Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Excitement!

Wow. So a lot has happened and I've been far too lazy to post! What a loser am I! So let's break it down, shall we?

First, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War. Excellent little RTS game. Squad based, still. You make squads of soldiers that can be expanded out to fullness or left at their original size. Doesn't follow the rules of the tabletop game it's based on, but it's an RTS not turned-based with pre-established army sizes. But it's still awesomely fun!

Second, our washer and dryer finally got delivered today! And I'll tell you with no shame that I was starting a load of laundry before the delivery guy had closed the door on his way out! Knowing that the appliances were being delivered soon, the last load of laundry I did at the complex laundramat was about a week ago and only had two pairs of jeans and a handful of t-shirts. The rest was work clothes, since I had to have those. But in a couple more loads, all my dirty clothes will be clean! Exciting!

I had a very strange dream. I was on what seemed in my head to be some sort of campus. Only it was huge. Like a business in it's uniformity and scale. A huge business park. But there were rules. Strange rules. Like an escalator you could only ride up if you were feeling "up." A stair case that split around a lift that if you walked down either side, you slowed down like you were in slo-mo, but if you took the lift, you were fine. But something was happening, strange occurances, rumors of a dark thing happening that only happened once every 20 or so years. Something big happens across the campus, so some others and I take off across a stretch of the campus comprised of three rising sets of walkways. The walkways are lined on the left with a series of hedges. beyond the hedges is a beach head with humongous waves. I don't know this because I saw them in this dream, but because my self in the dream knew that 1, this was a dream, and that 2, the beach was there and one I had dreamed about some weeks ago. Weirdness. But the others in my group were running along the topmost walkway, safer, but it slowed you down a little. Granted, we all had some powers or another so they were fast enough, but they weren't running as fast as I was. But I was on the bottom. No one took the bottom because on some of the spaces there was a gel. A magic reducing gel. (I've been reading a ridiculous amount of Harry Potter in the last few weeks, not too mention hours and hours of anime). But for me, this gel actually provided a defensive bonus. I seemed to be lacking in magical power, but I had a natural resistance to it. I didn't generally make that known, but most of the other people on the campus avoided me because of my affinity for the substance that was like a poison to so many of them. Behind me was a short, slender anime-esque girl with pale skin, waist-length deep purple hair. She had the same ability as I did regarding the deep blue magic-sapping gel. Only she had a tendency to run it through her hair. Which seemed to act, for her, like a conditioner. And with all the hair, she was constantly wearing a layer of magical defense. She also liked to throw the stuff at her attackers. Her name was Setsuka. Weird! Then I woke up as I made it to the end of the walkways. But the guy was here with the washer and dryer, so it was acceptable.

erlie in tha mornin'

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Go Team Venture!

Or, rather, Team Skywarp. Which is a bit of misnomer. It's not a "team," really, so much as a growing collection of Skywarp figures. I got the Robot Masters version of Skywarp and Thundercracker in the mail today. And the adorn the top of Skywarp(PC) quite nicely. I would love to have a Skywarp from every line he was in, if at all possible. Horray eBay.

Filed my taxes today. Isn't that exciting. I'm expecting a nice sum, actually. Next year, though, I might actually need to file for real instead of just using eFile with a 1040EZ like I've been able to do for so many years now. Oh well. Now if only I could get the rest of the money I'm owed, I'd be sitting pretty.

Harvey Birdman! Attorney-at-laaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwwooohhyeah...

Saturday, January 21, 2006

Grey's Grey Hair

Yep. Found my first one the other day. And you must understand something about my hair. Interspersed amongst the light brownish/dark blondish hair there are single very fine pale blonde hairs. At first I saw and hoped. But I plucked it out, for to better inspect. Alas! 'Twere grey it were! On the other hand, my hair is growing out nicely. That is all.

Wait! Sorry. This just in...as of...this afternoon...yeah. So I got a couple of packages in the mail today. The first of a series of Skywarp's I am trying to procure came in the mail. Transformer's Universe Skywarp. I have noticed, rather sadly, that the Universe line is a much cheaper line than the regular lines. But he looks good up there in front of my three Starscreams (Armada, Energon, Cybertron), Galvatron(Armada), Skywarp(Armada), Thundercracker(Cybertron), and Sideways(Cybertron) a top Skywarp t3h PC. I have Robotmasters Skywarp and Thundercracker on the way. What I'd love to get the Comic Con Skywarp, tiny though he is. Some day.

And speaking of Skywarp, he's running much cooler, about ten degrees celsius, with the Athlon64 DTR Clawhammer 3000+ than the old Sempron. And I got a Thermalright XP-90 heatsink which will, no doubt, cool things off even better. It's not installed, but that's owing to the torrents I'm working on that are so very near completion. That and it's a hassle taking all those Decepticons off the tower. And I really hate not having Skywarp on. Dunno why. I'm just weird that way.

jack in!

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

Spoke Too Soon

OK, so I spoke a little too soon on the ditching of AMD. It's still a lot cheaper to just get a new CPU. Which I did. And everything works fine now. Or at least fine enough. My heatsink isn't working like the old one did. The new CPU is actually meant for mobile use, not desktop. So my old heatsink doesn't sit quite right. Alas. So I have ordered a new one that everyone says does sit right with the Athlon64 DTR's. But for now, I have a temporary solution. I cut the old heat spreader off the (now) defunct Sempron and slapped it between the HSF(heatsink and fan) and the CPU. It's not great. Temperature is about the same as the old chip. But soon. Very soon.

