Bad Fetch

Making More Content After All These Years

2011-10-26T03:10:00.000-07:00

It's been nearly 2 years since I've posted something, so it seemed time to post some words for this here blog thing. Seems to me not many people blog much anymore. They all got the Facebooks and the Twitters and other things. Well, I have those too, now... so that's why I haven't been posting stuff here. See? Facebooks and Twitters.

By the way, my Facebooks and Twitters can be found below:

Facebooks

Twitters

I generate a bunch of content on those sites, but my entire work day isn't filled up with just doing that, silly, so now I spend the remaining free time I have filling up this thing with content. Neat.

Since this is a re-introduction back in to making the content, I'm not going to get in to details as to how different things are nearly 2 years since my last post. Nope. Instead, I will post new stuff about goings ons and what-not as it happens. So, it will be a long form of what I post about on the Facebooks and Twitters.

Good times.

Kegged: Tommy's Two Stone Porter

2009-12-21T21:33:00.000-08:00

It fermented solidly for 1 month, and now it is ready for the next phase. I kegged most of it, and bottled a few bombers for distribution. It won't quite be carbonated & ready to drink in time for Christmas, but it will be ready for New Year's Day, when the Oregon Ducks play Ohio State in the Rose Bowl. GO DUCKS!

Tommy's 2-Stone Porter

OG: 1.067

FG: 1.023

Alc%: 5.7%

Final characteristics:

Very dark and malty, with a roasted coffee and chocolate finish. The hops didn't get pronounced nearly as much as I had hoped, but it has a very subtle and earthy bitterness, coming from the Nugget finishing hops.

I'm extremely pleased with how this one came out, and I cannot wait to start sharing it with anyone who will try it.

Cheers!

Tommy's Two Stone Porter

2009-11-30T22:42:00.000-08:00

Latest home brew recipe which is currently fermenting for the holidays:

3/4 lb. chocolate malt

1/2 lb. Caramunich malt

1/2 lb. 60L malt

1/4 lb. roasted malt

1/2 lb. dry wheat malt

3 lbs. dry dark malt

3 lbs. amber malt

2 oz. Cascade hops (boiling)

2 oz. Nugget hops (finishing)

1 vial White Labs British Ale yeast

OG: 1.067

FG: ???

Brewed with my favorite nephew, Tommy, in mind. He's nearly 18 months old now, and getting REALLY big. The "Two Stone" reference is to the British weight measurement of "stone". He's a big kid, and I swear he easily weighs 2 stone (about 28 pounds) at only 1 years old.

<- Here's a photo of Tommy & his Dad (my brother)

The brew should be ready for drinking right before Christmas.

VG Art Replacements

2009-07-17T08:51:00.000-07:00

Excerpt from a blog I found recently....

"Maybe you're like me and your imagination goes a little kookoo from time to time about a game coming out and you maybe obsess over it for the fortnight leading up to it's launch. You deny yourself any knowledge of the impending title, refusing the numerous morsels of knowledge to be found on the internet with the devotion of an ascetic yogi. Then the day arives and you stride in to the store to pick up your game. THE Game! And the cover looks like it was designed by a drunk 6-year-old."

I totally agree with this sentiment. This guy has a solution. Head on over to VGBoxArt.com, and get your sweet new game the cover it deserves.

Case in point. I've been searching for the game ICO for the PS2 for years now. I bought it way back in 2001, just after it came out. I played and finished it twice, and then traded it in for another title (which I think was GTA IV). I immediately began to regret the trade-in, and have been trying to re-find the game ever since. On a recent trip to a Game Crazy store, the clerk was kind enough to use their expansive database to track down a used copy. He found 1 copy in the Lake Oswego store, and my lovely wife made the trip to pick it up. Victory!

So, I get home last night and excitedly open up the game. The disc is intact, but no cover art... just that craptastic Hollywood video cover with the name of the game written in sharpie. I did a quick Internet search, and found the original artwork for the game. Meh. I jumped over to VGBoxArt. Attached are 2 covers for ICO. One is the original that I remember being on the box (drunk 6-year-old style artwork), and then a user-submitted piece of ART. One which BELONGS on the cover of this wonderful, award winning game.

Is There Such A Thing As Too Much Sodomy?

2009-06-26T09:34:00.001-07:00

Michael Jackson died yesterday. So did Farrah Fawcett. Today is a day for playing MJ songs ALL DAY while thinking of Farrah in a bathing suit.

F.U. Facebook

2009-02-10T22:38:00.001-08:00

With under a year under my belt for Facebook, I've had enough. Goodbye Facebook, and all your silly time-wasting ways. Marking the day.

The 3 worst things about Facebook:

1) Waste of time

2) Too much BS tie-ins with ridiculous apps and polls

3) Too needy

The 3 best things about Facebook:

1) Connecting with "friends" who aren't really friends. Because if you were friends, you would already be emailing & having beers with them, right?

2) Uhh..

3) Still can't think of anything.

Fisticuffs Red

2009-01-21T14:11:00.000-08:00

First of all, Barack Obama was inaugurated as our 44th President of the United States yesterday morning. That definitely started out the day right. I watched it in the conference room at work on the big screen projected up on the wall with my co-workers. Pastries were brought in and tasty Stumptown coffee was consumed. It was fantastic.

Noland and I brewed up an Amber last night, with the need to have proper beer available for consuming during next month's Chili Fest. Photos here document some of what happened. They include, "Hop-filled bag boiling in the wort", "Counter-flow chiller ready to perform", "Noland shaking the White Labs yeast vial for pitching", and "The vase I broke while dragging a hose around the house". The amber is being called "Fisticuffs Red", and should be ready just in time for the Chili Fest at Das Bell Haus. The Crafts WILL be taking home 1st place this year.

Fisticuffs Red

7 lbs. Light malt extract

1 lb. Amber dry malt

1 lb. Crystal 40L

1/4 lb. Roasted black barley

3/4 lb. Corn sugar

2 oz. Yakima Golding whole leaf hops (60 min. boil)

2 oz. Mt. Hood whole leaf hops (15 min. finishing)

1 vial White Labs California Ale yeast

Total F-ing Rogue

2008-11-18T12:19:00.001-08:00

It appears the mighty Green Dragon has fallen to Rogue. Despite the efforts of Lolo Lancaster to retain control of the place, by making an offer to purchase from the majority holder, it appears GD is going to be sold.

I have memories of working just around the block from the old Flander's Street Pub, back about 6 years ago. At the time, it was a great place to grab some cheap happy hour pints, and get some good cheap grub over lunch. The staff was awesome, and the menu was affordable. Then, along came Rogue . They bought the Flander's Street Pub and turned all the little good things it had going for it in to very bad things. They did these things in the name of making a buck. Now, I'm all for businesses, and especially local brewing places making money. They should. However, half the staff left within the first month (information gained from talking with the bartender shortly after takeover), they killed happy hour dead, everything on the menu shot up by a couple bucks (kobe beer hamburger?!?), and their beer prices shot up by over $1/pint. Back then, I was a regular at that place, and I knew the people working there. It was where I could be found when my boss was looking for me. It was a good place. The Rogue came in and changed that.

Even though the Rogue is claiming they won't change a thing for the Green Dragon, I fear a repeat for what I saw happen at the Flander's Street Pub. Best of luck, chaps.

Green Dragon Slain?

2008-11-13T15:10:00.001-08:00

If it is true... then this is awful. It has been reported today that Rogue plans to buy the Green Dragon. First reported on Brewpublic.com. These are reliable sources, and I am shocked that this could actually happen. As if today wasn't already painful enough. Say it ain't so!!

Obama Victory

2008-11-06T10:45:00.001-08:00

OBAMA! President Elect Obama. It really happened. The 44th President of the United States is one for the history books, for sure. Exciting times, and an election which will be part of my thoughts and part of my kid's future history studies. We're trying to impress upon our girls just how important this all is, without overwhelming them. They seem pretty excited all around, but they were also pretty excited about Halloween this year too. Eventually, they'll understand the significance. No hurry.

It's been 12 years since I voted for a presidential candidate who actually won. That was the first time I voted, and I was stationed in Tazar, Hungary in the US Air Force. I was on a tour-of-duty, representing the 4400th Ops Squadron in Operation Joint Endeavor . We were over there flying some of the first real Predator UAV missions, and supporting NATO and the IFOR peacekeeping task force in the Bosnian-Herzegovina conflict. It was a time when America was viewed as being a strong and vital part of world peacekeeping efforts. The people in the countries I visited during that time (Bosnia, Hungary & Austria) showed great affection for US troops, and always greeted us with smiles. Besides my photos and memories from that time, I also have a nifty Challenge Coin which I keep as an added reminder.

The last 8 years under Bush have seemed to be this great unraveling of all the foreign relations we have built, as well as a general jackassery among all things political. Pundits running around, loudly spouting the most inane thoughts gracing their heads. The hate and greed and distrust we are feeling as forward-thinking Americans has become unbearable. Things really do seem as bad as we all imagined they could possibly get. So now, I have hope, and the entire country seems to have hope again for a much brighter future in America and the world.

Thank you America for looking past your silly racial conflicts. Thank you for looking past the fact that Barack Hussein Obama is a really weird name. Thank you for coming to your senses, and for finally electing the best person for this extremely important job.

And finally, a link to my blarg post from the day after election 2004 . It's nice to get things right once in a while.

Election Day and Night

2008-11-04T14:46:00.001-08:00

It is FINALLY election day here in the USA. Honestly, I've been at nearly zero production at work today, due to the amount of time I have spent cruising around the Internets reading stories about election day coverage. I am excited, as right now we are only minutes away from seeing the results begin to roll in from the exit poll locations on the East Coast. I desperately want to sit and watch the coverage whilst drinking beers and giggling. Only a couple hours left in the work day. I'm spent.

iknowkungfu recording was awesome. Great Halloween night show in Salem with CSG. The Tanked is back in full practice tonight.

!!! ELECTION ELECTION ELECTION !!!

G1 Tracking Number!

2008-10-16T13:19:00.001-07:00

Among a whole pile of other G1 related news & reviews , was a short article put out by Android Community which claims T-Mobile is handing out UPS tracking numbers for phones, and some pre-ordered G1 phones are already being shipped. With this bit of news, I hit the UPS site, followed the instructions from the post, and received my tracking number. Right now, the status is "Billing Information Received", which doesn't tell me much. However, it was updated with that status on Tuesday, 10/14. Obviously, I will be checking and re-checking the UPS site for updates at least twice-a-day, watching that status. It would be fantastic if that package arrived this weekend, or even on Monday. Come on, T-Mobile! Let's go!

The Beer Prayer

2008-10-14T15:26:00.001-07:00

This is a rad prayer. Credits to BrewPublic.com , as I totally ripped it from their site. I am now their faithful RSS subscriber.

Heading to the Hawthorne Theater to see the Street Dogs tonight at a rock-and-roll show. 8 days left until I get my G1. So far, 1.5 million of these have been pre-ordered. Kick ass.

Goodbye Tasty Pink & White Cookies

2008-10-10T16:40:00.001-07:00

This is absolutely THE MOST AWFUL NEWS I have heard all week. Archway cookies, the maker of Mother's Circus Animal cookies, has gone bankrupt . Did you hear me?!? Those fantastic little pink and white cookies with the little sprinkles on top are going away! My kids love these things, just as much as I have loved them since I was a kid. This is just terrible, terrible news. Damn you, economy!

I'm leaving work early today, heading straight to the local Safeway, and buying every bag they have left. Stockpile time!

G1 Pre-Order Bliss

2008-10-06T08:44:00.001-07:00

The G1 has officially sold out for pre-orders arriving on October 22nd. You can still pre-order online, but according to sources , those orders won't ship until mid-November . Ouch. So, here I sit in early pre-order bliss, as my Android G1 Google Phone is still scheduled to arrive a mere 16 days from today. Until that time, I continue to develop the ultimate Android application, play with the G1 emulator , and wait "patiently" for that much-anticipated box to arrive on my doorstep.

Questions I have been asked about the G1 so far:

1) "What is the first thing you're going to do with your phone when it arrives?"

A) I'm going to plug it in and let it charge, silly.

2) "What kind of application are you writing for your phone?"

A) Something which will help me find tasty beer at discount prices in seconds, no matter where I am.

3) "Is this G1 phone going to be better than an iPhone?"

A) I don't have an iPhone, but the answer is yes.

4) "What are you going to do with your old phone?"

A) I'm going to feed my RAZR V3 to my G1.

5) "What is Android?"

A) It's a mobile application software stack written by Google Developers. Go look it up .

The Twit

2008-10-03T08:57:00.001-07:00

I'm a Twitter user now. I finally signed up after all of this time. Partly because I'm studying specific details about how social media marketing and optimization is being used at work, and partly because I'm twit-curious. Anyway, if you're looking at the full version of this blog right now, you can see the Twitter feeds in the right-hand column, which I updated last night. If you're a RSS junkie like I am, then you have to use some other Twitter feed reader or actually go to http://www.twitter.com/badfetch to see the updates. Exciting, eh? Now, I can update everyone instantly when I'm enjoying a tasty bacon cheeseburger at Nob Hill , or if I just read a really funny article about Android . Weee!!

On to other news. Today is Violet's 35th birthday. Another milestone. Mia told me she wanted flowers for her birthday. I got her an iPod Shuffle instead, which she said she wanted months ago. I'm not sure if that means I failed or succeeded. Probably somewhere in between.

