The Pakistan Youtube incident

The Pakistan YouTube (causing YouTube to be offline for an hour over the weekend) is an interesting example of how the basic protocols of the Internet are still not secure, more so than I realised.

Basically the way the majority of routers work, priority is given to routes with less IP addresses in the block, and as the Pakistan Telecom route was more specific, routers took that instead. It took surprisingly little time to propagate its way around the world causing no more silly movies (especially those all important juggling ones.)

For those who want more info look at Renesys’s blog

Wii Twilight Hack and Pikmin

One of the more interesting things I’ve seen regarding the Wii home-brew scene (this time not requiring any soldering). Using the non-Japanese version of Twilight Princess and a modified save game you can boot arbitrary code. The modified save game from what I’ve read using a suitably modified name for the horse and smashes the stack allowing code to be executed, it’s quite an impressive trick and I wouldn’t be surprised if there are more of them out there just waiting to be discovered.

Played Pikmin a little last night, I didn’t have my gamecube memory card (and unfortunately the Wii doesn’t emulate it on the Wii hardware) so I only played for 10 minutes, it is a good game, would be even better if it was available on the Wii using the Wiimote and improved graphics rather than post-n64 graphics.

Juggling Club and misc stuff

Had a reasonable night at the juggling club, did quite a bit of 1 up 2 up, also did quite a bit of 3 ring cascade with one or two over the top throws (but they are really difficult to control). Also tried clubs again, but gave up when I damaged my left thumbnail. Tried the occasional backcross and had my first go at 4 ball juggling (managed 8ish throws sync, 4ish async), Maybe sync is easier to get going, but becomes more difficult because of the catches being slightly asynchronous. Someone (I’m really bad with names) showed me Mills Mess using 3 balls. MonkeyJuggler lent me Pikmin for the Gamecube (I must have tried hunting in about 20 shops for it over the years without much luck).

Oh Lamb Hotpot Pot Noodles are nasty, don’t touch with a barge pole. Thinking about it barge poles probably taste nicer.

The story about antidepressants being of little use over placebos is an interesting study, especially the bit about that the improvement relative to placebos increases at more severe depression is due to less effectiveness of the placebos rather than the improved performance of the antidepressants.

Ring juggling + Wind = Impossible.

I tried taking my rings (and clubs and balls) to a local park on Saturday afternoon. All the stories of rings outside are true, their flight paths really change with even the lightest of winds. Managed about 9 throws with clubs once or twice, starting to get a little easier, but even those got blown of course from time to time.

Started looking at the JugglingLab software, basically as an excuse to update my rusty Java 1.4 skills to Java 1.5, it didn’t take me long to change the code from the antique microstar XML parser to the one included in Java 1.5, I want to change some of the data structures to take the generics stuff. A new feature I’d like is the ability for JugglingLab to calculate the transitions between two patterns.

Driving Lessons: More open road

This time I set off from the university (bit of a pain with all the pedestrians) down via Narborough Road, via Fosse Park, via Wigston, via South Wigston then back up Welford Road and back to the uni. I felt I did okay. Still had the same problem with stalling at the traffic lights, it was because I wasn’t giving it enough gas, presumably I was worried about hitting the car in front. Broke the speed limit accidently a few times.

Pork Pie roundabout is a tricky one even with the traffic lights, my instructor said 1st left and I didn’t realise that there was an exit straight away. Went down a small road which was a 60 mph, but didn’t really go over 40 same with the 50 zones.

Not much else is happening otherwise.

Feeling Ill and Cannot Juggle

Last night juggling over at Leicester Uni, was feeling awful bit of a temperature. I kept dropping everything I threw so in the end gave up and went to the bar upstairs for a while. Tried doing some more 1 up, 2 up and I tried throwing one ball as a backcross over and over again but sucked at it. 3 Ring cascade is getting easier, I should decide what my first trick will be, I want something you can’t do on balls. Borrowed a Diabolo of the man with the unicycle and started messing around, managed some throws and started to learn how to control it if it tilts.

I didn’t really want to come into work this morning, I’m still feeling awful.

Last dead guppy adult.

I got home on Sunday afternoon, thankfully my Mum gave me a lift. On the way we stopped at Selly Oak Hospital to see my grandmother (and give her my birthday present, must remember to send something to my paternal grandmother [they share the same birthday]). Not surprisingly the radio controlled clocks cannot receive a single inside a hospital, what with the steel in the walls and machinery pumping out EM.

When I got home, the last adult guppy was dead, this one had red blotches on its stomach similar to one of the earlier ones. But no obvious signs. The guppy fry is doing fine (now seems to be swimming openly in front of the guppies). I won’t get any replacement guppies for a month or two (might as well wait for the guppy fry to become more adult).

