ximo

Sugar free dew drops and salted fish

Sat, 30 Aug 2008 03:48:34 GMT

So it's been a while and I figured, what the hell, why not post.

My civic is mostly dead. About a month ago, the timing belt finally decided to bite the dust and when adding up the costs of repair, plus the up and coming repairs, I decided it was time to just say screw it and get a new car. This in and of itself is not a big deal, as I was planning on replacing it in another ~6 months anyway, it just made me lower my financial target and take out a longer loan that I planned on. I checked out an 02 miata, which I totally loved, but the lack of any sort of real storage for anything (including people) mixed with the bumpy ride made me keep looking. I settled on an 07 scion tc. It's a dark blue, with a hint of purple, 2dr couple. Stick shift, of course, and it's quick but not fast. The ride itself is quite smooth and it's got a really big back seat (totally unexpected). I liked the styling of the car overall, didn't care too much about the rear end but over the past month, I've become quite acclimated to it. On a side note, my estimate was pretty accurate with how long it'd take me to regain my skills driving a manual transmission; one week. Now, it's just second habit and quite fun to drive really. Unless I want to, I don't squeal the tires anymore and while it doesn't corner like the civic, it's still got pretty decent grip. I'm still deciding on what to do with my old car and I'm about 90% settled on donating it. I get a tax write-off and don't have to drive it anywhere. Pretty much a win-win situation.

Several months ago I replaced my old computer. Nothing came over from the old system and this build was a long, long time coming. All in all, it wasn't the top end of what's out but it wasn't very far from it. I'm still looking at replacing some components later, but I'm in no rush. With the exception of crysis, it'll play anything at max settings with a good frame rate. Already got 1 500G and 1 750GB SATA II drives in the system with another 750GB sitting in the closet ready to go. I decided to try out vista on the machine and so far, no real issues. I do get graphical artifacts every once in a while and that does require a reboot to resolve, but other than that, no issues at all. It's really been a rock solid build and I'm quite happy with it.

My friends Tony and Amber are engaged and set to get hitched next spring, which rocks. Both are now graduated and in the next couple months, relocating to Austin for work/school. While I'm happy for them, I'll seriously miss their company and it'll suck for them to be gone. I'm sure there will be quite a few trips between Dallas and Austin, but in the end, it's two less friends to hang out with on the spur of the moment. Such is life tho.

On that note, I've been shopping for that special someone. Of course, it's not exactly as easy as it was when I was younger, but it's always been kind of a pain in the ass anyway. Been on a couple of dates, sadly; no real connection. I'm not in a huge hurry but at the same time, I'm not gonna lie, it'd be nice to have someone.

I don't cook nearly as much as I used to, which is kinda sad. Since I moved into my new apartment, the kitchen is quite nice and great for cooking. I just really don't have the energy most weekdays and without really anyone to cook for, it's easier to just go grab something or make something small. On a side note, Alice doesn't seem to really like the apartment too much when it rains and hides everytime. I think it's the fact it's a 2nd story apartment and the ground doesn't vibrate in a good way for her. Poor kitty.

-cheers

You Are a Chocolate Cheesecake

Rich and greedy, you're attracted to the dark side of life.

Nothing ever quite satisfies your inner beast. And somehow, people find that sexy.

What Kind of Cheesecake Are You?

Tue, 01 May 2007 16:37:27 GMT

"Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children." -William Makepeace Thackeray
Growing up there is a special status that your parents have when compared to everyone else, but recently i've noticed my parents have been demystified. This got me wondering when exactly this change occurred. When you're little, your parents are the very picture of an adult. While i'm not sure if it's because you're supposed to respect/love your parents or whatever, but there is definitely a psychological difference between how we see them vs. everyone else. Even when you're quite a bit older, they somehow still retain this status (even when compared to other people their age). I think it was about the time my age hit half of what my parents' was, i looked at them and started seeing something totally different. I saw more flaws, more differences, and ultimately less 'divinity'. I can't say i love or respect them any less, prolly more; but the pedestal i put them on when i was a kid is no longer there.

"...eat this chicken or I'll kill another." -Ali G
I think i've given up on consuming mass quantities of red meat. I've noticed that since i've been eating mostly chicken, fish, and pork, that i've been feeling alot better. When i eat red meat too frequently (more than twice a week) my stomach gets tight and my back hurts. I'm pretty sure it's because it's harder to digest, and i really don't like to eat 'heavy' foods. With rare occasion, i've pretty much stopped wanting burgers, pizza, most pasta, etc. Of course when your cooking tastes better (to me atleast) or comparable to most restaurants it is a bit easier to omit these foods. Now, by no stretch of the imagination am i going veggie, i'm still quite a carnivore, but my preferred diet has drastically changed in the past 6-9 months.

"The liberties of our country, the freedoms of our civil Constitution are worth defending at all hazards; it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors. They purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood. It will bring a mark of everlasting infamy on the present generation – enlightened as it is – if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of designing men." -Samuel Adams
Now i can't speak for everyone else, nor would i want to, but i think it's way past time we either do away with or highly restrict lobbyist. Honestly, i feel they are one of the many things that are destroying this country and should have no foot to stand upon. Now, when i say lobbyist, i mean the ones that make large gifts or donations to a politician in an effort to gain special consideration for their issues. On a political stage, by no means should your financial standing have any direct impact on the importance of your issues or your representation. Sadly, i don't think this will change and it's only going to get alot worse. Atleast it'd be a bit easier if we could put little patches on the politicians like the outfits NASCAR drivers wear.

Am I alone in thinking this world would be alot better off if we had another bubonic scale plague? Something that'd wipe out a large portion of the world's population and then simply just disappear? Now i'm not totally heartless and would desire one with minimal pain/discomfort and would prefer the people i care about made it through, but i'm not overly picky.

Random link that pissed me off.

Cheese Test: What type of cheese are you?

Orz

Wed, 25 Apr 2007 13:36:16 GMT

Last month i finished my Solaris 10 sysadmin cert and started looking for work. Slowly but surely, i've been working my way down a list of headhunters with various levels of success. Volt, Manpower, Modis, Teksystems, and most recently Robert Half. Out of all of them, only two seem to actually care about the people they are representing and work towards getting you employment, and only 1 (the most recent) is really active about it (including the only one to return calls promptly). All in all, it's looking slightly better now and i am starting to hear back from several of the inquiries about various job postings that i've submitted. As things currently stand, it looks to be about a 50/50 chance between me ending up in Dallas or Denver, which suits me just fine. If back in Dallas, i got several good friends and already have a nice, cheap apartment setup that i totally love. Denver, well, i got a couple of friends and finding a good apartment will be interesting to say the least. Overall, the process hasn't been too much of a headache, just quite time consuming and at times very annoying. Recently, i had to take some assessment tests, to which i scored either somewhere slightly above average (solaris) or way beyond average (pc hardware, networks, etc). This was a pleasant surprise considering i haven't really been focusing on sharpening my knowledge over the past month. I've broadened my search from just solaris/unix jr admin to include help desk with some admin responsibilities with either windows or unix. I can't say i'm particularly pleased with a pure windows environment job, but if nothing else it'll get me some basic admin exp and exposure to industry stuff. At the very least, it will give me some experience to put down on the resume (to which i'm sorely lacking) and the money to continue training on my own.

To my dismay (putting things very lightly), as i pulled up to the parking lot yesterday afternoon for my interview, my happy little honda decided to spew out mass amounts of white steam/smoke and my heart sunk as i looked down at the rapidly raising temp gauge. I checked under the hood to find coolant sprayed everywhere along one side of the radiator. Hoses were dry, connections were fine, and there was a ton of what seemed to be my car's lifeblood pouring out of the top of the radiator. So, after my interview i called my stepfather as there was no way i was going to be able to make the ~2 hour drive home with my car. It took 3 cooling off breaks to make it from the business park to the fry's parking lot 2 exits down the freeway. I did get to have a ben and jerry's shake along the way, which was overpriced but pretty tasty. Thankfully, there was a mechanic's shop in the same parking lot as Fry's, sadly it was Firestone. Now don't get me wrong, i've never been displeased with the quality of parts or work of Firestone, however they do tend to be one of the most expensive options. Up to that point, my car hadn't overheated (which in itself was a blessing) and the cost to tow it to any decent mechanic + that mechanic's charges for repair would prolly be close to just going to Firestone. So, after a bit of consideration i decided i would have to bite the bullet and use them. Quite unexpectantly, they were able to get it done that day (i brought it in just before 16:00). I twitched a little when i found out it was going to be just under $700 for the radiator, total coolant flush of the engine and replacement of the thermostat. I had been meaning to get the radiator replaced for about a week and all things considered, it's much better for it to happen yesterday than on the road to denver or the first day of a new job.

