Tuesday, October 7, 2003
I have a mini-article ready, but I think I’d better explain my short absence from this journal. I forgot to update on Friday, then seasonal allergies flared up on Monday, which kept me in bed until noon and home all day. Today, I’m operating at about 70%. I’m continuing to chug through my weekly list-of-stuff-to-do. I need another couple of weeks to be able to accurately gauge its effectiveness, but it’s going […]
Thursday, October 2, 2003
I’m continuing to have reasonable success with my evening schedules; Tuesday night was a good example. I came home ready to make a special dinner: steak and potatos. I cracked open the cookbook to discover that the recipe calls for marinating the steak for an hour. Blast. Well, I’d planned on making cookies anyway. I oiled and peppered the steak and set it aside, then proceeded to mix up the M&M cookie batter. I’d done this over […]
Wednesday, October 1, 2003
Fall has arrived. This morning, the sky was paved with slate, and the air was almost vindictively cold; even a long-sleeved shirt and a leather jacket didn’t quite keep out the chill. When I hopped into my truck, I turned on the heater for the first time this season. But I’m not complaining. Until today, the days have been nearly cloudless, and the air warms up by mid-morning. It’s still chilly by noon, but […]
Tuesday, September 30, 2003
So. I watched Fight Club Saturday night. I think it’s one of the best films ever made. A classic. And not because I agree with it, though agreeing with it isn’t really the point, I think. One of the things I appreciated about it was that it’s a black comedy. It’s not a serious moral fable. It has its serious side, of course, as all good comedy does. But, first and foremost, […]
Monday, September 29, 2003
Not much to write about this week. Had a good weekend; the major event was that I watched Fight Club for the first time, which I’m not willing to write about just yet. On a completely different subject, Lee Sheldon writes on the MUD-DEV mailing list, about using lots of explicit numbers (like a “+3 sword”) in online games: It always amazes me that when we provide the explicit numbers, […]
Friday, September 26, 2003
Well, my life finally seems to be settling down. Every morning this week, I arrived at work closer to my regular time of 9:00, and this morning I arrived two minutes before nine. Hooray! I can sleep eight hours now. My evenings are becoming more productive, too. I’ve begun scheduling my off-hours, which works wonders for my productivity. You’d think this turn my off-hours into drudgery, but the opposite is true: […]
Thursday, September 25, 2003
Test-Driven Programming So. Let’s say you want to write a program. First, let’s assume you know what you want to write, and you’ve broken the intended program down into small pieces of functionality. Index cards work well for this; you can write a description of each bit of functionality on an index card. So. You have a specific bit of code to write. The natural urge is to dive right in and begin coding […]
Wednesday, September 24, 2003
Oooh. I want Joel’s office. I love the diagonal walls. I had a great time with my parents last night, watching Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. The film was much more enjoyable than I expected it to be; it was a great reunion with the characters, and a darned good story. Emma Watson (Hermione) did a surpassingly excellent job, too; her emotion when explaining the term “Mudblood” was incredibly subtle. And Kenneth […]
Tuesday, September 23, 2003
Dang. I’d really like to get ahead on this journal. My regular blogs are sparse on new text today, so I don’t have much to write about there. I have a few other things in the works, but haven’t had a chance to upload them yet. I’m doing surprisingly well, considering it’s a Tuesday. We had a relaxing Monday Group last night, just three of us talking about creative power. […]
Monday, September 22, 2003
Light, I’m tired. I need to start cordoning off my weekends. I was on my feet practically all weekend, and that’s just plain not healthy. It keeps me from decompressing after the work-week, so that I’m a zombie the next week. Like I am today. The first night of AWANA went well. It’s amazing how good I feel when in AWANA; I just know what I’m doing and can really lead and help […]