My boy blue...

has kicked the bucket for real this time. (link)

Joseph "Patrick" Cranshaw, a veteran character actor who unexpectedly attained pop-culture status playing "Blue," the elderly fraternity brother in the hit comedy "Old School," has died. He was 86.

Your my boy blue!!

Everything was going good then....

Well, we installed the Adelphia cable service today and we can tell a difference. But then I read this article from slashdot. It seems that the attornies have come to a provisional settlement in the class action suit against Sony/BMG in the whole rootkit fiasco, and it doesn't look very good.

• 1) It says nothing that Sony/BMG has to do anything to undo what they did to their customers computers or have to provide cash compensation for the ones who sought help, however they do have to repair the unintentional security threats that was part of the whole fiasco.
  
• 2) It basically ligitimizes future similar DRM schemes as long as they are disclosed on the jewel case and the EULA. In addition, an uninstaller must also be provided.
• 3) The role of the EULA is ligitimized implicitly but never explicitly stated as such.
• 4) Their ability to collect personal information in their media products as to provide what they call "only for purposes of providing enhanced functionality" is legitimized.

If you roll over and say or do nothing then what you are saying is that its open season to do whatever they want to and with your personal computer. This is saying that Sony does not have to fix the computer nor remove their rootkit, just put some bandaids over the security vulnerability and call it a day. This is an outrage. There was not a EULA nor any indication that this software was on the CD nor being installed. There was no way to decline the installation nor was there a way to uninstall it.

While they say that this may lead towards a Digital Rights Management Protection Act, what is going to be in that Act other than letting anything and everything including the kitchen sink be thrown at you in the way 0f DRM software.

Don't let this happen, do like I am and seek someone out be it a Representative or Senator and let them know that this is digital rape. This will allow companies to rape you and your computer. Stand up now or it may be too late.

~Kisea

Nothing to see here really...

Well, I went to pick up the self install kit for mom's cable 'net service and I remembered that I needed to change the oil in my truck. So, I stop by Autozone to pick up 6 quarts of oil and an oil filter. I get 7 quarts of Ford Motorcraft oil and a Ford Motorcraft oil filter. I return home and proceed in changing the oil. I had the oil draining into my pan and I started filling the new oil filter with oil and mom asked 'why do you do that, they don't do that where I get my oil changed'? I tell her that I like to do things my way, thats why I have never had the oil changed in my vehicle by someone other than myself. I am picky about things like that. I would rather take about 30 minutes out of my day every 3 or 4 months to change the oil myself.

The reason why I put oil in the filter is simple, when you start your engine the first few seconds are critical. They have been formulating oils which cling to the parts in your engine more because those first few seconds after starting your engine is typically when your engine is not lubricated and suffers the worst damage. After you change your oil, the oil pump has to fill the filter with oil before it can further lubricate the engine. Thus, I fill my oil filter with oil before I install it on the engine.

If you were to look closely at a Ford Motorcraft filter, you will notice some little rubber baffles. These were added so that oil would not drain out of the filter when the motor was turned off. None of the other filters I have looked at have this feature which is why I always buy a Motorcraft filter for my truck. I also only use Ford Motorcraft oil because who else knows what kind of oil should be used in their products other than the manufacturer. I am proud to say that I have not had any engine problems with either of my two Ford trucks which could be in any way attributed to a problem with the lubrication system, oil filter or myself.

Now, I talk about computer related stuff a lot on here and since I worked as a mechanic for about 2.5 years before moving to Mobile to finish off my college degree I thought I would share this little insight with you. I don't know how many of you out there change your own oil, but don't be scammed. I don't know how often they do it now, but mom used to get her oil changed at Walmart. Every couple of oil changes they were charging her for a new drain plug. What they were doing was they were removing the plug with an air wrench and they would tighten it back up with an air wrench. After doing that a few times into the relatively thin metal they use to make oil pans it would either muck up the threads or strip the head of the plug. So, they would charge for an oversided, self-tapping plug every couple of visits. An air wrench should never be used to remove or replace a drain plug in an engine. They are trying to get as many vehicles through that place as they can, they are not looking for quality. I prefer quality, I guess that kinda makes me one of the odd sheep in the herd.

~Kisea

I'm tired of this 360 crap...

