Here is a word of advice for anyone who is willing to listen. It's a simple thing, but it could very well save your life ... and your immortal soul. If you're ever meeting with an advisor from your college and you're asked if you would like to take a macroeconomics course, kill the advisor and flee. You'll have to remove the head or destroy the brain, but this is the only way to make sure they don't come back. Also, you'll probably want to burn the corpse just to make doubly sure. Only, make sure the smoke is contained so that it doesn't escape into the atmosphere. Otherwise rain clouds could be contaminated and then we would all have a plague on our hands.
When I signed up for this godforsaken class, I though it sounded interesting. "A study of how society's needs are satisfied with the limited resources available." That sounds like it could be interesting, right? Well, it's not. It sucks ass. If only I could go back in time to kick myself in the balls as a warning.
I'm sorry if you're an economist or if you're in to that whole thing, but come on. Do you really have to make a graph for everything?!? Some things can just be said. You don't have to graph every single damned thing.
And some of the shit that's in my textbook is just plain stupid. Here's an excerpt from the book: "a $10 bill will do when the price of an item is $10, but a $10 bill plus a $1 bill is needed when the item costs $11." I'd like to point out that this textbook costs, as of the writing of this blog entry, 109.85 U.S. dollars. And anyone who pays this amount in exchange for the book is paying for that excerpt. I would like my money back. Or at least the portion of what I paid that went toward stupid crap like that.
Luckily I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Not much longer until this semester is over now. And then I can put this whole terrible nightmare behind me.
The drought was ended in a spectacular fashion yesterday when the heavens opened up and pissed all over us in biblical proportions. OK, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but it did rain pretty freakin' hard.
So hard in fact that it pwned my basement. I had to miss work today so that Debbie and I could run to get a wet/dry vac to clean up the mess.
But first I had to remove the obstruction from the gutter that I think may have been the root of the issue. So I ventured out around 8:00 this morning in the cold, pouring rain to climb up to my roof on a slippery ladder on muddy ground. That was fun. The headline was running through my mind: "MAN FALLS ON HEAD, DIES WHILE BEING DUMBASS."
Nothing of any significant value was lost, luckily. We did have to throw away some stuff, but all that crap probably should have been thrown away a long time ago anyway. The box containing Debbie's Barbie doll collection was a little wet, but I don't think any of the actual packages were affected.
On the plus side, while shopping for a wet/dry vac, Debbie purchased her very own Nintendo DS, of the crimson/black variety. It's pretty cool looking. And now I fully expect her to keep her grubby hands off mine. Final Fantasy VI isn't going to finish itself and how was I supposed to do it when she was using my DS to play New SMB?
Besides having fun playing the multiplayer modes of New SMB and Phandom Hourglass, I've been delighting in sending her obscene drawings via the DS's PictoChat function. I'm sure there's a better use for PictoChat, but damned if I can think of it.
So anyway, today kind of sucked. But I did get a day off work. And that's always a good thing. Although if I had fallen off of that ladder and killed my damn self, that wouldn't have been so cool. Unless I DID fall off the ladder and die and now my spirit is continuing its routines as if nothing had happened. Oh wait, no, that would be cool too.
I picked up The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass a few days ago and I'm really glad I did. This is a great game. And it does a phenomenal job of utilizing the touch screen of the DS. Many of the tried and true Zelda conventions are given new life with the advent of the touch screen and the stylus. You don't just throw the boomerang in the direction of your choosing, you can actually plot out its course by drawing a line on the screen.
Even the sea travel system is reborn in Phantom Hourglass. While that aspect was, in the opinion of many, a detriment to Wind Waker, in Phantom Hourglass, it's actually fun. Again, you can plot your course using the stylus. And, instead of directly steering the ship as in Wind Waker, once your course is set, the ship essentially steers itself while Link is free to man the cannon.
