Union Pacific's Great Excursion Adventure

Thursday Chaos Theory

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Chew on This: Food for Thought
I’ve seen a couple of links to this article today.

I can’t fathom the amount of… malice?… apathy?… evil?… that it would take to commit a crime like this.

And, from a different perspective: What about the other passengers? What goes through your head when you turn and see something like this occur mere inches from you? Or if you were the guy he smoked a cigarette with? Or the young lady he chatted up?

I’ve heard people say – and even said myself, on occasion – “People suck.”

This goes a long way to reinforcing that belief.

Stray Toasters

Late-afternoon randomness

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Stray Toasters

*voop*

“That’s the way that Lady Luck dances… Roll the bones.”

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Tuesday: Coda
After work, I made haste to get to Far West Comics for the HeroClix tournament. Keith, the judge got there just after me. And no one else did. Fortunately, Matt and Nano (the store owners) were playing in the event, so it wasn’t a complete wash. I got my two boosters and pulled the following figures:

I was very pleased to pull the Dugan, Doom and Impossible Man figures… very pleased, indeed. The others were all duplicates of figures that I got in my brick. I constructed my team of:

  • Arachne
  • Dum Dum Dugan
  • Iron Fist and
  • Kristoff

I used a Feat card – Loner – on Dum Dum, which gave him a bonus to his defensive value. And then, we went to work.

My first match was against Matt, he also fielded four figures:

I split my force and moved to positions that afforded me decent lines of fire, while still providing cover. The first game went fairly quickly. I took out two of Matt’s pieces without losing anyone. Next up, I fought Nano. He brought

I divided my force again, but in a slightly different pattern – I remembered to array my figures in a pattern that allowed the ranged members of each team to provide cross-field support to each other. That came in pretty handy. And some really good dice rolls didn’t hurt, either. I was able to eliminate Mole Man and the Spider-Slayer and was working on taking out Spider-Man when time ran out. Once again, I was able to keep everyone on my side alive, although Kristoff took a couple of solid hits.

For going 2-0, I got an Illuminati event dial, a Nowhere to Hide battlefield condition card and a map.

After the tourney, I came home… and had a lazy evening. Me, the couch, the TV and a crossword puzzle book. Mm-hmm, that’s right. And it was good.

Stray Toasters

And that’s all.

Mid-day randomness and stuff and whatnot

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Stray Toasters

  • House to apologize for slavery, Jim Crow
    • My first inclination was to think: “Thanks… 150 years after the fact.” I’m not a reparationist. To be honest, I don’t really care about them, let alone want them. It’s great that there’s being recognition of the problem… but I think it’s a bit “too little too late.”
    • My second inclination was to change it to mean Dr. House, from the Fox TV show. That made the whole thing play out differently in my head… in a far more amusing manner.
  • I’m not entirely sure if it’s jumping the shark or not, but apparently Clark Kent will meet three teens from the 31st Century on Smallville this season. I may have to tune in for that.
  • Baltimore Business Journal
  • I apparently have a version of Do Ya Think I’m Sexy… by The Revolting Cocks. That amuses me greatly.
  • The Obama Veepstakes
  • Doug E. Fresh and the Get Fresh Crew
  • Tonight’s ‘Clix tourney is a 300 point sealed box draft. This means that each entrant has to purchase two boxes and construct a team from the figures he just purchased. I’m both intrigued and concerned about this: I’m used to being able to select the figures I want. This will prove very interesting. In order to get a rough feel for what it’s going to be like, I did a mock draft. I asked SaraRules to come up with ten numbers, from 1 to 60. Based on the numbers she gave me, I used the figure numbers to come up with a couple of options for teams.
  • Carlin gets last laugh on death
  • Just when you thought the three seashells was bad enough comes this.
  • Tor.com
  • Active Directory

Sunday, not-so-bloody Sunday

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Sunday – 27 July 2008
After getting the oil changed (and tires rotated) and having my butt handed to me at HeroClix yesterday, I went down to visit Perry and the kids. We talked City and ‘Clix and other geekery. Go figure.

On the way home, I realized that I was craving Aussie Cheese Fries, so I called in an order from the local Outback Steakhouse. I got home and devoured the whole thing. I don’t know whether it was the full stomach, post-dinner cool down period or what, but I went from “watching TV” to “being watched by TV” intermittently over the next couple of hours. I woke up a little before time to head out to breakfast… only to be rooted in place by Dial M for Murder, which I had never seen before. I watched about 20 minutes of it before I was able to break free. I will be looking for this movie when I next go on a DVD run.

