1-31-03

My internet doesn't want to work, so I'm going to write for a while. I've been thinking recently about what the best albums to come out last year were, and I have a rough list, not in any particular order:

The BEST.

Chevelle - Wonder What's Next. This is just pure rock, and was exactly the kind of CD I love to hear.

Box Car Racer - Self Titled. Think Blink 182, except consistently good, and actually serious.

The All-American Rejects - Self Titled. Yeah, its pop-punk, but its earnest, and its raw, and its just plain well done. Probably the best CD to come out last year, in my opinion.

Foo Fighters - One by One. Everything the Foo Fighters have done well in the past is here. They get heavy, they get serious, and its a great CD, every song.

CD's that BARELY didn't make it:

The Notwist - Neon Golden. Yeah, its great stuff, very unique.

Filter - Amalgamut. A great CD in my mind, but not as good as Title of Record, so it didn't make it.

Good Charlotte - The young and the hopeless. A GOOD cd, but nothing spectacular. Its a great change of pace, but nothing ground breaking.

TRUSTcompany - Self titled. I have no complaints against this CD, its good, but there isn't anything real spectacular here. I mean, I'll listen to it and like it, but its not living up to the potential I think they could.

Audioslave - Self titled. DAMN good CD, but its just not RAGE.

Linkin Park - Reanimation. Yep, marketed to the masses, but its done pretty well. However, its not one of the greats simply because all they did was expand on their earlier stuff. But do check out the version of Crawling with Aaron Lewis. Oh.my.god.

Disappointments:

Korn - Untouchables. A disappointment to me, the only reason I own it is it was Korn.

Stone Sour - Self titled. Had potential, obviously. Just listen to bother. But if you can, try to avoid the rest of the CD.

Disturned - Believe. Yuck.

Papa Roach - Lovehatetragedy. Where did the good songs go?

Ok, yeah, I think that wraps it up for the most part. If there is an album you think deserves or doesn't deserve to be on here, lemme know. And if I forgot an album thats been out a while, its prolly because I didn't think it came out in 2002.

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Yep, I'm writing just for the sake of writing. Don't have a whole lot to say. I'm heading down to Norman after class tomorrow, er..today. Looking forward to seeing my baby, I really hate this long distance thing. On the brighter side, this week has been FAR better than last weekend. I was ready to kill anything and everything last weekend, it was not a whole lot of fun. So, what have I been doing with my time all week?
I'm glad you asked! I spent far more than I should have on computer parts, in order to make my computer faster and make two other computers work again. I'm taking the crappier of the two computers, sticking in anything I don't currently need, and giving it to my sister. Now the other computer, thats where the fun part comes in. I'm putting in a video card with TV out and a good sound card, plus my 80 gig hard drive, and hooking it up to my entertainment system. It uses the TV as a monitor and my reciever for the speakers. Its also set up to auto-play whenever a CD with video is put in it, and I'm going to move my mp3's and downloaded videos to the 80 gig HD. Its going to be a pure home theatre computer. Here comes the cool part: Through a program called VNC, I am able to control the new computer through THIS computer. VNC provides a GUI interface right into it, so I can see everything that it displays on my computer, and can use my keyboard and mouse to control it. So, to sum it all up, the only things hooked up to the box are a network cable, a TV out, and an audio out. Oh, and a six button controller. Hehe, I put emulators on it and played the original Mario Brothers in surround sound last night :)

You should all go watch this flash video because its funny as hell. Thanks to Robert for the hookup. Oh, one last thing... I've been enjoying and chiming in on Joe's blog recently, y'all should give it a read sometime.

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1-27-03

"Hey Zach, go downstairs and let me know if the bathroom still smells like beer."
-Quoth my 14 year old sister earlier this morning.

