I went back out to the site of Ignition 2006 today. We left the event early due to pouring rain and general bad unhappiness, with a strategic retreat to a loft in Old Town Montreal to have fun, hang out, and wear costumes that weren't covered with mud. But we left some equipment on site, and I went out to get it today, and whoooooo boy was it a mess.
We tarped everything up and left up protective canopies when we left, but I guess the wind really got into this cache of stuff in the last couple of weeks, because the canopies were blown all over the place, bent, bruised, and generally indignant. Most of the tarped equipment was still tarped and dry, but there was one corner of one tarp that had come up, and everything under it was wet. Fortunately it wasn't anything important -- empty bottles, a barbecue, and some folding tables.
The drive out to the site was great. It's a piece of land owned by my friend Sherman Samuel, just north of Mansonville in the Eastern Townships. The leaves on the trees have just about turned, so there's starting to be some bare trees and the last sharp colors of the trees. It's melancholy and beautiful -- great October weather.
I was able to cram everything into the Sleek Black Tux (my just-made-up name for the Hyundai Tuscon we drive), but the drive back was pretty rough. The smell of all that camping equipment put up wet and left in the forest for a couple of weeks was... well... pretty gamy. Like really, really old towels. We call that smell "meefy", and that's pretty much what the car smells like now. Meefy.
When I got home, Maj and Amita convinced me not to unload the car, but to come inside and watch the Battlestar Galactica season premiere on tape, and drink red wine and have warm split-pea soup. Allllll right.
tags: meef burning man ignition eastern townships snazzy tux
Lars, you well-informed and chaste commentator
I agree with Lars: Eric is doing the right thing.
I understand what the Mozilla Foundation is doing, and it's more than likely the right thing for them to do. I understand what Eric is doing with Gnuzilla, and it also seems like the right thing to do. Debian and Mozilla can be friends and yet not use the same name for the software. That's OKAY.
tags: lars eric dorland iceweasel firefox well-informed chaste
Freedom
It sounds like, at least briefly, China has unblocked Wikipedia. It's interesting to see if this will continue, and what it will mean for future policies towards China by other Web sites. Unlike Google, Yahoo, and MSN, the Wikimedia Foundation has steadfastly refused to censor its content to meet Chinese government standards. If the WMF can stand up to China and win, what does that mean for other Web sites in the future?