Below are the most recent 21 friends' journal entries.

Friday, November 6th, 2009
nidoking	11:45p	And now back to our regularly scheduled weekend I made another Final Fantasy 10 song, but nobody's commented on it. Oh well. It was fun to make, anyway. Maybe I just need someone who can actually make music to make the song from my lyrics instead of trying to record myself singing. Gaming-wise, I didn't do much. I decided to finish Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction so I could start on A Crack in Time. Fortunately, I was at the final boss in the former, and had just obtained the RYNO IV, which makes the whole experience as trivial as I'd been told to expect. No sense making things harder for myself when it was just a means to an end. The second game seems to have the familiar tie-in mechanic of offering the weapons at a discount if you have a save from the first game on the same hard drive. I like the new idea of flying around space and finding planets to explore, rather than just choosing them from a list like in previous games in the series. Even when some of those planets are dinky, it's still a nice feature, and gives something to do during load times. I also got to test my new video streaming and recording setup... it took some doing, but I got everything I need for a good video, and the only remaining issue is putting the parts together. Surprisingly harder than I expected, but I didn't devote much time to trying. I finished the second season of Dexter, even though I wasn't eating for much of that time. That was quite an ending. Now I'm taking a break to watch some MST3K before moving on, partly because the third season is on Blu-Ray, which will require the PS3. Also, it's bedtime and then some. (Comment on this)
vxo	12:45p	you too, tigerdirect? Like, forever, there have been websites trying to pull in traffic by posting unrelated (or semi related?) product reviews to their pages as search keyword bait... I suspect TigerDirect's doing it now too. Why? Well, I can't help but notice that in most of their product pages, when the product goes on special, there are user reviews that do not match the product. At all. Here's an example. Reviews mention a "modem" and a USB wireless adapter --- this page is for a PCI wireless adapter. I dunno... maybe it's just stupid users... but it seems really strange! (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, November 5th, 2009
nidoking	10:32p	This is why I don't take days off It wasn't BAD... but I didn't know what to do with myself all day. I played some Banjo-Tooie and some Blitzball, watched a bunch of Dexter, and had some not very good Aver's pizza. They'd lumped all the feta cheese in the center of the pizza, so it was a few bites of gross and then none of that flavor on the rest of the slice. I did go check my tires before lunch, and what do you know... they WERE really low. Averaged around 25 psi instead of 32. Well, I fixed those. Next time I do any appreciable driving, I'll see if the warning goes away on its own. Then I spent the evening reading the rest of the third arc of Jojo's Bizarre Adventure online. The in-joke on the very last page cracked me up. I'll still buy them as they come out, but really, one book every four months just doesn't cut it. (Comment on this)
napoleonherself	5:57p	Probably another one of my unpopular opinions. Army officer opens fire at Fort Hood, killing 12 FORT HOOD, Texas -- An Army officer opened fire Thursday with two handguns at the Fort Hood military base in an attack that left 12 people dead and 31 wounded. Authorities killed the gunman and apprehended two other soldiers in what appears to be the worst mass shooting at a U.S. military base. [...] A law enforcement official identified the shooting suspect as Army Maj. Malik Nadal Hasan. [...] Officials say it was not clear what Hasan's religion was, but investigators are trying to determine if Hasan was his birth name or if he may have changed his name and converted to Islam at some point. So if his name was Seamus MacGillicuddy, would they be investigating whether he was Catholic? Oh. Oh, wait, that's right. We only have to be concerned that someone has an imaginary friend who tells him to do things when that imaginary friend is named Allah. I mean, yes, I understand, there is some history of some individuals of a certain belief liking to make Americans go dead, so it's not entirely an irrational thing to look into. It just cheeses me off how nobody looks for racial or religious motive when it's a white dude sending mailbombs or driving fertilizer-filled trucks into government buildings or whatever, just when it's one of tham thar funny brown people. Coming eventually: a post about Freakfest! Short version, it was awesome and a bunch of people took pictures of us. Mecha has a thing about it if you're interested. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 4th, 2009
