Author: Snoskred

Talk Like A Pirate Day

9 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

pirates1

I got this interesting email from Krispy Kreme this week – I’m subscribed to their list because I love me some Krispy Kreme. It seems that if you talk like a pirate you get one free donut, and if you dress like a pirate, you get a free dozen donuts. This might be a fun place to go and have coffee and a donut or few today if you have one nearby. You can register and read all the fine print here.

pirates2

But if you want the fun of pirates without leaving your own home, below, I present to you The Pirate Movie. In full. On Youtube. If you have never seen this cheesy musical movie, make today the day.

You can also read my review of The Pirate Movie here.

food, movies

Ice Spheres

15 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

sphere

When I was little, my Grandma had this wonderful ice block which would create round ice cubes. I loved that thing. There is something about an ice sphere that is so pleasing to me. So when we saw some wacky sphere ice cube moulds at Kmart for $2.00 we thought we would pick them up and give them a try. It was a trip down memory lane for me, somewhat.

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To begin with they were quite successful, though, over-filling them did create an Icicle Incident in the freezer.

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However as time went on, they developed leaks where you open the spheres to let the ice out, and generally caused a mess and became a bit of an epic fail. Instead of spheres, you got half a sphere and then a space with no ice because that water had leaked out onto the plate I kept them on. I could probably have filled them a second time once they had frozen enough to seal, but it was a little too much hassle and annoyance rather than fun.

sphere5

We’ve stopped using them now because of this epic failure. I’ll keep looking for something more like this and hopefully one day I might find one that makes the mini ice balls like my Grandma used to make.

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Grandmas was more like this but it had 3 lines of ice spheres. I already have an ice cube tray which makes those large square ice cubes and for the time being I will enjoy those.

Late Breaking Ice Sphere Update

icesphere99

At the end of August, during our fortnightly Aldi shop, we spotted these ice sphere moulds.

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This mould makes large ice spheres very successfully. If they have some more of these on our next visit, I intend to pick up a couple more.

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They are not wrong when they say it creates a slow melting ice sphere. I made a drink at 6pm and by 8pm there was still a sizeable sphere in the glass. I suspect these will be fantastic in summer. Now, if only I can find a triangle ice mould, things could get really mathematical! :)

Over to you

Do you like a wacky ice cube? :) Do you have any ice cube memories?

family, growing up, Home

RNT Company Scam

411 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

With thanks to Mary Villahermosa who posted this email on the LCN Company Scam post – as I suspected these scammers have now changed their name.

Hello,

At this moment we have full-time and partial position.

RNT Company is a worldwide goods retailer so your central tasks will include sales support for deals held in Australia: keep the data of all the purchases and payments; communicate with our clients in America, Eastern Europe and Asia; do all the necessary service and support to our sales office.

You will have up to 3500 AUD monthly plus benefits for the part-time vacancy and for full-time post – 5500 AUD monthly plus benefits. We have a probation period, during which you will be trained and guided. This period is also paid.

Conditions are easy. You just need to have computer with access to the Internet, also basic Excel skills (the software must be pre-installed), negotiation experience.

Please respond to us back. CV will be a great plus for our HR team.

Have a great day!

PLEASE Don’t Tell Them!

It seems these scammers were using a template from LMP Company and they have switched names because the very first result for LMP Company now leads to scamwarners. Now, LCN Company leads to my post that it is a scam. So they are now changing their name to RNT Company.

So – please – do not tell scammers that their company name is listed here or anywhere else on the web as a scam – it will take them mere seconds to change their fake details and their new details will not be easily searchable for any future victims to find.

How Do You Know This Job Is A Scam?

This is a fake job scam. You can read more about how these scams work at Scamwatch.

In this case it seems they are direct depositing stolen or fraudulent funds into the bank accounts of scam victims. The money will appear to be legit to begin with. They will ask you to transfer funds to them via Western Union or Moneygram. It may take up to a year for the transaction to be reversed but it WILL be reversed and when it is, you will be required to pay the money back to the bank.

