A coworker asked me yesterday about how to use bittorrent, so I thought I’d include a quick guide on japadamus. 

Basically, bittorrent is a peer-to-peer file sharing system, but unlike kazaa for example, it segments a single file into many little pieces that are shared by many users.  So, when you download a single file, you are actually getting a bunch of little pieces of the file from different users.  Similarly, when you share a file, you are sending off little pieces of the file to different users.

Overall, it is very easy and pretty safe.  I’ve been using it since kazaa fell off, and I would say it’s superior to peer-to-peer networks in almost every way.

First, download and install a bittorrent client.  I use Azureus.  You can get it here.  It is free and it is one of the best bittorrent clients i have used.  the bittorrent client helps to find out where all the little file pieces are, and put them together in the corrent order to you get your complete file.  you can’t really use bittorrent without one.

Next, go to a torrent portal to find some stuff to download.  My favorite currently is BT Junkie.  Other good ones include TorrentReactor, MegaNova, IsoHunt and Pirate Bay.

Basically, torrent portals provide you with a search mechanism for the millions of torrentss that are out there.  the one i listed provide various types of search, and you can often specify searches for video, audio, application, games, etc.

Once you find a file you want, you can just click on it and click ‘open.’  That should open up Azureus and start the download.  You may be asked where you want to save the file, etc.

Note that the torrent file you download from these sites is not an actual song or movie or whatever.  It just tells your bittorrent client how to go out and find all the little pieces of your file from other sharers, and how to put this file together.  The torrent files are actually very small, and download in about a second.

And that’s pretty much it.  If you are downloading a big file, i.e. gigs, it can take a day or more to download.  But normally files such as a single album download pretty fast.

You may also want to turn on port forwarding to improve your download speed.  This is a little more complex, and there is a good guide here.  This isn’t mandatory, but it can speed things up considerably for you.

As for piracy concerns, I haven’t seen any cases with the RIAA suing bittorrent users.  So far, i’ve only seen the RIAA going after bittorrent portals which provide access to torrent files.  With that said, all IP information about bittorrent users is available while your are downloading/sharing, so it is possible that a suit could be brought up against a bittorrent user.  What I think will happen first however, is that the RIAA will go after the original torrent seeders (the people who first post up a file), since that person has the clearest link between sharing and downloading.  I think it is unlikley that the RIAA will attempt to go after individual bittorrent downloaders, in the near future at least.

Here are a couple great deals:

Macy’s is having their friends and family special starting tomorrow.  printable coupon is here.  10% to 20% off!

Borders has a 30% off 1 item coupon here.  Pretty good deal, expect I think they make you sign up for their free rewards program, which is a pain.

And finally a vid from the colbert report:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3Owd5lqWXY]

sigh, back at work after the thanksgiving holiday.  you notice there’s a distinct shift in motivation following thanksgiving?  i mean, christmas is coming up so soon, you can’t really keep your mind straight.  and all day long you’re just looking at xmas sales on the internet anyway and trying to decide what to buy for whom.

actually, i kind of like it better now as an adult where you can buy the stuff you want, rather than begging your parents or santa for it.  i remember that always made xmas kind of nerve racking.  i can’t imagine what it’s been like for the past two years with the xbox 360 and ps3, i mean, some kids must be pretty bummed out.  like, sorry, santa couldn’t camp out over night at best buy.

the whole santa thing was very confusing for me as a kid, until i figured it out at least.  i mean, on one hand, you have santa the all powerful and munificent, flying around the world and giving away gifts.  then on the other hand, you have santa outside of longs begging for coins with a bell.  i remember thinking, maybe santa wouldn’t have to be begging if he stopped giving away so much shit.

the whole santa thing seems like it’d be a negative facilitator for poor kids too.  these kids are told that if they’re good, they’ll get what then want.  but if you’re poor, you probably can’t afford xbox or whatever - so really you’re good and you don’t get shit.  so why be good?  why not just rob some dude or sell crack or turn tricks (illusions) - in that case bad would = xbox.

whatever, i mean, santa must be a tough sell nowadays.  is he up in the north pole churning out ps3s and ipods?  how do you explain that to your kids.  how do you explain that santa only made 400,000 ps3s this xmas so guys are getting shot in the best buy parking lot.

