Ginger_Warrior

Re: IGN--Did you catch up on the shitstorm surrounding Eurogamer and Robert Florence? If you never read a games article again, please make this your last one. Absolutely fascinating editorial on the cozy relationship between journalists and the games industry itself. Re: Multiplayer--A lot of people are saying, "Just because it has loadouts doesn't make it CoD." I could counter that by saying, "Just because it has shields doesn't make it Halo." My perception might be down to lack of map familiarity. People are only just finding their feet in this new world, so maybe the chaos is a result of that rather than design.

And if the other person was never going to be interested in sex/relationship either, it would make it pretty hard for them to "friendzone" me, or vice versa, since there was never an alternative on the cards. I'm not getting at you. I think we agree. It's just I've seen some guys use the term "friendzone" as a negative connotation, as if sex is the holy grail of all relationships, and all guys should be looking for it, and all guys would be getting it because they should be God's gift to women, if only they weren't acting in socially inept ways which lead them to being "friendzoned". Then you get all the crap about 'Once you're in the friendzone you should move on to the next target and not bother', which at best is a sweeping generalisation and therefore has limited usefulness, and at worst is completely inappropriate advice to the person it's being given to as well as being slightly derogatory towards women. The term may have had a very valid meaning when it was first coined, but its use has actually become quite jockish and only relevant to males wanting to outdo each other in a sex count contest, or else males wanting to give other males a hard time and make them feel bad about themselves.

What if you want women to generally "friendzone" you? I have plenty of female friends who are quite attractive but I genuinely wouldn't want anything more than what we have, and I'm pretty sure they feel the same way. That doesn't stop me flirting with other women, though, and my communication skills are developed enough to know when other women don't want me to "friendzone" them.

Anxiety can only be conquered by valium (don't even think about it, that's powerful stuff) and exposure to whatever's causing you the anxiety. It'll get easier. One last piece of advice then: Pay for it on the night anyway, unless she really really objects, then you can at least go halves. I'm not trying to suggest your buying her affection, it's just a nice gesture that shows you've had a nice evening and wouldn't mind doing it again.

'Not too much' meaning that she ends it abruptly? I'd say generally, being flirty with another person at least keeps the door open to the possibility two people aren't "just friends". If she reciprocates, then it probably shows she wants to keep her options open too. If she's cutting you off, then she's likely not interested and just wants to be friends. Where are you going for this meal, then? Somewhere fancy or somewhere more casual?

In these conversations, do you just talk about stuff or does it ever get a bit flirty?

This is an argument based on an incredible amount of ignorance. You're acting as if people on welfare receive anything close to the working average wage. Cite numbers then. Because I can tell you in 2011 America spent more than $1 trillion on means tested welfare. E: http://www.foxbusine...r-cost-welfare/ That trillion figure means nothing without context. Is it for 800,000 people, or is it for eight million people? The economic consequences and the political points change quite drastically if you put that figure into any kind of perspective and analyse it properly. While the unemployment insurance schemes in America are fraught with various complexities, both on a state-by-state level and on a personal level, therefore making it very difficult to draw a representative, national figure, the average UI compensation packets only add up to about a third of the average working wage of the geographical region they are awarded in (Tobey/Washington Post, 2010). Clearly, missing out on the remaining two thirds of the average working wage isn't enough incentive for people who are unemployed to find work... Call it 100 million people, and instead they could've cut a check of more than $10,000 to each of them for the same amount. Or 47 million, the number of people on food stamps, and the number becomes more than $21,000. Yes, unemployment costs the state massively in social support and the loss in GDP because there's less jobs filled. They also cost healthcare systems, because the unemployed are generally not as healthy as their employed counterparts, especially when it comes to mental health. Why are you so surprised by this? Shall we depart on a mass murder of old people too? They act as a drain on society, moneywise. Why is it you seem to be making emotional appeals (A TRILLION DOLLARS?!?!) rather than reasoned logic as to why you think unemployment benefits--despite having a set time limit and despite only giving a third of what the average American picks up in a month, therefore leaving many of their fellow Americans below the poverty line by quite some distance--act as a disincentive from finding work?

