So my three year old boy is HUGE into pipes and drains. We have a big storm drain outside our house that empties into the canyon next to the house, and it's been a dream of his to figure out where the pipe empties out. So one day we decided to scale the canyon. It was very steep, so I had to carry him while trying to hold my balance. We found the end of the pipe and had lots of fun exploring around.

Until a few days later.

Yup -- I started breaking out in a HUGE rash all over my body. All over my arms, all over my legs, around my waist, on my face and, er, my genitals. Big red blotches, weeping and oozing. And itching. Real, real bad.

Actually, I got really scared that it was something else. I have psoriasis on my hands. Anyone who has psoriasis can tell you how much it totally sucks. You can't cure it (it's genetic), you can only maintain it. It causes your skin to blister and scale, and you have to use heavy-duty creams to get rid of it. I was scared that maybe my psoriasis decided to go crazy all over my body! That would truly, truly suck.

Fortunately, I figured out it was "only" poison oak. Better than psoriasis, but boy does it suck hard. You cannot believe how bad the itching is. The only thing that I can compare it to (and this is only vague memories) was chicken pox. I couldn't sleep at night. I had to constantly rub ice cubes on myself as a topical anesthetic. It was absolutely horrible.

Now, in doing some research, I thought that it pretty much vanishes in about a week, so I tried to tough it out. I asked my pharmacist father-in-law if there were any cures, and he said there was nothing non-prescription, so I just tried to tolerate it.

Finally, though, I couldn't take it anymore. The itching was driving me insane, so I did a web search for "poison oak cure". And this stuff popped up: Zanfel. It promised to "cure the itching in 30 seconds, and get rid of the poison oak in 24 hours". Whoa. This has to be a scam, but I'm freaking desperate. I look at the list of pharmacies, and found one near me. I buy the stuff... OUCH! $32 for a little 1oz tube. SCAM SCAM SCAM. Screw it ... I'd pay $320 if it got rid of the itching.

The stuff was freaking amazing. It literally blew away the itching in about 30 seconds. Supposedly it sucks out and neutralizes the poison.

Unfortunately, it didn't cure it in 24 hours, though. The pamplet says that if you have "systemic poison oak", then the poison is in your bloodstream and the only thing that will get rid of it quickly is heavy duty steroids from your doctor. So I went to the doctor yesterday and got the steroids.

The Zanfel works for about 4-8 hours, and then the Uruthiol poison (that's the bad stuff) works it way from deeper in your skin back to the surface. Then I have to apply the Zanfel again, and I get more relief.

Man, if you ever get Poison oak, poison ivy or poison sumac, YOU WANT THIS STUFF. It's worth every freaking penny.

And I'm now an expert on poison oak, and how to avoid it. What's funny is that I used to think it was kind of a joke ("Oh yeah, gotta avoid that poison oak!! har har"), but it's no joke. The itching is absolutely horrible when you get it bad like I did.

By the way, the rule of thumb is that "leaves of three, let it be", meaning that if the plant has groups of three leaves, then it might be poison ivy or poison oak. The rule of thumb works for the latter two, but apparently poison sumac can have a lot more leaves. Fortunately, poison sumac is not in my area (So Cal), so I'm safe. This is poison oak country.

-- Feb 6 update (next day) --

As long as I'm giving updates on my health, I broke my little toe last night running in to answer the damn phone. My foot hit the side of the doorway. Now I look like a leprosy victim with a big limp. I think I'm ready to star in the next "Night of the Living Dead" movie.

This week has really sucked health-wise.

ShadowRam had a hilarious story about Oracle dropping the hammer on McNealy... see it here.

I have to admit, I hate McNealy with that idiotic smirk he always wears. I hate Ellison more, but it's still funny seeing McNealy crawling back to Oracle trying to get his keynote spot back when they gave it to ... Michael Dell! Oh man, that is sweet. :)

I've said it before, but if we have to have a software monopoly, given the choice between Gates, McNealy, Jobs or Ellison, I would take Gates hands-down. Thank god it's not Ellison. The man is insufferable enough.

I was pretty sure after that written statement was released recently purporting to be from bin Laden, but this story seals it for me.

So let me get this straight. When bin Laden is needed the most to rally his "troops", combined with the fact that he was never shy about using video in the past to do so, suddenly he's taken to releasing written statements and making audio-only tapes? Not bloody likely.

The dude is dead.

If you're like me, you have thousands of family photographs lying around that you would love to digitize for posterity. If you're also like me, you started scanning with a flatbed scanner, but the magnitude of the task just defeated you. You said, "there has to be a better way to do this". Well, finally there is. Somebody at HP got a clue and created a scanner with a photograph feeder! Stick in a stack of 24 photos, hit the button, and boom! They get scanned in. For me, the $280 or so would be worth it if all I ever did was just scan legacy photographs and then throw the unit away.

I ordered my unit. I can't wait to do it.

Now if I can just find some good picture organization software. Any suggestions out there? I want something that lets you select from a list of people/places for each picture. The other thing is that it should index picture files, and not try and store the pictures into its own "repository". Oh, and the index information should be exportable into an ASCII format.

