what's the point?

starting march 1, european users of microsoft windows will be given the choice of having something other than Internet Explorer as their default browser. in my opinion, the european competition commission wasted both their own time (and money) and microsoft's by arguing for this. on the last four computers i've owned, one of the first things i've done after the initial setup is to hop online (using IE) and download a different browser; right now i've got both firefox and chrome, and just keep IE around for the rare occasion when i have to manually update some microsoft product.

everybody who knows what they're doing and doesn't like IE will be doing something similar... at best, this will save them a minute or two. and the people who don't know what they're doing still won't have a clue, but now they'll have more choices to confuse them. so really... what was the point of this? way to go europe!

well... huh.

i've been reading and thoroughly enjoying the dresden files, by jim butcher... just finished up the 'last' (in the sense that the next one won't be published for several months) of them today. i knew it had been a series on sci-fi, and decided to check hulu for it this evening. lo and behold, it was there.

so i watched the first episode.

what. the. f**k.

the tv series is "based on the novels" in the same way that a bowl of sugar is part of a complete breakfast. as long as you remember to eat it with a few pieces of toast, a glass of milk, a glass of juice, and a bowl of actual cereal, that is.

i can understand the writers making up cases that were different from those in the books, and to some extent inventing characters to go along with those. but some of the rest... not so much. i stopped counting errors after i ran out of fingers, but i'm quite certain i would have run out of toes and possibly hairs as well. if i were feeling slightly more obsessive-compulsive, i would (and still might at some point) re-watch it, just to get an accurate count. off the top of my head:

1) bob should be a slightly perverted air spirit, not a ghost

2) harry shouldn't be using electricity

3) harry should be driving the blue beetle, not a jeep

4) murphy should be blonde, and shorter

5) they screwed up the name of harry's old teacher, and made him a relative

6) the "skinwalker" from the first episode is entirely different from the one that just made its appearance in book eleven.

7) no mister?

8) harry should be living in a basement, not a regular house

9) bob should be in harry's lab in the sub-basement, not on a shelf in the living room

10) murphy shouldn't have a kid

and there are all my fingers.

as for the tags: this is a very bad thing, based on a very good (and slightly nerdy) thing, and i recommend never putting yourself through it.

hey kid! i'm a computer!

stop all the downloading!

on a slightly more serious note, the time has come for me to build a new computer. the graphics card on my old system finally gave out on me after about three and a half years, and things have advanced enough since then that i decided to start from scratch and build a completely new compy. right now i'm running everything off of my laptop; it's more than enough for every day tasks, but not quite up to snuff as far as gaming is concerned.

so far i've got a good chunk of the pieces (see below), but i'm still not entirely sure which mobo and processor i want to use. any input from those familiar with computer bits and pieces would be much appreciated.

Case: Antec Nine Hundred
Power Supply: Corsair CMPSU-850TX
RAM: Corsair XMS3 DDR3 SDRAM 1333
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Black
Graphics Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 275 Superclocked Edition

as far as the big stuff goes, here's what i'm thinking so far:

Processor: Intel Core i7-920 Bloomfield
Motherboard: EVGA X58 SLI LE

i'm also considering picking up an SSD to use for the OS, but i'm not really sure the bang is worth my buck. i got one opinion on how big of a drive i should have for that (100gb), which seemed a bit big to me, as well as a bit pricey... the 80gb drives i saw were all $230+.

questions? comments? discuss amongst yourselves.

bass ackwards

i'm really not sure how amazon's shipping system works. i preordered Wrath of the Lich King a good two months before it came out, with regular shipping, and it got to me 4 days after the game released... which also happened to be one day after i went out and bought another copy because i got tired of waiting. last thursday, i ordered some beef jerky--a type i really like, but haven't been able to find locally lately. i chose the free "super-saver" shipping, which in theory is slower. the package shipped the next day, and was waiting for me when i got home from work. and it was shipped through the US post office, which is generally not known for it's speed. heck, it takes me three days to mail something from here to spokane, and i can drive there in less than three hours.

happy belated birthday

to the prince of darkness:

question of the day...

