From the Miami Herald –
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/breaking_news/7704252.htm

Here’s another reason to like living in South Florida….

Welcome to South Florida – and beware of the Monkeys

How to know when you are in Dania Beach: when the horde of wild monkeys at the rent-a-car agency throws mango pits. Continue reading 6404 Monkeys! →

Media Player Classic (open-source app that replaces Windows Media Player, Quicktime and RealPlayer)

Watched The Chinese Connection last night…I forgot how odd the theme music was. Great fight scenes, though… Bruce Lee at some of his best, I think. I considered making an icon from the “slo-mo hands” bit, but I imagine there are probably a dozen or so of them out there already.

I was cleaning up my closet and ended up looking through my gaming notes from 1995. Man, has my handwriting has improved over the last 8-9 years…What a horrid, crabbed script I had before! (It’s still messy, but at least it’s mostly legible now.)

Some Translations from those pages:

1/15/95 – Protectors – “Looks like trouble” gang found gadgets, Doc Eon (VINCENT’s enemy – robots to fight.)

odd artifacts –

• water gun – no nozzle.
• Platform
• Wrench & Bulb
• Pyramid-thing puzzle box – summons flying drones.

Mutants, Hollow Earth, Riches

Hollow Earth Entered via North Pole – 0 gravity – Aztec type wealth and equipment.

Dracodroid in 60’s, giant robot, 6 -vehicle “Voltron-type” vanished – West Coast’s most powerful being/super.

Earth Invaded in ’68, helped conquer villain, disappeared in early 70’s.

1/20/95 – Protectors FOCUS vs. Old Ones. Our super team (Based in Covenant, Rhode Island)

Plot elements – Evil Snake Knife -Gives the Aquarian a vision of a jungle river (Nile?), desert, fields (Egypt?), Bald, Dark folk, white loincloths, buildings with brass doors w/ canine designs, They’re aware of Aquarian, he snaps out of his trance.

Go to Miskatonic U to investigate the Necronomicon & Take Viper & Cobra (WHAT WERE WE THINKING?)

nicknames for Scarab (miniMAX’s DNPC/Ally) – Ladybug, Lori, Junebug – Doesn’t actually know a lot of Egyptology, buy liked old Journey album covers.

Notes in Margins-

• Brickhouse = a big baby!
• Grey Spectre & Ghost = Cool.
• Get Star Children into space… leave Gurney (Otho) on the moon.

Drawings by the Gray Pumpkin for games from 1/95 (9 years ago???):

miniMAX’s “desolid beam” and remote car device.

Khudrin, Dog & Blare (Blair?)

Well, It looks like news of my brother’s case has made it to the ambulance chasers.

No less than 14 articles of mail advertising for legal services arrived in my mailbox today (bro uses this location as his mail drop).

You know, the three collect calls my brother made to me from jail are going to cost me about $12?

Speaking of Florida jails / law, money grubbing… archived here

Playing with old silent movies… I present… Der Golem. abridged

Playing with old silent movies… I present… Der Golem. abridged

This work week should be interesting, with just me, CS and Rhodey. Hopefully I will be able to take the opportunity to get a stronger dialogue working between them. I’ll keep my fingers crossed.

Talked to Dave last night for the first time in an age… poor man is uberbusy. Everyone but the little baby is down with the flu, he’s working like crazy on refinishing the 2nd house, and he’s pulling overtime at work to stay on top of things. He’s near exhausted, but I think he’ll pull through… remarkably strong will and body.

More Pictures from Yesterday, Riverwalk:

Went for walkies…not sure for how long, but it was pretty close to 4 hours, I think. I took a slow, leisurely pace up Las Olas to Riverwalk and the library, watched the boats come in, grabbed a milkshake and people-watched. I really needed a nice day out and about and that fit the bill. There weren’t very many to watch due to it being Sunday, but there were a few. Foot traffic was light enough to allow for easy maneuverability, and parts were so quiet that it was jarring to me. I’m so used to hearing a vehicle’s engine or other street noise out there that it was rather eerie. There were parts of town that gave a real “28 Days Later” vibe. Even the singing fountain was quiet, save for the rush of the water… it was a very peaceful day out. I’ll toss a few images from my journey behind a cut.

5 pictures, average 75k each:

Ok! Let’s see to it my week is started with Cheerios and not frickin’ Drama flakes this time, eh? (Hm… Last time I mentioned drama flakes was on 8/8/01, the same day as my gamer rant, One-in-every-crowd, playing with CSS filters, link to the language machines, Wally caught for fraud & embezzlement, What dino lived in your backyard?)

I downloaded Bad Taste. Peter Jackson’s directorial skills have improved a great deal over 13 years…Bad Taste is like something I’d have made with friends in Junior high. The movie is downright gross and goofy. (The Frighteners was a lot better.) I’m even more impressed that they gave this guy LotR at all, and how good a job was done with it. (Rachel showed me Meet the Feebles ages ago, too. That was something different.)

Dentsu Advertising Museum

The Edo Era (1603-1867), during which a full-fledged feudal system was established by the Tokugawa shogunate, was also an era in which the culture of townspeople flourished. That Japan had already developed distinctive advertising techniques of its own as early as the Edo Era might come as a surprise to you. But ample evidence of these remain for us today to follow a historical trail, in the form of nishiki-e (a multicolored woodblock print), hikifuda (handbills) and signboards. A witness of the times, as well as a chronicle of advertising creative work in Japan, these relics represent a valuable record of both the evolution of corporations and the history of common people’s lives.

