ask-mark.com

It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything of substance here. I’ve been too busy with real life lately that I haven’t had much time to pound out a full post. A lot of what I’ve had to say over the past few weeks has ended up on either Twitter or my shared items. Some of those items are NSFW, or will at least result in strange looks from those around you.

As you may have read, I took the leap and bought Xbox 360 Elite and Rock Band, stimulating the economy just a little bit. So far I think it was money well-spent. I found out last week at Pete’s graduation party that Mike and I actually have different versions of the Xbox 360. I was unable to plug my AC adapter into his Xbox 360, and I found out that there was a change to the design sometime between June 2007 and January 2008. This resulted in a lower-power AC adapter for my Xbox 360, which has a different plug than Mike’s. It was pretty annoying, because the Xbox 360 Wikipedia entry is the only place I was able to find why I couldn’t use my AC adapter with his Xbox 360.

With the new console, I also signed up for a Xbox Live Gold membership with the gamertag markomni80. I tried to sign up with markomni, but the registration site kept telling me it was in use. After being frustrated with it for a few days, I gave up trying to get my gamertag and just signed up with my alternate screenname. Now I can do cool things like purchase new songs for Rock Band and play the game with Hersch or Mike or whomever.

This past week, I went out to Huntley to check out my mom’s computer. She said that it kept asking to put a boot disk in the computer. I confirmed my suspicions: the hard drive was shot. Now I am trying to figure out if I should get her a new drive or a new laptop. Either way, it will have to wait until at least the end of the month.

The new car has been working out very well. I have taken Dixie for a couple of rides, including a trip out to Busse Woods last week for Bert’s birthday and the Ultimate Frisbee meet up that Jessi posted about. That gave me a chance to try out the PetStep I bought for Dixie to easily climb into the cargo area of the car. Besides the PetStep, I have done a fair bit of customizing the car for me with a remote start system, iPod cable, cargo cover, cargo liner and bumper liner. I’d love to get a cold air intake for the turbocharger or a boxed subwoofer, but that will have to wait for a time when we have more disposable income again.

To wrap it up, I re-discovered Hulu this weekend. Hulu is a NBC Universal and News Corp joint venture that aims to bring premium video content online, and it’s free. Here’s an oldy, but goody, from SNL, featuring Alec Baldwin. I’m not sure how they kept from busting out laughing, but this Delicious Dish skit is one of my favorites:

That was priceless. I’d better get back to working on the stuff that I should actually be working on, which includes my application to Northwestern’s MSIT program, cleaning the house a little and taking Dixie for a much-needed (for me) walk.