I Am an Addict

[Whizbang]

I guess I might as well admit it; I am an addict.  I almost want something on the computer to go bad so I can buy something new.  If I don't need to replace anything, I may even try to come up with a reason for buying something.  The problem is that I rarely have the money for it and will try to find something to sell in order to buy what I want.   ;D  I will look on Ebay for good deals that I suspect are worth much more than the going price and then snipe them at the last few seconds of the auction.  If I don't need the purchase, I will test it and then re-sell the item on Ebay in a much more customer friendly motif.  My 100% approval on Ebay is a big plus.  I have even been known to pick up and sell aluminum cans to finance my cravings.  What makes this so accommodating is that my wife also has become a computer junkie and lets me get by with this atrocious habit.

OK, in all honesty, it's too hot to fish; I don't play golf; it is too hot even if I did, and my wife and I at least share a common addiction and space, as in about the same four-foot square area at the same time.  The practical side of this is that we rarely eat out (too fattening and way too expensive); we haven't fished in two years because of the drought that persisted and the oppressive heat; gardening also came to a halt for the same latter reasons; our kids are no longer kids; and neither are we.  When I reassess my problem, I guess I am really just taking a viable and sensible course of alternative emotional appeasement and am actually not an addict at all. 

Now, about my obsession for cats...   ???

[Ace]

Hello; my name is Ace, and I'm an alcoholic.

I figured I might as well get that out of the way.  I hope this isn't one of those Top Ten Steps rooms, since I usually don't read past "8."  I haven't fished for years, either.  I am going to golf today.  The only thing I might get for the computer is a dupe video card to try the SLI thing, since that was kinda the point.  Although I'm afraid I'll probably hobble the thing once I do it.  I'm going to watch some of the Open instead of going out to play.  We had a football opener party for the ND-GT game Saturday, and I had a few Coronas just to distract me from it.  I only had two yesterday, and a Chardonnay with our grilled chicken with salad dinner.  I'm glad Michigan played, just to draw attention away from ND.  Michigan was on the Sports Illustrated College Football Preview cover.  Go figure.

I had coffee, today.  Hi; my name is Ace, and I'm a coffeeholic. 

Ace; actually, my name isn't "Ace."

[Mark H]

That sounds like my problem of NAS (Nikon Aquisition Syndrome). Now they have a new DSLR I want.  ::)

Mark H

[Buffalo2102]

Hi, I'm Buff.  Can't remember what my name is though.

I'm not an alcoholic but I love wine - I guess I'm a winer.

I also can't stop buying bits for my PC.  Recently, I have bought a new graphics card, even though my previous card was running everything fine.  I bought a new processor, even though I didn't need to upgrade.  I just bought a Raptor hard drive.  Having reinstalled everything, I found that not only was it no faster than previously but it sounded like someone hitting a tin roof with a stick.  I've put the old Samsung back in now.

Like Whiz though, I use E-Bay a lot and so the Raptor will be sold for about the same price I bought it.  The graphics upgrade from a X1950Pro to a 8800GTS only cost me Ã?£80 and the CPU upgrade from E6300 to E6600 only cost me Ã?£40.

Buff; upgraded

[Ace]

Well, that was meaningless.  I have no idea how to measure pounds as a monetary unit.  Although with inflation, I'm up a number since last decade.  It'd be like checking my speed in kilometers per hour.  It's probably a good thing I don't buy stuff in Britain since I could get taken and wouldn't even know it.  And they probably just use the Buy it Now! button on eBay and don't even bother to bid in 50 cent increments and miss out on the last half hour of the dang auction and a swell golf club since you were out playing golf instead of watching the dang auction.  I've only bought one used computer part and that was Scuzzzy's old mobo and that was at a horrendous price let alone the ridiculous shipping charge although it did work fine so I gave it away.

