B-ball Played ball today w/ a bunch of peeps at Egan gym. Most notably Jeremy Lin who is the starting PG for Paly varsity and is being recruited by the likes of Stanford and Princeton. He is very good.

Things to work on:

- pretty much everything. Seeing someone who really knows how to play the game allows me to introspectively analyze my own tendencies. It really is all about fundamentals, which allow for the occasional opportunities for flair.

I scored a bunch in the first game but then we got beasted on by Jeremy's team.  ¶ 11:48 PM 2 comments

  Windows Vista quick thoughts I got this working on vmware today, although I haven't gotten internet connectivity to my virtual machine.

- UI is very clean and looks good, even tho I'm only running Aero and not Glass. Nice new fonts, clearer icons.

- Virtual folders. Basically they keep track of all your data, no matter where the data is located physically on the computer.

- Better search capability, although so far I can only search through user files.

- Metadata is much easier to add. No more right-click > properties. The form shows up at the bottom of the window and you can add info very quickly.

Hopefully more goodies in Beta 2. But the basics are all there and functioning. IE7 is still crap tho.  ¶ 6:37 PM 0 comments

  New Love Dell 2405FPW LCD monitor. It's huge and pretty. One pleasant surprise is the 4 USB port hub and the 9 in 1 flash memory card reader. It frees up a bunch of USB connections and remedies the fact that my ATC-110 case doesn't have any front-end USB ports. Transferring mp3's to my phone just became a lot faster, I can bypass the RealPlayer crap.

So that's a major upgrade to my rig. DVD's don't look as sharp at 1920x1200 but the WMV HD clips I downloaded look amazing. HD DVD is the future. I don't have the video card to play games at such high res yet, I figure I'll wait a couple years until the computer sector catches up with PS3. My bud is going to get dual 24", which is more hardcore but I'm satisfied. Ken you can finally have your Sony Trinitron back. Won't be buying much else this month, aside from clothes on 8/5.

I also have my eye on the Logitech Z-5500 speaker setup, mainly because the control center unit is really sleek. I'd have to get an Audigy X-Fi card to complement it though, and that soundcard isn't even released yet.

Aside from that I've been playing with VMware Workstation since employees get it for free. Going to try loading Red Hat ES 3.0 and Vista Beta 1 on it. IE7 beta is crap, broke trillian, firefox still beats it in all areas. Including memory footprint and page loading speed. Updated my phone with the latest firmware- much better memory management, I gained around 5 mb. I added the select network hack which allows me to select from Cingular Orange or Cingular Blue (AT&T) networks. Haven't tried the bluetooth DUN yet, need to get a BT dongle for my laptop.  ¶ 7:51 PM 1 comments

  July 20 I've been much more productive doing my reading in the middle of the night. Been falling asleep in the evening then waking up in the middle of the night. I have nothing to do but read docs and I'm a night owl.

Played basketball last week and have progressing well. I found some drills to practice and they really do help with reaction time. Can't wait to test them out this Sunday.

I have also been reading some graphic novels (!!!) because they are fun and pass the time. Recently made a huge purchase that will force me to budget myself for the remainder of the month.  ¶ 2:11 AM 2 comments

  1997 - wow has it been that long? While cleaning my room, found a letter that I wrote myself back in the 12th grade. Just one of those little AP Psychology assignments. Fragments of the way we were.

Back then I was worrying about what colleges I would get into and about the psych quiz that I hadn't studied for ...

Got me into a reflective mood. I'm keeping it but all the other junk goes.  ¶ 12:32 PM 1 comments

  Argh I finished 25 episodes of LOST in 3 days. Too many damn cliffhangers, many questions to be answered. Now I gotta wait till the next season to get my fix. Cool show tho, makes me want to head to Hawaii then soak in the sun all day. Then make a fort and hunt wild boar and woot woot!

I was also thinking about how useless the computer scientist would be on the island. The doctor of course is the stud, cuz everyone needs him. But even the construction worker or the fisherman is very valuable to the group.

Even an electrical engineer is pretty useful. Assuming there electrical components that he can engineer things with. But a CS guy? "err... let me program up some ... uh... food." :p

I guess he could be the quick thinker that figures out efficient algorithms for doing ... stuff?

Anyways my computer is on the fritz. NB fan is dead and I'm going to modify a Zalman hsf to replace it. Plus the video card is near dead and annoying the hell out of me.  ¶ 2:18 PM 0 comments

  Something to keep me busy .... 25 episodes of Lost. Just started tonight after a good day's work. Very compelling so far. The lead female character is a cutie too.

If I didn't have work tomorrow I'd watch all 25 in a row. :)  ¶ 12:36 AM 0 comments

  War of the Worlds Saw this one yesterday. It's not a typical movie at all ... character development is minor, the major focus seems to be on the fear and tension caused by our new neighbors.
The movie succeeds wildly in that respect. The action scenes are incredible, eschewing the typical framed bluescreen effects setpiece. Instead, ILM has seamlessly integrated their effects into the background plates, even in the midst of a shaky handheld cam. This combined with bleached process they put into the film gives it a documentary feel. The compositing and match-moving is outstanding, nothing looks out of place. Not even the huge 100 foot tripod!

I'm much more impressed with this type of visual effect, contrasted to Revenge of the Sith which was largely an animated movie with the amount of shots that were 90% CG. Dennis Muren should be taking home another statue come Oscar time.

The first act is a showstopper. The imagery is stunning. Very reminiscent of 9-11 disaster footage. I love the shot of the freeway getting blown apart, great design and execution.

After 40 minutes, the film slows down. A lot people dislike the third act of the film, but I'm okay with it. It doesn't match the tension of the first act but it's not terrible either. I'll probably get the DVD for the visuals and sound design alone.  ¶ 7:32 AM 0 comments