2006 – Page 5 – The Bald Heretic – Short, bald dude with a goofy beard

Beware the wrath of Cynthia

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As you can tell from previous writings, when Cynthia decides to prank someone it can be quite an event. Now imagine if you actually antagonized her.

Case in point:

Just about every Sunday, our good friend Jim comes over to the house. Cynthia cooks a nice meal and we watch the Simpsons and have a nice conversation. After that, Cynthia and Jim retire to the dining room to play dominoes. It’s a two out of three competition and the winner is dubbed the “Domino Queen” for the week. The loser is, in essence, the domino peasant.

The last time Jim was here he won the domino game and went home with the title. As of right now, Jim is the reigning “Domino Queen.”

For the last several weeks Jim has been unable to come over due to various band gigs and other commitments. At one point I was talking to Jim and expressing Cynthia’s anxiousness to have a shot and winning back the title. Jim responded as the Domino Monarch and indicated that Cynthia, as the domino peasant, would have to be content with “grubbing for potatoes” for another week.

When I relayed this back to Cynthia she was indignant and then and there decided that she would place a potato curse on Jim.

The first strike was a potato voodoo doll made from a real potato that she delivered to Jim with the curse. The second strike is tonight.

Jim’s coming over for dinner here shortly. Cynthia has prepared the following menu:

Potato chips with potato dip
Potato salad
Potato bread
Mashed potatoes and gravy
Pot roast with potatoes
Veggies with bits of potato mixed in

And for desert?

Home made sweet potato cake.

That’s a lot of “potato grubbin”…It’s going to be a starchy evening.

Pestis intel

I just managed to sneak this shot out of Cynthia’s “virus lab.”

It looks like Dan’s not out of the woods yet.

Pestis

Cynthia has decided to torment the C.T.O. (chief technology officer) at her place of employment. A gentleman by the name of Dan Digregorio.

For whatever reason, Cynthia decided that he needed a challenge so she decided to fashion 30 or so “viruses” out of some very basic components including a small pom-pom, some googly eyes, felt feet and twist ties and place them in his office at work before he came in.

She even named the virus Digregorious Pestis.

When Dan came to work and found his office “infected” with Digregorious Pestis he immediately suspected Cynthia and called her to confront her. She explained that she had no access to the I.T. floor as it was restricted and played innocent. Apparently he tried to gather all the viruse up but continued to find them throughout the day.

Cynthia never admitted to the prank.

Fast forward a few days.

Cynthia fashioned another couple of dozen viruses and again snuck into Dan’s office (a co-worker/co-conspirator gave her access to the restricted floor) and placed them all around. She noticed while she was there that he had all the previous viruses on a shelf but was missing a few which would indicate he had not found them all.

This time she placed a few on his desk and set about to hide the rest and included a poem she had written to accompany them which read:

I am just a little virus,
Often underestimated.
Even though I am quite small
I am often feared and hated.
When you think that I am gone
I am NOT eradicated!
I am busy multiplying
and MORE virus is created!

Signed,
Digregorius Pestis

There has been no response from Dan to the latest infestation. I can only assume he is plotting revenge.

Galveston Bay

FYI: These photography posts are best viewed directly from baldheretic.com as opposed to your RSS readers or Lj feeds, especially when viewing full sized images. Check it out!

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These two images were taken using the Sony 18-70mm f3.5-5.6 kit lens.

This one was taken from the fishing boat while still tied to the dock

Click to see full sized image

This one was taken while underway. The water was very calm but with the boat moving there was some up and down motion. The built in image stabilization shines here.

Click to see full sized image

The last two photos are with the same lens at full zoom and center on these jetties:

I was using the 3fps auto-advance and auto-focus to track pelicans as they dove for fish.
Each of these shots is a 100% crop, meaning that if you click to see the larger image you will see an un-resized section of the actual photograph cropped from the original image.

With full zoom and being out at the mouth of the bay near the jetties the image stabilization came in quite handy and is very apparent in these shots.

Click for full size

A three hour tour

This should be interesting.

My department, as part of our ongoing team building efforts, is going bay fishing today.
That’s right, a group of nerds consisting of hardware techs and software developers are going out on a boat for a few hours to catch some fish.

Cynthia suggests that this might be a ploy by the HR department to thin out the IT department.

If you don’t hear from me please send a search party.

I guess if something were to happen like say, getting stranded on a deserted island, I would prefer this:

rather than this:

Geek Gathering – Nov 2006

phliKtid

With all the fuss of fundraising and prepping to go to Austin this weekend we really didn’t hype the Geek Gathering all that much.

Still we managed an excellent turn out.

Russell Holliman of MobilePodcast.org who has been tangling with Apple over the name of his company, Podast Ready, found some time to join us. Always a treat. Plus he promised some swag after modeling the new company shirt for us.

We also saw Lambo and Sketkar of Astrocast.net fame make an appearance.

Lambo and Sketkar

All in all, a great evening. I had to cut and run to get home and get some sleep before heading to Austin for the Celtic Festival this weekend. More on that later.

2006 International Quilt Festival

Well worth clicking to see a larger version

The largest quilting event in the world happens in Houston every year at the George R. Brown convention center each November. The International Quilt Festival is something that Cynthia never misses.

From their web site:

The largest annual quilt show, sale, and quiltmaking academy in the world attracts more than 53,000 attendees with 2,000+ quilts, cloth dolls and garments on display; more than 1050 booths selling quilts, supplies, books, notions, antiques, and crafts; and more than 400 classes, lectures, and events for all skill levels.

It’s pretty impressive. In the past I have had to miss it due to obligations during the fall, but not this year. You might think it’s too girly or froo-froo or whatever but you would be wrong. Some of these quilts are works of art that are amazing to behold.

Here’s a picture of the entire quilt from the above photo:

Click it, you won’t be disappointed

Cynthia and I agreed that this was the coolest quilt at the show.
Just take a look at some of the detail:

Clicky and drool!

There was one other quilt that I saw that I particularly liked

More detail when you click

Cynthia was able to get some good fabric swatches for a quilt she is planning to make and we found some awesome fabric for a new custom shirt for me. All in all, a great outing and one I recommend to anyone.

Welcome to Camelot! (It’s just a model) SHHHHHHHHH!

Continuing to experiment with simulated tilt-shift.
I suppose I will eventually need to just break down and buy a lens.
This is infinitely cheaper, though.

Urquhart Castle from a picture I took on our trip to the UK a few years back.

This is the St. Angel Bridge in Rome from last years European vacation

It is helpful to use photographs taken from above. This tricks the mind much better because when we think of looking at a model we usually see it on a table top.