David.Blackledge.com

Natural Rotational Ambigrams

2011-07-29T22:55:00.005-06:00

What's that? Ok, an ambigram is a word that reads the same (or reads something else) when turned in some way (reflected, rotated, etc).
Natural Rotational Ambigrams are a subset of that which I like to experiment with. They're rotational ambigrams (they look the same when you turn them over (rotate)) and they're natural in that they don't use any artistic alteration to create them, just a typical English text font. It helps to have non-D'Nealian a's ("hook" a's) since they look like e's (and vice versa) when rotated.

Anyhow, over several years I experimented more and more with what was possible, at different levels of rigor, and I haven't messed with it in a few years, so I might as well post what I came up with, right?
Here's some of my favorites. They aren't much, which gives you an idea of how hard this ended up being.

Single words:

I
o
nu
axe
ale
pod
mow
seas
haley
paled
saxes
sales
swims
solos
passed
sasses

Symbiotogram words:

pa/ed
ma/ew
yo/oh
aw/me
id/pi
my/hw (homework)
sol/los (spanish)
pep/dad
wow/mom
les/sal (names)
aid/pie
ail/lie
say/hes
hey/hay
any/hue
[ape/ade]
[ame/awe]
aha/eye
med/paw
mad/pew
may/hew
dew/map
pam/wed
hem/way
ped/pad
dow/mop
hew/may
pal/led
deal/leap
wool/loom
plow/mold
sumo/owns
lieu/nail
same/awes
spam/weds
[shep/days]
shed/pays
[shem/ways]
says/shes
hold/ploy
held/play
sail/lies
pail/lied
hems/sway
liem/wail
hems/sway
sans/sues
pans/sued
deus/snap (Latin)
pals/sled
ales/sale
pies/said
sled/pals
lead/peal
sped/pads
sheds/spays
salem/wales
dooms/swoop
[saids/spies]
passe/assed
ended/papau (new guinea)
sassed/passes
pallid/pilled

Phrases with one word which rotates into several words:

say seal leashes
a seal lease
a snow mouse
a pew madeas dill a ellipse
ewes sam a
i was semi
pa pie aided
six ale alexis
pa lies sailed
pass as sod possessed
pass as sod sip dispossessed
a sod pose
oil od polio
spun od pounds
a as see
pa as seed
papa as seeded
papa as unseeded
papa a sun unseeded
she puns sundays
he puns sunday

Some favorite phrases and weird sentences:

am I we?
undue woman pun
said I, "sale's Wed."| pam: sales, I: pies
ha! u owe a moo sound. p u no! so owe a money
aw, o, s-sue? aw, papa, a 'use as needed' means 'some'
"pep" pam says, "wow" | mom, shes wed dad
mom wailed: shes passed. says pa liem: wow
wow! hold pam, shes mad | pew says wed ploy, mom
spam made hay | hey, a pew weds
papa, a sun shed dew | mad pays unseeded
wow i was semi mad | pew i was semi mom
pa lies, says "'six ale' alexis? she's sailed."
sued sumo owns pans
we you loom wool no ham

And my favorite:

he puns "hey, hay!" sunday

q is a little more difficult since it has to be followed by a u, so the rotation has to have an n followed by a b!

play aqua as any hue seen beheld
aqua palm ode aye a heap owl eden be
an bed opaque

Taking it a little further (allowing j and r to be considered rotations of each other):

jazzer
jaded paper
her jay
[jem war]
a joys shore
pale aqua jewel llama ran bealed
soliloquy or John Bolilo's
a joshua an bed pa queeny sore
horseman bed open by sal lesh quad opaque was joy

And letting t be its own rotation (a plus might work better):

jaunt tuner
smart jews

Ok... so it's just weird. But kind of fun.
Maybe next I'll post the rotatable pictures I started doing to go with some of these.

Solitaire, FreeCell, Mahjongg, Calendar, etc. for TiVo DVRs

2009-12-01T22:19:00.007-07:00

I know I mentioned Solitaire for the TiVo before, but now I've packaged it up nicely so it is easy to install and run... in fact I did that for a bunch of things. All are available at http://David.Blackledge.com/tivo

Solitaire and FreeCell are about what they were before, but there are now 2 versions, one without and another with all of my "Multitasker" features added (pictured) since those features are still difficult to configure and are a little unstable anyhow. And, of course, they're easy to install now (one download, unzip it, run the .bat file, enjoy on the TiVo DVR)

Mahjongg for TiVo was actually created by Gene Wadleigh a long time ago... his project was abandoned and didn't work with the current TiVo software, so I fixed it up and have finally made a good package that is easy to get running.

