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  • 5 min read

Fathers have it easy

… until they don’t.

I’ve often said that fathers have it easy. After all, once a woman’s pregnant, the father doesn’t have much else to do. Sure, there may be other kids, and the father’s probably needed in bringing them up. But it’s not like the mother will just sit around for nine months until the one still in the oven comes out. Nope: mothers will be mothers, and all but the worst of them (who can only be charitably called “mothers” in the first place—maybe baby factories, instead?) will keep on being mothers until they literally can’t be one.

But, as with many things, a great deal about fatherhood is left out, talked about in whispers—in snatches—if they’re talked about at all. Not because it’s shameful, or inherently wrong. I think it’s mostly because, among fathers who do it, it’s taken for granted as part of the job. And among fathers who don’t—mostly those with the title only because of their biological ability to sire offspring—it’s not worth talking about.

I am referring, of course, to enforcing discipline.

Now, I’m a Filipino: born and raised as one, and I’ll never shake that, no matter how hard I try (not that I’d want to). Family members, friends and most acquaintances know that I’m a little bit of a hellraiser: never does what I’m supposed to, talks back to my elders, gets into fights over little to no reason. As you can probably imagine, trying to bring me up was a hell of a challenge.

Growing up, I went through being:

  • sent to my room without food, and without permission to turn on the lights or the fan;
  • spanked (hand, slipper, peach switches, fly swatters, two or so different types of rods);
  • lashed with a (thick!) leather belt with a bronze (I think) buckle (which I now own and wear whenever I can)—usually, I get lashed with the belt itself, but I’ve occassionally managed to do something that warranted the buckle itself;
  • made to kneel on rock salt and mung beans with both my arms outstretched, with maybe a couple of (thick!) books on top of each hand, with my father waiting to lash me with aforementioned belt, if I drop my hands a couple of centimeters

I resented it, of course—who the hell wouldn’t? But I lived through it—and turned out pretty okay, especially considering what I was shaping up to be. I’m still a liable to get into trouble, of course, and my head’s probably harder than it was when I was a kid. But, now that I’m a bit more mature and have had time to think about it, without my father’s tough love, I’d probably be locked up right now. For that, if nothing else, I’m grateful to my father.

But now it’s my turn. And, believe you me, I never thought I’d admit to myself that what my father kept saying’s true: It does hurt a father more, if he decides to not spare the rod.

My first-born’s a little over three years old, going on four. People who watched me grow up tell me that he’s a lot like me at that age. I don’t believe them.

I think he’s worse than I ever was. He’s also smarter than I was at that age, so maybe there’s a connection.

And I thought I was a hellraiser. My son raises hell, then kills it, so he can raise it back up. He drives me nuts whenever he wants to. He’s a good kid, to be sure—but, damn it if that boy’s going to cause me to lose what’s left of my hair in the next five years or so.

But I’m Asian, and a Filipino to boot. I suck it up, try to do my job as a father.

Except it hurts. Hurts a lot. I know that everytime I give him even just a stern talking-to, I drive him further away from me. I’ve come to realize that, as a father, part of my job is to absorb most of the hate sons will naturally direct towards authority figures. I, the father, have to do it. I can’t let his mother do it, because fathers are expendable, for the most part. Even if I die tomorrow, I know that my family will have much more of a fighting chance than it would otherwise have, should I be the one that’s going to have to take care of it.

Of course, I’m going to try and make it up to him. I’m Robin while he’s Batman when we’re playing LEGO Batman on the Wii. I download shows that he likes, play to-the-death tickle matches whenever (or almost) he wants to. I hold his hand when he’s suddenly afraid of something irrational. I’m teaching him how to drive a car (he can only steer for now), lend him my helmet and let him put it on me when I leave for work.

But it’s never going to be enough.

Truth be told, I’m kind of jealous of what he and his mother have. That’s something I can never really be part of. Well, sure, in a Venn diagram sort of way, I can be a part of it, but I can never really experience the bond he and his mother share. That’s a bond that can only develop with the one whose womb you developed in for nine months. And I can’t really tell him that I have this longing to have that kind of a connection with him, not even when he’s old enough to understand it, simply because I’m his father.

Fathers are supposed to be tough, inscrutable, dependable. We can’t be seen as weak, or soft—even when we totally are.

