I’ve almost got my implementation of pMachine ready to go. I worked a bit on the templates and such and think I’ve just about got it set for prime time. I just need to figure out how to import my Greymatter entries in there and I’ll be set. After that, it’ll be a matter of importing things in, then messing around getting the uploaded images and whatnot to show up correctly.

This weekend was supposed to be relaxing, but I’m feeling pretty wiped out right now. Saturday we did our usual chores, but Sunday we actively did nothing. Jenn got kind of bored and ended up going grocery shopping, but I got a chance to watch a couple of the DVDs I’ve recently purchased and catch up on my Playstation time.

At the time, I thought it was kind of nice and rather interesting to be bored - I’m usually going so much or have so much on my mind that I don’t just get to sit down and relax. Looking back on it now, I realize that having nothing to do stresses me out. I can’t just sit and relax because I always have this nagging feeling that there’s something that has to be done.

To that effect, I woke up this morning totally wiped out, and I’m still dragging. I find that it takes me the two days of the weekend to get ready to unwind, then by the time the weekend is over, I’m finally getting decent sleep and would love to take the time to actually, truly unwind but it’s already time for work again. It’s a losing proposition.

I really need to replace the battery in my camera. Wouldn’t you know it, but as soon as the battery runs out on the damn thing, I end up finding buttloads of candidates for Traffic Asshole of the Week.

Speaking of cameras, I tried out this other camera that we have, the SiPix StyleCam Blink. It’s this tiny camera, similar to the camera that I use to take the Traffic Asshole pictures, the Che-ez Splash. I like the quality (if you can call it that) of the Che-ez camera better than the SiPix - the SiPix is really grainy while the Che-ez is smooth. I guess we’re talking the least of two evils, but for those in the market for an affordable, portable digital camera, I’d go with the Splash.

I got my new modem today, so I think I’ll go home and try installing that bad boy into my new computer. I still need to put the SCSI controller in, too, so I’ll do it all at the same time.

This is the first entry I’ve actually personally made in pMachine. I’ve finally gotten around to updating the templates on everything, and while there are several color-related CSS things I need to finish, I think I’ve got things pretty well taken care of. Now I just have to figure out how to import my stuff from Greymatter, and I’ll be good to go.

Today’s a hurry-up-and-wait sort of day. I’m supposed to get my product demo all compiled up and burned onto CDs for everyone, but I have one piece that I’m waiting to get from another guy and he’s having Visual SourceSafe problems, so I don’t think I’m going to make my 11:30a deadline.

Oh, just got another email. I guess it’s back up. Maybe I’ll make it after all.

In the meantime, I’ve got everything set to go, ready to burn the CDs and distribute this thing once all the pieces are in place. A nice close to a good project. At least I’m not running around frantically trying to get things to work.

At 12:30p I’ll be heading down to the semi-yearly coding “competition” they refer to as “Boot Camp” around here. Each time they have a different problem to solve and you get assigned to a team and your team has to come up with a program that solves it. Previous problems have included creating an online auction system and solving a business problem of your choice (your app had to be the “most used” at the end of two weeks to be the winner). This year it’s the “Puzzle Challenge” where we have to write an app that will solve… a puzzle of some nature. It’s a surprise, so I don’t know what it is yet. We’ll have eight hours to solve whatever it is. Should be fun.

Plus, you can win prizes for good coding. I plan on winning.

So I’m waiting. Waiting for the other guy to finish his part of the demo project. Waiting for 12:30 to roll around so I can go kick some coding ass. Generally waiting.

I think that’s hella better than scrambling around madly, don’t you?

Yesterday was packed chock-full of shit for me to do.

At 7:00a I had my usual once-every-four-weeks haircut. By 8:00a I was at the allergy doctor’s office getting my weekly round of allergy shots. 9:00a I got to work.

Got a lot done at work. I’m still working on the product demo, but it’s getting closer to the deadline and I’m almost done.

Okay, I just now got a sales call and I have to throw it in here because it was just dumb.

Sales Guy: Hi, my name’s Carl and I’m calling from [some web company I don’t recall the name of] and we’d like to build you up a web site and send you the URL to it so you can look at it and see what you think for 15 days. Me: You’d like to build us a web site? Carl: Yes, we would. Me: That’s interesting, Carl, but building web sites around here is my job. Thanks, though. Carl: We’re not looking to replace you or anything, we just want to build you an additional site. Me: Carl, why would we need another site? Carl: The more sites you have, the more people you reach. [Does this guy know what he’s talking about?] Me: Riiight. I don’t think so. Sorry. Carl: Are you sure? Even if you don’t use it, maybe you could get some ideas from it. Me: Somehow I’m thinking not. Thanks anyway, Carl. *click*

I hate sales calls.

Okay, back to yesterday.

At 3:00p the company had a cosmic bowling event I went to. It was hella fun, even though I don’t know half the people who showed up. (I’m not too social at work. Go figure.) I ended up bowling with Chris, our CTO, who, as it turns out, is a pretty cool guy on a social level. I think he was sharking me at bowling, though, because he’d bowl two or three gutterballs, then get like six strikes in a row. Huh.

They had a Monte Carlo bowling thing going for a while, too, and I won $25. Not bad for an afternoon at work, eh?

My average ended up around the 130 range and my high was 180. Can’t complain about that, except today my wrist is a little sore and my left ass cheek is killing me. (Get your mind out of the gutter [bad bowling pun not intended] - I’m a right-handed bowler, so I slide on my approach with my left leg.)

I was supposed to get together last night with Gerb, a friend of mine who I hardly saw when he was away at college and now I hardly see him and he only lives like 20 blocks away. We planned to get together like a week or so ago and then he ended up working late instead of coming over. I guess that’s just the way it goes.

Instead, I spent the evening networking the new computer to the old one and migrating documents and settings. I haven’t got the modem for the new computer yet so I had to run Internet Connection Sharing (sucky sucky) so the new one could download and install patches from Windows Update. That alone almost convinced me I need DSL or cable modem. There were like 80MB of patches and things to download, which means it’s probably still going. I know it was this morning. Bah.

I also settled in and watched my copy of The Matrix Reloaded in preparation for my viewing of The Matrix Revolutions next week on the company outing. After watching it for the second time (first time since the theater), I think it’s starting to grow on me a bit. You really can’t look at it from a standalone movie point of view; you have to look at it not only in its context in the trilogy, but also from a “what points are they making philosophically?” standpoint. Entertainment-wise… eh. But raw analysis? Very interesting. I definitely picked up on some stuff I didn’t catch the first time because I was too preoccupied with the suckiness factor.

It’s still not as good as it should have been.

Oh, and I’ve decided after researching it and talking to some folks that I’m going to stop ripping my CDs in to 320kbps MP3 and instead use 256kbps AAC/M4A. It’ll save some room on the ol’ iPod without really giving up much in the way of quality, and that’s the happy medium I’m going for. Am I re-ripping my existing stuff? Probably. I haven’t really ripped too many of my CDs anyway. Ideally I could rip them all into a digital, lossless format and then have a conversion program that encodes them into whatever format of the day I’m using. But I don’t have a terabyte drive to store all the originals on, so screw it. 256kbps AAC it is.

I was just looking at this guy’s blog when I noticed something happening, and it was so subtle at first that it sort of took me by surprise.

As you sit there reading it, the entire site changes its colors. Slowly, but constantly. Watch for it. It’s pretty messed up.