Twev1701.net

AOL released a new beta of their AIM client today. Although I support Open Source Source 100%, and use it whereever/whenever I can, I must say that I am a sucker for beta software. My IM client of choice for baout 6 months now has been Gain. I love the interface, and the fact that I can log into all of my various IM accounts (AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo!) all at the same time though one program. Add to that tabbed IMing (a must!) and conversation logging (another must!), and I can’t see a reason to go back to AIM ever.

And then I read about the beta today.

Apparently they added my 2 must have featues into this new beta dubbed “Triton”. Although I doubt it will replace Gaim on my desktop, I had to be a sucker and bite.

Although I really hate to admit it, my first impressions thsu are are pretty good ones. The interface is clean, and the layout of the windows is very nice. I have to play around with it for a few more days to really get a good feel for it though. The one thing that totally keeps me way from using AIM is the mandatory ad that is displayed at the top of your buddy window. Doesn’t AOL have enough money to keep my Bussy List free from ads?

Anyway…here’s a screen shot of what she looks like.

I just got (downloaded) the new Nine Inch Nails CD today. I really liked the first single, ” The Hand That Feeds”, but I had no clue what to expect of the CD as a whole.

I must say that I am quite pleased with it. It’s not something that I could listen to over and over like “Meteora”, but I can definitely see me listing to this all summer long.

I am going to take today and do something I always talk about but never do…play games all day! Dinner is already cooked (in the fridge waiting to be reheated), and all that needs to be done is a little laundry. So, I am going to partake in some games that either I have yet to play, or have barely touched. Here’s the short list:

Doom 3
Warcraft III
Serious Sam
Half-Life
Max Payne
Jedi Knight II

The weather around here is starting to get weird again. Last week, we had beautiful days in the 80s, and now we’re in the 40s. This is how weird it has been.

It rained for most of the day yesterday, and was a bit on the chilly side. Then, right around 4pm, it stopped raining, and the sun came out. It warmed up quite a bit and was actually a touch on the humid side. Then about 8pm or so, we had a pretty decent thunderstorm. It was powerful enough to knock out the power for a few seconds. (Normally not too bad, but Jess and I were in the basement when it happened, and since we had seen “The Amityville Horror” a few hours before, she started to slightly freak out.) After the storm was over, it was damn nice out. It was warm, but had a nice cool breeze blowing.

Fast forward to this morning. I wake up around 4:30am, freezing my ass off. I wrestle the covers back from Jess, and go back to sleep. Finally when I get out of bed around 10am, I go outside to see what it’s like out. Brrrrr!!! It has to be about 40 degrees out right now. It’s cold, it’s grey, and it’s windy. It’s actually more like an early November day then it is a late April day.

Then to top things off, I was looking at USA Today online after lunch, and saw that Ohio got snow. SNOW!! This is just crazy people.

But then again, I’ll probably be bitching in 2 months when it won’t get out of the 90s. Go figure…

There’s been a project that JP and I have been working on for the past few months, that we really haven’t talked too much about. The reason being that we didn’t want to put out too much buzz until we were ready for it. Well, we are officially ready…I think.

We have started our own computer business called i/o Computers. Although we have been doing work for family and friends for free for years, we finally decided to try and see if we can do this as a part time job, and God willing, maybe even full time in a few years.

Why am I suddenly talking about this? Today, we had our first real, paying customers.

I must say, it was a really weird feeling getting paid to do what I have considered for years to be my hobby.

I know we are a business and that we have to make money to stay open. But I felt really weird writing up invoices and then taking money from people. Don’t get me wrong, I love money, but it was just strange. I guess this is one side of the business I’m just going to have to get used to. I guess I had gotten so used to doing tech stuff for free for so many years that it’s going to take a while to not feel guilty accepting money.

I’m weird, yes I know.

Just go back from 2 days of work and spending time with Jess at Kutztown University. Time with Jess was fun as always, work was not, as always.

You may have read the 1st line of this post and thought nothing of it. However put all of this into perspective. In the past 2 days I have worked 16 hours, and spent about 8 of it in the car respectively. Although it was all worth while to see her for 2 days in a row.

A lot of things have been going on in my life in the past week. Most of it good, some of it not so good. But, most of it life-changing. Now when I say life-changing, I mean this mostly in a good way. I’ve come to look at my life in a new light, and see a lot of areas that need a lot of improvement. I think most of you will notice some very interesting changes with out my blog entries are done in the future. I guess you can say that I have been inspired to change my writing style somewhat. It’s really hard to explain, but when you see it, you’ll know what I mean. In fact, you’ll probably even utter those words out load. You’ll be reading a post on here, and you’ll be like, “Oh, now I know what he was talking about 3 months ago”.

Anyway, I closed tonight which means I got home arouns 10:20pm or so, and I have to be back at work at 8am, so I think this is about how long my post is going to be tonight. I’m going to go lay in bed with Lola and read a bit of my book before I go to sleep. Later….