I get REALLY HOOKED on a show, usually after it’s already either 1) well into the the season, or a 2nd or 3rd, etc., or 2) it’s already off the air. So what I do is find a way to watch them online. For a long time this meant having to download them using not so very legal means. Just about a month ago I deleted all six seasons of Sex and The City of my desktop’s hard drive. Right after the end of the last season I suddenly realized it was THE BEST SHOW EVER and then downloaded all six seasons and watched them in order and cried like a baby at the end. I still haven’t gone to see the movie because I’m worried about the emotional damage it might do.

And I don’t know if you remember that time that both Ben and I got somewhat COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY OBSESSED with 24 after it had been on the air for three seasons already? And we watched three seasons in a few weeks by watching it every single night and I actually blogged about possibly needing methadone and counseling when it was over.

Then last February we decided we should check out this LOST show that everybody keeps yammering about and: INSTANTLY HOOKED. We watched the first two seasons on DVD from Netflix when Season three had already started so we DVR’d the third season then watched them when we were done with one and two. Then we died from embarrassment and shame.

Then, dear internet, then about two weeks ago I finally took the time to take a look at Hulu and it was like I hit the mother load. Bones, Fringe, Nip/Tuck… all shows I never really took the time to watch before and now I’ve caught up on all of them… while at work. heh

But the best, BEST, OMGBEST!!!! They have all 14 original episodes of Firefly in the correct order. *swoon* I had never really gotten the chance to watch the show properly and after seeing Serenity (LOVE that movie and it still gets the most play on my iPhone) then watching some of the shows out of order, it was really confusing. But not anymore! I watched all 14 episodes in TWO DAYS, then started watching them AGAIN today because: HEART

I can’t believe this show was taken off the air. Given the massive fan base of the TV show, then the movie, it’s just a SHAME. After I finished the season I did more reading about it and Joss Whedon originally planned for it to be a seven year series and my poor broken heart aches to know what WOULD have happened. How long would it have taken them to realize River’s full potential? When were Mal and Inara FINALLY going to stop being stubborn and just DO IT ALREADY? What was the real deal with Shepherd Book and why DOES he know so much about crime and it’s major players? These are questions that I’ll never get answered! NEVER! How am I supposed to go on with no resolution!? No ENDING!? No Mal and Inara DOING IT?!

Anyway, in case you’re, like, into that kinda stuff, you can follow all my obsessing via my hulu feed. But I warn you, if you intend to be the least bit productive, DO NOT CHECK IT OUT AT WORK.

Hello, my name is Anna and I’m a serial series watcher. is a post from: aflux.net

So I walk into work this morning and before I can even set my stuff on my desk The Temp says:

Temp: My computer won’t come on.

I can see her computer from where I’m standing. It has lights on the front that are CLEARLY ON.

Me: It’s on.
Temp: No it’s not look. *moves mouse*
Me: Your computer has lights on and I can hear the disk spinning from here.
Temp: Oh. Well, how come this thing isn’t on then? *points to monitor*
Me: That’s your MONITOR.
Temp: Well my keyboard or nothing is working.
Me: When you hit capslock or number lock you don’t see lights?
Temp: Hits a random button, see, nothing.
Me: Capslock.
Temp: *hits it, looks at monitor* Nothing, see?
Me: The light ON YOUR KEYBOARD is on so it’s working.
Temp: Ohhhhhhh, but this still isn’t coming on.
Me: Did you try the power button?
Temp: Which one is the power button?
Me: *officially frustrated and completely over this conversation* The circle with the line through it.
Temp: *tries power button* Nothing,
Me: You should call IT.
Temp: Can you look at it?
Me: IT will be able to troubleshoot it for you.
Temp: Okay.

Five minutes pass. She’s on hold.

Temp: I’m still on hold.
Me: Did you check the connection to make sure it’s getting power?
Temp: Oh, no. *stands up, follows the cable TO THE COMPUTER* It’s plugged in.
Me: No, I mean is it getting power from the POWER CABLE.
Temp: Oh, duh. *giggle*
Me: *head desk*
Temp: Yeah, it’s all plugged in.
Me: IT will be able to troubleshoot it for you.

