Matthew Supert

So, tied into my recent notebook acquisition I am now working to improve my handwriting. My cursive handwriting I have always felt was "OK", but my script has been terrible. Following the line with the Midori modification video, I found another video from the "Stuff and Things" Youtube channel in which the host talks about his efforts to improve his handwriting. That video brought me over to a great website called iampeth.com. It is an interesting repository of old handwriting and calligraphy styles. From there I began to drill down and found the Ames Guide to Self Instruction in Practical and Artistic Penmanship. I am using some of the worksheets and style phrasing in that book to practice. 

Megan is also practicing her handwriting using the guides in that book. 

This past Christmas just about everyone in my family received Midori Traveler's notebooks as gifts. The idea started out with me from my motorcycle trip this past summer to the smokey mountains. I had wished during that travel that I had a notebook to write a daily journal of the trip while i was on the ride. My idea originally began with the concept of utilizing a Moleskine notebook. As I continued my research though I found out about the Midori Traveler's notebook. 

Long story short, I ended up buying everyone notebooks since a lot of my family has either been traveling a lot this past year, or will be traveling this coming year. I found myself though coming out of the holidays with no book for myself, despite the idea sort of originally being for me. Megan bought me a notebook for Valentine's day and went a step further by making some custom paper booklets for the notebook. You can see one of them with some pantone paper pictured above. 

I also decided to modify the notebook by adding some addition spine strings to it following this video from the "Stuff and Things" youtube channel. 

My most recent recipe from my cookbook series comes from The Sriracha Cookbook. I have made a couple of recipes out of this book before, but this dish was probably the most involved one I made out of this book. It called for sushi grade tuna, which I had some trouble finding at first. Megan took me though to an asian grocer in Naperville called H-Mart. This place not only had the tuna that I needed, but it was one of the coolest grocery stores I had ever seen. All sorts of fantastic foods, fresh fish (they kill them for you) an more. If you happen to begin in the area, it is worth stopping by the mart just to check it out and perhaps buy some of the green tea kit-kats or some other Japanese candy.

So, back onto this recipes. This was actually a pretty easy dish to make.  It basically was some Sriracha coated tuna that was seared on either side for about 60 seconds and then served with rice and some stir fried vegetables. Add some sesame oil and toasted sesame seeds and you're done. For the veggies I used both Yu Choy Sum and Chinese Broccoli and briefly sautéed them with some more oil before putting it all together. The fish ended up being sliced thinly, perhaps 1/4" thick. 

It was a simple dish and one worth making again. 

This past week I have decided to try my hand at building a map in Halo 5's forge. This is not something I have done before, but I figured I would give it a go to see how the process was. 

My first map is based off of the map "Training Grounds" from Titanfall. Since I needed to basically learn the basics and tools for forge I figured going off of a known map layout would be a good first approach. I also felt that I could make a good "Big Team" map. Here is a quick preview of what I am working on. I am probably 90% done with this at this point.  I just need to tweak some of the small details and also figure out why the strongpoints aren't capturing while testing. 

Megan and I had a great time heading to the Chicago Auto-Show yesterday. It has been several years since we last attended and it is always a fun thing to go see. The show is always huge and the crowds are always insane. We were exhausted by the end of the day, but it was ultimately fun to see some of the cars on the show floor. 

I have always enjoyed looking at the concept cars that these companies put out. I was surprised that there didn't appear to really be than many concept vehicles. Overall though there are some nice cars and it puts some things into perspective for a future car purchase that may be coming down the pipeline in the next 12-16 months. 

Last week we were having a conversation at work about the "heaviest" movies we have seen. These are the sort of movies that I felt were emotionally draining. Perhaps they were movies that were fantastic or perhaps they were mediocre, but you just don't ever want to see them again because they leave you emotionally exhausted. You walk out of a matinee on a sunny afternoon and you can't help but feeling depressed. Warning, there may be spoilers here. 

1. District 9

District 9 is the movie I immediately think of whenever we talk about a movie like this. I was left just completely exhausted and depressed at the end of this movie. It's whole critique on apartheid really hits home with the portrayal of the aliens and the shear brutality upon the refugees and the camp really hit home for me. I had never seen a movie portray the sadness and hopelessness quite like District 9. 

