My son just did the 2nd most “me” thing ever: fell asleep in the middle of an activity. He was playing in his jungle thingy and all of a sudden just boom, out like a light.
Pages
XBox Live
Meta
Weekend Update
Thursday, November 8, 2007
OK, so I haven’t written anything since September. I’ve been wary, what can I say?
I’m willing to admit that I’m frustrated and upset over how things have been regarding North Carolina. At last count I’ve put about 30 or 40 resumes out there and come away with 1 phone interview and a screening that led to a face to face that went nowhere only after pushing me up and down like a sine wave for two weeks. If you’re still reading, Stephen (or anyone else from the department), I know it wasn’t personal. I haven’t checked the logs for any hits from duke.edu lately but I’m not really worrying about that anymore.
(Continued)
Metaplace Announced to Resounding Meh
Monday, September 24, 2007
Raph Koster‘s new group Areae1 finally announced their product: MEATSPACE2 METAPLACE.
Raph was nice enough to give the BBC a preview. From the looks of it it’s building heavily on Raph’s personal quest of The Virtual World, except in this case there are going to be a whole BUNCH of worlds in addition to Raph’s, and WE make the content. Cuppycake, the Community Manager, tell us why we should care: apparently the Modders have all been bodily absorbed into the firmament, and thus we need to take up the reigns of design ourselves and make our OWN game worlds.
Reaction, predictably, has been mixed from both sides of the aisle. Mainly because, well…it sounds like Second Life. Granted, it appears to be a Second Life where you can play it ZOMG EVERYWHERE according to Cuppy3 up there. She says you’ll be able to play it on cell phones, blog sidebars, bars, refrigerator TVs, your iPod and your mom.
My question (and the question a lot of people have had) is “who’s responsible for the lawsuits?”
After all, the thing you’re going to run into is that some people may try and clone any number of games that already exist, and we certainly know that some companies are so anal retentive that they trademark relatively generic gaming terms and get litigious over it. Sometimes even real companies get in on the action, though when you have enough money and lawyers you can get pretty creative with your settlement terms.
I for one think it’ll be interesting, but unless it’s better-done than Second Life (which seems underdone, overhyped but with a great PR machine), I’ll be out in the cold again.
1whether you pronounce it “air-ee-ay”, “air-ee-uh” or “air-ee-uh-ee” is up to you
2Can’t take credit for the lulz there: from f13, via Lum
3not CuppaJoe, who is totally a different CM
You are carrying too much equipment. You are Encumbered.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Well…at least Steve is honest. I made some contacts and met new people. And those people were really cool. It’s a shame. I’m used to being cumbersome, though.
To-do list:
ComiXpress backend stuff
Flynn Interiors design
Talk to Fatima about HER site
I was gearing up to do web work for the next three weeks anyway. Might as well take the creativity and do something with it.
Even if I feel like a pole jumper trying to get over the wall around Jersey. And I keep seeing over the wall, but fall just short.
And smack into it.
New Beard
Monday, September 17, 2007
Changing my chi worked. For now. We’ll see.
In other news, hello Dukies reading my blog now :)
Life is going well, Mikey is healthy, and I’m finding less to worry about. Attempting to center myself, because I’ve felt very off balance lately.
Trying to find where the center actually is happens to be another thing entirely.
On the Past and the Future
Saturday, September 8, 2007
With the interview, the baby, and what will wind up being a large interstate move of my very own
People keep quizzing me on why I want to move to North Carolina so badly. To me, it’s not so much that I want to move out of New Jersey, but that it’s gotten so expensive to live here that I don’t know what else to do. I’m in a job that, while it’s not horrible, is slowly shriveling my soul. I can’t do support as a full-time thing anymore. There’s no creativity in it, just repetitive motions and repeated admonitions from my mouth and out their ears. While this job is soul-shriveling, it’s a state job. The benefits are fantastic. Healthcare is not an issue (except when they drag their feet getting your newborn onto your plan *grumble*) . The salary is OK. It’s more than a lot of people I know make for a single income.
But in this lousy state, it’s not enough. I don’t want an eighty year old house in Glassboro for $200,000. It’s not where I want my son to grow up. I don’t want to live in a place where the population density is to the point where if I want to avoid living up someone’s ass I have to move to the Pine Barrens or Millville. If I get this job, we’re moving, and it’s not without regret. I love New York City at Christmas. One of my favorite memories is when Aimee and I went to see the BNL Holiday Show, and we took the train in from New Brunswick, and got on the subway, walked across the street through crisp winter air and saw a great little show. New York positively crackles in winter. And it’s not to say that I don’t love Jersey at Christmas either.
