But first, an apology

Before I forget, I'd like to issue a formal apology to Andrew for berating his lack of rules knowledge when it came to Cities and Knights of Catan. It turns out I've been playing a number of rules incorrectly in Power Grid. Though there's not much behind the actions the players take in the game, the housekeeping can be a lot to keep track of. There are a lot of details in that game that are easy to overlook.

I was supposed to have my first class today, but the Ryan building was closed today due to a burst water main. The class was only going to be a ten minute "here's the outline, read these chapters for next week" thing, so the prof just sent the two of us an email (yeah, another huge class of two). Thus, my first real class will be the Graduate seminar tomorrow morning. I'll have to make sure to coerce some of my classmates into showing up to this week's game night. I ran into Chris and his girlfriend at a new year's eve shag, and they both mentioned that they were looking forward to playing some games, so I expect them to show up at least a few times.

Adam has made the bold statement that Power Grid is his favourite game, and that can be evidenced by the 10+ plays it's had in the last few weeks. I think I've only racked up two wins so far, and I always seem to make some pretty bad plays every time I play.

I started a new game of Disgaea. I've completely set aside any magic casting characters since they're a pain to level up, and opting for a beat-em-up team. One thing I've noticed about that game is that it's very easy to spend way more time playing it than you originally may have intended. I've racked up about 15 hours of playtime since I started it three days ago (hey, I'm trying to milk as much out of my free time as I can while I still have some!).

The other day, I made the mistake of drawing a comparison between X-Men Legends and Guild Wars. In doing so, I re-lit my spark for Guild Wars, and further fueled my hope that I can get Adam into it (since he seems to enjoy playing XML). The original game is only $30, with no monthly fees. For that price, you get some pretty good bang for your buck.

I had an urge the other day to buy a new computer. There was a computer on the Future Shop website that included a QUAD-core processor, 3GB of RAM, a 400GB hard drive, and a 19" widescreen monitor for a grand sum of $800. By the time I noticed, they were sold out. I'd still be a little wary buying a computer from a box store. I'd rather know that I have higher quality components than having to deal with the hassle of trying to replace crappy components that are jam packed into the case. Case-in-point, Adam's power supply died on his old Dell, and the spare power supply I had sitting around wouldn't fit into his computer since the old supply was sized specifically for a bracket in the case. Sure, you get a great computer for $800, but after a few years, you'll likely have to spend another $500 (as well as a ton of aggravation) to keep it up and running. I think I'll stick with my plan of getting a new computer when I'm done my masters degree (when I'll likely be moving away to get a job in, you know, a *real* city).

Listening to... Metric - Dead Disco
Link of the moment... David Blaine parody (heads up, foul language)

Board Game collection valued at USD$401

I was doing pretty well at getting to bed early-ish and getting up early-ish these last few days, but due to my not being able to turn down a nap earlier, I can't sleep. I'm still going to get up at 9 tomorrow, but Sunday means breakfast at A&W with the family!

I was curious to know what my board game collection was valued at. Rather than estimating, or even just adding up some prices online, I whipped up a database in case I wanted to do a similar query in the future. I'm also able to sort my games by playing time and game complexity as well.

I've taken all my prices from Thought Hammer, which pretty well has the best prices on every game ever, and they're always well stocked. My valuation of $401 does not take into consideration my thrift store purchases (stuff that TH doesn't stock, like balderdash, pictionary, etc.). Also, the prices I'm using are pretty well best-case scenario, so I paid more for each game than I've accounted for (my valuation is simply how much it would cost to replace all my games by ordering on TH). It also doesn't take into consideration the taxes I've paid, so after all is said and done, I've probably spent closer to ~$550 on board games. Not too shabby.

I've watched a fair number of movies recently. The list includes Die Hard, Wedding Crashers, Clerks 2, Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, and Talladega Nights. I guess I've sort of lucked out since there are actually some movies on the movie networks that I've wanted to see.

I've been invited to a softball game tomorrow. I'll know all of two people there, but I guess I should probably go. It's not as though I have anything better to do (although I'll probably be hurting for some sleep tomorrow early-afternoon). A pretty vicious thunderstorm has just started up, so we'll see if it's still raining tomorrow.

Sheena brought up a good point the other day; it would save me a lot of time if I just left my two gaming tables set up in the crawl space rather than moving furniture around every Tuesday. I think I'll do that, but first I'll need to clean up the crawl space, something I tell myself every year. I guess it's really a matter of throwing a bunch of shit out. For instance, I don't think I'll ever have enough of a need for those 15" and 17" CRT monitors (mind you, they'd be nice if I ever had another LAN party...).

