http://www.makeuseof.com/pages/best-linux-distributions

Give that a read. It's still a good guide imo, even if some of the descriptions kind of are lacking.

Honestly, with linux you just have to try out various ones and settle in with some that fits your needs. For example I use mint for my home system but have to use red hat based systems at work.

Shitwizard do you think there's a way to fit a santa hat you could fit into this little picture? Thanks for trying Panda.

http://s13.postimage.org/jxhf1fgl1/Pikachu.jpg

Can someone do this for me? Preferably with a santa hat shaped like this http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/pictures/20000/velka/santa-hat-11289230945H8y.jpg (anything flat like that so that most of the hat will stay in the picture would be nice)

http://s13.postimage.org/jxhf1fgl1/Pikachu.jpg

Ooh ooh I got a bunny head! Can I?

Are you guys looking for backups?

Marriage? Immigration? Neither are things one simply jokes about. They are all serious commitments that must be devoted the appropriate time to plan ahead, prepare for, etc. Both of you overlooked one of the most important parts of the immigration law - proof of your ability to support yourself. (Trust me, I've had to deal with immigration for the past 10 years of my life) This tells me that (and I'm being just honest here, no offense) neither of you seem ready to bear the responsibilities that come with such immense subject matter.

Now, just visiting Canada for traveling -- you should be able to do that if you're an American citizen. Getting approved for permanent residence in Canada (which, by the way, ever since they ridiculously tightened up the immigration law a few years back, is really difficult) itself is a long shot, especially given your situation.

Ask yourself this question - do you really know the pros and cons about living in Canada and the U.S.? I don't think you do. Cost of living, taxes are generally higher in Canada, and finding jobs is also generally more difficult (but there are better things like better health care availability for the poor, etc). What makes you think just moving to Canada with this guy will solve your problems?

You don't seem to have given this that much thought and your desperateness to get out of your current situation seems to have taken much a toll on you. What makes you think living with him will solve your problems? He seems rude and appears as he may have moved on from you. It's really not that difficult to act completely different online (there's a reason why so many of those online predators exist), and I doubt that you actually know this guy very well. Given that, I doubt that your moving in with him will actually in long term help you in any way or form.

Long distance relationships that last till the couple can be back together are rare, and it's really difficult to maintain one unless the two involved are really serious about each other. Speaking from first hand experience, I really don't think this is the case for you.

I seriously suggest that you take care of your more immediate problems first: depression, getting a job, etc. Forget all that immigration, marriage, relationship stuff for now. Living with someone who can't manage their depression, can't support themselves, etc is extremely difficult, and if you can't figure out how to handle those things now, it's only going to get harder for you and your future partner.

I should've clarified what I meant by yelling. What the coaches should do IF NECESSARY is chew out a trolling/rude/whatever player ONE ON ONE AFTER the mix. They should try their best to not let any immature behavior impact answering everyone else's questions, going over stuff, and playing the game. Unfortunately I heard that a coach raged (and by this as in went into a screaming fit, but I never heard who exactly) on a player or two while mixes were going on.

We have a shortage of coaches right now, even with the open level coaches in. I've had to spam guys like sigma (not that many of them bother to respond) over steam to ask people to get in and coach because we kept running out. We've already tried the IM+ coaches thing once, and it didn't work. I doubt that it will work now when not even making the restriction looser gets us enough coaches. Yes, there are some pros and cons to both choices, but most open coaches I've heard have been helpful to newbies.

That said, you guys have to remember that trolls/rude/showing off players aren't SO common that you'll run into them every mix. Also, interfering in game is different from trolling in the class selection channels. For example, people screaming (and yes this happens) when pyyyour/harblue/some well known player joins in "OMG ##### CAN I PLAY WITH YOU COACH CAN I PLAY WITH ##### PLZ HES MY IDOL OMG OMG OMG" or something along those lines is interfering with the organizers' job. I haven't had the chance to coach that many games, and have mainly been stuck as the organizer for the past few weeks, but things certainly do happen.

Easier said than done. Kicking/banning comes off even more abrasive than muting/moving people around/yelling etc. Quite frankly, it takes extreme methods like this sometimes to keep the mixes enforced, but muting/moving people back/whatnot has gotten me enough complaints as it is. I don't see how kicking/banning will help.

I'm not sure if this is the same game you're referring to, but there was a game where I was the coach and salty volunteered to medic. After awhile we found that I was rolling them too easily and therefore we switched. Me to medic, salty to combat class. So at least in that game, his switch to a combat role was justified.

Speedygeek here. I've been running a chunk of the newbie mixes for the past few weeks, and there have been a number of things that have come to our attention.

Shoutout to all who have helped out. During peak hours it seems that we're averaging 100+ players (!!!) in mumble at a time. Shoutout to Vick for getting this back again.

