GRAND OPENING! ...

By Mike Daly
January 11th, 2004

ok, it's not the grand opening. Wayne told me to say that.

It's been a very busy holiday. To sum things up, we all sat around on our bumcusses and played video games for weeks on end. All this toil was not without purpose, however. We have chronicled some of our celebration in the form of a quaint new gallery.

I got a drawing tablet for christmas. Hopefully, I'll be able to put it to use soon, but for now I'm going to continue working on my motorcycle model.

Now you know what I've been up to. In case that's not enough entertainment, prepare for this freakish(ly scary) delight: Apocomon: bringing the book of revalations alive through the magic and innocence of a pokemon parody.

Whew, that's creepy stuff.

Alright, tune back in wednesday for more goodness.

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Change of plan

By Mike Daly
January 13th, 2004

Hey, sorry about the late update. I was talking with Wastrel and we realized that updating 3 times a week is tough. For that reason, we are going to change the update schedule little.

So, we will now update on Monday and Thursday. Since this is effective immediately, I don't even have to finish this post. Expect an update from Wastrel tommorrow or there will be hell to pay.

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Tada... Nothing

By Wastrel
January 14th, 2004

So yeah Willow is making me update tonight... and I can guaruntee 1000% that there won't be an update waiting on monday as MLK weekend is coming up and The Monkies are heading to the Mountains!!
But in that sense, you can be satisfied knowing we'll have some funny sh.tuff for the next update.

Also coming soon is a new about page and hopefully a return to some cool iconage (depending on Willow and Wayne's aptitude to finish work... muhahahha putting it in an update to force completeion--I went there).

So in the mean time I leave you with some fond memories with an old link to A Modest Destiny and from the Animaniacs.... with "The Monkey Song".
peace


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Sublimed

By Mike Daly
January 18th, 2004

If any of you are unfamiliar with the band Radiohead, do yourself a favor and get familiar with it. They are excellent.

I'm not in much of a writing mood right now. I'm just kind of relaxed and spaced out (thanks to Radiohead), which is not really conducive to the strenuous mental labor such as using the english language in new and interesting ways. For that, I'll just post my content and move on with my mellow.

As you may recall, I got a tablet for christmas. I have been playing with it, and came up with a new piece of art. I present the soldier monk. I did this completely on the computer, no sketching and scanning involved, which was nice. There are a couple of things that bother me about this one, but by the time I realized them, it was really too late (and I was too lazy) to fix them. Oh well, overall I consider it a success.

Finally, I put up a picture that I worked on a very long time ago, but never put up. I actually didn't draw this one, it was done by one of my very talented friends, Michael McCoy. He drew the raw lineart, and I colored the image in photoshop. Here you go: Mike McCoy's guy.

Excellent. Time to return to the mellow.

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Boo-hoo-hoo

By Mike Daly
January 21st, 2004

Well, it's thursday, and I haven't done anything since monday except stress out and worry about my "real life".

The Game Developer's Club is in full swing with it's first annual game design contest, which is requiring more initial coordination than I planned. It's still a lot of fun though, and I'm sure it will all pay off when I get to see what the students are able to come up with.

In the meantime, a class I'm taking finally forced me to read something out of a book. Despite my strict anti-literature policy, I was able to enjoy the reading quite a bit. I'm reading a non-fiction book called Angle of Attack, by Mike Gray. Ask me about it later in the semester and I'll let you borrow it.

I'm also having to coordinate some other more troublesome GDC events that I don't really want to bitch about here. The point is that I didn't get any sleep tonight, and I'm in for a day full of classes. Oh well, I was probably going to sleep in class anyway.

Since I haven't done anything noteworthy, I am forced once again to post a random link. This time it's a sweet little song sung by a cat in a little flash movie. Yay. Shii's Song

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Guess who's back

By
January 28th, 2004

... back again. No, its not 'Slim Shady', it's just me. Sorry to dissapoint you.

I'm going to pull a Willow and make this update short and boring, filled mostly with me just talking. Here goes...

So the snow kept me out of class for 2 and a half days and out of work (surprisingly) for a day. Work now sucks because we are behind. I would write a rant about how I spent 5 and a half hours there tonight and will likely do the same tommorow, but I would rather finish this update and go to bed.

Willow just informed me that he added two images to the Art Gallery and Wesley has a "butt load" (as said by Willow) to put up as soon as we remind him of how to do it. I also just bought a digital camera last weekend and have been snapping off random pictures (mostly bad ones that get deleted) so soon enough I'll have some to put up. Hopefully by then I'll have that gallery thing figured out so it can replace the current setup. There isn't much documentation for putting it into your own site, unless you're using phpNuke.

I was going to take a picture of my camera for you to see how cool it is but over the past 20 minutes I've found it rather difficult, perhaps impossible, to take a picture of this camera with this camera. I'll have to draw it I guess.

Oh yeah, post in the message board some so it looks like our site is dynamic. Thanks!

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Miracle Methods

By Mike Daly
February 1st, 2004

So, I was really going to do my update yesterday, but i was distracted by another one of the inevitable nights where I fail to do my homework ahead of time and was forced to spend the greater part of the day completing it.

This one was a real doozie. I had a big graphics program due at midnight (3 hours ago as of now), and I didn't start on it until roughly the midnight before. After about a dozen hours of "binge programming", I realized that I hadn't been able to compile my program since I had started. Quite natrually, my program had over 100 errors, forcing the compile to abort.

Enter the "binge debugging" phase. Here I spent several hours continuously recompiling after changing one line at a time to find out where all these mysterious errors were coming from.

Next was the "realizing that you have 2 homework assignments due in your first class" phase. I managed to write a one-page summary of the semester's study so far in the 10 minutes between when I took a quick (and freezing cold) shower and ran out the door to catch the bus.

Returned home, passed out, awoke, realized desparity of situation.

So, it was then about 5 o'clock pm. I had a truckload of compile errors that I had not been able to fix after hours of effort, and even if the program compiled, the core of it was only about 1/3 complete. The cherry was that I'd only gotten tiny patches of sleep in the past 2 days. Despite the utter impossibility of my survival at this point, I pressed on, and that's when something strange happened.

Here's my theory: do you remember that old fairy tale about the elves that snuck into the cobblers shop at night and made lots of shoes for him? I figure those elves (or their decendants) hacked my computer to install a hypnotic screensaver. While I was entranced, they took up the keyboard, wrote the program, then let me wake back up. In my bumbling, exhausted state, I tried to keep writing the program, screwing up their program in the process resulting in the most shoddy looking miniature golf course displaying program ever.

Although my memory is pretty fuzzy of the last few hours of development, the conclusions of whatever actions I took during that time were clear: I had actually managed to get the program running by deadline.

I don't usually result to being really dorky, but I feel that the situation warrants the use of special language.

w00t, my friends. w00t.

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Tablets of Fire

By Mike Daly
February 4th, 2004

Just for the sake of remembering the good times, I'm going to tell you about my sleeping habits this week. As you may have read in the post below, I didn't get any sleep last Sunday because of homework. After submitting my program minutes before the deadline, I felt a tremendous weight lift off my shoulders. In my ecstacy I wrote the update before all that missing sleep caught up on me.

Then something kind of funny happened. I didn't get sleepy. I was so happy about being alive (as opposed to dead) that I didn't want to waste my happy emotions on forcing myself into slumber. So I didn't. Instead I took up my tablet and drew a picture that was meant to capture the state of my happiness. No sleep again.

Then an old friend had her 21st birthday so I trucked out to Chapel Hill to welcome her to the world of the old. So from sunday morning to wednesday morning (at around 3), I had only had two 2-hour pass out sessions, with no sleep beyond that.

I can understand staying up that long for tests and classes and stuff, but this time I put myself through it just because I felt like it. Man, I'm crazy.

Anyway, on to relevance. I've been drawing at a very respectable rate just recently. Monday night, after my update, I drew this picture; a self-poitrait of me just relaxing and being happy. Then again last night I made this screwy guy, I really don't know what I was thinking, but it turned out, uh, interesting. Although it wasn't specifically linked earlier, I also recently put up this little architecture study, as well as this line drawing of an elven woman. Also, I finally got around to coloring a picture I drew quite a while ago: the heroine.

Man, if you add those to the two I put up two weeks ago, you could say I'm on fire.

Right then, see you later.

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Its All About Me

By
February 8th, 2004

well, i've been rather slack as far as making updates, but i've finally gotten around to writing one again. and what delicious uselessness do i have for you today you might ask, my little kumquats? today i have finally added some pictures (not the moving sort though) to Wesley's Gallery!! YAY! ok, so maybe its not that exciting. so if thats not enough, i have also updated my profile finally. i also have some funny little videos i'd like to put up, but won't right now so's you'll have some motavation to come back... actually, i am not sure how to do it, and i have to wait for wayne to show me. so! thats it for today! have a great ... long time until i post again.

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Bedtime Stories.... Shiznizzle

By Wastrel
February 11th, 2004

Once again, it is the wee hours of the morning and one of us poor souls must do the update. As I happened to notice there were several pictures up in the Wastrel gallery, but without icons and therefore remained hidden, it is bequeathed unto me to deliver this update. And to Willow's request it shall be done in the entertaining fashion of a little Story. Here goes:

Once upon a time in a land far far away, there lived a zealot. The god-fearing zealot lived but a stone's throw away from the evil 13th no less). At the site of gokamehan in his shiny suit the villagers ran, and thus gokamehan's wrath ensued. It was great, and awesome. Only our zealot survived, and a great chase ensued as he ran from gokamehan's wrath. For gokamehan was no gentle man, once angered he showed his greatness, and thus he released a Kamehameha after our zealot. Racing through the village the great ball burned everything it touched in its path, leaving an unbearable sight and an eerie glow. The flame cast down our unfortunate zealot, who died in agony, and so Gokamehan felt momentarily appeased.
The following morning, with the fire quenched, Gokamehan realized what he had done. He was left all alone. Gokamehan wept! All he ever wanted was a hug, and instead he found fear and distrust.

So what is the moral of the story my friends? The next time you see a freak on the streets give him/her a hug, you never know if it'll make their day and keep them from killing someone.
And if they say "What the *expletive DELETED*?," you merely reply "oh my gosh, I Am So sorry I thought you were "insert name", you look just like him/her," while you slyly steal there wallet and walk off.
This way it's a win win situation.
And so I leave you with a goodnight kiss.

Sweet dreams my friends


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A tribute to the artists

By Mike Daly
February 15th, 2004

So, I usually don't have too much trouble coming up with some topic to blabber mindlessly about on these here news posts, but this time nothing is really coming to mind. Natrually when this happens, I post a link so some other site where the probably have a section where they make news posts identical to mine.

But first, I'm going to point out some things I've been working on recently. I am working on a samurai character model for UT 2k4 (the demo came out a few days ago for those who don't know how to use teh intarnet). It's coming along well, but has a boatload more work to do before it's ready. One night, I was feeling particularly artistic, so I made not one but TWO paintings with my tablet. I'm debating whether to call them drawings, paintings, or just pictures. None of them really seem to capture the idea. Oh yeah, so here they are. Isn't young me cute?

Ok, since I don't feel that is enough to make a complete post, I'm going to give you a few links. However, instead of being just random silliness, I'm going to post some of my favorite art sites that I have bookmarked. These guys and girls simultaneously inspire me and depress me (because they are SO much better than I am), and anyone should be able to appreciate the quality of their artwork independant of your artistic inclinations.

