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So, I've been seeing this girl for about 3 months now. I don't really know if she qualifies as a 'girlfriend' or not. Probably not, but it's close.

Anyways, I've been seeing this girl for about 3 months now. We usually are able to get together every week or two, so I've seen her around 10 times. Before Christmas, I went over to her house and met her boyfriend (primary). I was pretty nervous to meet her boyfiend. You can never be sure that partners are fully on board, or not, until you actually meet them. There was a slight chance that I would get my ass kicked (I'm more of a flighter than a fighter), so I was pretty nervous to meet him. Anyways, he turned out to be a really cool guy that I liked a lot.

Last night was my turn to introduce her to my wife. She was nervous. I was nervous. We spent the evening together while my wife was at work, and they met as my wife got home from work.

It was a little awkward. My wife was tired from a day at work. My girlfriend was nervous to meet my wife. I was nervous for both of them. I didn't know what to do while they met. I didn't know if I should touch one (or both) of them or not. I ended up kind of standing between them in an awkward triangle in the kitchen of my house. Small talk ensued.

Yes, it was awkward, but it went well. As well as a meeting like that could go, I suppose. We chatted for about 10 minutes, then I saw her out.

Everything is still going well between my wife and I. She is still not pregnant yet, despite ~8 months of trying or so. I've looked at the stats, and 80% of fertile couples conceive within one year, so there is nothing to worry about yet, but it's hard not to go down that thought path. We will continue trying. It took my mom almost 3 years to get pregnant with me, so...

I'm also thinking of trying to line up more dates again. It's been really, really nice not getting depressed over dating (poly dating as a male is super, super depressing), but I think I might take another try anyways. I really like the girl I have been seeing the last few months, but we aren't able to see each other as much as I would ideally like (because of work or other obligations), so I'm tossing around that idea.

I'm not really sure what the protocol would be for that though... I already talked to my wife about possibly trying to line up another date with someone else, but should I have the same conversation with the new girl that I have been seeing? It's only been 3 months, so I'm not really sure... I think it's a courtesy to check in with your partners before looking for another, but, I mean, we've only had ~10 dates, so... I'm kinda leaning towards just looking and if I manage to find anything to let her know, but I'm not sure...

Anyways, after a year and a half, things are still progressing well. I haven't screwed everything up yet!

When I was asked to make this address I wondered what I had to say to you boys who are graduating. And I think I have one thing to say. If you wish to be useful, never take a course that will silence you. Refuse to learn anything that implies collusion, whether it be a clerkship or a curacy, a legal fee or a post in a university. Retain the power of speech no matter what other power you may lose. If you can take this course, and in so far as you take it, you will bless this country. In so far as you depart from this course, you become dampers, mutes, and hooded executioners.

As a practical matter, a mere failure to speak out upon occassions where no statement is asked or expect from you, and when the utterance of an uncalled for suspicion is odious, will often hold you to a concurrence in palpable iniquity. Try to raise a voice that will be heard from here to Albany and watch what comes forward to shut off the sound. It is not a German sergeant, nor a Russian officer of the precinct. It is a note from a friend of your father's, offering you a place at his office. This is your warning from the secret police. Why, if you any of young gentleman have a mind to make himself heard a mile off, you must make a bonfire of your reputations, and a close enemy of most men who would wish you well.

I have seen ten years of young men who rush out into the world with their messages, and when they find how deaf the world is, they think they must save their strength and wait. They believe that after a while they will be able to get up on some little eminence from which they can make themselves heard. "In a few years," reasons one of them, "I shall have gained a standing, and then I shall use my powers for good." Next year comes and with it a strange discovery. The man has lost his horizon of thought, his ambition has evaporated; he has nothing to say. I give you this one rule of conduct. Do what you will, but speak out always. Be shunned, be hated, be ridiculed, be scared, be in doubt, but don't be gagged. The time of trial is always. Now is the appointed time.

