Zanthir's Body

Zanthir is #1 (Again)

2010-10-25T07:50:00.000-07:00

Not that big of a market, really. But still, it's nice to see Zanthir's Body back on top. Well, it's above the Halo & Lego guys anyways. I happen to have been using my Zanthir user account on the Ubuntu forums a lot lately. So that, as well as a random thread I opened and closed on the forums happen to appear above this blog. But, that's great, right? Results 1, 2, and 3 are all me for Zanthir.

The real question is though, if I go to a public library, where there is no user data about my preferences, etc., am I still the #1 Zanthir out there? I hope so. It's fun being #1 at something, even if it is something I invented.

Psychic Ball

2010-05-18T21:50:00.000-07:00

Backing off doesn't mean forgetting it completely.

Updates listed at http://psychicball.blogspot.com, and viewable at http://psychicballgame.com/Home.php.

Enjoy!

Poet/Philosopher

2010-05-15T11:39:00.000-07:00

When I was in sixth grade I wanted to be a philosopher when I grew up. Because I thought I really offered an enlightening perspective on the world. I thought I could really see thing from a helpful perspective.

The Devil Needs Love Too is a poem about seeing things from a different perspective. It expresses the philosophical idea that happiness and peace comes from accepting and loving all things, good and bad. Further that by loving, caring, and paying attention to what seems to be the problem, you can understand it, and it can metamophasize (that should be a word, don't you think?) into something that is no longer a problem.

I'm pretty egotistical, thinking I know things. Let's lay it out flat though. I haven't done any kind of formal experiments, but this is a philosophy. I'm not even saying I believe it all the time, but I like how it makes me feel when I read it, and when I think about it. This is my poet side, my emotional, loving, creatively expressing side. I think philosophy and poetry make a great pair.

Let me know what you think.

The Devil Needs Love Too

2010-05-15T11:34:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately, you can't just ignore the devil. If you do, he just gets meaner, and bigger, and angrier. Instead, you really need to pay attention to the him, understand his problems, love him, and let him know you care. Only then will he become restful, and you find peace.

Psychic Ball (Backing Off)/Updates!

2010-05-15T10:23:00.000-07:00

So, there is a demo screen up at Psychic Ball, and I'm trying to get a guest account up and running to play/collect some data this weekend. Check there to see if it's up and running!

I'll back off on the psychic ball thing from here I guess, now that is has its own blog here. Instead, from here, I'm going to re-vamp this site, update some of the general info (header, links, etc.) and try to redefine this blog's purpose.

I hope everyone likes the changes. Let me know with comments.

Psychic Ball

2010-05-08T18:44:00.000-07:00

Ok, here is the idea for this game: Psychic Ball.

Two players, red and blue, use their psychic abilities (real psychic abilities - not any in game simulation) to compete in an online battle.

Random number generators award points at random, and it is set up kind of like tennis, rally score, point score, game score, set score, to determine a winner (best 2/3 sets).

I want it to feel like a fighting game though. This is serious competition. Graphics will have some fighters that look like martial arts combatants from Virtua Fighter or something, as avatars for players. Also, I think I'll steal the ranking system from Virtua Fighter (also used in the board game Go) that goes from 10th to 1st Kyu, and then from 1st to 10th Dan. I think it's really fun to rank up in games, and fewer levels makes them more significant. I was thinking 23 levels total (since that's my favorite number) with maybe Master, Ascended Master, and Deity being the top three ranks.

From what I have read and heard about psychic abilities, some people should definitely be able to be better at this than others. Also, playing with a group focused on you winning should have an exponential affect on your ability to affect the randomness of the numbers being generated.

I had this idea originally when I took my first programming (or second) class in college, but I went for a poker simulation instead. I think I made the wrong choice. I was afraid of being made fun of or whatever, but there are a million poker simulations. There is only one (or, actually zero at this point) Psychic Ball.

Ok, I guess I need to get on the ball so that I beat the competition in terms of producing this game. I am really interested in keeping statistics on this game so a nice database server up and running to track player stats etc is really important to me. But, not to brag or anything (actually, exactly to brag), I am really good at database design, so this should be no problem.

If you are a talented writer, artist, designer, business person, psychologist (psychology are good at statistics and studies, so could help me determine what is relevant data), or anyone, and have some ideas and would like to contribute, please contact me by leaving a comment. I can use all the help I can get. (I'm kind of busy with work lately - at least I have a job.)

The truth is, Ryan and I have talked at length about making a game, but Ryan things psychic abilities are hogwash so is extremely reluctant to contribute or support me in this. Which is really discouraging. But when I think about it, and plan it, and start sketching and designing ideas, screen shot thumbs, databases, etc. I get totally psyched up and jazzed about the whole thing, so I think I'm going to focus on this as my primary creative project for a while.

I really need to focus on one thing, too. Too many times have I focused on an idea just for a few moments, and even though its a fabulous one, let it fade into history forever. This one is different though. I know because its been at the back of my mind since early in college. I haven't seen anyone else perusing anything like it. Ryan discourages me. Yet, I still am totally passionate and excited about it.

