Nocturnal Operations

So, yesterday I went and toured a few more apartments. Nothing to write home about, though. However, last night was very productive in that I reformatted my laptop hoping to fix its sluggishness and distorted audio. While I did that I reorganized my CD collection and found my Postal Service CD, which was mysteriously inside the case for Jack Johnson's Brushfire Fairytales album.

The reformatting was a little scary, because when I went to erase the partitions and all that good stuff for a clean install, it errored out on me twice after about 35 minutes and was making scary staticy noises from the hard drive. I prayed to God and tried just reinstalling the factory image of the machine. Thankfully, that worked and it solved my computer's symptoms. Unfortunately I no longer can connect by WiFi to my home network. I gotta remember what I did last time to solve that. For now, I've got a network cable stretched over that's hooking me up to the Web. Thank goodness. I had started going through withdrawals, shaking and filled with desires to go to websites that I only check intermittently. But now I got my fix. Aw, yeeeeeeeeeaaaaah.

Strike a Pose!

Yesterday Jen and I went down to Washington Park to do a little photo shoot. She wanted a professional looking head shot to use for her business, and I think we certainly got that. I also got a ton of pictures of my favorite girl and we had a lot of fun.

It was actually getting a little cold, so we retired to a nearby coffee shop. It was a Daz Bog, which I had never been in before. It was quite good coffee, and they have free Wi-Fi, which puts them high in my book.

Jen even got into the act and started taking some pictures of me that turned out quite nice. I really dig the chiaroscuro lighting.


We also got out and looked at some apartments for me. Man, was it ever getting cold though. On our drive home, it started to snow. By the time we got back into my apartment, the snow was coming down in a furious mini-blizzard. It continued to snow like the dickens, but a half an hour later, you'd never know it had happened. Yes, it's a week from May. Why do you ask?

Later that evening I went over to Isaac and Elsa's for some good barbecued chicken and some tremendously good peanut sauce over chocolate mud pie ice cream. And I performed Sabotage for the first time on Rock Band. It was not pretty, but it was amusing. They could use a recording of it to frighten small children.

Here's Where I Can Store My Bike

If only I could get it to Japan, I'd have a secure and super cool place for my bike. Take that bike thieves!

While we're on the subject, as I was riding in yesterday, I saw a guy in cycling garb walking along. I stopped to ask if he needed a pump or a flat kit, but no, his bike had been stolen. Even worse, he was testing out a prototype that had a wheeled luggage type carrier on the back. I felt bad for him, and certainly could relate, though I had locked mine. Not so with him. But his rolling luggage wouldn't work in the place in the video. I guess that means I'll have to defer on that, because my bike needs its subterranean lair.

Crease

This morning I found a small slice across the tip of my left index finger. I have no clue how it got there. There was a little flap of skin, but the skin had not been broken through to draw blood. I trimmed the little flap of skin and now I have a quarter inch long crease down the face of the fingertip. Bizarre.

I've scheduled a few apartment tours for tomorrow and Monday. That means hopefully I can have a chat with the Tower of Odd Smells' management about whether they really want to increase my rent by 50 or if they'd rather decrease it by 50. If it's a no go on the decrease, then it is Splitsville. They did at least cut down the vine that had been flogging my window. I asked last night and today it is gone, which is a nice development. Still, it looks like I can get a better place for less, just in a not as good location.

And completely apropos of nothing, how about Lost last night? Wowzers! The second half of the season is going to be a wild ride.

Highly Domestic

So, I put on Johnny Cash and made a pie; a wedding buttermint chiffon pie. The Johnny Cash nicely balanced the froo-froo nature of my cooking endeavor. The pie, though it sounds like a sugar rush overkill, mainly tastes like egg custard. Well, the spoonful of the filling I had did, at least. We'll see if it undergoes some alchemical reaction as it chills overnight in a graham cracker crust.

Oh, and may I say that a Kitchen-Aid mixer pays for itself the first time you get to a part in a recipe that talks about beating eggs into "stiff peaks". I have tried this with and without the mixer, and I can tell you that it is MUCH more pleasant doing it through the mixer, especially if you follow it up by whipping cream as well.

If only someone made as effective a machine for cleaning bathrooms, namely just getting hair cleaned up. I swear, I clean a sink, turn my head, look back, and spy a hair in my recently-cleaned sink. I wipe at it with the sponge, and it is replaced with a larger hair. Another swipe of the sponge and the hair is different and larger. Hair is so stinking persistent, except when it's on my head. Then it just gives up the ghost. At least after the over-enthusiastic barber lady had her way with my scalp, there is less hair to fall and less hair to clean.

