Dang.. so many of the journals I read have had people in a posting frenzy... I may have to trim yet again, and delegate more people to the "check once a week" category.
I've been eating a *lot* of spinach lately. I feel that I should be squinting, or have anchor tattoos on my forearms.
I saw this article about probability distributions and task resolution comparisons between d20 and Champs... I include it here only so that Danny can read it.(It'll bore all but the math/gamer-type). It boils down to the statement of - D20's skill system is fundamentally open-ended, task-based, and linear. The Champions skill system has a closed range, is success-based, and is normal. The comments have some interesting game-views, too.
Met the new landlord guy, and he seems to be nice enough... hopefully he'll be more on top of his game than the last one. I'm still looking for a place to own, rather than rent, though. The time's come to invest a bit. Paying money into my ownership rather than to someone else is overdue.
Roar of the greasepaint, smell of the crowd...
trivia for the day: Autopsy means "see for yourself."
Japan SAQ (Seldom Asked Questions).
Excerpt:
Crochet Dresses for Furbies.
April Winchell has some dandy multimedia, (Search for Seasonal midway down the page)
Extreme weather pictures.
WHAT DO YOU CALL...
1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks? stream or creek, alternately
2. What the thing you push around the grocery store? cart
3. A metal container to carry a meal in? A lunch box
4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in? griddle
5. The piece of furniture that seats three people? couch
6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof? gutter
7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening? Porch
8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages? soda pop (yes, both.)
9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup? pancake.
10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself? sub
11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach? bathing suit
12. Shoes worn for sports? sneakers
13. Putting a room in order? straightening
14. A flying insect that glows in the dark? firefly
15. The little insect that curls up into a ball? weevil
16. The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down? see-saw
17. How do you eat your pizza? knife and fork if too hot, folded as a bisected triangle, if suitable for handling.
18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff? yard sale
19. What's the evening meal? Dinner 
This story has been making the rounds lately, and understandably so. A fellow in Germany killed and ate a man. So far, no big deal, as far as such things go, which is rather extraordinary, in its own right. But there are twists.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the German courts.
KASSEL, Germany (Reuters) - A German confessed on Wednesday to killing and eating a willing victim in a case that could make legal history, telling a shocked courtroom the experience was "like taking communion" in a religious service.
At the start of his murder trial in Kassel, central Germany, Armin Meiwes, 42, offered a full account of the killing that has gained him worldwide notoriety as "The Cannibal of Rotenburg" after the town where he lived.
Meiwes said there were "hundreds, thousands" of people seeking to fulfil their desires to eat humans or be eaten via Internet advertisements in forums called "Cannibal Cafe," "Guy Cannibals" and "Torturenet."
In testimony so frank it drew gasps from the public gallery, Meiwes said he had kept his victim's skull and plastic bags of flesh in his freezer. He ate about 44 pounds of the flesh, defrosting it bit by bit.
"With every piece of flesh I ate I remembered him," Meiwes, a self-assured and well-spoken computer repair man, told the judge. "It was like taking communion."
The killing took place in March 2001. Meiwes was arrested in December 2002 after police received a tip-off from someone who had seen one of his Internet adverts seeking a slaughter victim.
The trial is expected to last until the end of January and some 40 witnesses will be called, including some of Meiwes's Internet contacts.
The gaunt, bespectacled defendant said that during his upbringing alone with a dominant mother he had longed for a little brother he could make "part of me."
He told how he made contact online with a 43-year-old Berlin computer specialist identified only as Bernd-Juergen B.
He invited him to his elegant half-timbered home near Kassel and killed him with a kitchen knife in a "slaughtering room" he had built containing meat hooks, a cage and a butcher's table.
"He told me he had had the desire since he was a child to be slaughtered and eaten," Meiwes said. "He was very intelligent and I didn't see any sign that he was disturbed." Meiwes filmed the killing and the video tape may be shown to the court.
Defense lawyers have said the film shows Meiwes cutting off the victim's penis at the latter's request.
"It was important to him that his member be cut off and that he witness it," Meiwes said.
