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What have you been up to in May of 2008?

July 13, 2008

3. Use fewer loops for slower speeds and more for faster speeds. For slow speeds, a big factor, use fewer loops. For fast speeds, use more loops. Let's take OWTLI as an example, my most listened to song of all. OWTLI, at true speed, is about 48 seconds. Using 6 minutes as the maximum, this means, with the rather long intro included, I can get 7 loops (it'd be a bit over 6 minutes, though very close). The best-sounding zone is from 60 to 90% true speed so this area would actually get 9 loops (given point 2). But, since this gets considerably longer (73.48% is the median (not 75 - it's exponential)). This means that the songs will last 36% longer. To counter this, where 9 loops (for about 7.6 minutes) would turn into 10.4 minutes, I'd need fewer loops, I use 7 loops where I'm over 8 minutes by just 3 seconds (calculated). But, what about 50% true speed? The basis here is 4 minutes, but it would last 8 because of the speed. Here, I'd just reduce the loops from the original 7 to around 4 or so. OWTLI goes down to even 20% true speed (!) and still sound somewhat okay. This turns 4 minutes into a monstrous 20 minutes. Of course, with all these extra versions, it can get quite bothersome. Thus, for the slower speeds, I might use 3 loops instead. The faster speeds may also use 7 loops. Take 125% true speed, the highest I go with OWTLI (it drops sharply after 85%). At this speed, the song, at 4 minutes for the basis, will only be 3.2 minutes, 80% as long. For 3 loops, that's 2 1/4 minutes and since speeds above 100% are rarely listened to, this is fine. Some songs, however, have very large speed ranges. Oh What a World version 2 has the biggest known, a factor of, if I recall, 11. This would seem to need a lot of different speeds, or so it seems. Actually, I could do quite well with 3. It has two sweet spots - around 80% (35% minimum) and around 180% (400% maximum). These would use 2 loop counts (and this song's loops are fairly long at true speed). The 180 one would use more than the 80. For the others, the slower speeds could get just 2 loops while the fastest get whatever 80% would have (probably 4, but I don't recall). The stuff between would that of the slowest speeds (2 loops) and the fast sweet spot would get like 8 or so. 2, 4, and 8 are the three. In short, given the 5 "zones" for "Oh What a World 2", zone 1 has 2 loops, zones 2 and 3 have 4 loops, and 4 and 5 have 8 loops. For OWTLI, it's 3 loops for zones 1 and 3, 7 for zone 2. Only special lap versions are immune to this (such as the 20-lap version for Desert Zone (of which is 41 seconds with the sweet spot from 80 to 110% true speed)).

With optimizations like these, I could actually squeeze out quite a bit more, but it'd mean needing to update my "WAV file sample rate generator" program quite a bit and make 4 or 6 base files (possibly 2 or 3, depending on if the new player has the speed bug the MuVo2 has). 8 (or 4) is a worthy addition just in case there's that one song or two where 3 isn't quite enough. After all, over 98% of my time is spent toward speeds in the "sweet zone". This comes from the theory of choice, "one does whichever activity has the highest motive, unless they can be done at the same time". Speeds in the sweet zone have the highest compatibility, of which compatibility directly affects motive (It has the strongest influence.). Take OWTLI. Around 60 to 90% true speed is the sweet zone, where the highest compatibility is at. After 85% true speed, compatibility drops sharply. Below 60%, however, it drops very slowly, unusually slow actually (partly why it can go to just 20% true speed where a single loop lasts over 4 minutes and the intro spans over 2 minutes).

#11 Norton - the final straw: I've now reached my limit with Norton. I figured that, since Zonealarm does far better with CPU usage and stuff, I'd be using that instead, getting the security suite edition. Zonealarm, as of the time of this update, has only 13 days remaining. Thus, when August starts, I'll, with 99% certainty, be using Zonealarm Internet Security Suite. ZA has caused me little trouble. With Norton Internet Security, while watching TV, the motion jerks a lot and I get a lot of skipping due a lot of CPU usage and often very long scans. ZA still does cause jerking, but it's nowhere near as bad and even with a scan running, it's a lot faster. Norton updates very frequently, but causes a lot of HDD activity which slows everything down. It takes 30 seconds to install a 350 KB update. To decompress something and install it should take a time frame hard to notice, but instead, there's a lot of hard disk activity, a lot more than there should be. Norton is the cause to many problems where timing is important. Once my Zonealarm subscription has just one day left or I reach my limit with Norton, whichever comes first, I'll throw Norton in the trash but upgrade Zonealarm. I've used Zonealarm for years and so far, I've never had any troubles with it at all. Dumping Norton means I wouldn't have any antivirus but the Zonealarm internet security suite would counter this. Zonealarm Pro doesn't have antivirus. Norton's support is grade D (phone support, now that you don't have to pay for it, is grade B+ so at least that's good). Zonealarm is more uncertain in the regard though.

