Sam: who needs an alarm system? http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060922/od_nm/austria_heads_dc

Evan: Wunderbar.

Evan: I thought that in order to construct your Post-Apocalyptic Throne of Skulls, you had to actually live in the post-apocalyptic era. But I guess all you need to be is an ordinary Austrian dentist.

Sam: Who knew?

Evan: seriously.

Sam: Novacaine for the Blood God!

Evan: haha

Evan: I wonder if those tests you take for job aptitude & career placement are able to measure your capabilities as a post-apocalyptic warlord.

Evan: “Dentist, Pharmacist, …”

Evan: “Post Apocalyptic Warlord”

Sam: “On a scale of 1 to 10, how positively do you view pain inflicted on others for your own gain?”

Sam: 9-10 range probably qualifies you for dentist/warlord

Sam: altho the pile of skulls thing does make dentistry that much more metal.

Evan: Again, who knew?

Sam: Not your average austrian burglar thats for sure.

My office has devolved into a junk room, and I’m on a mission to reclaim it. The original plan for the room was to make it into a cool combination guest room / office. At the time, I didn’t realize the fatal flaw in my plan: namely, guest rooms are idiotic. But I was young and foolish. A guest room it would be.

To that end, I acquired a free box spring and mattress from some old friends who had just had a baby and were looking to clear out some room. Free furniture! What could be more awesome! All I needed was some decent bedding and pillows, and I would have the centerpiece of the “guest room”. Of course, what ended up happening was that several months later, the bare mattress was piled high with bills and unopened envelopes and other office detritus. Flat surfaces in an office are just deadly.

So I finally gave up and spent some time figuring out what I needed to keep and what I could shred. And to help stay organized, I also invented a new filing system that is so easy-to-use and so awesome that for a couple of weeks, I could not shut up about it. Them: “Hey man, what’ve you been up to these days?” Me: “Oh! Let me tell you about my new filing system!” The ladies loved it.

Anyway, as part of this process, I’m trying to get a handle on all my old investments and consolidate whatever I can. Step 1 is making a neat pile of all the papers I’ve got for each account. Step 2 is making sure I can log into all the websites. To my dismay, I discovered that one of my old, nearly-lost 401(k) accounts takes your Social Security Number for a username and… wait for it… a FOUR digit PIN for the password. At first I thought maybe this was just an initial PIN that would enable you to set a new, stronger password, but no. After recovering from the initial shock, I logged in and received yet another surprise: the money was still there. Go figure. I need to get out while the getting’s good.

So Pub Quiz is pretty simple. The announcer asks ten trivia questions, and if your team answers the most questions correctly, you win a free round of beer. Generally, each round has a few easy questions, a few moderately difficult questions, and 2-3 challenging questions. Winning even one round is pretty good — the bar is packed with teams of four, so your odds are pretty bad to start with. To make matters worse, the perennial champion teams The Usual Suspects and Four Fat Indians usually win 2-3 rounds a piece, leaving the middling teams to fight over the scraps. Basically, it’s pretty hard work. TANSTAAFB and all that.

Anyway, last week we noticed a huge group of maybe 12-15 sitting next to us. A couple of them were wearing Google T-shirts, and a Google water bottle was sitting on the table. Hmmmm, we wondered… could they possibly be our good friends from Mountain View? Our suspicions were confirmed shortly thereafter when the announcer asked a question that went something like, “What is the technique by which bad guys steal your personal information by setting up fake websites?” The answer was “phishing”, but Team Google decided to be cheeky and call out, “Yahoo Mail!”

Outraged, we shouted out, “Gmail!” Team Google swiveled to look at us, blinking in surprise.

“Oooooooo,” said the rest of the bar.

Fortunately, our teammate Chris piped up with his soothing British accent, “People, people! Let’s just agree it’s AOL Mail and move on, shall we?” Crisis averted.^[1]

And thus the evening progressed. Now, a better man than I would just leave it there. It’s unsportsmanlike to gloat.

But I haven’t signed any sort of “Do No Evil” agreement, so what the hell: at the end of the night, Team Yahoo! had won three rounds; Team Google, zero.

