Intellectus Ex Nihilo (Wal-Mart on Ice)

[JohnDillworth]

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

3/28/45 and 3/29/45

Galloping to Victory: The spread to AV declined over these two days, first to 1,500 points and then to 800. Very close now.

Indochina: The enemy hasn't opposed Allied landings at Soc Trang. If the game continues, either by agreement or because I've totally miscalcuated the 1945 AV requirements so that it's actually 3:1 or 18:1 or something, then the Allies will be prepared to attend to Indochina/Thailand (and from there, China). And the reduction of Manila should be complete in 4-6 weeks.


I'm amazed at how quickly you've played this one. I know I have three going, but some days I only have one turn to play still, and you've played three and a half years in game in one year of real time!! That's astounding!

You should take a bit of a break. Read a book!

Dan doesn't own a TV. He stands as a shining example of what is possible if you do not own a TV. Be like Dan

[Canoerebel]

Obvert's comment made me laugh, because I read all the time. Probably six books a month plus lots of other stuff. Reading recharges my batteries, both personally and in my work for the magazine.

I just finished re-reading Jurassic Park for the fourth time and started a big book about the Battle of Chickamauga. Last week I finished Irresistible, by Andy Stanley, and I've started reading it a second time, so that I can make more notes and document my thoughts more accurately. In the past three weeks, I finished Do-Or-Die Men (1st Marine Raiders) and We Were Soldiers Once (both re-read for about the fifth times). I started Eugenia Price's To See Your Face Again, but just can't get into it. I've been reading through a new book about the flowers of Georgia, which has me ready for springtime. A love of reading is such a blessing.

Its the other stuff that I lag in - doing routine maintenance around the house, etc.

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

3/28/45 and 3/29/45

Galloping to Victory: The spread to AV declined over these two days, first to 1,500 points and then to 800. Very close now.

Indochina: The enemy hasn't opposed Allied landings at Soc Trang. If the game continues, either by agreement or because I've totally miscalcuated the 1945 AV requirements so that it's actually 3:1 or 18:1 or something, then the Allies will be prepared to attend to Indochina/Thailand (and from there, China). And the reduction of Manila should be complete in 4-6 weeks.

I'm amazed at how quickly you've played this one. I know I have three going, but some days I only have one turn to play still, and you've played three and a half years in game in one year of real time!! That's astounding!

You should take a bit of a break. Read a book!

Dan doesn't own a TV. He stands as a shining example of what is possible if you do not own a TV. Be like Dan

I am very proud to own and use a TV!! Films are stories too!

I do my fair amount of reading, mostly on the tube these days, but sometimes before bed. My first degree is English Lit and there aren't many 19th-20th century classic novels I haven't dipped into.

Now I read a lot of non-fiction though too. Some history, some contemporary.

[Kofiman]

If fiction is okay, I'd have to recommend the two large novels by Patrick Rothfuss. "The Name of the Wind" and "The Wise Man's Fear."

They're phenomenal.

[Canoerebel]

Fiction is great. It's relaxing, sometimes inspiring, and when well written recharges my own creative batteries. My reading is split evenly between fiction and non-fiction.

I haven't heard of the two books you've mentioned, but I'll look them up.

A few months ago, a young lady behind the counter at Chick-fil-A encouraged me to read The Road. I did so and found it interesting and pretty good. A couple of years ago, Forumite crsutton recommended The Good Shepherd by Forrester (WWII Battle of the Atlantic story). Very good. And I read and re-read lots of my own favorites over the years. Alistair MacLean and Kenneth Roberts are my two favorite novelists. A novel that really sticks out in my mind is The Unforgiven, a superbly written western.

I don't enjoy vulgar or profane books, which makes it pretty challenging to find good contemporary fiction.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Fiction is great. It's relaxing, sometimes inspiring, and when well written recharges my own creative batteries. My reading is split evenly between fiction and non-fiction.

I haven't heard of the two books you've mentioned, but I'll look them up.

A few months ago, a young lady behind the counter at Chick-fil-A encouraged me to read The Road. I did so and found it interesting and pretty good. A couple of years ago, Forumite crsutton recommended The Good Shepherd by Forrester (WWII Battle of the Atlantic story). Very good. And I read and re-read lots of my own favorites over the years. Alistair MacLean and Kenneth Roberts are my two favorite novelists. A novel that really sticks out in my mind is The Unforgiven, a superbly written western.

I don't enjoy vulgar or profane books, which makes it pretty challenging to find good contemporary fiction.