Rundown

I'm listening to the arrhythmical smacking of a vine against my window. (Whap!) The word vine may not capture the sound. It's more like a riding crop whapping against my window. And. It. Is. Driving. Me. (Whap!) Nuts. Last week the management had some yahoos rip (Whap!) the vines off the face of the Tower of Odd Smells. I came home to hardened tendrils of creeper dangling across my (Whap!) windows. I saw that the arborists, or whatever you call the trimmers (Whap!) of stories tall vines, had set up cones along the side of (Whap!) the (Whap!) street to make way for their trucks, so I figured by the time I got home the next day the offending vines (Whap!) would be gone. No such luck. (Whap!) Now a stiff wind is blowing through Denver and (Whap!) the vine is becoming quite the nuisance. As I soaked in the tub, with the door closed, I could clearly hear this thing (Whap!) whapping away. Hrrm.

The weekend was good, but exhausting. I went up on Saturday to visit Jen. We hiked the Flatirons and then went down to the Pearl Street Mall for some a good Mexican happy hour at a place called Tahona (good pork tacos and chips) and toddled around that area for a while. I got a good amount of sun and am now a red head ... well, red scalp at least. That's thanks in part to the aggressive lady who cut my hair without asking how long I wanted it. Jen introduced me to Powell's Sweet Shoppe, where we found a childhood memory of mine (Zots!) and some interesting wasabi and ginger infused chocolate laced with sesame seeds. Not bad at all.

Yesterday after church, Laura came up and we went to the Asian market in Sakura Square and stocked up on Oriental goodies, including more candy and disappointing dango. My lunch was a boxed noodle thing called Big UFO. After that we made split pea soup and the saddest pretzels in the world. They tasted fine, but these were the one-legged puppies of the pretzel world.

Man, I'm exhausted. Thus the reason for the bath. Now, I've got to get back to listening (Whap!) to the (Whap!) vine outside my window.

(Whap!)

Buildings in Flame

Waking to a fire alarm is not my preferred mode of waking up; not by a long shot. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending how you look at it, I have already become inured to being woken by fire alarms. Faithful readers may remember that I had it happen twice in the space of a week at 2 in the morning. This rude awakening came around 6:20 this morning, so I wasn't rousted from a deep slumber. But still. Annoying.

So I lay there, wondering if perhaps I should get up and see if I was in danger of imminent immolation. Should I? Probably. Is it a false alarm? Probably. Do I care right now? Hmmmm. After a while I stumbled over to the door to see if I could smell smoke or see people fleeing in panic. I saw neither. I returned to bed and listened to the sirens getting closer and the incessant cry of the fire alarm. Once the firemen arrived, I waited for the inevitable shut off, which came in short order. I relaxed and rolled over for another hour of sleep.

Then the fire alarm went off again. This, perhaps, was it; the calamity. I decided a swift move to the exits would be wise. I had already gotten dressed on the first alarm, so I had to make that fun decision of which possessions would I rescue from a burning building. I had never really even played this game in a hypothetical fashion, so to be contemplating the reality of incineration for my possessions, I had to make a choice. Here's what made the cut:

• My passport, cuz I'm going to Cabo whether my apartment burns or not.
• My car registration, which makes no sense, because I have a copy in my car, but it was next to the passport.
• My laptop; a natural choice in my mind. It's portable for a reason, folks.
• My CD and DVD backups of things on my laptop and photos from days gone by
• My cell phone, keys, and wallet.

I wonder what my choices say about me. I would say that I'm not very sentimental, but the primary concern with those data discs was all the photos I've taken. For some reason I couldn't bear the thought of losing those, but my Dunnies and handmade books didn't make the cut. What of yours would make it out through the flames with you? Anyway, I tossed those things into my backpack and headed out into the hall.

That's when I saw the firemen standing rather unconcernedly around. They were examining a malfunctioning fire alarm box on my floor. I asked whether I should get out or if it was the system. "It's the system," one said. "It's broke." No kidding. This whole flipping building is broken. After a month, they finally fixed the lock on the front door today. Urge to move out rising daily...

Citadels REsurrected!

Well, golly! That's cool.

So, back when I was but a wee student at the University of Denver and learning to push pixels and monkey with code, I took a game coding class and a rich Internet application (RIA) class the same quarter. In that wonderful you-got-RIA-in-my-game, you-got-gaming-in-my-RIA fashion, the two profs agreed that I could create one huge application for my final projects. After a ton of work well augmented with sweat and tears, I had a functional multiplayer Flash game called Citadels that could be played across the Internet.

