Cantousent

I agree. mkreku wins. This time.

A lot of refugees is one thing. I'm sure there is a refugee problem. However, 300,000 killed would result in a hell of a lot more than 300,000 refugees. Furthermore, the bedlam and mayhem in the street would overshadow the sorts of the individual acts of violence that currently make the news. Currently, there are more iraqis fleeing that returning home according to several sources. Nevertheless, that does mean that a sizeable number of folks are returning home. Not exactly the same as refugees flooding across every border in numbers so large that the refugee problem overshadows the actual fighting. There is no widespread genocide occurring in Iraq. There is a lot of sectarian and ethnic violence. Sure. That's still quite different from what some folks suggest.

This shouldn't be a question. I fall squarely in the camp that believes that Iran will not escalate the issue. They'll try to leverage it so that it appears that they've managed to get the better of the western democracies. However, if Iran were to refuse to hand over the soldiers, then I'm sure the United Kingdom would be compelled to respond with increased diplomatic measures up to and possibly including military action. If Iran were to imprision the prisoners indefinitely or execute them, then the UK should take military action. It would be far more detrimental for the region and the world otherwise. People on this forum often wring their hands and rend their shirts and weeo about the danger of taking action. There are times when failure to respond with force is far more dangerous. There are a lot of ifs in the original assumption. If.

I took a day when I didn't have to drive on vacation to watch a movie. I walked around the lake, took pictures of various waterfowl, and then relaxed to a nice viewing of War of the Worlds. Since I was expecting it to be bad, I was pleasantly surprised. It wasn't a great film by any means, but it wasn't really so bad. I'd heard that it sucked.

Now I'm back in Las Vegas, but I will be returning to my actual residence tomorrow, from which I can recount the days in England. I will be most happy to list the good, the bad, and the ugly. Overall, I'm glad I went and, although there were things about the country that I found puzzling or even outright irritating, much of the worst in my trip came from other factors. For example, having a 12 year old with whom I was compelled to smack on a few occassions. My brother has raised a child who understands and respects only physical force. I am willing to use such force, but I despise it. So, unfortunately, the ugliest thing thing in my England escape was something I imported with me from the United States.

It's funny. There are folks protesting outside of the houses of Parliament right now. They apparently live there in tents and have these big signs that say "over 184,000 killed in Iraq" and other such things. Then you see this report. If you look around, you see a whole slew of reports, each with a different result, stating the numbers of deaths in Iraq. If the number isn't high enough, then folks start looking for conspiracy. That's partially a pointed comment at you, Colrom, but not a malicious one. The numbers we receive regarding deaths are certainly not completely accurate. That would be impossible. However, there are... what? Some 26-27 million Iraqis? If they'd lost one percent of their population, there would be a serious refugee propblem at the borders. It would overshadow the actual indiviual acts of violence within the country. Hell, we're not even talking about the entire country. The most serious violence seems to occure within the central region of the country. We're used to thinking of numbers as mere statistics, but one percent is a huge chunk of people. Some of the unofficial reports I've seen have been completely ridiculous. As bad as Iraq is, if we had excess of one percent of the population killed in a country that size, there would be absolute mayhem. Not only that, but we're not even talking the population of Iraq, we're talking the population of certain key cities in one region of the country. After 5 percent of the population dies in a big city, a much larger percentage decides it's time to get the hell out of Dodge. The streets are congested and a constant stream of refugees clogs the road. So, when I see reports of hundreds of thousands killed, sometimes coming close to 1.5 percent of the population of the entire country, I completely discard them.

Paid ₤15 for 24 hours of internet access. Since I've already dropped the cash, I figured I'd make a quick update. Met with meta in Cambridge. It was quite fun. I told my wife to look for a nice looking Australian about SO high with blue eyes. She said, "oh, that will help." meta brought a friend and apparently told her to look for a tall American. haha Anyhow, I've become quite enthralled with London and I loved the Lake district. However, my crazy sister wanted to do so much I spent most of my time driving. I drove some 2400 miles since we landed in London. I'll give the full report when I return stateside.

