I think it's time to retool my web design skillset

I've been hearing a few keywords lately that have given me reason to doubt my own skills as a web programmer. They might be outdated.

Until recently, I didn't know what Ajax was. I have no idea what Ruby is... and what in the world is Ruby on Rails? Well, I intend to go out and update my skills to include these new technologies.

In a quick search for info on what Ajax is and how it works, I found this page at adaptivepath.com. It explains, in detail, what Ajax is about, where I've seen it before and how it works. It's a good intro. Now, I need to find out how I can use it, and if I can write a nice little application to learn more about it... after I finish the fantasy football app, that is.

Give the article a read if you've been hearing about Ajax, but you're not sure exactly what it is.

I think I've decided to switch my blog assistant project to the web, if at all possible. I'm still annoyed by the fact that I can't just select an image from a group and have it put the html code for the image (with style alignment) in this post. This post just made me realize that the admin page could probably be the host to a button for the same "assistant" features without the need for an extra java app.

Music I be liking... while my grammar be lacking

With nothing else to do online, and no real interest in coding on the fantasy football project tonight (rough coding day at work:\), I think a quick post about recent music is in order.

It's harder to find time to scour the internet and radio for new music that I might enjoy and I'm dern sure not gonna let MTV tell me what to like *cough*50 cent*cough*. In what little time I do have to branch out into finding new music, I've been going through fairly recent albums that I've downloaded but never listened to. Two gems from this collection, American Idiot by Green Day and A Crow Left to the Murder by Incubus.

Personal Favorites from the two albums... First, the Green Day album, Boulevard of Broken Dreams and Holiday (which have both gotten considerable radio play, or so Katie tells me). From the Incubus album, I sing aloud to Beware, Criminal! and Agoraphobia. A word of warning about the Incubus cd though... it took me a few listenings before I liked the music even though I'm an Incubus fan. So, just give the album a chance if you're gonna try it at all.

These cd's and a pack of chewing gum keep me awake at work. Chewing gum does wonders to cure my sleepiness at work. The music just distracts me from everyone else's phone conversations and banter.

Katie Holmes, brainwashed?

I never thought the day would come when I post about a celebrity relationship, but this one is just too strange. If you haven't heard, Katie Holmes is engaged to Tom Cruise, the zen alien: level 3 scientologist.

Fox news poses an interesting question, and points out a few things that seem mighty strange in the situation. Where was Katie Holmes during the 16 day period after her first meeting with Tom Cruise? They're hinting that she was being brainwashed.

I wouldn't put it past those scientology monkeys. They're strange creatures... believers in a religion that was created by a science fiction author that seem to relate your spiritual well-being with the amount of money you have, and more importantly, how much you give them.

Open Range, and why I like westerns.

I've been on a horse once. I choose those words carefully because I don't think you can consider what I was doing "riding". Now, if riding means sitting on a wild beast while it takes me wherever it likes while I sweat nervous bullets, then ok, I rode a horse. I don't drink whiskey, I don't own a gun and didn't even play cowboys and indians as a youngster.

I'm sitting in front of the computer, posting a blog entry about westerns. Linkin Park's Reanimation CD is playing. The air conditioner is on full blast to make sure a single drop of sweat doesn't form, where it might drop and defile the einstein t-shirt I'm wearing. Needless to say I'm not the "macho type" that I typically associate with those people who watch westerns.

Every time I'd see a western at blockbuster or on TV, I would pass it by for a more recent action movie or a good comedy. I like to think that I enjoy watching movies that I can relate to...or I used to anyway. Having seen my share of westerns,though, I've realized that I enjoy almost everything about them.

After watching "Open Range" today, I thought I'd post about my appreciation for them and recommend that anyone who enjoys westerns, or can stand westerns if they're good, watch this movie. It has a good mix of humor and action, a group of likable characters and a simple but interesting story line. That's all it takes to make a western, really.

Kevin Costner (Charlie Waite) and Robert Duvall (Boss Spearman) play a pair of cowboys driving their herd through the open range. Two younger men, Mose and Button (I don't know their real names, and you wouldn't recognize them anyway probably) are along for the journey also.

The plot revolves around a rancher who is claiming the land that Boss Spearman and his riders are crossing. Ranchers who are trying to lay claim to portions of land don't look kindly on "free grazers", those cowboys who lead their herds across their land, grazing on their grass. The two groups soon get in a conflict that stems from Boss Pearlman's cattle grazing on the rancher's land. That's it... simple enough.