Right, here we go:
DrainBamage
Moonlight Whispers
Artplaymix
Eatpoo
Estrigous
Francis Manapul
Hyung Taekim
Studio Qube
Aspylus

Well, that's really just a few of them, but those sites alone can keep an art enthusiast drooling for days. Plus, the great thing about artist's sites is that they have links section to their personal favorite art, which is usually pretty good. Perfect for "surfing" (I'm so 90's style).

Enjoy them. I'm out.

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Inevitable

By Mike Daly
February 18th, 2004

Hey folks. This post serves to demonstrate two sad inevitabilities.

Number one: I haven't done any new art content or writing since Monday, so I don't have anything original to post.

Number two: I stayed up all night again putting off homework. If you've been reading this site for long, you should know that this is far from the first time this has happened as well.

I guess there is nothing to do but post some random links, if only to serve by delaying your boredom a bit.

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That's funny...

By Mike Daly
February 22nd, 2004

I could have sworn somebody told me they were going to update the webpage last night.

Nothing to see here, move along.

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Hello again

By
February 22nd, 2004

So it's been about a month since I've updated my own webpage. Maybe more. Sorry, I just haven't been in the mood to do any significant changes or even post any decent content. I may have lost my web page creative desire (or something like that). This semester is definitely keeping me busy, but I can't blame it all on that.

Anyway, I did add a new side dish to our cooking catalog. It's pretty good stuff when you don't accidently add a whole block of velveeta instead of only a cup. Yeah. I did that.

I tried looking for some random link in my favorites list but I'm just not as resourceful as our friend Willow. Sorry guys.

We did try out some Burritos the other week but the recipie won't go up until we figure out how we like them best.

Thats all, go watch Strongbad now. It's Monday.

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it falls to me

By Wesley
February 25th, 2004

once again i am left with the awsome responsibility of updating our wonderfully useless website. i've been informed that it is my DUTY to bring you new content every update (and by you i mean the whole 2 people who visit our site regularly). so here it is, The Samurai. Personally, i think willow did an excellent job with the coloring of this one.

so now that you have some new content, i am now free to blabber on about whatever i want. and what i want right now is to tell you a few things that irritate me:

1. when you step in water with your socks on. like when someone takes a shower and then you go in to brush your teeth and your socks get wet.
2. annoying ringtones on cell phones. it should be a rule that everyone has to have cool ringtones. good taste should be mandatory.
3. people who wear those cheap foam and net hats with the super flat brims. YOU LOOK RETARDED.
4. any hanna-barbara cartoon. esp. scooby doo. (you may think they are cool, but that is because you are an idiot)

you disagree? have something to add? why don't you tell me about it in your two cents (i may regret this later).

whew, that was hard work. but hopefully i won't get griped at by Willow. peace out ya'll, and don't work too hard (you'll make me look bad).

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time to enjoy winter

By Mike Daly
February 29th, 2004

The past few days have been a total blast. In just the last week, we've had several beautiful sunny days, and some snow days as well. This time around, we made sure we enjoyed the snow, as it will probably be our last of the year.

So, we invited our lovely neighbors over to play in the snow with us. (or was it them who invited themselves? I can't remember) We all worked together to build a snowman. I figured I would try to make a cooler snowman, but maybe he was too cool. The girls then decided to make snow angels.

To celebrate our new creations, we did a square dance, which eventually evolved into some sort of inverted triangle dance. Wierd.

To cap things off, we (read: I) decided to give our frosty friend a beffitting sendoff samurai style. Poor guy never knew what hit him ... twice.

Ah, good times. Just today, however, I've been working on something a little more productive. I'm getting ready to begin the job application process, but before I can do that, I felt that it was necessary to make a new resume webpage as my old one is kind of ... old. I played with photoshop for a few hours and figured out a bunch of neat stuff I could do. I made an image of the prototype for you all. I've still got some more stuff to add, but I think it's coming along quite well. I'd appreciate some feedback, so I started a messageboard topic. Feel free to tell me what you think.

That's all I can think of, catch you later.

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I need a vacation

By Wesley
March 3rd, 2004

well my friends (and whoever else visits here), its time for a break. a spring break. although it'd be nice to be going on a cruise with Willow and Wayne, i'm heading back to the mountains for the week. Wastrel is planning to go skiing, despite the warm weather. so the monkey house will be empty... but never fear, much to your joy (or dismay) we shall return! Willow and Wayne with tans, myself with money (i'll be slaving working), and Wastrel with... um, whatever.

so in the meantime, we shouldn't want to leave you wanting of mindless entertainment, and therefore leave to you strongbad! "now, Wesley," you might say, "we have already seen strongbad. many times." and to that i say, ah-HA! while that may be so, my treasured readers, have you memorized them all yet? yesh, i thought not. now GET TO WORK!!! ...you bums. NI!!

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Grand ReOpening!!!!

By Wastrel
March 14th, 2004

The liquor cabinets are full, tans all about, and plenty of women stories to go around!

As you all should well know after a week long break we have each done nothing, and hence nothing really cool to provide for those content thriving viewers. On the other hand lots and lots of pictures, so I have the privelege of giving you folks a small peak into one of the Monkeys' Spring Break Extravaganzas.

And for the Grand Finale of this grand reopening we have something not so cool (The camera somehow messed up and did not properly record one of the jumps, and of course which one? The cooler bigger one at the bottom!!!).
Well, I hope each and everyone has enjoyed their 'Spring' Break and have nonstressful returns to their studies/jobs.
-peace


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Ooopsie

By Mike Daly
March 17th, 2004

Ok, so I was busy producing brown glass last night and apparently forgot to update. It's not really much of a suprise that nobody else remembered either.

I'm in a lab on campus right now, so even if I had something to add, I wouldn't be able to upload it. Now you know.

I guess I'll end this little post with some advice about mexico: If someone offers you free all you can eat tacos, they probably suck. If you are offered free all you can drink cerveza, on the other hand ...

Peace out

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I feel like such a bad guy

By Mike Daly
March 21st, 2004

I'm sorry, but the time has come again.

It's not like I don't have anything to post. We've got an endless supply of Mayan ruin pictures, and a boat-load of others that need posting and linking, but I just don't have time for it.

Between projects and job applications and day dreaming and museums, I feel thin. Like butter over too much bread.

It's 4 AM. I have to get up at 8. Here's your stupid link, leave me alone so I can sleep.

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Never Fear Content Man is Here

By Wastrel
March 24th, 2004

So once again it must be I to the rescue!! HA Just kidding, I know I'm not one to put much content on this page, but it seems as though everyone else, although loaded with pictures is a lazy bum.
So it boils down to the fact that I have two new pictures to present to you folks and I've put them online. So without further adou I present the three lovely ladies we frequently have dinner with, and all of us at their place.

Also for your convenience you will find links to movie clips found in each of our folders, on the gallery page. Enjoy!


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At last, It has come to this

By Mike Daly
March 28th, 2004

I always hate finding old derelict websites where the administrators made the last post to the tune of 'I don't have time to pay attention to the site right now, so I'll start updating again in a month', a post which was made sometime back in the 20th century.

Although I certainly hope that doesn't happen here, I am sad to say that I'm probably not going to be updating regularly until the end of the year. For those who don't already know, I am scheduled to graduate in May. Before then, I must complete my senior design project, and my undergraduate research. Both of which are tasks of unimaginable size. To top that off, I need to search for jobs and manage the Game Developers Club.

I am in the final sprint of college, and the truth is that I do not have the time for my hobbies. Even if I do take a few minutes to write an update, it will just be a stupid little blurb (much like the one you are reading now), without any real content.

It will be interesting to see if the site gets regular updates considering that there are 3 other guys in my house who are supposedly members of the crew. I think that it is unlikely. (hear that Wayne/Wesley/Wastrel? That's a challenge!)

Right, sorry for that depressing-ness. Here's your completely unrelated link.

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Reconsideration

By Mike Daly
March 31st, 2004

I know that just a little while back, I stated that I probably would not have time to be updating this site as often, at least until the end of the school year. Well, that was then.

Enter: Ritalin. A bottle of my old college buddies showed up unexpectedly last night, and I endulged in their company today. I took 6 pages of notes in my 3 classes, and cranked through 300 lines of code on my gameboy game. With the possibility of this vast, unimaginable power, my new work ethic will permit me to do things I never thought possible before.

Yes, folks. I am now a certifiable superhuman. With these new powers under my belt, I plan on doing several things. The first of which, is actually finish my projects and graduate this semester (perhaps not possible before). The second of which is to update this site regularly ... with a vengeance!

I figure I'll have about 20 minutes of free time each day, assuming that I cut my sleep schedule by 50 percent, which is approximately enough time to write about 1000 (ritalin induced) words. Fortunately, those thousand words can also equal one picture (at least that's what my old schoolteacher used to tell me). So, I'm now going to add one picture to the galleries each day until I have another seizure. Additionally, I will be updating the news section of the site with the useless links and excuses approximately NINE times per week.

Enjoy it while I'm alive, folks.

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It's me

By
March 31st, 2004

Although I have not added much content to the site lately, I think when I do contribute it's a lot more than posting some random link. Look at the last four news posts... Go ahead. Scroll down and see for yourself. There is no content, just babble. Willow always whines about how he is the only one who ever does anything around here, but all he does is make sure there is a new useless post on Monday and Thursdays. Ah I can't say all that. He does good and I know he's busy. But hear me fellow monkeys: if all you have to say is that you're the only one to update, keep it to yourself. No one wants to read that. I mean who would say such a thing... oh wait. um...


Here's your rant. Goodbye.

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Just to clarify

By Mike Daly
April 4th, 2004

Sorry about all that crap I said last thursday. I just looked at the date and saw that it was april fools, so I felt like saying something silly.

The truth is this: I still have an unimaginable amount of work to do, and will have no life until either A) I graduate, or B) I die trying.

I guess if I died trying, I still wouldn't have a life. Scratch option B.

Ironically, I did get a digital painting done later that night, but I probably won't post it because it doesn't really fit in and doesn't have a background or anything.

I spent over 12 hours strait working on my game boy game on saturday. I added 800 lines to the program. It was an amazing feat, I felt so accomplished.

There is not really a point to all of this, I just felt like clarifying my last post, and being sunday night, I noticed that nobody else decided to post so I figured I would fill the blank space.

Now go learn how to curse in hebrew!

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Trudging through hell

By Mike Daly
April 7th, 2004

The story of my week is a tragic tale. It makes me sad to think about, so I'm not even going to try to summarize it here.

so right now, I'm working on my 42nd hour of consciousness. This is largely due to my history group project, undergraduate research project, and senior project course. In addition to that, I have to organize a joint meeting for the International Game Developers Association and the Game Developers Club of NC State. Although I have finished my immediate work for the first three of those, the meeting is what I'm procrastinating on as I speak. I have several e-mails to write, and I just don't feel like doing it now.

If there is anything that I've learned in my two computer graphics classes, it's that I hate computers. I don't want to ever program again.

Anyway, I haven't done any official artwork per se, but I did go ahead and compile some of my sketches into a little collage. I have been experimenting with new shading methods, and I think they have served me particularly well with the guy's head and the girls body. Any comments are welcome, you can use the messageboard.