All of these new ideas work together to create a unique Zelda experience. Even though this is primarily a top-down adventure with gameplay similar to A Link to the Past or any of the other Zelda titles for the handheld systems, everything seems new. The level designers were able to use the new functionality of the boomerang and other tools to create fresh puzzles.
This one seems to be more of an adult game than previous Zelda titles. I don't mean to say Link is dropping F-bombs or giving his patronage to hookers ("yo honey, I'll show you a real good time for twenty rupees!"), but some of the puzzles require a depth of thinking that is, frankly, unusual for a Zelda game. And many of the puzzle hints are vague at best.
Playing Phantom Hourglass has reawakened my taste for the older, classic console games. Luckily for me, many of the old games that I cut my gamer teeth on are now available for the GBA. And, it just so happens, the GBA games are compatible with the DS. So now my handheld game library is stocked with games like A Link to the Past, Final Fantasy IV, and Final Fantasy VI. Once I finish Phantom Hourglass I'm going to start those journeys again. Rockin' it old-school. Hells yeah.
Today was my 29th birthday. Which means that, in just one short year's time, I will have been breathing oxygen for 30 damn years. That's a long freaking time. Especially since, in high school, I was voted Most Likely to Die From Asphyxiating on Vomit Before the Age of 25*.
Anyway, it was a pretty normal day. Went to work. The kids made me birthday cards, which is always cool. Every year I get new homemade cards from Emily and Xander which serve as a benchmark for their progress as little people. Every year I can see their skills and creativity growing and it feels good. It's funny that my birthdays have become less about me and more about my family, but I guess that's the way it's supposed to be.
I ate O'Charley's for dinner tonight, which was a rarity because Debbie usually makes dinner. I had their pecan/chicken tender salad. If salads could have children, I would want this salad to bear my children. It's badass.
I did get a really cool toy for my birthday. The wife and kids got me a new mountain bike. You can see a pic of it here. That's not a picture of MY bike, but it's the exact same model and color and everything. It's not a competitive bike by any means, and I won't be descending any mountains with it, but I wanted something that wouldn't bankrupt me which could also handle easy to moderate trails without falling apart. I can't wait to try it out, hopefully this weekend.
*That's not really true. I made that whole bit up.
Today is the September equinox, which, for myself and all the other residents of the northern hemisphere, means today is the first day of fall. We're coming out of an exceptionally hot and dry summer here in Northern Kentucky, so that's good news.
I think if I had to choose, I'd pick the fall as my favorite of all the seasons. It has more personality than the others. Plus, it's the season of my birthday. Also, it's home to my favorite holiday: Halloween.
As a way to welcome the fall and to commemorate the summer, Debbie and I took the kids on a short hike this morning to Middle Creek Park, which isn't too far from Boone County Cliffs. It was pretty cool, except for the swarms of mosquitoes (the drought has left lots of standing water where a creek used to be) and an encounter with one pissed off dog that, for some reason, really didn't like the kids. There are at least three distinct trails in the park. We stayed on Trail 1, but we saw signs that pointed to Trail 2 and something called Mud Road. Trail 1, with its wide, level, well-worn paths, was very hospitable. I didn't really see any of Mud Road, but Trail 2 looked like it may be a bit more challenging.
I plan on getting a mountain bike here in the next week or so and I think Middle Creek will be a great place to break the bike (and my legs) in.
Rob Zombie's 2007 remake of the horror classic Halloween was met with plenty of skepticism. Perhaps rightfully so. Hollywood hasn't exactly been kind to the Halloween franchise over the years. And when the reviews started pouring in for Mr. Zombie's go at it, they were less than flattering. Hell, it only scored a 23% from rottentomatoes.com.
To put that into perspective, 23% is only 19 percentage points higher than what House of the Dead (Uwe Boll's insult to both gamers and moviegoers everywhere) scored from the same website, and it is actually 16 points LOWER than what Freddy vs. Jason scored.
It's hard not to be influenced by numbers like that when you go to watch a movie, but I tried. And you know what? The 2007 Halloween remake really wasn't all that bad.
