1 - Ben R. Remember when running the grill was truly an art to be mastered and when doing lunch hour rush running full 12s and quarters would bring awe and admiration from the newbies?

Ed My barber in Columbus, OH was best friends with Knight and would always say what an awesome guy he really is. I never appreciated it until the apology incident but also saw 5 minutes later how quickly his temper and demeanor could change when some idiot asked him to autograph a copy of John Fienstein's "A Season on the Brink".

2 - Wow, I can't understand Nathans formula, I bow to your formula knowledge and hackery.

Things about me:
I married my high school sweetheart

I can't whistle

I once jump over the counter at a Burger King and yelled "I am the walrus".

I had an Elvis impersonator perform at my wedding reception. He was AWESOME!!

I am not the walrus

3 - ok, now that this post is aging a little it may be safe to post

- Raised in New Jersey - a FAT little boy in family of 6 kids. Went to Catholic schools and truly believed that my 1st grade nun had eyes in the back of her head.
- Started playing guitar in 6th grade 'cause I wanted to play guitar at Mass. Spent hours a day practicing guitar (did start playing at Mass after we'd moved to Washington, then later in bluegrass band at square dances, then later in country band).
- Started wrestling in high school, lost lots of weight and got in really good shape. Then we moved to Washington State, where no one knew I'd been the fat geeky kid, and I loved having a fresh start at the beginning of 10th grade.
- Jobs I've had: newspaper routes, babysitting, yard work, shoveling snow, etc as a kid. From high school and beyond: Picking crops (various berries and beans), school janitor, gas station attendant (in a bad part of town - lots of robberies and bad things happening to lone attendants, so I often had a .38 tucked in my belt), worked for a year in a daycare center (I'd go home at the end of the day and just twitch -- I still say "Owie" when I get hurt, and "Oopsie" when I drop something), fruit cannery production line, ice cream truck driver, dishwasher, street singer (at Portland's Saturday Market and at Seattle's Pike Place Market). Taught private lessons on fretted instruments - and played guitar and sang in Country band at night (seen plenty of bar fights - never been in one and don't want to be)
- After years of music biz, married with a son on the way went back to college full-time while working full-time and got 2-yr degree in programming. Been a geek ever since.
- Did Hapkido (Korean martial art) very seriously for several years - still practice a little when no one's around. Broke my nose as a kid, broke a toe doing Hapkido, but most injuries (cracked ribs, torn quads, concussion, torn retina, gashes and bruises and pulls and sprains, oh MY) came from soccer as an adult.
- Rarely read fiction.
- Love the water and sunshine and favorite music is contemporary Hawaiian and slack key guitar. Am almost totally out of touch with popular music.
- Could easily see myself living in silence and meditating all day in a mountain monastery.

4 - Oh, I don't even think you need the @Do. Sorry, my first one was more complex than it needed to be.

n := "twoallbeefpattiesspecialsaucelettucecheesepicklesonionsonasesameseedbun";
@For( X := 0 ; X < @Length(n) ; X := X + 1 ; T := T + @Right( @Left(N; @Length(N) - X) ; 1));
@Prompt([Ok];"";T)

5 - Hrmmm... back to ya, Rich... and expanded to handle up to 1000 words.

data := "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun";
S := @If(!@Contains(data; @Char(250)); @Char(250);
!@Contains(data; @Char(251)); @Char(251);
!@Contains(data; @Char(9)); @Char(9); @Char(13));
src := @Explode(Data; " ");
digits := (0:1:2:3:4:5:6:7:8:9);
digitsRev := (9:8:7:6:5:4:3:2:1:0);
numList := @Subset(((digits*100) *+ (digits*10) *+ digits); @Elements(src));
numListRev := @Subset((digitsRev*100) *+ (digitsRev*10) *+ digitsRev);-@Elements(src));
targList := @Text(numList) + S + src;
@Word(@Replace(@Text(numListRev); @Text(numList); targList); S; 2)

Incidentally, this is definitely backwards compatible to v3. It might work in v2. I don't remember what release introduced @Char and @Word. I don't think it would be difficult to make it v2 compatible, if we had the documentation on what @functions were available.

6 - I'm an old Lotus guy that's gone to the dark side (it's not that dark BTW)

I picked Tobacco as a kid in Ontario ( for money)
I was a member of the 4 H club Swine division ( I had two pigs)
I sold newspapers, TVGuide and Greeting Cards
I pinstriped cars
I worked in a radio shack
I programmed in BASIC and DBASE for money
I managed a Night Club (Caberet) where I was a bartender , DJ and doorman.
Now I'm a Microsofty and ex-Loti - and I'm writing a novel in my spare time..

7 - And you guys always bittch that I have too much time on my hands...jeez...

8 - c'mon Rock, I thought "I played for Bobby Knight" was a good disclosure.

Others about me --
1) Despite having a job which I could theoretically do anywhere in the world, I live seven blocks from my mom and the house I grew up in. Michael Jordan (yes, that Michael Jordan) lived three blocks north of me when he first moved to Highland Park (now, he has a slightly bigger place).

2) My life plan when I went to college was to open my own bookstore. I worked at Waldenbooks growing up, a job I took because of my unnatural fan worship of Doctor Who. Only because I took a summer job on campus stringing 10-BaseT cables did I get into IT.

2.5) I can still remember the international standard book number of Lee Iacocca's autobiography -- actually, both of them -- from the number of hardcover copies I sold in 1984/5. (in case you want to test me, it was 0-553-05067-2 and 0-553-05102-4).

3) I graduated college when I was 20. My first job out of college was, officially and on my business card, "Bulletin Board Administrator". That would be a SYSOP to you and me, but the company was a bit more rigid. Being that the company was FTD, most florists wondered what the hell was wrong with our bulletin boards back at HQ that they needed someone to manage the thumbtacks and corkboard

4) In same said job, our department was created to generate revenue for what was then a trade association. The business plan was so screwed up that we tried to resell software to the general public. Yes, FTD. We ran an ad in the Glen Ellyn, Illinois, local newspaper, which I designed on DrawPerfect for DOS.

5) I walked away from a car crash where I t-boned someone @ 40 MPH (their fault). The car was totalled. Airbags and seatbelts really are life-saving devices.

oh, one more
6) I had one of the very first Atari 2600 units. It wasn't even called a model number then, it was just "Atari". And it came with both joysticks and paddles. And Air-Sea Battle & Blackjack were my first cartridges. My dad still has said Atari somewhere (and when are you going to give it back, dad?)

9 - @Rock: I used to take Capoeira, brazilian (sp?) martial arts. And and early GOOD LUCK for next September. That's a huge achievement.

@Laurette: I hear ya! Back in 1994, I was the only woman in my entire graduating class on the university for Computer Science.

@Ed: My dad still has our Atari. Pong ROCKS in widescreen.

10 - Rock,

I lived in Bermuda back in the 80s, where I used to attend Saltus Grammar School (high school), where the school uniform of course includes beige Bermuda shorts !

Bacardi used to have a very attractive building on the outskirts of Hamilton, on Pitts Bay road. Are they still there ? Where did you stay when you went there, at the Princess ?

