Jason Parks' blog

Moving

Jason Parks — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 01:59:52 +0000

Not that people are paying attention anymore, but I am moving this blog over to blogger. If you have a feed you will need to visit http://blog.jparks.net and subscribe to the new feed.

have you guys missed me?

Jason Parks — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 19:34:46 +0000

Sorry I’ve been away from my blog, I’ve been working more late nights than I wish to count. I haven’t had much time for posting but something that has recently occurred has really got my mind going. This past weekend, my good friend Shaler got engaged. Many congrats go out to Shaler and his woman. And while I am very happy for them, I am also a tiny bit sad for myself. I never considered that I would have to share Shaler with another and now I’m afraid I might have lost him forever.

As I sit here at my desk I realize that I might never have another hug from Shaler. This makes me sad as I feel safest in his arms. No other person seems to understand me the way he does. I don’t want to go all brokeback on ya’ll, but I just don’t know how to quit Shaler.

The wedding will be hard to attend. I’m afraid to let people see me cry, but I don’t think I’ll be able to hold in my tears. Shaler, I’ll try to be strong for you, but I can’t make any promises. Perhaps I can find comfort in the arms of another.

Jham, will you hold me?

Look! Now I am famous!

Jason Parks — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 22:23:25 +0000

Some one discovered Wack A Mole;-)

The funny thing about this is that if you tap on my face it looks like I am punching my self. Also this was not my idea.

Look! Lily’s famous!

Jason Parks — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 17:15:16 +0000

Check out the Gizmodo article.

UPDATE
Engadget now has some pictures of Lily too.

UPDATE 2.0
Another picture of Lily.

What has jparks been working on?

Jason Parks — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 16:15:56 +0000

Today we finally announced the project that I’ve been working on.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 05:55:01 +0000

I seemed to have forgotten to make my “Where’s jparks?” post before leaving for Hawaii. Ooops. Well I am back from, as they say here in California, va-cay.

I hate flip flops!

Jason Parks — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 02:21:22 +0000

The rejoicing has ended. My excitement about flip flops has come to an end. Now I can’t even remember why I was so excited about getting flip flops. Maybe because they were forbidden is what made them appealing and something I HAD TO HAVE! But after nine days of wearing them, my blistered feet have had enough. Maybe this was Regan’s plan all along. Buy me cheap flip flops so my feet will hurt and I would not want to wear them. Well, if that was her plan it worked. I don’t even want to see if nice flip flops wouldn’t hurt my feet. I just want to go throw both pairs that she bought me in the ocean now. I am a broken man…

Yoga == Hippies

Jason Parks — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 05:20:06 +0000

I make fun of Regan all the time for saying that she is afraid to take yoga. “The instructor tells me to bring my anus back to which it came from”, she always says. I never believed that an instructor would say something so hippieish. After today I won’t make fun of her any more for saying that. We have been taking a yoga class in the morning, and yeah I know we are insane for waking up at 6:30 am while on vacation. Yesterday’s session was fine. We were on the beach and exercising the whole time. But today we had a hippie for a teacher. He rattled on about how yoga, real yoga, had nothing to with exercise. We westerners could not grasp the concept of yoga. We had to adopt it to our way of thinking and as Madonna says, we live in a material world, and that is why we made yoga into an exercise. He then proceeded to ramble on about unions and what not throughout the whole class. With all his ramblings and preaching I didn’t get any exercise. If I wanted to listen to some hippie shit I would have joined a drum circle. All I could think while listening to him was Cartman saying, “I’ve been keeping this place free of hippies since I was five”.

The Android’s Dream

Jason Parks — Sun, 01 Jul 2007 05:17:49 +0000

It’s been a while since I’ve reviewed a book. Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve written a book report since 10th grade. This should be interesting.

When I was thinking of how to write this post I kept thinking that I need to describe the book as a mash-up of two other iconic books or movies. For some reason I have it in my head, which I must admit deviates from reality from time to time, that this is how most professional reviewers review books and movies. Now that I have that notion in my head I, of course, couldn’t write this review any other way.

The problem is what two pieces of pop culture do I pick that will fully sum up this book? You see I really liked this book. It was by far the best book I’ve read in a long, long time. I generally read books that I like the story but the writing isn’t going to make the book a classical piece of literature. Not only was Android’s Dream a clever and fast paced story, but the writing was also very good. I liked it so much that I am actually keeping the book. Normally I like to give away the books that I like so that someone else can enjoy the story too.

What are the two iconic pieces of pop culture that sum up this book? I can only think of two movies that could describe this book, it’s The Bourne Identity meets The Fifth Element.

If you don’t like either of those movies don’t let this hack of a review sway you away from reading this book. The fact that I am writing this post should contest to how much I really liked the book.

[I wrote this months ago but forgot to hit publish. Oops!]

The Greatest Danger of Administering Prozac to a Cat

Jason Parks — Fri, 25 May 2007 06:37:28 +0000

While holding your cat just after you plunge the Prozac down her throat to make sure she actually swallowed it, one would think that the greatest danger would be being bitten or scratched. That is in fact not the greatest danger. The greatest danger would that your cat is so pissed off at you for shoving Prozac down her throat that she starts flinging slobber as thick as molasses around on you and everything in a 10 ft. radius like she was Slimmer.

See this post to find out why we are drugging our cat.

My wife loves me!

Jason Parks — Wed, 21 Mar 2007 17:29:12 +0000

Would you like to know how I know this? She showed me that she loves me by calling up Barnes and Noble to see if they had a D&D book that I wanted. You are probably saying to yourself that this really isn’t a big deal, it’s just a book. I would agree with you, but she makes a point of telling everyone that I am very lucky to be married, a point which I do not dispute, because I play, as she puts it, dork games.

If calling and seeing if they had the book was not enough to prove her love for me, she actually went and purchased it! Again you are probably thinking this isn’t a big deal, but apparently the booksellers at Barnes and Noble, which she used to be, look down upon and criticize the people that buy dork books. For her to brave the scrutiny of her peers was most definitely a testament of her love. Whether this was for me or her secret love of D&D, I do not know;-)

The Propelling Parks’

Jason Parks — Fri, 16 Feb 2007 07:59:14 +0000

To further our circus act, Regan and I started taking trampoline classes tonight to help improve our dismounts from the trapeze bar. As a kid I’ve always known someone with a trampoline and always enjoyed jumping on one. I was a little shocked when Regan said that she has never jumped on a trampoline before. Then the shock turned into concern because she is the only person I know that can easily give themselves a concussion.

So how did the class go? She was better at it than I was. That is up until the point where she started trash talking and told me that she was going to show me how it was done. After losing control of her bounce, she managed to knee herself in the head and fling herself half way across the trampoline to hit hard into the springs around the edge. If it wasn’t for two big padded things sitting on the edge of the trampoline she would have flung herself straight over the edge.

For anyone keeping score, here are the injuries so far:

Regan:

Landed in the net wrong and hurt her neck, which resulted in five hours in Urgent Care.
Bad take off from the trapeze platform, which resulted in an injured shoulder.
Got cocky on the trampoline, which resulted in hurt pride and most likely bruised forehead.

Jason:

No injuries to date despite the fact that he got dropped on his head from the trapeze.

Oh Winter coat, I shall miss you

Jason Parks — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 17:31:38 +0000

Today is Groundhog day. This is a day that has been much anticipated here in the Parks’ household. Why? This Winter the only way Regan would let me grow out my beard, better known as my Winter coat, was that come Spring I would shave off my entire beard. Yes, my entire beard! No goatee. No mustache. No mutton chops. It had to all go.

While Spring officially doesn’t come until the end of March, this hasn’t stopped Regan from asking “Is it Spring yet?” A few weeks ago when she asked is it Spring yet, I told her that we would know when Spring was going to be on Groundhog Day. I made an error here. I thought the legend said that if the groundhog didn’t see his shadow that winter would be extended longer than it normally is. While in reality, which sometimes I don’t pay attention to, if the groundhog did see his shadow then Spring would come early. I have to start paying attention to things!

Right now the following groundhogs have seen their shadow, Punxsutawney Phil, Staten Island Chuck, Wiarton Willie, Shubenacadie Sam and General Beauregard Lee. Which means that I will be shaving my Winter coat soon;-(

I have a future in the Circus!

Jason Parks — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 02:54:44 +0000

Or at least that was what I was told today after my trapeze class today. Unlike Regan, I had no fear of jumping off a platform high in the air. She was a little skeptical when I told her this before I took the class. I had to explain that as kids we would climb trees and who ever could hang and drop from the highest point would win. It was like monkey’s version of dare. Of course, this elicited the normal question of: Were you retarded as a kid?(tm)

I had a very productive first class. The only thing I had to try twice was a back flip. I was a little confused on what I was suppose to do and forgot to let go of the bar when I finally got into position. I was able to do three catches of the first trick. I hope I do as well on the second trick next week.

