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December 5th, 2009

02:04 pm Still eating leftovers from Thanksgiving at my parents' house and Marina's parents' house. Marina managed to recreate her dad's sausage dressing to take to my parents' dinner. Thanksgiving has always been one of those holidays where I could manage to eat more than I usually do for a meal, it's like my body knows to create an extra stomach for all the delicious food. Today we started eating the soup my mom made from the turkey bones and scraps. I'm learning how to use the Core Data API for Mac OS X. I'd forgotten just how easy it is to start assembling a polished looking program with what Apple provides by default in the XCode environment. Marina wanted a way to track customers and inventory for the piercing shop she works at, which eventually led to me promising to write her a program to do that for her. Doing this project for her gives me a project to learn new stuff and forces me to actually finish the project, instead of getting bored or frustrated and wandering off to something else. I've decided that I'm going to try to get as much of my shopping done this weekend and if possible online. I like X-mas and I like giving gifts, but I dislike the actual gift hunting process or possibly just the people I have to deal with while shopping. I am definitely not a fan how stores seem to think that X-mas shopping needs to start as soon as possible, especially when it stomps all over my favorite holiday, Halloween. Someone needs to force the stores to start advertising for holidays only when it's 30 days or less before the actual holiday. Sorry old cranky man rant over. :P Nice thing about working for a university, I get the week between X-mas and New Years Day off and paid for it! Plus I'm going to take off the 23rd and 24th, since the 23rd is my birthday. Hopefully I'll have the program for Marina done before my week off, because then I can spend my time painting my Warmachine miniatures (I have a backlog of them to paint) and playing a lot of video games. Couple of previous blogs I posted on SG and forgot to post here too: Sept. 21, 2009 In the last three months: Marina and I moved into a new place with a bunch of our friends, including Adam. So far the house has been awesome and everyone seems to be getting along, good thing with five of us living here. The house has plenty of space, which means I finally have a place to start working on building my R2. Got screwed out of a bunch of money by my previous landlords, Student Housing Solutions. Don't ever rent from them, their property managers will find a way to get the maximum amount money from you without making it worth while to hire a lawyer. Gotta remember to file a complaint against them with the better business bureau. Went to DragonCon and had a blast, as usual. We dressed up in steampunk costumes this year and got some good ideas on how to expand on the costume for next year. Talked with some of the other R2builders from the Yahoo group and Astromech.net. They invited me to help out with the robot table next year if I feel like bringing my R2 up there (depending on it's state of completion). Looking forward to our annual Halloween party here at the house. Got a couple ideas for things to do around inside and gonna setup a graveyard out in the front yard. And I want to play around with making some sort of interactive app to run on the tv during the party, something like using it like mirror (with the help of a webcam) and adding ghosts to the room. July 4, 2009 The one downside to my job seems to be rearing it's ugly head this weekend. It's my turn to be on-call, so when various servers throw tantrums the beeper goes off and wakes me up. It doesn't bug me so much when there's a straight forward problem and either I fix it or I call someone else and they fix it; but this weekend it seems that some of the databases want to fill up all their disk space. The first time it happened Thursday night (or Friday morning depending on how you want to look at it), it was simple call the database admins (I'm an operating system admin) and they went in and adjusted a few things and moved some stuff around and I went to sleep after waiting up for an hour until 3am. Happens again with the same databases as Thursday night except this time the db admin doesn't know why the databases are chewing up space but they seemed to be slowly fixing themselves, so crisis adverted...I am now fully in the belief that I will be woken up by the beeper later once I've fallen asleep. Some days I just want to take a big magnet to certain servers. Current Mood: happy

