floc.net or ASP.net?

Lately, I've been playing online Diplomacy again. Diplomacy is a 7-player board game where players each control a European great power at the turn of the last century. The actual movement rules of armies and fleets are really quite simple -- the complexity of the game lies in the negotiations between the players. For such a simple game, it can be surprisingly emotionally exhausting in its highs and its lows. I first played this game when I was a university student, and have played it on and off (a lot more off than on) since then. Due to the responsibilities of adult life, it's rare indeed when I can find 6 friends who are all simultaneously interested in playing a game of Diplomacy until 3:00am (because no matter what time you start a game, it lasts until 3:00am).

But, due to the magic of the internet, I can play Diplomacy by e-mail with friends and strangers from all over the world. One such site that provides this free service is the "DP Judge" at floc.net.

By the way, if you've never played Diplomacy, I have one word of advice: Don't. I mean, one of the following will likely happen:

• You'll love it, and spend (nay, waste) countless hours on game that can, potentially bring out the worst in people.
• You'll won't like it.

I suppose there's another possibility:

• You'll think it's a game like any other. Amusing, interesting, but you can take it or leave it.

This last option might be least likely, but let me know what you think.

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For the second part of this post (perhaps the good angel on my other shoulder, to use an illustration) I think it would be interesting and potentially useful in the career maintenence sense of the word to learn ASP.NET. As the web page says, "ASP.NET makes building real world Web applications dramatically easier." Despite working as a professional software developer for many years, I've most recently been working on what could be called the server side. If I wanted to make a web application such as the one I am using to type in this message, I wouldn't really know where to begin. Surely, the ".Net Framework" isn't the answer for every project, but it seems like it's as good a place to start as any.

I've downloaded the Web Matrix development tool, and written a simple "Hello World!" application. Web Matrix seems cool for free, but I'm sure that if I want something better, I can send Bill Gates some money, and he'll ship me the latest. As of now, I don't know what I'm missing, so it's good enough for me.

Watch this space for product and application announcements. But not any time soon.

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To sum up this post,
or , that is the question.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Ice Cream Cookie Dough Cookies

Did you ever wonder what would happen if you took a bowl full of "Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough" ice cream, ate all the ice cream, saved the supposed cookie dough, and tried to make cookies with it? I'm sure we have all wondered exactly that. As just another community service provided here ye olde blogge, here is the result of such an experiment.

1) First, make yourself a bowl of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. (Sorry, no photo available.) Be sure to suck all the ice cream off the cookie dough globules.

2) Form the globules into a cookie shape, and place on a cookie sheet. (In my case, I used a pie tin.) See below:


3) Preheat oven to 350F.

4) Bake the "cookie" for maybe 8 or 9 minutes or so.

5) Volià!


6) Realise that you should have greased the cookie sheet. The cookie was perfectly formed before removal from the cookie sheet.

7) Eat!

Results: I admit that you would have to call the result a cookie. It didn't raise much, probably due to a lack of baking powder or soda or whatever, and it wasn't completely firm when hot. But as it cooled, it firmed up into a slightly chewy, very sweet, not that good, but not horrible little treat.

James Doohan, 1920 - 2005

I just read that James Doohan died earlier today. He is, of course, the actor that played "Scotty" in Star Trek. According to the Wikipedia page, he is survived by several children, the youngest of which was born in 2000 when he was 80. Shawn from work asked, "Can you imagine that?" to which my reply was, "I don't think I want to!"

(I thought he was already dead...)

i see red

Yesterday morning, I went to a funeral instead of going to work. (I could write a lot about that, but I'll add only one item of interest here.) I wore a suit and tie, and allowed my daughter to select the tie, not that I have many to choose from. She went with a mostly red tie with some blue and a swirl design that the kids call the Easter Egg tie due to the shapes of the swirls. Perhaps the Easter Egg tie was quite an appropriate one to wear for the occasion.

When I got to work in my suit and tie, there were the usual questions asking why was I dressed like that, and envious questions asking me if I had a (job) iterview. My response was that there were only two possible reasons why I'd dress like that, and since it wasn't an interview, it was the other reason: a funeral. To that, a coworker from Taiwan gave a surprised, "You can wear red to a funeral?"

So I guess the lesson is, don't wear a partially red tie to a Chinese funeral.

What Does Lightning Smell Like?

My wife just sent me an IM, asking if I needed anything at the store. I responded that my Anti-Deodorant (as I always call it) is running low, and I could use some more. When describing what kind I like, I just noticed (or thought about) the fact that my current supply is of the manly "Lightning" flavour. What exactly does lightning smell like anyway? Scorched earth? Burnt food? An electrical fire? And is it something I want to smell like?