Between everything else, i've been picking up a few games here and there and working on my japanese cooking. I've went through the book i have and need more. As far as games, nothing all that great recently. Fear was good, but short, the various PS2 games were disappointing overall, and Vanguard (the 'next great MMO') it's buggy, a resource hog from an unoptimized engine, and laggy as all hell on my sat connection. I obviously don't intend on playing it any longer than i have to, but no new MMOs come out until this fall. With any luck, i can get into the Warhammer beta. Not like i'll have alot of time for MMOs once my work kicks into full swing, but i still need some kind of release.

Which Final Fantasy Character Are You?

Final Fantasy 7

Wed, 03 Jan 2007 15:00:54 GMT

Solaris training is going well again. After a serious motivation nose-dive before the holidays, I’ve forced myself to get back into the swing of it and it’s slowly coming together. Priced a Sun box last night, mostly just for practice. 180 bucks for an ultra 60 doesn’t sound too bad, tho I’m not really sure. Shopping for non x86 boxes is not something I’m accustom to. Honestly, if I can get past the tests w/o a machine, I should be peachy. I would really prefer not to have an antiquated machine laying around that I’ll most likely never use again.

Oddly enough, I was pseudo watching I love lucy last night when I came to realize that porn has made a really strong impact on our sex lives. By having to keep things fresh, pornstars feature a slew of new and/or never before seen positions, activities, and various fetishes that have slowly been added into our repertoire of things to try out. Mixed with the saturation levels of porn and sexual related discussions have lead towards our bedrooms being a lot more open than they were 40-50 years ago. Of course, I don’t give all the credit to porn, with all the sex therapist and various other forms of media (sex in the city, self help books, movies, magazine articles, and such), we’ve become a lot more adventurous than a few decades before. I think something I heard many, many years ago sums it up best. My sister was told that before my grandmother’s second husband, she’d never experienced cunnilingus. I can’t imagine it. I mean, by my first serious relationship I’d already learned the pleasures of both giving and receiving oral sex. I suppose it’s just a matter of time before even the newest of taboos are broken and accepted. Tho now I suppose the question is, what’s left in the taboo section?

Saw a few more movies via netflix. Ant bully was ok, good kids movie I suppose. Little man was…yea, it’s about what you’d expect. Lady in the water was decent, reminded me a lot of splash for some reason.

Well, tomorrow night I should have my first attempt at making japanese dumplings. Of course I’m gonna do it the hard way and make the wrappers by hand. I mean, what’s the point of trying to learn new things if you don’t do the most time consuming way possible first? ~.^

Something interesting things I've stumbled across recently:
Tickle me Emo.
A new twist on japanese speed dating

Marine rules for engagement

1. Bring a gun. Preferably, bring at least two guns. Bring all of your friends who have guns.
2. Anything worth shooting is worth shooting twice. Ammo is cheap. Life is expensive.
3. Only hits count. The only thing worse than a miss is a slow miss.
4. If your shooting stance is good, you're probably not moving fast enough nor using cover correctly.
5. Move away from your attacker. Distance is your friend. (Lateral and diagonal movement are preferred.)
6. If you can choose what to bring to a gunfight, bring a long gun and a friend with a long gun.
7. In ten years nobody will remember the details of caliber, stance, or tactics. They will only remember who lived.
8. If you are not shooting, you should be communicating, reloading, and running.
9. Accuracy is relative: most combat shooting standards will be more dependent on "pucker factor" than the inherent accuracy of the gun.
10. Someday someone may kill you with your own gun, but they should have to beat you to death with it because it is empty.
11. Always cheat; always win. The only unfair fight is the one you lose.
12. Have a plan.
13. Have a back-up plan, because the first one won't work.
14. Use cover or concealment as much as possible.
15. Flank your adversary when possible. Protect yours.
16. Don't drop your guard.
17. Always tactical load and threat scan 360 degrees.
18. Watch their hands. Hands kill. In God we trust. Everyone else, keep your hands where I can see them.
19. Decide to be aggressive ENOUGH, quickly ENOUGH.
20. The faster you finish the fight, the less shot you will get.
21. Be polite. Be professional. But, have a plan to kill everyone you meet.
22. Be courteous to everyone, friendly to no one.
23. Your number one option for personal security is a lifelong commitment to avoidance, deterrence, and de-escalation.
24. Do not attend a gunfight with a handgun, the caliber of which does not start with a "4."

You scored as Simon Tam. The Doctor. You have a gift for healing that goes beyond education. You took an oath to do no harm, even when your patients have tried to kill you. You are out of place where you are, being used to refined society. However, if you take that stick out of your arse you should be fine.

</td>

Simon Tam

81%

Kaylee (Kaywinnet Lee) Frye

75%

River Tam

75%

The Operative

69%

Capt. Mal Reynolds

63%

Zoe Alleyne Washburne

63%

Hoban 'Wash' Washburne

56%

Inara Serra

50%

Shepherd Derrial Book

50%

Jayne Cobb

31%

Which Serenity character are you?

Nobody should have to wake up before McDonalds opens for breakfast.

Thu, 28 Dec 2006 13:24:39 GMT

I haven't really liked the christmas holidays since i was a little kiddo. Partially because i am not part of any religious group that has anything to do with it. So when we decided to go visit my grandmother in Waco, i was honestly kinda neutral about it. The trip itself was fairly pleasant, nothing major occurred and it was just one of those times where you're with family you hardly ever see (my grandmother's sisters) and eat food you would never order. As far as gifts, nothing too out of the ordinary; kitty calendar, a DS with FFIII ^^, and the ever popular green stuff in an envelope. I've decided to stay home for the second trip mostly due to it being in the hellhole known as Houston. I've no desire to ever go back there again. It was kinda sad to see the potential for a really great snowstorm die out by a few days. It was raining solid for about 2 - 2 1/2 days right before christmas, afterwhich it finally dropped below freezing which left nothing but a little ice. >.<

Solaris training is progressing, tho slower than expected. Due to failing the first test on the first try (for very stupid reasons) and then the christmas holidays killing everything for a good 2 weeks, i won't be done till sometime in jan it seems. So yea, time table got moved slightly, but everything should turn out ok...i hope.

I've seen quite a few movies, mostly via DVD. Casino Royale was quite good, more of the old hardcore bond, less of the tongue in cheek brit. Miami Vice was decent, i wouldn't say it was great, but it really wasn't bad. National Lampoon's Pledge This was even worse than i coulda imagined. Clerks II was quite good, which for a movie that he wasn't gonna make, i was happy he did. Others escape me, but mostly cause they aren't worth a mention.

Still cooking, playing around with various things and having a good time with my now very worn japanese cookbook. I am wondering how i'll be doing this once i don't have 3 hours to cook 1 meal tho. >.< I figure i can break most of it up into stages to be continued later, except for the soaking of rice for 1 hour, then cooking it for another hour. I've soaked rice for as long as 3-4 hours and it still came out good, but i think it was closer to the 6+ hour mark that made it get crappy.

I'm starting to burn out on PSU, i can feel it happening. Between my connection being crap, most my friends aren't playing it, and having many other things that require my attention (mostly solaris and cooking); i've just been losing interest in it. Now granted, i'm not that far into FFIII, but i have to admit, it's fantastic. Easily the best FF game in 5+ years. It's got the feel of FF1 and 2 with a full on job system similar to tactics. Story is decent and it's not too bad about going hog wild with all the gimmicks of the DS (thank god). At the rate this is going, it could end up in the #2 spot for fave FF game (beating out FF7). Can't wait for Vanguard, here's to hoping it doesn't suck ass.

Ok, that's all for my posting atm... Perhaps i'll post sooner than once a month, but i wouldn't hold my breath if you were part of my depraved readership.

I found a slighty more fun test for this time. No super spiffy linky for it so: Here . My score was roughly 25 to the left.

