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Work work work

Finally, all the hardware, operating system, and software has come together and I can get to doing some serious benchmarking at work.   It’s taken a couple weeks to get to this point, and today was superduper productive.   So productive, in fact, that at night I was left spinning and thinking and spinning.   Can’t say I got the most solid sleep.

I also watched more Robot Chicken.    I have to say that I’m thankful this show is only 15 minutes long.  It’s just about right for how much TV I care to watch, really.

One last thing .. I know I’m bored when there are tons of little gadgets taken apart all over my workbench table in the room.   There are a bunch of little projects that I was working on that are finally getting to the ‘completed’ stage.   Secret project X, for one, is now code complete and I gave it a good test on the workbench.   I need to make a Flash or other web-based program to control it now, and figure out a user-friendly way to get the programs that are made into it.  One thing at a time, I guess.

This Friday – Monsters vs Aliens!   I need to find someone whose willing to go see it with me.

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Went walking in the woods ..

Today was fun!  I met someone new whose brother is a test pilot over at one of the best ice cream shops in the area.   The sky opened up w/ thunder, lighting, you name it .. and hail the size of golf balls.   Afterwards, we went for a hike in the hills behind the area I’m living in, and experienced a great sunset over a lake/river flowing with the torrent from the rain while steam gently misted over the water.   I’ve got a short video, and if I can upload it I’ll attach it to this post later.

Afterwards, Vietnamese food, great geeky conversations.   All I can say is WOOT.  Serious quantities of woot.

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There truly are amazing people in the world

Bats flying in the morning

Today was a busy, interesting day.   I got up early to work on a problem with some engineers working in England and Germany (around 4am or so), and watched the sunrise.   I got to see something truly amazing, thousands upon thousands of bats flying up into the sky.

The sound and sight of it is almost indescribable … a band of black that twists and undulates like smoke in the sky making squeaking noises.

The little company that I joined on contract is growing, rapidly.  I arrived three weeks ago .. there were three people.   Now we are six, and growing.   I really hope I can tell you more about the super secret stuff we’re working on sooner than later.

We moved offices, from the two little separate offices in the incubator to a full suite.  It feels like TuxVision in the early days all over again!   Little moves, little upgrades, small things getting bigger.

After work, I went to a cafe and ran into a few people who looked like they were practicing for something I love — IMPROV!   Lo and behold, they were, and were surprised as my tenor voice joined their quartet as they worked on a sketch.   *heh*  I couldn’t help myself.   Two hours later, I knew I had made new friends in Parry, Jack, Leonen, and Soleil, and have a voice that’s less than at it’s best.   It was wonderful, and we had the entire cafe laughing with off-the-cuff improv jokes and skits, and even making up music on the fly for no reason other than it’s fun.

It’s nice to have made some new friends.   May the trend continue!

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(Was -private- .. but I changed my mind) Weight and Exercise

  • Weight:  238 pounds
  • Target:   175 pounds
  • 63 pounds to go

I’ve been exercising and dieting for three weeks now .. W T F .. I’m not supposed to weigh more!   AAAAAAAA!   Not only that, I’ve cut out all the caffeinated drinks, am drinking more water, and bloody well did an hour on the treadmill at 3.4 miles per hour yesterday.

This is so farging not fair.  I’m sticking with it, but the result is so frigging counter-intuitive.

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Insomnia, you SUCK

I’ve been up for about 44 hours now.   I’m going to take a long walk around the block and see if tiring out my body will result in getting sleepy enough to get rest.    Happens every spring and fall, go figure.

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Busy, busy, BUSY day….

Sometimes, this is how I feel...
Sometimes, this is how I feel...

Today I —

Crunched and crunched and crunched both on the hardware design and linux kernel modifications needed at the early stages of designing the seeekret project I’m contracting on.   Brain was dialed to 11 for most of the day.

I picked up a ‘Flip’ camera from Woot.com to hack on.  They come with 2Gb of memory, and I’m going to see if I can use some Toshiba flash chips to get it up to a massive 8gb.  The firmware seems to support variable storage, and even better — there’s an SD card carrier that isn’t populated on the motherboard.  So, perhaps with some rework I might be able to solder one in.   The controller chip does seem to be present as part of the chip that runs the camera.

*grump*  I also went to the gym, and huffed and puffed for an hour after work.   I don’t like the gym, but it’s the only way I’m going to get back in shape and get both my heart and body healthy again.

Finally, I made plans to go to the movies tonight with a new friend…  and I think I made a complete, utter, total fool of myself doing so.   I really, really, really need to learn to let myself wind fully down from work before trying to be social.   As it was, I was nervous, and I know it both showed and make me feel foolish as all get go.    I enjoyed the movie thoroughly.   3D movies rock.

Sometimes I wonder if I ever will really be as socially smooth as my peers.   I’m good in groups, so/so when I’m one-on-one.  Go figure.

Well .. It’s late, but I think I’m going to hack on the Flip camera for a while.   Then try to figure out how the 3D glasses from the theater work.  Then sleep.