so if you were ever curious, this is what a dragon/blinder christmas looks like. we just finished wrapping presents and i decided to bring out the digital camera... and of course felt obligated to share it with you (well, not obligated of course, you don't own me!!!)

heh anyway, we are debating if we should start muppets christmas carol (yes, we own it on dvd)

today was really nice though. first day off i've had in a long time... and we spent it doing some errands (i finished my shopping for the dragon). i spent the morning in boston, and man, i nearly had the place to myself. beat the crowds i guess.

oh, we saw eragon. it was pretty good for what it was, a rushed but interesting story with dazzling cg. we then went over to the whole foods and spent about $50 on a variety of cheeses and snacky things.

well, time to wrap it up. good night all.

hello everyone. remember me?
yeah i haven't been around much. i just wanted to take a moment and wish everyone a very nice, pleasant and enjoyable holiday.

i'm nearing the end of the "big project" i've been working on. i think i put in 70 hours this week and now i'm just so tired. heh i even had the dragon at the office today. that was nice. she fell asleep in the big comfy chair i have. she was so good. really helped keep my stress level down, and she got to meet a few folks on the team as well.

when this site is launched i'll do a full write-up about it, heh mostly because i think its worth a full write-up.

anyway, i just wanted to drop a line and wish everyone a happy holiday.

so the miserable bastards found me and decided to bestow on me a "christmas present" (my term, i have to put a silver lining on this thing).

my company has been bugging me for a while to "pick up my blackberry." well, i would just usually respond "oh yeah, ok, i'll um, get it later." i've managed to use that for the better part of six months. well, this morning, they came down with a sparkling new blackberry 8700g and had it already configured and set up. oh happy day! another device! another digital tether.

this device is stupidly complex. you wouldn't believe how much "stuff" this thing has... and well, i dunno... i can see its utility, but still man... why!?!

so, now i'm just another cog in the blackberry machine. in a form of protest, i have it clipped to the *inside* of my pocket and i shall never be so crass as to clip the darn thing to my belt. i've always hated that batman look anyway. unless of course they give me a grappling hook gun. then, i'll clip it to my belt.

oh well. i have to get back to work. i'm supposed to be in a meeting. i'm reminded of one of my favorite lines from a very cool movie ("swimming with sharks") "a meeting they can't start without is the only meeting worth going to."

hehehe... kevin spacey is the cool.

anyway, like i was saying, we've lived in this place now for just over a year and there's something that has been bothering me.

in fact, it was just on this past thanksgiving that i shared this bewilderment with trmj and buffer-overflowed. trmj had a "meh" sort of attitude, but buffer, i think, quickly adopted my frustration.

and what frustration is that? what the fuck is in the red fucking folder!

since the day we moved in, this red folder has taunted us (er, well, maybe just me).

its there, gawking out that office window.

solemn has a theory, she believes it's contents is a list of people who have come around wondering what was in the red folder. i'm in inclined to agree with that theory, but until i know for sure, there will be a huge question mark in my mind.

for your extended consideration, i have uploaded a second photo so as to provide some context... a "bigger picture" as it were.

i mean, these pictures were taken out our front window (which i should say are 14' tall and expand 2/3 of the front of the loft we live in) so its not like its this little tiny insignifcant "thing." this is huge! damnit! what is in that folder? does the person in that office ever wonder whats in it? do they ever use it? can they even see it? can you see it? i know buffer could. it intrigued him, as if he fell under some kind of spell. is it a magic folder? ethelred? did you conjur this folder as part of your world dominiation plan? i need answers people! and fast.

i need to start this off by saying that texas is the reason is quite possibly one of my all time favorite bands. period. if someone told me i had to choose, it would be a three way tie between jawbreaker, texas is the reason and samiam (pronounced "sam i am")

don't know who they are? well if you listen to independent rock, emo, post-hardcore (btw, emo and post-hardcore are NOT the same thing), then you know who they are (or at least their sound) because they've influenced damn near every act that's followed them. they formed in the early nineties, recorded a couple 7"'s (which i have) then in '96 came out with their lp.

