*ninja* a superb warrior with mad skillz. resourceful; evasive; kick-ass
[Final Fantasy Tactics Job Class]

Hahahahahahahahahaha… Well, i’d love to think that’s accurate. Online tests usually are with me for some reason.

So i went to Lam Tang last night and got my Hung Ga Kung Fu on. I have to say that standing in one spot should never hurt that much. I have muscles i didn’t know i had that are screaming in languages i don’t know. I swear whatever the hell a triceps is it never entered my mind until yesterday, and now i can’t raise my arms… And the Horse stance was obviously invented by somebody with way too much flexibility. Anybody who can hold that stance for longer than 15 seconds should be really looked at in awe. Seriously, the tension that the stance works up in your legs is beyond incredible. I had a hell of alot of fun though, and it certainly was a good experience. I can see already that this will actually improve exactly what i want to improve about myself. That being it will give me what’s called “poise” by people, a knowledge of myself and all that. And i’ll get in shape at the same time, so it is a win win situation.

I’m also playing Warcraft 3. I suck at it, but i’m enjoying myself, and that’s all that matters, right? It is truly an enjoyable game, if i can make that assertion based on playing the prologue and a few human missions. The side quest idea is really kickass, and the unaligned units are a very good idea. To say nothing of the fact that the whole game is now dynamic, where WC and WC2 were pretty much static completely. What i mean by that is that other than your troops and your enemy’s troops there was precious little else that tied you to the world. The trees were all just a texture on an area, the hills were arbitrary walls, and the buildings just sat there. In WC3 each tree is differentiated from the others, the terrain actually slopes, and the buildings actually seem to have life about them.

I don’t hold this against the first two games, of course, because there are certain technological issues at hand. Not only that but they were working with 2d sprites at the time. I am a huge proponent of sprites, however, so i could never look down on a sprite-based game. The polygons in this game though have a life i’m not used to in a polygon-based game. They seem to be a logical extension of sprite animation rather than an attempt to blaze off in another direction. Needless to say i’m happy with it. We’ll see how happy i remain when i start losing missions repetitively.

And you want to know why i titled the post this way? Well i’ve managed to become what every phone support guy hates in a caller. Let me set the stage. I work for a school that has as a software title a program called “I Spy: Spooky Mansion.” Now it is one of those programs developed in the infancy of CD-ROM based games that has a tiny install footprint and keeps all sound and movies on the disk. This is annoying because the disks are dieing and we have to have one in each machine. So Frank and i come up with the idea of trying a network install. Should be fairly simple, right? Well, there’s nothing in the manual about it, and there’s nothing on the site about it. Frank says to call support and i do. Conversation goes like this:

Him: Thank you for calling Scholastic Tech Support, this is Bob, how can i help you?
Me: Hi, i work for a school district and we use “I Spy: Spooky Mansion.” I was wondering if it can be installed on a network.
Him: No.
Me: Ok, just wondering.

Then i hang up and, of course, go back to screwing around with it, as i know there has to be a way, right? So i copy the CD up to the server. This is a good first step, as it does install and attempt to run off the server, but it can’t quite. Then in a joint brainstorm (no drugs involved) between Frank and i we came up with the solution. I found out that you can specify the drive that is considered “The CD” with a registry key, but that wasn’t enough. Just specifying that “F:\ISpy” is the CD doesn’t make it run right. Frank then tells me to map a drive as root to “\\File_server_name\Vol2\ISpy.” I do this and tell the network config that for all intensive purposes “G:\” is the aforementioned directory. The thing then installs and runs like a champ. A winner is me!

The fun doesn’t end there, dear friends, oh no it doesn’t! I am then told to call support and let them know that i’ve solved their problem (+3 snide tone of superiority). So i give Scholastic a call again and guess what i get? It goes something like this:

Him: Thank you for calling Scholastic Tech Support, this is Bob, how can i help you?
Me: Oh, hi. I just called a few minutes ago (i was the guy wanting to network install “I Spy”)-
Him: *leaping in and cutting me off* Oh that must have been another Bob! Can i look up your account and get your information?

Lies! Dirty human lies! That is in fact Bob, unless they have two people with the exact same name and voice. They were born twins and their parents were lazy. Something like this:

Doctor: Congratulations, its a boy!
Bob’s Mom: I’d like to name him Bob!
Doctor: Cool, yeah. Hey look its another boy!
Bob’s Mom: Deja vu! Lets name him Bob!
Doctor: Those look like really nice drugs.

