Other links:

The BIG treat, though, was looking out the windows on Thursday (my birthday) and Friday while the Blue Angels were buzzing the buildings! It started out as an unnerving, thundering rumble. With Sept 11 still fresh in my mind, I didn't know what to expect when I looked out my window to see what the heck was happening out there.

Then I heard a voice from a nearby cubicle exclaim, "Oh hey! There's an air show in town this weekend, and the Blue Angels are scheduled to be there!"

There were a few close (and FAST!) fly-bys, but I did manage to capture this shot when they were doing some formation-flying a little further away from us:

Posted by Grey at 09/20/2006 15:48:55 (Post ID 395) 0 comments

September 19 is International Talk Like a Pirate Day

I'd write more about this subject, but it's hard to type with me hook!
Posted by Grey at 09/19/2006 12:49:16 (Post ID 394) 1 comment

I rarely watch TV anymore, preferring instead to get my news from the Internet and talk radio, and getting my entertainment from the Internet and DVDs. What drew me to watch last night's program on ABC was all of the recent controversy.

I've been reading on blogs such as Michelle Malkin and Hot Air (where I'll post comments from time to time) that key members of the Democrat party and lawyers representing certain members of Clinton's administration have been pressuring ABC to not air the mini-series.

Overall, I thought ABC did a decent job with last night's program. There was 1 scene in particular that I thought was over-acted (the lady crying in Sandy Burglar's office "you could've killed bin Laden!"), but in general I thought it was impressive how they compressed the history from the 1st Trade Center bombing in 1993 up to the foiled Millenium Plot.

After watching the episode, I turned off the TV and quietly reflected on what I saw, the history I remembered, and what I experienced on Sept 11, 2001.

I didn't listen to morning talk radio back in 2001. (I do now) On that particular day, I remember driving into work listening to one of the local "classic rock" stations. Their lame-brained attempt at the news said something about how a small single-engine plane might've accidentally crashed into the World Trade Center.

I followed my normal routine of dropping off my laptop at my desk and then grabbing a cup of coffee in the breakroom. I was in for a surprise as the breakroom was packed full of people (which was almost never the case). Somebody had rolled in a TV on a cart and I noticed that everybody was watching it. I thought I had stumbled into a department meeting, but as I looked around I noticed people from both IT and Finance.

After filling up my coffee mug, I took a second look and noticed the facial expressions. There was little conversation... any talking was quietly muted.

Then I saw what they were watching on TV.

Quiet gasps of "oh my God" as we saw a replay of the 2nd plane hitting the tower.

Some people muttering to their neighbor, "do you think we're being attacked?" To which their neighbor would answer, "the first plane could've been an accident, but after seeing the 2nd plane I think both were deliberate."

I hung around for 20 minutes or so, sharing the shock and disbelief. As the news was inconclusive and the announcers kept repeating the same half-information over and over again, I went back to my desk and tried to get some work done.

It wasn't until later that I learned about the attack on the Pentagon and the crash in Pennsylvania. As those details started trickling in, we all knew for sure what had happened: somebody was waging war on our soil.

Shortly after lunchtime, several of my co-workers rushed by and stated, "you'd better fill up on gas; the lines are getting long!" Having refueled just the night before, I shrugged it off. Back then I lived just 15 minutes away from the office, so I could go up to 2 weeks before I had to refuel again.

As I drove home for the day, I drove by several gas stations and noticed the long line of cars there.

There's a gas station at the corner were I lived at the time: 125th & Quivera. There was a long line of cars and several policemen were directing traffic in and out of the station. I shook my head sadly at all of the panic-induced people. Then I looked up at the big sign facing the street that proclaimed the price of unleaded gas: $6.45. (It was around $1.45 when I left for work that morning).

The State Attorney General got on TV later that night, promising to investigate any claims of price gouging. I drove out to the grocery store about 2 hours after that, and as I drove by the gas station I noticed the line was gone and the price sign was back to $1.45.

I boycotted that station for the next 2 years.

Anyway, I think my reflection on the events of 9/11 could be summed up in this order: sadness, depression, and then anger.

Having lost a parent to cancer last winter, I can "relate" a little to the feelings of loss that the 9/11 family members must have gone through... and are still going through. I feel so sad for them, and the stories of the last-minute phone calls and voicemails are so touching.

