Have a Mighty Mouse? Don’t try this at home
I have one of them fancy-schmancy Apple Wireless Mighty Mice. I like it actually, simple yet elegant solution to mousing that it is. But the ‘revolutionary’ scroll ball mechanism they use has a tendency to get gunked up. I’m an oily (some say greasy) Italian, so mine got there eventually. I usually just turned it over and ran it really fast across the sofa or something. This worked well, up until a handful of days ago. Then for some reason, the gunk became too much for my lil’ scroll ball to overcome, even with the help of the sofa.

I went to the internet looking for answers. Kinda like moses & the mountain, only I’m not jewish and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t god that responded. And if it was? Well he gives some bad advice, his holiness.

I read this hint about how a simple cleaning solution was to pour high-percentage alcohol down into the unit with it unplugged, then let it dry. The alcohol evaporates quickly, and as it does you don’t have to worry about it sitting around and shorting things out when you plug it back in later.

Now while this may be true, I can tell you from personal experience that it will likely make a small irritation a major one. I went from having an intermittent non-scroll issue to an intermittent scroll issue, coupled with a middle-click function that no longer worked. Gawdammit.

Well the mouse cost me about $50 and I had no intention of going back to a mouse not as full-featured, nor shelling out an additional $50 for a new mouse. At least until I completely broke this one. So then naturally, I got busy seeing if I could thoroughly break my currently broken unit completely, or fix it, whichever came first.

After finding a video on youtube (geez, that place again), I learnt how to get under this mouse’s skin. After that, it was trying to track down my particular issue, which at first I thought might actually be a short circuit somewhere, damn the luck. Fortunately for me, after about 10 minutes of examination, I found the culprit: corrosion. Yes, though the alcohol had dried fast enough to prevent any shorts, it managed to corrode the contact patch of the middle-click function so that attempts to use it resulted in nothing. Sweet.

Taking the thing apart really isn’t that difficult. The hard part really is the first step, getting the grey ring pried off without A) stabbing yourself silly with a very sharp razor edge – which I almost succeeded at, and/or B) snapping the grey ring while prying it off, which miraculously I managed to avoid entirely.

Bottom line? Don’t shortcut it, it’s not worth it. You’ll end up taking it apart anyways, so just start there if you must, and clean it all properly, huh?



Fannie Mae’s Brother takes a Dump
The Federally-backed program, Freddie Mac, posts a $2-BILLION loss. So that housing slump? Looks like it’s gonna continue for a minute or two longer.

Good. Maybe someday I’ll actually be able to afford to buy a house without having to have kids. So I can sell them. Cuz, uh, that’s what I’d do.



Have I mentioned Michael Vick Sucks? Good.
So uh, yeah, Michael Vick went to jail already or something. Phew! Now my dogs can go out safely again.

My only remaining question is this: When does Clinton Portis go on trial? Surely being that dumb and ignorant is a felony, no?



Recently Downloaded: Daft Punk
After having watched too many videos on youtube with people dancing to Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger, and also hating how Kanye West ruined it by opening his mouth and attempting to ‘rap’ on this track, I decided to shell out the 99¢ necessary to get a copy of the real thing from iTunes.

Yea, now as I dance through the valley of death, I will fear no, um, no… hidden cameras. OK I’m lying; I fear the hidden camera. You should too. Me dancing? Causes immediate blindness. If you get an email and it says anything about “dancing” and mentions “random,” “bob,” or even maybe “idiot” and/or “weirdo,” I’d recommend passing. Perhaps for the safety of all that I love, I should stick to the whitey head-bob.

Check.

Peace.

Tags: Entertainment