CNN snubs Canada

Canada took it's first female casualty this week since world war II, something that you think would be worth at least a human interest story on CNN.

Article

Hmmm...searching , searching ... nope. Nothing there.

Well..ok... maybe not that intersting.

Canada captured a Taliban leader. You know how the americans go ape over that and splash it all over their newspapers ....

hmmm...searching ...searching....

nope ... not there.

Article

so does CNN have any articles about ANYTHING canada did , good or bad ?

Searching ..nope ..nothing this week. Not a single one.

Sheesh !
No wonder no one ever heard of us !

Super Bloat Ware

I trade my DVD player to my sister for her old lap top , with the understanding that I can borrow it whenever i wind up in the hostpital again. since I have ..lemme see, two dvd players on this computer, one on the other , one in the living room... four dvd players at home , this seems like a pretty good deal to me. Especially since , with a lap top in hand , I probably won't care about a dvd player in the hospital anyways.

The lap top is ... ancient.

4 meg ram , 120 meg hard drive. No pcmcia ports , no phone modem , no network ports ... some kind of custom port on the back , probably predates the existance of pcmcia ports so you're never going to find anything that fits it. It has a floppy disk drive, and thats about it.

How did she get win95 on it in the first place ? I'm impressed.

I put dos 5 on it, and win 3.1 . Yes...yes... I know, my age is showing. Especially when you realize I have original disks for all of that. You're impressed ? I'm impressed, those disks only come with a one year warrenty and thinking back I think I've been carting them around for 15 years. And they still work !

This fills about 8 megs on my 120 meg hard drive. This ...is much better. Now it has room to manouver. I catalog my other disks.

Word processer , 2 floppys (about 3 megs) , spread sheet , the old quattro pro , is the same. An old database , not an ms-access knock off but a real one , Omnis 5 , also 2 megs. I recall an old version of dbase fits on 1 disk but I don't have it.

I'm now thinking of my sisters brand new lap top, with the latest ms-office. It requires several thousand megabytes , in effect , gigabytes , to do the same thing this old lap top could already do 15 years ago.

yes, I mean full color , spell checkers, relational databases not those stupid little one table ones everyone gives away but full blown ones that could actually challenge oracle databases, the whole nine yards. 15 years ago. Color print out's too and everything.

So ... her brand spanking new lap top can do..what ? That this grand old lady of a lap top can't ?

Thinking ... thinking ...
It can play mp3's. Poorly. Through low quality speakers.

The technical name for this , by the way , is "Bloat Ware", whereby you are forced to upgrade software and hardware to remain compatable with everyone else ... but the new systems don't actually *DO* anything more for you than the old stuff did.

15 years ... my how far we HAVN'T come ... lol

Rest in Peace

Article

Rest In Peace , Captain Nichola Goddard.

7:30 am and Ma Bell

My schedule reads 7:30 am start time tommorow. That's wrong. I've been trying to get my TL (team leader) to change that and he's being saying "yes , of course ,no problem , just give me a few minutes ..." for two weeks now.

Phone up work. Or try to.
Work just moved, a few months back , you see. Just AFTER the new phone books came out, so everyone has the old numbers , which are disconnected. Try www.yellowpages.ca , no luck.

Phone up ma bell, 411 (information , doncha know).

Automated computer answers. Speak the name of the city. Ottawa. Speak the company name. (censored) . One moment please.

Talk to a real person. Explain where it's located. She types a bit and says "Ok, here's the number. " And passes me to a machine !

the machine speaks the wrong number , of course, since I know the number begins with a 6 , and it gives me one beginning with a 2. and now you're out of hand the quarter for calling information, have the wrong number in hand , no way to call back and explain it all without being in hock another quarter, and ma bell must be laughing her fat a$$ off at the whole situation.

I eventually find the company web site, big multinational corp somewhere way down in the states, get someone from public relations to look up the number. finally , a number beginning with a 6 . Phone them up ...

I'm still starting at 7:30 am tommorow.

And now I owe ma bell a quarter on top of it all, for her giving me the wrong number. Oh , I actually phoned that number, hoping against hope. Some computer or fax machine or something answered, screaming electronically in my ear. I just hung up on it.

Gun Control Games

Liberals misinformed parliament about millions spent on gun registry: AG

Article

We want gun control. Everyone does. Except the gun lobby who wants to sell guns , of course. So what do we do ? We make a registry so the cops can easily find all fire arms.

And it gets gutted to the point where it's almost useless. As this article says, all information submitted was strictly volintary , no one double checked anything.

And , lets make sure it sinks. Hire two computer firms , not one , but two , to do the same job, just to waste money and deliberately rack up the price.

now the gun fanatics who want everyone shooting everyone as long as they get to sell you the guns can claim how expensive and stupid the idea was in the first place.

It's not expensive and stupid. It was deliberately sabataged in the first place.

Now the conservatives get to try it again , while the people who deliberately sabataged the effort ride their a$$'s about how useless it is to even try such a thing.

And the voters who really want this thing just get hammered with costs for something the gun fanatics will make every effort to gut and destroy a second time.

It would seem we don't really live in a democracy. The will of the electorate seems to come last here.

