How to keep your computer (and yourself) happy

Well first, here’s the stuff that I have in my PC. I built it myself (ta-dah!)

• Intel Pentium 4 3GHz processor with Hyper-Threading
• Intel D915GUX Motherboard
• Western Digital 80GB SATA Hard Disk
• 2 GB of Kingston RAM
• Lite-On DVD Writer
• nVidia GeForce 7200GS graphics card with 256MB RAM
• Windows Vista Ultimate

And this is what I have to keep my computer (and myself) happy:

• Comodo Firewall Pro 3.0.22.349. This firewall is free and doesn’t consume a lot of system resources. During the first week or two after installation, it will bug you about allowing or denying events, but once it’s learnt what goes in and out of your computer, it just keeps a silent watch in the background. If you’re connected to the Internet (and who isn’t nowadays) you need a firewall.
• AVG 8 Free. Again, if you’re connected to the net, you need antivirus protection, period. I’ve used AVG 7.5 in the past, and it does a pretty good job, so does the new version 8. Just remember to keep it updated and scan through your system at least once a week. The new AVG 8 comes with built-in spyware protection as well.
• CCleaner v2.07.575. Everyone needs a program to clean through the junk files that get deposited on our hard disks every time we visit the Internet and do stuff in Windows. CCleaner is free, and does an excellent job in the housekeeping area. You can even set it to run automatically every time Windows starts.
• O & O Defrag 10. Again a defragmenting program is necessary due to the fact that Windows throws and scatters files willy-nilly throughout a hard disk. Defragmentation re-sorts and consolidates files so it’s easier for Windows to find them. Think of Windows as a very untidy teenager throwing stuff around the house; a defragmenting program is the housekeeper that tidies up after him. O & O is not free, but there are plenty of free defragmenting programs around. Defraggler is a good one to use. Defrag your hard disks at least once a week and you’ll be ok. HOT NEWS O & O Defrag 4 is now available for free! Register here to get your free copy, with no limitations.

Now where’s my coffee?

Smoke gets in your (my) eyes

Don’t know about you, but I positively hate smokers. Having said that, I have friends who smoke, and am almost always tickled whenever they sit near me and ask the famous question: “Do you mind if I smoke?”

Well, what do you expect me to reply? “Yes, I do..get lost!?” So what I normally do would be to grab the nearest newspaper I can find and start fanning away like crazy, or if I can’t find a newspaper, I’ll probably find a good excuse to get up and leave. Anything from “Oh, look at the time! Got to go for work!” or “Man, I need to go to the restroom, fast!”

What is more shocking to me is to find that people are starting this smoking habit as young as their teenage years, and usually it boils down to peer pressure. You see your friends or peers doing it, so you join in (or feel like an outcast). And there’s also the famous excuse for starting this dirty habit: “I feel stressed, so I smoke.” Duh, give me a break!

I’m pleased to say that during my years in England and America, nobody has ever coerced me to smoke. My friends take me for what I am, and that’s it. That’s the way it should be. And some of them are so polite that they will snub out their cigarette when they see me coming!

Coffee in the morning

I don’t know about you, but I’m not really myself until I’ve had my caffeine fix when I wake up. Not that I’m Mr. Hyde or a zombie or anything like that. It’s just that my brain cells have to be zapped with caffeine before they can fully function, lol.

I used to have Nescafe instant coffee here, where you had to put some coffee, sugar, add hot water and cream, blah blah. Nowadays I’m just lazy and just buy the premixed 3 in 1 packets. In the late afternoon, I have another fix, and that’s it for me, a maximum of two cups a day. I’d be asking for trouble if I had any more coffee after 7 PM; I’d be tossing and turning in bed.

How about you? It’d be interesting to know how many cups of java you guzzle down every day. Also, here’s some interesting trivia about coffee in the Nescafe website. Lastly, this website, called positivelycoffee.org (heh, I like the name) has great information about coffee, all positive, of course

Down, but not out

Yeah, sometimes the blues just keep coming. And the weather didn’t help either. It was hot and humid the past few days, and last night the heavens let go a deluge of rain. Needless to say, I was caught in it, driving my son to his tuition class.

