Almost puppy time

I'm getting a Border Collie puppy in a few weeks. Can't wait! The pup is the from one of the nicest dogs I've ever met, Suke. Lotsa energy and QUIET! I was playing fetch with Suke and a few very young cousins a couple weeks ago. She would weave her way through the noisy little guys and bring the frisbee directly to me instead of them, what a great dog!

Also, my bloody Nexus One crapped out on me. Sending to HTC for repairs :(

Great moments in Borderlands history

Great moments in Borderlands history

Buying a new laptop

Mr Pip think he needs a new laptop. His 4 year old Acer is very slow. Maybe he should just try re-installing windows on it again? And create an image backup this time so it can be easily restored? If it wasn't for the slow speed, he wouldn't really need a new laptop... 

He read about some cool free imaging backup software here :http://lifehacker.com/5303067/five-best-free-system-restore-tools

Finding my voice cont'd

Mr.Pip thought it might be fun to write this blog as a story rather than in the first person. "yes... that will do nicely" he thought.

Finding my voice

I read a little tidbit of good advice on reddit today. there was a posting from a guy who is newly homeless and wanted to thank the reddit community for unknowingly saving his life. One of the advice posting that followed up said something along the lines of "write every day, you will eventually find your voice". That kinda resonated with me a bit. I'm not a very good writer and have a pretty limited vocabulary. I guess practice, practice, practice can't be a bad idea. I hope to write a little something everyday I can from now on. Doesn't matter if anyone reads it or not.

Work is going good right now. Life is topsy turvy, combining the extremely bad condition of my dad, and the excitement of my first baby on the way. I took a picture of my wife and my dad in the hospital. There will at least be this tenuous link from grandpa to grandchild.

Getting a dog, what name?

Hmmm, 

I like Xeno as its short for the Greek guy Xenophon. 

I like Roose 'cause it's short for Rooster who was a really cool character in Gates of Fire and Roose is close to it's mother's name Suke.

I also like Amra because he is the coolest fictional character of all (Conan)

Hmmm, decisions.

New phone

Just got a google Nexus One. What a huge jump in technology from my samsung r610! Even without a cell plan, its worth having as a mini computer.

Why was Avatar a good movie?

I just saw Avatar a week or so ago. My expectations before seeing it went like this:

• it'll be good because of James Cameron
• it'll suck because the story seems pretty weak and predictable
• it'll be good because of the what reviewers are saying about the visuals (people suffering depression over how lame the real world is?)

I really enjoyed the movie despite it being so predictable. When you think about it lots of movies are predictable. It was one of those movies that just have a feeling/aura about it. It did a good job in never wavering from its simple story, it didn't have any "dumb" moments that I was expecting. Maybe its because you're so busy just looking at the world of Pandora, I don't know. It didn't shy away from killing off alot of main characters either.

There's not many movies I look forward to seeing twice, but Avatar's one of them.

Good job James Cameron!

This is a test

 

Funny

2ur1h6t.gif (GIF Image, 320x240 pixels)


Some funny shit here

SUV commercials are So Stupid

They always show some yuppies "conquering nature" by somehow DRIVING up a fucking mountain! They don't show the actual drive of course, they just show the SUV magically sitting on top. Uh, roads stop where the trail begins. And not many trails are wide enough for a fucking car. and even then there's no way you could drive it (yuppies would know this if they ever hiked)

What really bothers me is that these ads imply you are somehow connecting with nature BY DRIVING THROUGH IT. Fuck that, drive your beater honda civic to the parking lot, and HIKE UP THE FUCKING MOUNTAIN! Thats a bit more outdoorsy dont you think?

Be a fucking man and walk!

Why do end up with Shit?

UPDATE!!

The toshiba laptop I wrote this blog on broke (would not power up). I took it back. Big fucking surprise. I am now the proud owner of a plain-jane Acer. Go Acer!!

---

It's depressing to think about all the crap I've bought that I've had to return. And i usually buy the "good stuff" to avoid crap. There is no such thing as the "good stuff" when I buy it. I will include all electronics I've bought, good and bad.
Lets start in 98

Bought a handbuilt computer ($1500) off a roommates friend. Kept crashing. Needed new video card. Still kept crashing, turned out to be the network card. Less than 2 years later, the motherboard fried, also destroying the processor. Also destroyed another processor when testing. cd drive stopped working within a month as well.

Bought new motherboard and cpu. didn't work with my system. returned it. Used the roommates computer for a while.

Bought premium Voodoo computer (for like $2800) in order to not have problems. Right. Crashed whenever using notepad of all things. NOTEPAD! Had to have it fixed (1-2 weeks).

Bought a $500 cd burner when they were new, 6 months later it only made coasters. exchanged it (luckily i had extended warranty)

bought top of line cl audio card. Caused my games to crash. returned it.

bought external drive enclosure, didn't work. returned it.

bought toshiba TV, had red distortion, returned it. bought another, it has same problem, but its too much of a hassle with a small car to return it again.

bought lite-on dvd burner, it wouldnt even read the dvds it came with!

bought absolute top-of-line 22" CRT monitor online for $1200 (i didnt wanna risk getting a lemon,bought the good one)! within a year image distortion, had to have it shipped at my expense to ontario ($100) got refurnished unit instead. had to wait 3-4 weeks.

bougth brand-name boxed ATI radeon video card for $300. within a year its memory melted. sent away for warranty work.

bought toshiba dvd recorder. first movie, it skipped chapters. returned it.

bought sony laptop. keyboard broke. returned it.

bought compaq laptop. burnt out pixels. returned it.

bought top-of-line toshiba laptop.burnt out pixels. kept it (got tired of returning things)

bought RCA mp3 player.menu system didnt work (could not get to main menu). returned it.

