Resolutions

So I'm not really big on resolutions for the new year. Personally, I think it's kind of silly. But hey, it's nice to have goals in life and this got me thinking: The reason so many resolutions fail are that they're either unreasonable or unrealistic. When we set ourselves goals, they're supposed to be kind of incremental... For instance, for a smoker to say "My resolution is to quit smoking!" for the new year, and the plan is to quit cold turkey so to speak, then they are most likely going to fail. Instead, for a multi-pack a day smoker, it should be a pack a day. Then a pack a week. A pack a month. Reduce the amount of cigarettes you smoke until you get to the point where you really aren't smoking anymore. Can everyone do that? I don't know, probably not though. But a carton-a-day smoker is more likely to quit the way I specified here than to just give it up in one go. Sure, some can, but it's usually the exception rather than the rule. Having a support group helps, like the AA group for drinkers.

So I've been setting some goals for my life, not necessarily new things... just things I want to get done. One goal we are actively working on is living a dream of some loved ones. My parent's are excited by the idea, and when we get it going we'll be picking them up to join us on a grand adventure. Another goal was to start my own blog, and work towards becoming self-sufficient. Kind of like a self-employed self-sufficient kind of me. I'm also planning to pick up ghost writing as a way to help with that, which is kind of a thankless job but something I can do. Erin's even on board with this, doing hand made crafts to help out. This is a step in that direction! I will eventually add adsense to this blog, but that's kind of in the future. Right now, I'm growing my reader base and hoping I really am good enough to do that.

I'm also working on a book. I know, I know, I've talked about doing this for ages. I even have a writer page on Facebook: I will not call it an author page, I'm not published anywhere that matters. When I finish up this book, I will self-pub via Amazon and see what I see. Who knows, I might even be good enough to get picked up by a publisher. Wouldn't that be fun? My plan is to start small. I'm thinking a hundred words per day. I know! That's such a minimal number. I know that when I do write, the odds are good I'm going to go well over that. I'm alright with this! But by setting a low number, I can tell myself "I just need to write a little bit today," and if I go over I go over. If I miss a day or two it's fine, as long as I remember to make it up. Seven hundred words a week, still a small number. But you know, I'm not planning to write a three hundred thousand word book or anything. I'm not David Weber, that guy is cooler than I'll ever dream of being on the sci-fi/fantasy scene, and he could probably out-write me on his worst day (and my best). Meh, I'm cool with that. I need to take the time to pick up an editor at some point, but it's early days yet. But, that's my goal! Thanks for reading, and I hope you lot have the best year yet!

Bringing in the New Year!

Alright, so it's getting closer and closer to the beginning of the year. Now, most families have traditions for bringing in the new year. For some, it's as simple as getting tossed on cheap grain alcohol and having a blast. It's the countdown to midnight, the resolutions for what they will do the next year. The Christmas and Thanksgiving days are more about being with family, but new year's is all about being with friends! I guess it comes down to having spent so much time with family, making nice, people want to be able to vent and unwind. Well, what better holiday for the occasion?

I will not speak for anyone else, nor their plans. Not really, beyond generalizations. Me and Erin don't really have a tradition yet, but we're planning to watch TV and play games with some of our friends. We might drink, but we don't aim to get so wasted we can't remember what we did either. Yes Erin, that means no Vodka for you! Now I like my family, and I expect most of my immediate family will  be here. There will be PS3 and PS4 games, as well as PC. Randomly, we need more non FPS co-op games for the PS4, Sony if you are reading this I'd take that as a kindness. Not that they'd read my stuff, I'm a little small time.

As far as the drinking goes, there will undoubtedly be some.What can I say, the sis loves to hook up a drink or ten, and my brother in law too for that matter. Part of me thinks it's all the kids, sometimes it's nice to be able to not have to deal. It's great having a day off for parents, and what better day than new years? So whatever your plans for the new year, I hope the next year goes famously for you! Have an awesome one!

Merry holiday!

For us, it's Christmas. Oh. I'm fond of the Yule tradition... buy a tree, a real, honest to god pine, leave the log in the backyard for a year then burn it at next year's Yule... But they are messy, real trees, and my sister is allergic to pine. So, while I've been staying with her I haven't followed the tradition. I can hardly wait for Erin's first time burning the Yule log! She doesn't know, I haven't told her, but she reads my blog so I suppose the cat is out of the bag so to speak.

