My Scams: Free PS3 Games
I periodically come up with ideas to make money that are sometimes illegal or immoral. I'm usually too lazy to act upon these ideas, but I'd like to start documenting them.
On this Kotaku article, they say that with the impending arrival of the PS3 Slim, Best Buy sent out a memo to their employees on how to handle customers who want to return their recently bought "fat" PS3 in exchange for the new "slim" version.
Best Buy has no need for old models of the PS3 so they want to prevent people who just bought a PS3 from exchanging it in for a new slim one. What they say is to offer the customer a free game (either Infamous, MLB 09 The Show, or Killzone 2) if they don't exchange their PS3.
What's the Scam:
I was thinking, those 3 games being offered cost around $50-$60 each. So what I should do is buy a "fat" PS3 now. Wait until the Slim PS3 is released September 1st, then go exchange my "fat" PS3, but instead, take them up on their deal for a free game. Then I'd go to every single Best Buy in the city/neighboring cities performing the same action accumulating 8-10 games. I would sell these brand new games for $40 each and in the process make $320-$400. Thus recouping the price I originally spent on the $300 PS3.
Good deal? I'd think so.
Blue Screen of Death, How I've Missed You
Just now my laptop of 6 years just went bluescreen. It actually was a double whammy since I had my laptop connected to a monitor also. The last time I had a BSD was about 4 years ago when my hard drive died. I was beginning to think that the BSD forgot about me. Seeing it today was a little heart warming, but after 1 second of a warm heart I got worried as to why it went blue.
It literally came out of the blue...forgive the pun, but I only had two Google Chrome browsers and an Internet Explorer window open. I wasn't downloading, installing, gaming, or anything that was process intensive. I was actually just looking up ratings of professors of classes I'm taking in the fall and suddenly it went blue. I guess it just needed a rest. I'm now using my netbook which luckily has not gone Eiffel 65 on me yet.
After a good nights rest, I'm backing up everything in good old Dell Latitude.
Your Head Looks...Swollen!
About 3 weeks after getting my wisdom teeth out, for some reason my lower right jaw hasn't healed yet. It was a dull pain until this morning where the pain woke me up way early. Which is weird since sleeping is usually my remedy for pain. Pain isn't supposed to wake me up. This pain is some kind of mutant.
Ahhh, I am very pain intolerant and this is pretty bad. Mom decided to get the prescription antibiotics that we didn't think I'd need. But geez, this pain feels like half my head has been punched by a clown with one of those boxing gloves on a spring.
Now my face is swollen. And ice packs seems to make it puffier. As you can see, my face is lopsided. Being lopsided is ok, unless of course you have a job interview tomorrow...like I do.
Sphenopalatine Ganglioneuralgia

That is the scientific name for "brain freeze." I'd sound so cool if I say that the next time I drink a Slurpee, but the problem is...I don't know how to pronounce it.
Right After Losing My Wisdom Teeth
You know how I was saying in my last post that I was going to eat a big breakfast and then leave a "surprise" during the surgery? Yeah I didn't follow through with that. It's a good thing because right before the surgery I had to sign a waiver that said that if I eat any food or drink 8 hours before, it could cause life threatening complications and I could die. so my last meal would have been the cause for it being my last meal. Whew! I'm not dead!
Well the process went like this:
The surgeon stuck a needle in my arm that was supposed to be a catheter for the IV. It didn't hurt as much as I thought it would. He then injected some stuff into the IV and said that I should start feeling the effects in 30 seconds. I was thinking, "Yeah right, 30 seconds? I'm a tough guy. It'll take more than 30 seconds for anything to knock me out." I started counting. Then the nurse stuck a rubber piece in my mouth and then I passed out. So I'd say it was about 15 seconds.
Next thing I knew, I woke up and my mouth was numb. I felt no pain and there was gauze in my mouth. I was fine. I didn't feel woozy. I could walk, but they still had me sit in a wheel chair and had a guy push me to our car so my mom and drive me home.
At home mom made me eat a pain killer. Then I strangely decided to film a video. Then after that for some reason I had a huge urge to watch Transformers so I put in Transformers in the DVD player and started watching it with Michael Bay commentary. My parents didn't like that I was watching tv so they had me turn it off. I then took a nap.
I wasn't really hungry even though I hadn't eaten anything for 15 hours. I guess the fear of pain from eating was enough to make my stomach not growl. I did have a lot of blood drip out. My shirt got dirty and I had to change the gauze every 40 minutes or so. I'm alright now. I just hope I don't choke on any extra blood while I sleep tonight. Gosh! It seems like everyday there is a chance of me dying!
Here's that weird video I decided to make. As you can see I'm still very incoherent and mind altered with drugs.
No Eating or Drinking 6 hrs Before Surgery
Getting my wisdom teeth out tomorrow. The appointment is at 9:30am. That means that if I can't eat or drink for 6 hours, I have to wake up at 3am to eat something otherwise I'll be stuck with just dinner 15 hours before.
I wonder why we can't eat or drink for 6 hours. Maybe it's so that we don't relieve ourselves while asleep during surgery.
You know what? I'm going to eat a huge breakfast tomorrow morning and ignore the rule. It might be my last meal so it better be a good one. Plus I'd like to hear what the surgeon has to say when I leave him a present during the operation. I assume it would be along the lines of, "Uh, yeah you pooped yourself."
I'm Never Having Trees in my Yard
This year I cut down 3 trees. A 15ft tall aspen tree, a 10ft tall apple tree, and just today a 25ft tall leafy tree. Mom had various reasons for wanting to cut them down ranging from too many seeds spreading to hitting the window when it's windy outside.
The tree I had to cut today was one of my favorite trees. It was at least 21 years old. I saw it grow up, but it had to go so I took our electric saw and chopped it down. Chopped all the branches to little pieces so they'll fit in our trashcan and then chopped the trunk as if the tree never existed.
NOTE: Uprooting trees is such and major, humongous PAIN IN THE...back.
I forgot to take a picture of the tree before I made the first cut so here are two pictures of the tree after I already cut half of it down. You can still see how tall it was.
Here's what the house looks like after the tree is all gone.
Here's the dying pile of tree.
What I've learned from killing all these trees is this: When you plant trees, they are small and they are cute...like babies. But after 15-20 years, they're gigantic nutrient sucking monstrosities that start imposing on your personal space. You won't like them anymore and will want them gone. And the process of cutting them down and uprooting their stubborn tentacle roots will make you regret ever planting the tree in the first place. So don't plant trees in your yard because you'll have to cut them down. And that is murder.
My future yard will consist of a 5x5ft square piece of grass for backyard picknicks and maybe a flower somewhere. No trees. Maybe rocks. And a tree house.
Here are some other trees that might fall victim in the future. God it's going to really suck to cut these guys down.
And now here's me, my brother, and my mom cutting down most of our aspen tree.