Sure, it had some faults, but most movies have at least a few of those. First of all, nearly a third of the film was spent tracking young Michael Meyers. So much time was spent developing the Michael-as-a-kid storyline that, by the time he finally grows up and starts stabbing people, you almost feel like you're supposed to identify with him on some level. I don't know, maybe that was intentional. Rob Zombie did ask you to identify with sadistic murderers in The Devil's Rejects. But come on. This is Michael Fucking Meyers. He's a force of nature. You can't identify with that. And he certainly doesn't need explanation beyond "he had a real bad childhood and now he stabs people a lot."
Another thing that kind of bugged me was the sheer size of Michael in this movie. He was played by 6' 8" WCW star Tyler Mane. This was a little excessive if you ask me. I know Michael Meyers is supposed to look large and commanding, but in many of the shots, he looked like ... a professional wrestler in a Michael Meyers mask.
Yet despite its flaws, there is one major thing that this movie does right where all of the previous Halloween sequels have failed: it does a pretty good job of capturing the feel of the original. I mean, after the whole Michael-as-a-kid bit, anyway. Obviously no movie will ever recreate that feel perfectly, but this one takes a mighty swing at it.
I think the biggest reason for the poor reviews of the new Halloween is that many of the reviewers are naturally comparing it to the original. Well, you just can't do that and expect to get a fair reading. You have to view this as a standalone film in order to appreciate it. While the other Halloween sequels fail while standing either beside the original or alone, this one can stand on its own feet. Well, again, after the kid Michael part.
I guess what I'm saying is that, if you can forget that the first Halloween existed, you'll get at least two-thirds of a good movie when you watch Rob Zombie's remake. And that's better than what you get from most movies.
OK, so it's not going to win any Oscars, but Shoot 'Em Up, the Clive Owen/Paul Giamatti action flick, does deserve to be recognized. Not for being particularly good, but for being fun.
In the opening scene, the film announces its intent. After Mr. Smith (Owen) kills the first mook by shoving a carrot into his mouth and punching the root vegetable through the back of the guy's head, he says, "eat your vegetables." At that point I said to myself, ah, so THAT'S the kind of movie I'm watching.
And that's not at all a bad thing, mind you. Movies like this, in my opinion, deserve to be judged in a category all their own. If I were to score this movie up against all the other movies out there, I'd be forced to give it a D. Yet, when scored against other movies of its kind, I'd give it an A.
You see, this is the kind of movie that you can pop in, switch your brain to auto pilot, and come out on the other end convinced it was the greatest movie ever. Other movies that I think are in this category are Cranked, Kung Fu Hustle, and just about any Jackie Chan movie ever made.
If you have trouble suspending your disbelief, you'll probably not enjoy Shoot 'Em Up. The fight scenes are blatantly ridiculous, but they are consistently so. The carrot through the back of the head is just one example of this. But if you've got no trouble accepting things such as that, this movie might be for you.
The performances are pretty good, especially for an action film. Clive Owen's always a plus. Sure, he doesn't have a lot of range (or if he does, Hollywood's not letting him use it), but it's still cool to watch him fire a gun. And Paul Giamatti makes a great bad guy. He pulls off the evil, sadistic, criminal genius very well.
Do you wear a bluetooth headset wherever you go, whether you're expecting an important call or not? Have you ever slept with your headset on? Have you ever worn two headsets at the same time? Then you may have a problem and this message is for you.
Sure, bluetooth technology is great and powerful. But with great power comes great responsibility. And you've gotta be responsible enough to take the headset off when you're not on a call. I'm sure you think it makes you look cool, and I'm sure all your friends are doing it too, but it doesn't make you look cool. It makes you look like an ass. And when you're with your friends and you're all wearing your headsets together, it compounds that assness to the point that the people around you may start thinking about harming you physically.
Maybe you think it makes you look important. Well let me tell you something. No one in the world is so important that they have to be ready to answer an incoming call on the first ring. Well, maybe Oracle. But you're not Oracle, are you? Unless you are, in which case ... cool.
