When you're caught between the moon and New York City

...you oughta do something about it. Okay, I give up, I don't actually know how that song goes. But it was playing during the credits of a movie I just watched, so it's still fresh in mine head.

Hum hum hum, what's new in the world of Kit?

I figured out what I believe to be one of my defining characteristics. It's something I see in myself on many levels, from the mundane to the esoteric. That's that I love a challenge. I love a fight. I love an adventure. Now what do I mean by that? It's not just the physical happenings of the world, though that's certainly true. I go and find the things that are liable to leave a mark on me, and I do them. Whether it's my first kayaking trip being down a series of rapids, or applying to a school I know nothing about, or waking up and deciding to drive 5 hours to a theatre camp I'm not enrolled in, or talking to that cute girl who works in the Con library, or.... the list goes on.

It's hard to articulate, and sounds incredibly trite, I'm sure, but the point of it is that life isn't fun without a good challenge. And I know how much I revel in that. And I like that about me; it's what doesn't let me stop, even when all the chips are down. I know people who can't do that. They freeze up when a challenge arrives, whether its in the form of a massive work burden, or emotional turmoil or just plain old depression. Hey, I get it, too. And I'm surely one who's been unsure of what the next move ought to be. But one of the things I'm most pleased with about myself is that, even then, I'm moving forwards.

I was recently feeling down because of too much routine in my life. And then it dawned on me. As I later told one of my closest friends as I was baking in the heat of Bozeman, "Nobody's going to change my routine for me. If I'm dissatisfied, I've only got myself to blame. So fix it, soldier." And I did. It's like I told my cat this morning as he was whining to have someone watch him eat: "Become a pioneer of the inevitable." Now, I was telling him to just eat, even if no one was there, but it rang true for me.

--

Huh, so that wasn't supposed to delve into the kitPsyche, but whatevs. I feel great, and that's what really counts.

What I don't feel great about is George Lucas's latest shitproject...I mean, the Clone Wars animated film coming out in a month. Seriously. Now, I'm about one of the biggest Star Wars geeks you will ever meet, and even I don't feel I can see it. And this is coming from a guy who got early tickets for Revenge of the Sith, because I'm just that cool (Yeah, yeah, I saw it before it opened :3)

I bought Pokemon Diamond a couple of weeks ago, but have yet to play it. This is due, largely, to one fact: The copy I bought was used, and the previous owner did not delete his save. There is a shitload of 'manz I can't just delete. It's like being given a gift that you just throw away. Seriously. Like, whoa.

Although I like to ramble a bit, and could ramble a bit more, I think I'm going to read or play Mass Effect or something.

Adieu
gun

--

Edit:

D'oh! >_<

And that, my dear, is why I don't read emails from my past. Especially not ones where I bare my soul and tell you that I love you, or the ones where you tell me you can tell me anything, that you should have trusted me, and that you love me.

Frack.

I'm a questionable person doing fashionable things.

A little lift from my depressing last post. I'm watching the first season of Saturday Night Live. It's awesome. Some old school humor, right here. My cat is sleeping on my couch, looking pathetic. I'm working on large-scale, mucho hush-hush intartubz projects. I spent today working at Canyon Village, fixin' problems.

I think I want to play Mass Effect. I made the mistake of starting a new game the day before Pokemon Diamond got here. Luckily for ME, Greg is being lazy and not getting online.

The downside is that my computer is still being "repaired." I'm more than a little upset about this, even though I understand the circumstances. It's that...I turned it in 2 months ago today. That's extreme and really, really pissing me off.

Oh well. I gots a lots of stuffs in my head that ain't coming out here, so fare thee well.

Oh, yeah: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKDgkcx9ric

John Christian Antweiler, 12/25/1918 - 06/18/2008

Ahhhhlot of shit went down this week. My grandfather, who was sick for about a year now, passed away early on June 18. He was a good man, one of the best I've ever known, and I sure as hell miss him. John Christian Antweiler, may you finally rest.

...nothing I can possibly say can follow something like that. So everything else will have to wait.

