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Thanks for reading my posts here!

I’ll admit it upfront: this blog didn’t last very long. Secretly I’ve always been planning to set up a WordPress.org blog, but I wanted to start blogging before I had decided on a web host & a domain name. Now I have those things, and am working on site design (putting my previous flash game project on hold). Conveniently, I’m on vacation from IIT, which gives me the freedom to invest time in brute force teaching myself this stuff. I’ll post a link on here to the new one when it’s more ready than it is now (not at all).

The day the iPhone 2.0 firmware upgrade came out, I spent most of the afternoon trying to connect to the overloaded servers to upgrade my phone.  While I waited, I perused the App Store for apps, downloading the ones I wanted to try so that they would be ready to sync right away.  I’ve trying out a few different apps that everyone seems to get like Remote, and I have a few others that I havenbeen ‘t really used yet, but thought I might want.  But there are four (free [except for Vay]) apps that make me love my iPhone all over again: Twitterrific, Pandora, Aurora Feint, and Vay.

Twitterrific is a twitter client for the iPhone.  I had used the Twitter web app before, and it got the job done.  Twitterrific not only gets the job done, but it looks good, is well-implemented, and adds lots of new options for mobile tweets, including automatically adding photos from the camera to twitpic when you select a photo for a tweet.  If you have an iPhone 3G, you can even geotag your tweets.

Pandora has been a popular internet radio service for a while, where you create stations from songs and artists that you like.  Pandora plays music similar to & including what you listed.  With this service on the iPhone, you basically have an infinite number of songs available for your listening pleasure.

Vay is the first RPG to show up on the iPhone.  It was originally released for Sega CD in 1994 so it is a great way to get your 90’s Japanese RPG fix in wherever you are.  It’s the first app I’ve actually paid for ($4.99) after Ben posted a tweet about it.  The controls work well and the battle graphics have been slightly ramped up.  Plus, thanks to my penchant for compulsively leveling up, I should be able to get nearly infinite game play out of this.

[Edit] To clarify: this game is really fun and addicting.  If you like RPGs I recommend Vay.

Finally, Aurora Feint (The Beginning), is an addictive puzzle game that makes great use of the accelerometer for changing the puzzles’ orientation to gravity.  You can level up to gain new abilities and make it easier to gather resources.  Given that this app was made in a pretty short period of time, I expect that subesquent chapters of this iPhone only MMO will be something to watch out for.

I want new sunglasses, check out the pictures and vote in the poll to let me know what your preference is, or make a suggestion with the “other” option.

Aviators

Wayfarers - weird smirk due to just finishing the MCAT.

In working for IIT at St. Olaf, I need to go into Regents Hall fairly often to check on building progress for classroom technology.  I took some pictures inside the building a few weeks ago, so it’s made substantial progress since then, but I thought these still might be interesting to anyone tracking building progress.  I’ll add some more when it’s closer to the August 15th deadline, and when I’m doing more installation in the building.  This first photo is me failing to adhere to the long pants only rule, oops.  Click on through for more photos.

One of several identical seminar rooms with a great view of the valley.

This trailer for Ferris Bueller’s Day Off was on Digg today; it combines two of my favorite things: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and the Requiem For A Tower movement by the Corner Stone Cues.

I’ve always been a big fan of the Scary Mary trailer because of how different it feels than the actual movie.

Yes, I’m at work right now.

Firefox 3 will be launching its commercial release soon.  I’ve been using the beta version and release candidates, and it’s awesome.  Way better than Safari and (hopefully you aren’t using it) ie.  Click on through to sign up to be notified when it launches so you can download it right away!

Summer is getting underway.  So far I’ve spent this one working for IIT at Olaf, studying for the MCAT (which I’m taking this friday [meep]), and dabbling in all sorts of web design and blogging things.  Until I decide exactly which direction I’m going with this, I’ve decided to stick with something with nice and clean, free hosting.  I had started out toying with SquareSpace, but after the 14 day trial you need to pay for their hosting.

The nice thing about Word Press is that it’s a really well-developed community, it’s free, and it supports widgets (though it turns out that some of the ones I would like the most are for WordPress.org rather than .com; which, I suppose I could use eventually.  I’d just like to have more functionality and control now.  If I can find a way to get enough revenue off of a site or blog to make it self-sustainable, then I could look into more hosting options.  However, any upgrades will have to wait until I actually know what I’m doing with this.