Tuesday, April 27, 2004
I'm ill. Not ill fresh, or ill j0, like rappers or l337 haXnorZ would have you believe, but ill like a person with a cold.
I got to see my family this weekend (plus!) but it was for the funeral of a great-aunt (minus!) but everyone was gathered together, so I got to see some 'rare' aunts (plus!) but Sandlin gave me a cold (minus!). It's not really so bad, just the standard edition cold. Step 1) Sore throat. Step 2) Body Aches. Step 3) Runny Nose. All my colds are like that. Well, for the sake of co-workers, I stayed home today, so as to spread the viral happiness as little as possible. Hope you're happy, co-workers.
Truth be told, I don't really feel that bad, cause I did go out and get some things done today. Shopping for some vitals (bagels and milk, mostly). And, I went out the the DMV and actually got my Licence plates. Here's a tip. If you're ever in LA and you need to get DMV stuff done, take some time off work and go to the DMV in Hawthorne. I had to wait in line three times, and never did it take more than 10 minutes. Gorgeous.
To-Do list:
1) Spend Gift Certificates at Best Buy and Amoeba Music (Thanks to Mom and Robbie).
2) Talk with Derek about Rooming-up
3) Sign up for my next class
4) Complete USC application (letters of recommendation)
5) Invite Mary over, and decide what to do with weekend
6) Write music for Next Movie
7) Write Scripts for next move
8) Pay next month's rent
9) Deposit all checks
10) Heal
Pretty nice.
Nothing more to write, my person hurts. Love!
-N
I got to see my family this weekend (plus!) but it was for the funeral of a great-aunt (minus!) but everyone was gathered together, so I got to see some 'rare' aunts (plus!) but Sandlin gave me a cold (minus!). It's not really so bad, just the standard edition cold. Step 1) Sore throat. Step 2) Body Aches. Step 3) Runny Nose. All my colds are like that. Well, for the sake of co-workers, I stayed home today, so as to spread the viral happiness as little as possible. Hope you're happy, co-workers.
Truth be told, I don't really feel that bad, cause I did go out and get some things done today. Shopping for some vitals (bagels and milk, mostly). And, I went out the the DMV and actually got my Licence plates. Here's a tip. If you're ever in LA and you need to get DMV stuff done, take some time off work and go to the DMV in Hawthorne. I had to wait in line three times, and never did it take more than 10 minutes. Gorgeous.
To-Do list:
1) Spend Gift Certificates at Best Buy and Amoeba Music (Thanks to Mom and Robbie).
2) Talk with Derek about Rooming-up
3) Sign up for my next class
4) Complete USC application (letters of recommendation)
5) Invite Mary over, and decide what to do with weekend
6) Write music for Next Movie
7) Write Scripts for next move
8) Pay next month's rent
9) Deposit all checks
10) Heal
Pretty nice.
Nothing more to write, my person hurts. Love!
-N
Friday, April 23, 2004
I GOT IN I GOT IN I GOT IN I GOT IN I GOT IN I GOT IN I GOT IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN!
So, so, so...Raytheon has this program where they let you work a reduced number of hours and take an increased number of classes, all paid by them, in order to get your masters degree *faster*. And I hear tell it's pretty tough to get in but I GOT IN!
What does this mean? It means that instead of taking a measly two classes a *year*, I get to take 4. Which means instead of taking four or five years to finish my masters degree, it's looking like I'll be done with it by the end of *next year*. Crazy-awesome! Woo hoo! It means more work, o-course, but then it will be *done*, and I'll have more money! I'm excited, so you should be excited too.
So I've decided that after I finish my masters, I want to learn something else. Here are some candidates:
How to play the drums (the full drum set).
A language. (Japanese, Spanish, Croatian, whatever).
Heck, both!
It's a short list, but I'm sure it will grow.
Okay, what else, what else. Oh, several of you know, and several of you do not, that my great-aunt on my fathers side passed away recently. Certainly not good news, but we had time to prepare, and the end was peacefull, and I hear tell she even liked my e-mails. (Ya ask me, she's probably reading this *right now*,). But the service is up in seattle this weekend, and I'm going up, thanks to a plane-ticket from the associated grandparents. Much thanks!
So I guess I'll have to cut this blog a little bit short, cause I've actually got to catch my plane pretty soon. So catch y'all soon. And see some of you even sooner, I suspect.
I GOT IN I GOT IN!
-N
So, so, so...Raytheon has this program where they let you work a reduced number of hours and take an increased number of classes, all paid by them, in order to get your masters degree *faster*. And I hear tell it's pretty tough to get in but I GOT IN!
