A hunter leaves his camp and walks five miles due south, then turns east and goes five miles, where he shoots a bear. He drags the bear five miles straight north back to his camp.
What time is it when he gets there?
Pop Quiz!
7
Category Archives: Idle Chit-Chat
Be careful what you ask for…
Why looky over there! It’s a poll! Just like pL asked for. Well, except for the dumb question. I decided since it’s free, what the heck, I’d give it a try. Unfortunately Pollhost does not think stuffing the ballot box is cricket, so at most you can vote once a day. Remember, it’s not just a right, it’s a responsibility.
I’ll try to come up with a new question every week or so. Whenever the whim catches me, really. If you have ideas for a poll question, let me know! If you think polls are a frivolous waste of valuable Internet resources, well, be sure to let me know that, too.
Eggs Over Easy
Note to visitors: I am passionate about my eggs. It’s funny how many people wind up here from searches in Google and Yahoo, looking for the Answer. Read on; the key to the perfect over-easy egg is only paragraphs away. This episode was written to entertain, but clearly there is a pent-up need in the world for advice on getting those eggs just right, and by gum I’m happy to give my opinion about anything. For that reason I have now written another episode: Eggs Over Easy – The Definitive Step-By-Step Guide. I would recommend you read here first, then go over to the step-by-step page. If you find this information helpful or entertaining, please leave a comment; I’d love to hear from you. Then you can invite me over for breakfast. Mmmmmm… breakfast.
I’m not a gourmet by any stretch of the imagination, nor does Iron Chef have to worry about being unseated by me. But I do like my eggs. Thus it is not an unusual morning when I venture out to find someone to cook some for me. Now that I no longer have a kitchen, this happens with even greater regularity. Alas, my fried chicken ova* are almost never cooked right. Oh, I eat them, and I still enjoy them, but there’s that little part of me that says, “doesn’t anyone know how to cook an egg anymore?”
I’m here to put things right. You don’t have to thank me; it’s what I do.
There are four generally recognized ways to fry an egg:
Sunny-Side Up: The egg is never flipped. The yolk is a bright yellow hemisphere sitting in the middle of the pristine white. The yolk is liquid, and some of the white around the yolk may have a jelly-like consistency.
Over Easy: The egg is flipped briefly. The yolk does not stand out as strikingly, but is still liquid. The white is no longer liquid.
Over Meduim: The white is cooked to a firmer texture, and the yolk is solid around the edges, and oozy in the middle.
Over Hard: The white is firm, the yolk is a lighter color and flakey.
Then there are those who intentionally break the yolk before the flip. We won’t talk about those people here.
Each degree of cooking is associated with a preferred texture for the white and for the yolk. Which brings me to my point. People who order their eggs over easy don’t want runny whites. If they wanted that, they would order sunny-side up. Runny yolk but solid white is why over easy was invented in the first place. It is by far the trickiest egg-frying style – it requires touch and artistry to cook one part of the egg without cooking the other. But it seems most places I go don’t even make the effort to try.
When in egg-cooking school, students must be reminded with great clarity and consistency: Don’t flip the eggs too soon. If one waits until the egg is ready to serve sunny-side, then flips it for just a few moments to sear the last of the white, it comes out perfect every time. Alas, impatient cooks do not wait for that perfect moment. They flip the egg prematurely and there’s no way that much white is going to get cooked post-flip without adversely affecting the yolk. The time to get most of the white firmed up is while the white is acting as an insulating layer between the pan and the yolk.
I have considered explaining to my waiter exactly how I want my eggs. I thought of saying “Sunny-Side Over” to convey my meaning, but I have never tried. Even if the waiter nodded and took notes, by the time it reached the cook I would probably end up with Sunny Side Rubber, so afraid would he be to flip the eggs too soon. That or it would just piss him off. No, we can but hope that future generations will take this to heart, and look with pride at the eggs sitting on the plate, seemingly in defiance of thermodynamics, the yolks jiggling, the whites not.
So mamas, tell your children, when you first hand them the spatula and the carton of eggs, as they stare wide-eyed at the pan in front of them, butter or bacon drippings faintly sizzling in the shimmering heat, that they must be patient. They must wait for the right moment to flip.
—-
* this used to say “fried chicken embryos”, but I got tired of people unfamiliar with the Coneheads explaining Greek to me.
They were the Googliest of times, they were the Moogliest of times.
If only anyone else cared about this as much as I.
