August 20, 2002
WOW! HOW DID THEY DO THAT?
I found a fantastic link today that people who are always sneering at movie special effects are going to love. I remember an article in Entertainment Weekly that disclosed, with the help of a surgeon, just how dead the hero of a certain popular movie would be if the injuries he sustained in the story had happened in real life. This site takes a look at Movie Physics; I particularly dig the bit where they talk about people in The Matrix jumping five feet in the air and then hanging a bit before they kick a cop in the chin... at which point he flies backwards into another cop, instead of spinning around and around as the laws of phyics dictate.
Of course, if you want to maintain the illusion, don’t go to Intuitor Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics.
On another note, I offer up my thoughts on the recent TEMPTATIONS REVIEW, live at the Casino Lac Leamy last Friday night, August 16.
And how’s this for the guest of honour at the Birthday Party for me/Chris/Matt on Saturday?
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August 19, 2002
YET ANOTHER RILEY ADDITION
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Sean Riley has joined us today, with his own Reel Short review on “Triple X”, now playing with Vin Diesel at theatres everywhere. Did he love it? Or did he hate it? Check it out on Family News.
And Erica Riley returns with her unique take on parents and teenagers. This should have been published over a week ago; my bad. Sorry.... Check it out on Family News.
And oh, yes... Shea jumps in with “Self Portrait”... . Kewl.
August 14, 2002
WEBSITE ADDITIONS: PERSONAL PAGES
Today marks yet another expansion of the RileyFamily WebSite. Today I am adding the first “Personal” Page. Everyone can have their own Personal Page; all you have to do is send me what you want to see, like Erica did with this EX-cellent new article, or send me an HTML file that you’ve done up. It will be posted in this area.
For now, you will find all Personal Pages under the Family NEWS page link... .
August 14, 2002
WEBSITE ADDITIONS: COOL NEW TOOLS
NEW GuestMap
NEW RileyCHAT
Trying some interactive stuff today. With all these extra doohickeys hanging around, I’m gonna haveta get rid of some things. I think I’ll make a “Stuff” page to collect everything in case some of you still want to get at them, like the Gas Price thing.
First up today: over on the upper right, you’ll see a new kind of GuestBook. It’s really a map of the World, and you can sign in by sticking a pin on the map to show where you are from. I think this is very cool.
Second, you’ll see a new button link on the left called RileyCHAT. It’s a free chatboard where we can post messages to each other, a little different than the one we had a few months ago. It’s not the prettiest, but it works and best of all I don’t have to pay for it or host it on my machine.
Please let me know what you think, gang. Peace out, Ronald.
August 11, 2002
NEW SHAREWARE
NEW Shareware: Doc Commander
NEW WEBGame: Ninja Girls
Check out Doc Commander, a tiny and solid replacement for the Windows Open/Save dialog box, today on the ShareWare page. And for those who like to play online, there’s a really cute , bouncy little thing called NinjaGirl.
August 8, 2002
YET MORE REVIEWS
NEW Review: Master of Disguise
NEW Review: The Hollies Live at Casino Lac Leamy
NEW Review: Triple X
MASTER OF DISGUISE
Reviewed by Erica Riley
Master of disguise? More like Master of CRAP! This film gives off great “WATCH ME!” vibes in the pre
views, but doesn't live up to the promises of a great laugh. The
main character, Dana Carvey, plays Pistachio, an Italian
waiter at the restaurant owned by his father, who is a retired Master of disguise. The plot falls into place when Pistachio's mother and father are kidnapped by the man
who almost caught Pistachio's father 20 years ago. Now, he has to take 'disguise' lessons from his grandfather about how to become a Master of Disguise. He sets out finding
more and more clues with his beautiful assistant, Jennifer.
The disguises are amusing, and there are a few jokes here and there. But unless you have a 5 year old child with you , don't go and spend the $11 on this movie. It isn't worth it.
THE HOLLIES LIVE at CASINO LAC LEAMY
Reviewed by Mike: Check it out in REEL SHORT Reviews... although this one ain’t so
short. Maybe I should start a new page called Real Reviews.
August 6, 2002
MORE REVIEWS
I’ve actually seen quite a few movies that I haven’t commented on here. I’m hoping one of youse guyz or galz will send me some reviews of your own to add. You can review anything you want: the opening of a new store, if you like. Anyway, a bit of catch-up this week as I add THREE - COUNT ‘EM - THREE stunning examples of insight into the latest excesses of Hollywood. Check out Reel Short.
Down on the lower left, I’ve plunked in a language translator. Don’t ask me why it’s set to start with Russian. I think you can stick in anywhere up to 150 words at a time, so if there’s a website you come across in a language you don’t quite get, try pasting some text into the box. Just be aware that if you are translating to Japanese or a “similar” language, the result will be displayed in non-English characters. But for those of you living in Mexico, this little tool could be a godsend around supper or wine time...
August 1, 2002
SOFTWARE TODAY
If you ever chat using AOL Messenger, MS Messenger, or the others, you should try Trillium. This nifty little messenger program lets you log on to ALL your accounts at the same time, and chat with everyone using a single interface, rather than having two or three programs open at the same time. The program offers different windows in one large container, to keep things organized, if you like. You can set the same online and away options as with the other programs. One thing I like: it’s free, and there are no ads linked to it . Unlike, say, most of the others. It has a ton of smileys you can send (although unless the guy on the receiving end has Trillium too, most of them will just show up as a combinations of text letters. And you can apply a multitude of different skins to suit your own taste. Fast, clean, and quiet.
