life and programming updates

Hey guys,
Steve here.
I’ve been wanting to write this post all day, but since my school recently got a new website blocking filter, wordpress has been blocked, thus eliminating the possibility of that happening at school. And when I got home this afternoon, I was far too tired to produce anything better than a sloppy, short, rushed life update post.
Okay guys, I’m really sorry for annoying you… but it’s really important to me that you vote on the, you guessed it, pole that will be presented below. Unfollow me if you wish… but I need to get your opinion. If you can just bear with me, this will only stick around through April 16, but until then, here you go.
[polldaddy poll=7937065]
So you want to know what’s up with me lately? Presumably, seen as how you’re reading this post. Well Since last Wednesday, much has happened in this life of mine. So where do I start? Well I guess how about Thursday and Friday. Yes, I’m sorry, the most boring days of my last week.
Since that severe weather day post was posted on Thursday, you could gather that we had another severe weather outbreak. The day was still rather uneventful for me; all the storms stayed north of us, and I spent the evening practically attached to my radio.
As for Friday, nothing much happened then either, and besides goal ball and my favorite weather (rain), Saturday was the same.
Sunday, however, was a good day, right from the moment I woke up. Sunday morning was one of those rare occasions when I get to wake up to the exciting yet comforting sound of thunder. And when I got up, I had a wonderful breakfast of eggs and sossage, then it was off to church.
After church, and a little bit of house cleaning, something really awesome happened. My brother Justin, whom I hadn’t seen in 3 years, came over for dinner! It was nice, but shocking, to finally get to see him again. Man… he’s already 20, and has a job. I still remember those days when he was 15. And, the day I last saw him was April 12, 2011, just 9 days before I started this blog!
Anyway, after the excitement of seeing my brother again, Monday and today were normal. I didn’t even have to write a Monday’s musings post last night; I wrote it on Saturday, and scheduled it to appear on the blog last night. That’s another neat feature of word press :).
As for the future, I’m going to miss school on Friday. My o&m teacher is taking my sister and I, and I think some other kids, to the firewheel town center. I’m not sure exactly what the field trip is for, but I’m looking forward to it. Since I don’t know exactly how the day will go, I’ll be sure and blog about it.
Besides the field trip, the beginner Orchestra Festival is next Tuesday. Basically, my orchestra class will be going up to a high school, where we’ll practice our songs (I might be wrong), but then we’ll come back in the afternoon. And at 6:20 Tuesday evening, we’ll have to be right back up at the high school, where we’ll be performing our music.
I guess that’s it for future life events.
Moving on, I did mention programming updates in the post title… right? Well here’s why.
As a programmer, you know I couldn’t stay away from my code for too long… so I didn’t. Last night, I decided to start working on sQuad word once again, and messed around with some of the code. By messed around with some of the code, I mean adding autosaving (never worry about your work being erased), and majorly tweeking the configuration. It used to be that, if say you wanted to show the version number in the window title, you’d have to check that option in the options menu, restart the program, then it would take affect. But now, it will automatically do it, no restart required. This is the same for the word wrap option.
And while on the subject of software, my dad and I will look in to getting a Patton (I think that is another word for software license) soon. If we get that, I’ll publish version 1.0 of sQuad word. But remember, I still have some visual testing to do, to at least make sure the thing works for you sighted users.
As for Trash, that will require a bit more tedious code work. Thus, I’m not even going to bather with that until I get the patton.
Well I guess that about wraps up tonight’s post. I hope you enjouyed it. Have a good night all of you, and try not to get bored to tears by the end of this workweek. Believe me, I’ll take that advice myself :).
Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

