.:: chuggnutt ::. | These are not the droids you're looking for.
chugg•nutt (chug’nut), n. 1. part of the name “The Rotten Chuggnutts,” a public access television show that aired in Spokane, Washington during the mid-1990s. 2. term for a person involved with the television show. 3. Internet Relay Chat (IRC) handle and username for a variety of message boards and web services. 4. something unmentionable. 5. the online identity and brand, for better or for worse, of the author of this web site.

December 23, 2006

34

On this day...

  • Hanukkah ends at sundown
  • Festivus is "traditionally" celebrated
  • The Night Before Christmas was first published, in 1823
  • Eddie Vedder was born in 1964
  • The Emperor of Japan Akihito was born in 1933
  • Van Gogh cut off his ear in 1888
  • A whole bunch of other stuff happened

...and oh yeah, it's my birthday. I'm 34 today.

Posted by jon at 11:16 AM : Comments (6)


December 18, 2006

Fantasy wish list

I'm nerdy, no two ways about it: while thinking about the kind of things I would want for Christmas this year, I got to wondering about fictional gadgets and technology that I wouldn't at all mind having. So, as a perfectly goofy/nerdy/idle/self-amusing blog post, I put together a wish list of sci-fi/fantasy gadgets I'd like to get for Christmas (or my birthday).

(Incidentally, I do have an Amazon.com wish list here. It doesn't necessarily match the list I made for my family this year, but I'm just sayin'.)

Lightsaber

Forget laser guns, a lightsaber is the perfect all-in-one weapon. The blade is indestructible, cuts through anything, deflects energy blasts, and acts as a flashlight. Plus, when you're done slicing up Sith Lords, it has a ton of household uses.

Tricorder

The ultimate all-purpose scanning device and handheld computer. As the various Star Trek series show, there's really nothing your tricorder can't tell you—from general weather and environmental conditions to the movements and stats of hidden people to the spin orientation of quarks.

Sonic Screwdriver

Doctor Who's miracle tool. There was almost nothing he couldn't do with that thing... repairing any machine... unlocking any door... cooking meals... getting cash from ATMs...

Time-traveling DeLorean... or TARDIS

Gotta have a time machine.

For vehicular transport, I can't decide between these two. If I went with the DeLorean, I'd have to go with the fusion-powered flying version, but then I'd run into various hijinks related to the existence of magical automobiles in the wrong era. And, of course, the hassle of being able to get the car up to (arbitrarily) 88 miles per hour just to get anywhen. Plus, it doesn't travel spatially—you travel to the same corresponding point in space in the different time period. Could be a problem if there's a building there in the future or something.

But, the thing looks cool.

On the other hand, Doctor Who's TARDIS travels both temporally and spatially, and is bigger on the inside than the outside. Drawbacks? Doesn't seem like you actually have much control over where and when you travel. Plus, it always seems to look like a goofy blue police box. Or, at least the Doctor's did. Perhaps I could get one of my own, an updated, working model.

Babel fish

Yeah, this isn't a gadget per se, but man, being able to understand and communicate in any language without having to fiddle around with something as cumbersome as a Universal Translator...

That's all I can come up with right now. Though I'm sure somebody will point out that since I chose a Babel fish from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, that I should choose, well, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" as a must-have gadget. Nah. I figure I'll just load Wikipedia onto my tricorder.

Posted by jon at 11:08 PM : Comments (2)


December 11, 2006

I was interviewed about Lost...

Based on what I've been writing (ranting) about "Lost" recently, I was contacted via email by a woman doing a feature story about the subject who wanted to interview me (also via email).

The twist? It's a Brazilian television Lost fan site entirely in Portuguese.

Globalization, ya gotta love it. It's cool seeing my name and site in print, even if I don't know what the article is saying. It's here: "LOST" JÁ ERA? TEMPORADA DESANIMA FÃS E PERDE AUDIÊNCIA NOS EUA.

Guess it's time to fire up the Google translator...

Posted by jon at 11:56 PM : Comments (7)


December 7, 2006

Hack Bend holiday shopping guide

A little cross-pollination: over on Hack Bend I'm going to be posting a Holiday Shopping Guide, and I want to make it collaborative as well as listing my own opinions on where to shop for the holidays.