I’ve started a photoset, both on Picasa and Flickr, of our trapeze classes. I also have video of Regan attempting the second trick.

IFL

Jason Parks — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 03:33:43 +0000

What is the IFL? That’s the question that most people ask when we tell them that we went and saw the IFL on Friday Night. It stands for International Fight League, which as their site puts it, is the world’s first team-based professional mixed martial arts league.

I had very low expectations of this event and was going mostly to see what it was about. The girls, Regan, Whitney, and Mary-Lynn, were more excited than I was. How excited were they? When Regan sent me an email about the event the subject line read: “ASSWHUPPIN”. I wasn’t so sure why they were so excited, but after going I can see why they got pump up. For that matter, I can see why people like boxing so much. There’s nothing like watching a guy get put in a choke hold and pass out to get your blood going.

No Wii for Mii

Jason Parks — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 21:37:55 +0000

I’ve failed yet again to acquire a Wii on another Wii day;-( Stupid E-bayers.

Danni and I are no longer together

Jason Parks — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 06:00:08 +0000

I was going to post this a while ago but never got around to it. I even had a clever idea of writing it in the form of a break up letter. But for some reason I’m in a creative slump and never finished it;-(

I traded in my MINI Cooper S in for a Volvo S40. Why? After moving back out here, I was quickly reminded of one of the major reasons I hate living in the Bay Area: traffic. Traffic here sucks! It sucks even more when you are driving a standard. It really sucks when you are the only person in your household who can drive a standard. So if we did take my car out I would always be the driver. That also meant that I was always the designated driver. That sucked ass.

After Regan got her new car (a kick ass Volvo C70) I thought that we would just take her car every where and I would only use the MINI for going to and from work. That didn’t work out so great since we decided to lease her car so she can get a wagon in a few years when we decide to have kids. With the lease we could only put 12,000 miles a year on her car. In the Bay Area you can put that on in a few months. After the miles started racking up really fast, it was back to me driving the MINI if we wanted to go any where. That sucked ass.

Just over a month and a half of when Regan got her car, I went and traded Danni in for Donna. I never pictured myself driving anything other than the fastest, smallest, semi-luxury car I could find. But I have to admit that I am rather enjoying driving my “adult” car.

New Year’s Resolutions

Jason Parks — Sun, 07 Jan 2007 03:48:25 +0000

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything, and I’ve decided it was time I spruced up the place a bit and start posting again.

I sort of went on a mini-rant to Regan and Whitney earlier today about how New Year’s Resolutions don’t count until unless they are presented in a bullet pointed list, here are my New Year’s resolutions, in no particular order:

Publish at least 52 posts this year and attempt to participate in this year’s NaBloPoMo (that is if they have it again).
I pretty sure I can do the first part but the second part may be bit ambitious. But I figured I would at least attempt it.
Go on a diet, get buffed, and take fencing lessons.
After my plan of beating my brother senseless with a foam sword back fired on me, I figured it was time that I get in shape. I need the fencing lessons because my punk brother works construction and I have a desk job; there is no way I will be able to get stronger than him. Hopefully better swordsmanship will be able to defeat his berzerker rage.
Acquire a Wii.
I missed out on acquiring this past Christmas. It was my fault that I didn’t get one. Initially I thought I would build up some serious good karma by letting all the little kids that wanted one for Christmas get one before I did. What, surprised by my selfless act? Don’t worry it didn’t last long, my stance on the matter changed as soon as I played one. I think my exact statement was, “Screw the kids! I have to have one!” Plus the more I thought about it, it wasn’t me that would prevent some kid from getting one, it is those damn eBayers. All I had to do then was not buy one from eBay and I would not incur any bad karma. Since then I’ve been hunting for a Wii.
Sort my Warlord collection
It’s gotten out of control.
Start cooking again
Google has totally spoiled me when it comes to food. Since I’ve started working there I haven’t really been motivated to cook my own meals. Why would I when I have chefs that are better cooks than me, cooking three meals a day? But it turns out, I don’t actually eat three meals a day at Google. And the money that I thought I was saving was actually being spent on dining out at night and on the week-ends.
Take more pictures
Regan has taken control over all the camera’s in the house, which has led me to take less pictures in 2006. Not this year!
Turn off the bathroom light
Warning, this was put on my list by Regan and I might not get it accomplished;-) The fan in the bathroom comes on when you turn on the light. For some reason, that little fan is the only thing that can wake her up from her coma like sleep.

I’m all talk

Jason Parks — Tue, 14 Nov 2006 22:37:45 +0000

jham: I needed a long sentence.
me: I got a long sentence for your mom, if you know what I mean.
jham: Yeah, you’re all talk.

How colorblind people see the world.

Jason Parks — Sun, 20 Aug 2006 21:28:37 +0000

I found this article on digg. I totally can’t see the numbers or the gradients. I had to cheat and ask some random person what numbers where in the circles and exactly where they were so I can pretend not to be color blind;-)

The Gamers

Jason Parks — Tue, 18 Jul 2006 04:42:27 +0000

I’m playing D&D again and Regan gets curious every once and a while and asks me about it. Since she has never played before she doesn’t understand the point of the game. I made her watch the movie The Gamers to better explain it. I didn’t explain that it was a parody before she watched it. After she finished she said that she was glad that she didn’t come to our game sessions because she wouldn’t be able to stop laughing at us.

Regan “Three Fist”, Warrior Princess

Jason Parks — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 23:53:12 +0000

Regan has this effective defense mechanism while sleeping. If one was to accidentally bump her LIGHTLY on the head while she is sleeping she will, without waking up, return the light bump in kind with a massive head butt that would put the Zidane headbutt to shame.

I can’t help but tease her about it because she grunted when she headbutted me.

The addtionial cost of living in California: Food Poisoning

Jason Parks — Fri, 14 Jul 2006 16:02:56 +0000

I never had food poisoning before. That is until I moved to California. Then it was an all too common occurrence. I moved away for almost three years and I did not have a single case of food poisoning. I’ve been back out here for just over three months and I am just recovering from my first bout of food poisoning. Ah got to love California living. Word of advice to the food industry: just because it is 64˚F outside in the middle of July doesn’t mean that you don’t have to properly refrigerate your food!

where is jparks anyway?

regan — Thu, 29 Jun 2006 05:56:26 +0000

If you’re a reader of Jason’s blog you should feel very unloved. He doesn’t even care enough about you or his blog to tell everyone that he’s at a Gamer’s Convention this week.

I would say let the nerd jokes start, but it might be too easy for everyone. Jokes are always better when it’s a challenge to make them. Things that are easy are boring. Insert a “your mom” joke here.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Tue, 30 May 2006 01:02:47 +0000

I totally forgot to post where we were going this weekend. I’m such a bad blogger. I guess it really doesn’t matter since most of my readers are coming from Regan’s blog now;-(

For anyone who doesn’t read Regan’s blog, we went to Austin this weekend for Jeff and Aim’s wedding. Everything was great except for the trip home. I keep saying this, but this was the absolutely last time that I fly through Dallas DFW. No really, I mean it this time. Our plane was 30 minutes late in arriving to the gate and took off 40 minutes later that it was suppose to. After landing and being delayed for 10+ minutes because of lighting strikes, 1 lighting strike within 5 miles of the airport == 10 minutes of waiting in the queue to de-board, we were left 10 minutes to make it to our next flight. Long story short we made it but our bags didn’t.

There will be pictures on Flickr soon and more of a story on Regan’s blog.

Look, I’m famous!

Jason Parks — Wed, 10 May 2006 21:05:58 +0000

I got my mug taken at the Homebrew Phone Club last week. The serious look on my face was from me trying to put the gumstix back together after Joe took it apart and couldn’t figure out how to put it back together.

Dan has already taken note of this on flickr.

From left, Joe Onorato of San Francisco, Jason Parks of Sunnyvale, and Diane Hackborn of Santa Clara check out a gumstix, a miniature computer used in wireless mobile technology, during the the first meeting of the Silicon Valley Homebrew Mobile Phone Club at the Google campus in Mountain View.
(Joanne Ho-Young Lee / Mercury News)

Bookshelves

Jason Parks — Tue, 02 May 2006 05:59:00 +0000

Regan and I have rebuilt our library so fast that you wouldn’t be able to tell that we lost almost every book that we owned eight months ago. It was more important to us to acquire books rather than a place to put them. This really didn’t matter in Austin since we had a two bedroom apartment with tons of closet space. When the books started to overrun the common space, we just stashed them away in a closet. Now that we live in the-kingdom-of-unreasonable-rent we had to down grade to a one bedroom apartment with less closet space. This meant that we actually had to stop buying books and break down and buy bookshelves. Today, after 245 days of being bookshelf free, we are now owners of a IKEA bookshelf.