Wed, 08 Nov 2006 03:08:44 GMT

Today i spent ~5 hours shopping for groceries. One of the downsides to living out in the country is that this is, without a doubt, HEB country. For those that don't know, HEB is a smallish chain of grocery stores originating in the Austin area. If you see a grocery store out here, there's prolly around a 90% chance it's a HEB. They have reasonable prices, a decent selection, and fairly good produce. The only major complaint i have is that the butcher's stock sucks ass, hardcore. I've tried, on multiple occasions; beef, pork, chicken, and seafood, all with the same result: sub-standard, tough, and flavor-less meat. This leaves you with two options, 1) search for a independent butcher or 2) search for a different grocery store. After spending ~20 min looking for a rumored butcher's shop, i opted for option 2. Well, it was a good 2 hours before i got to the nearest (to the best of my knowledge) non-HEB grocery store. I'm sure it prolly seemed quite interesting that i loaded up on chicken breasts, salmon, and swordfish steaks with very little other things in my basket (my previous shopping was done at the cult grocery). I got home just in time to start cooking dinner. >.<

With a decent amount of skepticism, i tried yet another new dish out of my ever-full japanese cookbook; Sakana no Shinshu-mushi (Fish steamed with Soba, Shinshu-style). Now, to date, i've cooked alot of different things in various ways, but steaming fish was something i'd never done before. As i spent the 2+ hours making the recipe for the first time, i had a backup plan for dinner, should it turn out...less than good. To my surprise, it was very, very good. Even without all the ingredients (mostly garnish type things), it was a smooth and delicately flavored (yet filling) dish. Basically, it's fish (salmon this time) wrapped around cooked Soba noodles, then steamed. Now granted, it's _far_ more complex and annoying (mostly cause it was the first attempt) than that, but that's a close enough description. Everyone was quite pleased with it and it looks like it's going on the repeat menu.

A good friend showed me this little movie about a mac, done in the same style as the WoW switcher vids. I have to admit, if you've ever been a Mac newbie, it's quite easy to relate to this guy.
Here is another interesting read i ran across today along with many other random things.

You scored as Combat Shotgun. The Combat shotgun is mostly a sidearm. There are many different Combat Shotguns like the M500, Remington 870, SPAS-12, Benelli M3, ect. The shotgun ussually holds up to 4 to 9 shotgun shells. The shotgun is very reliable and powerful and close range but lacks firepower at longer range. Double Ott Buck is very powerful you know. The Combat Shotgun either comes in Pump-Action or Semi-Automatic or both.

</td>

Combat Shotgun

53%

PSG-1

47%

M24 Sniper Rifle

47%

Grenade Launcher

41%

M4 Assault Rifle

41%

M249 SAW

41%

Ak-47

28%

Mac 11 Uzi

28%

What Gun would you Be?
created with QuizFarm.com

50 Degrees = no more scorpions ^^

Fri, 03 Nov 2006 14:02:27 GMT

Well, it would seem they are doing Castlevania game. Lets hope it's not another street fighter quality movie, tho i highly doubt it'll be side-scrolling; much to some people's dismay.

As i was out and about last night, i had a chance to play the Demo for Guitar Hero II. Somewhat limited on time, i only had enough time to play a song and a half. I played warpigs on Normal difficulty (just to get into the swing of things), which of course, i tore up. So then i went to the butthole surfers song on hard....ouch, that hurts. First two notes, 3 note cords! Yep, that's right, 3 notes on hard difficulty. Needless to say, i failed it (mostly cause i had to leave and couldn't try again). All in all, i'm quite excited about the game.

I saw The Prestige yesterday as well. While not a gripping, compelling movie to span ages and multiple viewings; it was pretty decent. Acting was ok, cast was solid, and plot was fairly believable. One magician movie down, one to go.

Random test for the day:

How evil are you?

Winter is coming ^^

Wed, 01 Nov 2006 19:22:22 GMT

So Sun pissed me off, or rather, the lack of students to the classes i want to take piss me off. As there's 1 student in all of the sysadmin I classes nearby, i went ahead and ordered the CD. If nothing else, it's cheaper, which is always good. I still will have to go to a sun place for the tests (and test prep class), but i've got a little more flexibility with that. I'm not overly concerned on going with the CD vs the class, but i wanted some baseline to see where i was at. On the plus side, i could be done with all this a bit sooner than expected. ^^

Since i started getting into japanese cooking, i've made quite a few dishes. I'm now past the vast majority of the dishes i already knew (with the exception of sushi). Thus far i've made: Miso Soup, Miso Salmon, Miso chicken, Chicken cutlet, Pork Cutlet, Smoked salmon Onigiri, Simmered beef rice bowl, Chikin Risu, Crabmeat Omelette, Shrimp Curry, Shrimp Tempura with Soba noodles, and a few other that escape me at the moment. Overall, it's not nearly as hard as i imagined it would be to get it right. Now granted, making curry from scratch is a massive pain in the ass which took 6-7 hours total. I can tell i've improved a good amount with how i cook now, but even when i started, things came out very close to how they are ment to. Most of the things i make i get right (in taste if not presentation) by the 2nd or 3rd time i make it. Still quite a few things in the book to make, but i'm pretty confident with my skills.

One of the hardest things has been trying to find a good place to get the cooking items and ingredients i need. Oddly enough, Austin has a much better selection than Dallas did, with the exception of a few things. I tried looking online for a good store, but alas, no such luck as of yet. I'm quite sure there are places out there, so i'll look a bit more later but i do get sidetracked easily it would seem.

Been a few weeks since i've played any MMO, which is rather refreshing. So far, only been playing Valkyrie profile 2, which i have to admit, rocks pretty hardcore. It's a shame i'm at the end boss tho. >.< They recently released the track listing for Guitar Hero II, which looks really awesome. Can't wait to play it, when i get around to it. Have to admit, Warpigs, Sweet Child o' Mine, Cherry Pie, and Primus (yay!!) should be a interesting to play.^^ Tho oddly enough, it seems Metallica was too good for a video game.

Your True Love Is a Cancer

Why you'll love a Cancer:

Cancer's loyal and sincere heart makes your own sensitive heart melt.
Caring and devoted, a Cancer will take the lead in pursuing you - and not give up!

Why a Cancer will love you:

You're laid back enough to deal with Cancer's little mood swings and freak-outs.
A fellow homebody, you know how make Cancer comfortable and at home with you.

What Sign Is Your True Love?

Yay, hell season is almost over.

Fri, 25 Aug 2006 02:06:28 GMT

I hate August. As if the mass quantities of daylight weren't bad enough, it's freakin hot all month. I can't understand how people can actually like summertime down here. I mean sure, scantily clad girls running around is interesting and all, but i don't think that makes up for the oppressive heat. It's like almost 21:00 and it's still ~95 outside. I suppose it could be a tad worse, atleast i don't live in Houston anymore. I consider it a bad sign when you get into your portable oven, ie: car, turn on the ac and you can see the cooler air coming from the vents but can't really feel it.

So yea, it's been like a few months since i posted last, just haven't had anything all that terribly interesting to say. Finished the solaris training CD, which was alot more engaging than i figured it would be. I still have yet to make my little cheat sheet with all the commands, options, etc, but will soonish. As soon as i get the duplicate CD sent back to Sun, i can register for Sysadmin I, yay! It'll be nice once i get all that done and can actually use it.

On the Gaming side of things, i left FFXI. I'm pretty sure i've 0 desire to ever go back to it, finally. It always was my fallback MMO when there was nothing else i wanted to play, but with the changes they made last and decline of a player base, i think it's finally time to walk away from it. I've been playing DDO a fair amount recently. It's more of a relaxed atmosphere and very casual gamer friendly overall. Met some cool people i like to run with, in a guild, all the good stuff. I'm very pleased with the frequency of updated content, for free no less. I figure it should last me till the end of the year when like, 3 MMOs come out. Hopefully one of them will be good and addictive. It's been a while since i've had that New MMO addiction, and i miss it. I recently picked up some good old fashioned PnP RPG books that Drax0r rescued from the depths of his closet. Been reading over them again, off and on. Not sure i really want to start up a full on gaming group again, but ya never know. If nothing else, GH II comes out in like Nov, so that's something i'm really looking forward to. With me currently in the last set of expert on GH I, i'm pretty sure i'm just about done with that. It's fun and like most games i enjoy, i can't beat them. I mean, i _can_ beat it, it's just if i beat it and see those end credits then all the magic of said game is gone.

Going down to Austin this weekend to visit my parents, which should be fun. It's quite pretty down there, tho i'm sure it'll be just as hot as it is here. Going to do the whole birthday thing. People keep asking me what i want for my birthday and every year it's the same. I've honestly got no clue. Socks, Food, maybe some shiny new game? I'm not really one of those people that have alot of things they want, so shopping for me can't be easy. I never could understand birthdays anyway. I mean it's fun to spend a day (or a few hours) with someone on their birthday to let them know how much you care and such, but it's kinda strange to me. You're basically having a party to celebrate another year of their lives gone by. The candle gets a little shorter. The flame dims just a little bit. It's really kinda morbid if you ask me.

