one more thing to help

bloodninja writes:

if after all that, you still want to do some voting for us, the DIY Network (Do It Yourself Network), an offshoot of HGTV, is doing a special on the Solar Decathlon. they've set up an online voting poll for the public's favorite house. the competition is totally bogus, stupid, and rigged. but nonetheless, it would be cool to have some more votes. you can also see some of the other houses in the competition if you're interested. www.diynetwork.com/solar.

getting sunny d to the top of google

bloodninja has been toiling for years on the sunnyd house (i wrote about it here). as part of the program @ the ut austin architecture graduate school, he and his team are entering a house in the solar decathalon competition.

in mid oct they are reconstructing the house on the mall in washington dc. it's going to be flippin' sweet and a bunch of our friends are going to be there rooting for fuckface (unfortunately i can't make the trip).

please consider doing a huge huge favor to help the solar d team and fro boy: help get their web site to the top of the google rankings. it's pretty simple. here are kenny's instructions:

i need to ask you all a favor in the name of UT SolarD - help me get UT SolarD back at the top of the google rankings! we used to be the number one hit for the search "how does solar power work?". when i renovated the website other websites managed to pass us, and we are now number 4. i've fixed our keywords, but the only way to rise is to get more hits. being number 1 on google was actually a selling point for us in the communications contest. i would really appreciate if you guys could take just a moment every few hours (or as much as you want) to google the term "how does solar power work?", and click the link to UT SolarD. again, we are currently the 4th hit.

in regards to the whol sunny d competition, this team is ridiculously hard core. nutbucket write:

so my life as a UT SolarD borg member is coming to its close - the competition has begun!!! well, it will in one hour at least (12:01am eastern time). we finished loading the SNAP house on drop-deck flatbed trucks at 1:40a monday morning, after spending all day disassembling and packing - in the heat of the hottest day of the year (107 degrees). in fact, austin was actually the hottest location on earth on sunday - hotter than death valley, hotter than anywhere. heat stroke was a close friend...

st louis is cold

i have to stop thinking that where ever i travel will have the same climate as atlanta. it's cold as balls in st. louis.

at least i found a decent indian restaurant near my hotel. rarely are there many options when staying at a marriot on airport property, regardless of the city.

mrs. wintermute has been writing her internship applications. while she was reading aloud her diversity essay, i realized for the first time how much harder it is to write those essays if you're white. i mean, whenever i had to write them for grad school applications, my stock intro line was "growing up as a second-generation american" or "living in ohio as the offspring of indian immigrants" and the essay pretty much wrote itself from there. hard to go wrong. since most folks fixate on defining diversity in terms of race, i barely have to think about those prompts. i consider it a measure of compensation for growing up amongst right-wing racists, having to pray to jesus before every varsity soccer game, listen to zenophobic rants, etc. just about all those sorry rednecks are shift managers at papa john's now anyway.

i told mrs. w that she should just say that she has a colored husband and has learned lots from my family and that she anticipates the challenges of raising half-breed children.

next time you're tired or think you have it rough...

pic from sports illustrated online (si.com).

this not a photoshop job--this guy is named Bobby Martin and he plays for colonel white high School in dayton, OH.

click here to see more.

even in 1982...

...i got stuck mowing the lawn

we need a real bullpen...

...if the braves are going to do more than win their 14th straight division and then bow out in the play offs.

thanks to jwall we got sweet seats for free last night. i almost didn't mind paying $7 for beer.

the braves blew a 5-1 lead in the 7th.

well, at least the phillies lost last night. if the braves win tonight they clinch it.

work has been interfering with my blogging...will catch up soon.

geek results

actually came a bit lower than expected

http://psychcentral.com/quizzes/geekquiz.htm

Results of your
Are You a Geek? Quiz

You scored a total of 19

You are pretty darned geeky Based upon your responses to this quiz, you appear to be firmly entrenched in geekhood. Does this make you a nerd, a technophile, an expert in all this computer-related? Well, pretty much, yes. Friends and family likely come to you for answers to all sorts of questions technology and computer related. You are their tech idol. But that's really not surprising, now is it? You know mainstream technology references, and you know and are interested in keeping up on nerdy sorts of stuff. (Although we didn't ask, we bet you're probably a regular reader of /. too!) But what does all of this mean??! Well, it means you're firmly entrenched in the grasp of technology and it's not letting go anytime soon! Take it easy, try and keep a balanced view of technology's place in your life, and you should be able to lead a fairly normal life while slouched on your couch in front of your LCD widescreen.

