I’m going off the grid for the rest of the day and maybe tomorrow, so I thought I’d throw up an open thread (so those of you who have started to play can tell us about DA2). Here is Lily pretending that if she doesn’t make eye contact, I won’t notice she is sitting in my seat.
Do you ever wonder what your dog is thinking about all day? Most of the time, unless we are on walks or if she is sitting on my lap or on her chair in my office, Lily spends the day lying under the comforter on the bed with only her head sticking out, and I often wonder what she is thinking. I think it probably is something as simple as “Better than the pound, better than the pound, better than the pound, I hope the fat guy doesn’t sit on me, better than the pound.” Who knows?
Poopyman
(Braces self for a half–dozen posts in rapid succession….)
Poopyman
I only have cats, and I’m pretty sure they’re thinking “Warm…is it warmer over there?…Getting hungry…need to stretch…” ad infinitum.
Don’t anthropomorphise them, JC. They hate that.
Scott
I’ve always wished I knew what my siblings’ dogs thought. I see so much intelligence when I look at them, but I know I’m probably anthropomorphizing them a lot. I’d love to know what they think of us and what we do…
Pococurante
Ah ok since we now have an open thread, I’ll crosspost:
The governor of Michigan is taking over the state. That’s no exaggeration.
schrodinger's cat
Is Lily getting a bit Tunchesque? BTW where is the big fella?
Haven’t seen him in a while?
The Dangerman
“Haven’t sniffed butt in ages, haven’t sniffed butt in ages, when, oh when, will I sniff butt again?”
beltane
I’ve been told by family members that my dog dogs nothing but sleep, cry and look out the window when I’m not home. You’d think the four cats would provide adequate companionship but I guess not.
Shinobi
I’m pretty sure my dog is wondering if it is time to eat yet. Every time i move in my desk chair he’ll turn to look at me like “Time to eat?” And then when I don’t respond he sighs and lays back down.
Cat Lady
Don’t know about dogs, but I’m pretty convinced that when cats go into that trance they do with their legs all tucked up under them, their brains are being downloaded by the alien mothership. When our little green overlords come for us, they’ll assume we’re their staff, also too.
PeakVT
She’s probably thinking about how she would really like to go out and roll around in stinky stuff again.
ETA: It looks like Crescent City had a run up of over 8 feet about 40 minutes ago. IIRC, that location always is the most affected because of the way the seafloor is shaped.
SiubhanDuinne
@Poopyman:
I see what you did there. I approve.
Elizabelle
@PeakVT:
PeakVT pegged it.
Loneoak
Fucking hilarious story out of my town: A dreadlocked diamond-studded-anal plug thief is apprehended while playing the accordion at the Farmer’s Market by the mother-daughter team that owns the sex toy shop. After spotting him steal the toys on surveillance video, the owner deduced that somebody with dreadlocks is going to be at the Farmer’s Market, and so hunted him down.
Hell hath no fury like a dildo-purveyor scorned.
It’s a nice shop, by the way. Or so I hear.
cmorenc
Often when they’re reclined in a comfortable position, dogs are simply doing what many humans only do with difficulty, at least without long study and practice with yoga or zen or other deep forms of meditation…simply going OMMMMMMM and being completely in the moment, without any directed thoughts.
Unless they hear activity suggesting food. Then, it’s “can I wheedle a few bits out of him, if I go where he is and insistently give him the right look?” Of course, this thought is nonverbal in the dog’s head, it’s more something like the picture equivalent of him-get-food! get-close-look-at-him-get-some?
Loneoak
@Pococurante:
I suggested on a previous thread that this story be front paged, but alas. It needs to be very widely discussed. All snark aside, it really is a dramatic usurpation of democracy, far, far more egregious than anything Walker dreamed up in Wisconsin.
Todd Pearson
Philosphocial question: Is one’s purpose in blogging to ridicule and gripe, or is it to persuade? I don’t necessarily disagree with many of the ridicules and gripes here, but a preaching to the choir approach seems a bit pointless to me. Make an argument instead of just saying that people who disagree with you are stupid assholes.
mikefromArlington
I once had a shit-tzu that I’m convinced was thinking of “blue ball, blue ball, where is it, where is it. Oh, it’s in my mouth…blue ball, blue ball, where is it…..”
Mark S.
