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  <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra</id>
  <title>Void and without form</title>
  <subtitle>signal to noise ratio uncertain</subtitle>
  <author>
    <name>amcathra</name>
  </author>
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  <updated>2009-11-20T20:04:40Z</updated>
  <lj:journal userid="7557672" username="amcathra" type="personal"/>
  <link rel="service.feed" type="application/x.atom+xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom" title="Void and without form"/>
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  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:14083</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/14083.html"/>
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    <title>Floods</title>
    <published>2009-11-20T17:34:30Z</published>
    <updated>2009-11-20T20:04:40Z</updated>
    <category term="transport"/>
    <category term="flooding"/>
    <category term="global warming"/>
    <category term="cork"/>
    <lj:music>none</lj:music>
    <content type="html">Buses were unreliable this morning due to the flooding in Cork. Being my usual myopic self I didn't realise how bad it was till I got some photos on the internet. Still, I did notice a lot of people were walking this morning, and the traffic being gridlocked. I also heard comments about flooding, and given the river has been high recently and all the rain in the last few days, I wasn't surprised.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Also, by a coincidence, I am currently reading a book called &lt;em&gt;Flood&lt;/em&gt; by Stephen Baxter (not good, when I notice the lack of characterisation it's not a good sign) about apocalyptic floods inundating the earth.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;So here I am with my bottled water waiting for the next set of storms due tomorrow. (Tescos had already run out, but I got some at Boots) The water in the taps is dirty and looks unsafe, and I have heard that they are advising people to stick to bottled water in the city centre for the time being.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;An isolated blip, or the next step in global warming... only time will tell. &lt;strong&gt;dun dun dun...&lt;/strong&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:13962</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/13962.html"/>
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    <title>Back from Gaelcon</title>
    <published>2009-10-27T16:07:05Z</published>
    <updated>2009-10-27T16:07:05Z</updated>
    <category term="boardgames"/>
    <category term="cons"/>
    <category term="dublin"/>
    <category term="gaelcon"/>
    <category term="trains"/>
    <content type="html">So I&amp;nbsp;made it back from Gaelcon last night, which I enjoyed. It has moved from Clontarf Castle hotel to D4 hotels in Ballsbridge. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I played mostly boardgames, which I find more reliable than RPG scenarios with a random referee at cons these days.  I bought a bunch of stuff over the con, which I will sort out over the next few days - the &lt;em&gt;Pegasus &lt;/em&gt;expansion for BSG, &lt;em&gt;Chaos in the Old World,&amp;nbsp; &lt;/em&gt;some &lt;em&gt;D&amp;amp;D&lt;/em&gt; books, also&lt;em&gt;&amp;nbsp; &lt;/em&gt;&lt;em&gt;Modern Art&lt;/em&gt; and a bunch of Zombie boardgame stuff from the charity stand at knock-down prices, &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I stayed in a B&amp;amp;B in the city centre, and had some trouble getting to the con on Monday because of the marathon-precipitated detours, but the taxi got me there eventually. Next time I may splash out for the hotel to avoid such troubles, not sure yet.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I was worried by the weight of my purchases on Monday morning as I&amp;nbsp;maneuvered my baggage to the con, so naturally I ended up buying as my last purchase &lt;em&gt;Twilight Imperium&lt;/em&gt; (probably the biggest, heaviest boardgame on sale there. I have wanted to buy it for a long time despite its impractical nature as a game that takes a marathon day or weekend to play. But the reduced prices at the con tempted me). This complicated my return journey a little and the game box has already collected some wear and tear from falls, but nothing serious.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;When I got to Heuston, the queue for the train wasn't being let on to the train on the platform posted on the boards, but eventually we were sent to a train on a different platform.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Things went fine once the train left, though there were three added stops along the way. Taking a hint from &lt;span class='ljuser ljuser-name_mytholder' lj:user='mytholder' style='white-space: nowrap;'&gt;&lt;a href='http://mytholder.livejournal.com/profile'&gt;&lt;img src='http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif' alt='[info]' width='17' height='17' style='vertical-align: bottom; border: 0; padding-right: 1px;' /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;a href='http://mytholder.livejournal.com/'&gt;&lt;b&gt;mytholder&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt; I looked for a seat with an electrical socket, though as it turns out my netbook was fully charged and lasted the whole way home. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;When I got back I managed to restrain myself from opening my new purchases (mostly), but still got stuck checking my email backlog. In my tiredness I set my alarm clock wrong and slept in this morning. Oops, but at least I&amp;nbsp;got some much-needed sleep.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:13795</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/13795.html"/>
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    <title>Strangely accurate</title>
    <published>2009-08-28T22:59:47Z</published>
    <updated>2009-08-29T21:32:05Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;a href="http://xkcd.com/627/"&gt;http://xkcd.com/627/&lt;/a&gt; &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Far too close for comfort :) Still, knowledge base search is a critical modern skill .</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:13317</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/13317.html"/>
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    <title>An inconvenient discovery</title>
    <published>2009-06-22T10:30:51Z</published>
    <updated>2009-06-22T10:31:43Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;strong&gt;Q&lt;/strong&gt;: what's worse than losing a banana&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;A:&lt;/strong&gt; Finding it in the bottom of your backpack a week later&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:13226</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/13226.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=13226"/>
