Raithe

Sat down with a cup of tea and got sucked into a series of documentaries about the Space Race, Nasa's history, the original engineering and how they developed the tools that are currently being put to do all the new rockets and landers and wotnot.

Hm. Something kept waking me up through the night and into the early hours of the morning. I am therefore doing my zombie impression now that I am in fact, actually up and out of bed and stumbling around in some vague attempt to do things.

Is it? Maybe it's just in a medically induced coma? On a more serious note, it does seem to have faded from general awareness. Either they are keeping very low profile or it has just been forgotten by the "masses". Not sure who their target audience is these days, but other than the Neverwinter Online MMO, I haven't noticed anything video game related for a long while. Well as I threw out on the Weird News thread, DnD just had it's 40th Anniversary. The trouble is they did the big push with 4th Edition a couple of years ago, and kind of turned it into Tabletop WoW. Pathfinder swept in and pretty much gathered up the hordes of fans who disliked that, and now the new "DnD Next" edition is about to come out to see if they can get the fans back. So I'm guessing while they're struggling with that, they aren't going to get too hooked into computer licensing.

http://youtu.be/e07l5-ryOw0

Just for the general sesame street silliness.. http://youtu.be/-7jS7X-2ggA

Trying to develop something for work. But kind of circling around and around. So, I'm going to take a pause, have a cup of tea, and then catch a friend in a little bit who has absolutely no understanding of the work I do, whereupon I shall talk through it with them and see if I can explain it in any format that makes sense to them. If that works, I think it might settle some of it in my mind and allow me to progress along.

Been there, done that. Judge Dredd covered the illegal smuggling and sale of that white powder decades ago..

For the general "This is where we plan to go this year" news from Bruce Maclean

http://youtu.be/NcAEjvT-Ri8

Hm, idling along a little. Doing a bit of work related reading, took a momentary break to see what Mirror's Edge is like, then dabbled in a bit more reading. A friend wants me to help quiz them later on some Biochem stuff they're learning, trying to get the grades needed to get into Nursing school. Hm and an author's latest story is out on amazon in a few hours, I might have to keep an eye on that. First of all.. fresh tea. Possibly something for a lunchtime snack too.

For that Monday start up...

Tim Curry as Richelieu was quite entertainingly scene-chewy, along with Rebecca De Mornay's Countess for pretty background..

Dungeons and Dragons at 40 years old

Because most days I get dressed pretty soon as I get up, and don't jump into computer games for hour after hour..

I felt like not being an adult today. So I stayed in my pj's and darth sideous robe, had a cup of tea, a muffin, and played computer games.

If you ignore the fact that there were so many daddy issues going on, on a case by case basis the individual missions were pretty damn good in ME2. It's just the overarching game plot that it kind of fell apart. You got the slight teaser on that Dark Energy side of things, but that fell through when writers changed. That, and you needed a "bridger" dlc to translate from the end of ME2 to the start of ME3. As a whole, the trilogy had a lot more good, fun moments then bad. It just wasn't too logically consistent, and the finale just never matched up with the expectations that got built up (that and the initial go-round pretty much sucked). Forget the War Assets, forget the shoe-horned multi-player aspect, forget the daddy issues, forget the long elevator rides, forget the planet scanning.... You had a lot of very shiny moments in the three games. By the end of it, you pretty much can say you got your moneys worth out of buying them.

True, but he pretty much acted just like Shepard. Thought he had a purpose and an understanding of the problem no-one else did. Check. Thought the fate of humanity rested on his shoulders. Check. Had a vision of how to solve the situation. Check. Was willing to make the hard calls to get there. Check. Inspired loyalty in the majority of those who followed him. Check. Had no problem breaking the rules to achieve what he wanted. Check (even Paragon Shepard did that). Shepard just did it with a small crew. The Illusive Man did it with a whole organisation and one massive bank roll.

Hm, not sure why but the last half of this week I've been struggling to find my oomph, feeling quite flat, and keep having bouts of exhaustion kick in by early evening.

