Blizzak attack!

Snow makes me cringe every year. This is because I have to drive in it. And because it's cold. I don't like cold. But anyway, this year I'm actually preparing for the snow compared to the usual way I do it.. which is at-the-last-minute ordinarily (grin).

I decided to get true blue snow tires for my car this year. There were two choices I had, steel-studded or studless. I went with the studless because those steel studs will make your car ride like a tank.. well maybe not that bad but it's really loud. My tire of choice is the Bridgestone Blizzak WS-50. A bit expensive, but I don't skimp when it comes to tires. Safety is very important, especially on snow and ice.

According to some early predictions this year, it's going to be a bad winter.. so yesterday I bit the bullet and bought a set of 4 Blizzak's from TireRack. They're on the way and will probably arrive before the end of the week.

Why I use TireRack: I absolutely will not buy tires locally. They always overcharge and the experience of buying tires through a dealer is a dismal one at best. You never get what you pay for, at least I don't.

By putting snow slicks on my car I'm certainly not telling Mother Earth to "bring it on". Hardly. But, when the snow comes - and it will - at least I won't freak out from substandard traction every time I get out on the road when snow and ice are prevelant. Getting snow slicks is only about two things only: Safety and confidence when driving. No one likes to lose control of their car, ever. Blizzak's won't make me "invincible", but they will provide me with a big sigh of relief most of the time when the roads are iced up - mostly because I can stop when I tell the car to stop.

Trillian How-to

My mainstay instant messenger program is Trillian. I use it primarily because I can't stand having a bunch of different programs for different messenger services. In addition, Trillian has a very light footprint (meaning it will not bog down your system.)

There are more than a few people who are absolutely fed up with the way instant messengers are delivered. In a moment I will be describing how to use Trillian and make it a simple, text based only tool - meaning no smileys, no graphics, no file transfers, nuttin'. Just text, the way it's meant to be. (grin)

Why Yahoo Messenger sucks:

The last time I tried Ya-Whore Yahoo Messenger, it pissed me off because it installed a bunch of crap I didn't want it to, AND it would not uninstall itself completely when I asked it to. All I wanted when I installed it originally was the messenger. I didn't want mail, I didn't want that stupid Yahoo! Toolbar, I didn't want to install any "Yahoo Experience" stuff (a dismal one at best,) all I wanted was a messenger.

Why AOL Instant Messenger sucks:

One word can describe AO-Hell AOL Instant Messenger best: Ads. And ads we got. Lots of 'em. They're everywhere. Also, by installing this messenger, you will have icons placed for AOL services all over your computer, like in the browser, on your START MENU in two to three different places... and it's just all very very annoying. Blah. Let's not forget the ads every time you even look at the messenger.

Why Microsoft Network (MSN) Messenger sucks:

Very bloated application. Way too graphical. It slows everything down and then tries to convince you to "integrate" it into everything else with that god-awful Passport crap. Also this software is VERY hard to get rid of.

Why ICQ Sucks:

ICQ used to be the coolest instant messenger app out there. It ran great, didn't force anything on you and it was fun to use. That's all changed. ICQ is one of the largest (if not the largest) applications just for instant messaging. It's unbelievably full of crap, making it almost impossible to enjoy using it at all. Like AOL, it's full of ads a-plenty.

The solution: Trillian

a) It's free (but there is a "pro" version available for purchase which includes extra goodies).

b) It's small.

c) It simultaneously connects to AOL/Yahoo/MSN/ICQ and also does IRC. And it will only connect to what you want it to connect to.

My trillian setup:

In the way I have my Trillian set up, I purposely turn off everything. No buddy icons, no emoticons, no file transfers and no text formatting. It's nothing but plain honest-to-goodness text. I also set it up so that it doesn't just pop forward whenever I'm in the middle of doing something.

The first thing I do is install the skin Silver-XP. This is by far my favorite because it plainly shows what type of chatter is chatting you. Example:

You can see that AIM's/Yahoo's or whatever are distinguished easily.

The next thing I do is turn off all the formatting/font/sound crap in Preferences:

On the File Transfer area of Preferences I turn all that off. If someone wants to send me a file bad enough, they can e-mail it.

All Buddy icons are turned off. Couldn't care less about those stupid things.

And I purposely set it to not just thrust a window to the front when someone chats me (it's just as bad as pop-ups).

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Trust me, keep your messaging like this and all of a suddent it's "Wow, I can actually enjoy chatting again!" (grin)

VALVe gets greedy

I had to reinstall Steam so like usual I visited their web site. The first thing I see there is 3 "versions" of the new Half-Life 2 from VALVe, that being Bronze, Silver and Gold. What got me was the Gold version - it's $90 bucks. My first reaction: "You have got to be kidding me."

The 90 bucks basically gets you the game, 2 additional games (based on the same engine,) some cheesy posters, a soundtrack (please....), a hat (to look super-geeky!) a "collector's box" (meaning it will collect dust and not be worth anything,) a postcard (YEAH!! A POSTCARD!! SWEET!), and some other crap - with emphasis on the word CRAP.

