Flu Tips 2012

A lot of people are suffering from the flu. Here's some stuff I've found out while under: 1. They didn't guess the right flu for the flu shot this year. I got the shot but still caught the flu. 2. The doctor can actually do something about the flu. I was surprised, as I thought being a virus it was untreatable, but they apparently have antivirals. So far I've noticed an immediate improvement in myself and my wife. If you don't have insurance, it'll run you around $150 for the drugs and another $100 for urgent care. If you do have insurance, it's half that. The best time to get this treatment is a day or two in. 3. It's more contagious than I've ever seen - every single person in my household caught it, as did a few people who visited. Where a mask if you can if you're around anyone who's sick. 4. Symptoms - It'll start with a cough and feeling tired, then into a hacking, probably unproductive cough.

Google Voice to get free everything forever

Recently I had to switch cell phone carriers as my phone stabbed me. My last phone, a Nokia brick-style phone, had seen so much use that the case chipped in various places, became jagged, and jabbed me in the skin under my thumbnail.

It was the first time my phone had tried to bleed me, other than financially.
So I figured I'd upgrade my phone to one of those new-fangled smart phones, as I frequently get lost going pretty much anywhere farther than the kitchen, and GPS would maybe save me an hour a week of, "...did they move the grocery store?"

The issue was that T-Mobile charged like 70 / month for some of their smart phone plans, and I'm a cheapskate. My previous plan, sans texting and data, was about half that, and I refused to pay more to receive more. And, as it turns out, I managed to get unlimited everything (data, text, calls) for around 35 a month. Here's what I did.

1. Swapped my old TMobile number over to Google Voice. There are many reasons to use Google voice. Short version, for me, was that my old TMobile phone number is now tied to my Google account. So if I switch carriers, I just redirect my Voice account to use that new phone.

2. My number was now on Google voice and my TMobile service was cancelled. Now I needed a cheap carrier - Virgin Mobile. They offer a small amount of minutes, and infinite text and data (data is speed-choked after 2 gb / month) for 35 a month.

3. I make calls at home using my computer and Google voice. These minutes are free.

So now all calls to my old TMobile number, which hasn't changed in years, are directed to my new phone and plan, and no one is the wiser. The same plan would work with any other carrier, but Voice let's me be a cheapskate

Whedon Should Not Make More Firefly

I loved Firefly. I've also watched Whedon's Buffy, Angel, and a bit of Dollhouse. His stories are compelling and his characters are lovable. But, under no circumstances, should Whedon be allowed near Firefly again.
I hesitate in saying this, as I have signed e-petitions and geeked out with the best of them, but this change in thinking has been a long time coming. Let me explain.
Say you were an orphan and had been adopted by a very rich man. He gives you a room with closet filled with toys, a pantry with all the food you could ever want, and a stable with your very own ponies. You spend a magical day eating, playing, and riding your new ponies.
At the end of the day, the kindly rich man asks you which of the ponies you love the most. With a smile, you explain you loved the soft brown one the most. The very rich man smiles knowingly, pats you on the head, and eviscerates that horse in front of you with a chainsaw.
"Why?" you ask. "Why would you kill the most adorable and beloved one?"
Spattered with gore, he kisses you gently on the head, and says, "Because now you'll appreciate the others more. Goodnight!"

That's Whedon.
Granted, I'd be thrilled and love it anyway should Firefly return, but... that pony. Why, Whedon, why? Curse your eventual but preventable betrayal!

Current stuff

Currently, I'm:

Jobs:
1. Employed at The Rocky Mountain Collegian. Takes about 1-3 hours to make an article per week.
2. Employed at Telvent for about 21 hours per week doing software QA.

GMing for 15 different people (there's overlap if you do the map)
1. Alkarin, fantasy game, 8 players.
2. Vampire, Chronicle of Ages, 8 players
3. 7th Sea, 7 players
4. 1920s Horror game, 6 players.

Club President of CSU Science Fiction and Fantasy Club

Attending CSU as a part time student (6 hours / week). Computer Science is harder than English was, because they actually want me to know stuff about things.

Snow Day

Dear Snow,

We both know that you're not coming down hard enough to cancel, or even delay, my test tomorrow. This is simply a cruel jape designed to raise my hopes and entice me to not study but instead drink some hot cocoa with peppermint schnapps. It will not work.I am on to you.
Warmest regards (get it, you frozen bastard?)

John

Twilight - Thoughts of one who Hates the Sparklepyres II

One last thought on the book. The age thing. It's creepy. There's a psychological difference between a young person and an old person. I can't tell if Edward is actually mature or if he's frozen at teenage-hood.

So as I was watching the movie, I found myself complaining at the screen. Writing it down will prevent me from looking crazy, save for the fact that airing my thoughts to the internet at large will make me look slightly crazier. Hurray!
The book had a lot of dialogue pauses where the character would get appropriate teenage angst. In the movie, this is handled by the actors staring mournfully at each other. I bet I could condense this movie to an hour by removing mope-pauses.
In the book, the vampires are supposed to be movie star pretty. Since everyone is already movie star pretty, this is handled largely by using cues like, "dyed-blonde hair" and "fossilized in hair-gel."
I use about that much hair-gel. Clearly, I am movie-star pretty.
Oh, hey, there's Jacob Black. I didn't recognize him with a shirt on.
I'm glad they had the main villains kill some extras. In the book, the villains just appear from nowhere, and are quite polite, then suddenly the whole book is about them. The book doesn't narrate a single vampire throwdown. If they skip that in the movies, I'll claw my screen.
I'm still creeped out by the notion that Edward watches Bella while she sleeps for months, before they were actually dating even. Sure, she's clothed, but clothes shift in sleep and people scratch themselves. He didn't know she'd be okay with it when he did it. Bad sparklepyre.
Note to directors - people cannot crouch and hiss without looking ridiculous. Especially wearing designer clothing and baseball uniforms.
But hey! A villain! A chase! It's starting to feel like a movie about vampires.
Aw, Bella was just as much of a jerk towards her father in the movie as the book. I wonder if she'll actually make up with him or show more than two seconds of concern for him. In the book, she pretty much shat on him, emotionally, then gave him a big fat meh the rest of the book.
Movie climax was better, in that it occurred.

