Finally it is done.

Finally it is done.

My dad finally got everything together and backed up for the upgrade. I took the computer over to jakes house and we worked on it for 7 to 8 hours. But it is done. I promised never to touch that thing again and told my parents that if it dies they might as well get a new one because I would not fix this one again. So I showed my dad how to run the clean up utilities and update the virus checker. Already he found 120 different things of spy ware on the computer between 2 users. Well now we know who is causing all the problems and I am trying hard to get their access limited but it is an up hill battle and I just want to let them hang themselves again.

Well that is my only adventure for this week mostly because I cant think of any thing else to write.

/Strike *Off*

What do you know, it worked!

So I've got a lot of catching up to do.

First, I had a high-end FM modulator installed in my car. It works far better than the other two ever did, and it cost about four times as much as one and about six times as much as the other. But it works well.

Leon was extremely kind to stay by my side while the guys at the car audio shop tore into my 2003 Accord and nearly broke damned near everything therein.

Here's the thing; I LOVE my car. I mean, I love my wife and my kids more than anything ever.

But my car holds a separate partition of love for its own in the hard drive of my heart, and let me tell you, I am thoroughly taken with that thing. So watching the stupid car audio guy rip the dash to peices was TORTURE. Just ask Leon. Really, it was scary for a minute or two there. But we got through it, and the car is ok.

Next, the digitizer in my Tablet started to go out again, and they left dust between the digitizer and the LCD last time they fixed it. So Toshiba has it again. I also told them to replace the LCD (because of a few dead pixels) and update the BIOS for me. So hopefully they'll do it right this time.

Eric has a cell phone! I've been nagging him to get a cell phone for years now, and he finally did it. He called me yesterday, all happy and beaming through the repeaters between where he was and I was. Congrats Eric, on your new cell phone. I guess your next acquisition will be a laptop? AlienWare has some nice models.

Maybe that should be a new paragraph: Alienware has some nice models. I went on the Alienware website a while back and specced out my dream laptop. It came to over 8,000 bucks. So much for that. Besides, I'm too endeared of my Tablet to take any portable system that isn't a Tablet seriously.

I was going to use some space talking about my math professor, but I find that I just don't care enough. Maybe later.

Sanity check

So, I've been busy, and more importantly, I've been rather isolated from all my former internet hangouts. I'll be getting cable internet in a couple of weeks, so maybe things will improve then, but for now, I'm still guy incognito.

But while I've been busy, apparently Jake's been going schizo. If you need more collaborators, then ask me about it. Don't create two trollish alter egos.

Good news, by the way. I got my first pay check from my new job this week, and so this afternoon, we got cell phones. I've never had one before, and I'm very excited about it.

Video is trying to kill the gamer in me.

Well it is time once again to make my post for this week.
One good thing this week is that I bought a copy of splinter cell yesterday. It looks to be a great game. The down side is that I can’t play it because my video card does not support pixel shading. Every thing else about the card is great and passes the tests. Also I found that the game does not support my video card even though they had new drivers for it on the disk. This now means that I am in the market for a new video card. So I spent some time at both ATI’s and NVIDIA’s web sites. Wow, am I really getting that far behind? Here are the links:
http://www.atitech.ca/index.html http://nvidia.com/page/geforce_6800.html

If you go to NVIDIA’s site it works better with IE than with firefox. Both of these companies are doing some amazing stuff. I was thinking that I would go with an NVIDIA geforce 6800, an ATI 9800XT or the X800 platinum. I am leaning mostly to an ATI 9800XT it’s a great card a third generation witch is saying something in video cards. Though after doing some more surfing I have found that there are a lot more complaints about compatibility from ATI products then there are with NVIDIA when dealing with windows boxes. This bothers me because 1) I have a windows box. 2) I hate dinking around with things just to get them to work. I maybe good at it but I don’t like it. In defense of ATI and the new X800 when it works it out performs the 6800 hands down. But I have always been a fan of NVIDIA I currently run a GeForce 4 MX 440 64 MB and it has kept me playing any game I wanted for almost three years. Well now you begin to understand what I have been pondering and why. Oh for the benefit of others I refuse to upgrade anything until half-life 2 is released and I know the specs. Hopefully that last line will save me some harassment.

On Strike

That's right, you heard me.

Eric, you lazy heap of married junk, this is a collaborative project and thou shalt collaborate.

So get it together or don't. But until you do, the title holds.

Love,
Jake.

