Billie short short stoy

This popped into my head yesterday during short short story time on FurryMUCK.

The billies are J. Willard’s creation, obviously. The idea of Nazis on Mars and the “The weather is schön, so schön” parody has been stolen shamelessly from Philip K. Dick. Who rules.

“Spoo!” “Mee bounce oo! Whee!” Kreisleiter Bauernfeind did a double-take at the noise in his earphones. For a moment, he felt himself a boy again on his father’s farm, with the babbling of his siblings in his ears. He shook the feeling off as he straightened and turned around. He was not a boy, he was Kreisleiter, responsible for surveying this latest acquisition of the Reich. He focused his eyes on the two small dogs sitting in the red sand, for all the world looking like tiny husky Plüschtiere. They jumped at him. “Oo not poof!” “Bite his tailie!” He fell, fast and hard, too fast even for panic. He felt the air purifier on his back break, a mechanic crunch. “The weather is schön, so schön. Even though there is not much to breathe here” he thought, incongruously, as he stared up into the Mars sky.

Me so 1337

I took the try2hack challenge and got through to level 6 in a fairly short time. Meaning, a couple of hours. Of course, level 6 displays “currently out of service”. And might not be back in service … but, hey, it was fun, anyway.

You can’t win anything, but you can have a little simple-minded fun with this.

Movies; the magic of cards

     Oh God. Did you eat all this acid?
     That’s right! Music!
(Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas)

I saw Equilibrium on DVD. I liked it, though it did have its rough edges. It’s Fahrenheit meets The Matrix meets 1984. As a blend of these ideas, it works very well. It’s the production of the movie that could have used a little more polishing. And, well, the hero is a little too gullible, which takes an edge out. I am not sure how to feel about the roles of men and women in the movie … this might be realism, or it might be chauvinism. Wait, there’s no difference beween the two. Goodie then.
The movie makes no attempt to explain why the “clerics” are called “clerics”. I thought it was obvious, but it might not be obvious to everyone … and playing that temptation / resisting / giving in angle a little stronger would have, I feel, given the movie something it lacked.

Final verdict: Gets an 8 of 10 because it does what was overdue, but does not follow through on the promise.

The Matrix Reloaded does not need a link or an introduction. I was presently surprised. It’s got the hodgepodge of religion and philosophy from the first movie, and I find that I actually enjoy that a lot. It is a rare movie that has that many obvious references, and even _more_ not-so-obvious ones.
The Matrix takes a smaller role this time … still strong, but a reality is not just a substrate. Which is good, as otherwise one does begin to wonder what the point of rebellion is.
Neo’s powers are downplayed a little too this time around, the agents get downsized in ph33r ph4ct0r, and Morpheus miraculously gains the ability to whup ass where before he would have run. That feels a little inconsistent.
As for some of the other characters, and The Matrix itself, and Neo … there are some very, very nice twists here, which I did not anticipate at all, simple wuff that I am. More complex than your average action flick by far, and more complex than many non-action flicks, too. W00t. All your delicious mind-fucks are belong to us.
CGI was a little sloppy; in many scenes, you can _tell_ that’s a CGI-Neo … he doesn’t move quite right, and, worse, he doesn’t _look_ quite right.

I’ll give Matrix a two-pronged rating: 10 out of 10 for story and sheer niftyness (if you are willing to overlook the underlying mongo-flaw that you can never get out more than you put in, and thus human batteries are a laugh); and downgraded to a 9 for some inconsistencies and sloppy CGI.

For books, I read Shatter’s recommendation Pastwatch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus. It is full of clever ideas about society … the origin of society, the prerequisites for society, and what would be necessary to have a better society. I enjoyed reading Pastwatch a lot.
Despite the clever ideas, do not look for ultimate, gritty realism when reading this book. It is a “realistic fairy tale”, an utopian tale, in that events are plausible, and history seems well-researched, but everything goes a little too smoothly, a little too wonderfully well (particularly in the second half of the book). That is fine, I like utopian tales. Been reading too many dystopies as of late. The dialogue is captivating, and Orson Card spins a tale that kept me engrossed.This book comes recommended. I give it an easy 9.5 out of 10.

Right. Cards. No, I have not gone back to the Mohegan Sun. I have, however, started playing poker for play money, just to learn the odds. And realized just how much folly it was to go gambling without having a clue. I truly was lucky to come out on top.

So, now I wish to go and calculate card odds, and I find that I have two ways of doing that: Running a ton of computer simulations (as this guy has done), or do some calculations. I mourn, not for the first time, my stupidity in throwing all my school books away. I remember exactly nothing from math classes.
So, now it’s back to stochastics, to get an idea of odds. Well, truth be told, if I wish to go beyond simple odds (“What are the chances of someone getting a straight? What are the chances of someone completing a set? When x players are at the table?”), I will either have to run computer sims (too lazy or observe people and get a feel for the game. Odds first.

