I have been learning a lot about myself lately. And consequently, I have been happier with who I am, and who I see myself becoming. And I think that it is a very good thing that I can look ahead and like what I see. Even while I am unsure as to what is going to happen in the future, especially related to my career, I am content with what I think it could be.

I thought of all this as I have been struggling to find a job somewhere around my school, and thinking about where and how I’m going to live next year. There are a whole lot of question marks in my future, but I have faith that it will all work out. Maybe it won’t work out exactly as I think it should, but I know from experience that I will be able to make whatever happens work for me.

Funnily enough, I started this post merely to say that I have found a job I am going to look into and that it excites me. And also that I am trying to progress myself further in the electronic media field by trying to get more involved in things that interest me. And it turned almost philosophical when I came up with the title “Work in Progress”. Funny how my mind works sometimes.

Related to my trying to gain more experience in the electronic media field, my debate blog will be releasing a podcast sometime in the near future, which Rob and I recorded last night. With a few more tweaks, it will be ready to post when we finish the written part of our debates. Stay tuned for that, I will post another link to the site when the podcast is up. Please let me know what you think of it, this is the first time I have done anything like this before (Rob never has either), so any feedback would be more than welcome.

I hope you enjoyed today’s ‘stream of consciousness’ style posting! Til next time.

That said, I did do a few interesting things this summer. I went to Kings Island (an amusement park in Cincinnati for those who aren’t familiar) with my girlfriend and her family and forgot to tell my parents I would be gone for 4 days. I took a family vacation to Dauphin Island, Alabama. I went to Cedar Point (another amusement park in Sandusky, Ohio for those that don’t know). I spent some time with family, friends, and my girlfriend. And I made money while working the rest of my time away. So it was a good summer, but now that I am in a routine again I’m kind of glad it is behind me. Thats just the kind of guy that I am.

I am currently working on finding something interesting to write about, so stay tuned! For now, check out the debate blog I run with my roommate, Rob. It is called Bone of Contention, and we are starting a new debate this week. We plan to have a new post every day on debate weeks, and to have a debate week every other week. We are also planning on starting a podcast for it, so stay tuned for that!

Til next time,

Aaron

I helped Zach Younkin to film the events and did other miscellaneous things to help the week go by smoother. I might be able to post the final video later, but I’m not sure if I’m allowed. Once I clear the rights and everything (Zach knows all about it, I don’t), I will either post the video I helped make or not.

OE is a mixture of fun, work, and church, essentially. I filmed some of the kids at their work sites around Delaware, some of the water balloon battle games they played, and even filmed music videos they made. The cast of the videos were the cabins, and they compete to create the best video they can in one take and in about 15 minutes. Of course, there were some technical difficulties (when aren’t there?) and so all the videos I filmed on Monday were lost and had to be redone. Oops.

If you want to know more about the week, leave a comment, I have tons of stories about when I went there, and even a few from this year. For now, I’m off to finish off the week strong, and tonight I have a lot of editing to do on that video I mentioned earlier!

Before I go, I would like to share some of the links I found while stumbling (read: procrastinating) last night. I really should have been working on one of my two projects, but yesterday was one of the laziest days I have ever had. Fortunately for you, that means more links!

First off, a sign that should not be on the internet. I don’t know why, but it says it right there: Do not post on the internet. Ok then.

Next, a new computer virus. I’m sorry to infect you, but I’m bound by honor to do so. Another side effect of the Amish Virus… I laughed pretty hard when I saw that.

Third, someone turned the original Donkey Kong into Russian propaganda? Believe it! This actually makes me want to play DK now, maybe its time to find an emulation… (Check out my post on emulators!)

Finally, a comic that related to a few posts I have written about personalities. I’m usually one of the guys on the right, thinking about how negative someone is but unwittingly agreeing anyways. Recently I have been trying to take a more proactive approach to life however, and I have been trying to be more of a positive guy than just a non-negative guy. I’m a work in progress, but hey, aren’t we all?

Thats it for this school year, but expect more from me over the summer and throughout next year! My surroundings may change, but I’ll still be right here, at A Rock in the Stream of Consciousness.

