This is just a quick list of supplies stolen from the PAX forums.

http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=100111

If I get the chance I will slim this down to what I personally need.

The Top Twenty Items Forgotten by Convention Attendees Checklist

1. Personal Towel (We know the hotel provides them, but if you’re sharing a room with several people, this guarantees you your very own towel. Also, if you plan on using a lot of makeup for a costume or dying your hair *and* use hotel towels, you will be charged a hefty fee for damaging hotel property. Please bring your own towels if you plan to do this.) You may also dip the ends in liquid vitamins and suck on the corners when needed.

* A pretty cool tip involving this is bringing a small clothespin with your name on it to attach to your towel so people can differentiate between yours and theirs. In fact, bring a couple, so you can share with people.

2. Shampoo and Conditioner (Again, the hotel provides these, but the bottles are quite small. Bringing your own ensures you will have some, especially if you use a lot of shampoo or have long hair.)

3. Toothbrush and Toothpaste (You’d be amazed at what going three days without brushing tastes like. Gross.)

4. Deodorant (If you don’t bring and use this, don’t be surprised when people start edging away from you in packed rooms and theaters. Don’t forget the strange looks and cringed noses you’ll begin to see.)

5. Razor and Shaving Cream/Gel

6. Comb and/or Hairbrush (some people do use both. You’d be surprised.)

7. One shirt for each day of the convention, plus an extra. (3 days = 4 shirts)

8. Pants (Same number as shirts.)

9. Underwear (3 sets, plus an extra.)

10. Socks (One pair per day plus an extra pair.)

11. Swimsuit (You never know.)

12. Jacket or warm sweater

13. Shoes (If you plan on spending a lot of time dancing or on your feet, make sure you have comfortable shoes with you. Your feet will hurt if you don’t have comfy shoes to at least change into.)

14. Any prescribed medication (Make sure to tell your traveling companions/roommates about any medical needs you may have.)

15. Tylenol/Aspirin/etc

16. Photo ID / Driver’s License / Checkbook / Car keys

17. A phone card (Not only is this cheaper than having calls charged to your hotel room, but having several people using one phone can lead to billing confusion with long distance calls. Bring a phone card so you can let your parents/significant other know you made it to the con safely.)

18. An extra pillow and blanket if several people are staying in your room.

19. Some non-perishable food from a supermarket (Like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, chips, pretzels and bottled water or juice. While there are a lot of restaurants close by, this is an easy way to save money. In addition, you’ll be able to have your midnight snack without leaving your room.)

20. Your best public manners. (You’d be surprised how many people forget to bring these along.)

The exhibition hall is full of awesome. There are upcoming games, and hardware showcased as well as things for sale from games, to guides, to t-shirts, to dice. Prices are comparable with standard retail pricing, or a little cheaper, even. Also, there’s tons of free shirts and other swag being handed out by various companies *cough*nVidia*cough*
the spoiler is for the REALLY well prepared

A List For The Well Prepared

* Small tube of super glue
* 3 straight pins
* 3 safety pins: 1 small and 2 medium
* Hair pins: 3 medium and 3 heavy
* Small sewing kit (small enough to fit into the palm of your hand)
* Safety matches (1 pack)
* Disposable plastic razor
* Small emery board
* Tylenol/Aspirin (travel sized contaiThe exhibition hall is full of awesome. There are upcoming games, and hardware showcased as well as things for sale from games, to guides, to t-shirts, to dice. Prices are comparable with standard retail pricing, or a little cheaper, even. Also, there’s tons of free shirts and other swag being handed out by various companies *cough*nVidia*cough*ner)
* 6 chewable Vitamin C tablets (at least 500 mg each)
* 2 Vitamin B complex tabs, stress formula
* 1 pack Tums/Rolaids
* 6 bandaids (or a travel sized pack)
* 6 antihistamine tablets
* 1 travel pack of tissues
* Tube of chapstick or other lip balm
* 6 cough drops or throat lozenges
* Smallest size of tiger balm or camphophenique oil
* Travel size tube of spot remover
* Spare car and house keys
* Breath freshener
* 6 moist towelettes (for cleaning hands)
* Small pencil sharpener
* Small pen
* 1 small pack of post-it-notes (the square ones work fine)
* Clear nail polish
* Small amount of masking tape wrapped around a short pencil
* 6 rubber bands
* 3 unlubricated condoms
* Small penknife
* Small tube of neosporin
* 3 garbage bag twist ties
* Mustache scissors (small pair of scissors will work as well)
* Styptic pencil or qwik stop
* Hand lotion (travel size)
* Aloe vera gel (travel size)
* 3 nail polish remover pad
* Tampons or pads if you are the type to bleed occasionally

