Gaudeana Sobari

Yep! That's her. She is my current D&D player character and one of the most grateful and interesting roles I've ever played.

In game terms, she is a 13th level cleric, more in detail, she is cleric (8)+ warrior (1) + war priest(2) + divine devote (2). She's got feats like shield ward, spontanous wounds, close combat, amgongst others. 13th level spellcaster, positive magic (for curative purposes) and banish undead as cleric skills chosen on first level. Remarkable characteristic: Wisdom, Remarkable Skills: Focus, Spell Knlowledge, Diplomacy... Remarkable Saving throw: Fortitude. 13th level spellcaster and four cleric domains: Glory, Protection, Battle and Strength.
She carries a big rounded metal shield, a magic armor found in one of the adventures (Which provides three different energy protections) and a battle axe wielded on the right hand. This axe was handed down in her family since decades, and she inherited it when she was only fifteen and her father died.

Aside the character sheet, her attitude is chaotic-neutral due to the prerequisites of her religion: Tempus, the god of battle, Though she has showed a bit of legacy in some of her actions. For example, she feels a deep identity related to her society (Scar Dale, within the Land of Dales northwards the Sea of the fallen stars) and a lot of her actions takes into account the wellbeing and prosperity of her brothers.

She was born in Travescuna (ScarDale, Forgotten Realms). Not the capital, not the smallest town, but fairly populated and, relaying on other opinions (Gaudeana's included), center of the true law and political power after the advent of several important catastrophes (Pest, sieges, Sembia, Cormyr and Zhent's invasions...)

She left her hometown after becoming a respectable cleric of Tempus. A message intercepted from a spy on his way to Cormyr revealed an enemy plan that jeopardized the integrity of the Council on command, and the name 'Ogloronth' made Gaudeana to travel to that land in order to uncover the responsible nobles, axe in hand.

She never got there... A weird thread was set upon her and other companions that made them draw their attention to the north.

But that's another story.

Europe

Do not get confused. The topic relates to Europe the satellite, not the continent.

Before starting out talking about this curious satellite, let's say that I've been going over wikipedia again, and I've found quite a few articles talking about the universe. How I came to this I don't know, but it is probably due to my everlasting curiosity of learning new things. Yep, wisdom is based on knowledge and how you interpret it. No info -> No knowledge -> No wisdom... :D Besides, It's been the 40th century since the first time man landed on the Moon.

Europe is one of the four main satellites of Jupiter. It is also the most interesting at a scientific level. It is approximattely the same size of our beloved moon, but a bit more colourful, and not as dusty. :D Europe's atmosphera is a weak layer composed by oxygen (100%), but this is not a biological oxygen (which means no plant or biological being has created it). The underlying theory about it says the oxygen is freed due to a surface's reaction to the sun beams. The magnetic field is quite weak in comparison to other planets, however it is rather influenced by the field generated by its father (Jupiter) which is one of the strongest ones in the Solar System. Moreover, sciencists speculates that Europe's core is made up of iron.

Here comes the interesting thing: Europe's surface is not made of earth or silicates as the Earth's is, on the contrary it is made of water, and this layer of water is 90 km deep, which totally forms the crust of the satellite. The surface is frozen due to the low temperatures outside (-170º) and it keeps a salty ocean underneath it, which is likewise warmed by the core activity.

Let's say this water rallies all the conditions to hold life in it, and real beings live within. Wow! That would mean we are not alone in the universe, and there's something else out there. Of course we must think in lifeforms like bacteria or microorganisms. I wont bet my ass there are carnivorous monsters twice the size of a human swimming and killing each other under that thick layer of ice... That would be awesome though, wouldn't it?

Tenada

Finally, I ended and hanged my first serious webpage on the internet. The page can be viewed at www.tenada.es under firefox 3.0 / IE 8.0, according to my tests.

First of all, the spanish word "tenada" refers to an old building to store the grass and food for the cows. This building was used in the past by people from León and Asturias (Northern provinces of Spain).

Now, this word has been taken for more than 17 years to refer to a folk band composed for more than 30 dancers and quite a few musicians. They all keep the Leonese tradition alive by means of dancing, playing instruments and singing. They preserve the songs of old that are being lost through the years, since old people do not transmit them to the new generations. Besides, they investigate and put together old works, old costumes and old traditions aiming for a better understanding of the leonese society, and maintaining the integrity and identity of the old lifestyle adopted long ago.

Technically, the page has everything they need to start out on the internet. News, events, pictures and contact info. Moreover, the control is taken by them and not by me (The webmaster) when it comes to update news or upcoming events. Now, I am working on extending the functionality, specifically creating a mailing list where you can input your e-mail and receive notifications.

I have learnt a lot (PHP, server-side scripting, java scripting and domain related stuff), and I feel a bit proud of it. Hope you enjoy it folks! I've contributed to the Net, at last!

No sense at all, part 3

I jumped onto the next room. In a blink, I saw the lamp nearby the armchair falling over, and the shutter over the armchair thumping violently back and forth. I run to it and peered to the outside. Nothing was there. The street was empty, well, almost empty. A black cat was crossing from one side to the other. He stopped and gazed at me. His expression was like "what the hell?". He leaped a fence and disappeared.

I closed the shutter and turned around. Jeez Louis... What's wrong with you, boy?. When I went back to the kitchen I saw the earring again, and felt a shiver running along my back. I didn't touch it. Neither move it or drag it or pick it up. I just stood there looking at it, as if it was somewhat "alive". Something was telling me that If I touched it, I'd ended up being a victim of murder once again.

I learnt we both could live that way. I did not touch it and it did not try to kill me. However, that tactic didn't reassure me at all. I couldn't stay near that thing for long, even more, I couldn't stay in the same building, so I took my coat and left the house. I needed time to think about what had happened, and give it a try to sink in.

I opened the door and directly run into Terah's presence.

Neural networks

So yeah, this is the topic I´m working on now. Sounds pretty cool doesn´t it?

In fact, Neural Networks is an optional course in computer engineering. And it is so, optional, so many many will miss it. It´s a pity, though others will consider it a salvation.

What is this stuff? Well, Neural networks is a relatively modern branch derived from AI (Artificial Intelligence yo, dummies). In a sentence: It´s the computational representation of human brain. But this definition is way too far from what a human brain really is, since we do not know anything about human brains yet, or at least not as much to create a 'bionic' copy of it, and make it work out.

Aside, it´s been possible to emulate the behavior of a biological neuron. You know, the electrical pulses between connections, and that chemical substance in between where knowledge is somehow stored. (Remember from the school?). So if a neuron can be emulated, then a whole bunch of them can be emulated creating subnets, nets and so forth. The drawback is the human brain is formed by millions of millions of these little things... Up to now, computers cannot store a representation of an entire human brain network. (Not unless we tile the entire planet with ram memory slots and connect each other to finally reach a mother board).

As far as I know neural networks are used to pattern detection, imagery, function approximation and error detection in industrial processes. Real application are Cancer detection, missile targeting, or character recognition.

Playing around with them under Matlab environment (You engineers should know about the program) tought me they are pretty powerful tools. Basically it´s like raise a little brain as baby, teach it with some kind of data (Images of lung cancer, for example) and then try its response inputting a testing parameter (A new lung cancer image) and see if the network has learned something. It usually does!!

All right, enough engineering for today. Listen to some punk, it will cheer you upright to heaven... ;)