Songs for a late night of work

In the spirit of dedication to work (which could also be any of: wanton self-destruction, masochism, repentance for sins, punishment for wrongs committed in a previous life, masochism, boredom) I pulled an all-nighter last night just to get some equipment put back together so I could run two 1-minute long tests before a meeting this morning.  Thankfully as I'm typing this I haven't quite yet collapsed, nodded off, or succumbed to any of the plethora of viruses that, even now, are almost certainly eying my sleep deprived and weakened body as the perfect breeding ground to cause a new pandemic

Regarding the topic at hand though, since it's a music post today, I was having a tough time finding a good balance between energy and chilled as my eyelids were falling closed.  I settled on a playlist of Nine Inch Nails and Filter for the bulk of the night.  I'd love to post more for each of these bands than I could reasonable expect anyone to listen to, so I'm going to limit it to only one song each.

Dose - Filter
Sorry, embedding disabled ... you'll have to follow the link.

March of the Pigs - Nine Inch Nails

The deconstruction of Harry III

I've been silently looking for some inspiration in photography lately.  It's not that I find anything particular lacking in the shots I've been taking, nor is there any shortage of inspiring photography out there to draw from, but I've been missing an idea of sorts ... an idea for a shoot or a subject to break me out of my norm a bit.  The idea of breaking out my camera at work certainly wasn't that idea, but tonight as I looked out at a mannequin spilled open on a table combined with some odd makeshift lighting and magnification I'd implemented to simply to make work easier I decided it'd make some pretty interesting subject matter.

If you've stayed with me through that brief introduction I present to you a short series of photographs dedicated to the idea that anything can be ripped open and probed to determine exactly what makes it tick.  Sources of lighting for this shoot were a fluorescent light built into an arm mounted magnifying lens I use to do electronics work (I also put the magnifying lens to work in a couple of pictures) and a simple halogen work light suspended from the ceiling.  No post-processing or editing was done at all, though I would like to remedy that at a later date.

Higher resolution pictures can be found in my Gallerama album

A big bloodhound in the back of a jacked up Ford

Feel like sharing music today, and don't have much to say, so enjoy some Clutch (and go see them live if they come to your town!) For the record I do realize that almost half of these songs are from one album, all I have to say to that is "Blast Tyrant kicks ass".

Donating skin

I've got an appointment booked in a couple of weeks to get my fourth tattoo done.  It's a simple design but it's going to be very interesting to see how it comes out since I've volunteered my upper arm as a canvas for an inexperienced tattoo apprentice!  We're talking about prime tattooing real estate here, so at this point you may quite legitimately ask me what the hell I'm thinking.  This is permanent after all.

I've had a design picked out for a long time that's relatively simple and insensitive to minor imperfections, getting my tattoo and getting to help out a budding artist seems like a win-win situation to me.

But I'm curious to hear what others have to say ... would you get tattooed by a new artist?  How about an experienced apprentice?  What type of pieces would you consider if you're going to an apprentice vs. an established artist?  May as well open the discussion up a bit, do you have a particular artist you go to?  Who are your favourite artists and what are you favourite pieces?

Be careful with your passwords

So I got a Facebook chat message from a friend today that said "Is this you?" and had a link to a facebook app.  Once I clicked it it asked me for my Facebook email and password which immediately made me suspicious.  Turns out my friend didn't send that at all and it seems likely that if I'd have put my email address and password in then my friends would have been getting the links too.

Welcome to the wonderful world of phishing, where less than scrupulous entities aim to steal your password by making you think you're entering it to a valid site for a valid reason.  There are a couple of common ways to do this, one is simply to send out an email asking someone to reply with there username and password for some legitimate sounding reason (any sane, legitimate, service will never ask you to email your password).  Another common variation is to create a web site that looks identical (or as close to identical as possible) to the site your trying to steal passwords for, then trick people into following a link to log in to this fake site instead of the site they think they're logging into.  These tactics are usually avoided by never sending passwords over email and double checking the address bar to make sure you're really at the site that you're logging into.

A follow-up Seether post

It was pointed out to me that I missed an "epic" Seether song when I made yesterday's post so I'll share one more song ...

A bit of light stretching

Based on various conversations I've had about getting my lobes stretched I think it is prudent at this point to provide a little clarification.  Having a lobe piercing stretched does not, contrary to popular belief, mean that I have large, gaping holes in my ears.  It is certainly the process by which people obtain large, gaping holes in their ears, but there is a great deal of middle ground to occupy.  The single flared tunnels I'm wearing right now aren't even distinguishable, upon a cursory inspection while I am wearing them, as being larger than a typical stud.

