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*sigh*
On my way back home. I need to start planning another trip out here. Soon.
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...Are the messenger pigeons in vogue too?
I was just writing something along the lines of, "I don't mind people treating the cell phone as a convenience. I mind people treating it as the only available option."
When we flew to Kentucky, I reserved parking at SFO. For my convenience, I could install an app on my phone, load the pass, and have it scanned from my phone as I drove in. *OR* I could print the pass like a caveman. One of the airlines had only two options: Install their app on your phone to get your boarding passes, or print them out once you were at the airport. One of my pharmacies offers cell phone-only coupons, but you can still get your medication even if you don't have a cell phone.
Most people use their cell phones to manage almost everything about their lives. But there's a significant-enough portion of us who don't that companies need to provide alternatives, even if they're inconvenient or annoying.
So my dentist deciding that they were a cell phone-only office is disappointing, to say the least. Except the kids already aged out of it so it was our last visit there anyway...
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I seem to have left some things at the hotel...meh... airport security doesn't require clothing.
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*sigh*
On my way back home. I need to start planning another trip out here. Soon.
I think you forgot something...
Random typo: molderator
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Yet even we made fun of preppers like Burt and Heather Grimmer in the fantastic movie Tremors. Preppers were just taking things too far.
And I still make fun of people stockpiling toilet paper every time they hear of anything that might possibly disrupt their precious supply (the East Coast strike that caused a West Coast run on toilet paper comes to mind).
And yet this morning for my January calendar I put, "Make sure we have at least 2 months' supply of food."
It's something you're supposed to do in earthquake country anyway, but with our president-elect reaffirming his commitment to use the National Guard to expel all illegal immigrants, and California's agricultural spokespeople responding (after the election, importantly), "If you do that, you're going to shut us down entirely. We don't have enough legal workers to handle that load," I'm guessing there's going to be a minor-to-moderate disruption in food supplies in California in January and February.
I don't think it's going to be catastrophic, end-of-the-world stuff. But I think food is going to get really expensive and really scarce really fast, and I don't want to be in that fight.
As always, time will tell.
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In lighter news, it's always astonishing to me just how much of a difference long underwear makes.
It's switched to Winder here (we get no Fall), so highs are in the mid-50s and lows are in the low 40s and I keep the house set at 58°F.
I was getting really cold, even with a wool hat on, so I broke out my polypropylene leggings. All of a sudden I'm snug and toasty. Because somehow keeping my legs warmer affects my entire system. As only makes sense.
Yay for undies!
We kicked on the in-line fireplace for the first time since last winter yesterday. Had to move the dog kennel out of the way and open the windows to air out the smell while it burned off the old stuff in the lines, but it was nice and toasty.
It drives me crazy that I meticulously vacuum our our heaters before re-lighting them, but still have to run them for a couple of hours to burn off all the dust and hair the vacuum doesn't get.
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In lighter news, it's always astonishing to me just how much of a difference long underwear makes.
It's switched to Winder here (we get no Fall), so highs are in the mid-50s and lows are in the low 40s and I keep the house set at 58°F.
I was getting really cold, even with a wool hat on, so I broke out my polypropylene leggings. All of a sudden I'm snug and toasty. Because somehow keeping my legs warmer affects my entire system. As only makes sense.
Yay for undies!
I definitely could have told you that.
They have the furnace in my apartment building set at 80 degrees.
Needless to say I have my windows open quite a lot.
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** spoiler omitted **
As always, time will tell.
I am not sure what does that says about me, but my first impression with your post was noticing that you misspelled Gummer as Grimmer...
I guess I'm not that worried because the dude is 78 and eats at McDonald's.
I guess I'm not that worried because the dude is 78 and eats at McDonald's.Yeah, well, the Wizard of Omaha is 94 and eats peanut brittle by the fistful and washes it down with Coke®.
Big, huge difference between peanut brittle and a big mac, just saying.
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Fact: My school just did Oklahoma!
Fact: My entire scholars bowl team were involved with the play.
Fact: Rural Kansas means there's a good chance of a lengthy commute to tournaments.
