98% of all donations from Google go to Democrats ( the left ) . I think we found the reason for the behavior.

Before you think I am being too harsh, please know that Google was somehow able to reconcile making special logos for Australian, Canadian and United Kingdom veterans, (e.g. Remembrance Day).

It seems only Veterans Day, Memorial Day and Christmas were off limits. 

This now seems to be changing.

It would be nice if people at least had some respect for the people who allow them to have a multibillion dollar company and protect their freedoms to speak, write, and be sanctimonious bags of hot air like Noam Chomsky. 

This is so like the people I meet and work with in Silicon Valley. Left wing, Marxist / Socialist, Elitist, Useful Idiots that hate their own country more than the people that actually, you know, DO TAKE AWAY RIGHTS. Like, I don’t know, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez and other lovely dictators and scum. 

I shake my head and wonder sometimes…

Sigh…

Penance Paid by Lazeros

Severus Snape is one of the most misunderstood characters in all of the Harry Potter universe. That is, he was until the last book, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows” and the 33rd chapter, “The Prince’s Tale”.

In this chapter we learn what I have always believed, that Snape is a good guy!

He is also a very sad, and very conflicted man.

The Prince’s Tale at the Reader’s Guide

I wanted to share the pic above with you all as well as that video. Both are awesome and tear jerking. Make sure to click the pic and go vote for the pic at Lazeros’ DeviantArt site please. 

A little bit on the significance of the doe. Lily Potter’s patronus was a doe and so was Snape’s. His was not always a doe; however. 

“Have you grown to care for the boy, after all?” asked Dumbledore.
“For him?” shouted Snape. “Expecto Patronum!”
From the tip of his wand burst the silver doe: She landed on the office floor, bounded once across the office and soared out of the window. Dumbledore watched her fly away, and as her silvery glow faded he turned back to Snape, and his eyes were full of tears.
“After all this time?”
“Always,” said Snape.

People argue over why Dumbledore would have eyes “full of tears”. To me it is simple, he empathizes with Snape’s love for Lily as he also had an unrequited relationship many years ago. Plus, he knows that the doe was the symbol for Harry’s mother and safety. In Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry dreams of his mother ( a doe ) in the forest and follows her to safety–a portent of Snape’s leading of Harry to the Gryffindor sword.

Second thing is some don’t understand how Snape’s patronus can be a doe, since in other books it has been said that two people can not have the same patronus. Snape’s patronus also was NOT always a doe, but only became that when Lily died.

Actually don’t see this being too hard to get squared

Patronus can change when someone falls in love or has great emotional distress inflicted upon them. Tonks patronus changed into Lupin as a werewolf because of her great love for him. ( tears )….

Anyway, yes, two people can not SHARE a patronus, but like there are many deer in the wood and birds in the air of the same species there can be patronus that are alike, but not the same. 

Final thought on this whole patronus thing. Harry’s patronus is a stag, similar to his fathers. His father was an animagus so he could actually create a real stag ( it was his animal form ), but Harry could not. I think there is some symbolism there in that Snape and his Mother are the Doe and Harry is the Stag or mate of the doe.

Oh and when translated from the Latin, Expecto Patronum means “I await a guardian”.

The final moments of Snape’s life are quite moving as well. The picture above is based upon that moment in time. As Snape lay dying, he looks at Harry Potter and asks him “Look. At. Me.”. This is because Harry’s eyes are the same as his mothers. Snape wants to see, one last time, his one true love.

I hope, in the future, the Harry Potter series and J.K. Rowling will be heralded as one of the greatest works of Western Literature. 

The beautiful, deep and moving story of Severus Snape should be reason enough.

A most excellent and heart tugging video indeed!

At Number 1 - The Greatest Story Ever Told

At Number 2 - One More Day

At Number 3 - If Only Tears Could Bring You Back

At Number 4 - Not a Day Goes By

At Number 5 - What If

I don’t know if I will keep it this way, but it is looking good so far. I am about 3-4 months away from having to switch to my own server if traffic continues its upward trend. At that time, I will make a decision if I want to stay with this WordPress blog style or go to a different angle like Alfresco or Sharepoint.