What does this mean? It means that instead of taking a measly two classes a *year*, I get to take 4. Which means instead of taking four or five years to finish my masters degree, it's looking like I'll be done with it by the end of *next year*. Crazy-awesome! Woo hoo! It means more work, o-course, but then it will be *done*, and I'll have more money! I'm excited, so you should be excited too.
So I've decided that after I finish my masters, I want to learn something else. Here are some candidates:
How to play the drums (the full drum set).
A language. (Japanese, Spanish, Croatian, whatever).
Heck, both!
It's a short list, but I'm sure it will grow.
Okay, what else, what else. Oh, several of you know, and several of you do not, that my great-aunt on my fathers side passed away recently. Certainly not good news, but we had time to prepare, and the end was peacefull, and I hear tell she even liked my e-mails. (Ya ask me, she's probably reading this *right now*,
So I guess I'll have to cut this blog a little bit short, cause I've actually got to catch my plane pretty soon. So catch y'all soon. And see some of you even sooner, I suspect.
I GOT IN I GOT IN!
-N
Tuesday, April 20, 2004
I'm going to type this up while I'm watching my masters class.
For those of you I haven't told already. I'm slowly chipping away at my masters degree. Mostly, because Raytheon pays for it. And if I don't start working on it now, I never will. Plus it's a good thing to have. Gets me money. And money gets me happiness, don't let anyone tell you different. Well, it's the first step, at least. Or one of the steps. This is a philosophical discussion for another time, moving on!
I'm doing The USC Den program.
Reasons it is good:
USC is a pretty respectable Engineering school.
Raytheon is paying for it.
The masters program involves only 9 semester-classes. No thesis, no comprehensive exam. (Not unless you want to get a doctorate too, and I don't.)
The DEN program (Distance Education Network) allows you to watch lectures over the internet, from the comfort of your own home, at whatever time is best for you.
People with masters degrees make more money than people with bachelors degrees at Raython. Explicitly so.
I'm learning stuff that is *immediately* helpfull at work. We've been working with Single Value Decompositions (SVDs). What are SVD's? I didn't know either until we learned about it in class...two lectures ago. (What, you actually want to know what it is? I'm not going to tell you. Get your *own* masters degree!)
Reason it is suck
It's pretty pricy (cancelled by Raytheon paying for it.)
Watching lectures is *Lame*! It's a good 4 or 5 or so hours out of my week that I'd much rather be spending doing...anything else. Running. Skipping stones. Other wholesome, young-adult activies. (No strippers!)
So, you can tell by the lists, I'm still for it. But sometimes I wish I were less responsible. I'd get more immediate satisfaction out of my weekdays. But like I said, I'm a sucker for money. I want it in bucketfulls!
I've been trying to loose weight by cutting down on junk food, but it's not working. I don't think I've ever taken so many people up on their offer to go out for burgers in my *life*. I think this may be fate trying to keep me at my current weight. I do more exercise, and burgers start showing up in *droves*. It's like that Alfred Hichcock Movie, 'The birds', except it's 'The burgers'. And where birds are scary, Burgers are delicious.
Kevin mentioned that he read about him being my hero in my blog. I went nearly giddy. Actually, Kevin was even my hero back at Calpoly. He's still the best teacher I've ever had for TKD, in my book. And I didn't pay him a *quarter* what I'm paying for TKD now. That makes him the man. The fact that he broke his ankle and then joked about it makes him the hotness.
Ugh...now the professor is doing a long, extended example on a subject I already understand. So instead of watching it...fast forward! Go DEN! Course, I'm sure more traditional professers rarely have buffering problems.
I want to be bilingual when I grow up. Japanese, perhaps. Or perhaps Croatian, cause that's what Mary speaks. I tell her (jokingly, people) that I'll learn Croatian if I mary her. Yes it's a joke, but you never know...
I'm just writing down thoughts at random. I hope you're keeping up.
I've started playing around with nunchaku. I started when I saw a movie of someone doing glowchucks. Like nunchaku, but with glowsticks (long ones) instead. Looked so awesome. I've gotten some pretty neat movies down, but I have yet to find glowsticks of the appropriate length.
The Croatian Cultural Center of Greater Los Angeles. Mary volunteers here. Give the link to Zrinka, parents. She'd be delighted, I'm sure.
Break time, I'm going to go exercise. Later!
-N
For those of you I haven't told already. I'm slowly chipping away at my masters degree. Mostly, because Raytheon pays for it. And if I don't start working on it now, I never will. Plus it's a good thing to have. Gets me money. And money gets me happiness, don't let anyone tell you different. Well, it's the first step, at least. Or one of the steps. This is a philosophical discussion for another time, moving on!