Well, that'll be all for now. I'll catch up with you later.

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There is nothing to see here

By Mike Daly
April 11th, 2004

I had a great easter break in the mountains. Didn't get any work done, though. I guess I needed to unwind after my trials last week.

There is nothing new here, as usual, so why don't you piss off

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Good broken promises?

By Mike Daly
April 14th, 2004

Early on in the life of this little webpage endevour, I kept promising that I'd do things (like post pictures of stuff like spring break, oops) then not doing them. The fact that I'd never followed through on my word bothered me, so I decided to stop promising to do anything at all.

I recently said that I wouldn't be able to update the webpage regularly, but, ironically, it turns out that this was just another promise that I would never make good on. Despite the fact that I have as much pressure on me as a uranium core during detonation, I keep making updates, as useless as they may be. I think part of this is that when one is doing work for long periods of time (as I have been doing every day for quite a while), one needs to take a break and relax their brain in order to continue doing work. Writing stupid things to imaginary people on the internet is a pretty good stress reliever for me, so that's why I keep doing it.

So today I am proud to announce that my portfolio webpage is finally up! Thanks largely to Waynes help and my bad-ass photoshop skills, the thing is functioning and looking pretty smooth. You can check it out at mike.duelingmonkeys.com. As usual, comments are greatly appreciated. If you have anything you'd like to say, spit it out on the messageboard.

I'm particularly happy with the 'portfoio' section, make sure to chech that out.

By the way, my meaningless posts will be much easier to write in the future thanks to new technology like this.

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No time

By
April 18th, 2004

I don't have time to do this. I didn't have time to upload the photos I put in the gallery. And then I definately didn't have time to resize the originals to something you can see on your computer screen. I'll do that later. Much later.

I'm really getting nervous about being able to finish everything required of me by the end of the semester. I just can't get in the groove of things, and every time I get close, I run into a new problem or obstacle. This has to stop soon, right?

Sorry about the images, everything will eventually be moved to the other gallery once we do a site redisign this summer (maybe).

Somebody email me and tell me everythings gonna be alright.

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Damnit

By
April 21st, 2004

I just wrote a big long good update about how Willow has been awake for like 3 days and some more crap, but stupid mysql made an error and DELTEETED my post. So now all you get is the random link

Computers suck.

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I can do it too

By
April 27th, 2004

Thats right folks, I too can pull the occasional all nighter in the name of education. I have had about 10 hours of sleep in the past two days, and will soon reach my twenty-fourth hour of awakeness. Sure, its no comparison to Willow's 65 hour marathon, but I don't have ridilin.

For the past seven hours I have hardly let my pencil rest. I've been drawing sketches and detailed drawings of a Super Nintendo game cartridge. I also made a complete assebly of the cartridge in SolidWorks. I'll post a picture of it sometime later when I can think straight.

In the meantime, be prepared for more useless updates as next week is exams for all of us and quite frankly, we don't care.

Oh crap I just remembered I need to burn the SolidWorks files to cd. BYE!

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This time I have an excuse

By Mike Daly
May 2nd, 2004

For some reason, our new server is not allowing is to connect through ftp, so I do not even have the choice of adding real content to this site. I'm not going to say whether or not I had content to add; I'll just leave that up to the imagination.

Anyway, I've got a final exam next Thursday, and another the following Tuesday. In the meantime I have to complete an honors thesis, a senior project, and start looking for a job. It would be nice if I could update my Portfolio webpage with my two new games, but as it's on the same server as this, I don't really have a choice, do I?

It feels like it's been a long time since I've written stuff here. It hasn't been that long really, but it feels like it because a lot has happened in the past few weeks. I am keeping myself sufficiently busy to warrant sparse updates. I hosted the big joint Game Developers Club and International Game Developers Association meeting a week and a half ago. It went really well, and to celebrate I stayed awake for 65 hours without so much as a short nap. It was quite an adventure; I walked about 5 miles at 5 AM so I could watch the sun come up from the top of the tallest building in our part of Raleigh - the campus library. Saw a fox.

I did make a pretty art picture recently, but Wayne and Wesley say I'm not allowed to show it to anyone ... ever. So, I guess there was no point in telling you that.

I lined up a special guest post-er for this update: my old friend Jewel. However, Jewel is now too busy saving the Princess Toadstool so she's not able to talk. Guess all the stuff I've said so far will have to be enough.

In conclusion, fanboys make me puke.

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Hell on earth

By Mike Daly
May 6th, 2004

If it wasn't for a few social activities with special people this week, I could easily list it as one of the worst in my entire college career.

Even by today (Friday), I've barely challenged the stuff I have to get done by the end of school (next Tuesday). I'm working as hard as I can, and still always seem to be falling farther behind. I've been missing nights of sleep. I came down with a miserable sickness which won't go away because I can't sleep it off. I've had a lot of trauma with my senior project which would not be worth going into the details on. I'm dissapointed in myself for missing my self-appointed deadlines for practically everything I'm working on. I'm so stressed that all the muscles in my back are tense and constantly uncomfortable. To top it all off I have nobody to massage them for me.

Add on car, bills, money, job applications, weddings, relatives, and graduation, and you have a fine mess.

Why can't I be excited about graduation? I should be, but I just don't feel that way. I feel like I have nothing to look forward to, which is the cherry on top of the unhappiness cake which represents my life.

That's all for now. I'm either going to keep working on my damned senior project or pass out trying. I'm so tired. Make it stop.

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Worst weekend ever

By Mike Daly
May 8th, 2004

I last complained, err updated on Friday. Since then, everything bad has gotten worse, and everything good ... was there anything good?

Friday evening, I went to bed early (around 7) because I was exhausted. I set my alarm and got back up at midnight. Worked on the program until 8 AM; napped until noon. Went to CH graduation until 4; then worked on the program until 5 AM with a 2 hour break for the driving range. Wake up at 10 AM on Sunday. Work on program until 2. Work on thesis until 9. Short break. Work on math paper until ??? work on program until ??? study for graphics final ?

I have scarcely left my room, made a proper meal, taken a shower, or gotten sleep in the past few days. All the muscles and bones in my body ache, I'm still sick, I'm tired, and I'm burned out. However, none of this is helping solve the problem of the F*@K!NG PROGRAM NOT WORKING RIGHT.

My minigolf game (downloadable from my portfolio webpage) is being expanded to play over the network. After endless reading, testing, and coding on the subject, my game now had 50% more lines of code than it did before. This is just rediculus. I can't start over, but this is too much. I can't make this program work. What should I do? Give up on my senior project and NOT graduate?

To make things just a little more fun, I've basically been home alone all weekend too. Just chillin by myself, alone, miserable. I hate it. I'm not happy.

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The twilight zone

By Mike Daly
May 12th, 2004

It feels so weird. I'm out in the mountains now. I'm not even really sure how I got here. I slept for 13 hours last night. What day is it? Weird.

I'm supposed to graduate in a few days I guess. I don't think I have to do any more schoolwork until then. I'm almost out of college. What will I do with myself?

Well, I would have like to have gone out with a bang, but it seems this breif, meaningless post is the last you will hear from Willow: Disaffected college student. Fortunately, I already have a replacement lined up; Willow: unemployed bum.

I would like to post up some pics, but as I said, I'm in the mountains far away from all that. Oh well.

As far as college goes, I think I had a pretty good run.

I'll catch you on the flip-side.

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no news for you!

By Mike Daly
May 24th, 2004

So it turns out our server deleted a month's worth of news posts. This is kind of frustrating considering that I'd written some expansive updates since I graduated. We are trying to recover them. I'm dissapointed in this, so I'm not going to write another update until I either get them back or know for sure that they are gone forever.

That is all.

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And we're back!

By
May 28th, 2004

After a week of brokeness, we've finally got things almost back to normal. The messageboard is in working order, and it actually logs your IP when you post now. I never realized that part didn't work until the 845th reply.

The comments section is making progress, but I don't want to make too many new things for the site until that lazy guy (Willow) decides to design a new layout. I think the comments work now, but they aren't the prettiest. That collapse button is temporary I promise, and one day it will work.

It saddens me to say that my motivation for fixing all this stuff tonight was because I simply didn't have anything else to do. All the Monkey's are gone. My girlfriend and her roomates are gone. My friends that I hang out with from work are either busy or gone. I don't have any homework, I don't feel like watching another movie (I've done a lot of that lately). I feel like I don't like programming anymore.

It's a good thing I'm not majoring in computer science anymore!

Anyway, my main reason for not doing more upgrades with the site is because there is so much room for imporvment it's scary. I look at the code, the database structure, the horror! And it all says back to me, "Why have you made us so ugly? Do you hate us?" To which I reply,."I'm sorry old friends, but I was not clear in thought at the time. One day I will give you a makeover."

One day. One day.

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Dodging the bullet ... literally

By Mike Daly
June 7th, 2004

Hello all. It has indeed been a long time since I've updated. I'm still lamenting the loss of my two enorm-gantuan updates I wrote about graduation and my insomnia adventure. However, I've finally decided to take back up the keyboard to let everyone know more irrelevant events from my life.

This update is inspired by the very unique and interesting experience I had this past weekend. I was up in VA beach visiting some relatives and it turns out that some of their friends were firearm afficianados. My brothers and I were invited to go out to the shooting range for a day and shoot stuff.

Well, that sounded like an interesting experience to have, so I took them up on it.

The first thing to note is that apparently people don't like to have shooting ranges near their place of residence. I'm sure this had something to do with why we had to drive 45 minutes to get to the place. Virginia is not much to look at from the back of a SUV.

The building was interesting. It was an old run-down looking wooden building complete with chipping paint and lots of dirt on the wood floors inside. There was a rusty wire fence dividing the walkway part from the ... uh store(?) part. Beyond the divider was shelves and shelves of bullets along either wall and various gun parts hanging on the back wall for sale.

It was here that we discovered that it costs 13 dollars per person per day to visit the shooting range. Does this seem expensive to anyone else? No wonder all the rednecks just decide to shoot up road signs instead.

Next, we walk out the back of the building and enter the range proper. The range is a muddy field of mud with heavily cratered cement barriers suspended in the air by rusty steel beams. At the other end, at various distances, are boards with trazillions of holes in them sticking out of the ground in front of walls of dirt and grass. There are about a dozen dirty folding tables and chairs set up at our end.

We lay out our gear on one and get started. We started with some lighter weapons. I would call these 'gateway guns'. I fired a small calibur rifle and pistol a great deal of times with some success. I was able to hit the target ... kind of.

Exhibit A

Then we moved on to the hard stuff. I fired off a few rounds from a .357 magnum, which was a painful experience. Also, I'd like to note that some of the other people at the range reminded me of the documentaries I sometimes see on the discovery channel about America's secret psycho militias. One guy in particular was brandishing about 5 high-powered assault rifles. If we ever get invaded by paper silhouettes, I'm going to Virginia.

Exhibit B

One one final note, you have probably noticed that my exhibits are well-constructed computer-generated replicas of the actual scene in question. I'd like to point out that Wesley, the guy who never updates this site ever, had a camera and took pictures, then failed to get them to me in such a way that I could use them for internetting.

