Stuff from February, 2004
This is the archive of tumbledry happenings that occurred on February, 2004.
This is the archive of tumbledry happenings that occurred on February, 2004.
John beat Max Unlimited on heavy. Using a pad. With his feet. None of this cheating with the controller. Yes, that’s right. I witnessed it. I said to myself, “what the heck” as he pounded through the beginning of the song. To say it was incredible would be an understatement - the guy’s a frickin’ amazing player. He got a “C” on it. No “D” for him. Amazing. We are bringing the DDR shirt idea together - I think we will get them printed fairly soon. Alright! As for me, I am about 50% there on my two-foot gallops. This, of course, means I am really only capable of one-foot gallops. So it goes. However, my grapevine step is nearly there (nearly being a relative word, of course). All of this combines to make me nearly good enough to pass Rythm and Police on heavy. When I pass that, I will be happy.
I’m so tired that my head is propped up on this bottle of Dasani so as to facilitate writing this entry. I just wanted to record an excellent and exhausting day (Monday) has passed. We got around 12 inches of beautiful snow. I enjoyed the beginnings of my classes and am definitely beginning to get a perspective on them. For the curious, Shakespeare, Physics, Multi-Variable, and QMCS (Intro to Java Design) all occur on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Thank goodness for Tuesdays and Thursdays. Tomorrow I will rest and rest and rest some more. I need to recharge.
Please skip to the fourth paragraph if you are not curious about the technical details of what has been going on here. You have been warned. Originally, I was just going to surprise you guys with this design and not mention any of the details. However, it has been such an interesting time, I figured I would share. As I said to Justin, I almost went insane doing this redesign. Here’s the sequences of events: I was bumming around in Paint Shop Pro (as I have been known to do) and brought up a scanned photo of Largent off of a Kodak Picture CD. I said to myself, “self, this could look good with a properly applied brush filter.” In a fateful sequence of menu choices and button clicks, I applied said filter and discovered it looked good - really good. Good enough to continue bumming, this time with a full draft space of 8.5 by 11 inches (‘round about 1224 by 1584 pixels when using a resolution of 144pixels/inch - but that’s for printing so don’t mind that). Then, things began to get out of hand. Recently, I had scanned the cover of my Shakespaeare book.
Our traffic has been up roughly 2000% in the last couple of days. (No, I’m serious). I would like to send my public thanks to the sagacious Mr. Dave Shea at mezzoblue for his generence reference.
In the meantime, I have been dabbling/putting together the print CSS file for the site, so I hope to have that done shortly. If you have not yet created a print style for your site, I highly recommend your doing so. For example, on the off-chance that someone prints something from this site, I would not want to be responsible for using all of their ink and soaking an 8.5x11 sheet of paper with a parchment-brown and blue background. I plan to keep everything in the print design pretty basic, but also to hide some things (such as most of the right side bar). Furthermore, I will design a logo for print that will play well with a plain white sheet of paper. Apart from that, things are rolling along pretty smoothly. The only big changes in the next couple of months are some house cleaning and streamling in the PHP files and mod_rewrite implementation.
The frenzied traffic has died down which, suprisingly, has caused my writing style to relax back to its former state. Recent change: the sidebar now supplies you with summaries of what has been happening here. You got it, you can be gone for up to one month and simply click to see what has changed. Will PHP wonders never cease? It was a challenge because imagexhibition is made up of one mySQL database holding picture information, and another for each picture. Each picture has a key that references the gallery id of another table, this latter table holds the information about each gallery. This avoids redundancy in the tables (streamlining by avoiding duplication), however it certainly makes some of the PHP retrieval code a little convoluted. Better there than in the database. Anyways, in order to pull out the information about what galleries have been changed and when, I had to pass two arrays through three mySQL queries. It all stemmed from the fundamental problem that the gallery table stores the date of creation of the gallery and not the date of the last time a picture within it was updated; which is how I wanted it to be. Therefore, the way in which I originally orchestrated the tables to interact forced me to (1) work backwards from the age of the pictures, (2) get them to find the gallery (or galleries, as the case may be), and then (3) load the pictures back from that gallery. Three steps total. I’d show you some of the code, but I haven’t really tested and implemented the CSS and PHP regular expressions for properly displaying source code.
So this means that Victoria’s Secret, Express, Express Men, Bath and Body Works, The Limited, and The White Barn Candle Co. are all owned by the same company?
I lost my necklace. It was my favorite necklace. A double leather strap deal, that held a cross (more of a plus-sign, at Katy’s observation). Around the leather, I added a little silver ring, with the words “believe” imprinted in the metal. This ring is from the family of a good friend. But what has happened, “is” I say? Not, “was”? Yes, we retraced all of my steps (I sure walk around a lot in one hour) and eventually returned to my classroom. Katy had the key to the physics room. I knew there was a reason she had a physics internship two summers ago! A little leg work, a little agonizing, and silent thoughts yielded success. I won’t soon forget the image of the cross lying there on the classroom floor, the ring off the chain and sitting nearby. I’m getting that clasp fixed.
Have you ever been having a rough and tumble day and looked down at your clothing, noting the dark hues and muted tones? Ever thought they were connected? Probably not. I’ve noticed, however, there seems to be some connection between the colors one wears and the way one feels. Is it merely correlation or full-blown causation? I think it is most likely a little bit of both. Today I am feeling pretty good and as I am writing this, my shirt is a pretty bright orange. Did I put this on this morning because I had an unusally positive attitude or did the bright color make me feel better as the day went by? Maybe the people in the ’70s were happier because of the baby blue leisure suits and tie-dyed t-shirts. Which doesn’t explain the drugs and sex; maybe the bad cancelled out the good.
All talk and no links makes tumbledry a dull website.
One of the best log entries I have ever read. Courtesy of Shawn.
One of the most clean, welcoming, friendly websites that I have visisted in a while. Dominey Design - Bright Ideas and Solutions for New Media.
While the people below me pound out soulless rap music, I turn up the volume to the musical epiphany occurring around me. Ani DiFranco - “Sorry I Am” is a fantastic track. I hadn’t sat down and listened to DiFranco before, and now I realize what I was missing. It’s almost like Howie Day meet Dashboard meets Jewel meets Mystery Ingredient X. Then there’s Paul van Dyk. I’ve liked him ever since I heard “Angel.” I tend to be a sucker for melodic club anthems, and this is one of that genre’s best. Would that songs like these took over the Sandstorms of our horrendous U.S. club offerings. If I could be somewhere, it would be the unreal dance parties of Ibiza (specifically, club Cream at Amnesia in Ibiza). Anywho, van Dyk’s newest album is called Reflections, and originally I hadn’t thought it was anything special.
I leaned back in my chair and looked skyward through my window. Up, up, up, my thoughts soared. Then they settled easily amongst the warm air of a gentle February that surrounded and cushioned me. The clouds were cotton-white and rolled about on the deep blue fabric of the sky. The sun, growing in strength with approaching Spring, lent illumination to the scene. Memories floated by, and I smiled and wept with my past. A beautiful daydream it was, enveloping my tired spirit and rejuvenating my conscious. Then, as swiftly and silently as it had begun, the veil of the dream world was lifted and I was returned to my desk, ready to continue life in the real world.
This is the most beautiful sound I have heard in a long time. No pounding music comes from any room near, and so I am alone with the sound of rain falling steadily against the windows. What a solace for a heavy heart, this sound of rain. How rain can sometimes set a backdrop of despair and yet at others sow seeds of the Spring of rejuvenation. Rythmic drops lull me into a calm thoughtfulness.