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Warming up to emoji
No long ago I wrote that I loathed Emoji. My main grumble was their usage abuse, and, especially, the overuse of “smilies.”

Since Apple’s iOS 10, I have been warming up to them, but it wasn’t until I came across Mu-An that they really started to captivate me. She uses them, sparingly, but with such taste! A few of her repositories exclusively deal with Emoji as well. Thus, this post i … ⌘ Read more

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What have you taught me?
His father was only giving him a small advise, worried for him. Parents worry too much, sometimes. It was not taken well.

“You suffocate me, don’t worry so much about me! Enough advise, what have you taught me, until now?” He asks. Perhaps no much, the father thinks in retrospect. Brushing the teeth, maybe? Lacing the shoes? How to clean the arse? How to respect others, and do good? To be happy, love, study hard, work hard? That, and the many little things of daily life. … ⌘ Read more

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China’s two child policy
This one is worth documenting, as it doesn’t happen every day. As a matter of fact, it hasn’t happened for over three decades.

“It is the latest twist in the most ambitious and ruthless social-engineering program ever undertaken by a modern state: Beijing announced Thursday that the Chinese Communist Party will officially abandon it … ⌘ Read more

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Big Red Bus
“Hi guys, don’t forget to donate today!” says the lady with the oneblood.org t-shirt. The Big Red Bus parks on campus often, sometimes they seem to be here every day. “We’ll give you a t-shirt and a cookie!” She says. That’s the price of your donation, but is it?

A typical pint of blood costs $130-150, and sometimes [even more](http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2010-04-05/news/os-blood-cost-anne-chinoda-201 … ⌘ Read more

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Walking and using the phone
Walking around with your head stuck on the phone is like playing the chicken game. The fully aware pedestrian walking in your opposite direction—and on the same path—is forced to play the game. Not as dangerous as driving but still very annoying. When you walk, please pay attention, look where you are walking, and leave the phone in your pocket. ⌘ Read more

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Apple on encryption
Apple mobile devices—iPhones, iPads, iPods—are used everywhere. The US smartphone subscriber market share highest percentage is dominated by them. As an American company, they are bound to comply with U.S. laws and regulations. So, when the U.S. Justice Department [requested](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/08/us/politics/apple-and-other-tech-companies-tangle-with-us-over-acce … ⌘ Read more

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Neighbors
Our neighbors are moving. The ones on the left, that is. They have been our neighbors for fifteen years, and lived here for seventeen, since the community was built. Quiet neighbors, the best kind. Now we roll the dice, and hope for the best, for whoever comes next.

The house on the right has had three owners; we have known them all. The first were the previous owners of our house. They left within two years. The second occupants came, and lasted a little longer. Then emptiness. For a while. The current ones … ⌘ Read more

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Reminders
“What did you have for lunch?,” the father asks while driving home. “Same as usual,” he replies. “And that is?” “I just eat random sandwiches of what comes to whim.” The father processes that for a bit. “I see.” Later, at home, “what’s there for homework today?” “No much,” he says. “Brush your teeth,” he is reminded. Later, in the evening. “Take a shower.” A few times.

Just before the father goes to sleep, and sees his bedroom lights on. “What are you doing up so late? … ⌘ Read more

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AP classes
Yesterday (15 October) Kent told me he doesn’t want to take AP (Advanced Placement) classes next year. He also told me he might not want to be a neurological surgeon after all, and that he really doesn’t know what he will want to be, professionally. We talked more, but the rest of it has no place in here.

Amongst the many feelings I am experiencing, regret is one of them. If only my parents were alive. I can’t express with words how very sorry I am for the many bad times I made them go through. ⌘ Read more

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Backing up and restoring GPG keys
If you use GPG to occasionally encrypt and/or sign your email, or to encrypt your files before placing them on the cloud, you will understand how important it is to have a backup of your GPG keys. Similarly important will be to know how to restore them as well.

Backing up your keys and configuration files

To back your private, and public keys, as well as your trust database, you will do1:


gpg --armor --export-secret-keys > ~/Des ... ⌘ [Read more](https://collantes.us/2015/10/13/backing-up-and-restoring-gpg-keys/)

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Good office slave manual
Yegor Bugayenko has a few tips—a short manual, per se—to help us be good office slaves.