If you ever tried clicking on the ‘contact’ link…

Jason Parks — Mon, 01 May 2006 04:22:39 +0000

You would have noticed that it didn’t work. It works now for both mine and Regan’s site. Hopefully I spam proofed it.

The quotable Regan

Jason Parks — Tue, 18 Apr 2006 23:21:44 +0000

Said to me by Regan while having dinner with Lauren and Trey, “Honey, if you thought with your penis we wouldn’t fight as much.”

Year in review

Jason Parks — Sun, 16 Apr 2006 22:04:15 +0000

The other day I reread some of my old posts so I could add more tags to them. It dawned on me that I only started this blog a year ago. My life has changed so much over the past year. So here is my year in review.

Shaler moved in with Marija and I decided to become a bum again. I drove to Austin to watch a pre-screening of Serenity and bartered for Jayne Hats. Took a vacation in the Outer Bank and learned how toss a boomerang. Regan and I pissed off a band member of some jam band. As Shaler and I were packing our apartment we found some volatile booze and a letter declaring me his bitch. Decided not to become a bum and move in with Regan instead. Took a vacation to Vegas and asked Regan to marry me. Got my head shaved. I finally got a landline only to have the hurricane destroy it. Got displaced to Austin and gained two new family members. Open sourced the binder. Took a vacation to Europe. Got a new job and moved to the Bay Area.

Undead Easter

Jason Parks — Sun, 16 Apr 2006 04:23:05 +0000

Regan said to me that we should get together with Lauren for Easter to have dinner and watch a movie. The heathen in me suggested that we watch Army of Darkness because it had things in it that come back from the dead. Both Regan and Lauren liked this idea so much that we are now watching two undead movies tomorrow: Army of Darkness and Shaun of the Dead.

Too bad they weren’t fond of my suggestion for dinner: rabbit.

Ok Dr. Rumsey, how did you find me?

Jason Parks — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 06:14:47 +0000

I got a new user registration email tonight. Some may not find that exciting but I rarely get new users so I was a little excited. I check to see who my new user is and I do not recognize the user name. What’s this? Some random person has stumbled onto my blog and found it interesting enough to register. I now had to know who this person was. I googled the email address of my new user and the first result is: Minutes of 2005 Business Meeting. With this I have found the name of my mystery user, Deb Rumsey of Ohio State University. I asked Regan why that name sounded familar. She had no clue but said it did sound familar. I then ask her to go get me my Statistics for Dummies. Sure enough it was written by Deborah Rumsey, PhD. Regan said that I had to make a blog post about this and that she was jealous that none of the authors that she reads registers on her site.

Making a Texpresso

Jason Parks — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 17:08:33 +0000

The only thing about Austin that I am missing so far is Texpresso’s signature drink. A Texpresso is just a cappuccino with half-and-half and extra sugar but made to perfection every time. Since I knew I was leaving Austin I started watching how they make them so I could try to reproduce them once I got to the Bay Area. What I observed.

Make a shot of expresso
Place two sugar cubes(three if you want it extra sweet) into the frothing cup
Add the expresso to the frothing cup
Add half-and-half to the frothing cup
Froth

This seems pretty simple right? Not! I didn’t realize that there are so many variables to making a cappuccino. How much coffee grinds do you put in the grind holder? How hard should you compact the grinds? How much half-and-half do you use? How long should you froth it for?

My daily experimentation and results so far.

April 11, 2006

2 clicks of coffee grinds
Double shot of expresso
1/3 carton of half-and-half
Two sugar packets

Results: Less half-and-half and more sugar.

April 12, 2006

3 click of coffee grinds
Double shot of expresso
Cup filled up to the “g” with half-and-half
Two sugar packets and 1 splenda

Results: Right amount of half-and-half but the coffee was too strong.

April 13, 2006

2 clicks of coffee grinds
Double shot of expresso
Froth cup filled to the first line with low fat milk.
Two splenda packets

Results: Last time I try a diet Tex.

where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Sun, 09 Apr 2006 16:42:14 +0000

Moving to the Bay Area.

We are about to sedate the cats and head to the airport. This should be a very interesting flight.

I lead such a thug life

Jason Parks — Sun, 09 Apr 2006 03:30:03 +0000

Shaler: “Dude, your song came on.”
Regan: “What song is that?”
me: “I’m in love with a stripper.”
Regan: “Aww! That was your future song before me.”
Shaler: “No! Let me show you what song was before you.”
Shaler goes into the other room to play the song.
Regan: “What song is he going to play?”
me: “Gold Digger.”
Shaler plays Gold Digger.
Regan starts laughing.

Driven by Regan

Jason Parks — Sat, 08 Apr 2006 02:04:53 +0000

regan: “OH SHIT! WE’RE GONNA DIE!”
regan floors it instead of stopping.
I start shaking my head.
regan(laughing): “If you weren’t so tired you would be yelling at me.”
me: “I’m too tired to care about dying.”

ToDo List

Jason Parks — Tue, 04 Apr 2006 03:49:56 +0000

Regan and I are very busy this week getting ready for our move to California. We got so much to do that she’s actually broken down and created a list for herself. Here’s my list so far for the week:

04/03/2006

Read Chapters 5, 6, 8, and 9 of Statistics for Dummies
~~Perform a trial run of sedating the cats~~
~~Call old Landlord~~…~~Make Regan call old Landlord~~
~~Call to see if a hotel stay will be paid for our last two nights in Austin~~
Finish sorting Warlord cards
~~Start working on state taxes~~
~~Start packing clothes~~
~~Walk Lily~~ ^1.
Make hotel reservations
~~Take out the trash~~

04/04/2006

Read Chapters 10, 11, 12, and 13 of Statistics for Dummies
Finish Taxes
Pack more clothes

04/05/2006

Read Chapters 14, 15, 16, and 17 of Statistics for Dummies
Pack more stuff that isn’t going to be shipped
Walk Lily

04/06/2006

Read Chapters 18, 19, 20, and 21 of Statistics for Dummies
Laundry
Pack three weeks worth of books to read
Pack anything I don’t want the packers to pack
Clean out cars and prepare for them to be shipped

^1. Lily’s walk turned into her walking us. I had to carry her most of the way because she was tired after getting a rabies shot and a thermometer stuck up her butt.

Warlord

Jason Parks — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 01:55:13 +0000

Today marks the fifth anniversary of Warlord CCG. The game is moving into its second reset, Epic Edition, and it looking better than ever. If you love D&D you should check this game out.

I’ve personally been playing since the beginning of 2002 and love it! Unfortunately I haven’t been able to play in a while because my regular gaming group was disbanded when the storm spread us out across the country. Hopefully I will be able to revive Warlord in the Bay Area when we move back out there.

I will never buy a Netgear router ever again!

Jason Parks — Mon, 03 Apr 2006 01:18:46 +0000

This is the fourth Netgear router that I’ve owned and each one has given me head aches. I gave my last one to Dan so that he could debug why I couldn’t connect to the FeedTree network. The current router model that I own does not allow me to keep ssh connections open longer than five minutes. I also found out today that when I reboot my machine that it will randomly delete port forwarding rules associated with it. *Sigh*

Bookshelf

Jason Parks — Wed, 29 Mar 2006 18:37:30 +0000

I’ve created a plugin for Wordpress that will display a graphical library of books that you read. This plugin allows you to track when you started and finished a book.

Download

Official release: 0.1
Current development version: bookshelf.php

Installation

Extract the bookshelf plugin into your wp-content/plugins directory.
Enable the plugin in the WordPress administration interface.

Entering books

The interface for entering books for Bookshelf is located under the Manage tab under the submenu Bookshelf

Currently the plugins stores the following information per book:

ISBN
Title
Author
Date Started
Date Finished

The image for a book is keyed off of the ISBN.

Templates

The Bookshelf plugin exports two functions to be used in templates:

bookshelf_display_library() This functions displays all books in the library
bookshelf_display_recent_reading() This functions displays the current most reading.

To have the current readind displayed on the sidebar place the following code in sidebar.php

`Current Reading`

Note: I’m not very good at CSS and the only way for me to get the sidebar to layout correctly was adding the

. Otherwise everything but the current reading was shifted to the bottom of the sidebar.