Boss comes over to say good morning.

Temp: My computer won’t turn on.
Boss: It’s on, see the lights.
Temp: I mean the monitor.
Boss: …
Me: …
Boss: Will you look at it real quick? I’m late for a meeting.
Me: *get up, walk to monitor, turn it around, push power cable completely into monitor, press power button, monitor turns on*
Temp: OH WOW! THANKS! I didn’t think to check there!

REALLY!? Because when I said CHECK THE POWER CABLE I meant, CHECK THE GODDAMN POWER CABLE!

&*#$%@*%

Welcome to my Thursday.

She was experiencing an ID10T error. is a post from: aflux.net

I had a really cool first post from the new Wordpress iPhone app all typed out and then the save button disappeared and the app ate it.

Now all you get is this sad little post instead.

Testing is a post from: aflux.net

Like most good geeks I downloaded and installed the 2.0 software yesterday and then downloaded EVERY SINGLE FREE APP AVAILABLE (and one paid app). Special thanks to TechCrunch for being on top of things and posting all downloads and links early. The app store is awesome. So far I’m pretty happy with most apps, especially the AIM, Twitterific, and the Faceobook app.

AND!

[StarWarsGeekGirl]

PhoneSaber! That was the first app I showed Ben. I’ve played with this app far too much. I can’t help it. I chased the cat around this morning and it was an epic battle that ended with him fleeing with his tail between his legs. HA!

Okay, I’ll stop now.

[/StarWarsGeekGirl]

The Facebook app is CRAZY fantastic and the developers should be very proud. It’s like a contact list on steroids. From now on instead of asking for a phone number to put into my phone I’m just gonna say “Add me on Facebook!” I’ve never really gotten fully into the Facebook craze even though I have a lot of friends that use it. Having to log in EVERY TIME I visit and the cluttered feeling have kept me away. Now that this is available, I expect that I’ll be much more active in that community… because, you know, what I really need is ANOTHER online community to become addicted to.

One thing I’d really love to see is a way to push info from Facebook to our contact lists, that would be the ultimate in coolness. GET ON THAT DEVELOPERS! kthxbye.

Twitterific is SO VERY PRETTY. I felt kind of bad for ditching Hahlo so quickly (for about 2.4 seconds) then The Pretty won me over. Twitterific is so easy to read and very well laid out for @replies and the integrated Safari browser with the option to also open in the browser for bookmarking was GENIUS. They really captured what twitter users want, I’d say better than even twitter does.

Now, if WordPress can just get it’s app out, I’ll be the happiest little blogger geek. From what I’ve seen though it will be awesome too. Easy to post, integrate pictures from the iPhone gallery on the fly, etc. It, combined with Typepad’s already available app, will take mobile blogging to the next level. It will be cool to see people doing more real time blogging of events.

I won’t be getting a 3G anytime soon because we close on the house today and we can’t really afford to be spending the money on new toys but a little part of me is happy that I got the App Store 24 hours before the 3G users. And my phone will always have the pretty metal back that I’ll flash around like a badge of geeky honor.

Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess. is a post from: aflux.net

Okay, so there has been this debate of sorts going around the tech/geek community for the last week or more basically paring twitter vs FriendFeed. And like I said on iJustine’s blog about it, I think the entire debate is null because it’s like comparing apples to an entire fruit salad. Twitter is micro blogging and FriendFeed is an aggregate for 41 different applications, including Twitter, with other features like commenting. You really just can’t compare them other than to say that they are both social networking sites but so are MySpace and Facebook and look how different they are. (In case you don’t get how they are different: MySpace sucks balls and Facebook doesn’t. IF YOU LEARN NOTHING ELSE FROM THIS BLOG POST, LEARN THAT!)

The debate is also questioning which one will become mainstream first, if either ever will. My opinion? I don’t really see it happening. When I try and explain the concept of twitter to non-geek folk, they just look at me with a blank stare and inevitably the same response: But, why? They just don’t get the micro blogging community as a whole. Now, compare it to a MySpace bulletin and eyes light up and lights come on and angels sing and THERE IT IS! There’s UNDERSTANDING in the eyes, they get it! Then you say, well just cut out all the spammy shit and do it in less then 140 characters. And THERE IT IS AGAIN, the blank stare.

