Search Results

When I started this little web experiment that is tojo2000.com, I added a stat counter. I honestly didn't expect anyone but friends and family to check out the website, but it was a fun way to experience things from the perspective of a web site owner. I'm still skeptical that web-based applications are the wave of the future, but I wanted to hedge my bets. One thing I didn't expect, though, was some of the bizarre ways that people would find my site. I signed up to get a free statcounter from Statcounter.com. They not only give you an easy stat counter, but they have some useful reports. From these reports I discovered that people have found my sites using some really bizarre search engine queries. Here are some highlights:

bake oven based on rocket design
bride's man
bubblegum on sidewalks
catling suck
discovery channel: my skin can kill me
disgusting cakes body blood
dublin fusiliers
full toenail ripped off
get sddl string for computer
israeli army girls
losing toenail
most embarassing moment ripped pants
my catling!
perl sddl
picture of a ripped off toe nail
ripped all the way
shh should be done in silence video
spiders full of clear liquid
suck my catling
war movies aired on amc july 2006
wedding photots
what are potato bugs


P.S. Why do so many people want to look up ripped off toenails on the Internet?

*shudders*

Welcome Stumblers!

It seems that someone out there likes me, and has given me the thumbs up on StumbleUpon. For those of you who don't already know, StumbleUpon is a great widget for FireFox or Internet Explorer that lets you wander aimlessly through the Internet landing on sites that other people with similar interests enjoyed. As you travel the grand expanses of virtual space, if you happen to see something you like you can show your approval by clicking on the thumbs up button on your toolbar. If you're the first to recommend the site you will be asked for a few very small bits of information, such as the category of site. The more people recommend a site, the better the chance that future Stumblers may land there. It reminds me a bit of the Infinite Improbability Drive from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. (Yes, it's a Wikipedia link. Bite me.)

In any case, thank you for stopping by and I'll endeavor to create some more content that's worthy of your time.

A Scene

Every once in a while I'll have a moment, a fragment of time that seems out of place. It just seems too perfect to have occurred naturally. I had one of those on Friday.

I was coming out of the grocery store after a long day at work when it happened. I had used the self-service lanes, and the plastic bags holding my purchases were filled awkwardly. Stepping through the automatic doors, my eye was caught by a flock of crows overhead. The sun had just set, but the sky was still a bright blue. The absence of the sun's diffuse rays brought the parking lot into sharp relief, and the black birds' outline showed clearly against the incandescent sky. A split-second later another group passed overhead, and then another. Soon the entire sky was filled with the currents of an avian tide, flowing in an arc across the visible sky and then crashing into some unseen barrier, doubling back against itself into swirling eddies of hundreds of opaque bird-shapes, then diffusing into nothing.

I couldn't help but stop where I was to watch. It seemed at the time like there was no other noise but the soft slapping of wings, then a sharp wet splat on the pavement near my shoe brought me out of my reverie just enough to realize that I shouldn't look directly up.

When the moment had passed, I started back towards my car. Another passer-by who had been there smiled at me and said, "Pretty scary, huh?" I said yes, but I didn't think it was scary. I thought it was extraordinary. It was something from a painting. It was something from a movie. It was a scene too beautiful to be taken from a day in my life.

SDDL Utilities

UPDATE:  There's a new version of SDDLTranslate.  This one's in Python, and you can find it at 

http://tojo2000.com/blog/2008/07/more-fun-with-sddl-python-style.html

-----------------------------

SDDL (Security Descriptor Definition Language) may not be the most exciting thing in the world for most people, but it's something I've had to delve into because I've been trying to come up with a good solution for scanning a computer for weak service permissions. I've found several systems so far with weak service permissions that could easily allow a malicious user to take over a system. This is a huge problem, but it is not a problem that can be "fixed". Microsoft is not going to release a patch that will eliminate weak service permissions because it is not a bug. Weak service permissions happen when the creator of the service sets the permissions incorrectly on the service, either because he/she fat-fingered it or didn't realize what they were doing.

Trying to find the best way to dump service permissions, I came across SC.exe (Windows XP and Server 2003). It has an option, "sdshow", that will export the service permissions for a particular service. As an example, try typing in the following at a command prompt:

sc sdshow Spooler
(I chose Spooler because it exists on all XP/2003 systems)

You should get an SDDL string like this back:

D:(A;;CCLCSWLOCRRC;;;AU)(A;;CCDCLCSWRPWPDTLOCRSDRCWDWO;;;BA)
(I cut it a little short, but it's still a valid SDDL string)

The problem with this is that it is a huge pain to figure out what you are reading even if you understand the anatomy of an SDDL string, which most people don't. That's where SDDLTranslate and SvcInfo come in, two utilities I wrote in the process of researching service permissions.

SDDLTranslate
USAGE: SDTranslate SDDL_String [-s]

SDDLTranslate takes an SDDL string as an argument and returns the corresponding access control list in human-readable format. The optional -s switch tells SDDLTranslate that the SDDL string refers to a service (some constants change their meaning when referring to a service). Let's use the SDDL string from earlier as an example:

SvcInfo
USAGE: SvcInfo

SvcInfo basically just automates the task of cycling through your services, running "SC sdshow Service", and then running SDDLTranslate on the result. Running SvcInfo will enumerate all of your services and get the security descriptor for each. Since the result typically spans many pages, it will also create the SvcInfo.log file with the output so you can view it in another program later.


