New Year Gaming Extravaganza

To celebrate the new year, David, Andrew, and I (and possibly Mike) are going to have a gaming extravaganza tomorrow night. Everyone is bringing their computer for LAN games, and we'll also have a PS2, GameCube, and XBox. David has purchased about 10 new games in the past week, and I'm looking forward to playing Time Crisis 2 and Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time.

New Design

This blog has a new design, prompted by my reading of Designing with Web Standards . I've never been very interested in web design, but I realize that it's a skill that a literate person must have in this era. I found Designing with Web Standards very enlightening, not only for it's discussion of modern web design with XHTML and CSS, but also for the historical background which it provides (I now understand the Mac vs. PC font size debacle of the late 90s that made the text on many pages incredibly small in Macintosh browsers). I'm still not a fan of web design, since it seems to be mostly a bunch of memorization about bugs in browsers and CSS quirks, but at least I feel more comfortable with it now.

The new design for this weblog still needs work, but if you have any suggestions, please leave a comment.

Battlestar Galactica

I finally got around to watching the new Battlestar Galactica mini-series. Overall, I thought it was engaging. The special effects were excellent for a TV show, and the writing and acting was mostly well done. Occasionally the dialogue was overly-dramatic and corny, but it didn't detract from my enjoyment. Judging from the ending, they are planning on continuing the show if it performs well enough, and I hope it does.

I haven't seen the original Battlestar Galactica, but it's now available on DVD, so I'll have to add it to my Netflix queue when I restart my Netflix membership.

Also, Tricia Helfer is hot.

Christmas Swag

O Christmas swag, O Christmas swag... here's what I got this year:

• Akira Kurosawa's The Hidden Fortress . A movie that Star Wars drew from heavily.
• In Search of Stupidity: Over 20 Years of High-Tech Marketing Disasters . Recommended by JoelOnSoftware .
• The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life . Sounded interesting, and I just got done taking a course in personality psychology.
• Taylor Professional Big Digit Timer . An attempt to more carefully control the amount of time I spend surfing the web and studying.
• $5 Subway Gift Certificate.
• $20 BP Cash Card.
• Two pairs of blue jeans and new gloves.

Amazon.com Wishlist helped ensure that I got what I wanted.

Here's what I gave this year:

• For Mom: Solitaire Till Dawn X by Semicolon Software.
• For Dad: LaunchBar by Objective Development.
• For Brother: $20 Best Buy Gift Certificate.

Japander

Japander is a huge archive of commercials that Western celebrities have done in Japan. I found the Eddie Murphy and Arnold Schwarzenegger commercials particularly amusing. If you saw Lost in Translation , then you should check this out.

(Gay) Marriage

A New York Times poll showing support for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage has been in the news lately. I'm rather detached when it comes to the debate surrounding gay marriage. Why? Because I reject the foundations of the debate - namely, that marriage should be a legal issue.

I see no point in legal marriage. Why does a relationship between two people need to become a three-way contract with the government? Why should the government care if I'm married? The movement of marriage into the legal realm is just another control point for the government in your life. If two people in a relationship (straight or gay) want to get married, then that's a decision for them to make in the social realm. The government should have no say.

Although my position may seem radical, a growing number of Americans seem to agree with me. Cohabitation of legally unmarried couples continues to rise, according to census figures. Most of these couples probably aren't as vehemently anti-legal marriage as I, but they know that the benefits of legal marriage are few and the downside is great.

Further reading:
Why Marriage? The tie that binds need not be legal.
Alternatives to Marriage Project (unmarried.org)

Moneyball

Last night I finished reading Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game . I was tipped off to the book by a post from Eric Albert over the summer. The book explains how the Oakland A's became one of the most successful teams in baseball, despite being one of the poorest teams. Oakland exploits the market for baseball players by using new baseball knowledge to select players that are undervalued. After reading this book, I realize the worthlessness of many statistics quoted by announcers and commentators. I'm not a huge baseball fan, but I found this book fascinating nonetheless. Recommended.

