Dramabeans » off topic

Oddly named innovations

javabeans — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 15:44:23 +0000

I know this post is off-topic, but DongA.com brings us this lovely image of a newfangled device being called a “scissor bike.” I don’t know about you, but those are two words that, when put together, conjure up some pretty unfortunate images, but oddly it’s very apt (the bicycle folds upon itself for ease of carrying). I don’t bike much, but I’d actually get me one of these — more useful than a razor scooter, less bulky than an actual bike.

Reviving dead links: Lots of song reposts

javabeans — Mon, 05 May 2008 20:43:40 +0000

I just finished going through all my song posts and re-uploading all the expired links. Bejeebus!, I have a lot of songs posted. Since re-uploading is a daunting task, I’m not quite sure what I’m going to do about expired links in the future — they go dead if they haven’t been downloaded in 60 days, and I don’t have the patience to scour through them on a bimonthly basis. I should probably be surprised that most of the links were still alive. (Although someone actually went through and reported all my Shinhwa links specifically! Grr. Thanks a lot for making my job harder.)

But I saw some links that went dead or were less-downloaded, and figured I’d highlight some — songs I particularly like or which may have gone overlooked initially.

(If I put up too many of those audio players, my browser tends to freeze, unfortunately. So if I don’t put up the audio player for the song, I’m putting up a link to the page where you can listen to it.)

For instance:

INDIE ROCK/POP

Bluedawn – “Tabula Rasa”
The Bluedawn duo (Han Hee Jung aka Dawn on vocals, Jung Sang Hoon aka Ssoro on guitar) released their debut album in 2003 and has since put out a second full-length album and a dual EP album. They broke up in 2006; I believe Dawn is continuing on with the new group Invisible Fish. [ Download ]

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Merry Christmas

javabeans — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 08:01:47 +0000

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE! (Happy Hanukkah? Kwanzaa? Generic seasonal holidays?)

Hope y’all have a nice, relaxing, energizing, kdrama-filled holiday. As for me, my day is entirely booked — I have lots of sleeping and reading and vegging to do. Phew. So much lazing about to do, so little time.

SONG OF THE DAY

House Rulez – “Merry Christmas” [ zShare download ]

Happy Thanksgiving

javabeans — Thu, 22 Nov 2007 19:17:34 +0000

Or, should I say, Happy American Chuseok?

I’m thankful for a lot, many things related to this site and many things not. I’m thankful for one guilt-free eating day in the year, because everyone’s in it together today! Even the skinny bitches who normally sneer at food and sustenance and all that pesky caloric stuff.

So Happy Thanksgiving! Don’t eat too much (”too much” to be deemed as you see fit), don’t drink ‘n’ drive, and, of course, don’t forget to count your blessings! I’m sure we’ve all got a few more than we realize if we think about it hard enough.

SONG OF THE DAY

Nell – “Thank You” [ zShare download ]

Pudding – “Thank” for some soothing instrumentals. [ zShare download ]

For the bored and random

javabeans — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 00:55:13 +0000

Keke. Totally just for kicks and giggles…

Today’s useless but amusing toy of the day comes via Pop Candy, which, if you’re unaware, is a fantastic blog on American/Western pop culture. Not the Perez Hilton-y, slagging-on-poptarts (or as they say, “celebutard”) kind of pop culture, but a witty, smart, ironic kind that skews a little Gen X and geek-chic, but is infinitely more readable and satisfying. If you’re into that kind of thing, that is.

Anyway. Wonder what you’d look like as an anime character? Try running a photo through the Face Transformer tool here. I tried it on myself, and the anime/manga setting is by far the most flattering. The “mucha” option yields decent results, but inevitably the Modigliani option brings out the chinkiness in all of us using the “East Asian” setting, and the Botticelli tends to make you look like a desiccated mummy (redundant?). Or third-degree burn victim.

Since I’m not about to post pics of myself up on the internet, and I’m feeling a bit of Coffee Prince withdrawal, I figured, why not kill two birds with one procrastinatory stone?

(Random) SONG OF THE DAY

The Melody – “Everything N’Nothing.” Someone asked for more of The Melody, so here’s my favorite song from their first album. [ zShare download ]

What’s funny is that Yoon Eun Hye, and by extension, Eun Chan, totally already looks like an anime character.

You know what’s funnier? If you select the option to “feminize” Gong Yoo’s face, it comes out looking almost exactly the same! No joke. I tried it on several different pictures (because it took a while to get a result that I thought was remotely interesting looking).

This Time it’s More Like Zen Annoyance

javabeans — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 04:12:04 +0000

OMG you guys.

So by now you’ve all heard my big server upgrade moan-and-groan story. Over the weekend, I upgraded from shared hosting (which was killing me with limiting my CPU restrictions, which build up very quickly when highly trafficked). I’d outgrown my little shared hosting plan and needed my own space.

And now, thanks to Coffee Prince, in TWO DAYS I have outgrown my basic VPS plan and have had to upgrade once again. I can’t be too upset because I say with pride that I have entirely Coffee Prince’s popularity to blame, and who can hold a grudge against that?

In the ONE HOUR that I’ve posted the Tenth Cup summary, my site went down five times. I know this because I was worried it would max out and have been closely monitoring my levels. The instant the server overloaded (ran out of memory) I restarted it. Sorry for the choppy hour, guys.

I’ve since upgraded to the next level with much more ram, and now, instead of operating at 98% levels of capacity (I freaked out when the techie pointed out the chart to me), I’m at a comfortable 53%. Phew.

I REALLY think this is going to be the last of my issues. And rock on, Coffee Prince!!

(By the way, just in case you’re wondering about this “zen” business, I commented in my darkest hours of techie-related aggravation that I was trying to be zen. But that if things did not improve, I would have to resort to inventing a new violent strain of zen.)

Dramabeans, Now With More Zen Violence

javabeans — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 17:09:43 +0000

Dare I say it? … dare I hope? …

…that the site is now working?

If you’ve dropped by anytime in the past two days, you’ll have noticed lots of weirdness. You may have noticed that I’d posted two posts that have since disappeared — they were both just there to let you know of possible site issues, so I decided not to break my brain retrieving them when they were lost in the transfer. All the important stuff is still here. Some of the most recent comments may have also been lost — there weren’t too many, but sorry if they did!

I’ve noticed that the transfer managed to drop every single thing written in Korean. I can’t understand why since I transferred my SQL databases exactly as is, and it’ll be a big pain to go back and fix them all (I started to, but I didn’t realize how many posts I have. Damn, I write a lot). But at this point I’m not complaining because I’m just glad that’s my only issue. So if you’re confused at all those ??????’s, I’m working on it!

I hesitate to rejoice fully, but in case you’re interested in hearing more about the harrowing travails of moving a server (which really, really should not be a difficult process), read on! And even if you don’t care about that, I’m throwing up lots of really random songs — they have nothing in common, aside from the fact that they’re just songs I felt like posting. I usually make it a point only to post up songs by Korean artists, but now that I’m freed of the shackles of restrictive hosting, I’m in a not-caring-about-the-rules kind of mood. I’m just gonna make the most of my new resources.

(One of many totally random) SONG(s) OF THE DAY

Death Cab for Cutie – “The Sound of Settling”

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