DxBlog

My cashier days are almost over!

2006-03-16T21:03:00.000-08:00

Firstly, yes. I've been a bad boy and haven't blogged in over a week. So sue me :-P.Anyhoo, as the title so clearly states I will no longer be a cashier at Wal-Mart the day after tomorrow. That's right, I've been fired :-(. Just kidding, ha ha! I'm being moved over into the "overstock manager" job and my first day is Saturday starting a 4am :-) (yeah, that's a close paren, not a P). I'm looking

Hi ho, it's back to work I go.... Hoover Dam it!

2006-03-08T09:36:00.000-08:00

Ah, but at least it's just today and I do get off at a reasonable time tonight. Then I got tomorrow off and it's also payday, so life is good B-). Also, it appears that the new job is secured because they've got my hours on the schedule as being 4-9am starting the 18th (yay!). But enough of that, on to the good stuff.I'll start out with last night's bowling. Remember how I said I was going to get

And I thought cart pushing was bad :-P

2006-03-06T11:51:00.000-08:00

The last few days I've been hoping for a departure from the normal routine of taking money from people. Well, last night I got my wish. I guess GM recieving is shorthanded so they've been pulling people in to help back there and I was one of the lucky ones. Now I've gone back to GM for truck unloading before, but last night I was actually dragging big palettes of junk around the store and I tell

Of Sin and Sacrilege

2006-03-03T22:51:00.000-08:00

I did something that would have me from about a year ago saying "Burn in Hell, you heathen!". That's right, I bought an iPod.Yes, on the same day that good ol' Pope Benedict got his, I am now the proud owner of a black 2GB iPod Nano, and I tell you... it's pretty freakin' sweet. Now don't think that I've suddenly grown a soft spot for Apple, 'cause I'm still a die-hard Windows fan. In my opinion

Vacation... WHOO!

2006-02-28T13:41:00.000-08:00

After a long six day, non-stop (almost) run at work I finally get a well-deserved two day weekend :-). And while I'm on the subject of work I should probably say it look like I'm not going to be cashier anymore. Charles (daytime manager) created a new job and apparently I was the first person suggested to fill it. So if this all works out I'll be keeping track of/putting away groceries overstock

Such stupid, stupid people

2006-02-24T10:43:00.000-08:00

I'm going to break from the formula today and talk about an issue that's been driving me insane lately. Here goes: Zelda: Twilight Princess will not be a Revolution game for crying out loud! Why? Here we go:1) Firstly, people have been preordering this thing (the game) since before the Revolution was anything more than a name. That'd be a lot of ticked people when it came down to the wire and

In for the long haul

2006-02-22T13:28:00.000-08:00

After having nearly five days off within eight days, I'm in for a six day, non-stop work-athon. I hope I survive. Luckily I'm not working past midnight on any of those days and I get a two day weekend at the end. Tomorrow is also payday, so that's another perk.In other news, I've decided to scrap my NES emulator... and move it to C++ ;-). After having the usual battles I have when developing with

Sigh...

2006-02-19T01:35:00.000-08:00

Not much to say about any serious aspect of my life. I guess I'll run the usual update: I bowled well on Thursday, my job as a cashier at Wal-Mart is going about usual, and I got yesterday off. Okay, now to the juicy stuff (mwa ha ha)!Today I completely rewrote my CPU core from scratch implementing a better design that'll be easier for bug killing. I actally completed the entire core over the

The Storm has Arrived

2006-02-15T18:28:00.000-08:00

Now I was going to title this "Calm Before the Storm", but the storm has already arrived. As you all know last night was Tuesday, aka Bowling Night and tomorrow is the Bowl for Kids tournament. Well, last night I had my best night of bowling ever with two games over 200, the best being 224. My series was 571 (goog enough for me to get a patch) and that brings my running average up to 166. So to

Teaser Trailer... WHOO!

2006-02-13T01:01:00.001-08:00

Remember that movie I said I was shooting? Well, here's the teaser for it (note: you'll need Windows Media Player). Hooray! Tomorrow I will start shooting the rest of it and hopefully I can begin editing on Wednesday. This is proof that even though I now spend 7+ hours a day in the mines of Wal-Mart, I still have too much time on my hands :-DI'm still hard at work on my emulator. SMB runs well

Hackfilms Ltd. presents...