I keep seeing at different places stories about people going crazy trying to get an xbox 360. This is totally insane. Its bad enough that people are stupid in the first place, but now M$ is playing right at them creating this artificial shortage of xboxes knowing that if a commodity is in short supply, people want it more. Why do we have such an ego thing going that we must have the new thing first in order to be the 'cool guy on the block'? There is nothing too special about the console other than it has a PowerPC processor with 3 cores. Whoopty doo. You get beyond that and its just like any other minipc (or toasters and I fondly call them).

M$ even charges a monthly fee for access to its xbox Live online stuff. I have a PS2 with the broadband adapter and guess what...I don't have to pay any monthly fee for online stuff, so suck that M$!! What technical advancements have been made in the xbox....oh, a faster processor and a newer video processor. M$, why are you creating an artificial shortage of xbox supplies, oh so your platform doesn't look like a flop when it comes out because everyone is either waiting for a PS3, Nintendo Revolution, or the xboxes with HD-DVD drives.

Why don't they have HD-DVD drives already, well they were rushing the product to market ahead of the other consoles. But, in order to play games in the very near future they will need a HD-DVD drive for their xbox. So, how is that going to work? Do they have to buy a totally new xbox or can they send it back to M$ for an upgrade, because we all know M$ does NOT want you to open that box up for anything. They have gone out of their way to try and make it difficult for someone to open it. Thank you but no thanks M$...I would rather wait and see how the PS3 performs.

Well, i'm waiting on mom's modem to come in so I can set up her cable service. Why keep DSL at 1.5Mb when she can get cable with 4Mb for the same price. I'm not terribly fond of Adelphia cable, but thats our only choice in this area. What surprised me is that they have a premium service at 6Mb and they forcasting in 2006 to hopefully have a 10Mb service available. We'll have to wait and see, they kept telling everyone that we would have cable internet service available soon, then two or three years later they finally had it available.

I guess thats all the musings for now from Cullman....
~kisea

What are all these shoes...

Well, I received a nice poker set with 500 chips and a strong looking aluminum case but the case was severly damaged thus mom and I returned it today. Boy, what a lousy day for Belk's to have a 50-20 sale. A 50-20 sale is just about everything if not everything is 20-50% off. While that is good for some people, its not good for people who have to return stuff because the lines are HUGE. Anyway, i'm sure everyone knows that.

Moving on. So, mom decided that I need a new pair of shoes and since they didn't have anymore poker sets she decided to get me two pairs of shoes. Why do I need two pairs of sneakers? I have a firm belief that about three pairs of shoes is sufficient (with a margin of error being +/-2 pairs of shoes). 1) sneakers, everyone needs a good pair of sneakers; 2) Semi-formal/casual, they look nice if your trying to be slightly dressy but are good for casual wear as well; 3) dress shoes/formal shoes, these are for those occasions where you really want to look good. Now, the margin of error I threw in there is for things I may not currently see, I have be a little flexible now one of those could be sandles or something. Anyway, mom opened the closet and my god at the shoes. I swear she has enough in there to supply the female population of several 3rd world contries in Africa.

Why do women have to have a minimum of 4 shoe options per outfit? There are some women who defy this, they merely have a requirement of 2 or 3. But those are the rare and far between minority. After seeing the ginormous number of shoes in her closet, I proceed to the spare room's closet to assess the situation in there. You cannot see the floor in the closet for the mountain of shoes in there. Its unbelievable. I was shocked. How can one person amass such a collection of shoes, I cannot fathom. Now, she probably does not rival Imelda Marcos for shoe queen, but boy does it look like its a contender.

I watched the latest episode of Doctor Who which was dubbed the "Christmas Invasion". It was quite exciting and I am on the edge of my seat waiting for the rest of the season to air. At the end they showed some minute clips of future episodes. This is what I posted to cbot in chat "K9, Giles and Cybermen Oh My!" Yes, I said Giles if you want to know more ask me. I think I am going to enjoy David Tennant as the new Doctor, he has a genuine love of the character which is evident on screen. It also helps that he has portrayed The Doctor on stage as well. Thus, rock on David, Billie and Russel.

~Kisea

PS: I would like to direct your attention to the links section on the right hand side of the page. I have added a link to 'The Dog House', which is a new endevour for Jeremy who posts on my blog as maddog gto. This is all new to him so I will look forward to reading what he has to say on issues.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

I hope everyone is having a very merry Christmas spending time with family and loved ones. Enjoy the day and holiday meals. If you have to travel much today, please be careful. I know kc has to travel back to Mobile today for work tomorrow but I don't know about everyone else.

