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[Jul. 24th, 2008|09:23 pm] |
The Dark Knight.
Was pretty awesome. I'm not sure I've seen a superhero movie where the villain gets more screen time than the hero before. Heath Ledger is indeed, fantastically, creepily, evil. And unrecognisable. Odd pacing in parts made some of it almost boring, and I LOVED what they did with Harvey Dent. Nice to see some of the darkness of the comic coming through again.
Corsair by Tim Severin.
Nice, light, well paced and researched young-lad-goes-to-sea novel. I had trouble remembering the lead characters name throughout, but that may have just been me. Horatio Hornblower meets Honor Harrington. Enjoyed. Book 2 is Buccaneer, good historical accuracy (as you would expect from a former non-fiction writer), nice bits of action, truly terrible daydreams about love and girls. No filth, just tortured longing. Could have done without...
Off to Scotland in 4 hours. |
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[Jul. 24th, 2008|04:14 pm] |
So for my last night out in London, I journeyed to the World's End Tavern. The streets outside the venue smelled of vomit, adn we found that if you stood still for too long people assumed you wanted to buy drugs and would try selling them to you. Beneath the World's End is the Underworld, a small venue which the likes of Sepultra, Marduk, and The Darkness like to play in. The whole place pretty much reeked of urine, which almost made one nostalgic for the days when the smell of cigarette smoke used to neutralise offensive odours at gigs.
The crowd was mixed, a lot of old punks dressed like they stepped out of a documentary on the 1970s, college kids, and old fogeys like me.
So we drank beer and watched the first two bands. First up was Mike TV, a band playing in the indecipherable pun tradition, i.e. music played wth verge and energy, but with largely incoherent vocals. They were okay. Next up was Moral Dilemma, clean cut boys with florouscent ties, playing melodic punk - imagine The Beach Boys gone punk and you have got it nailed. The rest of the audience hated these guys, and not in a good way.
The main act was the old American hardcore punk band The Adolescents. I have never in my life seen a mosh pit form faster than it did at this gig - people were diving off the stage within about 5 seconds of the first chords being strummed. Sonja was pretty rapt with the performance, but not being familiar with their songs I was left a it non-plussed, although I can see why "I Hate Children" had the whole room jumping up and down.
Over all too soon, and then I had to run away to catch the last tube home. probably the last time I will use the undergound here. |
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| What the fucking fuck? |
[Jul. 25th, 2008|02:04 am] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  WTF?! | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Head going boom. | ] |
Ok, going on a bit of a personal peeve rant here.
When I search for recipes online, I DO NOT want to find things like this:
CINNAMON STREUSEL MUFFINS
1 (15.2 oz) pkg cinnamon streusel muffin mix
1/2 cup dried apple pieces, roughly chopped
Prepare muffin mix according to pkg directions, stirring dried apple pieces into batter. Place foil baking cups in muffin pans. Spoon batter into cups, filling two-thirds full. Bake and cool muffins according to pkg directions.
That is NOT A RECIPE, you incompetant, lazy, retarded, sibling fucking lice infested virus ridden HOBO.
Sorry, that may have been a little harsh on the homeless population of the world.
But SERIOUSLY, folks.
This one is almost as good.
Vegetable Casserole
2 cans mixed vegetables, drained
3/4 c. mayonnaise
1 can Cheese Whip (Whatever the fuck that is)
Mix ingredients together and pour in casserole dish. Top with 1 1/4 cups crushed Ritz crackers mixed with 1/2 stick of melted butter. Bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes or until bubbly.
Dear god.
We're talking about COOKING. And BASIC cooking, at that, becasue I'm well aware that some can be pretty hard, but not THESE! Not goddamn rocket science, folks. How can the preparation of food be becoming a lost art?!
Just...just...ARGH. My head is going to explode.
This is driving me utterly insane. 1. Packet mix food is mostly disgusting, why would I want to use it? 2. If I have the instructions ALREADY WRITTEN FOR ME on the side of the BOX, why the hell would I be looking for a recipe ONLINE?!
I want a flamethrower. A big one.
