MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Merry Christmas everyone! I love Christmas. If only it was longer... :-)

Due to all the Christmas excitement, I haven't been doing much work on my web site these past couple of days. Oh well... whether it's done or not, what I have of version 4.0 is going online at the end of this week, and version 3.2 is coming down.

Adios!

Winter Vacation!!!

Wahoo - winter vacation has officially begun!!! That means that, hopefully, I'll be working on my web site a lot. Finished or not, I'll upload what I have two weeks from now, at the end of vacation -- and the beginning of the new year! :-)

Titles & MSN Search Beta

First of all, I've decided to add titles to all of my posts in order to make it easier to find what you're looking for. Rejoice!

Second of all, I've started using MSN Search more and more now that they've released their great new beta. Try searching for "population of india," "prime minister of canada," "39 feet in meters," "define garrulous," "3x - 97.4 = 4 * 3x," "lifespan of an elephant," "height of K2," "John Williams," or a bunch of other cool things. Check it out!

Oh -- and happy December!!!

I'm now enjoying my last hour (or less) of vacation. Very sad... I won't even be able to wake up late tomorrow! Sad, sad, sad. Oh well. To honor the occassion, I'll now run through what I did this past week. Get ready for one of my longest posts ever!

Friday (Nov. 19)

My last class ended at 11:40, and then we went on a field trip to the mall until 2:10 (it's a very long story why we'd be doing that... but the good news is, while there I picked up two new Star Wars action figures!). After that, a few friends and I went to a new store near my house: "The Container Store." I had at first expected it to be fairly boring, but then I started hearing good things about it. Now that I've been there, I agree that it's great. :-) I got a stapler that, instead of staples, cuts a piece of the paper to be stapled and then folds it over itself in some weird way so that it acts as a fastener! It's great.

After that, we did... well... nothing, really, except kind of sitting around. Then we went to the school play, which was "On the Razzle" this year. It was pretty good, depite some pretty obvious (but very well handled!) errors. ;-)

Saturday (Nov. 20)

I went a couple different friends to go see the movie "National Treasure." It was pretty good, although the heroes acted pretty stupid at times. "Hey!" they say, "let's just pull out the Declaration of Independance in front of a trillion tourists and hope no one notices us discussing buried treasure!"

Sunday (Nov. 21)

We went out to Concord briefly to visit my grandparents, and then we left and went to the Celtics game! We won! Better yet, David Ortiz was there! He got ten times more applause than anyone on the Celtics, as is to be expected. :-)

Monday (Nov. 22) & Tuesday (Nov. 23)

I didn't really do anything but read and play Halo 2. That's not to say that I hadn't been reading and playing Halo 2 quite a bit those other days -- it's just that it's all I did on Monday & Tuesday. Well, except for a little computer stuff. Actually, a fair amount of computer stuff... but not as much as reading and playing.

On Tuesday, I played around with Adobe Atmosphere a little bit, which I had gotton as an early Christmas present two weeks ago today (the 28th -- so I got it the 14th). Previously I had opened it once or twice, but on Tuesday I actually managed to -- gasp -- create a small room with a red floor. (I still had the problem that every time the viewer opened the file they fell past the room into the empty void beyond, though.)

Wednesday (Nov. 24)

At this point it started to hit me that, tragically, vacation was halfway over! Unfortunately, that didn't at all spur me on to work more on my web site or anything, and to this moment I haven't worked on it one ounce, which is really a shame. Seriously -- I wish I had gotton more done. Sigh.

Anyway, on Wednesday I went to Finding Neverland starring Johnny Depp with a couple of the same friends with whom I went to the Container Store. It was a good movie, but very sad. (Although I argue that it has a "happy" ending -- at least sort off. It's that "the-world-is-dead-but-it-lives-on-in-your-heart" kind of ending.)

Thursday (Nov. 25)

I was greeted in the morning by my older brother, back for the weekend from San Diego!!! :-) Unfortunately, he had to head off to Rhode Island for the day almost immediately.

Later in the day -- around 1:00 -- we started the 1-hour trek (great for more reading) to my cousin's house for my family's annual Thanksgiving party. It was in a different house this year, which was interesting. My cousins have a GIANT golden retriever (Shamrock), a TINY little fluffy dog whose face looked like an Ewok (Logan), a cute little kitten who looked like one of Hasbro's "FurReal" animatronic toys (Spencer), and three other cats and a rabbit.

The kids spent almost the entire time in the basement, playing EA Sport's Madden 2005 for PS2 and ping pong.

Friday (Nov. 26)

We finally got some quality time with my brother -- YAY! There was plenty more Halo 2 to be had, as well as some computer time and reading -- how typical.

Saturday (Nov. 27)

My brother's friend came over, and my older brother, and another friend. We (but not my older brother) played with Nerf guns. Hehe... fun! Shooting! Guns! (Just kidding. ;-) ) That night, we played Red Sox Monopoly (but didn't finish our game) and watched some extras on the Harry Potter & the Prizoner of Azkaban and Star Wars Trilogy DVDs. There are some funny interviews on the HP disc, and the Star Wars DVD set has a great 2-hour documentary Empire of Dreams about the making of Star Wars that I just started watching earlier this week (maybe during that Monday-Tuesday lull -- I can't remember). The best part is the original screen tests -- they're hilariously bad, in some cases!

Sunday (Nov. 28)

How sad -- the last day of vacation. It also happens to be today. I woke up and immediately went on the computer, determined to get something done -- preferably web site related. Instead, though, I ended up making some read progress in Atmosphere. I was creating a simple maze when my older brother came over, and we started making a house together. Now it's a two-story mansion, although it still has no rooms -- only floors, walls, and stairs. Still, at least I've figured out how to texture the surfaces!

I'm hoping to put some of my Atmosphere stuff on my web site in time for version 4.0, which is now looking at a possible Summer 2005 release, although I'm still hoping and trying for a Christmas 2004 release, which with any luck will become a reality.

Later in the day, I (and my brother, Willy) did our family's Christmas card. Willy wrote the message and drew a couple little things, and then I scanned it, edited his handwriting in Photoshop to try to make it a little more readable, and put in some scanned photos. Next, sadly, I had to do my Spanish homework. We definitely shouldn't be given homework over vacations.

Finally, the same people who came over last night to play Monopoly came over tonight in an effort to finish the game, this time accompanied by their younger brother, who spent the time playing Midtown Madness 3 -- the first game to be in our Xbox other than Halo 2 since we got it on November 9th. In Monopoly, I landed on Free Parking and got about a thousand dollars, only to land on a spot with a rent of $1,150, go to jail, spend three turns trying to get doubles & fail each time, have to pay $50 to get out, and then get a Chance card that forced me to pay another $50. Yikes. Bad luck. By the time we stopped, everybody was in debt except one person: Mr. Diego Moneybags, who not only had that I-Owe-You worth over a thousand from me, but also other IOUs from the other people. Ironically, he has the fewest properties out of all of us: just four.

Even after today we didn't finish the game. Hopefully we'll have some other chance later.

Well, sadly it's almost time for me to get my last sleep of the vacation. Before then, though, I still I'll squeeze in just a couple minutes of web site editing. ;-)

According to the latest issue of Wired, Murphy's Laws have been proven to be statistically true.

I'm currently on my second-to-last day of Thanksgiving Break, enjoying a nice game of Halo 2. It is GREAT. :-) We've now created a clan, Tiny Green Men -- the name is based on the original-but-too-long name we first had in mind, Deep Space Leprechauns. Strange, I know... it's a VERY long story. If you play Halo 2 on Xbox LIVE, get an account over at Bungie.net for the best stat-tracking I've ever seen, and then check out the site we have over there for our clan and join!

Halo 2 sold 2.4 MILLION copies in the United States and Canada the day it came out (November 9th), which is equivalent to $125 million dollars for Bungie and Microsoft. That's more money on opening day than any movie in history!

I can certainly see why so many people bought it -- it's awesome! I've been playing a ton online, and soon my friend and I will be starting our very own clan. :-)

I have to go do homework now. :-( Bye-bye!

P.S. Yesterday was the first snow of the season -- yippee!! There was actually a couple inches outside today, which is a lot considering it's only November.

Guess what??? TODAY WE GOT HALO 2!!! It's awesome!!! Sadly, I haven't had too much time to play it due to homework, but I've played plenty to know that it rocks. :) Go buy it! Or, if you don't have an Xbox, go buy it and and Xbox! And buy Xbox LIVE, too, if you don't already have it! See you online!!!

Yesterday we went to the Red Sox Rolling Rally with some friends. It was great! It also wasn't as crowded in our little strip of the road than it was elsewhere, which was nice -- we were only the 4th or so row back.

THE RED SOX JUST WON THE WORLD SERIES FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 86 YEARS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm soooooo excited!

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, Willy's birthday came and went -- we celebrated on the 27th, even though his birthday is technically a day later. He got Fable, The Sims 2, and -- yippee! -- Battlefront. I'm obsessed with the later two, and he's obsessed with Fable, although (of course) we're all getting plenty of fun out of all three. :-)

While I hadn't really cared much about it before we got it, The Sims 2 is wonderful. You can have five-story houses!!! The character creation is exponentially better, so that now you can actually create a Sim that looks a lot like yourself!

More happy news: I'm currently enjoying a five-day weekend!!! We get Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday off.

I'm off to play Battlefront now. Wish me luck in fending off the forces of the evil Empire!!! :-)

Sorry I haven't been able to update in a while... I'm just getting used to having homework again!

Last weekend we celebrated my grandparent's 50th anniversary up in Sorento, Maine. That was fun. :-) The whole family was there -- which is saying a lot, since my mom has five siblings, and one lives in Alaska with his wife and two kids. While there, we also celebrated a couple of family birthdays. Speaking of birthdays, by brother Willy's is this Tuesday!

This past Monday we had Matt Selman, writer for "The Simpsons" and Beaver class of 1989, come to talk to us. He said some somewhat inappropriate things and generated a fair amount of controversy. We even had an English writing assignment about him!

Yesterday I didn't go to school because I had a cold, but I'm feeling a lot better now. I've been playing lots and lots of the Star Wars Battlefront demo that came on the OT DVD set, which we got Wednesday. I absolutely love it -- I highly recommend it. :-)

Now Willy and his friend are playing Fable, which his friend brought over. It's a really cool RPG (role playing game) for Xbox. Willy has it on his wishlist.

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Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She loves sprinklers. While we're on walks, she'll go up to one and then kind of jump around and snap at it, trying to get a little drink!
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I'm off to do homework now, so bye!

On Friday we got back from our orientation in Maine (we had gone up on Thursday). All throughout Thursday we were separated into twelve groups of six people each (roughly), all competing throughout various activities for points. The finale of that particular competition came after dinner, when each group had to come up with a skit involving certain pre-determined elements. Our group (F, later christened the "Flying Firefighters" by me) did a skit where we were on a bus ride to Washington D.C., but then our bus driver (named Jerry, which is actually the name of our driver for our real trip last year) crashed and we had to camp outside for a night. It was... interesting.

(When the winners were announced Friday, it turns out we managed to come in 3rd place, despite a not-so-perfect showing at the theater -- but we had done really well at paper-cup-stacking and blindfolding activities.)

The next day, and our last day, we had an egg-drop contest. We split into new groups of 6 people each (mine was group 1) and, using some materials given to us like straws, rubber bands, a balloon, string, and tape, had to create a contraption that would protect the egg in case of a drop. Our egg died on the first drop, despite complex rubber-band-suspension, a cushioning balloon, and a reinforced straw frame. Oh well.

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Last night we went to The Lion King at the new opera house. It was really cool -- the costumes were amazing!!! Tomorrow school starts again, which is sad -- but there are only nine days left until the Star Wars original trilogy comes out on DVD!!!

Do you know how many femtometers are in a petameter? I do -- 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000!

Today in Physics we went over the metric system as somewhat of a refresher. While I know I called yesterday our "real" first day, even that was a special schedule. This was our first regular schedule day -- although even today, afternoon activities were replaced by a short little field trip.

Tomorrow we leave for Maine, at 8:30, for our orientation trip. I'll be back Friday. Wish me luck!

Today was my real first day of school -- not just orientation, but real school, complete with classes and homework and everything. :-(

One plus is that we got to see the new building. It's really cool -- especially the control room for the Black Box Theater, which hopefully I'll get to use some time for tech crew.

We also met all our teachers, which was fun, and learned who our classmates are and so on. And we didn't get too much homework, which is always good.

Tomorrow we go on some quicky orientation field trip, which is kind of strange, since we're going on a full-fledged, one-night trip the very next day. The teachers all say it's a lot of fun. Hopefully they'll be proven correct! :-)

We just got back from the wedding in Virginia. Today's our last day before school starts again, which is very sad. :-(

I just finished reading The Da Vinci Code. It was pretty good, although the endless cliffhangers got to be annoying. One thing's for sure, though: it was clever.

Well, I'm off to enjoy my last day of freedom for a long time. Bye bye!

In just a couple hours, we leave for a wedding in Virginia. We'll be gone until Sunday, and then school starts (for real -- not just pre-season anymore) on Tuesday.

Just now, I installed Windows Media Player 10. I highly recommend it. As I talked about a bit last time, there's a new look, simplified interface, auto-syncing with portable music devices, and -- best of all -- integration with the new MSN Music store. I think I might actually try it out -- MSN Music, that is. I played around with iTunes a bit a little while back, but never actually bought anything. Maybe I will this time. Who knows.

Well, I've got to go now. I'll try to update again Sunday. Adios!

Pre-season continues, for those who're doing it. Yesterday there was a little ice cream get-together for returning students, new students, and some teachers as well. It was also the first day the new Arts Center building was open to students, so a few friends and I spent much of the event giving a new family (with a kid entering 6th) a tour.

For me, work on tophtucker.com 4.0 continues after a month-long break. It certainly won't be ready by the time I start school, but I feel confident that I can finish in time for a New Year's 2005 release. Yippee!

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In Other News:

Check out MSN Music Beta. They're still "stocking the shelves," but eventually it'll have as many songs (if not more) available for download as its main competitor, iTunes Music Store. You can access MSN Music straight from the new Windows Media Player 10, automatically sync your music with any compatible portable music player, burn the music to CD, and so on.

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Random Rosie Comment of the Day:

She loves trying to catch bubbles in mid-air. :-) Also, just the other day she used her kennel as a stepping-stone to get up on the counter and eat a whole peach!

I'm back from the 9th Grade Orientation thing now! Here's my report on school, Taconnet, and this very blog.

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School

Unfortunately, we didn't have much time to meet the new kids joining our class. However, we did meet several of our teachers and learn a bit about our schedule. Kids playing a sport in the fall went on to start pre-season, but since I'm doing tech crew for the play instead I got to go home -- which I feel very lucky about, since the kids who DID attend pre-season say it was a pretty grueling experience.

However, before leaving I attended another web committee meeting about BCDS' new web site. I saw the new logo, as well as a few potential designs.

Taconnet

You learned about most of what I did at Taconnet a couple posts ago (I actually wrote that post while at Taconnet!). Here are a few other things.

• We saw a kid blow a giant bubble in the annual Freaky Talent Show.
• I learned the name of the next Star Wars film. :-D
• We made a movie with some friends. The plot was that Rozie, the managers' dog, actually had a secret plot to slaughter all the humans. Sound interesting? It was!

This Very Blog

You may have noticed a couple new features in the past week or so. The first is that nifty toolbar at the top of the blog, which replaces the ad that used to be there. You can use it to make your own weblog (aka blog), see other blogs, and -- best of all -- search my blog! I'm not sure how well it works, though.

The other new feature is that little envelope icon at the bottom of every post. You can use it to email that post to a friend! Cool, huh?

And don't forget the other features this blog has had for... well... a while, such as comments (just click that link at the bottom of each post) and the archive, which lets you see every post I've ever written.

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Well, that's all for now folks!

Howdy!

I'm back from Taconnet, and have been for a little over a week now. It was really fun! I'll try to give you a more complete recap later, but currently I'm only half an hour away from going back to school again! THE HORROR!!! Hehe... ;-)

Although, fortunately, this is only a couple-hour-long orientation session. People taking sports in the fall then have preseason for the rest of the week, from 9:00 - 3:30 or something like that. I, however, am not playing soccer this year. I'm probably going to do tech crew for the play instead.

As for summer reading, I'm almost done (it's due on the first day of actual school). I've calculated that by a week from today I will have read 14 books over the summer, which equates to about 5,000 pages. Yippee!

Adios, amigos.

Hi everyone! I'm writing this from Taconnet, so I have to be quick. We're now a little more than half way through our stay, and so far it's been great. Here are some highlights:

TUBING

• Tues. Aug. 3: We were caught in the middle of a torrential downpour, and I managed to flip a collossal tube while driving.
• Wed. Aug. 4: That same collassal tube was deflating, causing (at one point) one of two occupants to get squished and the tube collapsed onto itself!
• Wed. Aug. 4: One 6-year-old went on a slow roller-coaster type ride, as multiple wakes collided and the tube balanced on top of three-foot-waves.

ROCKETS ETC.

• We've set off one 1-or-2 foot rocket and two 2-or-3 feet mini-rockets. We got a great picture of one -- I'll have to post it when we get back!
• We also (with a friend who's a rocket scientist) got two cheap RC planes. One kind of worked, and the other didn't really work at all. So, we strapped a rocket engine to it and launched it a few times. :)
• We also got an RC boat, which works great and is perfect for chasing ducks with!

OTHER STUFF

• We've also made s'mores...
• Celebrated a few birthdays...
• Done some skiing...
• and a 550-piece puzzle!

That's all -- I really have to get off the computer now. Adios!

T-minus 5 minutes and counting...

Well, tomorrow's the day folks. Bright and early (well kind of -- around 10:00) we're off to Taconnet for four weeks. It'll be lots of fun, with swimming, boating, tubing, skiing, ping-ponging, tennis-ing, s'more-ing, eating, sleeping, walking, running, breathing, canoeing, drawing, writing, and more!

For the first time ever, we'll actually have a laptop there, which means I might have a chance to update this while we're up there. Wish me luck! And now...

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Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
Rosie is by now too big to fit properly in her kennel, and thus is forced into a "submissive position" whenever's she's sitting in there, with her head lowered. If she lies down, she doesn't have that particular problem, but instead she's long enough that she has to sort of drape her front paws over the front of the crate. It's very cute. :-)

Web Site Update:
Sadly, I won't be able to get any work done on my site for the next four weeks, though I will have two weeks after we get back (and before school starts) to work on it. (I had previously thought I only had one week afterwards -- oops! Pleasant surprise!) Anyway, I'm almost done with the Reviews section now. I still have a whole lot of work left to do, though, and there's little-to-no chance of me finishing before Winter Break. Oh well.

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T-minus 9:45 and counting...

Well, there's another birthday today -- my mom's! I made her a card that accidentally said "Happy Mother's Day..." oops....

Now, you remember what to do! What? You don't know what I'm talking about? Check the archives for one year ago today, then come back.

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Ok, back now? Good! Now sing!

Happy birthday to you..................

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In other news, today we overloaded the circuits in our basement with the computer, the laptop, the TV, Xbox, and dehumidifier. Is that how you spell it? I think so...

Well, that's all for now! Adios!

Ooh, just noticed something else. That last post there was my 111th blog post ever! How special! :-) And one other thing: check out my newly revised profile by clicking the link on the right.
 
Adios!

Happy birthday to this
Happy birthday to this
Happy birthday dear blog
Happy birthday to this!
 
Yup folks, it's the one-year anniversary of this blog! Wowsers... it feels like just yesterday when I started this! I'm so proud -- 93 posts and counting! :-)
 
One day, when I'm old and gray, I'll look back on this and think "Wow. I remember this." Or perhaps I'll think back and think "Wow. My memory's gone. I have no idea what this is." Or something like that. But I think that one day I should create a giant book full of all this stuff -- English journals, personal journals, word documents, emails, instant message conversations, blog entries -- showing all the events of my life. I think that'd be pretty interesting! Of course, it would also take forever to create... still, it could be a neat little "Story of my Life" thingy.
 
I think that's part of the reason I like blogging. It lets me create a record that I could look back on one day and say "Hey, what day was this? What happened this day?" and so on. I love keeping records. For example, just today we got rid of our old red Ford Ranger named Hank and got a new black Toyota Rav4 (we're still thinking of a name). I took over 50 pictures of Hank so that I would remember just what he looked like. Yikes. It's a good thing they're all digital, and thus free!
 
Digital pictures... they're wonderful for the same reason this blog is. They let me remember things I would otherwise forget. Like what Rosie looked like when she was only 2 months old, or what that snowstorm was like back in February 2003. It's for that reason that I have about 2,000 photos on this computer. :-)
 
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In Other News
 
Work continues on my web site. I had a link crisis earlier today, where I had to fix these same four broken links on every single page manually -- and then I made a formatting mistake when fixing them, so I had to do them all over again. Ugh. Now I'm mainly working on the Fun & Games, Reviews, and Star Wars sections. Wish me luck.
 
In More Other News
 
Today my friend came over for a couple hours and we played lots of Halo (with Willy, too). We were trying to have my friend, Willy and I all in a line with Willy in the middle and my friend and I facing each other. My friend and I were both supposed to shoot a rocket at each other (and thus Willy in the middle, too) at the exact same time Willy ducked to avoid the rocket. What was supposed to happen was that my friend and I would be killed by each other's rockets, and Willy would survive. (Who came up with this plan, anyway?) However, I... umm... "accidentally" ended up killing both my friend and Willy, while my friend's rocket just went right over my head. Hehe... oops. :-)
 
Speaking of Halo, yesterday I met a family who's just moved here from northern California. They have two kids -- one who's going into 9th grade (like me), and another who's going into 6th grade (one year below Willy Tucker). The older one has a Halo PC clan, which is what reminded me of this in the first place. Only 5 1/2 more weeks! I'm going to miss vacation... :-(
 
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Well, that's all. Tomorrow's my mom's birthday, and this Saturday we're off to Taconnet for four weeks, so it's an exciting time. But before we go, I have one more treat in store for you lucky readers... a picture! 

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She loves jumping up on the kitchen table now. She's gotten even more spongs since I last mentioned this, and she's also gotten a good amount of food. While we're in Taconnet, Rosie will be staying in a kennel recommended to us by the local marina owners (who breed puppies themselves, including "Parker," a cute yellow lab who looks just like the puppy in the K9 Advantix ad). The kennel is only about 15 minutes from Taconnet, so we might actually get to visit Rosie!!! YIPPEE!!!

Work on version 4.0 of Tophtucker.com is going quite well. The home pages for every primary section are done. I've just about finished the Family section, the Fun & Games section and the Multimedia section already have several pages, and the new About the Site page is done.
 
I still have to fix plenty of links, though, and there's still a ton of image work to be done. Nevertheless, the overall structure is complete, and I think it's all coming along rather nicely.

Sku! Just saw I, Robot. It was great! Yubnub! :-) Doesn't exactly make me feel too optimistic about robots, though.
 
Anyway, about the tophtucker.com beta...
 
On the site, you can currently preview the entire new family sections, one "flavor" of the new home page, and one totally new photo album. In addition, you can read over the outline that describes virtually every new feature of 4.0. (It reminds me of the NS-4s in I, Robot...) This winter (or so), the whole thing will go online. To see all this for yourself, head on over -- click here.
 
Following the primary updates to Tophtucker.com will be updates to the TuckLyne section, including updates to the Athena and TuckLyne Studios sub-sections. The new TLS site will include short video clips from our movies, and there'll be a whole new sub-section -- the TLO ("TuckLyne OnLyne" -- hehe, get it?) Store. There you can find simple instructions on how to order... well... anything! :-)
 
That part will come later on -- due to the school vacation schedule, probably sometime around Spring Break or even possibly later. Yut ehda... yeha!

Just now I uploaded the beta version of tophtucker.com version 4.0 -- check it out here! I also uploaded small updates to the School and Lessons sections and a bigger update to the Star Wars section. Check it out, and be sure to send me any feedback!
 
More on the beta tomorrow... or another day.... g'night!

I'm typing this from our new Dell laptop (they must love us right now), and I'm doing it wirelessly over our WiFi network! I've been having fun assigning the touch pad to do all sorts of fancy stuff, like launching a web site by tapping the upper-right or opening up Windows Media Player with the upper-left. Fun fun fun!

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She learned to swim yesterday! Well, she could already swim -- she had gone in once at Taconnet -- but yesterday was the first time she really went in, retrieved stuff, etc.

Just finished the document announcing all the exciting changes in store for tophtucker.com version 4.0! Actually, even it doesn't touch on some of the other longer-term things I've been working on...

I'm starting to distribute the document to select individuals for review. Then, in just a few days(maybe more, maybe less), I'll post it online along with the Beta section going up at tophtucker.com/beta so that everyone can take a look!

I'm writing this from our relativity new downstairs computer, which has a newer motherboard and an even newer hard drive.

Even after we got the motherboard replaced (to fix a faulty Ethernet adapter), we were having plenty of problems. Just yesterday a guy contracted by Dell to replace our hard drive came by and did so. Everything seems to be running smoothly -- so far.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
The day before yesterday (Tuesday), she managed to snag the singing little hamster we have in our kitchen. Yesterday, she did it again -- and I got pictures! Those pictures will be on my site in a matter of days, as part of the coming preview of version 4.0.

Also the day before yesterday, Rosie had a brief encounter with the neighborhood killer cat, Max, who catches and eats all sorts of animals. (We love him, though!) Max was sitting on a chair and Rosie came by and kind of sniffed him. I grabbed her by the collar, and Max hissed and basically ran off.

Finally, Rosie got her stitches out today. Yay!

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I'm off to watch Waiting for Guffman, a great movie that I highly recommend. Adios!

This past Thursday, June 1, we went to Spider-Man 2. It was really good. :-) Funny, action-packed, et cetera. Yesterday, as you know, we watched 2001: A Space Odyssey. Wow -- quite a difference there.

Also yesterday, we got the Spider-Man 2 videogame for Xbox. Willy and I have been playing it pretty much non-stop ever since. :-) This time around, you can swing, walk or jump literally anywhere on Manhattan Island. Jump on a car and ride it around. Catch little kids' balloons and get "hero points." Save the city. And so on. All in all, a great game.

Today -- just now, in fact -- we went to see "The Terminal." It's very funny. Tom Hanks plays an immigrant from the fictional country of Krakozhia who gets stuck in JFK International Airport when a coup in his home country renders his passport and visa worthless. For more information, check out the official web site.

Adios, amigos!

Dave: Open the pod bay doors, HAL.
HAL: I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.

We just rented and watched 2001: A Space Odyssey, and boy is it weird! Still, pretty interesting...

Currently, going to tophtucker.com displays version 3.2. That's basically the most-updated version. The original plan - though you might not have known it - said that there would be a version 3.3 before the jump was made to 4.0. However, in the interest of time that is no longer true. Rest in peace, version 3.3.

This basically means that, while there will be little updates here and there (a picture or two, a page update) between now and version 4.0 (scheduled for a winter release), nothing major is planned. That, in turn, means I have more time to work on 4.0, which means that it'll come sooner. Yay!

Note that no functionality is lost -- only a worthless interim site version is. ;-)

Very soon, a complete overview of plans for version 4.0 will be distributed to select individuals. Soon thereafter, a copy will be placed online, complete with a couple examples of the new site. Comments are welcome. :-)

Stay tuned!

Hello hello hello. Here I am, back again, for another great blog entry. :-)

First off, I now realize something. Look two blogs down. See how I say that my whole entry just dissappeared and that I thus had to do it over? Look one more entry down. There it is! The missing entry! I suppose it hadn't gone missing after all, though I maintain that it was not there immediately afterwards. Anyway, now you can compare the two, seeing little details that I forget or other ones that I remembered to include in the second version. :-)

Anyway, on Sunday, June 20, we left for -- Dallas. Yup, that's right, to go to Anchorage, Alaska we for some reason ended up in Dallas. While we were there, we saw a little Dell store and - BAM! - bought a laptop. Hehe... that was sudden!

Next stop, Anchorage. Alaska was lots of fun. We saw a giant glacier, several bears, some moose, and lots of mountains! One thing we didn't see was nighttime. In summertime Alaska, it never really gets dark. I took a picture at 10:30 or so PM, showing it was still broad daylight!

Our itinerary stated that we'd be in Alaska for about 5 days, then in San Francisco for 5 days. Unsurprisingly, that remained true. The trip from AK to SF was uneventful, and we arrived in time to see two things that were absent in Anchorage: our older brother Johnny, and darkness. (All the other things unique to San Fran would have to wait until morning.)

In San Francisco, our hotel was right accross the street from the Sony Metreon, a kind of Sony-only mall that we first discovered on our trip to SF three years ago. Unfortunately, 3 years ago it had a store called "Microsoft SF" with fun PDAs, software, games and more. Currently, it doesn't. Apparently, Sony took offense at Microsoft releasing the Xbox (which competes directly with Sony's PlayStation 2) and kicked them out. Very sad indeed...

At the Metreon, we played with projected marbles, ate ice cream, and saw at least a few dozen fancy Sony TVs showing the trailer for Spider-Man 2 -- which, might I add, is a Sony movie. (It also wasn't out yet during our visit. It is now, though, and I hear it's great.) In addition, there were tons of Spidey posters and giant Spidey wall displays. There were even more ads for it once you stepped outside, on busses, billboards, and so on. Despite its supposed greatness (I haven't seen it yet, so I can't be sure!), I think that's a bit much.

In SF, we also went to the beach (and made two giant sea forts -- the second only after the first was obliterated by a giant wave), saw plenty of restaurants, and saw my older brother's apartment. (In there, the day before yesterday, we played a board game called "Settlers of Catan." If you've ever played the computer game Civilation III, it's a lot like that. I love them both!)

The day before yesterday -- our last full day in SF -- we saw the best thing of all: Skywalker Ranch! We saw the giant sound/screening room, their artificial lake, and original props from Lucasfilm movies! I took at least 100 pictures of that place -- I hope to post some photos from the trip on my site soon, and those will be included.

Of course, I've been talking about putting stuff on my site "soon" a lot, and not much has actually gotten up there. We have plenty of free time ahead, though, so I assure you: there WILL be more updates SOON. :-D

Speaking of the web site, I spent some time discussing that with John while in San Fran. Fear not, version 4.0 is still on the way, and looking better than ever!

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
We just got her back from her stay at the kennel today! YAYAYAYAYAYAY!!!

Well, that's all, folks. Check back next time for another edition of...
TOPH'S AWESOME BLOG!!!!!!

Hi everybody! Just got back earlier tonight. While I suppose that was technically yesterday -- it as, after all, 1:24 -- that equates to only 10:24 San Francisco time.

Anyway, I'll update with all the details... umm... later today, I guess! In the meantime, I better get some good ol' sleep.

Adios!

Uggh, my ENTIRE last post just dissappeared into the ether due to Blogger problems, so I'll have to do a brief recap:

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She's just realized she can jump up onto the kitchen counter, so over the past week she's eaten 5 sponges, 1 wooden spatula, quite a lot of cheese and a little bit of coffee frappe. Yum!

Our cousin Alex came over today for most of the day -- we played LOTS of Super Smash Bros. on N64! Then we went over to my friend's house and played Halo PC multiplayer -- with Banshees! That was a lot of fun. (We had another couple cousins come over... was it Tuesday? Or Monday? Or Wednesday? Somewhere around then. We went to Shrek 2, which was fun.)

Yesterday a guy from Dell came over and replaced the motherboard on our downstairs computer, complete with a functional Ethernet adapter, which means that we now have internet access down there! Yippee!

Also yesterday, I went to Dodgeball with some other kids from school. It was so-so... nowhere near as good as Star Wars, that's for sure! :-D Hehe... I love Star Wars...

This'll be my last post in a while. Tomorrow we leave for Anchorage (by way of Dallas -- how odd)! (Rosie's already gone to her little puppy camp, where she'll stay for the next ten days or so.) We stay in Anchorage for 5 days, then go to San Francisco to see our older brother and sister and stay there 5 days! That'll be fun... while I might get my hands on a little internet access during that time, don't count on it!

While I've tried getting a little web site work done, it just hasn't really worked out for me. :-) However, when I get back there's plenty in store for good ol' tophtucker.com. Updates I'm working on include a better News page and plenty of new Photo Album content, as well as finished off the School and Lessons section. To top it all off, I've started planning out version 4.0. That'll be a mighty big update -- bigger than 3.0, I'm guessing. That might come by September, if I'm really productive, or by next summer if I'm not. :-) (I'd say early January would be the most realistic guess, though I'll do all I can to get it done before going back to school.)

Well, that's it! T-minus 9 hours and counting (that's until we leave for the airport). Adios!

Hi there! This'll probably be my last post in a while, since tomorrow we're flying to Anchorage (by way of Dallas -- how odd)! We're there for five days, then we go to San Francisco to visit my older brother & sister for five days, then we come back. All in all, 19 hours of flying -- which means 19 hours of quality time with my latest Star Wars books!

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She's just recently discovered that she's able to jump up onto the kitchen counter. Over the past week, she's eaten 5 sponges, one wooden spatula, quite a lot of cheese, and a little coffee frappe.

Today we had our cousin Alex over for a good chunk of the day. We played lots of Super Smash Brothers on N64! :-) Then, around 3:30, I went over to my friend's house and played some Halo PC multiplayer -- with Banshees! Fun fun fun!

Yesterday a Dell guy came over and installed a new motherboard on our new PC downstairs, complete with a functional Ethernet adapter! Finally -- internet! My life is complete! :-D Hehehe....

Well, that's all folks. I've tried getting web site stuff done, and to be honest I have gotten a tiny bit done, but it just hasn't been working out for me. ;-) Don't worry, there's plenty in store for when I get back! I'm working on updates to the News section, the Photo Album, and a bunch of other stuff. In fact, I'm starting to map out version 4.0! It'll be a biggie, quite a lot bigger than 3.0. I can't wait! :-D

Well, T-minus 10 hours and counting (that's until we leave for the airport)... While I might (if I'm lucky) be able to get my hands on some internet access during our trip, don't count on it! Adios!

Our friend came over last night to help us with various computer issues, including the issue of internet on our new Dell Media Center PC that I mentioned last post. Well, it turns out there's a very good reason I was having trouble connecting: somehow, it lacks an Ethernet adapter. Whether its simply missing it or whether something burned out we don't know, but tomorrow Dell is supposed to call us to let us know when they'll be able to come install a brand-new motherboard. Since we leave for Alaska on Sunday, go to San Fran 5 days later, and come back home after another 5 days, these issues might have to wait until then.

On a much higher note, computer-wise, I was able to connect the new Dell to our TV and play music & videos on both our TV and computer monitor simulataneously! Yippee!

Goodbye for now...

Just finished setting up our new Dell! :-D Actually, it's not connected to the network yet & thus doesn't have internet yet, but it's pretty much set up...

More on all that tomorrow!

Hi there! Sorry I haven't updated in a while... I've actually been working for the school this past week, not including Monday, updating computers and such.

Monday I went to Harry Potter 3 in IMAX with a few other people... we went to the Jordan's Furniture Comcast IMAX theater. It had Tempur-Pedic seats and armrests and a subwoofer built into every chair! WOW!!! That was fun...

Today was my last day working at school, so it was really only four days. Today I ended at 12:00, since they were taking down the network for repairs and thus I wouldn't be able to do any more work.

After that, my brother and I went down to our neighbor's house and swam some, had dinner, and then watched the third Zenon movie on Disney. It's bad enough that they spelled xenon wrong -- to make matters worse, that people in it (who are supposedly "futuristic") use expressions like "mondo-fabulous" and "macro-cool." Oh well -- it's so bad it's funny! ;)

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
While she swam a few times while we were in Maine a couple weeks ago, so has thus far avoided any swimming in our neighbor's pool.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
Last Friday was the first time she's ever met my older brother John.

Today I went to a friends' birthday party (we went to Blue Man Group), tried to fix our wireless network and partially succeeded (accidentally deleting some stuff on my iPaq in the process -- oops!), and... umm... "won" (not really) Monopoly in a game with my older brother, who was visiting from San Fran.

(At one point in the game, I dove across the board and tackled my brother Willy, vanquishing him eternally -- yippee! Hehehe...)

As for Friday's in-depth recap, here goes...

We started the day with a little down time / yearbook-signing time. During that time I learned that my aforementioned brother John was here from San Fran! YIPPEE!!! We lined all then lined up (in alphabetical order) out in the front circle, and at 8:30 we headed in to Bradley Hall for 8th Grade Promotion. Jessica and Max, our two elected student speakers, and our elected faculty speaker, Ms. Mathieu, spoke. We also saw an 8th grade reflective video, and CSP prizes were awarded.

After that, we had a little reception thingy with snacks -- yum! My brother tried tossing various foods into other people's mouths, with little or no success. We introduced John to a couple of my teachers and took plenty of pictures.

After that, we headed back to Bradley Hall for Final Assembly. There, awards were... well... awarded, and some last words were spoken. At 12:30 or so we were free, and I finished getting teacher signatures. (Many kids I would see again that night, and some more I would see Saturday.) We headed to Johnny's (that's a restaurant -- no connection with my brother) and had a celebratory lunch with my younger brother and a couple of friends.

Next we headed to Circle Cinema to see Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. It was pretty good. They have a new director who changed some things, as well as the general feel of the movie, to an extent. He made some good decisions, I think, but also a lot of not-so-good ones. The movie went by REALLY fast, they skipped a whole lot of content, and the supporting characters had little-or-no roles -- we only ever got to see the main guys, the pace was so fast. They changed a few bits of the book around, too. Oh well. It's bound to happen whenever a book makes the leap to the movies. Ha! Get it? A pun! BOUND to happen, like you BIND a book! Hehehe....

Immediately after that, I got a ride to a graduation party. We arrived around 5:35 and stayed until about 7:45 -- we were the last ones to leave, due to a bit of carpool confusion. Just for reference, I believe the party was supposed to last from 5:00 - 7:00. That was fun -- I took eleven pictures using my friend's mom's camera, which is one of those super-satifying ones that makes a nice "click." Fun! :-)

Last night's party was fun, too. There wasn't too much overlap, in terms of who went, which made it interesting. Other differences: Friday's was 100% outside, this one was 100% inside. Friday's went from 5:00 - 7:00, this one from 5:00 - 10:00. We played with some balloons at the beginning, listened to a bit of Beatles music, and marveled at the REALLY old TV in the basement. Then my friend arrived with his Xbox and game collection, and we started up Halo for some deathmatch / team deathmatch fun. Then more people arrived, we watched Pirates of the Caribbean, and headed downstairs for... I forget. Balloon fun? Yeah, some of that.

Anyway, later on, as some kids started to leave, another friend and I snuck upstairs for some more Halo. Unfortunately, he didn't have much experience, and the game wasn't very balanced. Once we got everyone playing and rotating out after losing, it got more fun. The later games were CTF; the earlier ones were team deathmatches.

Then I had to go home. Sad. My friend (a different one here) and I had quite a chat in the car, delaying my return to home -- as you could see from last night's entry. Well, that's all for the recap stuff folks. More real content tomorrow! Hey, maybe I'll get that iPaq working... ooh, and some web site work, too....

Just so you know, Star Trek AND Reading Rainbow star Levar Burton just won something like $167,000 for some teaching charity on "Star Trek" celebrity Weakest Link, as seen just now on the Game Show Network. The winning answer was antebellum -- but what was the answer? Unfortunately, some dumb aliens just came and blew up our planet-sized supercomputer that was only minutes away from the question. Alas, we may never know. Or will we? Find the hidden code, and post the question as a comment on my blog in our first-ever audience contest! May the Force be with you!

By the way -- I'll (still) update with a bigger recap a little later. No time now! :( Bye.

Howdy! Another fun day...

1. Opened some graduation gifts, incl. 2 Star Wars books -- yippee!
2. Played some Xbox
2. Headed off to another graduation party at 4:00; party went 5:00 - 10:00, though we stayed a little over 15 minutes late. Played plenty of Halo, which was great for me -- only 2 people (my friend & I) owned the Xbox version, so we had a clear advantage. Just to give you some idea of that, in one 4-person game, the final score was about 46 - 43 - 6 - 2. Not exactly evenly matched. :)

Well, gotta go to bed now. Believe it or not, I just got back from the party -- my friend and I (we were carpooling) ended up talking for a while after dropping him off at his house. Anyway, adios!

Wahoo! I'm a 9th Grader! :-)

I graduated from Middle School today, went to lunch, saw the new Harry Potter, went to a graduation party, came home, and wrote this -- all in one day! What an accomplishment! :-D

It's bed-time for me now, but I'll update with my impressions tomorrow -- my first full day of summer break! Yippee!

And just a bit more than 348 days left! YIPPEE!!! WAHOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!! Adios.

Today we had Community Service day at school. I actually just stayed at school and helped completely empty three classrooms.

We only have 4 more hours of middle school! Yippee! :-)

Today was our two-hour math exam. We had one 13-page packet to do on most all the stuff we did throughout the year, and then another 6-page packet only on "Chapter 10," which is the most recent stuff we've been doing. Even using all the extended time, I was only able to get a little less than half of it done. Oh well! The good news is: it's all over. We have no more work in Middle School -- ever!!! :-)

After the exam, we had little 20-minute sessions of each class. In Science we cleaned up a bit after the CSP chaos, in History the whole class played hand games, and in English we reminisced about the year gone by.

In Computer Class we did pretty much nothing other than surf the internet, though the winner of the recent "business plan" project won. My team -- "T-Ned Toys" -- won! Our idea was to make action figures based on NBC's hit reality series, The Apprentice. The best part was that they talked and had certain actions associated with them! So, for example, by pressing the button on its back, you could make the Donald Trump figure might say "You're fired" and do that weird hand thing. Donald Trump action figures... what an idea. Too bad it wasn't mine... ;-)

For our last Middle School class EVER -- Spanish -- we went outside to the tennis courts and just kind of played around. In started raining a little bit at first, and then it started raining A LOT. I got pretty wet. ;-) Of course, not as wet as the 6th graders, who had a water balloon fight.

After that, my carpool & I took a little trip to the local Barnes & Nobles, which also has a Starbucks cafe. While we were there it started REALLY raining -- about 100 times worse than the worst of before -- but, fortunately, by the time we left it had subsided. I love B&N. :-) We go there so often we even know the manager! Hehehe...

Well, that's all for now. Maybe I'll update again tomorrow and go into a little more depth... or who knows, maybe not! :) Adios.

Hello there! First of all, I'd like to point out that I have a new, secondary blog: Toph's Star Wars Blog. Check it out! (That means that I won't be posting much Star Wars stuff here anymore.)

Today in school we started off by practicing for our "promotion" on Friday, aka graduation. Then the whole middle school went to Dave & Buster's in Providence, Rhode Island. A little while ago we were given the choice of going to either "Good Times" (another arcade place) or Canobie Lake Park. However, Canobie Lake Park was rained out, and thus we all went to Dave & Buster's. It's on the very top floor of this giant mall - which, by the way, happens to have at least a couple dozen escalators. Oh well. It was fun anyway.

