Harvey Birdman Droopy

This was one of the funniest Harvey Birdman: Attorney At Law episodes I've ever seen. Droopy decides to have a little botox surgery, but the surgery goes wrong and he has a permanent smile now.

Droopy on the witness stand

He sues the plastic surgeon and Harvey Birdman is defending the plastic surgeon. If you get a chance to catch this episode, don't miss it. It's great.

After looking over my last few posts... I'm realizing more and more that I live the life of a 12 year old, full of cartoons, candy, and games. Life is great.

I have a problem

I have a problem. As a 23 yr. old male it pains me to admit that I like the game Sponge Bob: Battle For Bikini Bottom. I like it more than an adult should.

How can a person resist it though? The graphics are great, the gameplay is wonderful, and the voice-overs are authentic. What more could a gamer ask for?

I ask you, how can anyone resist the sophisticated humor of this?

So, you run around in the game, jumping on stuff, hitting robots, and collecting underwear (your life is restored with underwear), socks, and other various items. At one point in the game, you hang from a hook and bungee jump using your underwear... to which spongebob exclaims "the ultimate wedgie!". We have reached the pinnacle of gaming entertainment, ladies and gentlemen.

Anywho, we've been playing the Gamecube version, but I've got a few screenshots of the PC version, which is pretty much the same, but with mouse controls.

My problem with diamonds

1st: De beers. They sat on a stockpile of diamonds creating the illusion of rarity. As of 2000 they had a stockpile of $5 Billion worth of rough diamonds. From what I've read, they encouraged sellers to keep this fact quiet earlier on. However, I've heard that at some point in 2000 they released half of their stock to market, which is better, but still not good.

They also control who is able to sell the diamonds, what quality of diamonds, and how many they get. Considering they sell 70% of the rough diamonds in the world... that's pretty significant.

As technology gets better and better, synthetic diamonds are becoming a reality. As of some time last year, Wired Magazine was reporting that a company called Gemesis could creat flawless, identical yellow diamonds every three days at $100 per stone (natural stones of this type are worth $10-15k). Analogy time... Finding three identical yellow diamonds in nature is like flipping a coin 10,000 times and it never landing on tails.

What does De Beers do? They introduce technology (most likely for free) to sellers to make sure diamonds they buy are "natural". Diamonds can also now be "branded" to ensure that they are real, and that they're associated with a certain company. I understand people being competitive, but treating synthetic diamonds like they're the plague, and trying to convince consumers as much is ridiculous.

2nd: I'm not sure how much of this goes on anymore... but diamond wars. People getting arms chopped off... people getting killed for control of diamonds that will fuel rebel groups. Here's a link to the UN website talking about the problem.

3rd: I'm not sure exactly what it is about the whole theory that bothers me... Maybe it's that I hear so many women say that diamonds are a must when getting engaged. Maybe it's that I just don't understand paying 1200 dollars for a shiny rock.

Women are constantly fighting for equality in our society. They have jobs that pay as well as men's, though most would argue that they don't have these jobs in as great a number as men. Why should men be expected to buy an overpriced gem to show that they're committed to a woman? If it's just a symbol of love, and eternity, and other such things, why does it have to be something that doesn't really represent either of those? More importantly, why aren't women expected to do the same?

A girl in my Speech class gave her informative speech on diamonds today, just like I did the day before. She talked about what diamonds were, their history, origins, and the origin of the tradition. It apparently comes from count chocula (arch duke maximilian of austria) who had to bribe his wife with a diamond to marry him... she seemed fine with this tradition. I personally think it was hollywood and de beers together, but this theory seems to fit my view better. Lastly, she said "it can be said that dogs are man's best friend. Well, diamonds are a girl's best friend".

I hope I get a dog when I get engaged.

Anyways, this isn't to say I don't like engagement rings, just that I don't like diamonds, and have some cultural issues with women and old traditions. I'll probably get an engagement ring for the woman I propose to, but I'll go for a stone that has a little more character and color than a diamond.

Speech Day

I gave my first speech in front of the whole class today. After toiling through topic choices, I finally arrived at google, which I promptly changed to Diamonds.

