In Chestnut Hill while Sarah Was at work

Chris
cfaulkner@gmail.com
nvradm.blogspot.com
{sent via iPAQ}

Test with photo

Chris
cfaulkner@gmail.com
nvradm.blogspot.com
{sent via iPAQ}

Test post from ipaq

test emailing a post to my blog
Chris
cfaulkner@gmail.com
nvradm.blogspot.com
{sent via iPAQ}

Skated Tuesday...

I started off going to Wall Skate Park. I have been going here to warm up before heading to Joe's. The park is starting to fall apart and with the all cement park in nearby Roslyn nearing completion, I'm not sure what the fate of this park will be.

We had a really good session at Joe's. We had 5 people which is always cool. You really have to pull everything together when you are skating with this many people. I had really good night. I was able to put a couple nice runs together with fun back to back tricks. I think since I had just skated the ramp last Thursday, I was still broken in... if that makes sense.

The new park in Roslyn is gong to be about 10 minutes from work. I figure I can be skating in 15 minutes and get a good 30 to 45 minutes of skating a day. It will be like Encke park all over again.

Old Skate photos...

 
 

Here are some old photos of me pulling a backside air at the Spinning Wheels Pool. The park is also called Waves in Motions sometimes and it was near Reading PA.

Recent desktops...

I just thought I would post some recent desktop set-ups.

Facebook, again...

I've been drawn back into the world of facebook... I am just testing this feature that will update my profile with my blog posting...

New StarWars movie almost passes me by...

StarWars.com | Star Wars: The Clone Wars In Theaters and on Television in 2008

Wow... where did I miss the boat. How did a new Star Wars movie almost pass me buy un-noticed! I had seen the trailers for this but I thought it was going to be an animated series not a full movie and TV series. What do I do? I didn't make plans for this... hmmmmm. Well the TV series will be easy enough to keep up with. I guess I'll be sneaking out to the movies soon.

new posts coming...

My head is so foggy i haven't been able post. Everything seems to be a priority and nothing is really winning. I've missed blogging about a lot of fun that we have had over the summer so far as well...

Encke Skatepark on live.maps.com

Using Microsoft's map page i was able to find Encke Skate park in Radnor which I used to skate everyday when i was working at TV Guide.

http://maps.live.com/default.aspx?v=2&FORM=LMLTCP&cp=qp5dgq8qk3rm&style=o&lvl=2&tilt=-90&dir=0&alt=-1000&scene=19840957&phx=0&phy=0&phscl=1&encType=1

I beat that guy...

I have been having the urge to play Magic: the gathering again. I was surfing around looking at the free ways to play on the net. One thing lead to another and I found my self looking at the Lifetime Winnings leaders of Pro-magic players. I like that I can always look at it and say "Hey, I beat the guy in 2nd place :)"

bomomo

bomomo

have some extra time to kill... check this out.

Blind skater...

Wow...

Tales of the Beanworld

So back when I was collecting comic books I collected an odd one called The Tales of The Bean World. Anyway, I just read that they are starting it up again in 2009. There were only like 10 issues from 1985 to 1994 and it left off in a cliff hanger.

I found that a animation was made of one of the hunting raids that go on in the world and here it is...


The Chow Raid from fashionbuddha on Vimeo.

The first two and a half minutes...

This is the first two and a half minutes of video I took of us skating in the 80's... I am dying to get a VHS to DVD recorder so that I can save all of my old videos like this...

Another laptop. Acer 610TXVi

"Chris. Do you want another laptop" I hear this floating over the cubes. "Yes, I do" That was a no brainer. I had already been listing a little carefully as I heard a discussion of clearing out some stuff that we couldn't use anymore.

So now I get to add a smaller more portable laptop to the fleet. It will be better for taking the trips we have planned for the summer. It is missing the CapsLock,Shift, some other key, and Z. It still has the yellow rubber stubs that the keys were on and you can press them and they work.

It is an Acer travelmate 610TXVi. I have already removed WinXP and have Ubuntu installed and updating :o)

NEC 2500a DVD Burner talk...

In 2001 I bought a DVD/CD burner for the computer. It is a NEC 2500a. At the time if was one of the newer models. It was right before the prices on the burners started to drop. It was $90 at the time. You can get new burners for $30 now. Anyway, it burned DVDs that were rated up to 8x. That was the normal speed for the time. I have burned DVDs for years with out looking at the speed of the DVDs. The last time I went to burn DVDs i kept getting a message that the disc was illegal... Hmm? It took me a while to figure out that I had bought 16x DVDs and that they were now the norm and 8x were harder to find. I new that people find ways to tweak the firmware inside the burners and was able to track down the answer that saved me the money in buying a new DVD Burner. I just wanted to put it here just in case somebody else was looking for the answer.

