Blue Sparks

Download PiPic

If you want to set up your own site to build pictures of Pi, I have put the PiPic script up for download. It is available under the GNU GPL.

http://zenwerx.com/pipic.tar.gz

Pi? Pie!

As some of you already know I host a page on my site here which will show you 4 million digits of Pi. You may ask why, and I really couldn't tell you. It's just something I thought was neat, and so I did it. The calling of a true blooded nerd I guess...

Well, I took it one step further this week. I've heard of pages which will show you pictures of Pi before by mapping digits on to images, but they didn't do so on demand. So I've taken it upon myself to help everyone out. Now you can view Pi at any resolution you would like, from 1x1 to 2048x2048. It could go larger as well, although my current script is limited in size because I have (wait for it) 4 million digits of Pi stored here (and what's 2048x2048?).

So, if you're nerdy enough you can check it out too:

The Winter Blahs

Today I feel just 'meh'. I'm not exactly certain why, so I'm just blaming the winter. I really just feel like sleeping the day away...

Long Time, No See

It's been a long time since I've put an update here. No real excuses. I pretty much forgot about the 'blog.' Oh well, I guess. I'll try and update again at some point...

Sean Carpenter, Travelling Man

I just figured since my last entry was about Aaron, I should really write one about my other brother Sean. He would get jealous if I didn't, classic middle child syndrome (haha Sean, don't kill me... it's just a joke). We're actually off to see Sean's wedding tomorrow, which is being held in the Dominican Rebuplic! I get to go on a vacation, drink a lot of beer, and sit on the beach all for my brother. I swear, it's tough trying to support your family some times.

Aaron Carpenter, Rugby Star

I try to keep my praise for my brother at a minimum, for obvious reasons. It's not that I don't appreciate where he is now, I'm actually quite proud of him. Really it's that I don't want to feel like I'm pushing him on anyone, or trying to make myself look better by having a brother who plays Rugby for Canada. For the most part I let Aaron speak for himself, he's used to it now after all of the interviews. I tend to make my tributes in different ways, such as starting a wikipedia page for him, the Brantford Harlequins, and other Rugby Union pages.

This time it's different, I can't help but make note of how happy I am to see him playing in the Rugby Union World Cup. Canada may have dropped their first two games so far, but we, as a family, don't care. Aaron has made his dream come true, he's playing in the biggest sporting event there is for the sport of his choice. There has been ups and downs, just like any journey, but he has reached the goal.

I guess you can't help but feel proud when you get quotes like the following from Rugby Canada News (even though the try was called back... it's still a good quote):


My wife was telling me a story last night about her sister, who teaches a grade eight public school class. She has two students who love Rugby, and can't wait to get into high school where they can begin to play on a team. She asked the two of them if they knew who Aaron was and, of course, was greeted with glowing eyes and a thorough description. Now that she had their attention she mentioned that Aaron was her brother-in-law and was rewarded with two gaping jaws.

This story made me realize how important Aaron really is. Not just to his family, but the entire community. We have a generation of young players who are looking up to him and watching his every move. I can't even imagine the responsibility or the weight that must carry on a person, but I do believe that he does all of us, including the community, proud.



Aaron, keep up the good work!

Stupid Futureshop

Le sigh.... I received an email today with the subject "Important information about fraudulent email". The fact that it made it through my spam filter without a valid sender, was actually interesting. So I decided to read it. It purported to be a notification about phishing and have some detail about a scam pretending to be from futureshop and requiring your credit card number.



The interesting thing here is that there were some links embedded in the text. Now if you pull up the picture there, you'll see that the links don't go to future shop. They actually look pretty fishy... dcm5.com???? I started wondering if this was a strange phishing scam trying to pass itself off as a warning about the very act of phishing!

So I took some action. I emailed futureshop and politely informed them that if this really was a warning about phishing, having shady emails and links wasn't really the way to go about it. I also said that if this wasn't a real email, I'd be concerned about the fact it seemed very targeted at a specific group. Anyway, to finish off the story I got a dumbass boiler-plate message stating this was an actual email from them. At this point I got snarky and told them to shape up their act when they send out warning emails (as if they'd listen to me anyway). Morons...

House Pictures

It's long overdue, but we finally have some decent pictures of the house online. No outside shots, but who really wants to look at my brown lawn and wilted flowers anyway?? :)

Inside
Back Deck (with Dancin' Mike the Fool)

Bear Lake '07

It's been a week since we got back from the cottage. I've been right back into the grind, so it's been tough to find the time to write about the experience. I'm sneaking this in at work (I was supposed to be in a meeting, but the other people didn't show), so I'll try to keep it short.

I definitely had a lot of fun. I got to go fishing every day we were there. The experience makes me want to get my own boat so I can go out on the lake any time I want! The first few days were a little frustrating while I was trying to fish, but I managed to find a few good spots for fishing. I didn't catch a thing (besides Sunfish) for the first two days... I was beginning to reconsider my enjoyment of sport fishing. Finally on the third day Jackie and I caught a few Largemouth Bass. After that I had 3 days of angling fury, catching a ton of fish, including a 5+lb Largemouth! The luck dried up after that, but I was still satisfied.

 

Other activities included swimming (I cut my foot on a mussel shell, or a piece of glass), drinking, and napping. I was definitely into the drinking and napping. It made for a shorter lapse between the morning and evening fishing trips! :)

Our friends Kira and Mark came up on Wednesday. They added to the fun, since I was able to challenge someone other than Jackie to a game of Scrabble. We never really did get into the other board games or the deck of cards, but overall it was a fun time.

There were some car troubles on the way home. Kira and Mark's truck broke down with a snapped belt. Unfortunately even after Mark and I changed the belt on the side of the highway, it turned out to be another problem. We had to wait a couple hours for CAA to show up. But everything did end up ok... eventually.

That's really about it... if you want to take a look at the photos, they're available online for your viewing.

Matt's Pond

Just got back from fishing in Matthew's back pond a little while ago. I must say that little pond has some interesting things in it. Considering it's an irrigation pond one wouldn't expect it to hold stock such as Northern Pike and Bass! Well, if you thought that way you would be WRONG! Because this little pond is a goldmine! Bass, Perch, Pike... and even some Sunfish.

I wonder how much of it has strayed down the creek and decided to take up home there... I also wonder how much Matthew's brother has stocked in the past from other lakes. Just don't catch the turtles. They're not as nice as the fish.