Signing
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

Scott McCloud stopped in at Librarie Millenium when he visited Montreal on Saturday. The store was crowded with folks who wanted to talk to him, which was pretty neat. Though some of you held up the line. :)

I had never actually read any of Scott's books before. Actually, I know basically nothing about comics. However, after hearing him speak passionately and sincerely about his medium of choice, I've borrowed some reading material from my friends.

Since I had my camera with me, I took the opportunity to snap a few photographs.

Crossposted in mccloudtour.

I have some books that I want to get rid of. I have this insatiable habit for book-buying and sometimes I just get carried away. I don't need these ones anymore, so I thought that you might want them. I'm selling them, but not for money. Used books have terrible resale value. Instead, you must offer to do a good deed (that you normally wouldn't do) to some friend or stranger. You get to pick what that deed is. Then I'll be happy to give you a book of your choice. You need only leave a comment below.

Iron council by China Miéville (ISBN 0-345-46402-8)

I bought too many copies of his hardcover novel. China's a brilliant author who builds glorious worlds that are deep and dark and dusty. I read Perdido street station and fell in love with it, I don't see why I won't with this book.

Ender's game by Orson Scott Card (ISBN 0-812-55070-6)
Speaker for the dead by Orson Scott Card (ISBN 0-812-55075-7)

These two paperbacks comprise the first two books in the Ender Quartet. They are also the only two worth reading, as the series goes sharply downhill from here. It follows the life of Ender, a boy genius, who was formed into a tool in the first book and then has to make his own way in the second.

The subtle knife by Philip Pullman (ISBN 0-375-80211-8)

Why I have a paperback of the middle book in a trilogy, I don't know. But His dark materials is a wonderful fantasy series, so you should probably try to get your hands on the first and third books as well. Deep like Milton, but a far easier read.

The rituals of dinner: the origins, evolution, eccentricities and meaning of table manners by Margaret Visser (ISBN 0-00-637909-5)

We migrate from one knife to another. This trade paperback is a fascinating account of why we eat the way we do. No really, I know you don't believe me, but it's absolutely absorbing!

How to eat: the pleasures and principles of good food by Nigella Lawson (ISBN 0-7011-6911-7)

Once you know why we eat, it's probably best that you learn how to. This was Nigella's first cookery book and certainly one of her most charming. It's in paperback and it's in metric and all of the recipes are fabulous. Which is why you want it.

How to be a domestic goddess: baking and the art of comfort cooking by Nigella Lawson (ISBN 0-7868-6797-3)
Forever summer by Nigella Lawson (ISBN 1-4013-0016-2)

These two books are hardcover, but they were printed in the United States. All of the recipes are good as Nigella just really enjoys eating. However, some of the conversions to imperial units were done a bit poorly so you might have to fiddle. Or convert back and do some rounding.

Class by Paul Fussell (ISBN 0-345-31816-1)

An old paperback which was first printed in the mid-seventies. This book is a slightly dated categorization of the North American class system, a system that we still vigorously deny. Wryly amusing and slightly depressing, but a good read.

Nickel and dimed: on (not) getting by in America by Barbara Ehrenreich (ISBN 0-8050-6389-7)

This book is actually depressing. In this paperback, Barbara describes her adventures trying to eke out an existance as a minimum-wage worker in the United States. Although she came under criticism for not being good at living frugally, it still highlights the fact that minimum-wage is still below the poverty line.

Fast food nation: the dark side of the all-American meal by Eric Schlosser (ISBN 0-06-093845-5)

Another paperback to give you pangs of social conscience. This book describes how terrible the fast food industry was in the eighties. In fact, it triggered a huge change in how fast food is produced and could be responsible for the decline of McDonald's steady growth. It'll make you want to avoid certain restaurants in the future.

The long tail: why the future of business is selling less of more by Chris Anderson (ISBN 1-4013-0237-8)

A hardcover book on market segmentation. Well, I suppose I could go further, but I haven't really read it yet. It does have the reputation for being quite good. For some odd reason, I got a second copy of this book for free. Perhaps it's because I'm on the long tail of technology adoption?

