Nonsequittal Rumblings

I’m seeing diamond dust here! This is pretty cool! It’s definitely not snow. Very fine ice crystals are just floating in the air, and reflecting the morning sunlight. It’s very pretty. How appropriate is this, as I am a part of the team who works on anime-fansubbing the series called Diamond Dust Drops. I can’t really take a good picture of it, so… see this or this for a sample picture of what it really is. I’m sure all of you who’ve lived in the cold are have seen it in your lifetime, just not knowing what it’s really called.

<?php
// This function analyzes how well koji programs
// with any given mood & other factors for the
// day. Quite useful.
function koji_coding_in_php()
{
  global $me, $got_morale_support;
  if ($me == "feeling like PHP")
  {
    if ($me == "awake")
    {
      be_productive();
      return ("successful");
    }
    else
    {
      try_to_be_productive();
      if ($me == "happy")
      {
        return ("successful");
      }
      else
      {
        return ("miserably failed");
      }
    }
  }
  else
  {
    if ($got_morale_support == "true")
    {
      return ("half-ass success");
    }
    else
    {
      return ("shit-face failed");
    }
  }
} // end function
?>

Despite the worry about the chapped lips, the performance went rather well. It was a 30-minute gig, and that helped a lot. Since the last gig (Dec 15), we had no rehearsal until this Monday, Jan 19. That’s quite a bit of time not playing at all. Of course, being a good apartment complex residen’t, I didn’t play my trumpet so I don’t disturb my neighbors. (We’ll just ignore my ownership of a practice mute for now.) So my chops were quite out of shape. I could hit high notes just fine, but endurance wasn’t there. By the end of that short gig, my lips were quite tired. Even though my lips were tired, I could hit the high-E (3rd ledger line above the staff) as the final note of the night. So really, it wasn’t too bad.
Sometimes, we had some audio recorder running at each gig. From time to time, I hit a solo that I like. Last night, it happened while playing Here, There and Everywhere. Yes, the Beatles song. (What? It’s not a jazz tune? I know. But it’s jazzistically arranged, so it’s okay. We even play Doors’ Born to be Wild.) The mood of the song really allowed me to go for a lyrical solo. I wish I could listen back to it.

I work for a fairly large company. Being big means easier to find people who share common interest within the organization. That means formation of some clubs and such.
One such organization is the jazz band I belong to. Actually, this band is formed by the employees and non-employees, all of whom love jazz. We may not be the best band in town, but our passion is there. We love playing, and we love playing for good cause.
I actually joined the band before I was hired full time – I was still a temporary worker on hourly wage ($7.50/hr back then). I found a small ad in an issue of company newsletter, looking for more band members. I jumped on the case, and called the number on it.
“Hello, I saw your ad. I’d like to join.”
“Okay, sure. How much of jazz have you been playing?”
“I’ve been playing jazz throughout high school and college – 9 years. Always on 2nd trumpet part.”
“You maybe over qualified, then. But sure, come to at for a rehearsal. See you then.”
It’s a full size big band. The rhythm section is a bit weak (which is a bummer), but I still love the band. And the fact that nobody is really excellent means nobody has one of those “I’m better than you are!” type of ego floating in the band. You’ve gotta love that.
So, we have another gig tonight. And my lips are a bit sore. We’ll see how it’ll turn out…

Yes, I’ve been trying to put an entry to my blog too, ever since this morning. It went nowhere though. Right now, I’m in the mood to say… working sucks. I don’t hate my work. Actually, I love my work. I really never had any grudge against my current position (which it’s been 3 years since I got it) – supplier chain system analyst. (Why they can’t just say “programmer”?)
It’s just that… I wish I could spend more time on my hobby stuff (fansubbing related mainly) and on my girlfriend.
Speaking of my girlfriend, I really love her. I shall reveal my feeling in more of coming entries.
Also, speaking of fansubbing, I shall talk about it in my other future entries as well.

