Son of Random Stuff

[Arthmoor]

http://darkcreations.org/forums/ goes to a 404 page.http://darkcreations.org/ to a blank index page with no entries.

[AndalayBay]

It's www.darkcreations.org and www.darkcreations.org/forums. Now we were messing around tonight trying to get a Git repository running, so we probably screwed up some of Xae's redirects. I'll get chewed out for that later... Thanks for letting me know - I'll let him know so he can fix it. I'm really starting to giggle - he's not going to be happy. And I hate Git. With a passion. Despise it.

[Dwip]

Meanwhile, we're apparently living in the future.Because, you know, laser cannons and rail guns? Just not future enough.

[Arthmoor]

Yes please! I'd like to place an order for one death ray machine.

[Conner]

Just don't be too surprised if I announce that my father has passed soon too. He's currently in the ICU in a medically induced coma while they perform multiple surgeries (for the past week so far) to try to fix a major series of problems that started with a diagnosis of prostrate cancer complicated by bladder stones' date=' which became a need to replace several vertebra at the top of the spine with titanium, and quickly has become a double perforated intestines with severe edema and a form of staff infection (it's called MRSA, pronounced mer-sah) complicated by a situation of his body not retaining lipids or albumen so fluids aren't even staying in his bloodstream and his lungs are retaining fluids too. It's not looking good at all. And that's just my father's situation[/quote']Well folks, my prediction earlier this month has come to pass. At 1:50 a.m. eastern time, my father was pronounced dead by the doctor on duty at the hospital. Last week they'd replaced his breathing tube with a tracheotomy and put him on dialysis on a 24/7 basis and taken him off sedatives. A few days ago they'd cut back the dialysis to every other day and, this morning, his kidneys failed completely. Additionally, they had him on the highest dosage of three different blood pressure medications and were still having trouble keeping his blood pressure high enough to maintain life support and he was determined to not be breathing on his own at all, and even on a respirator his oxygen levels were not able to be brought up to where the doctors felt was a safe level, but his heart was still strong and his brain was still active. After a very difficult day of intense emotions and difficult decisions, tonight, at 1:00 a.m. life support was terminated. Those of his family who could be, were there, in person or on the phone, from that point until shortly after he was pronounced deceased nearly an hour later. I cannot begin to tell you how sorry I am to bring you all this sort of bad news, but I felt that, since I'd brought the matter up earlier in the month, I owed you all a telling of the final outcome.

[Dwip]

I'm really sorry to hear that, Conner. Condolences.

[AndalayBay]

I'm sorry to hear that Conner. My condolences.

[Ysne58]

I am so sorry for your loss Connor.

[Hana]

Oh Connor, honey, I'm so sorry to hear. I know exactly how you feel right now, a decision to terminate life support is NOT easy.SuperCyberHugs to you, Dragona and your family. May he rest in peace.

[Arthmoor]

Conner, Dragona, and family, sorry to hear that. My deepest condolences on your loss. :sad:

[Conner]

I will most definitely relay your condolences to my wife and family, and, in advance, I'll thank you for them on their behalves as well.Thank you, all of you, very much from all of us. We really do appreciate the condolences (and especially the cyber-hugs ).This has made this June an incredibly long month for all of us, to say the least. I can only assume that he's in a better place, or at least that he's no longer suffering, but the real tragedy is that the trauma of it all has only just barely begun for us, now we are stumbling through the entire funerary process and estate issues and so forth that we had to deal with 12 years ago, when my mother passed, all over again -- with just as much fighting, but this time it's with my step-mother against the rest of us and we're without my father to take a side while helping to make the parts that we could all agree upon happen -- with those of us who were involved, and who are still here, having had long enough to have forgotten how to handle some of them and who to talk to about handling the rest. :headbang:

[Thomas Kaira]

Very sorry for your loss, Conner.

[AndalayBay]

This sounds all too familiar... In my case, it was a guy that my dad had semi-adopted. He was a drug-dealing bum. But when my dad died, he decided he had some entitlement on the estate. My dad charged this guy rent for a while, so no, he wasn't the adopted son he thought he was.I'm sorry to hear that you might have a battle ahead of you. If at all possible, find someone who can talk to this woman and see what she wants. Find out what your rights are as legal heirs. Then present the facts to her and see what you can negotiate. Don't draw it out. Having lawyers do your negotiating won't help. They want all the money they can get. Only deal with the lawyers if she won't be reasonable.If you want to talk, feel free to PM me. I've been through this. I wish my dad and me had talked more openly before he died. I kid you not, this brings tears to my eyes as I type this. But we were separated by divorce and me not being allowed to talk to him until I was an adult. And being young at the time, I didn't know what I know now. *sigh*

[Dwip]

So, this is a thing that happened tonight.Playing back through Mass Effect 1 with my sniper Shepard, with Tali and Liara for backup. And their AI is seriously terrible. They get stuck everywhere, they're shooting me in the ass every time I'm trying to kill somebody, and I'm completely soloing the whole game because they're off being the Keystone Kops.And then I got to the sky bridge on Feros. And I'm staring down a couple of Geth Armatures and Geth Primes and going "Man, I'm going to have to be careful on this one. They can one shot kill me."Which is precisely when Tali and Liara jump up and charge forward, pistols blazing, shouting some combination of "Infantry leads the way!" and "BANZAI!" and wipe out the whole enemy team John Matrix style without any input from me whatsoever. I didn't change anything, no new gear, no new levels, nothing, but from that point on my participation in the mission was completely superfluous. With the best sniper rifle in the game with the best mods in the game on a max level infiltrator, I just couldn't keep up. Even the really hard part with all the Thorian Creepers flew by. They just didn't even care, and all I could do was sit there and be all "WHAT IS EVEN HAPPENING I DON'T EVEN" while they slaughtered legions.I think my AI teammates just haxed my game...

