Category: LiveJournal Archives

Well, I got enough of the web page done to call it a success and technically we could go live, but I never heard back from Craig about the status of the archiving he was doing before we go live. I sent him a message saying that we were all ready to go. I guess it’s possible he’ll push it out tonight, but either way, I’m not too concerened since I finished in time and that’s all that mattered to me.

I hate to admit it, but that jackhole on Macromedia’s forums was probably right about the menu system, so I’ve downloaded some suggested dreamweaver extensions that I am gonna play with in the next week or so. It looks like it may take a bit more effort with a much nicer end result.

So, yeah, between frantic ’bouts at coding the web page, I have been playing Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow. I haven’t talked about it at all, but it was pretty much the bad-assest game I’ve played in a while… I was wanting a third person stealth action game and damn did I get was I was asking for. I checked it out from Hastings and, well, I returned it 11 days late, but it was all worth it. Heck, apparently if you have a game checked out long enough, and don’t answer your phone, Hastings will send you a letter telling you that you still haven’t returned your rental, but if you bring it in with the letter, they’ll credit half of the late fees and a free rental. So even though I still ended up paying $4, I think it really paid off in the end. I definitely came out ahead.

If course I think its a good thing I finished the game because its warped my perception. I was at Target shopping around for a good container for my my milk at work and I passed the storeroom door. It was ajar and there were monitors in there hooked up to some cameras. My first instinct was to check the cameras, make sure I wasn’t on camera, slip through the door and find the darkest corner to crouch in and figure out my next move. Yeah. I had a lot of fun, but I’m glad I didn’t buy the original Splinter Cell at Hastings (they had it for only $10 used for Xbox).

I did pick up Love Don’t Cost A Thing since one of my favorite moves is Can’t Buy Me Love and I enjoyed Nick Cannon in Drumline. I’ll write on how I liked it tomorrow.

The web cam is on today,

Well, Space IV is done (that’s a class that monopolizes my lab, btw), so when I came in this morning, the lab was all but dead. There hasn’t been a call all morning. The lab attendant was even waiting outside the door when I opened the lab, so I didn’t even have to sit in there for 5-30 minutes. Now if I only had some cereal.

I fixed my menu vs. frames issue yesterday, no thanks to some orangutan who somehow learned to type on the Macromedia boards. All he was able to do was harrass me for using tools that I thought were, fast, easy, and efficient. He offered me a huge code to try and remedy the problem, but it wasn’t necesary. I think I wrote all this yesterday. It was a long day so I don’t remember.

Anyway, like I said, it’s quiet and I should be working on the web page since someone said it would be going live tomorrow. It should be pretty simple from this point on. If things go badly, I can work on it at home and scoop up some comp time.

Oooh Ooooh! 24 is on tonight. The episodes have actually been getting better and better as we close in on the end of the season. I’m going to be so sad when the season is over, but damn it’s been a good one. I went to the web site from the last couple episodes (www.sylviaimports.com) and while the actual web page was pretty damn lame, at least it announces that there will be a Season 4. Now I just have to get Seasons 1 and 3 (yeah, Season 2 was okay, but I’m not as excited about picking that one up).

I also want to look into getting the first and third Indiana Jones movies on DVD. I’m not so interested in getting the box set, as I’d be paying $55 and only watching 2 movies (as opposed to the Pink Panther set, which is only $50 and I’d watch all five movies!). I think I’m going to have to keep my eye on ebay and used DVD sources as I don’t really want the whole box set, just the first and last movie. I guess if I found the box set for cheap enough (I think it’d have to be half price), I might be convinced to pick it up.

Well, this has still been pretty un-prose quality rambling… just writing what’s been going on. In case it’s not obvious from everything I’ve written, yesterday was pretty much Hell around here, at least the first part of the day. I had three major things to get done (Rebuild a computer, process the lab attendant’s time sheets, and make headway on the web page) and I was completely prevented from working on them because I was dealing with lab issues all morning. The plotter was locking up at 78k on every file. Of course if a file was under 78k in the queue (remember, file size and print size are different), then it passed right through. If it was 78k or greater, it would just stop and cease printing. I finally got distracted long enough (3-5 minutes) to notice that it would eventually jump to a second filesize freeze. So I finally realized, it actually was processing and printing, it was just slower than anything I’d ever seen. I’m usually a pretty patient person when it comes to printing in that lab when its overbooked, but this was insane. Anyway, I think the best part of the morning, was when I was running out the door and tripped over the box fan and sent it spinning to the floor. It freaked me out, startled steve, and put a nice scrape on my shin. I slowed down a little after that, as did everything else. Today, even the halls are pretty empty. I love the second half of finals week.

