evildrganymede

nyrath, 3 months ago to random

A sample play through of the TTWG High Frontier

https://verywordy.wordpress.com/2018/09/27/theres-a-starship-waiting-in-the-sky/

evildrganymede, 3 months ago to music

I am a very big Heart fan, but I didn't know that Heart's "What About Love" was actually originally recorded in 1982 by the Canadian band Toronto (it seems a lot of North American cities had bands named after them back then!). I hadn't even heard of Toronto (the band) til last night when a friend mentioned them! It seems that they had recorded the song but for some reason left it off their 1982 album... (it resurfaced later as a bonus track when it was reissued on CD, after Heart made it a hit).

It's a pretty solid version too. Could it have been a big hit for Toronto if they'd released it as a single at the time? Maybe it was too soon for it to really catch on in 1982, but I guess we'll never know! (I love bits of music trivia like this!). #music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lua9OrloDkg

evildrganymede, 3 months ago to Catroventos

How is one supposed to pronounce "Dunwich" (as in HPL's "The Dunwich Horror", or "the Dunwich Legacy")?

I always thought it was "dun-witch" but I just heard someone call it "dunnitch" and weirdly I never even thought to pronounce it like that - despite being from the UK where we have places like Norwich ("norritch"), Greenwich ("grennitch"), Woolwich ("woolitch"), Bromwich ("brommitch") and also Warwick ("warrick") and Chiswick ("chizzick") ... but then we also have Ipswich ("ips-witch"), Northwich ("north-witch"), Middlewich ("middle-witch") and of course Sandwich ("sand-witch").

So now my mind is blown. Which is right - "Dun-wich" or "Dunnitch"?! #english #hpl #lovecraft

nyrath, 3 months ago to random

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/jeffrey-katzenberg-ai-entertainment-animation-prediction-1235643311/

evildrganymede, 3 months ago to Tolkien

I finally found a copy of The Nature of Middle Earth! Ridiculous levels of LotR worldbuilding detail, here we goooooo! 🤓 #lordoftherings #tolkien #books

evildrganymede, 4 months ago to scifi

Yep, just another ordinary day in a Stephen Baxter book :D #scifi #books

evildrganymede, 4 months ago to space

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-68091389

On one hand, oops! :) (but I absolutely love this image - it's a cheeky illustration of how difficult space exploration is!)

But lunar landing is hard and SLIM may be on its nose but it's in one piece so that's definitely something good! But If the sun rotates around to an angle where it catches the solar panels then this may still be a productive mission. The Japanese have pulled off some engineering miracles before when it comes to space exploration so this isn't the first time :). #space #science #SLIM

Plus the little Sora_Q rover ball is out and taking pics too!

Honestly, I think if I was JAXA I'd be pretty damn proud of this.

evildrganymede, 4 months ago to boardgames

Just finished a cracking game of Heat: Pedal to the Metal on TSS (since we're snowed under here) - I found a very good mod with TONS of custom made tracks that were the same as the ones from Formula De! So maybe I can finally play the Nurburgring!!.

The race was very close right up to the end with me ahead for most of the first lap, but my opponent took the lead in the second lap and negotiated the last tight corner much better than I did... and to cap it all a couple of the Legend bots managed to overtake me right at the finish line so in the end I came fourth!

I think this may be the racing game I've been looking for though! I love Formula De but this does racing so much better and more elegantly (and it's also more playable with two players).#boardgames

the pack bunches up now as we hit the first slow corner.
by the time we hit the first hairpin we're neck and neck (a couple of the bots are catching up but two of them are far behind).
Final positions after the second lap - Red (my human opponent) wins but the blue Legend bot almost caught up with him! Yellow bot comes third, comfortably overtaking me as I barely make it across the finish line in fourth place in that round after a rough second hairpin (I didn't spin out but my options weren't great), with the Green and White bots left far behind in fifth and sixth place!

evildrganymede, 5 months ago to random

Am I alone in thinking that the Winter Solstice (today) marks the middle of winter, not the start of winter? It just makes more sense to me - this is the shortest day in the northern hemisphere so winter should be on either side of it as the days shorten toward and lengthen away from that, rather than just starting when it's the shortest? #wintersolstice

kevinmgill, 5 months ago to random

Good afternoon from Sol 1000 for the Mars Perseverance Rover.

NASA/JPL-Caltech/Kevin M. Gill

evildrganymede, 6 months ago to random

I'm pretty convinced now that I'm actually one of those people that have the gene that makes cilantro tastes like soap!

The chimichangas at the local Cafe Mexigo have it in them and I noticed that they had a bit of a soapy kinda taste, so I tried a bit of cilantro on its own and... yeah, it does taste kinda soapy. I always assumed that's what it was supposed to taste like but I guess not!

evildrganymede, 6 months ago to ADHD

In September (just before my 50th birthday) I was diagnosed (by a medical profressional) with #ADHD. I have the combined variety - 6/9 inattention, 5/9 hyperactivity/impulsivity.

ADHD means that my brain chemistry is a bit wonky (and has been all my life, which explains a lot of things about me). ADHD is a neurological issue - people with ADHD have a bunch of physical differences in their brains, issues with neurotransmitters, how dopamine affects them, and neuron networks firing in their brain when they shouldn't be, all of which basically get in the way of life & mean (among other things) that we can't sit still, we get bored & are distracted very easily, forget things, and can't focus for a long time on tasks (mostly. Sometimes we hyperfixate on things instead!). There's a huge spectrum of symptoms & it manifests differently for everyone who has it but there are definitely commonalities that are shared. There's a saying though: "If you've met one person with ADHD, you've met one person with ADHD", because we're all different!

