Robin Harbron

Ever since my family outgrew my truck (7 people, and only 6 seats in my F-150) I’ve been dreaming of having a new truck that would seat us all. While I’ll probably have to settle for a van or Suburban that can seat 8 or 9, what I really want is a truck with, say, 3 benches for a total of 9 seats, and then a proper box on the back. Yes, it would be huge, and it would very likely need to be custom built. I really didn’t think such a thing existed.

A bit of googling has (probably) shown otherwise. Check this thing out! It has an extended crew cab which certainly could have room for 9 seats. I have no idea what purpose the other customizations serve; it looks like people could pop out the top (turret!), it has that divider on the windshield (with a little door to stick your gun out?), and what’s that big wedge shaped thing on the front? It looks like it could be lowered and used as a weapon!

Okay, Darren asked for it…

If your life were a soundtrack, what would the music be?

Here’s how it works:

1. Open your library (iTunes, winamp, media player, iPod).
2. Put it on shuffle.
3. Press play.
4. For every question, type the song that’s playing.
5. New question – press the next button.
6. Don’t lie and try to pretend you’re cool.

Opening credits:
“Low” – Sal Paradise

Waking up:
“Blessed in the City” – Chuck Girard

First day at school:
“Love Sanctifies” – Steve Hindalong

Falling in love:
Main title track from Eliminator – Jeroen Tel

Breaking up:
“Throw Your Hatred Down” – Neil Young

Prom:
“Remembered (for Gene)” – Undercover

Life’s okay:
“Keeping Vigil” – Steve Bell

Mental breakdown:
“From Hank to Hendrix” – Neil Young

Driving:
“The Lord’s Prayer” – The Hilliards

Flashback:
“I Believe” – Re-Born

Getting back together:
“A Little Grace” – Daniel Amos

Wedding:
“Big Green Country” – Neil Young

Birth of child:
“And I’m Evil” – Beatallica

Final battle:
“Forgotten Years” – Midnight Oil

Death scene:
“Spring” – The Choir

Funeral song:
“Someday Soon” – Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

End credits:
“Our God” – Hokus Pick

P.S. I cleared 25,000 words for NaNo Sunday night.

I finally managed to get to 10,000 words in my sort-of NanoWriMo. Even if I don’t make the target, it’s been pretty fun doing all this memoiring.

The blog spam problem came back. It was just one guy who always left the name “Hi there”. I tried modifying the PHP code to ignore anything from that guy, but it still kept coming. It turned out that “he” wasn’t using the comments form at all. He was completely bypassing it and somehow directly calling the main comment-post function. Anyway, I added the check right in the main function, and now I’ve been spam free for about 5 days.

New tires on the truck. $700 less in the bank.

I’ve been reading up on Java. I’m on day 5 of a 21 day “course” in a book I bought for $4 at Value Village. It’s a surprisingly good read. A lot of the C++ I learned while working on LarryBoy is making a lot more sense as I read more about Java. I mean, it made enough sense at the time for me to get the game done, but now it’s connecting in my brain at other levels.

Rianna and Heidi were explaining a play they had done for their brother Peter earlier today. After the play ended, they then went on to do the bonus features, since their play was apparently being released on DVD. They showed how the dragon’s treasure wasn’t real treasure at all, but was actually just plastic jewelry, and how the armour and robes they wore were really just toys and dress-up clothes.

I did some more NaNoWriMo writing tonight, but I’m pathetically behind schedule. I’ve been pre-occupied with doing some manuvering at work to go part-time, so I can hopefully get more work doing video game programming. It’s somewhat risky, so I’m nervous about that, but I’m also hopeful that it’ll work out really well.

I’ve added a couple more links to the blog roll. Marla (Marla: I’m really happy you decided to start blogging – hopefully Brian will make a few guest appearances too!) and Rob O’Hara.

I met Rob at ECCC 2006, and purchased his book called “Commodork: Sordid Tales from a BBS Junkie”. I just finished reading it today.

I really enjoyed it, mostly because of all the memories it triggered in me. Whenever I’d think of some old computer/video game related story from my past, I’d jot down it down. One memory would lead to another, sometimes several at once, and I’m pretty sure I occasionally re-forgot a memory before I got it down on paper. In total, I wrote down 114 different points! I’m realizing more and more that I’m a nostalgia junkie – rediscovering part of my past gives me a rush.

Memories varied from my first encounters with video games (Pong in Sault Ste. Marie, Donkey Kong at Grandma’s Restaraunt in Duluth, Minnesota, Rogue at Lakehead University), the BBSing days (Don Sutton’s E2000 board, and Darren’s Trashcan BBS), my first computer (Timex Sinclair 1000, bought at Kalax Computers) to the early days of the Internet (emailing friends in Australia for free, and hearing back from them in only hours, surfing for the first time, and putting up my own page for the first time) and plenty more.

So, this year I’ll be trying to write my computer memoirs this November for NaNoWriMo. Well, it won’t officially qualify, since it won’t be a novel, but at the moment it’s the only thing I want to write about.

It’s amazing to think that it’s been a full year since Kyla was born. We had got up out of bed at about 2 a.m. to drive to the hospital, and only 8 hours later we were driving home with another little Harbron. The nine months of parental leave flew by; I’ve been back at work for nearly three months already.

