7.30.2004
10:37pm

About to crash for the night, because tomorrow it's "over the river and through the woods..." to Grandma & Grandpa's house in Newark Valley, NY. About ten hours of river and woods and a couple tanks of gasoline. I almost planned not to go, because I have to come back Monday, but the idea of leaving Blacksburg even for a few days is entertaining.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention in my blog that everybody should vote for Kerry and Edwards in the 2004 election. To quote something clever I heard on last night's convention speech: "this Bush won't lead you to the promised land."

7.27.2004
9:49pm
Robin Williams - Blame Canada

*********!!!!!!!!!!!!!&&&&&&&&&&&&&&--------------&&&&&&&&&&&&&&!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!**************

Wild and crazy post for Jenny and Joanne, etc, etc. A non-boring entry to my blog.

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7.25.2004
8:05pm

Back from a trip to Roanoke for shopping and food with my family. We got some food and printer cartridges at Sam's Club, and browsed around looking for a new cell service provider. Verizon had a decent family plan, but they wouldn't let me get a (321) area code if my parents got local (540) numbers. This procedure is the same for every other provider, which means I'll have to wait until I get to Melbourne to sign up for a new plan. Our current service expires Tuesday, so my cell number will be inactive until August 23rd probably.

I rented Starsky and Hutch from Blockbuster, and it was an entertaining comedy. Neither Stiller nor Owens are particularly good actors in my book, but they were good as buddy cops. Snoop Dogg was the perfect cast for Huggy Bear, so laid back but authoritative. Vince Vaughn didn't seem like a very threatening drug runner, but then again this is a 70's-era film where all the villains are pathetic.

7:01am

Wow, I think this is the earliest time of day I've ever posted. Usually I'm running out the door to get to work at 5:45am, but I never have time to turn on my computer and type anything. I just finished my 12-hour night shift at Corning, working in QAT for the whole shift. There wasn't much difference between working the night shift and the day shift, other than the noticeable lack of support staff in the plant. I'm definitely ready for my two day break before I go back Tuesday, but it was kind of nice to see that 60.0 hours listed for this week. With regular and overtime pay considered, I will have made $490 minus taxes. Next weekend I'm planning to make a quick trip to Newark Valley, New York to see my grandparents. The rest of the family is leaving Friday night, but I will have to drive separately since I have to be back at work by Tuesday morning. The trip almost isn't worth it, 10 hours each way, for just a 3 day weekend. However, I'm afraid if I don't go now I won't have a chance for the next few years. Once I get an established job in Melbourne I probably won't leave except for a few days to visit my parents at the holidays and summer. It's pretty unfortunate that they're building this new house and I won't have much chance to live in it at all. Oh well, living away from home has its obvious advantages.

7.24.2004
1:33pm

I went this morning to get my hair cut at Supercuts, after downloading a $2 off coupon from their email reminder. I stopped at Wal-Mart to get some bell peppers for Mom, and at Target looking for a new DVD. I ended up getting two music CDs instead, Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here" and Duran Duran's "Greatest Hits" album. They were each on sale for $9.99, which is a lot better than Target's regular price of $14.99. I got a call from Mom while I was out, saying that Faun had contacted Dad at work and told him that they needed somebody to work the night shift. So it looks like I'll be working from 6pm tonight until 6am tomorrow. It also means that I have to go to sleep now, so I can make it through the night without falling alseep.

7.23.2004
11:58pm

Well, the Bourne Supremacy was good but not that good. The cinematography is almost identical to that of the first, alternating between blazingly-fast action scenes and docile conversational sections. Jason Bourne is more frustrated than motivated in this chapter of the story, and he has a good reason to be pissed off again. The runtime of the movie is pretty short, around 90 minutes. I was grateful though, because I was about to fall asleep in the theater. Not because the movie was boring in any way, but because I woke up at 4:50am and was just really worn out. The movie is left open-ended, as expected, to allow for another Bourne movie. We learn what his real name and birth date are, and the rest will supposedly be revealed in the 3rd installment. The movie takes us from India to Russia to Berlin to New York, all over the place.

7:43pm
Collective Soul - Collective Soul (album)

Finally the end of the work week. I'm already sick of building boxes and tube gauging Celcor (PDF), and I've only been there 3 weeks. The last two days I got to work in Diesel unloading big Celcor pieces and in QAT fetching part samples for laser gauging for a few hours, which was nice as a change of pace. The back side of the plant is pretty hot though, because of the three firing kilns that operate at 1600 degrees (I'm told). Fans only help so much when the ambient temperature is 85 degrees.

Upon arriving home I found that my THX shirt arrived from UPS today, along with the free blue filter glasses. Brandlocker responded to my inquiry about the cost, saying that the extra $5 was for shipping. I think it's unfair that they didn't list the shipping price before ordering, but oh well. In the end the shirt cost me $15.79, which is still less than a logoed shirt at Hot Topic.

I'm planning to see The Bourne Supremacy tonight at NRV mall, which is getting great reviews at IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes. I'm willing to part with the $7.75 because I know it's going to be a kickass movie, and I'd rather see it opening night than matinee tomorrow.

