Pete_the_Viscous

I liked Civilisation: call to power and Alpha Centauri. A while ago I bought Civilisation III, though, and I found that one to be not as good. The reason, I think, was that, while it claimed to be more advanced and to have better AI (and all that sort of thing), I found it to be much more limiting, and that it presented far fewer options on how to play it. Perhaps that was just me; I know other people that liked it more than the others. I might get Civ 4, but if I do, it'll be after waiting long enough for it to become cheap.

I don't really have anything to add, but I wanted to assert my appreciation of Pink Floyd. Actually, I do have stuff to add after all. Maybe this is commonly known, but Douglas Adams (the man who wrote the The Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy series and all that) was a friend of Dave Gilmour, and it was he who picked the name "The Division Bell" for that album (from the lyrics). Also, for his 42nd* birthday, he played guitar at a concert of theirs, or something like that. *or so I read. and here's a quote="some website. Answers.com, or something" In the original radio series, as Arthur Dent, Trillian, Zaphod Beeblebrox and Marvin the Paranoid Android step out onto the lost planet of Magrathea, atmospheric music from Wish You Were Here (Shine on you Crazy Diamond part I of IX) plays. Arthur asks "Did you know that robot can hum like Pink Floyd?" and Marvin switches to rock and roll on request./quote

Go as the Shaman Elements set. (This is most definitely NOT me, in case you're wondering).

No. Thankfully, I've led a rather uneventful life -- things have just never come up. I'm sure I'd do so if anything so much as a pin-[puncture] happened to me, but... nope, nothing so far. Oh, wait -- I'm pretty sure I'll have cried with laughter a few times; yeah, so I have done so, but never "unhappily".

Time to dig out my old score, to demonstrate how not to do it (and to warn of those who would post fakes): There. Beat that.

I don't know how well known it is -- shouldn't be too hard, though.

Down our way (that phrase always reminds me of the Blackadder episode in which he suggests numerous, humerous invented words to Dr. Johnson: "it is a common word, down our way"). So anyway, down our way a Chav and a Scallie are two different things. Well, that's not strictly true, as scallies are a division of chav -- I had them down as the sort of who wears almost exclusively dark/black clothing --for some reason -- and is (somehow) worse behaved.

That's a good point... but I'd still rather not have the chavs -- they're not the only jokes in the world.

While I know what you mean, and it is wrong to apply stereotypes to people like this... we're having a go at the people who DO conform to the stereotype -- the people who are all the same, and are[ like that :). While it's wrong to say something like "Those people who listen to X genre of music are all morons" there's surely nothing wrong with complaining about the sort of person described by the steretype: the morons who listen to that sort of music. On top of that... for someone to be an "emo" person (as far as I know -- I only ever hear the word on Tip.it) they must conform to that sterotype. Now, while I'm not going to start actually saying that they're bad people -- as usual, I don't know enough about it, and don't have an oppinion -- surely people can, with all accuracy in the world, talk about "those Emo kids who slit their rists and listen to x sort of music" -- if the person doesn't do that, are they an Emo person -- that's what I'm getting at. Maybe I've completely missed the point, and that's not what these people do. Even so, because in this case it is the stereotype that defines the person (unlike saying something like "Emoians* are all drug addicts" -- in which case the type of person existed before the steretype), I think it's justified for people to be able to say what they want about Emo-folk. If they started saying "oh, those emo people do yyy", then anyone who didn't do yyy would cease to be an emo-face. *I am at a loss as to how to use the word, even.

The tragedian -- the founder of Emo! Anyway, while there is certainly a place for songs about tragedies, and how someone left the singer for their best friend, and how the singer now wants to cut various body parts off and mail them to their bank manager...&c., having a band whose only purpose is to write these is -- I think -- silly. I'm about to get optimistic on yo' [wagon]. After all, there is always someone worse off than you -- why not have a good laugh at their expense? I do it all the time: hahaha! why, only today I saw a badly disabled woman fall over in the park!* --see? Easy. You know The Cure? There's an example of a band who can do tragic sounding songs, wear makeup and mascara/whatever it is that people darken their eyes with and get the balance right, with "happy" songs, too. *no, I'm not quite that nasty -- not quite.

I'm still waiting on news of Sven Co-op 2. That ought to be great. Day of Defeat... I get confused between that and two other wartime mods -- but I think it was DoD that I liked. Ought to be good, also.

Off topic, but: Das Boot -- that's a film? I remember seeing it on TV, in... I don't know "installments" -- I assumed it was a TV series.

Again, a good point. However (and, please, believe me when I say I have nothing against the USA), it's also fair to say that the USA has rather more money and resources than most other countries. In fact, it's likely (and, no, I'm obviously not an economist) that, if everyone put their minds to it, the USA could sort out it's own poverty problems, and help other countries with theirs. I mean, come on: sure, every country has poor people -- it's in the nature of a society (it just is) -- but compare how many poor and starving people there are in the USA with... well, any third world country, and surely it is lower? Anyway, the point I was making was one about selflessness, (see my second post on this topic to establish that I don't give a damn, by the way): putting others first, in other words. I gather that the majority of the USA is Christian. I also gather that it's christian of someone to put others' needs above their own. Seriously: you said that you've seen kids sit in school, not eating anything because they're too poor? Well what about those kids in other countries for whom an education is something only to dream about, for lack of funds? ----but seriously, I'm only saying this in response to what you said: I don't, as I will keep saying, care what the USA does with its money: it's none of my business, and I was only saying that there are other things to think about (see above post). So yeah -- while, as indy500fan said it's all subjective, and as the first poster said, lots of countries view the USA as being bad (not that that's necessarily true, or anything), and as I say, it's not right to make statements along the lines of "we give more than enough" or "you don't give enough", simply because there are always more ways of looking at it.

