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Comics You Must Read! #1

2008 Aug 28 * Comments(1)

Identity Crisis

[Thanks to Lionel for introducing this one to me]
Written by Brad Meltzer, penciled by Rags Morales, inked by Michael Bair. ISBN-13: 978-1401204587.
Note: Amazon.com's "search inside" feature lets you read the first few pages.

"Anyone who puts a mask on paints a bulls-eye on their families backs."

Superman shares a moment with his mom, realizing how precious she is.
The look on Clark's face breaks my heart.
We know Batman has no parents. Mom doesn't. 
 
A superhero is as vulnerable and fragile as those dearest to them.

The secret identities of super heroes is threatened: Someone knows all the secrets.  Someone is killing family members.  More than a murder mystery, it’s a view into the same world of costumed adventurers we all know, but there is something unique, and different, in this telling.  Meltzer surprises you with moments and nuances that fit these characters in ways you never dreamt.  This volume is unique.  You can’t think of the Justice League the same after this.  A complex adult telling of gripping story.

Read more »

Comment(1); Filed under the arts and tagged comics, plug.

The Shit Dancer [Tamdhu Stories 1.3]

2008 Aug 06 * Comments(10)

I first drank Tamdhu in September 2006.  It wasn't the first scotch I drank but it was the first in Scotland.  It's become tied to strong memories, times of occasion and celebration. Here's how I spent my first bottle.

Betty the Gas-Whore | Money & Other Friends | The Shit Dancer


An empty bottle of Tamdhu scotch,
A tasty brew for manly men

Back in November 2007, we got a tiny black cockapoo puppy, which we named Magee (pronounced Muh-gee). My life, along with my wife's, changed. An example: we were forcibly adjusted to higher tolerances of urine in our carpet. Whereas we had been accustomed to levels of 'none,' Magee demonstrated exactly how much more piss and shit there could be. The hallmark moment being when he snuck downstairs to perform what can only be described as The Shit Dance on our carpet. I did not witness it, but I can imagine no other way he distributed so many turds over such a large area than to have been practicing a waltz, while gettin' 'er done.

Our livingroom carpet, covered in small turds
Over 15 separate turds littered our white carpet when I discovered Magee's latest performance art

Those first weeks were hell. We slept in shifts the first few days, that’s how bad his night-time whimpering was. I understand newborn humans causing groggy nights, but dogs should not mess with you in this manner. Magee took great pains to correct my misunderstanding. Despite having been rewarded multiple times for peeing on a training pad, our eight week old puppy once held his bladder for seven hours rather than pee on his papers. Finally soiled his crate instead. Our dog has a tiny tiny brain. (and we gave up on paper training for outdoor training) I have devoted more attention to my dog's bladder and bowels than I ever thought possible. Oh, the detailed scatological accounts I could give...

Read more »

Comments(10); Filed under funny, the void and tagged dog, tamdhu.

Money & Other Friends [Tamdhu Stories 1.2]

2008 Jul 29 * Comments(4)

I first drank Tamdhu in September 2006.  It wasn't the first scotch I drank but it was the first in Scotland.  It's become tied to strong memories, times of occasion and celebration. Here's how I spent my first bottle.

Betty the Gas-Whore | Money & Other Friends | The Shit Dancer


Money

An empty bottle of Tamdhu scotch,
A tasty brew for manly men

Nobody needs to feel bad for my finances.  I've loved computers and programming from an early age, by a quirk of fate it pays well.  I wasn't much in debt, but the shiny smooth seductive plastic drew me into its orbit yet again.  I bought the first bottle of Tamdhu as an incentive for when I paid them off.

My credit-card balance finally returned to zero after a year long hiatus.  I'd accepted a new job and had good feelings about it. I paused for a moment and enjoyed where my career had taken me.  The horizons looked as beautiful as some peaks I'd just climbed.  Endless questions I'd faced about what to do next faded into blissful oblivion. Some questions would one day return, I enjoy change.  But for the moment I was back in that enjoyable mind-set: they're going to pay me to write code!  hotdamn!  I sipped Tamdhu in the newly painted purple room of the first house I owned and life was good.

My next memories of Tamdhu revolve around my friends Cliff and Vlad. Around the time Cliff and I had some long late night conversations, and around the time Vlad moved back to Edmonton.