I continued to work on the game even after graduating, but alas, DU decided to cut my free hosting for the game, and with me unwilling to fork out the dough for a Flash Communication Server host, Citadels languished hostless, and a great piece of my portfolio lay idle.

But now Citadels is back! David, who was one of those original two professors, let me use the RealEyes Media Flash Media Server to host the game. Flash Media Server (FMS) is the new version of Flash Communication Server. I spent most of yesterday and a bit of today porting the game over from FCS 1.5 to FMS 3. And now it is done and Citadels has been resurrected! You can play it if you like.

I kept getting sucked into it while testing. Of course, playing the game is much more fun than getting into the truly horrendous code I built. Back then, I didn't know how classes were supposed to work, and I didn't plan it out that well. All through this port over, I had to resist getting in there and prettying things up. Thankfully I resisted getting pulled into that morass of tightly-bound spaghetti code classes. I'm going to leave this one as it is. I've got enough new projects to get sucked into already.

Here's that Irony You Ordered, Sir

Five inches or so of it. It's snowing! Again! In April! Honestly, I don't mind it. It feels like one last embrace from Winter before we toddle off into the blossom bedecked Springtime, pulling off our sweaters over our heads and rubbing frost from our eyes. This particular snow comes with a double dose of irony, since this is the first time in two weeks that I've ridden my bike. The ride in was gorgeous. The ride home was pretty, but not so enjoyable, especially since I forgot my sunglasses. This meant I was squinting the whole ride home to ward snowflakes from landing on my eyeballs. But all the trees are coated with a shell of snow, looking ever so delicate. Pretty, but it's time for the snow to pack it in and move out. This is Denver, though, and it is never too late to snow.

Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps

WARNING: Title has nothing to do with post, but rather the music I am listening to right now.

That being said: Patio Season is here! Oh, what glorious weather! The clear blue sky bathes us in love and warmth. Open wide the restaurant and bar doors to let the happy flood of people stagger out of stuffy interiors to the glorious land of Patio! Let aromas waft from open windows and alcohol flow under the shining sun! Oh, days of outdoor eating! Oh, hours spent in sun-dappled conversation! Begin, brave and wondrous Patio Season!

How fitting, then, that Angie should announce today that she and her boyfriend will be coming to the States, especially Colorado, for a visit. It won't be until August, but regardless, I am excited, especially if she brings bags of German and Swiss candies as in years past.

Anyone want to wager how much irony-laden snow will fall after I post this?

And completely apropos of nothing, I woke up with a mysterious scratch on the end of my nose. It's completely gone now, but this morning it was livid red line across my schnoz. Weird.

Musical Interlude

So, have any of you seen my Postal Service CD? I ask because I can't find it and the people I thought that I might have lent it to haven't seen it. I did a combing through of my collection and I can't find it there either. It is one of my favoritest albums ever. And just off the top of my head, here are some of my favorite albums, in no particular order:

• Postal Service - Give Up
• Massive Attack - Mezzanine
• Cake - Fashion Nugget
• Paul Simon - You're the One
• Paul Simon - Rhythm of the Saints
• Moby - Play
• The Blues Brothers soundtrack
• Rolling Stones - Tattoo You
• Squirrel Nut Zippers - Hot
• Johnny Cash - American Recordings III: Solitary Man

Man, I really need to rearrange my media collection. Not only have I found things that I haven't listened to in a long, long while (Save Ferris, anyone?), but also things I've never gotten around to listening to or watching. Perhaps I should rearrange the CDs by the order I got them in? But that would depress me by reminding me that the Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves soundtrack was the first CD I ever bought.

Now Museum, Now You Don't

Jen came down to the beautiful city of Denver and we walked down to the Denver Art Museum. I thought that the second Saturday of the month is free to Colorado residents, but it turns out that's the first Saturday. D'oh. That didn't stop us, however, and we proceeded to enjoy art. It's pretty amazing that for all the times I've been through the museum, I still see things I hadn't noticed before and things jump out at me that hadn't previously. Especially on the Mezzo-American floor, there were a lot of things I don't remember seeing. So even while I shared my favorites with Jen, I got to see some new stuff too. We had plenty of fun hanging out together anyway, regardless of the art. We had some good coffee at Novo Coffee inside the museum after finishing the old building, and then we moved into modernity in the new building. I've got pictures of our excursion up in my gallery. It's a good one, so take a look.

Massive Mass Effect Post

Brace yourselves.