The Calendar is a handy little application for checking any "ical" format file or URL to check out what is on that calendar... it comes preconfigured with a few sports calendars, but it's really ideal for hooking up to your Google calender like I did... we use it most days to do a quick check of our calendars.

Also available is a simple package of my Multitasker software with the sample MultiSlideshow application (Pictures + Music/Podcasts + News ticker...) which, when configured correctly, can be used over and over again for a variety of contents... I use it a bunch of times to have

My pictures and music on my computer with titles of both (plus info one whatever my TiVo DVR is currently recording) ticking across the bottom. It also displays the current song's album cover as one of the pictures when the song changes.
The http://icanhascheezburger.com/ LOLCats pictures with comedy music from my computer with the picture titles ticking across the bottom (along with music titles and DVR recording information) (also ones for http://ihasahotdog.com/ and http://failblog.org/ )
Local news channel traffic cameras and radar images and forecast pictures with the news channel's own audio podcasts of news and weather from that morning with local news stories from their RSS feed ticking across the bottom.

Thanksgiving 2009

2009-11-28T10:26:00.007-07:00

Now that was a Thanksgiving worth blogging about ;]

Of course we have to start with the food. Tricia tried two turkey techniques she hasn't done before and was ecstatic with the result. Brining the turkey for a number of hours, and using Alton Brown's Turkey Triangle to keep the white meat moist. She said it was the most moist and just all around best turkey she has ever made. Although she wasn't happy with the experimental spelt dressing (which she enhanced the next night to great effect), that didn't take away from the fantastic meal which also included Charlene's requested sweet potatoes with marshmallows, and homemade mashed potatoes and turkey gravy all pictured here (in the foreground is a half-price centerpiece find from the turkey-buying trip... plus some embellishments by Ian).

I, on the other hand, successfully carved the turkey for the first time by getting a few turkey carving pointers from another video (I picked the shortest listing from search results, of course). They didn't mention in the video that the turkey was going to try to burn my fingers, though ;] And I still have no idea how he got such appropriate slices out of the thigh meat... mine just fell apart.

While things were cooking, the kids had the bright idea to break out Monopoly (in the back of the picture) which we may never before have played as a family of 4. Although the game was cut short (and recorded for picking up later in the weekend) by cooking and eating and so on, we all had fun. (Ian was winning).

Somewhere in the middle of all that, I successfully called my brother Doug for the first time who is stationed all the way over in Germany, and we all got to chat with him for a while which was really wonderful.

Earlier that day we had a visit from my Dad who brought some "heirloom" chairs we will be using in our dining room and a bag my mother owned he brought for Tricia which of course made her all choked up.

We all ended it with some homemade pumpkin and cherry crumble pie which were also superb (and with an unnoticeably gluten-free crust).

Yay turkeys!

TiVo Software available for download!

2008-12-29T10:02:00.003-07:00

I finally took some time last night to upload the current state of my TiVo software, so it's now available to download at http://David.Blackledge.com.
I haven't taken the time to make it easy to install, though... you currently have to install Galleon as a host for the software.
And, it ends up, if you want Tivo Solitaire, you have to download all the files that I've uploaded since it depends on the Solitaire Engine and it depends on Multitasker which depends on all the other files to do all its features. Maybe I'll make a non-Multitasker version (trivially done) just for quick setup.

Anyhow, go to my TiVo page and you'll find everything to download. Feel free to ask if you need help.

And the winner is...

2008-12-16T20:45:00.005-07:00

I sometimes forget that I seem to have above-average luck in giveaways... I happened to notice the TiVo Blog was doing one, so I "entered" (by posting a comment) and lo and behold, I am now the proud owner of a TiVo plush, some TiVo coasters, and TiVo "ears." Total retail value almost $22! 1 out of over 80 posted comments... that's pretty good luck, I'd say.

Not a bad day's haul for a school snow day / 2 hour work-delay day.

