9/30/2005

the assault continues...

i took a short "time out" from elfbashing to teach babyacid not to complain about undead assassins on dark throne. a quick plundering of gold later and we're currently in alliance negotiations ("NO ELVES ALLOWED!").

today being a long varsity day, not much has been happening other than lectures. not even my usual news sites have anything interesting to say...

metroid pinball will be coming out for the nintendo ds sometime soon... its going to ship with a gba sized cartridge that is actually a rumble pak, so you put in the usual ds-sized cartridge and the rumble pak. graphics look quite nice...

roleplaying last night was fun... we're sneaking into an enemy keep, in an enemy city, for some devils!
well at least the devils'll keep the demons busy once we get in. we also have to pull off an assassination while securing a little magic item to stop more demons being summoned. *sigh* war is hell... literally!
we hear rumours of a merric, the generic cleric, being around (our name for him)... he's not really that generic and more "evil as a bastard" as far as we can tell.
well we've made it into the city, now we need to breach the keep walls without getting breached by their defences.

thats pretty much all i have to report today... go read something interesting now!

9/29/2005

the undead walk... and attack

i've tried dark throne now and can say it is entertaining.
i don't know how long it's going to hold my attention (probably not long knowing my attention span...) but for now i'm having fun building up a little army and attacking people who have no army (spies are useful).
basically its your standard empire builder with resource management. you get untrained citizens which you train to be miners / soldiers / guards / spies etc...
and you need to do things like upgrade fortifications and but weapons for your army, all of which costs cash...
i'm of the opinion that other people have my cash, so i send my army out to collect it for me.
i'm playing an undead assassin (there are 4 races and 4 classes).
my army is reletively small (especially compared to the people of the same level) but is decently equipped (i've only been playing for 2 days now... population is still < 50).
i attack almost exclusively elves, especially if that have stupid usernames. this normally means someone who has logged on once, collected tonnes of cash because it just builds up over their period of inactivity, and are about to have their account removed due to inactivity... so i sneak into their wretched forest and take their gold!
you can make alliances and stuff and apparently claws has an alliance, but i haven't bothered to find out. plus i may lose intrest in the game within the next week...

ds central has a few pictures of the upcoming pokemon: mysterious dungeon.
basically there's going to be 2 versions of the game... one on gba and one on ds with some for of connectivity between the two (probably both carts in the ds).
the story revolves around a human who has been turned into a pokemon. you will turn into different pokemon throughout the course of the game.
basic gamplay: enter a randomly generated dungeon and partake in search-and-rescue missions while battling in the classic pokemon style along the way.

hmm... seems blogspot is having problems with uploading pictures today so picture this: the image of a knight with glowy green eyes in the top left corner of this post... and a screenshot of pokemon: mysterious dungeons next to the paragraph about the game of the same name (my brother from another mother).

and that's pretty much it for my day...
i'm going home to relax / play advance wars 2 / watch tv.
roleplaying tonight should be the start of an interesting adventure...

9/28/2005

*blink* *blink*

i am so tired...
finally written my last test (for now) this morning...
last night's math test went ok... i don't think i did as well as i was hoping to do, but i think i did ok.
this morning's comsci test (nice scheduling assmonkeys) went ok. i totally did zero studying but still managed to muddle through alright.
but all this shit has left me real tired.
i need sleep... maybe i'll go home and nap!
...and get back to some advance wars 2.


oh: and the fuckers in the comsci dept have given us something more to do. the day we hand in the hci project they put up an essay topic on our forums. its a pants essay on computing as a profession that compares the cssa (com soc south africa) and the bsc (british soc of computing)... and its due for next friday. at least that's a week away (like anyone is going to do anything this week, esp after the week most of us have just had...).
*blegh*

found a cool link on the nintendo ds forum i read: a free and legal roms site... they don't do any commercial roms but still have a fair load of stuff (including games and demos and whatnot) on a variety of platforms...
go check 'em out at www.pdroms.de.
also: ubisoft have a couple of cute little things for free download (some minigames and wallpapers and things) oer at their website.
look in the downloads / goodies section.

anyone looking for a nice avatar (especially if you like anime and animated gifs) try anime-kun. look at the gifs animes. lots and lots of stuff.
(btw: the site is french but easily navigable / understandable).

nintendo ds news for people in south africa:
take2.co.za has released advance wars: dual strike, castlevania dawn of sorrow, and meteos for order (each at R360). stock should be arriving very soon.
i'm still waiting for nintendogs to be released (expected: 7th oct)... ork-khrist still owes me some cash which will go towards getting one of these games (still undecided which one, but i'm leaning towards nintendogs first).
btw: they also have shaun of the dead (dvd) for only R93.


oprah was super-ultra-hyper-rude-X last night on her show.
she was doing some around the world thing with women from all over the world doing little bits on her show and she had some icelandic women there. firstly she tells her her shark is rotten (the food she brought) and then phones up their prime minister's office (thankfully he wasn't in) and proceeds to put on a stupid icelandic-ish accent and patronise the poor guy that answered and tell him that he must tell the pm that next time she's there she'll see him for shots and lamb testicles (they like their drink in iceland and lamb testicles is one of their food things).
he was probably thinking: "goddamn drunken yanks got hold of an icelandic phonebook again... if i catch you you'll have more than lamb testicles to deal with!" (only in icelandish... ^-^' ).

*sigh* anyway... that's about it for today... go away now.

9/26/2005

weekend of the dead and killer dolphins


land of the dead rocked!
friday was a fun night of being dressed up like a zombie, wandering the mall, watching a cool movie, and having a fun afterparty.
thanks nu-metro in canal walk...
thanks antonio at the one ring in observatory...
thanks schpat...
i even got a vote (just 1) for best dressed zombie. i guess all the hard work paid off... i don't mean hard work on the zombie costume (i did hardly any work on that), i mean all the hard work i did at varsity: left me in a zombie like state, i just added fake blood...
well done yanke, schpat, and moonflake (the top 3 zombies).


zomg:
this must be a plot for a b-grade scifi movie...
the observer is reporting that hurricane katrina has released military trained dolphins into the gulf of mexico. 36 dolphins "armed" with toxic dartguns are roaming the free waters.
these dolphins have had training in attack-and-kill missions since the cold war.
wtf?
there is concern that the dolphins may mistake people in wetsuits as possible targets and dart them...
the darts are designed to put people to sleep for later interogation, not so much fun in the water.
yeah....

oh.. i should have been a little clearer on fridays post: it was national dog week in america... if you didn't follow any links you wouldn't have spotted that ^-^'

quick gaming news:
gta: liberty city stories for the psp is shaping up nicely and is expected to be done by the end of october (probably american release date). the price seeems to be about normal for current psp games ($50 means sold here for R350 - R400). go view some more pics at the magic box.