That said, there seems to be a lot of drama and negativity around the mixes, and some of it seems to deter potential new players away from newbie mixes so let's clear some things up.

First off, mixes are for new players, not for those in low open/ugc platinum. There have been a number of players in that level that have been coming in, rolling the newbies, and ruining the games.

Play few times and if you keep rolling everyone by yourself, then you know you're too good for newbie mixes in your main class. If so, PLEASE play a different class or go play at #tf2mix. A few games just to see where you are, fine. But please don't do this every week, every mix.

That said, this is a newbie mix, not a team scrim channel. There have been many players from the same team who keep trying to stack teams asking to play with so and so and complaining when they don't get to. If you and your buddy get placed on same team, that's great, but please don't ask us to stack the teams in your favor.

Recently there have been a number of issues. Here are some examples that I'll clear up:

1) Coach yells at newbies in game for repeatedly ignoring them.
Notice I said ignore. You're not in newbie mixes to show off.
Don't want to learn? You have no business being there.
Trying to do what coaches tell you and not succeeding is ok.
Completely ignoring coaches is not.
Coaches raging on new players who are trying is also unacceptable.

2) Moving around in class / mix channels to try to stack teams or cut in front of other players trying to max your chance to play, hoping organizers like me won't notice.
This is really insulting. Coaches pretend to be newbies and vice versa, and they move around in channels trying to stack teams. People move to different class channels (when they've played a bunch) to cut in front of other players to play. This kind of behavior forces organizers to counter-move people around to keep track of players.

3) Being rude to other players in mixes, and being rude to organizers in class channels by spamming. Sometimes coaches/organizers have to mute.

4) Complaining about coaches being not good enough. We've already tried IM+ coaches only rule, and that didn't work.
Not ok with Open level coaches? Please go find many IM+ coaches who will show up consistently. There are only a handful of IM+ coaches who do, and they aren't enough.

These are just few of the issues that organizers have to deal with. There are almost always a shortage of coaches and organizers every mix, and players get frustrated waiting. People complain abuse for organizers muting players, counter-moving players during mix organizations, and for coaches yelling at them.

Sometimes in our effort to shut down the trolling and whatnot will end up affecting people who are innocent. We're trying our best, but we do mess up.
If we mute, yell at, or move people, we're trying to keep things from getting out of hand. If someone does this to you and you're innocent, please let them know politely on the spot. We don't respond well to rude rantings or threats.

The coaches and organizers are volunteers doing this just to help and have fun. Unfortunately, I've only gotten complaints and even threats. No thank you's, no appreciation. Many coaches/organizers said they feel the same. That's not fun.

So please give us the respect and know that we aren't there to ruin the experience, but to help.

I'm sorry to hear that that you got yelled at by some of the coaches.

But try to understand it from the coaches view too. They are volunteers who are there to help newbies and some coaches have commented that players who ignore the coaches and troll around doing their own thing are often the most frustrating to deal with. One coach, for example, commented that just because she's a girl newbies will often completely ignore what she says and just argue nonstop about stuff.

While this still does not justify the yelling (especially if the newbie the yelling was directed at was completely innocent), hopefully you understand where some of the frustration comes from.

Over the past few weeks when I often ran the mixes, there have been several incidents that I can think of where there were trolls who were

a) too good in DM to play in newbie mixes
b) trying to stack teams with their friends/teammates/etc
c) being dicks to everyone else
d) completely ignoring everything coaches were saying in game and just doing their own thing
e) moving around in channels trying to stack teams and hoping that the organizer (me) wouldn't notice
f) moving around in class channels trying to play in front of everyone else
and/or doing other similar things.

Honestly, if you're there to show off your so called amazing DM or whatever, you need to go to #tf2mix. If you're not going to listen to the coaches (and by this I mean you're ignoring the coaches, not trying to do what they say and failing to do so), newbie mixes aren't for you. Newbie mixes exist to HELP THE NEW PLAYERS, not for DM superstars, not for teams. If you have a team, go scrim. Stop trying to stack teams by playing with your teammmates and ruin things for everyone.

Now you see some of the stuff that coaches/organizers have to deal with. It's not exactly all sweet and fun. In fact, I got so ticked off by people moving around for stacking teams/trying to cut in front of other people to play that I started moving people back to their original channels without bothering to talk to them, and I've also muted players who spam channels and annoy the coaches. The problem is that sometimes innocent people DO get moved/muted/whatever with only the good intentions and people complain.

The coaches and organizers aren't perfect, and we have to deal with some things that really frustrate the hell out of us. So try to understand where we're coming from too instead of just complaining nonstop about so and so or whatnot. While we do appreciate constructive criticism, try to understand that dealing with all the trolls means that sometimes the innocent will get affected too, unfortunately.