Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Filed under: Uncategorized
Still thinking about properties and realized there is more that I would have to worry about. I would have to consider home insurance if I bought a place. Well, probably not consider it, I would have to get it. I think it is a good idea in practice but I have heard good and bad about the insurance companies. I think it really depends on the company and the relationship you have with your agent.
Not to completely change the subject but thinking about insurance makes me realize I need to look into insurance brokers. I need to look into different types of available insurance. I do have some insurance coverage, like car and stuff but probably need to get other things like life and property. Insurance can be a good thing to have. Although, the last time I had to use the car insurance they bit me. If I had known what a pain it would be to my pocket book in premiums later I would have just paid for the dents to be fixed myself. It was only like a few hundred off the deductible, but I didn’t know what claiming the stuff would do to my rates at the time. I ended up paying a lot more in the long run than I would have by just fixing everything myself. The company was nice otherwise, and quick, so I can’t really complain about them but I wish they hadn’t told me it wouldn’t affect my rates when it would. I learned that if something is not explicitly not your fault then you are probably going to see raised rates. Even if it was nobody’s fault or partially your fault. In my cause it had been nobody’s fault. It was depressing later, and I ended up changing companies. I did consider staying or going back to the company I had but I just couldn’t get over being told my rates weren’t going up when they did. I ended up changing to the ones I have now and I am fairly happy with them so far.
Tags: boat, car, house, insurance, rental
Filed under: Uncategorized
Why would you want to put software on your computer that often acts just like adware and attempts to control what you have already paid for? It doesn’t make sense to me either. They punish those that want to play legally and end up shooting themselves in the foot, kind of like cutting off your nose to spite your face. I don’t quite get what the thought process is the game companies go through? Put the game out with clear documentation on what the public is actually getting when they buy it and then put a huge effort into the community and ensuring that people who are playing the game illegally are painted as scum in that game community. I think if company worked to change the gamers attitudes about their games and how they do DRM it would pay off in dividends for them. They would just have to get the gamers behind them.
Can anybody really blame people for downloading games illegally? Actually, I can but in general I don’t. The companies are cracking down and making the illegal game copies so much more appealing. When a company makes it downright unpleasant for the regular public to play their games through harsh digital rights management actions, like required, continual online activation or other measures, people will choose the easier way if they want to play.
It wouldn’t be too hard to do especially if you had little to no DRM and specifically stated that and why you did it. Make the community and your users your DRM and you have people to support you, a built in audience and more revenue. If you have a few people in the forums or just around the net quietly pointing out that if you aren’t playing the game legally we want nothing to do with you because you are trying to kill what we like by not supporting the game makers, I think the message would get across. Plus you wouldn’t be driving over half of your potential gamers away with unpleasant and invasive DRM. Of course the game has to also be good, but that’s a different issue.
Tags: drm, games, pc games, theft
Filed under: Uncategorized
Talking about food again, cause I and many others I know like it. I made my version of a recipe I found a while ago while looking for something good to cook for dinner. You need chicken, breast or thigh, but boneless. You also need some red wine, red or black vinegar, flour, garlic powder and dried basil. Oh, and butter or olive oil for cooking it all. Trust me it turns out very good, and it’s fairly quick.
I start out by thawing the chicken then I cut it into strips for easy and quicker cooking. In a small to medium bag (I use a ziplock bag) dump in two or three tablespoons of flour and about a tablespoon of the dried basil. Drop the chicken strips in the bag, seal, and shake well until coated. Set that aside and then, for say four or so pieces of chicken, mix in a small bowl 3 tablespoons red wine and two tablespoons red or black vinegar. Sprinkle in just a couple of touches of garlic powder and an even lighter amount of the dried basil and stir again. Set that aside and warm up a pan on medium to medium high until your butter or olive oil looks like things might be getting fairly hot. Use a fork or chop stick to pull the chicken slices out of the bag and put them in the heated pan. Turn frequently to avoid any burning. Cook for about five to six minutes then use a spoon to spread the wine and vinegar mix you created earlier evenly over your chicken pieces. Then I normally sprinkle some more dried basil on the chicken and a bit more garlic powder. You can add other spices and stuff as you wish. Cook on medium heat for another five or six minutes until you think it’s done then turn it down to low and let it sit for another two minutes, turning as needed. Afterwards you just sit back and enjoy! I did, even had a bit of red wine after dinner. Yes I know chicken goes with white, but I like red. Hope you enjoyed your dinner as well!
