VegettoEX Dot Com

Category: Uncategorized

  • Tara’s Crazy Howling

    Time for another crazy cat story.

    So our little cat, Tara, has this fuzzy red/white ball toy that she loves. She likes to fling it around through the air and go chasing after it. She has even become slightly dog-like and will play fetch to some degree, depending on how lazy she is about bringing it all the way back to your feet.

    There’s one big problem, though. When she picks this toy up in her mouth and wanders around, if there is no-one to take it from her, she will emit this incredible howl to get attention… while it’s still in her mouth. She’s a very vocal cat, anyway, so that’s not entirely surprising. It’s just a horrendous noise, is all, and one you can hear from anywhere else in the house.

    (MP3 sample from latest vgconvos recording; bit.ly re-direction)

    tara

    I mean, she’s super cute… but there’s a reason why we tend to hide the toy at night. Those 3 am howls don’t help the sleeping, much.

  • vagettoEx is banned

    I was browsing through some YouTube comments again (I know, I know…), and noticed my video “Never Fall Apart” also uploaded on someone else’s account. I can’t really stop that, and don’t particularly care, either… but I was curious about the comments it might have, so I clicked through. For the most part, they’re the usual “I love it!” or “I can’t find this song on Limewire please send it to me for free because I’m an entitled little nitwit!“, but something stuck out to me even more than that:

    vagettoex_banned

    It’s such a shame. I share no pleasure in detailing the news that vagettoEx is banned. I don’t exactly know who he is or why he’s banned from whatever he’s banned from, though. Just figured I’d pass along the word.

  • Live Broadcasting Online

    Jeff and I have streamed our recording of lo-fidelity live a few times. We do so over on my Stickam account through a second computer (my laptop) while his is busy with the normal audio recording for the show. Up until last night, we’ve always just done it where the laptop picks up the audio through its internal mic, since the mixer is outputting to the Mac for audio recording.

    Well, the mixer has the main-out as well as the tape-out. I busted out my audio cables last night and did a proper line-in to the laptop to complement the video feed it was serving. The feedback from the audience was great (being that the audio was great… no-one ever said the show was great :P), so next time we broadcast, we’ll be doing it “correctly” again.

    That gets me wondering, though… what do we gain from broadcasting it live?

    I’m well aware of the effort it takes to build and maintain that “sticky” audience that we all so desire, and little things like fixing the audio on a live stream go a long way. How about that live stream, though? What purpose does it serve? Quite frankly, it seems pretty egotistical… people love us so much, they want to watch us as we record our shows! Aren’t we so flippin’ great?!

    I don’t really think that about myself, though. No, seriously. If you were hanging with us last night, you heard me complaining about Jeff and his amazing radio voice and how much of a struggle it is for me sometimes to get into the range I want to be in. There are plenty of things I don’t like about my various shows, so adding a video stream on top of that just seems crazy.

    I think it works for lo-fidelity, though. Jeff and I have both been podcasting for a few years, and we both edit our own main shows. We know the effort it takes. We know what goes into it all. Due to all that, this particular show is far more conversational than the one I do for Daizenshuu EX, and so it works well for a live stream… no random dead-air (not much, anyway ^_~), no confusion over what’s happening next, no piece-meal recordings (with the exception of the ahead-of-time Anamanaguchi interview), etc. We are able to get immediate feedback, too, and while we definitely gear it toward being a damn solid audio program and really just video stream because we can… it’s nice to pull in a couple random live things here and there, like someone’s off-the-cuff Top 5 list to go along with our own.

    That doesn’t really address the bigger question of added-value, though. So I guess it’s best to ask you all — the ones who are following me enough to be reading this blog. Do you have any interest in video feeds of the podcast recordings? What do you find interesting / disinteresting about them? Know that we don’t have the time or resources to put on big productions, so if and when we stream anything, it’s just going to be… yep, some folks sitting around mics recording a podcast.

    Really curious, though!

  • No Phone, No Cable… Living Just Fine

    I just saw this report over on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website talking about the cancellation/removal of land-line phones in favor of cell-phone-only service. We are apparently at a point where one-in-five American homes have removed their plain ol’ telephone service in favor of exclusively using cell phones. The wife and I have been this way since 2004 when we moved into our first apartment, and continue to be this way in the new house. In addition to that, we also canceled our cable television service shortly before moving, and continue to operate with no traditional television service.