Fact: Teenagers crammed into an SUV bicker a lot.
So every time they started bickering, I'd drop "Oh, the farmer and the cowman should be friends," and muscle memory would take over for a few bars.
We sang it a lot.
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"Ms. Scint, why is there a poster of a Molotov cocktail on the bulletin board?"
"Animal Farm."
If they'd, y'know, actually read the poster, they'd get their explanation, but they won't, so they can suffer.
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In lighter news, it's always astonishing to me just how much of a difference long underwear makes.
It's switched to Winder here (we get no Fall), so highs are in the mid-50s and lows are in the low 40s and I keep the house set at 58°F.
I was getting really cold, even with a wool hat on, so I broke out my polypropylene leggings. All of a sudden I'm snug and toasty. Because somehow keeping my legs warmer affects my entire system. As only makes sense.
Yay for undies!
Long johns are absolutely essential in winter.
My new motorcycle has handlebar grip warmers. I haven’t had to use them yet.
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I grow my own fur coat and can't be bothered to change clothes for the season
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Aaaand... another of Impus Major's professors has been suspended indefinitely with no reasons given.
At least this guy was terrible; he was the one whose entire "midterm review" was, "Just know who, where, what, when, why, and how and you'll pass," and when Impus Major asked, "So you just want us to know everything?", his response was, "Yes." And then when the high score on the midterm was 64% he notified the class he was going to fail them all.
So no, not particularly sorry to see him go. And apparently neither are any of the other professors. He was... misliked.
I could go into a loooooooooong essay on tenure and abuse thereof, but therein lies madness.
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So... just how punctual am I?
I forgot about our 6:00 am team meeting this morning so I was 2 minutes late. My team became concerned that I might have had a medical emergency.
For being 2 minutes late. Two. Minutes.
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I shift from dressing like a lumberjack in the summer to dressing like a mountaineer in the winter.
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So... just how punctual am I?
I forgot about our 6:00 am team meeting this morning so I was 2 minutes late. My team became concerned that I might have had a medical emergency.
For being 2 minutes late. Two. Minutes.
I was on time once and they called me when I wasn't there 10 minutes early.
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Amusingly, I slept through my alarm and was slightly late to work today, but not late enough to get the boss calling to find out what was up apparently. >.>
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Speaking of such things, I just had to have The Talk with Impus Minor:
"So, you have been fortunate in your life in that you've dealt with people who actually follow through on what they say they're going to do, and do what they're supposed to do; for example, me and your choir instructor.
You are now in the unenviable position of learning that most people can't be bothered to actually do the jobs that they're being paid to do, and you have to badger them just to get them to do the bare minimum. And for that, I apologize."
Long story as short as possible, his math professor agreed to give him a make-up midterm because of his Fargo trip, but first forgot about it entirely, then claimed he'd never agreed to it (Impus Minor had to show him his own email), then said he'd take care of it and never did, then told Impus Minor to stop bothering him and wait for an email that never came. And I know from experience that professor will happily give Impus Minor a 0 on the midterm if Impus Minor doesn't keep bugging him about it.
And this is after his "counselor" told him that there was no such thing as the late registration he was suffering (turns out that ALL part-time students don't get to register until January), then told him he should file for early graduation, which makes no sense, except apparently if you know you're graduating in the Spring you "file for early graduation" in the Fall to get priority registration in the Spring. Which makes no sense, she didn't explain it, so once again he's locked out of the classes he needs to graduate. Because the person whose full-time job is to help students graduate, couldn't be bothered to do any legwork at all to help him graduate.
It's why I'm not a manager. I'd fire half my staff every year because if I'm paying someone to do a job, I expect, at minimum, that they will do that job.
So, how bad is DVC?
Apparently Impus Minor was supposed to take an orientation before he started classes there. He never did. So for the last 3 years he's been forced to do late registration, been unable to get into the classes he needed to be able to graduate, and basically took an extra semester to graduate because he missed that orientation...
...and none of the counselors he met with ever mentioned it, even after he told one of them about his "late registration" problem.