it’s funny because kids are told that santa’s elves are cheerfully working up in the north pole to make stuff, but in reality their ps3 is probably made by a chinese kid their own age making $2 a month, sold to their parents at a walmart by an 86 year old filipino lady making minimum wage with no health insurance.  i mean, just be realistic - it is what it is - i’d still buy it, but it’d make the ps3’s graphics seem that much better.  1080p + a little human suffering.

these types of myths are all over for kids.  what about willy wonka and the oompa loompas?  i mean, it’s all there in the movie:  willy wonka went to a third world nation and picked up some tribal ‘workers,’ then shipped them back to his factory where they could not leave and were forced to make chocolate.  oh yeah, and he makes them sing and dance around.  did wonka also operate a tobacco farm and some cotton fields too?  can we get a charlie and the chocolate factory / amistad mash up?

and what’s funny is that kids all over the world have read this book or seen the movie, and are taught to think this kind of stuff is OK, even desirable.  I mean, they look so happy, right?  they’re dancing around and singing - good thing wonka saved them and helped them to become civilized.  good thing they’re no longer stuck in their barbaric home in the jungle. they love working for massa wonka, he’s so giving and munificent.  loompa, please.

anyway, here are some cool youtube videos i found this weekend.  again, thanks to digg.

This is a great video - these guys are actually pretty talented.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLn45-7Pn2Y]

Funny clip from iron chef here.

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=KMZnJQixq58&mode=related&search=]

so this year i had kind of a non-traditional thanksgiving.  SA and i got some fish and made sushi, but we also had some turkey and stuff from whole foods.  the cranberry sauce from whole foods was really, really good.  it was made all fresh and had  a bit of orange juice in there - super good.  but sushi and turkey - that’s definitely a japadamus thanksgiving.

afterwards, i was driving home at like 1am on black friday, and i drove past a couple of best buys.  the lines were insane - they were wrapping around the whole store.  and it’s not like it was comfortable weather either, i would say it was in the 50s - which is pretty cold for cali.  anyway, that made me not really want to do anything special for black friday.  i hate all these crowds - it’s just too crazy to stand in line all this time just to get a good price on a generic lcd tv or something.  i did some pretty thoround research on these black friday deals and there wasn’t really anything that spectacular - especially nothing i would camp out overnight for.  i mean, i can understand camping out for a ps3, especially if you are going to sell it for a profit.  but i mean, look at this shit - nothing to wait for in my opinion.

I did end up going to walmart on black friday because i needed a new water filter.  it was a mess.  it was packed, and the thing about black friday is that people feel the need to bring their whole families.  at  walmart, this means that you have families with 5 or 6 kids running around like it’s cinco de mayo.  and you always have these parents who feel like black friday is the perfect time to teach their kids how to push a cart, so you have all these f’ing kids driving carts into shit or just leaving them in the middle of aisles.  then there’s the strollers - you have these double strollers - which i guess is necessary for these families with 6 kids.  but they really have no place in a store.  you can’t get around them, and when it’s busy that means you can’t really move them anywhere.  i must have seen 10 strollers with babies in them just sitting unattended in walmart - like the parents were just trying to get their kids kidnapped.  incidentially, if you’re trying to get your kid stolen, walmart is not a great place to go - the last time those people need is more kids. i mean, i hate to beat a dead horse, but, you get the point.

I’ve also been watching this season of survivor cook islands.  the big deal this year is that the tribes were initially divided by race.  this meant that instead of having one tolken asian, they have 5.  anyway, this last episode - and this will be a spoiler - they converged the two separate tribes into one tribe.  it was probably the best epiode so far. 

Basically, there are two asians left: yul, who is this smart k who is a very strong player, and becky, who is also a pretty hot k girl, and is really tight with yul.  the white kids are a disaster.  i mean, it’s like they think they’re on the real world, not survivor.  they’re hooking up and getting f’ed up and stuff.  adam is the typical white frat boy, a copier salesman in real life, who flirts constantly with the white hos, candace, a student, and parvati, a waitress.  the other white guy left is jonathan, who is an older writer/producer, who did this mutiny thing where he pretty much alienated himself from everyone.  he’s not really down with the other whites, and as i’ll mention later is more aligned with the others.  there’s only one mexican left, ozzy, who is a really good survivor, and nate and sundra, who are popolos.

