HAPe4me

TWI probably had homOcidal teachers, but I think in this case your were speaking of homIcidal. hee, thought it was a fun typo and couldn't resist pointing at it. ~HAP

thanks paw, I was never to waydale, so it is great to know how you got GS going. ~HAP

My wife and I got to spend the afternoon and evening with the boys and their girlfrieds, eating and playing games. We did no exchange of gifts, just spent quality time together. A truly special gift to MsHAP and myself. One of the more relaxing and unpressured holidays of my remembrance. ~HAP

I wasn't making fun of ya Digi, sorry if it sounded that way. You had already CHECKmarked the box, so now uncheck it. HOWEVER, remember some people like their white font, so I don't see how it will work for you to see colors. Understand? ~HAP

SHARON- are you logged in to the forums? You must be logged in, (you can be anonymous or visible in the forums,but you MUST be logged in) SUSHI- I don't know how an avatar can show up in an odd place, they are only placed either before a chatline, and/or in the room user list. I have not seen a problem with smilies showing in odd places. Are you talking about flashchat or livechat? DIGI- what you ask is simple, Options> Text> UNcheck the box that says "use my text color for all incoming..." HOWEVER! This creates another problem. With so many people coming in and keeping the default Blue background with white text, their posts will be white text on your white background. Good luck reading that. (you can select/ highlight their posts, but that is a pain. Perhaps someone else knows some other settings so that this is not a problem, but until the default blue w/ white text goes away, it is a problem, especially when new folks come to the room. (when that happens, I generally switch to a gray text on my end so they can read me, but gray on my white background is tough on the eyes. When people come to the room for the first time, (or anytime, if they keep the default settings), they cannot see your blue or my teal text, in fact mainly they can read white or gray or yellow. USING THE AVATARS to separate regular chatter's lines is one solution. Most of the regulars could be easily identified if they locked in an avatar to put next to their posts. I understand some people like the blue background with white text, they say it is easier on their eyes, but to me it is like the old monochrome monitors, and is uncomfortable. To each their own. Somebody was playing around with the 'transparency settings, and indicated that would help, I have not tried it, nor understand how that would help newbies to see us, since they have enough trouble finding the option button, and where to type, let alone to change settings when they come. anyone have a solution? Maybe you just stay with the few light colors on dark background, or maybe the admins should eliminate the choices of backgrounds. For now, this is not working well, as it is hard for newbies to start with, and for those of us who have gravitated to our chosen colors, we may have to give up on that. Good luck, chatters have a way of working things out. ~HAP

to the top again

Bringing this to the top for a moment ~HAP

Sushi- smilies and avatars show up in strange places? What do you mean? I agree, a common "public log background" is better, and my preference is a light color, i.e.white or beige. Dark backgrounds with limited light colors for text is harder on my eyes. Se the instructions in the thread "Flashchat Instructions" below as to how to do this. The problem of course is that even if WE all make it light ourselves, then future newbies are still messed up with it. They will not be able to see our darker colors fonts with their defaulted blue background. So I wonder if Paw can just SET the default to be a white or beige background? PAW????? PAW????? HAP

its not really that hard, just go in and do it. You do the same thing for setting up the other rooms, except in those you don't have to turn the room white first! ~HAP ;)

Abi- I started a thread and posted instructions for changing the settings in flashchat. It is below, in the OPEN forum. HAP

I do not know if Paw is going to keep Flashchat yet, and I don't think he has decided, but for now, it seems to be the one of choice for its speed of loading. I am posting these instructions to change your settings in flashchat, if you want to use them. The default background of blue does not allow you to see chatters who use darker colors for their text. If you don't care about seeing others, you can chat with yourself and not do anything! Since the program will save your settings, you only have to do this once, and they will be there when you come back next time. PLEASE PRINT THEM, so you can refer to them when you try to use them. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If you do not care about seeing everyone's colors, you can just do this: Click Options> Text tab> Checkmark the box next to "use my text color for all received messages" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Everyone should do at least the FIRST step below, otherwise your default font will be WHITE and NOBODY will be able to see you if they have done the other steps and made their chat background white. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ FIRST: At the bottom, to the right of the I (italics) is the place you select your text color. Set your color to light GRAY for the moment. You can make it anything you want later, but for now this will allow you to see the chat room for now. SECOND: Click Options> effects tab> in the middle it says "Background". Under that it says "Show Background" UNcheck the box in front of those words. Click OK THIRD: Click Options> Themes> find the place in the right column that says "Public Log background" . To the right of that is a color selecting box. I suggest you select a white or beige color (if white is too bright for you). Click OK FOURTH: Click on the square to the right of I (italics) near the bottom of the chatroom, and select the color you want to use for YOUR font color. Do not pick WHITE or you will be in deep doodoo. Do NOT pick Teal, or you will be on my doodoo list (my list is not as deep a ........). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ AVATARS: You can select an avatar from the large list, or you can apparently upload your own, (I have not tried that yet). Avatars can be placed in front of your name in the User List, and/ or in front of your posts in chat. Here is how. Click Options> Effects. On the top left, is the Avatar section. Checkmark the box to the left of the word "MAIN Chat" Select an avatar from the drop down list to the right of MAIN. This will post your chosen avatar next to your posts in the chatroom. While you are here: Checkmark the box to the left of "Room list" select an avatar from the list to the right of it. CLICK OK. That is IT! I do suggest you always click on the B for BOLD. Our eyes are getting older and bold is GOOD, and most of us will thank you for it! The BOLD setting is not saved by the program, so this change you need to do each time you come (like always). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There are other things you can play with if you want, but for now this will get you going. If you find others are using a text you cannot read well, you can ALWAYS: Options> Text> Checkmark the box that says "use my text color for all received messages" If you have already done this, you will need to UNcheckmark that box to see everyone's font colors. Good luck, and happy chatting. ~HAPe4me

