What I'm Doing

Friday, October 26, 2007

Name Ideas Needed

Okay, I'm having a hard time coming up with a new name to use in Steam-related games (Half-Life 2 Deathmatch, Team Fortress 2, etc.). It appears, due to the profiles page in Steam, that this is likely to be something more-or-less permanent, so it needs to be something good. My usual online name, 'coderforchrist,' just doesn't seem to fit in the DeathMatch world (actually, I logged in with that name to a IRC channel recently and, without me even saying a word, a flame war erupted...).

I've been using 'Dr. Tran,' from this video (language NSFW) lately, but I'd rather have something perhaps more original. I've had a few ideas of my own, but I want to see if my few readers can come up with some good ones I haven't thought of. So, what do you think?

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Rain!

Hooray! It's raining! More than that, it's been raining the past couple days. Yesterday, we had a good, strong rain for a while, then it let up and has come and gone.

This is exciting for me. We've been in a severe drought for a while, now. Our water resources are near drying up. Granted, we need quite a bit more than a day or two of rain to get us out of this, but what we've had the past couple days certainly will help.

Thank God for the rain. I hope He continues to send it.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

What Kind of Reader Am I?

Well, wezlo posted his results, so I decided to give it a go of my own:

What Kind of Reader Are You?
Your Result: Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm

You're probably in the final stages of a Ph.D. or otherwise finding a way to make your living out of reading. You are one of the literati. Other people's grammatical mistakes make you insane.

Literate Good Citizen

Dedicated Reader

Book Snob

Non-Reader

Fad Reader

What Kind of Reader Are You?
Create Your Own Quiz

I've got to say, in my case, this may not be terribly accurate. I mean, I answered the questions as honestly as I could, but I just don't read all that often. I do have a tendency to be working through multiple books at once (a habit I should, perhaps, cut back on, actually), and I do carry books around with me and read whenever I have a moment. However, that's usually the bulk of my reading time. When I get home, there's so many distractions (Kristen, video games, Internet, roommates, etc.) that I actually have very little "serious reading time." The downside is, most of the books I tend to read require more of the sustained concentration approach than the "grab a moment when it comes" approach.

Monday, October 15, 2007

New Apartment

With Kristen and me getting married in January, I needed to get my own place to live. Up until now, I've been living at a friend's house with some other roommates. However, I don't think that would be an ideal living situation for a married couple.

So, I got online, did a bit of research, talked to some friends, and this Saturday, Kristen and I went out to a nearby apartment complex and got an apartment. Well, we applied for the apartment and got approved. I don't sign for the lease until my move-in day (beginning of November). The one thing I didn't have on me was my 3 most recent paystubs, which I faxed to the girl at the desk today, so everything should be taken care of.

I did learn today that the maintenance crew may not have time to get the apartment ready for me by the move-in date, which may end up pushing the whole move-in process back a week. So, here's hoping that everything works out there.

I'm pretty excited, though, because, beyond finally getting my own place, this is something that I actually took initiative and did for myself. For most of my life, I've been a pretty passive person. One could say that life happens to me. I mean, I will do what I need to do, but usually I need a push—even to do things I want to do. Lately, though, I've been learning to take initiative. I didn't need anyone to tell me that I needed to get the apartment taken care of. I didn't need anyone to remind me to go fill out the application. I did it on my own initiative.

In other words, I guess I'm growing up.

Friday, October 12, 2007

Cold-Weather Clothes

I woke up today, and it was 45°F. Wow! Up until now, it's felt like summer would never end.

Of course, this means it's time to break out the cold-weather clothes. Long-sleeves, shoes, etc. The trick is figuring out which of my clothes fit me. I've been trying to lose some weight, and get back down to wearing a medium. However, what I found this morning was that it seems like some of my large shirts are too big, but my mediums are still too tight. I ended up putting on a t-shirt and my jacket, instead.

This got me thinking. I've started wearing t-shirts more again. I think they feel more comfortable than the "nice" button-up shirts. However, all of my long-sleeved shirts are either button-ups or sweaters, and it's not cold enough yet to warrant a sweater. Besides, I'd like to find something like what they have at ThinkGeek, only long-sleeved.

So, if anyone happens to know where I can find some cool long-sleeved t-shirts, let me know.

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Nintendo: WTF?

This past weekend, I finally decided to get a Nintendo DS. I've heard of a number of very cool-sounding games for it, and the dual-sceen (+touch-screen) format just sounds very cool. What I had forgotten about until after I bought it was that the DS has Wi-Fi capabilities. Sweet!

I have yet to try out the Wi-Fi connection (Phoenix Wright—a non-Wi-Fi game—has eaten up most of my play time). Even so, the thought has already occurred to me (and, apparently, to a lot of other people) that it would be awesome if the DS had a web browser.

In my fantasizing, the browser could be just a limited as the Opera-based browser on my cell-phone, and it would still be useful. If nothing else, navigating would be much more convenient with the DS's touch-screen as opposed to pushing buttons on my cell's keypad. Even with the additional limitation of requiring a Wi-Fi hotspot (as opposed to the cell phone's more available network), I would find this to be a wonderful convenience.

Certain that someone has figured out a way to do this, I took to the mighty Google, and, surprise, Nintendo and Opera are way ahead of me. Apparently, after producing the Opera browser that runs on the Wii, they released the "Nintendo DS Browser." My initial excitement was quickly shattered when I learned one thing: the browser costs $30.

$30? WTF?

First of all, the capabilities of this browser are, as expected, similar to my cell phone's, with the above-mentioned additional limitation of requiring a Wi-Fi connection. As I said above, that's not a huge deal to me, but, hey, my cell phone's browser cost me nothing. On my old RAZR V3, I downloaded the Opera browser for free. On my new RAZR V3xx, it came on the phone. Is $30 too much to pay for convenience? I'm leaning towards yes.

Secondly, compare the two Nintendo systems: Wii and DS. Browsing on the Wii is, best I can tell, a gimmick. I've tried it (Google Reader even has a special interface designed for the Wii browser), and it's a neat idea. However, after the novelty wears off, its easier to just browse on your PC. If someone, for some reason, has a Wii and a wireless network but doesn't have a PC, I can see this maybe being useful. But for those of us with a Wii and a PC, I can't see why anyone would seriously use the Wii browser.

On the other hand, as I said above, a browser on the DS could be a very useful addition to its functionality. Mobile browsing seems to be gaining popularity. The PSP even has a web browser (for free). So, not only would it be convenient, it would make the DS an even stronger competitor against the PSP (granted, the PSP is more of a "media device" whereas the DS is a "game system").

So, to summarize, the Wii browser is merely a gimmick, but it's free. The DS browser could be a significant enhancement to the system, but it costs $30.

And, yes, I understand that the Wii has a system to download new "channels," therefore it costs little if anything to distribute the Wii browser, whereas the DS does not seem to have this capability, so the browser has to be distributed via a DS game card. So, I can understand charging to recoup the manufacturing costs. But does it really cost $30 per unit?

Apparently, this browser was popular enough in Japan (and there was enough of a demand for it here) that Nintendo decided to bring it to the States. At that price, though, I doubt very many people are going to buy it.