Favorite Online Shopping Interface?

I believe Amazon has just jumped to the lead with their new site Windowshop (beta). Sounds on by default, so don't say I didn't warn you (and think coverflow for shops if you can't be bother to click through

New Computer Ordered

It must be the week for it - after last weeks just in time arrival of a new work laptop (Dell D630 if you care), the wife and I decided to do the joint Christmas pressie to ourselves of a new iMac. Our current one was an old (5 years I think) iMac with the metal "neck" - still working as well as the day we got it, but lacking any more disk space, or the processing power to keep up with our ever increasing need to make videos, store loads of music, and view billions of pictures. Although all the apps on there still work, the whole thing was just getting too slow, and on the video side especially, it was making some things unusable. I also realized (when my brother bought a iPod Touch the other week when he was here) that it doesn't even have a USB 2.0 port, which meant no synch up for him from the Mac.

So, we splashed out a little (although I'm quietly confident I could easily spend a years salary in an Apple store and come out happy), and went with the 24 inch version, complete with extra memory and a slightly larger hard drive. It should arrive either at the end of this week, or the beginning of next, as for some reason I went with the cheapskate delivery option. Now of course I'm pining for an immediate delivery, but because they've already prepared it for shipment, it's too late to change it. We made the buy on "Black Friday" so we got an extra $110 off the list price, which combined with the wife's work discount, meant we got a bit of a deal.

So - plans for when it arrives - lots, but getting everything off the old one and onto the new one is first, followed closely by lots of messing around with Leopard (the old one would have died under the strain of a new operating system). I have a grand plan of encoding a lot of my DVD's as well, so that I can push them up through my Apple TV to prevent me from searching through the ever expanding DV collection, but that may take a little while (although hopefully not the 14 hours per DVD of the old machine). And of course, some video editing of some of the existing stuff I've got in digital format, including the eventual post of all the wedding stuff we got taped (only 2.5 years since that should have been done...).

Plenty to look forward to (for me anyway) - now I just have to prey the Fedex gods are nice to me...

Weekend Update

A pretty hectic weekend (so far anyway) - date night last night meant I got treated to a night at SwimClub32 for our (delayed) wedding anniversary night out. Today was a whirlwind tour of a decent number of shops - I missed the early morning start required to get a free t-shirt at the new Apple store in Park Meadows, but we went later on to see what it was like - looked pretty cool - I like the new layout they're using - very simple and clean, with lots of demo stations to play around. We actually managed to hold off from buying everything, but the place was packed and lots of people were making purchases. Park Meadows actually had a load of stuff going on today - the Nuggets had a playoff kickoff event, with cheerleaders signing autographs, and the mascot their for photos. The highlight of being there though was wandering past the window of a really expensive crystal shop, where some parents had decided it was safe to take thir eyes off their young kids for a while - just long enough for a kid who looked about 3 or 4 to take down the window display with one hefty push. Glass shattering, horrified parents and even more horrified sales staff followed, and we didn't stick around for any of the shouting.

Target was next (or should I say Super Target) for a few bits and pieces, including The Last King of Scotland, which we haven't watched yet. I doesn't look much like Scotland on the cover :-) Of course, we had to fit in the weekend trip to Home Depot (flowers for the garden though - nothing doing with the bathroom this weekend), Bed Bath and Beyond for too much stuff to fit in the car, and then the once every few months trip to the Liquor Store (off license) for way too much alcohol for me to drink alone (luckily, Heidi is arranging a bit of an event for her new co-workers, so hopefully they'll have some of it, especially as it included a case of Bud Light, which under no circumstances am I going to touch).

And then finally home after the almost 7 hour shopping epic (oh yeah, Safeway for tea and magazines), to watch the UFC (supposedly live) from Manchester. Another decent set of fights (although the Pit Bull Russian guys fight was a little on the boring side), topped off with the supposed next challenger for the heavyweight title and heavy favorite, Cro Crop, getting completely knocked out by a head kick. It was a pretty decent shot - Cro Crop's legs ended up at an awful angle underneath him as he went down, but he was completely out, but walked out of the ring about 10 minutes later, so looks like he didn't suffer anything too serious. Michael Bisping was one of the big draws on the card - the English fighter fighting on a UFC card for the first time in his home country. Although he got caught once at the start of the first round, and nearly got beat, he dominated the rest of the fight until the ref called a stop midway through the second round. The other guy was pretty beat up (make that very) by the end, so it was a decent win, and he's still unbeaten. I wonder when they're going to let him step up and work his way to a championship fight - hopefully it's soon, but not too soon - I think he's got a decent chance to go all of the way, and his fights are always pretty exciting.

Anyway, think that's enough of the rambling - just trying to make up for the lack of posts in the last few months, especially when I manage to grab a few minutes out of what seems to be a pretty hectic life these days. What happened to the weekends when I only made it out of bed to hit the pubs? Long, long time ago I think, and probably never likely to return....

You can buy anything on EBay

Well, pretty much, anyway.

The Worst (or Best) T Shirts

I picked probably the most innocuous example to display here - I guarantee that there is at least one t-shirt in there that will offend you. Just imagine sitting in Potts, with Graham and Glenn after a few pints, trying to outdo each other, and you'll get the idea.

Oh yeah, link is here

USB Pole Dancer

Is there no end to what can be done with a simple USB plug?

This one is extra special, allowing lonely boys (or girls I guess, if they're into that sort of thing) to fritter away many hours on a computer watching a little mechanical girl spin round and round. It might be worth it if you could actually get fellow workers to throw tips for her dancing - might even pay for lunch one day if they decide she's "the one".

But despite how amazing this is, what's even more amazing is that this little gift was actually on sale at Marks and Spencers! Only for a week though, before someone decided it was a little too risky to be sold from the store that stands for British decency (or something like that anyway). Check out all the details here if you don't believe me. (oh, and their site seems ridiculously slow at the minute, so apologies if you've already clicked).