A naval fiction story you probably haven't read is Warren Tute's "The Cruiser" - a British Ajax class cruiser in the Mediterranean. Read it when I was a teenager and it reinforced my interest in navel warfare in the WWII era. Easy to read and hard to put down as I recall.

[Canoerebel]

Hey, sounds interesting!

Have you read Alistair McLean's HMS Ulysses? It's a spectacular book. If you have, how does it compare with The Cruiser?

[Grollub]

ORIGINAL: Kofiman

If fiction is okay, I'd have to recommend the two large novels by Patrick Rothfuss. "The Name of the Wind" and "The Wise Man's Fear."

They're phenomenal.

Agreed. The language in those books are just beautiful.

[Capt. Harlock]

Manila: Probing attack drops forts to 7, results in pretty hefty Allied losses, and doesn't indicate a supply malus. That's probably going to be the final attack of the war, unless something unexpected happens.

Can you give us any more details about the BB bombardments at Manila? Problems with mines, subs, CD guns?

[Canoerebel]

A TF led by two slow BBs is bombarding Manila every night, with good effect. It is based at nearby Lucena, which has lots of AEs and AKEs. The Allies cleared out enemy mines, took Bataan by paradrop, and mined it heavily. Early on, Dave had SSX at Manila, but they were handled by various TFs, including the bombardment one, without any trouble. No CD guns. The bombardments routine is working very well.

[Canoerebel]

I looked up The Name of the Wind. It appears to fall into the fantasy genre, which I don't enjoy. I very rarely read fantasy or science fiction, with a couple of exceptions (The Lord of the Rings, on the one hand, and Heiro's Journey, on the other).

[obvert]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Fiction is great. It's relaxing, sometimes inspiring, and when well written recharges my own creative batteries. My reading is split evenly between fiction and non-fiction.

I haven't heard of the two books you've mentioned, but I'll look them up.

A few months ago, a young lady behind the counter at Chick-fil-A encouraged me to read The Road. I did so and found it interesting and pretty good. A couple of years ago, Forumite crsutton recommended The Good Shepherd by Forrester (WWII Battle of the Atlantic story). Very good. And I read and re-read lots of my own favorites over the years. Alistair MacLean and Kenneth Roberts are my two favorite novelists. A novel that really sticks out in my mind is The Unforgiven, a superbly written western.

I don't enjoy vulgar or profane books, which makes it pretty challenging to find good contemporary fiction.

Love The Good Shepherd!

Nice to have a few here to add to my lists.

[Anachro]

I'm reading the Parade's End tetralogy. So far, so good.

[Canoerebel]

3/30/45 and 3/31/45

Galloping to Victory: The Allies are 133 points from AV (if my math is correct and if I actually know the AV rules). If weather permits tonight's B-29 raid, the game should end. I hope it ends.

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Hey, sounds interesting!

Have you read Alistair McLean's HMS Ulysses? It's a spectacular book. If you have, how does it compare with The Cruiser?

I read both of them in my teen years. I thought them comparable, although McLean is the better writer in most ways. I was not/am not well enough schooled in the finer arts of writing to put my finger on the differences. The plotlines of the two books also have similarities.

[Kofiman]

I'm afraid so, it falls into the fantasy genre.

As for vulgarity or profanity.. I think in the whole book, there's one page with a couple of street kids who use some bad language. Maybe two or three other examples of someone saying something equivalent to 'my god'. Rothfuss isn't a writer who uses it for emphasis or punctuation, he's good enough to handle tone changes and form shifts without using profanity.

Grollub has it correct. It is really beautifully written, tightly plotted, built around very solid stuff that's well put together. It's just a solid narrative that is.. well, welcoming and comfortable.

Above all, well the prose is remarkable, and would feel archaic or clunky in the hands of someone less skilled.

I knew nothing about it when I got my copy, just picked up something to read on a holiday, and it happened to be the best novel I've read in decades.

I would recommend giving it a chance. Reading the first few pages should be enough to know if it's worth reading.

[Canoerebel]

4/1/44

Galloping to Victory! The Superforts hit Yokohama in modest numbers. Other than that its a quiet turn but sufficient to achieve the long-anticipated victory.

Remember the Lex! She sank around December 18, 1941, during the penultimate moment of this game - one of the most exciting episodes I've experienced. I would only lose three other fleet carriers in the match (but please don't inquire about the jeep carriers).