#12 Bathroom troubles - parents + mirror: Years ago, the main bathroom was rebuilt. It was in great need of it - the floor was weak and you could almost fall through it, especially in the areas near the toilet. As kids, me and my sister occasionally and deliberately flooded the bathroom. Then, around 6 years ago or so, my parents rebuilt the bathroom, including the floor. They rearranged everything. They got this one big mirror and placed it so that it was directly in front of the toilet. I warned them not to put it there, but they refused. I knew that later on down the road, arguments about it would occur and I'd keep saying "unblock it first" when they tell me to use it instead of the master bedroom's bathroom. This continued on for years, but usually only two to four incidents per year and nothing major. Then, along came July for 2008.

I got into a heated argument over it, the worst of all that I can recall. These actually continued for 2 or 3 days, longer than ever before. I began using my tricks to sort of "sneak it in" and this went for only 2 days. As I frequently had in my mind drifts (not my mind game), I often stated of the parents having three options. The first was to simply get rid of the mirror. It'd be the easiest and most trouble-free. The second would be to move it, as a recommended. The third would be to do nothing but let me use the then-current bathroom I was using. After getting into trouble over this, I, literally, avoided going to the bathroom. I drank a lot less than usual and I ate a lot less. At one point during the argument, I had thoughts of actually busting the mirror and I've busted many before that have blocked access to important areas (including the phone). The parents put curtains over it as an attempt, but that's nowhere near good enough.

However, little did I know, there was something special about that mirror that I never even noticed. Although yes, I knew that the two sides could be rotated (they're on hinges), just like the one in the previous bathroom I was using for years, I didn't know that the center part could also rotate. With that, I found the ticket to accessing that bathroom that I was originally blocked from. I still have to duck down upon entering to avoid it. Rotating it is done at the bottom using the wooden liner. After finding this out, of which my parents never mentioned about, I no longer have problems with using it. Showers are still questioned though. Although I don't have a worthy enough spot for toilet paper to be placed, this has a very tiny negative affector on the motive, -1.1. Compare that tiny -1.1 to a monster -70 that the mirror had. It takes 45 of those -1.1's to make the -70 (1.1^45 ~ 72.89). Just that -70 alone was more than enough to make me avoid the bathroom all together even with heated arguments going on about it. Even with the heated arguments, there's still 2.2 times the motive for using the original bathroom. I now no longer have this.

#13 Stumped on my 2D game - the character, still: It has plagued me for about 6 months by now. I've got most of the basic actions done (except ball, swimming, and charging the speed blast) in terms of the outlines. The lighting has yet to be done, but this shouldn't be much of a big deal. What's the problem? Rotation. Whenever I try to rotate the character, I get this weird jagged edge and it means having to fiddle with the character for quite a while to get it right. I've planned for it to be in increments of 15°. Although the landscape is based on increments of 5°, the offset of only 5° on the landscape is hardly noticed. What does 5° look like? Take a meter stick (a ruler that is a meter long) and on one end, set an object 87 millimeters (3 7/16 inches) away from it. This is a 5° angle (or, for any length, it's about a 1 to 11.4 ratio or just use the formula, "Length*tan(5°)", where "length" is the length of your source). For a more common 1-foot stick (at least in the US), set it 1 1/16 inches away). With gliding, the maximum offset is just 7.5° instead. For this, set it 132 mm (5 3/16 inches) from the meter stick (or 1 9/16 inches from a foot-long ruler; a 1 to 7.6 ratio). When you look at it this way, it's not much at all. Sonic, on the Genesis, snapped to 45° giving a maximum offset of 22.5° (414 mm and 16 5/16 inches then 5 inches and 1 to 2.4 respectively).