An exciting end to a long blogging break

Hey guys,
Steve here.
Woe! It’s already been almost 3 weeks since my last blog update. I mean the only evidence that I still exist (to you guys anyway) is my Monday’s Musings posts, but even those get scheduled sometimes if something bugs me enough on another week day. Don’t worry, this will not be an often occurance–even I need a break from the blog for a while. I think my break is over, so expect more life updates in the future.
As is with all way overdue life updates, I have a lot of stufff to tell you about. First, let’s start with d now, since it was the first thing that happened after my blog post.
As all d nows are, this one was quite enjoyable. On Friday afternoon (valentines day), I only had time to go home, pack, eat some candy, before leaving to go to the host home (the home I would be staying at for the weekend). Basically, the host homes were divided by gender and grade level, so the 6th grade boys would be in one, the 6th grade girls in another, and it would be that way for all the grade levels from 6 to 12. Anyways, shortly after arriving at the host home, getting to know the people I would be staying with, we all went to the church, where we had fajitas for dinner, and then played a getting to know game.
The rest of our Friday night consisted of worship and church service, going back to the host home, small groups discussion (a time to discuss what we learned from the service, but that ended up being small groups comity because I kept telling jokes and making people laugh), snack, and then just chill time until it was time to go to bed.
On Saturday morning, we awoke to a breakfast of breakfast tacos, before having quiet time (a time to study the bible). Then, we headed to the church where we had another worship service, lunch, and finally our mission project. A mission project is when we go out and do work, and it’s separated into host homes as well. Our group had to go and pick up trash (I forget where we went).
After the mission project, instead of a scavenger hunt, we did random acts of kindness. In that game, each group would drive around doing random acts of kindness for people, and taking pictures of it. I believe that the winner would be the group with the most pictures.
Finally, it was time for dinner, and then my friend Joseph and I spent the free time after dinner reading the bible.
After another church service Saturday night, we had small groups discussion once again, but I was more serious this time. Then, Joseph and I read the bible some more until bed.
On Sunday morning, we had another quiet time, before going to the church to have breakfast, a Sunday school service which ended up being people telling about their experiences from the weekend, and then a final worship service. After that it was time to go home.
Although I didn’t want to go home, I had a wonderful time at D Now. It was a great time for me to connect with friends, and get closer to god. I really look forward to going next year.
Now that you know about d Now, let me tell you about sQuad word. On Sunday, I found out that my friend Mason was also making a word pad. He had some stuff in his word pad that I didn’t know how to do, and I had stuff in my notepad that he didn’t know how to do. So, we decided to colaborate, combining our word pads to create ultrapad. Thus, sQuad word is now known as ultrapad, and is just about ready for release, except one small bug that is easily fixable. I don’t have a definant release date at this time.
As for my last 3 weeks, not much has happened, that being one of the reasons I haven’t blogged in a while. This weekend though, my family and I went up to my papa and nana’s lake house, and spent yesterday and last night there, because my dad had to help Papa with something.
Also, there is a winter storm warning in affect. It’s in the 20’s right now, sleeting, and the temperatures are still falling. This is really hard to believe considering it was in the upper 70’ss 24 hours ago.
On a final note, I have a few events to tell you about.
For one, it’s Steven D awareness month. Yes, I’m so awesome, I named this month after myself, so everyone could be aware of my awesomeness. 🙂
Also, Steve eve, and my birthday are coming up. Steve eve is the day before my birthday. Steve eve is on March 25, and my birthday is March 26.
And finally, on April 21, this blog will turn 3 years old, thus meaning I will have been blogging for 3 years!
On a last note, this blog is almost up to 10000 views (9,755 at the moment). Pretty cool… huh?
Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.
P.s. Glad to be blogging again. 🙂

life updates, and a new blog development

Hey guys,
Steve here.

I’m starting something new on my blog. It will happen every Monday, and is called Monday’s musings. On the Monday’s musings post, I will share my thoughts, opinions, and rants. These will not be life updates; although life updates will continue. Basically, a Monday’s Musings post will be for my thoughts and rants that have no part in my life update posts, and wouldn’t make sense in them. I hope you look forward to these new posts!

On to some other things, I did the podcast episode 15 Friday, and will do episode 16 today. As for that q9 series I was doing, I will have to do it differently. Instead of doing worlds now, I will do it level by level, but there are only 6 levels left. It will not be the same thing every time; the amount of action and excitement will increase. Well, I guess that gives me a game of the day for at least the next 5 or 6 episodes. Also, while still on the topic of pod casting, I will try to create a feed burner for the podcast. I hope it works so you can subscribe to the cast with a feed reader or something.

