The Grand Tour

The Guard Squirrel Protector of Beer




the kitchen


the living room


my mcdonalds flag


the bar


my door




my bedroom

What Should I Do If The Internet Goes Down?

So after going the last few days without internet access I figured this would be a good time for a Public Service Announcment about what to do if the internet dies. I found this at The Toque.com



It seems to be a pretty good guide, prepare to be informed

Every year we grow more and more dependent on the Internet. But would you know what to do if your connection suddenly went down? Internet failure down No one knows when the Internet will fail. It could happen at any time, leaving you bereft of your e-mail, your sports scores, and your Blogs. Therefore, it's important that you and your family have a contingency plan for just such an emergency. If your connection to Cyberspace were to ever get severed, you should at least be prepared. We have included a few key points that should assist you if that were to happen.
1. Panic! An excited, agitated state will give you that heightened sense of awareness and will increase your thought processes allowing you to come up with rational solutions. Panic is just nature's way of putting your body into over-drive. It's a defense mechanism that gives you an edge when dealing with potentially harmful situations, such as a severed arm or the loss of your Internet.

2. Find A Telephone Do you have access to a telephone line? Early computers connected to the Internet using a dial-up device along with a hardware device known as a "modem." Since this technology is obsolete, it will be of no use to you. Instead, use your telephone to call your friends to see if their connection is also down, as you will have lost the ability to send an email or an instant message. You can also use a telephone to call 911, an emergency service that will first tell you to calm down, and then will send out specially-trained technicians to find the source of the Internet's failure.

3. Use Your Back-Up Computer It's always good to have an emergency laptop handy, in case you need to harry over to a buddy's place where the Net is still up. If there is still no Internet at that location, at the very least you could connect to a small network or LAN (Less-than Adequate Network). Laptops can also be placed on tables at coffeeshops, while you sit around with a latte, nervously waiting for your connection to be restored.

4. Install A Game In emergency situations, installing a single-player computer game can occupy your down-time. While it won't replace the adrenaline rush of intense networked multiplayer action provided by the Internet, a quick game of Sim City or Flight Simulator may distract you long enough for your connection to return.

5. Perform Routine Maintenance While programs such as Norton Antivirus have removed most of the tedium of computer system maintenance, nothing could help pass the time faster than cleaning out your hard drive, emptying your cache, or organizing your celebrity fake porn collection. Take the time to stare at your screen while you perform a defragmentation. The time will literally fly while you barely notice your separation from the Internet.

6. Turn On A Television Or Radio Televisions, strange boxes that sit in your parents' living rooms, were once used to provide entertainment, long before DVDs and Playstations were invented. Televisions have the capability of broadcasting streaming information similar to the content on multimedia websites. With a "remote control," a wireless device that is like a small one-handed keyboard, you may be able to surf a limited number of "channels," while you deal with the loss of your connection. Unfortunately, television is only a one-way media.
In ancient times, radios were also used to entertain. A radio allowed you to listen to news, sports, and music, much the same way that you listen to live streaming audio on a Shoutcast server. Like the television, a radio will only have a limited selection of listening stations, and no video. Hopefully your separation from the Internet will be brief.

7. Read People in pre-Internet times used to read "books" and "magazines", written materials once created in printable format to pass the time. Some e-books are still available on paper, and may offer a short-term solution until your power is back and your broadband is restored. If reading is not an option, as a last resort, you may wish to try doing "chores," or try your hand at cooking. While these activities cannot replace the Internet, they may be able to make the down-time a little more tolerable.

8. Go Outside The idea of leaving your workstation may seem a little extreme, but you can perform errands that you normally get parents or spouses to do: grocery shopping, drycleaning, etc. Leaving your dorm room, basement, or above-garage apartment suite, may be risky, but again, the time may afford an effective distraction from your Internet woes. NOTE: Be careful to avoid the sun, because your pasty white skin will not be used to the exposure.

9. Spend Time With Your Spouse Communicating with your wife or girlfriend may seem like a radical suggestion, but the time investment may offer long-term rewards. Spending any amount of time talking about your "relationship" may free up more Internet time for you later on, when your ADSL or Cable link to the World Wide Web has been restored. WARNING: These will probably be the longest hours of your life.

10. Use Your Emergency AOL Disk If you find that your connection to the Internet is going to be longer than you can possibly stand, as a last resort, pull out an emergency AOL CD, the one with 910 free hours of connection to the AOL service. Take the CD in one hand...and slash it across your wrist! Suicide will probably be a better alternative than connecting to that service.

Hopefully some of these Internet alternatives will be able to assist you during an offline crisis. Emergency radio broadcasts will likely advise you of the state of the Internet and be able to predict when your bandwidth will be restored, but remember to have an emergency plan in case your digital detachment is longer than you expect



Peace out yo

I Assure You Were Open!

Ladys and Gentlemen we are back online! Live from the basement of an undisclosed location somewhere in the Happy Valley The Nittanyproudfoot has returned. The move is over my stuff is unpacked and as of an hour ago I have internet service as well. My new place is insane, it's huge , we don't have nearly enough furniture to fill it and I've exhausted my entire collection of movie posters trying to cover the walls, you all need to get up here ASAP. I'm sending out an e-mail with all my new contact info today so I expect to hear from every last one of you very soon.