If you support me in this endeavor, leave your support in the form of a comment as well. That would be very helpful.

Wish me the best of luck. I hope I can get something cool up and running very fast. I advertise that I am an agile developer, so this is a test of my abilities to deliver my quickly changing design requirements. I'll build a prototype fast, get it up and running for demonstration, and go from there.

Lots of love to all my readers,
Zanthir

OpenSolaris

2010-05-08T18:40:00.001-07:00

I just installed OpenSolaris on a new "budget conscious" (read "cheap") machine I built. I took my a while to figure out I needed to uninstall the default network (nge) driver and install a new network driver.

Sorry, I had some trouble getting it online. (If I want to be popular - i.e. number 1 search result, I should speak in layman's terms!) But I'm up and running now.

I want to do a bunch of cool stuff on it, like host a database, and host a game I plan on making.

The game is going to be Psychic Ball. I need to figure out what I need to do to secure rights to the name, etc. (I know, it's pretty stupid to be writing about it online, but I tend to be a fly by the seat of my pants, reckless, kind of guy.) Anyways, I want to get a game server up and running to host databases etc. for that game on this machine.

Zanthir's Body Drops to #2!

2010-05-08T18:31:00.001-07:00

I'm furious. Zanthir's Body dropped to the number two result. No wait~! I just checked! #3! I'm so mad. I have to do some research on how to boost my search results! I need to be Zanthir!

Any tips? I enjoyed my stay at the top so breifly... oh, *sigh* what can I do?

Someone told me links, I need registered websites to link to this website...

Hm...

I can link to those... does that help?

Here is Zanthir the Lego Dude, and here is Zanthir the Halo Dude.

/shrug

I don't know what to do... maybe respond to those who post comments, spam my Facebook friends to visit here. I guess in need to buck up and advertise my stuff while it's still near the top.

I need to get my $hit together!

Ok, let's go!

Zanthir's Body is the #1 search result for "zanthir" on Google!

2009-07-06T11:16:00.001-07:00

*Applaud*

Happy, happy. Joy, joy. Good job everyone. I couldn't have done it without you.

I'm curious how this happened. I thought this blog was totally neglected and forgotten about. But apparently it is the thing Google suspects people want most when searching for "Zanthir."

That's awesome. I'm so proud.

Zanthir was a name I made up. I was playing Rivers of Mud (ROM) way back around 2000, and I needed a name for a new character. I liked the idea the my brother Eldon had used to create an alphabet map that mapped vowels to other vowels, and consonants to other consonants. In this "language," Eldon became Arcim, which is really cool. Michael translated to Nodhear, which everyone pronounces "Nod, hear." I didn't like that. So I needed something else.

"Z" names were very popular on ROM. Zump was the imp. Zog was an imm. And there were a few others I now fail to remember. After playing for a while, I came up with Zanthir. It used "R" for "L" which is as my brother did. It also kind of used vowel to vowel mapping, though h is not exactly a vowel. I was happy. I thought it was perfect.

So Zanthir was my mage. I liked the name so much I made him a brother, Zanthril. Zanthril was an elf their. When I logged on, I almost got banned instantly. Some imm (Islena :p I think) tried to ban me as soon as I logged on. She was SOO pissed. She thought I was the infamout Zantaril. Apparently he had a bad reputation. I never leveled up Zantaril.

One most famous feat performed by Zanthir was the killing of an Obsidian Guard (level 40+) while I was around level 12. I had been running around midgaard giddy with the ability to do ALL CAPS damage such as, "Zanthir's chilling touch ***DEVESTATES*** the beastly fido's chest." I thought I was amazing. So when someone was screaming on gossip (Rofsky? j/k), "help, an Obsidian Guard is hunting me, he's almost dead," I jumped into the fray, and with one or two spells finished him off. I was the luckiest little mage ever. I got like 600+ exp and fell in love with my combat magic abilities forever.

Anyways, that is a brief history of Zanthir, & where it came from. And now, this blog is what Google thinks best represents the word. I like that. :D

Later

The Price of Gas

2007-09-07T06:37:00.000-07:00

The price of gas is not paid in dollars. The price of gas is paid in tears. Tears for the earth as we poison her. Tears for her children as we kill them.

Another Sleepless Night

2007-06-29T07:18:00.000-07:00

Last night Carly and I played water pong. We're super dorks, yes. Water pong, we decided, is beer pong, with water instead of beer. Anyways, I had to go pee four times last night, in the middle of the night, and once this morning. And no, I didn't drink any more water after playing water pong. We played two games, and I lost both, so I drank 24 or 25 cups of water with about 3.6 ounces of water each (the amount with beer would be 12 oz. * 3 beers / 10 cups), so about 90 ( 25*3.6=25*(4-.4)=100-10=90 ) ounzes of water. You wouldn't drink this much in beer pong. You have a partner, and when you loose, you and your partner cycle out.

