rknapp

Maybe the goose is in cahootz with the AFLAC mascot?

I'm disappointed in you James. You had me thinking you'd invented the Smelloscope and the Thinglonger! For shame...

I've been keeping Gunter in the back of my mind on the issue of the hero. He hasn't played much of a role at all except for the tour of Rome and the short discussion he had with Brandon about his relationship with Chase while they were in Aussie land. His role might be a physical one since a situation like this might actually require multiple people to bring down someone as determined and cutthroat as the Scar. Of course the 'who' part of the solution to that equation is entirely up to Mister Goat. I'm not sure how I missed that part about the goose, but on further inspection of the context I'm going to go out on a limb and suggest Mario was not referring to an animal at all. Maybe saying "goose" here was his way of referring to some sort of a jumpstart, or a link to a missing connection in the plan? He IS from the UK, after all -- and their terminology and slang is far different from that of the US and the Aussies. That's just a total stab in the dark though... I'm probably way off base haha I just can't see what an annoying bird who shits all over your property after migrating back has to do with a plan to kill five people all at once and make it look like an accident.

Well I'm late to the party... Drew sent me a link to the story and now I'm hooked! I guess I'll just skip all of the fluff speculation that ran through my head throughout the story (since most of that was revealed now anyway) and get straight to the point. The fifth person is either Helen or Scar. Helen is a big threat since she was/is an integral part of the band and the tour that saw the transport of the bombs to the US. The Scar is my other guess simply because, in that sort of business, there are NEVER any partners. I would not be surprised if the Scar has plans for Dimitri's demise as well. Now for my proposed heroes... the engineer and Joe. The engineer understands that he won't be paid or set free, thus the lining of his briefcase with gold and his supposed "plans" for cheating death. Whether or not his plans unfold before the first blast has yet to be determined, but I get the feeling that the first blast will not come for a little while yet since they keep saying over and over they have a lot of work to do. It could happen in as little as a few days or as much as a few months, I don't know. All I can guess is that the lives of "the five" will be in danger once they return to L.A. I also picked Joe because he serves no other purpose to the story now. His original purpose was a placeholder as lead singer to get the band going initially and to be a part of the web that linked the band to the terrorist plot. He was the Scar's "in" for getting the band to be his method for smuggling the weapons into and across the US. Since he has returned, he must have some significant purpose, and who better for uncovering the Scar's plans than his own son, who he has foolishly assumed is done? I wondered if Phil wondered if there was some deeper underlying motives for 'Jerry' to not care about his wife's death. I wonder if the specialist Phil is calling in for Joe will uncover those motives? Joe flies out the night of the concert for L.A., so he'll be out of range of 'Jerry' who likely has unfinished business with the band and must remain in the city for a while. This is, of course, all speculation. There is also the possibility of Gunter playing the role of hero, but I don't think he suspects much. Further, there is something that has been nagging my mind since the Scar's plans started to unravel... there no way in HELL that he would be able to blackmail the US for billions, take over Paraguay and the natural resources of South America, and get away with it. There are six billion people in the world and most of them would not let him get away with it. The US still has major allies who would seek out and destroy her enemies when she has been so mortally wounded (two nukes more powerful than Hiroshima and Nagasaki). It could also be likely that her enemies would join in the fight if only for feeling threatened that a terrorist has such devices at his disposal and has pictures suggesting that he has even more. That said, his plan will fail. Of that I am sure if the story is to remain fictionally accurate, such as it is. I will also say that I have read each chapter bracing myself for the inevitable -- one or more members of Instinct will die, particularly if Mario's list contains their names (and it will contain all of them). One more thing -- a question. What's all this business involving a goose and a phone book? I don't recall that ever happening... Oh and, regarding Eric's sexuality, he isn't gay. He's straight as they come, but he's adventurous. I say this because I firmly believe that he would have an intimate sexual encounter, with all of the trappings of casual sex, with a man. He said at the resort that he would try anything once. Sure, it took a bottle of tequila to get him to kiss Cody, but I don't think the alcohol was doing anything when he deepened the kiss and had no regrets after Helen caught him. Though, I get the feeling that, if they live long enough, she'll play on it in tandem with her threats to 'out' him.

Body hair removal is easy for me! I don't bother lmao.