The countdown continues

2008-09-29T14:19:00.001-07:00

T-Mobile announced on Friday that the G1 phone is in limited supply for pre-order, and for a short time their supply was "out" . They have since adjusted their tone to say there was a glitch on the site, causing the supply to appear empty, but they have them available again. They also just posted an awesome flashy little video on the site showing off the sliding feature of the phone, and some of the fanciness I will be enjoying in just 23 days. Go check it out .

Until October 22nd, I'm going to continue honing my Android development skills... in hopes of having my own little home brew application to load up immediately.

My Precious

2008-09-26T09:16:00.001-07:00

The "G1", aka the "Google Phone " or "The Dream" as it was referred to by code name was finally unveiled for the public last Tuesday, September 23rd. This Android based phone, which runs on an HTC handset and is being carried by T-mobile, is the one I've been talking about and waiting on for years now. That same day, the announcement was made that the phone would go retail on October 22nd. A day later, my lovely wife PRE-ORDERED the phone for me. She is the sweetest! By the way, have I plugged her new store yet? I was just there yesterday, and it's fantastic .

Anyway, I have noticed I'm talking about this phone to everybody. Friends, co-workers, complete strangers on the sidewalk... "Hey! See this phone?", as I hold up my current craptastic RAZR 3 or something. "Yeah. I only have 25 days left of using this piece of junk. Why? Because I am getting the Google Phone thedayitcomesoutandIcan'twaitOHMYGOD!!" A sad uncomfortable half smile and nodding from my selected victim normally ensues. "Um... cool." Indeed. Very cool.

I spent last evening reading the already-released user manual for the phone, and have begun to refer to it as "my precious". It will be a long 25 days still to come. Oh, and I'm getting the brown one .

Two Rights Don't Make A Left

2008-09-04T16:22:00.001-07:00

Watched the RNC last night, and the night before. I got sick to my stomach after only an hour. The mud slinging was almost too much to handle. You notice how none of the RNC speakers, Guiliani or Palin talked about policy? All they did was tell lies and make general slack-jawed remarks about their opponents? What's that all about? I hope the speech by McCain tonight speaks a little more toward the Republican's plan for the future of the country. Yes, we all know that John McCain is a war hero. He served his country with honor. But does that make him eligible for becoming President of the United States any more than me? I served our country in the military, and I served with honor. It should be noted McCain did so also, but it should in no way be the platform and/or reason for electing him as President. The attack tactics are not productive to solving all the problems with our country. Effective and intelligent solutions to difficult problems, both social and economic, is what I want to hear about. I have heard zero about such things from the Republicans so far.

Oh, right... the other "right". I was an inch away from getting right-hooked on the way in on my bike this morning. Happened at 28th & Glisan . For the car, the sun (bright & behind them) was a factor. I was riding right alongside them, and they might have had their blinker on at the time to turn, but again... if they did, I couldn't see it due to the bright sun reflecting off the car lights. Fortunately, they began turning ...real... ...slow..., and I was able to dart around them, just brushing the front bumper without any damage to myself or anything else. If they had cut a hard right, I would have been across their hood. Anyway, I lived, and wasn't mad at all, because really they would have been blinded by that sun behind them - even if they were looking. Biking to work every day is a healthy and sometimes dangerous endeavor. Basically, I just stay very alert, and keep my cool. Seems to work out alright.

Oh, and I checked out Chrome . I am using it as my main browser now. It is an amazing browser. All the functionality you would expect is available. Very intuitive usage. I love the extra features of being able to determine which sites/applications are using more memory *(very developer friendly). The Opera-like quick-launch feature is very nice. Built-in Google search browsing has been fantastic (saves me having to tab-over), and many, many other features I love. However, I see Google has a few things to work out still. Namely, they need to have the same kind of plug-ins/add-ons as Firefox. Some more in-browser applications crashing and some non auto-install plug-ins (like Java) are annoying too. It will still remain my core browser for now, and for the foreseeable future. Thanks, Google!

The Chrome Wars

2008-09-02T09:30:00.001-07:00

Yeah, clever title, huh? Listen, it's early... okay? I am only on my second cup of coffee, and a couple of minutes ago I suddenly hear FOR THE FIRST TIME that my beloved Google is putting out a browser for beta download TODAY. The browser is called "Chrome", and this is not a hoax. Check out more comic-based action-packed info here. The craziest part? I haven't read a single thing about this on Engadget or MAKE or any of the other fancy RSS feeds I subscribe to and read religiously. Nope. I heard this news from a co-worker, who is brilliantly artistic, but who generally isn't the first source I go to for late-breaking technology-related news. So, when she first talked about it this morning, I assumed she was pulling my leg in jest. Happily, that was not the case. As I am a Google super-fan, I am always excited about some new service / product / gPhone they produce / imagine.

Anyway, Google really is releasing a browser, and it will be available for beta download today. 2pm EST is the expected release time, making that 11am PST... or less than 90 minutes away! I will be downloading the browser and testing it as soon as it is available. Will it become a replacement for my beloved Firefox? Will it just add another browser for core testing purposes in Internet applications, compliance, validation & testing?

Avalauncher Sighting

2008-03-24T22:54:00.000-07:00

I was on the bike on the way home today, and as I rounded a corner I spotted a pickup with a familiar bumper sticker.

AVALAUNCHER!!

Anyway, I stopped, snapped a photo, and had Furfill the Need playing in my head the rest of the way home.

Cab Testing Phase

2008-02-25T11:44:00.001-08:00

A thing of beauty! Over the weekend I finished the remaining bits necessary to get the cabinet in working/testing condition. It now sits in what will likely be its final location. Here's the list of what is left to do:
- Replace the blue control panel overlays with finished design
- Install the t-molding using hot glue
- Fresh coat of flat black paint
- Re-wire the Power On button for better accessibility

Also on the list should be "find better chairs for playing in", because the height of the chairs to the control panels is not optimal. We already -plan to get different chairs in here for this purpose, but I might need to raise the overall height of the cabinet to ensure it's comfortable.

I'm really getting the games list dialed in, as there are certain games it doesn't make sense to add on to the list. Some just don't have the ability to "flip" screens when player 2 is up. Others, like Joust, have the player 1 & 2 on the same screen. No flipping there either. So, the games list is important here.

For the MAME front end, I'm using Atomic FE. It's an amazing & completely customizable interface. Sounds, loading screens, menus, backgrounds, etc. You don't need to install any .NET, Java, or anything else which will bog down the system. Highly recommended.

Cutting and Wiring

2008-02-22T23:06:00.000-08:00

One joystick and 3 buttons on each side was to be the plan. I cut the holes in the MDF first, and then clamped the acrylic on to make the other holes. Simple, really... since they all use a 1 1/8-inch hole. Pre-drill a pilot hole, and then do the real thing. I was a little worried about how difficult cutting in to the acrylic would be, but it ended up being very easy material to work with. I used some custom finishing bolts from the hardware store, so the top of the panel would keep looking very professional.

I don't have the finished artwork to be printed (which is being custom designed by my lovely wife), so I am leaving the blue protective sheeting on the back side of the acrylic sheets for now. Finally, I made the wiring connections from the controls to the keyboard encoder, and that was it. I cut holes and wired the additional buttons for players, coin, game selection, exit, and admin functions at various locations on the cabinet. Nearly finished!

And yes, as far as I know the best cutting table to use for your control panel is a priority USPS box which had previously contained your shipped controls.

Arrival!

2008-02-20T21:49:00.000-08:00

The package of controls from Groovy Game Gear arrived (unboxing of parts shown in photo). Also, I stopped by TAP Plastics on my way home today (on the bike), to pick up the custom pieces of cut acrylic for the control panels and the bezel. I have Friday off work, so I'm going to take the 3-day weekend to finish this project. Well, that's the plan, anyway.

Controls and Plastics

2008-02-15T12:08:00.001-08:00

My Valentine's Day present was to order all my controls for the cocktail cabinet. So, I went to Groovy Game Gear and did so immediately. No date set for actual delivery, but I should see them arrive some time around 2/22 (next Friday). My arcade-building buddy, Alan, is putting on another event at his house this weekend, which I hope to attend.

Recently, I found a place which is only blocks away from my house, called TAP Plastics. They are a plastics retail store carrying resins, fiberglass, adhesives, acrylic, and an assortment of plastic sheeting products. Their target is for the do-it-yourself person to come in and pick out supplies needed to complete any related project. This is exactly what I need for custom cut acrylic pieces to fit on the control panels, screen overlays, and other fun items related to arcade machine / MAME cabinet building. I plan to utilize them for many other (currently unknown) projects in the future.

Obama vs. Clinton - Exactly Like Chutes and Ladders

2008-02-13T23:01:00.001-08:00

Yeah, so I've been a big Obama fan since I've heard him speak, understood his stance on the issues, and DAMN if he isn't dead handsome. So, the only issue I am in opposition with Obama on is the death penalty. I believe it should be abolished, and he supports it (Clinton supports the death penalty as well). Anyway, I think he's top-notch, and I will vote/campaign/cheer for him from here on out. I really hope he ends up as the Democratic nominee, but right now it's at a near tie.

That's what brings me to Chutes and Ladders.

My 2 girls and I were playing a spirited game of Chutes and Ladders the other night, and I realized how these primary caucuses are EXACTLY LIKE the game of Chutes and Ladders. Well, I drew some comparisons. The "experts" are saying it is a real possibility that neither Obama or Clinton will be able to properly win the Democratic vote for a primary candidate to support. Well, I really think the photos below get my point across pretty damn well.

The two candidates, Clinton (left) and Obama (right) in a dead heat at the halfway point.

Again, the candidates (Obama on the left, and Clinton on the right) showing the possible results after all of the primary caucuses have finished. Didn't quite make it. If this happens, does it mean EVERYBODY has to vote for McCain? Just curious. You know... I'm only asking as a voter-in-a -democracy-kind-of-way.

Control Panels Replaced

2008-02-03T23:08:00.000-08:00

Spent a majority of the weekend getting the control panels rebuilt on the cabinet. The original control panels were made from 3/4-inch particle board. It has been through some rough times, where both control panel sides were basically destroyed. So, I cut things down to a workable state, re-cut the new parts out of 3/4-inch MDF, glued/bolted the new pieces on, then began the process of filling, sanding, priming and painting. Final tally for the weekend is 2 finished control panels, ready to be cut with pushbutton and joystick holes. Next step is ordering the necessary HAPP arcade controls and a keyboard encoder from Groovy Game Gear.

Super Tuesday Approaching

2008-02-01T12:48:00.001-08:00

Headline:

Ann Coulter is Voting for Hillary Clinton

The single-most compelling reason for me now NOT to vote for Clinton. I doubt I could stand the idea of agreeing with anything this woman thinks or says. Ever.

Super Tuesday is right around the corner. I'm looking for a place to sit with a beer, to hoot-n-holler with fellow voting individuals (DEM or GOP, doesn't matter), to watch the results for the upcoming primary caucuses. Exciting stuff, I think. So, anyone in Portland who knows of a decent place with tasty beer, a TV which will be showing the results and/or free wireless, please leave some comments as to where. M'kay?

Oh, and Obama in 2008!

PC Install, Yo!

2008-01-26T14:55:00.000-08:00

Spent most of the weekend taking apart the PC and installing the entire thing inside the cabinet. I found a nifty way to completely dissect a metal PC case by cracking the metal rivets. It can be done by delicately holding a flat screwdriver against the rivet nub at an angle, and then smacking the handle with a hammer. I highly suggest removing all computer bits you plan to use later before applying this method. It sounds severe, but it was a precision way to get the parts out you might need. Great stress reliever too.

Anyway, I was able to get all the necessary parts out of the case: motherboard, power supply, hard drive, optical drive, and a couple other bits like a front-mounted USB input and mounting plates. This has all been assembled inside the cabinet now. It is amazing how small of a footprint the entire PC innards can take up when pulled apart. I was even able to mount the case fan to the bottom of the cabinet, forcing hot air down and out.

As you can see in the photos, I have the hard drive mounted to the side, the motherboard is mounted so all the inputs can be easily reached with the top lifted up, the extra USB ports are up towards the top (why not?), and you can spot the antenna for the PCI wireless card sticking up. Currently, I'm playing with the idea of not adding the optical drive back in, as I can transfer files over wireless or USB thumb drive.

I've also hacked up my PC speakers to mount in the proper locations. I would like to place the speaker knobs on the outside of the cabinet, as well as figure out how to get an outer-mounted headphone plug to function properly. For now, the knobs are accessible inside. There's also a shot of the only way to currently turn the computer on, using the switch I removed from the case. Still looking in to a better solution for that.

XHTML Validation Problems With The rel Tag

2008-01-15T15:42:00.001-08:00

XHTML 1.0 Transitional validation is an obsession of mine. I must validate everything I touch. A coding anomaly came up this week which left me searching the Internets for an answer. I was getting a strange validation error on a project which was referencing the "ref" tag. All formatting looked correct and no other explanation came up on the W3C validation tools other than something about the doctype not supporting this attribute usage.

So, after much searching and testing... I came to an answer.
The rel attribute is not allowed inside an XHTML tag which contains an ending /> AND is inside the body of the page. The rel attribute is allowed inside a tag which is also in the header of the page (example: <link rel="badfetch" />).
The rel attribute MUST be inside a tag which has its own separate closing tag.

