nice and rotten

the thanksgiving holiday is behind us, and now we can all get on with our lives.
Thanksgiving, as a yout', was traditionally the point of departure for me between my whole previous year of gaming and the beginning of the whole COMING year, the things i had been salivating over in gaming magazines for the past several months were finally seeing the light of day at Toys R Us, EBX and Child World, or the like. It was pretty much a high point of the year for me (well, of course I generally didn't like being in school very much, and I wasn't into sports and stuff like that, I suppose my parents were too lazy to kick my ass and make me go outside.. sigh) Anyway, now as an adult I view it from the flip side, seeing all these games trickling out just past halloween and the media barrage that accompanies them, of course driven in that particular way that only the internet can do -- yeah, if we had this stuff when I was a kid, I suppose I would have ended up being even more antisocial then I was already..

Thanksgiving was alright, we got a bunch of time in with Rockband 2, though I must admit that after a year, I have had enough. I have a long way to go with the drums, and I have barely touched the guitar - more than any of that I've not ever really touched the progression modes, in my househould RB usually serves as party entertainment. It's been fun while it lasted and it will be awhile yet, but the novelty has definitely passed (and I can't say I am too terribly looking forward to download many more tunes). I suppose if the selection blew wide open and there was a lot more to chose from - the selection, while decent, has always felt painfully limited to me, though I can not blame them for putting out a decent effort - then I would get a fair bit more enjoyment out of it for some months to come. I suppose that's up to the future of rhythm games, a genre which is still relatively early along in it's stride. The problem with the whole "yearly update agenda" they push with these things, is that it kills the potential and enthusiasm. Either that, or sink a shit-ton of R+D into the thing and blow a fat wad of cash to absolutely annihilate the competition. They don't need to, so they won't - the short term answer is it's a pretty powerful juggernaut, though the potential for better games inthe long term gets kind of diminished as a result. No matter really, since I suppose no one ever really knows what they are missing - though they do realize when they are bored...

Bookending the sessions of Rockband, we pulled out the SNES and played some Bomberman 2. I have had it sitting in my closet for a good year and a half or so, with little more than a session here and there in the past with the game. Truth be told, I never really caught the train on the whole Bomberman trend, not that I didn't dig it, the game just fell through the cracks with me. I did finally get wind of it several years later, and plunked down for a set, and glad to say I did, the game is a lot of fun! I realize there's like EIGHTY variations of Bman out there, and I can't really say I know where to go next (or that I really need to). Four-player local is enough for me, I guess I will see if I can hunt down the first SNES iteration as well as the game gets some praise. Really, games like that still hold up very well, they remind me that we don't need to churn out crazy tech to have extremely fun gaming. Honestly, they still look and feel more than satisfying enough.. I like when this happens, pulling up a rock and finding a whole cool branch of gaming that one was kind of oblivious to in the past, that can still be enjoyed.

your penguin has slowed you down

Thunderforce VI is a shooter (R-Type type of shooter, not Quake style of shooter!!) has released for PS2 in Japan, it's been nearly 1 month. This was one of my favorite series of games in one of my favorite genres of games, and it's been.. about 10 years since the last iteration released. I guess I only was a big fan of the first two, but I still enjoy the music and aesthetics of those series to this day. that might sound weird, a little, but if you know the games, you know what I mean. I am tempted to plunk down the dough for an import, or an ebay, but i might wait till i can find it sub-$50 - especially since it doesn't sound like the perfect "return to form" that some might have hoped, or expected it would be. I guess I have to be supportive either way, and it does sound fun, but honestly I have a billion gazillion other games i can keep busy with any event. If they touted it truly as a must-have then that would be one thing, anyway I know better than to expect to see high-tech shooters from anywhere in the world these days that are any kind of SERIOUSLY competent.. that's okay, they're a pretty forgotten game, and at least i will have the oldies always kicking around. Anyway, makes me feel old, sigh.

Though if Compile spat out something like a decent followup back from the grave, I would have to pay attention I suppose...

I downloaded the demo for the new Tomb Raider Underworld 360 - gorgeous game, in this post-Uncharted world I guess it would pretty much HAVE to be. Not as charismatic as that title from hat i could see, but geez - breathtakingly gorgeous. These games have raised the bar, this is history right here. We won't see too much able to measure up to game like this, at least aesthetically, not much more this generation I am sure (just because - is it truly worth the dev time/cost yet?) I am not saying I wouldn't love to see more beautiful games of this nature, I am just saying it's not what you could consider cost-effective, ad if someday we reach the point where that's the rule rather than the exception to maintain such a level of quality, then the industry will be run markedly different, I will say that.

Picking up with LittleBig here and there, a remarkable game - NOT without it's issues for certain, but a fine entry nonetheless and I don't think you could find anybody, really, who hasn't been piqued by it. Yeah, it's definitely NOT for everyone, and in fact I think it's one of those titles which both alienates it's target audience (cumbersome community system, heavy difficulty, tricky play controls) while those who would truly enjoy such a thing are probably turned off by it's cutesy aesthetic. Also the editor (for the meat of the game - the designing aspect), while powerful and capable, is kind of wasted somewhat due to the fact that most people just DON'T WANT POWERFUL EDITORS WITH WHICH TO DESIGN STUFF. They really just want to be spoon-fed things that are fun off the bat and play them right then and there. I guess it is one thing if there's not a ton of other worthy titles demanding the average gamer's attentions at the moment. Personally, I am excited to play with the editor some more, I have a few ideas I would love to play with, but at this point my time is kind of precious and limited for such things, but hey - i am in no hurry, it's not going anywhere.

It boils down to the notion that i would love to design some 3D platforming of my own, but as mentioned above "i am always too busy" - still considering my career choices, i think this would only do me a good service, and I intend to get on with it. At some point!

I picked up a Wii game, Shawn White Snowboarding - unusual for me in many regards, but we have a balance board here and interesting Wii games (especially of this nature) are certainly few and far between. Still this one got a good bit of press, and it sounded like it might be worth a look for a few reasons. Like anybody with half a brain I enjoyed SSX back in the day (though A. never got terribly far with it and B. never really moved on from there so much) but after skiing in Wii Fit, I was interested in going a little further via the motion-control setup for such a sport-game.. Wort picking up, though I must say after being Tony Hawkified those aesthetics and "story" trappings are kind of a drag for me - it's pretty downplayed so I can't really complain. I just miss when the Japanese games did this stuff all weird and differently styled (jet grind radioooooo) and Nickelodean style just doesn't measure up the same.

Things are alright up Obsidian - always a few things to say about that place! They got out a genuinely cool trailer for Alpha Protocol about a week ago, I believe it's at Gamespot or somewhere. Also we got a cover story with PSM that is currently on the stands. Nice to see it getting a little bit of press here and there, the things not been announced a whole year yet - I look forward to when they start letting the substantial stuff release a little more and how that all gels.

