Taking Things Too Seriously

Some people take things too seriously. It always amazes me when I see how stressed out people get over the smallest things in their lives. It’s like “HEY! You’re alive! You’ve got friends! You’ve got food to eat and a roof over your head! Lighten up!” But of course, I don’t say stuff like that to people, because I’m a big fscking hypocrite. :)

On a completely unrelated note, our first radio show went amazingly well. I was pretty nervous when we got into the studio, but by a half hour into the show, I felt 100% better. We still have plenty of room to improve, but WE CAN DO IT, which I wan’t entirely sure of, before. This show is going to rule. Next project: Fliers and a website for it.

Computer status: Annie’s is still toast, as I’ve found no time yet where I could get Urn to help me without getting him in trouble. ;) My computer is working fine, despite the complete and total lack of all my graphics files. :(

Jester contacted me, and the themes have been approved with one final revision to be made, which I’ll have to do tonight. Then, as soon as they get the installer made, they’ll post it on the website. Hooray!

Also, I need to start making new hammerspace strips. I’ve got a bunch of ideas. :)

We're Not Nazis

background: Jester has referred scott to a potential web design employer.

Jester: So, I was talking to [potential employer] and he said he had been looking at your sites. Then he asked me what kind of a person you were. And I knew exactly what he was worried about.

scott: what?

Jester: Well, he’d looked at your obey fojar stuff, and there’s one image of Steve with one fist raised.

scott (seeing where this is going): *laughing* oh, no…

Jester: And then there’s Killing Machines. And hatelife.

scott: Oh my god! He thinks I’m a Nazi or something!

Jester: Well, I think he thought more just like you were depressed or goth or something.

scott: Well, you told him I’m just a normal guy, right?

Jester: No, I told him the truth, why?

So my computer works again!

So my computer works again! For the first time in nearly two weeks, I’m doing internet stuff on my computer instead of Annie’s! Hooray! How did I do it? Well, I’m glad you asked. First I yanked the damn sound card right out of the box, and the I formatted the hard drive and reinstalled with Win2K. Now I have no sound capabilities, but my computer functions without crashing. Truly, it is smooth and deadly.

In addition, my most excellent buddy Jester heard about my job plight here in Eburg and volunteered to recommend me to a few people! It might not yield anything, but if it does, I’ll get some web design work! WooHoo!

Take Home Final

Yarrrr… (I say that quite a bit… Pirate noises are the best). Well, since I last updated, the term has ended successfully! Out of my three classes this term, not one of them had a traditional final. Graphic Design III had a large final project which was due last week, and then we didn’t meet during finals week at all. American History gave me a take home final. That’s right. A TAKE-HOME final. Oh my god. I thought that I had seen the last of those (and multiple-guess tests) in high school. Oh man. It was great. Two essays on stuff I hadn’t read, but I had plenty of time to research the material right in the text. And then in my Capstone class, we had a final presentation on some really simple concepts, and our last class was just doing those presentations. Really informal, there was food. It was cool. And yet, even though I didn’t have any traditional finals, I’m glad to see this term gone by. Only two left now.

I’m broke again. That sucks. I thought I had a couple hundred dollars left to buy Christmas presents with. I stopped by the ATM… $10. AAAGH! How did I miscalculate that badly? Oh well… Annie’s agreed to loan me what I need in exchange for me paying her half of rent next month.

As the term ended, I got more and more wrapped up in getting stuff done. Then I got really really sick over Thanksgiving. Following that, I was too busy doing schoolwork to clean. Then Annie got a touch of what I had, or something different and was sick for several days in a row. Needless to say, the house was a wreck. Garbage all over, papers piled up on the counter, food all over, not a single clean dish in the house. It sucked. Usually, our place is pretty clean, but we just couldn’t clean. So finally, yesterday, we just sat down and did it. Annie did the dishes, and I picked up everything else and when we got done, our house was livable again! Then she baked chocolate chip cookies!

