vidar.gimp.org

QuicKutz Silhouette under Linux

vidar — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 14:30:46 +0000

Linda recently bought herself a QuicKutz Silhouette plotter/cutter (a re-branded Graphtec CC200-20, actually), and I thought it would be an interesting project to get the device working under Linux. And it was! After a few days of intense observation (my first real USB-sniffing project) I had most of the protocol pat down, and I hereby present graphtecprint v1.0 (a somewhat odd name, considering it?s not really a printer, but since itself claims to be I?ll just go on and humour it).

Wii!

vidar — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 10:01:24 +0000

So, finally, after close to 25 years of not owning a video game console (the previous one was a Philips Videopac G7000 system from the early 1980s), we finally took the plunge and got ourselves a Nintendo Wii system. It was bundled with Wii Sports and one freely selectable game, so we chose Super Mario Galaxy, which has been getting great reviews. Also, we threw in the Cars game for Marius, which instantly proved itself an enormous success. Ka-chow!

It’s been really fun so far (The “physics” in Super Mario Galaxy is a real mind-bender!), with the possible exception of having sore muscles in places we didn’t know existed. Then again, Linda and myself shook hands on trying to stay fit and exercise more this year…

(I didn’t bother with a mod chip yet. And I resent the hardware manufacturers for making me need one. Being able to make backup copies of my legally purchased games to avoid damaging the originals should be a mandatory feature, not something you have to (in their eyes) break the law to enable. Yes, yes, I know it’s meant to hinder piracy, but copy protection shouldn’t be an obstacle to paying customers. So there.)
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LastFMProxy v1.3

vidar — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:35:52 +0000

Here is the latest and greatest version of LastFMProxy so far. The previous version had more than a few quirks, and hopefully these have now been taken care of. Changes are mostly related to charset issues, but new features include ?audioscrobbling? (submission of tracks to your Last.FM profile) and much faster metadata updates; they should be about ?live? now. Download links, changelog and readme here. Happy listening.

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More movies

vidar — Wed, 23 May 2007 19:43:51 +0000

A few more nano-reviews:

Boogie Nights
An oldie (1997), but very much goldie from Paul Thomas Anderson, the brilliant man behind Magnolia. The latter has been a favourite of mine for years, so it was about time I got around to watching this one. The two movies are similar in many ways, and I recommend both highly. Like Magnolia, it’s a lengthy drama, but with some good humour sprinkled on top. If you don’t let the running time or the genre scare you away, you are in for a big treat. (If you’ve seen the movie you may giggle now.)

Little Miss Sunshine
A heart warming comedy about a dysfunctional family on a road trip to enter cute, little Olive into a beauty pageant. Sounds cuddly, doesn’t it? This was a pleasant surprise, because the humour in the movie was much, much darker than what I had expected - sex and drugs play dominant roles in the plot. So go see it.
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Movies

vidar — Mon, 07 May 2007 09:10:15 +0000

I watch a lot of movies - or try to, at least, but I rarely write anything about them. I thought I would try to change that, so here are some short reviews of things I’ve watched recently.

(While movies have long been one of my primary interests, my recently renewed interest in the art came about as a result of stumbling across movielens.org, a site where you can rate movies you’ve seen and get recommendations back, based on the ratings of people who appear to have a taste similar to yours, also known as collaborative filtering. It seems to be working fairly well, so I recommend you go and try it.)

The Fountain
This is one of the most fascinating movies I’ve seen in a while, to be honest. It’s a visual and thought-provoking story that spans a 1000 years, touching on subjects such as life, death, love and mortality. It is beautifully shot, perfectly cast and the soundtrack is fantastic. (Those who have seen Requiem for a Dream should know that Aronofsky knows how to score a movie.)

Adaptation.
Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman, the duo behind the brilliantly funny Being John Malkovich are back in one of the most cleverly written movies ever. Seriously. It’s about the movie’s very screenwriter, Charlie Kaufman, and his quest to adapt a book to a screenplay, and the challenges therein.

Deja Vu
Denzel Washington is back to save the day in this popcorn-friendly action flick, which actually isn’t all that bad. I’m usually not too crazy about what mainstream Hollywood puts out, but this one has a somewhat interesting plot that manages to keep my interest throughout. I’m reluctant to say more, as I wouldn’t want to spoil anything, but if you want a movie that’s entertaining and doesn’t take itself too terribly seriously, this just might do the trick.

last.fm and the stuff in my pants

vidar — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 10:46:17 +0000

Now, if that subject doesn’t make you want to run away screaming, you’re a sick, sick person.

Anyway, allow me to explain. last.fm is a 100% free internet radio station that actually plays music that it predicts you will like, based on what you already have listened to. Very clever and highly recommended. I have discovered more new bands that I could possibly count based on their recommendations.

Allright, moving on. About my pants, in the last.fm community, there has been an incredibly silly game going on there for a while. The rules are simple:
- Play 25 random songs from your collection
- Add the words "in my pants" to the song titles
- Mark the best ones with bold
- Post the results in your last.fm journal

How could I possibly resist?

