This makes me sad. 

It makes me sad for two reasons.  The first is the obvious reason - I enjoy both Karen's work and Star Wars, and I'll miss her take on the Star Wars Universe.  

The second reason is that this is just one more thing that makes me wonder a bit about the direction of the SWU.  Ever since The Clone Wars movie and TV series, I've been slowly losing interest in Star Wars, or at least the most recent things to come out of Star Wars.  I finally watched The Clone Wars movie this week, and you know what?  I liked the book better.  (Guess who the author was.  Go on, guess.)  

I think it all started when I ran across this post on John Scalzi's blog.  Now, mind you, I've never read any of Scalzi's work, and being a SW fan, I approached it with a grain of salt.  By the time I finished reading the post, I was in shock.  While I don't agree with everything he says, overall?  Holy shit, he's right.  

Now, mind you, I respect George Lucas for doing his own thing regardless of what anyone thinks.  That's his right, and if he can make money doing it, more power to him.  But for me, it's becoming rather like that old sweatshirt that everyone's had for what seems like a thousand years.  It's comfortable, I still love it, but it's got a lot of holes and frayed ends, and in some places it just doesn't fit anymore.   Really, I ought to just replace the darn thing, but I just can't quite bear to part with it. 

Well, to look on the bright side, Karen still has a few SW tie-ins to finish up (looking forward to the two 501st books), and of course she has plenty of other things in the works.  I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed Gears of War: Aspho Fields, and I'm definitely enjoying Jacinto's Remnant.  As long as she keeps writing them, I'll keep reading them.  And maybe somewhere in there I'll find time to finally finish the NJO and read some of the X-Wing books (After LOTF, Aaron Allston is definitely on the list of authors I'd like to read more of).

I left my glasses at work, so I can't look at the computer for very long without getting a tension headache. 

I read some documentation on OpenInventor on my 12" laptop anyway, because I'm a dummy. 

I have a tension headache now, right between my eyes. 

All of which necessitates this being a very short post. 

Ooooh, that's a tough choice.  It would be tougher if I had more to go on, keeping in mind that I'm only really familiar with David Tennant and Christopher Eccleston.  Well, and vaguely with Peter Davison, since I've seen Time Crash.  I'm going to have to claim insufficient information on this one.  

I'm optimistic about Matt Smith, though, after watching this interview with him.  His hair is kind of goofy, granted, but then again isn't that kind of part of the Doctor persona?  There's goofy element right along with the more serious "the buck stops here" kind of element, and you never know which one is going to surface at any given time.  I like the way he talks with his hands, too, the way he'd kind of wiggle his fingers when he was trying to think of how to express something.  

We shall see, we shall see. 

Considering my job, the last thing I want to be doing outside work is answering questions.  This does remind me of an amusing story, though. 

Back when I worked at a pharmacy, we had to ask every patient that picked up a prescription if they had any questions about their prescriptions.  That, of course, was typically shortened to "Do you have any questions?", which naturally prompted the occasional smart ass, completely unrelated question.  I don't remember anyone ever asking for my phone number, but I did have one gentleman ask me "What's the meaning of life?". 

My answer? 

42. 

That got him.  42 FTW!

Ah, yoga.  So nice to get back to that class.  I was really lazy over break -- and the scale shows it.  And my pants.  I don't like putting pants on and realizing they're a bit smaller than they used to be.  I really need to get back to working out.  I might start going in the morning instead of the evening.  If there's one time during the day that I really don't want to work out, it's at the end of a long day.  Usually I just want to go home.  We'll see if the urge to stay in bed is more powerful than the urge to go home. 

I'm also going to keep my hands occupied with something other than snacks while I watch the Fiesta Bowl.  I'm going to work on my Buckeye Afghan!  Maybe it'll be good luck for our boys. 

Go Bucks!

I really need to stop waiting to post until 10:30 or 11:00 at night.  So sleepy....

I feel like I spent today catching up on all the things I probably won't have time to do once classes start -- which is tomorrow.  I caught up on DVR, watched my Netflix, and nearly finished the book I've been working on.  Right now I'm too sleepy to finish it though, and it looks like the ending will be worth being awake for.  

I can't decide if I like this book or not.  It's Cry to Heaven by Ann Rice.  Normally, I really enjoy her stuff, but this one has just been....well...long, I guess would be the word for it.  It's kind of like reading Tolkien.  When something is actually going on, it's good reading, but then you spend pages and pages rambling.  

Proof that shouting at your computer won't make it run faster....

Can't....stop....yawning!  This thing of having a random day off in the middle of the week is messing with my sleep pattern, man.  It's not good. 

I bought my book for 681 today.  It's basically a detailed walk-through of how to write a ray tracer from what I've read so far.  Mmmm, ray tracing.  It's also quite the skinny book for being a relatively advanced computer science text, I was a little surprised.  Not that I was expecting a massive tome or anything -- now that I think of it, I don't think I've had anything too massive since I took chemistry a few years back.  Funny how the more advanced the class is, the smaller the textbook seems to become. 

The examples in the book are all in C++ too.  I'll have to whip out my trusty old C++ reference.  Fortunately, I'm not that out of practice.  I kind of skimmed the example in the first chapter, but I didn't have much trouble following it. 

Mmf.  OK, sleep time before I end up with QWERTYUIOP tattooed on my forehead. 