I've tried many different ideas as an attempt to resolve this, but so far, I haven't gotten anywhere. The only rotations that I can do without any problems, are the simple-to-do 90° and 180° rotations. These just involve shifting pixels (moving them) rather than performing calculations. So far, it's only precise to 90° with a maximum offset of 45° (the offset is equal to the length of the source). I can't have the jagged edge as it'd mess me up with the lighting. The character itself is actually being built at 4 times the normal intended size. The base size is 128x128, but it's being built at 512x512. Once I get done with the lighting, I'll scale down the final result then save a bunch of TGAs. I'll need to write a side function for since GIMP doesn't have a filter for it and script-fu is confusing. Besides, it's just faster for me to write the program (it's fairly simple outside the math statement (with lots of sines and cosines involved...) so it shouldn't take more than 15 minutes, provided stubborn bugs aren't present), save all base states' two grayscale layers for the lighting of each state (used for the Sun angle), run the program (this part should take a second or two), import this result, then do a "color to alpha" operation, making sure all pixels are black. Although the jagged edges shouldn't be much of a problem after I scale down the character, since the alpha offsets and color blending will make it very difficult to see these effects. A simple rotation is not good enough due to one of the features I'm adding - 3D effects. These are easy to do compared to this rotation problem and the lighting. It's just a bunch of multiplication by 15/16 and placing various pixels.... I've got shortcuts for working on this as well to speed it up.

Outside the rest of the scenery, I need the character in order to do the bulk of what remains - ability usage, getting in the challenges (55 of them at of now, 48 officially), tutorial, and various other things. As a temporary solution, I'm thinking of using what I currently have then developing around it. Then again, swimming, ball, running, and charging the speed blast don't even have the actual base shape yet. Speed blast and ball are very easy, but are also the least important. Running, with 8 frames per direction intended instead of 2.4's 4 frames (3 actually used), is the hardest to do, mostly in the angle of the legs/arms and how the legs and arms move. Of course, when running at 65 mph, easily possible in this case, the movement is just nuts. At 15 mph, you're making almost 5 steps a second. 65 would have this as 22 per second (or so) and yet, it actually peaks at 23. After this, the float run is used, of which is, for the basic shape, is already done. 23 steps per second is very extreme. At even 75 fps, the animation would actually be skipping frames quite often because it's so fast (4 frames per step means 92 frames per second (93 1/3 to be precise, so 1 of every roughly 6 frames will be skipped. With 3x motion blur effects, you wouldn't really see this that well, even at 60 fps.

I thought I'd show you just what exactly my problem is in a series of 4 screenshots:



Screenshot #1: This is the overview. The character, with the 3D effects, is shown here. The outline is used to distinguish what the close and far parts are, meant for lighting. This is level gliding to the right. In the other layers you could also see something for gliding "-90 right" (which means facing to the right but headed straight down) and another for "90 left" (which means facing to the left but headed straight up).



Screenshot #2: Without the 3D effects, the character doesn't look that exciting. When it comes to doing a rotation, I need to do it without the 3D effects since these don't rotate with the character (the vanishing point, the orange dot, is not the rotation center). As with many things, establishing a baseline is very useful and that's just what this is.



Screenshot #3: After rotating the character 15° as intended, I get this jagged line. Look at the feet where it's especially bad. The hair, face, chest, and hands all look very weird and jagged. This is what happens after I rotate the character and it's the cause of my problems.



Screenshot #4: Just to give you an idea, look closely at the edges in this further-magnified image. You can see that, during the part of rotation, you you can see the general outline and what is happening more closely.

So far, the only fix I know of is to work at each and every pixel at the edges, but this is very time-consuming, boring, and I'm prone to mistakes. I have to constantly keep switching to and from the original to see what it should look like. If I could create something, using vertices and lines and designed in a way like those svg files, I think this might be another option, even though it'd mean having to trace over the entire character. It would, however, result in better precision and it'd, theoretically, allow for easier, faster animation.