I think the speech went pretty well. However, I forgot to use my visual aid (which was a sparkling piece of manure), and my conclusion was not very good.

In researching the history of diamonds, and the way they're marketed, I found that sellers use the "4 C's" to evaluate diamonds: Clarity, Color, Cut, and Carat Weight. I couldn't help but think of my own list of 3 C's... the keys to my own happiness: Cartoons, Candy, and Computers. I need to add another C, I know, but I'm not ready to take that step just yet.

Katie Callaway's Puppy

I wish I had a puppy. Katie (not Girlfriend Katie) got this puppy a few months ago.

Speech 377 and Chris Matthews

Tomorrow I have to construct my second speech. Thursday, I have to give that speech to the whole class. I don't have a clue what I want to do my speech on, but I'm leaning toward Katie's suggestion of google. It's ironic because I was googling for what to do a good speech on, and lo and behold, I was looking at it.

Today in class we watched one of the best commencement speeches I've ever seen/read/heard. It was Chris Matthews of harball on CNN, giving advice to the graduates. He was pushing 3 points, put yourself in the game, always ask, and follow your hunch.

Put yourself in the game: If you're close to the action, you've got a better chance of getting a piece of it. If someone in a company that you're in retires, quits, or gets promoted, you'll be there to step up... things like that.

Always Ask: "The world is not checking in with us to see what skills we've picked up, what idea we've concocted, what dreams we carry in our hearts. When a job opens up, whether it's in the chorus line or on the assembly line, it goes to the person standing there. It goes to the eager beaver the boss sees when he looks up from his work: the pint-sized kid standing at the basketball court in the playground waiting for one of the older boys to head home for supper. "Hey, kid, wanna play?" That's life .. "

follow your hunch: "The same goes with every hunch: follow it or forget it. Don't spend the rest of your life telling people what you are "thinking" of doing with your life."

Anyways, they're all good points, I thought I'd point those out. He expounded on them, and made them all fit very well into a large piece of advice for graduating students. You can find the full text here.

Drive-thru windows

Sonic apparently insists on having their new locations built with no drive-thru windows. They have those markers where you're supposed to pull up and someone will come out to take your money and bring your food. Every one of these that I've been to has had poor service, or at least worse service than another sonic with a drive-thru window. Maybe it's just a coincidence, but I really hate places without drive-thrus... oh, and places without covered drive-thrus.

Trip home this weekend

Katie, Taylor and I all decided to come home this weekend. Lori Princess' daughter chloey (sp?) was having her first birthday party so katie wanted to check that out, and I just hadn't been home in a while, so I decided to come in. Taylor wanted to see Jim and Daniel's new place, and I guess hang out with them a little bit. Anywho, we all decided to ride together in katie's car.

Yesterday we went out with Sami and Chris and saw a movie, the Bourne Supremacy. This is the first time I've ever been in a full theater and heard someone say that they wouldn't move over. Katie asked a couple if they would mind scooting down ONE seat so the three of us could sit together. The two clowns (black girl, white guy) said they needed their space. She tried to explain to them that either way, we'll be sitting on both sides of them, taking up their room, but they didn't listen. So, we sat down and talked about them and how rude it was right there in front of them... about 5 different times for each person who asked "So, who was it that wouldn't move down?". Anyways, we sat on both sides, and Chris took up all the space he could, and I took up all the space I could of the armrest and they just cuddled together. People (especially some black women around here) think that they don't have to respect anyone but themselves, and they'll be fine... it makes me wanna slap someone.

Today, we chopped down the pear tree out of the parents' back yard (about a 30 footer), and chopped it up and hauled it to the side. I've got pictures of that to post here at the end.

Soon after I had to take a trip out to Gloster to a family function with Katie's family. It ended up being a nice night, even though I was sorta dreading going out there at first. We had the event at an old plantation home that her grandma is gonna be living in for a while until she finds her own place. It's about 160 years old, and it's huge... and sorta falling apart, but great. We had fried chicken, sausages, and all the fixings. We even had some home made blueberry cobbler topped with ice cream.

