Wyvern, Passion for Gaming

Mood - irritated but otherwise content
Today's Song - Vertical Horizon - Everything You Want

Well, this weekend was pretty fun for me even though I never got out of the house (much). It really started with last Thursday and getting to see Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire. I've seen some people get upset about how the movie changed some things and left out some parts from the book. While I will agree that it's upsetting that they did these things (because there are some parts that were left out that made the story somewhat different), I will not downgrade my score of the movie just because of that. I was still incredibly happy with the movie as a whole and stick by my 9 out of 10. It was really freakin' great!

Next was Friday... my mother was leaving for a women's retreat with the church and needed me to come back from school to wait for a delivery of some pillows; which, incidentally, came later after I had already left for work at like 5:30PM. However, after having spent a while playing Paper Mario: The Thousand - Year Door that I had borrowed from Andrew Hurst on Thursday overnight and hadn't got much sleep, I didn't even make my class (oops, I'm fucking stupid). So I ended up just staying in bed, waking up at 9:30AM, getting up to bid my mother goodbye for the weekend, and jumped right back on Paper Mario. Seriously, it's that good. The game is really freaking cool but I'll explain that later.

The last part about Friday happened at work. Or rather, it was work... you see, apparently the Carl's Jr. on Broadway in Downtown Sacramento needs some help for like the next month (more specifically, they need a shift leader to close). So they were going to send one of our other shift leaders and have me work from 10PM to 6AM at Franklin Boulevard. I don't want to ruin my sleep schedule (as fucked up as it already is) so I let them know this. In consideration of such, now I will be going to the Broadway Carl's Jr. for the next month or so every Friday to close instead of the other shift leader. So needless to say (though I'm still saying it), I went to Broadway on Friday. It was pretty cool over there; less people coming into the inside and more drive - thru and even the drive - thru wasn't so bad because the two girls who were there as cashiers didn't complain a lick of how much service we were getting. They just did their jobs and laughed with me as I was being my stupid, joking self (GP groans). Also, the drive - thru lane over there leads directly back out to Broadway so even if we were to pull a car, where the hell would they go? I was much more happy over there working on a Friday then at my store. But I don't know if I would want to move to there only because the entire back line crew (cook and friers) speaks Spanish and very little English. I don't know if I could handle that only because I don't necessarily have a good translator nor the time to learn Spanish to be able to understand the language orally.

Onto Saturday where I only got out of my bed at like 2PM and played Paper Mario until I left for work at 5:30PM. Not much happened on that day and that's because I'm stupid for sleeping for so damned long. I told you, fucked up sleep schedule.

And finally, yesterday (which happened to be Sunday for some reason)... not much again except Paper Mario... oh wait, I did work on my essay slightly. And I did go to lunch with my father and brother. AND I did watch some TV for football scores and pay attention to my fantasy football for a while (which I'm going to lose this week, grrrrrrr!). But other than that, yeah, Paper Mario.

So why am I so enamored with this game? Well first off, it's an RPG so simple, your two year old baby cousin could play it... AND PROBABLY GET A GOOD SCORE. I've never been very patient with in depth RPGs and as such haven't finished many (Can you say, Final Fantasy VII?). But Paper Mario boils down that leveling up shit to real simpleness by making level - ups happen every 100 experience points. Plus, the game's battling doesn't rely heavily on leveling up so you can get through the game pretty easily without leveling up a lot. Speaking of the battle system, it's freaking awesome. First off, the way attacks work is that you have to press/hold certain buttons or tilt thumbsticks as they appear on the screen. For instance, Mario's hammer attack is more powerful if you tilt the thumbstick until the lights on the screen light up all the way to the right of the bar. So these on screen instuctions make the game a real breeze. Maybe I'm sounding a little pansy - ish but I'm ok, I just really like the system. Plus, it does get slightly more complicated along the way. Not by much, but somewhat more. Next is the newest thing they added to the game. Now I never beat the first game (which isn't necessary for playing the sequel, ???) but I do know that this wasn't in there. There is a new feature called your special moves. Mario is on a search for these crystal stars and every time you gain one, you get a new special move. To use these moves, you need to gain staw points. To do that, you have to impress the audience that watches your battles. I'm quite serious here, every time you enter a battle, different amounts and types of characters from the game will watch your battle. Every time you do something impressive, the audience will cheer and give you star points. These points add up and once you fill a dot, you can begin using your special moves. This is really freaking cool and I've even discovered new ways to impress the audience. You can do things from just being able to execute an Action Command (pressing the attack button right before your attack connects so that the attack is more powerful) to even just waving at the audience to appeal to them and gain hecka more stars to add to your star points bar. Glen may be able to explain even furhter if you're confused or want to know more. I just really like the game and will continue playing until I beat it.

