Today I woke up (at 11:30 after a long night of finishing my CS project) to a world of pearl white. It snowed here today, the first snowfall of the season. Whether this means we will have the annual Corps of Cadets versus Civilians snowball fight is still unknown, but it was still a nice (although brisk) day to go outside and wander around, admiring the beautiful snow on the ground and watching the various people build snowmen or throw snowballs.

Above is a picture I took of the bridge by the duck pong here, with the snow gracing the slopes leading to it.  Of course this snow also brought cold weather which was not pleasant, but the ducks at the duck pond seemed content.

As I said before, here at Virginia Tech, we have the annual Corps of Cadets versus Civilian snowball fight.  Last year, this took place at approximately 10pm during our first major snowstorm in March.  This was an unfortunate snowball fight because I only managed to throw 2 snowballs before I was injured in battle  by a rogue snowball thrown by a cadet.  The snowball hit e right in the left eye and I was half blinded in that eye for the night.  The swelling continued for a week, at which point I regained full 20/20 vision. Hopefully this year I won’t be injured as I pan to bring my chem lab goggles.

An official group open to all VT students on facebook has been created to an for this event: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=197223762093

[Update] After finishing this I decided to Photoshop a bride and groom kissing on the bridge so here is the new picture:

Note for people wanting to convert TubeRadio to mp3: Since I have observed in my logs that several people have wanted to convert tuberadio music into mp3s you can, but you will need to go to the video in the corner, put the mouse near the top of the video and click on the link that appears.  This will take you to the main youtube video and then you can use a program such as Dirpy to convert this video into an mp3.  More information can be found here.

A few weeks ago a new application was featured on Lifehacker.com.  As usual I checked the website and wound up on a very useful program called TubeRadio.  Owned by Last.fm, the music website, TubeRadio allows you search for videos/songs on Youtube and play them right there in the browser.  It allows you to search for name of video, but even cooler is its ability to search for and fill a playlist with the whole discography of an artist.

The interface looks similar to iTunes, but unlike iTunes, it plays only youtube videos, but plays them just as a normal desktop mp3 player.    It evens allows you to share playlists like in iTunes.  TubeRadio allows you to repeat tracks, shuffle tracks of a playlist, pause, start, and skip tracks in a playlist.

At the bottom you can view lyrics, bios, and information about the band.  The best part is its free!  Just like with Pandora you can create an account that will save your playlists and preferences.  The only regret I have about TubeRadio is that I can’t figure out how to not display the video at the bottom since that would save my cpu since the flash player eats it up.  Maybe they have a feature to just play the music and not the video, but I don’t know it.

Also, Happy 2 Month Anniversary TubeRadio!  It turned 2 months on November 29, 2009.

[Update] After posting this I received an email from the owners of TubeRadio via Twitter.  Here are some points they gave me:

• “We use the last.fm databse of artists so their terms are that we have to put “powered by last.fm” on the site. Other than that, we have no affiliation with them.”
• “As much as we’d love to be able to offer an audio only stream, it’s against YouTube terms and conditions to do that, so the video _has_ to be there (it even has to be a certain minimum size!)”

TubeRadio is particiating in the competition for “Best New Startup of 2009.”  They would like you to vote for them at http://bit.ly/3H6XkV
Links:

Tuberadio.fm

Press Release Annoucing TubeRadio

TubeRadio on Facebook

TubeRadio on Twitter

I’ve always been fascinated by the graffiti that bored students draw on their desks.  Most of the time its immature drawings of the male sex organ, but sometimes true artists can be born simply by drawing a crude sketch during Chem lecture.  I decided during the summer to make this artwork public by creating my new site

VT Desk Graffiti

Here you can view desk graffiti pictures submitted by various people.  I suggest you help collaborate and submit your own pictures by visiting http://vtdeskgraffiti.com/send-us-your-pictures/

I was just talking with some friends about how they were named.  One for example was named thus after their parents and relatives had a round-table and threw names back and forth.  When they finally found one they asked “Is anyone we dislike named Sara?”  Wince the answer was no, she was dubbed Sara.

I too was named for a reason.  My mother once had a small doll name “Bobby” and so I was whether I liked it or not named Bobby.  Since Bobby itself is not a first name, I was thusly called Robert.  And so names can have numerous origins.

Names are very important things, they define who we are. And when someone else mentions that you look like a “Peter” or a “Paul” you wonder whether you were named the right name.  However, as you start thinking about it, you realize that your name is perfect.  Why? Because for the last how ever many years that is the only name you have ever heard and responded too, of course it sounds right.  You can of course change your name, but the process can be reasonably tedious, requiring a petition and possible fee.

Your parents probably spent hours researching “baby girl names” or “baby boy names” on the internet or in books.  This is a painstaking process and requires many hours of dedication by parents and family.

So instead, why not have your parents play a game for your name, making it random, for the name does not define the person (besides they can always change it later right ).

These are possible steps for devising a name game involving more than 2 people:

1. Do research.  Find the best names.  Do a google search for baby names or simply go to www.babynames.com
2. Get prepped for the game.  Know your opponents.  Note: Game may be more enjoyable with the right drinks *cough*
3. Write up all the chosen names for the right gender on to cards.  The amount of cards does not matter, but try to keep above 30 cards minimum.
4. Shuffle and deal these cards out to the players.  If you prefer a name you can try little sleight of hand.
5. This game is a bit like “Apples to Apples” (rules at bottom).  Have the dealer begin.
6. Everyone but the dealer (the judge) puts a card into the middle face-down.  The dealer then picks up the cards and examines them, choosing the best name out of the ones in the middle.
7. The winner of the round takes his/her card back and puts it back in their hand.  The losers’ card goes to the discard pile.
8. The next person in the circle becomes the next judge. Repeat previous steps.
9. Play continues until there is one card left.  This card (the winner of the last round) becomes the name of the baby.
10. If this name is not desired by a majority vote of players at the end of the game, the game is repeated, possibly with an addition of more names. Note: This game is not intended to be actually played (unless you don’t care what your child is named). This was simply a fun idea I had.

Links:

www.babynames.com

www.namechangelaw.com/

Apples to Apples Rules

The shadowing is not quite right because it doesn’t shadow the face, but that’s why I hadn’t uploaded it.  I did this over the summer.