You Gave the Wine List to Me?
I told myself I probably wouldn't blog about New York, but I decided this would be a worthwhile story. (Not to mention the fact that I promised a certain person I'd publish this; you know who you are.) Of all the things that happened in New York City, this is possibly the funniest, and the most unlikely to happen back here in MN. Aside from Broadway shows, that is.
Image via WikipediaPicture this: Times Square, a moderately upscale Asian restaurant, and a party of five. Two mothers, three "children" (though none of us were under 14). The age spread for us "kids" was 14, 17, and 23.
I suppose I should explain the situation a little better. We went to New York with friends of ours from Minnesota. The mother was a tutor of mine for a few years back, helping me with the Kumon Reading program. My mother ended up in college classes with Alia (the 23-year-old who has now, with the new year, become a blogger)
We came in reasonably late, after seeing Grease on Broadway. Alia had just gotten back from a trip-within-a-trip spending Christmas with a friend in Connecticut, narrowly missing the Broadway show (unfortunately, I think; it was better than anything I've ever seen here in Minnesota). Our table received three wine lists.
Obviously our two mothers got them. However, the third one was given to me. I'm 17, four years younger than the drinking age, but I suppose it could have been an honest mistake. After all, a lot of people offer me alcoholic beverages in restaurants, and I have been mistaken for a college student many times. But Alia didn't get one. That in itself wouldn't be too weird, and could even be interpreted as a compliment ("You don't look old enough to drink, miss." That would be a compliment, no?) But the fact that I got one is very strange.
And the story gets stranger. My mother, happy-go-lucky Jew that she is (I mean that affectionately), playfully suggested that we try to trick the waitress. So I asked Alia for the wine she wanted and waited.
When the waitress returned and asked me what I wanted, I pulled my best "I do this all the time" act and ordered. She didn't bat an eye, card me, or even give me a second look; she just took the list and went away. I tried not to laugh too much, but I guess I did, because both parents shushed me so I wouldn't give it away.
I myself can't stand alcohol of any kind. I only drink grape juice on Passover, and the one vodka shot I tried one Purim a few years back made my eyes water. Needless to say I had no intention of drinking the wine when it came.
A few minutes later, it did come, and the waitress set it down right in front of me. Throughout the rest of the meal, I behaved as though it were Alia's drink, and she treated it as though we were, at worst, sharing. By that I mean she insisted on keeping it by my plate, fearful that the restaurant staff would get suspicious if it was moved to her setting. Honestly, I don't think anyone would have noticed.
This isn't exactly Abbott and Costello material, I know, but it's amusing that, even in New York, underage people still get away with ordering alcohol.
Or maybe the waitress overheard our entire discussion and decided to just play along.
Nah.
Parked In: A Yom Kippur Story
I wrote this way back in October, but never got around to polishing it and posting it until now. Finally I found time and motivation to post! I hope you all enjoy this story; even now, I am still uncovering all its hidden meanings.
This year's Yom Kippur was interesting. After school, I went straight to dinner, and then to services. Specifically, we (my mother and I) were interested in Kol Nidre, a beautiful piece of music that is part of the evening service erev Yom Kippur.
The service started at 16:45, and I had what was basically a tech rehearsal for a production of scenes from Romeo and Juliet at 17:30. More importantly, we had a stage fight to completely rework, so I had to be at rehearsal as close to on-time as possible -- our fight choreographer would only be there for the first hour. It looked like things were going to work out pretty well; we'd just leave the service shortly after Kol Nidre and blast to rehearsal, perhaps catching the second half of the service later, around 20:30.
It was not ordained.
Exiting the shul at 17:27, I was horrified to find that the Temple's parking attendants had motioned congregants to double-park -- filling each passageway in the (relatively small, actually, considering the size of the congregation) parking lot with two lines of cars -- effectively hemming in those vehicles parked within the white lines on the asphalt (and each other, but I'll discuss that below). Worse, there was one BMW 525i that was just barely blocking the one possible escape route. Honestly, had it not been for that one car, I could have gotten to rehearsal five or ten minutes late -- not bad for a holiday. But that BMW was in the way, and I was stuck.
What could I do? We went back inside. There was nothing else to be done except wait for the end of the service and get to rehearsal as soon as possible.
As it happened, the rabbi delivered a very moving sermon that evening. I felt like I suddenly knew why that one BMW had been parked behind our car. If we'd been able to get out, we would have left and missed that sermon.
Even better, when I finally did get to rehearsal, everyone was quite understanding and the fight choreographer had stayed late just for me. I am grateful for that, and for the sermon that I came so close to missing. When something is supposed to happen, the universe rearranges itself to make that something possible. I find that amazing.
Portable Computing
I really have no right to talk about this subject, as I have never actually done it. I thought it might make for a good hypothetical post, though, especially since I don't have any other good ideas right now. What can I say, it's on my mind. That's because of where I was when I wrote this.
