Professional Reading

I finally got my copy of The Haskell School of Expression. It looks like an interesting book, and will perhaps be more engaging than the other Haskell book I've got, Haskell: The Craft of Functional Programming.

As I read the introduction, I downloaded a copy of the most recent edition of Hugs98, which is an interpreter implementing (most of) the Haskell 98 standard. This, and the Hugs Graphics Lib, are used in all the examples in the book. There is just one problem:

Warning! The Hugs Graphics Library does not work with the February 2001 release of Hugs. We hope to release a fix soon..

And the 2000 release of Hugs98 is nowhere to be found. Since I'm not so expert a Haskell user as to be confident patching libraries (thanks to the helpful soul who made some such suggestions), I will be waiting for said fix. In the meantime I am left reading...

Modern C++ Design, by Andrei Alexandrescu. I've read his articles posted to the Usenet groups comp.lang.c++.moderated and comp.std.c++, and the guy is a mad genius! The first chapter of the book is interesting, and of course, it is all about features which are not available in the version of the C++ compiler we use at work. Fortunately, there is one inexpensive compiler I can get from Comeau Computing, for around $50, which Alexandrescu says supported all the features used in the book, so I'll probably be getting a copy. First I'll try the 2.95.2 version of gcc, but I suspect there will be problems...

Bush in Florida

Various articles have been making the rounds this week, most seemingly stemming from a Knight-Ridder story, reporting that ballot examinations in Miami-Dade indicate that Bush would have won the election even if the ballots in that county were recounted.

Get over it! the Republican apparatchik will crow. Bush is your President, fair and square. Well, he ain't mine. I don't just mean that I didn't vote for him. I mean that the majority of folks voting in the United States didn't vote for him, and it took a doubtful ruling by a dangerously prejudiced Supreme Court to put him in office.

No, he is the Great Pretender, the Imposter In Chief. The most remarkable thing about this feeling I have, is that I've been much less interested in the news and in American politics in general, since I don't really feel a vested interest in what the puppet government is doing. Is that radical enough for you? http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010226/us/media_ballot_review_8.html

Stuffy Snoot

My cold is fading, but reluctantly. As I anthropomorphize the virus, I see it 'deliberately' clogging my sinuses, so I'll only get five hours of sleep (as I did last night). In this way, the cold hopes to weaken my defenses and prolong it's stay. Bad cold!

Sick of Sickness

I got over the stomach flu, and this weekend saw the advent of a cold! I hate it when I get a one-two like that. It was also a bit ironic, as we were having a pizza-and-cake party with Kelly to celebrate everybody being over the flu. The pizza was Jean's idea, the cake Kelly's. "qbullet.smiley"

All Your Base Are Belong To Us

You've seen the Dancing Baby, you've seen Dancing Hamsters, and any number of crazes and manias which sweep over the Internet from time to time. For the past couple of weeks, I've been seeing references to the phenomenon in the title of this article. Now I know what the talk is about.

The line in the title is one of many fractured English translations found on an old, low-resolution videogame called Zerowing. The link gives the opening sequence along with much of the wooden dialogue. This apparently so tickled some net geeks that they began making Photoshop images where street signs and such were altered to have the text "All Your Base Are Belong To Us."

Finally, all this evolved into a techno-beat video collage of these images, found here.

Update! There's a pretty good story with links and pictures at The Register

Diet Levelling

Today I packed a lunch of a banana and applesauce, but I was just getting tired of this bland stuff. I went over to the company cafeteria and built myself a salad. I'm still constrained in some ways, though, since I explicitly excluded broccolli from the salad. A broccolli salad was the last thing I ate before the stomach flu hit me.

Jean was able to eat scrambled eggs for lunch today, so I think it's fair to say we are all on the mend. Real food is just around the corner!

Best Buffy Line

Many good lines this week, but here's my fave. Buffy's latest nemesis is a god who looks like another small-statured woman, but who can whoop Buffy's butt. So this episode she encounters a cute young woman, perky and sincere...who throws her across a room because Buffy is keeping her from searching for her boyfriend. Later that night at 'the magic shop', she is nursing her sore arm and says:

Ouch! I don't know about you guys, but I'm getting tired of superstrong little women who aren't me.