When we won the seventh and final round, we were clinking our glasses in triumph, and Team Google was busy getting their coats. We even heard the sweet sound of, “mumble Yahoo! mumble mumble…” At this point we had far too much free beer to drink (discounting Chris), and the gentlemanly thing to do would have been to give our largess to our worthy competitors to the northwest. So… we gave it to the nice young couple with the piercings sitting behind us. Yeah, that’s right. This is our house, baby! Well, okay, actually it’s the house of The Usual Suspects and Four Fat Indians, but Team Google doesn’t need to know that.

1. Look, they outnumbered us 3-1. Even at Eleanor’s best, she could never defeat so many.

A couple of weeks ago, I went on a short camping trip with my sisters and my brother-in-law in Limekiln State Park. I really need to go camping more often, if only to be reminded of how absolutely gorgeous California is in all terrain and all seasons. We walked along a trail in nearby Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, and were treated to: the sight of great redwoods rising out of the mist fifty feet below us to soar above our heads; rocky barren islands emerging from the mist, like a pirate’s cove; a pristine waterfall pouring into Caribbean-blue waters; and a pair of extremely hot hikers from the Netherlands. One might argue that the Dutch hikers don’t count as natural California splendors… but in California’s defense, we do tend to attract more than our fair share of attractive, impossibly healthy visitors.

My middle sister took care of making reservations, borrowing equipment, buying food, and all other logistical issues. My middle sister is one of those Organized Persons. From her email: “Wednesday dinner is burritos and smores. Thursay breakfast is French toast, OJ and tea. Thursday lunch is PB&J, baby carrots, fruit, potato chips and trail mix…”

The only thing I was in charge of was Entertainment. Obviously no camping trip is complete without Scary Stories, so the first night I read a couple stories from a kid’s book of ghost stories. You know, the kind with, “And she turned around — and the hand she had been holding was completely severed!” Eeeeek! Not scary, not even with a flashlight under the chin. Next we tried Edgar Allan Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart. Again, not even remotely scary. The guy spends 40% of the story staring at the old man and creeping slowly towards him, which I found vaguely creepy in a homoerotic way, but not really scary.

The next night I ditched the scary story idea and instead read an excerpt of “The Rage of Achilles” from the Robert Fagles translation of the Iliad. That went better. I read up to the point where Achilles storms off, and Agamemmnon orders two of his men to go down to Achilles’ camp and retrieve Briseis. And if Achilles resists, “… I’ll seize her myself, with an army at my back — and all the worse for him!” Then I closed the book for the evening. My Gen-Y littlest sister shrieked, “What! What happened next!?” Advantage: Homer!

The only major downside to the trip was that I managed to lose my glasses. They were in their case in my pocket, and I managed to lose them while running through the surf. I noticed they were gone two minutes later, and ran back frantically to paw through two feet of water and sand. Incredibly, I actually found the glasses case! I raised the case triumphantly — and then realized that it was empty. Cue another “Wah-Wah!” from the Great Sound Effects Engineer in the Sky.

So for the next week I used my prescription sunglasses at work, which had the side effect of making me look like I was some sort of l33t hacker from the Matrix. I thought about temporarily switching my shell windows to to green text on black background, but that probably would have been pushing it. Oh, and as luck would have it, my group (Platform Engineering) is the one group I know of in all of Yahoo! that keeps all the overhead lights permanently turned off in their section. It’s actually kind of spooky in our corner. Which is only appropriate, given the universal truth of the computer industry: if you really want to hear scary stories, forget about Edgar Allan Poe, just talk to engineers who are responsible for maintaining billions of dollars worth of production data. No flashlights-under-the-chin necessary.

