So.

[unixronin]

So.

We're back from the weekend trek to Maryland.  Thoughts for the weekend:

1. Murphy really didn't want me to get to my interview, but we outsmarted the bastard.
2. Fluxx and Zendo are really cool games.
3. It's always interesting meeting yourself.
4. We have SO got to get out of this overgrown spam-can and into a real house (or hell, I'd settle for a townhouse like Sam and Liana's, no problem).

---

Let's see.  First, the morning of my interview, after we figured out a way I could get a shower without soaking my cast, the shower curtain rod fell down on me.  Three times, no less.  The third time, it landed squarely across the back of my neck as I leaned into the tub to retrieve my shampoo.

Then after I got done with my shower, one of the strap pins fell out of my watch for no apparent reason.  However, Murphy was off his game; it only took me about 45 seconds to find it, undamaged, and a few minutes to re-insert the pin.

So we make it out the door only a few minutes later than planned, make it to NASA about the time we want to, and I go into the gatehouse to check in with security and have them call the person I'm interviewing with.  Almost the first thing that happens after I roll in through the door in my trusty wheelchair is a woman turns away from the counter still looking where she's been, walks right into me, and kicks me squarely on the toes of my left foot.  Yeah, the one with the pins in the toes.  "Ow."  (Insert appropriate expletives here according to taste.)

Finally my contact gets there, about 15 minutes later, and it transpires that there are special paperwork requirements to bring me onsite because I'm still a UK citizen.  She'd checked in advance whether it was a problem, and was told "It's covered, all taken care of."  Needless to say, it wasn't covered, and the paperwork has to be done ten days in advance.

Nice try, Murphy, but we outsmarted you this time.  The applicable people were rounded up, and we headed off to the local Starbucks to conduct my interview off-site.  Starbucks coffee is frankly as awful as ever, but I think the last interview I had that went this well was the one with Cygnus Solutions, at which they'd pretty much already decided they were going to hire me and the interview was mostly a formality.

Anyway, the long and the short of that is I haven't the slightest doubt I can work with these people, and they seem to have equally little doubt that I can do the job.  Cross your fingers, folks.

On the way home, cymrullewes, having just seen a license plate reading "2DAMOON," suggested that if I get this job, since I'll be writing code to talk to solar observatory satellites, I could get a personalized plate for my motorcycle reading "2 SOL."  Well, granted, it's not a bad idea at all (setting aside for a moment the question of whether I'm going to be able to ride again, which is not certain at this point), but I had a better one.  Put on your Blues Brothers outfits, boys, and try this one for size: "SOL MAN."  (And if anyone steals the idea and prevents me from using it, I'll kick'em in the kneecaps.)

---

Oh yeah, I mentioned Zendo, didn't I?  Ever wondered if an arrangement of a handful of colored clear plastic pyramids can have the Buddha-nature?  Wonder no longer.  Check it out at Looney Labs.  This, like all truly great games, doesn't rely on gimmicks; it's just a simple, elegant game built around a simple, elegant concept.  It requires calm thought, not the reflexes of a six-year-old on speed, and there is a very definite zen to it.

And Fluxx?  It's a wacky card game in which almost every card played can or does change the rules, and even the objective, of the game.  I think it's the only card game I've ever played in which you can play, or be forced to play, a single card which, without any action on their part, causes someone else to win.

---

Finally, report from today's eye exam:  despite a history of glaucoma on both sides of my family now, I have no signs whatsoever of any form of eye disease, and my left eye is still 20/15 without breaking a sweat.  My right eye's deteriorated a little, though, and I've been having a little trouble focusing on my computer screen lately, so I need new reading glasses.

Here begins silliness:  Medicaid covers only cheap plastic lenses without scratch or anti-glare coating.  Presumably to reduce costs, right?  So why do they REQUIRE that you get new frames?  They'll only cover lenses in new frames.  If you try to save them money by having new lenses put in your existing frames, they won't let you do it.  Go figure.  Ain't bureaucracy wonderful?

Still, with any luck, about the time the new glasses arrive, I'll have a job, and I can just tell'em "No thanks, but you can make me some lenses in the same prescription in high-index plastic with anti-glare and scratch coatings, and I'll have them in my titanium frames, please."

Comments

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Short answer:  I'm finally getting my claw-toes straightened, which should significantly reduce my pain level, and getting my foot fixed up so that (hopefully) it doesn't break open and bleed every time I walk on it.

For full details and a recap of the whole story so far, see my November 6 (http://www.livejournal.com/users/unixronin/2003/11/06/) post.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Oi, fook mate, are you sure you wouldn't've been better off with an amputation?