-CatBoy

PAX is coming to the forefront of my mind as it draws closer to that Wednesday night where I get no sleep. Where at 3 am I will be sitting in a southern Florida airport waiting for panic to seize me.

Why would I panic? Fear of heights or airplanes? Going to a city I’ve never been to before? Meeting idols I’ve had for more years then I can remember? Playing unreleased games? Meeting new people?

Panic because my DS or phone is dead and I’m about to fly to Boston without music to lull me into sleep. At this point battery life falling below 50% is the only that scares me. As I write this right now it’s on an iPhone with 40% life left and it’s making me cringe.

Perhaps I can read a book on the flight and not throw up. That would be wondrous. But this is all beside the point of this post. The point I want to make is the Scout Motto. Be Prepared.

Such a thing has stuck with me since 5th grade. Boy scouts will never truly leave my life, not since I got eagle. If I didn’t get eagle I’m sure I would have forgotten all about scouts by now.

Since this post has become a rambling mess I’m just going to post a second one with the information I wanted to convey to myself.

Last night I started the CDI install on my ruckus. I bought a Daytona CDI from Battlescooter (Plug)

It came with lovely instructions that were beyond confusing. While also being very simple.
I wish it had a few more details on the process and location but I digress.

I popped open the battery box, pulled the seat and floor board off and began my adventure into wiring a scooter up. The guide didn’t really make a lot of sense to me, but that might be because I’m retarded. I’d post a picture of the guide for future reference but its copyrighted and I think it would only continue to confuse people.

The worst part was the Green and Red wires, the directions didn’t really explain how to connect them. So we went with clips from radio shack. By this time it had been many hours and dropped many degrees since I last ran my scooter. I put everything back on the scooter, floorboard, seat, battery box, and started it up.

Lately the scooter has been dying when revving, but that may have to do with the weather, not sure and probably won’t know until spring comes in full force.

So my scooter went from 38 mph to 23 so I’m quite sure I’ve screwed something up.
It was also a cold night, when I get home from work I’m going to fire it up, let it warm up and then take it for a spin and see if there’s any improvement. Might have been the cold/wind that kept it from achieving what I was looking for.

I fear I’ve either done something wrong, or dramatically screwed up the wiring.

Pictures after the break. If I get it to work I might write a how to.

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Ok, Just thought I would throw together a quick guide on how to hack the wii.

DO NOT SKIP ANY OF THESE STEPS UNLESS I TELL YOU TO!!!!

Supply List:

SD Card (2-8 gigs will work)
A Portable Hard Drive (160 gigs+, depending on the number of games you want to backup)
A Wii on system 4.2 or less. (Haven’t tried past 4.2 yet.)
Small amount of technical knowledge to get you through this.

If your Wii is already hacked and are looking to find out more about homebrew click here to go to the second part of my Wii Tutorial

Read more

The podcast is currently dead.

I spent a lot of time getting it to work but I’m about ready to give up completely.

There are two major problems with the podcast.

1. Internet

2. Computer

My internet connection is terrible, I hate it. I can’t stand that my internet is currently running at 2.7mbps MAX. while my iPhone is somewhere around 3.4mpbs MAX.
It drives me crazy. I using AT&T DSL and while I know they are terrible my only other choice is Comcast, which is supposedly even worse. At this point I could careless which one is worse because what I’m getting now is making me want to break down in tears on most days.

If it rains my internet goes out and when it comes back it takes days before its at 100% again. Sorry I should clarify that 100% in my book means Spotty when it comes to DSL.

One of my neighbors uses Comcast so maybe I’ll build a Tin Can Wifi antennae and see if its any better. I just need something to broadcast my podcast without it looking like butt.

