What the frak

Posted on 23rd December 2010 in Something Daily

Check it out: I got about five hours of sleep last night. This is fairly unusual for me. I have no idea why, but it seems that I’m pretty much incapable of sleeping in past 8:30. I’ve always been kind of a morning person, but it’s mornings like this that really make me wish I had the ability to sleep late. So it’s about 9 AM right now, I woke up an hour ago, and I didn’t write yesterday, so I feel compelled to update now.

Yesterday was my last day involving responsibility for the fall semester, in which my Recording Tech group and I finally presented the bluegrass cover of “Get Low” that we recorded to the class (so I can finally shut up about it! Sweet!). The teacher was late, then called ten minutes after class was to start to say that he was going to be another hour late. That was definitely a bit lame, as I came down to Steinhardt just for that class. But I had a fun lunch with Mr. Kevin Garrett and my class group. The presentation itself was pretty good, despite the fact that my board recall skills need a bit of work. We didn’t present a bounce; that is, we were required to use our multitrack and recall our mix on the board, making sure every knob is set in the position we used during our mix. This is, of course, a process that you need a few minutes to do accurately, and I didn’t really have a few minutes. As a result, the multitrack mix that we presented was a bit different than the one on Soundcloud, but I tweaked along the way. All in all, great project. Everyone actually had a great project in that class. Way to go, people.

Last night, I had resigned myself to not doing anything, as all of my roommates were, at that point, either at their houses, out studying, or asleep. As it’s the end of break, my motivation to do projects is pretty low right now, so I was looking forward to a night of reading the Tao Te Ching and playing Team Fortress…and then Jen showed up! I furthered my goal of getting her into Battlestar Galactica as we watched another episode – the one where Starbuck is stranded on a desert planet. It’s a good one. I remember seeing that episode my first time through the series – I think it’s the first where Starbuck really shreds, and it was also the first one that really made me think “Alright, this show is rad.” So I had a good night. A late one, but a good one.

Today I leave for home on a 7:30 bus. Before that, I need to pack my bags and say goodbye to some friends, as well as find some place to eat some food and hopefully skate around a bit. I just hope I don’t get hurt; I’ve been feeling kind of bold recently. Maybe not bold enough to hurt myself yet, but who knows. I’ll be careful, don’t worry! And hopefully I get to sleep on the bus, because I’m pretty certain I’ve missed my chance to go back to bed this morning.

Have a good Chirstmas eve eve!

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Owned by the Sidewalk

Posted on 14th November 2010 in Something Daily

Upon waking up this morning and seeing how beautiful a day it was, I decided to go for a skate and get totally lost…which ended up being successful in one sense, and very unsuccessful in another sense. The part about getting totally lost went well, as I ended up under the Brooklyn Bridge by Delancey in some huge parking lot, and for the first time in a while, couldn’t find my way back without a map. This may be excusable, due to the fact that I had eaten pavement a few minutes earlier. I totally skinned my elbow when my board slipped out from under me…I’m just glad I didn’t land on glass or anything.

I spent a while today discovering how to use Gimp to remove the graph paper lines from some of the pencil drawings I did a few weeks ago. It turns out that it can be accomplished by duplicating the image’s blue channel on a white layer, then selecting the lighter grays that make up the graph lines. After a bit of playing around with Gimp, I came up with this guy:

The enhanced version of my Sonic

It’s a start, huh? I’ve been wanting to learn the process of enhancing drawings on the computer for a while, and here’s my beginning. I’m going to add some shading to it a bit later on.

I started watching BSG again tonight with some friends. It’s crazy to watch again from the beginning and see all the stuff that I missed the first time, or foreshadowing that you can only catch the second time around. Some favorite quotes: “Frakkin rats!”, “You sound like a lawyer.” Quinn, if you’re reading this, you know what I’m talking about.

ubuntuforums.org is where I get a lot of answers when Ubuntu seems too daunting to be true. Maybe you’ll like it too.

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The Contents of My Pockets are Better Than Yours.