I submitted this as a story to Slashdot, but they rejected it. Well, I thought it was rather interesting and newsworthy.

In this recent Slashdot story, I posted that I recalled RMS advocating outlawing non-free software. I couldn't find an exact reference, so I decided to pose the question to him, once and for all. My question and his response are reproduced below.

My letter: "In a nutshell, do you support legislation that require software companies to produce free software? Or to put it another way, should non-free software be outlawed?"

His response:

Those two questions are not the same. I would strongly oppose a plan to require anyone to produce any particular kind of software. Whether to allow proprietary published software is a different matter.

Restrictions on redistribution of software all ultimately rest on explicit government intervention, whether through copyright law, through technology contol laws such as the DMCA, or through enforcement of certain contracts. I would not be sad to see this cease. Requiring release of source code for published software could be justified as a consumer protection measure, like publishing ingredients lists and nutritional analysis for foods.

I would not oppose such changes in laws, but I don't particularly advocate them either. What I advocate is free software. I don't much care whether publishing proprietary software is legally permitted, as long as in practice it rarely happens.

To be honest, I'm somewhat disappointed in this response. This is the first time I've ever seen RMS squishy about anything. It's like he wants to call for legislation outlawing non-free software, but he's not quite ready to go that far.

So he either backed up my recollection, or he did not, depending on how you read his statement. Personally, I think that if you are even ambivalent about whether it's my right to produce -- AND MY RIGHT TO PURCHASE -- proprietary software, then you have very wrong ideas about what freedom is all about.

If I, as a private citizen, contract with another private citizen to purchase the right to use a particular piece of software, it is none of RMS's business if I decide that the source code is not a valuable part of the transaction.

After a while, beating your head starts to feel good.

Perhaps you are aware of the The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Blackout. I found it all a bit silly, but never let it be said that RM/101 is not willing to ante up with a better idea. And this is it:

The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-out.

Whining about trivial things by the ignorant is more dangerous than a gun in the hand of a child. Rho's inflation of the importance of comments reflects on the inability of Slashdot's "community" to understand that this is just a web site, with a service that you get for free.

For the record, my feelings on The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Blackout rests firmly in the uninterested. I have almost zero opinion on the final outcome of the blackout. I love Slashdot, and will probably continue posting to support the site, but the details of the blackout are dull (to me).

Says rho, "In that case, Slashdot would be much better served by dumping the flaky and irritating overhead of a DB server and filling the pipe with a longer "Favorites" list--which, essentially, is what Slashdot is once you strip away the comments and comment posters." If rho thinks he can divine real significance from Malda's (factual) assertion that not as many people read comments as many think, he is sadly mistaken. Unfortunately, rho has an inflated sense of his worth, and has taken to whining because Malda doesn't stroke his ego like he wants.

This whining about being "underappreciated" is offensive. Thus, I propose a small revolt: The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-out.

T(H)GSW will be during the week of April 21 through April 27. Easy to remember, because it corresponds with the blackout (completely worthless information: the full moon in April falls on the 27th). During that time, I will be posting completely whine-free posts, and further will be smacking anyone down (through posts, of course) who whines about Slashdot. I will become Malda's idea of the ideal Slashdot reader. I will provide insightful content -- completely whine free.

During that week, I'd like to see if Malda sees Slashdot become a better place, or if it becomes the Hallowed Shrine of Whining, even more than it is now. I'd like for the more whiny posters to revisit their own self-importance and have a new outlook. And, I'd like for the "community" to really see what the true value of Slashdot is--not this inflated sense of "ownership" that they seem to have, but the fact that it's a free service that's fun to participate in, but is definitely not worth all this whininess.

This is where the (Hopefully) comes in. This is only meaningful if enough whiny posters agree to go along and participate. If there is only me (who never whines anyway) and a handful of others who cease whining during that week, it will be pretty meaningless. Barely a dent will be made, and rho and the rest of the "community" will never realize the incredible value from a whine-free Slashdot.

To spread the word, I'm changing my sig to link to this journal entry. If you would like to help, you can link to this journal from your own sig, or you can simply resolve to enter into a voluntary one-week whine-out. Pass the word. This will only work if a goodly number of comment posters participate.

To summarize, if you wish to participate, during the week of April 21 through April 27

• Click through as many stories as possible to check for whining
• Post as many comments as possible without whining (e.g., "They don't appreciate me", "It's not fair that the editors get unlimited mod points", "Why did I get moderated down", "Malda can't spell", "This story is redundant", "They only take PayPal", etc, etc, etc, etc)
• Drop the hammer on anyone caught whining with a big fat "No whining this week!" post.

Here are some useful HTML links to this journal entry (short version is 86 characters, should fit in most sigs). You'll probably have to unfungle them after the lameness filter gets through with it:

Long version (117 chars): <P>--<BR>Join <A HREF="http://slashdot.org/~Reality+Master+101/journal/6131">The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Whine-Out</A>

Short version (86 chars): <a href="http://slashdot.org/~Reality+Master+101/journal/6131">T(H)GSW</a> Apr 21-27

I was using this as my sig for a while, but I thought of something new, so I wanted to continue to give it a plug: Why do they hate us? Excellent article.