Weird Al is on Yahoo Launch!

Opening Music: (I Can't Get No) Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones on Yahoo! Launch

I turned on my Yahoo! Launch station this evening, and it was music to my ears! For whatever legal reasons, I had never heard any songs by "Weird Al" Yankovic on the station, despite my giving him a very high rating. Whatever the reason was, it is now resolved, and the song Traffic Jam was coming through loud and clear.

Now, if only they'll start playing the Beatles.

Here's what my station has played recently, in reverse chronological order. It's kind of an odd playlist, but not too bad. I lowered Elton John's rating. Not that I have anything against him, but I don't think I'll ever really want to listen to more Elton John.

10,000 Maniacs	These Are Days
Maranatha! Singers	Lord, I Lift Your Name On High
They Might Be Giants	Istanbul (Not Constantinople)
Me First and the Gimme Gimmes	Over the Rainbow
Pink Floyd	Brain Damage
Natalie Merchant	Beloved Wife
The Kingston Trio	Ally Ally Oxen Free
My Morning Jacket	Death Is The Easy Way
Elton John	Shoot Down The Moon
The Rolling Stones	(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
Jackson Browne	Stay
Nena	Feuer Und Flamme
Semisonic	Closing Time
Weezer	Say It Ain't So
Cream	Sunshine Of Your Love
Creed	Signs
Supertramp	The Logical Song
Rod Stewart	Lochivnar
Jimmy Fallon	Road Rage
Soundgarden	Black Hole Sun
Rush	The Spirit Of Radio
Weird Al Yankovic	Traffic Jam
The Benedictine Monks Of Santo Domingo De Silos	Traditor Autem - Benedictus Antoifona (Modo I) Cantico
Blind Melon	2x4

Thoughts On Drinks

1. When out at Target with your son, why pay $1 or $1.80 for a soft drink when you can get a gallon of refreshing distilled water for 79c? Nothing hits the spot like water, and there's nothing like chugging from the gallon jug with your son. Plus, it takes a while to drink a gallon, even if there are two of you.
2. When your Rum and Coke consists of diluted rum and caffeine-free Pepsi... well, I don't know. Something just seems wrong about that.
   

Old Photo

I was looking through some stuff, and I found a 5x7 of the following photo:

I must have wanted to frame it or something, but then forgot about it. It's from the 1999 (I think) United States Australian Football Championships. What was I doing there, along with Mike, Tom, and Joe? Frankly, I don't recall. :-) It seems both so recent and so long ago...

P.S. A common question I've heard concerning Austalian football is, "Is that like rugby?" In short, the answer is, "No." I mean, it's a contact sport played on grass with teams and a ball, like rugby. But of rugby, American football, and Australian football, the closest similarities are between rugby and American football, with Aussie rules being distinct from each of the other two.

Baseball Home Run Thoughts, in no particular order

1. Currently, Sammy Sosa is tied with Mark McGwire for #6 on the all-time home run chart, at 583, and 3 behind Frank Robinson's 586.
2. Sosa's home runs per season since 2001: 64, 49, 40, 35, 9*. (The 9 is in less than half a season.)
3. At the start of the 2005 season, Alex Rodriguez was tied with Albert Belle for 50th place all-time (381). In less than half a season, ARod has passed Andres Galarraga for 39th place and now has 401.
4. Jim Thome has "only" 7 home runs so far this season (which is exactly 7 more than I'll hit in my major league career), giving him 430 for his career, #34 all time. In his years with Cleveland, he had OPS totals over 1.000 four times, and was at .998 once. For the Phillies, he has had very good, but not great, OPS numbers of .958 & .977 (and this season he's down at .712 and on the DL). When he went to the Phillies, I was disappointed, but guessed that his best seasons may have been with the Indians. Whether he'll snap back to his old self or not remains to be seen, but I'll stand by my earlier prediction.
5. In the early 90's, we thought that Juan Gonzalez would put up some nifty career home run totals. After all, he hit 27 at age 21, 43 @ 22, and 46 @ 23, back in the days before McGwire, Sosa, and Bonds were smacking 60+. Now at age 35, he can't make it to first base. (At least he was born on October 20.) Not that his 434 career homers (#32 after 2004) are anything to sneeze at, but it shows the difficulties of projecting young players to have exceedingly high career numbers.
   

What's the Point of Europe?

