Two more games off the list

Well, I just finished Disgaea. I've been playing like a madman to get it done before any work comes my way. I logged 36 hours of playtime. It got very difficult passed a certain point, and I had to spend a good 4-5 hours leveling just to make it past the last few levels. A big problem I've got with that game is that the only way to get experience points is to kill enemies, and the ones getting the most kills are the ones that are already high-leveled.

Adam and I also finished X-Men Legends 2. That game, on the other hand, got easier as we approached the end of the game. If you stick with the same four characters through the whole game, you tend to gain more levels than you need. Nevertheless, the experience was enjoyable, and we were always looking forward to smashing the heck out of some baddies.

I've managed to cross 9 games off of my "list of games I want to play", though I only actually played 4 through to the end. Another 4 were just too uninteresting for me to justify playing (after all, that's what games are supposed to be for, right?) (Fallout, Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Sim City 4, and Lego Star Wars), and one got crossed off because I realized my PC just isn't powerful enough to play at a decent graphics level (Elder Scrolls 4).

Judging from my previous term, I suspect that I won't really have much time to play video games until the summer. My grad seminar course should be about equally hard as last term, and I suspect my reading course (group theory) will be slightly more work than last term (ring theory). Adam wants me to take a third course this term, but I'm hesitant, based on the fact that I found last term to be a lot of work, and I usually find the winter term to be a bit more grueling than the fall. The only other courses I'm aware of that I could take this term include a course in PDEs (which I am not fond of), and "mathematical models in quantum mechanics", which, again, is not in my area of interest. Regardless, I'm going to sit in on the latter tomorrow afternoon. Of course, no matter how much work I have this term, I'm going to take plenty of time to play some Smash Bros when it comes out on February 10th (should I preorder it somewhere, or just hope to find a copy in-store?).

Update: Before I even finished this post, I found out that SSBB has been delayed until March 9th. Stop teasing me, Nintendo!

Listening to... Amber Pacific - Always You
Link of the moment... Funny pics thread over at BGG

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)

Did you think I was dead?

Hey, look at that. I *didn't* forget how to put up a post in my blog. It's been so long I figured I'd have lost the knowledge. I'm quite surprised myself that I would be on a 2 month hiatus from posting. I guess I don't really have much of an excuse, either, though most of my November was spent on schoolwork. Most of my December has been spent on sloth. Ever since I handed in my takehome exam for algebra, I've just been doing as little as possible.

Hm, now which events from the last two months should I discuss? I went on my trip to Waterloo a few weeks ago, and that was fun. I stayed with Andrew the first few days, and Hugh for the last leg of the trip. We had a four hour game of Cities and Knights of Catan that was rife with inaccurate rules since Andrew had never read the rules in any great detail.

I had that party that I mentioned in the last post, and it went off without a hitch. Lots of people showed up, everyone had a great time, and it didn't take much effort to clean up the next day. I'll be sure to do it again sometime next term.

Hey, here's some big news: I've started drinking! Not as a hobby, or anything, but I don't refuse to drink anymore. I realized a while ago that I didn't really have a good reason to *not* drink, but I felt like I needed an occasion to start. I didn't want my first drink to be anticlimactic. I decided that Phil being in town was a good enough reason to celebrate. Since then, though, I've decided I don't really like the taste of alcohol, and the last few times I've had drinks it's made me pretty queasy, so at least now I have an excuse if someone offers me a libation. Plus on top of that, I'm still a cheapskate, so I'm not willing to buy my own booze often. At the moment, Adam keeps making new and disgusting drinks with what I have sitting in my bar. The only thing that I've enjoyed so far is the Amaretto Sour.

Phil is back in town again (yes, he's visited *twice* since the last time I made a post), and he and Adam are more or less living out of my house. We've been playing lots of Power Grid and Nexus Ops, some Guitar Hero, and we started playing X-Men Legends (very fun multiplayer game). I've been staying up til 5 or 6 the last few nights; I haven't seen much sunlight lately. At least I'll be well seasoned for New Year's Eve.

I didn't get anything extremely noteworthy for Christmas besides a Bohnanza expansion (from Sheena and Dan), and Super Paper Mario and Metroid Prime 3 for Wii. I was sort of hoping to get Super Mario Galaxy, but it'll still be waiting for me once I play the two games I got.

I attended a games afternoon the other day at the game store with Doug, a guy I met via BGG. I invited all of my friends to come, but none came. I'm willing to bet that Sheena and Dan would have, if they were in town. Regardless, I had fun. We played Incan Gold, Citadels, Bang (twice), and Munchkin. I'm not really a huge fan of any of those games, but I wasn't about to bitch and whine about it since it wasn't really my event. I sent an email inviting all of them to come to my games nights. I'm anticipating a pretty nice turnout to my games nights, but of course I've said that in the past only to have the usual 5 or 6 show up. If all goes well, Doug and his friends will come, and up to 6 people from my classes will start coming out as well. Hopefully Dan's two brothers will start coming as well. If I could get enough for two tables on a regular basis, that would probably be ideal.

Well, that's as much as I'm willing to write about at the moment, so I'll end it around here. I make no promises about when another post will show up, but hopefully I can get back into the habit of making a public journal of events in my life that next to no one cares about.

Listening to... Foo Fighters - Come Back
Link of the moment... Please do yourself a favour and watch all of these game reviews. HILARIOUS!

OMG! Where are the RSVPs?

I thought that by now, my workload would have lightened up, but it really isn't. Due to my excess of presentations in the last few weeks, I had to put some stuff off, and now I have to spend all my time catching up. Plus, I'll have to work ahead this week so that I won't have any work when PHIL SHOWS UP!

Yeah that's right, Phil is hitting town from November 4-8, a Sunday through to Thursday. That's almost better for me than if he were here on the weekend, because I need the weekend to get any work done (I usually don't get my marking until Friday afternoons). Of course, I'll have some classes to deal with, but that's only a few hours out of each day. I really hope Adam's in town next week, otherwise he'll miss Phil and that would be a shame.

