After playing Minecraft for a while, you quickly learn that the scariest thing you can encounter is a Creeper.

One of these things can come out of nowhere and renovate your creations before you know what happens.  Also, by renovate, I mean they blow a big gapping whole in the side of that thing you just spent several hours creating. So, with that said – why not bring the Creeper to your desktop?

• Download the Creeper Minecraft Wallpaper (1920×1200)

If nothing else, this wallpaper will help you stay one your toes and keep your mind on work. If you don’t, well – your monitor may very well blow up.

+ Download the Green Lantern Wallpaper (.zip)

Hal Jordan as the Green Lantern has always been my favorite.  For those who might need a history lesson though, Wikipedia comes to the rescue:

Each Green Lantern possesses a power ring that gives the user great control over the physical world as long as the wielder has sufficient willpower and strength to wield it. While the ring of the Golden Age Green Lantern (Alan Scott) was magically powered, the rings worn by all subsequent Lanterns were technological creations of the Guardians of the Universe, who granted such rings to worthy candidates. These individuals made up the intergalactic police force known as the Green Lantern Corps.

Want the original or more giant press art for Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe?  Google has a ton of them from the web site videogamesblogger.com.

I always have, and I always probably will.  With that said, I wanted to both give you some great green wallpaper and try out a new Google search technique I picked up from an article on Lifehacker.

First, here are some of my favorite green wallpapers I have found from around the Web:

Now where is the trick?

Next time you search Google Images, be sure to try typing in, imagesize:1680×1050 green.  Changing the dimensions, will change the resolution of the picture you are looking for, and insert any search term you want (doesn’t have to be green) for the type of wallpaper you are looking for.

There you have it – two for one deal just for you.

Here you have, for your desktop customization needs five of the most popular mushroom power-ups in icon form.

+ Download the the Super Mario Mushroom Desktop Icon Pack! (.zip)

The icons are compatible with the following sizes:  256 x 256, 128 x 128, 64 x 64, 48 x 48, 32 x 32, 24 x 24, 16 x 16.  It is also in both .ico and .png format.  Feel free to use, share and more.

If you like these, be sure to check out the custom icon archives!

Click the color you want, to be taken to the download page for that wallpaper selection.

I really enjoy all of the wallpaper selections on VladStudio.com, but these more recent ones really won me over due to the fact that they are simple – yet still look good on anybody’s desktop.  If you want the higher quality versions, you could always register too (I did, a while back) and pay a small fee for some great desktop artwork. 

+ Download the Tornado Man Desktop Icon! (.zip)

The icon is compatible with the following sizes:  256 x 256, 128 x 128, 64 x 64, 48 x 48, 32 x 32, 24 x 24, 16 x 16.  It is also in both .ico and .png format.  Enjoy, and let me know if you like ‘em or not.  More robot masters from Mega Man 9 to come?  One more to go!

Download the Desktop Icons for the other Mega Man 9 Villains!

Like What You See? Subscribe for Free!

Just click the wallpaper you want to go visit the download page for it:

Got a theme idea for next weekend’s wallpaper roundup?

We do it, and if it’s a scam, then so is my electric company regulated and overseen by the government.

At my home, I have the option to pay a premium for renewable energy, and I have lots of official stuff on my bill showing the higher price I pay with the guarantees that money got fed into the grid. My electric company releases the energy I pay for into the grid – they have to, or its illegal. Are the zaps coming into my house guaranteed to be clean?

No. Energy delivery is communal – but the higher premium I pay puts more clean energy into the grid that would not otherwise get there. If enough people chose to pay for the higher premium, a higher percentage of energy in the grid would be renewable. Does it come with the same ego boost as solar panels on the top of my house? No. Does it ensure that less pollution comes from me because I pay more than everyone else? Yes. It makes a difference.

It’s the same concept. Green Tags enable people that want to buy renewable energy but who don’t have it directly available to them to do so. If *everyone* did it no matter where they were, we could all be green in a short amount of time.

If you wonder if its a scam, ask to see the certificates that were issued (as we all get certificates saying precisely what we bought), and the report as to how they arrived at how much to offset. If they can’t give it to you, then yes, possibly, it’s a scam.

If they *can*, the place you are hosting is paying for their energy *twice*, once to keep the power on, and again in the same amount to feed that energy they used back into the grid as green energy so someone else doesn’t have to use dirty energy.

How someone voluntarily choosing to pay for their electricity twice can be considered “a scam” is beyond me.

Check out podcast 151 for yourself and join the debate.  Is green hosting good or just another sales gimmick to get you in the door?

Was in search for a few new visual styles for my laptop computer, and ran across these the other day on Deviant Art. Now there are a lot of ugly visual styles out there meant to replace the candy coated Windows XP skin but these three are very sleek.

For help on getting them installed, check out my previous tutorial on installing your own visual styles on Windows XP. Also big thanks to the artist of all three of these themes, from lassekongo83 Deviant Art. Fabulous work!

I covered this topic (as it relates to web hosting) and a few others this week on the podcast.

For most people, green hosting is that kind that has been sitting in the back of the refrigerator a little too long. Pretty soon though I have a feeling that either by hook or crook we will all be impacted by in in one way or another in the future. I’ll talk about it, tell you what it is and let you know what you can do to help.

+ Download the MP3 of this Podcast!

It seems like if you have enough money you can buy yourself out of your problem and then you don’t actually have to worry about changing your day to day business or day to day life. As I talked about on this week’s edition of the Web Hosting Show – I think there’s something that smells funny about the whole green web hosting deal.