T.A.Z. The temporary autonomous zone, ontological anarchy, poetic terrorism by Hakim Bey (ISBN 1-57027-151-8)

This little paperback, it's almost a pamphlet, is Bey's magnum opus. It changes how you perceive society, because it advocates the formation of small autonomous enclaves within the cracks of formal structures. A small book full of big ideas.

Bee boots
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

Tonight was a Milk and Cookies soirée at someone else's place. Michal's place, to be precise. It's an apartment on Ontario with an ambling layout divied up with tall plaster walls. The kitchen has an old farm sink, with shiny taps and a broad enamel basin. The living room is cozy with chesterfields. feygele lay across one of them, snapping photographs of the assembled crowd.

I met Liz, Ruth, and Leah. I met Andrew and Adriane. I met a Girl whose name I have now forgotten. I forget a lot of things, which is why I keep this journal. Someone was There was a coffee table full of cookies, so I set mine upon them. Chocolate chip. I had waited for them to cool, which is why I was late.

I lay upon a couch and stared at the chandelier danging from the ceiling. It was unlit. I stared at some letters, made of streamers, on the wall that proclaimed "HAPPY B-DAY RACHEL!" I would later discover that Rachel was one of Michal's roommates. She did a good job playing receptionist.

joenotcharles and vierge_en_trop were in attendence. I was told that I saw them too often at social events. I shall fix this, I think, by going off to Toronto this weekend. One can't host parties all the time. I also saw drkeys there who read some poetry. He's trying to avoid LiveJournal now. Reckons it ain't respectable, like.

Amanda, Dave, and Joe
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

I dug out two short fictions from a thin book and read them back to back. Have I mentioned that I love short stories? After a piece about the joys of encouragement and a cat's heaven, I heard great praise for the author. "It's so hip," someone exclaimed. It's a Margaret Atwood book, I explained. People became interested. You know, Vierge inspired me to read Atwood, which I used to avoid. But she channels Atwood so well that, sometimes, listening to her speak is like reading an Atwood aloud.

Afterwards, I switched gears to read some Hunter. It's not the same, but it got just as many laughs. Just because a story has sex and abuse and death doesn't make it unfunny. Does it?

We had to leave all too soon. I collected some free books from a coffee table (as if I need more) and put away the tin I brought. We walked up the hill, Vierge, Joe, Dr. Keys, the Girl, and I. All too soon, we were at Duluth and I had to bid everyone good night.

Good night.

I'm going to Waterloo this weekend.

It's an opportunity to see Timin and try to make amends.

I have sixteen boxes of Julie's books stacked by my doorway. In the morning, I'll lug them into the van. After work, I shall drive to Toronto.

Saturday morning, I will pick up holdenk and we will drive to Waterloo. I'll stack the books in the basement and then find people to hang out with. I think we'll have a marvellous time. You should be one of us!

Green
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

Each morning, CodeCon started later and later. This is not just because us volunteers couldn't get there in time, but also because the attendees would show up more hungover and sleep-deprived as well. Thankfully, it's a hacker conference so we started at about noon. Or 12:30. Which is "morning" for some.

We kicked off the day with a talk on Dido which is meant to help you write voice-menu systems. Quinn did a neat demonstration involving a real telephone, which was quite novel. However, since I despise voice-menu systems, I have to hate his project on principle.

In the Q&A period, I nipped over to Bill Pollock's booth. He runs No Starch Press which is absolutely fabulous. He gave me a free mug, some tea, a book, and a T-shirt. In exchange, I had to buy a few books as well. I'm afraid that my book buying habit is starting to get uncontrollable. Every time I return from a trip, I bring five or ten books back. Now I have a copy of madduck's book which I will get him to sign at DebConf 6.

I completely zoned out on the Deme presentation. I think I was talking to someone who wanted to convert me to Evil, after hearing that I was a hacker. I'm afraid that I'm too noble for that. But what I did glean from the presentation is that deme is an actual English word.

My presentation on UniConf came up next, so I put on my red "Speaker" badge and hopped on to stage. You see, I was at CodeCon as a backup speaker, in case one of the others missed a flight or fell down some stairs. I had to resist doing any of them bodily harm. For my altruism, I gave a talk about how UniConf glues configuration systems together, and why people should use it instead of writing their own. I got a lot of questions afterwards, which was pretty cool.