I think that realistically, twitter stands more of a chance to become mainstream just because FriendFeed has SO MUCH of Teh Geek linked to it. Walk up to your mom, aunt or dentist and ask them what Vimeo is. Or brightkite. Or del.icio.us. Or hell, even Digg. Chance are if you are reading this blog you’ve heard of all or most of those but I bet you that your “mainstream” friends have NO CLUE. So how are they supposed to ever really grasp FriendFeed, which is just an aggregate of all those services?

Anyway, this post was originally going somewhere else and ended up here. So with that I’ll ask your opinion! What are your favorite Social Networking tools? I updated my FriendFeed accout today to include most of them that I use and there are SEVENTEEN accounts.

My FriendFeed account links to:

1. twitter
2. Facebook
3. brightkite
4. del.icio.us
5. Digg
6. Flickr
7. GoogleReader shared items
8. GoogleTalk status changes
9. Intense Debate
10. LinkedIn
11. Pownce
12. StumbleUpon
13. Tumblr
14. Vimeo
15. YouTube
16. Zooomr
17. Aflux’s RSS feed

And that’s just where I got to before I got tired of adding them to FriendFeed. Add me to any or all or none. I’m just kind of interested to see how many of these ACTUALLY get used because on some of them I’ve signed up to secure the name, played with them a bit, then completely forgotten about them. I’m going to pay attention to FriendFeed for the next few days and see how much any of them actually get used and based on your answers to which you use more, see if maybe twitter isn’t as popular as some of these debates would have you think… but I’m skeptical. I get a lot of twitter traffic.

Tweet or Feed? is a post from: aflux.net

Comments links are showing up in IE again! The folks at Intense Debate seriously rock!

My iPhone was stolen.

Okay, I know. I just heard you gasp and felt the disdain as you painfully exhaled and shook you fist at the sheer injustice. No, really.

It happened about a week ago and at the point in time I realized it was REALLY gone, I actually felt the machine rip the connection out of the back of my skull, flush me down the toilet and I was being woken up aboard the Nebakanezer shaking in the fetal position. It was really horrible. Seriously.

So I’ve lived the last week with no cell phone. I connected the 8525 up to our WiFi and browsing with it was like getting out of a Ferrari and being forced into a Geo Metro. It was slow and clunky and only had one browser available at a time and I had to click 14 different times to get Windows Mobile to check my email and I JUST FELT SO DIRTY.

I decided to not even activate a new SIM card for the 8525. I’d just try to live through the nightmare of being detached from the entire world for as long as it took me to come up with the $399 to replace it. Then I decided to make all the money online because I felt like an asshat because TECHNICALLY, I left the phone on the sink in the bathroom and I realize that it’s completely my fault that it was taken (well, my fault and the theiving bitch face that took it) and I’m not going to dent the bank account because of my dumbassness.

Then my mom INSISTED on buying it for me. Seriously.

Mom: So it never turned up?
Me: Nope, I’m just going to raise the money to replace it.
Mom: Come over, I want to take you to the Palo Alto Apple store and buy you a new one.
Me: Absolutely not! It’s YOUR birthday! I’m not going to let YOU take ME shopping on YOUR birthday!
Mom: I’m 60 years old, but I will STILL BOX YOUR EARS. I want my kids to be happy. That’s what I want for my birthday.

Ooooookay. So we went to Palo Alto and I got my mom some really cute earrings and lunch and… there are no iPhones in stock. ANYWHERE. In the entire Bay Area. At all.

She ended up ordering me one later online but I’m wondering if I should have waited to get one because clearly if they are out of stock at so many places, ESPECIALLY in the stores that surround the Apple complex, then they are obviously about to drop a new phone. I’ve read rumors of 3G and built in GPS but damn… I don’t think I can go a month or two or three till it comes out. I’m dyin’ over here.

