Johnatone

I wanted to rip and tear pretty badly

Finally got RAGE for PC a couple weeks ago. Runs fine, still a fun play, but dear fuck are the keyboard driving controls shit. Currently setting up an XBox One controller to finish the races for a 100% playthrough. (Time trials? Forget about it with keyboard. Shesh.)

Updated my potato. Swapped out the AMD HD 2770 with an XFX RX 590 Fatboy, and the 550w PSU with a Corsair 650w modular. Running with an i5 2320 quad at 3.0 and 8 gig of RAM. Things are running much more smoothly now.

Fuck it. I'm gonna try Brutal Doom. Why not?

@Cyb When can we expect a Massmouth³? :D

Destiny is the Daikatana of our generation, except it made millions of dollars and nobody has apologized to me for all the failure the game is.

Just finished the Destiny 2 campaign. It was garbage.

Rented Destiny 2. Bungie doesn't get any money, and now I can say with authority that it sucks. Sounds like a win-win to me.

5 more posts to 1000! Unless Ling resets me. Shouldn't have said anything. Damn. Ignore this!

Quake 1? Why yes, I'd love my PS4 to become a $400 paperweight.

I've been trying to get this to work for a few days now. From what I understand, you have to format a partition in FAT32, put the proper folders in it (Video, Music, Photo, et cetera) and, in my case, convert the video files to MP4 so the PS3 will recognize them.

I deallocated lots of space on my hard drive, did a 32 GB partitioning in the correct format using SwissKnife and converted the videos, but no matter how many times I try it the PS3 won't acknowledge there's a hard drive hooked up.

I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing wrong; is there something I have to do to make the FAT32 partition default, or do I have to format the entire thing FAT32, or is it something else entirely?

The external hard drive is a 1 TB Western Digital My Passport and the PS3 is the slim 160 GB version, fully updated (although PSN has been down since Wednesday).

Thanks in advance for the help.

Okay, so I like industrial style music, but to be perfectly honest my knowledge of industrial is limited. I'm aware of the more well known artists like NIN, Ministry, Orgy, Rammstein, and I tend to latch on to random songs by other artists that don't typically do industrial (as in Alive by Kirzz Kaliko and Yoko Kanno's work with Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex).

Anyway, I'm looking into Skinny Puppy and KMFDM for the first time, plus weird side projects like PTP and 1000 Homo DJs. What are good albums or collections of these artists and other similar industrial/synth/death pop style artists?

Actually, that title explains it all.

I now get to officially say that I've been incarcerated in the Illinois Department of Corrections not once, but twice. It's not as bad as it sounds, I'm not a hardened criminal (the first time was for forgery, I stole a check, the second time for intimidation, I got drunk and threatened my friend). It's not fun, and although I'm a reasonably intelligent young man I seem to posses no common sense. Trust me when I say that there is no amount of fun worth being locked up for.

What was really cool though was that the cable provider for the prison had G4, so I was able to stay relatively up to date on the gaming and misc entertainment scene. I'm disappointed that Rage was moved back to next year, although that does give me time to upgrade my computer. I haven't played anything since 2008 (which is the last time I upgraded my computer) so a lot of stuff that's old to you will be new and exciting for me.

So the question I have on my mind is the Black Mesa Source project. It looks really good and I'm looking forward to playing it. I kind of wish there wasn't a copyright issue that prohibited modders from creating more than just the shareware version of Doom. I'm old enough to remember that when Final Doom came out it contained what was originally an independently developed total conversion that Id swept up the day of it's release for commercial purposes. What do you guys think of the project, and do you think Valve is going to do the same? (I'm upset that Portal 2 was pushed back just so they could develop it for the PS3).

Anyway, it's great to be back. I plan on spending lots of time playing with Doom again (yes, I know my first question wasn't even Doom related, but I'm keeping up on that) and re immersing myself back into the community.

Happy 4th of July!

