Civilization Admission

I own Civ 4.

I think I played it for about 15 minutes before feeling like it was going to take days of feeling stupid before I reached anythign approaching "fun", as it looked like a board game designed by someone who had a fetish for producing infinite numbers of rules.

Did I get the wrong impression?  Is there an easy way to slide into the game without feeling like a complete idiot?

I'm so much of a casual gamer nowadays (playing for a few hours a week, if I'm lucky) that I need something that I can get to grips with fairly easily.  I don't mind playing long games in small bits, but I do need something I can enjoy without doing a course in it.  If this is possible with Civ 4 then I'll give it another go...

Morning Conversations

Julie (waking up): I dreamt that I had an affair with Bill Murray, and you forgave me.
Andy: Well, it _is_ Bill Murray. Who wouldn't forgive you?
Julie: It only lasted an hour.
Andy: So, not so much an affair as sex.
Julie: We never actually had sex.
Andy: So, not so much an affair as a hug.
Julie: *goes back to sleep. Probably to go back to Bill Murray and tell him she's changed her mind...*

Pay details

I just had the usual debate in my head about this one, especially in the current climate, and decided that as I believe that _all_ salary information should be public that transparency is the order of the day.

I just got my end of year pay/bonus information:
8% pay rise to £35,645
9% bonus of £2,998

This continues the pay rises I've been getting which average out about 9% a year.  I must be doing something right!

I feel a conflicting set of emotions about this - happy that I'm doing well (that pay rise is well above the average), guilty that I earn a fair bit more than most of my friends, pleased that I can now afford to sort out a bunch of my plumbing, and buy a new cooker.

Delicious LiveJournal Links for 3-16-2009

• Who Needs A Hero?
  A fantastic piece on race and role models. Takes a starting point and then works in the realisations that lead to a completely different view. Very nicely done.
  (tags: sf drwho race)
• The World's Largest MMORPG: You're Playing it Right Now
  It's a shame you can't "win" MMORPGs...
  (tags: software games design usability)
• Tram workers find secret chambers beneath Princes Street
  Oooh, spooky
  (tags: Edinburgh)
• Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable
  When someone demands to know how we are going to replace newspapers, they are really demanding to be told that we are not living through a revolution. They are demanding to be told that old systems won't break before new systems are in place. They are demanding to be told that ancient social bargains aren't in peril, that core institutions will be spared, that new methods of spreading information will improve previous practice rather than upending it. They are demanding to be lied to.
  (tags: business journalism media newspapers)
• Brain decline begins at age 27
  It wasn't like this in the old days - back then people appreciated how much smarter their elders were. You damn kids get off my lawn!
  (tags: health brain age)
• Question 2
  What should go on a Top Ten "In retrospect, what the hell were we thinking" list of once-popular SF?
  (tags: sf)
• Question 1
  What should go on a Top Ten "In retrospect, what the hell were we thinking" list of once-popular comics?
  (tags: comics)
• Houseplants of Gor
  If you find this funny then you have almost certainly read too many novels that you shouldn't have done
  (tags: funny sf Gor)
• Tetoris
  I challenge you to complete a line!
  (tags: game flash tetris)
• David Mitchell on the public sector and online feedback
  It just goes to show - you can't be too careful
  (tags: society internet)
• Where did my sex kitten go?
  An opinion piece constructed out of so much entitlement and oblivious patriarchy that I'm ashamed to come from the same country.
  (tags: UK relationships sexism patriarchy)

Battlestar Galactica: Final Theory

( Final episode this weekend )