Author: Jeff Milner

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Battle for the Beard

I never grew a beard in my entire life. I grew it out of solidarity for my writers, and to prove that I have some testosterone. The biggest comment I’m getting the last couple of days is that I look like the character of Kris Kringle in “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.”

-Conan O’Brien

Conan sporting a beard

“I know what you’re thinking to yourself: Dave looks like a missing hiker,”

-David Letterman

Letterman sports a beard

Dave’s beard is already gone. I think Conan will keep his for a while longer. People have some strange issues with beards…

I’ve been doing some subcontracting lately. I’m feeling quite perturbed about the company’s animosity toward my beard. One of the reasons I choose to work from home is that I like sporting a bit of scruff. Now the owner of the company I’ve been contracting for, wants me to shave it off.

We’re meeting with some clients tomorrow and he’s made it clear, “We both need to be dressed professionally with a button up shirt, tie & slacks, well groomed and shaved.”

I knew that my beard was going to be an issue with these guys. When I started they had me sign a contract stating that I understand employees are to be clean-shaven. The next page went to great length to make sure it was clear to me that I’m merely a contractor, not an employee. Therefore I would not be entitled to any of the benefits that employees are entitled. Apparently he must feel that that doesn’t let me out of the “no beard” clause.

You might be wondering, what’s so great about having a beard anyway? Well, for one thing, it’s my face, my body; it’s a matter of autonomy. Men with beards are ascribed attributes of masculinity, wisdom, sexual virility, and high status. Who wouldn’t want that? Furthermore, my girlfriend likes it.

When an employer dictates what you wear to work, you’re free to change into anything you like at the end of the day. When an employer dictates the amount of facial hair you’re allowed to keep, well, get you’d better get used to it or start working from home.

I don’t see why—so long as I maintain it—anyone should care if I choose to sport a little facial hair. Either you’re a fan or not, but regardless, it won’t hurt you. I’m a contract designer. I work from home. The company that contracts me out rarely sees me face to face. On the rare occasion that I meet with clients I make it clear that I’m working for the company as a contractor. So far I haven’t noticed any client caring about my beard.

I can understand if a company wants to follow the trends of the last 30 years in an effort to brand themselves as conventional. That’s their prerogative. But as for me, right now as a self-employed contractor, the price to have my services is that you leave my beard the hell alone.

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Learning to Play the Guitar in the 21st Century

In answer to the age of question of “What would you like for Christmas”, I told my parents I would be interested in having a guitar. A couple of Christmas’s later, my parents came through for me! I am now the proud owner of a fantastic sounding Fender acoustic guitar.

Learning to play has been slow but rewarding. The first couple of days were painful on my fingertips. Then suddenly, after a blister or two, I can now play for as long as I like.

It’s great.

Really.

Practise

The guitar I picked out came as a package along with extra strings, a strap, some picks, a tuner, and a “Getting Started on Guitar” DVD.

I was surprised to find how easy and useful the DVD turned out to be. The host teaches you how to play a basic chord and then another track lets you play along to some canned backup music. The process repeats, slowly building up your skill.

It’s pretty sweet; my only complaint is that after the music stops, you have to grab the remote and navigate back to the song to start it playing again. It would be nice to be able to set it to repeat, and to have more than 3 practice tracks.

Lately I discovered a method of practising that solves this problem.

I got myself a copy of “Play Guitar Today! A Complete Guide to the Basics”. It’s a music book for beginners that has a CD enclosed for backup music. Well I ripped the CD to iTunes, scanned the music, and then set each track with it’s appropriate “album art” ie. the sheet music or instruction that fits.

iTunes—Sheet music as album art

Now when I practise the guitar, iTunes is the teacher. The corresponding sheet music pops up and I can go to town.

It was a bit of a hassle setting this up, but I’d recommend it to anyone learning to play—it’s totally worth it.

I wonder how long it will be until they sell it like this?

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Happy New Year

The first day of the year 2008 and so far, no complaints.

It’s back to work tomorrow—I’ve been keeping busy whipping up some web sites but that doesn’t mean I’m not looking for some more projects (ie. give me a shout if you’d like me to create something for you).

I’m very pleased with the new SB-800 flash I got for Christmas from my brother. (Not to mention the 50mm f1.8 lens I picked up for myself a week before Christmas) Keep your eyes peeled for some big improvements in my photography now.

I’m also extremely excited about the new acoustic guitar that has my finger tips in a constant state of numbness. It really killed me for the first couple of days, but now I seem to be able to play as long as I like. I love it!

This month also marks three years since my work with Relic on the video game “The Outfit”. I don’t suppose there is much to say about that, except that three years means that I’m legally allowed to talk about it, and because I couldn’t for so long, I guess there is just a built up urge to share.