But anyway, i give him my information and he makes a pretense of looking up the issue and all that. He then asks me what i was calling about and i give him the old one-two:

Me: That problem that we couldn’t get working, i got it working.
Him: *snide tone* Oh really?
Me: Yup, you just copy the CD to the server, install from there, edit the “CDLet” reg key and MAP ROOT a drive for it to consider the CD.
Him: *Trying really hard to sound like he knows what he’s talking about* Oh yeah, you mean you solved it with the… uhhh… map thing. Yeah, that might work…
Me: Yes indeed, that fixed it right up.
Him: *Quickly and nervously* Well of course you know that we can never consider that an official solution.
Me: Hey sure. Just letting you know i fixed-
Him: *Cutting me off quickly* Bye!

Then he hung up. It really is gratifying when you can seriously deflate somebody who doesn’t know what they are talking about be they tech or civilian. Yes, i will turn on my own kind without the slightest provocation.

Compare this with my incredibly positive Larson’s experience and you’ll see that i’ll gladly work with people who want to be worked with. I called Larson’s because our installs of Leapfrog Math in this one lab at one of our schools had constant problems with just one activity in just one level, so i called Larson’s support after a few days reinstalling the software, checking file rights, checking the servers, checking the hubs, whatnot. The girl who picked up the phone sounded intelligent and genuinely interested in solving the problem i outlined. She worked with her knowledgebase, then said she didn’t like that and did a google search for the issue. She found some articles and tossed them to me in an e-mail. They put me on the right track and eventually i found out that the problem was with a bad version of the HP drivers for the (eternally be-damned) Color Laserjet 4050. I typed up an e-mail and replied back to the one she had sent me, and she then thanked me and incorporated the symptoms and fix into the knowledgebase.

See? I’m a good tech. I bring what expertise i can to the table, i listen to any suggestions, and then i give back. I’d pat myself on the back but damned if my arms can’t bend that far today.

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So i’m thinking about shaving my head. I’m pissed that i’m going bald already, so its one of those “cut off my nose to spite my face” situations. I’m worried that my head is lumpy though, so i’d probably ask the hair-cutting person what her (or his) thoughts on the idea are. Regardless i may be cutting my hair short for the first time since second grade… It is an odd feeling, i have to say.

I am incredibly happy with Ragnarok. It is laggy as all get-out, and i’ve recently had my first “Thai” experience (somebody who KS-ed my stuff, then when asked to stop said “555555555″), but i’m remarkably engaged with Beta 2. I’ve just taken my Partizan to the upgrade guy and bought 6,000 Zenny worth of the metal that upgrades the 2nd level weapons and used ‘em. So now i’ve got a +6 Partizan, a Partizan with +18 attack on top of the 124 attack it already has.

Errr… i’m kinda switching back from Mozilla. And i have to say that IE can atleast handle all of my browsing without something wierd jumping up. I do miss blocking ads and the tabbed browsing.

And i’ve set phasers to “Birthday Gift” and fired a volley your way, Chats… here’s hoping you still get stuff from that billing address off the Amazon stuff, as it could get complicated otherwise. I departed from the wishlist entirely and used a different retailer… Its no totally horrible cat sculpture but it will have to do.

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In Denmark, i’m supposed to say, but with mozilla apparently. The same piece of code on two different pages is broken. I’ll be rolling the menu and the background out later today, but i’ll be needing to figure out why the menu doesn’t fly in mozilla. That should be something to work with later.

I think i may throw in the Mozilla towel. I like the browser and all, its just that i can’t seem to find anything about my terminal font-face issue and now this that works fine in IE seems to not work at all in Mozilla. I really wanted this to work out, but i think we may have to go our seperate ways.

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So now there’s a little SWAT guy glowering at you from behind my page. He was originally supposed to show from behind the posts as well, and from behind the sidebar stuff, but the one pixel border thing is accomplished by overlaying all that stuff over one huge one cel table in solid black. Thusly when i made the grey transparent, i just showed the black it is based on. So i think i’ll work on that later, and sleep now. It is too damn late.

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What Was Your PastLife?

Honstly, can i get a show of hands of everyone who’s surprised? Listen to my heart? I can’t see that happenning any time soon.

Oh, and Jin-Roh really did kick a whole lot of ass. Think if Harry Turtledove, Masamune Shirow, Yoshitoshi ABe, and Tom Clancy were to make a film. Its got alternate history, kickass vehicle design, a unique visual style, and the whole political drama thing (and the first person i could think of was Clancy) going on. Gotta love that. The range of expressions that the characters display is simply incredible. The way their faces move blows me away. I mean this film creates a set of animated characters that look more real than things that have come out of contemporary rotoscoped animation. The way the artist(s) portray body language as well make them speak more with their knees than any “Candidate for Goddess” character speaks with their dialogue in an entire season. I don’t know if my woman would dig on it. I’m pretty sure that the Jason/Tuten/Chris continuum would enjoy it. We may have to watch it sunday betwixt bizzare D&D-related whatnot. Of course i’ll make some disparaging comment about some anime series and really offend Chris’s wife. I seem to be uniquely suited to that task. *shrug* Or she could simply be very shy and i’m misinterperating “introversion” as “revulsion.” Hmmm… Mayhaps i should listen to my heart.

