the three paths to happiness

well... if you're looking for a recipe, you're looking in vain. i am not going to give you one, because i don't have one. however... there is something that has occurred to me. i've mentioned already that i get some of my most brilliant ideas on the loo, haven't i? :P

some pennyless losers mentioned some time ago, in an attempt to convince themselves, that money can't buy happiness. some other losers, having naught but money, smiled condescendingly and nodded their heads, proceeding to buy it by the pound. funny thing is, they're both sort of right.

ok, so in my deep thinking session, i've sort of reached the following conclusion: there are three paths to reach a certain level of happiness (yes, the definition of the term is still debateable, no, it is not a lasting state, but one that must be achieved over and over again).

1. happiness you can buy. you want a dress really bad. you've been wanting a book for ages. you just die for a meal at your favourite restaurant. you'd kill for a trip to japan. all these things can grant you a period of happiness - shorter or longer, depending on how much you want it. all these things can be bought and require a certain amount of money. you have that money, you buy that piece of happiness.

2. happiness you make. you can carve out a little piece of heaven for yourself. you can do origami. you can get that feeling of enormous satisfaction after cleaning a really greasy oven. you can take a walk in the park. you can write a poem or paint something. you can help a child with schoolwork. you can tend a flowerbed. you can solve a really difficult maths problem. all these things can give you a piece of happiness and don't require a significant amount of money. it is paid for in effort and is the happiness that comes out of one's own work or creation.

3. happiness you are offered. it is probably the hardest to obtain because it doesn't depend entirely on you (whether on work or financial effort). it is the type of happiness for each others are required: your parents, your lover, your children, a friend, the boss, your favourite sports team, etc.

of course, you might train yourself to lower expectation levels, but it is debateable. no matter how objective or even pessimistic you might be, you still hope. you want to believe that your team might win, you want to believe your lover will be true, you want to believe your kids won't fail a difficult task, you want to believe your friends will be there for you, etc. preparation might help, but not much.

now, i don't think there is any 'universally recommended' dose in which to mix these. it probably varies from person to person. i'd venture to say that neither type by itself will offer long time happiness, there will always be something missing. also, i don't think you can cut any of the three from the list and compensate with the others. it doesn't work like that. there is a dose that is right for you and any shift from that balance is bad for you. the more you need of one type and the less you get of it, the worse for you.

well... now that i've solved a millenia-old problem of humanity :) am off to count my pluses and minuses.

ps: images by: wint3r88, yestrdaysforigvn, moOnxinha

neverwinter nights nights

nope, no mistake in the title. that's what i'm losing my nights with lately: neverwinter nights 1, because nwn2 won't work on my stupid computer. yet. :D dungeons&dragons based rpg game. there.

on the past few days i was looking something up, and stumbled on a walkthrough for the game made by a chick for an online women's magazine. woo-hoo for rpg playing chicks. boo for stupid rpg playing chicks.

This is a really hard game to write a walkthrough for. You have many options of what to do at every step in the game. You can choose to help people and become more "good", or hurt people and become more "bad". Just because I choose to do something in my own style of gaming doesn't mean that you couldn't do the exact opposite and be playing just as well.

ok, i got that. so you want to be 'good'. at a first guess, seraph and i thought she might be a paladin given her desperation to acquire 'good' points. apparently she played a ranger. if she started out with a good alignment... how exactly was she acquiring more points? anyways... well, you can find the walkthrough here, if interested. i'm just going to point out a couple of things, in the chronological (sort of...) order of the game, from the introduction and chapter one. i'll do another entry, i guess, when i'm done with chapter two of the game.

In this little library area is a book you can grab - The Northern Four Adventuring Troupe.

false. except for quest items and certain stuff certain creatures drop when dead (ex. fire beetles always leave a fire beetle belly behind), stuff you find in bookshelves, piles of books, piles of skulls, chests, boxes, crates, armoires, corpses, wells, rubble, piles of stone and garbage (yeah, look into that too) as well as remains from defeated enemies... it's never the same. this mistaken affirmation appears throughout the walkthrough. you find a potion of xyz there, you find the abc book in that other place. ntz. doesn't work that way.

Fenthick asks you for help, and you level up again.

false. you level up based on how much experience you accumulated. you get that by killing enemies or doing quests.

