December 4th, 2007

Hoblit · Post by **Hoblit** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 3:57 pm

Looks like Daily Roll Call is gone downhill. There is no official December 3rd unless you count The Idiot Kings topic post from yesterday under Daily Roll Call ... if that was even on purpose.

Oh well.

Today was pretty busy, I traded for the phones tonight...on-call. Its also my weekend so its better this way. Otherwise my night would be Thursday and that would continue right into the weekend thus making Thurs-Sun on-call.

Bah.

Qotd: If The Idiot Kings topic post on December 3rd does count... then do you think Daily Roll Call will make it to Jan 1st? (specifically) You can ask the next obvious question tomorrow...IF we make it that far. (actually, I think its already been asked anyways) <font size="1"> Or is there already a day missed that I don't know about...like some weekend or something...</font>

erik · Post by **erik** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 4:02 pm

Daily Roll Call isn't even Daily Roll Call anymore, it's just Question of the Day.

sausage boy · Post by **sausage boy** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 4:21 pm

I read all the comments/reviews on my Purple Reign submissions last night, and I am pretty happy with them. Above average scores all round, and comments that the vocals were too loud in one song. Normally its "the vocals are too muffled or burried", so thats a nice change.

For the next round, I might try and write a pack of really short songs, like, 30 seconds to a minute. See if I can pull that off.

Plus I should work some more on my GOM entry. And fit playing Bioshock in between (i think I am almost finished, though. I just became a Big Daddy).

In other news, a huge box of chocolate arrived at work today as some kind of a thank you for some kind of article we published. I have already eaten half a block, and its 9:50 in the morning. It has left me feeling insubstantial and otherworldly.

QOTD: I still crap on about meaningless life stuff every now and again. I can't say i have started a thread, but I live in the future.

HeuristicsInc · Post by **HeuristicsInc** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 4:41 pm

sausage boy wrote:And fit playing Bioshock in between (i think I am almost finished, though. I just became a Big Daddy).

The big-ass mechanized thang? You can do that?

That game is wild. I found the demo to be very disorienting. I had trouble figuring out where I was and what was threatening, but the graphics were fantastic.
-bill

sausage boy · Post by **sausage boy** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 5:13 pm

HeuristicsInc wrote:
sausage boy wrote:And fit playing Bioshock in between (i think I am almost finished, though. I just became a Big Daddy).
The big-ass mechanized thang? You can do that?

That game is wild. I found the demo to be very disorienting. I had trouble figuring out where I was and what was threatening, but the graphics were fantastic.
-bill

It can be a little hard to get to grips with, but once you get the hang of it, it is really good. I love the electricity and fire plasmids combined with the machine gun firing anti-personnelle rounds. Minces through splicers, but weak against security or Big Daddies. I just hack the security anyway, and pump the Big Daddies full of Armour Piercing rounds.

The story is really good, though some of the 'surprises' weren't quite that surprising, as they are blatantly recycled from System Shock 2. But there is enough to this game that I will probably play through it again once I have finished it.

So I do highly recommend it.

Oh, and yes, at some point, it is necessary to become a Big Daddy, in order to advance. You even have to protect one of the Little Sisters, and I have to fight the urge to just belt her in the head with the wrench.

the idiot king · Post by **the idiot king** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 5:50 pm

it actually wasn't on purpose...the description of this particular folder seemed to match my excuses for not showing up here more often.

but that doesn't mean that the post can't count, right?

jack · Post by **jack** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 7:22 pm

erik wrote:Daily Roll Call isn't even Daily Roll Call anymore, it's just Question of the Day.

news
work was an exercise in patience. i forgot to pay my comcast bill so they shut off my cable TV and phone but i still have internet access. for now. i forgot to pay my bill until a few days ago, sent it in, and the day i mailed it they cut off my service. so now i could call them and plead my case but they'll probably think i'm full of shit when i say "but really, the check's in the mail...". and i'm not sure if it will just pop back on when they get my check or what. the rule here kids....don't procrastinate.

weather
we are having the weirdest weather right now. it's actually foggy and warm, while portland is getting slammed by winter storms. go figure. and there's this nasty stench in the air, coming off the bay, like dead marine life or methane or something like that, but it stinks and there's no offshore wind and it's not going anywhere. forecast....continued dark with scattered light into morning.

(thanks to al sleet...)

sports
hokies finish 3rd in the final BCS poll, almost made the championship game. if they hadn't lost to BC the first time, they would be playing for the championship. warriors are destroying the league winning 9 out of 10 and playing the most entertaining basketball in the NBA. al and captain jack are playing like all stars while indiana is still....indiana. cheers dan-o!

thanks and good night.

