Reading List and Blog O' Whirl

Longest German Word

2008-08-08T09:37:00.002-04:00

Whenever you need a new word in German, just join the words in the definition together:

Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz - "beef labeling regulation & delegation of supervision law"

Longest German Words

German Word of the Year

Ask an expert

2008-07-30T10:01:00.002-04:00

No Relief from $120 Oil Anytime Soon -- or Ever, says Energy Expert and Oil falls below $122 on worries over US demand side by side.

Updated 8/4/2008:
Oil prices drop over $4 after tropical storm threat eases, US consumer spending falls:

...falling below $120 a barrel for the first time since early May...

Salonpas

2008-04-15T19:12:00.003-04:00

Salonpas... like a chemical heating pad and ice pack. The menthol wears off quickly, and the heating affect is as hot as the thermacare heat wraps.

The Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee Featured on the Travel Channel

2008-03-07T19:41:00.000-05:00

Mavis Bank, not the shipper.

Hot Stuff

2008-02-15T11:35:00.002-05:00

Kashmir Dum Aloo by Ashoka.

This is described as "Curried potatoes in medium hot sauce." "Medium" is definitely an Indian palate relative rating, because this is definitely near the "hot" scale for me, and I love spicy Thai and Indian food.

Thai and Indian Meals

2008-02-13T12:06:00.002-05:00

Pad Thai, Curry, and Pad Grapow Mix

Pad Thai

Palak Paneer

Dal Makhani

Buffalo Wild Wings calorie equivalents?

2008-02-02T13:32:00.000-05:00

I've been searching extensively for Buffalo Wild Wings calorie content on the web, and have heard of many responses that they don't provide content because of their extensive menu.

Whatever.

Well, here is at least one "similar" option for the wings:
WingStreet's (Pizza Hut) Nutrition Guide

Garmin 305s now going cheap

2007-12-26T09:26:00.000-05:00

It looks like the Garmin 305 (with heart rate monitor) is going for less than $200.

35 Years of Sesame Street Music... Boxed Set

2007-11-17T11:14:00.000-05:00

Good stuff at mile 20 of a marathon

2007-11-12T09:23:00.001-05:00

The OBX Marathon had this stuff at their medical stations. Excellent stuff. Got me through some quad and calf muscle pain.

1997 Toyota Corolla Parts Store

2007-09-28T13:40:00.000-04:00

Toyota Parts and Books on Amazon.com

If you're a fan of Office Space...

2007-08-20T15:48:00.000-04:00

Office Space Kit, including:

Red Stapler
Initech Mug
"Is this Good for the Company?" Sign
Starter "Flair"
"PC Load Letter" Copy Machine Sticker
Your Very Own "Jump To Conclusions" Mat

An Initech mug by itself:

Norton Ghost 12.0: My latest favorite tool

2007-08-20T13:04:00.000-04:00

Just used Norton Ghost to upgrade/replace a hard drive that was in the early stages of failing--it had had a few intermittent blue screen/reboots:

This was a HP Pavilion zv5000 laptop with a 60GB drive and XP Home.

Event Viewer showed several things of note around the reboot times:
Got a bug check: 0x0000007a (0xc03dd9a4, 0xc000000e, 0xf7669130, 0x0737e860)

The error is The device .\Device\Ide\IdePort0, did not respond within the timeout period.

An error was detected on device \Device\Harddisk0\D during a paging operation.

Ran the whole chkdsk /r and chkdsk /f bit. Found 4KB in bad sectors--but more importantly, I heard the tell-tale sound of a hard drive beginning to fail.

Miraculously, Ghost 12.0 was able to make a disk copy of the hard drive (and properly resize) to an 80 GB hard drive. The only catch left is that the "bad sector" flags are copied as well. Not a big deal in this case, but here's a page with a resolution: The $BadClus metatfile.

Because of the failing drive, the copy operation for 10 GB of data (4500 RPM drive) took close to two hours. I'd imagine the faster hard drive in better condition would have a significantly better transfer rate.

Once the disk copy was finished, I swapped hard drives out and the new drive booted almost exactly as old. One glitch: XP Pro/2003 boot option was added as a second option, in addition to the valid XP Home boot. No problem... I just had to edit the boot.ini.