#14 145 pounds - less than expected: This you might find a little strange. Even though I don't exercise (outside the rare occasional sprint or slow run when out and about), and I only eat pizza (even with Pizza Hut and Dominos slipped in about once every 4 to 8 weeks), my weight is now only 145 pounds. I found this out upon seeing scales at a second-hand store a few days before father's day. I have a strong feeling that my high focus toward degreasing my food pizzas plays a major role in this. I recall the time I was at 220 pounds. I stopped having sodas (I haven't had a soda since January of 2004!), lost all interest in meat (I find it disgusting for one), and despite that, I still lost that much weight. 220 is a bit dangerous, but 145, I'm not sure on. I asked about it and found that I'm actually in the optimal range. When I found out that I was 220 pounds, I just took out some numbers and went from there. The basic formula is this: "Calories = FatGrams*9 + CarbohydrateGrams*4 + ProteinGrams*4". My pizzas have around 11 grams of fat, 39 grams of carbohydrates, and 16 grams of protein. Doing the math using this formula, I get 99 calories from fat, 156 from carbs, and 64 from protein. This adds up to 319 calories. Multiply this by 6 servings for the entire thing and this becomes 1914. The daily value needed would likely be around 2000 to 2100 for me so this is cutting it close. Throw in the snacks and I could easily be getting around 2300 to 2500 calories. My drinks only add in 48 calories (2 grams of carbs times 6), hardly anything (Compare this to if I used sodas instead, with 150 calories each - that's 900 alone!). If I'm exceeding my caloric intake, but still losing weight, then this has got to be a strong indication, very strong, that my degreasing plays a major role. Instead of 594 calories from fat, this drops to about 60 to 150 or so and is enough to counter this. This is an 83% reduction or so, very significant. One thing I would like to do would be to run a test that determines what my paper towels are actually soaking up, particularly how much of it is fat and the related. I do take multivitamins though, usually centrum.

#15 False advertising encountered: On July 4, interestingly enough, I was after getting ice cream sandwiches since I haven't had them in at least a year, likely longer. I saw something stating of it being 98% fat free and I was attracted to it. I then looked at the nutrition facts label and that's when it caught my attention. I saw that it had 2 grams of fat in a 60-gram serving size. This is a big problem. If it was 98% fat-free, then, it this 2 grams would be 2% of the original value. The original value is determined by dividing by 2%, 0.02, which yields 100. Nothing that I've ever seen has 100 grams of fat in it. Boston Market's chicken pot pie from a long time ago that I only saw, had like 40 grams of fat per serving, the highest I've ever seen. Values from 4 to 12 seem to be the most common so 100 is well out of the range. The brand is "Great Value", of which is available at Wal-Mart. For a reference, I looked at the nearby Blue Bunny ice cream sandwiches of the identical type. I saw that they had 5 grams of fat per serving. In a sense, this would actually make the 98% value more like 60% instead. 2/0.4 is indeed 5. This is how observant I get, and one reason why I'm suited toward beta-testing games (or being a detective looking for those stray hairs) and this has nothing to do with games....

#16 10 new dreams - recalling nearly stopped: Even though the update spanned 2 1/2 months, my biggest surprise is just how few dreams I recalled. I'm hardly recalling any new dreams and thus, there are very few available, just 10. However, there was still a big favorite in the group, one involving a hotel in Russia (dream 5-141 as of the time of this update). It was on my mind for nearly a week, sort of expected when the compatibility with it is 200 (it spikes to 500 toward the end), something rarely seen. Above 400 for compatibility starts extreme favorites and I actually have a few dreams that get that high, but almost entirely in the "fun" category. The highest is 1100, the only one that passes 1000 (dream 8-5.

#17 Bubsy - 4000 hours!?: I've been wondering on this. I know for sure that I've played Bubsy very heavily for a long time, almost as soon as I got the game. I've logged hours by the hundreds and got into the thousands. However, I'm not exactly sure on just how many hours I've logged at all. Since I tend to overestimate, I'm beginning to wonder if 4000 is an overestimate and it should be around 3000. I still have a 20% linear margin of error though so it's quite substantial. This means a possible range, using my previous thought of 3600 hours at the time (now 3700 if that was the case), the actual span would be from 2880 to 4320 hours, quite significant. This does put 4000 hours in the realm of the potential correct answer, but it also puts 3000 there which seems more correct. I've got 3 or 4 other games that have passed the 1000-hour mark (SMB2 is getting really close to this zone; Sonic 3 & Knuckles is the second-highest at 1600 hours). Then again, I haven't really done much in the way of calculated estimates either to kind of help improve on this....

#18 Desktop background changed... after 2 years: 2 years ago, I had my desktop changed to contain various scenes from the 2.4 version of my 2D game. With the 3.x version looking significantly better, I thought I'd update the desktop background. Upon getting the scene from before I added in the landscape, I knew it was a special treat. The reason was because it set a record. It was the best screenshot I ever took that are of my own creations. You should also recognize it if you've seen my 3.x overview documents. Since I run at 1920x1440 resolution and this screenshot was 800x600, I stretched it to double size. The text at the bottom is just a basic description of the scene. I'm always attracted to the spectrum, of which is how the text is based on. I spent a while to update it. I very rarely see my desktop, which is why it's the cleanest it can be. Those icons cannot be removed - they are part of Windows. All of my common programs are actually in the start menu so they're two clicks away (done in about 5 seconds, though 2 is possible) instead of as much as a dozen (from having to minimize a bunch of windows - note the task bar). The only times I see my desktop is when I'm about to turn off my computer, or immediately upon startup.