its tough to say this about any band's lp, but there isn't a single bad song on the record, "do you know who you are?" not a single dull or lack-luster moment on the entire record which ends way too quickly. 9 songs of brilliance.

they toured the us and europe and then called it quits. their absence has been felt, and they left a big huge gaping hole in the post-hardcore world when they departed the scene. well, this past week saw a reunion show (actually two) in their hometown, and while sadly i wasn't there, there are some decent write-ups here and here.

let me say, that this band is not for those who like glamor or spectical, or shredding. they aren't for the cynical starving for clever irony. no, texas is the reason is, i hate to say it, pure, simple, all emotion, naked, nothing hiding, what you see is what you get.

the first time i saw them, i was awe struck. my junior year in college. i don't remember who else was playing that sunday afternoon, but when texas took the stage and started playing, the crowd just surged... not a dry eye in the place by the end of their set. it was one of those rare (very rare) events where a hardcore show on a sunday afternoon was more like a mass group therapy session being led by the band. i remember after the set, because i was a writer for a few well-known zines of the time, i'd wander around to the back to grab some quick interviews with the bands... i had originally wanted to get an interview with texas, but all i could muster was a "thank you" and a hand shake with the singer garrett. i snapped a few pictures (long since lost) and went on my way.

having went through all this, if you have the time, do check them out. do i think they'll be doing a real reunion? recording another record? i really don't think so. part of me wishes they would, but another part of me is thankful for what they produced and we'll leave it at that.
 

well, as i said in this journal entry i think i do have a solution. and here it is, its called the nested set model.

there's a decent description of it here

the reason i am still a little hesitant is that the concept still isn't 100% clear for me. the concept of "left" and "right" is a bit fuzzy. i'm going to actually play around with it... but the nice thing is, in the above article, all of our use cases are represented. so, i'm a work with it and see if its a fit.

heh, sam, this may be something you want to think about, this is a real-world problem i am having to solve... well, i think i have a solution, but i want to run it through the je machine to see if someone else has any ideas.

here's the problem in a nut shell. we've got two (database) tables:

• Pages
• PageElements

they basically have this kind of structure:

Pages
============
id int
title varchar
author varchar
keywords varchar
/* ... bla other meta-data-like fields */
 
PageElements
=============
id int
pageid int (fk)
name varchar
value varchar
type varchar
parentid int

so, the concept is that we store pages in the system, and that we'll have N number of page "types" (different combinations of elements like headlines, body copy - we don't want to couple ourselves to a specific set of fields, which is why we have PageElements).

the problem is that we may have pages that have nested elements. for example, lets say a page has a "tab box" a div container that has little navigable tabs at the top, which are controlled by content managers. they can create tabs, and then add items to that particular tab for display.

well, the front end needs to know how to render the display, and therefor needs to know the relationship of the various elements. that being the case, we have two types of data relationships.

those with have clear parent/child such as the following data structure:

PAGE
    Headline
    Photo
    Caption
    Tab-Features
        Feature-Tab-1
          Headline
          article_ref
        Feature-Tab-2
          Headline
          article_ref
    Special-Message-1
    Special-Message-2
    Special-Message-3

so, as you can see... there is a parent/child relationship with the tabs, which is being handled by the 'parentid' column on the 'PageElements' table, and our data objects accomodate nesting (which gets messy because we have to examine the data type and determin if we need to "reach further in").

as convoluted as the code will get to handle that, its actually an easy problem. the tougher one is that of siblings ('Special-Message-x') in the above example page structure.

the problem is that we need to create that kind of relationship in the database so that the front end knows it needs to iterate through a 'Special-Message' object, and that means when we collect all of the page's elements, to treat those as siblings, not as individual elements.

i do have an idea of how this may work, but i don't want let the cat out of the bag quite yet in that i'm not completely satisfied that i like it (no, i'm not thinking of storing xml in the database, ugh), meaning, i'm open to other suggestions. i'm the architect on this project so its pretty much up to me to nail this down and anything i say goes on this.