Once again, Merry Christmas!

~Kisea

Merry Christmas Eve...

So, its the last day before Christmas and I know there are a bunch of people out in masses getting those last minute Christmas gifts. Good thing i'm at home, in my comfortable chair, writing this blog instead of out there with the nutzoids. You may say i'm being lazy....and your right. I do not want to go outside because a) the previously spoken about nutzoids, and b) its raining. So, i'll be completely comfortable sitting here in front of my computer either watching House or Doc Martin or playing CoH while snacking on some popcorn. Yes, today is a good day. If you were one of those nutzoids out there getting last minute gift, I pity you. Matt told me last night at walmart (1am so i guess it would be this morning) it was packed and had huge lines for the express checkouts.

So, Merry Christmas Eve to all and I hope tomorrow is also a very Merry Christmas!

~Kisea

Down with Alito...

I was recently reading an article about Samuel Alito. For those who do not know who this person is, he is the Supreme Court nominee from Bush since his previous appointee decided to call it quits. Well, apparently from documents released Friday it showed that he "defended the right of government officials to order domestic wiretaps when he worked for the Reagan Justice Department". Also, "Reagan-era memo said attorney general should be immune from lawsuits". Furthermore:

The memo dealt with whether government officials should have blanket protection from lawsuits when authorizing wiretaps. “I do not question that the attorney general should have this immunity,” Alito wrote. “But for tactical reasons, I would not raise the issue here.”

Needless to say, i'm not liking this guy too much. I don't know what we should do beyond trying to let our represetatives know that we are not happy with this. As much as I love the US, sometimes I ponder if maybe we should look to move elsewhere. The big companies seem to have congress in their pockets, while we the citizens seem to continually get the shaft. Oddly, the Jerry Reed song "She got the goldmine and I got the shaft" comes to mind...

~Kisea

How funny,

I was chatting with Matt online this morning and he was asking me about how big Cullman was. Well, I decided to google for the population of Cullman County and the City of Cullman. I was surprised that Wikipedia had an entry for both Cullman County and the town of West Point where I went to school.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cullman_County,_Alabama

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Point%2C_Alabama

As of the 2000 Census, Cullman was 96.81% white and 0.96% Black (the rest of the breakdown is on the site). While where I went to school, West Point, has a population of 295 and is 100% White. Quite interesting...

Stupid is as stupid does....

Funny: Driving several times past a line of people waiting to buy an Xbox 360 as you tauntingly dangle your brand new 'box out the window.

Not so funny: Your idiot friend drops the 360 out the car window and someone in line snatches it up and runs away.

More funny: Watching this all go down on video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch.php?v=KOhCu3_vtho

Muhahahaha

~Kisea

Greetings from North 'bama...

Hey! My trip was uneventful. I got here in just over 4 hrs with no traffic problems. When I got here and unloaded my truck I asked mom if she had a stocking, she didn't so I went ahead and gave her the stocking stuffer I had gotten for her. So I hand her the DVD of Serenity, so to be fair she gave me one of my presents. It was a DVD shaped box, so I opened it and lo and behold it was also Serenity. She had preordered it and it arrived a few hours before I arrived, when she promptly wrapped it. So, I have two copies of Serenity widescreen now :)

Today, mom and I went out to eat before catching a matinee of Harry Potter. We visited Johnny's barbeque, pretty good stuff. I like their sauce better than Top Hat but Top Hat has better meat in my opinion. Harry Potter was really good, I liked it better than the previous movies I think. There were some really good performances from the actors and actresses.

The challenge is still out there, if the link still works I may start posting the results of random pics myself. muhahaha

~Kisea

A challenge...

Ok, I posted a link last night to a website which did face recognition and matches you with celebrities. Now I want to challenge you to go to that website and submit pics of yourself and post here what you are matched with. I posted mine last night and I will post them again here. Let the fun begin!!