11 - 1) I tried out for the rock group KISS many, many moons ago. Guess what.... I was cut!

2) I have never driven a car in my life.

3) I worked in a photo studio during high school and used to steal pictures of all the cute girls who went to my school.

4) I used a golf scope to see the blackboard in school and in college.

5) I was the Inter-Fraternity Council President in college.

6) I worked at college during the summers teaching Chemistry, Calculus, Physics and Fortran.

More to come...

Bruce

12 - @Ed - Hmmmmmm...... okay, maybe some more background. I worked my way through college doing antenna and satellite systems, much of which involved high places, towers. Falls from ladders, roofs (rooves?), no towers, though. <G>

Six years of contact football - someone's always breaking, dislocating, or tearing something. Not me.

A few years of working cattle (the branding/castrating part, which really beats the hell out of a person) and on farms, which is a pretty darned dangerous occupation.

Car accidents, including one where I was hit by a drunk woman that permanently disabled my back.

Rollerblading was invented in Minnesota, ya know. When you get to the emergency room, they use a wire brush to scrape the asphalt out of/off your skin. That part really sucks. I think it's why whiskey was invented, but they never game me any, the bastards!

Of most of the people I know, I can't think of any who haven't broken something. Maybe it's not, I don't know. I've done enough entirely stupid things that I won't post here that something should have snapped by now (other than my mind..... hee ha ha ho ho )

13 - Man, I picked a bad time to drop off the face of the earth- is anyone still reading this thread? Read my stuff, ok? LOL

Most of the things about me that would surprize you are illegal- I'm not kidding, either- so I'll stay away from that. Let's just say I got away with all of them, and I'm not like that anymore.

1. I was in the Army for 3 years- when I was in basic training, my range buddy and I appropriated cookies and pies from the mess hall during kp, passed them into laundry bags through the window of the day room (we had to CLEAN it, not use it), and sold them to other guys in our platoon. $1.50 for a little pack of cookies and $4.00 per pie- I mean an 8" pie- LOL. The pies didn't sell as well because they're hard to hide. We kept ours in the ceiling. Oh, wait...is that illegal?

2. I rode a mountain bike 750 kilometers through Southern Germany (and countless miles more around towns we visited) when in the Army. I was about 220 lbs then instead of my current 320. We visited Wurzburg, Nordlingen, Rothenburg, Dinklesbuhl, Augsburg, Neushwanstein, Munich and Regensburg. It took 17 days and when moving from place to place we did at least 100 miles per day- even in the Alps.

3. I was a baker for 9 years before starting my career in IT. They don't call me biscuit man for nothing. My specialty is bread- I make a very nice crusty loaf of french bread, and can make cinnamon rolls that would blow your mind. I worked in a place where we made so many pecan pies we used to keep the filling in a 35 gal. trash can.

4. One time I....well, no I can't tell that....

5. OH! I know one that would surprize everyone: I shower EVERY day. No- really, I do!

6. I used to be a banquet waiter at the green marble hotel next to Lenox Mall (at last look it was a Marriot- not sure what it is now). I lied my way into the job (there is A LOT to know, so I was in trouble to begin with) and fumbled around at first (I was literally shaking the first time I had to pour wine for a guest- it happened to be the general manager of the hotel), but quickly learned to bring 7 plates of hot food out at a time with no tray. We were all hand service at the time (it was a Westin when it opened) and before the hotel opened we would practice carrying hot plates with water on them- walking in circles forwards and backwards. I served Loyd Bridges and his wife, Doc from Loveboat, Trini Lopez and that Atkins guy from the Blue Lagoon (he was an ass) while working there.

14 - @Damien: Obviously not the walrus.

Just as obviously, the Eggman. Googoogajoob.

15 - twoallbeefpattiesspecialsaucelettucecheesepicklesonionsonasesameseedbun or something like that?

16 - Hey Rock
What kind of horses?

I showed the first amateur Quarter Horse High Point Stallion in 86, World Champion Amateur Stallion in 87. Went ‘Professional’ for 10 years after that. Too many late nights in the truck burned me out.
Still have three in back yard and pick stalls every night.

Offshore Crane operator
Offshore Oil and Gas Operator
Drilled water wells in East Texas
Ship fitter for Offshore Supply boats (hottest job I have ever had)

17 - One more, in case it's not obvious....I like to cut and past my posts form word into blogs......hence the hieroglyphics.

18 - You married a groupie?

19 - Nice thread and a fine excuse to post on Rock's blog for the first time. Incidentally that for the VoIP tips blog, I'm up and running now.

1) I actually went to university to read a Pharmacy degree, nothing to do with computers at all. My CV reads otherwise as I changed courses later. I got into computers and the internet because it seemed to be an easy way to meet girls.

2) I once got a job in McDonalds. I tell friends and colleagues that this is because I went on a Total Quality Management training course and wanted to learn about how McD's have such high customer sat ratings. I mention that I always wanted to learn how to cook burgers anyway. The truth is that there was a girl called Alex that worked there and it was the only way to get to know her better. As my heart was truly in the job and I wasn't doing it for the money, my burgers actually looked like the pictures.

3) I sing karaoke, sometimes twice a week. I'd always wanted to sing publically and one week a girl I liked was singing and I figured it would be a good way of getting to know her. We later sang a duet to "Summer Nights" from Greece.

4) I once applied to the British security services to be a government agent. I quite fancied myself as James Bond and figured it would be an easy way of picking up women. (are we seeing a pattern here?) As it turned out, my language skills weren't really good enough and the starting salary wasn't worth the effort of brushing them up to the level required.

5) I love owning high performance cars and taking them to the race track or drag strip. As well as being a typical guy when it comes to cars, I figured it would help pick up women. One of my cars, in 18 months of ownership, was responsible for 7 different dates. I can't believe how shallow some people are and how stupid I was to believe dates with people like that might go anywhere.

6) I have a secret blog that details my invariably successful love life, access is by invitation only but naturally it runs on Domino. I'm currently in negotiation with a UK magazine publisher to publish extracts from it in a forthcoming article about online dating.

20 - Out-geek this! It uses permuted concatenation, @Log, an @For that is nested within an @Do and which contains another @Do, and an @Sort! It doesn't have the limitation of only working for unique words, and it should work (up to memory limits) on an unlimited length list!

a := @Explode( "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun" ; " ");
b := @Subset( @Do( n := ("9" : "8" : "7" : "6" : "5" : "4" : "3" : "2" : "1" : "0");@For( x := 0; x < @Integer(@Log(@Elements(a))); @Do(n := n*+ ("9" : "8" : "7" : "6" : "5" : "4" : "3" : "2" : "1" : "0");x := x+1));n); @Elements(a)) + a;
T := @Implode(@RightBack(@Sort(b);2));
@Prompt([Ok]; ""; T)

-rich

P.S. In production code, I'd use Andrew's method , but this is just to establish that my Alpha Geek chops are still right up there with the two of you.

