>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> WELCOME TO <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< ___ ___ __ __ _____ ___ / __| ___ / _ \ ____ \ \ / / _ _ | __ | ___ ___ / __| | (__ | _ \ | _ | |_ / \ V / | \| | | __| \ \/\/ / \__ \ \___| | / |_| |_| / / |_| | .` | |_____| \ /\ / |___/ |_|_\ /___| |_|\_| \/ \/ --- * ISSUE 7 * --- --- * C R A Z Y N E W S ! ! * --- Welcome to the seventh edition of CrazyNews: you've seen the web site, you've spodded on the talker - now read the newsletter! --- * Contents * --- * Introduction * The News! * 69 Reasons -!NEW!- * Tuna Bake - A Meal for Spods * Admin Admissions! * The Art of Poof * Osy's Travel Tips * Interview With an Editor * Residents Homepages Competition * Big Al's Woodworking Tips * CrazyStats * CrazyLands Tutorial * Submit Stuff * Mailing Information --- * Introduction * --- Welcome to another issue of CrazyNews, this is the seventh issue and for the more observant of you, yes that means issue 6 seems to have gone missing. Another case for the X files or just some kind of mystical paranormal happening? Read on... It all started when the last issue was sent into that vast entity called the internet and seems to have mysteriously been swallowed up, by what or whom I really don't know. Agents Ratcliffe and Gordo (of the FBS, Federal Bureau of Spods) were called in but after their valiant attempts in investigating the affair, the whole matter seems to have been covered up... trust no one I say. Anyway, I'll just finish by saying that this months issue is a bumper issue as mysteriously most of the content from the missing issue seems to have turned up here, so enjoy it! See you all soon! ~Raist --- * The News! * --- * UPDATE - Globe Trotting CrazyLands Residents! * Simba, Skid and Ostrich are all home! Glad to be back for the most part so we understand. Ostrich took a trip back via Northern Ireland which she apparently enjoyed. Nexus also had a few days stay in sunny Colchester recently, lots of spods descended on Harwich Road to say hi and lots of fun was had all round. Spods are constantly visiting each other around the world, and we try to keep you informed of visits - send us a postcard here at CrazyNews (crazynews@crazylands.org)! If any of you are visiting anywhere this year, let us know and we'll set up our own 'CrazyWorld - Places to visit Guide'! * New Articles * This month there is yet another new series of articles - 69 Reasons. Check it out, it should be a regular submission! Look out for an article from the ancient and venerable, (though possibly not always wise), talker veteran, Grim, next month. He should be sharing with his insights into the talker world in general. We can't wait. [No, honestly, we can't, that wasn't sarcasm! - Ed.] As always, if you have articles, or ideas for articles, get in touch with us at: crazynews@crazylands.org * CrazyLands T-Shirts: *THE* Official Spodding Gear! * Help support CrazyLands and show your true colors by getting your hands on one of the new, limited first-edition CrazyLands T-Shirts which are still available at a great price! They look great and will help to keep CrazyLands running. For more details look at the web page (http://www.crazylands.org) or email: Canada: nexus@crazylands.org Price, 20 Canadian Dollars USA: mulder@crazylands.org Price, 16 American Dollars UK (and elsewhere): swiff@crazylands.org Price, 10 UK Pounds --- * 69 Reasons * --- We intend to present you with 69 reasons for something each month. Some months it might be 69 ways to cook a chicken, or 69 reasons why politicians are wise, upstanding members of society [unlikely - Ed], or it may be 69 things to do on a wet weekend in Wales, in the UK [even more unlikely? - Ed], but whatever the reasons are, they should be pretty funny. Simba starts the article running with... * 69 Reasons Why CrazyLands is a Great Talker * 1. Tuna bake at the Essex spodmeets. 2. The belief that pink ostrich milk exists and the proving of it by Ostrich herself. 3. The mad toucan. 4. The newbies, ressies, staff and admin. 5. Having a place to stay (or live at) when you travel across the pond 6. Goliath. 7. Net.relationships. 8. Net.marriages. 9. Skid digging a swimming pool in the hub. 10. Late night spodding when you should be sleeping. 11. Ratcliffe's marriage to Gladys. 12. Alien and his mutant dwarfs. 13. Nevyn's coding. [Isn't this supposed to be reason's why we're great? - Ed] 14. Nexus' 80's music quest which has finally been completed. 