About the same time I found Ask. Mr. Biggs, I found another great podcast that compliments the typical radio show idea.

Dial A Stranger, as the name suggests, is a podcast where the hosts, Zachary and Mercedes, asks strangers that have submitted their phone numbers questions given by strangers on the website. The concept sounds a bit iffy, but the phone calls give you a strange insight into the life of strangers. Somehow they’re all fine with talking about the innate details of their life, and it’s very compelling to listen to. Even if someone has a boring life, it doesn’t take long until another person gets called with a new question

Speaking of questions, it’s also interesting to listen just to hear the questions being asked. I imagine they’ve gotten a lot of questions over the past 14 months, and so they’ve picked out some outstanding ones. I’d give some of them away, but I think you should just go listen to the podcast yourself and see what you think.

Tonight, I watched Purdue beat Michigan State pretty handily, 72-54. The game also gave people their first chance to see the new uniforms in action that were unveiled yesterday. While I’m nowhere near the level of the Uni Watch blog, I’d have to say that the uniforms looked pretty good. They seem a lot whiter than the old uniforms (perhaps a bit less black trim), and featured a lot baggier shorts than what I’m used to seeing on them. (At times, the fabric seemed to flow together and look almost dress-like.)

I definitely look forward to seeing the black jerseys in action next week at Michigan. In the photos I’ve seen, they really stand out to the eye, especially between the lettering and the multi-colored collar. I also look forward to seeing what the gold jerseys look like when they get released; hopefully they look as awesome as the ones.

Earlier today I went out and was doing some shopping. I stopped by both Best Buy and the nearby Barnes & Noble, but found myself wishing for the cheaper prices found online. I think Amazon has given me a dislike for paying MSRP for items that I don’t necessarily need right away. These places are good for browsing, but I don’t know that I’ll really buy from them unless I have a dire urge or a really good coupon.

While I was out and about, I decided to take a detour to one of the local Half Price Books. I had meant to go to one, but never found the reason to do so until today. After visiting there, I wish I had discovered that reason before. I loved the selection of books I found there, and most of them were in remarkably good quality for used books. (I compare that to my experiences at library book sales where books range from good to pretty darn poor.) In addition, I found a lot of books that I’m not sure I would find at other places, and I paid good prices for them. For instance, I had seen a copy of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude at B&N as part of a Buy 2, Get 1 Free sale. I would have paid about $10 for that copy, but I found it on sale at Half-Price for a buck.

They also offer a service where they purchase media (books, DVDs, software, etc.) from you. I’m sure I could send in a lot of my excess books there, but I don’t think that I’d get a whole lot of money for my books. Besides, I’d much rather give them to the library so they can use the funds to support their programming. Ultimately, too, I also can’t find a place where I can get a better deal for books than at those book sales; whether it be 25 cents for trade paperbacks or a bag of books for $8, they definitely provide a way to fill up my bookshelves. If only I had more bookshelves and more time to get through the books I have…

Last summer I decided to start listening to podcasts. I’m not sure what triggered me to do it, but I suspect it had to do with me getting a Mac and using iTunes a lot.

Over the course of the last few months, I’ve started listening to a lot of different podcasts, and I’ve found a few that really stick out to me. After reading Wil Wheaton’s list of podcasts that he loves this week, I feel inspired to list off a few of my favorite ones.

I’m not sure where I came across Ask Mr. Biggs, but once I listened to an episode, I knew I had to follow the podcast and listen to the whole archive (currently 22 episodes). The show’s main premise is of a local call-in show hosted by Mr. Biggs, owner of a local bar called Whizzbangs. During the show, Biggs and his co-host Roger try to answer questions from callers or emailers. However, these are no ordinary callers. They’re actually chopped-up edited calls from actual radio shows. Let’s just say that people can be made to say a whole lot of things that they never actually meant, and Mr. Biggs / Roger milk them for all its worth.

What makes the podcast really shine, though, is the overall interaction between Roger and Mr. Biggs. There’s been a few shows that they’ve taken maybe one or two calls, and spent the rest of the time talking about something completely ridiculous, such as a new movie being filmed at Whizzbangs, or the station’s management attempting to renegotiate the contract. I had to stop listening to the show at work because I couldn’t stop myself laughing maniacially while listening… I’m sure my cubicle mates appreciated it.

Go, try it out. I’m sure you’ll be entertained by the show.

Link

Earlier today, I spent a few hours playing some Super Paper Mario on my Wii. I’ve put in about 20 hours of work in the game, and I know I have at least 10 more trying to go through and collect things in the game before even beginning to wrap it up by finishing the last world.