TTYL

YAY!!! I’ve actually made some headway.

I finally figured out the menu issue that was plaguing me (no thanks to some online eliteist that posts on the Macromedia forums). And as opposed to his declaration of me needing some crazy 30k workaround, it only took somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 characters to fix the problem. So I say fuck you macromedia flamer, fuck you raw!

Anyway, I’m still WAY behind on this… tomorrow I think it’s gonna be headphone day, especially if Nick shows up.

Well. Here’s Heather, so I’m out of here.

so now that I’ve finally finished the four button version of the new SOVA page, and it’s live deadline has been publicly announced as the middle of next week, they’ve decided that it needs five buttons.

I guess my work load just got bigger.

So as expected, I ended up at the Advisory Board meeting. Interestingly
enough, I met, or at least was introduced to one of our faculty’s parents.

Its an interesting and admirable collection of people.

Dr. Davis’ speech is quite similar to the one he gives to the faculty &
staff at the beginning of each semester.

Ray sounds like he’s from the Northeast.

Choclear implants are apparently a huge pain in the ass. Moreso than a
normal hearing aid. At least for the other people around the user.

Kelly so takes after her mother.

Apparently the Dean’s search report was a unanimous decision and has been
submitted to the Provost. He has apparently recieved it. (muted chuckle)

The topic of collaboration continues to be a loud topic. The provost is a
very eloquent and entertaining speaker.

A new UNT art gallery in the Metroplex, very interesting. It will focus
entirely on UNT & SoVA artwork. It will even be located as a part of the
Dallas Art Community, right across from the Kimball.

Well, that would explain it, SoVA is 2/3 female, 1/3 male.

The SoVA space issue is apparently still active and alive in the president’s
agenda. Thats actually a relief to hear.

Some of the new boardmembers have a very “pie-in-the-sky” spunkiness that is
refreshing and yet somehow redundant (asking questions to issues that have
already been resolved).

The University Master Plan is apparently online. I’ll have to look into
that, it sounds interesting.

I’ve been here 2 hours already and have just now been needed. Sheesh. Now I
wonder how long I will be here.

As a result, I have recomended that Heather not donate any more money
to those forked tongued, guilt-tripping, hypocrites.

The rules:
Go to your 23rd entry back
Fifth line
Type it out in a new post.

Feel free to reply here with it as well.

I was watching Wil Wheaton on the Screen Savers this weekend. It was a rerun of an episode last week, and he was talking about his blog and how he just tells stories on it. I started thinking how great it would be to write more, and more eloquently on my blog, but I find that most of the time my stories aren’t that interesting, or that my days do not really produce stories. I’m not politically or sociologically minded, so I can’t really do observational anecdotes either. I guess I’m just not enough of an intellectual to really make this journal worth reading. Well, at least not in the mass community that is. I’ve got 40 people that list me as their friend, which means there’s a possible 40 people, most close personal friends, that are reading this at any given time. I’d like to think that I could write something that had a bit of a wider appeal, but aside from branching out into fiction, which I’m not that good at, personally, I don’t really see what it’s going to be.