I can't be the only one playing H4. So, what do we make of it? IGN gave it 98/100 but so far I'm really struggling to find the justification for giving a score that high. That's not to say Halo isn't a good game; it is. But having seen a score like that, I got really excited and, if the truth must be told, it's left me feeling slightly disappointed, because if I put my hand on my heart, I can't say Halo 4 is a great game. The campaign itself was interesting, and it had an engaging plot to it, but only after you put the controller down and spent some time thinking about it. Something which you didn't get much of a chance to do because the campaign was quite plainly structured of firefights punctuated by checkpoints, with no significant breathing space in between, despite there being no real sense of urgency in the the plot convincing you that you needed to be moving so quickly. They did a fantastic job of fleshing out Cortana's personality so you felt a genuine and heartfelt emotional connection with her, but I didn't get the same feeling from Chief. Maybe that was intentional, and for spoiler reasons, I won't elaborate on that possibility. What was very definite in my mind, however, was that 343i doesn't have that same ability of Bungie's to script good story-telling. From my experience on H3 and Reach, there were quiet sections between battles, which provided an opportunity for the game to explain the situation in a relatively calm environment via AI allies or Cortana etc. Those moments simply didn't exist in H4, except the Mammoth level. After the campaign, I went on Spartan Ops. This was probably the feature that excited me personally most about H4. There's plenty of potential in this game mode, and I'll have to wait until the next chapters come out to get a real picture of it. My only criticism in what was an otherwise thoroughly enjoyable playthrough was that it's too easy, even on the default Heroic difficulty setting; four Spartans can deal with firefights quite easily unless there's a curveball or two thrown their way. I'm hoping those twists will come in later sessions. MM (War Games) is the one I'm most ambivalent about. On the one hand, it's a massive improvement from Reach. AAs are more like useful add-ons than game changers, which is about the level they should be at. In fact, I've seen a lot of players forgo buying them altogether, they're that minor. Grenades are nerfed, which was a much needed change from Reach where half the game could be spent ducking and diving between a frag-fest, and even if you couldn't hit a donkey's ass with a DMR, you could do alright with a sticky or two. The loadouts have been well-balanced, even if the age-old BR "overpowered" problem has obviously reared up again. On the other hand... Halo is meant to be a more tactical FPS, something more like BF than CoD. So why give an AA that lets people see through walls at an enemy guarding a chokepoint with a shotgun/scattershot/sword? Why make the weapons spawn at semi-random locations across the map, and then point to where they are on the HUD just in case you're really thick? Why allow people to load the traditional power weapons out of the ordnance? Map and weapon control were key features of Halo gameplay--it isn't now, which leaves me asking what the keys to matchmaking victory are in the new Reclaimer era Halo. So far, from what I've seen, it's which team's members can jump the most unpredictably whilst still firing headshots. The now-instant spawns and lack of consistent spawn points also mean that you can kill someone, check their body for ammo/weapons, and be shot at by that same player, and any of his/her teammates who happened to die at a similar time, within a few seconds of killing them. That problem's made worse by the relatively easy nature of killing players; it's simply not that hard to shoot for the head on this game compared to other Halo titles, and with four bursts of the BR, they're gone without giving them much of a chance to retaliate. Which, even if it is a good MM experience still, doesn't feel like Halo at all. Eurogamer gave it 8/10. Now, that's a score I can find much more justification for.

This is an argument based on an incredible amount of ignorance. You're acting as if people on welfare receive anything close to the working average wage. Cite numbers then. Because I can tell you in 2011 America spent more than $1 trillion on means tested welfare. E: http://www.foxbusine...r-cost-welfare/ That trillion figure means nothing without context. Is it for 800,000 people, or is it for eight million people? The economic consequences and the political points change quite drastically if you put that figure into any kind of perspective and analyse it properly. While the unemployment insurance schemes in America are fraught with various complexities, both on a state-by-state level and on a personal level, therefore making it very difficult to draw a representative, national figure, the average UI compensation packets only add up to about a third of the average working wage of the geographical region they are awarded in (Tobey/Washington Post, 2010). Clearly, missing out on the remaining two thirds of the average working wage isn't enough incentive for people who are unemployed to find work...

This is an argument based on an incredible amount of ignorance. You're acting as if people on welfare receive anything close to the working average wage.