I made it to breakfast. VI was far more quiet than usual; I chalked it up to people taking advantage of the long weekend and going out of town. Part of the night’s conversation included discussions on “Who was the best James Bond” and different interpretations of The Joker.

This morning, my dreams were a weird amalgamation of 70s political thriller movies and IT oddness. No, they didn’t make sense to me, either – dreams rarely do. Thus, I didn’t even try to make sense of them.

Stray Toasters

I should try to sort out what I’m going to do today.

But first, a bowl of Honeycomb is calling my name.

Namaste.

Weekend Update

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Saturday – 26 July 2008
Yesterday, after work, I started tinkering with the iMac. I want to have it in the living room area, so I was looking at bridging two routers. The older router wouldn’t do what I wanted/needed, so I had to investigate other options. While an AirPort card would work, I think that I’m just going to pick up a USB network adapter and call it good.

Coffee and dinner were good. Mary found a book that amused me. I bought it and decided that I would have to go on my desk at work… alongside this. That made my little inner subversive smile.

I slept in until 9:30 this morning. It was nice. Too bad there aren’t any good ‘toons to watch. I killed an hour or so flipping channels, until I hit on Nickelodeon. Sozin’s Comet, the Season 3 finale of Avatar: The Last Airbender was on. I’ve only caught sporadic episodes of Avatar, but I’ve enjoyed what I saw. The finale was no exception.

Stray Toasters

TIme to get under way. I need to get the oil changed in the car and then it’s off to play ‘Clix with Chris for a while.

Yeah, weekends are good.

“Hold it… I ain’t pushing no ‘Moon’ button!”

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Friday – 25 July 2008

It’s SysAdminDay!

In honor of this, I once again bring your Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie’s System Administrator Song.

Last night, I hung out with Allie and her friend, David; I haven’t seen her in close to a year, I guess. She’s in town for a CF treatment. When I talked with her earlier in the week, I told her that I’d come visit her. I asked if she wanted anything. Her response: Tiramisu. So, I picked some up and took it to her. It was a fun visit.

I got back home around 11:00. I turned on the TV and watched the tail end of The Late Late Show. I thought about hopping on PokerStars, but realized at 12:30 that I was tapped. So I called it a night.

Stray Toasters

Namaste.

“Who do you trust?”

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Wednesday: Coda
After work, I headed to Dr. Volt’s to pick up this week’s comics haul and my brick of ‘Clix:

It’s a fifty-five piece set, of which I pulled 42 unique figures.
76% of the total set in one swoop. That’s not bad.
And, I got 11 pieces that I wanted, including:

And, since I got the brick, I can send in for the Super Skrull: Illuminati figure.

On the way home, I stopped in to visit SaraRules’ family. And, I picked up the “new” iMac. Now come the two most difficult parts: Figuring out where it’s going and deciding on a name for it.

Stray Toasters

  • Science!
  • I’m still on the fence… but leaning towards wanting to play DC Universe Online.
    When it goes live, that is.
  • This amuses me not only because of the caption, but also because the kitten reminds me of Lightning… when he was still tiny.
  • A live-action Cowboy Bebop movie? Could be.
  • Motorist draws gun at ‘Grey Poupon’ question

I should probably give some thought to calling it a night.

“The force goes into the flow…”

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Tuesday – 22 July 2008
I have been having… issues… with my cable box for the past few weeks. It decided to become more problematic late Sunday night. I was particularly miffed because I was geared up to watch The Middleman last night… and ABC Family is one of the channels whose reception has been “less than perfect.” Fortunately, I was able to jiggle things around (yes, that’s a technical term) and get reception on most of the failing channels. After calling Comcast – twice -yesterday, it’s basically come down to “there’s something wrong with your receiver; you should just bring it in and exchange it.” Great. The office hours are from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM, which just happen to be the hours I’m usually at work. So, I’ll be taking it in on Friday, when I will hopefully be getting out of work early.

Not only was I able to watch The Middleman, but I caught a rebroadcast of Burn Notice… and still put in a little time in City of Heroes. I ran Corvus Nox’ cape mission… not that I’m planning on him wearing a cape, but I did it anyway.

