The long weekend

Finally, it is 11:52pm on a Sunday night and I am going bed soon. It has been a week since I last stepped into my workplace and not because I was on leave but I had to attend a training session downtown which I thought was a real highlight in my current career right now. I wonder what lies ahead this week? Will I have so much work to do? Am I on call this week? Everything will be answered in less than 10 hours.

As I count the final minutes before I rest my head and doze off to dream land, I had the great pleasure of catching the final trilogy of the X-Men series and I thought it was wonderful. My only complaint that the movie was a little shorter than I expected. I am the type of guy who would love to watch action movies like that which lasts extremely long. If only it were for 3 hours.

The weekend was good, managed to get a little bit of exercise from my weekly futsal session and today's game was extremely fun. Ok I can feel the weight of my eyelids closing down on me. Its time for bed.

Say no more to dead batteries!

I can finally say no more to sudden battery deaths or that’s what I refer to when I am playing some computer game and die/lose/humiliated because the batteries on my mouse died on me. It has finally reached a point where I can no longer tolerate being defeated due to “technical” issues. The age of dawn has finally reached me and I can only whisper sweet goodbyes to my old wireless Logitech MX700 mouse. Farewell old friend, you have served me well for the past 4 years.

Behold my new mouse cometh. The all new (well to me it is) Razer Krait!


Back in the days when optical technology was but a myth and games such as Quake filled Cybercafes, Razer was a formidable brand that creates mice that were meant for gamers. Their first mouse which was a huge piece operated at 1000dpi (dots per square inch) and it cost a whopping RM300 then. Nowadays. 1000dpi almost come standard in any branded optical mouse which you can buy for RM100 but what makes this Razer so special is that it is rated at 1600dpi. Since most people are a sucker for ratings, they even print it on the box!


Yes, it is optimized for Real Time Strategy games! Does that mean that my already leet Dota skills will improve? Well I tested out the mice right after installing it and guess what? I lost! Hoorah I can blame it on noobs this time round.

Anyhow, let's talk about the mouse. It looks great, it is smaller and lighter compared to my heavy MX700. Here is a picture to prove it!


Look at how big the MX700 is and how small the new Razer Krait is. The weight is a huge difference mainly because the MX700 had two AA size batteries in them which caused the entire mouse to be heavier. At the beginning I wasn't used to the weight so mouse movement was a little quick for me. Right now, I feel as if when I hold my mouse, I am holding my phone as well.


The entire package was pretty nice, there was a CD for the mouse drivers, a certificate of ownership and authentication and finally a window sticker which is the same as those you would stick on your car window. I guess Razer was thinking that since most of the PC cases now have side window panels, it would be nice if someone stuck their sticker there and show it off at some LAN party.


In conclusion, it's nice to have a mouse that just doesn't die out on you. Oh yeah, the cool orange glow is pretty awesome except when you want sleep. I needed some sort of paper to fully cover it so that the light doesn't bother me when I sleep. Trust me, I am a light sleeper alright!

Passwords

Did you ever have a very simple password protecting your system? Or do you have a super password which follows all the rules such as having both capital alpha numeric passwords with symbols? The funny thing is that if your password is as good as it gets, what stops your own self from revealing it.

#244321 +(14698)- [X]

(Cthon98) hey, if you type in your pw, it will show as stars
(Cthon98) ********* see!
(AzureDiamond) hunter2
(AzureDiamond) doesnt look like stars to me
(Cthon98) *******
(Cthon98) thats what I see
(AzureDiamond) oh, really?
(Cthon98) Absolutely
(AzureDiamond) you can go hunter2 my hunter2-ing hunter2
(AzureDiamond) haha, does that look funny to you?
(Cthon98) lol, yes. See, when YOU type hunter2, it shows to us as *******
(AzureDiamond) thats neat, I didnt know IRC did that
(Cthon98) yep, no matter how many times you type hunter2, it will show to us as *******
(AzureDiamond) awesome!
(AzureDiamond) wait, how do you know my pw?
(Cthon98) er, I just copy pasted YOUR ******'s and it appears to YOU as hunter2 cause its your pw
(AzureDiamond) oh, ok.