Aliens is going along, we are pretty quiet across the board and I am gonna keep mum as well. Suffice it to say I am happy on this project, one thing that must be mentioned is that I really like my team here as well. The people are really nice, friendly, patient.. it feels good to get good feedback as well, and I feel my work/capabilities mesh well with the rest of the folks over there...

Lots more to say as usual, I hope to update this thing much more often in the coming year. Stay tuned.

the babysitter’s dead - you heard what i said

wednesday morning/tuesday night. it is pouring out, all evening, looks to be much of the same the next several days, perhaps... we went out shopping for turkey day dinner last night after i got home from work, looks to be quite a feast! Hopefully we can make a det in it..!

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THINGS I FEARED AS A SMALL CHILD
cockroaches, dragonflies
driving
being in front of people/center of attention
mushrooms
angry dogs
not wearing socks
thunderstorms
being in an a place i don't know
darkness
my dad's belt
creepy old people
being stuck in a dark closet





THINGS I FEAR AS AN ADULT
cancer
DUI
long-term relationships
layoffs
being stuck in the same location for an extended period of time
baldness, obesity
car accidents
impotence
annoying repetitive/tapping noises
not being asked for ID at bars and clubs
crazy women
babies
expensive CC bills
blacking out
oversleeping thru my alarm(s)
nervous breakdowns
internet outage


--- this list was much more entertaining when i thought of it yesterday. perhaps i will do it again when i am feeling a little more creative.

a billion bullshit arti$$$T$$$$$

another weekend has dripped by, another November has nearly withered away into a bunch of more-than-nothingness, and again i am up past my bedtime in preparatuon for another week ahead. it'll be a short week, as it's gonna be thxgiving on thursday and all of that.

things are all right, as recently noted I have been making something of an effort to fly under the radar, stay outta trouble, keep on the DL, all of that - basically try to avoid spending shit tons of money and not get too drunk. I dd get out a bit more than i'd've planned since last writing in here (blame several people's birthdays) and for those reasons i have a few nights that exist only in the very vaguest of memories... but ah well, life goes on, doesn't it... this weekend, i stayed in fri night and didn't do much. saturday i hung out with some buddies in pasadena, we ate then talked (a lot) then ate again then watched the new bond movie (review:meh). Today, being sunday, I cleaned up the apartment/washed dishes/played some video games, that was about it.

called my folks this afternoon, as we spoke i heard a helicopter just overhead - midday, what the hell, is there a bad accident on the 11, damnnn that is annoying!! Off the phone later, I gt online and right there on the front page of yahoo, there was the news - bizarre, of course - some dude was brandishing a pair of samurai swords (!!!!!) and supposedly attempted to attack a security guard at the Scientology Celebrity Center up the street from my apartment - the guard panicked and shot the would-be samurai dead right there. So bizarre. Anyway, that place isn't even a half-mile from my apartment..! Sucks, anyway it made me sad... Life feels short, fragile, and pointless in a way, in times like that. I guess we are all just ants though, and designed to be destroyed, often at one another's hands.

For some reason I decided to look on the UMass Amherst Art Dep' website, I don't really think i have a good reason why. All these names (the chair-people) cae kinda foodng back to m as I saw them listed there, though to be honest I can't say 99 percent of them really ever had any meaning for me. I just figured they were all a bunch of elder uppity artists getting paid too much to not do much of nothing. hey, that's business, maybe one day I will be able to settle into a mega-cushy job and complain endlessly about THAT too (yeah, me complain? Hard to imagine)

It dd inspire me, once again, to get more of an advanced presence on the internet, at least art-wise - it would be the ultimate gallery, more so than just my "texture mercenary" thing i mostly have goin' on now, anyway - though i suppose the more one gets into that end of things, the more masturbatory it all becomes really. Well, whatever fills up the times of one's life, I suppose. I guess no matter what, you're just ultimately trying to sell something else anyway, until you reach the point where they keep bringing you cash nonstop for just being there to receive it. Well, not bloody likely...

Cold out, it's been hot, then cold, then warm, then cool, no one else seems to know or care, i guess it's kinda irrelevant but it does seem a little offputting.. i don't mind if it is a bit cold for awhile, just stick to something.. damned season!

How do I feel.. well, bloated, restless, sleepy, kinda sezzzzually frustrated, lazy, bored with the stable things in my life, so pretty much - business as usual. looking forward to getting into the office tomorrow so i can finish up workin' on a dor.

no, no, no.. november...

hullo, and welcome to the column. It's a busy busy season, so let us jump right in. The irony is that I perceived this fall as being a pretty dull season, last spring (and even into summer) - I guess I was being a bit clueless then, as it is one of the absolutely fullest schedules on record! I thought last year could not be beaten, between Halo and Mario and Ratchet and Clank and Crysis, Portal, COD, a bunch of other things - man was I wrong! Right now we are looking at Rock Band 2, Guitar Hero IV, Resistance 2, Gears of War 2, Left for Dead, Saints Row 2 (to a lesser extent, but still!, Mirror's Edge, LittleBigPlanet, of course the new WOW expansion is out in a couple of days, I believe a new C+C just released. The new Tomb Raider game is looking fine as well. Motorstorm if you like that genre.. Whew. If you are a gamer, you are a busy guy right now. It sorta sucks that all this stuff releases at the same time, in some ways..

Surely there's a couple more I missed in there, but ya get the drift..

As for what I have been up to, well I did manage to get my hands on LittleBigPlanet, honestly the only game I have really had my eye on for some time. It's a hot little game, a very powerful engine in there and I think we are going to see some wonderful product from the fan community. So far much of the user-created stuff I have looked at has been pure drivel, but I can suspect that some amazing stuff is coming down the tubes. Myself, I have not made it terribly far through the tutorials, but what I have messed with has piqued my interest - when I get some time to do so, I will put it trough the motions. I will tell ya, as my job already is somewhat close to design, it is a bit hard to wanna come home and start cracking the book with this thin, though - but geez. What a canvas. My mind keeps racing, how I would have loved this toy when I was a kid, that would have been IT for me. Every aspiring game-maker owes it to him or herself to pick up this masterpiece! I mean, it's definitely limited, but they could certainly use this for college courses at the high-end, and prototyping at the low end...

I downloaded the mirror's edge demo on PS3, a gorgeous game - some things are off about it, but I appreciate the balls to put out a game like that. Hopefully it will fare well in it's reception. As with most things of it's ilk, I had enough from merely putting in some time with the demo, but I would say it's worth looking at, some very very good looking shots in that game. I'd like ot see them use it as a springboard, use that tech and those ideas to get away from this clean sterile city, make it alive and rich. Kind of swing halfway between this and a tony hawk game, or something - just a playground that you can pull amazing, adrenaline-dripping stunts out of, get that wonderful rhythm going.