Mega Important Note!!

If you got this email from a different name and email address, please leave a comment asap, you can use a fake name and email address to post the comment if you like. I’ll regularly add in other names, email addresses, website addresses, and any other info you can provide in to the post. It will help other people who are searching for the names. Thanks everyone who leaves a comment, it WILL stop people from getting scammed. :)

If your email was slightly different, or you have further emails from these scammers, please post them in the comments. Your comment will go to moderation and I will double check before it is posted to make sure there is no identifying information eg your email address or your details.

I expect they will be spamming their scam posts out to a multitude of email addresses over coming days, so please help out and give us the email address they are using, so that other people searching for that email address can find this post.

I gave them my bank account details?

If you gave them the account name, BSB and account number, they can easily print fake cheques with that information. You definitely need to speak to your bank about this ASAP.

In this particular instance, you may find they deposit a sum into your account – or they may send your account a payment from a stolen credit card. If that happens, DO NOT touch that money, because eventually the bank will reverse that payment.

If it were my bank details, I would close that account as a matter of great urgency. Speak to your bank as soon as you can, and they will likely advise you to do that.

I would advise anyone caught out by this scam to make a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman and also to Scamwatch via this form. The scam victim may be able to sort out a deal with the bank where the bank pays some – or all – of the losses.

More About Scams

You can see my collection of fake cheques collected from fake job scams here – Snoskred made 5 MILLION DOLLARS online this year!

You can read more about internet safety and scams here – Internet Safety & Scams – What You Need To Know.

The LCN Post –

Since it was posted on June 4th 2015, almost 9,000 people arrived at my website specifically by searching for words and email addresses that appeared in the LCN Company Team Scam post. That post received nearly 300 comments and I personally received and replied to hundreds of emails and contact forms with email addresses, URLs, further emails, and other important information which helped people find out that was a scam.

Thank You

For reading this post. Thank you for leaving a comment if you have any further information which will help other potential scam victims to find this post as well. :) You can contact me privately via this page if you like, I will reply – usually within 24 hours – if you provide a valid email address.

Further Emails –

Dear NAME,

We would like to offer position of Administrative Assistant at our company. Please, find more information about us and this position below.

RNT is a leading distributor of finest designer goods. Currently it is one of the most important specializing in online sales. With more than 5 years of experience in the designer goods industry. We offer a continuous renovation in our collections, following the latest trends in each country and season, thus satisfying the demand of clients. We always keep in mind that prices are an important factor when it comes to sales.

We are looking for a responsible person in Australia who will be ready to incur all necessary activities. Our candidate should be highly motivated. We believe that the experience is not the most important thing. The key to success is a fresh look and bold ideas!

The main duties of Administrative Assistant:

– Helping Entity’s Sales Department as a special projects support
– Data entry and other functions as specified in the instruction
– Running reports for all completed deals and wire transfers
– Providing overall administrative maintenance such as making of letters, processing purchase orders and transaction reports etc.
– Emailing correspondence every day

Hours: Full-time or part-time schedule possible. Your schedule can be irregular. For a part time variant – you will spend 3 hours per day average, from Monday to Friday.

Salary: Essential pay for a part time job is 840AUD on a weekly basis
plus 5 percent commission. Full-time job pay is 1300AUD on a weekly basis plus commission.

You will be on Probation period for your first month.

I’m sending you Application Form and short presentation of RNT(you can
find it attached to this email). You can find full job description in
the brochure(pages: 9-18). Please read it carefully, complete and send
it back to me via email or by fax +1-832-248-2766. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask.

