Strike Two

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Regular readers would be able to tell I didn’t make Tuesday’s publish date. You new readers won’t, though, and that’s the best part – everything’s still on time to you.

Since this is a backfill post, I don’t have anything in mind as a topic. Let’s see, let’s see…

Oh, I know! This just popped in: they don’t make movies like they used to.

Remember when a good movie took you on an adventure; movies like Ghostbusters, Harry and the Hendersons, Howard the Duck, Star Wars, The Muppets Take Manhattan, and Back to the Future? Before everything became shoot-’em-ups with amazing special effects and ‘splosions every 10 minutes and racy kissing scenes. Don’t get me wrong, I still love a good action movie, but where’s the adventure? Where’s the thinking man’s movie nowdays?

P.S.: I’ve not been keeping up with Hollywood so I probably don’t know what I’m talkin’ about, but “srsly”.

T.G.I.F. or S. or U. or Whatever

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T.G.I.F. S. U.

Forget it – it’s O.G.I.M. again.

Totally missed Friday’s post and couldn’t get to it Saturday or Sunday. Good thing, though, is this: after I’m done writing this I’ll change the publish date to Friday so you’ll only know I missed it by reading the post. Bwa-ha-ha!!

Tomorrow’s the next day in the 96-hour schedule. Guh – don’t know if I’m going to make that one either. I should have something done by at least midnight to begin qualifying as a Tuesday post, but right now I got nothin’.

Have I mentioned some of my favorite web comics: Dr. McNinja? Girl Genius? No Need for Bushido? The Zombie Hunters? XKCD? The Order of the Stick? Erfworld? Bearmageddon? Axe Cop? Dinosaur Comics?

No? Well what’re you waiting for? You have the links!

“O.G.I.M.” Already

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Mondays… figures. Just as soon we’re “T.G.I.F.” it seems Monday is here again. Working a half day on Friday can really make a difference – you’re done with the week and start the weekend early enough it feels like you get a whole day back. But that’s Friday… we’re talkin’ Monday here.

I’m starting to grow weary of my profession – there’s no way to truly measure results for writing code or redesigning an application’s UI. Two years ago I came from a job where I was basically the senior web developer and systems architect to one where I’m (what feels like, at least) a maintenance programmer making near half-again more than I used to. But the joy’s gone out of it; I’ve known developer power and freedom and I want them back.

At the same time, however, writing code all day just seems like an endeavor that will never have any tangible consequences in the real world. Unlike fixing a car as a mechanic or crafting a bench as a carpenter, we’re unlikely to get any lasting appreciation for what we enable business to do. I’m thankful I have a job in this sullen economy, but I’m starting to feel like I’m stuck in a race condition with the code – trying to debug, refactor, and redesign 6+ years of lax code standards, no design patterns, and “quick-and-dirty” implementation requirements feels like never ending drudgery.

It could be insanity, but maybe a career change is in order; to a field with real-life results you can feel – physically, emotionally. I love the problem-solving challenges creating a well-designed system presents. Maybe being a mechanic or carpenter has the same benefits…

So Happy It’s Thursday

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It’s still Thursday – I can still keep this schedule.

Ha-ha. Guess not. I’ll see what I can do.

Some 36 hours later (it’s Saturday night now):
“Fail so hard”, that’s what I can do.

Didn’t really do too well keepin’ the schedule for Thursday. Next post is due on Monday – maybe, maybe not.

I’ll just keep this one short: I’d like to get my hands on some Sen Thai again. It’s expensive to get on a regular basis, but when I used to work downtown it was the best food in the area. The “Fire Rice” was my favorite – just a plain dish of rice and meat with a good mixture of flavor and heat. I recall having ordered the dish as “Thai spicy” and it was so damned hot, but it was still so very good.

Ahh, the good ole days. If you happen to work in the city of St. Louis proper or are just in the area, pay Sen Thai a visit and may you not be disappointed!