I’ll start with an aside. Last week was the heyday of the blog, the pinnacle of blogular traffic. The reason is simple: I started getting listed at dodmac.info, and all the regulars had to check me out. Now they’ve bitten on a coupe of lurid headlines and they know better. They have passed back into their little worlds where there is no time for discussions about which comic book heroes are best-suited for playing tag with eagles. Their loss, I say. If they don’t have the backbone to stand up on the issues that mean the most today, I have no time for their sorry asses.
Which leads me to another aside… uh, that’s going to have to be another entry. At this rate we’ll never get to to the search hits.
- Google: aerodynamic ideas
- Yahoo: half baked
- Google: squirrel death – it’s pretty clear that lazy bastards too who just can’t get around to bookmarking are using this to come to the site. You’re my kind of people. Don’t ever change. Also worth mention were searches for squirrel suicide and squirrel death cult. I hope you’re not offended to be lumped together. It’s nice to know that someday when I’m promoting a book I’ll be introduced as the ‘squirrel death blog guy’.
- Google: “great googly moogly” phrase
- Yahoo: how do x-ray gogs work – whoever this was, I love you, man. My favorite physics professor of all times would say as he stood at the chalkboard (he was picky about his chalkboards), “Can you see the bosons moving? Put on your x-ray gogs.”
- Google: la dolce vida
- Google: listen to great googly moogly phrase – this from an entirely different domain than the other googly moogly search
- Google: spyware End User License Agreement – as of this writing I rank four on Google for this topic. This is one hit where I hope the reader really read what I wrote. It’s funny (in the sense of odd), but I really believe in what I wrote that day. The whole right vs. wrong thing, and how a few words aren’t what’s really important.
I think the moral of the story is, if you write enough stuff, it’s going to match what someone is looking for. If you give it a catchy title, they’ll bite like large-mouth bass when the flies have all gone home for the holidays.
No Pants Day
I had a big write-up planned about all the legitimately free music I’ve found, where you can find it, and my new favorite band (eX-Girl – a frightfully strange and completely musical group out of Japan), but I’m tired. Dodging eagles and watching people shock themselves senseless has taken it out of me.
I listened yesterday to Radio Free Pants – The voice of a new fashion sense, and I enjoyed it. It was a good combination of music I knew and liked and stuff I’d never heard before. Steve Martin punctuated the evening.
Alas, today I couldn’t hook up. Hopefully that’s because everyone in the world was already listening. I hope the link above works, but I may have screwed up and I’m frankly too tired to test it. If I didn’t do it right, just visit dphc using the link in the navigation section over there.
Site maintennance under way
Doing some experiments. Disregard any messages you might see about needing a new browser (unless you’re using IE for windows). Please stand by… making progress… wait for it…………………………………….
OK, I think I’m done (for now) with the changes that will really cause trouble. Any messages you see about your browser are the result of your browser not rendering graphics according to standards. Make the Web a better place; don’t use a browser that makes its own rules. If you see the message above, go post-haste to
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/
There are probably some other good alternatives as well, but that one I know is completely painless to install and works very well.
Ooohhhh….
This is what happens when inspiration strikes in the middle of the night. Well, I haven’t gone and read over what I wrote last night, so I hope it’s not too incomprehensible. I’ll clean it up shortly. Last thing I remember was typing “Sweet Saints of Symmetry, Batman!” There’s a phrase you’ll be able to search on in a few days.
I’m looking into a couple of comment-related features for this site that might be possible. One is to have links on the right-hand side to the blog entries with the ten most recent comments. By the way, I’m pretty sure if you have a news reader you can get a list of the ten most recent comments by pointing it at http://www.haloscan.com/members/rss.php?user=vikingjs. If anyone tries it, let me know if it works. You can also use a news reader to check the blog itself. I’m told that going and checking for updates vis the Web is so 1990’s. I just tried it and it seems… OK.
One more thing – the limit on comments will soon be raised to 3000 characters. Get your typin’ fingers ready!
OK, off to fix the worst of that Whacked-Out, Nut-Assed post from last night.
Ugh
Someone explain to me why the (no longer supported) Mac version of Internet Explorer is more standards-compliant than the Windows version. On windows, my PNG is being blended perfectly – with the wrong color. Where the hell did that gray come from? Over at the Hut there is a similar problem, but since I’m flogging mac-only software I didn’t worry about it too much.
I mean, shit, when was the PNG standard adopted? I had big plans for a graphic treatment that simply won’t work if browsers don’t render images according to well-established standards.
Someone Microsoft laid off from their Mac Business Unit should go give the windows folks some lessons.
Meanwhile, I’d be grateful for some feedback from the field about how other winders and Linux browsers are handling my graphic. It should look like this:
Obviously, there was still a ways to go, but you see how the ampersand crosses into the lighter color? The ability to do that was very important for my plans. I’m sure there are ways to accomplish what I want to de despite Microsoft, but this way was easy.