Most generally I am attracted largely to people of my own race, but that's not to say that I don't ever find others to be attractive. Come to think of it, all my sexual encounters (yes, all two of them, if you count the hispanic guy who was all over me that one time as sexual) have been with people of other races... interesting.

Interesting topic... I don't personally have much body hair. My head could be used for a mop *reminds self to think about a haircut* (one of my GSA friends made the comment that I should "get my hair did", and that we could "get our hair did" together... I'm scared that he might be serious), I've got some pit hair, though not much. I have arm hair, but not a lot. I've got more leg hair than I do arm hair and it seems to have grown in similar consistency over my thighs, the backs of my thighs, and my rump (right up over my lower set of cheeks, if you know what I mean). I've just noticed a very small amount of hair growing on my chest, which I'm excited about. Really I have only three problem areas. I don't like the hair on my ass and thighs, especially since, for the area most of it is in (sitting area) it's gross... pubic gross. The second area is that I have a few odd hairs growing around my nipples... and they're black! If they were just like everything else (blond) then I wouldn't care, but I hate the black. Third area would be the forest around my pickle and on my peaches. The peaches are probably fine... or at least the guy who made friends with them a couple years back didn't say anything... but I have a problem with that forest. It's NOT growing out, which is fantastic... it comes to a flat line 3-4 inches below my navel... but it grows up (away from my body)! It leveled out a few years ago, but I keep wondering if I should trim it... but then I worry that doing so will give me low hairs that poke and scratch at me! Besides all that, I've got a few low hairs that come up the middle from my forest to my innie where the worst is about an inch long. The forest, by comparison, goes to about 2-3 inches. on Couple that with the fact that I'm blond... everything but my forest, navel, and the few nipple hairs are blond. Face too, but I rarely shave. I shave maybe once a month when I get a goatee going, keeping only my chin hair. Now that I've written something that could get me banned... my opinion on other guys: I love leg hair! Not too much, but just enough turns me on. A nice, thick, patch of hair under the arms is wonderful too. As I said I detest my ass hair, so the same goes for another guy. Back hair has no place, but if he's sweet/cute and otherwise perfect, I can overlook that. Another plus that most of you seem to hate is chest hair. I'd like him to have a small patch in between his nipples, but not covering his entire torso. It might be nice to lay in bed, reach across him, and push my fingers through his small patch of chest hair, playing with it . I'm also a fan of certain types of facial hair. More specifically, around the edge of his jaw and over his chin. Not all over the cheeks and upper lip, though. As for color... dark. I like black and dark brown for some reason. I don't know... part of why I call myself gay is because I'm attracted to men, and men tend to have hair on their bodies, so I think just the right amount in the right areas is sexy as hell! I like hairless as well, but if I had two cute guys standing before me, one has hair in the right places and the other does not, I'd pick the hairy guy.

It's important to know yourself, and I would choose to do so scientifically to an extent. Other it's not that important to me because I no longer have any burdens on my shoulders beyond school.

Well the first order of business would be installing a larger hard drive (40 GB in there right now) so a fresh installation would be required. But, it would be interesting to play with some of those tools on some of my existing hard drives (such as the main drive that I have, since I might format it in the future anyway). Thanks! Yeah I'm the only one I know who has MCE 2005. One time my friend and I were fooling around with my 360 and found that it can do special stuff when working with a computer running MCE, which I happened to have. I think I've only ever used the MCE function a few times, playing music via remote from my old dorm bed because I was too much of a lazy ass to get up and walk the two feet to my desk haha.

Never heard of it. Got any links? OSX is out of the question because I would have to pay for it... and it angers me. One of my GSA friends asked me to help him find a nice picture of him (his friend wants to draw his face) and I tried to navigate his picture files/folders on his MacBook Pro (Leopard) with no success. I clicked the folder and nothing happened... wtf? I'd like to try dual-boot since my roommate from last year has that on his Mac with Leopard and XP. I'm guess that would require being able to install XP, though, which can't be done since Dell doesn't believe in shipping install disks with their computers when customers buy them. Gee, we buy the OS, but when it comes time to format the drive we have to buy it all over again... tards.

Runs fine on my laptop with XP MCE 2005. I noticed that there is a counter on the Ubuntu website indicating the date of the next release, so I'll wait for that to have the most up to date thing. Interesting that it can be booted from CD.