If the people who wrote those 'recipes' read this, hide. I'm coming for you, bitches. |
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| A slightly disjointed post |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|11:06 pm] |
I meant to get a few things done tonight... I'm going to be in the undergraduate prospectus. A marketing lady who has never really done any science interviewed me and wrote about my project, so now I have to fix what she wrote (and there is a lot to do!)... I said I'd do it by tomorrow, and right now it looks like it will be tomorrow. I also got photographed in the lab, which is a funny experience. Photographers like making things look "sciencey", so you have to pose doing stuff that you probably wouldn't do in reality, eg. "hold that thing there at that angle", "this spot looks boring, why don't you put some cables on it to make it look more interesting?"
I'm planning a ski trip with ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) satanicpushcart, and I should sort that out soon...
It's been very busy this week, and last week too. I've been testing out my trap (well, measuring magnetic fields and currents and stuff). Yesterday we spent all day mucking around with a servo circuit. It was tiring even though I didn't really do anything. I went to the gym after, and then to Anna's to be an extra in the LARP, but no one was there, so I went home and watched some Terminator with satanicpushcart. Massively tense shoulders :-(
I had a headache yesterday morning, so I went to the pharmacy on St David street to buy some Nurofen Plus. They are a bit anal there, and don't like people buying codeine products and try to get you to buy some alternative or go see your doctor. It's the only thing that works on my headaches, so that's what I buy. However, I let them talk me into buying vitamin B tablets. I don't know much about the various B vitamins, but you mostly get them from meat and they give you more energy. I don't eat much meat, and I also hate Vegemite/Marmite, so I figured why not. Yesterday I was feeling crap anyway, but today I was a lot more energetic. I went on the cross-trainer at the gym. I usually do half an hour on it, and at my usual setting I tend to do 60 RPM or less, and in the last 10 minutes I'm pretty tired and have to push myself a little. Today I was happily doing over 70 RPM, and didn't get that really tired feeling at all. So perhaps the vitamin B helps.
I also have to write my first PhD self-review next week!!
I should sleeeeeeep.... |
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| The Cycle of Theory |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|09:24 pm] |
About 3 years ago I got into a rather unfortunate discourse with menchi about GNS. I was for it, he was against it. And really, the divergence was even more fundamental: he was against all theory. That is something of a simplification, but basically correct.
Over the next while, my thinking changed and I realized that in large part his arguments for activities beyond theory were very sound. There is a lot of craft in our hobby; a lot of honing skills, rather than displays of naked virtuosity or finding applications for game abstractions. Many of my posts on his group-blog have been aimed at the skills and craft of the player, rather than the GM. And I like to think that I've occasionally made good sense.
I have, however, never lost my deep conviction that there must be some way of tying together all the strands of good practice that I have promulgated. Surely there is an underlying set of rules or principals which will inform good play? The macroscopic theories like SIS and GNS are difficult to apply in the microscopic situations of "what can I do in the next 5 minutes to make the game great" which is where the majority of my energy has been focused. That's not to say that they can't; but I have increasingly found it difficult to make the necessary translations and simplifications. It hardly seems worth the effort when I do.
Well, I think I may have found the beginnings of such a theory. A way of looking at the whole enterprise, but only a small bit at a time.
The two chief tools that I have been advocating in some form are:
- Open-ended choices
- Inclusive play
And really, I'm quite satisfied that these are the two simplest expressions of what I like in players; both as a player myself, and when I GM.
Making "open ended choices" means just exactly that. Characters can always do something which resolves a problem, or which ends a threat. But a far more engaging and challenging play style is to see how far the rabbit hole goes, and decide to follow courses to unknown ends. Of course this can't be the sole mode of play: at some point complexity can fill the available imaginative space in a game, and this is not desirable. But my feeling, my intuition, is that most people will simplify their characters' lives well before reaching saturation, many times before anything has really happened at all.
Inclusive play has been a much harder thing for me to distill. I have found a lot of very strongly character and action focused players, that I would otherwise approve of, become somewhat introverted. They pursue deeper and deeper connections with their own character, submerging themselves in their own minds. But it must always be remembered that roleplaying is a social activity; not a solo fantasy.
It seems to me that between these two very basic concepts, you generate most of the behaviours that I have venerated over my tenure on this blog. You generate pro-activity, or at the very minimum, an encouragement for the energy being put into the game by the GM. You generate a dynamic game environment. You create more interesting situations and characters. You build not only a world, but a community of imagination without limits.