Pic 1: Christopher Reeve 59%, Dennis Quaid 57%, Susan Sontag 54% (whos that), M. Night Shyamalan 51%, Slobodan Milosevic 51%, Andre Hazes 49%, Kenneth Branagh 48%, Will Smith 45%, Ralf Schumacher 42%, Pete Sampras 41%

Pic 2: Orlando Bloom 64%, colin Farrell 55%, Hilary Swank 53% (wow), Jack Kerouac 53%, Gene Kelly 52%, Nicolas Cage 52%, Christopher Reeve 51% (he's following me), Theodore Kaczynski 50% (ill bomb your @$$), Bernardo Bertolucci 50%, Andrew Carnegie 46%

So, if any chicks out there are looking for an Orlando Bloom / Christopher Reeve / Colin Farrell / Dennis Quaid type you know how to get ahold of me ;)

Link to MyHeritage

~Kisea

This is SOOOO Awesome

A friend of mine sent me this and it rocks (link) it does face recognition between your face and a database of celebrities. I submitted two pictures of myself and these are the results.

Pic 1: Christopher Reeve 59%, Dennis Quaid 57%, Susan Sontag 54% (whos that), M. Night Shyamalan 51%, Slobodan Milosevic 51%, Andre Hazes 49%, Kenneth Branagh 48%, Will Smith 45%, Ralf Schumacher 42%, Pete Sampras 41%

Pic 2: Orlando Bloom 64%, colin Farrell 55%, Hilary Swank 53% (wow), Jack Kerouac 53%, Gene Kelly 52%, Nicolas Cage 52%, Christopher Reeve 51% (he's following me), Theodore Kaczynski 50% (ill bomb your @$$), Bernardo Bertolucci 50%, Andrew Carnegie 46%

So, if any chicks out there are looking for an Orlando Bloom / Christopher Reeve / Colin Farrell / Dennis Quaid type you know how to get ahold of me ;)

~Kisea

Funny southerners...

I was looking through some of the fark.com postings and ran across this hilarious posting (ebay link here). That is simply awesome. But quite intriguing that its in Georgia, which makes me laugh more.

I was watching this nice show that I downloaded of course. Its called Doc Martin, a BBC show. I would call it a cross between House and in a way Everwood. Its about this big annoying surgeon who is going to be a general practicioner in a small british town. The first episode is quite funny, and I thought 'i would rather have a slight british accent that my damn southern accent any day'. Why? I don't know, I guess some southern accents get on my nerves. The typical rednecky accent of a person who does not know how to pronounce all of the sylabils in a word, its not very endearing. Although some of the 'southern belles' do have an attractive accent its hardly the typical 'rednecky' accent.

Now, I'm a Bush supporter but that does not mean that I have to agree with everything he says and does. I am very much against the patriot act extention, while Bush is adamantly pushing it get extended. I think its an unfair infrindgement on US citizens civil liberties and should be stopped. In the 200+ years before now we have never had to do such a thing to protect America from outside forces. Since when do we need to take it to a new level? He says September 11th does. Well, it exposed our weakness. Now, don't take this the wrong way but in sports you can see a loss as exposing your weakness and it can make a team better. It showed us that the USA has been much too complacant in the spy game. So much so that we had the information but we were too damn lazy to sift through it and heed its warnings. Now the people have a fire up their @$$'s and can do something. Everyone should contact their senator or representative and tell them your displeasure on a number of points from the patriot act to the broadcast flag to the legistlation which is aimed to close the analog-to-digital loophole. Both of Alabama's senators voted to extend the patriot act by making many of the things in it permanent. PERMANENT PEOPLE!!!! For too few people contact their senator or representative to speak their minds. Why? Because you think what you say doesn't matter? Well, if more people contacted him he would have to listen, else he would lose his job. How? You vote his @$$ out.

Its been nice being finished with classes. I've cleaned off my desk now so I actually have room on it. I have organized my room some so I can actually find stuff now. I finished my Christmas shopping now I think. I gave kc her gifts yesterday when she got in from work. She gave me season 2 and 3 of 24 which is cool and some of the Star Wars M&M figures which I places on my wall. My favorite has to be the yellow M&M as Chewbacca.

~Kisea

Busy day...

Ok, here's a bunch of pictures that I have been promising to post.
Here's Smokey and Bandit in their christmas stockings.

