Entry on 4th of july with pics...

http://din.vox.com/library/post/bbq-kickball-fireworks-oh-my.html

I'm a sucker for peer pressure and fear of missing out on cool things so I created a vox account at http://din.vox.com

I put up a post about wow demotivational posters I think people might find amusing, located at: http://din.vox.com/library/post/demotivator-wow-posters.html

As to my thoughts about vox, I think it's fantastic. I find that the more modern interface just makes posting more enjoyable and the media organization/inclusion and easy upload features make it a winner for me.

Everything went pretty smoothly. It was a catholic ceremony so I spent a lot of time standing up and bowing and sitting down. Also mumbling under my breath during the call and response parts because I had no idea what to say. At least I wasn't the only one, as there was much amusement going on. I also took my first communion ever. hahaha. The hotel that we were staying at was a hyatt in the middle of cleveland. It was a pretty neat looking design on the inside.


Here's the roof. (all pics from my phone, so I apologize for the quality).


Here's the view from my floor. The round area with the steps was where the reception was held with the dinner on the ground floor.

I think the best story from the weekend involves the maid of honor and the best man. She was a cool girl, but not all that cute. Unfortunately for troy, she got a radar lock on him and wouldn't leave him alone. Since he's a nice guy, he wasn't ignoring her or really doing a great job of turning away her advances all weekend. So me and the guys thought that we'd help her out. Cleared out the two guys that troy was sharing a room with and slipped her the key. hahaha. When I saw him the next morning when we were checking out, he gave me the dirtiest look along with the throat slitting gesture. She on the other hand, thanked me at breakfast ;) (current news is that "nothing" happened, oh well)

( more travel follies )

I am exhausted.

This past weekend was joe's (college roommate) bachelor party. Naturally, we went to vegas. Him and most of his buddies drove down there from stanford with just chad and I flying in from the east coast. Cj has now been living there for a year and of course doesn't have to go anywhere.

The usual happened and I won't be commenting on that.

Things to note:
- The luxor's pool is outrageously better than the sahara's. It's funny how the beautiful people numbers increased dramatically as you went to the higher end pools (fyi, apparently the hard rock hotel is where the strippers like to go. just rumors). I did get a nice start on a tan that I'll likely squander sitting in front of the computer.
- I really liked the luxor as a place to stay. Good location and they have a MCDONALDS!! right inside. mmmmdoublecheeseburgersforonedollarmmmm. so good.
- Margaritaville judged as a bar on the vegas strip is every bit as middle america awful as you would expect, however they have these awesome margarita dispensers that are perfect for chug races. They consist of 4 foot tall cylinders with a keg-type nozzle/dispenser at the bottom
- Joe was convinced to do all manner of embarassing things that we had compiled into a list. Fat girls and their underwear now will forever remind me of that saying about fools and their money.
- Joe's stanford friends were fun, although not quite as much fun as those of us from tech. I guess they make it up by being smarter.

Overall, it was a fun, relaxing trip. until my flight home.
( stuck it behind the cut because it's long )

Growing up in virginia beach, I always sorta took the beach for granted. It was always there any time I wanted to go and sometimes I'd go a lot and other times, very little. Now I find myself having to make specific plans and dedicate a whole trip to go to the beach and that seems strange. I really miss the beach. Just sitting out on the sand as the sun's going down and watching the waves.

As per the subject, I went to the outer banks (obx woot!) this weekend to help fill in the house that a couple of friends had gotten. Well, actually I just knew 2 of the people going and the other 8 were strangers picked to live in a house to find out what happens when people stop being polite and start getting real. Not really. Well, it could have been like real world, if the show's cast of characters were from the same church and most were married. I also don't think I saw anyone cry nor was there much/any alcohol. Although we did have a pool, hot tub, and pool table. For reference, the house was almost exactly like the beach house we got last year (also in corolla) in layout and furnishings. It was just south of the food lion shopping center instead of being north.

I managed to have fun like always and the people turned out to be ok after all. Didn't get to spend as much time on the beach as I wanted. We went crabbing on one of the days, which was a bust. It was too early in the season to catch anything and I managed to get pinched by a crab. I'm apparently out of practice with handling them. I think other than that, it was a pretty relaxing weekend. I ate way too much food. The person in charge of buying groceries bought enough food to last a week. 108 eggs!! It was like a costco commercial. The weather turned out to be great. It only sprinkled a bit on one of the days and was clear and sunny for the rest with a nice temperature. So I was able to turn a slight shade darker. Still want to get more of a tan, but I think I also need to get less fat before I go again.

I miss the beach.

The last couple months or so, I've gotten sucked into watching a lot of tv. Well, a lot of tv compared to the amount I was previously watching. Mostly thanks to the dvr in our living room and my roommate kevin's addiction to everything tv. Series I've been watching include house, gray's anatomy, conviction, and crossing jordan. I might be ashamed of some of the stuff I watch, but then I also watch some pretty low denominator anime...

