:: an update of sorts

i like hodgepodges. this will be a hodgepodge of updates. therefore, you will like this post...

first, a bit of news of a natural disater nature. those who have read my older entries know that i call slidell, louisiana home. some of you might be aware that slidell is near in proximity to new orleans, louisiana. this week, hurricane gustav threatened to undo whatever progress that had been acheived in the short three years since hurricane katrina ravished not only that city, but also a great deal of cities along the gulf coast. and while this storm did still cause damage and heart-ache, it does not appear to have cause as much destruction as its predecessor. my house back in slidell is in-tact. my family got to visit me here in starkville for the week, and i was glad they did. i'm man enough to accept the fact that i get homesick from time to time. and after spending three months with my family, i had gotten used to being with them again. so, it was good to spend time with them again.

on the reading quest front, i've finished my reading of douglas adams' hitchhikers' guide to the galaxy. i loved this book. it is fabulously well written, from cover to cover. seriously, there was not a dull chapter in this whole book. it's witty, it's funny, it's interesting. it's just a very good book. the movie based on this book, while a good movie, still doesn't compare to the brilliance contained in this book. this description of the book doesn't even do it justice, so i'll quote some of it for you:

"the universe jumped, froze, quivered and splayed out in several unexpected directions.
arthur and ford opened their eyes and looked about in considerable surprise.
"good god," said arthur, "it looks just like the sea front at southend."
"hell, i'm relieved to hear you say that," said ford.
"why?"
"because i thought i must be going mad."
"perhaps you are. perhaps you only thought i said it."
ford thought about this.
"well, did you say it or didn't you?" he asked.
"i think so," said arthur.
"well, perhaps we're both going mad."
"yes, " said arthur, "we'd be mad, all thing considered, to think this was southend."
"well, do you think this is southend?"
"oh yes."
"so do i."
"therefore we must be mad."
"nice day for it."
"yes," said a passing maniac.
"who was that?" asked arthur.
"who-- the man with the five heads and the elderberry bush full of kippers?"
"yes."
"i don't know. just someone."
"ah"

-page 81

here's another, more well known passage:

another thing that got forgotten was the fact that against all probability a sperm whale had suddenly been called into existence several miles above the surface of an alien planet
and since this was not a naturally tenable position for a whale, this poor innocent creature had very little time to come to terms with its identity as a whale before it then had to come to turns not being a whale any more.
this is a complete recorded of its thought from the moment it began its life till the moment it ended it.
ah . . . ! what's happening? it thought.
er, excuse me, who am i?
hello?
why am i here? what's my purpose in life?
what do i mean who am i?
calm down, get a grip now. . . oh! this is an interesting sensation, what is it? it's sort of . . . yawning, tingling sensation in my . . . my . . . well, i suppose i'd better start finding names for things if i want to make any headway in what for the sake of what i shall call an argument i shall call the world, so let's call it my stomach.
good. ooooh, it's getting quite strong. and hey, what about this whistling roaring sound going past what i'm suddenly going to call my head? perhaps i can call that . . . wind! is that a good name? it'll do . . . perhaps i can find a better name for it later when i've found out what it's fore. it must be something very important because there certainly seems to be a hell of a lot of it. hey! what's this thing? this . . . let's call it a tail-- yeah. tail. hey! i can really thrash it about pretty good, can't i? wow! wow! that feels great! doesn't it seem to achieve very much but i'll probably find out what it's for later on. now, have i built up any coherent picture of things yet?
no.
never mind, hey, this is really exciting, so much to find out about, so much to look forward to, i'm quite dizzy with anticipation . . .
or is it the wind?
there really is a lot of that now, isn't there?
and wow! hey! what's this thing suddenly coming toward me very fast? very, very fast. so big and flat and round, it needs a big wide-sounding name like . . . ow . . . ound . . . round . . . ground! that's it! that's a good name-- ground!
i wonder if it will be friends with me?

and the rest, after a sudden wet thud, was silence.

curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was oh no, not again. many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the universe than we do now.

-pages 134-135

some great writing. hopefully, if you haven't already picked up this book, these bits will get you interested enough to find a copy of this book and start digging in. i'm already intrigued and excited to read the rest of the series.

along the same lines, i'm about half way through chuck palahniuk's choke, and i'm enjoying it. palahniuk likes to drop his characters into strange, dark situations and this one is no different. i'll talk more about it when i finish the book. i'm getting to the point in the book where palahniuk is about the drop the huge hook that get his readers addicted to the story line, and that in combintation with his quick, flowing stream of consciousnes writing style, means i might finish this one quickly.

in tech news, i'm trying out a new browser this week. i'm a fan of mozilla's firefox, but i thought i'd give the guys at google a chance and try google's chrome. i really like it. it's very minimalistic and it runs incredibly fast. google put together a nice comic book style explanation of how it works here. there are two things that i dislike about chrome, however:

-unlike firefox, there is no independant bar for searching. and with firefox, i also have the ability to search directly in wikipedia or imdb without having to go into the page and then searching from there. i guess i just got used to this.

-post-entry edits to this blog, powered by google's blogger, doesn't run as fluid. i like posting my entries and coming back and adding the photos and moving things around. in firefox, i'm able to instantly stretch a picture to the disered size. i can't seem to that with chrome. also, i use a firefox extension called scribe fire to post my blog entries. as of right now, there is no extension of this nature for chrome.

to be fair, chrome is still in beta. i intend to send my suggestions to google and hopefully others echo my suggestions so google can address these issues and make chrome even better.

i'm not abandoning firefox- because i do love it so- but chrome is definitely worth checking into.

at the end of the last entry i teased at a review of good music coming out on the 19th. these releases included new music from david crowder* band (including a live dvd and some sweet extras), charlie hall, brandon heath, and jimmy needham. i'd love to review them. however, there is a little problem. first, i'm poor and unable to purchase all of these releases. secondly, ruckus-- the legal service i use to download and listen to music, doesn't have three of the four releases available. only brandon heath's what if we is available, and i'll post a review of that tomorrow. so, hopefully i'll be able to get a hold of these great releases and listen to them soon.


well, it's late and i'm tired. so that ends this entry.

more to come...