Sort Them I Will

02.19.2007

Over the weekend I tried to accomplish a little organization. I like organization. I like it the way that Jerry lives to make lists. Organizing things gives me a warm fuzzy all over. That's why I browse Staples when I'm bored.

I've got all this gaming stuff that I never use, but the possibility is getting closer that it may be used. With the success of last months game night the odds are good we could have another, maybe even this month. On top of that, I've found out that both Evil Matt & Trevor The Chiro are both BattleTech players. Or maybe it's BattleMech. Or MechWarrior. Robots and heat sinks, I know that much. Nonetheless, there could be even more gaming going on. And with more players playing whatever is being played, the odds of me not losing increase!

Since I've been getting gradually better at playing Battlefield 2142 online, I decided it was time to take a break and go back to some of the the boardgame fun that helps to keep me away from the computer. It wasn't time so much to actually play anything, but more for the preparation to play - a great use of my organizational skills! First up would be my Star Wars Miniatures figures.

Jerry and I played 2 games of Star Wars miniatures 2 years ago, yet for some reason I still keep collecting the pieces. It appeals to my "collector gene" in my DNA (those are the "C"s in the "ATC..." strings. There's a good history for the game in the movies, so there's not a lot of background reading beyond the actual game mechanics. There is a large community of support for adding on things (like my favorite scenery site). So I hold out hope that it'll be played again. The problem comes in that once I convince someone to play, it'll take forever to make up the squads and then dig out all the pieces that I have stuffed into boxes. So with a deep breath I began sorting through all the figures, grouping them along the way, and storing them in boxes most people keep screws and nails in out in the garage. It took a while, and I ran out of boxes, but I managed to get it done. Now I'm ready to play. Mostly ready to play. Almost ready to play.

It's a good thing I don't have anyone talked into playing yet.

Permalink boardgames gaming miniatures

How To Feel Stupid Dumb

02.14.2007

I've been making websites for the past 10 years. Every website in that time has used a database of one sort or another. Well, maybe not all, but 95% of them have. I've always made them by hand - there are tools that let you draw pictures linking tables together with what columns you want returned, but I've never drawn out my queries that way. A big part of that has been because I end up having to modify the query after the fact and it's a big hassle to figure out what an auto-generated query is actually trying to get. So I've always cranked out my queries by hand for the last 10 years (10+ if you go back before the web pages).

In that time, I've considered myself fairly comfortable in making database queries. Until today.

Inner/Outer Joins have been the bane for those learning SQL for a while. Bob Burruss introduced me to a shortcut that made life simple a long time ago. For a OUTER JOIN, just use "*=" with the "*" on the side that you always want the data returned from. Simplicity in itself. And it's worked. For years. Until today.

It seems the new version of SQL Server (2005, which is at least new to me) doesn't like "*=". It's not an ASCII standard. As such, you can tweak the settings on SQL Server to support it, but later versions may not support it at all. So go learn the right way to do it!

So I have to learn to do it the right way. A quick Google search showed me how to do it, but the sample queries weren't close enough to what I had to do. As much as I hated it, I was going to have to go look on the shelf that I reference about once every... 5 years? I dug out my Sql For Dummies book. I can see where Amazon has the 3rd edition, and another site lists the 5th edition. Me, I've got the 1st edition from August of 1995. I remember buying it for help in my Software Engineering class (it didn't help - I ended up having to take the class over again). I was about to reference a 12 year old book for programming help. I think that was almost worse than it being a "Dummies" book.

But I found the sample I was looking for. Of course, I had to search for it. In the index, it lists pg 163 as the only reference for OUTER JOIN. Once you get to pg 163, it tells you "... you have performed an OUTER JOIN operation (as discussed in Chapter 11)...", so then it's off to Chapter 11 to actually find out how to make an OUTER JOIN like the pros do.

For 10 years I've fought querying the right way. It looks like the system is starting to win. If only I could find a good way to *= the system.

Permalink programming/interweb

Remembering My Roots

02.13.2007

I spent the 2nd grade (except for the first 6 weeks) through the 1st six weeks of the 7th grade going to school in the greater Florence, AL metropolitan area. My formative years, as it were. This morning I saw a news blurb stemming from my old homestead: Feud brewing in school over student's hairstyle.

It seems a 6th grader was sent home after adding pink highlights to her hair. The controversy is that there isn't a posted rule preventing coloring of hair - they sent her home for disrupting students. She and her mother can't understand why the school would be so upset since she didn't disobey any printed rules. Except, maybe, disrupting the students.