Speaking of which, in the current anime season, I'm hooked on the melancholy of suzumiya haruhi, blood+, fate/stay night. Sorta watching noein and black lagoon. If you've got the time, I'd recommend finding copies of any of those. Yes josh, your copy of planetes is in the mail. really. ok, not really.

On the dvd front, I can't say I'm shocked, but looks like there's news of a 10th anniversary edition of neon genesis evangelion being released.

I just ran across this trailer for gedo senki on youtube. It's by goro miyazaki (son of hayao).

It's based on the earthsea series by ursula k. le guin. From what I've found it'll mainly based on the 3rd book (The Farthest Shore). The english title is "tales from earthsea," so it wouldn't surprise me if they pull stuff from the other books as well. Goro apparently secured the rights while meeting le guin at a preview screening of "howl's moving castle".

I'm still here and keep meaning to update, although there's not much to update on. Instead, I'll give you an nfl draft drinking game from the same people that came up with the superbowl drinking game.

( 2006 rules )

taken from bluemonday1047

Answer the twelve questions and then do a Google image search for your answer, choosing one result image to post in your journal.
( pics behind )

I ran across this 6 part feature about a press visit to the x-men 3 film set. Lotta good information and it definitely got me re-excited about the movie.

In other less dorky news, rumor has it that a memo is floating around redskin park with the title "All your players are belong to us". I think that once again, the skins will be offseason champions. <3

Hm, I might end up going to atlantic city this weekend for a friend's bday celebration. Hopefully the plans continue to move for this, but it definitely seems like it'll be a last minute thing as it was only discussed yesterday.

This excerpt is from ESPN Page2's Bill Simmons' article Curious Guy: Malcolm Gladwell. This is Gladwell's thoughts on fantasy teams and team sports in general.

Fantasy leagues? I used to do rotisserie baseball for a few years, and loved it -- until I had my baseball meltdown and gave up on the sport. I worried, though, that it began to erode my sense of team. I mean, the great appeal of watching sports is that you have a commitment to a team, and the players become secondary players in that love affair. I fell for the Buffalo Bills when they had Jim Kelly and Thurman Thomas and went to four Super Bowls, and I'm still in love with the Buffalo Bills even though not a single vestige of that original team remains; even though, in fact, the very thing that attracted me to the Bills in the first place -- that thrilling offense -- has completely disappeared. Sports team loyalty is really an extraordinary act of unconditional love. Suppose, for instance, that I love BMWs and have loved them all my life. There is a meaningful connection between the three series car I might be driving now and the [1981] I first drove 25 years ago -- not just in the feel of the cars and the engineering and the look, but also, I'm quite sure some of the same people helped to build both cars.

Sports teams demand the same loyalty from us. But where's the continuity? The uniforms change. The stadiums change. The owners and players and coaches and styles of play change. All that's constant is some ineffable and fragile sense of the team as a meaningful psychological entity. Now fantasy leagues come along and allow us to junk that concept as well. So I worry. Of course, it's conceivable I've over-thought this. I've been known to do that in the past.

I've been doing fantasy football for many years now and I certainly have to agree with him. I think one reason I've been able to enjoy fantasy football in the past is that the skins have been so bad, I don't feel guilty about paying less attention to them. Granted, that also makes me a bit of a fairweather fan. But I'm fairly sure that I spend enough time caring about tech football to make up for it. And of course, I like what he says on the loyalty to teams issue.

Speaking of tech, the football team starts spring practice in 2 weeks (march 22) and the spring game is april 15th.

I'm bored at work today so here's some random stuff I'm looking at.

courtesy of youtube, here's a clip of what i think is the winner of the 2005 yoyo world championships.

google video provides us with old lady pwning a mercedes

was waiting for regina to post this, but since I'm throwing out videos (and she's had plenty of time since showing it to me), here's yellow fever - or why white guys get asian girls.

Thanks to everyone that went to todai and then dr. dremo's (last weekend). I hope everyone had a good time and enjoyed the food. It's been a little while since I last posted and I'm lazy.

I went to see Midori perform with the national symphony orchestra with some friends on friday. She's freaking awesome and easily my favorite violinist. I think she's like 4.5 ft tall because she was only barely taller than the stand of the concertmistress she was next to on the stage. When she performs, she moves and poses like she's either dancing the robot or is having a seizure. Highly entertaining to say the least... That being said, she has a phenominal amount of talent, both technically and musically. One of the major knocks on her is that she doesn't play with enough emotion, but I certainly didn't see that on friday, nor have I heard that in her recent recordings (first recording was at age 6 and she's now like 35?). I just wish that she had performed more pieces for the program. I'm becoming less of a fan of this new format, that the nso is using for their concerts, the more times I go.

