Watching ANY downloaded Video

The problem with keepvid is that it only allows you to download in .flv format. And if you download a movie from the stage6 site, you get a .divx file.

What's a person to do?

Real Player can't handle it. And even if Windows Media Player could, why would you want to use it anyway?

There is a FIX!! (of course)

The VideoLAN Free Player, direct download here.

CAPABILITIES:
-can watch online streaming vid and downloaded vids
-has video and audio equalizers, filters, and other modifications.
-unlike WIN Mediaplayer, a working video normalization!!
-individualized playlist construction function, one-time or endless reply functions, shuffle
-handles all types of video formats including ALL those playable under REAL PLAYER, WIN MEDIAPLAYER, PLUS .flv and podcasts formats! (I don’t have one, so I can not confirm the bit about the podcasts.)

Refer back to here, for downloading your favs: Download and SAVE Movies to your HD


Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

The Ubiqutous, Lurking Soybean

Tofu...
You can't swing a dead cat without here hitting a block of tofu. (Monty Python as a veg*n)

I like Tofu, but I have discovered that the Japanese view of how to use tofu is very, very limited to the confines of their "shokubunka"-food culture. Frankly, I've made wonderful sweet potato pies, chocolate-pumpkin-goodness pies, tofu tacos, tofu italiano with red wine and maitake mushrooms, numerous casseroles, and an infinite number of curries all with that one special ingredient, TOFU. Besides, tofu gets a chicken-like texture if you freeze it (sliced) and then defrost it. I LOVE that in my Tofu Chaat, formerly "Chicken Chaat" recipe. <3<3

I'M NOT A VEGAN! WHY SHOULD I USE IT??
Even if you aren't a veg*n of some sort, tofu is super-cheap compared to beef or chicken in Japan (on the order of half price of meat for the same weight!) and as such, worth a try. There's also the added benefit of disposal. Garbage in Japan is strictly separated and "nama", or "raw" garbage is picked up at most 2 times a week.
Where does it stay in the meantime??
In your apartment. You can NOT leave your trash outside your door, or in the hall, or somewhere else. It goes out on trash day and ONLY trash day.
Nothing like the smell of rotting meat wafting into your apartment from outside on your balcony in the spring and summer. (I was a carnivore the first 2 years here. I *know*.)
Tofu, on the other hand... Well, you get the picture. There's no "bad" pieces, or the blood-soaked towels that sit under the meat to soak up the "juices", or grease, so nothing to throw out in a bag except the plastic container it came in.

I loathe cleaning and I like cheap (when it's HEALTHY) so it's win-win for me! Anyway, give it a try. It's cheap and not pumped full of bovine growth hormone or antibiotics. ;)

A GARDEN FULL OF TOFU:
Momen:
We would call this "Firm" in the USA. Good for stirfry or slicing and baking. Will break apart with hard stirring like in a curry.

Kinu:
We would call this "Silk" in the USA. Breaks apart the minute you try to handle it. Only good for baking and hiding it in other foods as it can be easily and completely crushed into a white...paste. This is due to the higher water content of Kinu tofu.

Yakidofu:
Cooked or Lightly Fried tofu. Great for most main-dish recipes. More compressed (less water) than Momen; and due to the slight pre-cooking, more meatier in texture and taste.
WARNING: The consistency of Yakidofu is entirely dependent on the manufacturer. I've bought yakidofu that held together only as well as momen, but the good stuff is far more compressed (less water), and can take a good beating when you put it in curries.

Agedofu:
Deep fried tofu that is hollowed out for use as a "shell" for stuffing. Never used it myself because of the deep-frying.

HOW SHOULD I USE IT??
Besides, the basic pointers I gave up in the "GARDEN.." section, I would suggest this site. My favorite recipe and veg*n "support" site: vegweb.com


Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

Movie Links - Part 2 (links!!)

If you haven't done it already, GET FIREFOX now! I can't stress that enough. :)

Now that we are armed and ready.
At long, LONG last...

LINKS!

online TV
site00: no need for a proxy server to hide outside-USA IP address
ABC news: need for a proxy server to hide outside-USA IP address. You can find out how to easily do that here or here.
CBS news
MSNBC & NBC news
site01
site02: over 2000 streaming TV and website links.
site03: streaming TV in 10+ languages!
site04: lots of US & UK TV shows, anime, & cartoons.

SP only 00 (undergoing an upgrade, but still accessible)
SP only 01: best setup and extras
SP only 02

NOSCRIPT USERS

If you are running NOSCRIPT (which you should if you want to watch movies), many of these tv streams require you to set NOSCRIPT to "allow" mode in order to view them. For security reasons, I always just choose "temporarily allow"

online MOVIES
These are great sites, especially the first one. Constantly updated, links checked for vaildity, and tons of material--TV shows, Movies, Anime, Cartoons, you name it.
site10
site12
site13
site14
site15

VIDEO HOSTING SITES:
If you feel up to searching through endless homage clips and porn for that ONE special episode/movie, you're more patient than I am so here you go! Good Luck. ;>

Definitely Good for Searching

Metacafe
Veoh
MySpace - Video Section
YouTube
Daily Motion
Google Video
Bolt
Guba

Good for Searching

Vidilife
Stage6
Live Digital
Grouper
Selfcast TV
GoFish

Plus these 2 in Chinese: (Use google webpage translation to view.)
OuOu video
Tudou video
warning: these sites are VERY slow when it is Night in that area of the world, so check your timing before hopping over. That item aside, they both tend to store full-length CSI, LOST, other TV series and many movies. Host site is in China, so there's little to NO regulation going on there. ;>

VIDEO SEARCH ENGINES:
Singing fish
All the Web

---

TROUBLESHOOTING:
If you have any trouble, come back and arm yourself with the necessary equipment found in the previously published articles here and here or here. If I find any more tricks, you know they'll be posted. ;>

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

Download and SAVE Movies to your HD

I found this handy little bit of information recently:

Vdownloader will download videos from Google, Youtube and Grinvi ONLY onto your computer in avi or mpeg format not flv meaning you will be able to watch videos on your computer! ***

You are also able to change the output size and audio bitrate in the process.
Run Vdownloader.exe and copy the url of the video you want to download. Click on Download button...It's that easy.^.^

Install: Just unzip ALL the files to a folder in your hard disk. Both vdownloader.exe and ffmpeg.exe must be in the same directory. Otherwise, videos won't be properly converted. Then you can place a shortcut on your desktop to vdownloader.exe to run the entire program.

Regarding Download Time:
Converting youtube videos did not take long at all. A 2 minute video was downloaded and converted in about 2-3 minutes to mpg.

WARNING: Because the command line only allows one URL, I tried opening 2 instances of the program. Running multiple windows of the program does not seem to work well. I've tried multiple times, but the secondary window only seems to make it to the "download finished". It is unable to create a working converted file.

OR, get the Firefox Addon
-Simple one click addon then a browser restart
-Actually uses the same underlying program as the site below which is why it only saves files as .flv format.

OR, you can also try this site.
* You MUST use the direct link to the video you want to download, ie you can not use a link that has "search" in it. Direct Links are found beneath the actual video when it plays.
* It will only download movies as .flv files which means you have to download yet another program. You'll need either an .flv viewer or another program to convert it to and mpeg or avi yourself.
A hassle, but the site does download from dailymotion.



***for some reason weird tail numbers sometimes get tacked onto the the url when you click it on even though they don't exist in the actual address posted here. If it does this, just search for Vdownloader on softpedia.com or simply edit the changed url by removing the ending %4%2's etc. until you reach ".shtml".


Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

Year of the Bore... BOAR

Everyone counts down at the end of the year--they count the seconds before the ball drops, they count the top 10 news stories of the year... The end of the year is ALL about counting. So...

THE TOP TEN SIGNS YOU KNOW YOU ARE IN JAPAN!
10. You frequently leave your bag/purse sitting in your grocery cart or in your bicycle basket and turn your back on it to look at something else. AND it never wanders off.

9. One apple costs 3 dollars and a mango costs 7.

8. You see signs like this--"For a Regulation of a Customer" and have to read the Japanese "translation" below it to figure it out.

7. You have to use a crank attached to your bathtub to light the gas in order to heat your bathwater. (Didn't that go out of existence in the early 1900's??)

6. You can watch programs that use Madonna's LIKE A VIRGIN and other classic hits to teach English.
-Seriously, how better to teach the phrase "You made me feel ---- "?

5. Rock-paper-scissors is a national sport.

4. New Year's celebrations include men running around in their underwear on their way to diving into a bathtub filled with ice cold water...OUTDOORS.

3. The pokemon children's magazine is displayed next to the "middle-aged" man's pornographic magazine on an outdoor bookstand.

2. You wear your pajama bottoms to work and no one cares. (I've been doing that for over a month now. Admittedly, they're a solid color, but still.)


And the number one sign you know you're in Japan when.....

1. A young mother helps her 1 year old son pull down his pants so he can relieve himself at a telephone poll on the way home from grocery shopping in the middle of the day.

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!

How to Mask Your IP: Part 2

Tired of getting the "only viewable within the US/UK/..." messages when you try to view THE OFFICE or NUKB3RS? Well, here's how we fix that. ;>

How to Mask Your IP: Part 2

This will help people who want to use different software and services online that are usually restricted to the locals. This little IP and proxy tweak also makes your surfing much more anonymous.

The below sites are all members of this network;however, all have different flavors.
site00
PROS: intro page tells you what it sees about your settings.
tells you what it will send as your "new" information.
simple interface to enter page you want to visit.
CONS: keeps the SURF bar at the tops of all frames.

site01
PROS: simple interface to enter page you want to visit.
CONS: keeps the SURF bar at the tops of all frames.

site02
PROS: allows the following advanced choices:
Remove all cookies (except certain proxy cookies)
Remove all scripts (recommended for anonymity)
Remove ads
Hide referrer information
Show URL entry form
name doesn't contain “proxy” which some filters automatically block
CONS: keeps the SURF bar at the tops of all frames.


STANDARD WARNING: Whoever runs that proxy can see all your internet communications - including MSN conversations and any passwords that are not encrypted! Use this at your own risk and do not transmit any sensitive data through the proxy.

OTHER PLACES TO VIEW STREAMING VIDEO--MOVIES AND TV--refer back to here! (in an upcoming post)

Thanks again for stopping into my little corner of the 'net, and Happy Browsing!!

Ads make the world go around. Help us out!