:: Track Zero ::

:: Thursday, December 26, 2002 ::

:: 8:00 PM :: 0 comments ::

a few days later...
wow. what timing. i have to say, as severe burns to the hand go, i really couldn't have planned for a better time...it left me out of commission for five days, which was just enough time to not have to cook any of the major christmas eve or christmas meals. on the downside, i've been unable to type very well until today...i finally took my gauze mitten off for good today...i had been changing the wraps once or twice a day, but i mean i didn't rewrap the whole thing this morning...and i'm down now to just a 3" square gauze pad on the palm of my hand. unfortunately, i've also had to stop taking the vicadin, since the pain is pretty well gone.

but at least i can still do whippets without a prescription.

the skin feels pretty weird in spots, but i think the creams and junk they gave me kept it from being anything too permanent. the worst spot is about a 1.5" diameter circle at the pad at the base of my thumb...it never turned into a blister, but it's still discolored, all which i think says something about the severity of the burn...they called it "partial thickness" but never gave me a degree rating...it feels sort of like a callus, and it doesn't hurt anymore...what's weird is, there's actually not much feeling there at all...

-J

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:: 10:36 PM :: 0 comments ::

vicadin high

so in holding to my standard practices for holidays, on my first day out of my cubicle-prison, i've given my self such a bad burn that i have to see a hand surgeon. first time i've been to the emergency room sicne new years 2000. i'm on a vicvadin-tequilla coctail right noew. i can only type with my right hand., i was cooking for my family and i grabbed the handle of a metfal pan that had just come out of a 450 degree oven.

i'm pretty dang whacked right now. here's a photo of my left hand after the er trip....
.

-J

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:: 7:10 AM :: 0 comments ::

jung typology test

if you've never taken a myers-briggs/jung personality test, it's sort of entertaining. according to my results, i'm a PBNJ. er, wait...no...that's from childhood's "you are what you eat" results...

I'm an ENTP [2 | 3], which translates to the following:
slightly expressed extrovert
very expressed intuitive personality
slightly expressed thinking personality
slightly expressed perceiving personality

from one of the summary pages:
"ENTPs are nothing if not unique. Brave new associations flow freely from the unconscious into the world of the living. Making, discovering and developing connections between and among two or more of anything is virtually automatic. The product of intuition is merely an icon of process; ENTPs are in the business of change, improvement, experimentation."

oddly, as an ENTP, i'm in the same category as Thomas Edison, Marilyn Vos Savant, and Weird Al Yankovick.

if i'm lucky, i'll be able to combine the intelligence of Vos Savant with the inventiveness of Edison and the mad-polka-skillz of Weird Al and find some way to parlay all of these traits into some master plan to take over the world...

or maybe i'll just have a beer and play some grand theft auto.

-J

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:: 3:05 AM :: 0 comments ::

things you learn at 5am

did you know that "hack" can mean "a cab" and "hacking" can mean "to drive a cab" and "hacker" can, by inferrence, mean "one who drives a cab" or by definition linked just there, can also mean "one who plays golf poorly"?

why do i have an eerie feeling that i'll be using this in a legal defense some day?

-J

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:: 2:10 AM :: 0 comments ::

you know, this whole "being awake all the time" thing gets old.

and when exactly did i start liking scotch?
-J

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:: 10:28 PM :: 0 comments ::

a different kind of drinking game

so those of you who know me know that i take a sort of perverse pleasure from screwing with people's heads. some might go so far as to call me "antisocial." those who know me better would correct them -- while the root remains the same, "sociopathic" is a better description...

what does this have to do with anything? well, i think i've got a great new "drinking game" that gives a perfect mix between drinking and antagonizing fellow humans. i got the idea from my friend matt's character in the movie Pub...in it, matt's character is on a quest for a drink, the contents of which are unknown. the bartender tries and tries to get it right. in the end, she gets it. but it takes awhile. so my drinking game plays off of that idea. the basic premise is simple...make up a word or phrase that could sound like a drink but isn't, then order it. sounds boring, yes, but it's harder that it sounds. and it's the scoring system that makes it fun...

