Saturday, September 4, 2010

Daily Report: Riverside

I thought I had checked that everything was as expected on my new used computer before buying it: 512 MB of memory? Yup. 80 GB hard drive? Check. 1.7 GHz processor? Yes. 128 MB video card? Got it. DVD drive working? I watched the guy load the drivers for the webcam on it... so yes...

... or no. It's only a cheap old CD-ROM drive. Doh.

(I wanted to copy all the Star Trek DVD's that I had bought from my friend Dave onto my new external hard drive. I had to use Epril's laptop instead.)

I did crap at work today. It seems to happen about once per week. However, a crappy day now used to be my average day just a few months ago.

Instead, I hopped on the motorcycle, and with Tyson running alongside, I went down to the river and joined Epril, Susan, Jans, and their friends on the grassy river bank where they had set up a little campfire and were cooking a jackfruit dish of some kind. I lounged in the cool water, while Tyson had a blast getting chased by an angry chicken. Filipino people are always scared of Tyson at first, but when they see him scrambling to get away from a puffed-up chicken, it puts them at ease.

After that, I went home and played my new game, Final Fantasy XIII, on the PlayStation 3. It's a game of jaw-dropping scope and grandeur, that was years in development. This is only the second Final Fantasy game that I've played (for more than a little while) and it's just fantastic.

Finally, I went with Epril, Susan, and Jans to Glitz Bar for more friends and some beer. I didn't stay too long; I dislike Karaoke so much. I finally figured out why too: Yes, listening to people sing off tune at high volume is the principal reason. But, in The Philippines, all of the Karaoke microphones are set to have this strong reverb effect. So when people sing, it is to my ears and brain the same as staring at an out-of-focus movie: Very annoying and uncomfortable after a while.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

99.44% of the karaoke singers I have heard remind me of contestants on The Gong Show.

I keep waiting for the hook.

Mike Farrell
Cagayan de Oro

Mom said...

Actually in Florida, the karaoke singers are quite good. They have their own CD's, practice all week, and put on quite a performance. They even have their "own selections" that they are known for, and people ask for them.

Jil Wrinkle said...

Well Mom, I would say by definition then, they are musicians... proper entertainment. Karaoke is first and foremost singing to entertain oneself... singing regardless of skill, regardless of others' opinions.

Unknown said...

You can buy a dvd burner for 20 or 30 bucks. Installing it is a breeze-basically plug it in.

Jil Wrinkle said...

Thanks Roger. I've bought and installed DVd burners before... I just was miffed that I hadn't noticed that I was getting a CD ROM drive instead of a DVD.