The following template can be used to create a page that will display all books in a library.

/* Template Name: Bookshelf */ ?>

CSS

Each image is of the class reflect. If you download reflection.js and add it to you site css all book images will be reflected.

Moving

Jason Parks — Tue, 28 Mar 2006 03:54:43 +0000

Today, after 4.37 years, I resigned from my position at PalmSource. I’ve accepted an offer from Google. This means that Regan will be moving back out to the Bay Area.

London Checklist

Jason Parks — Fri, 24 Mar 2006 20:08:43 +0000

In no particluar order the things Regan and I did in London:

British Library
Harry Potter Attractions
Changing of the Guards
Tate Modern
Lunch and Dinner at an Indian Restaurant
Rick Steves’ Oxford Circus to Piccadilly walk
Walked around trendy Islington
Original Bus Tour
Harrods
London Eye
H&M
Apple Store
Got lost in Knights Bridge
British Museum
Contributed to over seas opening week-end gross for V for Vendetta
Walked across the Millennium Bridge
National Portrait Gallery

Energy crisis solved

Jason Parks — Thu, 23 Mar 2006 23:32:21 +0000

I(Shaler and Jeff) went over to fabulousrides.com and got this great addition to Danny. Now I just wind and go.

It’s like London knew Jason was coming

regan — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 11:55:12 +0000

–Regan

“Our Italian coffee machines cost a bomba.”

Jason Parks — Sun, 19 Mar 2006 11:21:49 +0000

Today we tried breakfast from a place called Pret here in London. This has to be the best coffee we’ve had so far in London. Maybe it’s the fact that they claim to grind and brew their beans within 14 days of roasting. Thanks to Alton Brown we know that coffee starts to stale immediately after roasting.

That one cup, I got a regular when I should have gotten a large, makes me miss the good coffee of New Orleans.

Metro Karaoke

Jason Parks — Sat, 18 Mar 2006 14:54:40 +0000

When we were in Paris a man boarded our car with a karaoke machine and performed a few songs. He didn’t look all that enthusiastic about performing the songs. Regan thought that he must have lost a bet and that was why he was doing it. This got me thinking. If I lived in a city with a subway I would totally be making bets with the wager of performing karaoke on the subway. I’ve already picked out what Regan’s song would be, Madonna’s Like A Prayer, in full costume and all. I told her that making out with Britney Spears was optional but highly encouraged;-)

I Plead Not Guilty

Jason Parks — Fri, 17 Mar 2006 05:46:24 +0000

Our hotel doesn’t have free Internet service. The only way to get onto the Internet from our hotel is paid ASDL dial-up, cable not supplied. I was ok with this because there is an inexpensive Internet cafe across the street. What I am not ok with is no phone service in my room. I had to make a phone call today and the stupid swipe-your-credit-card-before-you-can-make-a-call phone wouldn’t give me a damn dial tone. I couldn’t even dial 777, which is the HELP LINE! Instead of calling the front desk, which even if the phone was working you can’t do, to fix the problem I decided to “acquire” the Internet instead.

The phone is plugged into a box that has two RJ-45 jacks, colored red and green, and the RJ-11 jack. The red RJ-45 jack has a cable leading to the box that is plugged into the TV. I’m assuming the box is used for the paid on-demand programming. So I plug my computer into the green RJ-45 jack. Nothing happens. I look around for anything I can use as a screw driver to remove the faceplate. Next to the coffee pot I find a spoon. I remove to faceplate with the spoon to find that the green RJ-45 jack is not connected. At this point I figure what the hell and unplugged the cable in the red RJ-45 jack and plugged my laptop into the red jack. Success! Not really. I get an IP address but I can’t route anything. It appears that the hotels DNS server doesn’t allow for external name lookup. If I had only memorized the IP address of jparks.net… Not to be foiled, I open up my ~/.ssh/known_hosts file and get the IP address of jparks.net. Can I ping that IP address? Yes! Can I ssh to that address? Yes! Do I now have the IP address of google.com? Yes! Does a Google search turn up an IP address for a public DNS server for the UK? Yes! Do I now have Internet! YES! Am I going to get sprayed with CS gas and then arrested for “acquiring” the Internet? Probably;-)

Mole Skin

Jason Parks — Sun, 12 Mar 2006 21:49:08 +0000

If you ever owned a Mole Skin, I like the graph paper ones, then you know that there is a section in the front for contact info in case of loss and how much a reward for the safe return. If you have never owned one or haven’t seen one, well now you know. In mine I just put my email address and for the reward I put “One kick in the nuts.” I am tempted to buy a few Mole Skins and put that in them and loose them just to see how many people actually contact me to get the kick in the nuts.

Metro Wisdom

Jason Parks — Sun, 12 Mar 2006 21:38:11 +0000

If you go to get on the Metro and most of the cars are full except for one, first check to see if a bum is occupying that car. If a bum is indeed occupying the car simply avoid the car and squeeze your way onto one of the crowed cars. If you are unlucky, like Regan and I were, to board the nearly empty car without noticing the bum, or not knowing to check for a bum, as was the case was for us, then you will be bombard with the foulest smell that you have ever smelt. The smell was so foul that the poor girl that boarded with us eyes’ went wide as the doors to the car fully shut. She then started uncontrollably gagging and had to exit the car at the next stop and switch to a different car. I’m not sure what was going through Regan’s head but I did not want to offend the bum by moving on the next car. Neither of us were gagging so we stuck it out for the three stops that we were on the Metro.

A Wonder Full Start

Jason Parks — Tue, 07 Mar 2006 17:14:54 +0000

Problems with job hunting an hour before take off.
Regan gets sick on landing.
It’s 2°C(35.6°F) instead of 10°C(50°F).
It’s raining.

On the upside, I did manage to navigate us from CDG to the hotel with out getting us lost.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 16:20:01 +0000

Regan and I are off to Europe in a few hours and will be gone until the 23rd. Our hotels should have internet access, so we should be posting and uploading pictures while we are away. I wish I had time to make a niffty map like Dan did when he went to Ireland.

Here’s a funny start to the trip. Regan woke up this morning asking me if we were fighting yet because she couldn’t remember. I guess that is better than her waking up and telling me that she is a mad at me because I was an ass in her dreams.

Hôtel de Ville

Jason Parks — Sun, 05 Mar 2006 20:57:10 +0000

I’m looking for a hotel Paris for two days after Regan and I return from London. Since this is the end of our stay I want it to be close to a metro station. I consult my arch nemesis’ book since he breaks down places to sleep by neighborhood. I’m looking at the map for the Marais neighborhood and notice this building labeled “Hôtel de Ville” near a Metro station. I start scanning the near by pages to find the entry for this supposed hotel. After looking at every hotel entry in the Marais neighborhood and not finding an entry for Hôtel de Ville, déjà vu sets in. Three years ago in France Joe, Justin, and I were planning a weekend road trip in the south of France. Joe and I were talking about finding a hotel for the three of us and I suggested Hôtel de Ville. Every town we been to so far had a Hôtel de Ville so I thought it was a good suggestion. Joe agrees that is a good idea and we should book the hotel later that day. Then Justin pipes up, which he rarely does, and when he does it usually is to correct me or make fun of me, and says that according to Rich Steves Hôtel de Ville is city hall. There you have it. The same mistake twice, both foiled and fooled by Rick Steves. DAMN YOU RICK STEVES!

I seem to remember after we found out that it was city hall that we planned to get some hookers and show up at Hôtel de Ville asking for a room. Then we made a rap song about it. I wish I could remember the lyrics…

Best Horoscope Ever!

Jason Parks — Mon, 27 Feb 2006 22:24:28 +0000

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 20:32:54 +0000

I offically start my sabbatical from Palmsource on Monday, but we are leaving for New Orleans in about an hour for Mardi Gras. Making a stop in Houston to visit Regan’s mom and her beast of a cat. Also stopping to see dsandler and erin.

The Game

Jason Parks — Thu, 23 Feb 2006 20:58:05 +0000

Most guys know what WOW is. Most girls that knows or dates a guy that plays WOW, hates WOW. The other night when Regan and I went out with a co-worker and some of his friends, I met some girls that hate WOW. What I found most interesting about this is that they created the following rule: If you talk about “The Game” you lose a piece of clothing. I thought that this was pretty funny when I was buzzed to watch some guy loose his belt. Now that I am sober I and had time to think about it, would losing clothing to a girl be a real deterrent for not doing something? I seem to remember a time in college that I would love to have girls telling me to take of my clothes and give it to them. Then again I just had to re-buy all of Regan’s and my clothing. So maybe I would be a little apprehensive in giving up my clothing since it cost so much.