    You know what? Things are just fine.

    In terms of telephone service, it makes complete sense to abandon the land lines. While the quality of cell phone calls still leaves a lot to be desired, it suffices more than enough for my phone conversation purposes, which typically do not last longer than one minute unless I am calling my parents. If I am on the road or otherwise out and cannot be reached, my simply not answering the phone is exactly the same thing as someone calling me and not being home to pick up the phone. Combine that with text messages that completely replace voice mail in terms of disseminating tiny bits of information in quick, easily-digestible form… well, you’ve got a winner.

    As for television, it is equally fine without it. We have enough things to keep us busy after the move that we have no time to just sit around and mindlessly watch television, anyway. Once things settle back down a little bit (which they are already beginning to do), we still have more than enough viewable-passive-media to keep us entertained until the ends of time without needing to obtain anything else. Throw video games into the mix, and I have a hard time understanding why I would ever actually need cable service on my television. In fact, the word “television” does not accurately describe that 50″ Kuro in my living room now, since everything from that to the “old TV” to the computer monitors are really nothing more than display surfaces of varying sizes and aged technology. Whether it’s a video game, a DVD, a Blu-ray, episodes downloaded online and burned to DVD+RW for viewing on the PS3 or 360… all of these display surfaces act in exactly the same way without needing to pay someone to be constantly broadcasting a live signal to them which I have no interest in tuning into, anyway.

    I will admit there is a strange sort of “learning curve” to not being able to just sit down, hit a power button, and expect an in-progress video. Everything must be manually initiated. In the long run, I prefer this. Beyond the cost savings, I find that I gain precious minutes here and there that might otherwise be spent mindlessly flipping channels before realizing there is nothing to watch and starting up some other activity. Now-a-days, I just go right into whatever that “something else” would have been.

    I’m constantly reminded of that Seinfeld episode where Kramer wants to cancel his mail. Can we do that, yet?

  • Kids and Social Networking – Your Thoughts?

    I am going to be doing a little presentation next week at a luncheon at an organization regarding children being online and social networking. The focus is keeping them “safe” in some sense, but it will be more along the lines of just being aware of what is out there, how to keep tabs on it, building the necessary vocabulary to understand it, etc.

    I think the big thing I am going to harp on is just helping people understand why people join these sites and do the things they do. Once you understand the why, everything else falls into place. As far as I can tell from observation and my own personal experiences, the main reason is just selfish validation. What I mean by that is that people are using these sites basically for the purpose of having their own existence justified and validated by receiving positive feedback. Whether it’s Digg promoting things, Facebook with the “like” button and status update responses, Twitter and getting responses to tweets… everything is intended to be a virtual pat on the back to just prove that you exist.

    While narcissism extends far into adulthood, there is no denying that it is far more prevalent among children (especially teenagers) and their rebellious age. It is always about finding your place, understanding where you fit into the world, blah blah blah.

    What does everyone think about this? Would you describe it differently? What other reasons do people have for joining and participating in these social networking communities?

  • Post Office Frustration

    On March 20th, I received an e-mail from Meritline.com that the pair of digital audio cables I had ordered from them were on their way to me in the mail.

    On March 23rd, I came home to see the standard orange/pink-ish slip the post office leaves when they have a package that will not fit in the mailbox that they attempted to deliver (but would not just leave on the porch for whatever reason). I could take this slip to the post office to pick up the package.

    On March 27th, I placed an order on Amazon for a new microphone, XLR cable, and windscreen.

    On March 28th, Amazon e-mailed me to tell me that the XLR cable and windscreen had been shipped (the microphone would come separately).

    On March 30th, I finally had a chance to go down to the post office with my slip to pick up the package with my digital audio cables. I went there directly after work without first stopping off at home. I handed the slip to the nice lady behind the counter, she gave me a box, and I went back out to the car. As I walked to the car, I remembered that the slip had said “oversize envelope” as a description. I was holding a box. I opened the box to find the windscreen and XLR cable. I walked back into the post office and explained to the lady that I was pretty sure I had another package there waiting for me. It was impossible for the slip that I had just brought in (received on March 23rd) to be for an item that had not yet even been ordered at the time (March 27th). The now-sassy lady dismissed me away saying I would have another slip if I had another package, and she walked away without checking for me.

