Helzerman's Odd Bits : Weblog

Monday Jan 01, 2007

Five things you don't know about me

It appears that I've been tagged by Simon for the "Five things you don't know about me" chain letter, so here goes.

1. Shortly after my husband and I were married I took him to a party where he met a family friend who was once a spy for Stalin (read about him here). My husband had to be wondering what he got himself into.

2. My nickname at IBM was Killer. One morning my husband received a call at 8am asking if "killer was there."

3. One of my outside work interests is scambaiting, "the practice of pretending interest in a fraudulent scheme in order to manipulate a scammer. The purpose of scam baiting might be to waste the scammers' time, embarrass them...or simply to amuse the baiter." wikipedia

4. In the 90s I worked on a project building and repairing computers for hospitals in Cuba. The computers for the project, which was sponsored by the Cuban Ministry of Health, were donated by people and companies in the US. Before we could ship containers to Cuba we had to explain why 486 PCs were not an ideal platform for weapons testing.

5. When I was younger I worked for Transworld Entertainment and met a bunch of famous singers including Ozzy Ozbourne.

And now for the next victims. I hereby tag: Ed Brill Mike Dolan Morgan McLintic Richard Schwartz Gordon Haff

Posted at 08:18PM Jan 01, 2007 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[1] Tag it:

Wednesday Dec 20, 2006

Merry Christmas

Saw this on the way into the office today. Spray-painted Merry Christmas "sign" in front of a shabby rent-by-the-week "hotel."

Picture of the hotel taken last summer.

Posted at 08:05PM Dec 20, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

Tuesday Dec 19, 2006

Seen and heard in San Francisco

First of all, I'm very dissapointed that I didn't get a picture of Drunkin' Santa, especially since he was so keen on me taking one. Silly me left my phone in the hotel room to charge for once (drat). Maybe tomorrow.

As for over heard (all in outdoor locations),

"Can I be your hero? Can...I... BE... YOUR....HERO....TODAY?" This kind offer was extended to anyone in remote proximinity to Howard and First Street yesterday. If you need a hero, I suggest you stop by.

"Yes, please come to San Francisco.... yes, I'll buy you anything...anything you want. Sure, dinner. Yes, we'll go shopping, anything you want." A man I'll just call Mr. Poor Sap.

"So, I said, I don't care about your personal life, GET BACK TO WORK!" Someone whose employees could probably use a hero.

Posted at 09:19PM Dec 19, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

....take them bowling

What's a Sun meeting without a little bowling? Here's me at our all hands corporate marketing meeting. The morning was spent coming up with some cool ideas for 2007 (you'll just have to wait and see heh heh heh). The afternoon was spent bowling.

See those two lines on either side of the lanes? That's where my bowling balls all ended up. No bowling pins were injured during this bout of play.

"This is not 'Nam. This is bowling. There are rules." The Big Lebowski

Posted at 09:09PM Dec 19, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

Sunday Dec 10, 2006

Car update - BMW wins over Outback

I took the 2007 LL Bean Outback and BMW stationwagons out for another test drive this weekend and decided on the BMW. The features are way too cool to list but include things like a radar-like screen that shows how close objects are to me when I'm backing up and voice command everything. Randy (my hubby) called me while I was on my way home from the dealership and the screen flashed that Randy was calling and asked if I wanted to accept the call. I said, 'accept' and we were connected. His voice was coming through my car speakers and he said he could hear me fine. This is going to be great for conference calls. There are other things that I'm sure car-geeks would love (such as tires that you can drive for 100 miles even if they're flat), but I love the ultra-automated features and things like the SOS button that will call ambulance, police and your two closest friends automatically with your exact location if something happens to you.

Here are some pics I just took with my cell phone:

Posted at 10:10AM Dec 10, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[2] Tag it:

Saturday Dec 02, 2006

You gotta kind of feel sorry for these guys...

Saw these two while taking my Subaru test drive. Apparently the two of them protest on this corner every day. Both had a very 60's aura about them. I can not imagine holding a protest every day only to have two people (including myself!) show up. Also, they picked a horrible spot right near some luxury car dealerships and two very high-end shopping centers (not exactly hotbeds for the disgruntled).

This photo is dedicated to my Republican friend (you know who you are) who gave me car advice via cellphone during my outing today. Figured you'd get a kick out of it.

Posted at 03:23PM Dec 02, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[1] Tag it:

Need a new car! Today's test drives...

I need a new car. My beloved Outback has seen better days and is starting to show signs of aging (it's a 1998). Today I test drove the 2007 "LL Bean version" Outback (considered the high-end of the line) and the 2007 turbo (one step down). Of the two, I liked the LL Bean one a lot better (bigger engine, and just plain drove/felt better). For variety, I also test drove two BMWs. The 2007 x3 Sports Activity Vehicle (didn't like it, felt to "big" ) and BMW's station wagon, the 2007 3 Series (liked that one quite a bit). So, now I am torn between LL Bean and Series 3. I'm going to bring my husband to the dealerships and get his opinion.