I'm still reading my Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics book on my breaks at Corning. Today I read about Alan Turing and several foreign mathematics prodigies.

7.17.2004
7:42pm

Finally a Saturday to sit around and be lazy! My day started earlier than I would have liked--at 7am, because the dogs were whining for attention. Fortunately Mom, Dad, and Brit are coming back today from Topsail Beach so they should leave me alone. After feeding and walking the dogs I ran over to Hardees for a couple breakfast biscuits, since I wanted something hot for a change. I could have easily made myself some scrambled eggs, but hey I'm not paying for it so who cares? I lounged around for a bit, played a few Quake III rounds, and cleaned up the apartment a little bit for Mom's sake. While browsing the web this morning I discovered a valuable web site called GasPriceWatch, which reports recent gas prices for various areas across the USA. They rely on volunteers to submit new prices, so little ole' Blacksburg didn't have a single gas station price listed. I signed up for a Spotter account so I can occasionally post updates to the site. Right now Blacksburg and Christiansburg are $1.79/gallon, recent spiked from $1.67 because of supply concerns.

At 1:00 I went to the New River Valley Mall cinema and saw I, Robot, the new sci-fi action movie starring Will Smith and loosely based on the book by Isaac Asimov. I've never read the book myself, but from the various postings on the IMDB forums, it seems like all they kept were the three rules of robot behavior. Nevertheless, the movie was definitely worth the price of admission. "I, Robot" is not as fun as Men in Black, but then again it is a darker storyline involving murder, psychology, and deranged robots. One thing did make me cringe during the movie, and that was the alarm clock that rings in two separate scenes. It makes the same sound as my GE alarm clock, which is enough to drive anyone crazy. There are many unbelieveable scenes--expected of a high-intensity action flick, but one involving a spinning Audi RSQ was just insane. There's some subtle humor about the dollar inflation by 2035, where three beers end up costing Det. Spooner $46.50. Apparently Spooner's gasoline motorcycle is a big taboo in 2035 as well, because it runs on gasoline that explodes! *insert mock expression of surprise* I also had to laugh at the U.S. Robotics corporation as the manufacturer of these masses of robots. It's a perfectly suitable name in it's own right, but the fact that a U.S. Robotics corporation already existed that manufactured computer modems and communication devices (now known as 3Com). I will most likely be looking for the DVD when it hits retail shelves.

While researching the synchronization connection between "2001: A Space Odyssey" and Pink Floyd's "Echoes" album, I found out that Pink Floyd's song Eclipse was the first music played on Mars by the Opportunity rover. I'd say that's quite an honor for Pink Floyd, but the song was particularly well-suited. Now they just need to play Dark Side of the Moon on the dark side of the moon.

7.12.2004
5:46pm

Thank goodness for days off. Today's my only break before I go back to work Tues-Fri, so I woke up late and decided to go see a matinee of King Arthur, despite the lackluster reviews. Before I went I called OfficeMax to inquire yet again about the Palm Zire 21 I bought on backorder 4 weeks ago, and they said it was unlikely they would get a shipment for a long time. They promised to call back after checking if any neighboring stores had an extra one to send over, but of course I never got a call. So I left 20 minutes early for Christiansburg and stopped at the store, and they said the only option would be to take a display model or to get a refund; I chose the refund, since display models are always beaten up and scratched. More minutes of waiting, several associates get involved to figure out how to do a debit refund. Then all of a sudden, a guy comes out of the back room with a Zire 21 in his hand, which they said had been delivered and subsequently misplaced. They package was actually the "limited edition" Zire 21 with a soft case, screen protectors, and extra styli. All for a total price of $51.19, which is impossible to find even online. I headed over to the theater and bought my ticket a few minutes before the movie started at 1:10, and the theater had maybe a couple dozen people seated but that was it. Overall the movie wasn't disappointing but it wasn't exciting either. Keira Knightley had an easier role in this movie than in Pirates of the Caribbean, aside from a corny PG-13 love scene. The villainous Saxons are given no background whatsoever about why they are invading Britain, and the Woads come off as rather mysterious. Fortunately this movie had some funny moments particularly at the beginning where they are demonstrating the comradery of the Knights (of the partially-filled round table in this case). The Roman-Catholic bishop in the movie is portrayed as corrupt and Arthur defends the pagan ways of his friends; beware any uber-religious types.

7.9.2004
8:34pm

Working a production job has its good parts and its bad parts... One of the positives is that the pay is decent and overtime is readily available. The downside is that 12-hour shifts are very tiring, and they don't leave time for much else in the day.