How to make your NEC 2500a burn 16x DVDs and Dual Layer DVDs.

The basic idea is that you tell the 2500a that it is a 2510a (the 2xxx series were basically the same drive) and then flash the ROM to the tweaked Firmware.

1. Liggy's NEC drive converter :: This will change the drive from 2500a to 2510a
2. Dee's ND2510 modified firmware 2A5C :: This will flash the firmware to burn 16x discs

Reboot and burn baby burn...

Guilty of reading an email sent to me...

I received an email with UPS tracking number info in it. It had my email address but the info was ment for someone else. The funny thing was at the very end of the email in very small text was this message... I guess I am a criminal.

"This communication contains proprietary information and may be confidential. If you are not the intended recipient, the reading, copying, disclosure or other use of the contents of this e-mail is strictly prohibited and you are instructed to please delete this e-mail immediately."

Desktop goodness...

It took a while but I was finally able to get my desktop the way I like it. With a Linux OS you can really change anything you want.

I don't like to have a static desktop. I want to be able to have the laptop on and see things moving when I am not using it. In the screen shot below, starting at the top left, you can see a video playing on a 'screenlet' (it lets you put little gadgets and widgets on the desktop). This is a mini web browser screenlet and I have a video from Google Video playing. I then took the opacity down so that you can see the desktop through the video. So you can have it playing and it looks like it is part of the desktop rather than something sitting on top... its a cool effect. i like to just set it to play random things and then make it almost invisible, sort of like you don't really notice it to much unless you start at it.

On the right I have a weather screenlet, a picture frame that cycles through pictures in a folder, System monitors for things like Wifi, heat, battery and other things. At the bottom is an awesome looking dock that you can put shortcuts to applications or folders. it also has a Gmail icon that lets me know when I have mail and a clock/calender that is tied into my Google calender. Under the video you can see my IM buddy list.

With everything set to be opaque, it just look cool and things are always moving...

Role Play Story Telling...

Many, many years ago (maybe in 2000), I joined a forum that was a story telling forum. Of course it was Star Wars based. Well, I found my intro for the character I was going to use, Gali Ilag. I thought I would post it here for fun along with my drawing of Gali. If I ever find the rest of the story that I participated in I will post them too...

Just so you know how this works... basically you see what somebody wrote and then you continue the story from your characters view point. Its allot of fun actually.

Gali Ilag blinked twice. Once to awaken from his meditation and again in hopes of clearing a horrible vision from his mind. This vision, this dream was of the future. It contained the unthinkable for any Ithorian, not just Gali. The vision shown to him was a nightmarish vision of the ruin of Ithor and the Mother Jungle.

Gali may have been able to ignore this nightmare had he not been a Jedi Knight on the verge of entering his mastery of the Force. “The future is always in motion.” He recalled his Master Todan Nadi telling him. This was one future that Gali wanted to be ready for although he had not the knowledge of when this would take place or if he would be alive to see it.

To his left, a monitor flickered on with a soft buzz. Gali turned to see the gaseous planet of Yavin on the screen. He adjusted his navigation controls and headed for the fourth moon of Yavin and the reason for this journey from his home world. This moon held the ancient secrets of the Sith Lords and more recently the base were the Rebellion made its first major blow against the Empire.

Now this moon or something on it called to Gali through the Force. Once before he had this kind of calling and it had called him down from the great Heard Ship to the sacred Mother Jungle and lead him to Master Nadi. Gali had trained in secret with the Ithorian Jedi Master to avoid detection by the Emperor and Lord Vader. As an apprentice he trained in the ways of the physical combat and light saber skills. When Master Nadi bestowed upon him the title of Jedi Knight, Gali, followed in his masters footsteps and discontinued the use of the light saber and became a master of battle meditation among other control, alter and sense powers.

Gali saw Yavin 4 come into his view screen and set his landing coordinates for the ancient temple that had housed the rebellion so almost a decade ago. Upon telling Master Nadi of this calling through the Force, he urged Gali to go. “Your destiny awaits.” Nadi, said. “The time has come for you to construct your own light saber. Go now and study the ancient weapon and when the time comes the Force will guide you through your weapons construction.” Nadi continued “Then…you too will become a Jedi Master.”
Gali landed his craft, Life. Walked out into the warm humid air. His forest green Jedi robes differed from traditional robes only in that they include a family crest and story embroidered around the edge of the outer cloak. With his ship secured, supply bag on his back and walking stick in hand Gali Ilag, Jedi Knight, set out to fulfill his destiny.

