March 15, 2005

In the face of pain

Today I saw a white haired old lady sitting on the curb talking to a police officer and another older lady. She had spilled her can of Hawaiian punch all over the walk way. After a moment I realized it wasn't Hawaiian punch.

I felt for the lad on the cement. She was older, and when I think of older people I generally think that they have lived through the pain you expect in life and don't deserve that kind of pain. The same thing for children. When you are in your late teens and twenties you are fit, ready for life, and when you hit your mid to late sixties you should be done with the parts that hurt you like that. I don't know why it suddenly came to me like that, while looking at this woman I didn't know. The pain of the young and old seems somehow unfair, while pain in your prime years seems somehow justifiable.

So yesterday I was reminded of something else. I have a job and a wife and a child. I need to pay as much attention to being a good person as I do to being a good worker and a good husband and father. I need to be more understanding of others pain and know when I can do something to help, and when I can not.

I need to take a little time out to help people, not clients. I need to work harder and making "special" clients less of an entity, and more of a person regardless of their attempts to prove me wrong. I need to get involved with society again, in a positive manner.

I guess the blood of an old woman has brought me back to my core, and shown me what I need to do to get right with myself.

Posted by Rob at 10:12 AM | Comments (0)

March 11, 2005

We just had a big move at the University. Well big in that our associate vice chancellor of IT, his right hand, and the wallet all moved. Well no one thought to take their machines over instead of letting the lowest bidding moving company move them. Today, nobody had set up the big guy's machine so when he comes back Monday he can at least check email. For as much planning that went into this some really basic stuff seems to have been overlooked. I think there should be a checklist when moving people.

Does this person run the organization?
if yes, then someone should be in charge of moving their mission critical hardware, as well as anything fragile.

If this person is down for a day or two, will there be hell to pay?
if yes, then someone should be in charge of moving their mission critical hardware, as well as anything fragile.


There that wasn't so bad was it? As an example, if the AVC's computer went down we would get a level 1 or MAYBE 2 call and someone would be in his office before they knew they had a call. I've been finding myself trying to get in front of stuff recently, and with the move I got in front of that. I also fear the old axiom no good deed goes unpunished.

As I think back now I hope it wasn't sucking up. I'm up for a couple of job interviews and I hope that subconsciously I'm not sucking up trying to make myself look better. The two interviews are going really well with an extremely positive outlook. I’ll now something about the position I really want probably in a couple of weeks. I really hope I’m not a subconscious suck up.

Posted by Rob at 11:30 AM | Comments (4)

March 01, 2005

GT4

I've been playing GT4 for a few days now. It is a good game, maybe a great game, but once again it uses an AI that would have rts gamers laughing.

You will get rear ended if you take a good line and the computer wants it, even if it will mess up their path.

There will be a car, regardless of what it is, that the computer will love. So far it is the opel speedster (as in GT3). Last night I was driving my 350HP NSX with all kinds of added in goodies, and a miata was kicking my butt. A miata.. doing 150. The roof would rip off, it would fly off the road, and the poor poor little thing would go sailing with the least little breeze. I can't imagine it having enough horses to keep ahead of an NSX on a straight. The only way I could catch it was by drafting and then only on the long straights.

On a positive note, the car selection and the rendering of the models is great. The cars handle very realistically, however, I have noticed that sometimes braking is questionable. I had a 76 skyline that would break from 112 like you dropped and anchor, but my NSX with improved breaks and racing tires will float, and skid, and complain if you aren't careful.

The courses are much more detailed, and realistic. When you are hauling near the edge of a road, and your tires get too close to the grass, you will get sucked into the grass, the hungry hungry grass. Sand will really mess with your plans. Running across a sandy stretch to avoid a curve is not a good idea anymore as it has become much more difficult to jump these corners. You can still do this with grass, just don't try to do anything drastic like turn, you will be disappointed.

The main screen layout for the simulation part of the game is better and worse at the same time. The car makers are grouped by region (for example, Japan town) and races are loosely grouped, however the have 3 used car shops and the race locations are spread across the board. It would seem better to have a garage, a car lot with sub car towns, and a race lot, with licensing being a sub menu in your garage.

Parts. ***SIGH*** why can't they get this part right? You are in your garage, you can't switch parts, you can't see what parts you own for a particular vehicle, and you can't switch parts from 2 like vehicles. When you sell a vehicle you get no extra cash for the tens of thousands of dollars worth of parts you have added in. Now there are 2 locations where you can buy parts for your vehicle. At the dealership or at the Tuner village. Tuner village has brand name parts for the same price and same performance.... so um... what's the point? The wings used to control down force all look stupid stpuid sptupid. They make the happy puppy sad.

All in all I'm 5% through the game and still enjoying it. As Kimi told me, those little controllers are strong. George is over there and I hear the poor thing go "ccrreeeeaaakkkk" as he torques it.

Posted by Rob at 02:29 PM | Comments (1)