and finally the lazy weekend report:
saturday was relaxed. got up extra late, lazed around the house, watched lemony snicket's series of unfortunate events, ate some food... and that's about it. the movie was cool... the clothes were awsome.
schpat and james came round for the meeting we (project partner and i) were meant to hold, but my project partner was running late and the whole thing got postponed. schpat had managed to poison himself since yesterday (either from eating the fake blood, or getting a dodgy burger from mcdonalds).
sunday: got up a little late. my project partner came round and we held the meeting that we needed to hold and i handed over my section of the work which i'd done so that he could finish it off for tuesday's handin. (i get to study for a maths test so i can't do much more on it now...).
thanks james and moonflake for your help. thanks schpat for trying... get well soon.

anyway: i'm off to d/l solutions to tuts so that i can go study maths... cya

*edit*: wow i had problems putting the pic into this post... blogger was uploading them but not generating the html and addding it into the post so i had to open previous posts and figure out how to link them (where to link them) and do it all manually... *blegh*

9/23/2005

national dog week and answers


well it seems that national dog week is about to end (sept 18 - 24) but since i think its national, not international, i'm not too surprised i didn't hear about before now.
looks like nintendo are doing their bit for the pups as nintendo insider reports here.
inspired by nintendogs' fashion, the aspca (american society for prevention of cruelty to animals) is holding a doggy fashion show, supported by nintendo.
there will be a grass-covered catwalk (dogwalk?) and dogs strutting their fashionable stuff, looking for adoption.
owners can get caricatures of themselves and their dogs, all sorts of spot prizes (nintendo DSs, nintendog games, etc...) and there are interactive nintendogs stations.
Mr. Shigeru Miyamoto (*bows down to the great miyamoto*) will be attending. some of you may recognise the name as the man behind such small titles as: mario bros., donkey kong, and the legend of zelda.
its happening this saturday (sept 24th) in new york, so any american readers out there (like i have international readership.. yeah right!) go have a look and have some fun. all the contact stuff is available at the bottom of the article.

oh! also, if you have a little spare money, there are some other victims of hurricane katrina to think about: the pets! go to the aspca website and donate... they need all the help they can get (or click the pic below to go straight to the donation page). they're helping out all that they can. *takes metephorical hat off to the aspca*


now to answer a few comments from yesterday:
fourier methods vs fourier analysis...
they are fairly similar except the fourier methods we are doing (mam200) is a little less detailed than a full engineering fourier methods... its kinda the detailed introduction into the subject.
as for the gaming news comment: i must ammend that i generally don't keep up to date on the pc gaming world. basically i look at the nintendo stuff ('cos i have a ds) and get the console news that lurks around the handheld news. i occasionally keep an eye on the psp ('cos i'd like to see how well its doing and its an interesting new foray into the market for sony) but my pc news is restricted to getting nag magazine every month.
as for fable: it was out on console ages ago (if i remember correctly) and was a bit of a dissapointment (overhyped), but they did do extra work into the pc version before releasing it so it may be a lot better now (on pc).

as for my life news (you're gagging to hear it, i know):
the test last night went surprisingly well.
spent most of yesterday studying in the library for it with a classmate and we managed to swot up on the necessary stuff. i did some informed guessing for a question or two, and turned out (post-test discussion with the brain of the class) to be correct. ^-^
i estimate a 65%.

zombies tonight *YAY*
land of the dead and wandering around malls in full zombie costume... yeah.
its gonna be great. try make the canal walk 8'o clock show and join us for the movie and afterparty at the one ring.
check schpat's blog for details.

roleplaying last night led us to an interesting junction. we are currently fighting a war against an army that's supported by demons. we recently had a proposal of help from a devil. devils hate demons (mutual feelings). this could turn out good... or bad...

and thats about it for today... got projects to do over the weekend, and test to study for on tuesday and wednesday, but after that life should slow down for a short time, so i'm holding on till then.

9/22/2005

avatar wanted... must do windows


got a day of studying and test writing ahead of me now...
turns out this test will be 45 minutes long (just like the previous fourier methods test).
now the major problem people had with the last test was the time. 4 questions in 45 mins was too much in too short a span. but some fuckers got 100% (fuckers!) so his response was: "some people," i guess 2 people, "got 100% last time so there is obviously plenty of time."
but he has also previously mentioned how badly everyone did overall in the last test... wtf?
one or the other mudderfugger! you can't have your cake and eat it, unless you want partially digested mush-cake.
this is why he doesn't supply notes anymore... he thinks people did badly because they aren't coming to lectures... i've missed 1 lecture... i did badly in the first test.
maybe its because you're a crap lecturer?
maybe if we had notes we'd be able to study something concrete and not simply confuse ourselves over the random examples which we take down from your lectures (which need correcting because you often make mistakes!)

and other text books don't really help too much because he's steering the course between fourier analysis and fourier methods and some internal malfunction that is his alone. this means all textbooks don't aproach the suject from the proper direction or cover everything we do, while overdoing stuff we don't need.
*sigh*
oh, btw: tonight's game will have to start a little late (people who play in the game: you know who you are) due to arse fourier test!


i'm currently hunting for a decent avatar for my profile... its difficult finding the right one (well.. it is for me) so the little soldier dude (advance wars: green earth infantry) will have to do until i find something else.
i have found a bunch of animated gifs though... so today's post is littered with the occasional one.

advance wars by web is still down :(
they're having problems with databases being moved and not everything migrating with them. this leads to lotsa screwups.
hopefully they'll be back soon.


there seems to be a slump in the gaming industry at the moment. news is scarce, but there are a bunch of games about to be released here so i'm happy.
of course i have precious little time to play anything right now, but in a weeks time i should be free and clear for a while (until exams arrive).
as for news in the real world: nothing interesting catches my eye.
saw something about "ants using herbicides in their gardens" but i've read about that ages ago (years) so its nothing new, unless they've discovered something new (how's that for a statement?). either way it doesn't intrest me enough to afford the click.

so thats about it today then...
need to go off and do some studying (i am so sick of studying) and maybe have a smoke and a bite to eat.
at least there'll be zombies tomorrow. that should give me enough energy to do the hci project on saturday (i'm sick of comsci projects now too).