As for my life, I had a fun weekend. Although I didn’t go many places (due to the ice storm that I will tell you about later in the post), I did other fun things. For example, I did the podcast, baked cookies and a cookie cake with my mom, hung out with dad yesterday, and talked to friends on Skype and wrote this blog post today.
Although I appreciated the unexpected 3 day weekend, I don’t want to go to school tomorrow. That will bring back the stress, the work, the projects… and everything else that goes along with having to go to school. On a positive note, winter break is in two weeks. I seriously can’t wait for that! Oh and by the way, I finally composed a Christmas list, so I bet my parents and the rest of my family are happy.
On another note, my old vision teacher, and a family friend named Dawn has created a really great blog. I think you should check it out. The address is
http://dawnadams.org.

As for the winter storm, I definitely did not get ripped off. That storm was pretty extreme–it dumped 1 to 3 inches of ice and sleet, and from Thursday night to about an hour ago I think, temperatures did not go above 32. I caught a recording of this for the interesting segment of episode 15 of the podcast, and I also got one on the natural events page.

Well I guess that about concludes today’s post. I’ll be back tomorrow night with the first Monday’s Musings post. Please comment on tomorrows post when it comes out and tell me what you think.

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

Latest news concerning Steven D: Winter storm causes extreme excitement, a strange thing or 2 about school, and out with the sister… temporarily anyway

Hey guys,
Steve here.

As I’m sure you know by reading my blog post about a week and a half ago, the winter storm that was expected to hit our area turned out to be a complete rip-off. The most recent one, which is supposed to begin shortly, has actually turned out to be worse than I last said in my Tuesday entry. Now, my weather radio (see the weather radio forecasts page for Update 2 which will be posted around 10:00 this evening), has told people “do not travel unless it is an emergency.” Not only that, but 1/2 inches of sleet, and 1/2 inches of ice accumulation are expected over night. Also, if it doesn’t sound obvious to you by now, there is also a winter storm warning in affect. Although the warning only extends through 6:00 tomorrow evening, temperatures will remain below freezing through mid day Sunday, and another round of wintery precipitation is expected Saturday through Sunday morning.
Besides weather, my sister has gone to Austin for the weekend. She is going down for an O&M (orientation & mobility) thing with our O&M teacher (I’ve been wrapped up in my life to know anything more about the trip). All this means for me, however, is that Libby will be gone for 3 days; piece and quiet at last :))).

In the title of this post, I recall saying something about a “strange thing or 2 about school.” What I meant by this was my progress report. As of right now, my grade in math exceeds that of orchestra. The math grade, 100, strangely tops the orchestra grade of 89. Although both grades are good, I still can’t believe that I’m making a better grade in one of the hardest core subjects than I am in some easy (just because it’s easy, doesn’t mean it’s not fun) alective class like orchestra.
While I’m still on the subject of school, I am proud to say that I’ve started my National History Day Project. I’m doing it over the underground railroad (the theme is rights and responsibilities). I will definately finish it by the due date (December 13, I think), and after that is out of the way I will do Stranded.

In the podcasting part of my life, I only have one more make-up episode to complete–Episode 15. Of course, I have episode 17 to do on Saturday, but that is a scheduled episode, and not one I have to make up. Also, as episode 14 was recorded, expect me to use my sony ICD-PX720 recorder to record most of the podcast, except of course the game of the day section.
By the way, while still on the topic of the podcast, I have all but one of the remaining episodes of 2013 completely planned out. Do not, however, think I’m going to spoil anything.

On another note, I recorded and submitted that review for main menu (the radio show that reviews products for blind people). And although this review was submitted Wednesday night, I still have yet to receive confirmation that the review is going to be included in this week’s edition of main menu.

Finally, I am still editing the website. The navigation menu is all kinds of messed up; links to certain pages such as blog test 2012 appearing twice in the menu. Fortunately for you however, I am working diligently to fix this issue. I hope you enjoy the new page names and site revisions! For more information about what I’m doing, see the site news page (I don’t know the exact url, so you’ll have to use my navigation menu (that page is in there).

Thank you for reading this post, I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

P.s. I got my 100th follower! Thank you so much Nate $mith for being follower 100, and all you other wonder people for being follower 1 through 99!

intresting weather, and a life update

Hey guys,
Steve here.

