Other stuff…

Music and Drums

I’m listening to Arabic Trance at work today. I think I need to buy a drum to not-play to go along with my not-played guitar.
Well, OK, I play the guitar once in a while…but not as much as I should, I guess.
I’ve always loved the sound of drums, but I’m not in the Ren-Scene anymore, so there’s no outlet there, and I’ve always hated the “Drum Circle” scene. It’s got so much Hippy Dippy New Age Crystal-licking spiritual freakshow stuff that goes along with 90% of the people that are into that whole scene… Heaven forbid that people get together and play some Middle Eastern drums because they like the way it sounds, not because it brings out some “inner energy” shite.

Religion Rant

Which I guess sums up my viewpoints on Religion all together. I don’t have much respect for *anyone* seeking any sort of “higher power” bullshit.
I went through a comparative religion phase, and looked at all the various flavors in my 20’s. I even went through my own Hippy Dippy New Age Crystal-Licking spiritual freakshow phase…
Ultimately, I decided that my higher power is *me*. If I cannot accomplish it, it’s because *I* am a failure. There is no higher power that will bail me out, or make a difficult job easier. God will not provide shite for you. And if you’ll notice, it’s always the poor who have a zillion Scripture quotes written with a silver paint pen all over their primer gray 1974 Toyota Hilux driving 45 MPH in the fast lane while laying down a thick blue oil-smoke-screen that would have been quite useful to the Wehrmacht advancing across the Russian plains in 1942. Nobody ever writes scripture quotes all over a Lexus, not even Oral Roberts.
It’s a proportional relationship. The more you NEED God to intervene on your behalf, to save you from…something…the more likely it is that you’ll believe (and hope and pray) that He will. And also the less likely that it’ll happen.
God will help you when you help yourself, buddy.
And so will I.

Trainz Rail Sim 2006

OK, I’m getting the hang of Trainz Rail Simulator 2006. It’s made some good strides in the realm of AI, and being able to do more than just drive trains around a track one at a time.
Last night, I spent quite a long time running 5-7 trains at a time. Basically, you can manually put together a train, then tell the driver to go here, load this commodity, then go here, and unload it… or set up 3 or 4 point trips… Do this a few times, and then you wind up being a rail conductor, or operational guy…taking manual control of a train for a few minutes and untangling a snarl (two trains needing a single stretch of track, f’rinstance – so you’ll back one up until it’s out of the way, the other one will carry on it’s way, and you can return control of the first one to the driver, who will continue when the track is clear.)
Still running into some bugs, though. Some locomotives just won’t be “driven”. They drive fine if you control them as a player, but the “onboard driver” won’t do anything with it. Some pieces of rolling stock won’t load or unload (boxcars are the worst), which is kind of a bummer, because there’s some beautiful “center-rail” flatcars that I’d love to use (you’ve seen them, I’m sure…even if you don’t really pay attention to trains, you’ve probably been stopped at a rail crossing enough times to know a flatcar from a boxcar from a TrailerTrain car…)


The ones in TRS are pretty…just wish I could use them.