Oh yeah, and i’m certainly glad that i didn’t pre-order Lord of the Rings yet… Widescreen edition or not, i’m waiting until November for the baddest of bad boys. Oh most definately. I can’t decide if its the faux bookcover thing they’ve got going on or the little Argonath Statues. Both are amazing selling points.

I’m leaving work in 30 minutes to go work-related (and sanctioned) shopping over at the Dutch Square Office Depot. We have all been allocated $500 to get office furnature for the new office we are moving to. I’m thinking $50 desk and a $400 chair. What can i say, i like comfy chairs.

I’ll be adding to this later, just to let you know. Jason, if RO comes back on gimme a ring, i’ll find you somehow.

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Ok, so me and Jason are trying to score dinner after hitting the comic book store, and since there is a Chick-Fil-A right there we decide to hit the thing. I order a chicken sandwich combo, value sized with iced tea and a brownie. Jason gets the same only little and no pickles or brownie. They try really hard to forget my brownie, but i do manage to get it. We go then and watch some TV, and in the midst of a Junkyard Wars we haven’t seen we discover that Jason has no fries. We wait for JW to finish and then run out to Chick-Fil-A. Now they close at 10 and we get there at about 10:05. We drive up and hit the drive-thru. (I can see multiple people hiding in the store.) I get a “*khkt*-losed-*khkt*” from the speaker and they won’t respond to me saying “I don’t want food. You forgot one order of medium fries. I’d just like a coupon.” so i drive around. I get to the window and start trying to explain myself through a closed window and gradually get more and more pissed. There is the drive-thru lady who is staring at me and just sneering up a storm. Seriously. I’m trying to say something and she is screwing up her face like i’m dog crap on her rug. Eventually the 12-year-old from last time pops up (literally, like he was hiding under the counter or had to get some stool to reach the window) and opens the window. I explain what happened and what i want. He says he doesn’t have anymore fries. I say i don’t want fries, i’ll get out of his hair when he tosses me a coupon, but he gets fries anyway. *sigh*

I mean it would be different if i wanted something i hadn’t payed for or if i actually wanted the damn fries. I get pissed at people who want me to break rules or whatnot, but even when i’m annoyed i try to maintain a level tone, and i tell them that i can’t do anything. It would have been different if the person had even listened to what i wanted to say, instead of screwing her face up like it was physically distasteful to even consider a dialogue. Ah well, its not like i can really do anything about it now. And at this point i don’t think any further action can be taken. I’m not going to complain to the manager or anything, that’s just low. I’ll avoid that restraunt in the future, it isn’t like they aren’t right next to a Wendy’s and a Chinese place (something stereotypical like China Garden or something). God i wonder what i did before i had such a convenient rant-space as this.

I got Ragnarok working last night too. It looks like my swordie isn’t accessible at the moment, just my theif. And damn but its annoying to have to downgrade my armour because i can’t wear it anymore (Wooden Mail is no longer available to theives) and my weapon (i am not the level 24 needed for the gladius). However, my Gladius seems to have three card slots, so that’s really kickass. I got a first-hand glimpse of what “Assists” means when talking about monsters too. I attacked a wolf and another wolf came from pretty far away to beat up on me. Normally i’d take them down, but the 40-someodd attack from the Main Gauche i’m having to use did them about 1 dmg or so a hit. I killed one but the other really tried to have me for lunch. If it wasn’t for a really nice magess he would have succeeded too. And so i granted my first positive alignment point.

I tried to get to Aldebaran too after getting some Iron Ore (i think there’s a guy who can transmute it into Iron there) and some Phraycon (might be able to sell it or otherwise use it). And damn but i barely got into the map two north of Prontera when this agro spider walked up and delt me about 130 damage. That really sucked. I think before i go back i get the levels to use the cutlass and get some better armour. But then that goes without saying.

I’ve seen lots of Knights and lots of Assassins, a few Priests and not one Blacksmith. I think i’ll start one to be part of a growing economy… and because i’d love to make my own weapons and stuff.

I bought Jin-Roh last night, and because it’s almost three hours long i didn’t get to watch it. I hope its good, it was a bit pricy.

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So it looks like my plan to play Ragnarok all night failed miserably. Oh well. To say that it was unexpected that they would turn their servers on and then that the poor bastards would be hammerred into the ground would be to tell a lie. *shrug* Mayhaps i’ll be able to get some playin’ on tonight… but then you never know, it could stay like this. It is free though, i have lots (tons) of books i haven’t read cluttering up the apartment, and there are people to hang out with, so it isn’t a “I have to play or i’ll never have anything to do!” Sort of thing.