9/21/2005

insert humorous title here


well last night's comsci prac test was easy.
basically 2 questions...
q1: read in an array and spit it out again (with some fiddling)...
q2: read in some numbers, fiddle, spit out answers...
done!
first q took about 20 mins, 2nd q took about an hour simply because i screwed up a for loop (increasing the variable x instead of the variable spam resulting in an infinite loop followed by a seg fault) and couldn't figure out where the fuck-up was, especially since i put in some funky cout and then forgot that i had made it so funky and was all like: "how the fuck is it read in that value???"
(btw: yes, i really do use variable names like int spam, string thing, int wikki, etc...)
but after i spotted my error it took but a few minutes to sort out and complete.
the automatic marking said i had 100% so i should pass the other datasets that give us our actual marks (and that we don't have access to so we can't hardcode the results).
test tomorrow though will be a lot more difficult being that its fourier methods. i've d/l'ed previous tests and solutions to the tuts which i'll print at home and study tonight and tomorrow day.


not much happening... there's a new dungeon rpg heading for the ds called wizardry asterisk: hiro no fuuin. magical punctuation or japanese naming conventions? we'll have to wait and see... (actually: it looks like a good old eye of the beholder style game).

also coming up is a psp game called shin megami tensei: devil summoner which is a remake of an old sega saturn rpg/quest thingie. looks cool.


all the metal slug games are being ported to gba :)
ah... those are some great arcade hits.

otherwise:
not much else happening at the mo.
schpat came round last night and we chatted lots...
will probably be doing the comsci project on the weekend.
weekend will be busy with land of the dead, bast's party, projects, sleeping, eating, going to the bathroom, etc...
anyway... i need to go to a maths lecture now.

9/20/2005

blegh... projects tests and stupidity


so i managed to catch cook (project supervisor) and ask him if we could do the projects alone...
"yes," he says "but you'll get half the marks."
proving that university is the only place where doing more work results in less marks. if this were business you would complete a 2 man project alone and your boss would be like: "wow! you roxxor!" *hands over at least 100% of salary... possible bonus*
uct analogy: "..." (doesn't talk to lowly students) *stabs you in face and gives you 0%*
fuckers!
cook goes on to tell me that if i looked at the marking guide there are marks going for team work... i had previously checked this, and subsequently rechecked. he's wrong. nowhere does it say that a second comsci student is required or that there are any marks for having more than 1 comsci student involved. the only "team" bit that is mentioned is a bit about requiring 2-3 non-comsci students to help.
he also asks why i can't do it with the same partner i had for the previous project... i inform him that there isn't a problem with the person, its a problem with the fact that i have two comsci tests and two maths tests all over the same period and it will be difficult to schedule all the time required.
his response: "you'll just have to go home and organise your time."
well fuck you very much!
your department set those 2 computer tests... you should be talking to maths dept about their tests as maths is a co-requisite to comsci, but you don't have the empathy of a brick. if you pushed the project back by a week or two then there would be no problems what-so-ever, but you don't care because you don't actually have to do the project.
ass monkey!
as it turns out i got the same partner, but we have completely differing timetables due to the two comsci tests and two maths tests and so meeting times are going to be an extreme asspain.
maybe i'll hand in a box of liquid shit with a small charge that disperses it when the box is opened.

*sigh*
anyway... i found a cool art/comic site thingie... lots of cool pics.
warning to work people: there are exactly 4 visible nipples, but its art (ie drawings) amongst the artwork... but you can scroll past pretty quick.

advance wars by web seemed to be screwing up for me today so i couldn't do my turns :(

not much else to say at the mo...
got maths lectures followed by a short trip home to eat and grab c++ notes, folloed by trip back to varsity to write stupid comsci prac test, followed by meeting with moonflake and schpat to try start hashing this project out (partner couldn't make it tonight... he's tutoring from 19:00 till 21:00).

9/19/2005

insane madness working bastards


cancelled my kult game for tomorrow.
basically my next 2 weeks look something like this:
comsci prac test tomorrow (17:30 - 19:30).
maths (fourier methods) test on thursday (18:00 - 19:30)
project handin (comsci - HCI) tuesday 27th
maths (introductory algebra) test on tuesday 27th (18:00 - 19:30)
comsi test on wednesday 28th (probably during normal lecture time)
fack!
so i'm doing a little research for the hci project and studying fourier methods today. the hci project seems to be a 2 man project, but is totally unclear on this point. everyone i've asked "thinks" its multiple people (excluding the test subjects) but is unsure...
i don't have the time to sort out another person to do this with amongst everything else i need to do, so i'm doing it alone.
maybe i'll check with the guy who set it... hmmm
arg... just checked to see if i could get his email from his profile on the comsci forums... obviously not. *sigh* guess i'll wander off to try see him just now.

oh, before i forget: my dad got a letter published in the YOU magazine (star letter no less). its all about christmas and the whole "seasons greetings" vs "merry christmas" thing.
he set up a little blog about it at: http://bringbackchristmas.blogspot.com
you can see a scan of the letter there (as well as associated whatsits).

anyway:
weekend was pretty cool. friday was all relaxed and moonflake and i watched videos.

life aquatic: fun, whimsical, and a little sad. i like the whole style of filming and the wildlife was great! the movie was wierd, but cool. overall i enjoyed it.

elektra: a movie with great potential that turned out average. there were some really cool characters (the main bad guy was funky!) that were just kinda wasted. the plot twist was visible while watching the previews before the movie. and they wasted a couple of great fight scenes.
silly things detracted from it for me. things like: hardcore assassin elektra getting confused by a bunch of flying sheets (all perfectly fine so far... bad guy power and unfortunate location) doesn't think: "move to other room where there are no sheets."
and: we defeat this group of bad guys who are part of a much larger group and automatically assume that we are forever safe, end movie on happy note.
and:
*possible spoiler warning (mild)*
really cool fight scene with main bad guy with him being all funky and showing off his powers. elektra gets her ass handed to her... lying all defeated she summons up her courage and blah blah to fight on some more and promptly kills bad guy with one strike that she couldn't do before... and he hasn't even broken a sweat yet. imagine taking ryu in streetfighter, having m.bison beating you until a milimeter of life is left in your health bar, suddenly you're perfect again and one punch later bison is dead. dude! he's the main bad guy... they should have stretched the fight a little longer and had her use his arogance against him to outwit him into an open position whereupon she kills him. instead: she hits him once. pants!
*end possible spoiler (mild)*
such great potential wasted. overall: average... get if nothing else is in.

saturday night was great: moonflake made mexican and synk, yancke, and schpat came round and we watched zombie movies (night of the living dead -1990 remake by tom savini, and dawn of the dead - original).
food was fantastic, movies were good, company was fun!


