taks

i have to agree with nearly every point mkreku has made, btw, though toee didn't come across as awful to me right away. once it became awful, however, it stayed that way and i've never been able to play it since. taks

not sure where you got that... i finished most that i've played. all the bgs and expansions (multiple, like 20, times), hotu and sou (as noted) plus half a dozen mods for NWN1, NWN2 and MotB as well as at least one mod (started several that i'm planning to finish), several of the ultimas before the "flying C64" incident, most of the might and magics (except the one i got stuck on), one of the wizardry games (don't remember which one), all three of the bard's tales, all the icewind dales and expansions (multiple times), all of the original gold box/D&D games on a C64 and probably 20 others that i can't even remember (i was playing crpgs before many of you were born). just 'cause i don't play the ones you like doesn't mean anything. taks

good news indeed, architect! i have had two friends die of lung cancer in the last few years and another just got done with breast cancer chemo. it is a hateful disease. the only steakhouse i've eaten at in the DC area that i've liked was capitol grill, which was outstanding. it's a chain i think, but a small chain not unlike ruths chris (which is outstanding as well). of course, my wife and i are trying hard to keep referring to each other as husband and wife (rather than b**** and a******). maybe we got too used to it... dunno, it hasn't been pretty. taks

he had his stroke a few months before his "resignation" in march of 2006 (episode aired in november, 2005), so he was basically done as the chef anyway. he wasn't really the one that resigned, either. his scientology buddies resigned for him, though they had put him under considerable pressure to do so from the time the episode aired until they actually did the deed. taks

i'm doing my damnedest to stay away from magazines in general. i've cut back to only the journals i get from the IEEE, and even they send me too much. i can't imagine what would happen if i signed up for any gaming mags (and i don't care to buy them in the stores). 99% of my reviews come from either in here, or from ve3d. very naive, STB, since reviews often come out within a day or so of the reviewer getting the title. in other words, not enough time to progress all the way through the game (well, most of them at least). taks

oooh, let's not relive that horror again. much worse than the noodle incident. taks

hehe, i laughed out loud at this one. not sure where i heard the same about G2, so i have to be careful where i get my advice these days. i have come to the conclusion, btw, that any game requiring mad skillz on the player's part is not worth owning. for the same reason i do not play FPS games. taks

you must have one of them time travel thingies, eh? yeah, he'll be missed. based on what i've read, he wasn't up to the task of continuing as chef after his stroke anyway, so we probably got all the chef we would have gotten. too bad. i have not watched anything lately, either. taks

oh, crap, so boring i forgot to add: the morrowind doesn't blow, it sucks. oh wait, it blows, too. bored into oblivion as well. oh my was the leveling system retarded. sorry to the fanbois, but i can't get into a game that requires 3rd party mods to be interesting. i paid for the freaking game to be somewhat worthwhile standalone. gothic 1: combat was awesome. not. gothic 2: better combat, still couldn't bring myself to finish. taks

hehe, in my uber cheat game that i just finished, minsc got a critical on him almost immediately and he dropped after only a few swings. i had the rest of my team focusing on the mage dude without even recording a scratch and suddenly "sarevok has died!" (or something similar) appeared on the screen. so then i installed BG2 to continue the saga. actually, that's one of the things i did hate about the BGs, btw: the random number generator is borked and to-hit rolls are very streaky. the difficulty of many fights is not dependent so much upon character ability, rather, it just depends upon which "streak" you get into. a 3-4-4-6-2-7 streak and it's all over... 16-17-15-18-20-20 and sarevok drops in 6 rounds. oh well. my list: NWN1: started it probably half a dozen times, just can't get past the boredom. i think i made it to the last fight once but i had jettisoned my henchman (the uthgart barbarian dude) and, as a mage, i couldn't even scratch the end-boss. i did finish both shadows of underwear and hordes of tiny underwear, however. ToEE: hehe, kewl combat ain't enough to redeem this steaming pile. arcanum: see ToEE, but without the kewl combat. maybe i just "don't get" troika's "vision?" KOTOR1 and 2: i can't stand the mechanics for some reason. started 1 and stopped within a couple hours, never to try again. FO1 and 2: sorry to all the fanbois, but these games simply bored me. planescape: yeah, bored again. PoRII: ouch. sucktitude. Ultima 8: super mario ultima. Ultima 9: as if things couldn't get any worse. there are probably some others that rank so low on my list that i don't even remember having them in my stock-pile. this of course, makes it difficult to report on whether or not i finished them. there are also some C64 games i never finished, but mostly because my C64 bought the farm when my dad launched it across the basement. U7 for one, which i actually really liked (can't get into the PC version anymore) and even one of the early might and magic games (got stuck somewhere, laid off for a while, and then the flying C64 thing happened...). taks

