My terminall ill N70 - Redux

(Click here for the original article.)

Might I add another problem: Can't open the Gallery. And yes, restart.

And another one: very slow response time.

Oh well, the past couple of days I managed to delete quite a number of SMS and I haven't been seeing that irksome message, "Memory full. Close some applications and try again." since.

And yeah, I'm still using my N70. (Loser!)

Another vintage gem

As I've previously written, MBK has been surprising me with stuff when it's not yet my birthday. Apart from the "Gayfit" tank tops, she bought me a vintage wrist watch from eBay. It's a Bulova automatic. She was supposed to give it to me on my birthday but the package came much earlier than expected and she just couldn't contain her excitement. So she handed it to me.

My terminally ill N70

I've had my Nokia N70 for more than two years now. I was basically happy with it (otherwise, it wouldn't have lasted that long). Until recently.

For the past few weeks I've had to deal with its failing software manifesting itself in different ways. One, I open a text message to which I have to reply. Surprise, surprise! This stupid message appears on the screen:

This is the most frequent of its problems. The first time it happened I immediately checked my phone memory. There was still about 8MB of free space. Maybe it's the memory card, I thought (although of course it's not!), and there was still some 30MB. Besides, how do I "close some applications and try again?" What the hell does it think it is, Windows? With Nokia I can only open one application at a time. Is my phone's software confused or what? Ironically, like Windows, everything's fine after you restart.

Two, I receive a text message and I can't open it at all. The same irritating message appears. With teeth grinding, I restart my phone.

Three, I can't receive any SMS. Of course you won't notice this until someone calls you up, pissed at why you don't return his/her messages. Then you restart your phone and voila - 10 messages arrive all at once!

Four, I can't send SMS. "Unable to send," it would say. Again, restart the phone (forehead creased) and resend.

Google Chrome

It's been more than a week now since I downloaded Google Chrome, the internet search giant's answer to Microsoft's Internet Explorer.  Call me stupid but I always thought Firefox was Google's.  Well, this moron just learned that it was just funded (partly) by Google, but is not Google's.

Back to Chrome, they say it's supposed to be better, faster, and much simpler to use.  Better, I really don't know.  I mean, there's much less clutter, which is characteristic of Google, but I can't really give an expert opinion.

The layout, of course, is different.  Tabs are at the topmost - no more title bar - and a nifty little plus sign lets you add a new tab with just one click.  And when you do, screenshots of your most-visited sites are displayed (kinda like Mac, they say).

On the second row are the Back and Forward buttons, along with one to reload your current page, another for bookmarking, the address bar, a drop-down button to contol you current page, and another one for customizing Chrome.  I was looking for a History button but being Google, I quickly realized that they incorporated it to the Back and Forward buttons.  Your browsing history appears when you hold down these buttons.  You can also view your full history, which is as detailed as it can get - down to date and time.  Deletion can be done by date.

That 70's look

MBK has been finding joy lately in scoring vintage finds online. And she surprised me last week with something for me. A little birthday present, she says. Actually, it's one of several presents so far. My birthday's not due 'till next week and the surprises just keep on coming. Oh how I love her. I'm one lucky guy.

Anyway, this is what she bought me from eBay:


Two tank tops with that unmistakable style from the '70s! See the photo prints, the colored piping - they're so '70s! They fit so snugly and I wonder, were people back then that thin? But I love 'em. In fact, the fabric is very much different from those of today and is arguably of better quality.

But what's really funny about them is this:

Yes, the tag says Gayfit! From what MBK read on the item description, they're "dead stocks," never sold, never worn. But even if they were made decades ago, I could still probably say that they're new.

Gayfit. What the heck! I'm just gonna cut off the tag.

Dark Knight advances to no. 6

Another week at the box office and my favorite film The Dark Knight pushes past Phantom Menace, The Two Towers, and Order of the Phoenix to land at no. 6 in the global box office charts with $949.2 million.

Well, since it's still showing in the U.S. and elsewhere in the world, it could overtake Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (cume: $961M) by next week. I'm being conservative here so let's just see if it could beat the first Harry Potter movie (cume: $976.5M).

Katherine Heigl flick lowest grossing movie of all time

$30. That's all it made at the U.S. box office. And because of that it holds a Guinness distinction of being the lowest grossing movie of all time.

I was intrigued at Yahoo!'s "Movie Disasters: Historic Box Office Bombs" so I continued browsing. And near the end of the 13-movie collection was Katherine Heigl - yes, Katherine Heigl of Grey's Anatomy and of Knocked Up - sharing equal billing with Leo Grillo and Tom Sizemore in a film called ZYZZYX ROAD.

Dark Knight now no. 9 globally

And here we...GO!

The Dark Knight has breached the $500-million mark at the U.S. box office - and the fastest at that! I don't know why this excites me.

It has also hauled in $417M outside the U.S., bringing it's global box office total to $921.8M. That's enough to catapult it to 9th place at the charts, six spots up from last week's no. 15. At the rate it's going, Dark Knight could easily overtake Phantom Menace and LOTR: The Two Towers by next week. And it could probably rest at no. 5 or 6 when its run is due.