So, yeah, weekend from hell. First, some backstory. Lets begin with my little sister, Samantha. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that common sense isn't exactly her forte.
Go back about six months ago, she gets brough her by her boyfriend Mikhail's father, who tells me she was found in bed with the kid.
Go back about 2 months, we get a call from the cops at like midnight, she was found at some sort of domestic disturbance and had been drinking.
Go back about a month ago. This was the first night she got ungrounded from the previous misadventure, and we STILL get a call from the cops at about 3:30 in the morning. As it turns out, at sometime in the wee hours of the morn, she decided to go for a ride with two boys in a car that had been started with a screwdriver instead of the more traditional method, you know, KEYS. So, caught out past curfew with underage drivers and a possibly stolen car.
Go back to this past friday. My mom lets me know she's going out of town to visit my dad for the weekend. I'm like "w00t" because in the past 19 years I cannot remembed ONE TIME at least one of my parents hasn't been home for the night. So, I immediately start scheming: How can I get my sister out of my hair and happy for the weekend, so I can do whatever I want?

I've got it! If I let her have a friend or two over, she'll be happy and entertained. Ok, so, she's still grounded, and my parents want me to enforce it, but I don't want to be the bad guy, I'll let her have a few people over.
So.
That was not a good idea.

At one point Saturday night there were 20 high school kids in my empty house while I was at work. Sunday morning I come downstairs to find Sam's best friend wrapped around her boyfriend on our couch. I find a 24 pack of Milwaukee's best sitting on top of our bar. I find trash strewn throughout the yard, and empty beer cans in the house.

Did I mention that she's 14, and that it would be MY ASS if she got in trouble, cause I let her have people over?
Yeah, just thought I'd remind you. Anyway, back to the story: Saturday night, she gets pissed at me and argues with me basically all night because I won't let Mikhail come over at 1 in the morning and bring several guys with him. This is after I've gotten the 20 people whittled down to my sister, two of her female friends, and one of their boyfriends. I've already had to fight with her just to get the boyfriend's word that he'll go home that night and not stay the night here. If there's one thing I don't need, its underage loving happening in the house when I'm in charge. BTW, this is all going down as soon as I get off work from an 8 hour shift where my manager, and I quote, "wanted to see how pissed off he could get me."
So. I was not happy to begin with.
Anyway, to try and wrap this whole fucking mess up, Sam told me she got rid of the beer Sunday morning, and wanted to go over to a friends. I was more than happy to get her out of the house. Especially considering it took me over an hour just to try and clean up after her Sunday night. So she calls me this morning, she's not going to school, and she lost her house key, so I need to leave the house unlocked so she can get in, which worries me to begin with, but I do it. Luckily nothing bad happened, which didn't seem to fit the rest of the weekend. But, anyway, I get back from class at noon today, she's on the phone with her boyfriend in my parents bedroom, and one of the first things she says to me is to ask me to see if the downstairs bathroom still smells like beer. As it turns out, her solution for the beer, almost all 24 cans, was to dump it all in the sink downstairs.

To top the whole thing off, the only reason I wanted Sam happy was so she wouldn't rat me out if Kat crashed here for the night Sunday (because today was our three-months), which Kat eventually decided NOT TO DO. Plus, over the past 4 nights, I have gotten 6 hours, 7 hours, five hours, and five hours of sleep, respectively. Yeah, I hope your weekend was better than mine.

Oh yeah, and there is no longer any soda, or much of any candy, left in the whole house. I wonder if my parents will notice.

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1-24-03

So, Monday is three months to the day from the first time I kissed Kat. She just arrived home in Tulsa, to find a dozen roses laid out leading up to her room, where I left a card. She's on her way over here right now, and I'm taking her to Bourbon Street and then to the movie theater at 10, at which time both the movies she wants to see start, so I'll let her choose. So, yeah, I think its going to be a good night. Sometimes I think I'm getting pretty good at this whole boyfriend thing.

