Category: Idle

Categories
Music

Mashuptown – more mash-up music than you can shake a stick at

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A couple years ago I got hooked on music mash-ups when a coworker pointed me to the work of Party Ben, a DJ who, until recently, had a mash-up show on San Francisco’s alternative station Live 105.  Since then I’ve been hooked.

What’s a mash-up?
Music mash-ups are the result of a DJ taking two different songs and mixing them together into a hybrid of the two, sometimes with fantastic results.  It’s a little like sampling (taking a riff from one song and making a new song around it).  Some of the results are total crap… but sometimes one can find some real gems.

Why do I enjoy mash-ups so much? 
Well… I listen to music a lot and find I get sick of what’s on the radio and what I have in my own collection.  Mash-ups are a fun way to listen to music I already like and make it fresh again.

Where can you find mash-ups?
A quick search will net you all sorts of stuff but you can save yourself a lot of legwork by simply going to Mashuptown, a mash-up review blog which picks out great tracks almost daily. Mashuptown will point you to the sites of some great DJs where you can find more great tracks on your own.  Another good place to start is on the mixes page of Party Ben’s site.  Party Ben has a collection of tracks all crammed into a single file, as if you were listening to a long set at a club.

Categories
Video Games

Xbox from UK, games from US – OK!

When our 360 went south Paula and I decided that the best course of action was to buy a replacement box instead of waiting for a really long, expensive repair (since it’s an American box it has to be shipped to the US for resurrection).  Since we use our Xbox to watch TV we also didn’t want to wait the couple months it would likely take.

The idea of a new box was all good and well… but I also have a library of games I like to play (including a copy of Lego Star Wars II we just bought but never got a chance to play).  Gears of War I can buy in the company store for €20… but Lego Star Wars and Ghost Recon were going to run me €60 each.  Crap.

After setting up the replace box I wondered: what happens if I stick the US (NTSC) game disc into my European (PAL) Xbox?

As luck would have it, I was pleasantly surprised.  Like DVDs, video games often have region encoding which prevents a game disc purchased in, for example,  Paris from working on a console purchased in Poughkeepsie.  In the case of the Xbox 360, however, the region lock-out isn’t a certainty.  Fortunately for me (and many other gamers) Microsoft adopted the policy of letting publishers decide if their game discs would be region-free.

Not all Xbox 360 titles will work in all regions… but luckily for me my two current faves, GOW and GRAW2, do.  No need to run out and buy replacement copies.  In my quest for an answer as to why my discs worked in my new console I came across a fairly detailed list of region compatibility on Play-Asia.com.  It takes the guesswork out of any future purchases (especially cool since buying games in the US is much cheaper with the strength of the Euro).

Categories
Video Games

My badge holder broke and my Xbox died

Sounds kinda like a country song…

 

Well, it happened… my decision to not buy an extended warranty on a first revision of a gaming console bit me in the tookus.  You’d think I’d have learned from my experience with my first Xbox (I bought the 2 year warranty… and the box was replaced twice for free).  But, alas, no, I didn’t and I’m now left with a $300 doorstop.

After Dick and Trina lost a couple units I could smell the storm coming… but at over a year past purchase date I knew it was way too late.  It crashed a few times in the past month (video froze while using it as a Media Center Extender) and yesterday we got the red ring of death.  Since we’re in Ireland now it would cost a chunk of change for the round trip to the US and back for repairs… it’s only about $50 cheaper to buy a new box here (with warranty) and we can get it right away.  Oh well… off to buy a European Xbox 360… I wonder if it will have a sexy accent like Gérard Depardieu.

In case you were wondering… my badge holder isn’t under warranty either.

Categories
Overseen

Ah… good times in California

When Paula and I were back in California for her graduation we had a really good time seeing the old, familiar sites and an especially good time hanging out with friends.