I'm doing The USC Den program.
Reasons it is good:
USC is a pretty respectable Engineering school.
Raytheon is paying for it.
The masters program involves only 9 semester-classes. No thesis, no comprehensive exam. (Not unless you want to get a doctorate too, and I don't.)
The DEN program (Distance Education Network) allows you to watch lectures over the internet, from the comfort of your own home, at whatever time is best for you.
People with masters degrees make more money than people with bachelors degrees at Raython. Explicitly so.
I'm learning stuff that is *immediately* helpfull at work. We've been working with Single Value Decompositions (SVDs). What are SVD's? I didn't know either until we learned about it in class...two lectures ago. (What, you actually want to know what it is? I'm not going to tell you. Get your *own* masters degree!)
Reason it is suck
It's pretty pricy (cancelled by Raytheon paying for it.)
Watching lectures is *Lame*! It's a good 4 or 5 or so hours out of my week that I'd much rather be spending doing...anything else. Running. Skipping stones. Other wholesome, young-adult activies. (No strippers!)
So, you can tell by the lists, I'm still for it. But sometimes I wish I were less responsible. I'd get more immediate satisfaction out of my weekdays. But like I said, I'm a sucker for money. I want it in bucketfulls!
I've been trying to loose weight by cutting down on junk food, but it's not working. I don't think I've ever taken so many people up on their offer to go out for burgers in my *life*. I think this may be fate trying to keep me at my current weight. I do more exercise, and burgers start showing up in *droves*. It's like that Alfred Hichcock Movie, 'The birds', except it's 'The burgers'. And where birds are scary, Burgers are delicious.
Kevin mentioned that he read about him being my hero in my blog. I went nearly giddy. Actually, Kevin was even my hero back at Calpoly. He's still the best teacher I've ever had for TKD, in my book. And I didn't pay him a *quarter* what I'm paying for TKD now. That makes him the man. The fact that he broke his ankle and then joked about it makes him the hotness.
Ugh...now the professor is doing a long, extended example on a subject I already understand. So instead of watching it...fast forward! Go DEN! Course, I'm sure more traditional professers rarely have buffering problems.
I want to be bilingual when I grow up. Japanese, perhaps. Or perhaps Croatian, cause that's what Mary speaks. I tell her (jokingly, people) that I'll learn Croatian if I mary her. Yes it's a joke, but you never know...
I'm just writing down thoughts at random. I hope you're keeping up.
I've started playing around with nunchaku. I started when I saw a movie of someone doing glowchucks. Like nunchaku, but with glowsticks (long ones) instead. Looked so awesome. I've gotten some pretty neat movies down, but I have yet to find glowsticks of the appropriate length.
The Croatian Cultural Center of Greater Los Angeles. Mary volunteers here. Give the link to Zrinka, parents. She'd be delighted, I'm sure.
Break time, I'm going to go exercise. Later!
-N
Monday, April 19, 2004
Hey,
I made up a song today, it goes a little something like this...
I got, a Game Boy Advance SP
It's lots of fun, and really great to have
I got a couple of games too,
Not to mention a starter kit.
Not to mention a starter kit.
Refrain:
I'm going to take it on the flight up to Seattle
because I hate flying and hopefully
Playing some video games will make
the flight more bearable.
Bridge:
Baby, baby I love you darling
Can't you see I gotta hold your hand.
Something, something, tearing me up inside.
Love, love, blah, blah blah.
Pretty catchy.
Also, the mini-sleep-apnea study turned up nothing, though it only lasted for a little while, about half an hour. I don't think I was in a particularly deep sleep either. Personally, I'm not worried. I haven't had any episodes for nearly a week now, so my suspicion is that something got a little bit inflamed from the coughing, and now it's not so bad anymore. If It becomes a problem again, I'll have a sleep-over somewhere and do a longer test. If not, case closed.
Derek and I are working on another movie. I've started writing some script-age for him, as well as composing some of the music. So with luck, I'll have some music to not for y'all in the coming months. Fingers crossed.
And Kevin is my hero!
-N
I made up a song today, it goes a little something like this...
I got, a Game Boy Advance SP
It's lots of fun, and really great to have
I got a couple of games too,
Not to mention a starter kit.
Not to mention a starter kit.
Refrain:
I'm going to take it on the flight up to Seattle
because I hate flying and hopefully
Playing some video games will make
the flight more bearable.
Bridge:
Baby, baby I love you darling
Can't you see I gotta hold your hand.