Moving on, I got the last of my ear lobe piercings stretched to 10 gauge today (I put up a page with a quick discussion of piercing sizes to give some idea of where 10 gauge lies in the aforementioned middle ground).  This piercing (the second one up my lobe) was done in 1996 ... with a gun, at a hairdresser if I recall correctly, just like the other lobe piercing that I'd already stretched.  The original studs were roughly 16 gauge (I haven't take a caliper to them yet), but over the years they'd loosened a lot so they went up to 10 gauge with just a quick stab with a taper and some new jewellery.  Here's a quick cell phone pic I took this afternoon (this way I also get to show off my daith piercing).

I bet it's not what you expect when you hear someone say "I got my ear lobes stretched today" ...

Scrambling for a topic

So I had a spur of the moment inclination to go get my second left lobe piercing stretched to 10 gauge after work today, then I remembered that the shop I go to (D & M Tattooing and Piercing) is closed on Mondays.  Oddly enough this isn't the first time I've had that exact failure in spontaneity, so a day later will have to do.

The stretch was also going to be my topic today ... hmm, I've been listening to a ton (or a tonne, my scale isn't that accurate) of Seether at work lately.  Certainly not the most unique or intriguing group in my library but it usually makes for a good listen, so here are a couple of songs that I particularly enjoy.

Introduction Appendix C: On Photography

A bit more than a year ago I decided I'd like to try my hand at photography in a manner somewhat more technical than the run-of-the-mill, point-and-shoot, style pictures I occasionally found myself taking. While I have a great appreciation for photography as an art form, my technical fascination with depth of focus, shutter timing and aperture selection, and to some extent lighting, is the driving force behind my interest.  Given the particulars of my interest my preference for subjects is largely falls into the architectural, landscape, and nature categories.  I've made no attempt, thus far, to delve into portrait photography or any real photos of live subjects.  Live subjects tend to move (at odds with my preference for long shutter times), require more intricate lighting, and just generally detract from my personal motives.

In order to satisfy my budding photography bug I got a used Nikon D40 with a 18-55mm kit lens and started playing around.  This very basic setup has actually allowed me to take some fairly impressive (to me anyway) pictures.  I've particularly enjoyed shooting city scenes at night, both in terms of the process and the results.

Parliament Hill over the Rideau Canal - Ottawa, ON - May 2010

Alberta Legislature - Edmonton, AB - November 2009

I've also enjoyed taking pictures of a more "natural" type, with the area immediately around my research lab being by far my most photographed location.

Sunset across a reflecting pond - Edmonton, AB - June 2010

Butterfly on a lilac - Edmonton, AB - June 2010

I haven't dedicated nearly as much time to exploring photography as I would have liked at this point, and given the rapidly cooling weather it might be some time before that changes, but going forward I'm hoping to get more practice with low-light cityscapes, diversify my subjects with more inanimate object, do some post-processing, and perhaps even start taking pictures involving people.  I try to upload some of my nicer and/or more interesting pictures to my Gallerama account, all of the pictures I included in this post, for example, are available in higher resolution there.

Introduction Appendix B: On Piercings and Tattoos

I have somewhat of an affinity for tattoos and piercings, though I should note that I'm neither heavily tattooed nor heavily pierced with only three small tattoos and nine piercings). I have had, on occasion, the question "why?" posed to me regarding piercings (oddly enough the same question doesn't seem to get asked about tattoos). The answer is simply that I like them and that I tend to get curious about what it's like to have different locations pierced. It only hurts for a couple of seconds and they're easily removable, so it seems like a fairly benign interest to pursue.

I've been sitting on this blog post for a couple of days now and I'm not feeling particularly wordy, so here's just a quick bit of info about what I've currently got.

Tattoos

• One on each wrist (daughter's names).
• One on my back (Black and Red Nautical Star).

Piercings

• 10g left and right ear lobes.
• 16g left "Auricle Piercing", it's like a helix piercing but specifically only mid-way up the ear.
• 16g right helix.
• 16g left daith.
• 14g labret.
• 14g tongue.
• One more that isn't polite to discuss in mixed company ...
• I've also had my eyebrow and left helix pierced, but took those out long ago (as I did with my first tongue piercing).

Introduction Appendix A: On Music

I like music, and I compulsively share songs with the hope that someone will listen and enjoy it as much as I do.  The songs I share tend to vary greatly, they follow my moods through darker and angrier moments, provide a good rhythm or melody as I go about my day, make me want to sing along (which I do poorly but loudly), and occasionally a certain song me will simply seem transcendent to me.  As a side note, I always appreciate suggestions for songs or bands I might enjoy (hint hint).

One is the loneliest blog post

In all likelihood you'll neither laugh nor cry, but with any luck you will allow me to entertain you with whatever discussion I feel inclined to venture into.  You can expect:

• Links to songs I feel like listening to, could be anything from heavy metal to smooth jazz.
• Discussion about tattoos and or piercings that I have, want, or find interesting.
• Thoughts on photography, and some of my painfully amateur photos.
• Some computer, electronics, or software talk ... probably in the form of complaints.

The title of this blog is quoted lyrics from the song "Silver" by Machine Head