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April 14th, 2009

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January 17th, 2009

05:22 pm Still waiting on my R2-D2 dome. It's a good thing I am reasonably patient and that I knew going in it takes a while to for aluminum parts to be made. Also the guy making the domes has been doing it for a few years and is well known and trusted in the R2builders groups. Trying to get back in the swing of things at work after the winter break. Actually managed to accomplish a number items on my to do list this week for work. Good thing I was starting to feel a bit depressed that I shouldn't be at this job. I started learning to program the iPhone before the break, sadly I didn't make a lot of progress during the break on that (though I did make progress in a number of video games :P). Hopefully I'll be able to shortly make some nifty apps and maybe make some cash on the side. The search for a house continues, I'm pretty much firmly set on renting a house for this year. I don't have enough in my savings for both a down payment and any possible incidental problems that always seem to crop up when buying a house. Also, while I'm fairly certain my job is secure for another year, I don't know what next year is going to be like at my job since they are expecting another cutback to the university's budget next year, and it might be a good idea to have savings buffer just in case. Current Mood: good

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December 18th, 2008

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October 16th, 2008

10:19 am While I'm still waiting to electronics package I ordered for building my R2, I've added myself to a list for the next run of the 300mm Dome. So I will finally have a part that looks like something recognizable as R2. Hopefully once the electronics come in and a few other parts ordered, I will start assembling my R2 dome and all the bits that make it up. And I'll start working on torso. I'm going to have be careful with the dome, it's going to run about me $450 + shipping. Damn being a droidbuilder is expensive, though I guess I could go cheap and use a plastic dome. I finally uploaded my dragoncon pics, about a week or two ago, and weeded out some of the worse shots. We rented Mulberry Street last week and it sucked in my opinion. Someone classified this in the horror/zombie genre and while I'm not sure what it is (maybe monster infection/curse) it is not a zombie movie. People get bit by rats and become rat-man creatures. I'd say it's more like a werewolf movie than a zombie flick. You have been warned. ( Mac Fanboy Rant ) I've been considering getting my ears pierced and gauged up to 2g. So anyone got any thoughts or comments? Current Mood: chipper

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September 8th, 2008

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July 9th, 2008

11:07 am - hodge podge update Boring work story I am a lucky bastard. Last week I was swapping out a KVM switch (for those who don't work as system admins it let's us hook more than one computer up to one monitor, keyboard, and mouse) during which I noticed that all the indicator lights had gone off of the current computer I was working on. Servers have two power plugs so that if one of them gets unplugged or fails, the server doesn't loose power. Turns out that the person who had installed this server hadn't left enough slack for the power cables so that if anyone was messing around in the server racks could easily accidently kill power to this server. Fortunately for me this server wasn't in production yet so while it was on, nothing important was running on it. So the admin of that particular server and I made sure there was more slack, and it was all good. Adorable niece story I have a couple of friends that I've know for a long time, I knew them both individually before they married one another. They had a daughter about 3 years ago (and another due within the next week) and they made me an uncle to her. Since I work with the mother I see my niece quite often, she sometimes comes into work and is often at lunch. Apparently she seems to think that every family has one me, to the point that when rattling off her family on her fingers I'm included when all other blood relatives are left off (though if you can get her counting on the other hand she will expand the list of her family). Also I hear she gets quite cross if anyone sits in the passenger seat of her mom's car, that is my seat according to her. Building R2-D2 progress update I've gotten another piece of R2 in, funny nearly all the most important parts of R2 are purely cosmetic and yet if you miss one small bit he just doesn't look right. So I've got what are called coin slots, cuz frankly that's what they look like. If you look at R2 you will see a line of coin slots running down the left side of him (when facing him). I've been waiting on the first of my electronics to come in for his dome (something else I need to get) to come in. Normally the dome electronics mostly just are blinking lights that don't do anything, but the set I've ordered have all sorts of additional features that can be programmed and controlled with minimal effort. Oh also a tie in to the afore mentioned niece, she was hanging out my apartment with Marina and found my Interactive R2. The last time she met R2 she was kinda scared of him when he moved around, but this time she was squealing and dancing around him especially when he went into his dance routine. Shortly after that she noticed one of my robotics magazines had an R2 on the cover. Then Marina told her that R2 was on tv and promptly started showing her Star Wars (she only showed her the original trilogy). I hear she bugged her mom and dad about getting an R2 when she got home. Muahahaha I'm such a bad influence. Samsung has this cool dino optical illusion statue, it's made to look like it's turning it's head to watch you. Current Mood: chipper Tags: job, niece, r2