Yeah, I got sick and tired of being eight years behind the technology. The computer's pretty nice, but I never got around to updating it because I usually spent all my money on gas, cigarettes and weed. Well, that me is gone now.

Anyway, this is the computer I have. It's not bad at all, and with the default hardware things actually work pretty well, but nonetheless I was behind the curve for gaming these days.

Before I went up the river, I bought myself a SoundBlaster Audigy SE so I could chat while gaming without sounding like shit, plus it helped with my musical pursuits (i.e. it doesn't sound nearly as bad when I record). It didn't really affect the performance of my machine any, but having things sound better is always a plus.

Last week I bought myself 2GB of RAM to max out what my computer will take, and I was pretty satisfied. Things tended to load faster with less hang-ups. Still, it wasn't enough.

So, Friday I went to Best Buy and applied for a credit card (like I really need another one), got approved, and purchased a BFG GeForce 8500 GT 1GB. It nice, very nice. All my games run on full settings at 1280x1024 without any drop in framerate. I figure now if I'm behind, I'm only behind by a few months. I plan on either buying a Fragbox or building a rig, but in the meantime I'm set.

Now, granted, I think some of the system requirements of these games is criminal considering all they do is affect graphics, and if the game itself sucks, what's the point? However, after playing on my friend's rig, I realized that being able to properly run the software does indeed enhance gameplay. Now I can actually say I suck because I suck, and not because my computer lags.

So anyway, despite all this, I'm having a few technical issues that I can't seem to pinpoint. When I got the soundcard, I found that if I ran it while using my modem, the computer would restart itself. I switched the soundcard from the top PCI slot to the bottom one (the modem is in the middle), and that seemed to fix it for a while. Now, though, the problem has returned. I checked the hardware manager, and the only conflicting device is something listed only as the 'Serial', and I don't know what that means. Any ideas?

Another question I had is this: one of the system requirements of my video card is a "300w PCI compliant power supply," meaning of course the one on my motherboard. However, my rig only has a 250w supply. The card works and runs, but is this going to be a problem in the meantime?

One last question. This one is hard to describe. I got home, hooked my rig back up, got online, and opened AIM. After about five minutes the computer flashed blue for a few seconds, the screen quickly displayed some numbers, and the computer restarted. Once it did, I got back online and started AIM again. Same thing happened. However, when I don't run AIM, this doesn't happen. Tonight, though, I had my sound card going, and tried to connect to the internet, and the blue screen appeared again and it restarted. I don't know what the numbers were; they kind of resembled memory ranges. Other than under those two circumstances, this never happens. As a note, I was using AIM while at my friend's house while I was utilizing his cable internet, and this didn't occur. Do you know what would be causing this?

Sorry if any of these problems are obvious; I'm pretty rusty on my tech knowledge these days. I appreciate any help you guys can give me.

Other than that, it's great to be back. Thanks in advance.

EDIT: I was loading a webpage, and patiently waiting on my 28k connection by playing a game of Solitare, and the dreaded blue screen-restart happened again. So, three circumstances now.

Steam is the worst piece of shit ever programmed, but we all know that.

I've circumvented the internet issue by borrowing a friend's cable access, which is nice because while I'm at his house we can play LAN games. We've been wanting to start a clan for a while, and once he and his father bring home the computers they're building in college, we'll be ready.

In the meantime, I've updated all my games and even downloaded a few mods to boot. I went ahead and downloaded the Source SDK, as I figure it's about time to learn how to map for 3D games (although, I do admit, I prefer the simplicity of mapping for games like Doom). To make a long story short, I'm still no good at it (no one becomes an expert in six hours), but it's fun and I'm learning.

The main reason I wanted to map with Source is because I couldn't find any mods that just feature battles with striders, gunships, et cetera. The strider battles were one of the main reasons I wanted HL2 in the first place: fuck the gravity gun, just give me a rocket launcher and an infinite wave of striders. Unfortunately, the towering creatures were under represented in HL2, and even less so in Episode 1 (there's only one). There is a mod on the way called Strider Mountain but it's still not released, and while I'll enjoy the single player experience, it's not quite what I want.

