Resolution

New article this morning from my hometown paper, The Rolla Daily Snooze summarizing yesterday's Backwoods Missouri Terrorist. Here's the part of the article that sums up how nerdy a school it is:

Venkatramolla was supposedly upset after receiving the first two ‘B’ grades he’d ever gotten and falling behind in his classes due to illness, according to a source who wished to remain anonymous.

Wow. Seriously -- they're just grades. And, for most normal people, getting two Bs at one of the hardest, most-respected engineering schools in the world wouldn't lead them to want to commit suicide. Maybe it's an Indian culture thing that I don't understand.

WoW is Worth It

As a fellow World of Warcraft addict, I don't think this fella should be prosecuted.

I completely agree with the writer of this article that you shouldn't ever get upset with others using your Wi-Fi if it's not secured. It seem ridiculous to me that they want to police what people are doing on the open wireless connection. With the exception of things that are illegal or could harm others or are obvious (like gambling, phishing or looking at porn), I think you should be able to do anything harmless and non-offensive on an open network -- even at the library. And, for heaven's sake, the poor kid lives in Alaska! I'm sure it's beautiful up there, but many open Wi-Fi spots do you think there are in that town?

Backwoods Missouri Terrorist

Phil just sent me a link to this article about the university in my hometown. Just proves there are psychos everywhere.

It's a little funny, though, because my mom is ridiculously afraid of terrorists. When my sister and brother-in-law lived in Cairo, Egypt for the past two years, she asked them one time if they had disguises and escape plans set up just in case the terrorists were after them. Of course, they survived Cairo fine and never felt threatened in the area where they lived. Now someone claiming to be a terrorist attempts an "attack" in my sleepy hometown, less than five miles from the house where my mom and dad live, where I grew up. A little ironic, don't you think?

UPDATE: My mom just called and said they're staying in Springfield until they figure out what's going on in Rolla. And my mom's brother and his whole family are on their way to Springfield. I'd be a bit put off too, but when does that cross over to being paranoid and alarmist? Hmm.

Old School Video Games in Food

[Thanks BoingBoing]

We're Famous Dog-Torturers

Phil posted a couple of videos on YouTube of Allie with the radio-controlled helicopter the other day. Now you can enjoy watching us torture the dog from the comfort of your home!

Crack

Thanks to my new friend, the brains behind iBlog.

Even the Elderly Can Have A Wii Bit of Fun

This is awesome.

We got a Wii when it first came out and we knew instantly that it was a hit and our friends and family would love it. Phil had pre-ordered our Wii from our nearby GameStop. It came out at midnight so we went over at about 10:00 to pay for it so we could just pick it up later, when the rush arrived. While we were there, we ran into the guys who started and run the VS Gaming Center across the parking lot. Phil has been going in there since the day it opened. He's even done a few projects for those guys and that's one of our hangout spots if we have a couple of hours between dinner and movies, or whatever. Anyway, we saw Dave in GameStop and talked to him for a minute. He actually had arranged with GameStop to get the Wii a couple hours early, so he was taking it over to set it up right away. We went over there and played World of Warcraft for a bit to kill some time. Once Dave had the Wii set up, there was a huge crowd gathered around. They played baseball and did boxing and all of those teen-aged and twenty-something guys were laughing and screaming and having a great time. There were probably 30 guys gathered around awaiting their turn. Meanwhile, the PS3 that was released the day before sat over on the other side of the room with no attention. It was hilarious.

Anyway, we play the Wii all the time, but especially when we have company. We took it to my family get-together at Thanksgiving and my entire family loved it, including my mom and dad. In fact, they hijacked it for almost an hour as they played baseball and bowling and golf against each other. It was awesome. Then, we played with Phil's whole family at Christmas and that was a blast. His parents also enjoyed tennis and bowling and kept asking for another turn. That's when you know a game is genuinely awesome -- when non-video-gamers beg to play. So, seeing elderly enjoying it doesn't surprise me! I'm going to go see if I can get the second level of Pro on my Mii bowler. :o)