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| Ronald M. Clifford |
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| SVN turns 1000 |
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| Thursday, July 16, 2009 |
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Married Life Posted: 3:01:00 AM 1 comments |
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Ah, the married life. Um, it seems to be the same as unmarried life. Anyway, it's been far too long since I've posted here. First of all, you'll notice a new picture! This is from my wedding, and probably will be the one I use online going forward, as opposed to that silly surprise smile face from 2001. I'll likely still use my side Vegas photo occasionally, but this is going to be my common photo for the time being. I'm still heavily addicted to World of Warcraft. Six Minutes to Release is still going strong, and I have done a lot with it since my last update. Right now I'm working on updating the broken LibWowArmory to work with all of Blizzard's latest Armory changes. Woo, this post is already linkerific. Cent has resurfaced as a project when I discovered C++/CLI. Basically, all the calls to Crystal Space are done in C++/CLI while I do the actual game logic in Visual Basic.Net. It's not been without its difficulties, though. For instance, passing a System.String from VB.Net into C++/CLI for use as a char* parameter without causing a memory leak was interesting. I finally came up with this function: const char* Marshalling::StringToConstCharPointer(String^ strIn) { marshal_context^ context = gcnew marshal_context(); return context->marshal_as } So far, I've gotten a blank screen with an FPS counter in the upper right touching 2,400 fps. I'm currently working on the static loader module that loads the images, music, and other various files needed by Crystal Space. Then I get to start working on the menu, which will be designed a heck of a lot smarter than the old one was. That is, no more 10,000 line classes. The only thing I have yet to figure out is the new event system of Crystal Space, which is probably just for lack of trying. Right now I cannot handle keyboard, mouse, or joystick input without breaking the frame processor. If I try to handle all events, the frame event doesn't fire. If I comment out the part that handles all events, the frame event works fine. I'm sure I'll figure it out with time. My music has, unfortunately, been put on hold. I just don't have the time nor the proper equipment to do anything with it. I've probably written half a dozen songs in my head in that time, but the overall motivation to actually do something with it is mostly gone. Hopefully next year I can get something from Open Labs and get myself out of this funk. And finally as a footnote, I am quite into Kado Kado, a competitive mini game website. I am doing really well in Iron Chouquette, Ellon in the Dark, Opalus Factory, and for some reason Cooking Lili. I absolutely hate Cooking Lili. But I'm good at it. Bleh. But seriously, many of the games are fun, and they're coming out with more all the time. You can play five times per day for free, or if you become heavily addicted like me, you can buy the ability to play more. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, February 03, 2009 |
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I just don't keep up with this like I used to Posted: 4:51:00 PM 0 comments |
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I am mildly annoyed at myself. I used to do a real good job at keeping up with what I'm doing as a way to keep contact with people out in the real world. And yet here I am, realizing yet again that it's been more than a month since my last post. Hmph. Anyway, a lot has happened lately. First and foremost, if you don't know that I've gotten engaged, you've been out of the loop! I proposed to Kathy on the 16th at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse. It's been over 7 1/2 years since we've been together. The only explanation I can gather is that I like outdoing my brother, who's got this thing he calls the "five year rule". Well, I did 50% better than ya, bro. Heh. Anyway, the date we're looking at is June 20, 2009, which would be 8 years exactly since we met at the Seabrook Beach Club. Which is closed. Would've made for a great reception. So the plans have begun. The bands are bought, and all of the fun of planning is on the way. Finding a ceremony and reception site, getting a planner, booking catering and a DJ, and all the other extras that go into setting up that special day. Admittedly, I feel I'm going really slow, but we're making progress. I did take a trip to Buffalo this year, although it was a lot shorter than usual due to me mismanaging my days off at work. I promised myself I won't do that again this year, but with the wedding, I may have little choice. Anyway, the trip was out of the ordinary, as the day before I was supposed to leave it was 60 degrees! The backyard flooded some with all the melting snow from Christmas eve and Christmas day, it was nuts. Then the next day the airport was closed because of high wind and power outages. Ugly stuff, I had to miss a day from work I couldn't afford to take. It was there that I got the idea to get proposal plans going when my mom commented, "Maybe I should take you out to look at rings." She was surprised when I took her seriously. Also while I was there, I got to see my brother play live again. It wasn't his usual band, but they still sounded pretty good. But the place he played out, yikes. It reminded me of when I saw my sister at a similar place the year before, except this one seemed smaller and seemed like it had four times as many people in it. We were packed wall to wall. I also extended my luck at casinos, as I posted a $200 profit from Casino Niagara. But this time it was off of a near straight flush in Let It Ride. The last card needed to be the five of diamonds for me to walk out with some awesome five digit figure. Instead it was the queen of diamonds, which was good enough for a flush. Now, what gets me is that I don't really understand why I sat down to play that game, because I normally go exclusively for Blackjack. Not only did I win on the flush, but I kept even for the rest of my time at that table. Yet the brief time I played Blackjack, I actually lost a bit. I have to wonder what kind of uncanny sixth sense I have when it comes to gambling, because I have only really lost badly once. I figure I'm up on casinos by well over $1,000 by now. Thank goodness I don't have a casino nearby in Houston, because I would be very tempted to play frequently. Hmm. A straight flush... that would've made for a nice wedding. Anyway, I got a lot to talk about, so I'll try to play catchup. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, September 12, 2008 |
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Blog moved Posted: 2:34:00 PM 0 comments |
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Thanks to the fine folks at StudioKraft, I've moved my blog off of roncli.com for the duration of the storm, and onto blogger.com, with StudioKraft doing the image hosting. Thanks Kim for setting this up on short notice! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, July 15, 2008 |
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iPhone! Posted: 12:27:00 PM 0 comments |
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When I first heard about the new iPhone G3, I'll admit I wasn't too terribly excited. I already had a Blackberry, and I had no reason to give it up. That is, until I saw the price. I was paying nearly $40 a month more for the Blackberry than the iPhone's monthly cost. And at $299, the price was right. Plus, Kathy has the old model, so I had a good idea of what to expect. Well, I've had it for a few days now, and so far it's lived up to my expectations pretty well. The only thing it's really missing is a decent RSS feed reader that notifies me when there are new feeds available, so I'm stuck manually using Google reader for now. But that's not too bad. If you were thinking about grabbing one, I would definitely recommend it, it's pretty nice to have a browser that actually works, as opposed to the gimped stuff that comes with most other phones. Nevermind the fact that my typing sucks on this thing. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, April 30, 2008 |
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Not much of anything Posted: 10:16:00 AM 0 comments |