Game selling has reached a new all-time low with this. First of all, Half-Life 2 isn't even worth the "base" price of 50 bucks. It's worth 40 at best. Secondly, there is absolutely nothing "collectible" about Half-Life 2. Not a thing. Third, if you have to include posters, hats and postcards just to sell the game - the game most likely sucks. There is something very wrong about any game that has to "include" stuff just to sell it - much less charge FORTY DOLLARS MORE just for the extra CRAP.

Holy SHIT does this piss me off. What pisses me off even more is that it will probably sell.. that's the worst part.

Small end note: I know that bundling goodies with games is nothing new... Atari and Nintendo used to do it very well. But the one thing I would expect to see isn't there: a t-shirt. T-shirts rock. Shirts are always good. That and sew-on patches for backpacks or something like that. Those are actually worth something (to me at least). Hats are dumb. Postcards are SUPER dumb, and posters..? Ehh. Gimme a t-shirt. I won't wear it, but it's better than a card or a poster.

From the ThinkPad

I am typing this from the Thinkpad 390 I just bought. True to my fashion, the first thing I did with this laptop was format the hard drive and reinstall Windows. That fortunately went through without a hitch, and everything installed exactly as it should have.

The screen is bright with no dead pixels, the sound card speaker sounds as good as it can for a laptop (laptop speakers by nature are cheesy because they are small), and for a 233Mhz it runs surprisingly well. It's not stellar by any means, but it does it what it's supposed to do - which is all I can ask of it.

I haven't tested whether the battery is any good or not. When I received the laptop (a small story I'll get to in a moment,) the battery was stone dead, but, the guy I bought it from on eBay mentioned in plain English that "battery is not guaranteed to work". If it doesn't work after I charge it, no big deal, I will buy another one. Replacement batteries for laptops are a common thing these days, especially for ThinkPad's since there are a lot of them out there.

Before I get to the whole shipping incident, I must say that this is a lightning fast keyboard. I can type super fast on this thing. IBM sure does know how to do keyboards right, that I'll admit. I think this is partially because the keyboard is yesteryear technology and I prefer older keyboards because the feel is so much better than the newer ones.

Okay, on to the shipping thing:

The laptop was scheduled to arrive today. 5pm comes around, no laptop. I go to ups.com and check the tracking. It said more or less that the driver could not find the location and that an attempt was being made to contact the shipper for a more concrete address. I called UPS myself and confirmed that yes, the shipping address was accurate. The driver was a goofball and didn't know where the hell to find my house. UPS said they would contact the driver and then call me directly. Ten minutes went by. UPS called back and asked if I could meet the driver at a specific location. I knew where it was so I said "No problem." I hopped in the car and met up with the driver. I asked him (nicely) "Trouble finding the house?" He simply replied with "The normal driver who does your route is on vacation for three weeks." Translation: "I have no idea where the frig your house is because you live in the woods."

Oh well. I got my laptop. It works fine so far. That's all that counts.

New laptop, selling old one

Recent events have left me feeling a bit blue so I decided to treat myself and buy a laptop. Granted, it's not new but it will run Windows XP and what I got is the most rock-solid laptop avaiable: An IBM Thinkpad (model 390). I won it last night on an eBay auction and bought it for $240.00. Considering what it comes with this is a very good deal. The Targus bag alone is worth 50 bucks(!)

The only thing it didn't come with is a network card. Fortunately I have a spare one. It's old but it'll do the job nicely. The LCD screen is a bit small, but I believe I can upgrade the screen from 12" to a 14.1" - the 390 had 3 models. Mine is the "2nd best" one. The premium one (at time of manufacture) had a 14.1" screen. I've scoped the 'net and have found a dealer of laptop LCD screens so it should be an easy swap. Since I previously worked as a Dell laptop tech, replacing screens is not a big deal. You just have to know what you're doing (obviously).

I will also be selling my old Compaq laptop. I have a Compaq Elite LTE 4/75 CXL, considered to be a premium model in its day. It's running Windows 95 and has a Megahertz modem that still works. The color screen is surprisingly crisp, clean, bright and has no dead pixels or screen lines at all. Because of it's age I will be selling it for around 25 bucks or so. The only thing wrong with it is a stone dead battery, however, I have seen replacement batteries on eBay for this laptop for around 20 bucks (cheap). Anyone who's interested in it can contact me should they want it, else I'll just eBay it.

Just for grins I surfed the web with the old Compaq last night. It actually surfs quite well considering its age. I was surprised and pleased to know that older computers can still "do internet" without a problem. And another thing: Windows 95 may be about as secure as a wet napkin, but man is it super easy to use and SMALL compared to XP (or 2000 or 98 for that matter). '95 didn't have all that integrated IE crap in it and it's so fast compared to later versions of Windows. Ah, the days of old. Windows 95 is a cool OS, I don't care what anyone says. (grin)

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