Life is good; no new resolutions for the start of the new year. I’ve found it’s more effective to just start them when I need them and not wait for arbitrary days like January 1st.

Have a great year!

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Backwards Singing

During a segment of The Hour (one in which I was very lucky to be a part of) they showed a backwards clip of a man singing Stairway to Heaven in reverse. Here is OneManSho doing the same thing, but with a more patriotic song. All the activities he preforms are to add a little spice to the reverse section of the piece.


[What Song is this? – YouTube]

I don’t know if this would count as truly backmasking, but it’s close enough that some of you may find it interesting.

(via)

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Memories of a Forth Grade AIM Class

Despite repeated emails and Christmas cards that continually expound the details, I can’t seem to regurgitate my parents’ plans for Christmas except in the most general terms. I’m expected in Medicine Hat on Sunday? Food will be eaten? Religious differences will be tolerated? The important details just don’t stick in my mind.

However, ask me which questions I couldn’t answer on my 4th grade aptitude test to see if I qualified for AIM, and boy, do I have a list for you!

For the record, I didn’t answer “Christopher Columbus” because my fellow test taker, Christine, who finished it the day previous, told me, “contrary to popular belief it was Captain James Cook that discovered America.”

Why WOULDN’T I believe her? And to be honest, I don’t even know if Columbus is the answer they were looking for—what about the Vikings? And while we’re at it, do the First Nations people count for anything?

Don’t lose any sleep over it. I got into AIM anyway.

In case you’re curious, AIM was this once-a-week afternoon program they had for students who were high achievers. While my peers at George Davidson were learning about the First Nations (Native American Indians as they were called then) and the settlement of Western Canada, I was busy across town learning advanced science, math, and computer skills.

In AIM they taught us about negative numbers, statistics, and among other things how to use a word processor—this was a pretty big deal considering that in 1988 most people hadn’t even heard of word processors. I still remember typing away in front of those state of the art monochrome green monitors. Our teacher Mr. Freeman insisted typing would be a useful skill later in life. Who knew he’d be so right?

And even though this might sound pretty cool, I hated AIM.

One of my complaints was that I wasn’t interested in learning how to type. Computers were for games! and as any 9 year old of that time will testify, learning about home row is significantly less entertaining than Lode Runner.

They also demanded too much homework. Any extra homework, is too much. The weekly afternoon assignments at AIM more than doubled my load for the entire week. And to make matters worse, I was completely stressed out that I wouldn’t do a good job.

Homework wasn’t the worst part though.

The worst part was that none of my regular teachers had ever gotten around to teaching cursive handwriting. Mr. Freeman, liked to mix his chicken scratching with cursive shortcuts. Basically I was in a class of geniuses and I when it came time to read our homework off the board, for all intents and purposes, I was illiterate. Talk about HUMILIATING.

Mr. Freeman wasn’t exactly understanding either. There were a few of us in the same boat and he lipped us off saying that if we couldn’t read his writing, that was our problem. It was the next week that I began skipping. (How did you think I found out what everyone in my regular class was up to on Wednesday afternoons). Shortly after that I ended up dropping the program&8212;but I’ve kept the guilt.

And in so many ways, I can’t help but feel like my performance in AIM has been a reflection of my life in general. If only my circumstances had been different… if only I had a half decent teacher, or someone to inspire me… and besides whatever it is I should be doing, it’s significantly less entertaining than any number of my daily distractions.

At least I can take a break from my worries with some holiday cheer.

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Incredible Wiimote Hack Creates Multitouch Display

Using a couple of homemade infrared pens, a Wiimote, and some software he wrote, Johnny Chung Lee of Carnegie Mellon University has come up with, what must be, the coolest Nintendo Wii hack ever. Since the Wii tracks IR lights, Lee found that practically any surface — a projector screen, a tabletop, an LCD screen — could be turned into a multi-touch screen reminiscent of the iPod Touch or Microsoft Surface.


[Low-Cost Multi-touch Whiteboard using the Wiimote – YouTube]

For those do-it-yourself types out there, the software can be downloaded here.

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Heraldic Brush Set

The other day I came across a neat collection of “Heraldry Brushes” by MrTentacleGuy on deviantART. I was disappointed to find out that the brushes were actually in vector format and while great for resizing and maintaining their original integrity in Illustrator, not very handy for quick and dirty Photoshop work where a brush set (.abr) is all you really want.

So I took his heraldry vector collection and made it into a brush set. I’m releasing it under the same Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Here is a little sample I threw together using the new brushes (sorry the red background is not part of the set).

Heraldic Brush Set Example

Download the Heraldic Brush Set (.zip)

There are over 70 high resolution brushes in this set! If you use it, please leave a comment and don’t hesitate to link back to your work as well.