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1-23-03

So, welcome to the redesigned blog. Rest assured, I"m not done yet, I enjoy playing around with this entirely too much. I'm thinking I'm going to tackle the forums next, possibly create my own comment server, I haven't decided yet. Basically it depends on how much Perl and CGI I am willing to teach myself. However, I am pretty proud of what I built today, and I hope y'all like it too. There is one page left, I still need to convert the December archives over into CSS, but I think I'm about to start that right now. Oh, and the whole site should be xhtml 1.0 compliant in the very near future, although I have no idea why I bother. There is no way they will switch the internet over to a new standard, because they risk alienating all the people who use the earlier standards. And we all know the internet is geared toward getting as many stupid people online as possible. Where do you think AOL came from?

Oh, hopefully you like the image directly above this sentence, I'm pretty happy that I was able to wrap the text around it. CSS is so fucking cool!

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1-20-03

Pseudo-bored right now, basically because I know its time to do school work, and I REALLY don't want to, so I'm looking for a worthy distraction. Oh, and if someone ever tells you not to do something because you'll regret it later- listen to them :)

I highly reccommend swinging by the Tulsa IMAX and catching the Lion King while its there. It was a nice blast from the past, and even though it was $18 for two student tickets, it was well worth it. Their sound system RULES, and even though their video intro is done really piss-poorly, I'm such an audio-phile that it was all good. I'm still trying to convince Kat to see LOTR on the IMAX with me next weekend.
Finally, all the pages on the site with the exception of the December archives have been switched over to the CSS standard, and one last shout-out to Rocky for persuading me to switch. Gracias, and maybe someday my site will look half as decent as his.

1-18-03

Yeah, I dig the style sheets. Anyway, I think I could just stare at Kat sleeping all night, its easily one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen in my life. She just looks so... peaceful. She's my girl, and I'm lucky to have her. I know I don't deserve a girl like her.

I wish I was tired enough I could fall asleep too, I'm just too wound up right now.

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1-17-03

Damn, its a LOT of work converting everything over to CSS, but its worth it, because from now on, whenever I want to change a color or a font, I don't have to do it on every page, but just on the style sheet. Ok, I'm going back to work.

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1-16-03

Two pronged update-
1. I've been redesigning the site, AGAIN, but the only thing y'all will notice is the archives page, which I'm pretty proud of. I remember seeing the calender thingy on Residence Life Comics and really digging it, and tonight I learned how to do tables, so I implemented it. Now all the days have an individual link, I may tweak that out more, do a "fave posts" kind of thing, I dunno yet.
2. "Life as a House" is a damn good movie. Everyone already calls me gay, so I'm not really risking anything by promoting a sappy flick. It has Kevin Kline, and he's a pimp, so grab your favorite female and watch it with them. I'm prolly gonna keep tweaking the site, so I'm out.

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1-14-03

Go watch the new All-American Rejects Video, you won't regret it.
So, I'm very very very torn. Derrik and Misty turned up the pressure on me tonight about moving in with them at the end of March. The thing is, it sounds SO tempting, and honestly, if I cut back on my impulse spending, I could probably afford. But ironically enough, I'd be moving to a smaller room, and I'd miss my dad's free food. Plus someone whose opinion I trust told me it would be a bad idea. However, I would LOVE the freedom. Would I like to have a drink? Why yes, I could do that! Would I like to not have to explain myself if I don't come home when I'm supposed to? Why I could do that too! Yeah, I rarely drink, and almost don't come home unless I've arranged it first, but its still the fact that I COULD. I have no idea what I'm going to do.

A.I. homework:
Are humans unique in possessing intelligence?
No, but we are unique in possessing the level of intelligence that we do. They can train mice to run mazes, dolphins can communicate, etc., but we reason and strive to achieve more, which is unique.

What is the most intelligent thing that you did last year?
That depends on the definition of intelligence, as in pure reason vs. emotion. Is this defined as the smartest thing I did that can be measured, or is it defined as what I look back as the best thing I did last year? If you want the smartest factual thing I did, it would probably be acing my assembler final, bumping my grade up to an A in that class. However, if you want me to answer as to what was the best thing I did last year, the thing I'm proudest of, I would have to answer that as refusing to give up when chasing a certain girl.