This morning, breaking up waking up was hard to do, but I managed to rouse myself and get up and on the way. Stopping for a free frozen mocha didn’t hurt, either.

Today, for a change of pace, I volunteered to attempt to bring a measure of order to the chaos that our IT Lab/storage area. It keeps me off the main floor (for the most part). I brought in my powered speakers and hooked them up to Defiant, so I’ll have music to keep me company. It sounds like the sub has seen better days; maybe I’ll just leave this set of speakers here and look for a better set for home.

This might just wind up qualifying as today’s workout. I’m good with that.

Back to it.

Namaste.

“Rainy days and Mondays…” (or something to that effect)

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Monday – 21 July 2008
A new week begins.

Last night, Perry and I spent a few hours in Paragon City – I played Corvus Nox, he played his Reforming Demon character. We joined a team that was running a few missions in the low to mid-20s. The team was “top heavy” with Tankers. This was a good and bad thing:

  • Good: We had people who could hold aggro (keep the bad guys’ attention).
  • Bad: They had to be elbow-up in bad guys… which meant that as the de facto healer, so did I.

I’ve mentioned before that Corvus Nox can heal, but that he’s not a primary healer. I tried making this point more that abundantly clear to my teammates. I think that the multiple deaths helped to underscore my point. Nevertheless, thanks to Double XP weekend, I put three-and-a-half levels on ‘Nox.

In an amusing side note, I ran into another character on the server named “CincinnatiJen,” who was a Bengals fan. In fact, the character concept was that of a super-powered Bengals fan. I commented to the player that, as a Ravens’ fan, I found it amusing. I’m not sure whether he/she knew enough Latin to know that “Corvus Nox” (roughly) translates to “Night Raven.” Oh, well.

And… I got my Rikti Monkey last night!

I’m not sure what to name him.. er.. her… um… it… though.

I wasn’t tired when I went to bed, so I used a crossword puzzle to help induce sleep. It worked… about 20 minutes later. I should have just stayed awake – I had one of the most disconcerting dreams I’ve had in a long time. It not only woke me up, but rattled me enough to make getting back to sleep difficult. *grblsnrkx* Thus, when the alarms went off this morning, I turned them off – with gusto – and returned to The Dreaming for a bit.

It’s Monday, but I’m hoping that wasn’t a harbinger of things to come.
On the plus side, Take Me There, by Blackstreet and Mya, greeted me on the morning commute and I have sauteed spaghetti for breakfast.

Stray Toasters

  • SaraRules made it back to Aspen in good time.
  • I finally found the link to the Heroclix Batman: Alpha site.
  • Speaking of Mr. Wayne, The Dark Knight made $155 million in its opening weekend, setting a number of records.
  • S’mores brownies.
  • Band Geek Hero
  • A couple weeks ago, I picked up four packs of NYTTJA frames from the Garden of Sweden, in red, green, yellow and blue. Yesterday afternoon, I pulled a number of comics out of my collection. Once I figure out which covers and frames will compliment each other best, I’m going to hang copies of cover art on the walls in my office. (Oddly enough, the green frames were easy to find cover are to match.)
  • Comcast. *shakes fist*
  • I picked up A Show of Hands (DVD) at Best Buy yesterday. It shall be included in today’s musical oleo.
  • just had to deal with an issue – which should have never been an issue – that someone in the office created… all because that person wanted to have things his way. Apparently, he forgot that we do NOT, in fact, work for Burger King.
  • Wow… and Mr. just did a little jig. Welcome to Monday.

Attack the day…

Namaste.

“Who needs sleep? Well, you’re never gonna get it!”

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Friday – 18 July 2008
Welcome to the weekend.

This morning’s goal was to sleep in. Apparently, my body had other ideas: Despite turning off the alarm, I was up a little after 7:00. And 8:15. And somewhere around 9. I got a call from Perry at 9:15 and decided to finally take the hint that I wasn ‘t really going to get much/any more sleep. He asked something that made me laugh though: “Did you take the day off because of [City of Heroes‘] Double XP Weekend?”

I’ll try the sleeping in thing again tomorrow.

Assuming I get in gear and out the door in short order, I’ll probably head up for a cup o’ Joe with Perry before heading to lunch with and Steph (former coworker of his). Maybe I’ll just go post-lunch.