    <title>funny webcomic</title>
    <published>2009-05-01T09:41:55Z</published>
    <updated>2009-05-01T09:43:43Z</updated>
    <category term="parody"/>
    <category term="humour"/>
    <category term="webcomic"/>
    <content type="html">Funny tee hee rather than funny ha-ha, but I enjoyed it. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a href="http://xkcd.com/575/"&gt;http://xkcd.com/575/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;And no maths involved at all.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:13004</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/13004.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=13004"/>
    <title>Shiny new computer</title>
    <published>2009-03-26T17:20:34Z</published>
    <updated>2009-03-26T17:25:30Z</updated>
    <category term="computers windows games"/>
    <lj:music>whatevers on the radio</lj:music>
    <content type="html">It's been a while since I posted here. I'm writing this on my shiny new computer, which appears to be superfast even with Vista compared to the more elderly PCs I am used to, despite being a budget PC. The numbers associated it are huge compared to the first computers I used back in the 80s, or even compared to the computers I use on my course. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The notebook I use normally blue screened when I was checking the TFT&amp;nbsp;monitor on it, apparently due to a driver issue running both displays. It seems to be ok now, and I got the TFT monitor working with the new PC after some initial &amp;quot;no signal&amp;quot; worries.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I'm still considering putting XP pro on it so I can at least look at the backlog of games I have bought that wouldn't run acceptably on old machines or laptops. I suspect a number of them won't run on Vista.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:12527</id>
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    <title>Oíche Shamhna Shona Dhaoibh go Léir</title>
    <published>2008-10-31T19:22:02Z</published>
    <updated>2008-10-31T19:23:02Z</updated>
    <category term="halloween"/>
    <content type="html">&lt;span style="font-size: medium"&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;A Happy All Hallows Eve to everyone.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:12071</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/12071.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=12071"/>
    <title>A new boardgame, playing with logo</title>
    <published>2008-09-16T16:43:30Z</published>
    <updated>2008-09-16T16:43:30Z</updated>
    <content type="html">I bought a boardgame called Tomb recently, though i haven't had a chance to play it yet.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Anyway I did some editing of the logo to result in this:&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;img alt="Tom" src="http://i464.photobucket.com/albums/rr5/Aenghus/tom_lg3.jpg" /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:11989</id>
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    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=11989"/>
    <title>Old friends, 4e D&amp;D</title>
    <published>2008-06-06T21:35:19Z</published>
    <updated>2008-06-06T22:53:16Z</updated>
    <category term="warps"/>
    <category term="friends"/>
    <category term="d&amp;amp;d"/>
    <category term="cork"/>
    <content type="html">Another big gap since my last update. My internet service from Chorus/UPC has been spotty of late, apparently due to noise problems on the lines in my area. It's slowly improving. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I bumped into Raymond Looney recently, after not seeing him for a few years. He's still in contact with a lot of original WARPS members from back in the day, so was able to fill me on a lot of people I haven't seen in even more years. Maybe a "where are they now" section on one of the WARPS websites/ forums would be a good idea. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I was out&amp;nbsp;at the marina in&amp;nbsp;Blackrock for a walk this afternoon. It's a nice walk by the river - I've never been there before. Fortunately the weather was good and showers held off. Only bad spot was the atlantic pool, which was badly polluted, with lots of algae and visible bands of milky stains on the water. There were more ducks out of the water than in it. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Later on I bought the boxed set of the new 4th Edition D&amp;amp;D rules at Other Realms. Nice looking books, they will take some time for me to read through. I'm running the second session of the intro Keep on the Shadowfell tomorrow, which should be&amp;nbsp;somewhat easier now I have the full rules.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:11499</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/11499.html"/>
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    <title>bad habits</title>
    <published>2008-04-02T18:53:04Z</published>
    <updated>2008-04-02T18:53:04Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;font color="#ff0000"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;font size="5"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;I hate smoking with the incandescent heat of a thousand suns&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;font size="4"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;font size="3"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;and I still have difficulty asking people not to smoke&lt;/em&gt;.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Fortunately it's less of a problem nowadays. Its still weird to walk into a pub and not need to wade though the smoky atmosphere gasping and wheezing.&lt;/font&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:11248</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/11248.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=11248"/>
    <title>It's my birthday...</title>
    <published>2008-04-02T18:44:45Z</published>
    <updated>2008-04-02T18:44:45Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;p&gt;and I haven't posted for ages, Since then, I'm living in new (and better) accommodation, and a few other things have changed in my life.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Being lost for words hasn't though. Probably why I haven't posted since Aug last year.&lt;/p&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:10873</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/10873.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=10873"/>
    <title>100 Hobby Games Meme</title>
    <published>2007-08-28T13:05:40Z</published>
