Hey guys. In the interest of trying to be more active*, I've decided to take a page from jell and make an Ask thread. So if you have any burning questions, I'll do my best to extinguish them for you! (or at the very least, blow on them and make it worse)

* I reserve the right to suddenly disappear forever.

Why did you make this your 1000th post?

This was my 1000th post, but then I mysteriously lost one or two. I didn't want to go through the trouble of typing up some big impressive post again, only for it to lose its arbitrary noteworthiness (which I would presumably reclaim and lose over and over again like some interguildian Groundhog Day).

Perhaps now Sprout's monopoly of answering questions will finally come to an end.

If you don't mind me asking, what exactly are you doing? I know most of our younger members are still in school, and people like me and Livio are in college, but since the big reveal I don't think you've ever actually said anything about yourself (or at least I don't remember any of it). I also wonder the same thing about CSD, since he's the oldest member whom we rarely hear from.

Do you plan on joining the Interguild League 2013? Do you plan on making a HatPC level anytime soon?

will you enter my comp?

why did you remove your 'small and humble siggy'?

what was your 'small and humble siggy,?

Can you explain why you pronounce the words "colonel" and "kernel" the same despite both words looking nothing alike?

I blame the french.

I blame Haily.

Do you think that it is true that I am literally becoming more stupid?

I don’t really know. I applied to university a few times now but never followed through with it. I've mostly just been working a lot, saving up, and keeping busy with some random projects. My excuse was that I didn't want to waste money pursuing a career I wasn't sure about, but it’s a bit more than that. I was really depressed for a long time and it came to a head over the past couple years. Existential crisis kind of thing. I’m a lot happier now, and I guess I’m glad I took some time to sort myself out, but man, it got pretty bad.

I'd like to be a writer more than anything, but of course for creative fields it's good to have something to fall back on. I applied for an audio engineering program this fall, which looks pretty cool.

By the way, if you guys ever feel stressed/depressed, I highly recommend taking up meditation. I know it might seem like a waste of time, but it's actually ridiculously effective. They just found out that it can alter gene expression as well, which is pretty crazy.

I don't trust myself to be active enough for any competitions. I have been feeling the itch to make a cave though, or some kind of level.


I did not. It is simply smaller and more humble than ever before!


It was a forum signature that said "A small and humble siggy."


“Colonel” is based on the Italian word “colonna”, meaning column (ie, commander of a column of soldiers). When the word first became a part of the English and French vernacular, it was based on the Spanish interpretation and spelled/pronounced “coronel”.

But the English scholars of the time, hilariously concerned with linguistic purity and consistency, wanted the word to reflect its Italian origins and pushed for the “colonel” spelling. This would have included the proper L sound, but by then the “coronel” pronunciation was too widespread to be changed, regardless of what the dictionaries had to say, so now we have an ugly mess of a word that nobody’s satisfied with.

English sucks sometimes, but I like to see the inconsistencies as a trade-off for not having to deal with gendered nouns.


No. Do you?

Exchange money for time in the last sentence, and this describes me. I've been to university and back and I'm soon to be back again - last time I studied statistics, this time it'll probably be kindergarten teaching.

Sorry to hear about your troubles, but glad to hear that you're doing better. I often think that many people take living normal lives for granted , but then at other times I think that there might not be such a thing as a normal life, and that most people have problems that they have to face, but you just never hear about them. But even so, I do think still that people often take things for granted that a lot of people don't have, so I try to remember to be thankful for what I do have, things like not having to pay my own way through college (as well as just being able to afford to go to college) and having found a major I like and am good at from the very start.

Also, upon first look, I thought you said "I highly recommend taking up medication"

Anyways, which cave of mine was your favorite? Which cave of yours was your favorite? And if you have one, what is your overall favorite cave?

Forgive my ignorance but I have no idea how this Sefro thing came about, so any enlightenment?

Tl;DR Dando was a man the whole time

to break away from the other identity, "dando" decided to change to her/his username used on other sites.

What kind of writing are you interested in? Fiction? Novels? Movie scripts? journalism? blogging?....

Oh, I have a question to ask you. So far, I've been pursuing the sciences in high school, but now I kinda have my doubts, even though it's a bit too late to change anything for next year... so do you think I should continue with bio, chem, and physics?  

^ why not? I take bio chem physics currently and it's wonderful (though its stressful). It gives you a bit more time to make your decision (not sure if you guys have to drop a science, over here you do, we only take 2 for As ), well for me I'd continue until the school says no or I can't take it anymore (grades...) otherwise I don't see how triple science is harmful in any way

canadianstick... is probably my favourite cave of yours. It was a great "all-around" sort of cave; fun, well-rounded traps and puzzles, smooth pacing, satisfying denouement, etc.

My favourite cave of mine is Grand Scheme of Things. Cause and Effect probably has a better overall design, but Grand Scheme of Things was a lot more fun to make, and feels a bit more polished I think.

I don’t have a favourite overall cave.


Here's the post that explains it. Basically, Dando/Flora was a sort of character, so I changed my username to Sefro to help distinguish my "real" self.


Any creative writing at all, so long as I have complete control of it. To that extent, I probably wouldn't like journalism too much, or anything where you’re tied to the whims of editors or producers. There are few things more painful than working really hard on something, only to have someone smear their mental boogers on it. I've been meaning to start a “general opinion blog”, but I haven’t gotten around to it. Writing a novel has always been an aspiration of mine, though. I've been working on one for a while now.


Even if you don’t end up going into a scientific career, you will never regret having a background in the sciences. It's good stuff to know. And it’s not just about the information, but also how you learn to process it; science classes are good for drilling a sort of tangibility into your head, a perspective that helps you think in a more principled way. That said, if you want to drop a science class to pursue something you’re much more interested in (so, not just because it’s difficult), then you should.

Firstly, this

me too

second, we pronounce it colonel here, nothing like kernel. never even heard of someone who heard that someone pronounces them alike.

third, about all college/university stuff. Quirvy be lucky, like me and jell, that we found something that we like and are good at. some of my friends have by now already got discharged from the army and they're doing their SATs now, but none knows what they want to study. I usually support only doing what you like; there's money everywhere eventually, even with pure mathematics degree >_>;

fourth: if you're interested in creative writing, I will link you to a Mafia game in which I'm dead; the mod is a professinal storyteller and he crafts INCREDIBLE flavor; it's extremely long and will probably be collected later to some kind of a minibook/series/something. It's lovely, I advise everyone to read.

http://forum.mafiascum.net/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=29468

The story is written during the game and sorta according to it(characters die etc), it's in a spoiler onthe first page, collected together.

AND LASTLY, my own question:
http://www.neopets.com/userlookup.phtml?user=dando52

firstly, kudos for being in the tyrannian war and having a HATIC plot trophy; that was before the very first time I ever saw neopets. secondly, explain, 3X Neopian Times champion. what? The Eragotten Legacy???

I have to commend you for writing four installations in that, Sefro. I couldn't write a single paragraph of a fictional Neopets story without breaking down laughing.

I think I hold a distinction of getting a story in the Neopian Times that didn't feature any actual Neopets. Hey, 13 year old me thought it was a great idea!