#19 Mouse Hunt (the movie) - it's been a decade: Nearly a decade ago, I often watched "Mouse Hunt", of which was on a VHS tape. I was unable to watch it for a very long time as the tape itself got wrecked (crushed). It was until a chance encounter that I saw it in a second-hand store while getting father's day gifts. I watched it soon after. I found it very funny.

#20 X hits scoring game: For a few months now, I've had this game where, by throwing something, I'd score points based on the number of hits I get. When I get a drink, of which I drink the entire 12-ounce can of light lemonade in one go (with breaths when needed of course), I crush the can (video of this planned, but would prefer audio), then throw it into my "cans" bin for recycling. When I throw it in, using my hypercount ability, I score points based on the number of consecutive hits I get. The scoring system is very easy. If I threw a can in and 4 hits were made, I'd score 10 points. If I threw another can in and got 6 hits, I'd score 50 points getting a total of 60. This is the basic table, of which you should easily recognize the pattern:

# hits	Points	# hits	Points	# hits	Points
1	1 or 0	2	2	3	5
4	10	5	20	6	50
7	100	8	200	9	500
10	1000	11	2000	12	5000
13	10,000	14	20,000	15	50,000

Notice how, for every third step, the score obtained is ten times higher? It's related to the formula "10^(steps/3)" but rounded to the nearest friendly number, of which, in this case, always has the first digit as either a 1, 2, or a 5. The actual numbers are 1, 2.154, 4.642, 10,.... The US monetary system uses something similar for it's bills (2's are rare although there are 1's, 5's, 10's, 20's, 50's, and 100's (I'd have thought there'd be 200's by now.).). 3 to 5 hits appears to be the most common I get, for 5, 10, or 20 points. It's rare that I get 7 hits, for 100 and so far, I've only once gotten 8 hits for 200. In some very lucky strike, I got 12 hits for a monster 5000 points busting all of my previous records. When taking trash to the dumpster, I also make use of this game to add motive. It's small at +1.2, but it does add up. After all, put 13 of these together and the increase is more than tenfold which has a huge effect on my maximum sustained duration. When hauling branches over one day I played the game until I reached 2000 points. Although I could just get a single 11-hit combo, this is highly unlikely. I did it based on the round. At first, I'd fill the wheelbarrow with the sticks (and there's lots of them). I'd be scoring at this point and when the wheelbarrow reaches the limit, usually with about 180 points even though about 20 to 30 sticks are there, I head to the dumpster. I throw the sticks in continuing to score. If I reached 2000 points by the time the loaded was fully unloaded, I'd quit. Otherwise, I'd do another full round with 20 to 30 more sticks, even if I had 1970 points where a 5 and 4 would be enough to reach the goal. When at Nelson Carlson Lake, I used this same system for scoring when I attempted to skip stones. No skips resulted in zero points, but one skip was actually 2 points (as there were two splashes instead of one). Four skips, for 5 splashes, would mean 20 points, of which I didn't get.

#21 Website navigation proposal: I often hear of others mentioning of troubles with navigation. I thought of having an extra header that contains a bunch of links. As an example, it would show each of the 10 categories, and be all linkable. There should also be something to return to the main index at the top center and my blog at the bottom. Within each category would be a few extra links to a few select areas within it. Having a "next page" or "previous page" item isn't possible with this - they'd have to be separate. This navigation method would be present on all pages, at least those that end in SHTML. I'd have to convert the HTML ones but my motive for this is still, after nearly 3 years now, in negative territory and for some unknown reason, it's not changing.