For those of you who download the odd file from the Weeb, try out Star Downloader. I’ve used a number of download tools, and I like to stick with the reputable ones (unlike
Netscape’s downloader and a bunch of others that are advertised as free tools but are really conduits to filling up your hard drive with pop-up ads. And don’t you just love those pop-up
ads that advertise pop-up killer software?!). Star Downloader ingeniously figures out 
how to split up the file and actually get different parts of the same file from different locations. This actually
causes the download to speed up, in my experience, about 300% (which is a big number that really means it’s about 3 times as fast). This is a huge deal for me. But even better, when it is done downloading a
small window opens asking whether you would like to install it, or unzip it, or run it... whatever can be done, it will offer to to it. You never even have to look in the directory to
which you downloaded. And the interface is simple and striking, making it a pleasure to use. One more thing, Mr. Columbo: it remembers everything you’ve downloaded and where you
put it, and you can check for files on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. Heck, you can even tell it to download into dated directories.
July 28, 2002
RANT
Telephones are not gods. I am not a slave to the telephone.
Everywhere, people have their cell phones glued to their heads. I have one, and I leave it in the car. The only time it comes out of the car is when I am expecting an important call. Why? Because I don’t want to be “in touch”.
At home in the evenings, I rarely answer the phone. Why? Because it interrupts me when I’m watching the toob or working or reading. People wonder how I can just let it ring. On the other hand, I have Call Display and two phones that can use it, and two Display devices. So who am I kidding, I asked myself today? And the answer is, of course, that I’m only kidding Bell Canada. I pay for their services and I use them when I need them. Just like my salt and pepper shakers.
July 25, 2002
FAME... what’s your name, what’s your name, what’s your name...
We are truly blessed today: Chris Pirillio 
of TechTV and Call for Help, and LockerGnome fame puts out a
highly-informative, often irreverant, and always interesting newsletter about computers: every morning. This, on top of all his other jobs. He has a lot more energy that your average
dude, that’s for sure. Every so often I have had the pleasure of discoursing with him via e-mail, usually to offer my “insight” or to rant about some point he has raised. Today I got an e-mail from a developer friend in California, Ben E. Brady (can we call him BenE. for short?), who makes a super little piece of software that actually prevents viruses from getting into your computer
via e-mail (and it works!). He was congratulating me on the yummy look of the BBQd sausages on the RileyFamily website. That was interesting, because I don’t remember ever telling him about the website.
Well, you guessed it: Not only did Chris post a recent rant of mine in today’s GnomeLetter, he even included a LINK to our webpage for the overtly curious. (That must have been just before the Roger’s ISP servers went down all around the country as legions of Riley fans rushed to check out my messy little HTML display here!)
I’ve included a link to the online version of the newsletter in our site, because the actual page is live and changes every day. So it rests here now for posterity.... and for eons to come, as I brag to generations yet unborn.
July 3, 2002
CHECK OUT THE NEW STUFF
NEW Online Virus Checker
NEW The Bourne Identity Review
Stephanie’s computer today was an unwitting host to a virus
that spread into her e-mail address book, and sent an infected message to most of the people in the list. And wouldn’t you know it, she’d just installed Windows lately and din’t have her Norton
Virus checker at hand.
How do you go about checking for a virus in an emergency? Well, of course, sometimes it’s too late... but sometimes it’s not. Trend Micro has a free, online virus checker that scans your
system right from the web. You don’t have to install anything. The site will also “autoclean” anything it finds. Let’s hope it never does, but you might want to bookmark this URL: http://housecall.antivirus.com/housecall/start_corp.asp.
=TEMPERATURE WATCH=
July 1, 2002
CANADA DAY!!
... just wanted you to know, in case you didn’t dare go outside yesterday (Humidex of 45 degrees, which is around a billion farenheit), just how hot it got: the sausages in the picture below? Well, I never actually turned the BBQ on...
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June 30, 2002
HOT FUN IN THE SUMMERTIME
NEW Enough Review
We’ve been blessed with wicked warm weather for the holiday weekend. This is a good thing. But instead of going downtown tomorrow and fighting the heat, the parking, the crowds, and the $4.00 chocolate-covereds trawberries, why not do it again? That is, head back to the thee-ayter for another fine example of the best of Hollywood? I know I am. I need more review fodder...
June 25, 2002
LAZY, HAZY DAYS
NEW Minority Report Review
Man, it’s hot, ain’t it?! Nothing to do but head to the ol’ air conditioned thee-ayter.
June 22, 2002
GETTING THE LEAD OUT
NEW Buffy Review; Sweet November Review; The Sum of All Fears Review
NEW Pictures from Judi Riley
NEW Genealogy Page
You’ll have noticed that the old front page content is gone. This is probably a good thing; boredom sets in easily. If any of you want something that is now kaput, just let me know at mike@rileyfamily.ca.
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The Genealogy page is where I hope to answer Lorne’s call for “smarter surfing”. The concept is that you or I might be browsing the Weeb looking for other Riley history, and we would have missed this site if I hadn’t put some hot words in the hidden “find it here” part of the site. But even after getting here, there was nothing that really talked about us or our history, other than the e-mail address page, which wouldn’t help anybody at all to determine just who we are and how fine we are.
For the moment, the G page is a placeholder only... you’ll see some names, but the organization part really requires a tool that I don’t have. Trying to sort things in a table is tedious and frustrating. But I believe Chris is ready to take up the call soon, so hang in there, everyone.
This is where I will dump all the stuff that gets removed from the home page. This is done from time to time to help speed up loading of the home page itself.