dubious.biz(ness)

I’m going to try to start taking a photo a day. These will appear on the flickr thingy on the side there. ( there>>>>>>). Technically I started yesterday with the picture of my hand. I definitely cannot guarantee that they will be interesting, it’s more for my edification than yours. I’m sick of the camera sitting at home and missing good shots because I get out of the habit of trying. Given that I do pretty much the same thing every day, it’s likely this can’t keep up forever.

This brings up a few interesting problems though: the main one is how to carry such a large camera around along with my normal stuff and keep it safe. There are a number of ways around this: buy little point and shoot camera, buy a little bag for the camera and stick it in my regular backpack, or carry my camera backpack around and use the little laptop compartment for papers. Since clearly two of these options are expensive and one is free, I’m probably going to do the free one.

The downside of that idea is that it makes particular things more difficult: carrying a lot of papers, carrying a change of clothes after rowing (increasingly more necessary). It makes the idea of buying toys attractive. But I am resisting. I suppose the better idea would be to not spend the money and to just not take pictures.

So the question now is: what will the picture be today?

This classic site lists quotes from the CompSci Lecturers. They’re really goofy funny guys, though many of the jokes may be lost on non-CompScis. A quote I was treated to today in Operating Systems class: “That’s how these things start: something says “I’m free porn” and the next thing you know it’s not.” (Talking about viruses). A lot of the best quotes are from lecturers that I haven’t had yet, leaving me something to look forward to in the coming years.

I got on the first boat. I originally was aiming for stroke on the 2nd boat, which seemed a worthy goal. There is no rank in seating position, but it seemed nice considering that I was previously stroke and it would be some sort of distinction. Ok, to be honest, there really is no rank in seating position, but in my head stroke is the best. So I wanted stroke.

Anyway, John, the boat team captain asked me if I would be interested in rowing on the first boat earlier last week. I was quite honored, and a bit confused, as I thought I really wouldn’t be that productive with the physical size of the rest of the crew. However, my main concern was that the schedule for the first boat is four outings per week and a lot of land training as well. That is a pretty big time commitment: I was doing approximately the same amount at the end of last term and it was taxing. So I politely turned down the position on the first boat.

A few days later, John offered me again. Refusing was difficult because I really would “like” to do it, I just know it’s going to make life more difficult. Of course, I have a knack of making my life difficult. The third time he offered, basically saying they were one short and slightly desparate to put together an eight. It seemed perhaps several people were in the same position as I: holding out from first boat because they knew the time commitment was significant. To complicate matters for John, the rules state that no fellows (those with professorships or otherwise employed in teaching or research), with which our college is well-stocked, may row on the first or second boats. This means that some of the keenest rowers who have been doing so while they were studying and now have jobs at the university are barred from the top two boats.

So I caved. I’m in the first boat, tenatively, and we went out at 7am today and it was -4 degrees C (23 degrees C) with what the BBC calls “Freezing Fog”. This is quite apt because it is freezing and foggy, and more so of both on the river. We’ll be going out, well, frequently. And I will be even tighter on time this semester than I was last semester. The upside, I suppose is that I’ll be rowing on the first boat, which means you are devoted the greatest portion of resources and are training with a committed and fit team. So, off to work so I can go to bed early… every night.

Short Update for Completeness I realize that I make it sound like no one else was going to row on the first boat and that they were screwed without me. This isn’t really the case, the issue was more getting together a crew in time to start training.

So rather strangely, the push for summer placements has already begun, even though it’s only January. In fact, it began at the end of term in December with a careers fair at the Computer Lab. Essentially, careers fairs turn up exactly four sorts of companies:

• Giant consulting companies that want to whore you out.
• Banks that have settled on fairs to sate their massive demand for fresh meat while allowing their actual hiring processes to be inefficent.
• Startups looking for cheap labor that reuse their sales presentation material in their recruitment booth.
• Hometown tech firms started by grads who pull talent because of the alma mater and proximity.

