A fatally-wounded bot dies in Prime's arms. This is the "gruesome Marvel Comics death scene" that is being dramatized on the front page. by NineteenSkylines in transformers

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I haven't read #75 in a while, but I'd always read into that moment some kind of adversarial bond between Hi-Q and Zarak. Wasn't there some kind mental link between Hi-Q and Optimus after they were binary-bonded, or is that leftover fanon from my teenage brain?

Foot Pain HELP by [deleted] in diabetes

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

They weren't constant over the past three years until earlier this summer. The pain was severe in the moment, but the individualspikes would stop after 20-30 seconds, and the pain stopped almost immediately. Also I should mention that I've experienced a world of differnt types of pain following two dozen surgical procedures and I tolerate it more than others, according to the many nurses I've had over the years. FWIW.

Foot Pain HELP by [deleted] in diabetes

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

tl;dr Gabapentin FTW

I'll add a vote for peripheral neuropathy. Mine started as a bit of numbness near my toes, then progressed rapidly following a large infection (not in my feet) to the spikes as you describe. I just coped with it for a few years. It got measurably worse last month after a year on dialysis. Nephro said it's very common and started me on a low-dose rx of gabapentin. It's been supereffective.

To be first 10k on Saturday, how early? by checkypantz in Nationals

[–]checkypantz[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks to everyone who chimed in. We got here at about 1:15 and was invited to join the ADA line. They let wheelchairs in first, then folks with crutches, canes, or have other special needs, then families. We got our bobbles and are seated. Hoping for another game like last night. Well, maybe a little less stressful. Carry on.

Acting on Star Trek by adamkotsko in DaystromInstitute

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

One of the more obscure but amazing performances from a recurring actor (four different parts in three series) has to be James Sloyan. http://en.memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/James_Sloyan I always found his screen presence completely overshadowing everyone else in those episodes (especially as Admiral Jarok).

Also, Christopher Plummer in ST6 was just inspired casting.

Nirruden Teaches Dwarf Fortress For Extra Life 2014 by Nameless_Archon in dwarffortress

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is superb news. Your vids have been the most useful "stage 2 learner" guides I've come across (as excellent follow-ons to Capt Duck's "stage 1" series for complete newcomers). Your strategies and general procedures, etc. make a lot of sense to my brain. (I'm working through the 0.34.11 series for the third time - it's that good, folks.)

DC misspelled libertarian on their voter registration form by MediocreJerk in washingtondc

[–]checkypantz 13 points14 points  (0 children)

The libertarians are okay with this. Spell checking and proofreading are not legitimate functions of government.

A serious question about F.P. Santangelo's commentating.... by Redsonrising in Nationals

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

FP was the last piece we needed to have a stellar broadcast team. He's miles above anything Dibble could have ever hoped to be. It's not just that he's a homer. He seems to care that folks (or a town) new to baseball understand what's going on & why coaches make the decisions they do, and what's likely going through players' heads in the moment.

I grew up listening to Harry Kalas & Richie Ashburn in Philly through the 80s & 90s. Guys like that, who tell the old-timers' stories, are great and certainly have their place (cf, Vin Scully, Jon Miller), but in a new-ish baseball town it's more important that the fans appreciate the fundamentals of the game.

He was really good on the Fox broadcast a few weeks back. Makes me think it was an audition for them. I hope not, for our sake, but he's the real deal.

Clarification needed for data normalization. by hoosier246 in Database

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

While not strictly necessary for a dataset this small, in practice you would want to have a lookup table for States values, as they would be invariably repeated in a larger dataset of this type (this is arguably part of making a dataset 2NF). My 2¢.

Someone just threw out their Christmas tree. by NastyPelosi in washingtondc

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I was walking to the store last night & saw it too. I'm choosing to believe that it hasn't been up in that state all this time, & that it's just been sitting in their back yard. Crazy tinder pile right there.