At lunch, wealhtheow and Bill came by to ask me what I'd like on my pizza. Wow! I said that it didn't matter, and thought little of it. Then they showed up with boxes and boxes from the local Costco. Bill had just bought everyone lunch! We organised a queue that would have made the British proud and everyone got a slice to eat.

I remember first hearing about Monotone from Graydon, back at GCC Summit. So I was a little surprised to see Graydon sitting on stage looking pretty while Nathaniel was presenting. Monotone has inspired a couple of version control systems but it's never really gotten popular. But one thing it hasn't passed on is its use of Merkle trees to express differences.

Truck
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

All throughout the conference, I had been selling drinks from behind the bar. Standing for all that time really hurts the feet, so I was sadden to discover that my shoes were not good for this. Still, I had a good time there. I've definitely found a calling in the service industry, if the computer bubble bursts again, I'd make a great bartender. I never knew! You make eye contact, smile and say something friendly. Then you chat as you pour a drink, take an interest in someone, and just be nice. If you give a little extra, smile and wink, like it's secret just between you.

I was busy chatting to my customers for the Rhizome presentation. Reading its description, I'm not really sure that I could tell you what it is. And I work with computers!

As I was selling drinks, I was also selling CodeCon T-shirts. Very snazzy T-shirts. Every time I sold a drink, I tried to sell a T-shirt along with it. Show off the front, show off the back, offer an appropriately sized shirt. Flattery seems to work very well, as does smiling when the person looks at it. You know they're sold when they're holding a shirt, so you offer to fold it for them and name the price. It was so easy!

Daniel came up again to do his Cqual++ presentation. Not only was this piece of software more difficult to write than delta, it's also less popular. Alas! He does some very impressive static dataflow analysis on C++ to find nasty, horrible bugs. But parsing out C++ is scarily difficult!

After the presentations were over, we had a very nice set of closing remarks which made all of us blush. And then we tore down all the stuff we put up and packed everything away. This is where I packed my own T-shirt in a box by accident. Jonathan's going to send it to me by post, which is very nice of him. Then I bid sad farewells to gorgeous Wealhþeow and charming akashayi who went off to dinner without me.

Six of us climbed into a taxi and we went to a sushi restaurant called Osaka, where we met up with breezip. Bree was the friend that the lovely and indefatigable spider88 kept trying to meet, but failed to. We were all quite exhausted from socialising with people since, after all, we are a group of introverts. So we enjoyed an excellent dinner with subdued, but fascinating, conversation. I was treated to the best uni I have tasted in my entire life. I think Bree was quite amused at my sea-urchin ecstacy. After dinner, Len paid with a thick wad of cash, which in conjunction with his suit, made him look like a mob boss.

I had a very good night.

Coming back to Montréal has been good for the soul.

Last night, I had a fun evening with jbailey and auzure_skies and Lithuanian mead. As the night wore on, they were finding it more and more difficult to play Settlers of Catan properly. But we shall have to do it again because (a) it was their first time playing, and (b) they were getting quite tipsy on 50% alcohol-by-volume.

I managed to get up bright and early this morning to go to Lotte Furama for 點心 with kyotto. We were there before most everyone else, so we had the pick of the freshest things as they came from the kitchen. We spent a good two hours eating breakfast, drinking tea, and chatting about life. We finally kicked ourselves out as the restaurant filled up.

Then, I went on a fruitless search for lunchtime sushi. Sushi bars are just not open on Sunday afternoons. Despite this, I met up with posixeleni and we had a pleasant lunch at Soup and Noodles. I then took her to Nicholas Hoare where we browsed the stacks and chatted some more.

My life now seems to centre around dining and chatting with lovely people! I am not complaining one bit.

The Bell-Ringers

Samuel Roddan

The church belfry was a wonderful place in the summer and I don’t think I have ever been so happy as on those cool Sunday mornings when, after ringing the bell, Benny and I climbed up the shaky ladder, wriggled through the trap door, and then, lying down on the flat roof and peeking over the edge, watched the people hurrying along the gravel paths in the Park by the mountain-ash trees.

