Polygons are getting more action than me

I have a complaint. There are too many video games with the theme of love. Final Fantasy 6 through to 10 all have love as the main theme of the game, and goddammit it's annoying. Just for once I'd like to control a main character who just wants to see the world, adventure, collect treasure, and kill goblins; not some pimply faced teenager who falls in love with another member of the party where one of the two invariably die after some dramatic love scene set to the tune of some romantic piano theme.

Even in Lord of the Rings: The Third Age, my main female elf character kissed my human ranger after he saved her, at which point I sighed a breath of disappiontment. There's no time for love when Sauron is collecting his forces against the races of middle earth! Put that back in your pants, Berethor! The Balrog is hot on our tails!

I had some people over at my house after some of us went for a prime rib dinner at the Prospector. Chris came from the hockey game, and he brought Alexa! I hadn't seen her in a year and a half...that is, back when I was happy, when I had something really worth living for. It's hard to hang out with your old friends when you're scared of running face first into your past.

Listening to... My mom's piano student
Link of the moment... Decent movie, but awesome theme song

Home post

Sure, I'll make a post, why not. I'll blame my being home for not having any since the 18th, but I'll cave and rant a bit now.

Pretty good Xmas, it's the first time I've gotten video games for a gift. I got Burnout 3 and Lord of the Rings: The Third Age, and I've played both a lot since the 25th. LotR is ok, and it is particularly similar to Final Fantasy X, but FFX just seemed so much more fluid. The battles were quick and you could get by without much healing. Navigating menus is sluggish too compared the FFX, but perhaps I should stop comparing apples with slightly different apples.

I've seen Vicky in the last week as much as I have in the three months before it. I don't know if she's avoiding me for any sadistic reason, but it sure seems like she's not trying very hard to upkeep her portion of the friendship. Yes, she might have been busy with exams, yes she might have a lot of shifts at work, and yes she might be busy with family Christmas parties, but would it be so hard to tell me so? Well...regardless, it doesn't look like she'll be getting back her Buffy season two, and I won't be watching the Star Wars series with her. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: hope and expectations are the first step towards disappoinment.

My dad just took off for Florida with the van, so it's me and the ladies sharing the Sante Fe for the next week. Luckily I think some of my friends have some favours to pay back, so I'll be making them my bitches while I'm here. I don't know how that man can drive to Florida so often...hasn't he heard of planes?

I got four of my five marks in. I was pleasantly suprised:
Calculus - 74
Computer Science - 92
Music - 91
Statistics - 95

That means if I get an 83 in algebra, I'm on the dean's list again. I'm realy only concerned with my combined yearly average being over 80, since next term is gonna be a tough one.

Listening to... Nothing at the moment
Link of the moment... For lack of a better link

Integrate THIS! *shakes fist*

That was by far, the worst exam I've ever written. For the first time, I'm actually worried that I failed an exam. Mind you, pretty well the entirety of students did poorly, from what I can tell, so they should bump up the marks. Still, it looks like I should be expecting a 70ish for this course...I should be able to keep my scholarship so long as I don't fuck up a course next term.

Algebra went well. Lots of people seem to be complaining about it, but I did very well except for one question. Between that, stats, and CS, I should have a nice exam set here.

This is my last day in Waterloo for the term. Oh, I'm excited to go back. Holy hell. The only drawback is that I can't play games with my buddies, unless they bring their systems over...I'd like that, playing stuff with them is fun. Of course I want to play board games, watch movies, and go out with them, but there's nothing quite like sitting around collectively playing a game.

I don't know what else to say, I just wanted to get another post in here since I'll be, you know, DOING STUFF for the next few weeks.

Listening to... Queens of the Stone Age - Regular John
Link of the moment... I've been reading this sprite comic from the very beginning in the last few days.

1. My watch
2. Final Fantasy Tactics
3. I'm a zombie
4. Prospector dinner
5. CS134 exam

1. My watch
I found out my watch has a crack in the glass on the face. I'm not sure if that makes me happy or sad. On the one hand, it gives me a reason to finally get rid of something that reminds me that my life is past its peak. It may be the most frequent reminder of the girl that once loved me, right up there with the pictures of us I still have sitting in my room at home...I don't know if I should do something about those either.

Either way, I picked this watch out and I can only hope I find one as appealing to me as it is. I like the design of it, and the colour of the backing.

2. Final Fantasy Tactics
You may want to avoid this paragraph (or few) since most of you are disinterested in FFT. Regardless, I put FFTA aside because the cycle has once again started, and I'm playing FFT again. I found an emulator, so I can play it at a faster speed than I used to, which will undoubtedly save hours of my life.