Name: Gali Ilag
Species: Ithorian – Deep brown skin tone with green eyes. Average height.
Jedi Knight with his main powers being in battle meditation and other defensive control, alter and sense skills. He has no light saber at this time(read bio to find out why)
His ship is named “Life” and can seat 4 people in the cockpit and has 2 sleeper rooms, a small galley and a cargo/seating area. It has one gun turret on top. Light speed and average shields.

Gali awoke with a start. A sense of dread hung over him. He immediately closed his slit like eyes and pushed out through the force to check his surroundings…he tapped into the trees to further his reach. Nothing but harmless animals and insects around him. The nightmare had visited him again.

Gali gathered up his temporary camp and sat on a nearby mossy log. Out of a pocket beneath his robes he pulled a small disk-like device. He moved his long fingers over the control panel and a holographic image of a grove of trees popped up. These same Bafforr trees were the same trees that called out in agony to Gali from his nightmares. Gali shunted out this vision now and used the trees of his home world as a focal point for his meditation.

After an hour he came out of his meditation refreshed and ready to finish his journey through the moons jungle. A journey that would lead to…”What is calling to me from this place?” he thought. His answer would come soon enough.

A break in the overgrowth revealed a small ancient stone structure. There was an opening facing Gali. The whole structure did not take up much more area than a yt-3000 freighter, nothing at all like the great temples that rose above the treetops of Yavin 4.

Gali did not need to extend his senses to know that this was the source of his calling. Raising his hand in the direction of the structure he used the Force to probe the dwelling for inhabitants but found none. He thought to himself,” why does a structure call out to me?” For that matter how, ”Does it contain something that calls out to me”

He approached the opening. From there he noticed that he could see clear through the front room to what appeared to be a second room and out the back passage way. As he entered the first room he noted several stone like slabs long enough for an average humanoid to lie on. The room was lit from openings along the top of the wall letting the natural light filter in. “An empty building?” Gali whispered out of one of his mouths running along his neck. His thoughts raced “Why has the Force guided me to an empty building?”

He moved to the next room and found much more. Many stone work tables and benches took up this room and along the walls were book shelves. Half of the books , he noted, had been pulled out and were on the tables but dust covered them. A calm came over Gali as he recognized his reason from being here…this is where he would begin his studies of the ancient Jedi weapon, the lightsaber.

The woolamanders chatter grew to a crescendo as they neared the back courtyard where the Jedi Knight Gali Ilag was deep in study. He turned his long neck toward the sloth-like creatures only when they began to pelt him with small sticks from high in the Massassi trees. Momentarily they stopped their “attack” but continued to chatter at Gali, this he could ignore. He turned back to the ancient books and was immediately hit by some fruit thrown by the bothersome creatures. With out a thought Gali motioned with his right hand and the pelting stopped again, but this time the creatures moved on. “The Force plays easily with simple minds.” Gali thought to himself. Through the Force Gali had suggested that he was gone and that there were much better tasting fruits further down the jungle. Woolamanders gone, Gali returned to his studies.

Gali studied many books on the Jedi/Lightsaber relationships. Writings by padawan and Jedi Knights

Feeling a bit like Luke Skywalker...

We had pulled the car up just a smidgen to close to the edge of the driveway the other night. Then of course it poured down rain(again). When we went to back out, the wheel spun and dug us into the mud... it didn't go anywhere.

i could here Yoda yapping in my ear about Do or Do not there is no Try... yea well. My dad volunteered to come pull us out the next morning.

i think I have had enough of the mud thank you.

 
 

Warehouse Ramp...

I held off going to the warehouse ramp until I had been skating the mini enough to be confidant about what i was doing again. Well last night I made the jump.

We had a warm up session at the garage-mini and then I piled into a car and we headed down. From the outside you would never suspect what is inside. The warehouse was rented and maintained by a core group of people. i think about 6 people pay a "rent" to have a key and then can sublet keys to other people who pay them. Guests are asked to donate $5 in a box with a bumper sticker on it that says "No Money, No Friend".

The only thing remotely close to this ramp that I have skated was FDR, and I have only skated that once. I stayed below the coping for the most part, coming up here and there for a 50-50 and some little grinds. Riding this kind of ramp with curves is very different than the back and forth of a regular ramp. one thing you can do though is get going very fast once you figure out how to pump through the pockets and up the walls.

It was a great time and I cant wait to get back there.

The video here is not of me. Also, I happened to take the video when people were falling so don't judge them on this video, it was mainly shot for to get the ramp.

Jedi Master Piggy Pumpkin...

 

I caught our Guinea Pig in the act of levitating his house again...

Nu to me laptop...

One of our trainers stoped in last week and said that her laptop kept shutting down and was missing some keys. I started the laptop up and in a couple minutes it went to sleep. Before I did any other trouble shooting I called our desktop person over and he decided to just give her one of the newer smaller HPs that we issue.