5 and a half weeks after the initial release date, I finally had the chance to go see the Lord of the Rings – Return of the King. Yeah, the movie was cool and all. But what I wanna talk about is not about the movie itself, but the theater I went to.
I went to this newest theater in town – Warren Theatre in Old Town, which is built very close to down town. A modest, 5-screen theater has not-so-modest feature and all. It was both good and bad. The good? They did really cool stuff to the theater. One thing you can notice is that they have a sports bar in the theater, but there’s no ordinary concession stand. Hm, interesting. Well, I get the ticket, and I enter the movie area, and the attendant gave me a pamphlet. After I found my seat, I opened the pamphlet and… it’s food menu! And on my left armrest is a little button… Yes, you press the button, then the theater attendant will come to you and take your order, and they’ll bring you snacks, food, drinks, what not. Whoa! And did you notice how I said “my left armrest”? Yes, each seats get armrests on both side of you, all of your own! You don’t armrests with your neighbors! Damn! Also, they have the “stadium style seating”, so the seat in front of you is built much much lower than your level. So even a tallest person sitting right in front of you isn’t going to bother your sight. Also, they give enough leg room, so you can’t reach the seat in front of you with your legs/feet while you’re sitting in your seat. (Probably a wise design, so you won’t kick your front-neighbor’s head while watching the movie.)
And here comes the negative side – the “at the seat order your food” system also gets in your way while watching the movie. I mean, they’re still delivering the food and taking the money after the movie started. You can even make orders after the movie has started. So there are these mice running around the theater, kinda bothering me. Hmmmm… convenience or serenity. Which would you rather pick?

I got up late this morning. I feel bad about it…

However, there seems to be more consequence than that to waking up late. The shower.

I live in an apartment complex. Usually, this place does pretty good about keeping my shower temperature pretty constant. Of course, if I flush my toilet right before I start the shower, the water temperature soars up. But, living alone, there is no need to worry about such silly thing. One more thing to note is that this whole building shares a central water heater. I don’t have to worry about my water bill, or water heating bill. But you know what that means… When my neighbors would to flush their toilet, I feel it too. And that’s exactly what might have happened. If I get up like I should, and beat the rest of the gang to the hot and cold water supply, I usually have no problem with my shower. So, I guess, that’s going to be my insentive to start waking up on time again.

Of course, I really have no right to complain big time, knowing there are some unfortunate soul on the earth. But when I’m not used to that happening on me, it is a big deal each time it happens.

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Speaking of that journal entry, the author of that journal, Shiori, is my girlfriend. I’m hoping that she will be the last one I will ever get. She is a marvel. Just like how she dedicated a whole entry on me, I shall write more about her in my future entries. I just can’t stop loving her.

I was just in the bathroom, sitting down, minding my business. I also took my cell phone with me. And there, I just found out how to turn off the sound for the phone for the games loaded on it. This is cool! I can now play the game quietly.

It finally feels like I’ve caught my groooooove again, here at work.

I’m no longer surfing the web at random… I claim those hours as my “learning time”, but that’s a big BS. Yes, I’m learning new things here and there, but I don’t have a specific target on what to learn.

Actually, I found couple new softwares while I was exploring. Both were interesting, but I got tired of them pretty quickly.

MyIE2

Internet Explorer with tabbed browsing. It even has built-in ad & popup blocker. At first, I thought it’s pretty cool. It works well. It’s fast. And it’s really not annoying. But after a while, I started going back to my old browser, Firebird. The performance sometimes get sluggish, but it’s still a good browser. Add the Adblock plug-in, and it’s excellent. (For those who want to use Adblock, you might find this list of filters useful.)

PSPad

A freeware text editor that doesn’t suck! Really, it’s a good piece of software. It just doesn’t fit within my taste, after getting used to TextPad (for Windows) or Vim (for unix/linux (I still use Vim on windows from time to time. It’s also free too.)). Some people might just find it as the text editor of the choice.

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P.S.
While writing this entry, I found out that Mozilla doesn’t like HTML class name that starts with numeric character. Bleh.

Ah, yes. Another week is coming to the end. TGIF. But you know what… it has been one of my least productive week. Yup, that’s what happens after I take a vacation.

It even takes me a while to get back into the groove in the morning. After a weekend is worse. Heck, we just had a week and a half long company shutdown. What am I supposed to do? What the heck was I working on before I left?

You see, I’m not one of those people who are organized enough to have all those things straightened before I leave the office. Yes, I need to fix that. I need to get a bit more organized.

And before I could get anything really big done, the week is already folding. Well, since I have couple more hours of office hours left, let’s see what I can accomplish during that time.

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I actually have quite a bit I could be writing, but… my mind is very unorganized right now. I’ll get to what I want to write eventually. Yes, I could write about my background, my life, my new girlfriend, my daughter, my job, my hobby – fansubbing and what not. I shouldn’t run out of things to write for a while.