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.

Windows 7 was released yesterday to retail.  Although I have been using it for well over a month in a virtualized environment on my Kubuntu OS, I installed the full version on my desktop yesterday.  I bought my copy of Windows 7 from the student discount website at http://www.win741.com/.  They offer Windows 7 for a low $30!

I found out today that the Virginia Tech upload limit has been increased to 4.7 GB per 24 hour period!!! This is a big improvement form the 650 mb limit before.

http://computing.vt.edu/internet_and_web/internet_access/exceedlimit.html