Spiele-Vorstellung: Full Bloom

Es gibt auf Facebook ein relativ neues Spiel, für das mir immer Werbung rechts neben einem anderen Spiel angezeigt wurde. Dann hab ich bei Inside Social Games mal einen Bericht darüber gefunden und es selber ausprobiert vor ein paar Tagen, und ich muss sagen, es macht mir echt Spaß.

Es heißt Full Bloom, ist von dem Anbieter Playdom (der zu Disney gehört) und besteht aus 2 Spielbereichen:

Einerseits hat man einen Garten, in dem man Blumen anpflanzt und aufs nächste Level züchtet. Das sieht so aus:

Goodbye, Zynga (for the most part)

I think I've managed to beat my games addiction. I'd posted before (in German) about the Zynga games I play on Facebook - Farmville, Cafe World etc. A couple of weeks ago I quit FrontierVille and now also CityVille. The reasons are the same - too many quests and tasks for which too many neighbors are needed. Some of my friends play, too, and I even added some people I don't even know. But I don't want to drag anybody into it who doesn't want to play. And it looks kinda stupid if your whole Facebook wall consists only of game postings, right?

Apart from the pressure to do what the game tells you to do in a given timeframe (sometimes when there are timed quests), playing these games got so time-consuming that it was just too much. Okay, you can click on things when you're on the phone, but it's rude not to give the person you're talking to your full attention.

I must say that in the beginning I liked the quests because they gave the gameplay more purpose, but when it's stuff like "harvest 1000 peanuts" and 1 peanut takes 4 days and you only have so much space on your homestead ... Or you have quests which you can never solve without more neighbours so they stayed there forever ... it was just too annoying.

So now I only play TreasureIsle and ignore the quests there. I'm also trying out some "casual games" like Mahjong or Bejeweled Blitz or Diamond Dash or whatever they are called. But I'm done with the real addiction and I'm glad.

Oh, and I completely blocked the game apps so I don't see postings from former neighbors or game requests. First I tried to not do that so people who still need me as a neighbor could still go to my farm and tend stuff or whatever, but the game requests were too annoying.

Ha. I have a feeling that post isn't very well-structured. Sorry.

Nachtrag zu Gowalla-Post

Mir ist noch was eingefallen: Und zwar gibt es doch außer "es macht Spaß" einen weiteren Grund, warum ich Gowalla und Foursquare nutze: Ich bin nämlich generell sehr interessiert an Technik-Themen, allerdings eher weniger an der Hardware, sondern Software, Desktop-Verschönerung und so Zeug. Als "early adopter" würde ich mich jetzt nicht bezeichnen, Beta-Tester bin ich sicher keiner, aber mein Interesse und Kenntnisstand geht angeblich über das des "Standard-PC-Benutzers" hinaus - v.a. für 'ne Frau, hab ich mir sagen lassen : ) Und inzwischen betrifft es hauptsächlich Online-/Internet-Sachen. Ihr dürft mich Nerdine nennen, wenn ihr mögt. Oder nee, das klingt zu sehr nach Nadine. Egal.

Ein paar Beispiele:
Ich hab schon den Opera Browser benutzt (so vor ca. 10 Jahren, würde ich sagen), als Tabbed Browsing noch kaum verbreitet war. Heute bevorzuge ich Chrome und hab immer noch 4 verschiedene Browser auf meinem Heim-PC.

Da ich Leuten kannte, die alle unterschiedliche Instant Messenger benutzten (AIM in USA, MSN in Skandinavien etc.), hab ich nach einer Lösung gesucht und Trillian gefunden, wo man sich in einem Programm bei mehreren Clients anmelden konnte. Auch das ist lange her - jetzt passiert Chat ja fast nur noch über Facebook, Google oder Skype oder eine Online-Variante von Trillian wie meebo (soweit ich weiß).

An den besagten Programmen gefiel mir auch, dass sie "skinnable" waren, d.h. man konnte über herunterladbare Skins/Themes ihr Aussehen verändern. Sowas gefiel mir damals sehr. ObjectDock ging auch in die Richtung, das war/ist eine Software, die unter Windows so ein Dock am Rand des Bildschirms anzeigt, wie man es von Macs kennt. Heute ändere ich nur noch ein- oder mehrmals pro Monat meinen Bildschirmhintergrund.