Well, I booted up Steam after work tonight and started mapping, but I couldn't test my map because HL2 (as well as EVERY OTHER PROGRAM IN MY LIST, including the SDK that I was using offline; dunno how it worked) has to fucking update again*. I'm getting sick and fucking tired of moving my PC around just so I can play my games offline**, and one of these times it's going to lose half of it's data in the process (towers aren't meant to move like laptops IIRC) all for the sake of satisfying Valve's determination to grab the gaming community by the balls and never let go.

Unfortunately, none of us can do a god damn thing about it. If Valve wants to alienate half of the internet users in America, so be it, but sooner or later their 'digital download revolution' mentality is going to bite them in the ass. I can't wait for the day their servers fry and their entire customer base has to start from scratch again, although I doubt it'll be quite that dramatic.

This push to an 'all digital data society' isn't just an error being committed by Valve; the entire nation is pushing towards it. The effects of a terrorist (or even a dumbass young adult, as I wouldn't put it past idiot zealot activists) using an EMP bomb would be devastating enough to a city's infrastructure even without taking out all of the vital information with it, and people are rallying for the move to make the latter a dark possibility.

In the long run I'm just blowing off steam (no pun intended), as nobody gives half a shit about my opinion and the people who share it fail to voice it [effectively***].


UPDATE****: Out of curiosity, I restarted Steam after I wrote this but several hours before I posted it. Now everything is fine and the games are ready to play offline even though I didn't go back online. Witchcraft! Well, no, but just more bullshit to have to contend with. It's bad enough having to reinstall Steam once a month without it being more temperamental than a woman on her period whacked out on crack going apeshit in a mall with a machete.*****


---

Also, I'd like to address another thing that's been bugging me. A lot of people have been saying Steam isn't intrusive and doesn't act like spyware. I've noticed something: normally, when I connect to the internet and do nothing, the internet is idle and does nothing. When I start Steam, it takes anywhere from six to twelve minutes before I see the "Connecting to Steam" dialog box, and in that time frame my internet sends about one or two megs worth of data. Now, is it just getting my internet and computer ready to connect to their servers, or is it sending them data I'd rather them not have? You make the call. I may just be a little paranoid about this, as when Steam is idle is the background once it connects the my connection stops moving, although it is eating seven meg worth of RAM even just sitting in the notification tray (the bastards).

Do remember to add seven to sixteen megs to the recommended settings on the box, as I doubt they're including Steam's usage in the recommendations.

---


*To clarify, I went online with Steam first (my first mistake) to see if my friend was online. None of the games needed to update. I was online so I could use the SDK Wiki. After an hour, I closed Steam down, got offline and started Steam again. Everything was fine, none of the games needed to update. I started the SDK and continued mapping. When I closed the Hammer Editor, I noticed every game on my list, excluding HL and TFC but including the Source SDK (the same Source SDK I was just using) needed to update and refused to play offline. What the fuck?

**As an example, I reinstalled CS:S for the sake of offline bot play. Because I didn't start and exit the game while I was online at the house with cable, I had to go online at my house with dial-up to start the game. When I connected, CS:S had to update again, an update of 26 megabytes, or approximately four and a half hours of downloading. I promptly returned to my friend's house the next day, which was good because when I got there HL2 and HL2:E1 also needed updating. The total updates for all three games were somewhere around 75 megabytes (approximately thirteen hours worth of download at my house), updates I probably didn't need and definitely don't care about; the games ran fine without them. FUCK VALVE. AND FUCK THAT FATASS GABE.

***Even me. I really wish I could do something about it, but unfortunately I love the product they're providing, and I love capitalism, and fighting their shitty Steam app is also fighting those two things. God damn me for feeding the beast.