Super Happy Post Time ! ! !

Sounds Japanese, doesn't it? Makes me want to see a game show host with a cheesy smile and screaming Japanese 16-year-old girls. Oh, and Hello Kitty stuff. Because it's...SUPAH HAPPY POST TIMAH!!!

Does that make me racist? I make fun of Japanese people, but it's just because I think they're cute.

I've been learning how to use M$ OneNote, and so far it looks really good. If I use it as much this semester as much as I used M$ Journal last semester, it'll be worth the $50 I paid for it.

And have a mentioned my Tablet PC on this blog? It is, bar none, THE best tool for school I've ever had. It's great. Toshiba built it extremely well. I'm grateful to have my Tablet in school.

I bought new headphones for my Archos yesterday. They're a Koss set. I've had a no-Koss policy for ten years or so, but I really like these. Maybe I was wrong about Koss. I sure like these.

Last night I went and played pool with Brent, as usual, but unusually, I played very poorly. Oh, the frustration.

It's not the first time I've lost my game. It's just the first time since I was this good. And it pissed me off. So I spent three hours playing at Leon's today, and I got my game back. The culmination of the three-hour ordeal was Leon's younger brother, Mike, coming downstairs with some trash talk.

And with my newly-regained game I kicked his butt. Happy me! I took five games straight against Mike, and that humbled him a fair bit. Duff Man says: "Oh yeah!"

Ugh

Wow, Blogger's new layout is nice. It's better than before.

But anyway, 'Ugh', as stated above, is how I've been feeling. The newly-prescribed amphetamines mentioned earlier in this blog are not working out so well, and I've got attitude problems.

And it sucks! I've got good music, good friends, a cool family, and most other things going for me, and I still feel icky. Clearly, my drugs are a problem.

I had childhood depression and drugs for said problem when I was a kid. At the end of junior high school, I refused my drugs and finished school without them.

Things were good that way, and I made it through a mission and other trials, still undrugged. I think there have been times when it would have been wise to get me on something, though.

The Air Force almost killed me a couple of years ago, and I was pretty well down for the count for about six months after that.

Maybe the stresses of being back in school are just bringing out the manic depressive in me. The thing is that I'm not the creatively depressed type; I just ponder my depression and get more depressed. My analyzing and probing childhood ADD/Depression doctors taught me well!

It really is too bad I can't enjoy my amphetamines like everyone else, though. I really did try, but Speed...at least not this kind...doesn't make me have fun, or even help me be more productive. It does make me super-introspective though, which would be fun if I had more esteem right now.

Wow, look at that! I can write a depressing post, too! Who'd have thought?

I'll write a happy post right after I post this one to help cover it up a bit.

It is always nice to say I told you so. Or is it?

Yesterday I sat down with my dad and worked the “family” computer over getting it prepared for a back up, nuke, and upgrade. What brought this on? Well a lot a things put together but most of all negligence. What happens when you don’t update your virus checker? You get viruses. What happens when you don’t run your virus checker? Viruses run you. (Or at least your computer.) What happens when you don’t watch what the kids install on the computer? You end up with a bunch of crap that never gets used and takes up valuable memory and bogs down the processor. So all together, negligence. I spent two hours cleaning up this system getting rid of all the nonessential information and stuff that can be reinstalled by disks. Two hours!!! What ever happened to maintaining your systems? This dose not include the backup or the nuke or the upgrade. Ok I feel better now.

I can tell you it does feel good to wipe out all the video games and their save files before letting my siblings run their backups. But you must find comfort where you can. Not all the family has their files saved yet so I think tomorrow will be the day to nuke the monstrosity.

I also worked on my fathers PC and it is working well now. It was going to be a nuke and load as well but after removing a lot of crap it just started working well again. Well duh! Of course it is but since I did not remove the programs he really likes to use he is procrastinating letting me complete the job. Witch in the end will only make it worse. Another I told you so for the future.

Thanks to a good friend I have SP one and two for windows on CD and that will save me all kinds of time later.

Now I did have a good time Saturday, playing laser tag with Jake, when I did not have second place his sister did. Credit where credit is due. This means that either his sister is a good shot and player, or I got beat out by a girl. I prefer the first one.

I could tell you about the problems at work but not many care about a small dairy department in a small store in a small town, except me. So farewell and don’t forget to maintain your systems least the gods of technology frown on you and make your life a living ______.

The Word 'Unblowuppable' Gets Thrown Around A Lot These Days...

