Sometimes things happen.

So here is the rest of my thoughts from yesterday - the ones that were eaten in the stinking mire of internet explorer dumbness. <I>Which I am still using</i>, because my internet presently <I>fails at life</i>. As many of you know.
Wait - I've installed Firefox, and I'm installing Semagic now (and 3Ds MAX too :D)

So!
<U>Laptop Review</u>.

First of all, I think the colour is very nice. I had noticed a few internet reviewers had tried to "edit" their photos to simulate "real-life colour," and the results were to my eye anyway always unpleasant. So I think it's a very nice colour.

The screen is pretty awesome - it doesn't really feel smaller than my 17" from Idril, so that's good, because I had been a little concerned. The image is bright, crisp and vivid, which I like a lot. There are also no dead pixels! (Idril has one) It seems pretty glare-resistant too, which is also important. I had been a little concerned about this too, because mine is the glossy type. But it hasn't been a problem at all, in fact you basically have to shine a light directly on the screen to get a glare. I haven't used it outside yet though, so we'll see what that's like, but I'm not too concerned.
The light bleed that some of the reviews I read mentioned is present, but it's pretty much only noticable when there's a solid colour on the bottom 2-5 mm of the screen. It doesn't bother me at all, because you can't see it when you're using the computer, pretty much.

The speakers seem to be of excellent quality, though I'm not what you would call picky or particularly sensitive to things like pitch, tone or whatever. They don't seem very tinny or whatever either. But! I didn't get the headphones that the American reviewers mentioned. (But sif care, really.)

Elebereth runs very quietly, much more quietly than Idril. The only noise I would call even slightly annoying is that it makes a kind of crackling/static-y type noise sometimes. But it's not all the time, and it's not very loud.

The keyboard is really nice, both in terms of looks and ease of typing - it reminds me somewhat of penchaft's PowerBook, although I don't really remember typing on it that well so -\(o_O)/-
There are only two things I find dissapointing about the keyboard - the absence of a numpad (which I knew would happen) and the vertical allignment  of the home, p up, p down and end keys. Although this isn't really a problem - I'm already getting used to it, and I would prefer a peculiar order than to have to press the "blue buttan" to get to use them, like you did on the other laptop I've had (haha! do you guys remember it? I did love it, for a time. My brother has stolen it though, makes me angry because it is still mine, it was a graduation present from my Aunty... hurr. All he had to do was ask. >:( but anyway). They also make a very pleasing "I'm typing on my laptop" noise.

Elbereth's pretty fast, too. Which I expected. But it's worth noting because it pleases  me.

The only graphical test I've been able to do so far is Fable (Which I realise prolly isn't all that hot anyway), and it's pretty damn sweet.

I brought a mouse yesterday too, which brings me to the touchpad - it is actually very nice, and I really enjoy the built in scroll feature. However there's just not enough precision for me to do what I need to do - in terms of Uni stuff and gaming. So I got the Logitech G5 Laser Mouse (with TWO thumb buttons) ($125 from Harvey Norman, cheaper than the Logitech site, joy! Btw if you know I could have gotten it cheaper from somewhere, please don't tell me :P), and it is pretty awesome. Turning the resolution or whatever it is little orange man/dpi thing right down is awesome for detail stuff. :D The fast setting is pretty crazy though, not sure what I'm going to use that for. After I've done this I'm going to try binding some keys to Autocad things. Eek, that's exciting. I'm thinking Thumb1 for Polyline, Thumb2 for Rec... mmm. Buttans. It has a horizontal scroller! I feel guilty when I'm using it, like it's broken and I'm making it worse.
It also does weights.

Oh, I have a question for people in the know, too- I ordered 4GB RAM, alll the paperwork says I have 4GB of RAM, but when I look it up in the properties/info/etc, it says that I either have 3.5GB or 3.586GB or something simmilar. Why would this happen? I know that HDDs are generally smaller than you expect because there's always some space taken up with formatting and stuff like that, but I didn't think it happens with RAM? :/

<hr>
So I went to the Architect's office for my first work experience yesterday. It was pretty fun, I like the guy, and I think I will learn a lot from him. He's also fairly young (graduated from Curtin in 1990, so that probably makes him about 39ish), but seems to also be doing pretty well for himself. There's no shortage of work - apparently it's just finding the happy medium between job satisfaction and income satisfaction that's the hard part. Which is good to know. The work he does is pretty nice IMO too, which is also good, because it would be a little disappointing to work for someone who produces ugly buildings, since not doing that is pretty much the entire point of the whole profession. I even got to go on a site visit!
He's doing some new call centre in Midland, so we walked over (it's near the DOLA/Landgate building if you know where that is) and had a look. It was all very interesting. The most amusing part of the whole thing was that there was a door with a full-length side window with clear, unclouded glass in it, and yet, the door also had a peephole.
People, clearly, are crazy.

Anyway... I haven't gotten that much (read: any) work done yet this week, which is why I'm like "oh lol shit it's thursday." And I have another session with the architect from 1.30 to 3, then I have DSE from 4-9. FUCK. I think I should probably quit Dick Smiths... I don't think I can handle this many commitments. It's a pity, the extra money is really handy and I only just got my staff discount card. QQ

Anyway I'm off to do the following:

- Wash my haair (oh, it is important)
- Write Essay Abstract
- Get together info for Techo model
- New sketch model for studio
- Plan, Section, Elevation studio (lol lol lol)

LOL.
But in all fairness if my internet would just freakin' work I would have gotten Elbereth set up loong ago and I would have gotten set up on Tuesday. Hurrrr.

