When we say “I love you”, what we usually mean is “Thank you for loving me”.

My father described to me his accounting system just now. He uses a hodgepodge of methods, because no software that exists works well enough. He’s a contractor, and travels from business to business working on computers. He often works in places with computers that break or network that is unstable for anything but email, so remotely accessing accounting software would be difficult, especially since one of the few workable choices is QuickBooks, which doesn’t play nice in any sort of distributed environment short of remote-desktop over a fast network.

So he uses an adaptation of old accounting techniques, now electronic. He sends bills to customers, puts a copy in his email in an IMAP box, and when a customer pays a bill, he drags it to the “Paid” folder. At the end of the year or quarter, he sums it up and enters it into spreadsheets and calculates taxes and the like. It’s a reliable system that even in the face of software failure, is quite robust. Email is well enough studied that things pretty much Just Work, mailboxes are reliable databases (if poorly indexed).

So to expand on this system and build a distributable workflow for accounting, imagine this:

Build a simple XML or RDF format for accounting documents (I suspect this already exists) — invoices, statements, promisory notes, checks. Attach them to emails as MIME multipart/alternative messages, with the alternate part being a text or HTML (or both) representation of the bill for human reading. Write simple software for generatingthese documents.

Then, the next stage, build extensions or external software for reading and cataloguing these documents — this could be a Thunderbird extension, even — and for summarizing. From there, build simple reporting software to pull what they need from the summaries and be able to calculate tax liabilities and other period-end financial tasks.

It’s a simple, scalable system. Contacts for bills can be pulled from an email address book. Customer relations systems that integrate with email would then integrate with the financial end of customer management. Email recording and logging systems could make record of financial transactions as they can make record of any other email sent or received. Cryptographic signatures can be used to sign the messages.

Last night: Brie and shiitake quesadilla.

This morning: Leek and shallot fritata with cream cheese melted on top.

Brie + Shiitakes + Tortillas = Brie Quesadilla of Delight.

Why my roommate, hellion0 rocks:

She: Fuck IE

Me: Yeah, totally. But wear a condom.

She: Yeah, with all the viruses it carries…

I coerced Fedora Core 5 Test 3 into playing MP3s (and maybe DVD). The patent issues make the licensing really truly ugly, and that trickles down into technical issues when a distro like Fedora plays indifferent to MP3 support. Don’t tell anyone, but I have binary RPMs of what I did (mostly stolen, shamelessly) from Livna. Don’t try these on FC4, they’ll probably explode. The RPMs are here (and there’s sources too). There’s YUM and Poldek indices for those who want to figure out how to use them. I don’t yet.

If you have SELinux enabled in enforcing mode, you may very well have to disable it – there is a permission error, utterly unreported by things in the UI, that makes gstreamer ignore the mad plugin. Your mileage may vary.

Two new friends. One makjor breakup among close friends. One major fight among others. Three old friends reconnected with. One soup made, one kitchen left better than it was before. One pot of coffee, one pot of tea. One cup of port, one block of cheese. Tomorrow, one trip to Grand Junction, one sister come home. Life is good if intense.

• 1 cup dry hominy, pressure cook 45 minutes, until soft
• 1 onion, 7 cloves of garlic, sauteed in butter or olive oil
• 2 small squash or 1/2 butternut squash, deseeded and cut in cubes
• 1 can of diced tomatos
• 1 tablespoon anaheim pepper flakes
• 1 tablespoon oregano
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 teaspoons salt
• water to fill Heat until everything’s getting soft. Serve with cilantro if you like the stuff.

Conversational Terrorism is a great read.

LJ has simultaneously broken my RSS style (it strips opening <link> tags) so my LJ stopped working in my feedreader, meaning I’ve missed anything important anyone’s said in the last 48 hours (or so), and broken the stylesheet @import rule I had, leaving my journal ugly and unstyled. I’ll see if I can’t hack about and fix some of it.

Yesterday, hellion0 moved in. I think we’re gonna get along just fine. We have similar taste in food and in music. I’ve spent a lot of time at work lately, so not much else to say. I’m hoping to get a chance to work on some of my projects tonight.

Good parts of today include phone conversation with claire_stretch, with raijna and with elliotpp. I am gonna explode out of happy and feeling useful. Now if only I can get off work and home and sane early enough to call jwitchbaby, I’d be communicating how I want. Doubly so if I can get a moment where she’s not already on the phone with rising_dawn.

I’ve known for a while, but tonight I really realize that I put friendship on the highest pillar of relationships.

I’m very happy with this.

New unschooler design contest just ended. Propose another!

Pick four friends from your friend’s list. Pick one feature from each, to form a superhero with a new personality. Then, what is this new person’s uncanny ability, major weakness, favorite vice, and least favorite food?

Mine:

Ingredients: anandabrat‘s playfulness, raijna‘s erratic romantic nature, elsbeth‘s enjoyment of blowing things up and wolftracks‘s wit.

The results:

• Uncanny ability: Ability to throw fireballs and run away giggling.
• Major weakness: Bouts of irreconciliable desire causing massive angst.
• Favorite vice: Clove cigarettes and too much sugar.
• Least favorite food: Anything too spicy.

Tag, anandabrat, vruba and wolftracks