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June 19th, 2008

05:18 pm My new Mac Pro tower came in about a week or two back and it's so awesome to be able to play games on it with all the settings dialed up. I ordered it with a copy of Mac OS X Server, I'm debating on using it as a part time web server (depends on how well my old Mac mini handles running 10.5 server). Marina was giving me a hard time about how excited I was playing with the server options and opening up the tower to add some harddrives. What can I say I'm a geek. Last Friday my car got towed from my own apartment complex by the towing company they employ. Granted I had parked my car in un-spot, when I first moved into my place 7 years ago it was parking spot but then the lot was resurfaced and they didn't repaint the lines for those spaces. Turns out that the people who paint the lines are the towing company themselves, which strikes me odd that they get to choose how many parking spots we have. Funny thing is I've parked in that same spot hundreds of times over the years and never was towed. I had even seen their tow truck come through our lot on several occasions slowing down when they got to that area looking at all the cars and not tow cars from that spot. So this towing company is either completely incompetent or shady about when they decide to apply their rules. It's too late for me this year to find another place to live and arrange to move there before I go out of town, but next year I'm either buying a house or I will rent one if I don't save up the amount I want to put for a down payment. The weekend before last we stayed at St. George Island at the state park, so we went to the beach which was nice once I found some shade and the breeze kicked up. I don't think I ever want to go camping in the summer in Florida again, I woke up at like 7:30-8am dripping sweat. I don't know how I managed to camp all those years during the summer while in Boy Scouts. Started reading World War Z, which is a book about the zombie apocalypse told from the perspective of the survivors. So far it is an awesome read. Also watched Diary of the Dead, which I enjoyed though there were a few parts that I would nit pick about. Samuel was bad ass though, possible best Omish character in a movie ever. I've been on quite a zombie kick recently I want to pick up the Walking Dead series trades. From the parts of the series I've read so far it looks to be good. Current Mood: good

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May 6th, 2008

10:13 am - first steps I ordered my first parts for building an R2-D2 last week, I'm now giddily waiting for the shipment notice. *sigh* This could be a long wait. For those curious about which parts I ordered look behind the spoiler, they're not big parts but it will go nicely with the next parts I plan to buy (also behind the cut). ( Read more... ) Been playing quite a bit of WoW and GTA IV this week. I've never played the previous GTAs, except for an hour or two at friends houses under duress (kinda taints the experience). Went to Tallahassee Roller Girls derby on Saturday, it was a blast as usual though it was more brutal this time for some reason. Girls were getting knocked out of the ring constantly at each end of the track. The derby didn't start out rough but quickly escalated, one of the opposing team members fractured two fingers. Definitely seemed like there was some rivalry going on between the teams that the rest of us didn't know about. Our team kicked their ass though, something like 119 to 41. EDIT: Forgot to include this video earlier, it's a music video for Schweine that plays on a radio station in GTA IV. Current Mood: chipper Tags: r2 robot droid rollerderby

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April 10th, 2008

04:49 pm - weekend mad scientist This weekend has turned out to be less eventful as last weekend, but that's alright with me I could use the downtime. Last weekend though was a pretty good time all around. Went to the local roller derby game, our home team won with a large lead on points. Later that night we went out to take part in a zombie walk across the campus I work at, it was pretty fun to be dressed up. There about 50 people at the walk with us, most of them were pretty cool. Couple of people had really good costumes and didn't break character until after the walk was done. There was one girl who was dressed in only bra, panties, and not much else, while she looked pretty hot she had a terrible personality (seemed to be very full of herself, she would run ahead of the zombie horde and then pose as everyone walked by and then repeat). ( Zombie photos ) I've started my journey on the downward spiral towards being a mad scientist. I have joined the R2 Builders group, yes that's right there are a group of people out there devoted to making R2-D2 style robots. Granted these R2's are remote controlled and not autonomous but hey ya gotta start somewhere. I'm practically giddy at the idea of having my own R2 around my place. I've downloaded a bunch of the blueprints and started researching the parts needed for R2 and started general robotics research. Sadly even with the group's help I probably won't have a working R2 for a year at least (if I'm not lazy at all) or couple years if I let other facets of life get in the way. Another wrinkle is I don't have much in the way of power tools or a garage, so I'll either need to start shopping for a house or spend more time at my parents bumming my dad's stuff. Current Mood: good Tags: mad scientist, weekend, zombie