21 - Bruce - You've never driven a car? How did you get to all those REO Speedwagon concerts ;)

Chris - Oh yes, dressing 12 burgers buns in 29seconds is an art, although it's funny at family BBQ's.

Ed - No bones broken here.

Rock - Take all beef patty, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickle, onion on a sesame seed bun

22 - Ah, it was two patties...all I know is that I cooked 12 regular and made 6 sandwiches

23 - Hey Chris Byrne -- I played for Bobby Knight once.


umm.

that is, I played in the Indiana University Pep Band while in college, and he made a guest appearance as our conductor one time. "This one time, at band camp..."

nevermind, back to pre-Lotusphere haze.

24 - I didn't think we'd get much of an admission or skeleton out of Ed Oh well....

@Jess - I know what you mean about basic. I did "basic lite", otherwise known as USAF basic training. It was kewl, in a masochistic sorta way, because it proved to me that I could do it - and I got to see first-hand the way it works psychologically. Tech school in the USAF was one of the best years of my life. About like 4 years of college crammed into one year - and getting paid for it

What martial art did you take? I take Choi Kwang Do - in fact I will test for my black belt on 17 Sept 2005 - woohoo!

BTW, thanks to everyone for participating - this is FUN

Rock

25 - I can't believe you geeks are teaching me how to develop around the whole Big Mac rhyming thing!

26 - I just know I'm going to regret this....

1. I have a Bachelor's and Master's degree in Chinese history and anthropology, no university credentials at all in computer science or engineering.

2. I could sight-read IBM punch cards at the age of 12 (hey, there are only 64 characters to keep track of)

3. I worked for 3 summers at Atlantic Records in New York. Got free tix to a few AWESOME concerts: Bangladesh, Allman Brothers @Fillmore...). Shook a few very famous hands. But the Beatles (on another label) are still my faves.

4. I dropped out of college after my first year because I hated it. Took 2 years to travel around the world, lived in New Zealand for 6 months and had a job copy-editing on a newspaper.

5. The college that I dropped out of because I hated it had a very strong fraternity system. I used to write letters to the editor about how fraternities suck. The Inter-fraternity Council elected me "Asshole of the Year", the first time such an honor had ever been bestowed upon a freshman. I am still proud of it.

6. I love RHPS, and have been secretly in love with Susan Sarandon since I first saw it. But I assume Tim Robbins has nothing to worry about....

7. My grandmother taught me to play poker when I was 8. I'm pretty good at it. Had a great game in Vegas several years ago with industry luminaries Damien Katz, Rocky, Karen Hobert. The Turtle, who witnessed the game but did not participate said to me the next day: "It was AMAZING! The more bourbon you drank, the more money you won!" Heh heh. I know the rules for Bridge, but I'm not much of a player, too hard.

8. I love it that Penn Gillette loves Uma Thurman.

9. I know ALL the lyrics to "The Beverly Hillbillies" and "Car 54 Where Are You?". I can never remember all the verses to "The Addams Family".

27 - This sounds almost like the "100 Things About Me" that appears on a lot of Microsoftie blogs. See how much more efficient we are?

So lets see...

1. I slung burgers and fries at McDonalds for two years in High School.

2. I was a bartender in college for my first two years (which explains why I almost flunked out and had to transfer schools )

3. Bobby Knight personally (and sheepishly) apologized to me once for something he did not need to apologize for.

4. I spent 3 years working on an unfinished Ph.D. in Political Science at The Ohio State University.

5. I was a buyer of TOMAHAWK Cruise Missiles (TM) and condoms for the US Government.

Hmmm..do I feel cleansed? Not yet

28 -
Uh, Chris, exactly which is more efficient then?

n := "twoallbeefpattiesspecialsaucelettucecheesepicklesonionsonasesameseedbun";
@For( X := 0 ; X < @Length(n) ; X := X + 1 ; @Do(T := T + @Right( @Left(N; @Length(N) - X) ; 1)));
@Prompt([Ok];"Backwards Burger!";T)

29 - I'm back. The hard thing is figuring out what would seem odd to somebody else (well, except playing "Rocky" in Rocky Horror and buying condoms and missiles for the government). Still, I guess it might surprise somebody that I majored in Latin American Studies in college, that in the middle of my one and only computer course I took at Swarthmore, I became the first convicted computer criminal (convicted by the Studnt Judiciary Committee) in the college's history, or perhaps that I am the black sheep in my family because I make money, and everybody dances around the subject at family gatherings. Those things all feel normal to me, but might surprise someone else.

30 - Five things....I can think of about a hundred things that would startle my co-workers about me....but keeping it clean, legal and down to the top 5:

1. I received a military designation when I was 12...Airborne Iceworm...for being the youngest to have ever travelled that far North with the military. I was part of a touring troupe. We went to Alert Bay Forces Base...approx. 200 miles from the pole.

Which brings me to item 2

2. I was part of a troupe of singers, magicians, dancers, etc. who entertained the troops in Alert Bay. I was a magician's assistant. It was my first paying job (besides babysitting). Yes, I'm a member of the Magician's Guild...sworn not to divulge any secrets (so don't ask).

3. I perform every summer at the local Rennaissance Festival. Yes, in costume. Just FYI, the wenches have way more fun than the wealthy...(and I've tried all the characters on for size)...and pirates have waaaay more fun than anybody else. I do such a good British accent that I constantly get asked what part of England I'm from.

4. I used to hang out with slalom racers and street racers. My car was a very peppy little VW Rabbit. Extremely well modified with anti-sway bars, a stainless steel Stebro exhaust kit and lots of other really cool mods. Never won anything, but had a total blast trying.

5. Used to have a 2-day party every year at my house called "The Chili Jam". I'd made 10+ gallons of chili and invite friends, family, co-workers and everyone I know in the music business (between 60 and 100 people at top count). Everyone would bring their instruments and we'd jam, drink and eat chili 'till the next day (at midnight I'd make a couple of trays of nachos and watch all the drunken fools 'feeding frenzy' their way through it in 30-seconds or less..o.k. small things amuse me). The following day, everyone would become conscious slowly, pick themselves up from wherever they fell and we'd all watch movies until everyone felt o.k. enough to go home (ask me about one chili jam's "Night of The Living Nannies" if you see me at Lotusphere...it's a good story).

31 - Another random confession, brought to mind by all the McDonald's talk:

I can recite the "Big Mac" construction song from memory - both forwards and backwards.

And I don't like Big Macs.

Sure, you can test me at LS05. I would type it here, but that wouldn't prove anything, now would it?

Rock

32 - Hmmm, things about me...

1) My first job was selling and checking tickets on a local train (public transportation) in Stockholm, Sweden. 20 minute round-trip, got boring pretty quick. Most fun was Friday/Saturday nights with all the drunk people going to/from the city.

2) My first computer job was as tech-suport at Microsoft in Sweden. Never used a MS product or even DOS when I got the job, had been using CP/M-86 until then. Was employee #42 at MS in Sweden.

3) Worked as a developer writing voice response applications to be used over the phone. Made some games, dating service, astrology programs, etc. The company was then aquired by a Dutch phone-porn company, so while I wrote a "pimping program" for farmers (to order bulls/semen for their cows), college-aged girls were in the studio reading/recording pornographics stories...