My blog likely won’t survive (at the very least, not in its current form) until he’s old enough to fully understand any of my posts. And in any case, at the moment, at least, I’m not too inclined to have him read any of them, even if he were capable of grasping nuances—don’t want him thinking of me as anything less than the iron fist that rules his life until he’s mature enough to make decisions for himself.

But if my blog (or this entry) does survive somehow, and he manages to read this (hopefully, by then, I’d have long since been dead), I hope he realizes that I only did what I knew and have seen for myself to be right. That, even though I was usually stern and seemingly cold from time-to-time, it’s only because that’s what I thought he needed me to be. That, through it all, my one constant thought was that I want him to grow up to be an upstanding citizen, and the best he can be.

You’ll probably go through your teenage years hating my guts and thinking I don’t care for you at all. You’ll do stupid things and manage to get into imbecilic situations. But while you’ll do shit that’ll disappoint me, nothing you ever do will make not want to be your father.

Cliché though it may be, you are my greatest creation.

I love you, son; though I may not say it often enough.

  • 3 min read

Rusty Hangers: Behind the Scenes

More than a few people have been wondering about Rusty wire hangers and a dark corner, asking one or two common questions each. I’ve decided to put this sort-of mini-FAQ up, to further stroke my ego and fill in details regarding the post’s short history.

  1. The post was originally conceived towards the end of September 2010. I was spurred on to write it when I read about a bunch of old-biddies and greasy politicos making common cause and marching along Quiapo, protesting the “imminent” legalization of abortion. To date, abortion is still illegal in the Philippines.
  2. It was held back all this time because I felt it lacked a certain polish. While I certainly have never been innocent of “preaching to the choir” (i.e., presenting arguments that only have weight for people who already lean towards your own position), I felt that this particular post needed to at least rattle the opposing side, or, at the very least, those who are on the fence.
  3. I read somewhere that March was Women’s Month, so I decided that this was probably the best time to release this sort of essay. Consider it a gift to free-thinking women everywhere: that there’s at least one Filipino geek and father who agrees that women are more than capable of deciding for themselves without the usual patronization they’ve experienced throughout most of history.
  4. The final version is pretty similar to the first draft, differing mostly in how they ended. The previous drafts stayed in limbo, while I experimented with different notes to end it with. One version tried to incorporate spitting on a stranger’s shoes for reasons I can no longer remember.
  5. It’s had three editors, all friends of mine. When I ran full-steam into the much-dreaded writer’s block, I felt that new sets of eyes would help in figuring out how to end on a graceful note. Please note that all errors, misinformation, &c. are my fault: these friends of mine merely were the first ones to offer their thoughts on my essay. They do not necessarily share my beliefs.
  6. I am not arguing for unlimited abortion, wherein any woman, of any age is free to abort a pregnancy for any reason, no matter how frivolous. I am actually a proponent of responsible parenting. I am “merely” arguing that current laws are too restrictive, to the detriment of women’s rights, not just here in the Philippines, but everywhere where a close-knit group of “well-meaning” old men run the show.
  7. I do NOT believe that men and women are equal, and I never will. Instead, I believe that men and women are different; in fact, in a lot of circumstances, women are superior to men (imagine being pregnant, guys, and working a regular 9-to-5 while you’re at it). Men are better whenever brute force is called for, but women can always go the distance.

Throughout my essay, my main point of contention is the fact that, it seems to me, the ones in charge of deliberating over such a tangled issue as abortion are people who either can never be, or are no longer qualified to do so. That, and that the opposing view (i.e., pro-women’s rights) are severly underrepresented (if at all).

In closing, let me leave you with two gems from Robert A. Heinlein, from whom I learned pretty much everything important I know.

From The Puppet Masters (1951):

Most women are damn fools and children. But they’ve got more range than we’ve got. The brave ones are braver, the good ones are better—and the vile ones are viler, for that matter.

From The Notebooks of Lazarus Long (1978):

Whenever women have insisted on absolute equality with men, they have invariably wound up with the dirty end of the stick. What they are and what they can do makes them superior to men, and their proper tactic is to demand special privileges, all the traffic will bear. They should never settle merely for equality. For women, “equality” is a disaster.

Heed the last quote well, ladies.