96 Hours Between Failures

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HAPPY NEW YEAR!! Yay! Hooray?

I have no idea what I’m doing. I’ve not been good about keeping up with posting on even a sporadic schedule. I just don’t have anything interesting to say and I don’t BMWC all over the Intarwebs. I don’t know why I want to do this, it just seems like something I should be doing.

I was thinkin’ just this morning about all the things I’d like to do this new year (in no particular order):

  • Enjoy the many gifts the Lord has given me
    • Stop chasing after fortune and glory
  • Learn a new language
  • Create a solid household budget and followit
    • Get out of debt faster
  • Get up on time during the week
  • Read my Bible
  • Learn to read music and/or play an instrument
  • Actually stick to the 96-hour blog schedule
    • Work on writing more and writing better
  • Carry one of the many zany ideas through to finality
  • Increase my worth as an employable person (++madSkillz)
  • Lose a considerable amount of weight
    • Gain a little muscle so I can carry my children without getting tired arms.

I’m not calling them “resolutions”, because that’s just asking for failure to come a-knocking.

Easier, but Not More Appealing

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Having the right tools for the job will certainly make a job easier; it doesn’t necessarily make doing that job more appealing. Perhaps in that statement my problem is revealed: blogging feels like a job – not one I look forward to doing; thankfully I don’t “blog” for a living. I’m no writer and that’s probably why.

I looked at various schedules for authoring and publishing new content and I think I’d like to try an “every four days” arrangement. A start date of January 1st also looks attractive since 2012 starts on a Sunday and it’s the new year (resolutions and all that, though blogging is hardly something I’m “resolving” to do in the new year).

A new post every fourth day means I’ll run through each day of the week once every four weeks. That lead me to consider making each day of the week’s post fit a particular genre or topic. For example: Wednesday could be “Humpback Whale”-day since Wednesday is commonly called “Hump Day” or Saturdays’ posts can be about cartoons or I could whine about workplace woes on Monday. The possibilities, as they say, “are endless”.

I don’t know why I would want to do this, only that I want to; I think I’m chasing after fortune and glory. What degrees of either will I reap from the Intarwebs, however, is yet to be seen.

C’mon, big money!

Out with the Old

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Some things have been runnin’ on this web server for a long time and have been in use by hundreds of people for a few years now. When I added WordPress to this site on October 18th and changed my .htaccess file to serve content from the blog I inadvertently cut off the long time users of the DDO Crafting Helper.

It’s been a long time since I’ve played DDO and the Crafting Helper has long been outdated. I’m afraid this evening, in preparation for the future of RandoJones.com, I’ve archived it – likely with permanence – along with every other file on the server. If anyone is interested in hosting it or recreating it themselves on their own server I may be able to provide the data, HTML/CSS, and .NET class library for the mini-site (or perhaps even the Visual Studio project files if I still have them). If you are interested, please send inquiries to DDOCrafting at RandoJones.

DDO was great and the advancements Turbine made in the engine that was originally created to run Asheron’s Call 2 (and that now runs Lord of the Rings Online) made the world of Eberron a very beautiful place to explore. I managed to make it to the top and had many successful adventures with my level 20 Ranger and it was a grand time. Building a character around the Deepwood Sniper ability was a lot of fun.

Unfortunately, DDO seemed to succumb to the same design philosophy that befell Asheron’s Call 2: the “Fun-on-Rails” policy, as I called it boiled down essentially to this: “You’ll have fun how we tell you to have fun.” Of course, this led to a lot of not-fun going on. Overall, though, even with DDO’s faults it was still a fun game. I even logged on as a non-subscriber (since it’s now “free-to-play, pay-to-win” more or less) a year or so later to see what all had changed and I was still happy to wander around and visit some of the old hunting grounds (that were open to a non-paying customer).

Ahh, the good ole days… Hey, Will, if you’re still out there – send me an email some time, friend! It’s been a while…