Later in the week I heard they were going to be getting rid of some of the equipment that was broken or not worth trying to fix. I sent a quick email to see if I could get the laptop and help it to the trash :o) That turned out to be a good idea. I got the OK to take it away as they were not planning on trying to fix it or give it to another trainer. I started it up and it did go to sleep. It turned out that the setting for the laptop to go to sleep was set to 5 minutes.

When I got home I changed that setting and since it was a DELL and I had helped my dad with his DELL a couple times, I new that there was a recovery partition. I accessed the recovery and wiped the laptop back to a fresh install of XP Pro :o) The laptop other than the two missing keys (F5 and F6) was perfect. Seeing that We have the desktop and the other HP laptop (I dont think i blogged that one yet) I decided to make this laptop my own.

It is a DELL Inspiron 1150. It has a Intel P4 2.8 ghz and I think 512mg of RAM. It is probably better than my desktop PC except for the RAM but i think it can be upgraded to a gig of RAM. I installed Ubuntu linux on it with the Gnome desktop. It's a pretty cool machine. I think the next time I have to actually buy a PC I'll just skip the desktop and go with a nice laptop...

Paine's Park Project

Paine's Park Project

I think this is one of the coolest if not the coolest web site I have seen.

Just check it out. Even if you don't care about the subject matter the site is amazing.

Frick'n huge statue...

statue.jpg (JPEG Image, 2828x1879 pixels) - Scaled (44%)

Check out he image above its a Frick'n huge statue in Russia. read about it below:

e Motherland Calls!
from Google Sightseeing by Alex

The Battle of Stalingrad was one of the turning points of the war in Europe and with casualties above 1.5 million, arguably the bloodiest battle in all of human history.

One of the most heavily contested sites within Stalingrad was Mamayev Kurgan, a hill overlooking the city. It is here where the USSR dedicated a memorial to the Soviet victory, the centrepiece of which is an absolutely enormous statue - “The Motherland Calls!” (”Rodina Mat’ Zovyot!”), which at the time of its dedication in 1967 was the largest sculpture in the world.

Since then Stalingrad, USSR, has become Volgograd, Russia, but this monumental memorial still dominates the skyline. The 52 metre figure is made of concrete, and her 33 metre sword is stainless-steel, making the sculpture 85 metres from tip to toe (not including the plinth, which adds another 16 metres). Here’s a ground-level shot which you absolutely have to see to believe!

The Motherland Calls! was designed by Yevgeny Vuchetich (who also designed Berlin’s Soviet War Memorial) and she was erected as part of a series of sculptures commemorating the Soviet victory in the Eastern Front of World War II (another of which, Kiev’s Mother Motherland, we’ve previously featured1).

This massive engineering task was orchestrated by Nikolai Nikitin who was also responsible for the previously featured Moscow State University, Warsaw Palace of Culture and Science and Ostankino Tower) - which are all ridiculously enormous too!

More info about the Battle of Stalingrad, Volgograd, Mamayev Kurgan and The Motherland Calls!, as always, at Wikipedia. Or check out a tour of Mamayev Kurgan at the official site (in English).

1.

At the time, I got a lot of stick for pointing out any of the similarities between these statues and America’s Statue of Liberty. So I’ve decided not to mention it this time. ↩

Locations: Russia / Categories: Monuments

Me skating the Garage Mini ramp...

Joe and I were both riding kind of sketchy tonight. I hadn't been at the ramp for about 2 weeks and could not seem to keep a serious line together.

So for my first ever skating appearance on the web, you get to see me at the end of our session put together a mediocre run... I promise it will be better next time. The main thing I wanted to get on this video was the ollie to the vert wall in the middle of the run. Again it was sort of week and I'll get you a better one next time...

You know you want to...

If you click that bubble over my head, you will be able to chat with me...

Since you asked...

So anyway. The previous post about Jacen and Vergere happened in books about 4 to 5 years ago. Jacen sort of apprenticed himself to Vergere and he learned to pull from the light and the dark side and questioned if there really was a seperation.

As it turns out Vergere died during that 20 book story arch (This amount of books was also created to sort of bring all of the writers to the same time line. For many years the books were all over the place and the time line was hard to follow). She was recently reveled to have been a Sith and what she was teaching to Jacen was a step toward the darkside.

Now in his 30s he learned the truth about Vergere and since he trusted and beleived in what he was tought by her, he was convinced to learn more about the Sith and started his path toward being a Sith Lord. He thought he would be able to control his power and like his Grandfather (Anakin Skywalker/ Darth Vader) bring piece to the Galaxy. Yhea, well He got the Dark Lord part down. In the recent story arc of 9 books he has become Darth Caedus. Along the way he has killed Luke's wife, Mara Jade, and tried to turn Luke's son Ben to the Darkside.

