October 30, 2003
Terrific Photo Series
My friend Steve in Alice Springs is an expert macro photographer. He's so good, his pictures sell commercially. He just sent me his latest gallery, a stunning series of photos of a beautiful wild gecko he found around Alice Springs.
October 29, 2003
Singapore Monoculture
Misspent lunch going from aggravation to aggravation, each aggravation being different from the next, but also the same. The fundamental problem is that Singapore has a tiny little retail monoculture.
Go to Sim Lim Square, the giant six-story mall of computer and peripheral shops. Spend thirty minutes trying to find a VIA EPIA mini-itx motherboard (cheap, tiny motherboards) going from one monkey-nut shop to the next. No one knows anything about it, and point like deaf mutes to the same Gigabyte and Asus motherboards the last sixteen stores also sold. Finally find an obscure store that looks more like a wholesaler. Guy does know what I'm talking about, says people have been looking for these boards, but they can't get them from VIA, because VIA demands a huge order. It just could never be absorbed in Singapore.
Disgusted with what was just a hobby project, I give up and decide to go to Funan IT mall and check out these Sharp LCD monitors. (Fine point: I actually tried to check them out at Sim Lim, but the Sharp shop doesn't even display their flagship 10-bit gamma corrected monitors there...) Show up, don't see the LL-1820, don't see the LL-T2020. Just see a lot of chaff. Guy comes over, I ask him, he says they don't import the 1820, only the 2020, and it's $3000SGD! (it's a 1500$USD monitor... ie. fucking rip-off) Come to find, they really only sell Sharp monitors manufactured in Thailand (except for the T2020). So I can't get anything good.
Very irritated, I abandoned the monitor browsing to go find a strong cup of coffee at Spinelli's.
"Short black coffee."
See the barrista reach for the espresso machine.
"No. Brewed, not americano [the most hated of all preperations]"
"No stock."
"What do you mean, 'no stock'" [as I look to the semi-dismantled coffee brewer]
"We're not making it today"
"Why?"
"Doesn't sell well."
"Then forget it."
Leave.
Sick and tired of this fucking place.
It's too small to make it easy to sell anything but the absolute middle-road product lines. The store owners are too lazy, stupid, and uncreative to try to find any specialty niches. Instead they're astonishingly content to try their hand hosting a store identical to sixty other stores in the exact same building. Consequently you find nothing here but the absolutely mediocre: Asus motherboards, Thai LCDs, and foul americano coffees.
Help me choose a monitor
I've been wanting to replace my huge old Dell 21" CRT with an LCD. I had in mind to get a nice big one with ten bit gamma correction so that I could do decent color work on photoshop.
My sister-in-law has a business associate who liquidates merchandise (overstocks, etc) and had a few models of LCD available. My thought is that maybe the savings are good enough to justify buying one of these monitors instead.
Tradeoffts? Neither are 10-bit gamma-corrected monitors and they're 19", not 21" or 23". The second issue is easily corrected by just buying two. Afterall, I bought a dual-head graphics card for that express reason. The first, I guess I'll just live with?
I'm not sure what to pick...
(@1.746SGD:USD)
Option 1: Sony SDM/HS93 /L /W /B 1000-1200$SGD (572USD - 687USD)
Apparently the expensive version has speakers. Yuk. No need, go with the cheaper version. Apparently the /W /B is for white or black. I saw a reference that /L is "limited 'Dark Blue' edition" Big deal.
Option 2: HP L1925 $750SGD ($430USD)
Conclusion?
I don't know. I notice the Sony has a contrast ratio of 700:1 instead of the HP's 500:1. I suspect ceterus paribus that's better for working on photos (mean more detail in the shadows and highlights).
Most everything is roughly the same (dot pitch, resolution, etc).
One possible difference is in the pixel response rate. Sony doesn't specify it. Instead they specify their refresh rates (which must be a misnomer anyway, since it is not a CRT)
Sony
• Horizontal Scan (kHz): 28k - 80 kHz
• Vertical Refresh (Hz): 48 - 75 Hz
HP
<20 ms pixel response rate
What should I buy?
