Hello, my name is Christian and I'm an addict...

...to Designer Toys !

I find it so awesome that one shape can be so many things. While mini figures (also called blind box becasue you don't know which one you're going to get) are a great start, large figures is where it's at.

For Christmas, my sister got me an awesome 8 inches Dunny designed by Mad. It's so cool it could kill you.

The big problem is that the Dunnys are hard to find in the Ottawa area. Almost no store carry them, except one : Norml Clothing, an upperground boutique in the Byward Market.

BTW, who knew there was an upperground movement ? I know about underground and stuff, but what the hell is upperground ?

Anyway, I knew they had some Dunny series 4 (I looked for 3-4 hours on the net to find some in the region once) and I went there during the fall and got some. I went back recently and they had the Insa Dunny, a 8 inches Dunny with a hoodie. Yes, a real dunny-sized hoodie.

I'm also a huge fan of Tokidoki and really like the way he design his stuff. The Cactus Friends figures and the Moofia are his 2 mains series that are very popular.

Another artist I like a lot is Touma. He's well known for the Knuckle Bears and other evil creature that look almost cute at the same time. Just do a "touma hell hound plush" search on Google if you don't believe me.

I could talk on and on about different other artist but I'll just conclude with one last : Joe Ledbetter. He's known for the Toxic Swamp Qees and the Finders Keepers series of figures. He got a really different style and really give a wacky personality to his creatures.

... and I didn't get it !

Way too expensive... and considering the shipping, the guy that bought it is gonna pay a lot. At least it was local for me, so shipping was easy...

I want that !

I really want this item, and I'm trying a new feature of eBay. Don't bid !

You know what remotely grind my gears ?

- Big box store selling computer fans for an outrageous price. 15$ for a double ball bearing fan is a lot. At least they are really quiet.

- Young kids thinking it's fun to put soap in a fountain. Good thing I don't own one, but I was getting home yesterday night from a friend house (who moved close to us in the recent weeks) and I saw a foam "ball" rolling in the street. One of my friend neighbour has a really nice fountain on his front yard. The fountain was overflowing with foam, litterally. While it is a cool sight, I can't imagine how it will mess up the water pump and how cleaning it will be hard...

- Seeing 5 police cars in one minute and a half and not knowing what they are searching for. No word on the radio about that so I'm still wondering...

- Not finding enough people to play paintball. While the number of intersted people is ever growing, none of the dates I choose it good for any of them. My girlfriend is finally open to the idea of playing, but I could only make a group of 5 people while I need at least 8.

I'm getting tired to hear "Yeah, I really want to play... oh... it's that day... I can't, sorry". Just freaking tell me you don't want to play ! I invest time to organize this and people telling me they will come and cancel 2 days before the event just makes me mad. When I do a reservation, I have to pay for it. The whole amount, except the cost of the balls. If someone is not coming and I can't replace it, I'm losing money. Even tho I tell people there is a non-refundable deposit, they don't want to pay it if they're not coming...

I can understand if you have a good reason for cancelling, unexpected events, car break down with expensive repairs, etc. But if you just forget you had something planned while I sent the first email about the game date 2 or even 3 weeks before is just plain wrong. And it happens way too many times. The worse is outdoor games. I struggle for almost a month to get enough people and some of them don't even show up.

That's probably why I am always in a good mood when I finally get to play. Paintball is the best way to get the stress out of your system. Even if I shoot at people that actually stick to their words.

Those of you who dare to play with me, I thank you !

- On a totally different topic, a happy one this time, I learned yesterday that I will celebrate the holidays at my house !

I was talking with my sister on MSN yesterday and was joking around, saying I was cleaning up my computer room to make it look nice for when she comes with my mother for Christmas. The truth is just that I was cleaning because my room is a mess, too many ongoing projects.

But she replied "Ah, so mom told you ?"... That's when I told her I was just making a joke.

