Happy Lunar New Year
新年快樂, 身體健康!
Xin nian kuai le, shen ti jian kang — “new year happy, body healthy” literally, but more like “wishing you a happy healthy new year” I think.
Last year was the year of the rabbit, but today is the first day of the year of the dragon.
Hellspawn does not approve! Ok, ok, actually I woke him up and that’s the look he gave me. Hellspawn and Fluffleupagus don’t care about the year of the dragon, it’s the year of the rabbits all the time as far as they’re concerned. Look at that face and try to tell him any different.
Trader Joe’s Freeze Dried Grapes
I’m always saying that Trader Joe’s is both wonderful and evil. Wonderful in that it’s convenient and walking distance and we go all the time, but evil in the sense that every time I go in, I end up buying at least $20 worth of stuff, even if all I wanted was a loaf of bread. So these are my latest thing. See this trash can? There’s two packs of the freeze dried grapes in there. We empty out the trash can once per week, which means that so far this week, we’ve eaten two bags of this stuff! Anyway, in case you were wondering, it’s yums. People who’ve tried it with me pretty much agree, I think. I guess the novelty of having a Trader Joe’s nearby hasn’t worn out.
Last Year: New Computer
Last September, we rebuilt my computer. The old one was a little over three years old, which isn’t so bad, but when Yut’s graphics card broke, I gave him mine since I had a motherboard with built in graphics capabilities. We were going to just buy a new one, but then I thought that Civ V and The Sims 3 had been playing a bit slow.
Also, my old computer case was a little loud. So annoying. Really, it all just adds up to needing a new computer, don’t you think?
- The Set Up, in no particular order. Most items purchased from Newegg which has good prices and lots of reviews. Also, they ship when they say they will. Some things were purchased from Amazon but they shipped late and kept changing the predicted ship date, which is unusual since Amazon is generally really good at this!
- Case: Silverstone Temjin TJ08-E A case for a mATX board, so it’s smaller. Also, it’s supposed to be pretty quiet — I check Silent PC Review for their reviews. Quiet is much more important than you’d think when it comes to computers. Anyway, the case is nice and quiet for sure, but I found putting together the computer pretty annoying because it was so cramped. It did have a slide out motherboard tray which was really helpful. I’m not much of one for opening my computer to mess around though, so it’s basically okay. Yut much prefers his P183 which is humongous. He doesn’t mind the size. We like our computers on our desks but I don’t like the big black box next to me.
- Hard drive: Kingston V+100 96 GB SSD Mostly I wanted an affordable SSD. Dude, if anyone reading this is looking to buy a computer, buy an SSD. It might even be worth it to either pay for the upgrade or buy one to install yourself, if you are at all inclined for that sort of thing. It speeds up boot-up amazingly.
- Processor: Intel i5 2500KSpeedy Sandy Bridge processor — a step or two below the top of the line. Top of the line is too expensive. Usually at around $200-250 is the price/performance sweet spot.
- Motherboard: Asus P8Z68-M A mATX motherboard. The standard one got good reviews and my last motherboard was Asus. Also read good things about UEFI on Newegg.
- RAM: Patriot Gamer 2 Series 8 GB Was on sale and didn’t have the super tall heat spreaders because…
- Heatsink: Xigmatek Gaia SD1283 Sooo tall. Almost too tall for the case. It seemed like it should be quiet-ish based on Silent PC Review’s reviews on other similar heatsinks, and it was cheap.
Total: under $700
The old computer. I took the power supply, an old Corsair 520HX which is modular. We still like it and it had the plugs I needed. Also I am reusing one of my old hard drives — the other one was an IDE and the new motherboard doesn’t support that any more. And the optical drive? I don’t remember. It looks like it might be IDE also in the picture.
Isn’t she cute? One of the hardest parts was keeping all of the rabbits and rabbit hair away from the computer.
Here’s the motherboard on the motherboard tray and the processor and heat sink installed. We forgot to install the heat sink before installing the motherboard on the motherboard tray which was a mistake since there’s a part to install on the underside of the motherboard so we had to undo and redo.
Look who else is helping!
Tada! New computer pretty much done, except for the side panel.
