Friday, November 30, 2001
Being on a schedule has its drawbacks. Even its advantages have drawbacks. Case in point: I normally reserve Friday nights for writing. Up until now, I’ve only been writing Points of View reviews on Friday, but recently, I’ve had the urge to write some fiction. Any sort of fiction. Not the Great American Novel; just something entertaining. As you can imagine, I’ve been mentally building myself up […]
Tuesday, November 27, 2001
“No rest for the Sipple….” For some reason, that phrase tickles me. I’m tuckered out right now, but I expect that. I went to Men’s Academy this morning (I wish they had a website), and its 6:30 a.m. starting time has taken its toll. Even so, I’m glad I went, as John’s message about wisdom was worth hearing. I got through the workday, though, and managed to drag myself home. […]
Monday, November 26, 2001
Well. It’s time for me to start becoming me. By that, I mean that I have a pretty high standard for myself, and I haven’t been living up to it. The problem is that, while I know which habits I’d like to have, once I start following those habits, I quickly fool myself into thinking that I’m totally faithful to those habits. I begin to slack off, because in my mind, I’m still faithful. So. […]
Saturday, November 24, 2001
Quickly, before the street-sweeper of the mind, sleep, claims me: I decorated my office for Christmas this morning. A (false) pine garland runs around the rim of the cubicle, festooned with fairy lights, which also climb the archway which serves as the entrance to our little space. It looks very cool. I also watched the first two episodes of Nadia and the Secret of the Blue Water, which fulfilled my expectations. It’s a wonderful, Miyazaki-like series, though it […]
Friday, November 23, 2001
I had the day off of work today, so my Mom and I went shopping. We had great success finding Christmas presents and such things. Particularly, I happened across an anime import store. It contains mostly Hello Kitty merchandise, but they have a wide selection of CD’s, wallscrolls, and models. Most importantly, they’re at American prices; I don’t have to pay USD $35 for a CD. I ended up spending $90 there, on a variety […]
Thursday, November 22, 2001
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Even if you don’t celebrate it, it’s a good idea to stop for a moment and be grateful for…well, everything. Practically everything that we have in life is, in some way, a gift from others. My Thanksgiving was a pleasant one; after I spent the morning ripping Christmas mp3’s (a surprisingly easy job once one gets used to the process), my sister and her family came over for the day. So, […]
Wednesday, November 21, 2001
It’s almost Thanksgiving. I’ll bake an apple pie tonight as my parents do the rest of the work. Meanwhile, I stumbled upon a wonderful little humorous essay called “Little Wars” by H.G. Wells, about how he and several friends became obssessed with playing wargames with tin soldiers. Contrary to Wells’ dark SF writing, this plays with convention and presents his play with tin soldiers as though it were […]
Tuesday, November 20, 2001
A few tidbits today: For the first time in…well…years, I’ve been spending a significant amount of time gaming lately. The object of my affection is Ragnarok Online, a massively-multiplayer online community and game, using artwork similar to Final Fantasy IX‘s. It’s still in alpha, which means it’s still free. A priest of Ragnarok I can’t get used to the idea that I’m actually playing a computer game for more than half an hour at a time. I used […]
Monday, November 19, 2001
Some actual content: Last night I watched the second and final DVD of the Ah My Goddess! OVA. It was surprisingly good; they managed to pull off a movie-scale story in about 70 minutes. Clearly, this was their Tenchi Muyo! in Love (I or II). As I discovered from the first disc, the best part of the experience was re-watching the disc with the commentary track turned on, where the producers and voice actors pretty much MST […]
Saturday, November 17, 2001
This has been a surprisingly productive day. It’s just past 2:00, and I’ve already taken care of my weekly backups, bought replacement coaxial cable for our den, and finished winterizing the pots in my garden. Weird. Right now I’m working on Landscape, trying to add a few features and make it so that it can be used as a replacement for the default desktop. I like the idea of providing for radically different ways of using computers. […]