June 2004 Archives
... and I still have a couple of gmail invites to spare. I've been forcing them on people who had no idea of gmail's indescribable coolness. A few people refused. One or two already had been invited. Others 'already had an e-mail address'.
I must say it's great to have one e-mail address that is, as yet, completely spam-free. All my other addresses have to go through Knowspam first and having the gmail account for online buying/selling, registering, etc, is nifty as it avoids the challenge/response barrier.
On the day Field of Depth is 'noteworthy' at photofriday.com, the database craps out so nobody can comment, and I can't upload new pictures.
I knew there was a reason I stopped using my Dreamhost account. Unfortunately, my two Pair.com accounts are maxed out (bandwidth-wise).
update: Dreamhost claim the db is working fine. They say it must be the 'third party software', i.e. MT. I don't know, it's pretty uncommon for MT 2.6 to just stop working like that (An error occurred: Connection error: Access denied for user: 'cvodb@tank.dreamhost.com' (Using password: NO) )
Looks like my photo site is permanently hosed.
*Bangs head repeatedly against wall.*
update II: It's always the simplest things. Not sure how it happened (but it's a typical Dreamhost type quirk) but some file permissions got changed automagically. Resetting them fixed the problem.
update III: But I am still getting 'permission denied' errors all over the place. MT cannot write to any directories. What a fucking pain in the neck.
update IV: All fixed. MT hung on one particular file in one particular entry. A wild guess: maybe the server crashed earlier today when MT was writing to the file & hosed its permissions or corrupted it.
{ click to enlarge }
I have a balcony at the back of my house. It's got a better view now they've torn down the buildings behind us.
Long weekends are lovely (when they're migraine free). Good things these past three days include:
(click to enlarge)
So there's a football match on. But I've my own game to play.
As I cycled into town to wreak havoc on shop assistants, a bird shat on my shoulder.
I stopped. Cleaned it off as best I could. Threw the jacket over my bike's handle bars and continued.
300 meter down the road the jacket slipped, twisted into my wheel and I nearly fell. If I had, I probably would have bruised myself and the loan Rebel in the backpack on my back.
Do you think the universe is trying to tell me something?
Do you think it might be 'schlemiel'?
But guess what, Dutch post did their thing and my EOS 300d had arrived just in time for me to pick it up. I decided to be a nice, quiet customer. I only end up embarrassed when I lose my temper anyway.
And they never asked for their CF card back. Ha! I'm 256 mb up on the deal.
I took the loan Rebel for a spin last night (scratches be damned) to see how it works with my 28-105mm and I've come to the conclusion that the Cosina is a piece of crap. (D'oh, you might say) It's just soft all over the place, particularly with sunny back light. I can't find a lot of reviews for this thing - though it seems the Vivitar 28-105 is the same make. Opinions vary. Apparently Cosina's output is unreliable. Sometimes the lens is good, sometimes it's not. Mine obviously isn't. Hey, guess who sold it to me?
Which means I am or will in the near future be in the market for a replacement. The 18-55 kit lens that I will. eventually. have. ($*&%#!!!) is adequate, and I've got the 50/1.8. What would complement that? Maybe a 100mm prime? Or should I go for a 70-300? Obviously not a Cosina one.
('Course that lens was never made to serve on a digital SLR - it works fine on the analog camera.)
Can I pick up my camera tomorrow? No, I can't. The shop hasn't got it yet. I think it's time to demand my money back.
Hey Google-bot, catch this: Do not buy from Foto Professional on Nieuwendijk in Amsterdam. They are expensive, their 'service' is a nightmare and they sell you stuff they don't even have.
In a about an hour from now, I will be meeting my cousin C., the "my favourite cousin in the whole wide world" type of relative that one usually has way too few of in ones family. In fact I think he's the only member of my family who doesn't do my head in.
We have never lived in the same country and unfortunately this means I have not seen him since at least 1990. About a year and a half ago I learned that he now lives in Paris and we have been talking on the phone on and off since then. From our conversations I know we're still in favourite cousin territory. This week he's on business in The Netherlands. I hope he can find Dam square after all these years. I'm excited!
Update: here he is.
The good thing about having migraine attacks is that when you 'wake up' from one you feel completely on the ball and your brain steps up a gear. All week last week I was finding it difficult to perform the simplest tasks at work. Now it doesn't seem like much of an effort. My head seems quite literally cleared up.
Any migraine girls and boys out there experience the same?
'S worth all the hassle. (No postprocessing, no cropping.)
More about St Aloysius. The statue was a going away gift from a museum I worked for. The head of the museum suggested I bring Luigi to Ireland, teach the natives about chastity.
The EOS 300d is mine. Only it isn't.
Read if you want to share in my consumer angst.
