Shouting out to '97!

So last night, while waiting for the peeps in my raid to finish group composition to take down Lady Deathwhisper, I decided to try out some old PSX games on the PS3... the result was me using every single downtime of the raid to play this:

Sure, GTA4 has better graphics. But come on... this is a classic! It was a haven of pixelated fun!!

Also, downloaded the Dante's Inferno demo on the PSStore. Awesome graphics and awesome mechanic, but I'm a bit worried that it might feel a bit repetitive after a while.

For now, I'm adopting the following policy in regards to the PS3: only buy a game after finishing the current one. So even before I consider Dante's Inferno, Wipeout HD, MGS4 or GT5, I gotta finish GTA4.

I don't really like Niko or his cousin, though. :|

I'll see you around! ;)
Kiauze

Gaming space set up!

So... this Christmas I decided to offer myself some presents. After 1 and a half year of planning, after being undecided about what exactly to do, I threw myself head on and bought my new TV and the PS3.

At first, I was a bit worried that the TV might not fit properly in my workspace, since the laptop took up a bit of space and I had a few stashes of blank CDs and DVDs in the corner. But after a little reorganizing, I managed what I consider to be quite a decent gaming space.

Still a bit messy due to the "leftover" parts, but should figure out everything in the next day or so. The Stargate DVDs will probably be moved and those HDDs I got at my feet definitely need a new place, but overall I'm quite pleased.

This, coupled with the new chair I got a while back is sure to provide lots of fun. :)

Here's to my GTA4 adventure (my first PS3 purchase)!

I'll see you around! ;)
Kiauze

Bright light, bright light!

Now, I'm a person that actually enjoys driving at night. During the day is also nice, but at night there are fewer people on the road and you're more relaxed about traffic. However, the sad disadvantage of driving at night on a highway is that there isn't a heck lot of lighting along the way, except the one provided by cars and the occasional street lights when you pass by an exit.

Now, I don't know about other people, but my eyes do tend to be a bit photosensitive in low light conditions... you know, the whole pupil dilating a bit so the eye can absorb as much light as it can, so you can... you know, see. Rapid or bright flashes of light in this sort of environment tend to be a bit chaotic on the whole mechanism.

I was returning to Lisbon last night, after visiting my girlfriend and her family. As I was normally driving by, I came up to a car and normally overtook it (is that the term? Not really sure). A few seconds in, I regretted it as the car, that was now behind me, had its headlights set on max. For a second, I thought that the guy was somehow pissed that I decided to overtake him, but truth is it kept on going, even after I left him far behind.

A bit further ahead, I found other cars doing the same. And along the way, some cars overtook me while their bright halon lights had their fun burning right into my retina.

After looking closer to the cars, I realized that their trunks were actually quite loaded and there were a lot of people inside. So what was happening was that they loaded up the cars and forgot to compensate the headlight level due to the extra weight. In normal conditions, the headlights would be fine... in these conditions, with such a heavy rear, the headlights were shooting up into the moon... and my eyes.

People really fail to realize small stuff like this. And, most importantly, they fail to realize the kind of impact this stuff can have on other drivers. For more than once I had to hide my face from the reflection in the mirrors so I wouldn't go blind, the irony being that I was now blind to what was going on behind my car.

So... people, PLEASE check your headlight level if you happen to have a heavy rear (no pun intended) so that you save us from having a mid-highway laser eye surgery. Also, please check if your headlights aren't set to max, because there was this one guy that actually had it on max and failed to realize it, even after several people flashed at him.

I'll see you around! ;)
Kiauze

Are ideas worth spreading?

(image owned by Bridge Studios, as far as I know)

Or better yet, is it safe to spread them?

Nowadays, ideas are spread at "lightspeed". New ideas pop up into the public spotlight at a rate never before witnessed, thanks to the wonders of "the net". I myself have a huge chunk of ideas in my brain and I do want to get them out... but how? And how can I keep them safe and... well, mine? Good ideas can be stolen pretty darn fast!

For the sake of this argument, let's narrow this down to technology ideas. If you have an idea that you think is viable, but needs research... is conducting your own research, alone, the only way to go if you want to keep the development safe? Can it be true that, in this day and age, it's impossible to truly trust someone to help you without them wanting to steal your idea away?

I've been told to send some of my ideas (properly developed, of course) to some well-known entities... but crap, what's keeping them from thinking: "Hey, here's a good one. Let's use it and never even bother to reply to this guy. Thanks sucker!".

I remember seeing something about protection of intellectual property... but don't know if it's even viable. Here's to some research, I guess!

I'll see you around! ;)
Kiauze

In and out of love...

Not in the literal sense of Love, but more of "love and respect for myself and my thoughts".



Following up on my previous post, I guess this is really a matter of respect out of one's self. Somewhere down the line in these 26 years, I got the impression that life and the pursuit of happiness was easy.

Well... it ain't. But here's to the challenge ahead! Now to find my notebook when I get home!

I'll see you around! ;)
Kiauze

Taking a step back...

OK, a few weeks since I last updated this. Had some ideas for posts in the meantime, but never really got around to do any of them... mostly out of laziness, but I've actually been busy with work life and personal stuff.

It's probably due to the time of the year, but thing is I've been giving a whole bunch of things a whole bunch of thought. And it scares me how all of them sort of interconnect.

Recently, I've discovered "How I met your mother" and I'm totally hooked to it. As I watched the Season 1 finale and saw Lily's actions and justifications, something really rang inside my head: the whole "even if you feel it's a mistake, sometimes you gotta make it to know if it's a mistake or not".

To be honest, I've never been one to commit to stuff. I usually stand a bit to the side, on a comfortable area where I can easily bail out if things go sour. Sometimes, it saved my ass from a whole bunch of hurt... but truth be told, it does leave me with a bit of emptiness inside out of not giving something that I actually want all I've got.

Going back to Lily and her flashback to her high school prom (if any of you don't know what I'm talking about, I HIGHLY recommend that you try to watch this series... it's THAT awesome!), I could really relate to the feeling of "whatever happened to the dreams I had?" and the question has been pounding on my head for a while now. And the answer is so simple that it frightens me as to the simplicity of it and why I didn't do it: I didn't commit to any of my ideas.

When I went to Physics Engineering, I had awesome ideas about hyperdrives, new forms of power generation, new engines, ways to avoid inertia, so much stuff. To be fair to myself, I was a bit young and naive. Deep down, I knew all of this was probably go down the drain for impracticability, but mostly I was under the illusion that Physics was the place where I could find people to discuss my ideas with. Short answer is, aside the rare exceptions, it wasn't. And here I let myself down, for I didn't pursue my ideas alone... I let my ideas go to waste out of not finding someone to share the ideas with. I lacked commitment to myself.

I wanted to go to MIT to try to find that which I felt lacked here... but failed to commit to the idea of living abroad.

Then I came to Computer Sciences and my goal was set out: nanotechnology and/or artificial intelligence, research & development. Again, I failed to find someone to share it with and... well, here I am working in consulting, quite the difference.

And these are the aspects that are known to most people that do know me... there's a whole bunch of other examples that I'm not gonna post here, but serve to demonstrate that I have an issue with commitment to stuff that I actually want. I know that I want them, but I get comfortable in doing what others would expect me to do.


The few times where I actually followed up on what I felt that I wanted... yeah, it made me happy for what it was.

Hence, the post title. I'm tired and exhausted out of barely scraping by. I want to start down my own path, independent of what other people think of it. That's why I'm taking a step back... so that I can hopefully take two or more steps forward.

Here's to introspection... that it leads to the road of happiness and helps me stay away from train wrecks.

I'll see you around! ;)
Kiauze