****I made the update even before I posted. Whee!

*****Mmmmm, colorful adjectives. Also, abuse of the '*'.


If you hated this angry rant, be ready to hate the next one! Coming as soon as something else pisses me off, so pretty damn quick!

I'd been wanting one of those bastards for a while. Problem is, I'm too much of a cheap bastard to buy one. Not at full price anyway. Then the other day I notice that they've lowered the price to $169.99. I figured what the hell; I'm working full time and have a little extra cash to spend.

I mentioned this thought of mine to a friend at work shortly thereafter, who responded with a "Well, hell, I got a PSP I can sell you for fifty bucks!"

He brought it to work on Wednesday; I bought it from him on Friday. I had to buy an AC Adapter, which I did Thursday and played Need for Speed Most Wanted until three in the morning. I don't usually like racing games, but Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit was one of the first games I played on the first PlayStation so this one was a trip down memory lane as the controls felt right.

Anyway, here's the lowdown on what's in the picture:

A) $50 - PlayStation Portable, 1 GB Memory Stick Duo (with 174 songs and 1 porn wallpaper), 2 Games (NFS:MW and Siphon Filter)
B) $7 - PSP Power Adapter
C) $20 - Pelican PSP Starter Kit (Case, 2 UMD holders, 3 ft. USB Cable, Car Power Adapter, Wrist Strap, Screen Guard)
D) $30 - Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories



With tax, about $110. Hell, I'll take it.

He's bringing me Siphon Filter Monday. I didn't know how I would like GTA:VCS but now that I've gotten used to the controls, it's a lot of fun. I formatted the memory stick, restored the defaults, figured out how to transfer data between the PSP and PC and updated the system BIOS (I was on 2.81; the current update was version 4.30). Who needs manuals?

Anyway, I like the PSP. The little bugger has a lot of potential. The battery holds out really damn good; I played for damn near six hours straight. The screen quality is good and bright. The sound is good. The whole thing is easy to use and relatively user friendly (especially with the newest update). This isn't going to turn me into a Sony fan boy by any means, but I'm fed up with my XBox and can't take my computer with me in the car, plus I've already decided I won't buy a PS2 ever.

I'm pleased with it.

So, what are your opinions on the PSP?

EDIT: Hopefully the picture works now.

NOTE: To all those who don't want to read this huge chuck of text, scroll to the bottom for a discussion synopsis.

I'm not quite sure how this blog started. I think one of the original ideas was to apologize for being a bigoted asshole (if you feel you can simplify it with those two words), but then I realized that kind of bullshit is best left to politicians and other assorted public figures. After all, I have my beliefs and opinions, as do all of you, and we all have that right, so I figure let bygones be bygones. Everybody gets offended, even me, and life goes on, so whoop-te-do.

Then I thought to start a blog about the four new XBox games I got last Saturday. There isn't anything to say about that really though, except that Metal Gear Solid 2: Substance was a waste of six dollars and was promptly returned after I finished the main story mode and Unreal Championship 2 pissed me off so bad that it got thrown against a wall and broken after only two hours. Concerning the latter, I do tend to have a really bad temper sometimes, but it's under a lot more control now than it used to be. Nonetheless, I've decided to sell my XBox and the ten games I have as the sixty or seventy dollars I might get from it can go to another 512MB of RAM, or maybe a new soundcard to record my music with, or possibly even the Ghost In The Shell: Stand Alone Complex Season One Box Set.

I'm not sure why I bought MGS2, other than the fact that I loved the original MGS and never beat the second one. I have this strict policy about buying games that aren't strictly M-Rated first person shooters, a very narrow mindset that is most likely keeping me from playing some potentially great games. One of my reasons is that I hate the camera in third person games; only in very few instances have I ever seen it done right. This brings me to a point: why the fuck did I buy MGS2 when I'm fully aware that the MGS games tend to have shitty camera angles? That's neither here nor there.