Daily Events

May 1: Racing against the clock, I postponed eating and worked on my site update. I finished it with 7 minutes to spare. I ate afterwards then took out SMB2 for story mode - 1.45 million points, my best so far. Bubsy followed then Virtual Pinball and the best custom-made game so far since I first played it. Virtual Pinball kept me awake a lot longer than intended. My new TV tuner arrived as well - testing begins tomorrow. Woke up at 8:05 PM and went to bed at 3:54 PM.
May 2: Daily check, eat, install TV tuner, troubleshoot sound, got videos of Bubsy (finally!), processed and uploaded them, then took a shower to go grocery shopping. Upon testing the TV tuner, I used SMB2 - no lag. It had no sound, however. The grade D documentation (bad) made it harder as there was no troubleshooting section. I soon fixed it through experimenting. With low volume, -24dB, I recorded and processed some Bubsy videos along with Virtual Pinball. Woke up at 1:35 AM and went to bed at 8:33 PM.
May 3: More Bubsy videos were obtained, along with upgraded true versions of its music - OWTLI's bass is awesome around 80% true speed and Desert Zone isn't that bad, though better. Village Zone and Tree Climb were also obtained but have no compatibility difference. I processed OWTLI for my MP3 player. I've still got another video yet to upload. I've had thoughts of getting a "full game" video of Bubsy as well, something I've had for several months. Woke up at 6:31 AM and went to bed at 9:45 PM.
May 4: Bubsy full game video recorded - better than expected. The archived version is processed, but segmenting it for YouTube remains. Just before I finished my daily check, I got involved with construction-related housework though I slipped in the completion of my daily check. I also went to get sodas for the car club I haven't seen for over 20 months now. Yard work was about to happen next and since I didn't eat since then, I did just then to avoid it. I'd rather do 20 hours' construction stuff than just 1 hour of yard work due to the 4.5 compatibility offset. After eating, the Bubsy full game was done. Woke up at 7:07 AM and went to bed at 11:17 PM.
May 5: Bubsy video processed in full and the first 10 segments are uploaded. While uploading, I played Bubsy and fiddled around - 9 more hours on top of 4000. This recent burst has probably put 30 more hours on. This made most of the day. Woke up at 9:20 AM and went to bed at 3:02 AM.
May 6: Bubsy full game series fully uploaded, Crue Ball cheap extra balls videos coming up next.... Following that, I don't know. At day's end, it was Crue Ball, though Bubsy covered a third of the day, for uploading that is. Woke up at 3:48 PM and went to bed at 6:44 AM.
May 8: A great dream was recalled (finally)! I was going to bed at 8:34 AM but forgot to charge MP3 player - if only I could run it off the grid.... Before that, I played vectorman 2 and got to that orbiting bonus game. It went on until I had almost 102 minutes on the clock, a new record. I didn't record it though. I fiddled with finding a way to record both my commentary and the game sound track, but after about 2 hours of testing, either the video is missing/jerky, or there's no audio from the game or microphone (not both). Virtual Dub gives a picture too, but it still doesn't resolve this issue. I have no solution so far. I had a hard time staying awake 80 minutes for 90% charge. Woke up at 3:28 PM and went to bed at 9:52 AM.
May 9: Daily check, eat, Vectorman 2 and an attempt at the video failed. I became very tempted for videos of FF7 so, out it came, again. I got 2 videos, but they need to be processed. They are mostly of "levelling grounds" so far. I reached the area where you are to use the chocobo farm - levels and my third video aren't far behind. Video 4 is in the same area - crossing the marsh without a chocobo. TV tuner works with PS1 - good! Woke up at 5:49 PM and went to bed at 1:38 PM.
May 10: I woke up to having no TV and a big, thick snowstorm - big snowflakes with a low density and a 1 mph wind - the snowflakes were coming practically straight down. Daily check, FF7, eat, and processing videos made up the day. I got those from yesterday uploaded with 3 from today partially processed. I had no story progress though and was about to. Woke up at 11:55 PM and went to bed at 12:52 PM.
May 11: Slept only 7 hours.... Process videos, finish uploading them, eat, preview them, then FF7. I got no new worthy videos though. I'm about to get to the next major leveling area, the fourth one. There's still plenty of videos to get before I finish FF7, at least 10. 3 more of levelling grounds, 3 or so more of bugs, 5 or so of oddities, and probably others. Woke up at 8:18 PM and went to bed at 10:23 AM.