Wow, how nerdy of me :o)

Gritty talk about the Force...

This comes from two characters in the Star Wars universe that you have never heard of. I love when they get into this stuff though.

It's between a 20 something Jacen Solo(one of Han and Lea's children) and Vergere (a non-human Jedi that had escaped the Jedi Purge (You know from revenge of the Sith, when Darth Vader started killing Jedi) when she was captured/ went with a race from outside of the galaxy (We learn from other books that Palpatine/ Darth Sidious, was trying to gain power and organize the galaxy so that he could defend the galaxy against this invasion which he saw in a force vision some 60 yeard before it happened. So many Sith were born with this vision of uniting the galaxy to bring about peace.). She returned when those beings then invaded the galaxy and captured Jacen.)

So Read on or just skip it...

I took this from here http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Vergere

To convince Jacen that there was no dark side, Vergere showed him a species of Yuuzhan'tar predator that had just successfully brought down its prey. She told him that the predator's adopted home was filled with what Jacen would call "the dark side." Jacen responded by telling her that what the animal did was not "the dark side," since it was merely following its nature, killing to get food to keep itself alive. Vergere then said to him "I thought the danger of the dark side was that it is natural; that's why it's easier than the light, yes?"

Jacen told her that the "real" dark side would be if the predator killed not just one animal, but an entire herd, and did so not out of hunger but just for fun, for the joy of killing. This prompted Vergere to ask Jacen if he believed the predator took no joy in its accomplishment of successfully killing its prey. Looking closer at the animal, it seemed to Jacen that the animal was pleased with itself.

As Jacen considered this and became more uncertain, Vergere asked more questions. "Kill one, it's nature, kill them all, it's the dark side? Is the line between nature and dark side only one of degree? Is it the dark side if that predator kills only half the herd? A quarter?"

Becoming frustrated, Jacen asserted that it was a matter of "need." That if the predator killed more animals than it needed to for its survival, those actions would be of the dark side. Vergere then launched a new series of questions, asking how "need" was defined. Was "need" the line of starvation or simple malnutrition? Would it be wrong of the animal to kill its prey and eat only half the carcass, wasting the other half? Would the animal's hunting be of the dark side if it and its family were a few pounds overweight and could survive without food for a time?

Jacen's protests that it wasn't about that made Vergere ask what it was about. She asked if intention always trumped action. What if, she asked, the predator slaughtered an entire herd thinking it needed them for food, then realized that it didn't need them after all and left them to rot? Would its intentions matter?

In an earlier conversation, Vergere had asked Jacen if he believed what he (and other Jedi) did was irrelevant, if he believed that the only relevant thing was why they did it.

It's Friday...

I thought it was Thrusday!  Wahoo I skipped a day...

--
-=Chris Faulkner=-
cfaulkner@gmail.com
ossus.blogspot.com
"Peace, it does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise, trouble or hard work. It means to be in the midst of those things and still be calm in your heart."

Happy Valen... Oh, no, thats just wrong...

Credit for this beauty goes to http://hijinksensue.com/

48blocks.com...

THE BLOCK IS HOT!!!

I didn't get to check out everything on this site but, it looks pretty cool. I want to go back and that is why I am posting it here.

New OTHER BLOG widget to the left...

Check it out. now you can see other peoples blogs and a snippet of the most recent post...

Teletubbies: Behind the Scenes

Teletubbies: Behind the Scenes

If it were not for the internet you would never know about this kind of utterly unimportant stuff... still it's worth a look.

Funny that my first skating at a cement park could be in Oregon...

Concrete Disciples Skateboarding - Skatepark Directory & Listings for: Bear Creek Skatepark - Medford, Oregon, United States

A possible destination for me when we visit Oregon this Summer.

Artwork by Tracey Lane

Coda Gallery - New York, Palm Desert and Park City

There is art up on the walls here at work of these cool looking trees. I finally got around to looking up the artist, Tracey Lane.

I like these enough to actually want one..

Build my city, NVR A Dull Mmnt...

So first click here http://nvr.myminicity.com.

OK, now that you have come back from becoming a part of my city. I'm still not sure what the deal is. They don't give much info on the site. Basiclly you start a city, kind of like Sim City and when people visit certain links they add new people/money/other resources... So I'll add some links here and just visit my city once in a while.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoniex...

I was really exited to see this. The book was really good and exciting with lots of action...

I feel bad for those of you who did not read the book. As I watched the movie with Sarah, I almost had no idea what was going on. I did read the book a while ago now but I still remember the basic things. At first I though they were skipping, well lots of stuff so that they could spend more time at the end , nope. It was odd. They didn't really explain to much of anything. I think they did a great job on all of the other movies so far. Hopefully they can reign it back in for the last two movies. Granted the book was huge, 700+ pages. I wish that more people would go the Lord of the Rings way and break the normal time for a movie and really tell the story as it needs to be told.

