Bounce

so kenny comes over around 3 and shows me what he's being doing to his trigger. he spent about 2 hrs last night tuning it, getting to how he liked it.

i felt it, and it's long and its light. it was pretty nice, but i like a little more response. but feeling his trigger and watching him adjust it some more made me want to play w/ mine.

first, i changed the forward stop to right before the trigger breaks the laser. then i toyed around w/ the rear stop a little bit to give it some slack. right now, it has about 1mm to 2mm worth of travel at the bottom. finally, i worked on the return, trying to get it to come back fast, but still be light at the same time.

after about an hour, i was finally happy w/ my trigger setup. the whole time, i was asking him if he had any bounce in his trigger.

so kenny gasses up his marker and rips a few shots. w/ one pull, he's marker sends out like 3 or 4. he adjusts it some more and manages to make it so that he has to manually stop the trigger or else it'll just keep going full auto. crazy.


eats

after we were done playing w/ our triggers, we went to kenny's restaurant, the lucky star to get some food. got some fried chicken wings and fried rice. the chicken wings were pretty good. he gave me this dipping sauce that was very reminiscent of the sauce from sweet and sour pork. but a little sweeter. it went well w/ the chicken.


visions

kenny brought some food for rich the guy that works at visions.

hopefully, my pants are in. alas, they won't be in till next thursday, too late for rexplex on weds. at least i'll be able to pick up a minigauge for shi so i can see the input pressure.

i try to figure out which gauge to get. do i get the one that goes up to 300 psi or the one that goes up to 750. i ask kenny around what psi his operating pressure is at and says that its around 230. so i figure, just get a 300 right?

well, not many options for 300, so i get the only one available. luckily, rich has some 90* elbows to mount the gauge to my front block.

i don't really trust my torch skills, so i ask rich if he can fire it up. we put the flame to the nut, and after a few seconds, attempt to unscrew it. it doesn't bouge. we put the flame to it again, but not too long, cause we're afraid that we're gunna melt the electronics in the 3-way.

in order to keep from frying my electronics, rich tells me to just take the thing off. but in order to do so, i need to take my lpr off. again, we need to put the flame to shi. the lpr comes off, but not w/o scratching the nut a bit.

next step, i need to take the 3-way off. but i have to take the frame off in order to get the wire off. but then i have to take the eye out. eventually, my entire marker is practically laid out in front of me. alright, i'm ready to really take the torch to this thing now. we fire it up and put the flame to it.

by this time, there was this other family there. this mom was buying her kids some stuph. this kid picked up the new dye 04 invision goggles. nothing different really, except that the frame around the lens is colored. the red ones have this nice red to clear fade. but it costs a little more. in the corner, i see this little kid trying on a dye jersey, and i'm thinking to myself: he's just going to grow out of it in a few years. luckily, it looked like it was way too big for him, so he'd probably be able to grow into it.

back to shi, we've had the flame to shi forever now. the entire body is heating up. we stop the flame every once in awhile to test the nut but it still refuses to bouge. after awhile, it starts to move and we manage to get the nut out. rich almost burns himself trying to push on the ram for leverage.

we sit around and wait for the body to cool so i can start working w/ it. and who happens to come in? dave! interesting that the 3 of us would be here at the same time. he's in here to pick up a ball detent for clifton's rat impulse.

dave decides to pick up a pair of dye 04 pants. he figures, since the rest of us are running dye pants, he doesn't want to look like the ugly duckling.

after awhile, the body is cool enough to work on. i teflon tape and screw in the 90* elbow. then i teflon and screw in the minigauge. as i'm tightening the minigauge, the wrench slips a bit, scratching the sides of the gauge a bit and manages to get stuck. i can't slide it, i can't turn the nobby thingy to open it. eventually, it comes off.

i screw in the 3-way, no problem. i begin to screw in the lpr and get about half way in and realize that i can't screw it in any further unless i take the minigauge off. so i take it off and finish screwing in the lpr.

