Need More Space? Bookstooge Has You Covered

Houston, we have a problem …..
….. I want more space!

Last month when I wrote the When to Dotcom post, my main issue was space. Given, I am only using about 18% of the free 3gb that WordPress offers, but big pictures eat away at that pretty quickly and I’m always looking to the future.

In the comments section people talked about various ways to deal with the space issue and Andreas gave a list of several options. I’m a prime member and a google member, so I tried out both amazon photo and google drive. Unfortunately, I have not been able to make either of them work the way I was hoping. For those of you who saw the original August ’20 Roundup & Rambling post, you might have noticed the big pix I usually put at the top that has all my book covers in a collage picture was missing or saying you needed permissions etc. That was me trying to use google drive.

Both google drive and amazon don’t seem to simply let you give out an url to a picture you’ve uploaded. It is all complicated “share this with these email people” etc. Or “set these permissions, blah, blah, blah”.

Then I remembered I had an old dropbox account floating around. So I opened that account back up and voila, I had another 3gb’s of space available. However, and this is what made the difference for me, I was able to use the dropbox links to host pictures here on WP.

I found several websites that showed me how to do it. Instead of linking to them, I’ll just post the info here so you don’t have to go chasing links down (and as we all know, links die on a regular basis). The following assumes that you have a dropbox account and have downloaded the dropbox app to your computer.

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Dropbox
Right clicking a file in a drop box folder will give the option to “Copy Dropbox Link”. This will not link directly to the file, but it can be changed to link directly, which can then be used in the above import.
In order to get a direct link, replace http://www.dropbox.com with dl.dropboxusercontent.com and remove the ?dl=0.
For instance:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/72vf8e2f0qx6vw8/Milan4.jpg?dl=0
would become: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/72vf8e2f0qx6vw8/Milan4.jpg.

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(Personally, I just leave the dl=0 myself. I don’t know the reason for removing it.)
Now, doing all of this means there are extra steps in adding pictures to your wordpress posts. But since I’m already creating a whole new process to write posts here on wordpress, another couple really aren’t going to make a difference especially if it means my space limitations are removed.

The other nice thing about dropbox is that you can get additional space for getting referrals. This is known as free advertising for dropbox. Whenever someone joins up for a free account (and the 2gb space), if they signed up using a referral link, they get an extra 500mb of space and I get an extra 500mb of space. Up to 16 gigs worth. And if they sucker convince someone else to join up with THEIR referral, then they both get 500mb. It’s just your classic “get rewarded for working for us” kind of scheme. I’ve used it twice, hence why I have 3gb instead of just 2. If you have any interest in joining up, shoot me an email and I’ll email you a referral.

I’m just glad I seem to have found a way that works for me to host pictures and increase my storage without having to pay. If you have found alternates that work well, let me know in the comments, would you? I’m always glad to learn things (well, ok, lets be honest, I am NOT, as my reaction to the forsaken block editor has shown) and if I can find a better way than dropbox, then I will. Personally, I would love to use google drive, as that has 15gb of free space.

Now, something to be aware of. Should dropbox ever cancel/close your account or go belly up or change or be taken over by aliens, or be ruled to be racist and full of hate speech by the EU, then there is the potential for the pictures you host there to become dead links on your wordpress site. That is right: D-E-A-D-L-I-N-K-S

Ok, this post has gone on long enough. Have a great rest of your day.

The Bookstooges on Vacation, Part Ace

Vacation has been great so far. The flights down to Georgia went as smooth as could be. Saturday we went to the Hiram SDA church for Sabbath and then my sister and her partner came over for the afternoon/evening and we visited for some time. Sunday we went over to their house and hung out by the pool all afternoon. After a late dinner we rolled home and rolled into bed.

