As an update to the War stories, when my sister moved out, not too long ago, she had taken our mean old lady cat to live with her.

We recently had her reinstated to her post here at our house and within 2 days she managed to capture, torture, question, and slay 3 mice.

Actually, she probably went straight on to slaying, but I’m sure they had a good tossing around before the deed was done, in any case.

The funniest thing about that is that she knows that when she kills a mouse, we react in some way that pleases her… because she always makes sure to bring them to us, or stare at us until we’ve had enough of wondering what’s in her mouth and finally realize what’s hanging out. Only then does she drop it, and continue batting it around, under our direct supervision.

She also leaves them as gifts, sometimes just a step or two from my parents bed, or in their doorway.

But those are old stories… the best one is the one from yesterday, when my father was getting ready for work, sliding his foot into his boot only to find a gift that “Fluffy” had left for her human masters to find.

Weird cat. We don’t give her treats or anything. But she always delivers them to us, as if she was trained to do that somehow.

I have no idea.

The End.

Doh!

If only I had tried to learn some basic Flash concepts before diving into advanced techniques and such, I would have realized how simply my error [see last post] was.

If you were interested in the solution, check out my forum post, where I asked and then answered myself.

By the way, it’s just a good thing to do if you find a solution to something you asked about in a forum or some such to go back and fill anyone else in who might be having the same problem as you. Now or in the future.

Oh, and I’m pre-dating my War on Mice story, which should show us as a post a week or so ago. Sorry it took so long. Busy, busy, busy.
The End.

Yes, as cheesy as it sounds, I’m working on building a brandless MP3 player, as well as a movie/FLV player in Flash 8. I downloaded the trial and hit-up the internet for some tutorials, hoping I could finish both within the 30 day limit, making them simply load playlists or some such from an XML file.

(Thereby having two cool flash products I made, perfectly legally, without having to shell out any cash).

With the new Video component ‘thingy’ in Flash 8 it was actually easier to just go through the documentation and build the movie player myself, which works like a charm except for one thing…

When I embed the SWF file anywhere but on an HTML page in the same directory as the SWF itself, the movie plays fine, but the controls never show up. And just to answer the first question for anyone that knows what they’re doing, “yes, I uploaded the skin file”.

So, what’s going on? Because when I view it in the same directory everything is fine. When I copy/paste the exact same OBJECT tags into a blog post, the video plays through once, but the controls never show up.

ARG!

Oh, and as I promised, the story about the war on mice is going to be posted tomorrow.

And just in case you’re celebrating, I hope you all had a happy 01:02:03 04/05/06.

The End.

Please Note: It was very late when the original manuscript for this was written. I am being a good boy, and an honest fellow, and reproducing it as it was written, with very little editing. Oh, and the time stamp is wrong. Please forgive me.

I am officially at war with the local tribe of mive. And by tribe, I (hope I) mean only two or three. When did it all begin? Let me explain…

It was the 31st day of March, 2006 (“yesterday” for the laymen out there). I was fast asleep in my bed.

There was a rustling. Enough rustling to wake me up, which is normally a bit of a task. Just ask my alarm clock.

As I sat up I noticed an ever-so-slight movement among some scattered papers (various printed articles from ALA, and some GED practice papers) and a Wal-Mart bag that was currently storing some paper garbage and a bag of peanuts from Texas Roadhouse (given to me. I’ve never been there).

The movement was less, but the rustling remained.

A-HA!

Within an arms length from my bed was a pesky rodent, aparently trying to burrow in my garbage, or else eating some of my stale peanuts.

I waited and watched, developing a plan…. what to do? I was groggy, not to mention un-armed. But then it came to me… Just beyond the rodent activity zone was my favorite pair of shoes. Well-worn Vans Old Skool Classics, pair two of two.

I must now apologize to any women in the audience, for the plan that came to me was…

CRUSH IT! I’ll grab my shoe and smash it like a bug! Ha! Escape me now, you pesky rat! (mouse… whatever…)
So, ever-so-quietly, I shifted my position, leaned waaaay out, reached beyond my enemy, grasped one amazing shoe, and slowly, quietly moved my upper body back to it’s crouching position on my bed.

I waited.

[there was] Rustling.

Crinkling.

I wanted to see the movement though. I knew I only had one chance to make it work. To get it right.

Movement.

I couldn’t tell exactly where it was. My eyes were still barely working.

Movement.

Alright. It’s narrow enough. He’s surely been there awhile. What if he gets bored? Finishes what he was doing. Or worse… what if he has a spider-sense and will know to leave before I strike?

So I harnessed all of the spare energy from here to the moon, gathered and directed my Chi through my chest to my arm, and Prayed that the mouse knew Jesus on a first-name-basis…

And there was a shock-wave.

A crater 3 feet wide where the shoe hit the floor…. wait… well… anyway… I pressed the big red “Launch!” button in my mind, my arm rocketed down towards the pile of rubble that would soon become a… remain a… pile of rubble.

SLAM!

Surely I woke everyone up. Probably not, though.

Silence.

No rustling.

No tearing sounds, no movement.

No crinkling, no chewing.

I lifted the shoe and surveyed the scene. I wondered if I had made enough contact to make a ‘mess’, or if perhaps I only broke his neck or some such and could simply scoop him up.

Slowly I poked at the papers. The Wal-Mart bag was in the way, and I knew he wasn’t in there, so I pushed that to the side.

With the shoe, I began trying to peek under the layers of paper.

Nothing.

Further in, nothing.

Perhaps further to the right? Nothing.

The stack wasn’t that big… had he gotten away?

And then I wondered…

The Wal-Mart bag. The peanuts!

I lowered my head, my body still on the bed, gazing into the small paper and plastic cave. Nothing. No rustling. No movement. But there must be a body.

Again, the shoe as my tool, this time into the bag. Pushing back the top for a better view…

There was the peanut bag… a small brown paper bag… torn. Probably from “the blast”, I thought… pushing it with the shoe…

THE MOUSE!

Leaping!

One bound, I noticed, and then a leap! The leap so great that he went above the shoe and landed next to my bed, never touching a thing on the way.

Then running!

Then gone…

Was that Mighty Mouse? Did he just fly?

How long did he lay in wait, barely breathing, not moving, before taking his chance to escape?

I simply watched him get away. I supposed for fooling me he deserved another chance. Also, if an atomic shoe blast wouldn’t take him out, I didn’t figure a wildy thrown object would do the trick either.

And so began the war.

Later that day I noticed they all must have been celebrating, because I saw what looked like two mice playing together. Of course, they quickly vanished.

I spent the rest of that day going about my business, all the while allowing my subconcious to develope the plans that will go into motion beginning today.

I have decided to be proactive. I will not set traps on my territory and wait for them to come to me… well, I will, but I’ll also… hunt them down. Find their lairs and disturb them. Chase them out. If they go only so far, I’ll the same again. If they live, they will live as nomadic mice, contantly on the run. they will not be happy like Mickey Mouse. They will not triumphant like Mighty Mouse. No. They will pray the speed of Speedy Gonzalez. They will be haunted with nightmares, perhaps of Pink Elephants, like a certain drunken Timothy Mouse.
I will seek them out. I will destroy them.

Or they’ll leave or something… either way, I’ll be happy.

The End.

I’m tired, and therefore opting for sleep. I have to be at my part-time gig tomorrow morning, so I’ll be writing what I wanted to post on paper, as I lay down for bed.

I’ll be sure to add it tomorrow after I get home.

There’s much to say about mice and how I officially declared war on the local tribe.

“All of this and more on tomorrow’s episode…”

[cue abrupt ending]

The End.