So I am asking for help. My website is being hosted through DreamHost, which does not have a lot of customer support, or at least any that I can find about this topic. If anyone has a website through DreamHost, or knows what I might be doing wrong in the FTP process, please leave a comment here or email me at toledo8904@gmail.com . Or if you just know someone I should talk to about it, drop me a comment or email.

I spent a lot of time working on this site, and I don’t want it all to be for nothing. Thank you for any help you may be able to give, and I will be back with an update and a story by the end of the weekend.

Sadly, I only have two links to share tonight, but please also check out the website I have spent many hours learning how to code, and that I am paying money to host. Let me know what you think of it, what might be improved upon, or if you just think it is great! When I post it today it will not be totally done, but it will be a workable template for which I can work on. The url is: http://ahecker.com so please check it out and give me some feedback!

Now for the two random links I have today. First, a pair of headphones that I am seriously considering buying. They are just really cool looking, and would definitely be a conversation starter. I don’t know what the audio quality on these are, but for casual listening it wouldn’t matter, just because they look awesome!

And second, a really funny ‘nastygram‘ from a city, informing the homeowner of their wrongdoings. Whoever did this is funny, and I would probably enjoy being their neighbor, except for that it would require me to live in a neighborhood that doesn’t allow giant rubber rhinos on the lawn. I mean, c’mon.

So, thats all for today. This is one of my shortest posts in awhile. Hopefully I will have a more in depth post later this week, maybe this weekend, about how I transformed from a PC guy to a Mac guy. So that is what I’m thinking about right now, and also the possibility of a joint debate blog with Rob at Piece of My Mind. Also, just a thought at this point, but something that we both hope to do in the near future.

Til next time!

There is something that annoys me about many people who love music though, and something that I strive to avoid. It enrages me when people take a song, possibly even a good song, and dislike it because it is popular, or overplayed. This happens with everything from movies to books, but I’m going to focus mainly on music because that is what I love and know most.

Before I get ahead of myself, I too think it annoying to hear the same song played on the radio repeatedly, and will even change the station on a song I like because I have just heard it too many times recently. That is understandable, in fact, I don’t even like hearing a song played two times in one listen. But the fact that it is overplayed doesn’t make me necessarily dislike it, it just makes me sick of it for awhile. It is still a good song, and in a week or two, I will listen to it again and enjoy it (if it was ever good to begin with). I don’t like when people take a song they might have enjoyed before it was on the radio and crucify it once it achieves stardom. I think this is a way that people try to set themselves apart from the masses and try to claim superiority. “I think that popular song is garbage, I listen to music no one has heard of, I clearly have better taste than those people”. Yeah, that quote is made up, and yeah, its an exaggeration. But its how I feel about people who abandon songs/artists at the first sign of popularity.

Examples of songs that I am glad I did not drop at the first sign of popularity, even if they were overplayed: Anything from Green Day’s American Idiot, Linkin Park, The Offspring, Creed, Fall Out Boy. There are many others, but not that I can think of off the top of my head.

I like stuff that isn’t popular too, so I’m not one of those guys who only likes the popular stuff. This is annoying, but not as annoying as forsaking anything popular. I like to think of it from an outsiders perspective: If I had not heard this song on the radio before, and didn’t know it was popular, would I like this song? If I say yes, then I get over the song being popular and accept that it is just a good song that the radio stations picked up on. In fact, when I think about it, I am glad that the radio stations are able to pick up on some of these good songs and play them to death; at least they are playing something that is fairly good. They could be playing crap to death, so why complain that they are playing good music?

I guess thats about all I have to say on the topic for now, if I go too much further I’ll become angry and stop making sense. I don’t like doing that, it makes me look like an idiot, it makes me stop listening to other opinions, and it turns people off of my blog. Same for everyone else who gets really mad about a subject, but I can’t do anything about them. So, I hope you enjoyed my insight for the day, and please leave a comment as to what you think about overplayed music.

That question is hard to answer. Yes, this album is incredible, but I think it could have been done in a shorter amount of time. I have some experience in production as well, so I can make that claim (sure I don’t have a lot of experience but I know some stuff). I’m sure the wait was due to the band, aging as they are, devoting more of their time to their families, and less of their time to the studio. That is respectable, but as a fan, I can’t help but be annoyed at the over four year turnaround.

