Well, another quarter has passed on by, and the world looks much the same as it did three months ago. There were some notable events that will stick with me for a while.

The Olympics in China -- awesome presentation, marred only by a few technical glitches. More confirmation of the fact that the IOC has no balls, not calling China out on the Mystery of the Underaged Gymnasts (maybe the Hardy Boys will get on the case). Michael Phelps was phenomenal, but for some reason he rubs me the wrong way... he doesn't act like a hero should act, and that bothers me subconsciously. I wish for the (imaginary, I think) halcyon days when we had heros we could worship because they had heroic values, not just because they did heroic deeds.

Banking meltdown in the US... saw this coming for the past couple years. Hopefully we'll let the market adjust so we can begin recovery, rather than postponing and exacerbating the problem. I have a great sense of unease about the next few years economically, but I'm not sure how to put myself in the best position to ride it out.

Presidential politics... same bat time, same bat channel as last election cycle, and all the ones I remember. Quick thoughts: Palin's in over her head, McCain is good at dissembling, Obama is gliding on the winds of change, Biden should've stayed in the Senate.

Rutgers football has gotten a rude awakening, Schiano better get his team to a competitive level before all his recruits de-commit.

Being a father continues to bring new joys constantly, I can't wait until my daughter can actually tell me she loves me, even though I can see it in her outstretched arms when I get home before her bedtime. On the plus side, she does signal 'touchdown' by raising her arms if I say it. Makes watching football even better :)

A good friend got married after living with his girfriend for over a decade. Congrats to them! Great people, maybe they'll be contributing more to the gene pool soon... don't know why else they would decide to get married after ten years together.

Other good friends had their first child... good luck to them, they'll need it. I thought I had a hard time adjusting to life with a baby, I think they're in for some real eye-opening.

Anyway, here's to hoping I remember to continue quarterly updates for some future retrospection.

Cheers.

This comes via ShadowWrought from stoolpigeon, JC, Smitty, and originally, ShadowWrought thinks, RM6f9.
Post a comment to this thread, and I will:

1. Tell you why I befriended you.
2. Associate you with something - fandom, a song, a color, a photo, etc..
3. Tell you something I like about you.
4. Tell you a memory I have of you.
5. Ask something I've always wanted to know about you.
7. In return, you must post this in your Journal/Blag/whatever.

Viva la chain blog.

So I happened to click on my comments tab today, and see that I have made 4095 comments. This means my next comment will be my 2^12th comment.

After a little consideration, I thought that it should be _really_ meaningful. A little more consideration, and I thought, "Wow, that's a lot of comments (nts: need to get out more) -- I wonder how my posting style has changed over the years."

Sorry for the navel-gazing (not that anyone reads my journals, anyway -- I'm averaging less than one entry every two years), but this got me thinking about personal numerical significance. Anytime I see a power of two greater than 2^10, I get a little warm fuzy feeling. I've got most of the powers of two memorized to some ungodly power, due to the influence of Telengard on the Commodore PET. I dimly remember that spell points were calculated by the formula for x = 1 to level: SP = SP + x. I remember also that exp need for the next level was 1000*2^(current level). I think the highest character I ever had was level 65, so I guess that's why I memorized 2^x all the way to the 65th power. I currently can spot powers of two to about 2^20.

I think it's interesting that this was what led me to a lifelong interest in mathematics, and in particular, formulas. Sure, maybe my affinity for math drew me to such silly pursuits while playing Telengard... but computer gaming had a big impact on my development. I still recall trying to build my own code for Telengard in Basic -- it's how I began to teach myself to code. It was the READ code that completely stumped me and taught me that sometimes you need to ask for help.

It's two and a half decades later, and I still remember my own personal summers of code. Adding functionality to Telengard, like magic weapons with 'charged' abilities and stat-gain abilities -- I think I got started just a bit early (and on the wrong machine) to have a blast tweaking Rogue. Who knows what might have come of it.

To continue the divergence from why I initially started this journal entry, I remember about 7-8 years ago my parents finally packed up and moved to their "retirement" house. I had a last look-over the items they were getting rid of, and in that pile in the basement was a box full of mildewed cassette tapes. Some were of music (the Hooters, Talking Heads, the Fixx, Dire Straights, Quiet Riot, to name a few groups) but the vast majority were of games and programs for the PET. I let them be discarded, but now I wish I could pull the data off and see what my earliest attempts at code were like -- especially the BASIC programs of over 2,000 lines before I learned about GOSUB :). I wonder if it'd be scarier than deciphering some of the perl code I've seen in recent years.

Anyway, it's been a nice short trip down memory lane this afternoon.

Just wanted to clear the air.

It would be a shame if anyone reading my last (and until now, only) journal entry thought it was from a few days ago, rather than 2y+. I no longer learn much new from reading slashdot, since topics are recycled so much... other than reinforcement of the fact that I know a lot less than I once thought I did. And some current events, though it seems that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Anyway, that's enough disjointed Friday rambling for now.

GO RUTGERS!