well, i've been toying around with this song for a long time, mostly because i like it, and because it has all of the elements that i want to get better at, with respect to composing/arranging and producing/mastering.

so i re-did the guitars (yet again) and scrapped the entire mix, zapped all of the outboard settings (in fact, i nuked all of the compression/limiting settings and started from scratch).

anyway, what i got this morning was something without so much artificial coloring and fake "air" that was driving me nuts with this piece.

its funny, the idea i was trying to go for earlier was to get a "big" round sound out of this, so i was relying on multi-band compression to tighten everything up, which is often the approach to use... but as i constantly learn is that an approach or even tools in the audio world don't always translate into what you really need because every piece of music is different, every track is different, every tone is completely autonomous, and what you "know" doesn't always mean its the right thing. i suppose the moral of the story (as it always is) that preconceived notions of what is correct can and often is thrown right out the window when the rubber meets the road.

what is different with this mix is that there's no over-all multi-band compression... and instead some very mild compression is used on each track individually... and the EQ on the guitar tracks are much gentler.

i think another major lesson i learned is that while keeping track of the low-end of the sound spectrum is fine and dandy to control mud and rumble, neglecting the higher end (those frequencies above say 5khz) is important as well and is something i've often find myself shying away from, because doing to much up there can introduce a harshness to the mix, and that to me is about the worst thing you can do. but what i found with this particular mix was that giving each track a bit more "air" up there actually added detail and punch, and because i was being gentle, i didn't add too much in terms of a harsh coldness.

i hope so anyway.

so, take a listen, or not. and as customary, have a good afternoon.

i know its been a long time. i've been buried in project hell. wrapping up a large content management implementation for a large insurance company (who you have heard of) - using teamsite. for those who have not had the pleasure of developing with teamsite, let me spare you the misery and just say this: everything bad you've heard about it is probably true. i've worked with teamsite on many projects, and i'm as close to an expert on the product as one can be, and i have yet to encounter a project that goes smoothly with said product.

as this project was wrapping up, i was picked as the architect and development lead on another project, with an insanely aggressive time line. this is a huge project. so big that when it launches, well, you will know about it. it will make national news. i can't talk about it, and in fact, internally, we have to refer to the project using code words... and i can't even say what the code words are. needless to say, the site we are developing is very visible. i made all of the architectural decisions (opencms/linux/tomcat) - and i've been finishing up the technical design for the site.

i'm looking forward to the holiday break. i've been working like a gottdamn rented mule the last few months and the pace isn't slacking. hell, just a few weeks ago... they wanted to send me to bloody china to consult on another project. thankfully i got out of that little chore.

well, i just thought i'd drop a quick je. oh, and am i the only who gets dizzy walking up escalators that don't work?

we picked up the car this evening. boy is it pretty. i stalled it out a few times getting used to driving a manual transmission again.. but solemn was there with with the hazard lights, and with just a few impatient boston drivers, i managed to get us over to the store (getting supplies for the days of the dead dinner) and then home again without trouble.

anyway, i really like this car. its got a lot of spirit (for driving around the tiny little streets of cambridge) and just has a lot of nice small details that will make it quite fun to drive.

i know its going to take a few more outtings for me to get fully comfortable with the transmission, but yeah, driving around boston in a sporty little car is quite fun. heh, its also cool to pull out of the dealer with a new car with 14 miles on it :)

we'll post some pictures soon.

so i was having this very weird, yet very entertaining conversation (via im) with a guy i work with. he's on this project to build a social networking application for a certain large client... and has spent the last few weeks doing mountains of research, most of it analysts type of research into social networking.

today he had to let off some steam, and we got talking about stupid people and how they use search engines to find social networking sites... below is a snippet of that conversation:

(2:04:09 PM) f_f_w: YOU HAVE TO BE FUCKING DUMB TO SEARCH FOR A WEBSITE WHOSE NAME AND URL YOU KNOW!!!!!
(2:04:11 PM) f_f_w: (sorry)
(2:04:16 PM) f_f_w: (segfault)
(2:04:33 PM) blinder: ROFL!!!
(2:04:41 PM) blinder: um yes, really VERY yes
(2:05:06 PM) f_f_w: I wonder why people don't look for yahoo on google...
(2:05:25 PM) blinder: because everytime you do that google kills a puppy

that is all. oh, you wanted a point to this? nope, there is non. sorry, and no, you can't have that 18 seconds of your life back. pitty, that.

as we did last year, we trecked down to southern ma to the king richard's faire and much fun was had. solemn got all dressed up (gosh, she sure is a pretty one) with walking-stick included. i rented a car for the weekend, in that that's the only way to get to the fair, and we drove down late saturday morning.

we got there around 1pm and just kinda walked around for a bit to see what was what. the usual post apocalyptic biker contingent was there, which i simply do not understand. i mean, what does *that* have to do with the 16th-18th century? nothing!

the pagan teen girls who have very little clue were there in force as well, as well as the poser-poser types who think just wearing a cape over jeans and a bud-lite t-shirt constitutes "getting into the spirit." no, it really doesn't. you either do it right, or like me, don't do it all. solemn, she does it right.

the harry potter contingent was noticably and thankfully not there that day.

we stopped by solemn's favorite trinket shop and she made away with a small fortune of shiney sparkly things, and then we stopped by the place with all the drums. i like drums. i played many drums. some year i'm going to purchase a drum. i *really* like drums. drums make fun noises like "pang" "boom" and "thwack." and in the hands of someone who knows what to do (like me) they can be very musical.

we tried to take in some of the performances, but while some had some genuinly funny moments, the vast majority of the performances were quite, um, lame. i think they wouldn't have been so lame if the acoustics of the theaters they set up weren't so non existent. this got us into the discussion of were does ren-faire performance sit in the hierarchy of live performances, with broadway being at the top. we concluded that ren-faire performance is above community theater, in that these performers are actually paid.

i'm not knocking community theater, but one has to categorize such things.

we stopped and sank some money in food tickets and nibbled on some baked potatoes and got one of the best treats evar! kettle corn :) that was a wise investment.

after all was said and done, we spent about 3.5 hours there, the weather was splendid and aside from me forgetting where i parked the stupid car, it went without a hitch.

the rest of saturday was spent watching scary movies (the remake of "the haunting" and poltergeist).

sunday was spent returning the rental, going to the store (the very one otter goes to) and cleaning the apartment, scrubbing the floors, hurting my shoulder doing said chore and then relaxing for the rest of the afternoon.

so, for now i must away!

i like my therapist. she gives me homework assignments. this week's assignment has been to take with me a little tin box that contains something that has a distinctive scent to it. throughout the day i'm supposed take a minute, small the contents, without worrying what it is, and then carefully concentrate on how that scent makes me feel, what it reminds me of, i then scribble that down.

today's was interesting. i'm pretty sure it was a tea bag. reminded me of winter, a warm feeling actually.

so, why all of this, what i'm sure sounds like a load of new-age hooey? it actually makes sense from a physiological perspective as well as an emotional one.

one of the problems we have discovered is that i have taught myself to disconnect my mind from my body, not quite like a dissociative or depersonalization disorder, to a lesser extent. why? well, its actually a very common coping mechanism for kids and teenagers who grew up dealing with trauma and abuse. if you can disconnect yourself, then you free yourself. its pretty simple really.

i mean, this is one of the reasons, and i've discussed this at length with my therapist (who is actually a psychiatric nurse) that i gravitated to krishna consciousness when it comes to spirituality -- kc basically stipulates that we are not our bodies, that our bodies are not temples, they are just material... a vessel. this always made sense to me, because that is how i always felt.

i never was comfortable in my body, and had a considerable amount of impatience for those who spent huge amounts of time and money on such material persuits.

