The Gamers Again

The Gamers 2: Dorkness Rising is now available on YouTube! (Sequel to The Gamers.) This time with a special effects budget! Although having it on DVD would be far better (as the continue ad reminds you). This is Part One, with Part Two to Part Eleven in the follow on links.

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Ladies and gentlesmen, presenting...

The Tube!

Just this morning I was gazing at my tube of toothpaste and thinking what a marvellous invention it was. It's a simple carrying and dispensing device that's elegant in design, keeps the contents isolated from the air (presuming we remember to put the cap on properly) and remains effective (as a device) for its lifespan.

How many things come in tubes? Toothpaste, gel, glue, foodstuffs, paint... a myriad of options, one delivery system.

It's not something we consider, and yet it's an amazing object when you do...

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Give me $10!

Have you ever given someone money? If so, you may have been scammed! Or maybe you're a nice person who gave money to a charity... but even then, some of those can get a little dodgy...

But, anyway, this week is the Fraud Awareness Week!

Now, there is a difference between getting defrauded and just dealing with people who screw things up. Definitely interacted with the latter, but have not been defrauded myself (as far as I am aware). Although that's the best kind of scam, the one where you aren't even aware you were scammed.

There are plenty of people who think they can't get hit. Don't click on emails, don't want to get involved with Nigerian princes, don't buy fake doctorates, don't get into get-rich-quick schemes run by people who are very, very friendly... But anyone can get scammed if they aren't thinking properly (eg. check out this insider's look at Ponzi schemes by an expert on human gullibility who not only just wrote a book on the subject, but with considerable irony just lost a good chunk of his retirement savings in the Madoff Ponzi scheme).

The point of the week is one message: Scams Target You – Protect Yourself.

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The Chronicles of Risan: Part the Twenty-Sixth

We step through the portal and... we are in a place, not of sight, or of sound, but of mind... we are in... the Void! Strangely enough, there are platforms here, connected by spider infested webbing. And creatures, of course.

Some of them have this nasty ability that they can just look at you, and you die. Happened to Reed (the Halfling paladin) and myself. With the Warlord, that is the three of us involved in this fight, we left the Dwarf and Swordmage behind because... eh, we don't like them. Although I expect they'll turn up anyway.

But in the mean time, there's these things, with other things, and that thing over there that can shoot us from a long way away... and the female drow that escaped and went out through another door. Interesting note: this void is such that if you fall off the bridge, you land back where you came from. Neat trick. As we had already been fighting, we were already in bad shape, and this fight really bet the snot out of us. At one point we considered giving us, but rallied ourselves and eventually got on top of this.

Annoyingly, when we got to the last creature, a devil, it surrendered rather than let us kill it. Huh. It did tell us that through the next portal was the Deathhold (or something), a subplane of the Shadowfell (where my lady the Raven Queen holds domain, although Orcus is staging his own battle). It is immediately guarded by the Keeper, who seeks knowledge. Unfortunately, that's not really my forte, but I was able to help the others talk him around. He decided to let us go, in return we had to destroy the Nightbringer (uber-sword of evil that everyone wanted). I'm good with that.

All that lay between us and the city with vampire drow lord was a desert. A long hard trek, with birds and ghouls and... really not something we wanted to face, still ready to drop as we hadn't rested. After getting through the last of the sand, we holed up and set down for a while. The city would have to wait...

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HC Again

Once more unto the breach, this time getting into something that quickly devolves into political machinations and... I have no idea what, as there was a lot of motivations and stuff that was hidden, as the main NPC that could have told us stuff said nothing. We do "succeed" in a way, but some things are explained differently as the person on Thursday did it differently. (And answers one question we had about who did the ending...) Nailed Redoux: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8.

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Wee TV

Something that has often been obvious with computers is to get TV on the computer (and then rip the program or something). I got a WinTV tuner thingy, so now I can view TV in a tiny screen on the computer laptop as opposed to watching it on the 42" plasma... (main reason I went for it was because it was cool... I mean, because Saturn doesn't get Freeview channels 6 and 7).

Once the device is plugged in and some software is accessing it, the big challenge is... does it actually pick up anything? The "scan channel" button is pressed and time passes...

The device comes with a dinky wee aerial. As with anything described by the word "dinky", it inevitably isn't worth a damn, and indeed nothing is scanned. Great, are we back to the bunny aerials already?

However, I do have some kind of external aerial coming into my place (which I ignored in favour of a digital link), so dug that out, hooked it up, and waited... and waited...

But, YES, I have channels! Including 6 and 7! Now the real test, is the signal actually watchable?

TV One, yes. TV Two, yes. TV Three... eh... first time didn't want to, but second time seemed to be fine. C4... er, sound is good. And as for 6 and 7, get a little, highly distorted picture, but I do get sound. Which is a broad summary of the other channels, picture not watchable, sound okay.

Ultimately... if I'm desperate, but basically I'm thinking it was a waste of money...

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The Atheist Riddle

While watching the latest Captain Disillusion, there was a pop up for the "Atheist Riddle: So simple, any child can understand, yet so complex, no atheist can solve."

Well, let us see what it is. Click to the site, and the question they present us with is "Where Did the Universe Come From? Was it started by... God?" The best answer I can go with here is "Presuming the universe did come from god, where did god come from? And if god didn't come from anywhere, why can't we use that explanation for the universe and cut out a step?" (The universe is tangible to us, per se, more than god, so we have a harder time accepting a vague answer about it.)

Although this isn't the actual riddle. That's basically "DNA is complex and looks like a language. What language hasn't come from a mind?" While science can explain how a lot of complexity arises naturally (and humans see patterns everywhere and think there is a reason behind it), it doesn't have an answer for everything, and not everyone accepts the answers they have, leading to "god of the gaps" and general denial of reality. As for a discussion of this riddle, see the Rational Response Squad, Ask the Atheist and Talk Origins, just for starters...

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