Toronto’s getting chilly: we had our first snowfall a few days ago, and it looks like it’s going to stay. Time for a new game to help winter pass!
I haven’t spent any time in the retail version of Aion, other than to make sure my account works. What looked more interesting was Eve Online: a MMORPG where players fly around in space blowing things (and each other) up! Here’s me in one of the beginner ships:
So far so good, other than there’s about a million things to learn before you feel like you have a handle on all that could go on. The in-game help channel has been fantastic, and the forums are full of a lot of good info as well. Other than the space theme, two of the big differences with Eve are that all the players live in the same world (unlike other games that split characters across multiple parallel universes) and that skills are time based. In most other games if you want to increase a skill, it’s usually based on experience, which is often based on the number of critters you kill. So more critters = more skill. But in Eve you choose the skills to train… and if it says a skill will take 24 hours to get to the next level… then it takes 24 hours… whether you’re online or not!
I haven’t tried any PvP yet: I’m a bit afraid of getting killed and losing my nice shiny beginner ship. That’s the other big difference with Eve: death has real consequence. If you played Eve for a month to save enough cash to buy a fancy ship… and you get in a fight and it gets blown up, it’s gone. It’s certainly making me more cautious as I learn the ropes…
My first weekend in Atlantic Canada found me walking the downtown shores of Halifax… taking random pictures and scouting out places to eat that were walking distance from the hotel (and finding Tim Hortons for the short drive to work!). Lots of interesting boats docked, probably because the hotel is only about a block away from the Maritime Museum, but this guy stood out from the rest:
It’s Theodore the Tugboat! If you don’t recognize him from TV you can read more about him here and here.
You can’t walk around the corner, see his big eyes staring at you, and not smile
Looking back it has been a year since Vanguard… and about 6 months since LOTRO (which I seemed to have forgotten to post any pictures for). Before Vanguard I think it was WoW for a couple weeks. I don’t know why… but I can’t seem to escape MMORPGs. Time to get back on the treadmill…
Every 6 months or so I read about a new one… and get the urge to try it out. This time it was Aion. What usually happens is I sign up for the new game… play it every waking moment for about 2 weeks… the decide “I’m done”, and walk away. I spent so much time in my first MMORPG that I think I’ve burned my brain out of the genre… the addiction doesn’t stick (to the chagrin of the companies charging the monthly fee)… making it easy to see when the real ‘grind’ begins so you can get out while you’re ahead
Aion is still in beta in North America (it has been out in Asia since November 2008)… and this weekend they opened up “beta 6″… the last beta to shake the bugs out before launch in September. So I rolled a Sorcerer and pushed through what content I could on Friday night and Saturday. Not enough time to do a detailed review… but initial impressions are that it’s “WoW-like” in how easy it is to get started in the world (Vanguard didn’t do much hand holding) but with some nicer graphics and early access to flight. PvP can be a big part of the game in later levels, but it’s not something I made it far enough to see.
I’ll be traveling for business the next month, but should be back before Aion opens up “for real”. I’m looking forward to trying some other classes and seeing other parts of this new world… in fact I wish I could play tomorrow as well… but I have to get ready for my flight.
(Actually… maybe I can sneak in an hour or two before heading to the airport )
What do you do with an old, loud, hot fileserver that’s acting up: crashing after a couple days or weeks of use? What if it’s full of obsolete IDE drives, and the drive industry is moving to SATA? What if you’re tired of buying replacement IDE parts to limp along just a little while longer?
Well, if you have 5 free SATA ports… you buy 5 of the best bang-per-buck 1.5TB SATA drives and upgrade! Here they are fresh out of their static bags. They don’t take up too much space, do they?
And here they are in a birdsnest of wires, hanging out the side of the case while the filesystem is formatted and all the files are copied over (which took about 12 hours):
And here’s what I got to pull _out_ of the computer: over a dozen IDE drives between 200-400GB each, several feet of IDE cable, a drive tray, a stack of power cables, and the 3 PCI cards it took to hook everything up to the motherboard. Plus a 120mm fan that kept it all cool (not pictured):
What did I gain? Well, so far, no more crashing. And things are cool enough that I could remove an extra fan, making it quieter. The new drives takes up about 1/3rd of the space and use about 1/4 the power of the old setup. And capacity has more than doubled to almost 5.5TB!
Today my friend BJ organizeda trip back out to Ganaraska for the dualsport guys on the ODSC and GTAM websites. The forecast mentioned a decent chance of rain, but we were hopeful things would stay dry while we were out and about. We were wrong
Not too many pictures today, just the normal ones of the crew at the parking lot:
…the Lookout…
…and the TrailTours guys we seem to see often.
A light rain started when we were unloading the bikes… but by the time we had made it through the first few sections of single track it was coming down harder. And not long after getting to Thorpe Hill it started to really get us wet.