    There was another slip in my mailbox upon returning home, this one (obviously) being for the XLR cable and windscreen, which I had just picked up.

    I really hope when I go back to the post office that there is a different person working there. I suppose as long as I have a slip with my name and address, they will just give me whatever package matches that name and address.

    But seriously. Logic, people. C’mon.

  • Thoughts On Donations?

    This is a subject I am heavily conflicted on.

    Ever since the dawn of Daizenshuu EX (and VegettoEX’s Home Page and Ultimate DBZ Links Page before them), I have done anything and everything in my power to keep things as “real” and “transparent” as I can with the site. I have never asked the community for anything, and do not expect anything in return for running the site. There have been plenty of generous “donations” over the years (for example, our buddy godofchaos has been hosting the podcast for us free of charge, and we’ll be porting over the forum to his server in the near future; many years ago our old buddy Scott, or SREDBZ, used to host our website for us). We’ve even had prize donations for website contests. These have always been unsolicited, mean the world to us, and make the community a better place.

    I’ve had people ask about monetary donations in the past, but I’ve always struck them down. This is for fans, BY fans, gosh darn it! Things are a little different now. I’m not a 16-year-old punk kid starting a links page. The wife and I are lucky to be two educated adults with full-time, well-paying jobs, but there’s no denying what the current economic situation is.

    Time to be a little realistic. Especially with our first home purchase entering the picture, one can’t help but wonder what a couple extra bucks would mean.

    There are new guide books coming out. There are new CDs coming out. Shipping from Japan ain’t cheap. Equipment could use replacing and upgrading. Thinking about trying some new conventions.

    Despite never having done so in the past, I’m seriously considering putting up a PayPal “Donate Now!” button over on Daizenshuu EX. Part of me feels… ya’ know, so what? Tons of other websites, blogs, and podcasts do this (including some of my favorites). I even paid for a premium version of a podcast for a while before it unfortunately passed on, and I didn’t think twice about supporting it. I tossed a couple bucks over to the CO-OP guys right after they got laid off from 1UP.

    The other part of me freezes up and feels like a total sell-out. It goes against everything I’ve tried to do in the past. I feel like we are in such a (comparatively speaking) great, financially-secure place… what right do I have to ask anyone for anything, even indirectly like this? What reason do they even have to take me seriously?

    So I guess that’s what my question is. What reason(s) do you have for even taking such a request seriously? If you saw that button pop up, how would you feel? How do you think the rest of the fanbase and community, the ones who don’t take the time to respond but are just as important, would feel? What would you like to see done with any donation you may or may not make, regardless of how little or grand it may or may not be?

    I’m definitely waiting to hear your responses. It’s not as important or dire as I think I’ve made it out to be, but your thoughts and responses are genuinely welcome. I’m going to cross-post this on the Daizenshuu EX forum (there’s obviously a larger reader base there right now), but please feel free to leave blog comments. If you would rather privately send your thoughts, go ahead and just send them on over to VegettoEX@aol.com.

    Thanks so much, everyone!

  • Lack Of (Modern) Literacy On YouTube

    The title should come as absolutely no surprise, but I’ve rofled enough to myself in the last couple of minutes that I figured I would share these with you. No, this is not a follow-up to my viewpoints on my own feedback/responses/criticism on YouTube, so don’t worry that I’m bombarding you with more of that nonsense.

    YouTube has a post up on their own blog talking about devices and services that enable a consumer to view YouTube directly on their television. Makes sense, right? I mean, we know about Microsoft’s partnership with Netflix to get that service on the 360, and PS3 owners have no doubt seen the YouTube link right when they launch their browser. There are plenty of other set-top boxes and new televisions coming out with integrated services like these, as well. For those of us that live the modern, technology-based lifestyle, none of this requires any explanation.

    Remember that the majority of the world doesn’t think the same way we do, though. Plenty of people are quick to point out that you can also hook up a computer to an HDTV, but most appear to be completely clueless. These two quotes stuck out to me (from what I could stand reading through):

    great stuuf what is the channel number in the unite kingdom

    … and…

    what the number of the channel it’s gonna be on? will it work on cable

    What I think this really proves is that general consumers still think of “TV” as meaning “a channel I flip to”. It’s easy for us to make fun of or at least chuckle at these types of responses, but for those of us trying to reach new audiences (ones that still don’t understand what it is we’re doing), seeing these types of comments is incredibly frustrating.

