Another of my new interests

After years of not playing around with it, I have gotten back into POV-Ray. I am working through the tutorial that comes with the program (also available in HTML format) and another cool tutorial I found online that looks helpful. So far, here is the best image I have achieved on my own.

MySpheres_480.jpg

Unimpressive to most, I am sure, but I am trying to figure out how to make marbles. A scene of mostly clear, slightly internally reflective, colored glass balls (with a couple of reflective metal ones for effect) is helping me to understand a little how some of the lighting settings work. I know there are lots of folks who could crank out this kind of thing in minutes, but I still know so little about the scene description language that I am taking it slowly and learning just a tiny bit at a time.

And most importantly – I am having fun learning something with no obvious career motivation.

And I still don’t know why posts are showing up 2-3 times each.  They are only in the database a single time.  I’ve had to go to a couple of Dr. appointments today with my youngest son to find out he had a fleck of metal in his eye and to get part of the metal removed, so I haven’t had more than about the 3 minutes I’ve spent on this post to worry about the site.  Perhaps tomorrow the wife will actually do something useful and allow me time to do things for me.

[tags]POV-Ray, Ray Tracing, Marbles[/tags]

Site upgrades

I’ve been working on site upgrades. I’ve had some issues with the site back-end software which I thought would be cleared up with an update to the site software. Sadly, not only did that not fix the problems I was having, it introduced some other problems. I have a backup that I can go back to, but I’m trying to hold off until I have a little more time to try resolving the other problems I’m having. In the meantime, I’m not sure when I’ll get regular updates going again. I’ve been trying to maintain 3-6 articles and asides a day, but the recent site software issues have impacted this negatively.

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Posting again – hackery at work

Thanks to Andrew’s suggestion that I use Windows Live Writer, I’m able to post again.  The program has improved significantly since I first tested and rejected it.  There are still some problems I have with it, but I think in part they tie in to the problems I have with how WordPress handles posts and the HTML code behind the posts, so I’ll have to sit back and work out those issues behind the scenes.

I have no idea WTF is up with year-old comments showing up as recent comments in the sidebar, there, but that’s another issue I’ll have to figure out later.

Now that I’m posting, look for loads of updates in the next few days as I try to get caught up.  Might not be much today while I deal with real-life crap (I’m looking at you, crapped out Air Conditioner), but tomorrow or possibly even tonight I can get going again.

[tags]Useless knowledge, Posting again[/tags]

Oh my – that *IS* a big one you have there

Washed up on the shores of a Dutch beach recently is this over-sized LEGO man.

giant-dutch-lego AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – A giant, smiling Lego man was fished out of the sea in the Dutch resort of Zandvoort on Tuesday.

Workers at a drinks stall rescued the 2.5-metre (8-foot) tall model with a yellow head and blue torso.


My wife keeps telling me size doesn’t matter, but I’m not sure giant-LEGO-man would agree.

[tags]Giant LEGO man, LEGOs, Amsterdam, Size doesn’t matter[/tags]

Test post

This is extremely frustrating.  I cannot post via normal posting methods for my site software.  My remote posting is only working about 10% of the time.  I can’t figure out why either fails to work.  I”m going crazy.

And my air conditioning in the house is barely working because of a bad blower fanwheel (which will hopefully get fixed tomorrow).  I’m not happy-RagMan right now.  🙁

Today in history – Thor finishes 4300 mile journey

The History Channel has lots of cool information on Thor Heyerdahl’s 4300 mile oceanic journey aboard the balsa wood Kon-Tiki raft in 1947. And with a name like Thor, how could I resist posting about it?

On this day in 1947, Kon-Tiki, a balsa wood raft captained by Norwegian anthropologist Thor Heyerdahl, completes a 4,300-mile, 101-day journey from Peru to Raroia in the Tuamotu Archipelago, near Tahiti. Heyerdahl wanted to prove his theory that prehistoric South Americans could have colonized the Polynesian islands by drifting on ocean currents.

Secretly, I think Heyerdahl was trying to impress some woman. That’s pretty much the primary motivator for 95% of what we men do, after all. We try to impress chicks, so we can have the sexx0ring with them. Any other behavior is driven by need for sleep or food.

Yes, we’re really that shallow, ladies.

[tags]Today in history, Thor Heyerdahl, Balsa, Kon-Tiki, raft[/tags]

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Church messages

YES, THE SITE IS SCREWED UP RIGHT NOW.  Sorry for the shouting.  I’m working on it, but it will probably be a day or more before I’m able to fix it.  I’m not sure if I can even post updates right now, giving the problems I’m having with the site software right now.

I wonder if I can convince my wife that God believes she should blow me more often?

your-knees.jpg

See, proof that God and the church want you on your knees more often.

[tags]Humor, Church signs, Blow me[/tags]

Two thieves rob Game Stop store – stupid evident

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before – Two men walk into a videogame store to rob it. Unfortunately for these idiots, the robbery was caught on store camera.

The Game Stop Store in the 3400-block of Cooper sells a lot of high-end video equipment, so when robbers came in they ignored the cash register and took merchandise.

. . .

As the robbery progressed the tape is still recording as a young boy walks into the store. As the gunman confronts the first boy and orders him to the ground. A second boy walks into the store, sees what’s happening and also gets on the ground.

Looking at the video, it appears that the men stole the PlayStation 3 consoles. Guess there weren’t even enough Nintendo Wii consoles for them to get those. Too bad, since that’s the system everyone wants now.

According to the story, one of the two robbers has already been caught. No word on how much the gaming systems sold for. (via Kotaku)

[tags]Stupid, Crooks, Game Stop robbed in VA[/tags]

A special kind of ugly

I just recently upgraded my cell phone to an LG enV VX9900. While searching online for a decent protective cover for it, I stumbled on this special kind of ugly snap-on faceplate for a different phone. Apparently, it is covered with Swarovski crystals, which is somehow supposed to make me desire adding the ugly to my phone enough to pay almost $150. There are two different faceplates, so be sure to click on each to seem them in their full ugly glory.

[tags]Ugly, Swarovski crystal, Cell phone face plates, A special kind of ugly[/tags]