Family: Liana Begins a Blog
Well, my current obsession with blogging apparently wasn't sufficiently terrifying to keep my wife away. I give you a valley, two vines, and a flower. I, at least, am looking forward to her future posts.
An assortment of Glenn's writings, photography, gaming resources, flash movies, and other creative output.
Well, my current obsession with blogging apparently wasn't sufficiently terrifying to keep my wife away. I give you a valley, two vines, and a flower. I, at least, am looking forward to her future posts.
Warning: This recipe is still in beta. I was looking for a good way to prepare two dark chicken quarters using other ingredients lying around, so the other night I pioneered this, and it came out great. That said, the proportions below may still require some adjustment.
I was hitting random blogs, trying to figure out if there was a way to apply my own style sheet to the new Blogger comment system, (there doesn't seem to be) when I ran across the blog of Latigo Flint, the greatest quickdraw the world has ever known.
Marvin the Paranoid Android |
Oath of Swords |
The Deed of Paksenarrion does, in fact, have its roots in roleplaying, but not in the usual sense. Rather than being written either as a sort of record of someone's favorite character in a game, or as a publicity/demonstration piece for some gaming system or mechanic, Paksenarrion was born (according to an email exchange I had with the author) from bad roleplaying: Elizabeth Moon, not gaming herself, heard some people playing "Paladins" (Holy warriors in the service of a god) and doing so very poorly. Her reaction was of course that "such a person wouldn't ACT like that"... and in thinking about what they WOULD act like, Paksenarrion was born.
The Deed of Paksenarrion |
If George Bush had really been willing to serve his country in time of danger, many other avenues of service were wide open in the Sixties....So why didn't he? Why didn't this proponent of patriotism and responsibility and accountability and so on just walk into a recruiting office and say "Send me to 'Nam--I'm willing?" What kind of patriotism--what kind of courage--wants the uniform but not the risk? If even women were willing to serve in the military and risk being sent to Vietnam, what kind of man would choose to pretend he was serving, while not actually serving?But while that made me happy, her point-by-point analysis of the President's record as Commander-in-chief, from her perspective as military authority, made me chuckle aloud. (Heck, check out her interesting commentary on global warming too.)
I don't know why. I cannot think of any valid, honest, honorable reason why someone would claim to support the war, and then by his own actions ensure that he himself was not at risk--and by those actions put others at risk.
George W. Bush claims that questioning the validity of his service in the Texas Air National Guard insults the men and women who have served there and been in combat. This is a disgusting perversion of the truth. It is he and other draft dodgers, with the connivance of Texas government (including the governor who wouldn't release the unit to the military and the individuals who jumped Bush over the waiting list to get him in) who sullied the honor of the National Guard here in Texas, and in other states where a politically-motivated governor allowed this injustice to occur. It is he and the others like him who insult and dishonor those who served honorably before and after this shameful period, those who actually put their lives on the line. Because of him and men like him, others were drafted into the service and sent into combat in their place.
First off, if you haven't checked out the beta of Google Maps yet, you really should. It's an amazing use of web technologies and provides the most satisfying map-browsing experience I've ever had on the web. It's still got a few rough edges, but even with them unresolved, I expect to be using Google Maps instead of any of the other internet map services. It's just that cool.
Ivy Sings |
A combination of personal circumstances and news articles have caused me to form a new opinion about the United States, and how we do things.
So how would Bush fix Social Security's long-term funding problem?
That remains the big unanswered question. Everyone in Washington knows it would be political suicide to cut the benefits of today's retirees or those about to retire. Absent those options, there are only three ways to bring the system into fiscal balance: cut future benefits, raise taxes or borrow the money, which adds to the debt.
The Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement, mandates cutbacks in such emissions, but the reductions are small and the United States, the biggest emitter, is not a party, arguing that the mandates will set back the U.S. economy.
Ingredients:
There's a new entry for Spike's Journal. Originally, I was going to try and post an update shortly after each session. I fell behind a while ago, and I haven't managed to catch up yet. I'm doing pretty well at the moment, but that still leaves me about 4 sessions behind where Spike & Co. actually are in the game. I keep telling myself I need to do two updates a week to catch up, but they take a while to write and I haven't been quite that focused. Maybe next week.