sunday: more mexican at moonflake's parents' place. mmm... mexican pork :)
mahjong was played, and i even got a game of munchkin (vs: moonflake's sister and her boyfriend).
i managed to win munchkin by convincing the bf to let his gf join the final fight he was in just so she'd get the 1 treasure. "are you going to fight it out for 2nd?" he asks...
"hmm? oh yeah... probably.." i tell him.
he lets her join... she's playing the wizard class and i tell her to charm the monster. he doesn't get the level (so he doesn't win) and he'd already promised the treasure to his gf so he didn't get that either.
my next go i walk into a level 2 something or other and (after stealing the kneecaps of alure) force the non-wizard player to help. 18+ vs 2. i won!

oh yeah: the nintendo revolution controller does have a gyroscope in it so it can be waved about like a sword, used like a steering wheel, emulate a mouse, and all sorts of other funky things... its not just a remote.
ign did an article on all the possible uses. read about it there.

advance wars by web: my attempts at the great push failed. i resigned as the counterattack overwhelms me. (first game on the funny, long island.)
the 4 player is going well.. looks like the other 2 players are getting aggressive with each other and i might get a breather here (the fourth player resigned).
vs synk: well.. the 2 problems mentioned earlier broke an already risky strategy... currently i'm trying to hold him off my bases while he preps to overtake. luckily its just a friendly, practice game 'cos i'm being whooped! :)

thats pretty much all that happened over the weekend...
not much else to say really.
look at the nintendog puppies while i sign off...

9/16/2005

quickie in the morning

right...
since fridays are usually crazy (tuts till 16h00) i'll do a quick post of stuff now.

nintendo ds news: xenosaga 1 & 2 are being combined into a single game which will be released on the ds. the magic box had this to say:

Namco has officially announced Xenosaga I ยท II for Nintendo DS, the game combines the stories of Xenosaga I & II into one game, with all new stories and an altered 2D battle system. The character designs and visuals are all changed from CG to anime. There will be massive movie sequences throughout the game, but will probably be rendered in real time instead of CG movies.

as well as having some pics (go there for more).


in other gaming news:
the nintendo revolution (the next nintendo home console) has released pictures of its controller... wtf? very very weird... looks like a remote control... wonder how it plays?
nintendo are either gonna coin it of a revolutionary design (no pun intended) or fall flat on their faces. check more pics at nintendo insider.

roleplaying last night was quite fun... devils devils everywhere (damnable damage reduction!)
and my character just started along a prestige class line: the eldrich knight!
it kinda suits him as he's a wizard with a greatsword. now maybe he'll be able to hit with the damn thing... and when my worgs grow up i'm gonna get one of them as a familiar (already taken leadership and improved familar feats) and maybe get the other 2 as cohorts... that would rock!
now i just need to learn all those magic weapon spells and other enhance hitting things that i haven't taken yet.

thats about it for today... short 'n sweet, all up in that like a bucket of chicken!

9/15/2005

woo...

heh.. moo-shoe... get it? *snigger*

nm happening today.
spent most of yesterday on the couch alternating between watching tv and playing advance wars 2.
talking of aw... my awbw turns are taking forever today... telkom must be sexxoring the lines again...
ask zenstar was updated answering the OG's gta question (original garrick).

reading a bunch of news over at iol today. a few things are plainly evident.
1. we have a lot of stupid and violent dickheads living in this country... a higher percentage of stupid, ignorant, violent fucks than anywhere else in the world (including warzones!)
2. people are way too pc for their own good... and generally they're only pc because society says "be pc!" they don't really believe or understand it. its like training a dog to "read" a book. it'll look at the pages and frown obediently (and maybe even turn the page every now and then) but is certainly does not understand anything its looking at.
3. stupidity. need i say more? just stupidity everywhere. some of it because the person is inherently moronic... some of it because the parents are preventing the child from developing (i didn't go to school... why should you?)... some of it because people don't want to expend the effort to think... some of it because they're paid to be stupid... this often links closely to point 1.

i'm not going to bother pointing out any "special" stories, but i will say this: "stop shitting in your water (typhoid township), stop abusing your children (many many cases), stop burning trains for being late (upset townships), stop looting (township schoolkids, and government), stop killing (many many many cases), stop producing more little fucks than you can care for and pay for (general), stop being a stupid dickhead (also general, esp government), stop replacing thought with automatic pc-ism (also general, and refering to qoutes about mr patel's hiring policies)."
it amazes me how stupid people really are... they think they know it all and yet they know nothing compared to your average first-world toddler.
(disclaimer: i understand i'm often wrong... at least i have a thought process leading up to my bad decisions).
to finish off this little ranty bit: at least 50% of this continent needs to die! who exactly? if we knew that life'd be a lot easier... i can tell you who i'd kill, but that'd just be opinion.

anyway... google has launched a blog search engine over at http://blogsearch.google.com. it seems pretty good. go have fun searching for your own blog.

erm... that i think is about all for today... roleplaying tonight... um... yeah!

9/14/2005

quiet, early winter day...

not much happening today.
comsci lecture. pick up some notes. surf the net a bit. go home...
well i haven't gone home yet, but i'm going soon.

after a sudden summer day it seems winter has arrived again.
luckily i looked out, up the mountain, at campus today and saw the cloudcover. i decided shorts = bad.

we actually managed to get some roleplaying done last night, inbetween bursts of other conversations.
the two players accused the most of disrupting the game (in fact, the two players who keep interupting the game to point out how much the other interupts) had their characters go mano - a - mano last night. well... steel pipe'o - a - face'o.
yancke's character made some comment insinuating something about schpat's character's intelligence and italian-ness... schpat's character is both touchy (short fuse) and feels persecuted about his italian-ness... oh, and is also a gangster heavily involved with "the family" if you get my drift.
luckily he had just spent his last bullet in the previous combat.
unluckily for yancke's char, steel pipes don't run out of ammo.
a quick beating later (and a serious wound) and schpat's char catches a bullet in his left arm from the cop (npc) who was trying to stop the fight and immediately after, gets his right wrist broken by moonflake's character to force him to drop the pipe (2 serious wounds... one from the bullet which was almost fatal, and the other from the wrist strike).
so we have a redneck, sewer-worker missing a few teeth and slurring nasally with a broken nose, and a pissed off italian gangster with one arm shattered by a bullet and the other strapped to keep the wrist straight...
*sigh*
maybe i should have let them kill each other off. we would have less interuptions during the game... oh well. they're somewhere where they may be able to heal a bit now (as long as the summoning doesn't go awry and kill everyone...)

anyway:
here's a nice pic of artwork from some upcoming game (lost magic) for the nintendo ds.

