Sunday, November 26, 2006

Ok, so it's official:
I have evidently lost all interest in blogging. Not in having a blog--that part I like--but actually using it seems to be turning into a bit of a problem area for me.

We all know I toyed with the idea of an offsite blog, but I never got around to doing it. For the longest time, I didn't consider why, but when I finally thought about it I realized, "Why do I even want an offsite blog? If that's all I'm going to be using the webspace for, then what's it got (besides a very personally-designed layout) that I can't get at myO?" So I dropped the idea. It wasn't until recently that I realized that I didn't want to stay at myO just for lack of good reason to leave, but the whole "community" thing that came with it that you don't get with independent blogging software and your own webspace. That even if there's not many more people that I'm interested in meeting on myO, there's still other people around. It's like you and a group of friends walking down the sidewalk of an empty road or a busy market street. It just makes a difference somehow.

And that kept me tethered to myO despite all its glaring inadequacies as a blogging service. So when Alan got ahold of Vox during its beta and invited everyone and their dog to it, a seed of interest crept up in me. Nothing big at the time, but at least an awareness. And as the number of OB peoples on Vox started growing, so did my interest in actually using my account for something more than commenting.

And really, the only reason I have for not going over to Vox is the load of nostalgia attached to this account, where I had my blogging beginnings and met so many awesome people, and all of that history is stored within a neat little archive here. It kinda helps me understand Alan's long, weary, eventually unsuccessful plight to transfer all his myO archives over to d-s. But it's not like I'll be deleting my myO account anyway (there are still comments to be made to the few people on my friends' list who still post), so none of that will actually go away.

So by now, it looks like I'll probably dump myO soon and move on over to Vox. I'm hoping that, one, it'll further help the migration of people away from myO like they damn well should, and two, give me something of a renewed interest in blogging. Because as much as I'm just not inspired to write blogs anymore, I do miss being inspired to.

In conclusion, then, vox.com. Get yourself a damn account if you don't already have one, and I'll post again when I've got it done and ready to update with the huge backlog of news I owe you all. :P
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Friday, October 20, 2006

House Tour! :D

My room as seen from the doorway. The white bit in the corner is a sheet, which hangs from the doorway since we don't have doors yet. XD




To the left when you come in. As you can see, that corner of the room is quite blurry, and thus I probably should've chosen a better location for my desk.




After much ado, I ended up with this TV and nice entertainment center in the opposing corner of my room. Lost the DVD player though. :P




The living room, as shown from my doorway. On the wall that I couldn't fit in, however, there is also this:




A freaking bigscreen :D Dad's girlfriend is going to try to put her house up for sale soon and wanted to make her living room look bigger when she shows the house, so she's having us take the trememdous burden off her hands for an indefinite period. We're nice people who are willing to make sacrifices like that. *nod*




The kitchen, as seen from the living room. As made clear by this picture, we don't have any proper floors yet either, lol. We've got the nice, big rug in the living room though, and some large pieces of carpet in my and Dad's rooms.




I think the shower is worth mentioning, because as you can see, we don't have it tiled yet. But what with the two curtains and the black... thing (I forget what it's called) up above them, it actually looks really nice with the curtains closed. Then you open them and see it lined with black plastic sheets XD It does have two shower heads as well, though, so when it's finished, which won't be any time soon, it'll be pretty damn snazzy. And now, on to the outside...




The house as shown from its right side, with our garage in the foreground. In the driveway in front of the garage, you find my sister's old, out-of-commision car, where I used to have to sit on the hood to get internet. And if you looked at the base of the house there, you'll see that it's actually reinforced styrofoam. Before we even moved to Hays, Dad's girlfriend (Nancy, just so I don't have to keep saying that lol) and her now-deceased husband apparently got some gigantic jacks, had them placed around the house, and lifted the entire fucking house five feet up, lining it with the styrofoam bricks, pouring in concrete, and thus creating the foundations of the basement we now live and thrive in. But what happened to all the dirt previously beneath the house, you ask?




Ask no more.




The other side of the house. You can't tell very well from that distance and that light, but the stairs going down into the basement are also there, on the right side of the house from this photo. The dog has an awful time getting up and down those stairs. We need to get some new, less steep ones.




