Why Blue Mountain Sucks

So I'm back from Blue Mountain after leaving YESTERDAY. As a result of 14 degree Celsius weather and rain, there is currently almost no snow on Blue Mountain. Actually, scratch that. There is no snow on Blue Mountain, just ice.

Possible bonuses included getting to drive there and most of the way back; however, driving there was hell itself. Due to the aforementioned high temperatures, the snow was actually steaming and creating a fog so thick even Moses and Chuck Norris combined wouldn't be able to part it. But I didn't kill myself/my dad so I guess it wasn't all bad.

*shakes fist at global warming*

Additionally, Blue Mountain sucks so much that they can't even keep the power on. So there I was, stuck in a cottage so close to skiing yet unable to, with no power and a cloudy sky so I couldn't even read that easily (incidentally, READ GODS BEHAVING BADLY), with my brother who said about 2.5 words the whole weekend (the .5 accounting for a mumble).

So now I need to wait till January 2ndish for a decent enough snowfall to actually go skiing. Which sucks because I've been waiting since about September to go.

*shakes other fist at global warming*

~Setsanto

My Christmas Gift to All

So, for my second post of the day:
MY UBUNTU THEME
since nobody actually reads this, this is a present to noone, but let's not dwell on that.


First things first. GET COMPIZ. it has nothing to do with my background but it's awesome. I'll also be adding AWN (the thing at the bottom) with this step.

Fire up Terminal (Applications --> Accesories --> Terminal)

Type in

gksu gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Add the following lines to the end

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/compiz/ubuntu hardy main
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/awn-testing/ubuntu hardy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/awn-testing/ubuntu hardy main

Save and close the file

Type this into terminal

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

And then this

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

Once that is done type in

sudo apt-get install awn-manager-trunk awn-extras-applets-trunk

AWN is now ready to go! You can open the program in Accessories --> Applications --> Avant Window Navigator. The AWN Manger is at System --> Preferences --> AWN Manger

To Run Compiz, you'll have to restart your X.org by pressing ctrl+alt+backspace, or just by restarting your computer. You'll then find it at System --> Preferences --> CompizConfig Settings Manager

My background is "A Dark Starry Night" by s3vendays. You can get it here

My theme is Overglossed by TheRob. You can get it here. Just follow the instructions.

The Icon theme is Black-White 2 Style by DBGthekafu. I have Black-White 2 Style Big, but you can go for any one you want. You can get them here. To install it, extract the tarball, open up the file, extract the second tarball, then drag that folder directly onto you appearances window.

AND YOU'RE DONE!

~Setsanto

P.S. If you want to make the AWN bar be curved, then do this:
Press Alt-F2
Type in

gconf-editor

Click on apps --> avant-window-navigator --> bar
Change bar_angle to -1

It's Christmas, not "Winter Festivities"

Since I am such a music nerd, I am co-president of the music council at my high school. As a result, I was a key figure in organizing our annual "Winter" Concert. *takes a bow*. I was also an MC, and made the mistake of referring to Christmas in my script. This was, of course, a complete no-no, because, you know, this concert has NOTHING to do with Christmas AT ALL. EVAR.

Which brings me to my point. ITS CHRISTMAS. GET OVER IT. I'm an atheist. I know that this holiday is supposed to commemorate the birth of Jesus Christ (who was, incidentally, actually born in July. But that's another post), and I also don't believe in Jesus Christ as the figure presented in the bible. And I also don't care. Christmas is a time of year. If someone came up to me and said "Happy Hannukah" I would say "Happy Hannukah to you too". I wouldn't say "I won't say Happy Hannukah because it's not my religion and I find it offensive". Or if I wanted to say that I would just mumble an unintelligible snippet to that effect.

But that's not to say that it's the fault of all non-Christians that we have this whole OH NOES CANT SAY CHRISTMAS problem. No, it is the fault of the hyper-sensitive and overly politically correct society that exists today in North America.

So my point is:

MERRY CHRISTMAS, HAPPY HANNUKAH AND KRAZY KWANZAA (sorry, I have absolutely no idea what goes in front of Kwanzaa. Any tips?) EVERYONE

~Setsanto

How to Install Flash Player 10 on Ubuntu

The above is my desktop on Ubuntu. Ubuntu being synonymous with amazingness. It took me the better part of a weekend to get everything up and running the way I wanted it to. How-to info coming as soon as I remember how-to. But for now a real lesson. How to get Flash to work on Ubuntu.

When I went onto Firefox for the first time after getting Ubuntu 8.04, it asked me if I wanted to install a flash player. I thought, yes, yes I would Firefox. Thanks for asking! This was possibly the most retarded decision I had ever made. And trust me I am retarded. Sound did not work on almost all flash video things. I was pissed. And it took me forever to find a solution. So here it is for all of you out there who have the same problem as me. I am pretty sure this works on all Ubuntu distributions; however, I only know for certain that it works on 8.04.

Go to System --> Administration --> Synaptic Package Manger

Click on "Search" and type in flash as your search query, let it search Description and Name.

A whole bunch of packages will come up. If ANY of the following are installed, click the box next to them and select mark for complete removal: flashplugin-nonfree, gnash, klash, konqueror-plugin-flash, libflash-mozplugin, libflashsupport, mozilla-plugin-gnash, swfdec-mozilla, ubuntu-restricted-extras, xubuntu-restricted extras.

Open up your internet browser and go to: http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/

Choose to download the .tar.gz file for Linux (Do not choose the .deb, it can cause problems)

Save the file, do not use Archive Manager.

Once the .tar.gz file has downloaded, right click on it and choose extract here.

Open up Terminal (Applications --> Accessories --> Terminal)

Type in

cd Desktop/install_flash_player_10_linux

(You can copy and paste by highlighting what I wrote, right clicking, choosing copy, then right clicking on terminal and choosing paste.)

Now type in

./flashplayer-installer

Follow the instructions, and you're good to go!

~Setsanto


P.S. To any of you people out there who are actually good with Ubuntu are grumbling about my very inefficient method of installing flash, this is the most failsafe method I have found of installing it.

So I have a blog...

woohoo first post. I am going to be writing on the premise that no one will actually read this, but do not let that deter you if you think you would enjoy the ramblings of a music-, lolcat- and ubuntu-addicted guy! I'll probably be posting a few Ubuntu help things, since I can feel your pain, fellow Unix users. Trust, once you get past the "O GOD, WTFZOMGBBQRTFM O WAIT I CAN'T RTFM THERE ISN'T ONE" part of it, you'll love it.

I may as well start off this specific post with a little info about moi (I sometimes randomly thrown in french words. Just for jokes). I've lived in England, Belgium, America, South Africa and now Canada. I've been in Canada for 3 years now, and am generally liking it. South Africa was probably my favourite country to live in, followed closely by England, but probably only because I was a toddler in England and everything is awesome when you're a toddler. I mean all that you have to do is eat, crap and look cute for relatives. But I digress.

I speak English, German and a little bit of Afrikaans. I wish I could speak French (hence the scattering of completely unnecessary French words), and am currently taking it in High School (amongst other subjects. I'm a little lot bit of a keener), where I am in Grade 11. I'm really into music, I've been playing flute for 5 years, oboe for 2 and guitar for 1. I like Metal and Classical genres of music, which is not as weird a mix as you may think (blog post idea!). Metal wise, Dark Tranquility and Amon Amarth are gods. Classical wise, CPE Bach and Mozart are gods. God wise, Chuck Norris is god.

So yeah, I hope you will enjoy whatever it is my sick twisted mind comes up with :D!

~Setsanto