world's first medford, oregon bachelor party

alright, so maybe not the real first, but i'm pretty sure it's the first for a group of fellas from los angeles and beyond.





welcome to medford!!! step right onto the tarmac and let the fun begin. we chose medford not for the wild night life, but for the ragin' rivers within near proximity.

















the upper klamath river raftin' posse., a.k.a. many of my best pals on the planet (and anywhere, but i'm biased of course).

















go go gadget telescope arm!!! super action photos courtesy of matthew's king kong-sized limbs.


































our little camping ground while rafting the klamath.

















a lost member of the beastie boys taunting a napping uy.

















gathered round the evening campfire.

















those roadies seemed like such a good idea at the time... an emergency pitstop on the way home.

gents, thanks for a fantastic journey!!!!

hurrah!!! dc on npr

update: looks like the producer hurt her back during editing and the story is going to run later this week. i'll let you know when i get the details. thx!

i did an hour-long interview with national public radio this morning to talk about my life as a virus slayer, spyware smusher, fraud foiler & general security wonk. fooled them into thinking i do real work ;-)

here are the shots from my treo while recording the spot with the reporter up in seattle. very cool lady named wendy kaufman and lotsa fun. as a long time NPR supporter, this was the cat's meow.

NPR says it's a three- to five-minute segment and will air at 6:50 and 8:50 a.m. in the United States on member stations that carry Morning Edition.

disaster movies & plane trips

alright, this should really be pretty obvious. it's one of those things that you figure would have been sorted out by now. i'm sitting on the plane cranking through email, reviewing documents, slogging through the to-do list and i glance up at the in flight movie. i was expecting to see something along the lines of "the wild", "eight below" or one of the many unoffensive movies you see while taking a long plane ride. not today. merely a glance revealed people, chandeliers and dinner plates careening off the walls of an ocean liner that was in the midst of plunging down to davey jone's locker. they're playing the remake of the old move poseidon featuring a prolonged cruise ship catastrophe.

why in God's name would you do this? apparently traveling on airplanes today is so dangerous that nary a bottle of aquafina nor a chapstick can be allowed onboard lest we leave the terrorists an opening to attack by undertaking feats with hairpins, ipods, and deodorants that would make macguyver look like a 6th grade science student. people's nerves are understandably on edge these days. so you're going to show them a movie about people in a general state of hysteria, slowing dying on another vehicle of mass transportation?

well, this summer's round of would-be blockbusters are going to offer a whole host of chances for the airlines to make not just minor mistakes like this one, but the type of colossal mistakes that are usually reserved for the french military and the us government. check out this summer's line-up:

World Trade Center: 'Nuff said.

United 93: Again, no need to explain.

Snakes on a Plane: Extraordinary. Can you imagine sitting on a plane while watching hundreds of lethal reptiles squirm their way around the economy section? (first class might offer some form of snake repellent seats, one would hope. prolly the best we can hope for now that steve irwin is gone.)

alright, back to work. maybe i can finish up in time to catch the next show. i'm hoping for "nacho libre". i've heard it's lousy but just like there's something naturally disturbing about watching people drown en masse, there's something naturally funny about seeing a fat man in a unitard.

current playlist

Hey You | Basement Jaxx | Crazy Itch Radio
Aguas De Marco | Antonio Carlos Jobim | The Best of Antonio Carlos Jobim
The Hop | Radio Citizen | Berlin Serengeti
Airbag | Easy Star feat. Horace Andy | Radiodread
B-Boy Stance | K-os | Joyful Rebellion
Take Me Out | Franz Ferdinand - Hot Chip Remix | Hot Chip Remixes
Nausea | Beck | The Information
Leaving So Soon | Keane | Under the Iron Sea
What Are You Afraid of? | West Indian Girl | ?
CobraStyle | Teddybears | Fresh
Fun For Me | Moloko | The Catalogue
Lotus Above Water | Telefon Tel Aviv | Fahrenheit Fair Enough
Tremendous Brunettes | Mike Doughty | Haughty Melodic

zymotic benjamin crump! & dangerous animal jobs

or in other words, i've now rec'd my 18th 5th 3rd phishing message in the past 30 days. happy tuesday!!!

and in the wake of the croc hunter's death, i openly wonder why are we surprised when people are injured/killed by wild animals when that's what they do for a living?

first roy of siegfried & roy fame gets bitch-slapped by a white tiger, ending their longstanding vegas stint since 1972 of getting tigers to behave like well-trained house cats in front of bright lights and loads of gawking turistas. count 'em, that's 33 years of getting carnivorous, giant cats to not eat them while balancing on a ball and growling out "b-i-n-g-o". an impressive run that should shock us more than a white tiger turning roy's neck into a little debbie snack cake. roy is doing better, thank you very much, and now they run the secret garden and dolphin habitat in place of the scary tiger show. all the better for them, the chances that flipper is going to go au naturelle and rip off yer head are pretty low provided that you steer clear of sardine cologne. and serious issues in the secret garden probably amount to gardenias sprouting up where you expected cantaloupes, neither of which is going to maul you if you don't water them properly. think of what they're saving on life insurance! in their own words (and mine):