Work is going alright, as usual there's a billion things going through my mind about Obsidian these days. I am on the Aliens project about 6 weeks now, I have learned so much in the brief period - getting chances here and there to express that, it's coming faster now. I have said it before, it is truly like working at a completely different company since I've migrated from the previous title, in some ways..

That should do for now, lots on my mind gaming-wise but as is often the case, I will have to get into it later...

fast one

well, obama cinched it, the projections were right-on, and so a new day dawns at last. As i drove home last night and listened to his victory speech broadcasting over my little car radio, damn if my eyes didn't tear up a little bit as i had a feeling that better times may lie ahead. Yeah, there will be lots of hard work to unravel the mess, and surely there's gonna be tough times to weather in the meantime. That is life. Anyway it's always interesting to witness history as it is being made. hopefully the stupid racist haters won't do anything stupid to screw it up. It'll be interesting to see if the rest of the world likes America a tiny bit more, now...

got word that daft punk was gonna be playing a secret show at space last night, so called some buddies up and trucked out lickety-split. the show turned out to be not, but it was fun to hang out with my gang. sadly, i am well into my career as an alcoholic, and as often happens I blacked out a good chunk of the night. i am tired of this shit! i never thought it was great when people proclaim how "awesome it is to get wasted," the more of it i do them more pathetic it feels, in my own case.. i know it's not helped by where i live, plus my lifestyle in general, and just getting always kinda wound up by work and all of that and needing to release, to escape from my inhibitions for a little while here and there. i have long wanted to find a more productive way to do that, but it's pretty hard, so i don't know if i will ever do that. just have to wait until some consequences kick my ass I guess - that's some pretty depressing thinking though. At least I am not the kind who "needs to drink," it's only when i am out in that certain environment that i snap into mode though. come to think of it, that's how i behave in every situation (that i have bad habits), it's totally an environmentally dependent thing. I guess that's why picking up and going elsewhere has long held a novelty to me, being someone else, having different behavior, stuff like that.

things are alright though. i will always have some stupid things in my life making me miserable, i will invent them if there's nothing there otherwise to give myself shit to stress about, the older i get i just realize that I am the type of guy who NEEDS stuff to get worked up about for no good reason (and as I type this I realize that I am definitely not the first person in my family to behave this way). I like to think that I am not dramatic about it, i may talk a bit about all this in here (hey it is my release, after all) but aside from the occasional binge-drinking episode i really tend to stay away from a lot of the shit in this world that is truly "bad for you," and particularly readily and easily available at all times - again, particularly in the crazy city in which I live. Perhaps just being on the fringe of all that insatiable, crazy endless energy is enough for me - to just dip in here and there and get a little on me, to wander through a little bit here and there, to teeter over the edge just barely a little knowing that I too could fall into that pit if i was a little more reckless. it's the old yin and yang story - the order and the chaos, you need to have a bit of one in the other no matter what, and the sooner you embrace that notion the sooner you can kind of get on with your life...

feeling a bit creatively driven lately, somehow.. not sure where i am being pulled, or what is exciting for me, but that energy is also kind of getting up some interest in my head as well. i recently evaluated a lot of the work i've done professionally, over the past year and change, and i feel like i have got myself to a decent spot and can generate some pretty good output that i am proud of. i'd really like to augment that somehow, just get a little more prolific and make some stuff to show off what i got - get away from the more destructive/time-wasting stuff i have been kinda mired in. I guess that shit is important too, since it sort of fuels my creativity (that is what the ANGST is for!!!) Ah, I love how life works..

i need to get a space, i'd love to have a little studio or something. i have a little "nook" at home but it's very hard to concentrate there, i can't really ever get ANY work done there unless it's an absolute necessity, and this irritates me to no end. I need some place to just put MY shit, to have my freedom, to chill out and make stuff and be free to concentrate and get into my rhythm. i'd love to just rent a studio space or something but i don't really wanna pony up a few hundy a month for that right now, however that could certainly become a necessity. my Dream, ideally, would be to get a little spot downtown, just move all my junk there, TV and games and stereo, be able to blast that
stuff any time when I feel like it, go there and just make a mess - make some models, some drawings, hell some sculpting, SOMETHING, I know it would be a great time. Hell even if I had a basement then it would be alright! Ah well. Things to work towards. Maybe someday I will finally work out some kinda half-decent payday, if i am a little bit lucky, and turn this pretty simple dream into a reality. A load more hard work is gonna have to get poured out before I can get there! You'd think a solid decade of working in an industry like this would have made that easier, but there's never any promises of anything...

Anyway it is inspiring for me to realize that I do have some goal to work towards, besides 'just make money so I can keep buying stuff and gasoline and keep working, or else'

toe knee hulk

10:30 pm, still at work but about to wrap up (it has been quite a long day!) - do you think I can make it home in time to bang it at cinespace? Nah, but i might wash my dishes and i think i will pass out after. Truth be told I would love to throw in a load of laundry, but i might not have enough stamina to wait for the cycles to go through. Still - geez, some clean underwear might be sort of nice? You know???

So after my recent political blog, the news has been pretty much declaring McCain/Palin the loser party this go-'round. All the poll projections show Obama Yo Mama with a ridiculously healthy lead. Granted it's not quite Super Tuesday for another week, but it looks like this thing has been decided in spite of my doomsaying. Well it feels a little weird, but let's hope things don't awkwardly fall apart at the last moment (which would be, well.... unbelievable, more so than anything seen before!) 270 electoral votes needed to win the election. Obama's projected with 355, McCains at 156. Mind you this is PROJECTED and it's a week early. To make matters more bizarre, Cloris Leachman's been voted off Dancing with the Stars. You got it!

my own, personal

mon-day ni-gh-t, 9pm, just wrapped up the day's work. I should buckle in and do a nice late night, but I haven't got the power to do that, especially since I am trying to make an effort to come into the office a little bit earlier these days...

things are alright, I guess there's not a lot to say over what's been said lately. I am kind of feeling like a hamster in a ball, lots of energy but no matter how much I expend it's only gonna kind-of propel me in some sort of general direction. I always consider myself as a focused sort of personality, but I think it's a disservice to myself to suppose that much (focused yes, but far from razor-sharp, then!) Well whatever, like anyone else I am just trying to do the best I can.

I feel like I am suppressing the more philosophical parts of my personality lately, like my deeper thought and consideration must just take a back-seat to being practical and productive, those are thoughts I don't like to admit (as it DOES run contrary to my personal philosophy) but with the way all things seem to go in my life, it seems like the only way to head towards some kind of solvent goal, and therein lies the notion of "focus." I think I have grown up in this day and age where freedom and personality are championed, but really as I get older I can see how that's just a myth really, if you try to act out and .. uh.. follow your natural rhythm in those regards (in their purer forms) then you're only going to end up broke and alone, possibly in jail. Well, in many parts of this country anyway (at least the ones I live in). As I write that, it fascinates me a little "if i am so drawn to that rough idea of freedom, why does my personality reject the idea of living under the radar, in a wayyyy more antisocial fashion?" I guess it's just not so simple an equation then. There's always a few more big factors to consider.