Mobile Phones and Plans

My contract with AT&T Wireless is up in January, so I've been scouting the mobile phone market, looking for deals. I've wanted a new phone for awhile, preferably one with web/email/AIM capability and possibly Bluetooth. The Treo 600 looks great, but it's too expensive. The T-Mobile Sidekick (a.k.a. Hiptop ) looks very nice, and I've read some good reviews. A major benefit of this device is that you can add unlimited data to your calling plan for $20/month. Also, if you buy the Sidekick from Amazon, you end up earning $30 after rebate, which is pretty crazy. The downside to the Sidekick is that it doesn't have Bluetooth.

Now I'm trying to determine the quality of T-Mobile's northeast Ohio coverage. I know Jason uses T-Mobile, and I haven't heard him complain. However, I've read some forum posts where people have complained about spotty coverage in certain parts of Cleveland. I'll probably just have to try the phone and return it if I'm not satisfied with the coverage.

Anyone have a Sidekick or used T-Mobile in Cleveland?

Gamma and Beck Eclipse Book

I haven't been following the Eclipse community as closely as I did while on co-op, so the release of Gamma and Beck's book, Contributing to Eclipse: Principles, Patterns, and Plugins , slipped by me. I worked with some early drafts of this book, and even then it was excellent. Gamma and Beck have both already penned classics ( Design Patterns and Extreme Programming Explained ), and I expect this book to continue that legacy.

Standing Ovation

Nice article in the New York Times about the history and current devaluation of the standing ovation. Every show on Broadway, even the mediocre ones, get standing ovations:

John Lahr, the theater critic for The New Yorker magazine, sees a complex psychological dynamic at work. "I think it's generally an attempt by the audience at self-hypnosis," he said. "They think if they go to a show and stand at the end they've had a good time. They're trying to give themselves the experience they thought they should have."

I know I'm a curmudgeon, but I really hate the trend toward giving everything a standing ovation. I haven't been to any plays lately, but I've been to a few events that call for audience applause, and it seems that everyone is willing to jump up and clap at the drop of a hat. And if you remain seated, then you look like an asshole. It would be interesting to see some social psychological research on this matter. What percentage of the audience needs to give a standing ovation to cause everyone else to rise?

Knights of the Old Republic

I am addicted to Knights of the Old Republic . I started playing it last week during a lull between exams, and before I knew it, I had racked up 6 hours of gameplay. Now that I'm on break, I've been playing it in earnest, adding about 8 more hours over the past two days. The story is deep and compelling, and there are tons of side quests. I already want to go back and play it as a member of the dark side. If you are a fan of RPGs or Star Wars, then you should play this game. If you're a fan of both, then prepare to be addicted!

Rich and the Chipmunks

Rich Drushel, EECS 375 instructor, sings .

Egg Hunt

This Saturday, I'll be participating in the Fall 2003 Lego Robot Egg Hunt at the Great Lakes Science Center as part of the Autonomous Robotics class I'm taking. It's free and open to the public, so if you're in the Cleveland area, then come on out. The competition starts at 12:30pm.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the Egg Hunt, two teams of two robots each are placed in a large enclosed arena, with plastic eggs scattered throughout the arena. At each end of the of arena is a nest. At the back of each nest is a bright light. One nest has a horizontally polarized light, and the other has a vertically polarized light, so that the nests can be distinguished by the robots. Any pastel eggs deposited in your team's nest are worth +1 point, while black eggs are worth -4 points. Rounds last 10 minutes, and the goal is to score more points than the other team. There are many strategies, but the most common one (and the one employed by my group's robot) is to collect a single egg, check its color, and drop it off in the appropriate nest.

I'm Back

The battle with final exams and projects has been joined and (mostly) won, although there are still some pockets of resistance. I've turned in my Networking final project, finished work on my group's robot for Autonomous Robotics , and completed my Databases final project and final exam. I've got two final exams left ( Programming Languages on Friday and Personality Psychology on Monday), but the psychology exam should be pretty easy. I've also got to finish up my robot design notebook, which is due next Tuesday. It's all downhill from here though, so expect to see more posts.