This afternoon’s agenda includes (but is not limited to) some cleaning… although, I may sneak in a little game time, too. And the idea of hitting some balls at the driving range isn’t entirely off the table, either.

To paraphrase Samuel L. Jackson, I’ve got “nothing but air and opportunity.”

Stray Toasters

Quote of the Day
From a conversation with SaraRules about Mamma Mia!, a movie that she wants to see… and that I’ve agreed to sit through:

SaraRules: Entertainment Weekly called Mamma Mia! “exuberantly vapid”
Me: Yeah…
Me: I saw something along those lines online last night
SaraRules: Awesome. I can’t wait.
Me: hahaha
SaraRules: Dude, I’m sorry, but it’s a hollywood move musical based around the music of ABBA. How can anyone expect it to be art?
Me: High hopes?
Me: Wishful thinking?
Me: Miracle?
SaraRules:
Pshaw. Delusions
SaraRules: Pshaw, now i have ABBA running through my brain.
Me: I’m sorry.
SaraRules: Hell, I’m not. Finding it on iTunes right now. 
Me: I love you… but sometimes, you scare me.
SaraRules: Because I like ABBA?
Me: No.
Me: Because you’re actively seeking ABBA out on iTunes. 😉

Time to start/finish getting ready to jet.

“He’s a rebel and a runner, he’s a signal turning green…”

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Thursday – 17 July 2008
4th and 1, so to speak.
I’m good with that.
AND… it’s NBN Sushi Thursday.
Bang.

Last night, I picked up an anemic number of books from Dr. Volt’s. I supplemented it by picking up one box, each, of Justice League and Avengers HeroClix. The JL box was nothing but duplicates; the Avengers box had a Rare Bucky figure.

I stopped in to hang with SaraRules’ family for a bit before heading home. When I got home I plopped down on the couch, unpacked Defiant, turned on the TV… and proceeded to nod off. I’m still not sure exactly how long I was out, but it was a little odd to awaken and not be really sure “what just happened…?”

I got up, got mobile and fixed a bite to eat. Then, it was time to hit the mean streets of Paragon City. I logged in and was invited to join a team almost immediately. I did. We fought The Freakshow. Level 30+…. which meant that I got sidekicked up to 29. And the XP started rolling in. By the time I logged off, I had tacked on a level-and-a-half. As an added bonus, an old server-mate from when I first started playing logged on and joined the team.

And I got to watch The Sisko Show and Seven Days, to boot!

I had a few (more) odd dreams this morning…

…and woke up with Here He Comes, by Will Smith, running through my head.

Workout
Mark, Wes and I hit the gym at lunch yesterday. Wes wanted to do some triceps exercises, so we worked back and triceps:

  • Bench Press: 3 sets/10 reps – 205 lbs
  • Pull-downs: 3 sets/10 reps – 120 lbs
  • Reverse Deltoid Flys: 3 sets/10 reps – 1 set @ 60 lbs, 2 sets @ 70 lbs
  • Tricep Press (rotating flat bar): 3 sets/10 reps – 80 lbs
  • Tricep Press (rope extensions): 3 sets/10 reps – 60 lbs
  • Push-ups (diamond): 1 set/15 reps

It was a good workout… and tiring. My shoulders are a little stiff/sore this morning, but I’m otherwise rather pain-free. But, I forgot to check my post-workout weight. Bah.

Stray Toasters

Namaste.

“They gathered from across the land to work in the secrecy of the desert sand…”

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Wednesday – 16 July 2008
Last night’s Scion game was good. We met a sphinx… were asked a riddle… and didn’t die. Helluva combination. We wrapped up the adventure that we’ve been on for the past couple of months and will start in on something new next week.

I had a couple of errands to run after the game, which took me in the opposite direction of the gym, so I went home without working out. I must have been far more tired than I thought, because shortly after talking with SaraRules, I nodded off while surfing the ‘tubes. When I regained nominal coherence, I decided that calling it a night was a good decision. I wish I knew what triggered them, but I had some BIZARRE dreams. I woke up from a couple of them trying to piece together what was real from what was heard/seen while dreaming.

