I was up this morning at 3:30 because I couldn't sleep anymore. I had a lot of extra stress heaped on me Monday evening and just couldn't get it off my mind. When I woke up, I just couldn't find a way to get back to sleep, so I got up and watched the season finale of 24. There was some distant lightning early today, but no thunder. The wind picked up shortly after, and was blowing most of the day, but wasn't as strong as it was so early.
Around 5am I tried to lie back down and sleep, but it didn't work. I just ended up staring in to space for two hours. But the good side of this is that tonight I should sleep pretty well. I've tried to stay up as late as I can (Lorien's not even home yet) so I don't wake up just as early tomorrow. Just had a couple of frozen burritos for a late dinner.
I also glued the silent switch back on to my iPhone. Stupid thing fell off when I was on the way home today. I very nearly superglued it down at the silent spot, a little dab of superglue sure goes a long way. But I switched it back and forth a few times as it continued to dry and it seems pretty good now.
In these past few days I've managed to get in touch with a few people I haven't seen nor heard from in years. Of course, not many people have had to track me down. I'm quite easy to find online. Perhaps that's not a good thing. Well, if I can't get famous, there's always infamy to consider…
I've heard a lot of noise about WolframAlpha in the last two days.
Given that they haven't figured this out yet, I'm still on the fence…
My youngest sister Betsy just had her second baby. Zoe Gabriella was born about 20 minutes ago, weighed 8 pounds 6 ounces and was 21 inches long. She has lots of light hair. Sounds like she looks like her mom and her grandma.
I think this is the 8th niece/nephew of mine. If you count step-brothers and sisters it's 12 or so. I'm starting to have a hard time keeping track…
It's a good Firefly-themed name, though I doubt it was intentional.
Happy Volcano Day to everyone that was nearby when Mt. St. Helens blew. Can you believe it was 29 years ago??
I'd like to find a good book (or website/reference material etc) on AI programming for game development. There are a lot out there though. I'd like to hear from someone that uses it. Specifically, this post is targeted at Ben 
Or Richard, if he comes around here.
Any suggestions?
I just called Whirlpool to check on the status of my new refrigerator—it's delayed again. Honestly, it's what I expected to happen. I have such bad luck with things like this. I placed the order on the 6th, and now it won't be available for pickup until at least the 29th. This is such a good deal though, I know it's worth the wait. It's just a tough wait when you have no refrigerator.
Anybody else notice the similarities between this and this?
Creepy!
I had a dream last night that the new refrigerator I ordered was 68.5 inches wide instead of tall. I was in a panic, but all it would really mean is I'd have to move the fishtank over a little ways. Besides, they don't make home refrigerators that big. It was a silly dream. See what happens when you live without a fridge for so long?
PS The Whirlpool distributor should have my refrigerator in stock on Tuesday.
- Heading out to the car to clean it out quickly and get on the road to Seattle. #
- Just got to Seattle. Parked right in front of Uwajimaya. Awesome #
- Got all the 金庸 books in the series that I was missing. So happy! #
- Now waiting for Ben to show up at the Secret Garden Bookstore in Seattle #
- The Secret Garden Bookstore in Seattle. Tamora Pierce is signing books tonight. Drove 325 miles one way http://twitpic.com/50fts #
- Spotted in Uwajimaya. Food FAIL! http://twitpic.com/50fve #
- 金庸 series I have all of now: http://twitpic.com/50fzj #
- More and more people are showing up. I made a strategic retreat to the other side of the store #
- There are tons of teenage girls mobbing the store now. This must be what it's like to be @rikkisimons at an anime convention #
- Filling up in Ellensburg #
- Just got home. Somehow dodged all the road hallucinations safely. Need sleep badly, but wife is happy with all her books signed #
- Unpacking and getting ready for work. 6 hours of sleep is about all I can ever ask for. #
- Still so happy I got all the books I was missing at Seattle's Kinokuniya bookstore (they have a respectable Chinese book section!) #
- Had a RAID storage device lose a drive today. Down one 10k RPM 300GB SCSI drive. Over $300 to replace. *sigh* #
- Off to play Pandemic! woohoo! Work day is over!! #
- Sitting at the Roosevelt Inn B&B. Not hungry, but nearly falling asleep #
- Been working all day on getting parts for a server and have put NO time in to my normal projects. *sigh* #
- Wrapping up, getting the heck out of the office. Still tired. #
- Got to speak Mandarin for about 20 minutes today, it was awesome! #
- Sweet! Another #wootoff! #
- It's been a frustrating day today. Nothing seems to be making sense #
- Note to self: don't nest queries with the MySQL C API #
- Special 1000th Tweet update! Full of 4-digit goodness! w00t! #
