No posts in over six years. Pretty much what 'defunct' means

I haven't posted here for quite a while. My life has changed quite a bit in the interim. 

I'm not likely to resurrect this blog. If anything, I'll scrap it and start afresh, or just leave it as a monument.

***


I became a widower in 2014. This has changed my outlook on a lot of things.

I turned 50 in 2016. My wife, who had been a year older than me, remains 48.

Hug your loved ones and let them know about it.


marty

Wow.. more than one post in six months!!

It's almost a record!

Feb 2012 update: Son (and his girlfriend) went off to Melbourne, Victoria to live and study (him at a interactive entertainment academy, her at a design school). I had a sad, but I'll survive. Kids eventually grow up and leave the house, it's by design. Sucks though: I knew he'd leave one day, just didn't expect it to mean he'd change state. He's right though (don't tell him that!). Victoria, especially Melbourne, is a much better location for his chosen career and abounds in opportunity.

I'd be scared shitless at the thought of just going to another state and leaving my family behind -- although realistically, I did exactly that nearly 25 years ago when I came here, but then I left one part of my family to live for a time with another part and then left that home when I got married. Not quite the same thing.

So I'm conflicted. Half incredibly proud of my son, half sad from missing him (which can sneak up on me).

Miniatures: going to try to get back into Warmahordes, playing this weekend
Legend of the Five Rings: dammit, I have a hospital appointment needing fasting the day after the next L5R tournament. I can't eat that whole day, and the thought of playing for six hours on an empty stomach is a bit much.
Roleplaying: Started a new World of Darkness game which is going well so far, even given my complete lack of knowledge of the game. And I'm running it. gulp.

2011 post

Yeah, I'm still slack.

Since the last time I posted, over a year ago:
* I changed employers, leaving my employer for over six years to an international IT company
* That international IT company then won the bid to outsource the IT for... the company I worked for for six years
* My son turned 20!
* I posted this message :D

Yeah, there was a lot more that happened, but I didn't post anything in that entire time.

I am thinking of getting back into blogging, perhaps in gaming-related fields, since I play a card game (Legend of the Five Rings), a miniatures game (Warhammer/Hordes by Privateer Press), and a role playing game (was Pathfinder, but we're starting a Tunnels and Trolls campaign this week!) pretty regularly.

Comment Spam is Evil

I'm not posting as often as I should (well.. duh) and so I've decided to change how comments are handled. Comments on posts older than 14 days (ie, pretty much everything) will need to be moderated. Given the 999:1 ratio of drive-by spam to actual people commenting, this won't be a huge problem. If the spammers start filling my mailbox, I'll turn off comments entirely.

Obligatory "Haven't posted for a while" post

Yay. Another year.

I've stopped playing WAR, and with most of the active players in my guild, I went to Aion. Best part of it is the flying, but the grind is getting to me.

I've been playing Warhammer 40K with my son, and so I think I'll be staying away from Aion for a little (or cutting down a bit) so I can get my army painted and make some terrain. Aion is already wearing off on a lot of the people I play with, so we might be looking for a new game soon.

Only logged in to delete some spam by some random blog spammer. Here's a hint, spambot. If you comment on a post that is a year old, about the bad customer service I had for the Oceanic server, don't say "I agree the customer service is good". Also, since there ISN'T an Oceanic server anymore (it was merged into a US server), the whole post is obsolete. In all, obvious spammer is obvious.

Dawn of the Self-Entitled

First, Josh Olson weighed in on why he Will Not Read Your Fucking Script.

John Scalzi picked it up with a short post and then a longer re-statement of an earlier post. Harlan Ellison appears in the commentary, with the brilliant use of "a fistful of auk-vomit", and a hearty "Boy, am I glad IIIIII don’t have e.mail."

Lee Goldberg also linked to Josh's post, and again with his own recent experience. Lee (and his uncle) turn up in the comments to John Scalzi's post.

Then Boing Boing links to John Scalzi's post.

Commentary is either:

"You are right, I'm an X, and constantly get asked by random strangers about X-stuff, and it gets really annoying"

or

"You are such a DICK for not giving me MY entitlement! I don't care how much effort it costs you, that part isn't important! It's ME this is all about!"

or

"I'm a concerned troll who deplores the incivility of some of these authors/scriptwriters/doctors/lawyers. Why oh why don't you just say 'sorry, I can't help with that' instead of posting such icky words as 'No, I won't help you and here's why'?"

The third case is particularly annoying given that the authors, script writers etc have often provided countless advice and experience to others (Lee Goldberg mentions doing teaching, speaking and seminars for free at a writing festival; John Scalzi has a huge number of articles about the writing business as well as his plugs for other authors on his site). And they've all gone way down the "Sorry, I'm not going to do that" route, more or less politely. They don't WANT to be the bad guy. So they make a post saying why they aren't going to read your stuff and then their comments fill with "You're such a dick!".

Someone on Boing Boing called "A.J" wrote:

Before reading this blog item, I had never heard of this dude. As of now, I still have no idea what he writes or why anyone cares, but I know for certain that he's a dick.

He doesn't even know who John Scalzi is. But he knows he is a "dick". Because in a hugely reasonable tone John Scalzi said "The person who determines what a writer should do for others is the writer, not you".

I get this. I'm not a published author (I'm waaaay too disorganised to finish any of my stories :/) but I work with computers. If I tell anyone that, look out. "I've got this problem with my computer...."

I agree wholeheartedly with Josh Olson over who is the dick in this situation: The requestor

Yes. That's right. I called you a dick. Because you created this situation. You put me in this spot where my only option is to acquiesce to your demands or be the bad guy. That, my friend, is the very definition of a dick move.

Don't Be A Dick.

One of my heroes

It is really odd for me to admit to a hero: Richard Dawkins, Richard Feynman, Stephen King...

John T Reed.

Mr Reed is a hero to me for a reason. His B.S Detection is awesomely good not only for detecting B.S. from Real Estate Scammers, but scammers in general. If something appears too good to be true, it probably is. If it is supported by a mass of "testimonials" it most probably is. If it makes use of waffle words like "easy money", "risk-free", "painless", "dream stealer", "nothing down"... it most definitely is.

I first found his site when I was researching Robert "Rich but non-existant imaginary Dad, Not so successful Dad that was the superintendant of education in Hawaii and to all accounts a perfectly adequete father" Kiyosaki. My boss at the time was a complete Kiyosaki fanatic who'd lent me a couple of his books. I found them interesting, but had qualms about the ethics of some of the things mentioned. Lie to the bank about your loans? It was okay to lie to the vendor and take their home for much less than it was worth?

Mr Reed has a whole page just on the topic of Kiyosaki here which goes on for page after page of a breakdown of claims Kiyosaki has made.

I'm not that interested in real estate, and as Mr Reed says, his advice wouldn't be suitable for Australia anyway simply due to the difference in laws and culture. I am interested in busting scams, which to me is why John T. Reed is a hero.