Actually three, but I haven't uploaded the other one yet, I'm still listening to it. The new ones are "August" and "Out of my Butt". Click on August 4th on the calendar. Out of my Butt is great.

Only on my laptop though. I don't much like the distro that I installed, for 2 reasons. It's Mandrake Linux 9.1. First reason, they made it too much like Windows. Second reason, here's the website. I don't think it's supported anymore! Woops. It was the only copy of it I had that was already burnt to CDs. I have Shrike (Red Hat 9.0) but in ISO form on one of my computers. However, I don't want to get into that for its big company and proprietary additions to Linux. RPMs are a Red Hat addition, which are mainly used for installing applications. When I use Linux, I don't double click applications. I use this server, and everything involves running gzip -d on it first, then tar -cvf, since they're just binaries with no install. You set them up manually, drop the script into /etc/init.d/ (which on my current installation happens to just be a symbolic link, like a windows shortcut) and you're done. It's beautiful. However, since I can't use Mandrake, I'm going to install Gentoo Linux. Their website is still up, they are still developing and supporting the latest kernels, and have added some neat things using standard linux techniques (unlike Red Hat's RPM). You can still use Red Hat without ever once using an RPM, so, really, I'm just not using it because I want to try something different :) Red Hat's still darn good.

Here's the funny thing. I actually bought Gentoo Linux. Well, I paid to have CDs with the software delivered to my house. To do this with Windows, you're looking at $179 (cheapest that I ever got it on ebay) PER COPY (per computer!). The beautiful thing with Linux (if you know how to use it), you buy a CD for ranging prices (I've seen $1.50 plus S/H), and you can install it on a bazillion computers. I paid $9.99 for the install CDs and $9.99 for the packages CDs. Plus I bought a mug :) I always contribute to Open Source software that I like. I paid $20 for a free FTP client, FileZilla. It's nice though, but sadly, I won't be using it anymore, as it's only available on Windows.

I've had Linux running as a desktop before, but ever since I got this server, I've been learning more and more about it, so I now will feel more comfortable using it all the time, and I'll probably learn more on the desktop, and I'll be able to do cooler things on the server. That's a cool prospect.

Anyway, geek me up in the comments again.

I live in the only town called "Drexel Hill" on the entire planet. I can't say the same about where I work... Philadelphia.

I like taking the bus in the morning. I used to take the bus to school between 1st and 3rd grades. We moved to within a block of the school during my 3rd grade. However, some things have changed, some good, some bad. For instance, we used to bounce up and down on our seats so that when we hit a bump, you would bounce much higher, which would prompt laughter from all over the bus. Our bus driver back then was a giant a-hole. We pissed him off pretty good. When you would miss the school bus, that's it... you had to walk. Jeff and I missed a few times and would trek the multiple side roads and one main road into school. The school bus was free for me. Now, you see different people every time. Some people you see a few times a week. Now, I would have the option of taking my car, but I find it a lot more enjoyable letting someone else drive, plus parking anywhere besides in my driveway sucks. Now, it's anyone's guess if there will be people at the next bus stop. Now, you almost never see kids on the bus. And now, my destination is a lot cooler.

That paragraph is stupid.

Work is cool because sometimes we'll talk about stuff at my manager's desk. Work related stuff. But, I get in by 9 and all the sudden it's 11:30 and I haven't done any programming, research, analysis, design, or whatever I'm doing that day.

I saw someone get punched yesterday. This man and woman were arguing at the bottom of the escalator, and she threw a pretty decent jab and caught him under the chin. He was calm and didn't have a fit, so that was good. It could have taken a much worse turn if he had really been an angry type of guy. I didn't want to have to whoop some ass.

Man, this post really sucks.

This just in...

Top Sports Cities (Article Registration required. The origin is The Sporting News)
1. Boston
2. Philadelphia
3. Detroit
4. Miami
5. Los Angeles/Anaheim
6. Houston
7. Baltimore/Washington
8. Dallas/Fort Worth
9. Atlanta
10. New York/New Jersey

Individual Sports
Baseball: St. Louis
NBA: San Antonio, Texas
NFL: Green Bay, Wis.
NHL: Philadelphia
College basketball: Philadelphia
College football: Iowa City, Iowa.
NASCAR: Bristol, Tenn.