After all these months, it’s been fairly quiet. Periodically (as in not every day) there is a high pitched whine sound which is super annoying now. May be something I can figure out and fix but I haven’t yet. I didn’t buy a graphics card because onboard graphics are getting better and I’m not exactly playing crazy high graphics games. It plays Civ fine and if I ever feel like it, I can add one later.
I meant to make this post in September but it took a long time to transfer the photos from the camera to the computer. :)
Glasses
I got new glasses!
Every other year, insurance covers a new pair of glasses. By then, my old glasses have usually got scuffs or some such, so it’s good timing.
I always go in thinking I want something not too boring, maybe plastic with nose pads. Plastic so my thick lenses aren’t too obvious, and I always want nose pads, they’re better on my nose and face somehow. But I never end up with plastic. It’s hard to find nice looking (on my face) glasses that are plastic and with nose pad. Usually plastic glasses don’t have nose pads, so the number of choices is smaller anyway.
This pair is style Kliik 459, metal frame around the face, and plastic side ear sticks (what are those called?). And the frame isn’t too big. The bigger the lenses get, the thicker they are. I like ‘em ’cause they’re light and cute. And not too boring. :)
Game Apps
Adi Robertson of The Verge reported today that there were a record-breaking 1.2 billion apps downloaded in the run up to Christmas, for both iOS and Android. The focus seems to be on the number of iOS (iPod Touch, iPhone, and iPad) and Android (too many to enumerate) devices activated or whatever, but when I read the headline, my first thought was, haha boy were we exemplars of the trend.
We were on break and there were a lot of sales and we had time to look through lists and try out new stuff and our niece and nephew like to borrow our devices for games so we downloaded So. Much. Stuff. Especially games. Standouts from that week were The Creeps! and The Creeps! HD from Super Squawk Software and Jetpack Joyride from Halfbrick (the makers of Fruit Ninja which I also have). Yut and the nephew (and I think neb) liked Jetpack, but I haven’t tried it; Yut, the nephew and I all liked The Creeps! which was just a really good implementation of a tower defense style game. I think the base games were all on sale for free, but are worth money. The Creeps! HD for the iPad is nicer than The Creeps! cos it was nice to play on the bigger screen.
In case you were looking for a couple of games to pass the time. :)
Happy New Year From the Rabbits
Happy New Year from the bunnies!
They look like they have big plans, but I’m pretty sure they are just resting: Hellspawn has his head resting on Fluff’s shoulder. But look at him! Doesn’t he seem a bit more chubby than he did previously? :)
It could also be the Endless Molt of 2011. I don’t know what’s going on, but both rabbits have been molting on and off for like … the whole year!!! I thought it was the weird weather this summer (cool then warmer then cooler then warmer then…) but it never stopped. Anyway they always seem to have a halo of hair around them.
Elote
Today, grilled corn made it back to the farmers’ market! Hallelujah, summer has finally arrived! I forgot to take a photo because I ate it too fast. Really, I could say I nommed it too fast, that’s how fast I ate it. Or shoompfed it.
Flacos, the vegan Mexican place, usually comes to the Berkeley Saturday Farmers’ Market, and they have grilled corn, Mexican style, when corn’s in season. Even though we’d eaten lunch already, we got two anyway. I wimped out and got just lime and salt on mine; Yut got the full chile powder (I think cayenne), salt, and lime treatment. Spicy! So we had to get a Thai Iced Tea because the burn starts slowly but then your lips and tongue and throat start going numb. Sooo full, but sooo good.
I’m afraid it’s going to be a short season. I know that there’s a crazy heat wave in much of the rest of the country, but here in the Bay Area, we’ve had an unseasonably cool summer (70°F high today) but with a lot of variability. I blame climate change. Anyway, it’s already late July and this was the first weekend I saw the corn!
Yes, corn does merit its own post, why do you ask? :)
Fluffleupagus Turns One
Happy Birthday, bunny!
We let her in the hay bag. I don’t know why, but evidently, hay is extra delicious directly from the bag. Also, she’s been getting carrot pieces everyday this week.
She’s a great bun! A bit runty for a Flemish Giant (which are supposed to be 13+ pounds) — Fluff is 14.5 or so — but that’s probably just as well. The poops, they’re so big and there’s so many! :)