Examples:
Validates: <a rel="badfetch" href=" http://www.badfetch.com">link</a>
Does Not Validate: <img rel="badfetch" src="logo.png" width="100" height="100" alt="logo" name="logo" id="logo" />

Found this out when using some DHTML to accommodate a flyout menu on mouseover for a menu item. The DHTML reference uses the rel and id tags to talk to the links, images, and divs for proper display, timing, and location of the flyout. The code looked like the following:

<a href="/faqs/" onmouseout="MM_swapImgRestore()" onmouseover="MM_swapImage('n7','','images/splash_05n7o.png',1)"><img src="images/splash_05n7.png" alt="FAQs" name="n7" width="141" height="18" border="0" id="n7" rel="subcontent" /></a><div id="subcontent" style="position:absolute; visibility: hidden; width: 200; margin-top: -18px; padding: 0;">[display item]</div>

However, this does not validate in W3C for XHTML 1.0 Transitional because of the location of the rel attribute. In order for this to work properly, I had to move not only the rel attribute, but the id attribute too. Simply moving them to the anchor tag did the trick.

<a href="/faqs/" onmouseout="MM_swapImgRestore()" onmouseover="MM_swapImage('n7','','images/splash_05n7o.png',1)" id="n7" rel="subcontent"><img src="images/splash_05n7.png" alt="FAQs" name="n7" width="141" height="18" border="0" /></a><div id="subcontent" style="position:absolute; visibility: hidden; width: 200; margin-top: -18px; padding: 0;">[display item]</div>

Now it all validates correctly. I hope this helps someone out there as the research I did on it came up empty, with only clues as to where the problem might be.

Not Getting Dead By Electro-shock

2008-01-06T23:53:00.000-08:00

More cabinet photos, as the work continues. I found an acceptable sized PC monitor to use, but there were a few things which needed to be done before mounting it inside the cabinet. First, I had to discharge the stored electric charge inside. It was a little scary, I'll admit, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I imagined. I also made sure to tell the wife to call for an ambulance if I didn't return from my work area in the next 20 minutes. Anyway, after performing that task, it was a matter of puzzling out how all the parts would fit inside. Once seated, the formerly cavernous cabinet is now looking jam-packed. It is also is looking much more like the finished product. I now have the mounted monitor hooked up to a PC with the emulator showing off Ms. Pac Man. Good stuff.

CRA!!!

2008-01-04T15:31:00.001-08:00

This is my Brazilian football player name & jersey. Thanks Nolildo for the link.

Find your Brazilian team player name here.

FOTM 2

2008-01-02T21:55:00.001-08:00

Holy balls. I'm happy. This probably is more relevant to myself and Billy more than anyone else, but Fire On The Mountain has just opened its second location on NE 17th & Burnside. A very, very short bike ride or walk to some tastiness.

Craigslist posting:
http://portland.craigslist.org/mlt/fbh/514183521.html

Confirmed on several other sites (PDXStump and Cluckbucket), and a visual sighting by Stacie (who is now a SE Portlander).

FOTM2
1708 E Burnside

Centipede & Cocktails

2008-01-01T22:42:00.000-08:00

2008 began with promise and a new project. Vi was trolling Craigslist and came across a find. A fellow arcade builder was getting rid of his cocktail arcade cabinet, and wanted someone to come get it pronto. I called to let him know I was coming, and headed out first thing this morning. Within 45 minutes, I returned with an original Centipede table-top, or "cocktail" cabinet. The cab is missing all the internal electronics, coin box, and control panels. It is, however, a fantastic project I can not wait to take on. I pulled out an old laptop which I promptly disassembled to use the LCD screen. After poking around the interwebs, I found no cheap and/or easy way to connect an old laptop LCD to a desktop computer. So, my screen choices are going to be limited to custom-fitting an old CRT or find some really cheap serial-connected LCD screen. I also need to dig up a faster spare computer to run the emulators. Since the control panels are already missing, I'm considering moving the control panel locations to a far-end configuration, instead of the closer mid-table configuration of the original Centipede cab.

I Like Rainbows Too

2007-10-10T12:24:00.001-07:00

Yep, like plenty of other people today, I too bought the brand new Radiohead album, In Rainbows. I just finished downloading it, so anticipation to open it is killing me. I paid £3.45 (3 pounds, 45 pence) for the album, which coverts to something like $7. You want a copy also, you say? Well, you get to decide the price, so go get it here.

First On-The-Road Tire Change

2007-08-21T13:05:00.000-07:00

Yep. I have been very fortunate to not have to change a tire on the road for nearly 9 months. Today was the first day I got a flat while commuting. The other flat I had to change was done at home in my garage like a civilized human being. I got this flat about a mile away from home, so I decided to make the change right there. Fortunately, I carry a spare inner tube and kick-ass pump with me every day, so I was able to make it happen. Unfortunately, it took me 40 minutes to make the change from the time I pulled over until I got it all fixed and on the road again. This was due partly to the lack of experience I have in doing this kind of on-the-road maintenance, and part was due to the tools I had at hand. It was my back tire, so dealing with the chain was a little more complex than the front tire. Also, I had to pop the tire off the frame with my garage door key (the least-used key in my chain), since I don't have a tire wrench. The next time I'm at the Bike Gallery, I am getting one of those things. Damn! Anyway, I got in to work 45 minutes late, but felt great about being able to make the change on my own without assistance. Just another notch in the belt of being a full-fledged member of the biking community.

The Return Of XP

2007-08-08T11:28:00.000-07:00

Okay, it took nearly 1 whole week before I had to call it quits on Vista. That operating system just plain sucks. It's a huge system resource hog, and the benefits of switching back to XP are obvious. My brand new laptop should not have to struggle running 4 applications at the same time. Unacceptable. Anyway, I've reverted back to my XP Pro, and the system is flying now. Bye Vista. Good riddance.

Laptop Ahoy!

2007-07-27T13:13:00.000-07:00

The new laptop came in today and I'm super-stoked to get it running. The only concern I have is that it has Vista on it. I'm starting to learn the ins-and-outs of Vista, and I think I can adapt. Sweet.

The Wait Continues

2007-07-25T12:58:00.001-07:00

Apparently, New Egg took their sweet, sweet time before shipping the order for my new fancy-ass laptop. It didn't get picked up by UPS until yesterday 7/24. With 3-day shipping, that places it in my hands no sooner than this Friday. This is good to know, because every time the UPS truck has pulled up outside the office so far this week, I've sprung up and run to the door with hope that it was packages for me. Not content to sit idly wondering when it was scheduled for, I broke in to our accountant's office, found the P.O., and photocopied the order sheet for looking up tracking numbers on the intertubes. Huzzah!

Billy finishes taking his lawyer bar exam today. It has been many years in the making of his lawyerdom, all culminating at this one exam. We're all meeting up at the famous Horse Brass Pub after work today to toast this fantastic achievement. Cheers, and nice going, Billy!

Laptop Computing

2007-07-19T16:11:00.000-07:00

I've had my current system at work for the past 2 years I've been there. It's a desktop PC which I built myself. A year ago, I doubled the RAM to extend the life a bit, but now the system is really dragging ass. As any developer knows, especially those who work on Windows-based systems, your development machine takes a beating. 2 years for a desktop system is basically the benchmark for it's total lifespan (in my opinion).

Anyway, today was the glorious day I have been waiting for, when I got to go shopping online for a new system. I picked out a wicked new laptop, along with some accessories to sweeten the deal. The package arrives some time early next week, so I'm going to sitting at the front door waiting like a methadone addict for that UPS guy to show up. That also means I'm going to be preparing my old machine for file transfer and cleaning. The "Cavalier", as the old machine is called, will be transitioned to a life of administrative tasks or light development.

I'll be riding out to Sauvie Island again after work to meet up with the family. Violet has taken to calling it simply "The Farm", like it's our family-owned farm that we go to. I'm looking forward to some wine, music, and food while sitting on a blanket in a field. Viva Thursdays at the farm!

Wednesday Toilet Talk

2007-07-18T19:17:00.000-07:00

It was raining solidly this morning, which meant my bike ride in was awesome. I got to work drenched and happy. I feel sorry for the poor suckers in their horseless carriages, listening to The Morning Zoo, how more soldiers were killed in this ridiculous war, or some such. I stink like a hog, and I don't really care. I B.O.-stick myself in the morning, and hope that does the job. No voiced complaints so far.

Several folks at work were sitting around near my desk, discussing our bathroom situation, so I ended up getting pulled in to the conversation when I heard it taking a nasty turn. We have 2 single-occupancy bathrooms at work. One for boys and one for girls. This is ample, since we have 14 employees (8F/6M), and everything has been hunky-dory until now. The complaint (by a female) was that the toilet seat in the men's bathroom is always up, and if the women's bathroom was occupied, they didn't feel it was right that they would have to put the seat down to use the men's bathroom.

Is this not a ridiculous request? I mean, what's the point in having a dedicated men's & women's bathroom if we can't treat them as such? My objective is to touch the toilet seat as little as possible. If we implemented this crazy rule, the guys would have to be touching that seat all day long. It's a courtesy to leave the seat up for the next guy who walks in there. If I were to use the women's bathroom, I would put the seat back down. No issue there. If we only had 1 unisex bathroom I would take the time to put the seat down as well. Also, is it really that difficult to wait another 5 minutes to go potty when the "seat-up" bathroom is taken? Anyway, I loudly protested the idea, and told the complainer to get bent. So concluded the mid-week workday toilet talk.

Division In The Rain

2007-07-17T23:29:00.000-07:00

The car got broken in to a couple months back. They broke out the back drivers-side window and swiped a couple of backseat DVD players we use to entertain the kids on long journeys. They also made off with several DVDs which were mostly Little Einsteins and Maisey (kid movies) type stuff. Overall, it sucks, but it has been more of an inconvenience than anything, trying to get these jackasses who are supposed to be fixing the various things needing it. We've had to take the car out to several places, and have lost time due to waiting on fixes. It seems like an easy fix to just replace the window, but the tint had to be replaced and the door panel was damaged and the trim, etc. So, we're almost finished with all the crazy, but it continues.

Tuesday morning, the car was scheduled to go out to the glass place for tint replacement. I had to drop it off in the morning, and then bike in from there to work. I loaded the bike on the rack, got my rain gear together for riding, extra clothing for work, and headed out. I dropped off the car at 7:55am, and then set off. The glass place is out on SE Division & 112th. I work in the NW industrial area of downtown, so it ended up being a long ride in to work. I thought it was going to suck, but it was actually really nice. Riding in the rain rules, especially when the rain is light. Also, I really dug the long ride in to work. It took me about 40 minutes to make it all the way in, and I got to take a route I've never taken before. Double bonus.

Then, 4pm rolls around and Vi gives me a call. "The car is ready, so you need to go pick it up after work". Awesome. The way back wasn't nearly as good, with all the after-work traffic, but it was still a really nice long ride. No rain to boot. I even got to stop off at my friend Shannon's house on the way, since she lives just a block off of the bike route I was taking. I stopped in and sweated all over her front porch, chatting with her for a few minutes, then I was off. I also got to stop in at the Bike Gallery on Division, which I hadn't been to before. I picked up a couple packages of Clif Shot Blocks, and quickly devoured 2 cubes to regain some energy lost. MapMyRide says the route is about 9.3 miles each way, which is over twice my normal morning commute. I honestly wouldn't mind if I got to (or had to) ride this kind of distance every day. That would be 100 miles a week just on commuting! However, I would have to get up earlier, so I guess my measily 4.5 mile daily commute each way will have to due until I get motivated to start the day sooner. I just love that sleep button.

Transformers At The Drive-In

2007-07-16T00:35:00.000-07:00

On my way biking home last Friday, I saw Greg Oden, the new Portland Trailblazer, walking West across the Broadway bridge with a group of what looked like basketball camp kids. That guy is huge, of course. Anyway, just an interesting pseudo-event on a normally uneventful way home.

Friday night, the family and I hooked up with the Becker family for some Newberg-style drive-in double-feature action. We caught Shrek the Third and Transformers. Both were great movies. Having young kids, I've probably watched the first 2 Shrek movies more times than is healthy. They are consistently funny, and I am always amazed how each movie is geared for the parents to enjoy along with the kids. Adult-type humor, skillfully plugged in to the mostly kid-style movie. The third does this trick as well. The kids were basically crashed within the first 10 minutes of the Transformers movie, so the wife and I were able to enjoy it without the crazy. Overall, fantastic movie, and I really want to see it again on my home screen or in the beer theaters. There was just so much going on at every single second of screen time, it was a bit hard to follow everything on the darkened drive-in screen. I'm really impressed how they stuck to the original feel of the Transformers show, which I used to watch religiously when I was a youngin'. The best quote I have read so far was from an intern at the Portland Mercury who said, "Transformers is like a ninja wailing on a 1961 Gibson EB-0 studded with canary diamonds... and firing lasers." Exactly.

Saturday and Sunday were spent kicking ass out in the yard. Something which has been long overdue this Summer in the new house. Early morning on Saturday, we went out to check on the Farmers Market in Hollywood. It was pretty neat, but the sun was so harsh, it was hard to stay out long. So, it was a very short trip. Also, on Sunday I took Cannon out for a long-ish bike ride in the used Burley we picked up recently. She was singing and talking most of the way, but then suddenly (about halfway thru the ride) she got very quiet. I looked back and saw she was totally passed out. The kids love going for rides in that trail-behind, and usually get pissed when the ride is over. It ends up being a great workout too, since hauling around all the extra weight feels like you're going uphill constantly.

Sauvie Island Hoe-down

2007-07-13T00:48:00.000-07:00

Thursday after work, I met up with 3 other dads for another Dads Ride Out event, put together from cycling fathers of Mia's school. We rode up NW Lovejoy and in to the West hills of Portland. I haven't been up hills much recently (not many at all since my first-and-only century ride for Reach the Beach back in May), so I was sucking wind most of the way. Once we reached Skyline, it was a fast ride down Newberry and then out to Kruger Farms on Sauvie Island. We all met up with our respective families there for the live music and good old fashioned hoe-down.