Something, something, tearing me up inside.
Love, love, blah, blah blah.
Pretty catchy.
Also, the mini-sleep-apnea study turned up nothing, though it only lasted for a little while, about half an hour. I don't think I was in a particularly deep sleep either. Personally, I'm not worried. I haven't had any episodes for nearly a week now, so my suspicion is that something got a little bit inflamed from the coughing, and now it's not so bad anymore. If It becomes a problem again, I'll have a sleep-over somewhere and do a longer test. If not, case closed.
Derek and I are working on another movie. I've started writing some script-age for him, as well as composing some of the music. So with luck, I'll have some music to not for y'all in the coming months. Fingers crossed.
And Kevin is my hero!
-N
Saturday, April 17, 2004
Lordy. I didn't realize how much stuff actually happened to me in a week. I've only been off posting for about 7 days, and already I can tell this one is going to be a doozy, too. Okay, ready? Lets get started.
Last weekend we celebrated two things, the resurrection of Jesus (can I get an alleluia, finally?!) and the birthdays of two of my co-workers, Ian and Mike Sand. Mike gets a last name cause we know a *lot* of mikes around here, and because, for some reason, everyone calls him by his last name. So he’s Mike sand, and Ian is just Ian. So we went out and did one of my favorite activities in the world. You: “Binge Drinking?” Me: “No!” We went to The Comedy and Magic club in Hermosa beach. I gotta tell you, I love this place. I really, really, love this place. Whenever I have random friends coming in from out of town and I need to show them a good time, I’m taking them here. This place is awesome. The comedy is *superb*, I tell you, superb! I very nearly lost it on several occasions. The headliner this week was ‘Rocky LaPorte’. We’d never heard of him either, but he turned out great. And there were something like 6 other acts before him. Shorter, yes, but hilarious! Plus, if you have dinner there beforehand, you can get reserved seating up near the front. It’s a total evening! Plus, they have some really top-notch talent coming through. Jay Leno performs nearly every Sunday. I haven’t seen him, but he’s evidently really good. And he tries out some jokes for the ‘tonight show’ while he’s there, too. Big names of stand-up comedy, too. It’s a boatload of fun.
That was the good part of the weekend, here is the bad.
Sunday night, I woke up at about 12:00 midnight and was unable to breathe for a good 5 or 10 seconds. I now have newfound respect for asthma sufferers, cause not being able to breathe scared the *crap* out of me. I called up some Kaiser Permanente people (the good folks that take care of my health insurance), and they said that as long as I was breathing normally at the moment, that I didn’t need to come in to the emergency room. So instead I just wandered around my house for an hour, totally too scared to sleep. Eventually, biological imperatives took over, though, and I slept the rest of the night. This actually happened again, actually, Tuesday before my appointment with the ear-nose-throat guy. But tests revealed nothing major, and despite the fact that I wake up several times a night in fear that I may be about to choke to death, I’m doing pretty okay. The doctor suspects sleep apnea, but before we do an actual sleep study, I’m just going to have Mary come over and watch me sleep to see if I ever stop breathing.
Sidetrack for a moment. I told my parents about the sleep apnea test and they had this to say:
I wonder how much sleep you will get if your girl friend is at your place?
Love,
Mom
Two things.
1) Mary and I aren’t really that serious yet. I mean, it’s really obvious that we like each other, and we’ve been hanging out and enjoying each other’s company and getting to know each other, certainly. So I’d say we’re ‘dating’. But we’re not quite ‘boy/girlfriend’ yet. She won’t even let me hug her in public, though in her defense, we were in San Pedro at the moment, and there are a lot of Croatians there that would have eventually reported back to her parents. Evidently they know a lot less about their daughter’s love life than my parents do about mine. Aren’t you pleased, parents?
2) This is the kind of comment I expect to hear coming from me, not my parents. Truth be told, I’m a little bit proud. *Sniff*.
Back to sleep apnea. Like I said, no more occurrences, but Mary will offer the first test. I’ll let y’all know how it goes.
What’s next…oh, here’s something intriguing. I didn’t go food-shopping for nearly a month. That’s right, a month. I was intending to at the three-week mark, but the sleep breathing stuff took up a lot of time, what with the doctor’s visits and all. So I went out and got a whole bunch of stuff a couple nights ago. I’m just saying…a whole month without shopping. Yowza.
Lets talk TKD. Among other requirements, there are physical tests you have to pass in order to get your black belt. Here they are.
100 Pushups
300 sit-ups
and one of the following:
Run 3 miles in 24 minutes
Swim 1 mile in 36 minutes.
