Author Archives: TheUser

Day 4 – Snorkeling

Snorkeling at Electric Beach

We started today with snorkeling at Electric Beach. It was a ton of fun! We saw a lot of cool fish and some other odd things underwater. It was hard to get pictures of the fish, but we still managed to capture some cool shots with Alex and Darnell’s GoPro.

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After snorkeling, we tried to find some geocaches but failed miserably. Luckily we did have a lot of fun exploring and hiking. One of them appeared to be missing, but the other was probably just hidden too well. We went to a lagoon in hopes of seeing sea turtles, but there weren’t any there. It was quite beautiful though.

Day 3 – Waikiki

hawaii

We started the day by going to Chinatown and doing some fruit shopping. Then we headed to Waikiki to wander around. We ended up stopping on the beach to do some swimming for an hour or so. There might have been some playing in the sand too! Afterward we had Mai Tais while watching the sunset. Then we did some more wandering around the city before stopping for dinner in a little food court. And of course, we played with Tegan a bunch because she’s so adorable!

Day 2 – Black Friday

We started the day with an interesting twist; the Hurst fridge died, so we had to wait for it to be replaced. During that time, I shopped on the Toshiba site, taking advantage of a Black Friday sale to purchase TVs! That made me happy. After the fridge was installed, we decided to do some hiking.

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We headed to Manana trail after picking up some new board shorts for me that actually fit this time. The trail was great – very scenic with some challenging parts. We eventually hiked to Waimano Falls, which was a great little waterhole for some refreshing swimming and a sweet rope to swing out over the water. We had to climb up some rocks with the help of a rope to reach a place from which we could jump. Surprisingly, I found that my week doing in-door rock climbing at Rockreation helped prepare me for climbing this rock! Anyways, jumping in was a lot of fun, and the swimming itself was invigorating.

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While we were swimming, a full thunderstorm rolled into the area. It was really sweet honestly, and I guess we were technically hiking in a rainforest. There was a rock overhang, so we moved our stuff out of the rainfall, sat down on the rocks, and enjoyed our lunch. We had packed leftover Thanksgiving dinner sandwiches, which were quite delicious. The whole afternoon was pretty magical in my opinion!

Hiking in Hawaii

After the storm subsided, we hiked for a bit more before heading to Aulani to see Darnell. I’m glad we got to see her at work! We walked around a bit, taking into the sights, and even swam in an infinity jacuzzi and saw a music and dance performance! Aulani had great architecture and design. The Disney magic can be found here as well. I enjoyed seeing the Menehune sculptures, the legendary people of Hawaii who are craftsman and build many things when no one is looking. We had some fruity drinks before heading to Just Tacos for Mexican food. It was a fun evening.

Day 1 – Thanksgiving

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We began Thanksgiving by going to Ewa Beach! We brought Tegan, who had a ton of fun both in the sand and in the water.

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We bought bagels with us, so between playing in the sand and swimming in the ocean, we ate some delicious carbs.

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Back at the house, we played some Settlers of Catan. I had played once previously, Alex had played part of a mock game, and Darnell and gem had never played. It was a lot of fun. For some reason, Alex got pretty screwed. In the end, I won.

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The highlight of the day was the delicious meal! We had turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry relish, mushrooms, Brussels sprouts, pineapple au gratin, fresh baked bread, crackers, pretzels, dip, and pumpkin extravaganza! It was amazingly good. We had a wonderful and relaxing Thanksgiving.

Dynamic CSS based on weather

Raymond Camden wrote a great tutorial on loading style sheets dynamically based on the user’s current weather. He poked fun at himself and the idea a bit at the beginning of his post, but I think it’s honestly a terrifically fun idea. As it’s beginning to get a bit colder as we enter the holiday season, it would be very… cozy… to have a site recognize the weather and respond with some cool blues and whites!

Will I get around to implementing something like this? Probably not. But I find it pretty interesting anyways!

Wreck-It Ralph

Disney did it again with Wreck-It Ralph. I watched it this morning and was thoroughly impressed.  Parts of it were definitely predictable, but even if I knew where it would lead, the journey is what’s important after being infused with the Disney magic. And that’s not to say I saw every twist.

There were more to the game references than just character cameos. Seeing gaming culture in the movie was fun as it followed the change in popular games and the culture as a whole; although, it was odd that people were even in an arcade. That seems a little old-fashioned, but I do wish I had an arcade like that near me.

In addition to the main feature, there was an animated short at the beginning called the Paperman. While Wreck-It Ralph was great because I’m a gamer, the Paperman is a true masterpiece. You should definitely watch both!

Windows 8

Windows 8 Partner Box

Happy Windows 8 launch day! It’s nice that it’s finally here, but I suspect that we’ll have a lot of customer questions despite our preparations. The Windows 8 launch was one of a few causes of stress this week. Hopefully next week will be calmer.

For lunch today we went to P.F. Chang’s before heading over to the Microsoft Store. We wanted to play with Surface ourselves. The first thing I noticed was how nice the Microsoft Store itself was. It was bright, colorful, and very welcoming.

The Surface was fun to use, and the keyboard was interesting. There are two type of keyboards. The first is the Touch Cover. It’s a cover with a touch sensitive keyboard and touchpad. The keys don’t actually depress, but you can feel individual keys. It felt a little odd but worked well. The second keyboard is the Type Cover. It’s similar to the Touch Cover but has keys that actually depress. It’s like a laptop keyboard.

The Surface itself felt solidly built. Even the integrated kickstand felt secure and useful. I just wish the Surface Pro (with Windows 8 Pro rather than Windows RT) was available now rather than in three months. There hasn’t even been an announcement of the price!

There were no surprises relating to software. Windows 8 is, no surprise, the same Windows 8 that we’ve been using for a while now. There’s also no Windows 8 family pack or bundle, which is unfortunate. Most people probably have more than one computer. I have at least three that need to be upgraded. Of course, Windows 8 Pro is only $39.99, so I can’t really complain.

I’m pretty excited about Windows 8. It’s hard to predict how receptive the general population will be, but I suspect that after the initial fear of the unknown calms down, people will be fine with Windows 8. While I don’t use the “new interface” at all really, I’m frustrated using Windows 7 computers. I’m anxious to see what other Windows 8 devices are released, especially by Toshiba. We’ve already announced an ultra-book with a slide-out screen, converting between a tablet and laptop. It uses full Windows 8, not Windows RT. Microsoft is almost entirely pretending that the Surface Pro exists, which might be a strategy to keep its OEM partners happy. After unexpectedly entering the tablet market, by only providing a Windows RT tablet, they’re allowing OEMs (whether intentionally or not) to fill the hole with Windows 8 devices.

By the way, Microsoft gave everyone in Toshiba’s Digital Product Division a box like the one in the photograph. It contained a Windows 8 t-shirt, a stress cube, some stickers, a bag, and a pen! Sadly it didn’t contain any hardware or even a copy of Windows 8!

Beatbot the Beatbox

Beatbot the Beatbox 1

Has it been long enough that I don’t have to be embarrassed by this? Beatbot the Beatbox was a game that I attempted to make a game development course at UCI. It never got anywhere near completion. You can read more about it here, where you’ll also find a PowerPoint presentation, documentation, and the download.