There is a winter storm warning in affect for Texas?
Yeah, you read that right. Tomorrow into Monday afternoon, there is the potential for 1 to 2 inches of sleet and ice accumulations mainly along and west of the Interstate 35 corridor; I am shocked. The winter storm, as of now, could cause power outages, extremely hazardous if not impossible travel conditions, and hopefully no school, but we’ll have to see about that.
I will continue to update you guys on this situation, and maybe post some stuff on the weather forecast page

–life–

My life has been good the past several days. I am now a level 13 on the game I’ve been playing, and would be a level 14 perhaps if I wouldn’t quit making such stupid decisions that get me killed. Some of those include fighting enemies that are one to two levels above me and stupidest of all fighting enemies when my hit points (health) are below fifty.
Besides the game, I have been working more on Stranded, but kind of taking it easy. I have created that avoid the Rpg board, but unfortunately there are still parts of it that need touching up, and the process of cleaning the thing up is very confusing (you would have to use the program I’m using to create it to get what I’m talking about).
On other news, I’m in a pretty good mood today. This is probably due to the fact that I just had coffee and got up so nothing has happened, and there’s at least a 50% chance we won’t go to school on Monday, and a 15 to 20% chance we won’t go on Tuesday either. The main reason however, is the fact that I have a weekend to look forward to, and a short school week that is going to be at most two days long, before a nice five day break, even if it is not the longest break you could get.
Finally, if you’re wanting more information about what has happened in the past two or three days, you have come to the right blog post. Thursday was a pretty normal day; after going to school, I was able to just relax and play my game, not worrying about homework or anything like that. Yesterday, after going to school and getting home in all that cold weather, I was presented with a nice surprise. My mom, being the good mom she is, made me hot coco and fresh baked chocolate chip cookies for a snack. Plus, I was able to come home to a warm and good smelling house.
The rest of yesterday consisted of playing hogwarts, crashing for a wile with my cat (he must’ve been feeling tired as well), and then taking a nice warm bath.
I can’t say much about today, because it just started. I know that me, my sister, and dad are going bowling around noon with the whole goal ball team, and after that it will more than likely become an afternoon of chillaxing. Tomorrow is expected to be extremely cold and stormy (mainly in the afternoon), and I’m looking forward to that. I will also continue to update the weather forecasts page (the one I gave a link to on the top of the post) with weather forecasts, that way you aren’t bugged by like 3 blog posts in 24 hours.
I guess that about wraps up today’s post. I suppose I’ll see you in a couple days.

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.

Would calling today the weirdest day of the centry be an over exaggeration?

Hey you guys,
Steve here.

Okay so I had an extremely weird afternoon. It literally started right after school–and even though what happened put me in a bad mood then, it makes me laugh now, just about 4 and a half hours afterward. I even remember thinking, “Even though I’m mad right now, I’ll be laughing by the time I blog about this.”

So what made this day so weird you ask? Well first, I forgot my violin in seventh period, and didn’t even remember I left it there until I sat down on the bus and it was too late to get it. I mean come on, couldn’t I have realized that it was missing before then? No.
So with that going on, I came home and my mom was out getting her hair done. Unfortunately, my phone was dead, because my sister switched my iPhone cord out with one that actually doesn’t work, so even though I plugged my phone in all day, it didn’t charge.
Next, my mom and I had to drive up to the school when she got home, get the violin, and come back home.

Around this time, we were deciding what to eat for dinner. We decided on cDonalds, so I figured that since the orchestra concert was tonight that I’d practice before dinner. Well, I changed clothes and settled in to my chair, and then she asked me if I was ready to go. Well of course I wasn’t, so I just put on something people wouldn’t look at and then turn away, but the shirt I grabbed was a tank top. Even in Texas, who wears a tank top to McDonalds in the middle of freeking November?

Well it pretty much went normal after that until we were getting ready to go to the concert. My mom and I spent fifteen freeking minutes looking for a pair of black pants because I thought we were supposed to wear those for the concert. Here’s the end result of that
1. I ended up wearing Navy blue.
2. We saw at least two people wearing khaki.

Other than that, the concert ended up being a great success. Even my mom, who I taught a song in 5 or less minutes (I’m proud of that), was able to pull it off at the end of the concert when all the parents had to play one of our songs.

Nothing really weird has happened since then, unless you count the fact that I had to clean up a bag of lunch meet smelling dog treets after they spilled when I was feeding the dogs earlier.
If you ask me, I really don’t know what to call this day. Was it good? Bad? Normal? Okay no it was NOT normal what so ever.

Thanks for reading,
type you later,
Steve.