The damp and miserable weather cut the day short, though it was starting to look better when BJ and I headed out. Not only did the rain cut down on the trails we rode, but it played havoc with visibility. The overcast skies made the trails dark, goggles were misty and covered with water blurring the trails, and those with glasses under their goggles had them fog up almost immediately after putting them on. I was “using the force” to ride half of the time… hoping I wouldn’t hit a stray stump, root, or tree and fall off. Some were not so lucky :
It also fogged up the internals of my helmet cam… causing things to come out at a much lower quality than usual. Still, I did get some footage of the first couple trails and our runs at Thorpe Hill. I got skunked: after about 3 tries I never made it up, bah! I did make it up the sand hill later… but by that time I had abandoned my goggles and the camera to see where I was going (so no pics). My ego was only mildly bruised… since many others didn’t make all the hillclimbs either:
Here’s a few minutes of YouTube footage from the day: note I screwed up somewhere editing it… and sounds are 1-2 seconds behind when they actually occurred… oops… figure that one out later:
Thanks to BJ for the invite, organization and spot on his trailer. Met a few new people today and hope to ride with them again! (and lots of WRs in the group today, go Yamaha! )
Today BJ found room for me on his trailer, and we drove up to Barrie to visit his old friend Curtis…and to meet a new friend from the ODSC site, named Ross. The idea was to roam the trails around Barrie then stop for a BBQ lunch at Curtis’s house. Ross lead most of the day and didn’t disappoint!
Here we are loading up…
And here’s the gang unloading: Ross is on the left with his Honda CRF 250X, BJ is on the right in the white top, and Curtis is in the black, with a very nice Suzuki DRZ400SM (with the stock street tires still on it)!
Better look at Curtis’s bike…
Better look at Ross’s bike…
Everyone was blue-plate, meaning we were street legal, so we could drive from Curtis’s house to the trails:
Amazingly Curtis rode very well on his street tires, even through mud puddles and sand… with one minor get-off:
Our first rest stop was atop a cliff overlooking a river:
The next was after some tighter trails, when we decided what the plans were for lunch…
…and it just so happened when we stopped at the intersection we had people walking their dogs coming from 2 different directions… and soon we were overrun! Release the hounds!
After a few more trails Curtis took off to warm up the grill, and we stopped to get our bearings:
The last pictures I took were at a tiny oval track under some power lines, where BJ got bit by a soft sandy corner..
…and where we stopped to film Ross taking a “leisurely” ride down the trail:
Actually… lets take a better look at that one. Ye-haw!
And, finally, we get to the title of this post. After a day of staying upright, not falling over once… at the last intersection before Curtis’s house I ran into Ross, yikes! Totally my fault! As we were approaching the intersection we had to switch lanes to the left to go through, and just as we were coming up on it the light turned yellow. Seeing that BJ went through… I did a shoulder-check to my left to lane change, and when I looked forward again Ross had decided to stop for the light… I could see him hard on the brakes and the back locked up. I managed to grab a handful of brakes as well, and started to turn to the left of him… but was still moving too fast and not far enough over…. the right side of my bike hit his left rear and pushed him a few feet forward… then I fell over. I picked up my bike (and my pride), sat with Ross through the red light… made sure he was OK… and after the light turned green 30 seconds later we were back in Curtis’s driveway.
Here’s his plate and mount at the beginning of the ride…
…and here it is again after I plowed into him.
Looking back on it… I should have tried to stop for that yellow, instead of trying to switch lanes to keep up with everyone. BJ would have waited for us, and I would have kept my eyes forward… with plenty of time to see Ross slowing down… time to stop safely… and I wouldn’t be sitting here feeling like shit. Ross, if you’re reading this… I’m really sorry I hit you. I can’t apologize enough.
By the time we got back, Curtis had started his massive grill and had burgers and pop for everyone. Then it was time to load up and head home. Thanks Curtis for your tasty meat and hospitality! (um, that came out wrong).
It has been awhile since the lasttwoTrailTours outings, so we booked another for 2009 -- which I just got back from! With me were Robert, Mark, Lea, Deirdre and Andrey… all people I either work with… or know through friends at work.
Andrey and I got an early start, and arrived at the meeting place about 30 minutes early. But it wasn’t long until other people started showing up. At 8:45 a guy on a dirtbike came to the parking lot, and lead us to the small grass field TrailTours uses to park cars for the day… then we all walked a short trail to the main compound. First order of the day: sign the waivers saying we take full responsibility if things go horribly, horribly wrong
Next, line up and get your safety gear…
…then go get changed. Here Mark’s sporting the latest in neon-green outerwear:
…and getting renamed:
And here’s Andrey and Robert (when Robert still had his ‘cute’ nametag )
Andrey ready to go…
And Robert feeling more manly…
Deirdre and Lea waiting for gear: in-progress:
…and then ready to go!
Andrey, Mark, and Robert looking like Power Rangers:
Next was the pre-ride safety meeting:
Then we got split into groups and went our separate ways. Mark and I got about 30min of “refresher” training in the big field, then hit the trails. The others got walked through how to ride a dirtbike, right from the basics on up! (I may have caught some of our people on helmetcam footage: I’ll have to check). Mark and I had 2 instructors (Rick on the left, and Jonathan in the middle, below) who took us to a small sand track section for some practice… then to the lookout:
Then, with a bit less energy than we started out with… back to the compound and get out of the gear…
Mark
Andrey
Robert
…for lunch!
