:: Venting Insanity ::

:: Saturday, March 22, 2003 ::

You're a kind and gentle person with a dark past that haunts you. But you find happiness in your friends and by protecting the weak and oppressed. Let's face it. You kick ass! ReverseBlade!

pain in the ...
Well, I was able to add the link to to my template, but I'm still trying to get Blogger to let me add //:i will not be silenced:\\ to the column. I managed to get a few changes into my template, but then it stopped letting me again. Grr....

Guess I'll have to try again later...

I'm also thinking of taking the quiz section off my nav-column. I added that and the eMode section mainly for filler, but I'm building up so many links underneath that now, I don't need them. Plus, it's just a pain to keep adding all those little pop-up pages everytime I take another quiz. Not to mention the fact that I wouldn't be able to add any new quizzes right now because I can't change my template. Plus, with the archives section getting longer, my navcolumn is getting huge. Maybe I'll keep the quizzes up, but put them on their own little page, which is what I might do with the archives soon.

Yeah... I'm just frustrated that I can't change my template. I really wanted to do something and I have a cool idea for a new layout that I want to try, but I can't do anything with it because Blogger's being a pain and not saving anymore than one session of changes every couple of nights. That means, if I change the colors and don't like how they look, I'm stuck with them for a couple of days. Go figure.

movie time
I watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding with my parents just now. It was so funny! In a way, it reminded me a little of my own family and how involved in each other's lives we are. Not so much that we're like the ones in the movie, but enough to make me think 'Leave me alone!' sometimes. But, every family has its quirks I suppose. ^^;;

Heh... Yeah... I took it more than once. I got Trowa, too, but I think I'd go nuts with him not saying anything all the time. I just think there's better pics of Duo she could have used... x.x

movie night
Estelle, Johnny, and I went to see Dreamcatcher last night. It wasn't really what we thought it was going to be. The commercials and previews all marketed the movie as another Stephen King thriller, but there were an awful lot of funny moments and then just plain weird moments. Now, granted, Stephen King writes his books that way sometimes, but there was no overall feeling through the movie. The dialog was hokey in a lot of places. I'd like to read the book, since there were a lot of unexplained things in the movie. They spent a lot of time establishing other facts from the book that they didn't need to spend as much time on as they did, too. I think they focused on the wrong thing.

today's meeting
The meeting with Rob went well today. I met the other two programmers as well, Monica and Dan. Monica's handling the middle and Dan's backend/database. There's also a webmaster, who's kind of in charge of all of us, and a graphic designer that I have yet to meet. Considering my position, I will need to meet with them and set up who will be doing what as far as the site goes. Who handles content, what the layout is going to be, color scheme and graphics, where the navigation tools will be, things like that. We got a lot discussed, a lot of questions were answered, and we're already working on ideas on how to approach the situation. While the next meeting won't be until May, Dan and Monica want to get started on some basics. I got the address to the prototype site, and I'll be looking that over to get a feel of what they're looking for so I know how to set up the forms and such.

However, my exact position and duties are still a bit unclear to me, so that's why I want to meet with the graphic designer and the webmaster. I want to figure out exactly where each of us stands and what it is that's expected of me. I'll try e-mailing Rob about possibly setting something like that up before May rolls around.

:: Friday, March 21, 2003 ::

wow...
This is probably the best explaination I've heard so far.

What Forest Creature Are You?

-----


You are the brunette, with an amazing personality.
You like to have fun, fit in with the crowd,
and are more often than not you look your best
no matter what you are wearing! Your only down
side is you can be a bit stubborn in your ways,
so lighten up and listen to others once in a
while.


*What anime character and personality would you be?*
brought to you by Quizilla

¿habla español?
Why is it that, in a country that conducts the majority of its business in english, do we have to have bilingual ballots and poll workers? Only in America does a third of the population not speak the main language.

