So I'm reading one of these typical computer magazines you can find at any newsstand or bookstore and there's an article in it where the author is talking about how computer game emulators are suddenly becoming very, very popular - you know, classic computer games like Asteroids, Dig-dug, Centipede, Galaxia and so forth - and it got me to recall one of my favourite computer games I used to love playing whenever I could.

The game wasn't all that sophisticated - heck, how many games WERE back in the early 80's? It didn't have 3D graphics, the main character wasn't a superhero, didn't have any weapons, couldn't do any complicated karate kicks or punches. But he could run very fast. He could jump incredible distances. And he was incredible (most of the time) at avoiding certain death on every level.

Not bad for a stick, I'd say.

Yes, for all you old-time Commodore 64 users out there, you know who I'm talking about. Don't you? Yes... yes you do! Why don't we all put our hands together and give a great big nostalgic hug to Jumpman and his brother, Jumpman II???!!

I'm not sure why I grew to love that twirling, jumping, spinning, unsophisticated, totally addictive little creep. But any chance I got, I use to hang out at my friend's house hunched over his Commodore 64 keyboard determined to make MY Jumpman last one more level, to jump a little higher and to avoid certain and utter doom. A doom that always would come. And before I knew it, I was hitting the replay button and watching him zoom and zigzag across the screen one more time. One more time. One more time.

Whew!

Guess it's a pretty good thing a Jumpman emulator doesn't exist or else I'd NEVER get the CMX Suite strip done.

:-)

-Chris Flick

So I'm reading one of these typical computer magazines you can find at any newsstand or bookstore and there's an article in it where the author is talking about how computer game emulators are suddenly becoming very, very popular - you know, classic computer games like Asteroids, Dig-dug, Centipede, Galaxia and so forth - and it got me to recall one of my favourite computer games I used to love playing whenever I could.

The game wasn't all that sophisticated - heck, how many games WERE back in the early 80's? It didn't have 3D graphics, the main character wasn't a superhero, didn't have any weapons, couldn't do any complicated karate kicks or punches. But he could run very fast. He could jump incredible distances. And he was incredible (most of the time) at avoiding certain death on every level.

Not bad for a stick, I'd say.

Yes, for all you old-time Commodore 64 users out there, you know who I'm talking about. Don't you? Yes... yes you do! Why don't we all put our hands together and give a great big nostalgic hug to Jumpman and his brother, Jumpman II???!!

I'm not sure why I grew to love that twirling, jumping, spinning, unsophisticated, totally addictive little creep. But any chance I got, I use to hang out at my friend's house hunched over his Commodore 64 keyboard determined to make MY Jumpman last one more level, to jump a little higher and to avoid certain and utter doom. A doom that always would come. And before I knew it, I was hitting the replay button and watching him zoom and zigzag across the screen one more time. One more time. One more time.

Whew!

Guess it's a pretty good thing a Jumpman emulator doesn't exist or else I'd NEVER get the CMX Suite strip done.

:-)

-Chris Flick

I'm sure everyone has heard about all the voter fraud and voter disenfranchisement issues in this country. Being in the computer field gives me a different perspective on the voting issue. In this day and age, why can't a vote be tied to a person by his Social Security number? Certainly the computer can come to the rescue. . .in fact it's a rather simple computer problem: when a voter votes, he is shown to have voted in a database. He can't vote again. What could be simpler? You show an ID to the people at the voting booth (maybe even a bar-code scannable ID card) and vote.  Once you've voted, the central computer has your vote stored and you can't vote again.

I'm not sure why they need provisional ballots with a system like this. It seems that more problems are created by allowing people to fill out pieces of paper when they don't show up on a list. What is to prevent them from filling out these pieces of paper at different locations? The whole thing is a mess and is really needless. Having everything computerized would give other advantages:

• You wouldn't need special equipment to get hauled out every 2 years -- you just need terminals.
• It could be standardized across states -- no more butterfly ballots, punch cards, or other problematic voting systems. That would virtually eliminate voter error, which was a huge problem in the last presidential election ("You have voted for Winthrop Blankenshipshire -- Are you sure??? Yes | No | Go back ")
• It could be administered by a third party.
• You wouldn't need trial lawyers to get involved in a voting process.

