new version of X Resource Graph

I just happened to see that there's a new version of X Resource Graph available. I love this little app. I keep it sitting in the lower left corner of my screen to keep an eye on my CPU load and network usage. Yes, I'm a nerd.

old houses

I noticed that Google updated Street View last week to include Buffalo! So of course I had to go check out what my old houses look like now.

257 Fawn Trail (formerly Gay Drive). I lived here from when I was born until 1985. 23 years later, it looks a lot different. There used to be a huge tree in the front yard that I would climb as a kid. There was also a large tree to the right of the driveway whose trunk my dad carved my name into. The last time I went back to see it (maybe 5-6 years ago), the trees were still there. Also, the house wasn't yellow when I lived there, it was more of a greyish blue from what I remember.

8 Kristen Meadows. I lived here from 1985 until 1993. The horrible pink shutters are different, but the rest of the house looks about the same. There were two trees in the front yard where the little circular pink flower beds are now.

Browsing through my old neighborhoods is bringing back some memories, and it made me realize that I haven't lived there for fifteen years. It sounds and feels like a long time ago.

one benefit to Pacific time

I've had a hard time adjusting to working and living in Pacific time and following sports back on the east coast. It's been really strange having NHL playoff games start at 4PM out here. (I imagine football at 10 AM will be even stranger.) Well, one benefit to being out here is that late games aren't that late. The Penguins just beat the Red Wings in 3 OTs, and it's not even 10 PM yet. Cool.

fixing Home and End keys on OS X

Recently at home I've started plugging in a full-size keyboard to my MacBook Pro. The default behavior of the Home and End keys on OS X (go to the beginning/end of the document) is totally counter-intuitive to years and years of muscle memory built up on Windows (and now Linux), to go to the beginning or end of the current line.

I found KeyFixer today and installed it. It's been a lifesaver so far - now my Home and End keys work the way I expect. Now, I just need to figure out how to remap Ctrl-left arrow and Ctrl-right arrow to jump to the previous/next word, and I'll be all set!

the cake is a lie...

So I finished Portal last night. What a cool game! It was a great change of pace from every other FPS I've played. With other games, I sometimes get frustrated or annoyed at the puzzles and then give up and just search for a walkthrough on the Internet. I didn't get that from Portal. I thought the puzzles were challenging enough to be fun, but not nearly as obtuse as those in other games.

Also, I was quite satisfied with the length of the game. As I get older and grumpier, I find I have less patience and less time in general to waste on video games. Portal was just the right length to keep me busy for a few nights, but not too long to feel like work.

Overall, it was a great game. And now my gaming plate is clean, just in time for GTA 4. :)

odd

I was self-Googling tonight and I came across this. Odd but cool.

assimilation complete

I'm at Google now.  It's even cooler than I imagined.

Watch It Shred!

Even better than Will It Blend? - Watch it Shred!

thanks, EA!

I'm always quick to bitch about how terrible a company EA is, so I figure I should give them a little praise when they deserve it. My Rock Band guitar that I bought on launch day was defective. I submitted a request to replace it the next day. When it took them a couple weeks to actually get the replacement, they offered me a free game to apologize for it taking so long.

So my copy of NHL 08 showed up yesterday. I haven't played a hockey video game in while (I got blisters on my thumbs from playing NHL 98 in college), so this will be fun. Thanks, EA!

oh yeah, some big news

http://sf-adventure.blogspot.com/

rm -rf /

We have a table at work for older hardware and other electronics that's up for grabs. I've been getting rid of some old machines lately, and I wanted to donate one to the table. I didn't have anything particularly sensitive on it, but I wanted to wipe it for the next person.

I've always wanted to rm -rf / just to see if Linux really would delete pretty much everything. Well, it does. :)

Rock Band - I HAS IT

I met Don this morning at Target, right after they opened up at 8. I walked right into the video game section, handed over my credit card, and waited along with about 10 other people for them to grab the stock out of the back. It turns out they had plenty of Rock Band bundles - after everyone got their bundle, they had probably 7 or 8 PS3 copies and 4 or 5 360 copies left.