The guys at the GameFAQs FFT board made some major breakthroughs with hacking FFT with a Gameshark. Now, if I put enough time and effort into it, I could manipulate the game in *pretty well* any way I want. Change abilities, change classes, statistics, items, monsters, etc. It's buggy to some degree, but it opens up a lot of doors to things I just plain don't like, or I've always thought would be better.

I've started up two games I had going before: Knights and Priests, and Geomancers and Time Mages. I could play this game a thousand times and it would be just as great every time.

3. I'm a zombie
I haven't been well lately. I can't sleep at nights, I just sit with my eyes open for a while. I've been going to bed at around 2-3 lately, that's probably not good. During the days I'm just in a complete stupor. Never fully awake, but when I try to nap I just can't fall asleep. Whatever, I guess it's not that bad right now, I can still study decently, so it's not getting in the way.

4. Prospector Dinner
This year, I think that the circle of us are gonna go out for supper instead of buying gifts. It's too hectic to buy so much crap all at once. I just hope that people haven't bought anything yet. I've had no contact with Vicky or Phil in the last while. In fact, I'm gonna call Vic right now. (phones) No answer. Probably has her phone off. Oh well, I doubt she was gonna buy me anything anyways.

Oh yeah, I'm gonna have people over for a sober new year's again. Board games can be very fun.

5. CS 134 exam
I did my Computer Science 134 exam with about 30 minutes of studying. I still think I aced it. I'll tell you, that exam was 12 ounces of recursion in an 8 ounce bottle. I've just got algebra and calculus left, but those are the two that are gonna require me to study an average of more than thirty minutes, perhaps more along the lines of 12 hours each. That should be enough. I think I know enough to pass right now, but my $1000 scholarship says I can do better.

Listening to... Metallica - No Remorse (they all sound the same to me)
Link of the moment... Final Fantazy Tactics discussion board.

Don't get near me, I'm contagious

I feel like I'm just a communicable disease, and anyone who comes into contact with me is worse off because of it. All I am is a burden to other humans. I'm a pessimist plain and simple, and no one likes pessimists.

I don't want to shave because I want my exterior to be as heartless and rugged as my soul, perhaps as a warning to everyone. I've infected too many people already.

I don't even know how I have kept the friends I have. I picked them up before my soul was crushed, and I guess they stick around due to habit (and to abuse my basement, for the most of them).

It's hard to not be pessimistic when you've experienced something as wonderful as I once had, and realize that nothing will bring you even a fraction of that joy for a long, long time. I don't have much to look forward to.

Listening to... Face to Face - Disappointed
Link of the moment... Brampton school teacher shot

How did I survive high school?

Let's do some math, shall we?

High School: 5 days a week, ~9AM - 3PM: 30 hours a week (excluding lunch and spare periods)

University: Sporadic days, Approx 22 hours a week

I did eight hours more work in high school, but University is so much more of a burden. I guess it can be explained by the fact that most of your work could be finished in class in HS, and all of the material was much easier.

I did particularly well on my Stat 230 exam, but I'm trying really, really hard to not get my hopes up. I've made my goal of getting 80%, of that I'm rather certain, so I should be just as excited to get 81% as I would be to get 100%. For anyone who just took the course, I'd say my test score should follow a normal with mean 88 and variance 25. More importantly, I'm one exam closer to my nice vacation.

I'm a little worried to go home, for one reason specifically. I won't go into much detail, I'll leave it laid in an analogy for you to figure out. Let's say that since I've gotten here in September (hell, since last April even), I've been damned hungry. But I'm a picky eater, and there's not much food down here that suits my tastes. Now, when I get home I'll be hanging around with quite a delicious dish, but alas! It cannot be eaten. It's...I dunno, still not ready I guess? Still in the oven. But the mere thought of partaking in its delicacy makes my mouth water, and if I've gotta sit around right next to the oven for three weeks without a single taste, I may go MAD I tell ya. Well, maybe I can look for new restaurants next term and find some better food.

Shit, I'm hungry now. I'm gonna go get lunch.

Listening to... Gob - Paint it Black
Link of the moment... I spend a lot of time reading the message boards for different games

Best entrepreneurial idea yet!

Before you read this, you have to promise not to steal my idea, ok? Promise? Cross your heart and hope to get raped by a pack of savage beast-men? Ok, then listen up...

Picture this: you're with a group of adolescents, and are just driving around, or sitting in a basement (sound familiar? picture my basement every weekend). Invariably, the question "what do you wanna do?" arises. Often the only real option is "I unno, watch tv?" or "I unno, rent a movie?".

Sure it would be nice to play a board game, or go ice skating, or some other once-in-a-while activity, but often these activites require relatively expensive equipment that will only be used sparingly. For instance, I want to go ice-skating when I go home this winter, but I don't want to invest $50+ on a set of skates that I'll use maybe twice this season.