I learned something new about myself today.  I actually like sauerkraut.  My mother has made pork and sauerkraut for dinner every New Year for as long as I can remember.  I never touched the stuff just because it smells so horrible when it's cooking, and I figure anything that smells that horrible probably tastes pretty horrible too. 

I actually tried some sauerkraut balls when I went to Schmidt's a couple of weeks back with my Aunt, uncle, cousin and cousin-in-law, so I suppose this evening's repast wasn't technically my first time eating sauerkraut. 

In any case, apparently eating sauerkraut and pork chops is supposed to bring good fortune in the new year.  Here's hoping it works. 

I also learned that 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy, hence the logo to the right.  I'm a bit of an amateur astronomer myself, and looking forward to participating.  I'll have to find out if the Astronomy department at OSU is holding any interesting IYA-related activities. 

I am now going to go lay down.  I'm not sure what triggered it, but I feel like I'm having my usual reaction to artificial sweeteners (headache, nausea).   It's like a guzzled a Diet Coke or something.  Bleah. 

I am lame.  My New Year's party currently consists of posting to my LiveJournal and watching nist.time.gov for the leap second.  I am lame, and I am a geek. 

I am also all prepared to take another shot a NaBloPoMo starting tomorrow!  I have a nice new style on my journal and I uploaded a couple of new userpics for myself, including a crop of the smiley face conjunction of Venus, Jupiter and the moon, shamelessly nabbed from Mike Salway. 

Happy 2009, everybody!

OK, so nevermind on NaBloPoMo, at least for this month. Oh well. :(

Due to a combination of a pulled muscle in my back and my standard seasonal cold, I haven't seen the inside of a gym all week. That'll teach me to put 30 boxes of paper away on my own. Yikes. At least my back is feeling better. Now if my nose would just quit dripping....

I also must post this gem from one of my Quotes of the Day e-mails this week:

Does that make anyone else automatically think of this?

I can't think of anything interesting to post, again, so here's a blogthing: 

You Are Warrior II

You are confident and brave. Failure is not an option for you. You aren't easily intimidated or scared off. You will stand and fight. You have more endurance than anyone you know. You have a will of steel. When other people are giving up, you're the one just getting started.

May I present My Cat on Stuff, the birthday edition:

I took the Saturn back to Enterprise today.  Not only was the maintenance minder not reset properly, (it kept beeping at me telling me to change the oil), but the CD player doesn't work.  The maintenance minder I could ignore.  The CD player, I could live with, if it weren't a tin can on wheels. 

So now I have Kia Sportage.  Definitely more comfortable, and it smells better.  The Saturn smelled like an ashtray, which is especially annoying for a recovered smoker like myself. 

Anyway.  Shuttle Endeavor launches in just over an hour!  Yay shuttle launch!  I'm going to watch it on NASA TV. 

From today's OSU Today:

Committee explores possible conversion to semester system at OSU

Recently, Faculty Council voted unanimously to approve a proposal to appoint an ad hoc committee to explore the desirability and feasibility of Ohio State shifting to semesters and to propose to the University Senate that the university shift or not. The committee will present a resolution to the University Senate by the end of Winter Quarter, 2009.
The members of the ad hoc committee are: Cathy Bindewald, Office of the CIO; Kathryn Corl, Council on Academic Affairs; Martha Garland, Academic Affairs; Timothy Gerber, Athletic Council/Faculty Leadership (Ad Hoc chair); Donald Haurin, Council on Enrollment and Student Progress; Christopher Highley, ASC Committee on Curriculum and Instruction; Adam Kolatorowicz, Council of Graduate Students; Brian McEnnis, regional campuses; Meghan Meredith, Inter-Professional Council; Brad Myers, University Registrar; Josh Rackers, Undergraduate Student Government; John Roberts, dean of Humanities and the Arts; Valerie Shafer, Student Life; W. Randy Smith, Academic Affairs; Harald Vaessin, Fiscal Committee; and Ingrid Werner, Graduate Council.

---

Of course, this doesn't mean we'll actually make the switch, but this is the first I've ever seen it officially being talked about.  Rumors have existed easily since my Dad was a student. 

I can't decide if I like it or not.  It's going to be an absolute nightmare from an IT standpoint, and this on the heels of a new SIS system we're dealing with.  (Well, the software group is dealing with it....it's all kind of transparent to me.)

Bored at work? I'm never bored at work. Not anymore, anyway.

I used to get really bored when I was an operator. When I got bored, I'd play games online...I was a bit of a Neopets fiend at the time. I used to get in trouble for it, too. *sheepish grin* I would have been happy just reading, but SOC is often not a good place for me to read, either because I was being interrupted every five minutes (I can pause or close a game. There is no pause button on my train of thought.), or there were multiple conversations going on around me, which is very distracting if you're me. I still have trouble reading when people are talking, although not so much so if they aren't trying to talk to me.

I dropped my car off at the body shop today. I'm looking at probably a week and a half to two weeks without my car.

My rental is a Saturn Ion, also known as a tin can on wheels. What I really don't get is the speedometer. It (and the tachometer as well) are to the right of the dashboard, as opposed to somewhere near the driver's line of sight. Because, you know, that would make sense.

Well, all I wanted was something cheap to get me back and forth to work. You get what you pay for, I suppose.

I miss my car already.

Yet again, I prove that I'm a huge geek. When I noticed the mileage on my car a few weeks ago, l just had to pull over and take a picture.