That's it for now I'm gonna try and get some pics of my place up by the end of the day.

peace out yo

The Steel City Exorcism

So apparently the tourism industry of Thailand is having a difficult time rebuilding after last Decembers tsunami. The reason? according to Suwalai Pinpradab of the Tourism Authority of Thailand many Asia beach goers refuse to return to Asia's southern beaches because they believe them to be haunted by the spirits of tsunami victims.

Well if you were dead were would you rather be? Taken the long dirt nap in Akron Ohio or spending eternity lounging in the warm sand of the South Pacific? Unfortunately bringing in paying customers takes priority over the comfort of freeloading poltergeists so the Tourism Authority of Thailand is doing what any reasonable 21st century government would do.

A statue of Godmother Ruby (aka Mazu in Chinese) will be taking up residence on the Thai island of Phuket. Ruby's job? Ghost eviction of course. Sorry Casper, it really sucks you were crushed by a monstrous wave and all but I really wanna do some boogie-boarding and your creeping me out.

So this got me thinking. Maybe when the Thai Government is all done playen Ghostbusters in Paradise they can ship good old Godmother Ruby to Pittsburgh's North Shore because according to Ween, Tommy Maddox has been dead for quite a while now and yet he continues to show up week after week at Heinz Field. There's only room for one evil spirit in "The Coca-Cola Great Hall" and Rod Woodson has seniority.

peace out yo

Yes That's a Monkey, and Yes That's a Real Sign

How's this for an unexpected birthday present.... Yes today was my birthday.

This site had 55 hits in the last 24 hours, since I know of about a dozen of you that read this normaly I have no way to explain this. So whoever you are please enjoy and feel free to leave a comment, I'm used to people calling me a complete moron.

Anyway in other far more interesting news...

• International Village the single greatest festival in Western Pa started today, if you've never been, go, take my word for it. If your a regular I'll see you there wensday or thursday ( possibly both).

• My quest to ride a unicycle is going very well, I'll have some cycling pics up some time next week.

• i added a link to this great site I found, it's called June Bug Coffin. The guy's a Penguins / Penn State fan from North Carolina. He writes some decent stuff check it out
  

• 10 days till my move to PSU

• The vampire monkey sign had nothing to do with this post but hey it's my birthday and I can do what I want
  

peace out yo

The Battle of the Keystone State

You probably read the title of this post and immediately assumed it to be about tonight's Steelers Eagles game and though I am so excited for the return of football that I've developed a nervous twitch, this post is not entirely about our dear STILLIRS.

I have even bigger news ( if it is at all possible to have bigger news the a starting quaterback not wearing a helmut on a motorcycle in Western Pa) here it is boys and girls.....
drum roll please

The Pittsburgh Penguins have just signed John LeClair, don't adjust your computer monitor folks you read correctly John- Freaken-Le-Clair. The Captin of the PhillyFlyers is taking a quick trip down the turnpike to the Steel City.

That means the Pen's line up now includes Lemieux, Recci, LeClair, Palffy, Gonchar, Thibault, Fleury, Malone, Koltsov, Crosby, Morozov, and Malkin. Insanity!

In somewhat distantly related news I'm hearing rumors that Hines Ward is heading to Steeler camp while Terrell Owens is talking trade to Atlanta. It relay must suck to live in Philly today.......... I love it!

peace out yo


oh yea, GO STILLIRS!

Back From The Land of Willburt and Mary

We've got a lot of stuff to cover so straight to business...

• The Mighty Pucks did win their championship against the dreaded yellow team. After loosing a close game one they came back and dominated games two and three. I'll spare you the details cuse Trev's supposed to write a review for The Mighty Puck. (lets go allstar I'd like to publish that before the next season starts!)

• It's probably going to take a months worth of posts to cover my vacations so here are a few highlights. I'll try to expand on them in the future.

1) I'm learning to ride a unicycle ( no that's not a joke)

2) I bought a t-shirt with a picture of a washing machine on it.

3) For the first time in my life I won a game miniature golf

4) I witnessed a man with a handgun being arrested at the Golden Corral Buffet ( imagine Pondorossa with even more rednecks in it)

5) I went to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and astoundingly was not disappointed

6) I got a Baja, you know one of those big ugly Mexican blanket looking hoodies

7) While on vacation I dug a 6 1/2 ft deep hole right in the middle of the beach then watched people stare at it with confused looks on their faces

8) The University of Willburt and Mary is an imaginary school of higher education that we've decided should be located across the street from the illustrious William and Mary Univ. The subject just kept coming up all week.



there's a lot more but i think i'm gonna stop for now,


as for the other questions i left on my cliff-hanger pre-vacation post i let you know about my Penn State moving plans within the next few days, and I'm not sure if Saint Nick is dead I haven't had a chance to watch the news in the last week but that photo looked pretty reliable so we should probably assume the worst.


Peace Out Yo

Say it ain't so

I've got a lot of stuff to tell you guys..................................but it's gonna have to wait cuse I leave for vacation tomorrow and I still have some packing to do. So your just going to have to wait till the 15th to learn the outcome to these burning questions.......

Did the Mighty Pucks win there championship game?

What did I do on my summer vacation?

Where exactly is my place in State College?

And finally Is Santa Claus in fact deceased?

check back a week from Monday for the answers

I gotta get packing people, the Atlantic Ocean is only 31 hours away and I've got a kayak waiting there.

See you in a week or so.
peace out yo