Journal Short Circuit's Journal: Merry Christmas to All 3
Merry Christmas to all. Or happy hanukkah. Or Ramadan (or is that over by now?). Or Kwanzaa. Whatever your religion, I hope you're seeing good times.
Traded Christmas gifts with the parents earlier today. I was in a hurry to see their reactions to what I'd bought them. And no, getting reciprocol presents wasn't on my mind at the time.
I gave my dad a 100-pack of blank DVD+R media. He's always burning this or that...I figured this would give him some burnable media that worked on my computers. (DVD-Rs don't seem to work.)
I gave my mom that book on database security that was reviewed on Slashdot a few weeks ago. I even used Slashdot's referral link, so Merry Christmas to Slashdot, too, I guess. My mom usually does advanced Access databases, but she has a very good grounding in general database theory and practical design. She also teaches the subject.
I got a Ripley's Believe it or Not collection book, which is neat. I've always had a fascination with wierd factoids.
I also got a CD/DVD burner that supports everything currently under the sun, including dual-layered media. I'd asked for a CD burner on my Christmas list, seeing that the one in my computer had apparently died. This one's a Sony DRU-810A. It works fine under Linux if I use the ATAPI driver with xcdroast. And xcdroast didn't complain about a lack of DMA support with ATAPI. (When did that change?). I've burned one CD, but no DVDs yet. We'll see what happens.
I've got mixed feelings about my third gift. I got a copy of Battlefield 2. I've spent more time playing that game over the past six to eight months than I have any other game. I'm even organizing a clan, to be called the Wiggins. (The two main members, me and Xenocide, really enjoyed the Ender's Game series. I think that's one of the few books Xenocide has.) But I've been doing it at a local Cyber Cafe.
And having my own copy would be totally awesome...if I ran Windows. But I'm only running Linux. Wait...I'd be perfectly willing to set that XP machine back up. So yeah. Great. Except the game requires a minumum processor speed of 1.7GHz. The closest thing I have to that is my laptop that I run at 1GHz to keep from overheating.
So I'm going to continue gaming at ULX all-nighters. But I've now got an interesting book of factoids, and a working burner. Life in the materialistic sense is looking up.
So why do I feel so down? Is it because I don't know whether everything was in place for me to graduate last semester? Is it because my job planned for next semester depends on my graduation status? Is it because I don't know if I'll have the money to move out west to live with my brother? Is it because I don't know if I'll be able to get a job with medical insurance?
Most likely, it's probably a combination of all that.
Anyway, Merry Christmas, and good times to all.
stamps (Score:1)
Generic All-Purpose Season's Greetings to you too. (Score:2)
DVD Burner. (Score:1)
I really like that I can stuff 8.5GB on to one disc personally. Though I have only done that once so far, copying some large video files for a friend that I had on my machine.