The second problem is my computer. Before I upgraded to a Mac book I was using an amazing Shuttle PC, that thing rocked balls. All day all night. but now its merely a shadow of its former glory. It ran windows XP perfectly, never a problem. One day I decided to upgrade to Vista, but it never worked, killed my hard drive had to start fresh. Went back to XP was happy again so I tried 7. Same problems with 7 as I did with vista if not worse. So I haven’t touched that bastard in months.

At this moment I need to pull the whole computer out and start fresh. Brand new spanking install, perhaps even server software to dish up my dvd’s to my xbox. It’s really a disgrace.

Once I have it fixed I might be able to run a decent podcast without nearly as many problems.

My 2008 Honda Ruckus is over a year old and carries about 2700 miles on it. Right now my top speed is 35-38 mph. Which to me is pretty slow. It takes about 1 city block to get to 30 MPH. I have an after market exhaust which will more then likely be taken off soon than later at this point.

I’ve done my best keeping up with maintenance. Work caused a few delays but it runs as smooth as it has since I bought it.

I want to try and document my journey through modding the Ruck. I have on order a new Variator, Roller weights, CDI, Drop-in Air Filter, and a new drive belt.

I’m not expecting the thing to go 50, but one or two miles will be a much need improvement. anything that will get my acceleration and top speed up will be good.

Going to try and keep this updated with pictures and hopefully guides on how to do things.

My room is a mess, I need it cleaned so I can be a bit more productive. Maybe even get it submitted to Lifehackers workspace flickr.

First things first, Clean. Lots of trash is in there right now, that stuff needs to go.

Second, clean out the drawers to the dresser. That thing is filled with crap. Too much worthless crap. Once its clean, get rid of it. It takes up too much space for it only to be filled with junk.

Third, move my bed to the opposite site of the room. Not sure how well that will go over of if it will add any productivity to the room, but I feel like it needs to be done. May consider a smaller bed to make more space in my room. If I had something less than a King there would be loads of space.

Fourth, create a useful work space. I want to have separate parts to my room. Each section will bring to mind the purpose of it. The entertainment area which has comfy relaxing chairs and a sumo. A small couch if I can find one. The bed, which will be used for sleep. No longer associate it with late night laptop browsing. A work bench for computer and electronics work. Closet for music, clothes, and whatever else I have laying around.

Fifth, work with Sam to put together a painting of some sort across my walls.

More to come on this topic though.

I want to learn to code, I used to know HTML, CSS, C++, and a bit of C# now I feel like I don’t know any. I could code up websites blind folded and now I depend on Wordpress and someone else’s themes. So starting Monday I’m going to relearn to code. Not really sure where to begin, but more than likely HTML. Something basic until I move on to my goal of Objective-C.

I will try and post as many samples of code I’m working on so I can keep my goals in line.

Can anyone even remember now what Nixon did that was so terrible? He ended the war in Vietnam, brought home the POWs, ended the war in the Mideast, opened relations with China, started the first nuclear weapons reduction treaty, saved Eretz Israel’s life, started the Environmental Protection Administration. Does anyone remember what he did that was bad?

Oh, now I remember. He lied. He was a politician who lied. How remarkable. He lied to protect his subordinates who were covering up a ridiculous burglary that no one to this date has any clue about its purpose. He lied so he could stay in office and keep his agenda of peace going. That was his crime. He was a peacemaker and he wanted to make a world where there was a generation of peace. And he succeeded.

That is his legacy. He was a peacemaker. He was a lying, conniving, covering up peacemaker. He was not a lying, conniving drug addict like JFK, a lying, conniving war starter like LBJ, a lying, conniving seducer like Clinton—a lying, conniving peacemaker.

Ben Stein

Here is a unorganized list of things I need for this Thursday.

A new set of dice for Sam.
Two sets of dice for Tom and Tyler
DM Screen
Dungeon Delve
Miniatures
Map
Players Sheets
Flash Cards for different powers.
Calculator
A way for my mac to use player creator from WoTC

Future, after Thursday:
Pound of dice from chessx.
Eberron Players Guide and Campaign Guide
World Works (different settings forest and city)
Cheapest solution for 3D dungeons and City’s and what have you.
A way to podcast our Games. Possibly using mac and publishing on iTunes How original.
Make website, Blog, Wiki, media, etc.