Here's Santa Thor
Ok, now we are getting into pics from Graduation beginning with Kc and Kenny while we are waiting for the students to enter the auditorium.
This is now the group dubbed T-Anne (the former T-Ed and Dee Anne)
Here's a pick of the group of graduate hopefuls, if you know who your looking for you can see Teddy, Matt, and Jarred.
Here's a pick of Jarred walking across the stage waving at his family.
Here is Teddy with his buddy Jesse (left) and Mother (right)
Here is Matt, just before his family caught up.
Matt striking a pose at the bowling alley.
From left to right, Brooke, T-Anne, and dougie doug
Kc, T-Ed, and Dougie Doug
Jesse and Teddy
The WoW group at the bowling alley.
Another pic of the WoW group at the bowling alley.
Now, for T-Ed and T-Annes wedding day. Well, its raining and cold and as we turn onto the road which carries us right to the wedding area.....we run into a Christmas parade. This is a pick of Big Joe Duke taking a pic of the parade.
Another pick through Kenny's windshield of the parade.
So, we finally made it and got to see T-Ed and T-Anne pledge their vows to each other after missing probably about 5 prayers but we still catch about 3 or 4 more of them. By this time its a pretty good sprinkle going on and we are the ones who get stuck huddling around the entrance to the porch area where the wedding is being held. Thanks to BJD, we had an umbrella for some of us to huddle under while watching. Here is a pic of Teddy in his Tux being all usherly.
Teddy striking a nice pose with Brooke on his arm...check out Brooke's shoes.
T-Anne and T-Ed after they have been wed.
Here is the groom's cake.
Close up of the screen.
Yes those are edible.T-Anne striking a very provocative pose, its kinda titanic-ish....hrmm... Oh, you may wonder about the semicirle area in the top left of the picture, well someone knocked it off the stand and broke the frame and the glass made that spot.
T-Anne and T-Ed dancing.
As a good crew that we are we had to decorate the car. Not even rain can stop us....muhahahaha!

Then, you cannot let good popcorn go, so I had to take a bite of some strategically placed kernels.
Finally, here is a pic for the skrubby. The wonderful Jan from Picklefish and Christy. That is what you missed while you were 'working' skrubby...well, that and beer at a dry reception...like BJD would say: "you are horrible, horrible people........horrible people"

~Kisea

Crap...

Well, Congress is going to give $3.1 Billion dollars for Levee repairs in New Orleans. Plus, Bush is going to ask for $1.5 B more!?! WHY? I think you know what i'm going to say....leave it be. Return it to the marsh lands like its supposed to be. Apparently, the residents are not wanting to come back. That means they dont need all those levees now. If they want to squander the money the goverment gave them several years ago on improvements to the Governors house or the Mayors house, so be it. Its YOUR fault for voting for the crooked politician or its YOUR fault for not voting at all. Echoing Matt's sentament, FEMA, stop giving the handouts to the people in New Orleans. They are becoming moochers on the government because the goverment is in a 'bad light' with the nation because of they were supposedly 'slow to help'. When McDonald's is offering to pay $9 a hour for grunt you KNOW the job force is bad. Take it and be happy you have a job.....bum.

Its looking like the Patriot Act is going to be made permanent. CALL YOUR POLITICIAN NOW!!!!!!!!!!! Express your displeasure and your reasoning behind it. Next thing you know the 'American Dream' is going to be 1984 and Communism. Maybe, instead of trying to get Espen to come back to the states we should just join him in the coldness known as Norway. Hackers seem to be in good esteem over there anyway.

What else was I going to rant about.... well I guess I forgot it now...later.

~Kisea

Bwahaha, two down and a joke to go...

Well, I studied all day for my exam at 6pm. I go to class 30 minutes early to sit down and cram the last little bit of programming language design into my head before the typical Langan style exam. So, in walks Dr. Langan and he begins handing out a single sheet of paper to each person. It has our score from the first exam, the second exam and what our final score would be if we chose to keep this and if the final exam would give us enough points to make an A in the class. Well, if your going to give me a choice, i'm not going to take your exam. So, i'll end up with an 87 which is disappointing but I fell in the rut from the beginning mucking up my first exam. So, i'll settle with a B. I should have an A in algorithms (made A's on every exam in there so far).

Now, all I have left is Doran's joke of a final exam for AI. Well, A) its takehome and B) its bobo questions. Questions like:

1) What is AI? What is intelligence?
2) Which area of AI did you find the most innovative? Why? How does it tie together core concepts of CS?
3) What do you think would be an innovative and intelligent project to undertake? Define a problem statement and give a brief justification from the literature to frame your project. What would you exect the results to be and demonstrate?

So, what do you think about that? Sigh.

So, after our 'final' for Langan a couple of us were speaking outside and all of us seemed to agree, Doran = idiot. I cannot wait to put all of the AI lectures online for everyone to listen to, in particular the ones where he speaks about the circullum instead of ummm class.