The scene was something else. Hundreds of families all there enjoying the sun, blankets on the lawn, listening to music, drinking, and talking. They had the field right next to the music area set up with sprinklers running, so the kids were going nuts out there playing. They had a beer & wine gazebo, farmers market, and barbecue going. The music was a local Irish band, so that was a treat too. It was all just perfect.

We picked up some fresh fruit from the market, got some beers, and then sat down with some other folks to enjoy the lot. The band played on to nearly 9pm, and then just as they finished, the thunder started. Warm rain poured down, and we threw the blanket over ourselves as we headed to the car. I loaded the bike on to the carrier, and we were off. The girls watched for lightning in the sky on the way home, and when we pulled in to the driveway, we sat there for 10 minutes watching and enjoying the lightning we so rarely get in Oregon. It was a perfect end to a great day.

We're totally hooked on going out to Kruger Farms on Thursday nights now.

Pejorative

2007-07-12T13:33:00.001-07:00

I was successfully able to use the word "pejorative" today in business-related conversation without sounding like a dick. Kick ass. It was "word of the day" a while back on m-w.com , which is my resource for looking up dictionary and thesaurus stuff. Words can be fun.

On another note... last weekend, the family and I traveled down to Roseburg to see my folks. My dad is building a tree house in the backyard, and I went down to give him a hand. We spent the days building his new office fort, and the evenings were spent drinking wine, talking, and watching the stars from their deck. It's amazing how much more there is to look at when you're outside Portland, and the sky is much darker. Good times.

Tour of France

2007-07-11T09:09:00.001-07:00

Something I never really thought I would do: Closely begin to follow the Tour de France. For the uninitiated, I'm talking about a nearly month-long cycling contest. It can be somewhat equated to the World Cup of cycling. Many teams from all over the world compete. Fantastic sports-type drama ensues.

2 By Truck, 2 By Bike

2007-04-16T16:57:00.001-07:00

I was unable to go out for a ride on Saturday, due to the powers that be. However, Spencer called me up to ask if he could borrow my lawnmower, as his landlord was going to be showing up the next morning and his lawn was exactly 3-feet-high. I already needed to go out and pick up my borrowed table saw from Noland, so I scooped up the youngest child, stuck her in the truck, and headed out with the lawnmower. A scant 5 minutes after we left the house, the kid was fast asleep in the driving coma. This was good, because I was able to flip on my Mickey Avalon CD without fear of her repeating back some of the lyrics in front of her mother later on. I dropped off the mower at Spencer's and then headed over to Noland's house for the table saw. I had to break in to get it, but I was quickly back on the road and heading home. It was at this time it really began raining and the wind really started going, and I was thankful I was not out on my bike at that moment. The rest of the day was uneventful.

Sunday was a beautiful sunny day. I patiently waited for my lovely wife to return from her business going-ons for the day, and thought about where I would ride to. She returned around 1pm, and I was out on the pavement by 2pm. I started out towards Hawthorne, by way of 42nd Ave (the bike way). I thought I would head across the Hawthorne bridge and drop down on to the riverfront walk to enjoy some cycling by the water. Along the way, I passed the Hawthorne Lucky Lab and started getting thirsty. I got down to the riverfront and came to a halt. It was filled with people slowly walking along enjoying the day. Damn! For some reason I thought I would have it all to myself. I made a mental note never to come this way again while the weather is so nice. I SLOWLY made my way through the throngs of people and down on to Naito, taking me NW towards Thurman. Again, I took a short detour and went right by the NW Lucky Lab Brew Hall, again getting very thirsty. I would have stopped for a pint, but I had exactly zero cash in my pocket. This was familiar territory, so I decided to head out towards St. John's Bridge and stop at Spencer's house to get some beer from him. Spencer was home, but he had no beer. He was kind enough to buy me a pint a block away at the "You're In". PBR was consumed. From there, I decided I would make a full trip of it, just as I had the day before in my truck, and go over to Noland's house. So, out Marine Drive and around I-205 on to Killingsworth, all the way to Noland's house. He and Jen had many beers left over from the party the night before. Again, I consumed a PBR, thanked them and went on my way. The last stop I made was over at the Sandy Bike Gallery, which is an awesome store. It reminded me I need some new gear.

Here's the path I took:
http://www.mapmyride.com/ride/united-states/or/portland/337460327

Arcade Project : Wiring Finished

2006-12-08T09:03:00.000-08:00

I finished up the wiring for the control panel. When I finished, it was far too late (3am) to do any testing, but I plan to knock it out this weekend. It needs some cleanup in the wiring with some tie-downs, but otherwise my wiring is dialed. It's time to rock this monkey.

Here is a close-up of the KeyWiz Max 1.5 keyboard encoder. How does it hook up to your computer? There are 2 PS2 slots. One uses a PS2-out to PS2-in on your mobo. The other PS2 slot is for an external keyboard to attach to. The little switch is used to switch between the two (if needed during testing).

Arcade Project : First Wiring

2006-12-07T13:59:00.000-08:00

I spent some time making my first wirings for the Player 1 joystick and buttons. Then, I took it over to a computer and plugged it in to the control panel. Donkey Kong was the very first test. I had wired up the Left & Right microswitches for the joystick backwards, but overall it was a successful test. All props to Groovy Game Gear and the KeyWiz Max 1.5. This keyboard encoder rules.

Arcade Project : Controls

2006-12-06T16:48:00.000-08:00

My controls arrived today safely from SlikStik. I didn't waste any time getting them hooked in to the control panel.
The photos show the scrap piece of wood I used to test my drilling diameters for the joysticks and pushbuttons.
Next, I drew out the location of every control I was going to mount.
Then, the holes get drilled.

Next, the pushbuttons installed.
And finally, all of the controls are mounted.

The wiring comes next. However, I'm already very happy with my control panel layout. w00t!

Arcade Project : Control Panel Assembly

2006-12-05T01:55:00.000-08:00

Realizing that the controls are going to show up the next day, I decided to put some time in to assembling the control panel. But first, I had to move the cabinet in to the new spot assigned to it in the basement. In order to get the cabinet to squeeze through the door from the garage in to the basement area, I had to take the trim off the door frame. No big deal. A few minutes later and I am sliding the cabinet in to the basement. It barely fits, but once it's on the casters, it rolls really well.

Here is where it goes bad. The end plan is to put it in to the "games" room, in the far back corner of the basement. However, this is the first time I have considered measuring the doorway between the basement and the games room. Way too small to get this cabinet through it. Not even close. So, after discussing our options with the wife, we decide to place it right next to the beer fridge, just inside the garage/basement door. It's actually a great location for it, so it all worked out in the end.

After I got the cabinet in it's semi-permanent home, I began attaching the control panel. It is really beautiful. I have a general idea on where the controls will all be placed, but I don't have exact drawings yet. I'm going to wait until I get the package of controls from SlikStik before doing any more work on it. The photos show the new location for the cabinet, with the control panel top on and another with the top on.

Oh, and I received the keyboard encoder from Groovy Game Gear only 3 days after I ordered it. I can not wait to hook the controls up to it, and run my first test.

New House Done Got Warmed

2006-12-03T11:29:00.000-08:00

Friday night was spent at the Tonic in the company of many friends, getting our brains rocked by the Wheel of Pain. If you haven't already gone out and rocked your metal head to Wheel of Pain, you should. They freeking rule. They are appearing all over the great city of Portland, Oregon. Obey.

Taking a short break from arcade cabinet building, I spent the entire day Saturday cleaning for the housewarming event to be put on at our new fancy Portland residence. Even Mr. Tony of the Avalauncher fame was in attendance, and much ballage was grabbed. Booze was consumed in great quantities, and photos were apparently taken. It was good times and thanks to all who made it out.

Arcade Project : Wheels & Base

2006-12-01T21:50:00.000-08:00

After making another trip to the hardware store, I now have the additional supplies I needed to attach the wheels and the complete base for the cabinet. I didn't realize how many different types & sizes of caster wheels were available until I was standing in the aisle browsing for them. In the end I estimated that the total weight of the cab should probably come in around 500 pounds. That includes all that heavy MDF board, computer hardware, and a big TV/CRT. I picked out four 3-inch casters (2 swivel/lockable & 2 static), each of which is rated to support 225 pounds. I mounted the 2 static casters in the back, and the 2 swivel/lockable ones in the front. I have about 2 inches of clearance from the ground to the bottom of the cabinet kick plate. This is just enough room to reach underneath and lock those caster brakes when I have it in a semi-permanent place.

I also finally got to cut out the pieces to my control panel from the 1/2" MDF board. The photo shows the bottom of the control panel just perched in the place where it will go. I can't screw any parts to the control panel down yet, because I need to move this beast out of the garage first. If I wait until the control panel is attached, then the cabinet will never fit through the door in to the basement area. You can also see one of the speakers I'm planning to mount below the marquee. That will happen much later though. I just wanted to make sure some old speakers I had laying around would fit correctly.

We have our Holiday & Housewarming party tomorrow and I'm wishing this thing was finished.

Arcade Project : Controls & Encoders

2006-11-27T13:05:00.000-08:00

My original plan was to have a 2-player control panel, but after doing some research on what other people have done I have changed my mind. Violet is giving me crap about all the time I'm spending on just deciding on the panel layout. The thing is, it is very important to account for player spacing, controller configuration for multiple games, keyboard encoder limitations, and budget. If budget wasn't an issue, I could run out and buy up all the controls I thought I would ever need.

Anyway, I've decided to build a 3-player control panel with an additional 4-way dedicated joystick, and a 3-inch trackball for games like Missile Command. The dedicated 4-way is for Donkey Kong and Pac-Man, where the movement can get confused if using a standard 8-way controller. At first I thought I would give each player 6 buttons each, thinking this would give them plenty of buttons for all games. However, when I began looking at game controls, I found that only the fighting games like Mortal Kombat used that many buttons. 98% of the games out there which use pushbuttons have 3 or less for each player. So, 3 buttons per player it is. Of course, I am going to make it expandable for more buttons in the future. I would also like to get a spinner knob for games like Tempest, but that is low-priority.

I priced out controls and keyboard encoders, doing research on reviews for both. I also checked out pre-built control panels (X-Arcade and SlikStik ), but didn't find anything that fit me just right. Happ Controls makes what is generally considered the best arcade controls in the business. I actually found it cheaper to purchase the same Happ Controls from the SlikStik web site. They also had a better color selection available for online ordering, since it looks like Happ doesn't update their online catalog as much as SlikStik does. At this moment, joysticks are $11.50 each, and pushbuttons are $1.45 each.

Keyboard encoders are used to take the signals from your controls (joysticks & pushbuttons), and process them in to keystrokes on your computer. There are other ways to process these signals, including taking apart a keyboard and soldering connections (the keyboard hack). I decided the cost for an encoder is worth it. I was considering purchasing one from Hagstrom Electronics , but the $130 price tag was making me dizzy. I also looked at Ultimarc, but in the end I went with the KeyWiz Max 1.5 from Groovy Game Gear . At $41 (includes shipping), and all of the inputs I need... it's a bargain.

I've ordered controls from SlikStik and the keyboard encoder from Groovy Game Gear today. For now I'm holding off on getting the trackball. I know I'm really going to want one soon, but at $130+ it can wait for now. There's some mouse hacks I'm going to look in to also.

Arcade Project : Frame Assembly

2006-11-20T13:59:00.000-08:00

It's time to begin full-frontal frame assembly. After I got enough screwed together, I stood the whole thing up. It ended up being quite a bit more massive than I had anticipated. Now it's about time to head back to the hardware department to pick up some more supplies. I need some big casters to roll it around on, a couple 2x4s to build the base of the frame, and some brackets for general support.

Arcade Project : Cutting

2006-11-18T23:44:00.000-08:00

Today I began the first cuts on the sheets of MDF. As was pointed out, this is really it. No turning back now, since after I cut in to the sheets, I can't really return them to the lumber store. I didn't care because this is going to rock, and I couldn't wait to get started. When I cut out the first side of the cabinet, I stood it up and looked it over. Excellent. It looks like the side of an arcade cabinet.

On to the next side, and then I began cutting some of the 2x2 for the support pieces. Every screw I use is being pre-drilled and counter-sunk. Eventually I will fill these holes and give it a light sanding before I paint it, so the surface of the cab is nice and smooth. I have all sorts of ideas for cabinet side & marquee artwork too. These will need to be attached to smooth surfaces.

Planning for the control panel and internal electronic components continues. I only get to spend a couple hours on this project every few days, so it will all be fairly slow going for now.

Arcade Project : First Steps

2006-11-17T13:22:00.000-08:00

After spending a couple weeks planning and researching, I have decided to go forward with building my own cabinet from scratch. Originally, I wanted to pick up a used cabinet so I could skip this step. However, I found out that some people spend huge amounts of time & money finding and restoring original arcade cabinets. These people are very passionate about cabinet restoration, and I got the impression it would be a terrible shame to take something that could be restored and gut it. Also, cabinets like that are hard to find and are hard to get a hold of for less than $200. I am confident I can build one for less than that, so there you go.