Anyways, last night I journaled a bit (hardcopy journalling, not blogging) and the energy I had, perhaps from the water, reminded me of the first sleepless night when I created this blog. I actually slept quite well, and long, so it wasn't a sleepless night at all, but I thought it made a good title. Last time I looked at the clock it was about 1:30pm. That's enough sleep for me. Well, it's off to work now. Bye bye.

P.S. I plan to be updating links to include all my web pages I manage, and some other like Grandma's Attic's blog. Enjoy!

A new found respect for pirates

2005-11-14T13:31:00.000-08:00

Today I was watching the travel channel and they were talking about gold. One topic was of the Inca civilization, their uses of gold, and the Spannish, and their theft of this gold. It made me sick to see the gold caked over the palace of King Phillip II depicting saints and christian scenes. But not all of the gold made it back to spain. Pirates intercepted many of those ships.

I applaud those pirates. They really stand for freedom. Isn't it interesting how the line between freedom and inprisonment is so fine? If you follow all of the laws, then you're a prisoner of the laws. If you live by your own laws alone, you could be taken prisoner by the authority in power. I believe this is a paradox. So, hurray for the pirates, who lived by their own laws, played by thier own rules, and gave the Spannish a little bit of their own medicine when they were taking so much from people who could hardly fight back.

Semi-Annual Post

2005-11-07T17:13:00.000-08:00

So, I stumbled across the email account my comments get posted to and thought I was being spammed or something. It was the 16 comments that have accumulated on my last post. Most of them seem to be advertising there own website or something, but it suprised me, as I was unaware of it as a method of advertising. They're nice though, people saying, "I like you blog" and stuff.

FRANCE TURNS WINE INTO FUEL? Yeah, read about it here:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/10/06/news/wine.php
Aparently some very fine wines are being turned into alcohol for fuel. This interests me mildly because I like wine and I'm taking a french class this term. I guess this is small news compared to the riots there (in france) that have been going on for eleven days now, though.

This is the first term I've been in college full time. I'm taking two math classes, french, and a design class. I met a fellow math major today (sophomore) and amusingly they were taking some of my favorite math classes that I have taken, multivariable calculus and linear algebra. I like them mostly because they deal with 3D concept images, which seem to have more substance for me. I have taken more math than most freshmen. This will actually be the fourth year for me here at Western Oregon University, I started while I was still in high school and this will be my first term going full time.

One more thing, here's a kitty for you.

On a Winning Streak

2005-02-28T12:28:00.000-08:00

Last weekend, February 18^th through 20^th, Meli and I each won a family poker game, me at my sister Rebbi's house, and Meli at my house. That weekend between I won a seventy-two dollar first prize and Meli won a fourty-five dollar first prize for a combined cash total of one hundred and seventeen dollars. I was so excited, and last week I was going to post about that, but didn't finish writing and now I have more to say.

This Friday, February 25^th Rebbi and Brad, Rebbi's husband, had another poker night, with two games, one starting at 6:00 and one at 10:00, and I won the first game. By the time it was over, all but Niva, who came in second place, and I were playing in the second game. Niva and I were content to just watch this one. I won three dollars more that night than I won the week before. To celebrate I bought Melissa and myself breakfast at little breakfast diner Saturday, and later that night we sharred tea and espresso cake with a friend at our favorite cafe, the Dragonfly Coffee Company. It's funny, I say I do certain things with my winnings, like save it, or pay bills, but instead I end up spending my winnings celebrating that I won, and having a generally good time in the process, which is okay with me. I'll just keep my day job to pay bills and save up, for now. I feel proud of winning at Rebbi and Brad's House twice in a row, because to me it says that I have the skills to turn a little luck into a winning night.

Happy Valentines Day!

2005-02-16T15:59:00.000-08:00

Valentines day has just passed, and I had a good one. Meli and I went out and saw a romantic movie in the theatre. Meli bought me chocolates. I bought her a burrito. These weren't just any chocolates and burrito though, it was a very fine assortment of luxurious truffles, and a delicious, fresh, grilled, veggie burrito. Afterwards we went home and watched Extreme Makeover: Home Edition and played some Katamari Damacy while snuggling on the couch, sipping hot tea, and nibbling on those rich assorted truffles.

There are things that we need and there are things that we want. In the realm of the latter, Meli has been bringing to my attention a certain butterfly necklace for a few weeks now. Meli says things like, "this necklace is so beautiful, don't you think it would look so good on me?" and "Look! It's only $69.⁹⁹! That's so cheap. Don't you want to buy it for me right now?" When she first mentioned it to me I really wanted to order it right away. I would honestly love to , but I can't afford it right now. She knows this and understands that I didn't buy her anything extravagant for Valentines Day. We still had a very romantic evening, with lots of hugs, snuggles, and kisses to celebrate the holiday. I hope you had a lovely valentines day as well.

Happy Birthday to Me!

