I remember figuring out the exact timing I needed to hit the bonus ramps over and over and over again. Computers allow you that kind of consistency. The physical world is more random but also more fun as you deal with the chaos of balls cascading down and careening around the playing field. Besides, the cost (the equivalent of CAD 0.50 for three balls) adds spice to every game.

An arcade hidden along Yonge Street has a good array of pinball machines, and I seem to remember that you could play them for a quarter. I should make a trip back there sometime.

A pinball wizard I am not, but I do like the game.

Random Emacs symbol: widget-specify-button - Function: Specify button for WIDGET between FROM and TO.

The December 2007 issue of the Linux Journal has an article on turning Emacs into a PIM using Org, and I didn't write it.

Okay, I *am* happy that somebody else is getting the message out, but STILL. <laugh> I had a lot of fun writing the Emacs and Planner article for Linux Journal before, and I wish I'd made the time to write another article. It's a good article, though.

NOTE TO SELF: That's it, I'm waking up *really* early in the morning to work on the book.

I may have a non-Emacs article idea or two in my blog. For example, I now have two years of personal financial data in Ledger, and I've done some cool things with Gnuplot. I can write that one up.

Also, timeclocking. I should be able to make pretty graphs from Org, too. Hmmm. That sounds like something that would be fun to hack.

Then there are little tips, too.

And there's analyzing Facebook data and making a Flashcard application, again in Emacs.

<steeples fingers> Hmmmm. How to squeeze more writing time into my day... <taptaptap>

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Random Emacs symbol: gnus-emphasis-underline-italic - Face: Face used for displaying underlined italic emphasized text (_/word/_).

That's what we had for Thanksgiving dinner. I borrowed W-'s camera to take the shot, as his was already all set up. This picture used the room light and an external flash unit placed diagonally in front of the pan. I like how the background is nice and soft, the roast is detailed, and the mashed potatoes are cheery but not overwhelming.

If I could shoot this picture again, I'd add another flash behind the roast in order to add more definition. I'd also find a way to minimize the shadow cast by the front edge of the pan, perhaps by raising the front-diagonal flash or increasing the toplight. I'd get rid of that sprig of whatever that is in front of the lamb, too. I'd also increase the depth of field by changing apertures so that more of the roast is in focus.

W- and I enjoy cooking and taking pictures of food. We usually have time to get a few shots in before hunger sets in. <laugh>

Random Emacs symbol: mail-parse-charset - Variable: Default charset used by low-level libraries.

My transcript arrived, so the only thing I'm waiting for now is my work permit. I hope to get it by the end of the week. I'll also need to renew my SIN. Speaking of paperwork, it turns out that I have to get a medical exam and register at some overseas employment thing in the Philippines before they'll let me leave again, so I've added a reminder about POEA to my March planner.

I made significant progress on the interviewbot I'm making in Second Life for Stephen Perelgut. It can read questions from a notecard, interview people who click on it using either a special channel or a general chat prefix, save the answers in-world, report the answers in-world, and e-mail one person's answers offword to a specified address. Next week, we need to check if it works, and to load-test it.

As part of my plan to give back to and be part of the community, I attended the Toronto Public Library public consultation meeting for their budget cut. Watching the meeting facilitator tactfully draw out neutral points from attendees' political rants was instructive. A recurring comment was that the provincial government should give more to Toronto. I felt some participants were a little resentful of new immigrants, or at least they felt that the library shouldn't have programs to help people learn English as a second language (or third or fourth). Some people also questioned the public computer access that the library offers. It was a learning experience, and I learned some interesting things from the library's presentation. I'm not sure if I'm going to go to one of those public consultation meetings again, though: lots of people just like complaining about politicians. I'll observe the next board meeting on Oct 15 to see if that's worth it for me.

W- and I practiced photography this week. We tried taking a picture of the cityscape from the bridge at Front and Bathurst. The CN Tower and the moon weren't very remarkable, but we did have fun taking long exposures of incoming trains. We have also decided never to shoot in ISO 1600 if we can help it, and are learning how to use the flash more effectively. We practiced using the fill-flash in bright sunsight technique described on Strobist (link at the end of this message). We'd have good results if I weren't so self-conscious about the current state of my skin. I'll go to a dermatologist as soon as my health plan kicks in. Next week, I'm going to start carrying powder.

