YaP

for he's a jolly good fellow..... HAPPY BIRTHDAY Comicality !! Have a really wonderful day !

If i remember it right, the bombs can be triggered using any phone, by keying in the code after dialing in to the bomb.. the "receiver" is triggered by those tone dial tones every phone uses. The little "pre-programmed" devices just make it easier to send the code, but as long as you know the code itself (and the Scar definitely knows them all, and maybe Dimitri does as well) you can use any phone and trigger the bomb. Vlad tried to mess around with the receiver's side in the bomb to change the code.. but Dimitri (or was it the Scarf itself ?) overwrote his changes, so the codes are what the Scar and Dimitry wanted them to be... From my experience, thats not odd at all.. its a quite natural reaction. As long as you are "under pressure", your adrenaline level is high and keeps you running.... the moment the danger is over, your mind (and body) need/demand a time out... saw it happen to others and myself (back in my days as paramedic and firefighter). So, not odd at all - quite contrary rather realistic

Yup, after all CJames is a nice guy (even though he does sometimes hide his nice side behind an evil goat ), and doesnt like to see us suffer for such a long time... and after he even acknoledged the cliff/cloudhanger himself... he couldn't keep us suspended for a whole week .

*releases a breath held for 2 days*. I didn't see this solution coming.. but i WAS sure CJ would not let it end the way it seemed in chapter 37 But thanks a lot for the early post of chapter 38. I think its really good, after the MOACH in chapter 37, a rather smooth chapter calming our stressed nerves is just what we needed Even though (of course, as the story isn't finished yet) there are still things to resolve, and the Scar is determined to take the boys out.. now that they shared what they know with the military, and they sure as hell will find the explosives on the plane etc... i think we have the worst behind us now Still, of course i am looking forward to chapter 39 on Tuesday next week Edit: yes, i agree, the title is kinda misleading. Nobody died in this chapter (luckily). And didn't CJ mention the chapter's name would be "fire above and below" ?? or did we make this up in our comments to chapter 37 ?

I think thats because of the wind / wind direction in relation to where they are heading... they try to save energy in the slipstream...

hmm, definitely marinade in olive oil, garlic, thyme, parsley, piment, maybe some fresh ginger ... and then have a nice salad and green beans (with bacon and tomato sauce) and potatoes on the side

LOL hmm, BBQ... tomorrow people all over germany will have BBQs.. as it is the 1st of May So lets have a 1st of May goat BBQ !

I agree with the fire below being the second bomb... but the fire in the sky can't be the plane.. because the boys HAVE to survive somehow... well, it could be the plane if they got out of it somehow (e.g. if they find parachutes.. but there isnt enough time for action like that because the missiles are already on their way). Well, maybe the nuclear device (the fire below) triggers the missiles going of (the fire in the sky) just BEFORE they hit the plane !?!?

what a chapter ! truly a "MOACH" (mother of all cliff/cloud hangers). Mean mean mean ! I think i will not read CJames next story (or sequel / second book to one of the stories already up) until its completely posted. Better read a weekend non-stop than wait for another week for such a cliffhanger to resolve Great chapter though !! Mean, brutally crude to us readers, but a great chapter. I have NO idea how the boys will get out of this alive. But they have to, don't they !?!? Maybe the EMP impulse of the second bomb going off will stop the missiles.. even though they SHOULD be shielded against an EMP.. but maybe they are not the newest ones and are not shielded well enough ? The fighters weren't really the latest models, so maybe the missiles aren't either......

Wow, what a chapter :-) . It might lead for CJames being on the NSA watch list though, as much as he knows about nuclear bomb design.. watch out ;-) (good thing you didn't go into all the details you know... and yea, its really scary this information is freely available...). No, no cliffhanger at all.. we just know that the "order to kill" has been given for Instinct . Poor Vlad.. and even poorer innocent Aussies getting killed (not mentioning the kangaroos and other wildlife).

All males do have a mammary gland. But its "deactivated"... As far as i know, you would have to use female hormones as a man for your mammary gland to start producing milk... which would have quite some side effects. If i would not have to take oestrogen and i would not start growing a (female) bosom, i think i would breast feed my child if i could. I think you are right with the "special connection/bonding" it creates. Its such an elementary thing to feed your child.. But i don't think it would work "naturally" for most men without using female hormones (or other drugs).. which i would not like to use because of the side effects... but i answered "Yes of course i would try", because i think i would (even if it doesnt work) Male lactation

I like (good) wine, and sometimes a nice single malt whiskey.. but i don't drink on a regular basis, and i rarely get drunk (but, well, it does happen, maybe 2 or 3 times a year, but never to the extend that i can't remember what i have done ). Even though i am German, i don't drink much beer .

So your system is set up to make a dump and reboot in case of a "blue screen".. thats why don't see much/for long on the screen... I suppose the info you would see on the blue screen is in those files.. i don't know if i can help, but i will try if you send me the files C:\Users\Jack\AppData\Local\Temp\WER-75223-0.sysdata.xml C:\Users\Jack\AppData\Local\Temp\WER92FB.tmp.version.txt best Pete

Well, that would be an hour of daylight you lose in winter in the morning... thats why they change it forth and back...

The blue screen should show some info about what actually crashed (very probably a system service or device driver).. that may help in finding the cause of this (i.e. which driver/software you should maybe re-install to get the original file back....)