Okay, so it's another update about uni. But seriously guys, what else am I going to talk about? The weather? Okay, so it was kind of cool today, but it's not exactly engaging eljay content. And it's not like I actually do anything else. :P

Plus I actually find it kind of interesting. Okay, I kind of am loving it at the moment, which is good because of how much work I've been doing.. but then I suppose I wouldn't still be doing this much work if I wasn't half enthusiastic.

ANYWAY!
I have found some awesome buildings with circular or round plans, and I will henceforth copy their ways of making a circle a less retarded shape for a building. I know you're probably not all that interested, but consider, if you will, the following works!

Alvaro Siza (♥) - Meteorology Centre, Barcelona, 1989-1992 (or Centro De Meteorologia, which is probably the correct name to use, because he's Italian)
(so many celebrity architects have "alvar" in their name! Alvar Aalto and Alvaro Siza. Okay, so two isn't exactly "many", but there aren't really that many celebrity architects, either. Am considering changing first name to Alvaghan, to see if it will boost celebrity. Or Mevar. MEVAR. Awesome.)

Mario Botta (<3)
Private House in Stabio (seriously, architects need to put a little more time into the naming of their buildings. What about "Space Monkies in Brick and Iron", that would attract more attention, and is certainly more memorable. And irrelevant.) 1980-82

Private House in Losone - 1987-89 (it has some really cool stuff going on)

Residential And Office Building in via Ciani, Lugano 1987-90

Mcbride Charles Ryan - Dome House (slightly better name, still a little too literal for my tastes), 2004-5 (totally awesome, lacks technical drawings >:( gonna call the architect. Seriously.)

I might find you some pictures. I'm going to scan the books anyway, in case some loser recalls them. Seriously, that is just not cool. Recall is so rude. I got one of my books recalled. So I recalled one today out of pure spite. Ok, so it's highly unlikely to effect the person who recalled my book, since they're on completely different topics, ok, so it was ridiculously petty, and ok, I'm not actually interested in the book, but it sure as hell would sell a lot of cans of a certain fizzy drink.

Did you see what I did there? If you did, you get a prize. (It may be an incredibly un-fulfilling prize, but that's just how I roll... (that's my sentence ender of the week, but only in my head. I haven't actually said it yet, I think.))

UM. I am downloading hundreds of little CAD reference files. You know, people, toilets, trees. Some of the people are quite funny. One is throwing up, two are hobos surrounded by empty cans, and two are fighting. It's madness. There were some more *cough* explicit ones, but I didn't download them because they're not ever going to be useful in an architectural drawing and they scared me.

I think that may just be all for now. If you want, I will underline the part of "what I did there" that is significant. Or parts, rather.

I didn't know he was in 300! Wow. I heard an interview with him thisarvo on the Merrick and Rosso show. He seems like a really funny, nice guy. This pleases me. It also bumps him up on the Ghan's list of Favourite Actors, because being awesome is better than being a dick, obviously.

Also! I went to meet my French Friend, Emilie, this arvo at Murdoch - marmot_pie I was going to call you to see if you were about but I seriously seriously have no spare time for the next two days and I'd feel bad calling you just to say "Oh hi! Bye bye now!", you know how it is. However I will say to you this:
I'm in ur uni, stealin' ur internatinal styoods.
So yeah. She's going back to France at the end of the year... :( This makes me sad. And I found out something completely crazy that perhaps only marxipan_xlii will appreciate:
Emilie's Aunty used to live in a house by Le Corbusier.
Seriously guys, this is freaking awesome/crazy. He's like an uber Architect Celebrity. If I end up half as successful as him I'll be a millionaire. Apparently she moved out because her husband has troubles with his legs and couldn't manage the stairs.
But yeah. Crazy!

I'm really excited about the Easter break hey. Seriously. If weeks had names, this one would be called "Sleep Deprivation."

Oh, and I'm totally loving the new Silverchair album. It's totally confirmed and re-confirmed.

Also! I can make stuff look totally awesome in three-dee programs now. Totally awesome. Clearly it's not nearly as hard as it looks.

And I can make stuff with lasers. Coolest freaking thing ever. I can't remember if I mentioned this yesterday, but it totally bears repeating.

I brought a Cleo Magazine because I actually like the fashion that's around at the moment (clearly I'm some kind of godless heathen), and I wanted to get me some mad tipz. But that magazine makes me angry sometimes. I mean, sometimes they're actually (!) interesting, but seriously, no wonder guys think girls are crazy if most of us believe things that are in this magazine.
There's an article about "How to tell if your relationship is going... going... gone" or something, and it basically lists these things as problems:
1. Going out with his mates, without you
2. Working out
3. Being tired

I mean come on. Okay, so some of them are kind of reasonable, but they're so freaking obvious (eg. "He doesn't go out with you ever" "he's cheating on you") that they don't need to be listed. I mean the only thing that will come from this article is some girls will turn into super suspicious crazy people, and that will end the relationship. Consider this hypothetical situation for me:
*girl walks into room*
*guy is working out*
Girl: "WHO IS SHE YOU BASTARD"
Guy : "uh... wait... what?"
Girl: "You're working out. Clearly you're triyng to pull in the chicks or impress some girl."
Guy : "actually yeah. I was thinking of impressing, uh, you"
Girl: "LIAR! I HATE YOU! EMO EMO EMO /WRISTS"
Guy : "...../cry"

^{Dramatic representation may not have happened}
But seriously, I'm sure there are girls who would react like that.

I suppose that's what I get for buying Cleo though. Yeah. That's probably where I went wrong hey.