Happy Mega Weekend

Friday the 13th, Valentines Day, Presidents Day. What a weekend!

Headed back to Ohio for the first time since Thanksgiving. It's time to see the folks back home and lay out some new Maxass tracks. Been some time since our last session, looking forward to this one. Also notable is that this is the sendoff of sorts, as my brother prepares to depart the country to move to Japan.

Been a busy week here. From freelance to band practice, to more freelance, been a bit slammed. Time to take a break!

A bit concerning are airplanes these days. Last night came the news that 50 people were killed when a plane crashed into someone's home in Buffalo. Of course then there's the epic flight of 1549. Thing is, both of these flights have been from this area. Couple that with the superstitions of Friday the 13th whoooo~~~! Should make for an interesting trip.

See you on the flip side!

Skiing Expedition

Saturday morning R, myself, and our friend Midori made the trek to Hunter Mountain via the Emilio's Ski Shop tour. Not a bad deal, just early hours: up at 4 to leave at 5 to catch a bus that leaves at 6:30. Yowza! But really, it's worth it in the end: there's nothing quite like hitting the slopes early in the AM. Too bad the rental lines were so long: gotta get my own gear, but that's a separate story.

Beautiful day out there nonetheless. Huge vertical on the main mountain. Temperature was about 40 at the base, low 20's at the top of the 1600 foot vertical, and so windy! Had some good rides in before we stopped for lunch.

In a way, I wish we hadn't stopped for lunch.

Was doing just fine in the morning, a little bit of the boot pain setting in. Then, after lunch, we made it back to the top. And my legs just didn't want to work anymore. I don't know how to describe it, other than, I just couldn't turn to the right gracefully anymore. Turning to the left, no problem. But trying to shift back to the right - not so good. Like damned dangerous. I'm on top of a mountain, on a decently slick slope, and I cannot stop. I will crash. And die. This is not good. So I did the only sane thing to do: slide it down to safe territories again and figure out what the hell is going on.

In the end, I determined that due to muscle strain on the inside of my lower leg (gastrocnemius perhaps?) coupled with some tiredness in by upper right (gluteus, yes), with a bit of slick ice caused by the sun, was enough to throw me off.

I worked my way down the black diamond part of the hill, took my skis off and chilled for a minute. My legs at this point did indeed feel pretty much shot. Fortunately, there was an easy glide the rest of the way down, which I could navigate no problem. And that was pretty much it - time was running out and we had a bus to catch. Before long we were on the way home, with the bang bang movie Rock and Rolla playing on the bus tv.

Personal firsts from the trip:
Early morning weekend train trip... some dude was leaking puke (not that interesting but worth mentioning)
Traveling to Harlem, hello UES
Traveling to the Bronx, seeing Yankee stadium
Going upstate in NY
Driving through suburbia and missing the convenience of having a car
Not being able to ski down a hill (g'hoh!)
Stopping at NYC's first Juice Bar, Papaya King (the papaya drink really is damn good!)

Down By the Virus

My company's busy, bustling pace came to a near halt the past few days.

An apparent virus breakout ("Sality") on our parent company's server basically left us unable to use the internet. It's funny - I use a mac and have zilch problems, but there was the fear that I could propagate the damn thing, since technically everything we access first passes through our heavily infected parent company.

So Wednesday was spent going around the office scanning computers, yesterday I got sent home right away and got to work from home. The problem is finally getting fixed but sucked out a fair amount of production time.

The irony is, known of our computers seem to have been affected by this - just a big bug hunt for the bogeyman.

Cyclops Robot

Next up for gaming: playing robots.

Just saw this short clip of this cyclops robot made by Dutch designer Ivo Vos (sweet name) showing a robot with an integrated webcam that will Pong you to oblivion. Made me ask, could this be part of the future of video games? Imagine going to an arcade and seeing one of these!


Pong Robot from Ivo Vos on Vimeo.

Which brings up a good question: how would this work in an ethics tournament? If the robot were set at some ridiculously high AI, most folks wouldn't even stand a chance. In the case of this little guy here, the first thing I imagine you'd see is either a covered up camera, or worse, ripped off appendages. Rather, the gameplay would have to include the robot in some way so that the player didn't feel like they were getting completely cheesed over.

Ah yes, but didn't somebody already try this?

Touch Me I'm Sick

Monday, man. Better known as ton of bricks day. Woke up with a sore throat, not feeling the best but not the worst. Should have been fine - a full eight hours of sleep and only one beer for dinner. Made it to the office and perked up a hair over a nice warm cup of green tea. For five minutes, I felt great.

Then I started going downhill.