I know the holiday is about giving, which is a nice thing, but everyone always wants to know "What did you get?" My response is easy enough. I got some PS4 games, a new controller, an A&W mug collection, some books and a sword. Damascus steel is so very pretty, but this baby is combat ready. I had an old Marine Ka-bar, I've had it for a decade and it was old when I got it, but... Well, it just felt like the time to pass it on. It's something I knew my dad would like, so I made it a gift. Me and Erin gave away some of her hand made bracelets, some Perler Sprites, a LeapPad2, some Star Trek ship model kits, game controller, Nerf gun, and a Halo Warthog my nephew has been eyeballing for the last year or two. Good times!

I don't know how you spent your Holiday this year, but I do hope it was spent with people you love. This year we got rain in West Virginia, but I know it's snowing in Seattle. Ashby, a friend, shared a video on Facebook. It looked crazy! My brother in law, Bruce, was able to get down this year with his Sam. Warren's here with his boys, one of my sisters, all the kids... It's nice. I could wish my brother and my other sister had been able to get down, but I don't really expect them anymore. I hope they're having a great day. Merry met my friends, and a happy parting! Until next time!

The holidays

For some reason, Christians get all upset if you tell them 'Happy Holidays!' instead of 'Merry Christmas!' And I understand the reasoning, I mean for them it's all about the one day. Oh, except of course for their OTHER holidays, Easter, Good Friday, all of that. I get it. But not everyone believes in or celebrates Christmas. Hell, Christmas as we know and celebrate it isn't even a Christian holiday anymore. I'll expand on that in a moment, but there is another thought. What about the Jewish population? Shall we wish them a Merry Christmas, even though for them it's all about Hanukkah? Or let me phrase it differently, are Christian's not upset when a Muslim wishes them a happy Arba'een, or when a Pagan or a Wiccan wishes them joy this Yule? What about Kwanzaa?

So, most people don't know much about the history of Christmas. For Christians, it's the day they chose to celebrate the birth of the Christ, their messiah. Here's the thing though, the day was specifically chosen to correspond with several "Pagan" holidays so that they could still enjoy their holiday, while nominally claiming to be Christian and avoid persecution. It's an ugly story, and there are dozens of books on the subject, so I'm not going to get into everything. One of those holidays was a week long event that concluded on the 25th of December. This festival, Saturnalia, was a Roman holiday that commemorated the dedication of the temple of Saturn, the Roman god of agriculture and harvest. During this event, there was no law, people could do whatever they wanted. At the end of the event, all debts were forgiven and no charges were pressed. As you can imagine, this wasn't really the best of times to be weak or an unprotected woman, but the wealthy were more often than not victims on this day as well as anyone the public had a strong dislike for.

Anyway, back to the subject at hand. Happy Holidays! If someone is wishing you happy times, why get offended? Simply said, Happy Holidays is a nice way of saying, "I don't know that I believe what you believe, and I have no clue what you believe, so I hope your holiday, whatever it shall be, is a good one!" Happy Holidays everyone, and may your god, God, gods, goddess, goddesses, god and goddess, or other watch over you this holiday season.

RV Updates

So I haven't really talked about this a whole lot, unfortunately I've lost my job. What has been a hobby for the past month or so is suddenly becoming vital to living. While I might have some disagreement for why I was fired, the fact is that I have been fired. Apparently I owe unemployment for my last job. They paid me, then the job appealed and suddenly I don't qualify anymore. So I owe something like two thousand to them. This is why I really need to read mail, instead of blithely assuming it's all junk. There's nothing for it but to move onward.

Officially, we are looking at getting this trip on the road, as soon as possible isn't soon enough anymore. So, as things stand we're looking at ways to make money online AND on the road, although I expect this income to supplement whatever alternative income I can get. The goal is still, eventually, to base out of Seattle. Right now we want to start, for the east coast, based out of WV. We're wanting to head north first, working up through Virginia to Maine, then taking another route back to WV before heading south to Florida. I'll grant, right now it's all dreams... but what is life worth if you don't have a dream, or a goal to shoot for?

One other thing we've been looking at is mobile internet. Satellite is the worst, but we haven't ruled it out. We're thinking about a mobile hot-spot, and using free wireless at various places to keep our bandwidth uses down. I've heard about a few that are supposed to be really good, but we're in the researching stage still. Time's about up though, and just in time for the holidays. Some days, it really doesn't pay to get out of bed. Our youcaring site is on my sidebar, donations are welcome. Happy holidays, everyone, I hope yours are as amazing as you are!

