Archive - June 2004

Tomorrow's my last day of summer camp. The last day is actually Friday, but I'm leaving tomorrow to go on vacation at my great-aunt's condo on North Hutchinson Island, about a two-hour drive from here. (I would provide an informative link about North Hutchinson Island, but it seems there isn't much information about it on the web.) We're spending the Fourth of July there. We recently discovered that my friend Mark's grandparents have a place on the same floor as us - the same floor, the same building, the same complex, the same island, everything. His family will be spending the weekend up there too, so our families are planning to have dinner together. I'm also going golfing with Mark and our dads. I've never golfed before. I hope I don't poke an eye out or anything.

But back to the present. Today at summer camp there was another Mass, so I played the guitar on most of the songs. I also accompanied this girl's solo with some slow arpeggios. I can't really do arpeggios that well, but I tried. I also had to play quietly because she sang rather quietly. I think I've been playing too much lately; my arms feel fatigued and my chest is sore (reduced from a sharp pain a little while ago). On the plus side, last night I did something I thought I could never do: I put new strings on my 12-string acoustic guitar with much ease. And there was much rejoicing.

It's about time somebody thought of this: "The Terrorists Have Already Won" Generator. As of posting, the terrorists can know they've won in 1,413 different ways and counting. I've submitted, "If I can't take the last slice of pizza, that means the terrorists have already won!", "If the euro continues to beat the dollar, that means the terrorists have already won!", "If you don't have anything nice to say, that means the terrorists have already won!", and many others. Submit your own!

When I leave tomorrow, my (not) patented PLAPS technology will experience its first field test. It'll post blog entries for me, but you won't even notice the difference. I'll be back on July 5th, so till then, ¡adiós!

The State of Florida is known (to its residents, at least) for having many specialty license plates that support sports teams, organizations, colleges, social issues, and environmental causes, among other things. The state currently offers 88 of them, for an extra fee that varies from tag to tag. In fact, police officers complain that they can't recognize them all. Here are the specialty tags currently offered. According to the numbers on that site, some plates are very difficult to spot on the road. Only 14 Hospice: Every Day is a Gift tags have been issued since that tag was introduced on July 1, 2003. Others, however, are (relatively) hugely popular. 717,598 Challenger/Columbia (formerly Challenger) plates have been issued since 1987. The plate honors the victims of the Challenger (1986) and Columbia (2003) Space Shuttle disasters. The plate's extra fee goes to the Astronauts Memorial Foundation and the Technological Research and Development Authority. In addition to those 88 specialty tags, there are eight military tags: National Guard; U.S. Reserve; Pearl Harbor Survivor; Ex-POW; Medal of Honor, Air Force; Medal of Honor, Navy; Medal of Honor, Army; and Purple Heart.

Oh, you may be wondering what the standard design looks like. The present plate, introduced in December, is rather ugly, in my opinion. First of all, the single, large orange that was formerly in the center has been replaced with two smaller oranges and some blossoms. It was funny to see the occasional smiley face drawn on the one orange. Second, according to the top line of the tag, the name of our state is MyFlorida.com. I may spend a lot of time on the Internet, but I do not live in MyFlorida.com. I can only hope that the next design, which will probably come out by or around the end of the decade, will look snazzier. If not, there are always specialty plates.

I've been worried that my untreated allergies are partially caused by my parakeet, Pastel, so I decided to get rid of him. We put an ad in the paper and someone came and got him today.

I remember when I first got Pastel. In February 2001, I had been wanting a parakeet as a pet. One Saturday morning that month (I think it was the 3rd), my uncle called to say that he had found one in his backyard. To make a long story short, we went over there and got him, and he became my pet. My sister so named him because of his colors of yellow, light blue, and light green. I was thinking of George, but I talked myself out of it.

Pastel never really did much other than sit in his cage. Sometimes I would try to let him go on my finger (wearing a sock for protection), but he was always afraid and would bite me. Sometimes he would flap his wings wildly for no apparent reason - maybe exercise - leaving feathers all over the floor. He had this bell that he always chewed on, I guess to sharpen his beak. He would also throw up on the bell, and, well, enjoy his food twice. He would mimic the birds outside and eventually he could sort of say "Pastel" if you were lucky enough to get it out of him. So he pretty much did nothing but sit in a cage for three years. Poor thing. I hope he'll be happier at his new home. The guy who bought him says he has another parakeet, so Pastel will definitely have company.

He'll probably be the last pet I'll have for a long time. I think for the past seven or eight years, there has never been a time that my sister or I didn't have a pet. She's had a fish, three guinea pigs, and a rabbit, the last of which she sold off last year, I think. Before Pastel, I had a fish and then two sea snails. But today the Age of Pets has come to an end. All that's left of Pastel in my room are an indentation on the carpet from where his cage stand used to be, some marks on the wall that we can only assume were somehow directly or indirectly caused by him, the old cut up pillow case I used to cover his cage with every night, old seeds in the garbage can, and probably some feathers in some hard-to-reach corner.

