Pilot's Log

I just spent most of the evening (and four attempts) to download and install Windows XP Service Pack 3. Part of the time, I left the computer hall and watched Doctor Who on DVD. (Problem is, I have no idea in which order to watch them, and I can't watch all the ones I have, because some are incompatible with my player [which is why I want a DVD-ROM for my computer nextish].)

Yes, I'm more a fan of games than a gamer.

For the Hackett Continuum, I'm using the program "Under Construction" to write-up machinery used in the setting for Dream Pod 9's Silhouette (Heavy Gear, et al) system. Got two done so far and will probably do more in the coming days.

FP

Hey.

Overnight I had the idea for a Flash-based virtual Ouija board. The user would type in a question, click the heart-shaped pointer thing and it would whirl about the board picking letters, the letters being spelled out below the board.

Anybody know enough Flash? Enough to guess about whether it's possible?

FP

I've succeeded in ripping most of my audio CDs to MP# format. There were two I haven't done yet, but it was a matter of taste. (Would doubt that Bro or Sis would care for Star Trek music performed by an orchestra that didn't do any of the actual performing for the shows. It's too classy to be called a "knockoff", but that's kinda what it is.)

Final total, 199 songs...roughly 750 MB. Just a tad too big for one data CD-R. Yes, my collection is pathetically tiny compared to perhaps everybody else on the other side of the digital divide. As I said before, till recently I trusted radio to play what I could tolerate. It's tougher to do that now tho'.

FP (who may go shopping for more music soon)

The default setting on my graphics program is 72 pixels/inch.

Is it at all possible to mod an Xbox (hardware and/or software) so it can play game programs from PC CD-ROM disks?

1) Manufactured Housing...I go past mobile home sellers fairly frequently around here, and I see those Colonials and Ranches and ones like those and think "You know, since the market is shifting toward immigrants, they really ought to be changing their styles. More Mediterranean Revival, more Hacienda, more Mission..."

I'm sure one or the other manufacturers will get the message, tho'. First one who does will win millions of dollars from the new customers.

2) There ought to be a TV newsmagazine devoted to general culture. By that I don't mean celebrities or sensationalism or quirky weird stuff that the tabloid shows like Insider or Inside Edition cover. I mean those topics that everybody really needs to know about in order to cope, these days.

I dread that somebody will start one, and it'll drift into the tabloid model because of those thrice-damned ratings.

3) Yes, there are sprite webcomics. Yes, I've even seen a sort of sprite webcomic where somebody took art from old war comics and added their own captions/dialogue to them...

...What I want to do is take screenshots from flight sims, plus some sim characters to match the period, and develop a story from that. Anybody try that yet? I'd link to the plotline idea I had from a previous blog...maybe I will do that as a revision here soon.

I've never been much of a graphical artist. I can design machines, but I am no good with drawing people.

FP

Hey.

Got my new scanner this afternoon. Canon LiDE 60.

Don't really care for the software, tho'. I guess what I'll do is use a graphics program as a main app and use the Canon soft as a subapp.

FP

I just spent most of the night downloading the latest version of Apple Quicktime, which now only comes bundled with iTunes, which I don't want, don't need, can't use, and ALREADY FRICKIN' HAVE because it was installed by the people who built my machine.

I updated QT because I wanted to see a trailer for a video that I can't afford, and probably wouldn't feel comfortable buying if I could afford it (and could pay over the Web--my money isn't any good "here").

I could have done so much more with the time I've lost tonight, and will never get back.

FP

Hey.

Trying to get my scanner working...I had some very brief shining moments of near-success, but now I'm only getting error messages--"Fail to adjust to an adequate color balance value." I've tried reconfiguring the driver program's compatibility mode, the BIOS mode for the parallel port, switching the power cord, switching the I/O cord, nuthin'.

Gonna call my "tech support" on Tuesday and see what up. Perhaps I'll have an extra PP installed just for the scanner (and use the main one solely for the printer).

As tech issues, this isn't so bad. But I want my scanner back operational!

FP