Another Word for Nerd

you end up like this lady on an episode of Trading Spouses.

I finally got Brad Parker’s MIT CADR emulator up and running. Here are some screenshots.

This weekend I’ll try to port the code to OS X (with X11). There’s some OS X-specific stuff commented out in the provided Makefile, but I still haven’t gotten a clean compile yet.

(Update: Okay, perhaps I should have titled it “Never buy a camera from PriceRite Photo” instead)

Online, that is - unless you like getting threatened over the phone. Wow.

If the predicted new Mac mini with Intel CPU comes out in January, I’ll be replacing this iMac G5 (17″, 1.8Ghz) with one and a Dell 2005FPW widescreen LCD. Will make a nice small silent workstation.

I’d pay cold hard cash for an OS X port of OpenGenera, but I doubt I could come up with the $5K they currently want for the Alpha-based version (its doubtful that a Mac version would be any cheaper). Nobody around here has a Symbolics machine they’re giving away, so it will remain a wish..

I guess SLIME + Emacs is the best currently-available development environment for Common LISP.

On that note, my transition from VI to Emacs is coming along nicely, although I’m trying to wean myself off of using VIP and start using the native Emacs cursor movement commands.

My mother made it safely back to Oklahoma this evening.

A couple of nights ago I had a strange dream - about trying to find a “lambda” key on an Apple Extended Keyboard II while reading The Little Schemer (which is strange, as I’m currently deep in Practical Common LISP), and at the same time, watching CNN footage of the President dancing around like a monkey.

Yeah, I’d say I definitely need more sleep.

Despite what AppleMatters and Ars Technica tell you, it is possible to completely dissasemble the Apple Mighty Mouse without breaking the retaining ring.

All I had to do was slip a razor blade between it and the body of the mouse to cut the glue. I was then able to pop the top of the mouse off the hinges on the bottom, unscrew the “scroll ball” assembly, pop off its top cover, and clean the rollers. I’ll have to glue the retaining ring back on with a couple dots of superglue, but the mouse works fine without it right now.

Update: Four drops of superglue, and everything’s back together and working perfectly. I’ve also crossposted this over at MacHELP.

Note: I took my Mighty Mouse apart after all the other cleaning methods had failed. I tried all kinds of cleaners, scrubbing the ball, etc, and it had gotten to the point to where taking it apart to clean the ball rollers was the only option.

The past few days have been a madhouse. My mother’s flying in tonight to visit for the next three days. Amy’s been running around like a chicken with it’s head cut off, trying to get ready and make the Perfect Thanksgiving Dinner.

Today she made cornbread (for the stuffing), cooked a ton of green beans w/bacon and ham, and made a chocolate pecan pie (w/Jack Daniels).

The house is clean, and we’re getting ready to shower and change clothes so we can go pick up Mom around 7:30.

It sucks when it’s 9:47pm, you need Jack Daniels to make a proper pecan pie, and all the liquor stores closed 47 minutes ago.

Picked up the iMac from the Galleria Apple Store this morning. Got it home, and it fires right up without a problem.

One thing I’ve noticed - the original midplane and fans in this system were rather noisy. When I replaced the midplane back in March, the replacement was MUCH quieter, but still with a “whine” that would kick up in pitch as the system load increased.

After the power supply was swapped yesterday, it’s now damn near *completely silent*, even with Azureus running and the Energy Saver options set to “highest” CPU performance. I’m *very* happy right now.