15. Zettl and his bug logs! 16. CrazyNews. 17. Spodgear! Get your t-shirt for only 20 CDN, 10 GBP or 15 USD. 18. Hedgehog's transformation into Sonnyk. 19. Singing of favorite songs in the hub. 20. Idlepooch. 21. Snowman's melting. 22. The port number - 6969. 23. Playing Jeopardy while it is on TV and winning because your television feed is 3 seconds ahead of everyone else. 24. Watching X-files together on Sunday nights so you don't get too scared. 25. Simba's recent engagement to Grim, and affair with Raist. 26. Ostrich marrying everyone. 27. Finding out if Mrs. Raist really does exist. 28. The flappy CrazyLands greeting. 29. The old friends and family atmosphere. 30. Place where you can bring the kid's you babysit. 31. Place you can bring your dad. 32. Over 3 years and still going! 33. Seeing Magenta cause trouble all by herself. 34. The Morris crowd. 35. The Essex crowd of UK types. 36. The Scarborough crowd. 37. It's home. 38. It's a place where, everybody knows your name. 39. The Merliness of Merl, Merlin, and Merlot. 40. Insight's ability to log on to CL with a Commodore 64 and Swiff believing he really did. 41. The Al/Alien mixup. 42. People to pounce on - LITERALLY!!! 43. The sessions. 44. Playing draughts, sps and ttt. 45. The Darby's days when no Scarborough spod would log on Wednesday nights until after midnight and a few pints in them. 46. Accidentally bumping into Gordo frequently. 47. Grim's birthday. 48. Seldon asking how to use the new socials with twinkles when no one knew how to use the new socials. 49. The new socials which people are still trying to figure out how to use. 50. Introducing Barenaked Ladies to the world. 51. Vivaldi's opera singing. 52. Id's welcoming of newbies. 53. The trans-Atlantic loves. 54. The good ol' days when... 55. Easter 1999 Toronto spodmeet (we hope!). 56. Merl hugging the hub. 57. The mistells. 58. Cannot find command 'tlel'. 59. Hugging yourself. 60. Newbies hi5ing themselves when they are trying to say hi. 61. Ski trip to Blue Mountain and the video it created. 62. Trying to figure out how to spell Mahiswaradas. 63. Our three year anniversary. 64. Newbies that ask for SU and apparently are the best coders on the planet. 65. The random bops. 66. Having 23 ressies on at one time. 67. Typing a 6 and a 9 and saying you went 69 with someone. 68. Finding out someone's REAL name and talking to them face to face for the first time. 69. The laughs, the cries, the joys, the tears, the smiles - we are a huge family of friends - keep it up! --- * Tune Bake - A Meal for Spods * --- Tuna bake seems to have developed into the official meal of CrazyLands (shortly followed by Kraft Dinner?), so this month I decided to write down the recipe for everyone to use, along with some hints and tips about what makes good bake. This recipe is to feed 3 or 4 people, depending on appetites. There's information below on how these amounts can be changed to vary taste. For the purposes of this article, here's a couple of translations - sweetcorn = corn and crisps = chips. * Ingredients * 3 small tins of flaked or sandwich tuna fish. 500g (approx) pasta twists. 2 Tuna Bake sachets (containing magic Tuna Bake dust). 1 1/4 pints milk. Mushrooms, sweetcorn or peas to add, all of which are optional. Cheese (grated) for topping or addition into the sauce, optional. Crushed crisps for topping which is optional. * Method * 1. Start the pasta cooking. 2. Add the sachets to the milk, blending. 3. Warm the milk mix until just boiling. 5. Add mushrooms, sweetcorn or peas at this stage. 6. Add any cheese required in the sauce at this stage 7. Whilst the milk is getting hot, drain the tuna and add. 8. Mix all well. 9. Drain the pasta when cooked, and add to the sauce when it's ready. 10. Mix well. Officially Tuna Bake is supposed to be baked - this is optional. 11. Add to shallow oven proof dish. 12. Top with crushed crisps and / or cheese. 13. Bake in medium hot oven till crisps golden brown or cheese has melted. 