My sister and her partner both have rescue dogs. The little guy’s name is Benjamin and he’s about the size of both my fists. He’s a tiny little guy and I just wanted to pick him up and throw him in the pool like a football. Thankfully, I resisted temptation. Buggy, on the other hand, is a pit and not a tiny little guy. He’s as friendly as a pooch and would practically beg you to throw his rubber bone into the pool so he could go chasing after it. Of course, then he’d come back and shake himself right next to you, so you had to decide if it was worth it 😀

Monday we went to the Atlanta Aquarium. We all met at 9am and caravaned into the metropolis. We got inside a bit after 10am. I was done by 11:15am. After that I sat on a bench and let others do their thing. We got home a bit after 2pm. I took a nap because I was tired out from being around so many people. And that was WITH the aquarium having a strict covid protocols for how many people could be inside at once. I don’t think I could have done it otherwise. Here’s a gallery of a pix:

And now, it is 5pm Monday afternoon. I am sitting on a wonderful couch, drinking a Rockstar, looking at blue sunny skies out the window. Tomorrow is going to be a Do Nothing kind of day. So far, this vacation has met, and exceeded, every possible expectation I’ve had. I don’t want to brag, but I think we’re the King and Queen of Vacation right now.

ps,
this block editor? still not liking it.

This Picture Never Fails to Amuse Me…

 

Fear Me

Call Me The Fluffy
Scourge of the Known Universe
I’ll Cute you to death.

MTG: Lands Matter – The Ecology of Magic

It has been a while since I’ve done a Magic the Gathering Deck List post.  I just looked and my last one was back in April of last year.  So time to haul out the cards and list out a custom built deck.

This is a Lands Matter deck, and while my post title is jokingly subtitled, the mana base for any deck is very important. For this one though, it matters even more.  The point of the deck is to pull shenanigans with lands entering the battlefield and either get Landfall triggers from your cards on the battlefield or amass a large number of lands and burn your opponents to death. I got the general idea from the Commander 2018 precon, which was a disappointment no matter how you sliced it. I’ve also got a secondary “play lands from your graveyard” theme going on as well.

So without further ado, here’s my deck list with some of the more interesting cards in pictures.

 

COMMANDER: 1

Lord Windgrace

 

 

PLANESWALKERS: 8

Nissa Who Shakes the World

Vraska the Unseen

Vraska, Relic Seeker

 

Ob Nixilis Reignited

Wrenn & Six

 

Ob Nixilis the Hate Twisted

Domri, Anarch of Bolas

Garruk Primal Hunter

 

CREATURES: 22

Archfiend of Ifnir

Jaddi Offshoot

Nesting Dragon

Ob Nixilis, the Fallen

Omnath, Locus of Rage

 

Oran-rief Hydra

Rampaging Baloths

Kozilek, Butcher of Truth

Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre

Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger

Titania, Protector of Argoth

Ramunap Excavator

 

Gitrog Monster

Multani, Yavimay’s avatar

Mina and Denn, Wildborn

Azusa Lost but Seeking

 

Wayward Swordtooth

Ob Nixilis Unshackled

Elvish Piper

Undergrowth Champion

Xenagos, God of Revels

Dryad of the Ilysian Grove

 

INSTANTS/SORCERIES/ENCHANTMENTS: 25

Scapeshift

 

Fireball

Lavalanche

 

Ghitu Fire

Kaervek’s Purge

Clan Defiance

Drain Life

Consume Spirit

Sorin’s Vengeance

Sanguine Bond

Exquisite Blood

Torment of Hailfire

 

Worldly Tutor

Diabolic Tutor

Polluted Bonds

Splendid Reclamation

Boundless Realm

Pulse of Murasa

Unbound Flourishing

Treacherous Terrain

Repeated Reverberation

Explosive Vegetation

Red Sun’s Zenith

 

Wildwood Rebirth

Violent Ultimatum

 

ARTIFACTS: 6

Crucible of Worlds

 

Sol Ring

Arcane Signet

Eternity Vessel

Library of Leng

 

Pyromancers Goggles

 

LANDS: 38

Nurturing Peatland

 

Reliquary Tower

Terramorphic Expanse

Ash Barrens

Cryptic Cave

Taiga

Badlands

Bayou

Lotus Field

 

Swamps x8

Mountains x7

Forests x7

Blood crypt

Verdant Catacombs

Bloodstained Mire

Cabal Stronghold

Overgrown Tomb

Mossfire Valley

 

Shadowblood Ridge

 

 

And this my Lands Matter EDH deck.  Hope you enjoyed some of the pictures.

 

 

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Breakfast of Poopers (Courtesy of Amazon)

 

Back in 2017 I was browsing Amazon and came across a Big Blue Donkey Butt.  I never thought that experience could be topped. Today, I proved myself W-R-O-N-G!!!