[Hana]

FFS Nexus ... who the hell is asking for these STUPID new formats? Probably the biggest unnecessary thing you've ever done./rage

[Arthmoor]

So I got this check in the mail today. Supposedly my share of some big class action thing from Google. I don't even know what the case was about nor have I ever seen any mailings on the subject. Something to do with Adwords.There's even this warning at the bottom:"If you have any questions about potential tax issues as a result of this award, we recommend that you consult a tax professional." yada blah blah whatever.So. The big amount? 7 cents. Yep. These fools cut me and however many other people involved checks for 7 cents. I should even cash it promptly because it's void by 12/26/2012.

[Dwip]

Yup, AI haxed my game. Apparently it was tired of me kill stealing my teammates. I was pretty superfluous for the rest of that run.Whassis about Nexus?$0.07... you're set for life now.

[Arthmoor]

Looks like Nexus has gone all social networking like or something. Bleh.The stupid thing about this check? It cost them 21 cents to mail it to me.

[Dwip]

Oh, that. I guess, if people like it?Well, Google can probably afford to set some money on fire, right? Keep the USPS going, all that.

[AndalayBay]

So I got this check in the mail today. Supposedly my share of some big class action thing from Google. I don't even know what the case was about nor have I ever seen any mailings on the subject. Something to do with Adwords.

There's even this warning at the bottom:

"If you have any questions about potential tax issues as a result of this award' date=' we recommend that you consult a tax professional." yada blah blah whatever.

So. The big amount? 7 cents. Yep. These fools cut me and however many other people involved checks for 7 cents. I should even cash it promptly because it's void by 12/26/2012.[/quote'] Don't spend it all in one place! Oh and heaven forbid: don't forget to report it on your tax return. I'm sure the IRS keeps a close eye on all those proceeds from CAL's.I will say one good thing about the new Nexus thing. Now I can clicked on tracked files and immediately see the latest questions about my mods. Saves me several keystrokes. Don't care about the rest of the shit.

[prettyfly]

Google clearly cares for its users. :tongue: Otho; it only costs 21 cents to main something in America? It costs 60 in Australia.

[Dwip]

Probably some form of business/mass mail discount. Standard first class rate here is...45 cents, I think. Since they came out with Forever stamps I kind of stopped paying attention.

[Arthmoor]

It was bulk mail, which is why it was so cheap. Standard first class is 44 cents. I think. Like Dwip, the "forever stamp" has caused me to lose track. For all I know it could be 50 cents now. Ironically, the forever stamp may be one reason the postal service is losing money. One could be sitting on a dozen books of the originals from 2007, at 41 cents, and not have to go buy new ones until they're all gone.

[Conner]

Very sorry for your loss' date=' Conner. [/quote']Thanks Thomas, the funeral was today and I was able to attend by telephone with the help of my cousin's son (my second cousin?) since I wasn't able to afford the travel to get there. I had put together a eulogy for him of sorts that the cantor was going to read for me but yesterday my step-mother gave the cantor her own input on it and changed up a few things so that what the cantor read instead was full of factual errors about his life. I was not amused in the least.

This sounds all too familiar... In my case' date=' it was a guy that my dad had semi-adopted. He was a drug-dealing bum. But when my dad died, he decided he had some entitlement on the estate. My dad charged this guy [i']rent[/i] for a while, so no, he wasn't the adopted son he thought he was.I'm sorry to hear that you might have a battle ahead of you. If at all possible, find someone who can talk to this woman and see what she wants. Find out what your rights are as legal heirs. Then present the facts to her and see what you can negotiate. Don't draw it out. Having lawyers do your negotiating won't help. They want all the money they can get. Only deal with the lawyers if she won't be reasonable.If you want to talk, feel free to PM me. I've been through this. I wish my dad and me had talked more openly before he died. I kid you not, this brings tears to my eyes as I type this. But we were separated by divorce and me not being allowed to talk to him until I was an adult. And being young at the time, I didn't know what I know now. *sigh*

Thanks, unfortunately, I suspect she had tricks up her sleeves before she met my father and then he effectively taught her all that he could by letting her be his confidante when he went up against my sister and I. In the end, he got roughly 85% of my mother's estate, she's shooting for 100% of his from all appearances. I think I will take you up on the suggestion about PMs, this forum is pretty nice and reasonably obscure enough that she's not likely to notice it, but it is still searchable via google...

[Conner]

So. The big amount? 7 cents. Yep. These fools cut me and however many other people involved checks for 7 cents. I should even cash it promptly because it's void by 12/26/2012.

Don't spend it all in one place! Oh and heaven forbid: don't forget to report it on your tax return. I'm sure the IRS keeps a close eye on all those proceeds from CAL's.

The sad part of that is that, you're right, the IRS really does keep a fairly close watch on Class Action proceeds, generally, but they also usually insist that you round all amounts that you're reporting and anything under $0.51 rounds down.