2005-02-09T14:34:00.000-08:00

Last thursday was my birthday, and it was a good one. Meli has been waiting to get me back. For her last birthday I suprised her big time, and she was looking to do the same to me. She succeeded. We planned a romantic dinner for eachother for the night of my birthday. As it was drawing closer, I suspected something was up, because the plans seemed to be set in stone. I asked, "are you sure you don't want to eat at 5:30 instead of 6:30?"

"No, no, no," she replied, shaking her head and smiling." I knew something was up, she had been sneaking around to make phone calls and asking me to leave the room often so she could have "privacy" durring discussions with others at work. I thought I knew what it was. I thought Meli's family, and Carly, our friend and co-worker, would suprise me by showing up, but I wasn't sure if it was going to be for dinner, or when I got home to celebrate after dinner.

Then it happened. Dinner time rolled around, we got in the car to drive to India Palace, our favorite restraunt, and Meli gets a mysterious phone call, "um, wrong number," she says, but I know what's going on, or so I think. As I open the door, I am suprised more that I could have imagined. Sitting at the far side of the restraunt are my family. It was so special to have them all celebrate me. Everyone who lived near was there, and I was in for another suprise, because my brother, Eldon, sister Rebi, and her husband Brad, were on their way, driving two hours to suprise me. Unfortunately they were late, but thay are some of my favorite people in this world, and I was exctatic to greet them

We had a wonderful night, after opening gifts we sang duets on Karaoke Revolution for the first time thanks to Melissa who bought me a second microphone for it. The very next night my siblings and our signifigant others all got together and played poker from evening until early morning, which is one of our favorite things to do. We make it a small tournament, usually with $5 or less to buy in, and set prizes for 1^st, 2^nd, and sometimes 3^rd place. The way we look at it, its hours of fun and cheaper than going out. I really love hanging out with them.

Amung the microphone and other girts I recieved the one I've spent the most time with is my Pearl Blue GBA SP that Meli gave me along with Final Fantasy I & II: Dawn of Souls in which I've finished playing through part one already. I've really enjoyed. One last gift that I've spent a lot of time with is Katamari Damacy which is the most simple, elegant, addicting, and hillarious game I've ever played. It is one game that people of all skill levels can learn and enjoy easily. Melissa's parents gave this to me, and I am so happy to finally have my own copy.

In reflection, this birthday was special in many ways. I've never had any kind of suprise party thrown in my honor ever until this day. I was so happy to see my family as we are often busy and don't get together very often. I just felt all warm and fuzzy to know that so many people were celebrating me this one time. Thinking about it I feel like I am floating on a cloud. It was the best birthday ever. Thank you everyone.

School is definately fun.

2005-01-25T10:19:00.000-08:00

This last weekend I was very concerned about writing an essay. Since high school ended (almost two years ago) I've only taken math and science classes to further my education until now. Needless to say, those math and science classes I took did not require any formal writing. So, for my writing class today a rough draft of our first essay was due, and I was very nervous. I feel great now though, because durring the class was an editing workshop, and I got very positive feedback about my essay. Not that I was in the most critical of audiences, but it felt uplifiting to hear that someone thought my ideas were really inspiring. I don't even know the name of the girl who read my essay, but her face seemed to light up when she started talking to me about the ideas. The only problem was I never really explained the main subject of my writing. That makes me feel good, because it won't be hard to find a place to put that in.

The next step is letting Meli's mom (Grandma from Grandma's Attic) have a hack at editing it. Meli insists that I do it, and I know it will be good for me, and since I got some good feedback today in class, I'll open myself up to whatever good ol' Grandma Rachel has to say about it. (I've heard when papers come her way, they leave soaking in red ink as if blood stained from a mortal wound.)

Honestly though, I'm having a great time and I look forward to what she has to say. I know that it will only increase the power of my expression to have a seasoned editor refining my document. I really could spend a lot of time improving the already great work I have (my, don't I have a bloated ego). So, hopefully I'll be mindful enough to tell you how it went after I let her have a hack at it. Also, please comment if you would like to see a post of my essay (probably not in this blog, but I could post it somewhere else) or just to say hi. Comments are fun. I promise.

School is Fun! (?)

2005-01-12T09:00:00.000-08:00

It's strange that I enjoy it so much. In the past I followed the trend of my peers in detesting school, tests, assignments and such. Now I get a new kind of enjoyment from it. I actually enjoy doing assignments. I excell at what I do.

Okay. Now I must admit I'm being two faced. I just had a heart to heart moment with myself. I'm being decietful to a degree. Decietful to you and me. I'm not communicating at a personal level with my writing professor. I am under the impression that responses from readings are due each day, but a little unsure. Unsure because I wasn't there when this was explained (if it is so). The first day I missed because I was a new student and began classes a couple days late. My first day responses were due from a reading. Yesterday (my second day at this class) responses were due again. I didn't have a response, I hadn't done the reading. I suspect both of these were assigned on the first day, but I'm unsure. I don't remember my professor assigning anything of that sort, but maybe I just didn't hear it. I haven't talked to my professor about it so I wouldn't know the answer. This is the result of letting fear control my actions. I know when I feel uneasy I need to talk to someone. I've finally decided to do that, and you're that somone.