So, there you have it. That was my interesting gun-toting experience. It's not hard to devise that I wasn't really in my element there. In other news, I'm still working on my motorcycle model for UT 2k4. Let's see if I can find that old render ... ah, here it is. Well, that's a really old render. The status of the project is that I have a "working" prototype running in the game. I still have a lot of work to do before it's done, but I'm having a hell of a lot of fun crashing it in interesting ways, doing stunts, and watching the bots try to drive it and immediately fall over. If I get it to a reasonable state of completion, you can expect it to show up here.

You know? What the hell, I'll go ahead and make some screenshots for you:

My beautiful bike in game
Me driving the bike suicidally hundreds of feet above the ground

Also, I've been having trouble coming up with a cool name for it. Check out this thread to give me your feedback. Wayne will probably be annoyed that I didn't use the nifty new 'Add Comments' link he programmed in to each news post, but I had already created the thread. Oops. Note that if you feel like commenting on my gun-toting adventure, you can use the 'Add Your Comments' link. I wonder if that works?

Enough babble. Catch you on the flip-side.

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Tag team, back again...

By Mike Daly
June 10th, 2004

check it top, wreck it - let's begin!

Wow that's old school. Today the two most popular and beloved monkeys are going to bring you some REAL content! Can you believe it?

First of all, we've been working on some burritos of our own design, although I doubt you can do too much to make a burrito "original" before it's not a burrito anymore, so take it as it comes. We think we've done a good job with these beasts, but if you care to improve on our methods, feel free to post your comments in the um, comments section.

Speaking of comments... I see that it's not so obvious of when there are new comments or any posted at all for that matter. I was thinking of having two forums in the Your Two Cents section, one for the existing messageboard, and another for the comments. The links on the front page would be more or less for your convienence and will probably be the only way a new topic relating to the news can be started. Meaning you will only be able to add posts to existing comment topics. You'll figure it out.

Willow speaks:

I will elaborate on the details of the burritos recipe just a bit. We sliced three fresh jalepeno peppers and threw them in a skillet. After a few minutes of slaving over the range, I started coughing and hacking. Wayne just looked at me, apparently amused at my agitated state. I muttered something to the effect of 'can you not smell that?' before collapsing on the floor and dying from toxic fumes. He just laughed and went on cooking. A few minutes later he also realized all at once that he could not breathe either and suffered a similar fate. The rest of the night the two survivors ate the deadly meal out of respect. They too, unfortunately, did not survive.

So, in other news, I've been working furiously at getting my motorcycle done. I've got the coding almost complete; now it leans as a motorcycle should. At least it leans as realistically as I'll ever want it to be. I made some nice looking team textures for it. The remaining work to be done is to pose a character so that they fit properly, as well as some other polish things like headlights and such. Finally, I need to program in the 'weapon'. I'm thinking that you hit fire to activate a bomb, then the next time it runs into something at a moderate speed, it blows up fantastically.

Ok, I'll stop boring you all now. I'll post screenshots and maybe movies of the bike later.

Oh yeah...

Whoomp there it is.

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Content Galore

By Wastrel
June 15th, 2004

Ok so maybe not just yet, but we promise guaruntee will try? to have more content on this page!!
In the meantime I did put up some pictures from my graduation, seeing as Willow and I did not graduate at the same place, and I added more pictures from us leaving and the little lobby celebration afterwards. Unfortunately I do not have a digital, and I'm lazy to scan in All the pictures I have. So by the grace of Wheedle (Our new honorary monkey correspondent who happens to be in the little known state called Hawaii at the moment) I have digital pictures of my graduation. You can check them, and the previous ones posted, out here. My personal favorite is the monkeys in style.

And more content should be sure to come. Of course you have noticed that our schedule in the monkey house has changed. Regular updates are no longer to be had, we will just try to put at least one up a week and whenever we have anything interesting to say!
Meanwhile Wayne works dillegently to revamp the site. And Willow is creating new icons, therefore I shall use 'mini-hobbes' in the meantime.

Until then keep listening to pearl jam (it helps sooth the soul) and check out some more pictures from our redneck style drinking in the road found in the miscellaneous gallery. (My personal favorite).

-Peace


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New Icons!

By Mike Daly
June 17th, 2004

Hey everyone. I have toiled the past few days making up new icons for our beloved duelingmonkeys characters. However, I am in the mountains right now, forbidding me from doing the final touches to make them viewable as news and messageboard icons. Wayne will apparently have to do a little extra work to get the png format to show up correctly as well.

In the meantime, I've placed them all in the art gallery. For your convenience, I'll go ahead and post direct links too:

Wastrel
Wayne
Wesley
Yours Truly

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Keeping Promises

By Wastrel
June 25th, 2004

So although maybe in a time frame aspect they are broken, promises made by some monkeys will always be fulfilled. And as it was duelly pointed out to me, I had mentioned you would have a content filled summer. So.... without further adeu.... no more stalling... I know you've been waiting for it.... by the way so how was your day?... I'm awfully tired and am thinking of taking a nap (fulfilling my name's definition).

Ok ok I'm just kidding here you go, some content. I finally finished the comic, that which I started and drew by hand in my software engineering class throughout the semester, to the reflection on a modern classic 'A Knight's SuckTale.' Rereading the article I feel it was not really a good review and doesn't convince those readers that may have unfortunately enjoyed the movie as to why it lacks any value. But I'm too lazy to really rewrite it, so just consider it a crappy rant, that does not really express my sentiments exactly nor clearly. But does my writing ever??

I thought not!... so enjoy the 'rant' and where's my cookie?!

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If it's not one thing...

By
July 8th, 2004

... you know the rest.

Let me tell you a story. It goes a little something like this:

It was a dark and stormy night in the little town of Blythewood. A cute couple with two young daughters sleep silently through the heavy rains. Only to awake to a flooded server room in nearby Columbia!

Dun Dun Duuuuhhnnn!!!!

The little server that could (host of duelingmonkeys.com, along with a few others) had to be drafted to fill in a position from a damaged server that actually did something useful. So Willow and I dug underneath the cushions, drank cheap beer, and robbed old ladies to scramble enough money to ship my older computer as a substitute. It's not as beefy as the previous one, but it should be able to hold up to the challenge.

So there you have it folks; that's why the website has been down for the past two weeks. Sorry. I know you missed your dose of brain cell poison, but we will strive to make the next batch more potent, if you know what I mean.

If you don't, then I guess you'll find out next time!

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Gaijin Dave in Japan: Episode II

By Wesley
July 12th, 2004

following is the edited accounts of senior foreign correspondant Wesley on his trip to japan. The original message was sent on June 30th.

Well, hello everyone!

I have arrived in Japan safely, and without too much trouble. Actually, I take that back, there were actually some difficulties, but that was before I even left the US. Once I got to Japan it was smooth sailing (er, training) to Nagoya where I am now staying with Michi and his family. For those of you I haven't talked to in a while, I am going to be attending an intensive language course in Okazaki for 4 weeks. Okazaki is not far from Nagoya which is where I studied last time I was in Japan. For those of you in Japan, I hope we get a chance to meet up! Everyone feel free to email me, although I'm not sure how often I'm going to be checking my email.

Now, the following is the account of my travel troubles. Read it if you want to, but it's nothing important.

NOTE: at this point the editor has decided that he doesn't want to fix all of Wesley's punctuation shortcomings. Deal with it.

so, the day before i left for japan i realized that the return date on my ticket was wrong. it was for July 16, instead of Aug 15! so i asked the counter lady the next morning at the airport and she said i should go through the travel agent who issued the ticket to resolve it. so when i landed in NY (my connection) i called the travel agent. he didn:t know anything about it, but said that at the time he issued the ticket i accepted and it was my fault for not noticing. he was nice about it, and he was right i suppose, but that didn:t make me feel better. to change a date on your ticket cost $150 straight up, PLUS the difference in fare. which in this case was about 400 smackaroos. so that puts my total price difference at $550. NOT GOOD. as i:m hanging up with the travel agent i hear an announcement that the flight is overbooked and they are looking for volunteers to take another flight the next day. incentive: a $600 voucher. SCORE! so i volunteer. i get the $600 voucher, a night in the hotel, three meals and i talked them into bumping me (and the other guys who got bumped) into business elite. its about 1 in the afternoon at this point, so i called peter up and took the subway to manhattan and hung out with him in east village all evening. score.

so the next morning i go to the ticket counter to ask about getting my return date fixed. i explain the situation to the woman at the counter and she starts looking things up. she feels really sorry for me and tries her best to keep me from having to pay the fare difference. she goes to talk to her manager for a long time. i:m starting to get nervous, as my flight is leaving soon. she comes back hands me a ticket and says i:m all set and to hurry or i:ll miss my flight (which i almost did). she got me a return date of Aug 13th at no additional cost. SCORE! my mad communication skills strike again!!! never underestimate the power of the lost puppydog face! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!

so that all worked out great! and i still have my $600 voucher! i had no problems getting to Nagoya and michi:s house, i woke up at 6 this morning and feel great! i have missed japan and i am so happy to be back (despite that its 9 billion million degrees and 500% humidity).

so thats my story so far. stay tuned for more (booming voice) "Adventures of Gaijin Dave in Japan!"

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Greetings from the aloha state

By Wheeldle
July 19th, 2004

Following is the accounts of our senior semi-foreign correspondant Wheedle concerning life in Hawaii

Why hello everyone. first let me start by introducing myself. i am the super cool honorary dueling monkey correspondant from HAWAII! i know Wesley is in japan, but hey - that just won't compare. i am a friend of Willow and Wastrel's from high school and lets just say i stuck - they like me too much. anyway, down to the good stuff! but first - this is my first post, so bear with my people!

i guess i can start by saying hawaii just does not suck. it rocks. the weather is always above 82 F, it hardly ever gets cloudy and rainy, the beach is right across the street from my apt, there is planty of eye candy going around (both male AND female - i won't deny it, there are some hot chicks around this place), AND i get to go out on a boat everyday and jump in the pacific in hopes of seeing some awesome shit.

for those not in the know - i'm working on a boat for the pacific whale foundation doing snorkel cruises and checking out turtles and dolphins. life is tough aint it? just the other day we saw a hawaiian monk seal that we all like to call "humpy the monk seal." you might ask, why would you name a cute little seal humpy? well, i might answer, it is simply because these male seals are aggressive and like to mate with anything they see. yes, i said anything. a fellow crew member has been grabbed from behind by humpy while he tried to ... well, you know. so we arent without our fare share of ocean porn out here. spinner dolphins were also on the agenda last week and there will be pictures to share of those too.

meanwhile, the downside of hawaii - gas is $2.65 a gallon, honey nut cheerios are $6 a box, bell peppers are $5 a pound, and most of my neighbors are old. but we still manage to have a kicking good time by ordering pizza, drinking beers, and making oven-made smores. (pictures to be seen - wayne is gonna help me with that)

until next time, this is wheedle saying aloooooohhhaaaaaa!

PS: everyone bug willow to make a "me" icon!

Hi, editor here. Hmm... looks like she already has an icon, oh snap! Repent, ye of little faith. Must say though, it doesn't do her justice.

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More content more!

By Wastrel
July 21st, 2004

Although I've posted up several pictures, I'm in no mood to write some creative story that will incorporate each and every picture seeing that there are twenty in the gallery. So therefore I leave you this link to the gallery itself. They are pictures from memorial day weekend. More pictures from our fantabulous 80's party shall be on their way shortly.

