The Blogdom. A Suburb of the Beandom.

I submitted a story to the 100 Word Stories podcast. The topic was Gold. Please go here and listen, then vote for your favorite story! You don't have to vote for mine, just the one you like the most. Voting goes until Friday the 16th May 2008.

Lisa Reviews is a more general blog which blogs about movies, other blogs, limo services, a whole menagerie of topics... a lot like this blog (when I am not working 70 hours weeks, I'll try to get this blog more on track with specific subjects).

I just watched The Mist, the recent Stephen King movie starring Thomas Jane (The Punisher). I wasn't sure how I would like it, but I heard from a reasonably reliable source that it was decent, so despite my fears of another lame excuse for a horror movie, we got it from the library. What did I think? I liked it.

The special effect, sound, acting, if not top notch, really close to it. Not one moment seemed corny to me. It was a movie that let me let myself go into the 'what if' mode and stay their because everyone acted their part realistically. The plot made sense, and I don't recall any holes in it.

It is bloody, but not excessively so. Enough to make it real, but not so much that it became a gore fest, in fact far from it. Despite the blood, the horror comes from the sense on danger, the unknown, and what once was safe being unsafe. The movie did good here too.

The effects of the mist, and other things, were very good. Without giving anything away, I will say that I was able to stay focused on the situation and not 'oh hey, effects!' This was also due in part to the realistic acting.

The ending? I wont say anything about it. Did I like it? Dislike it? Well, I'll say this much: If you like movies that are a bit chilling, tense, and well done, watch the movie and see the ending for yourself. I really don't think you will be disappointed.

My wife and I went to the Ikea store today. Wow! I've never been to one and I was impressed. I can't say I saw one thing I really didn't like. There were plenty of things I would never buy, but nothing that was ugly or just plain tasteless.

I saw some really neat things, too. My favorite was these drawers that would not slam! They have a buffer that catches the drawer as it closes, and then slowly closes the drawer the rest of the way. Fantastical! Also they had some neat light fixtures, inexpensive plastic cups and bowls which we got, and another favorite, a cheese grater, a lot like a normal one, the tower type ones, but it has a cap on the top and bottom so you grate the cheese and it stays inside, then you just dump it into where ever it needs to go. Amazing, and how!

The main point of the trip was desk chairs. We found ones we really liked. They are named Moses. They wont part a sea, but you wont want to part with your neck or bottom after sitting in them. They are comfy. Pretty easy to assemble, but the bolts got a tad hard to turn near the end, but, on the other hand, they wont be loose either. Very inexpensive, too.

If you have an Ikea near you and you have never been to it, go! Even just to see all the neat stuff they have and to look at all the names for things. Where else has a chair named Fritz?

Want a Workbench? Want it custom built? Want to built it on-line first? Formaspace allows you to do so. It's actually really neat. You start with a basic table, then you can choose options that are added to a 3D model as you go. There are a plethora of options to choose from, like keyboard trays, lighting options, and storage cubbies. I had a problem using Firefox with the design window not being able to be resized. This was not a problem in Internet Explorer.

Since price may be an issue when designing a workbench, having a real time quote would be nice while building your workbench. This is not included. If you want a quote, you must contact the company. There isn't even a rough estimate. This may not be an issue for some people, but if it is, be forewarned.

Overall, the ability to design the workbench is really neat, and seems to work quite well. Make sure you have Java installed to use this option.

I had a rather nice birthday today. At work, my co-workers got me a Subway gift card. I took my wife out to consume a portion of the gift card for dinner. I got a Tim Hawkins comedy DVD from my parents. Funny guy. My sister got me a mystery gift which I haven't received yet.

Best of all, my wive got me a system upgrade for my computer! I had been running Win2k for too long now and now I have XP. After losing some sanity points installing it, everything is working hunky dory! This solved the following problems:
Having to use my wife's computer to update my iPod (iTunes wouldn't work)
youTube not working
Most flash anything not working
Hmm... I wonder if Half-Life Episode One will work now... I shall have to try.

Aside from all the gifts (Thank you all!) I got several Happy B-Days on my Facebook wall, and oh, I got $10 from my parents that I put towards the game Bohnanza, which I haven't played yet.

Speaking of walking, I got what my friend Darian called 'marriage weight' (see fried chicken rap on my wife's blog). I've been struggling to get to the gym with all the overtime I've been working, but I still need to get into shape. My tum is a bit too large. You might look at my wife and I and not be sure which one of us is pregnant.

I don't know how much I weigh, so I should get a bathroom scale. The site Scales Etc. has lots of neat ones at a reasonable price. They have talking ones, in case you like hearing how massive you are instead of just reading it. They also got a really cool looking glass one that I dig. They even have one that looks kinda like a suit with buttoned pockets! That isn't its actually design, it just reminded on one.

In any case, if you feel the earth shake and stuff starts falling of your shelves and tables, don't worry, it is just me walking by because my wife is a really amazing cook.

So, I worked about six hours today, then after lunch took a nice relaxing walk for about an hour, then got home and wasn't going to do too much. Then my sister called and her car was broken down on the road, so instead of relaxing, I spent around 4 hours tinkering, poking, not getting anywhere, then towing the car home with my dad.

It felt kinda good to get my hands all dirty and gunky from trying to put the serpentine best back on. I would have got it, but the water pump ended up being fragged so the belt was loose on the wheels.

In happier news, I'm going to watch Lost after I write the next post.

A few years ago, my dad and I were talking, and he was telling me that 'back in the day' before you wrote a paper, one step was researching to see if the research itself was already done on the topic. For example, you may need to go through ancient tomes and manuscripts to see what conclusion they come to on a subject, say, the effect of Persian attack on Sparta, so before you do that, check to see if someone else has already gone through the data and came to a conclusion so you don't have too. You'd go through books on the subject to see if the research you need on that subject has already been done before you even begin researching the subject itself!

But these days with the new fangledness of the Internet, that whole step in almost eliminated. With just a few clicks, you can easily find hundreds or even thousands of articled on the subject, assuming the research has been done.

One website that offers term papers, essays, book reports, and research papers is Peer Papers. If simplicity is something you enjoy in a website, Peer Papers will fit the bill. No crazy text, confusing layouts, and minimal advertisement makes this site easy to navigate and use.

The site boasts over 100,000 papers to read and research. To access the papers, a membership is required, but you can preview the papers before you read them. It will show the first few hundred words or so of the paper with an approximate word and page count of the whole paper. You can select papers you are interested in to be saved for later use. All papers can be printed.

Membership can be purchased on a monthly, 90 day, or 180 day cycle.

One thing I like about the site is you can browse and get reasonable samples of the papers before you join, so you can not only see if what you are looking for is available, but you can get a taste of the quality of the papers before you spend any money.

Before you start researching your research, you can give Peer Papers a visit and see if it will help you on your quest for knowledge.

I sent a link to this article to Bill Maus at Bill Maus Art and in less than 30 minutes, I got an email back from him.

This was his reply:

Thanks for the link! --and for the kind words in your review!
take care and look forward to seeing more on your page:)

Bill Maus:)

It's always nice to get feedback on articles you write. It makes me want to review more of his books specifically.