nidoking	10:49p	It doesn't FEEL like the end of a week Today's Bridge: It was the last chance I had to play this week, so of course I didn't get to. Instead, I played Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box while waiting in line at Subway. Today's Work: More document review, and I got my picture taken for an article about the system I'm working on. Reaching Milestone C is a big achievement. Today's Gaming: More Banjo-Tooie... I'm finally starting to get somewhere in the factory, although there are plenty of things I haven't found yet. It's huge. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009
nidoking	8:38p	Being able to do things in the morning is great The streaming solution I tried last night didn't work. The sound was great, but the video came out at 5.9 frames per second, and Mediacoder can't even process more than the first 20 frames. So I played some Banjo-Tooie and found some new stuff, then went to the meeting. There were a few bits of smoothness, but there was a huge discussion right before lunch, so we didn't get to break until 1. We had a nice big lunch at the Bloomington Sandwich Company, so I didn't eat much for dinner. And now I have an evening to look into a virtual webcam program and maybe play some more games. Or just watch more Dexter... it's getting really good. (Comment on this)
Monday, November 2nd, 2009
nidoking	9:42p	The joys of having things to do Today's Bridge Forecast: ( It's a very bad day for clubs. ) Today's Work: Mainly reviewing the document on which the one we're almost finished is supposed to be based. Yes... we're still bringing our parent document up to speed with the one that's nearly done. There's some sad stuff in it, like a recommendation that we should really consider adding a feature that already exists in the first version. They also expect us to reuse most of the code from the first version. Uh... no. Not going to happen. You want to reuse ANY of it, you change your requirements drastically. We all know that's not going to happen. EVER. I may try a streamed recording tonight. I may not. I've got a lot of webcomics left to read, but at least there was no House to occupy my time. (Since when is a lack of House a good thing? Stupid suckball.) (Comment on this)
Sunday, November 1st, 2009
nidoking	9:32p	No substitutions allowed, apparently It's taken me most of the day to set every timepiece in the house (that I care about) back an hour, because it didn't occur to me that most of them would need it. The computers took care of themselves, but I only did the alarm clock after I saw the laptop clock and wondered how it got so early, and I forgot about my watch entirely until I told Curt we'd been playing Borderlands too long and needed to get dinner soon. Borderlands was an interesting adventure... we tried everything to set up a network game, but in the end, it required Game Ranger to make it work. It's great, though... Curt set up the room, I joined, and after finding where the executable had been buried in my Program Files folder, it started the game up for both of us, logged us in, and brought us to the server. We were purely cooperative this time out, although I kept getting lost and not being there to kill the bad guys attacking Curt. I also forgot that it's possible to revive a teammate, like in Left 4 Dead... must remember to do that. I almost died once, but somehow, I took down an enemy and got my second wind just in time. I also bought a healing shield on special right at the start, so while it cost a bit more than the regular shields, it means Curt can grab all the health pickups, while I recover naturally. Dinner was Olive Garden... they were out of lasagna. How do they run out of lasagna? The server offered me a few choices of substitution, and I asked him about a different kind of pasta. Somehow, our wires got crossed, and he brought me the entrée portion of just that pasta. That, plus the lack of refills (of anything) and the fact that he always had a runner bringing us our food while he was serving another table, led me to give a not particularly generous tip. I felt that exactly 15% would be a bit too little and gave him another 50 cents. I hate fractional tips, but it was required here. I didn't even get to order a dessert to take home, which was the only upside to getting what I got instead of what I asked for. I'm getting my stuff set up for another go at recording Katamari tonight... hopefully, we'll have all four people this time. That could mean a late night, but oh well. I should be plenty tired due to the time change. The Shinji Ikari Raising Project is probably the best version of Evangelion I've seen yet. Gendo is great, and for once, the response to all of the power going out is different and original. It's a keeper. (Comment on this)