Twilight conclusion: The book was okay, but teenagers are not role models. The movie was interminable swill.

Twilight - Thoughts of one who Hates the Sparklepyres

I read the first book of the Twilight series yesterday. I try to understand things even if I'm not inherently a fan of them, and I figure I can't be a writer and ignore a book that has sold fifteen-billion copies.
The writing was alright. Captured the feeling of being a teenager, with focus consistently on little emotions and overpowering hormones. It was actually fun, reminiscent of Harry Potter's cinematic writing, with focus on a blow-by-blow.
I was even okay with vampires being gorgeous. Made some sense - pretty predator to attract stupid humans. Sparkling still sets my teeth on edge - it doesn't matter that their skin is crystalline. It's... tacky.
The want-to-drink blood as want-to-bone metaphor was pretty damn thick, and the characters make some pretty stupid teenage decisions. But anyone who looks to a fictional teenager for a role-model isn't much better off than someone deciding that an actual teenager is full of good ideas, instead of hormones and cologne.

So, I'm now watching the movie and will broadcast my resentment as it grows.

Dying to Accomplish Something

Gaming is an interesting way of exploring something that's not intuitive. In this case, the necessity of death in drama.

Years ago, the style in gaming was more comparable to a videogame. You'd kick down the door, slay whatever non-human evil was inside, and loot the magical treasure trove it was inevitably guarding. This style of gaming is falling out of favor because computers can run quicker combats, generate more interesting treasure, and have better graphics (any).

It was in the high-combat era of gaming that you could expect a character death per story, or even multiple deaths per session. Your new shiny elven wizard would saunter around a corner, step on a trap of horrible instant squishing, and you'd generate a new character as quickly as possible so as to not miss the rest of the adventure.

There wasn't much point in having a backstory or character development, as your character was more likely to end up horribly exploded than happily ever after.

More recent games try to avoid the sting of death. It's minimized with either outright avoidance or an abundance of resurrection. Death is more like time-out than dead.

I am a proponent of low death or no death gaming. In a real story, you can ensure that no character dies just because Mook #23 shot his gun extra well that day. In gaming, a character can die long before they meet the man who killed their father, save the princess, or indeed even leave the farm.

Yet games where the threat of real, non-revocable character death looms feel more thrilling, more accomplishing. The compromise is best achieved by the person running the game - it's the job of the Storyteller to warn about dangers, clarify threats, and sometimes even nudge dice a little. But it's also the job of the Storyteller not to make consequences unreal.

We've all seen what happens when a story has characters hopping back-and-forth from the grave like they're cat's not sure if they want outside or in. It just goes to prove that it's better to let a character die than to let drama itself die.

Job Hunt

I swear, if I miss another job, and that dog laughs at me, I am going to find a way to hunt the dog instead.
Duck hunt joke. Eh? Eh?
Latest job hunt involves a custom-made Craigslist comber I coded in Java. Since I'm open to a lot of jobs, it's more a matter of removing ones I definitely won't take rather than using Search to find a job I want. So it does that part for me, makes a list of potential jobs, and I go through that once a day or so.
Also need to rewrite cover letter. All advice related to cover letters is useless - experts contradict themselves at every turn. Their one piece of advice? Address it to a person whose name you know. Thanks, experts! In the anonymous world of online-applications, nothing could be more relevant!

It's amazing how fast time goes when you're used to being employed or in school and then suddenly not. A full day can't show as much progress as an hour would have.

Finals VS Lazy The Slothbeast

I've had a class this semester that was quite easy - technical communication. Regrettably, despite a full English B.A., they seemed to think I sitlll needed halp wit my speling and grammer. Teh fool!s
So I've ended up in a position where I could not study (read - get a 25% by sheer multiple choice guesswork) and still walk away with a B. I could also, with minimal luck (65%) get an A.
I've always wondered how much I actually absorb in a semester and how much is just put in the night before a test and immediately lost. Of course, I've never had the gall to test such a thing.
However, I'm quite tempted now. My GPA did nothing for me in my previous job hunt, and I've always wanted to know the answer to this question. Do tests actually test on long-term knowledge absorption? Or is it really a cramming arms race? What really is the point of exams if they're just a measure of how well you can briefly recall information?
Or am I just enjoying the option to laze my way through this?

~John

...LiveJournal is dead? When did that happen?

I have a terrible history of keeping up to date with these things. Usually it's because I self edit or try to make myself all shiny.
Of course, with the number of people being not-hired or fired based on Facebook updates of them clad in orange safety cones and saran wrap, perhaps some online caution is warranted.

Nevertheless, occasionally I find myself wanting to rant without bothering people on the Facebook feed or limiting my verbose nature to 140 characters.

Additionally, I want to rant about my main hobby, gaming. Not computer games, as I've really not had enough time to engage in that, but tabletop gaming. The social, extremely nerdy kind where you pretend to be an elf.

Since I think most of my friends who find ridiculous the notion of rolling dice and cheering in triumph when a '20' is seen have dropped off the face of the earth, I feel more comfortable than I used to having gaming discussions in a public forum.

We'll see how often I actually end up updating this. But hey, on the plus side, Brain Bandit? Oh yeah, it alliterates. And it's awesome.

~John