I've been pretty impressed with the games I've played from the previous year. Most of the ones I played, such as Bioshock and Mass Effect, I'd love to play through again. We can add Mass Effect to that list. This game is epic. The world it ushers you into is so rich with detail and well thought out. Of course, it is also probably the buggiest game I have played in a long while, too. That doesn't stop it from being immensely enjoyable.

For gamers: There are spoilers coming, if you haven't played the game. For non-gamers: Mass Effect is a science fiction role-playing game, and unlike other RPGs, you really do get to play the role of the main character, rather than just direct them through maps and battles and leveling up. How your character interacts with other characters is the key part of the game. This is done through huge branching conversational trees. Most conversations give you three replies, one that is nice, one that is neutral, and one that is rude. Through your responses, you are crafting the persona of your character towards being more of a paragon of virtue or a renegade.

In the game, humanity is an up and coming junior member of a galactic civilization comprised of 11 or so species. Three species, the turians, the asari, and the salarians are the dominant species and form the ruling council of this huge empire. Part of the game deals with the tension between the different species, especially those on the council and those without representation. This strikes a chord with me, because I had been imagining what it would be like for humanity to be inducted into a galactic empire that, while benevolent, did not put us on an equal footing. I had been wanting to write a story or something set in that environment, but the good folks at BioWare (Mass Effect's maker) have done that for me, and with tremendous detail. The different species in the game are imagined in good detail with lots of cultural, military, biological, and historical data. You have to seek out the extra information, and most of it is irrelevant to the driving plot of the story, but it is good reading. They put so much detail and backstory into the characters, and even the technology and science used in the game. One particularly impressive entry describes what it would be like looking from the inside of a spaceship traveling at faster-than-light speeds. The lushness of the world is incredible. Even the sounds are great. As you walk by people you can hear their conversations. In one case, you can stop in a crowded city and hear the traffic go by. Listen carefully and you'll hear the sound of a Jetsons car going by.

During the game, there are tons of side quests off into different systems sprinkled throughout the galaxy that you can do non-linearly. As you seek them out, you can look at and survey the other planets in the systems. Each one has information or stories associated with it. Some are banal, like descriptions of the planet's atmospheric makeup, but others could be full-fledged games or stories in and of themselves. One even made a reference to the movie The Forbidden Planet, (Monsters of the Id!) which delights me to no end. Again, the level of detail and thought is incredible.

The side quests are hit or miss in how enjoyable they are. Some of them are pretty boring; just walking through a warehouse and killing off monsters. After a few of these, you're ready to get on with the main plot. Some, however, are pretty intriguing, such as the quests dealing with the rogue military faction called Cerberus and one where you have to help marines defend against waves of angry crayfish-like aliens called rachni and then hunt down the source of the infestation. You also spend a lot of time just tooling around the surfaces of planets in your nigh-indestructible tank looking for mineral deposits, crashed probes, and various debris. Sometimes this can get really boring and frustrating as you try to find your way through jagged mountain peaks, but other times the planet is so beautiful and the four-wheeling (technically six-wheeling when driving this vehicle) is pretty fun. I found myself trying to flip the tank after a while. It's not easy.

The main plot is standard fare, but enjoyable. A rogue government agent is trying to find ancient technology that will help him usher in an invasion of genocidal sentient warships. You lead an interspecies band of heroes to stop him. It bears a lot of similarity to the plot for Knights of the Old Republic (KOTOR), which was also made by BioWare. In fact, most of the game greatly resembles KOTOR. In KOTOR you had Force powers and fighting techniques that your team could use. Mass Effect gives you technological attacks and pseudo-psionic attacks for your party. Mass Effect compares favorably with KOTOR, though I like the combat system in KOTOR better, and you got to play a Jedi and have a wookie on your team. It's hard to beat that.

There are also a lot of bugs in Mass Effect. However, for how huge the game is and given how much they're doing dynamically, I can cut them some slack. You can customize the appearance of your character who is then used in lots of cinematic cut scenes and conversational trees. The people in your squad can vary for each of these as well. There was one climactic mid-game fight that I had to go through many times over, because the game would skip the battle and skip to a messed up version of the post-fight cinematic sequence. Another important cut scene had my character not show at all, making it look like I was invisible or that the main villain had become telekinetic. There were also times when I got stuck in rather stupid places and couldn't move and I had to revert back to my last save. Lame.

All in all, Mass Effect is a great game. It is engaging and engrossing and beautiful. I'd say that I liked Bioshock more, but it is an awesome game. Hopefully, finishing it will free me to work on projects, but Assassin's Creed is sitting on my TV stand...