nidoking	1:05a	Borderlands hates nVidia, or vice versa. Today's Manga: Tsubasa 23 and 24, XXX-Holic 14, Air Gear 14, Fairy Tail 8, Princess Ai: Prism of Midnight Dawn 1, Kamichama Karin Chu 6, Ballad of a Shinigami 2, Gantz 7, and Papillon 4. I was surprised to find two new books of Tsubasa, but apparently, it's in celebration of CLAMP's 20th anniversary. Today's Games: The new Ratchet & Clank, Uncharted 2, Wii Sports Resort, and as you may have guessed, Borderlands for the PC. Hooray for a free game. Boo for my display driver not being able to handle Borderlands. Once I finally tracked down a version that would install properly, I got the game running. It's pretty fun, but Curt was probably in Terre Haute by the time I started playing for real. No co-op for me yet. I just got to level 5 by the time I stopped, and then switched to FF10 for some annoying minigames. I've managed to get the five Celestial Weapons I've gotten before to full power... I may try dodging lightning at some point. I may not. I'm sure I'll play more Blitzball eventually. I also found an arrangement that may work for doing LPs of console games with live commentary over the Internet. Whoever's watching the stream will see some lag, but it's probably better than nothing... depending on who's providing the commentary, and on what game. Anyone who's got Skype and is interested in trying it out, at least for a test run, let me know. The free Black Jack taco was good. The guy behind me in line didn't know they were offering one until I told him, but the cops behind him were offered one when they didn't ask for it, so I assume that anyone who ate there tonight would have been told about it anyway. I have the 12th Wheel of Time novel and no plans to read the 11th. This should surprise no one. (Comment on this)
Saturday, October 31st, 2009
vxo	4:02p	Something just struck me about Kayoko Nakajima's "The Adventures of Zack and Max"... Everyone has one of the same two or three faces. Well, except for the pig. The Dayton to Dayton Calendar features all the characters with the same exact face. Dear Eris. They're all ROBOTS. How bizarre! (Comment on this)
Friday, October 30th, 2009
nidoking	8:58p	I don't much mind long days when they're this full. Today's Bridge: Four people... unusual on days when I'm not playing for free. Things didn't go well for us overall. The opponents started with a game we couldn't stop, and Kelly did a takeout double when she wasn't strong enough for it - she had five cards in the opponents' suit, so with five spades to the ace and four hearts, I bid twice despite having almost no power. S A-x-x-x-x H 10-x-x-x D 10-9-x C x was it, but I took her for enough power that a 2 contract was doable with a good fit even though Mike bid diamonds twice. What she offered me for my 2S contract was S K-10-x H K-J-x D K-x C Q-J-x-x-x. Ken led the queen of diamonds, so I covered with the king to Mike's ace. He cashed the jack of diamonds, leaving my 9 high, then switched to a club to Ken's ace. Ken led back to Mike's king, which I ruffed. Seeing some potential issues (namely, crap for hands), I led a low heart to the jack, which won. Okay. Spade to the ace, pulling Mike's queen if I remember correctly, and I figured I had a 4-1 split on my hands. I led another heart to the king, winning again, then cashed the jack of clubs and threw a heart, stupidly. (The right play was to ruff a club, then cash my nine of diamonds to sluff the board's last heart.) So I went with the low club, hoping that Mike would be void (since Ken had opened clubs), but Ken overruffed me. Fortunately, rather than cash one of his heart honors, he led a diamond, so I got to sluff the heart on the nine. Then it was a simple matter to run a spade to the 10, and had I been keeping count of Ken's spades, I'd have known he was left with the jack and pulled it with the king before cashing the last club. But I thought he had two and gave him one to make the contract exactly. We never finished the game - I got a S Q H J-10-9-x-x-x-x D A-J-x-x C 5, and Mike opened 1S, so I jumped to 3H. Mike bid 4C, so I bid 4D, and Kelly let that go. Mike went up to 5C, and I was done. So was Ken, despite holding five spades and two clubs. I led my queen of spades, hoping Kelly would have the ace and another spade she could lead me for the ruff. She did, but she didn't take the trick and let Mike's king have it. So we got the aces of hearts and spades and the long jack of clubs to set them one doubled. We can set 5S as well, since we have three aces, but I'd lead the five of clubs, and that's the ace we don't have. The question is whether Mike would lead his king of spades, hoping to find the queen singleton, since he has no way to get to the board - Kelly's ace of hearts covers the king that's the board's only entry, and if Mike leads any other spade from his hand, I get the queen and Kelly keeps her ace for a fourth trick. I think we're really hard-pressed to take less than four tricks if we defend properly. Today's Work: I spend the morning going over meeting minutes and the afternoon going over the mapping between our documents, looking for problems. Then I watched Dexter over dinner before even getting online. I haven't read webcomics yet. Good thing it's Friday. I'm looking forward to next week. With a meeting in town on Tuesday and days off Thursday and Friday (because I don't see any reason not to), that's only two trips to and from base. (Comment on this)