What do you think? Do these two principals encourage any significant negative behaviours? Are there any desirable behaviours that they discourage? Or don't encourage?
As I say, this is but the begining of my attempt to collate what I have learned into some kind of unity, and I welcome your input. |
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| On Sibling Success. |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|08:00 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  cheerful | ] |
In exciting news today (more exciting than being sick or watching Stargate:Atlantis anyway) I just found out my youngest brother has just been selected to receive one of two full scholarships to attend an eight day young player development course at the International Rugby Academy of New Zealand.
Which is pretty big news indeed. I'm terribly proud of him - not because I personally view sports as inherently awesome, but because I know how much effort and thought and focus he adds to his natural talent to get him as far as he does. He's an excellent player not only because of his athletic skills, but because of his passion, and the way in which he applies his considerable intelligence to tactics and getting a really deep understanding of the game.
It's weird to think of him being some kind of up and coming player, because he's just my little brother, but it kind of looks like he is. By all accounts he's very very good.
I'm not sure if I mentioned this here or not, but he's also been selected for the National Area Schools team, which means, among other things, he'll be playing some openers for NPC games. And this scholarship came out of the blue - it's not something he applied for, just something the selecting people gave him.
And he only just turned sixteen.
So, yes: proud sister. And sorry I'm going to be out of the country for most of his upcoming significant games, because I'd like to go watch. |
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| On Space Travel, And How It Always Seems To Hit The Same Snags |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|06:06 pm] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  sick | ] |
Still sick. Still pissy about it.
Can now talk, which is a plus, but have an achy sore chest, which is a negative.
Have been spending my time watching Stargate: Atlantis, which I had forgotten I had sitting around in reserve for just such an occasion as this (or, you know, originally for any annoying sitting around while travelling, but the theory is the same).
It's quite good, even if it has already used at least two tired sci-fi cliches in the first half of the first season. I think there is a certain amount of that that is almost inevitable with the genre, but sometimes it's done better than other times. In terms of innovative dealing with cliches, I'd rate Atlantis as better than Farscape (No weirdy magic physically embodied energy jesters! [yet]) and not as good as, say, Firefly. Other people's mileage may vary.
Anyway, it's enjoyable, and is passing time, which I am being forced to spend in one room of our house, which is warmest, because every venture into colder territory results in horrid coughing spasms which inconveniently interfere with, say, breathing.
Thank god for milo, is what I have to say. And also for the fact that I'm departing the last of the winter in three weeks in trade for the tail end of a northern hemisphere summer. And after that it's autumn (yeah, okay, fall) instead of spring, which while sadly lacking in flowering bulbs, is nonetheless somewhat similar meteorologically. And then summer again! And then if I'm terribly lucky, summer again after that. Rocking.
Now, back to the Pegasus Galaxy (Seriously? How do they say that so often with a straight face?) |
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| Dark Matter: Actual Play |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|02:29 pm] |
Setting and Character Session
The process of creating this game started from scratch over coffee with nina_in_nz. I hadn't gamed with her before, so I wanted to know what sort of games she was interested in playing. Conversely, surrealfish is one of my oldest gaming friends (I've been roleplaying with him since I caught him and xyphoid playing The Temple of Elemental Evil in the StAC library in 1991) so I already had a good idea of the kinds of things which would fly with him. At this point the game was "some sort of sci-fi" and I was going to read my new Shadowrun 4e rules. I decided that would be too much in the way of system and setting for a three to four session game.
Round two was an email in which I solicited input about the sort of game and the sort of setting both players wanted:
What would you like to do in the game?
What do you find interesting or cool about sci fi?
How far in the future would you like to go?
Are there any setting elements from other genres you'd like to see?
How would you describe the kind of game you'd like to play (You are __(characters)__ who __(do what)__ in __(setting)__)?
Their answers were pretty much on the same page, and with two players this wasn't a particularly arduous process! So I collated their responses, made a few notes of questions to be discussed in person, added a few tweaks of my own and decided on a system.
Yesterday was the first session with all three of us together. I went through my notes (although I should have printed them out as well) asking questions, discussing various aspects of the setting that we were unclear about, presenting various setting elements and explaining elements of the rules as I went. After an initial pass through, we made characters (with 10 advances rather than the 5 for starting characters), answered a few more setting questions, designed the ship and briefly discussed the starting system.
