A Snippet of Style

I’m really deeply in love with my Macbook Pro, and ever since I bought it a month ago I’ve been playing with it and tweaking its look. So I bought this really awesome decal online (a Snow White one) and am now eagerly awaiting its arrival!

I’ve also been adjusting the icons on my laptop with some awesome icon sets; apparently it’s simply a matter of cutting-and-pasting to replace folder icons. I’ve got this rather cool armchair with Apple pillow as my Macintosh HD icon. I’m still not too sure how to adjust dock icons manually, but I’ll hopefully figure it out soon. I also love that the size of the icons in Snow Leopard can be adjusted up to 512px! Seriously!! Though I do rather doubt I would ever go that extreme on the size; I keep it at 128×128.

Plus I’ve been downloading loads of freeware (like widgets / NeoOffice / VLC Player / Adium); do check out this site for a great listing of open source software - I do wonder how good the Photoshop alternative Gimp is? Might try it out soon. And of course, there is this old but still relevant post with an interesting list of cool things you can do on your Mac (that you might not know about). Do also visit this great site - it’s one of my favorites to download wallpapers.

Some interesting sites to check out up there (I might have gotten a bit carried away), but before I get even more technical/geeky, I’ll stop and get back to my point: the really awesome macbook decals I never knew were available out there. Check them out!

I <3 Apple Pie decal @ moviemagicman

Batman Gotham City Decal ($12.99) @ lildecalshoppe

Your own little Apple trash cleaner; Wall-E holding Apple decal ($12.99) @ lildecalshoppe

One of my favorite games as a child reinvented as a decal - the Whack an Apple decal ($12.99) @ lildecalshoppe

The wicked witch holding the archetypal poisonous Apple decal ($12.99) @ lildecalshoppe

Snow White’s Revenge decal ($12.99) @ lildecalshoppe (MINE! Can’t wait ’til it arrives <3)

Apple trash talk! Your PC Sucks decal ($5) @ moviemagicman (this one made me LOL)

Awesome tetris decal ($10) @ moviemagicman

The Wizard of Oz Decal ($10) @ thatstickerguy

Another version of the lovely Snow White decal ($15) @ coolandkawaii. This store also does personalizations from ANY IMAGE; really tempted to stick my own pic on my laptop

Have your apple & eat it too with this great decal ($24) @ coolandkawaii

Penguins, a melting apple and global warming. Make a statement with this cool decal ($15) @ coolandkawaii

This isn’t strictly a Macbook decal, but it’s oh-so-cute, don’t you think? Love is Vinyl decal ($17.99) @ coolandkawaii

That’s it for my list. I’m sure there’s tons more out there as well that I’ve not mentioned, but these are some of my personal favorites, though I went with that Snow White one in the end! Did you know that President Obama also has a decal on his Macbook Pro? Yes, he really does — a Pacman one! You can buy it here and see his laptop here!

apple macbook technology

I love Super Mario. And I love etsy.

Putting the two together and adding a mushroom falling out of a brick produces a wonderfully unique selection of gifts and accessories that appeal in a heartfelt way to my fashionable inner geek-ette. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Super Mario has always had a special place in my heart as my favorite video game as a child. I remember many happy days whiled away playing Mario with my sister (though she always forced me to play as Luigi. Ah…the angst of being the younger one ). Nowadays I’m more likely to be playing Mario Kart (yes, I’ll never grow up!) on the Wii, as Baby Peach on the Nanobike! Though I do always try to get in a game of the original Super Mario while traveling (some airlines have it available as part of their inflight entertainment). The mushroom kingdom maintains a special position in my heart ’til today .

So, to continue my story, the other day my sister and I were surfing around on etsy. (I imagine all of you as seasoned online shoppers would already know of etsy already, but for those who don’t (horror!), etsy is a marketplace to buy and sell handmade items). And she came across these amazingly geeky Super Mario and Luigi mismatched earrings. After some inspired and happy surfing time, I found a gold mine of Super Mario accessories and gift items. I’m in love with them!

Check them out (and do visit the shops):

The aforementioned Mario and Luigi mismatched earrings. Only $6 @ honeypopjewellery.

A set of six coasters featuring Mario blocks. Only $15 @ Pixelbrush.

Uniquely customized Mario gamer sneakers — really one of a kind! Only $110 @ ParadoxArtistry.

Super-size your style with this Mario mushroom bracelet. Only $14 @ Livethislife777.

This unique necklace features a mushroom popping out of a brick. Only $25 @ Paxalon.

Would you rock these Mario clips? I so would! Only $7.99 @ PlasticParadox.

This unusual decal features Yoshi eating the Apple on your Macbook! Only $12.99 @ lildecalshoppe.

So what are you waiting for? Buy yourself an early Christmas gift, or surprise your geeky friend with your thoughtfulness.

Btw, I also come across some other interesting Mario facts while writing this post. Did you know that the reason Mario wears his iconic hat is because the original creators of the game didn’t want to manage the difficulty of animating hair? Or that Mario was originally given the rather unimaginative name of Jumpman? Check out some of the wiki history here and here, as well as some interesting facts here. Oooh and apparently you can play Super Mario Online here. As for me, I think I’ll just stick to playing Mario Kart for now, and maybe get myself those awesome Mario clips .

fashion games style technology video games

A round up of some fantastic geek-y stuff from ’round the web! It’s a selection of the weird and wonderful for you to peruse and enjoy.

First up, we have some lovely Star Wars-esque trivia and pictures in the form of a photographic essay entitled What Stormtroopers Do On Their Day Off. Stormtroopers are the army of the Galactic Empire, for the Star Wars uninitiated. This photo essay is really rather cute (seems wrong to call Stormtroopers cute somehow), but honestly I find the pictures rather adorable in a somewhat nerdy way . Though a few are sadistically creepy as well — like the giant syringe being injected into Piglet.  You can also brush up your rusty knowledge of this epic classic at the Wookieepedia (the Star Wars wiki)!

Second, we have this personalized foosball table. Make your friends and family the players on this unique table! All you have to do is provide the company with pictures of the people you would like featured and they will digitally create 3-D sculptures of them. I would absolutely love to get one of these for my birthday — I kind of fear the cost though which is available only on request.

Third, have a song stuck in your head that you just can’t remember the name of? Then midomi is the site for you; simply sing or hum at least 10 seconds of a song and the engine will help you to match it up to the real song. I’ve yet to try it out to see how well it works but it’s certainly a novel concept.

Fourth, impress your geeky friend by gifting him or her with a personalized novel! Choose from out-of-copyright novels like Pride & Prejudice or Frankenstein and replace the main character’s name with your own or a friend’s. A really personal and unusual gift to receive.

Fifth, get the latest Star Trek film on a limited edition 4GB Starfleet insignia flash drive. I’m a big fan of the Star Trek series and movies and would just love this flash drive to “boldly store what no woman has stored before”. I love it! Owning it would totally make me feel like I was part of the crew; all I’d be missing would be the jumpsuit .

Sixth, return back to those games we used to play in school, together with Neil Gaiman who wrote a “twinteractive” story together with his fans. I’d love to get my hands on a copy of this audio-book once it is compiled. Certainly a novel use of social media by Gaiman, who I just love btw, especially Stardust! You can read the unedited version of the “story” under the tag #bbcawdio @twitter.

Seventh, Google Wave! That is almost enough said right there because naturally the web has been all abuzz about this all-new synchronous email client. Waves are constantly changing and everything is real-time; it almost seems like a Wave merges IM and email together into one entity. As we take more and more steps forward to even greater collaboration and integration, I wonder if we will someday create a larger consciousness for all of us to share our minds together — a collective mind, if you will. Like the Borg in Star Trek: “We are the Borg. We will assimilate you!” A scary thought right there, but it doesn’t stop me from wanting to try out Google Wave; I’ve signed up for an invite and hopefully will be receiving one soon — of course if anyone wants to share I’ll be up for it as well!

Eighth, in a lovely merger of beauty and technology, Dell laptops will soon come in OPI nail colors like “Kyoto Pearl” and “Strawberry Margarita”. A beautiful sight indeed, almost makes me want to switchover from my Mac — just imagine having your nails done in a color to match your laptop. Awesome!

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