Well, today was fun!
October 11, 2004, 9:44 PM
I went to Charlottesville this afternoon! Fun times. I ran into a few people that I knew this time.
First of all, I went to Sbarro at the mall for dinner, and guess who I ran into at Sbarro? Sarah Jones! You may recall that Sarah lived in Potomac Hall for two of my three years there, and was a good buddy of mine. So she, her brother who I met for the first time today, and I all had dinner at Sbarro. That was fun. Especially since I hadn’t seen Sarah since we left Potomac. And Sarah’s expecting! She’s going to be a mother before you know it – the proud mother of a little girl.
And while I was visiting with Sarah, a coworker from Wal-Mart heard me and stopped by to say hello. After Sarah and her brother headed off to do some serious shopping, my coworker, his girlfriend, and I took a few minutes to chat it up, mostly about work.
Then later, someone recognized me from Schumin Web, which I thought was neat.
So that made for a nice day. This is starting to get like Rogers. I say that when I see a whole bunch of people I know while I’m out. By the time we left Rogers (Arkansas), we would always see at least one person we knew any time we’d go out somewhere. It was odd not to see someone we knew when we went out.
So that was fun. And tomorrow, work at 7 AM. I’m just glad to have a day off here and there.
Categories: Charlottesville, Friends
Has anyone seen this font?
October 11, 2004, 2:11 AM
I’m looking for the font that JMU uses for their athletic logo and that JEM Transport uses. I’m looking for it as a Windows font. Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:
That’s the Duke Dog, and the “JMU” letters are what I’m looking for. Also go to JEM Transport of Harrisonburg’s Web site, and it’s the same basic font.
I’ve also seen the same font over the Guest Services desk at the Ocean Holiday in Virginia Beach. Unfortunately, I never got a picture of that.
I just hope I can find that font somewhere as a Windows font. Would be very nice to have.
Categories: JMU
What is downright scary for me as a webmaster…
October 11, 2004, 1:55 AM
Here’s what’s downright scary to me as a Webmaster. My Transit Center project.
(crickets chirping)
Why is that so scary? It’s not the expansion that I’m working on right now, that I’m about a day or so away from finishing. That’s easy. Right now I’m working on putting descriptions to pictures of Metro trains and stations.
The scary part is what I’m doing to the Transit Center after that. While the recently-expanded site is out doing what it’s supposed to, I’m going to be working behind the scenes to completely rebuild the site organizationally, since expansion of the site beyond its original bounds (adding several new transit systems) has proven to be a pain. Let’s just say that the site is a mess under the surface.
The funny thing is that for the user, the site works great. Everything works, and it navigates fairly well. In fact, I only have one navigational feature that I want to add, and it’s fairly minor.
Continue reading…Categories: Schumin Web meta
Five days of the same schedule… don’t know how I managed that.
October 8, 2004, 11:11 PM
I may not know how I managed that, but I’m not complaining! It makes working seven days in a row somewhat less painful. Of course, this is being said on a Friday – only day #5. We’ll see what I’m saying come Sunday night, at the end of day #7. Right now I’m like, “Oh, yes, this is just wonderful!” By the end of the seventh day, I could be like, “GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!” We’ll see.
Meanwhile, I watched most of the second debate this evening after work. All in all, I think John Kerry did the better job of the two, and George Bush looked like he was about to explode a few times there. One time he nearly did, jumping right in after Kerry was finished, and cutting off the moderator (Charles Gibson). We’ll see what the news says about it tomorrow morning.
Also, I’m looking at my journal from a year ago, and it’s interesting. This Saturday, October 9, will be the one-year anniversary of my “What part of ‘crosswalk’ do you not understand?” pass through JMU’s campus. That was a very unpleasant trip, and it was because college students don’t know how to watch where they’re going when they cross the street. I look back at it, and I’m amused by how quick I was to break out the obscenities. But at least I found parking.
Categories: National politics, Schumin Web meta, Walmart
ß
October 7, 2004, 12:14 AM
Finally I found out what ß means! It’s only found in German, a language which I have not studied seriously. I studied Spanish and Latin in high school, and in college had no formal foreign language study (the benefit of a Bachelor of Science degree), but I did become quite proficient in Foul while at JMU.
Of course, “Foul” only consists of about seven words, and you’re not allowed to say it on the air.
But anyway, ß. For years, I referred to it as “that funky-looking B that they have in German”. And that got me some very confused looks from just about everyone. But think about it. ß does look like a B. See? ß. B. So my description is understandable.
Turns out, though, that ß is not related to B at all. It’s actually related to S. And like most language elements, it has a very long history, and a big description of how it’s used in the German language.
Still, at least now I know what ß really means, and how it’s only a lowercase letter. It has no uppercase equivalent.
I am very pleased with myself for finding out about ß, a letter which has puzzled me for years.
Categories: Myself
What a day in Washington I had on Saturday…
October 3, 2004, 11:10 PM
I was up early, and in bed late, to say the least. What I did was cover two, count ’em, two political demonstrations on October 2, for a photo set I’m going to do for Schumin Web.
The first one was an anti-war funeral procession. Basically a rally and march, but with a more solemn funeral type atmosphere. They carried 100 cardboard coffins (designed to represent real ones, as you would expect) from Arlington National Cemetery to the Ellipse near the White House. At Arlington National Cemetery, speeches were given, and then the coffins were picked up, and the marchers marched. I photographed all over, and took movies. On the way into Washington, near the entrance to Arlington Cemetery Metro station (by the way, this is where I dropped out of the march, because I had other fish to fry that day as well), we encountered the counter-protesters, basically protesting the protesters. These are the ones who disagree with the marchers, and are voicing their dissent with the marchers’ viewpoints.
So after photographing the counter-protesters, and taking movies of them, and unfortunately not being allowed by Park Police to venture in between the line of police in the street and the counter-protesters in order to get shots of some of the signage the counter-protesters carried, I headed into Arlington Cemetery station, to head over to protest target #2.
Categories: Anti-war, DC trips, World Bank
Nice little update package from Microsoft today…
October 1, 2004, 1:00 AM
I updated my Windows this evening to all the latest stuff from Microsoft. This means new service packs, incorporating a bunch of new features. Don’t know what half of them do, but I’ll figure it out eventually.
Only things I’ve really messed with are the ones of immediate concern to me (read: annoying features). I fixed the pop-up blocker to not chime and throw a message up when it finds one. I don’t need to know about the ad I just missed that badly. Just a little icon in the corner is all I need. I also fixed it where I can still play flash animations that I’ve got saved on my computer without an extra “OK”. That was a bother before I found the switch to turn that off. I save flash animations from the Internet onto my computer when I find something interesting. I have my favorites that I watch periodically.
My comment above about “…incorporating a bunch of new features. Don’t know what half of them do…” reminds me of Tim Allen’s stand-up act. He says something like, “I bought a [tool]. What does it do? I don’t know. Looks good on that pegboard, though.” Then he goes on to say, “And where did I get it? Sears!” Tim Allen seems to like tools from Sears.