I'll have to read the reviews for this one but I can't imagine Im the only one that feels this way about the movie... Read the book, it s worth it.

Half...

So... I still weigh the same. Not that expected to drop the weight like crazy. The good thing is that I am keeping up with the exercise. I have skated twice and have been trying to Play Dance Dance Revolution at least an hour a night. It has a exercise selection to it. When you are done each level it will tell you how many calories you worked off. Most of the levels are about 9calories. I have started hitting 300 calories for the whole session. Thats 30 songs. It also keeps a record so you can look back and weigh your self before each session (the game does not weight you but you can record your data.)

The part that hasn't kicked in full force is my force of will not to eat bread things. i think that was major part the last time around. Well its only been a week and a half so its early yet.

First Weight In... 180

Just a quick weighin... I may just put this in the side bar somewhere...

HaPpy NeW YEarS aNd stUfF...

Ahh... New Years Eve and my Birth Day, 37. You would think that having on a birthday on New Years Eve would be a big party, at least once in your life. The most exciting thing that happened on my birthday was meeting Sarah. It's odd I never partied during the typical partying years. Tonight Sarah and Ruby have crashed out and Gryphon and I have been rocking the new Eye Toy for the Playstation 2. It gives your arms a big work out and you can really work up a sweat.

I went to the Willow Grove Mall during my lunch break today and bought new skateboard trucks. The ones that I have were bought almost years ago. I got some Tensor trucks, the Rodney Mullen pro models if you want to know. I also picked up some Bones RED bearings and Element hardware. It was $65 which is better than I could find online for all three( trucks are $19 each, bearings are $15. So this year my xmas money doesnt go for some sort of electric thing. At some point I'll have a new board from my buddy whom had a 100 or so FDR benefit boards made up. That should be about $25.

And some New Years resolutions:
- for the family we want to be more on time for things. Small things like being at places at the right time and big things like being prepared for holidays, birthdays and such...
- for me I am going back on a diet. Its the Chris diet. I had gotten under 170 a couple years ago. Daily exercise and cutting out breads, butter and cheese were a major part. I do let my self eat what ever on Fridays and have to be better about eating lunch. I think I am pushing 185 right now, but Ill start weighing in tomorrow. Ill do a two day detox type of thing and probably skip the first friday of free eating. So tonight I drink all of my beer and eat lots of chips and stuff... I plan on doing some sort of exercise at work. the skatepark (if you can call it that)near work is kind of far for a lunch time session but what I did to loose the weight last time was walking and there are many good walking places near work. I also hope to add a mini-ramp to our yards soon along with skateing at joes once a week if possible. Another thing is DDR that I will try to do for a half hour everyday. Im also going to cut out coffee. I dont really like it but its something that I seem to get every morning at work. Im going to try replaing it with Green Tea that they have at work.

So i think Ill try to find some sort of count down thing on the web since we dont have the cable TV and dont get very good over the air reception...

Have a good one...

Torn...

This week the company I am with had their Holiday Party. I had planned to hit the party at 5:30, have a few drinks, dinner and then head to out to skate the mini-ramp at Joe's around 7:30.

I almost left as soon as I got to the party. It was a lot of outgoing type people and I am just not that kind of person. I saw that they had Guiness on draft so I found a corner of the bar and thought I would a drink and maybe I could get over the anxiety. Ive come to appritiate Guiness draft. Getting a Guiness from a bottle or can is just not the same. I watched the bartenders make there drinks and hopped that more people would start arriving so they would start dinner. By the time I had hit drink #2 lots of people were there including my coworker. One of the other people that I had been in the new hire training had started talking to me to. They had some killer seafood type appetizers. It was getting to be like 6:30 and they had not hinted at dinner yet. The bar was flowing though, it turned out to be open bar all night... Finnally at about 7is they seated everybody... I drank down the last of my beer and made the choice to head out just before they came out to take orders. Getting the change to skate rarley loses out to anything even a very , very nice office party.

The skate session was my first since before we moved. So that was the week before Thanksgiving. i thought i would be way off and would have to spend most of the night just getting my basics back. It was so much the opposite as I had a great night and was able to pull some stuff off that I had not done since my teenage skating days. I can't wait to get a ramp set up in my yard and to get back to Joes. Ill have to get some video one of these days...

Rember Christmas is about the first 6 letters...