  • Problem Solved: Main Rig Working

    This was a happy weekend.

    You can review the situation for yourself in the blog post from last week, but long story short, I accidentally flipped the surge protector off with my main computer hooked up to it, and it wouldn’t boot after that. Thanks to a flurry of recommendations from personal friends as well as all your blog comments, I had a few avenues to go with in terms of problem-solving.

    One of the first suggestions was that I might have blown the power supply in the system. I was perhaps a little hasty in messing around with things, but I decided to rip that sucker out before I did anything else. The problem was that once I got it out, I didn’t really know what to do with it! If it was indeed the power supply that was busted, we discovered it would be tricky to replace since it was a proprietary 1000-watt Dell power supply which they did not just sell as a standard replacement part. There were a few on eBay for purchase in the $50-150 range (which isn’t too bad), but I couldn’t really be guaranteed I’d get a solid product that way. Off-the-shelf power supplies wouldn’t be too helpful, since this one had both a 20-pin and 24-pin connector each going into the motherboard (very strange). For a better idea of what I was dealing with, and at Jeff’s suggestion, here’s a comparison between this Dell power supply and a sentinel machine from The Matrix.

    cpu_alive_01

    Once Jeff and I got the darn thing back into the system and amazingly remembered/figured-out how to rewire the entire thing, the next step was to check the RAM. We took out all 4 GB and planned on going through them to see if any caused the system to crap out during the boot process. Much to our surprise, we got the computer booting right up with one stick of RAM, but with no mouse or keyboard. The boot process informed us that the system configuration had changed, and to either press F1 to continue or F2 to enter the BIOS setup. Well, no keyboard was plugged in. We plugged in the USB keyboard at that point to see if it would let us continue after a button press, but no-go. We held the power to shut the system back down. We then proceeded to put the entire thing back to normal with all 4 GB of RAM and the standard mouse and keyboard combination (though a different USB mouse than I usually use, but this different one actually being the mouse that came with the system in the first place, which I typically have plugged into the Linux system). Ah-HAH! Same result as before, with it immediately shooting to about one-quarter of the way through POST, and with no beeps to indicate any kind of problem. Reusing an image here, but this is what it looked like:

    cpu_dead_01

    After another hard shutdown, we decided to give it a go with no mouse and keyboard, but keeping the 4 GB of RAM in the system. Much to our delight, we got through the entire boot all the way into Windows! Once we got to the desktop, we plugged in a mouse and shut it down normally. Out of morbid curiosity, I decided to try booting without the Dell USB keyboard, and a cheap ol’ PS/2 GE keyboard that I think we bought at Radio Shack a few years ago (which, again, I typically have plugged into the Linux machine).

    cpu_alive_02

    Bingo.

    For whatever reason, the Dell USB keyboard was preventing the computer from booting.

    No, it wasn’t a specific USB port. We tried different ports, and I’m using all of my USB ports for various things right now (other than that Dell keyboard, of course). The only USB issues we ran into were the back six ports not working upon those first couple reboots (only the two on the front of the machine seemed to work). I’ve had this happen to me, and whatever the problem is, it seems to resolve itself. Perhaps it’s a loose cable inside; I dunno. Speaking of loose cables, the only other small matter that we easily corrected was that the top CD/DVD drive didn’t show up in Windows; it was indeed a loose cable. We were trying to figure out what the POST process was telling us when it said “drive two” was missing, but we assumed it meant a hard drive (since “slot two” out of 0, 1, 2, and 3 doesn’t have a SATA drive in there). We quickly realized that was ridiculous, since there was never a hard drive there, and the computer would neither know nor care if a random extra hard drive was or was not there.

    All of those little items were corrected, though, and rather quickly at that. With all of those minor issues out of the way (and after copying over Episode #0161 of the Daizenshuu EX podcast, which was being held hostage on one of the hard drives, to three other locations just to put my mind at ease), we figured we may as well just go ahead and install that new video card! Jeff thought it was so new and clean and pretty that we should take a picture of it before tossing it into the mix, so here you go:

    cpu_alive_03

    That’s an ASUS EN9800GT PCI-Express blah blah blah card. It’s $129.99 on Newegg, has a $25 mail-in rebate, and came with a free copy of Call of Duty: World at War (which I played for approximately sixty seconds in the campaign mode on easy before dying from a grenade, despite there being an indicator on the screen). Anyway, everything’s running silky-smooth now, including Prince of Persia which looks gorgeous. I was also able to finally beat Portal that Saturday evening, with the entire group huddling closer and closer to the screen during that final level and amazing boss battle. Yes, it took me a while. Yes, I’m slow at games. Yes, it was amazing.

