The title of this post has no relevance to anything described later on; it comes from the fact that I just updated my Facebook status to say “Jeff is quite curious about that woodchuck chucking wood…”. That is all.
I think the interview went well today, and it seems like it would be really interesting work (for me anyway). One of the things they mentioned was that the background check they would be doing would be “very intrusive”. Basically, they’d be contacting family, friends, neighbors, past neighbors, teachers, past employers, etc. to find out what they had to say about me. Although I didn’t say it, my mind was already thinking that I’m pretty safe in that regard. According to them I’ll get a call around Tuesday to figure out if I’m one of their top 3 picks to start going through all the background check stuff.
Sites like Slashdot that tend to have an anti-Microsoft bias like to make entries/post about how Vista is screwing users over with DRM and licensing issues. Yes, I hate DRM. Yes, I’d love to see everything in an open, cross-compatible format. Realistically, that’s not going to happen though over concerns of piracy. Seeing as how my ethics paper is going to be over DRM/fair use, hopefully I’ll get enough insight into inner workings of the law to see possible alternatives that can make both sides happy. After all, history has been full of compromises. Who says that in a couple of years if this battle is still going on I can’t be the one to resolve it??
Personal - Dallas
WordPress (what this blog runs on) by default uses categories for posts. If I didn’t use any, then all my posts would show up as Uncategorized. This could be remedied by hacking a few template files, but I find it easier just to let everything default to a Personal category because after all, this whole blog is personal in nature. If I ever put one on my portfolio site once I get around to designing it (which might even run on WordPress, who knows), then I might have a couple of categories to separate out entries, but for here, pretty much everything is personal. Sure, there could be stuff like “school”, but I just don’t see the point in categorizing stuff that way at the moment. And if I did start to do that, one category that would have to be present is a “rant” category, and that would encompass about 100% of the posts here.
My week that the time gods decided to take their smite stick to is finally back to a normal pace. Yesterday I checked my email and saw that a company had sent me an email on Monday (after I had checked my email the last time during the day which amazingly was around 2:00) asking for an interview tomorrow at 1:30. Well, aside from the fact that I have a class then, I also have my FBI interview tomorrow afternoon, so that wasn’t going to work. I told them that I could either do it this afternoon or Friday afternoon, and luckily they chose today since I knew all it would really be good for is to get another interview down for experience before doing the FBI one. Basically, if I don’t get the FBI internship, I’m probably just going to do summer school as nothing else seems like it would be something I’d love to do for my entire summer.
Personal - Dallas
Last night I got to what is probably about halfway through Okami, but I can’t say that with any certainty because I’m not using a guide where I can look and see that I’m half done with the walkthrough section. It’s still extremely fun to play, and, as the title shows, has a sense of humor very different than that of most other games.
The reason I’m making this post now is a) because I didn’t make one last night, and b) I’m going to a musical tonight and I’m not sure what time I’ll be getting home. And I can’t go two days without making a blog post, now can I?? ;)
Personal - Dallas
Listen closely and carefully because this might be the first time I’ve ever said this…I like too much stuff.
I’m not talking about physical items (although that’s arguably true also), but I just am interested in more things than I have time to devote to them. Video games, check. Good grades in school, check. (Notice the order those were in… ;) ) Watching TV, check. Linux, reading forums, tech news…all check. Basically, I want to do and learn too much. This is why I have the game backlog that I do. This is why said backlog isn’t going to have a net decrease on the year when I ask for 14 games for my birthday/Christmas. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing inherently bad or wrong with this, and I personally enjoy being this way. This is a problem that I need to figure out how to control, though. After all, would you want to suffer from a condition and do nothing about trying to help fix it??
Personal - Dallas
Wednesday, I’ll admit it…I completely forgot to make a post. I didn’t realize this, of course, until Thursday afternoon. I wasn’t going to backdate a post to make it seem like I really had posted, so my plan was just to write one Thursday night explaining that I forgot…except I forgot that one also. Then yesterday, up until just past midnight I was working the HP football game (which we won, 58-40), so that wasn’t really even an option for a posting time. So yes, two of those nights was due to me just forgetting, but last night I did have a valid excuse.