napoleonherself	6:35p	Canadian scientists are now my favorite people in the world. Some unknown person posted a link on the ZRC blog. It is a link to this: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/08/18/zombie_plague_paper/ Oh. Em. See. (for Cthulhu.) Basically this guy wrote a serious mathematical paper where he concludes that, in the event of a zombie outbreak, humanity's only option is to shoot on sight. Here is an actual quote from the actual paper: Human-zombie coexistence is impossible... Since all eigenvalues of the doomsday equilibrium are negative, it is asymptotically stable. It follows that, in a short outbreak, zombies will likely infect everyone. Okay, so I didn't actually go far enough in math to know what the hell an eigenvalue is besides something to do with matrices (and I hate matrix math so that's about as much as I care to know. Seriously. Matrices are jerks and probably they kicked my puppy at some point, even though I've never actually owned a puppy.) But... something about that excerpt just fills my blackened heart with delight. It's the combination of erudition and zombies, I think. "Blah blah blah math blah. Zombies will likely infect everyone." This isn't sarcasm, by the way. It's hard to tell with me sometimes, because I fall in love with the weirdest shit, but today it's this paper that some dude in Canada wrote. Also, he changed his legal name to Smith?, which is awesome even if it does lead to questions of how you pronounce it. I think I'd always pronounce it as a question. At least until he punched me. Unrelated: who is going to Freak Fest as a zombie rights protester tomorrow night? It would be nice if it was you! Probably it's just me, though. (Comment on this)
Thursday, October 29th, 2009
nidoking	8:47p	Could I plant a Horcrux at work to spend time on the clock for me? Today's Bridge: I got out of my meeting just in time to get in the draw, although I wasn't there for the actual draw. I still got to play, though. We started with what seemed like a reasonable 5C, and the trick was when Kelly tossed the queen on the first club trick. Did she also have the jack, or did Paul have it, making the finesse the right play? Ken played for the drop, but it failed. Off one. Then I got stuck in 1NT with abysmal splits and no way to play the long suit once I'd set it up. Off one. Kelly followed with a 2H, barely made, and I don't think we had any way to set her. Then it fell to Ken to make 2H to get us back in the game. He was doing fine until he didn't finish pulling the trump, letting Paul ruff a spade. Off one. Paul was up next in 2C, and Ken correctly judged when I led the king of spades followed by the jack that I was out of them, so he took the ace and led me another for the ruff. I led a heart to his ace next, and he led a heart back rather than giving the board an overruff... not that I would have minded much, as the board was Q-4 in clubs, but holding his spades until the board's trump are gone also works. We still had two tricks in diamonds and a spade overruff for off two. Then came the final hand... I had a mere S 8-5 H K-J-x D A-K-Q-9 C 10-x-x-x, just enough to open 1D. Ken responded 2S, I bid 3C (rather than 2NT, which also would have worked), he bid 3H, and I closed at 3NT. He had S K-x-x-x-x H A-Q-x-x D 4 C K-J-x... which is probably okay. I screwed up by not trying to set up the spades, but I was looking at up to four losers there even with a passable split, plus at least one club loser. I won the heart lead in hand and ran the ten of clubs to Paul's queen, won the diamond return, and led a club to the jack... and Paul showed out. Well, no joy there, and Kelly had three good clubs left, plus I was stuck on the board, not even in a position to run the spade finesse. So I led a low spade, and Kelly took with the queen, cashed her two black aces, and exited with a diamond while holding two good clubs... I think I had the 7 left. So I congratulated her for once again gallantly deciding not to set a contract, cashed my good diamond and heart, and crossed to the board's good hearts and king of spades. If she just holds that ace of spades, we're off... she covers the king and has another spade or club trick to cash. With that, the half-rubber was ours. Today's Work: It started with a surprise meeting... I'm sure it was announced previously, but I never pay attention to that stuff. I don't know why we met this week anyway, since we're meeting again next week as well. But the discussion this time only really got off on one tangent, and I managed to forestall a few other potential ones and keep us on track to finish the document we were working on. There WAS a rather long discussion that didn't really get anywhere much, but it was definitely on topic. Then I spent most of the afternoon helping the task lead finish some flow diagrams. It's annoying stuff, but we need to shove in people's faces how simple the processes are compared to the complexity they want. Then they can