This is just another platformer that I’ve played over the years. I’m not sure what attracts me to that game style. It might just be the relative simplicity of them, as there’s a lot less options than you find in a RPG or RTS game. Most platformers are relatively forgiving to the users’ mistakes, although this wasn’t quite the case on the early Mario games. To this day, I’ve never beat any of the first 3 SMB games, let alone The Lost Levels.

Most platformers also have a high level of replayability. I’ve played the beginning levels of the original SMB I don’t know how many times. I think I just want to try to master the level so I can keep moving on with more lives, which will hopefully let me beat the game later on.

While I definitely appreciate the games with a great storyline, it’s not necessary in these types of games, so long as the controls are good and I can have fun playing it. Most platformers are that way for me.

Title: A Canticle for Leibowitz
Author: Walter M. Miller, Jr.
Awards: 1961 Hugo

When I picked up the book, I looked at the editorial reviews on the outside that acclaimed it as “one of the most significant literary works of our time.” At first, I dismissed it as purely being editorial drivel. I didn’t remember seeing it on any reading lists in the past, and I’m not sure I had even heard of it before picking it up from the library.Experiencing it over the course of today [yes, I started and finished the book in one day], I found my initial reaction to be… well, wrong.

The story is about a post-apocalyptic Earth and the ongoing history of a religious order dedicated to Issac Leibowitz. Among other things, the book goes into conflicts between religion and science and the world in general. It’s also a generally good science-fiction novel. Over the course of the three acts, one cannot help but pick up the allusions to the history of the West as we know it, with the final act closely approximating today’s Earth. While I won’t reveal how the end of the book happens, it’s interesting to see how Miller lays out the ideas of history being cyclical.

In one sense, I wish I had taken more time to read the book. It’s not often that I pick up a book and find myself addicted not only by the plot stories, but by the philosophical questions it poses. One of the reasons I read books is to gain a better understanding of the world from them, and this book has caused me to rethink a few religious items. It is in all of these senses that I find this book one of the most intriguing ones I’ve ever read, and one certainly worthy of its accolades. I just wish more people would read the book.

Synopsis: Highly recommended as a read, especially if you’re a fan of post-apocalyptic anything, philosophy, the conflict between religion and the world around it, religion vs. science, and so on.

Last night, I checked the forecast and saw that we were supposed to be getting maybe an inch of snow. Let’s just say that the weathermen were off… by a lot. Between 7 and 8, the airport got 2 inches of snow, and we ended up with about 3.8″ in total, not to mention the blowing-and-drifting of the new snow / last week’s.

After struggling on the roads around the noon hour on my way to and from a lunch meetup with a friend, I got back to find an email from my boss telling it us was ok to leave early and/or work from home if you can. I decided it was a good thing to do so, especially if the blowing snow would cause any more issues. (Most of the interstates were closed this morning, and I-69 had multiple crashes involving multiple cars with multiple fatalities…) Surprisingly, my drive home was nice and easy, other than the bit of snow in the complex’s parking lot.

After working for a while, I started developing a pretty bad headache and a bit of a fever. I went searching through my bathroom and found a bottle of Tylenol. This is where the fun began… the bottle wasn’t all that difficult; just a twist lid with a arrow on the lid and one on the container. Allegedly, you match up the arrows and push up on the lid. However, this bottle refused to do it. I tried for a while in the aligned position, then tried twisting it all over the place, including putting it 180 degrees away from it. Nothing worked.

Then I looked at the bottle, saw the expiration date from last month, and said “Screw it.” The bottle is now sitting in the trash still not opened, and my headache has gotten a bit better without the help of Tylenol.

Last week while I was at the library, I was browsing the DVD section trying to see if there was something exciting to watch. I came across THX-1138, and knew I had to watch it. I knew it was George Lucas’s first directing work, so my expectations weren’t very high. However, watching it was important to me so I could see how Lucas has grown over the years, and to finally get some of the references to THX and 1138 that have been made in Lucasfilm / Lucasarts products over the last 30 years.

I’m not really sure what to say about the movie; it’s a futuristic story of a dystopia full of drug-controlled people living in a enclosed city. It’s not really my favorite genre of movie, and there were times that it was just too artsy for me. [The austere sets, though, allowed me to visualize parts of Brave New World for the first time.] Also, I’m not sure that George Lucas has really grown at all in his love scene writing skills over the past 40 years, even after he recut the film (I watched the Director’s Cut, which is the only form available on DVD at the moment.) That being said, it’s still interesting to watch as a way to see how George Lucas started off. Believe me, you could pick plenty of worse films to watch.

Over the past week or so, the 25 Secrets meme has been spreading through Facebook like wildfire. I’ve seen several them move through Facebook in the past few years, but never quite as much as this one. Basically, you’re supposed to list 25 secrets about yourself, then tag 25 other people to do it. I figured it would be worthwhile for me to re-post up on here, especially as a way of introducing myself more to you all. List after the jump.