Both SDDLTranslate and SvcInfo were written in Perl using a module I wrote for the purpose, Win32::SDDL. You can find Win32::SDDL on CPAN.


Click here to download SDDLTranslate.
Click here to download the source for SDDLTranslate.

Click here to download SvcInfo.
Click here to download the source for SvcInfo.

Cell Phone Crime Deterrent

I had the TV running in the background today and I caught this commercial. It's the first one I've seen in a while that made me laugh out loud.

Driving Under the Influence...

...of Money.

The U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals has now ruled that having a large amount of cash automatically gives the police probable cause to search your car and arrest you for drug trafficking, regardless of whether you have any history of drug involvement or whether you are using or transporting the money in a way that is indicative of drug trafficking. In addition, they can seize and keep the money.

Joe Francis, Founder of Girls Gone Wild

The picture you're looking for

(that wasn't interesting at all anyway,

I don't know why it generates so much traffic) isn't here.

Go look for boobies somewhere else.

Opportunity in the Middle East

The people of the Middle East really know how to put things into perspective.
After all, "You can't get hummus without mashing a few chick peas."

Help Name a Bridge After Stephen Colbert

I'm a big fan of the Colbert Report (as, I assume, are you all). I would love to build him a statue or a bridge, but alas, I haven't the money. Together, however, we can do the next best thing. The government of Hungary is allowing people on the Internet to choose the name of a new bridge. For a while Chuck Norris was the leading name for the bridge, but I think Stephen Colbert could kick Chuck Norris' ass any day of the week.

Here's what you have to do: Point your browser to this website and select "Stephen Colbert hid" from the list, then click the "Elhud" button at the bottom center of the page. The website is a little slow right now, but with your help we can make this a better bridge for the satirists of tomorrow!

NOTE: If you want to sort the entries alphabetically, click on "ABC szerint" at the top of the page.

Christmas Day, 1914

I came across a reference to this event in another article, and I was surprised that I had never heard of it. There is something peculiarly touching about the idea of German and British soldiers putting down their weapons for a few hours to play soccer and trade jams, tobacco, and other niceties. The three years of brutal slaughter that followed took over 16 million lives, and there is no way that these men could have known that this would be the one last glimmer of shared humanity before a long and disheartening war that many of them would never see the end of.

"In the sunken road I met an officer I knew, and we walked along together
so that we could look across to the German front line, which was only about
seventy yards away. One of the Germans waved to us and said, "Come over here!"
We said, "You come over here if you want to talk." So he climbed out
of his trench and came over towards us. We met and very gravely saluted each
other. He was joined by more Germans, and some of the Dublin Fusiliers from our
own trenches came over to join us. No German officer came out, it was only the
ordinary soldiers. We talked, mainly in French, because my German was not very
good and none of the Germans could speak English well. But we managed to get
together all right. One of them said, "We don't want to kill you and you don't
want to kill us, so why shoot?"

They gave me some German tobacco and German
cigars - they seemed to have plenty of those, and very good ones too - and they
asked whether we had any jam. One of the Dublin Fusiliers got a tin of jam which
had been opened, but very little taken out, and he gave it to a German who gave
him two cigars for it. I lined them all up and took a photograph."
(Click here for the full article.)

"On many stretches of the Front the crack of rifles and the dull thud of shells ploughing into the ground continued, but at a far lighter level than normal. In other sectors there was an unnerving silence that was broken by the singing and shouting drifting over, in the main, from the German trenches.

Along many parts of the line the Truce was spurred on with the arrival in the German trenches of miniature Christmas trees – Tannenbaum. The sight these small pines, decorated with candles and strung along the German parapets, captured the Tommies' imagination, as well as the men of the Indian corps who were reminded of the sacred Hindu festival of light."
(Click here for the full article.)

Three Years of My Face

You have to admire the dedication it took to see a project like this through to its completion.

Every day for three years she took a picture of her face, and then she made it into this movie.

I know I couldn't do it.

Me

By the way, YouTube doesn't list her name. Does anyone know it? I want to give her the credit.

UPDATE: Her name is Ahree Lee, and the film is entitled Me. She also has a film entitled "Everyone" that consists of everyone who she could convince to let her take a picture of their face, which "fleshes out the other end of the spectrum of homogeneity to heterogeneity."

ANOTHER UPDATE: I noticed today that the YouTube film was taken down. When I checked my email I had a message from Ahree Lee herself thanking me for linking to her film but asking me to use the link above instead, since the YouTube version was pirated.

It's a better link anyway; YouTube does not have very good image quality, and this is the entire version of the film, which is somewhat longer. For those of you that haven't seen it, enjoy! For the rest of you, watch it again.
It's mesmerizing.

Vampire Sea Spiders

Nasty.

FYI -- Looking To Make a Profound Statement?

Then maybe you should check your grammar.