Ace; the root word of "addict" is ADD

[Buffalo2102]

Don't worry about pounds - stick to dollars.  Everybody knows Dollars.  Just think dollars and divide by two - that's how many pounds it is.

The UK is now more of an island than ever - an island of Pounds in a sea of Euros.

Buff; Sterling

[Ace]

I wish I could divide my pounds by two... I'd almost move to England, for that. 

So a pound is only 50 cents a pound? Geez, that's pretty cheap.  Cheaper than baloney, I bet.  No wonder you live way over there, at those prices.

Ace; I should be a financial analyst.

[pat]

I prefer to think of it as being an enthusiast not necessarily an addict. I just upgraded some parts in one of my systems. Bought one of those Athlon 64 6000+ at $169. That price point is just too hard to pass up. Paired it up with 2 gigs of Crucial Ballistix DDR2 800 for $69 (after rebate), again hard to pass that deal. Put it on an ASUS M2N-SLI with an inexpensive XFX NVIDA 8600 video card and used parts I already had to finish it up. Went with my Vista Ultimate I got from the beta program and I think I�ll just play around with that for a while. Also picked up an Avermedia AverTV Combo PCI-E media center edition card with remote. Haven�t had a chance to install that yet, but should in the next couple of days.

[Whizbang]

My enthusiasm has been renewed.  A friend of my daughter would like for me to put together a system for him.  Since I am either inherently stupid, senile, or ridiculously generous, I told her that I would do it for free if he would simply buy the parts.  I might look for possible rebates in the process, but waiting for any remuneration from them would be like waiting for Rip Van Winkle to awaken.

[pat]

So can I guess DeeAnna is your new enthusiastic endeavor?

[pat]

Hey, good for you.  ;)

Wondered why you hadn't been around much.

Been a busy summer for me, hasn't been much extra time.

[Ace]

If I busted this gut I could take out most of Lower Michiana.

I'm glad to hear about you and DeeAnna too, unless she's a cat.  Murphy owns two cats, which explains a lot.  They're house sitting a large black dog named Elvin, who resembles a bear.  I went over to meet him, and he's a'ight.  Stinks though. 

I'm glad J and D got together, since it knocked that annoying cat rap off the top spot.  There's no need to promote either cats or rap.  They go together like "Pandas" and "The Works."  Even Elvin didn't stink that bad.

About the only computer devices I'm looking to buy are new games.  I finished Call of Duty II, and after winning the war repeatedly it doesn't offer much anymore.  I put off Oblivion, since it reminds me too much of work.  I guess I should update my Bears and Colts rosters, and play my Madden 2006.  Except you actually have to create a guy, and name him and provide his attributes and...

Hmm... like a Jester. 

Ace; ok, I can do that.

[scuzzy]

I'm not addicted to being an enthusiastic video gamer, although I admit that I enjoyed Myst when it first came out. However, Call of Duty has interested me once or twice.

What's your take on it Mr. Jester? Is it worth it? Fun? Challenging? Educational? Should I get version 1, 2 or 5? Do I need to do them in order? Does anybody really know what time it is?

Scuzzy; Ace, hand me that flame thrower.

[Ace]

You know, on second thought, I'm NOT an alcoholic...

Alcoholics go to meetings.  I'm probably just a drunk.

Anyway, as to ACE'S GAMING NEWS, on the subject of Call of Duty 1 vs. Duty II; don't buy Medal of Honor.  I don't know what the new Airborne one is, but I've never seen such a convoluted mess.  You're in a squad, and stuck with them.  There are very few movement options.  It's tedious.  I eventually got stuck on the beach on D-Day, and there was really no way to get off or out... I finally just gave up on it.

COD similarities; you start with a fairly tedious "training" exercise in both to learn how to watch coordinates and move and shoot and blow stuff up... It seemed shorter in 2, and actually leads to the first combat.  Both have you fight as a Russian, a Brit, and a Yank.  Both have a good amount of realism.