Read more »

Comments(4); Filed under narcissism and tagged cliff, colin, curtis, hunting, steve, tamdhu, vlad.

Betty the Gas-Whore [Tamdhu Stories 1.1]

2008 Jul 23 * Comments(4)

I first drank Tamdhu in September 2006.  It wasn't the first scotch I drank but it was the first in Scotland.  It's become tied to strong memories, times of occasion and celebration. Here's how I spent my first bottle.

Betty the Gas-Whore | Money & Other Friends | The Shit Dancer


An empty bottle of Tamdhu scotch,
A tasty brew for manly men
Betty, my camperized beauty, in front semi-profile
Meet Betty (the Gas-Whore)

I unscrewed the bottle and took my first swig of the night. Betty the Gas-Whore, my brown camperized Van, was being towed away. I loved that Van. It was my faithful, completely unreliable 1978 Chevy power-to-the-max off-roading adventurous little go-machine. With fold-out bed, gas stove, electric cooler, sink, table, storage friendly it was wired for sound, beer and good times: Betty was leaving tonight for good. I’d promised to give it to Laura the Sailor, a Canadian I met on walkabout. She never returned my email though, so I didn't give it to her.

Taking a swig beside me is my gorgeous love bunny wife Janine. Straight from the bottle, just like me, she apparently doesn’t fuck around with the hard liquor. Her and I took Betty to Drumheller in freezing -20°C cold and visited Pony Canyon. The land sung to us a song of incredible beauty and fun. On our wedding my cousin presented us with a picture of Drumheller, unaware of the significance. The Universe conspired to send us a memento. Shortly we took it to wine country B.C., on our honeymoon. My wife shudders in the cold of our garage and passes the Tamdhu back to me. She hurries her hot ass back inside.

Read more »

Comments(4); Filed under narcissism and tagged betty, depression, erron, janine, kyle, sermon, spirituality, tamdhu, travel, vlad, walkabout.

Command Line Parsing using Attribute Decoration in .NET

2008 Jul 16 * Comments(0)

The Tease

At some point, you'll have to write an application accepting command line arguments.  Typically a console application, but GUI apps can accept command lines too.  Its features and options will grow and you will become frustrated with .Net's default abilities.  You'll desire a robust parsing ability, and you'll wish to configure it easily, automatically and in an extensible way.  Welcome to today's topic

    screenshot of command-line program, demonstrating different usage patterns supported by the framework, described later in the document

Big whup, eh?  But let's see how simple it was to create: just decorate a class' properties with attributes to describe the mapping.

public class ProgramHelloArguments
{
    public enum GreetingType
        { Standard, Friendly, Familiar }
    private int? _age;
    private string _email;

    [EnumArgument("say"), HelpText("Specify alternate greeting")]
    public GreetingType Greeting = GreetingType.Standard;

    [CommandLineArgument("name"), Required, Position(1)]
    public string Name;

    [SwitchArgument("kissAss")]
    public bool ComplimentUser;

    [CommandLineArgument("email"), Position(2)]
    public string Email
    {   get { return _email; }
        set
        {   _email = value;
            if (!String.IsNullOrEmpty(_email))
                _email = "mailto:" + _email;
        }
    }

    [ValidDirectoryArgument("homeDir")]
    public string HomeDir;

    [IntArgument("age"), HelpText("Optionally specify your age")]
    public int? Age
    {   get { return _age; }
        set
        {   if (value < 0)
                throw new ArgumentParseException("Age cannot be less than zero");
            _age = value;
        }
    }
}
Goofy lookin' guy on a magic carpet

Join me on a magic carpet ride into simplicity as I further describe some of the interesting highlights of how to use it, how it works. and how you can steal the code, make it your own and add the quirky bits unique to your situation.  The full Visual Studio 2005 project code is available.

