Awful Monkey

For some reason yesterday's post did not show up properly on the front page. I'm still troubleshooting the problem, but then again it may just be this piece of junk workstation I'm on. I've gone ahead with the upgrade and decided to go with the most beefed up motherboard that I could in order to cover as many upgrade/expansion options as possible. I should now be fully prepared for TF2's release, and even make WoW more twinkly sparkly. The biggest benefit is the cease to these blasted lockups that I've been battling for almost a year now. They seem to happen at the most inopportune times too.

Why the rush for the upgrade? My last minute attempts to prepare for my possible departure for another Long Beach SC Fest. The title of the post corresponds to the tricks I'm going to have to pull in order to skate out of duty, arrive back in Honolulu for my school on time, and still pull off getting the full three days of vacation in Long Beach. I have to urge the qualification along of someone else, play devil's advocate to the duty coordinator, and if that doesn't work bribe someone to take my duty for me for that day. SC Fest ends the day before I'm supposed to report to a school on island, so I have to zip back and get ready for that. This is not a school I'm looking forward to either. It's one of those "You're going, You're learning, You'll have more work for you when you return because you're now qualified" type of schools.

Maybe I'll be able to weasle a few more college credits out of the deal. I'll have to look into that. Do I need more credits? Not elective credits, that's certain. I have probably over 120 credits of electives, but degrees don't want that many. I just need to knock out some core classes(or CLEPS?) and I'll have my AA. I just have to get off my lazy butt and get it done.

Inport work is boring and tedious. It's nice to be home and have the ability to go home and sleep in my bed every night. But it's bothersome having to drive into work 5 to 6 days a week and be bored while I'm here. Is there extra stuff I could pile onto my plate to fill my time? Most definitely. Do I want to pull that nonsense again after learning my lesson at COMMSTA? Not a chance. Never show all your cards; especially right off the bat. If you try to go above and beyond, they will just raise the standard which they hold you to, and expect you to maintain it at all times. My first Chief told me the old phrase "They only reward good work with more work." So I'll reveal my cards one at a time.

Posted by xKinetiCx at 12:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Upon further consideration of some recommendations, I've decided to switch up some of the upgrade options for my computer. Now that there is an announcement of TF2's release as a HL2 mod, I am definitely going to go for this upgrade(plus these repeated lockups on my current system are driving me crazy). The motherboard may seem like it's a bit overkill, but I figure I do these upgrades about once every four years, so I may as well get something that's quality and has the possibility of more future expandability. So, the configuration I've chosen is as follows:

ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe Wireless Edition Socket AM2 NVIDIA nForce 590 SLI

G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400)

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4600+ Windsor 2000MHz HT Socket AM2 Dual Core Processor

ASUS EN7900GT-TOP/2DHT/256M Geforce 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card

If you see any flaws in these choices, please post a comment.

Posted by xKinetiCx at 04:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I'm not dead, I've just been incommunicado due to being so busy since we returned to homeport. It's great to be back on land, and for more than 3 days at a time. I've completely refurnished my house now, and just received all my household goods yesterday. Everything is unpacked and setup, I'm still missing internet connectivity though(I've been stealing my neighbor's WiFi on my cellphone for the past week). It's nice to live in a place where I'm not ashamed to invite over company for once. I do live in a tiny apartment, but at least it has nicer amenities than I'm used to(it's not planned to be condemned upon my departure). Also, an unplanned change, I purchased a new car, if you can call it that. I traded in my RX8(Sorry, Norman) for a Mini Cooper. I know I know, everyone says it's a gay little car, but I've wanted a Mini Cooper for a very long time, and it just happened to be customized exactly how I had it on the web site. The RX8 had just become too expensive, between new tires, spark plugs($440???), and the horrendous gas mileage. I decided I needed something a bit more practical, and something that I would still enjoy driving. I will definitely miss driving the RX8, and it will probably be one of the best rides I'll ever have. But, the Mini is much more economical, and I even like the color(I hated the color of the RX8).

This heatwave going on in Hawaii right now is killing me. I saw the thermostat reading 96 degrees the other day. I'm not acclamated to this kind of weather yet. To top it off my apartment is on the second floor and it's like a little oven. After work today I'm going air conditioner shopping. I have a very small, probably 500 BTU, AC in there right now, and it's just not cutting it.

This inport period is going to be very long. I've completed my qualifications and have entered into the duty rotation, so at least I won't be into work as often as I was. But standing regular duty is going to get very old over the next few months. To fill the time(there's quite a bit of down time during a duty day), I've decided I'm going to enroll in some courses at Hawaiian Pacific University. Probably just general requirements for now, but I need to get them out of the way. Basically all that's standing between me and my Associates is a few credits from general courses. So, hopefully, if all goes as planned, I'll have my associates before 2007. What will I do from there? I suppose complete my Bachelors, but I'm still unsure of what to major in. Time will tell.

I'm posting from work, so I suppose I should get back to it.

Posted by xKinetiCx at 10:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Spending my work hours very wisely, I have planned a nice little upgrade for my computer upon my return. With the help of NewEgg I have picked out all the pieces. The reason I'm posting them here is to gather opinions on whether or not they would be wise upgrades to purchase or not. Since I can't easily send out e-mails to everyone, I figured this would be the next best thing. These parts will all work in conjunction with my existing hardware. I'm only planning on purchasing a new motherboard, video card, and cpu at this time. These are the components I have selected so far:

ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe Motherboard

ASUS EN7900GT-TOP Geforce 7900GT Video Card

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4600+ Manchester 2000MHz CPU

If you have any opinions on these components, either post a comment, or send me an e-mail. I haven't kept up on hardware news very much lately, so I may be way off base on my selections.

Posted by xKinetiCx at 11:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)