    <updated>2007-08-29T13:40:37Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;font size="4"&gt;100 Hobby Games Meme&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;From &lt;span class='ljuser ljuser-name_mytholder' lj:user='mytholder' style='white-space: nowrap;'&gt;&lt;a href='http://mytholder.livejournal.com/profile'&gt;&lt;img src='http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif' alt='[info]' width='17' height='17' style='vertical-align: bottom; border: 0; padding-right: 1px;' /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;a href='http://mytholder.livejournal.com/'&gt;&lt;b&gt;mytholder&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&amp;nbsp;who got it from&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;/b&amp;gt;&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&lt;span class='ljuser ljuser-name_mylescorcoran' lj:user='mylescorcoran' style='white-space: nowrap;'&gt;&lt;a href='http://mylescorcoran.livejournal.com/profile'&gt;&lt;img src='http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif' alt='[info]' width='17' height='17' style='vertical-align: bottom; border: 0; padding-right: 1px;' /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;a href='http://mylescorcoran.livejournal.com/'&gt;&lt;b&gt;mylescorcoran&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;...originating with Gregg Stolz&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a name="cutid1"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Boldface if "I own this game".&lt;br /&gt;Italics is "I have played this game".&lt;br /&gt;Italic and Bold are "I both own and have played this game"&amp;nbsp;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;

&lt;a name="cutid1"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;Bruce C. Shelley on Acquire&lt;/em&gt; &lt;br /&gt;Nicole Lindroos on Amber Diceless &lt;br /&gt;Ian Livingstone on Amun-Re &lt;br /&gt;&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="MARGIN: 0cm 0cm 0pt"&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Stewart Wieck on Ars Magica&lt;/em&gt; &lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;em&gt;Thomas M. Reid on Axis &amp;amp; Allies&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;Tracy Hickman on Battle Cry&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Philip Reed on BattleTech&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Justin Achilli on Blood Bowl &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;Mike Selinker on Bohnanza &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Tom Dalgliesh on Britannia&lt;/em&gt; ( own then new FFG edition, played old and new)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Greg Stolze on Button Men&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Monte Cook on Call of Cthulhu &lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Steven E. Schend on Carcassonne&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;em&gt;Jeff Tidball on Car Wars&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;Bill Bridges on Champions &lt;br /&gt;Stan! on Circus Maximus&lt;br /&gt;Tom Jolly on Citadels &lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Steven Savile on Civilization &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Bruno Faidutti on Cosmic Encounter&amp;nbsp; &lt;/em&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;(The the old GW reprint version)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Andrew Looney on Cosmic Wimpout&lt;br /&gt;Skip Williams on Dawn Patrol &lt;br /&gt;Alan R. Moon on Descent&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Larry Harris on Diplomacy&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;em&gt;Richard Garfield on Dungeons &amp;amp; Dragons&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;William W. Connors on Dynasty League Baseball&lt;br /&gt;Christian T. Petersen on El Grande&lt;br /&gt;Alessio Cavatore on Empires in Arms&lt;br /&gt;Timothy Brown on Empires of the Middle Ages &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Allen Varney on The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen &lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Phil Yates on Fire and Fury&lt;br /&gt;William Jones on Flames of War&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Rick Loomis on Fluxx&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;John Kovalic on Formula Dé &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Anthony J. Gallela on The Fury of Dracula&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;em&gt;Jesse Scoble on A Game of Thrones&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;Lou Zocchi on Gettysburg&lt;br /&gt;James Wallis on Ghostbusters&lt;br /&gt;James M. Ward on The Great Khan Game&lt;br /&gt;Gav Thorpe on Hammer of the Scots&lt;br /&gt;Uli Blennemann on Here I Stand&lt;br /&gt;S. Craig Taylor, Jr. on A House Divided &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Scott Haring on Illuminati&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dana Lombardy on Johnny Reb&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Darren Watts on Junta &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;Greg Stafford on Kingmaker &lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Lester Smith on Kremlin &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Wolfgang Baur on Legend of the Five Rings&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt; (which one?)&lt;br /&gt;Marc W. Miller on Lensman&lt;br /&gt;Ted S. Raicer on &lt;st1:place w:st="on"&gt;&lt;st1:city w:st="on"&gt;London&lt;/st1:city&gt;&lt;/st1:place&gt;'s Burning&lt;br /&gt;Teeuwynn Woodruff on Lord of the Rings (Which version?) &lt;br /&gt;Mike Breault on Machiavelli &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Jordan Weisman on Magic: The Gathering&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Steve Kenson on Marvel Super Heroes &lt;br /&gt;Gary Gygax on Metamorphosis Alpha&lt;br /&gt;Greg Costikyan on My Life with Master &lt;br /&gt;John D. Rateliff on Mythos &lt;br /&gt;Chris "Gerry" Klug on Napoleon's Last Battles&lt;br /&gt;John Scott Tynes on Naval War&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Erick Wujcik on Ogre&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Marc Gascoigne on Once Upon a Time &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;Mike Bennighof on PanzerBlitz&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;Steve Jackson on Paranoia&lt;br /&gt;Shannon Appelcline on Pendragon &lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;JD Wiker on Pirate's Cove&lt;br /&gt;Richard H. Berg on Plague!