My lovely wife went out and picked up some of the first supplies I need to start the cabinet. On the list: four 2x2 8-foot pine boards, two 4x8 3/4" MDF sheets, and one 4x8 1/2" MDF sheet. This will create the frame and panels. Here you can see I spent an evening planning and drawing all over these sheets of MDF. I've been asked where I came up with the design. During my research I found many plans on the Internet, but I picked my favorite from Jeff McClain's Ultimate Mame Cabinet page and will make some small adjustments to the plan as I go. Jeff is also a home brewer, so I already like the guy without ever meeting him. I'm going to work on the cabinet building without getting to the control panel until I know more about what controls I am going to use.

Arcade Project Gets The Green Light

2006-11-03T10:56:00.000-08:00

I have had an ongoing interest in a new project, which I am officially starting today. I am giving myself a time line on this project to have it completed some time around next Fall (so, about 1 year). The 1 year time line is so that I don't feel pressured to get anything done on it right away, I won't need to slack on any other projects I have going on, and having that determined deadline will help me to keep on track without being disappointed with the slow progress.

I'm going to buy as little equipment as possible to fund it. I will ask for supplies that nobody needs any longer, and reserve the cash for supplies I HAVE to buy. Fortunately, I can use some of the hardware I originally purchased for the HTPC project (which died a while ago), and 60 - 80% of the other stuff I need will be salvaged.

The Project: A MAME Arcade system, including a stand-up cabinet, 2-player controls, and hundreds of original arcade games running on an internal PC system. Hell yeah.

I'm really thinking about custom building the cabinet, since finding a used one in decent condition has been pretty tough. Plus, I would rip out most of the internal components anyway. Time to break out the tools!! I am going to scrounge a monitor off of work or somewhere and the PC will either be something salvaged or some pre-built system from Fry's for under $200.

D U C K S V S B R U I N S T I X H E L L S Y E A H ! ! !

2006-10-14T21:07:00.000-07:00

I attended the Oregon Ducks vs. UCLA Bruins game at Autzen Stadium today with several friends. The Ducks demolished UCLA. Great game. Go Ducks!! Yell-O!!

Laurelhurst House

2006-09-11T08:44:00.000-07:00

Vi and I took a trip to Vegas for one of her big work shows. I helped her set up the booth, and then we spent the rest of the time just enjoying ourselves. We hit the Main Street Station, won a bunch of money, and then proceeded to get hammered and give it all back to the El Cortez. Damn, we love that place.

I flew back in to town to spend one last night at the old house on September 10th. We moved in to our new home on September 11th, 2006. Violet stayed in Vegas to her booth at the ABC Kids Expo. I'm so happy we hired movers. The new house is beautiful.

Felida House : SOLD!

2006-08-23T07:33:00.000-07:00

It went on the market Wednesday (8/16) and sold on Friday (8/18). The inspection was completed on Saturday, and that came back really well with very little to fix. 3 days on the market. It was a "squeaky" clean offer, and we couldn't be happier with the results.

Now it's just a matter of moving. We're hiring a moving company to move everything while we tell them what a great job they're doing. There is still no official move in date, but it will be right around the week of September 10th - 16th. Plenty of stuff going on right around that time. Violet and I are taking a short business/pleasure trip to Vegas, Mia starts at her new school, we close on our sweet Vantucky home, Mt. Angel Oktoberfest, and the list goes on.

Miss Cannon Gray Craft turns 2 today. Happy Birthday, Cannon! Pirate party this weekend. Arrr!

Strawberry Wine

2006-08-16T21:53:00.000-07:00

We worked our tails off getting everything ready, and now our beautiful house in Vancouver is officially on the market.

See the listing here (for a limited time, of course)

Weeks ago, we interviewed the agent who sold us the house originally. We hadn't seen her or talked in over 6 years, but we remember liking her at the time and so we gave it a shot. The interview was horrible. She wanted us to price the house $25K below what we felt it should be listed as. She showed us fliers she had made up for other listings, and they were ugly as sin. She also let us know she would be going on vacation for 2 weeks, right during the time we felt was critical to sell. All of these things forced us NOT to hire her and to move on.

The next agent we interviewed was recommended to us by our Portland agent (who is fantastic). After the interview, we hired her on the spot. Top marks for understanding the market we're selling in and for not being a huge douchebag. The following Monday (August 14th), she came over again to sign papers and take photos. By Tuesday evening we had a sign in the front yard, fliers (which look great), and the RMLS listing.

Today we had 2 walk-thrus, which I think is a good sign for being the first day on the market. We hope for even more Thursday, Friday and over the weekend. It's essential that we get the house sold within the next few weeks, so we don't end up carrying 2 mortgages.

I have gotten an average of 5 hours of sleep every single night for the past 10 days, so I'm ready for things to start settling down. The house looks incredible, and I'm proud of the work we've done to it over the years. We're ready to move to Portland.

PDX Bound

2006-07-26T16:27:00.000-07:00

Well, it finally happened. After 4+ months of looking for a house in the Portland area, we settled on a place. However, it wasn't completely cut-and-dry to how it all went down.

Early last week (July 17th, actually) we saw a house come on to the market that totally caught my eye. After doing some initial research, I called up Violet and told her I was ready to move in to this house. I think my actual words were, "I'm ready to put our house up on the market after seeing this house". That evening we drove by the house and immediately put a call in to our agent, asking to see the inside. Our agent informed us that there was already an offer on the house, but it was a "bumpable" offer. That means the people who put the offer in had a contingency clause stating that they would buy as soon as their house (in California) sold. She also told us that every past similar situation she had been involved with had ended in the 1st position buyer dropping the contingency and following thru with the purchase. If we were to put in an offer, we would be in 2nd position and the 1st position buyers would have 72 hours to respond. So, she said, "Don't get too attached to the house. It's unlikely you'll end up with it."

1:30pm the next day, we were able to walk around the house and see the inside. We fell in love. However, the price on the house was a bit outside of our "affordable" range. So, we sat on it for a few days to debate it all. That Friday (July 21st), we made the decision to put in an offer on the house.

This last weekend was tough. We had a funeral to go to and there was a lot of family in town. We were excited about the possibility of getting the house, but at the same time we didn't want to get our own hopes up for something so unlikely to happen. 72 hours later, the 1st position buyers defaulted and we moved in to first position. That was yesterday at 3pm.

So, what does that mean? It means we're moving to Portland. Finally. It means that we have a hell-ton of work to do before we put our house on the market and move. To make sure we don't end up carrying 2 mortgages for any length of time, we need to put our house on the market in about 3 weeks. We also need to come up with a wad of cash for earnest, down payment, and closing money. We're borrowing as much as we can from friends and family, and then we'll have to figure out a way to come up with the rest on our own. We're going to be hella busy for the next 3 months. It's scary and exciting.

Anyway, closing is in September. The house is in Laurelhurst. Hooray PDX! Oregon is the greatest. Biking to work is going to rule. Living in Portland is going to rule.

Gay Pride Killed Portland Today And Now We Are All Dead

2006-06-18T22:37:00.000-07:00

Violet and I moved all of her studio stuff out of the garage this weekend and in to her new fancy studio space in NW Portland. We rented us a U-Haul truck, packed it full of fabric, sewing machines, 14 immigrant workers, and spent all day Saturday unloading it to the 3rd floor of her building. The new studio / office / showroom is in this great building, just 15 blocks away from my work place. It's a whole new start for her blossoming children's clothing line business, and I'm really happy she has her own space to work. I'm sure being in the garage puts a bit of a damper on the creative spirit.

Anyway, this morning I was looking up some info on the Portland Gay Pride parade, which was scheduled on Sunday (today), to find out if it would effect our route to her building. We had a few more things to get moved today, so we packed up the truck with some furniture and more fabric to spend a few hours getting things a bit more set up for business. On the Internet, the Portland Mercury had some disturbing news. We're all going to die today. At least, according to some quack pastor at some kooky church in Salem, Oregon. Salem, most of you will remember, is formerly of The Catholic School Girls fame, and now is of Bill Niese Lawyer-Fu fame.

The actual proclamation is rather long-winded, but here's how the Portland Mercury broke it down:
1. In June 18, 2006, there will be a Gay Pride Parade in Portland, Oregon.
2. This Gay Pride Parade will bring the judgment of God to Portland.
3. At June 18, 2006, there will be a huge earthquake happen in Portland area, the earthquake will cause a collapse of Bonneville Dam. A wall of water will flood and destroy Portland.
4. There will be another earthquake happen in the West Coast, cause a Tsunami and the Tsunami will go to Portland from Columbia River. So Portland will be flooded also by the Tsunami. (Portland is about 50 miles away from the sea coast.)
5. There will be a team of terrorists, who will bring automatic weapons (machine guns) and kill as many survivors as they can after the disaster. They kill people before the National Guard will arrive there.
6. Portland and the nearby Willamette Valley will be destroyed.
7. God urge the Christians to leave that area.

By some miracle, we are still here and alive. Praise be to Jebus. His fatness is still on the table.

One last thing. A happy Father's Day to me and all the other father-types out there. My father's day was actually pretty cool. The girls let me sleep in, take a shower, they made me breakfast with coffee, and then I got to set my drums back up in the garage, which have been sorely needing some playage time for many, many months now. I got to swill a couple pints down at the Lucky Lab, while hanging with Mia & Cannon. We ate a bowl of peanuts, a cookie, and played silly dancing games for much of the afternoon. Good day to be a dad.

The Bellrays

2006-05-19T12:26:00.000-07:00

Going to see The Bellrays last night at Dante's was as close to a religious experience as I've had in a long, long time. They are fantastic and put on an incredible show. Mr. & Mrs. Bell and Chaz were also there to witness the event. Freaking. Awesome. If you don't know about The Bellrays, go and check them out as soon as humanly possible.

Fatal Hunger Strike Hilarity

2006-05-17T09:33:00.000-07:00

This Friday marks the worldwide cinematic release of Dan Brown's fictional thriller, The Da Vinci Code by Columbia Pictures. It also will kick off a whole bunch of protests against the movie & book by people who mostly feel the story is insulting and blasphemous.

I've read the book. I can't wait to see the movie. Mostly because Audrey Tautou is really hot. The film itself will likely suck, but it seems to be getting some massive attention because of the protests being organized.

At least one group is even encouraging thousands to participate in fatal hunger strikes as a protest. That's basically starving yourself until you die. Obviously, this is a totally reasonable protest over a movie being released, and is in no way irresponsible. Some religious groups are organizing to publicly burn copies of the book, and in one case they wanted to burn an effigy of Dan Brown. Most of the protests are scheduled to be very peaceful events, however I still find it a bit silly when this (like much of the tripe coming out of Hollywood) IS COMPLETE FICTION. Apparently, Opus Dei formally requested that director Ron Howard place a disclaimer at the beginning of the movie stating that it was a work of fiction. Ron said no. His response: "...spy thrillers don't start off with disclaimers."

These guys have some suggestions for working out those "pre-protest jitters" - claiming "see how easy it is to protest!" They also have themselves a live countdown to protest clock. Sweet.

If you're at all interested, you can download and print out one of these fancy posters for your protest event. If you get close enough to fatally starving yourself, you can gnaw on your bleeding Jesus poster for nourishment.

Gray House - White Trim

2006-05-15T09:15:00.000-07:00

Getting ready to buy means getting ready to sell. The list of stuff we need to do is long, but we're slowly getting it all knocked out. The guys we hired to come out and paint the house started on Friday morning. It's all going from blue to gray. We're doing our best to keep the traditional look of the cape cod style house and colors.

Anyway, our list is long and my dad came in to town for the weekend to help us get a few more things done which will make us that much closer to selling. My dad is a workhorse and I just did my best just to keep up. We cut down large sections of trees, dug and replaced post holes for the fence, poured cement, cut and hauled brush, repaired foundation, and fixed trim. A ridiculous amount of projects got done this weekend and the painters worked through the weekend as well to have the job nearly finished.

The hunt for the perfect house in Portland continues. We're still driving by places and learning the neighborhoods while our agent keeps us updated with the latest places on the market. It's all very stressful and exciting.

Redneck Tie-Dye

2006-05-09T08:03:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was a whole lot of stupidness in the forest for the Brian's Bachelor Party event. We scored a campsite in an area about 40 miles East of Estacada. It's just an old forest road near the river, but it always provides a great place to spend the weekend camping. It's also near enough to a great rafting section of the river and just a short trip to Bagby Hot Springs for a refreshing weekend break point.

On Friday, I secured a place with Dan to carpool with in his truck. Before I met him at his place, I had to drive Mia down to McMinville so she could spend the weekend with her grandmother. While I was down there, I quickly set up her wireless network in her new office. Once that was done, I headed back to Portland. It was about 2pm, and I still needed to hit the booze store, the grocery store, and get some pints in me before the haul out there. When I got everything all set to go, I drove over to the Multnomah Village Lucky Lab for some pizza and pints.

Dan called at 4:30 and told me to meet him at his place around 5 so we could load up. When I got there, we got everything loaded in to his truck including firewood. That's when he told me we were taking his couch with us. I told him he was insane, but helped him load it on top of the truck and get it tied down. We were off by a little after 6pm.

When we got to the campground, there was much rejoicing about the couch and how it would make for great firewood come Saturday night. We played horseshoes and got hammered for the rest of the evening. 7 campers in all, and as dudes who go camping do, there was 7 tents to accommodate. I helped finish off a cheap bottle of whiskey and passed out in my tent after hurling a couple times. I woke up the next morning with a sore back after finding and sleeping on the only rock under my tent.