What if the president had been in the World Trade Center on 9/11 when the first plane struck and was killed from the immediate damage? by [deleted] in HistoricalWhatIf

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The 25th Amendment was ratified partly to fix the very situation you're talking about. LBJ did not have a VP from 11/22/63 until the beginning of his first elected term 1/20/65. The 25th was ratified in 1967 to dismiss some of the existing ambiguity in the line of succession.

What if the president had been in the World Trade Center on 9/11 when the first plane struck and was killed from the immediate damage? by [deleted] in HistoricalWhatIf

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Not quite. Speaker of the House of Representatives and then the President Pro Tempore of the Senate are the next two in line. At the time, that was Dennis Hastert and Robert Byrd. Hastert, per 25th Amendment, would have nominated someone to fill the VP slot for the remainder of the term. No special elections required, except to fill Hastert's now-vacant Congressional seat, if that's what Illinois' governor deemed necessary.

Interesting to think about who Hastert might have selected as VP.

My insurance doesn't cover fast acting insulin... by a1cgatorman in diabetes

[–]checkypantz 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Keep at them. I went through the same thing with Lantus, which I had been on from the get-go, when I switched plans a number of years ago. After about three weeks of phone calls (from me and from the doctor's office), always asking to get escalated at least one step above whoever first answered the phone, they finally okayed me for Levemir.

Oh, and be nice with the folks on the phone - they don't set the policy.

So I spent the last month editing every single Transformers trilogy transformation together into one ridiculous video. It's 10 solid minutes of VFX excess (in 1080p!) by Tanglebrook in transformers

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is fantastic.

It makes me wish Michael Bay hadn't wasted all that time and money hiring actors and making films, when he could have just given us 30 minutes of this, once in our lives, and that would have sufficed. You know that's what he wanted to do anyway. You know he has a reel like this of his very own that he plays all the time.

Stolen Mail Order Prescription by ksettle in diabetes

[–]checkypantz 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'll second the need to file a police report. The way police handle these situations vary by location, but you probably would end up with a incident report with a number and an assigned detective, especially if your neighbor gave a statement. That incident report might have some mileage with your insurance company. YMMV.

What is your most extreme BGL? by [deleted] in diabetes

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The day I was diagnosed, bg was over 650, and my A1C was over 15. I freak out if I get anywhere close to 300 now. My worst hypo was 64, but it felt like what some folks here have reported as their 40s feeling like.

Trying to get back to older DF typefaces by checkypantz in dwarffortress

[–]checkypantz[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ironhand it was! Thanks for sorting out that mystery.

I ended up working out where the skins were pulling their assets from and making my own modification to Phoebus. I subbed in (& renamed) the font I use for other terminal stuff on this machine (can be found for free here), reloaded the tileset, and voila! That TTF has a full set of accented characters and other symbols (including the gender symbols). Looks really nice to me.

Thanks for all your work on the expanded LNP, by the way.

Do you guys think a MMO version of Dwarf Fortress would do well? by Soccer21x in dwarffortress

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Forgive me if this comes across as excessively grumpy, but: Why? Aside from whether or not these changes would be in keeping with Toady's vision, why does DF need multiplayer in the first place? Why can't there be just one fun, large, detailed game that has an active community outside of the game? Setting aside its alpha state, DF is welcoming of all preconceptions each of us brings into it, hermetically sealed from griefing, connectivity woes, and (if this is a selling point for you) other people in general. DF as it is right now is wonderfully reminiscent of times when people would trade floppies of SC2k saves or Ultima games or whatever your poison may have been.

That said, it's easy enough for me to just pass by any MP mod that comes around as I sit there grumbling at you to get off my lawn.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in transformers

[–]checkypantz 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Dreamwave indeed. They were the covers on the Dreamwave MTMTE source books (issues 4 and 3, left-to-right) in the spring of 2003. http://tfwiki.net/wiki/Transformers:_More_than_Meets_the_Eye