.: What’s Bruin :.

Two things might cause me to switch back to Firefox given my last remarks about it versus Safari.

1. Version 1.5 of Firefox seems pretty cool.
2. A buddy of mine told me about an extension called “Tabs Mix Plus“, which allows the user to add a close tab button within each tab.

Item #2 was probably the biggest beef that I had with Firefox. Now that I can close tabs within the tab itself, I just might switch back since the Quicktags feature of WordPress is compatible with Firefox, but not Safari.

You know what Firefox still lacks? The ability to suggest the remainder of a URL based on your browsing history. Unless of course, there is a plugin for that.

Tags: Announcements, Firefox, geek_stuff, Safari, WordPress

You Are 34 Years Old

Under 12: You are a kid at heart. You still have an optimistic life view - and you look at the world with awe. 13-19: You are a teenager at heart. You question authority and are still trying to find your place in this world. 20-29: You are a twentysomething at heart. You feel excited about what’s to come… love, work, and new experiences. 30-39: You are a thirtysomething at heart. You’ve had a taste of success and true love, but you want more! 40+: You are a mature adult. You’ve been through most of the ups and downs of life already. Now you get to sit back and relax. What Age Do You Act?

Josephine scored 37 years old.

Tags: Participation

Finally finishing my roundabout of the static displays, I returned to our seats with Josephine’s help from getting me reoriented to our seats’ location so that I could catch the tail end of the morning’s “pre” air show show.

B-1 Bomber Taking Off

B-1 Bomber Roaring Overhead

Although I had to go back to our car in the parking lot to get our fried chicken lunch during most of the flight of this classic air support fighter, the A-10 Thunderbolt.

A-10 Thunderbolt Providing Air Support

A-10 Thunderbolt Landing

Although this aircraft is not pretty to look at, its takeoff was so awesome. The C-130 Hercules is a semi-huge transport plane that can take off on a short runway. Its afterburners are so awesome. Unfortunately, I missed out on the photo opportunity to take a shot of them.

C-130 Hercules Taking Off

(more…)

Tags: aircraft, Blue-Angels, Events, jets, Marines, military, Miramar-Air-Show, Photography

I saved another $100 by returning the Canon Optura 400 digital camcorder to Costco. They were having a special online this week at a price $100 less than what I paid for. So I returned my third digital camcorder and then promptly reordered the same camera online at the lower price. I like Costco’s satisfaction guarantee. The reason I gave for returning it was that I didn’t like the way it handled.

Tags: camcorder, Costco, geek_stuff, Photography

I’m thankful I woke up this morning, another day of life given to me by my Creator.

I’m thankful for my wonderful wife, my greatest blessing and gift.

I’m thankful for my son who is home for the holiday, sleeping peacefully in his bed this morning.

I’m thankful for the material provisions afforded to me because of my God-given talents. I am especially grateful that these provisions no longer come from educating retarded dumbasses like Elias, Dick, Sean, Natasha, Kayla, Chase, Nelfreed, Charles, and numerous others (whose names I’ve thankfully forgotten) destined to be the bane of society.

Finally, I’m thankful for freedom, forged from the hearts and minds of the founding fathers of this great country and preserved by the armed fighting forces of our nation.

Tags: Life, Thanksgiving

I wish I had thought of this.

Tags: education_and_training, quick_links

Too funny. What a looney.

Read all about it here.

Tags: Humor, quick_links, taser

I can’t wait . . .

The trailer “premiered” on tonight’s episode of Smallville.

Tags: Movies, Smallville, Superman, Television

Teach that little *$^&#* a lesson.

Awesome! I wish more parents did this to their children when I was in that wretched profession of teaching.

Tasha Henderson says she was tired of daughter Coretha’s bad grades, chronic tardiness and talking back to teachers. Earlier this month, she made the high school freshman hold a sign that read, in part: “I don’t do my homework and I act up in school — will work for food.”

“Mom Makes Naughty Girl Stand On Corner With Sign“

Tags: education_and_training, Humor

I started work on my next video project. A couple of weeks ago I had Pourpa purchase a copy of Final Cut Express HD at the UCLA Student Store for me. So when I imported my video clips, I was amazed at how complex the working canvas was for Final Cut. So much to my chagrin, I decided to uninstall all of the components for Final Cut because it’s just too complicated for me to learn right now. And I have no motivation to spend hours playing around with 20 different parameters for each element in a frame just to make a digital movie.

So it’s back to good ol’ iMovie for me! Simple. Easy to use. And only a couple of parameters to worry about. And it still makes great movies. After all, I’m just an amateur and hobby enthusiast.

Anyone interested in a like-new product of Final Cut Express HD? I’m currently selling it on eBay.

Update: Apparently, it’s illegal to sell used software on eBay as my auction was removed. Lame. So unless someone wants to buy it from me at a discounted price, I guess I’ll have to eventually learn to use this software. I’d sell it for $99. Its retail value is $299.