While I was recovering during the morning, 3 more dudes drove up in a big truck and hopped out. They looked like good 'ol boys with the whole "NRA Freedom" hats and camo gear. I thought they were in the wrong place, but it turns out they were the rest of the group. We sat around trying to figure out if we were going to head out rafting for the day or not. The weather had turned a bit cold and they were having a kayaking event on the river, so we opted not to raft it. Instead, the newly arrived group members suggested we go make some "art". Having nothing better to do, we loaded up and drove up the forest road a couple miles.

We found a clearing and unloaded the supplies. Zack, the NRA Freedom dude, turned out to be a local Portland artist. He had a bunch of old paint bottles, little booze bottles filled with ink, and a big ass roll of canvas. He didn't seem to have any brushes on him though. We cut a big square of canvas and placed it on the hillside. Using some pieces of rope, Zack hung bottles of paint and ink above it and then headed back to his truck. He came back with a crap-load of weapons and ammo boxes. These guys had 9mm, .45, shotgun, .22, some other rifle, and a Soviet SKS assault rifle. We were all just staring at them when he loaded them up and began handing them out. I was given the shotgun and was more than happy to empty it out on to the unsuspecting paint bottles while the SKS was cracking off shots to my right. It was really damn fun and by the time we were finished, the canvas had some beautiful colors blasted all over it. Zack announced that the painting we had all just participated in was to be Brian's wedding present after he had it properly mounted and brought to the wedding. That was Redneck Tie-dye. Awesome.

We finished up and headed back to camp to begin drinking again. The hangover had passed and to balance out the gun-toting manliness that had just occurred, the 10 of us played a game of Star Wars Trivial Pursuit around the campfire. For the rest of the evening we figured out what would and would not burn really well, but the couch never made it in to the fire. We left it for the next bunch of idiots to destroy.

Our Sunday morning was rained out, so we all just packed up our crap and headed for home. It was a good time and completely unexpected way to spend the weekend.

** Update: I've been waiting to post this until I hassled the people who took photos enough that they would have them available. I really need photo evidence of the art we created, but I guess those will have to wait until they actually come through.

Portland Or Bust

2006-04-26T12:21:00.000-07:00

Violet and I are back on the list of folks out looking for a new place to call home. We have been talking about it for quite some time, but we keep falling back on the fact that we freaking love the house we're in. Sure, it's in Vancouver, but it's in a really great part of the 'Couve. We have access to excellent schools, we have great neighbors, awesome local parks, and we're really comfortable there. We've been living there for 6 years now, and we have done an enormous amount of work to get the house updated and to fit our style.

Why are we considering the move? Well, let me count the reasons...

1) Commuting in to Portland every day is a bitch. We're a solid 25 minutes (when there's no traffic) in to downtown PDX. The time spent in the truck (when I drive in) usually comes out to just over 1 hour every day. Going to the pump every week to fill up sucks too. In the times I get to take the bus in, the time spent commuting is a bit longer, but the book reading is worth it. The bus costs $3 each way. Parking near where I work is $6/day. All of these things add up quickly, and I'm sick of it.

2) All of our damn friends (except for Pete & Christie) have already made the move to Portland. We would love to have the possibility of more social interaction with these people. As Vi put it, there's nothing that says we'll actually get more socializing in, since moving to Portland won't change the fact that we have 2 kids, 2 dogs, and tons of work to keep up with. However, it should provide some slim additional possibility of seeing these friends.

3) The business will be in Portland. It's well in the future, but we plan to own and operate a public house type of establishment. We don't want the business to be in Vancouver. It should be in Portland. That's where it belongs. It's just a personal preference.

4) We want to be rooted in our kid's school for the long-term. Violet wants the girls to be able to go to the same school(s) for their education. Sure, Portland schools aren't in the best state of affairs right now, but not all Portland schools are affected. There is a growing awareness that parents need to be heavily involved and committed to their local schools in order for them to thrive. We are going to hunt for the right neighborhood which will encourage that involvement. Basically, if we're going to move in to Portland (or anywhere else), we should do it before the girls start normal schooling.

5) The majority of good beer is in Portland.

So, that pretty much covers it. There's some other additional stuff in there, but 5 things makes it seem like I at least tried. Sure, there's some drawbacks I failed to mention (Multnomah County taxes, higher-priced houses, can't pump your own damn gas, etc.), but that's the price you pay.

We are on the schedule to have an Oregon-side residence by the end of this summer. It'll probably take a miracle.

Hippie Shirt

2006-04-24T19:58:00.000-07:00

The Springtime sun and rain combination has made everything in the yard go totally haywire. The weeds have been springing up along with the grass, and I have been dreading getting out there and taking care of it since the beginning of the year. The yard has looked like ass far too long.

So, this last weekend I decided it was time to shake the laziness and get out in the yard for some cleanup. It took the greater part of the entire weekend, but it got done. The yard looks awesome now. I received a nice red sunburn on my neck and arms, but it was completely worth it. It's amazing how much work needed to make up for the last 6 months of total neglect. We still have some more fill-in to do on the planting beds, since 2 whole years without getting them replenished has caused them to look weak. So, we ordered up 5 yards of mulch to be dumped in the driveway on Wednesday. It looks like I have another weekend to spend out there getting things just right, but damn it's worth it.

We spent the evenings grilling up food and even lit up the fire pit to cook up some smores. Good weekend, really.

One evening, the girls were watching some Baby Einstein DVD and one of the kids on the screen had on a tie-dye shirt. I casually pointed out the kid in the "hippie" shirt, and ended up having to explain what a hippie is to my 4-year-old daughter. I left it at a description like, "A hippie is someone who wears tie-dye clothing". I left out the stuff about hacky-sack and pipes. Better to leave that until she's a bit older. Awkward moment successfully delayed!

Tax Day : Weird Guerrilla Style

2006-04-16T13:56:00.000-07:00

Tax day came around this year and instead of digging in and giving the government more cash to fund a war with, we decided to file an extension and go drinking. Our fabulously awesome friend, Aunt Stacie took over babysitting responsibilities for the evening and we were off to a friend and fellow business person's 40th birthday celebration.

The location was somewhere I've wanted to check out for years now, but never came up with a decent reason for going to. Backspace is a gaming center very much like the one I was trying to open up about 3 years ago. It's a coffee bar, lounge area, artist gallery, and online gaming hangout. The only thing they are missing from my vision is the beer.

For those without prior knowledge of the business I was intimately familiar with starting, the gaming location I attempted to organize was going to be a place where online gamers could congregate and destroy each other in virtual cyberspaces. It consists of a bunch of networked machines, playing many different cooperative strategy-based games. The punch was that we were going to serve pints of tasty brew and facefulls of deep-fried everythings. Specials on Bawls and happy hour drinks, appetizers, and memberships were all covered. The whole operation never took off because of dwindling resources and no bank would give me financing (despite presenting a sensational business plan). The fundage on the whole thing went down and I had to go find me a real corporate-type job to start paying the bills again. Anyway, that's all in the past and I now refer to it as just another business learning experience.

So, Backspace is a great place with an artsy spin. They're staffed with a couple of real geeks, Drew and Chris, whom I had the pleasure of rapping out with for a while about business and what-not. They feigned interest in what I was talking about and were stoked when I said I would come by during normal business hours. That was at 3:30am Sunday morning when we decided to finish the night out at the same location we started at. More on that later...

The back room area of Backspace is still under construction, which made it the perfect location for a birthday party/artist showcase/fundraiser, powered by digital record-spinning DJs. I mean, they were real DJs, but they were all Macs and iPods and what-not. Anyway, we brought the birthday girl an appropriate Vantucky-inspired gift of a bottle of Jack Daniels, a pack of smokes, and a WWE ("pro" wrestling) lighter. She was thrilled.

They had a keg of some microbrew and some awesome foodage at the event. We stayed for a bit, but we left just as the fundraiser part was about to begin to hit another favorite bar of ours. We promised Andrea (our birthday girl) that we would hook back up with them at the Shanghai Tunnel later on. Our friend, Steph, had been at another 40th birthday celebration, and we all decided to take a break at the Low Brow together to get drunker.

We walked in to the Low Brow expecting the normal crowd and got the opposite. 90% of the people in there were dressed in some crazy costumes with some definite theme involved. Being that it was such a weird occurrence, we grabbed one of the party goers and interrogated them as to what the hell was going on. It was the inaugural Guerrilla Masquerade Party PDX. Yep. They chose the Low Brow. The poor unsuspecting wait staff was overwhelmed with business. I think they must have supplemented the staff by calling in an extra. It was really bizarre, but I think everyone was having a pretty good time.

After getting some threatening cell calls from Andrea about why we hadn't joined them at the Shanghai Tunnel yet, we decided it was time to hop over there. We gained a very welcome reception from the group and proceeded to close the place down. Seriously, we were the last ones out of there - and only after being asked to leave several times by the staff.

I'm not the first one to say that my wife and Andrea are cut from the same cloth. It becomes even more apparent when they are drinking/talking (read: drunk talking) together. Their actions are similar too. We found this out when I was restraining my lovely wife while at the same time Jim (Andrea's hubby) was mimicking my actions by restraining Andrea from somehow getting involved in an alley fist fight between a couple dudes we didn't know. They both really wanted to step in and "contribute" somehow. I looked at Jim and realized we're married to the same people.

We said our farewells and went looking for our car. Being safely headed toward home is always the best time to turn around and head back to the place where you began the night. So, we did just that. Back to Backspace and we helped close that place down too.

We got back home to a sleeping babysitter on the couch a little after 4am. It was a great night, and one that we don't get to experience all too often being parents of a couple kids. Happy 40th, Andrea!

Now Even More Gay For Google

2006-04-14T07:12:00.000-07:00

Seriously, Google. Could I possibly love you any more?

Google Calendar

The Great Truth

2006-04-07T06:22:00.000-07:00

Last week, my Grandmother ("Grandma Great") died. It didn't happen suddenly or anything, since we all knew it was her time and the way she was in the last few days told her family that her struggle was going to be over any day. She was a wonderful lady and I am glad I had the pleasure of knowing her as well as I did. I am also thankful that my oldest child, Mia, had a great loving relationship with her. However, this fact made it difficult when we were presented with the task of telling Mia about her Great Grandma's passing. The memorial service was yesterday, so over last weekend we began collecting information over the web and at the library about the best way to tell a child about death.

Most, if not all of the literature we found regarding children and explaining death talked about being straightforward. Don't use any euphemisms or descriptions that might be misleading, like don't say the person "went to sleep and didn't wake up" or "got sick and died" or even "they went on the final journey". Kids aren't going to be able to make the distinction between these vague ideas of dying and what really happened.

When I sat down to talk with Mia earlier in the week, I told her that Grandma was very old and even though the doctors tried their best to keep Grandma alive, she ended up dying. I asked her if she knew what that meant. She looked up at me sadly and said, "It means I can't see Grandma anymore". I told her that was true and then we talked a little more about how it was her body that isn't alive any more since it stopped living. She told me that she understood that we will all die, but she isn't going to die any time soon. Grandma was 83, and she lived a very full and long life. We all hope to be around that long. Overall, things went well with the discussion on death, and we concluded by agreeing if Mia had any questions at all about it, she could ask us at any time.

Yesterday, we made the trip out to Sheridan, Oregon to pay our respects. I agreed to be a pallbearer for the casket, so we got there a bit early to get organized. We sat in the 3rd row in the church during the ceremony. Mia sat next to me, occasionally asking questions. She saw the casket right up front and asked where Grandma Great was. I told her she was in the box. She thought about this and then asked why we had put Grandma in the box. I told her it was so her family and friends could say goodbye to her one last time. She replied, "It's kinda small. I don't think she could fit inside". I reminded her that Grandma was a pretty little old lady.

At the end of the service, they opened the casket to allow everyone to pay their respects on the way out the door. As we waited, Mia could see Grandma's head inside the casket and I took the opportunity to tell her about what was happening. She asked if she could go up and see Grandma, and I told her yes, but we would go up together. Mia stared at the casket for a few minutes, processing everything. Then she looked at me and whispered, "Daddy, I think it's only her head in there". Biting back a grin, I assured her that ALL of Grandma's body was inside. She persisted with, "All of her? Even her legs?". Yes, it was all there. I don't think she believed me.

When it was our turn, we walked up together and Mia checked everything out. Grandma's body didn't really look like Grandma anymore, which was weird. I tried to gauge how Mia was taking it all. She seemed content and we began walking towards the exit when she said, "Daddy, her legs aren't in there". We walked back to take a look. The front half of the casket was open, but the lower part wasn't, so it did indeed appear as if only 50% of Grandma made it in. Again, I assured her that the rest of Grandma was under the rest of the box and she would just have to trust me on this one.

After my duties as a pallbearer were over, we went to DQ for some chicken strips and ice cream. Yup.

Today is Mia's 4th birthday, so Happy Birthday to my sweet Mia monkey. The hula-themed party is tomorrow and then the crazy-pink-little-girl-bowling-and-ballerina party is on Sunday. w00 w00!!

Oregon Humor

2006-03-30T16:17:00.000-08:00

Funniest thing I've read all day today:

A Texan, a Californian, and an Oregonian are out
riding horses.

Suddenly the Texan pulls out an expensive bottle of
whiskey, takes a long drink, then another, then
throws it into the air, draws his gun
and shoots the bottle.

With bourbon raining down, the Californian looks at him and says, "What
are you doing? That was a perfectly good bottle of
whiskey!"

The Texan says, "In Texas, there is plenty of
whiskey and the bottles are cheap."

After some time, the Californian pulls out a bottle of champagne, takes
a few sips, throws the champagne into the air, pulls
out his gun and shoots it.

