This was a fun video to watch. I wonder if any of the participants at the end were passers-by who decided to join in? I don’t think I would have been able to get up the courage to join in if I had been there, but it sure looked like fun. I especially liked the wide variety of people that were included. (via The Happiness Project)
Archive for April, 2009
D&D Test Drive
Apr 29
This looks like fun: D&D Test Drive lets you try 4th Edition for free. I may have to give this a try.
Arjun Basu (arjunbasu) tells short stories with a twist at the end in less than 140 characters. Like the classic Hemingway story “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”, the interesting thing about these stories is the story you create in your mind around the words he’s written. I’m really enjoying these.
Free Realms launches Tuesday
Apr 27
I was surprised to read that Free Realms launches Tuesday – Massively. I’ve been in the Beta a bit and while it’s fun, it’s still rather buggy. I plan to play Free Realms in the days to come, but I think I’ll hold off on getting a subscription (for me or the kids) till I see if they address the bugs.
Essential X-Men
Apr 26
I’ve been reading the Essential X-Men to the kids (mostly to the boys) for the last few weeks. It’s a lot of fun. I like reading old superhero comics because there’s no way I can be over the top while reading them. I can do terrible Russian and Irish accents and as long as I make sure that SMASH! and BANG! is good and loud and the action keeps flowing the boys are entertained. Evan’s already read the book over a couple of times (he keeps falling asleep while reading it), but he still comes and listens to tonight’s exciting adventure! Hopefully I can find more collections like this one.
I don’t like the “deep” plot arcs – I find them a bit silly and they lack in action. My favorite stories are the ones where a villain shows up at the beginning of the issue, beats on the X-Men for a bit, gets beat by them, and then the metaplot advances a few steps. Trite but fun.
I wonder if I’d be up to trying to run a Mutants and Masterminds campaign for the kids? The biggest obstacle right now is that Alec wants to participate in everything but he can’t read yet. Maybe in a year or so?
EVE: The Unforgiving
Apr 25
After reading this post: Destructoid – EVE: The Unforgiving – A Basic Understanding of CCP’s Masterpiece, I realize why EVE is not the game for me right now. EVE is all about interactions with other players – NPCs are there for the equivalent of target practice. Right now, I’m looking for something that offers more parallel-play style of interaction. I want something like shopping at the mall – lots of people around but what I do is not affected by those around me in any major way (or at least not consciously).
(via EVE Online News)
The Veil Trilogy
Apr 24
I recently finished reading Christopher Golden’s The Veil Trilogy. Quick review – it was okay, but not great.
The story starts with Oliver Bascombe on the night before his wedding. As he watches the storm outside blowing, a wounded man made of ice appears outside. Oliver quickly discovers that the myths and legends of our world are real and alive in a realm that co-exists with ours just beyond The Veil. Something is hunting the myths and Oliver is pulled into unraveling the mystery.
The story itself is decently well told. I had trouble identifying deeply with the characters. The magic system didn’t seem particularly logical – things seemed to work perfectly in one scene and not at all in the next. The bad guys seemed to made from cardboard – I have no idea why they did the things they did. I felt that ending was rather abrupt. The story would have been more interesting if the consequences of the characters’ actions had been shown.
Overall, the series wasn’t unpleasant but I feel no interest in seeking out more books by this author.
This is really neat: DIY Gamer Builds Amazing Digital Game Table | Geekdad from Wired.com. What I find interesting about this project is that it has a lot of the advantages of both face-to-face gaming and computer gaming. The sheer paperwork of running a D&D game got overwhelming – enter the computer and suddenly paper gets a lot easier to manage. On the other hand, there is still something special about getting together physically with a group of friends which is not the same with internet play. If virtual reality ever shows up, it may be able to combine the best of both, but for now this seems like a strong step in the right direction.
TÖRdötCÖM’s plans for ebooks
Apr 22
From the April 1 news, TÖRdötCÖM’s plans for ebooks sadly looks like many publishing companies plans for ebooks. (Hopefully they have a real plan for ebooks that will be implemented before the heat death of the universe.) Oddly enough, the genre that seems to have embraced ebooks the most is romance. I’m planning to do more romance reading in the days ahead – solid reviews, good ebooks, and a fresh genre to explore what’s not to love?
Not Missing WoW Yet
Apr 21
I logged in to make Jaimie some flasks tonight. It had been almost two weeks since I’d logged in. I still don’t feel like going back. My account expires next Tuesday and I’m looking forward to that.