I'm thinking about portable computing right now because I keep everything on my hard drive. Well, stuff that isn't email or associated with a Web service. Applications and stuff all live on my computer. When I go somewhere else, I can't get at the FTP accounts stored in FileZilla (except for the one or two whose passwords I know by heart) or my Firefox data (stored passwords, which I don't usually need anyway; history; extensions).
Is that bad? Depends. On the one hand other copies of Firefox run a lot faster without all the extensions, but the one I'm using right now is at version 2.0.0.4. No organization I've seen bothers keeping Firefox up-to-date. The current version is 2.0.0.13 2.0.0.14 (updated again today, actually), and that could open me (and all the students and faculty) up to security holes, and I don't like that. Trying to upgrade gets me an error message due to students getting limited accounts.
Aside from the lack of updates, I also don't have any of the comforts of home. That is, I don't have my theme (which is currently a glorious black space theme) or my extensions (which do everything from notifying me of new email to keeping me apprised of visitors to this site to making sure I'm not trusting a bad site). I have no history, no bookmarks (which are actually in Google Bookmarks anyway). I also don't have OpenDNS shortcuts, but that would require configuration changes to the computer's operating system anyway.
Most of these annoyances would be solved if I simply got a USB thumb drive and loaded portable versions of my applications onto it. Transfer the settings files and I'd be good to go. Firefox, Notepad++, and FileZilla already have portable versions, I know for sure, and those are the only applications I really find myself wanting. I don't even use FileZilla that much anyway; I'm only thinking about it because I wanted to try something with it to fix a bum plugin on CodingExperiments.com.
With Notepad++, I'd probably want to have Apache, MySQL, and PHP along, too, so I could work on website development. I know there are portable server installations, too. Those could be added to the list if I got a reasonably sized drive (I'm thinking 16 GB at the moment, plus 500 GB of RAID 1 storage to leave at home for archival).
I could also bring along my computer, I guess. It is a laptop. But it's ailing with power jack issues, which make it really annoying to use if it's not left alone on a table (which it is at home). So the trade-off is not having my settings. I can live with it, really. I only spend an hour or two on foreign computers a week. Planning for the future, though, is something I should do. I won't have my own computer forever; it'll be going back at the end of this school year. And no, my idea of bringing a USB flash drive with me is not new; I'm just writing about it myself for the first time.
Strange Bug Reports on Blogger Post Scheduling
Thought I'd continue talking about Blogger this morning. 
Lately, there have been several comments to the Scheduled Posts announcement on the Blogger in Draft blog that indicate it doesn't work for everyone.
Personally, I haven't had any problems. I often write my posts the night before they publish, just in case I get a last-minute idea, or am away from the computer in the morning (which is indeed possible). Other comments indicate agreement with my statement. I wonder if the Blogger servers are being a bit wonky...
There were some issues (now fixed) with the scheduling feature back when it was first saved to draft (as the Blogger in Draft team likes to call the act of releasing a feature to Blogger in Draft), but those were fixed a long time ago. I was even experiencing the problem, too. This recent streak of bug reports is weird...
Musical in the Food Court!
This post digresses from my usual technobabble, but it's just too funny and creative (not to mention awesome!) to pass up.
Improv Everywhere is a New York City-based group of people started in 2001. What they do is usually totally off-the-wall and almost always funny. Their blog's tagline: "We Cause Scenes". The mission I'm featuring today, though, was done in Los Angeles, CA. (There is now a global Improv Everywhere site on Ning as well, but this mission was performed before that was launched.)
I like the idea of Improv Everywhere because I am also into improvisational performance. I don't usually get into the complexity they do, nor do I pull off stunts in public places -- in fact my improv is usually part of some exercise in theater classes. I do like to do things like randomly start singing in the middle of a mall, and that's what their latest mission was.
Posted to ImprovEverywhere.com late last night, "Food Court Musical" has already drawn a ton of comments. The story is, well... Watch the video first.
I don't know who came up with the idea to sing a song about needing some napkins, but this is just too funny. The way it starts with one person and escalates into an entire group is really great.
One of the best parts, I think, is the security guard. He comes in and everyone thinks he's about to break up the performance, when suddenly he starts to sing as well.
The title sounds to me like a cross between the two Disney films High School Musical and Full Court Miracle. It really works, I think. The choreography even reminds me of some stuff from HSM.
As described further on the mission's page, Improv Everywhere actually got permission from the mall to pull off this show. That's something they don't usually do, but in this case it made for a better performance. Having people dressed in the same uniforms as mall personnel and putting one behind the counter of Hot Dog on a Stick definitely made it seem more real. (The other food court businesses had no idea what was going to happen.)
Anyway, I won't lift all the notes from Improv Everywhere's mission page, even if I am rewording it. They deserve traffic for this one, so head on over there for more commentary and the photos.
Before you go, however, I would appreciate a comment here if you like this sort of post, or if you don't. I need feedback so I know what to write more about. 
