Just got around to updating the desktop shots. Realized I hadn't done that for quite a while. I think the XP desktop I have right now is one of the most visually appealing and functional ones I've had so far.
Totally loving it.

*Gasp* It's a real update!

Well, to tell you the truth, I haven't really posted recently due to the general lack of things to post about. Uni work has been going on, as usual. I just finished writing my first real program in assembly language today. After so much exposure to object-oriented programming with C++/Java during the last couple of years, it's definitely a big paradigm shift. Feels like I've gone back to programming BASIC. It's very interesting, nevertheless. Have a CS midterm coming up this week, along with several other things due, so it's going to be (and has been so far) quite a packed weekend.

More coming up, as time permits...

We went out to Westwood to watch "Walking Tall" on Friday evening. I thought "The Rundown" was quite an entertaining movie, and I expected this to be something similar. Unfortunately, it didn't really live up to that expectation though.

For one thing, it was a more serious movie (with a lot of action, of course), but what I really liked about "The Rundown" was the great mix of action and comedy. This one didn't have the humorous aspect to it. Moreover, the action scenes seemed a lot more generic, in a way.

Even though I ended up watching "The Rundown" twice on two successive days, I wouldn't watch this again. In fact, I'd say it's something you can skip, unless you're extremely bored and have nothing better to do. So yeah. That's that.


MoBlog MoMent: That's the view from my bedroom window at home. Spring has made the grass turn nice and green again. So much nicer than the construction site that I get to see from my dorm room window every day of the week...hrmm.

That's right...e-piphany just turned a year old today!

When I first put up this site, I didn't think it would last for more than a month or two. In fact, if you see the first post I made, you'll notice I say "Lets see how it goes..."
Guess I was able to stick on, though. Not bad!

It's funny when I recall what the site looked like in April last year. For those of you who never had the chance to see it, trust me...it was nothing like it is now. In retrospect, I sort of wish I had taken a screenshot or something. It was just so...plain. There was really no design, as such. No PHP of course, just static HTML (never even bothered to validate it *gasp*). As the months went by, the site took on a dual-role as a blog and my design playground, and it began expanding, bit by bit. Fun times, and it made me learn so much that I didn't know.

I'm sorry if it looks like I'm making this seemingly insignificant "event" sound like something big, but honestly, I'm not consciously trying to. Just thought it was quite amusing when I considered the gradual transition from then to now.

You've probably already noticed it by now.
Basically, I decided to create a "MoBlog" on TextAmerica, and get rid of the webcam section of the site. My reason for this?

Well, the webcam is pretty much always here in the room. There are only so many interesting things one can capture in a dorm room before it starts to get repetitive.

So what the MoBlog lets me do is send pictures directly from my cellphone to the internet with a couple of clicks. The most recent pic will be displayed here on this site. Clicking on the little thumbnail will take you to the MoBlog page on TextAmerica, which consists of an archive of all the older pictures.
The point is, I figured I could capture more interesting stuff outdoors rather than being confined to the webcam in the room. The current picture is obviously just a test to see that everything is working okay. The first real picture should be coming soon, so watch out.

I'm now back at UCLA after a rather short, but very relaxing spring break. Classes begin tomorrow, and considering the week begins on a Monday this quarter, I expect things to start at full swing from day one. I actually prefered the Thursday start we had in Fall and Winter. Gave us a little more time to get into gear.

Anyways, here's my schedule this quarter...a total of 16 units:


It would have been great if the CS discussion was on some other day, but I don't have any other options. Lost the chance of having three-day weekends all quarter...

Got some cleaning up and organizational stuff to do tonight. There are old papers all over the place that need a new home - the garbage bin. Not much else to talk about, so that'll be all for the day.

Lots of little tidbits from the last couple of days. First off, just for the record, nobody was successfully able to pull off an April Fools prank on me, which is always a good thing. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to play any tricks on anyone else either. No fun!

Speaking of April Fools Day, a number of pranks sprung up all over the web. The one that really left thousands of people in a believe-it-or-not situation was pulled off by none other than our good old Google. Whether this was intentional or not is unknown, but basically Google ended up making two announcements - one that was a joke, and the other which wasn't (but actually fooled most people into believing it was). If that sentence was far too convoluted for you to comprehend, read on. The real April Fools Joke was the Lunar job offer, which was obviously too ridiculous to be true. Google's other announcement was the plan to start doling out free webmail accounts with 1000 MB of space (yup, almost a gig). Now this number is so high, most people believed this was some sort of hoax too (whle I was busy trying to convince them it wasn't...haha). Amazingly enough, this announcement is, in fact, real...Google has already started beta testing the new service. Those of you still using Hotmail/Yahoo or any other free accounts that offer measly amounts of space - here's your chance to move.

There were a whole lot of other prank announcements all over the place, but every one of them was a little too predictable.

Gnome 2.6 was released, as scheduled, on March 31st. Todd of Dropline Systems released a test (but very stable) version of Dropline Gnome based on this new version today. Naturally, I rebooted into Slack and went through the nice, smooth upgrade process. Everything's working beautifully well, and X/Gnome feel snappier after the upgrade. The spatial Nautilus is quite a big change, and it took some getting used to, but it's extremely powerful and convenient. I was able to experience the true beauty of drag-and-drop when moving/copying files around, and it feels much more natural than the traditional navigational/tree structure.

The weekend is already here. That leaves me with the last two days of vacation. It's been absolutely relaxing, and I really don't feel like going back to uni so soon. But I can't really choose, so I might as well go in with a positive attitude and hope that the upcoming quarter is better than the last. My aunt, uncle, and cousin are coming over from Calgary to spend the day with us, before they leave for a cruise on Sunday. Should be nice way to end spring break.

Can't really think of anything else at the moment. Have to wake up relatively early tomorrow to get little bits of pending work done before I leave on Sunday, so I should probably be heading off to bed now.