Andy Ihnatko's YELLOWTEXTThe weblog of Andy Ihnatko, Chicago Sun-Times and Macworld tech columnist.Geekus Interruptus- February 26, 2006 An emergency transatlantic cablegram arrived early Saturday afternoon from one of my operatives in New York, providing an on-the-scene report from the New York Comic-Con: as it turns out, the situation was not so much Comic as Tragic. And not the usual sort of tragedy you can experience at a comix and sci-fi con...ie, in which you spot a middle-aged 300-pound man nonchalantly walking around in a Counsellor Troi costume, and then you frantically squeeze a whole bottle of Purell into your eyes....http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#27741 The Office- February 23, 2006 Okay, y'see, now this is why I don't have cable TV here in my office. A couple of weeks ago I hooked up a Slingbox to my TiVO and installed the SlingPlayer app on one of my Windows notebooks. As I write this, here in my Fortress of Productivity, aka Where The Magic Happens -- last year, the chamber of commerce erected a tasteful redwood sign outside the highway exit to aid tourists, pilgrims, and process servers -- my attention is split between this editing window and SlingPlayer, which is...http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#77305 Suffer A Little, Save A Lot- February 20, 2006 I'm issuing a Building 19 Alert to all New England operatives. I stopped in one of these extremely fine salvage stores yesterday and I wish to report two recent deliveries of particular interest to geeks: 632 words in article.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#59087 Nobody EVER says 'Ftumsch.'- February 19, 2006 A few bits and pieces: 1233 words in article.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#39634 Boinnnngggggg! That's GOTTA Hurt!- February 18, 2006 I agree: the Olympics is a wonderful and all-too-rare example of the peoples of the world uniting for a common, positive endeavor. In the past 100 years it seems like we've only been able to do that when the goals were to either determin an international champion in the field of curling, or to beating back the seemingly-unstoppable Nazi war machine. It's a bummer that this whole "redistribute wealth and resources to eliminate needless suffering" thing has been back-burnered but let's not...http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#41921 $338,000,000 Can Buy MANY Donuts!- February 17, 2006 This morning I made an hourlong roundtrip to Rhode Island just to buy a few PowerBall tickets. I bought them at the first lottery store across the Massachusetts border, the type of liquor store that seems to cater mostly to the "I just got released from a court-ordered rehab an hour ago and I told the cabbie to drop me off right here" demographic. 902 words in article.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#45941 The Eagle has Landed- February 17, 2006 Cool. Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time since the summer, I have a working blogger app. Not a batch of scripts that have to be managed manually, not something that creates files that I then have to FTP myself...but an item in a menu that takes the contents of an editing window and turns it into two live webpages and an updated live XML file. 666 words in article.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#51037 This Is Mic Number One, This Is Mic Number One...- February 17, 2006 Once again I give you a thrilling post filled with light and life and wonder and laughter and insight and none of those things, actually, because all I'm doing is testing some blogger code. 38 words in article.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#87350 To Sleep, Perchance to Steal- February 15, 2006 Yeah, I know: "9:30 AM And Ihnatko is actually awake" Indeed, it's a world gone mad, but such is the inevitable outcome of a redeye flight. Many folks complain that sleeping on an airplane isn't really sleeping, but that only swats at the truth. After you land, you need to get 90 minutes of real sleep for every hour that you napped on the plane. I dozed from 10 AM to mid-day yesterday and then I fell asleep at around 10 PM last night, waking up again at 5:20 AM this morning. I think I'm finally.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#98801 Get Back To Where You Once Belonged- February 14, 2006 Back home. Not only am I back home, but I'm back home and I've had a five-hour nap, which is about as Back Home as you can get. 292 words in article.http://www.cwob.com/yellowtext/yellowtext0206.html#36737 |