i start connecting all the low pressure hoses from the ram back to the 3-way. just as i reach for the hose to connect the 3-way to the lpr, i realize that the hole on the lpr is turned down. i sigh as i take the minigauge off again in order to have access to the lpr.

i attach the hoses and gas it up. huge leak somewhere. apparently, i didn't put my macroline in right. i fix that, but there's still a little leak somewhere. it's coming from the lpr hole. i probably just didn't put enough loctite on it.

i take the lpr barb off and put some more loctite on it. screw it in and wait for it to dry. we figure, let it dry overnight and gas it up tomorrow. i can always bring it back.

hopefully, shi is going to be alright for weds. i'm looking forward to playing.


samurai jack

caught episode 19 today. it's the one where he visits his home town and remembers his childhood. this is such a good episode because it uses images and music to evoke a lot of emotion. you can really feel the nastalgia and the longing of a time long gone. the happiness in young jack's face as he runs through the fields is just so evocative.

sometimes i wish i had give jack more of a chance when it first came on. just from watching one episode, i wrote it off as just another lazy animation. but after watching a few more episodes, especially the episode where jack fights the shinobi, i'm convinced that it's really style and art.

i'm a huge fan of the show now. the use of camera angles, screen size, and shapes and colors to convey the story is great. it forgoes a lot of dialogue letting the images convey the bulk of the story.

the story, although episodic, is very heart felt and goes to illustrate the strife that a world controlled by aku is like.


angelina jolie

as i was flipping through channels, i caught this weird movie on scifi called cyborg 2.

it's intersting, ther are times when jolie looks really good. and then others where her face just repulses me. this was one of the times that she just looked really hot. maybe because her lips aren't as big.

those lips have got to be her most defining feature. ever since hackers, i can recognize those lips anywhere. some claim that they're luscious. personally, i think they make me feel like i'm going to be swallowed into them.

whatever floats your boat.


vga

i managed to catch the beginning of the video game awards on spike tv. this has got to be the most inane awards show. a lousy excuse to show cheerleaders and girls in bikinis representing the dead or alive girls.

one of the "innovations" of this award show, as oposed to other award shows, is the lack of nominations. which, i guess is alright because most people just want to know who wins. but sometimes, usually when i disagree, i want to see what the other candidates were. instead of being innovative, the gimic ends up feeling very shallow. like the decision was made arbitrarily.

after they announce the winner, they showed some footage from the game tiself. which would be alrite, but not being able to see the other contenders, again, makes it feel very arbitrary.


wired

i used to read wired. keyword: used to. since i stopped, i ended my subscription. as magazines do, they include a letter in the magazine when your subscription is about to run out, warning you of the coming event. i figure, great, as long as i don't send them money, they won't send me any more magazines.

oddly enough, i receive a letter today, labeled: confidential. the return address only has the address, so i have no idea who or what this is from. it ends up being from this company called: north shore agency, aka, the nsa. oooh, i'm scared now, the "nsa" is after me. psh.

apparently, wired (or whatever the parent company is) wants more of my money so they can send me more magazines. isn't it obvious that if i didn't pay, i don't want anymore? this isn't an attack on your product. in fact, i think wired is one of the best publications out there. but i just don't have the time to read it. they're claiming that i OWE them money for a subscription that i never signed up for. i never returend any of those subscription renewal forms and my original subscription was only for 1 year.

they can continue to try and get money from me, but it's not going to happen. i haven't decided if this is going to affect the possibility of renewing my subsription in the future, but it's definately not helping them. other magazines are content at acknowledging the fact that their customer no longer wishes to receive their product when the customer stops paying. granted, there may be other reasons why people don't pay, but that's a different issue.

if i don't pay, i shouldn't receive any magazines. that's perfectly fair. i accept that. but if i don't pay, that doesn't mean i owe them money for magazines i no longer desire. i'll probably call up wired tomorrow and try and clear this up.