New Track: Universal Disconnect

It’s time to let this one go. I’ve been sitting on it since some time in January, feeling it to be to imperfect and trying too hard to “get it right”. The theme for this one was feeling disconnected from the universe, floating around out in the void alone and removed. At this point, I’ve … [Read more…]

Oh, Valve…

Someone give Valve a dollar so they can go buy a clue. They've announced that, at least through retail, you won't be able to buy the forthcoming Half-Life 2: Episode 1 / Team Fortress 2 / Portal bundle by itself. It will be available only as a $50 package which also includes Half-Life 2 and … [Read more…]

A Tale of HD and DRM

About a month and a half ago I finally upgraded to an HDTV. The old SD set has been on it's deathbed for a while, plus I wanted to get both an AppleTV and an X-Box 360 (the former of which requires an HDTV and the latter is certainly a much better experience in HD.) … [Read more…]

Regarding Apple, EMI, and DRM

There's an important aspect to this week's announcement from Apple & EMI that they were going to begin selling EMI's catalog DRM-free on Apple's iTunes Store that may have been overlooked. That is the entry of DRM, both as a term and a concept, into the average consumer's vernacular. Until now, I think it was … [Read more…]

Good Week To Be A Geek?

It’s shaping up to be a pretty interesting week for a geek like me… On Tuesday, Adobe is having it’s media event to officially unveil all of it’s Creative Suite 3 apps. If the beta of Photoshop CS3 is any indication, sweeping changes are in store across the line. Hopefully there will finally be a … [Read more…]

Trent, You Magnificent Bastard

I just read that Trent Reznor has released the source files for Survivalism, one of the songs of his forthcoming album Year Zero, in GarageBand format. He's done this before with a couple of songs off his last record, but he's also announced that he'll be releasing every song off the new record as GarageBand … [Read more…]

Home Again

Back in Cleveland. Not sure how I feel about that. Good to be home, I guess. But another couple days away would have been nice. Amazingly, the drive home managed to be worse than the drive out. First, I apparently missed a turn somewhere in New Hampshire and ended up off course. I found my … [Read more…]

Climbing That Mountain, Part 2

Yesterday there was a blizzard, today it’s raining. It’s like Cleveland, that. First lesson? A foot of fresh, thickly packed snow makes things really difficult. Hiking, climbing, all of it. Heh, like I needed the extra challenge. *laugh* Today was spent on one of the smaller climbing areas, learning to do everything. Well, not everything, … [Read more…]

Climbing That Mountain, Part 1: Addendum

Oh yeah, one other thing I forgot to mention before… As I got further and further, the mountains got bigger and bigger. I was looking at some of the particularly large ones, pondering their size. Then I realized, none of these even had peaks above the treeline. So those monsters were smaller than the mountain … [Read more…]

Climbing That Mountain, Part 1

Why do my trips always seem to start so stressfully? I originally planned to leave work by 3:00-3:30 yesterday, so that I'd have time to get home, eat dinner, load up the car, and get on the road by 5:00 at the latest. And be able to do so in a leisurely and relaxed manner. … [Read more…]