I always thought it was "Morning" like the start of the day, but apparently it's "Mourning" like sadness or bereavement.  Who knew?

These are the mourning doves that have been nesting on my fire escape for the past few weeks.  We've been trying to get a picture but have not wanted to disturb the nest, so this is one of the first pictures we've gotten.

Did I mention how much I love this place?, originally uploaded by astoriahermit.

I am long overdue on my gushing review of Fette Sau but if search the blog for earlier posts you will find some mentions. Here is a look at the interior. They have three of my favorite things: beer, bbq and bourbon. What more could a guy want than a mexican man hole?

A night at the summer house, originally uploaded by astoriahermit.

We call Fette Sau in Williamsburg (354 Metropolitan) the summer house cause that's where we like to spend our summers. The doors to the outside were open and the weather was nice... Spring has sprung.

Yeah yeah yeah, I'm blogging about my wife's blog - Bite me.  She deserves the plug.

On too business, in her most recent post she pays homage to bull shitters.  She makes reference to a quote (of mine) and I'd like to correct it.  The accurate quote is:

...don't even bother, I can make it up slightly faster than you can ask it.

For bonus points, the blog is a photo blog... can anyone tell me what the text in the image is associated with?

This is my favorite of her recent snaps.

Photo used without permission

All right, I've been a bit slack lately. There are extenuating circumstances. In the last week I experienced the most excruciating work day of my career - layoffs. No fun and a couple of my friends didn't escape the blade. But I'm recovering from my PTSD. Seriously, I wasn't sleeping and am only now getting back to normal.

Thanks go to my friend 'Killer' for giving me a little gem to blog about.  We were swapping stories about nicknames.  My theory is:

For a nickname to stick you either you assign a nickname that is a preposterous non-sequitur or one that is so finely tuned to the intended that it seems like the consummation of some longing in the natural order when it is applied.

Which is why Cobb is so perfect, but I digress.  Needless to say 'Killer' isn't really named 'Killer' but yet I predict the nickname will stick.

We were swapping stories and I was offering, what to some, is the old hoary chestnut about a friend of my little brother who I dubbed "Ox" well over 10 years ago.  I am awaiting confirmation but I'm pretty certain it stuck.

Approaching a mid-length post... She responds about telling me about a friend of hers who has fallen into a man hole THREE times - once in India.  She went on to mention that her friend was from Mexico and had likely done the other two there.  Neither of us could recall ever seeing an open man hole without all kinds of protective barriers.

Quick hop and a skip leads me to the phrase of the day "Mexican Man hole"...  I don't even know where to go with this.  I don't work blue, and this is generally a PG-13 blog, but I can't let it drop.  At any rate, fill in your own visual here all I have are some stock images:

Oh, and I'm back!

Thank you Mr. Harvey... this is beautiful

My team and I left a little surprise for about 60 co-workers this morning.  Let's just say it involved the little stickers pictured here and the optical sensors or trackballs on the bottom of their mouse.

Actually, thanks go to Noam for giving me the idea by pulling the prank on me a while ago. It takes people a bit to figure it out. Usually one or two unpluggings of the of mouse and a restart - or at least that's how long it took me.

And, before they try and weasel out, my accomplices:

If you've seen the Google April fools joke, it's a good one, but there is an Easter Egg.  If you expand the browser further and further to the right the image of the Martian landscape keeps going.  It should be mentioned that I have a dual monitor setup that extends 2560 pixels across.  Now I haven't been able to reproduce this, but when you expand all the way out to 2560 a little text bubble appears at the far right on the martian horizon in the photo that says "Welcome to Mars. Nice monitor". So pay attention as you do it, and if you figure out how to reproduce, please let us know.  Guessing it's a cookie thang.

Here is what it looks like on my screen (click the image for the full size):

I have yet to explore the questionnaires, etc.  But you better believe I'm signing up.

I love April Fools.

Feeling like I'm neglecting both of my readers so I thought I'd offer a morsel on Patents (that I stole from Wired).  At any rate, Venice, March 19, 1474 the following law was enacted:

"Any person in this city who makes any new and ingenious contrivance, not made heretofore in our dominion, shall, as soon as it is perfected so that it can be used and exercised, give notice of the same to our office of Provveditori de Comun [State Judicial Office], it being forbidden up to 10 years for any other person in any territory and place of ours to make a contrivance in the form and resemblance thereof, without the consent and license of the author."

Interestingly enough, according to Wired, it was about attracting foreign investment.

As a "Creative Professional" who does work for hire on a daily basis, Intellectual property law is something of great interest.  I've recently had to fill out a disclosure of all "prior works of authorship" to distinguish my own creative endeavors from things I've done for hire.

In that vein, I'll pass along some advice I received from a friend who conveniently happens to be an attorney:

When describing your works of prior authorship, cut as wide a [creative] swath as you can in as few words as possible.  Put the onus on them to get clarification to try and diminish the scope of what you're claiming.

So, to give you a bad example that is completely fictitious, rather than claiming my new sock knit as a work of authorship I would claim "new solution for sox".  Pretty wide swath, eh?

This is the part where I clarify the bits you've read above:  This advice from from my friend was offered as a courtesy to me and is being paraphrased by me to you as a courtesy.  This does not constitute legal advice to you and I make no representation that I have specific expertise in this area and I further make no claims as to the validity or utility of this advice.  Should you choose to act on these statements you do so at your own risk and are advised to seek competent legal advice prior to acting. This is posted here because it just sounds reasonable to me.

I just love legalese.

I guess clowns have to get ready for work too., originally uploaded by astoriahermit.

I was a little surprised to see a clown getting ready for work on the subway this morning, but no more surprised than you ever are to see weird stuff on the subway.