jinxed

Entries Tagged as 'jinxed'

Bloody funJune 11th, 2008, 7 Comments

Last night I met Vicky, Neil and Anouk for dinner.

On my way to Crazy Horse¹ someone threw a water balloon out of a window and it nearly hit me. It landed next to my right leg.

I looked up at the sky and shook my fist! They were out there somewhere! It was probably the same person who hit the back of my head with a fork.

I thought I escaped embarrassment. But during dinner, Vicky said, “You should go salsa dancing.”

“I don’t salsa dance,” I said.

“Why not? They always need more men.”

“The last time salsa danced I kicked the toenail off my date.”

“Ouch!”

“I had to make a tourniquet out of a napkin for her bleeding toe,” I said.

“Right,” Vicky said. “I always forget that story!”

Salsa dancing confuses me because there’s too much stepping. One wrong move and bang! She loses a toenail.

If I tried again, I would make her wear steel-toed boots. Not very sexy, but safe.

_{1. Crazy Horse is an excellent steak house in Wellington. I had filet mignon. In New Zealand “filet” is pronounced “fill it.”}

Form design for designers and developersJune 5th, 2008, 2 Comments

Last Wednesday I gave a presentation to the .NET user group. The presentation was about form design and it was based on research by Luke Wroblewski and Matteo Penzo

Designers (sometimes me) are different than developers (almost everyone at the presentation).¹

For example, before the presentation began, Kirk had an announcement:

“After the presentation we’ll give out a keyboard as a prize, so stick around,” Kirk said.

I said, “A keyboard? Excellent! Is anyone in the audience musical? Can anyone play a song?”

…

“No, it’s not that type of keyboard,” Kirk said. “It’s a Microsoft keyboard.”

…

I was the only person in the room who thought it was a musical keyboard.

The presentation went well, and it was fun to meet new people in the IT community. If you went to the presentation, thanks for coming!

Update: the presentation has been posted to Slideshare.

_{1. Although the title of the presentation made some girls bite the bait! Design can do that.}

Nouvelle Caledonie & meSeptember 16th, 2007, No Comments

Two weeks ago I went to New Caledonia. I slept. I ate. I mingled with French people. I also visited a small aquarium between two beaches, where nautiluses (living fossils) swim around.

Noumea’s a nice place. Almost everyone I met knew how to play chess and poker. Games are important when the people you meet can’t speak English.

The city was different… it smelled like Paris.

My camera isn’t used to sunlight so it saturated the hell out of my photos. Everyday looked like this:

Wharf 1

(near the Baie des Citrons)

Some interesting people too. The first day at the hostel I had this conversation (imagine my broken French):

“Hi. Are you okay? What happened?” I asked.

“This morning my cell phone was stolen. It fell out of my pocket and someone picked it up and turned it off.” he said.

“That sucks. My phone was stolen in Australia too.”

“Hey, what’s wrong?” I asked.

“Last night I left my wallet on the table outside. Someone stole 500 dollars from me.” He frowned.

“That really sucks. I hate carrying money.”

I was playing chess with a baker and he walked past our table, looking like death.

“What’s wrong with him? Is he still sad about his cell phone and cash?” I asked the baker.

“No, did you know his father was in the hospital? This afternoon he passed away.”

“Shit.” I said.

I don’t know how to console someone in French, and quite stupidly, I felt compelled to say something.

I said, “Tu n’as pas de la chance,” which means, “You’re not lucky.”

It didn’t make him feel better and made me feel like the king of understatements.

Life’s hard, eh?

Mop and dryJune 11th, 2007, 5 Comments

Yesterday I bought pavlova¹ for dessert.

I poured a bottle of cream into a whipping machine, and while fiddling with the plug the machine slipped from my hands! In one instant my kitchen floor went from dirty to rancid².

While this commotion was in locomotion, the chocolate on the stove was burning in the pot.

Burnt chocolate, cream-less pavlova, rancid floor. How lame.

_{1. a dessert consisting of a meringue base or cup filled with fruit and whipped cream.}
_{2. our floor was already gross, cream excluded. Instead of tiles we walk on doormats.}

Burn baby burnApril 20th, 2007, 17 Comments

I woke up this morning and my bedroom was on fire! I thought, “Fuck!” What did that stupid bear say? Stop, drop and roll? Or is that for forest fires?

jeffrey

i like butter, don’t you?