I went to six different stores the other day and didn't wind up buying anything at all. I hit up Value Village and the Salvation Army looking for some cheap games, but there was nothing too amazing (besides a really old school Donkey Kong board game that even I had to pass up). I went to the Game Shelf after that. They had an "open games day", which, while I was there, comprised two guys playing Magic in the store. They had a lot of tables prepared for gaming, but until they update their website, I'm not going to try to find out about any events they hold. I think that they're catering to the more hardcore miniatures type of gamer anyways (you know, 40K and Star Wars minis). Their prices aren't all that good. Most of their games are about $5 more expensive than I'm used to. Once you hit games that are over $50 at J&J, they mark the price up quite a bit. Still, given that I intend to buy Martine a copy of Bohnanza as a going away present, they're going to get at least a little business from me.

Now where was I? Ah yes. I went to Cash Converters to see if they had any gems stashed away in their used games, but nothing caught my eye (although maybe I should have bought X-Men Legends 2 for $10). After that was Walmart, where I intended to buy a second, new Wavebird for my Wii, but they didn't have any. They did have the new wave of Heroscape minis a day earlier than they should have, but I don't really need any yet. I headed to Future Shop after that, and they also came up dry for Wavebirds. I was interested to see that Guild Wars (the original) is marked down to $30 from the original $50. If Adam ever gets a laptop, I'll probably have to buy him a copy so that I'll have a reason to play that game again (anything besides more Battlefield! It's all he wants to play, besides tetris). Guild Wars is pretty good for just playing a quest or two at a time, you never really have to worry about experience grinding.

Listening to... Soulfly - Living Sacrifice
Link of the moment... Daily updates on Super Smash Brothers Brawl on weekdays! It's the highlight of my day!

Happenings of late (or, "The one about video games")

Well, there's not much to do at the moment. My table is done (it looks great!), and I'm not really in the mood for any of my games at the moment. Time for a post.

I've been working through all the Megaman X games. I finished X4 the other day (probably the hardest final boss yet!). X4 was a big change from X3 since it was a move from SNES to playstation, but it still kept the same feeling. X5, however, seems like quite a departure from the series. The bosses seem poorly designed and named (Axel the Red? wtf?), the multiple armor thing is a bit much, and the levels are painfully difficult and not really all that fun to play. I'm wondering if I even want to try to play through the whole thing.

I was browsing around Cash Converters as I like to do the other day, and stumbled upon Super Smash Brother Melee for only twenty bucks. Twenty bucks! EBGames sells their used copies for $47.99! Well, even though I was doing a good job of purging the game from my system, I couldn't pass up the deal and bought it. When I got home and started playing it, I noticed that my skillz were sorely lacking (I'm not going to try to push all the blame on using a wireless controller).

I also noticed while playing that the screen wasn't looking all that hot. It was especially noticable on the character select screen. If you know me at all, you know already that I quickly went to eBay to try to find component cables for the Wii. I found something that is (hopefully) even better: a set of component cables that connects to PS2, PS3, Wii, and XBox360. This solves not only my issue of getting the Wii hooked up on component cables, but also my problem of not having any more component hookups on my receiver, which would otherwise have meant that I would have to switch the PS2 and Wii cables depending on which I wanted to play.

Sometimes I have questionable spending habits. I was at Blockbuster earlier today, and bought Suikoden 3 for PS2, even though I don't really have any intention to play it. It was only $15, and I think it's become a rather rare title. I rented it once, and it was a pretty good game, so I figured it was a decent investment. Of course, it's just getting thrown onto an already huge pile of PS2 RPGs that I want to play through (I think I might give one of the Growlansers a playthrough once I get that cable in. Or maybe Final Fantasy 6. Or maybe...).

SPeaking of RPGs, I fired up Guild Wars the other day when I was bored. I did a quick mission to get the feel of the game again, and chatted with some guys who were sitting around. I pumped up the graphics with my new video card, and it looks really nice. However, it didn't get its hooks in me yet. I'm sure one day I'll get an urge to play it and get back into it, but my Wii, my slew of PS2 RPGs, and my board games are on my hot list these days.