If you want to wear it at the office, or even while you're driving, hey that's fine. But if you're in social situations outside of work hours, you don't need it. It gives people the impression that you're only half listening to them when they speak to you. Plus, if you've got one of the models with the light that flashes every few seconds, that's REALLY distracting. It makes you look like Geordi La Forge without his visor on.
Just take it off. Your family misses you. If you don't want to do it for yourself, then do it for them.
This has been a public service announcement from Andy, who reminds you to "just take it off."
I spent many of my key formative years growing up in Kentucky's Daniel Boone National Forest. There wasn't a whole hell of a lot else to do, so I spent a lot of time alone in the forest and, as a result, I love hiking. It centers me and, even though I might be walking a trail that is strenuous and tiring, it gives me energy. I haven't really been since Debbie and I started producing children and I've missed it.
That's why I jumped at the chance when Jason asked if I wanted to go check out a trail that he had heard of not far from my house in the Boone County Cliffs Nature Preserve. Emily was a bit under the weather, but Xander was up for it, so I packed a backpack this morning and we started out.
The website for the park says the trails are "moderate to strenuous," but I would say the main path is easy to moderate at most. It's made up mostly of gentle slopes and, aside from the occasional step built into the path, there's really no climbing to be done at all. Here's a picture that I took and this is a good example of about 90% of what you'll encounter on the main trail.
There are plenty of side trails that are definitely in the strenuous range and, while we didn't get to explore those too well, we could tell that they lead to some really cool stuff and some nice views.
It was a good time and I can't wait to go back to check out the rest of the trails. You can see some more pictures that I took on our short hiking expedition here. Also, check out Jason's blog post for his report.
The worst possible thing has happened. It's been like a million degrees for as long as I can remember now and my AC went out today. OK, maybe that's not the WORST possible thing. The wost possible thing would probably be if I were forced to watch 'N Sync videos for all eternity while Chuck Norris delivers roundhouse kicks to my nards. But this was pretty bad too.
The wife calls me while I'm at work to give me the bad news. She says she thinks it's the thermostat. So I leave work early and drive to my local Lowe's store to pick one up. As soon as I pull into the parking lot, I feel out of place. The lot is full of large, very manly pickup trucks, while I pull into a spot in my four-door sedan with car seats in the back. But that's OK. I'm used to it.
I go in, and with the help of a friendly employee, I find the thermostats in the electrical department, right where they ought to be. I tell him I'm looking for a programmable thermostat, and I ask him if he knows anything about therm because I want to make sure I get the right one. One that's compatible with my AC device. He tells me that he doesn't know much about these products, but Jim would be able to help me.
Presently, Jim arrives on scene. He's a burly, bearded man. The friendly employee tells Jim that I'm in the market for a programmable thermostat. And I tell Jim that I just want to find out which ones will work with my unit (heh heh ... "unit"). Jim and Friendly Employee Guy both assure me that all of the 'stats that they sell are universal and will work with any type of AC device.
So I think I'm done. But then, Friendly Employee Guy walks off and leaves me with Jim, who promptly asks me, "how many square feet do you have in your house?"
"I don't know. I have a small ranch," I answer truthfully.
Then Jim launches into a diatribe regarding people having cooling devices for their homes that are not powerful enough to cool their second story. This quickly evolves into other ways that foolish homeowners aren't getting the most out of their cooling devices. This is all good information, but I just want to make my purchase and get out. But he's very passionate about this and I can tell this is an important subject for him, so I indulge him by nodding politely at intervals during his speech, all the while I'm trying to imprint this message into his mind: dude. I have a ranch-style house. I have no second story. And I don't care about this other crap that you're talking about.
My powers are weak apparently because he doesn't stop until his phone rings. I take the opportunity to thank him, grab a $30 thermostat, and get the hell out of there.
I get home, break out my tool box, which is probably laughable by my father-in-law's standards, but which suits my meager purposes very well, and I get to installin'. Only, something is obviously not right. There are all these extra wires spilling out of the wall that seemingly have no place in the new thermostat.
