I've decided to show 3 months on the calendar for my own personal reasons. I know there will never be anything new posted to the site in the future lest I unveil what I've been working on in my basement for 10 years, that which has previously been called science fiction, but still, the clock on the server still says May 2005. It's so simple to change it. The only thing that I have to fix about this site is that I can't reload it in Tomcat. It'll re-compile JSPs if I upload them, but I need to restart the application, and something in the server.xml file in Tomcat is preventing me from easily doing that (right now I have to go to the Linux shell and restart Tomcat, shutting down every site on this server...)

Next thing I'm working on is a simple content management system so I can easily add pages with stuff on them, and after that the forum, and then finally a poll system. The casba will be rocked.

I love Cracker. They make software development possible. Right now it's 2:10 AM and "Shameless" is blaring out of my speakers. Check out their website I have posted in the links section.

I have been on a Cracker kick where I can't get enough of them. I listen to them right when I get up, on the train on the way to and back from work, whenever I go out, and the most time I listen to them is when I'm developing this website! I'll listen to all of the albums I have (all those listed on their "Discography" page except Countrysides) and when it gets to the end, I'll restart it. I'm pretty much addicted big time. You might even say that this whole site was developed while listening to Cracker. If so, I owe them big time. I can't list my favorite songs. Go to the discography page and find a song, chances are it's one of my favorites :)

Nice, as I'm typing this sentence "What You're Missing" came on. It's a rap song :)

Woohoo! I have a calendar now. The site is nowhere near done. Keep checking back for updates. I'm going to add a forum and some kind of cheap content management system. Those two are going to be added just because I'm using this same site for different sites. I just change the images and stylesheets, remove systems or leave them the same, and voila, you won't recognize it as being the same exact software but it will be :)

Brutal. The Sixers are losing big time to a team they should be losing to, but it just sucks, they made it to the playoffs when, about 20 games ago, it didn't seem likely at all. They're still fun to watch so I'll happily watch them lose.

I have a cool idea for the calendar. Aside from people being able to add dates to it, the calendar is now a project. It will include a web component and a few pages. Basically, now I'll be able to show, for instance, a small "newspaper" icon on a day that there was news. Of course, I like making these things easily configurable, I'll also be able to have an icon that signifies, say, a new Photo Album added, and on the date the photo album was added, that icon will show up on the calendar. It's going to be neat. Other "calenderable" things I have are downloads and links. This thing is going to be cool.

So also, the calendar control will be clickable and you'll go to a page, when you click a specific date, and it'll show you all the neat things that happened on this site on that date.

I have a few more things I want to add before I call this site finished for now.

Forum
If I want to use this site to replace many other sites I've written, the first thing I need to write is a forum. It's going to be complete garbage compared to what's out there, but you know what? I don't care. The other sites up, the Connell site and the Bygrave site both have forums with messages in them, so I can't just ditch them. So, at least I have to make them for those sites.

Calendar
Same thing as above, those sites have calendars with dates in them, Kate would be mighty PO'd if I just erased them. She may be in Japan but that doesn't mean I have no reason to fear her :) She will be back and I will hear it, believe me, even if it's 2 years from now! I'm partly kidding, in case your name is Kate Bygrave... :)

Also, I'm going to have to make the page wider so I can fit the calendar on the right side. They'll be up by this weekend hopefully. Other things I want to do is make the news "pageable", sorta like Google Search Results (the clicky numbers at the bottom). Instead of having "Goooooooooogle" it's probably going to say "w00000000000000000t" or something wicked like that. Alright, it's 11pm, time for beddy-bye.

I saw this last night. I went out in the worst outfit, I was ready for lounging but Jeff wanted a movie. I had on a paint covered "Ireland" shirt, long brown shorts, and shoes with no socks. If I left the socks I had on, I'd be walking around with calf high black dress socks and shorts on... lovely sight. Anyway, the movie, compared to the first one, sucked big time. It wasn't funny at all like the first one. If you go in with no expectations, you'll be fine, but if you go in thinking that this is the sequel to one of the funniest movies ever ("wait wait wait, so your saying your name is Gay Focker"), then you'll be brutally disappointed. If not, then it may be funny, I couldn't tell you.

