Happy Easter!

Enjoy this picture of a bunny!

Hey everyone, I've been having a pretty solid vacation, although I'm not looking forward to going back to work in the least. Hopefully you're having a decent April as well.

I'm planning on leaving tomorrow and should be arriving early Tuesday morning. Then I'll start looking for a house, and hopefully I'll have internet in time to start regular posting on the blog.

Starshard0's Super Road Trip

I've never been much for road trips. Being prone to carsickness, I was always incredibly bored as a kid because I couldn't read or play video games during the ride. Also my dad listened to country music the whole time.

So when I was faced with the prospect of a 20 hour trip from New York to Minnesota, I wasn't exactly what you'd call excited. Being in the car, with nothing but the radio for company, it didn't sound like a lot of fun. And it wasn't. But in the end I made it with no problems. Here are some of the things I learned on my trip:

I-90 is one big toll road

Whether you call it the New York Thruway or the Ohio Turnpike, I-90 ate up all the cash I had on me as I meandered through the Northwest Territories. I did end up getting some cool dollar coins as change though.

The Angola Travel Plaza in Angola New York is staffed exclusively by Asians

Nothing wrong with that, I was just confused. The Travel Plaza is basically a huge rest stop with a McDonald's and a Denny's and some other restaurants. I got a chicken wrap while I was there from a wrap place.

Big cities are impressive to drive through

I managed to pass through Buffalo, Cleveland, and Chicago, and each one had awesome buildings to show off. The closest I'd been to the Sears Tower previously had been when I had a stop at O'Hare.

Sleeping in a car is no fun

At least in the front seat. Unfortunately during my return drive the back seat will be full of boxes.

In closing

I expect my return drive to be a little more fun since I'll have my wife to keep me company and serve as my navigatress (a word I admittedly made up). Does anyone have any advice for making a road trip not suck?

Leaving for Leave

Hey everyone! I won't be posting much (if at all) during the month of April, since it's my vacation. Mostly I'll be spending time with my wife and looking for a house. Also I'll be doing P90X, so I'll let you all know how it turns out.

Let's Get Classy this Thursday

Hey everyone, I found some cool links on deployment that you may already know about, but in case you don't:

First, open three tabs in your browser.

Second, open this.

Third, open this.

Fourth, open this.

Finally, get classy!

Political Talk Radio Blows My Mind

I was riding with a friend the other day, and he was listening to a conservative talk radio show. I've never actually listened to a political talk show before, and I've only ever heard parodies. To be honest I couldn't tell the difference.

I can only vaguely remember what the issue was, but it was something involving Israel. I'm not going to try to get to in-depth about it, since the whole purpose of this post is to explain why I dislike political talk radio.

First things first, most of what political pundits put out is false. The whole purpose of punditry is predictions, and unless these people have a (working) crystal ball, then odds are they're going to be wrong as much, if not more, than they're right. Here is an article that claims that political pundits are no more accurate than someone picking randomly. And here is another article which claims that the more famous a pundit is, the less accurate his predictions are.

That right there ought to turn you off talk radio forever. You should probably steer clear of TV pundits too while you're at it.

Spening Your Tax Return Not Stupidly

Filing date is actually April 18 this year.

For some reason, I really enjoy doing my taxes. For that particular reason, I never put it off any longer than I have to. This year I didn't get much of a return because I didn't pay a lot of taxes because I was overseas. Most people will tell you that it's not good to get a return because the money was yours and you let the government borrow it interest free. That's not what this post is about though.

No, today I'm going to discuss what you can do with your tax return that won't make you look like an idiot. First some suggestions about what NOT to buy:

• Anything with a big screen

-This includes TVs, smart phones, iPads, and gaming devices. Most electronics with big screens are overpriced and not terribly useful. A giant-screen TV might look awesome, but in the end it's still just a TV.

• A motorcycle

-Unless it's going to be your primary means of transportation.

• A boat

-Unless you're going to live in it and sell your house.

• A pool

-Unless it's a foot deep and for your kids, and even then...

• Anything that requires you to borrow money to pay for part of it

-I think that actually covers most of the former items.

Okay, I think that about covers everything you shouldn't buy, now onto the good part, what you should be using that money for:

• Pay off your debt

-And if you don't have any debt... 

• Invest it in something

-And if you're already rich...

• Give to charity?

-Not really my kind of thing, but you did say you were rich.Otherwise...

• Go ahead and pick one of the items from the top list, or whatever else you were going to buy

-I can't really argue with someone whose already out of debt and has a decent amount of money tucked away.

So there you have it, several ways to spend your money that won't make me laugh at you. One really cool thing you can do is buy "I" bonds directly from the treasury with your return. Turbo Tax did it all for me automatically, but if you're doing your taxes manually there's a form you have to fill out. I think it might be the same one that you use for direct deposit.

Viva Tropico!

Before you freak out, I don't have the Mac version.

Over the weekend, I spent a lot of time playing Tropico and Tropico 2: Pirate's Cove. I would have played 3, unfortunately, my computer is a netbook and barely understands the concept of 3D gaming. I'll be primarily focusing on Tropico, because it's what I spent the most time playing.

The Story

You play as the dictator of a small island in the Caribbean. That pretty much sums it up. When you first begin a map, you pick the traits that flesh out your background, such as how you got to power, your strengths, and your weaknesses. Strengths are pretty straightforward, like Hardworking or Financial Genius, and the weaknesses can be pretty entertaining, although they usually hurt your relationship with different factions. Speaking of factions, onto...

The Gameplay

Once again, gameplay is king when it comes to playing games. In this case, Tropico is similar to other city building type sims out there in that you place buildings and try to keep everyone happy, or at least happy enough to not revolt. One interesting feature that shows up more in RTSs than city building games is the real-time construction of buildings. When you place a building it's not actually built right away. You have to wait for your workers to flatten the land and actually construct it.

In order to not lose, you have to maintain a good relationship with the factions. These include the environmentalists, the intellectuals, communists, etc. Obviously it's difficult to get on excellent terms with everyone, so usually I just pick a faction or two and try to convert the majority of people to that faction.

The ultimate goal of the game, besides just avoiding a coup, is to make everyone as happy as possible, with as much money in the treasury as possible, and with the biggest presidential slush fund possible. When you start a map, you can select one or all of these goals and that will affect your score at the end of your time in office, which you can also adjust at the beginning of the game. Adjusting the starting conditions affects your score at the end by multiplying it by a percentage to obtain your final score.

The Graphics

Tropico's graphics are similar to the games in PopTop's other series, Railroad Tycoon, specifically Railroad Tycoon II. That said, they're not bad, but they're not exactly Avatar either. As I've said before, graphics get a free pass from me as long as I can tell what I'm doing in the game.

The Controls

Tropico uses the mouse along with keyboard shortcuts, like most RTS games. Being able to adjust the speed on the fly means that you don't really need to race the clock in order to win, and can focus on a good building strategy.

The Music

I usually don't write about music in my reviews, but I have to at least mention that the Tropico soundtrack is awesome. According to Wikipedia, the game features Latin-styled Dominican music. I'm not entirely sure what that means, but you'll certainly never get bored with it.

The Issues

I didn't find any bugs during my time playing, and my only real complaint is that building things seems to take quit a long time, even on the very fast speed setting. That's just mean whining though, since it probably does take a long time to build and airport using just some shovels and hammers.

The Conclusion

If you've never played Tropico before, I highly suggest it. Especially if you're a fan of city building sims or even RTSs.