  • 4 min read

Code monkeys suck at writing

When I started this blog, I had in mind publishing various hacks and workarounds that I’d happen to stumble upon in my day job as a code monkey. After all, any code monkey worth his salt will, on occassion rant and vent regarding some particularly ill-conceived and/or -executed block of code, as well as rave over a singularly elegant line of code.

As regular visitors (all three or four of you) will note, this plan didn’t even have the luxury of failing: it was promptly discarded, courtesy of my very first post, which had a (slight) political bent. While I do write posts that have a more technical flavor, they are few and far between for a blog owned by a professional code monkey and amateur code junkie.

The rest are highly opinionated, profanity-laden, status quo–challenging, (usually) barely coherent maunderings regarding one or another political cause.

Friends IRL have often commented that I ought to pursue a political career: maybe as a minor functionary in the baranggay, then, maybe, a city-level post. Except that goes against the one unbreakable principle I have regarding politics: Those who’d serve in positions of power ought to be the ones who’d absolutely abhor being in said position. To keep government small and inoffensive, you see: the worst disasters are often perpetuated by well-meaning biddies whose only real joy is to hold power over their neighbors.

So it’s highly unlikely that I’d ever run for any political post.

However, being a politician is an altogether different thing from being political. And one can’t help but be political: pretty much everyone in this country has their one or two politically-bent opinion they’d hold onto, even in the face of overwhelming evidence of those opinion being absolutely stupid. From jeepney drivers to owners of corporations, they all think everything would become much better if they were the ones in charge.

So I write politically bent posts.

Even this blog’s name and tagline have a political bent. Who needs actual genius, when being a political genius is enough to lie, cheat and steal your way to the second highest political position in the land? Why hold an actual opinion, when it’s easier to just align yourself with whichever crowd you’re currently hanging out with, or whatever your parents believe, or whatever latest trend of thought is currently making its way through the social networks you’re signed up with?

Of course, very few people pay attention to what I write: after all, we tend to dismiss any idealogy not compatible with our own, and not bother with those that are (everybody likes to preach to the choir, but nobody ever likes being a member of said choir). But, then again, I was never one to care about site “hits”. Exposure in that sense has never been the goal; I don’t ever want to famous, even if only to have my fifteen minutes of it (not that there’s any danger of that happening any time soon).

I don’t write posts about possibly controversial topics to drive traffic (it doesn’t work anyway, if you’re not sort-of famous to begin with)—no, the goal has always been to try and start a dialogue.

As I’ve told several friends, this generation (my generation) is too laid-back. Too content to let older people to take the reins. The precedents they’re setting are, at the very least, obnoxious and, at most, dangerous for our freedom. And yet we’re content to do nothing, not even talk about it, merely because we don’t care, since we’re going to do whatever the hell we ghoddamned please, as long as we’re not caught; or, if that’s too hard, find some way of going around it. While this ingenuity and devil-may-care attitude brings tears of joy to the libertarian in me, the stupidity our “elders” are mucking around in are liable to turn around and bit us and our children on our collective asses.

The questions they’re floundering over are ones they’re not equipped to deal with, for they aren’t the ones who grew up with our experiences. Worse yet, they know they don’t have to live with the consequences of their actions today, which are mostly half-assed stopgap measures that end up satisfying no one, yet offending everyone.

As Megadeth said, “Yesterday’s answers [have] nothing to do with today’s questions.”

A while ago, I was whining to my best friend:

The abortion post has depressed me. I’ve been trying to do this for years, but it seems my writing ability has reached a plateau: it doesn’t seem to be getting any better.

Pisses me off. I know my position, and I feel strongly about it, but I can never to seem to put it across through my writing.

I’m pissed that my maunderings aren’t eliciting any reaction, even just from the people I consider part of my circle. For someone whose avowed goal is to create a stir, to generate dialogue over (what I feel are) important topics, that’s a heartbreaker.

Code monkeys are known for their disdain of documentation. It’s a stereotype that we just can’t write in such a way that conveys important information or strong emotions properly. Maybe I’d just go ahead and blame this, claim that the stereotype is true, that it’s something I just suck at.

Because the alternative—that this generation is so far gone into its collective slumber, that not even a passable friend calling their deepest beliefs into question can rouse them—is so much sadder.

  • 7 min read

Rusty wire hangers and a dark corner

Legalizing abortion will result in THOUSANDS of abortions more per month!

