My old QB RPG engine ran in modeX 320x240. Graphically one of the most advanced qbrpg engines, it had particle rain effects and shadows and transparent text boxes, a long with pixel*pixel movement and scrolling. Getting that to work on a 486 or a Pentium meant figuring out how to draw most of the graphics in 4 passes, one for each graphics plane, and to get the number of multiplies down by a factor of a million (normally you do a multiply, a divide, and a remainder operation for each pixel which was too much on those old machines)
And if I got any details wrong, it's been 20 years...
https://fbxl.net/oma/qfak/index.html
(Has the QB version and the windows FB version)
And if I got any details wrong, it's been 20 years...
https://fbxl.net/oma/qfak/index.html
(Has the QB version and the windows FB version)
Vancouver is a megacity to me (same as Toronto whose constructions are absurdly huge), the sort of place where you can get stuck in the huge skyscrapers that may be maze-like and interconnected in such a way that you might never need to touch the ground. I live in the backwoods where you can go touch a tree that grew there naturally, not because some city contractors planted it there. I've been outside often twice a day every day I'm not at work so I'm getting used to having my shoes firmly in the soil at ground level.
I think the thing with Chris Williamson is actually way simpler than any metaphor: he seems like he's in really good shape, and I've been feeling really creaky this summer. He seems like the sort of guy who would be in such good shape and so used to the city that he'd just jump off a walkway one story up like it wasn't a big thing.
The part about clothes I think is part of an ongoing theme in the dream about just being a normal guy. I made another quip during the dream about being someone who has touched a can opener this week, representing the sort of boring normal life where you eat preserves out of a can.
I think the thing with Chris Williamson is actually way simpler than any metaphor: he seems like he's in really good shape, and I've been feeling really creaky this summer. He seems like the sort of guy who would be in such good shape and so used to the city that he'd just jump off a walkway one story up like it wasn't a big thing.
The part about clothes I think is part of an ongoing theme in the dream about just being a normal guy. I made another quip during the dream about being someone who has touched a can opener this week, representing the sort of boring normal life where you eat preserves out of a can.
I had a dream that I was in Vancouver and I'd just finished interviewing with Chris Williamson, and we were generally walking back towards my hotel but he had to go have dinner with some fashion designer. He offered that I come by I'm like "naw, I wear my clothes until they literally disintegrate" and he was good about it. So when we parted ways he parkour jumped off the side of this building like it wasn't no big thing and I spent the rest of the dream trying to find stairs to get back down to street level.
tbf, I think that 100 trillion dollar bill actually experienced mass deflation over the years since they're collector's items.
I've got one framed on my wall because I'm that kind of nerd.
I've got one framed on my wall because I'm that kind of nerd.
[Admin Mode] Power bump again. We were down a bit longer because it turns out the bios auto restart was turned off. I solved that problem, and fixed the DNS.
Can't explain the power blips happening now of all the times. Not a cloud in the sky. It was beautiful out, and yet the last couple days were the first couple power blips in months.
Can't explain the power blips happening now of all the times. Not a cloud in the sky. It was beautiful out, and yet the last couple days were the first couple power blips in months.
My first printer was a delta kossel, and I had to move my printer to the basement because I'd spend hours watching it hypnotically redraw whatever I was printing over and over for hours (it was slow too)
My dad didn't have running water until he was like 11. My grandma was blind and if she was going to use water she'd have to draw it from the well.
The hedonic treadmill is real, we always have to be aware of it.
The hedonic treadmill is real, we always have to be aware of it.
[admin mode] quick power bump, everything is back up now. At some point I should invest in an unreliable power system.
Careful showing an image like that on the public feed. The kids are always telling me about that "ohio rizz"
Which doesn't sound pleasant at all.
Which doesn't sound pleasant at all.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14848997/Bumble-sacks-hundreds-staff-Gen-Z-ditches-dating-apps-love-old-fashioned-way.html
If the headline is correct, thank goodness.
Online dating is like the light from poltergeist: don't look into the light, don't go into the light. It's bad for you.
If the headline is correct, thank goodness.
Online dating is like the light from poltergeist: don't look into the light, don't go into the light. It's bad for you.
