It’s that time of the year and Penny Arcade has once again kicked off it’s Child’s Play charity drive. Over the last three years, the charity has raised over one million dollars in donations, toys, books, and games for children’s hospitals around the country.

Even if you can only afford a couple dollars for a pack of batteries, it can still make a huge difference in a sick kid’s life. I encourage you to donate any amount, even if it seems insignificant. Imagine the impact if every gamer (or non-gamer, I don’t care) in the world gave just $1. That small donation for each person could make an enormous impact when combined.

If you really just can’t bring yourself to make an outright donation, consider picking up a Child’s Play shirt from Thinkgeek. All proceeds go directly to the charity.

Since you never can be quite sure who reads what these days, I’ll skip the specifics and post a general guide for employers who want to disgruntle their employees. This is a reflection of my personal views and does not reflect the views of anyone/anything else.

For the sake of clarity, the employee in the example below will be female. It could’ve just as easily been a male, but specifying a single gender will prevent the s/he and him/her references.

Step One. Ignore your employee when she tells you for months that she doesn’t want a specific position that she knows will need to be filled soon.

Step Two. When said employee expresses her concerns that she’s being cornered into the position anyway, tell her that it’s good for her career.

Step Three. When employee wants to meet to discuss the position and her concerns that she’ll be unhappy, make her feel like she’s being a spoiled brat and not a team player. If this is still not enough to make her fall in line, bust out “suck it up and take one for the team”. If she still resists, tell her that if she absolutely, positively won’t do it, you may be able to find her another position [that will end her career at your company].

Step Four. When the employee finally caves (because, really, it’s either that or quit), tell her that she’ll love it and it won’t be that bad.

So there you have it, four easy steps to turn a perfectly happy employee into a perfectly disgruntled employee. On a completely unrelated topic, if you’re a company in Austin that’s looking for a programmer (or you know of one that is), I may know someone that’s looking for a job…

So yesterday I was sent a link to the new Weird Al music video, White and Nerdy. I’ve always been a bit indifferent to Weird Al, some of his songs are good, some not so good, but this one is awesome. Check it out and you’ll see what I mean. :)

P.S. For a true nerd, the Wikipedia article lists all kinds of cool stuff about the video.

Ok, I think it’s painfully obvious at this point that I’m just terrible about updating. However, rather than just giving up, I randomly try to redeem myself by posting intermittent updates. Today is no different. So lets see, my last post was in May… what’s been going on since May?

Well, I finally broke down and bought a Macbook. (Who am I kidding, I barely lasted a few days past the announcement). It has a few quirks (like the infamous moo), but overall it’s fabulous. I thought I’d miss the extra 2″ of screen, since I downsized from a 15″ Powerbook, but, as they say, size isn’t everything. ;) My favorite new features are the bright, glossy screen, the new trackpad with two-finger right click and two-finger scrolling, and the magsafe connector.

At the beginning of June we went up to Dallas for A-Kon, the huge three day anime convention. We had a great time. On Sunday we spent most of the day searching for treasure because Scrollquest had a free mini-hunt just for the con. Dustin and I spent several hours looking around Dealy plaza (the final resting place of the treasure), but we were apparently not observant enough. Luckily for our pride, no one found it and eventually the Scrollquest guys went out, picked it up, and did a random drawing of the people left. We had headed for home by then, so we missed out. The treasure was a little statuette worth $5k, so it was definitely worth all the effort, plus it’s kind of fun to figure out the clues and search for hidden treasure.

It’s hard to believe, but our one year wedding anniversary is next month. To celebrate, we’ve booked a cruise. We’re going to visit Jamaica, Grand Caymen, and Cozumel, Mexico. It’ll be our first trip to the Caribbean, so we’re super excited. So far we don’t have many plans, except Dustin wants to swim/snorkel with the stingrays while we’re in the Caymens. It seems to me that they are called STINGrays for a reason, but Dustin doesn’t see it as a problem.

Finally, NI is looking for an experienced IT Programmer/Analyst. Austin is a great place to live, and NI is a great company, so if you’re interested, drop me an email (jessie at jessiemihalik dot com) and/or send me your resume. However, if I don’t already know you… well your resume will have to be pretty damn good for me to pass it on, since I don’t want to look like an idiot for recommending someone incompetent. Anyone still looking to escape Rolla, now’s your chance.

For us mere mortals, the only way to get E3 news is via online blog/news sites or the coverage on G4TV. Seems like TV would be a good option, since many of the coolest features of E3 are visual (trailers, new console shots, etc). However, at this point, having watched the “live” coverage on G4 for a total of twenty minutes, of a three-hour show, I’m ready to bash my head into the nearest sturdy surface.

Why would I subject myself to such a potentially brain damaging activity? This show is painful. I’ve never been a huge fan of G4, especially since they eradicated TechTV, but really, this is terrible.

Exhibit 1: Olivia. She’s got to be a freaking robot. Absolutely no acting talent, she has zero facial expression. It’s actually kind of terrifying to see someone say “I’m so excited” while staring blankly at the camera. No, she wasn’t being sarcastic. I’m sure she was probably hired for her other assets.

Exhibit 2: Every other host on the show. Where did they find these people? I mean, seriously, I could act better, and I’m no actress. How does it happen that every woman is exceedingly good looking, but the men (Adam Sessler, I’m talking to you) are awful? I realize they are trying to appeal to the 14-year-old boys, but damn, some of us women play games and watch TV too. We’d like our fair share of eye-candy. Hopefully eye-candy with at least half a brain.

Really, I could go on, but I’ll spare you. If you can wade through all of the crap, they do, eventually, show some interesting tidbits. However, I’ve not really seen any “exclusive” content, though they say the word every other second. So, my advice to you, watch at your own risk. I can feel my brain cells dying, can you?