How Will You Die??

You scored as Natural Causes. Your death will be by natural causes, though not by any diseaese, because that is another option on this test. You will probably just silently pass away in the night from old age, and people you love won't realize until the next morning, when you are all purple and cold and icky. So be happy, you won't be murdered.

</td>

Natural Causes

80%

Disappear

67%

Suicide

60%

Disease

53%

Stabbed

47%

Suffocated

47%

Drowning

33%

Cut Throat

33%

Gunshot

27%

Accident

27%

Posion

27%

Eaten

20%

Bomb

13%

The dream fairies seem to be on strike.

Tue, 30 May 2006 11:24:32 GMT

Just finished disc 3 of Deadwood season 2. I have to admit, while the higher vocabulary might hurt the average viewers, it's nice to actually watch a show that isn't aimed at those with just a 3rd grade education. So far, the season has been quite enjoyable and has a very heavy Sopranos feel to it. Multi-tiered plotlines, character development, and just a touch of violence keeps me hooked. It looks like it'll be alot of fun to watch and i'm optimistic about season 3, unlike the total crap that is the most recent Sopranos plotline.

After a massive headache, my CD for intro to solaris was finally ordered today and i'm really looking forward to getting to work on it. I've got the sun box set up (sans a power cord) in the computer room and hopefully by the weekend i should have the cd in my grubby little paws. Due to the delay caused by my bank being a pain in the ass, i looked at other options for sysadmin I as the june 19th date seemed rather soon, all things considered. Thankfully, there's another dallas one on july 10th, so that should work out quite well (giving me a month or so before sysadmin II starts). With the way things are progressing, i'll have a month to spend on each section of the training; which should give me just enough time to absorb all the information without having too much downtime.

I love scripts. FFXI has a 3rd party program that i'd never, ever use called the windower. This nifty little program was originally made so you could run FFXI in a window or even just alt-tab to the desktop and keep the game going (without it, the game just crashes). Over time various things have been added that honestly i haven't needed or found much use for. One thing that i've been messing around with is writing custom scripts that function like very extended macros. While i haven't gone as far as to use them while not at my computer, keeping a hands-free approach while skilling strings on brd or summoning magic for summoner is quite nice. It's far from perfect, but they get the job done. With an almost complete set party for smn about to start, this will be quite useful.

Been playing quite alot of Guitar Hero over the past few days. I have to admit, it's quite a fun game (even if the rest of the house has given up once we hit hard difficulty). Overall, the game's difficulty scales quite well and it can be actually hard (screw Bark at the Moon). I'm still slowly chipping away at it, and i can really see myself getting better, but i'm playing less and less at a time due to frustration (i'd love to be able to just work on very specific parts without having to redo the entire song from scratch, for example). It's also quite obvious that some songs are actually much, much hard to play on a real guitar, whereas the converse is also true. I'm wondering what advances will be made for the sequel.

Your Inner Dragon is the most interesting of all. Yellows are the fourth rarest dragon of all (after Gold, Platinum and Chromatic dragons). They spend the vast majority of their time soaring high above the ground, often for no particular reason. They love to be in the air, and are thus typified as the Air Elemental dragon. Your Inner Dragon spends most of his/her time on the Plains or steppe highlands when not mingled with the air currents. All of the Elemental dragons are technically aligned "Chaotic Evil" but a Yellow is about as close as they come to being either Neutral or "Lawful Evil." So if you feel like a bit of a do-gooder sometimes, it's perfectly normal.

You like to spend time in silent, aerial meditation and would only really attack someone if provoked. Your favorable attributes are the sunrise, Spring, incense, clouds, and any kind of helpful air mass or current. When it's needed, your breath weapon is pure bolts of Lightning. How's that for a neat piece of carry-on luggage? See you amongst the clouds!

Oops, been a while since last post.

Wed, 24 May 2006 03:22:34 GMT

I would seem i got distracted by FFXI and really didn't have too much to write about really. It's good being back into the game and i'm leveling pretty quickly on Blue Mage. It's a fun job with alot of tweaking and versatility. So far, i've effectively tanked, main healed, and DD. I'm just now starting to get some of my more solid debuffs, so we will see where that goes. Picked up Fenrir (yay puppy!) and i'm up to the Diabolos fight in CoP (boo being quite far behind indeed), so Summoner should be more fun if not more complete. Made a couple new friends and got back into the fold with some old ones, which is really what MMOs are about in general and FFXI has always had a really solid community.

I went to my little brother's grave on his birthday. I'm still not sure as to why i actually do it, but i always go his birthday and the day he died. It's not that i really feel he's there or really even sure he knows if i'm there or not, but just the same i go to pay my respects and focus my undivided attention on remembering him from when he was alive. It's been almost 20 years now and to me i can still remember what he looked like and various things we did together from our childhood. The day may soon come when i'm no longer able to go there as often, which will be sad. I don't know if it's just part of proof of his existance or what, but i do feel slightly better everytime i go.

Last week i watched Scary Movie 4, which was quite honestly pretty boring. It seemed to have lost alot of it's appeal to me and about the only part i really did like was the end bit on Tom Cruise going apeshit on Oprah. Having never seen that episode of Oprah (can't say i'm really fond of her), it just made me really wonder how far he went in reality. Soooo, i watched a clip of him somewhere online. I must say, he's really gone off the deep end. Perhaps the more extreme thing he did was when he forced her to play mercy (sorta) 3 times. She totally had the scared rabbit look in her eye, which was great. I'd done some reading on Scientology before but had become a little fuzzy on some of the finer details. After a hours i not only brushed up on it, but learned a bit about their political stance and the trouble they've had in other countries. Seems most countries consider it to be some sort of dangerous cult...go figure.

Started watching a new anime series called Juuni Kokki last night. Thusfar, the story is about this highschool girl that oneday gets taken rather abruptly and under diress from her school to another world. She's given a magical sword and a magical orb, but this is far from a magic-girl series. The plot is pretty solid and so far there has been plenty of character development of most of the characters. The artwork is pretty decent, but nothing stelar. Overall pretty good, even if i am only on ep 11. I'll post more on it once i've finished or come close to finishing it.

Spiderman
Congratulations! You scored a super 53%!

You're hotter than, well, hot-cakes! You've got a fan base bigger than
Pam & Tommy, and to tell the truth, you actually don't mind the
super-hero gig. Most of the time, anyway.
Everyone seems to love their fun, friendly and courageous hero as you
swoop in to save the day, time and time again! Unfortunately, swooping
and day-saving doesn't help pay the rent, and you're not exactly the
"hero-for-hire" type either. Hey, at least you can play down the whole
life saving, self sacrificing gig with some neat lil' punchlines and
remarks!
Juggling both egos becomes a strain at times and whilst you want to
help everyone, you're also in search of "me time", often finding
yourself having to make constant personal sacrifices in order to
protect those around you.
Don't fret though! At the end of the day you'll find yourself with the
support from either those you rescue or perhaps a close friend or loved
one who'll get you by, reminding you of how cool you look in spandex.

My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 99% on Heropoints

Link: The Which SUPER HERO are you Test written by crayzee69 on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Nowhere near Berlin!

Sun, 07 May 2006 14:12:10 GMT

So the house is clean. I'm really amazed with how much more floor space we have. The cats can't find any new good places to hide and sleep, so they are kinda all over the place now. The whirlwind of cleaning that was jer, definitely kicked up alot of dust...so everyone appears to be sickly and is sneezing left and right. Somewhere in the middle of all this, we took a break to watch Hostel and Aeon Flux. While reviews said that Hostel was "the scariest movie of the decade", i however thought it was kinda fun with a different kind of story telling. The only real feeling it left was that we should stay the hell away from Bratislava. Overall, not a bad movie but i'm not in any particular rush to see it again. Aeon Flux, on the other hand, was alot better than i thought it would be; a decent plot line, visually appealing, and otherwise a solid film.

My check card finally showed up, Yay! I can finally withdraw money from my accnt, which means i can get the CD and start learning Solaris. I'm really looking forward to it and it seems like it'll be alot of fun. This also marks the end of my prolonged vacation tho. Was fun while it lasted, but it'll feel good to actually be productive again.