I chose 1. I don't drink to get drunk, I drink to have fun with friends. I've never been drunk a moment in my life and never plan on being so. It's more fun when others get drunk, anyway

Some time ago I created a small poll in the Member Q&A forums about favored operating systems. That thread was the precursor to the one you find yourself in now. I have a shit-ton of computer parts. Presently I have two spare motherboards, two spare processors (Athlon XP+ and Athlon 64), a spare power supply, memory that is compatible to both motherboards, a spare 17" flat glass monitor (old Compaq CRT... I call it my Buick, damn thing is so big/heavy), spare CD burner (year old!), spare DVD drive, spare HDD (have yet to determine if it works -- harvested from my old Compaq that was open to dust/pet dander for five years and has sat on my desk in the open for almost a year now). Presently my spare case is set up with the newer/better mobo, the 64-bit processor, 512mb DDR memory, both optical drives, a maybe-busted sound card, etc. All it needs is the power supply I have sitting around, the harvested Compaq HDD (60 GB Maxtor), and a PCI-e video card to run again. I'll be returning the PCI-e card in my current workhorse to the old one when I upgrade to either dual 8800s or dual 9600s, so that's not a problem. What I would like to do is use this spare hodge-podge to fool around with different OSs. What should I use? I have only ever used Windows (95-XP MCE 2005 and everything in between) so I'm curious now what other OSs look like and how they run. My control will be Windows 2000 and I'll only use OSs that can be obtained completely free of charge via the internet (like Ubuntu). My requirements are thus: Hardware Athlon processors MSI socket AM2 motherboard for my workhorse, ASUS socket 939 for the test mule Corsair XMS2 memory for my workhorse, XMS for the test mule (Corsair doesn't work in every system combination) nVidia 8-series or 9-series PCI-e video cards for my workhorse, 7-series for the test mule Linksys 802.11g wireless network card Creative Soundblaster Audigy 2 series sound card (might be broken, using onboard sound at the moment) Microsoft Intellipoint optical mouse HP Deskjet 6540 Samsung SyncMaster 940 bw ^I need drivers for all of these. Most of them are in the work horse, but the test mule will use PNP parts unless otherwise stated. Software Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise WinAmp AIM version 5.9.6089 (6.0 sucks hardcore) MSN Messenger 7.5 and/or Windows Live Messenger (sucks hardcore) DualCore Center/Core Center (MSI CPU monitoring/overclocking program) for my work horse Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird Nero Burning Rom Games I figure any OS should handle these but just in case: Any Blizzard game (WC3: RoC and Frozen Throne, Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, Starcraft II and Broodwar) The Sims 2 and all expansions Need for Speed: Most Wanted and Pro Street. They won't run well on the mule, but should have no problems on high settings in my work horse. Not using the work horses components will certainly be a limiting factor, but I'm using 2000 initially for test mule comparisons. The hard drive in question already has 2000 on it, but it might not work anymore. As long as I can install all of my components from the test mule and all of my favored programs, there shouldn't be any problems and I can freely peruse the system to see how it runs and to see if it runs better than Windows 2000. Ultimately I want to try Vista, but I don't want to pay for it without testing it on my own system, so that could be a while.

No the genre hasn't gone stale... it's just lost it's passion. There are infinite number of ways to write a story for any genre, it just takes imagination. There are certainly many scenarios which have been explored too much, but I've noticed that a lot of them have started with the well-used scenario, and then branched off to something else. The genre has simply gotten to the point where authors really need to flex their creative juices, so to speak, to create something fantastic. A lot of writers here have that power, it just seems that they haven't been doing so lately? (I haven't read a story on here in many months, so I don't know).

*checks stomach* Nope, no fetus(s). *Thinks really hard* Nope, quite gay*.

Haven't smoked a day in my life and never plan on it.

Bear in mind that this was almost four months ago... my hair is soooo much longer, and technically I do have a goattee now... I just don't shave it often. I shaved five minutes before that party.

I'm bored and avoiding doing my homework (all I have to do is draw a pick-up truck to model later on using a computer lol) so here are a few pictures of me from Queermas (middle of December). I'm the one with the brown shirt. Two winters ago in my snowboarding get-up:

When all you have is the desktop background and maybe a window that may have been maximized (and a blank area under the window where the system toolbar should be) that means Windows Explorer has crashed and the only way to restore it is to restart. It happens rarely, but it just sounds to me as though he has a much more serious problem than virus' and the like, probably a result from some of the virus' infecting key OS files, or they're overloading the OS.