In other news, will all the pissed off idiots stop coming to bother me at work? I don't care what you think, sir, the Kingston and the PNY RAM are really about the same. If you wanted the better one, you'd have picked the Corsair. And no ma'am, we did not steal your RAM. You're nuts. And to the other ma'am later, I would like to add that you're a bitch for insisting that I help no one else while you go out to your car to get your card to pay for the service I am about to render in front of you. It's a three minute job I'm about to do. While you're running your sweet little self out to the car, I could have checked that guy behind you and said good day. But no. You had to be a bitch. Which is why I charged you $29 for a nothing task. Have a nice day.

mad max, here

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

And Another Thing

So. I have Skywarp up and running. Not four days. And the 120GB hard drive goes out. WTF?! I don't care if this is AMD's fault for the board or chip or what. But I'm going to get an Intel board and CPU. Soon. This is crap.

kaaaaaaaaaaahhnn!

Monday, January 09, 2006

Moving Cinematics

Farscape. I've gone on about it before, but I just finished the series. Holy cow. Season 4 had a jaw-dropping cliff-hanger WTF?!?! ending. Peacekeeper Wars...a fitting end. The power, the conflict, that moment at the end when finally they all understand the power of wormhole technology. Identifying with John Crichton as much as I do, I could almost feel the conflict in him when he finally unleashes the power the Scorpius and everyone had been after.

But we're not here to write reviews of an ending to a series from many years ago.

Ok, so with this post I might be. But hey. It's my blog. And I wanna be John Crichton. So there.

In other news, it's almost 4AM. Things are just as crazy around here as they were nigh a week ago, but there's signs of calm in the future. I still want more RAM for Skywarp. I've exhausted all other options. The problem lies in the memory controller in the CPU itself. Blargh. That's not a cheap fix. Blargh! However, Media Center is running smoothly enough despite the lack of RAM. Soon, I'll need to get a tuner card or some such. But before that, I'll need more storage. I have nearly every piece of video/anime I own on my two hard drives, but they're closing in on full. Nuts! For those Whos playing at home, let's give a rundown of Skywarp at the moment, shall we?

Skywarp 2.5
Sempron64 2800+
512MB(256) PC3200 RAM
120GB HDD
160GB HDD
16X DVD-ROM
16X DVD+/-RW
6-in-1 Media Reader
Floppy drive
10 USB 2.0 ports (9 external, 1 internal)
4 4LED purple 80mm case fans
1 4LED purple 80mm CPU fan
2 4LED purple 80mm fans in...
...Chieftec 420W Power Supply
HP PSC-1610 All-in-One
Sony 21"(19" viewable) Trinitron monitor (1600x1200)
Chaintech GeForceFX 5500 256MB
SoundBlaster Live! 5.1 Digital
Altec Lansing 5.1 Surround Speakers.

And that's Skywarp. Some of the peripherals I have not reattached yet. Soon, though. Maybe with my next paycheck I'll get a fitting CPU. Maybe a full on Athlon64. We shall see. Anyway, it's almost 4AM. Time for reading, then bed, then three very peaceful days off.

don't stop me now...

Saturday, January 07, 2006

Skywarp LIVES!

Ah, the adventures of flashing the BIOS. I thought I had finally tweaked the motherboard into the great beyond. But I was finally able to flash the BIOS correctly. But...I still have the half RAM issue. Which I fear may be an issue not with the motherboard but with the processor. Alas. Thought, interestingly enough, the Sempron 64 at 1.6GHz with 256MB of RAM recognized is still faster than Megatron's 2.0 P4 with 1024MB RAM. Who knew? Granted Meggy's a laptop, but still. Maybe the computer is really recognizing the full 512 chip, but only reporting half? Who knows. It works. And I have GLORIOUS 1600x1200 resolution again. With FABULOUS 5.1 surround sound! Yay!

megatron, my leader. we are alive again!

Thursday, January 05, 2006

2006: The Dawn of WTF?!

Or at least if the trend of the last few days continues as it has, this is what we can all look forward to. Or at least all of us here in my mad little circle. There's not much I can write about right at this moment. Or at least not in great detail. There are things I wish I could spell out and spill out, but part of being me is keeping the confidence of those I love. At least in this journal anyway. But there's a lot of chaos and hurt. Most of it understandable, but a lot of it is the result of really stupid things. Like continuing to pressure and press and not giving room. Or continuing to talk to people and read letters that will only cause you anguish and hurt and blur your vision, ruin clarity of thought. Don't be childish. And the moment you use your moral high ground, you immediately use it. If you love, then you forgive. Maybe it's not so easy, but you do. And everyone: stop with the bullshit. Nobody likes it, and it only serves to piss everyone off. Which helps exactly no one. So there.

In other news, hours have been absolutely hell and I CANNOT get away from these absolutely inane customers! WTF?! IF you broke your computer because you tried to put 8 year old software on a BRAND NEW F***ING PC don't come into the store with an attitude about ME when I tried to offer solutions your mistakes! Jesus!

it's pretty bad when you can't tell the everyday crazy from the special delivery