New prohibited items for carry-on baggage.

Due to enhanced security measures liquids, gels, lotions and other items of similar consistency will not be permitted in carry-on baggage. These types of items must be packed in your checked baggage.

Additionally, liquids, gels and lotions purchased beyond the checkpoint but must be disposed of before boarding the aircraft.

Check out the full info HERE.

On a side note it also says:

We encourage everyone to pack gel-filled bras in their checked baggage.

Little Bunny Foofoo

Chuck and Lonnie (from Dragon's Landing Inn Podcast) got arrested and thrown in a Klingon jail (at Gen Con 06). As a penance, they had to sing Little Bunny Foofoo.

Check out the video at YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1D7YbTJDqSc

and check out the words if want.

Wacky news

Russian woman Alyona Gabitova is suing weather forecasters for ruining her holiday with incorrect predictions. (WENN)

Neal's Family

I got this email from my friend on August 9th and pictures today. Its a BOY!

Hi guys!

I am proud to announce the arrival of Maxwell Murphy Kahle!!! He was born this afternoon at 2:28 weighing in at 7lbs 5oz and 21 inches long. Both little Max and Mom are doing great and all of us are looking forward to a good night's sleep! 21 hours from the first set of regular contractions to final delivery.... Lotsa fun! ;^)

--Neal

Fantasy Hero Game: A sanity check and your throughts.

I got this email from my gamemaster on our thoughts on the game so far.

Player's Thoughts:

Just wanted to get some feedback from you two on several things. Sort of a pick-your-brain type of thing. The following are not in any sort of order, just how they came out of my brain:

1. (Most important to me) Are you having fun?
a. What do you like?
b. What do you hate?
c. Is there something that can be added, removed, or done differently to make the game more fun for you?

2. Plot hooks. The way I have been running it right now is pretty controlling of where you go and what happens. After the next 'chapter' or two, it should open up some.
a. What things that have happened, or have heard about, in thegame did you want to explore in greater detail?
b. Any sort of side plots would you like to see in exploring something about or for your character.

3. Game mechanics. Rules that we are using in the game.
a. Any rules that you read about (especially the optional ones) that you want me to include?
b. Anything in the rules that do not make sense to you? Or that you think that they is a different interpretation?
c. Anything that you think is just plain dumb?

4. Did you have any other thoughts or comments?

A Virtual Keyboard.

I though this is cool when I saw this on CSI:Miami a few month back.

Check out post I found HERE.

The Amazing Screw on Head

In this hilarious send-up of Lovecraftian horror and steampunk adventure, President Abraham Lincoln's top spy is a bodyless head known only as Screw-On Head

Check it out HERE.

The game last week.

Could also subtitled, "A Good Knight".

Our group of two started out at the depo, after a few days of resting. It was decided to take it easy and cover our tracks and with a great roll of 3 (on 3 d3 is a roll you want to make), our group was able go at normal speed and still be quiet. We even came across a fully armored knight and war horse. Vaden's plan was to sneek up on the horse and smack it with my War Club with my Tough Man power active (+10 STR and +2 PD/ED) and have horse fall and trap the rider. I tried to sneek up on the horse, but it was aware of my presence. I changed targets to the knight. With a loud ring when the armor was hit in the right shoulder, the knight fell to the ground. With a thud when the rider hit the ground, the horse rears up and attacks Vaden, dazing him. While Vaden dodged the next attact, Darbor came up to the fallen knight and finished him off. With two good hits to the horse, the horse knocked Vaden out (with a lot of STUN damage, 40 over his base STUN). Darbor was able to finish off with a good hit roll (apparently Vaden wore the horse for a easy finish).

With some found help, Vaden was taken back to the depo, when awoke a few hours later.

Learned that day: surprise is good and two time the STUN damage is great.

Dragon's Landing Inn Post

Kodakgallery.com

My problem with this sight is that what you upload is not what you get. You get to view the pictures online, which is good, but if you want the picture to be printed out or take to the local drug store to print it out, you get a 448 x 298 pix picture. With this quality the best you can get is a wallet photo, unless you want to order the picture online. One more thing that has come to mind is that to view the pictures you have to create a login and get spam from Kodak. Use Flickr. That my 2 cents on this.

7th Son: Book One - Descent

A great Podcast Novel by J.C. Hutchins that I started this week. Its been mentioned on a few podcasts and blogs. Give it a try its free to download!

The Premise
7th Son, Book One: Descent is the story of seven strangers who have been brought together after the recent assassination of the U.S. president. These seven men quickly discover they have one disturbing thing in common: They all appear to be the same man, with the same name ... and the same childhood memories.

