Please don't forget to read the bulletin board. Enter +read from anywhere.

The traditional SpinDizzy Halloween party was held Friday at Patch O'Black, local Jellicle cat's, Jellicle fields, in the Midnight Meadows area. Patch, and his lovely wife, Nikon,local raccoon, hosted the event, and decorated the place in a spooky Halloween theme. There were black and orange streamers, some Jack-o-lanterns and an assortment of entertainment. Ping and Kinsor helped Patch set up noises.muf, so all sorts of spooky, creepy and funny sounds and things happened during the party.

Most everyone was in costume. The party's hosts, Patch O'Black was Patch Skellington, and Nikon was dressed as Sally, the patchwork lady of Halloween Town. Argon, local centaur, came as Timoth, the centaur warrior from the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons comic book, Slug, local slug, came disguised as Gonterslug, a spoof of the art and writing abilities of the well known David Gonterman. His poorly drawn costume was quite good, and he entertained other party goers by demanding they read his Gonterman style fanfic. Butterfluff, local fluff, dressed up as Darth Butterfluff.

Cye, local 50 foot vixen was fetchingly dressed as Lina Inverse, and Gilead, local otter, wore a Big (O)tter suit. Ba'ar, local Bear came as Fred Bedderhead from The Country Bears. Boki, local seagull strapped on some stilts and came as a large crane. BarterGarter, local gartersnake and esteemed merchant, wore a green caterpillar fursuit, while Lylas, local black tigress came as a Tiger Angel. Mouser, local fursnake, was disguised as a furpent and Morticon, local evil wallaby, disguised himself as a Care-Bear.

The party was well attended, and everyone had a great time bobbing for apples, eating snacks provided by BarterGarter, and playing with the Player Plinko machine until it became too spammy, and Argon returned it to Centaur Square. All told, everyone had fun, and Patch and Nikon deserve kudos for hosting another great SpinDizzy Halloween party!

The Nautilus laser cannon, being jointly developed between the US and Israel, is a major step forward in the design of defensive weaponry. A non-weaponized prototype, known as MIRACL (for Mid-Infrared Advanced Chemical Laser) has been tested in White Sands, NM, and has shown an ability to shoot down not only incoming missiles, but solid artillery shells as well. The Nautilus is to be a portable, ruggedized version of this weapon, able to be carried on a military vehicle.

"It is clear that this weapon changes the whole nature of warfare, rendering conventional kinetic weaponry obsolete, and unable to even reach its intended target," remarked Gilead, local Otter scientist. That is, however, only the beginning.

"The obvious next step is to mount a pair of these weapons in the 'eyes' of a giant robot," he continued. It is clear to anyone who has ever watched anime that Gilead's observation is correct. Giant robots are able to defeat any and all weapons, aside from other giant robots, which are brought into battle against them. Furthermore, it would revolutionize the entire nature of military service.

"Giant robots are, from all available data, nearly invincible," Gilead said, "especially when piloted by flaming transvestites. Indeed, effeminate transvestites by themselves are pretty much unbeatable in battle (with the obvious and glaring exception of James from Pokemon). Once armies the world over equipped with giant robots, discrimination in the military would go out the window, pretty much by necessity. It'd go from buzzcuts and 'Don't ask; don't tell' to 'Pretty please grow your hair out and put on some pantyhose.'"

That could see a major change in the world power structure. Nations such as India, with their large population of eunuchs who beg at weddings, could rapidly rise to the first ranks of the world's militaries. It would be expected that the US, between San Francisco and the Greenwich Village area of New York City, would still remain the world's leading power, however.

In the more distant future, age discrimination would also fall. "The one thing that can defeat the most experienced, determined, and skillful transvestite in a giant robot battle," said Gilead, "is the inexperienced, emotionally troubled teenager." Nations wishing to achieve military parity with the new world powers would have to start using younger and more poorly trained soldiers in order to level the playing field. It would only be a matter of time, though, before the damaged little brats of the US and Britain, raised on Nickelodeon and Teletubbies, retook battlefield dominance for their respective nations. Paradoxically, Japan, which conducted most of the early, animated simulations proving the effectiveness of giant robots, would probably be relegated to second- or third-tier status. "Their children are just too well educated, disciplined in their studies, and polite to ever defeat even a fairly masculine transvestite in a non-transforming robot," opined the otter.

BarterGarter, local Gartersnake and esteemed merchant has been suspected of experimenting with a high speed item delivery service. Always looking for better ways to make a deal, the friendly merchant has remained tight lipped concerning any inquiries into such service. However, a paparazzi photographer contacted @Action News with the accompanying photograph.

After careful study of the photograph, and interviews with the photographer, @Action News remains unsure of the authenticity and / or the identity of the individual in the photograph. However, BarterGarter's constant search for new ways to make a deal, and her ability to operate the bicycle portion of her trading cart, make the possibilty of this sort of experimentation a very distinct possibility.

As the paper went to press, BarterGarter had had no comment on the photograph. Witnesses report no longer seeing photographic film on her cart.