14. Serve and enjoy! * The optionals * Tuna Bake varies from dish to dish. Of the optional ingredients, cheese makes the dish heavier and thicker, you don't need much. We usually use Cheddar or Red Leicester cheese (or perhaps Parmesan for the topping). Mushrooms are the favorite addition, in whatever quantity you like (usually about 6 small mushrooms or 3 big ones). Thinly slice and add to sauce early so they cook properly. Sweetcorn used to also be fairly common, though you don't need much and it kind of invades the dish somewhat. Peas are a recent innovation but very popular with some. Definitely adds a certain something, but not for everyone. Actually baking the dish is also optional (as mentioned). Though this is the official recipe, it does add a few more minutes to cooking time, and a lot more washing up! I only do this part of the cooking when I'm making a propper dinner for guests. If it's just spods, the meal is quite nice straight out of the pan with the cheese topping. * Varying the ingredients * The idea of adding more sauce mix and slightly less milk makes a stringer tasting sauce. More milk can be added to make the sauce thinner. We're also adding under the tuna quotient for the amount of sauce, again this makes a saucier mix because the tuna doesn't invade as much. This just happens to be how we like it because we add lots more pasta than recommended so we need that extra sauce. I've never tried it, but for vegetarians it might be possible to substitute the tuna for something like tofu. I've no idea what this would taste like, but if you work out a vegetarian version, please let me know (at swiff@crazylands.org)! * Tips * - Don't let the milk burn on the bottom of the pan, keep stiring it. - Don't add too much cheese. - Drain the pasta well, or the dish will be 'sloppy'. - Leave a small amount of oil / brine in the tuna (don't drain it totally) and this adds a moistness to the dish. - After mixing the pasta and the sauce, keep stiring in the hot pan for a while to help 'dry' it a bit more if necessary. - Don't under feed spods - they can turn nasty if they don't get enough tuna bake. - The tuna type used changes the texture and taste quite a lot. Try different brands of tuna to find out which you like best. We use John West Skipjack Sandwich tuna in Vegetable Oil (I think). * Supplies * I think it's Colemans that make the sachets we use, and as far as I know they're only available in the UK. If any overseas spods want sachets though, let us know here at CrazyNews and we'll see about sending some over. * Washing up * Keeping the washing up to a minimum seems to be an advantage for us spods, due to our packed schedules of logging on, logging on and of course, logging on. If you're careful, you can get away with only having to wash up the following stuff: 2 saucepans 2 to 4 plates 2 to 4 forks 1 measuring jug (for the milk) 1 wooden or stiring spoon 1 stiring spoon for the pasta (sieve spoon) 1 colander / drainer Good, eh?! * Mythology * It is said that if you don't actually oven bake the dish at the end, that you can't really call the dish tuna bake. It is also said, that if you should foolishly forget to add the tuna into the mix (it's happened more than once), then you can't call it tuna anything either, and therefore that makes the dish just . Make a strange blank but forced staring motion here for the name instead of saying anything. Oh yeah, everyone seems to think that this dish is pretty good for you too - so that's good (though apparently can be high in fat if you add lots of cheese). It is customary when trying to annoy the person cooking to ask for tuna bake, but leave in a huff and not eat any. This really does work. There is also a tuna bake song which can be sung to request tuna bake. This song is both annoying and bland, with few words - but the spods like it. :) A wav file or sheet music may become available on the web sometime, you never know! * History * The dish has been made in Essex by spods for over 2 years now. Almost every time there is a spod meet we have tuna bake - it's a tradition. Enjoy your meal! :) - Written by Swiff --- * Admin Admissions! * --- Hi everyone. I've actually got something to admit this month, actually something about me. It's taken a while for me to admit it to myself, but now I think it's time to 'come out' so to speak and tell the world. The lack of CrazyNews issue last month was really my fault. There you go, there it is. I can stand up and face things now without cowering in shame at my secret. Basically, the issue was running very late *bop's Raist* and by the time I got it to add the finishing touches and ship the thing (yes I do do that usually), I figured it was too late. So through my abject laziness I decided to skip the issue. Of course, some