Anyway, again, I’m sorry that I’ve been so quiet lately. I’ve been working on other projects and now that they are getting closer to completion I’ll have more time available again to stop neglecting aflux. Ohhhhh, did you see how I dropped the OTHER PROJECT bomb to leave you all guessing at the end of the post? Oh yeah, I did it! Is it killing you yet?

“It’s not the end of the world, but you can see it from there.” is a post from: aflux.net

I know that some of you have been twittering for quite some time and some of you have just been recently introduced to the obsession. It doesn’t matter WHEN you started though because the fact is, if you are twittering, you are hooked. You might send a tweet once a day or multiple times an hour, it doesn’t really matter because YOU HAVE BEEN SUCKED IN. MUAHAHAHA. I admit, my obsession has died down some since that first phone bill arrived with all 2,356 text messages listed and Ben was like, “THINK OF THE TREES!”.

I’ve tried to see if I can have just a select few tweets sent to my phone. Like, I don’t need every single one of Scoble’s tweets (even though I secretly wish I could follow him around from one techy junket to the next) but I would like to get Steen’s. And Jenn’s. And Sewwy’s. (PROPER SEO, Julie! Who, by the way, doesn’t Tweet which makes me sad.) So I think I’ll try when I get home to finally get that all lined up and working properly.

Ben has never really gotten into the whole twittering thing. When he’s seen me send a tweet from the phone or I’ve told him that YOU SO NEED TO TWEET he’s given me his standard “I love you dearly you hot ball of sexyness, but hell to the fuck no” look.

So I have to admit I was a little surprised yesterday the other day when he emailed me a link to a setup that sends you a tweet when your house plant needs to be watered. Surprised because maybe he was suddenly interested in twitter?! NO! Surprised because WE DON’T HAVE ANY HOUSE PLANTS! Well, we do have the one bamboo plant but you pretty much can’t kill those. I mean, you have to TRY and fail them. Maybe Ben would be more interested if there was a way to twitter you when your wife is premenstrual! Dude, somebody should get on that. As long as it doesn’t mean sticking electrodes to my ovaries and stuff. Because, no.

Man, I should really stop blogging when hopped up on Flu medicine.

So um, BLOG GIRLS! Are any of you thinking of attending BlogHer this year in San Francisco? Because it’s SO CLOSE to me. It’s like, right there *points North* and I promised myself last year that I’d attend this year and not be sorry I missed out on all the fun. But the thing is, I’d like to KNOW somebody going. I mean I know OF plenty of people going but I can’t exactly walk up to Heather Amrstong and be all, “HI! I totally stalk, I MEAN READ, your blog and think you are just the bee’s knees and can I sit next to you at the Cool Kid’s table?! Because that would be swell! And you said once that your shampoo smells really good can I just smell your head?! Wait! Where are you going? WHY ARE YOU SPRAYING ME WITH PEPPER SPRAY?!”

Or something.

And all of you who read my blog already know in advance that I’m crazy so it wouldn’t be QUITE as shocking to you. And I’ll probably go regardless but it would be nice to have somebody to hold my hair back after the cocktail parties.

It is bad luck to fall out of a thirteenth story window on Friday is a post from: aflux.net

Honestly? This is why I love this man so much. When I’m PMSing and I come across this thing that I think is SO GODDAMN AWESOME but will probably end up with me being shot at by a disgruntled asswad driver, he’s there to talk me down off that cliff.

Benjamin: http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electronic/8e9a/
http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/electronic/8e9a/images/2422/
me: OMG!!! I WANT! I WANT!
me: I seriously want that.
Benjamin: Although its a funny idea, I still think that it might be a bad idea for you
me: there are no cuss words!
And I bet my ’smile’ to ‘idiot’ would be better than you think.
*ratio
Like 3:1 at least.
And since I could actually SHOW the person what I’m thinking it would mean I’d be less likely to yell it at them when only you can Cassidy can hear it… because they’d KNOW. And that would be the ultimate satisfaction. No yelling necessary!
Are you serious though? I can’t have it?
Benjamin: I’m writing an email right now work related, I’m not even sure if its legal in CA
me: What if I promise not to use it while I’m PMSing?
Benjamin: is it legal in CA?
me: If it’s legal in CA can I get it?
Benjamin: its around the price point that you don’t need to ask, so I don’t know why you’re asking me
me: Because generally, with things like this, you are a better judge of good idea/bad idea.
Benjamin: bad idea
me: heheheheh
(k)
I love you. Even when you are trying to save me from myself.