The morale of this story? The new crack cocaine could cost you your clothes.

openbinder.org

Jason Parks — Tue, 14 Feb 2006 16:01:54 +0000

If you would like to see what I have been working on for the last four and a half years check out openbinder.org. That is for those of you that don’t already know.

dsandler already stole my thunder

Update: Digg has picked up the story. Go and digg it so it will get to the main page!

I knew John Crichton was based off of me!

Jason Parks — Tue, 14 Feb 2006 01:29:35 +0000

You scored as Moya (Farscape). You are surrounded by muppets. But that is okay because they are your friends and have shown many times that they can be trusted. Now if only you could stop being bothered about wormholes.

Moya (Farscape)

100%

Nebuchadnezzar (The Matrix)

81%

Millennium Falcon (Star Wars)

81%

Serenity (Firefly)

75%

Deep Space Nine (Star Trek)

69%

Andromeda Ascendant (Andromeda)

69%

SG-1 (Stargate)

56%

Bebop (Cowboy Bebop)

56%

Babylon 5 (Babylon 5)

56%

Enterprise D (Star Trek)

44%

FBI's X-Files Division (The X-Files)

44%

Galactica (Battlestar: Galactica)

13%

Your Ultimate Sci-Fi Profile II: which sci-fi crew would you best fit in? (pics)
created with QuizFarm.com

Persona non whata?

Jason Parks — Tue, 31 Jan 2006 04:59:27 +0000

Well Regan and I are off to Paris and London in March. I’ve been forbidden to act on my plan, my well thought out plan, of gaining the status of persona non grata in every European country. She mumbled something about letting me rot in a European jail or something. I wasn’t paying attention.

If anyone has been to London before and can give me hotel advice on where to stay that would be great. As it is I have to turn to my arch nemesis for advice and I’m none to happy about it.

Security

Jason Parks — Sat, 21 Jan 2006 03:09:51 +0000

On this weeks Stargate Alantis some one rewrote the operating system and set the city to explode the next time the gate dialed Earth. The Ancients created a city that could travel between galaxies but they didn’t install safe guards to prevent the OS from being overwritten. Since the Ancients sound like a bunch of hippies they must have installed Linux. And everyone knows how unsecure Linux is!-)

Say Whaa?

Jason Parks — Mon, 09 Jan 2006 17:43:51 +0000

Well it looks as though I will be watching the Oscars this year. Jon Stewart has been choosen to host this year’s Oscars.

I’m bored

Jason Parks — Wed, 28 Dec 2005 18:07:27 +0000

I have the entire week off and Regan has to work for most of it. Which is more of a problem for her than it is for me. I don’t see any one all day so as soon as she gets home I am in super jparks aggravating mode. I feel sorry for her because I am so annoying sometimes that I annoy myself.

Regan usually as quite a few stories about what some moron said or did while she was at work. She always has a funny or witty response for the idiots when they do or say something retarded. I always ask her if she actually told them that or not, but her response is always a disappointing “no”. I lecture her all the time on how she should actually say what she is thinking because that’s what I would have done. Which her response has always been something like, “I’m glad you don’t work retail because you would get slapped, kicked, hit, fired, maimed, shot, trampled, etc..” Yesterday she was extremely exhausted and actually told me to go and get a part time job. She explained that it would solve my boredom by getting me out of the house and interacting with people. Plus I would be aggravating and telling off all the idiots and I wouldn’t have to annoy her when she got home. Appealing to the inner scientist in me, she suggested that it would be a grand experiment to see what it would take to get me fired from a part time job. Oh she fights dirty sometimes;-) I think might actually try this because it sounds fun. Plus I finally watched Jackass for the first time over the weekend and I feel like doing something retarded.

So what should I go apply at first? Regan suggested Borders but I think she just wants me to put the competition out of business;-)

Get out the forties

Jason Parks — Tue, 20 Dec 2005 22:00:17 +0000

And pour some out for Firefly and Serenity.

When Buffy the Vampire Slayer creator Joss Whedon looks back on 2005, he can take comfort in knowing that his film-directing debut, the sci-fi Western Serenity, resurrected his canceled-too-soon cult classic TV series Firefly, and was also one of the year’s best-reviewed movies. ”I should say I’m above reading reviews,” he says. ”But I would be lying.” Alas, Whedon’s fond memories are also tainted by Serenity’s status as a franchise nonstarter; despite Universal’s best marketing efforts, the film only mustered $25 million. ”In the end, it was what it was: a tough sell,” says Whedon, adding that it appears the Firefly saga has reached its conclusion. He has no regrets — and he’s moving on.

What’s jparks up to?

Jason Parks — Wed, 14 Dec 2005 22:05:49 +0000

Working. I’ve been busy with work lately and haven’t had much time to write any posts. Hopefully I will do something fun and exciting soon so that I can post something.

The Lily, The Witch, and The Wardrobe

Jason Parks — Mon, 28 Nov 2005 06:24:41 +0000

The Witch..err…I mean Regan bought Lily a new wardrobe and a life jacket. The life jacket is in case we take her out when we go kayaking. I’m not sure what Regan did with the other pictures of Lily in her new outfits but here she is in the life jacket. Lily is not very happy with us.

Pub Hunting

Jason Parks — Mon, 28 Nov 2005 06:10:27 +0000

Regan and I went exploring the wonders of 6th street this weekend. We found this so called Irish Pub called Mother Egan’s Irish Pub. We were rather disappointed because it didn’t have the feel of a pub. Maybe it was just an off night or maybe it was the two HUGE projectors playing a football game that didn’t make it feel like a pub. Austin you disappoint. This doesn’t mean that we are giving up trying to find a suitable drinking hole. We are lushes after all;-)

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Mon, 28 Nov 2005 05:59:02 +0000

Off to Sunnyvale again. The 6am flight isn’t going to be so bad this time since I got stuck in first class!-)

TiVo Adds Overlap Protection

Jason Parks — Fri, 18 Nov 2005 23:26:01 +0000

Overlap Protection gives you additional options for dealing with recording conflicts. Normally, when two programs overlap by a few minutes, the lower priority recording is cancelled. (For example, one program ends at 8:33, while the next program begins at 8:30) When you turn Overlap Protection on, the DVR automatically clips the lower priority recording by just enough minutes to allow both programs to record.

When scheduling new recordings, the DVR notifies you of any recording conflict and gives you options for resolving it. If the Overlap Protection feature is on, your options include clipping the lower priority program.

Maybe now Regan will stop bugging me about this;-)

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Sat, 12 Nov 2005 20:09:42 +0000

I forgot to update my blog and say that we are in Baton Rouge for Pam’s wedding this week-end.

Last night at her rehearsal dinner I saw a “MAKE LEVEES, NOT WAR” t-shirt for the first time. Which now I want one since I found out yesterday that some of pilings for the levee’s weren’t even half as deep as they were suppose to be.

It’s been a while

Jason Parks — Fri, 04 Nov 2005 18:59:27 +0000

I’ve been busy with work and haven’t had a chance to update my blog in a while. Well I’ve been busy with work so I have nothing interesting to say;-( How ever I will be making a post later about something geeky I’ve been working on. You’ve been warned!

I look like the devil?

Jason Parks — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 00:43:57 +0000

Trey: There’s nothing like a little maniacal laughter from a guy who looks like the devil.

Nodwick

Jason Parks — Thu, 27 Oct 2005 00:17:27 +0000

I discovered this cool weekly online comic strip called Nodwick. I started at the begining and this is my favorite so far. Check out the wikipedia page for more info.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Wed, 26 Oct 2005 00:28:58 +0000

A little late but I am in Sunnyvale, CA this week for work.

Hear, see, and speak no evil!

Jason Parks — Sat, 22 Oct 2005 21:04:26 +0000

So how do y’all like my new mast head? Does it suit me?

It’s almost here!!!

Jason Parks — Fri, 21 Oct 2005 05:45:57 +0000

After sitting in customs for two days my new iMac is finally enroute again. Hopefully it will make it here by tomorrow or I will have to wait until next Friday before I can open it;-(

The man I love is a moron

regan — Sun, 16 Oct 2005 00:40:37 +0000

Hi all, it’s Regan. I would post this on my blog but I really think it will be better appreciated here.

Conversation from last night staring jparks and myself.

me: “Jason you don’t know how to flirt.”
jparks: “Whatever! I flirt with girls all the time.”
me: Actually I had no words and I just stared at him open mouthed. What a moron.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Thu, 13 Oct 2005 21:26:08 +0000

Back in New Orleans this weekend. We will be getting a few more things out of our house and hopefully meet with the insurance adjuster. Regan also has to clean out her office this weekend.