anyway, this last episode they joined tribes, and the big thing was that jonathan became kind of the swing vote, because you have becky, yul, ozzy and sandra on one side (the former aitu tribe), adam, candace, parvati, jonathan and nate on the other side (the former raro tribe).  but jonathan and candace had mutinied to raro - the weren’t organic members - candace so she could hook up with adam, and jonathan, for what reason, i don’t know.  candace was cool with raro, because she is all flirty with adam, possibly their strongest player.  jonathan went over because he thought he was tight with candace, but really she didn’t care for him, and the rest of raro looked at him as a traitor.

but, in the vote jonathan f’s over his former raro teammates and votes with aitu to get nate kicked off.  that was a big deal because it shifted the game so that the former aitu tribe now has power in numbers, assuming that jonathan doesn’t switch again.

nate was pretty pissed off when he got voted out.  in the end credits, he said “Jonathan, you can kiss my ass! You a dirty stanky, whack fruitcake who sold me out, who sold out our tribe when we brought you in. You trading bastard. So kiss my ass, Jonathan.”

actually that comment made me happy - it was really encouraging.  it shows how far racial relations have progressed in our country.  imagine a black person being surprised that a white man sold him out.  fifty years ago, the black guy would expect the white guy to sell him out.  but not today…that is progress.

actually, i was also kind of surprised that nate didn’t expect jonathan to f him over.  i mean, nate is a real, chest beating, keeping it real kind of popolo, and for the past two weeks he’s been talking shit about jonathan, like how jonathan wasn’t part of their original tribe, and how they gotta keep it real and stick together and how jonathan’s not pulling his weight, and what not.  so, for nate to be surprised that jonathan f’ed him over was pretty ignorant.  i mean, nate would have cut jonathan in a second if it was up to him.

so anyway, raro really wanted to vote yul out, because yul is a solid competitor, and he is also pretty smart.  at one point, nate said, “yul is intelligent.  i do not want that boy thinking anymore.  you know what i’m saying, you don’t want that clock ticking in there, homie.” which really says a lot about nate.

so yul convinced jonathan to come to their side, and jonathan convinced them to vote off nate, and that was that.  it was a big stretch for yul and aitu to trust jonathan, because jonathan had already f’ed aitu over when he muntinited, but anyway, it worked out.

another interesting thing about this survivor is that 13 of the original 20 people are from california.  it’s weird, it kind of makes you wonder if these people are actors or what.

anyway, that was black friday…japadamus out!

I’ve had the zune for about a day now, and overall I am pretty impressed.  although it is a first generation product, the zune is pretty slick and, for my purposes, it compares favorably to the ipod.  it is not, however, an ipod killer.  like the ipod, the zune is mainly closed and limited by DRM.  more importantly, the innovations introduced by microsoft are not cohesive, and fail to capitalize on apple’s failings in this market.  i would suggest that anyone considering a zune try out the device thoroughly, since there are some quirks with the device that may be deal-breaker-ish.

I got the black zune.  it is coated with a clear matte finish that has a blue hue, giving the device a blueish halo effect.  the zune  is slightly h eavier than the ipod video 30gb, but lighter than the 80gb.  You can definitely tell that the zune is bigg er than the ipod, but it is not obtrusive or unwieldy - and the size was definitely a compromise i was willing to make in favor of screen size.

the zune lacks the ipod’s slick finish and solid construction.  it actually feels more plasticy - coming close to the cheap feeling line, without actually crossing over; the device has enough refinements to keep it on the classy end of the design scale.  I can’t tell in my 1 day of testing, but i  suspect that the zune’s matte finish will be less susceptible to scratches than the ipod.  I think this is an important note, because the fragile ipod body creates the need for a separate protector, which increases the size of the device.

