Friday, July 31, 2009

My Google Voice Invite

I got my Google Voice invite about 2 weeks ago. Every night, I search, and hope that an area code that I want is now available (In order, 212 (New York City); 907 (Alaska, preferably Wasilla); and 867 (Yukon Territory)). So far, I've had no luck in getting a number in any of those three fine locations.

But, last night I had an idea for how to pick a new area code. Texts From Last Night provides the answer. Simply scrape all of the area codes from the texts, and find out which one is most common. And I have my new area code.

Somehow, I think I have to refine my curl and regex skills so that I can do this drunk and stoned to make it "proper."

Thursday, July 02, 2009

One less daily habit

Every day for the past seven years -- almost to the day -- I've taken two pills. Yesterday was the first day I didn't do it. And last night, I took only one pill*. As a habit, it slowly evolved: originally, it was at 11:00am; then when I moved to Seattle, it moved to 8:00am. It varied where I took it, some months I would always do it at home before I left for work, other times, it would be an excuse to get my morning diet Coke. (I may have moved to Seattle, but parts of me are still in the South.) And yesterday and today, nothing. I had to keep reminding myself that this was the plan, and it was ok.

I only missed one dose over the seven years. Which means I was 99.98% compliant. I think it would take a few thousand more years before I could get to six sigma quality. Other random facts is that this is about 3.321kg (yes, kilograms) of drugs. And cost my various insurances around $112K. This of course prompts the question: what's cheaper, cocaine or my drugs? Luckily, we have the internet, which gives us an answer: at wholesale prices, cocaine, but at street prices, my drugs.

--

*: Actually, it was two pills. There's a weird two-week washout regime to get the last of the old drugs out of my system and get the new drugs up to effectiveness as fast as possible. But that doesn't make for a good story. Even worse, the wash-out over-emphasizes the "bad" drugs.