While I was on I removed the ability for anyone to invite to the guild. I wasn’t as careful as I should have been in letting people in.
I may go back in a few weeks. Right now too many people that I like to play with have left. There’s not much social attraction when there are only three people out of ten that I want to spend time with.
Why Do I Have a Phone Line?
Apr 21
As Jaimie and I were getting the kids settled for bed, the phone rang. It was yet another pointless call and it put bedtime back at least 30 minutes. Nothing like a ringing phone to wake a drowsy kid.
Why do I have a phone line at home at all?
Reasons to have a phone.
- Everyone else has one!
- What if there’s an emergency?
- Our ISP is flaky, so the phone is a backup connection
- What if someone significant wants to call?
- Coordinating activities.
Reasons not to have a phone
- Most incoming calls are spam / pointless
- It costs $50/month
- It interrupts
Maybe I should turn the ringer way, way down and set up an answering machine. “Hi, we’re not answering the phone right now. Don’t leave a message as we won’t be listening to it. If you want to contact us, send an email.” If we’re expecting a call we can have the phone next to us and if not we’re not likely to miss anything important anyway.
How to Make a Baby
Apr 20
This video amused me: How To Make a Baby. (via BoingBoing)
Project Euler – First Steps
Apr 20
I have been having a blast with Project Euler. I’m not terribly far in – so far I’ve only completed up to problem 5. My favorite has been problem 5 – I was right on the brink of the elegant answer and just didn’t quite think it through enough. I’m using Ruby to work on the problem so I’m having fun learning that too.
One thing that always amuses me about reading math references is the statement “It is obvious that” preceding a couple of lines of what looks to me to be complete gibberish. Then they get into the complicated stuff…
X-Men Evolution
Apr 19
My kids have been watching X-Men Evolution on Youtube for the last few days. They’ve been having fun with the superhero adventures. I’ve have to see if I can find them more old shows to watch when we’re done with these. Cyclops seems really annoying in all the version of X-Men I’ve seen so far.
Canadian Members of Parliament voting records (finally) online – Boing Boing is great news! I don’t expect it to change anything (at least not out here), but it’s at least a step in the right direction.
This is interesting: John “Game of Life” Conway particles have the same kind of free will that people have – Boing Boing. I don’t pretend to understand this, but it’s fun to think about. If particles have free will, do particles have minds or souls or some such? Where does free will come from? Hopefully a modern-day Isaac Asimov shows up to explain this to me.
Hannah Montana
Apr 17
This song amuses me. It reminds me of when Jaimie and I first started being friends. She told me about someone who was convinced she was responsible for all the evil in the world except for the fall of man (and he was trying to figure out how she covered up her involvement in that.)
Kindle owners find out about DRM’s ever-present threat – Ars Technica. This kind of nonsense is why I don’t plan on buying a Kindle. If I’m renting books instead of buying them, they had better be amazingly cheap. Charging me the cover price, then yanking the books back on a whim? I’m not joining in on that foolishness. In 5 years or so they’ll likely be where the music industry is now (selling non-DRM works at a slight premium) then another couple years after that I should be able to get a hold of non-DRM books at a reasonable price. I’ll wait.
Talent = 10,000 Hours + Luck
Apr 16
Talent = 10,000 Hours + Luck | Open Culture amused me. I wonder what I would want to spent 10,000 hours doing? Then there’s the argument that you only spend 10,000 hours on something if you perceive (consciously or not) that you have a talent for it…
Jo Walton has an interesting take on types of series.
So, there’s style one, The Lord of the Rings, one book with extra pieces of cardboard.
There’s style two, Doctrine of Labyrinths, where you have some volume closure but need to read the books in order.
There’s style three, Vlad and Vorkosigan, where the cumulative effect of reading all of them is to give you a story arc and more investment in the characters, but it doesn’t really matter where you start and whether you read them in order.
And there’s style four, Union Alliance, where the volumes are completely independent of each other though they may reflect interestingly on each other.
My preference for authors I know is style three, two, four, and one in that order. For an author I know, style one works better if I am confident they’re not going to let me down with a lousy ending. When it’s an author I don’t know I hate style one series, especially when it’s not clear on the cover that that it’s book X of Y. For new (to me) authors, I hugely prefer style four or three.
I love a good series.