Split times necessary for a 4 hour marathon

2007-08-16T12:09:00.000-04:00

You can now buy your tank on Amazon.com

2007-08-14T13:42:00.000-04:00

"Not recommended for a drunken rampage"

Apple iPod Nano World Travel Combo

2007-08-06T14:20:00.000-04:00

The basic 2 GB iPod nano (2nd generation):

Apple iPod USB power adapter:

Apple world travel adapter kit:

Gladware versus Pyrex Containers (cost-wise)

2007-07-24T22:42:00.000-04:00

I prefer the Pyrex for packing and warming leftovers, and apparently the cost difference is not that great (the 8-cup Gladware is more in this instance). I find that the Gladware (or any plastic-ware for that matter) gets lost much more easily, and requires replacing from loss if not from wear. Moreover, the blue lid and glass of the Pyrex containers are definitely more forgiving when it comes to forgotten leftovers.

Pyrex 18-piece storage set; $29.99 or $1.66 per piece.

versus Gladware:

Gladware 1-3/4 cup (6 pack of 5 piece); $19.32 or $0.64 each

Gladware 8 cup (3 count), $5.99 or $2.00 each

Giant beige bath towels

2007-07-24T19:26:00.000-04:00

Nothing says, 'I have no idea what to get you,' quite like giant beige bath towels.

Larabar vs. Soyjoy

2007-07-21T14:59:00.000-04:00

Larabar wins hands down. Much better, sweeter taste. Moist texture. Pecan Pie has been one of my favorites. Over 50% fat, but most is polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fat. 100% raw food, made from dates, nuts, etc...

Soyjoy is dry, flavorless (mango coconut was horrible). 60 out of 140 calories from fat. 3.5g of the fat is saturated. Other flavors have 40 out of 140 from fat, with 2g of saturated. One of the things that surprised the most was the ingredients list:

Ingredients: Whole Soybean Powder, Raisin, Butter (from milk), Sugar, Dried Coconut, Frozen Egg, Maltodextrin (natural fiber source), Dried Papaya, Dried Mango, Dried Pineapple, Natural Flavors, Salt.

I have nothing against soy, but I'd figure that soy would generated be eaten as a meat or daily substitute. Soyjoy is definitely not a vegan product, despite the name. It's not very enjoyable, either.

Larabar

Soyjoy

With most PC options out there shipping with Vista, I think I want a mac.

2007-07-18T16:46:00.000-04:00

$1499 versus a $1250 with Windows XP Pro, I'm really starting to consider a Mac as my next computer. Thinking about it and doing it are two different things, though.

Saving for Retirement with Living Like a Pauper or Winning the Lottery

2007-07-16T00:07:00.001-04:00

The title may sound like the book is going to uncover lost secrets of getting rich, but in reality, this is book is a retirement savings manual written especially for novices. In addition to explaining the magic of everyday retirement savings, this book gives links to several additional resources and explanations of how to use those resoucres.

Sites that I bookmarked from reading this book:
http://www.americasaves.org/ - savings ideas
http://www3.troweprice.com/ric/RIC/ - T-Rowe Price Retirement Income Calculator, using a Monte Carlo simulation to determine how long your savings will last.
http://www.moneychimp.com/ - compounding calculator under calculators
http://www.dinkytown.com/ - lots of calculators, including a retirement income and mutual fund fee calculator
http://www.choosetosave.org/ - site partially funded by the AARP which includes a "ballpark estimate" for how much you will need for a comfortable retirement.
http://www.bloomberg.com/invest/calculators/index.html
http://www.livingto100.com/ - Life Expectancy Calculator

They still make TI-89s?

2007-07-12T09:06:00.000-04:00

I thought for sure that TI-89 graphing calculators would have been obsolete by now. But not only are they for sale on Amazon, but they seem to not have changed in price much.

Mac OS X Leopard Pre-order on Amazon

2007-07-11T10:00:00.000-04:00

MAC OS X Version 10.5 Leopard is a available for pre-order on Amazon.com.

Product will ship "sometime in October."

Jamaica Blue Mountain for $31.24 per pound

2007-07-10T10:52:00.000-04:00

Not a bad price for Jamaica Blue Mountain, cheapest I've heard of is $35 per pound.

I have got to get me one of these.

2007-07-10T08:45:00.000-04:00

I was searching for quad core on Amazon.com. I noticed that there were (5) desktops and (1) notebook. Actually, I think it was more like 2 desktops in reality... the others were processors.