This next week will be very hectic for me (aren’t they all, though?) in trying to get done everything I need to do and also be everywhere I need to be. Before I even start back to school, I have this ~100 page reading assignment of selections from 3 different government reports on stem cell research along with reading and taking notes for government. Monday my grandparents are coming in from Arkansas, so we’ll all eat dinner together Monday night. That means I’ll probably need to do my Discrete Math homework tomorrow, also. Tuesday after my physics lab I come home again, this time to go see Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (the reason why my grandparents are coming down here). Well, I have a test in my Exploration of the Arts class Wednesday morning, so that means my primary studying time will be Monday afternoon/evening when I’m not doing family stuff, Tuesday in between physics and my lab, and Wednesday morning before the test. But wait, also for Wednesday I’ll have another government reading to take notes on, and another Politics/Values reading (of who knows how many pages). Then Wednesday afternoon…nothing. Discrete Math homework for Thursday, and that’s it. Thursday afternoon I then go have my interview with the FBI downtown. That night I have one more government reading for Friday, and then Friday afternoon I have a home football game at HP. Enough for you? Throw in a physics homework due a week from today also for good measure.
Personal - Dallas
I felt like going to DQ tonight, so I IMed a friend to see if he wanted to go also. He did, so we set off to go to one that the DQ website had marked as only being about 4 miles away. Now, I’m not sure if the website was a little drunk or what happened, but the directions it gave us sent us into the middle of a residential neighborhood instead of to a DQ. Luckily I still had a really good idea of where we were, so we went off in search of another one I thought I remembered seeing on the map. Yeah, well it didn’t exist either. Basically, we spent about 40 minutes driving around trying to find a DQ when we both knew f one just about 10 minutes away (and that’s where we eventually ended up). Lesson of the night is to never trust DQ’s website for directions.
Tomorrow I have a government test, and then in the afternoon my main goals are to finish up the extra credit assignment for my Exploration of the Arts class and work on my physics HW. I also have an ongoing project for Andrew which I’d like to finish up relatively soon, but the “deadline” for that is still a couple of weeks away.
Personal - Dallas
Last Thursday I described the outlike of an idea I had about how to possibly speed up the rate at which I’m working through my backlog of games. Well, Saturday I played Okami and made some more progress in it, and then my thoughts were that I would work on Phoenix Wright on my DS while I’m out here at school this week. Well, Sunday night I remember to plug in my DS so it’ll be fully charged, but of course this morning I leave without it. I actually thought about it during the day, and then I went home this afternoon for two other reasons. When I came back out here, though, of course I didn’t remember it again. No matter how good my plan might be, it does require certain events to happen to be put into full motion.
This means, however, that my free time this week will be spent on the (probably more productive) task of rewriting a program so that I can create a version of it for Andrew. I coded it poorly to start with, so now that he wants this derivative (ironically, the entire program was created with this derivative in mind), I’m having to go back and change a lot of stuff around. Let’s just say that it isn’t the most fun thing to do in the world.
Personal - Dallas
This title would have been more appropriate Friday (or actually would have been the most appropriate Tuesday), but this will just work since no one reads my blog anyway. Basically, I’m not a big “music” person and never have been. I enjoy listening to the radio, and stuff like the iTunes Store has greatly increased the amount of music I own because I typically won’t go out and buy full CDs by artists. Weird Al, however, is an exception to this behavior, and his new CD Straight Outta Lynwood came out last week. My next door neighbor for a few years (around the time I was in middle school) introduced me to him, and then my aunt got me his CD Running with Scissors because of the Star Wars parody on it. He’s an awesome parodist, has a good sense of humor (example: as a promotion for this new CD, he released an anti-RIAA song titled “Don’t Download this Song” for free download on the internet), and makes music that’s fun to listen to. This new one is no exception so check (*gulp*, I can’t believe I’m linking to a MySpace page here) his MySpace page and listen to some of the tracks from his last album or two for free.
Personal - Dallas