ATC :: Since February 2001

Friday, July 25, 2003

Disney & Potter? - [4:03 PM]

HPANA: "Information garnered from an open lunchtime meeting between Bob Gault and the staff of Disney may have revealed that Disney is in a preliminary stage of constructing a Harry Potter-themed park." - I asked why Magic Mountain, owned by Warner Brothers, hadn't created an HP theme park back in April. Now it's looking like Disney may have the honor. Hopefully it's not rumor.
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Post Potter Depression - [2:58 PM]

I knocked out the last few pages of Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix last night. Overall I'm very pleased with the book and I'd recommend reading it, then again I'm a bit of a Potter freak. There's so much to talk about, so many questions, I could talk about it for hours. Go read it and come back so we can talk about it without spoiling it for others. Lots and lots of twists and turns, some questions answered, others posed. Seriously... go read it.

The only bummer about the whole thing is waiting for the next installment. Too bad Ms. Rowling can't write 'em as fast as we can read 'em, and I'm a VERY slow reader. Is it going to be one year, two years, or heaven forbid three years before we get to find out what happens next? Hopefully we'll see it sooner rather than later.

Time to start with book one and work my way back through them, sigh...
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Movie line of the week answer - [10:19 AM]

Shanghai Knights movie posterMy wife tells me yesterday's movie line was too easy, a cop out, I should have used a different movie line from the same move because it was a bit harder to answer. Fair enough, I totally agree with her.

Our winner this week was Mr. Tommy Williams. Thanks to everyone that played.

The correct answer is...

Shanghai Knights

The line my wife says I should've used was "This country blows!" Yep, it's a good one. Smile, life is good!
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Thursday, July 24, 2003

Movie line of the week - [9:24 AM]

Watchin' it on the big screen!I had to do some research last night to give you today's movie line. You have to say it with a bit of a nasally voice, like you've broken your nose.

Are ya'll ready?

I call that my kung pow chicken.

Ok, quick, what movie! Send your guesses here. Great film, great fun, worth watching.

UPDATE: I'd put the wrong date in the e-mail subject line, thanks Moose for setting me straight.
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More true than you know - [9:21 AM]

Robert Scoble: "Linux is not Microsoft's biggest enemy." - Scoble hits the nail right on the head. Our biggest enemy is ourself.
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Wednesday, July 23, 2003

Junior Vore + Driving == Danger! - [3:52 PM]

Steven Vore: "Guess who got his learner's permit today." - Good thing I don't live in the Atlanta area or I'd stay off the roads!

One more year and I'll be in the same boat, actually it's more like half-a-year. Oh the insanity of it all!
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Rubber duckies and our oceans... - [1:58 PM]

MSNBC: "Wanted dead or alive: Rubber ducky" - I've heard of this sort of stuff happening. A container goes overboard during a storm and the contents make their way around our oceans, turning up in strange places. Anywho read the story, it may earn you a $100.00 savings bond.
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Quick Order of the Phoenix reading update... - [12:07 PM]

I'm now very close to the end, I know, I know I'm an extremely slow reader. I read "The Death" on Sunday night in a marathon reading session that went on until 2AM Monday morning. I'm now only about thirty or so pages from the end of the book. The pace of the book REALLY picked up, thus the late bed time, and my hope is that Ms. Rowling will make sure that Harry doesn't whine so much in the next installment. The death was a surprise as were many other events leading up to it. All-in-all I'm very pleased with Order of the Phoenix. I'd say give it a read, after reading the other four FIRST, and don't let the slow start keep you from finishing. It really picks up toward the end, and leaves lots hanging in the breeze for the next two installments.
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Need a coder? - [10:22 AM]

Will write C/C++ for foodAnyone looking for a C/C++/COM/Win32 API type coder? Past history with Unix and Mac, although that's fallen outta the brain by now.
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Around the web - [8:58 AM]

MSN Search results for "Microsoft corporate culture" produce interesting results, Cass McNutt's ThoughtsOnBusiness is the #1 hit. Weblogs win again!

Ned Batchelder: "On a walk with my son a while back, we went to look at an abandoned house near Jamaica Pond. It looks like it had been quite a nice house once, but is now in complete disrepair, missing all of its window, plus some, covered in grafitti, parts burnt out, and surrounded by cyclone fence." - I LOVE old homes, ours was built sometime between 1900-1910. The old place described, and pictured, in Ned's post looks like a real gem. Hopefully somebody will take note and rescue it.

Quote of the Day: Bothell is to Washington what Bakersfield is to California. Smile, life is good!
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Tuesday, July 22, 2003

Eye Candy... - [4:16 PM]

Need some new eye candy for your XP Desktop? Why not give xicons a whirl?
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AOL blogging friend - [2:57 PM]

Foggidaboudit: "AOL sucks. Forget about it." - He didn't mean it, really he didn't, he was just seeing if I was paying attention. Yes David, I am.
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John Robb - [2:03 PM]

Please give a warm welcome back to Mr. John Robb.
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I Love OddWorld - [1:26 PM]

Wanted: Smart Folk!As seen on the OddWorld website: "A special message from the home office above Ross Dress For Less: We were unable to update the site this month due to technical difficulties. More specifically, the team that facilitates the updates was kidnapped by monkeys and placed in translucent balls, at which point they were rolled around and flung through the air for sport. No further information is available at this time. Please, pray for them. That is all ... until August 1st. " - You just gotta love 'em. Too bad I'm not a 3D code slinger, I'd be there in a heartbeat!

And, yes, they are located above Ross Dress for Less.
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There's nothing greater than the power of X. - [10:32 AM]

Last night we traveled up to Fresno to hang out with my brother and his family. Jay went out yesterday and purchased an Xbox System Link Cable and we were able to play Halo with eight people at once, a first for me since we have no real broadband choices that would allow us to play using XBox Live. At first it was Jay(my brother) and myself against Kim(my wife), Lori(his wife), and Haileigh(our oldest daughter) and we pretty much ruled capture the flag, then they added Jay's youngest daughter to the mix and we started playing on the map called Boarding Action. They whipped our butts. We couldn't even touch 'em. They stood three people around the flag and one would play commando and sneak up on our flag while one of us was busy watching our flag and one was sneaking across to get theirs. In the end Jay and I picked up our youngest daughters so we could compete, which evened the playing field quite a bit. All-in-all I had a fabulous time! We had so much fun in fact that we talked about having a sleep over for the adults so we could play all night. THIS is another good reason to get broadband in Exeter, come on Verizon get your butt's in gear. I want DSL!

On a side note, did you see that you pre-order Halo 2 today at WalMart? Weird.
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How about a Windows port? - [10:16 AM]

Brent Simmons: "When articles about Linux desktops come up, I usually read them, because in the back of my mind is the thought that a Linux port of NetNewsWire would be fun to do." - Interesting. I thought NNW was an Objective-C based application. Does anyone have an Objective-C environment for Linux? I think the GCC guys do but I don't know how good it is. Why not go to Windows first? Are there too many RSS readers to compete with on Windows? Enquiring minds want to know.
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Monday, July 21, 2003

The right thing to do? - [10:55 AM]

Rodent Regatta: "Should I make an attempt to export all my old posts to a text editor and attempt to clean up all the old archives?" - I think the right approach is to leave what's out there, out there. Start with what you've learned and build on it. Your sites evolution to standards could be used as a learning tool. That's how I approached the redesign of this site. Leave well enough alone and move forward!
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Want some candy? - [10:21 AM]

I just had to add a new graphic to the right column. See the "I Love RSS" Valentine candy over there Look over there, to the right..

Dave Winer asked Bryan Bell to design it and I think it's wonderful.
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