Why

I think that this guy's quote from the WWII veteran pretty much nails video game nostalgia.



Yeah, I know, I'm such a loser. Oh well. =)

Until later.

Sleep

So, I stumbled across this link a few days ago.

Or this page sums it up better.

Sleep paralysis, or more properly, sleep paralysis with hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations have been singled out as a particularly likely source of beliefs concerning not only alien abductions, but all manner of beliefs in alternative realities and otherworldly creatures. Sleep paralysis is a condition in which someone, most often lying in a supine position, about to drop off to sleep, or just upon waking from sleep realizes that s/he is unable to move, or speak, or cry out. This may last a few seconds or several moments, occasionally longer. People frequently report feeling a "presence" that is often described as malevolent, threatening, or evil. An intense sense of dread and terror is very common. The presence is likely to be vaguely felt or sensed just out of sight but thought to be watching or monitoring, often with intense interest, sometimes standing by, or sitting on, the bed. On some occasions the presence may attack, strangling and exerting crushing pressure on the chest. People also report auditory, visual, proprioceptive, and tactile hallucinations, as well as floating sensations and out-of-body experiences (Hufford, 1982). These various sensory experiences have been referred to collectively as hypnagogic and hypnopompic experiences (HHEs). People frequently try, unsuccessfully, to cry out. After seconds or minutes one feels suddenly released from the paralysis, but may be left with a lingering anxiety. Extreme effort to move may even produce phantom movements in which there is proprioceptive feedback of movement that conflicts with visual disconfirmation of any movement of the limb. People may also report severe pain in the limbs when trying to move them. Several recent surveys including our own suggest that between 25-30% of the population reports that they have experienced at least a mild form of sleep paralysis at least once and about 20-30% of these have had the experience on several occasions. A few people may have very elaborate experiences almost nightly (or many times in a night) for years. Aside from many of the very disturbing features of the experience itself (described in succeeding sections) the phenomenon is quite benign.

I've had this happen to me a couple of times, once in the last year. It's quite scary in that you cannot move. Add the "waking dream" portion of this and it can be positively nightmarish.

Has this ever happened to you?

Atari

So I'm a big atari fan. It's a big part of my early childhood. I've been thinking about starting an atari-based project, but I've not decided if it's worth the effort or not. It depends on a lot of things. I might talk more about that later.

I came across this article two days ago and it's taken me that long to get through it. But it was totally worth it.

For instance... did you know that Williams pinball came out of atari? That steve jobs and steve wozniak (founders of apple computer) worked at atari and even offered atari the opportunity to get into the original apple computer? There are so many early technology ties to this company that it's amazing.

Check it out if you've got any interest.

Until later.

You know you're a geek when....

You think something like this is cool.



Also, I want one of these.



Things are happening, I just don't have the time to blog them right now. Suffice it to say that things are going quite well around here and even though life always has problems, I'm happier now than I have been in some time. Thanks for stopping by. It'll get more interesting around here eventually. =)

Until then.

Food

So, a few months ago (okay 4...) I mentioned I was going to post about food and that I have a video clip about that.

Well.

I should start this out by saying that I feel like this sometimes when I'm around people with either very bad table manners or people who just plain eat loudly.

It drives me crazy.

So I thought I'd share. This movie only has 3 scenes in the "corporate world", so I've included all 3 to help give it more context. It's an interesting sub-plot. Pay attention to clip #3, that's how I feel sometimes. =)







The clips come from this movie. It's pretty good, I'm not usually into the romance/drama genre, but I liked this one.

Until next time.

Nostalgia

Magellan

So I got a GPS for my birthday back in August. Now that september's almost over I figure I should get off my can and post about it.



I've used it as a travel mate once and found about 25 geocaches with it so far. (There are a bunch close to work, so that works out well for a break)

I think one of the most valuable things I could have done with it is take a trip with my grandfather up into the mountains where we used to go when I was a child. We stopped at a number of old campsites and I marked their locations so that I could find them again. Maybe in a few years when my children are older we will go up and camp there.

I've also done a lot of geocaching for the short 2 months I've had this GPS. Some of the caches are fantastically hidden. Some are... well, kind of surprisingly still there in regards to their location. However, I've always been a sucker for a treasure hunt.

I'm not going to review the GPS unit I got, though I'm happy I went with the model I did. It was a bit more than I wanted to spend, but I think it's about perfect for me. It's got all the features I'd want and a few more that I'll probably never use. At the right price it was hard to pass up.

Incidentally, I did a little research on batteries and found cell phone batteries that appeared to be exactly compatible with the unit. So I spent $25 for 3 batteries when one "official" battery would have been $40. It pays to do your homework I guess.

One of these days I'll start my own cache. but until then, I'll be happy just toting the GPS around and finding geocaches of my own.

Until next time.