&lt;br /&gt;Martin Wallace on Power Grid &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Tom Wham on Puerto Rico &lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;J&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;oseph Miranda on Renaissance of Infantry&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;James Ernest on RoboRally&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Paul Jaquays on RuneQuest&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;em&gt;Richard Dansky on The Settlers of Catan&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;Ken St. Andre on Shadowfist &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Steven S. Long on Shadowrun&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Peter Corless on Shadows over Camelot &lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Dale Donovan on Silent Death: The Next Millennium&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Matt Forbeck on Space Hulk&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Ray Winninger on Squad Leader &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;Lewis Pulsipher on Stalingrad&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Bruce Nesmith on Star Fleet Battles&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Steve Winter on The Sword and the Flame&lt;br /&gt;Jeff Grubb on Tales of the Arabian Nights &lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;Shane Lacy Hensley on Talisman &lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;Douglas Niles on Terrible Swift Sword&lt;br /&gt;Ed Greenwood on Thurn and Taxis&lt;br /&gt;Mike Fitzgerald on Ticket to Ride &lt;br /&gt;Thomas Lehmann on Tigris &amp;amp; Euphrates &lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;Warren Spector on Tikal &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;David "Zeb" Cook on Toon&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt; &lt;br /&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Mike Pondsmith on Traveller &lt;/em&gt;(CT, MT, TNE, GT, T20)&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Zev Shlasinger on Twilight Struggle&lt;br /&gt;Kenneth Hite on Unknown Armies&lt;br /&gt;Sandy Petersen on Up Front&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;R. Hyrum Savage on Vampire: The Eternal Struggle&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;span&gt;&lt;em&gt;George Vasilakos on Vampire: The Masquerade&lt;/em&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;Kevin Wilson on Vinci &lt;br /&gt;R.A. Salvatore on War and Peace&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Jack Emmert on Warhammer 40,000&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;span style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial"&gt;Chris Pramas on The Warlock of Firetop Mountain&lt;/span&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;Steve Jackson on The Warlord&lt;br /&gt;John Wick on Wiz-War&lt;br /&gt;

&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Own 20, played 44, maybe 46&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:10666</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/10666.html"/>
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    <title>SF/F Book Meme etc.</title>
    <published>2006-11-15T18:12:03Z</published>
    <updated>2006-11-15T18:12:03Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;strong&gt;&lt;u&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;Meme copied from &lt;span class='ljuser ljuser-name_mytholder' lj:user='mytholder' style='white-space: nowrap;'&gt;&lt;a href='http://mytholder.livejournal.com/profile'&gt;&lt;img src='http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif' alt='[info]' width='17' height='17' style='vertical-align: bottom; border: 0; padding-right: 1px;' /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;a href='http://mytholder.livejournal.com/'&gt;&lt;b&gt;mytholder&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&amp;nbsp; 's blog.&amp;nbsp;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;This is a list of the 50 most significant science fiction/fantasy novels, 1953-2002, according to the Science Fiction Book Club. Bold the ones you've read, strike-out the ones you hated, italicize those you started but never finished, and underline the ones you loved.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;u&gt;1. The Lord of the Rings, J.R.R. Tolkien&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/u&gt;2. The Foundation Trilogy, Isaac Asimov&lt;br /&gt;3. Dune, Frank Herbert&lt;br /&gt;4. Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;&lt;u&gt;5. A Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula K. Le Guin&lt;br /&gt;6. Neuromancer, William Gibson&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;7. Childhood's End, Arthur C. Clarke&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;8. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Philip K. Dick&lt;br /&gt;9. The Mists of Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;10. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;11. The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;12. A Canticle for Leibowitz, Walter M. Miller, Jr.&lt;br /&gt;13. The Caves of Steel, Isaac Asimov&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;14. Children of the Atom, Wilmar Shiras&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;15. Cities in Flight, James Blish&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;&lt;u&gt;16. The Colour of Magic, Terry Pratchett&lt;/u&gt;&lt;br /&gt;17. Dangerous Visions, edited by Harlan Ellison&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;18. Deathbird Stories, Harlan Ellison&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;19. The Demolished Man, Alfred Bester&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;20. Dhalgren, Samuel R. Delany&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;21. Dragonflight, Anne McCaffrey&lt;br /&gt;22. Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;strike&gt;&lt;em&gt;23. The First Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Stephen R. Donaldson&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strike&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;24. The Forever War, Joe Haldeman&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;25. Gateway, Frederik Pohl&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;26. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, J.K. Rowling&lt;br /&gt;&lt;u&gt;27. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;28. I Am Legend, Richard Matheson&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;29. Interview with the Vampire, Anne Rice&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;30. The Left Hand of Darkness, Ursula K. Le Guin&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;31. Little, Big, John Crowley&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;32. Lord of Light, Roger Zelazny&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;33. The Man in the High Castle, Philip K. Dick&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;34. Mission of Gravity, Hal Clement&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;35. More Than Human, Theodore Sturgeon&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;36. The Rediscovery of Man, Cordwainer Smith&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;37. On the Beach, Nevil Shute&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;b&gt;&lt;u&gt;38. Rendezvous with Rama, Arthur C. Clarke&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/b&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;39. Ringworld, Larry Niven&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;40. Rogue Moon, Algis Budrys&lt;br /&gt;41. The Silmarillion, J.R.R. Tolkien&lt;br /&gt;42. Slaughterhouse-5, Kurt Vonnegut&lt;br /&gt;&lt;u&gt;43. Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson&lt;/u&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;44. Stand on Zanzibar, John Brunner&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;45. The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester&lt;br /&gt;&lt;u&gt;46. Starship Troopers, Robert A. Heinlein&lt;/u&gt;&lt;br /&gt;47. Stormbringer, Michael Moorcock&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;48. The Sword of Shannara, Terry Brooks&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;strong&gt;49. Timescape, Gregory Benford&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;strong&gt;50. To Your Scattered Bodies Go, Philip Jose Farmer&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I've read most of these at one time or another, including the older stuff. Looking at them, the evidence points to me preferring pulp to literature, though I draw the line at Terry Brooks. Still, there's a good variety of stuff there. I've read 40 of the 50, and at least started most of the rest.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In other news, I had an exam today, an MCP multiple choice exam via computer, and passed it comfortably in the end, though as usual I worried about it far too much. Still, the worry motivated me to study hard over the past few days, which seems to have paid off. It was a great relief to have it passed and done with.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;At the Fás course, we can leave as soon as we are finished on exam days, so I went into town and bought some cheap computer games&amp;nbsp;to celebrate.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:10076</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/10076.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=10076"/>
    <title>Gaelcon</title>
    <published>2006-10-31T21:00:22Z</published>
    <updated>2006-10-31T21:00:22Z</updated>
    <content type="html">I had a good time at Gaelcon this weekend despite the hike in all their prices this year. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I had trouble getting accomodation, but WARPS were kind enough to help me out. Thanks, WARPS.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The night before I headed up I noticed the backpack I was taking up had ripped slightly. I patched it up, but one of the straps ripped off on Sunday. Fortunately, I had another bag with me and was able to switch to that one.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I spent most of my time playing HeroClix, as I only get to play it at special events and cons nowadays.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;more after the cut...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a name="cutid1"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I had good fun with heroclix. Thanks to Brian Mulcahy and Paul Shorten for running the events. I was lucky enough to pull a special heroclix/horrorclix Zombie Spiderman from my Prerelease Supernova boosters.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I also pulled a U Thanos, with which I won the "Me-clix" scenario Paul invented and ran on Monday.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;All in all I was incredibly lucky clix-wise this weekend.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I also bought the &lt;a href="http://www.giantitp.com"&gt;Order of the Stick&lt;/a&gt; boardgame, based on the webcomic of the same name. I haven't had a chance to play it yet, but observed some others trying it out. Initially, it seems slow to get going, but familiarity with the rules should help. In any case it looks good to anyone familiar with the webcomic.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I played in the Cam Requiem game on Saturday, though I missed some of it.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;When I got home late on Monday I found out I had mice - they come in out of the cold around now. I set traps and caught two by the next morning. Hopefully that's all of them.&lt;br /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:9871</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/9871.html"/>
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    <title>Hmmm</title>
    <published>2006-09-28T16:51:49Z</published>
    <updated>2006-09-28T16:54:52Z</updated>
    <content type="html">another silly quiz result behind the cut. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;a name="cutid1"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;
&lt;br&gt;
&lt;table cellpadding="20" align="center"&gt;&lt;tbody&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td align="center"&gt;&lt;font size="5"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Ultimate Gamer!!&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/font&gt;&lt;br /&gt;GM says drop 2d10, aanndd... you roll 96% ! &lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;What, are you a first generation gamer? Did you own the brown box?! Whatever you do in your spare time, gaming seems to be your job. Either you looked up the answers or you're the best of the best, the type that makes other gamers strive to know more. Just don't let the knowledge overwhelm the newbies, it tends to push them from the hobby. We all bow before you. You are the living nat 20, congradulations. I'm going to flee the scene now ;) &lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td align="center"&gt;&lt;img alt="" src="http://is3.okcupid.com/users/166/288/16628998159541054245/mt1110331629.jpg" /&gt; &lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;/tbody&gt;&lt;/table&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;table cellpadding="20"&gt;&lt;tbody&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;&lt;span&gt;My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people &lt;em&gt;your age and gender&lt;/em&gt;: &lt;br /&gt;&lt;blockquote&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;table cellspacing="4" cellpadding="0" border="0"&gt;&lt;tbody&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td valign="middle"&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;table cellspacing="1" cellpadding="0" bgcolor="#000000" border="0"&gt;&lt;tbody&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td width="149" bgcolor="#b2cfff" height="20"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.okcupid.com/"&gt;&lt;img alt="free online dating" border="0" src="http://is1.okcupid.com/graphics/0.gif" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td width="1" bgcolor="#ffffff"&gt;&lt;a href="http://www.okcupid.com/"&gt;&lt;img alt="free online dating" border="0" src="http://is1.okcupid.com/graphics/0.gif" /&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;/tbody&gt;&lt;/table&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;td valign="middle"&gt;You scored higher than &lt;strong&gt;99%&lt;/strong&gt; on &lt;strong&gt;dice&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;/tbody&gt;&lt;/table&gt;&lt;/blockquote&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;/tbody&gt;&lt;/table&gt;&lt;table cellpadding="20"&gt;&lt;tbody&gt;&lt;tr&gt;&lt;td&gt;Link: &lt;a href="http://www.okcupid.com/tests/take?testid=13826541550696699943"&gt;The Real Gamers use Dice Test&lt;/a&gt; written by &lt;a href="http://www.okcupid.com/profile?u=luminasita"&gt;luminasita&lt;/a&gt; on &lt;a href="http://www.okcupid.com/"&gt;OkCupid Free Online Dating&lt;/a&gt;, home of the &lt;a href="http://www.okcupid.com/online.dating.persona.test"&gt;The Dating Persona Test&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/td&gt;&lt;/tr&gt;&lt;/tbody&gt;&lt;/table&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:9686</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/9686.html"/>
