Free Falling

Well this week continues to be not the greatest. Last week kind of foretold this (starting about Wednesday but I could see it coming from earlier tho) but yea that was the slide, this is the fall. Last night there was hope because it was Tuesday Night Mario Kart and we (Eric, Steiner, Nathan, and I) got in some high quality MK action. We (everyone other then Steiner) are catching up to Steiner in skill. If we had another 3 months it might be vaguely equal. Alas we have 2 more weeks and then it's all over, possibly forever. That's how life is though. It just ends at some point.
Today was a let down so far. Usually lunches on Mon/Wed/Fri are great. I get to spend quality time with two of my good friends (it varies with the day) but today (and last week) Wed was lunch was basically eat and sit in silence. Perhaps I am just being paranoid but I am really worried I did something to piss her off. Frankly I have no clue what's going on, but it's been on my mind now because it feels like I did something wrong that I am not being told about (so I can at least apologize and then get lost if nothing else) but yeah that is really on my mind right now. For me, after God, friends and family are what it's about and well it seems like I am losing touch with one of mine now (actually quite a few, lots of people seem distant, maybe it's just me tho) and that worries me to no end. Whatever is going on, more then likely it's my fault, because this week seems like that just about everything is.
Getting off my self pity and worry since noone cares. People might be interested that Apple has updated iTunes. iTunes is now a year old and has sold 70 million-yes million- songs in that time. Quite a few. I have about 100 out of that number. I actually do buy music now since iTunes Music Store came to be. Go figure music industry. You actually made money through downloads!
A salute to Neph again for humor on the Exalted forums. In response to whether firewands-think one shot ancient flamer throwers-could be parried by Sam Gamgee he said: With an suddenly-unhappy Smeagol, if Sam is smart about it. This just cracked me up. Decent humor is sometimes hard to find on forums these days!

From Iranian News

Tehran Times Take it as you will.

Minor Victories

Well with thanks from one of my classmates (whom I actually don't know her name) I am finally passed the sticking point that held me up all yesterday in VB.NET Why it sucks so bad I don't know, to tell the truth I think it has to do with Microsoft and their multiple lousy products but probably in reality it is more some tech didn't set things up right on public machines. There is no problem in A224 lab which is less restrictive so go figure.
Kudos to Neph for his hard work defending Exalted from the morons who live only to deride the game further because it doesn't conform to what they believe is true. This has already run Scott Taylor (aka izzylobo) to leaving the industry for awhile (see his LJ) and I am wary it may drive others as well. Anyhow see the defense here. I don't think a lot of the people who bitch so much see this but when you keep doing it over and over and over and act like its your right to bitch you drive away talent who work hard and get only your complaints as response. So thanks to those writers who stick with it and help us even when we don't act in way to deserve it.

Update (15:18):

Watching continued stupidity from peoply complaining who seem to be asking permission from writers to do what they want in their games instead of what's in the books, as if that makes it more valid. Sheesh, why do gamers have such a hard time with their own Golden Rule (If you don't like something, CHANGE it!)? I can definitely see where Scott Taylor and Bruce Baugh are coming from. Read Bruce's latest post for the World At Large and see what I mean.

Criticism can be useful at points but there is a general point where either you act on your criticism (ie, if it's that bad quit buying the product or actually go out and attempt to change something rather then put out philosphical ideals for the world to see but never or rarely act to achieve them) or you should shut up. I am probably guilty of not shutting up. Certainly on my roommate I should shut up, only a few weeks left anyhow. I could try and act to fix things but I don't. There's just one example for me. I think though part of human nature is to love someone/thing to hate and hate with a passion. In many cases it might be a love hate relationship which makes it all the crazier. Who can really say?

Anyhow back to CIS. I am 1/3rd the way through it and I just got done with the easy 3rd. I told myself no supper til I am 2/3rds of the way done so I had better get going because the Wooden Spoon lunch was dissapointing and my stomach is not letting me forget that!