Would you consider a machine intelligent if it could do the same?
No, because the machine would simply be doing what we told it to, and not rationalizing things out on its own, because a machine doesn't have emotion, doesn't have a desire to strive for more.

If not, what else should it be capable of to be considered intelligent?
"I think, therefore I am." A machine needs to be able to think to be defined as intelligent. It has to have the ability to make decisions even when it doesn't have all the information at hand. It needs to be able to make decisions based on multiple factors, not just reason. My basic issue with artificial intelligence as it stands is that all that we do is program machines how to deal with specific situations. We need to be able to make machines that can figure things out on their own, as opposed to looking in its programming for a way to respond to given input.

Otherwise, why cannot intelligence be computed?
I think right now we don't know how to create something that can think for itself. Its not a question of computing power, its a question of how do we tell something how to "think"? Sure, we can make a computer that can beat someone at chess, but how do we teach that computer to play checkers? By reprogamming it. The question, for me, is how do we create something that is intelligent, but then keep it in line? There is no doubt in my mind that if we created an artificial intelligence that was unlimited, it could rewrite the world through the internet. So, we have to limit what we create, in the theme of Aasimov's "I, robot." So, if we have limited the intelligence, is it still intelligence? It may not matter, I have a hard time seeing a machine become self-aware, simply because its impossible to program emotion, as far as I know.

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1-13-03

In the past 24 hours I have:
Driven 298.6 miles
Spent about $250
Eaten ONCE
Slept for three hours total
Bought two new tires for my car, replacing two that were about to explode, and got yelled at by the clerk for not rotating my tires.
Watched an older lady sneeze on my girlfriend.
Discovered Altoids Tangerine Sours, and rediscovered gummy worms.
Had my first day back at school.
Remembered why I love my girl.

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1-11-03

So, that's a doozy of an offer. At the end of March, my friends lease is up, and he is looking for a new roommate, rent + utilities will only be about $300-350, and its within walking distance of Zios. I've wanted my own place for a long time, and this way it will be in a place I'm reasonably familiar with a roommate I can trust, for a fairly reasonable price. Plus I would have it all summer, when I know I could afford it, which would rule. God, I'm torn. Its a money issue, plus a time issue, but its SO tempting. I'll let you know what I decide when I'm thinking clearer. Have anything to add? Hit up the forums.

1-10-03

School starts Monday, and I'm kind of unsure of how to feel about it. I know its going to make me a busy bastard again, but I'm pretty much used to that, working forty hours a week over Christmas break has been a nice change, actually kind of relaxing. I'm looking forward to some of the stuff I'm taking this semester, like Artificial Intelligence and Internet Programming, but I know they'll prolly be pretty demanding. I'm not happy about not seeing my girl during school, but hell, I'm used to not seeing her anyway. So, basically, its more of the status quo, and I'm not sure I want that. Is it too much to ask for some change, in a good way? Like the ability to not have to work 4 shifts a week? Like the ability to live on campus? Like the ability to see my girl more than one night a week?

*sighs.

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1-09-03

This is why I hate my fucking job. I wrote this yesterday night after I got off work, not intending to post it, but I'm doing so now. Enjoy.