Somewhere down the train of thought I decided to talk about why I find it asinine to purchase games when they first come out. I understand that the people that create these things put a lot of work into their games to sell them for a profit and feed their families. Go capitalism! Nonetheless, I don't know why, as a consumer, I am supposedly obligated to purchase a game, console, OS, piece of hardware, et cetera, the day it comes out. Spending fourty to sixty dollars on a single game doesn't guarantee it will be worth that money anymore than spending twenty-two dollars at Gamestop for four used games.

I had some friends that were constantly in line the night before for games they wanted. They were among the masses that got Halo 2 the night it came out and the next night I was among the twenty-three people in two small rooms crowded around four XBoxes deathmatching (or playing Slayer, since God-forbid Bungie use a universally accepted term for the gameplay so they can appear to be 'original' when in reality almost everything about Halo is ripped off of everything great before it) until the wee hours of the morning. What's this story have to do with me? Almost four years later I bought a used XBox for one hundred thirty dollars and the Halo Triple Pack for sixty. I can do the math really quick:

New XBox when it came out: $400
New Halo when it came out: $50
New Halo 2 When it came out: $50
New Halo MPMP when it came out: $30
------------------------------------
Total $530



Used XBox from Gamestop: $130
New Halo Triple Pack: $60
------------------------------------
Total $190

By intentionally becoming a victim of timeline, I saved myself three hundred fourty dollars. In retrospect, I could've saved sixty dollars by not buying the Halo pack, but hindsight is twenty-twenty. Nonetheless, I'm done with consoles, at least for now. I may invest in an XBox 360 in a couple of years and quite possibly a Wii, but I'm going to focus on the computer gaming industry and everything I've missed and am missing as we speak. I know I will continue to follow in the same timeline pattern as computer software and hardware tends to get better with age (i.e., after a while most of the bugs are ironed out and compatibility is higher).

Of course, then I made a purchase I'd been wanting to make for a long time but hadn't gotten around to. I went to my local bookstore hoping to pick up a Heinlein I hadn't read yet, and all they had was Starship Troopers, which I read nine or ten times before my ex-girlfriend lost it. My second choice was this: Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 by Hunter S. Thompson. I can say this: I am loving every minute of it.

I know that last paragraph was quite out of whack, but that was the last thing I thought about writing about. Anyway, I think I'm done.


SYNOPSIS FOR DISCUSSION (If you felt that any of this was worth discussing):

1: Do you feel that it is pointless to buy video games related hardware and software brand new, or do you enjoy buying a shiny new games within the first couple of months it comes out?

2: How do you feel about the paranoid, cynical and drug influenced writings of Hunter S. Thompson?


USELESS AREAS OF DISCUSSION

1: Why did you feel that MGS2 was (great/horrible)?

2: Why did you feel that Unreal Championship 2 was (great/horrible)?

Yes, unfortunately, on Super Bowl Sunday, my computer died. The motherboard fried for one reason or another. On Thursday, we took it to Staples. The tech geek there took it to find out what was wrong, and in the meantime, we got a new tower. The specs, you may [not] ask? Well, they're pretty generic:

-Intel Celeron D Processor 356
-512 MB PC2-4200 DDR2 SDRAM Memory
-120 GB 7200 RPM Serial ATA Hard Drive
-SuperMulti DVD Burner with Lightscribe Technology
-ATI Radeon Xpress 1100 Graphics Card
-Windows Vista Home Basic

That last spec...well, it sucks. I hate Vista. When I first had XP, I though it was retarded, but within 30 minutes I had everything working the way I wanted it. Vista is completely retarded and it'll be a few days before I'm comfortable with it, if that. While most of the programs my parents wanted on the computer have installed with no problem, the ones I use have had issues. For instance:

-Vista will not accept the install drivers for the wireless Microsoft mouse and keyboard we have. They still work, since mice and keyboards are standard plug and play technology, but what the fuck? It won't accept Microsoft drivers?

-The drivers for my new Yamaha Keyboard won't install. The "New Device Found" program pops up when I hook up the keyboard and turn it on, but when it tells me to insert the disk, nothing happens when I do.

