All posts by K3

I am a mechanical and structural engineer by training. My interests are anime, manga, consumer electronics, cooking and gardening.
My Life

Election Day

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At long last it’s election day and hopefully just before midnight, we will have some knowledge of this country’s direction.  I have very strong feelings about this election due to the presidential selection and proposition issues on the California state ballot.  My husband also is similarly motived and registered to vote after neglecting to vote for about the past 10-years.  Yep, it was that important to him to make sure the country gets back on a good track.

Both of us received mail-in ballots.  I sent mine in last week and my husband fillled in his ballot yesterday, so we are making a pilgrimage to the San Diego County registar of voters to turn his ballot in.  We are actually quite excited and can’t wait for the day to come to an end.  sigh … Eek!!!  It’s so exciting.

Gaming

Having Fun in Gunbad

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I went to the Gunbad for the third time last night.  I went via an invitation from some high level guild members — the same ones who invited me the first time.  I also brought along Kahnroy, though, with 7 players, Kahnroy could not go on into the final boss battle.  That was okay, though, because there was no big loot to roll for after defeating the big boss.  Anyhow, everybody, including Kahnroy got some loot and I learned how to use my “guard” skill.  Yeah for Kahnroy!  So I’ll be sharing his damage from now on.  Hopefully, that will help him stay alive longer when we get in sticky situations.  I can’t wait to try it!

As for Gunbad, if you haven’t been there, it’s a dungeon in tier 3 located in the Northwest corner of the Badlands in the Dwarf storyline.  To the left the battles are harder, but the loot is better.  We did the squig quests last night.  There’s some bug in the game, so some of the loot in Gunbad and in the game, in general, are for the wrong realm.  Hopefully, they’ll fix that soon.

We played using “vent” which allows players to chat with voice.  We didn’t have our headsets set-up yet, so Kahnroy and I could only listen in.   It took a little time for me to get used to vent because when I play, I generally discount external noise.  So early on, I heard the chatter but I wasn’t processing it.  Kahnroy had to repeat what was going on to me when I was able to slice off a little piece of my brain to actually listen.  I think things went well and it was great to hear the voices of some of the folks I’ve been playing and chatting with for the past month.  It definitely enhanced teamwork and I understand that the folks I’m playing with are having fun like I am.  It’s a great way to get a job done by remote teams.

Gaming

Keep Patrol Again

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Kahnroy convinced Aeronna twice more to go on keep and flag patrol.  The second time we just took some flags in the third tier of Elf Land — mainly because the RvR scenarios were broken that night (very few Destro were put into the scenarios, so there was a great imbalance and the scenarios ended very quickly).  That went pretty well, though, with just 5 or 6 players, the Heros were pretty tough.  I feared that the hero of each objective would get to his reset point, so I was pretty relentless in my hacking.

The third time, we were part of a warband that had just defeated Destro in the Witching Night Event (BTW, the large Witching Night RvR is so much fun in a large warband) and I was playing Giyosephina at first and then Aeronna.  We ended up taking all the keeps and the flags in the third tier.  Shortly after our conquest, destro starting to retake objectives, so we had to defend a keep too.  I was on artillery.  That was so much fun!  With some awesome teamwork, we beat them back thoroughly!

So I’m now used to RvR play and I’ve come to enjoy it more than questing.  I think it’s because I know how to use my characters more effectively and I’ve made some player friends through the guilds I’ve join and chatting.  Warhammer is a very rich experience.  I’m glad I decided to give it a go.

self publishing, unemployment

Running Tech Layoff Tally

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Presented to you in spreadsheet form courtesy of CNET.  The spreadsheets also include links to the stories about the layoffs.  Yikes, there are so many people that I’m competing with for very few jobs :(.

I’m sad to hear about the layoffs at Lulu since it believe so deeply in self-publishing.  But I guess in tough times, words can stay in blogs and pictures on photo-sharing websites.  I hope small publishers can weather the next few years to keep self publishing alive.

Gadgets

HP Leaks it’s Mini Netbook

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So cute! Now this is one way to do a mini-notebook.  Filling the entire space with keyboard makes it look like there was an effort to make the keyboard as large as possible to accomodate chubby fingers.  I think this also contrast with the smallness of the device, giving it that cute appearance — much like big eyes on a face.   I would love to see a follow-on with a screen that has very little border and that is one uninterrupted smooth and shiny surface.  No wasted space — I think that would look cool.  I also like the shiny lid.  If it’s like my big laptop, then the HP logo lights up on the back when the notebook is powered on.  The rumor is that the screen is 10-in.  It looks like it has a width heavy aspect ratio, which kinda concerns me because the menu bars of most programs eat up a lot of space along the top and bottom of the screen.  I wonder if there is a way to customize the presentation such that these menu bars run along the side, giving the viewing area a more natural look.  Well, I know you can move the main windows bar into and vertical postion.  I can’t wait to see both this laptop and the other new mini-notes in the stores this holiday season.