Dead Programmer's Cafe

Month: February 2003

  • Did I Mention that Purple is the Official Brooklyn College Color?

    I wrote about Monk parakeets before.

    Well, it looks like the Brooklyn College Environmental Education Science Masters Program. members are involved in some cutting edge research:

    “On the athletic field we saw 5 birds perched on the lamp post on the right side. They were flying back and forth. While we watched their flight we viewed one of the birds relieving themselves. We approached the ramp and examined the droppings. We counted 11 droppings and saw a distinct color change in its appearance. This change was not the same as what we had previously viewed, it was purple in color.”

    “On East 23 and Avenue J we saw three birds eating acorns and making a lot of noise. “

    This reminded me:

  • Brooklyn College Pictures

    I had to wake up early today to get to the speech class that is held at the ungodly hour of 9 AM. On Sunday. Sadists. It was raining. Brooklyn streets were foggy and smelled of jasmine tea for some reason. Ok, I did have jasmine tea yesterday, but I could not smell any on myself. The fog definitely smelled of jasmine tea. And sea.

    I’ve had some espresso at Michael’s bakery on R and Nostrand and took a bus to Brooklyn College. Some pictures had to be taken.

    A Jellyfish From Outer Space or a Manhole Cover? You Decide.

    Brooklyn College officials like to spend money on infrastructure. About six years ago, I remember, they purchased these really expensive, but nice ashtrays.

    The ashtrays came with these garbage urns. This is Brooklyn College La Guardia tower reflecting in the top of such an urn. Note the uglorific purple color. That’s the official school color. Maybe, some time in this century, I’ll get to wear a robe of that color.

    The cupola of the nearby Midwood High School.

    Even the storm drains are pretty.

  • Financial Experts

    It’s a great paper. For me to poop on!

  • Have A Nice Day

  • Yagi Decorated


    You know, most New Yorkers don’t look up much. No matter how cool everything is around them, they don’t want to look like tourists. But I am secure enough in my New Yorkedness to walk around looking at skyscrapers and taking pictures with my touristy looking camera.

    This hideous yagi antenna is on a top of one of the old art deco buildings on 46th street. By the way, it turns out that it named “after Hidetsugu Yagi (1886-1976), Japanese electrical engineer” and not baba Yaga as I thought. Actually it should be called “Yagi-Uda” because he invented it with the help of Dr. Shintaro Uta.

    Looks like nobody cared much for Dr. Yagi’s work in Japan at the time. Of course, they regretted it after they discovered that it was used by the Allies as a radar antenna. This reminded me about how Pyotr Ufimtsev’s dense paper titled “Method of Edge Waves in the Physical Theory of Diffraction”, which was completely ignored by the Soviet military scientists, gave Denys Overholser, a Skunk Works radar specialist, all the theory needed to build F117 stealth fighter.

    Indeed, yagis are very useful. You can extend the range of wi-fi networks with a yagi made out of Pringles can (gotta build one) and I’ve heard of a guy that made a yagi for his cell phone, so that he could access weak cell networks while biking across America. They may not look very good, but they have a kajillion uses in radio and tv.

    Too bad there is no book about Dr. Yagi on Amazon, but here is a rather interesting site about Japanese inventors. Here’s Dr. Yagi’s statue and here’s an iteresting quote that I’ve found: “US War Crimes Commission witnessed that Professor Hidetsugu Yagi was the first Japanese “to speak proudly of his work instead of denying it all.”

  • Happiness, We’re All in it Together

  • ‘Sup, Yo?

  • Obesity is a Serious Problem for Snowpeople in America


    I snapped this on the way to work. He sits right near Times Square. Looks like either cops or transit workers came up with yet another creative way of using traffic cones.

  • Gutenberg Would Be Oh So Pissed

    I’ve recently read a very awesome book by Henry Petroski called “The Book on the Bookshelf”. It’s a book about the culture of storing an collecting books. In it he mentioned a dinner party that he attended, where owners of a pretty big library served appetizers on Taschen art books (probably purchased for a buck or so). But many of the guests did not feel right about using book pages (no matter that they carried no value) in this manner. Even though it’s probably a cooler way to use these books than letting them mold in a used book pile somewhere.

    Petroski also mentioned some readers who would tear pages out of cheap paperbacks as they were reading in order to lighten their bags.

    I feel, that eating over a book (unless it’s a rare edition) is ok. In fact, I don’t really care if any of the ordinary books in my library have dog ears, food stains or water damage as long as they are still readable. I have no qualms even about throwing out crappy books. But still would refuse to use a book as a plate.

    Now, here’s a project I have mixed feelings about: some ljusers wallpapered their library with book pages. It looks very cool. It will probably look like ass later, when acidic paper will start to completely deteriorate in sunlight. It’s somewhat cool. Maybe even a bit creative. I’ve seen this done with old newspapers in the Le Figaro cafe in the Village though. But still, something ain’t right about that.

  • The Saddam Hussein Reader

    I don’t really know much about everybody’s favorite contemporary mustached dictator.

    I didn’t know that Saddam’s full name is Saddam Hussein al-Tikriti. I didn’t know that his wife Sajida, two years his senior, also happens to be his first cousin. That’s seems right, she is the one who gave birth to the abominable Uday and Qusay. Uuu – die. Brrr..

    Anyway, looks like Saddam’s biography shouldn’t be any less entertaining than “The Sopranos”. There’s a whole bunch of Saddamy goodness on Amazon:

    The Saddam Hussein Reader
    The Complete Idiot’s Guide To Understanding Iraq
    or this:

    What to pick, what to pick…