… and from there onto your CCD. What to do?
I came across a good CCD cleaning tutorial on Luminous Landscape.
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Category: Idle
Been a little overwhelmed at work but I’m digging out. Let me just say that mail order prescriptions is a really *^&!y idea. My life has been screwed up for three weeks because of those idiots.
How to blow off some steam? Penguin baseball.
- http://home.kabelfoon.nl/~hopha/penguin.swf
- http://home.tele2.fr/kcv/pinguin.swf
- http://www.casper.ru/temp/pingu3/?namn=422
Why three links? I dunno. You can hit the penguins farther with the last one though, so that must be worth something. DeEtte got 1200.2!
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Oooo… pretty pictures!
Here’s some great photography, voted the best pictures of 2003 by the readers of… well… something (the root URL doesn’t have much, the page just states “These photos were voted by readers as the best images of year…”).
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We are animals…
We must never forget we are animals, barely restrained by the society we live in. When our society turns a blind eye, the animal breaks loose.
Without Sanctuary is a collection of photo postcards taken at lynchings (hangings) in America’s not-too-distant past. This book is a grim, and often gruesome reminder of the beast that lurks just below the surface of mankind.
I encourage you to visit the Without Sanctuary page at Musarium to watch the flash presentation of some of the book, narrated by the book’s author. Be advised that many of the images are graphic and disturbing.
I’d like to thank Steve for providing this link to a disturbing part of American history, a part that should never be forgotten.
Detroit rockers Electric Six have an entertaining, less-than-serious song called “Gay Bar”. The song takes on a whole new tilt, however, when lip synched by George Bush and Tony Blair (I’m pretty sure they didn’t mean to ;)). Check out the unofficial video at Camp Chaos.
Here’s how a description on Amazon (yeah, they fixed my account and are, once again, on my good side) describes Electric Six:
Electric Six is the most exciting band to come tumbling out of Detroit since Kiss. Sporting grimy leisure suits and hilarious stage names (the guitarists are known only as Surge Joebot and the Rock and Roll Indian), the ragtag group comes up with a deliriously catchy disco trash sound on its smart, hyperactive debut. Studio 54 horns mingle anxiously with AC/DC-influenced garage riffs, while frontman Dick Valentine rants maniacally over jerky, suggestive punk-funk songs like “Gay Bar” and “I’m the Bomb.” Plus, rumor suggests that single “Danger! High Voltage” features the White Stripes‘ Jack White on backing vocals and, less plausibly, Bill Clinton on saxophone. How cool is that? Very. –Aidin Vaziri
Incidentally, Electric Six also appears on the Charlie’s Angels soundtrack, a fabulously eclectic mix of music. I give it a ::thumbsup::.
A good article from BBC news via Locker Gnome:
Digital cameras don’t only eliminate the cost and hassle of film processing, they should help do away with bad holiday snaps and see us all become better photographers.
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That wonderful glow
I’ve found that I really like taking pictures at night with long exposures. Sometimes the colors are not true to life, but that doesn’t bother me, I like what I see.
While waiting around for friends on Saturday night I was able to grab a few pictures in the back yard. I ended up with a flower picture I like.
I am surprised…. getting a picture a day is not as easy as it sounds. It is fun, however, because I am forcing myself to take any picture that comes to mind just to make sure I have something. It’s really helping to learn what works and what doesn’t.
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How not to support your customers
I’m trying to buy something from Amazon but my account has been broken since Thursday. Any time I try to submit my order Amazon just responds with:
We’re sorry!
An error occurred when we tried to process your request. Rest assured, we’re working to resolve the problem as soon as possible. If you were trying to make a purchase, please check Your Account to confirm that the order was placed. We apologize for the inconvenience.
Being a reasonable geek and a person in the Internet industry I expect this kind of thing will happen. So, I decide to wait and try later. Yep, it didn’t work later either.
Since their online help didn’t solve my problem I decided to ask them for help. Amazon has one method to ask for help: an online form. I don’t mind filling out a form. There’s just one problem… the form doesn’t work. I tried from work on my desktop machine. I tried from work on my laptop. I tried from home on my laptop. I tried from home on my home desktop. I tried clearing my cache. I tried deleting cookies.
My account is broken. I am unable to submit the support form. I’m unable to get in touch with Amazon, right? We’ll see. As a last resort I sent mail to every single Amazon.com address I was able to find on their website (everything from press addresses to their recruiting addresses). Hopefully someone will reply.
Here’s my advice to Amazon and everyone else who has customers: Think about it – what happens to your customers if they can’t get a hold of you? I’ll tell you, they get pissed off and they go away.
If it weren’t for the $50 gift certificate Amazon is holding hostage I’d write them off and take my business to Barnes and Noble.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one…
- Someone who speaks three languages is…
- trilingual
- Someone who speaks two languages is…
- bilingual
- Some one who speaks one language is…
- American!
Sure, an oldie but a goodie. Now in my defense I speak English, French and a little German. I don’t, however, have any idea what is being written into the comment fields of my blog (see here and here). I found a Norwegian to English translator on the web (but have since lost it… I’ll find it again I know, if only IE had some sort of history feature ;)) and had fair results. Perhaps I should try Swedish or Finnish… I’d really love to know what this person has taken the time to write. Anyone speak… well… whatever?
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Micro-tastic!
Tonight I borrowed a couple of micro photography lenses from Phillip (thanks dude!) and played around taking close up pictures of anything that came close. I found taking pictures of the dog a challenge since the depth of field on these lenses are a touch on the narrow side. 🙂 At any rate, stuff looks really cool when you can get really close.
For the curious, the lenses I borrowed are a 60mm 2.8 Nikkor and a 105mm 2.8 Nikkor. I put the pictures which were mildly in focus in my micro gallery. I took the pictures of the dog with the 105mm and the others with the 60mm.
