Saturday, April 17, 2004

   Teh heh heh . . . someone did something special today . . .
You know who you are . . . . . congratulations, girl. May you have the best of luck in your future to come. Omedatou.
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   Heavy Lifters are Fun!
Ah . . . it feels good to finally be contributing to society, ya know?

So yeah, last night was my first day of real work EVER. And, ya know, I didn't know what I was doing, and people were asking me things I didn't know the answers to . . . but hey, that can be fixed, I'm sure. Oh! And steel-toed shoes make driving feel weird - thought I'd mention that.

I guess I should point out what I'm doing. I'm a clerk at a superstore (for the Canucks out there, I'm working at Superstore), shelving and stuff like that. I also get to play with the big industrial forklift thingys, which is REALLY fun! So yeah, shelving, that, sweeping . . . apparently I have to water flowers and stuff too . . . it's a very loosely-defined job, isn't it? But yeah, I'm getting money now, so I'm happy.

Heh . . . . . how long ya think I'll go before I start bitching about how much I hate work? I wonder . . . . .

Anyway, today something cool is happening with other people around here, so I'll get out of the spotlight now. Peace!


OH! One last thing! The other night my friend got me all giggly-like, and I recorded another thing of myself laughing. This one is JUST a step below my true explosive laugh, but it's pretty close . . . anyway, click on these words here if you wanna take a listen to my idiocy. Ja ne!
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Thursday, April 15, 2004

   STREET PHILOSOPHY #10: Merchandise
(Here's something I haven't done for a few months . . . . . hope you enjoy it!)


So, I'm lyin' on the couch, watching cartoons or whatever (yes, I'm 20 years old and still watch cartoons) when one of those Justice League action figure cartoons comes on. You know, where they show off those figures like Batman with fold-out wings, or Superman with crazy clip-on armour and stuff . . . oh, and some crazy lookin' gun thing too, I think . . . in any case, he's more than just red and blue . . . . . ya know, stuff like this.

I hate these things . . . seriously! Ever since I've been 6 or 7 years old, I have NEVER liked the "artistic license" action figures. I mean, sure, they're cool and all in that they do pretty neat things like change colour under cold water, or are part of a new line with new outfits and stuff . . . but still! Ick!

Now, try to follow this, if you will . . .
So, why do we buy these toys for ourselves or for others? Because we like the series or whatever it is the line of figures is for, right? So why would we want them? Well, if it's to play with them, maybe it's like me who liked to create or recreate instances that fit in the context of the universe that those figures are from.
In other words, if I had Matrix figures (which I don't [why I don't I don't know why]), I would have them all fighting all flashy like, knocking people back and forth and stuff. If they were Star Wars figures, they would be having some sort of crazy adventure over the coffee tables or something, I don't know . . .

So how does the toymaker help this along? Well, first off, if they're nice, they'll try to make the figures look like the people they represent - Lord of the Rings has done this especially well, I feel (except for poor Aragorn's face, which they just can't seem to figure out. How else? They'll give them little accessories and weapons and stuff that pertain to them. I mean, you want a toy of someone, you'd like it to at least look like the person, right?

Which brings us to my problem . . . when the hell did the Justice League ever get "mega armor"? Better question, why the hell would the Justice League NEED mega armor?! It's almost as strange as why they would ship an action figure of Cyclops from the X-Men with a pistol thingy! His eyes shoot themselves, for cryin' out loud!

I guess it all stems from my young delight in Ghostbusters and all the toys that churned out from that line . . . but ya know, my favourite toys out of all of them were the 4 ORIGINAL guys, the ECTO-1, and the ECTO-2. Why? Because they were in the show, and they looked like them! I mean, the ones dressed up in funky radioactive suits and stuff were cool, I suppose, but they just never wore things like that . . . and don't even get me started on how the toyline managed to turn a street-sweeper in ECTO-5 . . . grr . . . . .

It's kinda fitting, I guess, that now that I'm older, a lot of REALLY cool toys are out now! I mean, the Lord of the Rings ones, the Matrix ones . . . anyone see those Crouching Tiger action figures? Those were good too . . . . . and then there's the whole Ultimate Soldier line of toys that I always stare at in the Toys R Us but never buy . . . . .


