Category: development

Guess where I’m going in March. And work is paying for it!! Yeeeeee-haw!! (I never thought I’d ever be excited to go to Texas, but here I am, excited about a trip to Texas)

I’m creating database tables of my own for a new product of my own design, for my own purposes, for the first time in a very long time. It feels good… I’m calling it mormoNotes, since it’s really for church (I take the notes in all the meetings I go to, and well, doing it in a text editor just isn’t working). I want a tool that creates nice templates, is searchable, and makes it easier to take notes in a wonderful hierarchical sorta way that I can then e-mail out. I know, tall order, but I think I’ve figured out how to do it. I’ll show it off when it’s all done (who knows when, but now that I have broadband, I’ll be online and be able to search documentation and divert myself from it without tying up a phoneline or feeling guilty. Yummmmmm-may.

Max and I rented a couple games this week to play while I was off. We got Jak II and Lethal Skies 2. We were hoping to get SSX3, but they didn’t have it yet. I’m sad to bring you these reviews, because I had such high hopes for these games. I really did. So, let’s get this over with:

Lethal Skies 2: This game’s pretty fun, and the graphics are great. The only thing missing in the rental is that Blockbuster doesn’t provide instruction booklets or even a little instruction on the back for most games. I’m completely stuck because I can’t find the button combination to use the air brakes. Without them, I can’t land, which means I can’t finish mission four. So… this one’s not even the game’s fault. Stupid Blockbuster. Maybe I’ll do gamefly. Hopefully, they provide some kind of manual.

Jak II: Max and I loved the first one. Jak and Daxter is one of the all-time great platformers. The story is great, the characters were funny, and it was just hard enough to be challenging without being impossible. It was the first game we bought when we got the PS2. We played it for months. So, when I heard the sequel was coming out, I was psyched. Holy crap, am I disappointed. They tried to up the maturity level, so there’s a lot more rust, guns, flying things, and grim, big-eared bad guys. Max didn’t like it right off the bat, and I tired of it after the first hour. This game is a lot harder than the first, and it’s hard from the beginning. The story isn’t as compelling from the start like the first one, and it just falls flat.

I’m really looking forward to SSX3. Tricky was the second game we bought, and we still play it. It’s that much fun.

And yes, I’m still working on the community site… It’s slow going, but I have a logo, and am working on creating a new template. I’ll give y’all more details on what I’m doing when I get closer to launch.

When not on vacation, go read Web Design Practices.

I decided to give Scoop a try on my laptop. I figured the install would be relatively Movable Type-like. Guess again. It comes with this little install script that’s now been running for over an hour compiling and installing thing, asking me question after question, and… I hope I didn’t just make a very large mistake. But, if I did just hose everything, at least I’ll have a good reason to wipe the hard drive and install Panther fresh with it comes out next week.

I don’t know what it is with me and beta software. I’ve come to realize over the years that I’m a compulsive installer/updater. I run Software Update on all my systems (Mac, XP, RedHat) at least once a week, and am almost always willing to install crazy beta/alpha software for no good reason. I think maybe I need help.

UPDATE: Still compiling… That’s two hours. I think we’re up to compiling the kitchen sink and a new mach kernel. I compiled Mozilla several times on my old G3 Powerbook running YellowDog, and I thought that took forever. Scoop takes the cake… really. I know it’s compiling a lot of Perl stuff, but this is insane.

Oh yeah, it’s time to beautify your desktop with some gorgeous wallpaper via the fine folks at Veer. Ultra-swank and incredibly varied for one little place. You will like it, I promise.

I just found out that a girl I used to sit next to four years ago is getting married in December to a guy that used to work in our Unix help desk. It turns out that I introduced them over four and a half years ago!

First, he gave her an IP address and a login, then he stole her heart. I freakin’ love geek love stories! And I’m a part of this one! I am the Geek Yenta!!

The front page of this site officially validates as XHTML 1.0 Transitional!! The layout’s been fine for a while, but the posts usually broke the validator in the past. Now, the posts (at least the ones on the front page) are fine, and I think will be in the future. Ahhhh, bask in the glory of my geekiness with me. Doesn’t it feel nice?