Phrase of the Moment:
¤ Phrase: "Your little hopes and dreams."
¤ Usage: "Poor fellow, his little hopes and dreams have all be smashed."
¤ Origin: Quipped by a whore, or pre-op transgender man, or a sociopath, or some other lowlife who was engaged in a vicious verbal battle with another lowlife guest on the Jerry Springer show
¤ Notes: While the Jerry Springer show is generally pretty lacking in opportunities for intellectual improvement, you do tend to hear some funny jokes, of the personal insult type.  This was one of the best.  One loser was arguing with another loser, and when one said something about how she'd loved her husband, whom the other lowlife had stolen away, lowlife #1 replied, "Bitch, I don't care about your little hopes and dreams!"

You'll find it applicable to almost every situation in life.  It's the "little" that really makes it work, since that just so perfectly and cruelly diminishes whatever claim to importance the other person might previously have had. -- February 20, 2004

fter the general crappiness that was Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were actually pretty okay.  Jamba Juice was consumed, super nachos were eaten, and life was enjoyed.  I even got substantial work done on the novel Tuesday night/Wednesday morning, and as always when I get work done, I feel better about myself.

One thing that's still dragging my life down is my new video card. I said on Tuesday's blog that I wasn't going to battle it anymore, and that I'd just continue playing D2 in 2D, not playing World of Warcraft or anything else that requires 3D, and that I'd wait for a working driver set to be released. I'd consider returning the device, but I don't know what I'd replace it with, and I'm not even sure I could return it at this point, being as Malaya, with my blessing, promptly mailed off the proof of purchase for the $20 rebate.

C, long time reader and regular emailer, at least tried to help.

I used a crappy MX440 myself (so that you know, it is sold as a GF4 but is actually a lowly GF2). I uploaded the driver that I used, you can get it from xxxxxx

Then again you might elect not to trust me with anything, since it is rather suspicious that someone is willing to spend an hour upoloading a 27-meg driver over a crappy cable connection...

BTW, I just bought meself a brand-new rage 9600 card with 256M memory (for Neverwinter Nights, if you have to know), and much to my surprise the old MX440 outperforms this shiny new piece of crap.

Aaaand, as probably dozens pointed it out already, you accidentally copied the wrong bottom part to the blog, repeating yesterday's dual reviews instead of the mailbag. 

First for the last; I didn't copy the wrong part, I accidentally forgot to copy over the new page bottom from the archive page (where I write them initially) to the main page (where most of you read them). As is usually the case when I screw something up on the Index page, it was fine on the daily archive page, so just as a general tip, if you load the main page and it doesn't seem to be updated when it should be, or it's missing something, scroll down and click the "permanent link" at the bottom of the main site page, or else click "previous update" and then scroll to the bottom of that and click "next update".  You get the idea.

Malaya noticed the problem and poked me about it, so when I got up Tuesday I copied over and uploaded the correct page. So if you viewed the blog Tuesday morning and wondered where the promised reader mail was, that's why it wasn't there. Click here to see it. And if you visited Tuesday afternoon, or Wednesday, try to expunge the last two paragraphs from your memory.  Heroin might help.

As for the video card, I tried the driver C was kind enough to upload, and it seemed to work, at least initially. All was fine with the general 2d functions of the computer, and it didn't lock up on start up like the latest drivers sometimes do.  It also didn't lock up when I started D2 after selecting 3D mode in the video test.  However once I was actually in a game, there were problems.

I mean, it's playable, I guess, and it's in 3D and all, perspective mode and everything. But at the same time, it's sort of like having one of those wavy glass sliding shower doors for a monitor cover, and I don't think I want that.  Or the headache/brain cancer playing with such a view would lead to.

 

It also makes it rather difficult to accurately evaluate the stats on your items, as this look at my runeword armor makes clear.

So I grudgingly uninstalled those drivers, restarted, and then reinstalled the latest ones that I'm told should work.  I then fired up D2 to play for 30 minutes while Malaya finished some work before we were off to get her Jamba Juice for the day, forgetting that I'd left it set to 3D mode... and here's what I saw next.

This screen has by now become quite familiar, as I get it about 15% of the time right after start up, and 100% of the time I try to make the 3D card do anything that actually requires 3D. Meaning that I'm still the owner of the least-used WoW beta authorization code on earth. It's quite a proud distinction.

Fortunately for my mental health, I feel like I can afford about an hour a day for gaming, and don't really care if I play WoW or not, so it's more of a mild annoyance than something that sends me into a computer-smashing fury.

My D2 v1.10 Fury barb is mid-way through Act 2 hell, and proceeding well on his plan to do all of Hell on players 8.  He's got pretty good gear, topped off with dual Colossus Blade Breath of the Dying swords, an Enigma Archon Plate, and 2 6-Ist Phase Blades on his weapon switch for horking, and he's fun to play. And yes, obviously I duped a ton of runes to get up to Zod, but hey, it's Single Player and you know what they say about cheating in solitaire. I'm only cheating myself.