There are four henchmen you can hire to help you out. Note that you should end up hiring ALL FIVE of these during Chapter One.

errrr. ok. it's five, really. and she goes on mentioning them:

• tomi undergallows, halfling thief. not really, the character class is rogue, which covers much more than a thief. trust me, i play one.
• daelan red tiger, half orc fighter. not really, he's not a fighter but a barbarian. image attached. different class, different skills. oh, and his mom did not fall in love with a 1/2 orc, but with an entire one. and the 'falling in love' part is not too clear either.
• grimgnaw, lawful evil monk. why state his alignment instead of race, as with all others? dwarf monk.
• sherwyn, human archer. she's a bard, really. an archer
• class does not exist. am not too sure about that human part either but i guess it's correct... and her name is sharwyn. she's deliciously stuck up, so you might not want to address her other than her name.
• linu la'neral, the cleric. she is an elf.
• boddyknock glinkle, mage. mage? whuzzdat? he's a gnome wizard. after completing his quest, he doesn't give you a lantanege ring, but a lantanese one. because lantan is the place he comes from.

tomi is to be found in the temple of tyr, where you start out. the other four are in the trade of blades, not trail.

Desthar is annoyed. The Nurse, when pressed, says that Desthar and the Helmites showed up just after the plague came, very suspicious. North is Arabeth.

false. it's desther and aribeth.

Nyatar by the tree wants animals freed - gives you a zoo key and transport via plants scroll, for the BlackLake district. You get 200xp and 400gp when you do this task, and then he becomes a merchant.

false. another mistake appearing throughout the walkthrough. characters who give you quests do not become merchants. they have wares for sale from the start. if the option doesn't appear in the dialogue, just re-enter conversation with them.

Moonstone Mask is a whorehouse. Ophala Cheldarstorn in there wants you to rob some nobles of their artwork. I refused. Giles wants you to kill someone. I refused. To let you in the back, she wants a letter from Oleff. If you go and get one, and pay 200 to Torgo, you get a coin. Up on the third floor is Tamora, Luce, and Tanith. I was female so only Tanith was willing to talk to me. Really he says nothing at all interesting and won't do anything "illicit".

oooo-kay.
(1) you refused loads of experience and gold by refusing to steal the artworks. had you done it, you would've also found out that maybe ophala was right...
(2) gilles doesn't want you to kill anyone. he wants you to bring the artifacts from the tombs to him rather than to oleff, so that they can be desecrated and grant power to the goddess talona. i refused it myself, though it's worth more gold to be evil, just like in real life. i draw lines too, but i draw them more comfortably ;)
(3) you don't steal artworks from the rich... but you did pay to have a date with a male prostitute. interesting attitude :P

by the way. this is one spot where the game is not balanced between genders. normally, gender doesn't influence your character but males have one more quest here, for the prostitute tamora. she'll give you her broach to go to the docks district and frighten hoff out of bugging her. you can sell the broach to hoff for 200 GP, frighten him and return to tell the story to tamora or kill him for the XP. they could've made tanith the brother of tamora so he can give you the same quest when playing a female character, or else find something. whatever.

Peninsula district:

A corpse by the fountain has the Sword Coast book. {...} When you finish clearing out the above-ground area, it's time to head into the estate, in the northeast. {...} There are firebelly monsters here. Head into the prison. {...} Head west, grab the gauntlet in the chest, and head downstairs.

1. that book... or something else.
2. or use the prison key... whichever.
3. fire beetles. they leave behind firebeetle bellies when slain.
3. the gauntlet or... whatever.

Beggar's Nest:

There are lots of zombies, a skeleton mage and Gulnan in here. She's a Yuan-ti. Lure the mages/skeleton over to one side to kill them (the mage first) without involving Gulnan. Then go kill her altar to weaken her for 200xp. Finally kill her off, being sure to run when she starts casting a spell at you. You can dodge most of them and just beat her down.

well, i've let my henchman take care of whatever zombies he could and ran straight for the altar. once destroyed, the undead disappear and only the yuan-ti is left.

Blacklake:

There are various noble estates on this map. If you're playing evil, you can steal things from them and do a quest to steal artwork, given to you in Moonstone Mask. I was a good character and left the houses alone.

errr... i was playing a neutral character that ended up being good. still, i did the quest. you don't even need to kill off the owner, just the guards. he gives up the items to you and explains why ophala wants them. oh, and poking your head into every box, crate and barrel is part of the game. nothing evil about that. you get evil points only for killing people at a whim or doing something purposely evil, such as giving the tomb artefacts to gilles, i presume.

If you leave the doors closed you can do it without killing them, or if you're seeking revenge for the poor animals (as I was) you can kill them too.

nice ranger. good ranger. you kill people for keeping a bear locked up but won't steal a statue :)

You find a +1 greatsword in this room which you can have Marrock turn into a Harbinger Kin Greatsword for the sword, Adamantite and 500gp. It's a great sword! Does fire damage. Get down to the main room with the tree on one side and cage on the other. Save here because you're about to fight Meladen. Touch the cage doors to start the fight. I found it REALLY easy - just two or three hits with my Harbinger Kin Greatsword. Let him go, get the key, he gives you nothing else.