4) I was in the army for 13 years, in a unit similar to the US National Guard or Army Reserves. I joined when I was 15, stayed in until I moved to the US in 1998. Also did a year (full-time) in the Air Force. Why is it so much fun to shoot things and blow things up?

5) I met my wife online in 1996, she was in Idaho and I was in Sweden. We met IRL just 10 days later when I was in Redmond to visit Microsoft, I had started my job as a journalist by then. Got married a year later and stayed married for 6 years.
Back then it was very suspicious to meet online, hehehe...

33 - What a fun thread, Rocky! Great idea. I can totally see you in RHPS ... I always wanted to be Magenta. Here are my top 5, although I'm sure you know some of them:

1. All through college, I'd planned to get my PhD in medieval lit and teach Chaucer at the college level. My first "real job" cured me of that, but I still love the history and literature from that time period.

2. My first "real job" was at a rock 'n roll radio station in San Francisco. It didn't pay anything, but the perks were amazing. I don't think I ever had to buy tickets for anything, even long after I left the job.

3. I love to knit. Am absolutely obsessed with it, and usually have several projects going on at the same time.

4. I spent a very long couple of hours in a holding cell in a Chicago police station with my college roommate and a weapons dealer (that would be two other people...my roommate was not the weapons dealer). It's a long story, but didn't involve any arrests and I wasn't at fault. Really.

5. I've been a vegetarian since I was in 7th grade (approx 13 years old). Started as lacto-ovo (dairy is okay), but added fish when I went to college because everyone said I wouldn't get enough protein otherwise. Probably a good thing, too, because I spent my first two years in a small college in rural Iowa -- not a mecca for vegetarians.

:)
Liz

34 - If you were paying to have something created for you...which would you prefer?

Both are three lines of code. One will work again in similar situations to reverse other strings of words. One will appear to work, but will produce results which do not match the expectation.

What happens to Ben's "customer" if McDonalds adds (gasp) Special Bacon to the Big Mac one day?

I'll take the bacon-safe solution, and use the time I don't spend coding the fix to buy Ben a vanilla milkshake at Lotusphere 2005.

--Andrew

PS: Yes, Ben did in fact see me disassemble a Dell laptop, remove the motherboard, fix a bent pin on the pcmcia card slot, and re-assemble and reboot the machine during a round table discussion at a Penumbra meeting in D.C. What he failed to mention, is that the only tool I had was my leatherman. Yes, there are pictures.

35 - @Stan - Riff-raff huh?
"It's astounding
Time is fleeting
Madness...takes its toll"

:)

Rock

36 - OK.. I'm almost certainly going to regret this but ..

1. I love anything to do with numbers and cards. My grandmother taught me to play for pocket money when I was 7 and I soon learnt to cheat

2. I slept on a futon for the first 13 years of my marriage then we bought our first bed but having no idea how much they cost ended up going to a shop and buying a 'mid range' one for 6000 USD. It took us 5 years to pay it off but it's the best bed in the world

3. Unlike Rich I pretty much read fiction exclusively or old film / theater books from the 1920s and 1930s. I read 5 - 7 books a week and skip sleeping at least once a week to read. I have a rule never to read a book with a map in the front pages

4. I hate exams - I walked out of my A level Biology exam when I was 17 without even turning over the paper and left the country soon after. 6 months later I came back and had to learn to type and take shorthand to get a job (100 wpm teeline)

5. Just about any joke in the world, no matter how old and corny will make me laugh

37 - I'm the only one in my family who has never broken a bone.

-rich

38 - Whoops... forgot to point out that "Data" should be your original source string of "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun"

39 - Devin - those are GREAT! You and Rob Novak have something in common - he was a projectionist at multiple theatres. You and I have a few more things in common (besides geekdom) - I shot expert with pistol (.38, .45, and 9mm), but I am only "proficient" (one under expert) with an M-16. My shooting range instructor said that he has seen many, many left handed people who are better with a pistol than a rifle. I also have owned a rash of cars, I have been electrocuted a few times (almost all while in the USAF, while working on HF and LF radios - BIG power amps on those).

Wow, thanks for sharing, Devin!

Rock

40 - My favorite job so far has been as dishwasher. Besides that, I wear most of my oddities on my sleeve, as it were.

41 - Ok, this is a hard one for people who know me enough to be surprised by anything. Its already common knowledge that I'm the only Alpha-Geek/Fireman most people have or will ever meet.

Where do you go from there?

1. I'm a complete coward when it comes to roller coasters. Total yellow streak. If someone is in danger, I'll grit my teeth and do it. Otherwise, forget it. I know what real fear is, and see no reason to subject myself to false fear.

2. I do in fact, on rare occasions, actually care about someone else. This will shock some of you, but its actually true. Its just like those "feelings" they keep talking about in those H.R. training videos we have to sit through at the fire station. How wierd. Don't tell anyone.

3. Unlike many programmers, I have absolutely no musical talent at all. None. Zero. Not rythem, not tone, none.

4. Growing up, and really until I joined the fire department, I'd never considered myself a brave person. I'd have actually said just the opposite. In school I was one of the smaller kids, was a good sprinter but otherwise a poor athelete (A.D.H.D. kids are frequently up to a year or so behind their peers developmentally) and did not do what I considered "brave" things. I was in my 30's before I learned that bravery isn't about not being afraid.

5. I taste just like chicken, if properly cooked.

42 - @Nathan: That's definitely the classic technique. Nice use of @Replace. I was going to post a similar version myself, but when I realized that I could use permutation, a @For loop, @Log and @Subset to size a number list to work with any arbitrary string, I just couldn't stop myself.

@Andrew: guilty as charged. And no, I will not explain chunking. Some things are better left forgotten

@Damien: The technique is a variation on an old trick that I first learned in IBM 360 assembler trick, but I'm sure it's older than that even. You fill a buffer with integers descending from N to zero. You treat your input string as an array of length N, in this case an array of words. Then you step through the buffer, replacing each integer value N with the Nth entry from the array, effectively reading the array backwards into the buffer. Why would you do it this way instead of just reading the words backward? Because it's actually a more general technique. It can be used to rearrange elements of an array into any pre-determined order, so the same code with a different order of bytes in the buffer could (for example) put the odd words in ascending order and the even words in ascending order, etc. In 360 assembler, the substitution (of bytes, not words) could be done with a single TR instruction. Variations on this techique were often used for rearranging byte-order when dealing with data from different-endian architectures.

@Ben: the milkshake is on me. I can't drink a milkshake on my diet, but I can certainly spill it on myself. Please bring a towel

-rich

43 - - I grew up in Arkansas and went through school in Arkansas.
- I won a freckle contest when visiting my Aunt in Tulsa, OK.
- I'm not a sports fan -- got tired of watching the Razorbacks perform opposite of the predictions.
- Moved to OK after graduating w/Math and Physics majors.
- Started programming on an IBM 7094 in Fortran and Basic Assembler Language
- My claim to fame: I've never written a COBOL program.
- I am a duplicate bridge enthusiast.
- My wife and I travel a lot -- might have visited more countries than Ed Brill.
- Last night reminds me why I'm not a sports fan.

