Chatter Of The Squirrel

Movie: Punisher Warzone

Unusual movie for me to watch at the cinema… But a friend insisted on watching something, and I figured that this will be more enjoyable than Burn After Reading.

Turning this comic book into a movie has already failed miserably twice. I figured the third time’s gotta be the charm. And honestly, I was not disappointed.

My first encounter with The Punisher was the old DOS game from ages ago. This was one of the few PC games I bought in those days. Played it through the end. It was also my first exposure to the distinction between a Smith & Wesson .38 and a Browning 9mm. (One holds more bullets than the other.)

I did not come across a Punisher comic until a dozen years later. The character was created during a time when a gun-toting vigilante had an appeal to comic fans who’s tired of the campy never-kill-anybody heroes like Batman et al. But other than the wanton violence, the character has no other dimensions. Frank Castle is just a psychopath with a grudge, and has no room to grow. The character’s popularity sunk so low that they made a cross-over comic with Archie of Riverdale. That was really sad. Although in the past year, the character had been rebuilt somewhat during the Civil War arc, where he was a contender to take over Captain America’s shield after Steve Rogers was assassinated at the conclusion of Civil War.

Back to the movie… The writer did not waste too much time on the back story. Just bring in the mobsters, and bring in the guns.

The action sequences are mostly so so. But there was a fantastic scene with a couple of parqours. I was half wondering if they might do another parqour chase like in Casino Royale. But apparently Frank has a more creative solution involving a surface to air missile. That was laugh out loud FUNNY!

I think this movie captured the true feel of the comic! Gratuitious gun-violence. Comic-like comedy. Comical villians. Limited human drama that was sprinkled sparingly, like salad in a steakhouse. That’s just the right mix of entertainment without trying to be taken seriously. Pretty good, for such a disenchanted franchise.

Wordpress disaster

Something happened to my blog yesterday. Some readers had suspected sabotage, but apparently that wasn’t the case.

The last thing I was doing, was creating a new page for a disclosure agreement. The internet crawled for a bit. Then suddenly http://insanesquirrel.com became inaccessible. Keeps giving a page error.

At first I thought that the server was slow, or Streamyx was acting itself again.

But I could ping my webhosting server. I could access the file manager. I could access the other web app I was hosting on my domain.

Just no Wordpress.

Suspected that some of the php files in Wordpress might have broken.

Downloaded the latest Wordpress 2.7.1. As well as started backing up all the contents on my domain.

I have no hope of figuring out if anything is wrong in the themes or widgets or css or anything in the Wordpress stuff… Best I can hope for is to replace everything while trying not to undo the work I’ve done on my themes.

I tried something unusual first… I uploaded the latest Wordpress into a random directory. Extracted the contents. Copied my wp-config.php file into this directory. (This file contains the login / password to access the MySQL database where the contents of my blog is.) This is the bare minimum to get the Wordpress running.

Tried to run the blog from this random database, and my blog loads up.

I could see from the mainpage that there are duplicates of “Disclosure” under “Pages”. This was the last thing I was doing. Somehow, one save created almost 10 copies of the page. And clicking any one of them creates an error.

So I accessed the WP Admin. And I can access or edit everything EXCEPT the Pages-Edit function.

Now I suspect that it’s something in the database. While upgrading the Wordpress to 2.7.1, I backed up my database and copied it into my comp, and looked at it. The last few entries in the wp_posts table is what I want to get rid of. The Wordpress 2.7 Database Schema is also very useful.

But how to access the database hosted in my webhost?

1. Accessed cPanel. Go to Remote MySQL
2. Add the IP address of a remote server I have access to that has a fixed IP.
3. Incidentally, this remote server also has MySQL installed already
4. Ran the command: mysql -h insanesquirrel.com -u -p
5. Got to my Wordpress table
6. delete from wp_posts where ID > 1095;

After doing this, the blog is broken again.

Studied the database schema a second time, and I added the command: delete from wp_postmeta where post_id > 1095;

Loaded up the blog from the random directory again. I don’t know what this does. But it fixes things.

Now the blog is up.  The malevelont disclosure pages are gone. The edit-pages.php can load again. And everything seems to be hunky dory again.

And I’m out half a weekend.

Well, I did most of this while multitasking and watching Old Boy. So it’s not all lost. Old Boy is one mind blowing Korean thriller. Where a boy’s careless words led to him being imprisoned for 15 years in a cell operated by gangsters.

Tune Hotel Booking

Tune Hotel is building new accomodations within walking distance to the KLIA LCCT in Sepang.

Cheap and basic rooms. And the earlier you book, the cheaper it is. And there’s an online booking interface.