some tips...first off, order it from a waiter or waitress who is not the bartender. if you order it right from the bartender, you only frustrate one person. if you order it from a waitperson, then they get to get pissed off at the bartender when it is the bartender's obvious ineptitude that is preventing the waitperson from delivering you your drink. naturally, this decreases their tip.

hopefully, you'll be within viewable distance of the bartender-waitstaff interaction. it's important for the scoring.

you get 10 points per person who is asked if they know how to make your drink until they come back to ask you. so if the waitress immediately says, "what goes into that?", that's no points. if, however, she places the order, that's two people -- her and the bartender -- so 20 points. if the bartender looks confused, you can go ahead and make assumptions when he talks to the other bartender and she shrugs. so 30 points. and so on.

20 points for each person who is not your waiter or waitress who comes over to ask what goes into your drink.

you get 25 points if someone pulls out a handbook or looks it up on a computer.

there's another 25 points in it if they come back to ask what's in it, and you say, "any good bartender should know," and send them back without any further clarification.

bonus 50 if anyone else at your table blindly says, "that sounds good, i'll have one too" without having previously been let "in" on your little game.

you get 50 points if they comp you anything in apology for either not knowing or messing up your drink.

you get 100 points if they bring you a drink without ever asking what goes in it. but there's a caveat...you have to go home and search the web to make sure it isn't a real drink. if it is a real drink, you have to send me five bucks to trackzero at track - zero . com.

for bonus confusion, try these tips:
specify a particular brand of a type of alcohol, which makes them think, "oh, it's a [vodka | gin | tequilla] drink."

feel free to say, "no salt" or request "extra" olives or lime or some other garnish. this just makes them less likely to ask for clarification on the rest of the ingredients.

find a way to get two groups of people at two separate tables covered by the same waitperson. arrange for someone in each party to order the same fictional drink from the same waitperson.

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:: 8:52 PM :: 0 comments ::

the coolest thing for a PS2 ever, 90-minute update

alright. i've had the broadq qcast player running for about 1.5 hours. another friend of mine got one this evening as well. within the first two hours of thinking "how cool is this!" i had the inevitable thought, "how much cooler could this be?" so i took a peek at my network traffic, saw communications flying over port 57005 between my PS2 and my PC. so cracked open the port on the 'ol firewall, emailed my current ip to my friend, and within 10 minutes, he was streaming mp3s from my QCast server to his PS2 on the other side of town, over broadband.

rockin. we're now working on finding an optimized video stream for broadband transmission.

-J

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:: 7:32 PM :: 0 comments ::

the coolest thing for a PS2 ever

if you have a PS2, then there are two things you need. one is the ps2 network adapter. they're hard to find, so if that link didn't work, and this link doesn't work, then I can't help you there. the other is broadq's qcast player. It plays MP3s, MPGs, AVIs (DivX encoded), and photo slideshows from your computer through your playstation 2. broadq is located right here in Austin, TX. if you order one, tell 'em TrackZero sent you. they don't know me, but i'm hoping if enoug people read this and order one, they will.

for additional cool-geek factor, i've got my PS2 connecting to my wireless network by plugging the cable into a Linksys WET11.

very cool.

-J

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:: 12:01 AM :: 0 comments ::

insomnia

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:: 9:30 PM :: 0 comments ::

vettewatch, part 2

so my original sales guy is back, and things are better already. i like this guy, his name is mike holtzman, working at james wood autopark in denton, texas just north of dallas. i recommend him if you're looking for a new car. anyway, so he came back to james wood today, and my official build date is jan 6, 2003. so sometime within that week, it'll be built. 12 to 16 days later, i'll be spinning 360's in what i'm sure will be the areas worst ice storm in the history of weather while i try and tame 375 unfamiliar horses for 200 miles.

on another note, i have no recollection of writing jephysics, below.

-J

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