LadyCrimson

@mkreku - perhaps you have some kind of combat animation bug? Or some kind of combat setting could be tweaked? Just a random thought, don't have the game. ------ Keep thinking about reconfiguring FNV to play again w/the new DLC's/patches etc. but the motivation isn't there. I guess I really am played out on that one.

Breaking Bad ended with a bang. That was awesome. And the very very last shot ...I read an interview with the series creator who pretty much confirmed that aspect/interpretation, too. Evil. Since they're geared for one final season next summer...I wonder...hm. I'm thinking Jessie & Walt will have a reckoning and of course Mike's going to come back from Mexico with a really really big axe to grind. heh.

Mom's not doing so well. Depression/memory/hospital visits etc. Old age (almost 80) + lingering spousal grief. Think she might be one of those that never quite recovers after the death of the very long term spouse. She was doing ok last time I saw her some time ago, but...things can happen fast. Memory/social wise she's starting to remind me of grandmother (mom's mom) quite a bit. ...this is going to be an emotionally bad upcoming year, I can feel it. *moody* On the bright side...um...well, my own health/life is still good. Also, Breaking Bad's season ending episode was the super-awesome. Thought that might be a final series ender but guess they plan on one more final season.

Like I said in the other thread, I'm not a fan of Apple per se but Jobs did things/got things done that were very influential to the tech/entertainment biz. Whether you like the trends he created is another story. I guess I kind of think of him as a genius marketer/consumer trend visionary, so I admired him for that even as I frowned at the i-everything mania (including itunes...). And I wonder if Apple can maintain their high level of trendy fame for long without him. But yes, to call him a tech-Einstein (as I saw one article do ) or compare him to Sagan,or JFK or whatever is...a bit much.

Yeah, that's always a bit of a shock. I can keep my weekly groceries to around $120, but every few months I have to go all out and pick up a bunch of the bigger stuff. Usually I hit $400 when I go to Costco, but I try and only go there a few times a year. Weekly is about $150 for us, since the rise in prices 2-3 years ago. We could eat cheaper but we're lazy. And yeah, when we used to go to CostCo once a month or so (long long time ago), seemed like we could never get out of there spending less than a a couple hundred on all this extra stuff we really didn't need. Twas cheaper to stop going. Altho we do go every once in a great while. :D

It also has a better markup than crack cocaine. The drinks industry aren't going to simply abandon it. Although equally one could easily tax it more than it is already. Bottled water is almost as bad, imio...only it's not as popular/been around as long as a mass-market thingie as soda. There are uses for bottled water of course, but as a "trend" it's stupid. "Let's filter and rebottle tapwater and sell it back to idiot customers for a huge proft!"

Yeah, that's probably what I'd use it for...surfing the 'net from the couch/bed. Which isn't reason enough to run out and spend cash on the thing. I don't need portable/wireless computing for work/school or hobbies so...it's just not something I care to spend that much on. The deskchair/monitor works fine. But the Kindle-Fire for $200 might be interesting. We'll see. The iPad2 does have a pretty screen, I"ll give it that. Anyway...despite our 2009 filing, the IRS is somehow mistaking e-trade's transaction reports for the capital gain/securities amounts, or something, and claims we owe them another 10K. What a mess, so bogus. Hubby barely used the site a few years ago to check things out during the crash - he wasn't very serious about it and he did not make any gains anywhere even remotely worth 10K in taxes, that's for sure. I don't mind paying my share of taxes...but I sure hate the IRS. And I'm not very happy with e-trade at the moment either (their transaction numbers don't match what hubby did).

Still on the Path of Exile beta. While not perfect for my personal tastes, the more I play, the more I like it. Tried all the classes and the 2nd difficulty, the duelist & witch are my faves. Waiting for the new version. @Mamoulian War - I love your ST sig pic.