44 - Rich and Nathan - Did anybody mention that whoever wins is buying the milkshakes at Lotusphere? Non-attendance is no excuse.

45 - Yawn.

a := @Explode( "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun" ; " ");
@For( X := 0 ; X < @Elements(a) ; X := X + 1 ; T := T + " " + @Subset(@Subset(a; @Elements(a) - X); -1));
@Prompt([Ok];"";T)

46 - 1. I was a DJ and music director for a commercial student radio station when I was in college, and I have occasionally done party DJing for friends ever since.

2. I turned down graduate fellowships from top-ranked schools in both computer science and political science in order to get married and go to work right out of college. Five years and one divorce later, I was turned down by four of the top five business schools in the country. (I didn't apply to the fifth.)

3. I am a collector of teddy bears. I have no idea how many I have, but it was over a hundred a few years ago. And no... they do not sit in glass cases. They would be lonely and very unhappy that way.

4. I once went to a costume party wearing a bear costume, carrying a picnic basket, and inviting people to have a treat. When they moved the napkin covering the basket aside, figuring that they'd find some cookies, they found a couple of chopped up baby dolls covered in ketchup instead.

5. I read almost no fiction. I have never read any Tolkein or any other fantasy, and excluding Douglas Adams the sum total of science fiction that I have read is a single Heinlein novel. In fact, even including Adams, I can count the number of novels that I have read in the last twenty years on just a few fingres more than two hands.

6. I can call up an immense stockpile of trivial facts, but I have a terrible memory for names and faces.

As for Rocky Horror, I went for the first time on the night that I got my driver's license, and I had already seen it about a half dozen times before I went to college. It hadn't shown in New Hampshire yet, though, so when it finally opened up for midnight shows at a theatre near campus near the end of my freshman year I was one of only two people in the audience who knew the audience participation lines. Got a lot of strange looks that night, but people caught on soon after that. Probably saw it over 25 time before college was over, but lost count. Never did the dress-up though.

-rich

47 - Are there any pictures of you dressed up for Rocky Horror?

1. When I was 17, I lived in a car.
2. I'm scared of amusement park rides.
3. My dog's name is Esophagus Jesus Blumenfield III but we just call him Gus (see http://www.cnsla.com/pix)
4. I'm a theatre geek.

48 - Ed - Dunno, but I have broken enough for everyone here. I was in a car accident in 1995 and broke my right ankle, tib/fib breaks at the knees in both legs, dislocated and broke my left hip, left scapula (shoulder blade), three right ribs and punctured my right lung, my left cheekbone (which is bone and teflon now). Before that I had broken my nose and hand on previous occasions. So, I got ya covered on that one

Oh, and this year in my family my youngest daughter broke both her arms, my second eldest broke her arm (radius/ulna breaks, mid-arm), my wife broke her right arm, and last week I tore a muscle in my arm.

Guess we're a rough family

Rock

49 - Same number of lines, but I can't read it because I don't grok [customsort] intuitively.

50 - Hmmm, this is one heck of a thread. I guess I'll chime in here. Some "surprising" things you might not know about me.

1) I also played Rocky in the RHPS floor show while in high school. I saw it at the Sombrero theatre, and did floor show at both the Valley Art and Mann's Christown. Rocky (Oliver) is right, playing Rocky (creature) was a great way to meet girls. I did the show every Saturday night for close to a year.

2) I've owned a LOT of cars. My brother has even said that I go through cars the way that most guys go through shoes. Details at: http://www.devinolson.net/spanky762/spankysplace.nsf/plinks/DOLN-68E4XJ

3) I used to do stage construction (high steel) and lighting work for Rock & Roll shows. I never went on tour, I was a part of the local crew in both Phoenix and Los Angeles. I have worked shows for Faith No More, Guns -N- Roses (multiple shows), Metallica, The Rolling Stones, The Who, and Bob Seiger. Something interesting I discovered while working these shows is that some of the folks you think would be cool are absolute assholes, and some of the folks that have a "bad" reputation turn out to be totally cool froods. My buddy Terry and I can be seen in the Rolling Stones "Steel Wheels" concert video. Well, actually you can't see my face. The camera was on the ground, and we were "clipped in" to the steel about 60 feet up. Terry was a few feet above me, and needed a light. The camera "shot" us as I was reaching up to light his cigarette for him (when working high steel, everything -even a cigarette lighter- is attached to you by a saftey line, which means I couldn't just hand him my lighter). So what you see in the video of me is my ass end holding the lighter for Terry. Great shot of him though (back in the "hair" days).

4) I used to run movie theaters for a living. I started working my junior year in high shool at the Big Sky drive in, cleaning the field in the afternoons and doing tickets & Snack Bar (trivia note: at a Drive-In, the place where you get your food is a Snack Bar, at an indoor theatre this is called a Concession Stand -I have no idea why this is). By the middle of my senior year in high school I had worked at 4 of them (the Big Sky, Rodeo, South Twin, and Nu-Vu -all owned by Transamerica Theatre Corp) and was managing the Nu-Vu (the only Spanish drive-in in Arizona). After I returned from my Marine Corps service I went back to work in the movie theatre business, only this time for indoor multiplexes. I spent 10 years in this field (try having 2 full-time careers, it can be quite tiring) before I finally "had it". I have worked for every major theatre chain in Phoenix: GCC (General Cinema Corporation), AMC (American Multi Cinema), Harkins Theatres, Mann Theatres, Plitt Theatres, Syufy Theatres, UA (United Artists) Theatres, and Blair Theatres. I used to teach a union approved projectionist's booth school, and have run every major type of projection equipment from carbon-arc with 20 minute changeovers & mono sound to fully automated Xenon bulb projectors using continuous loop platters and THX certified sound systems.

5) My grandmother taught me to shoot (with a bb gun) when I was 5 or 6 by having me color pictrues of indian's faces on paper plates, suspending them in the branches of various apple trees, and then shooting at them from the tree-fort I was "defending". I know this isn't very PC, but this was the 60s and I was a little kid. Thanks to her instruction, I became an expert shot (earned my "Expert" rifleman's badge while in Basic Training) with the rifle. I'm okay with my pistol (Combat .45), but not nearly as good as I am with a rifle.

6) I joined the U.S. Marine Corps during my senior year of high school. I had had an allergic reaction to a bee sting when I was five, and lied about this to get in. Just before graduation, during a "last chance to tell the truth or you go to jail" meeting with my Drill Instructor (Drill Instructor Corporal Petrovitch -remind you to tell you about this guy some time), I admited this to him. I was then pulled from training, and given a full back scratch test at Balboa Naval Hospital. It was discovered that I was no longer allergic to bees (yay! I get to go back to training); however I was (and still am for all I know) extremely hypersensitive to the Asian White Faced Hornet. (WTF?) Because of this, they decided that I was not physically fit for training. I was perfectly fit for duty, and had this not come out until after basic I would have simply been issued a "bee kit" and sent back to duty. So, I was given an Honorable Discharge, with an RE-3F rating (which means that I can only get back into the service if the supply of children, infirm, and old women is exhausted). This really bummed me out, but considering the events that have occurred since, I think my life has turned out MUCH better than it would have if I had stayed in.