I clicked on the quad-core notebook result. Not a notebook... 70 lbs. I believe it also sells for more like $2400, anyway.

Somewhat haphazard technical specs...

2(two) Quad Core Xeon Intel Xeom X5355 2.66 Ghz (xeom... that's a new one on me. I wonder if the misspelling is intentional)
BOOT 160gb sata hd, 10k rpm with 16 mb databurst cache
160gb sata hd, 2(two)500 sata hd, FD,
16 GB ddr2 sdram(8 DIMMS), 48X/32X CDRW/DVD
Sound blaster X-Fi, 256 MB PCIe nVidia quadro FX3450. DUAL DVI

Favorite Crystal Light Flavor Ever

2007-07-07T09:18:00.000-04:00

I know that people either love the White Tea Blueberry Crystal Light (TM) or they hate it... I generally don't like the fruit flavored Crystal Light (TM) or Sugar-Free Kool-Aid (TM) because they have too much fruit flavor and the aspartame flavor really seems to accompany that fruit flavoring. The white tea and blueberry are just strong enough to balance with the artificial sweetener in this case. Strangely enough, this flavor for some reason reminds me of RealLemon(TM) and Lipton(TM) Tea that I used to brew and add a 1/4 cup of sugar to.

Romancing the Clock

2007-07-06T13:13:00.000-04:00

"Accentuate the positives and reduce the negatives in your life." Reduce stress. Put things in perspective. Hire someone to mow the grass if you don't like doing it. Don't fight battles that cost you the war.

Some points of this book seemed a little bit excessive if taken literally, but I think the book as a whole is more of a self-help book for examining how you are spending your time. Sometimes the "accentuate the positives" and "reduct the negatives" is over-simplistic, but the stark examples help drive home a point as well. Since I enjoy having perspective shaken up once in a while, I enjoyed this book. If you're not both open-minded and willing to take advice with a grain of salt, this book may not be a good fit for you.

Super Pac Man TV Game

2007-07-06T12:42:00.000-04:00

If you're a Pac-Man fan, this handy piece of nostalgia will interest you. Pac-Man, Pac-Man Plus, Super Pac-Man, and Pac & Pal. I had always enjoyed playing Super Pac-Man and Pac-Man and had read about the other two games. Pac-Man Plus is an almost frustratingly difficult version of of Pac-Man. I've never had a problem breezing through levels on Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Junior, and Super... but Pac-Man Plus throws a wrench in my usual strategies. Pac & Pal is almost more pure puzzle game than its siblings. All will provide a quick diversion or hours of entertainment for you.

Cheapest 100-pk spindles of 80-min CDs, DVD+Rs, and DVD-Rs

2007-07-06T10:21:00.000-04:00

CD-R

DVD+R

DVD-R

Preferred Paper for Printing with a Canon i860

2007-06-19T10:22:00.000-04:00

After experimenting with various types of paper for photo printing, we've found that the Epson photo paper produces the best results on our Canon Printer:

Anti-spyware change of heart.

2007-05-14T22:05:00.000-04:00

Spy Sweeper is my new anti-spyware solution of choice. I started out using Ad-Aware, but I ran across spyware that I was trying to remove that Ad-Aware could not take care of.

At that time, I stumbled upon both the Microsoft Anti-Spyware Tool and Sunbelt CounterSpy. Both tools did an exceptional job, and went with CounterSpy because it was advertised as the creator of the engine for both products.

In two years of use, CounterSpy bogged down my 2.8Ghz P4 with Win2k and 1 GB RAM. I also had quite a few false positives in those two years. With a recent update, CounterSpy constantly disabled itself on my Win2k system.

I decided to switch over to one of the top recommendations from a Consumer Reports article... Webroot Spy Sweeper... as far as I can tell so far, Spy Sweeper is using only 8MB of RAM while not conducting a scan.

O'Reilly Book: Programming C#

2007-05-14T20:41:00.000-04:00

Programming C#: Building .NET Applications with C#

I'm not always impressed with books published under the O'Reilly label. I usually find them much more useful as a reference guide than a learning tool.

This book, however, stands out. As someone well-versed in Java and C++ concepts, this book was a helpful introduction to C#. Whenever a topic was presented in which Visual Basic, C++ or Java differed, there was an information box for the section pointing out the differences in C# compared to the other language mentioned.