My head grew heavier and heavier as my sore throat torqued itself back to its painful position. Energy levels quickly depleted and I knew damn well that I was going home early on the sick train. Lunch didn't do much for me, and by 12:30 I knew I might as well get the hell out. In reality, I stayed around the office until 2pm and then caught the first train out. I nearly fell down the stairs things had gotten so heavy.

It was a long ride home. Not helping the matters was the absence of my Q train at Union Square. Trains during the day are slow to come, and I must have just missed one and had to wait the long one. After the train, I stopped in the local grocery store for DayQuil and OJ, then finally made it home. A warm shower and then lights out, bed. Barely got up for dinner, I ate one piece of toast, half a bowl of soup and a chicken nugget, which took me 5 minutes to eat. Head pounding all the while.

I've gotten better since then, of course, but still haven't made the full recovery. Every morning, I'm full of this nasty phlegm. I have coughing bouts. I get headaches. I spit up loaves of bread that are brown and sticky.

I also get weird energy spurts. For example, I ran quite possibly a personal record of 3 miles in barely over 25 minutes last night at the gym, which is like an average of 8:20 per mile or 7.2 mph.

But the sickness: it's still around, and reminds me of Mudhoney's classic: Touch me I'm sick.

What's With All the Fightin' & the Fussin'

Last weekend we saw more disturbances in the Force than ever before.

Saturday, we were out for the usual grocery runs, hopping a train to get us to Palumbo's. All of the sudden, we hear these women screaming from the back of train. Stuff getting thrown! I tried to peak over the crowd, but getting a good glimpse across a full train car is kind of like peeping around an 18-wheeler on the highway. We hopped off at the next stop, and mosied over to check out the scene: two women, a latino and a black lady, tearing each other apart, screaming loud obscenities at each other. A guy with the latino girl was trying to pull her back in the train as the black lady tried to break free, tears running down her face. Not sure what it was all about, but a bystander who was right there thought that the latino started running her mouth at the other lady on the train, and it was all out war from there. The train was even delayed a bit while the door situation (which couldn't get closed due to arms blocking) got resolved.

Shortly after, and maybe due to a slip on an ice patch, we found a guy on the stairs, bleeding everywhere. There was a lady taking care of him, so it seemed like the situation was under control. Saw a huge gash on his forehead. But definitely busted.

Then on Sunday, a Typical Self-Riteous Prospect Heights Girl started running her mouth to another lady about her bed sheets. Basically, the other lady had brought in clothes wrapped in a bed sheet, and placed them in basket cart. Nothing shocking. "But this is how bed bugs spread! You people don't care at all about us." said the Typical Self-Riteous Prospect Heights Girl. "Excuse me, mind your own business, I don't have bed bugs" said the other lady. And then it started. The Typical Self-Riteous Prospect Heights Girl went on and on and on about how this is why bed bugs are so critical and you should move away from the neighborhood and it's people like you, that make this a terrible place. I didn't say anything but secretly wanted the police to show up and hose this lady down. The other lady looked pretty upset, but having just put her clothes in the dryer, just walked out, with the Typical Self-Riteous Prospect Heights Girl yelling at her the whole way.

It didn't end there either: 15 minutes later, a young man entered the laundromat, sheets in tow inside a bed sheet, which went plop! into the laundry basket. Didn't take but a minute before Typical Self-Riteous Prospect Heights Girl had met her knew match. This guy was a bit more able to stand up for himself, telling the mad lady to mind her own business, even inserting the classic "settle this issue away from me, pig!" line, "Write your congressman!". I laughed at that one.

So I gotta ask, what's with all the fightin' & the fussin'? Is it just cabin fever season or what?

The Rules of Bryant Park Ice Skating

Went ice skating yesterday in Bryant Park. Hadn't been ice skating in a long time, last time being some mall in Dallas in the late 90's. Admittedly, I thought it was pretty sweet skating right in the middle of downtown. Was a bit crowded (this was a Friday night in Manhattan after all), but not too ridiculous. Waited maybe 5 minutes in line to get in.

In retrospect, though, I don't think I got the best bang for my buck. Here's 3 things I could do improve this:

1. Bring my own skates. I don't own skates, but I'm guessing used pairs are not hard to find around here. Plus: ice skating is free if you bring your own skates. Renting is $12 a pair for some shitty plastic boots that inevitably push on your ankles it feels like a linebacker is on you.

2. Bring my own lock. Lockers are free, but locks are not. They are $9 a piece for something you could pick up for $2 or 3 elsewhere. We didn't get a locker in the end - rather, just shoved our stuff in bags, and put my shoes on top of the lockers.

3. Don't bring bags on the ice. We got busted for this. Reiko took a seat while I did a few more laps. I thought about going longer but my feet were absolutely killing me by then.

Haven't checked out the other places yet, namely Central Park and Rockefeller Center (I'm sure there's others). Any recommendations?