I recently destroyed what I believed was the sole copy of this site's primary stylesheet while making a minor change to support the Twitter sidebar that you'll now find on this site, so I should explain a bit about Twitter.

Twitter is one of the newer social networking sites, geared toward those who are so hopelessly plugged into the internet that they can't brush their teeth without blogging about the experience. Although I've assiduously avoided MySpace, Facebook, and all the other mainstream social networking cesspools, I'm a member of a number of lesser-known niche social networks, and I've been trying to hook them all into my sidebar here through the beauty of code.

Netflix has a kind of social network built in. You can see what movies your friends are renting, see how they've rated them, and recommend your favorites. And since they provide RSS feeds, I parsed the RSS and created a sidebar. Likewise, I tried to do the same with my Steam acccount, although it was much harder to parse the HTML in my steam page. It worked, but I decided not to add it.

Twitter provides a script to add your "tweets" to your site. And I have used it.

Twitter is microblogging. No more than 140 characters. The goal is to make it really easy and really brief. You can set up twitter to work with an instant messenger or mobile device, so that you can sit in a movie theater and send a text message to twitter: "Hey! I'm about to watch Iron Man!"

I've been using Twitter for about a week now, and it's a nice way to share tidbits with a few billion close personal friends when it's not quite enough to blog about. I'd never have blogged about accidentally shooting myself in the face with a can of whipped cream, but I Twittered it, and it was awesome.

So now you can view my Twitter entries (they're called "Tweets", but I don't know how I feel about that) in my sidebar. I will endeavor to tweet less about toothbrushing, and more about

Looks like my browser cache had a copy of my stylesheet, so I was able to resurrect it. You'd better believe I'll be keeping a backup from now on. I'm not a huge fan of the blueberry version myself.

Well, I just went and did it. While uploading a minor css change for the addition of a Twitter sidebar, I somehow managed to entirely delete my css file. And I've got no backup. So I guess you're stuck with this new style, "Blueberry Cheese Brownie", until I can find the time to rewrite the old one, which will likely not be exactly the same as it was. Sigh.

Over the past month, I've been working on many small changes to this site. Firstly, I've installed the newest version of Gallery, since the older version broke. It remains the only portion of this site that I haven't coded myself in Notepad. I may do some slight tweaking to the Gallery theme at some point, but overall I'm pretty happy with it.

I also added my Google Reader shared items to my list of RSS feeds on this page, in case anyone wants to follow the things I find relevant in my RSS feeds. To this end, I've removed my news sidebar. I certainly have plenty of other sidebar items. And I'm thinking about adding a twitter sidebar.

I've also rewritten my homebrew wishlist page. Now, instead of always having Amazon, EBay, and BestWebBuys links which may or may not work, I can dynamically create up to three links for each item at any site I want. I've stripped out about half the items on my wishlist too. Yeah, I know, nobody ever looks at it, but I can at least keep track of the cool stuff I like just for myself.

Lastly, I'm finishing up a new stylesheet, which will entirely change the look of this site. I may try to make a total of three styles before I make them live. We'll see. If you want to look at my unfinished stylesheet, click here. If you click there you'll get a cookie that will make that your permanent stylesheet, so if you want to go back to the normal style, click here. I'm open to feedback on the style, but keep in mind that I haven't yet fixed up all the pages on my site with the new style, so some may look lousy.

Okay, this is just about scraping the bottom of the barrel for movie quotes. I'm not saying that these aren't good quotes, it's just that my list is now exhausted. If I do another one of these, it may be a long way off.

1. Why should I change my name? He's the one who sucks!
2. You're gonna eat lightnin' and you're gonna crap thunder!
3. By night's end, I predict me and her will interface.
4. Robots building robots? Now that's just stupid.
5. With a gun barrel in between your teeth, you speak only in vowels.
6. He's finally matched his meet. You really licked his ass.
7. Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room!
8. I'm pondering the immortal words of Socrates who said, "I drank what?"
9. I like to party, so I like my Jesus to party.
10. I like you. You have balls. I like balls.

Game franchises have become like movie sequels, and more often than not, hearing about a game sequel gets a groan out of me. I don't need Cooking Mama 3, Postal 3, or Twisted Metal 6 any more than I needed Scary Movie 4, Mission Impossible 3, or Leprechaun 5. But even though many sequels are terrible, there are some I'd like to see.

