Jeff

23rd birthday

So here I am, 23 years old. I am supposed to get my birthday off from work, but I have decided to take it off tomorrow instead (and get a glorious three day weekend). I will be heading up to Purdue tonight (tomorrow night) to spend some time with my girlfriend. It will be nice to have an extra day off, and next weekend is Labor day weekend, which will be pretty sweet too. 23 years doesn’t seem like anything special… I think most of my birthdays from now on will feel like this. Nothing momentous and my life is going to be pretty static from now on. I will be working and just celebrate my birthday with a few people if anything, and then back to work the next day.

For myself, I ordered an HP mini netbook. Its a super light weight, super under powered, super small little notebook (laptop). I picked it specifically because it comes with a weird Linux distro (rather than waste more money on another millionth XP license) and the RAM is upgradable to 2GB. I am probably going to try and experiment putting OS X on it and see how it feels. If I don’t like it, I will look into Jolicloud or just Ubuntu Netbook Remix. I will probably post about my experience sometime on here…

For my site, (I am actually posting this to the new site, so you guys are going to be reading it in the future =) I am trying to get my old computer stable as a server and am failing at doing so. I will probably eventually try to troubleshoot the problem and try to finish the code for this up and then point my router to the server instead of the old P3 shitbox. I still need to code up a proper gallery system (beyond the scratched together proof of concept I have right now) and put together a proper administrative system, so that I don’t have to manually input my entries like I am doing now… Well, I better sleep soon so that I will be ready to go up and see my awesome girlfriend tomorrow night…

working

So I have neglected entering anything in this for a while, I am going to hide behind the fact that I hate trying to post to this over our crappy wireless at home, but that is only an okay excuse at best. I have been working the past two weeks (and two days now) doing JavaScript development for my company’s advanced interface. It is a web interface for a browser dependent attachment to our IP and Analog camera server software. I have been using the JQuery library (which I hope to later advance into this site more) and also designing the API for the JavaScript end using raw JavaScript. It has been a productive two weeks, but I am now in the period of complete overhaul, as I was beginning to realize how convoluted the “hack a feature on” strategy was making the code. I want to be able to use the code for other development off of this platform more, so hopefully this overhaul will be fruitful. I am about 50% through the overhaul, as I had to spend the past two work days installing a new OS on my computer because Vista took a crap. Hopefully this will be getting updated more, I plan on updating it more when I eventually get around to moving.

I am in the midst of pricing and contemplating buying a new computer. I would like to turn this older desktop (not too old) into a Linux machine that I can use for development, while also being able to use Windows and learn to develop on it too (since I am so unexperienced with it, as I learned this past week trying to develop in Vista). I then can use the Linux machine as my web server rather than the very old and very slow ClarkConnect box I am using now. The new computer will have an i7 CPU, because the architecture is just too good, that uses DDR3 RAM. I am still deciding on the Motherboard and the quantity of RAM, so I shall see.

I had to get a new phone plan as my family was moving on to bigger and better things (aka Verizon). I wanted a smartphone and based on the plans, available models, and networks available, I concluded on AT&T (it hasn’t really disappointed me yet) and have an iPhone (sadly I got it before the price cut, so I paid $100 too much). It is actually a very polished device, but I hopefully plan on moving to an Android phone in a few months, whenever AT&T gets a model and it seems polished enough. I think they are going to have one of the new “Rosie” UIs from HTC for theirs (Google it, its beautiful).

I will probably post again in the coming week to add more of the going-ons of my life. Don’t worry I am still sort of alive.

stuff

So I have been sitting around wasting time this past week. I have been reminded a few times that I need to post in this more often. I will probably do it more when I start working, and probably even more when I finally move into my own place. I have made no progress on the Django overhaul since finishing, this is probably due to the inability to use my desktop for much since the wireless sucks in my room for it. I will probably try and finish the styling some before trying to implement the code for that stuff. I need to first come up with a footer before I develop the content for that as well. Should I try and come up with a logo for the site ? sigh I need to sit down and come up with some bullet points for things I need to do. (which I have done a few times and lost the unsaved files whenever I restart)

In other news, I have graduated, I walked across stage and got the diploma. I start work in a week. I get to do javascript GUI development right off the bat. I started summer league for ultimate frisbee, so hopefully that can get me into some shape. I need to finish cleaning my room up, even though that will probably never actually get done until I move out. I am in the midst of deciding on a cell phone carrier and transferring the title of the car over to myself. I am going to be moving to living off of my credit card somewhat for a few weeks until I get my first paycheck. Then I can begin shopping for my new computer (I am so excited). I got to attend the race yesterday (the Indy 500) and enjoy the sights and sounds of fast cars racing around a giant oval track.

This coming week I hope to try and get the cell phone stuff decided on and get the title transferred. I then need to finish cleaning. I am going to try and plan to meet some friends here before I get busy with work. I may stop by my old high school (if it is still in session) and see my old teachers. I doubt it is though, so I will probably end up doing that in the fall. I hope to begin transforming the design of this site into the complete thing this week (like moving the design to all the sections and finish all the sections up, then making it better suited for larger resolutions and such). Beyond all that, I just need to enjoy my last week of freedom and boredom.