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The last month or so has been relatively quiet. There just hasn't been a whole lot going on. Trax in Space is as vacant as ever when it comes to administration. Saurin just refuses to give it the time it deserves, and seems to be unwilling to go with a somewhat open source platform. Unwilling as in, every time I bring it up, he doesn't respond to me. CTG Music hasn't done much, although we're going to have to with the 2000 day celebration coming up in July. I do occasionally bug fix things, but I haven't really put any work into it, because I've just been so busy. With what? Projects, of course, except I've been dedicating my time to one single project, the Six Minutes To Release website. It's taking longer than expected, largely because I can't get more than an hour at a time at it, and it's been pretty slow going. I'm hoping to wrap this up within the next month or so because, firstly, our WoW guild needs it, and secondly because I want to move on to something else. Aside from that, musically I've been working with Chris and the Clones on a really interesting vocal piece that, so far, sounds like an Audioslave work. I'm really excited to be working on this, because the music he's got going is so good. Hopefully something will come of this over the next month or so. In the meantime, my computer at work lost it's hard drive, and I've been spending the past 2 days now reinstalling everything. Very boring. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, March 14, 2008 |
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All Resolved Posted: 2:38:00 PM 0 comments |
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Well, thankfully all the issues from earlier this week at work were resolved. Everyone sat down and had a nice discussion on how everyone can improve things, and even though no apologies were thrown around, they really didn't need to be. Everyone was finally on the same page, and we finally got that application working again to boot. Yay! It really has been one of those weeks I just wish I could erase and forget about. I absolutely hate feeling stressed out, and that's been an unfortunate reality for me lately. Moreso, I hate being angry, and I think it was pretty clear from my post early this morning that I was ready to put a hole in something. I don't recall being that mad over something in a long, long time, and it's made me wonder if the combination of events from this past week triggered greater-than-normal anger. Probably so. Fortunately, it's over. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Sunday, March 02, 2008 |
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Vincent Lau Posted: 1:46:00 AM 0 comments |
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On Saturday, March 1st at 9:50 PM pacific time, Vincent Lau, known around the digital music scene as SalsaBoy and ViciousV, passed away. He was 31 years old. Vincent is most widely known for being a co-founder of Trax in Space. From 1994 on, he designed the graphics for the website, along with all of the icons and the characters that graced the site in its prime. He also was a contributor to Digital Music Revolution, the e-magazine that spun off from Trax in Space back in 2000. He grew up in Houston, TX, where his family still lives. He moved to San Francisco a few years back and was working for Wells Fargo. He had always had a blood condition, having to get it changed every 3 weeks. As it was explained to me, the condition "finally caught up to him". He was in the hospital once last month, and again a week ago. There's a lot I have to be thankful for in having known Vincent. If he hadn't been working with Saurin, I'd probably have never joined up with the Trax in Space team, and I probably wouldn't be where I am right now in my career. He was a very social person, easy to make conversation with, and always knew how to have fun. One of the most unique things about him, it seemed that no matter where you went with him - New York, Las Vegas, Washington - he would always run into someone he knew. Vincent, you will be sorely missed by many, many people. Rest well, my friend. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, February 25, 2008 |
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Three Years Posted: 2:09:00 PM 0 comments |
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Hard to believe it's been three years since I started this blog, and certainly a whole lot has transpired in that time. I've been quite busy with a lot of new things over the past couple weeks, and there's a couple of things I've got cooking on the horizon, so stay tuned for more new stuff. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, January 07, 2008 |
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Vacation Roundup Posted: 2:47:00 PM 0 comments |
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Well, I've been back from vacation for a few days now, and figured I'd update everything that went on. First of all, this was actually one of my better Christmas vacations. I tell Kathy every year to remind me to take short vacations, because spending extended amounts of time with my family tend to irritate me. So this year, I went for a 9-day vacation, one of my longest. Truth be told, it wasn't half bad this time around. Aside from one of my mom's many, many dogs using my chest as a spring board the first day there, and plenty of moments of boredom having to sit through watching television when there wasn't anything good on like a Sabres game, I actually enjoyed my stay overall this year. Speaking of the Sabres, my brother Ryan got me tickets to the NHL Winter Classic on New Year's Day. So we went to Ralph Wilson Stadium after I picked him up from the airport. Took us over an hour and a half for what normally should be a fifteen minute drive thanks to ridiculous amounts of traffic. It was snowing lightly that day with temperatures in the lower 30's. We get to the stadium, pay $25 for parking, and get to the gate. They scan the tickets, and it tells us "Reprinted". They send us to the ticket booth. Uh oh. Turns out that the tickets were reported stolen, and were from a block of tickets set aside for Penguins fans. After lots of arguing, Ryan finally got a new pair of tickets for face value - $39 each - and we got to see the game despite missing the first half of the first period. Overall, the game was kind of slow, but the atmosphere was just spectacular. The Sabres really should have won the game, but their 4th straight loss was the same as any of the others, they couldn't score goals. They didn't even allow a shot in the 2nd period until there was less than 3 minutes left, but only came up with one goal. In the end, Sidney Crosby wrecked an otherwise wonderful day of hockey with a shootout victory. They talk about playing that kind of game every year, but I hope they don't do it. That was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and repeating it annually would make it lose the luster and specticle that it was. Really enjoyable. By the way, Chicago is frickin' freezing. When I got to O'Hare on the 2nd on my way home, it was -6 degrees. Fahrenheit. Brr. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, December 26, 2007 |
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Lesser Computers Posted: 12:01:00 AM 0 comments |
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So here I am in Buffalo on vacation for the next week plus, and having to deal with a lesser computer to do stuff from. To give some background, I brought a bunch of disks and Kathy's laptop with me in hopes of getting some work done on my projects while I wasn't busy. Well, the laptop tends to overheat and shut off in the middle of anything intensive, like installing software. So I decided not to use the laptop for anything important, and have moved to my mom's computer. Well, first of all I was plesantly surprised to find an Internet connection whose download speeds rivals my home computer's. But that's where the similarities end. This machine is sluggish and, up until today, outdated in terms of updates. The computer didn't even have the .NET framework on it yet, which in this day and age is amazing considering how many applications require it. It's also bloated with "factory installed" software. The CA Internet Security suite is the worst offender, running a half dozen different applications in the background. What's worse is that this keyboard is terrible, often not letting me type a key more than once every half second, especially the "N", "W" and "L" keys. It sucks because I type over 100 WPM (I just found out the zero key does it too!), and having to slow down for this just irritates me. But it's what I've got to deal with, all of its 512 MB RAM, until I leave here on January 2nd, so I've got to use it if I want to do anything, I suppose. At least by the time I leave, it will be all up to date, and less bloated than it was before. I think I'll be running a disk defragmenter tonight, and see if that will help as well. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Sunday, December 23, 2007 |
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Eleven Hours Later... Posted: 11:45:00 PM 0 comments |
