Installing XP for Dual Boot on a Vista Computer

Ugh.

I could just leave it at that. Installing Vista on my old XP PC was simple by comparison.

Tonight's Odd Turns

I don't know about you but I often start off looking at something or engaged in one activity and then wind up so far off the track having run across amazing stuff I never knew existed.

Tonight is one of those nights.

Don't drink milk when you read the next question because I don't want to be responsible for you wheezing milk out of your nose:

Have you ever heard of "Scud the Disposable Assassin"?

It's a comic created by Rob Schrab about a vending machine assassin. That's right, you plunk in your quarter and you get a robot assassin who takes care of the job and then explodes. Hence, disposable assassin.

I started out on YouTube for some reason searching out some old fan film favorites of mine while I was talking to my brother on the cell phone. I was talking to him about Grayson and Batman: Dead End before I started my usual generic "animation" search.

I ran across a "4 Minute Film School" episode hosted by Rob Schrab! I had seen some of this guy's animation of (well, basically junk) puppets. Real Robot Chicken kind of stuff or fast Saturday Afternoon Cartoon stuff where they use puppets against a green screen. It was informative and fun but when I hunted down Rob Schrab and Scud the Disposable Assassin, I found Pat Grubb's animation tests of his 3D animated Scud test renders. I originally thought they were professional animation tests!

Pat Grubb aka Neuropolis
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iik7zo4UgfA

This kid just finished animation school and was looking for work. While being bored and waiting for the 3D money to roll in, he decided to make a 3D version of his favorite comic character, Scud. He sent some renders to Rob Schrab and Schrab supposedly LOVED them and he said he wanted to see Scud animated.

Pat found out about the Scud the Disposable Assassin short film contest and has decided to enter the contest. This thing (contest) started at the beginning of May and has to be finished by the end of July. He (Grubb) has modeled two of the three characters he is going to need and is well along the way to finishing the third.

The very short animation test has a MARVELOUS sound track that I had to hunt down. It turns out to be "The Pretender" by Foo Fighters. This is one of those songs that when I hear it, I wonder aloud, "Why did no one tell me about this song?" So, I bought it off of iTunes immediately.

Then I listed to Steppenwolf's "Magic Carpet Ride" for a bit and wound up typing this while watching "Burn Notice".

This day has been just all over the place.

End of the Rainbow

I always wondered where the rainbow ended.

Who knew it was the parking lot at work?

I was confronted with this bit of beauty walking out of the office yesterday.

Traffic This Morning

Now THAT'S a line of traffic. This line extended for a couple of miles. Thank goodness it moved. It moved slowly, but it moved.

Better Dental Health

Here's one for you: I like my dentist.

He's ... nice.

In fact, the whole office is composed of kind people.

I have lent them a hand with their computer on a couple of visits and spoke to a software vendor on their behalf. It is the kind of thing that I enjoy. It was fun.

My dentist sent me a generous gift certificate for a restaurant in gratitude!

My wife and I had an appointment with my dentist yesterday and while my wife was having her checkup, I chatted with the dentist's wife about their website. Although they have a couple of pages, there is very little content.

It turns out that they pay for all sorts of online content that is not reflected on their website. So, this morning I threw together a four page site, added some images and kept most of the content they already have while adding in some content from their auto-email services. So I zipped it together and sent it off in an email as something to consider.

Perhaps this is odd. Do most people create speculative websites for the dentist that they like?

I hope they like it.

Unexpected Visit

I got a call a little after 10 AM today. My father was at Philadelphia International Airport on his way home!

We got together and had some lunch.

When I walked out to my car on the parking deck, I took a moment to look out at the moving traffic. The images don't do it justice but they're all I could grab with my camera.




I should have taken a shot of my Dad.

Strange Tomatoes

My wife and I went shopping and we found this:



It looked like a pretty big tomato brain. I asked my wife, "When they started selling Chernobyl Tomatoes?"

Then I realized that name probably would not sell and the store must have come to the same conclusion, so they sell them with a different name:



Someone should tell them that tomato beauty is in the eye of the beholder!