John J. Chapman
Commencement Address to the Graduating Class of Hobart College, 1900

I hear what many of you posted regarding my reputation. But I made the decision to burn my reputation in the Spring of 1997, in response to the Heaven's Gate UFO Cult Mass Suicide. I've been publishing openly about my mental illness ever since then, in hopes of pointing out to others that reality is not as concrete as it may seem.

If my present consultancy doesn't work out, maybe I'll start a donut shop. No one would care that I'm a wingnut provided the donuts tasted good.

I have lots of other ideas.

I'm not saying you're wrong, rather, that to wreck my reputation was my conscious, carefully-considered choice.

Just before I posted my first web page about my illness, I carried a hardcopy around with me, to ask friends, family and my mental health professionals whether I should really publish it. All but one encouraged me to do so. That one who said I should not, had been stigmatized due to her own disability. I chose to publish in part to erase the stigma against people like her.

In the interest of open science, Annese planned to Webcast the entire sectioning online. He and his team expected that just a few brain scientists would tune in, but they were wrong. Annese began slicing on Wednesday, December 2, 2009, exactly one year after H. M.’s death. The next morning, when the researchers returned to the lab, thousands of viewers were waiting for them on the Web. Neuroscientists were watching, but so were all kinds of other people, alerted via blog and Twitter posts. Annese wound up slicing from Thursday morning through late Friday night, inspired by a global audience that eventually totaled about 400,000

Put articles here, edit, publish stories later. Comment if you like something.

Hate

Is CES getting too big for its own good?

Lenovo

Lenovo Refreshes ThinkPad Lineup at CES
Lenovo Launches The Modular ThinkPad X1 Tablet at CES
Lenovo Launches ThinkVision Displays With USB-C Docking At CES
Lenovo Launches ThinkPad X1 Yoga At CES With OLED Display
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/lenovo-thinkpad-13-windows10-chromebook,30879.html
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9889/lenovo-refreshes-thinkpad-lineup-at-ces
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9887/lenovo-launches-thinkpad-x1-yoga-at-ces-with-oled-display
Lenovo Announces The Vibe S1 Lite
Lenovo Debuts New ThinkVision Displays At CES 2016
These Are Lenovo's idea And Yoga Products For CES
Lenovo Shows Off (Razer) Gaming Systems And Peripherals at CES

Acer

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/acer-ultra-thin-curved-monitors,30873.html#xtor=RSS-181
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/acer-h7-monitors-usb-type-c,30866.html#xtor=RSS-181
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/acer-ces-notebooks-chrome-tablet,30874.html#xtor=RSS-181
Acer Aspire Unveils Switch 12 S 2-in-1 Notebook

NVIDIA

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/nvidia-vr-ready-qualification-program,30880.html
NVIDIA Announces DRIVE PX 2 - Pascal Power For Self-Driving Cars
NVIDIA Discloses Next-Generation Tegra SoC; Parker Inbound?
Nvidia Shield TV Update 3.0 Offers Marshmallow, Additional Storage Options And Customizations

MediaTek

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/mediatek-soc-wearables-smarthome-bluray,30833.html

Samsung

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/samsung-portable-ssd-t3,30875.html
Samsung Adds Lightweight Models To ATIV Book 9 Notebook Series
Samsung Unveils The Galaxy TabPro S
Samsung Announces New Gear S2 Models And iOS Support
Samsung Announces The Ultra-Light Notebook 9 Series Laptops At CES 2016

ASUS

ASUS Announces February Launch For The ZenFone Zoom

Huawei

Huawei's Mate 8 6-inch Phablet Coming To North America, We Go Hands On
The Huawei Mate 8 Review
Huawei Announces The MediaPad M2 10
Huawei Launches Huawei Watch Elegant and Huawei Watch Jewel
Hands On With the Huawei Honor 5X