(1) the stonefire axe, from a +1 axe, adamantite and 500GP does more damage and the same fire damage.
(2) meldanen is pretty easy to defeat once you got here. you should also have a belt that offers +12 magic resistance by now, so no problem.
(3) he does give you something else. for example, 500 GP to leave him alive. without you taking good penalties :P you might also kill him, i hear, to get one of his teeth to give to formosa. and to stop all trouble in blacklake. i admit i didn't. i just pressed him for his gold and got the key.

You need to kill everyone you can get your hands on (that is evil) to get red coins.

that is not evil. they have "thugs" and "ruffians" written above their heads and they attack you.

In 20 In a Quiver, Jerol sells stuff. You can buy 3 red coins from him at 150g a coin. He says Gilda at the Golden Apple has one or two more. If you head over there, Gilda has some but refuses to hand them over.

you really needn't buy those coins. plenty to be found on various muggers, thugs, ruffians and bloodsailors. i didn't spend my gold on coins and gilda did give me, one or two, i can't remember.

OK on to the Seedy Tavern. First, Jalek enters a drinking contest with you. You drink: Neverwinten Sailor Spirit, Dockside Dunn's, Orc blood Brew, Dwarven Red Eye, Thayvian Fire Juice, and Catoblepas Death Cheese Wine. He admires your spirit and says you can talk to Christov now. Christov gives you a tavern key to get downstairs. The auctioneer will sell you things for those red coins you found. I bought the +1 longsword for 10 coins, the AC2 +1 leather armor for 5 coins and the shimmering sash of spell resist 12 for 6 coins. None were anywhere near as good as the stuff I already had. Good for selling I suppose.

i didn't enter the drinking contest. then again i am a rogue and open most doors for myself. i bought some stuff for myself and when i finished off the entire district, headed back and bought some more for the coins i had left. there's nothing else you can do with them and the stuff you buy is virtually free, since there is an abunadance of coins being carried around by the various thugs you have to kill off anyway. i sold for good money whatever i didn't need.

OK, back to the stream. Charox sends you downstream. [...] Note if you go back to tell Dara'Nei that all is OK, she's gone. There's a note there with instructions on an alternate entrance to the sewers.

errr... it's charon. and the note was there ever since you freed dara'nei, it was on one of her guards, which you supposedly killed already to free her. people... do pick up remains from corpses. you never know ;)

Helm's Hold

Yuri the Knife is in one cell - if you free him and he runs to warn the others. You have to kill him to stop him. I just talk to him and then leave him there.

errr... and miss out on 200-something XP for killing a bad guy. how do you survive this game? i'm not advocating pointless killing here but... errr... whatever.

OK, now head over across the bridge. You'll meet a visage that tells you Desther served his purpose and now tries to defy his fate. Go into the courtyard. The corpse right by the doorway holds a gem. The gem activates some robotic "friends" that help you kill the enemies. I actually don't like to use the gem until the end because I want to kill all the enemies (and get all the XP) myself.

i'm not sure, but i think you'd get the XP anyway. you do when your henchman does the killing, after all. if you enter the room with the robotic friends (which don't really fit a d&d universe, miss... they're animated armours actually) without the gem, they attack you. you can thus either enter on the right side. or take the cave entrance.

Working your way around, Chaohinon of the Void is in the top right. He wants the Black Grimoire ritual book in the study. I refuse to free him and take the book. Up center is a book of Helm on a shelf. South of here is where the 'main entrance' is - you can put the gem on the pedestal if you want to activate the robots to help you out.

ok, not reading creatures' dialogues and quest book descriptions carefully leads you to here... the grimoire also contains banishing spells. put it in the altar before the demon creature and banish it for xp and good points, i think. then place the book of helm there instead and you can summon the spirit guardian of the place, which had been destroyed by the demon. you get another batch of XP, good points i think and the spirit lets you choose a reward. a magical weapon (a longbow with + i think), a magical item, the blessings of helm (true ones this time: increased attack, strength, endurance, defense etc... there were like six green belssing icons next to my character) or his insight on things. i reloaded and took the magical item, which i later identified as a ring of element protection (fire, ice, acid, electricity...).

