Line Rider 2

The original Line Rider was a simple concept that went from a small Flash file to a worldwide obsession.

Now the company (InXile) started by one of the guys from Fallout (yes, Fallout, possibly one of the best games ever) has the rights to the new version. Here's a sample from the new version, which includes acceleration:



Oh, I forgot the best part!

It's coming to the Nintendo DS and the Wii!

Chili peppers: is there anything they can't do?

Researchers in Canada have discovered an interesting aspect of pain cells in the pancreas of diabetic mice.

There's an article in yesterday's National Post about researchers curing diabetes in mice "virtually overnight" through the injection of capsiacin.

I also had this story pointed out by my friends who hold a hotluck every year. (Every dish at a potluck is spicy. Last year I made peanut-butter-and-habanero-jelly sandwiches.) Some growers in England produced a pepper that measures 923,000 Scoville Units. Considering the hottest pepper I've ever had—the Scotch Bonnet—measures a mere 100K-350K, that's scary as hell. I can't imagine actually using one in a dish.

the cylons have a plan, which evidently involves algae

Burning an album I bought the other day (BT's Movement in Still Life, if you're curious) and finishing up listening to the latest podcast about the last Battlestar Galactica episode.

These podcasts are interesting in that they're a half-glimpsed vision of what goes into the making of a show. Sure, there are narrative reasons why X and Y happen, but there are also financial reasons. You save money by making a bottle show because you blew your budget on episode 3. That sort of thing.

I do wish that the producer of the show would spend some money on a better microphone, as the last couple of podcasts are excruciating to listen to. The one for last episode had a high-pitched beep every couple of seconds that was maddening. (Sorely tempted to find a copy of Pro Tools or the like to even it out. I used to this kind of thing back in the day with Sound Edit 16; don't tell me the Sci-Fi Channel is too poor to spend an hour on post-production.)

Had a friend over the other night and I realized just how out-of-sorts my comic book collection is lately. I've been accruing them, but not doing much with them in terms of storage. She borrowed a bunch of trades so it's a little bit easier, but I can see that my weekend is going to be spent taking a look at sorting.

How to get sued:

So I know that both Yahoo maps and Google maps have little disclaimers that you should always check your routes before traveling anywhere.

However, it looks like they may need to beef up their language, based on the experiences of a family here in Oregon.

Authorities say the cyber-savy[sic] family may have plucked the route from Grants Pass to Gold Beach from an online mapping service, unaware of the elements.

Despite its impassable snowdrifts and single-lane, Bear Camp Road is offered as the preferred route on some Web sites and on-board-directions software available on some new cars. And most of those have no business in those mountains in the winter.

Yahoo and MapQuest offer Highways 199 and 101 as the preferred route. A Google map search, however, suggests the Bear Camp route, a series of federal forest roads used mostly in summer.

Evidently the father wandered out looking for help and they're still looking for him. I really do hope they find him.

Also, sorry for the delay in service--it has been extraordinarily busy for me lately and I haven't had a lot of energy to do much of anything. Like Roast Beef, I may suffer from SAD.