The Oregonian can't believe his eyes, "What
the heck did you do that for? That was a perfectly
good bottle of champagne!"

The Californian says, "In California, we have
plenty of champagne and bottles are cheap."

A while later, the Oregonian pulls out a
bottle of Widmer Hefeweizen. He opens it, first takes a
sip, then chugs the whole thing. He carefully puts
the bottle in his saddlebag, pulls out his gun
and shoots the Californian.

The Texan, shocked, says, "Why the hell did
you do that?!"

The Oregonian replies, "In Oregon, we have
plenty of Californians and the bottles are worth a
nickel.

Flying Solo For 15 Hours

2006-03-09T14:24:00.000-08:00

Violet is back off to New York for another business trade show thingy. She leaves late Friday night, and isn't back until the following Wednesday night. Seeing this as another extended amount of time at home with both of our girls, I decided to make the call in to their Grandmother. "Hey, do you think you would be able to take the girls over the weekend down to your place?". Grandma says not for the whole weekend, but she can pick them up on Thursday evening and then I would go and get them Saturday afternoon. That sounds like a pretty solid plan, which will leave me with a whole evening of doing whatever the hell I want to. Friday night.

Now, after thinking about this for a bit, I realize that I'm getting relief for only about 6 hours, really. I'm driving Vi to the airport late on Friday night, and then driving to pick up the girls the following afternoon. A total of 15 hours for complete solo bachelor-type behavior; with over half that time being spent on useless sleeping! Dammit.

Of course, Noland is planning a throw-down celebration of some sort on Saturday night, so that's out. So, if anyone is up for meeting at a pub around 11pm on Friday night, let me know. If there are no takers, I'll either:
A) Find myself bellying-up to a bar all by my lonesome, or
B) Go home, watch a damn movie, and be in bed by 1am.

Rock on.

Contracting With D-A-V-E

2006-03-08T13:07:00.000-08:00

On Tuesday I took a contracting gig working at Dave's current place of employment (thanks, Dave). It was a strange feeling being in an environment with other tech-types in close quarters. Daily, I'm working at a place with no other techies at all -- and being in a design studio, I'm the only one sporting a PC, while everyone else works on their Macs.

Anyway, the benefits to working with other developers is apparent when a troubling bit of code or programmatic situation is being worked on. Having someone (or many others) to bounce ideas off of or to help find a solution is invaluable. Being able to work with a team and share in the development of one application is pretty damn cool. I haven't been in that sort of application development team environment since Gee-Dubbaya-Eye. Admittedly, the best thing about the development team there was the code development meetings which involved about 20 minutes of code discussion, followed by 90 minutes of drinking. Best. Meetings. Ever.

The drawbacks to having other developers in the same office or room as you is that the code base is no longer under your absolute and complete control. If something goes haywire and you don't have immaculate code dependency tracking and control, then get ready to start fixing other developer's bugs. As it is now, I get to architect my code from beginning-to-end, using my standards and guidelines for structure, consistency, testing, and documentation. That's a hard thing to give up.

Anyway, working with Dave (even indirectly) was pretty cool and he took me out to lunch at Typhoon for some kick-ass Thai food.

More Fenouil To The Fire

2006-03-03T07:44:00.000-08:00

My experience at a fancy Portland Pearl-District French restaurant is shared among others in the Portland area. These poor people had a much worse time there, but the whole story rings true.

Customer Service - F
(Thanks to Bill for sending this link over)

This week has been a blur. Wednesday I took the day off and hung out with the kids. We went to the local beach at Vancouver Lake and spent a windy day out on the sand. Afterwards we stopped by the Southwest Washington Humane Society to look at and pet all the caged animals. This is some of the best free entertainment available for kids. We can spend an entire hour just poking at the homeless animals and then walk away. The girls keep asking if we can get a kitty. I tell them they have to wait until one of the dogs die.

Back On Auto-Commute

2006-02-27T08:12:00.000-08:00

We loaded up my pickup with a crap-ton old toss-away wood and garbage from the garage this weekend. We're on the final legs of finishing up the garage studio project and some things just had to go. Since we finished up late on Saturday, we planned to take the truck-load of junk to the dump on Sunday. I found out Sunday morning, while sipping a cup of coffee, that the dump is closed on Sunday. Suckage. My Monday morning commute plans had to change since I really didn't want to haul a huge load of crap in the back of the pickup down to Portland and back. Back to the bus.

I woke up at 4:45am this morning, thanks to Cannon crying about a dozen new teeth poking thru her gums. This worked out fine since I had the alarm set for 5am anyway. I popped out of bed, dressed and grabbed a book I've been putting off reading for months. I drove to the park-and-ride of the "Jeep got stolen" fame, and caught the 5:20am express to downtown Portland.

Settling in with a book for a solid 30 minutes and not thinking about traffic once was heaven. I miss the bus commute desperately. Of course, it always hurts sticking 3 semi-crisp dollar bills in the box every time I get on this particular bus line, but by the time I arrive at my destination I know the money was well spent.

Nickel & Three-Granding Me To Death

2006-02-26T09:15:00.000-08:00

Coming up in May, we'll have been living in our current house for 6 years. When we first moved in, the inspector told us that the roof was in decent shape, but would need to be re-shingled in about 2 years. The current shingles were original to the house when it was built way back in 1983, but since we have a high-angle of slope on the roof, it has taken longer to degrade the shingles than a normal house in this area. A shingle job should last about 12 - 15 years on the average house.

Anyway, getting back to our massive neglect, it is in our plan to get the house re-shingled this year. How much will a project like that cost? A few grand. We need new windows on the house to replace the see-thru cardboard it FEELS like we have up now. Since the massive window we replaced in the kitchen ran a few grand to put in, we're thinking a more cost-effective solution to the rest of our windows is in order. Replace the front windows this year -- costing a few grand -- and the back windows next year -- again, a few more grand.

To keep the outside of the house from looking like ass, we are also overdue for an exterior paint job. We just had a contractor over last week and got the quote: $2900 (a few grand). We scheduled that to happen in May.

Also on the agenda for the year is to take out a few of the trees in the yard, which have gotten too large or are growing a bit too close to the house. The birch on the East side of the house is now overhanging the roof, dropping copious amounts of organic debris all over the roof. This causes moss to grow all over the roof and makes the gutters hell to clean twice-a-year. The cost of taking out the offending growth will be a nickel. If only that were true... nope, it's going to cost about a grand, but I'm sure we'll find something else to dump another couple in to while we're at it.

Ah, the life of a homeowner. Repeat the mantra and don't stop this time: "This sure will be nice when it's all finished..."

New Design Has Landed

2006-02-23T15:37:00.000-08:00

Got inspired last night and whipped up a batch of new design for my site. It actually belongs on my business web site, but my blog gets the initial update while I finish writing up my copy (fancy word for text content). Until that happens, I will continue to display the temporary maintenance page which has been up for almost 6 months now.

For my birthday yesterday, Violet and Mia made up a carrot cake with the most delicious cream cheese frosting ever. Carrot cake continues to be my favorite of the cake flavors. Mia made me an awesome card and she was so proud of it too. She's such an awesome kid. Cannon continues to be the nutty baby she always has been. Sweet girls.

Mmmm... beer pouring robots.

Pimpmobile

2006-02-22T07:41:00.000-08:00

My mother is making her annual trip to Mexico today to help build a home for some poor family. She is part of her church's outreach program that does this same thing around this time every year. Good for her. Spread the word of Jebus and all that too. This time she is taking my 15-year old cousin from Willamina with her. Let him see the world and all that, I guess.

They came to the house last night and watched the girls while Violet and I went out to eat at Gustav's for some German food and beer. Gustav's was awesome. I had the schnitzel club with potato salad, along with a couple pints. We shared the Bavarian Cream desert over coffee after our meal while talking business. It was a greatly needed time for us to actually talk to each other without the kids around. That kind of thing rarely happens these days.

Anyway, I took my mother & cousin to the airport this morning at 5:15am so she could catch her flight out. Since I was on my way to work at that time anyway, I chose to simply take her car in after dropping them off. Preparing for the journey, I grabbed some CDs from my pickup. Once we got started down the road, she informed me the CD player doesn't work. So I'm stuck with ass-radio. Next, I realize that the car is making a lot of noise and driving a bit rough. When I ask about it, she says, "Oh, that's probably just the snow tires". Snow tires. Great. It's not snowing here and it's not going to snow here any time soon. I might as well have had chains on for all the noise it was making.

We get to the airport and I help them get their bags out of the trunk. As I'm closing the trunk, I take a gander at the vehicle I'm going to be taking in to work. It's got a huge yellow ribbon on the back with the ever-popular post nine-eleven "Pray for our troops" sponsorship logo. A great big American flag taped to the back window, making vision out the back a burden. Finally, both back door windows are covered with royal blue signs taped up saying, "Ask me about a great 'Get Away Massage'!" (her new business name, now that she's a licensed massage therapist). That's pimp.

Side note: Today's topic is Bender Bending Rodriguez #6 most-uttered word.

Happy Birthday to me. Year Thirty-One.

This Makes Ogre Angry

2006-02-21T19:14:00.000-08:00

3 bit computer for 2 bit nerds

More little geek toys for your bad ass.

Wooden Napkin Ring Slappy

2006-01-31T22:35:00.000-08:00

I got my kegging on this weekend with some assistance from my dad. He was in town for the weekend for some family stuff. Mostly, it was my sister & her husband's joint birthday celebration. My sister turned 30. She planned some fancy-ass event at Fenouil - a classic French cuisine place in the Pearl. The birthday event included most of our family as well as about 10 of her friends & co-workers. The place blows. We were told it was a kid-friendly establishment, so we brought along the crumb-snatchers (this being a family gathering and all). The staff seemed really put-out that kids were in the restaurant or something. When they served us wine, I reached for the glass and the waitress audibly grunted in indignation over my uncouth behavior. She purposely reached across, snatched the napkin from in front of me, yanked it out of it's little wooden ring, and placed it over my hand. She then waited expectantly glaring at me until I placed it on my lap. When I did so, she bolted. My father got the same treatment. Geezus. Just because you WORK at a French restaurant doesn't mean you have to encompass the cliche of being a rude French waiter.

The true insult was that my sister picked this place for her and her husband's birthday. Her hubby is from England. He didn't find anything about the place funny. She told me the reason for choosing Fenouil was because it was a place her family would never pick and wouldn't be comfortable going to. She nailed it. Their only saving grace was that they carried Terminal Gravity on tap. It came in a funny glass (read: not a pint), but it was TG, so I didn't have to end up throttling the uppity wait staff.

This weekend promises to be time mostly spent in the garage. Violet and I have been working on converting the garage space in to a usable workspace/studio for her business. In the last 2 weeks I have finished installing the electrical, putting up insulation, and laying drywall for one wall. Let's see... um... oh yeah -- 3 more to go. I might step foot out of the garage for a short time to watch Seattle & Pittsburgh play in the Superbowl XL. PREDICTION: Seattle will win by 13 points. Hooray.

If you haven't seen The Boondocks, a half-hour show on Adult Swim, then either start watching it or head over a your favorite torrent site to download some sugar. It deserves some awards.

Oatmeal Stout Brewing

2006-01-27T13:43:00.000-08:00

Billy and I got together for another installment of Justin & Bill's brewery hijinks. This time we put together a ultra-heavy oatmeal stout. Bill came up to Vancouver from his drudgery at Salem Law School on a rainy Saturday afternoon a few weeks back. After the boil, we ran it thru the counter-flow chiller and I noticed it was about the blackest brew I've ever seen. I took a hydrometer reading yesterday to see where it's at. Good news: it's finished. The still-unnamed oatmeal stout reads in at 7.4% alcohol and the taster I downed was fantastic. This weekend will be time to keg and carbonate. Next weekend we drink it.

OG: 1.086
SG: 1.029

I've been busy like a mofo with a long list of boring crap I'll get around to boring the crap out of any readers who still wander by. So, you've all got THAT to look forward to.

I have like 4 posts I've started and never completed. It's probably time to either post them or delete them. I can't even remember most of what happened in Vegas anymore, and I'm sure my other posts suck anyway. Design changes are in the air...

Anti-Christ? No. Anti-me.

2006-01-01T22:04:00.000-08:00

I've finally found the anti-me. It's a web site devoted to the opposite of what I love and believe in. Please check out how awesome their site is.
PROHIBITION.ORG

The best bit is their "values" area. Dear Intelligent Design. They suck. It's the new year and I'm still drinking. If you have ever said something equivalent to, "George Bush is the best thing to ever happen to this country!", you will totally agree with what these people have to say. I, however, disagree with everything they stand for (except for the part of living well). Prohibition was the worst thing that has happened to this country since it's inception as a country. Hands down. Yes, we have had plenty of terrible tradgedies in America and all that, but seriously, prohibition was so destructive to our culture as a whole. Prohibition = worst idea ever.

Breweries took a huge hit as a whole. Superior brewing recipes were wiped out completely or forgotten. Prohibition lasted 13 years. It cost the U.S. 500 Million per year to control. It was also considered a complete failure. Nice work, jackasses.

Worst idea ever. I'm still angry.

The Snippage

2005-12-01T07:09:00.000-08:00

It's taken me a while to get around to it, but I have been in pain, so sharing that pain seemed even more painful while I was in it. Now that I am recovered I can share.

