MichaelandChrissy.com

Chrissy took a video clip of Aiden eating his birthday cake with the Canon, so I wanted to get that posted to YouTube. However, I still had about a dozen other short video clips set aside that never got posted. I guess I lost momentum when I couldn’t figure out how to rotate landscape video into portait video (why turn the camera sideways while taking video?).

Well, I finally figured it out, six months later, so I powered through and formatted the rest of the video clips. I added seven clips last night by the time I ran out of steam and went to bed. You can see them here on our YouTube community page. I’m sure that Chrissy will have a dozen more that she would like uploaded. I hope to keep up with these better in the future.

“Ice Road Truckers” is a guilty pleasure of mine that I probably wouldn’t mention at all if Greg Dean hadn’t applauded it in his semi-autobiographical comic. I read RealLifeComics pretty much every day (along with Wapsisquare, Shortpacked and GirlGenius), so it’s gratifying when Greg brings up something that I can identify with. “They’re truckers. On a road made of ice. ICE!” Greg is awesome.

Speaking of awesome, I’ve recorded every episode of “Ice Road Truckers“, but I haven’t watched the last episode yet. The Sword of Damocles on the ice road is that, eventually, the ice is gonna melt and someone is going in the drink. Every so often, someone dies out there. To emphasise this, they show a digital representation of a semi-truck falling through the ice every fifteen minutes of each episode.

So I’m almost certain that someone dies in the final episode, but they do their best to make you think that about every episode. I think that’s the draw of the show. I haven’t watched much of anything since BioShock started taking up the majority of my free time, but I do plan to watch the last episode of Ice Road Truckers soon.

BioShock has turned out to be a very cool game. The artificial intelligence used by the enemies is pretty impressive. I just finished the Fontaine Fisheries level (second level, I think), and I typed out some thoughts on my strategy. If you like the game and want to hear my take on rescuing Little Sisters (as opposed to harvesting them, which is fatal, but grants you more ADAM in the process) and killing Big Daddies (not the easiest thing to do, but you always respawn nearby without penalty when you die), then click “Continue Reading” below.

Aiden’s first birthday party was on Saturday. The weather turned out to be agreeable, 75 degrees with slight clouds, so we put tents up in the backyard for the event. Predictably, we went with a Transformers theme, and Chrissy went all out on the party favors. Everything had Transformers on it: plates, tablecloths, napkins, streamers, and other decorations. After much searching, Chrissy even found a Transformers cake with a transformable Optimus Prime on it.

The best part about the cake was that it came with a smaller “smash” cake. This one had a single purpose: to be demolished by Aiden. We got lots of pictures of the sugary carnage, and Chip took some video for us (we’re going to try to get on YouTube soon). Aiden had blue and red icing all over his face and arms. I had to hose down the high chair afterwards.

A little over thirty of our closest friends and family came for the party, so Aiden had plenty of gifts to open. He was pretty spoiled. We tried to send him back in a huge “monster” gift bag, but he wasn’t too happy with that idea. Special thanks to everyone who brought something for Aiden! It was a great day and we’re happy that we could share it with you all.

I started teaching again today. Every so often, I’m asked to teach an Introduction to E-Commerce class at Indiana University Northwest. I don’t do it often enough to count on it as income, but I do enjoy the experience. Since I got my MBA in 2002 (a Master’s degree is required to join the faculty), I’ve taught the K221 class four times, usually only when the regular professor leaves on sabbatical or has too many classes himself. I like to bring real-world examples to the table, so the entire lecture isn’t about droning through the book material.

This semester will be a little screwy though, because the class is on Mondays only. Normally, a class will be an hour and a half for two days per week. However, this class is for three hours on only one day of the week. This will make for a very long Monday, since I leave for work at 7:30 AM but won’t get home until 10 PM. It’s only for fifteen weeks though — to put it in perspective, the last day of class is on December 3rd.

There are seventeen people registered for the class, but only fifteen showed up on the first day. None of them had any IT background aside from the basic knowledge of Windows and Office provided in A106 and A285. This just means that I’ll have to make a conscious effort to explain more and ramble less. I tend to ramble sometimes… We’ll just have to see how this semester one turns out, but I’m optimistic.