Case in point:

Seriously. If it doesn't make sense when you read it back to yourself

then you really need to go back and re-write it.

UPDATE: Some people probably think I'm being too hard on the creator. After all, maybe English isn't their first language. If so, I apologize, but I suspect that it is part of a larger epidemic lately of people who just don't think that correct usage of the language is important, and seem to think it's okay to take a "shotgun" approach to English, throwing out a phrase and figuring it's "close enough, they'll get it." Now I'll be the first to admit that I'm lazy by nature, but communication is vitally important, and in the case of this video the lack of extra effort on the language side really undermines the hard work they seem to have put into the rest of the film.

To the Enterprising Individual...

...who sends me the email messages every day entitled "Suck my catling!", I'd like to assure you that although I derive much amusement from them, I am no more likely to click on them today than I was a month ago, and you may want to rethink your Internet marketing strategy.

That is all.

Thoughts On Death

I’m going to die soon.

I have no fatal illness other than the slow leak of essence which afflicts us all, but it’s enough. Each day passes quicker than the last, and the slow acceleration that started in my childhood has finally reached a point where it is starting to frighten me. Days and years pass, and I don’t have enough to show for it. At the end of the day I can’t remember how I spent my time, and still time flows faster, pushing me further from where I began. I’ve been trying to absorb as much information as possible, staying awake as long as possible, trying desperately to stretch out each day, hoping to counteract the unstoppable mass of time long enough to understand it.

I don’t want to live my life trying to ignore my inevitable death. There is a myth that the ability to forcibly remove thoughts of death from your mind is a blessing. I don’t want the euphoric ignorance of the Eloi. I want to understand death and deal with it now, before time’s urgent pace finally reaches the panicked gallop that hurtles me headlong into the end of life. I’m sure some might dismiss such thoughts as morbid, but just imagine the sheer terror of one who suddenly finds themselves at that fatal Point B without first coming to terms with the subject.

Death is just a part of life, isn’t it? No! Of course it isn’t. Death is the end of life, and I don't want it. We’ve all heard the stories about how awful it would supposedly be to live forever, but I’m here to tell you that’s exactly what I want. I would hope that those I love would also live forever, but if that didn’t happen you wouldn’t find me taking a dirt nap out of a sense of fairness.

I haven’t reached any conclusions yet. I suspect they may be a very long time coming, if at all. All I know now is that I plan to stick around as long as possible until I can figure out what to do. Death will be coming for me soon. Should I meet him with milk and cookies, or a Louisville Slugger?

Darth Vader vs. the Japanese Police

A Note About Comments

Due to a recent post I've decided to start moderating comments. I will agree to publish just about everything with a few exceptions.

1. No spam
2. Post must make some sort of sense ( I won't post your random characters)
3. You can insult me all you want, but if you decide to insult someone I know that I write about in my blog, I may reserve the right to reject your post.
4. Nothing patently offensive (I'm not going to try to enumerate all of the ways things can be offensive, I'll be the judge. This is not a democracy, it's a blogtatorship).

North Korea - Children of the Secret State

A fascinating documentary on the children of North Korea by the Discovery Channel. It's a good watch, but get a good comedy from NetFlix first. You'll need it after watching this.

Sahir!

You're such a dick.

My Disgusting Body.

I completely disavow any understanding of or affinity for my body. I can't begin to try to explain how or why it does the disgusting things that it does. I mean, it has eyeballs for God's sake. They're full of clear liquid, and they're always moist and covered with tiny blood vessels. And lest I forget, they're attached to my brain. Don't even get me started about my brain. It's squishy and firm, and looks like the bastard son of a funnel-cake and a flan.

I try to keep from exerting my body, because when I do it secretes an oily, stinky, shiny fluid out of the thousands of tiny holes in my skin. In many areas of my body hairs come out of the pores as well. Disgusting, that's what it is. My body is fleshy and veiny and full of blood. It is so easy to accidentally break my skin, and when I do the gummy, mettalic-tasting blood oozes out and stains everything it touches. From my smelly little feet to my hot, humid, slimy mouth I creep myself out.

Underneath my squishy flesh it is the only part of me that I am willing to call my own. My bones are strong, and they keep the rest of me in shape. Looking in the mirror, sometimes I imagine that I can see my skull, and I wish I could just be my bones for a while. I feel like I can trust my bones. You can have my malleable, moist, and bothersome guts, but I'll keep my ribs, skull, femurs and phalanges. My body is already rotting on the vine, slowly dying, and I can't wait until I can wear my skeleton smile in peace without its constant interruptions.

We Are the World...Wide Web

A trip down memory lane from some of the early success stories of independent Internet fame.

(for better or worse)

Brought to you by We Are The Web

I tried to find the links ot the sites they're from, and this is what I have so far:

The Tron Guy -- Made internationally famous by creating his own Tron suit.

The Creepy Peter Pan Guy -- Made internationally famous for...creeping the crap out of people.

Leslie and the Lys -- Gem Sweater. Need I say more?

Two Chinese Students -- International pop sensations for their lip synch rendition of "I Want It That Way"

UPDATE: rathergood.com -- Once immortalized in a Quiznos commercial with a version of We Like the Moon.