I should have studied or slept

...but isntead I got another laugh (perhaps God decided to send me a little cheer, but I can't speak for His actions). As you might recall I am part of the Gmail e-mail beta through Google. Initially I had a lot of problems. Safari wouldn't work with it, I could see the page just fine but I couldn't click on anything, it was like looking at a picture of my page. Mozilla and Netscape, the two major Mac browsers supported couldn't even get that far-frankly they suck anyhow. So I used a Science Lab computer and made a comment. Ironically when I got home, Gmail worked with Safari (yay!) and now I see this off the Google News page. Isn't life funny. BTW if you want my new Gmail addy drop an e-mail to my current UWSP address.
Cheers from a somewhat happier Pointer (until I have to hit the homework this afternoon).

One Bright Shining Star

My sister's getting married!

Imagine that.

Hate it All

Today sucks. I head down to do homework after getting a nice 12 hours of sleep. Find out my iPod Hold switch is broken and I can't use it at all because it's set in locked, ie, the touch pad won't respond to touches. Less then a year in and the one (1) moving part is broken! What the hell? Apple is supposed to be quality stuff isn't it? But not to be outdone after I finally manage to get focused on homework again Visual Studio .NET proves that it can't do simple thing without hanging up, aside from taking 10 minutes to update it's help system (which I don't use) without allowing you to click out of it (thus wasting 10 minutes and nearly locking the computer again). Thus I cannot get even halfway through the assignment because I cannot establish a connection to the database. Now I have wasted most of an afternoon and evening and gotten absolutely NOWHERE.
So this week looks like it will absolutely shitty. I could rant about people right now (I feel pissed off at just about everyone minus maybe 3-4 people) but I won't. Damn, I'm angry though. What a worthless day.
At least Kyle listened and put his incredibly horrible smelling shoes in the hallway. I can't believe he lives with that kind of stench or that he expects anyone else to deal with it (Dani pratically had to leave the room yesterday when he took them off for 5 minutes).
Grr....

Britain

Yea, today was the big mandatory meeting. Things look pretty set to go for the hop across the pond. I was kinda surprised it's is mostly (2/3 or more) girls. I thought the numbers would be somewhat more equal. Oh well. I can't complain the way things are. I have to start hunting for a new (normal) backpack and one like backpackers use plus a digital camera. Right now too looks like if I can do things right I will be able to go to GenCon Europe and hopefully they'll pre-release Exalted: Fae Folk there although I don't really care if they do or not I just hope that I can make it and White Wolf represents.
Twism and I finally managed to finish unlocking the last protected stuff in Mario Kart on Kyle's Gamecube. Steiner had already done this with Eric's cube so it's not new but now both rooms are empowered. We rule, yea!
I think that's all for now. I don't feel like putting any deeps thoughts in at the moment. Too bad for you!

Poor Baldwin

Well this will really be Eric, Will, Teng, and whoever else gets elected problem but guess who's roommate decided he should run for treasurer? Yes. Scary. Granted it isn't technically my problem anymore but what in his mind made him want to do that? It's not like he does anything (less then Ben if that's possible, not that I really care that much, I don't but people ask me cause he's never around to ask, why he doesn't do anything) so why take something which according to the CAs I ate supper with requires a heck of a lot of work and responsibility? Yea. That's my roommate is stupid rant for today.

I now have a gmail account but using it has thus far been a problem. It doesn't work with Safari or the old IE Mac OS X version. Now I downloaded Mozilla 1.6 and Netscape Navigator 7.1 and neither can get to the page. The irony is I can get into the page with Safari but somehow nothing reacts to my mouse clicks. How in the world can I not click on links or anything? Must be XML I guess. I dunno. That's all for now.

Oh boy

From my Cisco days I know this is deep, deep trouble. More on this later maybe. After the IT people finish panicking.

Hamas: Friend of the US?

Israel has now killed two leaders of the group Hamas back to back. The world has condemmed Israel for this action. I am confused. If we take out Osama bin Laden will the US be condemned? It's not like Hamas is the legitimate government of the State of Palestine, as I recall the duly elected (in theory) leader of that government is Yasser Arafat. So how can you condemn a country for killing two men who have vowed to bring that country to destruction? It's not exactly like they are good people towards the US or Israel. (Yes, that is a biased source. Here is another with a near opposite take and one from about as close to the middle as you can get(?)). Granting taking out the leader may not help overall negoiations for peace but on the same side is Israel negoiating with terrorists or the Palestinian (spl) state?
Anyhow, rant over.