hmm ruby Murray was an Irish singer a loooong ways back, so would "having a Ruby Murray" be something about remembering something pleasant from long ago? ~HAP

Paw asked for feedback on the new chat programs he is looking at. Please give him some. It would be best to do it in the thread at the top of "OPEN" that is pinned so it stays at the top. I only started this thread because not many of you are giving your ideas up there! ~HAP (Pope Poop of Chat, Zeal of Teal, candidate for President of the USA, Reverand of the Disreverant)

Yes they are, but there is a problem with having three chat places available. I expect that some of them are still under evaluation, but can we eliminate one of them yet? I do admire Paw for spending time trying to find a chat program that works for what HE needs done at GS. It is his choice to make, and obviously there are reasons he knows that other choices need to be looked at. I don't really care what the reasons are for changing chat programs. Enough said on that. For what it is worth, I like Flashchat because it loads faster, has more avatars, stores our personal settings for when we come back, we don't need to login (if we are logged into the forums) and a few other features that the others do not have. That stored settings thing is a huge savings in the time it takes to start chatting. It DOES need to have sounds added that can be inserted in dialogue, however. It DOES need to be made simpler for the users to settle on background colors or themes that work to see different text colors. How about just eliminating the choices and making the background white like our previous chats have been? The most time spent so far in Flashchat so far has been in discussing "I can't see your posts in that color" as a result, people have gotten frustrated, and never gotten to see the other features that are available there. A work around for now is to NOT check the box at Options> Effects> Background> "show background". this gets rid of the annoying swirl patterns and gradients of the themes. You can then select the color you want for the dialogue background at Options>themes> Public log background Until we settle on a "public log background" color that works, each user can check the box at Options> Text> "use my text color for all received messages" If you select an avatar to use next to Main chat, it will make it easier to differentiate between other chatters. Options> Effects> Avatars. It is cool that we can set an avatar next to our posts, and also in the user list. This limits the need for different text colors somewhat. We can also leave a note that we are on the phone, away, here, or coming back, in the user list. the big benefit of Flashchat is that it seems that everyone can get into it!!!!!!!! (even if so far they apparently get frustrated at learning how to use it) OK, I hope someone else posts some ideas, so we can get ON with something,

hehe MaryP tell us the time difference from wherever you are, in relation to say the east coast, and we will see what we can do. Weekends people stay around till midnight sometimes, and maybe we can catch you Saturday or Sunday morning your time. Looking forward to speaking with you from across the pond. ~HAP

this warning was at the top of the Forum Home page when I entered GS: IPB WARNING [2] implode(): Bad arguments. (Line: 62 of /sources/lib/flashchat_functions.php) don't know what it means, but I bet you might want to know.

its 12:15 am mtn time, and i see google.com is logged in at GS? I couldn't PT them though. Do they have a password? ~HAP Listing them by "last click" it says Google.com is contacting a member by e-mail, and they have been doing it for 30 minutes. Dang, that is longer than one of ron's posts!

who alleged that TWI had interest in a acquiring nuclear weapons? members? locals? the agencies? you? JKB do you have copies of said documents? post them! You say they have info on this period of time in TWI, Do they give evidence of the pursuit of nuclear weapons? Be it far from me to give a dang about covering for tWI, but you are asking us to believe this statement based on your post? what is this, an attempt to get Bush to attack new knoxville? The intelligence on them is about as valid as it was on Iraq. bah humbug. ~HAP

hmm, doesn't seem to have posted the cartoon. sorry It was a snowstorm stuck car, with two people trudging through waist deep snow. One says to the other, "keep repeating, 'at least we don't have hurricanes, at least we don't have hurricanes....' "

Paw, its cool that you can see who is in chat at the bottom of the main forum page, but if someone in the forums AND in chat, they only seem to show up as being in the forums. i.e. right now, there are 5 in chat, but only two listed as being in chat on the forum page. the rest of us show up as being in the forums.