I may be picking up a new (to me) iMac from SaraRules’ father this evening. At SaraRules’ suggestion, I’m getting the Graphite colored one. The reason behind that choice of color:

Hmmm. I have a pink macbook and a pink iMac. Since Rob has a black macbook I humbly request the graphite iMac for him. Just so that we can continue to match. 🙂

Works for me. I think that it may replace ‘Nine as my desktop/server, as it has never really recovered from its last OS installation.

I haven’t decided whether or not I want to pick up comics today or wait until tomorrow…

Stray Toasters

  • By way of and CNN: Black in America
  • July 16, 1945: Trinity Blast Opens Atomic Age
  • Take the last train to Clarksville
    And I’ll meet you at the station
  • Natalie Cole say she has hepatitis C
    When I read this, it reminded me of a story from either freshman or sophomore year at Purdue:
  • Jim, one of the guys in our group of then-usual suspects, was from a small town in Indiana. One Saturday, while some of the other guys were working on a project, we were hanging out watching MuchMusic (think “Canadian MTV”) when a Natalie Cole video came on. We watched it for a couple of minutes before Jim blurted out the following gem: “She’s pretty good looking for a black woman.”

    I couldn’t have heard what I thought I heard: “What..?!”

    “Natalie Cole. She’s pretty good looking… for a black woman.”

    I now had confirmation that he had just said what I thought he said. *sigh* Jim, while rather intelligent, wasn’t the smartest guy. Had he been, he would have (possibly) remembered that it had taken Herculean self-control (and three of our friends) to keep me from trying to cave his head in a few months before when he had carelessly tossed a “less than socially acceptable” racial epithet in my direction. Before choosing to belatedly follow-up on that instinct, I decided that it might be prudent to find out what he meant with this new nugget of wisdom. So, I asked him.

    His response: “Well, with white women, you get blue eyes, green eyes, brown eyes…. blonde hair or brunette… or red. With black women, you just get dark hair and dark eyes.”

    In his mind, his logic was flawless.
    In my mind, I was trying to figure out places where I could hide his body that would take campus police weeks, if not months, to find.

    Instead, I just got up and walked out of the room.
    We never really talked much after that… for some reason.

  • , if you happen to have a spare $25k lying around: Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s typewriter for sale
  • Pope Benedict. Koalas. Eco-Disco.
    We shall not speak of these things, in conjuction, again.
  • Hall and Oates. Yep, I like ’em.
  • The art blog of Lauren Montgomery

Namaste.

“Bustin’ out of L7”

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I had to survey 15 servers today. For the most part it went without any hitches… aside from taking down two servers out from people who were working on them: I felt bad about one of them; the other was Chimpy.

Human of the Day
Today’s Human is for the reasons posted below.

Stray Toasters

  • had to help me recall the proper syntax for using Web Sharing to find something on Defiant. I felt like a complete n00b when I finally remembered it. To make me feel better, showed this to me:

    …and all was better with the world.

  • For : Wizard Magazine’s Greatest Bond Villain Poll
  • How would you pronounce “ghoti?” (Answer below)
  • In the words of Jude: Rick James was the original Superfreak.
  • Thanks to for pointing this out:

  • By way of Drew: Pickens Plan – Boone Pickens’ idea for weaning ourselves of our dependence on foreign oil.
  • Science of becoming Batman

And the answer to “How do you pronounce ‘ghoti'” is “fish.”

::: vapor trail :::

“The End Is the Beginning Is the End”

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Tuesday – 15 July 2008
“Sleeping in” is what occurs when one decides to ignore alarms in order to spend more time in The Dreaming
“Oversleeping” is what occurs when one fails to awaken at or by a certain time to begin the day.

Three guesses as to which one I did this morning.
Hint: I was up until 2:00 this morning watching The Middleman and stumble-dragged myself into bed when it was over and alarms were deemed “evil” in my sleep-addled brain.

After work yesterday, I headed home changed clothes and waited for Chris to show up… and then we headed over to play HeroClix with Perry. We played a 2-on-1 game – Chris versus Perry and me; 300 points, unrestricted. I played with the team I used in Saturday’s tourney and Perry used the Abomination and the Super-Adaptoid. Chris used Magneto and an assortment of mutants (with a couple of human Paramedics). And, as an added bonus: We played on a map that I have learned to hate. With a passion. And Chris beat us down. Soundly. We did manage to take out Wolverine… and nearly defeated Cyclops. But, it was fun.

Stray Toasters

Ka-POW!