I wish I'd have had the camera for dinner, but all I've got are pictures of Taylor and the pops figuring some way to get the tree to come down. So, here they are, along with a picture of the new gate that the parents put up:

Orangutangs

Pssst... Hey, get me outta here. I'll give you bananas, lots of bananas.

ReplayTV

Girlfriend and I decided we needed a new toy... Well, actually, I knew I needed one and I convinced her that she needed it too:). The toy I chose to try to market was the ReplayTV.

I told her about all the great features. We can record shows whenever we want, and not have to worry about missing any of your favorite shows (read sex and the city, friends reruns). We can replay live TV if something cool happens on TV. I can even transfer files to my computer for later viewing.

I really just wanted to have one for football season and for some shows that I always forget about, but always love watching. Girlfriend is the same way (minus the football season stuff). We always sit down to watch some tv, but there's nothing on. So, we figured that we'd get this, and build a collection of our fav shows, and we'd never have nothing to watch.

Anyways, we got it last week, and I think it's great. The only thing that it lacks is a second TV tuner so you can watch one show while recording another. That would make it the ultimate TV companion... though it's still pretty close as is. Katie was pretty upset about the fact that it couldn't record one show while another was playing... and that we had to pay $13.00/month to get any functionality from it. I warned her before hand of everything I thought she wouldn't like, but I guess I wasn't clear about those two points. We're still enjoying it though... or at least I am for now... Katie's in NY City being a tourist. ...While she's gone I'll fill the hard drive up with sportscenter and MXC episodes.

Last thing about the replayTV... We had problems getting everything set up initially. It was supposed to just work out of the box, but we couldn't get the IR Blaster that was provided with the ReplayTV 5504 to work with our Motorola Digital Cable Box from Cox Cable. If we entered channel 14, it would change the channel to 111 444. I found that the code for the IR blaster was wrong... it was supposed to be 0476 (I think) instead of the default 4476. It worked like a charm after that.

Now I'm trying to find out how to convert the replaytv files for burning to DVD... it's not as simple as I thought it would be.

Big presentation

Yesterday, my work for the last month was supposed to end in a presentation to some of the higher ups at the university.

The team and I prepared as much as we could for a small presentation of the technology we'd developed. After I gave the practice presentation, they gave suggestions of what needed to change, and my professor even gave suggestions of how to better answer questions. I was told that this question training was necessary because he had already said everything he could, so now he wanted to have the students voices heard. So, with all the training and practice, I was ready for my presentation.

I gave the presentation, and it went without a hitch. No software glitches, no crashes, no real problems with my speaking. However, after the presentation, the grilling began. I was asked questions about all aspects of this project... business, customer's perspective, technical... and I was only prepared for a technical presentation. My professor sorta left me out to dry by not finding out what kind of presentation would be taking place.

We went thinking that they were just making sure that we were meeting our requirements on schedule. Instead, they seemed dissatisfied with the technology display, and instead decided to grill me (first) on other aspects. They even focused questions on members of our team that were there just to observe.

Finally, after putting everyone on the spot, we were asked to come up with another proposal outlining our plan for the next 6-8 weeks. Due in 24 hours. If the university likes it, they'll accept it and go after my professor's second patent. If they don't, we may be finished, in the way of financial support.

People keep telling me that it was "good experience", and I guess I agree, but the thing I took away from it was... when someone tells you they're gonna have you say things for them, because they've already said them... be suspsicious that they may be acting as a puppet master, pulling your strings to give their message through you.

Firefox and Bugmenot

I just discovered the firefox bugmenot extension. I wrote about bugmenot.com a while back on this blog, but I didn't know that it had it's own extension.

After installing the extension, whenever you come to a site that requires registration, you right click the page and select bugmenot. A popup window appears giving you the login and pass for that site. It's amazingly simple. I'm glad someone thought to make this an extension. It wasn't that much work before... you just had to go to bugmenot.com and type in the site's url, but this makes everything so much simpler. It's great.

Firefox and extensions make IE look like a bloated dinosaur of a browser.