... was on a sign that I saw today. Now, the first 6 letters are: a,b,c,d,e,f, and g. hmmm...that doesnt make sense... Oh wait, drr, that was 7. So we have abcdef. is this some secret code? Are they trying to be like Google and only have smart people attend the church?
Maybe it's an Acronym? Here is what I found:
1. American Boys Club for the Defense of Errol Flynn
2. Abstinence, Be Faithful, Correct and Consistent Condom Use and Circumcision, Diaphragm for HIV Prevention, Exposure Prophylaxis, Female-Controlled Microbicide's (approach to prevention of AIDS virus)

Hmm... I don't know if either one of those says Christmas to me.

Maybe it's an Anagram. let see:
Abc Fed
Cab Fed

Ehh.. nothing there.

Maybe it has something to do with the first 6 letters ever. Man, you have do a research paper to figure this stuff out. i think I'm, done.

Happy Holidays to you...

Blogging is for people with nothing to do, part 5 :: We've Moved

Ah yes, here is something that can take some blogging time away, moving. After being in North Wales for about 9 years...wow, we have moved to a little house with a big yard in Souderton. The move wasn't to bad and we got it done in a week. We had to clean the new place pretty good and ran into massive issues with u-haul (coming to a post soon will be a rant on uhaul). I had some good help from a couple friends and we got the big stuff over. Then we shuffled stuff over in the cars and then finnally today we jumped started our 'extra car' and drove it to the new place where the battery promptly died again. if your up to it, look up the location of a 1996 plymouth breezes battery... funny huh. So now the kids can run outside and I have my first place that does not have anybody attached to one or more of our walls... very nice.

Our verizon DSL speed here is only the 1.5 teir instead of the 3 that we were used to but i guess will make due or get Comcast at some point. Maybe there run FIOS near here at some point...

Thats all for now.

Blogging is for people with nothing to do, part 4 :: New Job for me

So I prettied up my resume and went full on a job hunt. I got some small hits here and there. Then I get a call from a "head hunter". She's got a job in Horsham, 9 miles from my house... Wyeth was 24 miles. I had a great interview and I really felt like I would fit in. After sweating out the next couple days I finally get the call that I got the job. It is working in the IT dept of LA Weightloss Franchise inc. I mainly support the Point of Sale software that the centers use. The salary is more than what my raise at CAI would have been plus I get to have payed vacation, Sick days and Holidays and all the good stuff that comes with working for a strong small company. I started Oct 26th. While we were living in North Wales it only took me 25 to35 minutes to get to work... Which leads to the next post.

Blogging is for people with nothing to do, part 3 :: Our shows are back on.

Ah yes. Line them up and BitTorrent them down. Family Guy, American Dad, Ghost Hunters, The Office, Project Runway, Curb you Enthusiasm, and My Name is Earl (Jason Lee AKA Earl is a long time ProSkater).

So the shows take me away from Blogging and PlaneShift...

Blogging is for people with nothing to do, part 2 :: Skateboarding

So skateboarding came back to my life in a big way as I helped a friend build a mini-ramp in his garage. It's 19ft wide about 3 or so feet high and fun as all-get-out. I started skating the ramp and skating with alot of people in there late 20s and 30s, awesome. I also learned that Pabst Blue Ribbon is this weird skater choice of beer when skating. I never had the opportunity to drink beer and skate... odd thing.

Any way I can skate the mini better than I ever could and am learning new things every time I go. I looking to add a ramp to my new yard... but thats for a latter post.

So Skating has been dragging me from posting and PlaneShift...

Blogging is for people with nothing to do, part 1::PlaneShift

So in August when my classes ended I started playing PlaneShift when I had a spare minute. It's a free Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, like World of WarCraft. It's great because it is still in development and you get to see changes in the game. Plus you don't feel guilt that you are paying a monthly fee and not playing it if you dont feel like it.

Check it out, PlaneShift: Crystal Blue.

So that pulled me away from blogging...

YouTube - balloon bowl

YouTube - balloon bowl

iPAQ Filestore and how to fix it.

What is the iPAQ filestore you might ask? Well the iPAQ is a pocket pc. I am writing this from it now. It has 64 mb of RAM (like the memory in a PC) and 128 mb ROM (like a SD flash memory card). You try to keep the RAM pretty empty as the iPAQ uses that to do stuff. You install the programs you use alot on the ROM. The OS uses up some of the ROM and leaves you about 96 mb free. This is more than enough. Its best to put music and media onto SD Card. Anyway, Ive had the iPAQ for a couple years and have heard of this bug but I never ran into, till now. Aparently when you put to much on this filestore,as its called, you lock up the memory. You can use whats there but you can not delete it, or save anything else to it. Not even flashing the ROM (re-installing the OS and the very basics of what makes the device work) would clear it out. I chatted with HP, they said to send it in for repairs. Yea, no, I'll fix it my self. I did lots of surfing and reading through message boards. I tried a couple things but was coming up empty. On the fun side I am going to get mobile phone soon an considered this to be good time to get PoketPc Phone. I found one last thing to try... and it worked. I'll give you the basics and then the whole thing for anyone who might actually be looking for this fix.