So i stared back on FFXI a few days ago. With the new expansion there's a new area including a massive new city. After getting drafted to merit in the new zone, i slowly came to grip with the fact that i've gotten quite rusty as a brd. >< A few hours later, i'd readjusted to the aggro ranges, song timer/distance and such and was back in the game. Even with the mass lag and screwed up claiming changes, it was still alot of fun and i'm looking forward to going back. In the meantime, i'm leveling blue mage and waiting on a friend to catch up with my summoner. So far, i'm only level 10, but blue mage is really quite powerful. I am killing stuff that normally would require good/decent gear and food (which i am using neither). The great number of options on how to play this job really appeals to my obsession with game mechanics. On the down side, learning new abilities (especially buffs) is quite annoying. Atleast it's pretty cheap and overall farming abilities doesn't bother me too much.

You Are 40% Boyish and 60% Girlish

You are pretty evenly split down the middle - a total eunuch.
Okay, kidding about the eunuch part. But you do get along with both sexes.
You reject traditional gender roles. However, you don't actively fight them.
You're just you. You don't try to be what people expect you to be.

How Boyish or Girlish Are You?

Ah the internet! Where men are men, women are men, and children are FBI agents.

Wed, 03 May 2006 10:15:09 GMT

I don't know about others, but i'm getting very tired of sensationalist news. If it's not something negative, violent, scadolist, or otherwise not big enough to grab ratings, it never seems to be on the news. One of the latest 'OMG the world's gonna end' disease/virus would be the possible avian/human influenza pandemic(aka: bird flu). After overcoming my now almost instinctive reaction to block out any absurdly over-hyped fallacious media aimed at ratings, i decided i'd check out what (if any) the possible real ramifications were. Thankfully, there are multiple government sites with just enough information to give a much clearer, less biased perspective. As i first guessed, they are mostly just worried about some super-strain hybrid flu virus that carries the high fatality of one type of avian flu mutating and spreading to the human populace. Of course, as with any new strain of influenza, most people wouldn't have natural resistance to it and would become infected easily. However, considering how the flu is spread; "droplets from a cough or sneeze of an infected person are propelled through the air onto the mouth or nose of people nearby...when a person touches an object contaminated by respiratory droplets and then touches his/her own mouth or nose", i can't say i'm expecting the bubonic plague of the 21st century. Still, it's nice to actually know the basis for the myth the media has been hyping so much.

For the past few days i'd been wondering what the origin was for the heart shape: ♥. After spending a bit looking over various sites online, i bowed to Wikipidea's entry. Alas, it seems that it's too old now to really know where it came from for sure. The best ideas of it's origin: it came from Sumerian cuneiform symbol for woman, or the seeds of a long dead plan, silphium (used as a contraceptive). Oh well, i suppose i'll just write this off as another of those things i'm just not gonna know for now.

The macro virus, bane of M$ users and sysadmins.
Incedibly virulent due to poor coding.

Computer virus quiz

Commitment

Tue, 02 May 2006 01:09:42 GMT

The ball has started to roll today. I opened a new checking accnt this morning (something i haven't had in many years by choice). I've still got some cleaning to do, including setting up a space for the sun boxes. At the rate everything is going, i'll prolly get the intro to Solaris CD sometime next week and be fairly busy with that. I'll have till sysadmin I starts June 19-23 to absorb all the information that it imparts. Sysadmin II runs from either Aug 7-11th or Sept 11-15th. While i'm not sure i can make the first sysadmin class due to some friends getting married, i know i can make the second one. Everything finally starting to come together and i'm pretty optimistic about it.^^

In other news, i was reading over fark and ran across several interesting articles. The first two just reaffirmed the fact that people are really odd. I found a clip of a this "preacher" which was just so very odd. I supposed even pimps reform, but i mean...really. I also ran across this story of a guy that not only decided that stealing copper was a good way to make money, but also decided that he was more than qualified to remove said copper from live power lines. Somehow, Darwin failed us and he lived. The next couple articles just lead me to strengthen my choice that all my kids will have as much martial arts training as they want. A 14yr girl knocked out a older male assailant. Not to be outdone, a 75yr old granny did similar, but without any real training. The most disturbing thing about it was that this guy was charged with both burglary and attempted rape of said grandma.

I finished another anime series Magikano today. Thanks to insomnia, i had plenty of spare time ><. This simple 13 ep series turned out to be fairly decent in the end. Normally, when a review mentions high school, romance, comedy, and magic girl together, i worry. Thankfully, it didn't turn into one of those harem anime and focused more on the strange magic girl (witches) plotline. It's definatley not something i'm gonna hype, but i have to admit it was much better than i figured it would be. I do hate how you have to make a choice when watching the next to last ep of any anime series. You _know_ that when you start it, you've commited yourself to watching the last ep. I've tried to just watch the next to last one and save the last one, but that never works. I just end up sitting in bed thinking about the series till it drives me nuts.

You Are 29 Years Old

Under 12: You are a kid at heart. You still have an optimistic life view - and you look at the world with awe.

13-19: You are a teenager at heart. You question authority and are still trying to find your place in this world.

20-29: You are a twentysomething at heart. You feel excited about what's to come... love, work, and new experiences.

30-39: You are a thirtysomething at heart. You've had a taste of success and true love, but you want more!

40+: You are a mature adult. You've been through most of the ups and downs of life already. Now you get to sit back and relax.

What Age Do You Act?

You Are a Chocolate Martini

You're an elegant drunk, who only likes the best bars and the most expensive drinks.
A bit of a cheapskate, you're likely to mooch ten dollar drinks off both friends and strangers.

You should never: Drink and dash. You're gonna get caught leaving someone with the tab!

Your ideal party: A posh celebrity party you crash, with an open bar.

Your drinking soulmates: those with a Classic Martini personality

Your drinking rivals: those with a Blueberry Martini personality

What Flavor Martini Are You?

When will they develop button technology that understands a sense of urgency?

Fri, 28 Apr 2006 16:48:47 GMT

For reasons unknown to me, i tend to seek out the most heart-wrenching romantic/drama anime i can find. It's probably due to a slightly cynical view on life or the shear plot and unpredictability of said series. You never know if the relationship will work out, who might die, or basically what the outcome will be. That being said, i just finished watching a series called Hanbun no Tsuki ga Noboru Sora // Looking up at the Half-moon. **Mild Spoiler Alert ** It is a short(6 eps), but really touching story about a guy in a hospital with a mild illness that crosses paths with a girl that has near terminal heart complications. Each episode shows their budding friendship/relationship growing while knowing that it's quite possible that she won't be alive much longer. It's definitely one of those series that makes you take a double-take on some of the stuff/people you take for granted. ** End Alert ** I wouldn't say it's the best or most painful one i've watched, but it's quite good and i recommend it.

It never fails that after watching something a bit more emotionally taxing that i will need to do something else to kinda relax my mind. As i was reading over my favorite web comic, Megatokyo, i ran across a blog comment that Palladium Books is in serious trouble and may be going out of business. Now, as a quite avid gamer in my early years, Palladium made the first books that started me on my gamer's lifestyle. As such, it's always held a warm place in my heart and i'm rather sad to see that it may not be in existence for much longer. After the selling of TSR to Hasbro and the fall of FASA, i'm hard pressed to think of any other RPG publishers that were still around, much less still producing new content. It's a sad state of affairs that the type of games that i grew up with may not be around for future generations.

While looking over the vast amount of anime i still have yet to watch, i noticed a suspicious little folder that's been sorta just chilling in my downloads/new arrivals area for months and decided to check it out. It seems that its 200 japanese songs of various genres, so i quickly loaded it up into winamp and started to check it out for the first time. I have to admit, i've been a big fan and hopelessly addicted to JPop and JRock. With it's crack-like cheerful tempo and lyrics, it seems to balance some of my most random melancholy moods. What i never expected (or really even thought about) was the existence of JSka (japanese ska). I was quite surprised that the artist was able to not only recreate some of the better ska beats/feelings but even got the pouty voice perfect. It really fits in well (aside from being in japanese) with Save Ferris, older no doubt, and the like. While it's not something i'd listen to alot, it's nice to know there's more out there. Of course, as with any innocent attraction towards an addictive media flavor by my slightly obsessive self; i did find a new artist's vocal styling to become enthralled by: Shimatani Hitomi's song, Perseus. With it's familiar Kotoko/Misa-like pace and peppy upbeat lyrics, i was lost by the time i got halfway through the song. Looks like it's time to start working on my seriously deficient katakana translation skills so i can find more.

