Various recent events

Recently I have become involved with a site called Yahoo! Answers. It's a site where users post any question they like and then receive answers from the other members. People ask some really ambiguous and obscure questions on topics from music to health care to language, but that's what makes it all the more enjoyable. Often when I've Googled an obscure or specific search I have been presented with this site, and it's really interesting to read how people answer all these questions, often really well. I believe that Google ran a similar service a few years back, but it was shut down last year. I'd thought about joining in Yahoo! Answers before, as I already have a Yahoo! account, and finally did last weekend. I now find myself voraciously looking for questions that I can answer. I think it's a combination of showing off and a desire to help out a fellow human in need. There are forums all over the internet, but this site reduces the socialising aspect and just enables people to find an answer to their question really quickly.

We got a new piece of wireless technology delivered to our house yesterday. It's called the BT Home Hub, and after setting it up I've realised that it's a wireless router and modem in one box (you wouldn't have been able to tell from the instructions). We were already using a Linksys system in our house, which I invested quite a bit of money and time in setting up, but we now need this piece of equipment to enable us to use the new BT service we've subscribed to. The system was actually really easy to set up, very user-friendly and simple compared to the Linksys equipment, but I feel that my options are slightly limited - there's little room for customisation. Obviously, this has been done so that anyone can set up the system in a short space of time and with little knowledge, but I wonder whether this may limit somehow what is possible. I have no real reason to complain yet though, as everything works fine.

As we had changed our wireless system slightly I tried out Mario Kart DS with the new settings. It still worked, and I managed to sign up for an online game with 3 others relatively quickly. I'm quite surprised that people are still playing Mario Kart DS - it was really cool at first, but the match-up system leaves a lot to be desired, and opponents who often quit has meant that I only play the game online very rarely.

My band and I have recently had to organise a show in our home town for us and a band who are friends of ours. We'd never done this before, but in the end it was actually really easy - we just turned up at a bar and spoke to the guy who owned the place and everything was sorted within 5 minutes. If all goes well, which it should, we'll probably be doing a lot more shows soon.