Now that Steven has revealed his true self to the world, we need to give him all the support and caring we can. 

Just remember, Steven, there are many others just like you out there.  None is better known, however, than...

^{(thanks to Superdickery.com)}

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So the Librarian and I got together tonight to finish up Elfen Lied.  As brutal as the violence is, and it is very brutal, and as gratuitous as the nudity is, and it's very gratuitous, it can still be a incredibly beautiful show to watch.

Case in point:


Lucy, the character responsible for the highest bodycount in short-season history, and who had been imprisoned and treated like a lab rat for the past eight years, has just experienced the first moment of true peace and acceptance she has ever had in her life.  In a few minutes, she will be dead (or maybe not, considering the way the show ends), but she will go knowing that, despite everything, she is loved. 

This one shot, maybe three seconds long, makes the entire anime worth the price of admission for me.

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So we're a few weeks into the new season, and enough time has passed for a watcher to have decided on what's made the cut and what... well, hasn't.  That can only mean one thing: another installment of "What's Wonderduck Watching?"

Click below for the whole scoop!  Warning: quite a few screenshots, so dialup users, click and go make a sandwich or something.

more...

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Thank you.

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Back in July, Jeff of Hop Step Jump! posted a picture of an unnamed character from an unknown manga.  I loved it, and turned it into a wallpaper.  Understand that I change my wallpaper on a weekly basis, yet this one lasted for three months.  There was something about the young woman that just grabbed my attention.

A week or so ago, Jeff put up another picture of her... and I found out her name: Alpha.  A little bit of searching turned up the name of the manga: Yokohama Shopping Trip (Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou).  It's been very well received (and won an award for best SF manga in 2007), but hasn't been picked up here in the States... but more importantly to me, there were two different OVAs made for it... and they were listed on Animesuki.  A few quick downloads later, and I was ready to watch.

So, what was the result?

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1 The 14 volumes of the manga are some of most engaging that I've ever read. Go read them. Please.

Posted by: TheBigN at November 17, 2007 02:21 PM (Xs2Gi)

2

I've been working through the manga, slowly. There isn't really any action. It's all about atmosphere and engaging characters and amazing art -- and it's amazingly good.

But it's also just about the last thing I'd think would make a good anime. The things you need for a good anime just aren't there.

Anyway, I think there's no doubt at all that the Misago is a feral robot. And I bet the Sea Goddess is a broken robot, still partially functional.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at November 18, 2007 05:09 PM (+rSRq)

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McLaren's appeal on the cool fuel controversy in Brazil has been heard, and the FIA has very, very quietly announced their verdict. 

It seemed like a relatively simple question: did BMW and Williams have fuel that was more than 10 C. below the ambient air temperature, or not?  If yes, why didn't the stewards penalize the teams?  If no, why did the gauges used report that the fuel WAS too cool in the first place?  Certainly the results of this simple question could have far-reaching ramifications, but at it's core, it's a basic "yes/no" answer. 

But this is the FIA we're talking about here.  They've invented new ways to screw up for fifty years, and they didn't disappoint today.  After hearing the case presented to them (and listening to a Ferrari lawyer shred McLaren for an extended period... and just what was Ferrari doing there anyway?  They weren't involved in the actual question...), over the course of a full day, and delaying the release of the verdict until Friday night London time, the four-judge court of appeals came out and said "the appeal is inadmissible, we shouldn't've been hearing this case in the first place.  Appeal denied on procedural grounds."

In other words, nothing to see here, move along.

Except it's more than that, of course.  This is the FIA's way of sweeping the entire mess under the rug and putting a chair over the unsightly lump.  It solves nothing, and just makes Team McLaren even more sympathetic, as now it looks like the FIA is just playing with them.  They have a legit complaint, and they're turning it away because the team didn't fill out the correct paperwork?

Ridiculous.  Don't expect this to end anytime soon, either.  Next season's going to be a nightmare of charges, claims and allegations, mark my words.