The interface of the zune is surprisingly refined, and in my opinion this is where the zune wins most handily over the ipod.  the interface just looks great - smo oth and crisp with a minimum of clutter.  there are also neat effects for entering menus that are a big improvement over the ipod.  one big advantage of the zune is the customized background wallpaper.  This may seem trivial, but it’s very satisfying to see your photos as wallpaper.  One problem with the wall paper however, is  that the zune kind of crops the picture to fit the background, so you may need to do some cropping of your own to make the desired part of the photo fit in the frame.

i also like zune’s navigation pad.  with three buttons, it is slightly more complex that ipod’s single click wheel, but the separate back and play/pause buttons are a welcome refinement.  the wheel on the zune is actually a four way directional pad with a center button.  i am kind of in the habit of spinning it, ala ipod, but I think the four way pad works as well as the ipod, if not better.  it is actually kind of refreshing to just push and hold the button, rather than repeatedly spinning your thumb round and round.  I actually think the buttons are not as important as the device’s responsiveness to the buttons, and the zune does a good job here.  you can scroll quickly through menus, and when the list is long large letters appear to show you where in the alphabet you are currently scrolling at.

really, the interface is a big win for microsoft because i’ve seen a lot of competiting mp3 players that have a horribly cluttered, unnavigatable interface.  but the zune’s controls are slick and efficient.

the zune software is soso.  I have been using windows media player (WMP) 11 for a while now, and the zune player is mostly similar.  although some of the zune reviews i read reported system crashes, the installation of zune software for me was seamless.  during the install, which took about 15 minutes, my zune firmware was also updated.  this is an important update that enables wifi capabilities - so don’t forget to do that.

You can pick where the zune software will look for songs, videos and pictures.  I already had this defined with WMP11, so much of this process was already taken care of for me.  One note, you should put your porno videos in a separate file than the my videos folder, because zune software will find it by default.  then you’ll have these big thumbnails of your pornos in your zune video screen - potentially very embarassing. 

Loading songs to the library takes place in the background, and was mostly a smooth process.  Again, I don’t know how much of this benefited from my previous work with WMP11, but i didn’t experience any of the problems that other reviewers did.

The zune software interface is pretty slick.  by default it shows you thumbnails of album covers, which is a cool effect, but is also pretty useless unless you have these covers loaded.  the main interface also shows you virtual album stacks, based on how many albums from a particular artist you have.  these graphical features are pretty cool, and give the software a much more interactive feeling.

One big problem i had with the zune software, and actually this is true of WMP and itunes as well, is that my songs often get organized poorly.  for example, i get one folder for dr. dre, and dre, dr.  his whole name is dr. dre, fyi, it’s not officially a title.  there are even more subtle differences that cause the creation of new folders, like a capital vs. lowercase ‘b’ for blink 182.  This is a frustrating part of the library building process, and i’ve already gone through itunes and cleaned it up.  this was a pain to do again.

One tip for others that have this problem - it helps to use a third party tagging solution on your mp3s before building your library.  this is especially true if you bittorrent a lot of music since those songs are usually always tagged with a bunch of crap. 

using a third party tagging solution will help to standardize tags and reduce (but not eliminate) annoying library building quirks.  I used the magic mp3 tagger, which is an awesome program.  it relies on the musicbrainz tagging database that actually looks at the data in your songs to identify them.  it is the most accurate tagging solution i have used.  you can do this manually with the classic tagger, but since i have like 30 gb of songs i bought the magic mp3 tagger which automates the process.

Anyway, so i built my library and cleaned up some of the more glaring errors.  the zune software also downloads album art, but for me art was found for only 30% of the albums.  once you’re done with this, you sync with the zune - an initial sync will take a good 30 mins to an hour depending on how much music you have.

I don’t buy music online, i’m an old fashioned pirate, so i can’t really comment on the zune marketplace.  I know this is a big thing for some people, so you’re going to have to research this on your own.  also, the zune marketplace doesn’t offer video, if that’s a big deal for you.

In addition to music, I also added a few videos to the zune.  i record tv shows with beyondtv, so i transferred some of these files over.  the zune software wanted to convert them first, which was a pretty slow process.  but it seems that the zune software compressed these files pretty heavily for the zune screen, which is a big plus since i was short on storage.

one thing about the zune software is that it does a good job of putting options in convenient places.  if you want to adjust the sync options, then you can easily go to the options screen from the sync menu.  not a big deal, but a nice refinement.

overall, syncing was pretty streamlined.  like the ipod, bigger files do take a longer time.  but i always have these problems with the ipod where it takes a long time to drag and drop onto my ipod.  this doesn’t happen with zune software.

Listening to music on the zune was fine.  I mean, the sound was good, i’m no audiophile, but i didn’t have any complaints.  one thing is that album art looks great on the big zune screen, albeit a bit grainy.  if you don’t have album art, you get a stock cloudy background instead.

