that which shall not be named

Well, I've gone and done it. Went and ranted about [the diet that shall not be named] a few days ago. Now it seems that the Google AdSense script that generates the ads at the top of the page has picked up on it and seen fit to show nothing but ads for [the diet that shall not be named]. Wonderful....

[Listening to: Going Under - Evanescence - Fallen (0:-1)]

are you in?

So, I've been running around lately, signing up for every Google service like they were Pokemon. Up til' two days ago, that included Blogger, Google Groups 2 (beta), GMail, and the Web APIs. But Orkut was wildly elusive for me, and I didn't know anyone who could get me in. I must've spent four hours searching for someone to give me an invite. Finally, fortune smiled upon me and some incredibly nice soul invited me to join the party. At last, I'm in the club. :)

I've had the chance to play with Orkut for the past few days and I can definitely say that it is a very nice service. It's a pretty gated community, so you can feel pretty safe in knowing that you're not going to be bombarded by ads and spammers. I also love the various communities. So far there has yet to be a topic that I can think of that doesn't already exist as a community. And I take comfort in knowing that if I do happen across a discussion topic for which there is no community, I can create it myself. All in all, I'm just about as impressed with this service as I am with GMail. If anyone happens to want an invite to Orkut to try it out, just leave a comment with your first and last names, e-mail address, and a description of yourself and why you should be invited. Then maybe, just maybe, you'll get to try it for youself!

[Listening to: Experiment 626 (D I G I T A L L Y - I M P O R T E D - European Trance, Techno, Hi-NRG... we can't define it!) - Broken Toy - (0:-1)]

wimbledon

Well, today is the first day of competition at Wimbledon. Bless IBM for providing such a wonderful site to keep track of everything I'd ever need to keep track of. They've even got me considering paying the extra $9 or $10 for the Wimbledon Plus package that lets you hear more audio and watch entire videos until next year. At least then I might be able to watch a match or two. We really need a TV out here. Either that or I need a Tivo. I'll definitely be rooting for Roddick and my two fave ladies Lindsay Davenport and Jennifer Capriati.

the cult of the low carb

Alright already! Enough of this Atkins craze! You know, it's fine and good that America in general is trying to lose weight, but now I can't even go into a restaurant without having to be inundated with the plethora of new low-carb items (which are all items that were previously offered anyway with shiny new marketing strategies behind them). Look, you're on this diet, shouldn't you know what you can eat and what you can't? Is it really so hard to decide that the fried chicken with a buttermilk biscuit on the side is probably not on your diet? I mean, come on, fast food restaurants have low carb menus now. They never seemed to care before; why now?

Not to mention the fact that so many people are putting themselves on this diet like it was sent from heaven. Sure, it may help you lose weight fast, but do people ever consider that the diet might actually be bad for them? Now don't worry, I'm not going to open that can of worms too far, because there's enough fodder on both sides to start a war. But seriously, there is still an ongoing debate on whether there are serious health risks or not. It seems to me that it would be prudent to wait until conclusive studies can be done to decide on whether the diet is a good idea or not. But most Americans, anxious for that "quick fix", have jumped head first into these low-carb diets without any more than a marketing scheme to tell them that they're doing a good thing.

Look, you want to lose weight? How about trying the tried-and-true method? Stop eating so much and get out there and excercise!

indie films

Just by happenstance, I stumbled across several movies and shorts created by independent artists. I'm sure these are probably old news, but I was amazed by them just the same.

First is a short CG film that was created by one guy with his 1.4 Ghz Athlon PC and a few rendering computers. It's called This Wonderful Life and can be viewed at CGChannel.com along with an interview.

The second film that I was wowed by this morning is a fan-made Star Wars movie named .Star Wars: Revelations. I've heard of several of these in the past, and I'm not sure if this was one of them or not, but after looking at the trailers, I am thoroughly impressed. I'll definitely be checking this one out when it becomes available next spring.

a good day

Last night made yesterday probably one of the better days I've had at work in a while. I ran into a problem with the licensing tool that we purchased a while back and had almost convinced myself that it would take forever to get it resolved. I went ahead and fired off an e-mail to their support desk last night close to 5 pm and didn't really expect a resolution until today at the earliest. I was literally floored when I received a response to my e-mail in two minutes. I figured that it was an automated e-mail for sure. But upon reading it I found that it wasn't automated at all; in fact they had even answered my second question, which I half expected them to ignore. And they were completely friendly and professional to boot! After sending a second e-mail to provide additional information, I stepped out to grab a bite to eat and by the time I got back, my issue was resolved. No runaround, no hassle. Talk about making a developer's day! I am definitely impressed, and if anyone out there is a .NET developer in need of a licensing framework, check these guys out.

But that wasn't the only good thing to happen. One of my co-workers stumbled across , a company that creates components for .NET applications. We downloaded the demo and played with it last night. It was almost like Christmas; we played with it and were continually oohing and ahhing with each new feature that we came across.

To top it all off, Blogger has had a facelift (yes, I only recently noticed this), so I was able to give my blog a cool new style and finally include a commenting tool that works. All in all, yesterday was a great day! :)

back from vacation

Well, it's been a week now since I've been back from vacation, and it's taken me as long just to get back into the swing of day to day activities. I've yet to get any pictures online yet, but that'll be coming in the next few days hopefully. We went for a 5 night cruise to the western Caribbean and it was completely awesome! Our ship stopped in Key West, Cozumel, and Belize City, and we did all sorts of things like snorkeling, kayaking, parasailing, and exploring the Mayan ruins of Xunantunich. We even got to swim with a dolphin named Amaya.

Life on the boat was incredible also. There was always something to do, and we probably didn't do half of what was available. We had the two most incredible waiters there ever were. Ravi and Nerise, you guys are awesome! The entertainment was nothing short of amazing either. The singers and dancers they have on that ship were easily on par with some of the better Broadway shows that I've seen. Hopefully I'll have some pictures of all of this to share soon!

[Listening to: Captain Kirk - Bob Schneider - (3:11)]