Hey guys,

If you haven't noticed I've been away from the sift for awhile. I want to thank you all who voted for my pqueue videos and also threw me some promotes. I will try to pay back each and every one of you The deal is I've been sick and going through some other personal issues lately and it has gotten into my free time online. I think and hope most of this is getting back to normal. So I apologize for missing out on voting for awhile and hitting the queue pile like I normally do.  

 Ok so I sought out Gutsy Gibbon, booted it and ran it from DVD. Awesome stuff! However I'm trying to format a second drive to be bootable on the same SATA channel as my main drive, only with Ubuntu. I was wondering if A) This is possible and I can add the option to boot from either OS when I bootup and B) What formatting option is the best just to run the OS and a couple apps on from the 2nd drive in this SATA array.

Hey guys, so after having my Wii for a year and I still haven't gotten numbers for people in my addressbook.

Sooo here it is: The Sift Wii Address Numbers

TheSnipe: 1990 0660 3020 2712

Michael Scott's Dunder Mifflin Scranton Meredith Palmer Celebrity Rabies Awareness Pro-Am Fun Run For the Cure

My dog Goldie and I!

So if you didn't know I had to take a car ride down with my parents to Florida and visit my 84 year old Grandma for a week.

 <irrational rant>

 Well I made it down there, if you ever want to take the trip just sit in your chair, no lights, bend your knees to your chest for 20 hours stopping every 3 to take a pee, don't use your bathroom, rather stand inside your trashcan and try to make it as comfortable as possible. Oh and invite your inlaws over too just for the fun of it. That should sum it up.

So after days of recouping we had a Chevy Chase style Christmas. After some help with vocabulary quizzing for my GRE test ala the all and powerful Raven I hit the books every day for hours on end.. We learned from our mistake on the ride down and drove back straight-through (ok maybe we didn't learn it all) but the luggage was shipped home.

</irrational rant>

Anyways one day we went to the range with my Mauser Kar98k, it was the first time I was able to shoot it since I bought it. A beautiful gun that commands respect. After gaining the attention of the people around me at the range who were shooting 5.56 rounds and deafening one guy who took his earplugs out while the range was still hot I managed a decent 6in grouping at 100 meters, iron sights and a nice black and blue shoulder.

 So I'm home and on the sift again, thanks to the members who kept me company on my trip, namely Raven, Swampy and the Choggman I still feel a bit sane

Ok so not really but I play occasionally, here is one pic of my videosift swag.

I'll take the shirt elsewhere and create a videosift sight tour.

Otherwise for me I'm prepping for going to Florida (not too bad)

...but I'm driving down with the family (pretty bad)

Those coupled together may cause me to lose what sanity I have left...be warned  

So I've started to gear up for the GRE exams (Graduate Tests) and I have my books from Kaplan to help me study. Does anyone else have any helpful prep advise? The tests seem simple and straight forward however I know I need to brush up on my vocabulary. I scored a 760 way back when on my math SAT portion but only a 640 or so on the English portion (this was back when the highest combined score was a 1600).

I also am planning on taking the Physics GRE specialty test to get into a physics graduate program, anyone have some helpful advise? Thanks!

Yahtzee, the Australian journalist/game reviewer and video reviewer took a week off to visit Valve in the States. The Escapist has the article if you haven't read it yet. If you haven't seen his videos I think they're hilarious and can be found here.

 From the article: "

About a week ago, Yahtzee got on a plane to visit Valve. Seems they were so tickled by his review of The Orange Box, they wanted to meet him in person and shake his hand. Either that or shoot him and dump him in Puget Sound. The suspense was palpable. But even if they did whack him, he'd at least get to visit the US, which, as we all know, was a lifelong dream of his.

The only problem was he wouldn't have time to prepare a Zero Punctuation review for this week. Instead, he wrote a travelogue of his experiences in Seattle, including visiting a shooting range, firing handguns with the people from Valve. Yeah, it doesn't get any better than that.

So here it is, Yahtzee's Travelogue. Several days ago, he boarded a plane in Australia, headed for the United States, and returned only a few hours ago. Along the way he lost some luggage, a little innocence and gained a whole new perspective on life, and what it means to be an American. Maybe. Enjoy!

- Editor"

What I find funny is he has the same wanker (yet hilarious) style writing as he does in his reviews. 

Also if anyone has received this month's Wired magazine there are some great articles in there relating to the new seasons of Futurama as well as the technology being used in Iraq. I highly recommend it.

 I had a friend send this to me the other day, I just had to laugh.

Just wanted to wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving! I am spending it this year with my parents, which means it will be small and quiet, no kids to babysit or to run around this year. 