Peace
gun

Pictures from the Old and the Faithful

So I got to go to Old Faithful last week on business. The live streaming webcam had gone down earlier due to Windows Updates (damn restarting the computer, windows!) and while we'd got the stream back, we needed to make some minor adjustments. And by we, I mean the Media and Planning Office, Web Team of the Division of Interpretation, Yellowstone National Park, National Park Service, Department of Interior. And by all that, I mean that I was sent to Old Faithful to take care of things.

So I went. I fixed it. It now is not prey to Windows Updates, and I managed to get the stream to automatically relaunch on a crash. It's one thing to get a program to start automatically. It's another to get processes within the program to run. Whatever, I'm awesome.

While there, I stayed and watched the Grand Old Lady herself erupt before getting a quick lunch and bugging out back to my office.

Here are the pictures of the eruption: http://picasaweb.google.com/cgplumb/OldFaithful

Cheerio, now.

'¯\(°_o)/¯'

You know there's something wrong with your day that you read more than 650 strips of a single comic archive.

You know there's some sort of sign somewhere ingrained in the fact that the site you were on crashed when you were trying to access strip #666. Now, I'm not giving credence to anything but coincidence, but wow, what a coincidence.

BULBA BULBA BULBA

My friend Anna is awesome.

A place called home

I'm back home again, after a short, painful stint in Colorado and a long, yet fun, thirteen hour drive to Yellowstone today. I'm pretty whooped, but have to get something off my chest a little bit (but I promise to tone it down considerably from the first iteration I attempt to write):

I wish you didn't make me feel so goddamned nice. Seriously. What the hell are you trying to pull? You know things about me that I haven't even thought about in over a decade and you didn't even have to pry. I ain't like that, sweetheart. Now there's very little I miss about the big O, but I'm saddened to say that you're one of those select things.

--

... Okay, so that's probably going to come back and bite me in the ass. Whatevs, I'm not rightly caring so much at the moment. That, and I'm still attempting to get a normal internet connection (fighting with my sister already for our Verizon aircard) and adjusting back to being amongst the mountains.

Also, I'm a bit amazed at the higher-than-normal levels of synchronicity that have been around me recently. Seriously. Once, okay, chalk that up to bizarre coincidence. Twice? It could happen. Thrice? Getting weird. Four times? Fuck. That. Shit.

Still Alive

Over the course of the past four weeks, I've been picking up all manners of video games, and happened to pop one of my all-time favorite games back into the old 'box: Portal. Granted, the first night I did, I was not entirely sober, which meant that the mindbendiness of the game was a bit of a mindfuck...but there were no repercussions, luckily.

Since then, I've been playing it more, as well as listening to the theme song, which I actually found somewhat disturbing, due to the following line:

"Now these points of data make a beautiful line / and we're out of beta, we're releasing on time."

*Spoiler Alert*

This is sung by GLaDOS after she was "killed" by Chell (the game's protagonist). Now, it's not disturbing as much that the computer is continuing to sing, as that's sorta the point of the song (GLaDOS is singing about how she's Still Alive, hence the title). The disturbing point (which I'm sure everyone and their brother had already arrived at) for me was how, at the beginning of the game, Chell sat alone in a cell with a timer counting down to zero. Her progress is tracked over a series of controlled levels, but, for some reason, the infinitely scheming GLaDOS fails to take into account the fact that Chell could escape the final trap.

...or did she? It's a little surprising that all of the areas Chell gets to after she escapes the final trap have portal-accessible areas, culminating with a wonderful battle in GLaDOS's control room. Why would GLaDOS make a mistake like that? Easy answer: She wouldn't.

We already know that Chell is a subject of an experiment...but which one? We're led to assume it's testing the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device, which is said to be untested. But, if that was the case, why would GLaDOS claim that once Chell is out in the wild (perhaps going to Black Mesa? Ha ha, that was a joke, fat chance...) that her project is "out of beta...releasing on time"? Is it not that we played a lab rat forced to play a game, but that we were actually part of a deeper, more sinister project, of which we are the moving force?

Everything about Chell's testing and subsequent escape, from the counting clock that sets her loose to her destruction of GLaDOS's control center (and GLaDOS's destruction of Chell's identity) has a feeling of a tightly controlled experiment, in which Chell was supposed to escape.

Brr. I didn't know a game could make me feel that used. I didn't beat it; it beat me through me beating it. Wow, just...wow. It makes me find a whole new level of appreciation for its multi-layered subtlety.

My December

Going on 4.30am. I've finished my calculus that was technically due on Monday, but I hadn't finished due to CSCI homework. No chance in the wide world that I'll have the problem set that's due tomorrow done. I'll probably just wait until Monday to hand it in and take the late points.

I did finish my history paper. I..don't know how much the professor will like it. If it was my politics class, it'd be a good A paper. So I guess we'll just have to see how that goes. Good, bad, I don't really care. Class evaluations are (hopefully) tomorrow, so I can actually say what I want about the course, and soon enough it'll be over. Fin. Done with.

--

And I'd give it all away just to have somewhere to go to
Give it all away to have someone to come home to

^--

Love and life shouldn't be that hard. Who knows why, but it is. Too many people I care about are hurting these days: My sisters, my friends, me. What gets me is that things shouldn't have to be that painful. I know, I know...pain helps you grow, makes you stronger, blah blah blah blah blah. I even agree with all of that. In fact, I like to think I'm pretty adept with dealing with it. What gets me is to see people I care about in pain, to know that they're having a rough time of it. It's just... is it really so much to ask for their lives to be made easier? Even a little? I don't really care about my own in this respect...I just wish everyone else's could be a few shades brighter.

Edit: I'm sorry for the emo-ness of this post. It's late, I'm tired, I'm grouchy at the world for sucking. I've been listening to Linkin Park. I'm hungry. Deal with it.

Listening to Dispatch

A lot of questions swirling around in my head, coming from eighteen different corners. Questions like "why?" or "how" or "what?" or "what next?" or "why not?" Questions without answers.

___: I wish there was more I could do. I am so, so sorry. If there's anything, anything, I can do, you know I will.

___: I wish I wasn't scared of just talking to you. I'm working on it, I swear.

...

I could probably write more of those, but at the risk of being emo and/or becoming Roast Beef I should probably just throw in the towel for the night and put my mind to rest.

Eastern Promises

Just finished it. I liked it. A lot. It seemed to me to be a bit of a modern-day Godfather, even past the obvious similarities (ie, both about organized crime). Viggo's character Nikolai just really resonated with me...very well played.

I guess Eastern Promises was a bit of a primer for GTA IV, which comes out...well, 16 minutes ago. I still can't decide whether or not to buy it this week, or wait the whole summer. It is really a very, very tough decision.

Erm?

For some strange reason, I cannot stop narrating what it is I'm writing out loud. It is lucky there is no body around me. Greg would be looking at me funny and then I would have a problem.

It is also interesting, that as I narrate, it is in a slightly Slavic sounding accent. Who knew?

...

I also just bought my plane ticket home. Finally. Cannot wait to be with family and cat, and especially, not here.

werd.

Slight retraction

I know, I know....I ranted quite excessively about reviews and what-not. But...

...

Oh, my sweet baby Slice on a stick... would you take a look at the scores GTA IV is getting (Xbox 360 and PS3). So far...it's got the highest ratings of any game. Ever. Ever ever. I'm...even more excited for the game than I was, if that's even possible. Confession: I'm a bit of a GTA fan...owned almost ever GTA game that has come out... and this shall be no exception.

I'm torn, though. I'm leaving my 'box here over the summer, as I'm none too keen on flying with it, and there seems to be little point in buying it 3 weeks before I go home, especially when I have as much work as I do. Still...it could happen...maybe....

Either that, or I end up buying a PS3 over the summer...which could happen, I suppose. Not that I really have the money for a PS3, but it has Metal Gear coming to it, which I so desire. Maybe I can get a good deal on one. The problem there, of course, is the same dilemma I face now: I'll have to fly back to Ohio with a PS3, and that I really do not look forward to. Maybe I can get a case for it...or mail it...or something. I dunno.

--

In other news, I bought/currently paying for Greg's DS. He got a new one for his birthday and I took the old one off his hands. Been playing Pokemon Ruby...I know, I know...it's just...so much fun! Greg asked me tonight if I'd rather live in the Star Wars universe or the Pokemon universe. I actually couldn't decide.

This weekend sucked pretty hard for me. At least I almost had a heart attack on Friday. Next time I do it (ie, next weekend), I'll get pictures of the culprit, as it's actually a bit of a wonder I'm still alive.

Back and forth

Angry/sad/angry/sad/angry/sad

If it's not one, it's the other.

3:10 to Yuma

So slightly behind the times, but last weekend I watched 3:10 to Yuma. Immediately thereafter, I played directly into the mass media culture and, like the insipid fool that I am, I ran off to various review sites to see what other people, professionals and amateurs, thought of the film. IMDb, RottenTomatoes, MetaCritic, Wikipedia, Digg, you name it.

And then I stopped.

I blinked and came to a realization, which can be summed up in this sentence: "The internet is full of mindless fucktwits whose opinions are worth less than a sack of elephant shit." So really, who gives a good goddamn about what so-and-so on RT had to say versus what this-and-that had to say on IMDb?

Reviews (specifically film reviews) can be fun to read, to see a separate opinion on the film and compare/contrast to gain a heightened understanding of issues portrayed. However, it always feels like every reviewer, from Ebert to Joe Schmoe on the IMDb forums, believes that they speak the word of their god, and that only they can understand and unlock the secrets of a film (or dismiss it entirely).

Well, that's bullshit. Don't you tell me that the movie lacked essential character arcs. I'll decide what's essential in a movie for me. I'll decide whether or not something was done well. I'll decide if there were plot holes. I'll decide for me.

--

3:10 to Yuma: Hell, I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy this film. Russell Crowe played a baddy that I felt even Cthulhu would give a pat on the head (immediately before, or perhaps during, the devouring of Crowe's character's soul for all eternity). He was smart, he was calculating, and he was fun. He's what drove the story, not Christian Bale's worn-down war vet. That isn't to say that I didn't absolutely love Bale's performance, because I did. I just felt that the movie was using Bale as the protagonist to cast a light on the real lever: Crowe.

The plot was fairly straightforward, but not pointless. It wasn't something that made me challenge my beliefs. However, at the same time, it didn't need to be. It was breathing some air in the dead and dying western genre, but a little more brutal than other depictions (not counting Unforgiven).

At the denouement, I got a genuine grin on my face and thought "Hells yeah, Ben Wade."

3:10 obviously wasn't the film that changed the world. It was no Casablanca, it was no Godfather, but it was fun. It's a movie that I'm glad I watched, which is more than I can say for most of the steaming, festering piles of slop covered in battery acid with a topping of urine that come out of Hollywood these days. Sure, the movie had scenes that made me scratch my head and say "Huh?" and wonder why they were included. Sure, the movie had moments that simply didn't make sense. But hell, it was good. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

--

Going back slightly, to my previous rant, I want to clarify that I don't view all reviewers as the spawn of some unholy deity incarnated on earth. Film critics can jump right off a cliff, though (and that includes todays generation of snobby, indie, hipster or other stereotype [like the cinema studies department at almost any liberal arts school, Oberlin included]) who think that film has no purpose but to convey art or social messages and only they can understand it). To them, I say "bullocks."

The same goes for most literary reviewers, or really "traditional art" critics. They're not nearly as pervasive nor insidious, but I don't really appreciate someone whose got their well advertised, paid-for-review head up their ass telling me what is or isn't a good book. I'll decide that on my own, thank you very much. And really, I'm protective of my books; the written word is something I hold great love for. It actually verges on silly to imagine my love affair with words. But yet, it exists, and I think that I'm a good enough judge to judge for myself.

What I mean by "traditional art" doesn't mean I'm protecting "modern" art or people vomiting on themselves and calling it art (yes, that really happened here. Disgusting, and not art), from criticism. Because, quite frankly, I don't give a damn about what people have to say about it. What I meant by my phrasing is actually an interactive artistic medium, which largely goes unrecognized by the artistic community. Yes, I'm talking about video games.