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Perhaps I spoke too soon. After tons of delays, we finally got a plane to Buffalo, making me 3 hours late. Oi. Labels: Miscellaneous |
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Shuffle Off To Buffalo Posted: 4:02:00 PM 0 comments |
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Vacation time! I am currently writing from Houston Intercontinental Airport, enjoying a pizza from Uno Express. Yes, it's that time of year again, time to shuffle off to Buffalo. Not learning my lesson from the last several years, I'll be staying through to the second of January. So far, I'm thinking it'll be fun, but that usually fades after a few days. Fortunately, I brought Reason, Visual Studio, and enough equipment to setup a network for the laptop at mom's place, so I'll be fairly well connected while I'm gone. Amazingly, the airport is empty, and I have plenty of time to relax before my flight. No nightmare travel so far, which is great. So far so good, see ya on the flip side. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, November 01, 2007 |
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Time Posted: 4:50:00 PM 0 comments |
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Time seems to have eluded me lately, mostly going to gaming when I'm at home. That doesn't mean I haven't been busy, though. First up is my new Projects site. I've got trac working on my computer, and will be using it to track the many projects I am working on. I have too many projects. Another thing I'm working on is a wiki for Cute Trance Girls (Sorry, I can't help it!). Recently CTG was thinking of shutting down, and I really didn't want to see that happen. So, I joined the staff, where ideas are flowing freely on how to improve the site. I may or may not get into coding, we'll see. But for now my main goal is to help the site stay alive and improve, and if that requires coding, then coding it shall be. PHP, yuck... On Trax in Space, I've been as active as ever. I have just completed my third Artist of the Month article, and listen to every song on the site while compiling my "Best of TiS" playlists. The goal is to take those playlists and make some podcasts out of them. Whether I do that or not depends on how long I can rip myself away from WoW while Kathy's at work. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, October 15, 2007 |
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Niagara Falls Roundup, eh? Posted: 5:14:00 PM 0 comments |
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Kathy and I spent the week of September 24th in Niagara Falls, NY. We stayed at the Seneca Niagara Casino. What a beauty that place is, much more upscale than most of the stuff in Vegas. Granted, Niagara Falls, NY is still a dump, perhaps even more so now than it was when I left the area back in 1999. The Rainbow Centre mall is completely closed, and the awesome indoor garden they had next to it was replaced by a kids fun center. Stupid. The falls itself was awesome. We took the Maid of the Mist boat to within the horseshoe falls and got thoroughly soaked, enjoying every minute of it. The Falls really is an awesome power. I read somewhere that the American side of the falls will eventually flatten out and become rocky rapids, because the water can't erode the rocks that collapse fast enough. But the Canadian side has no such problem right now. I once again met up with Martin Kilner of Outpost fame along with his "grl"-friend. We had a blast on Cliffton Hill playing Minigolf, enjoying the food, and riding the huge ferris wheel with a falls view. Then we went over to Casino Niagara where Jenn won thirty bucks in like 15 minutes. Martin finally got his hat back that he left in our rental car in England 2 years ago, and couldn't be happier. We went to Toronto to worship the Hockey Hall of Fame, and dined atop the CN Tower. Wow, what a massive view from an incredibly tall building! They had a glass floor that neither me nor Kathy could bring ourselves to walk on. Of course, we gambled throughout the week. While I went home $150 short, Kathy managed to make $250, the highlight being her winning 10 hands in a row! With the progressive betting that we do, she would have easily pulled in $1,000 if her last hand hadn't been a loss while doubling. That hurt! Finally, on Saturday, we saw the Buffalo Sabres beat the Pittsburgh Penguins in preseason action 4 to 3. Sidney Crosby wasn't playing, but the game had tons of exciting moments, including one point where the Penguins goaltender was out by the blue line, playing a puck, and getting knocked over by a Sabres forward. The atmosphere was amazing, almost playoff in nature. For a preseason game! Buffalo's fans are hungry for hockey, and it was awesome to be a part of a game. I'm hoping to go to the 1/1 outdoor game against the Penguins, but we'll see if I can scrape up the money for that. Next vacation, believe it or not, is back to Buffalo in December for Christmas. Gonna be a long one for me, too, as I play to be there from 12/22 to 1/2. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, August 30, 2007 |
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Yet Another Roundup Posted: 4:54:00 AM 0 comments |
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Not a whole lot going on. Here's a list of things that have captured my interest in the past month: - Cute Trance Girls, or CTG Music as they'd prefer to be known, is back. Apparently some nastiness involving the server's host caused it to go down for a while. - Trax in Space is slowly coming along. I just wish there'd be more development and bug fixes going on than there are. There have been some rather interesting discussions going on over there, with one in particular that's annoying me. Basically, a strung-out reviewer wrote some pretty bad reviews while he was high on something, which started an argument on review quality. Debate in book form ensued, mostly stemming from differing opinions as to what Trax in Space should be. Fun stuff. - If you ignore the Timbaland junk, Open Labs has some pretty cool products, most notably the NeKo. Over $8,000 for the model I want, this all-in-one digital audio station is very impressive. I was going to go for a full studio solution, but I think that this will fit the bill nicely for now. Well, not now. Rather, when I have $8,000 to blow on music. - Kathy and I will be vacationing in Niagara Falls, NY next month for a week. It's supposed to be us celebrating 6 years together, but we're a few months off this year. We were going to time it to coincide with a wedding, but that's not happening now. Oh well, we're still going up, and we're still going to have fun. Maybe I can win big in blackjack again. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, July 11, 2007 |
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Starting Over Posted: 5:43:00 AM 0 comments |
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I get curious. Sometimes too curious. In the past, too much curiosity has cost me ways. Looking back on one event in particular, I probably seemed like a stalking freak or something. People just aren't trustworthy enough to take someone at face value. Which is fine, because there are a lot of people out there that AREN'T like me, and really are stalking freaks. It's when I forget that fact that I tend to take things too far, and end up looking desperate and foolish. You live, you learn. So when I got curious today, I happened to stumble upon a series of webpages by someone I knew over ten years ago. From the limited pages that I have read, she hasn't changed much at all, either. But with things as they are, would it be too awkward to say just hi? How do you say hi to someone you don't know anymore, and haven't spoken to in years? When I was in Buffalo this past April to attend my grandfather's funeral, I ran into someone who was a mutual friend of myself and the aforementioned. She asked me if I kept in touch with anyone. And I haven't, but that made me think a bit. In many ways I miss the friendships I had, but so many of them were superficial. I had had it with people who wouldn't let me be me. When I moved to Houston, it was a chance for me to start over, and six months in, I finally gave myself an opportunity to find myself, and over the past eight years I have really succeeded. I didn't *need* to re-establish any friendships from Buffalo. In fact, the last time I talked to anyone I knew from there who wasn't family or in some way connected to my family was... well, you can read the result of that on a rather prominent page of my main website. (By the way, the links on that page are broken. Get the music off of tns.roncli.com instead. I'll fix them someday.) This friendship, however, was genuine. An artist, like myself. Interested in many of the things I was. We were young, foolish, and certainly not made for each other in a romantic way, but boy did we learn that pretty fast. Time healed, and a solid friendship was born, nothing more than it was ever meant to be. In retrospect, this friendship was a good five years ahead of its time, I can't recall any other friendship like that in my time in Buffalo. I will never forget one of the last times I saw her, if it wasn't THE last time. She left me speechless telling me how our friendship had changed her life for the better. And what has it become? Just another friend from high school that I've decided to part ways with, just so I could start over. How CAN I say hi? Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, June 05, 2007 |