Generating Excitement

So I found some fun random generators. A couple I may actually use later for more significant purposes but in the meantime I will put one or two up here for you to peruse.
Writing Challenge
Quick Story
Weird Name <---useful for genning Exalted names.

My CIS test rather beat me up pretty bad, not looking forward to getting that back really. Hope I hold a B in that class. *sigh* At least the rest of my week should be fairly easy, although my weekend will be hectic.

Confessions of an AM rambler

I have a test in less then 8.5 hours. I haven't studied enough. Then again I should know it fairly well so I don't need to study much right?!? After this I will read some more and hope I actually know this, syntax is a real pain, especially when everyone including the Prof relies the program to crosscheck any errors before running. So it seems unfair to me. That is the life for CIS students, indeed anyone who has to take tests in regards to programming languages.
Let's see, what else do I have on my mind that I want to blatantly throw out for public consumption til I realize what stupid stuff I say and edit it. In fact realizing this I am not gonna say what I was gonna originally babble. Thankfully watching Gundam SEED let my brain re-engage. I am done for now, no need to bother you with my loneliness. Right. Ende.

28 Days Later

So Allison got me to watch that movie. Not too bad and even a happy ending. Definitely higher quality then 13 Ghosts. I can see why this movie got awards. Anyhow I enjoyed it and wasn't too creeped out (gee, interesting to actually be in those places now...). Not gonna say a lot more because it is late. Gundam SEED has begun on Toonami Saturdays. They cut out or messed up all the cool theme music. I am sad. Otherwise interesting to finally watch it again (I haven't watched the episodes I have in awhile). Watching some of the Animatrix now and then getting to bed.

From the Newsfloor

Sent by a friend. Interesting read on sorority life. Apparently the stereotypes are true. Gee, makes you wonder what those frats are up to. But don't get me started on that. I want a few more years of personal observations (and my former roommates list of stupid things I have seen people do) before I hit that.

Rollercoaster Thursdays

That's how they feel, but they never ever seem to live up to expectations.
First off, some blog statistics for those who do it or are just randomly interested in that kinda stuff. I thought it was rather interesting. Actually found it awhile ago and dug it up now for your reading pleasure
You can save Enterprise! Yes do it! Forget some anti-Bush pledge! Do something that is worthy! Yes I am teasing you anti-Bushites. American politics: where we vote for the least worst canidate. Anywho, irony is when the due date is.

I am done now.

Whoa, comments

Yea, so through my wonderful comment system I have discovered an Exalted artist's blog/LJ/whatever. I'll throw it up there on the side for you to peruse.

From the Forums

From Neph more specifically. Off the forums:
(Begin Post)
I've explained this elsewhere. I wish I had it still.

Whatever they once were, the Yozis are now the ultimate archetypal forces of pain and lies. They want their freedom. They want to punish Creation and all its denizens for their long imprisonment. After that, they want to get back to ruling the cosmos as eternal tyrant overlords. To this end, the Exalted stolen by the Yozis become princes among slaves. They serve as a warning of what the Yozis intend for Creation, a symbol of Yozi power and the intrument whereby the Yozis may enslave others. In one hand is suffering and in the other their honeyed treachery damns the world. Fear them because they will hurt you and keep on hurting you.

The Malfeans lurk in fitful slumber, more and less than dead within their temple tombs. The spite of the Yozis is the pettiness of a spoiled child who had his favorite toy taken away before being sent to his room. The manifestation of that spite is a temper tantrum, albeit one on the scale of the titans. That comparison doesn't diminish the horror of that cataclysm, but consider that the Malfeans aren't like that. The spite of the Malfeans has no bounds of selfishness and malice. Yozis want what was theirs, and they believe (rightly or wrongly) that they can have it again. Malfeans want what was theirs and they can *never* have it back. They watch and dream and remember and wallow in alien bitterness, knowing that all they ever loved or covoted or cared about has passed from them. The lurk in shadows, dreaming of shadows. They cannot or will not let go, and so they linger in agony until and perhaps beyond the end of days. Their spite is sour grapes spite. What they cannot have, they will destroy, and they will laugh when all is ashes and embers. Their servants have given themselves over in similar lingering, holding to life or its semblance beyond their time so they can extinguish light, life and hope. Abyssals are doomed where Infernals are damned. The deathknights *will* serve the forces of darkness by action or inaction, and if they struggle against that doom it shall burst from them to scourge the world on their behalf. The Malfeans do not yoke the Abyssals directly because there is no need. Abyssals are tainted, stained to the core of their souls. They will serve their purpose. That is inevitable. Let them play. Let them think themselves free.Let them wallow in life so they can come to hate it more. With every passing day they draw closer to the bleak epiphany of their doom, and ever onward to ragnarok. The Yozis plot and scheme for dominion, and so they claim full dominion of their slaves. The Malfeans crave nothing but the murder of the whole world, and so they are content to let their doomed killers wander free. Where the Abyssals go, death follows. What more do the Neverborn need?