I wonder if the argument could be made that ME2 throws you into the middle of Cerberus to add a touch more oomph to it, so you can connect to it more then just the "Black Ops that went Rogue" in ME1, and provides a touch more depth for seeing how they lose their way (so to speak) in ME3 by thinking they can control the Reapers, and that's the way to defend humanity. Hm, if you look at it with a bit of squint..actually.. Shepard has a point of view and perspective on what the problem is and how it should be solved. The character is willing to do a whole heap of things to achieve those goals and what they're willing to sacrifice to get to the end. The Illusive Man is exactly the same. He has his perspective of what the problem is and how to solve it. He is Shepard, just one in a mastermind role with an organisation rather then a "lone" wolf with a small crew and single ship.

Hm, it was on weird news stories that it got put up..

Although the increase in electronics makes it a whole heap more difficult to self-repair. Case in point, my dad has a Golf GTI with a mildly modified engine that's got to be going for nearly 30 years old now. Every couple of months he has it up on the drive over a weekend as he has to fix something, but it still runs smoothly. Compared to my mother's Renault people carriers that's just a few years old, but whenever it has a problem it HAS to go to a dealer because there's always fancy electronics involved that you can't fix yourself.

Woke up with a headache. Pretty much stayed in bed most of the morning. Dragged myself out for a cup of tea and some aspirin times. Going to see what my brain kicks over as I try to sort out what I should spend the afternoon doing.

Sounds like a John Ringo book But Ringo normally puts in a fair chunk of humour with it.

Been reading through a few papers, trying to understand things a bit better. Poked at some work, and then my brain just shut down at some point this afternoon. I've been all "okay, I know what I should be doing, but suddenly none of it's making sense and I have no clue where to start." Now it's barely half eight and I'm already yawning for the Olympics. Need a cup of tea and find out where my va-va-voom went.

1) When I die, I want to die like my grandfather--who died peacefully in his sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in his car." --Author Unknown 2) Advice for the day: If you have a lot of tension and you get a headache, do what it says on the aspirin bottle: "Take two" and "Keep away from children." --Author Unknown 3) "Oh, you hate your job? Why didn't you say so? There's a support group for that. It's called EVERYBODY, and they meet at the bar." --Drew Carey 4) "The problem with the designated driver program, it's not a desirable job, but if you ever get sucked into doing it, have fun with it. At the end of the night, drop them off at the wrong house." --Jeff Foxworthy 5) "If a woman has to choose between catching a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will choose to save the infant's life without even considering if there is a man on base." --Dave Barry 6) "Relationships are hard. It's like a full time job, and we should treat it like one. If your boyfriend or girlfriend wants to leave you, they should give you two weeks' notice. There should be severance pay, and the day before they leave you, they should have to find you a temp." --Bob Ettinger 7) "My Mom said she learned how to swim when her parents took her out in the lake and threw her off the boat. I said, 'Mom, they weren't trying to teach you how to swim.'" --Paula Poundstone "A study in the Washington Post says that women have better verbal skills than men. I just want to say to the authors of that study: "Duh." --Conan O'Brien 9) "Why does Sea World have a seafood restaurant?? I'm halfway through my fish burger and I realize, Oh my God.... I could be eating a slow learner." --Lynda Montgomery 10) "I think I know how Chicago got started. Bunch of people in New York said, 'Gee, I'm enjoying the crime and the poverty, but it just isn't cold enough. Let's go west.'" --Richard Jeni 11) "If life were fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead." --Johnny Carson 12) "Sometimes I think war is God's way of teaching us geography." --Paul Rodriguez 13) "My parents didn't want to move to Florida , but they turned sixty and that's the law." --Jerry Seinfeld 14) "Remember in elementary school, you were told that in case of fire you have to line up quietly in a single file line from smallest to tallest. What is the logic in that? What, do tall people burn slower?" --Warren Hutcherson 15) "Bigamy is having one wife/husband too many. Monogamy is the same." --Oscar Wilde 16) "Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." --Mark Twain 17) "Our bombs are smarter than the average high school student! At least they can find Afghanistan ." --A. Whitney Brown 18) "You can say any foolish thing to a dog, and the dog will give you a look that says, 'My God, you're right! I never would've thought of that!'" --Dave Barry 19) Do you know why they call it "PMS"? Because "Mad Cow Disease" was taken. --Unknown, presumed deceased 20) "Everybody's got to believe in something. I believe I'll have another beer." -- W. C. Fields