Today was my second day at Corning, following an 11-hour first day unloading ceramics cars and building boxes. Yesterday on Line 3 Mike showed me how to put the stacks of pieces onto the conveyer belt, which is a hectic job if only one person is doing it. After lunch I was quickly shown how to build boxes and put in the correct padding, and I made 310 of them for the outgoing shipment. Today I was told to go to Line 1 instead of 3, where I was one person on a 4-person extrusion team. Two of us had to place Reynolds plastic wrap onto the top of the ceramic logs as they went into the drier, and one person had to remove the wrap as they came out the other end. The fourth person was on break, and we rotated through on a 90-minute basis. This has to be one of the easiest jobs in assembly, placing or removing plastic wrap, but it gets old quickly. Plus you are still on your feet most of the time, so the periodic breaks are welcome. They seemed to be having quite a bit of trouble with the Line 1 equipment today, which resulted in some brief periods of downtime. At the end of the day they decided to shut the line down for 24 hours; either they met their quota or are planning some repairs.

Oh and the best part is yet to come: I'm supposed to work Tuesday-Friday daytime which would give me 48 hours per week. Apparently my parents don't think 48 hours is enough when I could be doing more, so my dad pretty much volunteered me for overtime this weekend. Which means another two days of work, then a one-day break on Monday before I go back again.

7.5.2004
10:53pm

Fool me once, shame on -- shame on you. Fool me -- you can't get fooled again.

I noticed on the web this morning that Fahrenheit 9/11 was playing at the local New River Valley theater, so I went for a bike ride then headed over to Christiansburg. I made a stop at Wachovia first to deposit a check, then at Wendy's for some lunch. I got to the cinema about 30 minutes early, but they had a pre-feature show called "20Twenty" that had some clips from upcoming movies. Michael Moore's documentary started with an investigation into the 2000 election results and the controversy over Florida, then shifted to the start of G.W. Bush's presidency and the numerous vacations he took. September 11th, the Saudis, Al Qaeda, the Bin Ladens, the Patriot Act, the "War on Terrorism," Iraq, and the US troops follow in a well-laid-out fashion that entertains and shocks, but most importantly informs the moviegoer of Bush's shortcomings and personal agendas. It really is an astonishing film, and Democrats and Republicans alike should see it, if for no other reason than to see an alternative perspective. Moore makes an interesting point near the middle of the film about the Free Media in the United States, but as it turns out they too are biased and portray events in a censured fashion.

7.4.2004
11:33pm

Wouldn't be the fourth of July without watching Independence Day. Now it's time for bed...

7:32pm

Happy 4th of July / Independence Day everybody!

I did end up going hiking with my parents today, so we got our stuff ready and headed to the park with the dogs. We got there around 11 o'clock and started the 2-mile hike to the waterfall summit, stopping to take pictures along the way. The trail was fairly strenuous in some places, but the dogs managed to keep up quite well. Having four legs seems to give them a distinct advantage in scaling inclines. The path was still wet in certain places so we got our shoes muddy, but that's part of the whole experience. When we got to the end of the trail we took some photos of the 60-foot waterfall, and we watched some of the people swim around the basin. There were also some peculiar butterflies that were attracted to a rotting animal carcass, which seemed to be very odd behavior for them. After resting for a few minutes we headed back along an alternate trail that didn't stay very close to the river, but was also faster to traverse. Dad cooked some chicken on the charcoal grill for lunch, and we managed to finish eating just as the rain clouds rolled in. When we got back to Blacksburg there was a severe thunderstorm warning for Montgomery county, but the rain only lasted for about an hour. We're planning to go see the fireworks show at 9:30 unless it turns out to be really crowded.

7.3.2004
11:05pm

Started the day at 8:45am, just in time to catch my parents leaving to bike the 18 mile Huckleberry trail. I was left with the responsibility to walk the dogs before they got back, so that we could leave for Roanoke as quickly as possible. I made a trip over to Wal-Mart to return the car compass that I bought a few days ago, because the thing started leaking oil and didn't show the correct direction. When I got back I took care of the dogs and browsed around on the web to kill some time. We left for Roanoke around 11:45am and got to the Valley View Grande theater at 1pm just as Spider-Man 2 was starting. We grabbed some tickets for the 80% full movie and managed to find three consecutive seats. The movie was simply amazing, flawless in just about every aspect. I expect that it will turn more profit than even the original, and they deserve it. There were some truely funny moments, as well as dramatic action sequences and sorrowful ones. As all of the reviews say, the character development has really taken a leap forward, and the Doc Ock villian is far better than the prior Green Goblin. There are some interesting developments at the end of the movie that set up for the third installation, due summer of 2007. I plan to see Spider-Man 2 in the theater at least once more before buying the DVD.

After the movie we stopped at the mall, Wal-Mart, and Target. We had dinner at the Olive Garden, and I ordered a chicken alfredo pizza that was very good. We stopped at Dick's Sporting Goods so Mom and Dad could buy some hiking shoes, and Dad looked at some bike helmets but didn't like the styles they offered. They are planning to go hiking tomorrow on some nearby trails, but I haven't decided whether I will go yet. Since we still hadn't had enough of shopping, we stopped at the Tanglewood mall and looked around. I found a book called "The World Treasury of Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics" for $2.99 at Waldenbooks, which is a big compilation of published works by various scientists. I couldn't turn it down for $3, and it will give me something to engage my mind before school starts again.