Brilliant Corners

Yes, I saved that much by visiting the local library today, and that's not including tax! That's what it would have cost if I went to the comic store and bought the five graphic novels that I checked out today.

Since I first got my library card I've checked out 56 items, most of which are graphic novels/comics. I don't feel like adding the cost up from all of those, but I know it's several hundred dollars. Now, I'm grateful to have saved all that money, but at the same time I'm sad I'm not contributing to the wallets of those certainly-deserving writers and artists. How can I resolve this quandary? Well, maybe my mind can be put a little at ease thanks to the cost of graphic novels. Something just seems wrong paying $20 for something that can be read in 15 minutes, great art or not. Still I feel a little bad about it, but that's what libraries are for, right?

Well, maybe I can't completely justify it, especially since I don't plan on stopping my visits to the library to check out more books and comics. However, there have been many that I enjoyed so much that I do plan on buying and adding them to the bookshelf:

• The Arrival, by Shaun Tan

  Gorgeous art and a wordless, yet moving and powerful narrative. I had seen this mentioned on a couple of "best of the year" lists, but it just took a look inside to see the reason why.

• Skim, by Jillian and Mariko Tamaki

  The story is great, but it's Jillian Tamaki's art that really grabs me. It reminds me a lot of Dave McKean's Cages for some reason, which I loved tremendously.

• La Perdida, by Jessica Abel

  I had read the first issue or two of La Perdida many years ago, but thanks to the library carrying the collected comic, I've been able to read the entire story (almost in a single sitting).

• Persepolis 1 & 2, by Marjane Satrapi

  These are some of the first graphic novels I checked out from the library. I still haven't seen the film, but if it is anywhere near as good as these then it should be fantastic.

• The entire Lone Wolf and Cub series, by Kazuo Koike and Goseki Kojima

  A Zen-like assassin and his infant son travel from job to job, often without saying but just a few words. Yeah, it can be quite violent at times, but it isn't overly graphic or gruesome. The beautiful art is what grabs me the most.

I really have enjoyed reading everything that I've checked out of the library, but those above are the ones that really stood out. I can also thank the library for getting me hooked on Iain M. Banks' sci-fi books. They had an old beat-up copy of Consider Phlebas which I loved. Sadly, many of his earlier SF books are still not yet available in the US (although they are being released, slowly) so I've had to resort to buying some from overseas in order to feed my Culture fix.

I was working with Google Maps for something I'm dealing with for work and thought I'd take a look and see if the "Street View" vans (or cars, or whatever they use) had been down the street we used to live on in Dallas. little StreetView trip to our old house--our first house--in Dallas. They have:

It's odd looking at the house from this perspective. First of all, it's no longer our house. Secondly, the current owner has been adding all kinds of changes to the front yard. It looks like he's adding some big flower beds or something there. From the Street View, they're still dirt so who knows what the final result will be. I'm sure he had a blast going to the Dallas Preservation Society meetings to get those changes approved. We had to go several times ourselves: first time was to let us remodel the inside, one time to get the fences approved, another time to let us tear down the old garage, and another time to get the "O.K." to have a new front porch poured. It was a hassle of paperwork and useless meetings, but in the end we didn't really have many problems.

Next time we're in Dallas we'll have to drive by and see what went into the new flowerbeds, since I doubt Google will update the views anytime soon. I don't really have that strong of an attachment to the house anymore, but it is a strange experience seeing it from the angle of ex-owner, and seeing the changes that have happened since we sold it.

And as long as he keeps the trees that we planted, one after each child was born, then I'll look on the changes with approval. Otherwise, he'll need a talking to.

How sad is it that out of all the Academy Award nominees for this year, I've seen only one in its entirety (Sicko) and another half-way through (Ratatouille)? Well, pretty sad.

Whether you want to call it "Getting Things Done" or call it keeping a list of Things That Need To Be Done, there are many applications out there to help you out. I've tried out several of these applications, as well as several web-based ones (like Ta-da List). I think I'm finally ready to give up with all the fancy solutions, and have returned to a simple one: the plain (though lightly-formatted) text file.

The first of the applications I tried was OmniOutliner-based KinklessGTD system primarily because of Merlin Mann's review and recommendation. It worked pretty well, but I'd occasionally get frustrated with how the system worked (with the rebuilding and whatnot). Then I tried iGTD and that also worked well, but something about the app's layout and icons eventually turned me off it (free or not). When The Omni Group announced the OmniFocus alpha testing, I thought I'd go ahead and try that one as well. I've been using that up until early this week. It's worked the best of all the options I had tried so far, but still it seemed to be too much work for keeping a todo list.

More recently I've seen some posts about YAGTDA (Yet Another Getting Things Done Application) called Things. It certainly looks pretty and I was enthused enough about the application and hype to sign up for access to the beta. I haven't received an email with info on how to get the beta, but I don't think it'll matter. I think I've moved on from the big (and not cheap) applications for my todo lists. I haven't stuck completely to the GTD philosophy (or theory or implementation or whatever) so I'm not sure I ever really needed one of the heavyweight apps in the first place.