Debbie does some digging and finds out that we have a heat pump. I'm still not entirely sure what that is, but the thermostat that I bought clearly warns that it will not work with a heat pump. So, time for another trip to Lowe's, this time with family in tow.
I return the device that I had just bought two hours before and start looking for one that works with a heat pump. Luckily, Jim is nowhere in sight this time around. Unfortunately, the only one that I can find has a price tag of $100, which, granted is well worth the benefit of keeping the temperature in my house below Tatooine-like levels, but it's a little more than I'd like to spend, so we make a trip to The Home Depot.
I head straight for the electrical department, but I find no thermostats. I snare a passing employee and ask him if he can tell me where to find them.
"They're in Plumming," he says to me. "On an end cap across from aisle 30."
I find this to be odd and suspicious, but I go to aisle 30 anyway and there they are. And luckily, I find one that fits my needs for only $40. I grab it and go.
I get home, once again open my toolbox, and install the new device. It seems to work perfectly, only ... no cool air is coming from my vents. And the outside unit is not functioning.
Debbie discovers that service technicians were called out on two separate occasions to replace blown fuses in the AC unit for the previous owners of my house. So, I go outside and start poking around the thing.
After about 45 minutes of jabbing at various places, cursing the heavens, and pulling on things which I know neither the names nor functions of, I finally find the fuses. A quick internet search tells me that these fuses are cartridge fuses and that there is no way to visually tell if they are blown or not.
Jump in car. Drive to Home Depot. Buy new fuses for $10. Install said fuses. Damn thing still doesn't work. We'll have to call a service tech tomorrow I guess. We probably should have done that to begin with, but oh well. At least we got a snazzy new thermostat out of the whole thing. Plus I got to use my tools, which is always fun.
I've always really enjoyed playing tabletop RPGs. Most of all, I enjoy running them. You know, being the Dungeon Master, the Storyteller, or any other game-specific term for the guy who makes crap up and tries to kill the PCs? However, as it sometimes goes, the older my friends and I grew, the harder it became to find the time to come together to actually play. We all started spawning children and settling into careers (well, some of us, anyway) and those things tend to suck up a lot of time.
So I was very pleased when, while wandering around the internet, I found a program called MapTool atwww.rptools.net. This small, simple, but powerful program is all you really need to play a game of your favorite tabletop RPG via the internet. Combine MapTool with your choice of VoIP service and you're practically all in the same room. Only, you can play in your undies without the awkwardness of doing so at a traditional gaming session.
Basically what MapTool does is it provides a grid (square or hex) which you can use to move your tokens around on. You can load a map image from just about any map generator, then lay the interactive grid over it and there you go. Now your map is ready to be used for play.
The program works just the way you think it should. One of the things that I always struggled with in my old traditional games is how to handle darkness. No matter the system, the whole process seemed really cumbersome and seemed to only slow the game down. But MapTool makes it simple. It allows you to designate any areas of the map which should be solid and that should block a character's view. So, from the player's screen, they'll be able to see that 5x5 pillar, but they'll never see the enemy standing behind it. It also makes it easy to determine line of sight.
There are also three other programs that are provided by the same site. One is DiceTool, which is an extremely versatile dice rolling program. The second is InitTool, which the GM can use to run the encounters and keep track of turn order, which can sometimes be complicated. There's also TokenTool, which provides a quick and easy way to create your own tokens for use with MapTool.
The best thing is all four of these great programs are completely free. You don't even have to register at the site. Just go to www.rptools.net, download the files, and you're ready to go.
My job requires me to deal with a lot of people's problems. People who I know for all of about ten minutes at a time. I can explain the whole process pretty easily: these people come into my office; they explain their issues; sometimes I help them, but sometimes I don't; and then they leave. And usually they're either pissed off or crying during the whole thing. If we're both lucky, I'll never see them again after that.
