I haven't been posting much recently, due to a number of factors:
I hope to rectify this problem very soon. A number of topics have crossed my mind recently, and I hope to get to them over the next week or so.
One ill side effect of being a computer geek is a lack of physical exercise. My typing and mousing fingers are in great shape. Sadly, the rest of me has only gotten worse over time. In fact, I think I can safely say that I am in the worst shape of my life at the moment. The typical out-of-shape physical ailments seem to follow me around all the time: aches, pains, and a general lack of energy. Seeing that I can't improve this area by continuing to sit around, I've decided to (try and) do something about it.
Thankfully, my employer offers a nice deal (a small monetary bonus) to motivate physical activity. I signed up to participate this year, thinking that a little coin would provide that extra push I need to start exercising. How and where to exercise is my first major hurdle. I'd rather avoid a gym if I could, mainly because I don't want to (a) pay for a membership and (b) spend time driving to and from the place. I could avoid point (b) by using the gym at work, but I still have to pay. Buying a piece of exercise equipment for home would be cool, but I don't have the room at the moment, and most good exercise equipment isn't cheap.
So long story short: I've decided to start out by spending 30 minutes walking the paved trail around the gym here at work. I clearly won't be able to do this when it's raining, and it won't be the most comfortable when it gets hot, but it's at least a start. Some exercise is clearly better than none, right? Plus, the weather is just starting to get nice, so it'll be good to get a little fresh air. I also hope to walk over at Eno River State Park more often on the weekends, which should give me a substantially higher workout (since the trails are often quite hilly).
In what ways do you exercise? Got any tips for a newbie like myself?
I enjoy my job at IBM, but I also enjoy coming home and putting work as far from my mind as possible. To do so, I tend to escape to other worlds. The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion is one of my particular favorites. There's something about becoming another person in another world that's refreshing. I can completely forget who I am for a while, and role play if you will. Another realm I'm starting to venture back to is the world of Prince Valiant. I've just begun rereading the comic strip from the very beginning, and I thoroughly enjoy becoming entangled in the intricate storyline.
What are some of your means of escapism? Surely I'm not the only person who enjoys getting away from it all...
A coworker and I were recently reminiscing about our elementary school days, and we brought up something that I hadn't thought about in years. Does anyone here remember "Swish Day" at their school? You know, the day when the teacher would bring out the big bottle of mouthwash, dispense it into little plastic cups, and make you swish it around in your mouth? They said it was "bubble gum" flavored, but in actuality, it tasted nothing like anything you've ever had before.
Searching the web doesn't yield many hits on swish, but I know it's something we did. Does anyone else remember this? If so, feel free to share your memories.
I had the great fortune of being rear-ended tonight while coming home from work. What a wonderful Christmas present, delivered early for my enjoyment! I wanted more than anything to spend the next several days dealing with insurance, collision shops, and going without a car. Whee!
Surprisingly, the occasional downtime from computers and the internet is a good thing. Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I spent time down in Georgia at my grandmother's house, apart from the world wide web. I came back refreshed. More importantly, I had a new perspective on some of my ongoing projects. Not that I spent any time thinking about said projects; not thinking about them is what helped me the most.
I've nearly flip-flopped again on my decision to use WordPress for my planned overhaul of Born Geek. Two particular articles have nearly persuaded me to give Movable Type another chance. Site performance is still a large concern for me (though I'm not entirely certain it should be), and this is where Movable Type really delivers.
The next release of Googlebar Lite will also have a little more tender loving care than I previously had imagined. Much better localized search results are in the works, thanks to my decision to drop all the awkward top-level domain options currently used. In place of all of that will come a simple drop-down menu, allowing the user to select the Google site they wish to use across all search types (just like the official Google Toolbar). I think this will be a real improvement over the current scheme. Hopefully, users will agree.
Today is my birthday! :D
I received a Nintendo DS Lite, along with the new Mario Brothers game, and they both rock! The DS is quite impressive, and I've only played with it for a little bit. Perhaps I'll post some photos in the next day or so. I also scored another Al Di Meola album (this guy can really play guitar - I highly recommend any of his stuff).
For whatever reason, I've been in an incredibly lazy mood over the past several weeks. Every day brings a new stretch of boredom, and I don't know what to attribute it to. Perhaps I need a vacation. Thankfully, I'll be taking one in two weeks. A new PC game couldn't hurt either. I recently realized that I've been growing more and more tired of the games I've got. This past weekend, I reinstalled Quake 4, to try out its dual-core support. Although it was an enjoyable experience, it felt hollow. A new experience would be most welcome, but sadly there aren't any games on the market that pique my interest. Prey looks interesting, but I'm not willing to pay $40 for it. Oh how dry the well seems to be!
In other random news, I'm working on a new theme for this blog. It's still in the concept stage, but maybe I can get it up sometime this fall.
I've been battling several minor medical problems recently, which has slowed my blog posting efforts. With any luck I will get back to normality sometime soon. The Firefox profile tutorial I've been working on is nearly done, and a new release of Googlebar Lite is on the horizon. I've also had an idea for a new Windows application that I might write, should I find the energy and motivation to do so. Writing C++ all day for The Man sure makes it tough to do so in one's spare time.
In other miscellaneous news, I recently purchased some new rims for my car. They replaced the original factory wheels (the standard steel ones with hub-caps). Over time I had lost or broken several of the caps, so I eventually took them all off. As a result, it looked pretty bad. The new rims have improved things quite a bit. I'm looking at buying a Canon A620 digital camera in the very near future, so I'll try to get a shot or two of them. Lots of picture goodness is heading this way; I can't wait!
