Random Update
A little morning update for you! That’s what I would have called this post, except that this isn’t really an update, it’s just a bunch of random thoughts that mean nothing. Because there’s not too terribly much going on that interests my readership, but I shall endeavor to spit out the most random thoughts I can concoct—since something needs to be posted on this site!
Random thought #1. The Detroit Pistons beat up on the Los Angeles Lakers last night in game 1 of the NBA finals. I can’t believe it. They toasted those pompous schmucks! Well, except for Shaq, who was his usual dominating self, but fortunately he got basically no support from any of his teammates and, as a result, the LAL as a whole looked poor. This is the team that has not lost a single playoff game in their home arena this year? Well, they lost the first one last night, and to Detroit—a team that hasn’t even seen the NBA finals since 1990. Sa-weet! Now Detroit just has to do it again—and again, and again. But even if they don’t, last night’s humiliation was priceless. Hollywood schmucks.
Random thought #2. Our new notebook computer arrives today via UPS. Exciting—a big blue Dell box at my doorstep again for the first time in years. True, I’d much prefer a homebuilt desktop PC, but with notebooks, what’re ya gonna do? Even though they shipped their support department off to Calcutta, I still support Dell’s products. Much more so than any other affordable, consumer-level equipment maker, that is. Alas, tonight I’ll probably be spending about as much time uninstalling goofy trial apps and other junkware as I will installing my own stuff. But it’s all good! A new computer is always great fun.
Random thought #3. I finally ordered my new digital camera, too—the Canon PowerShot S410—and it should be arriving today also, although its final destination is Detroit and not Florida. I had it sent to my family up north because Dell charges no tax on deliveries to Michigan. My parents are coming down to visit us in a couple of weeks, so my hope was that they could bring it along with them. I also managed to locate a place selling spare Canon Lithium-Ion batteries for a ridiculous $2.98 apiece, so I think I’ll order several!
Random thought #4. Did a lot of work over the weekend on my new Wolfenstein projects. I finished E1L3 and replaced the mutant (both graphics and AI) with a new “Stormtrooper” character, who wears a more traditional cyan/gray Nazi uniform and helmet, packs a pistol, and is based on the Officer actor. I also made a significant amount of progress on the Conflict in the Fatherland hint book, which I am converting from Word format to HTML and integrating into the design of my new Wolfenstein website.
Additionally, the age-old bug of “pushwalls move 3 tiles instead of 2 on faster computers” has been solved by a friend on the Die Hard Wolfers Forums. The code originally used tics to gauge how far a pushwall has moved (more like how long it’s been moving), which is of course a variable figure. But if we use a counter instead, and increase it each time the pushwall changes blocks (there’s code for that already, because as soon as a pwall leaves a block we have to make it “walkable” to the player), then we can get it to stop after an exact number of tiles…any number we wish. Kick frickin’ ass. We could even institute multiple pushwall object codes, each of which move a different number of tiles by using a case statement. What practical use would that be? I don’t know, but it sounds spiffing.
Random thought #5. First I was pissed at the local UPN affiliate for defiling Star Trek: Enterprise with a fitness infomercial, and now I’m pissed at the WB affiliate for taking Voyager off the air and replacing it with Stargate: SG-1. Isn’t SG-1 already on two other channels? Voyager is no longer aired at all anymore…thanks guys! I used to watch it at 5 p.m. on Saturdays, but now it seems to be toast. Oddly (or is it really that odd, I wonder?), our WB affiliate’s own schedule on their own website makes no mention of the change. I suppose it could be temporary, but whatever…if it’s not, I guess I’d better pony up the bucks for the next Voyager DVD boxed set…there’s only two episodes left to watch in the one I have now!
Random thought #6. FilePlanet sucks. Okay, so last night I decide I want to download the Thief: Deadly Shadows demo. All of the servers at 3DGamers were either busy or horribly slow, so I decided to go to FilePlanet. Yeah, you have to wait, but after the wait is over, usually you get very good performance. So I waited 37 minutes, and what did I get? A download that blasted me about 500 K, then hesitated for ten seconds, then another 500 K, then another hesitation…over and over. After letting it download all evening, we’re talking hours here, I still didn’t even get two-thirds of it. Not wanting to leave the damn computer on all night, I turned the machine off in the middle. And thanks to FilePlanet’s proprietary “Wait-in-Line” technology, I couldn’t use my download batcher to save and resume the transfer later. Bah!
Random thought #7. You’ll never guess what restaurant just opened up mere minutes from my house. The Real Seafood Company. This small, formerly Michigan-only chain has made the leap from the Great Lakes to Florida, and our town is the only branch this side of Toledo! I’m sure not complaining, though—I’ve never had better fried shrimp than at this place. I’m gonna have to get there el pronto. They have a nice looking raw bar, too. Upon checking out their website, I see that the corporation that owns The Real Seafood Company also has a restaurant called Blue Pointe in Fort Myers, to perhaps it makes sense that they’d into our town too. But all of their other ventures are either in Ann Arbor, MI or Ohio! It’s funny, because my wife and I were just grousing about how there’s a lack of decent middle-of-the-road restaurants down here (everything is either cafeteria style or super-spifftastic luxury dining), and now perhaps we might have another option to choose from.
Random thought #8. I was just reminded recently of the ‘79 Trans Am we’ve got up in the garage in Detroit. I was chatting muscle cars with a guy here at the office and it came up (we were talking about old Pontiacs), and I got to wondering…is the engine in that car basically dissolving from the four-year-old oil at this point? Is the car going to be completely shot to hell? Part of me is thinking that I should get rid of the Formula I bought and bring down the ‘79 T/A instead…if it’s not already too late, and that car isn’t already dead. The ‘79 needs very little, but the Formula is in worse shape. Perhaps it’s just not my calling to build one of these KITT replicas after all. Maybe I should just enjoy what I have, rather than let it waste away in a garage up north. This has been really tearing at me for a while but I don’t know what to do about it.
Guess that’s it for now. Hmm, what an ominous note to leave on.
Categorized as Randomness