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Why not just buy a $3 zipper at a fabric store, cut open the bear and sew it on?  You could do it by hand in about half an hour.  PLUS, I have never known a woman who is not turned on by a man who can pretend he knows how to sew.

[A Short History of Progress]

So that my recommendation will not seem diluted I will list only the most mind blowing book I can remember reading:

A Short History of Progress by Ronald Wright.  I caught a part of it in lecture form on public radio and I was hooked.  Only a hundred or so pages but very compelling.  It is basically an essay about how civilization is doomed.  Most of it is about human history (hence the title) which is one of my great interests, but the implications for the future are manifest.

Re:  Book Club.  Good idea, since many folk in these forums share similar interests, but I don't think many students or employed people can read a book in two weeks.  I would be interested in a non-fiction club, but only if the time period is stretched to at least a month.

I have a strong suspicion that this "confidential bulletin" might have been intentionally released to see if teenagers, desperate to get high, might be tricked into inhaling the off-gassed unpleasantness of their own feces.  Of course, there really is only one way to confirm this suspicion.....

Well mine is a self-portrait, designed back in 2003.  Of course I'm meaner and crustier looking now, but I'm too lazy to update it.

I've seriously considered changing my avatar, over the years.  It's kind of flat, blocky, and it doesn't have the correct size (thus the black bar on the right side).  But several people have since included me in their games in progress as either a model for a villain or as a holder graphic, so I figure keeping it lends me a degree of celebrity now. 

And then there's the issue of branding.  When I post something now people jump to pay attention, because they know a ruthless old German dude will get all pith helmet on their ass if they don't.  Would they do as much for a novel fluffy little bunny-wunny?  I think not.  At least not at first: it would take years to build up the same instantaneous recognition that my current avatar commands.  In the final analysis, it just wouldn't be a BaRoN post without it.

BaRoN

So NaNoWriMo is a little bit more than half over.  How's everybody holding up?  I'm still enthusiastic, but busy, meaning I'm not exactly on schedule (the story of my life....).  I'm not saying that I'm writing the greatest novel that will never be, but it's definitely going to take longer than the rest of the month to finish.  Maybe I should be looking for a NaNoWriYe or even a NaNoWriDe.  I'm optimistic, however, that a NaNoWriCe will not be necessary 

Baron

Well, I've only ever used three ways to put files on the net.

1) Hosts with page builders (like you seem to be using) usually have a pretty standard browse 'n' upload tool.

2) You can type an ftp address into your browser (IE, Firefox, etc.) but I don't care for it (I can't remember why I got frustrated with this approach -I haven't done it in years).

3) You use an ftp client (Filezilla is a really good free one).  With the client (which is a program you run on your computer) you see a split screen, with the left being what's on your hard drive and the right being what's on your server space.  All you have to do is enter your IP address or domain name and a password and it will connect for you.  Then its just click and drag from one side to the other.  The advantages of this are that you could transfer an unlimited number of files all at once, and its easy to keep things organized.

CANADA:
       Health care is free, but extras like dentistry, optometry, prescription drugs all cost the consumer.  You could buy health insurance for these -and many people get it through their work place if they work for the government or a large company -but it is not mandatory.
       And now for my actual experiences:   
       In my opinion the abilities of the health system are grossly inflated.  There seems to be this pervasive myth that doctors actually know what their talking about and can accurately diagnose illnesses.  The only effective health care I've had has been in the form of vaccinations and stitches, and I'm not entirely convinced that I couldn't have done a better job of them myself -I still can't feel the tops of two right fingers because of sloppy stitching of a childhood injury.  And the number of misdiagnosed illnesses among my friends and family -several leading to death -does not instill in me a great faith in the medical profession.  For me the medical profession will be a last resort to turn to, but I don't have high expectations.

-Baron

... but damn, it feels good to just write.

I hear you!  This NaNo thing has been great for my motivation.  I like randomly checking people's profiles on the forums over there to see how many words they have so far.  Whenever I find someone with a kick-ass excerpt and more words than me it really gets me fired up.  I can't say I'm on pace to make the 50,000, but I started doing 800-1000 words a day and now I'm averaging 1400-1500.  Severe edits will be necessary before I show the manuscript to anybody, but the core of the story is emerging -it's all very exciting.

Baron

Only 49846 words to go!  Unfortunately, I seem to have hit a bit of a mental block   Stupid no-alcohol for a year.... 



       ...............








Alright, back to the manuscript.

Two days before the starting pistol fires a mysterious -nay, baronial! - figure tosses his hat -er, helmet into the ring.  If only he could stop using dashes -his -prose -might -be -legible!  Of course since legibility has taken a back seat to word-quantity this is the perfect contest for him!  "See you at 50 000!" he taunts his fellow protagonists, before floating away in a zeppelin made entirely out of dreams and half-finished manuscripts.  He's mad, you see -MAD!!!!!

