Beautiful Night

Tonight has got to be one of the most beautiful summer nights of the year so far. I've got all my windows open, and am enjoying the cool 74 degree breeze coming through. It makes me want to sit outside with a good book, and just soak it all in, because I know it's probably not going to last long. Instead I'm sitting here in front of the computer, but at least I'm still able to enjoy it. Off to thesis....

Python and Sleep

Major breakthroughs tonight! Unlike past weeks, I have been very diligent this time. I took the time Saturday and Sunday to sit down with "the baby", and I've got to say, it really paid off. It should go without saying that the more time you spend with something, the more comfortable you get. I'm getting more comfortable with Python, because I'm spending more time with it. Not only that, but it stays fresh in my memory, and I find that every time I sit down, I spend less time "recapping" what the hell I did the last time. All in all, the invested time paid off, and I'm really happy! If you want to hear all the gory (and not so gory) details of what happened this week, feel free to visit the official Thesis site. If you just wanna see what it looks like, then I'll give you a lil' teaser:


Whooo yeah now that's sexy.



Ok, so now that the good news is out on the table - because of my high productivity levels, I've lost sleep and it sucks. I hate being tired all the time, and having to prop my eyelids up with toothpicks damnit. I'm going to bed early tonight though. The sugarplums await.

Over Stimulated!!

Today is one of those days where I am over-stimulated, over ambitious, and can't focus on one thing long enough to really get anything done!! I'm hoping that once I get home tonight I'll be able to focus on thesis work, and then it's on to Otsegoville. That puppy needs some real work. I have half a mind to set up a dev machine just for it. I think I may just do that, so deployment will be swift as far as the user is concerned. Yippeeeee Thesis thesis thesis.... keep focused... lol

Venus

Ohhhh boys and girls, I am so happeh!

Recently I've been busy with Thesis (a.k.a. "The Baby"), trying to get the next "chapter" finished. This isn't a paper I'm writing, but a program written in Python and Scilab. You can find links to everything here: www.otsegoville.com/Thesis. Anyway, to get back to the meat and potatoes of the story - I had a major breakthrough with my program today. Up until today, I had a version of my program that simulated the Sun, the Earth, and the Earth's Moon. All of their values were hard-coded, but it did work! I have been working on a way to specify an arbitrary number of planets, and was hitting a whole bunch of brick walls in the process. Well, finally today, I GOT IT TO WORK!! I was able to dynamically read in the values for the Sun, Earth, Earth's Moon, AND Venus! It all worked perfectly and I couldn't be happier! This was only the Scilab portion of the code, however. This is the most involved part, because it's the script that actually does the ODE calculations. Now, what I've got to do is find a way to have python read in each of the planet's coordinates, and SIMULATE!!!! More to come...

Fried Chicken Alfredo

Today I was hungry for lunch, and didn't want to fetch anything from any food place out there - so I made it. So, with a few things in my fridge, I whipped up this dish:

Fried Chicken Alfredo
1/2 C. Vegetable Oil 2 T. Butter 1 Egg 1 T. Milk 1/2 C Flour 1 C. Panko Bread Crumbs 1 t. Cajun Seasoning 2 Chicken Breasts 1 C. Whipping Cream	2 C. Shredded Parmesan Cheese 1/4 C. Balsamic Vinegar 1/4 C. Red Wine 2 T. Fresh chopped Basil 2 T. Fresh chopped Parsley 2 sliced Green Onions 1 Box of pasta, any kind

Cook pasta according to package directions. Heat the vegetable oil in a medium skillet under a medium to medium high heat. Combine the balsamic vinegar and wine in a small pot, and reduce on the stove until it is a third of its original volume. Prepare to bread the chicken by mixing the egg and milk in a shallow bowl. Mix the flour with the cajun seasoning in another bowl, and place the panko bread crumbs in another. Dredge the chicken breasts in first the egg mixture, followed by the flour mixture, back to the eggs, and then finally the panko bread crumbs. Place the chicken breasts in the hot oil, and let each side cook for about 5 - 6 minutes. While the chicken is cooking, place the butter in a large skillet. Let it melt, and then put the cream, and bring that to a boil. After the sauce boils a bit, put in the parmesan cheese, and stir frequently until all the cheese has melted. Toss in the pasta. Plate the pasta in shallow bowls, and top with the sliced, breaded chicken. Drizzle the vinegar/wine mixture over the top, and finish it off with the parsley, basil, and green onions!

I hope you guys enjoy this dish as much as we did! Cheers!

Shoe Obsession!

I have a shoe obsession! I love to shop for shoes. I don't necessarily buy any, but I love to look at them, and I would like to buy them, but oftentimes don't have the ends.

I've been watching that lovely show "What Not To Wear", and I have taken some of what they say on that show to heart. I only buy black shoes. I figured it was time to break out of that shell and go for a different color. What better color than RED! I ordered them yesterday, so hopefully they'll get here by Friday. I hope they fit!! Yay!

LINQ to XML

Recently, I've been working on a project that necessitated XML editing. I've not had much experience with XML, let alone XML editing, so naturally, I started searching MSDN & Google for some help in the area. I came across LINQ, which is a new technology developed by Microsoft to allow easy querying and reading of XML files(and other data stores). I had trouble finding a good introduction to the material until today! It turns out that after a magick query on google(haha), I found an absolutely GREAT post on the subject by Scott Guthrie: Using LINQ to XML (and how to build a custom RSS Feed Reader with it).

Another good reference from MSDN: .NET Language-Integrated Query for XML Data

If you have a chance to check these out, play with them a bit! It's fun!