Thank you,
Sarah Robson

Names & Email Addresses being used –

Sarah Robson – sarahrobson@rnt-hr.com – Jayne Womble – womble.jayne27h4@hotmail.com – boyd.paulitanp@hotmail.com – seguin.vickey650@hotmail.com – reimann.ashleyt44@hotmail.com – herman.goughj928@hotmail.com – dirk.cortez0hk@hotmail.com – solorio.leonej8e7@hotmail.com – branden.farrand76@hotmail.com = fawn.gainer237@hotmail.com

luettajtdillehayov0521@hotmail.com – luiseysyettofw7303@hotmail.com – lurlinegvgaylordpe6021@hotmail.com – lurazofluetbk0104@hotmail.com – luisehnevermanw9849@hotmail.com – luezmhieberwt3053@hotmail.com – luratxgerldo7425@hotmail.com – luisehnevermanw9849@hotmail.com – luznmogrenk0669@hotmail.com – lucreciaqhessingw5257@hotmail.com – luveniamdmermelsteindz7499@hotmail.com – luvisomesub@hotmail.com –

lurlenecsehmeriz1830@hotmail.com – luiseuvoorhiesv4156@hotmail.com – rakarai1979@mail.com – luettaqqmccabeap0317@hotmail.com – lulaggoldingert1009@hotmail.com – lunaykarbowskir1607@hotmail.com – lucinagkealohah2780@hotmail.com – luisnvcanelapk9601@hotmail.com – luiseysyettofw7303@hotmail.com – luisnvcanelapk9601@hotmail.com – Luiseyhreyerif0819@hotmail.com – lupitaiwcarninegp1870@hotmail.com –

lulagoldingert1009@Hotmail.com – ludieachristensenq7500@hotmail.com – sararobson@rnt-job.com – lurahctorresdn9533@hotmail.com – ludieachristensenq7500@hotmail.com – lurlenepdominquei2103@hotmail.com – sararobson@workrnt.com – lurlinegvgaylordpe6021@hotmail.com – antoninaumatskot0015@hotmail.com

susydsaultsb3407@hotmail.com – maidapstrongt8112@hotmail.com – constance.greenblatti36q@hotmail.com – corrinvjoasr0727@hotmail.com – geniawcaparrosn1297@hotmail.com – sixtadgulinsony7767@hotmail.com – fredianhanekampd2350@hotmail.com – cammyhengquistr9677@hotmail.com – twanaccrispj7504@hotmail.com – geniawcaparrosn1297@hotmail.com – alicendarlingtonu9334@hotmail.com – tiannaaocallaghanj7164@hotmail.com –

nereidaccastellanoa2013@hotmail.com – jeanellemrufust7780@hotmail.com – margaritedswaggertyw4873@hotmail.com – luisalkiersteadm4914@hotmail.com – laurettahburrighto9272@hotmail.com – kenyaspagetz0655@hotmail.com – alicendarlingtonu9334@hotmail.com – lorriqgohny3142@hotmail.com – lusethacheryy0808@hotmail.com – sararobson@workrnt.com – ceceliaxmalinem7261@hotmail.com – e-tote@freemail.hu – chelseaxlinkowskia3144@hotmail.com

alecpinero@mail.com – tinishatvicek7652@hotmail.com – zelmaokennas6535@hotmail.com – sybilflydiau6925@hotmail.com – nidaqkeattsu5992@hotmail.com – sherillymcelveenq4864@hotmail.com – Juho Huomo – alannanoseig7823@hotmail.com – karagdopazob6406@hotmail.com – letishaamastellerr4791@hotmail.com – lenitantselees9678@hotmail.com – ThomasBruce@alumnidirector.com – alannanoseig7823@homail.com – shanakkermanm5234@hotmail.com –

tinishatvicek7652@hotmail.com – sherylysundbergb3096@hotmail.com – kyungoimasterapa8814@hotmail.com – aureliaogollerj7552@hotmail.com – aureliaogollerj7552@hotmail.com – sirenalgehretd0939@hotmail.com – esterkmoulz7723@hotmail.com – ardellarsandstromt7200@hotmail.com – johannagdelozierp1783@hotmail.com – noemiqfriskneyy3396@hotmail.com – Vanitancallejor9522@hotmail.com – rachelecnduemmelos0877@hotmail.com –

