Walsingham

Yeah, I just had to walk home from the office and grab a copy of my dissertation, since I'm actually working a case on one of my specialties and can't remember what I've written about this thing. :D You have that thing where you read something you wrote years ago and think "Why the hell don't I write that well any more?"

I'm betting daughter. Look at the ears.

Wholewheat toast, butter, and homemade grapefruit marmalade for breakfast. I use butter because it makes me feel full till lunch, unlike margarine, which leaves me hungry again in about half an hour. Spaghetti carbonara (no cream) later, I think. Have good bacon, eggs, and garlic.

Nothing compares with a room full of books, at least reference wise. Actually, this is blatantly not true, since you can search for terms in an electronic reference. But you know what I mean. Coincidentally I'm cleaning out my library today. It's been filled up with absolute crap over the last year.

If only my ancestors had known they could gloss over racism with a meme .jpg, just think of all the trouble that could have been avoided.

"Westlings"? Western weaklings. Oh, I see, a portmanteau. Very teenage Russian girl.

I thought you were referring to Martin's ability to kill any character and thus upset Wile E. Coyote...

More horror films need comedy immigrant eldsters. And by 'more' I mean 'all'. EDIT: "Concern? Passion? ...Angst? Ennui? Gas?" LOL

Clingfilm over the shelves. (a.k.a. saran wrap)

There has to be some way to get this into a baby's mobile thing, from Fisher Price.

"Westlings"? ~ EDIT: More to the point, what kind of 'analyst' thinks we should "quarantine" the Mideast? Good luck with that, genius.

For God's sake. Even I know you dust, polish, then vacuum. The polish stops the dust settling.

It's a unique game, certainly. Nothing comes close to forcing [me] to play without fear, like that game. If you are afraid you will die. If you are pure righteous fury then you are fine.

I think it would be better if the player had nine aspects of themselves. When they died in game they lost an aspect. This would remove certain aspects of visual design, and certain game mechanics. So, for example, remove compassion, and you lose certain dialogue options. People look uglier etc. etc. [less symmetry] On the upside, the aspects you had remaining would become more powerful. And accentuate key design components. In this way dying would become a part of shaping your character, and power gaming would encruditise [definitely a word] the game-playing experience.

I'd have gone for a Devil May Cry/Bayonetta-style game that featured the Harlequins. Now here's a man thinking with his imagination. Much as I hate to admit it, console gamers would wet themselves if you could get the fluidity of the eldar into a game.

I managed to reinitialise Fallout 3 GOTY edition, so that I can get all the DLC despite GFW Live's best efforts to stop me. There is a great deal to be said for putting on a home made compilation of wild west songs, and ignoring the cheesy main plot almost entirely. Just saddle up, stick to fists and the odd scrounged rifle or 'nade. Stride out and explore. Yippee kay ay.

Sad how often Hollywood feels it needs to define America by punching someone in the face.* I wonder if you could pitch a movie that basically encapsulated all the parts of the Constitution? You know, with plot points on freedom of speech, abolition of slavery etc. etc. With explosions. And at least one visit to a strip club. *As opposed to British movies which define the nation using slow establishing shots of derelict housing and scrotey barefoot children

Black pudding and apple, with mashed potato. I have a bottle of cold ale somewhere hereabouts to go with.

Two words: long walk.

I like to think my irresponsible last minute all-nighters at 'school' are the reason I can handle impossible deadlines for work.

I hope I'm not doing him too great an injustice if I hypothesise he got peons to research massive chunks of material and then he just loosely stitched them together. Fair play to the guy he's sold a lot of books. I just don't see the point of all the technical detail without any counter-intuitive surprises, or worked through consequences. By way of contrast, Harry Turtledove has wins for the good guys in his alternate histories, but they aren't easy, and they aren't cheap, and they don't always win.

Probably horse liver.

I think you must be careful when comparing evils. I don't think there's any serious doubt that Assad's regime has done some literally (at least for this forum) unspeakable things to stay in power. I would also encourage you chaps to read up on England's 'glorious revolution' of 1688. As I'm doing at the moment. We had a savage civil war, ending with a bunch of religious nutters in power then. Then came the 'restoration' and within a relatively short space of time England was not only a monarchy again, but so unpoliticised and peaceful it was almost unrecognisable. [i'm chiefly referring to Simon Schama here, but supported by a bunch of stuff from the perspective of the evolution of the British Army]

I went off Clancy after Red Storm Rising. He sometimes covers interesting areas, but then he just 'Dr Who' waves a wand and makes the 'good guys' win every time.

As I said, the country might need economic investment, but the regime just needs to retain control. Impoverishment positively aids that, unless and until some external factor intervenes. EDIT: To clarify a little, I don't believe this is what Mugabe et al. sit around telling themselves. I expect they see themselves as the true believers, resisting foreign domination. their absolute control equates to Zimbabwean freedom, national freedom trumps the prosperity of people they never meet. I point this out by way of observing that any rule can be taken too far. Our own masters in the UK are so keen on economic prosperity that they will sacrifice just about any independence we've accrued.