Brian's Bits

So, it seems I had lost focus of this little page. I think some of my attention was a bit too focused on the frontpage, Choose Opera and of course, the Mustache Club sections. Well, seeing that I am no longer competing in the Mustache Competition, I may find more time to dedicate to my own personal page.
The tragic part of all this is the fact that facial hair has become more interesting than my own personal life. I guess that's what I get for being a nerd.
So, in the last two weeks or so, nothing terribly exciting has happened. But, if you're bored enough to read, here are some of the things I've been thinking about:

Sony added DRM software (or as the mob likes to call "rootkit") that seems to have rubbed people the wrong way. Had I bought a Sony CD, and had I been running Windows...and I had I tried to play that CD in my computer and wanted to install a proprietary player, I probably would have been pissed too. Well, I guess I'm safe, but I've lost a lot of respect for Sony.

AOL instant messenger has added bots to everyone's buddy list to "help" consumers find their way to great bargains (or something...). Seems funny, you know, having a buddy list and seeing things put on there that are not my buddies. But, I guess when a company loses 300 customers per hour, they've got to do something to get revenue. I can't say I blame them. After all, I run GAIM and am not subjected to their advertisements. I guess because of this, I should feel a bit responsible. So, I figure my negative feelings + my guilt = cancelling each other out for the time being.

I bought Cedega some time ago, and have actually been pretty satisfied with it, until their newest release - version 5. If you're familiar with Cedega at all, you might know they had a little app called Point 2 Play (P2P) that made installing games supposedly easier. I thought it was just a bit bloaty, and was more partial to the command line cedega. With version 5, however, it's all been integrated into one package. I suppose this would make life easier for new users, as it may be more intuitive. Unfortunately, it's alienated some of the existing userbase. I still haven't decided if I'm going to cancel my subscription (you don't buy the software, you subscribe to it), but I'm considering it. Those not familiar with Cedega (formerly WineX), it's just a fork of Wine - a Windows compatibility layer for Linux, that allows you to play DirectX games. Basically, makes Linux thinks it's Windows so you can play games.

I bought Halflife Source, HL2, Day of Defeat and Counterstrike (it's all one package), and wanted to replay HL1 before moving onto the sequel. So far, I've finished HL1 and have *just* started HL2. Unfortunately, Quake 4 also just came out. A new (native) Linux client just came out the other day too. Being that Q4 is native, I figure it deserves a bit of my attention (that, and I've played HL2 all the way through previously). I must say, I'm very impressed with Q4. Graphics are great, easy install and great performance on Linux, decent story (decent enough anyway), and most importantly: it's fun. If you buy a game this year, I'd say Q4 would be a good one to pick up.

I've been formatting computers like crazy it seems. My desktop is pretty cozy now running Ubuntu 5.10 (no, I'm not going to call it some silly name). I've been using Ubuntu since the first official release. Undoubtedly, there is a big "bandwagon" push of it. Aside from the hype, I'd say I'm pretty satisfied. I've got it running on this computer (my gaming machine), an 866 which will be a server / toy, a Poweredge server that belongs to a company my roommate works for (we're setting up LAMP and a CRM system, or some nonsense), and hopefully my work laptop soon (still have to make sure it's okay with the sys admin people).

With all this Linux and server business, I've been writing a few scripts to automate some simple / repetitive tasks. Some are just simple prompts so my (n00b) roommate can do basic administration tasks. Problem with these scripts is that I have a tendency of depending on them and using them for a long period, then I forget how the task is actually done without them. So, I spend all this time to learn new things of Linux so I can automate and forget them. Kinda funny, I guess.

With all this nerdy stuff going on, I've also had a resurrection of some of my web nerdiness. I admit, I'm not a hardcore programmer, and well...not especially skilled. It's still fun, and I guess that's what counts. I've been working on a few websites. Most for fun, some for friends. I'm a fan of XHTML, CSS and PHP. Hopefully I'll have something decent made before too long. Much of this depends on getting that aforementioned 866 in running order.

This is possibly the longest post in known history, so I'll stop here before my fingers turn to bloody little stumps.

We had our first "real" snow of the season yesterday. Things are certainly cooling down. I went out and bought a nice big coat to keep me warm. This picture was taken by Tor using his camera phone. Yeah, those are his glasses. Pretty hot stuff, I might have to find a pair like that.
So, there's some strange voodoo going on in the office I share with Frederik. This (and only this room) is remaining much colder than the other parts of the building. To keep my mind on warm thoughts, I've been listening to Modest Mouse - Good News for People that Like Bad News. Okay, I'll try and explain myself.
Last summer I took a trip to LA to visit friends and go to some shows. The timing was based around Taken's last show. I was able to stay with some nice people and see all kinds of fun shows. Although Taken has disbanded, be sure to check out Mikoto, which has the same singer (Ray) - a super nice guy that put me up in his place for a week when I was basically homeless.
While I was there, one of my friends came up and we went to Disneyland - first time since I was a child. Yeah, I soon found out I'm still a child. Anyways, it was a lot of fun. This was about the time that Modest Mouse album came out, so we listened to it a bit when driving around.
Much like Pavlov's dog, I built an association with this album to summertime fun. I had just graduated college, so I didn't have a care in the world - no school, no job, no home, no bills. This album always puts me in a good mood, even though I'm not particularly fond of the music itself. Strange how people's minds work...

So, I've been living in a sparsely furnished apartment for nearly a week. It's not such a big deal considering the amount of time I spend in the place, but it isn't terribly welcoming when I do return. One major hurdle for getting furniture is my lack of a car - or a truck, better yet. Yesterday, my roommates picked me up from work with a huge Dodge pickup truck. I should mention that "huge" is a relative term, and this truck was of average "American Size". In any case, this truck wasn't just some random thing - it's owned by a company that is in the business of making hot rods out of all sorts of vehicles (although I believe they specialize in trucks like this). It sports a new transmission, rewired computer and who knows what else. Point is, this thing is big and very very fast. On the express way on-ramp alone, we were able to reach a fair bit of speed.
Anyways, we went through a number of stores and bought some of the more essential items for our apartment. I got a new bed, found a desk (which I will likely be picking up today), some random computer things, a coffee table, a dining room table, and a bunch of other things. Total bill for the evening? about 7.000 NOK. Yeah, I'll put'er on the Visa.
For today, I get to buy a new bike and pick up that desk. Another 4.000 NOK, I'm sure.

This coming week will be a busy time for me. I've finally (after about 5 weeks of off-and-on looking) found a decent apartment. Although Majorstuen isn't terribly close to my work, it's no further than where I am now (Frogner).
I will be moving in with two friends that I went to school with - Kjetil and Espen. The strange thing about the apartment is that one room is considerably smaller than the others. Even after adjusting rent and other benefits, I'm doubting there will be any willing occupant.