Aber jedenfalls bin ich schon ziemlich computersüchtig, würde ich mal sagen, und langsam verlagert sich das auch auf Smartphone und Apps.

Weekend almost over :(

So ... I ordered a new display yesterday. Got it for a great price. Also by Acer like my Aspire X3200. And I signed up for facebook on Friday. I found more people than I thought I would, mostly my old online friends from the Baleheads days. They're from the US, Canada, Spain and Denmark. Cool. Germans tend to use studiVZ instead I guess. Hm. We'll see who else might pop up again.

Lalalala : )

Edited to add: Yay, links work. The wonders of DSL ....

Yeeha!!

DSL is working!! Took me a while to figure out that I had to manually de-activate the WLAN thingy. What's a big manual for if it doesn't tell you that?? After that, suddenly, my access data were accepted. Ha. Cool. So many things to do and see and listen to but so little time ...

Lalalala ... Now I don't know where to go first ... or what to download ... hm ...

DSL update

My router and stuff arrived yesterday. When I openend the box in which the splitter was in, I saw screws and a drilling instruction and panicked a little thinking I'd have to rip my old phone socket out of the wall. Then I opened the router box and the manual and saw that I'd been wrong. Phew. Relief.

DSL is supposed to be available from Saturday on. I noticed that my old Ethernet cable is too short so I need to buy a new one. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that everything will go smoothly. Problem now is that I'm supposed to show up at my parents' place on Sunday. I can already picture myself tapping my fingers, sort of like "Hi, bye, I can't stay ..." hehe. And my sisters wants to go shopping with me on Saturday. Hm. We'll work something out.

Also, I can't decide which display to get. I'd like a 19" widescreen. But I'm not sure which one. My co-workers say Asus displays are good value for money. But there's an Acer model that's cheaper. Argh. I hate that. I can't tell where the differences are anyway.

Replies to 2w10s comment to the post below:
No, I don't know the book you mentioned. Will check it out at Amazon.
And no, I haven't really made any updates since I had Vista. I tried once to update my anti-virus software. Ha. Forget it with dial-up. There's always some update download going on in the background I think. Haven't managed to stop that yet.

New music

Music recs

Good:
Maria Mena - All this time: Wonderful ballad with uplifting lyrics. Chorus: “All this time you’ve had it in you. You just sometimes need a push.” I can definitely relate to that. Somehow I hear “a little push”, but I think it’s just “push”. Whatevery. Lovely.

Polarkreis 18 – Allein, allein: Another song I can relate to (at least as far as the chorus goes). The verses are in English but I haven’t really paid attention to them yet. The chorus sounds like an anthem.

The Killers – Human: Heard it on British radio about 2 weeks ago. It’s now catching on here as well so it will probably be The Killers’ first song that gets some airplay in Germany. I guess they deserve it.

Sugarplum Fairy – Never thought I’d say that it’s alright: Came across it at work. Hadn’t heard of the band before at all. My friend Wikipedia told me they’re a band from Sweden. There was a pic and I thought, hm, funny, all these Swedish rock bands look so alike. And guess what, a couple of days later I heard on the radio that one of the guys in Sugarplum Fairy is actually the younger brother of one of the singers in Mando Diao. Ha. Guess that’s why his last name (Norén) seemed strangely familiar when I read it on Wikipedia. They sound pretty similar to Mando Diao, too, which might not be very original but it’s okay to me.

Nickelback – Gotta be somebody: Ha, how did they get in here? They normally annoy me cos all songs sound exactly the same. But this new one has got some good energy.

Jordin Sparks – One step at a time: Lovely (urban) pop song. Has not been released as a single here (yet), I think. Very positive vibe. Her other single Tattoo is good as well. Speaking of “urban pop” or whatever you wanna call it, I also like Ne-Yo’s new song Miss Independent. And Chris Brown isn’t too bad either. I’m becoming a planet chick. (That’s a reference to planet radio, a German radio station from Frankfurt that plays a lot of black music.) Still hate everything that’s too much hip hop / rap, such as Flo Rida or Lil Wayne or 50 Cent.