Update 2: Just sold it today 12/2/05. Who needs eBay?

Tags: Apple, Computers, digital-video, Final-Cut, geek_stuff, iMovie

7:55AM

Not exactly my juror badge number, but here I am in the Quiet Room of the Juror’s Lounge. It’s the North County Superior Courts, so I did not have to hassle with the traffic heading south. It was only a 15-minute drive, very nice. I wish that I worked up here instead of near the border. But that is a topic for another story. This jury summons was postponed from last May. I was originally to have served this during our trip to Greece, which is one reason why I postponed it. The other reason was that I was transitioning from my position at A Corp to my current one at S Tech. My current manager wanted me to try to postpone this one, but you can only postpone service one time. And this new summons could not have come at a worse time with respect to how busy it will be this week at work. But the way I look at it, work can wait.

This is like a three-day weekend for me with no work today. In all honesty I hope that I do not get picked to be on a jury. My last experience several years ago being on a civil case was okay, but it was extremely b-o-r-i-n-g. I’d just like to spend my time here today and not work at the office. I asked the person welcoming us at the juror’s lounge entrance if I could be excused since S Tech only pays for five days of service. But she said that they have short trials here, so I was able to stay. Perhaps I may be assigned to a three-day trial or something. The max that I can serve with pay would be a four-day trial since this first day counts as one of the paid five for me.

Right now I’m going through juror orientation, which includes this interesting 15-minute video about jury service. So with that, I’ll continue later.

9:00 AM

That was the most interesting juror orientation I have ever attended. I learned that you can perform jury service at any court in San Diego county. That’s awesome because I will never go downtown for Superior Court service again. There is ample FREE parking here. The lounge is nice and the chairs are comfortable in so far as waiting room chairs go. Orientation ended at 9:15 AM and now we’re on a break until 9:50. Pretty casual.

10:15 AM

They just did the first jury call and my name did not get called. It was for a criminal misdemeanor, four-day trial. If I do get called, I’d prefer to be on a criminal trial, which would probably be more interesting than two parties suing each other like the last trial I was on.

10:45 AM

I survived the second jury call as well without my name being called for another four-day criminal misdemeanor trial.

11:45 AM

Well I’ve finished watching the remaining episodes of Season 3 of Smallville. I had forgotten what a great season ending the last few episodes were, setting the stage for last year’s Season 4. It’s almost lunch time now. I think we get an hour and a half for lunch so I may go home since I already ate the lunch that Josephine packed for me.

12:00 PM

So I survived the third and final jury call as well. And then they released us to go to lunch and also for the rest of the day. So I know I won’t have to serve on a jury for at least another year. So I stopped off at home for a quick bite. I called my manager at S Tech and asked if she wanted me to come in for a couple of hours. I really wanted just to stay home and use personal time. But she wanted me to come in. So I guess it’s two and a half day weekend, not three. Now I get to work for a few hours and then fight the traffic on the way home in the late afternoon. Fun stuff.

Well at least the morning was a fun diversion.

Tags: jury-duty, Life

I returned my unopened box to Costco of this camcorder. Got a full refund for it even though I purchased it in July. Instead now, I’m waiting for the new camcorder to arrive from Costco.com. I decided to go with the Canon Optura 400.

Although I would have preferred this one because it probably would do better in low-light conditions, Josephine thought it would be better to stick with purchasing from Costco because of their 100% satisfaction guarantee.

Tags: camcorder, Costco, geek_stuff, Photography

He moves in mysterious ways . . .

I never thought that God could use me again since I stopped serving in ministry about 8 years ago and my spiritual faith has been kinda weak in those years. But lately, I’ve been trying to get back on track. Funny, because I was thinking about this very thing for the past couple of days, wondering if I could be of some spiritual use again in someone else’s life.

So while tonight was not a very good night for rejoicing over UCLA football, the angels in heaven are rejoicing over the repentance of one sinner who gave his life over to Jesus. Case in point, a former student of mine . . .