Posted on 10th November 2010 in Something Daily

I’ve started carrying a little notebook in my back pocket wherever I go. I kept noticing times when I’d have some idea for something to do, or look up, or the solution to some problem that I’d been working on, and I didn’t have anything to put it down on, so I ran the risk of forgetting it. So I decided to stop that from happening. It’s a notebook that a friend gave me last Christmas that has all the Uglydolls on it with their names and pictures of cookies. I read a piece from The Art of Manliness a while back that had a snapshot of the contents of a man’s pockets from childhood to old age. It was interesting, so here’s mine at the current time:

  • 1 cell phone
  • 1 carabiner with apartment keys
  • 1 white handkerchief, hand-hemmed
  • 1 notebook, lined
  • 1 ink pen
  • 1 leather wallet
    • $25 cash
    • 1 PA driver’s license
    • 1 printed reddit logo (you never know when you’ll need it)
    • 1 printed Dinosaur Comic
    • 2 photos of siblings
    • 1 Metrocard
    • 1 NYU ID card
    • Debit and credit cards
    • New York City subway map
    • 1 list of important phone numbers

Interestingly, I haven’t had the occasion to write anything in the notebook yet, as its only been a few days. But next time I have some thought that I reeeally don’t want to forget…I’ll be ready. And yes, I do carry a reddit logo and dinosaur comic in my wallet at all times. I know what you’re thinking.

“Look at this guy. He’s the man, because his wallet is way more awesome than mine. I wish I was rad enough to carry comics around with me all the time. And he’s got a handkerchief that he sewed himself! How will I ever compare?”

Don’t worry, maybe one day some of my coolness will rub off on you. Also, my wallet has Canada geese on the front. I can only think of one cooler wallet design.

How’s the “Rad Stuff” section coming along? Oh, you know, pretty good. Battlestar Galactica science.

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Battlestar Skateboard

Posted on 1st November 2010 in Something Daily

I’m working my way through the pictures I’ve uploaded onto my imgur account and have come across a few good ones, similar to the Pyramid Head costume. Here’s the design that I recently stenciled onto my Uglydoll skateboard. (WARNING: BSG spoilers)

Starbuck's Tattoo on my skateboard, 9/2010

In case you don’t know, this is from Battlestar Galactica – it’s the tattoo that Starbuck and Sam get when they get married. I had the new deck and thought it was awesome, but I needed some way to easily tell the difference between the front and the back. So I figured a stencil was the way to go, and it was pretty much a no-brainer when it came to what the stencil should be of. It’s a pretty cool looking design, regardless of the context, and the fact that it’s worn by one of the very best characters on the new Battlestar Galactica makes it all the more awesome. Not one single person has ever gotten the reference though. I’ve had to explain it to anyone who’s curious. I’m just waiting for the day when I’m in the elevator with someone I don’t know and they see my board and know what it is…and say something about it, of course. I won’t hold my breath though.

I finished the series with Quinn over the summer. It got to the last two or three weeks before I headed back to school, and we were only about halfway through season 4.0 or something like that. We really had to rush to finish, but i remember we watched the finale two days before I left home. That whole three-part episode was amazing (except for the very very end with the stock footage of robots). I’ve heard and read a lot of complaints about the finale, mostly from people who say that nothing in the show was resolved and that the introduction of religion and the concept of God were ‘cop-outs’. Honestly though, I have to disagree. I think that there could not have been a more fitting conclusion to a show that always had a fascination with the relationship between artificial intelligence and spirituality.

What happens to Starbuck at the end of the show, though…NUTS. It freaked me out so bad the first time I saw it. (Notice that even though I warned about spoilers at the top of the post, I still don’t want to give this one away. It’s too good.) That’s all I’ll say about that, except that again, people got really pissed over what happens to her, and I’m more than ok with it.

Not just the finale, but the entire show is worth the time of anyone who is into good dramatic TV; really, I don’t think it’s just for sci-fi fans. I’m not really that much of a science fiction person…actually that’s a lie. I don’t know why I was about to say that. But still, it’s great TV, with some super good acting (for the most part) and it’s very well received by critics. I can think of about two episodes off the top of my head that I don’t like – that’s out of about a hundred. The black market episode…not so much with that one. Also the one about Adama’s ex-wife. But even those are still important to the storyline.

Also, the whole show is now on Netflix instant! So if you have a Netflix account, you don’t have to search around the illegal internets anymore! You’re free.

EDIT: I just came within three seconds of finishing Ikaruga for the first time and died. I don’t need to explain my disappointment. Bryant was filming it and everything. That game is so awful…

This is a webcomic I discovered recently called Dr. McNinja – it’s about a doctor who’s also a ninja who fights ridiculous villains and has a pet velociraptor named Yoshi. Very well drawn, in my humble opinion, and the storylines are hilarious.

Have a good November 1st, everyone!

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