Goodbye, old friend.

Here's something that may be useful. The main page of sunrisesunset.com lists sunrise and sunset times for cities around the world. You can also create a custom calendar of any month from 1901 to 2099 for just about any city anywhere, showing sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset times for each day. A-mazing.

The Driveway-A-Thon has a winner: me, staying on the driveway for 39 minutes and 50 seconds. I beat out the five other contestants, whose names I shall shamelessly publish here: Kristen, Casey, Lisa, Sean M., and Kevin. They all tied for second with 0 minutes, 0 seconds each. In fact, they weren't present! So I win!

I expected no one would come, but I went out there anyway, right at the time we had agreed on back in March, ferchrissake. All I did was listen to some CDs. And since I swore I'd post pictures, here's one.

It doesn't need to be high-quality. Use your imagination. You can almost see all the other contestants out there on the driveway on this beautiful morning. Man, am I stupid. I actually thought that those morons were going to come to this stupid thing. I've been waiting for months to best them at this test of endurance, and then they go and chicken out (or "forget"). Out of this whole experience, I've learned two (2) things: don't do stupid stuff with your friends, and trust no one.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to wash off this pungent sunscreen. I hope my party next month gets a better turnout.

It's 7:46 A.M. local time, 74 minutes till the Driveway-A-Thon, the ultimate test of driveway endurance, begins. If all goes well, my friends, my sister, and I will try to outlast each other sitting (or standing, or whatever) on my driveway under the hot June sun. I plan to bring CDs, my camera, and maybe my 12-string acoustic guitar. (Seeing as it's black and in a black case, it probably won't stand the heat very well.) Of course I'll put on sunscreen and wear a hat, and I'll probably sit on a towel. I guess all I'll do is either listen to music or make it. We might do some stuff as a group, too, so I'll bring my playing cards.

Whether or not I can blog live from the event depends on that I can use my dad's laptop, get Internet access on it, and install my FTP program. (I don't just fill out a form and hit "Submit," you know. My blogging is done by hand in Notepad.) He says "Out there, it's going to be real hard to see in the sunlight," and "I don't think it's a good idea," etc., etc. There must be some other reason. I will take pictures, though, and post them later.

This is really cool: custom guitar picks (or "plectrums," if you prefer). I've heard of sites offering custom picks before, but this site has a lot of different options, including material and thickness. With the Flash pick designer, you can put text and/or pictures (uploaded from your computer) on one or both sides. Then all you have to do is click the link to order the pick you have designed. The unit prices are okay, I guess, but you have to buy at least 100 of the things. Maybe if my band ever gets off the ground, that would be something to think about.

The first week of summer camp is finally over. As a surprise for the kids (even though they probably didn't care), Adam (the guitar virtuoso) and I brought our electric guitars and amps in. I thought bringing in my semi-expensive guitar and amp would cause the kids to get in trouble for messing with it. Amazingly, they only grabbed my guitar case once, and only a few of them touched the axe. I thought I could finally get them in trouble. They're so bad. Adam won't be in next week, so it'll be just me on the guitar in music class. That's unfortunate for everybody, because he's the better guitarist.

I got my last report card today in the mail. Straight As.

The Driveway-A-Thon, a test of endurance on my driveway, is tomorrow. I think my friends and I are going to die of the heat out there. I'll do what I can to beat the heat and stay cool.

I received the following e-mail a few months ago:

Nothing screams "SCAM!" like a poorly written e-mail by a Nigerian guy asking to transfer funds into your bank account. This is what is called a Nigerian, or 419, scam. Once they have your account information, havoc ensues. If you receive this or any other sort of scam, check the headers to see whence the e-mail came. I went to the site that hosted this guy's e-mail account and sent a complaint (along with a full copy of the e-mail) to the "abuse" address provided on their site. They said that they would look into it. Playing Nigerian Spam-Libs is a fun way to raise awareness of these scams.

Following the death of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan earlier this month, there has been increasing chatter about how to memorialize him, or whether he should be memorialized at all. Included in these murmurs is talk of putting Reagan on the $10 bill to replace Alexander Hamilton, our first Secretary of the Treasury. He is probably the man featured on U.S. paper money who is the least important and recognized. He also was never a President, making him a rather likely candidate to get booted. But is RR likely to make it to our wallets any time soon?

I doubt it. Considering placing on our sacred, stable (and rather stale) currency the image of a President who served less than 16 years ago is likely to arouse too much opposition among Reagan-haters. It will take time for history to write an all-around acceptable generalization of his Presidency, i.e., "He was a good President," or "He was a bad President." How long? Who knows? Maybe 100 years. But people still might criticize Teddy Roosevelt, the President in 1904, for what he did or didn't do. Heck, people's opinions are starting to turn against early Presidents like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Andrew Jackson (all featured on our currency), for the sole reason that they owned slaves!