I’ve gotten pretty good at taking self portraits with just Paula and me… but I have yet to master taking self portraits with more people.  I do, actually, kind of like this goof when I tried to take a picture of Dick, Trina and myself and I could help but add a little something extra…

I suppose I really need to get the rest of the pictures up, don’t I? 

Categories
Net Travel

Getting logged into Hotel Internet with Vista & IE 7

When Paula and I were trying to get logged into Courtyard’s Internet connection on Saturday we couldn’t get connected, the browser just spun it’s wheels then gave us a “page cannot be displayed” message.  The behavior was the same on both my laptop and Paula’s. 

The typical experience signing onto a commercial network is turn on your computer, open a web browser, request a page and you are magically redirected to a sign-in/sign-up page.  The redirect works in some cases (the Westin most recently) and not in others (Marriott).  For some reason some implementations work with Vista and some don’t.  I asked the hotel tech support to log me on from their end but then played with Paula’s computer to try to get hers logged in.

The solution ended up being fairly simple, I turned off protected mode in IE, logged into the hotel Internet, then turned protected mode back on again.

I suppose if you’re stuck in a hotel right now unable to log onto the hotel network you can’t read this.  Ah, the irony.

Categories
Movies

A Ninja Pays Half My Rent

I don’t know what reminded me of this short film, but once in my head I had to go find it an watch it again.

Steven Tsuchida’s short film about the ups and downs of finding roommates won a whole mess of awards in 2003.

Categories
Dogs

So… what kind of dog is she?

We were always curious just what mix of breeds went into Nala (and were often asked).  If she were still around I would have totally forked over the $65 needed to buy the Canine Heritage Test.  This test kit from Maryland-based biotech firm MetaMorphix includes a cheek swab for your dog which you mail back to them to find out what really went into building your special friend.

So put on a pair of sunglasses and do your best David Caruso imitation… cheek swabs are cool.

Via BookOfJoe

Categories
Cars

BMW CS Concept, Dodge Charger… separated at birth?

I saw the snaps of BMW’s new CS concept on Uncrate, looks pretty sweet.  But, I could help thinking I’d seen the car somewhere before…

bmw-concept-cs2006-dodge-charger-4dr-sdn-rwd-white_100046511_m

So, do you think BMW is going to offer an R/T trim line?

Categories
Life

Something is bound to rub off

I don’t know why I do it, but often when I hear a sound I feel compelled to mimic it.  More often than not I mimic it badly.  Perhaps if I did it well Paula would find it less annoying… but I don’t do it well.

Here’s what life is usually like:

Getting into an elevator:

Elevator: “Ding!”
Reeves: “Ding!”
Paula: “Stop it”

Paula walking around wearing flip-flops:

Flip-flops: “Snap, snap, snap..”
Reeves: “Snap, snap, snap..”
Paula: “Stop it”

When a bass-happy import car drives by:

Car: “Ooots, oots, oots…”
Reeves: “Ooots, oots, oots…”
Paula: “Stop it”

And just yesterday, pouring wine:

Wine bottle: “Glug, glug, glug…”
Paula: “Glug, glug, glug…”
Reeves: “That’s my job”
Paula: “It’s been thirteen years… something is bound to rub off”

I’m so proud of her. 

Categories
TV

Painkiller Jane: Dud

SciFi Channel: you owe me an hour.

Here’s the elevator pitch: take the cheerleader from Heroes, stick her in a shadowy government agency like Sydney from Alias and have them hunt super bad guys like Buffy from… well… Buffy.

I really wanted to like Painkiller Jane… a hero who heals rapidly, bad guys with mind control powers and a group of bad-ass G-men protecting the world.  Combine that with some cool music and stylish cinematography and you can’t loose.

You know there’s a “but” coming don’t you?  Here’s the thing: they hired creative writing students from the local community college to write the scripts.  I guess they needed to make sure there was money left over to hire someone to write little mini games for their web site.

Look on the bright side, remember how you were trying to figure out if you should record the new SciFi channel show starring the sexy female terminator from T3 or a rerun of Myth Busters?  Problem solved.