My last piece of information concerns me and my money. As you may all know, I have a car loan payment every month and my insurance as well. Add on $200 I still owe my parents for having them pay the money to fix my car and I won't have much money to spend on Christmas presents. As such, I really hope you all don't mind if I can't get my friends anything. I will have little to spend on my family in the first place so if I can buy you guys anything, it'll be a miracle. Sorry about sounding kind of cheap but I have to be if I'm going to survive. That's because I'll have to be paying my car loan, paying my insurance, paying my debt to my parents, and paying for food for me to eat and gas for my car. Add it all up and I don't know if I'll have enough to buy even my family anything for Christmas. I swear, I'm going to feel guilty getting anything from them. Well, I'll talk to y'all later.

"But you'll just sit tight and watch it unwind;
it's only what you're asking for.
And you'll be just fine with all of your time;
it's only what you're waiting for.

Out of the island, into the highway;
past the places where you might have turned.
You never did notice but you still hide away
the anger of angels who won't return.

He's everything you want, he's everything you need.
He's everything inside of you that you wish you could be.
He says all the right things at exactly the right time.
But he means nothing to you and you don't know why."

Mood - groggy a bit but content
Today's Song - Poe - Trigger Happy Jack

So I went this very early morning (12AM) to see the first showing of the new Harry Potter movie. I'm very glad that I did because it was so freaking awesome. I may not have seen the third movie but because I've read the books (up to the fifth where I stopped and need to go back and start again) I wasn't really all that upset about skipping movies. Hell, I really enjoyed the fourth book the best anyhow so I really couldn't wait to see what they did to make it into a movie. It was really damned good and I can't say anything here lest I give shit away.

BTW Peter, I don't enjoy games from movies where all you do is play the movie again. In The Matrix: Path of Neo, you don't just play the movie... there are parts to the story that you can play differently, such as in the scene where Neo is being guided by Morpheus around his office to try to get away from the agents. You can get captured but also you can see what happens if you make it to the roof. So yeah, I don't also dislike movie games. It's just with LoTR games, it tends to be just that... the movie over again.

One more thing before I go, last night while at the theatres I met a bunch of people from my cousin Nathan's group of friends (either from Cosumnes River College or from the LARP he goes to) and I have to say, they were a pretty interesting bunch. From talk of setting people on fire to mistakingly calling butterscotch "buttersnatch" and therefore creating a new sexual word, yeah, I was pretty entertained. I also know GP wouldn't have been too happy because they were commenting every so often on the movie. Only it wasn't just a run of the mill comment... no, these were a straight out puns on dialogue and story plot. I too occasionally did some so I kow that Glen wouldn't have been able to stand that crowd. It's ok though, he'll go see it with Hurst and a probably more sane crowd of people. In any case, I apparently look like Hitler with my mustache so yeah. Later!

"Why do you make me feel like this?
Why do you gotta be such a dick?
Why do you make me feel like this?
Why do you gotta be such a dick? (I'm feeling sick.)

No no.

And I hate myself just enough to want him
but I hate him just enough to get off.
And I understand him; maybe I'm just crazy enough to love him.
Why not? (Why not?)"

Mood - content
Today's Song - Dr. Mario Theme (because my mind is on Smash Brothers)



Oh, that hurts my head so much...

...ANYWHO...

...It may not be very fresh in your memory, but it has been one of my titles before. And it happened again... I was over at Glen's house every single day last week and yesterday. So yeah, I did a lot of shit with Glen this week. Between Psychonauts, The Matrix: Path of Neo, and what turned out to be some excellent conversations of Friday, I'd say this past week of jam - packed!

In any case, I finally saw the Firefly movie. Glen and I had to travel to EMERYVILLE to see it but it was worth it. I can't believe that there's only one place in northern California that's still playing the movie... that's just sad. But it's ok because we got to see the movie, have some dinner at Denny's, and watch Glen kick more ass in The Path of Neo.

