It's 11:37 pm. And my week's worth of literary bull shittery is finally finished. Actually I think the papers are ok. We'll see how my professor reacts to them now.. Should have first block grades on Monday.

I may end up posting the discourse at some point too. Dunno yet. We'll see how the grade goes first. :)

Now to see about getting life back to "normal" again. And sleep. :)

 

Ok. On random. 4313 songs in this particular playlist. Just played "Mrs. Robinson" by Simon & Garfunkel off the Forrest Gump soundtrack. And if you note the song currently playing, the very next song, you'll see why it's possessed.

I'm just sayin'. :)

It's a slow moment here at work today. I figured it was a good time to update here.

Schoolstuffs: Summer semester's first block is coming to an end. It's been a rough couple of weeks, but it's all good in the end. I've still got to finish up the last bits of my Philosophy analysis paper and my take home final there. They're fortunately due on Friday, despite the fact that the block ends tomorrow. I just need to write out a few examples for the paper and then that's done. The final is going to be some simple stuff based on notes from class, so that's not a worry. Photography was a breeze. I was glad that I was able to get Photography done before one of my original professors from when I first started back in 1991 retired. He's worked at the school for well over 20 years, so his retirement is well deserved.

Next block starts on Thursday. That will be Drawing I and History of Art from the Renaissance.

If my calculations are correct for the rest of my Bachelors, and I can get challenge credit for the work I've done for the last 16 years, I'll have 10 or so classes left to take. At 4 classes a semester, that's only another year or so after Fall Semester. I hope everything works out there. Either way, my Associates is done this Fall. I've been chasing that thing for 10 years. It'll be good to have it done.

Workstuffs: Work has cooled down a bit since last week. The big project took a lot of my time last week, right in the middle of all the finals stuff for school, but it's all slowed down for me now on that front. Once the big event is over (there's a ginormous Seminar here from the 24th to the 27th that I was responsible for designing a good majority of the materials for), things will be back to "normal".

Comicstuffs: Poor Alice. She got stuck there just getting bigger and bigger in that room and hasn't been able to do anything about it for two weeks. I'll hopefully be back on track with the comic this weekend since school demands should be back down to normal levels. I have most of the drawings for Page 014 done, but they haven't been inked or colored yet. That will hopefully be this weekend's task.

Beyond all the normal stuff, unless something INSANE happens, I'll be actually going on vacation to the Anaheim/San Diego areas the end of July. I'll be down in San Diego for part of Comic Con and then the rest of the time at Disneyland. The family hasn't been able to go on a vacation together in 19 years. I think it's about time.

That's it for me. More later on, I'm sure. :)

Things are still kinda slow here at the moment, so it's meme time!

Ganked from xanath. Classic film is never a bad thing. And this isn't too surprising actually.

Link: The Classic Leading Man Test written by gidgetgoes on OkCupid, home of the The Dating Persona Test

I love Cary Grant and his films. Some of the best classic movies IMHO. Also, one of the best interview quotes I've seen: He said, "Everybody would like to be Cary Grant," then paused a moment, "So would I."

Too many good films to mention them all. But if you have to see something, go watch Father Goose or People Will Talk. Two of the best lesser known Cary Grant films. :)

FINAL UPDATE: [10:05 AM] The server is finally back up. After yet another phone call... Fortunately I got the same person I spoke to earlier and she forced someone to take care of it on the spot... Which should have happened yesterday, but didn't.

Again, sorry all. Things should be working now though.

---

UPDATE #2: [9:06 AM] So, things are supposed to be back up anytime now. I'm still waiting of course. Talked with someone in customer service this morning that knew what had happened and pretty much admitted that the billing department was ignoring things. She said that the Billing department had been told that something strange had happened on some backend system, but they are apparently choosing to ignore the info from the tech and CS crews. THIS is why I hate people in billing departments. Damned fools who have some ill-conceived god complex. That's ok. They'll get theirs in the next life. :)

Now it's just sit and wait for someone to notice that there's a request to get the server back up again. More when I have it.

---

UPDATE: [7:54 PM] So I just got off the phone with the MORONS at Verio... AGAIN. The idiots in the billing department that caused the screw up didn't do ANYTHING about the phone call earlier this afternoon. Of course, there's no information in their call logs to say anything beyond that a call was received. No info on the call. No info on the problem. No info on their solution that should have been done 6 hours ago. And naturally their Customer Service and Billing departments are closed until tomorrow morning and there's ABSOLUTELY NO ONE that can do anything about it there tonight.

So the server is down until I can talk to another set of morons in the morning. They claim to open at 8:00 am Mountain time.... they're going to get a call at 8:01. And they're not going to like me if this isn't resolved before 9:00 am tomorrow. Pisses me off.

Again, my apologies to everyone that has stuff on the server. As soon as I have more info on when the server will be back up (or if it comes back up at some point), I'll post a note here.