Here is my contribution:

Swallow the Sun - Don’t Fall Asleep in my pants
Kamelot - Center of the Universe in my pants
Trivium - Dying in Your Arms in my pants
Dimmu Borgir - Dreamside Dominions in my pants
In Flames - Worlds Within the Margins in my pants
Dark Lunacy - Now is Forever in my pants
Swallow the Sun - Too Cold of Tears in my pants
Opeth - Death Whispered a Lullaby in my pants
Kamelot - Serenade in my pants
Samael - Reign of Light in my pants
Norther - Death Unlimited in my pants
Graveworm - Dreaming into Reality in my pants
Dimmu Borgir - Blood Hunger Doctrine in my pants
Communic - Frozen Asleep in the Park in my pants
Sirenia - Save me from Myself in my pants
Searing Meadow - Infamous Lines in my pants
Satyricon - Delirium in my pants
Pain - Play Dead in my pants
Process Of Guilt - Motionless in my pants
In Flames - Food for the Gods in my pants
Shape of Despair - Angels of Distress in my pants
Trail of Tears - As it Penetrates in my pants
Tristania - Pale Enchantress in my pants
Swallow the Sun - The Giant in my pants
Blind Guardian - War of Wrath in my pants

Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone if you accidentally snicker at any of these titles. It will be our little secret.

Biannual update

vidar — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 08:48:23 +0000

Wow, I really suck at this blogging business, don’t I?

Anyway, here is today’s random selection of brain lint.

On new year’s eve I proposed to Linda, and the crazy wench accepted! We’re doomed! Aaah!! (I’m joking, dear. Ow. Stop. OW!)

Red wine and my recently acquired movie quiz book go together like … two things that go together really well. Especially the red wine. That goes together exceptionally well. (Certainly better than the beer I had last weekend, when we celebrated Michael’s (a friend of ours) 30th birthday, which brought me a insaneously hidderous headache, despite only consuming a few of them.) The quiz book was a great bargain, too. It cost me NOK 10.00 (approx EUR 1.25), and it contains 1800 questions (most of them pretty hard), and hopefully the same number of answers. We’re working on finding out.

In more technical news, I’m hoping to have fibre (FTTH) pulled through my wall soon - as in a few weeks. After moving to Karmøy, my ADSL has acted up quite a bit, dropping the connection every Nth minute, but only staying offline for 30 seconds or so. Enough to be annoying, nonetheless.

Music! I have discovered Dark Lunacy, a great melodic death metal band from Italy. Great stuff. Also, only a few more weeks until the Karmøygeddon Metal Festival kicks off, under which I plan to see Kamelot, Scar Symmetry and Communic. (May 5th on Byscenen, for those who may be interested.)

And I need more disk space.

Laban

vidar — Tue, 10 Oct 2006 08:09:16 +0000

The size of our family has increased yet again.

One of Linda’s online friends recently found a litter of kittens in her garage and announced the find online, asking for adopters. In a dramatic surge of mushiness, Linda managed to talk me into rescuing one of them, and this saturday we took a trip to Stavanger to pick him up. After a lengthy debate about names, we finally settled on Laban, after a friendly little ghost from one of Marius’ books. Disappointingly ungeeky, but such is life.

And in an unprecedented display of generosity, I have uploaded some pictures to Flickr for your enjoyment.

The fine art of asskicking

vidar — Thu, 21 Sep 2006 07:55:38 +0000

Haugesund isn’t a particularly large city, and hence is often deprived of many of the benefits of big city life. The lack of good concerts has long been a pet irk of mine. But things have apparently changed! Earlier this week, Bryan Adams came to town - and while he’s not anywhere near my cup of tea, nobody can argue that he’s not a big name. Yesterday, however, glam-, hair- and horror metal veterans W.A.S.P. dropped by, which is right up my alley!

And boy, do they still know their stuff! (I use the term “they” loosely, since the main song-writer and vocalist, Blackie Lawless, is the only one remaining of the original line-up, but the rest of the band did a great job as well.) What really sold the gig for me was the play list. Almost nothing but golden oldies, from the early 90s and back to the very beginning, which is exactly when I discovered the band. Except for one track, which was brand new, it was like a live “best of” compilation. Perfect!

The band also put the scaremongering pietists to shame and delivered nothing but a rock solid concert, almost devoid of special effects. I say almost, because the microphone stand was a sight to behold! (The local newspaper claimed that seeing the stand was worth the entry fee alone.) The band’s show in the earlier days included liberal amounts of skulls and fake blood, but that was how you provoked back then. An image like that would be nothing but cheesy these days, I suppose. (On a related note, I wish the black metal bands would lose the ridiculous corpse paint. Yes, yes, I know they’re supposed to look “dead” and all, but we all know they really aren’t!)

Conclusion: Top score from me. Minus one small point for not playing a longer set. 70 minutes (or so) was a bit too short for my tastes. Oh well.

PS! One things that certainly should not go unmentioned is their support band for the Norwegian gigs, Triosphere. Thunderous and powerful heavy metal, just the way your deity of choice intended it to be. (I guess this is a good time to admit that I tend to be a sucker for metal bands fronted by women. But only the good ones! (Good bands, that is. Ahum.)) Anyway, their debut album is out in October. Do check it out. I know I will!

Updates and stuff

vidar — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 08:08:55 +0000

Eek, time is running away from me again. It has been close to two months since my last confession. Eh, blog-entry. (I still hate the name “blog”, by the way. Just so you know.)

Much of my spare time has been spent offline lately. Partly due to us trying to convince Marte to kick the habit of demanding food during the nights - a probject which we declared a failure after about three weeks of little to no sleep for any of us. Our excuse was that she wasn’t putting on enough weight, so maybe she actually needs the extra meal.

Oh, and speaking of Marte, no less than two teeth popped up just before the weekend!

In other news, we are redecorating the top floor of the house. Luckily I was mentally present enough to remember to take a “before”-picture before we had actually disassembled the whole room. And equally clever taking an “after”-picture before we went and filled the room with all sorts of crap again:

(No, Tim, the one with the horrible colours is the “before” one. )

Bands that rock these days: Scar Symmetry, Trivium (thanks, Mel!), Slumber