Aging

Did you ever look at the world and say, "Hey that used to be a corn field." or "Hey that used to be a woods with deer." or maybe even, "I remember when mustangs were running there." Looking at those places these days I see businesses and cheap but expensively priced row homes. Human progress is really going forward but the price seems like too much sometimes as the world you once knew suddenly becomes more and more of a concrete jungle.

The world is an emptier place...

Two weeks ago from this Friday my grandmother had passed away. This was a woman who played in the local symphony, got straight A's, was an artist, played the violin, piano, and other instruments in her younger days.

Two events changed her life in a big way. The first was when my grandfather was killed in World War 2. He died on D-day on his first jump from a plane. He was shot and bled to death before his boots hit the ground. This loss combined with an accident in a factory left her in a mental institution for 14 years of my mothers childhood. My grandmother received shock therapy along with other treatments.

She never was declared legally sane but she lived with me for all but three years of my life and was a wonderful woman that lived till she was 90. My Mother (her daughter) and I will miss her.

Today's WTF brought to you by....

The Crystal Cathedral Church! This wonderful mega-church has done well over the years. The pastor Rev. Schuller has built up a nice size church and done really well for himself and his family in the process. Recently the pastors wife fell ill and an email was sent out to members of the church asking for hot meals to be delivered to the church so their limo driver could pick them up and take them to the reverend and his wife.

Check out the WTF, story here. Ooooh does it get better!

Police Response to Occupy Protests

Police response to Occupy protests wound an Iraqi war veteran in Oakland California. Video showing the individual suffered a fractured skull and as protesters tried to give the man aid police fired tear gas in to the group next to the wounded war veteran.

Check it out here on wired.

Update: He's going to need an operation. Check out more here at Boing Boing.

Colbert on O'Reilly's Book

I found out on the Colbert Report that Bill O'Reilly was sending copies of his book to the troops in Afghanistan. What they're doing with this book is most amusing.

That report left me amused. :)

Giving to the Stephen and Melinda Gates Foundation

So I decided to help out with the Stephen and Melinda Gates foundation. It's setup to help American teachers by simply posting a photo.

Here's how I did it.

Truely though I was trying for this when I made the picture.

Irene Pic 2

Here is a shot of the Sugar Maple's former spot in the ground. Good thing I finished removing the fence that was next to it.

Irene Visits

The extent of damage from Irene. Lost one Sugar Maple and one Flowering Pear tree. My Saturn Ion is in the picture for a size reference. Both trees were ripped right out of the ground and sheered off from the root systems.

Old Movies

I'm on an old movie kick. I went and ordered over 25 old movies on DVD and I'm loving it.

* Vincent Price - Last Man on Earth
* Charlton Heston - Solyent Green
* Charlton Heston - Omega Man
* Battle Beyond the Stars
* Them!
* 2 Million BC

and others. I'll have to put together a complete list later for now pass the popcorn.

Fun with character creators..

I've been playing around with the Champions Online character creator as I unlocked more costume parts.



I can make a Forsaken look good in there and I never have to worry about horrible armor drops some Blizzard art designer thought was good.

Reminded of a Feathermoon Meme...

I was wandering around Champions Online and I saw this...



I thought to myself, "That doesn't look like a druid?!" The name of the toon was Dawnfire. :)

One of those articles....

Did you ever just run in to one of "those articles"? It's a perfect example of what Darwin was talking about.

Death of the 4th Amendment

Take with a grain of salt, but for the most part I could see this being true.

Pulling the Plug on Privacy

Shocking turn of events!

Representative Anthony Weiner (D) New York finally bared the truth for all to see after being caught with his pants down. Still as prickly a situation as not telling the truth is, it would have been nice if he just told the truth from the start.

There... thats out of my punny bone now.

More Cantor Tornado Victim Fun!

John Stewart highlighted Eric Cantor's (R) ideas for funding aid for tornado victims. Apparently Mr. Cantor feels there needs to be justification for helping those in need from natural disasters.

On a lighter note...

FEMA has declared Eric Cantor (R-VA) the House Republican Majority Leader a disaster area. This happened one day after Mr. Cantor did something to withhold funds for tornado disaster relief. Get all the juicy details here.

Updates...

I did it! I finally got the payloader battery all charged up and started the damn thing! I am happy about this and drove that sucker right in to the manure pile. It's nice to have that pile pushed back now.

On a whole different note, I picked up a Motorola Xoom Android tablet over the weekend. Darn nice piece of hardware though I'm not sure how it will fit in my daily work flow. After two days I am missing my laptop for some things and may go back to it. We'll see.

Mac's no longer safe!