For those wondering, my route to work consists of two very large vehicles. First, I hop on the 101 Trolley at Lansdowne and Garret (Bonner High), take that to 69th Street, then take the Market-Frankford Line. The entire trip takes less than 30 minutes, and I go more than 50 streets on the train! It's not a bad ride at all. I found free parking less than 2 blocks away from the Trolley Station and that station is a 5 minute drive (with Bonner HS traffic) from my house.

Check out SEPTA's site for more information. (Acrobat Required)
101 Trolley
Market-Frankford Line

Read Phaedo which is part of Plato's Complete Works. It's amazing. Socrates is in a jail cell waiting to die, explaining to these two well-minded blokes that he is not afraid to die because the soul of the Philosopher is sound and will be accepted by the gods. It raises a lot of questions for you, which Plato answers later on, and basically proves the existence of a soul in a way that does not rely on faith, but on logic (which is why Philosophy rules). Socrates and his company cover all of the angles. Plato is my favorite to read for fun.

My Mom turned 36 (give or take a few years) on Tuesday, April 19. Actually, I don't know how old she is. She could pass for 36 though. I've seen 40 year old women who look much older than my Mom. Her secret is stay out of the sun! I don't think I've ever seen her tan or sunburned.

I got a new job, I'll be starting Monday. I'll be working in the city, taking the train, maybe also a trolley. It's a great opportunity with a Fortune 500 company. I hope to be there for a long time. It's a huge company but I'll still be working directly with only a few people.

I've spent over $1,000 on new clothes for this job!! I bought a suit for the interview and $500 worth of "business casual" clothes, which I'm excited about, I am not one to buy a lot of clothes because I'd much rather spend it on computer stuff, books on software, video games, coffee, etc. I think I'm going to enjoy this new job.

I was visiting the Sixers' site today, and found out that they have a vote for Andre Iguodala's top 10 slam dunks. I don't know if you've seen this guy play, but he is exciting. The Sixers drafted him in the first round this previous draft. He's made the all rookie team because he's just a great all around player... a great all around player who throws it down like there's no tomorrow. I've seen most of his dunks, these 10 choices are good, but he's had better. Boy that kid can dunk. Check out the video over here.

That's right, even with Webber, the Sixers made the playoffs. Special thanks to the supreme efforts from such players like Andre Iguodala, Allen Iverson, Mark Jackson, Sammy Dalembert, and of course Kyle Korver. Visit the Sixers website here. They will be playing the Pistons in the first round. I've seen worse odds overcome.

Also, the Phillies look pretty good this year despite Vicente Padilla giving up 6 homers in 3 innings the other night. The other pitchers look good, like Randy Wolf and Brett Myers. Pat Burrell got of to a blazing start. It should be a fun year.

About 2 months ago, I discovered a neat little site called CoffeeAM. They have a service called Coffee of the Month, it's $25 a month including shipping, and you get 2 pounds of coffee from different places every month. I'll be reporting in here the coffees that I get. Here's what I got so far:

February
Costa Rica
Kenya AA

March
Organic Galapagos Island Estate Coffee
Tanzania Peaberry

April
Colombia Supremo
India Malabar 'Monsooned Voyage'

I also bought 5 pounds of the Galapagos Island coffee just because it is probably my favorite right now. They have some of the expensive stuff in there like Jamaica Blue Mountain and Kona (Hawaii) Coffee. Pretty good prices, although you'll still pay $180 for 5 pounds! But, I've seen more expensive stuff. Google Kopi Luwak. Here, just click this link : super. Find some prices. $150 for ONE QUARTER POUND. Yup, $600 for a pound. I'll bet it's out of this world.

I've just updated my website to a whole new interface, but also to a whole new "back-end" too! You probably can't tell, but the new web page was programmed in 100% pure Java. Using JavaServer Faces as the presentation layer, a custom middle tier and data access tier, and for the persistence tier, I'm now using MySQL. It's worlds beyond what my old website could have even dreamt about becoming :) This website is like my old website's wildest dream. It would be like a man with no legs or arms (my old website) dreaming one day of becoming a professional basketball player (my "6'10'' tall, with a giant vertical leap, speed like a cheetah, and can make a jumpshot from anywhere" new website). That's how good this new website is.