Tags: basil, chicken, dinner, food, red wine
Filed under: Uncategorized
Internet searching can be fun a lot of time right up until you run into that page with the idiotic add that takes over the screen for a minute or two. Most of these can be ignored or bypassed with a pop-up blocker but sometimes it’s not a pop-up it’s just how the page is set up. Take for example, MSN’s main page. I don’t often voice my opinion on their ads, but this time I did. They have these kind of intrusive ads a lot. A whole lot. I absolutely hate them. With a passion. I make it a point to note what is being advertised that way and then I spend a month or three going out of my way to not buy or in any way support whatever advertiser is being presented via pop-up crap. I also go out of my way to try and spread the word about how annoying their advertisement was. I hope that if enough people start basically boycotting those seriously annoying and intrusive advertisements then the advertisers will demand that they be changed.
MSN does it a lot, Yahoo sometimes. If I could find a site that gave me the information I wanted like they do but without the idiotic in your face advertising I think I would switch and not even bother looking back. Really, how many of you find it annoying when you are trying to read or see something and some stupid (insert you favorite three swear words here) drops into your way. At that point unless I am just terribly interested in whatever it was I had been trying to read I normally just close the page and try and find the information somewhere else. You are probably saying I should just relax and get over it, but if I do that then it becomes the norm and I don’t want that kind of site to become the norm.
Tags: advertising, annoyance, boycott, intrusive, pop-ups
Filed under: Uncategorized
There is one thing that it is very easy to see when it is missing from people, especially children. You would think that by now people would have figured out that it is necessary, you could even call it a necessary evil. Perhaps one of the big problems with it is that the people, parents, who should be providing it to the next generation, their kids, are often unfamiliar with it themselves. Either unfamiliar or flat out running the other direction whenever a situation shows up that might require it of them.
This complaint is not really about parents, though. It is more in line with a general discussion on being disciplined enough to take responsibility for the consequences of one’s actions. This comes up because of the several articles in the news recently of people who have had really unpleasant things occur to them through their own actions, and then, of course you have those who feel that we should pity the person who brought things upon themselves. Honestly, to a point I agree with that. But when a person’s actions intrude on freedoms of another, then I got no sympathy for them. They did, they can pay and no need to punish anyone but them. Of course, sadly, their families and friends often get punished as well because they care for these people, even though they deserve what they are getting.
Three articles I thought kind of fit together, all talk about discipline in one way or another. One goes over the actions of a school principal who has taken to using a paddle to bring discipline back to a school that badly needed it. In another place a person shot and killed one of a pair who were stealing his truck. The police are not going to press charges against him for it either; which is a good thing. The last of the three talks about a British lady who is up for execution in Laos because she was caught smuggling drugs. I have to say that every single person, from the child who gets paddled to the woman who already died to the woman who may die deserves, perhaps pity, but no sympathy.
Tags: British, discipline, drugs, execution, Laos
Filed under: Uncategorized
Heard something on the radio station today that set me back slightly, but in a good way. They were doing an interview with Dominic Monaghan, from Lord of the Rings and the upcoming Wolverine Origins movie. He plays Chris Bradley in the movie and the internet radio station I was listening to at the time was doing an interview of him and one of the things they brought up was a question relating to the current swine flu problem that is circulating. His answer, I thought, was quite good.
