Last night I finally broke down and downloaded the new version of Visual Studio 2008 Express and directX9c SDK. I found a really cool tutorial online for learning how to program video games. Granted I already know how to program windows GUI applications in C++, the last of my few contracts have been in VB or VBA, so my actual ability in C++ is a little rusty and I’ve been planning to get back to it for some time. Specifically I really wanted to finally put some focus on getting good at it.

Here was the tutorial site that I found:

http://www.directxtutorial.com/

So just this morning I followed the first tutorial for DX9 and got the little windows application to display a blue screen, then fade it to black, and fade back to blue in a repeating cycle. It’s still a little jerky so once I get it nice and smooth I’ll see if I can post some source code and a downloadable exe in my software section. I haven’t had this much fun in a LONG time!

Once I get this thing working a little better in the direction I want to go, I’ll probably post a web forum so members can come and hang out and have more interactive discussions.

I was going to comment on this article:

http://www.marsdaily.com/reports/The_Appeal_Of_Mars_999.html

But I’ve been to busy at work and at home to really put together anything as of yet, since I wanted to post pictures along with my argument. I’ll have to get to it later.

I did, however, want to note these two articles also recently posted on the MNSFS mailing list:

http://www.rocketryplanet.com/content/view/192/38/

And:

http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/searagon.htm

Current mood: accomplished
Category: Jobs, Work, Careers

Well here we are again. After that last spat of time off while the company I am working for was busy negotiatin contracts with the Dept. of Rev. I had 7 weeks off work. It was nice because I got TONS of stuff done that I desperately needed to finish. However, at the same time I now have 2 months with only minimal pay.

To make up the difference I just landed a retail holiday night job at the local Circuit City here in Burnsville. So it looks like I’ll be working 80-90 hour per week for the next two months since I fly to Manila for 2 weeks and on to Bangkok for 3 more weeks after that right at the start of the new year.

I’ve also got a series of operations to have done between now and then! So needless to say I’m going to be, *Just a little* busy!!! *Understatement of the Century*

Well now to the topic at hand, last week I was contacted by a career agent that I posted my resume on a long time ago. (Like 2 years ago, just after college graduation)

The job

Category: Goals, Plans, Hopes

Ok, so I finally finished burning those TDK Dual Layer DVD’s and in the 20 pack, 9 of them where bad. Better average then the Memorex of course, and certainly better then Play-O brand! However, definately not as good as the Sony brand of Dual Layer DVD’s.

So there you have it, very interesting results. Just for referance I have two different brand DVD burners. One is Pioneer and the other is NEC. The NEC is about 3 years old and the Pioneer drive is only about 1 year old.

That should tell you what