I see what you mean. Anyway, good list of words that: a lot of them are ones that lots of people don't often use in conversation, whereas a lof of the other words people have been putting up are... commonplace, really.

While I completely respect that (notice that I didn't say I expect the USA to do things), the majority of people in the world have a similar sense of morals. So, while you're right, it's subjective, and not everyone will agree, most people will. This is why I used the word "one" not "indy500fan". For the same reason, most people aren't criminals and most people don't like violence. Frankly, I myself don't care what the USA does: I just felt like pointing out a reason for what the poster was complaining about, to show that it's not a one-sided argument.

What, one of the many crises that plague the USA, such as the terrible famine, ruthless civil war and unstable system of government? Countries like Indonesia should damn well do more for America, instead of being so selfish and relying on America for aide whenever they have even the slightest problem. Seriously, though -- you say that people regard the USA as bad when they don't help out other countries less fortunate than they? Well, think of it this way: is it not wrong to not right a wrong when it's quite within one's power to do so? There are so few situations in which a country as powerful as the USA would be of no help to another country, that others are bound to be a little suspicious if there is no aid forthcoming from them, when other, far less fortunate countries are pitching in. That's not to say that the USA doesn't do a terrific job in helping out outher countries when they're in need. I'm just pointing out that, yes, people will look down on a big country if it doesn't do it's moral duty. Edit: I have pre-emptively bolded the sentence above so that, if and when someone accuses me of USA bashing (likely), I don't have to quote them quoting me, and bold the bit where I said nice things.

Satiated -- what you have there is the dictionary.com definition of "satiate". Satiated is to satiate as full is to fill.

What darkrick said. I can't do it myself, mind, but I'm pretty sure that it's a cse of doing it and doing it and doing it, until it finally works one day. That's how almost everyone learns to whistle, how to click their fingers and how to do that owl impression.

Sounds like the -- I think they were called --- CATs they make 11 year olds take here to see if they're stupid or not. An example:

So there. Anyway, I just had to make a reference to the bottom episode in which they are stuck on a ferris wheel. Hole, I think it's called. I can't quote it, as it's rude. Here, is the script -- mods take this out if it's not allowed: here Click on that, then search it for "come back as a" then read from that line.

No, I didn't, but now I really want to. I haven't seen that for ages -- do you know if it's still being run at all?

Yes: both sorts of things (i.e. thinking there are more steps that I've gone up already, and dream-walking, and waking myself up with the movement). What I find worse, though, is when -- and I think it's called "sleeper's paralysis" -- one wakes up just enough of one's body to be conscious, but not enough to move limbs. That's just so horrible a feeling; being trapped, like that.

It's a bit one-track-minded* to assume that everything is goverened by logic like that. After all, if there's a god (not that I'm saying that there is, or anything), then anything's possible. It would pi... annoy a lot of people to say otherwise, considering that he/she/it is meant to be all powerful. Also, one could argue that it is green by one definition, and that it isn't green by another definition; in which case, it "is" green, and it "isn't" green, irrespective of the fact that it both is and isn't. Green, after all, isn't as simple as "A": it can meen so many different things, which is, of course, the point of that sort of riddle**. That sort of logic is far too complicated to use in this sort of forum; most people won't understand it, and even most of those who do will see that there's no practical use for it in this sort of discussion. On topic/ I don't know any good riddles that aren'y widely known already. There follows a token one that I looked up just now, seeing as I had nothing else to add to the discussion: My life can be measured in hours; I serve by being devoured. Thin, I am quick; fat, I am slow. Wind is my foe. What am I? The answer is "candles", for those of you who didn't get that from the first. Edit: here, this is the place from which I got that one. It's quite nice: HEERE!!!1!!tothemax *by which I mean no offense, be assured. A joke. **I assume, I've not read back far enough to check -- probably, though.

Same here: it gives one something to think about -- [fullness-of-self]after all, I know everything else :roll: ... and I bet you expected a "[/fullness-of-self]", there, huh :)? * Seriously, though: I have lots of ideas about what happens, though I'm not really sure I believe any of them. *Oh, and another way of looking at it: the later one actually finds out the better, I'd say.

Ever heard the song about the periodic table? Someone actually wrote all the element names down, put them in an order in which they at least sort of rhyme, and sang them. All of them. I myself don't make songs to remember things; instead, the best way I've come across is to read through what you need to know each evening: after doing it enough times it becomes -- or so they say, and so it seems to me -- lodged in your long term memory, rather than just hanging about in your short term memory. This really does work (for me, and almost certainly for others), and it's what I'd recomend you do.