1. I apparently have a book collection hobby. Somehow going to half-price book sales during college does that to you.
2. I seem to also have a media-collection hobby… it’ll take me a very long time to get through my backlog of DVDs and podcasts.
3. I love reading comics in all forms. I typically don’t follow comic books, but I follow all sorts of syndicated comics and the online webcomics.
4. I’ve found myself fall into depressions several times over the past few years. I’ve always managed to survive them, but it hasn’t been easy. It’s times like these that I’m glad I have good friends.
5. Seasons are wonderful. I can’t really stand driving in icy / snowy conditions, but I enjoy living in them.
6. As a little kid, I used to make it a habit to read car manuals. To this day, I have to make sure my seat belt is untwisted due to a precaution I read in it.
7. I also used to read computer books a lot when I was little. I apparently was able to give advice to my dad and a friend on the proper flags to pass to dir to get the right output when I was a little kid. This hasn’t changed much.
8. I can’t stand it if I don’t have things in a nice order around my apartment. By nice order, I mean things should at least be piled up neatly. This dovetails a bit with…
9. I don’t quite dust and clean as much as I should. I’d say don’t tell my mom, except she already knows.
10. Generally socially liberal, and fiscally conservative. I have a lot of libertarian instincts in me too.
11. I typically try not to bring up politics when discussing things with my family; things just seem easier that way. My family knows what I mean.
12. I’ve been out of the country only once in 2004 when I went to the UK. I really enjoyed my time over there, although I’m not sure that I’d want to try driving on the left side of the road.
13. While I was over there, I picked up a strange hankering for Irn-Bru. Too bad it’s not widely available here in the States (unless I want to pay extremely high shipping costs.)
14. I enjoy pretty much all sports. Heck, over the last few years (after my UK trip), I’ve picked up a hankering for cricket. I’m not sure I would ever sit down for a test match, but I’d be up for a ODI or even a Twenty20 match. For now, I tend to just follow text coverage on the BBC or Cricinfo.
15. Speaking of the BBC, my guilty pleasure during the end part of June and the early part of July is listening to BBC Radio 5 Live’s coverage of Wimbledon.
16. The last set of entries would have you believe I want to live over in the UK. On the contrary… I’m perfectly happy with being here in Indiana. I really enjoy the people, I enjoy the weather (for the most part), I enjoy my work.
17. Every time I come across The Black Hole on TV, I have to watch it. Something about its campyness and utter lack of respect for physics is addicting to me.
18. I’m generally OS agnostic. Over the last year, I’ve used Debian, Ubuntu, XP, and OS X. They all have the highpoints… but at the moment I think I’m a fan of OS X on my Macbook Pro.
19. I have a bad tendency to get into thinking funks every once and a while. They don’t happen very often, but when they hit, it’s a bad sign for me getting anything done for the next few hours / days.
20. I have a strange love for craisins.
21. I’m not a big fan of driving around. This has hurt me a bit in finding out new places in Indianapolis, but slowly I’m doing it.
22. I like pretty much all music (other than most country and rap), but my favorite band of all time would have to be They Might Be Giants.
23. I tend to be a cheapskate with my money when spending for me. For other people, though, I tend to splurge if needed.
24. Nothing makes me happier in life than making people happy.
25. I’m sure there’s something else I could come up with… but I’ll just let you ask me about it.

One of my ongoing goals over the last few months has been to learn some additional programming languages. At school, I used a lot of Java and C, with a very small smattering of C++ thrown in. I dabbled in Python and bash scripts, although this was more due to me needing to edit / support other people’s scripts than me writing things on my own.

At my internship during school, I got a chance to work on a lot of various pieces of Java. In my current job, I’m working with a fair amount of C# and Javascript (along with a few ASP .NET pieces). However, due to the web nature of the product, I have only touched just a small capacity of the .NET Framework.

I realize that I need to keep working on developing my skills, especially to save my butt in the economy today if my current job doesn’t pan out for whatever reason (I don’t suspect it will, but neither did employees of a lot of other companies). One thought is to continue working on other parts of C#, but I’m not sure if I want to run under Mono or not (at home, I have a MacBook Pro, and I’m not sure I want to run Visual Studio in a virtual machine, or boot up into Windows strictly for programming). I’ve also strongly considered picking up Objective-C (in conjunction with Cocoa), Python, Perl, and Lisp at one point or another. There’s plenty of more esoteric languages out there that I can try out too.

At this point, I’m not sure what I want to go with. I think I’m going to stick with a well-known language, but which one I don’t know. Once I figure it out, though, I’ll try to blog my experiences.