How Not to Program in C++

2007-05-14T20:30:00.000-04:00

How Not to Program in C++: 111 Broken Programs and 3 Working Ones, or Why Does 2 + 2 = 5986
I expected many great things from this book. I got mixed results. I usually enjoy figuring out "Bugs of the Day" and the like, but this was book was largely a mix of grading papers from an introductory programming class and debugging buggy programs at work.

Low points:

Debugging printf format specifiers and forward slash for escaping characters.
A few fairly long programs with somewhat trivial errors.

High points:

Bugs encountered as a result of optimizing compilers.
Exploring of lesser used features of the C/C++ language
Some interesting puzzles to find where initialization and/or destruction order went wrong.

Insight wants to save you money

2007-03-13T20:29:00.001-04:00

Insight wants to save you money by only raising your bill by $10 per month

Success for Dummies

2006-12-17T16:11:00.000-05:00

This book is an excellent inspirational dummies book by Zig Ziglar. Covered in this book are topics from defining success to setting goals to staying focused and positive on your goals. Success in work, life, parenting, and marriage are covered. If you're familiar with any of Zig Ziglar's writing or courses, this book will have a familiar ring to it.

Who Were the Early Israelities and Where Did They Come From?

2006-11-10T22:26:00.000-05:00

For someone who is not a Middle East archaelogist, this book could potentially be overwhelming: The synthesis in the last few chapters reads faster than most pages in the early part of the book.

William Dever speaks to the question that is the title of the book from an objective point of view, truly mapping the common ground between the Bible and the archaelogy of the early-Israelite periods in the region. Anyone looking to fully prove or disprove the Bible probably should not look to this book--this book offers the scholarly opinion with as little agenda as is possible given the subject matter involved.

Harvard Business Review on Managing Your Career

2006-11-10T22:12:00.000-05:00

Picked up in the airport while waiting for my flight, this book is geared toward the mid-level manager/executive--but the ideas are not hard to stretch to applications for even the everyday employee. At the beginning of each article is an executive summary.

There are eight articles in this book:

"Reawakening Your Passion for Work" - Listening to a calling, taking time out, and general examination of where you are and where you want to be.
"Goodbye Career, Hello Success" - Sometimes a successful career is not a conventional career.
"The Right Way to Be Fired" - How to avoid self-destructive behavior and manage the circumstances of being fired.
"Managing Oneself" - Knowing oneself, strengths, weaknesses, values, work and communication methods for more effective performance and teamwork.
"A Second Career: The Possible Dream" - Knowing what path and under what circumstances to follow that new path.
"Five Strategies of Successful Part-Time Work" - Establishing boundaries, communicating your value, and managing expectations when voluntarily moving to a part-time role.
"Managing Your Boss" - A foreign concept at the original writing of the topic, this article is on communicating with your boss--in the right way.
"A Survival Guide for Leaders" - Leading adaptive change, and the pitfalls therein.

Book of Ages: 30

2006-08-14T10:05:00.000-04:00

This is a great gag gift for anyone turning 30.

Dear Valued Customer, You Are a Loser

2006-06-20T09:44:00.000-04:00

The full title is, Dear Valued Customer, You Are a Loser: And Over 100 Other Embarrassing and Funny Stories of Technology Gone Mad. This book, by Rick Broadhead, has a somewhat deceptive title. It's not simply about bad customer service horror stories. It's about business horror stories, created or compounded by technology.

Many of these horror stories involve what happens when poor judgement is crossed with the virulent nature of e-mail. A few involve technology being employed by the little guy. A few involve technology being employed by a scammer. Most of these stories have at their center the mis-application of technology.

There are lessons in the humor here. You can (hopefully) laugh that these stories happened to someone else, but in the end, they are also a warning to be vigilant of the power of the ever-changing landscape of technology. The stories in this book involve customer service personnel, brokers, programmers (indirectly), and even CEOs.

Idiots at Work

2006-06-15T15:41:00.000-04:00

This book is a collection of:
- Infamous true stories--IBM and the world market for "five computers", Iacocca's "how much clean air" quote.
- Anonymous blunders - the "Gregg Typting Award" resume note.
- Anonymous stupidity.
- Corporate stupidity.

The anonymous stuff you've probably heard before, but there are a lot of gems in this book that you may not have heard before. The book is a series of shorts, from one-liners to single pagers.