Admit it, you can tell how its supposed to work just from reading the property declaration, right? Features worth mentioning listed below. (or let me draw you a picture [in a new window], if you prefer)

  • Both fields and properties are supported.  As are booleans (Switch), enums and nullable types
  • Re-usable validation (e.g. ValidDirectory, IntArgument), I'll show how easy it is to plug in your attributes for custom validation
  • Ad-hoc validation in property setters (e.g. Age), or ad-hoc re-interpretation of arguments (e.g. Email)
  • Required parameter validation
  • Use Position to pass parameters with out specifying the token (e.g. "CommandLineParsing.exe James"), or use tokens to pass parameters in any order
  • Use HelpText for auto-generating parameter help files (e.g. "-?")
  • Decorate properties of any class.  Imagine your own hierarchy of parameter classes which could be re-used across many programs

Note: The code's a tad too verbose to dump full contents into this article.  I'll omit the boring shit and provide full code for download.  The full code is better commented, but within this article I'll reduce or omit inline comments for brevity and discuss in paragraph form.

Read more »

Make a Comment; Filed under technical and tagged c#, command-line, library.

We Are Metallica

2008 Jun 24 * Comments(4)

Metallica Island

We Are Metallica. Relevance Is Not Our Problem. We have our own private island filled with a hand picked selection of fans who do not use the internet in any manner, only listen when they are told, feel towards our songs as we dictate, and are fed a high-protein soy-based supplement through their anus. This is all the fans we need. We have evolved to a self perpetuating oligarchy that no longer requires outside interaction.

Comments(4); Filed under the void and tagged metallica.

The Best of Projects: Fiction [3 of 3]

2008 May 29 * Comments(1)

Projects is the name of my website from Dec 1999 through June 2001.  After merging its content into Feelings of White, I chose some of the best and most representative articles. Join me on a look back, and a celebration, of this three year period of me as a writer.

The Eclectic | The Autoserious | The Fictious


A central idea of Projects was my pursuit of fictional writing.  There's another longer story that should rightfully be included, my Adventures in C Lab novella.  Unfortunately due to the crazy typesetting requirements, it remains unavailable online (one day, I promise).  Part Three presents two fine fictional tales, both full of humor.

Really Dumb Story III: The Sci-Fi Epic

Not a continuation; one in an unrelated series of stories I wrote.  The RDS is form where I relaxed the pressure on myself and had lots of fun with the writing process.  Set in the far distant future; the human race battles for freedom from the oppressive Vishians fighters. Vishian's are bad on account of how they're the enemy.

Dial 'A' for Accountancy

A great fun mystery romp.  The trail of clues begins in the accounting division of a bizarre revolutionary group.  The story that helped win me a girlfriend, then wife. Long before any of that happened I wrote my friend Janine a story as a birthday present.  Also certainly the best piece of fiction that Projects has.

Comment(1); Filed under the void.

Good goddamn, Galactica Roxxors With Coxx Out

2008 May 24 * Comments(3)

Galactica has been so rocking.  I may have gone slightly insane during episode 4x06 Faith, nearly incoherent with fangasm?  I believe 4x07 was was more linear. To warm your hearts during the show's absence, I recommend these other BSG fixes.

Sexy creator Ron Moore, sporting beard and whispy hair look If you haven't already discovered Ron Moore's commentary podcasts (rss feed) with behind-the-scenes DVD-like insights into the evolution and creation of the Galactica.  The commentary podcasts are highly recommended, my zombie friends.  I listen to them riding the bus sometimes.  Moore also recently gave an interview with Wired discussing the BSG's genesis in comparison the to original, he touched on his trek years and comparisons, a bit on new franchise entry, the new Caprica series.  Worth it.  Also just in: lowdown on Virtuality, his new series.

image image Looking for some people to hang out and chat with about Battlestar happenings? Why not check out The Galactica Watercooler?  His Jimboness approves!  Throw their podcast on over your breakfast background, or on the drive into work.  Their latest 100th podcast was a live, fun, celebration of their history.  Their viewer calls and lengthy discussions provide a lively spoiler-free forum for debate on what's going on in Galactica, what it all means.  They've got a lot of very good insights.  You might consider older entries too, like the first post-Razor dialogs.

Comments(3); Filed under the arts and tagged bsg, plug.

BSG 4×07 - Guess What’s Coming to Dinner?

* Comments(1)

Beautiful Athena, gun raised toward the viewer.  This bitch doesn't mess around.
U TUCH MY BABEEH!H!!!??
CUNTHEAD U GON DIE~~!

Baltar is right.  Roslin sucks.  She's off the deep end and Baltar, ex-president, one who spent time with Cylons, a center of a religion wonder: Gauis Baltar is speaking some truth.  Roslin's myopic vision of the future is remarkably un-democratic compared with where she started.  The forms of civilization they've held to so tightly are crumbling.  Ladies and gentlemen of the jury: she's changed. 