LOL Lifted, In 1982 I remember a branch halloween party (My3cents was there). I dressed as the Pope too, and my wife, who was a very obvious 10 months pregnant, dressed as a nun! ~HAP

thanks for the tweaks, dfnot is good now. For what it is worth, the room had lots of warnings about trouble with the AOL browser, but I tried mine (AOL 8.0) and it worked fine, actually better it seemed (faster) than with the usual IE browser ~HAP

you can change the screen size it takes up by clicking on the box at the bottom with the four black arrows (next to the "sounds button". Bold does not seem to work, unless you use the control p[anel each time and change from the default font size to large. Ithat works better for my eyes anyway, but I wonder if the default size could just be the larger font? It is a pain to select color, font and bold, all before you can start chatting. Pretty much the room seems like the one before the current um dead chat (is that the opposite of "live chat"?) I am sure after a little tweaking, Paw will have it up to our standards soon enough Another note, clicking the link from the main forum screen , closes the forum screen, so ya have to go open a new window to do forums AND chat. I like the other chat room because I can log into GS and then go to chat and keep the forum open all the while, without having to go make a new window. ~HAP

Moderator: I posted this in the open forum since its not just the politically inspired people who should pay attention to it, or who could benefit from knowing how they are being cheated out of billions by the Federal Government, or could benefit if they found out how to get a refund. Move it if it gets too politically oriented. This cellphone tax has been ruled unlawful, but the Federal government STILL requires companies to collect it and send them the money. Even though three courts have now ruled on the Federal tax applied to cellphones, the government still requires the tax to be collected and sent to them. Is it worth the paperwork to apply for a refund? What is with this stiffnecked policy? Another example of how much our government cares about us and legal taxation. This was on the USA Today site yesterday: http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-1...one-bills_x.htm ~~~~~(Begin pasted article)~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Posted 12/12/2005 11:29 PM Cellphone rulings could mean billions in tax refunds By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY Phone customers are due $9 billion in tax refunds and a 3% cut in wireless phone and long-distance bills, according to a series of federal court decisions. But the federal government continues to collect the tax and requires so much paperwork for refunds that only big corporations are likely to benefit. On Friday, a court in Washington, D.C., became the third federal appeals court since May to void the tax. Two other federal appeals courts, covering seven states, have ruled the tax unlawful, and cases are pending elsewhere in the nation's 13 appeals courts. In all, nine federal courts have ruled that a 3% federal tax doesn't apply to phone calls that are priced only by how long a person talks — not by how far the call travels. That means cellular phones, Internet phone service and about one-third of long distance calls would be exempt from the tax. The wireless industry estimates that consumers would save about $4.5 billion a year. Taxpayers also would be due three years of refunds — about $9 billion. The cellphone industry wants the tax removed immediately from bills and the money refunded. "Our customers shouldn't be paying a tax that courts have repeatedly found illegal," says Steve Largent, president of CTIA-The Wireless Association and a former Republican congressman. The Bush administration has not said whether it will appeal to the Supreme Court. "It's a matter subject to litigation, and that's all we can say," Treasury Department spokesman Taylor Griffin says. An appeals court decision in May voided the law in Florida, Georgia and Alabama. The government did not appeal but continues to require phone companies to collect the tax in those states and pass it on to the federal government. "It sounds absurd, but the law is written so that the government can keep collecting a tax even though it's been ruled unlawful," says Hank Levine, a lawyer representing businesses that challenged the tax. Federal law makes it nearly impossible to get an injunction to stop the government from collecting a tax, he says. The average consumer would be entitled to a refund about the size of the average $49.52 monthly bill paid by the USA's 195 million wireless subscribers. However, consumers would be required to seek refunds individually, documenting how much they paid each quarter in separate claims. The time limit for refunds is three years. A person entitled to a $50 refund would have to fill out forms a dozen times to get the three years' worth of refunds permitted under tax law. Collecting records and preparing the form would take about seven hours. "I don't think many people will make the effort," says Brad Waterman, a tax attorney in Washington. Big businesses would benefit most from refunds, especially those with large international phone bills. Convergys, which operates call centers around the world, has filed for a refund of more than $6 million. OfficeMax, a retailer, seeks $380,000. ~~~~~~(end of pasted article)~~~~~~~~~~~ HAP

Ok George, thanks for mentioning "There was also some other young lady who escaped deprogrammers and made it to the class with only the clothes on her back." I couldn't remember if my the incident I recall was PFAL77 or AC79. when you mentioned Athens, that confirmed it. My wife was at the AC class, but I had stayed home. I got a call from Athens asking me if I could be available to go to the airport here in Denver and meet a plane and a girl transfering planes. They wanted me to purchase a ticket and fly with the girl to Atlanta and stay with her until she got safely on a plane there to Ohio where she would be met by several TWI people and escorted to Athens. The concept was to not leave her alone in Atlanta for a moment, as there was a concern of her being intercepted there. Of course I could not refuse this spiritual duty, but I was certainly scared. You see I was (and am) 5'8" and about 140 pounds, so if we were intercepted by deprogrammers I would have only my revelation skills to deal with the situation. I was told that would be PLENTY! The girl pretty much slept the whole plane trip, she was obviously exhausted and still a little scared. I sure felt "puffy" that the MOG would trust me with such a mission. He did know who I was, and my size. I wish I could remember the girl's name, I have often wondered what became of her. ~HAP