Myth Busters

Jason Parks — Wed, 05 Oct 2005 23:52:12 +0000

After purchasing this stuff I feel like I should be on Myth Busters. Too bad I will defunking my house with this instead of debunking a myth.

Pictures of our house

Jason Parks — Wed, 05 Oct 2005 16:21:27 +0000

Ryan is back in New Orleans and was able to get to our street yesterday to take some pictures.

Hurricane Katrina

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Sat, 01 Oct 2005 04:46:55 +0000

Off to Oklahoma City to play some Warlord.

My kingdom for a can opener

Jason Parks — Fri, 23 Sep 2005 15:52:30 +0000

We didn’t have a non-electric can opener so we decided to pick one up yesterday in case we lost power during Hurricane Rita. Apparently everyone else in Austin was thinking the same thing because this is what I found when we got to the store:

I feel sorry for the person that was looking for the 99¢ can opener but had to settle for the $6.99 one.

How to make a mean cat nice.

Jason Parks — Tue, 20 Sep 2005 18:57:50 +0000

Have a natural disaster strike your city and you have to evacuate you and the cat. Do not sedate the cat when placing it in the carrier. Also it would be best if the evacuation would take two days with you having to stop overnight at a place with other cats.
Evacuate to a place that has other cats where you have to keep your cat locked up so that it doesn’t kill the other cats (your cat is the mean one after all;-)
Leave to go look for a new place to live and board the cat at a local kennel. Do this for a minimum of four days.
After finding a new place to live, the place must be a minimum of two and a half hour drive from where the cat is boarded, remove the cat from the kennel and let it stay overnight at the place you evacuated to.
The next day drive the cat to the new place, again do not sedate the cat when placing it in the carrier. Release the cat and let it get adjusted to the new place before approaching. At this point the cat should be pretty nice.

If the cat has a relapse place it in a room for about 20 min, the time it takes the maintenance people to clean the air conditioner;-) The cat will now be the sweetest cat in the world and will not want to leave your side. It will even follow you into the bathroom and bug you while you are trying to do your business.

Best Fiancée EVA!, Mirra, and Maple

Jason Parks — Mon, 19 Sep 2005 00:18:47 +0000

Thanks to Hurricane Katrina I have to re-buy my home office so that I can get some work done. The first major piece of furniture that I need is an office chair. For those of you that work at a computer for more than a couple of hours a day understand the importance of having a nice chair(if you don’t have a good chair you may end up looking like this guy.) I convinced Regan to let me just go ahead and buy a good office chair instead of getting a chair from Office Depot that will most likely hurt my back. Say hello to Mirra.

Where’s the trap you ask? Apparently if I spend a lot of money on an essential item that I need for work it entitles Regan to something expensive too. So say hello to Maple.

Say What!?!

Jason Parks — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 17:05:55 +0000

It looks like that sorry excuse for a President that we have is actually going to take responsibility for something.

Washington - US President George W Bush on Tuesday said he took responsibility for the federal government’s slow response to the Hurricane Katrina disaster.

“Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capabilities at all levels of government.

“And to the extent that the federal government didn’t fully do its job right, I take responsibility,” Bush told a White House news conference.

…

Update

Jason Parks — Mon, 12 Sep 2005 16:47:47 +0000

It’s been almost a week since my last post. Here’s a recap of the events in no particular order:

Regan started school UT today. I am driving her to school every morning, 9 am class on MWF and 8 am class on TTh, because a parking pass is $500 a semester. That price increase from $50 to $75 a semester at UNO doesn’t look so bad now does it;-)
Apparently my joke about not sleeping on anything other than 800 thread count Egyptian Cotton sheets was lost on Regan. She seemed to have taken me seriously and quested for the perfect sheets for the “Prince”. I am now the proud owner of a set of 300 count Egyptian Cotton Sateen sheets.
I learned that you should pay more attention when people , especially your fiancée, are talking to you. And at the same time I also learned that “whatever” is not an appropriate response when someone, especially your fiancée, says that they love you.
I was unpacking my clothes last night and as I was hanging them I realized that most of my t-shirts consists of AEG t-shirts.
- 4 Bounty Hunter t-shirts (black, blue, green, and red)
- 1 Dragon Lord t-shirt
- 1 Warlord Wyvern t-shirt
- 1 L5R t-shirt

DOG is my co-pilot!

Jason Parks — Thu, 08 Sep 2005 02:56:43 +0000

Regan and I drove back from Houston today and she had Lily in her car for most of the trip and I had the cats. We stopped about 30 miles outside of Austin because Lily was going crazy in her car. We all used the restroom and then set out for Austin again. Regan had me take Lily for the rest of the trip. Lily was a little angel. She got out of her purse and slept in my lap until we got into Austin.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Mon, 05 Sep 2005 14:01:00 +0000

Keeping Austin weird! Regan and I are moving to Austin. I don’t really want to call any where but New Orleans home but Austin will do. It reminds me of home a little. Everyone here has been real friendly here, expect for that bastard in Barnes and Noble Cafe, when I find you sir, more like little bitch ass punk, you and my foot will have a nice little chat.

Where are you?

Jason Parks — Tue, 30 Aug 2005 22:21:51 +0000

So where did everyone end up?

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Sun, 28 Aug 2005 05:10:20 +0000

Running from Hurricane KATRINA! We packed up the animals and are heading west to Austin. Not sure how long it will take us since it took us three hours to get to Baton Rogue…

I’m such her bitch…

Jason Parks — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 21:18:31 +0000

Two reasons.

So I got conned, actually it was more like black mailed, into getting a pedicure. Pedicures are a horrible experience and I suggest you don’t go and get one. The only thing that made the whole experience bearable was the fact the hot girl that was molesting my feet had a low cut shirt and a nice rack.
Not only did I get black mailed into a pedicure I also got black mailed into making a post entitled “I’m such her bitch” and explain that I got a pedicure.

*sigh*

Paramount Movie Executives

Jason Parks — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 05:23:16 +0000

Apparently I’ve done something to make the executives at Paramount Pictures to take notice of me. Not only have they taken notice of me but they are concerned that I get regular booty calls. They were very considerate and sent me a post card informing me about a new movie they are releasing in October.

I really didn’t know that Paramount had a studio in the CBD;-)

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 02:54:13 +0000

Back home.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Wed, 17 Aug 2005 03:33:31 +0000

Well I’m off to Gen Con in the morning. Go and take the tests I’ve posted and let me know your results.

What L5R Clan Are You?

Jason Parks — Wed, 17 Aug 2005 03:32:36 +0000

It seems to be a day of tests. This time the L5R Clan quiz.

You scored as The Mantis Clan. You are a member of the Mantis Clan! You prefer to do what you please without people giving you orders, and are known for causing trouble. Life is meant to be enjoyed, and you believe people need to loosen up.

The Mantis Clan	100%
The Scorpion Clan	83%
The Crane Clan	78%
The Crab Clan	78%
The Unicorn Clan	72%
The Dragon Clan	67%
The Phoenix Clan	61%
The Lion Clan	61%
Ronin	56%

The 3 Variable Funny Test

Jason Parks — Tue, 16 Aug 2005 18:19:04 +0000

Found this test too.

the Comic
(47% dark, 38% spontaneous, 47% vulgar)

your humor style:
VULGAR | COMPLEX | LIGHT

Yours is the most versatile and also the most popular kind of humor. You’ll crack a joke about just about anything, but you’re not mean-spirited or intimidating, so you can get away with it–even when, for example, you bust on Mexicans.

You appreciate a good dirty joke as much as next person, but, over all, you’ve got a brainier approach to humor than most. Now just go out there and write up a routine; it’s likely you’d be good at it.

PEOPLE LIKE YOU: Dave Chappelle - Rodney Dangerfield

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 37% on dark

You scored higher than 56% on spontaneous

You scored higher than 87% on vulgar

The 2-Variable Intuition Test

Jason Parks — Tue, 16 Aug 2005 17:17:06 +0000

I found this test on someone elses blog and decided to give it a whirl.

All-Around Awesome
You have:
77% SCIENTIFIC INTUITION and
77% EMOTIONAL INTUITION

The graph on the right represents your place in Intuition 2-Space. As you can see, you scored well above average on emotional intuition and well above average on scientific intuition. (Weirdly, your emotional and scientific intuitions are equally strong.)
Your Emotional Intuition score is a measure of how well you understand people, especially their unspoken needs and sympathies. A high score score usually indicates social grace and persuasiveness. A low score usually means you’re good at Quake.
Your Scientific Intuition score tells you how in tune you are with the world around you; how well you understand your physical and intellectual environment. People with high scores here are apt to succeed in business and, of course, the sciences.