How this even exists is beyond me. But it gave me a laugh and I thought I share. Because Sharing is Caring and I really care about your intestinal health! You know it’s good for you if Dr. Bookstooge endorses it. And I’m done being silly now. Have a great day.

 

A History of… The Hobbit

 

Lashaan recently wrote up a review of his first time reading The Hobbit. Great review and I highly recommend you read it. But it got me to thinking. I literally grew up with the Hobbit and thought I’d try to remember my life as defined by the experiences I was going through when I read and re-read the Hobbit.

I believe that my experience with the Hobbit started before I could even read. My mom used to read to me in the afternoons before I started going to school and I know she read me Narnia and the Little House on the Prairie series. I can’t remember her explicitly reading me the Hobbit but my familiarity with it in later years leads me to believe she did. I don’t remember too much of that time overall except for a warm fuzzy sense of “rightness”. 

The next instance of the Hobbit is an explicit memory, one very well defined. I believe I was in middleschool and our family was going up to Canada to visit the Grands. I went to the library and got the Hobbit so I would have a book to read. Even then I knew to always have a book handy. It was one with the faux-leather green cover.

Not sure it was this exact edition, but if not, it looked almost like it

I remember this so well because on the way home we stopped in Maine at some relatives and I got a wicked bad sunburn on my whole back (didn’t use sunscreen) and we had to travel for 12hrs in the car the next day. You don’t forget experiences like that!

In highschool I wrote a paper on the Hobbit and Tolkien. I don’t have that paper handy nor do I remember anything about it, except, I got to read the Hobbit and use it to do some school work. Score!

Jump forward in time to Bibleschool in the late 90’s. One of our professors read through the entire series on Friday nights and Saturday afternoons to us students in one of the rooms that had couches and comfy chairs. When you are 19-22, having a chance to just hang out with everyone and not actually do anything is great. Add in that we all liked the story, the Professor had done this for years and so had a fantastic voice for reading, well, it was all a nerd could ask for.

Aye, aye Captain Professor Sir!

In 2001 the SFBC came out with the omnibus edition of the Lord of the Rings. I bought that and the Hobbit at the same time. Why should I pay for 4 books when I could pay for just 2? Small print didn’t mean a thing to my eyes then and being thrifty meant more than anything.

Teensy tiny print

In 2006 I met Miss Librarian at a friend’s wedding (Miss Library and I had been friends online) and we exchanged books. I gave her a copy of the Hobbit.

It was this edition

2 years later we were married and suddenly there were 2 copies of the same book on our book shelves. 2008 was a year for surprises, that is for sure!

Fast forward 3 years to 2011. I was on Goodreads and loving it. I had book friends and was writing reviews left and right. One of my online friends re-read the whole series every year. I wasn’t as much into re-reading then myself, but he inspired me to go through them all. I was simply blown away by how well written the Hobbit was and at how it could still appeal to my mature 30’something self. You’re Mature at 30 and after that you’re just Old and who cares what Old People think.

And now we come to 2019. Devilreads is a bad memory, 30 is just a stage that I grew out of (into a much more Mature stage I must say!) and yet here I am reading the Hobbit again and still loving it.

Bad Memories Indeed

What do you call a book that enthralls a 4 to 5 year old (no matter how precocious), a middleschooler, a highschooler, someone in college, a mid 20’s man, a 30 year old in his prime and then a 40 year old with the wisdom of the ages under his belt? If Classic doesn’t fit, then I don’t know what would. As sagacious as I currently am, I suspect in another 10-15 years that I’ll STILL love this book.

I’d like to take the time to thank Lashaan once again. He’s inspired several of these A History of… posts. The more years I collect, the more memories tag along, except for when I forget them. So it is good to write them down before they disappear 😀

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I’m A Winner!

Back in June Powder&Page did a giveaway for some winter writing gloves. Considering how much I’m on the computer outside of work and how long Winters are here in New England, I entered. Not only did I enter, but I swept the field in a blaze of glory. I mowed down my opponents like grass before a scythe and I and ONLY I came away victorious.

Translation: I won 😀

I’d like to thank P&P for her kindness in doing such a giveaway (these gloves are like $50 online) and nothing I say about the product reflects on her in any way. If you don’t follow her, you should go check out her blog to see if what she writes interests you.  All the following pictures are clickable for larger versions. I just made them smaller in the post so I could blab more.