Worse than car salesmen, I tell ya.

slamfu: You having a BBQ this Sunday correct?

evangoer: Yes indeed!

evangoer: Will you be gracing it with your presence?

slamfu: Yes, and a favor to ask.

evangoer: If you’re asking me to change my mojito recipe, the answer is “no”.

slamfu: I need to be in the area the following morning, mind if I crash at your place? And your mojito’s go to your grave with you Im sure

evangoer: … along with all my other possessions.

evangoer: construction of the tomb is proceeding nicely

slamfu: We’re going to bury you in a giant(hopefully) warehouse

evangoer: will there be poison dart traps? I love poison dart traps

slamfu: altho the ashes of everything you own is much more portable

evangoer: !!

slamfu: We dont’ have poison darts, but we did get one of those giant rolling balls of death thingies

slamfu: There was a special.

evangoer: Sweet! Just make sure there are no nooks and crannies for those pesky tomb plunderers to roll into.

evangoer: Did you get the flaming model, or the regular?

slamfu: Regular, with an option to upgrade, and a warranty.

evangoer: Well done!

slamfu: I felt silly buying the warranty afterwards tho.

evangoer: First 10 miles or 1,000 years, standard?

slamfu: Those high pressure tomb accessory salesmen get me every time.

The more I think about it, the more I think Jessica Mitford had the right idea. No, scratch that — the more I think Yoda had the right idea.

It’s been a while since I’ve posted, but in my defense, it’s been a busy month. Things have been hectic at work. There were taxes to pay. Weddings to attend. My wife to murder, and Guilder to frame for it. Actually, if I were to murder anything, it would be the pigeons roosting in the eaves right over the stairs. I’ve poked at them with an extensible pole, but they keep coming back. I bought a plastic owl to scare them, but after about two days, the pigeons caught on. Wily, those pigeons. Noted animal control expert Tom Lehrer has some thoughts on the matter that certainly deserve further analysis.

The one piece of major news for the month is… drumroll… I’m changing jobs. I’ll be starting at Yahoo! in just a little under two weeks. I’ll be working for the Infrastructure group, helping to document internal software APIs and tools. Admittedly, this probably doesn’t sound as interesting to you as it does to me, but let’s face it: the life of a technical writer isn’t exactly about the glamour, baby. Oh, sure, the kids keep coming to me with stars in their eyes… and I keep having to break it to them that despite what they’ve seen on TV, technical writing isn’t all gold chains and supermodels and champagne and “Tech Pubs Emergencies!” that send you winging off to Amsterdam at a moment’s notice. The truth is that it’s hard work, kiddo, and don’t let anyone tell you different.

At Chordiant I was fortunate to have consistently excellent colleagues in both Tech Pubs and Engineering. And let’s face it, good relationships with your colleagues are make-or-break for a writer. Engineering is a little different in this respect — the proverbial “lone genius” engineer can, in certain situations,^[1] be marginally effective. Not so for tech writers. If all your Subject Matter Experts dislike you, nothing else matters. You’re screwed. So as I leave my comfy, well-established tech writing department, I can’t help feeling a smidge of trepidation mixed in with all the excitement and happy thoughts. The group we’re building is pretty new, and so we’d better be strong right out of the gate. Let’s hope my new colleagues don’t find out that I’ve been out-clevered by the pigeons.

One last note: as some of you might know, Yahoo! has a number of prominent bloggers. So far it hasn’t been my style to write much about work, and so I probably won’t turn into a “Yahoo! blogger” as such. It’s possible, but unlikely. The one thing I can promise is that I will attempt to post more frequently. Whether it’s storymapping, markup shenanigans, or delicious mojito recipes, I’m your man.

1. And for certain values of “genius”.

evan.goer: Sam?

slamfu: yes?

evan.goer: I have found a Stupid Warrior Forum Post that completely blows away all Stupid Rogue Forum Posts I have seen to date, added together.

evan.goer: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-warrior&t=109439&p=1&tmp=1#post109439

slamfu: bring it on, did I write it? 🙂

slamfu: Oh…the shrillness

slamfu: I saw that post earlier and my lamedar warned me off.

evan.goer: At first I thought we was kidding, but reading further in the thread, it looks like he is not.

slamfu: it is to weep

evan.goer: I cannot understand how all these people manage to survive in a complex, 21st century society.

evan.goer: How do they pay their taxes?

evan.goer: How do they balance their checkbooks?

evan.goer: I am seriously confused on this point.

slamfu: because its easy. Not like we gotta watch for lions after dark.  Sometimes I miss those lions.

evan.goer: Dude, okay, bringing back the lions would be bad for guys like me.

evan.goer: I can run very fast, but I’m not THAT fast.

