March 18, 2022

Fast On The Phone

I can only hope this looks okay when I post it, as this is quickly being dashed off on my phone. As mentioned before, I've made it to Duckford.


Quite honestly, this place looks a bit shabby when compared to its sister in Elgin... the remodel is pending. 

The physical rehab room is frankly small. You could fit two or three in Elgin's place and they'd still rattle around. But it's got the equipment I need, the therapists who seem to want to help, and a nice view of Mulford  to remind me that I'm finally back in the right city.

On the negative side the portions during meals are smaller here.  This may be a blessing as the kitchen staff seems to be populated by high school lunch ladies.

My roommate is the worst I've had since the 2nd one.  He has breathing g problems and "shooting pain in (his) legs. His breathing sounds like he's growling. The worst are his explosive yells two or three times a night. Just out of nowhere, suddenly I've got frigging Beetlejuice yelling at the top of his lungs. GREAT way to be woken up, lemme tell ya.

On the other hand, I've managed to stand up. Need assistance, and I was leaning hard on the parallel bars, but I  was vertical again. A few times, actually. And we may be able to do away with the embarrassing Hoyer lifts into and out of the wheelchair, thanks to a sit-to-stand machine. It ain't easy, but I can do it.

So there's that, which is good. I promise pt5 of the story is coming soon. 

Standing up... I do declare.

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March 10, 2022

Some Good News?

I haven't slept at night for about five days due to the Unholy Trinity of the jerk across the hallway and his TV at max volume all night, a guy that doesn't understand the concept of a call button and will yell "HALP!" all night, and my roommate who sounds like an Apollo moon rocket when he snores and he snores all night.


The morning headaches are amazing. The breakfasts somewhat less so.

And despite all of that, I have a smile on my face. Why?

I'm going back to Duckford. Not to Pond Central, alas, but I'll at least have the possibility of seeing family and friends. I'm being moved to the Duckford branch of the chain of LTC facilities. And its only a few miles from Pond Central.

Saturday morning is D-Day.  This pleases me. A lot.

Any of you watch "reaction videos"? A guy plays a song for the first time (allegedly) and... well, reacts to it. 90% of these are total crap. Another 9% are mostly crap. It's that last 1% that has a chance of being watchable.

I've been listening to a lot of loud, fast music just to keep me interested during my workout.

more...

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March 02, 2022

A Terrible Day For Rain

This past Monday, Feb 28th, 2022, at 4pm, marked an unimaginable milestone.  The one-year mark of my adventures in WTFdom passed with no fanfare, no acknowledgement, not even my weekly headshrinker visit... also with me suffering from the effects of my infection: chills, headache, general malaise and stupor. So really not much different than any other day, just with chills.


I thought about posting on Monday, but was too tired of all of this crap to actually write about it. Instead, I vicariously watched artificial people play videogames that I knew I myself would never finish. One was a ridiculously fast paced FPS, and my fast twitch muscles have been shot for years. The other was Getting Over It With Bennet Foddy. I own a copy of that one, which is why I know I'll never finish it.

Until 4pm.  At that time, I got to the edge of my bed, leaned hard on my heavyweight cane, got my legs under me and shoved with them like a Free Safety trying to break up a pass. Liftoff was Apollo-speed, not Shuttle-zippy, but I could feel the strength building, my knees getting closer to the point where they'd keep everything centered and controlled. If I could stand, I could walk. And if I can walk, this whole miserable adventure comes to an end.  It was going to happen right then and there. With the cheerful bit of my workout music screaming in my ears, I felt like it was really happening.

Then my knees screamed ABORT ABORT ABORT and I abruptly returned to the launch pad after a three inch freefall. No massive fireball though, which I guess is a good thing. It wasn't pain, it was just the realization that my knees were already wobbling and would have pitched me to the floor in short order.  Since I was there already, I did the usual leg and arm stuff until dinner. It was as disappointing as I was.

Just gotta work harder. Easy to think, hard to accomplish when you thought you already were.

On a different topic, remember that song I posred a bit ago, Lagtrain? About a month ago, another fanmade video for it came to my attention. This one was different though.

