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Latest Humorous T-shirt Slogan: "You Wish!" This one has to be taken in context to be appreciated. The girl wearing this belly shirt was maybe 5'0" tall, with a muffin top going on, despite the fact that she was clearly in her third trimester of pregnancy. In addition she was wearing a thong that came up past her low-rise jeans and pushed her muffin top down over the edge to really emphasize the roll. I'm not in perfect shape so I don't expect that others should be, but when you are wearing that shirt, along with the rest of the outfit, you open yourself to scrutiny (and perhaps random looks of horror).
It's fun to hate:
When Shadowtwin reigns supreme:
Your Horoscope: Sagitarius: 11/22-12/21 A typographical error in your Church's newsletter will lead to you performing sex acts on dozens of anonymous strangers in your pursuit of "oral highground." Capricorn: 12/22-1/19 The stars did recently tell your wife to "listen to her heart" regarding whether or not she should leave you. The stars did not intend for you to listen to her heart. But once you used that bonesaw on her sternum (not trusting the stethoscope which just responded with a cryptic thumping sound), we're pretty sure she made up her mind anyway. Aquarius: 1/20-2/18 The stars would like to apologize for stating in their last prophecy, "Be wary of the stranger you meet at beach this weekend. The stars aren't sure why, but they don't trust him." Through a cosmic hiccup, that information was supposed to be released this month. The August prophecy should have read, "A dark and handsome stranger will approach you on the beach, profess his love for you, and sweep you away for a jetset marriage. After which you will lead a long, happy, prosperous, healthy life as the Queen of a small island nation." We apologize for any inconvenience this error may have caused. Pisces: 2/19-3/20 Your new stopwatch will allow you to time how long you can hold your breath underwater down to the thousandth of a second. Unfortunately, poor planning will mean that you are not able to actually share the information with anyone. Aries: 3/21-4/19 Your innovative new device for beauticians to use while giving pedicures can be wildly successful and make you quite wealthy IF you change the name. Trust us, no one is going to buy a "Ped-O-File". Taurus: 4/20-5/20 Your Mother always told you to wear clean underwear just in case there was an accident and paramadics had to see them. But as you board that plane today, the stars want you to know that you needn't worry about it. The debris field will be more than 8 square miles, making it impossible to find most human remains. Not to mention that the ensuing fire burned so hot that it disintegrated not only all fabric, but most of the thin metals aboard as well. Gemini: 5/21-6/21 You just had to get that genital piercing, didn't you? The stars tried to warn you not to, but you went ahead and did it anyway... Now all your worst fears will come to bear when, at a campground this weekend, you run afoul of this guy: Cancer: 6/22-7/22 The less traveled by areas of the Grand Canyon's north rim offer some of the most breathtaking views of this natural wonder. You will soon find out they also include some of the worst footings and none of the handrails. They do, however, provide equally awe-inspiring, terminal velocity impacts. Leo: 7/23-8/22 The stars heard your pleas, begging for someone who you could share your love with and embrace for the rest of your life. If you are still single, throw your arms around the closest person to you at 3:44pm GMT on Dcember 9th -That'll be the one. Trust us, you won't have time to be picky... Virgo: 8/23-9/22 The stars have piled up most of your things on the front porch. You can stay at a friend's house, but you aren't coming back home until you admit what you did and apologize. The stars' Mother was right about you... (you must have really pissed them off; the stars were in tears while they told me this) Libra: 9/23-10/22 The stars have been doing a little thinking and a lot of math. The population of planet earth is roughly 6,796,590,704. That means that roughly 566,382,558 people share each astrological sign. About 18,620,796 have the same birthday. Based on average life expectancy as many as 248,277 people were born on the same day, in the same year, for every zodiac sign. How can one statement possibly predict the future of all of them? Ehh, fuck it. "A full moon while Venus is rising is an omen of good things to come." Scorpio: 10/23-11/21 They say you never know how you are going to react to a crisis. After a home invasion this weekend you will: You will scream, "Do whatever you want to my wife, but leave me alone!" You will then create a distraction by throwing your newborn at the assailant as you dive through the window to safety. Now you know. Music lost to history: Aerosmith - Dream On When I started doing these, I could never have imagined that I would be putting an Aerosmith song here. Since I was born in 1974, this song is well before my generation. It was recorded in 1972 and released in 1983 on Aerosmith's Self-Titled Album, but to read the information on it at Wikipedia most of us would become familiar with it from a re-release in 1976.
Like most of the music being released in the late 60's/early 70's that was pushing the rock-n-roll envelope, Dream
On relies heavily on solid composition and and melody. Before the era of the modern effects processor, these bands
had no distortion to hide behind (or very little), and synthesized instruments hadn't yet made their way into music. In
that way the music always sounds more raw to us today because, quite simply, it was. While it seems laughable to think
about today, music like this was so far removed from the bubble-gum pop of the 50's that it still wasn't accepted into the
mainstream. As the baby-boomers became the target demographic, the rock-n-roll movement really started to pick up speed,
with bands like Led Zeppelin and Aerosmith clearing the path for the much darker and heavier bands like Black
Sabbath.