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    <title>amcathra @ 2006-09-14T19:35:00</title>
    <published>2006-09-14T18:39:11Z</published>
    <updated>2006-09-14T18:39:11Z</updated>
    <content type="html">D&amp;amp;D nerd alert! This will mean nothing to the uninitiated...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;EvilCorp Lives !!!&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; &lt;a href="http://www.vecna.com/ess/Evolution/BPAD/index.shtml"&gt;here&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:9471</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/9471.html"/>
    <link rel="self" type="text/xml" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/data/atom/?itemid=9471"/>
    <title>Pluto demoted, now 8 planets in Solar System</title>
    <published>2006-08-24T17:17:19Z</published>
    <updated>2006-08-24T17:18:31Z</updated>
    <content type="html">Pluto has been demoted to a dwarf planet by the International Astronomical Union's general assembly in Prague. This means the Solar System now has 8 planets, and loads of textbooks are now wrong and will have to be updated.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Three other objects have also been classified as dwarf planets.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Quoting from their site at &lt;a href="http://www.iau2006.org/"&gt;http://www.iau2006.org/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;"The IAU members gathered at the 2006 General Assembly agreed that a "planet" is defined as a celestial body that (a) is in orbit around the Sun, (b) has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a hydrostatic equilibrium (nearly round) shape, and (c) has cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit. "&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;"This means that the Solar System consists of eight "planets" Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. A new distinct class of objects called "dwarf planets" was also decided. It was agreed that "planets" and "dwarf planets" are two distinct classes of objects. The first members of the "dwarf planet" category are Ceres, Pluto and 2003 UB313 (temporary name). More "dwarf planets" are expected to be announced by the IAU in the coming months and years. Currently a dozen candidate "dwarf planets" are listed on IAU's "dwarf planet" watchlist, which keeps changing as new objects are found and the physics of the existing candidates becomes better known."&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;While this is a reclassification rather than anything profound, it is still scientific history that will change the textbooks.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:8977</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/8977.html"/>
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    <title>Risk Assessment</title>
    <published>2006-08-16T16:41:43Z</published>
    <updated>2006-08-16T16:41:43Z</updated>
    <content type="html">This morning at my Fás course we had an interesting and scary presentation from a person whose name escapes me at the moment about road safety. He presented a number of alarming statistics about road casualties in Ireland and some of the reasons why the numbers are going up, not down.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Part of the reason for the statistics are failures in education and training. The training documents for learner drivers have not been updated for 11 years, and are way out of date.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The old killer was drink driving, which of course still goes on, but we were told is more the sin of the older generation. The major killer of young males 17-25 is IMO simply hormones. They believe they are immortal and the best drivers in the world, based on their willingness to take risks and survive after them. The percentages go catch up with people though, if they keep taking stupid risks.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I saw a documentary recently about people living on the San Andreas fault, and how they blot out the ongoing risk of the "Big One" hitting, transferring it to say a pronounced interest in disasters in a far-off country. Similarly they ignore the fire threat from vegetation that has evolved to benefit from occasional fires, and look for arsonists to blame when the fires do come. (something I have heard in other countries as well, thinking about it).&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The same behavior apparently is seen in those living near active volcanoes and other intermittent, unpredictable dangers. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;This ability to ignore disaster staring you in the face is mystifying to me, but then danger has always repelled me, and I hate horror movies.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Basically, people suck at understanding probabilities, including gambling and risk assessment. Training can help, but people have an amazing ability to ignore the inconvenient, both as individuals and as groups.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:8958</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/8958.html"/>
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    <title>Quotations meme</title>
    <published>2006-08-16T16:21:38Z</published>
    <updated>2006-08-16T16:43:10Z</updated>
    <content type="html">Which is to go to &lt;a href="http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3"&gt;http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3&lt;/a&gt; which displays 10 random quotations and pick 5 of them.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night. &lt;br /&gt;Edgar Allan Poe (1809 - 1849), 'Eleanora,' 1842 &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Take away the miseries and you take away some folks' reason for living. &lt;br /&gt;Toni Cade Bambara &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me. &lt;br /&gt;Carol Burnett (1936 - )&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I'm not going to die because I failed as someone else. I’m going to succeed as myself. &lt;br /&gt;Margaret Cho, I'm The One That I Want, 1999 &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Complaining is good for you as long as you're not complaining to the person you're complaining about. &lt;br /&gt;Lynn Johnston (1947 - ), For Better or For Worse, 11-06-03</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:8659</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/8659.html"/>