I'd seen it before. The source material, that is, back in high school.  You don't forget something like this. Or I don't. I forgot plenty of stuff from when I was a Knight but this bubbled up from the tar pit portion of my memory after just a few seconds. Vauc, does this looks familiar at all?  Mr Carlson's Geometry class?
This ring any bells for anyone? Well, whatever. Like I said in a comment on the yootoob page for this thing, "If you went back in time 40 years and told 14 year old me that I'd be seeing it as a cool video set to a kickin' song sung in Japanese by a computer... I would have been the happiest guy in the world." 

I suspect I'm not alone in that.

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February 20, 2022

Hospital pt4: I Only THOUGHT I Was Embarrassed Before.

Attempt #4 to write this entry.  I'm hoping that after having the previous three attempts fall over into the swamp, perhaps this will go better.


As you may remember, I had just informed a nurse that I needed to... um... empty my personal solid waste container, and she had just returned with a smile on her face and a bedpan in her hands. I suspect I had a look of horror on my face, both because of the... thing... in her hands and her first instruction: roll onto your side.

I tried. I tried very hard. I grabbed hold of the bedrail to my left and HEAVED... and sorta half-rolled to my side, kinda. My right leg was dead weight with the added fun of hurting like hell too.  I only thought I knew what pain was because the nurse put a hand on my right flank, another around my right knee area, and shoved.

I was later told that my scream could clearly be heard at the nurse's station half a floor away. My nurse was startled; she didn't really understand the situation. Once I could breathe again and my eyeballs stopped vibrating, she honestly apologized which was nice. At this point, allow me to mention something interesting ("Finally," says every reader of The Pond ever)... the bedpan itself.

I've seen bedpans before of course... big, metal things with a white color to it.  As it turns out, that was a very long time ago. Nowadays, they are a pale blueish-green thing made out of plastic, with so many swoops and curves it wouldn't have been out of place on a F1 car. Of course, aerodynamics is not exactly the point of one of these things, though sometime winds are involved. The nurse placed the device into the correct position and helped me slowly roll onto my back. And with instructions to press the call button when I was done, she sailed out of the room.

And then there was another problem. I hadn't voluntarily done... um... doo in bed since I was very very young and I was having a mental issue about letting fly. It wasn't until my guts were filled with stabbing pains that the cork was pulled and the contents decanted... and I still felt an intense embarrassment.  I pushed the call button...

...and very quickly, the nurse returned. Trailing behind her came another nurse... and I instantly wanted to die. This new one was younger and a LOT cuter.  That she was young enough to be my kid did cross my mind, and only added to my weaponized embarrassment. The two nurses together pulled and tugged me back onto my side. This time, my pride stupidly made me NOT scream in front of a cute girl. Tears, however, I couldn't quite control.

Then she walked by, carrying the bedpan while the other nurse began to clean my stern....

(I would like to point out that just now, this post attempted to make a break for freedom.)

...and I began to have a mental argument with myself: which is worse, having the cute nurse carry my pan of former food and clean it, or would it have been worse to have her cleaning me?

These are the sort of questions that try men's souls and keep me up at night. Does that surprise any of you? I mean, c'mon. Its me.

When they were finally done, I apologized to the first nurse. She just said it's the job, no worries, and they left me alone.

Some time later, a doctor walked in, introduced himself as the "(something) doctor, and I looked at your scans a bit ago.  Your kidneystone is too large to nibble out, so we've got two choices. The first is a full-blown surgery, which I think is overkill in this case."

I wholeheartedly approved of this assessment. "So what's the other choice?"

He gave me a real smile and said "We knock you out, run a tube with a camera up your lil' ducky, maneuver it up to your kidney, then slide a stent up it to the kidney in an attempt to let the stone escape on its own. And then we'll place a catheter in your dingus to your bladder to give it a path to follow!"

For the luvvapete, it's getting better and better by the moment. And despite my brain-addled situation, I had a feeling that I was missing something important...

Next: more zombies.

Also Next: Hospital pt5: The One With All The Hoses.

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February 10, 2022

Bedpan Saga Delayed; Delay Post Also Delayed

I just lost 1200 words of Hospital Hijinks for reasons I totally don't understand. I woke up my laptop, there's the post... must not have saved it at the end of the last session. So I clicked "save" and I got a message I had never seen in 18 years of using .mu.nu software.


"You are not authorized to access this page."

Look, it hasn't been the best of days. One of those "I want everything to go away for a while so I can just relax for once" days. Now that happens.  My chill is non-existent right about now.