I had the greatest week ever at work last week. Our boss came in and informed us that there was a big pile of surplus computers in the back room that he would let us gut if we wanted. They were all 486s, and we couldn’t take the cases for legal reasons, but the motherboard and all the other components were ours for free! All we had to do was take them apart! Miles and I together snagged about 13 machines, total. Miles got a few Macs in there, and all the rest are PCs. Now, most of them won’t work (they were surplus for a reason), but if we can even get four or five functioning machines out of this, we can put Linux on them and buy a cheap case, and we’ve gotten fully functional computers for free! The parts are lying on my floor in a box right now, waiting for me to inspect them and pass judgment. I can’t wait.

Tons of good ideas on websites lately. Steve and I are working on a new idea to put up on all the front pages of our sites. We came up with a new logo(s) for Fojar that I’m going to work on. I already put up a new front page for yellow5.com. Miles and I aquired big bad fojar and big bad spaceninja to make competing propaganda sites. I’m working on the new CNS page for work. I’m having fun. In the words of Tank from the Matrix: “It’s a very exciting time!”

And hopefully, now that it’s the break, our team will make some progress on Cube Fighter! If you have no idea what I’m talking about, visit play.fojar.com. I’m really excited about the concept, even if Jester thinks we’re wasting our time. What does that punk know anyway? Just because he’s got a job in the “real” game industry. ;)

Beach Trip

Well, I haven’t made an entry in two months. That’s a bit too long for an update, I think. Hmmm… what’s been going on with me… Annie and I are still getting along great, and life in our apartment is awesome. We’ve finally gotten over the debt that accompanies a move, and have gotten to a point where we can start splitting the bills equally and still have some spending money leftover at the end of the month. We had enough money this month that I finally hooked up cable. I’m so sick of bad reception, but there’s really not much you can do living in a concrete box. The cable company hooked us up with digital cable. The cable box has a modem built-in to contact the company (not sure why it would have to do that… maybe they’re keeping track of what we watch?). The first month we get everything free, so I’ve been having a blast flipping through all 500 channels (still nothing on, though). It’ll be nice when X-Files starts and I can actually read the little readout that says where they are.

I got hired for the job on the tek team! Not sure if I mentioned that before or not. The job is awesome. They started us out doing grunt labor, but we quickly graduated to real jobs, and I’m enjoying myself. I’ve got cool coworkers, and a good boss. We do work in a concrete bunker underground, but it’s kinda cool… there’s no sunlight at all (no windows), so I’m going to buy some posters to hang up in here… a few Star Wars posters, and maybe a good looking nature shot. Speaking of posters, we finally broke down and bought some sticky tabs to hang up posters in our apartment. Nothing would stick to the walls, but I really didn’t want to get these tabs, since they hardly ever come off posters cleanly. But now they stay up, and I think it’s worth it.

We went to the beach for labor day, and it was awesome. Good group of people. KT and Annie, with myself, Jester and Miles. Jester and Miles, we just discovered recently KNOW each other! I was talking to Miles one day, and he mentions juggling… “yeah the little brother of one of my friends in high school was a really good juggler. He ended up at Princeton… probably on a juggling scholarship.” A little commotion followed, and we discovered that Jester and Daniel were the same person. A brief email later and Jester knew about it. I had already invited Jester to the beach, so I invited Miles too, and it was cool! We all got along great, and spent the whole weekend babbling about computer games to each other (much to the women’s disgust). The weather on the first day was gorgeous, and we spent a good chunk of time on the beach. The next day was horrible and rainy, so we went to the cheese factory, but it lightened up enough for us to have our bonfire and s’mores, and then naturally the day we left was beautiful. Still, a great weekend. We enjoyed ourselves.

I’m not sure where the summer went. I had so much planned to get done this summer, and I got hardly anything done. I’ve been working really hard, but I haven’t read the books I wanted, or beaten my computer games or anything. *sigh* oh well. Maybe next year.

I’ve been reading Whitley Strieber books lately. He’s the guy who wrote Communion, the creepy book about a guy who discovers that he’s been visited by what would appear to be aliens ever since he was two. I got the book at a yard sale for a buck, and ended up buying the next three books. They’re fascinating reading. I don’t think I really believe it, but it succeeds in creeping me out whenever I read them.

Okay I think that’s enough for now. I’ll try to write more frequently!