The NSO performed a couple other works that I didn't care about plus the big one that I was there for: Tchaikovsky's violin concerto in D op. 35 (which is the one that midori was the soloist for). It's a hugely difficult piece and it's a standard for any major violinist's repetoire. I can't think of an interpretation that midori has done that I haven't liked so there's not going to be any nitpicking from me on this. Like always, she was spot-on with hitting the extreme high notes with ease. I also loved how she was able to clearly bring out a melody on certain passages that required the multiple string technique. I don't actually know what it's called (sadly not a string player), but it involves playing chords by bowing across multiple strings at the same time. It's a hard enough technique on piano to emphasize single notes within chords and I can only imagine how much more annoying it is on a violin.

Anyway, I have cd's of her and of the tchaikovsky piece if anyone's interested in hearing it.

I have a new email address:

din.chris at gmail.

My other gmail accounts will fwd to this one, but if you want to add me to google talk, this is the one I'll be signed in as. I sent some requests to people for google talk, but I don't know who all uses it or what everyone's gmail accounts are. So add me!

It's signing day!! Tech's recruiting class is ok, we lost out on some good recruits. This year was a strange aberration in that 8 of the top 10 rated kids went out of state. We did ok addressing issues on both the OL and DL, but the last two classes of linemen really need to step up and contribute. No top rated RB or WR this year, so I imagine the coaches will really try to target some good ones next year. Anyway, on to the fun news.

Over at noobsports I ran across a super bowl drinking game that looks pretty rough. If you try it, make sure you have plenty of alcohol. While reading these, keep in mind the stats of last year's super bowl: a combined 45 first downs, 700 yards of offense, 45 points, 5 turnovers, 7 punts, 6 sacks, and 10 penalties. 2003's super bowl has even higher stats. hah! I've bolded the rule that I believe will give you the most trouble...
( don't blame me if you die while trying to follow these rules )

Happy 250th birthday Mozart!

I used to love playing his stuff when I was younger. I still remember when I first got the book of his piano sonatas. The thing is like a phonebook. It was such a pain to open up and keep on the piano without closing on itself. His stuff is always a lot of fun to play because of all the long scale passages. You can just let your fingers fly over the keys. He used to be my favorite composer until I was introduced to the much darker sounding Beethoven piano stuff. Hah, thinking about mozart reminded me that my parents once stuck a sample of my playing on the answering machine at home. It was from sonata k331 - rondo alla turca (I had to cheat and look up the kerchel number as I couldn't remember). If you're interested, wgms is running all mozart stuff today on 104.1 fm or online at classical 1035.

And just a heads up if you didn't know... Chinese New Year is the 29th (sunday)!

Date:	2006-01-06 10:39
Subject:	grow!
Security:	Public
Mood:	calm

Meant to post this yesterday, but apparently I forgot to hit submit. Anyway, this series of games was brought to my attention recently and I thought they were fantastic. They're made by eyemaze and the basic premise is that you have a collection of objects that you place on the world. As you place them on the world (either by clicking or click/drag), animations will occur as the objects level-up to create a narrative. If you place them in the correct order, the animations become more elaborate until you get to the final animation that lets you know you've won. To help you figure out the order, you can see what level each item achieved after you've placed all the objects. The ending animation is obviously achieved by getting all objects to max level.

grow cube and grow are abstract type stories while grow rpg has you helping a little guy defeat the evil monster.

I've solved 'em already so I can help with hints if needed.

Date:	2006-01-04 15:42
Subject:	gator bowl
Security:	Public
Mood:	blah

( all football stuff )

the internet is for this (mildly nsfw due to language and subject matter. just use headphones). alternate link.

The visuals are from world of warcraft, but the song is from Avenue Q, which won the 2004 tony for best musical. everyone should check this one out as it's hilarious!

if you're bored at work (or procrastinating like me), here's a flash game to help pass the time. stick arena is a top-down gta clone using stick figures. internet deathmatch! it's pretty neat. standard controls. wasd for movement, mouse to aim, lmb to fire/attack.

panda - gel invaders is a flash space invaders-esque game. He (the panda) also stars in gel gel panic. And to keep with the panda theme, here's panda bounce which is a sorta breakout clone where you bounce the panda on a trampoline to collect fruit hanging above him.

mamezo is an action game where you bounce a little yellow ball around to pop balloons, using controls similar to the nintendo ds where you draw a line using the mouse for where you want the ball to bounce from. cup of tea is a cute game where you have to collect sugarcubes using two mice (the guy has a whole page of flash games here.

And then there's web sudoku. if you haven't heard of sudoku before, you should read the wikipedia article in the provided link.