push

Nothing too terribly exciting has been happening lately. Mostly the last couple of weeks have been a big push to finish stuff before I go away. I've been editing book chapters for this phishing book, getting papers ready for submission, wrapping up projects, getting my tax info ready ... the list goes on. Nothing spectacular.

On Saturday I leave for the land down-under, and it's finally starting to sink in. I am not really sure what to think except, "here comes another adventure."

On a side note, Cingular sucks, so I will be canceling my phone before I leave. I'll probably have a new number shortly after I get back, but for the meantime, Skype me, AIM me, or email me.

I will post pictures.

prince paul obinwa

I take great pleasure in my 419 scam emails, and I recently got a very funny one. Prince Paul Obinwa writes about his dead father, jealous uncle, and US$8.6 Million he wants to invest in US real-estate. His uncle is not happy, he says:

"He is not happy with me because I am going to be the next king in village and he's not just happy about it."

Good excuse. Now why would a guy want to invest the royal treasury in US real estate? That would be like the prince of Jordan wanting to buy Germany (related Link).

Anyway, click the image in this post to see the whole image -- it's necessary to get the full effect of Prince Paul Obinwa.

www06

My paper, "Invasive Browser Sniffing and Countermeasures" got into the 15th annual World Wide Web conference.

I'm excited. Only 81 papers were accepted (of 700 submissions), and our paper was submitted to a very competitive track; rumor has it that the security & privacy track had a 4% acceptance rate.

The only down side to this is that the conference is in Edinburgh, Scotland. And it's at one of the world's swankyist conference centers / castles. Entry fees are steep, and I'll be in Oz at that point, so I won't get to attend the soiree.

Oh well, I'll just spend the time on the beach instead of in that conference.

passed

I took my oral examination today... and passed! Now I can fill out the paperwork and become a full-fledged PhD candidate. Woohoo. If only it meant a pay raise... or pay... or food, anything.

sid in print

My 5081 words of fame:
Graduate discovers Internet weakness (via IDS News)

marshmallow madness

Holy crap does the Swiss Miss Marshmallow Lover's cocoa mix have lots of mini-sugary-marshmallows. I opened the can of mix just now and it looked like packing peanuts, and now they've all melted away into my cup of cocoa.

Hot cocoa always reminds me of elementary school. Something possessed me in the 5th grade to sign up to be one of those "safety patrol" kids. You know the job: you wear a special orange sash, and tell kids when to cross the street. I was lured in by delusions of grandeur, and highly disappointed when none of the kids would listen to me -- even the frickin' third graders. I had to take a test to get the job too: predict how long it would take a car to get to where I was on the side of the road. Really it was just a depth perception test, and after giving me the depth-test, my eye doctor always told me I could parallel park her car anytime.

Anyhow, after "patrol" on the cold days, I would go back into the school and put away the sash. They always had a water heater and huge Sam's Club sized can of Swiss Miss waiting for the safety patrol kids.

january t-storm

It stormed here yesterday. 2 January, and we have 62°F, thunderstorms and -- get this -- a tornado watch. Damn, this state is strange.

sha1 browns

Google's ads are funny. While viewing my spam folder on Gmail, I was presented with links to Spam recipes.