I went to Sandy's camp last night with Sheena and Dan. Besides the abundance of mosquitos there, I had a good time. Nothing much to report here, just some sitting around talking. Sheena and Dan insisted I bring Bohnanza (really! not my idea!), and we played a game of that. I came in dead last, but I seem to have gotten another two people interested in that game. Chris also said he really wants to play Catan again this coming Tuesday. I hope other people are willing to play with him, because I think I'd rather try some lighter, faster games with other people. Plus, I should be teaching some new games as well.

Anyways, I think I'm done jabbering on.

Listening to... Pitchshifter - Keep it Clean
Link of the moment... Police Squad - In Color! Great show.

Nothing screams "back in Thunder Bay" like a can of Razz Blast

I loaded up on Safeway Select pop today. It was on sale for $2.50 a pop (here, I cleverly used "a pop" to stand in for "a piece" and also as metonymy by referring to the case of pop as "a pop". I am so clever). Among the six flavours I got was Razz Blast, which is a blue raspberry flavoured concoction that might be described as some to be a sugar orgasm.

Sleep has been very odd since I got home. The first night I got home, I went to bed at 11PM and woke up at 3AM. I think that was a combination of getting up earlier that day for my exam, and sleeping on the way to the airport. I could tell when I woke up that I wouldn't be falling back asleep, so I played some Resident Evil 4 for a while and watched some Beverly Hillbillies until my parents woke up. Then I got some McDonald's breakfast and did some early morning shopping. I guess most of my shopping is out of the way, except for my sister, for whom I have no idea what to get. The local Walmart is open 24 hours through the Christmas, so I think I'll go there some night at 2 in the morning when I have nothing better to do.

I fell asleep no fewer than three times during the day, sometimes for ten minutes, sometimes for an hour, depending on when I was awoken by some distraction. I went to bed last night at about 12:30 and woke up twelve hours later, perhaps due to my lack of 'real' sleep the night before. Tonight, I can't seem to fall asleep, as it's 4AM. 48 hours ago, I was already up for the day. Peculiar, if you ask me. I wonder what time I'll be rolling out of bed, and I wonder what time I'll be falling asleep tomorrow.

Since starting Resident Evil two days ago, I've blown through the first two chapters. I'm on something like 3-2 now, so nearly halfway through the game, I think. If I keep this up, I should be done before Christmas. It's a pain playing in the daytime, because the sun is usually shining on the tv screen, and it makes for a pretty nasty glare.

I played Carcassonne (: The Discovery) with Adam and Sheena last night. They both seemed to enjoy it, and said they'd play again. Adam kicked our asses. I look forward to playing Settlers of Catan, but getting exactly four people to play might be tricky (six would be fine too, but I think four makes for the best game).

Future Shop recently had Battlefield 2 for $20 (Reg $40) and Guild Wars: Nightfall for $40 (reg $50), but I didn't buy either. I'd better not buy any games 'til after Xmas. I played BF2 with Andrew a few days ago, and to be honest it was kinda boring.

I think I'm gonna ask someone to go see a movie perhaps tomorrow. I haven't seen a movie in a while, and Casino Royale might thrill me. There's a particular someone who I may or may not have some chemistry with, and she may or may not be the only single girl I'm friends with in this city. I may or may not make a fool of myself if I put myself out there, and I may or may not care if I do or do not. It's a very dubious situation.

Do you think it's wrong to put the moves on someone without the intention of having any sort of prolonged relationship with them? It seems like the last two times I've made out with a girl, it didn't materialize into anything, and I had no plans for it to do as such. I realize that if you look at my love life in the last two years, I look like much more of a sleaze than I used to. Just getting my jollies with girls without any commitment. Maybe I've turned into a sleaze. Maybe my standards for "realtionship girl" have risen above that of "make-out girl" in the last while. Maybe my libido is just starting to take over. Maybe I've come to the conclusion that starting a relationship with anyone in Waterloo or Thunder Bay is futile anyways. Yes, I think it's a combination of all of those things.

Listening to... Cold - Just Got Wicked (Winamp Radio)
Link of the moment... lolz? Kitties are cute.

Up late thinking about Wii

Time for an exam update! I decided to study for my CS338 (Databases) exam. It paid off, as a lot of the questions on the final dealt with definitions and things I would have otherwise forgotten if I skimmed over them. I spent no time working on iSQL or relational algebra questions, but as I suspected, I was able to do it on-the-fly on the exam. I think I did rather well, but I never like to get my hopes up after exams. I fully expect to get at least an 80 average, but I won't hope for anything more.