---

[2:07 PM] Yes, the server is down. For the curious, Verio screwed up something and the server is currently offline until they fix it. (It was a problem with their billing system... and of course, they have to "look into it" to figure out what they did wrong...) I'm expecting it to come back up any time, but with how screwed up they can be, it's hard to tell when it will be back up again. I'll post an update when I know more.

My apologies for the downtime.

 

Just a quick update here. Last night, I thought May was going to be an exceptionally ugly month. This morning proved me wrong.

1) The server migration is pretty much done. All the stuff has been moved from the old to the new and things seem to be ok on the web side of things. I'm still updating passwords and things for email and user accounts though, so that's going to be ongoing for a bit. I have a few of you that have emailed me with password info, I'll be getting those updated here soonly. I'm hoping to have all the ones that I've gotten so far done tonight. I'll post something here when I've finished that.

2) For the 5th time in my life, I'm attempting to get school finished. I think it may actually work this time. Classes start tomorrow and I'm looking forward to seeing some old professor friends and co-workers again. It's all just a test of time now. I need to get these degrees done. Financial aid should work out for summer and fall, so that's all good going forward...

3) I'm FINALLY getting out of the unemployment pool. I've been offered a part-time design position up at BYU and it'll work around my school schedule, so it's all good there. They'll never have a lack of work there either, so there's little worry of downsizing for that reason. At least I won't lose the car. And that's a happy thing.

Life may actually be a good thing here in a bit. Won't that be good for a change? :)

---

UPDATE: All of the passwords that I've gotten so far have been updated. If anyone else out there reads this and needs a password reset, let me know ASAP. Thanks all!

 

Hey all. This is actually an announcement for everyone that has stuff on my Web server. This week, I'll be in the process of moving the contents of the server to a newer, (hopefully) more efficient server. As a result of the move, some things will be changing, but mostly for the better. The web admin piece will be changing which will allow folks that have domains on the server to administer the domains themselves. The web admin interface has many more features than the iManager system that's being used now.

There will be two major things with the server migration:

1. Passwords on most accounts will need to be updated. I know a few of the passwords for some of the accounts, but there are a bunch out there that I don't have, so there will be a need to get me new passwords. Anyone out there that needs and/or wants to get me a new password for their accounts, please send me an email at tim@skyfall.com and I'll get that set. Otherwise, any accounts that I don't have passwords for will get a generic password and I'll get it to you so you can go in and change it later on. THis will apply to all accounts, whether they're just email accounts or email & FTP accounts.

2. The really fun part will be moving and testing all of the things on the server that are using mySQL. Some of the SQL databases are big and will need special stuff to move them to the new server. I think I have a list of everything that's using SQL on the server, so I'll be working with those individuals directly. ming_ling, the DA! stuff is the main thing I'm worried about getting working right. I'll have to get with you and make sure things get moved right so things are good on the new server.


I have to have the new server up and running and everything off the old server before the end of the month, so if anyone has any questions about the move, or anything else server related, please toss me an email or reply here.


Thanks everyone!

Hey all! It's been a while since I've updated here... It's been a hectic time here as of late with all the changes, but here's something new. It's one of the things that has kept me out of the loop for the last while.




This is a group shot for my new webcomic called Beyond Neverwonder. It's kinda like an Alice in Wonderland meets Peter Pan type thing. But ultimately, beyond it being a webcomic, it's a project that I'm going to use to beef up my drawing skills. They've gotten rather bad over the years, so this will give me an excuse to keep up on it. It'll be updated Mondays. I figured that if I can bone up on artstuffs and try to be a bit entertaining at the same time, why not, ne?

If you want to see the comic, head on over to the website: www.beyondneverwonder.com.

Besides the new comic, not too much has been happening. I'm getting ready to attempt to get back to school again. Like in Kansas, I'm like 4 or 5 classes away from my Associates degree. And then only like 19 more classes for my Bachelors... I need to finish this thing since I know that I'm never going to get a design job again without it. If the world so desperately needs to have a piece of paper to prove that you have the stuff to work, then so be it. I'll get the piece of paper. I'll just be happy when it's done. :)

That's about it for now. More later I'm sure. :)

Going to be offline for the next day or two. I'll see everyone on the other side of Tuesday.

It's a rough thing when all you have is music playing and nothing else to occupy your time.

This song just came up. My iPod is an evil, evil thing...