"Long ago, Roy and I realized that everything that happens to this planet is man's responsibility. Our responsibility," says Siegfried. "After living and working with some of the world's most magnificent [and occasionally unfriendly] creatures, we have felt the threat of their loss [not to mention the damage their molars can inflict]. So we felt compelled to create a safe environment [for us]– an environment in which these animals could live in serenity [where we won't have to dramatically imperil ourselves to amuse you] ," says Roy.

and now the crocodile hunter, steve irwin. dear dear dear. this one is tragic and i will never look at another sting ray in the same way again. poor guy got impaled when the bugger stuck him with venemous barb right in the heart when he coasted over it while scuba diving in oz. he didn't harrass it any way, just was in the wrong place at the wrong time, startled the sting ray and it moved to defend itself by sending up its tail into the chest of the unsuspecting irwin. as a diver myself, i have to confess this is a little scary since he was supposedly just cruising the reef playing with the sponges (no reason to believe he wasn't).

an important factoid is that there have been only 17 recorded stingray deaths in Australia since 1969. rotten luck to say the least. nonethless, consider for a moment the number of things he'd done up until this point where the odds were very much in favor of something really bad [re: likely fatal] happening. the man made a living by taunting alligators, crocs, poisonous snakes, deadly spiders, etc. on video. not the type of thing that leads to longevity, right next to making yer 3 square meals a day out of snickers in a fry daddy.

so was mother nature playing a cruel joke on steve irwin or simply catching up with him for past debts like a bulldog collections agency? i haven't a clue. but what i do know, is that there is now one heckuva of a market for underwater kevlar jackets to repel sting ray barbs. if you know where i can score one, drop me a line.

jose gonzales, herbert, zero 7 with sia, & gotan project @ the hollywood bowl

this one long looked like the best of the bowl this summer with a heavyweight, fairly diverse line-up. alright, all hipster fodder but diverse nonetheless. all in all, it didn't disappoint. not everyone carried their weight, but it was a great show regardless.

jose gonzales
we missed most of him playing solo. happens far too often since it's hard getting that many people moving quickly and after the booze starts flowing nobody is in much of a hurry anymore. nonetheless, we did catch 2 of his songs and he was better than what i had expected. the duo of his acoustic guitar and mellow voice carried a lot better than i had thought it would at the bowl. i still don't feel like veneer is a stand-out album, but he's a capable performer (if not an exciting one).

herbert
oh boy, what can one say about matthew herbert? the man has made entire tracks out of sending a full starbucks latte down the garbage disposal. that'll teach 'em! 4 bucks down the drain my man and you didn't get so much as a caffeine buzz from it, someone in seattle is smiling right now and it's not your aunt myrtle. but i digresss...

herbert started out with a fruity pseudo-electric welcome message. it got better from there. he seems to have returned to his house music roots and cranked out some infectious beats. not bad at all. he brought along a vocalist with him who actually sounded pretty good, however, he was so dispassionate (or maybe terrified?) that it was hard to watch him. both he and herbert were in their finest bathrobes for the event. i understand the desire to do something different; to make a statement versus the iconic rockstar model, however, the robes just looked silly. someone should hook him up with Devo, they could lend his group little plastic pyramid hats so that he can still look silly (and cover up his balding head) without looking completely ridiculous and having to waste a perfectly good bathrobe.

oh, and he did squish a canned frappucino to make scrunchy noises at the start of one song. not surprisingly, it didn't add a lot to the track which ended up being good inspite of the can crunching noises. score: starbucks 2, herbert 0.

zero 7
i'll have to say i'm completely puzzled by gotan project headlining in front of zero 7. now i could argue all i want based on my opinion, but shall we consult the all seeing Google for the answer of whom should have headlined? observe:

Google hits for Zero 7: 3,870,000
Google Hits for Gotan Project: 1,750,000

That's a 2 million hit difference!? I suspect Gotan Project is really a mafia front of some sort and leaned on 'em to score the top billing in order to legitimize their Sicilian money laundering scheme.

Regardless of the order they played it, it was easy to see who the best of the evening was. zero 7 was stellar, alternating between the best of simple things and the garden. sia started it off with my flame and moved onto distractions from there. she was a star performer, belting out soulful vocals and dancing around the stage jubilantly. the highlights were back-to-back performances of the stand-out tracks from both albums: destinypageant of the bizarre. jose gonzales did a couple tracks and turned in another nice performance but was eclipsed by the obvious charisma and talent of sia. the guys worked the decks and played live instruments capably, they were clearly enjoying themselves up there. all told, great performance!!

gotan project
nothing really to say here, they sounded good but not great. to be fair, we listened to a few tracks and bailed since jane was not feeling well. i truthfully have a hard time distinguishing many of their tracks from one another-- they have a nice sound but i'm not sure how much range they have or what more they can do with it.

