Dwight Silverman can’t decide if Microsoft’s guide to asking good questions is geek absurdism or serious. It’s serious, Dwight. People who answer questions about software and computers get amazingly dumb questions all the time.
Once upon a time, I wrote an Open Source program for downloading programs from Kodak digital cameras. I used to get questions […]

Wendy, Summer, and Bryn went to the big Reliant Dog Show last Friday and worked a shift at the Houston Sheltie Sanctuary booth. Here’s a photo of Wendy holding Bailey and Bryn holding Ariel.

This is the most complex Premier project I’ve ever attempted. Seven layers. Over a hundred different clips. Alpha blends. Motion blur. Drop shadows. It’s taking hours to render just six minutes of video.

Update, Monday morning: last night I discovered three different mistakes, and Wendy spotted a fourth. Then I didn’t like the size of the […]

Dear Santa Claus,
This is what I want for Christmas. If you see one, you are to buy me one. I will reimburse you for the purchase price, tax, and shipping. I have been a very good boy this year, and this is all I want.
Jimmy

P.S. Don’t forget the tootsie pops!

The whole Internet seemed to be abuzz today with news of the latest Google Maps innovation: a hybrid map that combines map graphics with satellite photos (the detailed photos of urban areas are not satellite photos, but aerial photos taken from airplanes). I really like the hybrid views, but I think the image generation heuristics […]

The rumors of an Internet meltdown have been greatly exaggerated. Gmail came back online last night. Pobox was still down the last time I checked late last night, but is up and running this morning.

(This is the post I was trying to mail to my weblog last night when I discovered that mail wasn’t getting through.)
In June we complained about how dry the weather was. In July we’re complaining about how wet it is. We can’t seem to find a happy in-between. Wendy told me about a storm that […]

So I discover this afternoon that my outgoing email is not getting off the local network; a bunch of it is getting queued up on the qmail server I run in the closet. I check this, and I check that, and eventually I discover that the problem is that the server can’t establish a connection […]

CNN is reporting that James Doohan’s ashes will be launched into orbit by Space Services Inc., a company here in the Houston area that specializes in “space memorials”. Doohan’s ashes (well, not all of them, just one gram) will join those of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who died in 1991 and was launched into […]

James Doohan, who played Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott on the TV series Star Trek, has died at the age of 85. Star Trek and the writings of Isaac Asimov triggered my love of science fiction, a love I have not yet outgrown. Doohan’s character, a Scotsman commanding vast arrays of knobs, buttons, switches, and blinking […]

Email from Joy:

This is the cutest. I saw it on TV just a few weeks back. This dog is incredible. Takes about 30 seconds to download but worth the wait. Enjoy and turn your sound up. Joy
Requires Windows Media Player. Funniest dog I’ve ever seen. (What is that, a border collie?)

Leigh Ann almost got got. I’ve almost gotten caught too. Here’s JT’s rule for not getting caught by the phishers: don’t take the bait. Never, absolutely NEVER click any link in email that’s not from somebody you know personally. It’s as simple as that. Never click on those links.
OK, so you get a scary message […]