Blog Posts

• 14 May 2013 » Technical Debt And Process
  Technical debt and processTechnical debt is the thing that makes programming suck. It is the concept that as things are done not-quite-right, in the future they will cause problems due to unknown or un-knowable bugs, or trade-offs that were made in the interest of time. These problems are a form......
• 07 May 2013 » Why I'm Not An Architect
  Why I’m not an architectI write software. That’s what I do. There used to be a time in the world when that was a separate job from architecting the systems in which that software was to run. I suppose that separation still exists in certain large companies, too, but for......
• 07 May 2013 » What Is The Point Of Standups?
  What is the point of standups?Daily “standups” are a common thing in most companies these days. For those of you who haven’t had the displeasure, it’s a meeting, usually held at the beginning of the day, where a team goes over what they did yesterday, what they are planning on......
• 06 May 2013 » 2013 05 06 New Site
  New site!Well, a new skin. Jekyll upgraded to 1.0, and so I did, too. They added a new new command for creating sites, and I was playing around with it when I realized that their default styling looked better than my styling that I worked “long” and “hard” on. So,......
• 23 Apr 2013 » Managers Manage
  Managers manageIt is a well-known fact of the world that people who do a job tend to largely define themselves by this job. I believe (and I think that most people’s experiences line up with this) that the causal relationship between the job and the person is a bit smeared......
• 17 Apr 2013 » Boston Marathon Bombings
  Boston Marathon bombingsThere has been more than enough coverage on the actual events, so I don’t need to add anything to that. Furthermore, I don’t think it’s really health to add anything to that; at this point it’s all just reactionary speculation that is giving this person or persons the......
• 15 Apr 2013 » The Gun Debate
  The gun debateHow extreme positions on both side hide the truthI’m sure that some of you know that I’m a bit of a “gun guy” . That is just one of the several that I have. Some of my old friends from back in the day may be surprised to......
• 11 Jan 2013 » A Life Of Fear And Guns
  A life of fear and gunsIt’s been quite a long time since I updated this blog. It’s not intentional; life gets in the way. But I’m going to make an effort to be more regular about it.In the news lately, there has been an almost un-ending stream of stories about......
• 12 Sep 2012 » Positioning And Doing Nothing
  Positioning and doing nothingIn martial arts, we come around a lot to the idea of “it’s all fundamentals.”I’m a 2nd degree black-belt; why isn’t this technique or that working? Bend your knees. Straiten your back. Remember to punch from the hips. Etc. It’s easy to forget the basics when we......
• 31 Aug 2012 » Mysql Is Smarter Than I Thought
  MySQL is smarter than I thoughtSo I’m sitting at work, minding my own business, when suddenly: A wild query appears! And I do mean wild…I’m building a reporting class for a data hypercube that we have. The reporting class is basically a big query generator that takes a report object......
• 28 Jul 2012 » Making An Os
  Making an OSEvery year or so I take on the task of making an OS . It’s a big task, that deals with many low-level annoying details of legacy systems that never really got updated.On the other hand, it also requires getting to know more about what is happing with......
• 20 Jul 2012 » Response To Daniel Tenner
  Response to Daniel TennerDaniel Tenner, over at Swombat wrote an article that I read today called, How to hack the beliefs that are holding you back .The article was a recognition that shit you believe is likely causing problems in your life, and then goes on to list 4 “hacks”......
• 17 Jul 2012 » Picking Nits
  Picking nitsI see it all over the place. Even in tech articlesThat’s right. I’m speaking of BAD TRANSLITERATION!It’s “jutsu”. Not “jitsu”. Jitsu means “fruit.” Jutsu means “technique.” They are different.“Data Jujitsu” means “using data to grapple with fruit.” “Ninjitsu” means “The fruit of patience” (which is actually kind of awesome.)If......
• 05 Jul 2012 » Getting There
  Getting thereWell, I am closing in on the last few days of InsanityHoly shit.I know, I know. The whole infomercial-exercise-program. It’s supposed to be a scam. But this isn’t! Not at all. I’m not getting paid to say this. If you click the link, I get nothing. Google it yourself......
• 28 Jun 2012 » When You Stare Into The Void
  When you stare into the voidThe void stares back at you.We’ve heard the quote (even if I quote it wrong), and it’s one of those things that we all think about, sagely stroke our beards, and nod knowingly. And it doesn’t mean shit.But it’s come to mean something to me.......
• 26 Jun 2012 » Goodbuy Democracy. That Was A Nice Club We Had There For A While
  Goodbuy democracy. That was a nice club we had there for a whileJust have a readBasically, when that dude gets bought, he stays bought. He should get a big “political life” tatoo across his stomache in that stupid faux-gothic lettering.Part of me feels good that it’s not just the states......
• 25 Jun 2012 » Technological Hindsight; We Don't Has It
  Technological hindsight; we don’t has itI just read a write-up on the latest-and-greatest database to come out in the new db wars. It’s all about how MemSQL can do 80k queries per second on a set that MySQL can only do 3.5k.First I want to say bullshit. Anyone who has......
• 23 Jun 2012 » This Is Getting Rediculous
  This is getting rediculousRead this first. It’s a pretty good summary.Now, I don’t smoke weed. I did when I was a kid; it made me giggle, get hungry and feel stupid. I stopped when I got older because I didn’t like to feel stupid. It’s the same reason I’ll have......
• 17 Jun 2012 » New Toy
  It came!(That’s what she said)My new rifle came today. I picked it up over in Gresham earlier. I’ve been fiddling ever since.It’s a 16" DoubleStar DS4. I replaced the foregrip with a quad-rail setup. I’m still waiting for the optics to come in, but it’s going to be an A3......
• 16 Jun 2012 » An open letter to Rand Paul
  An open letter to Rand PaulI sent this letter to his office as well, but want it posted here for posterity. In case it isn’t perfectly clear, I don’t much care for him (or our current political system in general, for that matter.)Mr. Paul,I was excited when I first heard......
• 15 Jun 2012 » I still have some things to work on
  I still have some things to work onYesterday I went to the bank. I wanted to get a small loan to purchase some land. For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to buy 20+ acres of raw, un-developed land as a personal retreat space. Maybe develop it over......
• 12 Jun 2012 » The Difference Between Truth and Metaphor
  The Difference Between Truth and MetaphorThere are many truths in life. Some truths are specific to a place, time or circumstance. For instance, “press the peddle on the right to move forward” only applies in a car, but is none-the-less true. Other truths are universal, such as “gravity.” Our language,......
• 10 Jun 2012 » Leaky Abstractions in Life
  Leaky Abstraction in LifeIn computer programming there is a concept called a “leaky abstraction.” As the name would imply, it is not a good thing.An abstraction is is just what it sounds like; a way to obscure or hide details that maybe you don’t need to concern yourself with. A......