decide how hard to beg for the extra steps they can't possibly live without. It's not the same group that provided over 500 comments for yesterday's meeting, which provoked our software lead to postpone the very discussion that was supposed to be the center of the meeting so they could work on revising their list, but they're still determined to test the limits of how many annoyances the operator can ignore while trying to do anything with the system. It doesn't help that everyone's trying to use the original system as a template, and there's a new concept in the revised system that's so different, the same methods often don't make any sense. They'd rather try to shoehorn their old thinking into the new system, and THOUGHT DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY! It's like trying to write-enable a CD-ROM by putting tape over the hole. That worked in the old system, but this is a new system that does the same thing a different way. You're just going to break it if you try that. No Dexter tonight because I got home pretty late and had other things to watch while I ate. I've got some free time now, but I'm probably going to do something interactive. No idea what, yet... but I'll figure that out shortly. (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 28th, 2009
nidoking	9:46p	Then, of course, I need to do something with my life The meeting today went about as well as expected. I managed not to smart off once when the mute button was off (okay, I did... when the Systems Engineers were complaining that we NEEDED a requirement to unpack data so the software team would be able to leverage IV&V's work to find problems, I explained that we have a concept called "debugging" that we use for that purpose, and it's not IV&V's job nor their forté), and got some good sleep during an extended discussion about what we should do about safety critical failures. I'm hoping to get a copy of the comment forms tomorrow... one guy submitted somewhere in the neighborhood of 170 comments. I think a couple were not rejected before the meeting started. Mom had some computer problems and finally decided to consult with me about them. Once she got around to offhandedly mentioning that the network problems began at around the time she installed the new modem... we managed to think outside the box and find a way to get her back online. Now that I've had to turn my own computer on to figure out which menu options she needed, I'm considering doing something with that instead of returning to FF10. I beat an arena boss last night, but after weakening it with some Aeons and a lot of attacking, I ended up summoning Yojimbo and duking it out for 1 gil per turn. That guy's evasion rating is through the roof! I probably got some sort of nifty item, but I also got a bangle for Lulu with HP+30% and HP+20%. Cool. Having just had her learn Doublecast, she may become useful again. As recently as today, I read something that's changed the way I think about certain types of humor. I was watching a funny video, thinking that it looked like the sort of thing I like linking to, and that it didn't have any of those jokes. That was exactly when they started. I don't think I'd have found them particularly funny even before today, especially had they not been mixed in with all the other jokes. They were in really bad taste. Yet I have to acknowledge that I haven't had the experiences that some people have had, and when the jokes are funny, I still laugh. I'm not trying to make excuses; I just think, in the interest of full disclosure, that I should say it, and that I should say it here. I know that there are people on my friends list who have had dealings with very touchy subjects, and even after the "nigger guy" episode of South Park, it's never really hit me until now how true this is: I have no idea what it's like for you. I have nothing to compare it to. But I don't make those jokes, and if I ever have, I'm going to be watching my output even more now. On the lighter side, it feels like I've been through an entire season of Dexter in only three episodes. That's some impressive writing. (8 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, October 27th, 2009
nidoking	8:20p	One cool thing did happen today, but it might not be appreciated if I blab about it Before I forget (again), happy birthday to jeffholton. He's had a name change recently. (I only say that because it reminds me so much of Return to Zork.) No Bridge today - nobody showed up but me and Keith. So I spent my lunch break playing Justice for All, and FINALLY figured out what I was supposed to do just as my half hour ended. So that breakthrough will have to wait until I get back to the game, although I just reminded myself that the battery light was red. Better recharge. The outlet that I plug the charger into was dead when I got home, which is disconcerting since it's also the one my laptop plugs into. Fortunately, I've experienced this before. I think this house has only one GFI circuit, and for some reason, this outlet