AAAAAAH! Well, yes, very difficult, but that’s why I’m working on it right now. I’m up to roughly 60 pushups, but only about 110 sit-ups. I’ve started running, too. In order to do the requested running, I have to run at 7.5 miles an hour for 24 minutes, and we’ve got treadmills where I live, so I can measure that. Unfortunately, I can only keep 7.5 mph going for about .6 of a mile. But I’m working on it, and all this extra exercise has got to be good for me. Mary and I are having a competition to see which of us can get a 6-pack first. I have 3 months; she has a month and a half, cause I’ve got longer to go. Personally, I’d be surprised if either of us made it, cause I’ve always had a bit of a gut, and Mary’s, well, a girl. But if nothing else, it’s a good excuse. I’m aiming for the black belt, here. Lots of work involved.
My great Aunt has passed away. Not a huge surprise, we really saw this coming about a month or two in advance when she was diagnosed with cancer. But I’ve heard good things, like my periodic mailings were well received by her, and I know her daughter was able to come back and take care of her at the final hours. At any rate, I head up there next weekend to attend the…not funeral. It’s supposed to be a celebration of her life, which is perfectly fine by me. It may be a Christian Scientist thing, I'm not sure. But I'm down. I never felt comfortable at funerals, too much sadness that I don’t tend to share. I guess I’m still an optimist when it comes to death. Either that or I just haven’t lost anyone I’m so close too that it really hits hard. But one way or the other, I’m there next weekend, and get to see my grandparents and family again, so that’s always a plus.
*~~~~~~*Random Link of the Week*~~~~~~*
The Hunger/Rainforest/Breast Cancer/Animal Rescue Site. Make this your homepage. You can save rainforest, feed people, and do all sorts of other great things just by *clicking*. Plus, you can do even more neat things by buying some of their nifty stuff. Makes great birthday/christmas presents, eh? Do it! Do it now! Save the planet!
Okay, enough writing for now. I’m going to go shopping for…stuff…I’m not sure what, yet. I’ll let you know when I pick it up.
-N
Last weekend we celebrated two things, the resurrection of Jesus (can I get an alleluia, finally?!) and the birthdays of two of my co-workers, Ian and Mike Sand. Mike gets a last name cause we know a *lot* of mikes around here, and because, for some reason, everyone calls him by his last name. So he’s Mike sand, and Ian is just Ian. So we went out and did one of my favorite activities in the world. You: “Binge Drinking?” Me: “No!” We went to The Comedy and Magic club in Hermosa beach. I gotta tell you, I love this place. I really, really, love this place. Whenever I have random friends coming in from out of town and I need to show them a good time, I’m taking them here. This place is awesome. The comedy is *superb*, I tell you, superb! I very nearly lost it on several occasions. The headliner this week was ‘Rocky LaPorte’. We’d never heard of him either, but he turned out great. And there were something like 6 other acts before him. Shorter, yes, but hilarious! Plus, if you have dinner there beforehand, you can get reserved seating up near the front. It’s a total evening! Plus, they have some really top-notch talent coming through. Jay Leno performs nearly every Sunday. I haven’t seen him, but he’s evidently really good. And he tries out some jokes for the ‘tonight show’ while he’s there, too. Big names of stand-up comedy, too. It’s a boatload of fun.
That was the good part of the weekend, here is the bad.
Sunday night, I woke up at about 12:00 midnight and was unable to breathe for a good 5 or 10 seconds. I now have newfound respect for asthma sufferers, cause not being able to breathe scared the *crap* out of me. I called up some Kaiser Permanente people (the good folks that take care of my health insurance), and they said that as long as I was breathing normally at the moment, that I didn’t need to come in to the emergency room. So instead I just wandered around my house for an hour, totally too scared to sleep. Eventually, biological imperatives took over, though, and I slept the rest of the night. This actually happened again, actually, Tuesday before my appointment with the ear-nose-throat guy. But tests revealed nothing major, and despite the fact that I wake up several times a night in fear that I may be about to choke to death, I’m doing pretty okay. The doctor suspects sleep apnea, but before we do an actual sleep study, I’m just going to have Mary come over and watch me sleep to see if I ever stop breathing.
Sidetrack for a moment. I told my parents about the sleep apnea test and they had this to say:
I wonder how much sleep you will get if your girl friend is at your place?
Love,
Mom
Two things.
