All Your Base Are Belong To Us — The Kip Lange Homepage

Ahh, I have good news to relate. A friend of mine, an old friend and fellow Berkeley alum, whom I shall refer to only by her initials, L.S., is due to deliver a baby girl this Tuesday (although she herself “feels like it’ll be more like Thurdsay”).

She’s living on the Cape; more information is really not needed, if you know who I’m talking about and wish to express tidings of good luck and such, you can contact me and I’ll screen out any people who shouldn’t be bothering her.

Except for me, of course, I shouldn’t be bothering her either, but she’s a great girl.

So let’s all wish her some good luck this coming week (or maybe a bit longer, who knows) and remind her to “BREATHE!” and, I guess, “PUSH!”

This is the extend of my knowledge of the birth process (breathe and push). Beyond that it just gets icky and I don’t want to think about it.

But may the lovely Ms. S. (soon to be Mrs. something) enjoy many happy days with her lovely baby girl.

If you ever run your plasma HDTV in 4:3 mode, you should be very aware of this. Most plasmas will display 4:3 mode with two light bars to the left and right of the picture. This can cause burn-in, just like with any other TV. In other words, eventually, if you leave it on 4:3 mode long enough, you will see a “ghost” image of those two light bars on the left and right side(s) when you switch it back to fullscreen mode.

There is an easy way to fix this. I can’t tell you exactly what to do, obviously, since every brand of TV handles menus slightly differently. But it’s rather simple. Set those two “light” bars to dark — in other words, turn them off. And you’ll never have to worry about that ghost image ever showing up.

If you want to see what the Playstation 3s on eBay are selling for, check this link:

http://search.ebay.com/search/search.dll?cgiurl=http%3A%2F%2Fcgi.ebay.com%2Fws%2F&fkr=1&from=R8&satitle=playstation+3&category0=

Indeed. The mighty eBayers who waited in line in the rain, got beaten up by PS3-hungry thugs, who peed against alley walls all night waiting to grab those PS3s to sell to us poor fools for $2000 a pop — oops, they’ve dropped at least a grand. The most expensive one as I speak is priced at $1000, contains two free games (a $120 value), and the seller is so desperate to get rid of it so fast that he is willing to ship it for free or to HAND DELIVER it to you for free.

Most of the other PS3s (I’m talking about the top-of-the-line 60GB units) are selling for around $670-$800. That means that the poor fools camped out all that time for a grand profit of, on the low end…just about $70.

How terribly sad. And yet, at the same time, how terribly satisfying for those of us desperately waiting to pick up a Playstation 3, who were thwarted from buying the original units by these annoying eBayers who don’t even want the system and who were convinced they could sell it on eBay for more than triple the retail price.

They better hurry, too, if they want to make ANY money, because Sony is adamantly sticking by its plan to have one million units ready to go by March.

Serves ’em right, they screwed legit gamers out of the console they had been waitng years to buy and delivered them into the hands of spoiled children whose mommy and daddy are willing to shell out two grand (idiotically, with no service contract on a new and surely buggy system) just to make sure their trust-fund-wielding child would be able to play Resistance: Fall of Man on their personal HDTV (probably gifts from last Christmas) on Christmas morning.

Bah to all of them, I say, and power to the PS3-loving middle class!

Perhaps Maroney being hurt affected the team super-adversely. But 78 total yard passing by Brady? What a terrible game.

Miami deserved the win. I hate to say it, but they deserved it, they even deserved the shut-out that they pitched.

What a horrible way to break in my new TV, with a stunningly clear HD loss. Bleh.

This Patriot team will not be gong anywhere in the playoffs unless they turn things around and right the ship — and fast.

And, as I said in the title of this post, I can offer no excuse for their horrible play. If you’re a Miami fan, consider this a humble admission from me that the Dolphins simply (and dramatically) spanked the Patriots. Bigtime.

Ah, well, there’s always next week.