Oh, and yeah, it’s true: Games for play money can teach you the basic odds, and teach you to recognize the winning cards, quickly assess a hand, that sort of thing … and that’s all they teach you. I have been playing 3 hours yesterday, and 2 today, and am at $3500 from a starting point of $1000. If this was real money, people would not be playing that loose.

I am also beginning to see in action the truisms of “play tight in loose games, and only play loose games” and “when your games is starting to become loose, do not attempt to tighten up: Leave the table”.

It’s still fun. I do not know whether I will go back to playing poker for money, but I’m keeping it an option.

Adam, my coworker, got accepted at Trinity College, where he will major in philosophy and law (I think it was law). It is one of the top 25 law colleges in the country, apparently, or something like that. It is pretty prestigious. He got interviewed, and told it would take two weeks to get an answer. The next day, he had a call telling him he got accepted.
Which means he aced the interview, and all the requirements. Very smart cookie, that Adam.
So, anyway, he played poker for 4 hours online on Sunday, and won $300. Now he figures he might finance his studies with gambling. That seems a risky proposition … but on the other hand, the amount of fools playing poker online is unbelievable, and a smart player with a grasp for probabilities and money management has an edge.

I just don’t want to be one of those fools )

Poker is fun

Adam took me out to Mohegan Sun, a huge casino in the area here. We played about 3 hours of Texas Hold ‘Em 3/6 … meaning the first two rounds raise at 3, with a limit of 12, and the second two rounds at 6, with a limit of 18. I think . Anyway, it’s a game where you can go in with $100, and have some serious playing time and fun without fearing to lose your bankroll. Of course, you don’t win big at 3/6 … but I don’t want to win big. Winning big means losing big, too.

It was awesome fun. I was very, very nervous at first (never having played poker for money in my life … actually, never seriously having played poker ever), and then calmed down some at the end. I must have screamed “rookie” loud enough for anyone to hear; and I was lucky to leave with $35 up (deducting the $5 I spent for the chili in my calculations, here . There were some good players at the table, I think. I didn’t even know I had won until the chips were sent my way, often. I kept to good hands mostly, while our opponents played some hands I’d never have played, and got away with it. They’re just better at reading people (rookies and better at playing the game, period. They also consistently “payed to see the flop” at 6, 9 or even 12; and heck, that scares me away. I don’t pay 9 just to see the flop, not with my skills and meager starting money. So, I lost the occasional 3 just because I had an okay hand, but couldn’t go with the raising these guys were doing.

I may do some honing my skills with the help of strategy websites and play some free poker games; though I am told those usually don’t do much to hone skills at all.

Whatever it may be, I want to go back to the Mohegan next month, or thereabouts, as I had great fun. It’s a little bit of a social life, ne? Going out with a workmate and all that. But, I don’t want to get skinned. He was up 50 yesterday, and lost 180 today. Ouchie. Yeah.

I’ve got something to put in you!

At the Gay Bar! Gay Bar! Gay Bar!

*snort* This thing is hilarious. Just watching Tony Blair mouthe the words “Let’s start a nuclear war!” is worth watching it.

Apparantly, this little ditty is quite popular in the UK right now. The radio version has the “nuclear war” phrase edited out, though.

In other news, Comcast has replaced the Motorola cable modem for an RCA/Thomson one. This one works fine so far. That’s acceptable, I guess. Pushing out firmware updates would have been nicer; and the hoops we had to jump through to get this issue acknowledged and fixed weren’t fun either … but, it works. Good enough for me.

In other other news, I am on the way to achieving world peace. W00t.

Balls of steel

You have to see this school kid do his Jedi routine. This kid rocks. Truly he does. I haven’t laughed this hard since … ever.

The second video actually makes him look kinda cool, while the first is just …. dweeby. But determined. 20 points of 10 for balls

fw status

Let’s see now ….

Book has almost been released. Doug Maxwell is one of our 3rd level techs.

Work is murder these days. Client Service Reviews, planning for NG upgrade, figuring out problems in the lab, plus heavy ticket load. Come July, I’ll be well and ready for a vacation.

I hate Comcast. The cable modem they gave us has an old firmware which will crash in the middle of things when browsing certain sites or running VPN software. This is a known issue. Yet, Comcast seem unaware. When talking to Comcast technicians, the answers range from “reinstall Windows” to “flash the firmware yourself”. Which is not possible. Cable modem firmware is downloaded from the WAN side, not the LAN. I _can’t_ flash even if I had the firmware image, which you can’t get easily, as Motorola give it to partners only.

Tomorrow, they’ll be showing up with a replacement modem. I wonder. Might be the same model with the same firmware, in which case nothing has been gained.

Ridiculous. Truly, truly ridiculous. Suggestions on how to put the screws on Comcast are highly welcome.