This is all well and good. I mean, I've been doing this job for years now and I'm pretty good at it. The best, by most accounts. The problem is, it's getting to me. I used to be able to go through the process and, not only fix the problem most of the time, but also improve the attitude of the person at my desk. The crying chick would leave my office smiling and the pissed off dude would leave my office only slightly irritated. And what's more is I used to actually care about that person. I actually wanted to help them. Now, not so much.
I mean, don't get me wrong. I'm not wishing bodily harm on the people that come to me for help at work. Well, not all the time anyway. But I seem to have lost that desire to help. It's been replaced by a desire to get the damned whining bitch out of my office. OK, maybe I'm not to that point yet, but I'm afraid I will be soon.
Kim, the lady who pretty much trained me from the start, and who has been with the company for something like fourteen years, sometimes seems like she has completely lost all compassion for anyone of the human race. She has the same functions as I do at work and I see people go to her and she's so cold and heartless. So much so that some people have taken to avoiding her and coming to me, which gives me even more people to slowly chip away at my empathy. The funny thing is, Kim's not really cold and heartless; when she's not actually performing the functions of her position, she's a great person. But as soon as someone sits in her chair, she changes into something completely different. And that's what I'm afraid I'm becoming.
Everyone gets tired of their job at some point, I guess. I'll bet even Superman has probably entertained notions of just letting Lois fall to the ground after having been dropped from an extraordinary height by some villain or another. And I'm certainly no exception. I'm not exactly ready to change positions at this point; I still have a lot of things that need to be done before I move on to something else, but I'm afraid if I don't make a change soon, then I'll be altered in some fundamental way. And what if I've already been altered?
Emily and Xander started kindergarten last week. They didn't go to preschool and they've never been to any kind of daycare, so as you might imagine, this is a pretty big deal for Debbie and I. Debbie more so than me. I have to leave them five out of seven days just about every week, but she's hardly been away from them since they've been born. In fact, I think it's fair to say she spent more time away from Emily and Xander their first week of school than she had the entire five years and four months prior.
She handled it pretty well, all things considered. Admittedly, I thought she would be an inconsolable mess on their first day at school, but she surprised me. I was proud of how strong she was, even as we left the two of them in their classrooms. She has Luke to keep her company while they're away, so I'm sure that helps.
We made the decision to split them up into separate classes. We thought this was important for a number of reasons, chief of which was simply that they had never really been apart for extended amounts of time and neither one had ever really been alone in social situations with children of their own age group. We wanted to make sure they're given the opportunity to develop as individuals. Xander needs this more than Emily, I think. When meeting new people, Emily has always been the one to communicate, while Xander is allowed to retreat to a safe distance. We felt that, if they were in the same classroom, Xander's social skills might suffer.
The transition to school went smoothly and they're both doing great. I know it's just their second week, but I think they'll be fine. There's no bellyaching in the morning when it's time to get ready for school. Well, unless you count the usual complaints about uncomfortable clothes, but we've been living with that for years and it certainly has nothing to do with school. They both go out the door with their oversize backpacks and climb up into the school bus without so much as a whimper. And Luke seems to be having no trouble adapting to being the only child in the house for a while every day. He doesn't have to compete for Mom's attention anymore, at least for those few hours while his brother and sister are at school.
You know, before they started school, I was most worried about Emily and Xander being in the care of someone else for several hours every day and this was the thing that I thought would be the most difficult for me to get used to. I was wrong. The strangest thing to me about this transition, and the idea that I may never get used to, is that they are learning things now that we are not teaching them. I guess I just assumed that Debbie and I would always be the ones to shape their minds until they were ready to take over for themselves. But now there's someone else who is given the opportunity several times per week to impart knowledge upon them and to influence their beliefs, priorities, opinions, etc. That, to me, is pretty scary.
I guess I should have expect this, but I didn't. Though it might not be such a bad thing. As long as it helps to make them good people and as long as it doesn't change them so drastically that they become different kids, I'm all for it.