COD 2 is way better.  Scenery, explosions, bullets hitting, realism is sharper.  You are not nearly as restricted on movement, and have options on where you want to go to do your mission.  Not nearly as linear.  In 1, you have to find and use "health packs."  In 2, you just need to find cover and rest briefly.  2 also adds the risk of grenades coming at you, with an indicator.  So you get blown up as much as you get shot...  Both offer a range of difficulty, but with 2 you can replay and change it while with 1 you have to start the entire game over with a setting.  I'm finding replaying 2 is much more fun than going back over 1, as it doesn't need to repeat as much even though your mission is the same.

If you can find 1 cheap, it's fun.  But for spending the money and time definitely get 2.  One cool thing in the first version is being a Russian and crossing into Stalingrad and NOT getting a rifle... so you need to find one, and hang around a "protector" to get by for awhile...  Had some interesting vehicle riding (including tank battles) too.  In 2, you don't travel as much in vehicles but there is a double tank battle sequence.  Also has a mission where you need to spot, for artillery...  And a grueling D-Day launch (that you CAN survive...).  Nice mix of desert fighting, city fighting, building fighting, firing cannons if you want, range of weapons.  You need to hold your breath to be accurate with a sniper/scoped rifle in 2.  I think NOT having to find health boosts is a really nice touch, as that gets tedious playing a game in "near death mode" and knowing one bump is going to do you in...

For realism, your guys speak English but Germans actually speak German.  Go figure.  Going with the enemies weapons is an advantage, since you can grab ammo from the dead ones.  Each campaign and nationality has different weapons, too.  And they react differently, as far as sound/action/effect. 

I think next I'm going to look for a fighter flight sim.  Would be a nice break.  If you want a weird combo monster/Nazi fighter go for Return to Castle Wolfenstein.... but, while enjoyable, that really is one weird game.  For a stealth/bothersome/battle and nightmare combo do FEAR.  Weapons there are awesome (especially if you learn the cheat to get them ALL) but it's also a strange combination of battle and freakiness.

Ace; any war game beats the real thing.

[scuzzy]

Well thanks for giving me too much info. Now I'm really confused.

Okay, so I absolutely want Medal of Honor with a side of cod and then I set the characters to fight over dessert. And don't forget to pack Heath Bars.

This should be fun.

Scuzzy; Every time I see the words "Call of Duty", it makes me want to go to the bathroom.

[Bill]

As might be heard in one of the aforementioned meetings, 'Thanks for sharing.'

Bill; hic.

[Ace]

I think it's so cool we all have our actual photos up now for our avatars, except Bill who went with his shield. 

Look, I could share the dang games except I need the dang disk to play them.. unlike Diablo or MS Golf where the whole thing could load and you could just take off from the hard drive.  I did try to burn a game disk, once, but we won't talk about that... 

I went to Best Buy to shop; only thing they had was Microsoft Battle for Europe or something like that fight flight sim.  I was also going to get "Departed" and "Pan's Labrynth" since they were on sale for $9 each.  Except I found out that was the Labor Day sale, and not now.  So I left all three at the checkout.  Stupid store.  hey; here's a cheer

Fight Flight Sim
Catrapcrap
Booyah Booyah
Take a nap.


Ace is the A in AA...

[Ace]

Well, not like crystal meth.. I mean the software.  Although I do pop a pseudoephedrine on occasion, straight. 

Per Chandler's advice and recommendation I got connected to OnSpeed internet compression booster rocket.  U.S.  $49 per year, as advertised.  And it has been working well.  I signed in Friday after locating the American link (since it's out of London primarily) and tuned in.  I've got it set to near the highest speed/diminished video capability, plus have the Earthlink accelerator turned up.  Seems to me the OnSpeed does its thing independently, so really the pictures aren't any worse than just using the Earthlink tool turned up.  Speed is a lot crisper and non-delayed.  Only delay I'm getting is at initial connection, when the OnSpeed seeks its server and the Kaspersky is updating and everything is trying to go 3 directions at once.  Email (Outlook Express) is ok with it too.  So thanks Chandler for poiniting it out; it's a good improvement over the normal thumb-twiddling I do online.  I did OnSpeed's test, first before having it and after, and their results were incredibly better on time to download.  I figure I'm gonna be landlocked and stuck with dial-up for some time here, so made sense to at least try to push it to a higher plane.