I am *so* glad both kids will be out of there. Both of them have had SO many bad instructors, and now THIS.
Well, at least he should FINALLY manage to register for a full set of courses so he can graduate...
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For Whom the Burnout Tolls
"So, you're wanting to do that comedic duet with [other kid]."
"Yeah, and I want to do a dramatic monologue, too. Something to contrast."
"Are you sure you don't want to do it as a Prose piece? You wouldn't have to memorize that."
"I can memorize it!"
"You just got done telling me that you were auditioning for all these community theatre plays. Are you sure doing two memorized events on top of that is the best idea?"
"I'll be fine, Ms. Scint."
I'm trying, y'all.
And, our homeowner's insurance bill just came in "only" 26% over last year's.
On the one hand, between the fires on the West Coast and the hurricanes on the East Coast, insurance companies have been getting hit hard so I wouldn't have batted an eye at keeping my insurance and "only" paying 26% more...
...on the other, they just raised my liability premiums by over 50% and I haven't seen people suing more often, so there's obvious price-gouging going on.
At some point I'll either have enough set aside or I'll move out of California and insuring my home, my car, and my other physical belongings will be a thing of the past...
Hence California lawsuits are typically stupid affairs where people file for $20 million in damages against 12 different defendants for a fender-bender. Because if you can hit anyone with deep pockets up for even 5% of that judgement, you've made money.
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"Hey, how receptive is the city government to petitions?"
"Um, about the same as other towns. Why?"
"So if I asked them to move the sun a few feet to the left so we didn't go blind driving here in the morning-"
"Yeah, they'll get right on that."
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"Hey, how receptive is the city government to petitions?"
"Um, about the same as other towns. Why?"
"So if I asked them to move the sun a few feet to the left so we didn't go blind driving here in the morning-"
"Yeah, they'll get right on that."
It would help if Kansas hadn't apparently outlawed the existence of trees.
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There are trees! It's just that the road is a straight shot east, so the trees can't help. I often detour through the residential neighborhoods to get some tree cover.
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It really surprises me just how many gaming modules fall into the exact same trap of endless, pointless encounters.
Serpent's Skull is such an obvious rip-off of Tomb of Annihilation that I'm genuinely surprised that lawsuits weren't involved. But in Serpent's Skull, when you get to the hidden city in the jungle, there are clear goals: You have 7 regions of the city, each with its own faction, and the party can choose how to deal with each faction so there's a lot of decision-making and roleplaying involved. The kids actually found that exploring the city was one of their favorite parts of the campaign because they constantly had to figure out how they were going to deal with the factions.
In Tomb of Annihilation, it's, "Search the entire city building-by-building for the clues you need, and every single building is an encounter roll and a likely fight." We just had our third or fourth session in a row of interminable, "OK, you search that building? Let me roll the encounter table. OK. Let me set up the map. Roll initiatives!" tedium.
Even worse, since we're in the 5e version where money is meaningless because you can't buy anything and leveling is done by progression rather than by XP, we're not moving towards better gear. We're not moving towards another level. We're just fighting. Session after session after session.
And I'm reminded of the Crimson Throne remake of Scarwall. In the original, most of the rooms were empty. It was amazingly creepy, and the rooms that did have encounters were terrifying because they could make them particularly deadly. In the remake, every room had to have something in it, almost always an encounter. To make the XP balance they toned down the "special" rooms. So what had been an amazingly creepy run through an abandoned castle became, "I open the door. We roll initiatives. We win the fight. Next."
(1) It's OK for a room or building to be empty.
(2) You need an overall theme or story beyond, "Search every room until you find the McGuffins you're looking for.
Shiro's not running a bad game. He's running a poorly-written game for this section.
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My other big tirade of the morning is the whole, "Protect the cleric, with or without their permission," mentality.
All of Problem Player's characters have some kind of bonus action "teleport to safety" spell or class feature or racial feature because of course they do. The problem is, for a lifelong gamer, he has some of the worst group tactics I've ever seen.
So, way back when on his first PC, we were fighting a pack of velociraptors and he decided to teleport to "safety" and announced, "I teleport myself and <NobodysHome's toon> to this spot."