I don't know what I'll do when Phil is here, but whatever we wind up doing, it will be a blast. I have a feeling there's going to be a lot of video games, something I'm looking forward to. I'll have to teach him the ropes in Guitar Hero and Smash Bros so that I have a sparring partner. Haha, I'll make him practice while I'm in classes so that he can kick my ass like he does in every game.

I sent out e-invites to my party on the 9th. I haven't been able to get it out of my mind for the last few days; I just can't wait! As a break from my own work, I whipped up song lists for all the guitar hero games and all the singstar games, so that people who are waiting for their turn can anticipate what song they're going to perform. Aren't I thoughtful?

I invited just about everyone I can think of that would be interested, including a few people I only barely know from one of my classes. In addition, I've told most of the people I invited to invite anyone that THEY think would want to come. I figure that way, even if half the people don't show up, I'll still have a big crowd.

I've been thinking that it would be nice to visit Waterloo this December when I have no work to do, and while most of my friends are still in the city. The catch is that I have nowhere to stay. I stayed with Andrew in the summer, but he's not so confident in his roommate this term and doesn't want to impose. I certainly couldn't stay with John, because he's staying with Julie and I doubt they could fit another freeloader! I suppose I might be able to stay with Hugh if I asked, but then I'd feel stranded way over in Kitchener, and at John's mercy when I want to go anywhere. I wonder if Hugh still reads my blog...

I guess I've lost touch with some other people too. I haven't talked to Katie in a while, nor Caroline, and I haven't heard hide nor hair from Nathalie in a dog's age (although I think the ball is currently in my court in terms of correspondence). I guess my opinion is always that my life is so uninteresting that if I were to call anyone, I'd have nothing of any real interest to say.

Let's see what I need to do tomorrow. I'm meeting my adviser at 10:30 for some help with my algebra assignment, and then I'm going to lock myself up in the library with the measure theory text until I finish the problem I'll be presenting on Tuesday. After that I guess I'll need to get some lunch. Then I'll probably have to work on my algebra assignments until Adam's colloquium at 4PM. Then I'll have to get some shopping done (I'm out of juice and I want to buy Guitar Hero 3 soon). Then Prison Break with Grant and Chanel around 7 or 8 until about 10. Hm, I'm cutting it pretty close with everything tomorrow, especially considering I'm having issues with my measure theory assignment. Well, I guess my algebra doesn't have to take priority, so at least I can put that off if need be.

Listening to... Iron Maiden - The Prophecy
Link of the moment... OH SNAP I'm going to pwn this song

"The goal is to win, but it is the goal that is important, not the winning."

MAKE IT STOP! Goodness gracious, I've been overloaded with work for quite a bit longer than I'd prefer. See, I do an average of five hours per week of TA duties in two different courses, but last weekend (that is to say, about a week and a half ago), I got stuck with nearly 20 hours of marking to do (though this *in theory* means that I'll have less work to do in these courses later in the term). As a result, I had to get an extension on an assignment, and everything got thrown off kilter (it doesn't help that I had only a week to prepare my second lecture for my seminar course). Since then, I've been logging exactly how many hours I put into marking so that I don't work any more than I'm supposed to.

I got together with Chris (a fourth year undergrad in two of my courses) to work on an assignment that is due tomorrow morning (the one we got an extension on), and we made little to no progress in the two hours we worked on it. On top of that, I have the regularly scheduled assignment due on Wednesday that I have only barely started working on. Oh, right, and then I've got that lecture to give on Thursday afternoon that's not done yet.

Mind you, I have had my fair share of distractions this weekend. I had Thanksgiving dinner, of course, and after that I played my second game of Power Grid with Dan, Sheena, and Trevor again. Sheena pulled off a fairly decisive win this time, and I was left once again not really knowing what I did to lose. Also, Sheena had some people over to her place for some Singstar (as two new song collections have come out recently). I got a hold of Holly, and she came with me. She knew the words to lots of the songs, which I suppose is a side effect of working at the radio station.

I've got some plans to have a party at my house at the beginning of next month. My plan is to drag another TV downstairs, and have multiple games going on: Singstar in one room, Guitar Hero in another (GH3 is released at the end of October), and Wii Sports somewhere in between. If I can find another TV and convince Grant to let me borrow his Gamecube, then I can even have some GC games going on as well (SSBM, Mario Party, etc). Someone pointed out that it would be like those "fun days" in elementary school where you get the day off to play different games set up at different stations. I'm quite looking forward to it, so hopefully there won't be too many conflicts with the date I choose.

Listening to... Muse - Knights of Cydonia
Link of the moment... Feel free to peruse the lecture notes I've prepared for my lectures.

"Boom shaka laka!"

First, I'm going to list as many commentator quotes from NBA Jam that I can remember off the top of my head:

Boom shaka laka!
The nail in the coffin!
Is it the shoes?
From downtown!
Can't buy a bucket!

If you can remember any yourself, please remind me of the wonderful literary artistry from that game.

Well, I'm sorry to say, but I gave up on Super Mario Sunshine. I got to a point where there were three or four levels that were just TOO frustrating to complete. Yeah, that's right, I gave up on a kiddie game. Hugh, if you're reading this then I know that you're the most disappointed in me, but that's just the way it is.

I started up Tales of Symphonia for GC, and I've put some serious time into it already. It's a pretty good game and not too difficult, though some of the bosses can hand my ass to me in a flash. It's supposedly a 50+ hour game, so it's gonna be a long journey.

I've spent quite a bit of money on eBay lately. I got a MIDI to USB converter for my mom's new Mac to replace the old sound-card dependent one. I won Wind Waker for $18, a DVD boxset of Mission Hill for $30 (I was reminded of it when looking at the Filmography of the voice actor for the main character in ToS who also is the voice of Kevin French in Mission Hill (and Robin in Teen Titans)), and a 36-booster box of Harry Potter CCG cards for $20 (the best deal I could find).

In an effort to clean up the crawl space/storage room, my dad bought 6 heavy-duty shelves. Of course, I wound up assembling them, but I guess I have to earn my keep somehow. At least now I can feel like I did *something* productive this summer. They were a bitch to assemble, but they certainly will help in organizing all of our shit. Once we get rid of our old entertainment center (my brother is going to take it) and our old couches, there will be a lot of free room. I think I'll move my gaming tables in there to be set up permanently.

