Saturday, July 31, 2004

The Village: 5 Blancos!

posted by John Blanco @ 10:10 AM

 

We saw Shyamalan's "The Village" last night and it was excellent! I have given this movie 5 Blancos. Yes, a Blanco is good. Yes, 5 is the max. No, it won't be rare. :)

I've seen mixed reviews on "The Village" and I know why. As a good movie, it does reak a little of boredom at times, especially earlier on. Don't let this alarm you, every good movie does. You'll be drawn in within 20 minutes if you weren't before. I'll give no plotlines away here either.

This movie will make you think for quite a while. If that scares you, go see the "White Castle" movie... :)

Friday, July 30, 2004

Walk in the village?

posted by John Blanco @ 7:30 AM

 

Well, yesterday was Michele's birthday. I'm such a good hubbie, I got her a mini-giraffe, a Rubiks Cube, and a paper towel holder. I also didn't take her to her choice of restaurant. And instead of brownie's, I just made her eat the batter.

Hmmm?

Wha? I'm mean? Crazy talk.

The mni-giraffe was the same model as the "mama" giraffe I got her last year. It represents the baby that we may be trying for very soon now. :) The Rubiks Cube is the 2x2 gizmo that she saw and loved in Anchorman. Then there's a the paper towel holder, which is actually a bear statue (cute little bears climbing the holder with the one on the top waving hello).

We tried to go to Northwood Inn, but it was hella-crowded...so we went to Red Lobster instead which is her favorite. :)

Tonight, we go to see the Village. This is my choice, I've been waiting for this movie for months now. Jay's coming along as well. Jay is a friend of ours I met at chess club. He's a big King's Indian kinda guy.

Anyway, the movie will be cool. Nothing much else to report. We have like two more birthday dinners to go this weekend. I'm gonna have to find some time to study for my upcoming chess tournament as well. Perhaps Saturday morning.

Speaking on that, does anyone have a PS2->USB converter?

Saturday, July 24, 2004

Tattered Cimbi

posted by John Blanco @ 1:10 PM

 

So Michele and I took Harmony and Cimbi to the vet today. Harmony is Michele's kitty, a cute Scottish Fold minus the floppy ears (but she has tiny ones). She's white with blue (the cat kinda blue, it's really gray) spots and a pink and blue (gray) nose. She's pretty cute, I'd date her if she were human. Well, if she didn't shed...

Cimbi is a dapper young gentleman. He looks like Morris the cat, except much fatter. WELLLLL, he has lost weight. He's a sleek 11.8 pounds now!! Pretty shnazzy. If he still had a kitty penis he'd prolly get lots of ladies, too! Cimbi is called a "buff tabby" because of his strong kitty limbs, and ok, he's buff-colored. And by the way, he's not a girl! (but, oh so pretty...HANDSOME!)

Anyways, we take them to the vet and besides them both needing a whole lotta dental work, Cimbi's got a little problem. Ya see, he has this habit of trying to bite off his tail. He's gnawed thru his fur right where his tail (huh huh, tail...) meets his buttocks (huh huh, meets...), and now he's got some scars. The vet said it's no biggie, i.e., not cancer, but he recommended a cone head!

So, my little Cimbi, has to wear a cone on his head to keep him from scratching. Could be a week, could be longer. We already have pictures! I'll try to post them when they get developed...MUA HA HA!!!

Signing out. Late. Piece. One. Check ya'.

Friday, July 23, 2004

The Forefront of Technology's Past

posted by John Blanco @ 12:26 PM

 

It's been my theme for the last several years. Due to legitimate adult responsibilities and a techno-world changing too quickly to keep up, I've been persistently a year or more behind on every Web trend.

Blogging no different.

So now I join the masses in something that we all have a passion for, even if we don't know it. I will blog my life. Apologies in advance.

So, a real quick recap on the last 27 years...

Born in Yonkers, New York. Very cute. Good kid. Moved to Florida. Moved back to New York. Grew up and went to high school wearing sweatpants rolled up to just below my knees. Picked on and too nice for my own good. Got with the program towards the end of high school and after a year of community college (hahahaha), went to Colorado State University in, ummm, Colorado.

I've been living out here since 1998. I met my wife, Michele, out here and we're happily married. :) Adopted a couple children (cats, really). I'm an l33t Software Developer by trade, and as we join me, I'm working at Taliant Software in Denver. I do Flash MX work here...maybe one day I'll move on to Java which has always been a dream, but a judging by the stress the EJB guys are under right now I think I'll play with Flash another year at least!

My main hobbies are chess and sports. Wait, chess is a sport! Anyone who disagrees lies!!! I run a chess club called the Littleton Chess Club (Littleton is where Michele and I live) and am in charge of mowing the lawn (ours, not the LCC's) once a week. I listen to all kinds of music (Marilyn Manson, Slipknot, PJ Harvey, Weird Al Yankovic...yeah, that's right) but to be a favorite movie of mine it must truly be bizarre (Mulholland Drive, Fargo, Boogie Nights, Eyes Wide Shut). Hmmm, OK it's only a coincidence that 3 of those movies have crazy sex scenes. OK, maybe not. OK, maybe.

It's 1:22 PM here and I'm listening to some Marilyn and running a Flash build on my machine. Taliant is crazy with Flash. I mean, I'm running a *build*. I still can't believe we have a codebase of tens of thousands of lines of code in Flash! I mean, it's not compiled. I mean, we're using ActionScript 1.0 for gosh sakes! Yet, somehow, the insanity of it all is the best part of the challenge. :)

So, holy crap, the Unit Test suite ran to completion, nearly flawlessly, and it's all because I had a config file pointing at the wrong directory before. WOW! Life rules sometimes.

See how simple my life is?

Get used to it...see ya next blog. :)