There was a paper recently that suggested there could be enough white hydrogen in the earth's crust to power human civilization for 100,000 years. That's where this idea came from, that if we were to power civilization by burning large amounts of hydrogen over long enough timeframes, we start having to worry about oxygen depletion.
Geological or even long human timeframes really mess things up -- even stuff like planting trees doesn't matter because the trees die and rot and forests become deserts when the tectonic plates shift. On the other hand, microscopic organisms like diatoms dying over time can cause overwhelming geological changes -- such things are how we ended up with most forms of sedimentary rock for example.
Geological or even long human timeframes really mess things up -- even stuff like planting trees doesn't matter because the trees die and rot and forests become deserts when the tectonic plates shift. On the other hand, microscopic organisms like diatoms dying over time can cause overwhelming geological changes -- such things are how we ended up with most forms of sedimentary rock for example.
So-called "White Hydrogen" has been proposed as a carbon-neutral fuel source.
In the short term, the lack of carbon is a feature, but I'd argue over geological timeframes, it's a huge bug.
CO2 vs O2 at least has a cycle for replenishment. If we just burn H2 and use up an O, i can imagine we would reduce the O and we could only use processes like electrolysis to get it back.
It might seem like photosynthesis is a counter-argument to this, that plants "make oxygen" and so we'd be OK for that reason. My counter-argument would be that geological history is important to understand. The earth once had a CO2 atmosphere at about 25 atmospheres today, and the cyanobacteria converted all that CO2 into oxygen and sugar. That led to the biggest extinction event in the history of the planet, called the oxygen catastrophe. The carbon cycle takes that oxygen that was produced and recombines it with carbon to release energy, which then ends up getting split up again. The oxygen released is part of that cycle. It was part of the sugars produced, and it remains in that cycle. The carbon cycle has functioned for billions of years because it is cyclical -- the oxygen is released, consumed and returned to CO2, then released again.
As I said, photosynthesis does convert water and CO2 into sugars and O2, but the O2 is tied to the carbon cycle, and that same carbon cycle can use up the O2 just as quickly. We've actually seen that during the period where humans have been using lots of old sugars from fossil fuels, and the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere has dropped slightly (but at least it'll be returned because of the carbon cycle)
Contrasting that with burning hydrogen on its own, the hydrogen combines with atmospheric oxygen, and does not get released directly through any similar cycles. The fact that the carbon cycle releases O2 doesn't change that, because the carbon cycle was what released that O2 in the first place, and if you burn away O2, it doesn't get replaced by the carbon cycle, it just stops being available. It isn't a problem today, but it chips away at the planetary resources without any way to actually replenish them on geological scales.
There's no reason to believe that the carbon cycle would be able to produce enough oxygen to support all life on earth and all combustion and also a magical excess for billions of kilograms of hydrogen soaking up oxygen every year. It doesn't fit, it's not cyclic at all. In fact, we should have way more oxygen on earth in the sense that much more was produced through the process of photosynthesis in that original thick CO2 atmosphere was eaten up by other processes such as rusting iron or burning of combustible minerals
We'd end up in a century or two right back where we are today, stuck requiring massive public works projects to figure out how to release more elemental oxygen in the O2 form before we all suffocate. It's something way scarier than releasing too much carbon into the atmosphere, because at least nature has a way to deal with too much carbon!
In the short term, the lack of carbon is a feature, but I'd argue over geological timeframes, it's a huge bug.
CO2 vs O2 at least has a cycle for replenishment. If we just burn H2 and use up an O, i can imagine we would reduce the O and we could only use processes like electrolysis to get it back.
It might seem like photosynthesis is a counter-argument to this, that plants "make oxygen" and so we'd be OK for that reason. My counter-argument would be that geological history is important to understand. The earth once had a CO2 atmosphere at about 25 atmospheres today, and the cyanobacteria converted all that CO2 into oxygen and sugar. That led to the biggest extinction event in the history of the planet, called the oxygen catastrophe. The carbon cycle takes that oxygen that was produced and recombines it with carbon to release energy, which then ends up getting split up again. The oxygen released is part of that cycle. It was part of the sugars produced, and it remains in that cycle. The carbon cycle has functioned for billions of years because it is cyclical -- the oxygen is released, consumed and returned to CO2, then released again.