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Don't remind me Posted: 11:42:00 AM 0 comments |
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Yes, I'm well aware what day it is, and how old I am. Ugh! Perhaps the good news is that I don't feel old. I still feel like I am in good health, and I haven't slowed down a bit. I had always been afraid that by this time I'd start losing my edge a bit, but I'm happy to say that's not the case. Plans for the big day? Nothing special, birthdays are really just another day to me. I might go to a restaurant I don't normally go to, but other than that I'll be taking it easy. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, March 05, 2007 |
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Pain Posted: 11:27:00 AM 0 comments |
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The legs are doing much better today, although arguably they were even better Sunday... there is this uneasy feeling in my legs, as if they're about to tense up again. I am shuffling them around constantly, probably causing my co-workers to wonder what the hell I'm doing. Walking was painful Friday and Saturday, especially Saturday. After long periods of not moving them, suddenly getting up and walking around really hurt. I was convinced on Saturday that I'd be walking around strangely for weeks, but now things seem to be a lot better. I *just* got health insurance from the new job the day after this all started happening, so it is good to know that I won't have to suffer from the wallet should I need to see a doctor. But, so far so good. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, March 02, 2007 |
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Leg Cramps Posted: 9:52:00 AM 0 comments |
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When I said I wanted to have more stuff to post, this is NOT what I was looking for. Anyway, after a long night of work on the rack (more on that in a subsequent post), I got to bed finally at about 4:30 for a short night of sleep. Little did I know how short it was going to be, because at 6:30, with no warning, I went from sound asleep to screaming in pain. What happened? My right calf muscle tensed up incredibly tight to the point of severe pain. It was all I could do to massage the calf muscle to lessen the pain to the point where it was at least tolerable. I was sleeping, and have absolutely no idea what caused this, but it hurt like hell. Kathy, who was at work at the time, suggested it was some kind of charlie horse, but I can't be sure. Massage and stretch was all I did until she got home, about 7:15. We start discussing what happened, and then... My left calf must've been jealous, because it started tensing, again to the point of pain! I was just sitting up, still massaging the right leg, doing nothing with the left leg at all. Kathy was shocked to hear me scream as I quickly massaged the leg, again to the point where the pain was tolerable. Absolute craziness. I have no idea what happened. At 8:30, I decide to try and walk, and at first it wasn't happening, but as I tried some more, I realized I had to loosen the muscles up some more. Eventually, it did get to the point where I could walk again, so I chanced a shower, and finally went into work. But don't ask me what caused this, it came out of left field. I just hope it doesn't happen more, else I might need a doctor's visit this weekend. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, March 01, 2007 |
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Two Year Special Posted: 3:25:00 PM 0 comments |
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Well, it's now been 2 years since I posted this blog. In that time, it's gotten 221 posts full of informative information. That's, informative in the "TMI" sense, most likely. Anyway, when I went to post #222 on Tuesday, I noticed that Google updated blogger.com a bit, and added support for something called labels. It's something I've been wanting, a way to categorize my postings. You'll find that label in the bottom right of each post. To celebrate 2 years and this new addition, I've decided to write one post for each category today! This will not only make up for the gaping two month hole (I could've sworn I posted something in January, I'll have to check Successor when it's back up), it will hopefully motivate me to actually start writing stuff - maybe even DOING stuff - so that this blog remains relatively up to date. Here's to the next two years! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Saturday, November 11, 2006 |
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Yet Another Update Posted: 9:24:00 PM 0 comments |
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For a few days at least, I'm going to be able to get back to doing some of my projects. I think the one thing I really want to work on right now is OSMusic, because it's just dead right now. It kills me that such a potentially valuable resource could go so unused. I'm hopefully going to get the projects off the ground to be able to add that for the December update, while fixing some bugs and planning the next community feature. I'm not going to have a good handle on projects as a whole for a while, because I've been away from them for so long. I'll probably spend tomorrow planning everything out and getting all of the ideas ready to implement so that I can finally make some progress on the things I want to do. I've turned in my resignation for Westwood One, as I've got a new job coming up at US Interactive, a company that does online defensive driving courses. They use ASP.Net, and I'm really excited to finally be able to get into .Net professionally. This starts shortly after Thanksgiving. I'm mulling heading to San Francisco next weekend to meet up with Saurin. We've got something going on that I'm pretty excited about, and I think it would be a great opportunity to nail some stuff down development-wise with him. He wants to do some coding, and now that I've got a pretty good idea as to how we're going to set stuff up, we're ready to move forward with actually developing things. We'll be using PHP, so there's going to be a small learning curve. Speaking of PHP, the question of whether PHP v. ASP.Net is still up in the air. Both perform well, but we decided on PHP because of the dollar amount. It doesn't look like it's going to be too bad for me, it's very C-like in syntax, and we have another developer on board who knows a lot about PHP. And I'm happy to say that all that stress from September and October has vanished with the wind. There have been a number of reasons why my stress level has been so high, and most of them were work related. Now that Westwood One's out of the picture, I feel like a new person. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, October 31, 2006 |
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Bed update Posted: 3:21:00 PM 0 comments |
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It's been about two and a half weeks with the bed, and I'm glad to report that it rocks. The back pain has been greatly reduced, and let me tell you that it is a wonderful surface to sleep on after a rough afternoon of tennis. Kathy seems to be liking it as well, so it's turned out to be a great investment so far. My only complaint is that it is less cushy. The bed and the pillow are both firm, so when I want to sink into something, I really don't have anything to sink into, I just plop on the surface, and it barely gives. But once you're down for a few minutes, you forget about it. I've still got the about-once-a-month sleepless night that I get randomly earlier this week, but to me that was because I threw my schedule off, going to bed at 8 AM Sunday morning, something I've been trying to avoid. I guess some things never change. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, October 18, 2006 |
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Round Up Posted: 1:15:00 AM 0 comments |
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[Listening to: Nonpoint - The Truth - XM 48 Squizz] First of all, what the hell's wrong with Blogger.com? I had to log in to post this. I hate doing that. Anyway, since I haven't posted in a while, I figured it would do me well to give a round up of what's been happening.