Of course I'm looking forward quite a bit to Starcraft 2 and Fallout 3, and I'll be happy once details are announced about Resident Evil 5 and Final Fantasy XIII. But these are titles we know are coming. On the other side of the coin are Psychonauts 2 or Beyond Good and Evil 2, which may never happen. The games on my list below are probable, but I've heard nothing solid about any of them.

1. Thief - Although I could never get into the original Thief or Thief 2: The Metal Age, I absolutely loved Thief: Deadly Shadows, which was the third game in the franchise. They'd be insane to not put out a fourth title in the series. At this point, I'd expect it to be released on PC, Xbox 360, and PS3. There have been a lot of rumors, but nothing solid.
2. Mechwarrior - It's been a long time now since the release of the latest Mechwarrior title back in 2002, and the series dates back to 1989. Although there's been a long gap, I'd be surprised if there was never a fifth game in the series. Googling tells me that the latest news is from 2003, where IGN tells us that Mechwarrior 5 is canceled. But the Mechwarrior series was so much better than games like Battlefield 2142 and Chrome Hounds. The customization process was brilliant - the chassis you purchased would only allow a certain amount of space and weight, and you had to add heat sinks to counteract the heat produced by the weapons you'd bought. Energy weapons didn't need ammo, but created a lot of heat, and thus you used your weight on extra heat sinks. Autoguns and other mass driver weapons needed a lot of space and weight for ammo, which could explode if hit by enemy fire. Plus - you can run out of ammo. And missiles were great, but weighed a lot for what you got. I loved configuring mechs.
3. Fatal Frame - I've never even played any of the Fatal Frame games, but I do like survival horror. As I understand it, the premise of these games is essentially that you enter a haunted house with a camera. A magic camera. It can kill ghosts. Your film is your ammo, and better film does more damage. Anyway, I'd like to give the games a try, but Fatal Frame 2 is rare, and is currently selling for more than my car is worth.
4. Castlevania - I've been a fan of the Castlevania series ever since I saw Castlevania 3 on the NES over my cousin's house when we were kids. But other than handheld versions, it's been a long time since I've seen a true Castlevania title. Just recently, Konami has registered the name "Order of Ecclesia". A new Castlevania would likely be released on either Playstation 3 or Wii, and I've got both consoles, so bring it on.
5. Diablo - Blizzard has just acquired the Diablo3.com domain name, but there's been no official announcement. I played through the original Diablo on the Playstation 1, and while I enjoyed it, if I'm going to play action hack-em-up games, I'd rather play Dungeon Siege or Champions of Norrath. Perhaps that's just because those games are newer. Diablo 3 could change that. Hopefully Diablo 3 isn't a MMO - I think that since Blizzard already has World of Warcraft, there's less of a chance of it being an actual MMO. It would work much better as an online multiplayer co-op game that allows up to 32 (or more?) players. Personally, I'd likely be playing 2 player with Linda.

When I run out of things to write about, I still find that I haven't run out of things to be annoyed at. It's actually kind of sad - I'd actually rather run out of things to be annoyed at.

• People who spell rogue "rouge" - "I've got a fourteenth level rouge!" - This always makes people come off like idiots, and I've seen it so many times on internet discussion boards.
• Use of "they" as a gender-neutral pronoun - Unless you're speaking in the plural, don't use the word they.
• Wireless networking
• Red Shells
• Use of the word "my" as a variable prefix in code. - Example: MyDataReader, MyKeyPress. It just annoys me.
• My freaking garage door - Every morning, when I leave for work, the sun is at just the right angle that it hits the sensor on the garage door opener perfectly, and the door won't close - somehow it thinks that there's something blocking it. So I've got to pull the garage door opener off my visor, get out of my car, and stand between the sun and the garage door sensor until the door finishes closing so that the sensor is in my shadow. Then, as I get back into my car, I'm lucky if I don't accidentally hit the button and re-open the door. Yeah - that's happened.
• Stupid people
• Leaking Baby Bottles - Every so often, the lid on a bottle won't be threaded quite right, and when you tip it, milk or juice will leak out everywhere.

Thank you for joining us for this month's installment of annoyances. Be sure to join us again next time.

Warning: if you've got no interest in reading about games, skip the first two paragraphs and jump straight to the third. Uhh... and don't count this as a paragraph.