would have you believe that mysterious forces affected issue 6, so it never existed in our space time. That could be true I guess, and if you'll accept that theory instead of blaming lazy boy here, then that's cool :) Anyhow, this month is a packed issue to make up for it... though I hardly thinks it's fair that we should have compensate for cosmic forces, eh? (as the Canadians would say). There is other news from the Admin / Coding front, however, which is actually good news! Nevyn has been working away on the code (as is usual) and ironing out some of the hundreds of bugs you've all been helpfully reporting. It _is_ the case, by the way, that we get and read every bug you log on the talker, and all of them that are actually valid (and most are) are in a queue to be sorted out. Suggestions of course are always welcome, and Nevyn has been implementing a lot of those recently as well. I hope you all enjoy this issue. As always, Raist wants feedback and input - good or bad. Again, apologies for last month, if anyone finds issue 6 (ever) then let us know. Happy spodding! ~Swiff --- * The Art of Poof * --- It seems that Flipper has been getting people to go and hit her friends wish cushions and pillows via the talker. While this kind of abuse is not encouraged, we did feel it was only right for her to explain _why_ these attacks (apparently referred to as being given a 'poof') were taking place. So when she mailed us this explanation, we were more than happy to pass it on to you all. * The Art of the Perfect POOF * Just a whimsical show of youth you say? A clumsy pillow pat to the face? No, no, this is not so. What does the POOF actually deliver in its nose tickling, hair messing message? Nothing but friendship, fun and the most sincere of wishes for sheer annoyance. To be so lucky to be on the receiving end of one of these such "POOFS" would be considered to be an honour. As Ostrich has been in this position many a times, we can all sit back and envy to have such "POOFED' out hair, "POOFED" noses, or "POOFED" ears. May we all be so lucky to receive some in the future! [At this point we removed a blatant attempt to make you pay for the pleasure of being 'poofed' by Flipper herself. We will not pass on the address to post cheques and money orders to, but we will say it started with, 'I WANNA BE POOFED!'. Incorrigible. - Ed] - Written by Flipper --- * Osy's Travel Tips * --- * Strategic Cramming - (commonly known as "Packing") * When in doubt - you don't need it! This is the Golden Rule when packing for your trip. The less you take with you, the less you need to haul around with you. The less you haul, the less you hurt, the happier you are. You'll be surprised how little you *actually* need. Suggested Packing List: 7 pairs of undies 2 pairs of shorts 1 pair of hiking boots 2 pairs of jeans 1 Polar Fleece 4 T-shirts 4 pairs of socks 1 bathing suit 1 towel 1 waterproof jacket 1 pair of sandals 1 pair jammies (boxers and t-shirt don't take much room) 1 pair of flip-flops (for the shower - you'll thank me later) 1 item convertible into a dressier outfit (goes w/ t-shirt, ie. trousers or a skirt) Yep. That's it. That's all I had with me for 8 months' travelling through New Zealand, Fiji, Australia and Western Europe, and it worked out fine. Just think of all the leftover space in your pack for a laptop and modem! ;) Don't be tempted to squeeze in those extra items because you still have room in your luggage. That space is air which is light and very easy to carry, and may provide a space to carry home your most treasured souvenier. << OStriCH has globetrotting plans to make!! >> -- * Interview With an Editor * -- Recently CrazyNews has been promising a bulletin between issues, and as I'm _sure_ you all noticed, CrazyNews was absent from your mail boxes last month. We here at CN decided to talk to the editor - Raist himself - and try and find out what has been happening. We felt that you, the readers, were due some answers. Interviewer: Firstly I'd like to thank you for taking the time out to talk to us. Raist: erm... sure. I: With all the pleasantries over, I'd like to ask you a few questions about the CrazyNews and the CrazyNews Bullentin. R: erm... sure. I: Great! Firstly, how come we actually haven't seen a copy of the promised Bulletin ? R: erm... I: Really? As we thought! So by not producing one, you figured people would read it more? Hmm... interesting