The Unified Modeling Language User Guide, 2nd Edition

2005-08-04T20:53:00.000-04:00

After "learning" UML through various avenues, and trying to implement diagrams through Visio, I realized that I still needed a "correct" reference book on UML.

The Theory of Poker by David Sklansky

2005-08-04T20:47:00.000-04:00

Probably the first poker book that I've picked up that was not published through Cardoza publishing.

UML: A Beginner's Guide

2005-07-29T19:42:00.000-04:00

Fresh out of a class that covered use cases as part of its syllabus, I read this book for a deeper understanding. I found inconsistencies between the Use Case diagrams that I studied and those in this book. Read the other review on Amazon's website for more--I found that I wasn't alone in my confusion.

Caro's Book of Poker Tells

2005-07-16T11:36:00.000-04:00

Formerly known as Caro's Book of Tells, this is a Cardoza Publishing print of the original book. Stage-by-stage photos for the tells and profitability/accuracy of reading tells are included for each tell. Photos are from the original book (1970's?), but the descriptions and "Caro's Laws of Tells" are very useful. Over 300 pages, but at least 50% of the content contains photos or MCU Poker Charts.

Caro's Fundamental Secrets of Winning Poker

2005-06-25T10:52:00.000-04:00

I borrowed this book from the library, both because it happened to show up in a catalog search, and because I recognized him from Poker Superstars II. Format is the Who Moved My Cheese? of poker. I see it as a motivational quick-read vs. providing detailed stategy: about 10 pages for each game, large print, with 1/3 page blackboards summarizing main points. The book is short enough that there's no risk in picking it up and reading it: at 150 large print pages, it's a quick read.

The Mythical Man-Month

2005-06-08T22:34:00.000-04:00

The classic software engineering essay collection turns 20 years old. Interesting perspectives from 1975, 1986, and 1995. "Four new chapters" Chapter 18 is a re-examination of the original 1975 essays. Some minor clarifications are brought to light by time, but most assertions still prove completely true.

More than Enough.

2005-06-06T12:02:00.000-04:00

After making it through More Than Enough, I finally understand the structure. If you do read this book, don't cheat yourself by skipping the cumulative review sessions at the end of each chapter. They help reinforce a mindset that is a key to getting your priorities in order.

More Dave Ramsey, Ancient History, and Texas Hold 'Em

2005-05-03T20:59:00.000-04:00

Another Dave Ramsey Book, More Than Enough. If you need more inspiration to get your priorities straight, this is it:

I got the following book after listening to The Teaching Company's lecture series on Ancient Greece and Byzantium. I think I bought it through the History Book Club. You have to be an ancient history and classical literature fan to really get into this book, but it's interesting how it draws parallels between modern history and ancient history and the use of biological and chemical weapons.

With all the Texas Hold 'em craze, I bought the following book, Ken Warren Teaches Texas Hold 'em. It's valuable, but I think that I might go for the original Doyle Brunson book next time.

Total Money Makeover

2005-05-03T16:03:00.000-04:00

Whether you've gotten yourself into a financial hole, or you're just starting out in life, this book should definitely be a first stop. It's an easy read, so even if you don't have a good reading attention span, you shouldn't have any trouble making it through this book. If you live paycheck-to-paycheck, you need this book.

Previous Books.

2005-05-03T11:17:00.000-04:00

Reading list of books previously picked up...

Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising... - an interesting examination in what makes the wealthy become wealthy.

Dogs Never Lie About Love - insight into the emotional world of dogs, and excerpts of discussions about dogs.

The Dog who Loved too Much - Dr. Nicholas Dodman's first book on dog behavioral problems. Many of the case examples in book are somewhat heart-breaking; however, the tales of the people and their pets should also be motivating. Dr. Dodman's writing style in this book is somewhat dry, but the details in the pages easily make this book a page turner.
Dogs Behaving Badly: An A-To-Z Guide to Understanding and Curing Behavioral Problems in Dogs - an excellent book on dog behaviors.

Famous Financial Fiascos

The Millionaire Next Door

Big Bucks!

How to Get Out of Debt, Stay Out of Debt...

Financial Peace: Restoring Financial Hope to You and Your Family

The Hidden Life of Dogs

Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and others don't-a management book that turns the "business as usual" way of running business upside-down. Read it and marvel at the number of ways that your company is doing the exact opposite of the findings in this book.

To read: Gung Ho! Turn On the People in Any...

To read: The Faber Report: CNBC's "The Brain"...