Left Handed Presidents

So I watch a lot of news, perhaps to much. One thing I have noticed is that both Obama and McCain are left handed. I found a link of other left handed presidents. It appears lately there have been a lot. I don't know what it means but it is interesting to me.

How much?

I hate it when games keep track of how long you've been playing. Take Burnout Paradise for example. I've been playing that on my PS3 for over 55 hours and counting. That's approaching $1/hr for high-quality crashing entertainment.

It's a fun game too, you should play it if you have the opportunity. At first, I was really miffed that it doesn't offer two-player split-screen, but seeing as how I don't have anybody anyway, it is a moot point at this juncture.

But if you would rather not go all out for a top-end game, why not give Desktop Tower Defense 1.5 a try? That game got me hooked for about two weeks, which is impressive for a free flash game. Creating paths for pencil-drawn enemies to get destroyed in has never been more fun.

Television Addicts Rejoice!

Now that the Writer's Strike has finally ended, I can get back to my mind-numbing routine of watching Chuck, Heroes, The Office, and Smallville. Man, I missed these guys! I am still upset that the networks managed to function for so long. . .I blame the epidemic of reality tv shows. Seriously, Big Brother 9?!?!? Who watches this, other than voyeurs? Besides, the whole point of watching television is to escape reality and not to watch an artificial, carefully constructed version of reality. In essence, we are watching people watch each other. And then whine about it later on camera. This stale, suffocating decadence will cause the downfall of society. And that's my rant. I need to go back to writing a paper.

Estradasphere!!!!!

Lester's choice of music for today: Estradsphere



5 guys just having fun with music. They play a little of everything for everyone. This musical piece is 23 min long, so watch it when you have the time, or just watch parts of it. I hope you guys enjoy.

Handheld Linux Gaming, Part 2

It has been nearly two years since my first post on Handheld Linux, and I still want a handy little device that let's me do whatever I want in terms of making software for it. Recently I found out about the GP2X's newest addition, the GP2X F-200. It's mostly the same as the older model, but now with a touch screen, so perhaps we could see some neat physics games that utilize the pointer in some way. Perhaps if I actually got around to making more games than I currently do, I could find the purchase easier to make. Instead, I'll just have to sit at the sidelines and look at all the neat videos. I could do worse with $170 I suppose.

Eat Choke and Die

I rolled into class yesterday and two of my classmates were talking about the campus food service Chartwells. One of them was like I found a facebook group were someone changed the Chartwells to say eat choke and die instead of eat learn and live. It made me smile. The other thing that made me smile is I don't have to eat Chartwells anymore.

It seems sad to me because Chartwells could be good. It was very easy and handy as a college student. They just made some of the worst food and they did not change it up much. I think if Ed ate there every day for lunch and told Chartwells to get it into gear it could be better. But it seems for the most part the students eat there and Ed does not. Well that is all I have. Students still eating bad food and Chartwells still getting away with it.

Postage is going up-again

I saw on the news yesterday that the price of stamps is going up to 42 cents in May. I thought it was safe to buy pretty stamps instead of those ugly "forever stamps" because postage just went up recently, but apparently this was a false sense of security. Now I need to hurry and use all my 41 cent stamps, so if you get any mail from me, you can be pleasantly surprised to see Christmas stamps.

FHSU Bloggination: Nerd Edition

So Paul and I were thinking that perhaps the FHSU Bloggination isn't the best place to talk about our little hobby of programming. Now, I love a good programming joke just as much as the next person (Why do programmers always get Christmas and Halloween mixed up? Because DEC 25 = OCT 31), but it seems to be just outside the scope of the blog, so we've created a new blog over at http://pezad.blogspot.com. But no worries though! You'll still get the same hard-hitting journalistic standards at FHSU Bloggination that you've come to expect from yours truly. For example, here's today's tip: Although widely regarded as better for the environment because compact florescent bulbs consume less electricity than standard incandescent blubs, they do contain mercury and therefore you should avoid eating too many of them if possible.