Adama once asked if they were worthy of survival. The measure of judgment was always how far they'd strayed from their original rules.  And how very far has Roslin strayed.  And if she turns out to be right, then how much will humanity have lowered itself?  What will the cost of salvation be?  If it comes.

Read more »

Comment(1); Filed under the arts and tagged bsg.

WordPress plugin: Apply a CSS class defined in a post’s custom field

2008 May 22 * Comments(0)

It's not much, but it's helped the look of my site.  By applying a custom field to a specific blog post like so:

WordPress admin screenshot, showing a custom field with a key of "legioncss" and a value of "MyCssClass"

Your content (regardless of index, archive, or single placement) then renders like so:

<div class="MyCssClass">Actual Blog Post Here</div>

This allows each post to have different (but common) CSS Styles.  Other plugins allow you to apply a custom stylesheet per-post, but my plugin is more useful when there are a few common styles you want to re-used.  All that's missing is uploading the following code to your wp-content/plugins directory:

<?php

/**
 Plugin Name: Legion's Div Content Plugin
 Version: 0.1
 Description: Wraps the the_content with a custom css class specified in the "legioncss" custom field
 Author: legion
 Author URI: http://FeelingsOfWhite.com
 */

add_filter('the_content', 'legiondiv_the_content');

function legiondiv_the_content($content) {
    global $post;  //required to access $post->ID
    $customCssClass = get_post_meta($post->ID, "legioncss", true);
    if ($customCssClass != "")
        $content = '<div class="' . $customCssClass . '">' . "$content</div>";
    return $content;
}

?>

As a n00b to WordPress, it's hackability has impressed me.  I'm amazed that this is all it takes to write a plugin.  There are plenty of fantastic resources available just by searching the web.

Make a Comment; Filed under technical and tagged plugin, the process, wordpress.

The Best of Projects: Autoserious [2 of 3]

* Comments(0)

Projects is the name of my website from Dec 1999 through June 2001.  After merging its content into Feelings of White, I chose some of the best and most representative articles. Join me on a look back, and a celebration, of this three year period of me as a writer.

The Eclectic | The Autoserious | The Fictious


I explored a more serious side of my writing on Projects.  " Incapable as I am of doing anything without meaning..." I once said, and how true.  Part Two carries on with some more autobiographic and serious entries.

A Thinner Skin

A  manifesto of sorts, and one that still resonates with me. I've started jokingly tagging these kinds pieces as sermons.  It's a form of expression often containing a personal experience, tied to a little nugget of truth I've learned. Or hope to learn.

Journal Entry

What makes it a selection is the effective way the mood is set and the feelings are evoked.  I knew better than to attempt description of the beautiful girl who sat across me.  I'm still coming to terms with how autobiographical my writing has become.  But when done correctly, the writing transcends labels of fiction or non.  What interested me most was capturing the moment.

To Listen…

This predates any presence of mine on the Internet.  Written years and years ago, this brief piece continues to strike me as beautiful and stirring every time I re-read it.  It is from the second sentence that Feelings of White takes it's name.

Make a Comment; Filed under the void.

The Best of Projects: Eclectic [1 of 3]

2008 May 15 * Comments(0)

Projects is the name of my website from Dec 1999 through June 2001.  After merging its content into Feelings of White, I chose some of the best and most representative articles. Join me on a look back, and a celebration, of this three year period of me as a writer.

The Eclectic | The Autoserious | The Fictious


One of the most liberating things I did was not define too closely what Projects was about.  I came to view it as, literally, any of the projects I was working on. Although my focus was always clearly on creative writing, let's start Part One with some of the most eclectic pieces.

The Jib Generator (with bonus Anti-Jib abilities)

Of course, you've probably heard the expression "I like the cut of your jib." But what is a jib? Who knows!  Increase your jibbly knowledge after only 30 seconds of play with this silly little game. A fine introduction!

My Fridge Is Too Loud

A journal entry describe my kicking and smashing the inside of a fridge.  File this under "representative".  Posted in the first month, this was me realizing I had a place to unload some of the strange troubling things that I felt.  To admit publicly to such a moment of bizarre weakness was a theme that carried throughout Projects run.  I attempted to confront myself and do my best to admit and describe my own tiny piece of the human experience.