as i've gotten older and started this process of healing and coping, in a more productive manner, with all of the trauma of my past, the feeling of being disconnected has grown stronger to the point where it now bothers me. i don't want to be disconnected. i don't need to disconnect, to free myself, lift me away from the abuse, the trauma and anxiety because all of those conditions that created that are gone.

we talked about talked about the concept of hedonism, she wanted to take me to the "other end" of the spectrum. i got very impatient, and basically said i have contempt for the concept, and i got more angry thinking about it. she thought that was quite interesting and after chatting about it, she said that through my teaching myself to deny, to restrict and disconnect, i've built a major block to finding a middle ground.

this is where the sniffy box comes into play. scent, as most everyone knows, is possibly the strongest trigger for calling up stored memories. the *only* memories i have associated with scent are those of hospitals, and death. right now, i can smell it. i do not have any positive associations with scent memories. so, the idea is to engage in this exercise, which re-enforces positive memory triggers, it also will help me feel more connected to my body, my phsyical being, which, the idea goes, will lower my anxiety and stop the negative feedback loops that get so bloody loud.

i have a sniffy box (i coined the term)! my therapist said to not use anything like alcohol or peroxide, anything that could trigger the negative memories. solemn has been the one to find the object to put in the box, and they've been great. we've made it a game. i not only have to figure out how it makes me feel but also identify what it is, which trust me, is very difficult.

one of the first ones this week was a small piece of plastic bag dipped in this hair product solemn uses, and had in her hair the first time we met. i couldn't figure out what it was, but it actually triggered a happy memory (the autumn, leaves, warmth, and friends).

i like this exercise. it makes me think and be present, all important ingredients for being more connected.

what do you do to stay connected?

so, i've been having all sorts of fun with the shuttle bus that i take from harvard square to watertown (where i work).

over the last few weeks the buses have been getting later and later and the number of people using it has, from what i've seen steadily increased (but the number of buses hasn't nor has the interval between pick-ups have not decreased), to the point that i've had to wait for another bus, because the one i was waiting for, was full. well, last night i had to wait for two buses. i left the office at 5:00 p.m. i left the parking lot at 6:10 p.m.

well, this morning i left late and so i got a spot on the bus, got a window seat. well, as i'm sitting there, playing a pitch on my handheld, with my elbow almost, but not quite resting on the window frame, the driver takes a pothole really hard, and fast. the resulting shock caused my elbo to hit the thin metal frame and bashed it pretty hard. it hurt like a bugger but i didn't really think anything beyond that, until i got to my stop and looked down and notice two large blood stains on my trousers.

*sigh*

then i looked and noticed a huge chunk of skin was missing from my elbow. grrr.

i walked, briskly, up to the bathroom and managed to dab most of the blood stains off my trousers and got my elbow cleaned up, but now it hurts like a sonofabitch.

i joked to a co-worker that if they ever decide to take the shuttle, to make sure they have elbow and knee pads on.

yeah, the shuttle bus service is a free service the complex provides companies who set up shop here so that folks can come into work on the t (subway), but sheesh, i just wonder if they couuld have drivers that maybe paid attention to the roads a little better? i mean, sure i first thought it was my fault for having my elbow up, but that just doesn't seem right.

this is really a public service announcement.

if you, in your capacity as an IT manager (one with purchasing/decision-making authority) decide that it might be a good idea for your company to purchase interwoven's teamsite product, i will fucking find you, hunt you down like the dog that you are and, well, do something really bad, like maybe ring your door bell in the middle of the night and then run and hide in the shrubs - over and over again. yeah, so there!

i've been "working" with teamsite off and on for nearly a year, even spent a week in chicago last fall getting "training" and i still haven't found a single redeeming characteristic, feature or option this hacked together, bloated, inflexible piece of shit has to offer.

websites, many would point out, are often structured as hierarchies. teamsite, being a website content management system (costing well north of six-figures for a license) cannot actually work in a hierarchical fasion!!!

holy dear god!

so, my dear IT manager, just say "get the fuck out of my office you scum sucking pig!" when interwoven comes around pitching their crap.

thank you, you may now go about your day.