It’s too bad Apple or Microsoft doesn’t do this sort of thing. iWeb is OK but it is not really a blog and Sharepoint is AWESOME but too difficult to manage relative to WordPress and Joomla and Mambo

Honesty means nothing to these people. Elitist jerks will be exactly that. And these are the worst of the worst. Michael Moore, Obama, Jerimiah Wright and countless members of the press and unions don’t care about honesty. Hell, they will rewrite honesty if necessary. Why? Because, “the end justifies the means.” We have already seen Obama’s web admins rewrite history multiple times on his site. We have seen the rewriting of fact numerous times by his campaign. Just wait if he gets elected. History will be up for grabs and will be rewritten by Noam Chompsky, Michael Moore, Obama and his allies. And in short, history and freedom will never be the same again.

Good luck Sarah, I hope you have a strong character and stomach because the crap that has shown its head in this debate and in the past 3 - 4 weeks show just how bad things are. Believe me, it will get a lot worse. Fighting against Marxists is never easy. Fighting against Marxists backed by millions of people is even worse.

Original Two Sided Poster for Beauty and the Beast

This Saturday, Beauty and the Beast, I am so excited I could jump up and down. This is my favorite movie of all time and to be singing it with my friends at karaoke is going to be sweet!

The first time I loved forever
Was when you whispered my name

For all my life and forever
There’s a truth I will always know
When my world divides and shatters
Your love is where I’ll go

Sweet use of “Beauty and the Beast” video with the love song from the TV show with Ron Perlman and Linda Hamilton of the same name. Great song and a good way to remember one of the best shows to ever grace the television screen. I hadn’t thought about the show in a long, long time and I ran across this video purely by accident so it was quite the memory.

Here is a link to some info about this show which started off so great and then just kind of self-destructed. So many shows do this and, sadly, so too did this one.

If only tears could bring you back to me
If only love could find a way
What I would do, what I would give
If you returned to me someday
Somehow, someway
If my tears could bring you back to me

Another good video. I am getting ready to post the top 5 list Pretty song and not too bad editing, this is definately a 4 star vid.

Last night I had a crazy dream
A wish was granted just for me
It could be for anything
I didnt ask for money
Or a mansion in malibu
I simply wished, for one more day with you

One more day
One more time
One more sunset, maybe I’d be satisfied
But then again
I know what it would do
Leave me wishing still, for one more day with you

Found another great Doctor Who video. This one is set to “One More Day” by Diamond Rio. Hard to decide whether or not this is my favorite, but it has to be in the top 3 for sure. I will post a top 5 list here pretty soon. For now, enjoy this splending video.

Firstly, Aiko sang a new song I have been helping her with. It’s a very pretty song by Aya Matsuura called Watarase Bashi ( Watarase Bridge ).

also this version with English subtitles for those that would like to know the lyrics. The one above is a much better sounding version though.

I sang a couple songs actually, first was one of my favorites Towa ni Towa ni Hoshi no Yume ( The Never Ending Dream of the Stars ). Great song from Tenchi Muyo. Here is a the great Ai Orikasa singing it live

Second, sang an oldie by request from Aiko and John

Endless Rain by X Japan, one of the most beautiful songs ever written and a wonderful entrancing song to sing IMO.

Days of joy, days of sadness slowly pass me by
As I try to hold you, you are vanishing before me
You’re just an illusion…
When I’m awaken, my tears have dried in the sand of sleep
I’m a rose blooming in the desert

It’s a dream, I’m in love with you
madoromi dakishimete ( hold me as I fall to sleep )

Aiko and I did another duet this night. We have worked on it for quite some time and it came off pretty well I think. She thought so to and it was quite pretty and seemed to make people smile.

The song is Eyes on Me from Final Fantasy. Both of us had sung this song solo many times and it didn’t take too much rearrangement to make it work nicely.

This is another one of the songs that if you have never heard it, please, please watch this video as it is absolutely wonderful. Beautiful. If you can’t watch the whole thing at least start watching at 2:14 for one of the greatest scenes and moments in video game history. It is tear jerking and wonderful.

