I’m lucky enough to play a game that attracts other game playing programmers, WeeWar. The game was recently bought out by EA and has been put on the shelf for now. A small group of dedicated players remains, and when one of them posted that they had a new game available on the iTunes App Store called Fly With Me, I happily handed over the $0.99 and picked it up.

Fly With me is a fun little side-scroller where you control a bird and have to navigate through boards, chomping on bees to keep your strength up. The controls are simple, you just tap to flap, it’s the timing and animation that make the game challenging and fun. So much so that I have all 3 stars on all the levels, I’ve unlocked all the Game Center achievements and bonus levels (3 stars there too), got all the golden gears to unlock the super tough robo-bird, and as of the writing of this post, I hold the record for distance on all three of the challenge maps.

If you are looking for a fun game that is easy to pick up and play in short intervals, I highly suggest you pick up EA’s Fly With Me, and if you have any questions feel free to drop them in the comments!

iTunes page: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/fly-with-me/id470425126?mt=8

EA’s page: http://www.ea.com/fly-with-me-ios

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What do you do when things get busy and your creative energies are being focused elsewhere? You cut back on things that aren’t as important or as interesting. I cut back on my online reading and playing with new start-ups – and, well here we are 1 year to the day and no posts. Maybe you are in the same boat as me? You like having a site and like that you’ve written some things that people still find useful, and have a few things you’d still like to write about?

What can you do to breathe a little life back into your site?

• Set the bar LOW: Once a month is a crappy goal when you were cranking out 5 posts a week, but better than once a year!
• Set a specific day: Put it on your calender, think about your post during your commute, type some notes on your break at work, have lunch at somewhere with wi-fi and crank out that post.
• Get a buddy: Know someone else that is still posting away or even that isn’t and wants to get back to it? Have lunch with them and talk about posting or even write together
• Reward yourself: Pick something small as a reward for yourself when you finish a post

I’m sure that there are a number of other things that people have done to get the ball rolling again and if anyone is still out there that has succeeded I’d love to hear about it.

Sorry about the Programmer Day Blog being down, I’ve botched something in my hosting settings that I need to track down. Russia has made Programmer Day an official holiday so we’re seeing a lot of interest this year. Check out @ProgrammerDay on Twitter and have a wonderful #ProgrammerDay!

I’m having a little fun with one of the latest viral trends going around Friendfeed to express my general belief that the term ‘meme’ has been corrupted to be nothing other than a glorified fad.

1. Meme was coined by Richard Dawkins in his book The Selfish Gene
2. It is defined as conveying the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of imitation
3. It is derived from the Greek word “mimema” meaning something imitated
4. The study of memes is known as Memetics
5. It is intended to provide a definition for the way ideas and trends move through society as genetic traits move from generation to generation through genes
6. Genes are considered to move vertically from generation to generation,  although with current genetic research it’s possible they may even move horizontally within a generation at some point in the future
7. Memes are considered to move either vertically or horizontally
8. Good examples of memes that move vertically are cultural trends like racism, speech patterns, pizza crust preferences and the type of BBQ sauce you consider to be the only true BBQ
9. Good examples of horizontal memes are fashion, slang, and the belief that Al Gore truly deserved a Nobel Peace Prize
10. A fad is considered to be a phenomenon that becomes popular for a very short time.
11. A fad technically fits the description of a horizontal meme since it is transmitted and imitated
12. The short time period indicates that it is a failed meme, a dead end on the cultural evolutionary tree
13. Thankfully!
14. Although Jams were awesome – why don’t we wear those anymore?
15. Calling your short lived internet fad a meme will make you feel more important
16. You’re not
17. Calling it a meme will make you feel more sophisticated
18. You’re not that either
19. Calling it a meme might confuse more people into taking part though
20. So I don’t blame you for doing it
21. But I still find it a little annoying
22. And I just wanted you to know…
23. That the meme you are participating in is just a glorified fad
24. And as long as you are OK with that, then go for it!
25. If “internet memes” are your thing you might want to spend some quality time with Encyclopedia Dramatica

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Image by amyliagrace via Flickr

The company that I work for has a self-funded health plan and is always looking to positive ways to cut costs.  The most recent push is a weight loss competition with some pretty serious rewards if you can reach a weight loss goal and maintain it for two years.  Along with that is a 90 day walking challenge, we were equipped with a nice pedometer and are to track our steps.  The goal is to hit 10,000 steps 6 days a week for 3 months.

On weekends this goal hasn’t been too difficult to meet, but as a desk jockey and cube dweller, the weekdays have been a challenge.   The reward for all this walking is a gift certificate to a sporting goods store and the extra time it’s taking to walk all these steps won’t be worth that reward.  What makes it worthwhile isn’t the extra exercise either, because it’s not a huge amount.  What makes this a valuable pursuit is that it’s laying down new and healthy habits in my life, and I am a creature of habit.

What healthy habits have you taken on and what have you done to make them stick?

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