Finally! A Lily picture!
(She’s mad because you didn’t give a hat tip to eemom.)
Davebo
I have a Lab that just reached one year of age and already weighs over 90 lbs.
He’s thinking “what can I snatch from the coffee table, couch, bed, and make Dad follow me to the backyard to get it back”
They’re evil, evil I tell you. But I can’t live without them it seems.
Do you think Cesar can help me? And can I get him to Texas for less than ten grand?
Pococurante
@Loneoak: Agreed. Maybe ABL will take it on…
JWL
Gary Larson figured it out. He penned a cartoon in which people are outside staring up at a night sky full of flying saucers. As is their dog, who is heard to remark, “At last they’ve returned”. In the portholes of the spacecraft can be seen other dogs, staring down.
Anonymous At Work
You forgot something about eating. Some combination of “Am I hungry? Does it matter?” and “I wondier if X is edible? Have I tried to eat/gnaw it before? Does it matter?”
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Loneoak:
Damned shoplifters! Don’t they know that their thievery drives up the price the rest of us pay for diamond-studded butt-plugs?
Redshirt
Bacon.
BACON.
BACON!!!
Martin
Japan just had a 6.2 quake on the west side of the island. Epicenter near Nagano.
Man, they’re just getting fucked randomly over there now.
Corner Stone
@Pococurante: I thought Loneoak was requesting a serious exploration of a real matter?
Citizen_X
You’re going to see this eventually, so it might as well be here:
White (Male) People Problems, Chapter 3,546,128: Whiny Little Fuckstick Rand Paul, in a hearing yesterday, goes off on a bizarre rant aimed at Deputy Assistant Energy Secretary for Efficiency Kathleen Hogan. First, he asks if she’s “pro-choice,” and then complains that she’s anti-choice ‘cuz he cain’t git no terlet that flushes right, or something. Apparently, if you try to sell a non-low-flush toilet or an incandescent light bulb in Obama’s People’s Republic of Sharia-America, jackbooted Federal thugs will cart you off to Algore’s reeducation camp.
cyntax
NO SPOILERS–I promise.
I’m only an hour or so in on DA2 and probably won’t have time for much more this weekend. The combat is way punchier, much like the change from ME to ME2, the colors look more saturated, and it seems that they’ve changed auto attack so that whichever character you’re currently controlling, you have to manually attack opponents–can’t go along for the ride like in DA. Most of the mechanics are pretty similar, so you won’t have too much to relearn on the controls side.
At a more macro-level, I’m curious to see how well they’ll integrate the unreliable narrator into the game, or whether it will remain more of a gimmick. I think the idea of borrowing an overtly literary device like that and applying it to a game is an interesting one, since it could push the storytelling envelope of the game, but I’m a bit skeptical they’ve got a way to integrate into the game in a meaningful way.
Having the main character fully voiced is a huge plus for me.
Overall, enjoying the game well enough and looking forward to seeing how it unfolds.
Pococurante
@Corner Stone: You mean, not a Chris Rock imitation? Good point. :-)
rikryah
4.Pococurante
Rachel Maddow did an excellent piece about what the Governor in Michigan wants.
Rosalita
She’s thinking “when do I get to go out and roll in some rancid shit”
Corner Stone
Rosie is probably thinking, “Why does the fat man hate me? All I want to do is play with him and live life to the fullest! And for that I get those looks? I mean, it’s not like I caused him $100K in bodily damage or anything…”
batgirl
@Pococurante: Wow! Just wow, frakking, wow!
And I bet our press corp is too busy covering Charlie Sheen and NPR being pranked to commit an act of real journalism.
R-Jud
@Citizen_X:
Saw that on Gawker. As near as I can figure out, his math comes out as: if I have to have a low-flow toilet, you have to carry your rapist’s baby to term.
I haven’t observed lent in years, but I’m thinking of giving up the news for the remainder of it.
Martin
@Citizen_X: I’ve got an ultra low-flow toilet that can flush fucking tennis balls. Just buy Japanese toilets – Toto. They dedicate supercomputers to the design of their toilets.
twiffer
have started DA2, but not too far into it.
thoughts so far (in no particular order, or any sort of order, for that matter)
apparently, the dalish are now tinkers, cause every one of them i’ve met so far has an irish accent.
dialogue tree is ported and tweaked from ME2; all to the good, i think. combat is faster and more responsive. bit more cut scenes than i’d like, but they are skipable, so no problem. have gotten no where near the meat of the plot yet, so i’m not quite sure what’s going on yet.
not sure yet about the skill trees. also seems like companions are designed to use the weapons & armor they come with. not sure if i like that or not yet.
