Wally

June 26, 2016

Well, I knew I would fall off this. That's my fault and that's my problem.

When my finals ended, I decided to have some me time. That me time took a month, actually, it looks like a month and 4 days. I apologize to the readers, and to myself. I got more time on my hands but I became more lazy. I'll work on that.

So let's back track a month:

Got my grades back, passed.

Did Orientation at CSUSM. Added classes for fall. Also added a class at Palomar.

Played Magic every week with Curt and the buddies.

Recently went on a date. Sushi Diner and Tapioca Express.

May 22, 2016

Amazing week as always.

So let's back track to Tuesday. I was studying my ass off for the final on Wednesday. Oh and finals change the times too. It was 8-9:50pm. Holy late. I should get my grades this week.

After the final I wanted to have some me time, even though I had a load of work. And I decided to head to Los Angeles for the weekend. I haven't done something like that in a while. Always awesome to do something out of the ordinary. 2 hour drive wasn't fun though.

Now for the week ahead.

Starting up working out early again. With some tweaks that I am planning on doing now that school is out. A family friend of mine, Fernando, or BJ for short, gave me some insane tips that I haven't heard of, so I'm planning on implementing some of the stuff he gave me. He was very informative. Anyways, mostly workout frequently and cardio of course.

Starting tomorrow, I'm back on the programming wheel. I can't wait. C++ and Web Development! Ces said he will help the best he can. And one of the ways is including an email chain with a google doc of all of the work that we are sharing. Probably the best mentor I have.

Ces purchased books a while back, and I'm going to finish them no mater what I do. So the plan is, before I sleep, I will read up to 10 pages, no less than 5.

So let's try to get this down:

Monday,Wednesday,Thursday: 4:30 am wake up, hit the gym 5:00am

For Tuesday and Friday, I think I have to plan something for that depending on how tired I am. Plus Magic. Of course.

Work 8-4:30pm then code

Gotta turn in my rental book tomorrow. Or pay $300 for a book. NOPE!

May 15, 2016

Applied SMART & Stretch Goals to my work. I told myself, as a goal, to do 30-40 cars in one week. Which means I should do 6 cars as my floor, or 8 cars as my ceiling. The crazy thing about this goal, was that it was working. I was pushing myself at work to do what I told myself to do, and I was impressed. I did 38 cars total, which is better than the floor, and just scratching my ceiling. I was telling this to Jason and Ces. And Ces replies,

The system works.

Finished my 4th exam on Wednesday; I feel better. I just KNOW I goofed on 2 problems. Which worry me if I goofed on more of the problems. Finals are approaching on Wednesday, so I'm buckling down.

Since the final is cumulative, it's all 4 chapters smashed into one final test. So what I've been doing, is breaking each chapter into chunks, and referencing them from the practice final. Let's just say it's a better approach than just going straight into the battlefield.

The weekend was my little party before I buckled hard.

Did my Magic Draft on Friday Night, where Curt, who has not slept since he had a school project, was wearing his pajamas, also played draft with me. Sadly he was in a different pod.

Went to see my cousin Laura with Carlo and Karen. There was a ton of stuff at her place! I was surprised about that. Flowers, cupcakes, and my own little cake as well as couple balloons. I still miss her.

Calvin, Carlo's little brother, had his second prom. And Carlo had to pick them up at USD. I decided to help Carlo out while we wait. But we didn't just wait. We drank.

This is the full extent of our day.

So before I start my week again, I just want to tell myself this:

You're gonna go in this week, ready to murder this final. You're going to get a good grade. You're going to Cal-State San Marcos facing what you faced before. And you're going to be cool about it. You got this.

May 8, 2016

Happy Mother's Day.

This week was pretty eventful. Let's start with work:

Busy as usual, but with a little stress. I was working on a brand new 2017 Ford Escape, and immediately I made a huge error: I scratched the plastic covers for the center console. I called some co-workers of mine, and some of the answers were mixed:

Don't say nothin'.

Tell the manager it was someone else.

Just say it was there in the first place.

I thought about it. Of course their answers seemed logical and downright cold blooded. But I knew better. I had to bite the bullet.

