I'm back!
A major project blossomed at work which has demanded all of my freetime the past several weeks. It's been one of the most demanding and challenging DHTML/J2EE Struts projects I've ever worked on along with some complex Oracle queries. It's pretty cool actually. I've enjoyed expanding my knowlege into deeper J2EE/Struts and more robust and complex user interfaces with some unique database query challenges. What's even better is that I'm fully in charge and being challenged positively instead of the insane, frustrating bullshit that has dominated my career path. It sounds like I'm on drugs, but I enjoy my job. :-)
Okay, enough about that. I've spent what little freetime I've had reworking my online photo gallery. See what you think:
http://stevemillergalleries.com
The old version was really crappy, but it allowed me to experiment with a few things to make uploading and organizing images easier. The underlying engine that generates all of the image pages is JAlbum. It's a kick-ass application in my opinion for my needs...and best of all..it's free! I did make a nice PayPal donation to the developer to show my appreciation. It is a java based application (a little J2EE and JST thrown in) which allows me to really do some nice customizations. However, you don't need to know java to use it right out of the box as it has quite a few nice skins to start off with.
I've also been asked by my old band, Voodoo Blue, to fill in as drummer for a couple of gigs over the summer. That should be alot of fun as I miss playing gigs and the music scene in general. With my career finally settling down and stablilizing, I can see some time to get back into at least my home recording projects that have been shelved for too long. Now that I have a computer with the horsepower of a Ferrari, I should be able to do some proper recording/mixing techniques of existing work as well as finish up so many ongoing pieces. This leads me to the video stuff....
I might actually take a serious stab at making a chase video...finally. Part of my hesitation is the tremendous amount of work and effort I'll have to put into it to produce something I would be proud of. I also want to include all of my video from 1998 through 2006 as well...a huge task to sort through the many hours of video alone to start the entire process with a storyboard and all. Whew. I'm getting tired thinking about it. Time for a beer. ;-) At this pace, I may not get around to it until 2007. LOL!!
Other than that, the horrendous drought continues. My particular area of Collin County has been very hard hit. The scattered rains of the past week completly avoided my small area. I got one heavy shower for about 15 minutes while many areas close by had several events with lots of Dallas and Fort Worth receiving several inches of rain. That's been the story for the past year here. My grand total rainfall at my house for 2006 is only about 6 inches which is only about 40-45% of the official measurement at DFW. I've got massive cracks all throughout my yard. I can only water once per week and it's just enough to keep the grass resuscitated. I'm running soaker hoses all around my foundation.
Collin County has been declared a disaster area along with many other counties in Texas mainly due to the agricultural devestation. Lake Lavon which supplies most of Collin County's water supply including McKinney is beginning to dry up. If we do not get some heavy rains by this fall or early winter, we'll be going into Stage 4 drought contingency...if not before then. It's scary and damned serious. Another year of drought like this and we'll have the marshall law equivilent of water rationing. Pray for rain!
Okay, enough about that. I've spent what little freetime I've had reworking my online photo gallery. See what you think:
http://stevemillergalleries.com
The old version was really crappy, but it allowed me to experiment with a few things to make uploading and organizing images easier. The underlying engine that generates all of the image pages is JAlbum. It's a kick-ass application in my opinion for my needs...and best of all..it's free! I did make a nice PayPal donation to the developer to show my appreciation. It is a java based application (a little J2EE and JST thrown in) which allows me to really do some nice customizations. However, you don't need to know java to use it right out of the box as it has quite a few nice skins to start off with.
I've also been asked by my old band, Voodoo Blue, to fill in as drummer for a couple of gigs over the summer. That should be alot of fun as I miss playing gigs and the music scene in general. With my career finally settling down and stablilizing, I can see some time to get back into at least my home recording projects that have been shelved for too long. Now that I have a computer with the horsepower of a Ferrari, I should be able to do some proper recording/mixing techniques of existing work as well as finish up so many ongoing pieces. This leads me to the video stuff....
I might actually take a serious stab at making a chase video...finally. Part of my hesitation is the tremendous amount of work and effort I'll have to put into it to produce something I would be proud of. I also want to include all of my video from 1998 through 2006 as well...a huge task to sort through the many hours of video alone to start the entire process with a storyboard and all. Whew. I'm getting tired thinking about it. Time for a beer. ;-) At this pace, I may not get around to it until 2007. LOL!!
Other than that, the horrendous drought continues. My particular area of Collin County has been very hard hit. The scattered rains of the past week completly avoided my small area. I got one heavy shower for about 15 minutes while many areas close by had several events with lots of Dallas and Fort Worth receiving several inches of rain. That's been the story for the past year here. My grand total rainfall at my house for 2006 is only about 6 inches which is only about 40-45% of the official measurement at DFW. I've got massive cracks all throughout my yard. I can only water once per week and it's just enough to keep the grass resuscitated. I'm running soaker hoses all around my foundation.
Collin County has been declared a disaster area along with many other counties in Texas mainly due to the agricultural devestation. Lake Lavon which supplies most of Collin County's water supply including McKinney is beginning to dry up. If we do not get some heavy rains by this fall or early winter, we'll be going into Stage 4 drought contingency...if not before then. It's scary and damned serious. Another year of drought like this and we'll have the marshall law equivilent of water rationing. Pray for rain!
posted by Steve Miller TX at 7/13/2006 12:35:00 AM
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