Seconded, thirded, fourth...ded?... lmao. Jamie, you're a shining example of why girls say, "All the good ones are gay!" haha Lost weight, huh? I'm not sure I'm losing or gaining weight... I started the semester off at 214.5 fully dressed (including shoes, wallet, and cell phone)... I'm down to 210 dressed in the same manner, though my weight with changes in clothes and water level has been as low as 202 (yeah, not low for you, but you're a stick lol).

I've never cared about DST. My phone automatically resets itself. Win2k used to as well, but Win2k's clock program was written well before Bush changed DST to happen earlier than the rest of the world (making DST even MORE frustrating for people who are constantly doing business with Europe, like my Dad). I have to reset my PC clock manually for DST. As far as time zones go, my phone has a World Clock. What it does is on one side it displays my current local time. On the other side it displays whatever the local time is for whatever major city in the world I choose to monitor. If I live in the Northeast, but I am constantly contacting people out in California, I can tell my phone to watch my local time (kept in check via satellite, wherever I am) AND set the World Clock to watch the Pacific time zone. If I talk to people in India all the time, I could set it to watch some city in India in their timezone. I haven't needed to use it, but I imagine that will come in handy if I ever go time zone hopping. Right now I having it set to Berlin time, for no real reason other than my wanting to visit Germany very badly. EDIT: Checking my phone now it says -- Current time zone: 2:47 am GMT -4 Berlin: 8:47 am GMT 2 DST

Good, then I'm not the only one who's tried hahaha. Come on, this is centuries in the future, homosexuality has got to be mainstream by then! I'm so bad lmao. Nice. I once made up a couple where their maid was female and the gardener was male, and I had the guy doing the maid and the girl doing the gardener. Once the guy and girl had a few kids I had the guy doing the gardener, naturally, haha. I think every guy in each of my neighborhoods has "Woohooed" at least one other guy in their lifetime.

Simple enough, right? CJ didn't like Azure Dragon and I feuding over Windows and Mac earlier, so here is such a haven. Mods: if the thread isn't in the right place, then feel free to move it and say where it is being moved to! This seemed a logical place since it asks a question and demands an answer! Hehe. You can answer the poll in whatever context you like: Which do you use more? Which do you prefer more? etc. The only limiting factor is I want you answer based on what you use at home for personal use, not what you use for work. Ordinarily you don't have a choice of what you use for work and some of us require the use of a computer for work, so that negates any and all preferences. As far as the poll's separation goes, I separated it according to differences in operating systems. Windows 9x is completely different from ME/2000/XP/Vista. ME is completely different from all others in its own unique ways *shudders at the memories*, 2000 and XP are essentially the same and most people are using these, Vista is of course very different from XP even though some people would have you believe that Vista is simply a glorified XP. Likewise OS 9 and X are different. They also have different versions (OS X Tiger, Leopard, etc.) so please specify which version you are using. Other pertains to the many operating systems that people use and aren't at all mainstream (Linux, Windows, and Mac are the biggest ones out there AFAIK), including Ubuntu, Solaris, etc. Also please say why you prefer one operating system over another. This isn't meant to be a fight, just seeing who uses what in their personal activities. I personally use Windows 2000 as my primary operating system. It's lighter than XP and, in my experience, is the most stable operating system Microsoft has ever produced. I refuse to downgrade to XP simply because I much prefer using 2000 on my desktop than I do XP MCE 2005 on my laptop. Prior to my last hardware overhaul, 2000 was running faster and more efficiently on my desktop than XP was/is on my laptop. At that time, my desktop had a 2.0 GHz single-core processor, 256 MB dedicated graphics card, dedicated Creative Labs sound card, 512 MB DDR memory, 550 watt power supply, etc. My laptop had/has a 1.7 GHz Centrino mobile processor, 1 GB DDR2, 64 MB onboard graphics and onboard sound in a Dell Inspiron 17" WXGA package. The Dell ran video games better, but Win2k definitely outperformed WinXP in all areas despite having less ram and a comparable CPU. Now it's no contest since I upgraded to dual-core and 2 GB DDR2 and plan on getting two 8800 or two 9600 GT graphics cards to use SLI and kick ass in every video game out there. Which brings me to what I use my PCs for... web surfing and video games. In a year or two I will be increasing that to CAD, after doing the aforementioned graphics upgrade, upgrade memory to 4 GB DDR2 800 MHz, and possibly upgrading to quad-core if AMD can get their act together to improve their Phenom line of processors. Lucky for me, Phenom uses the same socket as XP+ X2. That said, I am waiting for Microsoft to either get the kinks out of Vista or for them to release their next Operating system (if it's at all good, since MS seems to have hit its pinnacle with Win2k is and now in a decline with the quality of each new release). I'd like to get 64-bit Vista just so that I can finally make full use of my 64-bit hardware and can also make use of DX10. Reasons that I use or don't use some OSs: Win9x - No longer using: 98SE was a good OS, just not as nice at Win2k. I really don't remember it though. WinME - No longer using: MOST INFURIATING OPERATING SYSTEM EVER MADE! Win2k - Using: Most familiar, most compatible, not infuriating at all. WinXP - Using: Most familiar (set to Windows Classic mode), kind of compatible (some programs require XP+), not as infuriating. WinVista - Not using: Slightly familiar (a little confusing, but nothing I can't handle in hour of perusing), not immediately compatible, but almost there, security prior to SP1 was infuriating, haven't played with it since then, performance prior to SP1 was sub-par according to tech articles. Mac OS 9 - Not using: Never used, so no comment. This OS was before I knew anything about computers and so I had no opportunity to use it. Mac OS X - Not using: Infuriatingly unfamiliar. I played with Tiger and Leopard at Best Buy and gave up figuring out how to open programs after ten minutes of mucking around. I want to throw it against the wall, but I didn't want to have to sell my left nut just to pay for it. Without desktop icons or a Start button, I'm totally lost. BUT I like that the desktop changes on my friends Leoparded MacBook Pro. As far as Mac as a whole is concerned, I absolutely detest their physical systems because of how proprietary they are... I switched to custom builds in 2003 and haven't looked back (except for the laptop, but that will change in a few years when I decide to get a whole new custom-built laptop for a lot less than any crappy name-brand system). Linux: Not using: Never used, so no comment.