    I’ve also picked myself up a UPS to put over in the corner with this machine. It was incredibly stupid of me to not have one in the first place, and while it’s unfortunate that I had to deal with the ramifications of my own shenanigans, it at least prompted me to finally take care of it. I actually can’t remember off the top of my head which one I grabbed, but it was one of the “Geek Squad” ones from Best Buy (I’ll update and add in a link later when I’m home).

    So there you have it. Problem solved, and I learned a ton of stuff in the process of fixing it all. All this nonsense due to my carelessness… and a keyboard.

    … which, by the way, works on the Linux machine perfectly fine and doesn’t prevent it from booting. Rofls.

  • More Reflections On… Well… People (And Being Online)

    A review of recent comments on the Daizenshuu EX YouTube channel and playing some Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 on Xbox Live last night reminded me just how jaw-droppingly incomprehensible people can be online. I have come across a couple good bits o’ reading over the last couple days that somewhat tie in with this subject, and I just wanted to pass them along. A lot of these thoughts will come around again when I finally decided to do a WTF EX podcast episode about current internet culture and the (non)value of feedback/comments as a whole, but until then, I hope you enjoy some of these bits.

    First and foremost, let me make it explicitly clear that I hold absolutely no (serious) delusions of grandeur and hardly see myself as any sort of true “celebrity”. With that being said, I also have been running prominent (for their community/audience) websites for well over a decade, moved on up in several hobbies, presented at conventions, etc. I’m out there. People know my name and plenty of other things about me. People have come up to me in public. I’ve been asked to sign things (OK, just once that I remember). OK? OK. Just sayin’.

    While I occasionally read a little too much idealistic and unrealistic prose over on Techdirt, as a whole I really enjoy what is posted there, and tend to agree more than disagree with what Michael Masnick has to say. Above-mentioned review of my YouTube comments and a few e-mails to Daizenshuu EX perfectly mirrors the title of an article from the other day, “Reading Comprehension: A Terrible Thing To Waste“.

    In 2007, some people who somehow signed up for the program without meaning to, started Google searching the program — and commenting on that post, often complaining that they were signed up against their will. In April of 2007, one person noted that the charge on his credit card was denoted as being for AMZ*Prime Club. Within days, if you did a search on that phrase, we were the top result. At first, our comments started to fill up with angry messages from people who claim they never agreed to sign up for the program. Then… people started emailing and calling us demanding a refund.

    Particularly with our “Rumor Guide” and detailed explanations of things from the originial Japanese reference material, many people write in to “correct” us, but end up saying the exact same thing, simply in their own words (and typically with FUNimation-only verbiage). It is almost always followed and ended by some snarky comment, demanding praise for their valuable time wasted on us (that’s if it hadn’t already started with a horribly-written insult). Just like Techdirt ended up:

    Five minutes later, she replies:

    How the hell do I contact Amazon – it seems to me that you and Amazon are probably working in collusion to fleece people.

    And… with that I give up. Apparently, it wouldn’t matter how clearly Amazon explains their program. There are still some people who will not be able to figure it out.

    … I have had too many instances where responding back and forth with readers/listeners/fans ends up with me tossing my hands up in the air. While the following example is not one where I responded back and forth with the author (I didn’t bother replying at all), and is also not an example where they don’t realize they are actually agreeing with us, it still fits in with the whole mentality of these sorts of comments. This may be completely over-the-head of my non-DBZ-fan friends and readers… but chances are, if you’re here reading this, you have some familiarity with DBZ ^_~.

    In your rumors guide, u said that Trunks can’t reach SSJ2.. and your reasoning was that because it was a big deal when Gohan ascended to SSJ2 and beat Cell..