9/13/2005

melting... melting...


welcome summer...
spring was around for, what?, 2 maybe 3 days.
now summer is back and bad!
people are roasting while running from lecture venue to lecture venue.
there isn't a hint of a possibility of a breath of wind on campus today.
(so no short skirts blowing up).
it's actually cooler in the overheated comsci labs than outside.

well the demo of my project just finished.
of course now is the time that any minor defect pitches up and shows itself.
but at least its over and the supervisor seemed pleased enough with what we had done (in spite of a problem or two raising its ugly head).
no more bridge ever again!


as for my advance wars by web turns (sorry synk... you'll have to wait for tomorrow) there's a minor skirmish over the airport i took in the 4 player game, but i'm begining to churn out battle-copters while using disposable troops to block off his anti-air vehicles, leaving his tanks open to chopper fire.
as for the other 2 player i'm in... i'm trying another rush, only supported by a few more infantry units, and my power is almost full.
if my power meter fills i'll be able to get my infantry to do a strike with their movement increased (2 spaces), their attack power increased (some %) and they will be able to capture territory in 1 turn even with only 1 HP left.
this means that if he makes a mistake i'll take his hq and win, otherwise i'll cause serious damage to his units, or i'll get rolled and not be able to defend against the counter-attack.

and now i must go home and wash dishes in preperation for tonight's kult game. i'm not using them as props... but we still need to eat.
that and play advance wars 2 and rest....
cya

9/12/2005

cramped ass control.


(edit: stupid animated gif not working *replaces gif*)
so lack of sleep is kinda making things feel like they're moving through syrup.
we finished all the docs and handed in at about 21:30 yesterday.
of course, once home, i couldn't get to sleep until it was nice and late (body obviously switched over to "work late and don't sleep" mode)
anyway...
there were only 36 people in my comsci lecture this morning (i counted).
36 out of a class of about 150 (rough esimate).
ok... so normally there's only about 100 people there, but it was practically deserted today. obviously loads of people didn't finish their projects.
in fact i saw at least one group working this morning after comsci. they were "finishing off" the documentation and their code was "99 percent" complete. (his words).
well i'm glad we finished.

so campus control were handing out leaflets as you got onto the jammie shuttle this morning (if i had a scanner here i would scan it), and this is what it says:
---------
Campus
Protection
Services
CAMPUS INVASION !
PLAGUE STRIKES CAMPUS BUILDINGS
  • Cell phones disappear
  • Data projectors & Laptops abducted
  • Bags abscond
Solution!
OWNER RESPONSIBILITY
(contact details removed)
----------

this is a pretty acurate replication. all that is missing are the contact details (email and extensions... no actual phone number for people using a cellphone becuse they're being attacked and don't have time to use a phone in the office thats closed and locked because its after 4 / because its lunch / because its tea / because the day has a vowel in it) and the stupid logo next to the first 3 lines.
notice a few things: nowhere does it claim that anything has been STOLEN!
stuff goes missing but they don't say stolen.
notice how capus control make no mention of their responsibilities in this regard or that they are meant to be here to protect the campus and the students.
notice their answer: owner responsibility. meaning that they don't give a fuck, they don't care that its their job to sort this kind of thing out... deal with it yourself!
thanks for that useful public announcement. it would have been easier to just get a loudhailer and walk through campus at lunch shouting "we suck! we don't do our job! go fuck yourselves!" in between munching doghnuts, swilling coffee, and looking through the lost & found box for anything worth any money.

and the jammie shuttle has implemented a fantastic new system. instead of having a dude look at your student card while you get on the bus and kicking you out if you don't have a card, you now have to swipe a reader just on the inside of the doors and a dude watches for a beeping red light and kicks you off if it doesn't beep. of course by the time you need to be kicked off you're already on the buss and 4 people need to be displaced off the bus into 4 other people in the queue to kick you off, and the readers that they use (and the mag strips on the cards) are probably the cheapest available. this means you need to swipe 3 - 4 times to get it to read, basically taking the time it takes to get on the bus and multiplying it by a factor of 10.
you still need a dude to check something... but now the dude is inside and can't move down the line pre-emptively checking while there are no busses around. efficient!
that evil, underground, criminal ring that survives soley on making fake student cards to get a free ride to campus are doomed to failure now!
ass monkeys!

i got to play a bunch of adventure quest last night while my project partner finished off the sequence diagrams in ms visio.
its fun. not massively complicated or engrossing, but fun.
i got to level 11 and almost finishe leroy's quest (damn that dragon... 25 hp away) before leaving.

and thats basically it...
i'm going home to nap and play advance wars 2 (as soon as i finish my advance wars by web turns)

9/11/2005

1000 electronic trees died...

woo.. late sunday night posting from varsity.
finishing off all the documentation for the project is a real pain in the ass.
somwhere a small forest of electronic trees died to facilitate all the documentation we've done today.
demo time has been booked for tuesday.
man, i cannot wait for all this to be over.
i never want to play bridge after this (not that i did beforehand).


campus looks a little spooky in the night hours. all dark and forboding inbetween pools of light here and there.
occasionally you see what might be a cat running by (i spotted 2 on my way home last night).
of course they could just be small varsity rats...

well i've been surviving on coke and cigarettes all day, but that's the standard diet for coders all over the world.
the comsci labs here are overflowing with students trying to do "last minute" things to their projects (and some of those things include coding the whole damn thing).
some of them look like they've been here since friday night...

anyway. i'm off to try finish the project so we can hand in and go home.

9/10/2005

1531 bottles of beer on the wall, 1531 bottles of beer...

damn...
just spent the day completing the project code with my project partner.
1531 lines of code, about half of which i did today.
it may not be the most nicely formated, or the easiest path, or the best, but it is done.
well... there's still documentation to do but as its already 19h00 we're going to continue tomorrow. hopefully it won't take too long.

last night was great though...
yancke invited us (moonflake & me) out to panchos for mexican.
wow... good enchilladas. still have half to eat when i get home :)
synk and conrad and dave (sharpe) were also there and much fun was had.

btw: yancke caved in to peer pressure and started a blog at (gasp) yancke.blogspot.com.

anyway.. i'm off home.

