Fuzzy Logic

Gone fishing.

2009-02-27T05:26:10Z

So I'm changing platforms again! May be a temporary shift (as before), or maybe a longer term deal, but I think I'm ready again to take matters under my own hands. Here's how it's different this time though:

All public LiveJournal posts and comments have been imported in-tact to the new site. Yep, all 570-something posts and 318 comments accumulated over five years.
I have lots of neat tools already installed, including OpenID, meaning you can still post with your LiveJournal account, with an account from one of the many OpenID-ready vendors, or (and this was important to me) anonymously - whatever floats your boat.
Search that works. Fast!
Aggregates stuff from my other networks for me (i.e. Flickr, Twitter, Facebook [maybe]) so there's a better chance that there'll be some new stuff up there.
Ad-free.

It costs me about 50 cents more a month to lease my own host than it does to remain a paid LiveJournal member (gets rid of the ads and makes the journal less fugly), but I can do so much more with it that I think I'm going to test the waters with the now-matured Wordpress platform once more. (And hey, if it goes bad, it's not an ordeal to import the remaining stuff back.)

Also... as much as I hate to admit it... I'm using Twitter now. I had a low opinion of the service, not at all helped by the technorati's (god, did I really use that phrase.... ugh....) inability to shut up about it.... but if you can't beat 'em...

So the new stuff's on dragaroo.net, and I'm dragaroo on Twitter, and everywhere else. (It's nice to have an unpopular name!)

Toys

2009-02-05T05:04:47Z

Look at this thing:

Medicom makes toys for Japanese markets that are well-regarded by collectors. I looked at Jeff Pidgeon's review of this guy's smaller cousin months ago, and even made a failed attempt to buy one from an importer, only to find them sold out, and the price jacked up to $80+.

Well, he's back. Only, as part of their Life Size Vinyl Collectible Doll series. And sitting tall at a foot-and-a-half, 3x the size of the original, he is literally taller than my Ikea LACK coffee table. (And he only costs about 9x more than one, too.)

It begs a few questions: (1) Just WHO is buying these things? (2) Where could you possibly have room for one (I own no bookshelf large enough to contain a coffee table-tall object)? and (3) ... can I haz one?

Then again, I am planning on taking up a mortgage in about three months....

Maybe I'll just stick with Sam & Max: The Statue.

Microsoft can be awesome, too.

2009-01-28T07:22:05Z

Seriously. (Are you getting this Sting? More calypso!)

iPhoto '09

2009-01-28T06:48:51Z

DSC04334.ARW
Originally uploaded by dragaroo

Stopped at the Apple Store after training today to nab a copy of iLife 09. And for my purposes, it's awesome.

Two-way sync to Flickr, tags, descriptions and original image sizes, automatic syncing on update. It's quite literally effortless. I AM STUNNED.

Since I'm sitting on about 800 unprocessed photos (that's 10 GBs from three sites) right now, this thing is going to be an absolute lifesaver.

The other features, I didn't think I would care much at all about; I don't need face recognition for big cats. But the thing is, (for people,) that face recognition stuff actually works. And well - very well. And that's really kinda cool.

And the places? It's only geotagged photos from my iPhone (as I don't carry a GPS tagger along with my DSLR), but it's funny to see the pins spread across the map and realize, oh yeah, I did snap some shots in the San Diego airport...

I'm surprised to hear myself say it, but I'm actually no longer that excited about Picasa Mac...

Home

2009-01-26T05:46:35Z

I let my Hostingrails account expire this weekend. I still have my domains for a couple months, and they're set to auto-renew so I'll keep holding onto them for a while longer, but it'll be a while longer before I push a site again.

Design is hard - harder than scripting. When I have a coherent design plan, I'll consider relaunching.

Until then, this'll do. I've got other things on my plate.

On an unrelated note, I 'played' Home on the PS3 today at the insistence of someone I ran into on LBP. It's... really strange. Really, really strange.

Even with Second Life, I've never really had a desire to play myself in a fake world with people playing themselves. It just seems surreal... in the bad sense. Huh.

Maybe I'm approaching it the wrong way... or maybe I'm just not used to chat rooms.

Bye XM! Hello iTunes! (or: loud music and bass)

2009-01-24T06:31:26Z

I think I'm finally going to pull the plug on XM. It's been kind of fun to get new stuff like BBC1 with the Sirius merger, but the more I analyze my listening habits, the less value I'm getting out of these days. I just don't care for most music, as it turns out. And the channels I do end up listening to inevitably are the ones that have ads. Yech!