7) I have been electrocuted too many times: I have taken a full 220v 3-phase blast across my chest (left hand grounded, right hand cutting into a live feed) causing a blackout, a trip to the hospital, and blood in my urine for a week. I have taken a blast through my entire body (feet grounded, left hand on live feed) from an 10,000v carbon-arc rectifyer (ouch) resulting in a blackout and a trip to the hospital. I have taken a 24v, 10amp blast across the chest (right hand working on amplifier power supply, left hand grounded) causing a "lock on" (couldn't let go) until the breaker tripped. This one also resulted in blackout and ambulance ride (this was the most serious of all -that much "juice" should have killed me instantly). I have taken dozens of 110v zaps as well. The really irritating part about this is that all of my major and most of my minor "zaps" have been caused by somebody else. Meaning, in all three of the "big ones" I had personally ensured that the power was disconnected (breaker locked off or equipment unplugged) before beginning work, only to have somebody else plug it in or switch on the breaker while I was working. It has gotten to the point now that I don't let anybody help me (in fact, I scream bloody murder if you even try) or even come near me when I'm working on anything electrical.

8) I can play the recorder or pennywistle with my nose.

All right, that's enough. Time to lock the closet for now, lest any more skeletons manage to break out.

Oh yeah, @joh (Comment posted by jon johnston 01/05/2005 10:08:44 AM) - God invented whiskey to stop the Irish from taking over the world.

-Devin.

51 - @Ed...interesting about the Atari....my embarassing claim to fame is being the All-Ireland Space Invaders champ the one and only time it was run sometime in the late 70's/early 80's

52 - I'm definitely late to this thread, but I'll confess a few anyway....

I had a summer job just after high school working in a factory. I was responsible for operating an ink roller machine that transferred a fake wood grain onto toilet seats. Over the next year or two I worked in a number of factories (temp work in the midwest means primarily factory work). I made insulators that are placed in between car engines and dashboards to keep heat and noise out of the car. I also worked at a sausage factory cutting apart large strings of bratwurst. Had to do this in a room that was cooled to just below freezing in the dead of summer.

I won my first shooting competition when I was 11. It was a Jaycee's kids gun safety program and I got to go to a State air rifle competition at the end.

Placed 8th out of 100+ shooters in a regional 100M .22 rifle shoot when I was 12. The next youngest competitor was 18. Soon after, I switched to competetive shotgun sports.

Throughout high school I shot on the only all-womens' trap team in southeastern Wisconsin with my mother, aunt, and a few other family friends. We won our class a few years in a row.

When I was a junior, my mother and I entered what had always been called the county 'Father-Son' shoot. From that point on, they had to change the name to 'Parent-Child' shoot. We took second place.

Between my junior and senior years in high school I was the womens' state trap shooting champion in Wisconsin.

53 - Well... here's my contribution.

1 - I worked 5 years at a Burger King and almost dropped out of college for a full time management position there.

2 - I used to sing and dance in way-off Broadway musicals.

3 - I was asked to be a male dancer in a drag show to raise money for aids research. I chickened out when I learned about the costumes!

4 - I thought I may have made a career mistake by getting into Notes and leaving COBOL.

5 - I too have danced in a corset for a Western musical number of a show that I directed.

There are a bunch more... like my best friend said at my wedding "I'm proud of my skeletons!"

54 - All you horse people: Cool. I broke and trained a little 14 hand 3 inch mare that we think was a mix of mustang and morgan. All western though -- none of that silly posting stuff. Since Cocoa (the mare) was afraid of cattle, we didn't do any roping. We did used to play "bareback pull-off tag" in the rodeo arena though. She rocked at tag.

Other things:

@A bunch of you: Barely finished high school. Was living with Michelle (no, not the person I ended up marrying) by my junior year. Lived near a college for about 4 years. Went to classes about 3 times -- except for Lit. I tested out of freshman comp so they put me in a philosophy class. It rocked, because we discssed philosophy under a tree instead of being spoon fed.

55 -
@Richard -- The prosecution rests.

56 - Great stories, Karl! WOW, cow semen and phone porn - now THAT is a job!

Rock

57 - I cheat, you see. Since there are no repeats in the words of the saying, I check for the position of each within the original list, and switch them. In the end, it will sort to be the reverse of the original. The @Member($a;a)<@Member($b;a) part simply returns @True or @False depending on whether $a is before or after $b in the list.

Did I just make that any clearer? I'm not sure I did.

58 - 1) I did information technology at uni and HATED programming of any sort, before I fell into Notes Dev, and now I love it

2) Over 10 years of working in Notes (Dev & Admin) , I can count on 1 hand the number of women I have worked with who coded

3) I have never, and will never sing karaoke style

4) My absolute favourite ever tv show is Buffy the Vampire Slayer - I have every season on dvd, and barely go a month without watching a couple of episodes

5) I worked in a supermarket for 4 years while studying at uni

59 - Actually, he says taking his tongue firmly out of cheek, that is the result the code was supposed to produce..I mean formula is so R4

Ok I am just kidding but I could not resist...

60 - Well... I'll give it a shot.

- I know that if you're working around a lot of acid, you wear 100% polyester clothing. The worst job I ever had was breaking dead car batteries in half with an axe when I was 14. We recovered the lead. We also smelted aluminum.

- I helped put the sound and fire alarm system in Texas A&M's Kyle Field football stadium around 1980-81. Was nearly killed (kilt) three times on the job. I was going to become the youngest certified fire alarm guy in Texas at one point, but decided not to because I realized someone would want me to stay in Texas and do that stuff.

- I have never broken a bone in my life.

61 - Ed, you may be interested in the following link :

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cult/news/drwho/2004/12/06/15823.shtml

The BBC is just about to start showing a new series of Doctor Who. I'm not a fan personally, but Billie Piper (phwoar !) is the Doctor's new assistant, which is reason enough to watch it ! Also, BBC7 does a radio version which you can listen to online -

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbc7/listenagain/sunday/rams/1800.ram

Anyway...

1. When I was a student, I once had summer job where I ran the "Pepsi challenge" (a blind Coke - Pepsi taste test) everyday, on a Dover - Calais cross channel ferry.

2. I'm a bee-keeper. Last year was a great year and our bees produced 80Kg of delicious honey !

3. I can click my toes !

4. Apart from my native England, I've also been fortunate enough to live in Australia, Bermuda, France and Italy.

5. I DONT'T dance, okay !

62 - What a fun topic! And a great way to learn about everyone...

1. I can play pool well. And I HATE it when people ask if I need help when I tell them I want next game.

2. I secretly always wanted to go through Basic Training for the army. Not to join the army per-se, just to see if I could actually do it. And learn some skills at the same time.