So, what's causing your toes on your left foor to be all wonky? Tendon length? I don't suppose lengthening them is at all viable?

(Ogre notes that he is going into engineer mode, second-guessing doctors, and generally making a pain in the ass of himself.)

Hrmmm. Well, maybe I'll stop that, not being familiar with performing upgrades and modification on materials that have to do some measure of their own repair afterwards.

Well, if they do have to lop off your left foot, I promise I'll make you a very pretty prosthetic, out of stainless or aluminum or whatever you want. Also, I'll figure out a way to set a motorcycle up for shifting with some other mechanism.

Maybe one could set up the left handgrip to twist like the right does, and use cables to actuate the shifter...

Or we could just put you on a big old chopper, with a handshift. I have this '95 VFR lying around I've been thinking of making an Akira-Kaneda out of...

Hey! Mapquest says you're only 8 hours away from me, while I'm out here in New Jersey. What does your schedule for, oh, the next 3 weeks look like?

-Ogre

[cymrullewes.livejournal.com]

I was going to say come and see us in Maryland over Thanksgiving except that I think you'd scare my Mom. But sure come and see us. I'll drag out the futon again so you've got some place to sleep. I don't mind you scaring the Out-laws. Not at all.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Well, Thanksgiving would be ok with me, except I've already made plans to go up to NYC and cook dinner for some friends.

I'm in NJ until the 11th, so sometime before then I'd like to drive down and see y'all.

-Ogre

Works for me . . .

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

...this place isn't much to look at, but it's easy enough to get to, straight shot down 95 most of the way.  And if the weather's tolerable, we have our own impromptu shooting range out back.  (Which should even be more usable now that the cold's cut down on the mosquitoes.)

Re: Works for me . . .

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Oooh! Guns! I've been missing those, here in New Jersey...

-Ogre

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Aw, he would't scare Mom.  Mom's more openminded than that.  :)

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

Oi, fook mate, are you sure you wouldn't've been better off with an amputation?

Sometimes I really wonder about that myself.  I really do.

Tendon lengthening was, in fact, part of the process on the small toes in this surgery.  And yes, the cause of the claw-toes is muscle contractures and internal scarring from the four hours or so during which my foot and lower leg had no blood supply.

Hopefully amputation won't become necessary, but if it does, I'll definitely keep you in mind to build me something totally bad-ass.  ;)

Shifting ... I have two ideas, one that requires money, one that requires experiment.

The one that requires experiment is to modify the shifter so that instead of having a simple peg, I instead have a tuning-fork or stirrup affair that I can put my toe into.  The idea behind this is that if I don't have to get my toe above and below the peg to shift, I may be able to get away with shifting mechanically with just the limited ankle motion that I have.

The other alternative (the one requiring money) is a remote power shifter.  TransLogic (http://www.translogicuk.com/products1.htm) makes a couple that should work - look at the PowerShift 2 (http://www.translogicuk.com/ps2.htm) and PowerShift 4 (http://www.translogicuk.com/ps4.htm) models.  They give power upshifts and downshifts, Tiptronic-style, with a handlebar-mounted push-button control and a linear actuator and, in the case of the PowerShift 4, a gear-position indication display.  They feature a momentary ignition interrupt for clutchless upshifts.  They really do it right.  As an added bonus, they CAN be programmed to automatically upshift at redline or any desired engine speed short of redline.  (Yeah, their primary bline of business is racers.)  The PowerShift 4 is the ideal power-shift solution; only catch is it's $1200 we don't have, plus installation.  If I get the NASA job, though, we should be able to afford it in time to ride next spring.

As for next three weeks' schedule -- well, we're going to be in Ocean City MD for Thanksgiving.  Come find us in #callahans on irc.freenode.net and we can make plans.

[ilcylic.livejournal.com]

Hrmmmm. Excluding the ignition interruption for full-throttle upshifts, I bet I could build something like that. That's a very cool device. Well, I'll just hope you get the job with NASA, for other reasons. Yay money!

I hope your foot doesn't have to get cut off, either. If only cybernetics were already here, then it wouldn't really matter. Well, from a functionality point of view at least, you might care about missing the pound of flesh. ;) I dunno. I certainly can't imagine exactly how much pain you're in, (though I can sympathize) you might very well trade the meat leg for a metal one, if it meant surcease from pain and no loss (or, even gain, it sounds like) of functionality. But if all that happens, and you get stuck with some ugly fiberglass thing, I'll fab something cool. I'm sure that makes it all so much easier to contemplate. ;)

-Ogre