Timesinks

I'm probably not going to do a lot of blogging or YT-ing the rest of this month. I've got a lot to do ( taking a trip to California at the end of the month ), and there's a lot of random stuff that is taking up a bunch of my time. I started to work on my 30 questions blog response, but as I was doing some research for the "favorite video game" question, I stumbled across this major timesink. The link in the last sentence may not mean much to most of the people reading this, but if you played Atari 2600 games back in the 70's and 80's, DO NOT CLICK ON THE LINK unless you have several hours to spare RIGHT NOW.

Some of the other things that are taking up my time include ...

My new laptop: The laptop came with 60-days of Norton anti-virus. The Norton product installed was really just a bare-bones product, so rather than wait 60 days, I decided to download and install the top-of-the-line Norton product. So I bought the product ( with a two-year subscription ), downloaded it, and started to install it. During installation, the Norton installation process informed me that it detected another Norton product on the computer. It told me it removed the product, and said I had to restart the computer to continue the installation. So, I restarted the computer, and the installation continued. A few seconds later the Norton installation process informed me that it had detected a Norton product on the computer ( uh oh - you see where this is going, don't you? ). It told me that it had deleted the other Norton product, and instructed me to restart the computer to continue the installation. Uh oh! Yes, I was stuck in a very unhappy loop. I was up to 3 AM trying to figure out a way around this, but eventually I gave up. Thankfully, I had made backup images of the initial laptop setup before I did anything else with the laptop, so the next morning, I simply restored that laptop to the original factory settings. I can still access and re-download the Norton product via their website, and for the next 60 days, the laptop will be protected by the original Norton product. So, basically, I've just kicked the problem 60 days down the road. I'm going to wait for the 60-day trial to end, and then I'm going to try downloading and installing the new Norton product again. I sure hope this works the next time I try it.

Fruit flies: For the last few weeks I've been battling an infestation of fruit flies in my house. I don't want to use anything like a spray with little kids around the house, so let's just say I've been killing these flies the old fashioned-way ( If you consider spending 30 minutes each night sucking them up with a vacuum old-fashioned - It's really the only way to get them without using sprays, ugly flypaper, or making a mess on the walls and windows . ). I really have no idea where the flies are coming from. I was killing about 100 a night for a while, and it seemed like there would be at least 100 more each day. I've been trying as hard as I can to terminate these little suckers faster than they can reproduce. I think I'm finally starting to win the battle, because the flies have really started to thin out over the last few days.

I enjoyed the following video so much, that it became a bit of a timesink yesterday ( Sorry, embedding is disabled for this video ). You really need to be a Beatles fan to appreciate this video, but if you are a Beatles fan, I'm sure you'll be very impressed by it.

Oh, even though it was a bit of a timesink, I think the Beatles parody video inspired me to get back in the business of making parody songs on YT. Nobody really took me up on my "Love is a Battlefield" offer, but I just thought of a parody I could do completely by myself. It's going to be a while before I find the time to make this video, but because you're all such loyal readers, I'll give you a little inside information about the video I'm about to make.

Earlier today, I read an article on fivethirtyeight.com which mentioned Michelle Malkin.


For some reason, this inspired me to start writing a Michelle Malkin song parody based on the Beatles song "Michelle".



The parody will be a ( hopefully ) humorous take on my conflicted feelings about Michelle Malkin. Michelle Malkin is a conservative super-right-wing politic pundit. I absolutely detest her political views ( To give you an idea of where she is coming from, she wrote a book called "In Defense of Interment" in which see defended the forced interment of Japanese Americans during World War II ). However, I also think she's REALLY REALLY HOT. Don't get me wrong - even if I was single I would never want to date somebody like her in a million years, but I still can't help but be a little bit turned on every time I see her on TV. It actually makes me feel a little bit guilty, considering how much I hate everything she stands for.

It made me feel especially guilty when I found I was a little turned-on by the video below:



Rich