“You know,” Benny would say, “if we slept in one Sunday morning and didn’t ring the old bell, I bet nobody would come at all.”

At a booksale of remaindered books, I picked up a copy of Sybil Kapoor's Taste: a new way to cook. This is a brilliant book that explores how different combinations of tastes excites our mouths.

We now know that there are five different receptors of taste: sour, salty, bitter, sweet, and umami. The last one may be unfamiliar because it's only been a recently recognised taste. Discovered by the Japanese, we have since borrowed the word to describe the taste of free glutamate. Even microscopic amounts of umami are discernable to taste.

Kapoor argues, quite correctly, that a balance of all five flavours makes things taste mind-blowingly good. So for lunch today, I decided to make a very strange pasta sauce. It turned out to be a splendid idea.

A balanced pasta dressing

Ingredients

• 3 basil leaves
• handful parmigiano reggiano
• extra virgin olive oil
• balsamic vinegar
• black pepper

Directions

1. Grate a handful of parmesan cheese into a pile of soft rubble. This is the umami component.
2. Cut the basil into a fine chiffonade. Here, we will find some bitter and some fragrance. Dump it into the bottom of a small bowl.
3. Next add a splash of extra virgin olive oil. It should be green and fruity and bitter.
4. Follow this with a drizzle of balsamic vinegar, which will add both sour and sweet.
5. Finally, grind in some fresh black pepper for a kick of spice. Combine everything together with a fork.
6. Now cook some stuffed pasta until it's just done and drain it well. Toss the pasta into a wide bowl and shower it generously with the cheese which should melt softly and coat the pasta.
7. Then drizzle the dressing on top and garnish.

Enrobes one generous plate of pasta.

Yesterday, I had an excellent time with vierge_en_trop. We sat down at Café l'Utopik, where we proceeded to drink hot beverages and talked at length about languages and books and life. We also observed some people breaking into a locked washroom door. It took them a very long time.

After this, we were getting rather hungry, so I invited her over for dinner. We swung by joenotcharles's office, where we found a young man who directed us to a closed and abandoned office. Not wanting to give up, vierge_en_trop left some messages on his voice-mail box while I picked up some groceries.

I managed to make two reasonable mushroom and cheddar omelettes, with some maple-glazed carrots and roasted potatoes on the side. I had bought groceries for three, but Joe is not very good at checking his messages. Or responding to them.

After our little dinner, we tried to find Joe. He had fallen into the black-hole of his apartment and we had to drag him out. Once we dragged him out, we had an exciting evening full of socks, Life, and Scrabble.

It was most edumacational.

Warren Spicer
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

Yesterday was actually super busy, because I had to get into my indie-scenester persona. I ran to La Sala Rossa where Katie Moore was playing, got inside, dashed up to the stage, and took some photographs. It was then that I noticed the weird room configuration: nobody was standing near the stage. That was good for me, since I could pick my camera angles unaccosted.

After Katie and Warren's set, they left the stage and I put on my coat before I knocked on the green room door. A girl from The Wailin' Jennys opened the door and I let myself in. You see, I had to dash off right then so I apologised to The Wailin' Jennys for having to miss their set. It looked like they had a full audience, with everyone sitting on the fold-up chairs that were provided. I've never seen a sit-down audience at La Sala Rossa so it was quite bizarre. Anyway, as a consolation, I offered some of my fresh brownies to everyone, which made things better.

Dan cuts his cherry-beer cake
Originally uploaded by sfllaw.

I hopped on to the metro and went all the way to the other side of the mountain. I was invited to phrawzty's birthday party. I don't actually know him, but that hasn't stopped me yet. I was walking to the party when I bumped into joenotcharles talking on his mobile phone. I chatted with him for a while, and he asked me if I needed directions. Here is where I made a stupid error, and told him that I had the address. He left to pick up vierge_en_trop and I spent the next half-hour wandering up and down the street trying to find a particular address. I was about to sit down on the cold curb and stuff my face with brownies, when I saw a bunch of happy people coming down the street. I accosted them and desperately asked them if they knew where a birthday party was being held.

I lucked out, because I asked phrawzty himself. I followed him down the road where he turned right into an empty lot. Then I followed him down the path and encountered the cutest white house and a little picket fence. lola_joan greeted us at the door and I started to warm up. Then I stuffed my faced with brownies.

