Holy Snow Batman–Blizzard Blankets Gotham

Transportation was nigh impossible yesterday.  Today, I’m going to give it a try:

From the MTA:

	Monday	Tuesday

Heard @Lab

We’re Measurably Cooler

Lab49: 22.5% cooler than Lab40

On Prism

Injecting the container is the last refuge of a scoundrel

Two Cures for a Heavy Laptop

		MacBook Air
	Gym Membership

@Lab–Catchup Edition

HPC Gandhi

It looks like Shawn Gandhi’s HPC/Cloud Workgroup is really going well.  He had a big crowd at his BYOL event a few weeks ago:

Shawn worked with Nikita Ivanov, CEO for Gridgain Systems, on a live coding workshop where participants bring their own laptops.  They used Scala and Gridgain’s own DSL called Scalar, to create a simple cloud enabled map-reduce application which ran on on a grid setup using everyone’s laptop.  They also created a little ping-pong algorithm using Scala and the actor framework.

Ain’t it Cool Google News

Check out Google Demo Slam, we did:

Parsley, BYOL

Looks like this BYOL thing is really catching on.  Michel Boudreau, of the Flex clan, will be holding a Parsley BYOL event in Feb.

Cool Site of the Month

http://benthebodyguard.com/

OK, Geeks, Listen Up

This post, on geeky mis-speak has dozens of replies.  Worth a read for those of us with foot in mouth syndrome.

Why I Love Software

With a little effort, it might not get tangled.

Small Audience Humor:  Haskell

Evolution of a Haskell Programmer

Haskell Researchers Announce Discovery

Programmer Competency Matrix

The ever popular and moderately controversial Programmer Competency Matrix.  Feel free to discuss.

New Time-Off Request Procedure

@Lab Holiday Spectacular

@Lab – holiday edition:

 

The Place

The Highline Room at the Standard Hotel definitely has spectacular views with its floor to very high ceiling windows on both sides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Getting there I guess is supposed to be half the fun and the entrance was full of unusual textures and passageways:

 

The elevators were a trip, dark, with black walls and ceiling and crazy videos on both sides.

 

 

 

 

Upon leaving our group was totally disoriented by the crystal ceiling art and maze like elevator lobby ambience.  An attendant was there to point us in the right direction though.

 

The Food

The food was excellent though in smaller portions than last year.  The only appetizer I saw during the cocktail hour was a mini burger thingamabob.  But on the bright side, I wasn’t overstuffed before dinner started.  I heard mixed reviews on the food, but I thought both the fish and the meat (hey, as the chronicler I have to sample everything ) were excellent.  I’m not a generally a fish person aside from sashimi, but maybe I like bass or it was just really good.  And both desserts (again chronicling )hit my sweet tooth just right.  The bar was a bit limited since it was just a corner bar station and not a full bar, but the free flowing champagne ably relieved me of my quest for the perfect drink.

Oh and don’t forget the parmesan.  Parmesan chunks at the table were delicious and are likely to find a place in my latest crazy diet (Atkins).  Such a fantastic salty cheese.

 

 

Converse

Fearless leader’s speech was short and sweet.  I saw lots of familiar faces and met a few new people.  Lots of significant others in attendance toned down the geek speak just a little.  My topic of the day is skiing, but I heard about tornadoes, kids and schools (and skiing), travelling, movies, and of course DLR, Ruby, MacBooks, etc. etc (and skiing).

My guesstimate puts 3/4 of the company there.

For those of you who didn’t come, you’re in good company since Luke was out.  Get well soon Luke.

Next year, no excuses for the rest of you.

 

The Gift –  Apple TV

Its Apple, its TV.  So the rainbows & unicorns are free.

My initial thought was that it needs to be jailbroken, but it seems to do everything I’d want to do with it out of the box.  I expect to be streaming Netflix and off my PC any minute now.

Very cool for cable cord cutters.

Thanks guys.

 

After Party

I’m all for additional drinking and mingling, but I think I was born too old for this place.  I’m looking for twice the space and half the decibels.  Lots of folks seemed to be having a good time in our SRO area and I can’t imagine when it broke up.  Knowing some of the revelers, I bet there was an after-after party.