Wine coolers:
Because I didn't pay for them and it beats drinking nothing.

Spam spam spam spam...
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Yeah. That's why I'm still getting spam in my Hotmail account. But I'm not getting as much of it, thank goodness. I was getting tired of those Viagra substitutes, loan companies, and "Lose fifty pounds fast" ads taking up 99% of my inbox. Now I get... uh... well, I got this one spam about Hunza bread that I don't really understand:

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2000 Year Old Bread Recipe Actually Helps You Lose Weight!
HUNZA DIET BREAD is a bread That Miraculously Stops Your Appetite And Hunger and is based on a 2000 year old recipe said to beat all fad diets hands down. It's the fastest, and totally painless way to lose weight.
By Mary Travis,
Special feature writer
(Canfield, OH)

Is there a painless way for people to lose weight? Yes! HUNZA DIET BREAD is being hailed as the weight loss method of the century. The bread is a duplicate of a 2,000-year-old recipe used by the little known civilization of Hunza.

The Hunzas are considered to be the healthiest people on earth. Their bread is the main part of their diet. This bread is absolutely delicious. Everybody loves it. But then a startling discovery was made. Just one or two slices of this bread would suppress a person's appetite for 4 to 6 hours! Could this be a designed bread invented thousands of years ago?

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Thank you, Mary Travis, for your email. But why did I get the email from some guy named Thomas Long?

This bread is absolutely delicious. Everybody loves it. It's fucking bread. It may be delicious, but I doubt I'll soil myself after one taste of it. And if I did everything that "everybody loves," I'd be a pot head and many others things by now.

Can I also say that I don't need to lose weight? I might weigh 150 pounds if I was soaking wet and holding a brick. Yeah. I totally could benefit from losing 30 pounds from my ass. :p

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[...]

Here is a little background of the Hunzas from a feature story which has been published in many major newspapers throughout North America. This is an excerpt from the article:

"The Hunzas exist isolated from the rest of the world in the Himalayan Mountains where they live to be 110 to 120 years of age. They have no cancer, heart attacks or other major disorders to speak of. They are active and fit to the end of their lives. Men father children at 100 years of age and older. Overweight people are unheard of because they have the perfect weight control system."

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Please provide a source for the article. Saying "many major newspapers" doesn't mean anything.

And hello, the Hunza existed 2,000 years ago. There was no such thing as obesity back then. Irrigation was limited, people lived off the land, and they only killed what they needed to survive. Nothing went to waste. And since they lived in the Himalayas, one of the most inhospitable regions of the world, they better be rather fit.

In regards to the age thing: If 100+ year-old men are banging women and having kids, more power to them. But I don't believe that; that "fact" probably came from the drunken village idiot or the senile village chief.

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[...]

The Hunzas were originally soldiers of Alexander the Great. This bread may have been designed for the use of his far traveling armies. It would make sense. It's the most compact form of hunger satisfaction and nutrition we know of. According to traces of Macedonian Heritage, this bread could have originated in Egypt over 5,000 years ago. As you know, the Egyptians were capable of doing many things that modern science cannot, even today, duplicate.

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That last sentence -- actually, the entire email -- is obviously reinforcing their belief that I'm some sort of "sucka." There's a lot more to this email (like a description as to what your stomach feels like from 0-7 hours after having a slice of the bread), but it's not worth talking about anymore. In fact, I'm surprised I have read as much of it as I did. And I'm actually commenting on it. I want those 15 minutes back. Damn.

Maybe I should stop using false email addresses and registering myself using fake statistics so that the spam I do get may be worth opening...

Nah.

I need a real job.
Like, one that pays me well. One that makes me feel like I went to college for a reason.

Gripe gripe bitch bitch moan moan cry.

I guess I should have gotten out of the fish and ice cream business sooner to get some few IT intern years under my belt.
Oddly enough, I'm glad I stayed at that place as long as I did. Some of the other workers there became my best friends for those summers. :p But I digress...

More bitching more bitching frustration frustration.

I'll blame it on the economy, heh.

How do I change IE's default text size?
Tell me how. It's rather annoying that I have to keep changing it to "normal" from "smaller."

"First... Headlines!"
The Daily Show owns. You cannot deny that.

* You are 16 times more likely to get killed in an accident while driving ten miles to buy your Powerball ticket than to win the Powerball. How crazy is that? Those and other odds can be read here.
* What are the odds of Govenor Don Siegelman becoming a senator? Probably not so good after comments he made about an earring-wearing boy. I bet he's a Republican, too, go figure.
* "When I think of you, I touch myself." And the Constitution says it's OK, too. Bring it. Sorry, no "what are the odds?" for this story.
* Despite his mutilation, Viera said Veliz could still enjoy "a normal sex life." What's the odds that he can father through sexual intercourse if two-thirds of his junk is missing? *shudder* I'm cringing in horror at what this guy did to himself. So uncool.

That's all I got for now. I have to relinquish my control over the phone line, anyhoo.

Cold Fusion J.G. Special Edition is here!
Yeah. I got tired of messing around with different game settings that I decided to send out my final product for you to dick around with, too. All you need is a copy of Diablo II, a game patch between version 1.04 and 1.06b, my mod, and you're ready to rumble.

If you are familiar with Diablo II, you already know that the game is too damn easy and it has some serious balancing issues that Blizzard will never fix. So, I took matters into my own hands to find a mod that would make the game interesting to me again. I was hurting for something to play; there's no games I'm looking forward to besides Shadowbane (which won't come out for a very long time), and Tribes 2 just isn't the same if I'm not playing with someone I know. I soon discovered the Cold Fusion mod. This mod definitely makes the game more challenging, and I enjoyed it very much.