You Have a Melancholic Temperament

Introspective and reflective, you think about everything and anything.
You are a soft-hearted daydreamer. You long for your ideal life.
You love silence and solitude. Everyday life is usually too chaotic for you.

Given enough time alone, it's easy for you to find inner peace.
You tend to be spiritual, having found your own meaning of life.
Wise and patient, you can help people through difficult times.

At your worst, you brood and sulk. Your negative thoughts can trap you.
You are reserved and withdrawn. This makes it hard to connect to others.
You tend to over think small things, making decisions difficult.

What Temperment Are You?

Grade A Bang-Bang

Thu, 27 Apr 2006 23:45:27 GMT

After re-reading an old maxim, i was suddenly filled with the desire to check out the Kriss super V machine pistol. While i wasn't able to find a printed spec sheet and/or RoF, it looks quite impressive. It's basically a funky smg that does indeed look alot like a spray nozzle that one might attach to a water hose. Normally, when i read words like "light-weight frame", "low felt recoil", and "one handed" i think of a gun chambered in .32 or even 9mm. Needless to say, i was very surprised that the prototype uses .45 ACP rounds in a 10 round double stack mag. After watching the short video, i'm left wanting even more info on this strange new machine pistol. Another interesting weapon i saw was the AA-12 auto shotgun. With a 300 cyclic rate using "2.75-inch shells at a rate of five per second from either a 20-round drum or an eight-round magazine", i have to admit, i was rather impressed with it as well. None of the compare to the awe inspiring M-32 multishot grenade launcher . With the ability to empty it's 6 rnd 40mm drum in 3 seconds, the tactical applications (both military and law enforcement) of such a weapon are impressive. I almost feel sorry for those armor plated terrorist deer.

Recently, i've recounted the number of anime series i've got on my system that i've yet to watch and fully intend to. Sadly, i figured it was closer to 3-4 when infact it was closer to 7-8. Needless to say, i've got more than enough to last me for a while (blasphemy, i know). I don't expect them to all be worth keeping, but i'm sure a few of them will find a semi-permanent home on my HDD. Remember the days when 1 TB seemed like alot of space?

You Are Japanese Food

Strange yet delicious.
Contrary to popular belief, you're not always eaten raw.

What Kind of Food Are You?

Holding the fridge door open.

Wed, 26 Apr 2006 18:59:51 GMT

I recently was side-tracked when checking out various up and coming games and stumbled across EGM's online site. After scanning the headlines, i read an article about the PS3. The main hardware specs were a high speed cell processor, strong graphics GPU made by nvidia, and a quarter gig of ram. Various other specs were a HDD of unknown size, 4 USB 2.0 ports, NIC, bluetooth, blu-ray DVD, and a new styled batarang controller. They said it'd be backwards compatible with PS1 and PS2 games, so lets hope they don't make the same mistake that Microsoft did with the 360. They did say they've got over 150 games planned for release or shortly thereafter, but a large portion will of course be japan only. Looking over a quite long list of confirmed bigger games for the PS3, quite a few caught my interest (unlike most consoles at launch) including talk about a complete remake of FFVII. So, here's to hoping it's good and worth all the wait.

I beat Suikoden V yesterday and have since been drifting around aimlessly looking for another game/movie/tv series to hold my interest. A quick re-scan over the MMO scene leaves me even more disappointed as only 3 peak my jaded gamer's appetite. It appears that two of the three might indeed suck hardcore, but at this time i'm unsure as to which ones. With the console market looking even more bleak, i'm getting more and more anxious about getting my training started so i can go out and do something else. With all the normal TV series i watch on hold till summer, i'm left with the new season of the Sopranos and finally a new episode of The Office tomorrow night. I've got about 4 anime series i'm currently trying to watch, but for some reason can't really seem to get into any of them.

Which File Extension are You?

Which OS are You?

Mon, 24 Apr 2006 10:49:15 GMT

The ongoing peep insurrection is slowly coming to an end. It would seem after the public executions of the pink leaders via teeth, the remaining yellow ones have settled down some. As a final reminder of what it truly means to defy us, a small portion was made to watch as a pair were sentenced to death in the microwave chamber. After only 5 seconds, they expanded past the box, terror filling their eyes. It was a shame we didn't have a camera on hand. Yes, it seems as if the revolution is at an end.

D&D Online Alignment Test</ br>

Your Character’s Alignment
Neutral Evil

A neutral evil villain does whatever she can get away with. She is out for herself, pure and simple. She sheds no tears for those she kills, whether for profit, sport, or convenience. She has no love of order and holds no illusion that following laws, traditions, or codes would make her any better or more noble. On the other hand, she doesn’t have the restless nature or love of conflict that a chaotic evil villain has. The criminal who robs and murders to get what she wants is neutral evil. Some neutral evil villains hold up evil as an ideal, committing evil for its own sake. Most often, such villains are devoted to evil deities or secret societies. The common phrase for neutral evil is "true evil." Neutral evil is the most dangerous alignment because it represents pure evil without honor and without variation.

--excerpted from the Player’s Handbook, Chapter 6

Dissent is the highest form of Patriotism.

Fri, 21 Apr 2006 00:21:03 GMT

Recently, i was reminded of a time when someone told my quite inebriated friend, "You're not going to Joplin". After a brief laugh, i then came to the realization that i held much stronger animosity towards anyone telling me what i'm not going to do, rather than what i should do. I spent some time deliberating why i felt stronger about being told what i wasn't going to do, rather than what i shouldn't. The answer was obvious, one was a suggestion the other was a direct order against my own right to freely choose. I really, really do love my country, but at times (more and more frequently) i find myself at odds with some of the directions that our "representatives" are taking it. Now, separation of church and state has always been a really big factor in my life. This typically has extended from politely butting heads with public school administration to outright yelling at the tv/radio/computer. Infractions upon this ideal is something i very strongly oppose, much like the many other unconstitutional laws that trample over the fundamental design of our country. In the same day i ran across two postings on Fark that i couldn't help but feel served some kind of warning. The First was an article about bill signed into law by the government of Georgia that would "make Georgia the first state to offer state-sanctioned elective classes on the Bible". The article continues to explain that "The law requires that the courses be taught in an objective and nondevotional manner with no attempt made to indoctrinate students. Now, while i personally don't subscribe to the christian mythology, i have taken a few classes in college on christian/bible history and always found them to be a bit lacking and biased. I have a complete lack of faith (for lack of better word) in any US based, state funded public education system's ability to teach this in an objective manner as they can't even get enough money to fund the more important school curriculum and fine arts classes over the local football team. Unlike some of my friends, i've yet to have any children that i know of but do plan on it someday in the future. Part of the many, many things i want for them is the total freedom to adopt any religion (or none at all) as their own. The second article is about Baylor University's recent decree via email to students. "Baylor Vice President for Student Life Samuel W. Oliver sent an e-mail to women students this week warning that any who 'associate' with Playboy would be subject to the university's disciplinary processes." Thankfully, this very sexist/prejudice mandate was met with a civil disobedient response. I can say i'm quite displeased with the administration of one of Texas' top medical based schools and their whole approach.

It would appear that i've become fully addicted to Suikoden V. Now, as an avid fan of the whole series of games, there have been a few that are better than the others (namely the first two), which lead to a slow start in the game for me. Overall, it's got all the good elements from the previous four with a few new ideas mixed in. The gameplay is semi-linear, with a rock solid plot and pretty spell/combat effects without the need to overdo it. That being said, it does keep with some of the nifty elements from the previous games. One said element is that there are few characters that appeared in the very first one and kept showing up throughout the series. It does need to be said that these are not just cameos, but full on playable characters that have a defined personality, backhistory, and quirks. In a RPG with 108 total playable characters NPCs, this has always been a really unique factor in the series. Somewhere around 25 hours into the game last night, i not only unexpectedly bumped it, but recruited my absolute favorite character from the series; if not one of my all time favorite characters from all games: Viki. Viki is a young (mid 20s) mage with a Teleportation True Rune. True runes are magical artifacts that all hold incredible power, one of which is eternal youth. She isn't the strongest character in the game (maybe in the top 10%), but that isn't the reason i'm so fond of my digital mage-friend. While she is a powerful mage character, the main appeal of such a character is her personality. She always has a similar entrance in the series; it would seem that occasionally when sneezing she accidentally teleports herself. Her spells are teleportation based and two of the three have an unhealthy chance of teleporting one of your players away instead of the enemy. This can be quite harsh when you're 2 hours into some dank cave/dungeon and instead of a really strong monster, your main healer goes *poof*. She does, however; have one of the most useful utility abilities in any RPG. Viki offers two way teleportation from your base of operation to any town you've visited in the past.

