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Every patch on my X61 tablet seems to bring Vista closer to the nimble responsive OS I’d like on my quasi-mobile PC that isn’t a Mac.  Today I noted on (Ars Technica) that Vista patch nirvana had arrived: SP1.

It’s not kidding either.  It was 1 hour and 20 minutes later that it declared Windows Vista SP1 installed on my tablet.  Thankfully no intervention is required during that time.

Now fingers crossed that not waiting for the Windows Update push in mid-April will spare me an NT 4.0 service-pack-like experience. 

So far I can report an overwhelming sense of sameness.  It’s quiet.  Too quiet.

Update:…and it boots and comes out of sleep faster.

…but almost that boring.

I Am A: True Neutral Human Sorcerer (5th Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength-12
Dexterity-15
Constitution-12
Intelligence-14
Wisdom-14
Charisma-15

Alignment:
True Neutral A true neutral character does what seems to be a good idea. He doesn’t feel strongly one way or the other when it comes to good vs. evil or law vs. chaos. Most true neutral characters exhibit a lack of conviction or bias rather than a commitment to neutrality. Such a character thinks of good as better than evil after all, he would rather have good neighbors and rulers than evil ones. Still, he’s not personally committed to upholding good in any abstract or universal way. Some true neutral characters, on the other hand, commit themselves philosophically to neutrality. They see good, evil, law, and chaos as prejudices and dangerous extremes. They advocate the middle way of neutrality as the best, most balanced road in the long run. True neutral is the best alignment you can be because it means you act naturally, without prejudice or compulsion. However, true neutral can be a dangerous alignment because it represents apathy, indifference, and a lack of conviction.

Race:
Humans are the most adaptable of the common races. Short generations and a penchant for migration and conquest have made them physically diverse as well. Humans are often unorthodox in their dress, sporting unusual hairstyles, fanciful clothes, tattoos, and the like.

Class:
Sorcerers are arcane spellcasters who manipulate magic energy with imagination and talent rather than studious discipline. They have no books, no mentors, no theories just raw power that they direct at will. Sorcerers know fewer spells than wizards do and acquire them more slowly, but they can cast individual spells more often and have no need to prepare their incantations ahead of time. Also unlike wizards, sorcerers cannot specialize in a school of magic. Since sorcerers gain their powers without undergoing the years of rigorous study that wizards go through, they have more time to learn fighting skills and are proficient with simple weapons. Charisma is very important for sorcerers; the higher their value in this ability, the higher the spell level they can cast.

Find out What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?, courtesy of Easydamus

I wonder what D&D life would be like if I had agreed to assassinate the president in the survey? Oh wait. The back button is my friend.

Obviously I would be among the most odious of chaotic, sonofabitches…

I Am A: Neutral Good Human Sorcerer (5th Level)

Lee-Harvey Oswald was true neutral before he shot JFK and neutral good after? Tell that to Jack Ruby.

I guess the survey is aware of who’s currently President of the US. Maybe it’s geo-located me and knows that my country doesn’t have a president. If I would assassinate some dictator who masquerades as president in Australia’s freedom-tolerating system of constitutional monarchy, then there is good in me!

Via Jeff Freeman

What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?

I know I’m not much of a marketing person. A marketing person recently told me that if developers were in charge of marketing, sashimi would be marketed as cold dead fish. I said developers were not that naive. We would actually market it as delicious cold dead fish.

But, you know, there must be a point where even marketing people run out of ideas with a product.

What more is left to do with, or say about, toilet rolls?

You can put puppies and ducklings in your advertising and talk about how soft it is. You can give it a name and a motto that speaks to how tough and unyielding it is like “Green bamboo Toilet paper: Very Tenacious!”[1] You can scent its “core” to make it remind you less of what you do with it. You can print your enemy’s image or poetry on it. You can cover it with pictures of shells and fish to remind you where it ends up. You can cover it in brown paper with happy flowers on it to distract consumers from the feeling of environmental purgatory that using it is going to give you.

You can also decide to make a roll of toilet paper longer and make something out of that.

This is what’s written on the outside of a packet of Kleenex Cottonelle toilet tissue.

“Change the roll less often. Double length. It’s twice as long. 1 double length roll = 2 regular Kleenex brand rolls.”

Finding that much to say about 1x = 2y is worthy of whatever the toilet tissue industry equivalent of an Oscar is.

[1] J & I were given this brand of toilet paper in Hong Kong before a month-long trek through China. It lived up to its motto.