The big news today is that I got my ATi All-In-Wonder Radeon to work with the arcade machine. This wasn't really a huge feat of genius or anything, I just plugged it in and it worked. But earlier it didn't and I was convinced that it was too old (AGP 2x) for my fancy motherboard (AGP 8x). But, alas, it works great. I had a good game of Gauntlet going on the TV earlier tonight. I also got the MAME 0.68 ROMs downloaded and installed. I feel like a whore for downloading the 1.7GB area51mx.chd, which is really just a combination of area51.chd and maxforce.chd, both of which I already have... but the collection must be complete!

I've got all my roms transferred onto the new computer now, with the exception of the N64 roms which I am still in the process of downloading (and the MAME 0.68 roms which just became available). It's about 30GB of roms so far, and over 100,000 files. It takes a long time to transfer that much data off CDs. I desperately need a DVD burner. Just think, if I had one of those new blue light ones, I could put everything on one disc. In other news, I hooked the Adaptoid up last night and tried it out. It is really an impressive product. It's so good that I think I'll getting a second one and a second N64 controller for two-player action. While my control panel is disconnected, it makes a reasonable substitute for most MAME games. My only complaint is that the analog joystick makes a lousy mouse/trackball substitute.

The computer components are in! I set the computer up last night. For some reason the Win2k Advanced Server installer had problems formatting any partitions on the hard drives while they were both plugged in. When I unplugged the 80G drive, it worked fine. Once the OS was in I was able to plug the 80G back in and format it within windows. Now I have all 120G up and running and the OS fully updated. Next step is to copy the old arcade machine computer harddrive over and start setting up the emulators and roms.

A few days ago I ordered an adaptoid N64-USB adapter and a similar dongle that lets me plug in two PSX or PS2 console controllers into a single USB port. I'll use these for emulating consoles whose controls are too complex for the general control panel. The adaptoid showed up today! If it works well with the computer that should be arriving Wednesday, I'll order a second one and another N64 controller (and maybe a pair of rumble packs off Ebay).

Nina and I continue to wait on the people moving out of our new house. No word yet on when we get to move in.

Last weekend Jude planned a spur-of-the-moment camping trip in the Manzano Mountains south of Albuquerque. He and Rob were going to go hiking during the day and then some friends and I would meet them down there in the evening and we would camp.

As Nina and I drove down in a convoy with Richard and Maryann, we got a call from Jude on his cell phone saying that he had torn his oil pan off and his car was dead, and that we needed to rescue him. Turns out the dumbass was going 75mph on a dirt road and bottomed out when the road went through an arroyo. Tore off all the under-armor, put a huge hole in the oil pan, and dented the transmission case.

His girlfriend was also en route, and she was aware of what had happened. Despite this, she did the exact same thing on the same road. She was going about 65 and her Jeep Liberty was much more suited for off-pavement travel than his Passat wagon... so she didn't hurt her car. But still, what a retard.

Anyway, we ended up sitting there waiting for a tow truck forever because we were in the middle of nowhere. By the time his car got carried away, it was late and dark. We tried to find the campground but got severly lost and ended up camping by the side of a dirt road in a field about 10 miles from the mountains.

Just after getting the tents set up, a sherrif pulls up. I'm thinking he's going to tell us to get the hell out, but he turns out to be really nice. He asked if we had anything to protect ourselves with, because there are lots of "weird folks" that come out here. "Car theives, drug deals, meth labs. Oh, and 911 doesn't work out here." Great.

Well, anyway, we made it through unscathed. The trip was pretty much a wash, though. At least Nina and I got in a good hike in Rendija Canyon before we left.

Yesterday Nina, Jude, Nathan, and I helped Robin lay sod in his backyard. It went from a total wasteland to a nice yard in about 2 hours. I was impressed. But damn that stuff is heavy to haul around.

Afterwards, we all went and played ultimate, where I had a nice lay-out which left me with the largest leg scrape I've ever had. It's about 10" long and 4" wide and stings like crazy. Looks like I fell off a motorcycle or something. It'll probably make caving this weekend sorta suck...

But regardless, I'm very excited about this weekend. Thursday after work Nina and I drive down to Albuquerque to meet Dan and Lynne, and we wait in line for 2+ hours to see The Matrix Reloaded. Then Nina and I get some cheap motel in ABQ. She leaves on a plane at 7am for her college reunion. Meanwhile, I drive down to Socorro and wake up Dan and we go drive up to the highpoint of Socorro County, NM. After lunch, I'll drive down and do a couple more highpoints (Lea, Chavez) on the way to Slaughter Canyon and a few days of caving. I pick Nina up at 9pm on Monday and we go back to Los Alamos. Should be a great 4-day weekend.

I opened up the arcade control panel tonight to figure out what was wrong with the bad switch on Player1->TopFire->Up. Turns out I had attached the leads to NC and NO, rather than COM and NO. Fixing it took no time at all.

Welcome to May. I sure have a hard time updating this thing.

Some catch-up: The third weekend of April started with Nina and I bailing on Caballo due to weather before we even got out of bed. We instead climbed along seven-bump mesa but out towards the end (on the slopes of bump 5) we got caught in a lightning storm. There was hair standing on end and everything. We had to take shelter in a really uncomfortable shelter cave just above the cliff face and wait out the storm while lightning struck the mesa and it hailed all over us. And to think it was really sunny when we started...

Rocketry the following day was awesome. Perfect weather. Here are some pictures from the launch.

I went caving again last weekend. Again assisted with the impact mapping in Hell Below Cave. There was a lot of aggrivating caver politics that cropped up this time, and I was very annoyed by it. I'll go into detail on that some other time. But the cave was great and I got some good survey experience. I'm filling out my application to get on a LEARN expedition to Lechuguilla Cave this fall. Wish me luck!

On the following day, I went rock climbing at Last Chance Canyon with Carrie, Briana, and Jake. It's been a long time since I had done any outdoor climbing. Again the weather was great and Last Chance is a wonderful spot for a climb. Tons of good bolted sport and trad routes.

Nina started at the lab this week, finally. She's really much happier now.

So ever since I got to graduate school I haven't been covered by my parent's dental insurance. And MIT doesn't give their students any. And I had no money. And I'm a pussy, so I never went and got any cleanings/treatment/etc. For 4.5 years!! Oh my goodness am I an idiot or what!? Well, anyway, so now that I am a full-time employee of the lab, I have lab dental. And I went in for my first cleaning yesterday.

No cavities.

Now how is that possible? 4.5 years with no checkups and a pretty lazy approach to dental health? Parents: don't tell your kids this is possible. But hey, I'm stoked! A little cleaning with the horrible gritty stuff and they look a lot better, and they tell me that I'm dentally healthy. Cool!

And here I had saved up all this money to pay for the thousands of dollars worth of fillings I thought I'd be needing. I went home last night and promptly bought a new computer.

Well, part of one anyway. I bought a new motherboard, CPU, heatsink, fan, RAM, and HDD for the arcade machine computer. I am really very excited about setting that thing up now.

I'm going to try again at climbing Caballo tomorrow with Carrie. It's only about the 10th time I've tried. Every time there's a last-minute conflict or bad weather (or the first time, when I had just arrived from Boston and the altitude totally handed me my ass). If the weather is anything like it is today, the hike will be awesome.

OK, all that stuff about Dan having the same video card was complete crap. So that worry is moot.

Also, I just ordered the hardware for the new computer!! A-bit NF7-M motherboard with a Athlon XP 2200+ CPU (1.8GHz), copper heat sink, fan, 512MB of PC2100 DDR RAM, and an 80GB HDD. Can't wait to set it up!