It involves flashing the device with a ROM for another language then flashing it back to your own language. you also have to trick the flash program into thinking you have the correct language... For those who need it and for anyone else, enjoi.


1. Download the latest English and German ROMs.
2. Unpack both.
3. Make copies of the unpacked English and German ROMs.
4. With the original German ROMfolder, rename "d2b10111go.nbf" to "d2b10111uo.nbf ".
5. Run "ROMUpdateUtility.exe" in the original English ROM folder.
6. On the screen just before proceeding with the ROM update (After the checks) copy the renamed "d2b10111uo.nbf" from the original German ROM and overwrite the " d2b10111uo.nbf" in the original English ROM.
7. Proceed with the ROM update.
8. It will take a very long time to start and longer than normal at 90% but be patient.
9. Now you have a German pda. Check that the filestore is now fixed by deleteting the backup folder in the filestore and/or running the format filestore found under sttings (use the icons to direct you if you can't read German).
10. If it works you now need to install the English ROM back again we need to trick the ROM update again.

11. You can now delete the two original unpacked English and German ROMs just leaving the copies of them. (This is purely to make it easier and I will refer to them as just the English and German ROMs).
12. With the English ROM, rename "d2b10111uo.nbf" to "d2b10111go.nbf".
13. Run "ROMUpdateUtility.exe" under the German ROM folder.
14. After all of the checks and just before proceeding with the update copy the " d2b10111go.nbf" from the English ROM and overwrite the "d2b10111go.nbf" in the German ROM.
15. Proceed with the ROM update. Again, it will take a very long time but be patient.
16. Run the format filestore program found under settings just to make sure it is fixed.
17. Now you are back in English with a fixed filestore.
18. Enjoy!

Short Timer...

... Sniff, sniff. Do you smell that?

It smells like a new job to me...

Sniff... 10+ miles closer to home.

Sniff, sniff... More money, full benifits...

Sniff... regular hours and paid time off...

Yhea... thats what it is...

Next Thursday I start, nice.

Finished the garage mini-ramp

Here are some final construction photos. I got to joes about 2:30. We got the top layer finished at around 9:30 and pulling the garage door tracks down took another half hour or so. We skated till about 1am. That was a bit late but it was the opening night. But its just like riding a bike... great little ramp.
 
 
 
 

Scarred For Life...

Scarred For Life... Eleven Stories about Skateboarders
I just finished this book. It's a good one that really hits at the mind and motivations of a true skateboarder. They all managed to make skating be a part of their life. We (Kyle and I) had a plan to save up and buy a car. We were going to drive that car to California after we graduated. We were going to skate where ever we could and then once in CA we would find some kind of jobs and skate...

Click here to check it out at Amazon.

Cure Lyrics Fun...

I love this line...

Remember the last time I told you I love you -
It was warm and safe in our perfect world -
You yawned and I had to say it over

Now the full lyrics.


"There Is No If..."

Remember the first time I told you I love you -
It was raining hard and you never heard -
You sneezed! and I had to say it over
"I said I love you" I said... you didn't say a word
Just held your hands to my shining eyes
And I watched as the rain ran through your fingers
Held your hands to my shining eyes and smiled as you kissed me...

"if you die" you said "so do i" you said...
And it starts the day you make the sign
"tell me I'm forever yours and you're forever mine
Forever mine... "

"if you die" you said "so do i" you said...
And it starts the day you cross that line
"swear I will always be yours and you'll always be mine
You'll always be mine
Always be mine... "

Remember the last time I told you I love you -
It was warm and safe in our perfect world -
You yawned and I had to say it over
"I said I love you" I said... you didn't say a word
Just held your hands to your shining eyes
And I watched as the tears ran through your fingers
Held your hands to your shining eyes and cried...

"if you die" you said "so do i" you said...
But it ends the day you see how it is
There is no always forever... just this...
Just this...

"if you die" you said "so do i" you said
But it ends the day you understand
There is no if... just and

There is no if... just and

There is no if...

random stuff...

 
 
 
 
Enjoy!

Nu Jetta Getting old..

 

The Nu-To-Us Jetta is getting old. It still gets 350 or so miles on a 12 gallon fill up... The clutch is holding in there, but for how long... dun, Dun, DUN...

To CapeCode we went...

 
 
 
 

Quick pics of some of the CapeCod trip...

Building a Ramp...

 
 
 

Here is something I have been doing. Helping a friend build a mini-ramp in his garage... I can't wait to help put the final layer on this baby and get skating again.

oh, hello there...

Hey look a blog... hmm. Looks like i need to sweep out the spiders and do something here...