Listening to “On Your Porch” by The Format. Staring through my reflection in the window.

I’m not sure what it is tonight. Something feels different.

Influences on present state:
- no caffeine since Sunday
– August Rush — sappy movie, horribly “dubbed” music instrument playing
– several season finales of shows yesterday all high on emotional drama (HIMYM, The Big Bang Theory, House)
– realizing I haven’t seen my family/relatives (other than parents) since last August

The Monkees - Daydream Believer: (direct link)

And a tinge of emo. There’s a reason I still wear my emo bear shirt.

Categories: Life

Today, I took an urban hike.

In the morning, I prepared by packing my new hacker bag full of essential gear:

• HP laptop w/ Ubuntu linux operating system
• wireless mouse
• power cord
• latest copy of Wired magazine
• two USB drives (8GB + 1GB)
• “My Startup Life” by Ben Casnocha
• notebook, pens, pencils
• Nalgene bottle
• iPod, 20GB
• … other miscellaneous

In the post meridian, I headed downtown as per usual intent on traveling to Saturday House at its alternate location in the Giraffe Labs coworking space. (Where’s the author?: if you look in the Flickr photos on the site, you’ll find me.)

I parked under Seattle’s infamous viaduct, one of the main highways which runs past downtown. It is infamous due to the fear that when a large earthquake comes it will collapse and crush everyone beneath it.

Fortunate for me, there’s free parking underneath. I took advantage in order to avoid paying the high cost of parking meters further into downtown.

From thence, I walked to Saturday House at Giraffe Labs. I walked by the baseball stadium, the football stadium, construction-related businesses, restaurants, bars, and homeless shelters.

Upon arrival, I managed to accomplish a few things on my task list for the day. I even managed to do a few things not on the task list like sweat profusely and drink a lot of water. Yes, it was hot.

Afterward, I headed to Elliott Bay Book Company with Rob to catch Cory Doctorow do a reading from Little Brother. Cory Doctorow has been featured in XKCD. Oh, and he’s won some important science fiction awards.

Cory’s a rather personable guy. He walked in the room with little fanfare and introduced himself to the people already waiting. The reading was pleasant and enjoyable (a great way to absorb literature), he took and answered questions, and afterward he signed books.

Now I’ve got a signed, first edition copy of Little Brother. w00t!

Oh, you can download Little Brother free. Legally. He’s cool like that.

I slid the book into my hacker bag, walked up the stairs from the basement of the bookstore, and hiked back to my car. Darkness had not yet descended so I had no reason to fear drug dealers, pimps, or prostitutes popping out as I traveled beneath the highway on-ramp and besides the barbed-wire fence. They will come out later in the night after I have already driven home.

Categories: Books, Life
Tags: Cory Doctorow, drug dealers, hackers, pimps, prostitutes

I love Seattle because of days like today. It’s sunny, blue skies, green trees. Spring is full blown today. I’m half-naked right now and loving it.

Martin got an iPod and converted all his albums to MP3s. The good news? I got my pick of his albums and ended up w/ about 15 CDs consisting mostly of ’90s alternative rock. Blink-182 FTW.

What’s my age again?

Made last minute dinner plans for tonight and breakfast plans for tomorrow. Apparently, I enjoy living moment-to-moment. It doesn’t hurt that yesterday George W. provided me w/ some much appreciated stimulation in the form of $600. Plus, I had my first payday from my new business which helps out, too.

Anyway, gotta head out for food. Later!

Categories: Life
Tags: Blink-182, George W. Bush, Seattle

Yesterday, I upgraded three Wordpress blogs to 2.5.1. Had a good time at SaturdayHouse. After SH, Patrick, JDugan, and I were going planning to go to a teriyaki place. It was closed so we ended up at Denny’s.

Denny’s is great for several reasons: 1) food. 2) tasty food. 3) meaty food. 4) no rush - they’re used to people sitting around.

Zombies were discussed. I’d never thought about it before, but Patrick pointed out that zombie movies are an excellent vehicle for discussing societal issues. George A. Romero revolutionized the popular conception of zombies through his 1968 film “Night of the Living Dead” and following films. He did this by using zombies “to criticize real-world social ills - such as government ineptitude, bioengineering, slavery, greed and exploitation - while indulging our post-apocalyptic fantasies.” (Source)

Today, I went to church, cooked and ate several bratwurst, upgraded my laptop to Ubuntu 08.04 “Hardy Heron,” fought w/ multi-column CSS/XHTML design, converted six CDs to FLAC files, converted six albums of FLAC files to 320kbps MP3s for use on my iPod, updated my iPod catalog, and ate some cheese.

Now I’m going to go relax for a few minutes before sleep. Good night.

Categories: Life
Tags: food, zombies

Things I’ve done in the past week:
- tracked down a childhood friend I haven’t talked to in five years using Google and a knowledge of her family tree
- completed my first coding-for-hire project
- received registration paperwork for my business
- caught up on this season of Battlestar Gallactica
- stayed up late discussing life, love, and theory behind contemporary evolution’s effect upon modern human marriage and mating patterns
- spoke with confidence
- spoke without confidence
- began configuring my own web server running Ubuntu on a virtual private server slice
- began learning how to use JavaScript libraries to provide graphical effects on web pages
- further research into Content Management Systems
- bought a bunch of old/new music on eMusic (Flogging Molly, Fugazi, Metric, Rodrigo y Gabriela, Thom Yorke)
- ate too much pizza
- did a few pushups for the first time in months

And tonight, I vegged out for hours watching TV. I needed a break.

Categories: Life
Tags: activities