And I still feel anger. Anger at those who sponsored and funded the attacks and yet remain free. Anger at the images of cheering Palestinians that the US and Palestinian press sought quickly to suppress. Anger at those who, to this day, deny the evil nature of our attackers and seek to appease them (or even pretend they don't exist and that 9/11 was all some super-secret government conspiracy). Anger at those who continue to betray our ability to fight and defeat this enemy, by leaking our secrets, publishing fake Gitmo Koran-flushing stories, and maximizing the story of Abu Ghraib while quickly burying the beheading stories of Nick Berg, Paul Johnson, and others. Anger at the Democrat Party for betraying its hard-working base and caving to the Move-On fringe wing. Anger at the Republican Party for likewise betraying its base and caving to political correctness and open-borders. Anger at my government for bowing to political pressure instead of: sealing the border, halting new Visas from Muslim countries, instituting racial profiling at airports, and failing to aggressively defend against the daily string of anti-US propaganda coming from Reuters and the Associated Press. (Fauxtography, anyone?)

I could go on. Think I'll go grab another mug of coffee instead.
Posted by Grey at 09/11/2006 13:49:02 (Post ID 393) 1 comment

How do I know this? Because some spammer is trying to tell me so, via my blog's comments section.... over... and over... and over... and over again. You don't see the comments on my site as my blog script is filtering out the spam, but the spam attempts are being logged for analysis purposes:

Cross-referencing the blog comment log against my webserver's logs sheds some interesting light on what's going on. But first, an explanation of what the spammer is attempting to do.

I first stumbled across this in October 2003 when I wrote a little post about it. I didn't pay much attention back then, as my site wasn't being targeted at the time. It is now.

In short, spammers are attempting to flood the "comments" section of my blog with URLs that link to sites under their control. While many different URLs are being "promoted" in this fashion, the ones I'm seeing really fall into 2 categories: online gambling and online "pharmacies".

The spammers don't intend for their messages to be read by humans. I've noticed they're mostly posting in older blog entries from 2-3 years ago. I suppose they're doing this in the hopes the older entries aren't being checked by the site administrator (me). In fact, I see ALL comments posted to my blog, regardless of the age of the original post, due to the "most recent comments" section at the bottom of my main page at coremud.org.

If they don't intend for their messages to be read by humans, one wonders: why post them at all?

The answer: Google

They've figured out that by posting links to their sites within other sites that are linked and indexed by Google, the "Google ranking" for their own site increases. (With apologies to Google's most understanding lawyers: I use this term loosely as this also applies to MSN, Yahoo, and the other search engines that periodically spider coremud.org).

Originally, the messages posted by the "link spammers" or "flybloggers" would mainly contain URLs that link directly to the site they're promoting. The "Buy Phentermine" spammer was notorious for this. They would also post their messages from a small number of networks based in Poland or Russia: networks registered to them and under their direct (legal) control.

Because the mainstream blogging software makers caught on and started adding content-based and IP-based filters that blocked said posts, the spammers changed their tactics in 2 ways.

First, it would appear the spammers are now using 'botnets: computers illegally compromised by viruses, trojan horses, and the like. This seems to be the case as the number of distinct IP addresses trying to post spam on coremud.org has jumped significantly, and the number of "repeat visits" from the same IP address have significantly dropped.

Second, the spammers are no longer linking to their own sites. They now link to forums, free web hosting, and hijacked web pages. Those pages, in turn, link to the sites they're promoting. This makes content-based filtering more difficult, as the URL they're trying to spam changes on an almost daily basis.

One particular idiot spammer likes to prefix his spam with poorly-written English: "Hello, nice site look this:" followed by a verbal diarreaha of spam links.

Another interesting thing I've noticed: The IP addresses posting the spam are hitting the comment post page directly. According to the webserver's log, these IP addresses aren't doing a "GET" on the blog page they're responding to; they just hit the "POST" URL directly.

How are they getting the "POST" URL then? The log says another IP address is hitting the blog hours or even days earlier... sometimes by a referral from Google, MSN or Yahoo. It would appear this is the "controller" that's reading the HTML of my blog to record the "POST" URL's name and expected POST parameters. It would seem this information is entered into a database and then distributed to his 'botnet for the next round of automated spamming.