Also I've fixed the typo in the comic I posted awhile back. In case you want the link to that here it is again.

I've been composing some pieces of music over the past month, with only the first one actually finished, but I'm not up to posting anything just yet. We're thinking of adding a music section and then maybe Willow and I shall post some stuff there. Until then you'll just have to listen to the background music in our animations for the pieces (or parts of pieces). Speaking of which, come august we shall unveil our newest addition to the duelingmonkeys website: Duelingmonkeys Theatre where with no regularity promised we shall post animations.
So that's enough from me... find me a job!!

-peace

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A long overdue catching up

By Mike Daly
July 26th, 2004

Hello everyone, it's been a long time, huh? If I'm counting correctly, well over a month since I've last updated. Imagine that! It's not that I don't want to update or I'm too busy, it's just that as soon as I feel like releasing my woes on the world via this webpage, someone else always beat me to the punch and had some sort of content to go with it.

Overachieving bastards, I'll show them.

What have I been up to, you might ask? Well, gather around boys and girls. Wrap up in some warm blankets and grab a bowl of popcorn; it's storytime!

Once upon a time, there was a ambitious young adventurer named Willow. As Willow grew up, he always dreamed of being a great engineer, but not just any engineer; he wanted to design games. When Willow came of age, he decided to go to the academy for training as an engineer. He worked very hard and excelled at what he did throughout his education.

After finally graduating, young Willow was free of the toil of schedules and responsibilities that academy life imposed on him. He very much looked forward to the adventures that his newfound freedom would afford him. He was also very excited about putting all of his training to use engineering games.

When this time finally came, however, things turned out differently than young Willow had hoped. He reached into his pocket and found that he did not have enough gold to travel around having adventures. Instead, he was confined to his humble abode where he slowly drained his meager savings buying bread crumbs and soup.

To make things worse, it seems that nobody wanted a fresh, young, ambitious game engineer. So many young engineers wish to design games, but the science of entertainment requires many more years of practice than the academy offers before the necessary proficiency can be attained. Even though Willow stood out among his fellow engineers as an ideal canidate to design games, nobody would take him in.

Solitary; without the means or will to move on is where we find our delapidated adventurer now. He stares out the window dreaming of an outside world that is just a bit more forgiving. While waiting patiently for a break that may never come, he puts his mind to work daydreaming, then turning his daydreams into things that others can see.


Well, that's the end of the story for now. I'll let you know if anything else happens in it. I know that it's unlikely anyone keeps a close eye on the galleries, but if you do, you might have noticed some new stuff in the art gallery sneak in. In case you didn't, I will now present them to you.

Card cover art: This picture combines two pictures that I drew as a thank-you note and birthday card for a friend. I figured it wouldn't hurt to share them with the world, so I slapped them together into one image, threw a quick gradient up behind them, and dumped them in the art gallery.

Hoshiko, the pilot: This is another one of the random characters I decide to draw every once in a while. For some reason, I decided to give her a name: Hoshiko. This is a japanese name that approximately means 'child of the stars'. It was done completely on the tablet. I think that I did a much better job on the shading of this one that I have before.

Wayne's birthday poster: In case some of you didn't know, our elusive webmaster recenly turned 22. To celebrate, I designed up this poster for him (what a nice guy I am). My favorite part is the black borders with the curly thingies: I drew those myself, you know!

Well, it seems to me that I've brought a lot to the table today. Don't expect that everytime, I've just been building a backlog of art up over the past month that I haven't been able to post. In the next few weeks I've got plenty of stories from Japan and Hawaii coming, so stay tuned.

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Study Wars: The Return of the Gaijin

By Wesley
July 29th, 2004

From deep in the DM archives comes a tale of excitement; a tale of heat; a tale of pain; a tale of frustration; ... a tale of cellphones. Following is the past adventures of Wesley, the rugged world traveler. Originally submitted, and accordingly ignored on the 7th of July.

well, here i am in Okazaki now. classes officially start tomorrow. i can:t say that i:m too terribly excited about it though. i had such a wonderful time staying with michi, i wonder why i couldn:t just stay there for six weeks. hahaha. i:m sure they would love that. i think they work too hard at being good hosts though. i would come into the living room, and they would move the fan in front of me. his mom did my laundry and cooked everything for me. i tried to help with the dishes and they wouldn:t let me. michi:s dad was even amusing the lengths he went to to make me "weraxu". they really treated me like a king while i was there. though unneccissary, it was very nice. i think the japanese people are the nicest people in the world.

(announcer voice) and now its time for the weather...
it is 37 degrees today. yes, most of you probably think thats pretty cool, but i assure you, it is not. for those of you who can:t instantly do conversions in your head, i:ll help you out: thats 37 degrees C equal to 98.6 degrees F. yesh, we love it. we especially love the 20 min walk from school to my apartment. which incidentally, i:m living in an apartment type thing, not your typical dorm kind of thing. there are 4 small rooms, and the two bedrooms have tattami (straw mats). its great if you love sleeping on the floor. which i have been doing for the past week. and i love it. not. on the plus side though, it comes equiped with a washing machine, a refrigerator, a gas stove, a rice cooker and AIR CONDITIONING!!! they dropped me off this morning though without turning on the power... it took me about an hour of hell before i got around to switching the breaker. but now things are good.

(annoucer voice again) in other news...
for those of you who don:t know this already (where have you been?), i... am an idiot. but this is not your normal kind of isaidsometingstupid idiocy (although i do that too), this is a rare form of ihurtmyselfrepeatedlyandlikeit kind of idiocy. yesh, i was bored on monday and thought it might be nice to return to the seventh level of hell for some judo. i went back and worked out with the nagoya uni judo club for two hours, and almost died. man those guys are crazy! i was actually suprised i made it through the practice as i haven:t really been working out recently, but i did ok. i threw a couple guys... i got pinned a lot. it was great until practice was over. i couldn:t get my pants off because the sweat and heat had somehow fused them to me. that took like 30 min to change cause i was so weak i couldn:t even undo the knot. then i had to walk back to michi:s house, but immediatly after i put my street cloths back on they became soaked (yes, from sweat), embarrasing and stinky. oh, and i was dehydrated of course. when i got home i drank about two liters of fluid in 30 min. that wasn:t so good, i was so full of fluid i couldn:t eat dinner. i took a cold shower, but the water was warm by the time it ran from my head to my fingers. other than getting kicked in the shin (no bruise darnit) and some sore muscles i made it through ok. great fun, good times. remind me never to do that again.

so anyway, things are going pretty good! i:m not too impressed with the computer lab though, so don:t be expecting too many of these emails. these computers are old and slow. but i:m happy, healthy, and ready to have fu...n... er, i mean learn. i:ve done very well with not using english since i got here (thanks to michi and his fam) but my brain is a little tired already. i hope this course doesn:t overwhelm me.

lastly, i got a prepaid cellphone. the number is 090-9927-4831. so now you can all call me at 5 in the morning to say hi. if you do decide to call though (hi mom) remember you have to dial 011 to make an international call, and 81 is the country code for japan. also, i:m 13 hrs ahead of you. you also have the option of emailing me on my cell, but keep it short because anything more than 100 chars (including spaces) will cost me 15 yen. my cell email is gaijin-dave@c.vodafon.ne.jp . the phone doesn:t have english, so i may or may not figure out how to read it. heheh.

thats all for now folks. tune in next week (or whenever) for another maybe-sort-of exciting episode!

THE END

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Word from the (very) west side

By Wheeldle
August 2nd, 2004

Yo, editor here once again. In case you are thick, Wheedle here is our senior semi-foreign correspondent shouting out from Hawaii. This sweet piece of mail arrived on the 23rd of July. I command you to dig it.

Things in hawaii couldnt be better right now! seriously. i have a regular schedule on one of the boats now - the ocean spirit. she is a great vessel and has all new snorkel gear and everything which is so nice! new paint jobs and even a new bow-line. some of this may mean nothing to you, but believe me - its exciting! i was even able to con my way into getting a new mask and snorkel from their new supply and it has been treating me pretty well so far. ocean spirit runs the same snorkel trips as most of the other boats out of the same harbor, but it is the overflow boat, so it is smaller. the max capacity is 100 and we always have less than that. today we had under 80, so its nice to have a smaller group.

oh! you wont believe it, the other day on the boat we had all the triangle schools represented! me from chapel hill, there was a guy who was a dukie from hillsborough and someone who worked at state! it was cool to have all that just coincidentally happen. even met a british couple now living in wilmington today. our first cruise on the ocean spirit was the Priscilla cruise, which is a gay pride private group. there was a lot of unlawful things happening on the boat - i sent the pictures out already. they were a lot of fun - drag queens, one guy offered me pot, i think i saw some guys having sex in the water. these are the gay people bush is trying to keep from getting married - but i think they were great fun! one of the guys kept calling me a diva and rubbed glitter all on me. he was a little drunk.

meanwhile, yesterday val and i and some of our other friends had the day off so we went to hana, which is a really nice part of maui on the east side. chris, shannon, and andrew also went with us, so it was a nice full car. there are waterfalls everywhere! and beautiful ocean views and mountain scenery. lots of mnt pools to go jumping and swimming in. i will be sending out those pictures shortly. we also went around the whole east side of the island instead of doubling back and that was an adventure. there were free roaming cows everywhere and for some reason we couldnt stop laughing and being excited about them! i mean, there ARE tons of cows in NC, so it was just strange.

otherwise, i am just trying to eek by on the expensive hawaiian living. i changed the oil in my car myself! instead of taking it in. i dont know how much i really saved, but it was quite an experience so i enjoyed doing it!

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Well hello there

By
August 6th, 2004

Haven't heard from me in a while, have you? There are several reasons. Number one: others have had more meaningful and interesting posts, so I yield my updating throneage to those. Number two: I have been on vacation this past week, so I didn't even read the loads of message board posts by the n00b. Number three: I have been busy busy busy on the new admin tool, which I am using right now to type this update (I hope it works!).

My vacation was nice and relaxing. We survived Hurricane Alex, although it was not even considered a hurricane when it hit where we were, so it's nothing to brag about I guess. I basically sat around, grilled some good food, worked on my tan, etc. It was a much needed break from the daily grind at you-know-where.

This admin tool I speak of doesn't mean much to you yet, but the sooner I get it done, the sooner I can start working on the part you see. I'm hoping that all my errors and bad coding practices will be fixed for the most part by the time I get to that part. It's coming along nicely though. If anyone wants to figure out why transparent PNG's aren't quite so, how you say: 'transparent' (I've googled, read articles, tried scripts and filters, just so you know), get in touch with me. It's not on my priority list right now, but Willow whines about it from time to time.

I fixed the little problem with the rants section of Our Two Cents. You may or may not have noticed that it pretty much always said "We've been thoughtless lately" (and we have) but that's just my eye-pleasing error message for the public. Anyway, it's fixed now. That particular table got corrupted somehow. I think everything is in tact.

Willow instructed me to post a link to something, but I can't remember exactly what it was (I think it's in the galleries somewhere) and I don't feel like waiting on dial-up to look through a bunch of pictures. If you are at work and bored (paging Colin) feel free to snoop around yourselves.

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This is the end. I'm going now, ... goodbye.