What Rurouni Kenshin Weapon Are You?

Faded stars

Tue, 18 Apr 2006 19:00:32 GMT

Recently i've found myself wondering more and more about all the random friends i've had over the years that seem to have just faded away. When i was a kid, i had a couple close friends that i figured i would be tight with for the rest of my life, but that lasted until high school. Now, a few years after moving from my hometown to Dallas, i've lost contact with every single one of my friends. It's not something i really hold alot of regret about, these things happen and in most cases i put a decent amount of effort into maintaining the friendship. Still, none-the-less, i do catch myself thinking about them and wondering how everyone is doing. I don't have an overriding passion to track them down or anything, more of just a passing curiosity.

Over the last couple months i've been looking at either getting back into school or just getting very specific training that would send me along the path to my desire career(s). After narrowing down the options to either spending time in college for a degree towards Video Game Design or Unix/Win Sysadmin, i decided to go with sysadmin. The job market is a bit easier to get into and i think overall it's gonna be the more stable choice. Sun has a pretty decent training program set up, so i've decided to go that route. As with most major decisions in my life, i've broken this down into a few phases. Well, i've concluded the vast majority of my research phase and it's not looking too bad. Overall, i'll be spending about the same amount as i spent on my car over the next few months. By the end of Aug, i should hopefully have all the basic skills i need to start work as a junior sysadmin. Looks like i'll have rather large gaps between intro, sysadmin I and sysadmin II, but that should work to my advantage i would think. If nothing else, it'll give me time to fully explore any of the weaker areas i run across and hopefully get some good, quality time in for a class and/or self study on perl scripting. I still need to check with SMU/UTD about some non-credit courses on perl, but that shouldn't be a big deal. If nothing else, we got more than enough books in both hard copy and ebook form to keep me very busy. It was a bit daunting at first, but it seems like it'll work out pretty well overall. With any luck, i'll be able to get a decent job that'll opt for sending me for network admin classes. If not, there's always vacation time later.

What Samurai Champloo Character Are You?

Fear the Chibi ones.

Tue, 18 Apr 2006 07:54:04 GMT

So, today (or rather, last night) i got to do a little shopping. It's been quite a while since i purchased a non-MMO game, and you can imagine the number of new shinies that caught my eye. After much deliberation i narrowed my choices down to either Dragon Quest VIII or Suikoden V. With not having played the DQ line very much, i opted for Suikoden V. I figured, since i'd played all the others, it was the safer bet. It wasn't but 30 min after that i started to suffer buyer's remorse. Now, some people i know are more than able to go and spend money on random things and not think a second thought of it. I am not one of these people. I've found that it originally started years ago when shopping for a new bang-bang, but has long since expanded to most purchases i make both Online and RL ones. It's been rather interesting to be playing a MMO and somehow being a gil pincher. As i see it, this is a problem as you shouldn't have to give such concern to buying items in a game. So far, this hasn't spilled out into single player games, but i figure it's just a matter of time. Then again, i've noticed many of my habits from either RL or MMOs have started to spill over more.

I've read many various game forums over the course of the many random online games i've played. One thread of discussion that always seems to creep up is when a small percent of the gaming community feels that it is in some way wrong to play any character with a sex other than your own. It never fails that these people seem to that play trolls, elves, galka, etc. Being a male who's been playing predominatly female characters for several years, this of course makes me laugh. It honestly doesn't bother me and i find it rather amusing. I first started playing females when i would run table-top rpgs. I always felt the need to try and play a little more in-character when creating the random NPCs that my players would run into. It never seemed right that players would spend most of an adventure and only run into males. Needless to say, most games i'd run would be a tad bit more pro-female than chainmail bikini clad warriors and slutty barmaids. As i progressed from "pen and paper" games to MMOs, i tried playing male characters in the first few MMOs i picked up, but due to a serious lack decent looking character creation options for males, found myself creating more and more female characters. Go figure that when given the chance, geek programmers would give more detail to the fairer sex. It doesn't help matters much that you're making a character that will have their backside as the center of your screen for the next 100-400+ hrs. That being said, it might as well be one that is pleasing to look at, even if it's only digital. This has, oddly enough, had an adverse effect on my RL world. I've recently caught myself saying things that i just wouldn't ever say. Now, these words aren't all that gender specific, but they do still tend to be used more by females and younger kids than males out of their early teens. Nothing too out of character for me yet, but it's definitely something i'll be paying slightly more attention to in future.

You Are Peeps

You're the type that's more likely to play with your food than actually eat it.

What Easter Candy Are You?

Be happy, the easter bunny died for your sins.

Mon, 17 Apr 2006 01:29:08 GMT

So today started off kinda odd and just keep on going in that direction. My trip to visit my family for the weekend didn't go as well as i would have liked, but overall it was nice. After a very dramatic Saturday, i passed out with the idea of leaving in the morning to avoid easter traffic. As i was eating breakfast this morning (damned early risers getting me up at the ungodly hour of 8am), my grandmother commented that someone had hit a rabbit on the road near our house. My first thought of "poor fluffy creature" was quickly replaced with how surreal it was that a bunny had become roadkill on easter morning. I mean, sure, my parents live out in the country and there are all sorts of random animals out and about at night, but mostly deer, stray cats/dogs, and a stray mountain lion. My mind started to race along with random tangents about the poor dead bunny. I mean, what if some kids saw it? Would they think the easter bunny was dead? Was there some little girl, dressed a cute pink dress with lacey white gloves on her way to church, crying her eyes out over the 'ewather bunny'? I figured, the best we coulda done would be to put out an easter basket on the side of the road with some easter grass and scrambled eggs. While this might seem a little morbid at first, atleast i'm not giving kids chocolate bunnies or marshmellow birds and encouraging them to bite off their heads/ears. :P

The drive back to Dallas was long and rather dull (as i have no radio and my MP3 player is sans ac adapter). As such, i had plenty of time to wonder all sorts of things i normally wouldn't. I passed a slightly customized red civic with clear light covers, frosted white tint, and a white ribbon sticker on the back. I couldn't figure out if they supported the WRC (men against other men's violence towards women) or if they just added it cause it looked as if they were supporting something and it matched. A few miles later, i spent about 5-8 miles in the company of a young girl driving a gold saturn. Now, being an avid people watcher, i've noticed that very, very few people tend to look at anyone outside of their cars when driving. I was wondering that as we had progressed from using walking/horse travel to cars as our primary modes of transport, if we had forgone the chance to meet some potentially very interesting/special people that could have enhanced our lives. I decided that this prospect was a little too disconcerting and bid adieu to my saturn friend at the 35E/35W split.

I went to go see Lucky number Slevin tonight with my roomie. Considering we had some time to kill (and gumbling in out tummies) we decided to go eat at chili's. We got a waitress that i hadn't seen before, and when giving our orders, i made some light-hearted joke about the difference between Savory steak butter, butter, and Spicy Cajun butter. Sadly, she was all serious and gave some half-hearted answer. Each and every time she came to our tables before it was "tip-time", she didn't smile and despite all attempts, seemed upset, too busy to talk (3 tables in the entire restaurant), or just plain determined to have no fun what-so-ever. With my roomie and i both in a bit of shock over the whole affair, we briefly contemplated asking her if something was wrong. After a few minutes of discussion, i decided that if something was seriously wrong, it may be better not to seem too intrusive. So, i settled for leaving a little pick-me up note on the back of the receipt. I hope it helped in some way, or if nothing else to serve as a warning to how she's presenting herself to her customers.

what fucked version of hello kittie are you?

completely fucked!
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Sunflower seeds are evil