I told my mom about having Christmas at my place sometimes at the end of summer, when her boyfriend (now her ex, thank god) had left. She was always saying she would think about that, never giving me a definite answer, the best I got was "We'll see".

It seems she had already decided a long time ago and told my sister she wanted to make me a surprise. So now I have to play the guy that still doesn't know and fake the surprise when she finally tell me.

Now I really have to clean up the room !

You know something else that really grind my gears ?

You know something else that really grind my gears ? Fixing/modding something that won't work when your done.

Yesterday I finally decided that I was going to mod my Colecovision. It's not really for me that I was doing it, it was for the Arcadia Festival. I was only adding a simple Audio/Video Composite mod to it, to be able to use RCA cables with it. My friend Sensato recently gave me a new way of doing it since the previous method I had was scary and expensive. By scary I mean it looked like it was freaking hard to do.

The first part of the mod went fine and was done pretty fast. Three small components, add the wires and then test. After less than an hour I do my first test : I get a clean picture ! Yeah ! Time to clean everything, put the connectors and call it a day.

I put duct tape (my favorite kind of tape. How could a tape that has a duck as a logo can not be your favorite too ?) to avoid any short, makes the holes for the connectors, put them in, solder everything (including the top metal shield), secure everything and do a test before closing it out.

And thats when it started to go downhill : I get washed out colors. I remove the metal shield (remember, in the old days, they were soldered to the board) and leave the Coleco pluged in to see how I was doing.

And I get perfect colors. I start to reassemble it.

And I get washed out colors. Even sometime, I don't even get colors ! I'm starting to get pissed. I think that maybe the RF shield is causing a short and I decide to remove it. Anyway, this one won't be using RF output anymore.

And I get perfect colors. I start to reassemble again. I put the metal shield and everything looks good. I put screw the shell back in place and I test.

And I still get perfect colors ! Yeah ! Then I realize I forgot to put in the power LED.

I should mention here that Colecovision were hard as hell to disassemble. They are made of 3 plastic part : top, base and front. The top and the front are screwed together and then a sticker is put on the front, making them stuck forever, unless you want to lose the sticker (which is almost impossible to replace). Once you're done putting it back together, you don't want to open it again.

So I open it back and look for a 5v lead. The Coleco power adapter output 12v, 5v and -5v, but I can't get the 5v from there because the main switch only is for the 12v lead. I had to look on the net for the schematics, find a suitable 5v lead and connect a red LED to it. Then it's time to test the LED.

Guess what ? Red LED, not the hyper-bright kind, doesn't need 5v... they need less than that. I burned 2 LEDs to realize that. I still can't understand why I didn't buy hyper-bright red LED instead of regular, while I got green and blue in the hyper-bright... So I settle for a green LED, which love the 5v (this thing is bright enough to make you blind, I'm sure) and start making the hole for it next to the power switch. I hook up everything, test the light and reassemble the damn thing.

By that time, I have spent 2 hours and a half on that. I'm finally done and do a final test.

I get washed out colors ! Argh ! The next hour and a half was spent disassembling and reassembling the whole thing because I was sure I had fixed the issue. Around 10:30PM, I was finally done. Good colors, nice and powerful LED and everything fully assembled.

Then I started to work on the Atari 2600. I had first done the mod to a Atari Jr. but might have killed it during the mod. Good thing I have a backup ! I do have to mention that I used the wrong potentiometer while I first did the mod. I used 2k instead of 1k, but in my mind, a 2k pot in the middle become a 1k pot. Maybe not...

I remove the 2k pots, put the 1k pots in, resolder on the second Atari board and test.

Clean picture, good colors. It's karma, I'm sure.

It's getting late so I decide to put the metal shield back in and call it a day. But before I go to bed, I do a last test.

I get a scrambled picture ! It took me five minutes to saw one little wire had broken off, the one that sync the whole video signal !

