Unfortunately, if you can’t import a save game, the default option is that Wrex was killed on Virmire. This is a serious bummer for those who can’t import for whatever reason or don’t want to replay ME1 to do so.

If you are one of those unlucky souls who don’t have a save game and you play on PC, there is always Mass Effect saves. Its a web site where people upload saves of various Shepards who have made different choices in Mass Effect.

First I want to give thanks to all the people who supported Team USA. That was amazing to see all the well wishes and support on Twitter, Facebook and the Bioware forums. I’m sorry we didn’t win it for you guys, but we tried.

Second, I have to thank my team: Cat, Tiffany, and Elaine. I have to say that it was incredible being on a team with these women – smart, gorgeous, feminine and video game lovers. It was really validating for me to be with other women that enjoy playing as much as I do. And while our approach might have been similar, our styles were definitely different. And I have to say, I think our new friends at Bioware also learned something about what female gamers love and how that translates to the way they play the game. In that sense, I really feel like we had a real victory. Thanks ladies! You’re the best and I love you! I also want to thank Derek, our team handler from Bioware. He was kind, patient, professional and never condescending.

Third, I have to thank all the other teams. What a great bunch of gamers. It was a blast and I am seriously missing all of you already. It was incredible playing against you and watching you play as well. Team Hungary was solid and I’m happy to see them win. A special shout out to Team Canada and Team Bioware, with whom we spent the most time with before the event. You guys and gals are some of the nicest and funniest people I have ever met. I feel blessed that I was able to meet you all in person.

Last but not least, I have to give it up for the Bioware staff. They were the most generous, genuine, friendly, and kind bunch of people. I really can’t express how awesome they are with words. These people are definitely the reason why Bioware has such success as an organization; amazing talent. Thank you for everything Bioware!

I’m going to be representing Team USA during the Warden’s Quest next week in London. How epic is this? I can’t even begin to speak about it’s epicness.

So what’s this nerdly activity I will be doing to represent my fine country, you ask?

Welcome to the Dragon Age: Origins Wardens’ Quest, a 24-hour gaming event where 10 teams of gamers from around the world are competing for a grand prize of $50,000 to be shared between team members. Each team must enroll as a Grey Warden and fight against the evil forces of the darkspawn. The road will be tough, teams will be eliminated throughout the 24-hour period and competition will be fierce as each team tries to out play and out role-play their competition.

You can watch all the action as it happens on our live video stream as well as support your favourite teams on their dedicated Facebook and Twitter pages. There will also be teams from BioWare and European Dragon Age Communities to broadcast live from the event on the Dragon Age forums, Twitter account, Facebook page and more. Throughout the event we will be giving away Dragon Age: Origins merchandise to fans who tune in and cheer on the competitors.

Join us on Wednesday 28^th October from 10am GMT to support the teams, watch the eliminations, learn more about the game and see who will eventually take the ultimate prize of the Warden’s Quest.

What is even more awesome is that Team USA is all women. Thats right! All women.

So stay tuned. I will post links to all the relevant live broadcasts and hopefully I’ll be able to do some tweeting/blogging/video from the event as well.

Cheer us on and maybe win some swag!

I keep stammering over all my praise for Bioware. What an amazing opportunity and what an amazing company. I cannot wait!

I finally got around to updating all of my profiles, when a friend told me about extendr. The cool thing about extendr is that it gives a nifty little tour option for your links. People can explore your world without actually visiting the Web sites. The browser plug-in to bookmark links to your profile seems to work, but it puts all the links into a “from the web” category. So you need re-categorize all the links into the appropriate categories. Luckily, this is simple in extendr.

extendr is missing feeds. Why not let someone subscribe to updates? The 250 character limit is constraining too. I haven’t seen any of the extendr profiles ranking in the SERPs for name searches either. It looks like that is going to take some time to achieve. The extendr pages do get indexed, however.

extendr could be used in so many ways. People know you from so many different aspects of your life. Manage your personal brand. Find and express your individuality through all the noise. Use it for your business, product.

It will be interesting to see which profiles and aggregators will be adopted on a large-scale in the next few years (and what new ones will appear on the scene). If anything, extendr has make me realize how many profiles I have laying around the Internet. Its a great place to keep it all tidy.

From the Washington Post:

A two-foot snake of unknown species escaped from custody Friday at the Alexandria city courthouse, authorities said.

No injuries or bites were reported in the incident. Officials said that they would search for the reptile this weekend and that court would be held as usual Monday.

An animal control officer said he was sent to the courthouse on King Street between 8:15 and 8:30 a.m. to deal with a snake.