I don't really pay attention to news the way I did 10, 20, or even 30 (ouch!) years ago, which is strange, since so much more is available now. To get into the reasons for this would be another post. But, some of the limited bit of news that I do get comes from BBC World Service on the radio. In recent weeks, the struggles of the European Union have been discussed, including the rejection of the proposed constitution by France and the Netherlands, and the assumption of the Presidency by the United Kingdom.

One thing that is not really clear to me at my distant vantage point is, what is the point of Europe? By this, I mean, what are people in and for the European Union trying to achieve? How will they know when they get there? Do they know where they are trying to go? I'm not sure, and maybe Europeans feel the same way too.

So, I got to thinking, what they need is a catchy constitutional preamble (which the people could hum and which would make them actually eager to attend this particular play) that can be sold as what they want Europe to be. If they can sum it up in a nice sound bite, I figure that the pro-constitutional forces can convince more people of their views.

By the way, thanks to Schoolhouse Rock, I'm one of the many people my age that can sing the preamble to the US constitution. (Actually, the Schoolhouse Rock version isn't exactly right, but it's close enough.) What Europe should do is to turn their preamble into a catchy tune that schoolchildren can sing -- if I can sing about establishing justice and ensuring domestic tranquility, so can Europeans in any language.

I assume that the proposed European constitution has a preamble, and thanks to the magic of the internet, it's only a click away. It's, well, a bit long for a preamble. Let's take a look at what it says: (My inline comments are in green.)

HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF THE BELGIANS, THE PRESIDENT OF THE CZECH REPUBLIC, HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN OF DENMARK, THE PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY, THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF ESTONIA, Blah Blah Blah, let's skip ahead, shall we?,

DRAWING INSPIRATION from the cultural, religious and humanist inheritance of Europe, from which have developed the universal values of the inviolable and inalienable rights of the human person, freedom,democracy, equality and the rule of law,

BELIEVING that Europe, reunited after bitter experiences, intends to continue along the path of civilisation, progress and prosperity, for the good of all its inhabitants, including the weakest and most deprived; that it wishes to remain a continent open to culture, learning and social progress; and that it wishes to deepen the democratic and transparent nature of its public life, and to strive for peace, justice and solidarity throughout the world,

CONVINCED that, while remaining proud of their own national identities and history, the peoples of Europe are determined to transcend their former divisions and, united ever more closely, to forge a common destiny,

CONVINCED that, thus ‘United in diversity’, Europe offers them the best chance of pursuing, with due regard for the rights of each individual and in awareness of their responsibilities towards future generations and the Earth, the great venture which makes of it a special area of human
hope,

DETERMINED to continue the work accomplished within the framework of the Treaties establishing the European Communities and the Treaty on European Union, by ensuring the continuity of the Community acquis, (Cool, a French word. Here's the definition.)

GRATEFUL to the members of the European Convention for having prepared the draft of this Constitution on behalf of the citizens and States of Europe,

HAVE DESIGNATED AS THEIR PLENIPOTENTIARIES:

HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF THE BELGIANS,

Guy VERHOFSTADT
Prime Minister

Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah. This goes on forever, listing everyone involved with every single European government.

HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN OF THE UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND NORTHERN IRELAND,

The Rt. Hon Tony BLAIR
Prime Minister

The Rt. Hon Jack STRAW
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs

WHO, having exchanged their full powers, found in good and due form, have agreed as follows:

OK, is anyone still with me? I don't want to sound too harsh, but let's face it, that's pathetic! Be aware that I cut out the bulk of it, where all the countries and all the people were listed. I mean, the bits about "DRAWING INSPIRATION", "BELIEVING", "CONVINCED", "CONVICTED", "DETERMINED", and "GRATEFUL" aren't all that good, but by themselves they aren't worth mentioning as examples of badness.

This whole thing is one sentence. That's OK, I suppose, for a preamble. But check out what the main verb phrase is. If you can't find it, it's "HAVE DESIGNATED AS THEIR PLENIPOTENTIARIES". What kind of subject is that? What's a PLENIPOTENTIARY anyway? (Or is the main predicate "have agreed as follows"?)

What they need to do is shorten the middle section, hack out all of the names, and get to the point... a point that a schoolchild can sing.

Taking things a bit further, do you know what the problem is? Who is making the constitution? In some places, it's "We, the people". In Europe, it is only about 25 special people, including "HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF SPAIN" who are creating the document. There's something to that, probably, but I won't pursue it here.

Are all preambles like this? I don't know. Let's take a look at another. For all intents and purposes, South Africa is a random country. Let's take a look at its preamble. Bravo, South Africa. Nicely done.

Europe, get with it.