Deirdre
Lea
…the whole gang…
They said a large group of people hadn’t showed up (more food for us!): but we still had a lot of riders! Here’s the bikes parked at lunch:
After lunch we headed out in separate groups again, with slightly ‘different’ experiences than in the morning. When we were at the lookout in the morning I told Mark he was doing great, that he didn’t fall off once! Apparently I jinxed him, and he fell off a couple times in the afternoon, but always got right back up again! And Andrey managed to wheelie his bike off into the bush… doing some damage to it… but he was fine. Nobody got that particular episode on camera… but we still crowned him “CrashMaster” of the day! Here’s some screencaps of Mark from the helmetcam:
…and Lea just for fun!
I was with Mark again, and after a bit more riding we stopped at the top of a small hill for a break…before pushing on…
…and while resting this guy rode by on a a dirtbike older than I am!
Then off to “The Falls” (a small natural spring) in the afternoon… where we crossed paths with some of the others:
Me, Deirdre, Lea and Mark
…and here’s one final shot of the team after we got back, had changed, and were headed for the cars:
Deirdre, Mark, Lean, Robert and Andrey
I had a great time, and everyone seemed to enjoy their day! No injuries other than a bit of fatigue… and likely some sore muscles tomorrow . The TrailTours staff was fantastic, catering to our needs, and the guides were happy to help anywhere they could!
Finally, here’s a bit of video so you can see the types of trails we rode… and I managed to catch all of Marks ‘incidents’ on tape (and Lea once too!).. while watching this please remember:
a) I was following Mark the whole time… nobody was recording my ‘navigational hiccups’
b) I had to chop nearly 3 hours of footage down to a 10 minute clip to fit on YouTube… so I had to include the interesting stuff
First stab at YouTube videos: footage from the helmetcam… audio converted in MediaCoder… then chopped to bits in Sony Vegas video editor to make each clip fit under YouTubes 10-minute limit:
Part 1 -- Trip to the Lookout and back, and some time at the Sand Hill
Part 2 -- Trip to the Falls and back
My batteries ran out just after lunch… hopefully by the time I go out again my second battery will have arrived in the mail!
I showed up around 10am, and many people were already there: machines of all shapes and sizes:
Just before we were ready to roll out, a dirtbike rider pulled up and asked if somebody could help pull one of his friends out of the forest. Apparently the bike couldn’t move under its own power. So we delayed the main start of the ride while one of the quads in our group went to find the broken bike… while the rest of us went to a local lookout and back. There were already a few other people at the lookout when we arrived, so parking became an issue. But we still wanted to get a picture of the ATC riders and their machines.
BJs ride wanted to roll down the hill, so arranging the machines became a question of: “How many ATC riders does it take to push a trike backwards up a hill?”…
…while others supervised (and laughed at the pushers )…
…until finally we got 5 in a row. BJ (the organizer) is out front in his white jersey (and left foot strategically placed to keep his ATC from rolling)… though even after taking 4 pictures I couldn’t get everyone looking in the right direction
From there we looped back to the start point to wait for the rescue team on the quad to come back…
…and a few minutes later they rolled in, bike in tow:
From there we headed out again and looped through the trails to some dirt hillclimbs… on to the local “Sand Hill”…
…and finally on the “The Falls” (that I forgot to take pictures of this time: though you can see some of the parking issues we ran into)
And finally back to the parking lot for lunch. It seemed everyone brought some food for themselves… but it didn’t take long before Ross and Shannon’s BBQ became the local hotspot (for hot dogs!).
There was also time for some ad-hoc maintenance: such as when White Rat alternated between trying to fix his ride…
…and trying to burn it to the ground
We also some more horses come through. We had seen horses a few times that day: but all we had to do was pull to the side of the trails with engines off and let them pass. Ganaraska is a multi-use forest: so we always went out of our way to be “the good guys” and put a friendly face on the sport. And the horse riders were without exception welcoming, chatty, and appreciative that we gave their horses the respect they deserved.
Also, over lunch we eventually saw some members we lost along the way pull in. Although we had the “when you get to a corner, wait for the guy behind you” system in place… it sounds like we crossed paths (literally) with another group of riders at some point… and part of group ended up following them instead. I know I’ve accidentally done that before… when you’re riding with a new group of people it’s hard to recognize if others are in “your group” or not.
I had a blast, and in the end we didn’t have any major breakdowns or other problems. I did take some video with my camera and helmetcam… but I don’t know how to edit or post it yet… some may eventually make it to YouTube. Special thanks to BJ (aka “Xhumeka”) for organizing the event: here he is again on his new ride:
P.S: someone let him know that somebody welded a piece of scrap metal to the back of his ATC when he wasn’t looking
I received a Wii Fit for Christmas… and although my sister and I started off using it regularly…. it kind of got pushed off to the side of the living room and forgotten.