And then the original version of this post disappeared, eaten by an unfortunate combination of touchpad and hate. So I had to rewrite the post explaining why I'm having to rewrite a different post.

Swell.

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January 30, 2022

Hospital pt3 - So Sick I Felt Fine

Sleep, when it finally did come,was not of the highest quality.  But it DID eventually happen between nurse incursions. Blood pressure was watched carefully overnight... I vaguely remember telling them to just leave the cuff on my arm, it'd save time.  If I did tell them that, they didn't take my advice.  They finally did get the stereo equipment plugged in, but it was much improved from when I had the monitoring stuff back in 2005. Still had enough cabling to control an Aegis cruiser's coffeemaker from the 12 sticky pads stuck to my chest, but the box they ran to was smaller and lighter. Still too heavy to put in the hospital gown's pocket though... my lovely frock was quickly disheveled, pulled into a plunging V-neck that'd be illegal in 17 states and Switzerland. However, instead of a big cable running from that to the wall, it had wifi.  Of course.  Everything has wifi anymore. Somewhere around 3am I could take no more and slept the sleep of the innocent.


Two hours later I was awakened by a frantic electrical *beep*ing, quickly followed by a fast-moving nurse.  Turns out three of the leads on my chest had worked themselves free of their pads, and the machine interpreted that as signs of imminent death. Reassured that I was not, in fact, shuffling off this particular mortal coil, the nurse decided to remove the old pads and hook up a wah-wah pedal, too.  How could anybody had known just how the adhesive on the pads would react to the feathers on my chest?  All the skin on the front of my body came off with the yanking of the pads.

Business began to pick up at 7am. Shift change occurred, a nurse held the bucket for me, blood was taken, medications hung, and breakfast served.  Break Fast literally in my case. Pancakes, sausage, thick gooey oatmeal? Heh. I like that version of life. A thin gruel that seemed to have been genetically related to Cream o' Wheet, a half-slice of wheat toast with a tiny amount of butter, and a glass of water. I couldn't finish it.  

9am brought the conversation I had wanted: doctor time! Or, more correctly doctors, plural. The first talked with me about the blood clot. It was fairly large, but they believed it'd respond well to the blood thinners.  Surgery was theoretically possible, but very unlikely. Everything would have to go horribly wrong for it to be a thing. Deep deep inside me, a little voice started to chant "you're gonna need it, you're gonna need it." Thats when it was the other doctor's turn. He introduced himself, and I realized the other doctor had pulled a Batman and completely disappeared. The doc explained that not only did the Donut and the Ultrasound fund the bloodclot, it found a kidneystone, too. Hooray! 

In a day or two they were going to take me in for a Procedure. They'd run a probe up my Lil' Wonderduckie and to my right kidney where they'd stick a stent up there to encourage the stone to go a-wanderin'. Then they'd install a catheter too. I suspect my cringe could be felt in Chicago... everything I've ever heard about catheters made it perfectly clear I never wanted one, ever. But wait, there's more! Remember that nurse who asked about the urine's smell? They apparently used it for a testing sample. I had an infection, and not a small one, either.  With that, a whole bunch of puzzle pieces fell into place. I had a whole series of symptoms for years... I've even written about them here occasionally... but never all at the same time. For an idiot like me, they didn't particularly cause any red flags to fly. The worst was a sudden back or neck pain, followed by bad chills. It would only last for a few hours, then disappear like nothing had happened.

But most of the time, I felt fine. I didn't even have a hint of the kidneystone. The antibiotic would flow immediately... but not before the vampires came by again. But after that... well, in fact, something else had to take place first. Something very, very important.

I needed to void solids.  And then, proving to me that nurses are very odd, the nurse was pleased. She left the room for a minute. Upon her return, she held out the other thing I didn't ever want to see. In fact, it was presented with a flourish worthy of any courtier in a fantasy castle.

A bedpan.

Oh, crap...

Next Time: More Zombies.

Also Next Time: Hospital pt4: I Only THOUGHT I Was Embarrassed Before. 

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January 25, 2022

Hospital pt2: Like A Cloud, Only With Squeezy Boots.