May 12: I've reached the fourth levelling grounds and got a video of it. Eat, daily check, FF7, video at end, process and upload it. Norton is really driving me nuts - I used ZA to block it... again. I'm practically at the breaking point. With grade D support, I'll be dumping it within the next 3 days. It's messing up recordings as well. FF7 dominated the day, leeling first and third, and gaining useful materia at Gold Saucer second. At stage 3's end, I got a video (2 attempts) of this area then processed and uploaded it after saving. I also looked at Zonealarm's Internet Security Suite. Woke up at 9:59 PM and went to bed at 4:01 PM.
May 13: I've reached the fifth levelling grounds, the big one. I'm 40 hours in upon reaching it. I've got 30 more levels to gain and probably over a hundred million gil along with it. The sixth leveling area isn't far behind, along with the first of the stat-maxing - strength. Woke up at 1:48 AM and went to bed at 4:30 PM.
May 14: I went over the fifth leveling grounds, still getting a video of it, but focused on the final one. I'm level 90 with over 60 million gil (and rapidly climbing - each enemy is roughly 50,000 gil and each level is about 4.5 million gil's worth. I even watched TV while leveling too since hardly any interaction is needed! At day's end, just before going to bed, I processed Village Zone and Tree Climb for my MP3 player, adding in Desert Zone as well. Woke up at 2:46 AM and went to bed at 8:02 PM.
May 15: Level 99 with plenty of TV while doing it.... I've also obtained a video of this. Both the fifth and sixth leveling grounds videos are processed in full. I couldn't process anything in YouTube since I couldn't reply to anything at all. I click "reply" and nothing happens. I now need to progress a bit with the story before I get involved with the video for the maxing of strength then vitality immediately after that. Speed and luck aren't until the end of disk 2. Magic and spirit I haven't done yet - no dependable, fast, and safe way to do it. Woke up at 5:19 AM and went to bed at 7:44 PM.
May 16: Yay! A good dream dream involving a first - New Orleans in Louisiana. Due to a solution discovered 4 or so days ago for a potential problem in my 2D RPG game, I spent the first half adding this in. YouTube is still out of order. I took a shower then went grocery shopping. FF7 followed afterwards and got setup for the maxing of strength. With only one morph, I needed duplicates so the last 4 hours were spent toward mastering it twice. I'm 1/3 of the way to the goal - TV was used and the sixth leveling grounds as well, the fastest. Woke up at 7:46 AM and went to bed at 2:02 AM.
May 17: 182 million gil, 3 morphs, and strength is on the way to being maxed. YouTube is still out of order. I'm not yet to the point where I get the video of it. I want to max out the current 3 then bring Yuffie or Cid in to "replace" Barret. I'm only concerned over the return of the case of mowing the grass - I seriously hate it in many ways, especially this time of year, the worst. Woke up at 12:00 PM and went to bed at 12:05 AM.
May 18: 212 million gil, strength maxed for all but 2 characters (Vincent and Cait Sith, my two least played). I got a vvideo of that as well. Vitality is now being worked on. Yardwork started the day but I delayed it some by eating... hastily. Pizza rolls take 30 minutes just to degress but 20 minutes to eat and 40 to prepare (laying them out). YouTube is out of order still. Woke up at 11:02 AM and went to bed at 2:08 AM.
May 19: 257 million gil, vitality maxed for some, but still in progress. I got a video of this. At first, YouTube was unavailable, again, but after fully processing the video, I saw that it was finally working so I not only processed 5 days' worth of comments (for those who were mysteriously immune to the problem), but uploaded the 4 videos I left off with, including today's. Woke up at 12:34 PM and went to bed at 4:51 AM.
May 21: Lulu - a worthy publisher. Thanks for the E-mail. I spent nearly an hour looking at it at the start. For FF7, I made major progress toward the story, finally on disk 2. I reached the part where I max the speed and luck and got a small start on it. I'm now getting over 900 gil per AP. The millions are piling up and fast. 5 battles and I get a million gil is how fast it is (the sixth leveling grounds is still faster with 4 battles for a million). Woke up at 3:28 PM and went to bed at 10:10 AM.
May 22: Eat, daily check, and FF7. Cloud is done - max dexterity and luck. Yuffie and Cid are 40% done. I was tempted for the chocobo breeding thing - pricy, yes, but when you get a million gil every 3 1/2 minutes, a 300,000 gil purchase is hardly anything. I made no story progress but plenty of stat and chocobo progress. I started on a 5-piece video of chocobo bugs. Woke up at 8:01 PM and went to bed at 1:22 PM.