Might try a YouTube feed, to see if it makes any difference there.  But am happy with the improvements I've gotten. 

Ace; zoom zoom

[scuzzy]

Wow. That is a big improvement. I had a hard time reading your poast because it went up so fast. I'm accustomed to your messages being as slow as molasses.

Also, try placing your computer in the attic. This makes it work like a gigantic slide in which your data gets a running start into cyber-world. You should see significant speed improvements by doing that.

For faster downloads, put your computer in the basement.

Scuzzy; and don't forget to add chrome exhaust tips.

[Whizbang]

Don't worry about pounds - stick to dollars.  Everybody knows Dollars.  Just think dollars and divide by two - that's how many pounds it is.

If only weight were measured in dollars,  then, all of the extremely over "dollared" people in the USA could divide that by two and lose half of their weight to pounds.  I am not sure that would be a big help though because I have seen a bunch that could easily divide by three before the alarm would stop sounding.

[Whizbang]

For faster downloads, put your computer in the basement.

I'm glad you didn't mention uploads.  With Pat's sewer modem, that could really be hard to clean the hard drive; and there is no telling what a virus might do.

[Ace]

It seems like now I can poast faster than I can think.

There's no way anyone is fitting into my attic; you can't get through the access in the closet in the guest room.  We had squirrels up there once, who were immense, but they entered from the outside.  The Critter Control guy couldn't get up there to check it out.  So, no, it wasn't just due to that pounds affliction Whiz mentioned.

It's like inflation gets worse every year. 

I don't know if Pat's uploads of dirty jokes and and videos and obscene phone calls could be any quicker, but his downloads of trees is already fast.  Scuzzy probably loads fast too, and that's with an automatic.  And how come the dang British guys got their way with the metric system, let alone OnSpeed??  I remember when we had a good ol' 100 yard dash, and mph, and yard sticks, and you could get a gallon of wine and not some liter of whatever.  And floppie disks were 5 inches or so and a foot was full sized. 

Ace; my feet are a foot, each.

[pat]

I think that would be downlogging, I think.

Anyway, got in the car and took the train to Chicago the other day, the only way to fly. Went to the Celticfest, that was all good especially the Searson band. Three sisters, a dad and one other guy on the drums. Might try and find something of them on YouTube so you can check out the newly found super fast internet connection.

[Ace]

Is it quicker to Chicago or by train?

You should have a blog on downlogging.  Hey; do you pronounce it "Keltic" or "Seltic"?  Maybe you can find a clip of the Searson's getting Tasered while performing at a Kerry talk.  I think Ozzy is probably getting to the point where he'd need to be Tasered to perform...

Ace; three sisters, a dad and another guy walk into a bar in Chicago and ask "Hey... is this the way to the Celticfest?" and the bartender goes. 

[pat]

By train, with a K and the bartender says; "What is this some kind of a joke."

And that is enough questions for so early in the morning, gives me a headache.

But not too early for a bad joke.

A baby seal walks into a bar and sits down. "What can I get you?" asked the bartender.
"Anything but a Canadian Club" replied the seal.

[Ace]

That was a good joke, for any time of day.  I used it and it worked great.  I knew there were celtics in Boston but not Chicago.

I still haven't tried any YouTube from home, to see if OnSpeed adds any get up and go to downloads.  I watched the Roseland Town Council video on WSBT and it didn't show anything useful, although the language was salty and entertaining. 

Ac;e awaiting the next joke upload