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Slight movements

2009-07-31T18:52:38Z

http://angrypeons.com is back online. posting will happen there from henceforth.

- The Management

Nobody retires from Phantom Limb's shit list!

2009-07-27T22:22:28Z

State of the board after Spring 1905. This game just got suddenly interesting.

Not dead yet...

2009-07-25T19:46:04Z

State of the board after winter 1903:

Double fuck

2009-07-21T18:40:09Z

How can i look at my orders that often and still fuck it up.

State of the board after fall 1903.

Well fuck.

2009-07-16T23:00:57Z

State of the board after Spring 1903.

I'll have to give it to you dewey, that was a rather ballsy move. I did see Spa -> Tus as a potential move but I was thinking you wouldn't risk getting 0 SCs this turn and would go for the safety of just guaranteeing Tunis. Well played, but you've quite a fight ahead of you still.

They're not coming for us are they general.

2009-07-14T22:36:01Z

State of the Board after winter 1902:

You'll get nothing and like it

2009-07-11T15:45:26Z

State of the Board after Fall 1902.

Ouch to Germany.

Cannons to the right of them cannons to the left of them...

2009-07-10T01:09:52Z

State of the board after Spring 1902:

There's treachery afoot

2009-07-08T13:30:19Z

State of the board after winter 1901.

mickj @ 2009-07-07T19:30:00

2009-07-07T23:34:30Z

State of the board after Fall 1901

I changed to a more simple display since jDip won't display who owns what with the prettier looking map.

Nobody ever says Italy...

2009-07-05T17:06:45Z

State of the board, Fall 1901 (Thank you jDip!):

Austria - Aaron
England - Paul
France - Dewey
Germany - Andrew
Italy - me
Russia - Vinnie
Turkey - Adrian

Click on the picture for a better view. (May need to click on it twice for full size)

Feel free to comment and discuss if you want but remember that all these discussions on here will be completely open and public to everyone, so don't say anything you don't want other people to know. Peanut gallery comments also welcome.

And They Would All Go Down Together

2009-07-03T15:26:28Z

So I've been a little youtube link happy for the last couple entries, but figured I'd add this because it's the most awesome thing I have ever seen ... ever.

mickj @ 2009-06-12T12:05:00

2009-06-12T16:56:16Z

Now I don't claim to be an excellent coder, but I've seen some really stupid shit in my several years on my current job.

Just now I've come across quite a doozy:

public Connection getConnection(String username, String password) throws SQLException {
	System.out.println("*** ConnectionPoolWrapper.getConnection(username, password) called... ***");
	try {
		throw new Exception("*** ConnectionPoolWrapper.getConnection(username, password) called... ***");
	}
	catch (Exception e) {
		e.printStackTrace();
	}
	return getTargetDataSource().getConnection(username, password);
}

I'm going to guess that this method was overridden from the base class and probably never intended to be called, but ... I really can't say for sure.

mickj @ 2009-05-31T02:08:00

2009-05-31T06:08:35Z

Umm ... ok.

Slap in the face.

2009-05-12T18:06:01Z

The more and more I think about Star Trek, the more and more I get irritated by the sheer madness of it all. Spoilers ahead, you have been warned.

First off, so I don't sound like I absolutely hated the movie, let's get some positives out of the way:

The casting was incredibly well done. Everyone nailed their part spot on.

Action sequences fun to watch.

As a whole it was a good movie.

Soundtrack was pretty good.

Acknowledging Christopher Pike

No mention of Jonathan Archer (at least I don't recall any)

Various neat little references to previous Star Trek movies and the original series (My favorite was the nod to Undiscovered country with the "A Lie?" conversation between the Spocks

Ok that's out of the way, now for the airing of the grievances:

No Klingons

When did the Grand Canyon move to Iowa?

Does every bad guy have to have a sinister looking black spider like ship? It could have looked at least a little Romlan.

While the soundtrack was good, it sounded like I was hearing the same song throughout the entire movie.

Time travel? Again? Seriously? And then using that as an excuse to throw away centuries worth of beloved lore. And not only that to have it explicity spelled out to us in the movie itself by Spock. And on top of it all, not only do they deduce very quickly that Nero is from the future, they immediately accept it.

Even for a time travel plot, what happened bordered on utter bat-shit insanity. There are 2 Spocks! Both aware of each others existence. Yeah.

Nero was fucking lame for a villian. He really provided no purpose than to purpose other than to provide the excuse to "reboot" the series. Even "God" from Star Trek V made a better main villain.

The one thing that did bother me about new Spock is that the whole "omg he's human he can't control his emotions". Nimoy's Spock showed emotion, but never to the point of acting like a maniac. Perhaps it's not a big deal, but this kind of bothers me.

Does every major player (Spock, Kirk, Nero) in the movie have to have their life scarred by some sort of horrible personal tragedy?

Some TOS cliches felt a little forced and awkward (McCoy's "I'm a doctor" lines are a prime example)

I'm beginning to think only Walter Koening can pull off the Nuclear Wessels joke. Not to mention it was really irritating to see it drawn off to Family Guy levels by having Yelchin saying "Wulcan" for almost a full minute.