GENtI

A small windows maze game for download that will amuse for at least 5 minutes while having your morning beer.  A recreation of a DOS game made with my friend Kevin in High School.  Paid $50 each for its creation, by a guy wanting a solitaire-like add-on for his application.  We spent three weeks on it: talented coders, aye, businessmen, nay.  Vintage Turbo Pascal maze-generation code was salvaged and grafted onto a Delphi GUI.

The Vegas music hums in the background

I've written a lot of weird crazy shit in my days; this is a favorite. I'm pretty certain I wrote it after coming down off a magic mushroom trip.  I always had trouble sleeping after those occasions, in part because I tended to drink a lot of coffee during.  A weird meandering tale taking it's inspiration from an old style text-based adventure that switches styles at least three times, makes just enough sense to cause you to wonder WTF?!

Make a Comment; Filed under funny.

The Four Noble Truths, phrased in a rather beautiful way

2008 May 14 * Comments(0)

Then there are the four noble truths. In summary they are an observation that there is a great sadness in our human condition. That sadness comes from our trying to cling to things, to hold on so tightly to that which, as we already know, is essentially open. In this clinging we crush the joy and the beauty of what is. However we don't have to do this. Instead we can follow the path of wisdom, of harmonious relationship, and of attention.

(source: http://lifestylenutritionmanagement.com/loveandmarriage.htm)

Make a Comment; Filed under the void and tagged buddhism, spirituality.

BSG 4×06 - Faith

2008 May 12 * Comments(2)

Roslin's mother, who bears an uncanny resmblence to a certain former first lady
Hi, I'm Barbara Bush, and I approved this blogcast.

Barolay, hand to her face after RedShirtSix unleashed her vengance
I haz nosebleeds?

By the time the scene was over, who did you have more sympathy for: Barolay or the RedShirt-Six? After a viscously quick beat down, we're subjected to a drawn out suspense wherein Galactica does it's best job since Gina at humanizing the death of one of those gods damn frakkin' skin jobs. As the NatalieSix talked to RedShirtSix, you realize just how truly horrible was her death on New Caprica. "We talked about this," said NatalieSix. Yah, talked about drowning in a sewage tank as laughing over her stood resistance fighter Baroley (not a red shirt). During rehab, simple citizen RedShirtSix probably even asked "why do they hate us?" What's she supposed to do, turn the other cheek?

Back aboard The Grand Poo-Barge, when Selix unexpectedly said of Athena "Hell ya, let the Cylon go," it highlighted that feelings of hatred still run deep. There's nothing Athena can ever do to prove her worthiness to the fleet at large. And why the frak shouldn't they be hated, the gods damn Cylons struck first, they melted loved ones in the million degrees temperature of a nuclear blast that still has Roslin's bunkmate CancerKira dying. What are they supposed to do, turn the other cheek?

Read more »

Comments(2); Filed under the arts and tagged bsg.

Welcome to the New White

2008 May 06 * Comments(10)

For RSS Readers: Congratulations, if you're seeing this, you're subscribed to the correct feed, you don't need to do anything, sit back and enjoy a nice refreshing beverage.

The new domain, FeelingsOfWhite.com, is up and running. There's still a lot of house cleaning to be done, but it's late and I'm tired because I went to see IronMan movie before this. Movie is good. Sleep is better. Updates to follow

Comments(10); Filed under the void and tagged meta.

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Recent Posts

  • Comics You Must Read! #1
  • The Shit Dancer [Tamdhu Stories 1.3]
  • Money & Other Friends [Tamdhu Stories 1.2]
  • Betty the Gas-Whore [Tamdhu Stories 1.1]
  • Command Line Parsing using Attribute Decoration in .NET
  • We Are Metallica
  • The Best of Projects: Fiction [3 of 3]
  • Good goddamn, Galactica Roxxors With Coxx Out
  • BSG 4×07 - Guess What’s Coming to Dinner?
  • WordPress plugin: Apply a CSS class defined in a post’s custom field
  • The Best of Projects: Autoserious [2 of 3]
  • The Best of Projects: Eclectic [1 of 3]
  • The Four Noble Truths, phrased in a rather beautiful way
  • BSG 4×06 - Faith
  • Welcome to the New White

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