I’m experimenting with new link formatting. I came to the conclusion that the way i had it was really hard to figure out what was the link in the text. Tell me what y’all think, and i may just keep it like this…

I’m testing something. This should look different. Not different like that. Less crappy different. More like Terminal, but something that Mozilla can read. At this point the only boundry to cross-browser compliance is the fact that Moz doesn’t like “Font-family:terminal;” and without that all the “special” text looks normal and, if i do say so myself, boring.

So i’ve found out that only my most recent Albion save is bad. I could replay the long ass druid dungeon and see what happens… See, the problem is that i completed the dungeon and thanks to the most annoying bug ever i was suddenly struck dumb and unable to speak with anybody. I still knew Celtic, but all of the druids and associated Celts looked at me like i was a loony. I thought i was going to have to replay all that i’d gotten done and was getting mightily pissed, but i guess i don’t have to. If Ragnarok stays down (lets just say it wouldn’t surprise me) i may just have to play Albion instead.

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Ragnarok is back! My comp at home is downloading the patch for it, so i should be stabbing things with my spear again soon. Ummm… don’t expect to hear anything from me tonight.

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So guess what i just found out? Apparently last time we played “Zombies!!!” we did a few things wrong… turns out Twilight has a nice little FAQ just for these situations. I think we’ll leave the results the way they ended up (because i won), but we missed some things. Mainly that when you lose the last heart you die. So both Jason and I died once more. Also the “One card per round” means that you can play one card from the beginning of your one turn to the beginning of your next turn. So our fast and furous card-playing was kinda against the rules. I guess that would actually make the game last far longer the more i think about it.

I’m just waiting for that expansion to hit stores in august. I mean its 15 locations and 30 more cards added into the existing 30 locations and 50 cards… “Zombies!!!” would then become a game and a half, and playing it would last atleast 3 hours or more. w00t and all that rot.

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All i have to say is “Thank God!” I mean seriously. I don’t know if anybody else that i was in “Reign of Fire” with noticed this, but those people kinda laterally in front of us (think the way a knight moves) had their cels on the whole time. And i don’t know about you, but somebody who continually gets calls at the highest volume about once every 10 minutes really annoys me. I mean there are other people with far more visited websites who say that blocking all celphone contact is an easy way to get sued but i honestly think that this whole frivolous lawsiut thing is on the outs. We already have almost no insanity defence. You say you were insane when you killed somebody and the whole jury starts glowering at you like no tomorrow. Say you’re sleepwalking and that’s a whole different story. Oh well, i could be wrong. All i know is that i was watching “The Green Mile” and somebody got a call. They spent the rest of the movie describing what was happening on the screen! Seriously. For over half of the movie she was all “Aaaaaw no dawg, he’s kissin’ her!” and so forth. If you need to contact sombody call the theatre. They have to answer the phone, and if this is a real emergency then you can feel free to have an usher go get people. I’ve had to do it before when i was working concession. Honestly i don’t see the issue. If there is a family emergency and they call you, what are you going to do? Chase the ambulance? Get home before fire devours your Devo albums? Seriously. I can see anything being an “Emergency” that couldn’t be better handled by professionals.

Speaking of “Reign of Fire,” that was one hell of a movie. It didn’t have emoting or anything, but then it isn’t like you are going to a summer action blockbuster to get Shakespearian whatnot. You obviously went to RoF to see a post-apocalyptic last ditch effort against a bunch of dragons. And in that respect it didn’t dissapoint. The dragons kicked ass, and were clearly an order of magnitude above the last dragons we all saw in movies (i think Dragonheart and Dragonheart 2). And they delivered what i’ve been waiting for since Dragonheart. You see, back in the day when i was seven or so, i got tired of the dragon always being the bad guy. I thought they were cooler than any other mythological beasties and thought that the whole “bad” thing was a frame up job. Then people started thinking of things the same way and we had the Good Dragon start appearing everywhere. This was OK for a while, and i really did enjoy it, but was thinking that it was time for a movie or book where the dragon isn’t everybody’s Bestest Friend. And sorry, i’ve been burned one time too many on the whole randomly choosing fantasy thing, so i’m not going to seek them out.

My shot glass can beat up your shotglass. Yes, it kicks that much ass. Now i’ll have to figure out when a certain birthday is happening so i can crash it (metaphorically)… with presents i mean.

I’ll finish rolling up my rogue this week and should be one badass boot-knife to the face guy by the weekend. Hopefully i won’t fall to Jason’s fearsome Calazone Golem. I see us facing and devouring the poor construct, then hectoring the party’s mage until they start making them. Poor mage. Ugh, i’m too much of a geek all of a sudden. I wonder how the woman will react when she gets back from France.

I got my newest Cinefex yesterday, and damn but that magazine kicks ass. “Attack of the Clones” and “Spiderman” make for really kickass articles, and next quarter i have “Minority Report,” “Men In Black ][,” and “Reign of Fire.” I’m really waiting for the RoF article.

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