I'm glad to announce that Jeremy and my project for AI actually worked!!! (sorta) Well, we got it kinda working about 2 minutes before class on tuesday. So, we did two test runs and it worked then we had to go upstairs for class. We watched Chris demo what he had done with the Aibo with his state machine and stuff. Then his dance to Madonna's Vogue which was so cool. Then we went downstairs the the CSCB 100 lab to demo our project. We had to move into there for the white background that Espen used for his thesis (Thanks Espen). After a few days of headaches trying to figure out what the frell is going on. The bobo webcam that Lego sells is a 10 year old logitech webcam which SUCKS. With it automatically adjusting its brightness contrast and stuff we narrowed the scope of where we are trying to find the 'red can'. Like I said, just before class we got it going but it was quite funny. We mounted the RCX (brick) vertically but the flourescent lights put out a lot of UV light which mucks with the IR communication of the bot. So, we had to have the communications tower about 6inches to 1 foot away from the bot. So, I got some RJ11 cables to suspend the tower and one to 'guide' from the side. I had to use a stick to guide the tower over the bot from the side else I would cast a shadow and much up the bot again. So, with that said, it was quite funny during the demonstration. But, all thats left is the damn bobo exam and this semester is in the books.

Peace

~Kisea

One down, two to go..

So, I took Hain's final tonight and it didn't hurt that bad. I guess being the 4th final i've had with him you eventually get used to it or finally figure out how he tests. Either way its over and no more Performance Evaluation of Algorithms for me.

Jeremy and I worked on our lame legobot. It reminds me how much I sometimes hate Java. Its such a burden trying work on outdate machines with little memory. I mean we are trying to do some image processing on 600MHz machines with 256MB of RAM running Windows XP. Now, you are probably asking why image processing in Java...well we (when I say we I mean Jeremy) already had some code for it in Java and the C version of the Lego stuff hasn't been tested nor are we familar with it. So, we decided to stay with Lejos. We are close and if we can get a machine which is a bit more, ummm, up to date, we could probably have it going in no time. We demo tomorrow and I don't think we can get a PC set up with what we need and make the necessary changes in time for class. So, this is a bit of a bummer. I'll post some pics of the bot and grabber arm we built later this week hopefully.

Tomorrow, I have Langan's class then Wednesday I have Langan's final. So, lets all hope that its not too bad cause I feel totally unprepared for it as of right now.

~Kisea

Graduation

Well, I got to see some of the Picklefish crew take their walk across the stage. Jarred, Matt and Teddy all took that walk and handshake Saturday. However, Jarred and Matt I'm pretty sure should have been UPE members but thats too late now.

After graduation, we went out to celebrate with Teddy and his family at American Cafe which was pretty good. After that we went bowling at Camilla Lanes off of Schillinger, Big Joe Duke dropped by for a few minutes. I have some pictures but they'll have to wait for me to have some time before I can post them. After we were booted out of the bowling alley because of reservations for extreme bowling, some of us went to the Bubble Lounge for a couple drinks. We got Matt a little toasty so I drove him to my house and he crashed on the couch.

However, through all of this there was a bit of a cloud over Teddy's celebration. His brother was in a motorcycle accident in Hattisburg friday night and had to have surgery. From what I gathered, he had a plate inserted into his ankle.

~Kisea

UPS finally found me...

Well, I guess i'm no longer lost now that UPS found me and delivered my packages. Now I can send off for my rebate on my new wireless gigabit router :)

Went to see a play tonight at the Laidlow Performing Arts center with maddog, it was quite enjoyable once the person beside me who spent half of the first act playing with her cell phone decided to leave. Everyone gave a very good performance and I was quite struck at how well they all managed to pull off British accents. Like I said, it was quite enjoyable and I must admit I probably should have gone to more performances before now. There are two productions scheduled for the spring i'll have to see about going.

Its that time of the semester and i've been trying to gear up for final exams but I just cannot get everything situated right so I can fully put myself into it. Lets hope that I know the material enough to do well.

I should have the updated course descriptions from the new and changed courses soon and Ill post them when I can. Beyond that there's no real news I feel is blog worthy.

UPS can't find me...