Right now I'm so pissed off that I'm not even pissed anymore, I'm just really sad. Basically, I came down pretty hard on a manager in training (Darren) tonight cause he greeted one of my tables when I was on my way there, and Darren in turn threatened my job, and Mario (a manager) and he laid into me pretty hard in the office. What happened was: I was at table 64, talking to them, with silverware in my hand to greet table 62, and before I could turn away from 64, Darren had greeted 62. When he walked past me, I said "Don't do that." Someone who has asked to go unnamed heard Darren in the server station saying "if he says something like that again, he won't have a job much longer." So, come checkout time, they ask me to stop and chat after I do my paperwork, and they tell me I had no right to get pissed at Darren, especially on the floor in front of customers. I tried to ask them why does he have the right to threaten my job, but their response was that if I can get pissed, why can't he? I finally leveled with them, that I feel like I'm expendable, that I don't think I'm respected, and the reason I get pissed when he fucks with my tables is that its the one thing that they let me do uninhibited. I'm not allowed to train, I'm not allowed to close, I'm not allowed to run 4 table sections, but I can run my three tables, and run them well, and I get offended when someone is watching over my shoulder and constantly stepping in. So, basically, Mario and I laid our cards out on the table: if they really wanted me gone, I would already be gone. I've said enough stupid things that they could very well have gotten rid of me a long time ago. However, they think I'm a good enough server that they don't. They don't want to replace me, but I AM replaceable.

Basically, it was just like I figured, I'm pretty much meaningless to them. They don't want to see me go, cause I do a good job, but they aren't going to go out of there way to try and keep me here. I have no clue how to react to all of this. Mario and Darren were actually laughing at me at several points, and Mario went as far as to say that he thinks there are self esteem issues that will probably make me feel like I'm being singled out. He didn't take it too well when I DID point out that Matt (the general manager) DOES single me out, but hey, whatever. For example, on Saturday, when Matt had me come in early to take part of a party (a 20-25, at two tables), and actually pulled someone else off the floor to "help" me take it. So, I wound up taking a 15 with another server taking the 8, and standing around a lot. Mario said that was just policy, until I pointed something else out to him. Several weeks ago, I came on in the backroom to take part of a forty, and Matt actually kept one of the morning people on the clock to take a 10 top to avoid me taking two of the tens, while at the same time letting the other afternoon backroom person (Melody) take two tables of ten. Basically, he's saying he trusted Melody to take 20 people, but not me. Mario didn't have much to say other than saying...
1. He has to enforce corporate policy.
2. He can't speak for Matt.

We spent at least half an hour going back and forth in the office, basically them telling me that I need to keep my mouth shut and deal with the fact that they have to enforce policy, and realize that they don't really want to fire me, because I do a good job, but they can if they want to.

However, I obviously don't do a good enough job for them to TRUST ME.

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1-08-03

Thanks to Sharon for input on the new color scheme. I leave you with a picture that I'm sure we've all seen.

Current playlist
$365 for four books. God damn college is expensive. However, I get both my scholarships back, amounting to $5000 for next semester, plus my $1700 loan, so all I need to come up with for next semester is $800. Fucking w00t. I think I'm going to blow $100 on a subwoofer to celebrate.
Anyway, Joe and Rocky have both redone their pages, and I'm VERY impressed, and a lil' bit jealous. Its inspired me to try and redo mine, although I have no idea how. I guess I'll worry about it when I'm actually inspired. This blog has grown in importance to me, though. I'm actually taking a webdesign/java class at TU this semester, principally due to it. I dunno, I just believe that if its important to me, it should be done right. So, yeah, I've redone the "me" page, somewhat, you can tell the sidebar on the left is changed, and I moved the December posts to the archive. More to come.
Oh yeah, I also made this. Yeah, I'm in love.

Hit up the forums.

