taks

we watched the hulk last night. wow. incredibly entertaining movie. i was really impressed. one question: is stark's appearance in the end before or after he becomes iron man? i've seen iron man as well, and his "ethic" (for lack of a better word) after becoming iron man seems at odds with general ross from the hulk, yet he talks about "putting together a team." as i recall, the hulk movie came out first, but i don't know the actual marvel comics timeline involved. taks

bummer, GD. given your upper-level status in the telecom industry, you may want to check out the GLG (Gerson Lehrman Group). my buddy recently ended a 17 year career with VZW (his choice) and signed up there. he doesn't consult with them a lot, only a few calls per week, but rates are on the order of $300/hour. even an hour or two a week can help while you're searching. taks

snowing heavily here at the office during what was supposed to be a light a.m. snow shower. big fluffy flakes, probably 30:1 ratio, i.e., very dry snow. usually early december snows are a little heavier, but it is unusually cold, too (16 F now, with expected high just revised down to 19). i'm probably going to head home early to avoid the end of the day rush when all the idiots that went to work in rear-wheel drive cars with bald tires are sliding around hitting each other. oh, today i also booked my xmas trip to crested butte. we're going to ski two days and play around town on the last day. we arrive xmas evening. the squirt is in ski school and we're doing a sleigh ride/dinner saturday evening. ski season officially starts this sunday for us, too, as we're heading to monarch. taks

are you being daft on purpose or do you really not understand capitalism? now you're arguing a strawman. i never said it would. what it will do is reduce the cost of health care in general, allowing other alternatives. so, exactly what are they teaching you people in school? "yay socialism"? you've all been blinded by the media on this issue for so long you think their socialist mantra is true. do yourselves a favor: read ludwig von mises, or if you'd like something a bit more palatable, milton friedman. taks

oddly, zoloft really didn't make a difference with my mood or emotions, at least not that i noticed. what it did was calm my nerves, but it left me feeling odd. i can't explain it. i didn't like it, and it certainly impacted my drive as well as my creativity. so yes, it was a sort of "am i stuck because of the chemicals, or because i'm stuck." well, i'm solving stuff again, so i'm convinced was stuck because of the chemicals. taks edit: oh, it's not that i keep "trying" his sig, i keep hitting it on accident. i gripe about it every once in a while just because...

yeah, you can read the internet and make valid judgements about the quality of healthcare in the US, particularly compared to a place like cuba (hint: michael moore's film was as much propaganda as the information cuba releases on the subject). tell me, do you take yourself seriously? taks

clicked on gfted1's signature... again. i'm beginning to wonder how the medical profession can claim that SSRIs are not addictive when there are such significant withdrawal symptoms that last as long as they do. baffled i am. i had an easier time quitting cigarettes. taks

hate it back... works for me. ahem. the ringing in my ears is beginning to drive me buggy. can't wait for the damned zoloft to be totally out of my system and things back to normal. i've heard it takes a few months for all the adverse side effects to wear off, however. yay... taks

hey, i don't practice atheism only once a week. it is a daily, hourly, by the second belief that i firmly uphold. is that beautiful, too? btw, it is somewhat important what we think in the west (actually, outside of islamic centers) because you can never hope to combat an enemy you do not understand. that said, we spend far to much time harping on "islamic terrorists" when in fact, it is "radical islamic terrorists" that are distorting the koran to their warped belief system. radical factions do this with the bible as well. i agree that the islamacists should be campaigning against radicalism. taks

and you know this how sitting in australia? there's a reason people come from around the world to get serviced here in the US. no, what needs to be reformed is the government needs to get out of trying to control the health costs with all of these ridiculous regulations and allow the free-market to actually work the way it always works, which will ultimately reduce health care costs for everyone, thus dropping the cost of insurance as well. we also need to get out of this notion that every little thing needs to be "covered" by someone else and realize that sometimes you simply have to pay. and, btw, for most, health insurance is NOT expensive, contrary to popular opinion. it's the people with various exclusionary diseases (such as diabetes, which my wife has), that cannot afford insurance. taks

yes, but immaterial to my larger point. when it comes down to it, he'll be forced to side with the republicans on issues that actually matter. the few that you mention he's always been in favor of, so it is no surprise. the immigration one is actually necessary anyway, the corruption one is, well, solvable in only one way, and healthcare we simply can't afford (nor should we try, but that's not the point). meshugger: franken was on SNL back in the early days with, IIRC, "the franken and davis show" or something like that. quite frankly, i didn't find him funny then. taks edit: i should add, healthcare does not need reform in the US. it is still probably the best in the world or close to it. health insurance is really what is meant when they talk about "reform." of course, there's only one way to solve that problem, too, but actually implementing what we say we implement isn't politically correct.

