We're back. 3 hour line at US customs.

So, half way through the wait for customs, my gas gauge hit 1/8th tank or less. I turned it off and pushed it into the parking lot of the duty free shop. They don't have any gas. The nearest station was 5 miles away. On the advice of the bridge authority people, we left the car there and rode a taxi into town to buy a couple gallons of gas. It wasn't cheap or fast, but it got us across. We finally got home at 3:00 AM after leaving Lansing, Michigan at noon. It would have been faster to stay in the US and drive all the way around that Great Lake.

Folks (the Bridge Authority guy and the taxi driver) said that Sunday nights are always busy but yesterday was busy even for a Sunday.

It was good to see Jenny's everyone's. I managed to only step on one set of proverbial toes so I'm getting better.

We got out to Michigan just fine. It was a long and boring ride I'm happy to say. Yesterday we wandered the new (10 years old) botanical gardens at Michigan State University. I had no idea that there were that Many types of flowers.

One of Jenny's brothers got into a car accident last night. He and his wife are okay. As far as we know, the other participants in the accident are in pretty bad shape. We're all worried about everyone who was in that accident.

I called my Subaru dealer and he said that I have 70,000 miles left on my timing belt, so I'm fine.

Oh yeah, we're travelling back on Sunday.

Tired. Going to Michigan Thursday. Jenny's Uncle Rob is getting married. Worried about my timing belt. If it pops, my pistons and valves may meet each other at a problematic velocity.

I'm once again trying to train SCA Heavy Weapons with Wing Chun Kung Fu. It's really hard to do. They're almost opposites but they retain enough similarity that they interfere with each other.

Wow! Ouch for our country.

by Kirk Anderson shown on PoliticalCartoons.com

Some new pictures

You can't make the stuff up...

During WWII, Japan sent thousands of Ballon borne bombs over the entire Pacific. And the government censored the news of them until someone died. And the Japanesse gave up sending them because they believed they weren't effective.

JoelOnSoftware.com had another interesting article. I gotta read that site more often. He wrote How Microsoft Lost the API War.

Work, fight, food, chat, sleep. Feeling better mentally.

Good luck Sis!

Got a fight practice in with Master Torvald, Finn and Angus. We had fun. It was good to play at a higher level than I usually do. Taught Angus everything I knew about spear. It took at least 3 minutes. :) (For you non-fighters out there, I'm pretty darn good with a spear. I'm still surprised that I could boil it down to so little instruction though. )

Hello to everyone in the Data Processing Department with me. I mentioned that I had a website and they were eager to check it out. Now they're all afraid that I'll blog the silly jokes they make. Hey Todd, Mike, Gabby and Holly.

Recycling trucks dumping glass are VERY effective wake up devices.

Long days, learning slowly. It's very different to focus on release time rather than super low bug counts. I'm used to coding with someone's life on the line, coding to accept biggish data collections is a whole different bag o' worms.

Trying to not spend first paycheck before I get it. O, BTW, I'll get medical and dental coverage soon. 401k after a year. Some tuition reimbursement is available for work related classes.

Brought my Intellimouse Optical into work. It's got 5 buttons and I've reassigned 3 of them to be backspace, enter and shift. MS had support issues with the shift functionality, so in the new version of the software they pulled it out. Grrr. Removing the requirement to swap my hand from mouse to keyboard has been a big help in my *knock on wood* avoidance of RSIs. That and I can't sit still for very long. See Mom, squirming is good for me. :)

Signed the paper work today. I'm officially working now. Folks are funny and nice. The guy who left moved the ball out of my mouse and into my desk drawer last night. :) Good Luck Mohammad Waheed!

I'm not calling everyone because I'm too tired. Love ya all!

I went into work today and tried to learn from the fellow who was on his last day. I feel like I got about 1/2 of a clue and might be able to cogitate that up to 2/3 or 3/4 of a clue. Feeling kinda lost, still catiously optimistic. Dress code is "business casual" which translates as "confusing". I don't have to look like a lawyer and I can't look like a slacker. Somewhere in that range. :)

Just finished an interview in which I received a rating of "We'll definately be getting in touch with you." The interviewer gets a point for well phrased questions. "Could you start this week? Would you have to give anyone notice?" was an excellent way to determine my current employment status.

The Hudson's Bay Company (incorporated in 2nd May 1670) is still alive and kicking. Their About Us, History page glosses over the first 100 years. Click "Learn more about our history" for the really early stuff.

Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is a protocol which allows businesses to interact computer to computer. Your IT people talk to their IT people and then some custom code is written for the interaction. After the link is coded, the two businesses can exchange data directly. It looks like a workable stop-gap measure since companies all have different systems that want information in different ways.

EDI Overview for Beginners

Will EDI be replaced by XML in the near future?
XML, or Extensible Markup Language, is a simple, very flexible text format originally designed to meet the needs of electronic publishing. At this time there is no single standard to govern its use, so it is unlikely that it will replace EDI in the near future.

Legio Draconis presents a decent Spear Technique Page
Getting that many spears and spearmen together is an accomplishment all by itself. Other Training Articles including WingChunKuen Archives - Combat Psycology: Mindset

**
I accepted a job offer from Certified Marketing Services and will be training tomorrow. **

France Bans Discussion of Computer Security Problems and then changes it? This article is dated 4/12/2004. When I look at the bill today, it has an exemption in article 34 (the section under discussion) which seems to exclude researchers.

Article 34 I - After article 323-3 of the penal code, it is inserted article 323-3-1 thus written:
"Art. 323-3-1. - The fact of holding, of offering, of yielding or of placing at the disposal equipment, instrument, a data-processing or very given program conceived or especially adapted to commit one or more offences envisaged by articles 323-1 to 323-3 is punished sorrows planned respectively for the infringement itself or the infringement most severely repressed. "the provisions of this article are not applicable when detention, the offer, the transfer and the provision are justified by the needs for scientific and technical research or of the protection and the safety of the electronic communication networks and the information systems" II. - With articles 323-4 and 323-7 of the penal code, words: "articles 323-1 to 323-3" are replaced by the words: "articles 323-1 to 323-3-1".

- Google translation of Article 34
If Security Focus' public forum didn't require me to register, I'd tell them about the change directly.

I just had a phone interview for one of my recent resumes. Not a good fit he decided. I have to agree. All my experience is low voltage systems and they use high power systems (480V by 1000A?). They don't have time to train me to work on the stuff safely.

EZ Pass gets today's dishonorable mention. If you don't use your EZ pass (automatic toll gadget) for an extended period, you get the error message "Call EZPass" when you do use it.

(Expanding explaination 6/7/2004) Because I got the error message, I stopped using my EZ Pass for the rest of the month until I had a chance to call them. Guess what happened when I re-installed it? I got the error message again. This time I ignored it and it went away.

Our rent finally went up. :(

by Daryl Cagle of Slate.com shown on PoliticalCartoons.com

May 2004 blog