I managed to meet some people from Ottawa like jenunderscore_, amp23, and elektrafrying. I do have to remind myself to invite them over for tea, the next time I'm in Ottawa. And then the party degraded to the state of putting faces to LiveJournal user names. So I have finally met gregorama, jul3z, and archdiva. I know I talked to tons of other people as well, but I didn't take very good notes at the party so I've forgotten their names. Sorry!

Sliced
Originally uploaded by lola_joan.

Laura baked a cherry-beer cake with candles and everything, which we all enjoyed spectacularly. Strangely, lots of people thought it was carrot cake, which made no sense at all. It tasted distinctly of cherries and wasn't healthful at all! Unhealthful cakes are my favourite kind of cake. Plus, it was moist and lush and had a wonderful crumb. I can't stop gushing about Laura's brilliant baking!

Eventually, Joe and Amanda showed up, and I was able to regale them with my tale of cold, abandoned suffering. I tried to get Amanda interested in Laura's bookshelf of awesome, but that failed. Even after Laura pulled out an amazing book about little chicks exploring the world! Anyway, we were getting tired by around midnight, so I suggested that we hit another party! (This was my trying to give Joe his youth back. Apparently, I'm stealing it vampirically.)

Joe picked up the box of brownies and we cabbed it over to messiahdivine's place. There, we chatted for a while but then we all stared to get super sleepy. I managed to see Simon there, and I made him promise to see me more often; we shall see how that turns out. I think I was accused of being an emo-kid after I stuck one of Amanda's new 'zine pins on my lapel. I should have denied this more vigorously. By about 3:00, I was really exhausted; somehow we managed to catch a cab back to my place. I'm sure I stuffed some money into Joe's hand before staggering back home.

I lost my bus pass yesterday. Good thing it's almost the end of the month.

That's the bad news. The good news is that I showed up to helf's birthday party. Strangely enough, I don't know Harold, so it was quite odd showing up to his party and saying "hello" to people in the hopes that one of them was him.

You see, I received an invitation in my inbox a couple of days ago and I thought that it was quite odd to be this surprise invitation. But then I abandoned care and resolved to go, because it isn't any day that one gets invited to a birthday party. And if it's someone's birthday, then one ought to celebrate it.

So I showed up with a store-bought tiramisù and buzzed upstairs. Inside, there were already some people milling about and talking to each other in German. Marc-Hubert, Eugene, Stephanie, and Alexandre (who can't actually speak German.) Harold was in the kitchen tending to a frying pan, so I set down my cake and hung up my coat.

We had a very nice meal and people started arriving. Karine and Pierre showed up, followed by Tony and Emily and Athena. Oh, there was also another person who showed up, but I cannot spell her name. I have since discovered that it is Devjani.

I was quite impressed by Harald's vast collection of classical records. Plus he has a rather nice shelf of cookery books, including A russian jew cooks in Peru, which was pretty fun to flip through. It was hand-written with hand-drawn illustrations.

Eventually, I got tired out from all this conversing and Athena had to leave early so as to arrive in time for work. She graciously offered me a lift home so I got into her cute little car and we chatted as we got lost around the city. Eventually, she dropped me off close to home and I thanked her kindly. And wished her the best of luck.

I was beating my head against the wall, trying to revise Linux 2.4.21 such that GCC 4 likes what it sees. This, my friend, is not an exercise I'd recommend for fun and games.

That was about the time that Julie called. She had arrived in town and was calling to let me know. As well, she had been visiting S. W. Welch, a used bookstore down St-Laurent, right near my place. This is important, you see, because she stumbled upon Les Diners De Gala, a cookbook illustrated by Salvador Dali.

Wow, oh wow. I went down there, found a whole bunch of other used books, and picked up this cookbook of awesome. It's absolutely gorgeous.

I've shelved boxes and boxes upon books, until I have finally discovered the floor again. It's nice, hardwood in fact.

There are a couple of boxes of Julie's books that I've collected into a pile, and with any luck I can tuck them away under a bed in the near future. Aside from that, I'm mostly moved in now. The only things left to do are wiring and setting up my desk of computers.