it's got nothing to do with taking potshots at the other sides' fallacies, i do that as well, to all sides. franken is just plain hateful. taks

that's what he said while he was running. now that it's this close, pressure will be on to conform to his party. either way, "corruption reform" is immaterial, immigration reform won't go over with voters, and, as the dems learned in '94, healthcare reform may be a priority, but not if it requires tax increases. they're all drinking the socialist kool-aide in one form or another, IMO. i just don't want it to go overboard near term. i'm more concerned with the unconstitutional "fairness doctrine," union check card nonsense (or whatever they call it), and obama's absolutely unconstitutional desire to make it the US mission to wipe out poverty abroad. neither he, nor congress, have the right to give taxpayer money away as blatantly as he wants to do it. given obama's largely clinton-based appointees, i wouldn't be surprised if he ends up another poll-driven president anyway, which means he won't be able to chase after his otherwise socialist dreams. franken, btw, is about as full of hate as is possible. i can't imagine how much of a dolt coleman must have been to allow someone like franken to tie an incumbent. taks

exaaaactly. pnp isn't about a rules implementation, it's about a group of friends sitting down every week or so and living out a fantasy adventure of some sort in person. taks

crpgs can't feel like pnp, no matter what edition of D&D you use, turn-based or otherwise. that was my point, 4e is a step in the direction of making pnp feel like a crpg. taks

not that i otherwise care about a republican winning a seat in the senate, but chambliss did just prevent a democratic supermajority, which i do care about. 60-40 with 70% reporting. i thought it was closer than that in the first election. guess i wasn't watching closely enough. taks

actually, that's the one thing that might make D&D more appropriate for crpgs. previous editions were PnP, which does not seem to translate well to the computer, and hence we end up with the strange bastardization that everyone manages to find something wrong with. taks

no. seriously though, i think someone in atari said to the bosses "another BG would really bind MC's panties, let's go for it!" the bosses all nodded in agreement. a classic conspiratorial approach designed to maximize MC grief. i've seen it before. taks

we already have a pope. he posts regularly. today i returned to work after being off since tuesday of last week. had a good trip to st. louis and hung out with my family the entire time. my brothers and i even managed to tie a good one on friday night, most of which i no longer remember. suffice it to say, saturday was a baaaad hangover, made worse by the now lack of zoloft in my system. yeah, quitting that, too, and suffering some apparently common withdrawal symtoms (tinnitus and muscle aches for starters). oh well, i'm now drug free except for the occasional zantac, infrequent xanax, and daily tums. taks

ah yes, but that hardly amounts to assassinations... attempts are frequent, yes, but not successes. taks

i may be wrong but i was under the impression that experience per character is based upon the CR of the encounter and there is no "split" per se. more people in your party changes the CR i think, so you may get less per character. works out similar, i guess, but the mechanism is different. a dev could answer that better. all NPCs do level at the same rate in the OC, so when you drag one in after you've leveled, you'll be notified that they've earned enough experience to go up. they don't take any of the actual experience, they just end up with the same as your party, nor do they count against the CR if they aren't with you. this is not so in MoTB, or at least, not exactly. NPCs may keep earning experience, but they' don't necessarily have the same amount as the PC or each other. taks

had noodles for lunch today, as a matter of fact. my son had the wisconsin mac and cheese (three different cheeses with cream) and i had the thai curry noodles with shrimp and a cucumber tomato salad with red onions on top. very good. no ramen pot attached, and there was no discussion of video cards, either. taks

yeah, there's a feel about it that i can't place. not IWD/IWDII as everyone seems to want to compare. the only similarity there is that you build your own party. there is narrative, but just not the long drawn out crap like in NWN2/MOTB. mind you, it fit well in those two games as far as i'm concerned, but it got a bit tedious at points. the striking part about this game is that i have a sort of goal, and a sort of direction, but overall, i'm lost. maybe it gets linear as i get into the plot (haven't played much yet), but really, at the moment it has a feel like "you're on your own, have at it." another thing: in this game, i'm actually concerned about death. not that the battles are so tough, but they happen often enough without chance for rest, and require sufficient tactics to prevent someone from going down. i went down in a cave recently because i didn't find a trap, and got webbed, then killed by baddies. apparently you MUST STAND STILL TO SEARCH FOR TRAPS! wow, novel concept. anyway, getting past an area is more fulfilling when the risk is greater (playing hardcore D&D rules, btw). taks

unfortunately, i'm not going to be able to play again till sunday night. tonight is pool night which means i arrive at the house tired and buzzed, and playing is difficult (i sit back far enough from my monitor that i have to strain to read when i'm buzzed). tomorrow is a single's qualifier board for the local APA pool league and i intend to be there. there's also a charity tournament i'll get into, and just about everyone of my friends from the league will be there... all the people that i drink with. soooo, i'll arrive home tired and buzzed again tomorrow night, too. too much drinking to play, in other words! taks

don't need to last... at least, only need to last long enough to piss off your ex. my suggestion: drink heavily. i am a follower of homer... alcohol, the cause of and solution to most of life's problems. taks