As the gurney was rolled through a maze of hallways... I could have sworn one of my steering units was dropping popcorn behind him... I couldn't help but notice that the ceiling was entirely different from what it had been when we had visited the land of the Angry Growling Doughnut.  Turns out we were headed into the hospital's New Wing... you could hear the capital letters thudding into place... which surprised me.  See, back in the day the Duck U Bookstore sold the books for this hospital's college of nursing so I had spent a lot of time there, and to be honest I had no idea where'd they'd PUT a NewWing. As it turned out, I was both right and wrong; there wasn't room for new construction.  So they made room... RIP college of nursing and some other stuff.  And so, I got to notice a new ceiling. And yes, I did spend a minute of your life telling you an over-detailed story to explain a different shape of ceiling tile.


I'M BACK, PONDSCUMMERS! Did ya miss me?
 

Eventually the steering units... it was a powered gurney, even had cute little brake handles and everything. The medical folk involved just leaned on the thing to make it go one way or the other. Anyway, they found an elevator and as luck had it it was packed with medfolk. A short standoff occurred before it was sent on its merry way. The next one was empty, though only for as long as it took to load in my scooterbed. Which took longer than you'd have thought; the wheels got stuck in the gap between elevator and floor. Eventually this trouble was dispatched and up we went to the 5th floor... the newest in the entire hospital.  The Cardiac floor. New ceiling, too, much further away than all the rest thus far. I really realized something right then. This was serious.  Or really, SERIOUS.  They wouldn't put me in the Cardiac wards if it wasn't.  They rolled me into a random room that honestly was bigger than my living room. 

And then, another transfer to another bed. As before, serious pain and sad puppy whining sounds. And a bed that was the most uncomfortable I've ever been. Seriously, it was like lying on an aluminum sheet with rods on it. The rolling table went away, taking the medical personnel with it, and I was in a hospital, alone, basically naked, on a painful table, in the dark, and scared out of my tiny little mind. Not because I was alone... that could be a good sign, you don't leave cardiac cases alone without them being wired for sound first... but because of the pain.

At the beginning of all this two weeks previously, stuff in my leg hurt but it stopped hurting when I stopped moving. When it stopped doing leg things it didn't hurt. But now it was constant sharp lance being wiggled around and THAT was scary.

Finally a couple of CNAs came in, turning a light on as they came. One threw a sheet over me. The other one though... she threw a switch on the far end of the bed and a loud hiss filled the room.  More importantly was that I was no longer lying on an uncomfortable sheet of aluminum but hovering just over it!  I'm sort of embarrassed to admit that my first thought was air hockey. In my defense, it had been a long day. They had put me in an inflatable bed and for the first time since 3pm, my back and butt didn't hurt.  Considering the pain in the rest of my body, it was a small victory, but a victory it was.

The nurses efficiently got my tree of bags hung and stuck in my arm... and drew more blood to look at the effectiveness of the blood thinners.  This should have warned me of what was coming but I was clueless...  its not like I had any experience in this.  They showed me what to press if I needed to use the loo, to adjust the bed, and how to turn on the TV. This would prove to be the most important of the three. And what a TV! 46" if it was a foot. Much cable channels, including TCM... during Oscars month. Say what you want about the Hollywood "I Love ME!" event, but they give that to good movies. During my stay I got to wat... a nurse walks in and takes blood... I got to watch about 30 great movies. I'd already seen some of them of course: I had Citizen Kane memorized long before, but I had managed to miss most Sidney Poitier films for example.

So that, mixed with my cellphone, would have my entertainment covered.  This was nowhere near to being true, but I didn't know that yet. I also didn't know that despite my bed being comfort itself, sleep was not going to be a thing. But at the moment, it wasn't going to be... a nurse walks in, takes blood, and leaves again... ...be a problem.

Yeah. I was screwed, I just didn't know it yet.

Next Time: More Zombies!

Also Next Time: Hospital pt3 - So Sick I Felt Fine

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January 07, 2022

So This Is The Hospital? Needs Better Urinals.

The ambulance backed into the ERs dropbox, dragged me out the rear... better than via the roof hatch.  I actually asked why there was a roof hatch, but alas I was already being rolled into the lovely eggshell blue hallway to a room past the open bay where the high pressure world of traumatic wounds and spurting blood in a life or death conflict against Death itself.


Two doctors were eating pizza and chatting. But in a high intensity manner.