The equipment he's got that really matters is the 35% crushing blow set helm, and 15% crushing blow unique boots, since 50% crushing is worth about 10000 damage, in hell.  Especially if you're playing on players 8. Not that the +10,000 damage trade off was available. I was going to use dual Kingslayer Colossus Blades, and made a couple of them (well one, and duped it) and it's actually quicker than the far-more-damaging BotD swords.  But I lose too much leach and too many hit points with them, and the rest of my equipment (especially my charms) is far too mediocre to make up for that trade off.  Faster killing isn't worth it if I'm almost dying all the time. It's just softcore, but still, I was raised on hardcore, and I don't like to die ever, if possible. My barb hasn't died yet in hell, at least, though he had a couple of mishaps in nightmare, mostly due to the buggy Fire Enchanted death damage, his low hit points, and Players 8.

My main observation based on several days of working through Act 1 and half of Act 2 hell, players 8? The level progression is amazingly quick in v1.10.  I was Clvl 71 when I started Act One, and I'm already up to 82, and I'm just up to the Viper Amulet in Act 2. I'm mostly doing this as an experiment and to have fun, and to compare the experience gain in v1.10 vs. v1.09, where far and away the best way to level up quickly was to get to Act 5 or the cows.  That's still true in v1.10 in normal, and somewhat true in Nightmare, though you often get such annoying random monster spawns in Act 5 that you'd probably prefer to be back in 4 where at least you know you'll be able to leech from most everything you roll on a given level.  Act 5 can be glorious now; my bowazon quivers when she rolls something like Flayer melee guys and Death Maulers, but for everyone of those perfect levels you get half a dozen levels entirely populated by Burning Souls, Skeleton Archers, Skeleton Mages, and Imps. And those are just unplayable for anyone but a Sorceress, and even she'll have problems with her merc dying constantly since there's nothing he can melee and leech from.

And no, none of this means anything to anyone who doesn't play D2 regularly. I'm sort of practicing writing about it since I've been considering a new Decahedron column or 3 for a while, and I'll probably start it off with a non-top ten column in which I talk about general playing v1.10 SP stuff, and ask for readers to submit their suggestions for a couple of upcoming top ten columns that I've been planning for months, but have never gotten around to writing.  Yet.

My mood has been further improved by the weather, which has reverted to the usual 60ish highs, after a week and a half of freakish (for March) 80s. The past 3 or 4 days have been sunny, windy, and cool. Cool enough to drive with the windows up and the A/C off, but not so cold that you need to wear a jacket in the day.  Just about perfect, as measured by my unscientific scale.  I want about 4 more uninterrupted months of this, please.

Since I wrote a great deal last night, and I'm eager to get back to the novel tonight while it's still early (not even midnight yet!) I'm going to end the personal rambling here, throw in some news below, and that will be that. Tune in Friday for something else, though I have no idea what yet.  I might even be forced to resort to running the dozen sequential photos of my super burrito manufacturing process, just to fill the space. 

¤ First up, we've got this rather surreal photo, which comes with no more story than you'll read in the caption below. It's weird on so many levels that I hardly know where to begin. I'm certainly grateful to it, since I can at long last fulfill one of my New Year's Resolutions, this one from circa 1998, by using "roshambo" as part of the name of a stored image file.

• Can you look at this without saying, if only to yourself, "Squah in tha nuts." in your best Cartman voice?
• Why does the guy getting kicked have on different shoes than his comrades, and are those really black strappy sneakers?
  • If not, what are those things wrapped around his shins?
• Does this do anything other than demonstrate the strength and protection afforded by a top of the line Shaolin jock straps?
• Can he prove that he's not just an eunuch?
• Did Herb really think it was a good idea to be photographed doing this, regardless of the circumstances?
• Check out the monk to the left, craning his neck to get a better look. Is he next, or checking for the proper form, or what?
• Did Herb have to give back the Triangle of Zinthar after this?

Former Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson, D-Culver City, kicks Zhang Xiao Ju between the legs during a demonstration performed by Buddhist monks at the Capitol in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, March 22, 2004. In their first visit to the United States, a group of Shaolin martial artists from SongShan, China demonstrated acrobatic flips and shows of strength among other things. With the monks urging him on, Wesson made several kicks to the monk who showed no emotion. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli)

 

¤ America's little dumplins continue to eat and eat their way into health problems, while overweight, overindulgent fast fooding parents everywhere wonder why.

American children are under threat from their own fat, with obesity so common that its effects have wiped out many other health gains, according to a report released on Wednesday.

The report, called the Child Wellbeing Index, found that obesity is the single most widespread health problem facing children. When being overweight is included in a statistical profile of how children are faring, health well-being falls nearly 15 percent below 1975 levels.

An estimated 60 percent of U.S. adults are overweight or obese, and obesity is close to overtaking tobacco use as the No. 1 cause of death, according to the CDC.