The ending of the game is pretty satisfying with a climactic battle up the side of a kilometer tall tower. The final boss battle is a bit weak, but overall the game was satisfying. Even the credits brought me joy, as there was a Nils in there and a guy with the last name of Ponce. Really. But the main focus is much more on how you relate to the people around you. You can build up or break down relationships, which will matter more as you get later into the game. You can talk your way out of dangerous situations and avoid bloodshed if you're going down the paragon path.

Weekend Review

Still sick. Still hating being sick. I enjoyed the weekend, nonetheless. I was very productive on Saturday morning and then spent a lot of the rest of the day plowing my way towards the end of Mass Effect. That evening, Jen and I hit Racine's (sooooo good) and then watched Leatherheads. Despite its lackluster reviews, I thought the movie was very nice. It avoided the cliches and formulas of most sport movies and was more about the creation of pro football as it stands today.

Of course, I always enjoy watching George Clooney work his magic, and he and Renee Zellweger play nicely together. Also the guy who plays Jim on The Office had a major part. And Milton from Office Space was there too, which is always delightful. Though there were some moments that felt like they belonged in a different film, the dialog was fantastic and snappy. ("You're only as old as the women you feel.") I give it a thumbs up. Jen gave it a qualified thumbs up. Interestingly enough, I'm seeing this billed on the sites I link to above as a romantic comedy. I didn't take it that way, but as a guy, I was focused on other things than the romance. I guess a girl could see it from a different perspective.

Anyway, Jen also was down here for breakfast and church today, and we went to Toast down in Littleton and had a phenomenal breakfast, especially the chai-infused French toast. That is some good eating right there. After church, Jen and I made some faux tom kha gai from the Tabasco sauce cookbook. After she left, I finished Mass Effect. There is certainly more to say about that. I'll give you a long post on that topic, as it is deserving of many words. Epic would be one of those words. More to come.

Oh, I also got Moby's new album this weekend. It's decent, but not as good as Hotel or Play. I think I need to give it a thorough listening to see how it grows on me.

Walky Taki's

Jason and I walked over to Taki's for some good, cheap Japanese food. I had never been there before, but as advertised, the food was healthy and exceptionally tasty. They didn't have the teriyaki I was looking for in my quest to find some teriyaki here in Denver to rival Portland's House of Teriyaki (a.k.a. Jesus Loves Teriyaki), but their chicken bowl is the best one I've tasted so far in our fair city.

What really made the night was that when we were ordering, the small Asian woman taking our order stopped to take a phone call from a customer, and evidently when she answered the person hung up, and this little Asian woman just starts swearing like a sailor. It was fantastic. She apologized and was very nice, but don't just call her and hang up, people.

I then came home expecting to watch Battlestar Galactica's premiere at 9. However, when I turned it on, I saw just the last 10 seconds of the episode. Durrrrrrrrr. It was on at 8. Fortunately they re-ran it at 10 and I was able to drink in the BSG goodness. The episode was good, but not as tension and action-filled as I had suspected. It will be fascinating to see how the new Cylons play out and we learn what exactly Starbuck is. I can't wait!

Ungh

In a day where very little worked, my body decided to get on the action and promote my cough to a full on flu, replete with achy joints and unhappy throat and ears. As much as I enjoyed my bike ride in today on the new bike, I was Herr Hackenkoff and brought up things that have been in my lungs since the Carter administration. At least the construction on the trail is done and I no longer have to ride on the sidewalk. The ride home was better, but I felt ready to collapse after I made it to my apartment. I HATE BEING SICK. It's not so horrible when it is the normal once a year, but I was sick before Christmas, then after Christmas, then for a day or two, and now again. Blech. I'm skipping Bible study tonight and will spend my evening laying down, ensconced in blankets and lubricated with hot tea.

It's Been One Year Since You Hired Me

Yep. I've been a RealEyes employee for a whole solid year now. Whew. Today was honestly fairly mild. I had to break from my project to help troubleshoot some font crap in another project, but I figured it out and got to be the hero, which is nice. So ... one year. Yep.

I also got a call from REI today letting me know that my bike was done early. I got to pick it up today and I can't wait to ride tomorrow, but man that thing was rubbing me the wrong way. Wrestling a bike into a small car and through doorways is a good trigger for frustration for me, especially when I'm still angry about the last bike. There's a reason I didn't keep my bike up in the apartment before.

This afternoon, I just have been grumpy and Satan was exploiting my pre-grumped self with lots of other little jabs. Renovation was canceled tonight though, so I have some time to relax and degrump. Ooo, I wish I had thought more. I could have run over and grabbed Moby's new CD, which is out today.