ardellarsandstromt7200@hotmail.com – theabvyeamansl5409@hotmail.com – alannanoseig7823@homail.com – maek@hot-shot.com – rachelecnduemmelos0877@hotmail.com – letishaamastellerr4791@hotmail.com – karajqlouisbz5389@hotmail.com – kindratrseabrooksji7014@hotmail.com – elenorszhazlegroveii9070@hotmail.com – florenciaqzbroadbentck4621@hotmail.com – karajqlouisbz5389@hotmail.com – nidaqkeattsu5992@hotmail.com –

dannetteegbenyamindm9355@hotmail.com – glynisdacorlezu7276@hotmail.com – johannagdelozierp1783@hotmail.com – tawanajsteenburghe4250@hotmail.com – marlinekpasterv6463@hotmail.com – florenciaqzbroadbentck4621@hotmail.com – carahksteerecw8565@hotmail.com – shiraeilunfordfa8623@hotmail.com – johannagdelozierp1783@hotmail.com – elenorszhazlegroveii9070@hotmail.com – clarissaawoodenu3892@hotmail.com – leisaqzingallsjh4402@hotmail.com

ettiehbheppnerzw1108@hotmail.com – yanirafushartrandfg9030@hotmail.com – leisaqzingallsjh4402@hotmail.com – akikoyjallinxc8263@hotmail.com – theabvyeamansl5409@hotmail.com – elenorszhazlegroveii9070@hotmail.com – alannanoseig7823@hotmail.com – azucenadwklaphakeys6702@hotmail.com – florenciaqzbroadbentck4621@hotmail.com – glynisdacorlezu7276@hotmail.com – hermelindavboudreaud13@hotmail.com – akikoyjallinxc8263@hotmail.com

azucenadwklaphakeys6702@hotmail.com – ardellarsandstromt7200@hotmail.com – florenciaqzbroadbentck4621@hotmail.com – leisaqzingallsjh4402@hotmail.com – carahksteerecw8565@hotmail.com – noemiqfriskneyy3396@hotmail.com – luannaektibbertpp0678@hotmail.com – vanitancallejor9522@hotmail.com – kyungoimasterapa8814@hotmail.com – lenitantselees9678@hotmail.com – luannaektibbertpp0678@hotmail.com – shanakkerzmanm5234@hotmail.com –

fawn.gainer@hotmail.com – rachelecnduemmeloso877@hotmail.com – zelmaokennas6535@hotmail.com – nidaqkeattsu5992@hotmail.com – sararobson@rntrecruit.com – dannetteegbenyamindm9355@hotmail.com – sybilflydiau6925@hotmail.com – sherylysunderbergb3096@hotmail.com – clarissaawoodenu3892@hotmail.com – tawanajsteenburghe4250@hotmail.com –

Angry Snoskred, job scams, www safety

New Cards September

12 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

malty5

Four new cards this month. While I am posting, here are some other new items I’m loving.

malty2

Australian made from Aldi, these Malted Milk Balls are amazing. They are about 50 times more yummy than a Malteser because they are solidly packed with malt instead of being mostly air. The only way they could be any more awesome would be with a dark chocolate coating.

malty1

Here is a look inside. Om nom nom! Run, don’t walk, to your nearest Aldi and pick up a set of these.

malty4

These Colour Clickers were just $4.95 and they have a set of replacement leads. These are mechanical pencils. I love using them and find them much better than wooden pencils. I’d buy a 72 pencil set if I could find one.

malty6

This 24 set of colour pencils was excellent value as well. I find the Mont Marte items to be great.

Greeting Cards, shopping

Night At The Museum

10 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

ahkmenrah
Rami Malek and Ben Stiller in Night At The Museum

When I was in primary school, my favourite book was From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg. The book is about two kids who run away from home to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

basile

For about 20 years I forgot the name of the book and did a lot of trying to find it. Eventually I posted a question somewhere on the web and received the name of the book as the answer, so I ordered it and settled in to revisit an old favourite. It was just as great as I remembered it to be.