PCs, Laptops, Tablets

MAINGEAR Rolls-Out 34” All-in-One PC with 18-Core Xeon, GeForce GTX Titan X
Endless On A Mission To Bring Information Age To All With $79 PC
Gigabyte Updates Aorus X5 Gaming Notebook With Skylake And Fusion Keyboard
Origin PC Goes Custom With Chronos SFF Case, Omni AIO Gaming PC
Toshiba’s DynaPad Tablet to Hit Stores in Late January
ASRock To Deliver Mini-PC Using Intel's New STX Form Factor
Razer Launches The Razer Blade Stealth Ultrabook And Razer Core At CES 2016
Samsung Announces Budget 'Chromebook 3' For Early 2016
Android-Based Remix OS 2.0 Coming As Free Download For PC And Mac
Intel’s Skull Canyon Mystery PC Confirmed And Detailed
First Benchmarks On Intel's New Atom-Based Compute Stick
Intel Brings Skylake To Its NUC PCs
AMD Reveals Single Socket For Zen CPU, APU
AMD Announces A10-7890K APU and Upgrades Desktop Platforms
Intel Expands Compute Stick Family with Cherry Trail and Core M Models
Compulab Rolls-Out Passively-Cooled Airtop Systems
CES 2016: MSI’s 27-inch 4K Gaming AIO with Full Sized Discrete GPU, the 27XT 6QE
CES 2016: 34-inch 3440x1440 AIO Hands-On at GIGABYTE
Home>desktops
CES 2016: MSI’s Vortex Gaming PC on Display and It Looks Almost Like a Mac Pro
CES 2016: MSI Gaming Notebooks and Mobile Workstations
ECS Goes Skylake with LIVA One

Smartphones

Gold Nexus 6P Comes To The US
Intel’s Smartphone: RealSense/Project Tango Dev Kit Shipping Q1
Lenovo, Intel Have Duelling Project Tango Smartphones
Intel and Google Equip Smartphones with 3D Cameras and Computer Vision
Acer Liquid Jade Primo Dock, Quick Look
Marshall's 'London' Smartphone Is Built For Music Creators
Macate 'Cyberphones' Promise Unspoofable Face Recognition, Other Security Measures

Wearables

CES 2016: Fitbit Blaze smartwatch sends shares into dive
Honor Launches The Honor Band Z1
Zeiss Smart Optics: Discreet Smart Glasses

Graphics

Imagination Announces PowerVR Series7XT Plus Family - Rogue Gets Improved Compute
Imagination Demos Realtime Ray Tracing
Asus Debuts Graphics Dock That Uses PCIe Over USB-C

Storage

Seagate used shingled magnetic recording in a 2.5" portable drive for the first time in order to fit 2 terabytes within a 9.6 mm thick enclosure.

Intel 3D XPoint, Pictured: Microsoft Joins The Party
LaCie Unveils USB-C Porsche and Chrome Drives
Seagate Updates DAS Portfolio at CES 2016
SanDisk Announces X400 Client SSD for OEMs
Patriot Memory Enters PCIe Storage Market with Hellfire SSDs
Zotac Prepares Premium NVMe SSD Based On Phison's E7
Silicon Motion Has The First Multi Vendor 3D Flash Controller
Need A 512 GB USB Stick Or USB Type-C SSD Enclosure? Patriot Has You Covered
OCZ Preps Second-Gen TLC, First NVMe SSDs For 2016
Patriot Shows Hellfire And Viper SSDs At CES
QNAP at CES: A M.2 SSD NAS, Dual-Xeon ZFS NAS and More
The QNAP TBS-453A Changes The NAS Game
Kingston Readies Several New Products For 2016
Mark Your Calendar: Phison E7 Set For March Release
SanDisk Updates DAS Lineup at CES
Plextor M8Pe With Marvell Eldora Coming Soon
Mushkin Goes For The SSD Trifecta At CES
G-Technology Demonstrates G-SPEED Shuttle XL Thunderbolt 2 DAS at CES

Displays

CES 2016: Hand-on with LG's roll-up flexible screen
Samsung Introduces Curved 27-inch CF591 FreeSync-Over-HDMI Monitor
Dell Introduces World's First InfinityEdge Monitors And 30-inch OLED Monitor
Dell's Wireless Monitors Change The Way You Work
Dell Demonstrates 30-inch 4K OLED Display
Hisense at CES: Affordable and Feature-Packed 4K TVs for HTPCs
Viewsonic Debuts Eight New Monitors At CES

