Wednesday

It's Wednesday! I haven't been spending any time on PSP homebrew, painting, architecture, or any other pastimes. We have been watching the new(ish) Battlestar Galactica series on DVD. I'm surprised by how much I like it. The story is sufficiently character driven; characters with believable motivations and foibles. I think the last sci-fi show on television that was of this caliber was Firefly.

Weekend-Update

It is a bit late to do a weekend re-cap….but here it is anyway. ;P

Friday evening was filled with rolling and coating an army of vanilla buttercreme cruffles. It took forever and once the army was complete, I pretty much went to bed. (hardcore!)

Saturday we were invited to another video game party. Yay! So we headed over to Kyle to visit Darcy and Thomas and see their new place. It was really nice and had a huge living room. (perfect Wii playing layout) The party was a lot of fun and there were lots of tasty treats to fill our bellies. We played WiiPlay a bit but WarioWare: Smooth Moves ended up stealing the show. You can’t beat WarioWare for making a fool out of yourself. Lots of laughs were shared while we hula hoop-ed, pick noses, fought robots and squashed Pikmin. There was a little bit of freeform SceneIt to be had as well but I really suck at it.

Sunday we went to the Alamo Drafthouse and saw possibly the strangest movie in existence, Big Man Japan. It is really hard to describe. It is a mockumentary of sorts that was supposed to be funny but just kind of left me feeling depressed and confused about what it was I just experienced. The movie follows an outcast who when electrocuted, is transformed into a giant man…with a stick. Hah
He is called into action every time a giant monster is threatening Japan. (which is apparently quite often) The monsters range from a freaky Stink Monster that looks like a fleshy octopus lady to a creepy devil-baby doll creature. The last scenes of the movie suddenly take place on a movie set with costume clad superheroes which left me wondering what the heck was going on. Luckily, they all live happily ever after in the end.

BloodSugarBakery

So a couple of weeks ago I bought a domain for the very slowly, up-and-coming online cupcakery BloodSugarBakery. It is still in its infancy, well actually more of a gestating stage, but hopefully, eventually it might be up and running. I’m not sure stylistically how I want the site to look and I haven’t really sat down and planned it all out. So, the ball has started to roll….even if it is rolling so slowly it can hardly be detected by the human eye.
All of the orders I have taken so far have come from co-workers. That is giving me some nice practice but there is so much to figure out it is pretty daunting. I think baking for me is more enjoyable as a hobby rather than a business, but I'm willing to give it a chance. There isn't anything to be lost from this experience, so why not give it a go?

RockBand Parties, Rock!

Saturday night we were invited to a RockBand party that I was commissioned to make cupcakes for. Little did I know that a third of the cupcakes would melt into chocolate puddles, yet this would possibly be the best party I’ve ever been too. First off, the host's house was amazing - modern, green and super awesome! The furniture was brilliant, the kitchen would make a chef weep and the house was filled with a bunch of wiggly puppies!
How could you go wrong?

On to the gaming...
I was hesitant to play RockBand at first, being a self conscience dweeb I figured I'd be terrible at the game. That didn't last long, as soon as I started playing guitar it didn't matter if I was horrible or not...it was fun. Mitchell was very good at drumming and he got really into singing, I pretty much stuck with the guitar. Everyone seemed to have a lot of fun. Some of the singing that went down that night was hilarious, a room full of RockBanders is pretty damn awesome. There was a three year old rocker that kept "playing" the drums, it was ridiculously cute. RockBand gets two thumbs up from me. I want to play it again already.

So the party was a success...melty cupcakes and all. Lots of laughs, good company, tasty treats and wiggly puppies! It just can't get much better than that. :)

More Karate Stuff

I wouldn't say I'm obsessed, but it does seem that I spend most of my time thinking about, or practicing my new martial art. Unfortunately I think it's necessary. On Monday I had my third lesson and I felt like I wasn't progressing as quickly as I should be. I did practice a bit on the weekend, but I don't think I was doing it effectively. So yesterday I went online and looked up some of the stances and such that I had learned in class. So far it looks like I've mostly been learning Tae Kwon Do. I also made a list of everything I remember being taught in each class so that I can know what I should know. I plan on taking a notebook with me and taking note at the end of the class what I learned that time. Hopefully I can get the instructor to help me fill in things I forgot or need more detail on. I'm also going to bring a towel with me this time, cause boy do I get sweaty!

How was the weekend?

It was good. Friday I went to Karate class. By the end of the class I was sweaty and dizzy. I learned more avoiding and falling. Saturday I went to a rank exam at the dojang. Almost everyone was there. I got to see sparring for the first time. There were two purple belts there that were 10 and 11 years old. It was amazing to see what those kids could do. After the examination, everyone started to mingle. I had planed to use that time to meet more people at the dojang, but I felt awkward and left.

GelaSkins for PSP

About a month ago I was looking at modding my PSP. I ended up purchasing a clear faceplate which I've been very happy with. In my search I discovered GelaSkins, a website that sells skins for personal electronics that actually have decent artwork on them. At the time they didn't have skins for the PSP yet, so I was a bit let down. But that has all changed. Now they have a wide range of skins for the PSP ranging from cheesy to awesome.