Banks can maintain records of millions of people so that when you put your card in an ATM, you only see your money. The IRS maintains records of taxes for millions of people. Even online gambling sites maintain accurate account information.  A computerized voting system would be far less complex than any of these, but far more accurate than what we have now. I think we are still using some voting machines from the 40s and 50s. It's time to move this process into the 21st century.

I get up very early each morning to get the kids off to school and a houseful of pets fed (the latter being more willing respondents to the wake up call than the former--come to think of it, the pets are the wake up call). As soon as I drive my so-called walker son to the middle school at 7:55, I start right in with my work. Given that I shove down breakfast and lunch while I am typing and mousing away, you'd think I would be done with work in time to enjoy the evening with my family. So why is it that I am often doing the midnight madness thing?

I was a music major in college. I remember how a bunch of us would meet for breakfast, then race down to the practice rooms to claim our favorite pianos. We often put in five or six hours of practicing a day, but we had breaks! We made time to relax and enjoy each other--even if we tended to relax by putting on a piece of music one of us had been practicing, and sing along together at the top of our lungs. I used to think we were crazy, obsessed monomanics. I hadn't even begun to know what monomania really meant.

So here I sit, another Tuesday morning with a long to-do list in front of me, and three cats lounging on the bed where I am working on my Powerbook. Not one of the cats cares for any of the others, so getting them to cooperate is not in the cards. Nor do any of them particularly fear me when I issue a command such as "Move off the blanket so I can at least make this bed!"

Well, this web field feels a lot like trying to herd cats. It's a slippery business, nothing seems to stay in control, and the clients often feel like those immovable critters on the bed. But then one of the cats (they're a somewhat grateful rescue bunch) comes over and pats an adoring paw on my face, and I know I love them anyway. Now don't we feel the same way about this Web biz?

Oh, no! My Birman cat just flopped on my Powerbook and deleted all this text! I am gonna have to type this over...

Hi, I'm Big John, and I'm a webcomic addict.

I never thought this would happen to me personally. Oh, I have seen the host of webcomics available, and even read Sinfest pretty often, but all the others I ran across tended to make me recoil in horror. I thought, "Hey, newspapers ARE useful for something! They filter out all this dreck!"

Unfortunately for me, Sturgeon's Law says that "90% of everything is crud", and since there are literally thousands of webcomics, there must therefore be very many good webcomics. In other words, only the law of averages was saving me.

I have a geek's brain, and like a squirrel, that brain eventually gets into everything. I had accidentally come across one more good comic, Freefall, and I noticed that the author had a page recommending other webcomics. Piqued, I visited one. Amazing! It was actually a GOOD one! I hadn't had to search or anything!

At that point it was far, far too late for me. It seemed that every comic on that list was better than the last, and soon I discovered that some of them had their own recommends, and so I was led on and on, down that old slippery slope...

Well, you get the picture. Suddenly the real world of webcomics was revealed to me. "So what?" you say? Yeah, I said that too, but try saying that to a finger with an insane compulsion to repeatedly click the "Next" button. Fingers don't have ears.

See my problem? "Webwork time" - "Webcomic time" = "Broke loser". So what I'm asking is, where is the support group for (supposedly) recovering webcomic-aholics? Is this a need too new to have engendered a societal response? Is there any hope, or should I just stop fighting it and submit to assimilation?

Oh my aching eyeballs...

Hi, I'm Big John, and I'm a webcomic addict.

I never thought this would happen to me personally. Oh, I have seen the host of webcomics available, and even read Sinfest pretty often, but all the others I ran across tended to make me recoil in horror. I thought, "Hey, newspapers ARE useful for something! They filter out all this dreck!"

Unfortunately for me, Sturgeon's Law says that "90% of everything is crud", and since there are literally thousands of webcomics, there must therefore be very many good webcomics. In other words, only the law of averages was saving me.

I have a geek's brain, and like a squirrel, that brain eventually gets into everything. I had accidentally come across one more good comic, Freefall, and I noticed that the author had a page recommending other webcomics. Piqued, I visited one. Amazing! It was actually a GOOD one! I hadn't had to search or anything!

