Well, I’m a bit miffed at DeviantArt. It seems you can’t subscribe to a member’s online journal’s RSS feed unless you’re a DeviantArt member. I can understand not being able to post comments unless you’re a member to cut down on spammers, MySpace is the same way. The difference though is that MySpace let’s non-members subscribe to RSS feeds.

I have no clue why DeviantArt is blocking access to the RSS feed, non-members can still read the journals on the website. And while DeviantArt does have paid memberships, they also have free ones which I’m assuming can also access the RSS feed.

So in general, unless I’m missing something it seems to me that DeviantArt is just trying to control something that shouldn’t be restricted. And honestly, if I had access to the RSS feed I’d be more likely to check out the site more often since I wouldn’t have to remember to check eveytime I wanted to see if my friends there had new content to read.

Well folks, it finally happened. Yes, I bought a car. It’s a used silver 2006 Ford Taurus. I’ll be picking it up Monday morning after work. It’s very nice, lots of leg room which is important for me. I do plan on replacing the radio eventually though with one that will integrate with my iPod.

Just heard about this product on CNet’s Buzz Out Loud podcast. It’s a standard AA battery with a built in charger. The top of the battery flips up to reveal a usb dongle so you can charge it via your computer. The downside? Right now it’s only available in the UK. But hopefully they’ll come to the states soon. Also they’re working on other size batteries.

Did a slight change on the naming scheme of the urls for my posts and pages so if you have any deep links to anything I’ve written there’s a good chance those won’t work anymore and will need to be updated.

Went to Dorney Park yesterday with the girls and their dad and their friend. Had a great time, they even got me on a couple roller coasters, which isn’t easy. The two roller coasters they got me on were the Talon and the Hydra. Both of which are the type of coaster were your feet are dangling instead of in a car, which I think is easier on me since I get cramped in those relatively small cars.

We also went to WildWater Kingdom which is the water park section of Dorney. We rode a bunch of water slides, as well as the Runaway River were you just float around the water park. One of the girls really enjoyed it since she found money in a couple grates at the bottom of the water.

We also got stuck for a bit on the Revolution, but it wasn’t too bad.

All in all I had an awesome time visiting my friends and hope I get to come back to visit again sometime.

My friend I’m visiting runs a program called Scribbles that meets and allows kids (and adults) express themselves through poetry, as well as gives them somewhere to go and be with other people instead of something like a gang. I was fortunate enough to visit during one of their meetings and participate. The kids there were terrific writers.

Later in the evening myself, my friend’s two daughters and their dad went to laser tag. It was a blast! We were lucky enough to be the only four in the arena during our game so that added to the fun. It was two-on-two, guys versus girls. Their dad and I hit them more times but they still won since they hit our base more.

And after we got home we played a few rounds of Catch Phrase, which is a game where you have to get your team to say a certain word without using that word and before time runs out.

All in all, definitely a fun day, can’t wait for tomorrow, we will be going to the amusement/water park.

I’m on vacation visiting friends in Pennsylvania for a few days. Got in yesterday, flight was uneventful, although person behind me got stopped by security.

Last night for dinner my friends took me out to a Japanese steak house, one of those places where they cook your food in front of you.

The food was good, as was the entertainment, although my friends said the chef wasn’t as friendly as the one they had before. But the chef was nicer than the waiter who took our order, not much in the way of personality.

I’ll have to check and see if there’s any similar restaurants near my home.

Found an article over at SuperHeroHype that revealed the list of Transformers who would be appearing in the Transformers movie coming out next year, as revealed by the screenwriters during a Yahoo! webcast.

Autobots:
Optimus Prime
Bumblebee
Jazz
Ratchet
Ironhide

Decepticons:
Megatron
Starscream
Brawl
Bonecrusher
Barricade
Scorponok
Frenzy
Blackout

The Autobots make sense to me, obviously since this is a live action/CGI film they can’t have every Autobot but they picked some good ones, including one of my favorites from the cartoon, Jazz.

The Decepticons on the other hand.. I remember seeing somewhere else online that some of the Transformers would be new ones not seen before in the Transformers universe, and apparently they’re all Decepticons, but what gets me is they seem to be reusing some of the names (Brawl, Bonecrusher, Scorponok and Frenzy). Now granted, they could be the originals, but due to the nature of the originals I find it unlikely (the first two were on 5 and 6 robot “teams” that combined into one giant Transformer for example.)

At least though they put Starscream in, another favorite of mine.