--Neph

(End Post)

Summed up nicely. Kinda a miserable life for Abyssals and Infernals tho.

Addendum from same topic:

(Begin Post)

Well, it's all in how you define redemption, actually. An Abyssal can be redeemed in life with truly Herculean effort. If slain, however, the permanently tainted Essence goes back to Exalt a new deathknight. This process continues indefinitely.

An Infernal cannot be redeemed in life, but all you have to do is kill him to set his Essence free. Yes, the next few incarnations will have urges, but that's ok. They can fight those urges or they can be quickly and summarily executed until the taint passes. Come to think of it, I wouldn't be surprised if there were Endings Caste devil hunters who covertly did that in the first age.

"But I'm not a devil worshipper! Why are you doing this."

"Because you could be. Because that risk is not worth taking. Because
it is necessary. Goodbye."

The Yozis have their Infernals absolutely, but only for a life. Then they have to lure them away again or snatch someone else.

Deathknights incarnate to their malformed Essence to the end of days, when they shall bring an end to days. Once more, I stand by my assertion. The Yozis desire dominion, but the Abyssals are ultimately harder to redeem and more doomed in the long run.

--Neph

(End Post)

Out of WDMD 101

Here is an interesting article related to anti-Americanism (it's actually a book review of sorts). I found it on the Ambrosia webboards. You might not agree with a lot of what says tho. Be warned but read it anyways, keep an open mind(?)

Player's Guide

Ok I am feeling educationally unproductive so I will sit down and review the Exalted: Player's Guide.
The book is split into 5 Chapters plus standard intro and one appendix.
The intro is the standard introduction for an Exalted books. It covers terms and some basic concepts covered in the book. Not much to say.
Chapter 1: Merits and Flaws. Merits and Flaws are new to Exalted. For that matter they are new to me as I have never played in a game with them. The stigma around them leading up to this was generally bad as World of Darkness games apparently had given people a bad taste in their mouth when mentioning them. However from my perspective they are quite good. Some seem a little useless but many I see could help round out a character's past/physical description. Large Size, Heirloom, and Past Lives are some of these for Merits and One Eye, Disfigured, Addiction, and Nightmares are among those Flaws which add flavor to the game and PCs. M & Fs require a lot of Storyteller oversight to control possible abuse of the system. That is perhaps the biggest weakness they have.

Chapter 2: God Blooded. God-Blooded actually encompasses not only God-Blooded, but Demon-Blooded, Ghost-Blooded, Fae-Blooded, and Half Castes (which took Nephilpal quite a while to come up with). It describes how each of these sub-races are created and what the requirements are to create one (ie, what conditions have to be met so the baby is God-Blooded rather then mortal). How to generate a God-Blood is covered. Patron and Inheritance backgrounds are introduced here to describe how powerful the parents were and how much influence their parents exert on their lives. Both are quite powerful backgrounds designed to make the God-Blooded a little more playable in the high powered world of Exalted. A number of specific Merits and Flaws apply to each type of God-Blooded allowing further indivulisation. A new Arconoi path is introduced for Ghost-Blooded. The creation of akuma (aka Demon-Blooded) and Infernal Exalted (also called akuma) is covered including the spirit charm which taints and controls a willing Exalt's Essence. Even if noone ever wants to make PC's from this section it opens up a lot of room for NPCs.