He said court personnel told him that it had been caught and placed in a box but that it had “evidently slithered through” a space surrounding pipes to reach a lower-level mechanical area.

The officer, Jermaine Fox, said he searched that area but turned up no snake. The species was not clear from the description given, he said.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has authorized some snake experts to hunt the estimated ten thousand Pythons in the Florida Everglades.

Read the articles here and here.

Maybe his new tag line should be: “Way easier than stealing my wife!”

He needs the money!

agbn2scjfu

This hero of a man, Bobby Jenkins of Wyoming, saved his lab, Tanker Truck aka Tank, by sucking the snake venom from the bitten dogs nose.

Story from the Casper Star-Tribune Online

Tank’s head had ballooned to three times its normal size. The vet at the Goshen County veterinary clinic, Jenkins said, was surprised the dog was still alive.

After his dog received an anti-venom shot, Jenkins and his mother shopped for groceries to take back to the ranch.

“My heart started beating really, really fast and I had a cold sweat,” he said. He and his mother headed for the hospital emergency room.

“It was awful,” Pat Shimic said Thursday. “I could tell he was ready to pass out. He was turning white.”

At the emergency room, a nurse told them sucking out the venom was the wrong thing to do.

Jenkins received four vials of anti-venom medication.

Jenkins and his mother were stunned at the cost — $3,500 per vial.

“I thought they were joking,” his mother said.”I thought they meant $35.”

Apparently the health care system is on the side of the snakes. Yikes.

Ominous Signs

The hospital said that was the second snake bite treatment this year.

Jenkins said there appear to be more rattlesnakes out this year than before.

Of course there are; the snakepocalypse is coming. But in addition to that the warm weather has snakes leaving their dens.

Apparently Jenkins’ case is unusual.

“I have never heard of this happening to a dog owner,” Dr. Tim Hackett, a veterinarian and associate professor of emergency and critical care service at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, said in an e-mail.

“I have heard stories about the dangers of sucking venom into your mouth but am not aware of any published cases,” he wrote.

“No first aid is generally recommended. Just get to a vet/physician as soon as possible,” Hackett added.

Dogs will be our allies

Zach Walker, a herpetologist with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department, said only a handful of people die from snake bites every year.

The prairie rattlesnake, he said, is not as poisonous as other types such as the cottonmouth.

Moreover, a lot of snakes don’t give a full dose of venom.

“They save it for use on prey,” Walker said.”Some people get dry bites.”

Harassing a large snake is really dangerous, he said.

He said he also has heard that when a dog gets bitten by a rattlesnake and survives, the dog is henceforth immune to the venom.

And this is why dogs will be our allies when the snakepocalypse comes. We will have a race of venom immune uber dogs to fight at our sides.

According to this article on Reuters.com “Toilet Snake Attack: Urban Legend Comes True?” a Taiwanese man got bit on the penis while sitting on the toilet.

“As soon as he sat down, he suddenly felt a knife-like pain and reacted instinctively by standing up,” the China Times said. “When he looked down, he saw the big snake.”

The 51-year-old man, from Nantou County, was under medical care with minor injuries, a director at Puli Christian Hospital said.

What the large yellow and black rat snake was doing in the toilet in the first place is a mystery, but it is clear that snakes are growing ever bolder in their war against humanity.

Just make sure you look before you sit.

If you have a Gmail account, the profile URL can only be customized as your gmail ID name or a series of numbers to mask your ID (otherwise people could infer your email address). If you use a non-gmail account, you can customize the profile URL to whatever your little heart desires. Which is what I did.

Search visibility is pretty much instant, but profiles, for now, are located at the very bottom of the page. I purposely set up my URL for my short name, Jacque, instead of Jacqueline to test. I have visibility for both names in the SERP.

Here is the result for me signed into a different Google account. Note the sponsored link:

Here is the profile on the bottom of the 1st page in the SERP. Note the links to the other Social Networking sites.

A search for my short name, Jacque shows the profile result along with with my full name:

Jackie Urick is a common misspelling of my short name. While I have thought about “dominating” search for “Jackie Urick”, once I realized a few years back that the only other person with my name is some high schooler in Montana (prolly graduated by now even), I didn’t sweat it. Besides, I use “Jacqueline” for my professional name.

What is nifty is that MY Google profile is appearing for the search “Jackie Urick” despite the fact I didn’t list it as a nickname in the profile.

TAKE THAT JACKIE URICK IN MONTANA.

You can visit my profile here: http://www.google.com/profiles/jacque.urick