they shipped my degree yesterday. it's not as impressive as the ones i got from UMR. still, i have it in hand now. taks

you should marry my wife. oh wait, that would require... ahem. taks

well put. i agree, too, that there aren't any easy answers. i certainly don't have any and this question has been asked of many far wiser than me for thousands of years, without a result that is a whole lot different than what we have today. taks

or 300... exactly the examples of "artistic license" i was thinking of. of course, stone was trying to make a statement with JFK since it is relevant to our times (oddly, still relevant 45 years later). taks

it's not so much about the pain, it's about reliving the pain over and over. it is not healthy to do this. taks

i didn't like ToB, either, sammael. at least, it didn't measure up to my expectations for the finale nor was it as good as the three preceding games (BG, ToSC, BGII). oh, i suppose you do still poke your head in here occasionally, eh? taks

i think you missed my point. these are two different moral positions no matter how you want to slice it. you're applying YOUR moral standards to the situation, and judging pro-lifers as hypocritical based on YOUR moral stance (in which you have equated the two things), not theirs. there is no hypocrisy if the pro-lifers simply separate the two things morally, which is their right. just because they have different morals than you does not change this. taks

last time i checked was when XP64 came out so my data is obviously outdated. taks

i need to get firefox back onto this machine (at home). i prefer it to the evil that is IE. taks

burn 'em. burn it all. if you are no longer with her, nor have hope of ever being with her again, it is not worth dredging up old memories. if you can't do it, then you haven't let go and this could be the step you need to take to get over her. either way, you'll feel better afterwards. tested that, and it works. not sure about my old girlfriends... of course, more often than not they were booting me to the curb (i am a pain, you know). yeah, samm, i agree. the reason my physician had me go through all this is because it all started the same time as the anxiety. well, 6 weeks after the first attack, but the stomach issues triggered the second attack, which resulted in a 9 month stint on zoloft (for which i have 6 months to go). it seemed the right thing to do (getting all the tests) when the endoscopy came back negative for h. pylori, particularly since the alternative was some sort of cancer or any one of a myriad abdominal problems that are much worse than an ulcer. hindsight, however, says otherwise, since every other test i've had says i'm normal (ha!). this is particularly true now that i've done more research and have educated myself on what could cause a false positive (taking PPIs is what). taks

i wouldn't recommend a 64-bit OS yet since driver support is likely still pretty crappy. most processors have been 64-bit to some extent for quite a long time (floating point units, intel actually used an 80-bit or something), so in answer, yes, you can use 32-bit OS on 64-bit hardware. taks

i don't think there are many true pro-lifers that see things this way (which is different than the "activists," IMO), but you're confusing moralities here. in one case the subject made a choice, in the other the subject was incapable of making a choice. apples and oranges. right or wrong is not my point, and quite immaterial as well. taks

if so, how's that tax thing going? taks

"10-ish," i believe is the word you're looking for. yeah, SteveThaiBinh, i've heard that... by itself it's just under U7 in coolness, but the two combined together makes for a great experience (and a long one). quite frankly, as much as i loved U7, i never actually finished it. my C64 bellied up before i got done (dad launched it across the basement... tends to be bad) and i went away to college. i didn't play any more games till i got my first PC in 1993 or so, then i got U8 which was, well, terrible. i stayed away from games, again, till BG came out. taks

i can't put mine in order, but i must say that i've played BG and BGII more than any other games, ever (or ever will). i'm still playing, too, which is why i often jab MC about his addiction (we share the same fate and all). anyway, the above, plus (in no particular order, and collectively there are more than 10): tales of the unknown, volume I: the bard's tale the bard's tale II: destiny knight ultima 7 (never played serpent's isle, btw) icewind dale I (i don't share the same love for II, though i enjoyed it) might and magic 1 and 2 (series up through 6 or 7 was good, i can't remember when it got ugly) NWN2 and NWN2:MoTB NWN1: HoTU (the OC was excruciating and i've never actually finished it) i can't rank the older games since they were all played in the mid 80s, which was over 20 years ago. i could probably add some of the gold box games, too, and i'd never be able to sort out which of all the old games i prefer since i cannot remember them all. i played the BT games and first several M&M games on a C64 with my brothers when i was a stoner in high school. we would stay up all night till school time the next morning. these games were my introduction to computer gaming, which was started by my best friend at the time (he died in a car accident in 1989). i would probably say that i don't remember the games as much as i do the experiences with my brothers and my friend. taks