Dead Programmer's Cafe

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  • Straight From The Horse’s Head

    My wife pointed out this unusual plaque over the entrance of a skyscraper in lower Manhattan.

    This thing just begs so many questions. Is it made out of zinc? Is there a lot of zinc in Jersey? Is zinc mining a profitable enough business to warrant building a skyscraper?

    Turns out that New Jersey Zinc is now called Zinc Corporation of America after it was swallowed by Horsehead Industries.

    But this only brings more questions. Was Horsehead Industries named after the hometown of the person who holds the leadership in number of comments in my blog according to ‘s LJ Comment Stats Wizard 1.1? Does Neil Kurlander, Esq., Senior Vice President, General Counsel & Corporate Development of Spafinder.com who spent 10 years working for Horsheads industries enjoy his new job better?

    Let this be a warning to you. Googling is a game nobody can win.

  • Don’t Look Into The Laser With Your Remaining Eye

    More wisdom from : don’t wave hands at Apache pilots.

    I guess this is the same eye-tracking technology as in MiGs and Canon cameras:
    .

    How long will it be before somebody hacks an old Canon Elan IIe and one of these bad boys together (don’t forget to watch the videos)?

  • Rowr!

  • The Key To Happiness

    My wife suggested that I take a picture of her doppelganger in this store’s security camera. I tried a slightly unusual composition. Chock-full-o-symbolism, isn’t it?

  • The Building

    Believe it or not, I finally visited my favorite building. My earlier detailed article about the building is here. And here are some photographic notes (a lot of the pictures did not come out well because it was already dark):

    From the ground you do not get the same airy, soaring feeling because the massive base hides the true proportions of the tower. But there are redeeming features up close, like this dramatic and unusual triple flagpole:

    Once you get closer, other beautiful details come into view, like this stunning art deco lamp:

    The lobby is Deco elegance itself:

    Later we had dinner at a restaurant in the South Street Seaport. The food was so-so, but the view was amazing:

  • On The Way To The AIG Building

    The governor of California must have asked our mayor to strategically place containers of liquid nitrogen to fight of devious Fox Mulder replacing T-1000 Terminators.

    Here’s a whole unguarded truck:

    And here’s a fine example of ducttapemanship:

    I wrote about the NYC LN2 phenomenon earlier.

  • All Wright!

    In the latest attempt to break the work-home-work-home Worm Oroborous cycle was my and my wife’s trip to Manhattan’s equivalent of Springfield’s South Street Squidport to listen to John C. Wright read from his latest book. The book, which I already pre-ordered from Amazon seems very promising, despite the fact that I hate the whole degenerate genre of Fantasy. You can find my previous rants about Mr. Wright (and assorted other Wrights) here.

    We listened to the Wright’s reading of the first two chapters, talked to him for a little while and got a copy of the Phoenix Trilogy signed.

    If you want to understand why I am so excited about this author, get a copy of Year’s Best SF 3 which sells for as little as one cent on Amazon and read Wright’s short story “Guest Law”. Then you’ll just have to read everything else that he’s written.

    After the reading we went to explore my favorite skyscraper and the SquidSeaport itself (I haven’t been there in years).

  • Good Stuff

    I recently purchased “Looking at Photographs : 100 Pictures from the Collection of The Museum of Modern Art“. This is another outstanding book recommended to me by the inhuman intelligence of Amazon’s engine.

    I can only imagine the torturous process that the author of this book must have gone through. I mean, how do you select 100 important photographs from Museum of Modern Art’s collection? And then write an article about the author, the photograph, the historical context and significance, the camera and photographic process used – all on one page? That must have been pure agony.

    This book made me think a lot about photography and photographers. I need to write more about that.

    In other news I only recently noticed how good ‘s photography is. Excessive lj-cuts + infrequent posting = people will not notice the good stuff.

  • Correct Form Of Mythology

    just loves to rant about how the majority Americans are ignorant, uneducated and not worldly at all like his beloved Europeans.

    He would not let me live down the following hilarious comments from the excellent post in :

    : “i took this with my picture phone, so in case you can’t tell: it’s a dog with boys (maybe men, but definitly of the male gender) sucking on it’s nipples. a very angry looking dog, i might add.

    eta: so apparently this is from a story in greek, er, roman mythology. thanks for the info kids. but i still think its ugly. :B”

    : “someone not study greek mythology in ancient history class as a kid?”
    …

    : “Ten bucks eh? I’d bid on it, just because I like the story of Romulus and Remus. Woot, greek mythology”

    : “Even more w00t: saying the correct form of mythology. It’s Roman (founders of Rome), not Greek”
    …

    : “And incidentally, that statue looks more like a hyena to me, but ancient civilizations aren’t known for their realistic art I suppose.”

    Having gone to one of the 12 toughest schools in New York I think it’s much more important to learn how not to have a photo phone stolen than to learn about “non-realistic Greek hyena statues”.

  • Sometimes I Hate Being A Fat Dude On Atkins

    “It’s like racial harmony in your mouth “. Huh, it’s been years since I’ve had one. I did not know that it was such a New York thing though.

    is worth a read (I’ll work more on more this weekend).