Trance Lab

I just wanted to say that I really enjoy listening to this podcast. It's a college radio show from the University of New Hampshire. It's called the Trance Lab, but that's a little misleading. Lord Bass, the DJ, plays all sorts of electronic music. I started listening when the only internet radio my PSP could pick up was RSS feeds. Now I download it with iTunes and transfer the MP3 to my PSP memory stick. It has exposed me to many new artists and it's just fun to listen to.

Lesson 1

Yesterday after work, I arrived home and found that Kim Soo Karate had written back and said that I could begin that day if I wanted. So, I drove up to the dojang (I'm guessing that's the Korean word for martial arts school) to begin my lessons. When I arrived I was introduced to the instructor and was offered a uniform. The uniform was brand new, so it had not shrunk yet and the cuffs of the pants kept getting under my feet. The first lesson was one-on-one with Mr. Richard Griffin. He taught me stances, stretching, punches, kicks, blocking and avoiding. I got very sweaty. I look forward to the next lesson.

ketchup

Since we last spoke a few things of note have happened.
I started looking for a martial arts school. I observed two schools, had a hard time deciding and changed my mind a few times, but have decided on Kim Soo Karate. I wrote them an email last night to set up a first session.
Kim and I went to the Scarborough Faire last Saturday. We had a turkey leg, funnel cake, corn in the shuck, and sausage on a stick. We watched jousting, glass blowing, a pirate cooking show, and a parade. I bought sealing wax and a seal.
On Sunday Kim and I went to Cheapo and I bought music for the first time in years. I bought Motor, MSTRKRFT, and Freaky Chakra vs. Single Cell Orchestra.
I cleared out the storage room somewhat and started painting again.
I think that's the highlights. I'm sure I'm missing stuff, but oh well.

Back to the Beat Part 2

A few months ago I got really excited about finding this website. PSP Rhythm is a music application for the PSP. I was awestruck by the concept. I could write music without having to sit in front of a bunch of equipment. I could write music without having to spend thousands of dollars. I could write music with something I could put in my pocket. AWESOME! At the time though I was stymied because to run PSP Rhythm I needed to have the kernal for firmware 1.5 running on the PSP. In other words, I had to do a bit of hacking. Now, I've done that hacking and I have Rhythm running on my PSP. In the process of making that happen though, I found a couple other pretty neat applications for the PSP. PSP Kick is very much like PSP Rhythm because it acts very much like a drum machine and is mainly purposed for triggering samples. What I really wanted though was a program that wouldn't rely on samples and could synthesize its own sounds. I found that in PSPSEQ.

Back to the Beat Part 1

Last time I stopped composing electronic music, I told myself. 'no more.' Problem was, I didn't really know what I was doing, and I never really played anything I wrote for people. But now I'm starting to reconsider because I've been noticing some really interesting ways to write electronic music, some new, some old. I have to confess, it's mostly the nature of the technology that's drawing me back in. I dream about performing live with small, or retro electronic devices. I find it appealing to use machines that people wouldn't expect to make music. For instance, the commodore 64. This was the first machine I ever used to write music, way back circa '87. Back then I had two programs for the 64 and a MIDI interface. All this was used to control a Casio CZ-1000 synth. This was all actually much more powerful than you might think. The CZ-1000 has been used by several professional musicians including Vince Clark (Depeche Mode, Yaz, Erasure). My CZ-1000 is still sitting around in my dad's house (granted in some disrepair) and there are plenty of C64s there too; my dad was a commodore hobbyist for many years. In fact he is in possesion of a paticular model of C64 that I think would be ideal for live performance. The SX-64 is a 23 pound 'portable' C64 with built in monitor and drive! I think it's about time to revive the CZ-1000 and ask Dad about borrowing the SX-64. This decision is fueled mostly by the desire to purchase a relatively new product for composing music on the C64. It's called MSSIAH. It's a cartridge that slots into a C64 and what it has on board is kinda mind blowing. It includes a sequencer, virtual synthesizer, beat machine, and bass line synth (I think there might even be a few other things in there too). I had been looking at its predecessor, the Prophet 64, for many years and only resisting because I know what a sticky web writing electronic music is. Now, with the MSSIAH, they've added MIDI to the roster of features, so I think it's time to take the plunge. I'm just waiting for them to release it sometime second quarter this year.

Fly, you fools!

Today I’ve seen some pretty good April Fools jokes floating around the interwebs.

My favorite so far has to be Blizzard’s “new addition” of a Bard Class to World of Warcraft. The site says “only a true hero can vanquish evil with the power of ROCK!” The trusty bard does damage to foes by rocking out on a killer axe….al la Guitar Hero. Blizzard always does fun April Fools gags…and you can really tell they put some work into their concept and website. Pretty awesome!

Blizzard had two more good gags online today. They “added” a Tauren Marine unit to the upcoming StarCraft II and apparently they are going to start manufacturing Diablo Loot Pinatas. Finally, you can fight evil at your next Birthday party...get Grandma into the act. “No party is complete without this adorable Lord of Terror!”

Yes! I smite you Diablo!