The radio station apparently had someone who worked there that was heading to Mexico. The impression they were giving made me think that the person was saying they were cocky or able to take care of themselves and that the travel advisory, read warning, wouldn’t apply to them. So, during their interview with Dominic Monaghan they asked him what he would do if he were in the same situation. Say he had made all of his plans, things were set and the tickets were bought. Hotel settled and all plans ready to proceed, would he cancel his plans because of the advisory. He thought about it for a bit but then answered that he probably would cancel because of the responsibility issue. He wouldn’t want to be responsible for bringing it back to his town. That answer made me stop a second and think because it made a lot of sense, but it wasn’t what I had been thinking about in considering my own answer to the question. However, in thinking about it I thought it was probably the best answer to give. It shows a concern for your fellow people that is not always found anymore. It also says a lot about the person answering the question that way.
My first thought was to myself thinking about whether I would want to take the catching the flu or not. I was thinking is it worth the chance for me to get sick? As you can see, I am a bit more selfish that Monaghan because my first thought was not about wether I might bring something back but about what chances I might be taking in regards to myself. I kind of hope, selfishly of course, that you are a better person than I.
Tags: Dominic Monaghan, Swine, swine flu, Wolverine Origins
Filed under: Uncategorized
Sunday is a lazy day, at least today is for me. Relaxing but buys, as there is always something to do or something that needs to be done. Yesterday was good fun, also relaxing in its own way. Went to see a tulip festival here locally that turned out to be more fun than I had anticipated. It took about an hour to get there, but the drive was nice also, although I thought I had gotten lost a couple of times, but it worked out all right. It is always nice to see different things.
Went fairly early to try and avoid the crowds, which was a good idea. When we got there it wasn’t too bad but when I was getting ready to leave the parking area was packed. There were lots of families with kids. There were also, of course, a lot of tulips. There were some stands set up that had an almost faire like atmosphere. They had wine and some interesting food available. Everything was pretty good, only problem being it was really cold! Otherwise it was a lot of fun. Have some tulips in the house today, brightening things up a bit. They look good on the table.
The faire like atmosphere was really the best part for me. I haven’t been to any kind of faire in a long time and it brought back memories; made me want to go find one and enjoy it. Last time I was at a faire of any type was in Alaska. It was a lot of fun, with all different types of stalls and food vendors and stuff. Actually, thinking about it the weather was warmer there during that faire than it was here yesterday. I miss some of the fairs I used to go to when I was shorter. I am sure there are still a lot going on, even in the current economic and weather climate.
Tags: crafts, fair, lazy sunday, sunday
Filed under: Uncategorized
Possible spoilers here.
Watched “The Day the Earth Stood Still” last night. I could see why it didn’t do so well at the box office. My friend and I were both disappointed. She thought it was a little strange and said it was ok until close to the end. I had to agree.
It was either a very poor adaption of the novel, I think it was a novel, or it was just a poorly written book. I really didn’t feel anything for anyone in the movie. There was the occasional disgust due to what they were doing but other than that I wasn’t really involved with the movie in any way, except to find the storyline itself somewhat interesting.
To be honest I kind of liked the movie until a bit after the ark scene and then everything fell apart for me with it. I haven’t checked the director, and it is probably some big name, but it felt like the person wasn’t really experienced in directing. Some of the camera angles and almost freeze frames were really jarring to me and ended up doing nothing but kicking me out of the movie.
Then there was the main idea about whether we were worthy or not. I didn’t feel like there was anything really given for the alien to see that we were. A few scenes of crying and remembering the ones that died do not make for mind changing activities. One of the things he implied was that the human race would have to change if he was to let them live, but to me, other than the woman there was not much evidence of it and really no reason for him to stop the process. I understand that they were trying to show that there is hope and that people can change, but they did a very poor job of it.