One big clue the spamming is automated is this: I've changed my "POST" URL a few times, just to jack with the spammer. His 'botnet continues to attempt to post to the old, invalid, URL for hours, days or even weeks... totally ignoring the 404 error. Eventually the spammer catches on and updates his database. In other cases, the spammer never catches on. Certain blog entries are "locked" from accepting any more posts, and you even get an error message when you attempt to post to them. The spammer's 'botnet ignores these messages and continues the post attempts anyway, even though they're automatically rejected.

I suppose I'll need to change my blog software again and make it so you have to decypher a graphical image and type in the correct combination of randomly-generated jumbled characters in the picture.... but what a pain. I have better things to do with my time. :(

Such as making personal mining domes for Core's players! :)
Posted by Grey at 09/07/2006 21:48:52 (Post ID 392) 2 comments

Looking out of the 7th floor breakroom window, facing west, I can see the KC Power & Light building. I'm told it is 22 stories high, and that it is possible (although you're "not supposed to go there") to take a special elevator that fits only 3 people all the very top where the light bulb is.

I find this building interesting for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, I look at this building and I immediately get this mental image of the Stay Puffed Marshmellow Man going on a rampage nearby. :) Secondly, if you click on the 3rd thumbnail you'll notice the escape stairs outside the highest floors. How would you like to be 20 stories high and in some pretty strong winds?

And then there's the lunch situation. Fortunately, a co-worker told me where I could find some decent places to eat within walking distance of our building. Prior to that, I ate at the little temporary "cafeteria" (translation: a food cart that serves boxed lunches or 1 hot entree Monday-Wednesday until our cafeteria is finished).

Their prices are $6.00 for....

This....

Yes, that's a piece of chicken on the right. Yes, my mouse is bigger. :)

(click on any of the thumbnails to view the full-size version)
Posted by Grey at 08/16/2006 07:52:59 (Post ID 391) 3 comments

We're on the 7th floor, and I have a window seat that offers a great view of some of the construction that's happening right now in downtown Kansas City.

Here's me at my desk

What's great about having a window seat in an oval-shaped building is nearly every desk can be considered a "corner office"!

I've got a great view of the new Sprint Arena that's under construction:

(click on any of the thumbnails to view the full-size version)
Posted by Grey at 08/07/2006 16:48:22 (Post ID 390) 7 comments

Certain IP addresses are being blocked. Any comment containing the word Phentermine is automatically rejected. Using my blog comments to advertise your bogus online pharmacy, gambling site, phony mortgage offers, etc., will cause your IP to be added to the blocked list and your comment deleted.
Posted by Grey at 07/09/2006 08:35:42 (Post ID 389) 0 comments

Anyway, with that disclaimer out of the way, here's what I've been working on lately:

That's a view of the sky on Core, the planet orbiting the remote star named Hermes 571-G. It's not exactly how I've always envisioned it, but it's pretty darn close! The sky itself is green and the cloud layers are blue. Aaaah, there's nothing quite like the smell of methane in the morning.

Nope, that's not a Photoshop render. What, oh what, could Grey be working on...? :)

Ignore the cheesy village buildings. I will rip them out and replace them with mining domes. I haven't done that yet as right now I'm focusing on the mechanics of the game engine.
Posted by Grey at 07/09/2006 08:20:32 (Post ID 388) 11 comments

In response to "After a long wait, I finally got my first NIGERIAN email" (Post ID 286)
02/09/2007 13:40:50 Grey:
Nicole, I'm glad you took the time to do the search!

In response to "After a long wait, I finally got my first NIGERIAN email" (Post ID 286)
02/08/2007 11:59:09 Nicole:
I've received two of these letters so far from Alfred Tas. I thought I would look up his name just to see what this crap was all about. I figured it was a scam because I'm not lucky enough to get that much money!

In response to "You have a nice site look this" (Post ID 392)
02/01/2007 22:05:49 Grey:
You're welcome.

In response to "You have a nice site look this" (Post ID 392)
02/01/2007 19:27:07 :

Thanks

In response to "The Mom Update" (Post ID 373)
01/01/2007 01:02:22 Grey:
Well that's so nice you think so, 148.233.229.235! Of course my blog script has been logging all of your previous attempts to post your links to online pharmacies, gambling, and gay porn. But thanks so much for posting in a thread I wrote....