Chapter 3: Mortal Thaumaturgy. This is mortal sorcery. This includes organizations which thaumaturges are in. It also gives archetypes for different types of mortal thaumaturges as well as how to generate them. The new backgrounds of Expierence and Knowledge are introduced which basically give bonus points for previous life and magical expertise. The library background is introduded to cover those characters who keeps books (this essentially is a good thing for researcher PCs). Some more M & Fs are given to round out characters. Investment charms are given for some high essence beings to give mortals extra Essence to work with for a short period of time. Arts and Sciences are also introduced (basically the thaumaturges' rituals of power). I haven't spent much time reading this so I can't say much more.

Chapter 4: Dragon Kings. Covered barely in Ruins of Rathess, Dragon Kings are now fully fleshed out here. All 10 Paths of the Dragon Kings are covered as well as all 4 species of Dragon Kings. DKs are at this point scattered and mostly savage beings but if raised correctly can become probably as powerful as low level Dragon Blooded. Their Paths are somewhat weaker then Charms but more vertasile. DK artifacts are also listed from Ruins of Rathess plus some new ones.

Chapter 5: The Exalted. First introduced is Exalted Power Combat. This changes some rules in combat attempting to fix abuses and in general make combat more interesting. It is fairly complicated. I have read through once or twice and am still pretty overwhelmed. Along with this a number of charms are Errataed or modified. The list is extensive and many many Solar charms were tweaked. Weapons have gained rate which relates to how many attacks/defenses a turn they can make. Next section is Mail and Steel, ie mass combat. An entire new combat rules system is introduced. The basics are that the leader of a unit essentially is the unit with the units strengths and weaknesses just modifying the leader's rolls. Powerful units can act as independant ones however allow Exalts to roam freely. The rules are fairly complex but less so then the Power Combat ones. Overall they give a good way to allow armies to clash. The next section is Martial Arts. A number of new MA forms are given here as well as training mortals and others MA. The new forms aren't particularily exciting to me although certain parts are interesting concepts. The final section is Elder Exalts. This is very short and just covers the rules for covering extremely long amounts of downtime and generally special rules for Elder Exalts.

Appendix: Writing in the Age of Sorrows. This appendix shows us High and Low Realm script. It is very Chinese although Low Realm is quite a bit easier to read (think High Realm = cursive, Low Realm = standard). Appendix also covers education in the Realm to some extent.

At the end of the book is a character sheet for just about any of the characters in this book. That's all!

Review Time

Yea so I got a pile of books and I am getting close to reviewing them. I haven't really shot all the way through any of them yet but it's coming, be ready for it! In other news, I had a very good day! Got to spend some time with a friend who I've kind of drifted away from, gives me hope that things are back on the right track. I am a little wary that right now I might be hurting one of my other friendships so I am attempting to pull back and think about what I am doing and how I am screwing up (again). This I've found is hard as I usually need to withdraw from society to ponder this for a bit and at the moment my group of friends is so diverse that there always seems to be one or two of them with whom I am hanging out with or have plans to, etc. Almost the perfect life at the moment, almost.
I got more stuff for England today. The classes you can pick mainly and a bunch of other things I need to fill out and run down. I am excited cause I can kill my writing emphasis requirement over there. However I will still need to take one CIS WE class because it's part of the major. Blah! Also found out that my two geography courses this semester are social science and not physical science classes! Wasn't Gifford supposed to know that? Grr... Well eventually I will have to deal with that, who knows when. Post England either way.
Final comments: Lars took all us Chi Alpha folks to Belts. Lots of fun! Quality time with people if Ashley doesn't kill me :D Did I mention Squirrel will be in Munich the same time I am in London? Hopefully we can meet up at some point (hey, her group doesn't go to London, and you gotta see London right?!?).
All in all expect reviews soon, I want to be somewhat thorough so I am not gonna do any on the fly although I am tempted to cover WindZones and Order Book: Michaelites now. That's all for me. Off to bed.

Essays

First, the rough draft commentary of mine (very fragmented at points) at the state of the world's militaries. My primary focus is naval here and yes it's not the most organized. I cannot find a decent amount of time to put into it. I will try and work on that. It's a Word Doc which'll download automatically.
Something Ashley sent me. Not sure if I qualify these days, think I used to. Something to strive for I guess. I know other folks who do tho. Great guys who make the world go around.
A worthy late addition from the same source as the above. This person really strikes to my heart!