Nerdorkable Crafts

So, people have been asking about Nerdorkable Crafts. I know, I'm people and I had a few questions of my own! Nerdorkable Crafts is a tictail store created by Erin. While there isn't a lot posted there now, she's got some pretty big plans. So I'm going to breakdown what she is offering and what she's planning to offer, as well as estimated pricing. I understand that she's trying to keep the price as low as possible, so that's pretty neat.

First are the Perler Sprites and coasters. She currently has listed a set of four Perler Sprite coasters done in the power puff girls style, the fourth being a heart. They're normally $1.25 but she's doing the lot for $4.00, so you save a dollar. As for the Sprites, they will vary based on the content. For instance a Minecraft styled coaster would be $1.25, whereas the Pacman style ghosts would be $0.75. This is essentially at cost, plus a very small markup for the time spent in making these things.

The next thing on her list are her "Lovelets." There are bracelets made with love, it seems, and are all completely crafted by hand. It takes her about a day to make two, and colors vary. They are $2.00 each right now, $3.00 for customized. She's planning to do a discount on premade, 15 lovelets for $10.00 just to get rid of some stock. They are three colors, mine is blue, black, and red. I wear it everywhere.

Finally there's future product. She's making soaps, but isn't sure there is an interest in custom made soaps. She's going to experiment and will give us pricing later. I'll update this at that time. She's also got a couple of scarves in stock. They are done on a hoop, so you have a long sleeve, essentially. Really warm, and while most people wear these around their necks, I like to stick my arms in mine (especially when it's really cold!). These are $15-$20 depending on which type of yarn was used and how many skeins she had to buy to make it.

So all in all, some pretty cool stuff! I've got a link to her store below, just copy it and paste it in your browser. Happy buying, happy holidays!


http://nerdorkablecrafts.tictail.com/

Life and Ethics

Okay, so I'm no longer working at Ticketmaster. Yeah, bit of an issue with attendance. Late too many times, which is funny because I was always early. O.o Missed a couple days too. Part of me wants to log into my work email from home, I do still have access. By the same token, I don't want to do anything beyond send a goodbye message, which should just about freak everyone who cared I'm gone out. Another part of me thinks that would be unethical, since I'm not there anymore. Erin's weighing in on the side of not doing it so I'm probably just not going to do it.

So what else is new? What's going on? I find myself with all the time I need to actually commit to this. Blogging, writing, my own honest reviews: I can do it all. I feel free again! The problem is, this doesn't really pay the bills right now. I'm not a one percenter, I don't see me suddenly becoming the next Larry Correia or David Weber. I'm just a guy with an opinion. To be fair, half the U.S. disagrees with me on any given topic. But hey, that is life, not so?

Then there's the ethics of it... Is it ethical for me to try and really make a living like this? Writing blog posts and reviews of various books, sitting at home behind a monitor doing my part for my Great Cause? Well, it turns out that making money blogging isn't easy. There are a few ways to do this. One, google adsense. It's a sexy program, and every time somebody clicks on a google ad I'd get paid. Nice idea, but I can't sign up until my blog is six months old or so. Then there's the Amazon Affiliates program. If you guys click on the link on the bottom, then buy anything at all from the website, I get paid a percentage. It doesn't cost you anything extra, but by clicking my link then buying something Amazon believes that I sent you there. It's a small percentage, true, but so what? Every little bit helps. And then there is my paid per view blogging, through another company. I've been working on it for a little bit... and I've made $6.15 so far. You laugh, it's a big deal for me. I'm waiting for the big $10.00!!!

Take care, friends, and please copy the link below and go there.. Every person is 2-4 cents!

http://www.softwarebroadcast.com/most-important-coding-languages-for-it-professionals-aid-18633

Trip ideas

So, we're looking into a few things to do while on this trip. We're expecting to need to use tax money in order to buy/payoff the RV we're going to use for the journey, but we've got a fund raiser out there for anyone interested in helping out. It's now listed on the right hand side of this blog. I'm also doing some ghost writing as well as blogging for money, although... With ghostwriting, I write and someone else gets official credit. The blogs are view based though, for every few people that click on my links I get a few cents. Ghostwriting is far more lucrative for me right now, I get two or three dollars every article, which ranges from four to five hundred words. Not too bad.

