I was introduced to the term "Pain to Hotness Ratio" while watching How I Met Your Mother not so long ago. What does it describe? - Shoes.

Most girls have been faced with the Pain to Hotness Ratio dilemma. The general rule seems to be that Cute shoes are never Comfy and Comfy shoes are down right ugly (the designer that makes a comfy cute shoe will make a lot of money). This phenomenon has resulted in most of us mentally giving each shoe a Pain to Hotness Ratio and, depending on the occasion, the guy, or the number of snooty girls one is about the meet, one decides to endure an increasing amount of Pain in order to increase one's Hotness.

Now, I love my feet; therefore, it is usually difficult to choose between decorating it as it deserves or having it nice and comfy. However, I have recently stumbled upon a gadget that significantly decreases the Pain to Hotness Ratio in most shoes.

This gadget is the gel foot cushion. Fitting comfortably and inauspiciously at the balls of ones feet, the transparent foot cushion is discreet enough wear with those high-heeled delicate sandles that usually kill ur feet after an hour of walking. It'll give your feet an extra hour or two of tolerance, which is usually a godsend.

Some background info:

My job = stay at a desk equipped with a very crappy Mac and wait for the phone to ring, sort the mail, make photocopies.

On good days, I actually get to walk around and make deliveries. On bad days, my job = me, a desk, a crappy Mac, and a clock that simply does not tick fast enough.

Why do I do this? 1) for the money 2) for the resume 3) I'm an international student so I can't even be a waitress if I wanted to.

So, how do I fill my days? I usually go around reading the New York Times, BBC News, Cnet News, Wired News. Once those have been exhausted, I move onto videogame blogs such as Kotaku, Joystiq, and Destructoid.

Obviously, I begin to run out of things to read online and I don't feel like actually reading a book. Randomly clicking around links in Joystiq has led me to one of the most entertaining websites so far:

www.wowdetox.com.

For those of you who have not at least observed the 2million or so people playing World of Warcraft, this will be completely irrelevant. Otherwise, reading WoWdetox is actually extremely addictive. Having been addictied to Guild Wars until 5 fights with my BF resulted in me having to sell my account on ebay and quit cold-turkey, I can at least sympathize with the poor souls addicted to WoW. One of my friends has recently quit - having gone to Germany this summer and thus finding an actual place where she could pick flowers and look at pretty buildings. I do not know exactly what will happen when she returns. I know 3 other ppl who are still feeding off of Blizzard's I.V. and trust me, it's not pretty.

So why WoWdetox? The comments hit very close to home and a lot of them are really funny. If you've played WoW, are still playing WoW, or are considering playing WoW, you should at least check it out before you end up spending over 20 hours a week to get better pixels.

As for why I never played WoW?

1) I have a 3.5 GPA to maintain \

2) I have a BF who actually complains when I play video games.

3) The graphics are crappy;I hate polygonal characters

4) Guild Wars was free

5) Most importantly, Oblivion is so much better!!

I still play a couple of hours of videogames a day but heck, it's my last summer vacation! I should enjoy this before I actually have to earn a living.

MSN refuses to let me upload pictures so I guess I'll have to wait. In the mean time, I might as well write about my rather uneventful 4th of July. The sun never did come out in Boston on that rather dreary day and the humidity was so thick it felt like a sauna. I woke up to the fact that it was most likely going to rain and that I had absolutely no inclination to camp out on the Esplanade in that weather. Luckily, my BF felt the same and after having some eggs and toast, we both eagerly settled on the futon and turned on the TV.

Nothing.

We sat there for a while, wondering why we paid a 100 dollars a month for cable, before giving in and reaching for the controller to our Xbox 360. Since the real world was simply too bleak to bear, the only logical step was to enter the land of Cyrodill and immerse ourselves in Oblivion.

Two level increases later we realized that we had finally finished all the arena quests and that a good 4 hours had been successfully wasted. While I would not have minded continuing with the game, my BF couldn't make himself stay in on the 4th of July, regardless of the weather. After making a very compelling argument that our Digital SLR had been collecting dust for the past couple of months and that this would be a wonderful opportunity to test out the fireworks mode, we decided to pack up our camera gear and headed for the Mass Ave. bridge.

We reached the bridge at around 7pm just in time to set-up our tripod before the crowds started pouring in. 2 hours later we found ourselves less than an inch from four extremely annoying teenagers and an extremely inquisitive 10yr-old and his father. Our tripod space was barely respected and I was beginning to grumble over the mosquitos and the heat. An hour of trying not to give the teens a wry glance for saying things like "i speak good american yo, not them British-speak" drove me closer and closer to my breaking point. I wanted to go home!

By that time, of course, it was too late. There was no way that we would be able to push our way trhough the hundreds of people on the bridge. Hell..There was no way to make it to the bathroom, let alone back home. I tearfully listened to the boy who was now eagerly counting down from 3600 (6 minutes before the show) and stifled the urge to give him a little nudge and send him head-first into the Charles.

3600 painful seconds later, the fireworks started. Now, I want to say that they were spectacular and all worth the effort, but...well..that wouldn't be exactly truthful. While I personally thought it was worth it, I think that was true simply because my boyfriend and I really like taking photos and the photos came out really well. They were typical fireworks, however, and we got typical fireworks pictures. The music wasn't that well synched and the fireworks not particularly creative; however, the experience was enjoyable and I loved how the pictures came out.

Which reminds me, why won't MSN let me load the bloody pictures??

Yes...I know ... they should never be compared. So, obviously I watched two movies this weekend. I stuck a knife behind my BF's back and forced him to watch Devil Wears Prada with me... the next day we I watched superman with him. Fair trade, non?

So what's the verdict? My BF, who is NOT gay, said he enjoyed Devil Wears Prada a lot more than Superman. No, I'm not kidding. Devil Wears Prada was a chick flick that wasn't really a chick flick - (which is why people who actually wanted to see a chick flick thought it was the worst movie ever.) It was a very funny and witty movie and had very little romance it it. The script was well done (compliments of the book, I presume) and the acting was decent. I know Anne Hathaway was a total type-cast but this was the perfect role for her; Meryl Streep was also a very good fit. It is also very easy to relate to - espeically for anyone who's had an awkward phase - and it kept the interest going. Of course, anyone who likes looking at pretty clothes will definitely get their eye-full.

As for superman. Well what can I say? It wasn't bad - it had a lot of nice flying sequences, a rather soap-operaish story-line, and some interesting acting. It just wasn't that good and I didn't expect soap-opera stories from the guy that made X-Men. It was also bloody 3 hours long so all I could think about at the end was whether I'd be able to make it to the bathroom. Otherwise, it's a decent rent.

Oh summer boredom, will you ever end? The only entertaining thing so far has been Oblivion damn it!