NFL : Green BAY?!!?1?11 We have so many more people than them, the best and most raudy fans in the F@#%!#! world, and we get to the NFC Championship game EVERY YEAR. That's bull. I don't even know that we win Hockey, but we'll take it :) I like all Philly sports, but it's a football town. I can't wait to see the Flyers, next year's Sixers, 10 years from now's Phillies, and who doesn't freakin love the Eagles. Green Bay sucks and I hope they lose every game this year. Oh, and I know someone who will be terribly offended that Philly also wins college basketball. Anyone who lives in a little city called "Lexington" in that small southern state known as "Kentucky". Those guys are nuts.

With some luck, this web page will be running on a new backend in a week or two. While I do find it easier now that I don't have to write ANY SQL to update, insert, delete, or get objects from the database, or create the tables for those objects, I am incredibly lazy, and don't want to have to build many of the web pages that I build when adding a new object type. It's a pain and a waste of time since they all do the same stuff, just with different types of data. Being a programmer in every sense of the word (the good programmers tend to be very good due to incredible laziness, their laziness drives them to think creatively. If I can do a task once that will eliminate a repetitive task later, you could bet the house that I'm going to do it), I decided that the current website is just not easy enough to extend or even maintain. I'll be testing this new software out on my new site, stringed.org, which was named because of my love of stringed instruments and classical music sometimes (coincidentally, stringed.com was going for over $1500). It will be my software showcase.

It's one of the more sporadic news entries, I just need to get to work on this stuff because it's a challenge, therefore FUN :) Geek me up in the comments.

I used to have a quotes section on my old website where I could just put in hysterical stuff that I said. This would make an immediate addition:

"Friday's coming like there's no tomorrow."

Oh man, I kill me.

(It has to be said on a Thursday. And if you're not familiar with the "like there's no tomorrow" saying, it's similar to these other ones:

That dude downs those hamburgers like it's his job!
That girl slam dunks like nobody's business!

These are just clever alternatives to these:

That dude downs those hamburgers!
That girl slam dunks!

As you can see, saying something with more words in it is funnier.)

Some of the quotes I had on there were really stupid, but my comedic abilities have obviously grown significantly. I can now think of dumb random s@#%@ in no time flat, and it'll usually be pretty funny to me. And because you visit my site, you would have to endure it, suckers. I'll add that as a to do item.

Thanks, everyone, for coming to the game on Saturday. I usually judge how successful a party is by how sunburnt I am, how little I remember of it, and how much money I have left in my wallet. The wallet one is usually a shock, like "I spent $80 last night?!!?" but never have I had more money than I started with, so that made it extra successful :) If anyone got too wasted (I won't point fingers) then please forgive them, for they know not what they do after many, many beers, and not drinking that much just might not be an option for them during this stage of their life. Don't get too angry, I am talking about me, so don't be like "what a DICK!!! he drank more than me!!" :) I got home that night, ate some wawa (thanks Tom!) and turned on the news because I wondered how the Phillies did that day.

So, thank your guests for me if they aren't on this email. I hope everyone had as good a time as me, and I hope we can do it again soon.

Love Always,

Jason

Yes, I said "Love Always". And NO ONE said anything about it! I was expecting a "awww, I love you too" or "dude, you're never coming out with us again..." Something. I had to mention it to someone and she had "figured you just must be an emotional type of guy...really emotional". Oh well, it was fun :) I had way too many beers that day, but I sent that email on Monday, so they had to figure it was not from the alcohol, right?! Unless I was bombed at 11 am on a MONDAY. On the first day of my New JOB!? I don't care that I only waited 8 hours before pointing out the error in their ways. They still should have checked their email and responded to me right away, putting every bit of the email under intense scrutiny. As if they have more important things to do with their lives.

We were at a Phillies game and I did wonder how they did when I got home. It wasn't really from the beer, we got in the game at around the 5th inning, got to our seats, and then a few people went to get cheesesteaks. I didn't get back to my seat until the 7th or 8th inning, and before I knew it, it was over. What a blast!

[Later on...] Ahh, the glorious jokes that come out of mistypings and misspellings:

Tom: I won't tell a sole
Me : i'm glad you won't tell any shoes
Tom: shut up

Or just quality humor about drinking...

Me : i like lyrical humor, but i can't get it out when i'm drinking. i can hardly form words, let alone think of long words to say

Here are two things that might make you laugh.

Coming up to a "left arrow green light" today, the left arrow green light went out, meaning oncoming traffic will soon be coming. After the light went out, the car in front of me went, I went, and I look in my rear view and TWO MORE cars went!! It was worth a post. I laughed and laughed and laughed.

