Xavier Onassiss

Thanks to all for the suggestions. I've been through the above steps regarding the system time and TLS vs. SSL. No luck there. I've got my backup machine (a Windows 10 laptop) fully updated and working properly now. With Windows 7 no longer supported, I think it's probably safest to retire it and move on. Sooner or later I have to learn to use Win10, like it or not.

Does anyone know anything about TLS handshake errors? I think it might be a problem with corrupted data in my browser profile, so I created a new profile. For the moment it seems to have helped. We'll see what happens. I suck at this.

Monkeying around with stuff way above my pay grade and I think I found the problem. Our ISP has upgraded to 5G, and apparently we now have a 5G network connection on our router? (I didn't know this was a thing.) Exact same name as the old wireless network with "-5G" after it. So I connected to that one instead of our old wi-fi, and now the issues I was having are gone. Also, I have six times the connection speed. Still have no idea why I couldn't connect with the old network, but here I am. I'm in shipping and receiving, drat it! And about two minutes after I wrote the above, my browser stopped working, AGAIN. So I haven't fixed anything, really. No idea what's going on here. My browser stops working after an hour or three, I reboot the computer, it works okay again. It stops working. Repeat.

I'm retiring my computer. Or not. Just like that, everything's fine now. I hate computers.

Bitdefender has made my desktop pretty much impossible to use. I have not-so-old (new in 2018) Win7 machine and I've got MalWareBytes running now. I had MWB running simultaneously with Bitdefender, but the latter recently decided the entire internet is a security threat, refusing to load pages, slowing down my browser to the point of uselessness. I had to deactivate it. I've got no issues with MalWareBytes, but I usually keep a couple of anti-malware systems running at once if at all possible. Is there anything else I should install? Recommendations from the Hero Forum would be welcome.

Pathfinder was created using the Open Gaming License for D&D. How could it be anything other than a D&D game?

It's an all-too common occurrence in some parts of the country. I keep getting questions about my curious driving habit of activating my turn signal blinkers exactly once, about a half a second before changing lanes, and then doing so, shall we say... vigorously. I learned it's pretty much the only way to get the drop on the "blinker assassins." Yes, there's actually a name for these miscreants. They're the jerk-wipes in the adjacent lane who stomp on their gas pedal the instant they say a lane-change signal, as if they're on a crusade to prevent any and all would-be encroachments against the sanctity of their precious lane. May they all crash and burn.

I think you're right.

I am, in fact, my own evil twin. Which simplifies everything.

It's like Pixar gave us the Fantastic Four movies we never got from Marvel.

From what I heard, nobody was steering. Wesley Crusher (or Wil Wheaton) would have been an improvement. Continuing this derailment, as it's of no concern to me who (whom?) Cassandra thinks we're being to hard on, or not.

Guess who gets the privilege of operating those detention centers? I can barely use a euphemism like "detention centers" with a straight face, so excuse me for a minute while I step away from the keyboard for a primal scream or something....

A theme song for any and every Bard class character. Warning: a bit of foul language here.

My conclusion is that his hearing went bad at a very convenient moment. (for him)

I am... SARCASMAN! Like I need to tell you that.

I've heard rumblings about a TTA rpg; has anyone seen it?

Another GOP seat may be up for grabs. Who didn't see this one coming? Aside from Congressman Nunes, I mean. https://shareblue.com/failed-memo-stunt-leaves-nunes-in-danger-of-losing-his-seat/

Trump never gets tired of reminding us all how superior he is. Mainly because he isn't.

That would be pepperoni. I nuke it for about half a minute to remove excess grease before it goes on the pizza.

I used to tell people who asked what I want for Christmas that I don't need anything, just get me a pizza. Now we make one from scratch every year because my wife understands me. Merry Christmas!

Update: the robots are now unemployed. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/12/after-outcry-non-profit-stops-use-of-security-robot-to-oust-homeless/

When I went to Canada, someone thought I was Quebecois because of my hat.

Sanity points notwithstanding, I'm gonna have a look at this on my day off.

Tinkering with the clock doesn't really change anything, and it's a huge inconvenience. I say get rid of DST, and then fire the bureaucrats who perpetuated it this long. Also, no severance pay for the dinks who kept changing the start/end dates. They're a menace. Just let me get my precious hour of sleep back this year because somebody owes me for that, and then let's be done with it.

This looks to be quite an improvement for the Hero forum. Many thanks, and congratulations.