Year: 2009

Ahh, Facebook– the meeting place for the world. I got a spammy message saying there are three people who have “pending messages” for me (whatever that means). So I logged in out of bored curiosity and I’m presented with some people I might know.

Okay, I know one of these people. Sort of. From years ago.

But I think I’m going to hook up with Ijrijrjrthjgthjgt Hyhhy because quite honestly I’m intrigued. Is that a Turkish name? Afghani? Maybe Mongolian.

At our weekly State of the Zing meeting today, Rob threw down the gauntlet. He suggested that we have a weekly programming challenge. It’ll help sharpen our skills, hone our wits, prune our… uhh… well, it’ll be fun in a geeky sort of way.

So on a whim I suggested the first challenge.

We don’t want anything that will take hours– a quick five- or ten-minute hack should be par for the course. And the winner will receive a much-coveted trophy of some kind that I have yet to buy. Let the games begin.

After the tragic and unexpected death of our TV, I thought it would be fun to rip it open and tear out the guts. In addition to being a great activity for the boys, I figured it would also make it a little easier to dispose of the 300-pound beast.

So we started by dismantling the screen and the huge three-by-four foot mirror inside, then going to work on the circuitry. The frame of the TV was made of sturdy (heavy!) half-inch particle board, but it turned out to be mostly empty space.

After unscrewing about a hundred screws and clipping some pretty heavy-duty wires, the boys managed to yank out the projection guns:

There were three of them– red, green, and blue– and each looked like either a futuristic weapon or a 1950’s-era vacuum tube or piece of ENIAC.

After tearing off the back panel we were able to get at the exciting variety of electronic components inside. I was a little worried about some high-amp capacitor in the works somewhere (like old cathode-ray televisions have) but nothing electrocuted us.

In the end we had a living room covered with electronics, and then Laralee and I wheeled the now-empty frame out to the driveway where we smashed it with hammers so we could load all of the pieces into the van for disposal in a dumpster at my office.

That was a good TV, lasting us ten solid years. Rest in peace.

Laralee was shopping with Kyra yesterday, hitting thrift shops around the area in search of a princess costume for Halloween. As it turns out, Kyra fell in love with an outfit I can only describe as “pirate wench”. It looks really cool, and I’ll have to take some pictures on the big day.

But anyway, along the way she found a pogo stick, of all things. Who knew they even made pogo sticks any more? For two bucks it seemed like a good deal, so she bought it. Zack absolutely loves it.

He spent an hour bouncing around the driveway today, and managed to do 112 bounces in a row. What a stud.

Whee, our first real snowfall of the season!

Food for thought from Seth Godin:

Just spent two days in Mountain View CA visiting Google. The “official” reason for the trip was a launch party for a project I didn’t really even work on, so I was thrilled just to be a part of the boondoggle. Good times, good folks, and a thorough demonstration of how Google treats their employees the right way. If I ever stopped running my own company to join the rat race again, the Goog is the first place I’d apply.

Autumn is such a fabulous time here in Colorado. The temperature is just perfect: a bit of snappy coolness in the morning, warming to the 60’s and 70’s in the sunny afternoon, and then cooling down enough at night that we can open windows and feel the cool breeze.

We went to Rocky Mountain National Park on Sunday and did a bit of hiking, just enjoying the gorgeous outdoors.

Business has picked up recently, to the point where I’m in the market for another employee. I’ve posted a job listing on Craigslist, and of course the results have been mixed. There were a couple of good candidates who replied to the ad, and about fifteen freelancers and recruiters who clearly didn’t read the big red type at the bottom of the ad that said I’m looking strictly for a full-time on-site employee, not a part-time off-site contractor.

This happens every time I place an ad like this, and I decided I wasn’t going to mince words with these clowns any more. So every time one of these idiots sends me their little canned spammy message bragging about their awesome services and amazing prices (for development teams from India, usually), I just reply with a canned message of my own that lays into them and leaves no doubt that I consider them rude and unprofessional.

But tonight I got a message from a guy that took it to a whole new level. This guy actually had none of the skills I listed in my job posting– including the ones in bold font that I explained were absolutely essential. I went down the list, amazed at how completely and totally unqualified he is for the position.

I want a PHP programmer, but he does ASP.
I need MySQL database work, but he’s an expert at SQL Server.
Our web servers run Apache, but he uses IIS.
I ask for Linux experience, but he’s a Windows guru.
I want a local person, but he’s in San Francisco.
I need an employee, but he’s a freelancer.

Reading through his multi-page resume was simply breathtaking. This guy is the anti-candidate: the polar opposite of what I want. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t so dang annoying.

So our TV died tonight.  It’s a ten-year-old 61″ rear-projection behemoth that weighs something like 300 pounds.  It’s served us well, but I guess this is a sign that we need to upgrade to something modern.  The problem is I’ve been spoiled by a five-foot screen for all these years, so it’ll be hard to go back to anything smaller.  And plasma or LCD screens that big cost as much as a car.

Hmm. Plasma? LCD? Projector? What’s a guy to do?