Toonamis

Toonami's going to have major changes coming soon. Seems like Cartoon Network seems to be doing well themselves. And new episodes of Inuyasha this Saturday too. (Shh, I know I have most of them on my computer somewhere, but I can't listen and do other stuff when they are subtitled!)
Lately I have been feeling really strong about my faith I keep feeling like I should say something about it on here but I don't know. I have a tendency to just make a mess of things when I speak up about such things (hmm sometimes it seems like anything at all) as some of you well know and I am not sure I want to step on a lot of toes even in something I believe passionately about. Granting I feel hypocritical if I feel passionate about something but don't ever stand up or spread or talk about it. Gosh knows I ramble on enough about Exalted or anime or whatever on here. We'll see.

VB Recovery

Ok my procrastination for VB has got me again, however I actually got a lot done. It looks like the second exercise isn't much more then hacking together previous programs. Wait that's how I do all my VB programs! Yea, VB isn't a language which ya learn, you just copy and paste. That's why I think it sucks!!!
Ok you all need to go over to Scott Taylor's livejournal and give him a pat on the back. One of our Exalted authors is sadly taking some time off for various reasons but one of them is the mass negative feedback he gets from the loud noisy people. Hope I didn't add to it but so far my only complaint in total with Exalted is the Savant and Sorcerer cover. The rest I can just work around, after all that is the Golden Rule for RPGs: "If you don't like it, change it!"
I am in the process of e-mailing an old friend who I have neglected to keep in touch with. Here's hoping I can catch up and also do a better job in the future! Speaking of friends, I had a really great Easter dinner with Lars, Al, Dani, Steph, Mandy, Josh, the list goes on and on, so thanks to everyone for the good food and good company! I found out out Katy is actually coming back to Point! I didn't think she was this year, so hopefully I will get a chance to visit her. Pretty exciting. Now I just need to get her not to put up Friends only content on her LJ which us non-LJ people can't read!
So it appears Adult Swim is now going to be 6 days a week with Saturdays being added. They are showing the Animatrix to celebrate Saturday's start. This seems to be an add-on to the new Toonami block (which adds Gundam SEED to the Saturday lineup) so it should be interesting. Sadly the weekday show quality goes down a bit with the addition of one of the American made shows instead of more anime. Blah.

Here's a game for you

Fun game in 2 pages. Warning, it uses swear words (for those of weak heart and young age). Amusing tho, and short. If you are wondering that is almost exactly what a White-Wolf game stripped to the bare minimum would be. I'm not gonna give you a link but White Wolf also acquired a bar. What an interesting company that writes the game I like.
Today was a good day. Actually for the most part this whole weekend has been so far. A little boring here and there but not too bad. I spent a lot of quality time with Dani and Allison. I am glad I have good friends like them! It's nice to be able to have people who are willing to spend time with you on a regular basis! Here's hoping that I have friends like that (especially them) forever, and that the couple of friendships I have which aren't doing so hot can become/return to this state. :)
That said, Lars is making Easter lunch/dinner for us today so I had better call it a night or I will fall asleep at the table! Happy Easter to everyone, take time to remember why this day is what it is and be thankful for the sacrifice made for us.

I'm gonna adendum this on rather then make a new post (it is now 1:36 AM if you want to know how late it be). This is more for me then for you anywho. Finalists for the Player's Guide.
Also (from PG inside cover):Top row, left to right: Maric, the Fangs of Stygia (Daybreak Caste Abyssal), Hentoshi Salume (Wood Aspect Dragon-Blood), directly below him: Shado (Night Caste Solar), moving to the right: the covergirl, Heysha Black Asp (Changing Moon Caste Lunar), Rhazahd Va'deen - The Maelstrom of Blades (Full Moon Caste Lunar), Ombato Hammer Horn (Full Moon Caste Lunar).