Personally, I would like to leave at least two or three Presidents on our seven denominations of currency, and devote the rest of the bills to significant writers, inventors, and the like. And, of course, you can't forget Martin Luther King, because these days if you only put white people on your currency, you're automatically a racist. I think there's a movement to put King on the $10 bill as well. Poor Alexander Hamilton! Unless you're long dead like him, there will inevitably be too much debate.

Here's a photo gallery of Abandoned Bicycles of New York.

My sister's and my birthday is next month. We've decided that we're going to have the same old type of party again: the back porch dance party. Some people say our parties are boring, but that's their fault, not ours. They don't dance. Originally we called people to invite them, but a few years ago we thought it would be nicer to mail out an invitation. I try to load the invitation with humor. For example, this year's says

and so forth. However, not everyone invited will receive one; we are calling and e-mailing some people, including those we have recently met at our new school. The invitations were sent out yesterday and we began calling people then as well. Some people whom we have called or e-mailed have already replied. I'm too lazy to go and get the list, but I think out of 38 people we've invited, we have three who said they can come and four who said they can't.

I've talked about Linux, an operating system gaining in popularity, before, but I think it deserves to be mentioned again. I'm still not any closer to switching from Windows to Linux, or even to trying it, but that doesn't really matter to me. However, I'm thinking about it more, if just a little. Here are some reasons why I might switch to Linux sometime:

• Price. This is probably the number one reason. I'm pretty sure that most versions of Linux are free. No one seems to be perfectly clear on this point, however, but I know at least that it's pretty cheap.
• Stability. They say that there are only a handful of viruses that affect Linux, and even then it's difficult for them to take control of the computer.
• Compatibility. Again supposedly, Linux can run fast on older computers.
• It's the Symbol of a Generation! Well, I guess this is just a lame attempt at getting in another bullet, but I think Linux represents everything the young generation stands for (not that all Linux users are young, of course). It stands for freedom and stuff. The freedom to view and modify others' code. The freedom to have free software. Stuff like that.

I don't remember where I read it, but I think the number of Linux users is set to pass the number of Macintosh users (or it already has). The SCO Group is a company that claims that Linux stole portions of the copyrighted code of the Unix operating system, which it owns the rights to. SCO wants to sue Linux users for violating copyright laws, while the Linux community argues that there is no stolen code. Some weeks ago at school, I saw a girl wearing an anti-SCO t-shirt featuring Tux the penguin, Linux's mascot. I flagged her down later and complimented her on it. Like it or not, Linux is getting bigger. I'll probably go over someday, but likely not right now.

If you're considering Linux, here's a place to get started, and here's information about Knoppix, a version of Linux that you can try out on your PC without installation.

Summer camp at my old school began today. I thought the day would never end. It wasn't particularly boring, it was just long. Faithful readers will recall that I was recruited to help out because of my guitar-playing abilities.

The day began like any other sweltering, summer day that was the first day of the school's first annual summer camp. I was told, along with the other "teen helpers," to man the entrances and tell parents that their kid's name was posted on a roster on a door, and that that room would be their homeroom. After about 8 A.M., when everything was supposed to start, Mrs. Chin, the head honcho of the whole thing, had all the teen helpers go to where they were supposed to be - either traveling from room to room with a group or staying in a classroom to help the different groups that would be coming and going throughout the day. So essentially, each teen helper is either mobile or fixed. Teaching music, I happen to be fixed in the music room. However, music classes don't start till after lunch, so for much of the morning I just sat in the room alone and played my guitar. Later Adam came in - he's the guitar virtuoso that I talked about in the aforementioned post.

For lunch, I tried a delicacy that a friend at school had shown me not long ago: it was a sandwich consisting of pepper jack cheese and mayonnaise on whole wheat bread. The original used white bread, but I only had whole wheat. I brought a reused bottle of water to drink, but there was something dark green floating in it, so I held off. I'll bring a soft drink tomorrow; at least those are sealed in cans.

After lunch, music class started. First we had the four- to six-year-olds, then the seven- to nine-year-olds, and then the ten- to twelve-year-olds. What songs we did for each class is sort of a blur because the classes came one after the other and we did a lot of the same songs, and the songs all sound the same. One favorite was "John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt" [sound warning] - that one got the ten- to twelve-year-olds marching around the room, I think. Adam and I played our guitars for most of the songs, while the teacher, Nancy, sang. Adam strummed fast because he could, and I strummed slowly, so to keep myself from looking like the guitar lame-o that I am, I sometimes tried to keep up. There was no point. I would just fall back to a "dah-dah-dah-dah" while he was doing a "dah-da-dah-da-dah-da-dah-da..." He also has a nicer guitar, and right before or after a song, he goes off on these little jazzy riffs that I couldn't dream of playing. I was asked to play the guitar at a short mass in the chapel at the end of the day. Adam wasn't there, so it was just me playing and Nancy singing. I think I did a pretty good job, considering about a week ago I didn't know some of the songs.

