Friday, August 18, 2006

Talkin' 'bout the weather report...

Oh, Yeah!!! Talkin' 'bout the weather REPORT

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

There's Steelers fans, then there is(was) this guy














































And yes that is a Steeler's game on the TV. This will be Juddy one day with his plasma. Only question is will it be the Dolphins or the Steelers?

Those darn Germans

First, here is a fine example of German Structural Engineering.

And here is a fine example of German Megalomaniacal Engineering.

update for Big Z

well, i'm back in the states, just to let everyone know. it is nice to be home. still jet-lagged as fukk, but getting through it. my tentative plans are as follows:

monday through wednesday : bellaire catching up
thursday through saturday : columbus catching up (poker, drinking, titty bar, you know, whatever we can fit in and afford)
sunday (early-ish) : head back to bellaire to catch the race and a few beers at F-bar or wherever
monday on: BRISTOL, BABY!!!

i'll prolly head back to bellaire for a few days once we get back. i'll solidify labor day and post-labor day plans at bristol i'm guessing. emma is coming to ohio to visit just after labor day it seems. we'll prolly spend a few days in the valley, then head to columbus. then we can all get together, hang out, whatever. i figured since i haven't had a girlfriend in a while, i can show mine off before i piss her off enough to break up with me with my stupid antics. woohoo. ok that's it. later.

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Pure Genius

I need help. Can someone find a version of the old Guinness screen saver that works on XP? It's the Anticipation screen saver from circa 1995. It's the one with the guy dancing around. Apparently it only works on Win95 and Win 3.1

I'd even settle for an MP3 of the background music. It's a song called Guaglione by some guy named Perez. I have all of the .bmp files and figure I could piece together a new version with a decent flash editor. Hook a brother up.

Hell I'd even go for a copy of Win95 so I could take a look at how it is supposed to look before creating the new one. Any help will be appreciated.

Anonymous!!!

My long long rant about the old tower generated a post from an anonymous reader... It's either Ed or Rob and my money's on Ed. At any rate he brought up some GREAT memories I'd forgotten about. I have to comment on #3 though. One of our favorite pastimes was trying to figure out who we tried to talk to the night before at The Greenery. It turned out that the phone numbers were assigned based on what green you lived on. Then you could telnet into OU's system and use what amounted to a WHOIS lookup. Several times we would only be able to come up with a first name and two digits of a phone number and end up finding out exactly who the person was, what room they lived in, the full phone number, their permanent address, their parents' names, permanent phone number, etc.

Also, I'm going to install Virtual PC on my machine so I can install Win98 again and see if the Guinness screen saver will work (it's not a fan of XP). Stay tuned.

Anonymous... come forth and share your identity with us!

Pizza Heaven

A while ago I mentioned the Defelice Bros. Pizza over on Brice/Livingston here in Columbus. This solved half of my pizza quandry. Dicarlo's is in Hilliard and Steubenville pizza co. is downtown. But today my dreams came true when I found this:



Notice the address. Thank you pizza gods, thank you. I'm now considering moving back to the Refugee. Well maybe I'm not that pizza crazy just yet.

Sunday, August 06, 2006

Longest Post EVER

Sorry about that. Only after I posted did I realize it is so freaking big.

Back in the Day

Back in the day...

Remember back in the day when the cheapest tower you could buy was still about $1800? When I bought my blazing 166 MHz Pentium with 32 MB of RAM, a 2 MB video card, Sound Blaster AWE 32 (which was a 16 bit card but with a software upgrade worked like a 32 bit) and 3 GB hard drive in 1996, it was the machine everyone wanted to use in Crawford Hall. Well, they wanted to use it to play Worms or NHL '96 on the 17" monitor or listen to the same dozen or so MP3's I had, plus it was one of the few machines that could do all of that plus "blast" the sound from the 20 watt powered speaker system complete with a subwoofer (Altec Lansing something or other). Occasionally we would telnet into OU's system to finish our chemistry homework on CAPA and on extremely rare occasions, use Word to type up a paper. It was a computer built for entertainment and put the several 133 MHz machines to shame. Its ability to ward off more than one spilled beer was simply remarkable.

That machine set me back $2500. Considering the 200 MHz processor with the same setup cost $2900, it was a deal.