People use what I post on my webpage?

So I have a googlepages webpage. I put a couple of the papers I wrote for my physics classes on it and figured that was that. I figured I would be the only one who ever looked at my webpage, and perhaps some people I told about it. Well, I was wrong. Today I get an email from some teacher at Sapientia University in Tg-Mures, Romania. He is like I am using your paper on the heat equation and wanted to know about something that was not clear. So I am like hmmmm. People do use the my webpage after. I thought it was cool to get and email from a random guy from Romania anyway.

Morbidly funny typo

Ok, so it's probably wildly insensitive and inappropriate to point this out, but today I noticed a typo that is quite common--and quite funny to me.

I was reading a beautifully written note on facebook about the tragic loss of a someone's dear friend. Unfortunately, the typo made me titter. Yes, I am a terrible person. Anyways, this was it:

"...he was creamated..."

It kind of reminds me of Soilent Green. People are now turned into cream...

So, my anal-retentive inner copyeditor forces me to point this out: the official spelling is "cremated." And just as a side note, Wikipedia mentions that "Contrary to popular belief, the remains are not ashes, but rather bone fragments which are then crushed in a device called a cremulator."

I am sorry if I offended anyone. I mean no disrespect to the dead or grieving. Really. But...people should try to spell it the right way.

some time ago, in a galaxy far far away....

Since last year i havn't done much except:

Beacame a registered geologist in training.
A certified concrete inspector.
Learned how to blast ducks out of the sky.
Learned how to knock down pheasants.
Watched a deer take down a guy at work, (it was hillarious as it sounds).
Got engaged.
Ran a race.
Went to some concert with Shayne.
Broke my elbow.
Drank my raise away yesterday at the Terracon holiday party that was way after the holidays and had an open tab paid by my boss.
Lost an incredibly embarassing bet (it was as hillarious as it sounded).


Oh and I didn't blog that whole time.

Ten Free Windows Tools I Use

There are good freeware tools out there for Windows, but there is a bunch of junk freeware too. Some are buggy, others are loaded with malware, and many are straight up not useful. This list includes nothing that will ask you to pay for the full version, nothing that will spy on you, and nothing that I haven't found useful. Now, on to the list!

1. Ccleaner (http://www.ccleaner.com) - Just before you defrag your Windows machine (yeah, I know, you can stop right there, Mr. Linux-doesn't-need-defragging. And who would change their last name to that anyway?), you should clean out your recycle bin and delete your temporary files. Although Windows includes its own disk cleaning utility, it isn't as thorough as this app. It even includes a registry cleaner as well! The only thing I wish it did was remove all but the last System Restore point (I have to use the Windows cleaner for that after I use Ccleaner). Other than that, it works quicker and better.
2. Process Explorer (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx?wt.svl=related) - Are you using the standard Windows Task Manager right now when you hit ctrl+alt+del? This one is better, especially if you do a little programming on Windows. Why is this?
   • Processes are shown in tree form so you can see which process owns other processes
   • CPU usage graphs for every running process, not just overall CPU consumption.
     
   • Shows which processes contain handles on various files and resources
   • Tons of other things I'm still figuring out.
   