Yes, thanks to my sister's overwhelming desire to see everything possible in less than three weeks, I've driven over 1300 miles in the past six days. Fun, huh? I'm supposed to meet a certain bloke, who shall remain nameless, in Cambridge today. That will be quite the experience, to be sure. Before you're too jealous, meta doesn't drink alcoholic beverages, so it's coffee or tea today. I think tea, as that's what I drink most at home. Iced tea? They look at me like I'm stark raving mad when I ask for it here. Luckily for me, tea, hot or cold, is my drink o' choice. I don't have time to include tons of pictures, but I wanted to put a couple in here. Dover, at the AA gun with my nephew: This is a photo of the my librarian sister in Stratford upon Avon: My sister has been here a few times, and my brother spends a few months in Britain and France every year, but this is my first time. There is a lot of the good, the bad, and the ugly on this trip. Overall, however, I'm very happy I came. It is something every American should do at least once. My nephew, who is a complete brat, keeps asking why things here are so important and acting foolish. When we came out of the Magna Carta exhibit, he asked why we had to go there since it wasn't American. I am a patriot. I have no intention of comparing my country unfavorably with England. Fairly, yes, which means some things here strike my as certainly more sensible. Some things, far less so. Still, I had to explain to my nephew that the Magna Carta was as much American history as anything we have in our country. The document, attacked so often as fake democracy, proves it's importance by the very debate. It transcends nationality. We, who are not English, should venerate the document as much as any born here. Anyhow, the full report will wait until later.

Hallo from England. I wanted to show pictures and everything, but my damnable laptop wireless has not been working for a long time and I don't have a cabled connection here. I will have to wait until I have a better connection to share photos.

I never get that angry with folks like that. On the rare exception, I'm not talking to the employee anymore. I'm talking to the boss. Still, he was just a yutz. That's just how it is. Some folks are like that. The next time I went into the store, I would probably ignore the guy. Maybe, just maybe, I might mention it to him when the prices drop on 360 games. Even then, I'd probably not even mention it. In fact, I'd likely avoid the subject altogether because I know, having been that yutz once or twice in my life, he's feeling pretty damned stupid for acting how he did in the first place. Of course, I usually try charm first thing, so we'd probably have been laughing over the game industry and the nature of consoles. :Cant's tongue in cheek grin icon: Oh, and EB and Gamestop are not only overpriced, but often unfriendly. I almost always order online. The internet is NEVER rude to me. hahahahaha

Between passports, packing, and federal regulations, I'm wondering why the hell I bothered. What a pain in the ass. Of course, I say that now, but I'm sure I'll be happy when I get there.

I'm edging a little closer to the 360 and I'm almost entirely out of the PS3 camp at this time. However, I'm definitely picking up a wii. Not because I want one, but I'm going to give one to my sister. I'll play it at her house. Condemned and Mass Effect look totally awesome and tubular. If I could figure out the sluggish console controls, I would probably play fpses on the 360 as well. I liked the first two call of duty games.

There's a low level frost talent that actually helps your fire and frost spells. Not by much, but some. I like teaming with cross talent folks. I like teaming with mages, also. I don't like taking the heat, but turning three of the enemy into sheep makes it a lot easier to take out the fourth guy.

That's the Slow spell. It's a spell taken from the end of the arcane talent tree. It's pretty lackluster, but I took it anyhow. I put my points into arcane for the other nifty talents, not for Slow. ....But there it is. I use it sometimes. It causes everything to slow down by half. Spell casting. attacks. Movement. etc. I think the best end talent for mages is in the frost tree. Summoning a frost elemental to defend you is great. Fire is the most popular and probably the best for outright damage. I'm happy with arcane, however. If anything, I'd keep everything else, ditch slow, and either reduce my blink casting cost or put the points into low level fire or frost talents. Now that I've save the money for my swift mount, I might just start buying better equipment, although I'm pretty happy with what I have now. This is my highest level character, so I've been sending money to my lower levels and guildmates, but now it's time to start being a little greedy for myself.

