Random Notes

I've been playing a lot of Halo 3: ODST. It's a fun game. Since there's no Master Chief this time around, I was a bit skeptical, but so far I like it. The ODST troopers aren't as well armored or equipped as Master Chief, so it's easier to die -- and harder to kill -- in ODST than in the previous Halo games. This means that sometimes discression is the better part of valor; it's sometimes more wise to skirt around the enemy, rather than engage them in a losing battle. I like making these decisions.

I've also been evaluating Windows 7. I installed it last night. The eye candy is nice, but for the most part it seems similar to Vista. As I say this though, understand that I didn't have any problems with Vista. The prompts to install software and change OS settings is a little distracting, but this hasn't changed in Windows 7. The upgrade took a long time, and after the install, it took a while for Windows 7 to settle down... things seemed slow for the first night... but after the nightly defrag and a little bit of post-install clean-up, it seems to be running satisfactorily. One thing I don't like is that Windows 7 took it upon itself to clear my desktop of my pre-existing files and reset my start menu.

I've been volunteering at a house that was flooded last summer. The place was gutted when I started... last weekend we got the drywall up. It's starting to look like a home, and we're hoping that the owner can move back in by Thanksgiving.

My mom is coming down for a few days. She's a little crazy, but we love her. I kind of like cooking for her and stuff. And she usually cleans my house when I'm at work, so there's a huge bonus.

Guess that's all for now.