Maybe I'll try to get the Internet working tonight. The service representatives at my ISP sure want me to login.

It's vaguely pleasant to wake up in the morning before the alarm clock. The sun comes in through the window, plays through the spider plant, and makes a nice pattern above my head. I've been sleeping on the double futon, which is rather comfortable, even if it is resting on the floor. Typically, Timin is there by my feet but he has learned to stay on his side of the bed so that I don't roll over and crush him.

Unpacking has been going slowly. I cooked on my gas stove (yay!) last night and glued some things back into place. Then I finished assembling the rest of the furniture that I had taken apart. This morning, I unpacked some clothes into their proper places and realised that I don't have enough of the right kind of coat hangers. I expect to have finished dealing with the clothes situation by Monday night, so the last and most daunting task is to shelve the books.

My bookshelves really aren't. They're just skinny ikea utility shelves that are bolted together. This means that they don't have any ends to keep the books from toppling out! The back wall is pretty good at keeping them from falling back, but I've come up with the dazzling idea of tying cotton twine around the ends. If I do this tight enough, I suspect that these will hold my books in place. I do hope it looks attractive, though.

But for now, I'll be co-existing with a bunch of boxes that take up all the floor space in the office. Speaking of an office, I haven't even any of my computers setup properly yet. I suppose that will have to wait until I put safe electrical outlets in all the rooms. The power-distribution box is in my closet but it is rather small with only four circuit breakers. Ah well, the earlier I get that done the better.

So much work, so little time. I'll be away all weekend in Toronto, which I hope will be restful. I'll try to keep my mind off repairs until I get back.

Here I am hacking on a manual for WvStreams, as I travel by train to Toronto. That's actually a layover for my trip to Waterloo. We're heading down there to hire another round of co-op students, this time for Winter 2005. Along the way, we'll feed and water them (for a much deserved mid-term break.)

However, I'm not really heading down this early because I like Waterloo a lot. I'm actually going down to visit some friends. Of course, I have to see Julie and she's graciously offered her couch and living room to me. Then I can also see ringzero and Adeel. I hear Kevin Fong is making a turducken for his dinner party, and I will be very happy to attend. In fact, I'm bringing some Montréal bagels to some ex-patriots who must endure Ontario bagels.

Oh yes. Before I hopped on the train, I showed Carlos around a small subset of the city. We went into some used bookstores, and he was able to procure some travel souvenirs. Unfortunately, my weakness for used books revealed itself, and I couldn't help buying a couple along the way. In my defense, they were purchased as gifts for others.

Anyway, I'll have to do a little NITI meet and greet on Monday, so if you want to see me, and don't want to tie yourself down to an actual schedule, you should show up at the University Club after 9pm. In fact, if you show up before, you can also apply to get a hacking job, or mooch off some free food.

A nice postman came by this morning with a box. It was a delivery of books for me.

Included inside is a copy of Women don't ask: negotiation and the gender divide. This book was highly recommended by Val Henson whom Julie and I met at OLS.

This book talks about the trend for women to not advance as far in life because they don't negotiate. There are various reasons why they don't, including: believing that things are outside of their control, not wanting to hurt people's feelings, not wanting to seem pushy, not believing they deserve better, &c. And this hurts them since males will typically be more confident and self-centred, which means that males are more likely to negotiate for better circumstances and leave women behind.

I've noticed this trend in myself, actually. My sister is more assertive than I am, and she goes out to do stuff all the time, whilst I'm happy to stay home. One time, my parents told me that if I wanted to do things, all I had to do was ask. Before, I would just sneak out to do the things I wanted to do, believing that anything not expressly allowed was forbidden. What a startling revelation. To this day, I still have problems asking for things, preferring distinctly non-confrontational methods and media.

The book then goes on to describes ways that women can negotiate, ways unlike men, so they don't seem pushy or bitchy. It also gives suggestions for how the workforce can treat women equitably by rewarding women before they ask. This recognises the internal belief that people will see that a woman is doing good work, and avoids the uncomfortable situation of "demanding" something.

All in all, I highly recommend this book to everyone. It will open your eyes that people are different, and how to treat women differently, so that they are treated equitably.