Finally, the part that really disgusted me about the movie was at the end when they had the President, over protestations by the now nice secretary of state still attempt military action. It made no sense!!! All it did was make the President out to look like a complete idiot and, for me, I believe it was the turning point on how I felt about the movie overall. Think about it, because the author or the re-write team for the movie obviously did not. If you have a civilization that can destroy you and has proven it, repeatedly. And every time you attack things just get worse and you have seen that it is a waste of energy, but, now you have the chance to possibly stop being attacked if you let the woman try to change things, what idiot attacks anyway. It made no sense, they had to know that attacking him would do nothing, just based on their past experiences. IT was completely stupid! If the other stuff doesn’t work and hasn’t worked for several times, then change your actions! Wasn’t that the point of the movie? Well, they definitely showed people not changing and then they said oh, you can change I will spare you. It was not consistent. I think by just changing that one part they could have had a very good movie because we were both enjoying it up until close to the end and that one thing destroyed the whole credibility of the movie for me.
Tags: day the earth stood still, keanu reeves, movie, movie review
Filed under: Uncategorized
Games are great fun. I prefer pc games to console games; I don’t even own a console. I hope that doesn’t offend anybody! Not that it matters much, but pc games just have more of the type I like. I am big on role playing games and am becoming more interested in adventure, strategy and simulation games. Back a few years when I was thinking about picking up a console there weren’t many with good choices in the role playing genre. I haven’t checked recently to see if that has changed.
I spent some time looking through the available games sites for new and old rpg’s that I could pick up. I am really interested in the downloadable ones because that is much easier. D2D and steam seem fairly convenient but they don’t have all the ones I am interested in. They do have a few but their selection isn’t as large as I would wish. Hopefully they will continue to grow their database of games. The older ones are cheaper and you know they already have almost all of the needed patches for them. It makes playing them much easier than when they were first released.
There are a couple of role playing games I like but I would really like to see a mixture of games molded into great role playing games. Take the openness of Oblivion with the character interaction of Baldur’s Gate II or Neverwinter Night’s II and the riding and fighting capabilities of Mount & Blade, plus the fun of Sid Meier’s Pirates and you would have a great game! The best part of any game for me, what I am looking for comes down to three things really. If a game has open exploration, great character building and character interaction I am extremely happy with it. I love building my character. I think I often spend more time doing that then actually playing the game.
Tags: classics, games, pc, role playing games, rpg
Filed under: Uncategorized
Good news! The captain who was being held prisoner by the Somali pirates is safe now. He was rescued by the US Navy when negotiations apparently seemed to be deteriorating. I am not sure on the whole story but rumor has it he may have jumped overboard again and when he did the captain of the Navy ship doing the negotiating took action. The end result is three dead pirates, one pirate prisoner and the captain safe again.
Reading the article I guess the pirates in the area were upset and threatening retaliation. I found that to be slightly offensive. What kind of arrogant (insert swear word here) are these guys? They said that the US is now their number one enemy, well good, in this case. They act like they have a right to hold people hostage and terrorize the shipping lanes, the only right they truly have after acts like that is the right to a speedy end and a (you knew I was going to say it didn’t you?) long walk of a short plank. I can’t seriously imagine what is going on in their heads to be threatening the ships and people with more violence. Sadly it might be good because if they do that then whatever country’s ships they attack will have the moral right to send them to Davy Jones’ locker. I hope that at that point no country would complain if it becomes one warning shot and then shoot to kill area where the pirates are attacking. If we are thinking in piratical terms and ideas then maybe some country will offer a bounty of several doubloons for the head of a pirate, that would probably put a stop to a lot of the issue.
It really needs to be done, because these pirates need to be shown that their chosen profession is now very risky and if they pick up a gun they are also opening the possibility of being shot, hung, beaten and quartered. It was just really amazing to me that the pirates were complaining about how they were treated, as if they were the victims in this. They brought it upon themselves.
Tags: captain, free, navy, pirates, somali