I don't download toolbars of any kind. They present the risk of infection with virus' and malware, they clutter up your browser (mine is configured so that the top is as thin as humanly possible), and they probably slow down the browser overall.

I agree 100% on Limewire. Not only does the program itself open you up to spyware/malware, the things you download open you up to virus' and trojans. OW MY VIRGIN EYES!!!! All of those mentioned benefits of NIS are available through AVG in a much more compact and efficient package. Not to mention free. You can get a paid version with additional features, but I don't need any of those features. Plus, it updates every day with new virus definitions. I have it set to download these updates when powering the computer on. Yes, that delays start-up a bit, but only if you're on a bad internet connection. The update files are small and download/install rather quickly. Another bad point about Norton is that if you ever choose to uninstall it, you'll have to format the drive. Simply uninstalling it won't do it since there are many registry entries and such that remain. The only way to uninstall it complete is to format the drive (PITA), go through the ENTIRE system and manually delete anything having to do with Norton and/ore Symantec (PITA), or find a specific program that does that for you (heard of 'em, but never seen 'em). I'm disappointed in you Kevvers... That sounds to me like Windows Explorer is crashing on you. It happens to me occasionally (usually indicates that 2000 doesn't like what I'm making it do or there is a bigger underlying problem on the drive -- the already mentioned programs have taken care of me just fine so far). If it's happening to you a lot, then formating the drive is your only option. Related to the MBR: How old is the drive? The main drive in my desktop right now is about five years old and I'm considering replacing it. It presently has information (drivers and such) for two complete system builds and it also has a small need for a format (accidentally deleted a windows .dll file when I was attacked by virus'/trojans prior to commencing a full assault on the system with my previously posted virus removal procedure -- 2000 bitches about that file everytime it boots) so I figure getting a new drive will save me some trouble and also prevent me from being in a big bind if/when the drive goes to the big PC in the sky. It might easier to simply replace the drive and start fresh (KEVVERS this applies to you to! It's cheaper than buying a new system everytime yours is too slow). If the drive is relatively new then I would suggest trying to save it before ditching an otherwise perfectly good drive.