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Friday, April 20

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Yes, that’s right. Another Contentless Friday! Hooray!

It was a mixed bag of a day. On the one hand — field trip! I got to go to the place that made the kiosk I’m building that multimedia dingus for. On the other hand, my dingus didn’t work. And they were supposed to crate the whole thing up and ship it to the venue today.

Not my fault. The hooj wide-screen monitor they bought for the occasion refuses to run at any resolution above 1024×768, though the manual says it’ll go to 1360×768 (which is what the dingus is designed for). So it does what a 16×9 monitor does when it gets 4×3 content: it stretches it horribly. And then slices off the bottom.

But it makes no difference whose fault it is, I gotta fix it. And the clock, she am ticking.

So I built a little test thing for the kiosk guy to use as a diagnostic and emailed it. Then I got worried — it was an .exe file and spam filters often block those. So I wrote a follow up message. Which bounced. So I wrote another from a different address. Which bounced. So now I’m pretty sure my IP is on the naughty list. Phoned him, he’s out. Rrrr.

On the other hand — Friday! And it’s going to be a gorgeous weekend! And I own a convertible! So, on sober reflection, work can smooch weasel butt.

Comments


Comment from mesablue
Time: April 20, 2007, 3:38 pm

But, do all three buttons work?

Have fun this weekend in your little girly car.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 20, 2007, 3:56 pm

Yes! The buttons work fine!

That’s kind of cool, actually. I’m trying to think of another use for them. It’s a little box that plugs into the USB port. Up to five buttons plug into the box. And you flip a switch to change what the buttons mimic (the option we used, for example, maps the buttons to the 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 number keys. Only I didn’t even get 4 and 5. Boo). You hit the button, it’s just like pressing the corresponding key.

The kiosk guy told me they were intended for people with handicaps. The package included velcro straps which, he said, were for attaching the buttons to your body. The vendor’s web site doesn’t say anything about that, but I rather like the mental image of special needs kids with colorful buttons velcro’d all over their little bodies, so I’m sticking with it.


Comment from SteamBoat McGoo
Time: April 20, 2007, 5:34 pm

Go, Weasel! That’s the ticket…a little convertible time, then some quality time in the Land of Single Malts.

Then everything will be All Clear.

BTW: not to make you sweat, but you’re at the top(!) of p5 and headed for p4 (with 13 votes!) on the Blog design. Not too shabby, my man, considering that there are 6.2 spazillion blogs in the running.

Mssr. Blue is on p2 with 14 votes.

And I…I have been playing with my new itty-bitty Dragonfly helicoptor out in the garage. Got into a dogfight with a bumble bee! Both halves of the bee lost. Hoo-rah!

Something about this li’l helicoptor pisses off bees. It probably squees beyond human hearing or something.

Congrats on being nearly done with the kiosk thing.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 21, 2007, 6:27 am

Oh! You do model aircraft, McGoo? My little brother was bigtime into that. His aircraft all seemed to feature copious quantities of duct tape. Must be aerodynamic, because he went to airplane school and everything.

Nice kid, but a cack-handed little sod.


Comment from Pupster
Time: April 21, 2007, 6:29 am

I make a habit of never testing or commissioning anything on a Friday. Nothing good can come of it. Sounds like the kiosk boys waited ’till the last moment to help build some drama. It would make a good reality TV show; sort of “American Chopper” with Weasels and USB ports.

I watched a few minutes of a car show on ESPN2, and the project car was a Miata into which they were cramming in a Mustang V8 engine. This guy sells a kit for the project, and he could REALLY use some web page design services. I’m pretty sure mesablue would still make fun of your car if it had a V8, but it’s his nature.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 21, 2007, 6:45 am

Whoa. Nice. That’s the original body design, too, which I much prefer (with the googly frog-eyed headlamps). It’s gone through a couple of redesigns since, each slightly lamer than the one before. My current one is design #2, which they only made for a couple of years.


Comment from SteamBoat McGoo
Time: April 21, 2007, 7:50 am

Double-whoa. Cramming a V8 into an itty bitty Miata is awesome. You’re talkin’ a lot of wrenchwork, though – and a not-insignificant amount of bucks. Don’t you need to beef up the entire drive train and frame to tether that monster engine? So your Miata is the “convertible” mentioned earlier?

Yeah Weasel, I used to do model planes (R/C and control-line) in past decades, but the thrill slowly left me. And – yes – duct tape is always involved. I just picked this heli-thing up ’cause it was cheap and ready to fly, and I wanted to play with it for a few hours. I was impressed. I wasn’t kidding about the bee – they do not like these things for some reason.

Now that I’m done with the heli, I’ll give it to the other Adult-Child in the neighborhood, he’ll play with it for a while, and then give it to the kid down the street. Who will probably break it within minutes, the little snot.


Comment from TattooedIntellectual
Time: April 22, 2007, 4:48 am

Good thing you’re not in the cutest animal blog (or whichever frickin’ category) ‘cuz you’ve been outstoated.

http://www.cuteoverload.com/
It’s the third entry down, stupid linky crap 🙂


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 22, 2007, 9:34 am

I know! I saw that! For one brief, shining, happy moment, I thought Cute Overload was flogging my little blog. It was not, so I shamelessly put a link to mine in that thread. I shall not be outstoated!


Comment from TattooedIntellectual
Time: April 22, 2007, 4:55 pm

Hah, didn’t even go thru the comments 🙂 To be honest, all that cute was making me a little nauseous.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: April 22, 2007, 8:20 pm

Oh! Then you probably missed their link to That Is So Cute I Could Puke a Rainbow.

Definitely worth a visit.


Comment from TattooedIntellectual
Time: April 22, 2007, 8:42 pm

Ok, some of those are mildly amusing, most of them are just scary as hell. I did come across this http://www.devilducky.com/media/60413/

Earworm warning!


Comment from TattooedIntellectual
Time: April 22, 2007, 8:52 pm

I should mention that I came across that link at cuteoverload not the puking rainbow site 🙂

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