---

I hate buying stuff, no kidding 75% percent of the stuff i buy does not work correctly. It uncanny how bad my luck is. I do have some good buys though... my toshiba dvd player, lg lcd, toshiba projector, kenwood receiver, sharp tv. but 5 out of like 25 aint that impressive!

---

Stupid Stupid Farmers

Thousands of farmers gathered on Parliament Hill Wednesday to seek help in competing against subsidized agricultural producers from abroad

Why the hell should I have my tax money going to stupid fuckin farmers? They like to think they're a buncha macho old-school, hard working, good folk. But they are as dumb as a bag of nails (even my farmer grandpa said that when he actually tried organize them). If you want more money, charge more for your fucking product! If people don't buy it, then TOO FUCKIN BAD! That's capitalism! If you get free money because you are in "hard times" then every industry should get free money. I went 6 months without work in my industry and I got ZERO from the government, not even EI because I was a contractor. I knew the risks so I SAVED MY FUCKIN MONEY for when times got hard, and I didn't complain. Farmers are so pro capitalism when it comes to selling illegally in the states when prices are high, and now they want free money when prices are low. Gimme a fucking break. And subsidis have nothing to do with it, if consumer want to support local farmers, they will pay more, if not cry to mama and get a NEW JOB that the economy wants!

Who needs a financial advisor anyway?

A fool and his money ... are soon parted by scumbags

"The suit alleges that the H&R Block Company steered hundreds of thousands of its clients, including almost 30,000 New Yorkers, into IRAs that were virtually guaranteed to lose money because of a combination of hidden fees and low interest rates.

The conduct described in today’s complaint is particularly appalling because many of those hardest hit were working families who struggle to save,” Spitzer said. “Instead of providing these families with accurate information that would have allowed them to make informed choices, H&R Block steered them into retirement accounts that actually shrank over time.”

The Attorney General’s office began the investigation in 2005 after receiving information from an H&R Block tax preparer.

Over the past four years, H&R Block opened more than half a million “Express IRA” accounts for its tax preparation clients. Customers were told that the IRA paid “great rates”and was “a better way to save,” but 85 percent of the customers who opened the accounts paid the company more in fees than they earned in interest. More than 150,000 H&R Block customers closed their accounts, incurring additional undisclosed fees, as well as nearly $6 million in tax penalties"

Story

Man, people are scum in all walks of life. I experienced something similar to this at a well known investment place. I wanted a safe place for a big lump of cash I had until I bought a house. He called me up and showed me a fund that paid like 3 or 4% GUARANTEED. It seemed like what I wanted, and was about to sign up when I decided to read the small print. There was a mgmt fee that woulda knocked the interest down to less than 1%! Fucker! He played dumb when I showed him that. Either he's an asshole or an idiot, needless to say, I do my own investment from now on. The only other investment guy I had showed me how to lose 10K in the dotCom crash. Thanks for the expert advice!

Hmmm, where to park....

"When I roll into work @ 7:45AM, I have my pick of parking spots. I park in the least convenient spot, and exert the 5 extra calories needed to walk the additional 25 yards. These days, this is what passes for "exercise".

So when I adjust the office blinds for the rising sun at 8:30, guess my frustration level when I see this:"

Hmmm, this guys seems to know what he's doing, I'll park next to him! People ARE sheep!

Link

Whats up with the Chancellor of Germany?

Did a family member die? Did she lose an election? Just sit on a whoopy cushion?



Nah... she's being linked to the US invasion of Iraq in a "smear" campaign. Ha ha. Thats what the rest of the civilized world thinks of Bushy's war in Iraq. Just being linked to it can do some serious political damage.

Now thats a look that says "distraught"

Story

An ounce of prevention...

is worth a pound of cure right? Yah, in principle its a lot easier to prevent something than deal with it later.

If you disagree with that stop reading and pray to your god for more brain power or something.

Lets assume there are 10 ounces in a pound. 10 to 1 ratio.

Why don't we spend just as much (or more) on cancer prevention as we do on cancer treatment?

Lets say every $100,000 saves a cancer patient. That same money could have been used to prevent 10 people from getting cancer in the first place! Or any other disease for the matter. Believe it or not, your life choices can lead to or from disease.

The simple, sad, true, cynical answer of course it that there's no money in preventing disease. But there's lots of money in treating it.

Do you donate money? I think about how much farther my money would go if it went into prevention. Any cancer charity that does not list cancer prevention as a major goal does not get my money. Its not that I don't care, in fact the opposite.

BoringBack Mountain

I went to see Brokeback Mountain on friday. I wanted to see what all the hype was about.

The hype I heard was things like being nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor type shit.


Best Picture? Well here is an official synopsis, which should have warned me:
"Two young men -- a ranch-hand and a rodeo cowboy -- meet in the summer of 1963, and unexpectedly forge a lifelong connection, one whose complications, joys, and tragedies provide a testament to the endurance and power of love"

Anything with "provide a testament to the endurance and power of love" sounds pretty fucking wishy-washy to me.



I didn't see alot of this power of love though, unless you mean sneaking out a couple time a year for a mountain fling is a testament to love.


The one dude didn't want to risk moving in with the other guy cause he thought they'd be murdered. uh... wouldn't risking your life be a better testament to love than sneaking around behind your wife's back?


Not much of a story, they have unhappy marriages, and don't seem to have many friends. Wow real interesting and brave material.


As for best actor? Nothing wrong with either of their performances except nothing is easier to pretend to be than a typical retard cowboy! Just grunt a few words under your breath and thats it. Kissing a guy takes guts, but I dont think they hand out oscars for that...

or do they?