Anyways, I have class tomorrow and I don't want to start a trend for myself. I've been in these kinds of situations before and I'm quick to freeze up and not do anything about it. Especially not tell anyone. I've gone months hoping no one notices that I'm hiding away from my emotions and assignments. God forbid anyone know I'm incompetent and can't understand directions or communicate with people. I'm preparing to break this old habit of mine. I'm being reborn as a masterful person. One who can easily talk with his professor about the miscommunication that has happened and remedy it.

Wow. That was big. I didn't even see it coming. I was going to tell you how much I enjoy my Computer Science class, but that was a pressing issue. I'll celebrate now by telling you of my successes. My classes overlap on tuesdays so I'm a half hour late to my CS lab. Testing each piece of my program as I went so I could easily catch any mistakes (which there were a few) I completed the lab elegantly and was one of the first few to complete. This morning in class we had a quiz. When asked to identify a few out of several errors I easily spotted and corrected (not just the few) all of them . There were a few of these kinds of questions and I made short work of them. I was the first one to finish. This made me beam with joy. I enjoy succeding. And I'm not rushing through any of this either. I'm taking my time being thurough. I work slowly and stedily. I am good at what I do.

Hello Mr. Governor!

2005-01-11T23:03:00.000-08:00

Today Governor Ted Kulongoski visited Dallas on a tour of local buisnisses and Grandma's Attic made the list. When he came, he entered through the back door and our entire staff greeted him. I was introduced as "the webmaster" of our webstore. He was immediately intrigued. He asked "can you show me how it works?"

Pleased that I had caught his attention I enthusiasticly replied, "Of Course!" He followed me back to the office. Embarassingly I had too much software running at the time to even load our homepage (winamp, photoimpact, hp picture viewer, msn messenger, a few web pages). Closing winamp freed up enough space that I could open our home page. I explained the process of creating an item for sale online.

"I want to buy something called wedding rings, how do I do that" he says. I show him our search engine and it finds six pages of results. He identifies what he wants, and says, "that's it, my wife has one of those." It happend to be one of ours. I explained how we own two pattern companies (Calico Hills Farm and Patti-Ann Publications) and that he had found a pattern by Calico Hills Farm. He wasn't very interested in patterns. "So, where do I buy the quilt?" He asked.

Some of us laughed, one of his associates said, "this is for the other people," meaning the ones who sew the quilt, not the collectors. That's a common misunderstanding about quilt shops. They don't sell quilts, just materials to make them. Anyways he seemed at least mildly intrigued. All this took place at my fire hawk workstation you might remember from an October post.

Next Ted was shown a world map with red pins stuck wherever we've shipped orders. We had just recieved our first order from Costa Rica today where coincidentally Mr. Kulongoski attended his son's wedding recently. He was very interested in the places we shipped to. "All of these are legitimate?" he asked. All but Nigeria, where a village of 200 seemed to want to attend a weekly sewing class. That's been a joke around the office for a while.

The whole day was very fun, everything seemed so exciting. It was all such a big deal. Reporters from a couple of state newspapers were asking people for names and job titles so hopefully we'll be in an article. I'm especially excited about the chance of my picture being in the paper. I do hope it is. I just had my hair cut, and I'm very photogenic by nature, so any pictures I'm sure will turn out fabulously (I'm so swollen with joy that I can't help but be conceited). I would be so happy. Aw, heck! I'm happy anyways. I just can't contain myself, I think, "if anything, this is worth posting about," so I post. I hope you enjoy the story. I know I do.

Supprise!

2005-01-10T11:11:00.000-08:00

Not for you, sorry. I was supprised by a comment in response to my last post. Here it is:

I was here. I read your blog on a regular basis and I enjoy it very much. I think these things get read by more people than post. I really do! Anyway, keep writing. The best way for a writer to improve is to keep doing it!

This suprised me. Of course who posted this is right about more people reading than posting. But what suprised me is the encouragment I've been given, and that you enjoy it. Not that I thought readers wouldn't enjoy it, I've been having fun writing, and write about things I like. Thank you for the feedback though. It's great to hear you enjoy reading what I write. Also when reading the last line I had to take a step back. I don't regularly consider myself a writer. When I think about being one, I like it. Thank you for the encouragment. Thank you for your witness of me.

Sign Below Please

2005-01-05T10:07:00.000-08:00

So I decided on monday to go to school. Tuesday I went to class. I have arranged a schedule that will allow me to take a couple of classes and still work full time. I'm taking a basic computer science class and also a writing class. It's perfectly in the center of my intrests in the sense that I know I'll enjoy using the skills I learn. It's not, though, in the sense that I'll be interested in any of the projects that I'll be assigned to do (unless by some miracle they are vague on the topics of assignment). I'm going to keep an open mind about it though. I'm happy to be in school again, and still have time for work. I'll keep you posted on how things go (and if I don't ask me "what don't you? You said you would.")

