Back in 1994 or so, I bought a book on digital image processing because I wanted to be able to save some of my fractal images in GIF format and needed to know how to write a GIF. I copied the C code out of that book and used it for many years. And then the internet came along. And so I put that code in a little free library that also assisted with JPG reading and writing and posted it to the internet.

Since then, based on that library my name has popped up in the credits for digital music players, big-name video games, and assorted on-line articles. Very cool. No, I don't use the f'ing GPL.

And today, I'm back into that GIF reading code, trying to figure out why it won't read a particular GIF I found on the internet. So, I've been looking at the code from GIF readers on the net, comparing what I do to what they do, trying to figure out what's going wrong. But I haven't figured it out yet because most of the GIF reading code I've found on the net seems to be derived the very code I posted way back when - either from what I posted, or from someone else who started with that same book. Big claim! How can I tell? Granted, there are a finite number of ways to write a GIF decoder, and they're all going to look alike on some fundamental level because the job isn't extremely complicated (though there are some tricky bits). But, you can tell. Some of the readers still have my name in the comments, for example. Others have been modified a bit and have dropped the credits, but might still retain the exact variable names from the code I posted; and some retain residuals of the quirky logic that that original code used. I'm sure I could put together a tree that shows all various branches and derivations of derivations from that original code. If there was a need. Which there isn't.

But, the bottom line is that I can't fix my GIF code because nearly everybody who posts GIF code is posting something based on, or derived from a derivation of, the code I posted to the internet twenty years ago - the code with the bug I can't find. Sigh.

Lost my wallet yesterday - all my credit cards, debit cards, insurance cards, my driver's license... all gone.

Now I don't even have a way to carry around the cash we took out of the ATM before we cancelled all of our cards.

Nightmare.

But I hope a night full of phone calls is the worst that comes of it...

Update:
It was on the floor of my cube at work. I swear I looked there at least three times. What a drag it is blahblahblah.

Because it's spring, it's time to put the seeds in the dirt. Mrs. requested I plant some little cucumbers, gherkins, for pickling. Easy enough, I thought - there are a thousand kinds of seeds for sale in stores right now, surely I can find little cucumbers. But, I couldn't. I had to go to Amazon to find seeds for gherkins. And, of course, some mom-n-pop seed store out there somewhere had a packet of seeds for me. Hooray. They were many times more expensive than a packet of ordinary cuke seeds from the store, but still cost less than a jar of pickles. So, no biggie. Click, click, done.

The seeds appeared in the mail yesterday. Turns out they came air mail, from Singapore. WTF?

How can anyone make money air-mailing seeds halfway around the world for less than four bucks, including shipping?

How the wingnut political tabloid The Daily Caller reports this:

White House executive pastry chef Bill Yosses is resigning after First Lady Michelle Obama fundamentally changed his job duties to focus on healthier food.

Yosses is leaving the White House in June to work on a new project focusing on “food literacy” and The New York Times says Michelle is “partly to blame.” The openly gay chef was hired by Laura Bush in 2007 to make his trademark cookie plates and sugar sculptures. Mrs. Obama took over in 2009 and ordered Yosses to make healthier plates in smaller portions.

Yosses began replacing butter with fruit puree and sugar with honey and agave. But Yosses was never fully committed to the new policy.

“I don’t want to demonize cream, butter, sugar and eggs,” Yosses said, noting that his departure from the White House is a “bittersweet decision.”

Sounds like the First Lady drove him out with all her health crap. Right?

Here's how the NY Times reports it:

Hired by Laura Bush in 2007, when he was already acclaimed in New York for the raspberry and pear soufflés he created at restaurants like Montrachet and Bouley, Mr. Yosses began moving beyond the traditional sugar sculptures and cookie plates after Mrs. Obama arrived at the White House. He was directed to make more healthful desserts, and in smaller portions, that were to be served only sparingly to the first family.

Mr. Yosses began experimenting with alternatives to what he called “the usual blitzkrieg” of butter and cream. Now, he said, “we replace butter with fruit purée, which gives some body.” He often uses honey and agave in place of sugar, has added whole grains to desserts and is considering heirloom varieties of whole wheat without the bitterness of wheat bran and germ in modern whole-wheat flour.

Mr. Yosses has also been inspired by the White House garden, where he has chosen from a cornucopia of strawberries, blueberries, rhubarb, figs, papaya, carrots, sweet potatoes and herbs like lemon thyme flowers, lavender and pineapple sage. Nearby is honey from the White House beehives. The result — oatmeal bars, baked apples and pear-quince cobblers, among many others — will have a lasting impact on his eating habits, as will Mrs. Obama.

“She has done it with humor and good will, without preaching, just the way you would hope the ‘Mom in chief’ would do,” Mr. Yosses said. He called her “definitely an inspiring boss, a combination of spontaneity and seriousness.”

Nonetheless, Mr. Yosses has hardly turned his back on his old, sweet life. “I don’t want to demonize cream, butter, sugar and eggs,” he said.

...

Mr. Yosses, 60, said he was also moving to New York to be with his husband, Charlie Jandusay Fabella Jr., a teacher. The two married in Washington in 2011, but “for the 11 years my husband and I have known each other, we have lived in different cities,” Mr. Yosses said.

The pastry chef will not leave the White House until June, when he hopes to put together “a group and foundation of like-minded creative people” for promoting delicious food as healthy food. He offered no more details about his venture, but said it would be devoted to food literacy from the bottom up.

Mmmm. Smells like the Daily Caller is cookin up a big batch of mendacity.

That is the nonsense that they teach in women’s studies at Duke University, this is where she learned this. The toxic stew of the modern university is gender studies, it’s “Sex Week,” they all have “Sex Week” and teaching people how to be sex-positive and overcome the patriarchy. My daughters go to a little private religious school and we pay an arm and a leg for it precisely to keep them away from all of this kind of nonsense. I do hope that they go to a Christian college or university and to keep them so far away from the hard left, human-hating people that run modern universities, who should all be taken out and shot.

Thus spaketh Austin Ruse, "devout Catholic" and the leader of a group called the "Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute".

Who would Jesus take out and shoot?

I celebrated by having π·r²/4 of a pizza for lunch.

How did you honor the ratio?

What would Ronald Reagan do
If he was here right now,
He'd make a plan
And he'd follow through,
That's what Ronald Reagan'd do.

When Ronald Reagan was in the olympics,
Skating for the gold,
He did two salchows and a triple lutz
While wearing a blind fold.

When Ronald Reagan was in the alps,
Fighting grizzly bears,
He used his magical fire breath,
And saved the maidens fair.

So what would Ronald Reagan do
If he were here today,
I'm sure he'd kick an ass or two,
That's what Ronald Reagan'd do.

And what would Ronald Reagan do,
He'd call all the kids in town,
And tell them to unite for true
That's what Ronald Reagan would do.

When Ronald Reagan travelled through time
To the year 3010,
He fought the evil robot kings
and saved the human race again

And when Ronald Reagan built the pyramids,
He beat up Kubela Kong.

Cos Ronald Reagan doesn't take shit from an-e-y-body

So let's all get together,
And unite to stop our moms
And we'll save Ukraine and Syria too,
Cos that's what Ronald Reagan do.

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Led Zeppelin is going to remaster all of their records, and issue them in an array of fancy new packages, some with new songs (live or unreleased).

They want all of my quarters. They might get a few of them, too.