Recently, I've been doing most of my gaming on my three consoles. On the PS3, I've played through Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, and played lots of demos, including the new demo of Echochrome, which is actually very cool. Linda got herself hooked on Fl0w, the one PSN game I've actually purchased. I also just got a copy of Assassins Creed, although I haven't yet started playing it. On the Wii, I've reached a stopping point near the end of Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles and No More Heroes where I just can't seem to advance. I'm having a lot of trouble beating Jeane. I'm giving up on Resident Evil, but I'm gonna keep trying to get Jeane in No More Heroes. I'm also stopped at 95 stars in Super Mario Galaxy, although I've technically beaten the game. My goal is to get to 100 stars. I'll also probably pick up Mario Kart Wii this week.

Probably the game I've played most recently is Final Fantasy XII on the Playstation 2. It's actually pretty amazing how much content they've managed to cram onto that one disc. Just the amount of high-quality movie content is amazing. I'm something like 30 hours into the game, and I'm probably not even halfway through.

In any event, I've been doing close to no gaming on my home PC. This is because the top fan in the PC had developed a squeal that had gotten louder and louder until it had become a loud screech that I could hear from across the house. No lie. And I found that the back fan in the PC had stopped entirely. Not good.

Up until recently, the most involved work I'd ever done on a PC hardware-wise was dusting out the case, replacing a graphics or network card, or installing new memory. But after talking to some folks at work, I became convinced that I could do it. So I checked the model numbers on my fan and ordered two fans on NewEgg. When they arrived, I spent an evening unscrewing the old ones, cutting zip ties with a kitchen knife, and praying that I didn't accidentally cut anything else. It took quite a while, since a lot of the connections were buried under other parts, but I eventually got everything connected. I plugged everything back in, threw the switch, and... nothing. No power at all. It was late, so I hit the sack and took another look the next day. After cracking open the case again, there was a fairly obvious cord unplugged that I must've bumped or something. Plugged that one in and voila! All is well. The new fans work great, and it's fantastic to be able to hear myself think while I'm on the PC.

Honestly, most of the PC games I want to play aren't playable on my current machine. I was originally going to buy a new machine in May, but since my old one is now running better, I may be able to wait. My deadline is now the release of Starcraft 2, although I'd like to have a new machine by the time Fallout 3 comes out on October 7th.

So I've got time to research and think about what to get in a new machine. Intel just dropped the price of their Q6750 chips by about half. I've also been wondering whether I should get XP or Vista on a new machine, so I called up the PC Gamer Podcast and asked them. here follows a transcript of that call:

Hey guys, this is Greg from Colorado. I'm gonna be looking to get a new machine soon with my economic stimulus check, and I'm trying to figure out what operating system to put on the machine. I've been reading number of articles recently about how with XP, pretty much everything runs faster, and how the framerates on games are gonna be a lot better. But then on the other hand, Windows Vista has got DirectX10, and so there's obviously a tradeoff there. Given all these things, what do you think is a better option for the OS to put on a new machine?

There's mitigating circumstances here. Stimulus checks come out in July, right? Will they still be selling XP on machines at that time? Microsoft claimed that they were gonna stop selling licenses, which would mean - it's not like they would take boxes off the shelves, but they were just gonna stop distributing it. Now they're rethinking it, because just like this guy, a lot of people are saying "I don't know that I want to go Vista". Now as everyone here who reads PC Gamer knows, we pushed Vista pretty hard back when it was launched. We really backed up behind it, we loved the story that Microsoft had about pushing Games For Windows as a platform, however, since then we've been pretty disappointed at the follow-up. Even with SP1, framerates continue to lag behind XP, which is a really disappointing thing when you spend as much money as you do for Vista, and you do spend a lot of money even with the recent price cuts. I would have to put it like this at this point, this is - sorry Microsoft - I'm saying unless you really really really really want DirectX10 and you've seen Crysis doing everything it can do and you've seen the water effects in Bioshock and you think "Wow, I just can't live without that", I might stick with XP for now, especially with SP3 just on the verge of coming out. Service Pack 3 for XP should be released within... what do you think Norm, a week or so? Very soon. Let's put it that way. And I think... you can expect a framerate bump there as well. Vista, you can always upgrade later if you want. It's not that difficult. We did a how-to on it not too long ago. You always have time to upgrade. Downgrading is a different story altogether.

Unless you're gonna buy a completely built machine, which I doubt for six hundred bucks. If you're just upgrading, I might say stick with XP for now, because I don't see that much value in Vista anymore, and I don't see them building on the foundation of what they launched over a year ago.