Finally, a link to drop. My sister is the lead singer of If Paige Wins, an alternative rock band out of Buffalo, NY. The website doesn't have much yet, but you can listen to the band's music. It is really good, she sounds like a cross between Amy Lee, Sarah McLachlan, and Alanis Morissette. Hopefully I won't keep to myself as much as I have, I really don't like neglecting this blog, it's the only place I get to consistantly communicate with a lot of you. So, until next time. Labels: Miscellaneous |
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Tempurpedic Posted: 1:02:00 AM 0 comments |
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Well, Kathy and I decided to ditch the old waterbed for a Tempurpedic bed. I've heard so many good things about it, and we have both been having problems, me my back and Kathy her shoulders, that we decided to go for it. Of course, the only one we can agree on costs $8,000 (after you factor in accessories), so right as I'm getting out of debt, I put myself back in it again. Hmph. But that's besides the point. I've had two nights on it now, and it's really not terrible. I find that I don't move as much. I think the trick of the bed is that it is designed to keep you in one position. Aside from that, I still get pain in my back, but I have yet to decide if that's because the bed is doing nothing or because I'm not used to it yet. I did something to it back in February while I was out of commission with my bad arm, so I wasn't playing tennis or bike riding. I had attributed it to sleeping oddly on the waterbed, because it would only show up after 8 hours in it. That aside, I'm willing to give it a good whirl. So far it hasn't been any worse, and I only have 2 nights of experience on it to judge anything. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, September 29, 2006 |
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Stress Posted: 3:33:00 PM 0 comments |
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I was hoping to be able to say that September has been a really good month for me. I had high expectations for two things that were supposed to go through rather seamlessly, resulting in, well, good things. The reality, however, has been far removed from the expectations. Instead, I find that my stress level at work is at an all-time high. So many blockades have been causing so many problems, and they are not sitting well with one of my co-workers who seems to love trolling over me with threats of weekend work that my boss isn't even interested in us doing. He's already got me working late nights, and this is causing me to fall behind on one of my projects I'm working on for some friends of mine, one that I can't really afford to fall behind on. One of the people who was with this new project has moved on shortly after I started working on it, making me the only person doing development now. If I don't do it, no one can, and I don't see that result being pretty. Already I've had some stressful issues come up on this project, and I've done my best to deflect the stress from that situation by providing them with what I can. The bottom line is that I'm now taking 12 to 16 hours a day to accomplish next to nothing, and because things have seemingly fallen through, not only has September been all but ruined for me, October isn't really looking all that great either. Oh, what I wouldn't give to be where I was just three months ago, working quickly on my own projects while working normal hours at my job. I was getting stuff done back then. Life was a lot simpler then. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, August 24, 2006 |
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I Need a Vacation Posted: 2:38:00 AM 0 comments |
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In June, as you know, Kathy and I went to Melbourne, Australia. Just this past week, we went to Las Vegas, staying at the Luxor hotel for a few days. I had a ton of fun, even won $630 in blackjack. Plus we had a nice, relaxing aqua massage. Boy are those things wonderful. Problem is, I get home, and all hell breaks loose. I have two websites I need to at least start this week, a bunch of stuff to review for Saurin, and to top it all off the boss is in town, giving work for this week a fast and hectic pace. Nothing seems to be going easy this week. On top of this, I don't have enough time to do much of anything, and with all that is going on I've managed to stress myself out in all of two and a half days. Geesh, I need a vacation. Again. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, August 10, 2006 |
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Another Update Posted: 12:05:00 AM 0 comments |
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Not too much going on right now. I've taken on another project that should be picking up really soon which will probably take up a lot of my time. In the meantime, I've stopped work on everything else to work on a game in C++ using SDL and OpenGL... goodness, the horizons I'm expanding with this project... which should be relatively done within the month. I'm having a lot of fun coding this one... it's a simple point and click game, and I've been challenging myself to use things I haven't touched yet, such as operator overloading, templates, vectors, and other simple concepts. At the same time, it's a fun game to play, so most of my time has been actually playing it. Yes, I have a working alpha, so it shouldn't be long before I wrap this one up. I have a trip to Las Vegas coming up. I've studied up on my Blackjack game and will cram some more on the plane so I get my hits, splits, and surrenders down pat. I've had some good trips and I've had some bad trips, so it'll be interesting, if not fun, to see how I do this time around. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, July 31, 2006 |
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Another Lull Posted: 2:11:00 AM 0 comments |
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Well, my decision to stop doing projects has lasted for almost a month now. I have absolutely no energy to get back into it again. I have played with Cent a bit, but for the most part gaming has taken up my free time. I like when I can relax. I'm sure I'll get back to working on the projects again sometime. But for now, I'm doing okay. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, July 07, 2006 |
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My Inno Posted: 2:21:00 AM 0 comments |
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About the only thing that kept me sane during the punishing process of reinstalling all of my software was my birthday present that I've been meaning to talk about for a while: the Pioneer Inno. This cute little device not only picks up and records XM Satellite Radio, it also serves as an MP3 player. It's not only portable, it hooks up quite nicely to my Audigy, and I get a really strong terrestial signal at and around my apartment. This means when I'm weaving in and out of tall buildings, the signal never misses a beat. Another nice feature is its FM modulator, allowing me to listen on my car's radio. With my Inno, I've discovered a world of new music. Currently, I'm hooked on Squizz, which beats the crap out of the rock stations we have in Houston. It's uncensored, and it doesn't just play the top stuff. For example, right now I'm listening to Disturbed's cover of "Land of Confusion". Try to find that on the radio. I also can feed 512 MB of MP3's into it. Needless to say, it's got about a dozen instrumental versions of my music that I sing along to in the car from one place to the other. It may single-handedly get me back into composing again, as I've finished up a Reason version of "Let Me Be the One" just so I could get a decent version of it to sing to. Price? Just about $320 if you find a nice discount shop on the net. Oh, and tack on another $69 for the car kit... when it comes out. I can't wait for it myself, as I am annoyed as hell when I run the battery down at work and can't use it in the car. Also don't forget the XM monthly subscription. Bottom line? Well worth it. I thoroughly enjoy what I'm hearing, and haven't been this satisfied with a product since... well, since Google came out with its latest product. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, June 19, 2006 |
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Melbourne, Australia: Day 1 Posted: 1:57:00 AM 0 comments |