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    <title>London visit comment</title>
    <published>2006-08-15T19:16:13Z</published>
    <updated>2006-08-15T19:16:13Z</updated>
    <content type="html">I am so glad that my visit to London was in July rather than last week. I flew to and from Heathrow and could easily have been one of the people queueuing in the rain.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;A friend of mine was caught in Stanstead, but the flight was an early on and he was "only" four hours delayed.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The alert has dropped in status at this point, but whether travel from the UK ever goes back to "normal" remains to be seen.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:8269</id>
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    <title>Retraining...</title>
    <published>2006-08-08T18:13:46Z</published>
    <updated>2006-08-08T18:13:46Z</updated>
    <content type="html">Last week I stated a Fás course in computer programming. Basically, this is to gain access to resources so that I can retrain myself in new technology, as my skills are out of date. And this part of the plan is fine, as the computers have the software I wanted to try out, MS Visual Studio.NET with Visual Basic.NET, Visual C#, some other stuff including Crystal Reports, and also Java (the sun version I think).&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I never did a formal course in Object oriented programming, and while I can muddle through it, keep feeling I am missing the core idea. The hope is that I will eradicate these misgivings during the course.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;A downside is that I have to sit through the teaching of elementary programming, something I did over 20 years ago (gulp, 24 years?!) (yawn). Still, a small price to pay for free access to the software, or so I try to tell myself. I have a load of notes from some other courses and saved online resources to keep myself busy if I get too bored.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Another downside is the 8.30 start, which I am still adjusting to. I was never a morning person per se, and am annoyingly waking up to early and then feeling tired all day. Still, plenty of time to adjust. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Also, they have disabled the internet in the lab - apparently it will be turned on half way through. All in all a good decision which eliminates the main source of distraction in IT, annoying though it may be to be without it for purely legitimate online study resources.</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:7963</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/7963.html"/>
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    <title>My holiday in London</title>
    <published>2006-07-25T17:50:39Z</published>
    <updated>2006-07-25T17:53:34Z</updated>
    <content type="html">On holidays in London with my sister Evonne and her husband Luis. They have been kind and excellent hosts. Their house is a few minutes from a tube station, which makes travelling in London much easier.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;It's hot in London, too hot for me. It's OK outside if you carry some water (I took a litre, and bought something at lunchtime as well), but in buildings without air conditioning it can be stifling, and the Tube at rush-hour is unbearable. I had to travel now though, as my course is starting at the end of the month.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;On the bright side it does mean girls wear skimpier clothing :) I also saw a lot of women using folding fans, which make a lot of sense in the current London heat. Evonne had picked one up in Seville on one of her visits.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;I have spent my hols here visiting museums, which are free. However, in this weather the more enclosed exhibitions are sweltering. Still, I had a good time and saw the Science Museum, Natural History Museum and the British Museum.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Friday night was an Ikea trip, where I sampled the Ikea cafe food and helped E&amp;L with a wardrobe. Saturday morning was breakfast in Ealing, followed by a walk around Chiswick.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;On Saturday evening Ashley and Hilary were most kind to provide me with a lift to and from the Reading Camarilla Requiem game, which was surprisingly eventful for a local game. It should keep me busy for a while Requiem-wise.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;On Sunday Evonne, Luis and I went for a picnic in Windsor by the river. Afterwards I decided not to bother queueing for the castle once we saw the size of the queue, so we settled for a walk around, and relaxing in one of the parks.. &lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;During my visit I did some shopping for books on Charing Cross Road, but got less than on previous trips, both because of a smaller budget and the impression that there were less second-hand shops around. I know that Murder Inc lost it's SF and F section in their move to a smaller premises across the road.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Because I bought less books I bought the D&amp;D PHB II at the Orc's Nest, mainly for the feats. It's out of my holiday budget, so that makes it OK :)&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Looking forward to cooler weather in Cork, which isn't surprising given my aversion to the sun. Not that I haven't greatly enjoyed my visit, but I don't think I would ever acclimatise to this sort of heat.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;                                                 Tom</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:7725</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/7725.html"/>
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    <title>Holidays soon</title>
    <published>2006-07-12T19:48:47Z</published>
    <updated>2006-07-12T19:48:47Z</updated>
    <content type="html">My sister Evonne in London is expecting and suggested I visit her before the new arrival takes away all her free time. So I am flying out for six days next week.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;She and her husband Luis visited Ireland recently, making arrangements somewhat easier being face-to-face.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;It's a while since I had a holiday and I am looking forward to it, though I will have to carefully watch the finances.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Before that there's Ubercon, the CIT convention that has arisen from the grave after a two-year(?) hiatus. If they can get their timetable set before the weekend, that is...</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:7479</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/7479.html"/>