First, what I am looking for a job is different than what I am looking for in a summer placement. In terms of real jobs my priorities would be completely different. With that in mind, being in a consulting company is a bit of a black knight. They’ll treat you as they would treat a new hire, but assign you to an unimportant role on a big project and make you do crap work. It is essentially the guarantee of doing something worthless on a worthwhile project. And, for people who haven’t experienced corporate life it’s entering the deep end, so you learn exactly how terrible it is. Then, presumably, you give up and become an english professor.

A bank is a bit more interesting, except that most banks are so vertically integrated that they want computer people for computer stuff and finance people for finance stuff, so you will likely be placed in tech support or as they call it here, Information and Communications Technology (ICT). This is because they will deem you too stupid as a first year to be in the software group, which would be equally terrible because their software is probably crappy and convoluted and uses old mainframes. You will be mentored by people who regard your distaste for such things as a quaint reminder of their youth before they gave into the behemoth that employs them.

Start-ups, well, they will use you as cheap labor. At least, that’s what we always did. It’s just too enticing to be able to buy three quarters of an employee for half price and see how much work you can get out of them in 12 weeks. So that’s really good because chances are that you will write code and the code you write will be incorporated into products, and after you’re gone, they’ll still use it. But unlike a consulting company’s corporate drudgery, you have the garage spirit, which as we all know is the best thing ever. The downside is a general total lack of organization and the possibility of being given a deadline that is critical to the company’s survival that requires more than 50 hrs / week of work making summer a 10 week nightmare cram session.

Finally the best proposition is obviously the Cambridge based companies that have gone big-time. There aren’t as many as one might home, in fact the biggest name is ARM, the massive processor design firm which has astutely manuveured itself in the market. I can’t say enough good things about ARM from the top down. Symbian a mobile phone OS company, as well a significant portion of Citrix (due I believe to VNC) are located here as well. They all have big names, and they do big things, and I’m sure everyone would like to be involved with them. However, their minimum requirements for technical expertise far exceed what most first years possess (to be fair they are mostly looking for second year students for their internships), and they can pretty much take their pick.

So I have been investigating another option, doing an internship with engineers without borders or a similar aid group. This has a lot of appeal to me, to do something humanitarian with a summer that might otherwise be wasted on a TPS report modification project. Additionally, I’d get to travel somewhere new, something I can never refuse. And I have no doubt that an aid project would be a good resume builder.

Speaking of resumes, I have a serious problem in that I had formatted my resume to fit perfectly (and quite full) on a single sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 paper. A4 paper, the standard here, seems to be slightly smaller. In fact in terms of pure area it is larger, but it’s narrower… anyway, it has wreaked havoc with my beautiful resume. To further complicate things, there is a huge difference between what each of these places expects to see on a resume, and I ended up writing one copy of the resume for each company I’m applying for, which has led to a current count of 11 resumes.

Finally, after spending way too much time refining what should have been a relatively simple site, the Wolfson June Event site is up and running.

Of course, several things aren’t finished yet, namely the online ticket purchasing app, and the neato flash intro. The ticket purchasing app is a relatively simple problem (no access to write to the database) and the flash intro is a weirder problem. When I uploaded the site to the server flash doesn’t behave nicely and doesn’t redirect, and if I put a button in that should redirect the site, it gets caught by the pop up blocker built into IE.

But as soon as it’s done I can get back to actually studying, thank god.

I wrote this right before I left Lexington, I had the TV left on behind me and infomercials started coming on… Just in case you guys think I’m watching TVs outside the store like a crack addict.

I need this video. IMMEDIATELY. I was watching infomercials last night, and suddenly I hear “booty ballet” and moves like Stir the Pot, Bad Kitty, Churn the Butter, and a Squishy Ball. Apparently, in a long historical line of combining disparate physical activities into really lame workout videos comes the king of all videos:

Yoga

Booty

Ballet

Just keep saying it. Actually, that’s pretty much the point of the infomercial, the senseless repetition of Yoga booty ballet. Yoga booty ballet. Yoga booty ballet. Over and over. The best part was when this hispanic chick comes and says how happy she is that she can wear “two pieces bathing suit” and says “ehohga boo-tee bayeah” ten times. Best quote, “People see me doing the Yoga Booty Ballet, and they want to know ‘What are you doing?’… and I tell them ‘Yoga Booty Ballet!’”. Looks like they say it about 7 times per minute. IF YOUR BOOTY’S NOT SATISIFIED, GET YOUR MONEY BACK!

