Not a lot of updates recently, I know. But I have been very busy recently, and I haven’t had much time to do anything other than working on research and TA work. I’ve been so busy that I haven’t even gone to my algorithms class in four weeks! I’m farther behind in that class than I’ve ever been before.

First, some will notice that the graphics on the front page of the site are a little bit different. This is due to my getting the latest version of Macromedia Fireworks, my graphics editor of choice. This was a little “birthday/I finally have money” present to myself. The problem is that the bottom of the menu graphic will look strange in IE. (Ed. Note: I have fixed this by changing the PNGs to 8-bit versions.) IE doesn’t support alpha transparency for 32-bit PNGs. Translating the technobabble, this means that Microsoft needs to fix their browser. If you look at it with a recent version of Netscape or Mozilla, you’ll notice that the graphics have nice, crisp edges, even against whatever background I might have in the theme. No more artifacts (read: little grayish areas right at the border). It looks really nice – just the way that I’ve always wanted it. You’ll also notice that the typeface on the graphics changed…I finally caved on this because I figure that most people wouldn’t have Calisto MT on their computers (I don’t on my laptop), but most do have Georgia, and with a little tweaking of the sizes, the type looks just as good.

Now, away from the techie-graphics talk, and on to real life. Teaching is still quite fun, if still a lot of work. I have come to the conclusion that I really do enjoy it, and so I feel better and better about it the whole time. I have a good class; I believe that has something to do with it. I’ve heard horror stories about people in other TA’s classes in the past; I’m glad that I don’t have to deal with that.

Research is slow, unfortunately. I have been trying to work on it, to no avail, for a while. I progressively got closer and closer but just couldn’t get my implementation to work. After a meeting today, my advisor and I have decided to see if we can hash out what’s going wrong by determining exactly how we believe the implementation should work in certain situations. I will be working on it tomorrow.

In apartment news, I am still undefeated in the Super Tecmo Bowl season, although it was not without a fight. I beat one of my roommates 33-28, but had to hold on after starting out up 30-7. It was almost an Alabama-Arkansas moment, but I held on and won. That being said, my defense is still pretty atrocious. I need to work on it…when I get time and stuff.

I won’t get to see Kelly again until next weekend, when we go to the Bama-Southern Miss game. I do miss her, even though we talk on the phone daily. Sometimes you just need to be near each other, and we both feel that way.

Last week, my computer’s battery decided to lose its capacity to hold charge. After much worrying about potentially losing data, a call to the good folks at HP was made, and I am now in possession of a new battery. My respect for them continues to grow…their tech support has always been great to me.

Well, I need to call my sweetie, so I’ll sign off for now. Enjoy the new look!