slamfu: you’re faster than plenty :) and thats all that matters.

evan.goer: Oh that is true, you don’t have to be faster than the *lion*!

evan.goer: good point.

slamfu: Yup!

evan.goer: Well now I feel much better about Caveman Goer’s survival chances then.

evan.goer: Also Caveman Goer is rarely sick.

slamfu: You might not get to ever have sex, but at least you wont get eaten.

evan.goer: yup, cannot carry the girl back to the cave, she is too heavy.

slamfu: Nor could you defeat The Rock in single combat

evan.goer: Well, sure I could. “Look over there, a lion” (throws rock)

slamfu: The Rock would never fall for such foolishness.

slamfu: Biff maybe.

evan.goer: Well not the Rock, he is a pretty smart guy. But Biff, yes.

slamfu: In fact, The Rock is likely to have a few such moves himself.

evan.goer: Well, then I am in trouble. My only hope

evan.goer: is to use my political skills to convince Biff to fight The Rock while I run off with the girl.

slamfu: is to build a stable society in which intelligence and discipline are held in high regard even if it means those who wish to sue over games are also allowed to live?

evan.goer: YES!!! Even better!

slamfu: or that.

slamfu: well you’d better get to work, cuz only the second part of that exists now.

Here’s a helpful tip for those of you who are going to be moving to a new place in the near future: make sure you throw your housewarming party within two weeks of your move-in date. This method has not one, but two advantages:

1. It forces you to unpack everything in a timely manner.

2. It insulates you from criticism regarding your home decorating skills. (“Well of course the place is a shambles. The poor guy just moved in!”)¹

The housewarming party was a success. People of all ages came, ate, drank, and generally seemed to be having a good time. Always risky to bring down the walls of family, work friends, elementary school friends, middle school friends, college friends, poker friends, MOTWM friends, and associated spouses, significant others, and kids. But it all seemed to work out. The only really tricky part was that I didn’t want everyone to think that the housewarming party was an excuse for a big gift-fest. I hate big gift-fests. Everyone hates big gift-fests. I just wanted people to come over, eat, have a good time. Simple.

Now, a naive person might think that there’s an easy solution: just say in the announcement, “No gifts, please.” Unfortunately, on the scale of rudeness, this statement is considered to be just a notch or two above stamping, “CASH GIFTS PREFERRED” on your wedding invitation. Don’t take my word for it — go ask Miss Manners or Carolyn Hax if you don’t believe me.² So… everyone assumes they need to bring something to the party, but you don’t want them to, but you can’t tell them not to, because that would be rude. However, if they bring it up on their own, you can say something, in which case they will wonder — okay, does he really mean it? And will I look bad if everyone else brings something and I don’t? We Earthlings, we are a funny species.³

Fortunately, it was possible to cut down on the gifts drastically by falling back on the age-old principle: if you can’t win the game, cheat. Rather than having a “Housewarming Party”, I called it an “Open House Party”. Sure, everybody knows that housewarming parties and gifts go together. But what the heck do you bring to an Open House party? Do you bring anything at all? What is an Open House party, anyway? Who knows? Who cares? Semantic confusion, my friends. It’s a beautiful thing.

1. Of course I mostly get a free pass on #2 anyway, being an unmarried straight male and all.

2. The reasoning being that no party should be held under the assumption that the guests “owe” gifts to the host, and that therefore bringing up the subject explicitly is rude, even if you’re only bringing it up to reject it.

3. No doubt this is the kind of stuff that drives people with Asperger’s totally crazy.

So I’m finally moved in to the new condo. Well, “moved in” is a bit of an understatement. Currently most of my stuff is in randomly dispersed boxes on the floor of the new place… except for my computer, which is still at my old apartment. Unfortunately, this is the only place where I have internet connectivity right now. It’s kind of funny, actually, sitting here with my expensive electronic equipment in a grubby and completely unfurnished apartment… it’s like being a brand-new bachelor all over again.