Hey, Aredne didn't realize it was a table. She thought it was some sort of weird human sacrifice altar of the draenai.

You've reached into your bag o' tricks and that's the best you could do? pathetic. You'd be better off citing the Spanish troubles with honest to goodness home-brewed terrorism. ...but the fact that we have nothing in our country that even remotely resembles the sectarian violence in Iraq in either straight numbers or as a percentage of the population. You live in a country that shields your right to spit out this sort of ridiculous vitriol. Give me a break. "I'm fairly certain that in most countries that have such deep devides you'd find the same thing, not just between Shiites and Sunnis, but between catholics, WASP's, Flying spagettii monsterarians, british Jedi, Jews, neo-nazis..." Hell, why didn't you cite the Oklahoma City bombing. It would still be ridiculously stupid on its face, but at least it would be a snappier, clever argument. Oh, liberals don't use clever and underhanded arguments. Merely nuanced.

Aredne in Ironforge, once again at the accursed Auction House, which I truly loathe. Aredne in Stormwind, watching the bridge. Aredne taking her horse for a boatride in Darnassus. Aredne gawking at the Draenai freaks in the Exodar.

Yes, I usually book these vacations a year in advance, if possible. It saves a lot of heartache and grief for me. Also, I've established that my laptop will work just fine at 240v. I don't know if I'll see Stonehenge, but I might. It depends on what everyone else wants to see.

actually this has some merit, the moment we can find some other group of people who are not part of our earthy society to hate is the moment we will unite to fight the suckers tooth and nail for anything they have. Otherwise it's a pipe dream. No. In truth, some of us would still conive against the rest.

That ammo thing is for lazy people, like myself.

I'm going to shoot him off a PM tonight on just that issue. He might run for cover, but I'd like to see the guy again. I still remember his words to me when I first met him. "Can't you Americans make a decent F***ing cup of coffee?" hahaha Oh, most of the pictures will be me hamming it in front of some sort of landscape, building, or park. I'm taking my sister, my wife, and my nephew with me. I don't think Spearamint Rhino is in the work. Finally, I bought an adapter today. It's not a converter. My power input for my laptop says it takes 100-240v. Will that work with my laptop? I'd rather not fry it.

My passport arrived. My Tickets are waiting for me. My hotel stays are all aranged. In three more days, I'll be on my way to merry old England. I just hope that the terrorists don't think I'm an important enough target to try to bring down my particular plane. :Cant's looking over his shoulder for suspicious characters icon: I'll be staying in London for a few days, then to Rutland and finally up to the Lake District. I think, while I'm up there, I'll go to Hadrian's wall and Scotland. I'd really like to go to Wales, but I don't think it's in the cards this time around. There's just too much to see close to our locations to drive that far just so I can say I've been there. It wouldn't be an issue at all except one of my favorite series takes place, in part, in Wales. We also purchased free pass cards for our stay. Most of the time while I'm on vacation, I let my wife and other guests decide where we go. I, on the other hand, decide how we're going to get there and the basic itinerary. That just basically means that I have to figure out how to accomodate everyone's desires. Same with this trip. However, I would like to see the British museum and library. I'd really like to visit the Elgin Marbles. It's a big tourist attraction in England and a sore spot with the Greeks. I've never been to England, but my sister has been a few times and my brother travels in the region frequently for business, logging probably a couple months all tolled between Wales, England, and France every year. So, with all that, if there's any place important to see while I'm up there, let me know. This trip has been long in the planning, like most of my vacations. It involves four of us, my wife, my sister, my nephew, and myself. That's fairly common also. My nephew is eleven, so I hope the experience is good for him. EDIT: ...And, be warned, there will be pictures.

Might have enjoyed it on the computer. As it was, I played it on my xbox and I can never get the hang of FPSes on my xbox. The controls are clunky.

I wonder if we can play harlequins. If so, you will have the distinction of being under the heel of a "faggy" looking Eldar. Otherwise, you'll just be brought under the heel of an Eldar.

I'm an idealist. Gorgon is a conspiracy theorist. Please don't interchange the two.