S C O R E S If you scored... Then... 30 & up 18 - 29 10 - 17 0 - 9 Pure geek Pretty geeky Almost a geek No geekness

This is not meant as a diagnosis tool!

wedding, biscuitville style

jim + emily walking to their first dance

last weekend we hit the wedding of our friends emily beavers and jim herndon. they had the most gorgeous, elegant southern-style wedding that i have ever attended or even heard of.

click here to see all the pics.

the wedding ceremony was held in duke chapel, truly one of the most gorgeous pieces of architecture in the South. emily walked down the world's long aisle (it took like 14 minutes and a brief water break). the chapel epitomizes the neo-gothic style of the entire duke campus. click here to read more about the architecture. the berini and citrini families of stonecutters built the chapel. most significantly, duke chapel was designed by julian abele, a heroic but relatively unknown figure in american history.considered the first african-american architect in us history, he never even got to set foot in the duke chapel due to segregation laws. what a crying shame. on a similar historical note, the woman who played mamie in gone with the wind was not allowed to attend watch the premiere at atlanta's own fox theater b/c of segregation laws. unbelievable.

after the ceremony we hopped on a chartered bus for the drive across the triangle to raleigh. the reception was outdoors at a rustic b&b (not sure what the rain plan was--hurricane ophelia missed us by 36 hours). i love outdoor weddings in the south. great food, especially the pork tenderloin with mango chutney. a minimal number of sappy wedding songs. i don't think i heard celebration or the electric slide. the dj did play cotton-eyed-joe. i don't care for it, but it was funny to watch a lot of yankees doing the banjo dance.

at the end of the night they jumped in a convertible and cruised off. we got our drunk asses on the bus back to the hotel. the trip concluded appropriately with a breakfast visit to biscuitville, a fast food joint dedicated to biscuits.

did corned beef ever leave?

we drove back with our new and very cool friends katie and david howard. they even put up with my nerdy word games. they're remodeling the house in which david grew up. i'm hoping to get some pictures of it soon. but for now, a nice pic of the howards:

katie + david

since emily and jim got engaged around the same time that mrs. wintermute and i did, we've largely planned our weddings in parallel. it's been fun to trade planning stories. hmm, not sure what we'll talk about from now on. it's been a year of weddings: seven and counting. one more to go next month.

emily and jim make a really good looking couple, so i'll leave you with a few of my favorite pics:

jim just after the ceremony. i went for the schindler's list effect (all black & white except for one spot of red color) with this one and it turned out nicely

emily + her dad right after the ceremony. the wind is about to blow off her veil and they're deciding whether to move the photos indoors and you could tell it was such a proud moment for her dad

damn usb cords

i have about 20 different usb cords for all the damn devices i have. one for my new camera, one for my old one, one for my ipod, one for my blackberry, one for my pocket pc, and about 15 that i can't identify.

the result is that on my way out the door wednesday morning, i remembered to grab my camera and even the usb cord since i was making my first trip by private jet, but grabbed the wrong cord.

shitballz.

so no pictures of the private jet or the 5 star holiday inn express now. but will post when i get home.

i'm currently in cape girardeua, missouri, which is here, about 120 miles due south of st. louis.

the private jet was sweet. unfortunately, our ceo (with whom i flew from atlanta, along with my boss, neil) is on a different itinerary than i am. so neil and i are driving 3 hours to memphis tonight, crashing at the hotel airport, then flying at the crack of dawn to atlanta friday morning.

at least i get to hit a new state: we will briefly pass through arkansa.

google results

turns out there are a bunch of other wintermutes out there.

but there is apparently only one MRS. wintermute. blog google "mrs. wintermute" and you'll get me everytime. pretty cool.

sunny d

fuckface has been spending all of his time (when he's not emailing us random fucked up sites, like here or here) building a house for the solar powered decathalon, aka SolarD aka SunnyD. click here to learn more.

he explains:

• this photo is from today. you can see the east wall (the angled one w/ the roof on top), which is partially covered in zinc, although the zinc still has its white plastic protective wrap on. the wrap will be removed and the zinc will shine (actually, its kind of a brushed weathered finish) once in DC. you can also see the redwood rainscreen (the slatted wood) covering the bedroom/bathroom, and you can see the bedroom window peeking out from behind the redwood. you can also see the grasses on the green roof, and see a bit of the underside of some solar panels that are shooting off the top of the roof.

uhh, just watch out for the purple stuff.

google blog search

those geniuses have done it once more.

google blog search is brilliant.

sadly, i guess i have not blogged enough to register many hits.

http://blogsearch.google.com/

photos from the astrodome

normally not one to repeat someone else's blog posting, but found this flickr link on boing-boing today. extensive collection of some very moving images.

click here.

geek heaven

hunter + his new girlfriend

once every now and then life throws the geeks a chance to fulfill their belief that they, not the meek, shall inherit the earth.

dragon con is one of those events.

click here to see my greatest pic collection yet.

i spent sunday afternoon in geek heaven and it was awesome. for everyone who knows that han shot first, that what you're passionate about matters more than what you look like, and who spent more than a few friday nights in high school watching x-files at home, it doesn't get much better than hundreds of sci-fi enthusiasts gathered in one place.

dragon con is one of those places.

i'll limit my soapbox to this: what i loved about being there is the sheer earnestness that radiated from everyone. no one was trying to playing it cool. everyone looks like a dork and they're ok with it. if you're enthusiastic about sci-fi then you are welcome to be there. at first, i felt like a tourist when i started taking pictures. then i realized that everyone wanted to be photographed--they were flattered! one storm trooper was even nice enough to compliment me on my han solo empire strikes back replica coat.

hunter and i got the phat hook up via janice, enabling all-access to every room. big up to janice!

the weekend started when mrs. wintermute and i saw two klingons on harleys drive past us in little 5. i knew right then that i couldn't miss dragon con. the costumes were simply priceless. some of my favorites:

dark side anakin

the two most popular girls at dragon con

what i love is little darth in the background

obviously, hunter and i were there primarily for star wars stuff. truly, one of the priceless moments of my life was meeting peter mayhew, the actor who played chewbacca. hunter got his autograph.

peter mayhew

in the end, hunter and i left with one conclusion: next year we're going in costume.

rookie mistake

i had an 10:30 meeting with someone who i thought was in our buckhead office. so i drive to the buckhead office and can't find him anywhere.

when i come back to my desk i look on the company directory. turns out he's in the alpharetta office.

where i work.

so i just drove to a different office to have a phone call with someone who sits 20 feet from me.

the life of a rookie.

had a great weekend. dragon con '05 was flipping sweet. pics to come.

signed up to volunteer at the red cross b/c i heard they need computer skills (another volunteer told me that the local office lacked a computer. bad first step). surprised they haven't called me in. even more surprised they haven't called katie in, with her mental health background (granted, she's not licensed yet, but can work as long as another licensed psychologist is there).

inmak park walking tour

mrs. wintermute and i had all-foot date this weekend. we strolled around what will be the new inman park village, stopped by our old place at bohemia 5, dined at babette's, and then stopped by videodrome.

click here to see pics.

i love living here. i love that when i stopped to photograph some flowers, the people who lived there came outside to explain what kind of flowers they were (moonflowers, they bloom only at night). i love being able to polish off a bottle of wine at dinner and not worrying about driving. i love strolling through the hood and seeing the downtown skyline.

some highlights:

mrs. wintermute in front of our building

moonflowers

corner of elizabeth and n. highland

cj's landing

thursday night i played with my cousin*, nick edelstein, a local singer-songwriter, at cj's landing in bucktown.

click here to see pics, courtesy hunter the photo bug.