Aside from unpacking and cleaning, there are still lots of things to do. For one thing, I’ve got to let various folks know where I am. It’s a looong list. At the top are family, friends, and various financial institutions. Further down: dentist, optometrist, alumni association. At the bottom we have the peculiar category of Magazine Companies Who Send Me Magazines That I Don’t Ever Remember Subscribing To. For some reason, Forbes and Sports Illustrated decided to just start sending me magazines. For free. Can’t imagine this is a good business model for SI and Forbes, but what do I know.

Actually, I suppose I don’t mind Sports Illustrated so much, I just tear out all baseball related articles and discard the rest. But Forbes… Forbes is just so tedious. Democrats: bad. Republicans: good. Lawyers: bad. Deregulated markets: very, very good, except when it comes to certain pet issues such as stem cell research, in which case the free market is bad and lawyers are good. Maybe I should just take this opportunity to call Forbes and cancel my “subscription”. Then again, maybe I like the fact that they’re wasting resources on the likes of me. On the other hand, while I’d like to stick it to Steve Forbes — and let’s face it, who woudn’t — the worthless magazines he sends to me are consuming paper, chemicals, gas for distribution. Because of my petty nature, rainforests are dying that I could have saved! Oh, my aching head.

The one thing I’ve learned while calling up all these institutions is that “La Maison” is a very bad choice for a street name. You have to spell it out for everybody, and it’s always pronounced back, “lah may-sin” (rhymes with “raisin”). Clearly, high school French is in serious decline. Only two people have got it right so far: the synthesized computer voice at my Visa company, and a scratchy-voiced lady named “Kitty” at the local water company. At least Kitty knows how they say “maison” down in old Par-ee, by God. And while we’re on the subject — if a condo complex is on La Maison street, isn’t that false advertising? Maybe we can take a vote on changing the street name at the next condo association meeting. I bet “Freedom Street” would sail right through.

It looks like our traditional grey skies and rain have officially packed it up for the winter. Off to bother people up north, I suppose. Two weekends ago, the sky was a stunning blue, with warm sun and just a hint of crisp breeze. Last weekend the sky was a stunning blue yet again. No humidity worth speaking of. Temperature according to the local bank’s thermometer: 72. Seventy-two freaking degrees. I’ve lived in this state for nearly three decades, you’d think I’d have gotten over the excitement by now.

A Bay Area Winter: Ridge Winery, March 6, 2004^[1]

So since I can’t get over it, I guess I’ll have to be staying a little while longer. As of March 31st, I close on a nice little two-bedroom condo in San Jose. Yes, I have finally joined the landed class. Well, not really. If I understand condominium legal concepts properly, I’ve actually joined the airspace-between-the-walls owning class. Hey, it’s a start.

There are two things I particularly like about the place. The first is the interior. The bedrooms and bathrooms are not overly large, but that space went to the living room, dining area, and kitchen. The common area has lots of windows and light and ceiling space. Basically, the place is great for entertaining. Unfortunately, I can’t include any pictures of the place right now. The current tenants still live there, and so while they have graciously let me take my fill of interior shots, it wouldn’t be right to post them on the internet. Besides, the current tenants have much nicer furniture than I do.

The second good thing about the place is the location: very close to Winchester and 280, which puts it in striking distance of pretty much everything in the South Bay. It’s even within walking distance of the vaunted, mostly-inflammable Santana Row. Not that I can actually afford to shop there, mind you. Santana Row’s shopping experience tends to fall along the lines of the 100% Copper Cookware store, or the Ugly Revisitings of Classical Art store, or the Holy Crap is THAT What A Suede Jacket Costs store. But a man can aspire.

Before I forget, I’d like to give particular thanks to Jeremy Zawodny. I’ve been lurking on his site for a while now, following his house-buying experience. All along, I’ve been just a few steps behind, and listening to his experence has been both entertaining and educational. So thanks for sharing, Jeremy.

Anyway, the good news is that now that the mounds of paperwork are done and the process is on autopilot,^[2] I should finally have a little more time to post. Maybe even return to a semi-weekly frequency. After all, I can’t imagine that the process of moving in and learning the ins and outs of being a new homeowner could impact my time at all. How bad could it be?

1. I like to think that the haziness at the south end of the valley represents an economy roaring back to life. Don’t you?

2. Of course, I’m the kind of guy who likes to count his chickens before they’ve hatched.