I got a 360. No games. Just 360. I'll be getting some games too..but I'm fine with demos and ect for now.

I have chronicled all of this hard work, and now it paid off.

Sweet.

-Cheers.

Actually, I'm close to getting an xbox 360.  What pisses me off is that taxes will jack the prices up, but i'm still at the 200+ mark ( if you count walmart giftcards). Only problem there is that I recently heard that Walmart is a bad place to buy a 360, seeing as  people return broken ones or switch broken ones like crazy there.  Gamepsot seems like a good place, though. In a few eeks I will be trading in some games to some place htat is supposed to get me a decent amount of money. Just have to get the Gamestop tags off of the games .....>_>

But yes. By this week I will have passed the 300 mark all together and the 200 mark in dollars. I'm pretty damned happy. Things are going smoothly. It's just that with taxes and the warranty it just seems sooo much right now. Once I get enough probably just save it and save up more money just becuase of the possibility of a price drop. If by the begining of June ( which is when I'll be officially out of a job) there is no price drop, I will blow my steak and by a 360 with xbox live,  Gears of war, and some impulse chosen games.

See, the problem with moth 360s out now is that even though the newest batches are supposedly good, some have been sitting on shelves for a while and are the older models....which may suck. Either way, I'm buying it with a warranty. No doubt about it. Not that microsoft BS either. I'm talking a replacement warranty. I want to be able to return it ON THE SPOT (TM)  if it breaks down.

But yeah. That's where I am. 360, here i come!

I mean, seriously. I have to be. Girl walks up to me earlier and says " Hi" as if I'm retareded.  I don't respond, because, just no.  Girl later asks me my name and gives me this " I've seen you around" bull ****. I tell her my first name and walk away.

I'm in on the joke. People, I know I'm not that appealing to most of the girls I've met. I mean, I have terrible acne. But don't think I'm too dumb to notice something like this when I see it. Seriously, It's not funny, and it puts me in a position that I don't want to be in.

Oh, and I can't get paid for November. Which is Ok, I guess. Seeing as i have other things to make it up, but still.

Gee, I can't wait until this school year is over.

Cheers

They're taking me back tommorow. Nice, which means hopefully that I"ll either be able to work Monday. I'm definatelay working the rest of the  week. If I don't work monday then my hefty friday working schedrule will fill the void. Dollaz, Dollaz.

PS. I blew 5 bucks on macdonalds. No BSing around,  I need to keep my wallet at school for now on.

Cheers.

Yeah, So i'm going to be here all week. I was planning on working a bunch this week, but because of the fact that i couldn't come today, I can't come all week. Plus I'm missing school. Man, this sucks. I guess the giftcards and me trading in a crapload of games will make up for the desparity. I was also supposed to get paid this week, 150 bucks, but I won't worry that much about htat. I already know I have that. 

Basically, I'm very stressed. It seems as if so many things are going to go wrong this year. I keep telling myself that it's going to be ok, but it's not. I keep telling myself that if I have a bad 9th grade year that I can make it alll up with the next 3, but I don't even know if that's true. I don't even know if I'll  try to do better next year. You can already tell at this point that I hate school. I don't like it, and I don't want to go, but if I don't graduate and get good grades so I can go to college then later on my life will suck.  It's not very posisble for me to live the life that I want with just a highschool education. I'm not even sure what I want to do in life.

Not only that, but I have this weight problem that's increasing rapidly. I really need to fix this. I might already be a diabetic, and I need to take some tests to make sure that I'm not already one. I'm not 300+ but I don't want to end up that way either. I just need to somehow etch in my brain that this is something that I need to do every day, and I need to force myself to not eat so much. It's not as easy as it sounds, though.

Money, I want money, now. So little money, such a long time. Yes, by the end of all of this school nonsense i'll have a good amount of money, but what good will it do me i'm not even sure if everything will go as planned. Part of me wants it to, part of me doesn't, y'know? More work=more days I have to spend cooped up in school. It's a connection. If I do bad in school then I can't work. If I cna't work then I will be pissed and not want to do anything. Hopefully I don't get any Es. If I can pull atleast Cs on my midterms that I'll be fine.  The only classes that I don't think that i'll be fine are Spanish and Math.

Well, atleast it's a short week. Becuase of certain circumstances I have a half day friday. That'll give me time to reflect. It'll be alot better when it's all over and at that point i'll know, even if I don't get the tests back, if I passed or failed them.

Wish me luck.

-Cheers.

Do it.

Ok, I'm going to make this blog as short as I possibly can. School is in the back of my mind right now, and I'm hoping to make up alot of things. You see,  if I don't do  good in school they kick me from my job.  Other than that I wouldn't be so stressful about it. So uh, yeah.

