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Category: Entertainment

Final Crisis is kind of Meh

Published by NiteMayr on April 24, 2008

The final issue of “Countdown to Final Crisis” finally comes out and it’s so bland and non-final it just wastes all of the momentum established in the preceding 51 issues.

I’m not sure I’ll even pick up the trades of this one; I’m that disappointed. I enjoy these big events, I’m a big fan of the far-reaching ones (even when they involve retcons) but “One More Day / Brand New Day” and “Final Crisis” seem to be the biggest non-events in Comics history. Not quite “Clone Saga” bad, but fairly close.

There be spoilers below here

Continue readingFinal Crisis is kind of Meh

The Anti-Midas touch

Published by NiteMayr on April 23, 2008

Low ratings for Bush visit on ‘No Deal’

The NBC game show matched its lowest Monday rating ever despite the much-publicized visit by the commander-in-chief. The two-hour “Deal” was seen by 10 million viewers and earned a 2.7 rating among adults 18-49 and a 7 share, down 27% from its prior season average.

Wow, too bad. I guess Glorified Guessing Games Grandiose Great-Apes and Great ratings don’t go together.

I am at a loss as to how that damn show stays on the air, then I remember that America voted for George Bush twice and all the pieces fall into place and I just laugh and laugh.

It’s better than just whining about it, right?

Exterminate!

Published by NiteMayr on April 23, 2008

Dalek Voice Changer Helmet – Doctor Who Novelties & Electronics at BigBadToyStore

The Dalek Voice Changer Helmet is a tiered, circumferential cranial housing, joined with a glowing blue eye stalk. By donning the Dalek Helmet, you gain the ability to speak in the Daleks bloodless tone, play back pre-record Dalek phrases, or activate the Exterminator sound. Should the Daleks ever stage a full scale invasion, battering past the pitiable defenses of mankind, the Dalek Voice Changer Helmet might make the difference between survival and hideous annihilation.

Wow, I want to see this in action before I buy it, but wow!

Our Horrible World

Published by NiteMayr on April 23, 2008

Okay, it’s not “our horrible world” but if you’ve never seen an Animal Murder a series of small fluffy animals, this video is for you.

You're never too far from..

Published by NiteMayr on April 23, 2008

First Spider in new house, originally uploaded by NiteMayr.

A SPIDER!!! ARRRRRGH!

I’m not afraid of spiders, I like them fine (as they kill other more pernicious beasties).

Wikipedia has this to say about spiders:

“Spiders are predatory invertebrate animals that have two body segments, eight legs, no chewing mouth parts and no wings. They are classified in the order Araneae, one of several orders within the larger class of arachnids, a group which also contains scorpions, whip scorpions, mites, ticks, and opiliones (harvestmen). The study of spiders is known as araneology.

All spiders produce silk, a thin, strong protein strand extruded by the spider from spinnerets most commonly found on the end of the abdomen. Many species use it to trap insects in webs, although there are also many species that hunt freely. Silk can be used to aid in climbing, form smooth walls for burrows, build egg sacs, wrap prey, and temporarily hold sperm, among other applications.

All spiders except those in the families Uloboridae and Holarchaeidae, and in the suborder Mesothelae (together about 350 species) can inject venom to protect themselves or to kill prey. Only about 200 species, however, have bites that can pose health problems to humans.[1] Many larger species’ bites may be quite painful, but will not produce lasting health concerns.

Spiders are found all over the world, from the tropics to the Arctic, living underwater in silken domes they supply with air, and on the tops of mountains. In 1973 Skylab 3 took two spiders into space to test their web-spinning capability in free-fall.”

My wife has this to say about them:

“AAaaahhh! Kevin! A Spider, get it away. Don’t you dare put that on me! Keep it away, you bastard!”

Hijinx ensue.

Ghost Ride it

Published by NiteMayr on March 4, 2008

"Feel the Penance Stare"

I really should have shot this against a dark background… Oh Well!

NiteCat, NiteGirl and I hit the theater yesterday and watched “Ghost Rider”.  There was a line outside, leading us to worry that we would be late for the film and that we had greatly underestimated the drawing power of “Ghost Rider”

We were wrong on two counts.