==========
UPDATE:
The Sharp LL 1820 (the ten-bit gamma 19" monitor) is unavailable in Singapore. Only can buy a grotesquely overpriced 20" LL-T2020. They only sell Sharp monitors manufactured in Thailand here (read: mediocre)
Also never saw any monitors that were larger than 1820x1024.
The HP (I believe) takes DVI input, but has a lower contrast ratio than the Sony. Wonder which is more important factor? Of course I couldn't find any examples of teh monitors to compare in Singapore. Just lots of crapy BENQ, Sharp, and Phillips monitors.
As a side note, I loved how I could walk into a "LCD Monitor Showroom" and they were "showing off" their monitors by allowing nothing but the stupid Windows Flag Logo to swim across the monitor in screensaver mode.... You can really get a great appreciation for sharpness, color range, and ghosting with something like that...
October 26, 2003
Jewelry Interesting?
We realized there was a profound problem when my wife managed to bend her thick platinum wedding band into an ellipse, and worse, her engagement ring into an ellipse with a giant crack running through the mounting. This wasn't the first time. In fact, it's the third time we've had to have this custom ring enhanced, enlarged, rebuilt. Each time we underestimate the beasting Ah-Ling is apparently able to deliver. Seeing the damage she's wrought, you'd think she should be suffering broken fingers. We decided it was going to be the last correction, however, and had it redesigned into a less-dainty, more sturdy model.
I was facing a dull Saturday afternoon with nothing planned except a tedious visit to our jeweler at his new (home) office to sort out the details of the rework. Suprisingly, a thirty minute errand turned into a four hour visit that was one of the most interesting times I've had since I returned from Australia in August.
David is a ten year veteran of the diamond jewelry business, specializing in an exceptionally high-quality class of diamonds, AGS Triple-Zeroes (also known as 'Hearts and Arrows'). He showed us the difference between those and, for example, our engagement ring diamond (perfect symmetries in the reflections, shadows, and faceting, for example).
As we discussed things more, it became increasingly obvious how experienced David is, and so we started asking him all sorts of questions about his entire career as a buyer, jewlery maker, and retailer.
It was really a very fun afternoon, as we learned all sorts of interesting details I'd never have guessed. (For instance, I asked him, "so do you swallow the diamonds before you get on the plane back to Singapore?") ("No..." was the answer, in case you wondered) It turned a dull subject (repairing my wife's ring) into something with color and excitement (dramatic details of a murky business)
October 24, 2003
Whoa.... I smell a vacation
-
The Dakar school
A.S.O would like to develop the concept of a "Dakar School ", in the form of a driving training course (a week-end in France or several days in Morocco in real race conditions).
This school would be aimed at teaching novice drivers all the ins and outs of this extraordinary race, from the seeking of sponsors to physical preparation, and from navigating, with an acquaintance of the regions.
You can vicariously surf the recon for the 2004 race now.
They've added a dakar forum.
Ouch... they're pretty strict on journalists/photographers.
- Press Accreditation conditions of attribution
Only journalists who are title holders of a valid press card (National Card or member of ISPA –international sportive press association) and duly accredited by an official press group may benefit from a press accreditation for the 2004 Telefónica-Dakar.
The accreditation request must imperatively be made by the editor of a press group, signed by the latter and duly completed with the group’s official stamp.
Exceptionally, a person who is not a press title holder may, upon agreement with the organisation, benefit from a permanent press accreditation for the 2004 Telefónica-Dakar, if and only if, his request is accompanied by :
-
• A letter from the press company by whom he is employed, justifying the object of his mission,
• Press articles signed by him and published in the last two years.
So if you manage to get a credential, then you have to purchase either their "plane pack" (7000 euros) or "car pack" (4400 euros). They don't provide that much for you aside from meals and bivouac. If you take the car pack, you have to bring your own car. If you take the plane pack, you get "one, max two chances to ride in the press chopper."
So the whole thing seems very tightly controlled. I guess another approach would be to join along with one of the teams as their team photographer. I browsed, but did not find, for tour companies that take spectators following the race. I'd be afraid to freelance it -- seems like one or two logistical fuckups (which is practically guaranteed) would leave you hopelessly behind the race, and forever playing catch up.
Of course, the ultimate approach is to run the race yourself.
October 23, 2003
Double the Worst Trouble You've Ever Had
I was searching my server logs tonight, looking for badly behaving bots, and for referals to stoke my vanity. I discovered a strange referral:
-
http://moneycentral.communities.msn.com/StartInvesting/general.msnw?action=get_message&mview=0&ID_Message=104448&LastModified=4675443969382464013
Why is moneycentral linking to me? Normally in these cases, when I goto the site, I find that there is a "recently updated blogs" pane or something that just happened to be displaying my urlwhile the page was being scraped by GoogleBot.
Lo, when I went to the referring page, I was being linked to by the community discussion, but not in a nice way.
The joker had stolen my joke from March and then passed it off as his own, and to the great amusement of the others.
For a moment I tried to cast a reply, pointing out the asshole's plagiarism (word-for-word) but the stupid forum was handicapped by Microsoft passport. After two minutes of trying I stopped and chose another (far more delicious) tack.
Dickhead had plagiarized too thoroughly -- that was his downfall... Not only did he steal my words, but he had linked directly to my image!
In less than three minutes I had swapped out the original image with something a bit more savage. Now the joke is on Dickhead.
Now we can wait and see how long it takes Dickhead to be banned.
October 18, 2003
Another Lunatic
Sitting beside someone the other day, he was idly reading off headlines coming across Reuters. Each was duller than the next, 'earnings estimates released', 'budget battle squares off', 'crime ring smashed', 'Mahathir warns [Muslim World] cannot defeat world Jewry through brawn alone.'
I sort of chuckled, assuming my friend had begun making up mock headlines to spell the boredom induced by others. Then I realized he wasn't joking!
Mahathir, the ostensibly secular, first-world Prime Minister of Malaysia, was standing at the "Organization of the Islamic Conference" meeting in front of most every leader of every islamic country in the world, plus Putin, plus Arroyo, saying all this crap.
He retires in two weeks. It's nice that he manages to totally crack up before that, so undeniably. Otherwise he would be remembered as something of a crank but who managed to make Malaysia a reasonably successful country.
It's hard to totally nail him to the bigot wall when most of his past remarks were aimed specifically at George Soros or Chinese Singapore, but it's a lot easier when he announces to a world audience things like:
-
"The Europeans killed 6 million Jews out of 12 million, but today the Jews rule the world by proxy, they get others to fight and die for them."
and
-
1.3 billion Muslims cannot be defeated by a few million Jews
The guy is a bigot and a lunatic and was in fact, before this illuminating incident, probably considered an example of the sensible, moderate, reasonable Muslim leader-of-the-future.
I shan't bother to link to any of the spate of articles where he tries to color and shade things retroactively. The guy is a bigot and he does hate Jews and he is happy to tell everyone about it. It's nice that he got that into the open and now everyone knows where we stand.
If you think I am selectively quoting his speech, or engaging in some sort of character assasination, check out the International Herald Tribune article for starters.
God hung the Florida chad
-
He told one gathering: "Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. He's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this."
Who is this lunatic? Just Lt Gen William "Jerry" Boykin, the newly promoted deputy undersecretary of state of defence for intelligence. He is in charge of the hunt for Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, for instance.
Like a proper crank, he sees the Mysterious Hand at work everywhere. Not only sees it, he's got photographs of it!
Now this is only offensive to those very few citizens of the USA who are not staunch Christian Conservative, and as Rummy said, was "conducted in a private capacity," but to make sure he doesn't upset even that very, tiny minority who don't share his same views, "Gen Boykin told NBC that he would be curtailing his speeches to religious groups. 'I don't want to come across as a Right-wing radical,' he said."
=== August 19, 2004
October 16, 2003
More battles
Abuse of precious karavshin isn't limited to unsightly comment spam. Doing vanity searches through my http logs shows that I've been getting hammered by a number of rude guests.
Prime Perp is the NameProtect NPBot. It's a hideous and notorious organism that ignores all codes of civil conduct and regularly downloads my entire website and, by my logs, seems to waste at least 8MB per month.
Its purpose? Paying customers have it search for copyright abuse. Let's see... does that benefit me? no. does it benefit my readers or friends? no. Does it benefit NameProtect only? yes.
Ok, sign the Death Warrant and release the Flying Field Tribunal.
In fighting NameProtect, I also found a list of several other similar monsters. Spreading the love, here are the entries for your own apache .htaccess file:
#nameprotect Deny from 12.148.209.192/26 Deny from 12.148.196.128/25 # cyveillance.com deny from 63.148.99.224/27 deny from 65.118.41.192/27 # branddimensions.com user-agent: BDFetch deny from 204.92.59.0/24 # www.markwatch.com user-agent: markwatch deny from 204.62.224.0/22 deny from 204.62.228.0/23 deny from 206.190.160.0/19 # rocketinfo.com deny from 209.167.132.224/28
It didn't stop there, I looked through my logs and saw a few other sites that had gobbled a huge share of my bandwidth. My criteria was simple, go to their website and if there was no compelling reason that they'd be behaving this way, nuke them.
Death Sentences were issued for:
berg.dbsmarketing.net (no web presence at all)
looksmart.com (some stupid search engine)
and
informatike.ilab.sztaki.hu
Now I feel a bit sorry for sztaki. They do appear to be a legitimate organization, but their bot really gobbled down a lot of pages. By my rules, it doesn't benefit me or my friends, and it's acting crassly, so I am banning it. I suppose if someone contacts me with some compelling explanation, I'll exonerate it, but for now I will assume the worst.
Very provisional survival granted to:
Alexa. This goddamned search engine ostensibly is mirroring Karavshin for perpetuity at the same time it is building its search indices. By my logs, and its archives, it seems to be doing a lot more stuff that benefits it than me. If my archive isn't updated soon (February is the last update) this motherfucker is getting the Death Sentence also.
Anyway, this looks like it will be another arms-race, similar to the comment-spam issue. Fortunately I have logs generated from webalizer, which will point out rude, piggish guests, and then I'll simply Deny them in my .htaccess log.
====
Update: November 1, 2003
I contacted the Hungarian guys and they fixed whatever was the problem with their bot. (They responded within 2 hours of my email, in fact) Don't ban them.
I just ran
- bash-2.05a$ grep NPBot log-raw.txt
and got several hits.
12.148.209.196 - - [21/Oct/2003:08:54:47 -0700] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 72 "-" "NPBot (http://www.nameprotect.com/botinfo.html)"
12.148.209.196 - - [21/Oct/2003:08:54:47 -0700] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 72 "-" "NPBot (http://www.nameprotect.com/botinfo.html)"
12.148.209.196 - - [21/Oct/2003:08:54:47 -0700] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 72 "-" "NPBot (http://www.nameprotect.com/botinfo.html)"
12.148.209.196 - - [31/Oct/2003:14:58:25 -0700] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 177 "-" "NPBot (http://www.nameprotect.com/botinfo.html)"
12.148.209.196 - - [31/Oct/2003:14:58:25 -0700] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 177 "-" "NPBot (http://www.nameprotect.com/botinfo.html)"
12.148.209.196 - - [31/Oct/2003:20:35:56 -0700] "GET /robots.txt HTTP/1.1" 200 177 "-" "NPBot (http://www.nameprotect.com/botinfo.html)"
I think this means my .htaccess file is working. It looks like NPBot sends the http request, but my apache server won't respond, and it gives up. Now I did notice another ip addresse (193.29.77.220) that sucked down a lot of data (22MB) in October. If that continues, I'll assume it's malign and ban it, too.