Now on to the "reboot", and my issues with it. I understand that they wanted a different direction for this and future Star Trek films. I understand that they didn't want to be heavily be bound to the restrictions of following the original lore 100%. But did they have to do in such a lame and retarded way, and in such a way that totally invalidated the events of every single movie that came before it. Spock and Uhura having a romance, that is something that is reasonably acceptable. Vulcan being destroyed and Spock's mom dead (she's in Star Trek 3 and 4, and they travel to Vulcan several times through the movies and TNG) is definitely not. And then not to mention that there are 2 Spocks in this new timeline they created. What kind of clusterfuck is that? And speaking of alternate timelines, if they continue down this road and make more movies based on this timeline (and it appears that they want to head down this road), that means people are going to get really fucking confused. It's just really maddening to see all the previous Star Trek movies to essentially being thrown in the garbage. And can you really come up with a lamer way to rationalize the "reboot". Bah.

Well enough of that. What's done is done. But I don't have to like it.

We think the price is worth it.

2009-04-22T21:04:12Z

If I could ask Obama (or wish that someone would ask him) one thing it would be this:

Since you have admitted to using marijuana and cocaine, do you feel you would have deserved to go to jail and serve a mandatory minimum of several years and have your entire life wrecked if you had been caught back then?

If you say no, then why do you support other teens going to jail and having not only their lives, but their families lives ruined for what you once did as a teenager.

If you say yes, why don't you voluntarily turn yourself in and serve your time for breaking the law.

I'm really curious to hear his answer.

That may be, but at least he didn't sleep with Lumberg.

2009-04-14T18:01:35Z

So as can be gathered from previous posts, I'm not a particularly big fan of Obama and his so called "change".

But, this is some change I can get behind.

USGov's stance towards Cuba has been one of utter madness. From what I can tell, the policy of total embargo benefits nobody. Not our government, not our businesses, not the cuban people, and the idea of freedom were certainly not advanced (which would be pretty ironic since that includes the freedom of association, which the policy did restrict).

Economic sanctions have never been able to topple thuggish dictators. It didn't work with Iraq, it's sure as fuck not working with North Korea, and it hasn't done shit for Cuba. The end result has typically been miserable and/or dead people in those respective countries.

Hopefully this means that the embargo is eventually going to end, because once it does the days of Castro regime are numbered. At the end of the day, free enterprise is the quickest killer of oppressive regimes than any embargo could hope to be.

The times, they are a-changing...

2009-04-10T18:19:02Z

Horray for CHANGE!.

Also, Horray for CHANGE!

And again, HORRAY FOR EVEN MORE CHANGE!

Aw, twenty dollars! I wanted a peanut!

2009-04-01T04:14:00Z

Finally, someone gets it. Having paper money backed by absolutely nothing is not such a great idea after all.

You can't make this shit up.

2009-03-23T23:30:29Z

I really wish this was a joke.

Uh, there's a $1000 leaving town tax!

2009-02-16T19:54:17Z

I've always been curious as to whether a tax revolt would ever occur in our lifetime. At some point, the gluttony of the government for the money we make is bound to reach a breaking point.

However, I've noticed that there is actually somewhat of a revolt going on, and it is took a form I didn't really expect it to take.

I came across this from reading the slashdot forums on an article about the New York state government taxing online download purchases.

Apparently people are leaving tax heavy states like California and New York.

The number of people leaving California for another state outstripped the number moving in from another state during the year ending on July 1, 2008. California lost a net total of 144,000 people during that period - more than any other state, according to census estimates. That is about equal to the population of Syracuse, N.Y.

The state with the next-highest net loss through migration between states was New York, which lost just over 126,000 residents.

Now granted, there are other factors involved here beside taxes. But, I can't help but think the high taxes are not a significant motivating factor.

I can't help but think this will continue to become a growing trend, especially considering that New York and California's response to their budget problems will most likely be a tax on wearing puffy pants (or a tax on not wearing puffy pants, whichever is more convenient for them), rather than the more obvious solution of simply spending less because the money doesn't exist to spend more.

If some really significant mass exoduses start occurring from tax heavy states, I wonder if Obama's next course of action will be another stimulus package to bail out those state governments who refuse to live within their means?

YOU HEAR ME! TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH!!!!

2009-02-12T15:38:10Z

Rush Limbaugh finally gives up on being supposedly a conservative and shows his true colors:

So, let 'em go ahead with these tactics. We can't stop them anyway. We lost the election. But they're going to lose down the road. They will not control government forever, and when our turn comes, we are going to turn the power of government against the left. We are going to investigate them. We are going to hold public hearings. We are going to humiliate them. We're going to nationalize their unions. We're going to fund our groups for a change.
If they can give ACORN $4.1 billion then we can start paying our groups with federal money. We're going to do exactly to them what they have done to us. We're going to build and use the Big Government that they have built and turn it right against them. We are gonna turn the power of government against the left, and against Democrats in ways they cannot imagine. They will not know what hit them. They are using the law. They are using government to advance a cause that is un-American. We are going to use the power that the left is centralizing in the federal government to punish them, to break 'em up, and to make them pay for this. It's time for tit-for-tat. Nice guy playing by the rules when they don't, is over. It's time they got a taste of their own medicine, and it's going to happen, folks, because they're not going to hold power forever.