One last thing, I'd like you to post a comment below. Please, if all you say is "I was here," I'd appreciate it. I just want to know if anyone is actually reading or if I am talking to the wind. Either way, I probably won't stop. I really haven't done much to try to attract people here. Anyways, sign below, and have a good day.

Education of sorts

2005-01-03T23:45:00.000-08:00

Grandma's Attic is my workplace. The descriptions of a large portion of the inventory for sale on the web are mine. That, and the images to accompany them, are pretty much the whole of what I am in charge of at my job. I am not a great writer. I am enthusiastic at times, and I do have glimpses of greatness but my love is in other areas of creativity. Drawing, math, computer animation, photography: these are things I am more passionate about. In High School I studied computer aided drafting for three years, the third of which was not so much CAD but more animation. I wonder now if I could get copies of the finished renderings of my class projects. I would like that. It was in independant study class of sorts. At the end the year my teacher made a proposition: If I could solve a certain block puzzle I'd been working (unsuccessfully) on in under two minutes before the final, I could skip the last day of class. It was a good time (I figured it out). I would have loved to take a fourth year, but I didn't out of laziness. I'm dancing down memory lane because I've decided to go back to school. Take some classes that will serve me in enhancing my skills to do the things that I love. I'm not even sure what classes those will be or which specific things I love they will be enhancing, but I know that it is what I want. This is a good place to have discussion, I'm craving some kind of social intimacy. It even seems awkward to me, but I invite everyone to post comments to any and all of my posts. I'm honest and real, as much as I know how. My intent is to share my open heart and create from it. This is good for my intent.

Happy New Year!

2005-01-03T14:04:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year! In the spirit of New Year's Resolutions I've added a link to The Doctor Within to my favorite places in my sidebar. The thing I'm resolving to do this year that relates to The Doctor Within is drink more water. "Two liters is the intake necessary to maintain normal good health. If you want to get into anti-aging applications, intake goes up to THREE liters. Obviously this is something you'd have to work up to. But for maximum hydration of skin cells, three is the number." Most people know they should drink two liters a day, but few consider trying anything more than that. I'd like to start monitoring the amount of water I intake, and increase to be between two and three. I would be very excited to get up to three, but also I would be happy to at least get to two. I invite everyone to join me in my resolution as well as share about there own resolutions. Through this may my way make your way easier, and your way make my way easier.

Christmas Kitty!

2004-12-19T15:14:00.000-08:00

Meli and I are really excited about Christmas this year (which is less than 5 days away now). We did a lot of wrapping this weekend and only have a few small things to finish up, then we'll have all of our presents wrapped and ready to deliver. The really big suprises we're going to let Santa deliver himself on Christmas Eve. Other than those select items we'll deliver them to under the trees in each of our homes some time this week.

Clea, my kitty, is getting excited too. Lately she gets these chills that make a shiver go down her spin. Then she claws into the carpet, getting ready for take off, and BLAM! She runs like a streak of lightning down the hallway. Other times she'll be real cute, (like she is in this photo) roll over and meow as if to say, "look, I'm being cute! Please pet me" And I do pet her, because she is soo cute! And she loves to be pet. She likes it so much that you really just have to hold your hand out and she'll pet herself. Don't you just love that? Anyways, I hope you have a great week leading up to Christmas, and I hope Santa leaves you many excellent presents under your tree.

(Edit: Meli was upset that I didn't mention it was her idea to put the hat on Clea and that she is the one who actually took the picture. So there you go, thanks to the creative genius of Meli you have this beautiful image of my kitty wearing a hat to fuel your Christmas Spirit).

Oh Christmas Tree

2004-12-15T11:08:00.000-08:00

I find myself checking my own page to see if it's been updated. Silly me! I'm updating mostly because I'd really like to see my site updated again. I'll have to thank myself fot the update after this. Oh look! Shiny.

This is the tree that Meli and I purchased together. We were driving around about a week ago and decided it would be fun to have a tree. We bought it from some guy working out of a tiny little trailer. It was marked 29 dollars but they took 26 (that's all we had on us). We strung six strands of lights around the tree (which stands about four feet tall) and hung about eight boxes of colored glass ball ornaments from its branches. It looks so beautiful as it sits on a perfectly sized table in Meli's parents living room. We planned on putting it in Meli's bedroom, but it seemed like a better fit to put it in the living room where everyone could enjoy it (also we convinced her mom to reimburce us). Wait! Meli got all of that reimburcement money! There's a score to settle now. Anyways doesn't it look lovely decorated so extravagantly? We had some problems with the lights at first, but after seperating the strands so they aren't piggy-backing the current from eachother and replacing some fuses it's been great. Also I carefully threaded the lights through the points of the star so that it light up brilliantly at the top. Meli and I had so much fun decorating it, and we plan to have just as much fun piling the presents under it. We're having a really great holiday season. I hope you are too.