There are some very important differences between Cold Fusion and normal Diablo II. Here are some of the main differences:

-- The game simulates a 4-6 player game in singleplayer!
  -- Creatures are much tougher, but you gain levels more quickly

-- The skill trees have been altered significantly
  -- New skills sets come every eight levels instead of every six
  -- Barbarian weapon masteries cannot be learned until level 21
  -- The Sorceress has two new spells, Warmth's power has been reduced, and Static Field is very mana-intensive
  -- The Necromancer has Bone Nova instead of Poison Nova

-- New monsters in new areas
  -- Be surprised at what you find in the Chaos Sanctuary! :)

-- Resistances are very very important, maybe even more important than your armor

-- Magical leeching items (mana steal and life steal) don't exist.
  -- Only certain unique items and some gems can give you leeching ability

-- Gems are rare, but they are rather potent
  -- Orbs (perfect gems which can be socketed anywhere for the same effect) have been introduced

-- Mana potions are sold in town

-- Increased backpack, stash, and horadric cube sizes. Hooray!

Now that is my kind of mod. It's nice to know that my character is capable of such things as dying. Unfortunately, even Cold Fusion has issues, some of which are just simple typing error bugs that piss me off. I decided to go forth and learn the arcane arts of making a mod for Diablo II. I used the Cold Fusion mod as my template. It's essentially the same mod, in fact. I just changed the sets, terminated a few bugs, altered some items, and added some more balance between the gems. Hell, you can give the Cold Fusion folks the credit for this mod for all I care.

Here are some of the things I've changed:

-- 10 CF sets replaced with 10 new sets
  -- 5 high-level class-based sets
  -- 5 mid-level generic sets
  -- In some instances, it's possible to equip more than one set at once
  -- Horazon's Arcanum is obtainable now
  -- The poison damage bonus for having the Phantom's Unholy Devices set improved
  -- Avatar's Humility durability bug fixed
  -- Virtues of the Avatar set's power has been cut in half. What a ridiculously powerful set it was. *sigh*
  -- Vengeance of the North and Full Armor of God sets' defense bonuses now work

-- 26 CF unique items replaced by 26 new uniques
  -- 12 based on items in Asheron's Call
  -- 10 based on items related to my roommates and myself
  -- 4 random ones
  -- Unique plated belt is refered to as a plated belt and not a girdle
  -- P.S., the unique plated belt is one of the new random ones :)
  -- Poison damage fixed on some unique weapons to what they should be
  -- The Stone of Jordan has been nerfed (but it's still better than in normal Diablo II)
  -- Since I can't draw, some unique items do not fit their default image. Oh well.

-- Magic items with poison damage have reduced durations (making them more potent instead of suck-tastic)

-- Grim/bone helms and shields drop more often (but not that often)

-- Gems overhauled
  -- Orbs are more balanced in respect to one another
  -- Orbs' powers are related to the powers of the gems that can make the orb instead of being kinda tangental
  -- Orbs are renamed
  -- Various gem powers were switched/reduced/improved/whatever

-- Two cameo appearances by Yours Truly! One is killable! :)

-- Unique monsters have new nicknames!
  -- Hey, if the game has an "M" rating, I might as well make sure people know it. ;)

-- The experience penalty in Nightmare and Hell difficulty has been reintroduced. Otherwise, why bother?

As you can see, I made the game more personable to me. It's a fun mod, but since I know everything that I changed (and everything I didn't change), the element of surprise and wonder isn't there. Hum. At least other people can get a kick out of it.

Now if you don't mind me, I have to go to the Moo Moo Farm and see if I can get the last pieces to my "uber" Sorceress set. Maybe I can score a good unique staff, too. That'd be sweet. Those fuckers won't stop dropping polearms, though. :p

MegaHAL = cool!
You gotta love AI programs that follow in the footsteps of ELIZA. It seems like you'd need Linux to be able to play with MegaHAL, but you can check out some of the neat conversations you can have with it here and even here. There's even some neat conversations on the MegaHAL site.

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MegaHAL: Bisexuality is practiced by people who are florists by day,
MegaHAL: assassins by night.

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MegaHAL: Hi there. We're having some nice weather at the back of your
MegaHAL: crap!
User: I have absolutely no way to respond to that.

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MegaHAL: Sex is the word cock instead of an ass and a world screams kiss
MegaHAL: me son of god.
Whitney: Um.
MegaHAL: Right. Crackhead squirrels in washington square park eat nuts.
Whitney: Uh.

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As you can see, it still could use some work.

My status
Even without having 'net access for three days, I can't stay online for more than fifteen minutes before I become really, really, really bored with it. What a shame.

I also really hope I land this "online assistant" job I applied for a while back and never really said much about. I can do everything they require and then some. Plus, I'm not asking for that much money since my resumé is kinda weak. I'm just doing it for the experience, heh. As a result, maybe I can be be the chosen position-filler while the remaining IT superstars get rejected 'cause they want more money to compensate for their experience.

I got rejected from two places today. That's ok, though. I'm kinda getting used to it. In fact, I expect it nowadays. :)

This site's looking a little bland. I should find a pic to post to add some color. Or maybe have an IM conversation. The latter requires me to be online long enough to actually want to hold a conversation, though. Pah.

I gotta make some food now. Later.

Testing 1 2 3...
In case you're wondering why there hasn't been a new post in three days, you can thank my wonderful internet service provider for being down since Saturday morning. I think my house lost power for under two seconds on Saturday morning, and then I noticed I couldn't connect to the internet for 72 hours. I hope there's no correlation between these two events, 'cause that would be really sad. And yesterday, my mom called the ISP to find out when they expect to be working again and stuff, and they said "We have no idea what is wrong with our systems." What a bunch of winners.

But I'm back now, assuming the ISP doesn't choke up again.

Hmm, let's see what's been in the news for the last three days...