For years Mac users have poked and prodded PC users about virus infections and how their Mac's are amazingly immune to the problem. A few years back I saw two Mac servers and a desktop get taken down by a nasty infection in our IT department so I knew it was just a matter of time.

Today the problem is getting worse as Macs take off in popularity, we find that Mac users are no different from PC users in the virus world.

* Support Reps told not to confirm Mac infections.

* AppleCare support rep says infections are getting worse.

It isn't ever a nice thing when your computer gets something it shouldn't and you lose control and data. Still after years of jeering from Mac users I can't help but let out a little "Tee Hee!"

What do I want?

I read a comment on some forum that said there are two questions everyone asks in life.

"Why am I here?"

and

"What do I want?"

Well I think the first one was answered for me after this past February more clearly. It's to take care of those that raised me and go on remembering them when they're gone. Aunts, Uncles, God Parents, Parents, Grandma's, Grandpa's, etc.'

Now the second question "What do I want?" I always asked myself without even thinking about it seriously. What do I want?

Well based on my life so far, to smile. I like laughing, I like making others laugh over time. I'm not really a comedian but I enjoy doing that when it happens.

Some would say wife, kids, etc. I've not had that luxury in my life yet and I'm thinking I may never have that. I've met some wonderful women and some not so wonderful women. Some of the really good ones were already married and/or far away.

So all I got to fall back on is a smile.

Now I just have to figure out what to do for lunch since I got all that other stuff sorted out now.

I have totally reached a new conclusion...

I'm really enjoying Champions Online more then WoW game wise. My little comparison below wasn't too far off on how things work, I could refine it more but I'd just say go and play the game since it's free to play up to max level.

The best part about the whole game I found is the fact that all my characters look the way I want them to and I can find more costume pieces along with regular gear to use on existing or new characters. In World of Warcraft I hated how my night elf druid from 2004 never had the bear claw hands I wanted him to get. That bugged me every single day even when I played my Tauren and couldn't get him to look the way I wanted at all times of game play.

I still miss people from Feathermoon and would love to be able to gab with with them regularly. RP was always fun there and people came up with some fun and crazy characters. CO isn't bad either, I finally found an RP super group (guild) and things are going pretty good. I think I tapped in to the role play community on CO and it's pretty good.

I only have a few characters but here's the stable I got so far. It's amazing the diversity of looks you can come up with. From a regular grumpy old dwarf in plate to angels, demons, semi-modern soldiers, and even zombies! The random look generator is even more wild in the creations it sometimes comes up with.

I decided to be brave and follow the path of Grizz with some characters. Never really rolled female characters before but I've done an even mix as you can see.

Can't wait till they come out with secret lairs in CO. It'll be fun sticking my zombie guy in the "Parents Basement" themed secret lair.

Osama is gone.

Late in mentioning it but I noticed on Sunday night they finally got him. Can't say that I'm overly happy (Yet I am happy) because wishing for someone dead isn't a good thing. Then again this fellow wasn't exactly a wonderful person to begin with since he did head up the group that caused the attacks on 9/11.

Ah well, at least the world is a safer place since that nut job is gone. Now if only they could find that crazy Waldo guy! Him and his red and white striped shirt have been the bane of my picture hunting expeditions since forever! *shakes fist*

Differences I noticed between WoW and Champions Online

I've been comparing the differences I've noticed between WoW and Champions Online. Both games are fun but here's the list of things I noticed coming from the "I played WoW for six years and just started Champions" perspective.

Characters

* WoW has two factions with multiple races on each faction. Neither faction has races from the other faction.

* Champions has only one faction and no real race concept. Characters can be made to look like different races.

* WoW has a fixed class base system.

* Champions offers arch types, like fire thrower, tech gadget dude, etc. Champions also lets you make hybrids with a mix of powers from any arch type. The down side to this is the more diverse the powers you have the less "Powerful" powers you can get. You can spread yourself out too thin.

* WoW lets you customize the base look of your character which can be hidden by the gear they obtain. Character looks are fixed and cannot be scaled or altered beyond the base body pieces. Hair and such can be changed.

* Champions lets you not only customize the basic body types but change individual body parts. Elongated arm(s), fat or thin, hooves or feet, almost anything you can imagine. You can also use a color pallet to change gear and body parts coloring.

Leveling

* Both are experience based.

* WoW has a talent tree system.

* Champions has a power point system similar to talents.

* New abilities level based.

* Both games abilities scale with level.

Gear

* WoW uses a paper doll system.

* Champions uses a checker board split between offense, defense, etc.

* WoW gear changes how your character looks.

* Champions gear has no effect on how your character looks.

* Champions has a costume system where you can purchase additional costume slots with a monthly stipend of Atari points. Stipend is for subscribed users only.

