W-Stool

Interesting story on Lake Tahoe. I've lived in Reno for quite a few years now and my wife and I never go to Lake Tahoe anymore, even though it is a 30-45 minute drive, and is truly one of the most beautiful places on earth. There are just too many people - it is amazing how crowded the entire area has become.

The snow lab in the Sierra was recording 7.5 inches of snow an hour during the storm.

I have the 15x45 model from at least 20 years ago. These things are completely insane, even 20 years later. What a product!

I was hoping someone would mention this. That movie is a flat-out delight. See if you can spot the actor who played "Harold" in "Harold and Maude".

So sorry to hear this. What a legacy of music he left us! For anyone who hasn't heard the music from Twin Peaks lately (or even never) listen to it today. It completely stands the test of time and is still one of my favorite albums. It is just so iconic - nothing else quite like it. RIP Angelo.

Do you have comparison figures to the F1 cars in the 80s or 90s?

I don't know about living there, but I've followed Formula 1 for almost 50 years and the Monaco F1 Grand Prix circuit is one of the last of the true classic circuits left.

If you enjoy Tracy Kidder's writing (and I very much do) I would also suggest just about anything by Michael Lewis - his "Liars Poker", "Moneyball", and "The Big Short", to name a few, are really exceptionally well researched and written.

The scene with Toby Esterhase and George Smiley in the basement office of Toby's gallery is one of my favorite scenes on film of all time.

I have a large book collection and one of the cornerstones is a first edition of every John le Carre book published. I've read them all, and while he is probably best known for "Tinker Tailor ..." and "Smiley's People", I found "The Perfect Spy" to be just an exceptional work of literature - and at times it is also autobiographical (his father was a con man). I'm not surprised he was at times profoundly unhappy - in my experience, many highly creative people never find contentment.

The TV miniseries of "Tinker Tailor ...", "Smiley's People", "The Perfect Spy", and "The Night Manager" are just amazingly well done and highly recommended.

RIP David Cornwell.

What are you using for a homelab priced temperature sensor?

Let me echo this as someone who once was responsible for HPC computing in a research intensive public university. Most career academics have NO IDEA how much enterprise computing infrastructure costs. If a 1 terabyte USB hard drive is $40 at Costco we (university IT) must be getting a much better deal than that. Take this argument and apply it to any aspect of HPC computing and that's what you're fighting against. The closet with racks of gear and no cooling is another fond memory. Don't forget the AC terminal strips that power the whole thing, sourced from the local dollar store.

Lose a buck on every sale and make it up with volume ...

It is amazing how vertically integrated GM used to be - for a vehicle they made just about everything except the windshields, the paint, and the tires. They also made city buses, diesel locomotives, fractional HP electric motors, earth moving equipment, consumer kitchen products, and sold insurance. They even had their own university that awarded bachelors and masters degrees. All of that is long gone now.

IBM operated the same way back in the day (late 90's). I had a very modest ISV that sold a $5K custom device driver to IBM and it took me nearly a year to get paid. Everything was outsourced - even the accounts payable department.

20 years later in another life I did business with IBM as an enterprise customer. Same complete shitshow. Never again ...

This is so funny because it is completely spot-on. The only word you failed to work into this screed was "rockstar". Hilarious.

Where are the floating pigs? What kind of makeover is this?

I am a Crumb fan and enjoyed this piece, although I guess I'm not surprised at some of his world views. The 1994 movie "Crumb" referenced in this article is really, really interesting. Fun fact: I've been through Winters, California many times on the way to Napa and had no idea he used to live there.

Got one of these emails too. I haven't used the account in almost 10 years, they must have many thousands of these accounts that have been dormant forever and are now getting hit with "invoices" for services rendered. Looks like a real dick move, no thanks.

This is correct. The Borland debugger supported this, it was the only real way to debug a "graphics mode" program back in the day.

As a 60+ geezer who is back to doing what made me happy in this business before career climbing and salary chasing took me into a bad place or two, let me commend you on realizing that contentment is what life is really all about. I truly wish I had understood this at 30 rather than finally and fully realizing it at 60.

It appears the ACME Portable Hole is no longer available.

That imaginary VC quote is one of the funniest and most astute things I've read in a very long time. Thank you!

I've ridden the Zephyr multiple times - it really can be a wonderful experience, and you will see scenery that is only available by train. A few pro tips:

- For two people, the roomettes are more confortable than the bedrooms, IMHO. Regardless, get a private room, the privacy and relative silence are well worth it.

- Bring some snacks and cold beverages. Water, coffee, ice are gratis.

- Your sleeping car ticket covers all meals in the dining car. Take full advantage of this.

- These trains almost never run on time. I once rode the Zephyr Reno -> Denver and we arrived 15 hours late on a schedule 29 hour trip - literally the next day.

You can't be in a hurry nor on any kind of schedule. Look out the window and enjoy the ride. Utah in particular is stunning beyond belief.

When Tron was first released I was in a grad level computer graphics class at a university in the USA midwest. I convinced our rather stuffy professor to take the class across the street to the "Cinema Twin" and watch the movie. In those days computer graphics consisted of mostly pen plotters and Tektronix vector displays - pretty dry stuff, lots of theory in the class but not much interesting output was generated. To say the collective minds of the class were blown away by the movie would be an understatement. In its own way it showed the future of CGI and what the this domain could look like. If you haven't seen it lately, give it spin - it holds up well.

In 2005 my wife and I lived in a part of the USA that had no Costco within a half day's drive. We soon secured jobs in a part of the USA that had two (two!) Costcos in the same city that we would live. True story - before we even looked for housing, I went online and joined Costco. Years later my diabetic cat even had a Costco pharmacy account (best place to buy insulin by far) and received a discount for being without health insurance.

Limited run of only 150 units! Sheesh ...

The guy who was behind VMS (the OS for the VAX-11 series) and Windows NT-3.51 - Microsofts first native 32 bit operating system. Spent some of his money going Formula Atlantic racing when most people his age would be looking at bowling balls and golf carts. Absolutely amazing guy whose name almost no one knows.

"Trading Places" reference noted and logged. Well done.

In the immortal words of the character Mark Baum (based on Steve Eisman) in "The Big Short":

"That's hilarious".

I am referencing the scene when he meets the CDO manager, and he said this with the utmost sarcasm. A great scene, based on true events, in a great movie.