It would take way too much to list every song every person sang and mine and Aiko are the two significant people for this blog so the last will be the group songs.

First group song was Tattoo Kiss from Kaleido Star. If you have never heard this song check it out. It is very upbeat and quite good. The show ain’t bad either

The girls all got together and sang Kizudarake no Wild ( Wild and Scarred ) from Bubblegum Crisis. Man, do I love that one and it was sweet hearing all 4 singing it. Good job!

Teardrops yuuki ni ima kaete
hashiridasu Born to be wild heart

Now teardrops change to courage
and I run on, because my heart was born to be wild.

 

As the evening wound down, Aiko got a request to sing Hikari by Mai Hoshimura. This is the ending song of “Tomorrow” a Japanese TV show.

So, at the end of the night we decided to break tradition and sing the opening theme to Sakura Taisen ( Sakura Wars ), Geki! Teikoku Kageki Dan ( Go! Imperial Flower Attack Team ).

Don’t let that kinda odd title put you off though. This is one of the greatest anime theme songs of all time. Written by Kohei Tanaka it has energy, spirit and enough power to make just about anyone want to come out of their seats. I will post two versions here.

The first one is basically the opening of the TV show ( there have been many series of this story and also movies oh and operas and also a live musical done in Paris, Rome, Tokyo and New York so this Sakura thing is big! ).

and to give a bit of what it would sound like in a group, one of the better live performances I have heard. BTW: These are the original seiyuu for the show as well so these voices are the same as in the TV show.

omedetou! yoku dekimashita!

OK, Oprah says Sarah Palin won’t be allowed on her show until after the election. Fair enough. I’m cool with that, ya know it is Oprah’s show. BUT WAIT! Let’s check Oprah’s response on this story:

“The item in today’s Drudge Report is categorically untrue. There has been absolutely no discussion about having Sarah Palin on my show. At the beginning of this Presidential campaign when I decided that I was going to take my first public stance in support of a candidate, I made the decision not to use my show as a platform for any of the candidates. I agree that Sarah Palin would be a fantastic interview, and I would love to have her on after the campaign is over.”

OK, no biggie, but a couple interesting points.

1. If you think that the Oprah show had “absolutely no discussion” about having Palin on you are truly ignorant of how these shows work. Guaranteed, there was plenty of ‘discussion’, it just got shut down because both Oprah and her executive producer are HUGE and I mean LOTS OF DONATIONS TO and support for ‘The Obama’.

2. “I made the decision not to use my show as a platform for any of the candidates”, unless it is ‘The Obama’. Obama has been a guest on Oprah’s show twice and she is a quoted, often too, supporter of him on both her show and in her magazine. She and many of her staff have sent his campaign thousands of dollars. Hey, that’s cool! I don’t have any issue with that at all. Just be honest and admit to using your show and media resources and your own money to support him.

Just because he had not announced yet she has the typical liberal weasel of, duh, he hadn’t announced so I wasn’t supporting a candidate. Yeah, that might work with the morons I live with here in San Francisco and Seattle, but I know a little bit about politics and you are endorsing. Again, no foul in my book, it is her show and money, but at least admit it. Seriously.

Once again, liberal weasel caught using deft vocabulagorical sifting.

Oh, and in case you are wondering, I actually like Obama. He seems like a genuinely nice person.

The Microsoft Path - Click to Download

A short slide presentation on Microsoft’s strategy as it pertains to .Net. Topics covered are the Application Development Foundation as well as WCF ( Windows Communication Foundation ), WWF ( Windows Workflow Foundation ), WPF ( Windows Presentation Foundation ) and CardSpace.

Music, animation and sparklies also highlight the sweet presentations possible with Keynote. It is a 45MB file so give it a bit to download and I hope you enjoy!

http://blogs.msdn.com/philoj/archive/2005/11/08/490200.aspx

You get to see me ( Grashio and Wildstar ) sweetie ( Bijou and Arabesque ) and a bunch of friends from Whisperwind Sentinels and Evade. Plus, at no extra charge an orphan and some great shots of scenic places in WoW. Oh! and DRAGONS!