Well, to put it bluntly, I’ve been racking my brains with ideas to make more bread (money, silly). I’ve got this Piano thingy in my Word documents, maybe it’d be a good idea to transform it into an e-book. What’s in it, you may ask? Well hang on, I’ll talk about it in my next post. To be continued.

My blood test results are back

On the plus side, my blood pressure and BMI (Body Mass Index) is near-perfect, and so is almost everything else. You can calculate your BMI here. I scored a 19.5–yahoo!

On the minus side my cholesterol levels have gone up slightly (LDL aka the bad cholesterol) and my calcium levels have decreased. So looks like I have to bone up (pun intended) on some calcium supplements. And the good doc told me to do some jogging as well, to increase my bone density. Duh, OK!

If I were a rich man…

…Yubby dibby dibby dibby dibby dibby dibby dum! Yesterday I went to teach three students who had just moved into their new house. When I arrived, I was gawking at the property. It wasn’t just one house, it was two houses joined together, with four levels! The total combined area must have been in the region of 6,000 sq ft. And to make me even more envious, they had just bought a brand new Yamaha Clavinova CVP-405 Digital Piano for their children to play on.

Somehow or other, I was reminded of Topol singing “If I were a rich man” from the musical Fiddler on the Roof. Ah, if only I had lots of money! This makes me want to watch FOTR all over again, even though the movie is a whopping 3-hours long.

Medical Checkup Time (groan)

Well tomorrow (April 23) I’m going for my blood test at my family GP. Hope the results will come back OK (it usually takes two days or so). I was naughty and missed last year’s checkup; hopefully all my swimming routines till now will not be in vain!

One of our submarines is missing, Part 2

Well, I thought Sarah (another good friend and fellow staff member of BigBlueBall) would be pulling a Nessa on me, but fortunately she was just fighting the flu virus, and she’s now back in action. And LOL, she’s going to be taking a bunch of computer exams this week! Just what we need: another computer geek . Anyway, best of luck in those exams, Sarah!

Opera, anyone?

OK, confession time. When I started to build up my classical CD collection way back in 1992, one genre I left out was opera. At that time, I thought (rather foolishly, I might add) of opera as grown-up women and men belting out their voices at shockingly high levels in languages foreign to me.

It was only in the past few years that I began to see the beauty of opera, realizing that it was the ultimate combination of voices and instruments. I also began to appreciate it without even knowing the languages, especially Italian. What satisfied me was knowing at least the synopsis of the opera, and then just letting the music and voices transport me to faraway lands where the action takes place.

Oh, another confession. During my student days in London, there was this one time where I paid an inexpensive student rate to see Wagner’s complete Der Ring der Nibelungen (The Ring) in Covent Garden. This is probably the longest opera on record, clocking in around 16 hours and consisting of four parts or sub-operas. I attended all the four parts in four nights, and needless to say, I fell asleep half-way through each night!

Now, where was I. Oh yes, my opera collection now consists of 4 operas. In no particular order:

1. Mozart: The Marriage of Figaro (English Baroque Soloists, John Eliot Gardiner)
2. Puccini: La Boheme (Pavarotti, Berlin Philharmonic, Herbert von Karajan)
3. Puccini: Madam Butterfly (Orchestra Accademia Santa Cecilia, Rome, Tullio Serafin)
4. Puccini: Turandot (Pavarotti, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Zubin Mehta)

All are very good CD recordings. The latest acquisition was Turandot, recorded way back in 1972, but my, what a marvelous sound!

I guess it’s a case of better late than never.

Life is precious…

And what do most of us do? We fight, we argue, we bitch, we complain, we worry, we gripe… the list goes on and on. And the saddest thing is that we do this ever so often with our loved ones, or our friends. It would be such a blessing if all of us would just live life to the fullest by not indulging in these negative and destructive acts.

I personally whisper a short thank you prayer to God before I go to bed each night, and I do the same when I get up in the morning (and find that the sun is shining, I still have my senses and can wiggle my fingers and toes, the roof is still over my head, etc. etc.)

Joann Javons has written a nice little e-book here entitled 20 Little Ways to Stop and Smell the Roses. It won’t take you long to read through it, and it’s free to download and save in your computer if you wish. I especially like #14 “Laugh Yourself Silly.” Yes, a lot of us, myself included, tend to take life too seriously at times. Humor is just the perfect antidote.

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