Had a pretty decent weekend.
It got off to a good start, a night out for a movie and light dinner with my partner in crime, notDeskmerc. Saw «I»I, Robot«/I«, which wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. In fact, it exceeded some of my expectations, certainly in the CG arena. I don't think I spotted a single motion control error in any of the robots, and I was looking.
Saturday was spent doing very little in the manner of productive things. I became disgruntled at my rendering software...still images come out fine, but all sorts of errors pop up when I try to render a series of images in .AVI or MPEG. Even the Quicktime MOV format won't work. I'm not going to spit out several hundred PNG files and thn run 'em together in a movie. That would suck.
Reinstalled Bridge Commander with a zillion new 3rd party mods. I am the Borg.
Maybe I'll have some new renders later on. Evidently I can do better, according to some persnickity family members.
On Sunday, I...I entered a church. A Methodist church. I didn't burst into flame as I had feared, but I took the risk for my grandmother who wanted to perform a reaffirmation of faith, a sort of karmic recharge you can get under the Methodist faith if you feel the need. (Methodists don't believe that baptisms clear out your permanent record, it's a symbolic gesture. Likewise, the sacrament presented isn't the actual transubstantiated body of Christ either, HERESY!) So the whole clan was there, minus the Jehovah Witnesses of course, because they would surely burst into flame upon entry into the chapel, but not for the same reasons I was concerned about.
Present as well were about 25 Tongans, all of which were joining the local church direct from their island paradise. In honor of their attendance, the entire service was performed in the Tongan tradition, with the pastor (priest? I dinno what the proper title is, minister) dressed in a grass skirt and sandals. The altar was covered in hand woven cloth with bright colors, and straw mats were everywhere. All of the Tongans sang Tongan hymns, and in the great Christian traditions, their present and past kings had written the words. The went something like this (translated into English):«BLOCKQUOTE»«I»There's a man
covered in blood
at your door
he wants to talk
and bring love«/I»«/BLOCKQUOTE»Or something like that. I was fascinated by the visual imagery, after all we just had this movie where you get to see God beat up by cheerful Romans and it caused quite a stir, but when the quaint island savages do the same thing with their limited means it becomes charming.
At the end of the service, there was a feast. However, I didn't attend. I left early with my Dad, because I had tickets to the ball game, where we watched the Astros savage the Brewers 9 to 1.
This week promises to be dull and insipid. I'll try to do something to brighten it.