Fri, 14 Apr 2006 22:50:24 GMT

I am, by choice, 90% carnivore. I like steak, sea food, chicken, etc. I normally don't touch most fruit/veggies as they are more for decorative purposes and flavor than actual substance in my book. I may eat some fruit or a salad once every few months, but i'm sure that's just my body's way of warning me about the upcoming threat of scurvy. One major exception to this is sunflower seeds. Such a pain to eat, makes a massive mess, but for some reason i find i keep craving them. I honestly think that since birth i've had some sorta salt deficiency and the strange salt on these seeds is both inquisitive and addictive. It has more of a fresh sea food/raw oyster flavor and i'm not quite sure how they did it. Sunflower nuts are ok, but not nearly worth the effort or energy expenditure nessaccary to obtain them. I've tried just getting sunflower nuts, but i end up getting tired of eating them and just keep consuming them for the yummy salt substance (which is in far lower amounts than full-fledged sunflower seeds). When found, jalapeno sunflower nuts are great. They add just enough to really give a nice build up and after a bag, i'm quite content. Now, i'm a big fan of spicy food, but it's gotta be done right. Which brings me to my next point, question: Where the hell is my spicy bacon? I mean really, one would think with the number of things they've made into a spicy version of it's bland self, bacon woulda happened at some point. By itself, bacon is great, good with gravy sometimes, but where's my bloody spicy bacon? I check the grocery stores, various resturants, and everywhere else for this happy skillet fried pork of spicy goodness, but it seems that nobody produces it. I suppose i could experiment and find a way to make normal bacon into spicy bacon at some point, but that sounds like a whole lot of work and ruined bacon. Maybe i'll give it a shot at some point, but currently, i think i'm far too lazy of a cook to go trying to spice bacon when i could just eat the bacon, un-spiced. So, for the time being, i'll be moderately discontent with the world and it's lack of spicy bacon. >.<

Two quizzes for the weekend. ^^

What angel represents you? (Breathtaking pics, and long results.)

You are the pleasing/giving angel! You strive to please people and you love to make people happy by giving them gifts. Your a very sweet, giving angel, a lot of people like you! You love people in the world as well as creatures that live in it. Don't let people take advantage of you and you kind ways. Color: Green and white. Flower: Buttercups. Sweets: Ice cream Animal: mice Number: 2 Element: Earth
Take this quiz!

Mmmm... fangirly.

You're a bishounen!

You're male, but people often mistake you for the other option. You're unfeasibly thin and pretty and always have perfect hair, often surrounded by sparkles/sakura/roses. You almost certainly have a tragic backstory which involves one or more of your parents, and are liable to have a Tragic Destiny (TM). You were almost certainly invented by a female mangaka, are worshipped by a female audience, and your life is characterised by periods of extreme pain and angst. Sucks to be you.

Which generic anime character are you?

The pitter-patter of little feet, in combat boots.

Fri, 14 Apr 2006 06:45:05 GMT

Gotta love those very few random TV shows that are worth watching. Penn & Teller's BS, Banzai, Firefly, BSG, etc. Recently got into a documentary on modern china called, simply enough, China Rises. Overall quite fun, but it did make an interesting comment slip out from me. The traditional family tree is a pyramid scheme! I mean, really. You take two people and they make babies (6-8 of em, so they have enough even after a few die), and those babies in turn make even more babies. So, here's the original 2 people, old and no longer wanting to work. When it comes to paying for what's needed, they get money from kids and grandkids, just like the mafia or any other organized crime syndicate. Mind you, i'm not compairing traditional families of old to organized crime, just a pyramid scheme for now. Time to make some babies soon i suppose, i wanna retire in 20-30 years. ^^

On a side note, i've found that while playing PSO, i've become quite addicted to raising mags. Ok, for those that might not know, Mags are these little sentient constructs that float around with you and you feed them random items that heal, restore TP, cure status ailments, etc. As you feed them, they get different abilities, evolve into new, cute floating thingers, and cast neat spells at your command (and sometimes on their own). At first, i was making them only cause i liked the stat bonuses and it's a wasted equipment slot otherwise. The problem is, they cap out rather quickly (lvl 200 ~ 40 hrs of playtime). Now, i'm randomly raising various mags because it feels kinda wrong when you aren't feeding them. It doesn't help the matter that there are tons of different mags with a whole slew of ways to raise that exact one. -.-

World of Warcraft has really gone too far. Some of the random image/file sharing sites will allow anonymous users to browse the most recent uploads. As a person who likes totally random media being presented in an easy to click format, i just couldn't resist. What i expected to find was mostly, random family pics, pics of people i've never met on vacation, pr0n (it's what the internet is for after all), etc. What i found, in addition to aforementioned images, was a plethora of WoW screenshots. I honestly never expected to see them, much less in such an overabundance. I highly expect that ten years from now, we will be watching one of those "Remember the 80s" shows on the years 2000-2010 and WoW will have it's own segment. I'm not sure if i'm more disturbed by Michael Jackson being an iconic figure for the 80s, O.J. Simpson in the 90s, or WoW being one for the 00s. I worry that i'll start to see WTS/WTB in a sales add for a major department store, or on an advertising marquee at 7-11. Who knows, maybe large scale physical public auction houses will make a comeback and replace flea markets.

I Am A: Neutral Good Elf Bard Mage

Alignment:
Neutral Good characters believe in the power of good above all else. They will work to make the world a better place, and will do whatever is necessary to bring that about, whether it goes for or against whatever is considered 'normal'.

Race:
Elves are the eldest of all races, although they are generally a bit smaller than humans. They are generally well-cultured, artistic, easy-going, and because of their long lives, unconcerned with day-to-day activities that other races frequently concern themselves with. Elves are, effectively, immortal, although they can be killed. After a thousand years or so, they simply pass on to the next plane of existence.

Primary Class:
Bards are the entertainers. They sing, dance, and play instruments to make other people happy, and, frequently, make money. They also tend to dabble in magic a bit.

Secondary Class:
Mages harness the magical energies for their own use. Spells, spell books, and long hours in the library are their loves. While often not physically strong, their mental talents can make up for this.

Deity:
Oghma is the Neutral Good god of knowledge and invention. He is also known as the Binder of What is Known, and is the Patron of Bards. His followers believe that knowledge reigns supreme, and is the basis for everything else that is done. They wear white shirts and pants, with a black and gold braided vest, and a small, box-like hat. All priests of Oghma are known as Loremasters. Oghma's symbol is a scroll.

Find out What D&D Character Are You?

Unexpected requests

Fri, 14 Apr 2006 01:05:45 GMT

Gotta love being volunteered for things without your consent or even your knowledge. Much like many of my friends, i tend to be a rather nocturnal creature by design and when i travel i normally do so at the dead of night. So imagine my surprise when i was told that on my upcoming trip to visit my family outside Austin that my grandmother was planning on getting a ride with me halfway. This is a little more than problematic to say the least. My plan was to head out around midnight or so friday night and come back during the early hours of Sunday. If this foolhardy plan was to happen, i'd have just enough time to arrive Saturday night, eat, visit, sleep, wake up for breakfast then head out...not even worth the trip if you ask me (as much as i love seeing my family). Thankfully, they were easily enough to lead towards the sensible solution that this is not a good idea. Everything has it's payoff, and as such, i got to spend many hours on the phone with my mother. Now, as this would not normally be a bad thing (i do love my mother after all), recent events have been less than cheerful. My stepfather was diagnosed with cancer last year. After some surgery, the doctors removed it all. Repeated tests showed that it has infact been removed, yet he's still convinced that he's going to die from it and seems to be just waiting for it to happen. One would think that, after all these tests, he could finally accept that it's gone, that he is well, and move on with his life. Everything seems to come from his father dying from it later in life. Despite the obvious life differences (which he doesn't really acknowledge), he really thinks that it's just a matter of time. So much for the saying, "What doesn't kill me, makes me stronger." Perhaps it's just the seclusion of their residency and stresses of everyday life.

Thankfully, everything else seems to be fine. The house hasn't burned down, my computer still works, and i've got a few movies/anime eps waiting on me to watch them. The cats woke me from my nap (seems they needed food and felt the desire to tell me...alot), but that's ok as i've got too many things to do other than sleeping. >^.^<

What is your element? [with pics + detailed answeres]

Your element is Ice. This element may seem a little odd, but this is a side-effect from when the element of Water gets too hurt. Once you were a content soul, and happy with life. But then something happened. Not necessarily on one day, it probably happened gradually over time. You lost your will to care and became even more reserved from the world. People had hurt you in ways you do not want to remember and now you isolate yourself from them. You have turned into an outsider and probably dress more in black than you used to. Your depression is eating you up and tearing you apart and the worst part is that no one is willing to help, or so it seems. In school you are often by yourself or one single friend and you rarely seem to be truly happy anymore. Your sad, distant eyes and constant frown seems glued to your face and you need a saviour from this world. You may turn to music for understanding and sing/scream along in the lyrics to get rid of some pain. You are not very open about your problems to your family/friends, and wish that they would just notice it and make it go away.
Take this quiz!