Mindless Update

2004-12-13T14:37:00.000-08:00

Just thought I'd say, "the anniversary party went great!" More people than expected showed up, much to the delight of the celebrated couple. I took several group pictures of kids and spouses, grand kids and spouses, and great grand children who are too young to have spouses. I was actually able to touch up, crop, enhance, and print these photos before the party was even over. It was quite fun.

Now that that's over, the real reason I'm posting is to share this short quiz with you. I was at work when I came across this (while browsing homokaasu.org/doses) and got a kick out of it. I'm not one to forward chain emails, or any emails, and am actually annoyed when someone forwards some mindless thing to me that has twenty other peoples names in the adress line, but I really got a kick out of this, and think you might too. Have fun!

50th Wedding Anniversary

2004-12-10T11:38:00.000-08:00

Meli's grandparents are having their 50th wedding anniversary celibration this weekend and I've been asked to video tape the whole thing. I'm pretty excited! We've been getting ready here at Grandma's Attic all week: hanging antique wedding quilts, moving tables, draping banners, and more! Pretty isn't strong enough. I'm very excited. Today I met Meli's great aunt and uncle. They drive a Toyota Prius. Meli and I love this car. I helped my brother buy one recently. He got the bare minimum in options. Meli's aunt and uncle though, they got the upgraded version with the smart key and navigation system. It's sooo cool. You don't even need to take the key out of your pocket, ever! (Unless you want to change pants etc.) It locks when you walk away, and unlocks when you return. If you are inside the car, you don't have to insert it into the dash, just push the power button to start! Check out the interior to see what I'm talking about (click and drag on the screen to change camera angles). It's so much fun. Meli says, "The Prius is the first car that I'm going to buy with my own money!" I would love to have one too. They're so dreamy. Oh yeah, it's a hybrid too. It's my favorite. Anyways I just had to get my excitement out in the open. Also I've had a personal request for more updates, so this'll help with that too!

More on Elves and Geekery

2004-12-08T14:32:00.000-08:00

I've always been attracted to elves. I like to play elves in RPGs, and have always been a fan of elves in Magic the Gathering (a card game). In the spirit of geekery I do anticipate the PC game "Dungeons and Dragons" a MMORPG. I have played many of hours of text based online MMORPG type games called MUDs, or multi user domains. Especially when I was in middle school and early high school it was one of my favorite hobbies. Sadly few people whom I physically socialized with found this as exciting as me, so I did some Star Wars D&D style RPGs (you know with pencil and paper etc.), and CCGs. When that got old I picked up MTG which I played in elementary school using my older siblings cards. This time I bought my own cards. Recently I was reminded of these hobbies of my past when I stumbled onto this article) from The Wave Magazine. It seems I have had four of the top ten "dorkiest" hobbies: CCGs, RPGs, Star Wars, and MMORPGs. Okay they only mentioned Everquest, not all MMORPGs, so I guess it's only 3.

I have three of ten. Any one of these is considered hugely humiliating and damaging to one's social life. I haven't felt the impact. Geeks rule anyways. Lately I've seen much publicity for geeks so I feel it is safe to reveal myself. I am a geek.

Christmas Elves

2004-12-08T09:50:00.000-08:00

This year for Christmas Meli and I are being elves. When I told a coworker about this she said "you mean you're buying everyone gifts or you're hand gifts out?" I said, "every night we go home to our little workshop and and hammer away at our little toys." She stared blankly at me a little, said, "okay . . ." and walked away without saying more. I was pleased at the state of confusion she left in. Satisfied with my mysterious aura I continued working.

Lately I've been shopping and working on gifts every night since December began. Mostly sewing projects. Its a recently aquired talent that I've found quite useful in creating delightful holiday gifts for family and friends. Blankets, pillows, and stuffed animals are on the list to complete. With over sixteen people on my list right now, and only seventeen days until Christmas, it'll be quite a feat to fill all the wishes I have of gifts to give. At one a day, I can succeed, and I have Meli cheering, inspiring, and supporting me every step of the way. As soon as I can I'm posting a profile style image of her on my sidebar but Hello has been cantankerous lately. Feels good to post here again, as it's been a while.

Battle of the Browsers!

2004-11-15T01:36:00.000-08:00

The question of which browser is the best has been the topic of some heated arguments over the last few years. Finally, the end all test of which browser truly is the best. A connect four tournament played across twelve boards at once, where the tokens you're connecting are your web browser's icon. I played tonight and had a lot of fun. It's annoying if your opponent takes a long time, but isn't that the same with every online board game? I think so. I won four games and lost one while I played, I think I just got lucky. I came in half way through each game. Click here to play Browser Wars!