Finally, a question: is it booty or bootie? I say bootie’s on the backside and booty’s pirate treasure.

Just before I left, Peet’s Coffee in Berkley sent me an email notifying me that they had secured a relatively rare coffee which they called “Lost Toraja”. Unfortunately it was being roasted for first time the day before I left, so I would have to go to some lengths to get it before I left.

I know a thing or two about coffee. I’m a fan of Asian coffees and particularly of Sulawesi-Kalosi, produced on Sulawesi one of the islands of Indonesia. And to be even more specific there are a people called the Toraja, who live in the uppermost hills of southern Sulawesi, one of the least accessible parts of Sulawesi. The Toraja produce the best coffee in the world, as far as I am concerned. While in Indonesia, we went to a particularly snooty place called Tanto, short for “Tanah Toraja” (meaning Toraja Land) and had some incredible cups of coffee from a vac pot. I brought back some coffee which claimed to be Toraja but I’m not sure that it was 100% toraja and at any rate it was a bit dry when I opened it.

Sulawesi coffee is the least acidic of all coffees produced in indonesia beside Javanese. Javanese, however is mild because of overfarmed soil which lacks the nutrients that the tree needs, so it is also flavorless. Sulawesi on the other hand is full bodied and complex, with a mild sweetness and some nuttiness. Toraja is less sweet and more nutty, and slightly earthy. If you don’t pay attention to your coffee flavors the ignore these descriptors (because they make it sound like eating dirt) and just trust me. Toraja is the pinacle of Sulawesian coffee, which is the pinacle of coffee in general.

To make things even better, Peet’s is the best roaster in the country and prides itself on roasting any coffee the same day it ships it to you. Their roast is absolutely perfect, at any level from Viennese to Italian. Further Peet’s is very serious about its coffee, and often procure “special” coffees, like “Aged Javanese Peaberry” and sell them in special lots. Peet’s calls this coffee “Lost Toraja” because it is made from the hundred year old trees only, which have an “heirloom” flavor hearkening back to the days of Dutch occupation. It’s called “Lost” because it is generally mixed in with other Torajan coffee trees which are younger.

So, I did what any insane coffee lover would do given that I would be leaving the day after this was first roasted. I called Peet’s and told them to overnight me two pounds of it. I had two cups the day I left and while I didn’t have much time to enjoy it, it is absolutely delightful. It’s slightly more smoky and dark than Peet’s Sulawesi-Kalosi and much much more full bodied than the Toraja I brought back. It is spot on to what I had in Tanto. Overall, I would say it’s nutty, smoky, absolutely no acidity, subtly sweet, and there is a hint of peppery spice. Overall the flavor is really full bodied and complex but extremely drinkable.

I can’t have any now (damn it) because I don’t have a grinder yet. But I can say, if you love coffee, or if you even like coffee, do yourself a favor and buy a pound or two of Peet’s Lost Toraja before it’s gone. If you aren’t a fan of Asian coffees, try any of their other varieties, or even the Major Dickason’s or House Blend.

Packing again. Leaving again. Living between places is no fun. This time it isn’t as exciting since I pretty much know what I’m getting into, it’s really more of a pain in the ass. I did a lot of work, and got paid, but unfortunately I didn’t get as much done in the way of school as I wanted to, despite only working six hours per day. It’s difficult to work a small amount being the sort of person I am, it’s really all or nothing. Anyway, at least I get to see all the buds again and all that.

I will miss my bed and my avacado toilet.

I sat on this post a while, and I figured I might as well publish it before it’s 2007.

There are few things better on earth than best of lists. And since 2005 is winding down, I thought I’d take a moment to reflect and put up a list of the best crap of 2005.

Best Album: Be, by Common. A hard decision, and certainly no track off here is a stand out, but honestly no album comes close to approaching the masterpiece of Be. The album is a complete, from first track to last, and consistent. Rarely is an album, particularly a hip-hop album, more than a collection of tracks, but this album stands as one piece.

