Archive for May, 2004

Are you excited?

Monday, May 31st, 2004

The redesign that has been delayed for over two years is honestly less than two weeks away. After life happening and stuff happening and projects that actually pay me happening, I actually spent a few hours on a design that I have been sketching for quite some time. Nothing spectacular. I’m just trying to get something better than this horrid Movable Type template. Speaking of Movable Type, it’s being replaced by WordPress. So, new content management system and new design in two weeks. Why two weeks? Because I will be in VA for my sista’s graduation and I have better things to do than design when visiting my gene pool.

Just In: Europe Removed from Fall Tour

Thursday, May 27th, 2004

Citing (primarily) financial reasons and top-secret plans regarding two Emerson campus organizations, I am officially withdrawing my enrollment in the Castle Well program. Besides, Emerson’s Castle program is more affordable during the summer session (maybe Summer 2006?) and I feel that my EVVY and emersive goals better met by staying in Boston next semester.

This decision now creates a small amount of chaos: it means that Emerson’s Student Service Center will actually have to use brainpower to make a change. And we all know the deficiencies in that department… Real issues include finding a roommate and affordable housing in Boston for the next academic year and enrolling in classes for the Fall; too easily accomplished with three months notice.

Just In: Summer Tour Expanded Beyond the Green Line

Thursday, May 27th, 2004

Lynchburg, Virginia has been added to my summer tour schedule. Greyhound will demonstrate a new rapid transit system that will deliver me from Boston to home-sweet-hell in a record-shattering SEVENTEEN hours. The transit system is called a bus and when my presence boards, it becomes my tour bus. All celebrities will want to travel in this much economical style.

Stops on the Lynchburg tour include the Liberty University Vine Center for Jefferson Forest High School’s Graduation Ceremony (starring my Rachie!), Blue Ridge Community Church, Movies 10 for posterity, Starbucks for Ryan, and a non-corporate coffee shop for Rianna.

Showtimes: June 4, 2004 (2:25 PM) — June 8, 2004 (10:10 PM).

Survey ala Ra & Ry

Friday, May 21st, 2004

Instructions:

  1. Copy this whole list into your journal.
  2. Bold the things that you have in common with me.
  3. Replace the things that you don’t have in common with me with something true about yourself.

The List:

  1. I smiled today.
  2. I did not sleep in my own bed last night.
  3. I surfed the Internet from the Boston Common with my iBook and Emerson’s wireless network.
  4. I have never been so alone and yet so alive.
  5. I am glad winter is over.
  6. I had a good day.
  7. I was confused by someone today.
  8. I find it hard to maintain friendships from high school, except for with a select few people.
  9. The most I have ever driven continuously was around 6 hours, ~275 miles (when I drove from Lynchburg, VA to Hershey, PA for Creation Fest 2003).
  10. I have a nose.
  11. I love to get lost in a book.
  12. My classes ended in April.
  13. I think Absolut Vanilla Vodka Coke is the most amazing mixed drink ever.
  14. I would much rather read fact than fiction.
  15. I have a bath tub.
  16. I wonder sometimes if I have made the right decisions with my life.
  17. I had to work tonight.
  18. I have much to learn.
  19. I wonder what people think about.
  20. I wish that I could sleep under the stars tonight.
  21. I am not wearing a Boston Red Sox shirt.
  22. I am moving into my apartment tomorrow.
  23. I rarely ever shop at the thrift stores.
  24. My fingers often type real words that are not what I am really thinking.
  25. I have never been out of North America.
  26. Yay for random IMs!
  27. I am apprehensive about next year.
  28. I have a four syllable first name.
  29. I used to want glasses.
  30. I will never turn into a slut. They are all jerks to my friends and I don’t like it.
  31. I have close friends.
  32. I lie awake wondering if things could be much different.
  33. I feel like I’ve made few stupid mistakes in my life.
  34. I have no serious regrets.
  35. Piercings and tattoos do little for me.
  36. I want to get a Harley after college.
  37. I want a big hug right now.
  38. I would give anything just for things to make sense.
  39. I despise dishonesty.
  40. I rarely have trouble finding hope.
  41. I really enjoy thoughtful gifts, even if they cost nothing.
  42. I believe it is better to give than to receive.
  43. I have less than $20 in my wallet.
  44. I hate when people quote lines from movies.
  45. I spend most of my time listening to music.
  46. I had the same haircut for the first 13 years of my life.
  47. I don’t really enjoy team sports.
  48. I am going to have a fun summer.
  49. I want to live on the beach.
  50. I love the color pink.
  51. I like Las Ketchup more than the condiment ketchup.
  52. I feel often lucky that I love so many people in my life.
  53. I love stars and angels.
  54. I played strip Blackjack two weeks ago and lost.
  55. I want to learn how to skateboard.
  56. I have a belly button.
  57. I despise liars.
  58. I have never played STRIP spoons.
  59. I wish that some things would never happen to anyone.
  60. I realize now that I don’t want to grow up.
  61. Every time I hear "toe fungus" I begin to giggle.
  62. I have my driver’s license.
  63. I am over $96,000 away from graduating college.
  64. I have been to Disney World.
  65. I love British accents.
  66. I occasionally like to be alone.
  67. I believe that all of the bad things in my life have ultimately been worthwhile.
  68. I want to live in San Diego.
  69. I like to make up my own words.
  70. I want a clear head.
  71. I want road trips with loud music.
  72. I rarely procrastinate.
  73. I am drawn to intellect and humor.
  74. I would rather be dancing.
  75. I hate apathy.
  76. I like supporting my friends in bands.
  77. I love to take pictures of anything and everything.
  78. I have predicted the future in my dreams.
  79. I am passionate.
  80. I love going to toy stores.
  81. I am stressed over school.
  82. I love the sun.
  83. I wish I had the money to travel abroad.
  84. Sometimes I feel suffocated by the love I have for my sister and brothers.
  85. I never TyPe LiKe ThIs.
  86. I wonder where I will be a year from now.
  87. I often want to correct the stupid mistakes of those I care about.
  88. I heart Nerds Rope.
  89. I almost always wear socks.
  90. I have changed much this past year.
  91. I am intolerant of ignorance.
  92. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else right now.
  93. I have the reputation as being a dreamer.
  94. I love to laugh.
  95. I regularly attend church.
  96. I often have great concepts, but not enough skill to actualize them.
  97. I have driven during Virginia’s curfew hours.
  98. I have yet to go clubbing in Boston.
  99. I welcome the opportunity to cry.
  100. I believe in fate.

Another Reflection Survey from Ryan:

2 Years Ago I: was preparing to graduate high school, attending my third prom, winning a national design competition, dreaming of life at Emerson, hating my family situation.

1 Year Ago I: was not blogging regularly, having far too much fun with my friends at R.B.C.P.C., obsessed with the music of Robbie Williams, managing a copy/packing shop,.

Yesterday I: finally moved into my apartment for the summer, took a huge black plastic trash bag full of clothing to the St. Francis House with Ted and was asked if I was carrying a dead body four times, ran into Stephanie Dicoursi, helped Blake and Sean dress Ted for a job interview, continued recovering from my strained neck, had far more fun than allowed at work, planned a trip to the Improv Asylum with Jess Reynoso.

Today I: have only done this survey so far. I do enough surveys at work and yet I get off and answer surveys instead of administer them.

Five Items I Have Brand Loyalty To: Apple Computer, Macromedia, FOX News Channel, Naked Juice, Burt’s Bees

Five Songs I Know All The Words To Without the Music: How Great Thou Art, Worlds Apart by Jars of Clay, What You Want by Caedmon’s Call, Honest Questions by Daniel Bedingfield, In This Life by Chantal Kreviazuk

Five People I Can Always Count On: Uncle Jon, Mark Lamb, Ryan Harne, Rianna Burch, and Rachie

Five Places I’d Love to Be: San Diego, Apple Headquarters, Blue Ridge Community Church, the "thinking room" in my grandparents’ house, Waverly Court

Five Things I Regret Doing: Letting the wardrobe guy at the Apple Switch shoot put me in a ringer t-shirt (I look anorexic), Bringing too much stuff to college (didn’t need nearly as much as I thought), Getting a CapitalOne Visa (the world’s slowest online payment), Getting a Discover card (accepted no where I want to be), Shipping my web server through Mail Boxes Etc. (they lost it, successfully claimed no legal liability, and left me with over a thousand dollars in missing hardware/software)

Five Things To Stay Away From: Illegal drugs, musical theater majors, proprietary Sony media formats, Microsoft Outlook (use Mozilla Thunderbird), Microsoft Internet Explorer (use Mozilla Firefox)

Rebuilding No More

Friday, May 14th, 2004

As announced today, Movable Type 3.0 is no longer fully free. I have been evaluating different blogging scripts since the very first day that I installed Movable Type. I hate it’s constant rebuilding, default comment pop-up configuration, and intensive file storage requirements (for all those pages that must be constantly rebuilt).