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What a day. Or two. It all started back on Saturday morning when Kathy and I had begun our fixing up the old laptop, Sparky Jr., preparing it for service in Australia with us. Perhaps the fact that it rebooted several times while trying to install Windows was a sign of things to come. We started running late, and in the process forgot our jackets and the US to Australian power convertor for our powered things. Oh well, too late. We walked into the terminal at 6:10pm, 55 minutes shy of our flight time, and paniced when the kiosks didn't recognize that I had reservations to Melbourne, Australia. No worries, the attendant was wonderful in figuring us out. So helpful was she that she discovered an earlier flight that had been delayed that we could get on to! We thought we had a great deal. Instead, we just been had. The flight continued to be delayed, and did not take off until about 4 hours after it was scheduled to, leaving us in Los Angeles at 11pm, rushing around an airport neither of us have ever been to before to get to a 11:40pm flight. We were in terminal 6, and found out we had to go to terminal 4. When we got to terminal 4, we were told it was for Sydney only, so we had to go to terminal 3. Terminal 3 was, in short, hell on earth. It was quite simply a sea of people, and I have never been pushed around by people I've never met before. They were just rude, brash, and unapologetic. The lines were all nightmares, and Qantas was over in the far corner of the terminal, causing us to go through this sea of people. The lines there were not long, but they were slow in serving us. When we got to the desk, we were assured we'd make our flight, and sure enough, after "expedited security" (really, just a shorter line, you still have to do the routine, and getting through it took about 15 minutes), we got to the gate at midnight, just in time to hear our row being called. Surprisingly, the 15 hour flight was not only event free, but the most pleasant part of the journey so far. Two nice meals, great service, and lots of sleep for me. Kathy and I finally make it to Melbourne, make it through customs in uneventful fashion, and get to the baggage claim, where we waited. ...and waited... ...and waited... Finally the baggage collection area shut off, and we were told nothing else was coming. Hmph. We filed a claim, and was told one of the bags never left Houston!!! So here we were, in the middle of a city we're unfamiliar with, with only a laptop, IDs and passports, and some check cards. No clothing, no extra necesseties, nothing. We left the airport via shuttle for the hotel, where we were told our early checkin was for 11:30. It was 10:30. So we went downstairs, bought some jackets, and had lunch. I've never had chicken parmesian (don't ask me how to spell that) in a sandwich before, it was actually quite nice. Kathy had some lasagna she was impartial to, but otherwise a good meal to keep us going. We wanted to go into downtown to hit the Qantas travel center, so we decided to take the tram. Bad idea. First of all, I had no idea that it cost so much to get onto the tram, it was $2.30. Secondly, I had $4.30. Oops. We got off at the next stop, faces red in embarassment. Then we made it down, via foot, the 3 blocks to the Qantas travel center, and found out that we could get $100 of free Australian cash per bag lost. Cool, $200 quick cash to pick us up new clothes! We hit a target another 3 blocks away, and then walked all the way back to the hotel where Kathy crashed. I was about to, but then I got on here to document our first day. Now I'm going out to meet with Thorn of TTR fame for some grub. Our bags should arrive tomorrow, though we'll be hitting Surfers Paradise to meet up with some friends of ours and spend the day there. I'll likely report again after that. Until then, g'day mate! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, June 06, 2006 |
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Oops Posted: 7:03:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: slammy - Reflections Part V 2006 remix (6:30) I just now noticed that I haven't been showing the song I'm playing... somehow my plugin got uninstalled. Oh well, it's back. Enjoy what I'm listening to again! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, May 24, 2006 |
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A Day Off... Kind of Posted: 10:33:00 PM 0 comments |
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I decided to take a bit of a day off in my catch up, doing only what was needed to complete today's tasks. Both of them involved working on the upcoming roncli Productions website, and both were completed sooner than expected. My body aches from tennis, although after only 3 times out I'm feeling a bit more athletic. Imagine. Me. Athletic. Heh. It almost turned out to be a day off at work. A power problem caused there to be no power at work when I arrived, so our computers and everything were off. We were contemplating what time to leave when the power came back on for good at about 10:30. Oh well. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, May 16, 2006 |
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Bad start Posted: 12:52:00 AM 0 comments |
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So much for getting a good start to my 2-a-day projects. I got wrapped up in silly stuff I was doing and never got around to managing my projects for the rest of the week. Oh well, I'll work on it tomorrow I suppose. Hopefully I can get something started. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, May 15, 2006 |
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This blog Posted: 1:32:00 AM 0 comments |
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So I've been terrible updating this blog so far this year. I do hope to change that, however. I've decided to get organized and work on at least two projects a day, reporting on what I've done here so that at least I can show myself some progress, if not the people who follow this blog. Things will start tomorrow, so expect to see regular stuff up here soon! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Saturday, March 18, 2006 |
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Another Blackberry Posted: 12:17:00 AM 0 comments |
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I have either fallen in love, or have gone psychotic. Recently, I decided to purchase a Blackberry 8700c. I couldn't port over my number without paying big bucks (long story behind that, but I'm not too upset over it), so it's on a new home phone number. But the things I can do with it are absolutely wonderful. I have instant and on-the-go access to full email, web browsing, today's weather, and all sorts of other things. But why does this make me psychotic? I have a Blackberry 6230 that work gave me, so now I have two. Kathy calls me the "fastest geek in Texas" the way I have them holstered in both of my pockets when we go out. It is quite amusing when you think about it, but the deal I got and the service Blackberry provides was just too good for me to pass up. What's most amusing is when one starts to vibrate, I have no clue which one is which. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, February 22, 2006 |
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Happy Anniversary Posted: 2:37:00 AM 0 comments |
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Now playing: Korn - Twisted Transistor (2:58) It was one year ago this past Saturday I set up this blog. In that time, I managed to post 160 times, a little under 2 per day. It is interesting to walk through it and see where my interests wane and wax over time. Here's to more years of pointless posts such as these! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, January 03, 2006 |
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Happy New Year Posted: 7:31:00 PM 0 comments |
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Well, another year has past, and 2006 promises to be... well, I'm not sure what it promises to be yet, but we'll find out as things move along. I actually rode my bike to work today for the first time since the accident. I'm still catching my breath, it's hard to ride a mile when you've done literally nothing in the past several months. But that will ease over time. The good news is, that means I'm back to 100% again, hopefully I won't do anything to kill that. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, November 04, 2005 |
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Another Late Night Posted: 3:16:00 AM 0 comments |
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Seems sleep avoids me like the plague. Thank goodness I have a job that'll put up with me going in late, or even working from home for a bit. It's been three months, and I am really enjoying the work and the people I work with. The paperwork's a pain to keep up with, though... hopefully we can figure out how to make that go away. I decided to take a look back over the last year or so and see what I've accomplished. Well, a whole lot of nothing. Musically, only one song was completed, "Everytime", that was actually "completed" back in October of 2004, but I just didn't have the will to sit down and put it together. Once I finally did, it came out okay. I think I could've done better, though, but I still haven't learned enough about post production to do it. But that's about it. I've started so many songs AGAIN that I can't keep track of them all. New music is in my head that I can't get out because I just don't have the will to open up Reason or ModPlug and write it. The only stuff I end up doing sounds like... well, "Everytime". I have planned for a while to pretty much destroy roncli.com and make it better. However, I haven't had a good spark of imagination as far as what to actually fill the void with. OSMusic.Net has all but died, despite my occasional bursts of work to try and get something going again. The previous ASP.Net project I mentioned may help with this, but then again, that all depends on whether or not a certain someone's decided to lose concentration and wander off to another idea. (I know you're listening Saurin!) My work with Google Desktop has been fairly extensive lately, and I've mostly figured out how to get it to work in VB.Net. Despite the minor problem I had with it the other night that forced me to reinstall the program, it's been a great addition to my desktop, worthy of the space it takes up. And to a desktop space junkie who got himself a 22" monitor just so he could see it all, that's saying something. It'll be a while, though, before I'm able to put anything together, as it's either work with an incomplete VB.Net API that I haven't quite figured out yet, slowly learn C#, or use scripting which doesn't support everything I'd like to use. Cent has been my oddball project. I've learned a great deal about C++ and can actually do stuff without having to look it up anymore. I've also got a handy dandy C++ book that I still need to finish up to help me along, should I need it. The program itself is working out good. I get stuck sometimes, but once I past those points the application works oh so wonderful. I haven't gotten into any 3D Crystal Space programming yet, but I understand the basic concepts and have read a lot about creating content for it. It shouldn't be a stretch to see this project through to completion, it's just going to take a hell of a lot of time to do. Other things grab my attention every now and again, but usually not for too long. I haven't really been able to concentrate on any one thing, so it's good in a way to have so many projects to keep me going from day to day. Eventually, something will be completed, I hope, and I'll have something to show for all this time I've been seemingly accomplishing nothing. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, October 25, 2005 |