By Wesley
August 9th, 2004

First, a note from the editor:
Hey, why don't we bitch at willow for not downloading, resizing, renaming, thumbnailing, and uploading every picture we send him the night he gets it? Sounds like fun to me too.

Anyway, I had to skip two of Wesley's updates because he wants this posted before he gets back from Japan. If you really care about what he did during the weeks he spent in Okazaki, you'll have to drop him a line. Without further ado:


well, i'm sorry to say that i don't have pictures of my bike for you today. and yes, i realize that i said i was goign to send them this past weekend, but i was busy drin... studying. i had a test this morning, and i think i did pretty good, certainly better than i did on the last one. anyway, tomorrow is the last day of class for me. after that i'm goignto head back to nagoya and stay with michi's wonderful and generous family again, and then on monday i:m off to tokyo! i'll be returning to the US next friday!!! yay!!!

now, although i do not have pics of my bike right now (i will later, they are on someone elses camera), i DO have some other pics. they aren't too big, but i'm only going to attach three. well... maybe 4. hehehe. so, the first one is a little something cultural for ya, a float at the nagoya port fireworks festival on "sea day". yes, a national holiday for the ocean. the next pic is me with this scary lookin buddha statue outside of a temple where there was a gigantic metal buddha. the pics of the big buddha didn't come out so well so i'm not sending those. the third pic is me with a bunch of cute girls (now perhaps you know why i like being here so much). and lastly is the house i'm going to move into when i move back to japan. it suits me, don't you think?

alright gang, this is probably the last mail i'm going to send from japan. i'll give you my full report upon my return to boring world land. er, america i mean. although i have a feeling i'm not going to have time to be bored this coming semester. i hope you are all wishing me luck for my graduation. and to all of you who have written to me (thank you!) and i haven't written you back (sorry!) you will just have to wait. i have 25 emails sitting in my inbox waiting to be replied to, and i don't have the time to do it right now. so please accept my apologies if you have been waiting to hear from me.

and thats all folks. feel free to send me questions or comments, but i probably won't be able to get to them for a while.

the drummer from def leopard only has one arm! come on party people, (hoo hoo) put your arms in the air (hoo hoo). peace out.

Alright, editor back. it seems that Wesley sent 12 pictures, but only referenced 3 in his letter. For the sole purpose of adding chaos and confusion, I added them to the 'wesley' gallery, which already had 15 pictures in it. This means that you all get to search through the gallery to find out what he is talking about. You will find the gallery in question beyond this link.

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Tidbits of hawaiian wisdom

By Wheeldle
August 12th, 2004

Time for yet another update from our lovely senior semi-foreign correspondent Wheedle. Cool.

hello duelingmonkey fans. its time for another hawaiian update: life is good. work is stready, and the money is barely rolling in. ive gotten a few numbers from people and phone numbers from guys on the boats, cause - well ... they have their heads on strait! i've even managed to score a 20 dollar personal tip outside the group tip jar. people love the wheedle (must be all that damn good flirting). i even managed to peer pressure a friend into kissing me not 2.5 hours ago. yeah - its the hawaiian in me.

i have a few driving tips for everyone. ready? NEVER RIDE YOUR BRAKES DOWN A VOLCANO! you heard me. as i was coasting down Maui's dormant volcano, haleakela, and lost my brakes from riding them too much. oh yeah - and my emergency brake doesnt work on my wonderful Mercedes sport car ... wait, thats not me. Another driving tip: if you follow the good looking hawaiian's and tourists on the side of the road with your eyes, then your car will follow. My roommate has made it her job to constantly remind me of my poor driving skills here in Hawaii. Tip number 3: never hit park cars, UNLESS they are massive pickup trucks and your tiny little camry wont make a dent in their 5 ft diameter tires. Final tip: dont run over parking lot medians. Well there you have it - i guess i could use a little practice in the driving dept. I'll call the BMW driving school right away. I wonder if i need to bring my own beamer?

Concert last night: Jack Johnson. Very very good.

Night before that: Friend's 21st b-day. I was the DD. Take a few guesses what i ended up doing at the end of the night? Dropping my passengers off at the final bar of the evening and leaving them there to call me when they need me. You might think - that is aweful unresponsible to leave 2 VERY VERY drunk people to their own accord while you frollick on the beach. Well, i might respond, they were getting on my #$%*&% nerves. Backseat driving, poking, beer pounding, and touching too much. I later find out my roommate had to be escorted out of the bar and our other comrade was pushed to the curb by bouncers and had his hair yanked (i say yanked, because in reality this sounds like a girly fight "i got pushed on the ground and they pulled my hair" so i have to spice up his story just a little for you guys). Needless to say, i felt a little guilty for not being there. And now i have to pay for my mistakes and hear the story get told at least 5 times a day - to people who have already heard it - a lot - and a lot - and a lot.

In an attempt to be astronomical, we tried to watch the Perseid meteor shower tonight and only saw 3 meteors. I may wake up at 2am this morning to see if they get better.

Well, that's all for now folks. I guess its not really ALL. I mean, i DO live in Hawaii after all. There are constant adventures. Scuba, snorkel, manta rays, turtles, dolphins, etc. So is life here in paradise.

Aloooooohaaaaa!

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Listen up you sorry <insert clever insult>

By Mike Daly
August 15th, 2004

So, here's a funny story for you this morning. Ok, it's not a really a story, in fact it's not even funny. I'm just going to tell you something that happened; it explains the picture I'm going to link. If you want to get any entertainment out of these words I write here, you are on your own. Pretend it's funny, and maybe you can fool yourself.

One day, I felt like singing. Fear not, however, I am far too wise to attempt this futile endeavour. (there have been secret experiments in the shower - all failed) I would not be so irresponsible to unleash my singing on the world. In fact, I should be paid not to. On the other hand, one so enlightened as me has other means of expressing my desires at my disposal. A sketch of cute little people singing a happy song was the result of this peculiar impulse.

Fortunately, this was not the end. An artistic rampage followed the sketch. The aftermath of the rampage revealed a standalone page of comic. It is this comic that has brought us together today; me to present, and you to consume.

Without further meaningless filler, I present Imaginary Friend, a comic by yours truly.

I have spoken, now piss off.

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:(

By
August 24th, 2004

You see that face? Look at it. Look at it long and hard. OK stop looking weirdo.

That's the face of dissapointment. School has started once again (for two of us at least) and this semester looks like it may be my most time consuming yet. I have 15 hours, which isn't bad until I'm told that at some point before December 3rd, I have to spend at least 30 hours observing in a high school classroom. This means, that after I struggle to get out of bed and make it to my early classes where I am a student, I have to spend half an hour getting to my car, another half hour getting to some school and then observe some punks. I really don't have time for this, especially since I'm not going to be a teacher, but I guess it will be a fun experience. Thats what I'm going to tell myself anyway.

On top of school, I still have work of course, and so far this week I've logged 9 hours in 2 days. I know to some of you 9-5ers thats half a days work each day, but I'm on the go from 8 am to 10:30 pm all day. Monday's and Wednesday's are awful.

This means, that my webpage developing goodness is going to once again be put on hold. I really wanted to have the new site working by our two year anniversary (and if Willow would start on the new design it would help) but I don't see that happening. Maybe instead we'll actually have some meaningful content in our news post.

Whenever I do get to finish, I promise it will be pretty. And you will have the option to register. It's not required to make news comments or message board posts, but if you do, you can do some cool stuff. Have your own icon(s) (you have to provide it, we'll just host it), edit posts, contribute to the cooking section and possibly a 'Guest Articles' section, and possibly more. A lot of the code required for this is already written. In fact, I'm using the News Post editor right now, instead of phpMyAdmin. Unfortunately, writing "Dueling Monkeys Gallery 2.0" will take some time (not much of it though, if strpos() will start working) and restructuring the message board will take longer. I may ask for some help/tips from some of you more experienced folks.

I hope I can still work on this stuff on the weekends, but the next two are already booked, and the semester is just getting started. So it doesn't look too good.

In other news, there is a thread in the Message Board about getting me an IPOD, but wait until I reply again before you register. I'm still waiting on a confirmation email and I want to make sure it actually works. Also in other news, don't see the new Exorcist movie. I wasn't expecting even a single thumb up, but this one was bad. It was only scary because it made you jump, it was gross, the plot sucked, the acting sucked, it was very random, there were characters in the movie that didn't need to be there, it was 2 hours long and only needed to be 90 minutes, and most of all, it was a waste of $12 (me and the girl matinee style).

More movie news: In case you haven't noticed, I wrote an article on Bulletproof Monk a week or so ago. I hope you like it (the article, not the movie).

There is also other news that is very good, but I'll let someone else talk about that. BYE!

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A much-needed update

By Wheeldle
September 6th, 2004

Editor here, I'm so so so so sorry that I've been so bad about updating this here page. I'm extremely busy, but I'll do my best to catch you all up when I can. In the meantime, our wonderful senior semi-foreign correspondent from Hawaii has decided to step in and help out - much to my relief.

i was recently at the website and noticed that an update had not been made in quite some time, so i made it my duty to write one when i had a free moment. well ladies and gents: here is that moment. its 1:30am hawaii time and im just wide awake while my roommate is passed the funk out. i guess it was also about time that people knew that hawaii just isnt perfect. i must do what i can to make you all feel lucky to live on the mainland sometimes and not flaunt the beautiful waterfalls and coastline views.

so here is the downfall to hawaii: the tourists must leave sometime. i wish i could say "yay! no more silly white people that dont know their ahi from their ass" but i cant say that. because my job was dependent on their existance. and now, Ocean Spirit - the boat that i called home away from home - had to be shut down because the tourist numbers were dwindling. i know must exert extra effort working on the boat with a 9 hour trip that goes over the waters known to many as "the washing machine." well, it is time i let out my big secret. come one and come all! WHEEDLE GETS VERY SEASICK. there, i said it - and in CAPS no less. i work on a boat and i tend to be allergic to the motion of the ocean. going over the washing machine just doesnt make my inner ear very happy. BUT, i have been doing ok thus far - knock on a palm tree.

the other downfall to hawaii: most people who work here, are purely summer help. my roommate and most of my new friends have left to go back to finish up school. how old and mature i feel to have already done that. not really - i just feel poor and slightly more bored. i do hope i have made some of you happier to be living in the NC area. paradise aint perfect. although we saw some spinner dolphins today and i got paid double time for the labor day holiday - life is just OK at the mo'.

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The big news at last.

By Mike Daly
September 9th, 2004

As some of you may have noticed, the time I devote to our precious little website here has recently suffered from an acute drop-off. This time, I really have an excuse, and it's really valid.

I'm sorry that I haven't told everyone about this until now, but I wanted to make it a suprise announcement to everyone at once, but never got around to it because I've been so busy. Anyway, enough delay; time for my announcement.

As of Monday, August 30th, I have become an employee of Numeric Designs Ltd! I am now an official "3D Graphics Software Engineer". In other words, I professionally program a graphics engine for games.

This is exactly what I've always wanted to do, and what I've focused my past 4 years of college study towards. I've finally got the job!

I have a really nice setup, all of the guys I work with are really cool, the workplace is pretty flexible and casual, I get all the snacks and drinks I want, and the work itself is exciting and challenging. Although I don't have to, I've worked about 50 hours a week for the past two weeks. I'd like to get on my feet working with their engine as soon as possible, so I've been putting in a lot of extra time.

