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Video Games
I must say that I enjoy playing video games on my PlayStation 2. I'm not very good, so I don't play all that often. I recently bought a few games off eBay. I also bought a steering wheel and Gran Turismo 4. However, I'm really bad at games and my driving consists of steering into walls most of the time. Since I wasn't very good at Gran Turismo, I saw that the wheel also worked with Burnout, so I played that and thought it was quite cool. Realizing that this was an ancient version, I bought Burnout Revenge. It turns out either that I'm OK at this game or they made it quite easy. In either case, I am having a great time playing it. My poor driving skills don't seem all that poor (however, I found that the Dual Shock controller works better than the steering wheel for control). My wife thinks I'm crazy as I've played for a few hours at a time for the last week. I'm about 30% complete and am making decent progress, all while having a pretty good time. It's amazing that this game has kept my attention for so long already; usually I play games for a few minutes and get bored. Kudos to the folks at Electronic Arts for producing this addictive game!
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Cycling class
I've been going to a cycling class 2-3 days a week for about 2 years now, not to learn to cycle (obviously), but to stay in shape. Over that time, I've had a number of instructors at 2 different facilities ranging from the instructor that thought it was a Latino dance class (based on the music she was playing) to the instructors you can tell have done real cycle training. This morning I went to the gym, happy as a clam as I just fixed 2 serious code bugs, and see an instructor named Wendy teaching the class. She isn't the normal instructor and I've had her as a cycle instructor before. Actually, she is the reason I no longer goto Sunday classes; she took over the Sunday class from another instructor. I find that she is loud, annoying, and not very competent at teaching. The commands she yells out (you can hear her half way across the gym) are sometimes helpful, but sometimes plain stupid. She keeps saying "Gear up" and "Gear down". I think the reason this annoys me so much is that it is so inaccurate. The stationary bicycles are all based on resistance as they have a belt that goes around the wheel and pushing the lever "up" adds more resistance. I suspect she learned those words at a training class and keeps using them, but really doesn't have a clue that the bicycles don't have gears.
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Crashes, crashes, crashes
One thing I really hate about releasing software is that no matter how much testing you do, it is bound to crash on users. Now the problem is, how can I reproduce the crashes and fix the issues? Users swear they can reproduce the issues, but I usually can't no matter how much I stand on my head and type with my feet. There must be a better way to extract data from customers and troubleshoot issues.
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The Mothership called
No, I'm not talking about aliens, I'm talking about Apple Computer. I got a cold call from a researcher at Apple who saw my resumé on Linked In. (I've thought that Linked In was kind of a joke, but now I might reconsider.) Apparently my resumé looked interesting for a couple of positions. Unfortunately the big sticking point is my unwillingness to leave San Diego and move to Cupertino. I know my in-laws would love for us to move, but it just isn't happening. I got a follow up call from an Apple recruiter as they're looking for people that do human interface. Now, if I was willing to move, I could possibly get a job there. The recruiter will pass my name along to the group that does contract hiring, so who knows, maybe I can become a contractor.