This is, of course, what the conservative “ghod fearing” bigots would have you believe. That by legalizing abortion, we’d witness pregnant women all over the country, stampeding towards the first legal abortion clinic to open. That most women are just positively chomping at the bit, straining on their leashes, and would gladly stick bent, rusting wire hangers up their vaginas to try and turn the fetuses (fetii?) inside them into something resembling a bloody mashed potato.

That’s, they’ll tell you, how it’s turned out for aching teeth, right? Your tooth aches? You have a dentist pull it out. You’re pregnant? Well, by ghod! If we legalize abortion, you’d terminate your pregnancy the first chance you get!

Setting aside everything else, I really am baffled that there are women who back people who think like this. Forget the legal and moral arguments: how can anyone tolerate people who would think of them this way? What does it say of the people who march against legalizing abortion (causing massive traffic jams in the process), when—through their actions—they’ve implicitly agreed with the people who think that the only thing keeping them from aborting a pregnancy is the fact that’s illegal here?

No wonder bigots are always smirking: They’ve probably realized the irony of it all, and are laughing inside for being able to play all their followers for chumps.

But that’s probably giving them credit for more intelligence than they’re due.

Another thing I’ve noticed is that, in every country that’s tackled legalizing abortion, the ones with the loudest voices are the men. What the hell do we men know about pregnancy, anyway?—let alone giving birth. From what I’ve learned growing up, a man’s role in pregnancy is simply to help a woman get started, then get the hell out of the way. Once a woman’s pregnant, a man is relegated to the uncomplicated (though admittedly arduous at times) task of keeping the mother healthy and with a roof over her head.

So, why, oh why, are you women content in letting the least qualified people decide this issue for you?

No, no, let’s not count even the doctors. They may know how your body functions more than you ever will (though, from my experience with more than a couple of medical people, caring about you is a different thing altogether); the fact that it’s your body makes your voice the only thing that should matter.

Not the voice of some well-meaning old biddy, who’s way past child-bearing age, and is simply looking for something to do. Not that of a crummy politician who’s out to please everyone of voting age by promising them everything in the vaguest terms possible, giving them the chance to weasel out of anything at a later date.

No, not even the voice of a geeky blogger, whose only qualification is the fact that he’s a father.

Why are you letting the opinion of others dictate yours? Be it the opinion of your friends, your family, or even your cult: no opinion should weigh more than your own, because, otherwise, you’ve given up the one thing that (occassionally) sets us humans apart from lower order animals.

Why ignore facts and rational arguments in favor of the conditioning that’s been forced upon you, starting from when you couldn’t even realize that they’re violating you? Why limit yourself to knee-jerk reactions, before you can really think about an issue, without resorting to arguments that have been made for you?

Here, then, are the facts, as I see them. I’ve tried to be as objective as I can in presenting these; hopefully, you’ll try to be as objective as you can in reading them.

Abortions Happen

Not some deep philosophical musing; merely a statement of an otherwise—non-controversial fact. Abortions have happened, are happening and will continue to happen. Evidence of the truthiness of this statement is often presented on primetime news (usually when people are sitting down for supper, too).

Abortions happen for a variety of reasons; not all of them happen because the mother is living off of the streets, barely able to feed even herself. There’ve been plenty of middle-class folks who’ve terminated a pregnancy, and the news back when I was young were peppered with speculation that such-and-such local celebrity managed to squeeze in having an abortion during a trip overseas.

Being illegal has not stopped the number of abortions performed in this country; if anything, the numbers have gone up in recent years, along with the number of unwanted pregnancies. Note, however, that I am not implying causation—not even correlation. Again, merely statement of facts.

Unwanted Pregnancies are Real

The people who tend to be shocked that a pregnancy can be undesirable are almost always people who have never been raped, nor have had a family member go through such an ordeal. Or have never gone through a day wondering when they’re going to eat next. I like to think of them, and the rest who can't accept unwanted pregnancies as fact, as sheltered, escapist juveniles (regardless of their actual age) insisting on trying to live in a world of fantasy, where everything is sweetness and light.

Except this post is supposed to be about facts.

