This one is a commission for ilhander. The foofy scarves haven't passed the Jayne Hat as a "can you make another of those?" project, but they're tied with the Toddler Hoodie at three now.

Some time a few weeks ago, I went to try to install something on my Android. I don't do it that often, and I'm a little absent-minded, so it went something like this. "Okay, where is the Market? It's not under M. Maybe it's under A for Android Market? No, it's not there. Is it not an app? Is it some other thing? This thing has an App Store of some sort, I know I've installed things before. Do I have to use iTun... no I do not have to use iTunes, I'm pretty sure of that. Where the hell is the Market? It has... that little green and white android guy. I remember the icon. It was just here. This is... really surreal. How am I supposed to install apps? Maybe it's just all QR codes now? That can't be it. There must be some sort of app, maybe I'm just misremembering the name. And misremembering what it looked like." After about five minutes of poring carefully over the list of apps, I finally found it. It had been renamed from Android Market to Google Play (filed under P), and the icon had been changed.

Bah.

Now, my sliding keyboard has stopped working. I bought SlideIT a while back, and I find it much better than tapping keys as far as input is concerned. But because I paid for it, it has to log in to check my license every so often to make sure I'm not a software pirate. Which it does by connecting through the Android Market and verifying my login. Right. (Now that I am on a computer and can search more properly, the answer seems to be "reinstall and it should work", but still.)

* * *

This second rant is not something that personally thwarted me, but is really kind of hilariously wrong.

Amazon has been doing this thing recently, where they excerpt (randomly chosen) sentences from user reviews and say things like "5 other reviewers made a similar statement", thus lending Great Weight to that particular statement.

I was looking at Redshirts by John Scalzi, and toying with the idea of pre-ordering it (the alternative is getting the audiobook read by Wil Wheaton, so I may do that instead). Now, it's a book called "Redshirts." You can imagine what it's about. You can imagine what very precise franchise it's a satire of. So, what are the three review quotes (from Amazon Vine) that Amazon chooses to showcase?

"The characters exhibit wonderful chemistry, and despite no huge amount of effort spent on development there are some surprisingly touching moments."

Heh, cute and informative.

"All three codas are more serious in nature and are worth reading."

Interesting. And...

"My favorite television show is Doctor Who."

Wait... what? Ha ha ha ha hah. Okay, first, this is like putting "I really love Batman" as a reviewer quote on your Avengers poster. Second, Amazon tells me "3 reviewers made a similar statement." Really? There's twelve reviews, so twenty-five percent (or maybe thirty-three percent, it probably means "3 other reviewers made a similar statement") of people reviewing this book made a point to say how much they liked Doctor Who?

As it turns out, no. Only one reviewer mentioned Doctor Who at all. (They actually say "I am a quasi-sci-fi-fan. My favorite television show is Doctor Who. I watch Fringe. I loved Firefly. I know my Star Wars and Star Trek just enough..." so it makes sense in context). Two reviewers use the word "favorite", so that's not it either. Two reviewers use the word "television", but two others use "tv", so that's probably what it's counting.

"My favorite television show is Doctor Who" and three other reviewers mentioned television, so they must have meant the same thing, because you really only need to read one word in order to figure out what the sentence means.

I see what you're trying to do, Amazon, but "My favorite television show is Doctor Who" is hilariously silly as a showcase quote, and "Three reviewers made a similar statement" would probably be rated as "Pants on Fire" by any proper fact checker.

Tags: rant
Current Mood: cranky

Look! A sweater (for mjperson)! I got this yarn on my last yarn crawl in San Francisco, after spending a ridiculous amount of time in Artfibers, and it came in wound cones of exactly as much yardage as I asked for. Neat! I ended up getting two different lighter weight yarns, one yak and one alpaca, and combining them together. Both fibers are very warm for their weight compared to wool, so I think it will be a pretty warm sweater. It might be a little droopier than wool, which is very resilient, but I made it non-baggy, so that would help. The feel of the fabric is different than wool - silky (in a way that a small fluffy animal might be silky, not the way silk is silky - silk yarn actually has a... crunchy, squeaky feel, and this doesn't), and pettable.

Tags: knit

bluepapercup asked for an entry on knitting, so here are some thoughts, in rambling order.

First, I enjoy it a lot more now that it doesn't take that much concentration. Like any physical skill, it's a lot more effort when just starting up, and becomes more effortless as you get better at it. I'm still not that fast a knitter - I'm sure switching to contintental would help with that, but I'm just not willing to go through the long phase of being a beginner again.