This morning I flavoured and expanded my notes. I'm excited about the collaborative setting and the set-up and I hope nina_in_nz and surrealfish can see their ideas amongst the material. |
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| Dark Matter: Set-up |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|01:22 pm] |
Smuggling on the FringeThe Brief:
The players are criminals, mercenaries, oddjobbers, refugees, dissidents and explorers who, by choice or necessity, exist on the fringes where central control has devolved to local powers of various sizes. They do jobs of varying legality, try to keep their morals, and uncover secrets about the true nature of the universe, its history, and their place in it.
( The Crew ) |
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[Jul. 24th, 2008|01:53 pm] |
| [ | Tags | | | crap | ] |
| [ | Current Location |
| | right there | ] |
| [ | Current Mood |
| |  contemplative | ] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | Smashing Pumpkins - The Beginning Is the End Is the Beginning | ] |
Lolita is a crack whore |
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| Somewhere Between The Soul & Soft Machine |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|01:24 pm] |
I may play with this guide on making Ubuntu Hardy Heron look and act like Mac OSX Leopard, because it sounds much easier than actually installing OSX. :)
Digg also found this really cute little collection of sysadmin tricks from IBM, including how to tunnel SSH thru a company firewall, and then tunnel VNC thru SSH... *grins evilly*
Purdue has come up with a cheaper way of manufacturing LED's meaning that LED-based light bulbs may soon become cost competitive with CF ones. You can already buy LED light bulbs, which have a much longer life than CF bulbs, use less power, and become bright faster (though most don't give off as many lumens as a CF bulb at present), but currently they are mainly made only to support US voltages and are generally more expensive than CF bulbs. As the article says, consider not having to change a bulb for a decade, and using only 3W of power instead of the 10 - 18W of CF bulbs. LED bulbs are the way of the future, and if anyone's looking at a market to get into I reckon this one is going to sweep away CF before it even becomes fully established.
For the techno-lovers, Delia Derbyshire of the BBC's Radiophonic Workshop, responsible for the ground-breaking Dr. Who theme song, died in 2001, but recently tapes have been discovered in her attic, and the BBC is making some of them available on it's web site, including a techno-sounding track that could have been released now. There's a good list of what's available on Noise Addicts.
In other news, I recently bought a USB video capture device from offtheback.co.nz with the idea of transferring a few old videos on to digital. The first video I dug out to test iit on happens to have the Kapcon XII Twelfth Night LARP on it (the archive site is in bad repair at present, one of the many things I need to fix). That was in 2003, only five years ago. Lots of people on it in great costumes, I've noticed vizi, exiledinpn, superlate, andymacdaddy, jenni_talula's brother, and evie_fae so far. I will now take bribes to not release this video on you tube! :)
Actually, you won't have to worry for a while yet, the capture device and associated software (ULead VideoStudio 10.0) doesn't seem to be able to maintain a smooth capture rate, at least not with my old work lap-top, and raw video in AVI format really chews up hard drive space! |
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| Dark Matter: Setting material II |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|01:21 pm] |
There's No Place Like HomeThe Mazerolles system lies in the wide Pause-Imperial fringe zone between Imperial space and The Pause Authority. The nearest Imperial system, al-Beidh, is six wormhole jumps away. Mazerolles is an F class star (whiter and hotter than Earth’s sun) ( with five planets. ) |
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| Dark Matter: Setting material |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|11:41 am] |
A Disintegrating GalaxyEarth’s galactic empire is splintering under the pressure of internal tensions and external forces. Opportunistic system- and sector-level government structures are breaking away, dissident movements are seizing planets and outposts. Imperial military forces resist in some sectors, collude in others and elsewhere instigate. At the core, the imperial courtiers continue their petty bickering amidst pomp and excess, the escalating price of imported wine provoking only changes in personal and house status. ( While their masters play, the various arms of the imperial bureaucracy struggle to maintain their own integrity and power. ) |
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| Alien Round! |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|12:10 am] |
KAOSian space-borne early warning systems have detected the approach of an alien spacecraft. The mind controlling, body-snatching, brain infesting aliens are expected to arrive approximately Monday morning. No doubt they will attempt to Infiltrate the ranks of KAOS and take over from the inside.