Virtual Reality

Oculus Rift Now Available For Pre-Order For $599, Will Ship In April
The Vive Pre, HTC’s New VR Developer Kit: First Look
HTC Unveils the Vive Pre Dev Kit
Virtuix' Potential Mini-IPO Lets General Public Invest In VR Tech
Tom's Hardware Tries The Virtuix Omni VR Treadmill
Alienware And Dell Announce Oculus Ready PC Bundles For $1,600
Oculus: The Best Way To Keep A Secret Is To Not Know Answer
Exclusive: Fove's VR HMD At CES 2016, First Look
Virtuix Proved That The Omni Vr Treadmill Is the Real Deal
QiVARI Eye Tracking Tech Taking On Tobii, Fove In AR/VR HMDs
3DRudder VR Foot Controller Steering Towards March Launch
Interview: Valve's Chet Faliszek On The HTC Vive Pre
Crytek Announces 'VR First' Academic Program

Cameras

HumanEyes' Consumer-Grade 'Vuze' 360-Degree VR Camera Package, Under $1,000
Razer Launches The Stargazer Webcam With Intel RealSense3D At CES 2016
Kodak Launches 360-Degree 4K Action Cam And Accessories

Networking and Routers

Promise Unveils Apollo Personal Cloud Product
Amped Wireless' Athena Series Gets A New Router And Range Extender
Linksys Teases New MU-MIMO Products At CES 2016
Netgear Announces Cable Modem Router To Lower Your Monthly ISP Rental Costs
Wi-Fi HaLow: Long-Range, Low-Power Wi-Fi for Internet-of-Things Devices
Four New Linksys Cable Modems Revealed During CES
Netgear's MU-MIMO EX7300 And EX6400 Range Extenders Are Available Now
TP-Link Unifies Smart Home Functionality With The SR20 Smart Home Router
Securifi's Almond 3, An All-Encompassing Smart Home Solution
Netgear Releases Nighthawk X4 Successor: The R7800 Nighthawk X4S
D-Link Offers Adaptive Roaming With New Unified Network Kit
Synology Demonstrates RT1900ac 802.11ac Router at CES
Linksys Expands Max-Stream Networking Lineup at CES
Netgear Updates Networking Lineup at CES
TRENDnet Announces AC2600 Router and AC1900 USB 3.0 WLAN Adapter at CES
Amped Wireless Launches APOLLO IP Cameras and Updates Networking Lineup at CES
D-Link Demonstrates Innovative Networking Solutions at CES
Securifi Updates Smart Home Hub Lineup with New Almond 3 Wireless Router

Cooling, Cases, PSUs, Motherboards, Accessories

Cooler Master Debuts MasterWatt 1200W, 1500W PSUs
Cooler Master Unveils MasterAir Maker 8, MasterCase Maker 5
RGB Lighting Comes To Logitech’s G502 Proteus Spectrum
CES 2016: be quiet! Doubles Revenue in 2015
Deepcool Integrates Liquid Cooling Into Genome ATX Case
be quiet! Pure Power 9 Series Unveiled
Rosewill Showcases PSUs, Cases And More At CES 2016
Seasonic Reveals Its First Titanium PSU: The Prime
DeepCool's Liquid Cooled PSU
AMD Reveals Wraith: Next-Generation Cooler for Microprocessors
EVGA Introduces Upgradable All-In-One Liquid Cooling System
Thermaltake Pacific R360 D5 Water Cooling Kit Makes A Splash At CES
SilverStone PSUs, Cases And Other Accessories At CES 2016
In Win Outs H-Frame Case And Limited Edition 1065 W PSU
Thermaltake’s Core W100 And WP100 Are Cases With Plenty Of Spaces
Thermaltake Makes A 'Green' 1250-Watt RGB LED PSU
CES 2016: Deepcool’s Gamer Storm brand Exhibits Water Cooling for a Power Supply
The Problem With Overclocking On Non-Z170 Chipsets
CES 2016: GIGABYTE’s Double Length Gaming BRIX
MSI's Four New Motherboards Includes Gold PCB Model
Super Micro Unveils Z170, H170 Boards With OC Features At CES
The Rosewill Quark Series Power Supply Review (750W, 850W, 1000W, 1200W)
CES 2016: The Race to Skylake Xeon Motherboards at GIGABYTE
CES 2016: Deepcool’s Genome is a Water Cooling Equipped Case with a Helix Reservoir
All Of Asus' New Motherboards At CES
CES 2016: MSI’s Golden Idea for Motherboards
CES 2016: Cooler Master’s MasterWatt Connected Digital PSU Almost Ready
Patriot’s Three Prototype Gaming Mice At CES