I saw one of the PDI (Pre-Delivery Inspection) guys that was working on one of the cars nearby. I came up to him and basically said it was my bad and I f**ked up.

He looked at it and he said, "I'll go tell the boss about it."

15 minutes later he comes back and tells me, "Our boss was surprised that you told that to us. Some times guys would lie and say it was there. She told me to tell you thanks for telling us and that we will fix it no problem."

Sweet.

I added a new article on top about my Magic events. It's going to be the next section here. Already loving it. Funny thing, there are minor differences that I haven't changed yet and it looks different from the main section. You'll see.

Went to visit my Ma. Treated her out to lunch and this Cuban bakery place called Porto's Bakery. We went to the one in Downey. Imagine a bakery with a full line around the perimeter of the store. It's like you're in line waiting to ride the Indiana Jones Adventure in DisneyLand. Pure mayhem when we went to order too. My sister said it's worth the wait. But on Mother's Day? Damn. That's so crazy.

May 1, 2016

Got my test back this week. It wasn't good. Even my professor was wondering what happened. I don't want to cop out and tell her that I was so busy with a full-time job and coming back from New Mexico; I admit, defeat.

Had my first video cast with Ces and Jason. It was amazing. But to break it down from the jokes and the full on catch up, we had an agenda.

Ces was going over WordPress. This was the next step for this website at first. The problem is that I'm still working with HTML, CSS, and jQuery. The next step, is Jekyll.

So when I'm good and ready. This website is going to be updated completely with Jekyll. I'm freaking excited.

On a side project, I think I'm going to put another blog on this site for Magic.

Every week, I head to At Ease for some time to play some Magic, hopefully every Friday as the time permits. I usually draft, but I've also tried Standard. As such, I'm planning on writing down some of my games and records, also some of the wins and losses. I'll also take pictures of what I draft, and what I based it on. Curt, for the most part, comes to my table and asks me to see my draft. Recently, he's been happy with my drafting, and I feel like I've been improving more so than what I originally expected. Honestly, I still suck. But Curt says I've been better. So with regards to that, I'm planning on posting my recent records. That should be fun to read.

April, 24, 2016

Sorry again for the lag. It's not that I'm procrastinating, I've been busy. I know, I say that a lot. It's pretty annoying. Like using the same card over and over. Let's see how I can break this down:

Got back on Monday night from GPABQ

Full-Time job Tuesday-Saturday

Exam 3 for my math class on Wednesday

Orientation and School work Thursday and Friday

There you have it. My week in a nutshell. You know what's crazy? I haven't had the time to work out for 2 weeks! Isn't that disgusting? I went today this morning before going to Murrieta to help my dad, and I was frustrated that I was marginally weaker than before. That's what I get.

I called Ces on Thursday after work and asked him how we was doing. It started out as FaceTime, to Video log, to making fun of Jason's picture.

Oh yeah the picture above is something new. Karen has been drawing lately and she's been able to get some customers for her art. I'm so proud of her. Her family was excited too so they purchased an iPad Pro and even the pencil for that. This is one of her pieces. She's stated that it's not done. I told her that I want the first piece she completes from her iPad.

April 18, 2016

Finally back home from my trip. So many stories to tell, but right now, I feel like crap.

I need to work out.

April 11, 2016

This weekend, I'll be attending my second Grand Prix. But this time, it's out of state.

I was asking Jason and Ces what I should do for this upcoming event. My idea was to blog about it live, but that's where Twitter comes in. Snapchat can help, but that's only to a select few, and it deletes the snaps in 12 hours. This is big for me. Not just the event, but because it's out of state.

Ces gave me the idea of timestamping it on google docs. Either way should be cool. And of course, I'll be heading there with Curt and the gang from At Ease.

April 10, 2016

This week was nuts.

Last week, I was told to train a new guy that was hired last month for my old dealership, Jack Powell and Mossy Volkswagen of Escondido. It wasn't as intense as alarm installing, but he had to know the main cars that he was going to install in.

The thing of course is practice, which is the main reason you make more money in our company. Since he was new to this, I knew it was going to take some time for him to install in cars that I already know, but without a doubt I knew he was going to get the hang of our work. With me, I was transitioning to a new dealership, which is also new to me. I'm sure I'll be fine.

