julian_t

7 ms·

31.
by julian_t 2y ago
I wrote and contributed to several programming books, back in the glory days when your local bookstore had shelves of 1500 page tomes on programming topics. It really is true that you didn't do it for the money - up to six months work
32.
by julian_t 2y ago
Philip Glass, the composer, supported himself throughout his life as a cab driver and a plumber. There's a great story of him installing a dishwasher for the art critic of Time magazine.
33.
by julian_t 2y ago
Is there a law, like Betteridge's Law, that says "the answer to any question that says 'why not just' is 'it isn't as simple as that'"?
34.
by julian_t 2y ago
A South African colleague of mine reasoned that if 5.25" disks were "floppies", then the 3.5" ones must be "stiffies". Somehow this never caught on at work.
35.
by julian_t 2y ago
Is there some sort of survivors' club? The hours spent trawling through "Inside OLE" while trying to get the dam' thing to work...
36.
by julian_t 2y ago
Just last week I came across a site that listed over 1500 "partners". I' wonder if anyone from that company can tell me who each of those is and what they are used for?
37.
by julian_t 2y ago
A watch and a signet ring. In the UK at least, rings were a common piece of male jewelry.
38.
by julian_t 2y ago
I did a contract in the run-up to Y2K to help with some code that used two-digit year fields. In their defence, it was originally written in Fortran II sometime in the early 60s, and I think they can be forgiven for not thinking it might st
39.
by julian_t 2y ago
That's a great point. I saw something a few weeks back that I (coming up 70) want on a t-shirt: "I hate being the same age as old people". That definitely expresses how I feel very well.
40.
by julian_t 3y ago
My wife has very poor navigation skills, but is currently completing her second masters out of six degrees. So pretty smart, I guess. But she's also really dyslexic, and we've wondered if that could have anything to do with it.
41.
by julian_t 3y ago
Yep... Calais (ME) and Bryn Mawr (PA) come to mind.
42.
by julian_t 3y ago
Veterinary models also assume that the subject can't sue you.
43.
by julian_t 3y ago
The same kind of thing happens in the US. A relative (a Brit) needed to renew his visa, put in the application and heard nothing for months, and a immigration lawyer told him that it could take over a year to process. But the lawyer also sa
44.
by julian_t 3y ago
Synthetic aging... there's quite a lot of this going on in the guitar world. On the purely cosmetic level, you can find a lot of 'relic' electric guitars, made to look like they've been on the road since the 60s. Some ac
45.
by julian_t 3y ago
At least with old fashioned keys you can't easily give out a duplicate. I was once in bed, late at night, lights out, when someone let themselves into my room - a rather drunk guy demanding to know what I was doing in his room. The des
46.
by julian_t 3y ago
It's missing my local one here in Surrey, where someone has one growing in their rather small front garden. Such a huge tree in such a small space - I wonder which one came first. Anyway, thanks for making me aware of this, I'll g
47.
by julian_t 3y ago
Just past 50 years in. It's fun watching new hires when they realize how old I actually am ;-)
48.
by julian_t 3y ago
As a guitarist, that's partly why I prefer actual effects pedals to adding a new plugin to an application. Physical cables to plug in and knobs to turn somehow improves the experience for me. But Walkmen? Nah, give me my MiniDisc any d
49.
by julian_t 3y ago
That brings back a lot of memories. I too laid a lot of cable, and as well as field telephones we had 18, 19 and 88 sets. My first introduction to radio communication. What now seems completely surreal is that we also had all sorts of weapo
50.
by julian_t 3y ago
I think this is true whenever we learn to interact with a system. When I was learning the saxophone I had real trouble getting one note to sound properly, and it seemed to me that there was a leak on that pad. My teacher couldn't get m
51.
by julian_t 3y ago
It's the same for cars here in the UK, where what used to be small cars are getting larger with each new release. The current crop of Minis are larger than a lot of large family cars used to be. People say it's due to "what t
52.
by julian_t 3y ago
Maybe one written by a Geordie?
53.
by julian_t 3y ago
Yes, some shops are, and I lost count of the times when me, carrying a basket with a few items, was behind several other shoppers with huge trollies full to the brim. Pick a busy time and all the lanes are held up like this. Now we have sel
54.
by julian_t 3y ago
I wrote a few things for Wrox back then. Ivor managed to get his books onto the reading lists for a few US colleges, and that ensured a steady flow of royalties (and requests for updated versions). I was quite jealous.
55.
by julian_t 3y ago
When working in Shanghai I had to go to an office in an outlying district, where the subway station was below a mall, and the way in and out of the subway was through a MacDonalds, walking past the queues waiting to order. The first time
56.
by julian_t 3y ago
I'd really love to have been in the Albert Hall to hear this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdyAF9M3XVw
57.
by julian_t 3y ago
I have a related peeve about an iOS app I use (MapStr) to save recommendations for restaurants and pubs. It's an excellent app, but has one feature that bugs me. For each entry you can set the status as "to visit" or "vi
58.
by julian_t 3y ago
Speaking of kitchen appliances, we need a new immersion blender and my wife wants a cordless one. The old corded one lasted nearly 20 years, but most cordless ones have non-replaceable batteries and so are going to become junk long before t
59.
by julian_t 3y ago
When I was at school in the 70s, if we got something on our hands in the science labs we'd wash it off with acetone or benzene (but were never advised to drink them) And I still remember the chemistry teacher rolling beads of mercury r
60.
by julian_t 3y ago
Nasty liquids that clean the glassware is one thing... nasty liquids that would dissolve the glassware (and you) takes it up another level. I was happy when I got past that part of my experimental career.

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