Legal Summons

A knocking on my door, and a young boy , couldn't be more than 20 , showed up. Took my name down , had an official legal document for my wife.

Is she declaring bankruptcy again ? Man , I am so glad I refuse to co-sign ANYTHING with her.

Nope. She is being divorced.

Oh yeah , I remember this. After we'd been together five years, she abandonned me , ran down to the states and married some guy in order to get american citizen ship.

She'd come right back after he used her and tossed her away. I remember the idiot actually coming up here to visit after she'd returned to me ! In my own house ! I didn't treat him so hot. He thinks maybe to this day he might be a little pissed at me but thats nothing compared to how pissed I am at him for stealing my woman !

Anyways, she came back to me. And stayed married to him, still thinking she wanted that american citizen ship and this would eventually somehow get it for her.

Hmmm... she has thirty days to fight it from the day *I* signed for it, and she's out of the country visiting relatives right now. Wont' be back until twenty of those days are up.

Now ...
... where can I hide this thing so that she won't notice it for 10 days and it will be too late to fight it and she'll be stuck with me ? Hmmm... I think it just accidently fell down behind the fridge ...

Aid block 'may ruin Palestinians'

Article


The Hamas-led Palestinian Authority...


A group that got elected by declaring it's hatred of all things jewish and having to do with the infidel west...


...will collapse in poverty and insecurity if it continues to be starved of foreign aid, the World Bank has warned.


So what do you want us jew loving westerner's to do about it ?


In a new report, it says failing to resume aid could "disable" the Authority and set back efforts to build a Palestinian state by "a dozen years".


Considering that the current state being built wants to shoot every westerner it can find and kill every jew in the world... I'm not seeing how this is a bad thing.

Accept war deserters, 'Peace Mom' pleads

Article


American anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan wants the Canadian government to grant sanctuary to U.S. army deserters.


Yeah yeah ! We'll harbor American Desterters on one hand , and on the other continue to send troops off to die in Afghanastan and Iraq !

Not going to happen.


"I'm just here begging the people of Canada to force your government — because your government works for you, …because your government does not work for war profiteers — to allow our soldiers to have sanctuary up here," she said.


Ummm.... nope. Sorry...
and uttering the phrase 'war profiteers' doesn't make it so. You still have 3000 casualties from 9/11 as I recall.

Trust me, if 4 guys with carpet knives and a willingness to sacrifice their very lives are incapable of keeping a secret , an entire INDUSTRY of companies, consisting of thousands and thousands, isn't going to be able to keep any conspiracy a secret of any kind. You are deluded in those accusations.


It's estimated 40,000 to 60,000 U.S. draft dodgers fled to Canada during the Vietnam War.


Vietnam is 1950's, it's now 2006. Those desterters , if they were 19 at the time, are now 75 years old. Are you thinking of drafting them too ?

Some people just can't let bygones be bygones.

"Do you mind if I have a seat ?"

Me and my sister were sitting at the starbucks (a coffee bar) enjoying a nice friday afternoon ( I work weekends, get some week days , like friday off ... sister is currently unemployed) when a 60ish woman came to our table and asked "Do you mind if I have a seat ?"

I'd noticed her around, doing the same thing with a previous woman, but nothing had come of it , no shouting or anything , so we let her sit at our table. It didn't take her long to start in on her sad tale of woe.

Her husband abused her, she didn't know where to go or what to do, a very sad tale. We advised that there were a number of womans shelters for such things , but no , she'd lose all her pretty things if that happened.
She didn't have any brusies or obvious marks on her , but my sister asked anyways , "did he hit you ?"

Dodged the question , and related to us the tale of how her husband called the cops on her , well yes she had blacked out and had a temper tantrum but it was all his fault he made her so mad. It was replent with details about the evil cops sneaking up on her , twisting her hand behind her back "I was just sitting there , honest ! " and dragging her down into the back of the police car. She spent 4 days at the royal ottawa , she relayed to us. All because he had a vendetta and could give a good song and dance to the cops and get her in trouble.

The husband showed up a little later. He was leaving. But , she'd hidden his cheque and he needed that. She was more concerned with what he had packed in his boxes, worried he might have taken her things. She showed no fear, only anger. She did not ask or beg, she commanded, she told him , she was going home and wanted to look in those boxes to make sure he wasn't making off with anything he shouldn't have.

As they walked away , I couldn't help but notice she was taller than him.

So... she was being abused.

And the first thing that comes to her mind is that she got arrested and stuck in the royal ottawa (a mental institute) because he'd made her angry enough that she'd blacked out and thrown a major temper tantrum.

The moment he'd shown up at the coffee bar , she'd transformed from poor little me to pissed off mama bear, just by the sight of him , he hadn't even said anything yet.

I keep seeing news articles about this "abused wife" syndrome. It ends with the wife killing the husband , going to court , and getting off scott free.

He'd mentioned he was only leaving for a week, but if he was smart, he wouldn't come back.

Online Games

Which Online Game is most fun ?