You don't see other countries bending over backwards like this. You deal with it. You learn to speak the national language or you don't communicate. It's that simple. The majority of business transactions, job and work related issues, and public communications are done in english here. That's it. Learn it, don't complain that I don't speak your language. I was born here and learned english. You can, too. It's not that hard.

well now
It's good to know that everyone has their priorities straight again. After all, can't have too many people searching for nude pictures of Britney Spears on the web now, can we?

{{dies}}

and you thought graffitti was bad
It's bad enough when they spray paint the wall across the street and you have to stare at PICO WUZ HEA for a while, but now they're doing it to websites. Google was hit the other day. When you searched Iraq, it came up with a message that said, "No matches available. Iraq was blown off the face of the earth."

What's even worse is that one of the defacements mentioned in the article used sTiCkY cApS. I HATE STICKY CAPS! It makes a person look like they never went to school, for crying out loud.

Codes frustrate me. By the time you remember what you have to type to put out a particular word, you're better off just typing it normal.

oi...
It's good to see that at least the hockey players showed good taste.

blogger update
I was able to change one little thing on my template, then it stopped letting me do it. Grrr...

interview update
Well, I think the interview went well today. It's an airplane maintenance facility at the airport in Islip. The position itself is pretty neat. A lot of clerical and receptionist type duties, but it's closer to home than these others I've talked to and the pay's good. Plus, I get all sorts of benefits, which is always a good thing. Eugene (the guy I talked to today) said he'd get back to me by the middle of next week.

{{crosses fingers}}

vet update
Dad took Marbles back to the vet again today. He got another shot and Dr Savino gave him another medicine to try (once every other day) in addition to the stuff we're now giving him. Then, he wants to see him back in two weeks. Once we get the leg pain thing under control, we'll see about doing anything about his hyperthyroid. Dr Savino said the cat's hormone levels aren't too drastically high, so he's not overly concerned about it. He felt the same way about the elevated white blood cell count and the slightly elevated blood sugar. All were still fairly close to normal, so the vet thinks most of it is just that the cat's stressed out.

I say again, a cat that sleeps all day has stress?? If only I could have a life like his...

class update
I did most of the homework with Tina last night before I left. Hopefully, she'll be able to get the book this weekend and won't need to share mine. I've only got two pages left of the assignment that's due Monday. Prof Stephenson also gave us our take home midterm. It's due Apr 10th, right before Spring Break. I also have to remind both my teachers that I'm going to miss class on the 3rd and 4th for Grand Assembly. I spoke with both of them the first night about it. Both decided that we're not having class on the 4th anyway. It's only a make up class, and they're both giving take home assignments to do instead of having to attend class. However, I think Prof Lucero is having a test on the 3rd, and I want to make sure I can take it either before (maybe Tuesday or Wednesday) or after the weekend (perhaps Monday). I'll talk to him about it again on Monday, just to remind him.

permstor update
Well, I think that's what it's going to be called. We have our first big technical meeting on Saturday at a diner in Commack. I'm kind of excited. While I don't have much to bring as I really don't have a huge webfolio for myself, I need to take some time today before we go out to think of any questions for the other two programmers. I'm really looking forward to this one!

tutoring update
I got paid!!! The paperwork finally went through and I got my first paycheck. A whole $65.33. Oh well... it's better than nothing. The check arrived yesterday in the mail, I deposited it today. Prof Spratt said he got my check by accident. They give him his check in person instead of mailing it to him. Well, apparently 'Sul' and 'Spr' are right next to each other in the Briarcliffe payroll. My envelope got stuck to his. So, he put a stamp on it and mailed it for me since he wasn't sure when he was going to see me. He told me that on Wednesday. He must have dropped it off at Patchogue because I got the check really fast.

Dean Rob also said he put in my group tutoring sheets. So, I have two more checks pending from the school, the second individual tutoring sheet, and the several group tutoring sheets.

I think Jen is seeing Chris now, though. He's in her math and physics classes, like I was last session, so it's easier for him to check over the homework with her than it is for me, since I don't know the assignments. However, if I have to sit through another no show with Evelyn, I'm going to freak.