I tried to get to sleep early last night so I could get some good sleep for my morning exam. I went to bed at midnight and fell asleep at 5:30. I actively tried to fall asleep until about 2, when I gave up and played Zelda on my GBA until about 3:30, and spent another 2 hours trying to sleep. I'm feeling really drained right now. I think I'm going to try to stay awake all day and just catch up tonight, rather than sleeping in the afternoon or evening.

I've gotta say, I'm putting a fair bit of thought into buying a Wii. I have this odd hankering to play Paper Mario and started thinking about buying a GC when I go home (since I already have stakes in Mario Party 4 and 6 and an extra controller for my roommate's GC), but if I'm going to lay down $120, I might as well get a backwards-compatible Wii for another $200.

I don't really like buying systems at launch. I like to wait until there's a nice padding of games and support. Of course, the Wii will have been out for a while when I get back home in May. I'll have to agree with Paul when he says that the Wii costs a mere pittance in the grand scheme of things (less than half the cost of a PS3!), and I have a lot of money I've been saving up for such a purchase.

I also have a terrible desire to buy a DS, but I doubt I'd buy one, given that I have the SP. There are just as many GBA games I haven't played yet than DS games (though Yoshi's Island 2 alone might be worth it the cost). Argh, the fact that the Wii isn't going to be out for months still is bothering me!

Well, there you go for another boring video-game related post. Oh yeah, my Guild Wars Monk/Necromancer (Crow Aziel) is level 20 (max). Huzzah!

Listening to... Division of Laura Lee - Pretty Electric
Link of the moment... I'm convinced this is THE BEST SNES game.

Whatever happened between you and me?

Jeez, I'm starting to get lapped in terms of blog posts now. It's been one of those "busy weeks followed by apathy" sort of things. Last post I made was talking about my SQL assignment...I've already got that back, and I'm about to hand in the NEXT assignment for that course, so shame on me.

Haha...I keep telling myself I'll proofread my posts before submitting them...I put some pretty godawful mistakes in the last one. "Luch" instead of "Lush", and "phong" instead of "phoning". I'll try to be a bit more careful this time around.

Well, my case study is handed in now. That's what the "busy week" was. I think my entire group was working for the week straight on that thing. I'm proud of the final product, so that means it'll probably get a miserable mark. It's not completely done though; we have a fifteen minute presentation to give on Wednesday. I think for the most part we can wing it since we know the material of our own sections pretty well. I actually had to go buy some clothes for the presentation, cause I don't have any 'business casual' clothes.

I've been watching a lot of movies lately. Let's see how far back I can remember:
-Pirates of the Caribbean (Curse of the Black Pearl, on CBC)
-Saw
-The Ring
-Seven
-Mad Max
-Kung Fu Hustle
-Old School
-Three Amigos

Of those, I'd like to comment on two. Please don't see Mad Max. It's an hour and a half introduction, five minutes of his mission of revenge, and then the credits roll. Terribly paced movie. If you think you want to see Kung Fu Hustle, then I recommend you see Shaolin Soccer instead. If you've already seen Shaolin Soccer, then Kung Fu Hustle likely won't live up to your expectations. It's not bad enough for me to recommend you not seeing it, but it's not as funny as I thought it would have been.

Guild Wars is getting really hard. I'm in the second area of the game, and my party size has increased to six. That just means 1.5x as many enemies to team up on my character and kill him. I'm going to play through the game with my monk character first, and hopefully accumulate items for my other characters to help them out.

Andrew has got me hooked on Smash Brothers Melee lately. Thing is, I suck at it, but it's good times anyways. We've got two characters left to unlock, plus a bunch of stages.

I think I'm going to bring Trigun back from home. I think Andrew would appreciate it; I remember when I got into Firefly, I noticed a similarity between the two, and Andrew likes Firefly, so hopefully he'll like Trigun as well.

Only a week and a half left in the term...then exams. Nearly there! I only have two exams to write as well. Still two CS234 assignments to start and finish, but I don't really have anything else to get in the way of them, so it should be smooth sailing for the rest of the term. I just hope Wednesday's presentation goes well...

Listening to... Trigun - Yellow Alert
Link of the moment... An old Dragonball Z fight video with an awesome song...brings back my childhood

SQLing

Well, I guess that Databases assignment wasn't so bad. I'm not sure all my answers are correct, but they seem as though they should be. Plus, now I can fake my way through Microsoft Access. I guess I can throw that and SQL on my resume now, plus that Euchre database is looking a bit easier to do.