I realized that since we got the HDTV, I hadn't yet tried setting up a computer to the PC input. I have an old 900MHz Compaq running XP that doesn't really do anything besides get played on by Adam (who now has a job and doesn't come over as often as he used to), so I set it up to the TV. I haven't really done much with it yet, but I've fiddled around with all my emulators and set them up to the right resolution. Along with my PS2 to USB dongle (hehe, dongle), it's a nice little gaming machine now. Unfortunately, it's not powerful enough to run Project64 without slowdown, but everything 16 bit and lower runs fine. I haven't yet checked ePSXe, but I have a modded PS2 so emulating PS games is not a high priority.

Well I guess there's only a month left of summer. I suppose that soon I'll have to get together with my academic advisor to figure out what courses I'll need to take. Fun. Last night I was thinking about how I don't really like dealing with Fibonacci numbers. Maybe if I'm bored I'll try to figure out if there are infinitely many Fibonacci numbers that are prime, or infinitely many Fibonacci numbers that are square. Or maybe I'll play video games. I'm not sure.

Listening to... No Use For A Name - Fields of Agony
Link of the moment... Does this blog have the Buddha nature, Master?

Let's see a BIG turnout next Thursday!

Games night has been rescheduled from Tuesday nights to Thursday nights starting next week (due to Tuesday being cheap night at the local movie theater). Last Tuesday wasn't much of a games night anyways. Chris brought Mario Party 8 as he had just rented it, so a four player game of MP8 ensued (unfortunately leaving multiple people to sit and watch, something I hate doing). After that was over, Dan broke out Singstar for PS2, much to Grant's zeal. The rest of the night was nothing but loud karaoke in my basement (though I did manage to fit in a game of Hive with Adam (I finally won!) and an unfinished game of Balderdash that was quite hard to converse over).

This was quite a shame, since I really had a hankering to play Vegas Showdown which I picked up (along with Nexus Ops) at the border earlier that day. I tried to get a game tonight with the neighbours, but once again my plans fell through as they had unexpected visitors. I swear, I shouldn't even attempt to plan anything anymore, since the universe likes to spite my plans.

My mom's Mac came in the other day (did I mention she got a Mac? Cause she did). I'm in the process of migrating her files to it and organizing them in some fashion (14GB to sort through!). I already threw boot camp on it and installed XP on a partition (for all those files that I unfortunately cannot transfer over to a comparable Mac program). It's really not fun to try to sort through other peoples' messes, so I might just tell my mom to sort it out on her own time.

Super Mario Sunshine is shit. I don't like it, but dammit I'm going to beat it. I have a bad habit of being unable to control Mario while jumping, which leads to MANY frustrating attempts at the same parts of levels. Sometimes he'll want to do a wall jump when I don't want him to, or he won't when I do. Sometimes if I want to turn around and do a small hop, he'll do a crazy backflip into the endless abyss. I've never wanted to bring pain upon Mario as much as I do now.

Well, Traveler is over. Only 8 episodes long. It's a pretty good show, and it's a shame that it's not going to be renewed for a second season (especially since there are DOZENS of loose ends that I won't get to see resolved now). Chanel and I have decided that we're going to start watching Prison Break season 1 (my mom has the boxset) on Wednesday nights since Traveler is over.

Listening to... Opeth - Deliverance
Link of the moment... Quite humourous. Watch it.

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.

Hit the peg! Hit the peg!

Argh, thanks for waking me up, truck outside. Curse you!

I feel like I've been quarantined in my house lately. I can't seem to find anyone to hang out with. No one is phoning me, and anyone I phone is busy or not answering their phone. It was a pretty boring weekend; I just watched some movies on the movie networks.

Spiderman 3 spoilers
I watched Spiderman 3 on Friday, at a matinee. The theatre was only about half full. I don't want to give a full on review (I'm not a movie buff, so anything I say would just be coming from someone who doesn't know shit about production values and such), but I do want to say that I'm unimpressed with the way venom turned out. Topher Grace is not the right casting choice! They didn't put enough effort into building up Eddie Brock's hatred for Spiderman and Peter Parker. We saw Eddie lose his job, and have his camera broken, and even have his "girlfriend" stolen, but I never got the impression that it was all adding up and making him go mad.

On top of that, I didn't like how after Eddie supposedly reached his breaking point, he's still making wisecracks to Spiderman. I like how Scott Dewitt says that "Venom was the same dork as Eric from That 70's Show. Venom. Not the guy that turns into Venom. Venom himself is a dork". Venom and Eddie Brock really are two different characters, and there wasn't enough in the movie to get that point across. One thing I really missed not seeing as well was Venom calling himself "we", to show that the symbiote is a part of him, and not just something to enhance his powers. But enough of that.
END Spiderman 3 spoilers

I'm QUITE excited about my games night tomorrow night. I've had this fascination with werewolf ever since I had the idea of playing it. I've put a fair amount of effort into considering which roles to use, and how to handle voting in the day phase. I've whipped up some reference sheets for the roles and their powers, set aside some playing cards to assign roles to players, and even scrounged up some poker chips in hopes that the assist in the voting process. Now, all I've got to do is wait to actually play the game!

I picked up the Megaman X collection for Gamecube, as previously mentioned. So far I've blown through the first game, and I'm starting on the second. Even with all my heart tanks and four full energy tanks, the final boss took me countless attempts. Most of the time, I wouldn't be watching my health bar and found myself dead before I could use an energy tank. If memory serves correctly, X2 is just as hard, if not harder if I try to get the good ending by defeating three extra bosses.

I've been thinking of building my own poker table, using one of these designs. My old one is sort of in shambles, and if my weekly games nights actually pan out, having a nice table would go a long way. I've never been that good at that sort of stuff though. Even when I just changed the fabric on the old table, it came out in worse whape than when I started. I think I'm just too impatient. If I throw actual carpentry on top of that, I'm sure the end product won't turn out as it looks in my dreams. Still, I think stuff like that can be fun, and it's nice to have something that you built with your own two hands and can be proud of. I think I'll just mull over it some more.

