Two more birthdays, one of which is the zeroth

Happy belated birthday to janeg! I was home sick yesterday and didn't go online at all; desperately trying to shake the bronchitis that resurged with an unholy vengeance Friday despite medication. (And a note to filkferengi: I tried your "boiling bath" suggestion and it seemed to help at least a small bit. And I am now on timed-release vitamin C as well. Thank you.)

Also, congratulations to tigerbright on having given birth over the weekend to Eva Helen (neé "Fishie"), born Sunday, 9 December, 2007 at 6:21 AM Eastern, 6 lb. 13 oz. and 19 in. of healthy red-haired baby girl. Mother and child are reported both doing fine and still in hospital. Hugs to both of you, and we will expect pictures as soon as you or a housemate are able to post them. Welcome to the world, darlin'...yer welcome to it! :-) Hope Joshua likes his new little sister...

An even bigger birthday upcoming: Arthur C. Clarke hits the big Nine-Oh

On 16 December 2007 (this Sunday), one of the most towering talents of any literary genre, our very own Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, turns 90. BoingBoing.net reports the story here and offers a link to the Grand Master's very own blog, where you can wish him many happy returns directly. Congratulations, Mr. C., and may you remain with us at least long enough to see us actually make a real trip to Jupiter.

What's your favorite work by Sir Arthur? Mine is his excellent memoir Astounding Days: A Science Fictional Autobiography (his scientific autobiography is a separate volume, Ascent to Orbit). As far as his fiction is concerned, I have to go with the Odyssey series, beginning with 2001: A Space Odyssey (which actually began life as a short story, then progressed to a novel only after the movie was made) and ending with 3001: The Final Odyssey.

The language of imprecision

Just thinking about those oh-so-useful words we all know for things whose actual names we can't quite recall at the moment (or just don't feel like bothering with): thingamajig, dingus, whoozie-whatsis, thingummy, whatchamacallit, doohickey, jobbie, doodad, gizmo, whangdoodle and the ever-popular, simple but elegant thingie.

Then, of course, there's designations for people whose names have slipped from memory: whatsisname, whoozis, whatsherface, that joker and whoever. And units of measure: a tad, skosh, jigger, dollop, finger, pinch, smidgen or a schmear.

Care to add to the list? Got a favorite? And does a dictionary of this kind of terminology exist out there? Somewhere there must be a latter-day Samuel Johnson who has taken up this field of lexicography.

Will the real Java engine please stand up?

Am I the only one who thinks that people smart enough to write software that automatically updates itself ought to be smart enough to make that software find and get rid of its predecessor version(s) during installation of updates?

Evidently this is beyond the folks at Sun Microsystems. Which is why I find myself with no less than three—count 'em, three—different versions of the Java runtime engine on my system, counting the current one I'm supposed to have. Which goes a long way toward explaining those frequent script errors I've been seeing on startup.

So when the new troubleshooting guide for Documentum, which is Java-based, came down today from $TEMPCLIENT's IS department, one of its suggestions is "check the Add and Remove Programs control panel to make sure you have only the current version of Java Runtime Environment SE and remove older versions."

Now why on God's green and pleasant Earth didn't I think of that months ago? Guess I'm silly for expecting not to have to think of it any more than I have to think about updating it.

NEW FILK: Tacky Lights

Someone on the friends-of-friends list just posted a phrase which started germinating trouble in the Old Filker's brain:

( Tacky Lights )

Let's see if this gets me in trouble with LJ Central...

One of my fondest memories was being shown this short by an old, old friend, SF fan, projectionist and amateur film buff Joey "The Big Reel" Grillot of New Orleans, way back circa three decades ago when I first started getting about in fandom. (As you can see, I was hanging out with a corrupting crowd early on.) John Magnuson Associates animated one of the classic routines by the late, great Lenny Bruce and created the hilariously profane, icon-desecrating masterpiece that is Thank You, Mask Man. Now YouTube has no less than four copies of it on view; the best one is here.
"Then I'll make trouble...'cause I'm geared for it!"

More birthday wishes

To a dear friend, a true mensch, a gifted songwriter, a dedicated structural engineer and the man who has served for many years as my Trained Pet Guitarist™, gorgeousgary, many happy returns of the day. And thanks to his lovely and also gifted wife, the_sheryl, for letting me know.