-Week before last: The school I go to to get to another school ( long story, very convoluted) was delayed a day because of a stomac virus outbreak. I had a little diarhea that night and instead of giving me something for it, they sent me home the next day. Missed that entire week of school and really wasn't even sick. I'm starting to think I did that purposely......

-Christmas Week: I completely forget about school because frankly I don't give a damn....or atleast that was my attitude until I'm realising today that I missed tests and lots of work.

This week: Kids go back to school, but beucase the school that I go to to get to another school isn't open this week, I miss a FULL week of school. I Don't even know the reason why they don't reopen at the same time, but it kills me. I'm loving the large vacation though. Well needed. Still need to catch up bad.

Basically: I'm screwed. I can't wait until I just go to school in my county again. It may take me around 20 minutes to get to school and from school a day but that's better from  an hour plus going to a school ( that you don't actually take classes at) to go to another school, for convoluted reasons.  I"ll miss the job though. Funny how that works.

I was already not doing so hot, specifically in one class where I was straight up getting a D because of a project that I dind't finsih. It's too late to finish it now becuase the days that the guy was letting you finish stuff in class were the days  to which I was out. And I don't have a hot glue gun and good enough hand stability to do anything. I'm already doing poorly and math and getting worse in english. PE is messing me up becuase of over competitive boneheads and Science is well...Science. Government is Government....yeah.

That's pretty much it.
PS. Didn't fill like typing "Algebra I, Physics, English 9, American Government, Physical Education, Introduction to Engineering and Technology Conecepts.....D'oh!

Yup, still saving up for that Xbox 360.  It seems as if no matter what I do I'm always thinking of getting one. For a week I went crazy and started to try doing those stupid refferal websites. I won't mention any of them here since they are all made up of  scum and usually the people who succeed in getting the free product are too. Naturally, HDTVs and Xbox 360s go hand-in-hand. Right now I have a 20'inch Emerson defective TV ( picture slants a bit, but I'll get used to it ) and I'm looking to reach the next level.

There's the Widescreen monitor route, but it's entirely too complicated to get it to just play games. For the 360 I'd have to buy an extra VGA cable and then buy either new speakers or different connectors and ect just to get sound with my monitor. From the looks of the package,  it seems like it best accomidates LCD monitors with built in speakers. I'll tell you this much: I'm just not for it.  Of course,  with a TV tuner and all it'd be significantly cheaper than just straight up buying an HDTV,  but one of these days I'll get cable back, and one of these days I will likely want something that supports HDMI *cough*big fat console that is amde by arragoant company*cough* (long caugh eh? ). 

The one that I've been looking at for a considerable amount of time (a day :P) is the lowest of the Vizio models, the VX20L. It's 20'inches and I'll be damned if it doens't pack a punch.  Supports everything except 1080p and it can hook up to your computer. Talk about killing two birds with one stone. It has HDMI, Component, Composite, S-Video, Computer RGB,  RF Connector to internal tuner,  and Analog Stereo Audio for HDMI port.  Basically, it's got everything that I'd want. I'd definately prefer a larger TV because of my visual setbacks,  but I'm cool with it. I've been using 20'inches all of my life.  It's the cost of an Xbox 360 Premium, by the  way. Yeah.....ouch! 

 I'm so far away from the 360 right now, there's no way that I can be able to get this TV in time for the 360. I'm just going to rough it out  all year. Find a job after I leave this one and the end of the school year somehow and work the hell out of it. I really would like a summer job becuase I could  the funds for it to  pick up more games and then use the school year job to get the HDTV. Not to mention that I'd want to get a TV stand/ entertainment center for it, just to make it all come together. Surround sound might be pushing it just a little bit. But I want to be atleast close to the full experience at the least prices possible, and that's good enough for me. I'm not going to jinx myself, but they probably wouldn't rob me seeing as they'd have no idea that i'd have the stuff in there since my room is in the back of the apartment, which  is where I'd put my stuff for that reason. People can easily knock on the door and ask for something completely irrelevant as a diversion to see what you have in your house.

In an unrelated noted, a long time ago my sister and I let someone come in our house through the balcony, some random stranger. He just walked through and went straight to the door. We don't even use that balcony anymore, by the way. Later that night, a detective came to our house asking for some guy, we said we didn't know him. I'm thinking maybe a few weeks later we had got robbed. We didn't have much at that time, but it was enough. They took the dreamcast, VCR, N64,etc. Came in through the kitchen window. Also took some other stuff.  We got most of those things back, and now we don't let strangers in our house, ever. We did get robbed again,  but the story is so blurry and I don't know alot of the variables in the situation so I'll only tell you a little. Mom invited a man over, we never liked him at all.  She let him in like an idiot, when he left my sister's piggybank was cracked open with all of the money taken out of it and 100+ dollars were gone from my brother's drawer. Ofcourse, she's learned her lesson since then.