It was a tactically suicidal position where every creature on the map could reach us, surround us, and kill us. I refused the teleport. He teleported anyway and died.
Last night, we were in a fight with a big dinosaur. Yet again, he decided he was going to teleport himself and me to a tactically stupid position. Fortunately, his teleport was self-only so he couldn't take me with him.
But I swear. Maybe, before trying to teleport or move someone else's character, you should, y'know, ask them whether it's OK? Even if he were trying to put me somewhere advantageous I'd refuse on principle unless he asked first. His determination to put me in tactically terrible locations would seem like out-and-out hostility except for the fact that he's dumb enough to put himself in those locations as well, and if I refuse he goes without me.
EDIT: I mention "protect the cleric" because in another game I built a ridiculous tank cleric with an unbuffed 5e AC of 23 (obscene for 5e) and the life domain so she self-healed whenever she healed anyone. And yet every time I tried to stand next to the fighter to hold the front line, the AC 15 monk ran in front of me to "protect the cleric" and cost us most of my resources for the day because of all the healing she needed getting ripped apart for being in front of the AC 20+ fighters.
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"Hey, how receptive is the city government to petitions?"
"Um, about the same as other towns. Why?"
"So if I asked them to move the sun a few feet to the left so we didn't go blind driving here in the morning-"
"Yeah, they'll get right on that."
A few years ago, I was driving home from work when the sun shifted from behind a building and every. Single. Car. On the road swerved simultaneously as the drivers were blinded.
If someone was watching traffic patterns through a satellite, I'm sure they would have panicked too.
My other big tirade of the morning is the whole, "Protect the cleric, with or without their permission," mentality.
All of Problem Player's characters have some kind of bonus action "teleport to safety" spell or class feature or racial feature because of course they do. The problem is, for a lifelong gamer, he has some of the worst group tactics I've ever seen.
So, way back when on his first PC, we were fighting a pack of velociraptors and he decided to teleport to "safety" and announced, "I teleport myself and <NobodysHome's toon> to this spot."
It was a tactically suicidal position where every creature on the map could reach us, surround us, and kill us. I refused the teleport. He teleported anyway and died.
Last night, we were in a fight with a big dinosaur. Yet again, he decided he was going to teleport himself and me to a tactically stupid position. Fortunately, his teleport was self-only so he couldn't take me with him.
But I swear. Maybe, before trying to teleport or move someone else's character, you should, y'know, ask them whether it's OK? Even if he were trying to put me somewhere advantageous I'd refuse on principle unless he asked first. His determination to put me in tactically terrible locations would seem like out-and-out hostility except for the fact that he's dumb enough to put himself in those locations as well, and if I refuse he goes without me.
EDIT: I mention "protect the cleric" because in another game I built a ridiculous tank cleric with an unbuffed 5e AC of 23 (obscene for 5e) and the life domain so she self-healed whenever she healed anyone. And yet every time I tried to stand next to the fighter to hold the front line, the AC 15 monk ran in front of me to "protect the cleric" and cost us most of my resources for the day because of all the healing she needed getting ripped apart for being in front of the AC 20+ fighters.
It's a damn ugly holdover from earlier editions.
I hope my own game/rules have made this less of a necessity by improving natural healing, but...the mindset remains.
My other big tirade of the morning is the whole, "Protect the cleric, with or without their permission," mentality.It's a damn ugly holdover from earlier editions.
I hope my own game/rules have made this less of a necessity by improving natural healing, but...the mindset remains.
What surprises me is that because we skipped 2nd edition, we missed this mindset entirely.
1st edition (1974): The cleric was one of the two classes who could wear full armor, so the cleric was always in front.
3.5/Pathfinder (2009): The cleric had solid armor, excellent mental saves, and amazing self-healing, so the cleric was always in front.
Tactically, we never encountered a situation where it was a good idea to focus fire/burn down the cleric because you couldn't one-round them and the DPS classes would go to town on you while you were wasting your actions trying... it was way better to down and coup de grace the DPSers.