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    <title>Escaped, finally...</title>
    <published>2006-07-12T19:42:28Z</published>
    <updated>2006-07-12T19:42:28Z</updated>
    <content type="html">That's enough of that...&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;a name="cutid1"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div style="background-color:#555; color:#eee; padding:8px 16px;border:8px #000 outset; width:60%; font-family:helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:center"&gt;&lt;h3 style="color:#fe0; background-color:#777; padding:8px; margin:0px"&gt;I escaped from the Dungeon of Mytholder!&lt;/h3&gt;&lt;p&gt;I killed Mouseferatu the floating eye, Ratmist the minotaur, Puritybrown the arch-demon, Eyebeams the kobold, Craigoxbrow the dragon, Gothwalk the fire elemental, Brannonb the floating eye, Omentide the zombie, Artbroken the nymph, Fluffworld the mind flayer, Coffee Lifeform the kobold, Arken Thell the mind flayer, Gamescribe the fire elemental, Frosthearted the owlbear, Coyotzin the leprechaun, Twistedtorment the arch-demon, Owatersprite the leprechaun, Dundragon the arch-demon, Irirshmadcat the zombie, Gbsteve the cockatrice, Markboss the giant spider, Sammywol the nymph, Samvail the goblin, Aeredhal the fire elemental, Saoili the floating eye, Maiatzm the leprechaun, Justhal the zombie, Neddyteddypoo the floating eye and Roh Bela Arraha the kobold.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;I looted  the Amulet of Jaarius, the Amulet of Luciddestiny, the Axe of Phoenixsong123, the Dagger of Joecrow, the Crown of Pwca, a Figurine of Scott Lynch, the Sceptre of the Never, the Crown of Crnixon, the Wand of Bog Boy, the Crown of Le Dazzler, a Figurine of Tequilamonster, a Figurine of Theanonamerican, the Dagger of Thecaptainsblog, the Armour of Mark Gedak, the Amulet of Mikegentry, the Amulet of Wilthoughts, the Crown of Joedizzy, the Sword of Kit Hartford, the Crown of Hrafen, the Amulet of Snesgirl, the Armour of Inkstained, a Figurine of Cavalorn, the Axe of Bluelang, the Sceptre of Yojimbouk, a Figurine of Mr Orgue, the Shield of Heyokish, the Armour of Mulkabu, the Armour of Stabarinde, the Sceptre of Psysquid, the Crown of Ezrael, the Wand of Natural20, the Shield of Ross Winn, a Figurine of Branan, the Wand of Aaronace, the Sword of Rsdancey, the Amulet of Sdemory, the Axe of Benpretend, a Figurine of Rich Ard, the Axe of Angusabranson and 589 gold pieces.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p style="color:#fe0; background-color:#777; padding:8px"&gt;Score: &lt;b&gt;1614&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;a href="http://thesurrealist.co.uk/dungeon?user=mytholder" style="color:#fe0;"&gt;Explore the Dungeon of Mytholder&lt;/a&gt; and try to beat this score,&lt;br&gt;or enter your username to generate and explore your own dungeon...&lt;form action="http://thesurrealist.co.uk/dungeon" method="get"&gt;&lt;input type="text" name="user" style="background: #fff url(http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) no-repeat scroll 0px 1px; padding-left: 18px; color: rgb(0, 0, 204); font-weight: bold;"&gt;&lt;input type="submit" value="Go"&gt;&lt;/form&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
  <entry>
    <id>urn:lj:livejournal.com:atom1:amcathra:7388</id>
    <link rel="alternate" type="text/html" href="http://amcathra.livejournal.com/7388.html"/>
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    <title>More constructive use of time...</title>
    <published>2006-06-30T20:35:26Z</published>
    <updated>2006-06-30T20:35:26Z</updated>
    <content type="html">&lt;a name="cutid1"&gt;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;div style="background-color:#555; color:#eee; padding:8px 16px;border:8px #000 outset; width:60%; font-family:helvetica, sans-serif; text-align:center"&gt;&lt;h3 style="color:#fe0; background-color:#777; padding:8px; margin:0px"&gt;I escaped from the Dungeon of Mytholder!&lt;/h3&gt;&lt;p&gt;I killed Mouseferatu the floating eye, Ratmist the minotaur, Eyebeams the kobold, Craigoxbrow the dragon, Aislinns the owlbear, Brannonb the floating eye, Mfp the mind flayer, Hideouspenguinb the arch-demon, Eng Monkey the troll, Ocultado the zombie, Hedgetrimmer the goblin, Coffee Lifeform the kobold, Ubiquitous Cat the mind flayer, Geisha Guy the orc, Gamescribe the fire elemental, Coyotzin the leprechaun, Twistedtorment the arch-demon, Owatersprite the leprechaun, Irirshmadcat the zombie, Markboss the giant spider, Sammywol the nymph, Scintilla Tales the giant spider, Saoili the floating eye, Amcathra the gelatinous cube, Maiatzm the leprechaun, Justhal the zombie, Neddyteddypoo the floating eye, Roh Bela Arraha the kobold and Hexjumper the cockatrice.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;I looted  a Figurine of Cavalorn, the Armour of Multiplexer, the Amulet of Metalrabbit, the Armour of Inkstained, the Amulet of Snesgirl, the Crown of Hrafen, the Wand of Natural20, the Sword of Kit Hartford, the Crown of Joedizzy, the Amulet of Wilthoughts, the Armour of Mark Gedak, the Armour of Mulkabu, the Armour of Stabarinde, the Sceptre of Psysquid, the Crown of Ezrael, the Axe of Bluelang, the Armour of Ladyjestyr, the Crown of Crnixon, the Sceptre of the Never, a Figurine of Scott Lynch, the Crown of Pwca, the Shield of Rpgactionfigure, a Figurine of Mr Orgue, the Shield of D Fuses, a Figurine of Theanonamerican, a Figurine of Tequilamonster, the Crown of Le Dazzler, the Wand of Bog Boy, the Axe of Benpretend, the Amulet of Mikegentry, the Sceptre of Elissa Carey, the Amulet of Sdemory, the Sceptre of Yojimbouk, the Amulet of Jaarius, a Figurine of Branan, the Wand of Aaronace, the Sword of Rsdancey, the Dagger of Thecaptainsblog, the Axe of Angusabranson and 699 gold pieces.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p style="color:#fe0; background-color:#777; padding:8px"&gt;Score: &lt;b&gt;1699&lt;/b&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;a href="http://thesurrealist.co.uk/dungeon?user=mytholder" style="color:#fe0;"&gt;Explore the Dungeon of Mytholder&lt;/a&gt; and try to beat this score,&lt;br&gt;or enter your username to generate and explore your own dungeon...&lt;form action="http://thesurrealist.co.uk/dungeon" method="get"&gt;&lt;input type="text" name="user" style="background: #fff url(http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) no-repeat scroll 0px 1px; padding-left: 18px; color: rgb(0, 0, 204); font-weight: bold;"&gt;&lt;input type="submit" value="Go"&gt;&lt;/form&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&lt;br /&gt;</content>
  </entry>
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