I suppose that does explain a bit about myself, doesn't it? I can't say I have any real answers like I usually do for these, but, well . . . I like the toys that look the way they should. Maybe I'm infringing on people's imaginations and stuff, but I always felt that that was what my imagination was for . . . . .
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Wednesday, April 14, 2004

   One Down, Three to Go . . . . .
So, yesterday morning was a comedy of errors, I think . . . . . and hey, how ya doin'? I got online late . . . just sorta happened . . .

Aaaaaaanyways, I set my clock half an hour earlier so I could get up sooner (Takes about an hour to get to school, 8:30am History exam, ya know) . . .
. . yeah, I set the alarm for 5:55pm . . . oops . . . . . so that was the first tick. When I realised the alarm didn't go off, I got up at about 6:20 and hauled ass through my morning routine so I could get to the bus stop down the hill. Ugh . . .

Well, after the bus, I got on the train and studied my terms for 20 minutes. After the train, I got on the other bus to get to school. I figured I'd just nap for the 30-40 minutes and rest up before the show . . . . . some idiot got on the wrong bus . . .
There are 2 bus lines, you see: the regular one that makes all the stops through the uptown area, and the special one that goes nonstop to the school . . . watching this ahou get all fidgety like the bus driver was insane or something really got to me - well, he got let off (lucky bastard), swore really loud once he was outside, and THEN I took a quick nap.
Yeah, that was tick number two.

I got to school at about 8am. Good time, I think, as it'll give me another half hour to study up a little more. Of course, once I get to the building, I find out that the food place was closed since the 9th . . . I really wanted coffee this morning too . . . . .
Third tick.

Well, I shrugged that off, thinking, "well, as long as I get my ritual chocolate cookie from the vending machine . . . . ."
. . yeah, all the machines in the area were either broken or out of stock.
Tick tick tick tick . . . . .


In any case, I think the exam went well enough, but we'll see (as it turns out, VERY FEW people actually did the paper). More fun comes next week. Huzzah.

-History 372 (X)
-Film 220 (O)
-Latin 200 (O)
-English 346 (O)

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Monday, April 12, 2004

   AKU SOKU ZAN!
I shouldn't be here, but, being the procrastinating bastard I am . . . . .

So yeah, over the course of last night and this morning, the younger brother kicked all kinds of ass towards those accursed Ishin dogs of the imperial ants (erm, or something . . .).

He cleared everying off the kitchen floor and counters, powdered the cracks, corners, and crevices with all sorts of bug-killing death-poison (I think super-commercial death-spray was used in the process as well), this morning everything was washed with bleach and all, and all the stuff was put back afterwards. Last we checked, there were no ants.

Now, I'm gonna go back upstairs and try to study. With luck when I grab a drink for myself, I won't see ants and have to come back down here to edit this . . . happy long weekend, everyone!
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   And so it begins . . . again . . . . . .
First things's first, Happy Easter everyone. I hope you all had good ones. Now that that's done, let's get into the nitty-gritty . . . to be honest, I didn't even really think about Easter this weekend - other things in my mind, ya know . . . . .


Okay, so, I don't want to write an exam Tuesday morning at 8:30am, so instead I want to write the essay and then hand it in that morning.

Of course, as I write this, I've pretty much got nothing . . . . . not a good thing . . . . . so yeah, I hate exam time.

Um, I'm probably gonna be around less than I already am now and then for the next little while. So, uh . . . ah, we all know you guys'll be fine without me - I'll be back soon enough, I'm sure.

But yes, let's go look at the Investiture Controversy and all the other crazy church & state conflicts throughout the Middle Ages, shall we?
(My my my, when did school stop being fun, eh?)


Oh yeah, I saw The Magnificent Seven and The Matrix Revolutions finally. I liked them both. Take that as you will.

And the AI in Civ3 cheats. Big time. They're jerks.

And there's ants crawling all over the counter in my kitchen. They're all jerks too (I mean, how many scouting parties is that retarded queen gonna lose before she realises not to send troops there?! What an ahou!). But yeah, I'll leave it at that.