In other news, Mario Power Tennis for Game Cube is quite fun. I played four years of tennis in high school, and this game reminded me of the fun times on the court. It's fun to those who are new to the game of tennis too! Melissa says "maybe when you teach me to play tennis I'll actually understand." The game plays like real tennis and has many additional special features and gimiks courts that are optional. I'm really involved and it's so easy to learn, even my parents could play (they're both over 50 and don't understand video games). Anyways, I've been having fun with games lately, I hope you do too!

Happy Halloween!

2004-10-27T08:20:00.000-07:00

Here are before and after shots of my pumpkin. Can you guess which is which? It was a monster that weighed at least one hundred and fifty punds, maybe two hundred (at that size they just eye ball it for sale price). It was difficult to handle, definately a two person job, and I'm a nineteen year old, six foot tall, two hundred pound young man. The pumpkin must have weighed about two hundred pounds. Even after carving it was quite a task for two.

A kind of blue (or orange) print

2004-10-25T18:06:00.000-07:00

Here's an idea of what a finished pumpkin with this design might look like. I also used this as a kind of blue print as I was carving.

Creativity at work

2004-10-25T18:05:00.000-07:00

I've decided to carve a pumpkin, and I came up with this design based on a drawing I did of my kitty Clea. She's so pretty. I had to omit a lot of detail, but I think it looks fabulous. Some friends thought it was a cougar, witch, and dragon. The cougar was the closest guess. Anyways I thought I'd post it. Now anyone can print this out pin it to your pumpkin, and carve this design. I etched the shapes with a knife, then removed the paper and carved all the way through. I'll post this in color and a finished photo of my pumpkin at night. Enjoy!

Not a wink.

2004-10-22T08:24:00.000-07:00

As anyone who's observent enough to look at the times of these posts can tell (assuming the time is relevant to my location) I didn't sleep much last night. At all to be exact. I had an espresso drink called "double torture" on my way home from Eugene last night. I left around 11:00 p.m. so it wasn't that late, but I thought I should be extra careful. The espresso drink had four shots of - you guessed it - espresso as well as chocolate milk and vanilla. It was torture unfortunately. Laying in bed listening to the rain for hours at a time until the sun finally started to rise. This is only the second time I've stayed up all night with caffene being the only possible explination. Last time was at least two, maybe three, years ago. Anyways, it's about that time, so I'm going to shower up and head to the office (the one you see below). This is going to be a long day.

Fire Hawk Workstation at Grandma's Attic

2004-10-22T04:43:00.000-07:00

Here's my little Cooper's Hawk above my computer at work. Isn't she cute?

My sister told me when she cleaned my window she couldn't get to all of it. I decided it was good enough when this hawk tried to fly through it.

2004-10-22T04:20:00.001-07:00

This bird decided to try to fly through my bedroom window one morning. It scared the shit out of me. I thought someone had hit my window with a baseball or something until I saw the lone feather floating in the air. Freaked out I ran outside to see if the bird was okay. It was unconscious breathing shallow quick breaths. I called Meli, my girlfriend, in panic and she reminded me that my dad is a veternarian. I rushed it to the animal hospital wrapped in a towel, and while waiting for my dad to see me, the bird decided to wake up. Not actually having any strength yet there was little resistance to being put in a cage. Later that day I tried to let it go as it was making the above pose at me from inside it's cage. Meli says "now I know why they call it being watched like a hawk." This is an immature Cooper's Hawk by the way. It couldn't fly that first day, it only tried to hop away, so I caught it, using a long sleeved shirt, leather gloves, and sun glasses so it wouldn't peck my eyes out. It was scarry for its size. It wouldn't drink water from a bowl and wouldn't eat any raw hamburger or chicken (it preys on small birds and rodents). I figured it would probably eat a mouse from the pet store, but it flew away on the second day. It seemed to still be injured, my dad says he thinks the tip of its wing is broken and not the "humerous" or something like that. He always uses medical terms that I don't have storage space for in my mind. It was pretty fun to be that close to a wild predator. Now that I think back I wish I would've marked it with something around a foot in case it flies around my house again. It did mark me however from when I tried to pick it up without glove on. It held on to my finger for just a few second and I was crying like a baby. I put it on a flaming background just for fun. I also rasterbated the picture and hung it above my computer at work. See homokaasu.org for more information on rasterbations etc.

My left eye, painted in acrylic paint by myself.

2004-10-22T03:56:00.000-07:00

I painted this durring a friends and family gathering in the spirit of "World Dream Camp 2004." I painted it on a binder in acrylic paints. It is my own left eye viewd through a mirror. Later I painted that mirror too. It was a good time.

My First Blog Post Ever

2004-10-22T03:34:00.000-07:00

This is exciting! A place on the web I can actually call my own? Hurrah! I'm really only doing this because I had too much coffee on my drive home tonight and I can't sleep now. At least I didn't fall asleep at the wheel though. That's always a plus. Well, this is really just a test for now. How is it? Just like all the other blogs, eh? I'll see if I can do something to make it look original. Watch and see (over the next several days).