JacobSanford.com

Since a blog post. Guess I better ‘get on it’ Pat home in 2 days and got Toronto stuff to post. For now, Jennie AND Olivia have posted their synopses of the trip. Photos to come.

Are you aware that Microsoft Excel has a column limit of 255 columns? That’s one of the most shocking things I’ve discovered this week. I don’t understand this concept at all - isn’t this 2006, not 1986?

Mabye there is a deeper coding problem that I’m ignorant of.

But it boils down to the fact that my 1300×1300 data matrix cannot be handled by Excel. While frustrated, my annoyance evaporated quickly when I moved over to Quattro Pro 11 and had no problems.

I just checked out google on the topic and found this on wikipedia snippit:

Quattro Pro also avoids Excel’s long-standing worksheet size limitation of 65,536 rows by 256 columns, with a maximum worksheet size of one million rows by 18,276 columns.

So that means a quattro worksheet can hold (1,000,000*18276)/(65356*256)=1089 times the data. Later on I found a poorly written, but surprising:

[I have heard from] MS that developer can fix to 450 ish Columns…….. MS do not have direct plans so im told expand but i have feelers out as i know that soon developers tools will allow this poss next office as an additional patch or seperate program. Ill post you soon as Microsoft let slip detail, i am in the right place with work. BEST fix is to split over 2 or more sheets i guess.

Can you believe this? 256 to 450 - what a groundbreaking expansion.

The return of the Thin White Duke
Throwing darts in lovers’ eyes

Sure sure - I kept with the Bowie theme. Give me a break - I had to choose some grandiose lyrics for that monumental photo.

Back on track - holy sweet Moses - its true. Patrick is coming back into the country after a year’s absence. His suggestion of a brew-ha-ha in Bellisle was met with great excitement from this writer. Especially since the weather seems unseasonably warm and I can envision Beer and a grilled steak on the BBQ. It’s been at least 48 hours since I had one. And it’s been at least 2 hours since I had a drink. Oh wait, it’s 10am. 3 hours.

Anyhow, how time passes quickly! While freshening up my coffee I realized that the last year has gone very quickly - but let’s not get back on a ‘getting old’ rant again - that’s depressing.

I woke up last night to Olivia fluffing her pillow over and over again like she was kneading bread. It continued for several minutes before I said something, upon which she seemed extremely confused and then went back to sleep. I think her dream (whatever it was) got stuck in a stuttering loop similar to a record’s needle skipping. Very strange. What wild mental tale warrants continual fluffing of a pillow? She made a strange excuse this morning up about being unable to move the pillow sideways - I think it was something much more sinister.

As many of those who know me are aware, I have a small piece of a meteorite that has material in it that is pre-solar. 4 bil+ old. I have decided that in the interest of total exploration I will eat a portion of it. Details of the results to come.

If you’re interested, I posted some select photos from our Florida Trip. Jason’s old thumbgen script still works better than any I’ve tested.

All right, all right, off to the abyss. I have some muddling to do.

The race was definitely under way.
I had witnessed the start; I was sure of that much.
But what now?
-Raoul Duke
Olivia surprised me last month by admitting that she was mildly apprehensive about turning 24. I must admit; it seemed a little out of the blue (and out of character for her). The more I think about it, however, the more I understand some of what she was feeling. And it’s kind of scary - we are at a point in our lives where we ARE actually getting ‘old’.

Even more ominous is the demon of responsibility that is starting to ‘roll on up’ on me -and it’s happening faster than I’m comfortable with. That thesis that always seemed so far away is now a present reality. The gross spectre of a ‘real job’ (that I’ve been avoiding for god-knows-how-long) is now looming over me. Almost all of my friends have left the bubble of school and have moved onto another stage of their life. It goes on and on.

Ho ho - the obvious solution is simple - suck it up! The problem with that attitude is this - I live in the wonderful fantasy of a world where aging applies for everyone but me. In this world everyone around me gets older but I will always stay the same age.

So if Olivia is worried about turning 24, is there a concern for someone turning 26? Most Likely. Do I feel it? Hell no!

After years of intense television and literary research I am convinced that strange beings like myself never actually age or die. We just grow brighter and brighter until the world stares eternally in awe.