Wil’s lived a pretty special life and has made the best of it, whereas I’ve led a pretty average life, and stayed just on the up side of normality through most of it. I’m not bad off, in the grand scheme of things. I’ve married a wonderful woman whom I love to no end. We have our problems, but if I have to give up adventure for love with speedbumps, I’ll take love. I have an awesome house in a town that I think is great and only getting better. Sure, there are things I’d love to be doing to the house that we don’t have the money for, but its still the perfect house for us. There’s not a day that passes that I walk through the rooms and halls of that house and don’t feel happy and proud that it’s ours, that we are in the process of owning it, that it is our domain to do with as we please. I have (now) five animals with whom I share this personal space. All of which have their own unique personalities and quirks. They are all memorable and special in their own way and I wouldn’t give up any of them for a second, even though lots of people have tried to convince us to do so. I have a job that, while monotonus, stressful, and occasionally nearly unbearable, immerses me in an incredible, creative, artistic environment, where I feel very much at home. I have friends who work close with me and while a bit more money could make some of my dreams and desires come true, I’ve never gone hungry. In fact, I’ve gained weight, so I must be eating well. Sure, I’d like more money, I’d like more free time, I’d like more luxury, but I’m not living a bad life in the long run. Maybe it’s just not sparkly enough to be put into prose.

I think I will try to be more observational, I’ll try to be more thoughtful, I’ll try to be more insightful as I walk the walls of work and home, as I walk the roads of Denton. I will try to find the poetry and prose in the life I already have. There’s not telling what’s out there, waiting to be seen and remembered.

well. I got the initial code and design down for the rebuild of the overly “Flash-y” site done. If you’re interested you can check it out at http://www.art.unt.edu/new2. A lot of the links still go back to the old Flash based version, but I’m slowly replacing them. Its not to say that I don’t like Flash, I very much do like Flash. I just feel that in this case it was not very well done and was causing problems with our screen readers. It turned out that there were some simple work-arounds to get past the screen readers, but a few people, myself included, were not very fond of the navigation of the first version. My intent was to strip out the Flash and streamline the navigation. I feel I’ve done quite well at that. You can see the first version (the flash version) at http://www.art.unt.edu/new.

Anyway, the dogs are getting along better and better as the days pass. They’ve really taken to eachother quickly. I think that’s really good. The cats, on the other hand, have yet to figure out what do to with this new behemoth of a beast that has invaded their territory. Tashi, the first cat, has already decided that its her house, and no mangy mutt is going to keep her from roaming free. She doesn’t pay any mind to the dog, and runs away when he chases her, but otherwise, she’s unaffected. The other two however, are afraid to even leave the cat sactuary end of the house. So much so, that one litteraly exploded in a fountain of urine on the bed in the guest bedroom the other day. This is not the first time this has happened. When we first installed a “Cat-Flap” (that’s so fun to say, say it with me, cat-flap, cat-flap, catflap) in the door to the laundry room, where the cat “stuff” is (food, water, litter), one cat just didn’t understand the concept, so he never went, he finally just found release on the guest bed. Unfortunately, that was the week my parents were visiting. How embarassing.

To protect the cats, yet not restrict their freedom, we’ve installed a second cat-flap (teehee) in the door to the living half of the house (bedrooms and bathrooms) so we can keep that closed and create a barrier between the cat sanctuary and the free nation of canines. The cats can pass through, but the dogs have no access past the door. Unfortunately, I think the cats (or at least two of them) are still too scared to invade enemy territory, even though their life sustinance is at the opposite end of said realm. They’ll learn though. They gotta eat, right? What I don’t get is when the dogs are obviously outside or in their cages, the cats are still to afraid to go through. Pussies.

Anyway, as far as Ia and Knight, we pulled an old nylabone out of the back that we had saved for trips (it was a bit worn down, but not so much it wasn’t still safe) and now the dogs pretty much don’t have anything to fight over. They each have a bone, they each have places to sleep. We even fed them at the same time outside yesterday, and they were fine with it. Such good dogs.

I contacted Kathy Schaeffer about the Denton Dog Park project yesterday. Turns out the project is still in process, but the location has changed dramatically. Its now at the far south end of town, rather than the north end near us. So now it’ll be a drive to go out there rather than a brisk, longish walk. Its nice to know its still in progress though. She suspects it’ll be opening sometime next Spring.

Anyway, time to get back to some simple cut and paste coding. Maybe I can finish the top four pages today. Though, I was tempted to not come back today… hmm….

Shit, looks like software I gave up on years ago is the sollution to all my media problems.

Looks like its time to put Premier back on my computer. Too bad there’s not an Adobe Premier LE or Elements.