3 weeks ago I went in for voluntary sterilization (aka: vasectomy). The process itself was rather painless, but the recovery period was pretty rough. Per my doctor's instructions, I took my prescribed valium 1 hour prior to surgery. Violet drove me in to the hospital and by the time we got there I was feeling relaxed in a huge way. After shuffling in to the office and getting called in, I sat on the exam bed and dumbly stared at the wall trying to figure out how I could get more valium. The nurse took my blood pressure (which was very low -- feeling good), and then she left telling me the doctor would be in to see me in a few minutes. I promptly fell asleep.

I woke up and the doctor began work almost immediately. He began asking me about my job and had me talking about web coding, eBay addictions, fishing, and beerfest. Before I knew it he said he was finished. The whole thing took about 20 minutes with no pain involved. He asked if I had brought a jock strap, which I told him I had. He suggested that I continue wearing a jock for at least the next few days while the worst of the swelling went away, and to put ice on my stuff to decrease swelling. He also gave me a little plastic cup and ordered me to bring it back in to the clinic with a sample inside within 6-to-8 weeks. They'll check it for any swimmers and I'll be considered safe and sterile after 2 "all clear" samples. If recanalization has occurred, I'll have to go back in for another try. That would be bad. Finally, the doctor told me I should stay off my feet and not to try even sitting upright for the next few days.

So, I thanked the doctor and headed out to the lobby. Violet was there to take me home and I promptly got in to bed to rest. I felt some minor pain -- more of an ache -- in my stomach and groin. That ache increased over the next couple days, but I did my best to stay off my feet and to keep my groin extra-safe from anything and everything directly hitting it. I kept switching out bags of frozen peas to keep down the swelling. Most of the time I spent watching movies or catching up on my GTA - San Andreas playing. Violet did a great job of keeping the kids off of me for most of my recovery period and she took care of any food/beverage needs too.

The surgery was on a Thursday, so by Sunday I was up and moving around. There was still some very sore spots, but the swelling had gone down and the ice was no longer needed. I returned to work on Monday morning, but ended up taking Tuesday off after I had pushed it a little too hard too soon. I think the thing that caught me off guard the most was the after-effects which weren't discussed by the doctor and I had no idea what the hell was going on. Namely, I couldn't tell when I had to piss. You know that feeling you get when your bladder is telling you it needs some pressure relief? Well, I couldn't get that feeling at all. I wasn't incontinent or anything, but I would have to just guess if I might have to piss every so often. It was a weird experience. After asking some other guys who have gotten the Big V, the consensus was that it has to do with the local anesthetic you get down in the scrotum just before the cut is made. Tasty. Anyway, that was fairly annoying for about a week.

Full recovery was marked about 2 full weeks after the surgery. Bladder fill sensors were functioning, I didn't have to walk around like a cowboy any more, and things were generally happy down below once again.

Kitchen Window Installed

2005-11-04T22:01:00.000-08:00

Here's the new kitchen window. It is huge. The area all around it is jacked up still because we had to post new drywall around the hole, take down a cabinet, the trim, backsplash, and so on. I'll get another photo posted when it's done-done with all the finishing touches. Yee haw.

Thursday Morning Demolition

2005-11-03T15:50:00.000-08:00

We have window installers coming tomorrow morning to fill most of the South wall in the kitchen with window instead of wall. This morning I took the area they need to work in down to the studs. It took me about 3 hours to finish the work, but I still need to pull the electrical thru this evening. The main reason it needed to be done was so they could insert the king studs for the window headers. There is a venting pipe for the sink which I'll also need to cut and replace after they get the headers in tomorrow. It'll should be loads of fun.

The outside looks in on our kithen. I put up plastic to protect the side of the house from the rain that keeps falling from the sky.

Killing A Pumpkin For Beer

2005-11-02T15:29:00.000-08:00

The pumpkin ale has been re-created this year. I began with the same recipe Bill and I used the last time and ended up modifying it to use more pumpkin which was spiced while baking, more fresh spices (instead of powdered), the Craft-grown hops, and a different yeast (East Coast Ale from White Labs).

For the first time I cooked this batch outside in the chilly night instead of the comfort of the stovetop. I used a propane cooker and it seemed to work out nicely. The hardest part of it was hauling the cooked wort inside the house to run it thru the counter-flow chiller when it was all done.

It smells incredible so far and should be ready to make an appearance at the annual Thanksgiving festivities this year. I wish I could have made 10 gallons of this brew instead of only 5, but if it rocks as much as I think it will, I'll make another batch next month.

Add One More Hour

2005-10-30T07:07:00.000-08:00

I have always been happy about gaining an hour in the Fall. An extra hour of sleep is how I would look at it. Well, you know who doesn't get to benefit from gaining an hour in daylight savings time? The parents of young children. Kids don't care if it's only 6:30 in the morning, according to your clock time. They have slept their fill and are ready to drive you insane and reaching for the aspirin before 10am. Joy.

Pepper Kegged

2005-10-29T22:46:00.000-07:00

I was worried that the 2 pepper brews hadn't fermented enough and had gotten stuck during the fermentation. I went to rack them both today and took a hydrometer reading on each 5-gallon carboy. I was completely wrong. Both have fermented completely as initially expected, and both are kicking ass in the flavor department. Instead of racking them, I ended up kegging them both. I'll be giving them another week of force-carbonation before testing the final results, but I'm pretty happy so far.

Tomorrow, I will be re-brewing the Pumpkin Ale that we kicked ass on a couple years ago. I didn't brew it last year... I don't know why. It's hella good brew. A tasty alcoholic pumpkin flavored beer always sends a warm welcome to the holiday season.

My brother and his wife are back from Cancun. Hurricane Wilma tore that area up while they were there. Unlucky SOBs. Anyway, they are back safe and all is well.

The Big V

2005-10-17T12:35:00.000-07:00

It took me a while to decide if I was going to blog about a serious decision and upcoming possible medical procedure. Normally it's something considered private and not really sharable material for the masses. But I said screw that.

Violet and I have 2 awesome daughters. They are both wonderful and beautiful kids. We love them so very much, but we really don't want any more. We had to make a decision on how to handle it. I drew the short straw.

That's right, I'm going in for a vasectomy. Before I go under the knife, I thought I would do some research online about the procedure. I also hit up some other guys I know who have had one in the past. The information collected was great stuff. This is a short vasectomy Q&A (PDF) which was very helpful.

I'd have to say I was quite uninformed about vasectomies in general. The top 3 things I would have gotten totally wrong in a quiz before reading up on it were:
1) Some men do not truly become sterile for 6 - 8 weeks following a vasectomy because of sperm "downstream" that need to be worked out.
2) Because sperm makes up less than 10% of the ejaculate fluid, there is no noticeable change in the amount or appearance of ejaculate or the sensation of ejaculation following vasectomy.
3) The actual proceedure often lasts less than 30 minutes.

Today I went in for a meet-n-greet with my urologist. He gave me the dope on what the vasectomy is all about. He had to get a good sense from me to make sure I should have one at all. After speaking with him for a bit, he began slipping on some surgical gloves. "Hey doc", I said, "are you getting ready to, um, do something there?". After a short exam of the goods, he showed me what needs to be shaved before coming in for the surgery. I asked him if I could just wax it all off, but he didn't think that was very funny.

Before I left, he handed me a little packet with writing on it. It says, "VALIUM - TAKE ONE HOUR PRIOR TO APPOINTMENT. DO NOT DRIVE WHILE ON THIS MEDICATION". Inside is a little blue pill. I told the doc thanks for the valium and he told me to use it wisely.

I made the appointment in early November, so I'm going in to get clipped in just a few short weeks. Wish me luck.

Chili Beer 10 Gallons Brewed

2005-10-12T23:42:00.000-07:00

It's been a long time since I've thrown together a brew. Far too long.

The chili beer (still unnamed) was first brewed in April of 2004 by Billy and I. We did 5 gallons cooked with jalapeno and serrano peppers, and the other 5 gallons without. In the end, the pepper brew was far superior to the brew without. Bill and I decided to brew the chili beer because we were inspired by The Old Market Brewery - Hot Tamale Ale.

We created the recipe with our own ideas on how to go about it. It's got the jalepeno and serrano peppers as well as starthistle honey and some Cascade hops. The end result was this incredible smelling and tasting beer with a spicy hot kick that hits you shortly after sipping. It's just the right amount of spice that makes you want to keep drinking the beer. Nothing wrong with that.

I spent 2 evenings brewing 10 gallons of this chili beer with slight modifications. The original brew was done with 2 pounds per 5 gallons of chilis - deseeded. This one was made with only 1 pound, but with seeds included. Also, I used a mix of Cascade and Willamette hops from my homegrown collection instead of the original Cascade-only recipe.

If you've ever wondered if you can pitch only 1 vial of White Labs yeast upon 2 5-gallon carboys over the course of 2 days.... the answer is yes. Yes you can.

UW Undergraduate Presentation

2005-10-05T07:21:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I headed up to Seattle and the University of Washington Business School to assist with the presentation of an undergraduate project proposal to undergraduate business students.

This is not a normal Tuesday evening for me.

Myself and a business associate of mine (some dude I did some work for) made the trip up there together. Basically, he is a graduate of UW and a former VP of HP (you know -- the printer company). He started a unique sort of business and needed my web application expertise to run the web side of his business. We launched the application back in June of this year and it has been working well. However, he felt the business could utilize some "free" resources in terms of marketing & development ideas. He spoke with some old professors of his and got ourselves set up to present our joint effort in front of students looking for a project to complete their educational credit requirements.

When we got up to the UW campus, we found the classroom where we were presenting. We slapped on some name tags, met the business professors and settled in for the presentations. Including us, there were 5 companies in all. In order of appearance, they were: Expedia.com, Alaska Airlines, King County Metro, and DMP Interactive. We did our thing when it was time and we answered a few questions from the students afterwards. The response was not overwhelming for our project, but hey - we were up against Expedia.com.

Overall, I was suprised that the students really didn't ask many intelligent questions. They just seemed to be asking very surface questions which had little to do with the projects presented. I spoke with a few students who were very enthusiastic about our project, but again they asked dumb questions with no substance.

We're going to hear back from the interested students to create a team for handling the project requirements by the end of October. Either it will fly or it won't. This could be a good thing if it pans out. It doesn't look real likely though.

Finished Linen Closet

2005-10-04T10:48:00.000-07:00

Finally, photos of the "finished" linen closet. Two more cabinet doors and the bottom sliding drawer will eventually be added. The current drawer front was too short, so it looks like its going to be another trip back to the Rebuilding Center.

To see what it used to look like, photo here.

Sapphire Hotel Is Beatles Friendly

2005-10-03T08:06:00.000-07:00

The wife has survived another year, earning her an additional birthday. In celebration we decided to wrangle a sitter and go out on the town together. We still live in Vancouver, Washington, and knowing that we have basically exhausted every last place to "go out" to in the 'Couve, I called Noland to recommend a place in Portland which we haven't had the chance to try out yet. After some thought, his recommendation for The Sapphire Hotel on Hawthorne was the one that stuck out as our best choice.

Since it's right on 50th & Hawthore, there was no problems finding the place. Being a Sunday evening, the traffic, parking, and crowd was sparse. This was to our liking, since we were looking for something that would be lightly romantic. This place delivers well. It was an comfortable atmosphere, with every table set with candlelight and simple place-setting. The menu is concise, but every dish sounded awesome. Their drinks are stiff and they have happy-hour every single day from 3-6pm. We had drinks, a fantastic dinner, and then both ordered desert. This is now one of my very favorite places to go for a night out in the Portland area.

One thing that seemed off about the situation was that Noland had suggested it, and almost as if on cue they played an hour worth of Beatles music about 10 minutes after we walked in the door. During our meal and desert the tunes moved more towards a Bob Dylan and some acoustic music, but the Beatles music thing still stuck with me. I like the Beatles just fine, so no problems with the music selection for that evening.

After the Sapphire, we didn't want to cut the night short so we headed to Barnes & Noble in Jantzen Beach for some book perusing. It was a great night out and it was a reminder that Violet and I still enjoy spending time out together without the kids around.

Cedar Kicks Ass

2005-09-22T22:16:00.000-07:00

Finished project.

Maid Service Now Included

2005-09-21T22:14:00.000-07:00

Overnight, we have gone from the type of family who doesn't have a maid service to the type of family who does have a maid service. Yeah, it's weird. Violet and I have been knocking the idea around for a while since her business is really taking off and it has been increasingly difficult to keep the house clean and have any free time together in addition to preparing the house for appraisal, etc.

So, a maid service costs us $20 an hour and we have her coming in once every 2 weeks to clean for about 4 - 5 hours per visit. It's a bit expensive I guess, but damn, this lady cleans the entire time. When she leaves, we have this clean house to maintain for the next 2 weeks. It's really nice. The cleaning crap that only gets done once in a very long while because of other craziness, now gets done every 2 - 4 weeks.

I've always viewed people who have a maid service as those people who would rather just have someone else clean up after them. Now I think many people have it because they are going thru the same situation we are. Basically, your time is more valuable spent doing something else, and the potential for enjoyment of the time is greater than the potential for enjoying the $80 you're going to part with.

We're maid people now. We still don't have a yard crew, because I still love getting out in the yard and killing some plants, dammit.

Lighting Is Good

2005-09-18T01:12:00.000-07:00

Last minute addition of installing low-wattage lighting in the steps set my finish to the project back by one day.

Support Issues

2005-09-14T21:08:00.000-07:00

I ended up having to sink 2 new concrete piers for corner post supports since the jackasses who originally put the deck in used a combination of the stuff in the photo to support the sinking, dry rotted corner post. Nice work. The pier was sunk well below the soil level. In the place of actual solid support was bricks, rocks, and two-by-fours. It was a mess.