Don’t Nag. No matter what is happening, you should never criticize your direct manager. The boss is always right. Everything else may be wrong — the situation, colleagues, suppliers, computers, the CEO, investors, the market, or the weather, but not the boss you directly report to. The word of this person is the law. The boss is the god. … ⌘ Read more

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The Martian
We just came from seeing the movie “ The Martian.” Minus the obvious, very predictable, Hollywood scenes, the movie was quite alright. It made me wish I could live to see the first few missions to the Red Planet. Being the selfless guy that I am, thought, I would be willing to settle if my child gets to see them instead.

While on the topic of movies, and theaters, it is amazing how expensive it is to see a movie these days. For three tickets we paid $36 … ⌘ Read more

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Enticement
Someone decided to entice us to fill out a survey, by sending us a “lucky” two dollars bill with it. Normally we do not fill out any type of surveys, unless proper remuneration is provided. Two dollars isn’t really worth the effort, and normally would not be accepted as a fee. Yet, since there is no way to send it back with assurances it will reach the original sender, we have a small dilemma on hands.

Thus, as the survey is only two page … ⌘ Read more

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Of no use

A farmer got so old that he couldn’t work the fields anymore. So he would spend the day just sitting on the porch. His son, still working the farm, would look up from time to time and see his father sitting there.

“ _He’s of no use any more,_” the son thought to himself, “ _he doesn’t do anything!_”

One day the son got so frustrated by this, that he built a wood coffin, dragged it over to the porch, and told his father to get in. Without saying anything, the father climbed inside. … ⌘ Read more

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Prediction
Next year we will have our Presidential Elections. Everyone knows that, of course, because the politicians have been campaining for almost a year now.

Below is the name of a file with my winner’s prediction on the United States 2016 Presidential Elections written on it. It is a hash algorithm of a file containing a sentence with my prediction. I will refer to this post the day after elections, as the results are known.

2016-Presidential-Elections-Prediction.txt


eeb872df145294d1c7c2547 ... ⌘ [Read more](https://collantes.us/2015/10/05/prediction/)

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Tempus Fugit
Time seems to be passing by too fast. Way too fast.

A week starts and then it is over when I blink. Same applies to weekends. It used to be that time seemed to pass quick only when engaged in something. Lately it is the same, whether I am busy or not. I am afraid I will blink again, and I will be gone.

Amongst the many things we can’t control, time is the one that hurts the most, especially as we grow older. I think I am having a déjà vu. ⌘ Read more

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Space for the dead
I read an article today on The Guardian, which showed up on the eight page of Hacker’s News. It talks about the lack of space for the dead, in the world of the living.

“Some 55 million people are reckoned to pass away each year (about 0.8% of the planet’s total population – equivalent to 100% of England’s). Yet urban planners and developers focus overwhelmingly on accommodating and making money from the living. Ceme … ⌘ Read more

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NixOS 14.04 released
NixOS 14.04 “Baboon” has been released, the second stable
release branch. It brings Linux 3.12, systemd 212, GCC 4.8,
Glibc 2.19, KDE 4.12, light-weight NixOS containers, and much
more. See the release\
 notes for details. You can get NixOS 14.04 ISOs and
VirtualBox appliances from the download page. For information on
how to upgrade a 13.10 system to 14.04, check out the [manual\
 section on upgrading](/manual/nixos/stable/#sec … ⌘ Read more

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Heartbleed vulnerability in OpenSSL
A serious security\
 vulnerability has been discovered in OpenSSL. All stable
NixOS releases prior to version
13.10.35708.15a465c are vulnerable. (You can
see your current version by running nixos-version.) To
upgrade to the latest NixOS version, run nixos-rebuild
switch –upgrade. You can verify whether you are safe by
running

$ nix-store -qR /run/current-system | grep openssl

If this shows any OpenSSL ve … ⌘ Read more

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NixOS 13.10 released
We have released NixOS 13.10, the first stable branch of NixOS.
Its goal is to provide a safe branch for production environments
that need bug fixes and security updates, but not the
potentially destabilising changes that sometimes occur on the
unstable branch. You can get NixOS 13.10 ISOs and VirtualBox
appliances from the download\
 page. See the announcement
for … ⌘ Read more

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