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March 18th, 2008

04:21 pm - Renaissance Fest I signed up for the iPhone SDK, I've still got to work through all of the dev info. I'm kinda pissed that Apple won't let me upload any apps to my iPhone directly without paying $99. Went to the Renaissance Fest down in Tampa on Saturday with Marina and our friend, KC. Got to watch a human battle chess match, split a huge turkey leg, and saw plenty of girls in corsets. I got myself this great flask, now I can start becoming an alcoholic. Also learned that it is a good thing that there aren't Teavana or Apple stores in Tallahassee, given how much Marina and I spent. Saw a great Rocky Horror Picture show down at a small theater near the beach. And now some great random links from the week: Star Wars concept products that never made it Great article about this Japanese man who still makes pen nibs 5 works of art that could kill you And a Dr. Tran video I hadn't seen yet Current Mood: good

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May 16th, 2007

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May 9th, 2007

02:26 pm - update My sister has officially graduated from college, managed to just make out a semester before she did. My iPod's hard drive died, but then magically started working again once I opened the iPod up (I think it's cuz it was threatened with physical violence). The router for the apartment appears to have blown a capacitor or something, as it is constantly buzzing, very hot, data seems to be flowing very slowly, and three of it's ports are dead. I should be receiving a couple of payments from the dude that slashed my tires last year very soon (once I get my address straightened out with his parole officer). I'm going to London in June to meet a SG I've been talking to for a while now. Things are going well with Marina. And my new job has just been great, such an improvement over the old job at the help desk. Current Mood: happy Tags: general life

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December 19th, 2006

03:47 pm - Graduated! I've finally got my BS degree in Computer Science, it took 10 years but on the other hand I have no debt and still have an ok job. Granted I'm going to start looking for a new job. So I'm reading up on PHP and Perl right now and I'll start polishing my resume over the winter break. I'm hoping to have enough money later during the late spring to go visit a bunch of friends spread out in the US for about three weeks. Current Mood: happy Tags: school graduation

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October 18th, 2006

05:06 pm - NERF awesomeness Found out that NERF has released a sniper rifle that shoots 35ft and comes with 2 quick reload cartridges that carry 12 shots apiece. Muahahahaha NERF doesn't know the kind of terror it has unleased on my office. It's called the NERF Longshot and sniper rifle comes apart to become 2 guns but really who's gonna use it like that. Current Mood: happy Tags: nerf sniper

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August 31st, 2006

05:15 pm - randomness As I was approaching the ROTC building on campus the Invader Zim armada theme music kicked in on my iPod, I thought it was appropriate. Whoo! Going to Dragon Con tomorrow morning so glad to get away for four days to live in a purely hyperreality. Current Mood: happy

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August 23rd, 2006

06:50 pm - "It's elusive" I was helping an user on the phone today with Thunderbird, she'd switched from Eudora (so I'm willing just to do about anything to keep from going back to that bug riddled program). While trying to walk her through adding a card to her contacts, it turns out she is having some trouble clicking on the button for creating a new card, as she described it "It's elusive". What she was trying to click was little yellow info box that hover just next to the mouse pointer and when she tried go click that it would move away and eventually disappear when stopped being over the add button. I couldn't be mad at for really trying, if anything I was trying not laugh at the idea of seeing her trying to chase it down. I just love her describing that, "It's elusive", yeah that's gonna be sticking with me for a bit. Whee it's wednesday, only 2 more days til The Return of the Bing! (though only briefly) Current Mood: good Tags: work