1) We got in to the actual theater in time to see the end of the Spider man 3 trailer.
2) We greatly underestimated the drawing power of “Wild Hogs”.

I could not believe the stream of Nascar driven humanity that was waiting to see “Wild Hogs”, and openly celebrating it.

Wow.

Anyway, Ghost Rider was great.  It meshed the Dan Ketch and Johnny Blaze Ghost Riders into one.  It was a good movie, lots of action and good special effects.  NiteCat LOVED it.

Nick Cage was great as Johnny Cage (giving him a chance to be Elvis on a Motorbike without singing)

The ONLY thing I hated was that Donal Logue was killed.  No love for the redhead scotsman?

Artist Spotlight: Andy Warhol Eats a Hamburger

Published by NiteMayr on February 27, 2008

If this video proves anything, it proves that Any never had a job in food service. Smack the side of the bottle damn it, you set the sauce free with a good smack on the side of the bottle.

Can you see how much packaging was on the burger? Wow, we suck, don’t we?

I guess things are better now, right?

Getting your iTunes Playlists into the Zune 2.0 Software

Published by NiteMayr on November 22, 2007

I upgraded to the Zune 2.0 software, which promptly killed all the useful playlists I had set up for playing in my Xbox when I wanted to listen to music.

I used to just drag and drop my playlist contents into Media player 11, but since Zune streams mp4s and I have a buttload of them, I made the transition.

I upgraded to 2.0 and liked the new interface, but the lack of any sort of smart playlists leaves me using Itunes to make playlists and no obvious way to get them into Zune.

I have figured out the steps to make this happen:

  1. Open up itunes and shrink the window to a point where it is still usefull, but not maximized at all.
  2. Open up WMP 11 and maximize it.
  3. Click on the the Now Playing button and then ensure the “List Pane” is displayed.  If the List Pane is not displayed, click the down arrow under “Now Playing” and click “Show List Pane” (I searched for ages to find this when I decided I wanted it)  It also appears on the Library screen if you do not want to use it on the “Now Playing” screen.
  4. Now, select the contents of your playlist in iTunes and then Drag and Drop the contents to the List Pane in Windows Media player.
  5. Once your songs appear in Windows Media Player, Click the down arrow next to “Untitled Playlist” and then click “Save Playlist As…”
  6. Click the Down Arrow beside the file format and choose “M3U” as your format and save your playlist.
  7. As long as you are saving your playlist in the default C:\Documents\username\My documents\My Music\My Playlists location, it will appear automatically in the Zune Software.
  8. Once the new playlist appears in the Zune software you may choose delete the m3u file as the Zune software appears to keep it’s own copy.

If you do not save the file in the default location or simply wish a more manual method, save the playlist in m3u format and drag and drop the new m3u into a waiting playlist in the Zune Software.

Have fun with your new software!

Originally posted on nitemayr.vox.com

You know you've done wrong by your customer when

Published by NiteMayr on September 17, 2007

Starting immediately, we will be upping the activation count to a 5 by 5 plan. We will be raising the maximum amount of computers a user can have BioShock installed on simultaneously from 2 to 5, and allowing a user to reinstall BioShock on each of those computers from 3 times to 5 times

Oh, something is wrong with your install?  Reinstall.  Hmm, still not working, reinstall.

Have these people even seen the inside of a software support center?

Reinstall is step 2 in the four-step customer blow-off plan for bad techs.

For those at home, the four-step plan is this:

1.   Did you reboot?  Will that take a long time?  Go ahead and call back if that doesn’t help!

2.   Did you reinstall?  That will take a long time!  Go ahead and call back if that doesn’t help!

3.   Did you install Patch X+1, [where x is the version the customer has and +1 is a cosmetic update]?  The download will take a long time.  Go ahead and call back if that doesn’t help!

4.   I’m sorry, I don’t support that operating system, let me direct you to the correct agents, thanks for calling!

At least twice in any long-term support issue, a customer is going to be forced to reinstall.  If they have done so on their own they are already buttressing against these imaginary limits.

Let customers who have physical media or downloaded “unlocked” media reinstall as they want, if you are trying to lock stuff down to prevent piracy, REWARD paying customers with content that is only available through online activation of keys, make the enhanced content online only and activated only through an SSL encrypted keying system.

Ta Daaaa!

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