So, I leave you with two things. One, pray I get a new job because I need more money than I'm making right now. And two, the emperor is a bastard:

Mood - amused

Here's an interesting little game I found over on Peter Ruibal's blog... yeah, that's right. Mr. Ruibal seems to be updating his blog again. So that's cool. Anyway, the game goes as follows:

You go to google and you put in quotation marks, "[firstname] needs" and grab the first ten or so results. excerpt from Mr. Ruibal's (Sir Twank) Blog

Here are my results:


Josh needs our help and prayer. (Me: I sure do, Mr. Pope.)
Josh needs to fix it. (Me: What's "it?")
Josh needs a laptop foundation. (Me: What the hell is a laptop foundation?!)
Josh needs a holiday or just a cuddle? (Me: BOTH.)
Josh needs remedial spelling lessons pronto! (Me: That's friggin' hilarious!)
Josh needs needs you! (Me: I do?)
Josh needs a new bicycle. (Me: Screw the bike... I've got a Sentra!)
Josh needs to do something about some car. (Me: I'm way ahead on that one.)
Josh needs to be in the same term limit window as the next governor and other
statewide offices. (Me: I didn't know what half of that even meant and yet somehow I need it.)
Josh needs support to learn how to express anger appropriately. (Me: Oh, go fuck yourself.)

Fun! BTW, if you read this one first, there is another post for today below this one.

Mood - happier than I was on Monday
Today's Song - Trocadero - Steady Ride (Gun Metal Green)

We interrupt my web browsing to bring you this special new bulletin. I am actually a deep - voiced... oh wait, wrong news flash.



Ah, there we go. I swear, when Penny Arcade makes me laugh it's a good thing... especially when they do really fucking strange things, like this:



I had something else to say but in my search for the full names of the authors of Penny Arcade, I lost it. So yeah, we return me to my regularly scheduled web browsing.

PS - If you couldn't read those very well, just click on them to get to the original sizes. I had to scale them down to fit into post posting area here. A'ight, later y'alls!

"Gun metal green... prettiest that I've seen.
I've nothing to hide and you've nothing to hide.

I'd trust you at the wheel even if we're going down.
Our love is made of steel; last us 'til the underground.
Steady and surreal in a world of lost and found.

Took out the trash, paid my bills all in cash.
Nothing to hide and it's summer outside."

Mood - pissed off with life
Today's Song - Dennis Leary - Life's Gonna Suck

...and I suppose I haven't been to good to life either. In any case, the following is something I posted on the Red vs. Blue forums in my journal. I know it's long and it's unedited so some of it may not make sense outside of the context of the RvB forums. But I'm feeling like a lazy, ass - hole right now and I don't care. So if you are TRULY and HONESTLY interested about understanding anything I say here, give me a call and I'll try to sort through my emotional baggage (heh, Psychonauts joke). Rant is as follows:

You know what sucks the most about being a college student? Needing money and not having enough. Seriously, I'm sure we can all agree that money makes this world go 'round (whoever thought that this was a great idea needs to take a look into the future realize, "Whoops, I fucked up didn't I?") And because money seems to make the world go around, I get to be a little poor bastard wishing he had a life. Schooling aside (because that's a different matter and I'll talk about it later), money makes my life a living hell. I want things, there's no question of the matter; I want to have entertainment in my life whether I have the time for it or not. So when things like a fesking broken down car (piece of crap required me to get it fixed a month ago and I needed to be mobile so I broke down and now I owe my parents $300) begin to happen, I get irritated that I no longer have a steady income. What I have is me needing to live paycheck to paycheck; this doesn't work to provide me with entertainment at all. So then I have to revert to doing shit that may nor be healthy (like buy games when I know that I need to save money whenever possible).

Oh, the title of this post was being a non - sponsor, totally went absent minded on that for a minute. Yeah, I'm stupid. I wanted to sponsor but forgot, I gots no money in teh bank account (at least none for such a luxury as seeing my beloved RvB characters spout hilarity for my personal enjoyment). God, luxury... I wish that word didn't have to be used when referring to items that can be bought when one has the extra expenditory resources. But it does mean that and that means that I shouldn't be buying them. But there I was at Gamestop last Friday, buying a copy of Smash Bros. Melee just so that my brother's copy could come back home with me to my house in Rancho Cordova.

