Reality used to be a Friend of Mine

Certified Grappling Instructor

Madspin — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 20:27:27 +0000

After a long week with many long hours, I can now call myself a certified Harris International apprentice grappling instructor. It’s been a great opportunity to train under Roy Harris and learning what it takes to be an instructor. (Level One)

Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Seminar Day 2

Madspin — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 20:43:21 +0000

As I’m supposed to, I feel pretty beat up after the two day seminar of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu with Roy Harris. Today we focused on the Guillotine choke and boy was it rough for the neck, throat and ears. Yes, your ears do get rubbed quite a bit and the fabric our gi’s are made of is pretty rough. Luckily I brought my earguards so it was all right.

I’m glad I decided to attend the seminar and feel like I learned a lot and that the new insights will improve my game substantially. It was also good to see mr. Harris again, as well as my friend Jose!

Ended the evening with watching the fantasy movie Stardust with my kids and indulging ourselves in some sodapop, chocolate and chips!

Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Seminar with mr. Roy Harris

Madspin — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 19:42:55 +0000

Today was the first of two days with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu seminar by our head coach mr. Roy Harris. He is a 4th degree black belt from San Diego, USA.

The theme of today was top game positions and preassure game. I think I had great benefit from todays instructions and hope that my top game will improve by practicing what we learned today.

I also had the privilege of working with my friend Jose Hissas Granja, a brazilian black belt of the club Kimura, during todays instructions.

I’m currently a blue belt under Roy Harris in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

300

Madspin — Sun, 25 Mar 2007 14:38:46 +0000

I went to the premiere of the movie “300″ on Friday and I must say I’m impressed. The movie is a piece of art! The colors, the mood, the actors, the music, the slow motion/full speed battle scenes are beautiful as well as gory. It’s not as cartoony as Sin City (also a movie by Frank Miller) but it’s just as “different” from ordinary movies.

Troll i ord

Madspin — Sun, 18 Mar 2007 21:07:34 +0000

It just so happens that the spanking new 4GB SD memory card is acting up and wont be detected by any of my card readers. So, I had to call customer support and they said it might be a faulty card. The good thing is that they sent me a new one right away which probably will arrive tomorrow. But at the time I got my GP2X and memory card that wasn’t working I didn’t have the patience to wait for a new card to arrive, so I went to town and bought a 2GB one. It’s not as fast but at least it worked right away when I tried to use it.

Now after having done loads of research it just happens that I’m not the only one that is having this problem. 4GB cards are fairly new and uses a different file system than it previous brothers and sisters of 1GB and 2GB. Thus the older card readers wont be able to read them. I need a card reader that can handle Fat32. So most likely the card we thought was broken works perfectly fine and so I’ll end up with two 4 GB cards that I can’t use. UNTIL, I can find a card reader that can read them. So far I’ve bought 2 card readers at a total of 300 nok. I’ll end up at least getting another if I can find one that is compatible (praying that it will read my 4GB cards). I think it will be worth it in the end!

GP2X coming my way!

Madspin — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 16:15:01 +0000

Last night I couldn’t wait any longer and I ordered a GP2X that I have been wanting for awhile now. The GP2X is a hand held multimedia device which is capable of playing games, video as well as MP3 files, but the best is that it is open source and thus a lot of emulators have been ported to run on it. I’m a big Amiga enthusiast and I can’t wait to be able to have a portable hand held Amiga that I can take with me wherever I go

I’ve also ordered a 4GB (yes 4GB!!!) memory card on which I can store video, music and a bunch of games. Hopefully it’s compatible with the GP2X or else I’m going to be bummed and forced to run into town to buy another…

You can read more about the GP2X here

Teaching Photoshop

Madspin — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 17:22:12 +0000

Todays as well as yesterday I’ve been teaching Photoshop to 3 people from a company called Vital. It’s the first time I’m teaching Photoshop so it’s really interesting for me as well, since I have to look at what I do in another perspective so to speak. Why do I do the things I do and that comes so naturally for me to do. Now I have to analyze my process and be able to express why it’s smart to do it this way. Photoshop is a massive tool with lots of options and tools within itself and so there are often many ways to accomplish the same goal. Sometimes one approach will work better than another, it depends on what you want to do.

I think both days (12 hours total) went very well and my “students” thanked me and told me that they were very happy with the course. It was a basics course of Photoshop and I think they have learnt enough to be able to do stuff on their own and confident enough about the tool to experiment and learn more advanced techniques themselves.

Yet another

Madspin — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 10:20:01 +0000

Getting tired of 3D models yet? Here’s a hockey puck with plenty of bounce to it. Now I’m gonna model the hockey stick to whack it with!

Another 3D model

Madspin — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 09:18:13 +0000

Here’s a curling stone I’m modelling for an XNA project some friends and I are working on. XNA is a development platform that allow us making games for the Xbox 360.

Missing Steve Irwin

Madspin — Tue, 20 Feb 2007 19:14:30 +0000

I just came across a fun clip of Steve Irwin on Youtube. It reminds me of how many times Steve Irwin has entertained me through his TV shows and how much he will be missed. He was such a great personality and had such enthusiasm with his work. He did take a lot of calculated risks and I thought more than once about the fact that one day he might miscalculate and lose his life. But I’m sure we all thought that it would either be a crocodile or a venomous snake and not a fish that would kill him in the end. R.I.P. Steve you are certainly missed.

See the fun clip I mentioned here