I played the original System Shock right after I finished the full version of Doom (my first PC game) back in 1995. It was a great game that one-upped Doom by adding RPG elements, like an inventory to store items and the ability to upgrade your character’s skills over time. I ran out and bought a copy of System Shock 2 as soon as it came out in 1999. It was a bigger, better-looking version of System Shock with more shooter elements and interactivity. It too was a great game, but copyright problems have kept a third sequel from being made.

However, the makers of System Shock have now released the “spiritual successor” to the System Shock games called BioShock. I haven’t been so excited about a game since Oblivion. I started playing it last night, and I’m very happy with it so far. The game takes place in an underwater city in 1960. The theme is very “art deco”, and everything looks like it jumped out of an old film reel from the 1950’s. The problem is that this underwater utopia is falling apart and there are gene-spliced crazies roaming the halls in search of you.

The star of the game has to be Big Daddy. Or rather, the Big Daddies. These are huge protectors in armored diving suits with huge, glowing eyes. They’re armed with either giant drills for an arm or rivet guns for long-range combat. Their sole job is to watch over the Little Sisters, who carry the substance that you require to level up. To get to the Little Sister, you have to go through the Big Daddy first. And he brings the pain. I managed to kill one once, but it took three lives to do it.

Part of the fun of System Shock 2 was finding audio diaries discarded in the halls. These would fill in backstory and explain the relationships between some of the characters in the games. I’ve already found about a dozen. The recordings sometimes explain how to carry out critical tasks or how to use new abilities. The voice acting is very well done, and they’re fun to listen to as well. I keep on the lookout for the voice recorders, which look like phone booths on the wall.

I found the G1 homage repaint of the Transformers Movie Jazz at Target today. He’s a Target exclusive, so it was just a matter of time before he showed up there. I didn’t feel bad for getting him, despite the fact that I swore off buying any of the movie-related toys.

The difference here is that this Jazz is painted to look like the very first Jazz from 1984. I’ve got every incarnation of Jazz from 1984 to the present (except for that Action Master from 1990, but he doesn’t transform so he don’t count), so this figure fell into place in my collection.

Chrissy took the last year off from work to stay at home with Aiden. Now, practically on the eve of his first birthday, she’s going back to work. She’s excited to be teaching again, and she couldn’t wait to sort out her room. I took Monday and Tuesday off to help her get the classroom ready. Felice and our nextdoor neighbor, Christopher, offered to help too.

Chrissy brought almost everything home with her at the end of her last school year. Everything was put into storage under the stairs, but it all came out for the return trip. There were enough giant tupperwares to fill a minivan, and then some more odds and ends to fill up the back of the CR-V. Unfortunately, I had to carry them all to the vehicles and then unload them when we got to the school. Classrooms have books in them, and bins full of books are heavy.

Once everything was carried into the classroom, Chrissy still needed to organize her room. She wouldn’t have another opportunity to situate things until the first day of school. We unloaded all the boxes and put everything in its place. Then I spent a few hours on a ladder, taping study aides to the walls. By the end of the day, Chrissy’s class was ready for new students.

Aiden took his first few steps earlier this week. Just two at a time, which is really exciting the first time you see it. Chrissy and I were both in the living room when he did it, just toddled over to me from the coffee table. It wasn’t very far, but it was the first time that we had seen him take a step from a standing position.

This weekend, Chrissy and I were playing catch with Aiden. He didn’t actually leave the ground, but we sat about three feet apart on the floor and sent Aiden back and forth between us. He would take three or four steps and then launch himself at us. We then turn him around to go back. Chrissy’s family has all been over to watch him walk. At this rate, he’ll be running all over the place by his first birthday.

Summer is usually bad for mining stocks, since the Canadian mining companies are usually doing their thing while it’s warm. The mergers and discovery reports that drive stock prices higher don’t usually happen until the fall or winter. Typically, the stocks drop around April and don’t come back until after September. I thought that I would hang on until then, but I’m not happy with the results.

The stocks started falling in late April, but I was up almost 50% at the time. I figured that they would probably go down 25%, which would leave me up by 25%. However, I had not anticipated a drop in the Uranium spot price from $140 per pound to $90 per pound. Uranium consumers are conspiring to reduce the spot price, which is causing panic selling. As of now, I’m 20% in the hole.

Historically, the Uranium stocks see new highs by January or February. It would be foolish to sell now when the stocks should recover by September or October. The only option now is to hold tight and wait for the recovery in the next month or so. Next year, I’m going to sell everything in April and buy back low in August.