The downside of all of this is that I have suddenly found myself with absolutely no free time. I'm struggling to keep up with the few hobbies I manage to squeeze into my weeks. I don't know how much you'll be hearing from me via dueling monkeys for a while; probably not too much.

Anyway, I'll try to keep in touch. Perhaps I'll try to drop a line in the messageboard every once in a while when I don't have time to write a proper update.

Right before I started work I managed to finish up one last art project. I had wanted to make a rock-climbing themed poster for my room, but in the end I don't think it's good enough to be worth the hassle of printing. I threw it up in the art gallery, you may view it here:Ascent poster. There is a hard to read poem on the walls, for the poster resolution, they are easy to read, but it's not too easy from the web version. Oh well, if you really care what it says, post a thread on the messageboard and I'll tell you.

Well, that's all the time for updating I have. See you all later!

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Free dancing lessons

By Mike Daly
September 14th, 2004

If you are a person who desires to dance like the pros - using your stunning body movements to inspire attractive members of the opposite sex to adorn you with their bodies ... we can in no way help you with that. Sorry. However, if you want to know how to dance like a machine-operated stick-puppet; well, there we might be able to help.

You see, Wastrel and I decided to implement a little animation project a while ago (a very long while ago, actually) and we have finally finished it. I've always had an interest in art; I've experimented with 3d modeling, 2d art, animation, and music; and this project seemed like a good way to put it all to use to make something. The idea was to make some 3d models of stick-puppets (in the image of your's-truly) and have them dance to music. The intended irony of this is, of course, that stick puppets are rigid, and therefore do not dance in any way.

That simple irony is what convinced me to propose the idea, but, unfortunately I didn't realize at the time that the joke would take a total of about 5 seconds to tell and wear off. Not taking this post-production realization into account, we planned a 2-minute movie short. We more than planned it, we implemented it. Now we are done and you all get to see it.

I guess what I was trying to say in that last poorly-worded paragraph is that I don't really know what the point of this animation is anymore. It's not really funny, so if you watch it you'll just have to try hard to appreciate the fact that we followed through with such a thing. Trying to derive entertainment from that thought might be your best bet to enjoy it.

Anyway, enough blabber. Here is the video:

Dueling Monkeys dancing lessons (wmv format - grr)

I think that we'd like to make more videos like this. Now that we have learned from the first, I think we can make the next installments more entertaining. If you guys have any ideas or suggestions, please let us know! For your convenience, I've created a messageboard topic concerning the subject - c'mon, it's easy! Link to the messageboard topic.

Well, that's all I'll say for now. Work is still fun. Catch you on the flip-side.

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My return from sabbatical

By Wesley
September 21st, 2004

Ok, so actually i wasn't on sabbatical. i've just been a slacker when it comes to things website related. but hopefully all that will change from now! thats right! from right NOW i am promising to be more diligent in my updating duties!

maybe. it seems i'm not going to be quite as busy as i thought i would be this semester, although i do believe i still fall into the catagory of WAY TOO BUSY. but hopefully you will hear from me at least one more time before you grow old and die of old age. that is, assuming you continue to diligently check our website everyday, dear reader.

i guess the point of all this useless blathering is to inform you that there is a new food item! yes, i can sense that you are foaming at the mouth with the mere thought of trying another one of our cullinary delights. so without further ado, Tuna Melts!!!

Maintenance here: Web editor fixed. Continue with your babble

so in the meantime check out this crazy webpage. peace out.

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Good News Everyone!

By
September 28th, 2004

I have several announcements to make. But first, let me explain that I'm tired. I've already complained to you in my last update (which was a long time ago) that school and work are consuming most of my life. I won't do it again as long as you know that things haven't changed. So, there isn't really anything cool about this update. No artwork, recipes, or funny links. But, if I can remember to do it in my break tommorow (read: today), I'll come up with something.

And now for the announcements...

Number 1)
I am all but certain that I will graduate in July 2005. I might even get to walk in May since I'll only have one humanities class and one major class left. More on that later.
Number 2)
Willow and I have decided that in order for you guys to finally see any progress in this "major overhaul" I keep telling you about, we're going to have to split it up into two phases. Phase One will include the administration part. I've already done most of that part. I just have to decide if I want to change the way the message board works. The first phase will also include a pretty new frontend for you guys to see (get to work Willow). Phase Two will be less noticible. Things might run a little faster, but for the most part you won't see any changes. I'll change the code to be less messy than my two-year-ago-skills allowed me to be, and I might even throw in some RSS feeds. A third phase, if applicable, would be the new photo gallery. But I'm hoping it will be done before the second phase starts.
Number 3)
We haven't watched any Strongbad email in quite some time, and noticed the other day that there were about six or seven new ones. I bet at least one of you haven't looked in a long time, so for old times sake, check out Homestar Runner.

Ok, so there was a funny link. SO SORRY!

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Mahalos wanted

By Wheeldle
October 7th, 2004

greetings from the aloha state. wow have things been busy here! working makes you tired!! did you know that?! did you also know that people are cheap? well, if you didnt - let me share. i work on a boat for a nonprofit organization. i get paid VERY LITTLE MONEY. i rely heavily on "mahalos" or "tips" if you will for income. today there were 112 people on the boat. we saw dolphins TWICE and turtles as well. i also gave one bootilicious fish presentation. i made 19 dollars in tips. what more do you want people?! do i have to jump through a ring of fire? do the dolphins need to make you a mai tai with a little paper umbrella? tap dancing? dramatic prose? karma. that is all i must say. karma.

now that i have vented the frustrations of money ... life here is generally. as i was telling wayne the other day - i feel it is against my ability to complain about life in hawaii. because even if you had boils and locusts and death of the first born and all that ... much easier to bear when you walk outside to the view of palm trees and the sunrise over a volcano. there was a beautiful double rainbow from a small shower today. so that is why i smile despite the workload that i bear and the lightness of my wallet.

meanwhile, at starbucks a nice old lady sketched me ... said i had strong facial features but she had trouble defining my cheekbones. curse my chubby cheeks. but she gave me the picture and i will eventually take a picture of the picture and send it to willow to post as a link here. im famous.

until next time folks ... always remember to tip your waiter.

aloha

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the mad monkey sickness madness

By Wesley
October 12th, 2004

its kind of like mad cow disease. ...except with monkeys. except NOT like mad cow disease, more like the flu. damn, i knew i should have dressed up like a fragile old lady and gotten that vaccine. anyway, back to the point, Willow Monkey and myself are sick. Wayne is soon to follow. (no really, i backwashed into his drink when he wasn't looking.) and we not enjoying it, not one bit.

so, thats all i have to say. BUT instead of leaving you hanging like that, i'm going to direct you to Engrish.com, where you can help us pick out our new motto; Monkey Bros., Calm Down Monkey, or Banana.

and now i'm off to bed, undoubtedly to awake in a pool of my own snot cause my nose has turned into the incredible unstopable faucet of mucus! come see it now! ...actually, don't.

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Whoa I'm tired

By
October 17th, 2004

It's nearly 2 AM, and I'm a bad student. I have a mid-term tommorow, which I feel pretty confident about, but I have class in 6 hours and am obviously not asleep yet.

I had a big weekend though, so it's ok. I went down to Oak Island to do a little chillin and a little fishing. Mostly chillin. I ate more than any one person should at Golden Corral. I felt bad the rest of the night and the next morning. I got some homework done and managed to do some laundry (yes, both of these things at the beach). I don't usually do any homework until Sunday night, but I was in the mood for once.

In other news, NC State finally beat Maryland for the first time in 4 years, and it was almost a shut-out on the road too! Yay for us! I had a very spaced-out drive back to Raleigh today, which inspired this rant about the upcoming election. I hope you enjoy it but if you don't, please don't tell me. I stayed up an extra hour writing it (thanks to GW's website) and would be heartbroken if you didn't agree with me.

Okay, not really. Go ahead and complain.

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enter george

By Mike Daly
October 23rd, 2004

Hi everyone!

Man, it's been so long. We have a lot to catch up on. As many of you may know, I recently shaved the old goatee. Believe it or not, it was in an attempt to look more like Wayne. Now that the deed is done, I wonder what the hell I was thinking? Oh well, nothing I can do about it now. You can decide whether you like it better or not by following these easy-to-compare before/after pictures.

Before (note the frown)
After! (happy!)

The question now is, what would I look like with a goatee AND smiling. Well, it's too late to take a picture of that, so we'll have to rely on some DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY!

Maybe? Maybe not.

Pretty cool, huh? I've made another drastic change that many of you do not know about, however. Just today, I drove out and picked up George who is the latest addition to the monkey household. I'm pretty excited about having George live with us. Perhaps I can concoct an excuse to invite a bunch of people over so you can all meet him.

Meet George

Also, I've been doing a ton of cool things at work. One of which is learning about radiosity in 3D Studio Max. Because of this, I've recently become obsessed with rendering things using radiosity. I love it. I hope to get some of my old models a new radiosity rendering sometime soon so you can see how cool it is.

If I didn't have to go watch a Star Wars documentary now, I'd probably write a rant about car repair shops and how much they are liars. But I do have to go watch the documentary, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Peace.

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Happy Halloween

By Wesley
November 9th, 2004

hello everyone. wow, we haven't updated since oct 24th! i can see why you must be positively frothing at the mouths for something new and exciting to alleviate (if only briefly) the tedium of your pathetic, trite, insipid, stodgy, plebeian existences. what? too much? yea, sometimes i get a little carried away. sorry. sorry everyone. i'm sure your lives are abundant with excitement, but you may still get some minor enjoyment from the amazing extravaganza that was HALLOWEEN 2004. or maybe you won't. it actually wasn't that amazing, and i don't think it quite qualified as an extravaganza either. but that sounded good.

now i know that you are all eagerly anticipating something grandois for the Dueling Monkeys 2 year anniversary, but i just wanna clue you guys in (so you don't think its some kind of sick joke) that we will not officially be recognizing the anniversary of the most awesomest website evar until about a week from now.

now i know what you are thinking, "but Wesley, wasn't this totally magnificent piece of webology created on Nov. 11th 2002?" and my answer to that is, "why yes, young one. this phenomenal stunning coolness was indeed created on Nov. 11th 2004." good job, you have just earned yourself a non-kick in the balls. we'll celebrate our own bloody anniversary whenever we bloody well feel like it! we don't need you ne'r-do-wells meddling in our affairs! honestly, you must find something better to do with your time. well go on, bugger off.

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George: Destroyer of everything

By Mike Daly
November 14th, 2004

I'm going to bounce around between several unrelated topics for this post, so if you are afraid that many acute topic shifts might confuse you, you may want to do some mental streching before you read on.

Now that that is out of the way, I'll begin with an update on George. George, being a cat, loves looking out the window. Not any window will do, however, he must look out EVERY window, and nothing will stop him, not blinds, not a sheet tightly tacked over the entire window. If you are a blind, I highly recommend getting out of his way or else bad stuff might happen.

