weissblog

Since Amanda left me back in July, I’ve been given all sorts of advice (and ignored pretty much all of it). But one thing a lot of people have told me is that I need to find me. Find the person I was before Amanda. Find the person I am without Amanda. Find the person God wants me to be. Well, I wasn’t sure how to go about doing that. Those who know me, know I want a formula or equation for everything. But no one could provide a formula for how to find myself. Read the rest of this entry »

So, there’s a very interesting discussion going on over at Thingiverse, a site where people can share projects for their 3d printers. If you have never seen what a 3d printer can do, I recommend watching this video as an example. It seems that some folks have made projects for a couple of parts of an AR-15 rifle (the magazine and the lower receiver). And of course there’s a bunch of people up in arms about it (pun intended). Their all fussing about the legality of ‘printing’ a weapon. At what point does it go from printing parts to printing a weapon? It’s a situation that really deserves a touch of attention from the ATF (take the hint Scot/Drew), maybe even a blog post or something pointing people to the federal code that covers things like this. Personally, I foresee a day when Remington et. al. start suing people for copyright/trademark/patent infringement for printing copies of their guns.

But all that aside, there’s a part of this story that I didn’t see mentioned anywhere else. It’s my understanding that 3d printers don’t exactly fabricate things out of metal. As such, someone could easily buy such a printer and make a fully functioning gun that would pass through metal detectors. Granted that the weapon would probably break after a shot or two is fried from it. But how many shots do you need if you can walk right into a place where no one else is armed? Additionally, what’s to stop someone from printing out knives, shuriken, or some other weapon. I can’t wait until these printers get more common. Inevitably some prison somewhere will buy one and some inmate(s) will starting printing weapons and then we’ll have headlines about prison riots and how dangerous these printers are. Yep, can’t wait. You know it’s coming.

Thanks to TechCrunch for the link to Thingiverse
Thanks to HackerNews for the link to TechCrunch

I’m no poet or writer. But I was thinking, it’d be sorta cool to show the conversation between a man’s heart and mind when he’s contemplating divorce. If nothing else, maybe writing it will have a bit of a therapeutic effect for me.

I miss her

I know. But I don’t.

Not any?

Well, I miss having a friend I can talk to; someone to confide in. But I have other friends. She sucked at it anyway.

I still want her to come back.

I don’t think that is going to happen.

I refuse to give up hope.

That’s fine. But we’ve already set an ending date. You agreed.

I know. And each day that date gets closer and I grow more afraid that she won’t come back before you make me go through with it.

It’s for the best.

That’s easy for you to say, you wanted this.

You’re right, I did. And I’m trying to enjoy it, if you’d let me. Finally have the chance to do things the right way. Finally have the chance to do something for us.

You sound like her. Are we becoming selfish too?

No, because we still put the kids and others first. But we will take time for ourselves now. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt like it was ok to be me. Why do you want her back so bad anyway? She’s hurt you so many times.

You know why. You know how much I love her.

I know that you do. I fail to comprehend how much. But I also know that you love the girls. Hasn’t she hurt them enough. Why allow her to get close enough to hurt them more.

Because of love.

Now who’s being selfish? We must protect our own. We should have already done this. The time draws near, you must let go.

No, I’m not able to. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to.

Then how will we move on? How can we be happy if we’re warring within our self?

I don’t know. Give me more time to figure this out.

The time has been set.

Then all we can do is wait.

And let go.

No. Not yet. Hope has not died.

 EDIT: The day after I wrote this, all hope died. I think part of me did as well.

Since high school I’ve wanted a certain, rather large tattoo on my back. But I was told, repeatedly by many, that I should keep my first tattoo to a reasonable size. So, some years back I started trying to come up with a less grandiose idea for a tattoo. About three and a half years ago I started toying with the idea of getting one symbolizing one of my favorite Bible verses (1 Cor. 13:13). But I never could figure out how I wanted to symbolize that verse. Everything I came up with was either too common or too feminine.

So, over the years, I’d think about it here and there but never really made much progress. Then, about three weeks ago, I was doing some more research, looking for different symbols for faith, hope, and love. After looking at various oriental characters for those words, and the original language used in that section of the Bible, and the Latin translation, and all sorts of other stuff, I came across some designs using an anchor to represent hope. I had never seen that as a symbol for hope before. And that sent me in a new direction… where I found more girly drawings of an anchor, cross, and heart merged into one item. So I finally quit and went about other things that morning. About 15 minutes later, while praying about something that had nothing to do with tattoos, an idea popped into my head (and if your offended because I think it was from God, tough. go pray). I hurriedly sketched out the idea, in a very rudimentary way (an artist I am not).

About a week later I went by a tattoo shop up the road and ran my idea past a guy. He wasn’t getting it so I sketched it out for him and I could tell the light clicked on. He worked up some sketches and I went by earlier this week to take and look and approve of the design. And last night, August 18, 2011, I went in and got my first tattoo on my right arm. Here it is:

photo taken < 5 minutes after being finished

In closing I just want to say, if you don’t like it… tough. I didn’t do it for you. And if you do like it, thank you very much. I appreciate the support. But I didn’t do it for you either. LOL

EDIT:
For those who asked, I went to Texas Finest Tattoos & Piercings on the corner of Nacogdoches and Higgens. Ask for Lil Man.

Came across this quote/poem/whatever tonight and it seems to fit perfectly:

I’m not going to stress over you anymore. It isn’t worth it.
I tried to work something out but you just ignored it.
I’m not trying to say I don’t want you, because I definitely do.
All I’m saying is I’m done chasing after you.
-unknown

And to all, a good night.

-jcw