Sentient Puddle
@cyntax: I’m trying to figure out how the unreliable narrator thing plays into the story as well, but from what I hear, it’s the reason Bethany’s boobs are so big.
guy44
@twiffer: The Dalish have Welsh accents, or at least they’re supposed to.
I know it marks me as quite the loser but I’m dying to go home and just spend the night with DA2. I’ve only gotten to play a little over an hour so far as other things got in the way.
Early thoughts: I am loving the tight focus on a main (voiced) character and his family. DA:O was fine because it was as much about establishing a world as a character. Now that the world is established, great intimate storytelling can commence.
The game looks waaaaaaaaay better and load times are shorter, which is an impressive achievement. The art direction is also much improved. However, I wish they had reduced the cartooniness about 15% (or de-Rastafy, in Simpsons-ese) because elves now look like anime characters and combat is too cartoony looking.
I am, in the early stages anyway, OK with the combat changes. I love the idea of cross class combos, and the idea of having talent trees with upgrades means I won’t have to take a dozen talents I’ll never use to get to the few useful ones.
I must say though that I miss playing as a DA:O mage. Those guys were so overpowered it was great – I mean Mana Clash was only useful against mages but it was practically one-shot kill! Good times.
geg6
I have no doubt what our two dogs are thinking.
Henry: How can make them give me more chewies? How can I get them to give me some bacon? How can I get them to rub my belly?
Otis: How can I get them to give me whatever they are eating? Doesn’t matter if it’s lettuce, cucumbers, or bacon, I want it. How can I get them pet and scritch me under my chin 24/7/365?
J.W. Hamner
I don’t really have any deep thoughts on Dragon Age 2 yet… but I think it’s weird that they have the looting “junk” concept of WoW, but then auto-sort it to another tab so you never really have to look at it, and gave you a button at every vendor to auto-sell it. It’s hard to see the point of that, but I guess it’s adds more flavah or something.
Otherwise the story seems good and the characters are pretty interesting… though the distribution of classes seems lopsided towards a fighter starting character.
Rocking two+ mages still seems boss.
Wile E. Quixote
Joe Manchin, the David Broder of Democratic Senators
Manchin to vote against his party’s budget bill
Gee Joe, maybe you’re doing all of this because it’s your job you lazy, whining bum. If you can’t hack it then you should quit and let someone who’s prepared to do the work do it for you instead of just ripping off the taxpayers by sitting on your useless ass and bitching about President Obama.
J.W. Hamner
@twiffer:
From what I can tell this is true of armor, but not weapons. You can swap out their starter weapons for better ones, but you have to do quests for them to improve their armor.
Violet
So glad to see a Lily picture. It always makes me so happy to see how well she’s doing, given what horrible shape she was in when you took her home. You are both lucky.
As for what she’s thinking, maybe she’s thinking, “Dad’s chair! I can be closer to Dad if I sit here! I love Dad!”
Yeah, I’ll go with that.
daryljfontaine
“Happy, warm, food, dad.”
Or slightly more complex: “I am happy that I am warm. I would be happier if dad would bring me food.” This is what Lily is thinking as she pokes her head out from under the comforter.
D
Corner Stone
@Wile E. Quixote:
Hey now. Please remember that Cole crawled over broken glass to vote for Manchin. Literally.
Mr. Poppinfresh
One of my two cats, Nelson, is terrified-of-the-world similar to Lily. One of his favorite things in the whole world is to go into the bathroom off our bedroom at night, pull a big fluffy towel off the rack ontop of himself, and then curl up in a little nest of his own making. First thing in the morning, I find him peeking up at me with just his nose exposed.
I, too, often wonder if his whole thought process consists of, “This is warm and safe… FOR NOW.”
cyntax
@Sentient Puddle:
Yeah, no kidding about Bethany: Apparently our sister is the next reincarnation of Lara Croft and she can cast spells.
J.W. Hamner
@cyntax:
I think they’re really only ludicrously big in the first scene… then they shrink down to merely improbably big after that. Though if you think Bethany is scandalous… just wait.