I knit while watching TV, or at role-playing games, or while reading. Especially for things like watching TV, being able to multi-task like that is nice - I feel less like I'm being a complete waste of time if I'm being useful at the same time.

I like making things, especially complicated things or pretty things or interesting things or cool things or things that other people can't make. I do not always like having things in the same way - I would really love to make some of the more interesting crocheted lace doilies, or learn tatting, which makes even more interesting lace. But I do not actually need to have any doilies, and I'm not sure I know anyone who does want doilies, so I don't make them. (Am I mistaken? Do any of you out there want doilies? :) ) So I mostly make practical things, like socks and sweaters, or impractical things that other people want (like squid hats).

This ties into the other thing about things - I like presents. I like getting presents, and I like giving presents. So it's an excuse to give people presents all the time! (Well, not that all the time - as I mentioned, I don't knit that fast). Sweaters are generally too warm for me, so I have almost no sweaters that I've made myself. Happily, mjperson has a job that takes him into roofless buildings during winter, so he will take as many sweaters as I can give him.

Finally, I'm fidgety by nature. If I don't have something to do with my hands, I'll doodle or twiddle my fingers or bite my nails or something. So having something to do with my hand is calming, it fulfils my fidget instinct. Some people say meditative, but I don't think I'd go that far, but it's pleasant, and peaceful (except for discovering that I've made a mistake and having to fix it, which is not at all peaceful.) The tactile aspects and the aesthetic aspects tie in a little here - it's fidgeting in a physically pleasant way, or like I'm doodling artistically. So it's nicer than just making a mess with my pencil, or picking at my nails, or whatever other fidgets I could be doing.

Admittedly, none of this addresses something like "why knitting rather than crochet?" which may have been the particular point of curiosity. I think that's mostly function rather than form - crochet is better at structural, knit is better at clothes. So I've done crochet, like all the octopodes and the Titan afghan and so on, but I'm iffier on crochet socks or sweaters. And I'm not good enough to autopilot crochet yet.

# are ebooks

( Black Ships, The Serpent Sea, The Night Circus )

Tags: book reviews

Original questions from desireearmfeldt:

Things That Are Not Right

I kind of like the phrase "What is this I don't even" for things that are completely and bafflingly Not Right. Like the left-turn signal from the right lane (which I did get an explanation for). I have a hard time using the phrase, though, because it's so incoherent (but that's the point). That's for things that are so Not Right that they're hilarious and amuse me - being in customer support, I run into a fair number of those - and they make for good livejournal posts. There are other things which are so Not Right that they're rage- or despair-inducing, and those are less funny, and I am not really sure what to say about those.

Things That Are Puzzling

This could be technical challenges, or it could be certain people. Technical challenges that are puzzling are fun. I tend to talk to myself during these (the other night, producing B5, there was "Why are these signs showing up off the left edge of the paper? Wait, for the love of God, why did visage put things at -9 inches outside the box?" (And I figured out the "why" answer to that, too, which is even better in puzzle-solving). "Why are you receiving mail to this 400-person list that you are not on?" was one of my favorite recent technical puzzles that took me a long time to figure out but I was very pleased when I finally did. But a technical puzzle that I can't get any traction on at all - that I don't understand enough to do anything, or even know where to start, and all the documentation is written for someone who knows more about UNIX or encryption or whatever than I do - that frustrates me very quickly, which is a character flaw. It is a thing that I love about my job, that it presents me with these occasional puzzles that need solving, and that it also lets me mess around in my spare time and build puzzles for myself like "How do I write database-based webapps to run octopus contests?"

People I know are also interesting puzzles. I like making models of people in my head - they're more explanatory than predictive, but I think they do help to throw warning flags for me when I seem likely to annoy someone else by tweaking them in a way they don't want to be tweaked. They are not as predictive as I'd like, because people are not easily simulated to that much detail. There are also people who I don't have good models for - sometimes I might have instincts for them, but sometimes they are just mysterious black boxes who might say anything at all. (On the other side of things, I really love when I can communicate with someone without any actual content - things like "Did you do the thing with the thing? I figured out who it should be - it's obviously *that* guy", talking to mjperson in front of players, or "rectangle with squiggle in it" for "Jabberwocky" in Pictionary with justom. But that's not about Puzzling at all, that's about having solved the puzzle).