That machine served as my primary computer for five more years. It saw a classic game of NHL '97 where I led Ed 3-2 heading into the third period. I passed out after the puck was dropped. When I woke up we were in OT and the game finished tied at 3. Only later did Ed admit to pulling my goaltender with a minute left because he said he could not lose to someone who was passed out for the entire third period. It was UPGRADED to include a 10 Mbps Ethernet card in 1997 when we moved to Wilson Hall and got access to OU's network. It ran the first game controller system to allow four players and to allow all players to access eight buttons. Shortly thereafter, it ran the first TV tuner card on the market and served as my television when I moved to New South Green (the first TIVO?). It ran perfectly when I upgraded to OS to Win 98. When I got my 400 MHz blue laptop, the old tower streamed MP3s (at a screaming 1 Mbps) and shared its dialup connection to Wright State's modem pool with it. Of course, who can forget all of the audio editing with Goldwave and graphic editing with Photoshop 3.0-5.0. Even after my move to NC, it still ran my NES and SNES emulators and more.

Did I mention the eclectic collection of stickers on the case? Everything from the nWo Wolfpack to the Mine Safety and Health Administration's "It's Not Just Dust, It's Silica". If you ever need to escape a collapsed mine, you'll find directions on how to signal rescuers. Hopefully you remembered to take the computer with you.

However, the old girl was showing her age. When I got my 1.7 GHz with 512 MB RAM laptop, I used the tower less and less. When I bought the house, I didn't even bother to set it up after I moved in.

That is, until today. I expected to it to fire up right away, and I was not disappointed. After all, except for one incident when I didn't seat the video card properly and didn't realize it until after Dell was kind enough to send a replacement motherboard (back when you got 3 year parts replacement warranties standard), it hasn't let me down.

I knew it was time to do something with it. After all, not too many apps will run on a 166. So, I happened to have an old 500 MHz machine that was replaced at work. As it should happen, it was the same exact case as my 166. I decided that while most of the hardware would be different and essentially the 166 was going to have to be put down, I could at least salvage the plastic shell. Not many apps will run on a 500 either, but XP runs pretty well. I decided it could at least be a file server, beta tester, or play music off the network. So, I took the RAM, 52x CD burner, and 3 GB hard drive from the old tower and plugged them in the new machine. I took the plastic shell off of the case and replaced it with the old, sticker-covered shell. My tower was back.

It's funny how something like a 10 year old computer can bring back so many memories. My first instinct was to put it in the trash and move on. Then I got to looking at all of those damn stickers. There were so many good times shared around that computer. Parties in 14x10 dorm rooms with enough people it had to be a fire code violation, chatting on IM, listening to music and watching the Geiss visualizations until you got ill to your stomach. Rigging a peer-to-peer network at Chad's so we could trade MP3s. Suddenly I couldn't let it go.

Ultimately most people will call it a waste of an afternoon, salvaging a few computer parts that are completely obsolete and putting them in a machine that is 90% obsolete. Stripping some plastic of a metal frame and putting it on another metal frame. Nearly all of the original parts of the old tower aren't even in the "new" tower. But my Dell with the blue Dimension XPS P166s faceplate and dozens of random stickers has been with me from Athens to Bellaire to Athens again to Bellaire again to Dayton to Cary and now to Fuquay. Now I get to keep it for a little while longer. Time well spent.

I thnk I'll try and hook it up to the 50" DLP HDTV and 1000 watt 7.1 Dolby Digital setup... after all, the TV does have a computer input jack. Amy's gonna love that thing sitting in the living room.

Saturday, August 05, 2006

I Love Outsourcing...



and speaking of outsourcing havens...

Z, don't worry about emma poisoning your driver, the Indian people have been drinking pesticide for a while now

Thursday, August 03, 2006

A Strange Coincidence

I was at work on Monday and happened to look outside to see a camper parked way out in no-man's-land in the lot. I didn't think too much of it at first, but then I took a closer look. The first thing I noticed was that it was a late 70's / early 80's Coachman camper, exactly the same as the one Russ and I have for the Bristol trip. I mean this camper was exactly the same, from the window placement, to the bump up in the rear where the bunk beds are. The only difference is that our camper looks about a hundred years older. While that was interesting, what really peaked my interest was what was pulling it. Lo and behold, directly in front of the camper was a 1991 white, full-sized Chevy van, EXACTLY like the one Russ and I have to pull said camper! My first thought was that Russ got bored and decided to test drive our camper 130 miles to Columbus, only to drive past and park outside my work. While that could have very well been the case, my second thought was that this is some really strange coincidence. Anyway, here's a pic of the camper parked out in front of work.


Tuesday, August 01, 2006

A B-Town Boy P.S.A.

It is not attractive. It is not cool. It makes people wonder if you are on drugs. It may stop you from eating hot wings. This disease is called "Hyperhidrosis", or "Excessive-Sweating Syndrome". It affects 1% of the worlds population (and possibly several of the B.T.B.'S) and can be treated. If you or a loved one suffers from 'E.S.S.', please, call or instruct that person to call a physician.


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