Bottom Row, left to right: Shadow (Zenith Caste Solar), Prophet of Crimson and Steel (Midnight Caste Abyssal), Shataina (Zenith Caste Solar), Crumbling Pillar (Dusk Caste Abyssal), Tepet Kenjarek (Water Aspect Dragon-Blooded)

Bad News, Just News

Ok, first off the bad news. There seems to be a lot of it. First off my prayers and thoughts go out to Eric as one of his friends from high school, a Marine, died this week in fighting in Iraq. I could tell you all the cliches but I won't waste your time. Suffice to say I feel for Eric and for his friend's family/friends.
Tying in with that I guess is the whole situation in Iraq at the moment, however I think we are going to see that when the US Marines are unleashed in their full strength any resistance will crumble. It does however throw some doubt on whether things are ok over there or not. But I don't feel like messing with that now. I do say, "Yay for the Japanese for not backing down!"
This week Rwanda remembered. Did you?

Some controversy: Savant and Sorceror cover. A bit racy if you ask me. There is massive debate on the forums. Apparently the artist who does this cover (I mighta mentioned him earlier) is known for this kinda stuff. I leave it to your judgment, but myself, well not sure I am thrilled about getting this book because well it is a bit too much for me.

Random comment, it seems Brent's blog is becoming more popular (his link is also on my siderbar) so I will help advertise it so my -0 readers can go increase his readership. Yes, yay, woo-hoo.

WDMD slacking again

Star Wars Episode Three comes releases May 19th, 2005 one day before I turn 21! It is traditional tho for Star Wars to come out mid May near my birthday so I am not surprised. Just thought you would like to know (even tho already everyone is planning to hate it, give it a rest, in a generation our kids may think the second trilogy is better for all we know).
It seems that there are problems with blogspot lately, people haven't been able to load this page. I am not sure what's up. Try either http://www.mirv120.blogspot.com or http://mirv120.blogspot.com to get here. One should work I think. IE seems to be troublesome with this site, I am not sure why except for it is a Microsoft product. However the address is a web standard so it shouldn't think this is a file to download!!! Grr...
Hey, for the record our student presentation in this class isn't too bad. The guy speaking is funny! Yay! Two good classes in a row! Granting that means I will write less here.

Battleground Europe

Guess we should expect them to hit us at home, we're hitting them at home I suppose. Still with a friend who is in Spain at this moment I am watching this news a certain silent aphrension. Sad to see that terrorism actually works on a people tho or unless you neglected to notice the losers in their election were winners prior to it. Want to bet ever election day for European and North American countries are now circled? I wonder if I will be safer in the UK coming up to elections then in the US. However I have little doubt that even if Spain pulls its troops out from Iraq and Afghanistan that the attacks will stop, suddenly it will be "retribution" for the occupation. Remember we weren't occupying Iraq or Afghanistan when they attacked us. If you are wondering tho I am not afraid to go to the UK even if I am a marked target (which sadly I probably am to some extent), I think we need to interact with the world and I am certainly not going to let some hateful person from expanding my life expierences.
Why do I say this now? I don't know, trying to make this more then just personal stuff and Exalted talk. Or just cause I can. Whatever. PG reading commences now.

From Ashley's LJ

This is what boredom gets me...

1: Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 18, find line 4: "Females with this Merit can automatically conceive as a result of a given union..."
2: Stretch your left arm out as far as you can. What do you touch first? Loft
3: What is the last thing you watched on TV? Kyle losing again at Madden
4: WITHOUT LOOKING, guess what the time is: 8ish
5: Now look at the clock, what is the time really? 8:02 pm
6: With the exception of the computer, what can you hear? the Naruto end theme (from season 1)
7: When did you last step outside? This afternoon when I went out to Lake Joanis
8: Before you came to this website, what did you look at? Red vs. Blue
9: What are you wearing? Blue jeans, dark grey sweatshirt, my EVN t-shirt
10: Did you dream last night? Yes.
11: When did you last laugh? Awhile ago
12: What is on the walls of the room you are in? Black Hawk Down and Fast and the Furious movie posters.
13: Seen anything weird lately? Our room is somewhat clean
14: What do you think of this quiz? I'm bored, enough said
15: What is the last film you saw? Ocean's 11 (that was awhile ago :/ )
16: If you became a multi-millionaire overnight, what would you buy first? Prolly some books
17: Tell me something about you that I don't know: I miss Jenny
18: If you could change one thing about the world, regardless of guilt or politics, what would you do? Everyone discovers God and is saved
19: Do you like to dance? Not really
20: George Bush: We picked him over McCain?
21: Imagine your first child is a girl, what do you call her? No idea
21: Imagine your first child is a boy, what do you call him? No idea
22: Would you ever consider living abroad? I am planning to do so