Growing up my Grandma – Granny as we called her – would take us on the tram to Adelaide. From there we would catch the beeline bus to North Terrace and visit one of two places – the South Australian Museum or the Art Gallery of South Australia. Sometimes we would go down to the River Torrens and catch Popeye around to the Adelaide Zoo. For many years these were my favourite places in the entire world.

Whenever we visited the Museum, I would imagine what I would do if I was able to take up residence there. We spent a lot of time in the room full of rocks and minerals and all the cabinets were locked – maybe if I lived there, I could find the key and open up those cabinets.

ahkmenrah2

Ahkmenrah attempts to broker a peace between Larry and Attila The Hun

So it came to me as a surprise that I somehow had missed out on the awesomeness of the Night at the Museum movies. I discovered them thanks to my present fan obsession – Rami Malek is in the movies as the Pharaoh Ahkmenrah.

The storyline goes a little like this – Larry (Ben Stiller) gets a job as the night guard in the American Museum of Natural History. Unknown to most of the world, the museum contains a magical tablet which makes all the exhibits spring to life at sundown. If they are outside when the sun rises, they will turn to dust, so it is important that the night guard keeps everyone *in* as well as keeping other people out.

robinteddy
Robin Williams plays Teddy Roosevelt

Robin Williams is in all 3 films and the final film was one of four not yet released at the time of his death. While my favourite Robin Williams role will always be John Keating from Dead Poets Society, followed of course by Mrs Doubtfire, this role is in third place, for me anyway. I also loved that he spent a lot of time on a horse.

amyadams

Part of the fun of the following movies is the new historical characters appearing plus the new locations. Movie 2 has Amy Adams as Amelia Earheart and Hank Azaria is hilarious as the very angry Egyptian raised from the dead. I thought the second was the best of the films – Amy Adams was so fantastic in it.

danstevens

Movie 3 has Dan Stevens as Sir Lancelot and Rebel Wilson as a British museum security guard. Plus Hugh Jackman makes an appearance. But beware, this movie you might need to BYO tissue box.

ahkmenrah

Rami Malek is incredibly believable as the Pharaoh Ahkmenrah. For much of the first movie, he is locked in his sarcophagus desperately trying to get out, and there is a level of fear created around his being able to escape. But when he is eventually released towards the end of the movie, he is just delightful and not scary at all. Sadly he is missing for a lot of the second movie, but in the third he is present for most of the movie.

It should be made clear that I am not usually a Ben Stiller fan but I did enjoy him in these movies. I think the biggest problem for me, with him, is he seems like he is about to burst out laughing the entire time he is on the screen. Kind of like Jerry Seinfeld who just never could keep a poker face.

If you watch the out-takes, he does laugh a lot. But then again how could you not laugh at Ricky Gervais and Robin Williams? And Jerry had to contend with 3 very funny people but worst of all, Julia Louis Dreyfus. There are lots of Seinfeld bloopers on youtube.

If you have not seen these movies and you love a museum and/or historical figures, you will probably deeply love these movies. When people talk about movie magic, I think they are talking about movies exactly like these. :)

Over To You –

Which historical figure would you want to bring back to life and talk to? What would you do if you could live inside a museum or art gallery? What museum would you most like to take the magical tablet to?

Here are the trailers for all 3 Night at the Museum movies.

Movie Reviews

Sunday Selections Week 37

12 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

oja

When my Aunt and Uncle were visiting at the start of August, one morning we got a phone call while I was in the shower – the parents felt like visiting a museum. Where should we go? Obviously HARS was my first thought. I knew I wanted to make friends with VH-OJA soonest.

oja2

I threw out that suggestion and the parents agreed, and the other half left the bathroom, and a few minutes later I was yelling his name because I just remembered.. call them back and tell them to wear covered shoes. You need to wear covered shoes to visit HARS. My mother has this habit of wearing high heeled clogs which mean her toes and her ankles are exposed to the world. Luckily they had not left home yet, and sneakers were the order of the day for all.

oja3

I personally chose to wear some sneakers that Sephyroth had sent me in this package. It felt right that I should wear something he chose to a place I would love to take him. It also felt right that as we went to view VH-OJA, there were Breaking Bad style clouds floating about.