But back to something that's really important and/or interesting.  I want to get this computer put back their too, but that'll never happen. My technically declined mom actually thinks that if I just replace this computer with the one back there that it'd mess something up settings wise. We've done it before, and it worked. If I'm correct, the router holds all of the settings and is on the same network, so I don't even see a problem.  My mom won't see it until she walks in and realises it.  I want it all in one place, you know? I want one play to  call my space. All my life I've had to share my room with someone,  and I have to now even though it's only a good 35 percent of the year. I know this is a stereotypical complaint, but she always asks me to clean my room, which I hate because I have no reason to be in there. I mena, the computer in there sucks worse than this one and I don't even use it. If we just switched them then I'd be in there alot and I'd start organizing things better and designing my room better.

Ok, so I've went too places you didn't even want to go with this blog. I'll sum it up.

- Everything I want so far, The 360 (w/ game, 1600 marketplace points, and 12 Month Live Subscription) The Vizio VX20L, The TV Stand, and the cheap Surround Sound, all cost around 1,100 dollars put together. Ugh, back to the old grind.  If you haven't noticed now, I'm pretty much broke and can't afford it  right now. I'll only be able to get the 360 by the end of this school year ( hopefully) and it might be the last job I get in years if I don't shop around really good.

That's pretty much it as far as this area of my life. Stay tuned for another post full of information that owuld be too congested and off topic to put in this one.

Cheers :D.

Seeomg as I am a potential 360 owner, I've looked into every possible aspect of making sure that when I get mine  I'm not left out in the cold if it dies and how to keep it from dying. Yeah,  alot of variables  go into this, and the problem that everyone has come up with is the GPU. Yup, the GPU.  When the GPU gets pushed to the limits, the console overheats, when it overheats, it freezes. This can cause alot of problems. See: Tons of threads titled " Gears of war killed my ****ing 360!". 

Research ( aka people taking their 360s apart) has shown that the GPU stays hot after you turn the console off. A not usual hot. This does not help it at all. However, research has also shown that  within  just 2 minutes unplugging it, it cooled down.  Alot of people use their 360s to charge the batteries overnight, which can cause a problem.  I'd say get a kid where you don't have to use the 360 to charge the batteries, seeing as there are a bunch out there. 

The updates? Supposedly, this is how it goes :update=>GPU efficiency raised=>more heat=>trouble.  But it's not the updates' fault. It's the sloppy coding of the console.  I'm no hater,  infact i'm willing to bite the bullet and pay for the warranty, the coolers,  the charging kit, ect.  I'm just saying that we shouldn't have to go through this just to- nevermind.

But yeah. So far we've went through that the GPU is the main cause of all of the heat, which is the main problem. There are things you can buy that can increase the life of your 360. Firstly, Don't buy the Intercooler. It steals power from your 360 and just cuases alot of problems later on. As far as the cooling fans,  I'm not sure about them.  One that I've heard good things about was the Antec Notebook Cooler. It can connect directly to your 360 or from a different source ( if you're  really crazy about conseving power). You put them under your 360.

Designed for notebooks, this bad boy works wonderfully with the 360. It has 2 fans attached to the bottom that are constantly blowing cool air onto the unit, and an aluminum surface to disperse heat from the bottom of the 360.

Links will be at the bottom of the blog post.

In Conclusion,  lets face it. These things are the equivelant of turing your Playstation over and/ or the tons of people who bought multiple Playstations before the redisign. Things shouldn't be like this at all.  We shouldn't have to take these precautions just to assure that  a console lives as long as it should. The class action lawsuit will tell the truth about the console.  With the unfinished backwards compatability and the overheating, I personally think the 360 could have been a rush job.  Oh, and also, I'd suggest for potential 360 users to not buy into the one year warranty. Personally,  i don't like the idea of sending my 360 in and then having the possibility of getting a refurbished unit. Get a warranty at something such as wallmart and if your 360 breaks you get a brand new one, to which you should get a warranty on that.

References+Links

http://forums.xbox.com/8733984/ShowPost.aspx
Input on what's cuasing the update console bricking.

http://www.maxconsole.net/?mode=news&newsid=6458
Article about the Antec Laptop Cooler

http://forums.xbox-scene.com/index.php?showtopic=573301
A person's experience with opening his Xbox 360 to realise that his GPU heatsink was hot long after everything else was turned off.

Cheers.