No deal
News ·Thursday September 28, 2006 @ 21:04 EDT (link)
I have issues with the new Deal or No Deal game show; it's so very content free. For those that don't know it: there are 26 boxes containing dollar amounts from 1¢ to $1 million; the player picks a box at the start, and then has to pick a series of boxes which are revealed and change the amount he is offered for the closed box he picked at the start. First he picks five boxes, then an offer is made, then maybe three more, then eventually one at a time (so, if the boxes that are revealed are high, the offer goes down, and vice versa; it's somewhere around the average value of the remaining boxes). My problem with it is that it drags out so long. It's really a five minute show: pick five numbers, here's your offer, yes or no; if no, pick three more numbers, another offer, and then more numbers and more offers. You couldn't speed up Jeopardy this way, for example; the questions legitimately take time to ask and answer.
I finally got a haircut. According to the friendly woman that cut my hair it'd been 12 weeks since my last one.
Net::SSH2 has a spinoff module, POE::Component::Generic::Net::SSH2, although it incorrectly states that Net::SSH2 is blocking (it's not, see the poll method). He also makes an unprofessional comment in the perldoc about the libssh2 documentation (not mine, that's the C library backend).
I'm still not sure if I want to file for citizenship; I can now, and I suppose it won't hurt and I'm past the age where I need to register for the SS (that's Selective Service, not the Schutzstaffel), and as a permanent resident I can still be drafted anyway. Also they don't really care about dual citizenship any more (although they couldn't do anything about it if they did, except refuse to grant U.S. citizenship, since citizenship is solely between and individual and the government granting it). It's $400 to file, too, and probably a lot of hassle making (another) fingerprint appointments etc. (hopefully they still have my prints on file from last time, but what are the chances that anyone up there talks to anyone else for good? Sure, if I checked out Mein Kampf from the local library they'd be all over me like hot lead on an alien*... but to do good, never).
* "Like a fat kid on a smartie" is so overused. Guy Lane used to like "like white on rice" though.
So I just googled "Guy Lane" and first found the one I was looking for in a UW bulletin (talking about graduating seniors on the Warriors hockey team in 2001 after a win) and on Nigel Barham's blog Pray and Obey; seems he's a missionary in England (he has a great name for it) and is concerned about all the abortions they're having there and in Europe (he mentions Down's syndrome and Godwinizes himself; I disagree, I think it's better not to bring a child into the world to suffer that much) and all the Roman Catholic priests and occult workers in Italy, but I repeat myself. Excuse me while I drop him an email; we were at Waterloo together, and his brother Ted and I were in Ottawa for a while, attending Rideauview and helping out at AWANA.
We've booked a trip next month to fly to California and visit an old friend from my days at Hilton in Memphis, TN, flying on Alaska Airlines, the same airline that brought me here for the initial interview and moved us out here. They give out little cards with pictures and Bible verses on them; they were a great encouragement when I first got one on the long trip out here from Boston. It'll be our first time in California, so we're fairly excited. Also it'll be good to see Bob again and meet his family.
And ack, I really need to put up those blinds in the dining room. A TV show gave me a good idea for it... instead of getting a dining table, we could put a ping pong table in there (it was a pool table in the show, but we prefer ping pong).
