Ever have one of those ideas that just grabs you, and won't go away until you try it? I was on my way home from work, stuck in traffic (unusual, given that it was a Thursday, and it was Friday-bad), and flipping through radio stations. As I was doing that, I flipped past a channel playing an old song I used to hear a lot: "Rolling Stoned" by someone who's name escapes me (and I'm just too lazy to look up... it wasn't really that great a song, anyway :P ). My trivia-soaked brain remembered that it was specifically written to get the artist on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine... and the spark of a ludicrously-lunatic idea just flared to life:

Why not just ASK to be on the Soapbox? What's the absolute worst thing that could happen?

I tried to dismiss it... I buried myself in Hellgate for a little bit (more on that later)... but that idea just chewed on me like a terrier puppy chews on the one good pair of dress shoes you own.

If you write this, and submit it, what will happen? Why not just try it? Apple pie sounds really good right now...

And so, just to see what would happen, and to shut my idea off, I wrote last night's piece of insanity. I laughed at myself just before clicking the submit button ("You do realize that not even you believe anyone would have the stones to try this? Just checking...") but I did it anyway. That'll show me!

It worked as I designed it: it didn't land me on the front page ("DOH!!!") but it did prove to me that the staff does read editorials. It also proved to me that all I need to do is come up with an idea, and refine the ***** out of it before submitting it. My faith in the editorial staff is restored. :D

Now, on to other news:

Last week, I picked up a monster of a novel. Atlas Shrugged never really drew my interest before (I know one high school class taught the Ayn Rand novels, but I didn't take that class... they didn't think I was "smart enough" for it back then: hooray for underachieving!!!) but after Author_Jerry wrote about it, I figured it might be interesting to give it a go.

First impressions: it's BIG. One thousand plus pages, with smaller-than-average print for a paperback. It has taken me a week to hit page 193 of 1069... an ordinary book would have been finished by now.

The story is engaging, though, and while the characters aren't as fully fleshed out as I'd expect, the main character is as realistic as she needs to be, and the dialog is believable. I'll give a better account when I've reached the halfway point (in about 10 years or so).

Also, just from the tiny fraction I've read, I can tell Terry Goodkind ("The Sword of Truth" series) has read Rand's work: the themes are almost identical, and the villains in his novels sound suspiciously like Rand's "villains" (not in the cIassic sense of the word, but in the figurative against-the-hero(ine) role). This point of familiarity is actually what's driving me to finish "Atlas Shrugged." (Word of advice: try like mad to finish the first 50-100 pages before attempting to judge whether to continue... trust me).

Back to Hellgate: as much as I've beamed about it for the past couple of weeks, a disturbing trend has manifested itself. Whether it's just my old PC having problems keeping up, or if it's the game itself, I've had several crash-to-desktop errrors happen to me over the last few days. What makes it worse is, no matter where it crashes, I have to start all the way back at the last station I visited... very frustrating when you're about 3+ nodes out from the station, and almost done with a side quest.

...and it reinforces a nasty trend I've noticed since Diablo 2: artificially increasing the difficulty by forcing you to start at the last "teleport" point when restarting your game. I dislike the idea of slogging through all the enemies I just wiped out only to get back to where I ended my last session. It's like driving to work, crashing your work PC, and finding that, to reboot it, you have to make the commute all over again.

Just out of curiosity: how many American readers saw "3-Day Weekend" in the title, and thought, "He forgot it's Memorial Day weekend! It's a time to remember those who've fallen in battle defending the US and her people? How thoughtless!" Guess that answers that... :lol:

I'm under no illusions: just like July 4th and St. Patrick's Day, we've made it a day to hit the party circuit and discover how much alcohol you really can drink. For families, it just means a time to find a beach or picnic spot and sprawl lazily on the ground, hoping it doesn't rain or hail. Would it be asking too much to spare a moment of silence for those who've fallen for our freedom?

(/end gloomy thought)

I was listening to this song the other day, and almost drove off the road laughing. I won't promise the video is devoid of offensive content, so watch at your own risk... but listen to the song. :D

Cheers!