Universal Driving Laws

Ok, recently I've come to look at driving differently. I have set up these rules, but I have on several occasions broken several them. But this is what I believe is what separates the good drivers from the bad ones.

1. Be alert
2. Be calm
3. Be considerate
4. Be predictable
5. Don't send an sms
6. Don't talk on your cellphone
7. Don't flash or bright the guy in front of you
8. Keep a comfortable following distance
9. If you drive fast, drive with your headlights on, and especially follow rules 1-8.
10. If you drive slowly, don't sit in the fast lane, and don't be shy to put on the emergency lights, and go into the yellow lane.
11. Put on your indicators BEFORE you actually turn.
12. Keep your car in a roadworthy condition.
13. You may add more, but think before you add more, because it may be you transgressing some of the above rules rather than the other person doing something stupid.

Dog Owner Email

Ok. I cannot send this along. I am not someone to spam others. However, I do feel that this message needs to sent out. So those of you out there that read this, may spam others with it.

(I snipped the 185 other names that was added to the list)




Dear Friends & Colleagues,

I was horrified and shocked to see the article in the Daily Voice yesterday
about Tammy, a dog that had been burnt so badly by her owners.

The owners wanted to punish her for jumping over the wall into the
neighbours place. They fetched her and put her in her kennel and set it
alight.

I am not sure how many of you have seen the pictures. As an animal lover
it brought tears to my eyes because she was burnt so badly. The SPCA had
to put her down.

The SPCA have removed the other 2 dogs from these people and are pressing
criminal charges against them. I am therefore appealing to all animal
lovers to please add your name to the petition so that the owners are given
the maximum punishment befitting to them.

I have spoken with the Daily Voice, and we have an agreement that they will
forward the signatures to the SPCA to use in the prosecution of these
people. PLEASE, if you agree, please sign the petition and forward to as
many contacts as possible. Every 200 signatures, please return to me:
hfaulman@bremner.uct.ac.za ... This
will then be forwarded to the Daily Voice who in turn will forward it to
the SPCA.

Thank you and regards,
Hillary


1. Hillary Faulmann
2. Jody Faulmann
3. Justin Faulmann
4. Reenen Laurie

Driving?

Ok, blogs are sometimes meant as just a boiler...

What is more frustrating to you on the road - highway (120km/h limit)?

The guy in front of you going at 100km/h in the FAST lane...

or

The guy behind you, while you are doing 110km/h in the FAST lane to pass the 100km/h truck in the SLOW lane, flashing his lights at you when he's doing 140km/h+?

PS: I substituted LEFT and RIGHT for fast and slow to make it more readable for the international audiences... (Like I have a lot of international hits)

Diplomacy Game

So, I started a diplomacy game with only south africans.

I hope they don't google me, because they'll find this reference and maybe I'll give them inside info they might want to know.

This is how it looks before the second set of moves:

Now, some of these players are kings in the diplomacy circles (Turkey and Russia), and some (like me, germany and I think france) are pretty much noobs.

So, at this stage I am looking for france to assist me into munich, and turkey to assist me into greece.

How it will pan out, I'll see. But I thought that Italy is traditionally the worst, so I'll try to go big or go home. So if both my moves fail, and austria stabs me, I'll be out of the game in absolutely no time. (Which is fine)

The way I am reading the diplomacy is somewhat odd, but I think that France will indeed assist me, but I am unsure of Turkey's intentions. Also I think that the austrian fleet will go into venice, but if it does, so goes.

That's it for now, I'll let you guys know how it went next week.

Inside Man

So, I went to see Inside Man last nigt.

Summary: 9/10

A very "smart" movie, interesting plot, and apparently (I am not someone who analyzes directors) Spike Lee's original style etc.

I would recommend it to all my friends, only those who are extremely sensitive for bad language should give it a miss.

Magic: Nationals!

Ok, after almost genuinely a sleepless night (the question of "What am I going to play at Nationals?" bugged me, and after that was answered the excitement kept me awake) I finally figured out what I want to play at nationals.

(Oh, by the way, I qualified for nationals, by playing Durham's Zoo deck.)

For me, I first check what are my chances against Zoo, if I have a good ratio, then I know I am set against all aggro... Gruul included.

So far, this deck has been tested against Zoo, and it comes out tops... I still have to test against Greater Good, and Ghazi Glare (which is big here in Cape Town)...

Anyway here it is... Blood Moon is the winner. :-)

Deckname: Warp the Bloody Moon
Designer: Reenen Laurie
4 Mountain
5 Plains
4 Temple Garden
9 Forest
4 Loxodon Hierarch
4 Faith's Fetters
4 Anarchist
4 Warp World
3 Carven Caryatid
3 Blood Moon
3 Heartbeat of Spring
2 Sensei's Divining Top
4 Birds of Paradise
4 Sakura-Tribe Elder
3 Utopia Sprawl
SB: 3 Cranial Extraction
SB: 1 Swamp
SB: 4 Defense Grid
SB: 1 Island
SB: 3 Confiscate
SB: 3 Ivory Mask


Tiaan says his plays Kumano too, and I think it's a good idea to get some "burning" going…

Americans Quotes

"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public."
H. L. Mencken (1880 - 1956)

Dnd - boring etc.

