Site: Nintendo music

(Note: pictures does not match link below...it's just REALLY cool)

It's always important to be able to download one's favorite old-school console music. :)

http://downloads.khinsider.com/game-soundtracks

New Year's Resolutions

Well....a new year is upon us. I'm currently in Tampa and about to undertake the inevitable return to Charleston. I will be starting a new job in a few days. Excited about it? Not as much as I could be, but it's a job, nonetheless.

I s'pose that I should make a list of the new year's resolutions. I can't recall if I typically did this in the past, but it never hurts to write them down, I guess. :)

Actually, I'm going to compile two separate lists. One will be for the actual goals that I will work on and the other will be for things that I would *like* to work on but very likely won't.


The goals:

1. Fix my body. This actually has two components. Firstly, I have a bad shoulder and a bad knee. Time to get off my rear and get them fixed. Secondly, I've become so sedentary that I'm actually ashamed of myself. Things need to change.
   
2. Consolidate my communications infrastructure. I currently have four different phone numbers (don't ask) and it drives me just as crazy as those who have to call them. Time to dump three of them.
3. Figure out whether I'm going to stay in my house or not. If not, then take definitive steps in that direction.
4. Take a more proactive role in my industry. If I'm going to do it, then I'd might as well own it.
5. Travel more for leisure. This is, of course, completely contingent on work and finances allowing.
6. Start saying "yes" more often and stop being such a reserved wuss. There's no harm in trying new things and taking a few risks now and then

The runners-up:

1. Keep in better touch with friends. I suck at this tremendously. This is also somewhat coupled to #6 above.
2. Work harder in school. I'd like to say that this was going to be definite, but, to be honest, my will is wavering at the moment and I'm debating taking the next semester off.
3. Actually show my important friends how much they mean to me. I consider this to currently be a personality flaw on my part.
   
4. Be better at checking my mail. I hate snail mail.

I'll see what I can do to keep everyone in the loop regarding how this is going. :)

Entry: Random photos

"WHY???????"

"I'm sorry....you were saying?"

"I'll neeeeever tell."

Entry: Ugh

Everyone knows that I hate politics. Amongst the reasons for that discontent is my dislike of politicians. Rarely do I go on here and talk smack about any one politician. However, today is different.

I sat and watched President Bush's national address Wednesday evening (was it Wednesday??) and I couldn't help but leave that experience with a feeling of foreboding.

My problem with that speech is that Mr. Bush has a severely crippled crystal ball that he seems to like to use. It's that same crystal ball that he used many many moons ago to sell the nation on the Iraq war. Now, granted, I'm not here to talk about his motivations for going to war or the degree of progress that we're making. I'm here because I can't help but remember his telling the public years ago about the series of events that were going to transpire after the invasion. He told us about how Iraq was going to rebuild itself with its own oil revenues after we got their infrastructure running again. He said it with such confidence....as if it was completely obvious. Well...after his many reassurances, none of his predictions ever came true. And now, here I am on Wednesday evening watching him use those same lines of rhetoric to talk about what will happen with the US economy after this "much-needed" bailout takes place. Supposedly, after the bailout, the economy will normalize and everyone will be shiny and happy again a few years down the road.

The crystal ball looks familiar. I am far from assured. Jon Stewart scratched the surface on this a couple of days later. Feel free to watch for yourself.

Again...I'm not here to discuss the war in Iraq. I'm not here to discuss the economy. I'm simply here to remind everyone that, when Mr. Bush looks me in the eye from that magical picture box in my den and lays out an entire series of events that will transpire of his own design, I have a hard time believing that they will ever happen.

The end.

My first classes at Nova

Well....sorry it's been so long. Since I took the time to write such a lengthy post regarding whether or not I should attend Nova (see last post), I figured I should at least share some of the pictures that I took of my first trip down there this last weekend. I was actually VERY impressed with the facilities.

A picture of part of Nova from the air. Interestingly enough, the land used to be the site of a large circular runway that the USN/USMC used back during WWII to test aviator skills. You can see the remnants of the airstrip. Flight 19 took off from this very runway the day they disappeared into history.

Yeah. Weird. I know.

That is a really cool aquarium. It's in the cafeteria.

A random shot of the campus from a window.

This is a really bad@$$ building-sized portrait that someone did. Apparently, it was inspired by the Marine Biology folks.

The outside of the gym facility. I'll have to visit this place next time.

The cafeteria. Kinda reminds me of one of those uber food courts that you see in some airports. It's completely stocked.

The doors to the 'Flight Deck'. This is a kind of social club with a bar.

This is the inside of the University Center. It houses the gym, cafeteria, Flight Deck, stadium, etc.

A random monolith in the library.

A random glass garden inside the library.

Here is a little shrine that they built to commemorate the visit of the Dalai Lama (sp?) a few years back.

This is the Carl DeSantis. This is where my classes and orientation were.

This must be for the medical nerds.

I thought this was kinda funny.

This is the outside of the University Center.