So if you live in Central Oregon and have any recommendations or want a piece of the action, let me know, or comment on my Hack Bend post.

Cheers!

Posted by jon at 10:51 AM : Comments (2)


December 5, 2006

These Santas are so wrong

SouthFlorida.com is running a photo gallery of kids scared of Santa Claus, which is gut-busting funny. (Really! I laughed out loud at a lot of these.) But some of these Santas are so messed up that I had to re-run them here. (But go check out the rest.)

Like this one...

Bad Santa!
Hard-drinkin' Santa

Or this one:

Bad Santa!
America's Most Wanted Santa

More...

Bad Santa!

Bad Santa!

Bad Santa!
Bank Robbery Gone Bad Santa

And while those are fun, what the hell is with these fake Santas?

Fake Santa!

Fake Santa!
Holy shit this freaks me out... it's like Night of the Corn Santa or something

And finally, I think we have what qualifies as Worst Santa Ever:

Worst Santa Ever

Via Boing Boing.

Posted by jon at 10:36 AM : Comments (2)


November 30, 2006

I need this gum.

Posted by jon at 11:46 PM : Comments (0)


November 29, 2006

What's shakin'?

Yes, I'm aware I haven't posted much here on chuggnutt.com lately. I've been focusing most of my writing energy on The Brew Site and Hack Bend recently, since I keep thinking of topical things for those blogs and I really don't want to become a caricature of myself with "Lost" rants.

Aside from that, here's a loosely-presented list of things that have been happening:

Thanksgiving was very nice, and low-key. We did the expected big dinner at my parents' house, though we weren't a big crowd. We made some excellent pumpkin pies with a gingerbread graham cracker crust. (Gingerbread graham crackers. Seriously. Rachael Ray is on the box.)

I hung outdoor Christmas lights on the house the day after Thanksgiving. The cold air gave me a bit of a cold.

The day after that consisted of generously picking up weary travelers Shannon and Brian from the Redmond Airport; Shannon confessed a creepy desire to pummel saguaro cacti. Whack job. :)

The two recent books I've read/are reading are Stephen Baxter's Manifold: Time and Manifold: Space. I think Time is the better written of the two, where he actually builds characterizations (mostly; he's not as strong here as some writers) for his cast, whereas in Space they feel more like mouthpieces or conveniences. Maybe he just got lazy, since he's sort of continuing the main character's story, and didn't feel necessary to rehash... or not. I don't know. They're full of interesting concepts, nonetheless.

When I get a chance (which isn't often), I've been thoroughly enjoying "Secret Weapons Over Normandy" for the PlayStation 2. That game completely rocks. I didn't think I'd like it as much as I do; I think a big part of that is the relatively simple controls used.

(Yes, that's me: I need simple video game controls. I'm retro that way.)

Anything else? Um... working. Nothing interesting to report there.

Posted by jon at 11:45 PM : Comments (4)


November 23, 2006

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone's Thanksgiving is a good one. We're baking pumpkin pies today (made with a gingerbread graham cracker crust) and heading out to my folks' house for dinner and family. Enjoy the long weekend!

Posted by jon at 10:47 AM : Comments (0)


November 16, 2006

About those people waiting in line for a PS3...

Something I don't really get about those people (mostly young?) waiting—no, camping—in line for days outside of stores like Best Buy for the PlayStation 3... Do they not have jobs, that they can take the time to spend a week camping out at a store? And if they don't have jobs, how can they afford to buy something as expensive as the PS3 (at $600)?

Of course, I don't get why people would camp out for movie premieres, either. YMMV.

Posted by jon at 11:48 PM : Comments (6)


November 9, 2006

Obligatory Lost post

I'm starting to think I'm becoming a parody of myself with these "Lost" posts. I'm also thinking about coining a new phrase: "to pull a Lost." It should be self-evident what I mean by that, but: to start out strong, have everything going your way... and then blow it. Which seems to be what they're doing.

Actually, last night's episode was better than it has been this season... mostly. I'll get into that below after the obligatory spoiler warning...

