Month: July 2008

Categories
Personal

1’s and 0’s are my friends

I am just taking a little break from studying here to regroup and get ready for some more pounding of material. I have for quite some time wanted to digitize my VHS tapes. No, not old movies, I would just re-purchase them on DVD if necessary. I have some old recordings and such that are much rarer. I was doing a little research on the best way to do this, because during my 2 week break before school starts up again I am going to be huddled over a VCR trying to do away with magnetic tape. That got me thinking, why not go a step further and convert the DVD collection to files as well. I am a little obsessive when it comes to minimalism. My ultimate goal would to have all my forms of media accessible through the computer; books, movies, comics, school works, everything. I know some people like the tangible feelings of books and whatnot, but that is just not me. I want to be mobile and not sacrifice any of my stuff. I am just thinking how easy moving would be if it was me, my clothes, and my computer. Anyway, I did a little math and I have roughly 216 DVD discs full of movies. I could probably encode them between 1 and 1.5 gbs per file and not be upset at the quality loss. That leaves me at roughly between 216 gbs and 324 gbs. That is actually not too bad. I’ll just purchase a few HDD’s, throw them in raid and let the magic fly. That would make skimming through my movies a breeze and I would have to deal with individual discs. The one thing I wish would happen would be the digitalization of textbooks. I have to lug like 3 hardback textbooks around during the year and 1, it makes me look like a hunchback and 2, it will eventually turn me into a hunchback. All I want is a PDF of my books. I would carry a notebook and my laptop and that is all. It would be glorious. Alas, textbook companies are not keen on that idea due to projected money losses. I would even pay the outrageous prices for the PDF even though all the costs would be in digital distribution which would be quite a bit less. I guess piracy would also be a concern, but damn what a utopia that would be for me. Simplifying my life is something I have found to be quite the productivity enhancer. I have discovered RSS feeds lately and it makes surfing the web a very quick venture. I just browse my iGoogle and that’s the day’s news. Anyway I need to get back to studying, but I was just bouncing some stuff around. Wish me luck!

Categories
Nonsense Photography

I Was Strolling Through The Park One Day

I went for a walk in the park with a friend today and we stopped to check out the scratching and vandalisms that had been immortalized on the wood. The results were entertaining. I love people.

When I saw Lynnette I just thought she was all right, but after a while she became kind of acute. (Somebody stop me.)
Categories
Nonsense Projects Video Games

It’s a Good Day

Lets start off by saying that hell is feeling a might chilly today. Can you guess why? Well if you haven’t heard (or cared to hear) Final Fantasy XIII is coming to Xbox 360. I honestly didn’t think it would happen; Sony is known for having an iron grip on its franchise exclusives. I will tell you that I couldn’t be more excited. I have been a fan of the series for quite some time now and I thought I might have to miss out this console generation. Square Enix and Microsoft came through for me. I haven’t been so into an E3 for about 4 years since they began cutting down. It is good to feel the anticipation is back.

Here is the E3 Trailer of Final Fantasy XIII

In other news my favorite video game of all time is getting a DS remake. It is basically the same game it was on the SNES, but with dual screen functionality and it’s portable. I guess they are tossing in a few added goodies as well. I can’t tell you how excited about this. I mean this game is the pincacle of gaming for me. It has a deep story, all the characters have depth and with many multiple endings it takes away some of the linearity that Squenix RPGs are known for. Squenix is really getting on my good side lately.

Squee!

With all this video game news I thought it would be a good time to post pics of my painted 360 faceplate. I decided my all white 360 was in need of a face lift. I decided the theme would be the Rebel Alliance from Star Wars (like that took any time to decide.


Here is the inspiration. A rebel flag.

I decided to flesh out the image and see if I could transfer the general idea to the faceplate. Here is the mock up image.

After two weeks and many, many coats of paints. I arrived at my finished product. I am happy with the way it turned out. What do you guys think?

A couple posts back I mentioned my self improvement plan via Excel and I promised to post results of my progress. I have been keeping up with it I promise. The results with grades are…sub-par to say the least, but at least it shows improvement. I would also like to say that I have not bit my nails for an entire week, and I will say that I am starting to get the shakes. I am going to get a manicure if I can break it. I know that sounds a little girly, but I don’t care. These nails have gone through hell over these past 20 years and they deserve a little pampering.

Range··························Percentage······Grade
6/30/2008 – 7/6/2008·····54.17%···········F
7/6/2008 – 7/13/2008·····64.58%···········F

The last thing I have to post is a picture I took while picking up milk at Meijer today. There is just something wrong with the sales pitch.


Cookies?

*Edit*
I watched serenity last night and there is a tremendously bad ass scene at the end with a finish pose that was begging to be made into a wallpaper, so I did just that. It’s in wide screen only right now, but request if you would like a different aspect ratio.

R.Tam Desktop