My favorite quote from the 6th grader: "If it's actually written down in a handbook do not dye your hair no color then you should follow the rules."

I checked Clairol and I can't find a dye for no color, so I'm really hoping that's not in the handbook.

I went to Hibbett Middle School the last 6 weeks we lived in Florence before moving back to Huntsville. The school had only opened up a year or two before that, but that was 30 years ago. I don't think it was soon enough, because now I color my hair about every two months. I wonder if pink would cover up the gray better than the color I've been using? If only I could find some of that "no color" to follow the rules!

Permalink random

Of Puppets & Lip Synching

02.11.2007

I'm not one to go to YouTube very often. I tend to lump it in with MySpace - just because people can put things on the internet doesn't mean they should. Then again, maybe I shouldn't be one to talk.

I don't know how I got there, but there's a comedy group out of Seattle that has put together a couple of videos where they lip-synch to a pop tune (or 2) using the girl of the group and puppets. Yes, puppets. As goofy as it sounds, it's really well done.

It's not the first time I've seen puppets carry a tune. Yarbrough & Peoples did it back in the day. The Muppet show was chock full of singing puppets. Back in the prehistoric era on Sesame Street they had singing puppets! But it's been a few years (decades?) since I paid attention to singing puppets. Finding that I like them again maybe I need to go pay more attention?

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Uncle Russ Is Mean

02.04.2007

The following is true. The names have been changed to deceased wrestlers to protect the innocent. Some of the guilty may be protected by this too.

Friday was Dad's birthday. It was also Groundhog Day, but that's not relevant. To celebrate, I took the drive out to Moulton to have dinner with Dad and his extended family, including his 2 step-grandchildren who are in the 3-5 year old range. I've probably seen the kids 4 times in the last 2 years. Pez Whatley (the older) is always glad to see me but usually keeps her distance. John Tenta just keeps his distance.

Now, most people know I'm not exactly kid-centric. I don't ooh and ahh over newborns. I don't wish I had a kid of my own nor regret not having one (at least not yet). Jerry refers to my house as a child's deathtrap, with sharp objects and exposed outlets all within easy reaching distance for anyone crawling around. While I wouldn't poke a child's finger into an electrical outlet, I wouldn't deny that I might sit back to see what would happen if a kid started to poke all on their own. I'm a firm believer in learning from the mistakes you survive! Anyway, back to the story.

After dinner and a piece of allegedly sugar-free birthday cake, I was sitting with Dad and Road Warrior Hawk talking and catching up. There was a lighter on the table that I was spinning around and playing with absentmindedly. I picked it up and noticed that this was abnormally hard to light. Eventually all it took was a mighty squeeze, and then it lit. Road Warrior Hawk had a drink on the table to which she jokingly said "Don't get that lighter too close, you'll blow up the house!". So of course I started playing with lighter and the drink. It was around then that I noticed John Tenta was sitting in Dad's lap, and as I would bring the lighter closer to the drink (a good 4 feet away from him) his eyes would widen in fear. Pull the lighter away, he would relax. Bring the lighter closer to the drink, his eyes would start to explode.

I took the unlit lighter and pointed it not at the drink, but slid it along the table toward Road Warrior Hawk. As it got closer, John Tenta's eyes widened more and more. Once the tip of the lighter was off the table (and still about half a foot from Road Warrior Hawk), I would squeeze and light it. John Tenta would be in the fringe of crying. I released the switch and slid the lighter back toward me and John Tenta would relax a little but still keep his eyes on the lighter. We did this 2 or 3 times until he let out a whimper, then everybody else that had evidently been watching was afraid he would start to actually cry and never stop, so I had to stop playing with the lighter. Dad then put John Tenta down and let him run in the living room to the lap of his mother, where he still kept an eye on me.

Since I couldn't play with the lighter, I turned my attention to a pair of utility scissors on the table (if Jerry thinks my place is a deathtrap, he should look at Dad's kitchen table!). I held up my left hand and stuck out my index finger, but holding it at 90° to where John Tenta could only see the profile of my hand. I picked up the scissors, opened them, and put them behind my finger, but it probably looked to John Tenta like I was about to cut my finger at the middle knuckle. So then I snapped the scissors shut, bent my finger down at the middle knuckle, and winced really hard. A wide eyed John Tenta buried his face in his mother's shoulder as he thought I cut off my finger.

It was mean, but I have never tried so hard not to laugh. Unsuccessfully.

I found out from his mother afterwards that "Uncle Russ is mean." Yep, it's good I don't have kids. Probably safest to keep them out of a direct line of sight of me, too.

Permalink random