The marketing and product management people at EA quietly released the cover art for our game to various web sites a few weeks back. They decided on this cover many months ago and I was quite happy with it when I first saw it.

The prevailing opinion is that it doesn't look like a typical cover for an EA game. People should take that as a compliment because EA is definitely trying something new with skate. Look for this cover art on store shelves... soon?

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Everyone at the Vancouver studio got an e-mail about a month ago stating that we had to do take "sexual harassment" course. At the time, people didn't know everyone else had gotten the e-mail, so lots of people were wondering who's ass they shouldn't have slapped.

It turns out the course is to be taken online. It's done via a browser and you can choose to do it with video and audio or just text alone. With multimedia, it takes about two hours to do. Without it, it's about 90 minutes. When you finish the course, you get sent a certificate.

Some people did the course right away, while others have not (like myself). I got sent a warning last week about it being my final notice for taking the course. It didn't list any consequences if I didn't take it. I probably should take it soon. The problem is, we're so busy, two hours of work time is a lot to ask for.

Also, a popular refrain these days around the floor is, "Oh, I'm allowed to say things like that since I haven't taken the course." It makes a great way to end an inappropriate joke.

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I didn't have to take a cab home tonight. One of the development directors drove me home. He lives in Port Coquitlam. Joining us was another SE, he lives in Coquitlam. The DD lived in the UK less than six months ago. Now he's driving on the opposite side of the road. His driving is pretty good. I bet I would have done worse if I had to drive in the UK.

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After a much anticipated opening, I was able to patronize the Taco Bell / KFC combo restaurant near Coquitlam Centre tonight. In short, it was a slightly disappointing visit that left me with a hint of great promise for future visits.

When I arrived, I instantly noticed there were lots of people waiting for their food. At least five people were waiting for their orders. Despite this, I walked up to the counter where an impressive menu greeted me. Yes, you can get Taco Bell and KFC at this place but did you know you can combine the two? That's right! So let's say you get a two piece KFC meal but you're hankering for a taco. Adding a taco is just a dollar extra. Say you decide you want a quesadilla meal from Taco Bell but you gotsa yearning for a piece of fried chicken. One loonie more will get you a nice piece of Original Recipe.

I selected the Crunchwrap Supreme with beef. Rather than describe it, just look at this guy's blog post about it. Ordering is fine but I must have waited ten minutes for my food. It sucks to wait around that long for "fast" food. Also, the pop / soft drink / soda dispenser was out of 7-Up syrup. I had to toss out my cup of club soda and fill up with something else that I didn't want.

Despite the super long wait for my food, once I got home with my Crunchwrap, I was pleased. It wasn't greasy at all and it tasted really good. The lettuce in the thing was really fresh and everything stayed neatly in the pocket.

I'm going to return to try out the fried chicken and then order a taco as a side.

Seriously, if I don't stop ordering stupid stuff to eat my heart is gonna complain lots in about ten years... probably less.

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I actually did some real telecommuting today. Yes, I remotely check my work e-mail in the evenings but it's an entirely different story when you're making changes to the game and then checking them in from home.

At home, you have access to the game code and data but there's no way to check if anything you've done will break the game. When you're sitting in your jammies, you don't have a console with you so you can't test stuff. It's generally frowned upon to make code check-ins from home.

This morning, I checked my work e-mail and discovered a problem had appeared in one of my areas. A producer sent me a message detailing what had gone wrong. From that, I decided that if I removed one line of code the problem might go away. So I phoned the producer up and told him what I was going to do.

I took the line out and checked in my changes from home which is a first for me since I think it's a pretty risky thing if you can't test it. Since I had to go to the movies, I couldn't stick around to find out if the change fixed the problem. I e-mailed the producer and told him to e-mail me with the results. Then I left to go see Spider-Man 3.

Later on, I checked my e-mail again and it seems the problem was fixed by taking out that one line. If you're interested, the line I took out was this:

pGame->MakeGameCrash();

Ok, so nerd humour isn't universally loved.

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