I'll CC the blog on an email I wrote just now...

My honest opinion is that DND should *all* be about the plot and as little as possible combat.

Combat takes (much) longer than it would do real time, and the uber slow speed is just unbelievable.

If I were a DM these days, I'll give 1000's of XP for "plot completing" and give a 10x bonus for "negotiating" bad guys rather than fighting them.

The last game I played was where everyone was high level and we basically had 2 fights with high level monsters per session. The plot dragged on at a snail's pace. Characters died the whole time, and recreating new ones is almost as tedious as the combat were that killed them.

I'll give a lot to be back in my brother's game world. We started out as two character's offering to transport a package from Ten-Trees-at-River's-End to Tremien (? - can't remember the town's name... and my character came from that town)... and ended up by us being wanted by the biggest church of the game world, as well as half of the underdark's elven kings.

We started off as level 1 characters and worked our way up slowly but surely up to level 6... Which in terms of today's games arent that high.

We had a half-crazy half-ogre accompanying us, who'd do all kinds of crazy things like throw his sword (bastard sword) at the enemy to distract it, and then run in with his fists and "bite". Also he was very fashionable... or so he thought. Warrior wannabe-bard with extravagant clothing (something quite a lot of the loot he got was
spent on).

I think (but I am not sure) his name was Janu Whitherbee or something like that... A self proclaimed name he chose because it sounds sophisticated. I'd say he had about 11 intelligence, but liked to think he had 16 or 18. :-)

It's amazing how I can still remember these characters that was part of my life probably more than 8 years ago. It was because my eldest brother is a pro story writer, and maybe my own imagination was/is so strong.

A great DM makes for the best game there is, that I'd love to play again.

My googlepages has been updated

Hi all,

I've really been stuggling to update my google pages, when I realized that it was googlepages that didn't support Firefox. So, much to my dissappointments I opened up IE (bundled with my XP) and logged on and did some changes.

So, anyone interested in some of my family photos etc. just click on the title of this post.

Women and men

Well, I had an interesting experience last night.

I was at UWC (University of the Western Cape). I often visit US (University of Stellenbosch) and have to visit the bathroom (obviously) every now and then.

In Stellenbosch's bathrooms, there are all kinds of graffiti, but mostly about guys wanting to arrange a "meeting", and just writing rude stuff in general. (There are also those who want to convert the others by writing things like "You'll have to attone for you actions" etc.

Anyway, so I was in the UWC library (a fairly impressive library, beautiful architechture, filled with staircases passageways) and I got to the very top level about 6 stories high. There in the very corner is a male bathroom, which I entered.

Needless to say it was filled with rude graffiti, but interestingly some of the graffiti was made with a lighter against the roof. (Don't these people know that paint are flamable?) Then one story down, was a female bathroom. This was at the edge of the library, so I felt it safe, and I wanted to know... I entered the female bathroom and found .... not one scratch. The place was fine, not even a "My boyfriend is bigger than your's" comment.

Now I ask myself, what are men's issues? Why do they need to write stuff on the walls? What makes us do these stuff?

Even I have graffitied on a bathroom door. (I made a circle and wrote: "Graffiti Here:")

I don't know, and I doubt I'll ever know. Women are hard to understand, and men generally make sense... but this is just beyond me.

Time Spiral - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Time Spiral - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

"Keyword abilities from past sets, such as Morph and Flanking, are rumored to return."

Morph!!! Flanking :-/

"This surprise is rumored to be a reprint of Akroma, Angel of Wrath."

I hope they reprint exalted angel. :-)

Zombies!!!

Twilight Creations Inc - Zombies!!!

So, I got to play some zombies the yesterday. Pretty entertaining. I read Cassey's comments about the game, and though I appreciate what she said, I did not find a great deal of satisfaction in "screwing" the other players.

Comments I frequently make about the random penalty in 30 seconds (the 0-2 die) include that the game device is faulty, because they made the board too small they've introduced this stupid die. Rather double the board size, and give a random bonus.

Back to zombies!!! Cards that make you skip a turn, or inhibit the other player makes for non-pleasurable experience. Why not have a card that say "you take another turn", than have a card to say "Target player misses his next turn".

Everyone wants to play. Making someone not play isn't fun for them.

Our game ended eventually with positive synergies rather than negative ones. And I think the game played as "teams" will work excellent. As positive synergies are great, and the negatives aren't as bad because you've still got a team member who you can be "involved" with.

So if I play zombies again, I'd very much like to officially include "team" rules.

Visual Pattern Fluid Intelligence Test

So Kestell's blog had a link to this site. I did this test.