Video on the zune was awesome.  this is another big improvement over the ipod.  i loaded episodes of heroes, family guy and dirty jobs on the zune and all of them looked great.  I actually recorded these shows in only mediocre quality, but when they are converted for the zune they look great.  the horizontal viewing is a big plus, that makes it much more bearable to watch longer videos on the device.  For all the ipod vs. zune reviews out there, if you watch lots of video, you will want a zune - no question.  the only problem is that storage is limited, so if you have a lot of music you will only be able to put on a handful of videos.

zune has a photo viewing option also.  this worked ok, although I am not a big photo buff or anything.  i mean, you can create slideshows or go through manually, pretty straightforward.  you can also create albums and zoom in which is a neat feature.  some reviewers complained about the orientation of the pictures, but i mean, all you do is turn the device around.  it’s not hard.

the zune radio worked well.  the device actually uses the headphones as an antenna, so it gets pretty good reception.  I get good reception in my office, but in whole foods it got cut off as i walked deeper into the store.  one annoying thing is that you can’t save radio station presets.  this isn’t a big deal for me since i only listed to a couple of stations, but it’s a glaring oversight nonetheless.  the zune is able to read info tags that some radio stations use, so in some cases the zune shows what radio station you’re listening to and what song is playing.  that was a pretty cool feature.

I guess wifi is the big differentiator for the zune, but i didn’t really have the chance to use it, since i only have 1 zune.  i walked around with the wifi on, but of course didn’t see any other zunes.  that was kind of disappointing, because it’s really one of the more prominent features on the device, but oh well.

Overall, i think there is no question that the zune is superior to the ipod.  however, this may be specific to my usage scenarios:  i don’t purchase songs, i do listen to the radio, i have recorded tv on my pc, etc.  I can see how the limited selection of the zune marketplace would be a dealbreaker for some users though.

for me, I would say the interface, the screen, the radio and some parts of the software are the biggest plusses for the zune.  and these are areas where the current ipod can’t really compete.

One thing about the zune though, is that although the device is pretty sweet, it is also very disappointing due to its vast, yet untapped potential.  wifi is a great example:  the device has wifi, a big plus, but you can’t sync via wifi, purchase songs via wifi, and when you share songs you are bound by strict limitations (3 plays).  that is lame.

Another big disappointment is that the zune won’t play videos recorded with windows media center.  I am pretty sure this is some copyright thing, but if you record tv with windows media center it just won’t play.  this is a big reason why i got the zune, and luckily i use beyondtv, not media center, but i think microsoft missed the boat big time with this.

I mean, this is the core problem with the ipod:  like all mac products the device is really tightly closed and mainly proprietary.  apple always does this and it drove them to the point of bankruptcy, but they never learn.  anyway, the video limitations of the ipod are insurmountable.  you need mov or mpeg4 videos, and the software doesn’t convert videos for you - you actually have to get third party software.  also, apple is big on this tv show buying store, but i don’t really think this is going to catch on.  $2 for a tv show that is available for free during prime time, or on youtube, is not going to work.  Ok, the RIAA made song purchasing work, but the same model can’t be used for tv because TV really is free. 

So, I thought the zune would be a great place for microsoft to make a big stand in the digital entertainment space, converging recorded tv and portable devices, but no.  just a huge disappointment there.

and the whole DRM thing is really a pain too.  actually, i don’t think this is all microsoft’s fault - I think their hands are tied between building the zune marketplace library and satisfying consumers.  but at the same time, they clearly do push you towards their own store.

i mean, wifi - it’s so simple.  this could have been a killer feature:  share songs with others, sync while your zune is in your pocket, etc, download songs from starbucks, etc.  but all the restrictions microsoft places on wifi is just so overwhelming lame it really takes away from the benefits of the device itself.

so, although I am pretty satisfied with the zune, and will definitely use it over my ipod, the device still has a lot of room for improvement.  it’s microsoft’s style to come late into a market, and then take several versions to get it right.  if zune is version 1.0, then they have done a very impressive job of getting a solid product out there.  my main worry however, is that microsoft will be so tightly bound by DRM and copyrights, as well as its own itunes aspirations, that the zune will always be an ipod imitator, rather than a more open, flexible platform that would make it a true ipod killer.

