Schinckel.net

I missed the first season of the new Battlestar Galactica. Something to do with it being on late at night, during _WoW_time, and not always being on at the same time every week. I was a big fan as a kid of the original series (I even have BSG wallpaper in my room at my parents’ house!), so I was looking forward to the new series. And I wasn’t disappointed. From the first moment, BSG was fantastic. I was forced, by the ineptitude of the Channel 9 programmers, to download the first series via BitTorrent - or rather, have a friend who had already done so burn me a copy. Season 2, which is currently being shown, and which, since it wasn’t advertised, I missed the first couple of episodes, fell into the same boat. Download the lot of them, at least that way I get to see it in the right order. And now, with Nine still showing season 2, while #3 is on the US, I’ve had to revert to BT again. Man is this season good. I disliked the ending of the last season - it seemed to change character way too much in the way it was set up for the occupation. I watched the Webisodes regardless, and didn’t mind them. And then Season 3. I’m still a couple of episodes behind the US, but I’m hooked again. The way this series, unlike virtually every other program on television ever, isn’t afraid to do a good bit of character development, and then, suddenly, kill off the characters. Just like that. (Although, just quietly, I’m still not convinced the one they killed in Episode 4 isn’t a Cylon.) They could have padded out the Resistance a bit more - I’d like to think I’m not spoiling too much by saying they got off the planet a little to easily, but hey, it was ballsy. And sacrificing a BattleStar - I’m not sure that was such a good idea, either. Surely they could have managed to come up with a way to jump away at the last minute. Or did they…? And the mind games the Cylons manage to play with each of the characters. I love it.

I listen to a variety of Podcasts, including All In The Mind, “Radio National’s weekly foray into all things mental,” and generally like it. As I’m known to do, I take exception (or get annoyed) with particular segments. The two podcasts I listened to today irked me especially. The first was a discussion of Placenta Brain, and the general consensus was that it doesn’t exist. I know of this phenomenon by it’s alternative name, Mummy Mind, and I have seen it in all of the women I am close to who have borne children. The general theories go like this: somehow (possibly due to hormones) women become different during pregnancy, often exhibiting behaviours they wouldn’t normally, like leaving their car running when running an errand, and being surprised to see if running when they return. I would go somewhat further than this. Bearing children permanently damages their minds. My sister, who was a perfectly normal, intelligent person, suddenly started making inane comments about all sorts of things. Something which she had not done before giving birth to my favourite nephew. I had grown up with my mother making crazy statements (often obvious ones) and had just put this down to it being her. After my sister had her baby, if occurred to me that Mum had been smart in her youth (her school reports, and discussion with friends and family from that era confirm this) and had simply lost her marbles (not totally) after giving birth. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love my mother and sister very much. I don’t profess that they are totally bonkers, just not as “sharp” as they used to be. And giving birth seems to be, for both of them, the turning point in their lives as intelligent individuals. More than just the impairment during pregnancy, I think it seems to linger… • The second podcast was an interview with a Jewish Psychiatrist practicing in Israel, and treating both Israelis and Palestinians. This seemed to set him off on a good path, but he started to throw in some pretty inane language himself, particularly some of the Jungian Jargon (Always Alliterate!!!) and I quickly lost respect for him. It’s the first Podcast for a long time I have skipped the end of. His discussion of recurring dreams was a particular annoyance of mine: I can’t find the exact quote in the transcript, but it was something like:

The thing about recurring dreams is that they are telling the mind something. And the fact they repeat is because the mind “just doesn’t get it.”

I’m still of the impression that dreams have very little relation to reality. If we can see something in our dreams, it is only because we want to. Dreams are like “random events”, or spring cleaning of the brain’s circuitry. Any relationship to real life is only because there are all these events, images, sounds, memories, and our mind just attempts to fit them into what it perceives as reality. Forcing the facts to fit a theory, as it were. Anyway, he started to go on with a bit of rubbish after that - I’d arrived home (hardest ride I’d had for a while, pretty much head-wind all of the way home, with a bit of a rise for the last kilometre or so), and often while I continue to the end, I skipped it. • Now, before I get too many nasty comments about the first part - please note that I’ve deliberately played it up a little. My family are not loopy (perhaps just a little, but that’s a whole other story). I’m merely stating the anecdotal evidence I have seen about cognitive deterioration during, and indeed after, pregnancy. And, I have some other cases, but I’m saving them for my paper on the topic… after all, Fraud, ahem, Freud, Jung’s mentor, based all of his theories on a handful of cases.

…on such a Winter’s Day.

California Dreamin’ • “Room Service” • José Feliciano ★★★

Okay, that’s just a silly lead-in to what I’m going to post about. For some time, I’ve been trying to get Category Pages to handle a bit nicer in Blogsome. I needed to be able to get a Category ID from a Category name, and I hadn’t figured out how to. I’d basically given up. Then I found my new best friend, {get_cat_ID cat_name='Cat_Name'}. He allows me to do this. And much easier than I thought it would be, too.

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    {if $smarty.server.REQUEST_URI|truncate:10:'':1 == '/category/'}
        {capture name=cat}
            {single_cat_title}
        {/capture}     
        {capture name=catID}
            {get_cat_ID cat_name=$smarty.capture.cat}
        {/capture}
    {/if}

Now, how do we use this to get child categories?