Belgium’s most famous reporter TinTin is 75 years old. Congratulations and happy birthday to Snowy too. The intrepid reporter first appeared in print on January 10, 1929, in a comic supplement to the Brussels newspaper Le Vingtieme Siecle.

More Florida Sky – South Beach

Bail update – Paperwork guy got here at 3, took about 10 min to fill out the paperwork, he took it to the jail, hopefully got the bro out of the pokey. (Supposedly it can take up to 10 hours for him to be slotted out?)He’s to come here after he’s out, to fill out and get information to send them. I called his Cell phone, and wouldn’tcha know it, Andy answered it… that tells me that they were together when bro was arrested. If I had known that, I’d have thought twice about letting him out. What it boils down to is that the bond cost $100, plus $1000 in collateral (basically I transferred $1100 to them, and when he goes to court, I get $1k back. If he’s an idiot, and decides to skip out on his court date, I’m responsible for cost incurred in finding him, and taking him back to jail. He’d be a fool to skip out because it’s a major charge vs his current situation. He’s another “professional victim”. Nothing is ever his fault, just bad luck or mean people. It’s never “ok, I admit it, I screwed up, and was wrong” unless he’s pinned in a corner by logic, and at that point, he’s just paying lip service… not really believing it. This is the same guy that called the landlord a jerk for kicking him out, after not paying rent for 6 months.

[update-10:41pm – Brother showed up at my door about 10pm… I reviewed with him what the situation was… If he’s arrested for anything, I lose my money and he’s stuck in jail without bond for as long as it takes for his case to come to trial. He seemed frightened and upset from only spending 18 hours in there, so I think that drove the point home. I explained to him about Andy always being a catalyst for his worst times… and he paid lip service. I can tell when he’s not taking what I say as anything but a lecture. That’s his call, he’s an adult, and he knows with full understanding that there’s not a thing anyone can do for him if he screws up.]

It’s been a crappy week, but it’s Saturday, and I look forward to a better week starting tomorrow. I’m not on call, and I think that I’ll take a little smiley walk up the beach, and enjoy the weather.

Some good news (hope I don’t jinx myself) On-call wasn’t too busy at all. That’s a nice blessing to count.

Fiddled with Mr. Snail a bit.. made his foot slide. Still not sure what to do with the eye stalks. stationary like that, he looks a little like a Viking ship.

Speed, highly addictive card game. (I may put it in the Toybox later.)

The Fog of War, I really like this site.

Opening ports with the westell modem/router is a real chore. Once I get it right,t I’m writing the procedure up and will post it as a faq on my website… I look forward to seeing how many hits I get on it, and even more forward to hearing form folks that got helped as a result.

Obligatory Newt Picture du jour

Things to do in order to get my mortgage worked out with 1005 financing for the coming purchase of a place (rather than renting)… if not, 5% down is pretty standard.

Letters related to phone, power & cable, stating how long my accounts have been open, payment timeliness, and contact numbers for the people concerned and a list of my canceled rent checks for this and my prior place. Most of that’ll be dealt with on Monday.

Note to self, look into seller concession, where the seller pays 3% of the price to go to closing the deal. (That’s a good $3k-ish, right there!) It looks like a pretty good possibility, depending on the seller.

I’ve looked at too many bits of hacker-text. 2004 looks like the word “soup” to me.

Work News – Kahuna will be doing opening and trainings in Nevada next week, Newbie and DL are going to St. Augustine. That means it’s just me, CS, the bean counters and Rhodey in the office. I think MM is skipping next week… still waiting for clearance to do codeRED.

I helped with her practice training, and discovered that the big kahuna can’t say the words “telephony” or “liaison” properly.

Blimp over Fort Lauderdale today

More Gifties in the mail! First the tea, sage and the sandalwood prayer-beads yesterday, and now the astounding Fresca sent me some cool loot, too!

The Zombie Survival Guide : Complete Protection from the Living Dead by Max Brooks (Mel’s Son) and Godzilla vs. Destoroyah/Godzilla vs. Space Godzilla (two movies on one double-sided DVD!) Two great flicks that I’ve wanted for a long time.

Thank you, very much!

Porno Bob is a big Tony Robbins fan, and he believes in a lot of other things things that I don’t buy into but he seems like a nice enough guy. This is the first job he’s had in a long where he wasn’t the boss, so we’ll see how he adapts.

CS woke me up in the middle of the night because he forgot his codeRED password while on call. it took me about 5 minutes to shake off the Alpha-state foolishness and get into alert mode at 1:30 in the morning. (When I’m on call, I snap to attention immediately.)

Newbie is suffering a lot, because of SD’s departure without notice. Not only is she having to do trainings, but now she’s got to go to St. Augustine with DL… both of them are fairly uninitiated in that department. What’s worse, there was talk about putting me in a tie, and having me teach the police how to use the system. Ouch. No, not unless it’s the most dire of circumstances. I’d rather do community meetings than a cop thing, if only due to the “I wanna be here” factor of civilians. Police are really busy, and if they’re made to go to a meeting for an hour or so out of their day… well, it can be a hard sell to get them to pay attention to the lesson plan.

A lot of therians got fired today, including probably the best quest maker, Josie2. I’m going to donate some there bucks to her cause, just to say thanks for her good work, and to mourn the loss of an awesome employee.

Tom Cruise as Iron man? hmm… that could work. Stilt-man, maybe? Heck, if Michael Keaton could be Batman, why not?

Chimpanzees struggling to survive amid the destruction of their forest habitat have begun snatching and killing children. Continue reading 6394 Mail call! →