3. I used to take gymnastics and martial arts.

4. Most of my house is cheap flea market and yard sale finds that I enjoy painting and finding a place for. Granted things have a high-turnaround rate in my house, so the quality isn't that great.

5. Here's MY skeleton in the closet: I absolutely love KC and the Sunshine Band. Wholeheartedly.

63 - @Karl,

One of the more bizarre negotiations I had in a prior career was a grant to the American Breeders Service (a subsidiary of W.R. Grace & Compaby) for the privatization of the cattle breeding industry in Poland. The pictures in the manual to be translated made it clear to me I am glad I did not make that career choice (unlike my old college roommate who breeds sheep in upstate New York).

When I questioned computer costs and fuel costs to justify the grant amount, their project manager said that I did "not know enough about the cattle breeding industry to ask 'intelligent' questions about their proposal.

Needless to say this pushed a button and I responded "what the hell do I need to know about bull semen to ask 'intelligent' questions about computer and fuel costs?"!

64 - You use @reverse for that?

65 - Rocky? What in the world would persuade a semi-sane person to do THAT?

I alternated between Eddie/Dr. Scott and Riff Raff.

66 - Ben This is much better accomplished in Lotusscript and might actually generate how Rocky might say it if drink has been taken:

Sub Click(Source As Button)
Dim strRecipe As String
strRecipe= "twoallbeefpattiesspecialsaucelettucecheesepicklesonionsonasesameseedbun"
Dim strNew As String
Dim iLength As Integer
ilength=Len(strrecipe)
While Not (ilength < 1)
strNew = strNew + Mid$(strRecipe, ilength, 1)
iLength=iLength-1
Wend
Messagebox strNew
End Sub

Formulae are just so inefficient

67 - Wow, these are some excellent responses! OK, gotta respond to a few...
Tony - what do you do at the Evil Empire now? What did you do for the Rebel Alliance?

Ed My job while I was in college (to be a math teacher, of all things) - and the job I had before I was hired by Lotus - was with WaldenSoftware, which at that time was a division of Waldenbooks. I think EB bought them later on.

Kevin - worked with Paso Finos at a farm outside of Valdosta GA called Paso Fino de Verde, owned by a man named Fred Green. I was responsible for Espirito de Verde (barn name "ugly") who was a shy, spirited show stallion and whose father was the first national Paso Fino Grand Champion. I never worked my way up to showing Ugly in the ring, but it was still kewl that I was friends with and got to ride a $30,000++ show horse. He was my buddy.

Laurette - we gotta get you out more! I was one of two people hired by Synergistics to open the Atlanta offices. At one time our entire development staff was women (4 of them) except for me and another guy. Our overall mix in the office was more women than men too. Before that I worked at The Future Now/XLConnect, and we had quite a few women on staff there too.

Tim I drink an inordinate (unhealthy) amount of Cokes. I have taken the Pepsi challenge on numerous occasions (and the RC challenge, and the supermarket challenge, and...) and I am 100% at guessing what I am drinking. Like an alcoholic knows his drinks, I know my carbonated sodas Also, when were you in Bermuda? I was down there quite often for a client last year (Bacardi), so I know Hamilton and the island fairly well (for an outsider).

Ben - glad to hear Vonage is working out for you! Haven't I actually seen your blog somewhere? I could have sworn I have been to it. Oh, and what type of car(s) do you own now? I like cars a bit myself, but I am really into motorcycles at the moment.

Thanks again for participating everyone - this is a great deal of fun!

Rock

68 - @Ed - I remember one of my first jobs was working with a computer science professor who developed a new technique on the Atari which allowed "smooth scrolling". Before that, you could only switch around an image in jerky units. He was an early open source advocate (before the name existed) and gave the technology away, where it promptly got added to every graphical game used by Atari.

69 - Boy, there are so many! Here are a few random items off the top of my head:

I (and a few crazy Australians and New Zealanders) once climbed to the top of the Cheops Pyramid in Egypt. We went up before dawn, and were almost arrested by guards when they saw us coming down later that day.

I spent nine months living in (and restoring) a 17th century farmhouse with no running water or electricity in the village of Moncarapacho on the Algarve coast of Portugal.

I was a champ swimmer in high school – made it to the Olympic trials, but not further.

I lived with 9 New Zealanders and Australians in a big flat in London for almost two years.

I had an infected Kidney removed in Goreme, Turkey.

I spent a year working and living in Australia. I lived five doors down from Mel Gibson on Beach Road, Coogee Beach (a suburb of Sydney). I saw him once, washing his own Jeep Cherokee in front of his house. Said hi and he said hi back. The next year I was trekking though Mae Hong Son, Thailand, and he was filming “Air America” there. Said hi again as we passed on the street, he said hi back. Pretty sure he didn’t remember me. Never actually met him.

My sister has been on Doctor Phil a few times.

Despite the fact that I have authored several books and articles on technology, I’m self-taught - I don’t have a college degree. But I’m starting on one this year.

70 - Andrew, Andrew, Andrew - @For is so... last week. Why not use [CustomSort]?

a:=@Explode( "two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun" ; " ");
T:=@Implode(@Sort(a; [CustomSort];
@Member($a;a)<@Member($b;a)); "");
@Prompt([Ok]; ""; T)

Out geek that, I dare you!

(Granted, it will only work because of one special feature of this particular saying)

71 - Rock,

I worked with Ed a lot and did internal field enablement for Notes and Domino WW. My job was based out of cambridge, but I lived and worked out of my house in Vancouver, BC.

As an evil sith lord, I'm a Business productivity advisor for the Provincial governments across Canada.

I don't really sell anything - but I'm working to have the provinces fully deploy the latest version of microsoft anything that they own. ( but it's mostly in the collaboration space)

72 - Hmm, I always missed the girls when I did HS Plays...:

The Music Man (8th Grader in HS Play because they needed boys for the boys band)

High School

Carousel
Showboat
Fiddler on the Roof
Guys and Dolls (Did lighting and blew up the board)

1997- Community Theater
Camelot (Had one line )

Also sang in The Messiah for the Athens Choral Society that year. Only problem was is that I am not a true tenor or baritone but am stuck in the middle.

Hence the love of Karaoke!

@Ben - Swarthmore? Does that make you a Quaker as well?

73 - Hey, I said I cheated. Good thing nobody pays me to write formula language solutions. It was the right solution for this one problem, and I outgeeked you fair and square.

74 - Well, Rich -- once again you win the "Rich Schwartz complexity award!" For those who don't know, Rich is the only one who has ever won that award. I'm not entirely certain that he's being honest about which would go into production.

My friend, would you like to try to explain "Chunking" to the good people of Rocky's forum?

75 - Good one, Nathan. But too bad it doesn't work if one of the words contains a char(250). Girly man!