October 15, 2003
Comment Spam: Fuck to YOU!
My problem with spams being added to my comments has recently escalated. They're coming more regularly, and instead of promoting stupid zipcode websites, they're promoting 'lolita' sites. That's too much. Must stop.
When I searched Google it was clear EVERYONE with a moveableType installation is suffering this problem.
Everyone has their pet solution, and many of them seem way too complex too fast, and all are immature. I'm not keen to start getting involved in collaborative blacklists and comment vetting queues and so on.
Pareto Solution?
So my pareto solution was to rename my mt-comments.cgi file something different. The hope being that the spammers aren't actually parsing my blog itself for the comment link, just assuming that its the default MoveableType name.
To implement this, just change the name of your mt-comments.cgi file indicated in mt.cfg, rename the mt-comments.cgi to the same name, and then rebuild your site.
Form Hacks
Some other guy had a crude little hack that wedged a hidden form variable into the comment templates, which mt-comments.cgi dies on if if doesn't find that variable. Again this assumes that the spammer is not doing a great deal of parsing of my specific page, just shotgunning spams designed around the default MoveableType installation.
The problem was, the guy didn't bother to list exactly which templates needed modified. I fucked about for forty-five minutes trying to get it to work, but somehow I wasn't able to find one of the templates. I just gave up when I stumbled onto the mt-comments.cgi rename trick. If that fails to work, maybe I'll pursue this one again.
Other Solutions
Probably the most "advanced" (complicated?) solution so far is by Jay Allen. It's tidy in that it doesn't involve hacking mt scripts, but it does involve a bunch of plugins, and then having new behaviors with MT, etc. I also don't like it in that it actually stills allows the comments to be added, it just doesn't display them. I don't want the fucking things cluttering my system at all, on both the user or admin side. I hope I don't have to implement this solution to find relief. Or if I do, that it is sufficiently matured that I'm not beta-testing this thing.
Of course someone put out a "noisy number picture" authentication solution too. If I have to go "advanced," at least that would be an interesting one.
One last solution was to lay honeypots on your site that could only be seen by a harvesting bot, and if touched, resulted in that ip address getting .httpaccess blocked. Not really that helpful. So what? I turn mt-comments.cgi into a honeypot? Ok, first time someone goes to that url, referred by a Google Cache or whatever, I've fired a false-positive -- the worst sort of failure.
Parsimony
One parsimonious aid would be a better comments/blocking admin page. I should be able to see a page with all comments for all blogs I am hosting. Each comments should have a "delete comment" and "delete comment and ban ip" link. And if I ban an ip, it bans it on every blog, not just the blog which suffered the spammy comment.
Conclusion
This will be a continual fight, but MoveableType/SixApart seems to be taking this seriously and is looking to create core functionality to aid in the fight.
=== followup ===
One more pareto solution is to stop google from indexing the comment entry page by itself.
It makes sense for two reasons -- one it prevents spammers from finding an easy hook to your commenting mechanism. Secondly, aesthetically, it's a really crappy search result for google to return, because it doesn't have any links to the original blog article.
To be clear, simply add the the meta tag to the top of the "Comment Listing Template" inside MoveableType then rebuild your site.
=== Update (11/09/03) ===
Here's the best summarization of anti-comment-spam strategies I've seen yet.
=== Update (2/19/04) ===
I implemented MT-Blacklist tonight. My earlier apprehensions were wrong; this is a good product.
Liquid 20 Maintenance Project: Service Manuals
Back when I was still in University, I had a $1000 Buick Century. My dad made a great investment and bought the official Buick/General Motors service manuals for it.