I typically chose the bottom of the neck pageboy like hairstyle, but it gets boring having them all look the same. I liked the official frazzled one too, but it clipped into glasses on one side if you wore those. FO engine just doesn't do hair well I guess.

As long as they leave the Mongolian Beef and Green Bean Chicken alone, I'm good.

Speaking of Apple, hubs just came home with an iPad2. Work client gave it to him cause the client thinks hubs "needs it." Hubs might disagree but hey, free stuff. With the iPhone they switched him to recently (which he doesn't like much), I now get to tease my non-Apple spouse about being an i-person. Guess I can take a peek at it and see what the fuss is about. I still have absolutely no use for such a thing myself, but shiny gadgets are always cool to look at regardless. Cheers, Mr. Jobs.

I was never, and never will be, a fan of Apple products (less about Apple per se as the way tech is going as a whole). But he was a tech-wizard and a tech-trend setter...influence for decades past and to come and all of that. I admired the man for that. So it's kinda sad, if not unexpected. Stupid cancer. I wonder how Apple will do over the next decade or two....we shall see.

Making high-fat frying oil a bit more expensive isn't going to teach certain groups of folk to not fry everything they eat and even 2.3 saturated fat is going to be bad if all you eat is fried chicken, fried tortillas, fried potatoes and so on. And if you're going to tax fat, why not an extra tax for even lean red meat (colon cancer). An extra high sodium tax for cheeses, canned soups, crackers, many breads, etc. How about a huge tax on restaurant meal offerings that exceed 800 calories per dish (those 2000 calorie Applebee/Chili meals etc.)? People can always order 5 rounds if they're really hungry....and rich. ....in other words, I think it's silly. Educate and then it's up to the people whether they want to be fat/high risk or not. Government shouldn't be part of the 'what you can eat' equation in this sense. But if you're going to do it, do it. Make the tax high so people don't want to spend $5 on a single small candy bar/soda or $25 for small bag of Milky Ways/box of soda or $15 for a McD's McMuffin or $20 for pork won ton soup, except as a very once in a while thing, otherwise it's pointless as a preventive measure, imo. I don't know how much Denmark's taxes will be, but 25 cents, say, is only for making the government money. Of course, if a McMuffin cost $15, McD's would soon lose lots of business, and then you have a possible employment issue (not just at McD's either, trickle down effects)....so I'm guessing it'll be in the cents category. At least at first. Maybe you can raise it a little every year or couple of years to get people used to it.

Yeah, I have one and it looks great while you're not moving. But the longer styles tend to clip into the back and stuff when you run. And others do not work if you wear a hat (you go bald...) Kind of annoying.

The Village Barbershop (2008). The actor who played Cliff in Cheers stars in it. A deliberately slow paced chr. study type movie, with dry humor and sweet notes. I liked it a good deal more than I thought I would. Very nice. Also finally watched 1st season of The Walking Dead, all at once. Not bad for zombies. Might watch the upcoming 2nd season. The BBC series Survivors wasn't bad either - similar theme, but no zombies. More like The Stand minus the good/evil magic mojo perhaps.

Past midnight....enjoying the sound of the rain while I read news articles. Then sleepy time.

Wow, it doesn't get much more Diablo clone than that.. Right down to the two orbs in the corners The font even looks similar. D2 didn't have a half-naked chick in chains 'holding up' one of the orbs, tho.

Much as I like Path of Exile, I didn't feel like going back to it today (that Act2 kind of burnt me out a bit) so I went back to Darkstone for a couple hours. I'll play more PoE tomorrow. I do want to check out the other classes before they change it, so I have some notion of comparison value.

I definitely picked the right man to marry. It is so awesome (to me at least) to be with him for so many years & still be so similar in the ways that matter;to have nights where you can be just mouthing off at 1am about the world and everything you like/dislike about it...the sounding board sessions. And they understand. And agree. And laugh at your stupid jokes and you laugh at theirs. And all is right with the world then. I'm still so in love. *mushiness overload*

Settling in to try and watch the TB/Texas playoff game. But after hearing/reading about Tito no longer being the GM of the Red Sox, I am not feeling the baseball love right now. Edit: oops make that the Yankee playoff. I swear the TV said TB/Texas 5 minutes ago. Bah.