The EMTs had one last gift for me as they dragged me off the gurney to the bed-like object that would be my resting spot for the next five hours. They tried not to bump me around, but failed. Not really their fault... YOU try transferring a walrus from one table to another, see how it goes. The next hour is mostly a blur now. Medical people wandering in, poke and prod, then wandering right back out again. Somewhere in there they gave me a stylish gown in no specific color... a sartorial choice that I have become quite familiar with, alas.  

Eventually I began recognizing people that made multiple stops in my space. One actually poked me with a needle to take blood... the first of many vampire visits I'd experience. Someone else hung a bag of whatever because that's what the do in hospitals, then plugged it in.

I'm reading the above stuff, and it's not really very funny. None of it really was, honestly. it's even past my admittedly tiny abilities to make funny. There was a lot of pain involved. Like when they took x-rays of my upper leg and they needed me to turn my leg this way or the other... that really was agony.

Then it was time for the device I'd become very familiar with... the Angry Growling Donut. Yes, others call it a CT Scanner, but I don't care. Sadly I had to do the leg trick again, except in a small confined space with no room to move. Fun was had by all. Then it was back up to the warm and inviting ER room and its remarkably comfortable table with great back support. 

By now it'd been a couple of hours, and I'm sure this'll come as a shock to everybody, I needed to use the little ducky room. This caused a rather confused look to appear on the nurse's face: What do you do when a patient the size of a treaty battleship needs to pump bilges take a leak when he can't sail walk? A handheld urinal was out; prior experience definitely rendered that a non-starter. Suddenly the expression of "brilliant idea!" appeared on the face of a second nurse that had been called in for consultation. Or moral support maybe? Was never quite clear on that, just the first time of many over the next couple of weeks. The decision was made: the collection container (two liters... I appreciated their optimism) from a suction machine (note: possible foreshadowing) and two diapers to catch possible overflows (really, it was quite flattering)...

...and everything held in place by two nurses.

Ah. Yes, of course. I should have realized beforehand.  Suddenly the old adage passed through my mind: "You have no pride, you have no shame. You're in marketing!" Or, in this case, a hospital. Ah well, 25 years of retail burned all that down to a small, mewling thing huddled in the corner of my mind, and it's not like worse things didn't happen the last couple of years at the Duck U Bookstore. So once everything had been set up and the audience allowed to take their seats. I let fly. I tried very hard to keep the sigh of relief contained; no reason to make this any weirder than it already was.
Prize gathered (240ml... hey, it'd been a long time) a look of concern flitted across the nurse's face and she asked me a question that in other circumstances would have me laughing at the surrealness of it all: "How long has it smelled like this?" I could only shake my head: not too long at all, really, but not recently. With that answer received, she took the precious liquid away.

Then another torture device was brought in: the ultrasound machine. This was applied to my inner thigh after that odd gel stuff was gooped on, and Madame Torquemada began her work. To explain just how this felt, let me apply a comparison that can be easily understood. 

Imagine you're in a terrible car accident on the highway. Everything is destroyed, the engine is in the back seat, the front passenger seat is ten yards behind the car, the works. You yourself are unharmed, and simply get out the normal way. As you do, you are counting your blessings.

Then you are attacked by a bengal tiger. Just as the massive teeth and claws approach your unprotected body, you are hit by an 18-wheeler at full trot. Then, as your broken body lies on the side of the road, someone runs up and presses an ultrasound scanner to your leg.  

After being allowed some water... an entire Dixie cup, all to myself!... I was left alone for a bit. I think I texted Brickmuppet and Ben both at this point though to be honest that's kinda slipped my mind. A bit after that, three nurses, led by a woman that was obviously a doctor (if nothing else, her name badge and ID with the large word "DOCTOR" under it gave it away... mind like a steel trap, that's me) walked in.  She explained that the Angry Growling Donut and the ultrasound both spotted a blood clot in my right leg. The good news was that was fairly early in the experience and should respond well to the usual brace of blood thinners and other meds.  The bad news was that she could not admit to t.he hospital without a display of the physical situation. Or to put it simply, I had to try and stand up.

I goggled (back in grad school I would have helmeted. More protection while welding) at her. Seriously? Step one then... slide my legs to the edge of the table. My left leg moved fine, but the star of the evening was my right one... and I couldn't move it. My foot worked, but every pain receptor  in my brain lit up with a nearly visible "TILT" light. After a few more attempts, each hurting more than the one before it, she said "That's enough. Would you agree?" That was directed to the nurses. A half hour later, I left the ER, bundled into an elevator and rolled to my new home for a while.  It was 1030pm on the last day of February, 2021.