As I said, photosynthesis does convert water and CO2 into sugars and O2, but the O2 is tied to the carbon cycle, and that same carbon cycle can use up the O2 just as quickly. We've actually seen that during the period where humans have been using lots of old sugars from fossil fuels, and the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere has dropped slightly (but at least it'll be returned because of the carbon cycle)
Contrasting that with burning hydrogen on its own, the hydrogen combines with atmospheric oxygen, and does not get released directly through any similar cycles. The fact that the carbon cycle releases O2 doesn't change that, because the carbon cycle was what released that O2 in the first place, and if you burn away O2, it doesn't get replaced by the carbon cycle, it just stops being available. It isn't a problem today, but it chips away at the planetary resources without any way to actually replenish them on geological scales.
There's no reason to believe that the carbon cycle would be able to produce enough oxygen to support all life on earth and all combustion and also a magical excess for billions of kilograms of hydrogen soaking up oxygen every year. It doesn't fit, it's not cyclic at all. In fact, we should have way more oxygen on earth in the sense that much more was produced through the process of photosynthesis in that original thick CO2 atmosphere was eaten up by other processes such as rusting iron or burning of combustible minerals
We'd end up in a century or two right back where we are today, stuck requiring massive public works projects to figure out how to release more elemental oxygen in the O2 form before we all suffocate. It's something way scarier than releasing too much carbon into the atmosphere, because at least nature has a way to deal with too much carbon!
It's a cargo cult of education -- People think the piece of paper is a magical spell, when in reality what matters is the level of discipline and skill it takes to get the piece of paper.
This is why you need a masters degree to be a line supervisor at Denny's.
This is why you need a masters degree to be a line supervisor at Denny's.
Seeing a lot of normie media is on flipboard which is on the fediverse was pretty neat. Obviously not every normie media outlet is worth the space on your timeline (even if it's updating at 1000 posts a minute), but a few might be interesting to certain individuals and this means they're available.
Sort of reminds me of when the Biden administration was like "ok taliban, don't forget to maintain our dei policies! If you don't we'll be very cross with you!"
It was the funniest thing because the tonal disconnect was hilarious. It only became clearer later when interviews with western news outlets came out and the interviewers were like "So you're going to treat women well, aren't you?" and the taliban were like "we're the taliban. We'll treat women well by making them wear hijabs and never letting them leave the house."
"We expect the Taliban to uphold the basic rights of the Afghan people, including women and girls. The international community is watching."
"Future engagement with the Taliban will depend on their actions in protecting the rights of minorities and women."
Just the same sort of performative rhetoric.
It was the funniest thing because the tonal disconnect was hilarious. It only became clearer later when interviews with western news outlets came out and the interviewers were like "So you're going to treat women well, aren't you?" and the taliban were like "we're the taliban. We'll treat women well by making them wear hijabs and never letting them leave the house."
"We expect the Taliban to uphold the basic rights of the Afghan people, including women and girls. The international community is watching."
"Future engagement with the Taliban will depend on their actions in protecting the rights of minorities and women."
Just the same sort of performative rhetoric.
Ngl I'm surprised the birds allowed themselves to get caught, let alone dyed from head to toe.
If my wife was like "catch a pigeon and dye it for me" I'd be like "do it yourself" and that would be the end of that conversation.
If my wife was like "catch a pigeon and dye it for me" I'd be like "do it yourself" and that would be the end of that conversation.
On one of the SPC movie nights they had an episode of that show on in between the real movies. I had no idea what it was, and I had no idea what the premise of the show was, and maybe I wasn't watching closely enough but I never realized what the premise of the show was until long after the episode was over.
I didn't get the vibe of a celebrated success story from that show, even without knowing what the premise of the show was, it seems to me like a bunch of exceptionally well-adjusted kids trying desperately to keep their mentally ill friend away from sharp objects or lengths of rope.
I guess it's reality TV so the producers can show us whatever the hell they want, but it definitely didn't look like a show about a happy person.
I didn't get the vibe of a celebrated success story from that show, even without knowing what the premise of the show was, it seems to me like a bunch of exceptionally well-adjusted kids trying desperately to keep their mentally ill friend away from sharp objects or lengths of rope.
I guess it's reality TV so the producers can show us whatever the hell they want, but it definitely didn't look like a show about a happy person.
Imagine being a member of the reddit brigade in 2025. Already a fate worse than death.