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    {list_cats optionall='0' list='false' child_of='$smarty.capture.catID'}

This appears to not work, as it continues to get all of the categories. I think there is an issue with child_of, at least on Blogsome.

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    {get_category_children id=$smarty.capture.catID}

Only generates the IDs of the child categories. Useful, but not excellent for my uses. However, there exists also a function called {wp_list_cats}, which allows for arguments in the for &arg=value.

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    {wp_list_cats args=“&child_of=`$smarty.capture.catID`”} 

Notably, you must use double quotes when trying to embed a variable inside an argument. Final code (not counting CSS, that’s up to you - or look in my StyleSheet):

{if $smarty.server.REQUEST_URI|truncate:10:'':1 == '/category/'} 
    {*Category Index Page*}
    <div class=“catNav”>
        {capture name=cat}{single_cat_title}{/capture}
        {capture name=catID}
            {get_cat_ID cat_name=$smarty.capture.cat}
        {/capture}
        Currently browsing 
        {get_category_parents category="`$smarty.capture.catID`" link="1" separator="&raquo;"}, which has sub-categories 
        <ul class=“inlineCatList”>
            {wp_list_cats args=“&&list=0&children=0&child_of=`$smarty.capture.catID`”}
        </ul>
    </div>
{/if}

And, thanks to minimalnet, since because of the post in the forums: How can i show the Dashboard Blog Stats in my blog?, I began scouring the source code again.

Summer The First Time • Bobby Goldsboro • Room Service ★

Every now and then, I have cause to go through the Blogsome source code, and each time I come across what seem like interesting functions. Today, I noticed:

• get_category_parents
• get_category_children
• get_linksbyname
• get_autotoggle
• get_lastpostdate, get_lastpostmodified
• get_currentuserinfo
• query_posts
• get_cat_ID

Some of these I don’t yet know what they do, but at least three are very interesting for doing stuff I’ve been working on for a while.

I’m going to start playing around with Google Calendars. My Touch Football admin team have been using Google Docs (was Writely) for collaborative documentation, and I need to reorganise my life. gCalendars look cool, and I might be able to sync with PalmOS. Hopefully both ways, although even just one way might do.

I’m not sure if this is a ‘feature’ of general Gmail, or only the _Gmail for Hosted Domains _variety. I had the need to send an executable file, and I had zipped it up, as there were also support files in the directory. I attempted to send it, and Gmail complained:

Sorry, ArchiveName.zip contains an executable file. Schinckel.net policy prevents sending these files, as they provide a security risk.

I had to rename it to .zip.jpg, and then resend it. I’m not an idiot. I know when a file I am sending is relatively clean (as clean as can be expected), and I am prepared to take the risk. I manage the domain, and I have never checked any box about preventing .exe files. Aargh!

I’ve worked in fast food. Granted, it was a long time ago, and I was only a delivery driver, but it vexes me how often orders are mucked up by these (generally) young people. What hope does our society have when the youth can’t listen properly and remember for thirty seconds what food I want. We went to KFC at Mitcham tonight, on the way home from a Training & Development session. Jaq was driving, so she ordered, and it went a little like this:

Jaq: Can I have a Zinger Bacon and Cheese Twister, in a large combo; and a second twister with cheese and no tomato please.
Stupid Drivethru Operator: Okay, so that’s one Bacon and Cheese Twister in a large combo, and a twister with cheese and no tomato.
Jaq: No, the first one was a Zinger Twiser.
SDO: Sorry, we don’t do Zinger Twisters.
Me (yelling from passenger seat): Yeah you do, I have them all of the time.
SOD: Silence.
Jaq (to me): So that’s it then? Do I drive thru?

[We decide to drive to the window. As the previous car pulls away, a hand holding a large chips comes out of the window - obviously they forgot to pack the order properly.]

New Drivethru Operator: We don’t have them as a menu item, but we can make one up for you.
Jaq: Ok, thanks.
NDO: So, that’s a Bacon and Cheese Zinger Twister combo. What drink did you want?
Jaq: There was another twister too, with cheese and no tomato.
NDO: Ok. What drink did you want then?
Jaq: Sunkist.

[Time passes. Drink is brought out. It’s a small one.]

Jaq: Um, we ordered a large meal. Were you the girl I spoke to before? Because she read that bit of the order back to me.
NDO: No. Sorry.

[NDO takes drink, and brings back a large bottle.]

NDO: There you go, and there is your meal.

[Bag is handed to us. As we begin to drive off, I notice there is a small chips in the bag. We stop. I then realise there are two small chips.]

Jaq: Excuse me, we ordered a large meal and got two small chips.
NDO: Yeah, we have run out of large chips containers.

[We drive home.]

When we arrived home, it got even worse. Initially, we thought they’d stuffed up Jaq’s order badly, by giving her tomatoes, and no cheese. But it turned out that they had just made my Zinger Twister sans Bacon and Cheese. So, I’m counting about 5 errors in our order, plus at least one in the order of the car before us. That’s pretty pathetic, KFC.