I have been reading, but I start noticing that I fall alseep way before 10 pages. But in this book, I've been pushing my way through this chapter,The Math of Success..

The author goes on about how most of our success is built on systems, and he states that our success is logarithmic. Meaning it's all a pattern, and subtle too. He states:

The future is thoroughly unpredictable when it comes to your profession and your personal life ten years out. The best way to increase your odds of success-in a way that might look like luck to others-is to systematically become good, but not amazing, at the types of skills that work well together and are highly useful for just about any job.

He does go on about what he uses, in which case are:

Public Speaking

Psychology

Business Writing

Accounting

Design

Convseration

Overcoming shyness

Second Language

Proper Grammar

Persuasion

Technology (hobby level)

Proper Voice Technique

These are things he used to get to where he was at. He goes on explaining how each is useful, and how each work well around each other.

I tried putting some of them together, but let's just say that's too much.

April 3, 2016

This week I'm working on How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Wing Big by Scott Adams. If you remember Dilbert from the comics, he's the author.

Mind you, my schedule is pretty hectic this week:

Monday, Wednesday: 8:00am-4:30pm Work. 7:00pm-9pm School

Monday, Linda comes down for the day, and Cheryl and Linda both leave for Peru to climb Machu Picchu. I almost typed Pikachu instead.

Tuesday, Thursday, Friday: 8:00am-4:30pm Work.

This is my schedule, every week. I got this.

April 2, 2016

Ces, Jason, and I have this pretty neat little productive project going on. Ces's idea, of course. Let me back track.

Before, we would call each other periodically, talking about how are week was going, what are plans are. You know. Being a friend. Catching up. But as we all know, we have different lives, and everyone is busy. I mean we stay busy. So our schedules just were not meshing well together. This is still the case.

But one day Ces had this idea of being more productive. I myself, am horrible at being productive. I tried quitting everything cold turkey. Media-wise. But it's always there. I mean I'm addicted to my own damn FitBit watch. I have to keep track of my stats. I don't even know why. But Ces gave this goal chart to measure what I do. I'm not going to go overboard and explain myself, but I'm going to type what I read in the books he gave me.

The Obstacle is the Way

Read the first chapter. It's this author writing about how every obstacle we face, which could be anything, is the way to a better path. And the way he goes about explaining himself, is through our history. Mainly the leaders of our time. What they had to face, what they dealt with, everything. And the first theme is perception. Pretty excited. Enjoy it already. And yeah, it's a self help book.

March 17, 2016

Last week I started brushing up on C++. The reason for that is so I can play catch up when I go to State. And what better way to catch me up?

I'm so glad I still remember some of the basic stuff. But I'm worried it won't be enough. That's why I gotta keep pushing myself, even if I fall asleep on this laptop.

So if you noticed, I'm having trouble creating my link to the website to both my sister's Big Climb in Seattle and that C++ for Dummies book. I'm not sure why it's not working right. But I'm certain it has to do with the scripts. Man I'm so far behind.

March 15, 2016

Linda is doing this Big Climb thing. Sounds pretty intense. Totally donating.

March 13, 2016

Oh hi.

So I want to apologize for how late this post is. I was excited to say that I wanted to start web development. But then I realized how my life changed with my job and school. So Team Treehouse, Ces, and myself, my bad. Now don't get me wrong. This dream isn't dead. It was just postponed.

I got a new Mac on Tuesday, March 8, 2016. The day before my exam for Calculus 2.

Now that I have my own laptop. I can actually have my own projects and documents to work on without going back and forth on my sisters desktop computer.

So I'm probably going to start brainstorming new projects this month.

Oh yeah, since I'm going back to school, I have to learn C++, soon. So now I'm going to practice before I transfer to state.

October 22, 2015

Talk about busy.

Did a ton this week. Had to study for an exam, study for work (since I'm training), birthday party for Karen, and Treehouse.

For this one, you can't really notice it too much, but it's for smaller screens. I added a drop down menu for mobile devices.

The problem I'm having is the use of pixels in the CS file. I'm just testing it out here and there.

So the neat feature is landscape. I had trouble with this. Regular mobile users can look at this website normally, or, if they want, turn their smart phones sideways for landscape.

