Not sure what I've gotten myself into but now I want to procrastinate again...

Book Goodness And Other Things

Hmm it's Halloween. Not that exciting. More of a pain that's it really windy and therefore chilly outside. I am attempting to be rather productive today cause stuff could pile up next week. For the first time in awhile the CPS lab is half dead. It's a little unreal considering this place usually is a zoo.

I got Prison of Souls today. It's nice and highly complicated in comparison to Battle of Kar Dathra's Gate and Nokgorka but that might be also cause I've only read it through once. Alas I gotta wait once again for the next one to come out and they are still writing things so could be awhile!
DMZ 1: On The Ground has the same issue, DMZ 2 doesn't come out til January of February. Should count my blessings there though and from a practical sense the delay is understandable. Before they become graphic novels these are actual comic books so it takes several issues before there is enough for a novel.
Pride of Baghdad is also impressive and I gotta admit the ending made me a little sad. Pretty good book that can do that.

Not much else new and unusual here. Carl makes dang good soup but in general Carl is a dang good cook. (I got a Lars replacement, hooray! hooray!) Things feel busy again but I think in retrospect they aren't too much different then the past couple weeks.

Well off to write some religious studies papers.

Monday Day Longs

Ah today was a long day for some reason. I was permanently tired even though I got a decent amount of sleep. My body is crazy sometimes. Maybe it was the fact I had lots to do today. I got it mostly done too. I worked on a web page and it was rather challenging but I think it turned out ok in the end although it's not finished (then again it's kind of a prototype so maybe did not need to completely finish it til it's ok). Also general studying for a quiz.

Tomorrow is religous studies up the wall but that's ok. Then I dunno, this week feels like I have a ton to do. Guess I need to get organized.

Carl made beer cheese soup tonight. Twas good. Plus I got some of my books I ordered. Yay. Wasn't that random? Anyhow I am done. Maybe more tomorrow!

LibraryThing

Do it, I'm mirv120 of course :D

Movies

Two similiar movies about two very different wars: the Balkans and Rwanda.

From Slashdot

Hmm today I learned how to rig the elections and then learned how some liberal bloggers are helping to keep the Democrats in the same category as the Republicans. I just love how politics happily invades every sphere of existence and always with that wonderful spin although granting this started several years back. Maybe I'd believe it more if they were pointing searches for their candidates rather then using this to point people to bad press about the opposition.

Marketing Issues

It must be tough for PR departments around this time of year trying to get the word about their cool new products. All the local channels just show campaign ads and nothing else. It's like watching a political infomercial channel (with all the subtleness of Fox News/al Jazeera). I'm darn lucky to be gone in 2004 so I didn't have to watch it!

Something Book Reviewish

So I finished American Gods which means I can return to Ptolus.

So the valid question would be: "what did I think"? Well as you can probably guess it was at least decent cause I read through it in what 3 days and in the middle of that I did study and take a religious studies test too. First half of the book was ok. Thought it had a few too many sex scenes and was a little confusing but the second half focuses more on the story and is therefore less confusing. Also by this point I'd figure out what to be looking for in the story so I got more out of the characters. The confusion actually works well as the reader gets to figure out the world with the main character.

I loved the fact that a huge amount of this book takes place in Wisconsin and in winter. It made it feel like home. Perhaps since the middle portion is primarily focused on those two setting points is what made the latter half better. In the end the book surprised me. It's not blow you away great but it's certainly a good read and the main character is enjoyable to support. I'd probably get a ton out of re-reading the book at some point but who knows when I'll get a chance with the backlog!

So this morning there was frost on my bike seat when I came out from morning shift of work. I thought the dew was the show-stopper. Shows me! Rather tired all day, napped between work and my test and had strange dreams but not enough nap. Be interesting next week when I am up later. But I seem to be able to survive on very little sleep besides which I can sleep in most Wednesdays. Twas nice to see the sun today. Gotta admit at this point the sun is better then the grey-gray of clouds in late fall and it feels like late fall. Only flurries or snow make clouds ok.

Statistically speaking the most obvious equivalent for a county in Wisconsin called Lumber would be Wood right? Either way I don't think there is a Lakeside, WI so the trick is to figure out where it is. Lakeside, Lumber County, WI. A couple hours north of Madison (meaning beyond Point).