   It even allows you to replace the standard task manager so that the next time your give Windows the three fingered salute, it pops this baby up instead. Because it doesn't come as an installer, consider making a C:\Utilities folder to put it in. My only gripe with Process Explorer is it doesn't have a networking meter. Rats...
3. NetMeter (http://www.metal-machine.de/readerror/) - Don't you wish that the networking meter that comes with the Windows Task Manager had a few more options? Does WireShark give you too many details when all you needed was a graph? Give this majigger a chance to fulfill your network speed curiosities. It gives you second-by-second stats on how much you downloaded, and it will even give total download numbers. It can even run as slightly transparent, and fades to fully opaque when you mouse over it if you so choose. Why care, you ask? Because this thing gives you solid KB/s numbers, to help you figure out if you are really using all of that highspeed broadband that your ISP supposedly gave you.
4. 7-zip (http://www.7-zip.org/) - Why are people still using shareware for their archiving needs like WinZip? or WinRar even? Because they don't know of the many free (and open source, Boo-yah! [boo-yah? really? What is this, the 90's? -Ed.]) alternatives, I think. Sure, this may not look as pretty as WinZip or WinRar, but it has the stuff that counts:
   • Extracts from many different formats, including zip, rar, 7z, bz, tar, iso, cab, blah blah blah
   • Multi-processor archiving support for the 7z format. Two core CPU? Use this. Or maybe you have four cores, and only want to use two or one? Blam, it's done.
   So there.
5. CrossLoop (https://www.crossloop.com/landing.htm) - So my Grandma calls me. Her computer had been BSODing on her a couple of times a day, and it was getting annoying (Interesting fact: Microsoft chose blue for their screen of death because it was a calming color. 23 years later, maybe not so much.). I had talked her through a few things, but nothing worked. I needed to control her machine. The problem, however, was that she was three hours away. Sure, windows has a remote controlling feature by default, but it is also lame. I installed CrossLoop on my Grandma's machine and my own. CrossLoop transcends firewalls and routers, so all I had to do was type in the connection code that she gave me over the phone, have her accept my connection, and I was in! I was able to clean the computer, perform some maintenance, and install some much needed software (including two spyware cleaners and AVG anti-virus). The result? A smooth running machine. Thank you, CrossLoop!
6. Notepad++ (http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm) - The standard notepad that comes with Windows is decent. I like it alright. But it doesn't do tabs or session saving. It also doesn't highlight code. Notepad++ does. 'Nuff said.
7. CDBurnerXP (http://cdburnerxp.se/) - Remember back in the day when Nero used to be a great tool to burn CDs? Now it is so bloated you practically need to start one Nero program before you can start another. I just want to put data on a disc, not navigate a labyrinth of options. If you are like me, and you don't need all that extra fluff of transcoding video and making DVD menus, then this is for you. Does data and audio discs for CDs, DVDs, Blu-Ray, and HD-DVD.
   
8. Foxit Reader (http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php) - Adobe Reader is bloated. It takes forever to start up. And once it starts up, it has to do a massive update or something dumb. All I wanted to do was look at a PDF document, man! Get it before it gets too bloated itself.
9. VLC Media Player (http://www.videolan.org/) - It isn't the prettiest player when it comes to playing music or movies. But it makes up for that fact by playing nearly anything, even MP4s or FLVs. You can download your favorite YouTube, Google Video, or other videos using http://keepvid.com/, and then play it with VLC Media Player, no extra hassle.
10. The GIMP (http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html) - The new 2.4.x series is finally out, man! Yeah! Slightly easier to use than the older 2.3 series. Although commonly billed as a replacement to Adobe Photoshop, it isn't quite as powerful, but then again it isn't as complicated either. Having said that, it isn't as easy as Microsoft Paint either. Take some time to play around with it, because the benefits won't be immediately realized. Many good sites provide some good tutorials on GIMP. It beats paying hundreds of dollars on Photoshop. (Yeah, yeah I know. But it beats pirating Photoshop too.)

Blatantly obvious: Firefox (http://www.mozilla.com/) - I know: you already know about this. It is so recommended by everybody that I didn't put it in the official list. But then again, my list didn't quite feel complete either. Besides, 90% of Web surfers out there are still using some form of IE, so obviously a few more people still need convincing. IE probably is good enough. But I bet you didn't know about that index.dat file (Shout out to Lester for letting me know about that one), a hidden file which I have no idea what it does but probably isn't any good for your Internet surfing security (Ccleaner can remove that file, by-the-way). IE7 does extensions now, but I'm assuming it will never be as popular as the Firefox extensions.

So, do you have any good free or open source Windows apps? Maybe some alternatives to the ones I've listed? I'd love to hear about it.