Maybe I feel limited enough from the outside world as it is, and then when I do subject myself to it, it can only be under extreme circumstances (i.e. if I am gonna go out ot a club, I need to be intoxicated). How silly an idea it seems to go out to a club and NOT be drunk, or conversely to participate in otherwise "sober activities" while otherwise mentally misaligned. I don't like thinking about this stuff, it makes me feel like I am just full of shit. It is interesting though, and something that's just not really approached in society, and it makes me feel like we are all no better than cavemen, still...

I am a little tied up, I want to bend my borders, I want to hop in my car and leave my office and pick a direction, let my mind wander, and just drive, drive until my Gas Tank is getting low, fill it up, and then drive some more, ignore the highway signs, don't care where I am going, don't care when I am coming back, or if I am coming back..

you're ON!!

hello, texturizers, nothing to see hare. Mauve along.

I have been silent in my game blog for awhile now, maybe a bit longer than I'd like - I would think it'd be prudent to post in here maybe once or twice a week, at best, if I ever want it to be taken any-kind of seriously. But as usual, I have life and work and such to think about, and I do have my "real blog" to pour into when the writing bug strikes. Still, I have much to say on the world of gaming (and my work), so it'll come when it does. And it does, now..

At Oblivion, I mean Obsidian (was that a slip?) I have finally moved over to the Aliens team. Not sure how much I am allowed to talk on this stuff, so I must keep it pretty brief. After spending the last year and a half of my life living in Alpha Protocol, and all that entails, it is bittersweet to move on - I'll just say that the last work I was doing on that project looked like my best so far. Aliens-wise, well - I took the job with this studio specifically because I wanted to work on this title. So there! I am gonna miss working with Unreal Editor, though. I whined about it a good bit at first, but I feel pretty capable with it these days. So gratifying!

Nothing is spinning in my disc tray lately. AT ALL. The only modern-ish game-ish thing i have spent any time with was the Pixeljunk Eden demo on PS3. I seriously logged a good 10 hours in there - I didn't even feel the need to buy the full game, it was one of those where you can totally just cruise with the demo as it is. Fun though, nice little game to chill out and kick back with and while away some hours. Also downloaded the Mega Man 9 demo, expecting to make short work of it. holy CRAP tough. I am ashamed to say I could not pass the halfway mark of the stupid demo level - it only succeeded in pissing me off. Mind you I am a longtime lover of Mega Man TWO specifically - but geez. Anyway I think I am a huge loser if I don't shell out for Mega 9 sometime soon. 10 bucks, geez. Why the hell not.

LittleBigPlanet is the game I have got my eye on. I am going to see if I can snatch this business up this week - I sense this game might be something else. I haven't actually shelled out an honest $60 for a PS3 title yet, in the nearly one year I have owned the device - and the title that packed-in with it, Motorstorm, never got more than maybe 5 minutes of playtime from me (for shame! I know) so it is high-time to pick up something worthwhile, and this game looks like it's gonna be at least that. In this day and age of franchised IPs up the wazoo, it's no small feat when a game comes out with backing like this and interesting possibilities this intriguing. I expect it might end up boring, but I suppose that's only if I don't give it a chance...

Reading online about Wii Music, this is a title which most are scoffing at - and deservedly so? Maybe not - it looks deep, for whataver "it is," though I am not sure how one classifies this exactly. It looks like something I'd've had great fun with as a kid, and also looks like it is something I could enjoy playing with my girlfriend (and so, that is why I am eyeing it..) Weird looking title, but again, it's so refreshing to see Nintendo always going their own way with everything and sticking to their guns, their philosophy. It's nice to see this rubbing off a little on the competition as well (reference LittleBigPlanet, above) - trying weird things and just seeing it through to the end. This is what makes things interesting in the world, as opposed to the "static media" as I'll call it..

I bought an X-Arcade stick off a guy at work for 60 clams. This is basically a big chunk of wood with pro-grade joysticks and buttons sticking out of it, professionally manufacture of course. I have had a Hotrod for years, which is the same thing, but Hotrod's only good on PC - I feel a little out of place with that huge behemoth butted up against my workstation. The X-Arcade hooks up to my Xbox 1 as well, that being a modded Xbox with about a bazillion Mame (arcade) roms stored on it's HD. I love having that console but I hate playing arcade games with an XBox controller - the X-Arcade feels wonderful! Sucks that it took me so long to get this all figured out, but the price worked out at the end of the day. I'd still love to get a dedicated Mame Cab set up somewhere down the line, but this is a WAY more than satisfying substitute, perhaps superior in several regards. Playing Ms Pacman is STILL loads of fun, even all these years later.

Nintendo DSi, this cracks me up. What the hell is this? DSlite looks great as it is, a wonderful library, everyone loves it, etc. etc. This is kinda pushing it a little. Two cameras? No more GBA slot? Bah. It's interesting, and they will get some cool gear out for it I am sure. But let's just say I still have yet to buy any DS models at this point. I wonder how the new PSP is faring. Is there yet ANY halfway compelling reason to buy a PSP, for real? Hello? Echo-o-o-o-o-o...

how does it go, tomato

And so Roctober arrives to a blustery finish, another weary month drizzled by with little fanfare, depressing the world with it's economically troubling events, and few (if any) half-decent movie releases to sew up past a crazy-blockbuster summer. But no one is complaining about any of that. America's codpiece is tuned towards the coming elections, about a week and change to go. And of course, everyone has an opinion on the topic - and so, I am no different.

I seldom touch on politics in my blog, for several reasons, but it's always coloring my life, my mind, and all who cross my path, to be sure. When it's as relevant as it is now, I feel somewhat compelled to spit out a couple of words here or there on the topic, and so then..

"Vote Ron! Wy don't you vote? Vote, vote, vote. or you can't complain when things aren't running the way you wish they were." To the contrary. I am tired of explaining this, but I will put it out there once again - I don't vote for much the same reasons I will never by a lottery ticket, it feels like a WASTE OF TIME. If I wanna make a difference in an election, then I must do something to raise my visibility and develop my voice or something like that. Otherwise, punching a confusing card (in a state which always votes Democratic, anyway) feels somewhat pointless. But the larger issue, is the fact that it just goes against my philosophy - bearing witness to the past two elections, it has pretty much been proven to me how things work, and how much of a BS job the whole electoral process is. It just does what it wants. It makes us feel like "we have a voice, we have control" of this fiasco to some degree but honestly, it's so far out of our hands it's just not even funny. Is this a bad thing? Ummm.. well.. is it even relevant? Sure I would say "I WISH things were different and "good would prevail over evil" but at the same time, to be a superpower, to run the world "for the betterment of mankind" in the way that we do, things just sort of follow the way that they do in sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy. This is not to say that massive foreign policy arguments wouldn't be different under a democrat-controlled white house - but at this point, with all the groundwork laid down by the GOP, there's nowhere to go but up, anyway. This war we are in, whatever state you'd like to call it now, isn't going to peter out no matter who is in charge... It's not a faucet that can be turned on and off.

