Friday  the Twenty-First of February, 2003

Digging through old disk space, I found some photos of the glass clown that inspired the first, rather slapdash Upsideclone. The clown isn't there any more, it disappeared from the junk shop at some point last year. I hope it has been shattered; it's chilling to imagine it actually sitting on somebody's mantelpiece.  ]
The Silent Project; a gallery of screenshots from people who've knocked unconscious every single person on every single Thief level, lugged all the bodies to the same room, and piled them up in an artistic manner. An astonishingly thorough waste of time. (Reading the forum links, it takes about an hour to push a static NPC along a short corridor.)  ]

Passing Frenzies: Thief II - Button Men - Startopia - BlogNomic - Trodo


 Wednesday  the Nineteenth

Introducing Confab, a blank-card game for an integer number of players greater than one, battered into existence during conversation with an ever-so-slightly automated Ben:-

Get a load of blank cards; at least ten per person. Everyone then scribbles arbitrary conversational sentences ("Hello." "How are you?" "Yes." "No." "You're very tall.") onto the cards until bored. Shuffle them all together, deal five to each person and leave a face-down draw pile. Taking turns, players must either play a card that follows conversationally from the previous card (or opens the conversation, if they're the first to play), or - if they can't go - draw a new card from the draw pile. Resolve disputed plays via a simple vote, or something. The first player to empty their hand wins.

Sounds a bit of a throwaway game, but there's a good level of strategy and humour to it; the 'offensiveness' and 'defensiveness' of particular sentences, the vagueness of wildcards, the general effect of two cartoon characters communicating via pre-written signboards. Language is a game, after all.  ]



 Tuesday  the Eighteenth

In the light of rules which are now actively encouraging the publication of misinformation in player's weblogs, I hereby announce my resignation from the game of BlogNomic.  ]
NetHack Monster High Scores; "This program lists high scores for monsters, either by the number of players that they have managed to kill, or by the total score of their victims."  ]
"A group of prisoners are trapped in a forcefield. These prisoners are perfectly brave, meaning that they would attempt an escape on any positive probability of success. The prisoners are monitored by a guard who has only one bullet in his gun, but who also has perfect marksmanship skills (he never misses). A maintenance technician needs to tune up the forcefield generator, and so for one second, the forcefield is released. How can the guard still keep all the prisoners detained?"
"Hardcore tech-interview style riddles, not gaussian elimination logic puzzle fluff" - a hefty collection of lateral and logical puzzles, given vividly concrete settings and well-dissected (for the most part) in an intentionally-awkward-to-search forum section. Some very elegant and mathematically beautiful solutions, and a lot of healthy brain exercise along the way.  ]

As 
Above

Brain children. Recent or noteworthy Web offspring.

Online cliques. Trespassers may be welcome.

In the bookpile. Powered by allconsuming.net.

Incidental music. Ohrwurmen or otherwise.

Other weblogs. The ones I make a point of returning to a lot.

Supporting cast. That have Web pages. In alphabetical order.

Weeks beginning. All having ended.
2003: 17.02 10.02 03.02 27.01 20.01 13.01 06.01

2002: 30.12 23.12 16.12 09.12 02.12 25.11 18.11 11.11 04.11 28.10 21.10 14.10 07.10 30.09 23.09 16.09 09.09 02.09 26.08 19.08 12.08 05.08 29.07 22.07 15.07 08.07 01.07 24.06 17.06 10.06 03.06 27.05 20.05 13.05 06.05 29.04 22.04 15.04 08.04 01.04 25.03 18.03 11.03 04.03 25.02 18.02 11.02 04.02 28.01 21.01 14.01 07.01

2001: 31.12 24.12 17.12 10.12 03.12 26.11 19.11 12.11 05.11 29.10 22.10 15.10 08.10 01.10 24.09 17.09 10.09 03.09 27.08 20.08 13.08 06.08 30.07 23.07 16.07 09.07 02.07 25.06 18.06 11.06 04.06 28.05 21.05 14.05 07.05 30.04 23.04 16.04 09.04 02.04 26.03 19.03 12.03 05.03 26.02 19.02 12.02 05.02 29.01 22.01 15.01 08.01 01.01

2000: 25.12 18.12 11.12 04.12 27.11 20.11


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