These were the same manuals that the mechanics themselves used (or at least had sitting in their workshop). Printed on tissue thin paper, the manual was split into two binders each four or five inches thick. They were full of troubleshooting flowcharts, technical diagrams, and step-by-step explanations.
It enabled me to do much more maintenance on that car than I ever would have otherwise.
Now a decade later, I have two Trek Liquid 20's. They cost twice as much as the old Buick, are nearly as complicated, and are definitely much cooler. The thing is, they're more finicky and complicated than my old 1980's Schwinn Sierra, so it's harder to keep them going.
I really like the bikes. I want to keep them around as long as I can, so I figure it's worth the investment to deeply understand how to maintain and repair them.
With that goal in mind, I decided to find the equivalent of the Buick Technical Manual for my Liquid 20. The problem is, a bicycle is much more like a computer than a car, in that it is assembled from openely distributed pieces... a PlexWriter CD-Rom, a Western Digital HardDrive, an NVidia graphics car inside a chassis supplied by Dell. My Buick was an all-GM product.
It's a problem because that means there is no monolithic service manual. You have to cobble together technical information from all the different companies that supply components to the bike. Hayes brakes, Shimano drivetrain, Fox shock, etc.
So that's what I'm trying to do here, assemble a collection of links and mirrors to provide a one-stop location for all the technical information available on the repair and maintenance of all systems on a Trek Liquid 20.
It's tedious and currently incomplete business.
Service manual library for a 2003 Trek Liquid 20.
Trek Liquid 20 Bike Owners Manual
The RockShox website is one giant 404 error (even product pages are missing -- thank God for the Google Cache). Most of the manual urls are dead.
The page full of service guides is full of dead links too. KindSoul@RockShox emailed me two of the guides:
Note that neither of these manuals is the 2003 Psylo U-Turn service manual. But presumably between these two manuals, you can get close to the right instructions. Since the same Psylo C 7 XC spare parts list covers 2002-2004 models. [mirrored] the designs must be very similar.
03 Aftermarket fork part numbers list is a big fat 404.
Available Online:
RockShox FAQ
Fox Racing publishes the owner's manual online [mirror] but doesn't provide any shop or service manuals, except for some tuning tips.
MBaction published a cool technical diagram of how the adjustable shock works in several different terrain conditions.
Reading lots of user reviews on this shock, it is said that Fox says the shock is not user servicable at all and that it needs rebuilt after eighteen months. (Uh oh.)
Hayes HFX-9 XC Hydraulic Disc Brakes
Hayes wins for having the most service information online.
Full Installation, Maintenance, and Service Manual [Mirror]
Shimano XL SL-M570 Mega-9 Shift Lever Set
Standard Link-Type Front Derailleur - FD-M571
RD-M750 rear derailler
It's not clear whether I have a RD-M750-SGS or an RD-M750-GS. The component itself says "RD-M750" but the Shimano website seems to have deprecated the component (replaced by M760?) so all I have to go on is the cached page.
Service Instructions page [Mirror]
SRAM Powerglide II 7.0 Cassette 11-34 (I think!)
It's not very clear the exact model. This is my best guess. The SRAM website (parent of the RockShox website) is just as bad as RockShox -- plagued by 404 errors everywhere. I salvaged a tiny bit from the google cache, but nothing useful beyond simple stats.
FULL SPECIFICATIONS
FRAMESET:
FRAME: ZR 9000 Alloy. Double butted seamless drawn tubing. Custom butted head tube. Bi-axial downtube. Triangulated Rocker Link design. Black Magic composite seatstays. Liquid geometry adjusts to changing terrain. Handmade in the USA.