idea... What about the absence of the last issue? R: erm... Swiff: Actually, that was my fault... erm, yeah... problem at the publishers you might say, yeah... R: erm... publishers, yeah... I: I see... Well I'm sure all the reader(s) of this will sure appreciate your honest answers on the progress of CrazyNews Bulletin and the production of this Newsletter. I assume we won't be seeing a bulletin anytime soon - if ever. Right? R: erm... I: Yeees. Thank you. R: erm... I: Yes?? R: What are you talking about? I: Well, quite. --- * Residents Homepages Competition * --- This month we announce the first winner of the CrazyLands Homepage of the Month Award, and it goes to : -----~ WINNER ~---- Gunnar http://www.prostar.com/web/gunnar/ -----~ WINNER ~----- Another nicely presented page, with some really interesting fractal links, check them out! Please note, that adding a link to CrazyLands obviously gives you a better page and so more chance of winning. There's information at the CrazyLands web site on how to get a cool animated gif on your page which lonks to us. See: http://www.crazylands.org/ If you'd like to enter this competition all you need to do is make sure that your webpage is part of the CrazyLands webring. Check out http://www.crazylands.org to see if you're webpage is included If your site doesn't appear on the web ring email Nexus (nexus@crazylands.org), who will arrange for your link to be added. --- * Big Al's Woodworking Tips * --- Another woodworking tip this month from our very own craftsman! "When plaining difficult or interlocking grain, lower the cap iron as close as possible to the end of the blade, this reduces break up in front of the blade and will result in a smoother finish." --- * CrazyStats * --- For the number geeks among you here is CrazyStats! Every month we'll give you a list of stats that will guarantee to kill off the most lively of conversations. The new code to produce new and interesting stats has failed to appear, but we're still hoping for it one day. This months CrazyStats effort: Longest up time ever: 22 days and 7 hours+ Current Residents: 1032 Total Online time of: 1.85M minutes Top 20 spods: 1287 days, 5 hours, 55 minutes Longest spod session by: pumbaA Their time in one session: 10 hours, 10 minutes and 51 seconds ...as of 00:22 on 2/9/98. [Coo, very up to date - Ed] --- * Classifieds, Correspondence Section, Personals * --- Wanted, missing issue - Issue 6 which mysteriously went missing this month from email boxes everywhere is wanted by police. Have you sent his issue? This issue was quite short and contained ramblings from various users. If you see this issue, call us here at CrazyNews. * FREE SPACE FOR ALL TO USE! * Your advert here! FREE! This section is where ressies can submit info for other ressies to get in touch with them, to start (or end) a love connection, or to buy or sell goods or information! Please note that all adverts are free, and any one advert will only be run for 3 issues of CrazyNews. The editors reserve the right to remove an advert or decline to display it at anytime. --- * CrazyLands Tutorial * --- Here is the second part (of many) of the twinkles tutorial. Please see issue number 5 for an introduction to twinkles. Back issues can be obtained from the newsletter address: crazynews@crazylands.org * Connectors - Part Two * Last time in CrazyNews I talked about the basics of twinkles, what they are and what they look like. This month, I'm going to try and explain what connectors are and how they give us access to 'pools' of information. Quite simply, a connector is part of a twinkle. In last months example I used the twinkle: $Recv-Name This twinkle puts the name of the person who is reading it into the text where the twinkle appears. Another example of a twinkle is this one: $Recv-Title This twinkle would put the title of the person reading it into the text where the twinkle appears. In both of these twinkles, the connector is the $Recv part of the twinkle. A twinkle will usually start with a connector of some kind. The purpose of $Recv is to give us access to a group of information about the person receiving or reading the twinkle. By following $Recv with the sub-twinkle -Name, we are asking for the receivers name. In a similar way, with -Title we are asking for their title. $Recv is effectively giving us a connector or reference to a 'pool' of information and we are specifying which