Update (13:28): Reduced embed size; it was too big for the content column. It should no longer overflow into the sidebar.
Official Gmail Blog Posts Internal Screenshot?
I just looked over the post about Gmail invisibility at the Official Gmail Blog, and noticed that their screenshot is a bit funky. Compare the two images below:
The first image is mine; the second is what the Gmail Blog posted. Now, there isn't much different there, but they aren't posting screenshots of the interface the rest of us see. Makes me wonder what enhancements Google is hiding in the internal Gmail interface, waiting to be released to the masses. I hope there's some good stuff there... I want box controls! 
[Second image credit: Official Gmail Blog, under a claim of fair use for commentary]
The Sharper Image Files for Bankruptcy Protection
Yipe! I knew The Sharper Image's products were niche stuff, but I didn't think sales were this bad. The company filed for bankruptcy protection (as reported by the New York Times) due to slipping sales, stiffer competition, and image problems with its line of Ionic Breeze air purifiers. They'll also be closing approximately half of their stores, if I read the article correctly.
I have a pretty good idea as to why they're not doing very well. The problem with The Sharper Image is that their prices for things are a good chunk more than identical (but differently-branded) items elsewhere. For instance, a blue InfoGlobe clock I bought from the Discovery Channel Store was an extra $10-$15 at The Sharper Image, with the only difference being the logo displayed on a small panel above the five buttons on the front. Excessive markups are a bad way to try and increase profits, since the Internet makes it easier than ever to compare prices at different stores before buying anything.
I can't say I won't miss the stores (if they close the ones I go to), but they kind of had this coming, and I haven't bought anything there in years, if ever. They're still great places to browse interesting and unusual trinkets, though.
Evidence of Gmail Task List
Following the post I made yesterday about the rumored Gmail task list feature that "turned out to be" RTM, I saw a comment from Garett at Google Operating System and revisited the Groups thread pertaining to his original post. Users on Groups have posted evidence that Google is internally testing a task list feature.
The evidence comes in the form of CSS rules. One particularly interesting one references corp.google.com, which is (as far as I know) an internal network address accessible only within Google. Take a look at this rule (I've added line breaks and indents for clarity and space):
.gtasks-sprite { background-image: url(http://www.corp.google.com↵ /~bolinfest/gtasks/sprites.png)}
Looks like Garett was right after all. Yipe! I still want support for other task services, though. And the option to turn it on and off.
Gmail Task List Feature?
Garett Rogers posted something very strange this afternoon. It seems someone wrote in with a screenshot of a task list feature in Gmail and a (to me, rather dubious) explanation of how it got there. He thinks it's likely to be "similar to the 'Remember The Milk' addon" (he says RTM for Gmail uses Greasemonkey, which I don't believe is correct). The screenshot he posted, which I won't duplicate for fear of copyright infringement (see the original post), looks very, very similar to the RTM pane I have in my Gmail account right now, down to the icons and styling.
I'm excited if Google is going to add a new feature, but I'd rather it not be this one. Actually, let me re-state that. I'm excited if there's going to be a task list, but I hope Google has a stand-alone list as an option, and also offers support for RTM, Toodle (I think?), and some of the other more popular task management services. A list within Gmail doesn't do me much good, because I really like RTM. I wonder what's really up, though. Garett's post doesn't look too convincing to me.
Phooey. I got my hopes up for nothing. I actually read the Groups thread Garett linked to, and found that others had already come to the same conclusion I had tentatively in my head. That user somehow has installed the RTM extension and doesn't remember. Here I thought Google was doing something. Oh well, sounds like my suspicion of Garett's post was justified.
Here's what I think is going on. That user sounds very confused, because the task list and its associated tab within Gmail's settings keeps appearing and disappearing. One of two things could be happening: It could either be a hoax, deliberately written to get buzz going about something that's been around for ages; or that user could be going between Firefox (where RTM for Gmail works) and Internet Explorer (where it doesn't). Perhaps it's both, I don't know. But I'm pretty sure that it's just RTM for Gmail, and not a Google feature.
Update (02/17): Garett insists in a comment at Google Operating System that he posted a screenshot of RTM accompanying his post about a bona fide task list feature in Gmail. The saga continues... And it looks like I was wrong, actually.
Some Users Could Be Experiencing Gmail Outages
My site stats are telling me I have a spike in traffic from searches relating to Gmail outages today. All the keywords are similar to "gmail down january 11", with some minor variations, most leading to my Gmail's Down post from last January. To me, that's a good sign that Google's having some problems. My account is unaffected thus far, though it might be (you never know).
Maybe this is some sort of rolling outage having to do with a major network upgrade. Or maybe there are brownouts (short power outages) at one of Google's datacenters (unlikely; they must have enormous backup power systems). It's probably not network trouble, since I'm getting visits from search.
So, that's what I can gather from the search trends right now. There's a possibility that Gmail is having trouble today. That's all I know right now. I just hope it doesn't hit me...
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