I know it’s an old story: Microsoft choosing which standards to follow and which to ignore. I would have thought they would be all over PNG, since it gets them out of paying royalties.
OK, I feel better now. I have work to do. On my Windows machine. Huh.
A Brief Explanation of Muddled Ramblings and Half-Baked Ideas
It’s not such a big deal, really – I woke up one morning and realized that what I was doing was’t what I wanted to do. Five years later I did something about it. This is me clearing my throat, trying to find my voice. Some days I get close.
Other days, well…
It’s a strange conceit to think that people I don’t even know will give a rat’s ass what I think. I’m OK with that. There aren’t too many ‘dear diary’ entries here. I’m just looking for things I can write about. When I find them, I try to write about them well. My goal is to be interesting, or at least amusing. I almost had thought-provoking once. Maybe with practice I’ll get there. I know you don’t care what I had for breakfast. I don’t even care about that and it was my breakfast, unless there was something at breakfast that inspired me to write.
Like eggs. Mmmm… eggs.
Still, we do have fun here. If you know a great way to get poor quick, or if you happen to be a Belgian Buddhist Kung-Fu/Brew Master Monk, this is the place for you. Don’t forget to read the comments; there are people who hang out here who are much smarter and more articulate than I am. Chances are, you are, too. We cover a huge range of topics, so don’t form your conclusions based on one or two entries.
Things we have discussed here lately:
- Space Launch Systems and Lunar Vacations
- People in bars
- What a government is and what it should do (and the best beer to use to buy votes)
- Suicidal Squirrels
- Bars
- The Road
- Rutabagas
There is also a running story, Feeding the Eels, which is in the style of an old detective radio series. I mostly do it for simile practice when I don’t feel inspired to do so-called real writing. Still, it’s fun—at least for me.
Also, please be sure to leave a guest haiku! Just leave it in a comment somewhere; I’ll find it.
two times out of five
haiku writ by someone else
a breath of fresh air
Finally, it’s worth noting that the look and feel of the site is definitely – and perhaps permanently – in flux. So far I’ve been mucking primarily with the main page, so the other pages seem fairly ho-hum in comparison. I have decided not to go too far out of my way to deal with all the quirks of Internet Explorer – IE is the biggest impediment to progress on the Web, and I’m not going to let Microsoft hold me back. You shouldn’t either.
Leave your mark in the sand before you move on.
Ogling Google
I’m sure this is far more interesting to me than to anyone else, but here are some of the searches that lead people here today (it was a big google gay):
- Google: La Dolce Vida – 4 of them today! God bless that spelling. These seem to come in bunches. I wonder if something in the media triggers them.
- Google: happy birthday clothes
- Google: wingnut adams blues band – twice from the same domain
- Google: darth vader returns
- Google: squirrel death
- Google: car passed over – again? Anyone who arrives here because of that search is welcome to explain what they were looking for
What is it with people and squirrels?
By the way, I think I’ve run out of antisquirrels. Can I get more at the dealership?
Obvious flaw in the plan
You see the result. It’s another friggin’ novel. I’m not well-known for my sparing use of words. The thing’s not even finished. The most important sentence of all is missing – the one that gives the whole thing the proper mood. Put on your x-ray gogs, kids, because the font is getting smaller! Wahoo!!!
Coming Soonish
Unless I decide to write something else.
Hey, you know what would be cool? I’d be cool if I was driving along somewhere, or more likely sitting in a bar with my laptop, and someone said, “Hey, are you that Homeless Tour guy?”
That would be cool. It’d be like being a rock star, except without all the money and chicks.
The real reason I’m posting right now is to warn both of you out there that I’m going to be messing with the site for a bit tonight and probably into the morning as well, so at times it may just fly apart. I’ve decided I need a better header. It’ll still have the name of the blog up there, but in some yet-to-be-dertermined artsy style. More important, it will have a short explanation for new visitors about just what it is they’re getting into.
As long as I’m sitting here bleary-eyed and weary-fingered, I just want to say thanks to all y’all for posting so many comments. It’s funny, some things I write I expect to get lots of comments, and nothing. Then, out of the blue, wham! Comment-o-rama. If you haven’t been pulling your weight in the comment department, it’s not to late to start. You know who you are.
But hey, if you just like lurking, that’s fine, too. Just don’t let it turn into stalking.
Addendum: Anyone know where I can find a font that looks like a typewriter that hasn’t been cleaned in 30 years, so there are blotches of ink everywhere?
