Carol rode a Canadair regional jet home yesterday, and I am mysteriously a much happier man. (We have not been apart for this long in one chunk since she was in grad school in Minnesota in 1976.) I have not in consequence been much inclined to write on Contra today, but I must mention something [...]
Posts from ‘November, 2008’
Odd Lots
A couple of people wrote to ask for a photo of Jackie, the gawky, lovable 26-pound bichon I visited yesterday. See above, at the right end of the group. (Compare the size of Jackie's head to that of 10-pound Aero standing next to him.) Jackie is also the only bichon I have ever seen who [...]
For This Beautiful and Extravagant Creation
Thanksgiving Day. Giving thanks is a special case of living mindfully, which is always a good idea, whether or not there's an open manhole a few steps ahead. The older I get, the more mindfully (and thankfully) I try to live, not only because I've discovered so many fascinating things to be mindul of (and [...]
Odd Lots
Yesterday's Wall Street Journal and New York Times (and many other outlets) reported that the Houghton-Mifflin trade division will be “temporarily” suspending acquisitions of new books. (The textbook division, which provides most of the company's revenues, is not involved.) This comes in the wake of H-M's purchase by an Irish software company last year. I [...]
Coming -Clean About Eclipse
I got the NASM plug-in installed into Eclipse yesterday, after a tip from Bishop Sam'l Bassett of the Old Catholic Church, who had spotted a forum comment that I hadn't. (The real skill in using the Internet is crafting your search terms.) Eclipse has a plug-in cache, and sometimes you have to empty the cache [...]
Going Into Eclipse
As I mentioned yesterday, my publisher wants me to revise Assembly Language Step By Step over the coming year, for release in early 2010. I had assumed for some time that they considered the book a dead issue, though judging by my royalty statements, it continues to sell. And that's a clue: When the market [...]
Odd Lots
My editor at John Wiley called and indicated that they want me (finally!) to rewrite Assembly Language Step By Step for a new edition in the spring of 2010. This will be a big job, since DOS will be jettisoned completely (and real mode relegated to a hisorical footnote) and a huge chunk of the [...]
Review: Hellboy II
Not much would make me want to be 12 again. Halloween 1964 was great good fun (and on a Saturday!) but soon afterward, life started to get mighty weird. Ordinary girls who lived in ordinary houses and had ordinary names (like Terry, Laura, and Kathy—not a Samantha in the bunch!) became mysterious, mythic creatures who [...]
Odd Lots
The pseudobachelor life does not become me, but I'm working on it. So far, the heuristics seem to be: Stay in touch (our cell phones are being given a workout), stay busy, and socialize whenever possible. I've also found that I must get out of the house at least once a day or I get [...]
Crossover Linux
Crossover Linux has been on my list for a long time, and I might not yet have bought it except for a peculiarly ascerbic but brilliant promotion that the notoriously eccentric company did prior to the recent election. I downloaded the 25 MB shell script installer, got the serial number by registering at their site, [...]