Cat Nap

Jason Parks — Wed, 03 Aug 2005 21:16:29 +0000

So Tangi, the hell spawn that she is, usally doesn’t want to have anything to do with me unless I am trying to work at my desk. She loves to sit on my keyboard and prevent me from doing any work. If I try to move her I get attacked and hissed at and then she proceeds to try to sit on the laptop’s keyboard. Of course this doesn’t work and I have to shoo her away again. To save me from being attacked twice I put a clip board on the laptop’s keyboard. Now it is her favorite place to take a nap.

Land Line, part deux

Jason Parks — Wed, 03 Aug 2005 17:28:16 +0000

So I got my land line installed toady and realized that I do not have a phone;-(

Oh the pain!

Jason Parks — Wed, 03 Aug 2005 02:52:54 +0000

I get asked this while I was drunk over the week-end:

regan: If you could save me or Lily(the dog) from a burning building who would you save?
jparks: I would throw Lily and pick you up.
regan: THE ONLY CORRECT ANSWER WAS ME!

I think I got yelled at for saying that I would throw the dog too. I SO CAN’T WIN!

blogshare

Jason Parks — Tue, 02 Aug 2005 22:08:21 +0000

I haven’t a clue as to what this website is but it has neat graphs!-)

Rolly Polly

Jason Parks — Mon, 01 Aug 2005 16:15:00 +0000

So I go across the lake yesterday to see my sister’s new baby, damn breeders, and I ask my brother if he could shave my head. He said my mom would do it and I asked him if he had a 1/2″ guard and he said all he had was a 1/8″ guard. Stupid me, I believe him and said fine and go ahead and shave it. Half way through my mom shaving my head he said that he was kidding and he had a full set of guards. After getting his well earned purple nurple he pointed out that I would have done the same thing to him.

[UPDATE]: Look here for proof.

Where’s joeo?

Jason Parks — Wed, 27 Jul 2005 16:44:58 +0000

joeo will be in town for the next 12 days.

An idea…

Jason Parks — Wed, 27 Jul 2005 02:40:00 +0000

I’m thinking of opening a Tapas restaurant called Topless Tapas. This would satisfy my love for boobies and small portions. What do y’all think?-)

nerdcore

Jason Parks — Tue, 26 Jul 2005 19:26:51 +0000

My new favorite type of music.

Land Line

Jason Parks — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 17:33:37 +0000

So after almost four years of not having a land line I finally have to get one because the cell phone coverage in this neighborhood blows. Back to the low tech days;-(

Pink is the New Black™

Jason Parks — Sun, 24 Jul 2005 21:33:26 +0000

Where’s my shovel?

Jason Parks — Fri, 22 Jul 2005 19:15:04 +0000

Regan: Hey some guy told me I was beautiful in Wal-mart.
Me: Why did he do that?
I start looking for my shovel.

Danny

Jason Parks — Tue, 19 Jul 2005 02:44:20 +0000

I’m going to have to resign to the fact that my car’s name is now Danny, as in Danny DeVito. This nickname came about when Jeff and I were walking up a meet Joe and his sister at a restaurant and Joe said all he could think when he saw us walking up together was the movie Twins. Then Jeff comes and visits and after driving my car christened it Danny.

We’re not Afraid!

Jason Parks — Fri, 15 Jul 2005 02:33:53 +0000

I like the way the British handle terror attacks.

My new Geek Padawan

Jason Parks — Tue, 12 Jul 2005 01:50:13 +0000

Last night I set up an AIM account for Regan and my young Padawan is already strong in the ways of the IM. I was sitting next to her and asked her a question. Instead a responding like a normal person she IM’s me. I foresee great things for her. She will be the greatest IM’er of all;-)

Vegas

Jason Parks — Thu, 07 Jul 2005 20:38:01 +0000

Vegas turned out to be not as exciting as I thought it would be. All the years of watching movies about Vegas and CSI I thought Vegas would be a little more exciting. I didn’t even come close to getting into any trouble. I know that is hard to believe but it’s true!

As most of you know already I asked Regan to marry me while we were in Vegas. I was going to ask her at Picasso but it turned out to not be as intimate of a setting as I thought it would be.

I’ve been informed that I’m not expressing my excitement about my engagement to Regan. Take two. I ASKED REGAN TO MARRY ME IN VEGAS!!!!!!! WAHOOO!!!!!!

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Fri, 01 Jul 2005 14:32:44 +0000

Viva Las Vegas! If you get a call from a 702 area code this weekend it’s most likely me looking to be bailed out of jail;-)

Attack of the Killer Pen

Jason Parks — Fri, 01 Jul 2005 02:52:26 +0000

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Sat, 25 Jun 2005 00:48:14 +0000

I was planning on packing up all my worldy belongings and put them into storage this weekend. Followed by an extended road trip. Plan’s have changed. No storage unit. No road trip. Something better.

My Nerd Score

Jason Parks — Tue, 21 Jun 2005 22:24:44 +0000

My Goth Name

Jason Parks — Sun, 19 Jun 2005 00:10:23 +0000

Trauma

Lieutenant Uhura

Jason Parks — Sun, 19 Jun 2005 00:02:27 +0000

So I have a bluetooth head set for my phone and Shaler keeps calling me Lt. ever time I talk on it. I was just on the phone with Aim and he walks by and says, “You picking up anything on the subspace frequencies?”

Shaler’s Bitch

Jason Parks — Wed, 15 Jun 2005 04:45:02 +0000

So Shaler and I were packing again tonight and he found the following document:

We were at a Ben Fold’s concert back 2002 and Shaler and Michelle show up drunk as could be. They actually had to hold each other up they were so drunk and I’m not entirely sure how they made it from Port of Call to House of Blues. When Ben Fold played Song for the Dumped and sang the verse, “Give me my money back, you bitch.” Shaler starts screaming as loud as he could to Rebecca, “Jason is my bitch!” over and over again. Some how in the process of her trying to get him to shut up I got signed over to Shaler.

Notary Republic

Jason Parks — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 19:14:49 +0000

We were getting some coffee at the PJ’s Coffee in Clearview Mall on Saturday before seeing Mr. and Mrs. Smith. Little did I know that I could get my documents notarized as I ordered coffee.

Where have you been?

Jason Parks — Mon, 13 Jun 2005 18:58:33 +0000

I’ve found this link that will allow you to create maps of the places you have been to.

Here is where I have been in the US. I have driven to all of the states expect for Massachusetts and Maine.

My European map is much less impressive. I’ve only been to Austria, France, and Hungry. I will have to work on that.

Volatile Booze

Jason Parks — Sun, 12 Jun 2005 07:16:32 +0000

Shaler and I were packing up the kitchen toady. He goes outside to the storage shed to get some boxes to pack up the kitchen. It turns out that we never fully unpacked the boxes when we moved in. Here is what we found in them:

1 Unopened bottle of Beaujolais Nouveau - 2003
1 Unopened bottle of Champagne
1 Mostly consumed bottle of Everclear
1 Mostly consumed bottle of Captain Morgan Rum
1 Partially consumed bottle of Brandy

Shaler decided to dump out all the booze. Word of advise, do not open a bottle of wine that has been stored in a rather hot place for over a year! Talk about rancid. The same goes for Champagne. Although opening the bottle of Champagne made quite a show. Good thing I had Shaler open it out side.

Geeks

Jason Parks — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 20:49:15 +0000

I knew being a geek would one day pay off.

Jam bands

Jason Parks — Mon, 06 Jun 2005 19:48:29 +0000

I’m such an ass when I’m drunk. We meet up with Oscar the other night at One Eyed Jacks to see some band that he liked. Regan and I have never heard of the band before so we asked Oscar what type of music it was when we got there. Oscar described them as a jam band. Which started a drunken rant about how much Regan and I hate jam bands. While we were ranting Oscar goes inside and gets a member of the band to explain to us why we should go inside to see them play. This is what I remember of the conversation.

Oscar introduces the band member to me.
Band Member: “You guys should come inside and see the show.”
Me: “Are you a jam band?”
Band Member: “No not really.”
Me: “Well how short is your shortest song?”
Band Member: “About three minutes.”
Me: “Well how long is your longest song?”
Band Member: “About five minutes.”
Me: “hmmm.”
Band Member mumbles something and storms off.