The room left and straight is the final room so clear out the other two first. Then go in to kill Desther. Kill the rest before starting in on him. He gives up and you get 300xp.

errrrm. not quite. go in the main room first. kill off some ritual creatures to break desther's defence and try to kill him. i couldn't, so i just lured the creatures into the corridors and took them out as they came, but not all came. when desther arrived and he surrendered, all creatures disappeared, except the ritual ones, which i killed off easily. it also cleared the neighbouring rooms, so raid the chests there. make sure you've done everything else in the hold before going for desther, because once you entered that door, it seals shut with a force field.
well... this was my 2 cents on the walkthrough. presuming anyone interested finds it... coroborate it with what this chick wrote at the link i provided. am not sure there aren't other things left out, but at least you have more covered now.

l'ombellico del mondo

you know those youtube clips where american citizens find it perfectly ok to be asked the question "which country should the u.s. attack next?" without asking themselves why the u.s. should attack anyone? and they randomly name a country, from afghanistan, to any of the koreas, china and even france? and then, when asked to point out on the map, they indicate australia as north korea and new zealand as south korea?

well... until recently, while i was convinced that such people exist, and it saddened me that should there ever be a referendum in the u.s. on whether they should attack anyone (not a chance for that, they are too much of a totalitarian regime for that, that's right, you read me correctly), these people would be voters, i thought that they were a minority, that they have been picked out to be mocked and laughed at and put on youtube; that certainly you can't equal them to the average american citizen, who may be proud, nationalist, but not a complete self-centered, americano-centrist moron.

well... apparently americans are just like that. average americans, at least. i still retain hope and faith that there are some who think differently, though they seem a somewhat obscure elite now. let me tell you why.

i work for a multinational company with headquarters in several continents. my job is at the welcome center which works 24/7. yesterday i received a phonecall at 11:15 pm EET (that's eastern european time, for you american folks; with europe being that small continent on the other side of the atlantic ocean - the one on your east coast - just north - as in "above" africa - that big piece of land in the rough shape of a triangle. by the way, a triangles is that form with three sides). that's GMT +2.

it was from a lady from the headquarters in the u.s. she shouldn't have phoned my in the first place, as she was looking for someone from another department, but skip that. anyways, she insisted to look for that someone and to be put through immediately. i thought it might be an equipment failure emergency and i asked just how urgent the matter was. to my surprise, i found out that it was no such trouble and the lady merely wanted to communicate the person here a password for an application.

"errrr.... ok, so this can wait until tomorrow morning, right? you know, there are time zone differences, and it is past 11 PM here. i wouldn't want to look up and call someone on their personal mobile phone at this time, as it's... a bit late". silence. and then. 'oh, yeaaaaah, yeah, sure, it can wait." she was having a revelation, i could hear it in her voice. like doooooooooooh! when you make a phone call on the other side of the planet, don't you give a moment's consideration to that? i do it even when speaking to someone one or two timezones away... hello, the earth isn't quite as flat as your brain, you know? geesh!

new blog

yup. my sixth. the fith on blogger.
addicted? who, me? noooooo waaaaay.
:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

since i've taken them out of my profile, here is the list, links are in the links section where needed.

personal blog - the one you are reading
closed lyrics blog
open lyrics blog - dragon mouth
photography blog - dragon eye

*** a day, a song ***

well... enjoy :)

come to my window...

yup. you got it. saturday afternoon, stuck at the office. peace, quiet and unfortunately a headache. which has kept me from staring at the screen and from reading till half-way past the shift. what can one do as an alternative? yup. think. and that's just as bad an idea as ever.

i opened the window wide. i can't sit by they window. well, i could, but i couldn't see outside, as the windows are rather high set, the sill is pretty wide and about the height of my chest. so i stood by it. my jacket was there, on the central heating because it needed to dry. it rained so hard as i was coming to work, that the rain actually soaked through in places, my t-shirt was wet on my back. not to mention that my jeans were soaked up to my knees because some idiot considered it perfectly ok to speed through puddles in a weather like this. anyways, i'm digressing. but then again, that's normal for me.

as said, i opened the window. i cuddled into the spread jacket, which was nice and warm from the heating. and there was fresh, crips air on my face. it's still raining outside, though not so heavily. barely past seven in the evening and pitchdark, a black darkness (yes, darkness can be otherwise too... dark blue, for instance) filled with little yellow lights in the distance. and a few disturbingly coloured ones, from commercials. but mainly yellow-orange ones. and some nearer, from the street lighting below (did i mention my office is at the fourth floor?). i have always loved the way streetlights reflect in the wet asphalt at night. it creates a special atmosphere. i like that.

so i stood by the window for nearly half an hour, my belly and arms nice and warm from the central heating and the jacket, my back cool from the fresh air streaming inside. and my forehead cooled by the night air (is 7 pm air night air?). that did my headache well. i've shut the window now, as the office was getting too cold and the headache is coming back too. i think i'm going back.

if i think some more, i might even write something. because such demons as awake in times like these can't be defeated. you either surrended and succomb, or let them out in the world in some non-destructive way. that, for me, is writing. i don't have many who care about them, not anyone who could even begin to understand them, and none on whom i'd dare to set them lose. so i let them go into the night... you can sometimes catch a glimpse of them, at nights, if you pass by my window...

for musical illustration click here.

second picture by ahmet kasim.