. . . the last professor in the once-prestigious Solar Combustion Sciences department clutches his chest, winces, and slumps face-down on his desk.

These scammers also have web pages that offer "AOL technical support," "PC technical support," and so on, with 800 numbers prominently listed. So if an un-aware person (like my Aunt . . . ) hunts for help via Google they'll often end up getting in touch with these jerks.

I have a couple of variant responses worked out:

"So, in India, do they use the term 'con artist' or 'confidence trickster'?"

"So, does your mother know what you do for a living? Did she teach you to be a crook or did you go bad on your own?"

"Sorry, I only have Linux machines. I don't think you'll know how to fuck them up."

"Oh, good, I was waiting for your call. Let me go to the server room and pick up there."

"Oh, good, I was wondering what was happening. Let me turn the computer on." (Put down receiver, wait.)

Unlikely. The full Falcon 9 has a good track record so far. Few rocket programs don't have at least one or two explosions along the way (and some have many more).

The video was captured by an onlooker. Because of the noise, SpaceX has to publish when tests happen, so fans know when to head to one of a couple of areas to watch and record them.

They have (or had) a mostly exclusive contract with GeoEye for one of their satellites, though the US government held priority over that in case they needed access to the imagery.

Google recently purchased SkyBox, and so may soon be launching its own constellation of smaller satellites. These will reportedly have high-res video capabilities, so it may be possible to watch traffic (or other things) moving in real- or near-real time.

They used the opportunity afforded by him leaving to kill MacLean Stevenson's character, but it wasn't out of spite. They did it to remind the audience that the show took place during a war. The studios were livid with the decision, as they had not been consulted and didn't like that they couldn't bring him back later.

You may be right that B5 was the first to plan it this way, though that wasn't the way it was originally phrased.

"And best of all, this was the first series to kill off 'major' characters"

That's not true. Off the top of my head, MASH killed Henry Blake, and that was probably the first time a major character was killed off in a major series (other than a cast member dying). It was much more sporadic before the 90s, but it did happen.

Their status page promised roll-outs starting in late 2012, but it also has horrifically bad information, even for an ISP ("Verizon will use a IPv6/56 address format, which means this will support 56 LANs.") I've asked about it several times, but no one at any level seems to know what's going on. The routers have been IPv6-enabled since spring of 2013, which got a lot of people excited. There's a rumor that the hold-up has to do with newer set-top boxes and broken IPv6 stacks, but no one knows how believable that is. (I don't buy it. I just think Verizon is refusing to spend the money necessary to implement it.)

If everyone is stoned they'll hang out on the couch and won't wash as often, saving on shower water.

Also, they won't have the initiative to go out for a round of golf.

So, you can let the water-hog golf courses turn back into habitats for ground squirrels and coyotes.

Sirnomad99 notes that there were other influences. Jon Peterson, author of the scholarly gaming history Playing at the World, suggests that Tolkein and LOTR was just one influence among many. The Conan stories, Pratt and de Camp, Leiber and Vance are all specifically mentioned.

In fact . . . I just picked up the book and turned to page (117) where I'd last left off. There are quotes from Gygax where he suggests that Tolkein is not the be-all and end-all authority on the nature of fantasy creatures.

Oh . . . I actually have a set of the Ace paperbacks! They're not impressive. The special characters look hand-sketched, and the cover art is mediocre.

A firm hand on the rudder is required at troubled times such as these. We should gladly accept

NO WAIT THIS IS BS, I DI

[LOST CONNECTION]

Google* and others should be willing to pour big bucks into the research. We may as well bow to the inevitable and let them build DRM, mandatory personality profile tracking, and advertising insertion right into artificial memory creation standards.

* New motto: "We'll figure out what 'evil' is and then not do it."

From what I've read, Tigard, Beaverton, and Hillsboro are all in consideration. Not every neighborhood in every town. My house is not far from Ronler Acres (massive Intel plant) and across the street from an office park, so hopefully I'll be in luck.

I'd love to have another alternative to Comcast.

I know a number of people who make use of virtualization on notebooks, and SSDs help dramatically there. I switched to an SSD on my home system and since then, it's become painful being on any system with an HDD because of the latency caused by the drive. I'm trying to talk my boss into letting me get an SSD for my work notebook as I usually have at least one VM running and often two, and the competition for the hard drive is killing me.

It's not a necessary thing for every person who has a notebook, but it's a much larger fraction than car owners who have a Ferrari in the garage.

Now I know why I always get asked to collect the folding chairs.

*sigh*

Plan B is a Chinchilla Ranch. Anyone want a cool chinchilla-fur mouse pad?