To keep my opnion of the movie short and sweet I'll say that I think the acting was great (except maybe costner), the scenery was great, the characters were likeable and the plot was good too.

On a side note, I've gained an appreciation for Robert Duvall. He was fantastic in this movie, and I'm hard pressed to find a movie of his that I haven't enjoyed his character. Let's see, there was John Q, Gone in Sixty Seconds, Phenomenon, The Godfather... well, that's all I have, but I liked him in those movies.

Anywho, if you're in the mood for a simple movie, and you enjoy westerns, see this movie.

Our judicial system in action.

A man serving a life sentence for murder was sentenced to three additional years in prison for passing out cheese sandwiches while in jail. The whole story (via fark).

I see that the inmate was accused of charging an officer, and I can see the extra disciplinary action needed for something like that (though I'd like to see that carried out inside the prison walls). They shocked him with a stun gun for passing out a sandwich though... I'd charge them too.

Cucumbers cause indigestion?

I've found recently that whenever you learn a new bit of information, you will most likely hear someone make reference to it in the near future. Sometimes this happens to me when I hear someone use a strange phrase I've never heard anyone use. I will hear someone else use that phrase on TV or in passing soon after.

That happened to me again today. The weekend before last I went into town to visit my parents and had lunch from outback with them. The salad I ate had sliced cucumbers in it, which they warned would give me indigestion. They said that cucumbers give most people indigestion for some reason. I'd never heard of this before, but they were right. I walked around burping for an hour or so later that day.

I heard the notion that cucumbers cause indigestion again in a book of Taylor's, Mere Christianity by CS Lewis. In the later part of the book he made reference to Cucumbers causing indigestion, which I found strange, but before hearing that fact from my parents, I probably would've paid no attention to that.

It's a strange occurrence when you have something like this happen. I always thought that it was just a big coincidence when I would hear something new, and then someone on TV would repeat it, or another friend would repeat it. But, it's more likely that I'm just more aware of it after someone says it. If I hadn't heard that info from my parents, I wouldn't have paid any attention to the fact that it was in the book I was reading 2 weeks later.

Amazon.com home defribillator review.

I found a funny review for the home heart defibrillator on Amazon.com today.

I've already written the manufacturer recommending some sort of modulating device. I learned the hard way that the payload is specific to the human heart. You see, our beloved terrier, Kevin, had literally barked himself to death chasing the jingling Christmas tree ornament stuck to his tail. Not wanting my six year old's holiday to be forever tinged by death, I called out: "The AED! Stat!" I couldn't recall the specifics of that CPR/ First Aid class I took in college some years ago, but I've had to jump start my '62 VW Beetle at least once a week for the last 2 years. Well, we had our own little Christmas miracle that morning. Ol' Kev batted his eyes, struggled to his feet and licked my son's nose. Much like a microwave dinner, which does most of it's cooking AFTER the zap, Kevin then tore through the house like a cheetah on speed before exploding in the bathroom. (See my review for Dr. Easy's Biocleanser.)

No one reported this to Amazon.

McCain will get my vote in 2008

Again this week, McCain reaffirmed my thoughts that I will be voting for him in the next election, should he run. It was his comments about Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, that have renewed my interest in seeing him voted into the presidency.

Excellent idea

http://www.ashersarlin.com/archives/2004/09/a_cleaner_safer.php

Pistachio Commission

In researching the secret word, I came across http://www.pistachios.org/. Yes, that's right. There is an organization dedicated to the promotion of pistachios. More specifically, it is the California Pistachio Commission. You may have just read the silliest organizational title in history. Can any of the members even admit their membership in public without a chuckle, or a mere snortle?

Of course, by looking at the website you'd think it was a support site for passing kidney stones, as that's what the two pictured people appear to be doing. Actually, the site seems to target women.

The thing that gave me pause when reading the front page was this quote:

"The U.S. FDA has announced that eating nuts, such as pistachios, may help reduce the risk of heart disease when eaten as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol"

Eating three helpings of donkey excrement as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol may help reduce the risk of heart disease. How do people get away with claims like this?

Secret Word

The secret word is "pistachio".