A few minutes later:

me: hahaa I asked Claudia about it. I usually drive to lunch. Her answer: “As long as you never use it when I’m in the car with you!”

Does the noise in my head bother you? is a post from: aflux.net

It’s on it’s way. And it’s PINK! Flamingo pink actually. Shut up.

I hit refresh on the refurbished Dell website about 562,226,529,526 times today and there was ONE laptop that met all the requirements. As soon as it popped up I called Ben and tried to act like my brain was not in the process of exploding RIGHT THEN AND THERE because OH MY GOD I WANT THIS LAPTOP and he ordered it for me right away. *swoon*

Inspiron 1520 Notebook: Intel Core 2 Duo T7300 (2.0GHz/800Mhz FSB/4MB cache)
160 GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM)
15.4 inch WSXGA+ Notebook Screen with TrueLife (1680 x 1050)
8X DVD +/- RW w/dbl layer write capability
9 Cell Primary Battery
Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium
256MB NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT
2 GB DDR2 SDRAM 677MHz (2 DIMMs)
Intel 4965 802.11a/g/n Dual-Band Mini Card

I do have to say though, what was with all the pink laptops that had still had stock integrated graphics but upgrades for integrated webcams?! Girls, seriously. What the hell is up with that? I’m kind of ashamed.

P.S. – This is an official reminder to myself to post something soon about Ben’s War of the Ants. It’s getting pretty out of hand. He passed the Raid hurdle and I think I saw him searching google for Do it Yourself Napalm earlier. It’s about to get serious up in here.

You could be my flamingo. is a post from: aflux.net

Last Friday in a moment of complete madness and click happiness I okay’d an upgrade on the iPhone from firmware 1.0.2. to 1.1.1 and within 30 minutes wanted to throw myself from the Golden Gate to end it all. Ozzy and Sharon said this week that they made a pact that if either of them ever have an illness that effects their brain, they’d assist the other in not prolonging life any more. I thought that was kind of funny coming from a guy that bites off the heads of live bats and a woman that throws pot roasts over her fence at the neighbors… But I think Ben and I need to come up with something similar. If we’re ever forced into using a stupidly inferior firmware on our current obsession the other will find a way to quickly and quietly stop the other’s suffering at whatever cost.

The good news is that the directions offered up on hackin0sh to downgrade actually work. Although, it was much easier then they let on if you had never attempted to unlock your phone. After the restore and two runthroughs of the AppTapp.exe, I just let the phone “restore” via iTunes and BAM! Everything was back. MobileChat, Springboard and all the pretty themes, Customize, the NES emulator, iFlickr, all of my goodness was there.

If you have the phone, and you haven’t upgraded yet and you really depend on any of the awesome applications AppTapp provides, NO NOT UPGRADE. Not only did I lose all those apps, but my battery life was cut by about 25%. I’m not completely certain that was caused by 1.1.1 but today was the first day that I ran out of battery at work after 6 hours of video playback. Prior to this, I was easily making it the full 8 hours of video playback with battery life to spare.

I’m pretty dissappointed with how strict Apple is regarding 3rd party apps. They need to realize how upset people are. People were returning phones in the hopes of getting one that hadn’t been upgraded yet. It’s okay, Apple. We LOVE our iPhones. We’d DIE for our iPhones. We also love the ability to add pink icons to the desktop and to play Super Mario World on them. These apps are making an already awesome piece of equipment even better.

So here’s my suggestion to Apple: Buy AppTapp, open the source, allow geeks to make your product even more valuable to the end user, sell more phones, watch profit grow.

Oh yeah, if I suddenly disappear off the face of the earth one day, it COULD be because I didn’t read the little box that popped up and Ben’s kept up his end of the pact.

It takes 46 muscles to frown but only 4 to flip ‘em the bird. is a post from: aflux.net