EDIT: But even if "protect the cleric" WERE still a thing, the whole, "I'm going to teleport you around without your permission," is NEVER a thing.
Speaking of forcing me to do things against my will...
...Global Megacorporation is moving to a new payroll system. Fine. They've given me weekly notices for the last month. They've provided links to training. They've provided a sample site so I can go there and see how the new system will work. All in all, this has all been fantastic communication and preparation and I approve.
And yet this morning, "You must now complete this mandatory training on the new payroll system."
FFS. You've given me every opportunity to learn the new system, and you can simply say, "If you didn't take the training you cannot ask for help."
Instead you're burning tens of thousands of employee hours to make sure employees can read their own paycheck. If your payroll system is THAT unbelievably complicated, maybe, just maybe, you shouldn't be switching.
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"Hey, how receptive is the city government to petitions?"
"Um, about the same as other towns. Why?"
"So if I asked them to move the sun a few feet to the left so we didn't go blind driving here in the morning-"
"Yeah, they'll get right on that."
Was that you, Orthos, or the pupils?
Either way, they seem to learn sarcasm from the best.
|
Tactically, we never encountered a situation where it was a good idea to focus fire/burn down the cleric because you couldn't one-round them and the DPS classes would go to town on you while you were wasting your actions trying... it was way better to down and coup de grace the DPSers.
It's a weird idea. The closest I've seen is 'protect the caster' but when the caster in question has better defenses than you, you should really just stay out of their way.
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There are trees! It's just that the road is a straight shot east, so the trees can't help. I often detour through the residential neighborhoods to get some tree cover.
I have been in your countryside. Even by Midwestern standards, Kansas has no trees.
But yes, I do know the pain of the due east road on a morning drive.
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"So, you have been fortunate in your life in that you've dealt with people who actually follow through on what they say they're going to do, and do what they're supposed to do...
I just had to have a talk with a client.
Client's Internal IT: I'm looking for some HR documents that were on our old internal Sharepoint servers. I know the previous guy worked with you on migrating that stuff to the current Sharepoint.
Me: Not exactly. First, those servers were supposed to no longer be in use before I started this job over three years ago. Second, your predecessor's predecessor was supposed to migrate that data to your Sharepoint. Third, when we were doing a migration a year later, we saw those servers still online. We asked your predecessor who stated "I need to go over those servers again and just double check them before we decommission them." Over six months later he told me I could turn them off but not delete them. It was only three months ago that you gave me the authorization to delete those old servers.
If that data wasn't in Sharepoint by now, that data is gone.
Shiro's not running a bad game. He's running a poorly-written game for this section.
Would it be rude of me to request you look over my own adventure writeups for review on this kind of thing? >.>
"Hey, how receptive is the city government to petitions?"
"Um, about the same as other towns. Why?"
"So if I asked them to move the sun a few feet to the left so we didn't go blind driving here in the morning-"
"Yeah, they'll get right on that."Was that you, Orthos, or the pupils?
Either way, they seem to learn sarcasm from the best.
Wasn't me, I haven't left the house all day. I work from home so driving into the sun is a thing of the past. Or evenings.
Shiro's not running a bad game. He's running a poorly-written game for this section.Would it be rude of me to request you look over my own adventure writeups for review on this kind of thing? >.>
Not at all. You'd just have to also provide the time machine so I'd have the time to do it... :-P
"Hey, how receptive is the city government to petitions?"
"Um, about the same as other towns. Why?"
"So if I asked them to move the sun a few feet to the left so we didn't go blind driving here in the morning-"
"Yeah, they'll get right on that."Was that you, Orthos, or the pupils?
Either way, they seem to learn sarcasm from the best.
The receptionist and me. Her son is one of my quiz bowlers, and he is also made of sarcasm.
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A:"I drew my D&D character!"
B:"Why did you make the eyes so big?"
A:"It's my styyyyyle. Not like you can draw better."
B:"I can draw like Vivziepop."
Me: "...aren't you two a little young to know who that is?"
A:"...I've never met a teacher who's heard of Hazbin Hotel before."