 

First off,  I find it highly ironic that I won these in June and when they came at the end of July we were in the middle of several days of 90+ degree temps. That is 35C for all the rest of you. Sadly, it does mean that I’ll have to wait a couple of months to see how their warming ability actually works.

 

Second, these come straight from China. They don’t get shipped to the Boutique website you order them from and then shipped to you.  If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say Chairman Mao himself helped with my order.  I could smell “communism” on the packaging. With the potential trade war escalating between China and the US it is something to be aware of. It took a month for me to get these and if things heat up politically, you could be looking at a price jump, a lengthier wait time or both. 

 

 

 

When I opened the packaging, it looked like this. I have to admit, I wasn’t sure at first which end was which.  Turns out the longer end goes on your wrist and the smaller end goes over your fingers. It helped that there was a slit for your thumb.

 

 

 

 

 

Once I put one on, it all made sense. I’ve found that the lower portion of my hand and pinky finger tend to get colder faster in the winter because of leaning it down on the touchpad of my laptop. This glove should take care of that issue. It also leaves my fingers free so I don’t feel like I’m typing with sausage fingers. Nothing worse than sausage fingers, especially if you don’t have any ketchup to dip them in!

 

Mrs B kindly took a glamour shot.  Besides keeping my hands warm for typing in the winter, I can see these coming in handy for when I have to go brawling and beating the crap out of all the communist miscreants in our Fair Town.

Of course, the real test will come in 2-3 months when the cold weather starts settling in. I’ll try to remember to do an update post later this year when I can actually test them for their intended use. Unless I’ve shredded them on communist punks of course!

 

Sandwich Ratings

I was talking with YouKneek over on her thread at LibraryThing (starting about message 275) and we got sidetracked onto what our ratings would be if they were sandwiches.

I through out a whole range off the top of my head but once I was done I realized, this was a subject worthy of a serious blog post. Food is serious business and so is rating books. And considering that I’m Mister Serious, it all fit together, like a toe in a sock in a steel toe’d boot!

So without further ado, I present My Ratings as Sandwiches!

 

1)  Anchovies and (your favorite) Cheese on Toast 

This is a picture of ricotta cheese (not my favorite btw) and anchovies on toast. The mere sight turns my stomach!

 

2) Peanutbutter and Jelly

I ate this from 2000 until almost 2010 everyday for lunch. It was economical, easy to change up (different jelly every week) and I loved crunch peanutbutter. Now however, I will go hungry rather than eat one of these. I burned myself out on them and I’ve never recovered from it.

 

3) Turkey bologna and cheese

I use wheat bread instead of white bread (because I’m not a racist!) but this pretty much looks like a bologna sandwich I’d make. Relatively cheap, not for every occasion but giving my body all the fuel it needs during a work day.

 

4) Toasted tomato sandwich

Toast, mayo, salt and pepper and then sliced up summer tomatoes. Yummmy!

 

5) Reuben on rye but with turkey bacon instead of sauerkraut

I don’t have a reuben very often. 2-3 times a year at most but I savor them when I do have them. Something about the rye bread just hits my tastebuds square on.

 

I hope you’re hungry now.

 

‘Round Yonder in These Heah Pahts…

…. we dun kut doun them dern trees and then shuut ahh guns so as to celerybrate!

Dern trees, always growing in them there forests. Nothing but a nuisance!

 

11 acres of private land surrounded by 70+ acres of conservation land. Shooters paradise.

For the record, that is a soda can in both pictures. Alcohol and guns should NOT mix

 

 

 

Yep, that is how I spent last Saturday. Pretty much just watched my bro W.C. Bombfunk use a chainsaw (I was there for safety reasons) and then we went to a house of a friend of his to test out his new to him AR-15 rifle.  The baby had just been put down for a nap so we started with our 9mm pistols to give him to time to get fully asleep. Then the 223 ammo came out and the rifle shooting began.  I did a couple of rounds at the 75yard range but Bombfunk went for the 100yard’er. Neither of us hit any targets at our range, but with a new gun, that is no surprise.  What Magic the Gathering cards are to Bookstooge, guns are to Bombfunk. He was grinning like an monkey.