But these are all little ways I'm supplementing the move, as opposed to where we plan to go. The very first stop is Charleston, WV. We're pretty close, and we've been once, this time we're looking for souvenir's so to speak. If I can find a place, I'd like a tile with an image of the city on it. Not sure if it's feasible, the capital here is small compared to most other States. It's worth a look, though. I've got Erin looking into that aspect. But that leaves us where to go next. Erin thinks we might head north east first, up to Maine and work our way down through the capitals of each State. This way we're close to family in case of emergencies, and we'll get a stronger feel for how much it'll cost in gas.

I've got friends in Arizona, southern Cali, and Washington. She's an east coast girl, I'm a west coast boy, between us we've got friends and family in all kinds of places. There's a mutual friend in Texas we're planning to hit up, and there's some people we met on Facebook and a few conventions we plan to visit while we're out. It might be cool to hit a convention before we go... if we're good to go by February, might be able to hit up MystiCon, one of our favorites. If closer to July there's LibertyCon for sure, and another place in MI as well. It all comes down to when we leave. So, that's where we are in the planning, although I am open to suggestions. Cheers!

RV Ideas: An update

The last RV post is featured on the right, over there, with the link to the fundraiser site. Donations are welcome and just in time for tax season. I'm not assuming it's going to work at all, but I'm not going to be upset if it does. Now then, we've got some updates! I was asking mom more about my Aunt Lynn, places she specifically wanted to see and so on. A new goal is to buy a tile from the capital city of each State, also from DC if we can get it. When we finally move into a house, we're going to use these tiles in the kitchen to make a kind of homage wall to my Aunt and Erin's father. Isn't that something?

There's more though! My mother is a cancer survivor. That's right, the same disease that stole my Aunt, my mother's half-sister, from us was beaten by my mother! I'm a little worried for any children me and Erin have, though, cancer on her paternal side, as well as my maternal side. Anyway, mom is going to be joining us on the trip. That's excellent news, because that means dad will be along as well. This means that I won't be doing all of the driving, dad will be driving too. This is great for us, because it means I can get more videos and pictures of the land, and we'll be looking into towing their car behind the RV. What do you guys think? I know most of you answer me on FB, and that's cool, but if you post here I won't be offended. Promise!

So Erin's thinking we might also hit up flea markets and swap meets along the way, selling her crafts and my mother's art work to supplement our income. I'm cool with the idea, but it's something I haven't really asked mom about yet. Dad is all for the idea of swap meets though, you can find some amazing things that way! We're also thinking about hitting up various salvage yards on our journey, looking for newer RV's that might have better cabinets and so forth that we might be able to buy cheaply. Keeping costs down is always a good idea! Thanks for reading folks, if you like what you read here please feel free to share. Have an awesome day!

Windows 10 hates new motherboards repost

I originally posted this on my wordpress site, but I decided to go with blogger.com since I'll eventually be able to use adsense without having to go through hoops. Enjoy!

Alright, so quite a few people know that any Windows 7 or newer user can upgrade to Windows 10 for free. This has been true since mid-July of 2015 and it will remain true until mid July of next year. This isn't just true for computers and laptops either. This is also the case, right now, for tablets. Microsoft has also announced that some smart phones will also be able to upgrade to Win 10 as well. If you have not yet upgraded, I personally recommend waiting a few more months. Many of the bugs have been worked out, but I've personally come across a few that have been inconvenient.

So what does any of this have to do with Windows 10 hating on new motherboards? Not too much, but it is kinda cool to know. I understand that most people out there aren't the kind of people who do their own upgrades. This isn't a bad thing, and it really isn't even a matter of whether or not most people can do their own upgrades. For the most part it is as straight-forward as following the instructions and being extra careful. Most people don't have time to mess with it themselves, however, and elect to go with pre-built systems. There's nothing wrong with going to a website, telling a computer company what you want in a system, having that company build your system and ship it to you. If you are the kind of person who either prefers to build it themselves to keep costs down, or even so you can buy it one awesome piece at a time and assemble it as you can, then you need to know that Windows 10 can give you trouble.