1) Mary and I aren’t really that serious yet. I mean, it’s really obvious that we like each other, and we’ve been hanging out and enjoying each other’s company and getting to know each other, certainly. So I’d say we’re ‘dating’. But we’re not quite ‘boy/girlfriend’ yet. She won’t even let me hug her in public, though in her defense, we were in San Pedro at the moment, and there are a lot of Croatians there that would have eventually reported back to her parents. Evidently they know a lot less about their daughter’s love life than my parents do about mine. Aren’t you pleased, parents?
2) This is the kind of comment I expect to hear coming from me, not my parents. Truth be told, I’m a little bit proud. *Sniff*.
Back to sleep apnea. Like I said, no more occurrences, but Mary will offer the first test. I’ll let y’all know how it goes.
What’s next…oh, here’s something intriguing. I didn’t go food-shopping for nearly a month. That’s right, a month. I was intending to at the three-week mark, but the sleep breathing stuff took up a lot of time, what with the doctor’s visits and all. So I went out and got a whole bunch of stuff a couple nights ago. I’m just saying…a whole month without shopping. Yowza.
Lets talk TKD. Among other requirements, there are physical tests you have to pass in order to get your black belt. Here they are.
100 Pushups
300 sit-ups
and one of the following:
Run 3 miles in 24 minutes
Swim 1 mile in 36 minutes.
AAAAAAH! Well, yes, very difficult, but that’s why I’m working on it right now. I’m up to roughly 60 pushups, but only about 110 sit-ups. I’ve started running, too. In order to do the requested running, I have to run at 7.5 miles an hour for 24 minutes, and we’ve got treadmills where I live, so I can measure that. Unfortunately, I can only keep 7.5 mph going for about .6 of a mile. But I’m working on it, and all this extra exercise has got to be good for me. Mary and I are having a competition to see which of us can get a 6-pack first. I have 3 months; she has a month and a half, cause I’ve got longer to go. Personally, I’d be surprised if either of us made it, cause I’ve always had a bit of a gut, and Mary’s, well, a girl. But if nothing else, it’s a good excuse. I’m aiming for the black belt, here. Lots of work involved.
My great Aunt has passed away. Not a huge surprise, we really saw this coming about a month or two in advance when she was diagnosed with cancer. But I’ve heard good things, like my periodic mailings were well received by her, and I know her daughter was able to come back and take care of her at the final hours. At any rate, I head up there next weekend to attend the…not funeral. It’s supposed to be a celebration of her life, which is perfectly fine by me. It may be a Christian Scientist thing, I'm not sure. But I'm down. I never felt comfortable at funerals, too much sadness that I don’t tend to share. I guess I’m still an optimist when it comes to death. Either that or I just haven’t lost anyone I’m so close too that it really hits hard. But one way or the other, I’m there next weekend, and get to see my grandparents and family again, so that’s always a plus.
*~~~~~~*Random Link of the Week*~~~~~~*
The Hunger/Rainforest/Breast Cancer/Animal Rescue Site. Make this your homepage. You can save rainforest, feed people, and do all sorts of other great things just by *clicking*. Plus, you can do even more neat things by buying some of their nifty stuff. Makes great birthday/christmas presents, eh? Do it! Do it now! Save the planet!
Okay, enough writing for now. I’m going to go shopping for…stuff…I’m not sure what, yet. I’ll let you know when I pick it up.
-N
Saturday, April 10, 2004
Okay, test post out of the way, time for the main course. Hang on, kids, this is going to be a long one, cause I've got a lot of things to cover today.
Catalog of the previous weekend: April 2-4:
Oy, let me tell you, I am really just wringing the productivity out of every weekend these days. I'm going to use last weekend as an example. Friday, my day off, I had planned to go into the DMV and spend as much time as was needed getting my *California license places*. Unfortunately, that deal fell through when I realized that, while I had managed to update the tags on my licence plate to 2004, I had failed to hang onto the appropriate paperwork, and so my vehicle's registration had expired 2 years ago. He he. That and the fact that the people that the people who are supposed to be doing verification, you know, making sure that the car is actually what you say it is on the little form, simply were not there. But did I let this get me down? Heck no! I bounced back like some sort of crazy 'Power ball', said 'To heck with this!' (my actual words may not have been quite so mild), and proceeded to go to Six Flags Magic mountain!
Tabitha, workmate, and Jeff, Tabi's boyfriend, had convinced me to check the place out with them, and being as I'd never been to a 'thrill ride joint' before, I figured it would be good times. (Certainly better than the DMV, at least.) And it most certainly was. We were able to go on most every single ride in the place, rides that went from crazy cool to totally freaky. Example: A new roller coaster called X. (Cause it's x-treem, presumably) They strap you into this full-body mega-harness that allows them to actually spin you, in any way they see fit, around the axis that runs from your left to your right side. It's as crazy as it sounds. You start off up the first 'crazy drop' heading backwards, so you can't see where you're going (of course), and as you start to go over the edge, they rotate you so that your head is pointing directly to the ground. *Head* to the *Ground*. Everyone now: "Yaaaaaaaaah!" Definitely wins my 'most x-treem coaster award. Favorite Coaster award goes to Scream.