It's no secret that there have been rape victims who become pregnant and later on decide to see their pregnancies through. What's less well-known is the fact that these women are actually few and far between; they make better newscopy, and so are the ones who end up being interviewed by our favorite “unbiased” news outlets. No major news outlet wants to be branded as pro-abortion, and news editors know that they'd end up being labeled precisely so, if they ever dared to present stories of rape victims who would rather (understandbly) terminate a pregnancy resulting from rape.

And so we’re conditioned to think that the natural and “right” reaction to pregnancy-by-rape should be quiet and defeated acceptance, as if what happened was the rape victim’s fault. We’re conditioned to look upon those who fight back against what happened to them as “evil”, and if, ghod forbid, ever they should think that they have the right to do what they want with and to their bodies, then they are reprimanded (or worse, banished), for they were not properly appreciative of a “gift”.

Again, let me point out that the ones doing the judging in all but a few of these cases have not gone through what the victims have.

Focusing on the stories of those who conform to our society’s idea of what is acceptable, with more than subtle hints of praise, and then condemning people who make decisions based on their situations, is far removed from the objective reporting just about all journalists everywhere vehemently claim to uphold.

Forbidden, Unless Explicitly Allowed

Ask random strangers if they'd consider holding people at gunpoint for their money. No particular reason; just for kicks. Most of (I’m tempted to say all) the people you’d ask would say they won’t do it. Why not? Because there’s a law against it, dumdum—you wanna go get locked up?

Well, what about if, say, you lost your lunch money and you’re really hungry. Still no? Why not? Because that’s not a good enough reason!, they’d say (and you’d probably agree).

Well, what is as a good enough reason? What if, say, your family’s starving, because you were kicked out of a job that wasn’t very good in the first place; plus, the damned government’s obviously not going to do anything to help little guys like you, because, hey, it’s their job to tell unfortunate folks to fuck off, right? Would you do it then?

Well…

People are always anxious to point out that the laws against crime X are the only reason there aren't more people going around committing it. Whatever happened to the Christian belief (you’d hear this view espoused pretty much every Sunday in pretty much every church in the country) that people are basically good? Why are these supposed model Catholics passing judgment on everyone else? Isn’t this the type of behavior that John the Baptist and Jesus rallied against?

My point—and I know I took my sweet time getting to it—is that just because something is legal (or, at least, doesn’t have laws against it) doesn’t have to mean that one is obliged to do it. Simple enough a concept, right?

Is it a wonder why I’m sitting here, scratching my head, wondering what the fuss is all about. Because, from where I’m sitting, the whole issue against legalizing abortion is the thought I posited earlier: Why are well-meaning old biddies and the slimy politicians behind them assuming that, should abortion be legalized, there’d be a sudden influx of abortees lining up on the first legal abortion clinic (and any subsequent ones)?

More importantly, why should YOU care, if you never plan on undergoing said operation?

A friend of mine has noted that abortion is illegal and that lawmakers want it to stay that way because it’s against the established morals of society. This is a democracy, after all: the will of the people above all!

Except we know this isn’t true, even without the usual hypocrisy that goes on in every representative government. What the people want is rarely what the people get: just ask everyone who has long wished income taxes to disappear.

Morals and ethics change—they have changed, repeatedly. If you don’t believe me, read Leviticus and tell me why we aren’t setting up unchaste wives in a public plaza somewhere and stoning them to death.

It can be argued that one of the government’s jobs is to guard and guide public mores. But mostly, they were set up to serve the people and, as such, they have a responsibility to engage their constituents in honest, open discussion when a sizable bloc deems itself disenfranchised.

For it is nothing less than that: a disenfranchisement of a entire generation as soon as it found that not only can they hold opinions unsanctioned by their parent’s religion, they’re figuring out that they, in some cases, they should.

I am calling for women’s voices to be heard, for it is their voices, above all, that should be heard. I demanding that my government give back what it has, unchallenged, legislatured away: that of a woman’s right to choose for herself.

A minor update of sorts: I posted a sort-of mini-FAQ regarding this post. See Rusty Hangers: Behind the Scenes.

  • 4 min read

I hate Emacs

Programming has, personally, always been a passion before anything else. Sure, it enables me to provide a nice, comfortable life for my family; with the money I earn being a code monkey, I can pay the bills (mostly), put food on the table, buy something one or more of us wants as opposed to needs. But, for more than a decade now, it has always been something I’d be doing regardless of what I did for a living.

Note the fact that I’m still coding these days, though I’ve been without a job for about a month now.