What a long day. Is it Friday yet?

Here's a LiveJournal community devoted to a cartoonish ghost that has appeared in graffiti around the Atlanta area. The ghost has closed eyes, a large grin, and two sharp teeth. All of the ghosts appear to be done by the same person, so if the vandal gets caught, it won't be good for him. But the members of the community are apparently more concerned with taking and posting pictures of the ghost around town.

Yesterday, my untreated allergies were killing me, so I finally cleaned my room. I mean, I actually cleaned it. I put on a mask - the kind that doctors wear - and started dusting and putting stuff away. My dad helped by bringing in the Dustbuster, the vacuum cleaner, and the Shop-Vac. We sucked away most of the dust, including the dust in the crevices of my room where the tan carpet was blue-gray. I also cleared off stuff on my dresser, desk, and shelves, to keep dust from collecting and to make future dusting easier. I found some interesting things, such as unmarked cassette tapes, my parents' old CD with a West German guy playing Bach on a Moog synthesizer, and newspaper pages dating back to October 12, 2001. I was supposed to line my bird's cage with that stuff. Speaking of which, my dad cleaned the cage while we were at it.

You could say that the dust defeated me, because it forced me to make the appearance of my room second to cleanliness. I used to have lots of stuff on my desk, dresser, and shelves, but now I have less. The stuff that wasn't necessary or easy to dust went. It kind of looks like I'm moving out. It's terrible, but hopefully my allergies will go away.

A company called ELPJ manufactures a laser turntable, an innovation that was 14 years and gobs of money in the making. The record goes in as a CD would in a CD player. Instead of a stylus, the grooves of the record are read by a laser, which is much more accurate and does no damage to the disc. (A regular stylus alters the grooves on contact, causing wear and other bad stuff.) Because the record is not touched, it's possible to play a shattered record if you have all the pieces together. The best part is that some models come with a remote control, so you can actually sit back and play your favorite tracks again and again. Supposedly record libraries and radio stations are using them. You can too if you can afford the $8,000-$14,300 (U.S.) price tag. The only other drawback I can see is that the laser can't play colored or clear vinyl - it must be black. But still, if I had a lot of records and a lot of money, I'd buy one of those things.

The Driveway-A-Thon has been postponed to June 26, which, incidentally, was the original date we had planned. I think we all need an extra week to prepare.

Yesterday I observed the growing popularity of the cartoon site Homestar Runner. In fact, just the other day I saw a Trogdor [sound warning] sticker on a car, and last year I saw a Stinkoman [sound warning] t-shirt. But the creators of Homestar Runner had another pet project: a satirical website of a "company" called THORAX CORPORATION LLC,,. Though they don't explicitly claim ownership, Homestar Runner references and their distinctive style of humor can be seen throughout the site.

A sound effect of a man screaming was recorded for the 1951 film Distant Drums. It was described in the Warner Brothers sound effects library as "Man Being Eaten by Alligator." Who back in 1951 knew that it would continue to be used today?

Because the shriek was emitted by a character named Wilhelm in The Charge at Feather River (1953), it has come to be known as the Wilhelm Scream, or simply the Wilhelm. Since then, it has been reused in dozens of movies and TV shows, even to this day. It's been heard in all of the Star Wars and Indiana Jones movies, and has also been used in Toy Story (1995), Titanic (1997), Spider-Man (2002), and The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002). Here's a large list of the Wilhelm's appearances, and here's a WAV file of the Wilhelm itself.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, Ohio, is holding GuitarMania II this year. As part of GuitarMania, individuals and groups painted ninety 3 m tall guitars, which were placed around the city of Cleveland and in the museum on June 1. On November 6 most of the guitars will be auctioned for charity.

It just so happens that I'll be in Cleveland in August, and I plan on visiting the HoF. One of the guitars I'm looking forward to seeing is The Cheatar, by Matt and Mike Chapman of Homestar Runner, an online cartoon site. Their guitar is painted like The Cheat, a little yellow thing that's a popular character.

The Cheatar is staying inside the museum. Here's a map (PDF) of which guitars are where.

I'll admit that I'm a shameless promoter of my web site(s). But isn't everyone? I've scrawled the URL of my Pokémon fan site on at least one bulletin board (and I mean the real-life kind). When you're new to webmaster...ing..., promoting your site can be fun and exciting, but then it gets old really quick. You realize that in spite of your efforts, you're getting absolutely nowhere. That's why I prefer these days to have the World of Stuff's pages promote themselves, and only occasionally will I worry about the site as a whole. This week has been one of those times, however. Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. I'm a blatant link swapper!

Being a shameless promoter takes a lot of nerve. How would I know, you ask? Well, I don't have it. So I'm a shameful promoter, if you will. Recently I've taken advantage of some sites linking to TWoS by asking the sites that link to those sites to trade links with me. It seems immoral and wrong to just go up and ask, but I guess that's the biz. To get recognition for your site (besides that which attracts the press), you need to exchange links. If it is in fact the biz, it's not a very good one; of the 21 requests I sent out on Monday and Tuesday, I've received only 5 replies: two yeses, two soons, and a no. I guess it's not that bad of a return, considering I am engaging in - shudder - spam-like activity. Unsolicited e-mails, I mean. But enough of that. I've been starting to get more hits because of those yeses, and I hope they're getting more hits from me.