I Wish I Could Go Back Home
by Travis Tritt


I wish I could go back home
I'm so tired of living all alone
I left to sow my wilder seeds
Now look at all the pain I've grown
I wish I could go back home

It breaks my heart to see her cry
That's how I left her when I said good bye
I never meant to be so cruel
How could I have been such a fool
I got scared when love drew close
Turns out her love is what i'm needing most
Instead I'm back out on my own
Wishing I could go back home

I wish I could go back home
I'm so tired of living all alone
I left to sow my wilder seeds
Now look at all the pain I've grown
I wish I could go back home

She waited as long as she could stand
Finally gave up and found another man
And he's getting love that once was mine
I can't believe I've been so blind
What goes around comes back they say
But I'd trade my future for one yesterday
We had a good thing now it's gone
Lord, I wish I could go back home

I wish I could go back home
I'm so tired of living all alone
I left to sow my wilder seeds
Now look at all the pain I've grown
I wish I could go back home

We had a good thing now it's gone

Lord, I wish I could go back home

I've decided that I need to stop pretending and go back where I belong. I've realized that life for the last ten years has been nothing but a series of unfortunate events and that the only way I'm ever going to get back on the right path is to finally put all this stuff in my past, bury it and do my best to forget all about it. The hard part there is that means walking away from people that care about me here. I want to say that it's nothing that any of my friends have done to cause this. I just can't let all the hate and pain keep me down anymore. I don't like where I've gotten and I need to get out before it destroys what little bit of a life I have left.

I know things are bad when I'm to a point where all the crap is keeping me up at night. I've slept very little in the last 5 days. All I keep thinking about is all the problems and after a good, lengthy evaluation, I know that I'm never going to be able to overcome said problems here. I know a lot of people will view this as me just trying to run away from the problems, but you know, when there's little you can do to try and fix them, sometimes you just have to cut bait, walk away and start over.

I have to admit that for the last ten years my life has been a string of delusions and fantasies. I've been living with them for so long that I'm tired of them. I can't see myself going much of anywhere in life where I am now. I know now that I need to change some things and I honestly can't see myself being able to do that here.

It's going to prove to be a tough thing on my friends and roommates, but I have little that I can contribute anymore. It seems that everything that I try to put some effort into here just turns into more pain and drama. But even with this, I know that they're strong enough to make it through whatever tough times may be ahead.

Though I think more the point though is that I just don't want to hear about the stuff that's been causing people grief. I'm going to be honest and say that I don't want to hear about ACen and Reactor anymore. People can make me out to be whatever they want. I did what I did in the situations that I was in and if I were ever in those positions again where people were taking advantage of me or trying to screw me and my friends over, I'd do everything exactly the same all over again. People may not agree with that, but that's all I have.

I want to get on with life. I know that means that I have to leave Chicago. I need to go back to Utah and get back to doing what I should have done ten years ago. As annoying as Utah can be at times, I'd take that over what I've been dealing with for the last few years. I just hope that people will eventually learn to forget about me and move on...

That one's for free.

 

I've spent the last few weeks thinking about things, observing people and getting the general feeling of things around me. I've determined that, despite the great fight that I have put up for the last five years to right the wrongs that have blocked my path, I don't think I'm ever going to win. I came to the realization a few weeks ago and I think it's time to just admit that I'm never going to be able to fix the things that the world wants to keep perpetuating. Like so many others, I had hoped that some sort of rational thinking or a bit of common sense would prevail and get things on the way to being fixed. But I know now that people would rather pretend that the thing doesn't exist so they won't have to deal with it.

And that's just something I'm going to have to, well, die with. All this stuff is just reminding me of a song off the new My Chemical Romance CD...

DEAD!
by My Chemical Romance

Yeah!

And if your heart stops beating
I'll be here wondering
Did you get what you deserve?
The ending of your life
And if you get to heaven
I'll be here waiting, babe
Did you get what you deserve?
The end, and if your life won't wait
Then your heart can't take this

Have you heard the news that you're dead?
No one ever had much nice to say
I think they never liked you anyway
Oh take me from the hospital bed
Wouldn't it be grand? It ain't exactly what you planned.
And wouldn't it be great If we were dead?
Ohh dead.

Tongue-tied and oh so squeamish
You never fell in love
Did you get what you deserve?
The ending of your life
And if you get to heaven
I'll be here waiting, babe
Did you get what you deserve?
The end, and if your life won't wait
Then your heart can't take this

Have you heard the news that you're dead?
No one ever had much nice to say
I think they never liked you anyway
Oh take me from the hospital bed
Wouldn't it be grand to take a pistol by the hand?
And wouldn't it be great if we were dead?

And in my honest observation
During this operation
Found a complication in your heart
So long, 'Cause now you've got (now you've got)
Maybe just two weeks to live
Is that the most the both of you can give?

One, two, one two three four!

LA LA LA LA LA!
LA LA LA LA LA LA!
LA LA LA LA LA LA LA!
Well come on,
LA LA LA LA LA!
LA LA LA LA LA LA!
LA LA LA LA LA LA LA!
Oh mother@#$%&,

If life ain't just a joke (LA LA LA LA LA!)
Then why are we laughing? (LA LA LA LA LA LA!)
If life ain't just a joke (LA LA LA LA LA LA LA!)
Then why are we laughing?
If life ain't just a joke (LA LA LA LA LA!)
Then why are we laughing? (LA LA LA LA LA LA!)
If life ain't just a joke (LA LA LA LA LA LA LA!)
Then why am I dead?
DEAD!