But...what if I could rent them? They do that at larger indoor arenas, but if I want to go pond skating, I'd better hope for the sake of my wallet that I can find someone of similar shoe size to borrow from. Or what about board games? Again, I'm not gonna shell out $70 for a new edition of a game to play once with my friends.

Hence, the idea of the Weekend Shop came to me. A store that rents general entertainment equipment for days at a time. Board games, sports equipment, seasonal activity equipment, video game systems and accessories, and whatever else I can come up with. If video rental places can do so well, I don't see why this wouldn't as well.

Some of the problems that others have pointed out:
Large startup costs
Massive rent costs
Damaged or lost equipment (game pieces, sticky boards, stinky skates, etc.)
Loss of business due to people buying their own stuff
Me not living ine one city long enough to start it up

Listening to... Bombshell Rocks - On the Warpath
Link of the moment... Clay institute will give you a million dollars if you solve one of these mathematical problems

I'm fucked. Utterly, royally fucked.

Oh deary me. Why did I decide to start playing Final Fantasy Tactics Advance a week before exams? I should have known better, my exams aren't spread out enough to allow much game playing. It's on my mind though, I can't concentrate on studying cause all I wanna do is play that game.

I'm pretty PO'ed, I left my Trivial Pursuit in the games room, so that others can play it if they want. However, I went down to play it with John last night and, lo and behold, it was gone. I asked a few people if they had borrowed it, but it looks as though whoever has taken it has no intention of returning it. I'll tell you, you try to do something nice, and some asshole has to go remind you that the world is a terrible place, full of stupid, selfish, arrogant people. Goddammit I hate humans.

I found a burger place, and I've fallen in love with it. I've eaten there two nights in a row, but I'm going to try to keep myself from going tonight. The burgers just taste so...fresh off the grill. They smell like summer barbecued burgers. Friggin awesome.

I hope I find enough motivation to find a good place to live next year. More importantly, I hope I find good people to live with next year.

Here's a rundown of my exams:

Monday, 6th 11AM - Music 270
No point in studying. I own this exam. I'm gonna walk in, bend it over, and give it a good thrashing.

Thursday, 9th 7PM - Stat 230
This one worries me a bit. This is the course that's gonna give me minimal returns on my studying. I've pretty well got two full days to study, so I think if I can keep mind off of FFTA and on the course notes, I should be fine. I'm hoping to finally understand the last quarter of the course which, as my quiz marks have shown me, I do not know already.

Monday, 13th 7PM - CS 134
What's with my late exams? I've got Friday and the weekend to study for this one, but I think setting aside just one day should be more than decent. I know most of the core concepts, I just have to worry about doing some practice questions and reading up the fine print for those goddam multiple choice questions.

Thursday, 16th 2PM - Math 235 (Linear Algebra II)
So I've got Tuesday and Wednesday to study for this exam. I think another two full days of problem sets and old exams should be decent to get me through this exam, but I'm never prepared for the theoretical questions, they usually get me depressed. Maybe about ten big proofs I've gotta memorize and understand.

Saturday, 18th 2PM - Math 237 (Multivariate Calculus)
I suppose it's actually Multivariable Calculus or Calculus 3, but "Multivariate" sounds so much cooler. This is where the big problem comes in to play. I have only the 17th to study for this exam and pack for my flight early next morning. That means I'll have to layer all my studying, which pushes Algebra studying back before my CS exam. That will confuse me. The actual studying for this course scares me a bit too. I've got another good 10 or so proofs I should know like the back of my hand, and it'll take another full day of old exams to know what the hell I'm doing.

Oh me oh my, the packing. I guess that really won't take me more than an hour come to think of it. Just gotta get enough clothes packed up, move the fridge to my room, and clean up a bit.

Listening to... The Dickies - Killer Klowns from Outer Space (Watch the movie!)
Link of the moment... I really don't like how this site is set up

Does anyone even read the headings?

I think I got perfect on my singing test in music class. I was awesome.

I failed my stats quiz today. I thought I knew enough of what I was doing to get a pass, but aparently I didn't. I got 68% on another stats quiz last week too.

I only wound up with a 68% on my CS assignment -- the one I stayed up til 5 AM for. What a disappointment. Even after fixing my code, it turns out that the stats it gave were all skewed anyways. Hey, here's an idea: fuck you stupid motherfucker tutor.

I don't care much about the stats, I'm not majoring in it. But when I start getting low marks in the subject I'm planning on excelling at, it tends to make you second guess yourself.

And no Vic, I didn't recieve your email. Must be the shitty Lakehead servers, I guess. I hate when I put effort into emails and they never make it anywhere. All the more for us to talk about when I get home, I guess.

18 days and counting, see you soon everyone.

Listening to... NOFX - The Decline
Link of the moment... Why do I suddenly want one of these? Oh yeah, Pokemon Remake and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance.