Interesting Stuff

Εὕρηκα! I have found it: final and conclusive proof that I am not the biggest nerd in the world!

This past weekend, Emily surprised me by coming down to visit. We went to the 3rd Street Promenade and had sushi (her first time eating real sushi). We also went to Venice beach and watched this dude catch a flounder. We tried to go see Grauman’s Chinese Theater, but they were opening The Fountain, and we couldn’t get through the throngs of Hugh Jackman fans. So instead, we drove up into the foothills and found some excellent views of the city. I introduced her to Jeeves and Wooster and Penn & Teller’s Bullshit. A good time was had by all.

I’ve been making some really stupid mistakes at work. Hopefully I can put a stop to them and get back to doing stuff correctly.

and I know I need to post news soon…

Starting the day after tomorrow, I will be on a road trip with some friends to the east coast. Most importantly, I will be spending New Year’s Eve in Times Square, though we’re also going to Boston, Washington D.C., Niagara Falls, Chicago, Toronto, Pittsburgh, and the rest of New York City as well (not necessarily in that order). I shan’t update during these next two weeks or thereabouts, so don’t expect anything from me.

In deference to the great enjoyment afforded me by the television show Jeeves and Wooster, I have begun to read the stories upon which the episodes were based, in the form of The Jeeves Omnibus by P.G. Wodehouse. While not exactly funny, these tales are immensely entertaining. The one blot on the Wodehouse escutcheon, however, is his debonair employment of obscure persiflage. This veritable patois made me reach eftsoons for my dictionary, which I have kept open for the nonce. Wodehouse’s Britishisms are easy enough to decipher, but his vocabulary provides a greater challenge. His writings are quite amusing nonetheless, and I highly recommend them.

For the Firefox users among you, I’d like to use the previous paragraph as a plug for the dictionary tooltip plugin. Once this is installed, you can double-click on a word to find its meaning, searching any of about a dozen different online references. It even claims to be able to translate from different languages, though I haven’t been afforded a chance to try that part out yet.