I already said it, but I think this album is incredible. It is still Green Day, so if you’re not a fan, don’t expect to love it, but it is a more mature Green Day, both musically and lyrically. And that is saying something coming from their previous album.

For those who haven’t guessed, I really enjoyed American Idiot as well. I know a lot of Green Day fans didn’t, but I think it was one of their best (before you ask, no its NOT because of the singles, I sincerely like every song on that album. I’m tired of people disliking it because it was overplayed… But thats a post for another day).

21st Century Breakdown is another concept album, following in the style of American Idiot. This time, the story is a lot easier to follow, in my opinion (American Idiot almost reminded me of Fight Club with its weird character duplicities). Without giving away any of the story, it is basically a story of the romance between Christian and Gloria, and a whole slew of other events that get in the way. Its really good, if you take the time to listen to and understand the lyrics. It is definitely an album that should be listened to as a whole, although the individual songs are all good on their own.

Where the album really shines though is musically. Green Day covers a wide range of musical styles on the album without ever straying away from their distinct pop-punk vibe. The song ¿Viva La Gloria? (Little Girl) almost sounds like a Hebrew folksong at the beginning, while Horseshoes And Handgrenades sounds a lot like the Strokes. And of course, the first single, Know Your Enemy is one of the catchiest foot stomping songs on the radio right now. Every time I hear that song it gets stuck in my head for hours!

As much as I love this album, it does have its low points. The last two songs on the album have the same beginnings as the first two songs. This is a cool concept, but the first time I heard it, I actually turned it off because I thought the album was replaying. There are also a few songs that sound like they were groomed to be big radio hits. I know this is true for almost any commercial band out there, but I would have liked if they at least tried to hide it. I’m not saying they are bad songs because of it, but rather that they don’t necessarily fit in with the rest of the album. The songs in question are The Static Age and 21 Guns. I would put money on them being on the radio at some point. I think they are both really good songs, and deserve to be on the radio, but they are also a lot more formulaic than most of the other songs on the album.

So my verdict on the album: If you don’t totally hate Green Day, give it a shot. It really is a good album, and I will be listening to it for a long time to come. And with 17 full length songs (2 even reaching the 5 minute mark, impressive for a punk band) it has more bang for your buck than most albums out there. 8.5

This post will double as a call for help for the small issues I have been having, if there are any out there experienced in Parallels, let me know if you have the answers to any of my questions please!

To start off, I will just say that I love Parallels as a tool to allow me to run Windows on my MacBook Pro. It isn’t perfect, but it is definitely a lot better than Boot Camp, if only because I don’t have to reboot to start Windows. That alone was enough to warrant spending the money on it (I spent $80).

But there are also some cool features about Parallels that make it cooler than just running Windows in a window. My personal favorite is coherence mode, which integrates Windows’ windows and the start bar into Mac’s user interface seamlessly. It is kind of like running your Windows applications in Mac without having the Windows desktop around so you can access your Mac seamlessly. And the start bar appears at the bottom of your Mac screen. It was really confusing when it first happened, and I thought the program was broken. But once you use it once or twice, it really starts to make sense, and it allows you to navigate your Windows machine and your Mac machine together at the same time. I would not, however, recommend using coherence mode with any intensive programs, as it uses more of your resources than normal or full-screen mode. I was playing Unreal Tournament (the old one, not any of the 200x series, so not a hugely intensive game) in coherence mode, and my computer shut down to prevent heat damage. So don’t do that, if you like your computer the way it is.

I use parallels mostly to play games, so when I run it, I usually push it to the limit. I learned that you have to manually allocate any RAM to the virtual machine above 1GB. So I allocated about 2.35GB of RAM to my Windows machine to help speed up my gaming. Even with this, newer games run pretty sluggish. This might be because I am running the Release Candidate of Windows 7, which is sure to use a decent amount of emory on its own before even thinking about games. I’ll say a little about Windows 7 a little later in this post, so keep reading

I also have been having a problem with the sound in Windows. It will work fine for a while, and then it will just stop working. It still works through my Mac, but any Windows sounds will stop. This is a minor annoyance for now, but something that I will be looking more into later to see if I can fix it. I’m sure the fix won’t be too hard, just something that I have to do.