Prison of Awakiness

It's almost 2 am and I am wide awake. I gotta be up at 6am to work and I got a test that I haven't really studied enough for at 11am. The inklings of a cold that would not go away despite adequate sleep and lotsa fluids is now finally into the runny nose stage. Yet I still feel pretty good. Course gonna feel bit worse in about 4 hours but what can you do? Least I have lots of reading material and more on the way.

Mythos

So reading American Gods (and aside from expecting to be a)snowing and b)freezing because of said reading) I've realized how much fun it would be to create your own mythos. Not a mythos based oneself but rather just create any old one that would somehow fit into today's society. It'd be a challenge in a lot of ways to make it seem feasible for a pantheon to exist in today's world but not impossible in fact relatively easy. It would just take a certain amount of care at times.

Anyhow, that's my thought. I really should be studying for religious studies because I have a test tomorrow but I will admit that I'm not. I'm reading and procrastinating and genetrally not motivated.

American Gods

So after a discussion with Carl today about Neil Gaiman I went and found American Gods from Bookworld today. I realize that I really love books. I shouldn't be getting more books but I am. I am going to have a huge library eventually but I wonder if I will have read all of it!

I suppose though I could be spending my money on worse things. I'm gonna need a bigger bookshelf soon though.

C for Vendetta

(alternate title V for Cookie)

Remember, remember the 2nd of November

(Yes 2nd was intentional)

LotR Redux

So I actually sat down and watched the special features from the LotR special edition dvds. They are 3-4 hours long each. Wow. That's really long. Interesting tidbits tho. Kinda fun to sorta watch in an absentminded, not quite there, way. I realized that last fall semester I finished the semester off by watching the entire trilogy twice through and then the entire Star Wars saga (all 6) in less then a week while I ground through homework. Don't think I will need to do that again thankfully although there was something downright legendary about that time in my mind. Twism and I pounding through our projects so focused that entire movies would pass without notice. Oh the good old days. Hard to believe that was last year and I count it as a good old day. Maybe I am slightly whimisical for times when I just had people around. Single apartment is nice but occassionally have the company all the time is far better (the two each have pros & cons).

Anyhow Mario Kart is on tonight. There's a rehash of the good old days. And then maybe over to the LAN party. We shall see!

Darkness Falls

As Tyler pointed out. It's dark out already. This week has kind of been a doldrums, not that I am complaining. It's just not been terribly exciting for good or bad. Makes me kinda wary as usually these middle grounds don't last long and I have a tendency to expect them to go down hill (me of little faith I suppose). In the meantime I suppose I should enjoy the slightly more relaxed pace of it all right? That just leaves me with the debate between bio-informatics and generic positions. Hmm.

Well back to reading Ptolus.

300,000,000

200,000,000 more and we'll be at half a billion. (You can do your part by getting married and having 72 children. Wait...)

I'm not so sure that I'll actually be making it out to Hawaii these days. Not gonna lie, that makes me pretty sad :(

Reading

Today is an odd day. I don't really have much on my plate. One e-mail needed to be sent and a short paper written. That's done it took very little time. That leaves me with Ptolus (p 302 of 655 - the rest of the book is appendixes/indexes/appendindexs) to read for the remaining 3 1/2 hours of my shift. I'd better be on p 400 when I'm done I guess.

There really ain't much else new with me. Not that that is very odd, life is pretty quiet. Class, work, reading, and when I can fit it in (not often enough) friends. The one disadvantage with my schedule now is I never have enough time with my friends. I have very few free evenings and my weekends tend to be overscheduled. On the bright side in a couple months hopefully I will be gainfully employed by day and nothing taking up my evenings. We'll see.

Blargh

I hate it when my stomach feels like crap. :/

It's cold

Well I got snow but someone turned off the heat and then turned on a fan. Be careful what you wish for eh? Sorry I've been quiet of late. Pretty busy with life and stuff.

Long day

Hmm normally Wednesdays are pretty good but this one seemed off. It was kinda cool that it snowed today and I got to see Jessie. Mostly though it just felt off. Couple randoms thing I can point to that attributed but I dunno overall why. Must be one of those weeks eh?

Long week already

This week just feels long and its only Tuesday evening. Oy. Not much news. Plus I'm tired.

Reading

So I bought and read Jurassic Park on Saturday. Back to Ptolus tho!

Well that could have been handled better on my part...