747

A moment happened which I have dreamed about since I was a child.. There I am, standing on tippy toes, touching the underside of a 747. I will not lie to you, there was salt water forming in my eyes from happiness.

isme1

There was also this moment which I had dreamed of for many years – touching the tyres of a 747. They are smaller than I expected them to be. HARS had to come up with a way to tie the tyres down because there can be a lot of wind at Albion Park and in high wind conditions, 747s *want* to fly. Here is some video of that happening to a plane in storage.

If you think about it, that “want to fly while on the ground” characteristic speaks to an amazingly designed plane. No wonder the 747 has been an incredible aircraft for such a long time.

hars1

HARS was a fantastic museum to visit. There was a lot to see. It is a small world – we ended up on a tour with the guy who services our vehicles and quite a lot of kids, which could have been deeply annoying but they were very well behaved considering the tour went for two hours and I think maybe twice there was screaming. If we’d been 20 minutes earlier there would have been no kids on our tour, and the tour that went just after ours was just two people.

hars5

We will go back again – each tour guide has different personal areas of interest so each tour will be different and they will each have different stories to tell. If you like or love planes you will love this place. Even if you do not love planes, you will probably still enjoy visiting HARS..

Would you like to join in with Sunday Selections?? The rules are very simple:-
1. post photos of your choice, old or new, under the Sunday Selections title
2. link back to River at Drifting Through Life, somewhere in your post
3. leave River a comment so that she knows you’ve joined in and can come over and see what you’ve posted.

Weekly Wrap Up –

This week we’ve recycled the former chook triangle into a cage to sit on top of the garden bed. It was first chook proofed with hardware wire during the week, and then today it was covered in fly wire to protect the plants inside from moths and caterpillars.

We’ve also recycled the hardware wire covered cat door we created when our new little kitty arrived home a couple of years ago and made that into a cover for the nasturtiums. The chooks have been out and about quite a bit since Thursday after a few days locked in, free ranging and eating spiders. Pics next week as this post is already picture heavy. :)

We’re watching 2 episodes of 24 a day at dinner time – this was a show neither of us had ever seen. We’re enjoying it. It is nice to watch a show together and it rarely happens that we both like something. Mr Robot has inspired us to try some new shows and find things we like.

I am watching The Pacific by myself – another show we have never seen. There are three reasons I wanted to see this show –

– on our last trip to Hawaii I became interested in WW2 history. I brought home 4 books on Pearl Harbor and I got a couple more for my Kindle.

– Anything Tom Hanks has been involved with you can be 100% sure it is going to be pretty incredible has been my experience. I’ve seen 5 episodes and this is no exception to the Tom Hanks rule.

– Rami Malek, again. Though the character he plays is deeply creepy.. and I do mean creepy.

Oddly enough, I discovered that I have the companion book to the series on my e-reader, so I am reading that as well..

Sunday Selections, television shows, weekly wrap up

Pineapple Collection

18 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

pineapples
Gold and Silver pineapples at Pillowtalk

A while back, Kirsten over at Kirsten & Co wrote this post – My DIY Bar Cart Project – and in the comments I mentioned I would check out Target to see if I could get me one of the gold pineapples. When visiting Shellharbour to see Take That live back in July, I did drop into Kmart and they did not have any gold pineapples left. They did have metallic pink ones, but every single one was slightly damaged.

With my Kmart pineapples I bought as gifts for family, I regularly visited until I found a non-damaged pineapple. We have a Kmart nearby so regular visits was not a problem. With Target being a two hour round trip, regular visits were not going to happen.

pineapples2

My friend who I went to see Take That live with suggested that I visit Pillowtalk to see if they had any pineapples. And it turned out, they did. The gold one was a little pricey for me at $49.95, but they are local and I can keep checking back until they go on special or on clearance which they eventually will.

pineapples3

So, I bought the silver pineapple for $29.95 from Pillowtalk, and added it to my candle shelf in the entry way. I can see it from where I presently sit, reflecting the late afternoon sun rays from the sliding door. When it is night time, lighting the candles creates a lovely reflection from the silver pineapple, and also from the gold foil sleigh I have sitting on that shelf.

pineapples1

The yellow one was originally a gift to my sister, but apparently it did not suit her partner and his design ethics and standards (alternatively it could be because he is an a**hole), and thus it was left behind when they went home after their visit.

After all those visits to Kmart to get a perfect one, I figured it would fit in well at my house, though yellow might not have been my personal first choice of colour. They had white and jade ones too, once upon a time. I never saw a perfect jade one, I did find a perfect white one which I gave to my parents, and it now sits on their stairwell shelf.

pineapples4

So now that I have two pineapples, I guess I am starting a pineapple collection. I’ve seen a couple of others I would like to add eventually, as well. Kmart no longer stocks the pineapples, at least, not that I could find on my recent visits, otherwise I would still be trying for a jade one because that was gorgeous.

I will like to mention, Happy Actual Birthday to Sephyroth today. You may recall I changed his birthday to February, for reasons I explained in this post.

Sadly though, the movie Triple 9 which was meant to be released today has been delayed until March 2016.

Happy Snoskred, Home, Sephyroth

Trouble Brewing @ Lumosity

41 Comments Posted on by Snoskred

lumo2

I may need some kind of intervention, because I can’t stop playing this game on Lumosity. I’ve been a member there since 2012 and I enjoy the brain training. I can tell you that it has improved my brain, in particular my maths and memory.

lumo1

So what is Trouble Brewing all about? Making coffee. It is a divided attention time management game. It helps with multi-tasking and in general I was already pretty good at that to begin with considering that was what I did 6 hours a day 4-5 days a week in my last job. But this game has me challenged and pushing myself continually to get to the next level.

lumolev3

To begin with, it is all fun and games and relatively easy because the coffee making machine and the orders are all on the same page.

lumo4

As you progress, the order screen and the coffee machine screen separate a little. You’ll have a couple of machines on the order screen, then a screen with more machines. Like this –

lumo6

But when you reach level 9, a terrible happens. You now have one order screen in the middle, and two separate coffee machine screens. Like this –

level91

The order screen

level92

Cafe screen one

level93

Cafe screen two – you can see the coffee level indicator is telling me that cups are nearly full on the other screen. Each level you have to fill more orders but the time does not increase – at least it hasn’t yet. 40 cups in two minutes on level 9.. that is a lot of orders to fill in two minutes!

lumo9

At the end of the game you get to see your score and your top 5 scores.

As I write this on the 16th of August, I am stuck on level 9. It is my hope that one day soon all the stars will align and the moon will smile on me and I’ll do everything in exactly the right way in order to pass this level and move to level 10.

Update – 05/09/2015

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FINALLY!!!!! This is the day the stars aligned and the moon loved me enough to let me complete all 40 orders in 2 minutes. I’m still having trouble believing I finally got past level 9.

finally1

Playing this game so much has made me better at the other divided attention *and* memory games because this game uses memory to remember what orders need to be filled. This week I got top scores in Train of Thought and Star Search, plus a memory game where items wash up on a beach and you have to pick ones you have not picked on previous waves. I’m thinking it might be worth focusing in on one particular game for a week at a time and seeing how much I can improve.

Obviously Lumosity have not paid me anything to say this – in fact I have paid them in order to play the games. Nearly two years ago I bought the family plan – it runs out in November, then it is every man for themselves. You can likely find free brain training games on the web, if you look for them. I love the convenience, record keeping, encouragement, and the happy and positive vibe of Lumosity. I’m not sure how much the basic plan costs over there but I know I’ll be signing up for it again.

Over to you –

Do you brain train? :)

exercise, Gaming, Lumosity, time management