Pain, strategy, stealing and friends

On Sunday night, I was still feeling the pain resulting from Friday. This time it was a vague, but not too bad, brand of whiskey which I finished together with Tim over two games of Risk, played with the guys I go out quizzing with on Tuesdays.
We started playing at around 9pm. We finished the second game at 6 in the morning, finishing up with a final drink on the balcony, watching the sun come up amidst the avid twittering of birds.

Risk, as it turned out, has changed substantially. For a boardgame. The ‘standard’ game is now played with four assignments per player, as opposed to the one assignment I used to play with years ago. The alternative game is world domination, where consecutive sets of cards (three infantry, three cavalry, etc), obtained when conquering a country, can be traded in for more and more armies, up to an impressive 60.
These updated rules made the game surprisingly interesting as well as strategic.

The resulting headache and lack of aspirins the following afternoon impeded my enjoyment of the subsequent hash and 101 birthday party, thrown in the far south of Johannesburg.

3G

In Thailand, I paid 4 euros for a month’s worth of unlimited internet (I think it was 512Kb). In South Africa, I pay 35 euros for 2 Gigs of 256Kb. It’s a good thing I’m making some money, or I would spend my days crying.

Friends? What friends?

As you can see on the top of my homepage, I’m one of the early testers for Google friendconnect. Yet another Google product which will make a few developers, selling or promoting applications which do what, with friendconnect, is a breeze, very unhappy.
The service is only just beginning. The number of available applications is very limited. But as users can develop their own applications, this is set to grow rapidly.

Related:  Slow going

I’m currently only using the member thingy, but another widget allows for inline ratings, similar to what I use on this site, but with the added bonus that users can leave reviews, also similar to what you see on this site.

It’s not too much yet, but I suspect that Google’s friendconnect will be de rigeur for smaller websites which won’t have the power and/or know-how to build their own social environments.
However, at the same time, smaller websites, like this website, are not social in nature, so they wouldn’t really need members. Or these websites are already working with WordPress, Blogger or other straightforward CMSs and would not have an interest to use these social features.

Stealing is praise

It’s funny where one’s work pops up.

Crime and food

Tonight, I had dinner at a ‘Thai’ restaurant. The food was good, though the prices made me choke. Compared to Thailand.

The owner, a young bloke, was beaten over the head with two liquor bottles on Monday when three oaks, carrying guns, robbed the place.