Finally, here's the biggest shot I could get of the inside of the main part of the house. This is about a third of the main floor, and for reference, this is about what the basement looked like when me and Dad started working on it. The second floor of the house is in similar condition. The idea, obviously, is to finish the entire house eventually, but it's going to probably take a few years. The place is ginormous. :X
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Saturday, October 14, 2006

At least I've got an excuse this time, dammit!
Everyone, go rent Everything Is Illuminated. It's awfully good. :)

I was going to hold off this post until I found the USB cord for the camera so I could get some lovely pictures, but I hated not finding it, lol. So, we're moved into the new house, and we finally have our own internet. Which is good, because it's been getting increasingly cold and therefore uncomfortable to sit outside the garage leeching other people's networks. >_>;

And my word, every time one moves, they remember just what an abhorrent amount of stuff they have. We've always been packrats (I think that was made official when I found the scuba tank in the attic in Louisiana. Why the hell do we have a scuba tank?), and as the population of the household dwindled from six to just me and Dad, it seems very little of the collected crap went away as well. So we rented a large storage building and filled it to the brim, and we've still got an excess of boxes. XD

---

Shin: Yes, I wish I could remember what kind of camera they shot it with. It was one of the things I liked most about it.

Mimmi: I'm going to go visit you and then break my leg or something, just to get pampered by you. ^~^

Aleialeialeia: Know what's an even more comforting smell? Bakeries. :D

Liam: POST!

*ahem* Guess I don't have much room to speak, myself. :3

By Pi, I mean Pi the film, which is also about pi the number. :P You should check it out.

And please do get me some of that music! Acoustic guitar music is one of the harder things in this world to mess up on. :P
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Sunday, September 24, 2006

So, in the last three weeks...

1. My dad's [girl]friend, the one with the house we're working on, has to make monthly payments on both her own house and the project house, and she's pretty much out of money. So we decided that we're going to move into the basement of the house (it's the only part we've worked on, and it was going to be made into a little apartment anyway) and start paying rent. It'll be cheaper than our current rent, and it'll take a lot of money stress off her too, so it's generally a good situation. The place is almost finished, and now seeing it go from a concrete floor and wooden frames to an actual living environment is all the more satisfying. =)

2. I started really getting back into guitar after going over to a friend's house to practice a few weeks ago. He taught me my first extremely easy songs ("Smoke on the Water" and "Iron Man", which are the first songs every guitarist learned, ever. Even if they started learning before those songs were even written.), since I had purposely only been practicing a few chords up until that point, and it really catapulted my desire to learn more. Oh how joyous it was to find that my favorite Pavement song, "Shady Lane", is very easy and sounds good on acoustic.

3. A few days ago, as we were working on the house, I was walking around the outside moving some scaffolding. There are window wells around the outside of the house (much like this one, but coming up about four inches from the ground and without that weird cover), and most of the ground around the house slopes steeply. As I walked past one of those wells on that steep ground, I slipped and fell, smashing my left side into the rim of the well. Needless to say, it was very very painful, but I was able to get back on my feet a few minutes later, oddly. The pain came back later on, of course, as it stiffened up though. It's still kinda sore to the touch, but the bruise it left is deceptively large, purple, and hideous.

4. I saw Pi last night, and it was amazing.

And that's all! What's new with you folks? =]
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Sunday, September 3, 2006

Nothing magical about the water
This morning the pastor said "Lord" fourteen times in a prayer.

Now, if God created us in His image, and we don't generally like to be addressed by name three times per sentence, do you think He does?
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Wednesday, August 30, 2006

One of the greatest OB moments I've ever seen
So now, read this thread. And compliment it also by reading this conversation that just occured =D:

8:32:27 PM monsieur3quid: Dude, you've messed with the wrong group of people.
8:32:47 PM nofuturist: Cool. Who's this?
8:33:12 PM monsieur3quid: A friend of Jake's. You know him as Forrest.
8:33:26 PM nofuturist: Ahh, that so? How nice.
8:34:23 PM monsieur3quid: Yeah, you think that you can be all calm and cool about it now, but you know nothing of what we can do to you.
8:35:00 PM monsieur3quid: I say we, meaning a group of 5 hackers. All from hancock county.
8:35:30 PM monsieur3quid: Yes, Hancock. Not Ohio. We have gotten the recent call list from your cell phone.
8:35:49 PM monsieur3quid: You called the wrong school, but we don't put up with Narcs.
8:36:18 PM nofuturist: Keep going, this is getting pretty good. :D
8:36:45 PM monsieur3quid: That's what you think.
8:37:02 PM monsieur3quid: We are in the middle of pinpointing your location as we speak.
8:37:48 PM nofuturist: Oh no! Please, call off your laser satellites, I've got too much life left!
8:38:07 PM monsieur3quid: Very funny.
8:39:02 PM nofuturist: ;_;
8:39:48 PM monsieur3quid: Why did you feel the need to Narc, anyway?
8:41:08 PM nofuturist: Well if what Forrest is saying is true, "Jake", then it didn't work in the first place. Which makes the real question, o master of the 1337 h4x0rz, why do you make such a big deal of it if nothing happened from it?
8:42:52 PM monsieur3quid: Because even though it didn't work, someone else trying to go against the system might not be so smart, or so lucky. Narcs are the lowest level of society, and it is something that we just feel strongly intolerable.
8:43:50 PM nofuturist: Sweet. Do you carry your guns in trombone cases and stuff? If not, you should. That's the sign that you've "arrived".
8:44:32 PM monsieur3quid: I am not a violent person.
8:44:56 PM nofuturist: Oh, ok.
8:45:11 PM nofuturist: ...Do you keep your 1337 h4x0ring spy gadgets in trombone cases then?
8:45:17 PM nofuturist: You gotta put something in there, man.
8:46:26 PM monsieur3quid: Spy gadgets, as you called them, are not needed. Everybody slips up. And so everybodyy can be caught by using only a computer.
8:47:18 PM nofuturist: Man, at least just get a freaking trombone. You're letting me down. :<
8:47:37 PM monsieur3quid: Wow. You are hilarious.
8:48:31 PM nofuturist: Ohhh, OCHS doesn't have a music program? Sorry, I didn't know that was a sore spot for you. =(
8:49:07 PM monsieur3quid: I am not sure how OCHS is doing in the music.
8:50:55 PM nofuturist: Mind checking on that for me? I like to stay on top of things. *nod*
8:52:50 PM monsieur3quid: Next time I'm there, perhaps. But for now, why don't we talk about how of an asshole you are going to look like to the Ohio County School Board. Going and trying to set up some innocent kid. If indeed there is a kid by whatever the hell name you gave them.
8:53:11 PM monsieur3quid: Which of his aliases did you give them, anyway?
8:53:25 PM nofuturist: Aliases! XDXD
8:53:32 PM nofuturist: That is absolutely fantastic.
8:53:36 PM nofuturist: I think I love you.
8:53:58 PM monsieur3quid: None of us use our real names on hardly any sites.
8:55:17 PM nofuturist: If I had an alias, it'd be "oOb3rN!teh4wk".
8:55:49 PM monsieur3quid: You didn't answer my question. Which one?
8:56:36 PM nofuturist: I think it was... Clive? Maybe?
8:56:45 PM nofuturist: Lemme think, Clive... Clem, perhaps.
8:56:59 PM nofuturist: Cody sounds familiar too...
8:57:02 PM nofuturist: Hmmm.........
8:57:18 PM monsieur3quid: I know you used Forrest as the first name, dillhole. What was his last?
8:58:11 PM nofuturist: Dills don't have holes. I think you're actually referring to avocados, which, coincidentally don't have holes either.
8:58:26 PM nofuturist: Although they are depicted often with a hole in a half, where the nut in the middle was.
8:58:31 PM nofuturist: But alas, it's not natural.
8:58:41 PM monsieur3quid: Do not stray from the subject at hand.
8:58:52 PM nofuturist: Oh, right, aliases.
8:59:08 PM nofuturist: Like I said, "oOb3rN!teh4wk" would be great.
8:59:38 PM monsieur3quid: Ooh, you're a clever one, aren't you?
9:00:12 PM nofuturist: I thought you'd like it. It rolls off the tongue, no?
9:01:58 PM monsieur3quid: You try to talk all cool on the net, but odds are that you are some zit-faced geek boy sitting in your mothers house, searching for free hentai because you are too damn cheap, or to damn ass-ugly to get your own poon.
9:02:49 PM nofuturist: *sob* You're right! Poon is just too expensive nowadays! You know where I can get some cheap poon?
9:03:34 PM monsieur3quid: Ha. You respond with a joke, psychologically meaning that I am right.
9:05:23 PM nofuturist: omg, quit reading my brain waves. It's creepy-accurate. :O
9:06:24 PM monsieur3quid: You know, if you weren't a Narc, your smart-asseyness would make you a pretty cool guy.
9:06:53 PM nofuturist: I know. It's a pity.
9:07:11 PM monsieur3quid: Exactly.
Monsieur3quid disconnected (9:07:42 PM)