October 13, 2015

First day at work.

I'm going to say, that I haven't been this excited to go to work. I actually enjoyed it. I know I'm new to this, so I'm incredibly slow. But I do like this new style of work.

I'm going to try my best to keep this job for a long time.

So basically, my agenda consists of:

1.)School

2.)Work

3.)Tree House

4.)Gym

5.)Magic

Trying to Slight Edge most of this stuff. I can sacrifice Magic if I have to. Right now I'm feeling it out so I can wrap school and work together, while having the time to study. Then I can add more time to do Tree House, and wrap more time around my gym.

Yeah. I'm liking that idea.

October 12, 2015

I got the job.

October 7, 2015

Testing jQuery. Created a lightbox, where the event of the user, clicks the image, lightly shading the website, linking the image in front of the website, making the image larger, and when the user is done looking at the image, can create another event by clicking away from it.

October 6, 2015

Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker's Father.

Testing jQuery. Created a spoiler box, where the user clicks on the button, and an event occurs, revealing what the spoiler is shown.

October 5, 2015

Whoa. I missed like, a whole freaking week on this. Well I do have good reason.

During the last week, I had to switch my priorities a little for a job that hopefully I can get. Man I hope I can get this job.

Anyways, a few days ago, Linda came down from Seattle to visit the family. Our plans were simple:

Camp at Joshua Tree National Park

Go to our cousins' baptism.

Man, what a busy but great weekend. I had such a fun time camping. You know I don't remember the last time I've actually gone camping. I think it was Camp Moran in 6th grade. But really, there has to be another time. I took a ton of pictures. The one thing I wish I was able to figure out on my camera was take pictures of the stars. Pretty sure it was my first time seeing the Milky Way. Because of this experience, I definitely want to go camping again.

I also went to a baptism! Our little cousin Avery Lynn was baptized into our religion. But it was bittersweet since Linda had to leave. Now I would want to post some pictures. But I can't.

On a personal note. I finished one of the books Ces told me to read. Actually, he purchased these books for me. And man did it change my perspective completely. It's called The Slight Edge. This is by far the most helpful book I've read in a long time. Let me take an excerpt out of this:

Do one simple, daily discipline in each of these seven key areas of your life - your health, your happiness, your relationships, your personal development, your finances, your career, and your impact - that forwards your success in each of those areas; and make a habit of doing some sort of daily review of these slight edge activities, either through keeping a journal, a list, working with a slight edge buddy, a coach, or some other regular consistent means; and spend high-quality time with men and women who have achieved goals and dreams similar to yours; in other words, model successful mentors, teachers, and allies, and do it daily, weekly and monthly.

What a book. I'm definitely going to re-read this again.

September 28, 2015

So I did Pre-release for Magic. I think my body is pretty exhausted from a full day of Magic. It wasn't straight. It was:

6:00pm

Friday Night Magic. All the way to 11pm.

12:00am

Midnight Pre-release. All the way to 5am.

12:00pm

Noon Pre-release. All the way to 6pm

6:00pm

Last Pre-release of the day. All the way til 11pm

September 25, 2015

They didn't have to put the "AGE 13+" on there.

Anyways, it's Pre-Release midnight tonight.

So if you've played a ton of video games before, EB Games, Gamespot, or other companies would release their video games at midnight. And it would be huge. I remember going to one for Call of Duty, but I don't remember which CoD game I've gone to. So imagine doing that, but for Magic.

Yeah. It's gonna be huge.

September 23-24,2015

So one of my main goals on this website is to design plenty of features including the blog. But my class, TreeHouse, has switched gears this past week. I've been doing JavaScript, which has been a delight for me. In fact, I'm actually enjoying the whole coding process since I'm already familiarized with that syntax. That being said, I've been working on JavaScript instead of the website. But that doesn't mean I'm not progressing. In fact, JavaScript is probably the polish of a website. So I can't wait to do that. But I'm starting at the basics.

Oh yeah, I love messing with Picasa.

September 22, 2015

When your best friend decides to cosplay on his stream. This is what happens.

September 21, 2015

Been trying out Picasa 3 all day. Simple and easy. Just testing out all the stuff I can do with this program. Of course, I needed to take a picture with some color. And you know where you can find such color: Magic cards.