Took another driving lesson. Next one's still in November. I'll be taking up emergency maneouvers in winter—oh joy. *terrified!*

Went for another library run. Most of the productivity books are alike, but I found some nuggets worth keeping. I'm still trying to figure out a good booknotes workflow. Any tips? Next week, my goal is to take notes from at least three books.

Tea today was good. Ian and Joe shared a lot of insights about large-business sales. I'm glad to hear that our get-togethers are helpful for them, too. Intellectual conversation is apparently a rare thing in this world. <wry grin> Let's have more of it, then! Next week, my goal is to organize my tea workflow.

Little revisions to my website here and there. I browsed through my past entries and realized that I write a lot about my life in the process of thinking through things, but probably little that's more relevant to other people's lives. My goal for this week is to pick a few topics, outline a few areas I want to explore and write about, and plan my reading. That will let me develop more depth and be more useful. Recurring topics include networking, contact relationship management, personal productivity, personal finance, and Web 2.0. Next week, I want to have a personal editorial calendar. ;)

Life is good.

• Strobist: Flash/Sun Crosslighting

Random Emacs symbol: w3m-scroll-right - Command: Scroll to the right.

Is it normal to look back two years later and wonder how I managed to forget to write? I can still somewhat remember the fun of creative writing, of trying on different phrases and voices and roles. Maybe I'll pick that up again. From where am I going to take the time to do that? I wonder...

Random Emacs symbol: planner-multi-tasks-equal-p - Function: Return t if TASK-A and TASK-B are equivalent.

On the way back from work yesterday, I talked to Wayne about the driving test I'm planning to take today. He asked if I was ready for it, as he hadn't seen me study. I started rattling off rules and numbers. I then told him about the Emacs-based flashcard system I was using (flashcard.el). He was curious about the technique, so he asked if it had a name. "I can't remember right now, but it starts with an L," I said, and started playing with names. Leichnoff? No... Leitnoff? No... Leitner? Hmm... That felt right.

I still have to work on remembering little things and staying present, but I feel pretty good about pulling stuff out of my head. I trust my first guess more and more now, and it's usually right.

Maybe that saying is right, you really do just have to exercise your memory...

Random Emacs symbol: w3m-default-coding-system - Variable: *Default coding system used to encode url strings and post-data.

Bobby and Adam were our teachers and safety crew. After a few instructions, they had the first ten participants strap on their belts. I was #14, so I settled on the mat and started stretching.

The first one up was clearly experienced. She launched herself off the platform and swung gracefully through the air, tucking her knees in and over the bar in the smoothest of motions. She let go, pointed her toes and arched her back. When Bobby gave the signal, she whipped back up, grabbed the bar and untucked her knees, and let go. She landing on the net with a gentle bounce and swung herself over the side of the net.

Right. She made it look so easy, which naturally meant that it was difficult and I was going to embarrass myself big time. Fortunately, I had decided not to take any friends along. I was glad I'd gotten there a little late. There were twelve other people before me, twelve people to learn from and twelve chances to visualize what should be done before I actually had to get up there and remove my toes from the comfort of the ground.

The next two people up inspired great confidence, though. They couldn't get their knees up to the bar. At that point, I decided that even the experience of swinging on a trapeze would make it worth it for me, and that any sort of trick would be chocolate fudge icing on a double-chocolate cake.

The rest of the students passed in quick succession. Some had clearly done this before. Others were obviously first-timers. My fellow first-timers generally made an undignified scramble for the bar, but that was okay—at our level, just touching the bar with one's toes could be considered an amazing achievement.

And then it was my turn. I climbed up the aluminum ladder, which swayed with every step. I visualized the first person's performance, while giving myself permission to do the frog scramble that other beginners did. It was going to be okay. It was going to be fun.