May 23: Gold chocobo obtained - 152 for the speed, 9 below my highest. Instead of males, I kept getting females, 10 in a row actually.... I got videos of the battle arena, racing, and cave-finding. I then did the "ancient forest" area towards the end (no video). The videos have yet to be processed. I also got 2 more songs off FF7, yet to be processed (chocobo racing and gold saucer, the former being the most liked). Woke up at 10:49 PM and went to bed at 2:23 PM.
May 24: FF7 and I nearly maxed the luck and dexterity of 3 characters - video of it is still yet in need of being obtained - it should be tomorrow. Drowsiness was problematic, probably because I slept 11 hours. I have almost 400 million gil. I processed the chocobo racing song - 65 to 105% true speed is the good zone. The one for gold saucer was rejected. Woke up at 2:21 AM and went to bed at 3:59 PM.
May 25: Still storming when I woke up. I ate first and the storms were gone by then. The daily check followed with the final maxing of luck and dexterity. Wanting the "big area", I progressed through the story until I reached disk 3. Then I got interrupted for a bit of housework - weekends: oy! After 20 minutes, I returned and gained 150 million gil's worth, now over 600 million. I also tried out a way to record the game sound track and vocal track but again, nothing. I record but get no sound from the game. I'm beginning to wonder if I should return the card. Woke up at 11:16 PM and went to bed at 5:09 PM.
May 26: Another video and now nearly 800 million gil - 500 million to go and 3 more days at it. Daily check then FF7 were the first things I did. Toward the end of this run, I got the video. I ate and processed/uploaded 3 videos. After previewing them, I returned. 791 million gil - 530 million to go! Woke up at 4:09 AM and went to bed at 7:03 AM.
May 27: A billion gil and a video of it. I found a bug while recording the 2 1/2 hour process (for a whole "loop"). I processed it and it just needs to be uploaded. I have it as 5 segments, but I only really need one or 2. Woke up at 6:29 AM and went to bed at 9:00 PM.
May 28: 1.3 billion! One more round and a new record is confirmed. After this, I'm not sure. It's between continuing until passing 2.147 billion, obtaining a faster chocobo, or taking on Emerald Weapon. The chocobo case is most likely. I also got another video. It's of "mimed" limits and is 3 segments stitched together. It's processed but needs to be uploaded. I adjusted the previous video as well, the 3/5 point. Woke up at 8:26 AM and went to bed at 11:40 PM (±3 minutes).
May 29: 2 records in one day - 1.43 billion gil and a chocobo with a speed of 176 - fully recorded! I started processing the videos. I spent some time running an experiment to find ways to get a chocobo faster than 161. By mating a black one with a previous gold one, using a Zeio nut, I got one with 176, which stunned me upon seeing it (the cause of the delay in the video). I'm now wondering if 200 is possible. 176... that's 109 mph! If speed is an 8-bit value (unsigned char), then a speed of at least 233 is bound to cause problems for Teioh - 256 goes to 0 due to variable overflow. Top speed of zero - wonderous racing material, wouldn't you think? Woke up at 9:53 AM and went to bed at 2:28 AM.
May 30: Process chocobo video while doing my daily check, upload it, take shower, go grocery shopping, get Pizza Hut, eat, check YouTube, then FF7 made up the day. I'm after a chocobo even faster than 176. I got a black one with 147 for the speed, the fastest black one I've had (130-something was the previous). Woke up at 11:45 AM and went to bed at 12:36 AM.
May 31: A good dream was recalled. I first ate the last of my Pizza Hut pizza. I did my daily check then went off to get my cans recycled - 87 pounds of them. That's a lot of aluminum, more than a year's worth, or over 2000. Getting a rather-early dad's day gift followed. At the place, there were scaled - I'm 145 pounds, a bit lower than I thought. FF7 followed then watching "Mouse Hunt", a movie I have seen in nearly a decade. FF7 for a video of the battle arena followed then getting Tifa. 176 seems to be the fastest possible. I got a black chocobo with 161 as the top speed, my old record for a gold chocobo. Woke up at 11:42 AM and went to bed at 3:13 AM.



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The news entry headlines in bold are color-coded for a reason. They tell how big the event was for the headlines and how good my day was for the daily entries. From May 2006 onward, a slightly different system is used, of which has triple the precision. For dates prior to this that use color coding, from the white color, skipping two to red and so on is used. Here's what each color represents (for updates to before May of 2006):

	Extremely major event / Very good day
	Major event / Good day
	Somewhat major event / Somewhat good day
	Normal event / Average day
	Somewhat minor event / Somewhat bad day
	Minor event / Bad day
	Extremely minor event / Very bad day

Footnotes:
None