Forgot...if you do get in the beta to check it out and get the below glitch effect (the banding stripe at the top of the screen), perhaps also along with some strange screen jitter-jump during combat, turn off Post Processing in the options. Or some people had to turn AA off entirely. Just turning off PP worked for me tho, and I still get the AA at least.

Yeah, I'm hoping the new version/patch will address some of the things I'm personally nitpicking with. I didn't start feeling very nitpicky until about clvl 15. And could be at very high clvls my nitpicks would go away for some reason, too.

The game has a lot of the same structure (Acts, waypoints, etc) and of course the classes are similar to the way all such games are (there's always a mix of melee, mage, ranged, paladin or hybrid and/or thief in most fantasy rpg's, not just Diablo-clones). There's enough differences to make it interesting to play for a while. But as usual nothing in it is going to make anyone who dislikes hack n slash games like hack n slash games, however. Played a Duelist to lvl20 so far. My main two issues with the game on a personal level is that as currently implemented, combat becomes rather tedious/boring after a while. I mean, I know all D-clones are grind-fests and all that, don't get me wrong, but even within that definition it didn't take long for me to feel a little bored/annoyed that every step I take I'm attacked by 8-15 enemies. It feels a little too same-y all the time, at least when playing solo. And I don't like the combat-skill selection overmuch, tho it does work fine. Not supposed to post pics or go into details since of course it's all subject to change but here's my first thoughts: --potions that recharge during combat are pure genius and much better than floating orbs ala Diablo3. They're only active while in one of the belt slots (can't keep spare full ones in inventory) and the rate of recharge still creates a challenge in the harder fights, since you can easily use them up and be left with nothing. --The passive skill tree, which has nothing to do with the gems/skills - Holy Gigantic Endless Interconnecting Honeycomb, Batman! It leaves an impression. I'm sure it'll change a lot but still...holy carp. Fascinating and nothing I've ever seen in a D-Clone. --not sure I like the skill gems. Interesting in theory and it works "well enough". I'm just not sure I like it, at least the way they've implemented it at the moment. --For me, the item system as a whole doesn't feel very long-term interesting or loot-hunt addictive since it's mostly so connected to the skill-gem socket thing. It's kinda interesting at first but meh...figuring out how you want to do the passive skill tree is, for me, more motivation to kill-grind than the items. So far. --melee targeting (especially close up) is rather terrible & feels sluggish. Most of the time I'm just flailing away at my feet hoping I'll hit something. It works/I've survived as a dual-wielding swordsman, but ranged targeting is definitely so much better/easier. --no gold is nice, even if the item barter amounts to sort of the same thing. It makes those ID scrolls & other small things worth something...and they don't drop a ton either. Means you don't fill up your limited backpack very rapidly & can stay out in the field a long long time if you want. On the other hand, it means you have little reason to even look at/pick up 98% of anything...let alone use a precious ID scroll to ID anything that isn't a rare with the exact sockets you want. Basically, if you like Diablo type games, you're likely to like this one for a spin or two, especially since it's free. It's graphically decent, has some interesting elements along with the same ol' same ol', and if you're unhappy with D3 (for whatever reasons) this could be a substitute for you. We'll see. Still early.

I have absolutely no idea how to get a friend-invite key...I assume one has to request one on the forum or some similar method, which I'd feel bad about doing until I played longer/posted a lot etc. If I get one I'll give it over. Edit: you posted while I was typing. hehe. Glad you're in then.

Looks sweet, thanks. Turns out some other online friends are all playing, I might be able to get a friend invite from one of them faster than the company deciding to choose me. We'll see/I'll hope!