Yes, bravo!  Altruism should always be applauded, and the more learning resources for AGS, the better.  Now to feed a random paragraph into the old Google translator to find out what this is all about....

We shall now begin to create the view of Joe. Like I said in my earlier part, the views are groupings of sprites which, in turn, make up a character animations. Entering the screen Views we already have two animations for Roger, the character in the staffing Default Game. Roger, but it is very noble, it's built for games of 320 àâ€" 240, apart from being either ugly (in my opinion), we are creating the hearing with Joe walking.

  Well, obviously it would be more eloquent in Spanish.  Your work seems to be quite thorough and user-friendly.  You probably won't get much thanks, but I'm sure a lot of Spanish speakers will dearly appreciate your work.  Hopefully this will lead to an explosion in the number of Spanish AGS games, followed shortly thereafter by an explosion in the number of English translations of those Spanish games for the rest of us to play.

Me, I don't know anything about music theory.  The original music for my latest game -and granted there wasn't a lot of it -but that which was original was composed in the following way: 

1) I'd click and drag notes onto the musical staff at random (gasp!).  I'd use smaller notes if I needed a faster tune, larger ones if it had to be slower, but the pitch was all just random.  I'd also leave my program in the default piano mode unless I had a particular sound I was going for.

2) Then I'd listen to the "composition".  Ninety percent of the time it's crap, but since I hadn't invested a lot I'd just delete and try again.  It's usually not a long process before there's a bit of it that sounds kind of neat, and then I try to fill in the rest by ear (a tedious process for me, since I don't know off hand which notes have which pitch -usually I'd be thinking the next note must be "high-ish", etc.).

3) Once I was happy with the tune I would shop around for a suitable instrument, sometimes adding a baseline or a second instrument if it seemed appropriate.

Now I'm not saying this method produced super great tunes, but they sure were original!  There was also a strong tendency for them not to be anything like what I needed.  But I set myself the task of coming up with an original track every night, and after a month or so I had quite a bit to choose from.  Here are some ten second examples:

Discord in G*
Tribal Rhythm
Foxtrot Theme

*I don't know what the key of G is, the name just sounded cool.

Of the examples given I've only used the last one in a game, and it was dressed up quite a bit by another musician, but the others have potential, I think.  Anyway, just wanted to share an alternative method of music composition.

Eek.....(Baron pulls at his shirt collar) -that's looking like a bit of a bug.

The good news is, I've fixed it in version 1.42, which is now available for download.

The bad news is, if you haven't saved previous to the trolley derailment you will probably have to start from scratch.  Sorry about that.

  Thanks for finding and reporting the bug: at least the next player won't get stuck.

BaRoN

The janitor will do his thing indefinitely, allowing you to solve the rest of the lock puzzle.

Spoiler

I think it was the professor that tells you that to open the vault you need two separate clones to submit their identical DNA, as well as enter the secret code at the same time (which is what the janitor is doing).  Basically you're going to need another clone, or part of a clone, to help you out.  The janitor wouldn't work, since his DNA has mutated.

[close]

As for what to do after the desert planet....

Spoiler

Marf, the puppet planet, is where you want to explore.  If you're not getting very far you should watch the captain's log carefully.

[close]

What I want to know is why they bothered to report on the differences between apparent races when the study ostensibly was "not intended to make any particular group look bad, reinforce stereotypes nor to further a hidden agenda of any kind."  What do they prove by publishing something like that, except for negative stereotypes?  A study that tried to interview the offenders afterwards and find out the rationale behind their choices would be much more useful and, well, valid.  Where's the socio-economic data?  Education data?  Church attendance records?  Family history?  Psychological assessments?  Not in this study.  Instead they publish 60% of people who looked young and black were dishonest.  Can we really call this research?

The Game of Diplomacy is always brought out when my brothers and cousins all get together.  Sure I could back-stab people online, but it's just not the same as looking your erstwhile ally in the face and doing it.

My condolences as well.  Although I wasn't all that attached to the ongoing Wheel of Time saga, I agree that the first book (Eye of the World) was a  masterpiece in the fantasy genre.

To be perfectly frank, I still don't know what PCX stands for, and I am too lazy to click on Radiant's link.  I agree that the ability to think logically is the only true prerequisite for using AGS.

Yes, I keep getting "This connection was reset" type warnings, and have to try twice to see threads sometimes.  It started maybe a couple of weeks ago?  I just click again and soldier on.

There can never be too many sarcastic death scenes.  Ever.