Cultivating my hunger

Somehow this weekend was fairly busy. I guess it relates to me ending up with five(!!!) new RPG books so I have a lot of reading to do. Not to mention a test on 3 chapters in Geog 110 including the longest chapter in the book which happens to be rather boring if thorough. Ask me about world agriculture, I might even be able to answer something.
I now have the Exalted Player's Guide and Blood & Salt. Both are quite good although I haven't gotten through much of Blood & Salt. I will comment on them more later. From helping out Jason with card sorting (wrestling is one of the most degrading things towards women btw) I picked up the Michaelite Order book for Engel, a yet to be released core book called WindZones, and a D20 mecha book. The Michaelite book I had been thinking about getting but didn't want to spend the money so getting it for free is quite cool. Due to my Exalted books I haven't given it a thorough look (indeed the only book of the five that has been thoroughly looked thru is the Player's Guide) but the fold out map of the entire Himmel is unbelievable. The artwork for this game continues to be impressive and does a wonderful job and increasing the feeling for the setting. WindZones I cannot say much about except considering it is very short (slightly larger then your average softcover RPG book) and that it is a corebook it should be interesting just how much is packed in there. Ben looked it over and reported that the mechanics sections was 2 pages long. For those of you who don't play RPGs, that's practically nothing at all. The mecha book I took on a whim, Ashley already said she wouldn't let me use them in her game, alas, no dragons piloting giant mecha thru brothel and bar ridden towns.
Dani has me now somewhat hooked on Naruto. It is fairly good when they actually get around to doing stuff but suffers from too many flashbacks and the dread people reacting/panicking/not doing anything interesting syndrome. The pace will hopefully pick up tho.
This week I need to get out and enjoy the nice weather and extra hour of sunlight-sunlight in the morning is a real waste. Aside from that I am feeling like I have a couple friendships which are riding on the edge of either not being friends anymore or being much less close both things which rather worry me. As a result I think I need to take some time to step back, give people some room, and also just think. This is good walking weather so I had better take advantage of it. Hopefully I can shake this shadow which has been with me since Friday.
For those of you who care I am now charged with trying to update the Chi Alpha webpage for UWSP. So if you have suggestions or ideas feel free to give some input. I hope I can turn out something nice for people, or otherwise whoever takes over in the fall will just have to waste more time to build a new thing all over again. I do want to contribute back to Chi Alpha because it really helped me in my walk with God and why should I reap the benefits and not pass them on to others? If you believe passionately in something but hoard it for yourself what's the point? Spread whatever is so good to others so they can enjoy it with you. Or something like that. Sometime I want to post some stuff from CGS up here. It won't be nearly as good as the real thing but I don't know if you can put good teachers into an easily mass replicated form. I rather doubt it else we would have them out there.

Canada Strikes Back

Why didn't Canada want to join in on our war in Iraq? Well apparently their military already had a war of their own! Totally understandable how they didn't want to split their troops onto two fronts.
MAHQ appears to be celebrating April Fool's Day. That's today. If you go to the site you should be able to catch a few blatant Gundam references (the AUEG being my favorite personally). Last year's stunt was a milder, but more subtle, news story about a new Gundam series based off of Gundam SEED, which incidently comes to the US April 17th.
Red vs. Blue has put up the last episodes of Season 1 this week. They will re-cycle through Season 1 starting next week. I found Episode 19 to be hilarious myself, probably in my top 3 RvB episodes. I am finally completely caught up now so I can keep up with the banter at GASP. Yea nerds love this stuff. It is Halo made funny after all!
Some basic notes from today, CGS was quite interesting. If you can make it you should, Wednesdays in UC 241 at 5:30 PM. Good stuff. I think I am gonna put some stuff up from it a little later but it doesn't fit with this post's random humor or news theme. WDMD also got points because the video today was interesting, notice the part of my previous post where my Dune commentary fell apart. I was actually paying more attention to class then to my own muddled thoughts.