I do find myself wondering why these two topics in particular - they seem to be bookends for something, but I'm not recognizing it as an obviously Me Thing. (In particular, I don't recognize Things That Are Not Right as one of my Things, but I don't know whether it's that I'm missing the point somehow, or this is something other people see in mee that I miss, or what.)

The Fascination Of Yarn

There are a bunch of different components to this for me. First, there's color. A lot of people have spent a lot of time turning yarn into lovely colors, such that they're kind of mesmerizing on their own. Between the color and the depth - the interplay between light and dark between each ply and the space between, or the edges of the yarn, I find a lot of yarn just really cool to look at. Like this image of a MadelineTosh yarn - there's a depth of contrast there that isn't in something like this. And many of them feel pettable - cashmere, angora, bison, that sort of thing. So, that's coveting the item for its aesthetic properties. I think I only have one skein that is *only* for aesthetics and I can't imagine what to make with it - that's this, and the picture doesn't really do it justice. Next, there's the potential that yarn has in it. It could be anything! It could be created into anything! It's like the fascination of an art supply store for anyone with any dreams of being artistic, or a stationery store for people who daydream that they might ever write more letters or a novel, if only they had the perfect pen. Yarn is suggestive that way - there's a whole universe of might-be comprised within everything. If only there was enough time. Third, I think my whole family has some prediliction towards hoarder-ness; I only let it come out in me in books, bowls, and yarn - but boy does it come out there. Fourth, visiting yarn stores I've never been to before is a Thing I Do With harrock when travelling - sometimes it's a good escape when I need more introvert time, it's always a fun little adventure. And if you're using "going shopping" as an excuse, you have to get something. Interestingly, I seem to have talked for quite a bit about yarn without really touching on why I like knitting. :)

Femininity

I think femininity is something that specifies things that I can do (wear perfume, wear a shawl when I'm cold at work, put my hair in a bun), but I don't think that it speficies things that I must do (wear makeup, wear heels). And it's something that I... never really got the hang of. I wore makeup some in high school, but I never felt comfortable that I was doing it right. But being fat is depressing when shopping for women's clothes, and being fat and tall is even worse. (Most nylons, in particular, will allow you to be tall and skinny, or short and fat, but not both, and if you have fat thighs, wearing a skirt without nylons can be chafingly painful). So when I find jeans or pants that fit, I wear them to death, and I wear shirts rather than blouses, and I couldn't tell you whether more of them are men's shirts or women's (much to ilhander's despair). Well, hum, I seem to think that femininity is all about what you wear. I guess there are behavior patterns that are "feminine", some of which I fall into (not asking for raises, being deferent, knitting), and some of which I don't (solutions v. sympathy, not very kid-nurturing, perl hacking).

Music

I don't listen to background music very much. I do use music for specific tasks - fast music to bicycle to, wordless music to tune out distractions and work on a task I don't want to work on for hours (like writing the log) - I can't listen to music with words while doing something with words, or they get muddled together. Bouncy music to clean or cook to, a very few specific pieces for destressing or calming down. A while ago, rifmeister was collecting mix tapes (well, CDs) from people, and I made one for him. I alternated between "Music I like for no reason" and "Music that hits me emotionally in one way or another". I probably haven't thought about music that hard before or since, but I really did like the exercise.

The Art Of Happiness

Some of it is innate temperament (which I really want to spell without the "a". "temperament" sounds like something you do to cure paint), I think - I don't fret about a lot of things that other people do. I don't worry about what the meaning of my life is, or if I have a purpose, or if I have lived up to expectations of me (except in the "would my PhD advisor disapprove" sense, which I'm still a little dysfunctional about), or mortality, or... a lot of stuff. I find it hard to stay angry or unhappy overnight, which is very convenient. A whole big ton of it is luck - I kind of fell into a job I love, I have a husband who's competent and wise and a housemate who's good company, and a strong social circle, and enough money, and pretty much everything I could want from a life. And some of it is process in living/working with others - concede on the things you care less about than the other person does. Care less more often than you care more. Er, I don't mean "be apathetic" about everything, I mean "don't invest all your ego in all your opinions." Since this is a desireearmfeldt subject, I will say that I think that "concede rather than compromise" is a way in which I strongly differ from you - you strive for fairness between trusted allies/partners while I strive for... I guess communism? "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." And one last bit that didn't fit anywhere else - "I knit so that I don't kill people" is a button I've seen. Enjoyable hobbies is key, and bowing out of hobbies when they stop being fun is also important.