Figured I might just add some few helpful tips here about hooking up an HDTV with a Comcast HD-ready box. First of all, you need the Comcast HD-ready box, as I mentioned. It’s a silver Motorola (not the black ones, those are just digital boxes). Now for the part that’s a bit confusing. Comcast has not yet, to my knowledge, released a box that has an HDMI (standard HD cable format) output. The only digital output on the box is a DVI-D plug. If you’re unfamiliar with it, it looks like the only thing on the back of the box that resembles a plug for a computer monitor.

Now, whatever Comcast tells you, you’re going to need to use that DVI-D port to get yourself a digital picture. This means you’re going to need one of two things, either a cable that is male HDMI on one end and male DVI-D on the other — they sell around $100 — or, alternatvely, you can buy a stanadard HDMI cable (male on both ends) and a DVI-D adapter. The adapter costs around $20 or so. It should be female on the HDMI end and male on the DVI-D end, the part which connects to the female jack on the HD-capable box.

Still with me? Good. You’ll need one other thing, one other cable. It”ll be a simple two-jack (on both ends) component cable. One connects audio left, the other connects audio right (welcome to stereo). They’re usually red (for right) and white (for left).

Turn the TV on, switch it around, test the HD channels, you should be all set.

Also, one caveat: if you plan on getting a Playsation 3 anytime soon, like me, make sure you pick up an extra HDMI cable. You need one to play the PS3 in high-def (that’s actually the big point, all the PS3s’s games are in HD, and right now there’s not much of a jump in graphics if not played in HD).

I hope this helps someone else along the way to hooking up their HDTV (and you can always mail me with a question if you want) , here. Remember, Comcast, no matter WHAT they say, does not yet make a box wth an HDMI output.

Happy vidding, me droogs!

The 42-inch flat-panel plasma arrived today. It’s a Panasonic, and, my God, it is beautiful

HD on it is crisper than I thought it would have been, the contrast is great, the colors are vivid — FINALLY, I have one of the things I have pined away all my life for: the Big TV.

Now, if I can just get a Playstation 3 and a flying car, my life will be complete (I believe it’s easier to get the flying car than the PS3 right now).

Plasma. Oh yes. Oh yes.

So, here I am, having ordered a 42-inch plasma HDTV from Circuit City…and the idiots can’t seem to figure out when to deliver it. First they said it was coming Friday, now they tell me I have to get a new receipt and it’ll come on Saturday. Well, it damn well better come, because I plan on watching this week’s games in HD. I can always try the TV downstairs but bah, that’s a rear-projection HDTV, who wants that?

Took an hour on the phone with Circuit City to clear things up, too.

This damn TV better arrive on Saturday. My whole life, I’ve wanted the Big TV. I finally go shell out the money for it, and what happens? They tease me with delivery dates. Not fair. If I wanted to feel this frustrated, I’d start dating again.

And nobody else can watch the Big TV when it comes. Thppthh!

Muhahahahahah! Hahah! HAH!

USC bites it in a contest with UCLA. Oh, thank you God. If it couldn’t be Cal, at least another UC-system school…

May your throwing arm break in two, Booty.

Just thought I’d take a moment to address this issue, since most of the game sites are so fed up with people asking the question that they simply won’t answer it anymore. The question is:

“Why does my character have permanent silence on him/her? I’ve tried Vox and Echo Herbs and nothing works. Also, s/he has no mana points!”

Or, just:

“My character has no mana points!”

Here.

Go into the party screen, go into the accesories for your characters, and unequp the manufactured nethicite or the Dawn Shard.

That help?

And do I totally sound like a RPG geek now?

And out…

I mean this from deep, deep down in my heart. Fuck USC. Fuck the University of Spoiled Children. Fuck the University of South Central. Fuck them all, fuck them all up the ass with a spiked-tip mace.

I can say this because once, a few years ago, Cal, my alma mater, DID fuck USC up the ass with a big spiky stick.

Right now, I’m just hoping Notre Dame can wipe them off them field. They’re like some kind of annoying virus bred in the depths of Los Assholeses. They must be dealt with. Quickly. I’m tired of seeing them in the Championship game. Tired, tired, tired.

Fuck USC. Always hated the bastards.

That goes for all you USC alums, too, fuck you all up the ass until you’re raw and bleeding. Good riddance to your arsehole, that’s what I say.