Quests

* WoW's quest system was revamped in Cataclysm. The transitions between quest hubs have been smoothed out very nicely. Quests are broken in to normal in game world quests and dungeons/raid quests.

* Champions has a decent quest system. Quests flow pretty well but there are some rare points where I have encountered a "Where do I go now?" moment. That isn't as bad as it sounds because you have random NPC's run up to you now and then with a randomly generated quest in other areas that leads you to find new quest hubs usually.

* WoW's quest system can let players of vastly different levels group together. The down side is players of lower level don't get as much XP from mob kills because the higher level player drains the amount rewarded.

* Champions has a feature called side kicking. This lets two players team up and the second player's level can be adjusted higher or lower to match the party leaders. That way both player can quest together and lower level players are rewarded fully while not having overpowered help. This also lets higher level players get some help from lower levels while rewarding the lower level players with proper XP for the help.

Dungeons

* WoW dungeons are fixed difficulties with normal/heroic (Heroic not available on all dungeons).

* WoW dungeons are also level fixed, lower level players can't help higher levels. Higher level players can help lower but the lower level player loses experience as a penalty with mob kills.

* Champion dungeons all appear to have several difficulty modes that can be adjusted like WoW's normal/heroic. There are three to four difficulty modes to play at which gives a little more flexibility in the challenge level you can take.

* Champion dungeons benefit from the side kicking feature so players of different levels can receive the maximum reward and quest experience while balancing things out so you don't blast through with a higher level. Higher level players can be scaled down to lower levels.

Raids and Looting

* WoW raids are fixed loot rewarding limited numbers of players in the group. They're also on lockout timers.

* I've only done limited raiding in Champions with a non-maxed level character. No single group can tag a boss in open world raid encounters. From what I can tell everyone that participates and gets on the aggro list gets rewarded. The reward isn't crazy powerful but it can still be useful.

Travel

* WoW offers four basic modes of travel. Run/walk of the character, a fixed flight taxi system, ground only mounts, and flying mounts. Ground mounts start out at 20, flight at 60, and taxi as you discover other taxi hubs.

* Champions offers travel powers to hero's. This means you can fly the minute you leave the start area if you want. You can fly, bounce, ride flying objects, web sling, speed run, tunnel, etc. Normal character run/walk is also available.

Quick note, while flying has been a grumbling point in WoW for PvP, Champions offers talents your character can take which will debuff enemy players of their travel powers. So you can ground a flyer quite easily for a brief period of time if they're in the air already.

****

I will say this about Champions, it isn't perfect but it's really nice to be playing a game where I have full control over how the character I make looks regardless of their gear and what they're doing.

Also if I really missed one of the races from WoW I could make most of them in Champions. Forsaken (zombie parts), Trolls (monster parts), orcs (humanoid body shaping), draenie (monster parts), elves (body shaping), dwarves or gnomes (body shaping). The only thing they don't have is cow people heads even though they got the legs/feet/hands/tails for em. :/

Edit: Champions also features a built in FlagRSP for your characters. See zombie guy in previous post. :D

More Outragous Character Fun

Behold Roadcone!



He has beastial powers which fit right along the zombie fighting style of clawing and such. His super travel power is digging in the ground like Bugs Bunny.

Games

So recently I stopped playing World of Warcraft. After six years of fantasy gaming wearing me down and losing my Dad in February I decided to try something completely different.

I tried the free to play Lord of the Rings but it was boring. I looked over some other games and they didn't perk my interest. Then I looked at super hero games like DC Universe and City of Heros but what I settled on was Champions Online. They have a free to play silver package that just beat out the other two.

Meet... the Negotiator!



He's one of my many little characters I spent lots of time on setting up since I decided to subscribe. I also have another guy which is a zombie from Plants vs. Zombies. He's got a road cone on his head.

The best part about the whole game is you can spend HOURS customizing the look of your character and no matter what gear you get they will retain their look unlike in World of Warcraft. You can also setup other RP clothing slot sets and have tons of outfits. It cost game tokens per set but it's nice not having to worry about crappy looking gear. :D

Tidbits

Reading through FARK I found an article that talks about how the Republican voucher program under the budget plan Paul Ryan put out could backfire on the Republicans. It's an interesting read on how profits could win out over old people.

Life at home is just going for the most part. The work I did to lay more stone in the driveway in front of the barn worked out well. So far water during rain storms is going away from the barn and not pooling up in front of and getting in to the barn. More work needs to be done though, it's still not perfect but it's a little better then what it was.

I think this weekend I'm going to start moving dirt and filling in holes in the yard. Leftovers from when the back of the house was worked on need patched up as well as the back yard itself with more dirt.