Linkin Park - Leave out all the rest: Sad lyrics. So good it makes me want to cry.


Bad:
Britney Spears – Womanizer: Listen to it once and it will stick in your head. And not in a good way. Makes me want to puke. Apparently the video is very sexy but I haven’t seen it yet and don’t really need to.

Alicia Keys & Jack White: Another way to die. This is the new Bond theme song. It sounds very much like former Bond theme songs. Couldn’t really care less. The title of the new Bond film sucks as well. At least the German title. It’s so bad that I can’t even remember it now. Oh yeah, my brain’s working excellently righ now ... and no, I didn’t have any alcohol yesterday ... Oh, and did I mention that I’m not into Daniel Craig AT ALL? Don’t understand what everybody sees in him. Okay, he’s got a good body. Pfff. Like that makes him attractive or a good actor.

Sarah Connor – I’ll kiss it away: Song for her kids or something. Lyrics are okay and I guess I could bear it in an unplugged version, but the synth beat they’ve put in it just ruins it.

Computer status update:
The mouse wheel is working now. Don't ask me why. Yippie! And I've managed to set up an internet connection. Still on dial-up so everything is as sloooooow as before. But still better than being offline. Right now I'm trying to update my antivirus software, and some other updates are in process in the background as well though I'm not sure for what. Hm. I don't like that my comp does things I haven't told him to do. Must look into the settings to stop that.

Comp update

At the end of last week, the comp I wanted was available again so I ordered it immediately. Yay! Got it on Tuesday. It's an Acer Aspire X3200. It's small and black and shiny and pretty. And fast and quiet. I do have one problem, though: the scroll wheel on the mouse won't work. Co-worker says it must be a driver problem. Will try to solve it on the weekend. Haven't found any solution in any online forums yet. Very annoying.

The comp has got Windows Vista Home Premium. Looks okay though the explorer takes a bit getting used to. Am loving that it comes with a couple of games that XP didn't have, such as Mahjongg and Chess. Oh yeah, the games, that's what makes a good OS ... I'm such a girl.

Still don't have DSL or any other internet connection at home at the moment.

Other things: it's very cold. Must get my coat from the attic on the weekend. Brrrrr.

What's new?

Quick update:
I'm trying to buy a new comp. Once I had decided on a model from the 2 a co-worker had suggested, of course it wasn't available anymore (or temporarily out of stack or something like that) at the online shop of my choice.

I'm also trying to pick a DSL provider. Not easy.

I'm getting my hair cut today.

That's it. Over and out.

Smashing shout-out

Just a quick rec of a site I stumbled upon via http://www.mister-wong.de/charts/

Smashing Magazine http://www.smashingmagazine.com

It's an online mag for webdesigners. I'm not one, but it's still fun to look at the site if you're interested in photography and such. The latest post features free desktop wallpapers with calendars for the new month. Yay. I love changing the wallpaper on my comp. The wallpapers are all beautiful and stylish and come with or without the calendar and in various sizes.

Okay, gotta get back to work. See ya.

P.S. Why must Blogger mess up the hyperlinks EVERY frigging time?! Argh. If only I could remember the little HTML I once knew ... Shit shit shit. So I guess you have to copy and paste the URLs instead of clicking them. How last century. Grrr.

Fixed ... I hope

My comp is up and running again. I got SP 1 and 2 now and AntiVir, a free antivirus software. And some other stuff. Still trying to re-build everything the way I had it before, which means downloading loads of desktop customization stuff, such as Rainlendar and skins and visual styles for XP. I’m so addicted to that stuff. Just can’t help myself, even though my sister claims that's what caused my problems. Pff. What I still need is a dock application, but ObjectDock is an 8 MB download, which is a lot if you’re on a dial-up modem so everything moves in slowmotion. Blah. Weekends are too short, that’s for sure. During the week, I always think of all the things I want to do on the weekends, but of course, when Sunday evening comes, I haven’t done any of them. Argh.

What else? I'll be going to Switzerland for a day, or a day and a half, on Thursday for a business thing, accompanying one of my bosses. I hope I won't have too much trouble with the accent cos Swiss German is pretty hard to understand. I remember when I was in London back in 1994 standing in front of Buckingham Palace, there were people talking next to me and a friend and at first I had no idea what language they were speaking until I suddenly realized it was Swiss German. Um, yes.

We've still got summer weather here, BTW. Very much so. I even wore a skirt to work last week, and shoes without socks. Spectacular, I know. : )

Nice week everyone!

The never-ending story of my computer problems

Last Sunday (i.e., a week ago), I successfully re-installed Windows XP Home with my recovery CD and also installed some software I had on CD. 2 days ago, I went online to get as much of the software I’d had before, above all my beloved Opera browser. When I went to their website, I saw that it looked very different and new because version 9 had just come out a few days before. I also succeeded in theme-patching XP so I can use visual styles again, which is important for me because I like changing the look of my desktop. I also downloaded the latest version of AntiVir, a free German anti-virus software and ran it on Sunday morning. That’s where the trouble started. First of all, the virus-scan wouldn’t finish. A scan of the local hard drive normally takes about 45 minutes. This time, the search went on for more than 6 hours. I thought it was because the software actually unpacked all archives whereas it normally skips them. Anyway, at some point there was a virus warning. It kept popping up about 15 times and then it started again after a minute or so. Apparently the anti-virus software couldn’t handle or heal or delete that particular virus. I tried to go online to download an update for my anti-virus software, but the download wouldn’t start. So I shut down the computer and used my old laptop to go online to look up some info about the virus. Guess what, it’s a very nasty one. A backdoor hax or whatever. Gives 3rd parties access to my data. People in support forums say, a re-install of Windows is the best solution. Argh!!! Not again!! Other ways of getting rid of the Trojan thing were described as well, but they were way too complicated for me. They consisted of downloading several programms, running them and posting log files etc. I did download one thing called Haxfix.exe and that actually seemed to help cos the virus warning didn’t show up on the screen again. But the anti-virus software doesn’t seem to be working either and another attempt to download an update failed.

Is anybody still reading? I know this isn’t very interesting, but I just need to vent. I think part of the problem is that the recovery CD I installed from doesn’t have Service Pack 1, which I had on my computer before. This seems to make the system unstable. For instance, Ctrl+Alt+Del doesn’t make the task manager pop up on the screen now. But maybe that’s unrelated to the SP1 thing. I’ll try to get that service pack, but I think I’ll have to format the hard drive again anyway. I’m so sick of everything. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Comp update

I'm back online, obviously, and from my own comp this time. I managed to trick my comp, whose DVD drive decided to stop working at the crucial point when I wanted to actually install Windows (the before mentioned "26 minutes remaining"). So now I have a running system, but one which says I need to activate it within 30 days. Yippie. I still need to find my own Win XP CD - if I ever had one, which I'm not so sure anymore - or try using that recovery CD again, but not before next weekend.

Um, yes, what else? Christian Bale got a parking ticket. Go to www.justjared.com for pics. Not as spectacular as I thought. He looks as he always does in paparazzi shots. Very casual clothes. When I read the headline (Bale gets busted), I thought he was arrested.

OpenOffice.org is cool. That's all I can think of for now.

Nothing but trouble

When i booted my comp on Thursday (a national holiday), nothing happened. It kept shutting down and re-booting. So I got my XP recovery CD and formatted the hard drive. Thus, all my data was deleted. Yippie. I don’t even want to think about what exactly was all lost. All my pics, wallpapers, desktop themes, browser bookmarks, fonts, games etc. Anyway, C:\ was formatted, the installation files were loaded, installation started. Then, when it said “26 minutes left”, I was asked to insert the XP CD. And the searching began, cos I didn’t have it in the box where all my other CDs were stored. I searched a number of rooms in the house and even drove to my sister’s place cos I had lent her the CD a while ago when she had a problem with her laptop. Of course, I couldn’t find it anywhere. So I clicked cancel instead of ok. The installation continued, and some kind of Windows is on my comp, but there’s not much there. No IE, no WMP and lots of other stuff is probably missing, too. When I wanted to start the Drivers & Utilities CD I also have to fix things, it said runtime error. Great. I thought the solution was to get an XP CD from someone. On Friday evening, my sister’s best friend, who lives round the corner, was home and had such a CD and I borrowed it from her. I tried several things, but never got further than I had got before cos even when I had put the CD in the DVD drive (my CD-RW drive is broken) and clicked OK, nothing happened, i.e. the necessary files simply couldn’t be installed or copied from the CD for some reason. I thought maybe the comp was looking for them in the wrong drive (it said D:\i386 as the location), but even when I changed that to E:\, nothing happened. Argh. I really don’t know what to do and am seriously considering getting Linux, if it’s available for free. I am so annoyed by all this crap. I have 4 days off from work, but can’t enjoy them at all. I just want to scream and shout all day. Stupid computers. Oh, BTW, I have no idea why my comp wouldn’t start properly in the first place. I’ve been having problems for a while, such as the computer re-booting when I wanted to connect to the internet (via my slow dial-up modem), but I had gotten used to that. I don’t think it was a virus cos my anti-virus software downloads the latest updates whenever I go online. I’m so lost.

Sorry if all of the above wasn't very interesting. I just needed to write it down, I guess. And I wanted to let you know that you probably won't here from me for a while. At the moment, I'm online via my old laptop. My mood couldn't be worse and there's not even a new ep of Veronica Mars on today because of some stupid sports event. Also, the weather sucks. It's cold and rainy and windy. GRRRRRRRRRRR

My desktop

I thought I’d post a screenshot of my desktop as it is at the moment. I love customizing things, i.e. I like skinnable applications. I wanted to be able to have more than the desktop themes Windows XP offers, so I downloaded a patch that let’s me change the styles, or designs, as they’re called in XP (I think). Uh-oh, it seems I don’t really know the vocabulary to talk about this stuff in English. But I’ll try.

Anyway, my current visual style (of which you don't really see a lot except for the taskbar) is one that makes the computer look a bit like an Apple, or looks like OS X or whatever. It’s called Milk Redux and is by KoL and Dragonblade. Where I found the wallpaper I can’t remember.

The calendar is Rainlendar with AeroLendar skin. (Oh, when looking up the URL of the Rainlendar site, I noticed I haven't got the latest version of RL ... must update soon ...)

The dock icons are from ObjectDock, but the dock itself is a different one. I love the dock, it’s so much prettier than having icons all over the desktop.
If you’re looking for skins and all sorts of computer art, I can really recommend DeviantArt.

Random things, about New Year's Eve, mostly

First of all, happy belated new year!

Next, I don’t want to get into trouble for posting pics that don’t belong to me, so I’d like to say that I found all those I posted on the web. Copyright to the actor pics goes to the networks and for the puzzles to Schmidt Spiele or Thomas Kinkade. Very interesting, right? ;-)

What else? I had a good new year’s eve. I’ve had ones spent at home just eating and watching TV. One year I even ended up crying in bed. That wasn’t fun at all. But this year I visited my best friend and we celebrated at another friend’s dorm. We ate lots of food and had fun. I didn’t have time to get depressed and I was happy about that. At midnight, we went out on the street cos my friend’s boyfriend wanted to shoot some fireworks, but I got very scared from the noise and smoke. I even thought some part would fall on my head. I’ve been outside on new year’s eves before and never thought that. Very strange. So I went back to the dorm and watched the fireworks from outside my friend’s apartment and waited for the others to come back.

In other news, I hate my computer. My DVD drive won’t work except for 2 minutes right after booting the computer. Now I can’t watch the DVDs I got cos my DVD player can’t play them either. Grrr. Also, my beloved Mozilla Thunderbird e-mail client has been behaving very strangely for a while. I think it started when I set it up to receive e-mails from my Googlemail account with it. Double grrr.

That’s it for now. I wanted to post something else, but I can’t do that yet cos I haven’t found a certain picture I need to make the post funny.