Firefox innovation

Blake Ross, one of the creators of firefox, is trying to get people to submit ideas for innovative ways to use machine learning in the 2.0 version of firefox. He is offering a Gmail account to each of the 5 or so people whose ideas are deemed to be the best. If their ideas are used he will credit them in his papers and in the firefox credits. I'll have the brain working over time on this one, instead of watching old harvey birdman episodes tonight.

Firefox is the best browser that I've ever used, and I hope it continues to improve at a faster pace than anything MS puts out.

Thieves...

Sami's dad owns a men's clothing store in Shreveport. He carries urban clothes and a few suits and ties also.

A few weeks ago a person/group of people decided to try to rob his store after hours. Since the store was barred up and had an alarm they thought it would be a good idea to run directly into the front of the store with their car. I don't know what kind of car they had, but they weren't the brightest fellers. They rammed into the store and as soon as the alarm went off, which they had to know was active, they took off. So they made off with absolutely nothing, and a lot of damage to their car.

Anyways, I got some pics, and I thought they were interesting.

Sami's house this weekend

I forgot to post a couple of pics from this weekend at Sami's house.

Saturday night we all gathered up and went to Sami's new townhouse to hang out. We hadn't seen the place since he moved in about a week before. So, I figured I'd take the digital cam and snap a few pics while I was there.

Sami's been doing great with his store, georgio's, in bossier mall. He finally got out of his old apartment, and bought himself a townhouse. Coincidentally, the townhouse he lives in now is in the apartment complex that I lived in for about a year when I moved back to Louisiana. They've remodeled them and made them much nicer. He's got all new appliances and carpet and all that good stuff. It's really weird to me the way things like that happen, but anyways... here are the pics.

Sami on the couch and Taylor giving his approval in the background.

Girlfriend trying to avoid looking at the camera. I'll get you next time, gadget!

Airborne Express/ Ebay trouble

As I wrote a few weeks ago, I was looking to buy an 8-bit nintendo for Girlfriend's birthday. I ordered one off Ebay, but it showed up broken. I received a partial refund from the seller and accepted it since I got a few games out of the deal.

I decided that since this nintendo was broken that I would go ahead and order a second one and it would be here by birthday time. Well... the seller I bought it from supposedly shipped it with Airborne Express on the 18th. Time went by... and on June 30th, I started to get worried that I was getting scammed. So, I shot off an email to the seller, and he said that he had shipped it on the 18th as he said and that he would try to locate a tracking number. I didn't hear back from him for two days.

In the meantime however, on the 1st of July, which coincidentally was Girlfriend's birthday, I got a knock on the door. It was a black lady who lived in town that had received my package 7 days ago! She said that she called them and tried to get them to pick the package up, but they wouldn't. Noone was required to sign for it, and they didn't even deliver it to a person. It was just left sitting outside... but even with all this trouble, at least I had the nintendo for Girlfriend ON her birthday... right on time.

I plugged it in, and lo and behold, the confounded thing didn't work. It just gave me the same ol blinking screen. The box was a little bit damaged, but I assume that what really did the nintendo in was being outside for 7 days in the summer heat.

So, Now I've called Airborne Express (I think they may be DHL now), and they're supposed to send a form for a claim, and then have some inspector out to look at the package. I've read online that they usually try to get out of paying the money... and if that does happen, I'm gonna be on this guy like stink on a pig if he even tries to hint that I'm responsible for the damage to this nintendo.

In the time between getting the first and second nintendo, I managed to fix the first by buying another part off ebay and installing it. I almost spent the entire sum that was refunded to me, but at least we have a working nintendo now.

Girlfriend's B-day

Yesterday was Girlfriend's B-day, so I gave her my gifts (an original NES nintendo with about 10 games, and a subscription to a magazine she always buys). I also bought her lunch and took her out to dinner.

Today, we drove into shreveport for the weekend and had dinner with her family, which went surprisingly well. We called it quits early tonight because we're gonna wake up early... well, relatively early, and go to longview for a 4th of July thing with my relatives in Texas. Maybe I'll have some pics to post tomorrow when I get back...

It's gonna be great though. They're cooking ribs:).