And on another note it was announced that Peter Cullen will be voicing Optimus Prime in the new movie, and for those who aren’t aware Peter Cullen voiced Prime in the original Cartoon and animated movie in the 80′s.

It’s just two bad that Chris Latta and Scatman Crothers (original voices of Starscream and Jazz, respectively) both have passed away, their voices both fit those characters so well in my mind.

Got the link to the logo generator from Veronica’s site, I’m still trying to figure out how to make it the logo on the top of the blog, if anyone has any idea on what to change in the WordPress files I’d appreciate it.

Friend sent me a link to this site the other day. Star Trek inspired spoofs of those inspiration posters you see everywhere these days.

Heard some of the strangest news I’ve heard in a while on CNet’s Gadgettes podcast. Apparently AGFRAG Entertainment is developing a video game based on Bob Ross. Yes folks, sometime in the future you can make happy little trees and poofy little clouds on your PC, Nintendo DS or Nintendo Revolution according to this article on IGN

There is also a contest where you can submit your own art and the winner gets their entry included on the box art.

I picked up the new Gargoyles comic the other day at my local comic shop. I’d seen an ad for it a couple months ago and had added it to my pull list, but I hadn’t realized until a couple days ago that it was written by Greg Weisman, the creator of the Gargoyles tv show. Yes folks, that means that this comic is the first canon work for the Gargoyles universe in about a decade, give or take.

The first two issues are pretty much the same as the first episode of The Goliath Chronicles, which was the only episode that Greg was involved with, but starting with issue 3 there will be a completely new, never before seen by the public, story arc.

Got back from my trip to California this morning around 1 am, long cramped flight, but the trip was worth it. I went to attend I-Manicon 2006, the annual fan club members only convention for The Invisible Man put on by the I-Maniacs.

I had a blast, I arrived Friday afternoon, though a bit later than planned due to a flight delay, and when we got to the hotel we hooked up with some of the others who had already arrived than went to get some food. Afterwards I took a nap for a bit before helping put the goody bags for the con together.

The hotel was very nice, and from what I hear unless something better comes up before then, the con will most likely be there next year as well.

Saturday, the day of the con, was awesome! Was nice to see some of the attendees from previous years, got to catch up with some of them. Also got to meet some new people. Once everyone arrived we watched an episode of the show and some music videos made by a fan club member. We also played “O Crap” a themed version of bingo which was neat, and not just because I won a prize, a magnet.

After that we went to lunch at the Encounter Restaurant, which is inside the Los Angeles International airport. The food was ok, but the place made up for it with the sci-fi/space theme.

After lunch we went back to the hotel, and we watched an unaired pilot that Vincent Ventresca, the title character on The Invisible Man, did that a fan club member was able to get ahold of.

We then watched some more music videos until our guests arrived. First to show up were Eddie Jones and his wife Anita, who was also in an episode of the show. They signed autographs and did photo ops with the attendees for a bit and then Mike McCafferty showed up. He also did autographs and photos, and he even remembered me from the Chicago con which was very cool.

Next Vincent showed up, this was actually his first time appearing at one of our cons, all the other guests had been to at least one before. He was very nice, as were all the guests, and he did the autograph and photo thing while we waited for our last guest to arrive. He also found out we had copies of a couple of his unaired pilots, something not even he had, so we gave him copies as well. Then when Paul Ben-Victor, who like Eddie and Anita, was at last years convention. When Paul arrived we switched from autographs and photos to a Q&A session for a bit, during which the last guest showed up, Jason Makiaris, who guest starred in an episode of the show, and who is a friend of Mike’s who was also at the Chicago con. Shannon Kenny was also supposed to attend, but something came up at the last minute and she couldn’t make it, but hopefully she’ll be able to come next year.

After the Q&A we did group shots with the actors as well as one big group shot with all the attendees. We had to rush a bit on that part though since Vince had to be out around 5ish to go somewhere, although he was nice enough to stay a tad later to finish the photos.

Afterwards we treated the rest of the guests to dinner at Cafe Pinguini, the food was decent although it was a bit noisy. Mike’s family met us there and joined as well, he has a cute kid.

After dinner we headed back to the hotel, where Mike and Jason joined us for a bit, and told us about some the stuff they’re working on, including Robots of Comedy, a humorous, albeit corny, internet video project. He also told us a movie he filmed around the time his son was born (approximately two years ago) is finally coming out in September. The ironic thing is, one of the actors in the movie is also in My Super Ex-Girlfriend, which was filmed later but is being released first, go figure.