Another story came into my mind. My friend, John, and I were coming home from somewhere that makes you cross the trolley tracks up near Garrett and Burmont. Well, we start to cross the trolley track even after noticing that the lights are blinking. Keep in mind they don't have those things that drop down and are normally made of wood painted red and white. We swore we JUST got over the tracks, and John looked in his rear view, and ANOTHER car made it over fine!! Trolleys do have brakes, but still, that thing was close, I was in the passenger seat and it was coming at us from that side. Sometimes I count my blessings :)

I don't have anymore :(

I rarely watch TV besides sporting events and sometimes the news, but when I do, I manage to find entertaining stuff. Last night was the first show of the new season of "The Surreal World". The last one, with Chris Knight, was good. I did watch most of it. The new one has people in it like "Pepa" from "Salt 'n Pepa", and Balki from that show, and a couple of good looking women, and a dirtbike pioneer, and of course, Jose Canseco. It's going to rule.

Another show, on that same channel (it's a Godsend), is that fat show I had mentioned before, where everyone has a set amount of weight to lose, and they form teams, and whatever team loses the most weight wins. This is mildly entertaining when it's just normal people, but now there are personalities on there that most of us would know already. That girl from the Snapple commercials (Wendy), the lead singer from Warrant, Victoria Jackson of SNL, Phil Margera (Bam's dad who gets the S%@!#^# kicked out of him by Bam in pretty much every episode of Jackass [I don't watch the new one]). Of course there's more, but most worthy of a mention is Gary Busey. This dude rocks.

Let me clarify something though. I don't care for celebrities any more than I care for us "normal" folk. I don't know why, but if I saw someone who I don't consider an "extraordinary celebrity", they might get a second look from me if they're lucky. Not all celebrities are created equal, and of course, it's all opinion, but I find that there's an elite group of super talented folk who deserve it. Probably a topic for another discussion. Basically, don't expect this to become a hotbed for celebrity talk. In fact, you might as well get it all out on this post. There's a reason I don't have categories on the left entitled "TV" or "Celebrities". I don't watch TV really, and I find it a waste of time to talk about other people, anybody, either in a nice way or in a bad way, but especially in a bad way.

Anyway, back to Gary Busey. So, this guy, you may have heard, was in a huge motorcycle accident, had a huge change on his outlook on life, appreciates it more and everything, and became a philosopher of sorts. And these other people laugh at him when he comes up with stuff like his acronym of TEAM (Together Everyone Achieves More) and when he states that his team was put together by a power greater than himself and it's a sign. They laugh at him. Those guys, whoever they are, have no idea what he's been through and how he perceives life. They should just STFU in my opinion. But, whoever got this group of people together are geniuses. They know what people will clash, put them on the team together, and it becomes entertainment for all of us, defending Gary Busey or ripping on the Snapple girl. It's not even worth that much time talking about it, and I've wasted 8 minutes of my life. The disrespect shown is unbelievable. I was in an accident, and if I claimed that it changed my life, and acted like it like Busey does, I'd pity anyone who laughed at me, but he's probably too nice for that.

Sometimes I catch the first show of a season (last night I caught 2), and then never watch it again. We'll see what happens. I want to see if Bam's Dad loses 80 pounds! He considers mowing the lawn on a RIDE-ON MOWER exercise, it's hilarious.

Something else that's funny: I saw the Hulk Hogan reality show last night, where his daughter who's 16 wants to go on a date with a 22 year old, and Hulk's having a hard time letting her, and finally agrees to it after buying GPS tracking equipment for the car. OK. She's 16. The one scene had her coming out after getting a shower, in very skimpy bra and panties. Hulk, any guy who watched that episode has now lusted after your daughter. That's no estimated guess. Hulk, minding who his daughter dates at 16, apparently doesn't mind that the rest of the country now has very little left to imagine of her.

As you may know, I take the trolley and the El into work everyday. Trolley to 69th Street, then 69th to work. You may have heard that there were subway bombings yesterday in London, and that had caused alert levels to rise here in the lovely USA, but only for rail lines (which I think is dumb, but that's another story for another time, like in 10 minutes). However, I fear nothing, so I continue to go to work on the train. Call this whatever you want (courage, heroism, Godlike symptoms), I'm a stud.

Mainly, this courage comes from my lack of fear from dying or losing a leg or something, but also it comes from necessity for a paycheck. You might ask, what good is a paycheck if you're dead? Well, I'm sure that no one who has received a paycheck posthumously can answer that question, so why would you be asking me it? Like I know? Are you racist against dead people?! Ok, don't make me play the dead card on your ass. I'll have civil rights all over it.

So now that I've covered my utter lack of fear from anything (except bugs flying down or up my shirt), let's ponder why it's dumber than Kodie to raise threat alerts here in the United States. These also happen to be more reasons that I'm not afraid of an attack.