Cars

CES 2016: Faraday Future shows off its concept car
Qualcomm, Nvidia are driving us nuts – with silicon-brains-for-cars
Automakers Mark Moves Into Tech With Expanded Presence At CES
NVIDIA Pascal GPUs Coming to Automotive ‘Supercomputer’

Drones and Robots

At CES, New Robots Deliver More Coos Than Utility
Drone able to transport humans shown at Consumer Electronics Show by Chinese drone company

Misc.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/ces-enthusiast-news-here,30869.html#xtor=RSS-181
CES 2016: A look at the first tech announced in Vegas
NZXT Launches Overhauled CAM 3.0 PC Monitoring Tool
CES 2016 Day Zero Wrap-Up (Video)
Ambarella CES 2016 Tour
Revisiting Keyssa: Commercial Availability, Products in Q1 2016
Tom's Hardware CES 2016 Day One Video Wrap-up
Tom's Hardware CES 2016 Final Video Roundup
Tom's Hardware's CES 2016 Top Picks
Peek Into The Future: C.E.S. 2016 Wrap-Up
CES 2016: ASUS Product Tour
CES 2016: Dell Booth Tour
CES 2016: Lenovo Booth Tour
Conexant Announces New Audio Processing Solutions At CES
Report by Robert Scoble from CES
ASUS Booth Tour at CES 2016: 10G Switches, External GPU Dock, USB-C Monitor and more
An Unexpected CES Trend: Modularity

Write:

Automotive + NVIDIA Pascal
LG rollable display
3D Xpoint
Seagate stuff
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9940/intel-and-google-equip-smartphones-with-3d-cameras-and-computer-vision

No, I am not "stealing" when I block ads.

But even if I were ... I am going to block ads, anyway. I can't be reasoned with. What are you going to do about it? :)

I teach my children that our family considers a certain set of words to be "bad words," words which we choose to use sparingly or not at all. I also teach them that it is sometimes necessary to use these words in a quote, to communicate accurate information about what somebody said, and that this is a permissible usage of those words.

Of course, everybody's set of bad words is different. For many people that set is empty or near empty. For most speakers of English, that set includes a word that starts with N and is a racist epithet used against people of dark skin.

Before his death Ian Murdock used that word in a quote. He was extremely agitated and emotional at the time, possibly under the influence of alcohol, and in my opinion he didn't communicate his message well at all, so it's no wonder many people are misunderstanding. But the concept is not hard. Murdock did not reveal himself to be a racist in his use of this word - instead he was railing against racism and people who use that word, people who will ignore evil deeds because they are done against mere "blacks."

That's all he was trying to say and once it's understood it's pretty clear. But some people are calling for Debian to be renamed because they believe the founder, Ian Murdock, was a white supremecist..

I'll keep calling it Debian.

BTW, ReiserFS was named after a wife-murderer. Just sayin'.

Some express dismay that I'm living in a tent under a highway overpass. Actually I feel like I've got it pretty good.

I have my music, see.