¤ Georgia has now banned female genital piercings, as part of a bill intended to ban female genital mutilation.  My initial thought was that this is just another hick state and their gynophobic reaction to things; banning abortion, banning birth control in schools, banning sex ed, etc.  But after reading the article, they might just be hillbillies.  Sadly enough.

Genital piercings for women were banned by the Georgia House Wednesday as lawmakers considered a bill outlining punishments for female genital mutilation. The bill would make such mutilation punishable by two to 20 years in prison. It makes no exception for people who give consent to have the procedure performed on their daughters out of religious or cultural custom.

An amendment adopted without objection added "piercing" to the list of things that may not be done to female genitals. Even adult women would not be allowed to get the procedure. The bill eventually passed 160-0, with no debate.

Amendment sponsor Rep. Bill Heath, R-Bremen, was slack-jawed when told after the vote that some adults seek the piercings.

"What? I've never seen such a thing," Heath said. "I, uh, I wouldn't approve of anyone doing it. I don't think that's an appropriate thing to be doing."

The ban applies only to women, not men. The bill has already been approved by the Senate but now must return to that chamber because of the piercing amendment. Both chambers of the Legislature must agree on a single version of a bill before it can go to the governor for final approval.

It's nice that they banned the mutilation, since even though it's probably unconstitutional, as an example of government making a law that tramples over individual religions, it's best that we just go ahead and trample over religious customs that the mainstream doesn't like and that hurt individuals.  Hell, if the Supreme Court found that banning Native Americans from smoking peyote for their spirit totems isn't unconstitutional, no one's going to overturn this one.

I mostly found it amusing for the honorable Rep. Heath's stunned reaction when confronted with the reality of clit rings.  I guess he doesn't spend much time on the Internet?

Obviously someone who knows what they are, and who doesn't approve of such things stuck that bit on the bill. And no one a bit more worldly than ole Bill noticed it, or wanted to bring up the issue of stainless steel rings through female labias and clit hoods on the Georgia House floor.  Which was probably a good idea in terms of their career, given the venue.

So what actually happens now?  I mean is this enforced?  Does every tattoo parlor/body piercing store have to take clit rings off the menu? Will actual cops be out there, perhaps female cops undercover, displaying their coochies in order to arrest fat guys with long hair and lots of bad tattoos just at the moment the forceps gripped curved needle nears the target?

And you thought the female cops who went on prostitution stings had the shittiest jobs in law enforcement!

¤ Talk about another shuttle disaster narrowly, and accidentally, averted.

When a shuttle returns to Earth, the rudder brakes the craft to a speed that is safe for landing. Shuttle program manager Bill Parsons told a press conference on Monday that a gear in one of four actuators that move the two-part rudder was installed backwards on Discovery.

By good fortune, the defective actuator was installed in the top position on the tail-mounted rudder, where it was subject to the least force. However, the faulty actuator could not have handled the most extreme forces during landing if it had been in the bottom position.

That could have disabling the rudder by jamming it open or closed. "Loss of the rudder speed brake would mean loss of vehicle and loss of crew," said Parsons.

Discovery flew safely 30 times with the defective actuator since its first launch August 30, 1984, and no one suspected a problem until the actuator was taken apart to check for corrosion.

Yes, you read that right.  They flew 30 times with this thing in backwards, and if they'd ever had really severe stress on it, it would have broken and quite possibly caused the shuttle to crash and burn.  It's hard to imagine that with the price tags on these things, and the few they've ever built, an error of this magnitude could be made, and never found for all this time. You also have to wonder why they manufacture the part so it can be put in backwards and still look like it's working. What's the sense in that? I mean sure, it took them a decade to start putting plastic tabs on the plugs on hard drive ribbon cables so you could tell if they were right side up or upside down other than by plugging them in and turning it on to see if it worked, but I'd like to think the space shuttle has a bit more intelligence in its design than cheap PC components.

¤ This is funny, in a pathetic sort of way. Some scholar wrote a book about a famous Indian warrior from the 17th century, in which he apparently said some less than flattering things. Now an obscure and radical political party in India is trying to have him arrested and deported by Interpol, so they can do... something. I have no idea what sort of freedom of the press laws they have in India, but they can't be too free if this sort of thing is allowed to happen.

Indian officials have decided to seek the arrest of an American scholar who has written a controversial biography of a historic national figure.

James Laine, who teaches religious studies at a US university, has written a book on Shivaji, a 17th Century warrior venerated in western India.

The government of the western state of Maharashtra said it would seek the assistance of Interpol to arrest him.

The AFP news agency quoted Mr Patil as saying the book contained allegedly slanderous remarks against Shivaji and his mother.

So in essence, this is like a guy in Indonesia writing a biography of George Washington in which he claimed that he did some less than heroic stuff, and the US government trying to have the author arrested and deported. Laughable, in other words.  Y'all Maharashtrians have rather thin skins, eh?

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