Source:
- Bash.org

Pre-U Getaway

Pre-U getaways have always been fun and ever since it started about 6 years back, I never failed to enjoy every one of them. This one in particular was the most tiring one I have been to, well due to the fact that I am severely overweight and I can't really play basketball and futsal with energetic youths because I lack stamina! What made it fun was that I could still kick some ass, literally because of my size and clumsiness I did manage to accidentally swing my leg in such a reckless manner.

Being the “hardworking” guy I am (notice the quotes), I had to drive down to Port Dickson on Friday night, enduring the heavy traffic and trying to reach there in one piece, the drive really wore me out. Of course the usual busy day at the office took all of my energy away (I guess eating a heavy lunch at the Marriot didn’t help one bit). Before I could even try to meet some of the new guys at the Pre-U getaway, I was knocked out on the bed.

The next day (Saturday) was good as the morning started out fine with eggs and sausages for breakfast. After that I had to play the guitar for the morning session which made my fingers totally raw thanks to the strings being extremely high from the fret-board and my own lack of super hard skin. Sharing continued on after the first session on Friday night and lunch came pretty quickly. A quick meal with some fried fish and veggie, I felt a little hungry even after lunch. Trying to allow my poor fingers to get a break from the ever torturing strings of a Kawasaki guitar, I made myself to endure more pain for the afternoon session.

Plans were made that there would be some beach-side games happening at 3.00pm which was perfect as it allowed me to go out and grab a quick bite at the local mamak as well as buy a birthday cake for one of the happy camper whose birthday was around the corner and also withdraw some money from the ATM to pay for camp! I managed to share a plate of rojak with Grace and Andrew where the three of us had a good chat on old times.

Back at the camp site with a full stomach and roaring to start playing some sports, I quickly took the first opportunity to play some futsal which I later found out that I am totally lousy at ( a which I clearly denied although I was outpaced and out skilled by everyone else ). The good thing was that I managed to work up a good sweat. Of course there was a statement which Lemuel did say to me after I showed him a thing or two about basketball. “Mark, how you could lie to me and said that you were fat!?!?!” he shouted at me after I took a three pointer shot.

Sunday came and Sunday ended pretty fast with everyone having had a chance to share their thoughts and lives. The drive back was going to be a weary one since everyone slept late on Saturday night. By the time I got home, I went straight to my room and fell asleep. The weekend was a terribly tiring one I might add but I am very grateful for the public holiday on Tuesday.

The funniest things that happen

I am sure there is a point where everyone gets stuck in their usual work cycle where everything becomes mundane. Then there are those funny moments where it just really makes your day. Today was one of those days for me, everything was running on as usual, there weren't any special problems or work for me to handle and it was becoming a little more mundane for me. That was until after lunch when suddenly my boss comes out and say, with the bird flu epidemic floating about we can't eat chicken, beef is a no no because of mad cow desease, pork is out of the question because of JE, fish has mercurial poisoning and vegetables have insecticides. We should all stick to chocolate!



Another funny thing happened was during a netmeeting with people around the world I had to attend. As usual netmeetings are just people meeting up online under aliases and nobody can actually see who is on the other end except by hearing our voices. The funny thing was when a person with a women's name began speaking in a low manly voice, I just burst out laughing. Man, I think the day was pretty eventful.

Note:
- Image taken from http://www.godiva.com

Worst of 2006?

How many countless of lists do we get every time? Lists such as the best of 2006 or the best company in the world and others fill the void of cyberspace. Well apparently there is one list which actually gotten my interest peaked, so much so that I decided to write a post about it.

If you head over to CNet.com and looked at one of their headlines today, you would notice a list that says the Worst Tech of 2006. Now wait a minute, 2006 just started and there is already a list up? Well believe you me, when you take a look at it you couldn’t but agree with them. The funniest bit was the tech which achieved position number 10, Kazaa 3.



I think the comment given for that software was priceless, “Worst product that can get you arrested and ruin your PC”

Now how true is that? For those of you who are avid p2p users would remember when Kazaa used to introduce countless amounts of spyware to our precious computer systems. Well it has reached position number 10 but honestly I would prefer it if it was at the top.