RJ Grady: Proving Grounds of the Quirky Underlord

05:06 pm - who needs facts when you have fear?

Blathering about how even though regular screening for women who are not over 50 or in high risks groups does not save very many lives, we have an ethical duty to fund a medically useless practice:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34040273/ns/health-cancer/

I am open to the argument that these scientists were wrong (even though I suspect they know their stuff) but I am definitely not open to the argument that we should fund mammograms because people are scared. If they result in too many false positives and not enough true positives, that's really it for a medical test, isn't it?

11:50 pm - RPG Talk: Best RPG Wiki on the Internet

RPG Talk is now up to 736 articles, although in truth most are stubs of various sorts. This post is part of my continuing quest to make RPG Talk the definitive RPG wiki on the Internet. Frankly, the RPG Talk wiki exists because I could not find any other wiki with a similar scope, which is to say, to collect everything about everything. In addition to blurbs on various games, I have this vision of articles on events of historical significance to RPGs, common terms, memes, and articles on stuff like immersion

08:14 pm - my brain speaks computer

Navigating LJ always requires mental gymnastics for me. To me, it's illogical I should click on Previous 20 Friends in order to continue reading. If I click on Next, I see the last page? Obviously, whoever came up with such things was thinking in terms of date stamps. However, LJ is unlike a regular journal in that it reads back to front, not front to back. Hence, the top of the stack is the most recent entry... that would make it spot #1, and anything Previous should head back toward the top of the stack.

Why doesn't it say 20 More Recent Friends 20 Less Recent Friends? That would be unambiguous.

11:52 pm - I am almost afraid to hope

Senate bill includes public option:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33479225/ns/politics-health_care_reform/

11:31 pm - I loooove planets!

Extrasolar planets:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33379852/ns/technology_and_science-space/

I like the idea of Earth-like worlds being out there, even realizing that large-scale colonies even within our own star system are probably fifty years away. Simply knowing when and where other life existed at one time our galaxy would be a fact I could meditate on with great pleasure. I think some of the best moments are the humblest, those times when I am able to imperfectly encircle my mind around the concept of the universe's vastness and its utter superiority to any individual, even any species or world or epoch.

08:56 pm - Wireless Network is making me crazy

Box: Windows Vista
Router: Netgear wireless router and DSL modem

Ok, so my computer network was running basically smoothly. Then one day, my computer took a brief nap as it is wont to do when not in use. Ever since then, something named Virtual Profile now lives in my list of wireless networks and my computer no longer automatically connects itself to my router when it turns on. Removing the Virtual Profile just causes it to reappear at the top of the list when I turn my computer on. My computer now dithers and announces "Wirless networks are available" instead of assertively connecting to my home network which is set to connect automatically and not to connect to other networks even when it lives at the top of the list. Virtual Profile also likes to turn itself on to connect automatically even when i disable that option before restarting.

And, of course, connecting to Virtual Profile grants no Internet access.

What is really weird is Virtual Profile has the SSID of Netgear, the router default. This leads me to suspect that something is cached somewhere in my computer.

Googling has revealed that other people have had this problem, some people do not understand, and those that do, do not have an answer.

Help?

08:55 am - reposted: copyrights

Reposted from PDFS--Of the WotC Court Case

( How much does it cost you to read Shakespeare's Hamlet? )

09:10 pm - children will surprise you if you let them

So my four year old was being, as he often is, a difficult, overwrought mess. So after supervising his dunking following a tearful teeth brushing episode, I decreed he could do whatever he wanted provided he 1) not hurt anyone, 2) not break anything, 3) not put on dirty clothes, or 4) scream. I suggested he could go play, go to bed, read, repeatedly eat and brush his teeth all night, or whatever.

Some time later, after pestering us for a while in the hallway and our bedroom, he appeared in the kitchen and announced he was cashing in on my offer that he could eat all night. So I started feeding him. First, he had seconds of spaghetti. So then I offered him an apple, which he declined. But he had some cheese. Then some crackers. Then I offered him a huge piece of the lemon cake his mother was eating. And crackers. And a glass of water. I cheerfully encouraged him to keep eating. Then I offered him a scoop of ice cream on his cake. I made myself a milkshake, and he asked for a sip, so I gave him of chocolate milkshake, too. I asked him if he was full.