It is good to have family nearby sometimes 🙂

 

MTG: Fight & Flight: Dino Power!

So I’m working on my third Commander/EDH deck.  One of the recent blocks in Magic the Gathering took place in a world where dinosaurs were a huge part of every day life, for good and bad. Some of those dinosaurs are really, really big and so I wanted to make a deck where I could come out with massively huge creatures and just stomp all over my opponents.  I’ve spent the last month creating this deck in a word document.  Sadly, with our recent car situation (I’ll be talking about THAT bottle of fun’ness in my monthly roundup next week) this deck is going to go on the back burner.

This time around, I decided to add every single card in picture format. I won’t be loading them as individual pictures because otherwise it would take 5minutes for my site to load and that just isn’t fun for anyone.  For each category (in bold) I’ll be showcasing 1 of the cares I think is cool or cool looking and then doing a clickable grouping thing so you can check them all out, or not, as you so desire.

My Good Knight Sirrah deck, while I really like it, just hasn’t performed. I win about 25% of the time with it.  The Get Salted, I’m Exalted, while not competitive, has something closer to a 90% win rate and I don’t play it more than once now as it can be demoralizing to someone else to lose on turn 6 in a game that usually last 30+ turns. This deck I’m just hoping to stomp around with big dinosaurs and have fun killing things whether I win or lose.

There are several main parts of this deck. First and foremost, getting a lot of mana out quickly (with artifacts and sorcery/instants) so as to be able to get the big creatures out quickly, use the Enrage mechanic on half my dino’s to help boost me in various ways and then to use the Planeswalkers and the rest of the sorcery/instant cards to fight outside of combat using my dinos hopefully massive power and sweep away the competition. I’ve tried to make all the cards synergize with as many possible other cards so no matter what I draw I will be good. Only a real play test will tell though.

Without further ado, here is my deck list:

 

Commander:1

Zacama, Primal Calamity

♪We will♪ we will♪STOMP YOU!!!!♪

 

Planeswalkers: 4

Huatli, dinosaur knight

Domri Rade

Samut the tested

Vivien of the Arkbow

 

 

 

 

Creatures: 27

forerunner of the empire

Kinjalli’s Sunwing

Sun Blessed Mount

Bellowing Aegisaur

Burning sun’s avatar

Etali, Primal storm

Gishath, Sun’s Avatar

Imperial Aerosaur

Majestic Heliopterus

Needletooth Raptor

Polyraptor

Raging Swordtooth

Ranging Raptor

Raptor Hatchling

Regal Behemoth

Ripjaw Raptor

Shining Aerosaur

Siegehorn Ceratops

Silverclad Ferocidons

Sky terror

snapping sailback

sun-crested pteradon

sun-crowned hunters

trapjaw tyrant

wayward swordtooth

Zetalpa, Primal Dawn

Ulvenwald Tracker

 

 

 

 

Artifacts: 17

Tower of Fortunes

Sol Ring

boros cluestone

gruul cluestone

selesnya cluestone

boros signet

gruul signet

selesnya signet

commander’s sphere

seer’s sundial

staff of nin

Mindstone

Pillar of Origins

Worn Powerstone

Hedron Archive

Thran Dynamo

Dreamstone Hedron

 

The Power of Scyenze, errrr, Magic(!!) compels you!

 

 

 

Sorceries/Instants: 12

Cultivate

Nissa’s Pilgrimage

Skyshroud Claim

Rampant Growth

Kodama’s Reach

Farseek

Dromoka’s Command

Domri’s Ambush

Band Together

Gravitic Punch

Rabid Bite

Thrash

 

The first rule of Dino Fight Club is: You Always Pick the Fight Option TWICE!

 

 

Lands: 39

Command Tower

Terramorphic Expanse

Evolving Wilds

Myriad Landscape

Taiga

Wooded Foothills

Stomping Ground

Cinder Glade

Fire-lit Thicket

Savanna

Windswept Heath

Temple Garden

Canopy Vista

Wooded Bastion

Krosan Verge

Plateau

Arid Mesa

Sacred Foundry

Naya Panorama

Rugged Prairie

6 Forests

6 Plains

7 Mountains

 

 

 

 

 

So there you have it. A ton of pictures. Please feel free to make suggestions or comments or to ask questions.

 

 

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