I also have to remind myself to correct the tutor sheet that Dean Rob posted around the school. I'm not a networking tutor/major... I'm a programming tutor/major. {{sigh}} Big difference there. Oh well.

social life update
I'm going with a bunch of friends to see Dreamcatcher tonight. YAY!! I'm just happy to be going out.

new worm
Yup... a real virus warning for once...

white flag waving 101
If this continues, the war will be over in a few days. Even the civilians are getting in on it.

press conference
Rumsfeld held a press conference on the war. Some of the questions from the reports made me wonder what kinds of teachers are working at journalism schools these days.

oh go you YOU are a rainbow unicorn !!


What colour unicorn are you ?
brought to you by Quizilla

Oi... once you navigate the bad grammar, you get a result...

-----


A Beautiful Princess! In your past life you had a
true love whom you adored, and ruled over many
people. In your current life you like to be the
boss, yet you're not demanding. You're sweet
and innocent and waiting for your prince
charming to come and rescue you!


What Were You In A Past Life?
brought to you by Quizilla

-----


Pink:
You see the world in bright pink. The world is a
happy, happy place! You love all people and
things!! Life is great! You're just like a
happy child. Spread the cheer.

*this quiz was made by href="http://www.uinmind.com/sara">Sara


What color do you see the world in?
brought to you by Quizilla

PINK??? O.O;;; That is so *NOT* me...

-----



What Shoujo Mascot Are You?

O.O;;; eh?? Never heard of this one.

-----



What Magical Girl Are You?

-----


You're an Elf! Did you manipulate the answers?


What LotR (Lord of the Rings) Species Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

-----

Okay... enough quizzes for one night. {{points at Stalking Snape}} She took a TON!

spring is here
I should ask if Mom did her egg trick. I was in class at 8 pm Eastern, but that was supposed the start of Spring. When that happens, you can balance a raw egg on the small end. It's the only time you can do it. {{shrugs}} My sign of Spring was the constant and disgusting rain we had tonight while I was driving to, sitting in, and driving from class.

sigh
I still don't understand how people can think they have more information than the government. Maybe we can make better decisions, but we don't have all the facts they have. While a wish for peace and safe returns is noble thing, there's something inside me that keeps saying that someone somewhere knows more than me and I have to put my faith in that person that they're doing the right thing.

I would love to see my friends come home. I would love for all those families to be together again. No one truly *wants* war, but I feel it's a necessary evil. It took how long for them to do anything about those disarmament resolutions? Twelve years? Yeah, the UN Security Council can just go blow, for all I care. They don't enforce their resolutions, so their authority just died, as far as I'm concerned. They can say what they want, but we all know they won't do diddly about it, so screw 'em.

In the meantime, everyone's out there screaming and hollering about how wrong this is. Martin Sheen knows jack about what's going on. He doesn't have an entire force of undercover operatives out there gathering intelligence for him. He's not a government official, people. He just plays one on TV. As far as I'm concerned, he's not an authority on the matter. No celebrity is. I'm not either. But don't tell me I'm completely wrong when you don't know everything. After all, I'm not saying I'm completely right. I don't have some elite force of undercover operatives gathering intelligence either.

Last words? **SUPPORT OUR TROOPS**

:: Thursday, March 20, 2003 ::

yay
Got an 'A' (two wrong out of 38) on the first take home assignment for my network class. Prof Stephenson's breaking down the grades for us right now. We installed CompTIA practice exam program to help us study for Network+ certifications last class that we've played around with a bit.

We're going over the homework now...

arrays
Prof Lucero gave me a special assignment today. He had me work on arrays while the rest of the class was continuing with the conditional statements like 'if'.

interview
I got a call from McArthur Airport today and have an interview at 10:30 am tomorrow. {{crosses fingers}} So far, this one is the closest to home. I haven't heard about that web position in Hicksville, or the sales position, either. However, I'll make a few calls when I get home tomorrow and see what the deal is with them.

sigh
Now to my next class...

I joined two new cliques today, but Blogger's being a pain and I can't update my template still. Here are the links until I can do so.