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Elbow Update Posted: 12:06:00 AM 0 comments |
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The NLCS and the World Series has had most of my free time's attention lately. It's helped my arm heal, but something odd's happened. Instead of my elbow being the cause of great pain, the pain has moved further down my arm and now causes bad movements of the wrist or lifting fairly light loads to result in throbbing pain. Not sure why my forearm's getting the brunt of it now. My elbow's not even 100% yet, I still can't get it to straighten out, maybe 80% of the way or so. I may have to have someone take another look at this soon if it doesn't start to clear up. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, October 13, 2005 |
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Dropping the Ball... or the Box Posted: 1:21:00 PM 0 comments |
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So I was all set to receive my new 22" monitor yesterday that I won on an eBay auction. I went to track it online, and noticed its status: "Exception". Uh oh. Turns out UPS dropped the box. It's now, in its damaged state, on its way back to Phoenix. I'll be getting my money back, thankfully, but man oh man... I was going to get a $600 monitor for just over $130. The deal was too good to be true. Actually, the deal was true, just UPS messed it up. Back to searching again... Labels: Miscellaneous |
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Back to Two Hands - For Now Posted: 12:34:00 AM 0 comments |
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My elbow is better today than yesterday. I can put it comfortably into a typing position with little soreness. I can't maintain it for terribly long, however, only lasting a couple hours before I have to call it quits. The medication seems to be helping with the swelling, not that I've noticed any. Hopefully just a few more days, maybe a bit into next week, and I'll be close to normal again. Until then, the pain has been tolerable. But man, doing things left handed has turned me into a clumsy fool. I can't do ANYTHING left handed without doing it wrong. It was funny when I couldn't eat my soup at Chic-Fil-A without spilling half of it on my shirt. It got old when I couldn't make my iced tea, or cook my rice without getting something everywhere. Most of the pain right now seems to be just soreness. I try to stretch it a little bit every so often so that my arm actually has some movement and so my shoulder doesn't cramp up, but it's been a challenge all day. Sleeping was okay, but I slept very lightly. Hopefully tonight will be a little better. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, October 12, 2005 |
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Ow Posted: 8:40:00 AM 0 comments |
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So I took the bike out for a spin to work yesterday. Nearly fell off it at a narrow part, but managed to stay up by thrashing my right arm against a street post, the big round metal thing found here in the Galleria area. Turns out that wasn't my best option. I don't know what I did, but I hurt something pretty badly in my elbow in the process. X-rays say it's not broken, but man it hurts. I timed myself typing, and am down to 38 WPM from my normal 108. Oh well, maybe my error rate will drop, too. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, September 26, 2005 |
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You've got to be kidding me... Posted: 2:47:00 AM 0 comments |
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While I was gone... 170 emails. Unbe-frickin-lievable. I'll be here for a while... Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, September 19, 2005 |
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Weekend Update Posted: 1:58:00 AM 0 comments |
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Not too much going on lately, just been enjoying work and playing games and stuff at home. I did manage to find time to add nearly 3,000 lines of repetative code to Cent, a part of the program I hadn't been looking forward to writing. The good news is that I have most of the logic wrapped up in my head, whereas before I hadn't a clue how to start. This means that it is likely I will be picking up the programming again, and may have more to report soon, and maybe even some new screenshots. Don't get too excited, I'm not ready to start with the 3D portion of the game yet. My goal is to get a solid foundation in the settings screen so that I can concentrate solely on the 3D portion of the game. Of course, this application may be entirely unnecessary, it looks like Core Decision is starting to kick into high gear. Their goal is for October of 2006... given the amount of time I've worked on Cent, my offering may come much later. They're also quite a bit ahead of me in terms of development, which is no surprise. The advantage I have is that Cent is based off of Crystal Space, so I don't have to worry about coding the engine, I just have to make it work. Having played around with it plenty, I have no doubt I can do that much. In other news... well, I really can't give away what I'm doing next weekend just yet. With my luck, I'd post it, and then the subject of next weekend's events logs on to read the blog for the first time and... well, that's about all I have to say about that. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Wednesday, July 27, 2005 |
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Vision Posted: 4:00:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: Gopher - 3: Meeting - The Gathering of Arms (6:39) Heh... this is a first. I woke up from a short nap, and have been reading online and coresponding with people for a good hour and a half. My eyes glazed over for a moment as they often do when I'm tired... I went to refocus, and began to think how incredibly clear my glasses were! They were scrubbed today, so there was good reason to think this. Unfortunately, the bad reason to think this was the fact that they were sitting, not on my nose, but on the coffee table by where I had napped. I got glasses several months ago to correct the difference in vision between my left (20/20) and right (20/15) eyes which had been bothering me for some time. I've liked them so much, I wear them almost all the time, and the difference is remarkable. I've since noticed that I usually strain slightly at my ridiculous 2048x1536 resolution when I'm not wearing them, though this isn't the case today. In any case, I'll have the glasses back on for sure tonight when I head out with a friend of mine who I haven't seen in a couple years. I'm not even sure he's aware I have them yet, so the reaction should be rather amusing. Labels: Miscellaneous |
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Interview Nerves Posted: 3:36:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: Gopher - 3: Meeting - The Gathering of Arms (6:39) I love interviews. At the same time, I hate them. The plus side is the exploring of a new potential opportunity, meeting new people, getting a glimpse at how other places do things. This is, of course, aside from the fact I become a ball of nerves when I know that the reason I am at one in the first place is to compete with one or more people based on a comparison of our capabilities in my field of choice. Much is at stake, financial stability being at the top of the list, and I tend to go into them thinking, at least on a subconscious level, "Don't screw up!" This is fine, though, as that is part of the process. But what I absolutely hate is the feeling I have after them! Not immediately after them, though. I tend to get on a rather healthy post-interview high in the minutes after. But then it sinks in - the waiting has begun. Ugh. The feeling deep down within of not knowing what's going to happen can be surprisingly strong. Wish me luck. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Sunday, June 05, 2005 |
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I'm older! Posted: 6:37:00 AM 0 comments |
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Ack. My 28th birthday has snuck up on me. Another year down, not too much accomplished other than the launch of OSMusic. Hopefully I'll get some more motivation to do stuff this year. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, May 20, 2005 |
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$15 For an Adapter? Posted: 3:47:00 PM 0 comments |
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You gotta be kidding me. I wanted to setup Kathy's old 10mbps hub so that I could put the new Linux box on the network without having to hijack an IP address from my last apartment. Problem is, I couldn't find the adapter for it. Went to Radio Shack, thinking why not just buy one, they're cheap! Right. The cheapest was $12, and for the voltage I wanted, it was $15. Screw that. I headed down to Micro Center and got a shiny new 5 port 10/100 switch for $20. Now my network is more stable and responsive, and I don't have to suffer from anything less than 100mbps. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, May 03, 2005 |
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A Day at the Beach Posted: 1:05:00 AM 2 comments |