Today, when looking for something simpler I came across a couple of TextMate bundles that are more along the lines of what I need, especially since most of my day is spent in TextMate anyway. I first found Henrik Nyh's Tasks bundle, which in turn pointed to Sven Fuchs' Taskmate bundle, which is based off of Tasks, but is a little more functional. And it's exactly what I need (for now). It uses a simple text file as the base with some minimal formatting (colons and dashes) to mark up your task/todo list. This is more like it. Not jmuch effort needed and it does exactly what I need.

I did have to make a few changes to Taskmate for it to work for me. I like using the Quicksilver "Append to" command, but it only allows appending text to files ending with the ".txt" extension. After adding the Taskmate bundle, I opened up Textmate's Bundle Editor and changed the following info:

fileTypes = ( 'todo' );

to

fileTypes = ( 'txt' );

so that it will recognize .txt files instead of .todo files. In order to avoid issues with other basic text files, I added another line to make sure it's working with Taskmate files:

firstLineMatch = 'Todo List';

Now, in order for Taskmate to work, the file must have a ".txt" file extension, and the first line of the file must be "Todo List". Of course, if you're reading this and would like to use your own qualifier, just make the necessary changes. I did make this solution a little more complicated than the default installation, but once these things are set, you don't have to think about it again.

I should have posted this yesterday, on my actual birthday, but I was too occupied with work and then with my new toy.

I didn't make any real new year's resolutions this year, so instead I'm making a list on my birthday on what I intend to do this coming year:

1. Quit smoking once and for all, dammit (starting now)
2. Draw more often in my sketchbook, and post some of my favs here on this site
3. Take more photos, and post more to Flickr
4. Ride my bike more, and if I can't go for a ride, so some other exercise
5. Write more which includes giving NaNoWriMo another shot this year
6. Start up that project I've been stalling on for a year
7. Post more to this weblog

In a years time, I'll take a look back and see how I've done. Also, how is it that I'm turning 36 already? Where have all those years gone? :)

We'd had snow falling from the sky at various levels of intensity at least ten different times so far, but I still can't get used to it.

While growing up in Texas snow was a novelty. We would maybe get one snowfall a year. Sometimes it would stick, but usually it didn't; or, it wouldn't stick on the ground for long. In Texas, I think we'd get ice or sleet more than anything else.

It snowed every year, sometimes heavily, during my years living in Michigan. I can't remember if I grew to hate the snow and ice, or whether I enjoyed it. I know there were some days when walking across the Michigan State campus, carrying my heavy band instrument, that I hated the slipping and sliding the snow and ice caused.

We're back in the north again, and the snow has been falling, especially the last couple of weeks. And I like it. A lot. It hasn't collected on the ground so much yet, so it hasn't interfered with driving yet, so my mind may end up changing later. I just find it wonderfully peaceful, and it makes the dropping temperatures just that much more bearable. It's definitely a nice change from Texas.

So, quite a bit has happened since the last time I posted anything here...

1. I finally, finally finished all my school work and received the diploma for my Bachelors degree;
2. we sold our house in Dallas and moved to a new city and state;
3. we moved into an apartment/loft, which is the first true apartment that I've ever lived in;
4. I just recently launched a monstrous Ruby on Rails project for work that I'd been working on for months;
5. we all bought new bikes and I can't wait to ride mine again;
6. we've been eating some great food and soaking up our new culture, but damn, I miss a good Mexican food meal;
7. and there's probably much, much more but it will have to wait.

Oh, and I also redesigned this site, but I wonder who checks website/weblog designs much anymore. Everyone reads via newsreaders these days, right?

Last week I finally graduated with a Bachelors degree (English Literature, if you can believe that). When I walked across the stage during the University of North Texas commencement ceremony, I finally made that first step into the working world.

Oh, wait. I'm already there!

My first semester at a university (at Michigan State) was in the fall of 1989. There were many starts and stops, degree changes, and school changes in between. I eventually dropped out about 11 years ago and started working full time.

Then, a few years ago, a good friend of mine re-enrolled and began working on his degree again - after an absence almost as long as my own. Slowly but surely, by taking one or two classes a semester, I completed all the classes I needed to complete my degree. So, now, after almost 17 years, I have completed my college education.

It still boggles my mind that it's finally over. While going back to school I continued to work full time. We had our second child somewhere in the middle of all this, too. This really wouldn't have been possible without the help and support of my wife, who sometimes didn't get the breaks she needed when I was at class, or at the coffee shop studying. It was tough at times, but we made it work somehow.

Now, what's next? Well, that's the question I'm still asking myself. Stay tuned.

I have yet again relaunched this weblog. This time I've done away with weblog applications that others have written and have rolled my own (yet again).

This time I've written a very simple weblog app with Ruby on Rails. It doesn't do anything fancy, but that's all right with me. I needed a simple project to get my Rails chops back in shape.

There are still a few things that may break or not work, but I think I've taken care of all the important stuff. If you do get an error or anything, please let me know.

The evidence is overwhelming; I honestly think I'm cursed. Yesterday, I had yet another hard drive fail on me. This time, the hard drive in my Powerbook died. And it died hard.

Amazingly enough, the drive died as I was backing it up. So, even though it didn't complete the backup, it did copy all the important things (namely my Users directory) to the external drive before it bit the dust. If I'm not the perfect example of why you should back up your data (and often!), I don't know who is.

I'm happy that everything important is safe, but what a hassle it is. I'm now without my Powerbook for at least a week. sob

Heed my warning: back up your data!