Photos to music

A video I put together with several photos I took around Outlook, all put to the tune Home, by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros.

 

Flag on my … laptop bag

It's my laptop bag. And there's a flag on it.

The first week of my staycation (that means my vacation where I stay at home) is almost done.  Presently, I am putting together a video of my walk yesterday down to the Skytrail bridge, which I’ll post on my Youtube account soon enough.  Today, I wanted to kick back and relax (like I’ve been doing for the entire week already).

Part of why I like this vacation is that there’s no pressure.  I can be at ease and do things at my own pace.  Not that I don’t mind going long distances like last year, or even head into the city to take a break from Outlook.  But this year, I wanted something quiet and no hassle.  And that’s just what I’m doing.

The only thing that could make my Breakfast of Awesome even better would be to add toast and Saskatoon Berry Jam. Hindsight is 20-20.

Part of the awesomeness of a staycation is the food.  I know, you might say “but Tim, you get awesome food when you go out someplace else”.  Yes, I do, but I also get to try a few different things, or even have something really familiar.  Like this morning’s fair of a sliced up apple, crispy bacon and scrambled eggs.  Jealous yet?  I should say so!

Look to the left.  You may begin drooling now.

As I said earlier, I will have a video posted later, and that was of my walk down to Skytrail.  Anyone who follows me on twitter will have seen the seven photos I posted yesterday along my walk.  I’m going to do another one tomorrow, as I sling my backpack (laptop bag) over my shoulder and head on over to the Outlook & District Museum.  I’ll take photos and shoot some video, and I’ll post that tomorrow as well.

I’m also thinking that tomorrow’s food picture of the day should involve ice cream.

Anyway, I only showed a sampling of the pictures I took yesterday.  Here’s a bunch more.

Until tomorrow…

…keep ’em flyin’!

 

To dome or not to dome

The talk early this year in Riderville has been about a few things.  Would the Riders defense be as potent without the likes of John Chick and Stevie Baggs who took contracts with Indianapolis and San Diego respectively, and the retirement of Eddie Davis?  It’s now five games in, and aside from an embarrassment against Calgary in week four, it’s not too bad.  Although, the Riders have given up the largest number of points per game.  Fortunately, the offense has been putting up numbers.

The other talk has been about a new stadium in Regina.  Moasic Stadium at Taylor Field is old, let’s face it.  It’s been there for years.  The same location has been the site of football in Regina for at least half a century.  There is a lot of history there, but there’s also some problems.  The stadium will have to under go several renovations to bring it up to snuff.  So the question is, is it time to build a new stadium in Regina?  And is it time to make that a domed stadium?

Football in Canada, especially on the Prairies, is not kind.  Saskatchewan, Winnipeg, Edmonton and Calgary all boast outdoor venues, none of which has the option of a roof to cover up during bad weather.  The Riders, Eskimos, Stamps and Bombers have all played home dates in rain, snow, sleet, had games paused during a blackout, and in Edmonton’s case, mud.  Commonwealth Stadium in Edmonton is one of the last football venues in North America still played on grass.

You might think that any one of these four cities would warrant a new domed stadium to make things much more inviting for the fans.  Well, there are some arguments for such a move.  The BC Lions have BC Place Stadium, which currently is undergoing renovations, so the team has to play home games at the smaller Empire Stadium.  And people have loved it.  The weather has been great, and you get a view of the mountains in the background while attending a football game.  In Toronto, there is Rogers Centre.  Home of the Agronauts and the Blue Jays.  Back in the day, when it was called Skydome, the retractable roof was great.  It’s still an impressive site, and with football and baseball always happening, Rogers is a stadium fit for a large metropolitan center like Toronto.

Then there’s the Big O.  Olympic Stadium was to be the crown jewel of stadiums in Canada.  But financial problems, and an Olympic games that put the city of Montreal in so much debt that they are still paying for it, became an eye soar.  At one time home to the Montreal Alouettes and the Montreal Expos, it was often stated that they wondered when the roof would get finished.  The stadium was built for the 1976 Olympics, and people still wondered in the 1980’s when the roof would finally be put in place.  When the Als folded, only the Expos remained, and it was embarrassing to see only 5 to 10 thousand people show up for a ball game in a 60,000 seat stadium.

Fast foward, the Als returned to the CFL, and decided to move into Molson Stadium, a smaller outdoor venue.  It’s been a perfect fit.  The last two games and playoff games are always played in the Big O, and they’re always close to or at sell out.