Sorry I’ve been absent from the blog lately. I had a great time in Chicago – there are links to photos etc. here.

The game I programmed (along with my friend Adrian, and a whole team of people doing design, art, music) has now been out in stores for a couple months. I just found a copy at Wal-Mart today which was neat, but not as exciting as I thought it would be. It’s been getting surprisingly good reviews, ranging from 6/10 to 8/10. There’s a page about it here; scroll down, and on the right are links to (currently) six reviews.

I’ve been getting a lot of comment spam over the last few months. It started maybe around June, after months of no spam at all. It then went away for a lot of August, but now it’s back to the point that I’m deleting dozens of spam comments every day.

Rather than forcing people to sign up and log in to comment, I’ve hacked away at some of the WordPress code to add an extra field – just type nospam in that box and then your comment should go through. Could a couple of you faithful folks try testing it out? Just leave a quick comment without filling in the nospam box, then with, and see if it behaves.

Also, if you folks have any thoughts on whether or not this is a good solution, let me know.

This is the 3rd track from the “My 64” album. We had a lot of fun playing the music for this track – musically we were more influenced by MxPx’s cover of “Summer of ’69” than by the Bryan Adams original. My singing is particularly awful on this track.

SUMMER OF 64
————
Music/some lyrics: parody of “Summer of ’69” by Bryan Adams; original lyrics/guitar/bass/vocals: Robin; Drums: Darren

In a way, this is a continuation of “History”. “Ahil” is short for “Ahileas”, the name of a school chum from years ago.

I got my first real computer
bought it at the Target store
Played it ’til my eyes turned red
The first summer with my 64.

Me and some guys from school
Made some games and we tried real hard.
Ahil quit, Ron went Amiga
I should of known we’d never get far.

Oh, when I look back now
That summer seemed to last forever.
And if I had the choice
Yeah, I’d still want to be there
Those were the best days of my life.

Ain’t no use in complaining
When you’ve got a job to do
Coding in C on Intel’s
Give me my old CPU!

Coding on my 64
Playing games ’til 3 a.m.
My pals SID and VIC
Oh, I remember when
Those were the best days of my life.

Back in the summer with my ’64.

We were flying high
We were young and structureless, spagetti coding time
I guess nothing can last forever – forever, no!

And now times are changing
Look at everything that’s come and gone
Sometimes when I play that old 8-bit
Sit and wonder thinking what went wrong…

Coding on my ’64
Playing games ’til 3 a.m.
My pals SID and VIC
Oh, I remember when

Those were the best days of my life.

Listen to Summer of 64.

This second track on the “My 64” album was a whole bunch of fun to record, like messing around with effects on the background vocals and trying to get a sitar-like sound out of my acoustic guitar for the solo. I also like the inherent goofiness in singing long phrases like “Double Density 5 1/4″ disks”.

Anyone who grew up with the Commodore 64 will probably identify with at least one or two lines in this song.

REMEMBER WHEN
————-
Lyrics/music/guitar/BGVs: Robin; Lead Vocals: Darren

Remember when…
The screenshots on game boxes said “Commodore Version”?
You could find double-density 5 1/4″ disks?
Disks weren’t preformatted for IBM’s?
You could buy 9-pin joysticks?

Remember when…
Printers came with instructions on how to program them?
Microsoft wrote programs for our computer?
You could buy disk notchers?
64k was more than enough?

Remember when…
People didn’t laugh when you said “I own a Commodore 64”?
People laughed at games on an IBM?
An operating system was 8k?
Basic only took another 8k?

Listen to Remember When.

I’m starting to get ready for my annual trip down to Chicago to meet up with fellow Commodore geeks at the end of September. SWRAP didn’t put together a show, so a friend of mine put up the money to rent a big conference room at a hotel. Long live the ECCC!

It’s been 7 years since Darren and I were recording an album of music about or composed on the C-64. We sold about 20 copies of it at the 1999 Chicago Expo, and the remaining 10 copies I made eventually sold through Loadstar on consignment. A pretty big success – it pretty much paid for either the 2x CD-ROM burner or the 4-channel sound card I bought for the purpose… but not both.

Anyway, it doesn’t seem like I’ve blogged about these songs before, so here goes.

HISTORY
——-
Lyrics/music/guitars/bass/vocals: Robin; Drums: Darren

This song is simply telling the true story of how I ended up owning and using a Commodore 64. Incidentally, “Acid Rain” is the name of a game we loved to play on the PET way back when. I’ve managed to find copies of the other two games I mention there, but not even a mention of “Acid Rain”. I’d appreciate any leads you folks could give!

Another note: the “I Adore My 64” was a Commodore marketing slogan at one point.

Lyrics:
When I was 10, I became obsessed
With video games and the like
I dreamed of Donkey Kong, Pong and then
Space Invaders through the night

At school we had a Commodore PET
We wore out the “A” key
Acid Rain, Weather and that
Dungeon game filled the screen.

Then I bought a Timex Sinclair
I began to learn how to hack
But I couldn’t get it to save or load
So I promptly went to bring it back

Then I went to Duluth and was about to buy
A VIC-20 when my mom or
My dad said the wisest ever thing
“Why don’t you buy a C-64?”

Oh yeah!

So I got my 64 (x2)
I adore my 64 (x4)

Listen to History (I Adore). (SORRY, LINK BROKEN)