my mental sieve...
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| Evil Wayne my mental sieve... |
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Tuesday, May 30, 2006 Lost-O-Rama Burned through the last seven episodes of Lost over the weekend. I even lucked out with the episode that TiVo deleted, "3 Minutes". ABC.com had the last 5 episodes online to watch. The picture was smaller and I'm forced to sit through three, brief ads, but the quality was excellent, and I didn't have to miss a thing. I love the way this show is, in no way, satisfied with the status-quo. Everything is constantly changing. The evolution of characters by intertwining their pasts (their sweet tightly interconnected pasts) in segmented flashbacks while moving forward on the island is brilliant. It keeps it from getting stale while opening up avenues of development you don't normally get to see. At the same time they're letting out glimpses of character development, they're also threading out the secrets of the island. The finale gave up some major ones, at the same time leaving much open (and creating a couple in the process). There's no sense that we won't ever know exactly what's going on here. Just that it will take a long time to tell and that's a sign of good writing. They know it can't go on forever, so why bother pretending it will? Unlike Twin Peaks, I get the feeling they know what they're doing. I can't wait to see what happens next season. posted by Evil Wayne | 10:18 AM 0 comments Friday, May 26, 2006 Myra 1.00 This is probably a bad idea, but I'm getting sick of never starting anything because I'm afraid I won't finish it. I'm going to try to write another serial. This time I'm going to post it as I go with only sparse editing. In fact, I have almost nothing written yet, so I'm not sure what's going to happen. I do have a loose plot idea. Myra is an idea that go back pretty far, at least to the middle of the 4S serial. I had written some of it beforehand, but it just sort of languished away. When we got our first real computer and dot-matrix printer (complete with track-fed paper) I would type up a section of story that wasn't really related to anything. I would format it like a book and print out a single page. Thus, it looked like a copy page from a book, because it would begin and end in the middle of a sentence, but the bulk of it would be this terrible situation that Myra and myself had gotten into during various jaunts through space and time (later, I added other characters, Teller, Doreen and the Shadowcat). I would take these book pages and hand write letters to friends on the reverse side. Kind of a double whammy; half was a lame letter from me, the other half was an adventure fragment. Yeah, sounds exciting doesn't it? Anyway, this is my putting-up or shutting-up I guess. I've always wanted to put something down for Myra, and a serial seems the best way to not kid anyone that I think this is serious fiction. Also, as a warning, I can't imagine this will have any regularity to it. It surely won't be weekly like the last one, but hopefully it won't have these gigantic lapses in time making it ridiculous. And, with only a loose outline, I can't guarantee that this thing won't devolve into a 4S similar tripefest. Only time will tell. So, to kick it off, here are the first two segments (even if one is the prologue): Myra. posted by Evil Wayne | 11:49 AM 2 comments Monday, May 22, 2006 The Rainbow and The Severed Head There were some quick and powerful thunderstorms moving through the area yesterday afternoon. Around 5 PM, I thought I head some thunder in the distance. It went from sunny to dark and foreboding in the span of about 20 minutes. From there, the wind picked up and rain started coming down in this weird criss-cross pattern. It looked a lot like cross-hatching, except with water. Then the thunder and lightening and heavy rain. But it didn't last long, probably on the order of about an hour at the most. After, Kelly called me up to the door because there was the awesome double-rainbow across the street. I grabbed the camera and got this shot, which I think is rather cool, because the rainbow on the left seems to delineate the dark clouds from the bright.  Here's a couple other shots, but they're pretty much the same thing. Rainbows #1 Rainbows #2 Rainbows #3 Right before the rain started pouring down, Kelly went outside and was running around in the rain (because she's 12, that's why). When she came back, she forced me outside because I had to see something. As we came around the bushes that partially obscure the front steps, there was this head sitting there, facing the door.  Because it was facing the opposite way, with the back of the head facing us, I had the same initial reaction as her: What the fuck is THAT?!? It was wicked creepy to see it sitting there, in the rain. I grabbed it and put it out back on the picnic table. Later we discovered it was a friend of Mike's who thought it would be funny, but I have to say, I initially took it in a very Godfather kind of way... posted by Evil Wayne | 1:40 PM 0 comments Thursday, May 18, 2006 Invasion We watched the season finale of Invasion last night and it looks like ABC won't be renewing it. At least it's not on their Fall schedule, which is too bad. It's a little hokey in parts, but it's still a good show. One thing we noticed was how much of the story they packed into the first season. From the things in the water, to what they do, to finding out who's an alien-hybrid to the Sheriff