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Biggish news on the F1 front recently, as two teams change leaders... and the names are big.  REALLY big.

As has long been expected, Ferrari gave Jean Todt the heave-ho.  Near as I can tell, there's no visible reason for it.  It's not like the team underperformed while he was in charge, after all.  My guess, and this is only a guess, is that it was time to return Scuderia Ferrari to Italian command.  The surprise in my eyes is that the team allowed him to sign Felipe Massa to a three-year deal, particularly with Alonso still floating out there.  That might be one reason why Todt was let go.

Todt's old running-mate, Ross Brawn, has been on sabbatical for the past year.  Instead of returning to Ferrari as their team principal, like he'd hoped for, he's returning as Honda's boss.  It makes sense.  One, Honda is a particularly British team (despite the name, the team is based near Silverstone), and Brawn is a Brit as well.  Two, after their dismal season, which was caused by a miserable car design, they desperately need a good tech wonk, and there's probably none better.  Three, maybe the hulking Brawn can kick some life into Jensen Button, who's win at Hungary in 2006 is looking more and more like a fluke.

One leaves, perhaps for good.  The other returns, probably for a long while. 

At least we won't have to wonder about Todt's sweater anymore.

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"They call them leathernecks.  They call them devildogs.  But what they are...

...is Marines."

Semper fi to the good guys!

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As most readers of the Pond are aware, cable broadband became available last month for the first time out here.  Everything was fine and dandy until last week, when it appears that my Motorola SURFboard (model SB5101) started to  have a case of the hiccups.

Once or twice a night, the modem'll just stop functioning.  The "send" and "online" lights go out, and access just disappears.  Usually a hard reset (unplugging the power cord) will rectify the problem, but at least half of the time, the signal will drop again a few minutes later.  Another hard reset, combined with a reboot of Chiyo-chan, will fix the problem... until the next night.

Obviously, the modem still works... I'm posting, after all.  It's just annoying as all get-out to have the connection just drop like that.  When it IS working fine, I get some flat-out amazing (to me and my many years of dial-up only, your mileage may vary) d/l speeds: 175kbps is quite common, and I've seen it up around 200kbps when d/l'g something with a lot of seeds (I've switched to uTorrent, by the way).

There's a 25' run of coaxial from a splitter connecting the modem (which I'm considering naming "kamineko") to the wall, and a ethernet cable connecting the modem to Chiyo-chan.

This sound familiar to anybody out there?  The tech from the company came by and left a note saying to "clean the teeth on the ethernet cable" with a q-tip and a drop of denatured alcohol, but to this ex-CowPuters employee, that sounds like a standard brush-off answer ("Take two aspirin and call me in the morning").  If any of my readers have experience with the SURFboard, I'd appreciate your advice.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 02:44 AM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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1 I've got SB5100 which seems to work fine going into its 3rd year of service. However, I had a couple of them to die on me. The SB5100 replaced some Siemens crapmodem, and before that a pre-DOCSIS LAN City died in my care. I figured that cable modems just have limited life spans by nature, unlike normal modems.

Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at November 10, 2007 03:22 AM (9imyF)

2 You named your computer Chiyo-chan?

I would make fun of that, but I named my network "Roshtaria", and my various computers "Bugrom", "Escaflowne", "Cephiro", and....

Posted by: Ed Hering at November 10, 2007 09:04 AM (+3/HD)

3

I've used cable modems in Massachusetts, in San Diego, and here in Portland, and I've never seen that happen. But I always used an external cable modem, never a card.

What I would suggest is to talk to your neighbors. See if anyone else has a cable modem, and find out if they've been suffering the same symptoms.

My suspicion is that they'll say they aren't, which would mean your board is bad.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at November 10, 2007 01:03 PM (+rSRq)

4 One of the main causes of speed and connection problems with Cable Internet can be the splitters.  Did you supply the splitter, or did the cable company supply it?  Make sure it's a 1GHz Splitter.  Also, if it is more than a 2-way splitter, make sure that the cable modem is on the 3.5dB split, not one of the 7dB splits.