For a libretto of Phantom of the Opera, theatre-musical.com has it posted.

This is Michael Crawford and Sarah Brightman in Angel of Music and The Mirror.
Please enjoy the “music of the night”.

Angel! I hear you! Speak, I listen
Stay by my side, guide me!
Angel, my soul was weak, forgive me
Enter at last, Master!

Flattering child you shall know me,
See why in shadow I hide!
Look at your face in the mirror, I am there inside!

Angel of Music! Guide and guardian!
Grant to me your glory!
Angel of Music! Hide no longer!
Come to me, strange angel…

Oh and I should post a link to my friends site as well, Opera Gifts!

Do you people just sit around thinking up new ways to make things hard?!

What is it with Microsoft? I don’t know.

For my next trick, sometime in the next 60 days, I am going to finally upgrade from shared hosting to a virtual server. Seems I have outgrown the little shared host and need a faster more powerful engine to run “the machine”. It won’t hurt to have better web stats too. GoDaddy is great for hosting, but they do kind of suck for statistics and I am all about stats!

Installing Sharepoint on Vista

 Vista will need to have these things installed for this tutorial:

1. Windows Vista 32 ( I have not tried it on 64 )
2. Windows Vista Service Pack 1
3. IIS 7.0
4. SQL Server 2005 Express Edition

• Everything under IIS 6 Management Compatibility
• IIS Management Console

Internet Information Services : World Wide Web Services : Application Development Features

• .NET Extensibility
• ASP.NET
• ISAPI Extensions
• ISAPI Filter

Internet Information Services : World Wide Web Services : Common HTTP Features

• Default Document
• Directory Browsing
• HTTP Errors
• HTTP Redirection
• Static Content

Internet Information Services : World Wide Web Services : Health and Diagnostics

• HTTP Logging
• Request Monitor

Internet Information Services : World Wide Web Services : Performance Features

• HTTP Compression Dynamic
• Static Content Compression

Internet Information Services : World Wide Web Services : Security

• Basic Authentication
• Request Filtering
• Windows Authentication

All in the install was smooth as silk. Just remember to use SQL Server Express, Developer etc. and not the Windows Internal Database or what is called the Stand-Alone install. That install option is not support at this time. 

On a side note, while Vista is usable, the drivers currently available for VMware Fusion ( and regular as far as I know ) are not WDDM on the video side. So, no beautiful Aero Glass On the bright side; however, Vista runs quite well in Beta 2 of VMware Fusion with only a couple odd issues. I still prefer Server 2003 as far as snappiness for development, but it sure is nice to be Vista capable since so many of us use that for our developer platform.

The first item is a StorageSpire

StorageSpire

This is about as cool as it gets. The StorageSpire is a 1TB Solid State Disk ( SSD ). It is made for high transactional operation ( like, um, World of Warcraft for example ). Very nice stuff and we are using FibreChannel to hook it into the test, but I am hoping to switch to InfiniBand for testing. We might end up with FibreChannel in the end, but I am a fan of InfiniBand myself.

We also are testing out some pretty cool rack mount SSDs made by Texas Memory Systems. These RamSan - 440s are the fastest SSD in existence.

RamSan 440 - Fastest SSD in the World

Serious, these things are FAST with all caps man. Anyway, we use drives like this for big banking apps and the like. I got brought in on this team to try how well they would work in gaming. MMOs are just big database apps anyway AND certain ones are making pretty good money, SO why not try putting the app on some serious server power.

To say the least, early tests are pretty impressive. I get latency of basically a couple MS like 10-12 ms even in a very large “instance” say, uh, for instance, Shattered Halls. Not to bad considering what the usual is.

I don’t know if this will ever make it into the real world, but it is pretty cool none-the-less.

Oh you want to know how much… uh, well, how about $250,000 a piece for the 512GB version and we have, uh, 4 of them at the test site. So, we are testing your game with $1,000,000 worth of harddrives! YES!

Very upbeat, live performance. Nice stuff!

Disabling IE Enhanced Security - Click to Download

and YouTube as well though not as clear.