2. We Were Soldiers

It is probably impossible to create a list like this and not include a Vietnam movie in here. There are several excellent and striking Vietnam movies out there, and I wouldn't classify this as the "best" Vietnam movie, but this is the one that stuck with me the most. The cinematography work on the ground really showcased the mayhem that was all around the U.S. soldiers and their landing zone. Watching Mel Gibson's character breaking down and crying at the end was the pivotal, emotional upheaval that put this movie over the top. As a viewer you really get a sense of the weight that his character bears with all of the soldiers who served and died under him. 

3. American Beauty

I chose American Beauty because of the solemnness it leaves you with at the end. This film doesn't quite have the sadness, that some of the others due, despite the tragic ending. Instead it almost felt like a "release" of sorts. Almost as if our main character finally got out of the mundane world. 

4. The Green Mile

If there is going to be a straight up tear jerker in this list, it has to be "The Green Mile". Michael Clarke Duncan puts on an amazing performance playing a death row inmate who I think personifies a sort of messiah type character. The relationships that are developed between his character and all of the guards during the film really turn the final execution scene into a very personal and heart wrenching final moments. 

5. Hotel Rwanda

A movie you have to watch once but don't ever want to watch again. What makes this movie so impactful is knowing that it all actually happened. The defining scene that is etched into my mind is when Don Cheadle's character has to drive down a road strewn with dead bodies. He is forced to drive over those bodies and the movie shows the physical and emotional impact of each bump in the truck as he has to drive over those bodies. 

Several months ago I jumped on an opportunity to purchased some really nice Giclée prints for my office and home studio. I had them sitting at my house for months knowing that the framing would cost a fortune. I finally bit the bullet and had them framed and the end results turned out really nice. 

The first set for my studio are three limited run Zelda prints from Marinko Milosevski.The printing took a while, but the end result was gorgeous and it was really cool to have the individually numbered prints

The second batch were four art deco sort of science fiction travel posters from an artist called Steve Thomas. Again, the results turned out quite good I think. 

Well I got the H4 relay installed this morning. Took a lot longer than it should. The basic thing that I needed to do was just remove the gas tank, then run the new line from the battery to the headlight assembly. Of course something unrelated to the relay install threw me off. After disconnecting the gas tank I had a slow but persistent drip coming from the primer nozzle on the fuel tank. I don't know why this thing was leaking as I just rebuilt the damn petcock in October. Well that led to me having to drain the tank so I didn't get gas all over the garage. That was the longest part of this whole process.

Once I got the H4 relay installed it was just a matter of moving in reverse. The relay kit has the relays set inside the headlamp housing so I think later this summer i will replace the standard three pin connector with posilock connectors to get some more free space in there. 

My troubles didn't even there of course. After getting the bike fully assembled again it wouldn't start. It would turn, just not over so I knew I didn't jack up the battery connection. My guess is the engine was flooded or something or perhaps empty from sitting for the past couple of months. After about thirty minutes of messing with everything I finally got it to turn over and run. I let it run for quite a while just to flush itself out. Turned it off and it started back up again with no problems. Overall a decently smooth project.

It has been a while since I have posted one of these reading lists and I thought it is time to post an update as to what I have been reading. The biggest book on the docket for the past several months has been Three Kingdoms Romance (or Romance of the Three Kingdoms). This is an ancient chinese folklore tale that covers the time period during the fall of the Han dynasty and is considered to be one of the four great chinese classics. I have been laboring on its four volumes since September of 2011. Thank the heavens for the Kindle version as it made it much easier to read.  It broadly lays out the conflicts of this time period and intersperses it with a bit of magic and demons for good measure. Overall it was a pretty good book for being over eight hundred yeas old. If you think Game of Thrones has a lot of characters, this thing had literally hundreds. 

Since that book took up so much of my time I have actually not read a ton of other books. I listened to the audiobooks of both Heat Wave and Mockingjay. Heat Wave was simply not a very good book and Mockingjay was a fitting end to the Hunger Games Trilogy. It is a pity that I just cannot stand the main character in those books. 

I also got a start on the Books of Skyrim (Download Link). This is a collection of all of the books found in the Skyrim video game. Someone on the internet kindly put them all into an ePub file. I have to say that they are pretty good actually and hey, they are free. 

For the months ahead I have several real paper books to get through. I just started Born to Run this past week and I also have sitting on my shelf Manovationals, Arabian Nights, and the Complete Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (plus a dozen more books sitting on my Kindle).