Next Time: More Zombies!

Also next time: Hospital pt2: Like A Cloud, only with squeezy boots.

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January 02, 2022

Knock Knock, Neo... er... Wonderduck

(yawn) {stretchhhhh}


Boy, helluva nap, that.  I was supposed to have dinner with the folks at 6pm, wonder what time it is?

Oh. Oh boy. That's gonna be hard to explain. Well, lets give it the old Duck U try, hey?

You members of the Pond Scum that have stuck around have been told a little bit thanks to Brickmuppet and Ben, both of whom deserve praise (or scorn, whichever) for keeping me sane for the past very long time.

Short ha ha ha version: blood clot in the leg, with added problems, like a previously unknown UTI and a kidneystone.  And with some nutritional problems to boot because this all started with some leg pain like I have gotten for years. But it got worse, to the point where getting out of bed and walking to the bathroom was about the limit of what I could manage... so I stopped eating.  For about 10 days, give or take, Then Feb 28th, as I tried to shower, my leg stopped doing leg things,

when I fell, I miraculously missed everything so it was about as good as you could hope for. Except now I was naked on the floor of the bathroom, unable to stand up, or really move at all without the leg exploding, So I called 911 and actually said "I've fallen and can't get up." It only took a few minutes for the EMTs and firemen to show up, and they then proceeded to drag me bodily into the living room, got me on a tarp, and got ready to take me out to the ambulance.

At which point, one of them asked about my collection of Haruhi Suzumiya figures. I was more than happy to chat about the 110 figure collection... I'm just a few obscure figs from having every scale, prize, trading, and posable figure listed on myfigurecollection, and the general consensus is that it's probably the largest collection of its type in the US. So I've got that going for me.

Which is nice.

That was the last fun I would have for about a month.

When they carried me to the ambulance, it was snowing. Also, the streets they took to the hospital need some SERIOUS roadwork, because every bump, pothole, or slight depression in it transmitted itself directly to my leg. i'm pretty sure I didn't scream at all. Much. The ER was waiting for me and thus ended any dignity and hope I've ever had in my life.

NEXT TIME: More Zombies. Oh my god, did that joke feel good. 

ALSO NEXT TIME: Welcome To The Pleasuredome Hospital. 

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January 06, 2021

Strongbad Predicted This 17 Years Ago

Dancing Robots! Dancing Robots!
I like does little guyz.

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December 31, 2020

New Year's Eve, 2020

I got nuthin'.  I don't even have the annual fireworks picture, thanks to losing it in the failure of my external storage drive.  So here's an old one instead.


I just saw what I typed last year on this date:

"2019 was not a good year. May 2020 be better for all the Pond Scum. Thank you for sticking with me."

Wow.  Good to see the future listens to me, huh?  Happy New Year, everybody.

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December 29, 2020

"Your Train Looks Like..."

Over in some other part of the internet, a discussion of the KiHA 281 DMU was occurring.  Used by JR Hokkaido on their Super Hokuto routes, they've been around since 1994.  Someone described them as looking like something the baddies in HalfLife2 would use, and it's hard to disagree. A comment was made saying that they looked like the trains used on the Narita Express.


I knew it was the other way around, the E259 N'EX EMU didn't take to the rails until 2010, but I was wondering if there was any link between them... the same designer, that sort of thing.  Certainly there had to be something, that's hardly a look that immediately pops to mind when you think "train". Much to my chagrin and annoyance, an hour or so of looking turned up nothing at all... except for one fascinating little factoid.  The man who designed the N'EX?  He also designed the Kikkoman's bottle!

I can see it.  I mean, they both tilt and all...

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December 20, 2020

No, No Thanks, That's Okay...

As found in one of those ridiculous Sharper Image-style catalogues:


Was the marketing department totally unaware, or was this intentional?  Could they really not have known?  If you'd be able to own one of these without saying things like "Pass the smegpot" or "could you make a fresh pot of smeg" all the time, you're a better person than me. 

I'm uneasy about the butter on the toast now.  Does that look like... um... butter... to you?

"Merry Christmas!  I got you some Smeg!"

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December 05, 2020

Is The World Ready For This?