In case you were happening to wonder, here are a few blogs and bloggish sites I follow:

• Google Blog: Yes, the last great dotcom has joined the blogosphere. In this blog, Google employees talk about personal experiences, working in the Googleplex, and, well, other stuff, I'm sure. The blog is relatively new and not much has been posted in it yet.
• mcgees.org: The personal site and blog of one Joshua McGee (whom I met through Where's George?). His site is quite similar to TWoS, actually; it's a topicless blog accompanied by various other random pages. His Diacritic Decoration page uses the special characters from my Ultimate Cool Characters.
• Raj KAJ's Journal: The blog of a guy who lives in my area. He posts a lot of interesting stuff and takes pictures around town. It's interesting to see some of my daily sights posted by someone else on the Web.
• Slashdot: "News for nerds. Stuff that matters." Need I say more? Actually, yes. Slashdot is one of the premier geek sites on the Internet, providing technology- and geek-related news and links. The Dvorak Keyboard and You was once linked to in a Slashdot discussion and received a record of 47 hits that day.

A few months ago my sister, our friends, and I came up with the idea to see who could last the longest on my driveway. The date we set for the Driveway-A-Thon was Saturday, June 26. However, due to one participant's upcoming vacation in Rome (and I'm not talking about Rome, Georgia - some people have all the fun), the date has been pushed up to this Saturday, June 19. According to the Weather Channel, there will be isolated thunderstorms with a 30% chance of rain and a high temperature of 32°C. It will probably feel even warmer, though; it's been very humid as of late. The Driveway-A-Thon will have to be a battle against the weather as much as it is a battle against boredom and the other participants. Weather permitting, the show will go on and I plan to blog live from the event and post pictures later. I hope it goes well!

I hate when boring adults make web pages that they say were typed by their babies or pets. They all say stupid things like, "I coughed up a hairball again today!" or "I spit up again today!" Here's a pet's blog that's different for a change: Ripley the cat does his own typing.

A few weeks ago, I signed up to help out at my old school's first annual summer camp, which will run next week and the week after that. They want me to play the guitar and teach songs to the kids. Are they that desperate for talent that they need to recruit me? The other guy they got was a guy a few years older than me whom I call "The Kid with the Long Hair." He plays at church, and he's really good. He does all these solos and stuff, and even though they sound like Weather Channel music, they're good.

Anyway, yesterday I met with the lady who I guess is in charge of doing the music at the summer camp. She lives about a thousand miles inside this far-flung neighborhood. Deep in the neighborhood, she lives in one of those gated commune-type things where all the houses have to be the same. All the houses are on a single street, to boot. Anyway, she's really nice. I had my doubts about playing music for little kids, but after I got a taste of what songs she's planning on doing, I felt better. I mean, these are kids' songs, not classical pieces. But still, teaching four- to ten-year-olds songs for two weeks isn't a decision I could have made while sane... or awake. I hope it'll be all right.

Now, for your entertainment(?), here's a cheesy graph showing the number of hits to the World of Stuff home page. The record-holding month is September 2003, with 574 hits, or 19.1 hits per day. The antirecord belongs to May 2003, the month after the site's launch. That month saw only 39 hits, or 1.3 per day. Things aren't doing so great as September 2003 anymore. Last month was rather disappointing, with only 330 hits. I predict that this month will end with at least 366, but only time will tell.

Today marks the 227th anniversary of the adoption of the United States' first flag on June 14, 1777. Flag Day, as it is known, has never been a national holiday, and only Pennsylvania celebrates it as a state holiday. In fact, it wasn't even celebrated until 1885. Compare to Independence Day, which Americans have celebrated since the country's very beginning. Still, Flag Day is a day devoted to the flag, and these days, people are more obsessed with it than ever. There are women I know whom I refer to as "angel/flag ladies" - everything that has an angel's picture on it, they own, and the American flag is plastered to every corner of their garage, their cars, and of course, their t-shirts. They also like crafts and hand-painted wooden things, but I digress. You probably know their type. The point is this: some people are head over heels for the darn flag.

Me, I don't really care about the flag that much. I have a few in my room. One is a plastic one that some insurance agency or something stuck into everyone's yards some Memorial Days ago. Another is a gigantic one that used to be in a classroom in what used to be the high school that I would eventually go to, but didn't yet at that time. (Funny how those things work out.) The third, which I no longer have, is a little one I got a while back. A few months ago I brought it into my science class because there was no flag in there, and so each morning we had to pledge allegiance to air.

Anyway, here's some information about the U.S. flag, and here's a gallery of historical versions.