- Wrapping up at work. Time for leftover pizza with Lorien! Yay pizza! #
- Lorien is watching Fruits Basket...again #
- Just bought bacon salt at the @wootoff Awesome!! #
- Watching My Name is Earl. This one's a bit ruder than normal
# - Just bought some soap from @geekyclean! #
- Sharing cookie-baking secrets with Nigel. He loves the cookies I brought in to the office #
- Bought a bag of "Random Crap" at the @wootoff #
- Sometimes a new TV is in the bag... #
- *sigh* my Random Crap disappeared from my purchase history. Guess the @wootoff isn't perfect... #
- Off to IHOP for a late dinner! #
- Just caught two kids making out I'm a car in the IHOP parking lot (it closes at 10pm). Parked next to them and ruined the mood. I'm so mean #
- Hehe, I'm such an old man... #
- Dinner has been moved to Shari's, mainly to avoid the weirdo crowd that seems to hang out at Denny's late at night #
- Of course they sat us right next to the loud weirdo teen gang, the irony is harsh #
- Much less happy with TwitterFon now that it has ads. Perhaps there's a non-free version now that doesn't. #
- Goodbye, TwitterFon. You were great before you had ads. Hello, Tweetie! #
- Sneaking around the house quietly so I don't wake Lorien #
- Wife's still asleep. It's nearly 10am. Must give her a break, though. She's been watching the B&B for the past week #
- Just started up a batch of sourdough bread. Since my fridge is dead my starter has been at room temperature, so the timing's good #
- Sourdough is now rising #
- Catching up on Make: Magazine podcast #
- Having barbecue at some friends. Allergies are acting up #
- Neighbors at the BBQ have creepy goats and tons of wood http://yfrog.com/5elcvj #
Lorien just called and wants to have dinner in Coeur d'Alene. We're going to the IHOP for some late-evening dinner. Lunch today was huge, and I haven't been very hungry since.
PS. IHOP closes at 10pm here. When I pulled in to the parking lot, I noticed two kids making out in one of the cars, so I made sure I parked head-on to them and ruined the mood. I'm such an mean old man!
My transcode didn't work. I get random black frames, possibly from compressing all the video (172 minutes) on to one DVD. Yeah, I know, I shouldn't have done it, but VCD is a lower quality, I should be able to fit that much on a DVD.
I also got a call today about my wireless Internet connection. After over a month of going back and forth (and paying for a site survey), Imbris doesn't want to go through with it because they have too many "problems." Disappointing, but I have a couple of other options. I'm sick of overpaying for a terminally (hehe) slow DSL connection.
It's been a heck of a week! I spent most of my time yesterday and today tracking down an obscure error in the way I was using the MySQL C API. It was a random memory overwrite and was a real bugger to track. On top of that, a completely separate program that I have nothing to do with was failing and making it look like my program was still broken!
I've had a real tough time dealing with my Dell corporate reps, too. Usually they're great, but this week for some reason has been a great challenge.
On a nicer side, I've just finished transcoding the first four episodes of a Taiwan production of 笑傲江湖 from old VCDs to a DVD. I even had the chance to speak Mandarin twice this week! Once in Seattle buying the final 金庸 books that I was missing, and once on Wednesday; there's a woman from mainland China that works for the other company we share building space with. I don't see her very often, but it's really great to brush up once in a while. Lorien and I had lunch at Qdoba today and talked about how lucky I am that in all these years I haven't forgotten my second language.
And I'm still on the fence about seeing Cinematic Titanic in Portland. It's a six hour drive and my mom and sister are both in Virginia Beach with my other sister.
Well that about wraps up my week. It's going to take all weekend to wind down. Tomorrow we have a barbecue and a dinner party to go to!
Are you tired of all those pictures of fuzzy kittens and bad spelling? Take a break and visit Яolcats. From Eastern Bloc nations straight to your kitteh-loving heart.
In case you don't know about this, now you will. And it will ruin all future road trips. Once you know about them, you'll see them all the time.
For some strange reason, there are a number of people that have a fear of stopping to relieve themselves while on the freeway. So they use a bottle. While they're driving. And since it's really gross to have a jug o' pee sitting around in your car, they then throw them out the window. Unbelievably, this happens all the time. Seriously, look at the sides of the road next time you're on a freeway.
To help raise awareness, the State of Washington has these plastered in the rest areas:
My problem with the whole thing is they're missing their target audience—those are the guys that aren't stopping at the rest areas in the first place!
PS: Ewww!
I ran across this on Monday while in Seattle and just had to get a picture of it!
It's a yummy FAIL!