Marvel sues maker of City Of Heroes game

Marvel should be ashamed of themselves. They have filed a suit against the operators of the popular City of Heroes massive multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG). In the game, you are able to create an identity for a superhero, and assume that character's identity. Marvel's position is that some people in the game are creating characters that resemble closely, if not exactly, marvel super hero characters. This is reasonable because it's probably true.

The real problem comes in when they try to get a share of the money that the City of Heroes operators are getting from subscriptions to play their game online. They claim that NCSoft Corp. and Cryptic Studios (the operators) are guilty of contributory and vicarious copyright and trademark infringement. This basically means that the makers of the game should be held responsible for even allowing their game's players to customize characters in a way that will resemble marvel characters. This, of course, is ridiculous.

People who make products and services shouldn't have (or be able to) to police the users of their products. It all goes back to the basic idea that once a consumer buys a product, he/she should be free to do whatever he wants with it. If a person who plays city of heroes wants to parade around the imaginary world that exists in COH as a replica of captain america, they should be allowed to do so. It's no different, in my opinion, than dressing yourself as spider-man and running around outside scaring the children in the neighborhood. Well... basically the same anyway. If a consumer wants to take on the role of an imaginary figure, whose right is it to say that they can't do so? I think Marvel will be hard pressed to say that these people are wrong for doing so.

So, they're attacking the company that allows people to do so. This is even worse than attacking the consumers, in my opinion, because I don't believe the COH operators have done anything wrong. Marvel is just going after the one body from which they can extract money.

The COH ops shouldn't be responsible for policing and protecting everyone else's intellectual property. It's an extension of the consumer's personality. It's as strange as having a t-shirt printer forbid people from making themselves t-shirts featuring their favorite cartoon character, or screen capture from a movie (I wonder if this is illegal too).

--Thank goodness for people who are better at expressing ideas than I am. Here's an article on the subject. It's as right as right can be.

Damageplan massacre

It was a sad day for the music world yesterday. The band Damageplan was playing a concert last night in Columbus Ohio when a gunman jumped on stage, shooting the guitarist Dimebag Darrell multiple times, killing him. He shot and killed one other member of the band, though his identity has not been released. The gunmen then directed shots into the crowd, and at other members of the band killing 4 people total (2 band members and 2 audience members supposedly) before he was gunned down by police.

Damageplan featured former Pantera artists Dimebag Darrell and Vinnie Paul. Vinnie Paul has not been confirmed as dead or alive, but his brother Dimebag Darrell was pronounced dead at the scene.

On a personal note, I grew up listening to pantera and really enjoyed most of their music. They had some really beautiful songs. My heart goes out to those family members and fans who lost loved ones at the club last night.

ABC is really stretching desperate housewives out...

Katie and I both really enjoy the new ABC show Desperate Housewives. I am obviously, as a male, obligated to like it because it has Teri Hatcher in a lead role. It's in the male handbook, look it up.

There've been several occasions in the last few weeks where Katie and I have sat down Sunday night to watch Desperate Housewives (and Boston Legal) to find that the show has been bumped back a week for some awards show, or tv movie. ABC is really stretching this show as far as long as it can. They've already got viewers expecting to see it. So, they sit down, having already set aside time to watch it, and see that something else is on. Oh well, they figure, I'm already here and this doesn't look half bad. I say it's dirty.

They should at least advertise somewhere that Desperate Housewives will not be seen this weekend. To be fair, Katie did watch the TV movie that was on this past Sunday night, "The Five People You Meet in Heaven", and she enjoyed it. I however, didn't care to watch Jon Voight in heaven in place of my night with Teri Hatcher. It's cruel, ABC. Stop it.

This week in news...

I wrote a few entries earlier this week about the Nintendo DS situation. We bought two of them to sell on Ebay because there was gonna be a shortage in stores. At first, I thought I'd end up returning them because their prices weren't high enough to make enough money to pay ebay fees and such, but they started to rise pretty quickly, so we're still gonna sell them.

Not only are we gonna sell those two, but we went to wal-mart and bought 5 more. We felt so strongly (or I felt strongly, and convinced Katie of the same:)) that we could make money on these that we had to try to get some more here in town. I also decided to sell them all seperately, even after I scheduled an auction selling the first two together. I looked again at the numbers, and it just made more sense to sell them all seperately. So, 5/7 auctions will end today, and I hope they all go well.