Unwitting participants in a human cloning experiment, these "John Michael Smiths" have been gathered by their creators for one reason -- to catch the man who murdered the president.

Their target? The man they were cloned from; the original John Michael Smith, code-named John Alpha.

Web
Podobooks.com

The game last week.

The following week in gamming with our HERO game.

This game was a long one, dealing with a two (us) on three (them) battle. We were surprised by two swordmen which rushed up and while the archer took some pop shot at Darbor character. My character, Vaden was able to knock out one of the swordmen, leaving it a little more even. Vaden rushed the archer knocking him down and sent his bow flying. Attacked and missed the archer. He get ups and tried to dodge Vaden's attack, but got smashed in the head by his club. Durring this time the swordman Vaden had knocked down had recovered and was no ganging up on Darbor. Vaden rushed over and knocked down the same one down again. With one down, we attacked the third swordman, not doing too much damage due to armor. Vaden next noticed that the knocked down swordman was playing possum and recovering from the stun damage. Vaden attacked the prone swordman and was able to kill him. And then there was one. At this point Darbor was not doing so good, down to 2 Body (having taken a few arrow hits), while Vaden having taken only a few point of Body damage. At this point the last swordman got a great hit and almost killed Vaden (took a lot of Stun, was taken down to 2 Body and got a deep gash on his right thigh). The swordman made a run for it, fleeing the battle. With our character damaged and needing to rest, we headed away from the battle area. It looks like our characters are being pursued and Vaden needs some first aid on the gash or he will pass out.

This where the game ended for the night. At this time something poped into my head. "Figher needs food badly."

If I could change what I did durring the battle I would change:
1. If I knock someone down, make sure they are dead (do not want them pop up again and attacking).
2. With Vaden higher speed, he could have rushed up to the archer sooner and killed him sooner.
3. Do something other than just attack, do some Combat Maneuvers.

Also post this at the Dragon's Landing Inn.

Drive by cell phone call.

On Friday, some time after work. As I pulled into the mall parking lot I got a call on my cell phone. It was Chris, unknown to me at the time, I just passed him as I pulled into the mall. He just finished seeing Superman Returns.

It was like, "I just passed you as you drove in." "You did? I did not see you." He said "I know what you're going to see." No thats tommorow. I just driving to Circuit City to pick something up."

The age of Cell phones. Try looking around. Most people have a cell phone these days.

Two short videos to watch.

This is hilarious! It's from a talent show at a college in Massachusetts. Try to watch the whole 5 minutes (especially when Mario hits the star).

"Super Mario Bros." -- live!

Also check out this video, the name says it all.

Best home made lightsaber duel ever!

What some friends said:

"That was great. Really high quality effects." -Chad

"Heath...that is awesome!!! I wish I could make vidoes like that!! sort of reminds me of you grabbing swords!!!" -Luke

"That's awesome! It's better than the last three Star Wars movies combined! Better action scenes and no cheesy dialog ;^)
That Super Mario brothers skit was hilarious as well. It's good to see the internet finally living up to its potential." -Neal

No game today.

One problem with a small group (one GM and two player), is that if one player gets sick, the game get canceled. As it was for tonight.

My podcast shirt.

To support one of my podcasts, the Dragon's Landing the following shirt was purchased from CafePress. I only had one beef about the product. The Ash Grey T-Shirt that I purchased does not show the picture very well. The grey box around the "elven chain +5" blends into the grey of the and does not show exactly as pictured here.

The game last week.

The following week in gamming with our HERO game.

With our group of two, we back out looking to take any scouts or lookouts. We saw the scout and tried to sneak up on him. We failed. He sounded the horn. Knowing time was limited, we went to attack him in the tree he was posted. Vaden got right under the tree he was it. He activated his strength which helped leaping up and swacking the lookout. While I was doing this Darbor was throwing some knives at the guy and hitting a few times. After Vaden knocked the lookout out of the tree, which I did not see. The body missed me, but he spewed some porridge from his morning meal. We finished off him off, did a quick search of the body and decided hide near by.

We waited for a time till 2 others showed up and started tracking us. I was able to keep track of on of two myself. hoping the other was not sneaking up on me. hoping they would pass on by, Vaden activated his Skin of Granite power (which gave hime some protection from the unknown). Darbor himself activated his power of Walk With Nature (which uped his Stealth rolls). Darbor snuck on the guy I was keeping a eye on and say him dropped. Now where is the other guy? The answer to that found me. I was attacked and almost got knocked out (2 more points and light out). My Skin of Granite power save me from the knock out and Body damage. Darbor kept this other guy busy while I was able to activated the Tough Man power and knocked this guy out in one shot.