2006-02-10T23:22:00.000-08:00

... I ain't gonna tell you! HA HA HA! It is Star Wars related, but that's all I'm saying. I actually filmed the opening sequence today and it turned out quite sweet indeed (hold on, gotta watch it again... oh, yeah. It's great!). Hopefully on my days off next week (Tuesday and Wednesday) I'll be able to finish filming. More on that as things develop.I did go bowling on Thursday and had a better

Bowling update

2006-02-07T22:21:00.000-08:00

Well, tonight's bowling much mirrored last weeks (though I feel fine). My first game beat my old record of 207 by a pin, my second game was 159 and my last, 116. This brings my average down to 162. I'm going to practice at Red Apple this Thursday (payday and my other day off) and I'll be adding that to my running total.I've been working on my NES emulator like nuts lately. I'm up to around 40/158

The sickness...

2006-02-02T02:03:00.000-08:00

My once a year sickness has come and gone (almost). It started late Monday, got worse Tuesday and when I woke up about 3pm yesterday it was on the outs. Sadly, I feeling so crummy yesterday morning I actually had to call in sick (hope that doesn't hurt my performance review...).But anyways, you all are probably wondering how I did Tuesday being sick and all. To sum it up: good, bad and ugly (in

Cashiering 101 - An attempt at comedy

2006-01-29T18:34:00.000-08:00

There isn't really anything new to report so instead I will treat you to a little Wal-Mart Cashier 101.Your RegisterIt's always (side note, remember that word. At Wal-Mart it's important). As I was saying, it's always important to keep your register clean at all times. That means making sure trash, roaches and Michael Jackson are nowhere to be found. Make sure that all items are where they're

2006-01-24T23:37:00.000-08:00

*sigh* My "weekend" is now over and all I have to look forward to is asking people if the "found everything alright". Oh, well. Could be worse. At least I'm getting paid ;-). Speaking of which, payday is Thursday again :-D.I haven't started on my "project", but I did pick up the threads of my GBA Tetris Attack game. I've gotten a bit done through to basic clearing. I'm probably going to work some

2006-01-21T23:00:00.000-08:00

It is Sunday and that means today is the last day of work before my two day weekend! WHOO! I've got some more grandiose plans in the line of game programming. However, this time I am not going to program ANYTHING ELSE until this project is done. I'm going to work on the basic framework the next couple of days and once I have something significant I will tell you what that plan is, but until then.

2006-01-18T00:41:00.000-08:00

Well, here is my first blog post on Blogger. Why the switch? Mainly I was sick of the lack of features in Tetra and don't really have the time/motivation to code them. Secondly, Blogger may give me a little more publicity. If me from six months ago were to meet me now he'd consider me a heathen for moving, but I think it's time that some things were laid to rest. Now that my site will be blog

Fun with faces!

2006-01-12T00:15:00.001-08:00

Found a website that is currently beta testing some faceial recognition software. You can upload your face and have it match it against a database full of celebreties. Well, I dumped a picture of me and and apprently I look like Tim Berners-Lee :-D (actually there is a striking resemblene). Now isn't that cool :-). See ya and have fun.

Tetra updates!

2006-01-09T20:00:00.001-08:00

I was kind of feeling the lack of Tetra's blog features today so I went in and started piddling around with stuff. As you can see the archives list is now sorted in descending order and I also have a little links bar (I can add as many side bars as I want too :-)). Also, fixed a few problems in the message board code and cleaned up a couple other things that had been bothering me for months.I got

So it's 2006... I smell no difference

2006-01-01T20:13:00.001-08:00

Ah, the new year has arrived and with it a job change for me. That's right I achieved my life long dream and got a part time job at the Sizzler! No, really. I am now a cashier at Wal-mart. I originally wanted to be a cart pusher because cashier was something I wanted to be even less. There was a bit of confusion for a while because I told Debbie (schedule lady) I didn't really like cashiering and