It’s just a lot to deal with. I’ve been thinking about it for a long, long time. Yeah, Jeff got to me a while ago, but it took until I had a family to realize it. I joke that the streets are paved with gold in North Carolina, but to me it’s not so far off the truth. It’s a beautiful place to live. It’s a place I can afford to buy a great house for m son to start his life in and it’s a place where very close friends have done great things with their life.
And that’s where we’ll do it too.
Pavarotti e morta
Thursday, September 6, 2007
http://www.nypost.com/seven/09062007/news/worldnews/swan_song.htm
September 6, 2007 — Arriverderci, Luciano.
Opera legend Luciano Pavarotti, regarded as the greatest tenor of our time, died early today at his home in Italy following a bout with pancreatic cancer. He was 71.
Pavarotti’s manager, Terri Robson, said that the singer died at his villa in Modena, Italy, at 5 a.m. local time.
“The maestro fought a long, tough battle against the pancreatic cancer which eventually took his life,” Robson said. “In fitting with the approach that characterized his life and work, he remained positive until finally succumbing to the last stages of his illness.”
Instantly recognizable by his black beard, tuxedo-busting girth and trademark white handkerchief in his right hand, Pavarotti won the admiration of opera buffs and pop fans alike. His was a wide-ranging celebrity that even Placido Domingo and José Carreras – his partners in the “Three Tenors” concerts – have not achieved.
For opera fans, the beauty of Pavarotti’s voice made him the ideal interpreter of Italian arias, Neapolitan songs and Christmas classics.
Pavarotti, who was as much at ease singing with sopranos as he was with James Brown, scoffed at accusations that he was sacrificing his art in favor of commercialism when in July 1990, he helped launch the “Three Tenors” concert in connection with soccer’s World Cup held in Italy that summer.
His life would go on to resemble an opera-like tragedy when, in 1996, he split with Adua Veroni, his wife of 35 years and mother of their three daughters, and took up with his 26-year-old secretary, Nicoletta Mantovani, whom he wed in 2003.
Following cancer surgery in New York in July 2006, Pavarotti retreated to his birthplace of Modena. Taken to a hospital there with a fever last month, Pavarotti was released on Aug. 25 after undergoing more than two weeks of treatment.
The son of a baker who was an amateur opera singer, Pavarotti was born on Oct. 12, 1935, in Modena.
Like most Italian boys, he had dreams of being a soccer player. When that failed, Pavarotti’s parents urged him to find a job. For a short time, he worked as an insurance salesman and teacher.
After taking on singing as a hobby, Pavarotti caught his big break thanks to another Italian opera great, Giuseppe di Stefano, who dropped out of a London performance of “La Boheme” in 1963.
Pavarotti served as a stand-in – and a star, the likes not seen since Enrico Caruso, was born.
Pavarotti was known as the “King of the High C’s” for the ease in which he tossed off difficult notes. In fact, it was his ability to hit nine glorious high C’s in quick succession that first turned him into an international superstar singing the aria “Ah! Mes amis,” in Donizetti’s “La Fille du Regiment” at the Metropolitan Opera in 1972.
During his later years, Pavarotti, who kept an apartment on the Upper West Side, would refer to The Met as “my home.”
Good News
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Thu Sep 06 2769 Depart PHILADELPHIA INTERNATIONAL (PHL) at 5:25 PM
Arrive in RALEIGH DUR (RDU) at 7:05 PM
Fri Sep 07 192 Depart RALEIGH DURHAM (RDU) at 8:35 PM
Arrive in PHILADELPHIA INTERNATIO (PHL) at 9:50 PM
Meaning yeah, I got a face to face interview for a job at Duke. I’m worried about being away from the Little Bug for the night, but it’s a tremendous opportunity to get a great job, even if it’s contract-to-perm.
I’m really nervous, but I did a good enough job on the phone this morning that they want to see me. There was joking and back-and-forth with them, and the one guy is a musician, too. Worked at Disney for ten years. So that’s a good sign, right?
Video Games and Your Baby
Saturday, August 25, 2007
He’s three weeks old as of yesterday. I’ve learned the following with regards to video games:
All-Pro Football 2k8 is a thumbs up. Nothing horribly loud or startling about it. Routinely sleeps on my chest while we play.
Gears of War is alright when he’s being held by Mommy.
Bioshock makes him very fussy. Lots of screaming, screeching, and Generally Bad Things.
On that note, I’m in love with Bioshock. Just a fantastic game. The atmosphere is unlike any other game I’ve played, and the HDTV and the surround sound certainly add to everything. Just creepy hearing a Splicer come at me from behind a split second before I rotate and blow ’em away with the shotgun.
And on a tangent, SecuROM is NOT A FUCKING ROOTKIT. Get it straight, you idiots. 2K’s FAQ has all the information you need to shut the hell up and just enjoy what is a complete and total masterpiece.
Even if I won’t play it while the boy’s awake.