Paco Del Stinko · Post by **Paco Del Stinko** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 7:46 pm

Great broadcast, Jack. And before 11, too. I like the daily role even if I have little to add to it. But Erik is right. You present yourself for accounting in a role as Ross Durand did/does: "Here"

So, here. I shoveled just a couple of inches of snow today and don't mind missing a clobbering at all. I do love the cold fresh air in my lungs in the winter though.

roymond · Post by **roymond** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 7:59 pm

Well, yesterday my wife found a way to tip a fire extinguisher in a cabinet, pull the safety, and discharge it in the kitchen and fill said kitchen and attached living room with a fine yellow dust 1/8" think in places. It's not fun to clean up so I had to run home mid-day and finish off as she had patients to see. Today we got the last of it. I think. Non toxic. They say.

Ross · Post by **Ross** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 8:58 pm

Here.

Heather. Redmon. · Post by **Heather. Redmon.** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 9:26 pm

I like Jack's new format idea for the dying Roll Call thread, so I will join in, minus sports:

News Today I stayed home from work because my son is sick. He had a doctor's appointment and I took him. Turns out he has an infection in both ears. But, he hasn't really been acting sick, just saying "huh" and "what" alot. The doctor said he can still go to school and stuff, as long as he feels ok, but he's got to take an antibiotic for 10 days and has a follow up appointment on 12/18. He had a tympanogram to see how his eardrums are functioning, and they're basically not. He's got lots of fluid behind his poor little eardrums. Hopefully this clears up fast because we're flying out to CA on the 22nd.

Weather It snowed all freakin' day today and I was out driving around in it. After Spencer's doctor's appointment, we went out to eat and then to Super Target so he could use the last of his birthday gift card. He bought some Justice League guys, some Cars (the movie) cars and a Hot Wheel. We were out and about (in Minnesota pronounced oot and aboot) for a good four hours. When we got home, I immediately had to turn around and go to Walgreens to fill his prescription. Driving around in falling snow before the plows have come through is a pain in the ass!

I'd say over the past week we've gotten about a foot of snow. It's currently 19 degrees F (that's about 7 C) with a light snow falling. I just finished shoveling the walk and the driveway. I had no idea how big our driveway is until I started shoveling it. I just took a muscle relaxer (left over from my back pain days) and I'm gonna kick it for a while before I go to bed.

Whoo hoo!

jack · Post by **jack** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 9:52 pm

heather is the hardest working mom on songfight (in addition to being arguably the rockinist chick....).

hey, i still have internet access! and it still stinks outside! even more than before!

Billy's Little Trip · Tue Dec 04, 2007 10:21 pm

OK, Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer just ended, now I can get back to what I was doing.

QOTD: I don't understand what you are asking because you confused me with all of the parenthesis and small type. You should become an internet politician.
Roll call will mutate and evolve, like a germ, as Jack has just proven. A year from now it may just be the weather section, maybe it will be the recipe section. The only thing I'm sure of, is that it will be.

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 10:34 pm

QOTD: I think it will make it to the new year, but will die within the next year ... not all forum topics are meant to be - silly polls is pretty much dead too (unless you count the purple reign stuff, which - I think - should be in sidefights)

jack · Post by **jack** » Tue Dec 04, 2007 10:38 pm

like the story of your life, it will never die.

HeuristicsInc · Post by **HeuristicsInc** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 7:57 am

Heather, sorry to hear about your son - when I was little I used to get ear infections a lot and they hurt like hell. Not sure why he isn't feeling pain from these. Maybe you got to them early enough?

roymond, ouch. Who would have thought it possible?
-bill

Rabid Garfunkel · Post by **Rabid Garfunkel** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 9:39 am

sausage boy wrote:For the next round, I might try and write a pack of really short songs, like, 30 seconds to a minute. See if I can pull that off.

Advice: Forget things like choruses and anything bridgelike longer than 2 bars. Play at a tempo that's faster than you're normally comfortable in. Record in a room that's less comfortable than the rest of the house/apartment/domicile. Put off the deadline to the last possible minute (but have your recording phases blocked out and follow that strictly). Heh. Or listen to a lot of Ramones.

Heather: Yow. Ear infections. To this day I have a great faith in the magic healing powers of cotton balls when I see them spent and laying on the pillow beside me.

Jack: Has the coastal dying-out gotten that far south? Oregon coast has dead patches here and there, utterly lifeless and mysterious. (And we don't even have offshore drilling!)

sausage boy · Post by **sausage boy** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 3:30 pm

Rabid Garfunkel wrote:
sausage boy wrote:For the next round, I might try and write a pack of really short songs, like, 30 seconds to a minute. See if I can pull that off.
Advice: Forget things like choruses and anything bridgelike longer than 2 bars. Play at a tempo that's faster than you're normally comfortable in. Record in a room that's less comfortable than the rest of the house/apartment/domicile. Put off the deadline to the last possible minute (but have your recording phases blocked out and follow that strictly). Heh. Or listen to a lot of Ramones.

Duly noted.

I kind of figured normal chorus, verse, bridge whatever would have to be abandoned in favour of furious wankery. I image its a bit like writing an ad jingle, get 5 minutes worth of info into 30 seconds.

Rabid Garfunkel · Post by **Rabid Garfunkel** » Wed Dec 05, 2007 5:55 pm

Repeat the phone number/product/store name seven times, yeah.