Listening to... Death By Stereo - These are a Few of my Favorite Things
Link of the moment... They make it look so easy!

My computer's veins once again course with electricity

Yeah, I'm back home. Of course, I have oodles of info to burn through, but not much of it is fresh on my mind.

The trip home was pretty excruciating. I couldn't sleep very well the night before, since I was sleeping on the couch. We got up at 7 and were on the road at about 7:30. Things were going fine until just after the border. We took the wrong highway and started heading towards Detroit. It's a simple mistake to make, trust me. That detour set us back what must have been a little over an hour. Driving was pretty quick through Michigan though, aside from some rain that slowed us down.

A late dinner got us leaving Sault Ste. Marie at about 6PM, much later than we should have been. The real problems arose when it started getting dark out. After passing through Wawa, we saw a lot of moose, and if you hit a moose on the highway, it has a better chance of surviving than you do. So, the rest of the night, we had to drive pretty slowly and at full attention to avoid impending death. We had some issues with gas, too, as we had a really hard time finding a gas station open at night. We rolled into my driveway at about 1:45, making it an 18 hour trip.

I hope that we made Hugh's trip a memorable one. It certainly was fun having him around. We hit up Kakabeka, and he even went up Mt. McKay. We went to Scuttlebutt's and the Brown Street Station (where I met up with Sheena and Veebs, among others). And, of course, some general hang outage.

I've had this real nasty cough for about a week. It's hard to describe, but it's the kind of cough where when you cough, you don't feel any better and so you have to keep coughing. It's been keeping me up at nights and waking me up at all hours. I really can't wait to get rid of it so I can do some real relaxing. I bought a big jug of orange juice, so maybe that will expedite the process.

I bought a Wii! It's given me some good times. Wii Sports is still amazing, but I'm still waiting for some decent games to come my way. I think once some copies of Super Paper Mario hit eBay, I'll scoop one up. Of all the Miis that are populating my system at the moment, Hugh's is most true to reality, while my own is probably in second. Beyond those, I can't seem to make anyone else look that good.

Well, I'm getting tired. Time for point form updates!
-I bought a Wavebird from Cash Converters today
-Apples to Apples went over well with my friends, once again
-I'm going to buy Megaman X Collection tomorrow
-I got a blister from rocking out on my drums; I sounded pretty good
-I'm going to host a games night next Tuesday; I'm hoping to get enough people for a good game of Werewolf
-Heroes on Monday was awesome
-I'm going to see Spiderman 3 this Friday
-I've still got lots of cleaning and sorting to do

Listening to... Orgy - Social Enemies
Link of the moment... Oh, Sam Raimi, is there anything you can't do?

Sonic...he's the fastest thing alive!

Well, I've got one exam out of the way and another two to polish off my degree. I was most worried about the Network Design exam, but the exam went very well. I didn't ace it, but I most certainly passed it; I might even be in the 80-90 range depending on how he marks it. Of course, I only care about passing at this point, since I have no hopes of making the Dean's list. As a result, I'm not taking studying seriously at all. I've studied maybe a total of one or two hours for tomorrow's Cryptography exam since I think I know enough of the material to just wing it and pass. I won't know a lot of the definitions and more obscure things, but I can't think of an overly compelling reason to study for it. I think I might light a candle under my ass for Network Flow since I neglected the second half of the course, and I really don't even understand any of the algorithms or theory that we did. Well, we'll see what happens when Monday evening rolls around.

I beat Sonic 2 today, with John's help on some bosses. I have metal sonic down to a science now; I can beat him in about ten or fifteen seconds. I tried to beat the original Sonic yesterday, but I didn't have any continues and lost all my lives on one of the later stages. One day...one day I'll beat it.

I think I'm going to go through the US to get home, rather than going up through Sudbury. So long as I don't get held up at the border, it will shave nearly two hours off of my travel time. I've just got to make sure I have some US currency for food, gas, and tolls.

J&J still doesn't have Memoir '44 in stock, but they said they would likely get a shipment on Tuesday. I'll phone after my exam on Wednesday, and if they actually do have it in stock for a change, I'll pick it up as a personal graduation gift. At least then I won't have to worry about playing it when I should be studying.

Well, I've only got a little over a week left in Waterloo. I hope I can do something worthwhile in that week. I'm realy worried about becoming one of those people who just stays in Thunder Bay their whole life. I guess there's nothing wrong with that, but I just feel so secluded there. There's so much to do *outside* of Thunder Bay.

Listening to... In Flames - Dial 595-ESCAPE
Link of the moment... They need to bring back the old TV shows.

Done undergrad classes! FOREVER!

Well, classes are over. Like, for good. That is, undergrad classes. I suppose I'll still be taking courses at Lakehead for a grad degree, but those don't count. Now I've just got to burn through three exams, and I'll have a Bachelor's degree under my belt!

So far, I've just been relaxing since classes have finished. I've been sitting my poor ass on the couch, playing a lot of video games (ah, the good life). I started up Metroid Prime the other day. I usually frown on sci-fi themed games, but this game is really good. I still have issues with aiming through the shoulder buttons, but I can certainly see why the game is as highly rated as it is. I think the best thing about this game is that there is no stupid mascot character that rides on your shoulder constantly telling you what to do (looking at you, Legend of Zelda). If you ever do get stuck on something, you can scan items in the room for information, and you'll occasionally get intel through your visor about anomolies in the environment so that you always have somewhere to go, and the map makes it really easy to know how to get there.

I seem to be hanging out a lot with Katie and Jordan. They came over on Monday night after a grocery trip. We played some Super Jeopardy (on the NES emulator) and then played 25 words or less with the roommies and Julie. It's a pretty decent game, but I think some house rules are needed, as some of the rules are a bit ambiguous.

Last night, I went out to East Side Mario's with Katie, Jordan, Andrew, and Sean. I had some pretty good bowtie pasta (I would have gotten more, but everyone else was done their meals by the time I got a friggen refill on my iced tea). After that, we played a game of Catan (Jordan and Katie were on a team). It was a pretty good game, aside from some overly long turns. Catan is such a great game, just because trading with other players is such a big part.