In other news, Ocean's Twelve comes out this weekend. Despite the fact that I instictively distrust movies with this many stars, I enjoyed the first one, so I'll be going to see the sequel this weekend.

Lastly, I'm looking forward to a new episode of mythbusters coming out next week. Here's a description of this new episode:

Episode 24: Ming Dynasty Astronaut
Deep in the Mojave Desert Buster takes the hot seat in the MythBusters' quest to test the myth of the Ming Dynasty Astronaut. Will he defy the laws of gravity and survive an explosive launch into space? Or ... not? Then "mad scientists" Adam and Jamie search for a source of free energy, as Adam's stunt double faces nearly losing his head at the hands of the MythBuilders' killer fan. It takes two heads, three fans and five MythBusters to test this head-turning, stomach-churning story.
premiere: Dec. 15, 2004

For those who don't know what the show is about, it's a show about disproving common myths. For instance, the myth that using a cell phone at a gas station can spark and cause a fire, or the myth that dropping a penny from a skyscraper will kill a person. The two hosts recreate the myth using their own unique methods, and decide whether the myth could actually be true or not.

It's really a great show, and I'm looking forward to all the new episodes. I just wish the premiere episodes weren't space almost a month apart.

Luke McCown got his first NFL start today

Former Louisiana Tech quarterback Luke McCown got his first NFL start today. Unfortunately, he got the start against the defending superbowl champs, who are 10-1 this year. He performed well, considering this is his rookie season, and his first start against the New England Patriots. Here are his numbers:

	CP/AT	YDS	AVG	TD	INT
Luke McCown	20/34	277	8.1	2	2

This isn't the best part of the situation though. I think the best part was the publicity that Louisiana Tech got as a result of McCown taking the start. They mentioned Louisiana Tech multiple times, and any publicity is good publicity.

Nintendo got the best of me.

Last month, after hearing that there would be a shortage of Nintendo DS's, I went and placed an order for two of them, along with two starter kits. Of course, the only reason I bought them was to make a quick profit on Ebay, which I've done successfully with a few other items. However, the only way I'd get a profit on these is if the supply ran out at retailers. Well, to date that hasn't happened.

I just got the two systems in the mail today, and as of last night our Wal-mart still had a shelf full of them. So, it looks like I'll be returning the items to wal-mart... eating the 12 dollars in shipping.

If it was Nintendo's plan from the get-go to release news of a shortage to increase purchases during the preorder period, they succeeded. Many stores online sold their initial preorder stock two weeks before the release of the system. I have to admit that I fell right into nintendo's plan. However, I have to think that the real winner here will be UPS and the other parcel services.

As more and more people realize that they're not able to sell these for anything but a loss on Ebay, they'll want to return them. If they bought them online, they can return them to a local store, and UPS gets one way shipping. If they bought them from an online-only retailer, or the store they bought it from has no local presence, the customer's parcel service of choice will see some added business again.

I'd like to see some numbers on that.

Muay Thai Kick Boxing - Kit Cope

I can't believe it happened, but I actually enjoyed a show that MTV aired. My ReplayTV was set to record pimp my ride, which is usually worth a look, and they were showing a "true life" documentary episode called "I'm a Muay Thai Boxer".

It was interesting stuff. There's a type of kick boxing that originated in Thailand called Muay Thai kickboxing. It seemed to be just like all other types of kickboxing I've ever seen, but then again I know nothing about kickboxing. However, I did enjoy seeing the training they have to go through to prepare. MTV did a decent job picking subjects for the documentary, and putting the film together.

They followed two american kickboxers who were invited to compete in a bare knuckle competition in Thailand. Kit Cope was the first. A former cheerleader at UNLV, he became interested in martial arts and became dominant in the Muay Thai Kick boxing world here in the US, and fought in a few fights outside of the US as well. The other fighter, Ben Garcia had also been a top Muay Thai fighter, but had not fought in about two years after an elbow injury.

Anyways, it was an interesting show. So, if you see it on the guide channel, give it a chance.

Here are a couple of links to some important sites in Muay Thai Boxing.
http://www.mastertoddy.com (The trainer of the documentary subjects)
http://www.wmtc.nu/ (World Muay Thai Council)

Custom Key Blanks

I took a trip to Wal-Mart Monday to do my grocery shopping for the week. Katie and I also decided to get a copy of each other's keys in case we run into another situation like last week, where I volunteer to pick up some stuff from her house while she's at work, but lock the door behind myself just after leaving her house.