So, in lieu of the $6-something I managed to weasel my subscription down to, I've decided to start buying music again. Which works nicely, since iTunes is finally largely DRM-free (it's not there yet, but it's closer than ever before). And based on what I've found so far, damn, am I glad I did.

Holy crap! A frenetic electronic pop-alt-rock piece with DnB roots, brash overdriven synthesizers backed by horns, chorus and melancholy lyrics. There's way too much going on here, and I can't stop listening to it.

Moody, melancholy, angsty, driving percussion... Nine Inch Nails at its best. My second favorite NIN track behind The Hand That Feeds. And not unlike Pendulum, it's layered like a cake. As for the content... what do you want? I've got some belabored self-confidence issues to work out... :p

Let's set the record straight: I'm not a fan of Kanye. I think he comes across as egoistical douchebag, and if that SNL performance is any indication, he's not a particularly awesome vocalist either. But... I actually like vocoders. And syncopated percussion. And piano. And penetrating bass. So conflicted... And yes, it still fits with the melancholy vibe. I'm on a roll!

And for something completely different. Part of the eclectic soundtrack for LittleBigPlanet, Cornman combines xlyophones, accordions, piano, choruses in Spanish and English. It's like the organic equivalent of Propane Nightmares.... except not at all. (A number of the tracks on the Kinky album have appeared all over the place... I think Mas was used in one of the first iPod commercials.)

Just about everything on the LittleBigPlanet soundtrack is awesome though. Be sure to check out My Patch by Jim Noir and especially Atlas by The Battles.

And finally, the flavor of the month? The 25-minute "Most Unwanted Song" as heard on a recent repeat of This American Life. Some context may help, or you could just grab it and figure it out for yourself.

(BTW, if you don't use Lala, it's totally worth checking out. I still tend to buy on iTunes or Amazon just due to convenience, but Lala has some incredibly robust features and generous sampling rights, in addition to being platform agnostic. Check it out!)

So, that should give you some idea of why when people ask 'who's your favorite band', I can't even fake an answer. But what else should I be listening to?

Note to self

2009-01-19T08:17:40Z

Attractions in Colorado I've visited (in no particular order):

Colorado Springs area
- Cheyenne Mountain Zoo
- Seven Falls
- Helen Hunt Falls
- Garden of the Gods
- Colorado Wolf & Wildlife Center
- Cheyenne Mountain State Park
- Pueblo Zoo
- Royal Gorge Bridge and Park
Denver area
- Wild Animal Center
- Denver Zoo
- The Wildlife Experience
- Downtown Aquarium
- Denver Center for the Performing Arts
- The Colorado Convention Center
- Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge
- Denver Museum of Nature and Science
To Do
- Big Cats of Serenity Springs
- Mission Wolf - summer
- Wolf Sanctuary(?) - near Ft. Collins
- Cherry Creek State Park
- Rocky Mountain National Park
- Pike National Forest
- Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve
- Butterfly Pavillion(???)
- Kangaroo Conservation Center (GA)

Wild Animal Sanctuary

2009-01-12T05:56:09Z

I escaped to Keenesburg, Colorado on Saturday to check out the Wild Animal Sanctuary, one of (if not the) largest wild animal sanctuaries in the United States hoping to get a shot or two of a cat, and also to a lesser degree, to test out our sophisticated new European license plate toll for the Expressway E470. (Theoretically, I should be getting a bill from them in about a month. And if it works, honestly, I don't see why this isn't already implemented everywhere: ESPECIALLY YOU BAY BRIDGE.)

Many of the animals are retired from the entertainment industry or otherwise abandoned (or confiscated) from private owners who weren't capable of caring for them. As a guide at the visitor center informed me, they facility has been here, in a generous patch of Keenesburg surrounded by vast farmlands for nearly 30 years, though it's only been open to visitors for past 5, presumably as a means of helping to cover some of the costs of an $800,000 annual food budget required sanctuary currently running at capacity.

The visitor center and its observation decks (the only areas on the grounds that visitors can actually view the animals from) are unique in that they consist largely of ramps and platforms which put you high above the grounds, so you find yourself looking down at most of the cats, with only wooden slats separating you from certain death. Unfortunately, for the cats closer to the rotunda, that presents the challenge of not only shooting a subject from a near-vertical angle, but also combating the shadows casted by the neighboring mesh; not a great look if you're not expressly going for the 'captive cat' angle.