Now, I just need to find myself a Falcon 360 and I'll be all set for Thanksgiving. :)

sigh

I think that this is the most painful Bills loss in at least 10 years.

They're not going to make the playoffs this year. They're not going to finish close to .500. They've lost lots and lots of starters to injury.

But tonight - it looked like the stars aligned for the standard bearer for small market teams to knock off Jerry Jones and the big-money NFL. The Bills never trailed in the game, but they found a way to keep letting Dallas back in.

Until the end. One part of me kept thinking that with all the tough losses we've suffered over the years, that there's no possible way Dallas could pull off a win. I guess I was wrong.

On a positive note, it looks like this is Trent Edwards's team now. Gotta keep hoping for next year. :)

does Guitar Hero rock the 80s?

I picked up Guitar Hero 80's Edition yesterday. Some thoughts:

The game is just the Guitar Hero 2 engine with some new songs and new outfits. There's one programmer listed in the credits, and the rest are art and music people.

There are a lot more 3-note chords in these songs. Also, I noticed a green-orange chord or two.

I've seen some framerate slowdown in Hard and Expert modes. WTF? Throttle the background graphics if you need to, but *don't* mess with the framerate!

Overall, the song selection is kind of meh - I've had more fun rocking out to songs in Guitar Hero and Guitar Hero 2. However, this song has been stuck in my head for the past two days.

So, I'd have to say that it's the weakest of the Guitar Hero series, but worth the $40 I paid for it. Bring on Rock Band!

what a game...

I almost passed out when the Sabres won Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Semifinals tonight. After Chris Drury scored with 7 seconds to go to send the game to overtime, the camera panned over the euphoric crowd. I was stunned to see my cousin Evan screaming his head off cheering!



I've always kind of half paid attention to the crowd at Sabres games on TV, thinking I might recognize someone. Tonight I finally did!

enough already

Dear Enterprise Rent-A-Car:

I appreciate the fact that you guys are advertising during the NHL playoffs on Versus. However, I must see the commercial where the 3 girls are throwing their scarves out of the back of the convertible anywhere from 5 to 10 times during *each* game. It's getting a little old.

Can you guys please run a new commercial? And maybe one that's targeted more towards the people watching hockey?

Thanks!

Firefox text size on OS X

I've been using ctrl-scroll wheel in Firefox on Windows for ages to increase or decrease text size. Firefox 1.5 used cmd-scroll wheel on OS X to do the same thing. I was irritated when cmd-scroll wheel stopped working in Firefox 2.0, but never irritated enough to find out why.

Apparently they changed this in 2.0 to ctrl-scroll wheel, I guess to be more consistent with the Windows version. This collides with the default setting for OS X's zoom feature.

I've never been able to figure out the Firefox setting to change the text size shortcut, so tonight I finally reassigned the OS X zoom to cmd-scroll wheel.

Yay, now I can use ctrl-scroll wheel in Firefox to change text size!

I think I need one of these

I'm not sure why, but I really would like a beer pouring robot. I'd prefer one that spoke its preprogrammed witty bartender phrases in English though.

Guitar Hero

So, I got Guitar Hero II this past weekend as a wedding present. (Thanks, Don and HM!) Initially I thought, "hey, cool, I played this once before, it was pretty neat." It definitely wasn't something I'd go out and buy myself.

That was Sunday. As of Tuesday, I stopped by Hollywood Video GAMECRAZY (TM) OMG to pick up the first Guitar Hero.

I'm officially addicted. As in, early stages of WoW addiction. The past few days I've had Guitar Hero songs going through my head during most of the day, waiting until I get home to try to complete more songs on the next level.

Time to go sneak in a song or two before heading to work. :)

w00t!

After probably doing more research on a new TV than I did on my new car, I finally pulled the trigger this morning. I ordered a 61" 1080p Samsung set from Amazon - free shipping and no tax! I so can't wait for the Super Bowl this year!