1) Coordinated attacks usually happen at the same time, hence the word "coordinated". By the time we heard of London's attacks it would have been too late already. Plus, there's like a huge time difference, so rush hour in the morning there is like sleepy time here. Rush hour in the evening there, if it's 5 o'clock, is lunch. My point is, terrorists would have suspected that the USA would have taken steps to prevent an attack here after hearing of the one in London. So they would have either coordinated an attack or just decided to attack one place.

2) Terrorists are not stupid. We probably insulted them bigtime by raising threat levels on only the public trans systems. Seriously, do you think, if attacks are only slightly coordinated, like 5-6 hours apart, that they would perform the same types of attacks? Meaning, bombs on subways?! Come on. I give them a little more credit than that.

That's not to discount the police or metro police who stand by the turnstyles everyday, looking for anything suspicious. But that brings up a question. They're always there. I thought the threat level was raised. Shouldn't they be "stepping up" security? They have the same amount. Oh well, I still feel safe. Plus, SEPTA has these signs, and has had them for as long as I've taken it, in their cars that say "Nothing can stop a train faster than a forgotten bag" or something like that. And it also warns to keep an eye out for this activity. I think it's brilliant. But, we're only Philly, what interest would al Qaeda have in us? I have no idea.

"This update installs a permanent copy of Package Installer for Windows to enable software updates to have a significantly smaller download size. The Package Installer facilitates the install of software updates for Microsoft Windows operating systems and other Microsoft products. After you install this update, you may have to restart your system."

From my latest Windows Update. Well, WTF??!? Do I have to restart it or not? I'm not installing it because that is the dumbest thing I've ever had the displeasure of laying eyes on.

I've had it up to HERE ;) with Windows on a personal level. Sure, I'll still need one for games because of the monopoly they've created with good PC games. Or I have to stop playing PC games altogether, which I'm not ready to do. At least not until the PS3 comes out, or the PSP comes out with good games, or the Nintendo Revolution takes shape.

My gaming PC isn't even working now since I bought the new 4 port PC/Mac KVM switch. It works fine with my other Windows PC. And, it even works fine until Windows starts up on that gaming PC, then it FREEZES ALL OF THE OTHER COMPUTERS attached to the KVM. I can't make this stuff up. I have no idea. The KVM maker says the USB port is not getting enough power if it has that behavior, but it works before it gets to Windows. This would lead one to believe that either the drivers are not compatible (I tried to uninstall and get the latest from somewhere, ANYWHERE, at least two times, but Windows says they are the latest drivers), or that, although hard to believe, Windows is at fault somehow. I just bought a PCI 5 port USB card, so we'll see. I'm hoping it works because I need that computer. I didn't spend all that money on it so it can sit there and freeze my other computers. If you think I'm lying about these symptoms, I'll gladly record it before the USB card gets here.

So, I'm thinking, now that I don't really need Windows (since I have a Mac), I can install Linux on my two non-gaming PCs. This laptop actually has Linux on it. I installed it first, before Windows, which exposed a horrendous bug in Windows. Since I installed it on the first partition, Windows automatically designated the next partition E:, thus making it have no C: drive. Well, if you run into weird things happening in Windows, check to see if you have a C: drive. You can make it seem like you have a C: drive by going to start>run then type in "cmd" then type "subst C: E:". (Replace E: with whatever drive Windows is installed on). That will return it to "normal".

So, now that I'm installing Linux, you will see a much happier person behind the text on this website. I might buy you flowers if I see you. I might let you sit in my seat on the subway. I might (if you happen to be a bum) give you my change or buy that gold necklace off of you for $20, to help you get all hopped up on cocaine and liquor. Yes, these will be better times for everyone. It might even have side effects, you never know. They might lower the oil prices, stop the war in Iraq, hell, Israel and Palestine will make up and say "Dude, I'm sorry I took over your land in the 60s, but God said it's ours" to which the much more pleasant Palestinians will reply "Hey, man, I know it was yours, we were just getting comfortable, no hard feelings? We'll just go move in with Egypt, it's all good." Ahh, world peace at last.

For the last day and a half, I put some pretty major work into this website. However, the only parts you'll see are in the comments section, and now a News post can have multiple categories associated with it. The thing about the last one is it's not easy at all. You need a few things.

#1 Table structure
#2 Change all your code that uses just a Subject in the news table
#3 Create a dual select box (which I needed anyway)
#4 Create a data list control to list each subject associated with that news post underneath it.