I will give the Dems this much, though, they may be wussier and less shrewd than the Republicans, but at least to some degree they seem a littttttle less evil. Ah well. We will see. This is all pointless anyway, because as I have maintained all along McCAIN WILL WIN THE 2008 ELECTION. That's right, look at history, look at what's happened in the past as the prior Electoral Eves drew closer, how tight those races were, and here we are again, same old business. I think we all easily forget about what John Kerry pointed out last time, "The Two Americas" - you have us, the creative dudes, the hard workers, the intellectuals, the businessmen, the trendy hipsters, etc etc. And then you have THEM. The rednecks. The old-fashioned people with much worse grammar. The people who fear Jesus, Aliens, Terrorists, all with the same ferocity. I would still say those guys have us beat like 4 to 1 easy, at least. And these aren't the folks who go out to rallies, they don't "put out the vote," they sit at home with their curtains drawn and their shotguns loaded and their grits cookin'. They mind their own, but they fear everything, and they've been taught that, they've had it beaten into them, and they beat it into their own kids likewise, and it festers, it perpetuates. The Star Wars generation can't really touch it...

And these people aren't "bad." They are just people. They are our brothers and sisters, they watch the same movies an TV that we do, but it's all viewed through a slightly different prism - one that would never ever want to vote a black man into office, I will say that. On top of being black his name is "Barack Obama." Tell me that's not the one-two punch. Yes, America professes how badly it wants change, and it knows it needs it, look at the sorry state of affairs we've got ourselves into now. But it's not going to come that dramatically, not with all the hatred and confusion and Mickey-Mouse constitution we've still got, it's our foundation, it's our backbone, and in this way it is sort of our shame. America is the great big Melting Pot, but it's being tended by a fat old white guy with a straw hat, cowboy boots and the thickest southern drawl you ever did hear.

In spite of all I say, some part of me thinks that the Republicans put McCain out there to dry. Like they send him over ("is this REALLY the best we can do?") And some crazy person decides to strap a handgrenade named Sarah Palin to his chest and pull the pin. That was some craziness if I ever did see any. All they had to do was play it straight, get some good-looking large-chinned rich goofball in there as a subordinate, some no-name, it would have been boring but it would have been safe and, dare I say, pret-ty smooth. But no, somehow they decided to embrace this whole "America needs Change" attitude as well and wanted to pick up the Lesbo Vote which Hillary left in the lurch. Well this was not the way to do it, that's for sure. Anyway, that's what's frazzled my radar. Are the Pubs trying to throw the fight? Are they leaving us in this big stinking mess with the war fallout and the economy in cinders and trying to wash their hands of the affair, "let the dems clean it up!" It wouldn't be easy for anyone to take that mess and make sense of any of it, and by the time the next election rolls around the Pubs'll be sitting mighty pretty like the old father figure "it is okay son, we can handle it from here, you gave it your best shot." I don't know, something about that feels a little believable to me. As for all their investors, constituents, etc., they have enough firewood to keep warm during the long winter, and this will just weed out the wannabee's. I don't know. Something is up.

Anyway I stick to my guns. McCain's got this one locked in spite of all the weirdness. I would prefer to see Mr. Obama taking charge in his stead. I guess we can all just watch and wait - nailbiting.

the blankets were the stairs

apologies to that band.

Friday night, 1 week prior to Halloween, a time of the year that is very scary to me for reasons other than the usual (it's the Bermuda Triangle to me! Typically when I get dumped, fired, etc - while everyone else is out carving pumpkins and dressing like freaks, I just wanna stay at home and bury myself beneath my bedsheets for like.. TWO WEEKS, my eyes peering out, waiting for the blackest clouds of fate to pass me by so I can just get on with business as usual). Oh okay it's not ALWAYS horrible, but the human brain sure loooVVvvvVVes it's patterns. So, y'know.

Late, 2:30am, doing laundry, though it's almost done and then I'm to sleep shortly. Quite tired these days, things have taken a toll on me, I am out of shape, my nerves are quite frayed, the usual whining, etc etc. I feel like an awful pill of a person to be around lately, I don't know how/why my girlfriend puts up with it, hopefully for her sake she is a bit oblivious or something 'cause I feel like a major drag these days! Still, I tease her that "she's always happy and in a good mood" and I know that I appreciate that of her, it just makes things easier sometimes when I am feeling like I just wanna napalm all the fools on the freeway...

I have weird thoughts in my head, a lot of the same garbage/flotsam and jetsam that tends tt like to resurface ad nauseum, I wonder if I will ever be free of it (probably not, I guess I am not "me" if it is not there). Once in awhile, maybe more often that not I have this shitty urge of wishing I could just press a button and replace so many things in my life (particularly myself) - though I don't really know what that accomplish, after the novelty of "new everything" then I would probably just sink back to the same way I feel anyway, only set back some paces. Maybe that ain't a good way to feel about it. I think I am just looking for some direction, some belonging, something. I have all my shit all figured out (as much as it is gonna be) and maybe that bothers me too in another way. Maybe the bottom line is that despite my age, a part of me is frozen in this permanent-immature state, waiting for that next event which woulda happened long ago anyway if some things in my life had been different. Not sure if that's a good thing, a bad thing, or totally irrelevant, it's just a feeling, maybe I am just inventing crap.

Ah, seasonal affective disorder, where are you when I need you...? On that note, I am sick sick sick (not really so dramatically so, I just view the trend as pathetic/lame) how quick we as a society are to label everything with complicated-sounding names that brand them as "debilitating conditions," things that we have no control over," limiting factors that prevent like 99 percent of us from ever wanting to aspire to be more than some half-assed schmuck who's not good for very much at all. Who are we trying to make feel better, the old and infirmed? Come on, sickness and dying is a part of life! But more so, mediocrity is as well, in fact it's something of a saving grace - limiting factors are what truly define anybody as an individual. It's what draws us together, puts the humanity into us, and still we feel so shamed for it, somehow even when it's something ("talent") that we should not feel the least bit shamed for. It's not to terribly bad now, still kind of at a comical stage, but I can see where it's going and it sure ain't good. Again, my catch-all "this is part of our design" rings in my ear and so I can't just outright lambast it, people hate their humanity sadly, and this is an expression of that, and like all things in this world that too will grow and evolve however it will. Some will take advantage of it (ad agencies, pharmaceuticals, gov't) and others will know better, ad if not that then something else anyway, just like as usual. Okay I am pretty sleepy now.

my understanding has pretty much ground to a halt

greetings, those of you who read my blog, all fifteen thousand of you. How are you guys doing, I mean I really want to know! Jennifer, have you had that mole on your tucous looked at yet? And Bill, did you resolve that squabble you had with your neighbor yet (you know, after his god bit your wife and all). To be fair, she shouldn't really have been snooping through their yard anyway, I mean honestly, it's kinda not-cool to be going through you neighbor's trash and stuff looking for.. oh, I don't know.