is on that circuit as well as the one in my bathroom and the outdoor outlet. Maybe the rain short-circuited it. It must have been shortly before I got home, because the laptop was still running, but as I imagine it was in powersave mode and probably hasn't had its own screen on, I guess it would be able to run longer. I've also found it difficult to eat in front of the laptop lately, considering that I'm sitting in the middle of a giant folded mattress that doesn't even lie flat on the floor, so I've been eating in front of the TV and watching Dexter. I guess I can talk about that, and more than the "I'm finally watching it" that basically sums up the situation. The second season seems to be heavily delving into how emotions can be a weakness, even for characters like Dexter who suppresses what little emotion he has. Boy, do I know that feeling. Also vaguely related to the cool thing that happened today, although saying that may or may not tip off the one person who might know what I'm talking about. I'll stop being cryptic and just plain stop saying stuff. Now to watch the new Nostalgia Critic video a day early, freeing up tomorrow evening that much more. I'll be working in town, so I'll have some extra time to make a proper dinner, and I expect I'll eat it to more Dexter. Then I have to choose between Phoenix Wright, FF10, or finishing an LP video and getting back into the hobby. Also, I really wanted to do a news post today, but the browser kept crashing. That's probably for the best, because there's no way I could have topped this. (Comment on this)
vxo	4:50p	At one time, I would have complained about the fact that Miami had degraded to the point where the most interesting cultural event it ever had was the opening of a new shopping mall. Well, apparently we're in another boring stretch here, as Coral Gables just had a big unveiling for a cruddy traffic circle. Wow. We're now celebrating the installation of 'traffic calming'* devices. How... epic. XD * Also known as, "preventing a small two lane residential street from trying to become Interstate 95". (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, October 26th, 2009
nidoking	9:56p	Harry Potter and so many things nobody really cared about So, this is it. My final Harry Potter book/movie reduction. I don't imagine I'm going to be able to improve much on what I've got now, even with a few things out of order. It's all about being funny and reminding everyone of why they loved the book and what's messed up about that, and how the movie went off on its own agenda even more so than ever before. This one really had a lot to pick apart, and the flaws are big enough to drive a hippogriff through. Speaking of which... "Whitherwings"? Seriously? Nobody's going to hear that and put the silent H at the front, and without that, it takes on a completely different, very unintended meaning. Tell me I'm not the only reader who noticed that. It's even worse in the audiobook. ( If only half of the prince was blood, what was the other half? ) (12 Comments |Comment on this)
nidoking	8:40p	Mostly Bridge, which should be no surprise Today's Bridge: We had seven, and after two weeks in which I only got to play once (that I can remember), I actually got to play today. Amazing! We had some interesting hands, too... starting with my bidding a 4S overcall and Paul raising it to 5S. The opponents both bid as well... Ken opened 1C, but I was going to bid 4S no matter what he said, despite a rather weak holding of S K-10-9-7-5-4-3-2 or so and just one queen on the side, plus a singleton diamond. Mike responded 5D, and that's when Paul bid 5S. I got that unopposed and undoubled, naturally, since the opponents weren't going to bid a slam almost blind, and I could have made it had I finessed for a jack. Failing that, I lost a trick too many. Then Paul declared a game, also off by one, but I don't remember why. I think it was a case of none of the finesses working, but I believe he also failed to pull trump and gave up some ruffs I don't think he needed to. Then it was my turn to declare at 5D, in an auction where Paul bid clubs three times and I finally raised him to game. The diamonds were the better choice by far. The only loser we had was the ace of hearts, once trump had split favorably and given me plenty of crossruffs, and I jettisoned the board's hearts on my spades and mine on the board's clubs, although we were already trump-tight by then. Even with a heart lead, I had the king, so we're covered, and Ken had the singleton queen of clubs, which promoted my jack for yet another trick. After that, the opponents ended up in a 4S where Mike had three club losers and said that the ten of spades was a lost cause, with Paul holding four of them, but when he didn't pull enough rounds of trump, my six diamonds became a powerhouse. He ruffed his diamonds early, leaving the board unable to do anything about them, and when I got my Q-10 of clubs, I was able to lead through Mike for Paul to overruff twice. Then I ruffed the ace of hearts