And for several years now, the one constant factor in my experience has been beloved GNU Emacs.

In every programming gig, full-time or part-time, high-brow or mind-numbingly boring, I had Emacs on my side. It doesn’t matter what programming languages I’d have to work with at a site—heck, nothing mattered: if it involved working with text (or even a number of non-text stuff), I could count on trusty Emacs to handle it.

Recent experiences, however, have left me… lacking in positive affection: i.e., I hate Emacs.

I’ve written posts that can be taken as signs of wanting to get rid of Emacs altogether. Except that’s not the bent of my “hatred” at all.

Let me elaborate.

Part of the reason I’ve come as far as I have professionally (or, at least, I’d like to think so) is the fact that I’m pretty much always looking for something new to play with and learn from. That’s why an older version of my résumé listed over a dozen programming languages (if you have a copy of this, please send a copy my way!). Or how I happen to be able to work with at least 5 desktop/server operating system families (which amounts to about 8 individual operating systems, if I count several GNU/Linux distributions as a single OS).

When I’ve been idle (i.e., without a new toy to play with) for a while, a sort-of watchdog inside me nags me to find something, chiding me for being a bum. Hence my recent forays into NoSQL, as well as my disappointment in a lack of fancy new programming languages that seem worth learning.

However, what I’ve been unable to quench for several years now is the desire to try my hand at a different programming environment.

All such attempts have ended up being aborted, always for the same reason: they lacked one thing or another that Emacs has (or could give me).

Emacs has positively spoiled me for other programming environments.

Larger environments, like Eclipse, NetBeans or Komodo, I dismissed (among other things) due to how slow it felt working with them. If one of them had something I really liked, it always turned out to be either:

  • something I could have in Emacs, too—some with a bit of work (i.e., symbol/function lists, refactoring browser, autocompletion); or,
  • nothing I couldn’t live without, or merely a passing fancy: probably because I found it shiny at some point (i.e., tabs for open buffers)

I passed on lighter alternatives, too, mostly due to their inability to emulate Emacs’ keybindings. As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been using Emacs for about a decade now: at this point, my fingers know how to play with Emacs while I’m asleep.

It occurs to me that there’s barely anything new to explore in this particular field. Not because I’m a stuck-up Emacs user, whose words are dripping with condescension, unassailable within his smug certainty that Emacs has won—there’s nothing left to fight for, and all others should just admit it and switch.

No, this is more an objective, albeit admittedly narrow, view from a neophiliac who’s been trying to find something relatively novel to get excited about.

Go ahead, pick any number of relatively popular programming environments and compare their feature lists. You ought to notice that, for the most part, they’re pretty similar. Syntax highlighting. Code completion. Symbol and function browsers. Code folding.

Usually, what gets other geeks excited are integration with one-or-another tool. Bug/issue trackers, project management apps, revision control. Even this doesn’t really suffice to set apart most programming environments. Most of everything else that’s left are usually rather superficial. That, or extensive possibilities for modification (something that even haters will—grudgingly—concede is something Emacs excels at).

Even the one editor that got me drooling again—for a while, at least (Sublime Text)—is “merely” a rehash of tried-and-true text editing principles.

Is this is it? Have we reached the pinnacle of text editing (as it applies to programmers, at least)?

There is this one project that leads me to think (and how I thank it for that) that no, we’ve still some ways to go.

Code Bubbles bills itself as a “Rethinking [of] the User Interface Paradigm of Integrated Development Environments”. It really is rather impressive (watch the video embedded below, or go to its YouTube page).

However impressive the Code Bubbles project is, one still has to note its similarity to Squeak (or, rather, the 40+ year old Smalltalk technologies that Squeak has inherited). It’s depressing (specially so to the Smalltalk and Lisp old-timers) how mainstream computer science is just catching up to several decades old techniques and technologies, and how what’s arguably one of the most promising programming projects we code monkeys as a group have managed to birth is something they’d still sneer at as “not (yet) good enough”.

Still, Code Bubbles is impressive. And I'd love to get my hands on it, except it’s (at this point) only for Java, and based on Eclipse, to boot.

Somebody ought to implement something like this for Emacs.

  • 3 min read

Mercenaries Kill

… time by going over their stalled projects, summoning whatever motivations led them to start said projects in the first place, and then going to work. At least, that’s what this humble (software) mercenary, having been forced to a bit of down-time recently, has been doing these past few weeks.