I've never played a Pokemon game.  The only console I've ever owned was the Sears version of what later became known as the Atari 2600... nothing since.  I've never bought a pack of Pokemon cards, either.  I've only seen a couple episodes here or there of the animated series on Cartoon Network or somesuch.  All of which is to say, I've got no background to speak of in the games or lore of one of the most successful entertainment franchises in history.  I know a little bit, sure, but... well.


Which made it surprising that I actually watched most of this video:
Special surprise guest appearance by my hands-down favorite pokemon of all time to boot.

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November 25, 2020

The Elephant In The Room

Remember this?

I wrote about this sketch years ago, and it is still way up there as one of the funniest things I've ever seen.  Something about Tim Conway's fnorky sound effect, but I always lose it at the monkey.  I mention this because I stumbled upon something fascinating... to me, at least.  An interview with Vicki Lawrence... Mama... about that sketch from her point of view.  
Knowing the backstory makes it all the better to me.

In this time of plague, humor can go a long long way.

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November 03, 2020

Break Time!

Things are a little crazy out there in the world.  Sit back, relax, have a nice cup of beverage, and let's take a little train trip.

There.  Don't you feel much better now?  It's a fascinating little train line, some amazing sights and architecture on display.  It's also very very cramped in spots... at one point the train comes upon a work crew which appears to be standing in people's back yards to get out of the way.  The roadbed looks like it's exactly one one foot wider than the train in some parts of the line.  And then there's the street section.

An enterprising model railroader could probably do this entire line in one swell foop.

EDIT: Ed's comment got me thinking.  Despite my neurons being atrophied from lack of use, a connection was made and I went digging around in my yootoob links, and I found what I was looking for.

The Shonan monorail has its southern terminus at Enoshima.  I had watched at least one video involving it, and I knew that it wasn't a Union station with the Enoshima Electric line... monorail requirements being distinctly different from electrified train lines.  But did the videos intersect in any way?  Sure enough, they do!

First, the monorail terminus is visible during the previously mentioned street section of the video above. If you pause the above video at  the 22:53 mark (or follow this link), the monorail station is partially visible as an elevated white building with large windows at the end of the street, on the right.  It's only visible for a second or two however.  The train then rolls on to Stop EN6, the Enoshima station, coming to a halt at 23:47.  It stays stopped for two minutes, finally rolling off at 24:51... pause the video at that point.   

Oft mentioned videowalker Rambalac leaves the Shonan Monorail station at the 17:59 mark of this video.  He then begins walking south from the Enoshimaguchi Exit until at 19:07 he's approaching a set of train tracks..  Pause the video at this point.

On Rambalac's video, on the right is a cream-colored building with garage doors, and a black latticework item directly in front of a bright-white sign.  On the left is a green sign on the wall of a white building, that says "Enoden Goods Shop".  Now bring up Aunz Railfan's video.  Just visible on the left is a dark-colored sign on the wall of a white building.  Straight ahead is a white building with garage doors, and a dark latticework thing with a bright white sign.  Tah-dah!  There's the intersection of two videos.

Here's the screencaps, Rambalac first, Aunz second, with the reference points circled:


Ain't gonna lie... it's totally pointless stuff, I know. But man, do I enjoy playing "pointless detective" on things like this.  The little touch of joy when I confirmed the two crossed was probably an overreaction on my part, but it was still there.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:06 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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October 23, 2020

Minutes Of Calm

Be like this.

We will all be better for it.

Edit: found mere minutes after the original post went up.
If yootoob is being yootoob again, see here the video here. 

It is early in the morning, so I didn't really notice The Neat Part.  Then I did, and I laughed.

I am a dreadfully simple duck.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 06:52 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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October 18, 2020

Time Skip

This past Thursday I went to bed very late... or early, depending on how you want to look at it.  Like "five in the morning" late.  There's an event coming up in Fate Grand Order that I'm not going to qualify for... you have to have cleared a story chapter that's quite a bit down the line from where I am... but for all of us that don't get to participate there's a nice bonus: 1/4 action point cost for all story chapter sections.  So I've put my shoulder to the wheel, my smartphone to the grindstone and I'm making good progress on finishing up the first overall Part of the game.  I'm very close to completing the Babylonia chapter after all of this... anyway, that's what I was doing up at 5am.  When I did finally drag myself to bed, I slept very very hard.