One thing that was funny was the sales person at Subaru was telling me how the LL Bean car had a "wooden steering wheel". I had some funny visions in my head including something like the car from the Beverly Hillbillies. Turns out it looks like this:

So... anyone have any good car recommendations for me?

Posted at 03:13PM Dec 02, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[2] Tag it:

Thursday Nov 16, 2006

Museaum of bad album covers

Thanks to Charles King for pointing me toward this really funny site: The museaum of bad album covers.

Among the gems:

Posted at 05:30PM Nov 16, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

Wednesday Nov 15, 2006

Unexpected nakedness on Scripting News

A quick trip to Scripting News provided links to some very NSFW pics today. As my friend John D would say, Cripes!

photo credit: Nikita Kashner

Posted at 09:42PM Nov 15, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[2] Tag it:

Sunday Nov 12, 2006

I might as well just be buying crack (or meth or whatever the heck it is you make with Advil)

I wasn't feeling good all weekend, so I figured I'd better hedge my bets and get some non-drowsy cold medicine in case I'm still not feeling great on Monday. For some reason, Advil Cold and Sinus is the only cold medicine that doesn't send me into outer space (Tylenol Cold renders me useless for the entire time it's in my system).

The process went like this:

Went to the isle in the drug store and retrieved a slip of paper to bring to the pharmacist (who fortunately was on duty since it's not 24 hours there).
Gave her a copy of my drivers license. Waited while she inputed the information into her computer.
Waited for her to retrieve the medicine from the back room.
Filled out a form including, name, address, phone, etc.
Paid for the Advil.

All this because apparently; mix up some advil, draino (which they leave right out there on the shelf for the grabbing!) and assorted other objects and, Bingo!, you get meth. I've never tried meth, but I have a feeling that these days it's probably easier to find than Advil!

Posted at 07:38PM Nov 12, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

Saturday Nov 11, 2006

Coolest computer ever

Here are some pictures of the coolest machine I've seen, perhaps ever; the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment (SAGE) system. Besides spawning new concepts/functionality such as, "magnetic-core
storage, modular design, interactive graphic displays, on-line common
databases, and continuous and reliable operation," the 1950/60's era computer had features that no system should be without including, an ashtray, rotary dial phone and a panic button.

Me and Sage at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA.

The "gun" - held against the screen it would display information on incoming aircraft.

The ashtray - hey, if you had to sit in front of a screen looking for the Reds all day, you'd smoke too.

The phone - handy for when the alarm button lights up.

Only a small part of the machine. Note the additional phones built into the side and tables.

Posted at 03:38PM Nov 11, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

Friday Nov 10, 2006

Photos of Mercury (and Venus) transit

At 11 am PST Nov 8, Mercury started to transit the Sun, here are photos taken afocally thru my my friend Tony Nievera's 4 inch refractor. There is a sun storm seen in the photos. Tony says he's going to put these on his blog, but I'm sick of waiting for him to do it, so I'm posting them below.

From Tony's email, "The next transit of Mercury is scheduled on 2016. We`see the transit of
the two planets between us and the Sun. Venus transits the sun every 212 years because of the incline in its orbit relative to earth's. The transit comes in pair every four years. We will see the Transit of Venus again two years from now, the last transit was last June 8, 2004, then it will be another long wait in 212 years."

Photo credit all photos: Tony Nievera

Posted at 03:55PM Nov 10, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[2] Tag it:

I'll never get used to this

As someone who grew up in New York, I still have a hard time getting into the "holiday spirit" when it's so warm and green outside. Yesterday I had my first eggnog latte of the year. Look at the picture of the coffee cup - does this look like eggnog weather to you?

Posted at 09:55AM Nov 10, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

Thursday Nov 09, 2006

Too much information!

Just an open letter to anyone working in cubes or offices with thin walls....

I don't need to know that,

your employee is a liar
human resources called you because you turned up at a customer site in "inappropriate clothing"
so-and-so is going to get a low rank on his performance review
someone is guilty of a felony
your daughter ran up tons of charges on your corporate amex

These are just some of the things I've heard over the last two months or so. People ---shush-it.

Posted at 10:11AM Nov 09, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[0] Tag it:

control / caps lock

One of the strange things about using both a Sun Ray and a Laptop is getting used to switching back and forth between the control and caps lock keys. For those of you who do not have a Sun Ray, here is what that part of the keyboard looks like...

Posted at 10:04AM Nov 09, 2006 by Catherine Helzerman in Personal | Comments[4] Tag it: