In 2006 We Trust

My cousins and I have decided that 2006 is going to be the year for the Pinto families, and with an engagement announced I'm sure that there will already be a wedding this year in the family. Last night, we hosted a New Year's party at my place, and people seemed to enjoy it, but I'm not totally satisfied with it. I'll share what I learned for those of you who may have to similarly plan a New Year's Eve party with family. I had a ton of good music, but without enough young, energetic dancers I had to succumb to playing oldies with spurts of hip hop and dance in between. If my brother was in town that would've been different though since he'd bring some of his friends. Also, I really need practice in reading audiences better for playing the right tracks. When it ends before 4AM, I only consider it a partial success. I couldn't help being glad though that 2005 was over. I have so much more to look forward to this year, and now my ambitions are high for getting an internship this summer. Though I still find myself easily distracting from working on my program, I'm becoming more optimistic about getting it done and have decided to limit myself to 7 hours of sleep starting tonight. I'm thinking that I'll open up more this semester and get out there. Without football or EE 316 I feel that I'll actually have weekends to go on some dates or else I may have a mental breakdown from schoolwork. Getting an internship will also give me a better idea of what life outside of Texas is like and far away from the parents. It's really annoying to have to have my room and bathroom constantly presentable to invisible guests; it'll be nice to be back in Austin. Maybe I should read this book when I get back.

To continue the theme here, BBC put up a smorgasbord of 100 things we now know that we didn't know before this year. It's just a fun read. Microsoft is in talks with a Japanese company to bring a number of communications services including IM and VoIP to businesses, and it seems to me to be a precursor for American businesses. There's no doubt that as domestic firms get larger they face communications issues, so I don't see why they wouldn't be interested in everything in a pretty package. While I'm on M$, the exploit in WMF that allows virus-laden images alone to infect your computer has now been used to spread an IM worm. Please protect yourselves from the vulnerability. Some people have already found themselves screwed over by the Sony rootkit, so Sony is now prepared to give you three free album downloads to compensate. Not too shabby! There are also rumors that Sony may not be able to ship the PS3 by next summer, and I'll be you they're true. Frankly, even if they release it next winter with a single killer app that actually taps the system's immense resources, they'll smoke the Xbox 360 on two fronts, which launch though the best games are still early in the development process and the console cost them an arm, a leg, and a genital. Lastly, just had to mention that Windows Live Mail is in beta.

I know I went over in tech news, but there's nothing going on in movies. The box office estimates for today aren't even up yet! From what we have, the Chronicles of Narnia is almost a sure winner unless Peter Jackson paid a million extra people to watch King Kong today, which should get 2nd. Harry Potter is still on the chart, The Producers is of to an extremely weak (but predictably bad) start, and I hope that Munich's $8,000 a theater is enough to get it a wide release. I might as well mention that I rewatched a lot of 24 this weekend on A&E (season 1 and part of 2), and it reminded me of why I love the show: Jack (Kiefer Sutherland) is a total badass and David Palmer (Dennis Haysbert) is the man! Please don't forget to catch season 5 on January 15-16 on Fox. It also reminded me of how hot Elisha Cuthbert (who played Kim Bauer) is; so much so that I'm going to pick up The Girl Next Door (see my review) at Best Buy tomorrow (it's on sale) and put up a saucy photo of her:



Now, it's time for some Unconscious Mutterings:

I say ... and you think ... ?

1. Celebrate::Good times
   
2. Resolve:Resolution
   
3. I need to::finish my damn program!
   
4. Call::Telephone
   
5. Token::Coin
   
6. Brand::Clothing
   
7. Comparison::Shopping
   
8. Far away::Shrek (the land of...)
   
9. Artful::Aesthetic
   
10. Fantastic::Four