The only reason it doesn’t say Monk and Coltrane at Carnegie Hall up there, which was absolutely beyond belief, is that this treasure was actually in a proverbial time capsule at the Library of Congress, the original recording is from 1957.

Best Company: Apple. What a freaking winner. iPod photo, iPod video, iPod shuffle, iPod nano, switching to Intel, iTunes Music Store proves that you can make money in media on the Internet. What’s missing? Everything they promised for 2006.

Best Dead Famous Person: Bing Crosby, for the 28th year running.

Best New TV Show: My Name is Earl. It’s actually funny. And it’s on TV. How does that happen?

Best IPO: PartyGaming, Two Americans and two Indians operate an EU based company and prove that there are still good ideas left off the beaten track of the Internet. Namely, in online gambling. Particularly notable is Ruth Parasol who made her first fortune in porn, and has now moved on to using other sins like greed to sate her own.

Best Movie: None. I only saw two, Star Wars and King Kong, and neither of them was the best.

Best Country: China. Here’s why. I have very strong feelings regarding China. Sometimes I feel like I’m the only guy who notices they’re cheating. However, 2005 was their year. I think that 2007 will definitely NOT be theirs, and 2008 may be a total catastrophe (or great, they have the Olympics), but 2005 was their time to shine. In China you have a country which has accelerated themselves from third world to the greatest economic boom of the past 100 years. They have done more and faster than the United States has since the 1870’s. And we’re the economic superpower, kids.

Best Athlete: Lance. What a freak of nature that guy is. But in a totally good way.

Most Controversial News Story: Is George Bush a total idiot. And all the Iraq, judges, earthquakes, and uhh, everything else bad that happened this year. But honestly, God is trying really really hard to prove a point. Even I wouldn’t go that far.

Best TV Show: My Name Is Earl. That show funny. Carson Daily invented karma.

I got my tux yesterday, or at least I ordered it, the parts will be arriving and altered over the next week. Has been turned into a ridiculously masculine process. What is your size? Numbers. What sort of collar do you want on your shirt? Three choices. How many buttons? One, two, three? Gold or silver trimmed cuffs? The most complicated decision is the tie. There you get a choice of bow tie or neck tie, and several colors.

In some other store you can choose your brands, jacket collars… but ultimately at best it’s like buying a car. You pick a brand, you pick some options, and then drive it off the lot. Quite frankly, to me this isn’t really the way to buy clothes. Least of which a very expensive and very suave suit like a tuxedo. Not that I enjoy shopping, and least of which clothes shopping. But when spending money and dressing myself, I don’t want to feel that I’m led down a conveyor belt in the “Buy a Suit” factory. What ever happened to racks and racks of clothes? If this were a dress shop do you think they’d produce a check list? What hemline? What color? What sort of strap?

If I went to a better store, say one on Savile Row, I suppose I could tell them precisely how I wanted it. Or some place in Italy which probably has the entire world’s store of tuxedos where my eyes would glaze over in the midst of the sea of suits. But my choices are limited by my funds. And clearly my opinion is in the minority, as every run-of-the-mill tuxedo shop follows this pattern. What is it about men that they cannot seem to make a decision to dress themselves without hand holding? I don’t like to be treated like a child, and it seems a market of chest-beating alpha males has decided that being treated thusly is just what they’d like.

Not that I’m terribly disappointed, I got a good deal, I got a vest and all the garnish in my favorite two colors: white and black. Except the tie. It turns out they only sell “pre-tied” bow ties. And since I needed a black bow tie, I opted to skip it at that store and buy a real (untied) bow tie, so my package deal means I got a red neck tie. Yippie.

After buying my real bow tie, I had to learn to tie it. This is perhaps the most difficult knot that I’ve ever had to tie. I never had any trouble tying a neck tie in any of the various knots. I tried to tie it on my knee, I tried to tie it on my neck. I tried to tie it in front to a mirror, I tried to tie it with my eyes closed. It took nearly two hours to get my first knot. It turned out I wasn’t doing a particular very minor thing with the first loop that wasn’t mentioned in anything online. After this, I was able to repeat it a number of times. Yay. So now I’m parading around without a shirt, ripping my bow tie off and retying it a la Chippendales. Kidding.