Curmudgeon Alley

I have not real gripes with book. It is not great; it is not bad. There are not a lot of resources out there to use to study for the OCP Developer exam. This seems to be one of the few resources out there outside of one of the exam prep companies.

I’ve been in this business more than a few years, and I am used to reading technical manuals and books. This one is especially dry. I really had to crack my internal whip to get after it.

My real gripe is the CD packaged with it. Continue reading “OCP Developer PL/SQL Program Units Exam Guide”

2010/01/212010/01/21

Aunt Katy Gives an Anatomy Lesson

It was summer, and we were in Oklahoma again. Back from the east coast, and our urban life style.

It was early in the morning, and I was at Aunt Katy’s house. I was not very old, I’m thinking 3rd or 4th grade. She asked me if I wanted to go out to the ranch that day; they were going to make steers. That caught my interest as I thought steers came into the world the usual way; I did not know they were manufactured. Being an inquisitive child I asked her, “How do you make steers?”

She replied, “Well you know, they cut off their #%$”. I looked at her perplexed not understanding what #%$ meant. She proceeded to go through a list of slang terms for that portion of the male anatomy, with me looking puzzled the whole time. Continue reading “Aunt Katy Gives an Anatomy Lesson”

2010/01/212010/01/21

Steak and Kidney Pie

steak-and-kidney-pie One of my favorite stories about my mother involves Agatha Christie. When I was in high school she really enjoyed reading these mystery novels by the famed English author. Apparently, a popular dish in England and Agatha Christie’s novels is steak and kidney pie. My mother decided it sounded delicious, and one evening when my father was not going to be home for dinner she decided to make the dish. The fact that she waited until her husband was not going to be there will give the reader a clue as to what is coming next.

She found a recipe, and bought all the ingredients. I’m sure the steak and kidney were not cheap. She prepared the dish and put it before us unsuspecting guinea pigs, oops I mean boys. After a bite or two, none of us would eat anymore, and remember we were teenage boys aka bottomless pits. My mother became very upset, and began to cry. The funny part is after a bite or two of Agatha’s dish, she decide she did not want anymore either.

We never saw steak and kidney pie again.

2010/01/212016/01/17

If I was not so damn old, and Canada so damn cold

Court eases business, union election spending rule — Link removed

From the above article:
“The Supreme Court threw out a 63-year-old law designed to restrain the influence of big business and unions on elections Thursday, ruling that corporations may spend as freely as they like to support or oppose candidates for president and Congress. The decision could drastically alter who gives and gets hundreds of millions of dollars in this year’s crucial midterm elections.”

All together now…

I pledge allegiance to the registered trade mark
Of the United Corporations of America
And to the greed for which it stands
One conglomerate under Adam Smith
Outsourced, with excessive profit
And power for an chosen few

If I was not so damn old, and Canada so damn cold, I would immigrate. I hate what the Right is doing to this country. I used to be proud to say I was American. That has not been true for quite some time now.

2010/01/202010/01/21

WTF is Right

From an online discussion (I just love civilized discourse):

Obama is the president. He can only sign the bill the house of representatives pass and send to his desk. Executive branch cannot make the legislative branch do anything they do not want. Clinton tried in 1992. How did that go…..

As for the Legislative branch: If I remember, the Soap went something like this:

GOP: we will block and sabatoge anything important to Obama no matter what

(Senate Dems : kisses Olympia snow’s butt to try and get 60 votes. But apparently party loyalty is more important than the country…) Continue reading “WTF is Right”

2010/01/202025/04/03

A Short History of Progress

A Short History of Progress by Ronald Wright available @ Amazon.com

What is the difference between our 21^st century global civilization, the ancient Sumerians, the Easter Islanders of Cook’s day, empirical Rome, or the Maya civilization. Answer, not much. The last four are all societies that had their heyday, become stuck in a paradigm, and then brought ecological disaster on themselves via overpopulation and over exploitation of natural resources. “Each time history repeats itself, the price goes up”, Wrights quotes from some pertinent graffiti. The cost this time could be in the billions of souls.

This a short book 132 pages of actual text with another 68 or so of footnotes at the end. It is a mad rush through human history exploring the collapse of those civilizations and a couple that have been more sustainable. Continue reading “A Short History of Progress”

2010/01/192020/12/31

Skinning Rats

It was the fall of 1978, my son was five years old and my daughter 8. They were “knee high to a grasshopper” as they say in Arklahoma. I was attending Central State University, since renamed to the University of Central Oklahoma. I was majoring in Biology.

Why Biology? First I had a real love for the science. Secondly, I had always done well in this branch of the sciences. I had basically been forced into a business degree program my first year of college and nearly flunked out. It was a lack of interest and other factors (partying???). In retrospect I might have better served myself and my family to have gotten my computer science degree at that time rather than the B.S. in Biology. The punch cards intimidated me, and at time I had doubts about my intellectual capacity. Dissecting struck me as easier than flow charts. Plus, I’ve made a real study of coming to the fork in the road and taking the wrong tine.

This particular semester I was taking several courses, but Mammalogy 4263 taught by Dr. Caire is of interest here. Dr. Caire had his M.S. in rats, and his PhD Continue reading “Skinning Rats”

2010/01/172010/01/17

Bottomfeeder

Bottomfeeder: How to Eat Ethically in a World of Vanishing Seafood by Taras Grescoe available @ Amazon.com

Wonderful Written – Very Intense

Grescoe is a master wordsmith. He paints such vivid word pictures that I wonder if I were to actually go to some of the places he describes I would experience déjà vu. After reading his descriptions of eating Belon oysters in France or barbequed sardines in Portugal, I had to fight the impulse to bring up Travelocity and find a flight. He has a narrative, anecdotal style that kept me flipping the pages.

I’ve long been bothered how food arrives at my plate. I’m not opposed to eating meat or fish, but I want to do it in an ethical manner. After reading “Eating Animals by Jonathan Safran Foer I doubt that is possible with meat purchased from most sources available to me. I saw seafood Continue reading “Bottomfeeder”