Having tortured myself over the cost of this toy, this thing I can only barely justify buying, ("I don't have kids or pets to photograph, nothing worth saving for posterity...") I finally managed to get over it and fork out.
I decided not to order online, but to go to an actual, physical shop. A place with a counter on which my I can bang my tiny fist when needed.
'Ivo' was going to make me a deal. He'd take in my old Olympus OM10 body plus a 50mm and a wide angle lens, and he throw in some goodies. I'm paying 200 euro more than I would have online, so I expect some swag.
He makes me an offer (a 256mb card, a UV filter, a sun cap) and I agree, run my bank card through the machine and say: "Oh and by the way, I want the European one (EOS 300d), not the American (Rebel)."
They're out of the 300d, of course. They have one Rebel left, with a Sigma lens. Ivo says I can take it home, he'll order the 300d for me and I can swap the Rebel for it next Saturday.
Okaaaaay. I agree. I sort of have to, because I've already paid.
They put everything in the box for me and I cycle home, and get rained on. The closer I get to home the more frustrated I am with the deal. All that money, and I have to be careful with this loan Rebel for a week? All that hassle and I don't even get the 'it's miiiiine' thrill?
I unpack the box. What a bummer you have to charge those batteries first. Why can't they come fully charged? I locate the charger and the cable...
It's an American cable. Which does not in any way fit our Dutch outlet. I do my best Edvard Munch impression.
So I ring the shop. 'Terribly sorry, we have the Euro cable here, can you come get it? We'll give you a camera bag to compensate.'
By now my head is starting to hurt. I get on the bike, go across town again, pick up the Euro plug, refuse the bag (I have lots of bags) and instead get a polarisation filter. Ha! Just what I wanted. A small victory.
I cycle back home, get rained on again. Stick the battery in the charger, check my watch. 90 minutes to go. I start assembling the camera...
The Sigma lens doesn't fit. Looks like a Nikon fitting to me. When I was buying my camera, two other gents next to me were buying a Nikon D70. I bet they got stuck with the Canon fitting. Can't anything go right today? Fortunately, my own sweet 50mm and the 28-105 lens both fit.
I ring the shop again: 'Say, if you're a Nikon lens short, I've got it, thanks ever so much.' I can't help but be a little sarcastic. To be sure they get it, I tell them I am seriously pissed off. Unfortunately 'Ivo' is with a client so I get some other bozo apologising on his behalf.
So here I am, with a head ache, a lousy mood, an empty bank account and a camera I'm afraid to touch.
There is a counter and my tiny fist will be banging it next Saturday. And that 256 card I found already sitting inside the camera? They're not getting it back.
I've been watching Virgin Prunes videos for most of the evening. All in the name of research, mind.
It's almost unbelievable that the warped images on these videos depict men, no... boys not even 25. They wrote some heavy shit barely out of their teens.
If from now on I watched pap for the rest of my life, I'd still be allowed entry to music heaven. I've paid my dues watching 4th generation bootleg tapes of Dave-id Busarus vibeing out at a 1983 New York crowd. I've seen two men in quite queen-less drag jump each other, roll around in muck and scream: "Why. Should I. Be like you?"
I've paid 150 DM for a Japanese pressing of If I Die, I Die. I have all the early CD-releases. Twice. And I'd buy the upcoming remastered CDs if I wasn't getting them for free this time.
That place in music heaven's mine.
From Monday, we will be revealing the artwork and tracklists for five re-mastered Virgin Prunes CDs on Virginprunes.com. One CD per week until their release in September.
So come on all you Marilyn Manson fans, come see where Brian got his cue. Other Prunes adepts include The Sugarcubes (Björk), Michael Stipe and Kevin Shiels (My Bloody Valentine).
Look mum, our site's linked from Mute.com.
6A have listened to their users and changed their licenses accordingly. Since I personally had no big problems with their initial plans, I can only be even more appreciative of the current ones - they fit all of my sites just fine.
I can't wait for the personal edition of 3.0 so I can finally update U2log.com (re-design underway).
I wonder if switchers will switch back.
Hey. Are you in the middle of it?
No.
Are you at work?
No, at home.
Can you... um... I have a computer question. Are you an iBook person?
// you KNOW I don't have an iBook //
I don't have an iBook, but I'm sure I can help you. I've helped you before, remember?
Yeah. Well, you see, my mail is all fucked up. You know new mail always comes in at the top? Well now it's all messed up and it comes in somewhere in the middle and I can't find it.
Sounds like it's sorting on subject, not on date.
// Other phone rings //
Hello? HELLO? Well FUCK OFF so.
// Doorbell rings //
Now the doorbell rings. I'm fucking on the phone. This is my life. This is my life for the last month. Hello? How'ye. I'm on the phone. Yeah, um...