-rich

76 -
yawn * yawn

Sub Click(Source As Button)
Dim v As Variant
Dim x As Integer
Dim txt As String
v = Split("two all beef patties special sauce lettuce cheese pickles onions on a sesame seed bun", " ")
For x = Ubound(v) To 0 Step -1
txt = txt & " " & v(x)
Next
Msgbox(txt)
End Sub

77 - Loops are for girly men...

src := @Explode(Data; " ");
digits := (0:1:2:3:4:5:6:7:8:9);
digitsRev := (9:8:7:6:5:4:3:2:1:0);
numList := @Subset(((digits*10) *+ digits); @Elements(src));
numListRev := @Subset(((digitsRev*10) *+ digitsRev);-@Elements(src));
targList := @Text(numList) + @Char(250) + src;
@Word(@Replace(@Text(numListRev); @Text(numList); targList); @Char(250); 2)

Yes, it's limited to handling 100-word phrases. Extending it is pretty trivial.

78 - man, formula language strikes again.

79 - LOL, we actually only dated briefly in HS. She was into the jocks/pretty boys, and I was the "guy friend" that she came to when they all stomped on her heart. I even told her when I was 17 that she would wind up marrying me because I was the only decent, noble guy she knew.

We were married three years later

Rock

80 - Rock - Yes you've seen my blog before, you posted on my VoIP thread thanks. Not actually using Vonage, but a similar provide called Sipgate here in Europe.

Car wise, nothing too exotic as my budget doesn't stretch that far but I did own a 280bhp Mazda RX-7 Twin Turbo for a while which was great fun. Due to it's light weight it was good for 0-60mph in 5secs and a top speed in excess of 180mph on the dial. Cost me £30,000 in 18months that car...enough for a small house in Canada!

Currently driving a 3.2litre V6 VW Golf R32 which is significantly more economical, quite necessary during divorce settlement, but maybe a new toy in the future

81 - @JonJ - "I have never broken a bone in my life" -- me neither, but is breaking bones really all that common? Just curious.

82 - "Doc from Loveboat"...... Hahahah !!!!

83 - Oh my...

1. I did the "working in a restaurant" stint during the final years of school.

1a. During that time I wrote my first paid for program on a Sharp Basic programmable "calcuputer". Think Spaghetti...

2. I started studying "electrical engineering" but switched to psychology after just one year. The m/f ration switched from 400/2 to 40/60 - but that didn't help me to pick up any (I tried though)

3. I picked up a girl in the job I worked in besides university. That gave me an excuse to drop out of university completely. We then spent the next 2 or 3 years working and living together. After the company folded, we found out that we didn't have anything else to talk about.

4. A couple of years later I met a woman, talked all night, went swimming naked in the lake at 4 am (with her and other guests) and invited her (actually I wanted to invite another girl, but she was quicker to accept) to see RHPS (the movie) which was showing open-air at the lakeside the next day (actually, same day in the evening). Before the movie I then rummaged through her underwear. She hadn't the slightes clue to what the movie was about, but came along and hoped nobody would recognize her with that strange looking man next to her...
We married soon after and still are (after almost 10 years)

5. I started Notes Development in 1992 - I was hired for that purpose, sent on a course a couple of days after and freaked out the instructor, because after 2 days class I had emulated his "for sale CRM" application in all important features.

that must be enough for now

84 - Just remind me never to get drunk around Rocky.

Eddie eh? "Meatloaf again?" has to be one of the best audience participation lines in the movie!

85 - Gentlemen, gentlemen. Back to your respective drawing boards, I'm afraid. The correct resulting string is: "bunseedsesamieaononionspicklescheeselettucesaucespecialpattiesbeefalltwo"
Your script and formula samples would generate something like: "nubdeesemasesanosnoinoselkcipeseehcecuttelecuaslaicepsseittapfeebllaowt"
Reversing all the letters doesn't leave you with pronounceable words to impress the customer with (and yes, I could recite it bidirectionally as well back in the day, but I've recycled those brain cells or killed them off since then...). Anybody for building an array or list of ingredient strings and looping through THAT in reverse?

/pretty sure I should be embarrassed that I noticed this to begin with...

86 - Greyhawk and Rob both mentioned something that I alluded to with my RHPS confession - chorus and drama are great ways to meet girls if you're a high school guy. Besides RHPS I was also in the men's chorus, "concert singer" (mixed chorus, audition only), and the "Reveliers" - a student-directed chorus. I was also in drama club, and acted in quite a few plays, including "You're a Good Man Charlie Brown", where I played Snoopy. This, incidentally, is where I first met my wife (of coming up on 20 years) - she came on stage to ask me for my autograph

Rock

87 - Guess I'd better get that presentation complete, else a very fast, corsetted, but short near-black belt will beat me to a pulp.

Slightly better than a teddy bear, I guess. (@Richard, I have this picture in my head now, and I cant get rid of it..)

Confessions? Well, there's the public LotusFear ones like trying to trip up Al Zollar on his first appearance whilst trying to get to the podium, or asking the "why dont you support outlook client" back in 1999.

1. Played Violin for near 12 years and ended up on the front desk of 1st fiddles for the youth orchestra. Didnt pull any hot chellists, however, despite near constant attempts. Wind ? pah!
2. Set up a pirate radio station at university.
3. Got beat on unreal tournament by my daughter when she was 12. (And I was *good*)
4. I have a wife+kid - most folks just see the beer monster and assume that nothing that short, hairy and drunk can possibly be married, let alone with the same person for 20 years. (I'm scared of her..)
5. Left University after flunking maths, and worked my butt off in nightschool to get a diploma four years ago. (Kids. Get your degrees young - they're much harder to get later)
6. My high school (1,500 kids) built a religion around me for three years. Unpleasant.

(I did martial arts whilst at school and a hundred pounds lighter. Now I either bounce or flatten...)

Rocky Horror ? Wow. I used to have the "audience Partici.....Pation" tape in the car. Got some odd looks at the lights, screaming "You've got no f**king neck!". Oh and attending RHPS last night in Edinburgh with a gay friend abd being utterly shocked at the audience in bondage gear. It *was* that scary.

Therapy ? Us ?

---* Bill

88 - OK, backwards...

bunseedsesamieaononionspicklescheeselettucesaucespecialpattiesbeefalltwo

Whew!

Rock

89 - Well lets see.
I went to school to be a chef. Have worked in many industries before IT, Cooking, Construction, Sales, I even serviced vending machines for a while. I did Inventory Control At Lotus During the Jim Manzi years.
Thats how I got into this racket. I complained too much about the applications I was using, so you know what happened next. and here I am.
John

90 - I think I am scared to do this one

91 - Hi my name is Alan, I like long walks on the beach, puppy dogs, the summer rain... oh wait wrong web site.

Hmmm, some things about me that I'm happy to share...

I went to school for mechanical engineering, and did my thesis work in high performance athletics (your body's max vo2 capacity)

Outside of work my life pretty much revolves around sports. I play ultimate frisbee, tennis, and volleyball (Yes, I am vertically challenged, I was a defensive specialist and setter for years). I've just started indoor rocking climbing.

I'm a huge Police/Sting fan, but I also listen to a lot of techno, and like Celtic music!

I'd rather be working in the entertainment industry (movies, video games, etc) than in software.

I'd rather be taking photos for National Geographic than working in the entertainment industry.

Finally, I'm not really short, I'm just standing far away.