//:i will not be silenced:\\

:: Wednesday, March 19, 2003 ::

update
Bush Launches War, U.S. Targets Iraqi Leaders

It has begun, this time for real.

family point of view
Blog: Army Family Journal

Another reason to support our troops. Their families are in crisis. Linked to this blog are several other military family blogs. Please read.

it has begun
Deadline Passes; Saddam Sits Tight

MSN put this up today. The war will begin any moment. No one has an exact time on that, but I'm sure someone somewhere knows what that time is. They're just waiting to tell everyone so it doesn't leak out too early.

stupid blogger
I can't update my template. Hopefully that will change tomorrow and I can do the changes I want to do.

back to class
I'll write more tonight if I can.

preparedness report
It's always better to be prepared than not... This site provides helpful insights on what to do if something goes wrong.

And naturally, just like anything the government puts out, there's a spoof available for everyone's perusal.

hmm...
It's after 6. Jen's usually early for tutoring, so I guess she's not coming. I saw eye candy for tonight's class walking into the building today. That means he should be in class later tonight if he didn't drop. I'm going to go grab some food. I could go home, but I don't want to use all that gas.

grr...
Evelyn's not here again. {{sigh}} I'll wait until 6 or so and see if Jen comes. If not, I'm outta here to get some food before class.

make a wish
I saw a rainbow on the way in today. It wasn't a full rainbow, the sun was still too high in the sky. Also, I couldn't see the colors without my sunglasses on. They were too washed out otherwise. But, there was a small strip on either side of the sun. With my sunglasses, I could distinctly see the seven colors of the spectrum in both strips. It was really pretty! *_*

bombing has started
While no one has actually announced we're at war, MSN put up this article on their main page. The deadline is 8pm my time (Eastern) tonight, 4am in Baghdad. Already, seventeen Iraqi troops surrendered and crossed the border into Kuwait. This isn't counting the ones that surrendered during the British training exercise.

Where Is Raed? reports that the entire city of Baghdad has basically shut down. Salam mentioned rumors that they might not let the people leave the city for safety if the bombing starts there. In a way, I wish I didn't have class tonight.

Kevin Sites didn't post anything about the bombing today, but he had posted a few days ago how it was difficult to get a good internet connection in order for him to post. Salam mentioned the same thing, how it was getting harder for him to access his blog.

politicians at their best
Politicians at Loggerheads Over Official State Biscuit

Do these people even realize there's more important things going on?

quick update before bed
Thanks to Yonina and much to my relief... The Bonsai Kittens are fake. {{big sigh of relief}} Apparently, some MIT students thought it would be funny to post it up.

The whole idea is just plain sickoid, if you ask me. Then again, I wouldn't surprised if someone had thought it was real and tried to do it. {{rolls eyes}}

blogs of note
This came up on the Blogger home page.

Where Is Raed?

I found it very interesting and rather shocking that Salam was able to make this. I hope for his sake he isn't caught. It sounds like he does a few things to get around certain bans.

:: Tuesday, March 18, 2003 ::

blah...
Lost my inspiration while staring at the code. I'll mess with the colors later.

hehehehe
Yes, I'm nuts.



I found my site listed on the Weather Pixie users page. ^^;;;

warning
I will be spending most of tonight playing with my template and testing new colors towards a new layout. Don't be surprised if something looks really funky for a moment. If it does, just try refreshing a few times and the colors might change. I'll post again when I'm done.

yaaay!!
Blogger's got its act together again and my website has been updated. Of course, it could also have been WebMasters. Who knows... Either way, everything's all better now.

And I didn't lose a word! WHEW!

military exercise
Saddam's Soldiers Surrender

Looks like the Iraqis are having military exercises just like the British troops are. This was brought to my attention by Tom Barrett of Conservative Truth in his editorial article.

grrr...
Blogger's being a pain. It's not publishing to my website, even though it's publishing to it's own servers.

break time
I'm on break in class right now... We're doing a lot of work tonight on this little matching game we're making. It's kinda cool.

driving adventures
It seemed like every slow old man was on the road in front of me on the way to class tonight. What a pain!