9/09/2005

bees and midriffs

don't forget about friday 23rd, canal walk, 8pm screening of land of the dead.
and the afterparty will be held at the one ring, with prizes and all.
dress up as a zombie and shable around the mall. it'll be great.
check schpat's page for more info.

theres something i don't understand...
i don't mind it. i just don't understand it.
wandering around campus i see plenty of girls who like to wear t-shirts that are just that little bit too short so they can show off their midriff (and there are far too many who really really shouldn't be showing it off unless they're trying to sell it for real estate).
now it looks cute and whatnot, except sometimes there's a wind or its a cold day, so what do they do? they wear a jersey for warmth.
but the jersey is also a little too short so that they don't cover that all-important midriff that they must be under contract to expose under pain of death.
its obvious that the jersey isn't doing its job as when its cold they obviously feel that its a bit nipply (erm.. nippy).
like i said: i don't have a problem with it... it just defies logic.
maybe i'm too practical with my dress-sense. maybe i should expose my midriff too. maybe us guys are missing out on something?


anyone who has been up on uct campus knows about the bees. they are all over the place all the time. you throw a can in the bin and a swarm of bees rises up to defend their territory and to pick the can clean of all possible substances.
their diet is made primarly of chocolates, cokes, and coffee (the dominant mostly empty containers in the bins).
now i was wondering: can you imagine what their honey looks like?
i mean no wonder they're all over the place. they're on a permanent sugar/ caffine rush. the busy worker must take a hit of tiny espresso honey before leaving the hive in search of his next sugary fix.

anyway.
did my advance wars turns this morning only to discover that theres a new bug that prevents recon units and infantry units from firing their machine guns.
bugger! i kinda needed them to take out one of synk's infantry units.
oh well. its really a practice game for us and this'll just be concidered a random handicap of war.
the other 2 player is in a bit of a stale mate... i'm trying to push towards his lines, he's just holding me off with artillery. i think i'm going to build a small strike force of tanks and run them in with a small force of artillery behind. if he shoots one he'll get slaughtered by the other... as long as i survive that long ;)

in the 4 player game i'm in i managed to race to the airport, bottom center, and begin securing it in spite of a recon from one of the opposition racing to stop me :)
see the pic: i'm yellow comet in the bottom left.
this game only happens every now and then as it needs to go through 3 other people before i get my turn. but it looks like its gonna be a nice battle.
talking about advance wars: i'm halfway through the final mission of the normal campaign. once this is complete i'll start the advanced campaign (to make money to buy all the unlocked cos) and start doing warroom maps (once i have all the cos to use).

looks like this weekend is going to be rather bland for me as i need to do a little more coding (probably do some tonight) and a bunch of documentation finalisation for handin on monday: the final day of our comsci projects.
i can't wait for this to be over.
i don't really have a problem with the project or with doing it other than its damn boring and been stretched out too long (and they keep dumping tests and whatnot in the middle of everything. obviously we're only doing one course at varsity and don't do anything else what-so-ever when we're not in their lecture).

in the real world:
new scientist news reports that the media glamourising forensics is become a problem with jurors expecting csi in the courtrooms and being overly ready to agree with cautiously presented scientific evidence. criminals are also becoming more "dna aware" with a greater tendancy to wear rubber gloves during breakins and doing things like dumping an ashtray of discarded cigarettes in stolen cars before abandoning them leaving the police with 20 possible suspects... (my fav part of the report is the complaint that tv shows are showing crims how to avoid being caught, then they let slip with tricks like the one i just stated... silly).
but some dude said something about how all this doesn't really matter as you leave forensic evidence around anyway.

i'm sure there should be more to write about... but i can't think of anything else right now.

9/08/2005

mad code


well today has been wholey uneventful really...
all i've done, other than surf the net a bit and do my advance wars turns, has been coding my project/ debugging what i'd written. looks like saturday will be needed to finalise everything and do documentation after all.
the only other thing of note is google decided to pull my ads as they say they've detected "invalid clicks" and this goes against policy and blah blah blah.
the short of it is this: cash refunded back to advertisers and ad account closed.
whatever... it was going to take almost a year to get a payout anyway.
looks like schpat had the same problem.
ok... that's about it for today as i need to do some washing before people come over tonight otherwise we'll have no plates to eat off.
look at the picture while i sign off.

9/07/2005

hitting the brick in the cloud

wow. it was impossible for me to get to sleep last night.
after everyone left (there was no roleplaying done, but a lot of debating and discussing and shouting and laughing so it was all good) i went to bed and promptly lay awake for hours.
needless to say getting up in the morning wasn't the easiest thing in the world.

luckily i saw my project partner on the way up to varsity. i was getting worried having not seen him in over a week, but he seems to be about the same point i am with the coding (ie: last features being added and tweaked) and we're both happy to use saturday to complete everything, so it looks like we'll at least have everything done by monday... hopefully well enough to get a passing mark (especially with the stupid tutor who can't find the stuff we handed in and sends emails saying "where's the stuff?" without explaining what stuff he wants, especially annoying after i had to show him how to find the stuff because he couldn't figure out how to use the software we were told to use... and he's meant to be a 3rd year comsci student... butt-monkey!)

my comsci lecturer coined a phrase / made up a saying i found quite humorous. "every cloud has a hidden brick."
"you're happily going along and everything is nice and fluffy, and then you hit the brick in the cloud!"
basically hitting the brick in the cloud is when you think everything is going fine and then wham! straight out of the blue a massive fuckup occurs.
which brings me to my fourier methods lecturer....
the brick of the day.
dude is doing an example on the board (stretching our understanding already by this point) when he draws a cute little graph and doesn't extend the t+1/2 section over the 1/2 mark even though t is greater then 0.
now everyone is going, but if t is bigger than 0 then t+1/2 is bigger than 1/2...
"is it?" he smugly asks a class who's currently thinking "the answer to the question is 1/T times the integral of what the fuck?"
he then lets it hang until people are dropping their pens on their desks and giving up for the day (half way through the lecture) and only then explains (rather poorly) how we don't bother with what is past 1/2 because we already looked at that section in the previous part of the question which noone understood anyway...
of course by the time the explanation came most people had already turned off and i'm sure there are people that walked out thinking: "never integrate past 1/2 because *insert unknown stupid lecturer reason here*."
if you've ever been to a complex lecture you know what i mean... some things you just assume because the lecturer said so and you don't understand the reasoning but you don't really care anymore.


so synk joined advance wars by web and we started a game and played a good few turns in quick succession (it's a small map, see pic, with not much to do in the begining). i've taken a bit of a gamble but can't discuss my tactics here as i know synk reads my blog.
none of my other turns have come back yet.

checking my email i find my blog finally got added to blogwise :)
i'd completely forgotten that i'd put it in for submission.. it takes a while 'cos they have so many blogs to check and add.

bast has added herself to the blogging world as she will be leaving capetown in the near future going on to a better job in a different place...
check her blog to keep in touch.

i'm thinking of bailing home soon and shaving, showering, and relaxing for the rest of the day... stupid insomnia... plus i'll get to play a little more advance wars 2 :)
always good.