Happy Sukkot!

2008-10-15T20:40:00.019-06:00

We got our first Sukkah up this year! We got a kit and it went very smoothly...until the heavy wind and rain storm the first night of Sukkot :-/ That's a lesson in "just barely enough isn't enough." Hardware store had 6' and 8' boards to use for the roof structure... I wanted 6.5' so I went with the 6' ... which left no room for shaking in the wind. We rebuilt with the 8' the next day.

Here's the time-lapse of our Sukkah building!

Messy Yard:

Prepped Yard:

Hard at work:

Roofless, but standing:

Roofed:

Roof collapsed and soaked after first night it was used. :[

Bird Flu?

2008-10-11T15:19:00.008-06:00

Ok, bad joke...

On 10/4 my son happened to be in the living room and called out "there's a bird in the fireplace!" ... I came over and heard the chirping and saw some flapping myself. (Get it now? Fireplace...flu ...told you it was a bad joke)

Not much to tell except it was so dark that we could only really see it well in the flash pictures.

When we opened the cover, it just hid behind the fake logs, so my wife Tricia started dismantling (hey, another pun!) the log stack.

She eventually got hold of it so we could release it out in the front yard.

My uneducated guess says it's a thrasher... a confused one.

Don't lock yourself out of XP

2008-09-24T11:54:00.000-06:00

... like I did. My daughter accidentally set the password on the only administrator account on my Windows XP computer, then promptly forgot what it was.

That was an interesting delimma... many sources said not having another administrator account or any other protective measures meant I was stuck and would have to reinstall Windows.
A little searching found a method to clear your password if you have your Windows XP install CD and your product key (I have no idea where mine are... got it from Emachines, so I might not even have a proper install CD, just a "recovery" CD). It ends up there are also a number of "less reputable" products (in that they are something the bad guys probably use) that can either clear out your passwords, or actually crack them for you.
I ended up using Ophcrack (on SourceForge, so I felt more comfortable with it, even given its name) which was able to crack a few passwords, including my daughter's, but not all of them. It only had to run for about 10 minutes.
Lessons learned:
1) CREATE A PASSWORD RESET DISK - it's trivial, and can even be done with a removable memory stick/thumb drive if you don't have a 3.5" drive. You just have to put the result somewhere very safe or anybody that gets hold of it can erase your password at any point in the future.
2) CREATE A SECOND ADMINISTRATOR ACCOUNT - a bit like having a backup of your data... a backup account. Surely you won't forget BOTH passwords.
3) Creating a CD from an ISO Image - DON'T DO IT AT FULL SPEED. I threw away 6 CD-Rs trying to make Ophcrack work. First one wouldn't finish booting, 2nd one wouldn't even try to boot, Third was like the first one... looked on the internet and they said do it at 4x (I was doing it at 48x) - three tries of that failed to get past writing the Table of Contents, so I tried 16x and it worked.
4)... well, give your kids their own accounts.... except the last time I tried to do that, they couldn't run most programs unless I made them administrator accounts, too... maybe XP works better since then.
5)... backups... I really should just buy one of those one-button-press backup systems since anything else is too annoying to bother doing. I do share stuff on the home network with my wife's computer, so I could get to a lot of my stuff still, but not everything (notably, all the TiVo HME programs I'm working on!)

Ok, so I got a blog

2008-09-04T20:34:00.002-06:00

Why not... Google/blogger.com just made it too easy not to do it ;]

Ok, so my real website is http://david.blackledge.com/, but this place is more likely to have recent content.
I just finally updated my website after 6 years of stagnation because NetIdentity sold to Tucows who sold to domaindirecthosting who screwed up the transition and made my whole site go "under construction"... I had been working on a new front page, so I finished it, added a quick and dirty thing on my current TiVo software obsession and threw it all up there.

I just created a group to talk about the TiVo stuff, too... not that there weren't enough already, but I like Yahoo Groups and it's easy to do...and I already had an account there unlike the other discussion boards.
I put some screenshots there, and posted a description of most of the stuff I've done.

A few things are "already been done" things as I look a little harder at www.tivocommunity.com and the like, but I know that I've got some new cool stuff.

Drop me a line if you want the software made available to download sooner than "when I get around to it."