If you feel like hearing the whole five minutes of conversation, you can get the mp3 here. Listen from 49:50 to 54:45. I know that since I called in the question on my cell phone, the audio quality was just horrible. For that, I must apologize. I think next time, I'll be recording a mp3 at home and emailing it.

And they assumed I was going to be buying a $600 PC, which is also not the case. Between Linda and myself, and Lia, we're getting a bit more. And beyond that, I might be sinking a few of my own dollars into the PC, but I'd really like to keep it well under $2000.

Lastly, I've been having some network trouble at home this weekend that I think may be router-related. I've power cycled the router many times, and that always seems to restore the connection, but even when it's on, it generally crawls. When the connection goes down, I can't even see the router from my PC, so it's definitely local. And the connection is so bad that I can no longer stream music from my server to my Tivo or PS3. Do you think I need a new router?

Aside from BSG, there's not too much on TV right now. If you're looking for looking for a good show, I highly recommend renting or Netflixing Dexter. Linda and I are nearly finished watching season 2, and the show is downright amazing. Yes, there are occasional bits of gore, and yes, there is nudity. And there's a hell of a lot of swearing. That's why it's on Showtime.

The eponymous character is a serial killer. Yet somehow, he's a very likable guy. That probably has something to do with the fact that he only kills other killers, and Dexter's victims generally don't have anything near the twisted ethics that he does. So he's a vigilante, yes. But not the typical movie vigilante. He doesn't just do away with his victims - he does it in a ritualistic, serial-killer way. It's only Michael C. Hall's charisma that pulls off the character of Dexter and makes him so likable.

The show's writing is excellent. The relationships are complex and include minor details that add realism most shows have never had. The writers weave in bits of comedy where you'd least expect it. And the situations these writers come up with make for cliffhangers that will have you staying up past midnight watching episode after episode.

The show also has some amazing mood music. I find myself humming some of Dexter's different tunes throughout the day. And the intro is a masterpiece - it shows Dexter going through a number of everyday activities, but they're done in such a way as to make you squirm. It starts with a closeup of a mosquito biting his arm. He slaps it. Then he makes breakfast - closeups of him cutting and eating food are made to seem quite disturbing. He flosses his teeth, and the floss looks like garrotte wire. He puts on a tee shirt, and the fabric stretches across his face in an unnerving way. I've heard a number of people say they can't watch that intro, and that's what makes it genius.

Season 3 of Dexter is due to start in October on Showtime. Can't frelling wait.

A long time ago, I blogged about a classical pianist and singer called Elly K, who after my post actually left a comment on my site. Since then, she's changed her stage name to her real name: Elizaveta. Actually, her real name is Elizaveta Igorevna Khripounova, but I really can't pronounce or even remember that name, so I'll just keep referring to her as Elly.

Elly has an album titled after what I consider her best song: Breakfast with Chopin. It only has six songs, and two of those I already had copies of, but I still find myself glad that I bought the album. The majority of these songs are taken directly from classical pieces, which of course are centuries into public domain. But she's taken popular classical music, made minor alterations, and added lyrics. I loved this years ago when I heard Breakfast with Chopin, but amazingly she's made it work with a few others on this album.

Breakfast with Chopin is the same song I'd already heard, but with the welcome addition of strings. What sounds like a string quartet backs the piano, and really adds to the piece. Likewise, Storyteller, the other song of Elly's that I already owned, has been similarly improved. This time, not only has the string quartet been added, but a certain stacatto quality has been applied to both piano and vocals that I find very appealing. If you listen closely, you can hear what sounds like a cello being softly plucked during certain portions of the song.

Snapshot is my favorite new song. I recognise the classical piece, yet can't name it. Elly somehow manages to capture that perfect timing that I can never seem to imitate when I myself play piano - it just teeters off the end of a beat in a way that leaves you hanging in anticipation. The addition of an accordian really works here too.

Lullaby for E is based on a piece that I can actually name: Fuer Elise. The rhythm has been totally changed with the addition of bass guitar and drums, but the plucky little beat is so catchy that I found myself humming it in the shower this morning.

Mariner's Song is a another song which is doubtless based on another classical melody with which I'm not familiar. The flute, strings, and piano work well together to create a beautiful haunting melody that is another of my favorites on the album.

The final song on the disc is Kite. It's a fanciful little tune about being a kite. "It lives on the ground but it dreams of the sky / a bird trapped inside of a heart that aches to fly"

You can listen to clips from the album on Elly's CD Baby page.