I don't like DST either. "Standard Time" usually is closer to the "astronomical time" for where you live, i.e. the sun is at the peak at 12 noon (thats how it should be). I don't think it really saves energy (thats the reason they started this mess - at least that was the plan). This "one our more daylight" in the evening doesn't really make a big difference in terms of energy usage. Some farmers don't change the time they milk their cows, or feed their animals, because the animals are used to be fed (or milked) at a certain time and get edgy/distracted if the farmer suddenly shows up an hour earlier or later than they are used to. For me, it disturbs my sleeping rhythm.. it takes me some time to get used to the time switch (so yea, i am one of those people that are now rather grumpy because i lost an hour last sunday...). I think its one of those stupid ideas that some highly payed government consultant came up with - just so that he came up with something to justify his fee... totally useless and plain wrong (unnatural). (Seems like its closer to 95% against DST here now )

I was thinking the same.. thats going to be interesting... Will the Scar plant the other bombs at the other concert sites ? Probably.. as the equipment trucks are his way to transport them. Great chapter again CJames !

Yea, i think its one of those things nobody really knows the origins of. I heard it may have started some time in the 16th century when some French king changed the start of the new year from 1st of April to 1st of January, and everybody that did celebrate the new year on 1st of April after that was considered a fool. But who knows....

I agree with what James said. All in all, i do prefer Linux (especially for servers), but i run Windows (2000/2003 server/XP) on most of my boxes as i develop software which needs to run on windows. And i agree with rknapp on his comments about the various windows versions. Actually i never used ME (it was too crappy to begin with), and i only use Vista for testing. I am not a fan of all those fancy visual features (usually i switch it all off so XP/Vista does look and behave more like 2000 ). From my experience Windows is really OK since Windows 2000. Win98 was already much better than 95 or 3.1 (not to mention Windows 1.0 *lol*). As for Mac's: i have never owned one, but i had to help some friends out when their Mac crashed and they didn't know what to do. So, from my experience, the "user friendliness" of the Mac ends if you have a serious problem... I actually don't think Macs are better or worse than Windows in terms of "stability" or "user friendliness". They definitely look better, and are more expensive. The benefit of not being so vulnerable to viruses/trojans because there are not many viruses/trojans that affect the Mac is still there, but the hackers actually do catch up on that recently. And from a research some guys in Switzerland did recently, it seems Apple takes longer to fix bugs and close security holes than Microsoft does.. All in all, i think we do get a lot for what we pay for a Windoze PC or Mac. Considering the complexity of a PC's hard- and software (whatever OS you run on it), they are amazingly stable nowadays.

A friend of mine had a similar problem with a trojan - well, actually a trojan that downloads other trojans ... really nasty. I got rid of it using SpyBot S&D running in protected mode, and Kaspersky Anti-Virus (I totally agree with Gary though.. most Virus scanner do their job, and i stick with what works fine for me ). It sounds to me like you have caught one of those trojans that actually load other malware.. Did you "Immunize" your system with SpyBot S&D ? It actually writes a bunch of entries to the "Hosts" file in windows and blocks access to those suspicious servers this way, which helps - even if you still have that trojan - to prevent that it re-loads more malware... The one my friend had caught was actually not in the MBR, but launched itself via some (multiple) registry entries. If you know what "beast" you actually caught (the Virus Scanners usually give you a name for the beast), I could try to look up some information on it. For my friends computer i had to remove some registry entries and delete some files in protected mode to finally get rid of it... Hope you get it fixed !

Yes, definitely cool comsie ! I suppose we all know how "real life" can interfere with our plans.. as long as you don't disappear all is fine in my book Lol, i always say "i am not heterophobe".. so get as straight as you feel like I hope you can solve all the real life issues soon so you have your mind free for (the less important) online stuff ! Take care ! Pete

Typos, and wrong punctuation, do disturb my "flow" when reading a story. Not to a point that i stop reading (if the plot is interesting to me), but it makes me "stumble". I prefer (probably like most) reading stories with "proper mechanics", visible "breaks" when changes in time or place occur etc. Definitely makes reading more enjoyable - especially if you are not a native English speaker like me. Usually I have a dictionary at hand to look up words i don't know. So if I stumble over a typo i might first think its a word i don't know and try to look it up, and if i finally find out it must be a typo it is especially disturbing for me - but even that doesn't make me stop reading if i like a story. I am still amazed how many talented writers out there are willing to share their work for free, and I don't expect it all to be perfectly edited. I am sure most writers and editors take great care to make it as good as they can. At least with the stories that are worth reading.

Welcome (back) Xuan. Don't be shy, we don't bite (unless asked for). Well, as you have been around before, you probably know that already Have fun !

I agree ! Especially as he is already suspicious about J/S, he should be way more careful around him, But well, we all have our weak spots. And tequilla definitely is a very weak spot for Eric. I think its bad enough to yell "NOOOOO". Its mean to end the chapter there. I will wonder all week now how this little game between J/S and Eric ends. And what about J/S plans for the boat!? Sharpening his knife already!! Yes, me too. I start to like him. And i think you are right.. he will save the day some time soooon. Great Chapter CJ ! Please post the next one ASAP

lol, i suppose most of us here are in the same boat when it comes to computers and Internet . As I earn my money programming, i use the computer - and the Internet, all day long. I am lost without my Internet connection - work depends so much on getting information and communicating via email. I do have (at least 1) backup computers in case my "main" PC dies. If my ADSL connection doesn't work, i have an old fashioned modem (better slow than none) to connect to the web. If the phone line is dead as well I can use my cell phone with an UMTS connection to connect to the web.