As I mentioned a few days ago, I'll be going on three trips over the summer; two of them will be a week long. How am I supposed to entertain you, the reader, while I'm trying to relax and have fun? Because I don't use blogging software, it can be annoying to blog away from home. I'd have to bring along any files I might need, plus my FTP program, onto a laptop computer. It would be a big pain in the neck, trust me. Since vacations are about getting away from pains in the neck, what am I supposed to do?

The answer is PLAPS - the Pretty Lame Automated Posting System. It works like this: while I relax and try to have a good time, pre-written blog entries will be automatically posted to the site day after day, at any time I specify, until I return to the helm. I won't give away exactly how it works; that's my own little secret. But if you're reading this, then it does indeed work. Though this post first appeared at 17:35 UTC, I actually wrote it several hours before. It's the first example of PLAPS at work! Though the delay for this post is a few hours, I could easily (and will) set the delay for days, so that PLAPS will be able to handle things while I'm gone.

What song was #1 on the American and/or British charts on the day you were born? Find out! (You'll have to enter an e-mail address because they e-mail you with the results. Just give them a Mailinator address if you're wary of giving your real address.) The U.S. number one on my birthday was "Good Thing" by the Fine Young Cannibals.

What's Special About This Number? It's a very long list of what's special about particular numbers from 0 to 9,999. Included are lots of big words and numbers named after dead guys.

Freedom from exams! Freedom from school! Yesterday I presented my dang project that I'm dang tired of talking about and linking to, and both days I filled in all the bubbles on all the tests and today I wrote the lame essay for English. And today, it's all over. Over! My freshman year of high school is over. It all happened so fast.

I remember the first day of school. The ancient buildings, since obsoleted. The crowds of strange people. The schedules posted on the old pink walls. The homeroom at the first bell and the darkness outside at the ungodly hour of 7:00. The seemingly scary classmates. The seemingly scary teachers. The seemingly scary classrooms. (Hey, those buildings were old.) The finding of the classes. The eating of the lunch. (Mexican pizza, on top of a garbage can.) The being late to classes. The scariness and beginningness of it all. But eventually, as you know, things happened. I met people, sometimes in rather strange ways. I got good grades. Homework levels dwindled. Things became okay.

But now it's all over. I am often disappointed by the lack of closure on the sacred last day of school. So I'd like to thank everyone who made my year great. First, I want to thank my sister for being there for me (most of the time, anyway). Next, the friends from my old school who helped me out during my freshman year: George, Katherine, Lauren, Mandi, Mark, Mike, and Nick. I'd also like to think the friends I've kept in touch with even though they don't go to my new school: Alex, Casey, Lisa, Kelli, Kevin, and Sean. Then, a thank you to the old friends that I ran into this year: Brittnay, Dennis and Dobbs. Finally, I'd like to give a big thank you to the new friends I made: Andrew, Autumn, Billy, Bryce, Bryan, Chris, Curtis, Dan, Donald, Ed, Evan, Fava, Fedia, Gilbert, Jackie, Jon, Josh, Katrina, Kerliza, Lea, Meghan, Melanie, Omar, Paolo, Reed, Richie, Sacha, Sherrelle, Terrance, Tomás, Tommy, Vargas, Vivian, and Yamileé. I couldn't have done it without you guys; I really mean it. Thank you all. To the ones who will be back next year, I hope to see you.

This summer I plan to go to Hutchinson Island, Florida, for the Fourth of July weekend; Grandfather Mountain, North Carolina, for the last week or so of July; and Ohio in August, the last week before school starts again (ewwww). During the last two weeks of this month I will be playing the guitar at a summer camp at my old school. But for now, it's relaxation.

And an interesting follow-up: yesterday I wondered what the school would do with everyone's ID badges which they issued and recently took back. I pondered, "Would they reuse them next year? Not likely, but it's a funny thought, as some people's are defaced beyond recognition." Well, I was right. They are planning on reusing the ID badges next year and even keeping the pictures, I think. All they're going to do is change "2003-2004" to "2004-2005."

Today in Global Studies after everyone had presented their country projects, Mr. Firestone received a call from the office using our high-tech interdepartment messaging system: the telephone. He then told me to to go to Ms. Phillips. (I only knew where to go because yesterday he took a stack of papers out of the garbage and told me to deliver them to her.) I wondered why I had to go. Was I in trouble? I went down to the office and told the lady at the desk that Ms. Phillips wanted me. She asked me my name and couldn't figure out why I was there (I didn't know why either), so she set me aside to deal with some other people. Then she told me to go to Mr. Weaver's office down the hall, room number whatever. Man, did I go crazy. No one wants to get sent to Mr. Weaver. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy.

As I was waiting outside the office, which, it turned out, was actually Ms. Phillips', Ms. Phillips came out from another door, apparently trying to look for me. She came up to me and handed me... my ID badge. She said that she had received word from my mother that I was going to need it over the summer (as I ranted about yesterday), and told me to give it back on the first day of school. So I once again am able to board an airplane, having a photo ID and all.