Now lets return to Regina, where the winters can be harsh and summers can be blistering, combine both seasons with a wicked wind.  You’d think that a dome in Regina would be a no brainer.  But there’s money to consider.  Who pays for it?  There has been agreement that the city of Regina, the Riders and maybe even the province could kick in some funding.  Now to get the federal government on board.  But for a project like this, the tax payer, because that’s who’s paying for it in the end, needs to see a quick turn around.  Sure, the Riders will play there.  But that’s nine games.  What else?  The University of Regina Rams, and the Regina Prairie Thunder of the Prairie Junior Football Conference would have a new place to play.  And, of course, there’s the high school teams in Regina that could benefit.

A new stadium in Regina could also attract some major events.  Remember the Rolling Stones playing at Taylor Field?  It was one of the most sought after ticket events of the last few years, because the Stones never played anywhere in Saskatchewan during their entire musical career.  For the longest time, after Saskatoon built Saskatchewan Place (now called the Credit Union Centre), big name talent was flocking to the city.  AC/DC, Def Leppard, Alice Cooper, Bon Jovi and more.  Those names still come to Saskatoon, and very few go to Regina.  Sure, Regina hosted Bon Jovi recently, but other acts are few and far between.

A dome in Regina would make sense economically.  Plus, there’s already several groups that have come forward to help with the project.  One of those has been several Tribal Councils in Saskatchewan.  First Nations bands in Saskatchewan are some of the most keen business people around.  Many reserves have gone from sparse and run down, to much more affluent.  There are, of course, always exceptions to every rule.

So with so many interested people looking at a new stadium, I guess the only questions left are when would we see an official announcement either way, where would it be build, and would the Riders end up becoming like the Minnesota Vikings once they got a dome and dwindled into NFL obscurity.

Until next time…

…keep ’em flyin’!

 

Abject horror!

Sometimes, every now and again, you will find that one thing which you can’t stop watching.  It may be the most hideous thing you’ve ever seen (like the scene in Hannibal, with Ray Liota at the dinner table, and the… yeah, you know the one, although my girlfriend at the time and I both covered our eyes while her co-worker kinda giggled, which was sorta disturbing in a way).  You know those times.  It’s not just a train wreck, although it could be.  But it’s the type of thing you can’t stop watching.  Like when Britney Spears went insane and shaved her head.

There’s a description of that.  One that perfectly describes the situation in only the way a picture can.

You’re welcome.

Until next time…

…keep ’em flyin’!

 

The Gaming bug

Remember a while back I mentioned how new games are just meh to me currently.  Well, most still are, but there is one I’ve really started to get excited about.  I’ve been playing Guild Wars again, and have been reading up on the new system that ArenaNet plans to put in place for Guild Wars 2.

Guild Wars had eight skills, GW2 will have ten, divided nicely into profession/weapon and profession/race.  The first five skills are based on your profession and what weapon you’re holding.  So, a warrior could go sword and board and have three sword based skills and two shield based skills.  Or dual wield swords to have several sword based attacks.  Or axe and pistol to have three axe skills and two pistol skills.  Or a bow or rifle…. I think you get the picture.  What I gathered from reading is those skills change automatically as the player changes the weapon he or she is holding.  Sword and board to sword and pistol, the skills change.  Before, you have to get to an outpost before you could change them (article on combat and skills in a one and two part series of developer notes).

The next five skills are more flexible, as you can change them about, with the only exception being there has to be one healing skill in the set.  Each profession will have some type of heal skill available.  As for the other four, a mix between profession and race to round it out.  Race based skills would be like something the Norn have.  They have the ability to shapechange based on their totem spirits, bear, snow leopard, raven and wolf.

They are slowly putting up the professions, the first of which is the Elementalist.  By guessing, one could assume that warrior and ranger would be two other professions.  Not sure about the other professions of monk, mesmer and necromancer, however.  And I’m going to assume that assassin and ritualist from Factions and paragon and dervish from Nightfall have been given the boot, but we’ll see.  It would be disappointing, because paragon was a nice profession that mixed well with a warrior.  Each profession gained adrenaline for attacks, which was needed to fire off certain skills.  Plus, paragons already used a shield, so you wouldn’t need to put points into tactics in order to use a warrior shield.

It also seems that they are really driving for teamwork to be the primary goal of the game, because some of the attacks they described involved one player on defensive in front of another player, and a combined attack of some sort.  Thus, removing the need to actually need a second profession like is the case in Guild Wars now.

A little disappointed that dwarves were not added to the race list (article on the five races located here).  According to cannon, dwarves disappeared somewhere between GW and GW2.  Maybe they’ll be added in from expansions.  Could possibly be that some of the old professions might be added as well, such as paragon and dervish.  Have to see.