1-04-03

You know, I keep wondering if I should find some sort of theme for my blog here. It seems to alternate between three basic ideals:
1. Bitching or philosophizing on life in general.
2. Me telling the world how madly in love I am.
3. Chronicles of work/school/family.
But the thing is, I'm feeling kind of burnt out. Its like that reserve of darkness that I ran on, that part of me that was kept bottled up and away from human eyes. I'm showing it to people, and not just on this blog. It used to be something that scared me, quite a bit. It still does, to some extent. I have a touch of blackness to my heart. Not much, mind you, I'm still a big softie. But its there. There are certain things that bring out the Zach that you don't want to fuck with. The Zach that doesn't play so nicely with others. The Zach that would willingly hurt another human being.
You see, I try to model my life on one basic rule- don't hurt other people, unless they deserve it. I know its hypocritical, but I don't care. I can't bring myself to steal something from a complete stranger, but I can tell the asshole at work every single thing he does to annoy me, at whatever cost to his self-esteem. Its my own form of pseudo-religion. It kind of covers my bases. I've looked around at most religions, and what do they all teach? What did your momma bring you up telling you? Don't do something to hurt someone else, or yourself. Its pretty simple. I have no clue where my conscience comes from, and I have no idea WHY I hate hurting others. There is no doubt in my mind that if I really wanted to steal something, or hurt someone, I could get away with it. I'm smart enough that if I really wanted to, I know I could. But I don't want to. There is only one person in the world that I could ever track down and completely fuck up. Even the people who I hated from high school, or the asshole customers, or the people who I feel have wronged me, or betrayed me, I just don't care enough to really want to hurt them. As a matter of fact, I almost want to try and fix things.
But you see, therein lies the problem. Fixing something means that something was broken. You know, I'm not sure I want to admit I fucked up. I don't like admitting I am/was wrong, and I like to know WHY I've done everything that I've done, and have a perfectly good reason for doing it. I do for the most part, but I must admit, there are some choices I've made that bother me. There are some things I've done that I wish I hadn't. Sitting here, feeling that uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach isn't helping me one bit. Its not changing those decisions I've made, nor is it making me feel any better about them. Regret is easily the emotion I've had the most difficulty with over the years. Oh, don't get me wrong, I have a very dangerous temper, thats what my rant was originally supposed to be about today, but its regret that bothers me the most. I regret not keeping up with old friends. I regret wedges driven between myself and others, put there by me and by them. I regret finding comfort in the arms of the wrong women (in the past, I've been nothing but faithful to Kat since I met her). Most of all, I regret what someone did to me when I was young.

I regret a lot of things, and its never little shit. For example, I don't regret eating the extra donut, it was a choice I made, and I enjoyed it at the time. So why do I regret other choices I made? I think because I made those choices for the wrong reasons. Or maybe I've taken the wrong path. I don't know. It probably stems from my desire to try and fix everything. I want everything to be roses, perpetually. I want the white picket fence stereotypical American existence, and I want to have no black clouds hanging over it. That, and when I die, I want to be able to look back and not regret how I've lived my life. I'm not sure I will really care what I accomplished, materially, but I know if I died right now, I'd wish that I had affected more people in a positive manner. I don't mean religion, I mean I'd want people to remember me as a bright spot in their day. Not like a Jonathon Pierce bright spot, who has nothing but an outside appearance. I mean someone who was a real person to them, who cared about them. No, you won't find me working in a soup kitchen anytime soon, and that's not what I mean. I'm too selfish to live a life of philanthropy. I want the people who I come into contact with to remember me. To remember me in a positive light. That's what I want. That's why I have regrets.

1-01-03

I'm feeling really damn apathetic. Work sucked, made $17 in four hours. I misread my schedule and so I went in an hour early, and wound up missing Kathrin being online, which really pissed me off. I left for work at 3:45, thinking I had to be there at 4, but I wasn't scheduled until 5 (and didnt get any tables until 5), and she was online at 4:30. Basically, today has been a colossal failure of a day. I tried to cheer myself up by going to Blockbuster and renting the first LOTR after work, but of course, they had no copies left. Walk back in my house to interrupt my dad screaming at my little sister for something or other, and I'm just not caring anymore. All I want right now is to hear my girlfriend's voice, and to get to talk to her as long as I want without her traveling companion sitting and staring at her until she gets off the phone. I really don't care how much it would cost, I'd pay whatever, its all I want right now. Actually, scratch that, what I really want is to just wrap her up in my arms and fall into a deep and peaceful sleep, but I would totally settle for just hearing her voice. This is one of those times where I really wish I had a number I could contact her at, I would totally call her right now, regardless of cost, some things are just worth the money. Shit, its too damn early.

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