Here there be spoilers!

Posted by jon at 3:55 PM : Comments (4)


November 8, 2006

The truth about vampires

I realize I'm about a week late blogging this item (should have been around Halloween), but I just can't resist: Count Dracula not in the numbers, physicist says. A scientist is playing Scully to scientifically disprove the existence of monsters—vampires, zombies, ghosts, and so on.

Articles like this make me amused and irritated at the same time. I always get a kick of out it when a goofy, kooky topic like this shows up in the "serious" mainstream news, but it annoys me when they purport to have The Answer to things and get their science and logic wrong.

Case in point: his proof against the existence of vampires is flawed:

[Costas] Efthimiou takes out the calculator to prove that if a vampire sucked one person's blood each month — turning each victim into an equally hungry vampire — after a couple of years there would be no people left, just vampires. He started his calculations with just one vampire and 537 million humans on January 1, 1600 and shows that the human population would be down to zero by July 1602.

Now I'm not saying that vampires do exist, but that's weak. Yes, you've shown us that repeatedly doubling a number increases it exponentially very quickly, but this "proof" is hardly proof. First of all, why the assumption that vampires always make more vampires? If the vampire doesn't kill you outright, then you become a vampire. I think it's up to the "source" vampire. No exponential increase.

Second, couldn't some of these vampires be feeding on animals instead of humans? (Digression: wouldn't vampire cows be funny?)

Third, I'm sure vampires are reasonably intelligent enough to have figured out that if they keep making vampires, there's no more food left. I imagine they plan accordingly.

Fourth, where did this "one person per month" figure come from? That seems rather arbitrary.

So his reasoning is flawed. I think he would be better off arguing against the more implausible vampire myths, such as the physical impossibility of their not casting reflections in mirrors.

Or, you know, doing real science.

Posted by jon at 8:50 PM : Comments (4)


November 7, 2006

Lost A-Team mashup

I love this video mashup of Lost and The A-Team. I might even like it better than the actual third season of "Lost" so far!

Posted by jon at 11:55 PM : Comments (3)


Protolariat

This entry stems entirely from a gross misspelling/mishandling of the word "proletariat" on my part. "Protolariat" is not a real word; if you search for it nothing comes up. What better opportunity to create a new word and be the only search engine result for it? :)

So, what should the definition be? I'm thinking something along the lines of:

  • An incomplete model of string theory
  • A poorly-executed or work-in-progress "Web 2.0" site; possibly derogatory. "Friendster is a real protolariat"
  • Mushroom juice
  • A long piece of rope with a knot at one end

Coining new words with the power of the internet!

Posted by jon at 11:49 PM : Comments (0)


November 6, 2006

Kids + illness + birthday = entirely too busy

The "illness" referred to in the title above is our daughter's; she isn't seriously sick but has this cough that really kicks in after she's been asleep for a few hours, and this happens two or three times a night. It really sucks to have your sleep punctured every couple of hours to go administer meds or water or whatever.

Anyway. It was also our daughter's birthday weekend, so we were running around a lot getting things ready and such. The birthday party went really well, so that's good. Thankfully they seem to get easier as the kids get older and more autonomous. No need to give the little ones booze and sleep it off anymore.

I'm kidding. (Or am I?)

The only hitch was two kids didn't get picked up; turns out the mom who was supposed to be picking them up went to the wrong place. Fortunately, we had our minivan and cellphones, so we were able to take the extra kids to where they needed to be. That may well have been the first time we've carpooled...

Anyway, I'll try to get back to my regular blogging schedule. Which hasn't been very "regular" of late, I know. I'll get right on that... sometime...

Posted by jon at 10:48 PM : Comments (0)


November 1, 2006

More Lost braindump

No, this won't be quite the rant I did last week, just thoughts since watching tonight's episode of "Lost." In particular I thought tonight's Eko-centric episode was far better than last week's, but most of this is just braindump. Maybe some ranting. And oh yeah, huge spoilers.

Huge spoilers ahead, don't say I didn't warn you...

Posted by jon at 11:37 PM : Comments (9)