Saturday, Mary came over, I gave her a quick tutorial on Matlab, we visited Derek, co-worker who lives directly above me, and Lavtrell, Co-worker who lives in the same apartment complex, but above neither of us. Then Mary split, and Derek and I practice our swordfighting for the first time in years. No injuries, mom, we used the padded swords.
Sunday, Derek and I shot a movie. It's called 'Flash and Flair'. It's a silly little thing that Derek and I have been pondering doing for a while, and we decided to shoot it because we wanted to shoot something, and due to the nature of the story, we would be able to shoot it with just the two of us and a tripod. We did all the filming within two-and-a-half hours (which is pretty doggone amazing) and Derek Edited it like crazy for the next couple of days. We have a working version now, but it's 700 MB. Pretty big. Once we get it encoded down to a reasonable size, we'll post it somewhere on the net and I'll link it for you. It's certainly not our greatest endeavour, but it's not bad times at all.
All that in the span of just three days. Pretty cool, eh?
I tested for my next belt this week. Green belt with Blue stripe. Another couple of promotions and I get to move into the advanced class. Hopefully they'll let me work on my spinning hook kick there. It's totally fallen apart since I stopped practicing it. (Sorry, Kevin.) I was terribly unimpressed with my performance during the sparring part of my test, I'm still working on my counters, they still don't work. I got tagged quite a few times. But, I still passed, so I can't have dont that bad, right? And the board break. Oooh...that went *really* well. Knife hand neck strike. (I'd type out the Korean, but Kevin would laugh at me.) I got my hips all the way into that strike and sent my hand through that board and into the next zip code. I think I'm ready for bricks now! Booyah!
Easter! Almost. And I'm so proud of myself. I was always *completely horrible* when it came to remembering not to eat meat on fridays in Lent. Even when I was back home and I had parents to remind me. But I was *totally on top of it* this year. Not a single scrap of anything remotely-meaty came near my lips. Perhaps this means my memory is getting better. Likely it just means that I've fallen in love with the gardenburgers. Delicious! They're no substitute for a good hamburger but they're darn tasty. Here's a good recipie I've discovered:
Ingredients:
1 Gardenburger (tm r copywrite etc...) Patty
1 Bagel
Some Greens
Cream Cheese
Split the bagel, spread on the cream cheese, grill the patty and slap it and the greens between the bagel. Simple, yet soooo tasty. A little bit bachelor-esque, perhaps. But no one said these recipies had to be complicated. Goes great with Katsup and/or Tobasco sauce. Serves 1. Serves 1/2 if you're me.
*~~~~~~*Random Link of the Week*~~~~~~*
Making Fiends. This is a fun little flash animation site that's silly, strange, and incredibly funny. If the webpage asks you to install 'Flash' or 'Shockwave', go ahead, they're animation programs that are totally harmless and pretty common around the internet these days. I'd be a little surprized if you grandparent-ly types don't have them already.
Wow. Look at that Blog. Pretty impressive. Okay, back to the video games.
-N
Catalog of the previous weekend: April 2-4:
Oy, let me tell you, I am really just wringing the productivity out of every weekend these days. I'm going to use last weekend as an example. Friday, my day off, I had planned to go into the DMV and spend as much time as was needed getting my *California license places*. Unfortunately, that deal fell through when I realized that, while I had managed to update the tags on my licence plate to 2004, I had failed to hang onto the appropriate paperwork, and so my vehicle's registration had expired 2 years ago. He he. That and the fact that the people that the people who are supposed to be doing verification, you know, making sure that the car is actually what you say it is on the little form, simply were not there. But did I let this get me down? Heck no! I bounced back like some sort of crazy 'Power ball', said 'To heck with this!' (my actual words may not have been quite so mild), and proceeded to go to Six Flags Magic mountain!