I had some real weirdos on the road on the way home from the interview earlier, too. First was this menace of a woman that shouldn't have been driving at all. She was swerving all over the lane, kept changing her mind halfway through lane changes and going back to where she started, speeding up and then slamming on her brakes... It was making me crazy.

Then there was Mr Crotch Rocket. He was on one of those Ninja bikes (whatever they are) and was driving like a total @$$. Cutting between cars, riding on the dotted line, impatiently squeezing through tiny spaces between moving vehicles. And there were large trucks on the road. I was waiting for him to slide underneath one. It would have served him right.

break's over...
Back to class. We're starting loops. I wonder if anyone's going to get their computers jammed into an infinite loop tonight. That should be amusing.

go flying
Fly Guy

This was kinda cute...

chock full of interview goodness
I had the interview with NAC today. It seemed to go well. The girl (Stacy) showed me around a bit, too, which is always a good sign.

got the letter
Rob V e-mailed me again. The location has been decided for our first meeting this Saturday, time still TBA. I'm kind of excited.

class act
So, I have C again tonight. I have to go through my disks and find some empty ones to start saving things on for class. I have a couple of programs saved on the computer I use at school (they didn't delete drive H last time, so I'll see if they're still there tonight) and I want to bring them home to have them. The bigger library I have of working code here, the easier it'll be to do things later on.

cat-ness
Marbles is acting like he's in more pain. He pulled his leg away from me today. We've been keeping him on the medicine, but he hasn't been using the boxes now and sometimes doesn't even go downstairs. It's not fun cleaning *that* up... Either way, we don't know what we're going to do. That's the problem with having animals all around the same age. It hasn't even been two years since we had to put Daryl down. {{sigh}}

dixie chicks boycotted
Dixie Chicks Continue To Receive Backlash For Anti-Bush Comments

Wow... public destruction of their albums, too. What about public opinion now? (found by Johnny)

bad translation?
Trogdor

A cute little game that's actually a bit hard to play. The grammar sucks, but it might be on purpose. Either way, consider yourselves warned. (found this on Wil Wheaton Dot Net and it's a part of Homestar Runner)

updates
I've added a few new sites to my NavColumn. There's also been a few layout changes (check out Bloggity's new theme! pretty!), along with some new sections and reorganization. I haven't really been posting updates since I figured most of you were pretty smart enough to figure it all out yourselves. >P

But... just in case ya missed some... there they are! {{points}}

heh...
I looked into being a Pampered Chef consultant and hosting parties and stuff... They need a $90 investment to get started. {{sigh}}

I just can't win. I figured I could do it around my school schedule, but I don't have the $90. I could borrow it, but I don't know anyone who would host parties and buy stuff. Pampered Chef isn't cheap stuff. Besides, I'm not a very good cook and I'm not very good at selling. I'd probably do really bad. ^^;;

fair and balanced
As always, I try to be open minded and listen to the other side.

MoveOn.org's Global Candlelight Vigil for Peace

I wonder if any of these people realize that disarming Saddam will make World War III that much less of a possibility? (link found on Wil Wheaton Dot Net on the bottom of the Soapbox section)

bonzai trees are pretty...
...but this is just plain old sick.

Bonsai Kittens

Where do people come up with these ideas??? I could never do this to my cat! (found on Dave Barry's blog from Michelle Caswell)

the new canary
Hm... If this is what the military's relying on...

Marine Pigeon Force May Detect Attack

The wonders of modern science... x.x;;; (found on Dave Barry's blog)

heh...
That was easy... I found a link on Yahoo! to the White House printing of the speech itself. Heh...