-Microsoft Word 95 installed with no problem. What the fuck?

Whatever. It's new technology, and it won't be compatible with anything for a while. Still, the fact that Vista is not backwards compatible with anything sucks. I haven't tried to install any of my games yet, so I haven't had the joy of screaming profanities at the top of my lungs against Microsoft yet, but I'll find out tonight.

The good news it that my parents okay'd the work that needs to be done on our old Compaq, so when that comes back I'll get that one instead of this Vista-loaded piece of shit. I'm hoping that they don't fuck the old PC up by puting Vista on it, as I was perfectly happy with XP (despite it's lack of DOS). We'll see it two weeks though. I'm still going to have to pay for this new computer since I fucked up the old one, but five weeks worth of paychecks isn't really that bad to loose considering I owe them well over 2600$ for paying my court fees among other things.

Yay for blogs.

EDIT: I just put in my Half-Life 2 CD...I have yet to see anything happen. I'm pissed.

...or: How I quit doing drugs so I could get off probation on time and why it isn't going to help.

I think you all remember my Drug Testing thread, which was quite pointless and stupid, and from a combination of your advice and the stern advice of my probation officer ("Be clean by the first week of December or I'll revoke you, and don't drop dirty after that.") I quit smoking pot.

Now, I'm a pot smoker, plain and simple. I quit and don't intend on returning to it even when I get off probation, as it has kept me from getting jobs and will keep me out of the military (yes, they'll still take me; I'm just biding my time). I don't use any other kinds of drugs. None of those other drugs appeal to me, especially that dirty ass meth shit. Technically cigarettes and alcohol are drugs, but we're disregarding those since I can't get in trouble for them.

Anyway, I've been clean for two and a half months, and am proud of myself since I rarely exercise self control. I give a lot of credit to my friends who don't want to see me end up in prison and have been helping me not relapse. I myself have found ways of occupying myself (writing music, playing video games, et cetera. Whatever works). I went in for my drug test today, and my probation officer happened to be in, so I went to see him and asked the secretary to get me my lab results. This blows my mind:

http://www.freewebs.com/johnatone/results.htm

Now, my PO tells me not to worry about the negative numbers [in the meth and cocaine column]; as long as they're negative there isn't a problem. I think there is, because I don't use those drugs and therefore shouldn't be showing anything at all. Also, if I haven't been smoking weed for over a month (2 1/2, to be exact), don't you think the numbers should read 0? Not only that, all of a sudden out of nowhere is a single high positive amongst low negatives in the cannabis column. Needless to say, he's sending the urine off to another crime lab to be reanalyzed. Chances are, it'll come back positive. For instance, a woman I know who was testing clean tested positive out of nowhere. They sent it to the crime lab and it came back four times higher than the testing system here. Also, another friend of my currently on probation has three clean drops and then a dirty drop, three clean, one dirty, et cetera, like clockwork.

Now, I figure most of you will say 'bullshit' to this, but I have NOT been smoking weed for two and a half months. I've got less than eleven months to get off of probation, and then I'm a free man, free to get the fuck out of this county and get on with my life. Why the hell would I fuck this up now, especially considering that having my probation revoked means 5-7 in DOC?

I do intend to fight this. I'm doing research on criminal law and browsing lawyers I could hire to appeal the drug testing, which was not a part of my probation to begin with (I was convicted of forging a check for $30), as well as find other loopholes and abuses of the judicial system committed by these people against me. I'm also hoping to be able to file a civil suit, which in this day and age is possible (after all, in this country you and sue anybody for almost any reason and win, so why not use it to fight a corrupt local government?). I don't know how far I will get with the latter, but the former I intend to take as far as I have to. I hope I win.

On the other hand, if anything, I'll lose, have my probation revoked, and then you'll all be rid of me for a few years, which I'm sure plenty of you would enjoy greatly. :)

EDIT: Link fixed.