Tabitha, workmate, and Jeff, Tabi's boyfriend, had convinced me to check the place out with them, and being as I'd never been to a 'thrill ride joint' before, I figured it would be good times. (Certainly better than the DMV, at least.) And it most certainly was. We were able to go on most every single ride in the place, rides that went from crazy cool to totally freaky. Example: A new roller coaster called X. (Cause it's x-treem, presumably) They strap you into this full-body mega-harness that allows them to actually spin you, in any way they see fit, around the axis that runs from your left to your right side. It's as crazy as it sounds. You start off up the first 'crazy drop' heading backwards, so you can't see where you're going (of course), and as you start to go over the edge, they rotate you so that your head is pointing directly to the ground. *Head* to the *Ground*. Everyone now: "Yaaaaaaaaah!" Definitely wins my 'most x-treem coaster award. Favorite Coaster award goes to Scream.
Saturday, Mary came over, I gave her a quick tutorial on Matlab, we visited Derek, co-worker who lives directly above me, and Lavtrell, Co-worker who lives in the same apartment complex, but above neither of us. Then Mary split, and Derek and I practice our swordfighting for the first time in years. No injuries, mom, we used the padded swords.
Sunday, Derek and I shot a movie. It's called 'Flash and Flair'. It's a silly little thing that Derek and I have been pondering doing for a while, and we decided to shoot it because we wanted to shoot something, and due to the nature of the story, we would be able to shoot it with just the two of us and a tripod. We did all the filming within two-and-a-half hours (which is pretty doggone amazing) and Derek Edited it like crazy for the next couple of days. We have a working version now, but it's 700 MB. Pretty big. Once we get it encoded down to a reasonable size, we'll post it somewhere on the net and I'll link it for you. It's certainly not our greatest endeavour, but it's not bad times at all.
All that in the span of just three days. Pretty cool, eh?
I tested for my next belt this week. Green belt with Blue stripe. Another couple of promotions and I get to move into the advanced class. Hopefully they'll let me work on my spinning hook kick there. It's totally fallen apart since I stopped practicing it. (Sorry, Kevin.) I was terribly unimpressed with my performance during the sparring part of my test, I'm still working on my counters, they still don't work. I got tagged quite a few times. But, I still passed, so I can't have dont that bad, right? And the board break. Oooh...that went *really* well. Knife hand neck strike. (I'd type out the Korean, but Kevin would laugh at me.) I got my hips all the way into that strike and sent my hand through that board and into the next zip code. I think I'm ready for bricks now! Booyah!
Easter! Almost. And I'm so proud of myself. I was always *completely horrible* when it came to remembering not to eat meat on fridays in Lent. Even when I was back home and I had parents to remind me. But I was *totally on top of it* this year. Not a single scrap of anything remotely-meaty came near my lips. Perhaps this means my memory is getting better. Likely it just means that I've fallen in love with the gardenburgers. Delicious! They're no substitute for a good hamburger but they're darn tasty. Here's a good recipie I've discovered:
Ingredients:
1 Gardenburger (tm r copywrite etc...) Patty
1 Bagel
Some Greens
Cream Cheese
Split the bagel, spread on the cream cheese, grill the patty and slap it and the greens between the bagel. Simple, yet soooo tasty. A little bit bachelor-esque, perhaps. But no one said these recipies had to be complicated. Goes great with Katsup and/or Tobasco sauce. Serves 1. Serves 1/2 if you're me.
*~~~~~~*Random Link of the Week*~~~~~~*
Making Fiends. This is a fun little flash animation site that's silly, strange, and incredibly funny. If the webpage asks you to install 'Flash' or 'Shockwave', go ahead, they're animation programs that are totally harmless and pretty common around the internet these days. I'd be a little surprized if you grandparent-ly types don't have them already.
Wow. Look at that Blog. Pretty impressive. Okay, back to the video games.
-N
Hello.
I've tried keeping journals before. It's actually rather an intriguing prospect, to be able to keep a record of what you were like at times past. I go back and read old letters and old writing of mine all the time. Just to see what I was like. Helps me to gain wisdom. Course, mostly these attempts fail pretty quickly. It's about making it part of a routine; that's what keeps it going.
Course, I've made 'e-mailing people to tell them what I've been up to on a semi-regular basis' a routine now, so the theory is that this is going to work out well enough. We'll have to see if this sticks around.
And now, here's Jim with the weather. Jim?
-N
I've tried keeping journals before. It's actually rather an intriguing prospect, to be able to keep a record of what you were like at times past. I go back and read old letters and old writing of mine all the time. Just to see what I was like. Helps me to gain wisdom. Course, mostly these attempts fail pretty quickly. It's about making it part of a routine; that's what keeps it going.
Course, I've made 'e-mailing people to tell them what I've been up to on a semi-regular basis' a routine now, so the theory is that this is going to work out well enough. We'll have to see if this sticks around.
And now, here's Jim with the weather. Jim?
-N