I've seen some people in local groups here who were diagnosed as adults who have had their lives completely messed up by this, but for me it seems I managed to figure out my own coping mechanisms and while it's still had a significant effect on my life it's not absolutely wrecked it like it has for some people. I'm not sure whether that's because it's not as severe for me as in others or because I've just managed to deal with it & work around it better, or maybe it's both.

This little pill, however, could change everything for me. After much research and consideration (and talking to people, including a very good ADHD coach to help me understand things) I've decided to start on medication that hopefully will bring some balance and order back into my brain. I'm starting on 18mg Concerta today & we'll see how that goes (the dosage may have to increase) but hopefully this will have a positive effect and let me concentrate & focus better!

evildrganymede, 6 months ago to scifi

I'm reading Children of Time (about halfway through?) and so far it's brilliant, so I picked up the rest of the trilogy today :). Humans accidentally uplift a civilisation of Jumping Spiders as part of a terraforming project, what could possibly go wrong? :) #scifi

I'd say "warning: not for arachnophobes" but considering I am one it's not traumatising me too much - at least the author picked the cute ones :). I just view the spiders as an alien race really, but they're really well done! Definitely worth picking up, I'd say. #scifi #scifibooks

evildrganymede, 6 months ago to TheCulture

The Culture Drawings book is full of pages like this - all these raw worldbuilding thoughts and sketches lovingly scanned in and restored! Whether there's much that can actually be deciphered coherently is another matter, but it's kinda fascinating to see :) #TheCulture #IainMBanks #SciFi

Delinquent Class GOU

evildrganymede, 6 months ago to books

I've finished re-reading The Lord of the Rings! It was fun to read it again after so long - I read it all at once in a big omnibus edition back in the 80s, as I recall I somehow managed to read the whole thing in a weekend (or maybe from Friday to Monday at least)! By the time the PJ movies came out my memory of the story was very fuzzy (especially after the first volume)!

It was interesting to compare the book to the PJ films and realise how different the films were - they mostly got the right idea but a lot of details were certainly different - e.g. the Elves didn't show up at Helms Deep, the Entmoot went a bit more smoothly, the Ringbearers didn't go to Osgiliath, the Army of the Dead didn't auto-win the battle at Pelennor Fields (or even show up there at all), etc. But a lot of things that were there were just shifted around or said by other characters at different points (Saruman's demise, for example). Still, I love the PJ movies and don't think any less of them - now I'm just reminded of the full story :). It was fun to read it again and easier to read too (probably because of familiarity from the movies).

I may even go through the Appendices at some point, there's some interesting stuff in there (apparently there's a new "Nature of Middle Earth" book out there somewhere that goes into more of the worldbuilding which I'd be very interested to read!). And I'd like to read the Fall of Numenor book too at some point (probably when it stops being an expensive hardback!). #books #lordoftherings

evildrganymede, 6 months ago to books

Yaaaaaaaaas!!! I went to Indigo to grab the Book of the Future reprint (one of the iconic books of my childhood that got me into science) and found The Culture Drawings book as well! #books #scifi :D

nyrath, 6 months ago to random

This another of my favorite bittersweet songs.
I lived through all this, and I share the song writer's opinion that we were robbed. I honestly thought I'd be able to visit the moon in 2000.

https://youtu.be/l_Yubitl5nk?feature=shared

evildrganymede, 7 months ago to Astronomy

The Psyche mission finally launched today and I am looking forward to the data it sends sends back when it gets to its synonymous destination! We haven't seen a world(let) quite like this - Is Psyche (the asteroid) just going to be a huge lump of metal in space? What would craters even look like there? Or is it still going to have some kind of regolith on it? We'll find out in 2029! #psyche #astronomy

kevinjardine, 7 months ago to vr

I created a board game about the closest stars. You can travel around, create research and trading bases and learn about the individual stars, their exoplanets, etc.

Any funders interested in helping me put a fancy mixed reality version of this on the Meta Quest 3?

I have the headset, the Blender, graphics and coding skills, the ideas, and even lots of connections with professional astronomers. What I don't have is any way to fund this (or any other) mixed reality project.

#VR #MetaQuest3

evildrganymede, 7 months ago (edited 7 months ago) to battletech

...and they're done! All the mechs from the Inner Sphere Force Packs are painted (and the AGoaC and Beginners Box). I started this in June 2022 and this was my first proper painting run (after a practice run of a Skaven Blood Bowl team) and I've been painting whenever I can since then. 50 mechs done! I have some Clan boxes but I'll be doing those all in one clan's scheme per box, which should be a bit easier than coming up with a new paint job for each mech (I did one IS force pack in Kurita colours just as a test run).

I'm quite proud of all of them but I think my favourites are the "character" mechs - the Cylon Centurion, Skeletor Atlas, He-Man Victor, Shockwave Cyclops. The Stalker, Dragon, Orion, Archer and the Unseen mechs turned out pretty good too. The Thug is probably my least favourite because of the garish colour scheme but at least it stands out :). 1/3 #battletech #miniatures #miniaturepainting