And there's another piece of this puzzle; for those who don't know (which is about all of you), I recently moved from my childhood home of 19 years to a new house out in Rancho Cordova (which recently gained cityhood here in the Sacramento county of California). As a sidenote, if you get tired of me detailing every last god forsaken thing just skip ahead to the juicy meat of journalism that I do here. God, I'm stupid. Anyhow... I moved. Now don't get me wrong, I freaking like it out there better than in the ghetto of Southgate. Seriously, I don't have to be as worried that some fruitcake, bastardized idiot is going to come up and punch a hole through a window out in Rancho Cordova. Oh yeah, ask me about that one later (good story if you like getting freaked out at work kind of events). But the fact that I have to drive out to South Sacramento to get to work and school doesn't give me any extra cash because gas prices still suck (even though they're going down) and needing to eat doesn't help my wallet either because I'M ALWAYS OUT OF THE HEADQUARTERS (as I like to call it since I really don't feel like I have a home anymore, just a homebase if you will). So since I'm out of the house, guess what I get to do? Waste my money on expensive fattening foods that take away both huge chunks out of my paycheck and life considering I'm sure I'm going to die of some sort of fast food related over eating kind of shit. And the problem is, I'm probably going to just wallow in this pig STW. Reason being is that I have royally fucked up my schooling.

Geez, didn't mean to rant but I've just got to do it. Maybe someone out there can either tell me what the fuck to do, push me in the direction to go because shit I can't seem to it for myself, or just generally comfort my ass as I land on the ground from a four thousand mile drop of shear fucking stupidity. Anywho, back to school; I screwed it up. I can't seem to get myself to continue going to classes. And even the ones that I don't stop going to, I do stupid shit like procrastinate doing my essay for it so that it's totally fesking impossible to do it. If you get tired of cursing or fake curses there of, I hope you have a censor on your computer because this things full of shit like that. In any case, yeah, school is fucked. So what the hell do I do? Do I try to go to classes again next semester, wasting yet another $381 on what might end being a repeat of history? Do I try to get a job out there in the real world which seems to think that people like me should just die rather than hire me and give me a chance to better society and myself? Or do I just continue on the path I'm on and hope for the best? Shit, none of these situations seems likely to turn up anything positive. I suppose the only thing I can do is live one day at a time and stop spending money in the stupidest places.

Oh, and if you're wondering where the hell I've been for so many months, these forums just got really boring to me. I remember when I first joined a year ago you could post practically anything. Shit, I wouldn't mind being able to bash on n00bs again. But apparently, everything these days has to be kosher and politically correct. So instead, there are so many freaking rules that I don't even know if I can post the word "floccinaucinihilipilification" without getting banned from the site. I just wish there was something to do. With most of the old forum topics having been overdone and overtalked about and with the what appears to me to be the disappearance of forum games (like my quoting game if anyone of the 35 friends I have here remembers), there seems to be absolutely nothing of interest for me here. I remember so many different topics and drawings and ideas floating around. Maybe it's 'cause I haven't been involved for so long that I can't see a reason to rejoin. But I do know one thing that probably lead to my eventual almost complete disappearance from these forums... that would be the departure of a good friend of mine from these forums. His name here was Bvhjdbvkjf.

Bvhjdbvkjf was, in my opinion, one of the coolest people to have ever graced these forums with his presence. He knew a lot about the forum community type people and how to run things excellently. He and I endeavored on a website project that never really took off but was very much a cool idea and if we ever get it going again I will be very happy. Someday I intend to contact him again when I have the time. Our thread about how to do the basics of these forums got a pretty big response. We both were tired of being surrounded by idiots who didn't listen to those of us trying help them understand how to work the forums and also we were tired of hearing the smart people say that there was no way to help these people so just bash them. While I do enjoy a good thrashing of a n00b from time to time, I still say that imparting knowledge betters them and you in a way that insults just cannot touch. So when that thread about every basic nuance of the RvB forums got locked, we decided that it was time to put it into website form. We called ourselves "The Anime - Zing! Team" (based of our mutual love for anime and the mod point called Zing!) and we tried to create a website filled with our different interests. Even though that project failed, I restored that same tutorial about the Rooster Teeth forums and how to work it's basic functions so that it would not go quietly into the void. You can find it here.