with the deadweight queen for off three in total. It's possible that he could have avoided one of the club losers by leading the jack from the board. I cover with the queen, he plays the king, and Paul gets the ace, leaving my ten high but promoting the nine for whoever had it. If Mike has it, the contract is makeable, but who'd run a play like that? My side ended with another game to end the rubber, and then Paul declared a game where I was on the weak side, but he misplayed the trump and missed what I think was a makeable contract. He has a habit of starting a finesse, then abandoning it halfway through the trick, like leading his jack and then covering with the king even though the queen hasn't appeared. That's definitely bad play... either lead low and cover high, or lead high and let it ride. I cut the Bridge part all the time... but it's all I have today. It's probably worth mentioning that I got the Attack Reels in FF10 last night... after losing one tournament to the Al Bhed right away, I tried again and was in the opposite bracket from them. The Luca Goers took care of them, but I was prepared - I think I had characters with Nap Shot and Wither Shot 2, which would have made scoring goals possible. However, three straight games. Now to capture fiends and collect ultimate weapon pieces I missed - and maybe Jecht Spheres. But tonight, with no House, it's webcomics first and gaming if there's time. I want to finish an LP video of my own eventually. (Comment on this)
Sunday, October 25th, 2009
nidoking	8:59p	And my room is full of boxes For a report on my first night on the Sleep Number bed, turn here. Hopefully, tonight will go better. The only other thing worth mentioning today is that I finally found the time to watch the first episode of Dexter season two. Having watched the first season ages ago, then read the books (I'm reading the fourth one now), I'd forgotten just HOW different the two versions are. I know the divergences were only going to increase after season one, but this is bigger than I'd expected. Cody talks, probably more than Astor does. That's just the tip of the iceberg. But that's all I really want to say about it right now. Back to FF10, I think. If I can win the first tournament, I'll get the Attack Reels. Problem is, Nimrook. Just Nimrook. (Comment on this)
napoleonherself	6:17p	I have unpopular opinions. http://www.forbes.com/2009/10/22/maternity-leave-survey-work-forbes-woman-time-vacation.html Um. You have made a decision, of your own free will. You presumably know that this decision will result in a great deal of inconvenience, even difficulty for you over the years, and presumably you have decided it's worth the trouble. Why, then, does anyone else owe you something? Why should you get extra time off just to deal with the results of a decision you made? Can I make some other, different decision, and get to take off work because of it, in addition to the "regular" vacation/sick time I get? No? Only childbirth counts for that? Well, then. Thank you for doing us all such a favor then, I guess. Carry on being a protected class with extra rights and privileges that you deserve because, um... something. This is a topic I've gone on about before, and I know it's just screamin' into the wind and all, but... yeah. I understand that giving birth to and caring for a new baby is a lot of work and physical trauma and all, but I'm not sure why you should expect your workplace to make it up to you. From what I heard, raising a kid meant making sacrifices... whether it's not trying to drag a ten-month-old to that new action flick that you really really want to see, or not trying to get your job to subsidize your having added a family member. Of course, I've never had kids, so I could be wrong. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, October 24th, 2009
nidoking	11:27p	My Sleep Number is up Today's Manga: Rin-Ne 1, Kannazuki no Miko 1, Sumomo mo Momo mo 2, Gestalt 3, Ultimate Venus 5, The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords 1, Hana Yori Dango: Jewelry Box, Yu-Gi-Oh R 1, We Were There 6, and Momogumi Plus Senki 1. That's ten, half of which are new series, although I suppose Yu-Gi-Oh R is a continuation of one I've got, and Legend of Zelda definitely is. Well, from waking up a bit late (as usual on a Saturday), cleaning up the room enough that I could assemble the Sleep Number bed, getting my desktop set up to record Katamari Damacy, doing the recording, assembling the bed, to dinner at O'Charley's, where they didn't bring our appetizer until they brought dinner (they didn't charge us for the appetizer), it's been a full day. I played a little bit of FF10, but didn't accomplish much. Well, about time to figure out what my sleep number is for real. The futon is in pieces right in front of my computer, so I'm sitting on the mattress while typing, and I'll have to climb over it to get to the bathroom during the night. This could be a painful week. But at least I should be sleeping well. (2 Comments |Comment on this)