next up: feist in a couple weeks and then paul simon at the greek in october.

red fish, blue fish, dumb phish

so the infosec buzz right now (among other things) is about how sophisticated online fraud attacks are getting. "vishing", blog-based enticements, IM enticements, and highly targeted attacks. i've heard some pretty good ones of late that target people who lost an ebay bid and get a follow-up message (supposedly from the seller) that alls they have to do is send them the $$$ and they'll send them the desired item as the original seller bailed out. clever.

well, my inbox tells a different story. stretching back to around the middle of last month i've been the recipient of routine, silly phishing attacks for 5th 3rd bank (where i do not bank). check out the screen cappie below, shows 14 since July 20th. each one has a wacky combo of words or excepts from a story of some sort coupled with an image containing the enticement. check it out:











who in god's name would trust this and cough up their identity? do ppl really rush so fast to attachments that they don't read the message? i doubt it.

i would have more sympathy for someone who was suckered into helping general ungawa recover his 20 million from the nigerian government than the person that thought that just maybe they're account really was suspended in a message that starts with the words "fishy gimp, pus gamy awe, slue bosh pax ...".

on the flip-side, phishing messages like this would provide an ingenious starting point for coming up with creative, new indie band names. think about it. "she wants revenge" and "clap your hands and say yeah" could have just as easily been "ramage bagpipe brokerage" if they had been cruising my spambox. has a nice ring to it eh? how about "pain roof opal" instead of "death cab for cutie"? maybe these guys missed their real calling...

current playlist

Solitary | Skye Edwards | Mind How You Go
Is It Any Wonder | Keane | Under the Iron Sea
Zueri - Lindstrom & Prins Thomas Nortic Flav Mix | Tosca | Souvenirs (J.A.C remix album)
Funk Box | Visioneers feat. Capital A | Dirty Old Hiphop
Throw Your Hands in the Air | Teddybears | Rock n' Roll Highschool
Blower's Daughter | Damien Rice | O
Storm | Cut Chemist feat. Edan & Mr. Lif | The Audience's Listening
Bullitproof | Breakbeat Era | Ultra Obscene
Canto De Ossanha | Jurassic 5 | Feedback
Lemon Tree - Thievery Corporation Remix | Herb Alpert | Rewhipped
Tippy Tip Toe | Crackpot | Tummy Touch Compilation
Red Umbrella | Kostars | Klassics with a K

w00t detroit city

first the superbowl and now a detroit judge is the first to officially decry the ludicrous levels of surveillance we have been under since 9/11. personally, the surveillance doesn't bother me nearly as much as the thought that i'm paying someone with my tax dollars to sift through millions of calls and emails to do something that could be accomplished much more intelligently through other, more efficient means.

"The landmark decision makes U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency's once-secret program. The American Civil Liberties Union had filed suit against the government, claiming the program "ran roughshod" over the constitutional rights of millions of Americans and ran afoul of federal wiretapping law."

Link to full article at news.com

infosec? it's more glamorous than a hotel heiress...

this post is for all of you who wondered what a real security conference looks like (all 2 of you out there). think it would be cool to hang with a group of "hackers"? look no further as i provide a brief look at the dorkstravaganza that is one of the industry's longest running infosec conferences: defcon.
















this is a glance at the crowd in the riviera hotel in las vegas where defcon is hosted. for those of you who have not been to the riviera, it is located on the 7th layer of hell, which is oddly right next to circus circus. suckarama. it's cheap even by the standards of lima, ohio. while nearly every hotel worth its salt in vegas is adding marquis chef restaurants, the riviera just added a new "subway" sandwich joint and knocked another 50 cents off of footlong chili dogs.
















this my friends is a robot contest. a fight to the digital death for a series of mechnical 'bots created by hacker types for a nail-biting duel at defcon. grab your cheetos and strap yerself in amigo, it's a bout to the finish that would make C3PO blush....
















this is the message board and agenda displayed at defcon. it was about 15 feet tall, go big or go home. if you could read the text on the right-hand side (snapped this with my treo like the rest, the camera sucks), you'd chuckle in delight at adolescent humor such as the following winner i read on the big board:

What's the difference between a Northern fairy tale and a Southern fairy tale?
A Northern fairy tale begins, "Once upon a time..."
A Southern fairytale begins, "Y'all ain't gonna believe this shit..."

















i've saved the best for last. this is the wonderful wall of sheep, which displays those naive enough to connect to the defcon network without using some form of encryption to protect their communications. this is sort of like taking your chances with a hooker in botswana. bad idea. most of what ends up on the screen is people's passwords for email, ftp and other popular internet activities.

you might be able to see the image of young fella on the left-hand, bottom corner of the screen. the title of this photo is "MySpace Lover!"-- this poor sucker was caught connecting to his myspace account while at defcon. this was greeted with howls of laughter and widespread derision. to think that anyone would use the internet to connect socially!!! absurd.