information we want by using the sub-twinkle. This might sound complicated, but it really is not. When someone reads my say (for example) which contains the $Recv twinkle, I am immediately getting a reference to that player. This reference allows me to look up information about that player. The $Recv connector has the name Recv, but is of type Player. This means that is it giving me a reference to a player. The Player type connector 'pool' contains the following information: Player -> Age Birthday Conjugate Cpu Description Email Emotive Gender Idle_login Idle_time Idle_total Last_on Login_time Login_total Mail_received Mail_sent Name Nationality Plan Plural Possessive Privs Ressed_on Room Schedule_time Setting Spodnumber Time Title Typed_commands Url Each sub-twinkle in the connector 'pool' will show something different. To find out about each sub-twinkle in a connector then you should be able to type: help $Recv-Name ...or which ever sub-twinkle you're interested in. There is more than one type type of connector, and indeed more than one way of accessing each of those types. At the moment, we have seen the Player connector. The $Recv twinkle gives you a player connector, specifically the Player connector of the person reading the twinkle. However, $From will also give you a Player connector. $From gives you the player connector of the person who has written the twinkle - in this case, you. Therefore, $From-Name will always give you your name, under every circumstance. Some of the other connector types that exist apart from the Player type are as follows: Room Time Settings Talker Cpu Raw For example, $Time-24 gives you the CrazyLands time in 24 hour format and $Room-Id gives you the id of the room that you're in currently. The last point for this tutorial is as follows. It is possible to get a connector FROM another connector. This is best described by example. When we use the $Recv twinkle to get a Player connector, one of the sub-twinkles we can specify is -Room. This sub-twinkle does not provide any information directly (like -Name does), but instead provides a Room type connector. This type of connector lets us find out information about a room, in this case the room that the receiving player is in. Therefore we could have a title such as: Your current time is: $Recv-Time-24 ...which would give the player their current time (the time in their time zone) in 24 hour format, or even: You are in $Recv-Room-Id ...which would show the player reading your title which room they were in! Connectors can reach down to an unspecified number of levels. Finally you should notice that each part of a twinkle after a dash (-) starts with a capital letter. No twinkles start with a lower case letter. That's it for this month. You should now be familiar with the idea of connectors and how they work in twinkles. You should be able to see how information is organised for access via this connector system. Next month I'm going to talk about formatting twinkle output. Seeya later $Recv-Name! --- * Submit Stuff * --- If you want to submit anything, use the following email addresses to send your stuff. Please remember that all the usual rules about content apply, and the editors reserve the right to change any submitted articles. Please make sure you say so if you do not wish your name and/or email address to be published!! crazynews@crazylands.org All submissions, jokes or debate topics, etc. crazy@crazylands.org Any email to admin, complaints, etc. Back Issues - Soon to be available on the web page. Currently available at: crazynews@crazylands.org --- * Mailing Information * --- This email has been sent to you because you're a resident on CrazyLands, the talker which runs at: crazylands.org 6969 See our web page at http://www.crazylands.org for more information. If you do not wish to receive this email, please log onto the talker and type: crazynews off If you do not know why you have been sent this mail, please let us know at: crazynews@crazylands.org ...send along the email address that you received this email at and any character names you may have had on the program. Your email address is never published to users or external sources. It is a rule of the talker that you must set a valid email address however, so that you may be contacted if there is a problem or with important talker information. This is not a stored mailing list. --- * The End (of issue 7)! * ---