Presidential Address

There ya go! Told you I'd find it.

my thoughts
Powerful words. And after 12 years of appeasement and waiting after a resolution that was supposed to have only given them 45 days (big difference, 45 days to 12 years), it's about damn time we did something about this lack of disarmament. Personally, I think some of these people would be willing to wait until one of those weapons of mass destruction was used against them. Then watch them jump up and down and scream for war. {{grumbles}}

I'm so sick of Americans getting all anti-American, too. Yeah, some Americans are pretty dumb, but you're bound to find stupid people like that wherever you go. Why is it that our mistakes are tacked up on the bulletin board for all to see, but everyone else's are swept under the rug? Why do people only remember the bad things about us and not the good? Notice how quick everyone is to forget our integral part in WWII, but they shove Vietnam in our face.

This time, we have a reason to go in there. They violated Security Counsel resolutions by not disarming. The Security Counsel looks like a bunch of pansy-@$$ed jerks right now by not enforcing their own resolutions! If nothing is done, none of their resolutions in the future will mean anything. They're losing their effect.

It's time to take action. It was time to take action when those first 45 days expired over a decade ago. It was time to take action when the weapons inspectors were bugged, harassed, threatened, and kicked out of the country. It's been time to take action for 12 years.

Why doesn't anyone else see that?

:: Monday, March 17, 2003 ::

home again
Well, class was pretty cool. We're building our way towards doing arrays. We made a matching game where you had 9 numbers arranged in a cube on the screen, and you chose two numbers to flip over to see if you got matching letters. It's cute. I'm thinking of adding on a small section where I allow the user to chose a new game or exit.

Unfortunately, I don't remember how to add a random number generator (which I'll probably learn in Advanced C) to reassign the letters and numbers. {{shrugs}}

presidential address
I missed it since I was in class, and I've been searching all over to find information on what he said. I saw a few of the news reports afterwards where they showed tidbits of the speech and analyzed it to death. However, I'd like to see/hear the whole thing for myself. If I find a link to something good, I'll post it.

♣ HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY!!! ♣

things that make you go hmmm
Well, Evelyn's not here again. I have a few minutes to sit and do nothing before class starts now. I was able to retype my program homework for C, though, which is a good thing. I wasn't happy with the way it came out after I did it last time and wanted to retype it again. I didn't get a chance to do it earlier, so at least I could do that before class.

Prof Stephenson (John, but I know too many John's already, so I'm just going to stick with that for him) called earlier and said class was cancelled tonight, so I'm not going to be here until 10:30 like I normally would be. His brother-in-law hadn't been doing well and passed away over the weekend, but he said class would be back to normal on Wednesday.

busy day? sort of
I ended up feeling really crappy yesterday morning because I didn't sleep Saturday night. I ended up not going to Nana's, and didn't hear Mom and Dad stop home before Mom went to Lori's party, so I missed that, too. I went to Grandma's for the corned beef, though. It came out really good. She didn't make it dry this year. And it was ready when we got there, so Dad didn't have a chance to sneak the Guiness into the water while it was cooking. That's okay, it tasted good without it. She also soaked pears in peppermint schnapps (I know I spelled that wrong) and served them with vanilla ice cream sprinkled with green sugar crystals. It was an interesting flavor.

time for class
If it's not too bad, I might blog some more during break. ^^;;

:: Sunday, March 16, 2003 ::

yaaaaa!!
I can't sleep!! I'm exhausted, too. And I have tons to do tomorrow... x.x;; {{dies}}

tutor style
Not the house archetecture...

I met with Jen today. They kicked us out of the library early. Grr... >.< Then we only had an hour down in South Street. All in all, it was a sucky and pointless tutoring session. >.<

Tho', I sill get paid... if they ever send me the money!!!

phase 10
I went over to Estelle and Johnny's. We played this card game called "Phase 10" after the baby went to bed. It's actually pretty cool. There's four colors, the cards run from 1-12, with a Wild Card and a Skip Card. You have ten 'phases' you have to achieve (in order!) in order to win the game, but you have to have the least number of points. I liked it. Next time, I'm going to see if I can steal Mom's box of "Mille Borne" cards to play. Either that, or I've got an "Uno" deck.

blah
Must... try... to... sleep... now...