I generally try not to put too much thought into these things. Though I put some into it. I always do well, and I finish it before hand. You have 15m for this, and I still had more than half of the time left.

Your overall percentile is 87% which means you scored higher than 87% of the people who have taken this test.

So if you are interested in visual pattern tests... click the link above.

Commons Deck

Ok, this one is vannila, no uncommons or rares... Haven't tested it, (nor did I the previous one) but it looks decent. Once again terrarion...

Evasion and card advantage...
11 Swamp
10 Plains
4 Last Gasp
2 Consume Spirit
4 Mourning Thrull
4 Ravenous Rats
4 Nezumi Cutthroat
4 Terrarion
4 Faith's Fetters
4 Shrieking Grotesque
4 Kami of Ancient Law
2 Death Denied
3 Stinkweed Imp

One card that maybe should make it is Unholy Strength...

Uncommons Deck

Well, it's probably missing the spirit of the deck, as it's playing a whole lot of PRIZE uncommons. Most notably the Selesnya Guildmages, Vitu Ghazi, Moldervine Cloaks, Watchwolf, Dryad Sophisticate and seedspark. Just Fists, Faiths, Transluminants and Terrarrion that's not uncommon.

Big question mark on the Terrarions and the Transluminants though, but they are turn 1 drops and thins the deck. I decided not to include the loxodon warhammer, but they would be pretty cool on the Skarrgan Pit-Skulks.

Other obvious common lacking is the Mourning Thrull...

Here goes then.

7 Plains
3 Vitu-Ghazi, the City-Tree
9 Forest
3 Selesnya Sanctuary
2 Fists of Ironwood
4 Seed Spark
4 Faith's Fetters
4 Moldervine Cloak
4 Selesnya Guildmage
4 Watchwolf
4 Skarrgan Pit-Skulk
4 Terrarion
4 Transluminant
4 Dryad Sophisticate

OkCupid

I haven't blogged for a while for a couple of reasons, but mostly because I was waiting for more responses from my Sexiest Woman post. :-)

All things aside though, I'd like to say that a lot of my procastinating time have been spent on OkCupid these days. The site is a free dating site, which results in it having loads of ads on it, a lot of it with sexual content. But it is still a worth while site for doing interesting tests.

There are not a lot of CT people there though, and I think very little SA ppl overall.

As a single male in cape town I feel I have to tell people (preferably females) about this site.

Nuff said for today. :-)

Top 10 world's sexiest women unveiled

Top 10 world's sexiest women unveiled

Here is a text list, and my link will take you to my favourite, Keira Knightley.

1. Scarlett Johansson
2. Angelina Jolie
3. Jessica Alba
4. Jessica Simpson
5. Keira Knightley (my personal favourite)
6. Helle Berry
7. Jenny McCarthy
8. Maria Sharapova
9. Carmen Electra
10. Teri Hatcher


I think the photo's on this web page aren't the best, but they are decent.

Jenny McCarthy has a really bad photo, and Teri's age shows a bit in hers. Jessica Alba's photo's isn't great, but her beauty still shows through.

My list (from these) summarised would be:

1. Keira Knightley
2. Jessica Alba
3. Maria Sharapova / Carmen Electra (toss up)

Honourable mention to (in sequence)
Scarlett Johansson
Jessica Simpson

and the rest doesn't really cut it IMO. Or at least on these photos.

Radie Stadler

It is always a bit awkward when someone dies that you did not know well, but would have liked to. Radie Stadler, a truely amazing man, died yesterday (26/03/2006).

He was someone in whom I saw quite a lot of myself. In the office he was always full of jokes, and knew life is about more than money and career. I always stand around corners frightning people when they turn around etc. and Radie is the only one who ever did the same to me.

I easily related to his warmth and his kindhearted nature. He was truely someone who lived life as I believe it should, for fun and making others happy and feel good.

I did a google search on him, and it revealed nothing. Hopefully this blog will now be hit to show something of this great man.

R

I'm on Google Pages

Reenen se Laurielys prentjies en dinge


So, Google invited me (because I was on the waiting list) to use their Google Pages service. But since I already have the blog, I decided I'd rather dedicate that page to the LaurieLys. It's our family's mailing list, which, like all things on the web etc. dies out if it doesn't quite reach critical mass. I do believe though as more of the grandkids reach university, there will be more developments and post there. But for now the Laurielys isn't very active.

Hopefully my site will help it get off from it's knees again.

Human Rights Day

So we, South Africa, celebrated Human Rights Day yesterday.

Personally I relished the oppertunity to celebrate my rights. Especially my right to stay at home and play computer games and design a Magic Deck - I am thinking of splashing green though.

I heard on the radio earlier that some other (developed) countries doesn't have a human rights day. I believe it's our RIGHT to have a human rights day. :-)

I think however that for black south african's (and all others who were part of the "struggle") this means something else. To have gained back their human rights is actually truely something to be celebrated.

And therefore, without having done anything really constructive (in a non-magic sense) I actually believe that this day is something special and should be cherished.