It's a chilly night here in Los Angeles, as I sit here at my desk in my bathroom with the heater just-turned on, sipping a coke (it's filling and I've not really got any food here). The weekend was alright, busy times as usual in my life - let's see, last week my parents were in town (1st time in 4 years) so there was a lot of running around as I wanted to make sure they had a memorable trip. We rented a car and blasted all over town. this past weekend, I was hoping to just relax ad sit on my ass and not do too much at all, as it turns out it was still rather busy anyway - though I did get a little reprieve on Sunday. I sat my ass down on the couch to watch the final sox game this evening, unfortunately they got their hides tanned by the Mental Rays from tampa bay. I am sort of glad that I don't watch professional sports very much, though it is nice to be distracted I can see my personality just getting stressed/tense from too much getting-caught-up in that kinda stuff.

A few of us went out last night, it was a full night all around - dinner at Geisha House, drinking and dancing at Beauty Bar, and then back here to my pad for Pizza and Rock Band. I guess these are the Golden Days I'll look back at someday when I am old "for real." And of course today dragged my butt over to Los Feliz to meet some friends for a very tasty lunch. Life here isn't bad, I suppose...

Anyway, on to the complaining part of the email. I do feel tired, and I feel like my life is kind of at a standstill right this moment. It seems like some forward momentum I have been cruising with has kinda ground steadily to a halt, it's not there yet but it's pretty decided. I am not saying that's altogether bad, this halt is sort of representative of that Stability which I am always fearful of, but my personality is as such that I need to constantly be in the middle of some great flux where everything is threatening to break all-hell-loose if something super-crazy doesn't get pulled off at the last minute. It's this feeling, as usual. which puts my mind into evaluatory-mode and makes me think "hmm what should I do, quit job/move somewhere else/etc" and of course my reaction to that is that I must keep a steady course; if there's not a huge pit of trouble all ready to drop on my business, then don't ask for it. Still, there's a good few circumstances in my life which do kin of wind up that way, (hey - always, to some extent, right?) though by now I feel more than capable to be able to tackle any last-minute escape plans which would have to be hatched, if need be. So, I am not looking forward to that so much - but it's good to be secure in my own confidence of "I know what I am doing."

Still - I don't know really what I WANT. I think I sort of have already achieved many of the goals I have set for myself, certainly a few bigger ones are a ways-off from being realized but a lot of the middling stuff is pretty ordered at this point. Someone sort of pointed this out to me recently, and I took it somewhat offensively (a little, I suppose) "What!! how DARE you accuse me of having my shit all figured out - clearly you do not know me, sir or madame!" Well, I suppose it is all relative, then. Anyway I look around my apartment, and a lot of the clutter has been minimized, so I guess it's a little symbolic of my mental space being a little tidier than it'd been. I guess I kind of feel like a bit of a weight has been lifted in my life work-wise, as well, and as sad as that may sound, it's absence kind of leaves me feeling a little less chaotic in the rest of my dealing with the world....

Anyway, I guess at this point i will just keep working hard and trying to keep that stuff all going as best as possible. At some point i really WILL get out of debt (one should hope) and then maybe I will shovel out for a new TV or some crap like that (not something I ever seriously consider, but it's fun to pretend like I am concerned about it, in a strange way). Sigh, sleepy. I've had much deeper things I wanted to get over in here, but instead I think I will just phase off into the ether.

rome is burning!!

You know, a friend of mine supposedly forecasted that "the world is gonna end Tuesday." Well, Tuesday has officially come and gone and the world is still here, but y'know, it is taking something of a beating right now. It's a weird feeling, this feeling of disarray - no one is quite sure what to make of it, how this has all happened, and quite what to do about it - nor what manner of times lie ahead. We kind of follow forward with quiet trepidation, the doomsayers among us clamoring the loudest, those with our delicate balance to protect just toeing the line, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but not so expectantly that we've battened down the hatches and locked up for the long winter, quiet yet.

The media has a nasty little habit of trying to drum up panic, but I see that as more reflective of human nature, really. Still, these are some unprecedented times we live in, with layers upon layers upon layers of - well, no one knows what's on the top and what's on the bottom anymore. Sometimes it feels like society is a very carefully-constructed house of cards. All these rules in place, intertwining and slipping and sliding all around one another, like some Eastern Traffic Pattern - but all it takes is for one sizeable-enough monkey wrench to full in place and gum up the works, and then it just all falls to shit.

Anyway, the natural order is kind of building up and breaking down, and the point of culture/society is to do that pretty much incrementally - not stop/start/stop/start with the slow determinedness of nature, but rather advance, then spread, then advance from more fronts, then spread some more. It's quite interesting really. Sure there'll be some time when that finds some weakness exposed as well I suppose, but it's hard to measure as compared to the regular patterns we see in nature, or at least that is what we like to tell ourselves. The ante just gets raised..

Anyway as I was saying, who knows what's to come. So the money will be all gone? Jobs disappear? People get hungry, lose their homes, submit to desperation - rioting, crime, strife? Never mind the problems on the world stage (they've been expressing themselves here and there to certain degrees) we have a big question mark about to slam into the Homeland of Tomorrow? The rest of the world is already definitely reeling from all this Stock Market BS.

Anyway, things continue with their momentum, all things, good and bad. Life goes on, as it doesn't know how to do anything else. We just take it a day at a time, and hope that those who we've placed in charge are smart enough to steer the course..

stop crying over spilled organelles

13 past twelve and yes i am at.. the office. On the weekend. for the umpteen billionth time. i have (still) been lighting, all day, with somewhat satisfactory results. The point is RESULTS, at least it is getting done (enough). See my last post about the wonderful world of lighting.

Really I guess I don't have much else to say right now. The lights are rendering and so I have a few minutes to twiddle my thumbs while i wait for the machine to not-crash, hopefully. It has been doing a lot of that, unfortunately - I sat here for a good hour and a half trying to render lights, and then it crashed (burning that time). Then I figured a much quicker solution, sorta by accident.. UPDATE it just finished rendering the lights, and then I hit the "save" button, and as I did that, it crashed (and ate my work). Wonderful.

I feel like 2008 has sort of slipped past me, unnoticed. This is truly a year where I've been kind of wrapped up in work, mostly, and let everything else kind of take a backseat, in many ways. I did get to have a good few standout moments of irregularity, to different degrees - hey life is never actually "boring" - but it's certainly not been the usual hecticness I was kind of keeping tempo with a couple of years ago. There's only so many hours in the day, and I am just one man.