There are more than just countless tigers though. Leopards, wolves, lions and a bear can be seen also, but as their existence is expressly not one of a zoo, your ability to view (and or photograph) them will depend heavily on their inclination to roam closer to the visiting platforms or its surrounding fences, and a powerful zoom lens (300 mm minimum).

Unlike most zoos, there are no explicit photo restrictions either (at least that I was made aware of), so next time I'm bringing a tripod. (I brought a monopod on this trip, but really found it almost useless at stabilizing a shot with the longer lens). Best times to visit are feeding, 9-10 AM Tues/Thurs/Sat or mornings/evenings in the summer. More info on their website. Go!

Full set here!

Loud music and bass.

2009-01-12T05:09:19Z

And Happy New Year! Only 11 days late on this one... not so bad right?

Anyway, I returned to my apartment today to find a note on the door from a not-so-anonymous neighbor who has been filing noise complaints against me for "loud music and bass" from late night to early morning (2:30 AM). And I could not have been happier to have seen it. Why?

Half of the reported 'incidents' of said loud music and bass occurred over two weeks during the holiday when I was in another state. Score!

I tried to bring it up with the unsigned neighbor (banging on the wall at unsung hours of the night is a clear giveaway folks), and gave them a few moments to respond, so that I might have a chance to explain the fallacy of their accusation. But as no one showed, I went down to the renter's office and left the incriminating note, with all sorts of curious annotations (i.e. loud noise at 6:30 AM this morning... though I wasn't awake until nine...) and with any luck, this matter, which has dragged on for several months now, I might add, should resolve itself, insofar as I'm concerned.

It's too bad though. In a sense, I feel sorry for them; the kid is nice enough - he greets me unfailing whenever I run across them (which is more than I can say for most of the people in this complex), and despite my current war of attrition with his mom, I've done my best to stay neutral and exercise the same degree of courtesy I would for any person of forced proximity; in the midst of all this, I even let them know when they'd accidently left their keys in their front door, and would have been open to talking about the more pressing situation, had she not sheepishly thanked me and closed the door.

But hey, if that's the game they want to play, by all means. With any luck this new evidence should be damning enough to put the final nail in the coffin.

Score!

2008-12-27T07:29:31Z

So I gots me a new MacBook Pro now, and I got to say... it's a pretty nice piece of kit. (The MacBook, once it gets back from iResQ with a new keyboard assembly, now goes to my sister, who may have better luck than I at not destroying the thing.)

I also scored Areas of My Expertise, along with Dark Night and Serenity on Blu-Ray, plus a kick-ass fuzzy logic rice cooker that I'm dying to try out. Not bad, not bad.

And I'll be taking my mom and sister to Phantom of the Opera down in the Orpheum on Wednesday. So, on the whole, this 'forced vacation' thing isn't really all that bad.

A belated merry christmas, winter solstice, and whatever else you may or may not observe, to all.

MBP

2008-12-20T08:49:36Z

Well, I pulled the trigger; I ordered a unibody MacBook Pro to finally replace my ailing, decrepit MacBook.

I have very mixed feelings about Apple these days, but after toying with some of the competition, damn, when they get things right, they get things right.

The glossy screen reminds me a bit of the Gateway M275 tablet I briefly owned. It also had a thick glass display. That display was quite annoying. I mean really annoying.

The MacBook's screen (the previous one with the plastic)? Not at all. The M275, terrible. Hopefully, the MPB lies closer to the former...

I spec'd out a fully loaded HP too. Blu-ray, twice the ports, more RAM, DVI and HDMI and CHEAPER. It's absolutely absurd.

But they're plastic-y machines, and HP controls, even on the enterprise laptop I use at work, and on the HP laptop I bought for school before trading it in for the first MacBook, are just finicky. They don't always respond, and when they do, they don't work quite like they should. These minor annoyances add up quickly (gets stuck in dual monitor mode, swaps screens, etc...) to the point where I just don't want to bother. And I've had my fill of crappy hardware with the MacBook - it worked fine, it just fell apart with my usage.

And I'm also slated to take a Ruby on Rails course online via Sierra, and since I already had the best tools for that on my portable, it should just things easier...

So here's hoping I made the right call. I fly out to Roseville tomorrow (late tonite) and the thing should arrive on Wed.

Always look...

2008-12-17T05:39:20Z

My dishwasher, ice maker, and microwave are broken, someone filed a noise complaint for 'loud music and bass from night to early morning' (news to me), the rails on the driver-side seat of my car are jammed, I'm behind on my project, I can't drive in the snow, my HMO sucks, I have to be at the DMV on Friday and in the airport on Saturday, and it's freaking ridiculously cold.