Tim
Lily is thinking “I love the fat man, treats are good, I love this comforter, I love the fat man, treats are yummy, squirrels are exciting, I love the fat man, treats are delicious, food is good, love, love, love, treats are good, I love the fat man, treats are yummy, that big fat white cat is kind of spooky and I will keep my distance, the fat man is love, I love treats, the fat man is my soulmate, love the fat man, treats are yummy, oooh, ooh, WALKS are the best, I love walks, but I love the fat man more, zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz..rewind…
stuckinred
@Tim: jesus, you actually do know SOMETHING
stuckinred
Did you miss the airborne dog post?
asiangrrlMN
Aw. Lily looks so happy and content in her chair. Where’s Tunch?
stuckinred
@asiangrrlMN: Watching the Illini play Michigan!
Liberty60
Hmm, just saw something about how the strict building codes in Japan saved countless lives, esp. compared to the mud and shit houses that are built in other countries where there are no codes.
Hoocoodanode?
cyntax
@J.W. Hamner:
Oh….oh my.
@Liberty60:
Building codes make the Baby Galt cry.
BombIranForChrist
Time change this weekend.
I am eager to read Slate’s article on how it’s not really changing this weekend.
elmo
Fucking dogs, how do they work?
goblue72
@Cat Lady: Cats sleep something like 18+ hours a day. Their waking hours are pretty much limited to eat, poop, bat some string around, get scratched on the head, go back to sleep.
They just can’t escape their evolutionary history as solitary predators that evolved to conserve energy in order to use it in very short, fast bursts of extreme violence. Basically, they’re ninjas.
Dogs on the other hand, being pack animals, seem to get pretty bored when they can’t be in a pack. If you’ve ever been to a dog park, you’ll see what your average dog would spend his entire day doing if he could live in a pack of dogs.
twiffer
@guy44: my ear is not tuned enough to tell ’em apart. and the “tinker” like lifestyle, well, just kind of said “irish” to me.
twiffer
@J.W. Hamner: considering i’ve already upgraded some companion weapons, you’d think i’d have realized that. [grin]
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
I don’t understand why you people don’t realize that it doesn’t matter what President Obama does – his re-election is the most important thing in the world.
.
.
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
@The Dangerman:
like the erstwhile sassy magazine once entreated its readership to learn to flirt like an animal.
Cris
Obama said the US and allies are “tightening the noose on Gaddafi.” OMG violent rhetoric! Next time a tyrannical strongman is strung up by a rioting mob, I’ll know whose fault it was.
Phoebe
@Shinobi: This is what Suki does to me. But she doesn’t want food all the time. I feed her and she just keeps looking at me, and it’s not because she wants better food. What she wants is attention and ideally for us to both go outside. But if I’m just going to sit here typing or reading or whatever, she’ll lie on the beanbag or the floor like a corpse until, as you say, the chair moves slightly. Then hope springs anew. This is my first dog. They are different from the cats.
Maybe Lily is thinking, “He’s going to want to sit in this chair and in order to do that, he’s going to have to deal with me. At least I hope that’s what happens. Oh, please deal with me!”
Phoebe
Also: this perked me up, if nobody’s mentioned it anywhere else [Wisconsin firefighters moving all their own money out of the bank that donated to Walker]:
http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/515607/awesome%3A_wisconsin_firefighters_shut_down_bank_that_funded_walker/#paragraph3
parsimon
@goblue72:
Not indoor/outdoor cats, so much. At least, those of mine who were inclined to spend a good 6 or 8 hours a day outside probably weren’t sleeping during that time. Investigatin’, is what they were doing.
It is true that when they came home, they slept, ate, pooped, etc. What else are you going to do? The house is boring.
Mnemosyne
@Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal:
Wait, Sassy advised its readers to flirt by sniffing their romantic prospect’s butt?
I’ve really got to dig those back issues out of the closet.
Montarvillois
Any word on Charlie’s Angels rescue dog Lady the Bassett? I don’t see anything on their site.
bob h
We have a rescued Cocker Spaniel that spends all our time at our feet, following us around in a way that gets to be quite irritating. It as though she is looking for us to give meaning to her life. But haven’t we condemned these pets to a boring existence, aside from the walkies and feedings?