Ok, so I ordered some stuff from newegg.com Monday the 29th of Novemeber and it shipped out the same day because Newegg is good that way. So, by Thursday the 1st of December UPS had it in Mobile to deliver. Well, today is the 8th and I still haven't received my packages. Apparently, now that I have moved less than 50 yards from my previous place of residence, they cannot find me now. So, Tuesday the online tracking said they were trying to get a 'good' address. So I call the 1-800 number to track my package that way and it forwarded me to an agent. She went through the speil that the driver reported that they cannot find my house. HELLO, its only a mere 50 yards from my old place. Anyway, she asks what road does my road come off of, so I tell them Old Shell. She said that she will send a message to the local UPS people.

The local UPS peeps call me at 8:05am, yesterday the 7th of december. She then asked me some more precise directions to give the driver. I tell her all of the pertinent information and she replies, "Oh, i know exactly where you are talking about, he must be a new driver in that area. I'll give him these directions and I assure you that your package will be there today." Well, guess what....no package. So, last night I called and forced the system to give me an agent and I told them whats going on and she was nice and told me that she was sorry I haven't received my package still. She said she would send an urgent message to the local UPS people again and they should call me before 10am today, the 8th.

I am so fed up with UPS. Why did newegg have to go and get a deal with UPS, Fed Ex worked great I always got my package a day early and never did anything like this happen. Down with 'big brown' and the 'brown truck'. I mean, can't these people use something like Google Maps, Mapquest or something. I checked both of them to make sure the driver wasn't going somewhere else. We have some huge numbers on the house if the driver can just find the gorramn road (serenity/firefly reference).

~Kisea

An inside look at the possible new CS requirements...

Well, I finally got ahold of one of the draft versions of the new requirements for CSC specialization. Note that there are now 3 intro courses before you get to 120/121. CIS 110 has been replaced I think with CIS 100, then we have the freshmen seminar CIS 101. Then another new class, CIS 115 intro to problem solving and programming... I find that funny. Now CSC 311 is a core course called networking and communications which I thought was 321 but CIS 321 is still there with the same name. CSC 324 Database concepts is a core course but its not the same ole course, its supposedly more geared for CS majors somehow, ill try to find out more. Software engineering has been renumbered and is no longer a PC course, its CSC 331 and its a writing course, I don't remember if it was before. Then finally CSC 434 Formal language and automata theory is no longer a core course but is now an elective. Here are the pages I promised:
NOTE: there are about 2 more rounds of possible changes left before these are finalized.


Now that is out of the way. I thought my previous post about Katrina and New Orleans would be my last (at least for quite a while), but I guess not. I was signing out of my hotmail account when low and behold I see the headline on msn "Katrina victims speak out", and of course I had to see what they said. The first paragraph was just stupid:

Black survivors of Hurricane Katrina said Tuesday that racism contributed to the slow disaster response, at times likening themselves in emotional congressional testimony to victims of genocide and the Holocaust.

They have never been part of genocide nor the holocaust. Likening themselves to people who have is an utterly disrespectful act.

More utterly obsurd remarks were

“I was on my front porch,” Diane Cole French said at the hearings. “I have witnesses that they bombed the walls of the levee.”

So, we decided to just blow up the levees to kill all of these people in New Orleans to just have to fork out the taxpayers, OUR, money to rebuild it again. This is totally obsurd and insane, she must have been on something. If you watch the video accompanying the article you will hear that she didn't even see the levee break or the 'bombing'. Anyway just watch and read here.

I have no sympathy for these people any more. I am sympathetic towards the people on the Mississippi coast and Alabama coast, but NOT for New Orleans. It was a mandatory evacuation, if you really wanted to get out, there is always a way to get out. You don't shoot at helecopters trying to bring aid and rescue people who desperately need help just because they are not helping you immediately. Just because your coming off of cocaine or crystal meth or whatever doesn't mean you can shoot and loot things such as 42" plasma televisions. You can't eat a plasma tv! I'm sorry, I think i'm getting the same thoughts in my head as Chris and Big Joe Duke, we should level the place with a nuke and write it off. Those people are looking for handouts from the government and will never (and has never) done anything which required effort to try and better themselves. We keep giving them handouts, and they keep bitching to get more handouts. Go away...

~Kisea

PS. Almost forgot to post this, but Thursday is the second part of the multipart Python workshop. I dont remember what this one is on exactly but ill try to get that up tomorrow. Its Thursday December 8th at 3:30 in FCE19 (same room as last time). Mr. Howard Whitston presiding again.