I know. Supporting Muslims is a such a terrible, dirty thing to do. What next--the commie Russians?! I don't understand this notion of cutting ties with Israel. Both candidates could barely have emphasised their commitment to Israel more. They spent half of the final debate talking about how important Israel was to US foreign policy concerning the Middle East. Anyone who claims the US is breaking off from supporting Israel is showing just how blind and ignorant they are to what the policies actually were, from both candidates.

Fascinating polling analysis from Florida. Obama and Romney doing even better than the Democrats and Republicans did with young people and whites respectively. It's becoming very apparent that they've spent a massive amount of their campaigns on making their own political bases very solid. It does make a mockery of those who claim this election has been too bipartisan, though. This election is very apparently divisive.

Yes, you are. The kind thing to do is let her die of coronary heart disease. Idiot.

Has anyone heard from pokemama recently?

That much is true. I'm being very careful to draw a line between Romney and the Tea Party, even if there is this pseudo-relationship between the Tea Party and the GOP, and then hence, Romney himself.

Romney is definitely not part of the KKK, nor does he represent anything about it, or its values; any reasonable person can see that. Any reasonable person can also see that Obama does not support terrorist or Islamist activity. Is it perhaps reasonable, though, to suggest that beliefs held by certain extreme elements inside the Tea Party are a throwback to the KKK? Is there any real difference between saying, "I'm not sure if I'll vote for him because he's black" and "I'm not sure if I'll vote for him because he's a Muslim"? (Which Obama isn't anyway, but hypothetically speaking if he were) One's discrimination based on race, the other is on religion. Apart from that, I see no difference at all.

I had to learn how as part of my first aid course. Which reminds me, I need to retake the course next year. You need to take a first aid course every 3 years for it to be valid in the workplace. It also has to be WorkCover approved. If it's first aid, that would be epinephrine for anaphalaxis, right? We have to know about Epipens (autoinjectors) to be a first aider in the UK. I can imagine anaphalaxis being more common in Australia, simply because there's more insects willing to bite you with foreign antigens.

So we got taught how to give subcutaneous and intramuscular injections today. Earned the first needle stick injury of my career as I was unsheathing an insulin syringe. Bloody hurt too. :sad:

To a certain extent, I don't mind that situation. If that did happen, it's my fault for putting the information on Facebook in the first place and making the information available to the public, not Jagex's customer services team, and I accept the risk that if I quit and I'm not longer monitoring my account's activity, someone might try to take advantage of that. There has to be some level of personal responsibility, and now that we have JAG, if you fail to make use of it then you don't really deserve much sympathy.

You have to wonder whether those people are really that disdainful of the two main parties, or whether they've simply failed to engage with politics at all, and refused to accept that governing itself entails compromise because you need to work with people, not against them. I've not yet come across a political manifesto that's been completely fulfilled--I vote for the party whose manifesto best reflects my personal views, in full knowledge they probably won't be able to carry those promises out to their entirety, but will probably follow them in that general direction.

I thought I'd been hacked after nine months of inactivity but after checking a few things and punching in a few sums, I can't possibly have been. All my cash was gone, but my items were still there, a lot of them could have been sold too, so it just didn't make sense that I'd been hacked. I think looking at my herblore level, I must have spent all my stuff on that, and put the rest of my cash in MTK before quitting. There's probably a rational explanation. I have no macro offenses, proven or otherwise, against my account.

Yeah, with Plat Myr, I don't think anyone really "trains" Farming per se. Time is always the limiting factor in Farming because trees take so long to grow; it's something people spend money and train as a secondary priority alongside everything else. Good luck with it though!

I'd have bet on the popular vote. I think the polls being shown by the Republicans are using demographics which mean they're no longer as accurate a sample of the whole country as they could be, and I think incumbent governments in general enjoy a 1-2% boost as the day gets closer and voters who previously threatened to go somewhere else "come home". I think it'll be close, but Obama will win the popular vote by 1 or 2%. Unless Obama does something drastically wrong today or tomorrow, or unless Mitt Romney finds proof he is actually God amongst us, the EC is as good as decided already. Romney simply hasn't made enough progress in swing states he needs to win.

Never underestimate how the Internet feels about marijuana.

Drunk actions are sober thoughts. And there's probably a reason you'd kept them at the "thought stage" to begin with.