The interface is clumsy and irritating. You have to log in repeatedly, as if the system doesn’t even use cookies.

Strategy #1 Do not book all your rooms all at once.

If I book 5 rooms, they’re MYR53 each.
If I book 3 rooms, they’re MYR27 each.
So I made 2 separate bookings, first 3 rooms at MYR27, then 2 more rooms at MYR53. Thus saving MYR76 from the extra effort.

The system tries to ‘help’ you from having to enter your credit card information repeatedly.

It SAVES your credit card number, details, CCV number all in their system.

It does NOT use the standard VISA or MasterCard API, where the charge request is passed directly to the VISA or MC systems, and the request will be approved or declined immediately.

Instead, the details are stored in their own clumsy system, THEN the details are sent to the VISA/MC systems, hidden from your view. This way, if the request is declined, they will always have your credit card info and they can make adjustments to the charges, and try to charge again at a later time.

The credit card details are automatically saved into your account profile. Thus HELPING you and saving you the effort of entering the tedious details again when you make the next booking.

How HELPFUL!

The moment I’m done with my bookings, I accessed my user account, go to “My Cards” and deleted my credit card info from the list.

Double check the “My Cards”, nothing listed.

Good.

Triple check, I’ll try to add my credit card into the system again…

It’s already been added?

That means that the details are still stored in the database. They never deleted it. Only made you think they have. When I try to enter the same credit card again, they check the new card against any existing cards, find a match, and informs you the card is already in the system.

So this card is stuck. You can’t use this card in their system again. Use another card? What? And have 2 credit cards compromised by their crappy system!?

Unless, you create another user account and link the same card to this new user account. That works. Not ideal. But at least it limits my exposure to just the one card that I’ve allowed to be compromised >_<

So, my most recent booking got rejected. That’s cos I’ve got 38 flights charged to my overheated credit card already. Checked my bank balance, nothing has been charged from Tune Hotel for this rejected payment. Checked the Tune Hotel system, the room booking is still there, there’s nothing I can do to re-attempt the payment.

Do I leave it as it is? Or make another booking with another card and assume that the botched booking is scrap.

I didn’t trust Tune. So I waited. Maybe they’ll call me about the rejected payment and ask me if they can try again.

I didn’t get the call. But a few days later, I noticed the charges in my credit card statement. And the amount of the charges are different. What should have been charged was something like rm60, rm80, & rm30 (for a cancellation). But the credit card statement showed that they charged rm80, rm80, rm10.

The total charged is the same. But it demonstrates that they are able to adjust the amount their system charges. It proves that their system is storing credit card number, details, and even the CVV verification number. So that if the card was declined, they can retry at a later date.

Well, I’m not suggesting that they might make fraudulent charges to my card.

Nor am I suggesting that they have not vetted all their employees so that none of them may be morally inclined to use the information in the system for their purposes.

Or the developer of their clumsy system might not drop in to maintain some code, back up their database, and take home some of their backups.

Or the hardware vendor of the server where this system is installed on.

Or anyone who has access to their server room.

Or if it’s hosted elsewhere, that any employee from the webhosting company who might have access to the server might not be tempted.

I’m not suggesting a system that doesn’t handle cookies in a user friendly manner might not have some strong encryption for the card numbers they store in the database.

Or that the system might not be intrusion proof, and some hacker might not come along and take away a treasure trove of credit card details.

This system is simply unacceptable.

I still have 1.5yrs before this credit card expires. And in that time, I am vulnerable.

Insomnia

Didn’t manage to get much sleep last night.

Instead of my usual scheduled bedtime listening (Snowball, Warren Buffett), I loaded up Richard Feynman’s Surely You’re Joking Mr Feynman.

A mistake.

The stories were so compelling that it kept me up all night listening to it.

I’ve read this autobiography years ago, around 94-95. Feynman won the Nobel Prize for physics in 1965, for something that I don’t really understand… (ie ”fundamental work in quantum electrodynamics, with deep-ploughing consequences for the physics of elementary particles.”)

But it was his young life that inspired me. His involvement in Los Alamos working on the first atomic bomb. His shenanigans cracking safes containing world-transforming information and reports. His way of looking at the world, at science, at people.

He remains the one person that I admire most.

I’m sure I didn’t doze off to sleep until nearly 4am.

Food: Snack Thoughts

So I got a tray of leftover CNY goodies to munch on.

So many yummy nuts. And all to myself. mmmMMMMMmmm

Having some thoughts about the pumpkin seeds in the middle though.

A TON of yummy seeds, all pre-shelled.

How was that done? Is there a machine that can efficiently crack and de-shell pumpkin seeds? Or is this done by an army of grandmothers with dentures somewhere in China?