If you live in the Amarillo area and need computer help, swing by Amarillo Technical Helpers [AmaTechHelp.com]. They provide computer service and repair, custom software and website development, and network installations, among other things. Their page includes a handy “Tech Tip of the Week,” which gives you some good information that can save you money.

Currently they are offering a “PC Tune-Up” for $75 – 50% off regular price.

Now this one was cool – a quiz to see if you can figure out if a name is a D&D character name or the name of a skin malady. I managed to get 12 out of 16 correct, so I don’t think I did too bad for a minimal hypochondriac…

btw – my favorite character name of all time was Ch’Likal N’Stur (Chuh-Lee-Kull N-Stir)(yeah – I had an apostrophe fetish at the time). Named a dog after her, even. She was a dark elf magic-user/thief, 1st edition AD&D. She kicked ass.

[http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/14962]

I’m not a fan of captchas (if you don’t know, they’re those screwy pictures of words that you have to type in to prove you are a human) and I don’t plan on using them – at least until my spam load becomes overwhelming. But if (when?) I do use them, I’ll use Carnegie Mellon’s reCAPTCHA service. No, I’m not shilling for them. Completing their captchas helps to digitize old manuscripts. You are presented with two words, one they know and one that they need read. If you enter the correct word for the known word, then they assume you did the same for the second word. Once a couple of other people verify that by submitting the same second word, they add it officially to their digitization of the work. Makes it a lot easier to translate books when thousands or millions of eyes are translating.

[http://recaptcha.net/learnmore.html]

I was checking out StumbleUpon when I came across an idea put forward by DayJobNuker called “IReply“, which was expanded upon by BloggerBingo as “Be a Community Builder“. I really like this idea and think it could be a great way for C/D-list bloggers like myself to get some exposure, and to help out others of our ilk. It basically boils down to this – if you leave a comment on my blog, I will:

• visit your site (if you link it in your name).
• visit several pages, not just one.
• leave a comment on a post, provided I have something to say about it.
• Digg you, submit you to StumbleUpon or Reddit, or another social site – provided I like the content
• click on an ad, as long as I don’t violate any terms of service by doing so.

What I won’t do:

• accept spam comments. If your comment doesn’t apply to the post, I’ll mark it as spam and delete it.
• accept adult content. I try to run a PG-13 theme here.
• click through to adult content. Employers don’t like that kind of thing. Neither do wives (at least not mine).
• subscribe to your RSS feed. I’ve got too many as it is (unless I really, really, really like your site).

I’ve got a backlog of comments that I haven’t taken the time to visit, so I think I’ll go do that now.

Mark your blog with one of these icons (courtesy of DayJobNuker and BloggerBingo).

HeadInjuryTheater has a post about the “Stupidest Monsters Someone was Paid to Make” – “CELEBRATING 30 YEARS OF VERY STUPID MONSTERS.” I would vote for the Evil Squirrels as my favorite.

[http://www.headinjurytheater.com/article73.htm]

Worse Than Failure contains the stories of developers, the kind that you don’t want to know. Stories about the Brilliant Paula Bean, Payback, and others will give you a reason to dread maintaining code and working with others…

[http://worsethanfailure.com/]

Ok, this guy (Chris) has some pretty funny videos here. Some language warnings.

[http://www.cutewithchris.com/]

This one was pretty dang funny:
[Show 126]

As was this one:
[Show 115]

And this one:
[Show 116]

That’s the name of the blog, and more trivia is name of the game.

[http://ididnotknowthatyesterday.blogspot.com/]

Dark Roasted Blend has a little piece on the “Knock Nevis”, the largest ship in operation (possibly the largest in the world). That sucker is longer than the Empire State Building is tall!

[http://thrillingwonder.blogspot.com/2006/12/ biggest-ships-in-world-part-2.html]

As if the Cowboys losing last night wasn’t bad enough, I just found out that the TonyHomo.com blog by Really Drew Bledsoe has ended as well. Everybody go post a comment asking for a ProBowl appearance!

[http://tonyhomo.blogspot.com/2007/01/ game-over.html]