Anyhow. As a lot of you might be aware yet another UWL student ended up in the river of late. Think I wrote about the last one too a way's back. It's a bit depressing actually. See I get home this evening and what's one of the frontpage stories? An article about how this year's Octoberfest (ie Not-Sober-Fest) noting that this one set the record for ER cases relating to drinking. 32 years and we're setting records. Rather sad. Someone had a .42 blood alcohol count! No wonder people keep ending up in the river. That drunk near the main channel of one of the biggest rivers in the world? *sigh*

And

I know, I need to update active blogs again, etc, etc.

Urgh

Yea, that's right.

So Ptolus is def. a big distraction at the moment. I am slowly crunching through it. Ironically I may actually plug through it in a week or two at this rate. Very interesting reading too. Lots of plot hooks even within organizations. I haven't even gotten to locals (except jumping ahead to skim the two evil fortresses on the Spire). At least I am enjoying it though so I didn't waste my money. Pretty sure I'd like to run this for people the whole thing can support a full run from lvl 1 to lvl 20!

Anyhow, this weekend I'll be home. That should be fun. I'll even have the place to myself for a night. That might actually be kinda lonely. I've realized that while I really want a house it'll be darn lonely with just me. Hadn't thought of that initially and don't know why. Guess I might need to recruit housemates. Or get hitched? (Ok quit laughing, it could happen someday, maybe even before the 2nd Coming.)

Right, well I'm out.

Pink Form Letters

First an update on the neutrality issue. Heard back from a couple people in the know. This is apparently a legal and allowable stance for the SGA. Can't say I am thrilled and the previous administration certainly handled touchy issues like this better then the current one. I got a form letter response today from them. It was a rather generic but I guess one can't expect much more. Nice to see that our little government emulates its bigger brother quite well.

I suppose I cared mostly cause I tended to not side with the "Vote No" campaign but I think they'd be just as ticked if the SGA had sent out a "Vote Yes" e-mail so arguing for neutrality it a fair compromise. Oh well.

In other news, what would you say if this blog went pink for the month? I know Tyler is opposed but Katy liked the idea enough that she made her Livejournal pink. It's for a good cause but I'll let people weigh in. So actually weigh in!

That's all for now. I got the rest of GITS:SAC 2nd Gig and Ptolus today so pretty excited/consumed by that.

Ptolus

It's huge!

October

Wow, the leaves are starting to change fast. I should get out to Schmeekle and snap some pictures for Jenny. That'll be a Wednesday project probably. Get out for some exercise and all. It's October already. Graduation is hurtling towards me. The mind boggles at all the stuff I probably need to do and don't even realize it. I've just started job hunting and that of course makes me nervous. I'm always worried I'll make some little faux pas and the HR person will just toss my application even though I'd be good at the job. Sometimes details can elude me and I'm aware of it enough to worry about it. Ah well, God'll put me where he wants (someone remind me about this post when I am hired as the IT expert for the Amundsen-Scott Base, Antarctica).

I finished The Color of Magic last night. Yea, I know that wasn't on the reading list but I needed some light reading and that fit the spot perfectly. What can be funnier then a failed wizard sheparding a tourist (with sapient luggage) around the world while doing their best to avoid Death? Yea, you can't think of anything cause it's hilarious. In all honestly I'll probably be massively sidetracked in Ptolus (pronounced Tawlus btw) before I really get into Wild at Heart. Then again I suspect Wild of Heart may cause much thinking and we all know how I avoid that like the plague! :D

I have the urge to read Jurassic Park. I wonder if it is on discount at the B & N back in La Crosse? They are moving really soon (yay a new bigger store, I can't wait!) so a lot of stuff is supposed to be marked down I'm told. I'm excited. Don't ask me why I suddenly want to read Jurassic Park. Somehow I looked it up on Wikipedia today and realized the novel sounded pretty good. Can't hurt to try it out anyways. Oh, I know why now. Cause the British game warden (Muldoon?) was in the video we had to watch for Religious Studies. That also inspired this quote, from a Rabbi in the video: "Do you know Brother Christiani that in 500 years velociraptors will kill you?" Ok, so he didn't say that but I thought it'd be funny.

Yea, I am wide awake and I'll be hurting around 6 when I have to get up. So I should get to bed. Night all.

"You must understand. We are all criminals now. Everyone of us on this ship. Our own have been ordered to shoot us out of the sky. We're under attack on all sides. I know you want to go home. But that is impossible for any of us now. There is one way for us to go. Forward, only forward. Into what we cannot know." -Kyuzo, The Red Star