I've already got well over a hundred dollars worth of games that I'm considering purchasing. If I buy them before I leave, I save myself some shipping and handling, but I don't want to try to fit any more boxes in my car for the drive home. Even though I don't play games much now, I can justify it since I expect to be playing games regularly with my friends back home (boy, I hope I get a good following back home, or else I'm gonna have a shitload of board games and no one to play them with).

I think I'm gonna make the trip back home around the 24th or 25th. Even though I'll be done on the 18th, I think I should stick around since I won't be seeing a lot of people for quite some time after I leave. It takes about 8 hours to get to Sault Ste. Marie from here, and about another 8 from the Sault to Thunder Bay. Since there aren't any sizable cities between the latter two, I'll probably split the trip up over two days in that way. I guess that means I don't have to get up early for the first day! I've also had the brilliant idea of loading up my Zen with podcasts to listen to on the ride home. Most of my music is kind of stale, so some good talk radio might be the ticket to keep me entertained on the road. I think I'll download a few episodes of the Dice Tower. Does anyone have any other suggestions (Paul, I'm looking at you)?

Listening to... Trapt - Still Frame
Link of the moment... I sort of like this show. Too bad there's no online audio-only supplement for it.

My Falco is awesome! (Smash tourny recap)

Note: This entire post is just a summary of the tournament I played last night. I will probably hae another, more varied post up soon.

So, I played in a team smash tournament last night. It was awesome! The organization was a bit chaotic, but things went pretty well. It was Swiss style, triple elimination, so that once you lose three matches, you are eliminated. We started off playing only three stock (I'm used to five stock) since there were a disgusting 48 teams that played (that's 96 people!), including my Falco and Andrew's Samus.

Andrew convinced me to bring my own controller, and I'm glad I did, because when I was warming up on one console, the joystick was pretty shitty and as a result I made a lot of mistakes. Our first matchup was against a Shiek/Marth combo on Jungle Japes. I lost my first life quickly due to the level, which got me worried. Right when I came back, though, I spiked both opponents off the stage. After some battling, I found myself dead, leaving Andrew with the two opponents, everyone on their last life. He pulled out the win after he KO'd Marth, and Shiek made a suicidal mistake, putting us at a 1-0 record.

Our second match was against Dr. Mario and Falco, on Kongo Jungle. Andrew and I didn't play very well. I made a few big errors, one of which cost me a life. This match put us in the middle half of all competitors, a 1-1 record.

Our third match was again on Jungle Japes (previously one of my most hated levels, but now one of my best), this time against a Fox/Samus combo. They both started the match guns blazing, but it didn't take long for Andrew and I (team BRDO) to disarm them. Samus made some good use of the fully charged blast; I reflected a few of these, which Fox almost reflected back to me. Fox fell victim to the fate of most Foxes; his aggressive play got him killed pretty quickly. After that, it didn't take long for us to take down Samus. This win was due to some pretty good team tactics on our part. This put us at 2-1. Due to the tournament structure, 1/8 of the teams were eliminated.

Our fourth match was against another Fox/Samus team on Pokemon stadium. This is usually one of Andrew's best levels, so I had high hopes. I shined the Samus out of the air for a KO once, a feat I'm proud of. Fox and I were playing mind games for a while, often with him coming out on top. I was suprised to hear Andrew ask if he could steal a life (meaning I still had two lives after he lost all his three). His Samus usually lasts a lot longer than my Falco due to his great recovery. He got a few bad recoveries leading to suicides, which gave our opponents enough of an advantage to beat us. Our 2-2 record meant that our next match could be our last.

Our fifth match was against Pikachu and Shiek on Fourside. Andrew and I rarely play Fourside, but it turned out to be great for his recovery and even greater for my spiking. The pikachu spammed his lightning bolt, which I fell victim for repeatedly. We successfully spammed our projectiles for a while, locking down the opponents, until I decided to go show them the bottom side of my boots. After some shine-aerial combos, some spikes, and even some impressive shine-spike combos, we had a two-on-one against Shiek, with plenty of lives to spare. This was probably our most decisive victory, giving us at least one more match to play.

Our sixth match was on Princess Peach's castle (bad for Andrew and I) against Marth and Fox. Again, some impressive combos and spikes helped me along the way. At one point, I thought I had lost my last life, but found that I still had one left. Shortly after that, Andrew was knocked out, leaving me with a 2-on-1. They both had 50%+ damange, and I had none. Of course, I thought I was terribly screwed. I played some mind games, and tried to separate the opponents. I knocked Marth out with a well placed b-air. I noticed all match long that Fox had a bad habit of coming in with an aerial, so I punished him with a shield-grab. A few of those, and another b-air sent him reeling, securing another victory for team BRDO.

At this point, 31 of the 48 teams had been eliminated. Our next match was on Corneria (which I mistook as a blessing). We were up against Dr. Mario and Luigi, the latter being controlled by the famed GOD?, who placed second with Luigi in the singles tournament. I made a few poorly timed mistakes. My real undoing came when Dr. Mario caped my recovery when I was at a low percentage, wasting a life. Had I sweetspotted the edge, we might have stood a chance, but once I was gone, Andrew was left to take out a total of four lives from the two players, a difficult task for any player. Thus, our tournament life was extinguished with a 4-3 record for the night, putting us somewhere in the top 17 teams.

The tournament was really fun, and even exhilerating. The feeling of winning a match that ended with me facing off alone against both opponents was great. Though we didn't win anything, I think that placing as high as we did is a pretty good result for our first tournament. I'm sure that with more practice against humans, we could fix our mistakes and do even better. Unfortunately, this is my last term, so I won't be attending anymore tournaments.

Listening to... Division of Laura Lee - I Guess I'm Healed
Link of the moment... I hope they're able to post detailed results, and some videos of the top teams.

Que sera, sera

I feel like I'm not entirely content with my life as of late. I feel like I need a clean slate, a fresh start. I recently got my offer of admission from LU, and I'm torn between sending it off with my deposit and ripping it up in an act of defiance. I'm getting entirely sick of math, and school in general. Well, hopefully life gets better after an undergrad.