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I spent a good portion of the day on Sunday at the beach going to a friend's graduation party. Was quite the blast, I got a nice sunburn and I'm sore from head to toe! Nothing like some good fun in the sun. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Saturday, April 30, 2005 |
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Poker Night Posted: 4:21:00 AM 0 comments |
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Did much better at poker this time around, coming out ahead roughly $13. Though the same guy that beat me with the straight flush last time around ended up ahead after milking $25 out of one guy in a game of guts. Some people have all the luck! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Sunday, April 24, 2005 |
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Dudley's Dungeon Posted: 4:11:00 AM 0 comments |
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There is a NetHack comic out there, Dudley's Dungeon, that chronicles... well, silly NetHack related stuff. I submitted 3 comics (I think they're funny anyway!), hopefully they'll be approved soon. Check it out if you're into NetHack at all. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Saturday, April 23, 2005 |
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w.blogger Bug Update Posted: 2:03:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: roncli, The Nightstalker - Everytime (Preview) (7:41) The w.bloggar site is back online, so I went to check up on the bug about editing old posts. Sure enough, it is a known issue. Apparantly, there is some sort of communication failure between blogger.com and the w.bloggar software. Oh well, I guess this just means that I will have to be more careful when I post for a while until this gets fixed. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, April 21, 2005 |
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Laziness Posted: 5:53:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: DotSPF - Narcussis (5:39) Not much going on right now. Kinda mentally preparing myself for what might be a hard working job, should things go well. Been just gaming and occasionally touching up some music pieces. More to come. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, March 31, 2005 |
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Damn Hackers Posted: 5:51:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: Atomship - Pencil Fight (3:38) I've been using w.bloggar as my method to post since I started this thing... It's very useful and puts a little "b" in the systray, which I leave visible all the time as a reminder for me to not ignore my blog. It's worked rather well so far, until I've had to edit a post. Apparantly, w.bloggar is getting some sort of "invalid property value" whenever I try to load up an old post. It loads the text fine, but when I go to update the post, it actually creates a NEW post. No problem, I figure, I'll just go to the website, wbloggar.com, check for a new version, or report a bug. Well, I guess they have an invalid property value thing going on too, no site comes up. A quick run at the source reveals the reason. <!--r00t by Team g0dmode, greets to BasS-Z & Para Sh4rk!--> PWNED!!!!!1111one11!!1onetwo11six11shiftone!!!111½½¼¼¼ Bastard hackers. Labels: Miscellaneous |
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Web Junkie Posted: 5:16:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: Atomship - Pencil Fight (3:38) Here it is about 5:15 in the afternoon. I've been up since about 8 in the morning, mostly trying to figure out the NWS XML web service. I eventually got it (more on that in my next post) thanks to a website that had downloadable code available that consumes the service. So, I wanted to make a post here in my blog about it. I open up Crazy Browser, got to the history, and click on "today". How many freaking websites did I visit today?! The list is absolutely ENORMOUS, showing over 100 sites. Am I a junkie or what? Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Sunday, March 20, 2005 |
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Poker Posted: 4:59:00 AM 0 comments |
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Texas Hold'em, all in, with a pair of 5's in the hole, and a 5 and two 8's showing... losing to a straight flush... ugh! It's tough losing with a full house, but still a heck of a lot of fun. I'll definitely have to go poker playing again in the near future. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Tuesday, March 15, 2005 |
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Troupe Posted: 8:14:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: roncli, The Nightstalker - Cent Credits (2:40) Met up with Troupe today, who's in town with his family. Didn't do much more than talk shop about Reason/ModPlug/Renoise/Outpost/CTG/TiS, but it was still fun. I'm hoping we can get together and whip out some totally kickass tune at some point before he leaves, he's a very talented musician, worth checking out! Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Thursday, February 24, 2005 |
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San Antonio wrapup Posted: 5:16:00 AM 0 comments |
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Got to see my brother's new Dave Matthews Tribute Band play in San Antonio last night. They are currently on tour, swinging the western states next month. The only venue I'm sure of is the House of Blues in Hollywood, although I know they are playing in Las Vegas, San Francisco, and Seattle as well. It was an interesting experience. I personally thought the in house sound guy did a poor job, allowing for - and not correcting - horrible feedback in the midranges. The woodwind player also left a lot to be desired, as his idea of improvisation was weak (do basic stuff, only really really really fast!), and the non-improv stuff was done pretty poorly. But the fiddler rocked, even if he accidentally unplugged himself in the middle of a solo twice. I couldn't get over how much he got into his solos, and he complimented the band well. The bassist and drummer sounded great as well. And Ryan, oh my how he has matured as a musician. His guitar playing - which was non-existant up until a few years ago - is amazing, well beyond what I have learned. And - perhaps the clincher in a tribute band - he sounds almost exactly like Dave Matthews. These guys are definitely a treat, especially if you enjoy Dave Matthews stuff. The audience was happily jamming to every song played, despite the technical problems. If they're coming to an area near you and you like Dave Matthews stuff, go see em. Here's a tip though. If some weird guy with glasses gets up on stage before the band starts to play, and he's wearing a guitar strap around his waist, leave for about an hour or so. Your ears will thank you. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Monday, February 21, 2005 |
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Wrong Number Posted: 6:30:00 PM 0 comments |
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Ugh.. just checked my voice mail, people apparantly are calling me during the day asking about a travel trailer that is for sale in a classified ad somewhere. The person's number is one digit off from mine, and all sorts of Texan hicks are dialing the wrong number trying to find out more about this damn trailer. Labels: Miscellaneous |
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The Beauty of BitTorrent Posted: 3:22:00 AM 0 comments |
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Ah yes, modern technology is wonderful. Not only am I helping myself to the complete set of MAME 0.92 ROMS, I am checking out EA Sports latest offering, Nascar SimRacing. No doubt that both of these will entertain my attention for days to come. BitTorrent is so much easier than dropping in an IRC channel to get what you want, or wading through dozens of sites and hundreds of porn ads before finding what you want. The less intrusive something is, the more I like it. Plus, this way I can give something back and put this T3's upstream to some good use so I'm not just another bandwidth hog. Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Sunday, February 20, 2005 |
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SQL Server v Winamp Posted: 3:38:00 AM 0 comments |
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Now playing: RedHeat (m0d) - Discovery (11:25) So I'm sitting here working on my log analyzer web app, and Kathy's sitting on her computer listening to Winamp and playing AdventureQuest. The music plays along fine... until I decide to create an index on my 5 million row table. See, my SQL server is on the same machine as all the MP3s. Since this machine doesn't have any spectacular hardware in it - just an SIDE hard drive - SQL Server and Winamp fight for drive time. The result is usually that SQL Server wins out, causing Winamp to choke. This happening once in a while isn't bad... but I've been hitting my database with new indexes all night trying to reduce my query times from 1 minute to under 1 second. The result, lots of unnecessary interruptions. If we didn't use the MP3s on more than one machine - and an available machine other than the server had enough hard drive space - this could be avoidable. Until then, though, I guess we're stuck just skip skip skipping away... Labels: Miscellaneous |
| Friday, February 18, 2005 |
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roncli.com blog Posted: 11:56:00 PM 0 comments |
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Now playing: David Filskov - Boulder Trash (Dash) rearr. (1:27) Look! It's a new blog! Not terribly exciting, I know, but I figure this is the best way to both get information on my various projects out there, and to let people know that I'm not dead. In any case, I'm not going to be giving this much of a start, I'm just going to pick it up and post as I go. Enjoy! Labels: Miscellaneous |