So, Parallels is a good program for those who want, or need, to run Windows, but would prefer to run a Mac on a day-to-day basis. Its not perfect, but it gets the job done, and looks good while doing so.

It also runs Linux, which I just recently installed on it. I haven’t messed with it at all because I have been in Chicago all weekend, but it installed great and worked flawlessly for the half hour I spent configuring my settings.

So now, I’m sure at least someone has wondered what I think about the Windows 7 RC. In short, I think that it is Vista 2. It is better than Vista 1, but still feels just like Vista. And it still has those annoying security pop-ups that they said they would get rid of. In fact, I feel like I am getting them more often. Maybe it is because I am in parallels and it is linked to the Mac security somehow, or maybe it is because that is the way they changed it. But now, every time I  open up a program I downloaded from the internet I get a pop-up asking if I really want to open this, because programs downloaded from the internet can be dangerous. I would have been fine with that the first time it popped up, or even if it had a ‘never show me this again’ check box. But for now, it is just plain annoying.

Some of the new features are cool though. I haven’t delved too deep, but the ones that stick out to me are mostly centered around the GUI. There is now an option to select background themes, which is cool. You can right click the background and select change background image, and it will randomly select an image out of the theme you selected. It is a cool way to randomize your background while staying with a theme you like. I have mine set to architecture, so I can cycle between images of awesome buildings as my background. The other cool feature I have noticed, and I’m not 100% sure this wasn’t in Vista, is that you can hit the Windows button on your keyboard (or the Command/Apple button for me ) to bring up the start bar, even if you are running a full screen application, such as a game. This is cool because it will let you navigate your computer without exiting out of the game, much like Mac OS X. They also kept the ‘show desktop’ button, but moved it to the bottom right corner. I like that button, and the new location doesn’t bother me at all.

The best thing about 7 is that it supports multi-touch. This is great because I am so used to using it on my Mac, and also because it will allow other PC companies to create multi-touch devices for their laptops.

So overall, Windows 7 isn’t bad, but its not a huge improvement for me either. Maybe by the time they release the final version it will be better, but for now, it is just Vista 2. Sorry Microsoft!

Thats all for today, check back this Friday for a review of Green Day’s latest, “21st Century Breakdown” on the 2 week anniversary of its release. It probably won’t be as in depth as the review of Queensryche’s “American Soldier” was, but who knows, maybe I’ll get carried away.

Right now, there is nothing better to do, so I am going to post a few links that I have stumbledupon over the last week or two. It seems as though my readers enjoy these posts, as they are often the highest rated when I check my stats.

So first, this Craigslist apology letter. I find this to be hilarious, and kind of ballsy. I mean, I would have never done this, what if she really did call back?

Next, college Tetris. This is really cool, and something that I would want to attempt to do sometime during my college career. I feel like if I wait any longer than that, it would just be stupid, but if I do it in college it will be awesome. What are your thoughts on that?

I don’t know what to think about this next one. This is the rumored ZuneX, Microsoft’s souped up version on an iPhone. Supposedly. They don’t know if they will have a phone in it, but it is supposed to play XBox Live Arcade games. Even cooler, it can link to your XBox so if you buy a game on one system, you can play it on the other. So, I will have to wait and see on this one, but for now, I am a little bit excited for it.

And last, but definitely not least, the transforming USB drive. It is a little pricey, but it would be worth it just as a conversation starter. “Woah, what is that thing? / Its a flash drive, and it transforms / Wtf? lol!”. I know that my pen/USB drive/laser pointer is a good conversation starter, so this would have to be an amazing one. The only thing I wish it would do is automatically transform when plugged in… That would make me buy it. As for now, I already have 12GB worth of flash storage, I don’t need another, overpriced drive.

So thats about all I have for today, stay tuned as I have another review in mind, and I will be posting about my experience using Parallels to run Windows 7 and Linux on my Mac.