YAY! I have transportation!!!

I finally have a car!! It's not much, but it's a car! Here it is:



Not really. Actually, this is more like it, although mine is not quite in as good of a condition:



It's a 1992 Chevy Lumina. It needs a bit of work before it's really drivable, though. It needs a new tire, a good tune-up, A/C repairs, inspection, registration, and possibly a new battery.

I HATE MOSQUITOES!!!

Yesterday, my dad had me help him fixing some pipes in the backyard. Wouldn't you just know that at the time we did this work our backyard was swarming with mosquitoes! The damn things bit me all over my arms and legs. Every so often, something triggers and makes them start itching...ALL AT ONCE!! It's almost unbearable. ALL MOSQUITOES SHOULD DIE!!!

Interesting...

A quick visit to the Star Wars website has just revealed to me an interesting thing; a new addition to the Star Wars legion of sites. Star Wars: Blogs. It is a section of the Star Wars site devoted to people blogging. I personally find it...odd. As much as I like Star Wars, I don't know if I could have a blog semi-restricted to discussion on Star Wars. I would feel a compulsion that my posts would have to be about Star Wars. Well, to each, his own, I guess.

Batman Begins

I finally got to see it yesterday. It is, by far, the best of the Batman movies to date. When Batman is fighting the henchmen, you don't see him. This is just as it should be. He is silent and hides in the shadows. It's just awesome! The car, too. To quote the movie, "I gotta get me one of those..."

God, I hate cleaning...

Especially when approximately 99% of the mess I'm cleaning up was caused by my sister. She really is quite a slob, and it goes to the extreme. We actually have to vacuum UNDERNEATH the cushions on the couch to get everything. It doesn't help that our cleaning actually kicked up a lot of dust, so that I can barely breathe right now. We actually finished a few hours ago, and the dust is still getting to me. Her mess actually destroyed one of her favorite video tapes a few years back, along with our VCR. It seems the tape had been placed in some...substance...and she then attempted to place it into the VCR to watch it. The substance (which I believe was composed in part by popsicle, lollipop, and milk) was all over the tape, including the magnetic ribbon inside. When the VCR tried to read it, the substance ended up contaminating the heads within the machine, rendering it useless.

On a side note, has anyone heard any of the latest rumors regarding the Nintendo Revolution? There are many, and if even half of them are true, then the next Nintendo home console will be the most realistic video game system ever. For instance, one rumor discusses a visor helmet, incorporating full head-tracking, meaning that control of the camera will be dependant on how you turn your head. Another uses two facts to make a speculation: 1. NASA has recently developed a holographic projector, capable of displaying real-time 3D images; 2. An undisclosed Japanese gaming company contributed $300,000 to the development of said projector. Is Nintendo going to have a holographic projector as part of its next system? Further advancing the concept, another rumor states that, in conjunction with either the projector or the visor, the system will actually be able to scan the environment you are in (your room) and use that as the game environment. Finally, another states that the control system will consist of a pair of gloves capable of providing what is called "haptic feedback," or contact simulation. Say you cause the character to touch something hot; the gloves heat up, but with built-in safeguards to prevent injury. Also, Say the character picks up an object. The gloves provide resistance against your hands to correspond with how that object should feel. So, say you grab a baseball bat; the gloves push back against your hand in the appropriate spots to make it feel as if you are holding a bat. Crazy, isn't it?

That was cool!

I got back a little while ago from the Houston Symphony. They had a concert of music from the Lord of the Rings trilogy, along with concept art from the planning of the movies projected onto a large screen above the orchestra. It was quite awesome. I sat almost dead center, second row from the orchestra itself, so close I could have talked with the musicians if I really wanted. I also had my first experience with a line to the bathroom. Being a guy, this is something I have never had to deal with. It was an interesting thing. They broke for intermission, and, idiot that I am, I decided to sit for a few minutes before getting up to go to the bathroom. And the whole time I was sitting there, I wondered why everyone else go up and out so fast after the intermission began. The funny thing is, they had two ladies rooms, but only one men's room. And, the one men's room only had 6 stalls, for a large concert hall full of people! It was absolutely crazy! Someone remind me next time I go see a performance to get out as quickly as possible during intermission.

Okay, I promised...

I promised to explain my little outburst earlier, and here it is. While I was at NASA, my team was probably the most closely knit team there. We were the Blue team, the Working There team...we are team RAMROD. RAMROD stands for Re-Assessing Mars Research and Operational Development. It was originally introduced as a joke, a line from a movie, but the rest of us thought it was good, so it stuck. We had little huddles before a task, and it was the last thing we did before we left to go home; we all put our hands in and shouted "1, 2, 3, RAMROD!" And there you have the story of RAMROD.

Give it a Whirl

Well, since some of my friends have gotten blogs and people keep asking me if I have a blog, I guess I might as well start one. Just don't expect me to keep up with it obsessively. Alright, so how about a little backlog of the most interesting thing to happen to me in a little while:

I just got back from NASA on Friday, I was there since the Sunday previous. It was with a program called Texas High School Aerospace Scholars. It's open to people between their Junior and Senior years; I highly recommend it to anyone who's interested in aerospace or space exploration. They divided us into teams, and each team was responsible for a different aspect of a manned Mars mission. There was also a competitive design mission, where each team was on its own. The teams received $329 million to use on supplies (imaginary money of course) and after the design and construction of a rocket, a lander, a rover, and launching the parts of the rocket into orbit (which amounted to taping the pieces to a balloon and sending it up one story) whoever had the most money won. Guess what? WE WON! We somehow managed to come out with $449 million. Anyways, it was great.

Oh, almost forgot. RAMROD!
:: I'll explain later. ::

Btw, some friends and I have a forum at A Web Forum, so check it out. We're also starting up a Star Wars-based RPG there. Later, y'all!