Regular Everyday Stuff

Words of the day

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I have the [W:OED] Word Of The Day pop up in my RSS thingy. Yesterday’s word was, predictably, [W:Shrovetide] – c1425 Orolog. Sapient. vii. in Anglia X. 386/39 {Th}e sondaye In Quinquagesime, with {th}e tweyne dayes folowynge, {th}at is clepyd Schroftyde.

Todays, by contrast, is [W:Drum and bass] which dates back as far as – 1990 [W:The Face (magazine)] Nov. 53/2 ‘Dub Be Good To Me’..is Beats International‘s most characteristic creation. It’s drum and bass culture, the sound of downtempo Britain after midnight. 1997 S. BARROW & P. DALTON Reggae v. 204/1 But the first vocal record with a full dub version on its flip..is usually recognised as the [W:Little Roy] ‘Hard Fighter’ track on the [W:Lloyd Daley] Syndicate label, recorded in March 1971, with the splendid ‘Voo-doo’ as its strictly drum and bass counterpart from [W:The Hippy Boys].

The OED Rocks! But, alas, no Little Roy or Hippy Boys on Spotify yet. 🙁

The best word of the day has to be ricockulous, which describes something a degree or two worse than ridiculous but not quite as bad as ripenisulous. It was used by [W:Ben Goldacre] writing about the Facebook causes cancer nonsense on his Bad Science blog. Splendid.

Homeschooling and baking controversy spoof

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An anonymous editor added a splendid story to the [W:Wikipedia] [W:Homeschooling] article. It was quickly removed but I post it here for prosperity:

In 2001 the Wonderbread company introduced a class action lawsuit against the US government–specifically targeting homeschool families. The company charged homeschool families with saturating the market with their homemade, wholegrain products and hand churned butter. Spokesman for the Homeschool Commission for Fair and Equal Baking Practices, Leonard Norton, defended American Homeschooled families by saying: “Homeschooling and wholewheat baking are almost synonymous. It would be a tragedy to see honest, hardworking, homeschooling Americans see their right to wholewheat baking taken away.”

Note the Spotify link below – this stuff isn’t just thrown together 😉

Revolution video & WordPress 2.7.1 upgrade fixes

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While exploring Runtime Revolution I was unable to view the tutorial videos. I had the audio content but a blank green screen replaced the video content. It turns out the problem is solved by disabling the Perian plugin for Quicktime.

I also was unable to do the WordPress automatic update thingy. This one was solved by disabling the WordPress Automatic Upgrade plugin which was conflicting with the automatic updating process :-/

I just mention these in case you are looking for a solution to similar problems.

Time-lapse movies: One day in one minute /Sydney harbour

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Sometimes I remember to put the webcam on first thing and managed to catch the moon fading as the sun rose the other day. With the sun hanging so low at this time of year there are reflections – the sun is reflected in the lens which is reflected in the window – and flares aplenty. Note the wind change at the end of the day.

What is it about these [W:Tilt and shift] images that give them a toy like quality? Fascinating (but expensive) stuff…

Things I did not know (part 703.5-b)

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There is a Simple English Wikipedia for children, non-English speakers etc. which seems like a good idea and an opportunity to waste even more time 😉

You can use your UK library card number to access all manner of online resources. Usually the larger your local authority the larger the range of resources available but even our modest library service offers many useful links. Guess I will have to get a library card now 😉