... but I got a bonus. XD

(Also, wtf Jobs? Could this truly be the beginning of the end?)

Fallout 3

2008-12-09T06:41:45Z

I entered Megaton on a lead, and found a guy who would trade some information in turn for hit on another person. So, I went to said mark, only to discover that she was screwed over by the guy who wants her dead. So I return to the first guy, lie about finishing the job, when he extorts me for the cash I should have collected from the dame. In frustration, I pull a gun, kill the guy, kill his assistant, leave the bar and am met with half the denizens of Megaton firing at me for killing one of their own, while the other half flee as I mow the former down, including the doctor, the sheriff and his second-in-line. As I leave the town, a robotic sentry outside starts firing, but his armor is impenetrable by my weapons, so I run.

Several days later, I return to town with a few subtle changes. Extortion guy's mistress now runs his business. The people remark there's nobody really in charge anymore. There's a hired mercenary guarding the trade store. And eventually, the son of the sheriff I killed approaches me and remarks that he is to carry on his father's will should I make good on an errand I'd previously pledged.

So, I'm suitably impressed.

Picasa 3 rawks.

2008-12-05T05:12:07Z

I've been going back and forth lately on whether now is a good time to upgrade my Mac, but things just got complicated:

Picasa 3 just came out of beta and it is phenomenal.

Super-fast, recognizes files no matter where they are on your PC, and now natively supports way more RAW file-types (including those from my Panasonic and the Sony ARWs).

It even replaces the relatively harmless Windows Picture Viewer with a vastly superior, slicker, and frankly more Mac-like preview feature that kills.

So maybe I'll be sticking with my current config after-all...

For what's it worth...

2008-11-26T06:58:01Z

... and depending on where your interests lie, it may not be worth much, but Bolt was pretty good.
Certainly the best film the Disney-side has put out since it went 3D. And it's pretty neat in REAL-D too.

Between Bolt and Magasascar 2... Madgascar is more like a series of vignettes, with some hilarious ones (involving the penguins, and of course, Sasha Cohen Baron's masterful King Julian), tied together by a much less satisfying Lion King-ish story arc.

Bolt is, rather surprisingly, the complete package. A marked improvement over the subpar Meet the Andersons and the middling Chicken Little. And hopefully, it's a direction Disney Feature will continue with in the future.

It's the caffeine.

2008-11-18T06:39:11Z

Oh snap, Slashdot alerted me to the fact that there's another OSC book in the 'Enderverse'. As someone who voraciously tore through every other book in the series, how was I not aware of this?

Then again, I guess it might have something to do with the fact that I've just about stopped reading since moving out to CO, and for no good reason. I literally still have a His Majesty's Dragons boxset still shrink-wrapped on my bookshelf. And then there's Knight's next book in the Age of Fire series in a couple weeks, meaning it might be a good idea to finish the other half of Outcast.

I think it may be a side effect of this multi-tasking ethos I've developed. It's short-fused my attention span by so much that I get antsy if I'm not listening to a podcast while reading a website and brewing a pot of coffee.

Or maybe it's the caffeine...

Anyway, with my upcoming flight back to Roseville this weekend for Thanksgiving, I think I'll tackle things in this order:

Ender in Exile -> Dragon Outcast [that's two flights there] -> Dragon Strike -> His Majesty's Dragons

I'll have to throw in some nonfiction too for good measure... either Life in the Valley of Death, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, maybe even More Information Than You Require.

LittleBigPlanet

2008-11-13T05:45:27Z

Completed the single player campaign for LittleBigPlanet today (in co-op with the help of a guy from Luxembourg)!

And, just to reiterate, it's awe-some.

This is one of the few titles that I think I may adopt a completionist attitude for, as the items you collect can then be used in the surprisingly sophisticated level editor. (And I really want that dragon costume.)

Otherwise, it looks like the next PS3 game I'll be latching onto is an import copy of Afrika, that obscure photo safari game. It appears to be getting a Chinese/English release under the title Hakuna Matata, and since the PS3 is conveniently region-free, it seems like as good a time as any to hop behind a literally digital Sony DSLR.

THANK. GOD.

2008-11-05T04:19:35Z

WELL DONE AMERICA.

THAT IS ALL.

Fun shall overcome.