Continued reading shows that they plan on putting in dynamic events, things that change the world as time moves on.  One day there may be a thriving village with vendors, the next day a smoking ruin overrun by centaurs.  Interesting article where the developers said they examined every quest system of every MMO in the genre and found them all to be flawed greatly.

From www.guildwars2.com:

In Guild Wars 2, our event system won’t make you read a huge quest description to find out what’s going on. You’ll experience it by seeing and hearing things in the world. If a dragon is attacking, you won’t read three paragraphs telling you about it, you’ll see buildings exploding in giant balls of fire, and hear characters in the game world screaming about a dragon attack. You’ll hear guards from nearby cities trying to recruit players to go help fight the dragon, and see huge clouds of smoke in the distance, rising from the village under siege.

There is a second fundamental flaw to traditional quest systems: what the quest text tells you is happening in a quest is not actually what is happening in the world.

For example, in a traditional MMO, the character who gives you a quest will tell you ogres are coming to destroy the character’s home, and you need to kill them. You then get a quest which says, “Kill 0/10 ogres” and you proceed to kill a bunch of ogres standing around in a field picking daisies. Since every player in the game needs to be able to do this quest, the ogres will never actually threaten the character’s home – they will just eternally pick daisies in the field. The ogres aren’t actually doing what the quest says they are – the game is lying to you!

Interesting point at the www.guildwars2.com site on Dynamic Events overview.

One of the challenges of a massively multiplayer game is building a game world where hundreds of players are able to interact together and feel a sense of community, not a sense of threat, from other players playing with them. One of the great flaws of content in most traditional MMOs is that players generally cannot actually play together unless they are in a group, and the content types actively encourage them not to interact, or worse, become hostile, when another player is nearby.

Traditional MMO quest systems will send multiple players off to kill a boss. One player kills the boss and gets the loot. The rest of the players have to stand around and wait their turn for the boss to re-spawn so they can kill it and get credit for it. You don’t want other players around you because they’re stealing your kills and slowing your rate of achievement. MMOs are supposed to be about hundreds, if not thousands of players, playing together in a community, not putting them in the same world and then pushing them apart!

Yes, I’m looking at YOU Champions Online.  Run into that a few times where I needed to take out a target (not necessarily a boss) and several other players tried to take it from me.  Without anyone stepping back and saying “ya know, we could team and do this together.”  I’m guilty of that too.

Much like killing a giant monster in CoX, entire events will be scalable.

The event system in Guild Wars 2 is designed to specifically address this problem. All players that fully participate in an event are rewarded for doing so; everyone who helps kill a monster or blow up an enemy catapult will get credit for doing so. There is no kill stealing and no quest camping. Everyone works together towards the common goal of the event and everyone is rewarded for doing so. To help ensure there is always enough for everyone to do, our events dynamically scale, so the more players who show up and participate in the event, the more enemies show up to fight them. If a bunch of players leave the event, it will dynamically scale back down so it can be completed by the people who are still there playing it. This careful balance created by our dynamic scaling system helps ensure you have the best and most rewarding play experience.

Something else I like is that they are trying to make it more like a community instead of a large group of people milling about who have no interest in playing with anyone else.  Too often in MMO’s I’ve seen that happen.  Not all MMO’s are like that, mind you.  There are communities within the entire community you can find.  Champions is extremely guilty of an MMO that players seem disinterested in actually doing anything.  Oh sure, there are Super Groups that do band together, but they’re far and few between and maybe only a percentage of what can be found in City of Heroes/Villains (City of Heroes/Villains has better community building skills).  Too often I’ve run into this in MMO’s where I join an Super Group or Guild or whatever and everything is happy and fine and we all shit sunshine and rainbows together.  A few days later, absolutely everyone in the Super Group or Guild or whatever is off soloing stuff and has no interest in the rest of the group save for using the Super Group channel as a twitter feed.  I’m looking at YOU Champions Online!

Events are designed to help bring the community together and to give everyone a shared sense of responsibility and camaraderie in the game world. Even if you’re not grouped up with someone, you’ll only be rewarded for having more players come help you with an event! In Guild Wars 2, when you see another player you’ll actually be excited to see them, where in traditional MMOs you generally think, “Oh great, here comes a guy to steal my kills.” Through our internal game testing so far, it’s been remarkable to see how well this idea has functioned in practice. Our entire studio has experienced countless moments where we’ve been drawn together to parts of a map to do events and felt a strong bond with other players; a truly dynamically created sense of community born out of the event system.

The other thing it looks like they’re trying to address is replay.  How many times, how many freakin’ times have people save the dumbass Fortune Teller from the Circle of Thorns in City of Heroes?  Or stopped the battle between the Clockwork and the Skulls in City of Heroes?  And there’s no change at all, it’s the same thing, time after time, with only the map or degree of difficulty changing based on the difficulty setting of the player with the mission.

There are two very common types of MMO players that generally are not specifically catered to by traditional games in the genre. One is the explorer who wants to explore every nook and cranny of the game world. The other, even more common, wants to make alternate characters and play through the game as many different ways with as many different characters as possible (aka the altoholic). In Guild Wars 2, we’re using our event system to help cater to these kinds of players in ways no one has ever attempted before.

For the explorer, much of the joy comes from discovering new things. In a traditional MMO, the explorer gets to explore a vast world, but after they have explored it once, there is nothing left for the explorer to do, because the game world does not change. The game becomes stale, and much of the joy is lost when the explorer has run out of things to discover. Our dynamic event system in Guild Wars 2 ensures this sense of joy from discovery is never lost in the game world! Every time you enter any map in the game, completely different events and situations could be occurring to discover in a new and different way. A village that was previously filled with friendly norn could, on a return trip, have been taken over by evil Sons of Svanir who are now using it as a base of operations and have put up their own architecture in place of the norn’s. This dynamically changing world will create the ultimate sense of discovery for the explorer.

They do end of the article by sort of detailing in as short a form as possible what they feel the current system of MMO’s has become, and what they hope to achieve.  If they manage to pull it off, more power to them.  Have to wait and see, but if they can do it, then Guild Wars 2 will be very impressive indeed.

MMOs have become extremely popular, but the genre has done little to evolve over the past decade. Generally MMO players explore an unchanging, persistent game world, leveling up by performing quests which do not change the world in any way once completed. It’s time for the genre to take the next step, and explore the idea of a truly dynamic, living, breathing persistent world where the player’s actions really make a difference, and everything that occurs in the game world has cause and effect. The event system in Guild Wars 2 is going to bring this concept of a dynamic world to life for our players and we cannot wait till you all get a chance to play it with us. You won’t be disappointed.

And one last thing from the FAQ:

How will character progression work? Will you be raising the level cap?

Guild Wars 2 will have the kind of extensive character advancement appropriate to a persistent-world RPG. Our goal is to avoid forcing players into the grind-based gameplay that too often accompanies a high level cap.

Also, to allow players the freedom to play together even if their friends are at a much higher (or lower) level, we are planning to implement a strong sidekick system, similar to that used in City of Heroes™.

And for your viewing pleasure…

 

The eyes have it

I had no choice, I had to break down and get new glasses.  Not just frames, which I also needed, but new lenses.  As I spoke to the eye doctor, I was brought to the sudden realization that yes, I am very much getting older.

The new glasses I have are progressive lenses.  For those who do not have the joy of having glasses, or are much younger than I am, here is what progressive lenses means.

From Wikipedia:

Progressive spectacle lenses, also called progressive addition lenses (PAL), progressive power lenses, graduated prescription lenses, and varifocal or multifocal lenses, are corrective lenses used in eyeglasses to correct presbyopia and other disorders of accommodation. They are characterised by a gradient of increasing lens power, added to the wearer’s correction for the other refractive errors. The gradient starts at the wearer’s distance prescription, at the top of the lens and reaches a maximum addition power, or the full reading addition, at the bottom of the lens. The length of the progressive power gradient on the lens surface depends on the refractive index of the lens, with a final addition power between 0.75 to 3.00 dioptres for most wearers. The addition value prescribed depends on the level of presbyopia of the patient and is closely related to age and to a lesser extent, existing prescription.

This is going to take some getting used to, as I have already discovered.  Looking straight ahead is fine.  The world is so much clearer than my old glasses.  But looking down, that’s a whole new adventure.  My eyes have to adjust every time they move it would seem.

My eyes are getting older, and they aren’t really getting better.  As a matter of fact, they’re getting worse.  It’s a scary thing to think about sometimes, and the thought has run through my head that what if one day I wake up and I’m completely blind.  As it is, my eyes are bad enough that I can be classed as close as legally blind without actually being blind.

It has been suggested that I go in to have my eyes dilated, which as has been described to me, is like having a puff of air shot at my eyes.  I have a hard time touching my eye (no contact lenses for me) so a puff of air probably isn’t going to be any better.  I have also been informed that I won’t be able to drive for the day after it’s done.

I suppose it isn’t so bad, at least a lot of this is preventative, so that my eyes won’t get worse right away, or I won’t have to go in for major surgery.  So, why not lazer surgery?  Why wouldn’t I wish to improve my eyes that way?  Remember what I said about touching the eye (which just the thought makes me squicky)?  Yeah, lazers really don’t make that any better.  It’s like “Here, have some hot, burning light in your eye ball!”  No thanks, I’ll put up with the glasses.

Until next time…

…keep ’em flyin’!

 

Shani update

An update to Clarissa’s artwork for Shani.  This one is coloured.

Look for more coming soon.

 

More artistry: Shani Wennemein

Clarissa Hummel has managed to complete a new version of Shani.  A full body view and has given me permission to post it.  She’ll be inking and colouring it later, but for now I wanted to give a glimpse of the elven gunslinger.

Stay tuned, Clarissa will be having a full colour version coming later.

Until next time…

…keep ’em flyin’!

 

Looking back at old words

As I mentioned earlier, I went into the city this past weekend, mostly to visit my folks and check out my dad’s new computer toys.  I did also hook up with some friends as well, and it’s one comment that Kevin said to me that stuck out.  As I soon as I came into the restaurant where the weekly Water Buffalo meeting was being held, he mentioned my stylish bunny hug.

Yeah, he totally said bunny hug.

Yes, that's right. I'm wearing a Saskatchewan Roughrider Bunny Hug. Bunny. Hug. Say it with me now.

That would have been the end of that, had it not been for my usual checking of stats here at the blog (because the most mundane of things sometimes interest me, not because I want to crow about it, it’s just interesting).  The usual hits are seen mostly in the posts we made back in October during the 31 Days of Ghosts Zodi and I did.  And for the record, I’m collecting more for this year’s edition of 31 Days of Ghosts.  Most people take a look at the Winchester Mystery House, Myrtle’s Plantation, Fort San Sanitorium, H. H. Holmes Murder Castle or any of the other posts during 31 Days of Ghosts.  Also, a few people are hitting the pages for Blood of the Moon and Black Mask & Pale Rider.

But every now and then there’s an anomaly that sticks out.  Some weird post that gets a number of views that was just a posted rant or something cute and funny, but not anywhere near popular by any stretch of the imagination.

Somebody’s out there investigating Bunny Hugs.  Oh yes, there it comes again.  Bunny Hugs.  We will make the word come back in fashion again, if not for the world, then at least the province of Saskatchewan.  Mark my words.

Until next time…

…keep ’em flyin’ (in your Bunny Hug)!

 

The world of technology

This past weekend I went into the city, but with a different purpose than most other weekends.

The other weekends I did spend time with friends and went about doing some shopping and even saw a couple of shows.  This time, I went in to spend time with my folks.  The big reason why is my dad has entered the 21st Century, so to speak.  In this order he has purchased a digital camera, a netbook and a 3 in 1 printer.  Pretty decent.  And from the prices, pretty affordable.

The camera he purchased is a Fujitsu Camera, which is actually better than my own Kodak.  I didn’t read the full specs, but it can do everything mine can and instead of being 8.1 megapixels, it’s 12 megapixels.

The netbook he purchased is an Acer, which actually seems better than my own laptop, and I’ve even given mine an upgrade to 2 gig of RAM.  Plus, his is loaded with Windows 7 Starter.  A big step up from my own Windows XP.  Though, I’m not complaining, it took me two years to go from Windows 98 to Windows XP when it did come out.

Finally, the printer he purchased is a 3-in-1 HP Printer.  A pretty decent one as things go.  We aren’t looking at getting a magazine or newspaper quality type print job here anyway.

All in all, however, I think my dad made some pretty decent purchases, all of which go toward taking some nice photos and printing them off with ease.  My dad was always a photo-bug, having his own black and white 35 mm camera and even used the old Kodak Brownie line of cameras (I still have a Kodak Brownie Hawkeye camera, and it still works).  He taught me how to develope film and helped me learn about setting the photo paper down and getting the picture just right.  About the dodge and burn paddles and how to make things not look so over exposed.  You know, before Photoshop had all of that in the same utility and you could do it with software.

Now that dad is set up with his own computer, camera and printer, the next step is getting him online.  I think we’ll wait a bit on that.  Not like I need to worry, I have faith that my parents are going to be around for a while.  But having my dad connect online will be an interesting, if not sometimes entertaining, experience.

Until next time…

…keep ’em flyin’!