I finally got my zune today, a week after it was released.  that was kind of bs by  amazon.  oh, and another thing - USPS tracking sucks.  it gives barely any information of where your package is, and it isn’t very timely.  I got the package at lunch, and the site still hasn’t updated yet.  this is what it reads:

November 20, 2006
—
RICHMOND CA US
Departure Scan

November 15, 2006
—
US
Carrier notified to pick up package

I know this is hard to read in this format, but basically I have only these two pieces of information, which tells me nothing.  And what is this ‘carrier notified to pick up package’ on the 15th.  then it was picked up on the 20th?  i can see the conversation:

amazon:  yeah, we have a package for you to pick up

USPS:  ok, we’ll come over, when’s a good time for you.

amazon:  how about next week sometime, this poor bastard only got the super saver shipping.  why dont we just let it sit here for five days.

That is lame.  what pisses me off more, and this is really my bad, is that i could have got amazons prime 2 day shipping for a $8 one month trial.  this amazon prime would really come in handy now that it is xmas, but i refuse to get it now since i waited a week for the zune.

anyway, so far it looks awesome, but i’m at work so i can’t set it up fully or load songs or anything.  One thing is that you need a upgrade to get the wireless capabilites turned on - that is kind of lame.

hmm, what else.  I made this pepper vodka last week.  I saw it on an episode of good eats with alton brown.  basically you get pepper, crush it a bit, put in in the bottle, and shake it every day for a week.  after a week you strain out the pepper corns and you have your pepper vodka. 

It really tastes quite good. I mean, very spicy.  I’ve been using it for bloody marys and, man, its good.  it really enhances the flavor of even the most basic, thin, off the shelf mix.

It doesn’t look so great i know.  it looks just like dirty water, but it tastes fine.  one note, alton brown crushed the pepper with a mortar pestle, but i didn’t have one so i used the coffee grinder.  this was a bit too powerful, in retrospect I should have put the pepper in a bag and used the meat tenderizer.  you want the pepper to break apart - in other words, crack the shell, but you don’t necessarily want it in dust form.  i figured that out when the dust didn’t strain out and you have a lot of pepper particles in your vodka.  still good, but a little rough going down.  alton brown gave a pretty detailed explaination of why this technique works, complete with big styrofoam pepper corn.  basically when you crush the pepper and put it in alcohol, it reacts with the alcohol and infuses it, or whatever.  anyway, it works.  try it.

I got these frozen yaki onigiris at mitsuwa last week.  i know how this sounds, frozen rice, no bueno right?  well, it was not bad, really.  the rice does come out kind of mushy.  it’s not like a real yaki omusubi where it’s all nice and burnt and crispy.  but the flavor is good, and pretty well distributed throughout the rice ball.  they also come in this little plastic tray thing, and what you do is rip out a single omusubi with the tray below and put it in the microwave.  it’s really convenient - a pretty good snack, although it costs $5 for 6 omusubis, so really you’re paying about $5 for a cup or two of rice.  that’s not a good deal.

Oh, one more thing.  I was trying this recipe from rachel ray for this soup.  it requires the use of kale, which is this leafy green that is kind of peppery, apparently.  anyway, i go to wholefoods and get my organic kale.  But, when i go home and look at the kale, it is absolutely infested.  see, the kale leaves have lots of ridges, and all these spiders or mites or whatever had housed up in my kale and embedded themselves in these little ridges.  plus, the kale leaf has kind of a natural water repelling property, so i couldn’t even wash these guys out.  it was waaaay lame.

that’s the thing i don’t like organics.  i mean, i’m ok with taking in a little pesticides if it means my veggies don’t have bugs in it.  i’m really getting pretty sick of this hippy shit all over.  organic everything - sometimes is just not practical.  Ultimately, i paid more for a piece of organic kale that i was unable to use because of these f’ing bugs.  plus, i like my meats with a little hormone and antibiotics - is that actually bad?  has anyone researched the long term effects of non-organic foods?  i mean, hormones make the meat more tender - what’s wrong with that?  antibiotics make meat cheaper - again, what’s wrong with that?

I think this whole organics craze is just a new way to make more money off of rich american consumers.  you create a problem, i.e. pesticides, hormones, antibiotics, etc., and then create an expensive solution to the problem, i.e. organics. 

