Leaf

That time of year.

Fungus

There are a ton of these little guys all over the backyard.

At the Beach

Sandcastles and feet.

Beetle

I really hate these guys.

Quick TCD redo: www.thirdculturedesign.com/ #

How I got my Ruby on Rails + MySQL environment back up and running after installing Snow Leopard

I upgraded to Snow Leopard tonight. It was a surprisingly quick and easy task actually. I did a clean install to a new drive, installed MacPorts and then ran the following, recorded here as much for my own memory as for posterity.

# get the right version of zlib
sudo port install zlib +universal

# install mysql
sudo port install mysql5-server

# configure mysql (some interaction required)
sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.mysql5.plist
sudo -u mysql mysql_install_db5
cd /opt/local ; sudo /opt/local/lib/mysql5/bin/mysqld_safe &
/opt/local/lib/mysql5/bin/mysql_secure_installation

# yay, ImageMagick
sudo port install ImageMagick

# rubystuffs
sudo port install ruby
sudo port install rb-mysql
sudo port install rb-rubygems

# do an update, just in case
sudo gem update --system

# grab a bunch of gems
sudo gem install termios
sudo gem install mysql
sudo gem install rake
sudo gem install rails
sudo gem install mongrel
sudo gem install capistrano 
sudo gem install capistrano-ext

# install git 
sudo port install git-core

The whole process took a little over an hour on my Mac Pro. Then it was just a matter of checking out a few codebases and rehydrating a few databases. Very simple.

Updated 11/1/2009 to include universal zlib configuration option.

Jars

Amy and I are leaning how to can foods this year. So far so good. (Of course, we haven’t eaten any of it yet.)

Lightning

A little black and white, just for fun.

Cave of the Mounds

It was dark.

Lightning

I had never photographed lightning before, but it’s always been on my to do list. Turns out it requires patience and an extremely cooperative thunderstorm. So much fun.

Raindrops

They stayed there all day.

Nothing doing

I’m pretty sure this morning’s Twitter outage and Facebook flakiness are combined causing an unprecedented surge in the nation’s productivity.

At least, this is a personally true statement.

We launched a bunch of new features on pnt.me today

Check out the new and improved pnt.me, for all your URL shortening needs. We really rounded out the feature set with this one including things like link statistics that update in realtime, and a brand new look and feel.

Mustached

A weekend of fun and facial hair.

Afternoon Tea

Science-style.

Long exposure fireworks

I thought the colors in these were just too fun. Lots of red flares and a few local fireworks captured by a series of fifteen second exposures. I didn’t have a tripod though, instead I used a shaky park bench on a floating pier.

Burgos HDR

Same cathedral as here.

Eiffel Tower

Paris, France.

Cathedral

The Burgos Catherdal in Burgos, Spain.

Bamboozling Ourselves by Errol Morris

Saturday on the (Rebooted) Final Frontier · How Star Trek shows us the right way to reboot a franchise.

100 Abandoned Houses

Chicago at night

Out the hotel window.

Kites

Gretchen flies a single-liner.

Where's the most remote place on Earth? · A heatmap of sorts.

Spring gardening

A bowl of basil.

Evernote Stats · An excellent breakdown of Evernote’s stats showing the relationship between downloads, registered users, and active users. Way to go Evernote for being so transparent, this is great data.

Is Real-time the Future of the Web? · Yes. Or yes, some of the time. We can do real-time and asynchronous content on the web, I don’t see any reason to pick.

50 Best and Worst Twist Endings in Movies

Chicago Botanical Gardens

Great place for a Sunday stroll.

Driving Range

With new King Cobra SZs, thanks Mom and Dad.

Glacier Hills Mother's Day Walk

I thought the light filtering through the trees was just fantastic.

Integral 1/Cabin

A group shot in a dark theater with a single speedlight

Dew

It rained this morning.

This is broken · Seth Godin on interactions.

Dracula in real time · Bram Stoker’s book starts on May 3rd, read along in real time.

32 miles for 32 years

Amy snacks about 10 miles into a 32 mile birthday ride for me.

It’s the 1st of May. Anyone have a scone and a large house blend yet? #

Weekend tree planting

Last weekend.

Parrots Join Humans On The Dance Floor

Movie Trivia: Clue

Magnet drops super-slowly through an eddy tube

WiFi decktime

Getting to be that time of the year.

Twitter Notification

Part of the ongoing Gmail+Twitter Arduino notification project. (Thanks to iPotion for the Twitter logo.)

Ride Through the Streets of Barcelona in 1908

Relationship Symmetry in Social Networks · Why Facebook will go Fully Asymmetric

The Gmail checker takes shape

Very blinky.

Swingline

Stapler in the sun.

Game Theory at Yale