Aug. 30th, 2004

jack: (Default)
This evening I went to dinner with my good friend Tim (who a couple of you will have met at one of my dinners, or already know from Trinity), and his girlfriend, and sister and boyfriend. Since he left university he has mysteriouly suddenly become able to cook. Anyway, a few choice quotes:

Tim: Search engines are going downhill. *Whatever* I search for, I get porn. When I searched for "Cyclometric complexity[1]" I got porn.
Me: [Pause] What *kind* of porn?
Tim: I don't know, I didn't click on the link. Actually, it was a list of sex tips.
Me: Maybe it was "things not to say during sex." I mean, it'd put *me* off my stroke. It'd be distracting.
Girlfriend: Or maybe it's a list of things not to say at dinner parties.
Me: Or maybe it's something *to* say during sex.

Boyfriend: Where shall we play Zombies!!![2]
Sister: Shall we do the floor?
Boyfriend: So to speak.
Girlfriend: I'd prefer to do it on the kitchen table.

Mum: Hi. Where are you? Can you talk?
Me: I'm sort of sadwiched into the corner at Tim's house. Is it urgent?
Tim: *Sheep noises*
Mum: I just wanted to ask if you were still coming home tomorrow, thus unfortunately missing Edith's roleplaying game, and possibly being sluggish with emails for a couple of days, but returning for friday in time to hopefully[3] move into your new house[4].
Me: Yes. By the way, Tim says "Baaaaa."

Oh, and as a bonus, a lover's quarrel heard this moment outside my window:
Man: You're separating out cognition.
Woman: No, you're separating out effeteness by claiming I'm separating out cognition.
Only in cambridge...

[1] FYI this is a way of measuring the complexity of a function in some way related to the number of potential control paths having some connection to Euler's formula when considering them lines on a sphere. Tim said below 5 was desirable, below 10 acceptable, over 30 a serious problem maintainability. He had recently found one rated 142.

[2] A board/card game reminicist of a *very* cut down D&D. The "!!!" in the name is deliberately ironic.

[3] Shut up, pedants.

[4] I'm paraphrasing here. She didn't actually say any of that.
jack: (Default)
This is my second fanfic. It's set on the discworld, a bit after Guards! Guards. It's probably worth having a look at if you haven't read any Pratchett, but obviously it won't be as good.
Vimes opened his eyes. Then he opened his eyes again. Finally, he scraped at one eyelid, removing a chunk of gunk, and opened his eye for the third time. There was a slight tearing and a blaze of light. For an encore, he sat up. This was less than successful. In fact, it was less than failure, because a large grey blur he tentatively identified as the ground suddenly reared up at him, cracking him across the jawbone, and he realized he had been sitting up, but was now lying in the gutter.
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