There is something I would like to say. I am homophobic. I'm a regular poster here and I wouldn't in a million years admit it unless I was hiding behind this account..Like I am now

Alright, enough of that.

Yes, I'm a homophobe, or as I like to say in real life, I fucking despise faggots. Now, granted, I don't claim I can tell who's a fag just by looking at him/her, and some of my favorite artists happen to be queer in one way or another (Queen, Bowie, Orgy, Reznor, et cetera). Also, I don't go to antifag rallys, nor do I curb check fags for fun in the street. For the most part, as long as fags leave me alone, I leave them alone, like anybody else.

So why do I hate faggots so much?

01) The ones that claim "God and/or nature made me this way." Bullshit. The whole point of a species survival is to reproduce and carry on the species. Now why the fuck would nature create something that isn't going to reproduce? It's not fucking natural, quit acting like it is.

02) The ones that go on and on about gay rights. These are as annoying as women's rights activits or civil rights leaders. You want to be equal? Fine. Just shut the fuck up and go about normal business like everybody else. Quit trying to get noticed and get special fucking treatment. That's not what being equal is about.

03) If there is a faggot at a party, they always seem to home in on me. Here I am, trying to get drunk and have a good time, trying to mack on the bitches, and this fucking dude tries to hook up with me. Always trying to rub up on me and shit. Doesn't even stop when I politely explain I'm not a fag and tell him to leave me alone. Fuck that shit. Next time this happens I will curb check the motherfucker.

04) They're not helping with the aids problem. Everybody keeps asking what to do about aids, and I always say this: take everybody with aids, and fucking kill them. Then burn the bodies. I saw a commercial the other day where a woman asked what she can do to prevent herself from getting aids. My response: Unless you're a slut, nigger or faggot, you're probably not going to get aids, so don't worry about it.

That about covers it; if I think of anything else, I'll add it later. I hope I've done my part to piss some people off. As I stated earlier (#2), I don't mind any of you guys being a faggot as long as you don't make it an issue. When I'm deathmatching with you guys, I can't tell.

...what are you plans for 2007? Hell, it's only six days away now, and I'm pretty sure nobody's going to wing it (or at least all of it). What are your plans, resolutions, goals, et cetera?

Getting a job is priority number one.

Getting laid is priority number two.

I plan on turning 20 in March.

I know in almost exactly 11 months I'll be off probation.

My goal is to have this god damn six+ years in the making album done by November as well, although I've said something similar to that the last six years.

Steam sucks, Valve sucks. Period. But we all knew that. It's bad enough I've only got a 28k connection, making updates and downloads take forever, but to add to that Source engine games run like shit on my computer, despite my meeting of the minimum system requirements (parts of HL2:E1 are completely unplayible because the flashlight will only shine on models).

Then I thought: The XBox is a powerhouse. Why not mod it and install Steam onto it. Then perhaps the game will run smoothly. Also, it'd be cheaper to buy a 100$ mod chip compared to the $500+ I'd spend upgrading my computer (man, I'm a cheap bastard.)

My question: Is this even theoretically possible? I'm assuming that once I mod the XBox and have a different OS on it, I'll be able to install HL2 and connect to the internet to get the necessary updates and downloads. Then, being one who doesn't play online, I'll be able to configure the system appropriatly and play the games offline. Or something like that.

Mongs, trolls and useful posters, commence!

Love it, absolutely love it. Deep, invigorating storylines, superb animation (for an anime), all the high tech stuff you expect from an anime done in a very realistic fashion, and I think the soundtrack kicks ass. Sadly, I've missed a lot of episodes from both seasons 1 and 2, and I fear Adult Swim will yank it off the air once 2nd Gig ends. I'm also looking foreward to the domestic release of the movie (GITS: SAC: Solid State Society). I went out and purchased the first GITS movie, loved it, although it wasn't quite what I expected, although it does remind me of how La Femme Nikita was a great show, and the movie wasn't the same, although I loved the movie.