So hard, in fact, that when I woke up the sun was going down, the light filtering in my window thin and gray.  I could scarcely believe it... more than 12 hours asleep?  I haven't done that in years... I must have woken up, used the loo, and come back to bed at least once, and more likely twice or three times, without me remembering!  How very odd.  Well, I needed to relieve some hydraulic pressure, so I crawled out of bed, casting a glance at the clock on my phone as I did.

Immediately I knew there was a problem... it must have glitched or something from all the hours of resource-hungry FGO from the night before because it clearly said "7:20".  Around about 720pm it's full dark at Pond Central.  Since the sun was still shining, though weakly, the phone must be two hours fast, like it's set to a timezone somewhere in the Atlantic, maybe Prince Edward Island.  I had no idea how that might have occurred, but it clearly had.

Feeling very tired indeed for someone who had just slept for more than a dozen hours, I trundled my way to the computer and fired it up. Still groggy, I glanced at the system clock.  730.  Oh come on, now my computer is wrong too???  What the hell is going on?  It wasn't until I visited a weather page that said "Your Forecast for Friday Morning" on the masthead that I twigged to what was going on.

I hadn't slept 12+ hours.  My clocks weren't mysteriously off by two hours.  It really was 730 on Friday... 730am.  The sun was going UP, not coming down.  I had slept two hours.  No wonder I still felt tired.  I opened my e-mail... and promptly fell asleep in my chair.  Waking up when the mouse threw itself at my leg... no way I pulled it off the desk when I fell into slumberland and my arm went limp... I decided to go back to bed.  Probably for the best.
I've never quite had that happen to me before, certainly not for as long as it lasted and as convinced as I was.  Even now, I feel a little like it's a half-day earlier than it should be.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 05:33 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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September 21, 2020

Submitted Without Comment


EDIT the next day:

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September 14, 2020

Before Civilization.

A few weeks back, I was chatting with Ben from MidniteTease about pretty much nothing in particular when the discussion turned, as such discussions between two relatively healthy red-blooded American males often do, to the topic of videogames.


Why, what did you think I was going to say?

Anyway, Ben is currently learning how to create mods for Fallout 3.  Considering that I can use my computer to open e-mail, this amazes me to no end.  He had said something about making Deathclaws wear party hats... I think?  I might have that wrong.  Anyway.  He's doing that, and I'm still playing Fate Grand Order.  Still have yet to miss a log-in from when I began around the New Year, in fact.  I've gone from being a total clueless n00b in the game to being a total clueless vet at the game with a roster that's strong enough to carry my lame tucus to victory.

No, no, what I meant to say is that I've actually learned how to play, how to use the mechanics to my advantage, all that sort of thing.  I've spent hours reading and watching videos on the thing, and without a doubt my favorite part of the game is... a daily webcomic that gets posted on Reddit.  I've linked to Rednal's imgur album so you can read it if you want.  It just put up its 500th consecutive comic a few days ago, and also finally gave it a name.

However.  FGO is not the only thing I've been playing of late.  God help me, I've begun playing Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy.  As the creator of the game says, "I created this game for a certain type of person.  To hurt them."  I don't know if I'm the certain type of person mentioned, but it does hurt.  So very much.

But during that conversation with Ben, somehow we veered off topic briefly to floppy disks.  No, I don't know either.  But as we chatted via text, I went looking through a box of old Sony disks I have here... from my RadioShanty days, no less.  Over 20 years old, in other words.  Poorly labeled if at all, they just sat there with no way for me to access them.  And there, at the back of the box, was something that honestly took my breath away for a moment.  Or maybe it was the hot sauce on the burrito, one of the two.  Lets go with the thing in the disk box, shall we?

1987.  I had a 286 around about that time.  I couldn't tell you how much RAM it had... probably 640kb.  I'm pretty sure I bought this when I was in grad school, though. 1991, then.  Either way, holy crap.  You've maybe played the remake that came out in 2004 which is available on Steam, and it's really quite a faithful "cover" version.  But just think about this for a moment.  When Sid Meier made this game, he was still four years away from the release of Civilization.

That means it was literally "before civilization."  And, for all you kids out there, yes, it's before your knowledge too.  You never experienced floppys.  

This is very nearly archaeology,  certainly in computer terms.  How weird it is to say that.  Anyway.  Thought you might be interested.  If not, eh, sorry to waste your time.  If you were, great, happy to waste your time!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 01:53 AM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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