When I left Caltech in January 1985 I was determined to work as a street artist on Telegraph Avenue in Berkeley. I'm not real sure what happened - my memories of the time are confused - but I wound up at UC Santa Cruz where I ultimately completed my physics degree.

I've been working as a coder since 1987. Since 2004 I've thought I should be a musician. Not just as a hobby but as a way of life.

I was really beating myself up for not singing on the street as often as I could have. But I've been a busker for just three months. Actually I'm making good progress.

Today is below freezing, it's too cold to sing. Not that I'm unwilling to brave the chill but that the cold air in my throat diminishes the capacity of my voice.

By the time Spring comes I will have more songs to sing, and will sing better. I'll earn plenty of tips then.

I'm good at coding, but coding does not make me happy.

Music makes me happy.

It's that time of year again. The time of year when everyone and their dog waxes nostalgic about all the shit nobody cares about from the year past, and stupidly predicts the next year in the grim knowledge that when the next New Year comes along nobody will remember that the dumbass predicted a bunch of foolish shit that turned out to be complete and utter balderdash. I might as well, too. Just like I did last year (yes, a lot of this was pasted from last year's final chapter).

Some of these links go to S/N since they don't have slashdot's patented text mangler. Stories and articles meant to ultimately be published in a printed book have smart quotes, and slashdot isn't smart enough for smart quotes.

As usual, first: the yearly index:

Journals:
the Paxil Diaries
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014

2015 articles:
Where's my damned tablet? (somehow didn't post this one to soylent)
Are printed books' days numbered?
A suggestion to mobile browser makers and the W3C
Futurists...
"My God! It's full of fail!" -David Bowman
Where's my fridge??
1950s TV

Sci-Fi:
Nobots
Mars, Ho!
Yesterday's Tomorrows
Dumb Tourist!
Amnesia
Stealth
Voyage to Earth
Plutus' Revenge
Note: Soylent is changing URLs of Mars, Ho! and Yesterday's Tomorrows so that they lead to a 404

There are six more stories finished and one started, but I'm giving the magazines first crack at them. They are:

Dewey's War
The Exhibit
Sentience
Martian Murder
Cornodium
Weird Planet
The Prisoner

Last years' stupid predictions:
I got one wrong; Random Scribblings didn't come out. I could have published it this year, but since the subtitle is "Junk I've Littered the Internet With for Two Decades" I decided to add this years scribblings and a little of next year's to it.

This year's predictions: same as last year's. I'm not going to predict publication of Voyage to Earth and Other Stories because chances are it won't be done. As I write this the stories finished so far make up 36,000 words, which is halfway there at least. But I will predict:

Someone will die. Not necessarily anybody I know...
SETI will find no sign of intelligent life. Not even on Earth.
The Pirate Party won't make inroads in the US. I hope I'm wrong about that one.
US politicians will continue to be wholly owned by the corporations.
I'll still be a nerd.
You'll still be a nerd.
technophobic fashionista jocks will troll slashdot.
Slashdot will be rife with dupes.
Many Slashdot FPs will be poorly edited.
Slashdot still won't have fixed its patented text mangler.
...and a new one: microsoft will continue sucking

Happy New Year! Ready for another trip around the sun?

I just read that the rough cut for Star Trek Continues episode 6 has been completed. The episode should be out some time in 2016. Looking forward to it! I wonder if it will feature the new engine room.

Meanwhile another Star Trek fanfilm production was sued today by Paramount. From what I read from the STC people, Paramount had stated they would permit fan productions as long as noone was making any money. I wonder if that's not true, or they changed their mind, or what.

So ... what happened to Ian Murdock?

Update: At the time of my writing this earlier, there was no news. Now I see from his employer that Ian committed suicide.. He was already dead by the time most of us heard of the threat, I believe.

I read a portion of Ian's article on how he found Linux earlier today and enjoyed it a lot. He started on an Apple 2 like I did, but obviously he went a lot further in life. So sorry to lose you, Ian. The world is much poorer for your passing.

Suicide threats should always be taken seriously. Worst case scenario you embarrass somebody and they never do it again.