Okay, one last thing. Yesterday at kung-fu I was playing with a stick, spinning it here and there. I wasn't paying attention. I smoked myself in the cheek hard. My mouth didn't bleed or anything though I did have a bit of a headache afterwards, so I'm happy. It did hurt like a something something, though.


[12:10am EDIT: Yeah, this essay's not gonna happen - I better just study for the exam . . . durnit . . . . .]
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Saturday, April 10, 2004

   Week in review . . .
I wonder why I feel so exhausted right now? Hmm . . . . .

Well, classes are done now. All that's left is to kill off some finals. In lieu of one, I can write a paper instead, and I think I'm gonna do that (otherwise it's thinking at 8:30am). In any case, I'm free after the 27th, which should be grand, methinks (yes, I just used the word 'grand'). Since Thursday, I've been taking it pretty easy, which probably isn't a good thing, but I'll knuckle-down today after I go see my supervisor and get my ID card and shirt and, if I can get around to it, some steel-toed shoes.

Oh yeah, I got a job, by the way.

So, we all remember "Boromir", right? Well, he happens to get wind of my dire need for money at the moment, so he does some magic over at his place, and, well . . . . . ya gotta love friends, is all I can say. So yeah, I'm gonna be working Home & Garden at one of the Canadian Superstores in the area - it's the one a half-hour drive away from me, but I'm thinkin' that's the least of my worries. But yeah, it's probably gonna be hard enough work for minimum wage, and it's gonna take a while to get used to the ropes, I'm sure . . . but there's probably gonna be a fair bit of heavy lifting, so that should be fun! (And yes, I am strange that way).

Hey, it beats workin' at McDonald's or the Panago call center (like EVERYONE else I know).


Alright, so that's school, that's job . . . what else am I missing? Um . . . . . oh! Playoffs! I'm not paying enough attention to 'em, but ya know, it's an annual ritual to see how far the Canucks'll make it before some dire thing happens to them and then they suck and die . . . but, ya gotta have faith, right?
(Meanwhile, Montreal gets killed in overtime . . . aiya . . . . .)

Oh yeah, and YTV restarted Inuyasha at the beginning again. Poopie. But, I'll be sure to not miss new ones again stupidly like this winter, I hope . . . . . where's a good batch-torrent when ya need 'em, huh?

So that's this week in review. Next week, there'll be first day of exams, first day of work, and my brain may or may not explode from messy brothers. Should be fun, ne? But yes, 'til then, be safe, have fun, and don't forget that modifying posts now requires you to scroll all the way down to the bottom for the button.

Annyonghi gaseyo!
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Thursday, April 8, 2004

   Heri bibendum erat
Wednesday was the last day of class for History, English, and Latin. And it's bittersweet, ya know? I mean, we survived a year of medieval texts, a year of Chaucer and Middle English together, and a year of those weirdos Quintus and Trimalchio. But, considering how TOTALLY tired I am with school at the moment, I think on the whole it's a good thing that the semester is more or less over - indeed, by the time many of you read this, my semester will be over!


Now that that's out of the way, I'm gonna talk about my weird-ass Latin class and my friends in that class:

1. Take a drink if [Prof's name] says "subjunctive"
   
2. Take a drink if [Prof's name] laughs
   
3. Take a drink if [Classmate's name] asks a question
   
4. Take a drink if [Prof's name] uses "loving" or "killing" in an example
   
5. Take a drink if [Prof's name] mentions an indirect clause
   
6. Take a drink if [Classmate's name] comes to class
   

We made a drinking game for the last day of Latin class! Haha! So yeah, me and 3 other people all sat in class, reading along with the thing, with our bottles of orange juice . . . well, orange juice mixed with stuff, but . . . . . in any case, we tallied 15 hits, mostly from the prof laughing and that one guy asking lots of questions. Yeah, we must've looked strange to everyone else in the class - they MUST have been thinking we were doing something like that! Eheh . . . . .