"I feel like I'm going to die," he said.

"So you're done?"

"Hm," he said. "I think I'll have some more spaghetti first."

Which he did. Then he went to brush his teeth again. Now he's happily singing on the toilet.

10:59 am - Congress Deadlocked Over How Not to Provide Care

WASHINGTON—After months of committee meetings and hundreds of hours of heated debate, the United States Congress remained deadlocked this week over the best possible way to deny Americans health care...

10:52 am - flip flops of plague

Flip flops contaminated by fecal bacteria:

http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/32453516?GT1=43001

08:10 am - Writer's Block: Thanks for the Input

10:05 am - Let's Get Loud: Health Care Reform Means Today

You may think that the time for health reform has come. It may seem like now is the time for reasoned discourse and debate. You may feel we are on the verge of history.

If so, you are wrong. Health care reform is in a tenuous state, battered by health industry lobbyists, anti-governmental conservatives, reactionary wackadoos, and even conservative members of the Democratic party. Our allies are few. Our voices are drowned out by the insanity of fear and the poison of greed. The battlefield for the debate is not the one we would have chosen. Unless something happens, I fear health care reform is going to die a fiery death and it will be 4-6 years before we have another realistic shot.

In short: the time is now. Not next week, or tomorrow, but today, and every day. Raise your voices. Express your belief that health care is a civil right, that we should not have the worst health care system in the industrial world for the highest price tag, that the availability of care is not based on "consumer choice" but on human need. It is time to get loud. It is time to get in people's faces. It is time to get rude, if need be. Because health care is under assault, and our enemies are not concerned with politeness. They are concerned about only one thing: maintaining the status quo. They don't care what people believe, or whether people all believe the same things, provided they can create a simple state of mind in the majority of our lawmakers in Congress: hesitation. Hesitation can be deadly.

If you have friends or relatives of a convervative bent, now is the time to engage them in debate. Tell them we spend half again as much of our GDP as France, yet have a higher infant mortality rate. Tell them health care costs are not rising because of government spending, but because of business incentives and the vulnerability of the spending public. Remember the Russia of the 80s? Well, we are the Soviets of the new millenium: archaic, inefficient, laughable, reactionary, and ultimately doomed to accept the new reality whether we like it or not.

Advocate for health care reform today. To at least one person. Today.

08:05 am - jump up, jump, and get down

05:38 pm - another case of workers being manipulated by special interests

Parasitic fungus takes control of ants, forces them to become zombie slaves:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32388708/ns/technology_and_science-science/

10:56 pm - Sarah Palin finally announces official resignation from reality

Sarah Palins claims health care reforms wanted by Dems would create "death panels" and encourage euthanasia of those with Down syndrome:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32340009/ns/politics-white_house/

08:19 am - Quick, the Bat-Shark Repellant, Robin!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32319693/ns/technology_and_science-science/

03:22 am - antidepressant use doubles

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32274077/ns/health-mental_health/

In the last ten years, antidepressant use has gone from 6% to more than 10%, and those on antidepressants are more likely to receive antipsychotics and less likely to receive talk therapy. In the majority of cases, the evidence I'm familiar with suggests most people do best on a combination of antidepressants and talk therapy, with talk therapy being associated with better long-term improvement. This trend is at least partly driven by the availability of drugs and the difficulty of getting insurance to pay for psychotherapy. This is one of many areas in health care where market forces have driven an undesirable result.

08:43 pm - 4e on the cheap

So, like if you want 4e stuff, you can visit the Half Price books in Mesquite or the flagship store and score a few things. I am a a nearly compulsive collector when it comes to RPG stuff, but I still couldn't bring myself to buy the 4e stuff, even at a stiff discount. There is very nearly zero I would find a use for it, so long as 99% of other roleplaying games were available as an alternative.

I guess that makes me sort of a hater, but I swear, not really. 4e just makes me sad and fills me with an uncomfortable disdain. It's a well enough designed book, and I could in theory enjoy playing it, I just do not like very nearly every respect in which it is different from 3e, apart from some maths.

09:08 am - Dallas #2

NYC gets the prize for most aggressive drivers; Dallas comes in second.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31380857/ns/us_news-life/

07:17 pm - Merry Chrismas!

Happy birthday, cdk