As it stands, once you have installed it on your hard drive and started it for the first time, Win 10 is more or less set on that motherboard and CPU. I recently updated my motherboard (and processor, in for a penny and all that) you see and I got a bit of a shock when I turned my system back on. You see, 10 deactivated itself as soon as it detected the motherboard. I wasn't the only person to find this little problem and it isn't fun to fix. In fact, fixing the problem required (essentially) replacing the entire OS! Since it is still within the first year, I downgraded back to Windows 7 and called the number to reactivate my copy. When I did that, however, I lost every single thing I'd done since I installed 10, with the exception of the work which I backed up. I subscribe to the 3, 2, 1 method, it's worth looking up. Since it has been less than a year since release, I'm able to upgrade back to 10 at any time, and yet I'd just been burned a little. I wanted to make sure this new motherboard and processor were going to work out before I re-upgraded.

So, it's been a little bit since all of this happened, why bring it up now? Well, the truth is that the research I did hadn't turned up anything specific until I specifically looked for problems. Maybe someone else out there with the same problem will read this and find a better way than I did. This week I reinstalled 10 and I've only had a few glitches. I'm cautiously optimistic, but I stand by what I said earlier. If you use Win 7 and are thinking about upgrading, I'd hold off for a bit. If, alas, you are one of those poor souls like my Erin was, stuck using Win 8.1 for what felt like all eternity, I recommend upgrading as fast as humanly possible. You don't deserve what Microsoft has done to you my friends, 10 will be a good thing! As an old friend is known to say, stay golden my friends.

Goal ideas: Fallout 4

So I was talking to a friend at work, and we've got some big plans for a mod. Here's the thing though, we can't really even get started until Bethesda gives us the FO4 GECKO. FO4edit isn't nearly enough for what we've got in mind. We've got an ambitious project set to take place in West Virginia, after the war. I've started my initial research, however. I've gone over some satellite imagery of WV, getting an idea for the way the land is. Our goal is to start with how it is today and guess how it might have looked in 2077, add in a few of the Fallout universe specific companies to take over the locations of every similar place as possible with the exception of WV specific areas like Tudors and Appalachian Power. Throw in a couple of obvious bosses, add in the main college FB teams (we don't have any pro),

We're also looking into WV specific gear and transportation. Instead of having to build the equivalent distance of Charleston to Beckley, we're looking at using the existing transport system, with the newer FO style buses, to go from main city to main city, although we might try adding a few stops such as Marmet or Cabin Creek. Take it for granted that this isn't everything we want to do, there's a series of quests we want to implement that make the FO4 main quest look small, we're also wanting to do better options for good/evil/sarcastic than the main game. So if you are talking to the mayor and pick the good option he'll say something positive, or if you pick the bad option you aren't getting the same dialogue. One other thing we've been thinking about is a Children of Atom quest line.

So these are a few of the ideas we've discussed, and as you can see it's fairly ambitious. Add in that there's trees pretty much all over WV, including IN the capitol city, and it's chalk full of win. We're wanting to add in pine trees and greenery. Look, even if WV were nuked it used to be a rain forest (and who'd care enough about us to nuke us anyway?) and would be a low priority target. We're assuming we got at least one, thinking about a radioactive Corridor G maybe, or perhaps up near the airport on Greenbrier (there's at least an AF base up that way). If you have thoughts, by all means I'd love to hear your ideas! Just keep in mind we can't even start until Bethesda finally gives us the GECKO.

Stories and writing

Okay, so I'm not the most amazing author in the world. The simple truth is, I've picked up a couple of cool ideas and just never taken the time to actually follow through. There's no reason I couldn't have finished a book or ten at this point, but I've been lazy. So, I'm going to tell you a few of my ideas and let you think about it. You can comment, of course, but I don't really expect you to. So, ready for a glimpse of how my mind works? Without further ado, let us be about it!

One idea I'm toying with is a result of an FB conversation. I once stated in error that the world was once believed to be square. That's false, of course, the world was believed to be flat. Quite the difference! But we got to talking about what if the world WERE square? It would have to be a fantasy or a science fiction book. Sci-fi for a created world, or fantasy for something like... Say Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. I'm not on his level, in my opinion, and I don't think I could pull it off quite right as a true fantasy... But what if we take this square world and invert it? Think of a Dyson's Sphere, now make it a square and wrap it around the sun. Now we've got six huge flat worlds... We can break them down further, kind of like the Ringworld, but I don't want to do that. Right now I'm tempted to work in this single square. So how about day and night cycles? I was thinking a sphere much closer to the sun, rotating of course, which is partially contained. Essentially, every so often as this sphere rotates you get light and you get darkness. On one of the worlds there's a place where it never gets dark, on the opposite side a place where it's always dark. What do you think? Yeah... but it's got potential, despite the hand-waiving.