While I (and most of my generation) are probably far more familiar with the Aerosmith of the late 80's and early 90's, the
reason this song makes it onto my MLtH page comes down to one thing: Age. Not necessarily the age of the song; In fact,
as I sat down to do the research for this today, I had no idea when it was released, but would have guessed (closely) the
mid 70's. Tyler was born March 26, 1948, meaning that this song was written when he was only 24 years old. I'm not sure
why, but I have always thought this song was pretty amazing given his age at composition. I suppose it is human nature to
wax poetic about the days of yore and the imminent passage of time, but the melody sets a mood that makes you feel it
right along with him. As the song nears the end and his lyrics become more more frenzied, you can almost feel the pain
(longing?) in his voice. Listen to it with headphones and no distraction sometime, you'll see what I mean.
I wrote a short bit some time ago about Kelly Sweet's cover of this
song (see the video on Youtube). While I have since gotten over
the initial hatred I felt towards the cover of the song, I still just can't like it. The words are there; she hits the
notes; but I just can't hear it in her voice. As if there is somthing very personal about the song and Tyler's
deliverance of the lyrics that just can't be duplicated. At least to me.
That said, I have heard Aerosmith doing the song with an orchestra, and it also seems to lack the passion of the original.
So perhaps the thing that I like so much about it is the under-produced, raw sound of it, or it may be that I am still
hearing it through the ears of that impressionable youth that heard if for the first time in a dusty old Van with my Uncle
Art. Either way, it seems it is Lost to History.
I Can't Believe it's Not Porn! WhorePresents.comYep, it's not porn. It's not a site with gifts for sale either, which is probably a good thing since I can't imagine that any woman would be at all flattered to get a gift -no matter how nice- in a box that says "Whore Presents.com" on it.
Daily Reading:
My reading list changes from time to time, and there are many sites that I visit that are not on the list.
They are listed in the order that I visit them, enjoy!
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Thoughts on Factions
The game was released a couple of weeks ago, and of course I was on board and playing it the day it came out, well the day before it came out since it was pre-ordered. I have been holding off on making any comments about it because I wanted to take the time to play some parts of it through a couple of times. Now that I have done that, I will start with the random observations about the game.
First, the beginning of the game is entirely too easy. I can understand the need for a beginners section, as this is a standalone game there will be a lot of gamers playing it that have never played the original. The problem with the ease of the beginning is the difficulty of the rest of the game. It is entirely possible to plug along and do all the quests and missions on the little island (the beginner's zone) without ever dying, or even coming close to it. The second you step outside the city on the mainland it is possible to die without ever getting a spell or attack off. My first time through I was trying to save cash by waiting to upgrade armor. I died so many times in the initial quests on the mainland that I was seriously considering just giving up on the game. It is not that I don't like a challenge, I just didn't understand my own skills, as well as those of the hired mercenaries, to be able to take on the monsters there. There is just a gap in monster levels between the island and the mainland. The last things you fight on the island are about level 12 while the first things you fight on the mainland are level 20. In a game where level 20 is max, 8 levels makes a hell of a difference. There really should be either additional zones on the island that let you face some higher level monsters, or zones on the mainland that let you face lower level ones. There is simply no way to test out the effectiveness of your skills on higher level enemies until you are actually fighting in the city. Which wouldn't be so bad except for the greatly improved AI in the game. The first enemies you face when you reach the mainland will target a single party member hit him all at the same time, and since it is a computer controlling them by "same time" I mean within thousandths of a second of each other, making it impossible to heal before the inevitable death. The second character that I took to the mainland didn't have nearly the problems that the first one did. This was mostly due to knowing what attacks the enemies were going to use, who they were going to attack first, and what character classes would work well together against the particular groups I was fighting. So it wasn't nearly as impossible as I thought, but it really does need a place where you can practice against monsters that are above level 12 and below level 20. The other thing that really stands out about Factions is the availability of high-end weapons. The rare (relatively) "green" weapons seem to be a lot more common in Factions, not that it really matters since they really aren't that great in comparison to the other available weapons. The weapons that you can get from collectors now is, in many cases, vastly superior to the best of the "green" weapons. And those are the weapons that anyone can get with a minimum of effort. The economy of the game, being directly related to available items, is changing dramatically because of the ease of acquiring such powerful items. A shield that used to sell for 50,000gold has exactly the same stats as one that you can get from a collector if you just pick up a few mossy webs during battles. Clearly no one is going to buy the one for 50,000gold any more. Which is great for the player, not so great for the bots. Speaking of the bots. If you have ever done an ebay search for Guild Wars, just about all you see is money for sale. It seems that in order to slow the sale of Guild Wars stuff on eBay, they just made it easier to get all of it. Since it is no longer necessary to have a sword that costs 100k, what when you can get one with better stats off of a collector, you can really have a really well equipped character by the time you are level 20 with nothing but the gold that you are rewarded for completing quests. Of course there will always be people that don't want to do the work and are willing to pay someone to do it for them, so the bots will live on, at least their prevalence will die off a little bit. cross-posted to Shrouded Fury.com. ArchivesJune 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 July 2007 October 2007 December 2007 February 2008 August 2008 January 2009 February 2009 March 2009 April 2009 July 2009 August 2009 October 2009 November 2009 Site design was stolen directly from Blackchampagne.
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