At that point it was far, far too late for me. It seemed that every comic on that list was better than the last, and soon I discovered that some of them had their own recommends, and so I was led on and on, down that old slippery slope...

Well, you get the picture. Suddenly the real world of webcomics was revealed to me. "So what?" you say? Yeah, I said that too, but try saying that to a finger with an insane compulsion to repeatedly click the "Next" button. Fingers don't have ears.

See my problem? "Webwork time" - "Webcomic time" = "Broke loser". So what I'm asking is, where is the support group for (supposedly) recovering webcomic-aholics? Is this a need too new to have engendered a societal response? Is there any hope, or should I just stop fighting it and submit to assimilation?

Oh my aching eyeballs...

Hi, I'm Big John, and I'm a webcomic addict.

I never thought this would happen to me personally. Oh, I have seen the host of webcomics available, and even read Sinfest pretty often, but all the others I ran across tended to make me recoil in horror. I thought, "Hey, newspapers ARE useful for something! They filter out all this dreck!"

Unfortunately for me, Sturgeon's Law says that "90% of everything is crud", and since there are literally thousands of webcomics, there must therefore be very many good webcomics. In other words, only the law of averages was saving me.

I have a geek's brain, and like a squirrel, that brain eventually gets into everything. I had accidentally come across one more good comic, Freefall, and I noticed that the author had a page recommending other webcomics. Piqued, I visited one. Amazing! It was actually a GOOD one! I hadn't had to search or anything!

At that point it was far, far too late for me. It seemed that every comic on that list was better than the last, and soon I discovered that some of them had their own recommends, and so I was led on and on, down that old slippery slope...

Well, you get the picture. Suddenly the real world of webcomics was revealed to me. "So what?" you say? Yeah, I said that too, but try saying that to a finger with an insane compulsion to repeatedly click the "Next" button. Fingers don't have ears.

See my problem? "Webwork time" - "Webcomic time" = "Broke loser". So what I'm asking is, where is the support group for (supposedly) recovering webcomic-aholics? Is this a need too new to have engendered a societal response? Is there any hope, or should I just stop fighting it and submit to assimilation?

Oh my aching eyeballs...

I've finally decided to make the plunge and update my main office machine to Internet Explorer 6.0. I've been running 5.0 mostly because it is nice to have for testing some inconsistencies between IE 5 html and css rendering with other browsers. However, it seems that noone is even trying to maintain compatibility with the browser any more. Even Ebay, which should maintain a lower common denominator with browser compatibility, does not work properly with IE 5 -- I was getting popup JavaScript errors on every page. This seems odd, considering that IE 5.x is still the second most popular browser out there. . . .at least according to all the stats I've seen.

Unfortunately, I am not very impressed with Firefox, Mozilla, or any of the other browsers out there. For business use IE seems to offer the most -- copying tables and pasting them into Excel or Dreamweaver, for example. Also, it seems to load much faster. Hopefully the upgrade to 6.0 will not slow me down. There is nothing I hate worse than a slow-loading program.

Excuse me while I restart. . . .

I grew up in Florida. But man, I don't remember having more than a handful of strong hurricanes. What in the world is going on down there? I still have friends all over the area and they've been through alot the last couple months. One web friend, Peb (who goes by the name MarshBunny), after repeated back to back 'canes, has turned her frustration and creativity into a really great "I survived" logo. It's on T-shirts, mugs and hats. If you're in Florida, you'll want to check it out.

My favorite part of the I survived Hurricane Season 2004 logo is the really cute frog. He looks like he's just had it... Peb says that's how she feels too! And rightly so. ;)

I found this today and thought this was cool, but I don't know how long it's been in use: Google does calculations and conversions. For example, if you type a simple calculation like 7*4+(3/4) you'll get an answer. Even cooler are the conversions. Try some of these:

45 gallons in ounces

30 days in minutes

7 years + 82 days + 7 hours + 8 minutes in years

198 pounds + 8 ounces in kilos

234 in hex

More information at http://www.google.com/help/calculator.html. If there is anything that Google won't do, I'm sure they will come up with a way to do it soon.