I eat lunch with a few dudes at work pretty much daily. I suppose it would be wayyy cheaper to bring lunch in, but when I do that I tend to get even more withdrawn and disassociative from my fellow man, and all that entails - basically makes me feel kind of extra-crazy, the point is it is good to get out for a little chunk during the day and out of my work-cave and away from the wretched, wretched computer. Anyway we sit and eat nachos or burgers or pizza or burritos or buffalo wings whatever unhealthy thing we can get our hands on, once in awhile down it with a beer or two (or margarita or two, hmmm, could go for a bit of that right doggamn N-O-W) and we sit and whine about work and whine about women and whine about money and all that other crap that guys do, heh heh. Anyway, it's the good part of the day. So recently one of the guys was talking about all of the horrendous circumstances he'd found himself in, during his tenure living and schooling in and around Hollywood, a lot of the cliched craziness one would assume would happen on moving out here and being an artsy fellow in their early 20s, in this day and age - stories with a humorous bent to be sure, but also quite dark and sort of depressing, overall. Narrowly avoiding running in with colorful characters of ill-repute, to say the least, and finding ways down some dark, dark paths. I don't like to pepper my journal with too many specifics if it is not actually my story and I am not sure how cool other people would be with degrees of incriminating them - I have had issues with this before! - so I will leave it at that. Use your imagination. Dirty living, alright! Anyway, the kinds of stories that you love to hate, and I am no different. So I am listening to this dude spill his guts, and comparing it with my own past (as I'll do) and it really makes me appreciate the crowd I have surrounded myself with, at the end of the day. I guess we do take one another for granted at times - and hell, no one is perfect - and SURE (damned.. thing crashed AGAINNN).. ahem..SURE we do things to piss each other off now and again, to whatever consequences.. but yeah, I am constantly reminded of the fact that I have got a nice group of people around me, and that I am really lucky for that.

everything in paradise is wonnnnderful

greetings from the front gate! What's up, I do believe it's been a good month or so, at least, since I have last paid any manner of visit to this little hellhole i call "my gameblog." I guess a lot has happened, or not..

Right up a the first, what have I been playing? Answer, nooooot much. Nothing at all really. Just killing myself at the office as usual, I am lucky if i take 20 minutes out of my day while I am on the can to get in a little GBA action. Replace PER DAY with PER WEEK, per-haps, and then it's a little more accurate.

Anticipating the mega man 9 throwback release, not so much for the game itself (no way it can even be anywhere near as perfect as good ol' number two) but I am pretty interested to see what type of reception it gets from the community at large, this is a weird move to say the least. I will probably grab it as well, though to be honest all the MM's past three were getting kinda grating. Not that they were bad games, they weren't bad at all.. it was just "enough already!"

Our game is going along well enough, as usual there's a billion things I'd love to say as far as positives and negatives go, but that's what post-mortems are for. Meanwhile, I am supposed to be moving to the "dream project" as I like to call it, this coming week - it was supposed to happen (rather suddenly) last week, but got held over for various reasons. So I am a little suspicious of what is next, but I am sure it will outline shortly. Anyway, mixed feelings about all of that - I am used to working on a game until it is out the door, not working feverishly on one and then getting plucked and dropped right into a whole different universe. Hey, I can deal with it, that's my job! It's a little odd though, and kind of a new thing for me. Not a big deal though, but worth noting. I guess my beef is that with my current project, I've got a few loose ends I was planning on wrapping up, and suddenly I find myself having my hands washed of that, mostly - to what degree I am unsure, but I would expect it is pretty absolute (especially since the project I am moving to will likely not leave much headspace for external goings-on). Anyway, suffice it to say that's why I have been pulling madman-style hours at the office lately, to the displeasure of those involved in my social life...

autolabs, cacciatore

jeez lots of blog writin' from me lately. that's cause it's a lot of extra late-late-nights in the office for me these days. honestly i can't really remember the last time i was used to gettin' out of here before midnight. i consider getting home before 2am relatively a good thing. so, yeah. anyway, i am lighting now. i spend all this time building stuff, and painting the textures, and testing how it looks while playing thru - the last step of the creation process (before further testing and eventual breaking everything) is applying the nice, nice lighting which makes it all look really sweet or really bland. lighting is a pain, because you set up a bunch of lights as if they were in the real world - set their colors, the brightness, the falloff, directions, etc, all to a --very-- rough approximation of what it would look like onsceen. hey, it is something. a lot of calculation must be done in one's head, a lot of fakey stuff must be setup. there's not a real good "true lighting simulator' out there yet, just tons of tools to help you approach half-decent fakitude. when you do it right, things looks real smooth, real nice. when you don't set it up properly, all your hard work ends up looking sort of flat and chumpy and just not as awesome as it SHOULD (esp. compared to the other stuff!) So it's kind of a big tease really, especially when you are strapped for time. The upswing is that once you get the hang of it, and learn a bunch of shortcuts and things (like anything), you can put out some really nicely-lt looking things with some relative ease. Anyway, this is all very fascinating, I am sure. Hey. It's my freakin' blog alright! You don't like to hear about light attenuation? You don't wanna hear about my turkey sandwich from subway? You don't wanna know about the the fact that I have to dump some stuff in a dumpster illegally and hope not to get caught? Don't read! Yeah! YEAH!!!

Anyway, it's about quarter to two. I have a good 45 min of driving ahead of me yet. I am gonna let this light pass finish rendering, and so long as it's not all ugly when it comes out, I am gonna pack it in and go home.

more pudding for the put-ting

it is getting harder and harder to remember to write the proper month in the tagline up there. it's always my inclination to write MAY or or something. Time has officially stopped passing. It's all just one big endlessly endless month now, sand it just keeps going on. Forrrrrrevvvvvvvvar.

I had a dream that I was in a rough neighborhood last night, and the apartment building i was visiting was occupied solely by black jews. That sounds like something Steven Wright would say.. It is late, 11pm, and I am at the office still. I have been getting in (slightly) earlier these days, but I still seldom leave before midnight.. hell, before 1am. It's kind of a nightmare time of this project right now, a lot of stuff is coming together and as a result lots of arted things are having to be last-minute-fitted together differently. It's a bit of an irritating way to work, on the plus side I do think I have lots of good work in here to show in my portfolio. Still, I am a tired guy, and I have a neglected girlfriend.. and neglected friends. Hi May! Hi Skillz! Edwin! Mong! Jeff!! All you guys... remember me?? Tyler? Tyler Uppercut?

MVG?

Anyway, I suppose I will (at some point) drift back to some more semblance of a normalcy of life and society. I like to say that occasionally because it tricks me into thinking it might be true. The fact of the matter is, I am dyed-in-the-wool workaholic and at this point i need stupid shit to wrap my life and mind around, or I just don't feel right..

Maybe I could just spend more time writing..