I still think it was very weird of the school to take away everyone's ID badges. I really don't know what they'd do with them. Would they place them in each student's file? They should have a digital version of the photos, as they were taken on a computer and all. Would they reuse them next year? Not likely, but it's a funny thought, as some people's are defaced beyond recognition. Oh, and they say "2003-2004" on them. Would they recycle them? Doubt it. I've never heard of any school recycling anything, not even on TV. And that wouldn't explain why they'd need it so urgently, unless the county or the state has some kind of mandated recycling quota. (Actually, that could be.) Would they use the ID badges, along with lousy photos featured on the school web site, to create the world's largest scrapbook?

Here's the web site of the Gallup Organization, which conducts polls, polls, and more gosh darn polls. Check it out to see some recent polls, to learn how polls are conducted, and to... well, I'm sure they have other stuff there.

Today was the antepenultimate day of school and the final full-length day. Today was also the day we found out that they were going to take our ID badges back, lanyards and all. Nobody knew why, either. Not even the teachers. No joke. They were just told they had to collect them.

I didn't think much of it when I heard about it early in the morning. But later, I did think about it because I'm going to need a photo ID when I go on a plane in August, and, well, it's my only stinkin' photo ID. So later in the day, when my teacher asked for them to be collected, I was stark raving furious. I almost refused to turn it in, but in the end I submitted. However, I removed the ID from the lanyard and handed them in not connected to each other - with the hope of ticking somebody, somewhere, off.

They can't do that, if you ask me. A photo can't be something they just give to you and take away from you. This afternoon I felt like a Soviet peasant when the Reds kicked down the door of his little shack and goose stepped off with all the grain they had rationed for him. For a young, young high school freshman who hasn't gotten his driver's license or permit yet, like, I dunno, me, an ID can be a your key to the world - whether for boarding a plane or just for getting a discount at the movies. Oh, and I needed it to apply officially for my job (so I could get a paycheck instead of cash). Should I choose to get a new job over the summer, oops, sorry, I can't. They took my ID away from me. I swear.

Yeah, like anyone's gonna believe that one. These ID badges were supposed to protect the school from the axe-wielding murderer that could slip in at any moment and pass himself off as a student. So if an axe-wielding murderer sneaks in tomorrow or Thursday, I really will laugh.

Final exams start tomorrow. I'm sick of talking about them. I'm almost done with my project, which is due tomorrow; I'll post a picture if it ends up looking pretty.

I've been working on my final exams and final projects and what have you. My final exam in English is to write an essay. We've been studying Joseph Campbell's model of the hero. The essay will either be about (a) whether the protagonist in The Catcher in the Rye is a hero or a "lost soul," (b) whether the protagonist in the Odyssey is a hero or a villain, or (c) how a children's or adventure movie of our choice (I'm choosing The Goonies) relates to Campbell's heroic formula. The thing is, the teacher isn't going to tell us which one it will be until exam time. So, he's making us prepare for each, which I guess is a good thing.

In Spanish I have to do this final project that's not my exam, but it's a 200-point project, and so it's kind of important (even though I have a 99% average in the class). We got to choose our topics for the project out of the textbook. They have these sort of writing pages where you practice your writing. I chose a page where they ask you about your favorite meal and stuff. Lucky for me, I think it's the easiest one. You just write the answers to their questions in the form of a paragraph, and that's half the battle right there. My paragraph, typed, takes up hardly three lines. It looks awful. The other part of the project, at least for the people writing about their favorite meals, is to make a menu. That's all I heard. So I'm making a menu (in Spanish, of course) of what I eat during a typical day. I'm calling it El Menú de Pedro (Pedro is my Spanish name in class). Oh, and we have to present our projects, and the presentations are going to be filmed. Yipee.

I haven't done much with my Global Studies project as of late. I'm almost done with the paper, but I still haven't started the visual model of the country yet. I went out last night to look for Play-Doh, but I realized they probably don't have a great selection of earth tones (unless you want tie-dyed terrain). I'll go to the art store today and look for some clay.

Ah yes, I do have one other subject: science. For that class I'm going to have just a plain vanilla test for my final exam. I don't think I'll do so great because there's a lot of stuff to remember, and I have a hard time remembering science stuff. With English, Spanish, and Global Studies cluttering my mind, I haven't even had time to think about it, anyway.

With Garfield: The Movie seeing its U.S. release on Friday, you can only wonder how hideously awful it's going to be. Don't get me wrong here; I like the comic strip (more on that in a second), but this movie just looks like it's going to stink. In fact, I guarantee that it's going to hit IMDB's Bottom 100 Films when it comes out. Anyway, I used to like the comic strip on which the movie is based. Garfield was funny until a few years ago when he just started leaning against that table/countertop thing all the time. Since the strip is translated into a gazillion languages, there's no room for humor anymore. It's just Garfield and Jon leaning against that table and saying stupid stuff. Sometimes, to kick up the variety, Jon will be on the phone. Or maybe Garfield will go outside and get beaten up by a dog. But that's it. It's simply not funny anymore.