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July 5th, 2006

11:56 am - Where are the fireflies and stars? After watching the fireworks last night I found myself reminiscing about 4th of July's from my childhood and in general summertime, which caused me to realize that there weren't any fireflies floating around in the fields and I remember more stars in the sky. I can't remember when either disappeared but it seems so odd now that they are gone. My parents live towards the outer edge of the city but that edge has grown out farther each year which means more lights and more light pollution blotting out the stars. I can still see more stars at my parents' house than at my apartment but there were so many more up there back in the day. The fireflies have been missing for several years, I remember vaguely seeing a few earlier this year and mentioned it to my parents, they responded that's because they stopped spraying insecticide for mosquitos. Is a little bit of comfort really worth the loss of something so magical and entertaining? It seems to me that kids are missing out on all sorts of things we took as givens of childhood: fireflies, stars, playing on vaguely dangerous playgrounds, running amok in your neighborhood without fear, falling down and getting hurt. It's all part of growing up. Is a modicum of safety and comfort worth that loss? And I better stop now before going further off on this tangent, 'cuz I wasn't planning on going in that direction. Current Mood: sleepy

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June 7th, 2006

06:08 pm - stupid things people do OK so here's a few things, I've either heard about recently or saw myself, that just amaze me at the stupidity and assholishness of some people. First of all at my university a couple of the outbound football players, one of whom had already been pick during drafts, robbed one of their fellow former teammates. So now they are facing felony charges. I mean really for the dude that got picked to be on a professional football team how stupid can you be? You got a good paying job doing something you loved doing and you go endanger that sweet setup by robbing someone? I saw this poor girl, who I think I know, in the parking garage on campus and the front bumper of her car had been ripped off. She had her car parked in a legal spot at the end of a row at the bottom of a ramp leading up to next level in the garage. Now I'm not an extraordinary driver, some of my friends even think I'm a bit reckless, but I can at least navigate around in parking garage without incurring damage to my car or others parked there. To top it off who ever did it didn't appear to have left a note on the car like they should have, fucking assholes. This is old news but I only recently heard the result of the court case on an old podcast that I had waiting on my iPod to be listened to. Some woman who gave a guy a blow job saved his sperm in her mouth and used it to get herself pregnant, and then brought the poor guy to court for child support. Apparently sperm is considered a gift by the court and the guy has to pay for child support. What I don't get is how is that fair? The dude didn't have sex with her in the way that you'd normally expect someone to get preggers. If anything, I would think this is some form of entrapment. I mean how is this different from going in the trash and retrieving the condom to do the same thing? Granted if the dude is out going around and have casual sex with strange women eventually he's gonna get a strange woman, but usually that falls into the stalker category. I don't think the court should have awarded child support to her. Most of the time I'm optimistic about people and want to trust them but then a string of events like this just makes me sit back think damn what the hell is wrong with these people. I can only assume that people like the are just purely selfish. At least they are only a small part of the population, I hope. Current Mood: good Tags: stupid

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April 24th, 2006

04:23 pm It's been a while since I've posted what's been going on with my car. A few weeks ago I got call from the officer in charge of the investigation on the attack on my car back during spring break, he informed me that the dude, who I suspected of doing it, came in to sign a stalker acknowledgment form and while he was there doing that he decided to confess to all 3 attacks. After that I had to turn in all of the receipts and estimates on the damage to the car so they could charge him and issue warrants. Last week he called me and notified me that the warrants had been issued and he would be picked up within the week. So now I'm just waiting to hear from the state attorney about the status of the case in court and if I'll be getting any of my money back. It's nice knowing I don't have to go out and check my car every morning to see if something new has been done to it. I still do a cursory check each morning so I'm not 100% back to my old self but I'm getting there. Admist all this, after talking with two close friends of mine to make sure I had my mind pointed in the right direction, I broke up with my girlfriend. It really sucked cuz I still really liked her but for reasons I'm not going to go into here it was better for both of us to separate and better find out what we wanted. Current Mood: okay Tags: car relationship

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