Now I've already got two of these worlds kind of pre-written. One is basically earth, only a powerful esper (because ESP not real magic) named Eandyil Nathar sells contracts to trade one life for another. Yeah, I know, one too many Linkin Park Vids, but the idea is awesome! I've even got a contract written up for it, it's kind of fun. The other is a faux-fantasy world that Eandyil starts in. There are Dragons, although they're basically powerful shape-shifters with some ESP as well as time-travel. Time travel is deemed impossible by science today, but didn't Clarke state that any sufficiently advanced science is indistinguishable from magic? Come to think of it, there's three laws that are attributed to Sir Clarke, but that's the most famous one. Anyway, that's the world my tidbits come from. Check it out on my facebook page, www.facebook.com/Eandyil.Nathar and have a great day today!

Little Annoyances

Hello everyone! Have you ever worked harder than you should have for something to get done, then when it's done it seems to have vanished? I've got a link at the bottom of this. Months ago I posted this for a paid-to-blog site I've been flirting off and on with for awhile now. I did far too much research, and got this article together but they wanted an introductory paragraph. Not a problem, added it and they said it was like it was written by a middle schooler or someone not from the country. Okay... so I might have been a little annoyed. I went through and thoroughly messed up the grammar, then proceeded to fix the initial paragraph. It got accepted, with criticism, and supposedly it was posted... but the link has never worked. The first time I clicked it, it came up as a deleted page. Now it says a database error. Still, I get paid for every new IP that hits the link, so by all means! Click the link below, laugh at the page and close it out. Two cents a click!

Erin has joked that I should post this on the bottom of every post, so people will just "know" to click on it. The idea made me laugh, I won't lie, but what's the point? It's not there! Specifically it's a post about the internal components of gaming computers. I waxed eloquently about the joys of AMD, because even though Intel is better, if they have no real competition then we'll get less than amazing hardware.Where is the drive to be the best when there is, literally, no competition? This is a short post, as it's a late night for me now, but I thought I'd share my thoughts and let you all know I live. I've deleted that politics post from last month, I've decided to leave politics to facebook for now. Don't worry, I'll let you know here when I change my mind. I don't know whom or what you worship, but may they shower you with favor! See? I'm not above a little religion. Farewell!

http://8mbbroadband.com/what-are-the-internal-components-of-gaming-computers-aid-18376

RV Ideas: Step one, choosing an RV

So, the future is now and nobody can afford a house anymore, at least that's how it feels. All over the t.v., you hear about "Tiny Home" living. Here's the thing, they're putting a new "glam" name on something people have been doing for decades. What is tiny home living? It is living in: A modified bus, a fifth wheel, a travel trailer, a recreational vehicle, and even a camper. Look, until a few years ago, whenever someone said something about tiny homes you thought about shows like "Little Family," and "Little People, Big World." You thought about "little people" living in the world. It wasn't even about their homes being little, just them. But these days, "tiny home" is just a new spin on an old idea. For convenience, I'm lumping all of the varies types of "tiny homes" into the initials RV. So, glam aside you still like the idea of travelling the country in your own mobile home? We're right there with you! So, our first step is choosing the RV!

Now the first thing to do is know what you want. Do you want something that drives itself, or something you have to haul? Are you planning to camp out as much as possible, or only as a last resort? I'm the driver, so I personally prefer something that drives itself. That limits me to either a Class A, B, or C RV. The Class B is, essentially, a glorified van. That's not the most accurate description, but it's pretty close for our purposes. Dropping that, then, we're looking at a class C or a class A. Now the class A is, generally, going to be the more luxurious option. If possible we'd like a class A with a real toilet, walk in shower, queen or bigger bed, a desk for my computing needs and a place for Erin to do her crafting.While I'm inclined to like the class A, I aim to look at the C's as well, and find the best I can for the money we're planning to use.

Update: So we've hit up our local RV/auto dealer and found a couple of okay deals. We found a class A that's within our budget, but we're holding off until after the new year. Depreciation works both ways, dealership people! So, since we're not planning to leave until April or May we are going to hold off as long as we reasonably feel we can. I've also been comparing prices on the rvtrader.com website, and I'm reasonably sure that even if the dealership manages to sell the one we want that we can find another good RV for a good price. So, 2015 Itasca By Winnebago Sunstar 26HE, I'll be seeing you real soon! Although, to be honest, we're willing to go even older if the price is right. This model doesn't have a real desk area, but it's a little smaller which I read to mean a little easier to drive. Until next time, people!

Long term goals.

Hello again, everyone! As you know I'm still relatively new to blogging. My old site, eandyil.wordpress.com is still active at this time, but I'm moving here. Speaking of moving, and long term goals, I'm going to give you all some information about me and my life-mate/fiancè Erin. I know this feels a little disorganized, but I promise to bring it all together. Right, moving on.

We've all lost people. We've lost people to murder, violence, disease and just plain old natural causes. We've lost a double handful between us, and we try to honor our lost, but I'm going to tell you a little bit about her father and my aunt. My aunt's name was Elizabeth Lynn Therkildsen, and she passed away from cancer. She'd done many things in her life, short though it was. She was in the Army when I was very young, but her big dream was travel. After she got out, she became a stewardess to continue seeing other countries. She used to bring back foreign coins all the time. She once said that she'd like to hit every state, but she wanted to hit every country as well. She sure did get the chance to visit a few, but she never got to spend a lot of time there. I know I'm not likely to see all the countries like she wanted to, but I do think visiting the states shouldn't be a problem.

And then there's Erin's dad. His name was Steven Culhane and his dream was pretty straightforward. He wanted to buy an R.V. and spend a few days visiting each state in the U.S. When I asked Erin about Hawaii, she pointed out that he'd talked about taking some kind of boat to get over there. So what we're planning to do is honor both my aunt and her dad by living his dream, and also visiting each of the States. Since driving to Alaska would mean driving through Canada, we can even visit another country on the way. Hawaii is not currently on the list, but the simple truth is that if we get enough money figured out then sure, we'd love to spend a day or two down there. By the same token, we'd love to see the world like my aunt dreamed of doing. Japan, Britain, Norway, Sweden, even Russia would be awesome. However, we've agreed to start small. So, the first goal is to buy an R.V. we can live in for an extended length of time in. We're thinking solar panels on the roof as well, this way we can save money as much as possible on costs once we hit the road. Our end goal is Seattle, Washington. Aunt Lynn lived in a few places, but whether you count it as from L.A. or Phoenix it's still deserts. I remember her saying how much she liked trees and greenery, so Seattle is the plan!

So, before I posted this I found that my Erin has started a fund for this. If any of you would like to donate to the cause, well we won't say no. I'm sharing the link here.

https://www.youcaring.com/erin-culhane-steven-moynier-479080

How Fallout 4 Sucked Me In

Alright, so computer gaming is technically a waste of time. Look, no matter how you slice it, no matter how amazing the game is, it all comes back to a time sink. Do I care? Absolutely not! Fallout 4 is the newest game in the Fallout Universe. A quick and dirty history: In the year 2077, the world was nuked back to the stone age. Alright, maybe not quite that bad, but two hundred years after the war people are still dependent on the "ancient" technologies if the prewar era. There are prototypes put to use, and (spoiler) there is one group of people who have actually surpassed the prewar tech and continue progressing forward, but aside from that one group even the most technologically advanced groups are using and maintaining the prewar tech. If this sounds interesting to you, I definitely suggest checking out the Fallout games.

So Fallout 4 sucked me in. I’ve spent days in this immersive world, crafting, modding, building. Frankly, it is one of the better games I’ve played. Oh there’s problems. A lot of the dialogue is canned, the game engine needs an overhaul, and in spite of how great the game itself looks the bodies/faces of the people in this game are a little underwhelming. I look forward to the mods, and it’s one reason I prefer the PC over any other system for games like this. I’d love to see either an official or player made expansion, letting you revisit the locations of the earlier games. Seriously, the in game weapon and armor mods are very well done, and if I could not only do this with Fallout 4 but also see the effects of what my character did in Fallout 3/New Vegas/2/1? Yeah, that would be awesome!

I’m still rambling, but I’ll try to get to the point. If you are interested in shooter games, you’ll enjoy this one. If you are interested in RPG games, you’ll probably enjoy this one. If you like to build stuff, micromanaging your little communities like a freaking boss, this is a great game for you! I’ve been building my own personal mansion, but I’m not at all pleased with the building options I have. Even with the five Picket Fences magazines, I just don’t like the look of what is available build wise. With the player/mod community, however, I know it’s only a matter of time before I can do such things as remove and/or repair the prewar housing and then custom build my own, no doubt awesome, mansion. What? Oh, time to load back into Fallout 4. I’ll see you in Boston, my friends!