Here at the End of All Things: Take any dot base on the map and you get a "Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!" Engage in a tiny surface combat between an SC and an enemy APD near Balikpapan and you'll hear Tokyo Rose boasting of sinking "Two carriers, etc." There's so much audio fanfare in the game, but the end is quite a letdown. At the very end of the 001, there's a very short and weak flare of trumpets and the sad little victory screen pops up. It's like thru-hiking the AT, but doing so from north to south and winding up at the top of rather non-descript Spring Mountain in the Georgia forests. Just kind of a let down given the immense build up and anticipation.

What Say Ye? Yup, Yup: That's the message I sent to Dave, to see if he wishes to continue to savor the Downfall era of the game. We haven't broached the topic in our emails, so I have no idea what his thinking is. His email transmittal with this turn was purely routine - "Another." He didn't tip things off at all. He's quite a gentleman.

[obvert]

Well done Dan! Congrats!

[Anachro]

Congratulations on a very efficient victory against what seems a skilled opponent.

[Anachro]

On the topic of books, I have always been a bit of a history nerd, particularly ancient history. In the past few years, I've been on a bit of a Roman history kick, reading a number of primary sources and history books, as well as ancient authors, that I have found to be extremely interesting. Forgive me if you don't like such stuff, but if you have even a modicum of interest in Roman history, these are some good recommendations from me:

1. The Letters (Vol 1-4), Cicero, Verlag and Beck, Translated by Shuckburgh: These four volumes encompass the complete collection of private letters of Cicero (as well as a few other statesmen of the late republic), tracing a period from before his consulship in 63 BC to a little while before his death in 43 BC. It is a fascinating first-hand, eyewitness account of the various personalities and events of the late republic, particularly those leading up to and including the civil war, all told from the viewpoint of a man of immense learning, political and oratorical skill. I re-read these letters at least once a year and always find them extremely enthralling. On top of all this, there are extensive footnotes to all the volumes that really go deep into detail on the minutiae of the letters to give great background and context to each.

2. Selected Political Speeches, Cicero, Ed. Betty Radice: A Penguin classic compilation of various famous speeches of Cicero's with a good enough translation, though I'm sure there are better. This gives good detailed context to the letters above and shows Cicero's skills as an orator whereas in his letters he speaks more informally. You'll learn more fully about some events that Cicero might only allude to in his letters. Unfortunately, this doesn't include all his speeches, such as the full number of Philippics he wrote attacking Mark Antony.

3. The Republic and the Laws, Cicero, Trans. Niall Rudd: A work that, in its time, was of immense importance and studied by Roman school children to the end of their empire. It gives a viewpoint on the Roman conception of their republican constitution and why it works, why it's the best (Romans really did feel they had the best governmental system in the world), and how Cicero thought it could be improved made to work again in the era of the late republic when things were coming undone. It was published only a little while before civil war broke out. Unfortunately, only extensive fragments of it remain with a number of portions missing, as it was discovered in the form of a palimpsest in the Vatican archives.

4. The Historians of Ancient Rome, Ronald Mellor: A collection of works by ancient authors, stretching from the republic to the collapse of the western empire and beyond. All are fascinating, particular the excerpts from later authors, but the crown jewel for me is Tacitus' Annals, which not only cover a fascinating period showing the early empire and the transition to autocracy (the emperor's immediately after Augustus), but do so with a provocatively good style. It's not wonder the period in which Tacitus' wrote is called the Silver Age of Latin.

5. Roman Letters: An Anthology, Ed. and Trans. Zeiner-Carmichael: Various primary source letters from different periods of the Roman republic and empire. Probably most interesting here are the letters Pliny the younger, covering his dealing with the emperor Trajan, but also more private letters. One particularly fascinating one is his first-hand account and recollection of the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in a letter written to Tacitus, the historian mentioned above.

6. Letters on Ethics, Lucius Annaeus Seneca, Trans. Graver and Long: A series of letters written by the famous Roman statesman and philosopher Seneca (during the time of Nero, who eventually forced him to kill himself). Though ostensibly letters to a friend, these are altogether taken as a work of Stoic philosophy, and perhaps the best representation we have of the Roman conception of Stoicism (along with Marcus Aurelius' meditations). Much of the early Greek writings on Stoicism have been lost, unfortunately. That said, even if you don't have an interest in philosophy per say, these letters are a joy to read and full of what I consider to be very good advice on life. For a nice summary of philosophy, the various schools, and more please see Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy.

7. Caesar: Life of a Colossus and Augustus: First Emperor of Rome, Adrian Goldsworthy: Immensely readable biographies of these two giants of Roman history by the noted British historian Adrian Goldsworth. They do a very good job presenting the life and times of these two fascinating figures.

I can go on and on with more, but I'll stop for now. [:D]