being the bad guy, then the sort-of-good guy and his alliance with Russell. I will say they didn't pad out the show a heck of a lot. Some of those things could have been parlayed into a whole season, but they chose not to and I really liked that. The story moved fast and a fair amount of information was passed on each episode. There's still a lot of mystery, like how much the government or at least the Army seems to know -- so it's too bad it looks like it isn't getting renewed. Afterward, I was looking it up on IMDB.com and I saw the little girl who plays Rosie was born in May of '97. That was the same month and year I graduated from college. So in same time since she's already done way better than me. Sigh. posted by Evil Wayne | 9:38 AM 0 comments Wednesday, May 17, 2006 Here Comes the Sun The sun finally came out today. It's been raining for almost a week. While everywhere else seemed to flood our storm drain, which is usually prone to backing up whenever it so much as mists, was functioning properly. Yesterday, they had blocked off a way to work and the detour led me on a long, twisting way the fuck off the beaten path route for about 10 miles. In the end, I came out about a half-mile from where the detour began. I have no idea if it's supposed to last, but it's nice to see blue sky again. posted by Evil Wayne | 2:32 PM 0 comments Thursday, May 11, 2006 CRV: 2 Days and Counting I had to do some more tearing down and building up again last night. It's almost a wash on progress to where I was beforehand. About the only thing I got out of it was a layer of grey and then a better idea of where it's all going (well, the lower half anyway).  I had to extend the rear by 2 studs to accommodate a double-wheeled rear. Otherwise the wheel housing would stick out the back in very unpleasing way. Although now that I look at it, I should probably have the plate connected to the ramp's sidewall to make it more sturdy. Only that will cut down on the platform's width. *sigh* Then I tore up the middle area to rework the rear door. Awhile ago (actually, when I made the module of the first Portsmouth Game Day in '04) I discovered you could make a 6-wide airlock fit snug and flush to a wall, if you short the door by 1 plate and use a tile on the base. But you can't do the same thing with a 4-wide. So the front, cockpit door has to sit outside the wall versus the rear door being part of the wall. I was okay with this until I went to put a layer of plates on top and realized the inverted slopes on the rear door were sitting higher than the inverts on the other. It's too bad I suck so badly with preplanning, because just looking at this I see all these little changes I could make. Like the rear wheel housing. That grey strip of bricks in the back is all 2xns. I could strip it out and replace it with 1xn on the inside and fill the wheel-facing side with some kind of greebles at the very least. And the flat plate holding the housing together over the rear wheels would be cool if it led to a second level door. There should definitely be handhold's and/or ladders around there for units to grab onto and pull themselves up, but it won't be a big deal if you've got nowhere to go. Why do I only seem to get to build when the clock is ticking? So, let's see: the lower level isn't even done. I'm short 2 tires for it to be a six-wheel. I have no interiors yet. I have two-days, and beyond all that, I still have to find the troopers and the truck from the original PARV game and build weapons for them all. Oh yeah, piece of cake. posted by Evil Wayne | 2:15 PM 0 comments Tuesday, May 09, 2006 CRV: 4 Days and Counting Well, I'm starting to get over my building paralysis that usually afflicts me whenever I'm building anything important. I'm not sure if this happens to anyone else, but I reach this point where something is partially built and I realize I want to insert all these little bits of detail (greeblies) only I can't envision it right away. So I get stuck, because to keep building means to seal off the lower levels. I know I can go in and tear it down, but what a pain. So I had only a basic shell of the lower level of the CRV done. Last night I didn't get to build very much, but I realized that I was about to create a cockpit area that I had no realistic windshield for. See, I've been using this as inspiration:  I was thinking of using the same type of windows he has on top on my lower level. Only those windows have sidewalls (hence the 2xN front area). The way I've got my cockpit arranged won't let me do that, at least not for a BrikWar game. So I rummaged through my collection of glass and found a trans, dark-blue version of this:  Which is a bit scuffed up, but serviceable. Unfortunately, it means a one-man cockpit. Which is okay, but now I have redesign the front end. This morning I tore the whole down and I am almost back to square one with this thing. posted by Evil Wayne | 1:39 PM 2 comments Friday, May 05, 2006 Dream Sequence I was in the city again. I should say that I've been in this city before. Occasionally I have dreams that seem to take place in the same city. It's a place that's rank with decay. Buildings, large, and lifeless, with cracking faces dominate all views. Huge cement overpasses, criss-cross each other complete with rusty girders, like a dense network of El trains, holding them up and obscuring the sky. In fact, I think that's the part when I realize I'm back in the same place again. No sky. I mostly seem to be on the street level during these dreams, but