---

You all love me, I know.
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Sunday, August 27, 2006

Said the straight man to the late man...
So, teh dad is going down to Mississippi for several days tomorrow to interview for a job at a college in a town called Starkville. I'll be staying with a family friend while he's gone, which should be alright. And if he doesn't get the job (which he'll probably be able to, if he wants it. They need a director pretty bad), then there's still an opportunity here in town, possibly, and that's the one he's really going for. He feels we should try to stay here, and I certainly concur.

I've also been listening to In the Court of the Crimson King by King Crimson for, um, forever now I think. I mean, wow. It's the first KC album (I've been listening to their discography in order), but I've still barely gotten past this. In fact, I've barely listened to any of the new music I've downloaded, because this has spent so much time on my playlist lol. It's really an incredibly epic album, and, as you might expect from prog rock, utilizes alternative instruments for the melodies of the songs (mainly orchestra), instead of just guitars. That's something I'm always happy to see in rock, Hunk Dory by Bowie being another great example, and I think it could have a lot more appeal than it seems to now if more artists would just give it a chance.

---

Shin: I'm sure at least most of it is there. I haven't checked, but I don't see why they'd leave out too much stuff from such a big album for them.

Eric: ...Wow XDXD
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Thursday, August 17, 2006

One down
First day of school was today, whoa. o.o

It was alright, but my classes are all going to be a lot harder this year (hell, even History looks to be a lot of work). I'm taking Psychology, Trig, English, Chem, Computer Apps III (we's gonna learn BASIC, huzzah XD), Spanish II, and American History.

In other news, I've been completely download-crazy the past several days. I've now got The Fall - The Complete Peel Sessions, Frank Zappa - Sheik Yerbouti, Velvet Underground - Peel Slowly and See (five-disc box set, but the first disc was missing from the torrent), Hum - You'd Prefer an Astronaut, Hum - Downward is Heavenward, Sonic Youth - Daydream Nation, Morphine's discography, and 15 Captain Beefheart albums and King Crimson's discography on the way. I couldn't find much that wasn't a discography, really, or I'd have gotten that instead. XD But if anyone wants any of that, say the word and I'll upload it.
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Thursday, August 3, 2006

This Week in John's Life
Tuesday: Got iBook back, have been delighted ever since. Even if we end up not staying here and I have to give it back before school starts.

Wednesday: Downloaded an MMO called Shadowbane, which used to be commercial, but to my delight, went free a few months ago. Very guild-warfare-and-PVP-oriented, but I'm still on the newbie island, so I haven't experienced any of that yet. It's got surprising detail for something with such extremely low system requirements. Join it, I need some people to chill with. I'm Roald Latpyrre, on the.... the server that starts with a B. >_>;;

Also, TALLY HALL PLAYED ON THE LATE LATE SHOW. Best late-night television moment in history, hands down.

Todaysday: Packing up to go to Louisiana for a week or so to help my sister get settled into her dorm down there.

Friday: Leavin'. :D

---

Shin: Hell, I'll say. That guy was awesome. We really need more fatties in office, they'd at least represent Americans better. :P

Liam: Hey, don't worry, nobody's chops can live up to van Buren's, and nobody expects them to. Go ahead, maybe you'll score second place. :D
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Sunday, July 30, 2006

Le Music.
Pere Ubu - Terminal Tower: A '70s rock band having an acid trip in Chernobyl.

Swervedriver - Rise: A shoegazer band discovers the Autobahn.
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