Rob on Rails

Monday, February 1st, 2010

I’m just wrapping up my second full Rails project at work, and I have to say that I’m slowly getting the hang of things.

It’s wonderful (and frustrating) that I can look back at my first project and realize all the things I did wrong. The good part about that is a lot of the first-time mistakes I made are easily fixed. I’m pretty sure I’ll be saying the same thing about my current project once I’ve moved on to the next.

While I’ve come a long way, I still feel I need some proper training so I can really get into the deeper stuff with Rails. While I’m sure I can do pretty much anything I need to, and anything my job requires, I’d really like to grow my skills so I can start REALLY using it. I’d love nothing more than to let a client know we can go above and beyond for them, and really make their interactive shine.

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2010

Friday, January 1st, 2010

So 2010 is here. No flying cars, no housing on the moon…nothing that exciting.

What did I see in 2009?

Plenty.

Beatrice is pregnant with our 3rd child. It’s an amazing thing.

Beatrice and I put our house on the market. We’re still waiting for it to sell.

Aiden was diagnosed with mild PDD-NOS, and is making HUGE strides. He’s in a new preschool, and is thriving.

Delfina gets bigger every day. It’s amazing how smart she is. It’s a shame she was too young to start school in 2009.

I lost two amazing women in my life. Both my grandmother’s passed. Even though I didn’t get to see them much, it’s very strange not to have them around anymore. The world will be a worse place without them.

Beatrice became a full-time, stay at home mom. With 2 kids, and one on the way, I’m sure she’ll be working much harder than she ever did at an office.

After 2 layoffs in a six month period, I became fully employed, and have been for over a year.

I started moving away from PHP to program in Ruby on Rails. I’m finally coming into my own as a web developer with my own technique and preferences.

I’ve made/kept some amazing friends, some of whom I’ve never physically met, though I hope to remedy that in the future.

2009 had its ups and downs, but then again, so does every year. I’m thankful to have my amazing family, and to continue moving forward in all that we do, even if it doesn’t always feel that way.

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Suspend Gaming

Tuesday, December 29th, 2009

OK designers and publishers, here’s the deal.

I grew up on video games. I’ve supported, advocated, and played video games a huge portion of my life so far.

I’ve grown. You’ve grown.

There’s a problem, though. You’ve grown a little too big for me in a sense.

Let me start off by saying this. I love epic 60+ hour games.

I love them a lot.

I even love beautiful cutscenes. I never said I didn’t.

I’m married now. Working full time. I have 2 kids, and another on the way. I still game, but my time is REALLY limited. All I’m asking for is for you to allow me to suspend my games when I don’t have time to reach a save point.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not asking you to allow me to save whenever I want. All I want is the ability to suspend my system, turn it back on at a later time, and pickup where I left off.

I know it’s not THAT complicated to do. I love that I can do that with my DS and PSP.

Why can’t I do it with my Wii or 360? Why must I always feel rushed when I play more in-depth games, frantically trying to find save points when my time is almost up?

Seriously. I love playing your games, but I’m missing out on more and more gaming because I can’t afford to waste time playing, and not knowing if all that I’ve done over the course of an hour or two will matter, or if I’ll have to do it all over again.

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Kenny’s Bite Sized Non Adventure Part 1

Sunday, December 20th, 2009

This game is amazing.

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Skipping Workouts

Friday, December 18th, 2009

Lately I’ve found myself having to skip workouts because of severe pain in my left leg. At first I thought it was shin splints, and took a week off of working out to rest.

It seemed to help.

I started up my workout routine, and everything was going fine…then the leg pain returned. I’ve gone from working out 4 nights a week to 2, and it’s still no help.

Guess it’s time to see my doctor. I hate skipping workouts, because it makes me feel like I lose so much more progress than I’ve gained.

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Trouble Moving On

Thursday, December 10th, 2009

Ever since the release of my first game, ElementaliS, I’ve been having trouble moving on with a myriad of other designs I’ve got kicking around my notebook.

I’ve said it before, I made a lot of mistakes with ElementaliS. I think the fear of future mistakes is what’s holding me back with my other designs. No matter what I try to work on, I keep coming back to ElementaliS and what I could have done with it.

That brings me to Phoenix Ash (Working title).

Phoenix Ash will be a completely rewritten set of ElementaliS rules that can be played with the base game and some new, printable cards.

From what I’ve worked on so far, the game is drastically simpler to comprehend, and WAY less fiddly. It’ll actually be the first of several card packs, each one dealing with a different element. The thing to keep in mind is that this isn’t an expansion, it’s a full game meant to truly replace ElementaliS.

Phoenix Ash obviously deals with Fire.

I can’t say when it’ll be released as I’m taking my time with it. I really don’t want to rush things.

I’m just hoping I’ll be satisfied and can move onto future projects.

It’s been 4 years. It’s time for something new.

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Sitting on Hold

Friday, November 27th, 2009

UPDATE: Looks like the damn thing FINALLY (really) shipped today (Dec 1st). If all goes well FedEx is saying it’ll show up December 4th. Keep in mind I bought the damn thing on November 19th.

What would be crazier than trying to get ahold of Apple Customer Service during the morning on Black Friday? Probably a lot, but that’s what I’m doing right now.

You see on Nov 19th I ordered a refrub 40GB Apple TV. I got the shipment notification shortly after, but ever since FedEx has not updated the tracking. The thing is supposed to come tomorrow, so I called FedEx and they said they received a notice that there was a package to ship, but never got the package to ship it.

They told me to call Apple. So that’s what I’m doing. I’m pretty sure they’ll throw this all back on FedEx’s shoulders, but I have no clue what to do to get this package found.

For all I know it’ll show up tomorrow as planned.

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Through The Eyes…

Saturday, November 14th, 2009

As if keeping up with a blog wasn’t enough, I finally broke down and started a Tumblr account. It’s called Through The Eyes…,and it’s a place to for to post random things I see or think.

The truth of it is, I’m having a hard time keeping up with this blog. I seem to update it in waves. I am very good with updating Twitter, Plurk, etc… Tumblr has a feel similar to those sites (at least for updating), and is very easy for me to update from my iPhone.

We’ll see how long as lasts, but for now I think it’s going to work out.

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Nano WriMo Started

Saturday, November 7th, 2009

I started a few days late, but I’ve started.

Every day this month i’ll be writing 140 characters of fiction (actually 135, because of the space and hashtag) on Twitter.

The easiest way to find my posts is by clicking here.

I’ve decided to tell one story over the course of the month. Originally I thought I’d just post separate story chunks, but then a wonderful idea struck me. Follow Sih in a strange, micro adventure.

If you have no clue what I’m walking about, check my previous Nano WriMo post.

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Handbrake TinkerBell and the Lost Treasure

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009

Yesterday I picked up TinkerBell and the Lost Treasure for the kids. After watching it, I wanted to rip to to my hard drive because:

A) My kids are notoriously rough with DVDs, and

B) It’s nice to travel without a LOAD of the kids DVDs.

Unfortunately Disney has to make creating a digital copy of a movie you OWN a pain in the ass. I had to play around to find just the right title that wasn’t in the wrong order. It turned out to be title 16.

Now I understand this is to thwart movie pirates, etc…, but this speaks to a larger issue. If I buy a DVD, I should also get a digital copy in this day and age. If you’re not going to let me create a digital copy, give me one, especially when you charge as much for a DVD as Disney does.

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