occasionally I've been in the buildings or higher, looking downward. I should probably give it a name so I can reference it without constantly going over it again and again. But what? I was on the street and walking into one of the buildings. It was filled with business people coming and going. It was more like a train station than an office, but it was an office. Somehow I got to the top floor. There, I was inside a computer room. A gigantic white room with a large, black, central mainframe in the center. This room had nothing but glass walls on the outside, a complete 360-degree view of the city. But it was night and the glass was tinted, so -keeping with the whole "no sky"- I couldn't see anything. Suddenly the ceiling was moving. Giant doors swung open and the wind rushed in from above. There was a helicopter there and several lines dropped down into the room with me. Which was followed by a group of men and women dressed in black sliding down. They had weapons that were at first pistols then became phasers. They fired at me and I ran for the door. One of the walls was no longer made of glass, but a regular wall with a doorway. Running through several shots from the phasers zipped by me. But they didn't chase me, so I wandered back to the doorway. Inside, I could see them placing explosives around the mainframe. I ran for the elevator and was on the street again in no time. Crossing the street, I ran into a bar that was filled with policemen. There, I tried to tell them what was going on. That some terrorists were trying to blow up the mainframe. But I couldn't seem to speak English anymore. It all came out as garbled and slow. The entire room just looked at me blankly. Then they started to laugh and went back to whatever they were doing beforehand, completely ignoring me. Like I had walked in and make a joke that they didn't get. I ran back to the building and was on the top floor again. There, they were putting the last explosive down and reeling themselves back up. I tried to grab a rope, but it was pulled out of my hand. I knew I only had seconds before I would be vaporized with the mainframe. I bolted through the door and down to the next level. There, was a room identical to the above without the mainframe. But it had a giant gas bag for just such an emergency. I hit the inflate button and the bag, which was the size of the room, began to inflate. It then passed through the ceiling, like a ghost, and, as it passed through the mainframe, it picked up the explosives and slowly floated up. In the dream I was suddenly above the building, in the helicopter. From that view I couldn't make out any gas bag, when suddenly it appeared that the whole top of the building exploded. Then I was back in the building. I could see up the stairwell, into the room through the open ceiling doors and the bag was several feet above the building when it exploded. And that's when the alarm went off. posted by Evil Wayne | 9:50 AM 1 comments Thursday, May 04, 2006 Lost Still haven't caught up on Lost. But Tine is wicked eager to spill the beans about something. So I figure I should post that I haven't seen it so someone else doesn't blow it either. I've been pretty good about avoiding the various threads and whatnot concerning it. Frankly, I've reached this point where I almost don't care anymore. I'm 5 or 6 weeks behind and it's really starting to fade, which should tell me that it's just television and it isn't that meaningful in the first place. I've been enjoying the time where Tine and the kids are in the other room and I'm left alone. I've actually managed to sort some Lego and start building. But I know as soon as I do watch that first episode, I'll probably be hooked right back in. On the plus side, I'll get to watch 6 or 7 episodes without waiting weeks in between. Strangely, I've kept up with Invasion. posted by Evil Wayne | 1:31 PM 4 comments Wednesday, May 03, 2006 PARV-Lite With the Portsmouth GameDay coming up, NELUG is running a couple of BrikWar games. I'm still not 100% sure how I keep ending up putting games together like this. Seriously, every time I come to the end of game I think, "Man am I glad that's over. Now to sit back and let someone else come up with the next one." Yet here I am again. Okay, I'm only half serious. I do dig coming up with scenarios and alternate rules (not the math, that's Shaun/DaveE department --yesterday he sent me this equation to show how to factor averages. A God-damn, honest equation. Sigmas and a variables, the whole deal). Anyway, I've picked up the PARV idea again and it's only going to be slightly modified. No Radar-Assisted Navigation for one. And the vehicle is smaller, which means I can't call it PARV anymore. It's more like an extended camper at this point (because I'm not done building it). Here's the write-up for the GameDay people: The Cataclysmic Recreational Vehicle (CRV) Commandeered by a band of marauding pirates, the Blood Warriors, the CRV is a large, pre-apocalypse vehicle intended for survival and comfort in the world after the cataclysm. Pursued by another band of cut-throat street pirates, The Pink Ladies, the CRV fights its way across the desert wastelands of an apocalyptic future to freedom! It's road-warrior fun of the aftermath kind! The CRV is a GM-run game for 4-10 people, divided into 2 teams. Each side will control a number of vehicles in a running gun-battle for control of the CRV. posted by Evil Wayne | 10:09 PM 0 comments |
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