I'm taking next week off from work, so hopefully I can use that time to catch up on stuff I've been wanting to do for some time (CoLT 2.0, a Firefox profile tutorial, etc.). I may even go nuts and convert this blog to WordPress 2.0.3. I ditched an earlier 2.0 build back in February, but I'm toying with the idea of trying it out again. We'll see what happens with that.
There are several other miscellaneous topics to discuss: I've decided on putting off my computer upgrade for another month or so. With the predicted AMD price cuts coming down the pipeline, I could potentially save hundreds of dollars by waiting just a little longer. So that's what I'll do.
I only need one more Prince Valiant book (volume 35, Doppelgänger) to complete my library collection! Volumes 38 and 39 recently arrived in the mail (I purchased them via eBay), but I have yet to read them. Unfortunately, the last volume I need is also the hardest to find. I've only ever seen it on eBay twice: once with a larger collection and once by itself. With any luck, one will pop up when I'm looking.
Last week I gave the Prey demo a shot, and was very impressed. I want to run through it again, and I hope to comment further on it once I do so. It's definitely a game I just might purchase...
My only grandfather passed away on Saturday, June 24. He had been very sick over the past month or two, mostly due to liver cancer. I'm going to miss him greatly; he was a great man.
The month of June is turning out to be pretty crappy overall. My grandfather has become very sick, and my sister and I are driving down to Georgia this Friday to join my parents who are already there. That means that I'm taking a day off from work, at one of the worst possible times. I've got a number of deadlines looming, each of which has a number of associated problems holding me back. But all of those problems pale in comparison to spending time with my grandfather. So off to Georgia it is.
I finally found a picture of my kitty cat:
I miss her greatly, but seeing a picture of her brings back good memories.
The only pet I've ever owned had to be put down this morning. Her liver was failing, her cardiovascular system was shutting down, and she could barely breathe yesterday. My dad took her to the vet this morning and made the decision to have her put down.
For the past 14 years, our cat Sugar has been such a joy. I'll miss her greatly. If I can find a picture, I'll try to post it for those who didn't know her.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised. – Job 1:21b
I've been incredibly busy at work over the past week, due to the fact that I had a due date today for one of my projects. Thankfully, everything has wrapped up (for the time being, that is) and I can rest a little this weekend.
Only a few more days until Half-Life 2: Episode One is released. I still haven't preordered, but I'm hoping to do so soon. It's neat that you can preload the game before you preorder, and it didn't take too long to do (although I already have Half-Life 2 installed). Whether or not episodic content will be a winner is still up in the air. All I know is that I really enjoyed HL2 and I'm really looking forward to this next chapter in the Half-Life universe.
I'm currently enjoying some vacation from work (essentially today and tomorrow), so I have some free time to get stuff done. Perhaps Googlebar Lite 4.0 will show up soon. I'm still waiting on one of my translators to respond; once he does, a release is quite possible. Much of my free time has so far been spent in Oblivion. I just can't get enough of that game!
For the first time in my life (that I can recall at least), I have completed my taxes early. I usually wait until the last few weeks before the April 15 deadline, and subsequently have to wait to get my refund (due to the volume of returns the IRS has to handle). But tonight, in a little under two hours, I completed both the federal and state forms. Interestingly enough, I owe the feds some money this year, also a first for me. Thankfully, I'm getting a sizable refund from the state, so that should cover it.
It's really incredible to me that the North Carolina state tax form is more complicated than the federal form (the 1040-EZ that is). I spent the majority of my time on the state form tonight, trying to figure out all of the nuances for charitable contributions and the like. What's more, the PDF form that allows you to enter the data from your computer doesn't allow you to save your work! You have to complete the form entirely in one sitting (unlike the federal form, which allows you to save). What could their justification for such a terrible "feature" be? I'm just glad that I didn't lose all of the data once I was done; having to redo the thing would have driven me crazy.
Tomorrow I head back to work after an incredibly pleasant Christmas break. The only programming I did over the entire break was work related, and only a small amount at that. Not writing code allowed me to do all kinds of things I've been meaning to do, and it really let my brain take a breather. Now that I'll be getting back into a more normal routine, perhaps I can make some headway at Born Geek.
One of the benefits of living in the country is the ability one has to burn yard waste (doing so in the land of cul-de-sacs not only provokes complaints from the neighbors; it's against the law in many places). I have always enjoyed having a fire outside, and now that my family lives out in the country, we can do just that. My father and I recently built a pit out in our back yard, using some decorative bricks we brought over from our previous house. And today we got a chance to have our very first fire! We had a significant pile of sticks (and even some giant logs) that had collected in our front yard, and today we got rid of the entire pile. Not to mention the thousands of leaves we cleaned up. Excitingly enough, there's still a ton of stuff lying around for us to have another fire (or three). But we thoroughly enjoyed our time today, taking part in a simple country pleasure.
In a completely unrelated topic, I completed Chaos Theory this evening. The game is excellent and I plan to play through it again, this time using a little more care in each mission. Upon completing the game, I was instantly shown the credits (no end movie). Thinking this strange, I took a look at some stuff on the web that indicated that and ending movie was indeed supposed to play. It turns out that I accidentally pressed the mouse button the instant the movie started playing, skipping through the movie to the end. Games should be smarter than that. Cut-scenes should have a short delay before the player can skip by them, preventing accidental clicks or key presses from skipping over the content. One or two seconds should suffice. Regardless, I really enjoyed the game and I highly recommend it to any Splinter Cell (or stealth based game) fans.
I've made progress on two fronts today:
I'm off to my grandparent's house in Georgia tomorrow, but I'm taking my work laptop. Perhaps I can make some progress on non-work related stuff. I definitely plan to do so later this week, when I return.