9/06/2005

a short update

a bit busy today...
must finish code that i've been neglecting a bit.
the war over at advance wars by web is heating up... we've had major contact now and he's setting up firing lines that i need to get my tanks into to disrupt otherwise i'll get slaughtered on my way in.
but i think i can do it. a couple of sacrifical units, savings allowing me to get a neotank soon, and the fact that i'm trying to choke his cash supply should all give me the upper hand... hopefully (i hope my opponent doesn't read this :)
basically i'm attacking his infantry to prevent him from taking cities. cities give you cash. cash gives you units.
secondry objectives are destroying other units and taking cities myself.
i'm already up a couple of cities and have destroyed a tank of his and reduced the strength of his infantry. all at a cost (soon to be paid) of a tank unit and possibly an infantry... not bad concidering i'm also pushing back the contact line closer to his hq which i'm hoping to take :)

watched bad santa yesterday... it was surprisingly heartwarming for a tale about a complete asshole :)
i suggest you see it.
also saw most of alexander. damn oliver stone and his 3 hour epics. i fell asleep for a bit about half way, but when i woke up everyone was still doing pretty much the same thing (squabbling) just slightly further east in the world. i didn't think too much of it.

other than that not much happening: i couldn't get to my gmail earlier but that seems sorted now. roleplaying is happening tonight (kult) or rather: my group is coming over and there is a chance of roleplaying happening tonight :)
whatever... as long as its fun who cares right?

oh yeah... i promised to link to a flash rpg thingie for synk so here we go:
adventure quest rpg. it looks like fun (i wanna play a vampire slayer) but i ain't got no flash at varsity :(
so someone try it out and tell me how it is... maybe i'll play from home or try the other labs or something.

as for the prize from schpat: i'm thinking of going for the box...
schpat's box looks enticing *wink*

9/05/2005

a long weekend leading to a long week

there was no post on friday as i took friday off and spent it with moonflake as she had the day off. it was my vac after all.
i managed to finish almost all my coding for the project. just a few what-nots to do and then a final class to be sorted once i know what formats i need. then we just glue it all together into a final project... yeah... sounds easy doesn't it. :)

the weekend was pretty good. we didn't really do much, which was kinda the plan. i'm getting really far in advance wars 2. almost finished the campaign :)
but i have missed a map to one of the hidden missions (i know where it is too... i just couldn't get it and get a good rating for the mission) so i'll have to replay anyway :)
plus once i finish the normal campaign i should get access to the advance campaign (basically the same but harder... against more troops etc.)
plus i have the warroom to go through (a bunch of skirmish maps)
the game has a lot of playability/ replayability :)
on a similar note: i did my advance wars by web turns today. i'm currently in 2 games and waiting for a 3rd to start. i only do a turn every now and then (one every day or two) so it may take a while to finish, but as you can see from the screenshot nearby, things are already heating up in one of the games... and it's only day 4. (i'm playing sami: orange star, vs grit: blue moon).

on to gaming news:

a new gameboy advance game is in production at the moment, rebelstar: tactical command. its being plugged as a turn-based strategy from the creators of x-com. ever play x-com (know here as ufo: enemy unknown). well look at the nearby screen, or visit their site and you can see that the gamplay looks very similar. even the storyline has a couple of similarities. this is a good thing as x-com rocked. plus i like the look of the anime style characters :)
the story (copied from their site): The year is 2117. The evil Arelian Empire has been in control of planet Earth for decades. Initially, the Arelians brought peace and prosperity to a world ravaged by war, disease and ecological devastation. Later, they controlled Earth's inhabitants through fear, using their henchmen, the Zorn, to abduct people when they turn 30. Now, a band of rebels rises up to fight against the Arelians. A new recruit, Jorel, quickly advances through the ranks and becomes their leader. He organizes the rebel forces and builds a powerful army. Soon, he'll challenge the Arelian Empire for control of planet Earth.

also: a new metal slug game is in creation :)
metal slug 6 is heading for the arcades sometime soon. there will be 6 playable characters and i'm sure it'll be just as fun as all the previous metal slug games.

movie news: land of the dead is soon to be released here in sa. the fourth installment of george romero's "of the dead" series of movies (night of the living dead, dawn of the dead, day of the dead, and now, land of the dead).
schpat is organising a land of the dead party at one ring with prizes and all. more details will be posted as i get them. check out schpat's page too.

talking about schpat: i need to choose the money or the prize. now the cash is always good, but is the prize worth more than the cash? is the prize something i want? can i afford to not get 60 rand? how strong is the need to know what's in the box? is there a head in there? hmmm.... what to do....

on the real world front:
new orleans.... what a fuckup that place is.
cops are turning in their badges rather than go out into the warzone that new orleans has become. soldiers have been given the go ahead to shoot to kill. choppers bringing in aid get sniped at so they no longer land, they just turf the stuff out the sides and bugger off. raping and pillaging has become rampant.
the irony of the whole situation is that there are people there who are claiming that there are not enough soldier giving aid and help to people.
people are claiming that america doesn't care about them.
a small observation here: the soldiers would be able to give you more help if they didn't need to stop you looting the stores, didn't need to prtect themselves from you shooting them, didn't need to protect other people from you mugging them, didn't need to protect the innocent from you raping them.
they would be a lot more helpful if they could land their choppers without you shooting at them.
i feel really sorry for the innocent people there... i really do.
but next time they warn you that a catagory 5 hurricane is on its way and the place should be evacuated, you should go. you live in a soupbowl surrounded by water just waiting to flood you at the smallest chance. you got lucky: the storm got downgraded and was only catagory 4 when it hit. next time you may not be so lucky... leave!
also: thinking "it'll be really easy to break into people's houses once they've evacuated." is not a smart thought process, although that seems to be what has happened. viewing footage of police and soldiers turfing wannabe gangsters out of shops may be funny for a short time, but in reality its sad.
sorry to all the innocent people there, but the rest deserved to be flooded. i can only say i wish more people drowned, weighed down by their pockets full of someone else's possesions.
new orleans has been flooded before and no amount of building will stop mom nature when she throws a cat 5 hurricane hissy fit. next time listen to the people who study this shit and evacuate, leave the criminals to drown. if all the innocent people left when they were told to, the army could open fire and clear the scam up in one easy sweep.
every new bit of information i read/ see leaves me with less compassion for what remains in new orleans.
*sigh* stupid stupid stupid...

to lift your moods, i'll sign off with a cute icon thingy:
ps: an interesting question relating to faerie fire and fog clouds has been asked at askzestar... i will be answering soon (a day or two).

