My dad and I were looking for an older socket 939 CPU the likes of an AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ dual core, but we didn't realize how inexpensive a whole new motherboard could be.

If you don't know where I'm going with this, then I at least hope you're good at sports or something.

So, my dad and I went to Fry's, with a few ideas courtest of me of what to buy. Sure enough, we went, we bought, we brought it on home.

We got:

AMD Phenom 9600+ Quad Core CPU (last one in stock)

Asus M2N-E Socket AM2+ DDR2 Nvidia motherboard

2x1GB DDR2 RAM

Logitech R-10 Stereo speaker system

Canon Pixma MP210 Multimedia Printer (FREE with the Motherboard!)

Overall, a 9600+ Quad Core is a little bit of an upgrade from my current 3200 single-core... :D

At the moment, however, I'm writing this on my laptop, because right now we're working on getting the motherboard totally working (black... screen). It's pretty cool, actually-- I have it hooked into my 22" 1680x1050 monitor, and my Razer Lachesis gaming mouse is in it... It's my home away from home. My very slow home away from home.

It's going to be good...

So, today I went looking with Mom and then Dad for a new mousepad. I convinced Mom to let me get a pretty good transparent/blurry one, but when I tried it out with my new gaming laser mouse, it didn't track right.

So, a little later in the day, Dad and I went looking around at a bunch of stores, including Office Depot, Costco, and then PC Club, my favorite little computer parts store. I suggested it because of this really nice gaming mousepad with blue LED lights on the curvy perimeter, so we went there and looked around.

While we were there, I found said mouse pad, and fans for my HDD, since it was overheating.

So we waited at the cash register to buy them, and he starts making suggestions and reccomendations, since I've constantly reminded my parents that my CPU sucks (single-core 2Ghz), especially compared to the rest of my computer. He looks up my computer and I tell him how I've had the GPU, PSU, monitor, mouse, RAM and more upgraded but NOT the CPU, he looks up what type of CPU I have (socket 939) and says we should get an AMD Athlon X2 4800+ Dual Core, since that's the highest end we can get with my socket type, without replacing the whole motherboard.

So today my dad and I are looking for that CPU online, and if we find it on the cheaps, we're going to buy it. :D

Also, be sure to check out my last blog, I posted it today, too.

Ever wanted to use that spray you saw on Youtube?

In between my last blog and the blog before it, I finally came across the hilarious "This guy is totally not a spy" spray I'd been looking for for the longest time. It was in .png format, and not immediately compatible with TF2, you have to run it through a program that makes the background transparent, and then converts it into a Valve-compatible image format which you can then copy into TF2's files and select from the normal drop-down list.

I do not wish any of you who want this transparent tag to go through these troubles, so you can get to the Valve-compatible files themselves directly from here. Instructions on where to copy these files are handily included in the folder, and it's really simple and easy. Try it out, satisfaction gauranteed! Have fun!

One of the first games I tried to join in TF2 was Mario_Kart, but it took too long to load, so I joined a normal game.

Yesterday I revisited Mario_Kart, and joined the game.

IT IS FREAKING AWESOME. There's music (a first!), moving vehicles, a bright colorful environment with a background courtesy of Super Mario World, big wide-open spaces, and a chance for every class to shine.

I've broken a lot of personal records on this map with a lot of different classes, such as a damage record for the Scout and Sniper, my highest point amount (15 with the Sniper), and 5-headshots in one life. I beat my all-time record for damage in one life with 4,505 as a Sniper, my second-least played class!!

This map has been the perfect way for me to become acquanted with the Sniper, with the long open area with an offset area in front of RED's spawn, it's easy to get your headshot perfected for other games. It's so fun killing Heavys and enemy Snipers while their trying to kill you :D

Overall impression of Mario_Kart:

:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

...All I've been blogging about has been the Orange Box and Steam lately, and there's a good reason: they both rock!

So my question to you is: wanna play a game with me? What's your SteamID so we can be Steam buddies? :D Mine is DarCowAlways (duh).

Gimme a time, gimme a date, gimme a SteamID and I'm there. :D Team Fortress 2 FTW!

I've had an old headset with cheap plastic and horrid sound quality for quite some time now, but about a year ago I earned enough money to buy a new, high-quality set that had great sound and was really comfortable.

It's always worked perfectly for me, that is, until I used it with Team Fortress 2. Whenever I use it in a match, they say "Hey, fix your mic!". When testing it in the TF2 settings menu, it sounds normal, and even when I switched to the old mic they said they couldn't hear me. So it's not my system, it only doesn't work in TF2 online matches. And, my internet connection is 20Mbps, so nothing wrong there...

:?

I bought flOw today, and I've gotta say, it's the best PSP game so far. It's 8 dollars and takes up 90MB, but is a hard-to-put down game with a LOT going for it.

I personally can't wait until I can play ad-hoc with one of my friends.

I was the first to review it! I downloaded it at 7 PM, and played it to 10:30, on the day it came out! How awesome is that?!

Here it is. For anyone skeptical about flOw, I suggest going here to play it on the web and see for yourself. Remember, though, that it has come quite a long way since that flash original.

Today I finally got to level 23, Super Bagman.

Whatever a 'Super Bagman' is. :P

Steam- at first I thought I'd ignore it since it's necessary to play the Orange Box, but then I found out that it's actually pretty great. There're free demo downloads, SteamIDs, friends lists, it keeps track of my TF2 stats and the stats of other TF2 players, and we can all join the same game with it. Very cool, actually.

Team Fortress 2 = addictive.

--Player Types--

My preferred team is red, but I also play on Blu if I have to.

My most-used characters are, in descending order:

-Spy

-Engineer

-Medic

-Heavy

-Pyro

-Scout

-Soldier

-Sniper

-Demoman

I don't really like the Heavy, but when I'm playing my two favorites, which are all defensive or supportive, when we are under massive attack I sometimes switch over to Heavy to take them out.

--Game Stats--

I have over half of the achievements unlocked, and I've ranked up exactly 250 kills as of this post.

I look for games populated by ~16 players, with a top of about 22.

My username is very guessable.

I use voice chat in-game.

My favorite game mode is the traditional control point mode. My second favorite is the intel capturing, and I loathe the defend and attack missions.

I've spent ~11 hours so far playing TF2.

What are your stats/favorites?