The cement slab is in where my Dad is buried. Soon they'll have the tombstone out there and my Mother is looking forward to that. Oddly enough I am as well since I guess it could be a form of closure.

House Hunting

I miss how Google Maps used to show houses for sale in my area and their prices. Now when I search for real estate they just show realtor's offices. I really wish they'd go back to showing the actual houses and prices. It was such a nice interface to look around with. Most other real estate sites suck and are cluttered all to hell and back.

Think of the Executives!

GE helps John Stewart give up.

Transocean the company that brought you such fun things as the Gulf Oil spill has given out bonuses to it's executives for a good safety record.

So after finding this video, I'd say my day is complete now. :)

The Mall

Years ago I worked in retail doing stock room work. My days were spent lifting heavy furniture, stocking shelves, and unloading freight trucks. Back then I worked in the mall, a brutish hell hole of humanity where lives are dragged through the misery mud of other peoples success. Stare deep in to our eyes and feel the pain of being chained to the phrase "The customer is always right." for only minimum wage and see if you keep your sanity.

So when I went over to Cracked.com I found this handy dandy Mall Survival Guide. It's good, really good.

TSA Goes for the Gold

No criminal record for father and son? *Check*
Father has proper identification? *Check*
Son has legal last name that is different from Father? *Check*

So pretty much model citizens are detained for over 18 hours by the TSA for being too clean.

Nifty story I must say.

(With disturbing bonus picture of two TSA guys and the kid.)

Changes...

Life is full of change, if it wasn't it'd be boring. That said my life changed drastically in the past two months and in one way it sucks and in another the optimist in me is looking at this new chapter in life with a little excitement.

My leg is feeling better somewhat.I've been moving around a lot more other then sitting and doing the computer thing constantly. Morning and evening meetings with the horse unit and a dash of evening stall cleaning is helping me lose weight. Up side!

Today I put together four new dining chairs for my mother. I went through my Dad's tools and found a socket wrench and and 1/2" socket and an hex head socket attachment which let me whisk those chairs together in no time. Those cheap tools they give you with the chairs SUCK.

On another note, I miss my Dad since he passed away. It would have been really great to have him there to tell me where the socket wrench was for the two attachments I found first. Could have saved me a half hour of searching.

Also on another another note, I'm going to have to clean up and organize my Dad's tools. I did manage to find that he had a laser level. He was high tech and didn't tell me. >_>

Oh noes! My Weighted Companion Cube!

What ever will I do now?!!



Truely I will need to craft some swords. Must go and get raw materials at Papercraft!

Old games gone new!

If you are a gamer of old, you'll remember such names as Quest for Glory and Kings Quest. Look no further old timers, Anonymous Game Developers Interactive has released Kings Quest 1-3 and Quest for Glory 2 FREE! These games are remade for newer versions of Windows while remaining true to the originals.

Check it out!

It's finished...

Today was the funeral for my Father. It's sinking in that my life is a bit emptier then normal these days. My Father knew how to give to others. I just wish he knew how to give a little more to himself by asking for help more so he'd still be here to give to others.

I had the best damn father I ever could have gotten. I'm very thankful for the time I had with him. I will miss him.

My left leg is sore, glad I'm going to the doctors on Friday for a checkup after that viral infection.

Remembering is all I can do now..

I couldn't have asked for a better father, he overcame my grandfathers alcohol problems and grew in to the greatest Dad I could ever hope to get.

He always pushed to do better and his work ethic showed it by working 10-16 hour days for 6 or 7 days a week sometimes even in to his 60's. He pushed himself so my mother could have as good a life she could possibly get with her health problems.

I've always been proud of my father and always will be.

Rest in peace Dad.

:(

Lunch

So... I was thinking I'd have the egg salad sandwich but the yoke was on me and I grabbed tuna.

Healthy

Yay! I'm healthy again, it wasn't flu but some virus. Life is good again. On a side note, I pre-ordered a four book hard cover set of The Art of Computer Programming by Donald Kunth.

Being sick...

Is such a wonderful thing. What was going to be a nice three day weekend where I just putz around has turned in to a four day weekend where on Friday I kicked things off with a prayer to the Porcelain God. After a doctors visit and prescription pickup I've been spending my past few days getting to know my throne.

Might be flu, might be gastric, I'm leaning flu. Since I've gone from hourly visits to the throne to congestion and other things. Doctor ran some blood work on me so we'll see.

One interesting thing out of all this is I've been prescribed my first suppository! That is in case the pill doesn't stay down. No butts about it, it's an interesting feeling and not something I want to do on a regular basis.

Things that make you go wow...