Anway, I love the show. The blog is for discussion on it. Do you love it, like it, hate it, loathe it?

Also, a question: would anyone know where to find MIDI for the SAC soundtrack? I think some of the songs would be great for a Doom PWad. Also, since the MP3s are usually over 7 meg for some reason or another, and /Newstuff has a policy on that, I figure a MIDI is my best option.

...short of actually quiting your drug of choice.

Hey all! I had some quick questions. Let us speak hypotheticals(s/p) for a moment. Say I have a friend, and that friend has weekly piss tests, but he refuses to quit smoking weed. Are there any ways he could clean up his urine short of quiting? Factors to remember: they test for high levels of water in the urine (low creatine levels). Also, he has a budget of $0.

Suggestions I've heard:

A shot of vinegar a day, diluted with kool-aid.

A cap full of peroxide in a glass of water, followed by lots of water.

Niacin pills.

Those are all the things my friend has tried. It usually lowers the THC level below the limit (they don't count anything below 50 as a fail). Do you guys know of any surefire things that would work? Thanks in advance for your help.

It started out as a quest to make a CD with old love songs spanning all genres, but when I stopped hanging out with that chick (she wasn't interested. I don't blame her) it turned into a project to make a CD with the best classic alternative rock from the nineteen-eighties.

Now, it's a two volume collection of the best classic rock from the eighties and earlier. I'm also in the process of making a volume three. Remembering how the first CD became a struggle of "How am I going to fit all these on one disc?" spawned the second volume, it's safe to assume there will be a volume four.

Anyway, I've listed the track order below. I'd kind of like some feedback and suggestions on the track listing (what's good and/or bad in your opinion, what you'd reccomend, et cetera), and I figure this would be a good way to start a discussion about music. It's also why it's in blogs.

Classic Alternative Rock Volume 1
01. The Clash - Should I Stay Or Should I Go
02. Tears For Fears - Shout
03. Phil Collins - In The Air Tonight
04. Falco - Rock Me Amadeus
05. The Smiths - How Soon Is Now
06. Billy Idol - Rebel Yell
07. Elton John - Saturday Night's Alright
08. David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust
09. R.E.M. - It's The End Of The World As We Know It
10. The Beatles - While My Guitar Gently Weeps
11. Gary Numan - The Machman
12. New Order - Confusion
13. The Fixx - One Thing Leads To Another
14. Oingo Boingo - Weird Science
15. Simple Minds - Don't You (Forget About Me)
16. Billy Idol - White Wedding (Part 1)
17. New Order - Bizarre Love Triangle

Classic Alternative Rock Volume 2
01. David Bowie - Blue Jean
02. The Beatles - Happiness Is A Warm Gun
03. Men At Work - Who Can It Be Now
04. Eurythmics - Here Comes The Rain Again
05. Echo And The Bunnymen - The Killing Moon
06. R.E.M. - Losing My Religion
07. The Church - Under The Milky Way
08. Gary Numan - Cars
09. Cheap Trick - I Want You To Want Me (Live)
10. The Beatles - Helter Skelter
11. Billy Idol - Dancing With Myself
12. New Order - Subculture
13. David Bowie - Rebel Rebel
14. After The Fire - Der Kommissar
15. The Clash - Rock The Casbah
16. Animotion - Obsession
17. The Human League - Don't You Want Me
18. Genesis - I Can't Dance
19. Tears For Fears - Head Over Heels

These are the song that are *******ely on Volume three:
Yazoo - Situation
The B-52's - Rock Lobster
Peter Gabriel - Sledgehammer
Talking Heads - Burning Down The House
The B-52's - Love Shack
A-ha - Take On Me
The Cars - Moving In Stereo*
Yes - Owner Of A Lonely Heart
A Flock Of Seagulls - I Ran (So Far Away)

*Thanks to Bucket for helping me remember this song.

What do you think? What would you do differently? What would you reccomend?

Edit: The word *******e is edited now like **? I must've missed something somewhere.