2008-11-03T05:45:04Z

I finally got around to get a warranty replacement for my 1080p Vizio set, and decided to take the next step; get something that actually outputs 1080p.

So, after counting pennies for a chunk of the day, I went out and bought a PS3. Why?

Blu-ray movies
LittleBigPlanet

I didn't really buy into the hype when LittleBigPlanet was introduced nearly two years ago. It sounded like a neat concept, but the execution was bound to be sloppy.

But now having played it for hours upon hours, I'm a believer. It's quite simply one of the most fun and social multiplayer games I've played. Quite an achievement when you consider 9/10 times, no one even has a headset (let-alone keyboard).
The game has a happy-go-lucky ethos that oozes out of every character, object and song, accompanied by the far-too-calming narration of Stephen Fry. Using the Sixaxis (motion controls) lets you sway your Sackboy's (your character) face and hips alternately, holding down one set of triggers controls his arms, and another set lets you drag other players across the scene. You can shove other players in and out of harm's way, grope them, tease them, smack them, jeer, smile... these facets of player interaction are a mere layer on top of the core game, the Sackboy's perennial journey to the right of the screen, but they add so much to the overall experience that it would be half the game without it.

In short, it's awesome and easily one of the most plain 'fun' game experience I've had in a long, long while.

Go get it, and look me up. I'm dragaroo on PSN, and pretty much everything else.

dragaroo @ 2008-10-25T00:05:00

2008-10-25T06:13:13Z

I took photos at CMZoo on Sunday, and am hoping to get up early enough to hit Mission Wolf and possibly Great Sand Dunes National Park. It'll be the longest drive I've taken since moving to this state, but it may be the last chance I have to safely do either in a 2WD this year.

Anyway, I figured I'd post photos from the last trip:

~~Only one so far. I'll weed through the rest of the set and see if anything came out well.~~

I'm thinking about becoming a volunteer docent for the zoo.

Also, I sent-in my mail-in ballot today. Did you?

Snow Rabbit

2008-10-23T02:58:38Z

I awoke this morning to this:

and this:

I was somewhat less excited by the latter.

We made it!

2008-10-16T04:07:15Z

Well, I'm glad that's over with.

And believe it or not, I think it actually went rather well.

And I went rock climbing at GOtG after.

I could learn to like this line of work.

(Incidentally, the first two sentences are applicable to the final debate as well.)

The big one

2008-10-15T03:33:25Z

If you had told me that four months out of college, I would be giving a presentation to Microsoft, I would have laughed.

Oh god...

So, let's change the subject. New MacBooks, eh?

Looks pretty sweet. It's just... with my spending, I don't think I'm in a position to responsibly buy one without financing it, and that just seems like a sticky proposition these days. I picked up a 21.6" Acer screen this weekend from Staples for less than a fourth of the cost of the new Apple display, and it doesn't even have (yet another) port that nothing [yet] plugs into. And you know what? It's not half bad - not miraculous, but it totally gets the job done. (Funnily enough, the new Cinema Display looks rather like the HP consumer displays. Only much much more luxe. The HP business displays are the way to go though, imho.)

On the other hand, they are awesome looking machines. I mean, gorgeous.

But when I can grind my own coffee as well as Peet's, get to work in my Rabbit as well as that guy's Porsche, and even have a spare dime to spend on something ridiculous, it's a mighty tough proposition.

Methinks it might be time to start putting some money aside for MacWorld...

Or hey, my sister's always wanted her own computer...

Extremely unnotable fictional cat.

2008-10-14T03:21:14Z

Man, I do love Wikipedia. I mean, there is literally no where else where that combination of words could possibly come together - makes you wonder if the editor who tagged this for deletion has dealt with many fictional cats of little import lately.

(And sorry, tough luck Lucifer.)

I also renewed my love for Threadless:

Ridiculously good. If they weren't so damn expensive, I'd have bought two.
But you understand the appeal...

And let it be known... today's the first day I used the heater. It's going to be an interesting winter...

Only in Okinawa (or ハイサイスティッチ!)

2008-10-13T04:53:46Z

I was listening to the soundtrack from Animal Crossing, as I'm apt to do, when all of sudden, this tune popped up:

Boomp3.com

It's an Okinawan folk song that I vividly remember hearing when I lived on the island. Granted, it's Nintendo, but nonetheless I was surprised to hear it again in this form.

Oh, and you see what else got the Okinawa treatment this month?

By the look of it, Stitch seems to have become something of a mainstay of Disney Japan.

(Lilo didn't make the cut.)