One thing I did learn, never hide yourself near the path you took to distance yourself. Move off the trail and then hide.

Smile Dad.

Dad at Outback Steakhouse on our Father's Day.

Wacky news

A black bear was chased up a tree by a territorial ginger cat in West Milford, New Jersey, on Sunday (WENN)

Yahoo! New Story

The game last night.

A little history, HERO System, fantasy setting (swords and club level of weapons) with some mild super powers thrown in.

Our small group of two was to cause some trouble from some raders. we were heading towards their location and came across a lone rider. We thought easy target. Why not try to sneak up on him. We made our stealth roll. But his perception roll was better. His horse spead up and tried to run down my character, Vaden. Unknown to the rider, Vaden had powered up. (This means that his strength rose from 18 to 28, got a little toughter and tripled my weight.) Vaden tried to dodge. He was not fast enough to dodge. Vaden did not take any Body damage, but took enough stun daze him. What happent next was a little funny. The horse got stoped dead in his tracks almost throwing the rider. Darbor, the other person in the group of two, steped up and attacked the rider and got a good hit. Next the horse attacked and got a lucky hit and knocked him out. My partner in this outing does not know of my power (stoping the horse probably did rase a question or two in his mind). With him knocked out, Vaden could be a little more open with his powers. He pull out his great club and attacked the horse. With a lucky roll, Vaden smack the horse right in the face with a high Body and Stun damage (which is doubled with a head shot). The horse fell over traping the rider unable to move. With a called shot to head of the rider, I knocked him out too.

With the battle over I checked on Darbor, with him ok. I tied the rider up and planed to take him back to town. I took about 3 hrs to get back to town and the rider never did wake up. That must have been some hit.

This reminded me of the scene from Blazing Saddles, where Mongo punched out a horse.

Email on the high seas.

My brother and his wife are on there honeymoon on a cruise hitting some ports in France, Italy, Greece and Turkey. While on the ship they have internet access and have receaved updates on their trip and outings. The magic of technology.

My parking spot.

Found out today that for perfert attendance plus the most worked hours in my work group in May I got my own parking space. (All I did was show up for work and put my normal hours in.) One down side I see is that I walk to work most of the time, but once a week I do have a parking for when I drive to work and then head off my HERO game.

A different choice.

Sushi-Ten was closed today, but Todai was not. 40 kinds of Sushi, hot entree, salad and dessert. The Sushi was ok. But lots of choices to make.

My day at Oh! Chocolate.

(Click on the above picture for a biger picture.)

Today I spend about a hour playing with chocolate at Oh! Chocolate. We learned some infomation about the different types of chocolate and then learned about diping with chocolate. We were given a pool of eather dark or light chocolate on a marble table. With the right hand the chocolate was moved around to cool. When right, oreos, grahams or strawberry were covered and set aside to cool. Doggie bags were passed out and our creations were taken home to be devoured.

On the way to gaming. . .

I was taking the back way, to bypass the freeway traffic, when I saw a odd truck. You probably see the rotating bilbboards in your local town or rotating signs at the mall. I saw this midsized moving type truck that had rotating advertising on the two sides I caught as it went down the road. Weird.

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Sushi at Sushi-ten

A few shots of 35 pieces that was eaten at the all-you-can-eat sitting at Sushi-ten with some friends on this last Saturday. (Click on the picture for a bigger picture.)

Work Spam Titles

Over the last weeks I have gotten some odd titles for some of my spam at work.

tap water brace
roly-poly foul ball
orthodox prevalent
earshot jab
grease Congress

The Window.

Some of the wedding were sent to my parents (via email) and I was able to sneak a peak at them. There were over 2000 pictures taken before, durring and after the wedding.

When I see this picture, I see the window at destroyed my first flower I had pined onto the tux. I had opened the window to get some air in the room, there was a strong breeze and all the pedals dispensed around the room. I did not see the effect myself. I turned around and say the pedals on the floor and then looked at the one I had on. There were no pedals on it. Luckly there was a spare.

See some updated pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/heathbar/search/text:wedding/

My old hobby.

I was at Fred Meyer today and saw a paint gun being sold there next to the BB guns. Back in the old days you had to get them from a catalog or a specific store (makes me sound old, doesn't it).

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In the lunch room today.

While at lunch it was committed about Chris, a coworker, had come and sat in on this week's HERO game. With the 2 girls they did not know what a RPG or Roll Playing Game was. One thought it was a board game. After a brief description, I think they were a little surprised to find out what it was.