We went back through the bowels of Wal-mart to the automotive section where they have the key copying machine. They had a few key blanks (the metal from which the copied keys are formed) on the rack that had designs on them, which I had never seen before. I figured that since I always have trouble finding which keys are which, especially in cold or rainy weather situations, that I would get one of the keys with a logo. They had an american flag, the saints logo, LSU, flames, and some black key that I couldn't really see. I chose LSU since it was the one I could actually use without fear of snickers (laughs, not the candy bars).

I had to wonder why there were no Louisiana Tech key blanks in the middle of Ruston. Surely there has to be a market for them. We have 10,000 college students, with many more fanatic alumni here in town. I'm sure that most of them would be happy to get copies of their own keys made with the tech logo and colors on them. Tech could even make all their keys to the dorms in this fashion. They'd get money for the use of their logo, and the students would have keys that stand out from their other keys.

Tech, you need to stay on top of these developments. Also, you should start marketing some USB thumb drives with your logo. You've got a brand name, as you well know judging by all the crap you sell in the bookstore, but you're not targeting the right items. You could have so many more useful items. Louisiana Tech Key Blanks and Louisiana USB thumb drives would be great.

Real Gilligan's Island

As a regular watcher of TBS afternoon shows (Home Improvement, Seinfeld, Everybody Loves Raymond), I've been watching a lot of the real gilligan's island commercials lately. I found out from watching the commercials that the two blonde ladies who were cast as "Ginger" are both real, fairly well known actresses.

So, I ventured online to find out who they were. I found that one was Rachel Hunter... I thought I'd seen her before. Who is this other girl though? Nicole Eggert? Why does that name sound familiar...? Let's see, she played in Baywatch, ok. She also played in Charles in Charge.

I realized that it was the cute little blonde headed girl, Jamie, from Charles in Charge that I used to drool over. I couldn't believe it was her. I didn't even recognize her. I just realized that this is sort of a useless post, all to say wow, she's gotten some work done, or her looks have just changed drastically with age.

Roadrunner in Shreveport, LA

My parents switched from DSL internet service to Roadrunner cable internet about 6 months ago. Since then, they've had about 4 outages. Today, the cable internet service went out, and the lower channels began to appear filled with static. They can't get a cable person out there in a little truck until Tuesday. Where's Wiley Coyote when you need him?

I had planned a trip home to get away from here, and get some work done. I figured that being holed up in a room with relatively few distractions would help me to get some web site work done for a customer, but now I won't have access, so I'm stuck here.

I think it's about time to start mailing my parents pamphlets from directv and dish network. They'll get more channels for less money, and will be able to switch back to bell south's reliable DSL internet.

UT2004

UT2004 is probably the most addictive game I've played in years. I just played for two hours straight. Hmmm... I spent an hour updating some user docs for school, and it felt like two hours. I spent two hours playing UT2004 and it felt like 30 minutes. I've learned about relativity.

Maybe I'll have more time to play that over my break between spring quarter and summer's 1st session. I probably won't be playing any time soon with finals coming up here in a week or less.

I think my Entrepeneurship class forgot to get a meeting together tonight. Oops.

Last night's 6 month dinner went well. I had a lot of work to do, so I ended up offering to take her out instead of cooking, and moving the cooking to Friday. I got her a card and took her to Log Cabin (probably our favorite restaurant in Ruston). She gave me a toolbox filled with things I like... cheez its, dr pepper, and gum. I just realized that I have the same taste in food and games as a 12 yr. old kid
...
sweet.

Movable Type Testing

I'm just getting this movable type system set up, and lemme tell ya, it's pretty nice so far. I know a lot of people are adamant about blogs being of the devil, but I think it will be a nice way to keep record of what's going on day to day. At the very least I'll be able to look back and see what I was thinking at any given moment. This is all assuming that I'm able to keep up with posting regularly... so we'll see.

Hmmm... this new shoutcast station is great. Paradynamic Roadhouse, playing Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, and a lot of other classic blues stuff. Haven't heard any John Lee Hooker lately, but I'm keepin my ears open. Wow, their website is horrendous.