Once upon a time I mentioned how cool radiosity was. This time, I come bearing proof. A while back, I threw together a 3D rendering of what Wayne's TV cabinet might look like when he had only done the plans. I took that old file and threw together two versions that represent the default lighting system, and lighting using a light tracer (kind of like radiosity). Check it:

Old School
New Hotness

Finally, I'd like to thank everyone who participated in crazy Halo 2 multiplayer madness night recently. Keep an eye on the messageboards cause that's going to happen again at some point (although not for a while). For those of you who have not gotten to play Halo 2 yet, I have some pictures that might give you a better idea about it:

How does Halo 2 make you feel?
Mike E wants YOU to play Halo!
What does Willow think when he plays Capture the Flag?

I encountered a fascinating creature last Saturday night. I will describe it via an analogy, missles are to homing missles as deer are to this creature. I was driving down the interstate late at night minding my own business until I notice the creature standing by the side of the road on the left. I hit the breaks, it starts moving to the right towards my path. I press the brakes harder and turn to the right, it speeds up moving to the right. After about another quarter of a second of screeching tires, turning to the right, and the damn creature accelerating to the right to perfectly match my attempted evasive maneuver and BAM!. The creature does a barrel roll in air, lands about 20 feet from the car, gets up and runs off into the woods. Normally, I think I would feel sorry for hurting an innocent forest creature, but I think in this case my actions were a sort of natural selection. I feel that it was important to stop the reproduction of this particular type of deer so that the entire species of deer doesn't eventually evolve into assassin interceptor deer.

That's all I got. Also, the beard kind of grew back, so there will be no more shaved Willow icon again for a while.

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The End is Near

By
November 21st, 2004

This weekend I made more progress on schoolwork than I have all semester. I wrote a 6 page paper, read over 100 pages in a novel, I'm currently writing up an 'activity' about public transportation (and how much it sucks) for middle school students to ponder about. That's about it, but its a lot of stuff.

The little activity is going to be "Better ways to get people to the State Fair", inspired by this year's "State Fair on Saturday/NCSU vs. Miami/NCSU BBall Red & White Game" fiasco. Why on earth did they plan all of these events on the same day. The fair saw over 100,000 people that day, the football game saw at least 53,500, and the basketball game probably added a few hundred more. I don't care if Edwards Mill Road is new and big. It's not big enough for that many people. Can you believe they actually had directions from every single location in the State take the Wade avenue exit? Bah!

Okay I know you don't care, so I'll move on.

I copied all of Dr Muffin's photos from the costume party into a new gallery so that you don't have to search through the message board and open them in a new window or tab so often. I hope you appreciate my hard work.

Colin's Toga party was fun, eh? That DVD game is evil, and I shall not partake in it again unless inebriated. You guys had a lot of food, and it was good, but I was full for like 18 hours after that meal. Also, my toilet seat is happy. But that is because of Spongebob, not the meal :).

Oh right, I am fogetting to get to the point of my news subject. AFter I write a horrid paper on the not-so-bad book I am reading, I will be somewhat free until the Monday following Thanksgiving. That week is dead week, and after that is exams. My last regular semester should be no problem if I can find an internship, but per Cynthia's advice, I have found a possible job that requires skilled persons in the PHP/MySQL/CSS/XML/APACHE area (how convienient). I'm going to call them on Wednesday and hope that they are in good spirits, as I don't fit their Computer Science Major requirement.

So maybe I'll be able to figure out why Internet Explorer hates me, what kind of crazy CSS I'm not aware of, and how many other pages I'll have to alter to make the new design work. Maybe for Christmas DM will give you the newness. I refuse to make promises any more though, because one of a billion things will get in my way if I do.

Like the book I should be reading.

Or the activity I should be finishing.

Or the house plans I should be drawing.

Or the five final exams I should be studying for.

CRAP! The end is not anywhere NEAR near!

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Thanksgiving should not be all about turkeys

By Wesley
November 24th, 2004

i mean really, turkey is over-rated. and cranberry sauce? uugh! well anyway, that all aside, we here in the monkey household would like to wish anyone out there who happens across our humble webpage a very convivial (yea, you know you don't know what that means) thanksgiving! eat whatever you like, but try and expand beyond the stereotypical thanksgiving dogma of pilgrams with blunderbusses chowin down on turkey with cranberry sauce. personally i prefer the honey baked ham. oh oh, and twice baked potatoes of my mothers own recipe. mmm... drive safely wherever you may be, and meet us back here next week for a jolly christmas rant.

what, you were expecting something more?

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It's humping season

By Wheeldle
November 28th, 2004

it has been a while since i have updated everyone on the hawaii scene ... well, nothing has changed. the weather - still beautiful. the food - still expensive. gas - still waaaaaaay to expensive. thanksgiving came and went with no tofu turkey dinner for me because work called. my birthday came and went with very little pomp and circumstance. but its ok because i had a great birthday massage and a wonderful birthday facial and a suprise birthday cake. dad sent suprise birthday roses. so wheedle is a happy 22 year old.

meanwhile the humpback whales have arrived!! ive seen just a few as they trickle into hawaiian waters and one breached! to those not in the know - a breaching whale consists of it launching its several thousand pound body out of the water and coming down with a massive splash. it was AMAZING! whale watches will begin in december and it will be whale soup in the waters outside the harbor. interesting facts i learned from doing my whale outline: humpback whale tongues weigh 2 tons; their penises can be up to 8 ft long; females are longer than males; generally only the male whales sing. there is much more, but i have to learn all the facts before i start conducting my own whale watches.

imminent information: i will be homeless in 2 days. by december 1st i will be out of my apt and shacking up at friend's apts until i can find a new place. i like the idea of living on the beach in a tent, but apparently mom isnt too keen on that. we'll just have to keep open minds for where i can live. anyone need a roommate? wanna move to hawaii and shack up with me somewhere? its not half bad here. how cold is it where you are? below 60? its over 80 here ... come on, roomies?

in the meantime, i am enjoying the sun, the breeze, harry potter three, and waiting on spiderman 2 to come out. mahalos are picking up a little and ive been able to save some so i can go back to school. donations are accepted.

aloha,

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The grind

By Mike Daly
December 7th, 2004

I've been working furiously to be a furious worker at work these days. I'm learning lots of cool stuff. One of the coolest things I worked on recently was writing some pixel and vertex shaders. For those of you who don't know, pixel and vertex shaders are micro programs that are executed entirely on the graphics card. The shader programs process a single vertex or pixel, and get executed over and over for each pixel and vertex in the scene.

At this point, I'd like to say that I know nobody probably cares about this, but it's been a while since my last update, so I'd like to put something else up, and I haven't been doing anything else interesting. So tough it and enjoy your shader lecture.

So I wanted to put together a shader that looked like a transparent ghost. This can be done without shaders, but the problem is that parts of the geometry that should be obscured aren't. For example, if you are looking at someone standing sideways, you could see his far armpit through his transparent body, or the inside of his mouth which looks like crap. With mine, that's not a problem. Enough blaber, here's a screenshot:

Spectral Glow with Alpha

Ok, so maybe that was kind of an anticlimax. Deal with it.

I was looking around the galleries today, and I noticed that some nice person thumbnailed and galleried all of the costume party pictures. You have probably already seen them, but I'll point it out anyway:

Costume Party Gallery

And here is my personal favorite:

You tell 'em, Amber

I have a recent top-secret project I'm working on that I should be done with in about a week, so tune in later to check that out. Other than that, I got nothing.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot random link. Can't forget that.

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Viva la tequila!

By Wastrel
December 13th, 2004

Quin lo sabia? Pero yo finalmente fui a Mexico.
So this monkey decided to infiltrate yet another country, and add another notch to the belt, during Thanksgiving. And how do you celebrate Thanksgiving in Mexico? With lots of Tequila and Tortillas of course!
In case you didn't know, they actually don't celebrate Thanksgiving, but none-the-less we still followed tradition and ate a Thanksgiving dinner (ok so really it was baby back ribs, but at least everyone came out and we ate a huge meal), and shopped on Friday.

Really I went to Monterrey, the third largest, and richest mexican city there is. Thus the prices compared similarly with Raleigh, and really there was nothing to see except for the Cola de Caballo 'Horses Tail'. Therefore mexico, for me, was simply a change in sceneray and friends and a relaxing time going out to clubs/bars!
On a parl� fran�ais, un poco espa�ol, and of course because of jason (who uses italian come on) english. So it was fun and mentally tiring switching between all the languages.

Anyway enough rambling, look at the pictures! And catch up on some spanish by reading calvin and hobbes en espanol
If you want to hear more detail about the trip, with Austin, Texas included, then just ask me.

In other news, I've been kept busy and away from content making through the daily grind at Acronym central EPA in RTP working as a contractor in the ORD-APPCD (I swear you can make a rap song out of these), and spending my sundays bartending. This leaves little free time when you throw in applications to graduate school, and just trying to hang out with friends I hardly ever get to see! But pictures are easy and I'm a wastrel so that's my content!

-peace


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If you can't get help here, please get help somewhere

By Mike Daly
December 18th, 2004

Today I will warn you of the horrible dangers involved in cycling. On the street, cycling is known as 'riding the bike'. Well, hopefully you already don't do bike, but if you do, you may find the following materials enlightening.

Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 1
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 2
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 3

I hope you enjoyed that. To give it some context, I made up that pamphlet as a gag gift for a co-worker who is really into biking. In it's original form it was printed on one sheet front and back with three panels each side. I arranged the panels into the order you would read them on the pamphlets when I put them up here.

I would also like to post a rant about Kinko's but I'm too lazy to write one. Besides, they don't even deserve it they are so crappy. You don't want to know how much I had to pay to get that damn thing printed out.

I'm going to be heading out of town as of this coming thursday. After that, I'll be away from any means of updating for a long time. There is a chance that Wayne will have a little suprise for you by then, but if you don't see it soon, you can consider the front page of Dueling Monkeys closed for the holidays (by all means continue using the messageboard) There is a small chance, however, that you might hear an update from me coming from the sunny state of Hawaii! I'll be chillin with Wheedle for about 10 days at the beginning of January.

Extra thanks to Sam and Cynthia for hosting a great party last Saturday. Wayne and I are going to dive into some tasty cheese and sausage as soon as he gets home tonight.

I'm going to do more than finish this post off with a plain old random link. I seem to recall that on Saturday there was a discussion on what webcomics were good. At the time, I think I had a little bit too much honey lager in me to recall all of mine so I'll do you all the favor of posting them here. Following are all of my favorite webcomics in no particular order.

VG Cats!
The 10k Commotion!
A Modest Destiny
Sinfest!
Penny Arcade
Mac Hall
Girly
Chugworth Academy
Apple Geeks
and finally...
Angel Moxie

If you find enough free time to start any of those from the beginning, I think you'd be doing yourself a favor. Especially Sinfest, I love that one.

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Merry Christmas!

By
December 22nd, 2004

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Our gift to you this Christmas is that new design we've been promising for the past year. You'll notice that there are a few thrown-together-at-the-last-minute things, but its a gradual process.

One thing that is pretty tacky is that the Art Gallery, Photo Gallery, and Theater all link to the same old gallery. I'll split them up later, when I rewrite the gallery. No sense in doing extra work that is going to be deleted soon anyway. Also the old style "menu-on-the-left" thing doesn't work since we have no menu on the left, so it will look a little odd.

However, I think most will agree that the coolness of Willow's new design will overcome these petty blemishes. If you find any problems, please post them in the New Site Design thread in the messageboard. Thanks!

P.S. I GOT A NEW JOB!

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