amd or intel? i want a quad-core cpu, and hope to be rocking dual graphics cards in sli/crossfire as well. any recommendations are welcome.

hooray for nerds!

rachel lucas = my hero.

laziness, or a shout out?

i've probably mentioned it before, but i'm a huge fan of the stargate: sg-1 series. i just finished season 8, and seasons 9 and 10 are sitting on the shelf begging to be opened. recently, i saw a name that i recognized from the show: kelowna, a country on another planet that one of the main characters was from. and i thought "wait a minute, why is the wenatchee rotary club doing something with people from a fictional location?" but it turns out kelowna is also a city in british columbia, a four hour drive from where the show was filmed in vancouver. which really makes me wonder how many other locations on the show are named after places on earth. so the question is: were they just lazy when they were coming up with names, or did they think highly enough of the area to decide to put it out there for everyone to see?

oooh...

yeah, i want one of these too.

i bet the wife was a horde character

because let's face it... those horde folk? they're pricks.

man, i need to start playing that again

nethack is probably one of the greatest games ever. even though it could potentially make you hate life, or at least various letters of the alphabet. for those who haven't played it before, nethack is considered a roguelike game, where everything is represented by keyboard letters and symbols: your character (@) fights his way past grid bugs (x), orcs (o), dragons (D), and vampires (V), quaffing potions (!), reading scrolls (?) and spellbooks (+), and picking up gold ($) and gems (*), watching out for traps (^) on his way to the staircase to the next level (>). see the link above for a more complete description.

this post was inspired by something i found while cleaning out my email inbox, a "theme song" of sorts that a friend sent me a few years back:

Play Nethack
By Francisco Rangel


(To the tune of Paint It Black by The Rolling Stones)

I see a red D and I want to play nethack
Go down to Gehennom and bring the trinket back
I see the grid bugs bite, the Kop runs with a hose
I light my magic lamp and so the darkness goes

Drop stuff on altars but they're cursed so they glow black
I stash my scrolls and potions in an oilskin sack
I see corpses all around, I'll eat them right away
Hope I get intrinsics, hope my god will let me pray

Sit on a throne and get to genocide some L's
The Oracle will speak, and the shopkeeper sells
Get a prize from Sokoban and then on to clear the quest
Kill Medusa, find the castle, open up that chest

The Valley of the Dead, and David's Treasure Zoo
I'll visit Vlad and get the Candelabrum too
If I look hard enough for the vibrating square
I'll kill the wizard, get the Book, and I'll be there

I'll get the amulet and make a run for it
With demons on my tail, I hope I don't get hit
Go through the planes and reach the altars at the end
I'll sacrifice the amulet and I'll ascend

I wanna beat this game, it's so hard, cannot save, can't restart
I'll go to Gehennom, with my pet by my side
Don't eat the food that's tainted, tainted, tainted, or you'll die, yeah!

for something so simple, it gives a very accurate description of the gameplay... much like weird al's "the saga begins" did for star wars: episode I.

also while checking back on the main nethack page, i found another theme song, which not only has lyrics, but also some music to go along with it.

on which note, it's time for me to get back to greek. but i see the length of this post as a good thing; it means i still have some procrastination skills.

there comes a time...

...when, despite all your previous protests to the contrary, you must finally break down and start playing WoW. i never denied that it was a good game, i just always felt that the $15/month could be spent better elsewhere. but no more. my little brother got the game for christmas, and i'm hooked. i'm currently working on the 10-day free trial that came with it, and i'm headed into town this weekend to pick up the full version.

right now, here are my characters:

*Menoichius: Human Paladin, level 15. I believe the server is Eltrigg, or something like that. But that's on my little brother's account, so I'm going to be re-creating him in Boulderfist.

*Klavicus: Undead Warlock, level 6. Just started this guy tonight, on the Hakkar(?) server. I know, I really should pay more attention to the server names. But he's not going to be my primary character, and it was the first "recommended" one that didn't have a queue.

i am a huge nerd

i now own a first edition copy of "contact" by carl sagan.