Aran

Dinti/Eddie could have been pulling an extremely long con.

They are also both Tullegolar, obviously, as well as Imban.

Yeah, the steel is apparently just glued and infused with bronze. They could get objects strong enough for industrial use by sintering or laser melting, but that kind of technology is probably not affordable for ordinary users.

For a moment there I thought it was actually Eddie, and then I looked at the profile link and got all disappointed.

Hm, too bad. Waited too long with the whole archiving thing.

Though I understand that all content of that forum lives on (in a very mangled form) in this current version.

The Wise family of Hobbits was so-named because they all had 32 teeth.

Wait, that would make Samwise the one with 30 teeth; ie. "half-wise".

cites this response Tolkien made to a request to reprint the "Riddles in the Dark" riddles without permission

Am I just too tired to parse this? How do you request permission to do something without permission?

Or was the response without permission - hence, a denial of the request?

(Also, my copy is on loan to my sister, and hunting down the quote online pretty difficult, with the movie interfering. )

Hah. Old people with your jobs. I'm going to be alive ten years after you're all gone and all I have to do is study, and write. The youth are obviously superior.

 

WHY? MY BACK! Oh, where did the years go?

Having done that for years now (all my life if you include school and software developer training), I find the prospect of a real job kind of appealing. The TA positions are occasionally fun, but they're mostly stressful, barely paid, repetitive and (worst) they don't come with an office. And worst, I can expect at least another decade of that if I want a PhD.

You know the people who say that academia is its own reward? Screw that. It's its own punishment.

After reading Jennifer Government back in 2006, I finally bought two more books by Max Barry; Company and Syrup. The latter has yet to arrive, but I read the former in a single night last week. Same thing happened back then. They're just impossible to put down.

Edit: Syrup's here, and I just ordered Machine Man to complete my collection.

<- should have learned by now not to open spoilered images.

Congratulations, Tyran.

Thirty white horses on a red hill, at first they champ, then they stamp and in the end stand still.

Teeth, precious.

Though we only has nine.*

(I don't know where the "30" came in, but it seems likely that it's a mutation swapping "32" with "30 white".)

Found this while delving into the oldest Google hits for "thirty white horses", from 2000.

Thirty white horses in a red cave,

In rank, tight abreast, each member a stave;

Some laden with silver, but not for its cost,

Some riding on bridges not meant to be crossed;

Together they charge without a word spoken,

To clash on the field in formation unbroken;

Though never among them be found king or queen,

A crown made of gold can often be seen.

What are they?

I have no idea if this riddle is older or not; aside from their first line and their solution, they don't seem to be connected.

Having started a job, and today having to be there at 9, I can now answer this.

 

No.

Hey congrats on that btw.

Have some virtual coffee.

I've actually managed to get TF2 running on Ubuntu natively via the Steam beta, though even on the lowest graphic setting I still can't aim properly. (Which is totally the fault of the computer and not me sucking at first person shooters. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.)

However, since my desktop died I'm about to put together a new computer - which is not the beast I was hoping for, but still more powerful than anything I own. Once classes are over in a few weeks, I'll be happy to join in the fun.

It's a reference to the song "Tik Tok" by Ke$ha.

Sad to say I got that, and barely managed to restrain myself from posting it myself earlier.

(Though at least I can claim I only knew it because of xkcd.)

I am a former computer science major. I don't wake up in the morning.

^

Though lately I've worked on breaking that trend, rearranging work load to the point where all-nighters become an occasional occurrence rather than a weekly one. I'm officially mid-twenties now. Have to get my health up if I want to last another half-century.

Interestingly, how refreshed I feel on waking up has next to nothing to do with how long I slept, but depends on the time of day. I feel better waking up at 7:00 after three hours of sleep than at noon after eight*. Could be psychological.

I know hardly anything about medieval weaponry, but I got the impression that pole arms were longer than this, relative to the size of the blade. Though maybe that's just one giant blade.

In any case, these drip with coolness.

grep'd the dump for damascus. This is in A2 and E2 (and it is indeed about Demonslayer).

This simple, long stone box rests on white marble. It is adorned only by the sun symbol of Avernum.

 

Inside, you find the unique artifact for which this well hidden complex was built. It's a greatsword in a long leather sheath. The handle is wrapped in leather and gold wire, and the bit of the blade you can see is Damascus steel.

It's not much of a description, but the distinctive appearance of Damascus steel should give you a good idea to draw from.

As cool as asteroids are, I don't understand the justification for hauling one back home, especially to the moon's orbit. If you're going to haul it back, haul it all the way to LEO so we can get some actual work done.

I can't find a mass estimate for AO₁₀ (the current candidate), but I'd have a few reservations about pulling an asteroid into low orbit around our only inhabited world; particularly since this maneuver has never been attempted before.

because our 24/7 news media can’t actually do journalism, CNN, MSNBC, FOX and others have all just helped ruin someone’s life because they posted headline pictures of the wrong [censored]ing Ryan Lanza.

Facebook groups calling for his death have already been created. Apparently it’s now open season on anyone named Ryan Lanza.

Note that even the "right" Ryan Lanza is the shooter's brother, while the shooter is already dead. How does that even...

The two I mentioned would be Alorael and myself. The next would be Tyranicus and Dikiyoba. Rounded up to five in case I missed anyone.

I'm also given to understand that the majority of SW mods at one point were part of Polaris, back in the day.

Some were, but really more like 2-5 depending on how you define "part of" (mod, active poster or registed member).

surely the Refuge is now officially recognized by Spiderweb ... All that's remaining is a link in Spiderweb's General Forum header

The concept of "the" SW satellite is a relatively recent invention. While Desperance, Polaris, Shadow Vale and Calamity Refuge are the most memorable and long-lived satellites, only the latter two were the only ones in their time, and none of them were ever recognized on the SW forum in any official status. For the precise reason those satellites existed in the first place: To communicate more freely than an official company forum permits.

(Specific Blades communities are a different story of course. I'm pretty sure the Lyceum once had a place in the BoE forum header.)

 

 

what even is the point of non-alcoholic cider

 

come to that what even is the point of non-alcoholic anything

Until recently I didn't even know "cider" could mean just juice. I thought that was just called apple juice (clear or natural), cider was fermented juice, and "hard cider" was some kind of distilled apple brandy in the same vein as "hard liquor".

Happy birthday, Sylae!

Extermination has never looked more adorable. Happy birthday, Sylae!

Most mods joined before Jeff decided to give free copies of his games.

So did I for that matter, but it is certainly an incentive now.

I actually still pay. Partly to support SW and partly to feel less guilty about going on hiatus for months ever so often and abandoning my post in the line of duty.

Full circle. I'm fairly sure I got linked to Nationstates from either Spiderweb or Desperance back in 2003.