Numbers 1 and 2 were simple, but time consuming. However, numbers 3 and 4, with a new technology and very little documentation out there to go on, can be particularly daunting tasks. In the end, the amount of code written was not at all proportional to the amount of time spent on it, but that's usually the case in Computer Science and programming. You think and think and think, then the easy work begins, unless of course you're using a technology that you aren't too familiar with, like JavaServer Faces. I've written web controls in the technology before. The menu control, for instance, and the calendar control. However, unlike the menu and calendar controls, the Dual Select list is an input control, and the Data List control is an interation control, neither of which I had developed in JSF, up until this weekend.

Here is what the dual select list looks like:



And here is the short amount of JSP code that writes out all of the categories under a news post.



Now the code to "plop" a dual select list onto a page



Simple.

Now I just have to go through all of my news posts and properly categorize them. I'd rather drink gravel.

There was a miscommunication. I thought everyone wanted to go, but then everyone realized I was serious about going, so they all backed down :( Actually, that's not true. Scott wanted to go, and still may.

So instead I stayed in, cooked some burgers on the grill, lost much of the hair on my left hand, pet Kodie and watched the Phillies get manhandled by the knuckleball of Tim Wakefield. Now I'm going to add some features to my website. It'll be a Friday night to remember.

I don't feel like typing a lot, so this is a quick list of short, to the point, pieces of crap:

Tone Loc is playing tonight at Reeds in Blue Bell. I'm going and so are a bunch of my freak-show-seeking friends. I'm going to ask the bartender for a funky cold medina, then receive a fake laugh, as if that's the first time that particular bartender heard that particular joke on that particular night.

I thought about something that I used to think about when I was a kid. Could people join hands and connect around the world? Then, my new age, internet techy brain mangled it into this other thought. It would be cool if there were chained links from one webpage in one region to another webpage in the next region over, and the link on the next webpage linked to a region next to it, and so on and so forth.

Then, another idea popped in from this. You could probably send a search engine into an infinite loop if you could trick it into going around and around. This would involve changing the links and content on each linked page, but it wouldn't get anywhere except around the world an infinite amount of times. I guess that's getting somewhere, but it's not helping its cause in searching the web. Basically, one thread would be useless out of many threads of execution that make up a web spider's software. But, it would be neat.

I've been going to Barnaby's of America pretty much every Thursday for the past 2 weeks. It's not a false statement, but rather unnecessary to use "pretty much every Thursday" and "for the past 2 weeks". Oh well. More words == more chance someone will read something.

I've been listening to Candlebox on shuffle during my commute to and from work. They are good. Great. They rock and write good melodies, and they have good guitar. A while ago I got so into them that I even researched and found out that the lead singer has another band. I bought an autographed copy of their album. The new band is Kevin Martin and the HiWatts.

Wednesday I spent my commute to work listening to "Sexy and 17" by the Stray Cats. I listened to it 6 times straight, and then 3 or more on the way back. There are no words to describe that song, you basically just have to listen to it 100 times.

That ex-KKK member got 60 years for the murder of 3 people. He's like a million years old. Justice was not done in this case, even by the furthest stretch of the imagination. 40 years had passed. Way to go, Justice.

Some people think that guns should be banned, that the 2nd Amendment is old and for "militias", which are pretty much near extinction. That'll work like the Prohibition of Alcohol in the earlier part of last century, by all accounts of the quick run-through in my head. I think less things should be banned, but I can post a book on this topic.

Ahh, the critics. Read the comments:

"Contradictions in your post.. do you want to type or not? "I don't feel like typing a lot" ... and ... "but rather unnecessary to use "pretty much every Thursday" and "for the past 2 weeks". Oh well. More words""

Obviously not a soldier in the Battle of Logic. If not wanting to go to work meant not going to work, well, consider half of America on vacation. Or, want to be a millionaire? It takes a little more than wanting. This further justifies and explains my comments. Tune in next week.

[check back for more]

I put up two new songs that I created with the assistance of my Mac and GarageBand, a program that CAME WITH my Mac Mini. They are called "Jazz in June" and "Funkin A". I have to make the Downloads page easier to navigate, somehow.

That's right! Mac Mini. 1.42 Ghz G4. Ram to be upgraded in a bit. Installing the latest software updates right now. And I almost have my first song written in GarageBand. This thing's sweet. At 1280x1024 it's a sight to behold. I will have some pictures up soon, as soon as I clean up my room a bit :) It's got a bunch of new trash from the purchases today. I also got a new 4 port KVM switch so I can have all of my 4 computers hooked up to one keyboard, monitor and mouse. Technology is amazing.