Do you live in an apartment building?  Unfortunately, due to the way a lot of those places are wired, heavy duty amplifier/distribution blocks are required to get a signal to all the apartments.  Unfortunately these things lead to some issues.

Finally, many cable modems have an on board Diagnostics page.  You can usually access this by doing to 192.168.100.1 in your browser.  Your Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) should be 30dB or greater.  Your downstream receive power should be between -6 to -3 dBmv or -2.5 to +2.5 dBmv depending on your provider.

If that's not the case, then you have probably have bad lines somewhere, either inside or outside the house.  The cable company may or may not have tested the signal strength during the initial setup.  If they didn't, have them come out and check it, if it's low, they are responsible for the lines outside the house.

This is way longer than I intended, hope it's useful.

Posted by: Buttons at November 10, 2007 02:29 PM (VjS5e)

5 That's all pretty good advice, but none of it would explain why Chiyo-chan would lock up. I've lost my cable connection once in a while, and it's never locked up any of my computers.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at November 10, 2007 05:27 PM (+rSRq)

6

Sorry... allow me to clarify:

1) The Motorola SURFboard is an external cable modem.  Despite the name, it's not a internal board at all.

2) My computer has never locked up when the modem signal dies.  However, to 'cleanse the palate', such as it were, I've rebooted.

3) The Pond is in an apartment complex, which is also the cable provider through an external company, and the splitter (2-way) came with the SURFboard.

Oh, and yes, I named my computer Chiyo-chan.  She's small, cute, EXTREMELY intelligent, and holds a lot of information in her head hard-drive.  My 80gb external HD is Tadakichi-san.

Posted by: Wonderduck at November 10, 2007 07:18 PM (DcSb+)

7 Oh man, you are otaku, aren't you?? What'd you do for ponytails?

Posted by: Ed Hering at November 11, 2007 12:03 PM (+3/HD)

8 I had the same symptoms (different cable modems) - twice.  The 1st time, the Cox 2nd level tech found hundreds of IP resets on their router, it ended up being low signal (their tech has a dba meter), and they installed a local amplifier at my entry point which fixed it.

A couple of years later they apparently upgraded the neighborhood.  I started getting the same symptoms again.  This time, the signal was way too high.  The tech removed the amplifier, and extra splitters, and everything is working fine again.

Posted by: conrad at November 11, 2007 02:51 PM (mo/xg)

9 What'd you do for ponytails?

USB cables.

Posted by: Wonderduck at November 11, 2007 03:09 PM (AW3EJ)

10

No, we use the twist ties that come on USB cables. (Otherwise they'd just go to waste, you know.)

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at November 11, 2007 04:13 PM (+rSRq)

11 Steven, I used to work for CowPuters, back when they had retail stores.  When they closed them, those of us who decided to stick around (so as to get our severance pay) got an added bonus: spare parts.

I've got so many USB cables I could use them to decorate a geeky christmas tree. 

Posted by: Wonderduck at November 11, 2007 05:37 PM (AW3EJ)

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On December 6th, 2007, there is going to be another meeting of the WMSC.  Unlike last time, when McLaren was fined $100 million dollars and excluded from Constructor's Championship points despite a large lack of concrete evidence, this time around it appears that there might just be some proof involved.

Except it's not McLaren on the chopping block.  It's Renault.

According to the announcement, Renault is accused of possessing information on "the layout and critical dimensions of the McLaren F1 car, together with details of the McLaren fuelling system, gear assembly, oil cooling system, hydraulic control system and a novel suspension component used by the 2006 and 2007 McLaren F1 cars".



Please note the dates involved: 2007 and 2006. 

The FIA is seriously up a creek now.  With their ham-handed evisceration of McLaren, they set a precedent that they now have to live up to: exclusion and severe fining of Renault upon guilt.  Please note that this means that there's quite a good chance that they could have their 2006 Constructor's Championship revoked.  I wonder if anybody in the FIA noticed that Ferrari was second that year?  "Gosh, really?  Hm, fancy that."