(8:18:41 PM) Michael: what happened w/ your bruins
(8:19:12 PM) Michael: I was hoping that they would win
(8:19:25 PM) JoeBruin88: grrrrr
(8:19:37 PM) Michael: big upset huh
(8:19:48 PM) JoeBruin88: it wasn’t on tv here, so we had to go to a sports bar
(8:19:58 PM) Michael: oh that bites
(8:20:04 PM) JoeBruin88: I left after I saw an Arizona player jump on a deflected ball in the end zone
(8:20:13 PM) Michael:
(8:20:31 PM) Michael: ya he didn’t realize it either
(8:21:10 PM) Michael: they can still pull through on dec 3 I think it was
(8:21:28 PM) JoeBruin88: I don’t care anymore
(8:21:37 PM) JoeBruin88: there is no hope for the Rose Bowl now
(8:21:38 PM) Michael: why is that
(8:21:57 PM) Michael: what if they beat usc though
(8:22:06 PM) JoeBruin88: you get fox sports west 2 at your house?
(8:22:20 PM) JoeBruin88: then neither usc or ucla will be going to the rose bowl
(8:22:21 PM) Michael: is that what the game was on?
(8:22:25 PM) JoeBruin88: yah
(8:22:29 PM) JoeBruin88: you have satellite?
(8:22:31 PM) Michael: yep
(8:22:33 PM) Michael: yep
(8:22:40 PM) JoeBruin88: how do you get your Internet
(8:22:49 PM) Michael: we don’t get cable
(8:22:51 PM) Michael:
(8:22:56 PM) Michael: it sucks
(8:22:59 PM) Michael: dial up
(8:23:00 PM) JoeBruin88: modem?
(8:23:02 PM) Michael: dont laugh
(8:23:04 PM) JoeBruin88: OMG
(8:23:12 PM) JoeBruin88: Fallbrook sucks
(8:23:21 PM) Michael: no cable sucks
(8:23:27 PM) JoeBruin88: how’s your brother doing at cal?
(8:23:35 PM) Michael: the stupid company says it’s not worth it to come out here
(8:23:43 PM) Michael: I don’t know
(8:23:46 PM) JoeBruin88: does he like all the weirdos?
(8:23:48 PM) Michael: he came down here
(8:23:54 PM) Michael: last week
(8:24:04 PM) Michael: seemed kinda down
(8:24:16 PM) Michael: said it was alot diffent from here
(8:24:16 PM) JoeBruin88: oh yeah?
(8:24:19 PM) Michael: ya
(8:24:31 PM) JoeBruin88: sounds like he needs to make some friends
(8:24:36 PM) JoeBruin88: school is tough
(8:24:36 PM) Michael: but he has only been there for 2 months
(8:24:47 PM) Michael: ya he has some
(8:24:48 PM) JoeBruin88: it is very demanding
(8:25:02 PM) Michael: but likes his friends here better
(8:25:04 PM) Michael: ya
(8:25:26 PM) Michael: he said everyone there got like perfect scores in 8th grade on the SAT
(8:25:48 PM) JoeBruin88: wow, I would be spending my entire life to get our of there (fallbrook)
(8:25:58 PM) Michael: LOL
(8:26:09 PM) Michael: ya I guess
(8:26:11 PM) JoeBruin88: it’s the same at ucla
(8:26:15 PM) Michael: it grows on you though
(8:26:22 PM) Michael: oh I bet
(8:26:23 PM) JoeBruin88: I was the valedictorian in high school
(8:26:24 PM) Michael:
(8:26:29 PM) JoeBruin88: and so was everyone else
(8:26:30 PM) Michael: really
(8:26:36 PM) Michael: huh
(8:26:38 PM) JoeBruin88: I felt stupid there
(8:26:39 PM) Michael: what’s that
(8:26:44 PM) Michael: oh
(8:26:49 PM) Michael: I get
(8:26:51 PM) Michael: it
(8:26:54 PM) Michael: at ucla
(8:26:58 PM) JoeBruin88: til I hit my groove in my last two years
(8:27:11 PM) Michael: ?
(8:27:34 PM) JoeBruin88: well, it’s kind of a strange story, but interesting
(8:27:43 PM) Michael: really
(more…)

Tags: Bible, born-again, Christian, faith, former-student, Spiritual, truth

Things started out badly when we arrived at the Players Sports Bar in Clairemont Mesa. There were a ton of people in the bar and lots of televisions. But the UCLA game was only on one tiny little TV. There were a few alumni people there. I thought it was pretty lame. Not even a single seat available. And I definitely did not want to stay in a noisy bar just to watch a football game on some 10″ TV. So we left. I’m never going to that place again. It was so lame. Certainly the UCLA Alumni Club of San Diego can do better than that place.

Off to Oggi’s in Carmel Mountain Ranch, hoping that they would have the game on Fox Sports West 2. Well, we were in luck. We had meatball sandwiches. I had Greek Salad with mine. And that was about the end of the good times because Arizona had scored four touchdowns in the first quarter.

This game was destined for disappointment. Things went from bad to hopeless. Late in the third quarter, I saw the most retarded football play I have ever seen in my life. QB Drew Olson on 3rd down threw to someone. It got deflected into the Arizona end zone. Players were just standing around. Then an Arizona player jumped on the ball in the end zone. Touchdown Arizona, score 51 to UCLA 7.

We got up. I looked at another UCLA fan next to me and said, “I’ve seen enough.” Then we went home before the end of the quarter. It was a foregone conclusion: UCLA will be undefeated no more.

With a loss like that UCLA does not deserve to play in a national championship game. I think the Bruins will be very lucky if they get to play in one of the other three BCS bowl games. Final score tonight (I just looked up the score) Arizona 52, UCLA 14.

Tags: football, Sports, UCLA

Although it was released this past Tuesday, I finally purchased it. I am watching the documentary DVD 2 right now.

Tags: DVD, Movies, Star_Wars