Ok so I'm a pretty shy person in public despite my work with the police and EMS I really don't have much in the way of an outgoing personality. I'm not one to ask out a girl unless I have known her for awhile and then the frienship/relationship boundary is a devil to overcome. This is about as outgoing as I get (a trip with friends to Atlantic City, I'm on the right)

 However today I was thinking to myself why can't single girls (or guys) have something to show for it. I mean married women have rings, what's so hard from adding a single or taken finger? It's so hard to tell with girls lately if they have rings on from a boyfriend or just to dress up. I'm not saying let's label everyone with a big "HEY I'M SINGLE" tattoo on their forehead but there has to be something. Granted this brings up the question of "well I don't want everyone hitting on me" and I know when I don't want to be bothered I put my ring on my left hand and let it be known.

 I would just like sometimes to be able to read through the signals. For example, yesterday I was at Applebees and this REALLY cute hostess gave me some cute looks and was flirting. I'm not going to go "hey so umm are you single" and embarass myself in public like that. Or today I was at CVS grabbing some stuff and again the same thing happened. Am I alone here or what?

 Yes yes I know, short answer: Grow some balls.

Long answer: It's not that easy and I don't want to come off as a complete jerkwad. 

...and with goodies!

 So you all know I've been out of commission and computer-less (except for an old laptop). It was tough for those 2 days, I'm finally over the chills and the shakes and after a night gaming and updating this new system I feel the anxiety attacks have gone.

 Ok so here is what I got, thanks to some help from SMK Superstore:

    AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200 (2.6GHz) AM2 CPU  

    Asus M2R32-MVP(GREEN) Socket AM2 CrossFire Xpress 3200 RAID IEEE1394 A&GbE ATX Motherboard  

    Thermaltake CL-P0268 Intel LGA775 & AMD K8 AM2 CPU Fan w Heatpipe

    iMicro 859BK3 X-Blade Gaming Case

    2GB - PC2-6400 (DDR2-800)   

    Radeon X1950 256MB PCI Express Video Card 

    A new Logitech 5.1 surround sound setup

    Samsung LCD 19" Widescreen

    A new respect for computer speed

So yeah I'm up and running, sifting now too and thankfully I'll have some pics up very soon.

I played COD 4 last night and my jaw literally stayed on the floor the entire time. WOO 

My new computer comes today (See last entry), thankfully I'll be able to watch videos again without the glitches and freezing I get with this busted mobo. Since I've changed every part out of this computer except the mobo and processor I have to think it's that. Anyways my spare parts are sitting around just waiting for fedex to come today with my barebones system.

And don't worry all, I'll shoot a vid of me going Office Space on this old POS. 

 If all goes well I'll be back in sifting and voting order again later today!

....since it is slowly dying piece by piece. It was built from scratch, it's been fixed, tweaked to the max, and upgraded in parts enough to call it a chimera. Well, it's time to move on, I'm getting all sorts of graphical artifacts and glitches and have spent 2 days working on the problem to no avail (it looks like lines of distortion that come and go). New drivers, different power routing, wiring, potential overheating or blown out monitor, interference, aliens, as far as I can tell none of these are the cause.

 So Monday I order my new barebones system and add on to it as I please. For now, I'm trying to not get dizzy trying to read this text and also trying my best not to smash this case up. Untill then I guess I'm on hiatus.    

Ok so I just got the Les Stroud (Survivorman) Newsletter and this week's The Office is about: 

INTO THE WOODS-SPECIAL GREEN WEEK EPISODE - After Ryan (B.J. Novak) excludes Michael (Golden Globe winner Steve Carell) from a corporate wilderness retreat, Michael heads into the woods for his own survival adventure with nothing but the suit on his back. Back at work, Jim (John Krasinski) tries to revolutionize the office birthday party. Rainn Wilson, Jenna Fischer, Leslie David Baker, Brian Baumgartner, Ed Helms, Angela Kinsey, Kate Flannery, Oscar Nunez, Phyllis Smith, Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein, Creed Bratton and Craig Robinson also star

Ah I love this show!

Also new out this week for the PC are Gears of War and Call of Duty 4. Finally something to break the computer game monotany that has been going on for the past few months.        

Ok so I'm in the market for some new 5.1 speakers for the computer and well, there's soo much out there I really don't have the patience or urge to go through countless reviews for a box of speakers. Soooo my laziness aside, what are your experiences with companies and their sound quality. I'm stuck right now with crappy 4.1 Altecs (bleh!) and just want something for that cool 5.1 gaming or maybe if I hook up the cable connection to the card. Suggestions? Preferences?

Other than that I'm psycked because the Flyers are 8-4 3rd in the conference! Woo!

Ok so I put off starting my blogging lately because well a) Life has been pretty much mundane and b) all my writing has been school papers and my mind is kind of blank.

 However I found a funny follow-up story today on the whole who started the Calfornia wildfires.

 As shown in TDS clip Califorincinaration

So in summary Fox News blamed Al Qaeda, Anderson Cooper blamed Global Warming and let's not forget Iraq.

 Well the story came out today from CNN

"Police: Boy playing with matches started 38,000-acre fire"

Well, I guess it was just a matter of time, how do you press charges though in this situation. It's gotten me thinking on one hand the kid should be punished, but is a federal court hearing necessary?

I still find it odd kids still play with matches these days, but I guess there is a little pyro in us all.