Our R+D department has been hard at work all morning watching martian films and has determined that so long as you with some one you are immune to infestation. The Dictator recommends, for your own safety, do not go anywhere by yourself! An effective weapon to use against the xenomorph menace is being worked on and the benevolent politburo will despatch it with no delay...once it is developed...sometime next week. It will then be the official duty for every KAOS agent to slay those they suspect to have been replaced with pod-people...just be careful because the weapons will also no doubt be lethal to humans as well.
-Round Starts Midday Monday.
-I will be Q.
-The Alien Team must infest as many KAOS Agents as possible
-The Human team must survive as much as possible
-The team that has the most surviving members at the end of the week wins.
-If you are in a room and all the people in it turn to you and say WIBBILIDY WIBBILIDY WOO to you YOU HAVE BEEN INFESTED!!11!
-The round has no boundaries or safezones!! (apart form vehicles, places of work and lectures/library/labs etc.
-Leave a comment or see mme to sign up to the round.
-The alien killing weapon will be announced midweek. |
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| Once again |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|11:52 am] |
My updates have been few and far between.
Some have noticed my lack of presence on #kaos also.
Did 2x weeks working at a winter milking farm in Te Pirita. Very beautiful place and I had a wonderful time there, but at 30kms each way, it was not affordable for me to come home for the break in between milkings. This meant that I left home 4:30am, and returned home around 6:30pm, which is pretty much my reason for not being online.
I set up my mattress in the back of the landcruiser, and most days had a wee nap during the break, which certainly helped the energy levels, but still, by the time I got home I was pretty much ready to sleep.
Am now back at other farm. 11kms from home means that on days like today, I can come home and chill out and skim over all the far too many LJ entries that I am behind on.
Christchurchians will be cursing this rain. It is worse when you are outside in it!
I don't recommend anyone attempt to enter our property in a 2 wheel drive. Unless they are a thrill seeker and are prepared to bribe us to tow you out!
I came into town yesterday, for the first time since the 48. Caught up with my old workmates, my mother, and some kaosians. The first time I have been in the "lcr" (ahem.. smokers cafe) in god knows how many years! Wondered if I should pretend to be a student. lols.
Time flies when you are having fun, and I am still a little behind on all the odds and sods I was gonna do. Did enjoy The Warehouse sale though.
When I first started on the farm I felt a little lonely. Not majorly, just that it was odd having no people around. At Harvey's there was always someone to talk to on my lunch break, and there was always South City to browse around.
I am used to being alone now. Certainly happier with my own company than I have been in the past. This has to be a good thing. |
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| M.I.A. |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|10:53 am] |
There are times when getting dressed I realize that I have T-shirts that I've not seen for some time. infact they have since no longer be accounted for. I don't understand how this has happened, going from having a T-shirt to not having it. Perhaps, since they are all black, they get lost amoungst themselves. Left at the bottom of the laundry pile for too long, developing sentients and making a break for it in th edead of night. Maybe they have been left at the furtherest depths of the clean clothes box where new clean clothes replace them before they can be retireved.
So far I have misplaced or other wise lost: A union Jack style shirt, A turbostill shirt (sign by the band), A Metallica shirt, two guiness shirts and a Danish Beer shirt. Perhaps I should find a clothing geologist to explore my T-shirt box. |
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| Weird |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|11:45 am] |
After weeks and weeks of not being able to watch the Yahtzee vids on the escapist, today they started working again. Happy Birthday me.
Edit: Zero Punctuation's availability has gone back to sucking now. |
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| Spare Shihad Ticket |
[Jul. 24th, 2008|09:35 am] |
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We may have a spare ticket to Shihad tomorrow night at the Wellington town hall. We'll know for sure tonight, but if you're interested, drop me a line. |
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[Jul. 24th, 2008|09:16 am] |
A genetic hybrid dedicated to discovering the fate of her kidnapped psychic brother... and making her fortune.
A hiveworlder who escaped the crush of humanity on his home planet and now seeks renown as a champion of the downtrodden.
A hijacked and re-programmed Government-grade AI in a re-purposed dignitary runabout.
The quasi-religious order of psychics whose web spreads throughout the decadent and decaying empire.
A fragmenting galaxy where those who control the wormholes, control information.
Dark Matter |
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bored
grateful