Additional Addendum: This additional addendum is to call your attention to the additional addendum (labeled Additional Addendum) in the post “Great Googly-Moogly”. I wouldn’t want all that typing to go to waste.
You can see the progress I’m making on the header – the idea in my head far exceeds my ability to execute. The image is a PNG with an alpha channel, and I haven’t tried looking at it with any Windows browsers yet. If you could take a moment and let me know how it looks on yours, I’d be grateful. That Flowery font was just a placeholder, but now it’s kind of growing on me. You can see that the typewriter part is far too clean. I had the & cradling the H really nicely in a previous version, but the I made the & bigger so it could drop out of the dark blue area and break up that line. We’ll see how it goes.
Great Googly-Moogly!
I’d take a picture, but I’d have to get out of bed. Use your imagination.
Addendum:
OK, now it’s snowing pretty hard, and I’m out of bed. Your imagination is no longer required. 
Additional Addendum:
The snow let up pretty quickly yesterday. the sun came out and the light dusting on everything quickly vanished. Still, it was pretty nice. This morning I slept a little later than usual, and when I opened my eyes to say good morning to lake and mountains, what did I see but several inches of snow covering everything. Well, that got me up in a hurry.
I grew up in the mountains, so I’ve seen snow in May before. Part of me is saying, “Jerry, what the heck’s the big deal?” But it is a big deal. The way the sun is shining off the snow-laden branches, the way the Internet is down so I can’t work, all these things make life special.
I think the best part about it is the surprise. Having lived in San Diego for so long, I pay no attention whatsoever to weather reports. So when I woke up this morning to discover I had been transported to a winter wonderland in my sleep, I felt like a kid on Christmas morning. I’m so stupid giddy over the snow I went out in my bare feet for some of the pictures (photos). The picture I’m featuring here doesn’t have the bright sunshine, but I like the composition.
My Internet connection here is relayed over the lake by a satellite dish (although I suppose it’s not a satellite dish if no satellite is involved), and apparently the connection is quite vulnerable to poor weather conditions. Unfortunately, now that you’re reading this, I’m back connected to the outside world and that means I’m currently struggling to concentrate on work when what I really want to do is go out and play.
Ironically, with the Internet down, I would be able to concentrate on work much better, but the tools I’m using have been specifically designed to not work when they can’t connect to the mother ship, for no reason other than corporate paranoia. Ironically, anyone with actual malicious intent could hack the tools pretty easily, but that’s not how I plan to spend my day.
I’m going on a walk.
I Need More Tunes!
Alas, the bulk if my music collection is in a box in someone else’s garage, waiting for me to ship it overseas. I have 564 tunes on my laptop, which seems like a lot at first blush, but it’s just over 31 hours. Given that a few of the tunes aren’t very good (Enuff Z’Nuff will be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes – what the hell was I thinking?) and I listen to my tunes quite a lot, the selection is wearing thin.
I really like emusic.com, where I have found several bands I never would have heard otherwise, but it’s a monthly subscription and you only get so many downloads per month. The 22nd of each month is download day, the day my account refreshes, and I have come to look forward to that day with great anticipation. By now I have several months worth of tunes queued up for download.
My hosts have a bunch of CD’s but I’ve now become too lazy to get up and choose another CD when the one finishes playing. I’m ambivalent about copying music these days; it’s kind of an extension of my philosophy that as someone who is trying to make my living selling software and eventually novels that I shouldn’t be stealing other people’s software and artistic output.
So, any of you have favorite bands with downloadable demo tracks? I can’t order CD’s because I have no place for them to be shipped.
Taking the edge off
“All rightey!” I hear you say. “Jerry’s posted something at last!” [Right. just who do I think I’m fooling?] It’s as if the doorbell rang and you’re expecting your favorite mother-in-law. But when you open the door, what do you see? A burning paper bag. You weren’t born yesterday; you know what’s inside.
That’s how I feel about the last thing I posted. You came for Suicide Squirrel II, and got a serious, if muddled, discussion about the role of government. I stand by whatever I said (I’m sure it will make sense in the morning), and I really hope I get lots of comments that force me to develop my thesis more fully. For the occasional random visitor to this blog, though, it’s pretty heavy.
Hey! Occasional Random Guest! Yeah, you! Don’t you care about our country? Or yours? Don’t step on that bag!
In other news, we got a hit on “car passed over” today. Who the heck would search on that? Got another squirrel guts hit, but it was from an insider. Also got “elevator squirrel ocelot guts rutabaga death cult” a couple of days ago from someone in the Albuquerque public schools. Now who could that have been?