I have to ask myself, did I get what I deserve? I guess I did. I'm just so sorry for all the people that have defended me to the people that want to keep spreading the rumors and lies. They all have suffered WAY more than anyone ever should have to over something as silly and stupid as all this. I'm eternally grateful to my friends who have stuck by me. It's true friendship when you have people that will put themselves on the line for you despite the world being against you. All I can say at this point is that I'm happy to have the few good friends that I have. You all are what makes life good and I thank you all for it.

To the people who want to keep making me out to be the ultimate villain, I ask you all to give my friends some slack. While we may have some of the same ideas and beliefs, they are not me and I'm not them. Just because they associate themselves with me doesn't mean that they're guilty by association. They are individuals with their own ideas and their own beliefs. They deserve the respect that they've earned. Don't make them out to be bad just because they happen to stand on the side of the road that I do.

I think I'm done now. It's time to move on.

 

So, this last weekend I, rather unexpectedly, ended up going to the first anime con that I've ever been to where I wasn't working something at the con the entire time, Ohayocon 2007 in Columbus. I was part of the Voices For band crew and it was a kick ass weekend of fun, goofiness, music and insanity. Got to hang out with a lot of cool people. Granted, a lot of the guests that I was able to hang out with, I've met them all before and I know who they all are. They just have little to no clue who I am or that we had met before. But that's ok. TIme will take care of that...

I was happy to see everyone that I did. It was great to see yammerin_nutsak and the Noodle Man, bam2, fightdir, banzchan and Emily, goldenboyd, janscottfrazier, Monica, Brittney, Mike, Tiffany and Matt, Rikki and Tavi, Bruce... Then there's all of my ACen friends down there as well. angelmerc0, acenconchair, djopm, socialninja, Tim L., Brandi... It was a good old time. I was glad that I was able to hang out more with the likes of Doug, Jan, Bob and Emily over the weekend. Lots of fun was had. I'm glad that I was able to be there for a change. I remember why I enjoy the cons. It's to hang out with all the cool folks that I've been fortunate to meet over the last 12 years. I'll hopefully have a much bigger report written up soonly. :)

As for today, it's that time of year again. As I type this, the Macworld Keynote is going on and there's SURE to be some cool new stuff from Apple today. I'll have more on what I want to drool over later on in the day. Until then, I'm going to go back to the keynote coverage... Laters! ;)

 

In a bizarre twist, I'm on my way to Ohayocon to help with the Voices For band transportation. I'll see whoever will be there when I get there.

More later I'm sure.

 

Our party here just broke up. And I have to say that while a lot of messed up shit happened in 2006, there were a lot of really great things that happened in the Year That Was. My thanks go out to everyone, for all the happenings of 2006, good and bad. Being able to have a good mix of both the good and the bad, makes the good stuff look that much sweeter.

I've recently discovered the insane, twisted storytelling that is the band My Chemical Romance. While the overall message of their latest album is rather intense (it's dealing with cancer, death and just general angst), there's a lot of the appropriate in their stuff. Despite all the garbage that goes on in our lives, there's always something to look forward to, even in the worst of situations.

For me, despite craziness and insanity going on right now, things are in a much better place now that 2007 is here and I'm happy to be where I am with my friends around me. May the year bring great things for all of us.

We'll carry on. Happy 2007 everyone. :)

 

December's been a bizarre month. As the holiday gets ready to get into full swing, things finally have a chance to slow down. I'll be hitting the train to get to Midway here in about 3 hours and then I'm off to Utah for the weekend... It'll be a nice thing to have some time with the fam. And I haven't seen my brother that was in Japan for 3 years, so it'll be nice to see him.

For everyone else, have a Happy Holiday, Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah or what have you... We'll see you all for the new year. :)

It's my yearly moment of silence for "home". This day, 65 years ago, the Japanese launched an attack on Pearl Harbor, on the west side of my home island of Oahu. Just a moment of silence for all the men and women that had fallen that dreadful Sunday morning... And for all the others that have given their lives to defend all of us over the years.

So I have a job interview on Friday afternoon.

This could prove interesting. :)

 

Now I get to turn around and head BACK into the city... At least they're paying me for 4 hours today for coming out here and not being able to work cause the office is closed.

Yes, things have just been kinda here the last little while... There are updates, but I've not had much time and/or energy to post them... You know, like Thanksgiving picts and things. Maybe later. For now, here's a commercial:

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:: curses the bag of Life Savers Fruit Explosions Gummies on the desk ::