And on that note, let me introduce Dollhouse.

Houses of, and for, Dolls

Continuing with (just now established) tradition of using vaguely homoerotically-suggestive names for things Google will index forever and will possibly become a source of embarrassment for me in my old age (see Exhibit A), I’ve put up a hub for something I’ve mostly constantly been doing for the past decade or so: free software development.

If you’re curious (and not one of my three regular visitors to whom I’ve already shown this to—which likely means you don’t exist), and would like to see what I’m talking about, you can check out the index here:

http://dollhouse.diosa.ph/

And so as to set the record clear for the sudden barrage of militant homosexual visitors this blog will receive after Google once again ranks me for all sorts of LGBT-related keywords (probably for paragraphs such as this), let me explain that I’m referring to a kickass Joss Whedon TV show which, as is usual for not-Buffy Whedon shows, was canceled just as it was getting really good.

Playing with what makes Ersatz Genius tick

As alluded to in this incarnation’s debut post, and as detailed in the site’s colophon, I’ve managed to slap on custom functionality on PyBlosxom through its pretty-sweet plugin system. I also mentioned that I’ll probably put the Tumblr-to-PyBlosxom plugin up at some point.

Well, that particular plugin is still offline. However, I did manage to put in the required effort to ready most of the other custom plugins for public consumption; they’re up on Dollhouse if you want to gawk at and/or grab them.

I’ve also tweaked the layout a little, making available the little “taglines” to the main navigational items up top. They’ve been there from the beginning; I just never figured out a satisfactory way for them to become visible on hover. I’m still not overly happy the way they are now, but, damn it, I’m a code monkey, not a designer.

Replanting Ersatz Genius

Unless I screwed up mightily, you shouldn’t even have noticed this particular change.

Recently, I got a VPS instance from HostMist (consider this an endorsement); I’m now in the middle on moving everything I put up on my other VPS to the HostMist one. Dollhouse is already on the new one (which I’ve taken to calling defiant).

I’m not going to go into details as to why I’m dropping my other account; suffice it to say that I wasn’t very happy with what I was getting. Yes, yes, I know the usual argument: if you go for low-end VPS services, you ought not to expect too much. But I’m sure expecting that, at the very least, my VPS stay up when I’m not actively screwing it up falls on the right side of “too much”.

So, yeah. No longer giving them my hard-earned money.

HostMist, though… They’re something else entirely. They cost a bit more, of course, but I’m happy to part with my money when I’m getting something great in return.

March is International Women’s Month, so I’m trying to figure out something to do that ties in with that. Maybe I’ll dust off the draft of an old post on abortion; I might even get to actually push it out (been trying to do that since around September 2010, actually).

We’ll see.

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Panacea for the Poison: Bill Zeller's Last Words.

Excerpted from source:

I have the urge to declare my sanity and justify my actions, but I assume I’ll never be able to convince anyone that this was the right decision. Maybe it’s true that anyone who does this is insane by definition, but I can at least explain my reasoning. I considered not writing any of this because...

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Upgrades are a bitch

Note to self: next time, actually pay attention when upgrading system packages.

My VPS is down at the moment, because I inadvertently upgraded the glibc package. No ETA yet and when I'll get it back up. :(

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Saying goodbye to Tumblr

In my very first post, I lamented the fact that I seemed to be locked into Google's (admittedly very shiny) services—which I then followed up with a list of possible replacements for specific services. I suppose I'd forgotten that it was being locked-in that was the problem, not who I was being locked-in with.

I suppose I rationalized it by thinking that "lock-in" is a rather harsh way of putting things (which it was) since I could always get my data back—except when I can't. The recent extended Tumblr downtime brought the idea home rather forcefully. Sure, I had most of entries backed up, but that was mostly luck.

Anyway, I've relaunched my blog, and its setup is now almost entirely under my control.

I'd like to say thanks to the people who liked my posts enough to either tag it as such, or even reblog one or two of them. I'm keeping my account open, if only to keep on following the interesting folks I found here, but I'll only post on my Ersatz Genius 2.0 (heh) from now on.

(Or, maybe, when I have some free time, I'll write a plugin that will auto-post my blog entries here, too. That should be fun.)