This is the inside of the Carl DeSantis building.

Some random indian dude.

My classroom.

Entry: My dilemma

NOTE: A word of caution. I wrote this in a hurry. Please don't hold the possible excess of grammatical errors, misspellings, and all around BS against me. ;)

So, as many know, I was recently accepted into the School of Computer and Information Sciences at Nova Southeastern University. My goal is to pursue their PhD in Computer Science. "What is the dilemma", you ask? I'm trying to decide if I should quit before I even start.

"But why would you want to do something like that?? At least give it a shot!"

My premise:
Many a would-be-academic has shot himself in the foot by choosing the wrong institution at which to pursue his advanced degree(s). Although it'd be more than adequate for any industrial or government-oriented career, I have hesitations regarding how it would be received by the academic community should I ever endeavor to join their ranks. I'm no stranger to being an alumnus of a less-than-internationally-renown institution. Having received two degrees from one, I have absolutely NO reservations whatsoever regarding the quality of my education after having gone up against people from schools like Penn State, VA Tech, Johns Hopkins, etc. I'm a definite believer in the premise that books alone do not make a person smart and neither does the money they pay to a big-name university.

What are my goals?
1. Currently working for a federal research laboratory, I want to be able to maximize my contributions to the research community (no matter where my career takes me).
2. To pursue this degree NOW (when I am unhindered) instead of later (when it won't be potentially feasible anymore).
3. To definitely consider collegiate academia as a retirement occupation and, quite possibly, even a pre-retirement career.
4. To be able to maintain my career while pursuing the degree. (This is an absolute must.) Therefore, I will be skipping the usual post-graduate student template that demands constant sacrifices to the god of stipends and perpetual impoverishment. Most unfortunately, this creates a demand for a distance-learning program.

My reasons for applying to Nova:
1. Regionally accredited school
2. It is a brick-and-mortar school with traditional class formats (established in 1967) with probably the most time-tested and refined distance-learning process and technology that there is (given that it was an innovator in this field).
3. It is a not-for-profit school

Why this program scares me:
1. Perhaps this is just my humbled opinion, but I think that EVERY CS PhD curriculum should have a very good algorithms course. This school offers none. It's other classes are on the norm, but that one omission has me thinking. I know...I know. It's the small things that keep me up at night. It's just that every PhD I've ever talked to pretty much learned all of his algorithms magic during his post-graduate education. Simply understanding the basics of big-O and having to look up what "P=NP?" means every time I think about it just doesn't seem to cut the mustard.
2. No comprehensive qualifying exam(s). As anyone who knows the pain and misery of studying for quals can tell you, this particular type of exam is to provide assurance to the faculty that you have derived a keen mastery of the crucial fundamentals of computer science theory and that you are ready to move on to your dissertation. Lacking this exam is analogous to becoming a Navy SEAL without ever having gone to BUDS training.
3. My acceptance letter had the wrong date in it. It was the right month/day, but it was for 2007. I guess somebody used the wrong template. They were kind enough to make the quick fix and then re-send it. Still.... IRK!!
4. I seem to recall a few typos in the graduate catalog. This might be my imagination, though. Granted, they were very few and very far between and the catalog was rather humongous, but still!
5. This university has surprisingly little money coming in for research (and I do mean little). That is really scary.
6. It is considered to be a national 4th-tier school.

Why this program DOESN'T scare me:
1. It has all of the requisite accreditations.
2. Minus the algorithms class, the offered courses seem on par.
3. The faculty seems to have a good collective background (Princeton, Columbia, UPenn, Imperial College, Carnegie Mellon, UFlorida, URochester, Purdue, and some others including Nova grads).
4. The faculty seems well published and appear to have diverse and scientifically legitimate fields of research. (Did I just say that out loud???)
5. Having read the testimonies of current and past students, the course-load is no joke and sounds to be on-par with actual doctoral-level coursework.
6. It has very realistic application requirements as would be found in other PhD programs.
7. A masters degree is a prerequisite.
8. There are impressive research dissertation topics from other graduates

Anyone who does an online search for this school can easily find a zillion different people who claim that this school is a "diploma mill" (or, in english, a school that sells degrees for minimal amounts of work and that are mocked by the general academic community). I have found that probably 35% (given my made-up statistics) think so because they believe this school to be a for-profit institution (the sure sign of a diploma mill) never having actually read anything about the school. On top of that, I'd say that an additional 55% think so since they don't consider a distance-based PhD program to be legitimate. These are typically people who favor the usual model that embraces student poverty, teaching assistantships, and no chance at working on an actual career until the diploma is in hand. That leaves roughly 10% who just don't think that the school measures up for various other reasons. THANKFULLY, the overwhelming majority of people (including the nay-sayers) wouldn't dream of grouping this university with the likes of Capella, University of Phoenix, and other for-profit schools. (Well...a few do, but they usually get jumped on pretty quickly by others.)

Comments?

"The worst thing about the zombie apocalypse will be pretending that I'm not excited."

- Jerri and Steve