I don't think I've really done a stitch of work lately. I haven't had an assignment due in a while; I have one due on Monday, but I think I might just not submit it again (it's only 2%). I wrote my (makeup) midterm for CO453. I think I passed it, but then again, that's what I said about the first one. Hopefully, I'll at least get more than 35% on this one. As for that crypto midterm? 98%.

Well, at least I seem to be involved with more stuff lately. Tomorrow, Andrew and I will play in a euchre tournament at St. Jerome's. On Tuesday, we're skipping euchre to play in a Smash Bros. team tournament (hopefully this will also knock me out of my #1 ranking so I don't have to wind up buying a prize for myself). On last Wednesday, I went out for Nathalie's birthday. We went to some Vietnamese/Thai place. The food was ok, but nothing to scream about. For a few days there, I was eating very poorly. I had a meal at midnight the night before, then the dinner that I got that night lasted me two small meals for the rest of the day. The next day, I had a pizza pop around 4 PM and a small frozen dinner later that night. Now that we've gone to Sobey's, I've got more food in the house.

After the dinner at Nathalie's, we went back to her apartment. I won a match of Wii Tennis, and had a terrible try at Wii bowling because I randomly picked a left-handed player (as a result, every shot had massive amounts of spin in it). We also played a game she got as a gift called Loaded Questions. One player asks a question from a card, everyone else answers, the person to the right of the player reads them all, and the player has to guess which player picked which answer. Since there were six of us playing, things dragged on a little late (six players gives the player a 1/120 chance of guessing correctly, five players gives a 1/24 chance). Overall, a good time was had.

I had high hopes of getting some good sleep tonight, but again my nightly sleep cycle turned into an hour and a half nap.

I really hope I'm drawing near the end of Shadow Hearts. My characters are Lvl40, and I think the cap is Lvl50. It's a decent game and all, but things are getting a bit repetitive. Battles all seem to follow the same pattern. I hope you'll also notice the completion of Megamans three through 5; John and I are just before the Wily stages in 6.

My dog, Skipper, died the other day. My sister is really broken up about it (as well I would expect her to be), and my mom was getting choked up on the phone too. Me? Eh, I guess I'm pretty unaffected. He was a good dog, and he'll be missed around the household, but I'm not going to shed any tears for him.

Listening to... Hatebreed - Tear it Down
Link of the moment... Mike Joooooooones.....HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW

I am not economically viable

Well, things have taken a slightly interesting turn lately. Ever since Katie and I have started hanging out more regularly, I've been thinking of her in a different light. I asked her out the other week, and she responded favourably. We went doubles with John and Julie, to the bowling alley and Kelsey's. After that, we watched Falling Down and Hostage here. I won't go into details, but I will say that the date was very fun but not necessarily encouraging. I've been convinced by third parties to not worry too much about it and stop putting unnecessary thought into it. We'll see how things progress.

John and I beat Megaman 4 the other day, and we're done the first eight bosses on Megaman 5. He usually lets me do the bosses, which I seem to have a knack for. I've set a personal goal of beating as many of the megamans as I can without using cheats. Of course, who has the time for video games these days?

300 was a decent enough movie. I think I wasn't really in the mood for it though. I was pretty tired when we left, and it took all my willpower not to fall asleep at the wheel on the way to Mississauga. I didn't notice any difference at all between the IMAX screen and a regular screen. The movie was good, but I think there were still a few cliche-ish parts. I guess overall I'd give it a recommendation.

This week's Network Design assignment was considerable easier than previous ones, but there are still some questions that I couldn't get done. I didn't finish nor even start my Network Flow assignment. Again, it's only two measly percent, so I don't care too much. I didn't have much time this weekend, due to the movie and the date. I suppose in theory I could have worked on assignments rather than playing megaman games, but where's the fun in that?

I got a conditional acceptance to LU. I don't know what it's conditional on, it says more detail can be found in my offer of admission. I guess I'll go; I'm not overly excited to do more learning, but I can't really think of anything better to do. It won't hurt me to take 1-2 years to get a post-grad degree.

Happy early birthday to Nathalie! Her birthday is this Tuesday (I think), and I'm going to her birthday dinner this Wednesday. I think I have an idea of what to get her, too. Of course, I couldn't possibly say what it is here, or it won't be a surprise! I just hope I can find one easily.

I wish I was sleeping right now. I tried going to bed pretty early, and I would have been successful, had my roommates been a bit more considerate. I could distinctly hear all three of their voices upstairs. Sure, I could have asked them to keep it down, but by the time I was awakened, the damage had been done. Well, it looks like another instance where I sleep for two hours one night, and 12 the next. It happened to me last week, and that 12 hours of sleep was quite relaxing.

Somehow I guess I need to fit in some study time for my last midterm. I've got to study the four assignments we've had, plus the first midterm I took. Well, que sera, sera. As far as my crypto midterm goes, I'm pretty confident that I kicked its effing ass. Good for me! It helped that I really didn't need to study the RSA stuff, as I did so pretty extensively last term.

Listening to... Iron Maiden - 2 Minutes to Midnight
Link of the moment... I thoroughly enjoyed this movie.

Then I must be some kind of Genius

Well, I got my midterm marks back. I got a 90 in Network Flow...excellent. Network Design? Well, I got the second highest mark in the class! Unfortunately, that mark was 35%. The odd thing is that the highest mark in the class was around 75%, so there was a pretty huge drop-off. We're going to have a make-up midterm, and the prof talked to us all individually. I didn't tell him off or anything. What worries me is that it doesn't look like he's admitting that he's partially to blame for the class doing so poorly. Well, there's still 90% of the mark to be decided, so we'll see how this second midterm goes.

My sleep schedule is quite off lately. Lately, I've been going to bed between 4 and 5, and waking up at around 2PM. On days that I have class, I usually only get a few hours of sleep, and then crash when I get home. I forget what messed up my schedule. I was looking forward to attending a games day yesterday, but I woke up at 3 and realized it was half over, and by the time it would take to get ready and get there, it wouldn't be worth going.