New CS requirements....

I hear rumors of new CS requirments for the 06-07 calander....more news when I receive a hard copy of these new requirements from my inside source....

I stand by my previous post...

In case you haven't read it, I had a post a couple months back about Bayfest in which I slammed Bo Bice (link back to previous post, Oct 10th to be precise) . Coincidentally, he was on Leno tonight so I thought I would listen to him again, albeit not live, and give him another chance because, according to the fans that posted comments about my blog were totally different from my own take of the situation.

Well, again Bo Bice sucked. Maybe he needs to quit writing his own songs or something, I don't know. He sounded kinda flat and even though he seemed to be getting into the song it just wasn't there. Am I just not moved by his music...I guess. But it still stunk. I would rather drive some 300+ miles to pay and see Butch Walker (thanks for letting me hear some of his tunes) than stay in Mobile for a free Bo Bice concert. Thats what I have to say about that.

Is it getting cold in here or what? Dang, I took Thor out early this morning (9am) and it wasn't too bad. I go to let him out again around noon and dang has it gotten cold. I think this is another one of those winter blasts which keep us grounded. I see all the snow in the northeast and wish for some of that wintery goodness to strike here as soon as the semester is over or maybe when I get home to celebrate the holidays.

I kept hearing today on the news stations something about the democrap (I mean democrat) attack on christmas? Did I miss something here? Whats this all about, I didn't get to hear it well when it was on TV. Thats all for now...

~Kisea

All i can say is ..... wow

21:09] czarMaybach: dude I got to get the soundtrack for School of Rock
[21:09] KiSeA 1: lol, tis a good movie
[21:11] czarMaybach: Joan Cusack is kinda hot
[21:11] KiSeA 1: you are a sick sick man
[21:11] KiSeA 1: sick
[21:11] czarMaybach: yes I am
[21:11] KiSeA 1: i'm going to blog that
[21:11] czarMaybach: completely
[21:11] czarMaybach: oh shit

I'm so angry...

This is BS! Louisiana officials are being critical of FEMA because they have not already sent them checks to replace damaged voting equipment in New Orleans... WTF is that! First, what does FEMA stand for? Federal Emergency Management Administration. Is voting equipment more important than food, water, housing, and schools that they need to be replaced RIGHT NOW? I know FEMA does not look good in most people's eyes because of the whole hurricane issues. I would like to see how anybody else would handle such widespread destruction themselves. Be glad that we have FEMA, many other countries do not have anything similar to FEMA. I see New Orleans and Louisiana as prying on this weakened state of image of FEMA to demand and hopefully receive any and all aide they can think of.

Straight from the fema.org website,

The Federal Emergency Management Agency....is tasked with responding to, planning for, recovering from and mitigating against disasters.

At some point, the giving hand of the government must stop. They need things, I know this, we see it every day on the news. But, blasting FEMA over voting machines, thats insane. Why rebuild a city that is about 80% below sea level. We know there are going to be more hurricanes, its inevitable, and eventually one will hit New Orleans again and it will happen all over again. If Louisiana wants to rebuild it, then let them foot the bill, not the rest of the United States.

Once more, FEMA got into place as soon as they could. It was a disaster area people, how can you magically get somewhere you cannot reach. Furthermore, the Governor has to declare it a disaster area and ask for Federal help. The Federal government cannot simply waltz in there and start helping because of Federal and state laws. Because we believe in states rights and not a blanket Federal laws then if Federal officials waltz into a state and start to take over this could be considered a form of 'hostile takeover'.

Plus, stop blaming Bush for the hurricane. If he had the ability to conjure a hurricane and send it wherever he wanted, do you honestly think it would be New Orleans/Mississippi/Alabama? Come one people, you can't blame everything on him it's just not plausable. Blame yourself for your dependence on oil, technology and your lifestyle. We are an extremely wasteful people. We cannot sleep without having lights on in our house, or our thermostat set at 60 degrees in the summer and 80 degrees in the winter. We have no idea what car pooling means. We have to have our huge SUV's which get 5 miles per gallon. Maybe we need to rethink our lives.

~Kisea

Announcement

Hey everybody, Jeremy wanted me to spread the word about his mom's new Dippin' Dots. Its grand opening is tomorrow over on the eastern shore (link below). If your over there give it a go, I hear that 104.1 is going to be there at some point.

Link as promised

~Kisea