But, fat feline fanatics, there is hope. This page randomly takes panels from Garfield strips and arranges them haphazardly, a la Dadaist poetry. The results can actually be quite interesting and funny - a major improvement on the originals, if you ask me.

Today at school I was invited to the seventh annual end-of-the-year awards ceremony. I had heard it (jokingly) called the Nerd Awards, so I'm just calling it the Nerdies. I really don't care if people call me a nerd. To me there's nothing wrong with being one.

There were a lot of people there - a good chunk of the school. Many of them were only there because they had had perfect attendance throughout the year. I got that award too, and I hope next week doesn't spoil the record. (I also had perfect attendance in 2nd and 4th grades.) To my surprise, I received a Nerdie for excellence in my English I Honors class, which is not one of my better subjects (I'm doing well in all my subjects, so "better" is a relative term). I also received an award for doing well on the FCAT. That's a total of three awards. The only thing I didn't like about having to attend the ceremony is that I missed watching most of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb in my Global Studies class. (It was a timekiller disguised as preparation for next year's history class.)

Anyway, I have a lot to do to prepare for all my final projects and exams, so before I take a short break, here's an interesting link. The Infinite Cat Project started when a user on an Apple help forum posted a picture of his cat with a flower. Another user posted a picture of his cat looking at the picture on his computer screen. A third user photographed his cat looking at that picture, and madness ensued. To date, an chain of 142 cats looking at cats has been created, and they are taking image submissions.

From the In Case You Really Care Department, this is the third part of a series chronicling my creation of a fictitious country for my Global Studies final project. (Here is the last update.)

I've found that I now have less than a week to finish the project; it's due next Wednesday. I've written about many aspects of my country, Recenia, already. From the list of stuff I have to write about, I've incorporated the following into my paper: (1) landforms, (2) natural resources, (3) location, (4) transportation within the nation, (6) religion, (7) racial makeup, (8) language, (9) products grown/produced/manufactured, (12) capital, (13) imports/exports, (15) history, (17) population, (18) population density, and (20) land area. I'm currently working on writing (5) government type/leader. That leaves (10) public works, (11) currency, (14) military, (16) financial strength, and (19) culture left to be done. However, I've made a list of my own stuff to be included as well: independence, flag, highest and lowest points, country code top level domain, motto, national anthem, holidays, and natural hazards. Of course, the official list is my top priority. Even if I don't include the stuff from my own list, this paper is going to have a tough time squeezing between two and five pages with double spacing. The history, the longest section, is six paragraphs alone. However, many of the items can adequately be described in a single paragraph or a sentence.

I'm worried that I'm going to focus more on the country's culture and such than its actual economy. I didn't do very well at attempting to create an economy for the country. I've decided it's mostly tourism, industry, and some agriculture. Sand is used to make glass, so does that make sand a natural resource? I've decided that it does. That's how lame I am at creating an economy. It kind of stinks, because I have a feeling the whole project is supposed to be about creating an economy. I hope some people's economies are worse than mine. Glass as a major export. For a Connecticut-sized island that doesn't actually exist, I guess it's reasonable.

This weekend I'm going to have to do the other half of the project: creating a visual representation of the island. The teacher has said he would prefer it to be three-dimensional. It's a good excuse to break out the old Play-Doh, I guess. I haven't even thought about what I'm going to do for the model, except that the medium will be Play-Doh. Hmm, if I spent as much time working on the project as I did writing about working on the project, I could be considerably farther by now. Oh well, I have about a week.

GIANTmicrobes makes stuffed animals that look like microbes (except that they're a million times actual size). Some of the cute critters include the flu, the common cold, athlete's foot, and black death. Buy one for someone you love!

Quick, what's the only place in the United States where traffic keeps to the left?

Well, there are actually two places. One is in California, where the northbound and southbound lanes of Interstate 5 swap sides for about five miles. Which Side of the Road Do They Drive On? gives an interesting look at which side of the road people drive on in countries around the world. It details why people in different countries chose to keep to different sides and lists the "right" and "left" countries of the world. Countries that drive on the right outnumber countries that drive on the left by about 2 to 1. The site's scope is not limited to cars; they also talk about trains, planes, boats, and pedestrians.

It reminds me of when I visited the Bahamas in 2002. Like in most former British colonies, the rule of the road in the Bahamas is to keep left. Normally this would mean that the steering wheel on their cars would be on the right, but it's located on the left, if memory serves. Throw in that challenge with the Bahamas' narrow roads and not-so-great drivers, and it makes you wonder how they manage to do it. As for me, I would recommend visiting a country where they drive on the opposite side of the road. It's a pretty cool experience if you can get a ride.

Oh, and the other place under U.S. jurisdiction where traffic keeps to the left? You can find that information on the site.