I’m hoping to be able to stay longer next year and also attend Comic-Con, which is always the weekend after our con since quite a few of the attendees go to both and can’t afford to fly out to California twice.

There was also some exciting news that was sort of mentioned, but I can’t go into it yet, but once I can expect another post on it…

…you know you own something and you can’t put your hands on it, and yet you know you’ll find it the moment after you no longer need it?

Found a couple cool sites tonight while surfing. They both have downloads of video game music and sound files.

The first site is VGMusic.com and has a nice selection of midis of videos games, both classic and newer ones, including Halo.

The other one is OverClocked ReMix and as the name suggests it has a ton of remixes of video game music.

Went to Motor City Comic Con yesterday. Didn’t stay as long as I normally do though, had to do other stuff, so this will be a short report.

Saw John Wesley Shipp, who played Barry Allen/The Flash on the The Flash tv series that was on in the early nineties. He was very nice and friendly, although I’ve not really met anyone at these conventions who’s been mean and grouchy.

After that we stood in a slightly longer than normal line for the con to see Brent Spiner, who played Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation, among other roles. He was also nice, although since the line was long for him they kept us moving a bit more so than with John Wesley Shipp.

That’s correct, you’re iPod, or other mp3 device could help you save a life one day. The Sussex Ambulance Service in the UK has a page with audio files you can download to find out what to do in an emergency situation.

A few things though, as mentioned on the site:

I bought a new laptop last Friday. My old one had been in the shop for about a month before they told me it wasn’t really worth repairing, just wish I’d known that during my vacation. I did get a nice system tho, I ended up getting a 15.4″ Toshiba Qosimo. Much nicer than my old system. I now have a DVD burner, built-in wireless and a built-in slot for my camera’s memory (the memory is relatively newer so this is the first time I’ve seen a slot for it on a laptop). And the graphics are a lot better as well. And I haven’t played with it yet, but the laptop also has a built-in TV tuner and DVR functionality.

Found this quiz on Apple over at the BBC News site.

I got seven out of ten right, how many can you get?

No, I don’t mean Steve Jobs. I’m talking about New York City. Which is where I went last Sunday during my trip to visit friends in Connecticut over the weekend.

I got there Friday night and my friends picked me up form the airport and we drove back to their place and had some home-made chili, which was awesome. Him and I then played City of Heroes for a while before bed since we were both anxious to play. I actually met them through the game.

Saturday we went out to Denny’s with his brother and future sister-in-law. Afterwards we went back to their place and played some more CoH while the two ladies went shopping.

Later on we decided to go bowling, although that didn’t quite work out. When we got there we were told we couldn’t bowl until the next shift which was about thirty minutes away even though half the lanes were open. But we decided to wait, so while we did him and I looked for a ball, which wasn’t much fun. Almost all of the balls had finger holes that you’d have to be a skeleton to be able to use. But we finally found a couple, and then went up to pay at the counter so we could start bowling, only to find out it was $18 a person. So we left.

On the way back to their place we stopped to rent a couple movies, we picked up Sky High and Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. We then had shrimp scampi with linguini and snap peas, which was delicious. We then watched Sky High which seemed appropriate considering we met on an online game based on super heroes and super villains. It was a really good movie too, cute, funny, action, definitely thinking of buying it.

Sunday we drove to the train station and rode to Grand Central Station, which was biiiiig. We then found a tour bus that we could pay one price and use the ticket all day if we wanted to stop anywhere. The first part was really nice, it was a bit chilly but not too bad. Saw lots of sights including Times Square, the Empire State Building, and Macy’s.

When we got to China Town we got off to meet some people and afterwards before getting back on the bus we stopped at a hot dog cart so I could try an official New York hot dog. However, we found out after buying them they weren’t the same hot dogs that the cart advertised which were Sabrett’s, which are the unofficial “official” hot dog of new York. So, even the hot dogs have counterfeits in New York.

We then got back on the tour bus, while it was raining and since the bus was open at top the seats were wet, so even with a plastic poncho on them they were still cold and damp. It also got colder so I didn’t take the camera out as often on this part of the tour and I missed some of what the guide said due to the wind. I did get a picture of a couple of courthouses though, one of which they use to film exterior shots for the Law & Order series. We also saw the outside of Central Park.

After the tour we walked back to Grand Central to catch our train back, then they drove me to La Guardia to catch my flight, which arrived back home safely.

I definitely had an awesome time and hope I get to visit them again sometime.