Don't get me wrong: My whole life isn't based on shooting people. I'm just really good at it.

Last night my brother, Jeff, had his belated laser tag birthday party. We played four games. I lead the scoring in all four.

Leon, again my teammate, was also my runner-up in most rounds. Just like Half-Life. Fun.

For all you budding laser taggers out there, here's my basic strategy.

1. Hold the gun high (next to your face) and always point it where you're looking. That way, you can shoot at whatever you see. The twin advantage to this strategy is that when your gun is by your face, it puts your elbows in the vicinity of your chest pack, making it harder for someone to kill you with a shot to the chest. This is not breaking rule #13 below because it’s a real combat strategy not a cowardly attempt at not getting shot.

2. Don't move too fast. First, you'll run into things if you go too fast. Second, you'll miss opportunities to shoot the other guys. Be methodical, and look everywhere. Point your gun where you’re looking, and shoot when you see something.

3. Shoot at everything, especially if there's no penalty for shooting your own teammates. Don't shoot your own guys intentionally, but if you're not sure, shoot first and get a positive ID later.

4. Find less-used areas of the playing field and exploit them. There's a part of our local arena that no one goes in much. Except me. I can shoot other players from there who don't expect me to be there.

5. Find well-traveled areas of the playing field and exploit them. I like to find the halls that feed in and out of the popular areas and shoot people as they come and go. That's a very handy trick.

6. Follow people. When someone runs right by you without shooting, it means they don't know you're there. Follow them and shoot them when you get a chance. Then duck behind a wall and if they're stupid enough not to get out of there, shoot them again when their pack comes back to life.

7. Always shoot the chest. Shoulders are a stun, but the chest is a kill. Big points difference. So learn to aim your gun and shoot at the good stuff.

8. Hide your own chest. If you're sniping, you WILL get seen eventually. So keep your vital parts hidden behind a wall. Only let the other guys see your gun. Then they can only shoot your gun. If you're running along a wall, crouch so your chest is below the wall. You don't want to die, do you?

9. Don't tell people where you're going. In other words, run away, but then run back. Odds are, you'll get an easy kill on someone who thinks you're long gone.

10. Oh yeah, when you're outnumbered, DO run. Run, damn you! Then maybe circle back and pick them off one at a time.

11. Don't get all hung up on bunkering down in a spot and holding it. Seriously, if it's such a great spot, why are so many people shooting you? Towers are a good example of this. Yeah, it's nice to have a height advantage, but when everyone flushes you out, maybe you don't want to go back there for a while, right? Last night we had guys that really, REALLY wanted to stay in the towers. So they died a lot. Because I killed them.

12. When you are shot (and you will be if you're playing with me), GO AWAY. Waiting around for your pack to come back to life so you can kill me is a bad strategy for two reasons. First, I'm probably not there anymore. Second, if I am sticking around to kill you again, I still have the advantage! Hello? My gun is still good! I can just shoot you over and over until you come back to life and then you're dead before you even get a shot off! Don't be stupid. Run when you're dead.

13. Don't cover your pack sensors with your hand. First, you've got three more sensors that your hand isn't covering that I WILL still shoot. And I'm a good shot. Second, you're a cowardly stupid little dink if you do this. Third, how are you going to use your gun effectively if you're too busy being a coward to think about shooting me? Fourth, did I mention that this is an extremely cowardly thing to do? Die with honor, you ugly Klingon.

My keyboard is going weird and I'm getting long-winded. So you're dismissed for now, maggots.

Congratulations, You Are Dead...

That was a pretty good LAN party.

Anyone who accuses me of feeling that way just because I did well and killed a lot will be vehemently shushed. And at least partly right.

I think we need to play that Subtransit map more often. On our last round in Subtransit, I lead the kills at 101. The runner-up was Leon, my team-mate, at 55. It was simply incredible.

I did OK in Crossfire and Boot Camp, but my-oh-my, I had no idea I could do that well in Subtransit. Wowser. And thanks for letting me win those, guys.

My son's face is just fine. It looked a lot worse at the time than it turned out to be. Now if he can just learn to stay in bed, we'll be great.

The wife and I are at peace again. The making up was nice. I like to make up.

Tomorrow I'll take my last final for this semester. It's been a hard semester.

Last night my parents got home from Bermuda. They had a great time, and they seem well sunned and rested.

And I'm going to be doing some fishing over the next couple of weeks.

In short, things are looking up! Now I have to find a job. Ick.