Consumer Posts
Some interesting points regarding consumer goods…
Joy Dish Soap:
For years I had a giant bottle of some Dawn-branded dish detergent. It worked great. Eventually it ran out, so while at the store I bought a bottle of some Lemon-scented Joy. Well, you know that musty / moldy / mildewy smell that dish clothes and sponges get when they are left to sit in a too-moist state for too long?
For some reason since switching to Joy, I’ve had my dishwashing sponge turn rancid once a week. Previously with Dawn I could use the same sponge until the scrubby side had worn flat and it was replaced because of wear, not stink.
Currently, after having been replaced a week ago, the sponge smells so bad that I can’t wash dishes with it, lest the stink permeate my hands for the next 24 hours. (Washing doesn’t get it off.) I guess I’ll be buying some Dawn on the way home and throwing out another perfectly good sponge.
It really is a fun game. It will absolutely, completely piss you off until you understand what is going on, but after that it’s a good bit of fun. Definitely worth the 400 points. It’s one of those games where once you get it you want to keep playing it. Too bad I had to go to bed last night… I wanted to play more this morning, but I was close to running late for work.
Other XBLA Demos I’ve Tried:
· Alien Hominid HD: Like the original, but without the bugs (it’s playable!), better graphics make the cartoony-ness even better, and still absurdly hard.
· Beautiful Katamari: A HD version of Katamari Damacy, which is good. What is bad is that instead of cheesy, poor translations there is intentionally bad English in the dialogs, reminiscent of LOLCATS type crap. Hopefully it doesn’t cost more than $30.
· Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved: Fun, Robotron-like (but not), hard, cheap. I forgot to actually buy the full version last night so I’ll do that tonight.
· Viva Piñata: Cute, just not fun for me. Seems like Danielle would like it. Basically you maintain a garden in order to attract very well rendered piñatas. There may be more, but I only gave the demo about 30 minutes.
Xbox 360 UI:
This is typical Microsoft crap. It is not easy to find where demos vs. downloaded XBLA games vs. whatever else is located. I don’t understand why I shouldn’t be able to be in the downloadable game store, where it says that I have already downloaded the game, and start it from there. Instead you hit a button and it tells you how to launch the game. (Go to this menu, then that, then pick this.) It’s somewhat shiny, but a bit too busy for me. Also, I don’t like the built-in banner ads, even if they are just for other games.
iPod w/ Apple Lossless
Sounds really, really good. The DAC in the iPod is actually pretty nice. However, battery life on an iPod is greatly decreased when using lossless. I think this is because the iPod has (if I remember right) a 32MB buffer which it fills before spinning the disc down. This is plenty big for a couple of lossy tracks to fit in, but not lossless. Therefore the disc has to spin up a lot more. Perhaps this will be changed in future iPods.
To work around this I might make a new iPod cable with built-in charging bits for use on my desk along with the headphone amp.
Boomboom rocket is an odd, fun little game you might enjoy. I also am addicted to Bejeweled2 and Hexic.
As far as Beautiful Katamari, it seems ilke they hired someone with a better grasp of English to do the translations, I know exactly what you mean. We’ll still probably get it if we can afford it.
It almost seems to me as if someone who spoke perfect English wrote cutesy phrases instead of the wonderfully quirky original translations. They are just too polished, I think.
I’ll give Boom Boom Rocket a go… The other two just… Meh… Not for me. I’d really like Bookworm, but on PC I’d played that twitchy-fast, I don’t think it’d translate well to non-mouse control.
re: sponge
I dont know about the soap effects on the sponge, but I usually hit my sponges with a little bleach once a week or so to kill off errant bacteria.
Sanitizing is a good thing, sodium hypochlorite solutions are your friend. BTW, thats bleach :)
re: dish cloths: I always change my dish cloths once a day. Always. Without fail. Prevents those nasty odors.
Oh yeah, and regarding the stink on your hands? Soap definitely doesn’t take that off. Bleach would, obviously, but I dont run around dunking my hands in bleach solution very often. Lemon juice probably would though.
The thing is, I haven’t had the need to do so before. It’s something with the new soap… The old stuff wasn’t any sort of particularly antibacterial soap or whatnot, it was just plain old commercial strength Dawn.
I’m going to try and grab another large bottle at Costco after work and throw out this crap.
Understood.
Just thought you might like to know how to save your perfectly good, but stinky sponge.
A sanitizing solution of bleach would fix that sponge right up.
Yeah, maybe… I’m still a bit hesitant to leave the giant mass of dead organisms in there, though. I’d rather have them just not grow in the first place.
Also, I’m not sure if I have much bleach around the house. I usually don’t have much use for it. :\
Uh, I think the dead organisms would be flushed out, honestly.
Its surprises me that you dont have any bleach around, and that you say you dont have much use for it.
You brew beer, right? Dont you have to sanitize your equipment, especially the bottles, for making beer?
I use a phosphoric acid-based food grade sanitizer for that. ;) If the yeasties eat chlorine they produce something which tastes like band-aids. :D
Phosphoric acid is naturally found in beer, and it’s safe to consume in the quantities used as sanitizer, so this works out great.
maybe that would work to kill off the nasties in the sponge then :)
It may. I also have a stack of six or so more sponges… As they normally last for months and months, maybe I’ll just grab one of those. :\
The demo for the game Worms is more fun then imagined…try to give that one a go.
Oh, yeah… I want to. I’ve been playing it on computer for almost the last 10 years. I love Scorched Earth-type games.
Ugh…I know exactly what you mean about the dirty dishrag smell not coming off your hands. My roomate always uses dishrags and leaves them soaking wet in the sink. She also, never notices when they get stinky and just leaves them in the sink until I can’t stand it anymore and end up washing them. Grrr…Anyway, I always use Dawn dish soap and I tend to use sponges instead of dishrags because the rags always seem to get stinky while the sponges never do.
P.S. Viva Pinata is awesome.
Uggh. Yeah, I don’t use dishrags because they are natural fibers, which are really hard to wring out. Sponges aren’t as porous so it’s a lot easier.
So, no plans to get a copy of BioShock then? I’ve heard that is pretty good.. :D
Er, actually, yeah. But I’m not sure who is writing this so I can’t reply appropriately. :)
That was me, I managed to lose my galeon profile earlier with all the cookies :(
Oh, doh. :D Hi… Yeah, I’m going to get it, probably from skweek since he’s completed it. I’d like it now, but… oh well.