Do your chickens really taste better because they were allowed to run in a field?  think so?  then you are a sucker.  because i’ve seen these free range chicken farms and its not like chickens are running around the hills like the sound of music.  they are in a big warehouse with a small door on one end that leads to a little open area.  it is their choice to run around.  and they don’t have this ability their whole lives - only for a couple weeks out of their life.  most likely, your free range chicken was in an enclosed warehouse just like a non-free range chicken.  all these farmers are doing is meeting the definition for organic or free range as cheaply as possible, then selling your more expensive food.

And that’s OK.  actually, I think that is a brilliant marketing strategy that leverages the ignorant assumptions of american consumers.  I mean, has anyone ever seen any warnings about non-organics?  like, say on cigarette boxes?  no, because there’s no proof that non-organics are worse for your, or that the pesticides are present in levels that will affect your life span or anything. 

it just sounds better to say that it is organic, and if it costs a farmer $0.50 more per pound to farm an organic vegetable that can sell for $1 more per pound, then it’s not only in his best interest to grow organics, but it’s also in his best interest to make you want organics.  i actually think the organic people are the same ones who sell all these ab excersizers.  the same asshole with that eletrocuting belt on is probably on his way to wholefoods right now.

and really, that is fine.  i don’t care.  i mean, i got to whole foods and i buy their overpriced shit.  all i want though, is not to have bugs in my kale.  hear that?  i want the motherfucking bugs of the motherfucking kale.  i mean, fifty years ago you people would have been hug upside down with a fork up your…oh, wait, that’s a different rant.

So the big news this weekend was that michael richards, aka kramer from seinfeld, went off during a standup performance and yelled the n-word at some guests.  the video is here, and it’s gooooood.  BTW, that video is probably NSFW, unless your boss doesn’t mind if your computer is blaring the n-word over and over.

One note, kramer yelled the n-word at a bunch of black people, and then they came back with ‘cracker.’  but the ‘cracker’ wasn’t very satisfying.  i think minorities really have to get together and think of a better racial slur for whites.  I mean, obviously it’ll be hard to pick a word that emcompasses 200 years of oppression, but we can try a little bit harder, right?

Other notes, this is a hilarious auction.  The guy’s posting is for 3 playstation 1’s, not a playstation 3.  pretty bs move, but smart.  the sad thing is the winning bidder is probably some old mother trying to buy a ps3 for her kid.  I wonder what her kid is going to do with 3 ps1s.

Overall, anyone who paid several g’s for a PS3 is feeling pretty dumb right now, because the whole ebay market just blew up over the weekend.  We’re now seeing prices in the range of $1300 for the 60GB system, to as low as $800 for the 20GB.  my feeling on friday was that the suppy way outpaced demand to keep up the multi-thousand $ auctions.  On friday there were like 15,000 auctions for ps3, and while there were lots of initial bidders that were willing to push the price of early-listed systems, there just arent enough to keep the prices up.  what’s funny is that a system won on friday vs. monday may be shipped at the same time.

One more bit of news, and btw, these are basically straight off of digg, britney spears is considering releasing her sex tape for free to kill the market for k-fed’s version.  it’s just basically a c-block to keep k-fed from making any money off it.  anyway, seems like a good idea, but who cares, it’ll be free on bittorrent the second its released through either channel.

Look, i don’t want to be one of those girls that just talk about TV shows and movies and singers all day, but i really love The Office.  I look forward to thursdays when it comes on.  and usually I watch it more than once that day.  it’s such a good show.

I agree that originally the show suffered from the presence of the UK version, particularly since the UK version was so heavily praised.  the first season of the US Office was pretty much a port of the series, and even included some of the same jokes and stuff, which, i’ll admit, was very lame.

But in season 2 the office really started to expand on its character and plot development beyond the UK show.  Obviously you had the tension between jim and pam, but you also has relationships between dwight and angela, which was new, the emergence of kelly, and some other notables like ryan, kevin, etc.  Individually these would be token developments, but together they really help the show to be more complete I think.

So, the bombshell in season 3 was that first, jim kissed pam at the end of season 2, leading to pam breaking off her engagement to roy.  then, jim moved to another branch of dunder mifflin in Conn, so he and pam were no longer together.  But, in the last episode and this episode, you learn that jim’s new branch