We started out with lunch at "DAB," as I'll call it from now on. We were served by a nice guy named Jon. Anyway, after that, we headed out to the arcade portion of DAB. I played Star Wars Racer a few times, some cop-chase thing a few times, a Ferrari racing thing, and maybe something else that I'm forgetting. Unfortunately, at that point my little "credit card" ran out of credits, and I had to stop playing. :(

We also went to DAB earlier in 8th grade, a couple days before winter break started. That day we went to some play -- the one with all the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future -- and then we went to DAB. That time they had another Star Wars game, called -- imaginatively enough -- "Star Wars Arcade." It was lots of fun, and it's too bad they took it away. I complained to the management, but they just said that they rotated games from time to time and that there were still plenty of good ones out there.

I actually still have my DAB credit card from that time around with a few credits left, which I suppose I could have brought this time for a little extra play time. Oh well. Maybe next time! :)

This was the 8th grade's last bus ride together. :( So sad... less than 3 full days of class left! Actually, NO full days left -- Wednesday and Thursday are 2:10 releases (the norm is 3:40), and Friday's a noon dismissal.

On a totally unrelated note, I discovered something REALLY cool in Microsoft Word today. (That program has SO many undiscovered features that 99% of the world never even realize exist.) Go to Tools > Options, then click the Spelling & Grammar tab, then check the "Show readability statistics" checkbox towards the bottom. (Last item under "Grammar" section of the tab; second-to-last checkbox.) Once that's checked, after every session of Spellcheck MS Word will tell you various stats about your document -- number of words, blah-de-blah, and so on. The best stuff is at the bottom. The Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, for example, predicts what grade-level student should be able to understand the document. Cool, huh!?!?!? I certainly think so. Try getting as high a grade level as possible. My record is 12 -- which, I believe, is the highest possible.

Bed time for me! Good night moon. And good night to you, too! :)

I'm back! In case you're wondering, I've been studying for my 2-hour Math exam on Wednesday. Not fun...

Anyway, last weekend was LOTS of fun. The best part was that Rosie got to come with us! She went swimming a few times, met a few friends, found a dead fish, and plenty more. She was really good staying with us; when she did wander off the path, she was quick to return. We had s'mores Saturday night and another fire Sunday morning, though that time there weren't any marshmallows involved. (But there was hot chocolate!)

We canoed around a bit -- actually, "dinghied" around would be more appropriate -- including one time when I had to head out to retrieve a wayward tennis ball. We also visited Day's, which is a nice little store they have up there. Finally, I read. A lot. I finished Star Wars: Shatterpoint on Friday, and now I'm almost done with Star Wars: Specter of the Past. Actually, I didn't end up having time to read nearly as much as I wanted to. I'm a big fan of Star Wars books, although reading them out of order like this kind of messes me up. One day, maybe I'll read through them all from beginning to end. I've read a lot of them -- the whole X-Wing series, the Thrawn and Black Fleet Crisis trilogies, the entire Young Jedi Knights series, the Jedi Academy trilogy, I, Jedi, Darksaber, the Courtship of Princess Leia, and more. I've read the first couple of books in the New Jedi Order series, and I'm looking forward to finishing that up. I'm also looking forward to reading Survivor's Quest, Tatooine Ghost and plenty more Clone Wars stuff.

And, while we're on the subject... there's only 352 days, 4 hours, 8 minutes and 14 seconds left until Star Wars Episode III! YIPPEE!!!

Howdy! We just got back from Taconnet! Well... by "just" I mean "just" over half an hour ago. ;-) It was fun, and -- best of all -- Rosie got to come with us! She ever swam a bit! I'll check back with a more complete report in the morning... good night...

And only 3 1/2 more days of school!

Today in school we had the CSP fair, where people walk around and look at everybody's presentations. It was pretty fun, and I actually learned some stuff. :-)

Afterwards, we had a little post-CSP party with ice cream and so on. While walking back from that, my History teacher, my English teacher and I walked past a sparrow. My English teacher pointed out that it was a baby, and then realized it was injured and its right eye was hurt. She went to my Science teacher and got a box full of little bits of newspaper for it, which we then -- over the next two-three hours or so -- filled with mulch, twigs, leaves and grass to make a nice little nest. We even had a styrofoam cup for it to drink out of! (Although it didn't really want to drink -- or eat, for that matter. We got it to eat, but only a tiny bit of bread. We found plenty of inchworms, but the bird wasn't interested.

One of my classmates, who helped make the next, was planning to bring the bird home and then bring it to the Tufts medical center near her house, where it would be safer. I'm not sure how that ended up -- about ten minutes before school was let out, I had to go to this meeting about redesigning the school's web site, which lasted until about 4:45. I do, however, happen to know that the bird was still safe with my classmate at pickup time.

Earlier tonight, we went to a 7:30 movie with a couple other kids. It had funny parts, but also not-so-funny parts... anyway, I have to go to bed now. Goodnight, everybody!

(By the way, I have tomorrow and Monday off -- four day weekend!!! To top it all off, next week is our last week of school! WAHOO!!! Although, since it's also my last week ever of middle school, it is a bit sad.)

Bye bye!

Wahoo -- the CSP is OVER!! Today, a little bit past 1:20 PM, Nora Lutz completed her presentation on Nuclear War, and then we were completely DONE!!!

These days, and especially in the coming days and weeks, I'll be working a lot on Tophtucker.com V4.0 and the new TuckLyne web site, which should launch along side it. Those two giant updates should be coming this fall. In the meantime, I'll try to keep the current version up-to-date.

To top it all off, here's my first RRCOTD in a long time...

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She's certainly getting bigger, but she still loves (1) holding her own leash, (2) biting people (though she's getting better at that!), (3) jumping around, and (4) her squeaky hamburger.

Today, from about 9:47 to 9:57, I did my CSP presentation. I'm really glad it's all done now! WAHOO!!! I think it went pretty well... feel free to leave your comments using my nifty new comments system! Just click "comments" at the bottom of this post, and then click the link to leave a new comment.

Adios, amigos! And there's only 358 days, 1 hour, 56 minutes and 21 seconds left until Star Wars Episode III comes out! As Little Ani would say: YIPPEE!!!

I have about 2 hours 18 minutes and 26 seconds left until my CSP presentation. Wish me luck!

Yikes! We just got hit with a mega-lightning bolt here. Well, not actually hit -- but it sure was loud!

And there's another one!

We had a lot of lightning this morning, too.

By the way, there's only 359 days, 2 hours, 2 minutes and 10 seconds left until Star Wars Episode III comes out! YIPPEE!!! I can't wait. This past weekend I watched Epidode I, and earlier tonight I watched the Battle of Naboo all over again.

Adios!

Today we had our first day of CSP (Creative Scientist Project) presentations at school. It lasted pretty much the whole day. I go tomorrow, from 9:45 - 9:55. Wish me luck!

Just saw Shrek 2 last night. Very funny, very good -- especially in the second half. Other promising movies coming soon include "Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban", "Spider Man 2", "I, Robot", and -- in less than 361 days -- Star Wars: Episode III! YAHOO!!!! :-D

Howdy! Like the new look? So do I! At some time I hope to make it match more with my regular site, http://www.tophtucker.com/.

Anyway, not only does this make my blog look a gazillion times cooler, it also adds important functionality -- you can now comment on my posts! Yippee! Just click the little Comments like at the end of each post and then click Post a Comment. In addition, you can now check out my Blogger profile on the right!

Sadly, my Links have dissappeared temporarily, but fear not -- they'll be back in a jiffy! Hopefully, at least.

On a totally separate note, today was my last day ever of Middle School classes! Next week we present our CSPs (Creative Scientists' Projects), and the week after that is the last week of school altogether!

Adios, amigos! And there's less 363 days left until Star Wars: Episode III!

Guess what everybody? As of midnight last night, there's only one year left until Star Wars: Episode III comes out! YIPPEE!

Hey y'all!

Sorry it's been so long since my last post. I've had a lot going on - science project, tons of quizzes, and a big computer class project. Now I'm about to go to school. This will be my last regular week of classes, and then we have two more weeks of special schedules after that.

I have to go now. I'll try to update this again soon, hopefully with an entirely new look for the blog!

I've just uploaded some changes and additions to my web site.

- The entire Games section is updated.
- The various home pages have received minor updates.
- The School now has two new pages: the under-construction School Projects page, and the very beginnings of a School Trips page.
- The Library page has some minor changes. The Reviews and Editorials section, contrary to what I say on the page, is not online yet but will be soon.
- Willy's page has been updated.

We just got back from our 1-week 8th grade trip to Washington D.C. It was really fun! I took over 100 pictures -- I hope to post some of the best on my web site in the near future.

We went to the Smithsonian, the Capitol, all sorts of monuments and more! I'll be posting a more complete report on my web site soon (probably coinciding with my photo updates and a new School section update.)

Gotta go to bed now -- adios!

I just got back from a birthday trip (not my birthday; my friend's) to Boston Paintball, where I played (surprise!) paintball for the first time ever. It wasn't full-fledged paintball, though; they had some strict rules and they weren't using the really painful paintballs. It was indoors in this big room with all sorts of bean-bag "bunkers" you could hide behind. Some were in the shape of right triangles (called "Doritos" by the people there; i.e., "there's one behind the left big dorito."). Others were cylindrical. We all got helmets and wore especially thick clothing as protection.

Some guys had REALLY fancy guns, with custom paint jobs, double barrels, scopes and laser sights. The people running Boston Paintball separated those with rental guns from those with special guns in order to level the playing field, but a rental person was allowed into the non-rental game if they wanted to. We ended up playing in all the games.

The game started off with each team crowded behind a barrier of netting on either side. As soon as the ref said "go," you had to spread out across the bunkers -- you weren't allowed to stay behind the net. When a lot of people got playing -- sometimes we had ten or more guys on each team -- it got really crowded, really loud, and really chaotic.

I'd say the best part was the teamwork involved. Before the game started people told their friends "okay, we'll go to the big left dorito first, then you cover me while I move up..." Once the game started, everyone was yelling out enemy locations and requests for covering fire.

The other three people "at the party" (for lack of a more appropriate phrase) all got bruises, but I pretty much stayed behind the bunkers the whole time and thus came out perfectly alive, with no real bruises and only four or five hits. The more experienced people we were playing with, even though they were clearly verterans, were still really nice to us. (You can tell they're veterans from the *literally* eight bottles of refill paintballs strung around their belt, the mohawks, the special helmets and guns and the fact that they carried their equipment on IN TWO OR THREE SUITCASES.) Also, they weren't really way way way better than us -- we could hold our own against them.

In conclusion, it was really fun, but I would NOT want to try serious paintball. I've seen some of the giant bruises that can cause. ;-)

Hi there!

Beaver had this past Monday and Tuesday off, Monday for Patriot's Day and Tuesday for some teacher work day thing. On Monday we went out to the marathon, where I counted the first thousand male runners just for fun. :-)

Yesterday I had a pleasant surprise when I signed into Blogger and found, to my delight, an offer to join the Gmail beta-testing. What is Gmail, you ask. It's a new Google-powered free email that gives you ONE GIGABYTE of storage! Yippee! It's really cool.

Yesterday was also the Beaver Spring Concert. Congratulations to everyone involved (especially the middle schoolers, who I actually know)!

The whole 8th grade leaves for Washington D.C. this Monday, where we'll be for a week. We have to get to school at 5:30 in the morning, and it's a 10-hour bus ride! Since time flies when you're having fun, we have a really "fun" event planned: watching Schindler's List!

(That was a joke, by the way.)

We've watched a little in History class, but we haven't had time to finish it -- it's over 3 hours long! (Of course, with our 10-hour bus ride we could watch it three times and still have time to spare.) It's just about the least "fun" movie I've ever seen.

Random coincidence: we're watching a Liam Neeson movie in both History and Science. In History we're watching the aforementioned Schindler's List, and in history we're watching the PBS series Evolution, narrated by Liam Neeson.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She loves playing with all her doggy friends! Casey, who's a black lab in our neighborhood, is one of her best friends; she also enjoyed play-time with fellow golden retriever Dante while at the marathon.

Just got back from the Sox-Yankees game. The Red Sox won! :-D

Manny hit a homer, Schilling had an awesome first game @ Fenway as a Red Sox player, and the whole stadium had lots of fun chanting "You use steroids" to Jason Giambi. :-)

GO SOX!!!!

Today is the first day of my four-day weekend -- yippee! :-) We get Monday off because of Patriot's Day, and Tuesday off because of some teacher work-day thingy.

Today we're going to the Red Sox game! Wish them luck! :-)

Oh, wait! I almost forgot!

Today was "Service Learning" day at school. So, my advisory & I went to Shattuck Shelter to stuff informative folders for a legislative fundraising meeting Friday. On the bus ride there we watched Teletubbies, and on the way back we watched Barney -- how much better could you get!?!? ;-)

(The bus was REALLY nice!)

Adios for real this time. :-)

Today a couple of other kids from Beaver and I went to the Bowen (my old school) production of The Wizard of Oz. It was really good! Afterwards I talked to the cameraman doing the recording, who I had met the previous year at Bowen's 2003 musical. Here's my rough transcript of how it played out:

ME: Hi!
CAMERAMAN: Hi! Wait a second.... do I know you?
ME: Yup! I talked to you last year. You were the one who filmed the President, right?
CAMERAMAN: Yup.

We then found out that he had filmed every Bowen play since... 1994? Yeah, I think it was since 1994. (Either that or 1996.) That means that he's filmed every single Bowen play I've been in or seen! :-D Pretty cool, huh? As for the president thing, during my discussion with him last year I learned that he had filmed some U.S. President -- Kennedy, I think -- only a couple of weeks before they were assassinated. Yikes!

We all had lots of fun giving out flowers afterwards, even to people to had no idea who we were and/or weren't even in the play! ;-)

Adios.

Yesterday we had a Nobel prize winning scientist guy from NIST (National Institute for Standards and Technology, I think) come and give a little speech at our school. It was really fun! He talked about atomic clocks and the need to slow down atoms by making them really really cold.

As a demonstration of just how cold, he brought along a whole lot of liquid nitrogen for the talk. He poured it on the ground, poured it over his hand, stuck 10 balloons into a container that looked like it could only fit one, shattered a rubber ball and a banana, and so on. It was lots of fun!

Beaver really needs to get a lifelong supply of that stuff. Imagine how perfect it would be in the cafeteria when you need to cool down your drink really quickly! ;-)

Gotta go to school now. Adios!

Updates to my web site have been uploaded.

- The FAQ is now updated.
- The Photo Album has two new albums containing artwork I've done.
- The School section got some minor factual updates.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
A little while ago she managed to beat the squeak out of her squeaky frog. A couple of days later she got two new toys: Squeaky Baseball and Squeaky Weird Bumpy Rainbow-Colored Ball (aka "Sweburacob").

Happy Easter (and this time it actually is Easter)!

Howdy! Sorry it's been so long. By now I've pretty much given up hope that I'll ever be able to update this daily. ;-) Oh well. Here's all my updates from the past weeks.

- I'm back at school now -- spring break's long gone. :-(
- Happy Very Much Belated April Fool's Day!
- A few more web site updates are still coming in the next couple of days...
- There have been ten 3-minute episodes of the Star Wars: Clone Wars cartoon on Cartoon Network over the past couple of weeks. This past Thursday was the big, 6-minute finale featuring GENERAL GRIEVOUS, the new bad guy for Episode III. If you missed the cartoons, you can see all 20 (10 for Season 1 from last fall, 10 for Season 2 these past weeks) online. Chapter 20 was by far the best.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She's currently learning to shake and jump over small obstacles! :-D

Happy Easter, everybody!

Today Rosie had her first Puppy Kindergarten class! She played with her new friends (Woody, Logan, Scarlet and more), learned some new tricks, and had a great time! :-D I'll try to get some of the pictures uploaded to her web page soon. Which reminds me.....

In Other News:
- I've just uploaded a bunch of new updates to my web site, including, among other things, a new My Programs page where you can download computer programs I've made!
- More updates on the way, and I've just gotten a great idea concerning what to do for version 4.0, which is (hopefully) coming this summer or fall!
- If you've been having trouble accessing my site the past couple of days, fear not -- so have I. Hopefully it's all resolved now.

Adios for now, amigos!

Spring break is 3/4 over... :-( Very very sad. Oh well, I've been getting a lot done. By the end of this weekend, expect some major web site updates. By the end of this day, expect some new photos and Rosie's page. Speaking of Rosie...

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
Rosie has this bone thingy that she's totally obsessed with, but we only give these things to her to chew on when we really need her not to chew us. So, last night it was resting on top of Rosie's little cage/kennel, which is all black wire with all the little holes -- well, pretty big holes -- so that you can see into it. I walked into the kitchen and found Rosie inside her kennel with her nose sticking out a bit through the top, knocking around the yummy bone "out of her reach" on top!

Just as I walked in, she succeeded in knocking the bone so that it fell through one of the cracks and right into her mouth! I burst out laughing as she ran, ecstatic, back and forth with her prize.

That was funny. Very funny. :-)

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
I now have many holes in my socks, pants, and shirts due to Rosie. Oh yes, and in my skin, too. Sometimes, it hurts a lot. :-( Oh well -- I still love her just as much! :-D Besides, she'll get over it...

In fact, puppy school starts tomorrow! Hopefully there will be some good influences there.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She has by now learned that she can squeak her squeaky frog not only by biting it, but also by hitting it up against various hard objects like the floor, the wall, and your leg.


Answer to last time's quiz: c, a, b, d

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
Sometimes, if she has a chew toy in her mouth yet decides to go after your foot, she forgets to first drop the chew toy. Of course, she usually notices once she discovers the strange presence keeping her mouth from her target flesh.

Random Rosie Quiz of the Day:
Rank the following chew toys by how much Rosie likes them.

a. Squeaky Frog
b. Tennis-Ball/Bone Thingy (kind of looks like a barbell; mini tennis balls on either side, connected by a "tennis-tube")
c. Squeaky Hamburger
d. Blue Ball with Bell Inside (so it jingles whenever it rolls)

Answer to last time's quiz: d, "All of the Above"

Also Note:
Rosie's web site has been updated with new photos. Check it out!

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
When she gets really tired, she's REALLY tired, and is prone to suddenly collapse and refuse to get up. Even if she's on a walk, after a particularly hard stretch she might just randomly lie down.

NEW!!! Random Rosie Quiz of the Day:
When she's in that super-hibernation kind of mode, is the best way to wake her up...

a. Hold her up and move her paws around to make her dance?
b. Sing/hum [non-lullaby] music?
c. Talk loudly to her and rub her belly?
d. All of the above

I'll post the answer tomorrow... hopefully.... also, I hope to post some new pictures I took today to her web site, along with some older ones that I still haven't uploaded.

This morning (aka just now) I woke up and looked at the clock. It was 7:55, just five minutes before school should start. My first thought was "Oh no, I've slept too late!" My second thought was "Oh wait, it must be a Tuesday!" (when we start @ 9). My third thought was "No, it's definitely not a Tuesday, it's a Saturday!" My final thought was:

IT'S SPRING BREAK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just wanted to share that happy story with you. I'll report back in later in the day with a RRCotD!

One more thing: I just noticed that I've had this blog for over 8 months now. Wow. Time flies when you're having fun! ;-)

Good night.

After the first (partial) day of Spring Break, I hereby declare it a success! YIPPEE!!! :-D We got out of school at 2:10, then we just did stuff at home for a while, then we went to Hidalgo (good movie, by the way), then we came back, and now I'm about to go to sleep. Fun! :-)

In History class today we saw a very (unintentionally) funny movie about a very not funny topic -- that is, the Nazi party. In it, this history teacher starts a class experiment called "The Wave" (also the name of the movie) that ends up getting WAY out of hand, with everyone doing this weird salute to each other all the time and chanting "Power through Discipline! Power through Community! Power through Action!". Kind of weird, kind of scary, and also kind of funny. ;-)

Anyway, I'll update you later on other happenings. In the mean time, here's something for you to CHEW on (pun intended).

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
Her little baby teeth are REALLY REALLY SHARP, and have so far punctured everything from socks to pants to shirts and yes, even flesh. Ouch.

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She is seemingly anti-claustrophobic -- she loves confined spaces!

Last weekend I went skiing, which was fun. Now, a week later, I've finally decided to update my blog again. Guess what? Only one more week until Spring Break! YAYAYAYAYAY!!!!

In other news...

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She's getting very good at letting you know when she has to go the bathroom. She just stands by the door and whimpers a tiny little bit, very quietly.

(So much for getting better about keeping that daily.... oh well!)

I almost forgot --

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
Her favorite thing to chew on are her squaky hamburger toy, table/chair legs, any corners on the walls, and feet/pant legs.

Sorry I missed the comment for the 23rd, 24th, and 25th. I'll try to be better in the future -- but not over this weekend, remember! Read the post directly below this -- we're going skiing! :-D

I'm off to go skiing directly after school today (we have the day off tomorrow for teacher conferences or something -- YIPPEE!!!), so don't expect any posts over the long weekend -- where we're going there's no internet.

I'll report back after my big adventure on the bunny slope! :-)

Random Rosie Comment of the Day:
She by far prefers sleeping with her head elevated.

Also:
I've updated the Rosie page on my web site. It now looks much better! :-)

Because it's been so long since my last web site upload, I've uploaded what I have so far of Version 3.1. I'll upload the rest whenever I get it done. :-)

Toph Tucker

Say hello to the new member of the Tucker family -- Nina Rose Tucker! :-D

At some point I'll make the web site all pretty and everything, but for now it's kinda clunky. Oh well. Adios!

Nina Rose Tucker

Now, after that quickie post, here's a rundown of this ever-so-exciting day.

Exciting thing #1:
There was a rumor at school that someone was running around with a gun. There wasn't. However, there was a suspicious **unarmed** character fleeing the local Fleet bank, who was caught on school grounds. Moral of the story? Don't believe rumors!

Exciting thing #2:
The school dance. Yay. Not actually all that exciting. Moral of the story? Next time get more soda so we don't run out so quickly.

Exciting thing #3:
Writing this! Yes, indeed, this is so much fun I'd classify it as downright exciting! Moral of the story? Blogging is fun!

Exciting thing #4:
The most exciting thing of all, even though technically it wasn't really something that happened today. Wondering what it is? I'll tell you what it is! We're getting a puppy! Yippee! :-D Moral of the story? Um.... how about puppies are cool? Does that qualify? No? Not really? Oh well.

Okay. That's all. Have a nice day! :-D

Hi there, loyal readers!

I've just created a site on Xanga, a rival blogging site to Blogger. But don't worry, Blogger -- so far you're still my favorite. :-)

Anyway, if you want to check it out here's a link:

tophtucker's Xanga Site

MY THOUGHTS ON THE RELEASE OF STAR WARS IV - VI ON DVD:
Many people are upset that the upcoming 4-disc (3 for the movies, then 1 for an all-new documentary) will include only the newer Special Edition versions of the movies, which change some minor plot points and brush up on the look of the originals. I never really saw much of the originals, and the only time I've seen any of the originals in theaters was when they were re-released as the Special Editions. I, overall, prefer the new ones. Why? They look better. They also have some new footage. Here's a rundown of all that:

EPISODE IV:
- New scene: Han & Jabba
- More shots of Mos Eisley, making it seem less deserted
- Better dewback stuff
- Cooler shots just before Battle of Yavin

EPISODE V:
- More setup shots for Cloud City
- Better landing sequence
- Once they're inside, you can see out windows
- More Wampa stuff
- You see Vader's shuttle going from Bespin to his Super Star Destroyer

EPISODE VI:
- New & Improved Sarlacc
- New musical sequence in Jabba's Palace
- Shots of people celebrating all over the galaxy towards end
- New Ewok celebration stuff

Also, the overall film quality of everything is vastly improved. Now, for the downsides I've heard most often:

- Greedo shoots first in Cantina scene (Episode IV)
- Something about Luke slipping or screaming or something that I never quite seem to get (Episode V)

Not all that much. However, I suppose that for most people there's the whole issue of "This is how I first saw it." In my case, I've pretty much always seen them as the Special Editions. I do think it would be nice if Lucasfilm released an original version DVD, but I'm not nearly as riled-up over it as some people seem to be.

The bottom line is: I can't wait until September 21st! :-D

Quick note: The little green icon at the bottom of my sidebar is a sort of "fire escape" for if you're caught reading blogs at work. :-) It's supposed to send you to a suitable site for work, but so far it's just sent me to Google. Oh well. Good in concept, I suppose...

One thing I forgot to mention yesterday: in school on Friday I spent 5 hours on tests! Yippee!!! It was lots of fun -- you should try it sometime! :-)

Happy Valentine's Day!

Today we got out of school and entered a FOUR DAY WEEKEND -- yippee! :-D Happy Valentine's Day Eve, everybody.

My new favorite thing in the world is Helium-4 at (or below) 2.17 Kelvin. At that point it becomes a "superfluid", a really weird liquid with zero viscosity. Somehow they can crawl up the side of jar & over the top, and then come back out again, too. It's really weird! :-D

Oh, and congrats to Opportunity & get well soon Spirit!

Today for Service Learning Day my advisory went to Welcome Baby (a charitable organization) and sewed blankets. That means I learned how to sew! Yippee!

By the way -- where'd all the snow go? :-\

Last Friday many schools got the day off it was sooooo cold....... and Beaver was one of those! That means that we got a 4-day-weekend! :-) Too bad we go back to school tomorrow...

Today we worked on Survivor or Not some more -- we're making progress!!! :-) Hopefully I'll have a TuckLyne Studios blog up soon where you can learn more about all that.

Oh, and happy new year!

Congratulations to NASA and Spirit, good luck Opportunity, and RIP Beagle.

Today's the last day of winter break for me. :( Very sad. However, I've worked on my website a bunch and will (hopefully) be able to upload my updates to EVERY PAGE soon. The only thing that's stopping me from uploading them now is updating the rest of the pages. :)

Saw Paycheck today -- good movie. Never try to predict the future.

That's all for now. Adios!