The left -- you people, you Democrats -- you are creating a monster that you will not be able to control forever. You will ultimately regret what you are doing just like the media will ultimately regret its sacrifice of reason, its abandonment of its primary purpose. The day is coming when the media will actually investigate a Democrat and find some problems and nobody's going to believe them because they've lost all credibility. Nobody believes what the mainstream media says now anyway. Except the uneducated, the illiterate, and the uninformed -- which, sadly, is a fairly large number. Well, we'll deal with that. We are taking names. We are taking names now. We are monitoring who on the left is going to deserve payback, and it's going to be hell. This much I promise you. This is just getting out of hand.

We're gonna come after the left's favorite corporations. We're going to come after your favorite political constituents. We're going to come after your favorite media outlets. You want to try the Fairness Doctrine? Fine. We'll impose it on network television. We'll impose it on newspapers. You want to try censorship? Fine! We will censor you when we get the control of the government back. We will reapportion districts using the Census to help conservatives. We're going to turn the power of government against the Democrats and the left and weaken and you break you into little pieces. Because, my friends, the day has passed when we can become passive and be passive about what they are doing. We will use the political and the legal system as they have and are, and we will use it to promote our party and to diminish theirs. We will use the power of government and legal system to promote our movement and our agenda, just as they are.

If they are going to bastardize the American system, if they are going to make this government large and powerful and intrusive, someday they're going to lose it. But they're going to lose it after having amassed all this power. We will control it, and we're going to turn it right back against them. We will build a massive army of patriots to counter ACORN. We will defund ACORN. We'll defund the labor unions, and we will fund our own people to go out and zap ACORN. And we will do everything we can to enhance anti-union employment. We will make sure that when companies lose money, that the people that get canned are union people. We're going to use the power of government just like the left is using the power of government. We're going to use the Justice Department.
We're going to go after big unions with the Justice Department. We're going to find all of the criminal activity. We are going to find all the lack of ethics. We are going to find every bit of corruption we can, and we're gonna sic the attorney general and the justice department and the US attorneys on you people just as you have been doing to the people of the right and the Republican Party for 50 years. And then we're going to find George Soros and other concentrations of left-wing power and wealth. And we're going to focus our attention on him, so that the American people will finally learn just who the hell paid for the bastardization of the United States, just who the hell paid for the destruction of the American way of life.

And this is what's wrong with politics in this country. Reward your friends, punish your enemies, that is the motto of the 2 ruling parties. Principles like limited government, personal and economic liberty be damned, because our side has to win.

It's you.

2009-02-04T02:01:29Z

I finished Fallout 3 a while ago. Something that I've noticed that has been somewhat of a trend in games these days, particularly the "epic" ones like Mass Effect, GTA4, etc, is that the main game (i.e. everything that is not optional in order to progress and beat it) has been extremely short.

When I finished Fallout 3 I clocked in at about 20 hours, which is extremely short by my standards. Factor in that probably about half that time was spent on optional side quests and towns, and that's a really, really short main game.

I've yet to wonder whether this is a bad thing or not. If you want to, it may take you probably around 50-60 hours to go through everything the game has to offer. The question is ... do you want to? I did attempt to try and play through it again, but ended up stopping. Though I think most of that was that probably pulling from wow, so maybe if wow wasn't around I would have made it through again (doing some different extra stuff of course, and playing through it as an evil asshole).

Still I wonder if this is a problematic trend with games today. The same thing happened with Mass Effect. I think the main problem was that the optinal content was so disjointed from the main game. Occasionally, while traveling from planet to planet you'd get a distress call, a communcication or a crewmember would do something and would kind of trigger a "hey you busy, mind doing this little side item, plz". It's ok, but there's still no real compelling reason to do so. In Fallout 3, you kind of just run into sidequests, so it's very possible you just end up going through the main game and just missing them all.

The sad thing is I do want to keep playing Fallout 3 since a downloadable add on was released last week. The catch is that I have to go through Microsoft's lame Games For Windows marketplace. Normally this wouldn't be a problem, but the inconvenience is fucking retarded. For one, I bought Fallout 3 from Direct2Drive. It was an easy transaction, I gave them money, they gave me game to download. Fast (well buying it was anyways), and convenient (download -> install -> play).

For one, why the fuck is the downloadable content not available on the same service I used to buy the actual fucking game? Second, now I have to go and register on yet another fucking site just to get downloadable content. Not only that, I can't just pay for it either. I have to buy "points" and then, and only then, can I actually purchase the DLC. What a fucking incovenience.

mickj @ 2009-01-22T18:44:00

2009-01-22T23:53:27Z

I can't believe i thought this was cool at one point in my life.

No.

2008-12-15T00:36:37Z

There is no way you can convince me now that the NFL Referee's association does not have a vested interest in fucking over the Baltimore Ravens.