9/01/2005

lions and dogs and muggers, oh my...

firstly a warning: todays post has more than its usual load of pictures.
right... on to the good stuff.

last night moonflake and i visited my parents. supper was great (stew with bacon bits and stout for flavouring... mmmm). my dad arrived home a little late (everyone else had already eaten) due to some meeting he had attended, but when he got back he gave moonflake and myself a lion's claw each. the claw is set in a little silver whatsit so it can be hung from a chain or something.
very cool. my dad is keeping the main claw which is scarily big when you stop and think about the size of the paw that it must come from...

anyway. after chatting for a bit and watching a little tv we were on our way back home.
upon arrival at the gate to our flat, a small dog runs in ahead of the car. i park the car thinking we're going to have to open the gate again to let the poor dog out, but while locking up the car moonflake notices the poor thing is shivering quite a bit so i go over to it and pet it on the head.
lo and behold the poor thing is quaking like a bad natural disaster movie because she's soaked to the bone. she must have fallen into the canal or something.
well she had no tags or collar, and had a slightly snaggled ear, so we assumed it must be a stray or a runaway. now we can't take it upstairs with us for the night because the flat allows no pets and the garden is a real adventure to get to if the poor thing needed to get out urgently in the middle of the night.
also we had no food in the house for it (unless it would have eaten provitas). so we pack everything from the back seat of the car into the boot and i pick her up and put her into the car. she was very quiet and friendly and i think she was happy to get a little attention and get out of the cold. moonflake got a rag which i keep in the car to wipe the windscreen and used it as a blanket/towel as it was just the right size. now with dog comfy and wrapped up in the back seat we went off to try discover a 24 hour vet/ animal shelter (as it was about 10pm).
now the only vets i know about are in claremont, so we drive through to there and quickly find the blue cross animal hospital... the parking lot has cars in it and there are lights on in reception so i park the car and get out to go check if they are open and will take a stray. also in the parking lot is a car with 4 people sitting in it.
so i cross over to the door and try look inside through the blinds.... it looks deserted, so i look for opening hours and find an intercom which i ring. while i'm doing this i notice an occupent from the other car has gotten out and was walking towards my car (where luckily moonflake had locked the door)... "uh-oh" i think to myself and prepare to head back, but then he seems to go past the car, and since i noticed an entrance to some housing just past where i had parked i assumed he was going there. still i decided that it was time to go.
i take a few steps away from the door and i hear a noise from the intercom which could have been an aswer but was (in hindsight) actually the thing hanging up after no response. so a turn back to say "hello?" and ring again when i hear a thick xhosa accent, slightly slurred, wafting back from my car asking if anything was wrong. hell yes something was wrong... a dodgy dude had come between me and my car in a poorly lit parking lot. as i return to the car this guy's buddy comes out and crosses over to my car too.
explaining that we have a stray and are looking for a 24h vet, these two drunkenly try to explain something about how they work here and the back is open enough to let a dog in or something... the slurring and accent were not helping understanding, neither was the adrenalin that decided now was a good time to come out, neither did the fact that my brain was checking their hands for weapons while simultaneously mapping a path to the car door around these two that didn't leave my flanked with one of them behind me, and checking the whereabouts of my wallet, keys, phone, and knife.
thankfully i have played d&d enough to get my back to the car while keeping them both in my forward quadrant, all the while looking intrested in what they had to say and explaining how i'll just take the dog to another vet, while being prepared react to sudden movement.
a quick knock on the car window to signify that i'm ready to dash in an lock resulted in moonflake unlocking my door and a slid in and slammed the door while explaining (again) that its ok thanks... we'll go to another vet.
and by that i meant get the hell out of there as quickly as possible. now i may be jumping to conclusions but those 2 were super dodgy. i doubt either of them worked there ("the back door is open enough to get the dog in..." what?) and they were either attempting to move in position to mug me, or were going to ask for money to take the dog ("we're not really supposed to do this, but we can blah blah blah...") and then wait till we were gone and throw her back onto the street. i've seen people do the whole crowding, agressive, prep to be mugged thing and that is waht these two were doing. moving in closer than needed and talking lots, switching from one guy to the other and back to keep a person unbalanced and not concentrating. i was expecting them to ask for 20 rand to take the dog and then jump me as soon as the wallet appeared... fat fucking chance.
so we fly out of there like a bat out of the proverbial hot place. there was so much adrenalin in me at this point that my foot was shaking on the clutch whenever i changed gears. we decided to pull over and call my dad since he works in claremont and generally deals with sam's (our dog's) health. so we pull into a garage with 24h store and park. i get the bright idea to ask one of the paramedics that were standing around having a cigarette/ coffee/ whatever.
turns out one of them knows of a 24h animal place in rosmead opposite the rosmead spar, so we go there. (thanks guys... you were a real help:)
we get there and it is 24 hours and they do take strays. a short formfilling later and our little stray was whisked off in the arms of some caring man who tells us he will phone all the vets tomorrow and see about finding the owner. he also thins that she has an owner but has been stray for a while now because she was starving. also she was very old he tells us. thanking him we left to go home to sleep knowing that we had saved a poor dog from hypothermia, probably got it a meal and warm place to stay, and avoided being stabbed/ shot. life was good :)


right... enough of the doggy saga and on to some interesting and humorous stuffs.
i found a game for the nintendo ds called "londonia gothics" and clicked through their site (all in japanese) only to discover that there is a rather nasty enemy called a deathbag (see picture). it looks like you can get a bunch of dresses for the main character and dress her up (her name is alice) and stuff... difficult to figure out but it looks cool.

meanwhile the guys over at liksang.com (exporters of games and related) have an amazing piece of hardware for sale (see picture below for proof). a "gba opening tool" for removing the screws in your gba. it a screwdriver guys... admittedly the screws are funny and you can't use a normal screwdriver, but seriously...


hey :) today is my lucky day 'cos i won schpat's 1000'th visitor competition. i went over to his page, read his blog and his counter was at 995. i go read a comment and then return to his main page and bam! 1000. i'm sure he'll post the pics i took as proof.


more gaming news:
pheonix wright, ace attorney is on its way... you play an attorney. you don't need to figure out what is going on, you just need to find a way of proving it in court. this means you have to talk to all the other characters in the game, collecting their stories and evidence and building an airtight case. sounds like loads of fun.


i'm still waiting for trauma center: under the knife. i finally found a (tiny) picture of the boxart so i thought i'd post it here :)

in real life news:
scientists have unveiled the chimp genome. if you found the schpatdope on dna interesting then check it out. they're going to uncover loads of info about the human genome through comparison... all good stuff.

and now to sign off with a picture of alice from londonia gothics (because its a cool picture!)