So sweet, yet so short

2005-12-25T23:10:00.001-08:00

Before I delve into this stuff I just want to say I hope you all had a good Christmas :-).Well, Christmas paper shredding has come and gone once again. All that excitement and anticipation over with the course of a couple hours. Ah, but a pretty sweet Christmas it was. So, I bet the question on the tip of your tounges is "What'dya get?". Here's the run down: glass chess set (frosted even :-D),

Christmas is coming

2005-12-20T19:45:00.001-08:00

Twas some days before Christmas and all through the house,not a creature was stirring except for the dudeon his laptop.Doesn't rhyme, but I don't care. I'm sitting here in our new living room lit up tree in front of me and a fireplace full of stockings to my right (picture coming soon). Now this in and of itself is a nice feeling but having my laptop and posting here while doing it makes the

LAPTOP!! WHOOOO!!

2005-12-15T07:11:00.001-08:00

Ah.... I sit in the living room in a nice comfy chair as I write this. Yes.. I got my laptop out this morning. I stayed up all night to do it, but I did it and DANGif it isn't a darn nice feeling :-). I've got a bunch of junk I'm going to need to uninstall (currently there are 14 icons down on the system tray :-P). But at least I've got a processor/RAM combo that can handle a bunch of stuff :-

Cart Pushing SUCKS!!!

2005-12-06T13:24:00.001-08:00

Yeah, that's right. It isn't in my nature to swear, but I hate cart pushing. The last two nights layaway has been dead enough that they've sent me out to push carts in the parking lot. I pushed carts in freezing weather for one and a half hours without a hat or gloves on Sunday and for an hour yesterday. Luckily I was smart enough to bring the hat and gloves then. I tell you though, if Wal-Mart

Return of the mad eBayer!

2005-11-29T22:00:00.001-08:00

Yes, it is I, insane Matt posting inane items on eBay! For those of you who don't know I am the creator of such infamous items as the "Common Cold" and the "Darth Vader Pancake". However, this eBay auction is a little more sane... just a little. At the very least I'm selling more or less a legitimate item... an e-mail address. That's right, loz.twilight.princess@gmail.com (yes, I actually managed

The Xbox 360 is here...

2005-11-22T09:47:00.001-08:00

Because I work at Wal-Mart now I get to witness all sorts of interesting things: people putting peanuts (yes, the food) on layaway, burly guys throwing canning jars all over the place, etc. etc. But yesterday was probably the most interesting, if not incredibly stupid, thing I've seen yet: people waiting hours and hours to get their hands on a freakin' game system. Not only that but they would

Another reason to hate cats

2005-11-16T20:39:00.001-08:00

Now it may be a fairly unkown fact about me, but I can't stand cats. Mainly, if for any reason, it is because at our old house there were cats that made a permanent residence there. And when the males went around marking their territory, it wasn't pretty.But, anyways, I have another reason to hate cats: It seems I'm allergic to them. Yesterday I went to an allergist to see what the heck I'm

One Week Anniversary

2005-11-11T23:52:00.001-08:00

As of today (or yesterday now :-P) I've been working at Wal-mart for one week. I've done probably about everything, now, and seen just about everything put on layaway (except groceries). I'm not sure what my standing is now, but I was already getting high praise on Monday (can't let it get to my head). Also, yesterday, the other layaway boy had his first day and I showed him the ropes. He'll be

My First Day

2005-11-04T18:36:00.000-08:00

Well, I made it through my first day working in Lawaway. Overall I think it went pretty well (except all the women's underwear I had to handle :-P). However, it'll be nice when I can go in there and know what to do instead of hanging around more seasoned coworkers and have them coach me through everything. I just did the math and my first paycheck should be about $326.20. Figuring I get about