For this one I just tested out the saturation. And I saturated the crap out of it.

September 20, 2015

Ces taught me something last night over Google Hangouts, and I'm trying it out.

And by divine fate, where our universe grants a reflection of themselves, we both wore beanies at the same time.

September 19, 2015

Chula Vista Games

A few days ago, Curt invited me to lay havoc in a tournament at Chula Vista Games. If you know me, I barely trust in my own skills. I asked him if he thinks I'm capable. Curt gives me this smirk of I-don't-trust-you-but-you-should-try look. I agreed and the date was set for the 19th.

I went to Chula Vista that day listening to the Art of Manliness, and a little bit of Foreigner. Man that song just defines Car-aoke. Anyways, I gave my regular pleasantries to the kids, Ty & Chris, and Curt & Mera. Andrew & Tyler came later. It was time to head out. Curt gave me the address and I asked him, "Dude have you been here before?"

"Nah, but it's nearby. I guess it's down H Street.

We didn't realize we were heading to the hooligan side of Chula Vista.

The other thing I didn't realize was, the amount of Magic I was going to be playing.

9 hours.

September 18, 2015

I can see bias being a good thing.

September 17, 2015

No class yesterday. That was weird. Didn't know professors could skip class too!

Played that Magic Draft last night. AT EASE Games as usual. This draft was a lot more forgiving this time. I wasn't cut nor was I cutting anyone else. Everything was completely smooth. If you know when that happens, everyone was picking their colors correctly.

That doesn't mean I'm going to win all three rounds.

Now the results here are incredibly biased. I swear. So what this picture isn't showing is that there are 3 rounds within each round. Basically, best out of 3. All the opponents I played with came to nail biting, gut wrenching, sweat pouring, and down-to-the-wire wins. It doesn't mean that I'm a sore loser or anything like that. I admit defeat of course, I just wish that Magic gives points for the rounds you win. Now you're probably saying, "Dude Wally, you suck! Why aren't you winning?" This is were Curt comes in.

After each round, if able, Curt will break down each turn, or even more specific, each phase, to me. He logically goes through each step to ensure that I saw what I did wrong or what I could have done. The great thing is, the mistakes I made aren't horrible error mistakes. So I believe this is the best advantage I have over other drafters.

Clearly, Subway and Magic can co-exist in harmony.

September 16, 2015

Started on JavaScript. You know what's crazy? If you've programmed before you'll see the similiarities. I mean, I've coded in C++ before, and JavaScript has the same syntax. I kind of breezed right through this class but I do want to get into the interactivity of this site soon.

Pretty sure everyone knows I'm a nerd. Or maybe a geek. Hrm. I need to look into this. Anyways, I play Magic. And last night I've gone to a comic book store called Sky High Comics. Played a Limited format called draft. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, don't worry. I'm probably going to make a website on how to play Magic. I think everyone should play Magic.

September 15, 2015

Just finished the CSS Basics class. Right now I'm just working on this site before I go onto JavaScript. I'm trying to retain everything right now, but it's a little overwhelming. I guess it's just more practice.

Wednesdays and Fridays I go to At Ease Games in Mira Mesa. This is basically where I play Magic. Jason, excited as he was, got me into this. Curt, professional as he is, is helping me solidify my game. He plays in a different format, but nonetheless, he knows the mechanics. As Ces is my mentor on websites, Curt's my mentor in Magic.

September 14, 2015

Working on the header. Realized I don't really need all that stuff on the top. Probably later I'll fix up something but right now I'm working on linear-gradient. Doesn't seem to work. It feels very annoying not to get something right when you're on a roll.

Finally got my charger for my camera. Good ol' Amazon. I took some random pictures and deicded to test it out. Looks pretty solid.

September something, 2015

You're probably wondering what the hell is going on here. Ces is helping me with my website. He is my mentor and he's going over the website with me. I'm actually building this as I go. So this isn't really definite. On the other hand, I'm trying to make a portfolio, a fitness website, and probably a video game website. This here is just a blog on what I've learned so far.

You're probably going to notice huge changes to this site. So I'll keep you updated by the week.