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AstroWorld Closed

I found out that AstroWorld (that was in Houston, TX) has closed down (looks about 6 months now) at my brother's wedding. I had worked there for 2 summers and was sad to hear the news.

New Link:
http://www.themeparkinsider.com/news/response.cfm?ID=2489
http://houston.citysearch.com/review/9897344

It does look like they saved two of the rides and looks like the water park is still there.

New York pictures.

Here are the few pictures I took. I let the Wedding Photographer do his job for the rehearsal and the Wedding.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/heathbar/search/text:wedding/

Here are are the few shots I took around the town.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/heathbar/search/text:New+York+2006/

Move Complete

The move from my old apartment is complete into the new apartment. Still alot of unpacking to do.

New York Times Wedding Listing

Here is the text that was in the New York Times wedding section.

Katharine O'Connell and Chad White

Dr. Katharine Jean O'Connell and Chad Scott White were married yesterday at the 3 West Club, an event space in New York. The Rev. Emily King, an interfaith minister, officiated.

The bride, 34, will continue to use her name professionally. She is an assistant clinical professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Columbia, from which she received a master's in public health. She graduated from Duke University and received a medical degree from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

She is the daughter of Christine and Neil O'Connell of Jackson, N.J. Her father retired as a designer of computer systems for Merrill Lynch, in Somerset, N.J. Her mother is a procurement and billing specialist in Holmdel, N.J., for Lucent Technologies, the telecommunications equipment makers.

The bridegroom, 31, is an editor in Jersey City with the newsletter publishing unit of Dow Jones & Company He graduated cum laude from Texas A&M University and received a master's degree cum laude in journalism from New York University.

He is a son of Rulena and Larry White of Seattle. His father, who retired as a vice president for marketing at the Statesman National Life Insurance Company in Houston, is now a property manager for Singleton Associates, an architectural and commercial real estate development firm in Seattle.

The bridegroom's first marriage ended in divorce.

Published: April 2, 2006

New York Times Wedding direct link.

Emails with Steve

Last night the email count was 5 replys, finding out that our toast format has changed back to what we started with. The begining is the easy part, the ending has been found and looks good. Now we need the middle part (ie a story or two). Emails will continue, but on Friday, we will meet face to face to go over what will be said on the day of the toast.

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Only 4 days to go till my brother's wedding day!

Here is what my schedule looks like leading up till the wedding day.

Friday:

· get measured for tuxedo

· rehearsal at 6:30 at 3 West Club

· dinner at 8:00 at Connolly's Pub

Saturday:

• Meet up Chad in Ben's room at the Club at 3:30pm
• Distribute the boutonnieres to the groomsmen

usher duties:

1. Ask guests whether they are family or friends and seat them accordingly.
2. Ask guests to please turn off their cellphones, pagers, Blackberries, etc.
3. Tell guests to head outside after the ceremony for the bus tour
4. Help guests get on the tour buses after the ceremony
5. “Information central”: know where the coat check and restrooms are (1st and 4th floors)

wedding duties:

• Several speaking lines during handfasting ceremony
• Holds the rings until the ring exchange at the ceremony
• Signs the marriage certificate after the ceremony
• Tips Emily after the ceremony
• Toasts the bride and groom at the reception (with Steve)
• Collect the wedding flutes, unity candles and cupcake tower
• Collects the envelope gifts from the guest table, and brings them back to the apartment

The fortune cookie says . . .

"You will find hidden treasures where least exprcted."

"You may have to be patient; think listen and heed signs."

Emails with Steve

With the wedding for my little brother arount the corner (April 1st), me (the best man) and Steve the co-best man) have been emailing back and forth with some ideas for the toast to the happy couple. (I am not putting anything here, my brother may see it and be scared to show up ;-) )

My video link find.

Live-action Version of The Simpsons Opening Credits, From a British Promo.

Found at tv-shows-on-dvd.blogspot.com

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My half day.

Today at work the computers systems kept on crashing. While on a call they would go down and then given a little time they were available again. Only to go down again. Thank god today was a half day for me. At lunch, I left leaving any system problem to be fixed (I hope) by Monday.

My moving day.

After the trip to New York, the next weekend (April 8th) will be moving day.

Moving out.

With a knock on the door, I found out that I get to move and be out by month end. They are remodeling my unit and the surrounding units. Good news is that I will not have to move that far. Over in B building they are finishing up some of the remodeling (ie new carpets, appliances, floors, etc.) and I will be moving in at the end of the month. On a side note there is the wedding at the end of the month. I am going to see about moving in on the next following weekend. The rent is higher, the location is good for the walk to work and the recent pay rase helps the the rase in rent.