Windows 2003 Troubles

2005-10-30T09:11:00.000-08:00

Well, yesterday was a great day... NOT! Somehow, and I've yet been able to figure out why, my password got reset. Now I figure it's one of four scenerios:A) A little kid somehow changed the password by pounding on my keyboardB) One of our neighbors has been sitting cracking our WPA passkey the last month (and I'm think that all of our neighbors have WiFi)C) Some Uber h4x0r who's peed off at me

dxprog the wage slave

2005-10-27T14:55:00.000-07:00

Well, I made it past my interview (I'd like to say with flying colors). I may as well say I've got a job (I have no doubt in my mind that I'll pass the drug/alcohol test). In fact, before taking the test today (yuck) I overheard the people in the back talking about how I was "the only one today" and that Wal-mart hasn't been "getting any applications". They're deperate. They need me.No updates on

Update from progland

2005-10-25T11:23:00.000-07:00

Ah, well it seems I have stuff to talk about again. First of all I've got an idea for a simple short film which I will probably be filming as soon as I finish the script. But until I can get a trailer up, you'll have to live with this poster:I should be able to finish the script this week and start shooting next week. So keep coming back for updates.Also, and this is the big news, but it looks

I isn\'t dead!

2005-10-15T21:28:00.000-07:00

And I isn't ejucaded either :-P. Not much new going on over here. I'm still doing the Clear Creek site (sparked an idea for an ASP.NET wiki :-D). Also, did a bunch of work for the Schindler's again. Made a profitable $50 off of it which I've promptly used to buy myself a 120GB hard drive. Oh, and I got a free $20 Amazon.com gift certificate for taking a [http://www.gametap.com]GameTap[/link]

Prepare for a Revolution!

2005-09-19T10:48:00.000-07:00

It was certainly an exciting weekend for those of us paying attention to TGS (Tokyo Game Show). The new Nintendo Revolution controller was finally unveiled. At first I was kind of skeptical, I mean the thing is a freakin' remote:Part of me kind of died because I've grown up holding a controller in two hands using super quick thumb reflexes to get myself around. However, the more I thought about

Pictures! Yay!

2005-09-15T16:28:00.000-07:00

We went through our grand tour of the house today (second for me) and I was able to snap some pictures. So, here they are:The stairsThe living room:The dining room:The office (sadly, it's not my desk :-():Our room (Jeff, Chris and I):The girls room (that's Jeff's butt and Becky, twin #2, in front of the window):The kids, and my, bathroom:I seem to be missing pictures of the master bedroom as well

The moving begins!

2005-09-14T16:21:00.000-07:00

Our realtor called today and apparently we should've been packing a week ago because now we're left with exactly one week to pack! So, I've been going through my stuff today (nuked a few CDs :-D) and getting ready.Yesterday was the first night of bowling and a good night of bowling it was. The first two games were sort of ehhhh, but the last game was my best yet. I'll let the image speak for

Crunch time!

2005-09-02T13:52:00.000-07:00

Well, we've had an offer, the papers are signed and with any luck the moving will commence soon. So for those of you out there who pray please add in an extra word to the man upstairs that all this goes through :-).Bowling league starts again in a couple weeks (13th) which I am looking forward to. Dad and I had been on a Monday league over the summer, but it was with "commoners" (i.e. people who

General Update

2005-08-30T14:09:00.000-07:00

It's been a few days since I last posted anything. I'm sure you're all thinking because we're moving. Well, sadly, that guy who was so interested seems more interested in renting, not buying (stinks :-P).But, anyways. Today I began studying for the GED. It's not quite as simple as I thought, but I basically finish high school in one run as opposed to another two or so years.Things on Desert

The ship is about to hit the fan

2005-08-24T08:46:00.000-07:00

Got a call this morning from our realtor. The showing last night went incredibly well, apparently. So well, in fact, that the guy is going to be getting his financing in order within the next day or so. So that means I will be movingprog!!In other news, Steve's Four Swords Adventures copy should be coming in the mail today. It'll be nice to have something to play again.Well, that's all I can

Title goes here (best I could do :-P)

2005-08-16T22:12:00.000-07:00

Some interesting things happened today (we had burgers for supper, that in itself makes it interesting ;-)).Firstly, my Empire game is coming along nicely. I spent most of the afternoon and part of this evening getting the random map generation working. That was a blast :-D. Tomorrow I will actually start building the engine framework. This is the part where I generally choke, but I feel pretty

Tetra a thing of the past?