Had problems getting the pictures of the compact flash, my card reader doesn’t seem to like my card. Had to use another machine to read the card. Slowly working my way through the 1GB/100 photos I took on Saturday. I quite like the one linked to this post.

Ballring 2008: HLG

This weekend the Birmingham University Juggling convention happened (Ballring 2008)

Before I went this was my plan:

• Rings: Buy 4 rings, get decent at the 3 ring cascade
• Clubs: Spend at least 2 hours on clubs, try to do 6 or 9 throws with a clean finish.
• Balls: Play around with chops, one up two up. If I have time behind the back throws. Do some more practice with shower and reverse cascade.
• Contact Juggling: Do some contact juggling and watch other contact jugglers, finally work out how to do the butterfly
• Have a good time, meet other jugglers
• Participate in a game or two (without any expectation that i’ll get remotely close to winning).

In the style of those people who post to rec.juggling I’m going to do a HLG (Highs, Lows, Goals)

Highs

• Had fun
• Decent show and renegate (but I have no benchmark)
• The compare wasn’t bad, his impersination of David Blane was funny.
• I think in the second round of 3 ball gladiators I got into the last 10 or so. (The first round I was about the second dropie by my own causes), 3rd round did okay, but not as good as the second.
• I enjoyed most of the professional acts especially the contact stuff by Jeanine, Juggling by Sebastian (first time for that routine, a few drops but the first time I’ve seen 3 club box), the devil sticking was good, including the two tennis rackets at a time trick (dunno what the trick is called) and the yo-yo guy was good.
• Highlight of the renegade, I think the 4 diabolists.

Lows/Annoyances

• The lighting in the hall was a bit hit and miss with a few windows and no internal lighting. You could tell it annoyed a lot of jugglers as they were all facing away from the windows.
• I think the hall may have been too small, also having the chairs on the side was a little annoying as I dropped my balls behind them 3 or 4 times and I had to scramble to try and find them.
• Mass majority of the female toilets did not have locks on them.
• I decided not to take part in the 3 ball limbo, realised I should have done when it stared.
• I seemed to do very little juggling.
• Not one act all night used a unicycle.

Goals

Mostly see above, I bought my rings (4 for 6 quid, bargin, flurescent ones). Didn’t really use them much. Played around with clubs for about an hour or so spread across the day, managed 6 or so throws once or twice. As usual killed my hands and ripped a hole in my fingernail. Managed a little one-up two-up, and a tiny bit of the fake, tried chops once but gave up pretty quickly, will focus a lot more on those soon. Didn’t really do remotely enough contact juggling. Will post some photos when I get home (staying at my mothers this weekend)

On workshops, I went to the magic one, intermediate ball juggling (I couldn’t do any of the tricks except the fake-backcross, but they were good to know about when I eventually get around to them), I went to the contact session and met bazz (someone from ijdb chat) and realised that I should have a lot heavier and bigger ball really to do contact with. I borrowed one of his balls and found things a lot easier. I Also went to the balloon modelling one which was good except I forgot half the instructions, another one of those pick up ideas and practice later sessions.

Next convention for me is nottingham, details below (from the ijdb)

1^st – 2^nd March, 2008 Oh No! Nott Another Juggling Convention, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom

I hope my fish are okay, I left them one of those weekend blocks, but I don’t know if they’ll actually eat it. I’m going to buy an automated feeder tommorow which should be far better.

Some pics by rec.juggling people (mine will come soon, I’m having problems with my memory card)

• MonkeyJugglers Photos
• The Void’s Photos
• Fak’s Photos
• My Photos

Mid Febuary Search terms

The top search terms (out of a whole 40 or so)

• clutch control
• danio having trouble swimming
• juggling stopping
• clutch control
• clutch driving
• fish fungus
• driving a clutch
• pictures of fish fungus
• ma francais

The others follow a similar pattern, they nearly all related to clutch driving and fish illnesses

I don’t know what to say to those people having problems with clutch control, I found it remarkably easy, just move the clutch slightly above and below biting point, job done, increase it if your on a steeper hill.

If I get more problems with my fish, I’ll take some photos to share.

Un autre guppy est mort. Je ne suis pas surpris

Le guppy homme est mort quand Je arrivé la maison dernier soir. Je ne suis pas certain mais Le guppy femelle peut-étre malade.

I woke up with a crinked neck and have been in pain from it most the day, hope it doesn’t spoil BallRing this saturday. I’m interested to try some steals if I have time to try it.

Got an alarm clock for my grandmothers birthday (Mum suggest it), will take it with me when I head to Brum.