Switchfoot - Nothing is Sound

All right, I bet all the sixteen of you who have looked at my blog are wondering, "OK, I've read about his crazy life, but what about the reviews and bible things?"
Well, here's a review. I recently got Switchfoot's new album, Nothing is Sound in the dual CD/DVD format. I, being a fan of their previous Beautiful Letdown, found their latest album to be somewhat of a departure from Letdown. I read in the latest issue of CCM magazine (Christian Contemporary Music, I think) about how Switchfoot is going through their "branding," where they want to be more mainstream, which is OK with me - reaching out is good. But I hope they don't forget their Christian fan base once they get where they want to be, because I liked them before. On the new CD, my favorite track is Stars, a song that is more similar in sound to Letdown than to a lot of the others. Others that I like are Politicians, Happy is a Yuppie Word, and The Shadow Proves the Sunshine. It's another great album from Switchfoot, even if it is departing a little from their previous work to reach out to the secular world. But there is still plenty of awesome material, and it's a CD worth getting if you're a Switchfoot fan. The DVD version contains all the songs in 5.1 surround sound, but I, not having surround sound, was more interested in the commentary and such. I watched quite a bit of the behind-the-scenes section, and found out, among other things, that at least Jon Foreman (I think) drinks Sam's Club bottled water. Cool, huh?
Randy

Can't forget the Blender!

Well, in my sort-of roundup of supercool open-source projects, I realized I left out a very important member. The other day, I finally tried out Blender3D. It is an open-source 3-D model editing program. I don't know how it compares to others like 3D Max and Maya, but I know it blows the socks off of my CAD-3D program I was working with. Once you get the hang of the controls (which takes some doing), it is very intuitive to make some awesome 3D models. I had fun making a man with claws and a tophat for starters. If you're into 3D modeling, or just want to play around with making 3D objects, check it out. And make sure you go along with a tutorial, otherwise you'll probably get lost pretty quickly. I reccomend WikiBooks' online book Blender 3D: Noob to Pro. Check it out!
Randy

In case I forgot to mention it...

I'm into computers. Especially programming. Which somewhat explains why I'm very much into Open-Source software. If you don't know what that means, look it up in Wikipedia (another adherent of the open-source spirit), then come back.

OK, now that you all know what open-source is about, I can continue. Some awesome exapmles or this are GIMP (www.gimp.org) and Inkscape, both drawing programs, GIMP leaning towards raster (like paint) and Inkscape (www.inkscape.org) on the vector side (like, uh, Word's drawing stuff?). Another super-awesome example is NASA World Wind, a program kind of like Google Earth (World Wind is more functional, less eye candy. Kind of like AOL vs Firefox). "But," to quote a great Geico commercial, "I digress." My main purpose of mentioning open source is not only to spread the word on awesome programs and developers, but also to brag on what I was able to do with them. With the help of the FREE Gimp and Inkscape, with no assistance from other more expensive programs that shall not be named, I created the design for our boy's tennis shirt and e-mailed it to the printers. (For anyone interested, I had to send them an .eps, instead of the open-source SVG, but Inkscape handled it beautifully.) I used GIMP to import a bitmap of the Air Jordan logo so I could loosely base my work on it. I then created a vector outline of my design, tweaked it, exported it from GIMP, opened it in Inkscape, touched it up, and viola! I had a nifty shirt design. We got our shirts today, and they turned out pretty well. I may not be able to draw, but I can trace pretty well. So if you're into that graphics design kind of stuff, or if you just like to draw, check out GIMP and Inkscape. And of course, if you want to read about them, check out their articles in Wikipedia (GIMP and Inkscape). I was going to end with some clever line from Shakespeare (or whoever wrote the stuff), but I can't come up with anything off the top of my head. So for now, adios.
Randy

Rubik's Cube? Next!...

All right, call me a geek, but I'm happy because I finally solved my Rubik's cube yesterday. Hooray. I'll get some pictures in later of my finished cube. I won't be a speed cuber any time soon, but I'll soon be able to do it without directions. Maybe if anyone wants it, or maybe just because I want to, I'll post directions on how I did it. In other news, expect some movie reviews in the future. I just watched The Adventures of Ociee Nash, and will be reviewing it soon. I also want to review The Incredibles and Finding Nemo. But for now, I'll be content with my Rubik's cube, all solved. It's not quite as gratifying as it could be, since I picked it up probably at a garage sale years ago and just recently picked it back up, so several stickers are home-made, particularly the center red one. Maybe next time I'll have a "real" cube. So think happy thoughts, and until next time,
Randy

Ooh! A shiny new counter!

Well, I haven't posted in a while, but it's been real busy with school and all. If you didn't notice, I have a shiny new counter there on the right, so I know how many of you are out there. I picked that particular style mainly because it didn't clash horribly with the silvery background. If you think it's garishly ugly, and want me to change it, go ahead and browse through the counter style options and let me know which number you like. I noticed (with some excitement) that a grand total of 8 people (or bots) have viewed my profile. That's like, twice what it was last time I checked, and that was twice the time before! If it keeps doubling, I should reach a million in, like, a month or something. But anyway, nothing to dreadfully exciting has happened recently, so I think I'll just leave it at this. Except to say that I still think my cat is the best. So toodles,
Randy

Edit 8:34: Hey, after a little searching, I found Webstats4u. Much cooler. So I have now officially added a new, more detailed counter, but kept the old, more visible one.

A Stone's Throw Away from Insanity

Augh, I'm tired.  But I guess I'll let you in on my random thought of the day.  I was thinking, we always say something is a stone's throw away.  How far is a stone's throw?  How far can you throw a stone?  Maybe we could average our stone-throwing distances and round it off to a nice even number, and call that a stone's throw.  Then when someone said, "That rock hyrax isn't even a stone's throw away," you could whip out your measuring tape and (assuming the little critter doesn't run away) say, "Nuh-uh.  That rock hyrax is precisely 154 feet, 4 3/16 inches away.  A stone's throw is only 150 feet."  Your companion would probably look at you strangely and then slowly back away, but at least you would have the satisfaction of knowing you defined a previously nebulous distance.
     Like I said, I'm tired.  And my thoughts are pretty strange.  But at least it's a post, right?  Hmm.  I need more sleep.  Goodnight,
Randy

Hello, World!

Being a programmer, I have to start everything with a "Hello, World!" It's just gotta be that way. So now that I've gotten that out of the way, I can get started. What I'll be doing here is posting movie reviews, what I've gotten out of my daily Bible readings, and of course things from my normal life that I deem worthy for the blog. Read my profile for a little more detail. What's with the title you ask? Well, I am totally a cat person, and my favorite cat is moody, and will quite often try to swipe my head off. So I decided to name the blog after my wonderful kitty. The "limited" thing is just 'cause it sounds so much more exciting that way. I'd say that's about enough for my first post. I should get back to my programming. Signing off,
Randy