On the platform, Adam tightened my harness and hooked up the two safety lines that Bobby controlled. He told me to stand with my toes off the edge and lean forward to grab the bar with my right hand. And then I was somehow supposed to trust this guy to hang on to me as I grabbed the bar with my left hand, leaning forward so that my center of gravity was over thin air. As part of me started thinking ahead to the things that might go wrong and how I might deal with them (hands slipping because of sweat or surprise? safety person not paying attention), another part of me though, "What the heck, I'm up here already. I want to see what it's like. Let's go!"

"Hep!", he said, and off I went.

That first swing is a rush. I'd like to say that the only thought that was running through my head was "DO NOT LET GO DO NOT LET GO DO NOT LET GO". But it wasn't. It was just too much *fun* watching the world whiz by. And at the height of that swing, Bobby gave me the signal to get my knees up there.

Right. Time to haul myself up. So I hauled.

You must understand that the last time I did anything even remotely like this was when I was five years old and doing gymnastics. No, wait, I also made a habit of hanging upside down by my knees in the low-branched kalachuchi trees of my high school. But it had been a very long time since I had climbed a tree or played on monkey bars.

No, I did not have this flashback while I was up there. I was too busy hauling. Crunch, scramble, get those knees up and over.

Whee! And then to let go of the bar—and point my toes—and arch my back—whee!

It was over far too soon. The toughest part was figuring out how to get back on the ground. I squawked, bounced off the net, clambered to the edge, and tried to let myself over gracefully. Nope, I used up all of my grace points doing that trapeze trick. But I did manage to get myself back on terra firma without breaking anything.

And then we were taught another trick: somersaulting on the dismount by tucking our knees in and leaning back. Piece of cake!

I'm going to sign up for circus classes this fall. I probably won't go for the trapeze right away, although I'll drop in for classes once in a while. I think I'll start off with flexibility training, because that's something I can keep practicing on my own. But I've found something I enjoy doing. Now I have even better reasons to develop strength, endurance, and flexibility. I could always *see* these tricks in my mind's eye, and now I can remember the exhilaration.

Happiness!

Random Emacs symbol: other-window-scroll-buffer - Variable: If non-nil, this is a buffer and C-M-v should scroll its window.

I remember figuring out the exact timing I needed to hit the bonus ramps over and over and over again. Computers allow you that kind of consistency. The physical world is more random but also more fun as you deal with the chaos of balls cascading down and careening around the playing field. Besides, the cost (the equivalent of CAD 0.50 for three balls) adds spice to every game.

An arcade hidden along Yonge Street has a good array of pinball machines, and I seem to remember that you could play them for a quarter. I should make a trip back there sometime.

A pinball wizard I am not, but I do like the game.

Random Emacs symbol: widget-specify-button - Function: Specify button for WIDGET between FROM and TO.

After learning a tiny fraction about defense against a knife, of course my mind goes and constructs a knife attacker to see how that might work. In my dream, I felt the fight-or-flight response (and definitely leaned toward flight!). The strange thing was that it didn't stop there... Rather, I ended up flashing back to the last time I felt a really strong fight-or-flight response, which had nothing to do with knives and everything to do with overhearing my name in conversation. That really sucked; I just couldn't stop my heart from racing.

And then I ended up dreaming someone I know was really really sad, and I just couldn't figure out how to explain things to cheer her up, and I just felt terrible.

So yeah, not quite restful sleep for me yesterday. Strange, isn't it? A knife grabs attention, but it's worse to wake up and realizing that your phantasms are less obvious and more real.

(Just you wait until I get speech recognition, sir!)

;; Create a flashcard-type file for the multiplication table until 15
(insert
 (mapconcat
  'identity
  (shuffle-vector
   (apply
    'vector
    (apply
     'append
     (let ((list '(1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15)))
       (mapcar
        (lambda (a)
          (mapcar
           (lambda (b)
             (format "%d x %d = : %d" a b (* a b)))
           list))
        list)))))
  "\n"))

On Technorati: emacs

Random Emacs symbol: mm-insert-part - Function: Insert the contents of HANDLE in the current buffer.