Sorry about the boring history lesson but it's just me being nostalgic. I absolutely loved Bvhjdbvkjf's company here on the forums and was sad to see him go. I really wasn't pleased with his attitudes towards himself but that's another story and one which I'm not qualified to tell. Bvhjdbvkjf will be missed. My point here is that I believe that once Bvhjdbvkjf left the site, things began to change. The forum moderators began to get tougher and tougher on everything. Some people might remember the "Don't Be A Jerk Day" forum that spawned the eventual banning of any n00b bashing in these forums. That's good thing, yes. But it seems to me that it also led to the shortening of what people could do in the forums. I swear, I wouldn't feel safe trying to type anything out in a thread because I fear that anything remotely relating to anything random and fun would be suppressed. Goddamn, I sound like an idiot, don't I? I've been rambling on since who knows when I started typing this out. All I wanted to talk about was my money situation. And now I'm on the forum conditions? What the crap? I just wish there was something I could do about my life. Well, I'm going to go and I'm going to see what these two pieces of ranting stir up. Mayhaps I've written an essay here that I can turn into my teacher, eh? Probably not, considering I was supposed to write on the movie Twelve Angry Men. I hope you all have a great time here because I can't see myself having any fun soon (which means someone should have fun if I can't). Alright, ranting Lantern/Ranma/Captain Falcon/whatever the hell you want to call me signing off.

PS - You may notice I changed my comics links around again. I got rid of two that I got bored of (6x9 College and Zebra Girl), got rid of Neko the Kitty 'cause they haven't updated for a long time and I just don't care anymore, I added Discordia (which is one I have been reading just never got around to adding it 'til now), and I added the two Bob & George sub - comics that I've been reading but haven't had linked until now. So yeah, I'm at 18 comics total. Does anyone remember my previous count? Does anybody really care?

"Life's gonna suck when you grow up, when you grow up, when you grow up!
Life's gonna suck when you grow up; it sucks pretty bad right now!

(Hey! If you know the words, Sing along!)

You're gonna have to mow the lawn, do the dishes, make your bed.
You're gonna have to go to school until you're seventeen.

(It's gonna seem about three times as long as that!)

You might have to go to war, shoot a gun, kill a nun.
You might have to go to war, when you get out of school.

(Hey, cheer up kids, it gets a lot worse!)

You're gonna have to deal with stress, deal with stress, deal with stress!
You're gonna be a giant mess when you get back from the war."

Mood - amused
Today's Song - Poe - Dolphin

When I get bored, you should run for the hills. Because then I start doing things like this:



"There's a broken beam inside of the big big bridge.
I guess that whole thing is caving in.
Maybe it is time I learn how to swim;
I'll be a dolphin, I'll be a dolphin.

Sometimes I think I'm breaking down
and other times I think that I'm fine.
But something got into my engine (It slowed me down).
Now I gotta turn this whole thing around.

I'm gonna be a dolphin,
gonna be a dolphin.
I'm gonna be a dolphin,
gonna be a dolphin."

Mood - kinda tired but hopeful
Today's Song - none

Holy crap, did I have the most interesting customer come through my drive - thru last night. Ok, so it's Halloween and I should be expecting some people to come throught with a costume on. But this one woman just made me laugh (and not with her but at her).

Here's the dealie: this woman comes on to drive - thru and orders one burger. I ask he if she'd like anything else (such as soda or some dessert) just like I'm supposed to and she gets all uppety about me asking such a thing. So before she gets to the window, I'm already thinking she's sort of a bitchy person about thing; low and behold, she's dressed as the evil queen from the story of Snow White. She evens says to someone on her cel - phone, "The evil queen bitch is hungry." I was going to comment on the costume but after hearing that, there was no need.

So I'm thinking she's ok and I'm ok with her. But then she goes and asks me if the burger patty was fresh. Her reason for asking: BECAUSE I GOT THE BURGER TO HER SO FAST! First off, if it wasn't fast food then it wouldn't be called FAST FOOD. Secondly, we get our food out faster at late night (I believe it was about 11:30PM, somewhere around there) because we've got less people to serve since dine - in is closed and people don't usually want food at such a late time (at least, not on a Monday). Plus, she only ordered one burger... what are you thinking, we're going to pain stakingly kill the cow in the restaurant? Goddamn, I'm not that sadistic. ORDER UP! *MOOOOOOO!!!* Was that a cow? Yes, now here's your order... go away. Long story short (too late), yeah lady, it's fresh! I explain to her in a slightly (understatement) nicer fashion that our burgers are fresh. Once again, I think I'm out into the clear when she drives off and says, "I had better not talk to no mirrors." That really loses it's touch when it's just written but what she meant was that she had better have a fresh burger or else. But instead of just saying that, she used a cheesy reference to the character she was dressed as. I couldn't help but laugh after she left. "I had better not talk to no mirrors" ? Dear lord, that's just cheesy and sad. And that was my Halloween funny story. How about you?

"Robin Williams doesn't sing... most of the time..."