Your mail.
Yeah, um... it's messed up.
Are you near your computer?
I was opening the door! [...] I'll start it up. It's warming up now. Anyway, while it's doing that...
(30 minute convo)
OK, so take it easy...
But what about your mail?
Huh?
I was supposed to help you with your mail.
Oh... yeah, um...
What e-mail programme do you use? Entourage?
No. Um... I don't know. Just...
OK, look at your mail. See the column with the date? Go right to the top. What's there?
Um... there's a little light to see how much battery you have and...
No, in your mail programme. Your mail is divided into columns. What's at the top of your date column? Can you click that?
I don't understand.
Riiight...
I'm sorry, I am not very good at this.
Etc.
Knowspam, a very good spam-blocking service, has become a little unreliable. Development has all but ceased ('I'm working on other projects') and now the 'feedback' tab has been removed from the website. What gives?
(Knowspam has blocked 41,786 spams for me. It could be a whole lot more, but I use Mailwasher too, from various locations.)
David Bowie, about an hour and a half ago in the Amsterdam Arena.
(Yeah, that's off a screen, with the Ixus' digital zoom maxed.)
On the back it says I was a contributor to Collectormania (a magazine that folded in the mid 90's) rather than the more current and appropriate 'the editor-in-chief' of U2log.com. Shows you how these publishers still live in the dark ages.
It is bloody weird to see my name next to Bill Graham's.
A while back I went to see James Marsters' band Ghost of the Robot. I said at the time I was going to write about it, but after I posted the pictures, I struggled with a 'review'. To be honest, I was too riled up, too angry to put it into words.
Today I finally got the chance to write down my feelings on the show and possibly on 'actors who want to be rock musicians'.
I think I really do feel music is sacred, a concert is high mass and the stage is a holy place. And anyone who gets up on it and doesn't give 100% commits sacrilege.
A timely find: Sensitive Light: Data protection act (via):
Yes, but what are you doing?
I started taking pictures of people on public transport this morning. Stealthily, I'm not quite that bold yet, nor will I ever be.
For work I'm trying to come up with some kind of generic format, a standard number of characters for headlines, body text (for larger and smaller articles) and excerpts on the frontpage of a news site. This to make syndication between our various sites easier.
Hopefully I'll find some links (which I'll publish here). I'm sure this has been researched before, and there should be some theory to be found online. Searching is made more difficult because sometimes I don't know the right keyword to search on (what we might call an 'ankeiler' would probably be a 'lead' in English, etc.)
So far, just lots of 'how to' guides.
The idea was to hand over my poor decrepit 'mountain bike' over to the bicycle repair 'cooperation' around the corner. It's been sitting on my balcony gathering dust (from the demolition work at the back of the house) and getting a bit rusty - its tires cracked and flat.
I was going to hand it over and get back a shiny healthy bike to go cycling, preferably today. So I picked it up from the balcony and carried it down the stairs - at my life's peril - getting dust all over my clothes and grease on my hands.
When I got to the shop there was a sign up 'closed due to the birth of our twins'.
Bloody kids.
Plans thwarted by bicycle repair(wo)man's offspring I made my way to my favourite camera shop (where I bought my Canon lenses in the past) to chat up the staff, ask for their price and fondle the camera I covet. Interestingly they have both the European (EOS 300d) and the American (Digital Rebel) version - the latter of which comes with 'more software'. I'd still pick the Euro one for aesthetic reasons (red 'rebel' logo annoys me).
They are cheaper online by about 100 Euro, but it's nice to have a shop to go to, to complain and bang the counter and get that sweet 'we'll make a special price for you' feeling.
'When will you be buying one,' they asked and I said 'within the next two weeks'. If I can get over my 'oh my god the money!' vibe.
Starting up a photosite has made me realise I've had SLR's since 1980, but only recently - thanks to the internet - 'know' what to do with them - as the acres of crappy pictures in my dusty archives prove.
Fieldofdepth.com now comes with some sort of navigation, an archive, the start of an about page, a contact form and a links page. Picture descriptions have been moved to the 'comment' pop up.
Two things I want to do but can't figure out how to in MT:
All fixed.
Field of depth was ready to go not a day after registering it, thank you Pairnic! Did a very quick MT2.6 set up with assorted plugins. Future-proofed the URLs, started improving XHTML 1.0 transitional validity. Will probably add Photostack like everybody else is doing. It's sitting on that Dreamhost account I downgraded to the cheapest plan a while ago, but has accumulated a 1.6 gigabyte disk allowance over the years. What better to fill it with than pictures? It's nice to have them in a separate place.
Update: It's hardly rocket science, but still - yay, XHTML 1.1.