The generous folks (actually, the CEO) at pMachine gave me a free license for its newest blog tool offering: ExpressionEngine. I installed it and imported my Movable Type data last weekend. So why haven’t I kissed Movable Type good-bye? Because ExpressionEngine is lacking and unpolished. While ExpressionEngine rocks my world with innovative backend and frontend features that no other blogging scripts offer, the dynamic URLs are so unnecessarily illogical with no hope for improvement that I cannot commit to deploying it publicly.

Movable Type does offer one feature that ExpressionEngine cannot: flexibility to migrate away. I have never been happy with Movable Type, but I can import its output into any blogging software package I choose. Every other blogging script is vying for some of Movable Type’s marketshare and, therefore, offers the ability to import Movable Type data. No blogging scripts (to my knowledge) will import ExpressionEngine’s output or database structure. Once I transition to ExpressionEngine, I am stuck with it. So until I am 95% happy with ExpressionEngine, I am sticking with the horrid Movable Type just in case I decide to go with WordPress instead.

For the record, Jeremiah.biz project-in-progress LiveWireRadio.us uses WordPress successfully.

Answer to Prayer

Thursday, May 13th, 2004

I secured an apartment. No banks needed. All is well on the northeastern front. Sweet.

Hey Uncle J, this world just doesn’t work for me.

Thursday, May 13th, 2004

So, here I am. Employed in Boston with three well paying jobs for the summer, living in Emerson housing until May 16. My apartment optionS have fallen through and now it’s decision time. If I am not able to stay in Boston, I will not save nearly as much money this summer and I can most likely kiss my semester in Europe this fall good-bye. I have one last and viable housing option to stay in Boston but it requires payment for the entire summer up front. I don’t have the money for the entire summer (just yet), so I am going to attempt to get a loan from a bank tomorrow. I am prepared to be laughed out the doors or given an option of 30% APR. Which means that I am prepared to be stuck in Lynchburg, unemployed for a few weeks, eventually stuck with a minimum wage job that I hate, and barely saving any money for the following academic year. Shit.

Birthday Poem for Mom

Monday, May 10th, 2004

Mom's grave

The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.

–Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

One Art by Elizabeth Bishop

Protect Fair Use with HR 107

Sunday, May 9th, 2004

EVERYONE, please please please visit ProtectFairUse.org and use the form to e-mail your House Representative to support HR 107.

Better yet, call your representative.

I am calling with regard to HR 107, the Digital Media Consumers’ Rights Act of 2003.

As a concerned voter, it is critically important to me and many other Internet users that this bill pass on Wednesday.

That it prevents mislabelling of so-called “copy-proteced CDs,” which are actually in violation of the Redbook Compact Disk standard, is laudable.

However, the amendments it proposes to section 1201 of Title 17 of the United States Code — added by the Digital Millenium Copyright Act of 1998 — for scientific research and the restoration of the principle of fair use are key. This bill will bring back rights belonging to the people which have been taken away by the DMCA.

Thank for your time.

If you are unfamiliar with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and its atrocities to consumer rights on media, visit http://eff.org/IP/DRM/DMCA/.

slashdot discussion

A Few Essential Apple Hacks

Saturday, May 8th, 2004

LaunchBar
The biggest usability challenge for me switching from Windows was adjusting to the lack of a Start menu equivalent in Mac OS X. There is no centralized (I’d argue, not even a good out-of-box method) for quickly launching applications in Mac OS X. I use well over 50 unique applications a week and the Dock simply cannot handle all those icons on my 12-inch screen. LaunchBar solves this Mac OS X inadequacy and beats the Windows Start menu concept.

Sogundi
Adds an essential Mozilla feature missing from Safari.

Screen Spanning Doctor
Apple’s purposeful retarding of the iBook’s video card is inexcusable when even crappy and significantly cheaper eMachine laptops with Windows XP come with a dual-display capability. This godsend application rights Apple’s wrong.

Desktop Manager
Adds my favorite UNIX desktop feature: virtual workspaces.

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