I don't really care what video game reviewers say, for much the same reasons as I don't give a flying monkey shit what other art critics have to say, as I already make up my mind to buy a game before I read reviews for it. Hell, usually I buy the game first, then read a review of it. Previews, sure, who doesn't like previews? The main difference is that games have not been subjected to the holier-than-thou bullshit reviewers for as long as other industries, so it's not quite the corrupted cesspool of evil that makes up the shepherds leading the flocks of sheep to Best Buy, and United Artists Theaters. Instead, it just leads the sheep to EA...which isn't really a step in the right direction.

PS: For those who were wondering, I am apparently hegemonic and intolerant for not accepting a creation myth as historical fact. Cultural fact, but not historical fact. So while you read my oozing commentary, it may be good to remember that I am simply a hegemonic, intolerant cretin, and to take my hate-infused drivel with a grain of salt. Or so I have been told.

PPS: Being told the above made my day. ^__^

Echochrome

Joystiq ran a story today regarding a demo for Echochrome. I read it, shrugged, decided to dust off my old PSP...and wow, am I glad I did. It was not a simple task, getting the old machine ready for a new demo... it needed firmware updates (from 2.50 to 3.90) and network authentication. Sadly, the integrated web browser can't handle SSL encryption, which made it unable to authenticate itself via Oberlin's log in.

Anyway. Echochrome. Simply fantastic, despite the demo being completely in Japanese. Addictive as all get out, too. Maybe it's just 'cause I started playing it at a quarter to one, or maybe it's because I had a lot of fun, but I want to replay it again already.

The concept of the game is simple enough. Take a given scenario that is maddeningly similar to an M.C. Escher painting, and guide your little dude to each checkpoint, using the terrain to your advantage. It's so....easy, yet elegant. Plus, the music was pretty fantastic. For the first time in a long while, I enjoyed holding my PSP.

Now that I've gone ahead and updated it, I might as well get ready for using it. That's gonna require a couple of upgrades...namely a bigger memory card (32MB simply does not cut the mustard) and God of War: Chains of Olympus (because I need Kratos). Given enough time (and money...I'm short on money), I'll hopefully begin to use it again and justify the multiple hundred dollars I spent on it on its launch day.

An Awful Long Hiatus

I'm back. I have a confession to make: I plain old forgot this even existed until Sunday evening while I was going to Cleveland for a concert. It came up in conversation (when I found out that I had been internet stalked) and that made me start thinking about actually paying attention to the old dusty blog.

So. This is my plan for Nothing Personal:

• Regular updates, at least once per week, if not more. If I do multiple updates per week, it'll follow this format
  
• Details of what's new in my life, et cetera
• My take on some sort of large-scale scenario, issue or activity (though, I have to warn you, it'll probably be tech related most of the time. Either that or politics)
  
• Meaningful subjects, which means anyone who's reading won't have to slog though posts like these (usually)
• Eventual integration to my website (when it gets built)
• The Nothing Personal webcomic! I know! Just what the internet needs! Another comic that's attempting to be witty, sometimes touching on video games, sometimes other issues. It's actually modeled a lot on real life, so it's not intentionally a Penny Arcade rip-off.

--

Now, on to business...

Motif Designs: I currently have a couple of projects running. I'm writing a database driven package called "Sponge" for the college's language department, which I'm hoping to expand into a more robust platform that other schools can use as well. It's running fairly smooth right now, as long as I remember to not break my stupid SQL databases.

I'm also working on two separate contracts. One is for a buddy of mine and his film company. It's going slowly, partly due to my laziness, partly due to the server being crap and partly due to not hearing much for a few days at a time. Rest assured, it's getting there.

Personal life: Boy oh boy is it snowy out. We've been getting pretty consistent snow for the past couple of days. Today was the first clear day for a while. I went and dug out Caitlin's car for her after work. It felt good being outside and actually doing work for once. It's not so cold outside...most days I walk around with my coat unzipped and it feels pretty comfortable.

I..guess I don't have much more to say at the minute, but hopefully this will begin to evolve into something worth reading in the future.

cheers