Every other week, I will be calling attention to the new members of our community. (Editor's Note; ...with the permission of each of the new folks featured, of course. Folks who don't want to be featured in this series, will of course, have that wish fufilled.) This is not to embarrass them, but rather I do it in the hopes that it will encourage everyone to give them a special welcome and friendship.

The following members are new to our community as of a week or two ago at most. Please give them a warm welcome and offer assistance if needed. Who knows, you might even make a new friend or two!

• Darkmirror - flying nocturnal toon cuddly empathetic snuggly magical fluffy shy male Shadow Squirrel
• Borris - Male Polar Bear

Welcome to latest edition of Bearing up, the advice column where Ba'ar (That's me!) has answers to your most challenging questions.

Deer Bearing Up,
Some mean hunters killed my mom and then laughed. How can I get revenge?
Bambi

Dear Bambi:
Get yourself a gun and lock and load!

Dear Bearing Up,
I bought a copy of The Hulk in letterbox format. Since it doesn't fill the whole screen, why does it cost more than the regular version?
Signed, D. V. Dee

Dear D.V. Dee:
It's really quite simple. It may look like you're getting less image, but you're actually getting MORE image. When you see a letterboxed movie you are getting the movie EXACTLY as you saw it in the theatre. Otherwise the images would have to be cut to fit the entire screen. So with more material comes more cost.

Dear Bearing Up,
Where can I buy a Rosie the Robot? I'm tired of doing housework.
Signed, G. Jetson

Dear G. Jetson:
Go on over to your Marionettes, Inc. store and buy one. It's that simple.

Remember possums (to steal a term from Dame Edna ;-D), if you have any questions, please page mail me (Ba'ar) online or send mail to big_bear@operamail.com. Thanks.

This week, Argon asked, "Austin always has a repsonse when you use a global on him. A "global response". Not having seen the same one twice, this week's question is, how many global repsonses does Austin have in his list?"

• Roland says, "It's not a list. Austin really has a group of monkeys typing for him at all hours of the day."
• Tanuki barks, "That sounds more like a contest than a survey, like counting the M's in a jar."
• Gilead chirps, "Austin has Pi! responses, Pi factorial."
• Ping squeaks softly, "More than a few, less than a lot. Whatever I guess, it's probably not. ;)"
• Gem steampuffs for a moment as he computes. @vX .............. [LOADING] "...? More than 'this' and less than 'that'?"
• Suri says, "3012."
• Butterfluff -- Austin has several thousand responses. And too much free time, at least at one pont.
• Adara -- Gee, I'd say Austin has at least 150 global responses. But hey...do we get a prize for guessing closest to the correct answer, like in grade school??
• Tarka says, "I know... 22 of them Argon. Last time I looked."
• Chanspot says, "3012."
• Slug points to his "3012 for vice-Pope" pin.
• Roofus_roo -- My answer to the survey question: 1,100. Give or take a hundred. (I'm actually responding to a survey! The end of the world is nigh!)
• Cye hmms. "Over 100."
• Mouser hisses, "42?"
• KevMan says, "55555. :p"
• Boki clacks, "If I had half the answers in my list, he'd still have twice as many as I. So the answer can be expressed as 2I."
• PatchO'Black mews, "He has one more than you think, Argon."
• Nikon says softly, "Argon, the world may never know."
• Spikey blinks and ponders "Uh..ath many rethpotheth that he wantth? Coz he'th in charge..."
• Dael softly yips, "732."
• Guest1 says, "18."
• Shoe says, "50, There that is a number and that was slightly fun."

When asked for the correct answer, and how he set it up, Austin said, "One thousand responses, total. Setting it up ... the essence is in my _act/def/hug I pick a random number between one and a thousand and store it temporarily. Then the hug picks out response number (that number). The ohug then looks up that same number and picks out that response, and finally clears the property where the number was stored. There's a complicating factor in that a single list can store only 511 lines, but that just means I split the list among several shorter lists."

Error in Sonic the Hedgehog Article

Several weeks ago, an @Action News writer reported that the Sonic the Hedgehog fad had passed and was as passe as pet rocks. Upon happening to view Sonic X on Fox, the editor of @Action News asked the reporter show him upon what he had based this statement. The reporter admitted to having failed in this aspect of his article's research. @Action News does not condone nor encourage innacuracies in its articles. The reporter was required to take a remedial accuracy and facts workshop, and provide the editor with a full summary of the plot of each Sonic X episode for the next three months.

An innacuracy in an article concerning DragonBall Z required the editor to require the same workshop be taken, and full summaries of the plots of three months of DragonBall Z episodes. That writer resigned.

@Action News regrets any inconvinience these errors may have caused.

Submitting a story or artwork for @Action News is easy! Just send it to newspaper@spindizzy.org or qmail or page Argon about it.
@Action News is published weekly on or after 12:01 AM Eastern Time on Monday. Most any type of story or article will be accepted. Generally, we'd prefer things that aren't out and out lies or flames about other folks, and have a basis in the reality of SpinDizzy. Things that occur in public areas are fair game. The things reported don't have to have actually happened, (any more than anything that happens here does) but make sure you don't overstep the social boundaries and rules of interaction that we have. These are pretty broad guidelines, but we expect good sense to apply.

Thanks! Argon, Editor @Action News