FORK: RockShox Psylo XC, U-Turn, HC2 damping, adjustable rebound, travel gradients, 80/125mm travel
REAR SHOCK: Fox Talas R air spring, self-adjusting negative, travel adjust on shock, adjustable rebound
WHEELS:
WHEELS: Bontrager Race Disc: Trek Regional Team wheel; Disc-specific rims, welded for huge strength; Bontrager Offset Spoke Bed; Fully serviceable, cartridge bearing hubs; International standard brake rotor, no adapters req.; Race Cro-Moly skewers; 965 g, 28h front/1050 g, 28h rear
TIRES: IRC TrailBear, folding, 26x2.25"
COMPONENTS:
SADDLE: Bontrager FS 2000, Cro-Moly rails
SEATPOST: Bontrager Select
HANDLEBARS: Bontrager Crowbar Sport
STEM: Bontrager Select, 10°
HEADSET: AHS 1-1/8" alloy cups, semi cartridge, sealed
DRIVETRAIN:
SHIFTERS: Shimano Deore LX
FRONT DERAILLEUR: Shimano Deore LX
REAR DERAILLEUR: Shimano Deore XT
CRANKSET: Bontrager Race 44/32/22
CASSETTE: SRAM 7.0 11-34, 9spd
OTHER:
BRAKESET: Hayes HFX-9, hydraulic disc
PEDALS: Shimano M515, clipless
UPDATE July 2nd, 2004
I found a really good site for bicycle mechanics, good descriptions and good explanatory photographs.
October 05, 2003
Another Paper Review
Epson 'Photo Quality Glossy Film' (SO41107)
A6 sized (105x148mm 4.1x5.8") paper described 'Durable, bright white film sheets' 'Use for photographs' 'For brilliant Photo Quality color with the highest gloss finish' 'Use with EPSON 720/1440 dpi print mode'
Results were quite good I thought. Much less bronzing than on the shitty Epson 'Photo Paper'.
The instructions advise selecting 'Photo Quality Glossy Film' and if that Media Type is not available, 'High Quality Glossy Paper.' I only have the HQ Glossy Paper option. It apparently worked fine.
The paper has a corner notch cut in the upper right hand corner when looking at the shiny printing side. This is peculiar and not nice if you are, for instance, mounting these prints on a black background.
Price was 8SGD (4.57USD) per 10 sheets.
I would use this paper again.
October 04, 2003
Quicksilver
...That we need is a systematic alphabet--made so that the shapes of the characters themselves provide full information as to how they are pronounced."
These words filled Daniel with a foreboding that turned out to be full justified: by the time the sun rose, they had fetched the dead man from the gaol, bought him back out to the cottage, and carefully cut his head off. Charles Comstock was rousted from bed and ordered to dissect the corpse, as a lesson in anatomy (and as a way of getting rid of it). Meanwhile, Hooke and Wilkins connected the head's wind-pipe to a large set of fireplace-bellows, so that they could blow air through the voice-box. Daniel was detailed to saw off the top of the skull and get rid of the brains so that he could reach in through the back and get hold of the soft palate, tongue, and other meaty bits reponsible for making sounds. With Daniel thus acting as sort of a meat puppeteer, and Hooke maniupulating the lips and nostrils, and Wilkins plying the bellows, they were able to make the head speak. When his speaking-parts were squished into one configuration he made a very clear "O" sound, which Daniel (very tired now) found just a bit unsettling. Wilkins wrote down an O-shaped character, reflecting the shape of the man's lips. This experiment went on all day, Wilkins reminding the others, when they showed signs of tiredness, that this rare head wouldn't keep forever--as if that weren't already obvious. They made the head utter thirty-four different sounds. For each one of them, Wilkins drew out a letter that was sort of a quick freehand sketch of the positions of lips, tongue, and other bits respondible for making that noise. Finally they urned the head over to Charles Comstock, to continue his anatomy lesson, and Daniel went to bed for a series of rich nightmares.
Prose like this is why Neal Stephenson is one of the most entertaining novelists ever. (Especially the dry bits of humor here and there)
October 03, 2003
Back from London
Yeah, I'm back from London. I haven't totally disappeared.
However, I must confess that I finally got my copy of Quicksilver today, so this weekend will probably not be especially productive.