Nachimir

Thanks again Tabacco Meetups: Yes! Pabosher will be out there too.

Thanks tabacco. Looks like it's kind of on the way to the apartment I'm staying in Any other recommendations from people in San Francsico? I used to know loads of places, but I'm sure they're out of date given I haven't been since 2009

Ace! Thnaks Mington. Thanks, too.

This is making loads of sense now. Just completed it twice in a row with the Zoltan Cruiser then the Federation one it unlocked. Zoltan: Federation:

This is pretty great: http://www.wrongingrights.com/2013/01/what-if-we-responded-to-sexual-assault-by-limiting-mens-freedom-like-we-limit-womens.html

Love this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=Haz7rilcjHA

Norway goat cheese fire closes tunnel

Linking because it's big.

I am a huge appreciator of you doing that to someone during the adverts in a cinema. Unrelated: Brian Butterfield is apparently back!

For me, the photo is about the bird (of which everyone has heard), so by doing that crop I'm putting it on a point in the photo, according to the rule of thirds, that gives it more impact. If I thought the photo was about the boats, I'd crop it differently. Neither me nor brkl is necessarily right, there is no one true word (about the bird) and every time someone comes up with a rule, there will be exceptions. The rule of thirds I linked above is a good starting point when it comes to composition, and generally pretty reliable, but when used to it I think it might be an interesting exercise to go out and break it repeatedly. (I only just noticed that colour has been changed in the one I cropped: that wasn't intentional).

Well, kinda. She certainly has the power to, even if it isn't really publicised most of the time.

Yes, pretty nice. I think a crop like this would serve it well: Not that every photo should follow the rule of thirds, but it's a generally reliable way to compose stuff. -- I once took this, at the ATP where Portishead re-formed: It made me stop doing photography, because I was holding the camera at arms length above my head in a crowd, gawping at the tiny fold out screen and shooting a lot of photos until I got a good one; and this one was better than most of the things I've ever taken. I looked at it, felt very much like giving up, and haven't done much photography in the past five years. Recently though, I borrowed a DSLR and a prime lens and got to use it for a month or two, which did a few things: 1. I understood just how much faster a lens is at f1.8, and how much more powerful and flexible a good lens is in terms of focus and versatility. 2. I always used to tell myself "A poor workman blames his tools", but seeing the difference between the camera I've been using for quite a long time, and a DSLR with a nice prime lens on it, I've reconsidered. Beyond a certain point, kit makes a massive difference. 3. A really big one: I learned some technical stuff that photographers have always told me is not important, but it really improved my mental model of how photography works: The f-number is the ratio of the aperture to the focal length. So on a 50mm lens, at f1.8, the aperture is roughly 27.8mm wide. At f4, it's 12.5mm; at f16, just 3.1mm. Before, I only understood f-numbers as counter-intuitively corresponding to bigger and smaller apertures, and apart from that progression they seemed arbitrary. From understanding how those measurements are defined, optics/lenses went from partial mystery to something I could relate to the way a pinhole camera works, in that both are now parts of the same model in my head rather than things that work differently. A pinhole camera works because it has a tiny hole and big area to expose, so each part of the photographic paper in it is (mostly) only hit by light coming from a very small line of sight (Imagine lines of sight going from every point on the paper, through the pinhole and out into the world). In really naive terms, I now understand the optics in a lens as something that lets you use various sizes of big hole to expose a much smaller image coherently and consistently. (Edited for clarity. Well, an attempt at clarity).

I'll be there for the first time in a few years, mostly because I'm working on some of it. I don't think the thing I'm working on most of the week is announced yet, but I'll also be helping out with one of the parties too.

Update on that horrible situation I was dealing with in December: I told my friend that her coworker had been derogatory about her, broaching it in the slightly indirect way I mentioned before. A lot of the conversation that followed was in confidence, even down to vague particulars of it, but suffice to say she knew a lot already and discussing it turned out quite well for both of us.

Police aren't armed by default, but I have seen them carry MP5s and Glocks in my home town. Typically, they're in cars rather than patrolling on foot or guarding anywhere. There's a more comprehensive list here: http://en.wikipedia...._United_Kingdom Handguns were banned for civilians after Dunblane, and since then rules have been tightened up for air weapons and imitation firearms too, which either have to have a part such as the slide brightly coloured, or the owner has to be registered with an airsoft club. Pretty much the only things a civilian can get a license for are shotguns and rifles, and certainly not auto/semi-auto ones. Pest control and reenactment seem to be the most common reasons for gun ownership here now.

This facebook account deletion captcha is gloriously mangled: http://acutespider.tumblr.com/post/37777341045/pranksterpianist-karkinogeneticist-i-was The audio version is at the top of the post, too.

Comfort yourself with this magnificent and enormous space shuttle picture.

I *really* regret getting rid of my Amiga Power issues. Especially the J.F.K. Assassination Special they did to fill pages during the rapid decline of the Amiga.

Holy fuck! *Now* I understand how to take on ships with three or four layers of shields. I was relying a lot on autofire, but now I'm keeping it off; timing lasers and missiles to knock down shields simultaneously, then beams to slice in immediately after. I didn't quite kill the boss, due to taking a hammering learning the above lesson a few sectors before then needing repairs over all the upgrades I wanted, but I got it down to 1/3 health. I can see how this is going to work. Thanks!

Best words I've read this week

Gritting roads is pretty much all that happens to deal with it in the UK, because we only get about one week of snow a year, if that. I live in a very hilly neighbourhood, and most of the roads turn to black ice halfway through a snow week. I see a lot of fools in cars and vans slowly sliding back down the hills after trying to get up them.

That's like calling a pawn a prawn! Mystic Meg predicts that you will now be ostracised forever: Luckily/inevitably though, her ability to predict is no better than random chance. Wicked nebula.

Yeah, I only pause to give initial orders; the recharge times on most weapons give plenty of time to retarget. Usually with the Engi ship, by the time I need to worry about micromanaging crew to repel boarders, I have enough drones and weapons available that initial orders can suppress shields and weapons then kill most ships without me having to lift another finger. Nice to have it confirmed that opening doors affects oxygen propagation; I'd been doing so around repaired breaches because it seemed to help refill rooms with less in. Some really good tips there. (Oh man, I want to play FTL instead of working now).

I've not quite got to the point where I'm scaling up enough for the last sector, but I've got to the boss and got it's health halfway down. At the moment I can't take the shields down for long enough before it starts destroying my systems and killing my damage output. I've read that boarding to kill the crew is one of the easiest ways to to do it. The Engi ship has made this a great deal easier than the human one, and after a frustrating yet addictive first 8 hours with the game, a lot suddenly clicked and I unlocked two more ships in the same session (Rock and Zoltan cruisers). Long range sensors are an upgrade I prioritise way over others now, too.