I was going to clean the shit out of this house, but the Dollarama is closed due to Canada Day. I need a mop head, bucket, and a few other small things. I was hoping to get all my chores out of the way today so I didn't have to worry tomorrow. I've got my marking done and now CS338, CS234 can wait until Wednesday and Thursday night, so that means the only thing that should be on my mind for the next three days is my individual section of the case study.

I've already clocked well over 10 hours on Guild Wars in the last few days. I finally got one (actually two) of my characters into what is referred to as "Post-Searing", where the map is drastically changed from what it was in Pre-Searing. It used to be nice and luch, which I really like in games, but now it's more of a wasteland. The game is much harder after this point; you really can't play by yourself. I joined some random guild, but still used the AI-controlled party to do my quests since not many of the members were online or responding.

I went bowling last night with the mathsoc people. By mathsoc people, I mean the guy who organized it, and two of his friends. I felt a bit out of place, but I got four free games of five pin. Lino had some righteous BO. I think it got on my clothes.

I'm debating phong Nicole or not. I have no one else to hang out with, but I'm not sure if I'd rather play NES with her (which includes 2 hours total drive time) or stay in and play more GW.

On a parting note, are you ever gonna get your blog back up Paul? How else will I hear about Spiderman 3 news with personal commentary?

Listening to... Bedouin Soundclash - Eloween Deowen
Link of the moment... God, I need better ideas for links

Time to lose myself in Guild Wars

People not in town this weekend:
Hugh
Andrew
John
Julie
Nathalie
Laura

People I'm left with:
...Sivji?

This weekend should be an interesting test of my mental state. I have a feeling that by the end of it I will have lost a bit of my sanity. I'd even consider going home if it weren't for my fear of all this work I have. It's not much work, but I'm certain it will be slow progress.

I planned to buy Guild Wars tonight, but I decided not to. I bought it Tuesday night instead. I think it's a bit slow going at the moment, much like any other MMORPG. I think once I get a good handle on the controls and abilities, and once I find a few people to party up with, it will be a bit more interesting.

Well, I think I'll play a bit of that now.

Listening to... Alkaline Trio - Sleepyhead
Link of the moment... Just gotta make sure I find the right Guild

This is my main offender

Hm, how to sum up last weekend's wedding...I went to the casino and won $170, had cheesecake three days in a row, enjoyed seeing some family, and was breathtaken by the Detroit skyline at night.

I bought Fluxx a while ago. Fun game, but I think it's getting borderline stale already.

I've been putting off this comparison assignment for a while now. After getting back my 60% process paper, I feel like anything I hand in to Paci won't ever be good enough, so what's the point in trying?

I finally bought my PS2 the other day. I could justify it without it being on sale because of my casino winnings and a Future Shop gift card from my sister for my birthday. I've finally got it tricked out to play burned games really easily, but it took a lot more effort than it should have. The kit I got was subpar. The instructions online were just plain wrong. I replaced one of the pieces with a self-moulded twist tie. I'm convinced I could have done the entire thing with just twist ties. I also had to glue one piece in for it to stay in the spot in which it needed to stay, so my console is permanently modded. So much for the warranty; I certainly hope it lasts the year. On the bright side, it works marvelously. It's much quieter than my old black box.

All weekend, I've had this terribly powerful urge to play Guild Wars. I think once I get my assignment in on Wednesday, I'll go buy it. It's been a while since I treated myself to a new PC game. I'm sure it'll be slightly boring without anyone with which to play it. I'm trying to convince Andrew it's in his best interest to buy it, but $60 takes a lot more convincing than what I've been doing. I suppose eventually I'll get caught up in some guild online or something. Hopefully there's some guild of casual players...I hate jackasses that yell at you for not using the "best" builds or not being able to hotkey like a madman.

I downloaded the new Three Days Grace and Hoobastank albums. They're both pretty good, but it will still take some time for them to grow on me. I'm debating whether or not I should buy one or both of the two Chore albums I can't find any other way. I probably will eventually, but I think I've spent more than enough money on myself lately (at least, I will once I get Guild Wars later this week).

Well, I'm going to make some pancakes for the roommies. Aren't I such a generous person? I think so...

Listening to... Eyelid - Invention of Hope
Link of the moment... Nothing is ever as easy as it looks.