I'm finally on the second disc of Shadow Hearts, but I think there's still a ways to go before I finish it. I beat the co-op story mode of Timesplitters: Future Perfect with Hugh, after some horrendously difficult stages. For Yoshi's Island, I've only got to acheive my goal of getting at least 80 on every stage for the last world, and then beat the last stage. I haven't touched FFVI lately. I have too many games started up already, so I'm trying to get SH and YI out of the way first.

I'm talking to Aly as we speak ('we speak', being figurative, of course). He reminded me that he has my Serenity DVD. I suggested that we actually do something, rather than just saying "hey, we should do something". It looks like I'll be going to see 300 this Friday in Mississauga (or Mrs. Sauga, as I jovially refer to it) at the IMAX theatre. I guess it doens't really mess with my midterms or anything, and the roads should be nice enough to drive on, so I can't think of any good reason not to go.

Katie was over last night, for the first time in a while. I was starting to get the feeling that she didn't really want to hang out with us anymore, but she initiated the hangout, so I suppose my fears were unfounded. She, Andrew and I played some NES (I have a NES emulator for PS2 with 900+ games), Scene It, and Carcassonne. As the night went on, activities included making spaghetti, and Katie falling asleep on the couch. I didn't know if I should wake her up or not, so I just played some Megaman 3 instead. Eventually she woke up (at 3:30 AM) and I kicked her out of my house. Good times, as usual! Unfortunately, she is babysitting this Monday and as such can not come over to watch TV.

I bought a Pitchshifter CD from those seedy guys that set up shop in the SLC the other day. "deviant", if you must know. It was a rare find, so I was happy to pay the eight dollars (sans tax). It's not as good as www.pitchshifter.com (the album), but I haven't really given it any time to grow on me. Now if only I could find a Bucket Truck or Chore cd...

The university had 1.5 snow days at the end of last week. They closed up shop at 3:30 on Thursday due to some pretty fierce snowfall. Overnight, there was really nasty freezing rain, hence the closure on Friday. It didn't mean much to me, besides letting me sleep in and saving me three hours of unenlightening class.

Well, that's as much as I'm willing to type for now.

Listening to... Reel Big Fish - Take On Me
Link of the moment... NES emulator for PS1. Needs a swap disc or mod chip to work.

Well you know what? *I* like it, and that's what matters.

Well, my car is fixed! It took six hours and $150 but my car now gets me to where I need to be.

I went to Cambridge with Andrew and Hugh the other day. Andrew needed to get some skipants for his skitrip, and the National Sports here didn't have what he needed, but they told him the National Sports in Cambridge could get him what he needed. While we were there, we went to the mall, where I got FFVI Advance from the EBGames. We also went to the fabled Bluenotes outlet that John always gets his three dollar t-shirts from. Shirts with so called "witty" slogans on them aren't my thing, but they were indeed cheap. Hugh picked up a $20 parka that I thought was very good for the price. Not only was it only $20, but they were also under the "buy one get one free" deal. Long story short, Hugh and I walked out with matching parkas (though his is black and mine is brown).

I got out to a movie with Caroline, from the euchre club, the other night. We went to go see Smokin' Aces. I enjoyed it quite a bit, and found it startlingly similar to Lucky Number Slevin in style. Of course, since Kevin Durand had a sizable part in the movie, I had to mention that he's from Thunder Bay. Good for him.

Oh yeah, funny story from the other night. Katie was coming over Monday night to watch Prison Break and Heroes (actually, she only stayed for Prison Break), so I offered to pick Caroline up to watch them with us (she watched Heroes as well). I went to go pick her up, and due to her living on a busy street (Columbia), and my inability to see house numbers quickly, I wound up parking my car a few houses down. I walked up to her house, which was pitch black, and remember that she told me that her entrance was through the garage. I opened the door to the garage, and it was pitch black inside. I tried calling her cell, and only got voice mail. I waited around a few minutes, hoping she'd come out, but she never did.

At this point, I figure the only thing I could possibly do to get in communication with her is to drive back home, and see if she was still at her computer. Unfortunately, she was not, so I verified that I had the right address (psh, who writes down addresses?), hightailed it back, and used my cellphone as a flashlight in the garage. It turns out that once you get a few steps in, the light turns on via a motion sensor. Luckily, she wasn't waiting around the whole time, but did some dishes in the meantime. All in all, a somewhat interesting and awkward sequence of events.

I had big plans to play through Shadow Hearts this week, but it seems that the TV is in heavy contention. Hugh also had the bright idea of killing the week with video games, and Andrew has his usual Smash Bros. stints. I'm only about 8 hours into the game, sadly. I really should be getting on that crypto assignment too. It's bothersome to think that my week off is half over. I'm not particularly looking forward to getting back to class.

Listening to... The Human Abstract - Crossing the Rubicon
Link of the moment... Thanks for the nice link Paul

Our hero returns after a short hiatus

13 days since my last post? Egads! I'd apologize, but I certainly have nothing to apologize for. I owe you all nothing, you hear me? NOTHING.

I can't say much has happened in the last two weeks, really. I went to the Silver Spur last weekend, with John's sister Maria and her boyfriend, along with John and Julie. It wasn't particularly entertaining, but nowhere near as bad as that one time I went to Scuttlebutt's (*cringe*).

Tonight I went to Polar Jam '07. There were six bands in six hours, but I wasn't really up for a six hour commitment, so I missed the first two bands (Intransit and Saigon Hookers, two bands I was particularly looking forward to). I saw The Junction (thumbs up), Brassmunk (if I had any more than two thumbs, they would all be down for this overly generic hip-hop), Idle Sons (recognized one song, most of their others were generic verse/chorus/verse/chorus/guitar solo/chorus, but overall enjoyable) and Thornley (great performance as usual, but their Come Again/Big Wreck setlist is getting a bit stale). It was an outdoor concert, so during most of the bands my toes were painfully numb. I was even wearing two pairs of socks! Not the warmest night we've had lately, most of the bands were complaining about it.

Today, I decided to try to get some sleep after getting back from classes. About half an hour into my rest, I heard a crowd of people, and assumed Hugh had some people over or something. Then I heard them come downstairs. Then I heard my door open, and saw some people poke their heads in. They seemed pretty shocked to see me, and I asked them what purpose they had in my bedroom, uninvited. It turns out that our landlord decided to give some people a tour of the house, without giving us any prior notice! I'm pretty unimpressed with him. Even if he los tour number, he should at least come to our house before he brings anyone else with him. What an ass.

My weekends seem to be chock full of things to do. Tomorrow I plan to go to campus to play some board games with Watsfic. Next weekend, Nicole is going to be in town, and I'll be going to a concert with her on Friday night. She said she might be going to a party on Saturday night, but if not, I'm sure we'll be doing something together. Maybe mario party, perhaps bowling; we'll see what the weekend has in store for me.

I'm not all that impressed with my assignments lately. I have two due next Friday, and I'm not entirely sure how much I will be able to finish by then. My big work days will be Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday, but I like to be essentially finished by Tuesday so that any problems I can't get past on my own can be solved on the Wednesday before the assignments are due. I took a look at Network Design, and it doesn't look too difficult. The bigger challenge will be Network Flow, since the questions deal with STUPID linear programming and matrix representations of graphs. I don't understand any of it, and I've noticed that staring at the page does not do much for me.

I finished Okami, after 34 grueling hours. I've started up a new save in my favourite game of all time, Final Fantasy Tactics. This year, it's ten years old, and still as engrossing as ever. Judging by my previously saved game of 50+ hours, it might take a while to beat this game. After playing Okami, I stand by my opinion that a short game (10-15 hours) with lots of replay value is more enjoyable than a long game (30+ hours) that relies more on its story than variety in gameplay.

Well, I should get some sleep. Our landlord is showing the house to people tomorrow at 2PM, so I should try to get up early to get a bit of cleaning done (I wouldn't want people to think I live a slovenly lifestyle!)

Listening to... Tool - The Patient
Link of the moment... Kudos to [station on channel 5 in Waterloo] for putting this on after The Simpsons at 5:30

Fun trip to Brantford

Well, I'm back in "the 'loo". Hugh was home first on the third of January, then me, then Andrew, and finally John the next morning. Our family is once again complete. We went grocery shopping, but I forgot to look at what I had left in the cupboards and freezer. Because of that, I underbought and now I'm very low on food and I don't think anyone else wants to go shopping.

I only got to see Holly once while I was home. We went to the mall together. It was a very nice mall trip, she definitely made it fun. I got some pants and a nice zip-up spring jacket for $20 each. The pants are too long, so I'm either going to have to hem them or just let them be too long.

My classes are pretty boring so far. I few times, I've been close to nodding off during class. James, who I know from the Euchre club, is in two of my classes. The other class (Network Design) has only seven or eight students, and the prof isn't really that good of a lecturer. He goes a little too fast and writes a little too small for my liking.

The other day, I tried to beat Hugh in Smash Brothers with one hand. Specifically, my right hand. I used my thumb on the analog stick and my pinky for the buttons. Had I been able to react quickly enough to recover when off the edge, I'm certain I could have easily beaten him, but inability to recover proved fatal.

I had an idea at the euchre exec meeting. I'm not sure if it's a good idea or a bad one, but I'm going to put more consideration into it. We're trying to find new events to have for the club, and I think we're a bit wary about how Warrior Weekends are being managed. One problem I have with WW is that they tend to have a lot of events running concurrently, so people have to choose between events. What I was thinking is getting a few entertainment-based clubs (UWGamers, WATSFIC, etc) together, and having a day-long event with lots of back-to-back events. Then people can participate in as many events as they want without having to choose between them. Of course, it might be more work than it seems, getting a lot of clubs to be on the same page, and co-ordinating all the advertising efforts.

I beat the Warriors. As you might notice on the sidebar, it didn't take me very long. There are still a lot of extra backstory missions I can do, and a few more modes I can unlock, but for the moment I'm done with the game. I've moved on to Okami, which hasn't really wowed me yet. It's pretty fun, but I'm gonna say that LoZ: TP looks like a better game.

Listening to... Three Days Grace - Scared
Link of the moment... My latest wallpaper...I like this art style

Shag-adelic, baby

You may notice a slight addition to the sidebar. Hopefully by putting that up, it'll cut down on the "games I want to play" posts. I finally beat Resident Evil 4. I'm right near the end of Megaman ZX as well, but there's no way I can get through the "beat all the eight bosses again" part without some FAQ help.

At Blockbuster the other day, I picked up Okami as planned, and since they had a buy-one-get-one-half-off deal, I picked up Meteos for DS for another ten bucks. The next day at Rogers, I saw Kirby: Canvas Curse in the used games section. It looks like a good game, and I can never find it on eBay, so I picked it up as well. I'd better not buy any more games for a while, it looks like I have enough to last me through until the summer.

I went to Chris' house the other day and played some Wii. I've gotta say it doesn't really live up to my expectations. With Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, I felt like all I needed to do was shake the controller in front of me until the guys were dead. When I tried doing one move, it would wind up doing a different one. With Wii Sports golf, the same sort of thing happened; it wouldn't do what I wanted it to do. Boxing had the same problem. When I'd try to punch low to the body, it would do a hook to the face. Tennis was definitely fun though. Props to tennis.

I played another two games of Carcassonne with Grant and Sheena last night. I think I might actually be getting to the point where I'm getting sick of that game. I've played it entirely too many times since I got home.

Maybe later today I should go return stuff. X-mas gifts, that is. I'm still not sure if I'm going to keep the camera I have or exchange it for one with a smaller frame. I guess I use it so rarely that it won't make too much of an impact. Canon's a good name, and I don't really feel like putting in the time to finding out what the best model is otherwise. I guess I'll just take it all in cash, because I can't think of what I should get from Future Shop. I certainly have enough games. I'm not sure if I really want to invest in any more boxsets at the time being.

Well I need to get some food in me. I'm sure I'll have to look for it outside the house, as the cupboards don't seem to be well-stocked lately.

Link of the moment... Slightly interesting article over at Joystiq