We told everyone later, in any case - well, everyone that came to the pub after Latin class (it's Latin! We were all in a very Romanesque frame of mind!). But yeah, the 4 of us already with a head start, the rest of us crammed around a long thing of tables . . . and our prof giving the toast! Nunc bibendum est! [clang!] Heh . . . but yeah, it was a fun little get-together outside of class . . . . . where we continued to talk about Classical Studyish stuff (mostly it was about movies coming out and stuff [yay Troy!]).

So yeah, that's half my week so far. Neat, huh?


(So yeah . . . heri ego leviter ebrius eram)
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Monday, April 5, 2004

   So, last night was interesting . . .
So get this, I get greeted by anew MSN person this night . . . I have no reason to turn it down, so I accept. The person messages me:

Hey Adam

So yeah, wrong person . . . so we chat a bit, laugh about how we're total strangers and there's been a big miscommunication and stuff . . . . . she finds out I'm from Vancouver, I find out she's from Ontario, and we laugh a little more. Ya know, the whole incident is kinda funny, don'cha think?

Anyway, suddenly she wants a picture of me; she was then going to send me a picture of her. So I'm thinking to myself about this, wondering if there's anything worth sending her . . .

Let's see . . . . .
Nope
You send me a picture first then I'll send you one
No, I meant 'let's see if I have a pic'

Pushy gal, don'cha think? My my . . . anyway, I decided it would better to not send her one.

Crap. Deleted them after all. Sorry.
u loser
Yeah, probably . . .
u just don't wanna send me a pic because ure an ugly piece of [expletive deleted]
Yeah, we can go with that, sure.
u loser, why don't you fight back?
I've got better things to do, I'm sure.
Like?
I can write up things for people I know rather than be insulted by someone I don't know . . . kind of a no-brainer, don'cha think?Haha no.
u loser.

This is all off my memory, so I'm probably slightly off - in any case, that was the gist of it. After that she went offline (I assume she blocked me) and I blocked and deleted her in turn. Fun night, ne? Heh . . . . . she couldn't handle the sarcastic pacifism! Haha! Ah . . . . . so that was my night.


In other news, daylight savings almost made me late for something this morning (grr), I cut my knuckle trying to break apart a thing of frozen-together ice cubes with my fist (kids, NEVER do that!), and I finished watching Peace Maker Kurogane (damn good show) - now I REALLY hope that Konami will bring the game Fu-un Shinsengumi to North America! Yeah, now I'm in a total Shinsengumi phase (way to go, girls, you've sucked me in now).

That shall be all for today. Have a good day now.
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Saturday, April 3, 2004

   James of Vancouver's Account of The Penance of SomeGuy
1. Though I am far from qualified to write this account, I feel it is in the best interests that the world not lose what had happened that day in the 2004th year of our lord. Indeed, I risk much in my efforts to observe and record these events, as some people involved had wished to account me as related to the events herein. Though I may be lost as well by those wishing for vengeance, I shall still hold to my beliefs and trust in him who is above to protect me. Thus, I shall tell you of the great evil that had arisen to a small community and of the man once reknowned for his grace and piety, but was instead pulled down to the likes of the wicked and disdainful.

2. SomeGuy of myOtaku came into the light of the world, bringing almost divine knowledge to others and holding his place justly. He taught others of the ways of his native land and excelled in his desire to better the lives of those around him. His desire to help others would often even come at the expense of his own body, and he braved all nature of fatigue, mentally and physically, to right the wrongs of the material earth. In the end was his eternal promise that he would never leave, just as the ships on which he came to the world would never leave.

3. Then came a fateful night spawned from the old New Year's date which was cast away by our ever pious Pope Gregory centuries prior. Tainted by the influences of the sights and sounds surrounding his being like Lucifer, the once noble SomeGuy fell to the lower masses and plotted and conspired against his fellow men and women. Thus, he planned a great trick that would surely strike dissent and ill will throughout the masses. Possessed by the devil, SomeGuy wrote lies of great magnitude, hiding away while those around him thought he was going away forever. In this way his ploy succeeded, though such a ploy can never be praised all too highly.

4. Though he believed his game to be all in good fun and acted of it in a very lighthearted manner, such was not the case. For greater powers chose this moment to truly test SomeGuy, and he was struck deaf and mute for a night. In rendering his ability to communicate with others, the weight of his previous words could only gather heavier, and the innocents affected by this most heinous prank felt great pain and suffering for this.

