Stark Raving Mad

Strange, that some of us, with quick alternate vision, see beyond our infatuations, and even while we rave on the heights, behold the wide plain where our persistent self pauses and awaits us.
-- George Eliot

Thursday, November 11, 1999
One year ago: Out the Door
Two years ago: Orycon III

After conferring with Jack today, I decided that instead of taking the train to Portland early Friday morning (for Orycon 21), it will work ok if I ride down with him. The only thing stopping me was concern about what time he would leave work to start the trip, but it turns out he's taking the whole day off. The cable folks are finally going to install his modem after several botched appointments and he'll be free to leave after that. (And after his daughter gets home from school, around noon.)

At work, Chip and I went to lunch with a buddy of his, who possibly might come to work with us. We went (again!) to the Mongolian grill spot a few blocks from the office. This time I wasn't surprised that we drove, since it was raining pretty hard. I can see why this spot is so popular with groups from Microsoft, and others. You don't have to wait for someone to take your order, you pick your ingredients yourself, and you get to watch them cook it. Health, efficiency, entertainment, all in one! We talked about the bike trip that Chip's friend had made all over Europe recently.

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In the afternoon, Chip and I did a code review on the two classes for one of our applets that we need to make a few changes in. Reassuring yet scary -- when we got to the key functions, Chip started saying "What is this! I don't get what's going on here." Reassuring to know that even an experienced developer (though not a super Java whiz) had trouble figuring out the section in question, but scary to think that it's so complex that he had that trouble. We did find a few easy things to change, and some possible dead code that can be eliminated. We were done late in the day, and Chip suggested I should take a shot at making the fixes and recompiling. "Sure!" I said, "but I think I'll wait until Monday." I didn't have the brainpower left to concentrate as I would need to.

After a pasta dinner at the mall (tortellini with pesto sauce, oddly bland), I drove home, grabbed the sack lunches for the homeless men, then drove over to St. Joseph's. The coordinator (besides calling to remind me that I was sheduled a few days ago, thank heaven) had warned me that the winter shelter this year is moved to the school cafeteria instead of the parish center, because of a construction project happening at the old place. When I got there, the man who would be spending the night with the homeless men was wandering around baffled -- the new location was new to him as well, Did I know where the notebook was with the info for volunteers? Did I know where the keys were? But I knew nothing of all that. I only know about the food! The door to the kitchen was open, so I was able to drop off my sacks and get home to watch TV.

For the first time, I actually saw Stark Raving Mad instead of listening to it on a TV-sound radio. I knew who the two lead actors were, so I had a good image of Neil Patrick "Doogie" Harris and Tony "Big Night" Shaloub already, but this was the first time I saw the other characters, and the sets. I think I liked my mental image better! If you try this no-picture method of watching TV sometime, let me know what you think of it.