2005-08-15T00:02:00.000-07:00

Yeah, seems like a crazy proposition considering how much time and effort I've stuffed into it, but I may be moving on to something new. I've been seeing a lot about Ajax, some fancy JScript/XML stuff that basically eliminates page loading, and I may take a shot at basing my new engine around this. Of course, it's just an idea at the moment.Currently, I've been starting a new game. It'll

New house?

2005-08-12T10:57:00.000-07:00

The parents have signed the papers for our new house and to get our current one slapped on the market. Today, day one of house-on-the-market-dom, an investor came by to look at the place. As I write this we have no idea what his thoughts are, but the fact that it's only been a day is promising.In programming land I downloaded every pattern from ACC and am having fun fiddling with that data. First

Erg

2005-08-06T10:32:00.000-07:00

Well, I got my games today (after an eternity of waiting) and surprise, surprise they're pirated copies :-@. I', hoping I can get a refund and if I can't get that I hope at least that these games won't fritz on me immediatly. But, my ALttP cart (which I learned is also pirated) hasn't gone nutzy on me yet, so maybe if I'm lucky I'll still be playing these when I'm 50 :-P.I've finished with my

The Canon to Real Life

2005-07-27T22:18:00.000-07:00

It seems I may be launched from my protective shelter at home with my family right into "real" life soon (what is "real"? ;-)). I'm currently being considered for a job at Gamespot/TV.com/MP3.com doing web work for them. Now that in itself is cool but it would mean relocating to San Fransico (a good several hundred miles from here). It's kind of an exciting thought, though. Finally making my own

A History of Me - Part 1

2005-07-08T21:53:00.000-07:00

For lack of anything else to write I will begin a series of autobiographical articles about me (ego bloating time ;-)). Before I start that, though, I'll give a quick rundown of the week. I rebuilt our shelves this week: painted them white and added some proper braces. Looks pretty good. I also, more or less, finished the docs module which is nice. Now I can start work on the various game stuff I

We is in the paper... kind of

2005-07-01T22:28:00.000-07:00

While we're not mentioned directly (at the parents request) the local paper, Examiner Enterprise (aka Teh Typo Tymes), ran an article on the group that's been helping us get the house whipped into shape. Now this is a crummy recreation of what's in the paper, but until I can get all the pictures scanned and stuff this'll have to do.But enough of the nicey, nice stuff. Tomorrow they're coming

Days like this don\'t come too often...

2005-06-21T15:54:00.000-07:00

Indeed, they don't. To start my day off I was awakened with the news that my copy of Zelda: The Minish Cap came. And on top of that I also got my first trial issue of Nintendo Power. Of course, this was all dampened by the news that American School sent me Geometry. Fun....Okay, so that was all cool in and of itself (except the geometry). I then carried out my normal routine of checking ACC, YPN,

Oy!

2005-06-16T15:35:00.000-07:00

I'm currently bogged down by a bunch of various projects and am having some trouble getting myself motivated to complete them. The biggest is, yet again, Tetra. I'm also starting some GBA dev and trying to get ACPD3 finished.In other news, I finally seem to have gotten accustomed to the grips in my bowling ball. The other night I shot my current all time high of 172... very sweet :-D. I also shot

Whew!

2005-06-05T14:16:00.000-07:00

Just got finished going through a rigorous exercise course with the babies and now I'm beat. Good time to write a blog entry ;-).I decided to pick up the threads of ACPD3. I've been having fun getting the idiot BSTRs to work again :-P. I'm going to be moving as much as I can to the DLL this time around and figuring out how to avoid DLL hell, too. For a change people actually seem to be interested

My REAL Blog

2005-06-03T20:25:00.000-07:00

Here it is, Tetra Blog (beta)! Coming down the road are a few more styles, and the ability to add sidebars. These can be any Tetra sidebar so I'm going to be rigging up an RSS feed reader sometime in the near future. That combined with the Universal Document Module will make Tetra quite a nicely rounded little CMS :-). And for anybody who'd make a rebuttal to that