5. And just as the Franks withered away from hunger outside the gates of Antioch because of their sinful nature, so too did SomeGuy wither away from within. For the next day, after being japed on himself by those with even greater power than he as he made his way to the university, he had a vision. And Adam himself, the creator of the world, came to SomeGuy and warned him to distance himself from his current path, lest the void swallow him like an inescapable tunnel of wind. At once, as if jolted by a pitfall in the road, SomeGuy came to and realised the sinful manner in which he conducted himself.

6. "Oh woe!" he cried out, throwing his arms up to the heavens, "how could I have forsaken everyone I have come to love like that? What manner of evil took up my being and compelled me to hurt others in such a way? True, the way which is taught is one of forgiveness, but for now I can see no possible way to repent save by confessing with my body and mind. Perhaps some day others may come to accept that as well. Oh, those whom I have hurt, the pains from within me which I feel shall never be matched by any form of punishment you may inflict upon me!"

7. And so SomeGuy sought out the crowd hunting for his blood. Sure enough, the divine hand led them to each other, and SomeGuy, mindful of all he had done, dropped to his knees with his arms outstretched. The mob quickly took him, bound his passive hands, and carried him to the center of the community.

8. It was there that all those gathered exacted their vengeance towards the repentant SomeGuy who stood at the center of it all. The first to exact her revenge was 'Beck of the South. As the mass of people began a steady chant of "bastard", 'Beck approached the bound man. As if he was a brother that had betrayed her, she looked into his eyes, allowing her hatred to seethe into him sharply. Immediately afterwards, with a great shout, she lunged forward, threw her arms around the offending person, and squeezed her hands together with all the might of the heavens above. As if boulders had crashed together, the sound of the inner body of SomeGuy could be heard crumbling from within. After Beck of the South felt satisfied, she released her grasp and returned to the chanting crowd. SomeGuy, while hurt, remained standing, eyes focused on the course of his redemption.

9. As Beck stepped back, two new people stepped forth. One, Mole of the Flatlands, came from behind SomeGuy and forced him prone on his back and proceeded to pin his arms and legs down. The other, Shandrial of the North, knelt down beside his head. For she had been wounded far greater than any other could have possibly been, and the heavens had indeed deemed it necessary for Shandrial to rectify this great evil and set balance to the world again.

10. Though his wounds were clearly visible through the cloth on his being, SomeGuy miraculously ignored the pain and looked up at she who was kneeling above. He looked at her spiritually scarred face and nodded for her to proceed. For he knew that no matter how he might be reborn after his trials, he will forever know that he had truly concerned her in a way never meant to be. With that, Mole of the Flatlands secured the final holdings and Shandrial extended her finger towards SomeGuy's forehead. Like a righteous hammer, Shandrial dealt justice out and into the man's head, over and over again. And though the form of punishment was tailored specifically to deal with those who would resist the purifying effects of the divine hammer, SomeGuy remained still, and took each blow in stride.

11. For a day and a night, the same amount of time in which those who had been wronged had to endure, the penance continued. By now, a great fire had shown itself on the forehead of SomeGuy, who remained awake and attentive throughout the ordeal. And though deep inside she may have felt that her personal satisfaction had not been made, a higher power instructed her to desist, for the penance had been made and to go any further would be evil in itself. And so, SomeGuy was released. He rose like some new Constantine from the waters, and all present knew that the ills of the previous nights had now been expunged. And let it be known that the heavens rejoiced, for one of their own had been returned to the flock. Though the lesson remained that even one who seems good at heart can be tainted by less than virtuous behaviour. And may that lesson continue to spread through the word and through the voice.


(I've been reading too many Middle Ages primary sources . . . . . but in any case, to hit the point home, it's gonna take a HELL of a lot to get me away from you all! No, you're gonna be stuck with me, for better or worse. As such, I apologize PROFUSELY to anyone whom had to worry about anything in regards to my silly little gag from the other day, and I hope that all can be made better as we continue on our way. So yes. May we all return to our regularly scheduled lives now, methinks.)
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