This one will be fixed tonight. I'll then install the connectors, the power LED (I won't forget it this time).

Then I start to pray that everything hold off next November !

You know what else really grind my gears ?

You know what else really grind my gears ? Morning traffic.

During the 4 years I've been travelling to Ottawa for work (I miss thoses days where our buidling was in Hull), I've seen an increase in early traffic. I normally leave my house at 6:00AM and get stuck on the highway almost right away.

How come so many people start to work so early now ? 4 years ago, the highway was not even crowded until past 7:00. Now you have to expect an additional 10 min to come in on time. I didn't slept really good last night (blame it on the current heat wave) and had to get the garbages out so I left 25min late. It took me more than one hour to get to work ! It's getting ridiculous !

4 years ago, the road were empty when I was leaving home. Now I see a line of twenty cars waiting at the drive-in line at Timmy's. Make yourself a coffee for god sake ! You'll save 2$ and won't have to wait 20min for it. I've been contemplating the idea of starting late, around 9:00AM, like a coworker of mine did before. But the peak hour tend to end at 9:30AM, so I still would have to stay in the traffic for 40min. I don't really want to leave before 6:00AM, because I like my morning sleep. I'm stuck !

At least now I have a decent car. Last winter was horrible in the old Daewoo because it was cold inside the car during the whole trip. Now I stuck in traffic, but at least I'm comfy.

I wish I could win the loto and stay at home. Somebody want to buy me a ticket ?

You know what really grind my gears ?

You know what really grind my gears ? Thinking that everything is harder than it looks.

Let me explain. At our last paintball game, when checking the speed of our markers, mine was acting funny, never shooting at the correct speed. Either too slow or too fast, sometimes even shooting 3 feet in front of me.

So I disassemble the whole freaking thing. I check my air lines and see that my Quick Exhaust Valve is dirty. thinking that I found the issue, I try to clean it. I even ask the staff to help me clean it since I didn't have the correct tools. I reassamble the thing after it's clean and guess what ? I have a leak ! I almost rip the whole freaking thing apart and find the leak, screw a loose bolt and it's fine. I go to the speed check station for a second time. Same problem, can't fire at correct speed. Since I want to play, I take a rental marker and get in the field.

Speaking of rental, I'll never use one again. Once you get an electronic marker, you never go back to mechanical. You get so used to the fast rate of fire, almost no recoil and lightness. To make it worse, my rental had a CO2 bottle, while I use an Air tank. If I can't use my marker, I'm not playing.

But let's get back to the main issue. During lunch, I try again to fix it, to no avail. The damn thing won't fire correctly. I reluctantly use the rental again and finish the day with it.

That was back in July. I didn't touch my marker since then until earlier this week. I read on the net that most QEV can't be service so when they have stuff in them, they have to be thrown out. I said "Fine, I'll install the stock bolt back in. I replace the tubing with the correct length, but bock the bolt and it's good to go. I buy myself some balls (hard to test without them) and fire a couple shots in my backyard (had to be carefull, I have a bitchy neighbour). Looks fine to me but I want to test at a friend of mine, where I can shoot more and faster without disturbing anyone.

I went at his place yesterday. Put balls in the hopper and start to shoot. The first balls drop at my feet and the second doesn't get out of the barrel. I'm officially pissed at myself.

Earlier in the day, I was reading my marker manual at work. In the troubleshooting section, there is a question about shooting inconsistency. The first thing the manual mention is to change the battery... Which nobody ever tought about. I open the marker, change the battery and try to shoot again. I don't see where the ball land because it went too far. Same thing for the 5 balls after that. I aim for the plywood target my friend and I improvised and hit it. My marker is back to normal.

So I could have avoided all of this just by changing the freaking battery. I did all that for nothing, my QEV was still usable and I missed a lot of fun because I stressed over this and had to use a rental marker. The worse is that I had extra batteries at the game !

Remember, when something's wrong, check the battery !