Way back near the end of February, I was just browsing the net and sort of doing that near-zombie like surfing mode. This mode has led to other results, such as the purchase of a LiveJournal, rearranging keyboard keys, playing insane practical jokes. On this particular occasion, I was sort of seduced by a little bit of advertising from Live365.com. Actually, I was listening to the Inktank.comEDY station, where various segments from Saturday Night Live and The Groundlings were intermixed with tracks from the comedy albums of people like Bill Cosby, Robert Schimmel, Louie Anderson, and Robin Williams. Anyone who has listened to Live365.com knows that if you do so with all those banner ads, then you’re sort of also subject to their enticement for you to buy your own Internet radio station and broadcast audio tracks.

In my mind, the big question became about “Who the fuck would want to subject themselves to my brand of music?” I have a rather eclectic taste, after all. I love the sounds of Frank Sinatra and all the golden voices from that era, 40s era Big Bands, Jazz, Japanese Pop, Anime soundtracks, movie soundtracks, and some sparse 80s tunes. If you pour all of that into a pot and stir vigorously, you end up with Radio Free WNOHGB. Sprinkle lightly with comedy tracks as well, because I love to laugh (who doesn’t?). Again, I thought, “Hey, no one is going to listen to this, but it would be cool to have my collection of mp3s available no matter where I go.” So, based on that midnight logic, I bought a station for about nine bucks and it came with the typical 100 megs of storage space. Even though I have to reduce the bit rate and frequency, nineteen gigs of music is still going to be rather daunting for a hundred megs of space. Of course, I bought additional space, going from 100 to 500. I figured that 500 megs would be quite enough. I didn’t actually intend to convert my entire library and upload it, just what I considered to be the best of the best. Right now, I’m at 700 megs of used space out of 1.1 gigs.

RF-WNOHGB seems to have generated a lot of listeners, if I were to take the listener statistics that Live365 offers with the membership seriously. Within those two months, things are going pretty well so far. Every now and again I tend to surprise people with a live broadcast, interacting with the players on WNOHGB in a slightly-delayed format has made for some good interactive fun. I’m hoping that in the future we’ll be able to do more with the capabilities that keep being offered by Live365 on a semi-quarterly basis.

“You’re listening to Radio Free WNOHGB.”

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Ah, what a wonderful thing sleep can be sometimes. For the most part, I sometimes tend to think upon it as a hinderance in the middle of a really good day. When you’re involved or wish to be involved in something fun, and fatigue sets in, I always get angry at my lack of stamina. While this whole moving experience isn’t exactly what I would call fun, it’s not so much about the task as it is the people who help you complete it. I’m fortunately in my current job to have a wonderful group of co-workers, who’re just as keen in maintaining levity as I am.

I got home last night and climbed into bed, and I put one of my DVDs in the player and put it on repeat. The DVD is Horatio Hornblower: The Examination for Lieutenant (Known simply as ‘The Fire Ships’ in the US). In truth, I’ve actually had this on repeat over the past week, while I sleep. I like having the TV on while I sleep, because it just gives me a little comfort. Some nights, I just need peace and quiet, but others, I’ll leave something playing or music going. Anyway, I could let all of the Hornblower movies run all day and all night and I wouldn’t grow tired of them in the slightest. I’ve read the books up Lord Hornblower, and now, thanks to a really good friend of mine, I am now reading into the Alan Lewrie series by Dewey Lambdin.

Where Hornblower is about a rather unassuming young man growing up in a fish-out-of-water story, funding himself to be more courageous than he thought and earning the respect of those around him, Lewrie is like the antithesis. Lewrie is a rascal, a cad… but he’s got a great sense of humor. Where Hornblower would be gallant, Lewrie is more likely to turn tail and run. In this, Lewrie just has more depth and characterization. Hornblower is a predictable bore next to Lewrie… but I would still read both books a thousand times over. If you’ve got the chance to buy or read these books, I highly recommend you do so.

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I’ve re-entered college this quarter, trying to pursue my degree in Japanese with all the enthusiam that I can muster. I’m already into the third week, now, and with fifteen units I’m beginning to really feel the burn, so to speak. It’s been kind of hectic to keep up with all the homework and even more so it’s just damned complex on top of doing my job.

I’m not talking about what I do on WNOHGB, either. It’s called trying to pay the bills and make life somewhat comfortable for myself. Have you ever tried to balance the need for new anime versus the need for sustanance? For a mature person, it’s no question. For me, admittedly a rather illogical person, it’s difficult. Hell, I want the latest and greatest, but reality bogs me down. So, my job pays for the ability to spend money on the stuff I want. That’s reasonable. Problem is, now I’m working 14 hour work days and going to school, and doing all my extracirricular crap, too.

As I write this, I’ll have been up for going on 40 hours. We’re moving facilities from Palo Alto to Mountain View, and I’ve sort of already grown attached to my new cube. I love it. It’s clean, it’s new, it’s just really really cool. I was the first to move into the department’s area, and I set up all the monitoring stuff for the group. Working weekends primarily, I’ve got most of the week off, but this week, I’m putting in massive amounts of overtime. So, I’m on my sixth wind, but it’s not quite as impressive to me as my second wind was. My t’gallants are still and I am feeling very becalmed.

Earlier, though, I was giddy as all hell. I was lauging, joking around with some of the other night-owls. I played a round of foozball in the new gaming room. We moved all our video and physical games into a designated room. At the old building, we just stuffed everything in one room… food, drinks, games, supplies. It was kind of cramped in there, y’know? And right now, as I’m feeling the effects of massive sleep-deprivation, I was also driven to actually get a livejournal. I’m sure tomorrow I’m going to wonder what the fuck I was thinking…

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I don’t actually have much to say, but this seemed like a good idea for right now. For some reason, writing journal entries in MS Word just doesn’t seem to have the same feel as it would in a diary. Yes, I did used to keep one of those things when I was a lot younger. I’m sure I’ll have more to say here at a later time.

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