*his first cousin donna married my first cousin henrik. by patel standards, we're family. mrs. wintermute thinks this is weird with a capital "V."

anyway, the actual show went well. most importantly (since it was his show), nick sounded good. he was nice enough to let me choose the cover song (pixies' wave of mutilation) and even played a wintermute original. our drummer stan, despite being older than dirt, came through big time, and our improvised solos held together pretty well.

the night started out rough when the sound guy showed up an hour after the show was supposed to begin. but i wasn't complaining, b/c A, never complain to the guy who's in charge of your sound (it's like sending food back to the kitchen) and B, starting later improved our chances of having a decent crowd. at the end of the day, the crowd consisted of hunter, nick's family, stan's family, the other bands, and the organizers of the event. so we basically threw a show for each other. my view on this is that i'd be happy playing in someone's basement. so if i'm going to get to do it on a stage with a sound system, any audience is gravy.

five minutes into warming up, my bass stops working. it's not the amp, it's not the cord, it's definitely the bass. here is the point where my night just gets way, way, way lucky. first, the drummer of the other band is a guitar tech. he guesses that my input jack is detached or fried. next, hunter, has a pocket knife that can unscrew the the back plate of my bass. no way we were going to find a philips head that small. third, and this is where it gets unbelievable, the shift manager at cj's actually has a soldering gun kit.

Un.Fuck.Ing.Be.Lievable.

Finally, nick's dad is a contractor who builds houses. Nick grew up doing electrician stuff helping he dad. nick and mr. edelstein fix the jack, re-attach the plate, and presto, i am good to go. imagine if that had happened halfway through our set. i would have been up shit's creek.

here's the sequence in photos:

mcguyver # 1 taking apart the back of my guitar

jack, the manager, getting his soldering gun

macguyvers # 2 and #3 soldering the jack connection

lisa from one introduces us.

time for the mo szyclack, err, nick edelstein experience

the soundguy shows up, we finish soundchecking (shortest on record: 90 seconds). the chick from One gets up to do her spiel, and then we do our thing.

all in all a fun night. beats law & order re-runs AND it got me out of work early. thanks again to nick for having me play with him. thanks to hunter for showing up, fixing my guitar, taking pics, and not complaining when i bought him a pitcher of the cheap shit (that's actually what it said on the tap) as a thank you.

good show last night...pics to come

the show went well last night. plus hunter took a ton of pics. unfortunately, all those pics took a toll on the camera batteries so i can't upload them right now. pics + some stories to come.

tonight mrs. wintermute and i are taking a walking date. walking to an inman park restaurant and then strolling to either dad's garage or lafont for a movie. for the day, i'm working from home. like kip, yes i love technology. blackberry + vpn + wireless internet in the apt + voice mail being forwarded to my email as a .wav file = why the hell should i trek to alphacrappa?

i'm really glad to live in a real neighborhood. the furthest thing away is the publix, and that's still only 10 blocks to ponce. having lived without a car for three of the last five years while i lived in ny and boston, i'm looking forward to walking more. hey it may even get atlantans to talk to each other and meeting their neighbors.

of couse, as soon as this gas scare dies down i'll be back to driving to pick up the mail.

suburbia scares me

just saw dr. physics for lunch. he reports that that gas lines at costco have filled the parking lot; he gave up waiting.

uhh, people, you're just making it worse! stop hoarding gasoline!

the doc took his oldest daughter to her first day of pre-school this morning. there were approximately 300 people (kids + parents) there; he counted two non-caucausians: one indian couple and the african-american teacher.

uhh, is there some kind of secret password that white people have in order to move otp?

the doc invited mrs. wintermute and me to come to his neighborhood pool for a labor day bbq. he has to fill out a 'permission to bring a mixed race couple' form first. i think we'll go just to draw stares. too bad we don't have any half-breed kids yet to really shock the fine folks of dunwooody.

gas lines (2)

last night, leaving alpharetta, cars were lined up five deep.

at soccer practice, a couple of enterprising guys said they had filled up canisters with gas and were going to sell gas out of the back of their truck. while i admire their entrepreneurial zeal, hoarding gasoline is just going amplify the shortage.

this website is a good way to find cheap gas in atlanta.

about a month ago katie and i decided that it would be cheaper to drive to durham for emily's wedding on sept 10. shitballs.

now i really hate my 28 mile-each-way commute from inman park to alphacrappa. i put a carpooling ad on craig's list. no hits yet. hopefully the gas prices will encourage folks to do take me up on it.

i have to say, that if this gas shock gets people to drive less, carpool more, or consider supporting marta (11 of the 13 otp counties have repeatedly voted to not allow marta to build stations in their area), it could be a good thing.