Tommystorm

Well, for the second time in my life, i managed to break my left leg. This time from a far less dramatic cause - a bad ankle-twisting whilst stepping off of the back porch. A break to the lower part of my fibula was the result, and fortunately all i need to do is wear a removable brace for a few months. I am pretty much able to walk around normally.

For those of you who know me, you may recall the story of my first broken left leg. It was a snow-covered January day at the Farmingdale NY airport, and while waiting for the frost to melt of the wings of my airplane, I slipped on the ice and “twisted my ankle badly.” I was limping, but it didn’t hurt that much … so i hopped in my plane and flew home. Halfway thru the flight, i realized that it hurt like hell to depress the left rudder pedal. That’s when i realized it was broken. I managed to land the plane at my home airport - luckily the winds were calm and not much rudder was required to land safely.

I was in a cast for 3 months.

My little warlock Hexnut got transformed into a Tauren then into a Chicken while i was playing World Of Warcraft the other day. I made a little video about it.

Believe it or not, up until last weekend, I had never been to a Comedy Club. How fitting it was that I was indoctrinated by an evening with Bob Marley, the Maine-born comedian who’s made his way up to the national television night-show circuit. Marley has actually performed many times in my town here in Maine, but i’ve never gone to see him here. I will in the future for sure.

Marley was a riot. Unlike what i’ve heard about him, he used alot of physical and demonstrative comedy - not just words - on this evening at the DC Improv. I was surprised to hear little of his home state of Maine, except for the stories about his growing-up-days with mom and dad and their thickdowneaster drawl.

It has been a long time since i laughed so hard. He didn’t give you a break either. It was like a 45-minute continuous laugh.

Zomg. Go see him, ya moron!

I recently traveled to Montréal, Quebec, Canada (eh) to see Milkbags for myself. Here is a short documentary of that trip.

Received an email today from the folks behind the Unity multiplatform game development environment. Seems like iPhone is being added to the list of platforms.

I quote:

Unity is Coming to the iPhone

Unity Technologies, a 3D game development tool provider for creating console-quality games for the desktop and Web, today announced that the company will support game development for the popular iPhone platform. The Unity engine is the core technology that facilitates visually rich, engaging 3D game play, whether it’s on a traditional desktop, or on the Web at major gaming sites like shockwave.com, or now on the world’s leading mobile device – the iPhone.

iPhone Beta Program
We have created an iPhone beta program that will provide hands-on support to drive 3D content creation and deployment of mobile games. If you are interested in joining the iPhone pre-release program then please contact us at iphone@unity3d.com for more information.

Check this out! You can now view (and download) any South Park video for free from South Park Studios.

On March 29, I’ll finally get to see my favorite NHL team in person in Boston! Amtrack’s Downeaster will deliver us to the event.

I’ve begun deploying my own MMORPG server based on Mangos. Check back for progress updates. =D

Despite some the very hilarious truths outlined in the “Happy now, bitches?” article from the Secret Diary of Steve Jobs, there is a very important ingredient missing from the new iPhone SDK.

You may have noticed this Missing Feature when using your iPhone to read e-mail.

Its the feature that made RIM’s Blackberry so successful.

Guessed it yet?

The only thing iPhone does outside the context of the currently active application is tell you about incoming phone calls, SMSs, voice mail, and calendar alarms. Therefore, unlike RIM’s Blackberry, you cannot use your email box as a “paging” system or interactive collaboration scheme with your e-mail-bound colleagues.

Okay, granted that Steve says that they will have Mail “push” in the next version of iPhone OS, so the Apple Mail app may overcome this problem, but what about us SDK users?

Having been a Blackberry user for several years, I can tell you the single most useful thing about it was the ability to have the little bugger buzz against your buttocks the instant you receive an incoming email message. Especially if it was a meeting invite, whereupon you could immediately accept or decline. It made for very efficient and effective inter-office communications … perfect for someone who doesn’t sit at their desk in front of their computer all day long.

iPhone’s Email application only checks your mail boxes when you invoke the application. It wont tell you about inbound email when your phone is in any other application, or at the main menu screen. Worse still, you have to wait for the Mail application to talk to all of your IMAP/POP servers while you sit and stare at the spinning wheel-of-progress in order to see if there is anything for you. No such thing as downloading your emails in the background, ready and waiting for you to read them the instant you invoke the Mail app.

So, what does this mean for you excited iPhone SDK downloaders? That’s right. You aren’t going to be able to do that either with your apps. No RSS feed readers telling you asynchronously when there are new stories to read. No instant messaging applications that will buzz your butt when the boss needs to tell you to pick up milk on the way home from the office.

iPhone is not a RIM killer. Yet. (Hint Hint, Apple)