"He screamed terribly and jumped around the table but after a while he said he was surprised it didn't hurt and was very pleased that the wound bled so strongly," he added.
"It gave him pleasure."
MURDER OR EUTHANASIA?
Eventually the victim lost consciousness and Meiwes killed him with a knife. He hung up the corpse and cut it up, filming the process.
Prosecutors, who charged Meiwes with murder after a psychiatrist declared him fit to stand trial, are seeking a life sentence.
They concede the victim wanted to be killed but argue he was incapable of rational thought.
Meiwes's lawyer has pleaded for him to be convicted of "killing on request," a form of illegal euthanasia which carries a maximum five years sentence.
Legal experts say the charge of full murder may not stick given that the video film shows the victim to be willing. The case could reach the Federal Constitutional Court, Arthur Kreuzer of Giessen University's Institute for Criminology said this week.
Meiwes said he became obsessed with wanting a younger brother -- "someone to be part of me."
Using the pseudonym "Franky," he posted Internet ads saying: "If you are 18-25 you are my boy" or "Come to me I'll eat your delicious flesh."
Some 430 people responded to his e-mails within a year.
Unlike other cannibals, Meiwes used the Internet to meet his (very willing) victims. The three sites he mentioned in his testimony have shut down in the year since his arrest. He also posted messages to a Usenet group called alt.sex.snuff.cannibalism, where several of his posts are archived by Google Groups.
The newsgroup, like many others, is so overwhelmed with spam that the active users started prefixing their posts with "ASSC" to separate out the noise. If you look around, you'll find an active community of cannibal fetishists, with their own forms of fan fiction, creative writing, poetry, and the occasional "stab" at humor. Compared to this kind of creative output, Armin Meiwes' posts are downright dull.
I've been eating a *lot* of spinach lately. I feel that I should be squinting, or have anchor tattoos on my forearms.
I saw this article about probability distributions and task resolution comparisons between d20 and Champs... I include it here only so that Danny can read it.(It'll bore all but the math/gamer-type). It boils down to the statement of - D20's skill system is fundamentally open-ended, task-based, and linear. The Champions skill system has a closed range, is success-based, and is normal. The comments have some interesting game-views, too.
Met the new landlord guy, and he seems to be nice enough... hopefully he'll be more on top of his game than the last one. I'm still looking for a place to own, rather than rent, though. The time's come to invest a bit. Paying money into my ownership rather than to someone else is overdue.
Roar of the greasepaint, smell of the crowd...
trivia for the day: Autopsy means "see for yourself."
Japan SAQ (Seldom Asked Questions).
Excerpt:
Q. What is the origin of the Japanese superstition which says that if you cut your nails at night, you will die young?
A. This superstition has two versions. One says that if you cut your nails at night, you will die young (Yoru ni tsume o kiru to hayaji ni suru) and another that you won't be with your parents when they die (Yoru ni tsume o kiru to oya no shi ni me ni aenai), i.e. you will die before them. There are two reasons for these superstitions. One is that during the Edo period, cutting one's nails at night was dangerous because of the lack of light. The second reason is that the Japanese word 'Yotsume' (cutting your nails at night) sounds like 'Yo o tsumeru' which means to cut short a life.
Crochet Dresses for Furbies.
April Winchell has some dandy multimedia, (Search for Seasonal midway down the page)
Extreme weather pictures.
1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks? stream or creek, alternately
2. What the thing you push around the grocery store? cart
3. A metal container to carry a meal in? A lunch box
4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in? griddle
5. The piece of furniture that seats three people? couch
6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof? gutter
7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening? Porch
8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages? soda pop (yes, both.)
9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup? pancake.
10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself? sub
11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach? bathing suit
12. Shoes worn for sports? sneakers
13. Putting a room in order? straightening
14. A flying insect that glows in the dark? firefly
15. The little insect that curls up into a ball? weevil
16. The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down? see-saw
17. How do you eat your pizza? knife and fork if too hot, folded as a bisected triangle, if suitable for handling.
18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff? yard sale
19. What's the evening meal? Dinner
This story has been making the rounds lately, and understandably so. A fellow in Germany killed and ate a man. So far, no big deal, as far as such things go, which is rather extraordinary, in its own right. But there are twists.
