Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Illness and frustration

I spent the better part of the last three days sick in bed with brief moments of energy. Look at the date and time of the previous post, for example. I was awake and lucid between 2:30 and 5:30 a.m. Sunday.

The cold/flu finally broke last night, but I came down with a migraine around 5:00 p.m. Two Dilaudid took care of the pain eventually, but not the associated nausea or gas. I didn't get much sleep between the coughing and the gas. Some expulsion or another kept waking me up.

I read a script for Alex Sunday night, but I haven't felt up to writing my own. Today, I accompanied Child Two's class to a fun day of skating and tubing at Beaver Lake and now I feel crappy again. Maybe I shouldn't live up to all my obligations.

I offered to read something for Robert the director by tomorrow. That I will do, but it means even less time for me to write this week.

I don't want to post to the blog with just a summary of my health, so here's a crosspost from a post of mine on the WarBirds forum. After solving some equipment problems, I tried WarBirds on Saturday for the first time in months. I am a WarBirds trainer, renowned for my knowledge of air-combat maneuvers and skill in the virtual skies. Here's what I had to say about my Saturday session:

I really, really suck.

For one reason or another, I haven't flown very much WB in the past year. I finally fixed my rudder pedals and put them on a non-skid base, so I thought I'd give it a go this weekend.

Turns out I suck.

Really suck.

I can't master the field-of-view changes to zoom in for shots and I can't hit anything zoomed out. Yes, it's mapped to throttle buttons. This is something that has bothered me since I left WB 2. And I lose tracking with these large cockpit frames. I'm still not used to them.

I think I landed a few bullets on targets, but I can't shoot anything down. That doesn't matter so much, because I can't fly.

I used to be decent at this game. I know energy fighting, and I know what the planes are supposed to do. But no matter what I fly, I seem to have the speed of a Zero and the maneuverability of a Jug (ed.: a P-47, a thundering locomotive of an aircraft). Everything in the sky beats me like a rug.

I can't lag turn, I can't lag roll, I can't even follow cons with my views.

The only effective move I made this weekend so far was a hammerhead with a 190 against a Spit IX. But I missed the shot and slammed into the desert floor since my crappy hardware can't display ground clutter and I had no idea I was so low.

Really, I can't hit a freaking thing out there.

Except, apparently, the desert floor.

I tried Spits, 109F, 190A, P-40E - I suck in everything.

So if you shoot me down, tell me what I'm doing wrong - and don't think you're so Sierra Hotel because I've got trainer wings. Because, you see, I suck. You probably just suck a little less than I.

I don't have the best hardware up there (G4 @ 533 MHz, with a 64MB Geforce 3 and 1 GB RAM), but I'm not going to blame my equipment. Fact is, I suck at this damned game.
_________________
Webs, OC 101 "Red" Squadron, Israel
Member, WarBirds Training Staff

Some who responded say it may indeed be my archaic Mac that's at fault. Big help that is.

Bonus observation on last week's TV:

Did you notice that both last week's "House" and last week's "Grey's Anatomy" had patients who spontaneously orgasmed? I wonder if that's coincidence or if both writing rooms look at the same medical journals for inspiration, and both found such a case in the literature.

Regardless, the "Grey's Anatomy" patient was a sideshow for the doctors. She could be cured with some unspecified offscreen surgery. The "House" patient's orgasms were an important symptom that led directly to the correct neurological diagnosis. "House" is a medical show. "Grey's Anatomy" is a soap opera.

1 Comments:

Blogger Naila J. said...

I totally agree about House and Grey's Anatomy.

That's why I don't watch the latter, or ER for that matter.

I like the medical-ness of House. I've always been into those weird health science terms no one can pronounce, even less completely comprehend.

I love House. It doesn't play dumb with the viewers, and it doesn't make you feel like it's all cheesy BS that would never happen anyway unless it were on a TV show.

February 21, 2006 10:16 PM  

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