Notrh Carolina Pictures

Jason Parks — Tue, 31 May 2005 20:02:57 +0000

I’ve posted the pictures from my recent vacation to North Carolina. Not all of these are mine but I found it easier just to post everyone’s pictures in one place rather than posting multiple links.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Tue, 31 May 2005 19:57:44 +0000

I’m back in New Orleans now. That means time to start packing. Bleh!

What did you expect?

Jason Parks — Fri, 27 May 2005 04:47:23 +0000

Hasn’t everyone I know learned by now not to tell me not to do something? Apparently Jeff still hasn’t. I just needed my backpack out of his car but he had to go and tell me that I couldn’t drive the rental car.

Two words

Jason Parks — Wed, 25 May 2005 21:52:29 +0000

Me: I got two words for you(Jeff), “DUMB ASS!”
Joe: Dumbass is one word.

Your MOM!

Jason Parks — Wed, 25 May 2005 20:06:56 +0000

I don’t think the “Your MOM!” jokes will ever stop now.

Me: I like the back-end server.
Jeff: Your mom likes the back-end!
Justin: Your mom is a back-end server.

Marty to me: Can the adults get back to thier conversation?
Me: That was a pretty good burn.
Marty: It was old, dirty, and cheap but it works.
Me: Just like Jeff’s mom!

Crocodile Dundee

Jason Parks — Mon, 23 May 2005 15:21:31 +0000

The second to last bullet point on things prohibited in the Hatteras Lighthouse is:

Frisbees, boomerangs, and other equipment that may be thrown

Apparently I’m not the only idiot that carries a boomerang around on vacation.

Ah burn!

Jason Parks — Mon, 23 May 2005 04:29:07 +0000

Jeff is checking into his hotel room
Best Western Receptionist: “Oh I can’t put you in that room. You don’t look handicap to me.”
Me: “Oh but he is!”
Jeff hangs is head in shame.
Best Western Receptionist: “That’s so mean! Is he your friend?”
Jeff: “No, colleague.”
My turn to check into my hotel room
Best Western Receptionist: “Are you sure you had a reservation at this hotel?-)”

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Sat, 14 May 2005 03:15:50 +0000

I will be in Mobile tomorrow for MOBICON. Then it’s off to North Carolina for a week at the beach. After that it’s off to the Bay Area for work and the PalmSource DevCon. Finishing up my travels with KublaCon.

Or as Regan so elegantly put it, “geek conference, week at the beach, week at work, geek conference.”

“That hat makes you look like an idiot”

Jason Parks — Fri, 06 May 2005 06:58:53 +0000

Jeff and I just got back from a prescreening of Serenity in Austin and guess what we bartered for? Well if you are not a die hard Fire Fly fan and guessed it from the title, Jayne Hats.

We had two extra tickets because Aim got sick and Justin couldn’t make it. Jeff was just going to see if we could just trade them in but when we got there this woman had a sign on the back of her truck “WILL TRADE JAYNE HATS FOR TICKETS”. I point this out to Jeff and we went over to see what the sign was all about. We told her that we had two extra tickets and she jumped out of her seat asking how much we wanted for them. To her astonishment we said that we would take the hats. We thought it a bit strange that someone would trade hand made hats, she was actually making them in the parking lot, for a pair of tickets. After putting on our new hats we went inside and this guy tells us that it was awesome that we traded the tickets for the hats because he had to pay a scalper $75US to get his ticket! After getting some drinks we went and stood in line and the woman that we traded the tickets to was so happy that she came up and gave Jeff and I a hug and thanked us trading the tickets to her.

I never felt so much like a geek than standing in line to see a movie and wearing a costume from the movie. It was like going to see Star Wars dressed as a storm trooper. I felt even more like a geek when we got into the theater and everyone started cheering because we were wearing Jayne Hats.

Before the movie started we had a surprise appearance by Nathan Fillion and Ron Glass. They stayed and watched the movie and had a Q&A and autograph session after the screening of the film, which involved a dramatic scene where Nathan spat water on my shoe.

Color Blind

Jason Parks — Wed, 04 May 2005 06:25:22 +0000

I’m in the process of changing the theme for the site. I’ve found one that I like but I don’t like the colors in it. Yes I know that I am color blind! So over the next few days I will be changing the colors in the theme and hopefully it won’t turn out to be something dreadful to look at.

Where’s jparks?

Jason Parks — Tue, 03 May 2005 08:33:37 +0000

I will be in Austin this Thursday to watch a pre-release of Serenity. So for all of you guys in Austin you’ve been warned! And yes I know I’m a geek for driving 500 miles just to see a movie.

Revelation

Jason Parks — Sun, 01 May 2005 23:59:06 +0000

Shaler: “Man I forgot all about unloading the truck…”

Random Pictures

Jason Parks — Wed, 27 Apr 2005 20:14:31 +0000

While organizing my picture and putting them up in my gallery I found a few interesting pictures that deserve an explanation.

The following is when Joe, Justin, and I were banished to France for a month. The hotel that we were staying at had a breakfast area that had two glass doors. After spilling something Joe gets up to get some napkins and in his haste runs straight into the glass doors and almost knocks him self out.

Apparently durning the 2003 California Recall Election a few of my co-workers wanted me to run for Governor.

99 problems…

Jason Parks — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 03:44:24 +0000

Tonight Shaler confirmed that he is moving in with Marija. What am I going to do now that I don’t have a roommate you ask? Well I will be once again packing up all my worldly belongings and putting them into storage and living out of my car (ok maybe not my car so much this time since I’ve upgraded from a compact to a ultra compact). So if I show up at your door step I might be staying for a while!-) And if I do I promise I won’t stay for two months like last time;-)

Zero

Jason Parks — Tue, 19 Apr 2005 06:18:52 +0000

jcole made an off hand comment about how Lucus should have starting numbering Episodes I, II, and III at zero just to confuse people. I kindly pointed out that the Roman numeral system doesn’t have a zero in it. This of course started an arugment over who actually created the number zero. I said that zero came from Islamic roots while he said India. If I’ve deciphered wikipedia correctly the earliest documented use of a non place holder zero was by Ptolemy during the Hellenistic period in Greece. I guess we were both wrong;-)

Opps!…I misspelled again

Jason Parks — Mon, 18 Apr 2005 18:00:32 +0000

[12:49] bindertroll SO DOSE NOT WANT TO WORK ON THE APPMGR
[12:49] bindertroll HATES THE APPMGR!
[12:49] DOSE THE APPMGR
[12:51] Trey suggests that we dose bindertroll.

Gallery

Jason Parks — Mon, 18 Apr 2005 06:57:38 +0000

I’m finally getting around to putting all my pictures back up. You can view the gallery here. I should have more up in the next couple of days.

285 mph

Jason Parks — Thu, 14 Apr 2005 02:34:40 +0000

Jason Cole chagned his wheels on his roller blades last week and it turns out that he has ABEC 1 rated bearings. I remember Shaler saying something in college about how bearings really don’t affect speed because they are rated for some ridiculous speed(he said~70mph). I decided to go hunting and find the exact number out. ABEC 1 roller blade bearings are rated for 32,000 rpm (~285 mph for 76mm wheels). It turns out that the ABEC scale is just a system for rating the manufacturing tolerances of precision bearings. The higher the rating on the ABEC scale the less variation is allowed during manufacturing. The speed of your blades really won’t be affected by the “lower” quality bearings. All you need is a good lubricant and you will be set.

Hopped up on Bawls

Jason Parks — Tue, 12 Apr 2005 06:43:37 +0000

Two week-ends ago I took a road trip with my brother and Neil up to Memphis for Midsouth Con. Midsouth Con had free soft drinks and beer for the entire week-end. For an extra $5US you could get premium beers and energy drink called Bawls. None of us had ever heard of Bawls before so decided to give it a try. Turns out that it tastes better than most other energy drinks. Energy drinks should never taste good! I can not remember how many of those damn drinks we drank but it was enough to bring our maturity level back to the sixth grade and keep us up for days.

I decided to do a little research and see how much caffeine is actually in Bawls. A 12oz. can of Bawls contains 80mg of caffeine . A 12oz can of Mountain Dew contains 55.5mg of caffeine . That’s roughly 44% more caffeine than Mountain Dew!

Misspelling

Jason Parks — Mon, 11 Apr 2005 21:34:37 +0000

Since Dan isn’t around anymore to capture my impeccable spelling and grammar;-)

[9:20] WAKEUP JHAM!
[9:20] wether you like it or not jham, you are working on linux today! HA HA HA HA!
[9:21] man i can’t spell
[9:21] weth·er: n. A castrated ram.

In case you are wondering I’m bindertroll.