- He found his victim through the Internet, by advertising for someone who wanted to be killed and eaten.
- The victim wanted to be castrated first.
- The gourmand filmed the mutilation and killing.
- The film makes it clear that the victim consented to the killing.
- The butcher may only get a five year sentence, since there is a statute on the books defining "killing on request" as a form of euthanasia (illegal, of course), carrying a five year maximum sentence.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the German courts.
At the start of his murder trial in Kassel, central Germany, Armin Meiwes, 42, offered a full account of the killing that has gained him worldwide notoriety as "The Cannibal of Rotenburg" after the town where he lived.
Meiwes said there were "hundreds, thousands" of people seeking to fulfil their desires to eat humans or be eaten via Internet advertisements in forums called "Cannibal Cafe," "Guy Cannibals" and "Torturenet."
In testimony so frank it drew gasps from the public gallery, Meiwes said he had kept his victim's skull and plastic bags of flesh in his freezer. He ate about 44 pounds of the flesh, defrosting it bit by bit.
"With every piece of flesh I ate I remembered him," Meiwes, a self-assured and well-spoken computer repair man, told the judge. "It was like taking communion."
The killing took place in March 2001. Meiwes was arrested in December 2002 after police received a tip-off from someone who had seen one of his Internet adverts seeking a slaughter victim.
The trial is expected to last until the end of January and some 40 witnesses will be called, including some of Meiwes's Internet contacts.
The gaunt, bespectacled defendant said that during his upbringing alone with a dominant mother he had longed for a little brother he could make "part of me."
He told how he made contact online with a 43-year-old Berlin computer specialist identified only as Bernd-Juergen B.
He invited him to his elegant half-timbered home near Kassel and killed him with a kitchen knife in a "slaughtering room" he had built containing meat hooks, a cage and a butcher's table.
"He told me he had had the desire since he was a child to be slaughtered and eaten," Meiwes said. "He was very intelligent and I didn't see any sign that he was disturbed." Meiwes filmed the killing and the video tape may be shown to the court.
Defense lawyers have said the film shows Meiwes cutting off the victim's penis at the latter's request.
"It was important to him that his member be cut off and that he witness it," Meiwes said.
"He screamed terribly and jumped around the table but after a while he said he was surprised it didn't hurt and was very pleased that the wound bled so strongly," he added.
"It gave him pleasure."
MURDER OR EUTHANASIA?
Eventually the victim lost consciousness and Meiwes killed him with a knife. He hung up the corpse and cut it up, filming the process.
Prosecutors, who charged Meiwes with murder after a psychiatrist declared him fit to stand trial, are seeking a life sentence.
They concede the victim wanted to be killed but argue he was incapable of rational thought.
Meiwes's lawyer has pleaded for him to be convicted of "killing on request," a form of illegal euthanasia which carries a maximum five years sentence.
Legal experts say the charge of full murder may not stick given that the video film shows the victim to be willing. The case could reach the Federal Constitutional Court, Arthur Kreuzer of Giessen University's Institute for Criminology said this week.
Meiwes said he became obsessed with wanting a younger brother -- "someone to be part of me."
Using the pseudonym "Franky," he posted Internet ads saying: "If you are 18-25 you are my boy" or "Come to me I'll eat your delicious flesh."
Some 430 people responded to his e-mails within a year.
Unlike other cannibals, Meiwes used the Internet to meet his (very willing) victims. The three sites he mentioned in his testimony have shut down in the year since his arrest. He also posted messages to a Usenet group called alt.sex.snuff.cannibalism, where several of his posts are archived by Google Groups.
The newsgroup, like many others, is so overwhelmed with spam that the active users started prefixing their posts with "ASSC" to separate out the noise. If you look around, you'll find an active community of cannibal fetishists, with their own forms of fan fiction, creative writing, poetry, and the occasional "stab" at humor. Compared to this kind of creative output, Armin Meiwes' posts are downright dull.
posted by Scottobear at
9:47:00 PM
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