May 2008 Archives
I need to sleep, but every time I swallow, my throat hurts so bad that I'm jolted awake by the burning pain. I took medicines and gargled salt water... nothing helps or eases it at all. It's almost 4am now, and when I try to sleep I'm stuck in a half-waking strange dream-like state in which time is marked by the jolts of pain every time I need to swallow my saliva again.
I had a happy birthday.. thanks, Famke, X, Laura and Servando. =) (though they will most likely never read this post).
The day went by rather normally... I'm reading, "The Sweet Trade", a novel about Anne Bonny and Mary Read... pirates who sailed with Calico Jack. Went to class and drew stuff... there were airbrushes there today.. real life airbrushes! Haha~
They work so neat... you hook it up to an air source, like a compressor or something-- then you press down on the switch to begin the air flow, then slowly pull back on it to determine how much ink you want to let out. The distance you hold it away from the target surface determines how wide, soft, or fine the spray is. What a neat device!
Went to see the counsellor afterwards to secure my Associate's, which I will have in the Summer. Carl's... 2 Western Bacons for $4 - not a bad deal. I think it's what the burger's worth.
Awe's class... it was really fun. Yuli appeared. It was nice to see her again... the class is totally fun, and I think it's finally getting to the point where everyone's starting to see the show click together, and we're getting closer as a whole class.
Last Friday, I organized a get-together for Famke's birthday ... (it was a joint thing, because it turns out that her's was May 16, mine was 19th, and Servando was 8th). Watched Prince Caspian for an awesome $4 per, because of Servando's hustling connections.
Today, Famke repaid the favor, and got a couple people to get together after class and go out to celebrate mine. We all hopped in Laura's car, and went to a Mexican place 'cause Servando and X hadn't eaten dinner yet. Great time!! Hung out there after class from 10 until like, midnight. Talked about lots of random subjects, like ... Famke's crazy Uganda experiences with white-water rafting, and what to do if your car gets struck by lightning (park it "against" a light pole... ground it by touching a metal part to a lamp post).
Laura drove us back to school, and Servando drove me to my car which, at 12:20AM, luckily didn't get an overnight parking fine. =) Yay~
Thank God for a wonderful time!
Gamer Stratification:
Playing for Victory: A good game is one that you can excel at.
Your ultimate goal is the thrill of victory. It almost
doesn't matter how you win, so long as you come out on
top at the end. The glory of standing over your defeated
enemies is the most rewarding experience. The game loses
appeal when you are defeated.
Playing for Competition: A good game is one that drives you to push yourself.
You play for the thrill of the fight, pushing yourself to
the limits of your abilities. If the opponent is either too
strong or too weak to offer a challenge, the game ceases to
appeal.
Playing for Experience: A good game is one that is engaging, and has lasting appeal.
You play to experience everything a game has to offer. You
enjoy games that challenge you in a way you hadn't thought
possible before, and game that offers a good experience
will always have a draw on you.
Playing for Fun: A good game is one that entertains.
You play simply because it's enjoyable, for whatever reason
at your whim. You stop playing when the game stops being
fun.
There is no ultimate gamer, or a category of "Hardcore". Most hardcore gamers
fall into the Victory category, but it's not necessarily always the case.
A hardcore gamer can be in any one of these groups. Similarly, casual gamers
tend to be in the Fun category, but can still be in any of the others.
Since my readership at this point in time consists of strictly one person, I think it's okay if my blog is rather disorganized for the time being. I don't have any themes going on, and today- I don't really have much commentary either. What I do have is a scan of a sketch I did of Haru, out of the blue. This doodle was out of slight boredom in Chinese class... I wanted to try drawing a sexy looking crotch & legs, so the picture started with that first. 9_9
What would a robot think if it suddenly had gained self-awareness?
So, I realized- I don't suck at drawing. I'm just terribly inconsistent and lacking practice. I got burnt out on in-class assignments today and started working on a little page. It's Ria and Teirah from Genesis Epoch who are, for no particularly good reason, walking in a narrow valley with a stream in it. The DM attacks them with a falling rock trap!
After taking a good look at my four big stories, I kind of realized that they're fairly similar. Genesis Epoch in its current iteration is, honestly, based off of the game, "Infantry". However, unlike the game, I realized that 1 vs. 1 duels and honor and all that doesn't really work out so well when I'm trying to depict a war drama. Ria and Teirah were orphans drafted into the war at a young age.
I think that's a very shonen JUMP type of plot device though. I'm toying with the idea of making them just two refugees trying to get to safety, and being forced to grow up in a world that's rapidly changing around them. This way, they have interactions with soldiers from both sides of the conflict. Also, they're now sisters. In honor of Ender's saga's most loving sister I've ever seen in fiction, I think I'm going to name them Ria and Teirah Valentine.
Sam and I have recently been talking about how cool it'd be to have a true virtual reality simulation, and how it'll be totally within our technological grasp in the future. The scenes we described in our fantasies were approximated by Garry's Mod-- just creating things for fun, set loose in a world where we have power not only to destroy, but to create, and play as we see fit.
Gmod + Skype = awesome.
Happy Mother's Day! A happy one indeed. I totally missed church worship this morning, for which I really have to apologize to Bryant for. Failure to launch, seriously. I woke up at noon, which I didn't expect to do at all, because I hadn't for a long time. I guess my body couldn't take the lack of sleep recently. I'll be sure to take good care of it from now on.
Betty and Thourn came over -- we cleaned out the garage and decided on what we were gonna keep and what was going to be tossed.. most of it! I need to call the bulky items collection to get rid of it... and we may need multiple calls. A clean garage would be nice! It was tiring, but kind of fun because everyone was there. Mom and I couldn't do it alone.
Betty and auntie made dinner. It was very delicious! She also made dessert-- mochi cake, which I find surprisingly tasty-- I usually don't eat much dessert, but I'm having a hard time getting enough of this.
New week-- but lots of things to take care of. Here goes~
