Archive for July, 2006

Higurashi no Naku Koro ni 16

Wednesday, July 26th, 2006

Shion can't stand Satoko any more

The first of the “answer” arcs is supposedly retelling the Watanagashi story from a significantly-different perspective. We originally saw this story from the perspective of Keiichi in episodes 5-8. This time, it is from the perspective of Shion Sonozaki, who is in a far better position to know what’s going on. The story again resets to before Keiichi arrives in Hinamizawa, this time approximately one year before.
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Utility Spells

Tuesday, July 25th, 2006

Every adventuring Wizard and Sorcerer worth his salt has a Fireball or Lightning Bolt and a couple Magic Missiles spell up his sleeve in case a fight breaks out, and spells like Bull’s Strength and Cure Serious Wounds have an obvious appeal when out dungeoncrawling or dragon-slaying. This post isn’t about those no-brainers, but rather the more subtle, multi-use spells you may have been forgetting.
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Higurashi no Naku Koro ni 14 & 15

Tuesday, July 25th, 2006

Akasaka conversing with Inspector Ooishi
Episodes 14 and 15 comprise a short “time wasting” arc that takes the focus away from Keiichi and his classmates, starting this time before the construction site murder in Hinamizawa and focusing on a young investigator from the PSIA investigating the abduction of a young boy. The change of pace here is palpable. From the previous 13 episodes, we have no reason to think that this protagonist is about to be slaughtered by a vengeful mountain spirit or murderous townsfolk, which provides a big shift in the tone of the story. This shift itself is a bit unsettling in the context of what came before it, but the “time wasting chapter” is more of a police drama than a creepy thriller.
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DHCP on Speedstream 5861

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

Speedstream 5861 front panel

Speedstream 5861 back panel

The Efficient Networks Speedstream 5681 is a modem/router combo from the folks at Siemens. There are a fair number of tricks that can be done with one, and there are several interesting firmware revisions in circulation.
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PPPoE on 2wires

Sunday, July 23rd, 2006

2wire Homeportal 1000 HW

The 2wire Home Portal 1000 HW and 2wire Home Portal 1000 SW are ADSL modems with integrated NAT routing and WiFi, and perform as a PPPoE client for their local area networks. For connections that do not use the PPPoE protocol, some configuration is required.
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