I have a selection of online games , mmog's they're called (massive multiplayer online games, or something like that). They all cost the same , 60$ to buy the game (when they first came out) and 15$ / month there after. I had reason to cycle through a number of them and I thought I'd write a review.

World of Warcraft
It's not bad. The rule system is unique and not based on anything else. Combat starts out relatively simple and grows progressively more and more complex as you level up. The first five levels are very rapid , you burn through them in an hour, and you can usually make level 8 or 10 on the first day , assuming several hours game time. Advancement slows considerably after that.
There are a lot of "solo" area's where you can just off monsters all by yourself , a fair number of fixed quests for you to run through , and instance dungeons. The dungeons will require you to party up you cannot really run them alone.
There is a certain difficulty factor that is unavoidable , that is to say if you stay in a low level area , you stop getting experiance. I think the rule is you still get xp if the creature is 5 levels below you , but not 6. And this goes up 1 every 10 levels (at 10th you can get xp of creatures 6 levels below you , at 20th , 7, etc) so you are forced to move on to higher level area's. Elite monsters in "instances" (dungeons that require a full party) generally insure that even a high level charactar that gets no xp from the dungeon will still have a very hard time in it...very hard and fruitless. Ah well.
The games crafting system is interesting and keeps some life into it. Fishing is a waste of time however, that was nerfed a long time ago, but you can make your own weapons and armor and such.
I would rate world of warcraft as a pretty good game, but I don't play it anymore because after a year you just get bored.

EverQuest
I have a new computer.
I must be the only person to have a copy of Everquest and have never played it because it would't run on my old computer. So I put it on this machine and gave it a shot.

Boring , and glitched.
first off, they want you to grind away killing rats and bats as a new charactar, in a combat system that doesn't actually inspire patience (press the auto attack button and wait... or if you're a spell caster there is some stradegy ... wait for the rat to attack , then hit the hot key for your spell and hope it doesn't fizzle.. it should go off before the rat attacks again. Blow the timing , and the rats next attack interrupts the spell).

This took about 1 minute to master and then it was just a boring grind. Gathered my 8 rats and 4 bats and 4 vermin nests I was supposed to kill, and returned to turn them in, speaking to the stated NPC.

She totally ignored me. Wouldn't let me turn in the quest.

And this is on a beginning quest that must have seen a million people go through it with their new charactars. Obviously this game is no longer being maintained.

After a few hours I decided the game was simply too boring, too much grinding , no way to turn in quests, most likely I would get stuck somewhere due to these glitches ... cancelled my subscription the very same day I had applied for it and uninstalled it.

Matrix Online
Charactar creation consisted of simply what does your charactar look like. As you progress , however , you load "abilities" into your memory that give you better and better combat abilities, or spell like abilities (viral attacks and what not .. the whole thing is very computer theme'd if you've ever seen the matrix movies) and of course there's the constant problem that while abilities are easy to come by (you can just buy them at various venders) memory space to load them is in short supply , so you're always fiddling with what you have loaded, what will fit.

Combat comes in two flavours, ranged , and hand to hand. Ranged you select a target , click on the gun or shot gun icon (depending on what weapon is in your hand) and you start firing until either you fall down or the enemy does. Not too complicated.

Hand to hand , is very complicated. You have a selection of attacks, like fast (more speed than damage) , power ( more damage than speed) throw , and block. You also have a special "head butt" abilitie that can only be used on a charactar that is stunned. Oh , your "fast" attack has a chance of stunning. So a beginner tactic is to use your fast attack until the opponent is stunned and then click on the head butt ability to inflict massive damage.

Later on this motief is repeated with special kicks and punches that only work when the enemey is off balance (a throw will leave him off balance) staggered, etc. This tends to make hand to hand combat fairly complicated.

Whats that you say , you'll just stick to ranged ? Sorry , works great at low levels by after a bit the enemy will charge you and force you into hand to hand.

Judging by the training video's in the introduction hall that all charactars go through ranged combat has it's own issues. Weapons don't have the same range, so if you can run fast and stay ahead of the enemey , you can pretty much get free shots off at him until he falls and defeat him without getting hit at all (I also noticed an ability with guns to slow an enemey down by 50% ...hmmm... )

There's a lot of "grinding" in the game (just killing over and over) but the combat system is complicated enough that that isn't as boring as you'd think.

There are also "missions" to be accomplished, and the missions advance some kind of story line that holds the whole game together. When your charactar gets pretty high level (I think level 50) there are "world events" for such high level's.

I see the threads of a crafting system for building your own equipment (you get to see ALL the abilities , even the ones you don't have , and definitions for what they do) though I havn't experimented with it yet. That's always nice.

Multi-class to a fair thee well.

Raise some cash , kill a few thugs, hit the venders. Buy up some "virus/ hacker" abilities, and suddenly your charactar switches from being a kung fu martial artiest to a virus zapping ranged "spell caster" type. Doesnt' work out too well ? You still have those kung fu abilities, just load them up again. Or try out healing for a while , or programming (you get to make a pet that fights alongside with you) and try that for a while. Tweaking exactly what abilities you will load, will you be all the way kung fu ? Or will you take just enough hacking to give yourself some self healing ? Is obviously going to be an art form unto itself.