More Nifty Things I Bet You Didn't Know About Cephalopods

The Indoneian Mimic Octopus is pretty awesome. A lot of octopodes can change color and texture, but this one actually acts. It'll hide in a hole and stick out two arms and pretend to be a snake. Or it'll put all its arms parallel and swim along and pretend to be a flounder. Or it'll swim sideways with all its arms sticking out and pretend to be a lionfish. xkcd captures it pretty well. I can't tell if the stories about the octopus sneaking across the room to eat the fish in another tank are real or not - they seem to be ascribed to enough places that it might be an urban legend, or it might be really really common. On the other hand, the octopus who kept shorting out a bright light that annoyed him by squirting it with water when no one was looking seems to be real. The octopus at the New England Aquarium gets given puzzle boxes full of food for lunch, as opposed to all the other lazy fish who can just eat stuff without doing any work. Octopodes are "honorary vertebrates" in the UK (which means that you have to treat them vaguely ethically when doing experiments on them) and are pretty much the only tool-using invertebrate that we've found. Octopodes have fairly poor proprioception - the only way they're really sure what their arms are doing is to watch them.
Non octopus factoids: Some squids have elbows (actually, they look a lot like bacteriophage to me). Then, there's the flamboyant cuttlefish. Most octopodes and cuttlefish use their color changing for camouflage. This guy, though - he's decided that since he's invested all that energy in being able to be whatever color he wants at any given moment, he is going to *rock* the fuschia and maroon and dark gold. Not to mention, he's going to set them to move in waves, to be extra-fabulous.

Here are the seven things that desireearmfeldt asked me for. Posts eventually. :) But now also, people can comment to ask me to list seven subjects for them to write about.

• Things That Are Not Right
• Things That Are Puzzling
• The Fascination Of Yarn
• Femininity
• Music
• The Art Of Happiness
• More Nifty Things I Bet You Didn't Know About Cephalopods

# are ebooks. I definitely have switched into more-ebooks-than-paper-books mode, which I am oddly embarassed about.

( Infernal Devices, Stealing the Elf-King's Roses, unclean spirits, Memories of the Future, Embassytown, John Dies at the End )

Tags: book reviews
Current Mood: sleepy

A conversation at lunch:

mjperson: Let me tell you about the stupidest idea I ever heard. I was watching NCIS, and someone died, and they were investgating it, and he died of tachycardia, which was weird because he had a pacemaker for low heart rate. And it turned out that someone hacked into his pacemaker. How stupid an idea is that, pacemakers being just accessible via your wireless and remote hacking? Bah."
Me: "... well, pacemakers probably don't have IP addresses, but you know that the ones controlled by wireless don't really have any security, right?"
Mike: That can't be right. They have to be encrypted, you can't just let people hack in and control your pacemaker.
Me: (google google google) "Well, here's an ABC News article. Okay, look, they say it's not a problem, because the number of attackers in wireless range of you is pretty small. "Within wireless distance of you, the number of attackers is necessarily pretty small," Kaminsky said. "It's not to say the devices can't be attacked. They can be. ... It is something for the implant device [user] to think about it."
Mike: ARGH! What do they mean, it's something for the user to think about? Why is it not something for the implant device *maker* to think about? How could they not worry about that? Just stick in a private key...!
Me: Welcome to the real future. It's not as smart as the science fiction future.

Tags: mikestory

Due to the cancellation of greyautumnrain's run on Tuesday, our traditional Craigie mob with special guest star brilit went to Craigie on Main. What we didn't know before getting there (or probably in my case, knew once but had forgotten) was that it was the Off the Beaten Path dinner, which involved things like duck testicles and cuttefish and plankton (!) and tripe. We were either wusses or not hungry enough to have the full tasting menu, so just ordered from the "bar menu" (which was a subsection of the tasting plates) and then split an elk burger four ways. We seem to make a habit of accidentally going to their interesting dinners - the last time was about a year ago and was the All Pork All the Time dinner.

In other random news, I spent a while getting hooked on Creeper World 2 and woefully neglecting both my knitting and my TV watching. (Does it count as neglecting if it's just TV?) Having finished the main levels and the bonus levels, I have been poking at the user-generated levels, but many of the ones I have tried seem to require a much better player than I am in order to defeat. (An interesting side effect of the level rating system is that you can only give a level a thumbs up or thumbs down if you have beaten it.)