Please note that all blog posts before 8 April 2007 were automatically imported from LiveJournal. To see the comments and any LiveJournal-specific extras such as polls and user icons, please find the source posting at http://brianenigma.livejournal.com/2005/09/I do not update this thing often enough. Recent events in life:
- Last night, I got to hang out with Eric for a bit, but became a sleepy-monkey pretty quickly after some fries (wonderfully seasoned with big chunks of sea salt and big chunks of freshly ground pepper) and beers.
- Tuesday at yoga, I was the only person (aside from the teacher) to show up. Instead of canceling the class, I got a very nice private lesson.
- Does anyone have recommendations for ergonomic/carpal-tunnel-syndrome style programs for both Linux and OS X? I am looking for the kind of thing that sits around in the background and gently reminds me every our or so to take a break. No, I am not afraid that my fingers will seize up and fall off — it is more for back, posture, breathing, and all-around health instead of a specific ailment. This was one of the recommendations of the yoga instructor.
- The juicer is good. I need more apples and less lemon. Lemons are pretty darn strong when you use the whole thing. Does anyone else have a juicer, and if so do you have concoctions to recommend?
- The Wild Oats near work increased both the price and size of their various cold sandwiches. I would rather go back to the cheaper price and smaller size because their new wraps are hard for me to finish.
- A few weeks ago, I ordered a couple of things from Amazon, which finally showed up last night. The first was a hard-to-find-locally book, Maze: A Riddle In Words And Pictures. It is really, really weird. Basically, it is a graphic “Choose Your Own Adventure” book, using text and visual clues for puzzles. The illustrations are very Edward Gorey, very detailed, and contain a huge number of red herrings. At least, I think they are red herrings. Here is the introduction:
This is not really a book.
This is a building in the shape of a book…a maze. Each numbered page depicts a room in the Maze. The doors in each room lead to other rooms. For example, the room on page 1 has doors leading to rooms 20, 26, 41, and 21. To go through door number 20, simply turn to page 20.
Your challenge is to find your way from room 1 (after the Prologue) to room 45 and then back to room 1 using the shortest possible path. If you use your head, you should be able to make the journey in only sixteen steps.
There are any number of clues in the drawings and in the story to help you choose the right door in each room. Clues in a series of rooms may relate to one another, and may indicate a path. Other clues may refer to a specific door in a single room.
Anything in this book might be a clue.
Not all clues are necessarily trustworthy.
Once you’ve found the shortest path in and out of the Maze, challenge yourself further. Go back and find the riddle hidden in room 45. The answer to that riddle is concealed somewhere on the shortest path.
Now proceed to the Prologue…your guide awaits you.One of the most aggravating things is that some rooms have very visible exit doors or halls, but there is no way to select them. For instance, one room has four exits, three with numbers over them and one with a picture of drums (another similar room has a heart above a door.) Is there a way to choose the fourth path? What number could the picture translate into?
I also picked up the documentary/drama, The Pirates of Silicon Valley, which was just as great as I remembered.
- I used the last little bit of my “fun money” (recent raise + three paychecks this month instead of two – vacation bills = fun money) to pick up a black iPod Nano. I’m still keeping the big iPod, which will continue to synchronize with the big desktop at home–music and pictures–it will just stop handling my podcasts. The new iPod (which I have tentatively named “Do Not Eat”) will sync up with the laptop and will only do podcasts, address book, calendar, and Delicious Library. The new lanyard-slash-headphone accessory is absolute genius!
- In other Nano news, someone has already disassembled one. I cringe just looking at those pictures.
That’s all for now.