    However u didn’t consider that the “big deal” could have been over Gohan’s power and NOT over the SSJ2 transformation. We all know 2 Saiyans can have different strengths even if both are SSJ form. For example, Trunks and Goten in early SSJ form can’t beat Vegeta or Goku. Also, SSJ Goten was slightly weaker than SSJ Trunks.

    What I’m tryin to say is, ppl weren’t surprised at the new “SSJ2” form that Gohan transformed into. The big surprise was over the fact that Gohan’s SSJ2 form was even more powerful than Goku’s and Vegeta’s SSJ2 form.

    Now, back to Trunks. During the Cell saga when Future Trunks fought Cell, he clearly became an “Ascended Super-Saiyan”. Even the episode was titled “Trunks Ascended”.

    Later on, during the Majin Buu Saga, episode “230 – Super Saiyan 3!”, Goku CLEARLY stated that an “ascended super-saiyan” is also known as “super saiyan 2”.

    So there u have it.. Future Trunks WAS indeed able to become SSJ2.

    There are so many things wrong with this e-mail. They are clearly writing in response to one particular entry in the “Rumor Guide“, and yet despite having a well-researched and correct explanation in front of them, there is some… I don’t even know what to call it…? I don’t think “sense of entitlement” is the right way to explain it, but it’s along the same lines. As I’ve noted time and time again, there seem to be a large contingent of FUNimation-only fans that yearn to “correct” information based off the original Japanese… and while that’s not to say there isn’t the opposite (I mean, hello!… I’m right here!)… oh, you can see where this is going (an “It’s FUNimation’s own fault there’s a fractured fanbase, not mine” editorial is too much effort for me, these days). Let’s just move on.

    The other article I wanted to point you over to was “Some Things Need To Change” by Michael Arrington over on TechCruch. Arrington takes a lot of flack for things he does and says, but at the end of the day, I think he’s pretty accurate in saying:

    I write about technology startups and news. In any sane world that shouldn’t make me someone who has to deal with death threats and being spat on. It shouldn’t require me to absorb more verbal abuse than a human being can realistically deal with.

    Again, please refer to the beginning of this entry where I plainly state that I’m not placing myself among the larger crowd of genuine success stories in the tech world. I’m just some guy on the internet talking to other nerds. There are clear parallels and warning signs, though. Do I really want to take any of my projects “further”, whether it’s a legitimate business or just a highly-expanded-upon hobby-venture? If there are already fake YouTube accounts set up with the sole purpose of insulting one of my websites (whoops; just legitimized it by acknowledging its existence!), repeatedly have to delete anti-Japanese comments from my actual YouTube account… blah blah blah. I don’t mean to make it out to be a larger situation than it really is (let’s be honest… it’s not). At the same time, they’re all horrible reminders about what kinds of people are out there, and how easily they have access to provide “feedback” to you. Why should anyone have to put themselves in a position where that’s even a realistic situation? Perhaps I’m being the unrealistic and delusional one, expecting and hoping to just go about my business having fun with enjoying things without receiving negative comments in response.

    The problem is that I love what I do when I’m not hiding from some crazy fucker who wants to kill me or being spat on by some unhappy European entrepreneur we didn’t write about.

    CONCLUSION: My buddy David summed it up pretty well when he told me…

    I think YouTube, Hulu, and similar large online forums just show how the world really is: loudmouthed, hateful, and ignorant.

    Also, if your first name is “Michael”, you appear to be doomed on the internet. Even further additionally, does John Gabriel’s theory just make that much sense?

    As I’ve stated before, I’m not looking for “sympathy” or even agreement with the topics discussed and relayed in these types of posts. People seem to like the “behind-the-scenes” look into how things are done at Casa de EX (like my podcasting setup), and I figured this all worked together nicely to provide yet another view. Especially if you disagree with what I’ve presented, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

    Pretty interesting how I’ve essentially degraded internet comments to a worthless pile of trash not suitable for a second glance, and then say I value them. Let me instead end it on a funny e-mail.

    From: < name removed >
    To: vegettoex@aol.com
    Sent: Sun, 25 Nov 2007 7:04 pm
    Subject: PLEASE RESPOND¡¡

    You know Yoshio Anzai (shueshia) ?
    Please give me information about yoshio anzai and contact information for yoshio… please
    ATT: < name removed >
    Bogota Colombia
    Thanks

    Hey, it’s snowing outside!

    (Any uplifting things you’d like to hear about? :P)