Here's what it comes down to: if Renault is found to have had all that data in their possession (and there was a 'raid' on their HQ by FIA investigators recently), they can either penalize the team... or they can turn a blind eye to it.  They do the former, and they damage the sport.  They do the latter, and they kill the sport's credibility altogether.

If the latter does occur, McLaren is going to scream bloody murder, and the lawsuits will fly thicker than a Minnesota snowstorm... and y'know what?  They'd be right to do so.

Duck and cover, lads.  It's gonna be a long couple of months.

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First he tried with kiwi.

Now he's apparently training cows for suicide missions.

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It's been a while, but The Librarian's schedule has finally slowed down enough that Anime Night has resumed!

And what did she want to watch?

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-Alfred J Kwak, ep2

It's a duck... with a duck!

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Sometimes when you're down and out, and life has you on the ropes, something wonderful comes along and makes you realize that the world is great and good.

This has occurred today.  Today, a fansub group released episode 1 of The Greatest Anime Ever.  Ladies and Gentlemen, for your entertainment, may I present...

            ^{...flying, check, good for a duck.  Swimming, check, good for a duck.  Wiggles?}
ALFRED J. KWAK, or Ahiru no Quack in Japan.  This is an important distinction, because AJK was originally a Dutch-Japanese collaboration that was translated into no less than  seventeen different languages!  While a children's show, it appears to be headed into quite mature territory.

According to Wikipedia, for example, In episode 1, Alfred is hatched, and minutes later, evil land developers turn his home near a stream into a theme park.  Alfred's family is killed in a car accident in episode 2.  His opponent is named "Dolf", and is apparently based on Adolf Hitler (though we haven't met him yet).  The characters age over the course of the 52 episode run. 


                                       ^{Our hero as a young man duck.}
As you can tell from looking at the screenshots, this is an old show, starting in 1989.  It's not bad, for a children's show, all things considered.  The transfer to the OGM format is pretty poor, with any movement being blurry; that's probably an artifact of the original DVD source material.  Still shots look fine, if a little soft-focus.


                            ^{Our hero's father, taking umbrage at the slight on his family...}

Truthfully, I'm sure I wouldn't've watched this if it didn't have a duck as the main character (and I didn't have broadband).  However, I'm glad I did... it's fun, and there's a lot of potential here.  ANN says it's a historical show, teaching children about life and such things as WWII.  If so, I can't wait.

One huge surprise, though, was the voice of Alfred.  The moment I heard the theme song, I thought "I know who that is," and a look at the cast list confirmed it: Megumi Hayashibara, performing in only her fifth or sixth show, and what might be her first lead (I can't tell if Ranma 1/2 debuted before or after).  It's a piece of anime history, and it's about ducks!  How cool is that???

And in this episode, Steven's worst nightmare comes true:
more...

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In a move that surprises maybe three people living on Pitcairn Island, McLaren officially announced that HWMNBN would not be driving for them in 2008.  They also announced that the sky is blue, grass is green, and water is wet.

Speaking for the team, Ron Dennis said that he wished HWMNBN all the luck in the world and presented him with the keys to a new McLaren F1 supercar.  He went on to say that the strange ticking sound emanating from the glovebox was 'nothing to be concerned about, nothing at all,' and walked away, whistling tunelessly.

HWMNBN responded by reflexively attempting to shove a Spyderco Harpy in Dennis' back.  Repeatedly.

It remains to be seen who HWMNBN will be driving for next year, or who will join McLaren as Lewis Hamilton's teammate. 

In a just and fair world, HWMNBN would end up in a ForceIndia*.  Or working at the Valencia McDonalds.  Or ARCA/REMAX.  We can only hope.


*note: was Spyker, Midland, and Jordan.  Insert your own joke here.

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