I intended to get a regimen of exercise going and lose some weight before my folks came to visit, which is less than a month from now - well guess what, no exercise (and that's WITH having bought Wii Fit!) At least my weight and physique have stayed -relatively- stable. That's not too wonderful, but I guess it's better to maintain some general equilibrium than keep accelerating down that particular bad decline. Still, that is steadily what happens if I keep treating myself so crappily. I don't wanna really think about the mind/body/soul of 43-yr-old Ron very much, at this rate.. it's not a pretty picture.

As I might have mentioned, I am supposed to move onto "the other project" next week, which was supposed to actually have happened this week (and so, I don't know if it's for-sure happening or what). The whole notion is bittersweet, for a few very valid reasons. Anyway change is always a good bit of a headache, so whatever happens, I look forward to getting on with it and moving on with the next stage, whatever that may bring. I fear it usually since it's never "an easy transition" in any of these cases. When I get involved with any kind of project, it completely occupies so many of my waking hours, in many ways - like I said, I cannot exist without having "some stupid shit" to wrap my mind around, but it's usually got some pretty good highs and lows in there.

I went out drinking late last week, I might have mentioned.. I got really drunk, unintentionally but really after all this time I SHOULD GODDAMNED KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT...! I concede, I am an alcoholic, not full-bore but definitely some marked degree. I have been way way better about going out with any frequency/doing dumb shit in general in the past.. well, couple years, really, compared to what I'll call my hayday - but the past few occasions, I have made up for it with some pretty crummy judgement and expensive bartabs. Nothing truly ass-kicking, but enough that should serve as a good warning about "self, get your act together if you don't wanna have some pain-in-the-ass to deal with," which I have a good couple of already lining up to shake muh hands anyway. I don't truly regret such experiences, it's important to get humbled and reminded of ones' limits, fallacy, etc once in awhile, keeps you in check. Even so, good not.. to.. push it.

Anyway the show was fun. I wish I were heading out right now, it's goddamned Wednesday night! I miss the salad days, Man!!!

DEMO CRACK

welcome back to my mind, friends. 1st of all, let me wish a (couple days late) happy bday to my brother, who celebrated that on Friday. He and I are both at the point where we are not too excited to have "another birthday" pass, as it represents a whole lot of crappy things in general (ain't getting any younger!) but in light of what he has been wrestling with, career-wise and all, the past few years - I am sure glad to see he is on a really good path right now, I am very proud of him and glad that things are going more his way now. He took some BS from everyone in that period as well, but he stuck to his guns and did it how he wanted to, and it is working out at last - and that's great!

Also a happy bday to my buddy aaron, we all went out to the bar last night to get the gang together to celebrate. It was good to see everyone, a few faces there who I seldom see (some not for a real long time!) so that's always cool. It was a good time, though I must admit I wasn't really in the mood to be socializing just then, much less getting shittery faceried (I decided to be the DD that night). A bunch of my friends did throw a bunch of drinks down their throats though, and I am sure more than a few of them (who should know better) drove home anyway. Yeah, this is the part where I start proselytizing, but not without good reason, enough people in our group have had a few shitty consequences from that bullshit, just call a cab alright? Whatever, that is how it goes.

Yeah, so my mood is pretty much down in the crapper right about now. I mean, life's not bad, there's a bunch of good things going on overall, lots of things to look forward to as well, but right now some things in life are really kicking my butt - nothing too terrible or life-threatening, not by any stretch of the imagination - but still enough to get my nerves all completely whacked-out and sore. I just need that stuff to settle down. There's some very simple things I have sought in my life for a long time, things which seem like they should be pretty easy to come by - things which seem like almost everyone else I know always have got pretty damned well-patted down. Not EVERYONE I know, but enough of them, that it makes me feel like "well what the hell is wrong with me, what do I have to do to get this part of my life figured out?" The answer, honestly, is pretty easy - do the best you can, the way you know - try to be open-minded, step-up if need be, just don't be brash, don't be stupid. Keep your head up and try to keep the big picture in focus, and don't worry about the shitty little speedbumps, no matter how obnoxious and jarring they are. Okay, this is the part of the journal where I just give myself a pep-talk, don't mind me. The other end of this is, when you go through some shit - especially some cyclical shit - of course it's gonna rattle you, and eventually mold you. Of course it's gonna set you up to act a certain way, and this makes sense too. So if shit is gonna get you down, don't fight it, just wallow, repair, and move on, and no shame in that. I am only human..

I didn't go into the office this weekend. i could have (and in some ways, should have) but honestly I am super-fatigued from work right now, i really need some distance from it. I feel like my career and i are having a little bit of a lover's spat right now-- anyway I will throw myself back into it as soon as the morning gets here, and to be honest I have a mountain of things to tackle this week. In fact I have a huge question mark of mountainous things looming on the horizon, generally. Just keep plowing on...

So we went to Ikea, the particle-board furniture land of good times, a couple of weeks ago. I bought a new chest of drawers, which has sat unassembled in 2 boxes in my apartment - until yesterday. I bought the same make as my existing one, the one which has slowly and steadily been deteriorating (the result of some shoddy construction on my own part, some years ago). Assembled the new guy yesterday, and pulled the Oldie Olson out of the closet, and the old boy finally just completely fell apart in so doing. It felt like a sad metaphor for some things in my life, I have lots of half-assed ghetto-quality things in my employ, across the board - things which function (mostly) as they should, but are pretty close to completely falling into complete, irreparable collapse. It sounds a little dramatic, as usual I exaggerate, but i can certainly think of a good couple instances which this would completely apply to. the point is, I DID get a fresh new start with this new chest of drawers, a pretty stupid and perfunctory part of life of course, but one that is nice and makes that beginning part of the day slightly less of a pain in the neck to deal with. If only everything else was so easily replaceable.

Also at Ikea, I had my eye on a little side-table to put next to my couch - I have been wanting to do this for awhile now, returning there today I found the usually out-of-stock model that interested me was available in the "defects/floor models" area. A lot of that stuff is usually pretty ugly damaged, this one wasn't bad at all (a little nick on the side) and it was half off the usual $70 pricetag as a result, so why not. I grabbed the sucker and brought it home, slid it appropriately beside my couch. Well - it's alright. Though I am glad to have picked it up (and so cheap, as well!) it definitely does not do much to help the decor of my home. Granted my place is pretty slobby generally (that may be a certain girl's fault) but I do take some pride in having at least a sensible and symmetrical layout to the main centerpiece of my apartment home (please use a gay voice when reading that sentence - thanks). Seriously, it's pretty far down the line of importance, but having less clutter and a decent design of one's home does go a long way in helping to maintain a feeling of calm, of order in one's own head. I am quite a hypocrite when I say these things, I know this is true - refer to the whole paragraph above about all my falling-apart ghetto items and such - but it is nice to make an effort, I think, At least, it does make me feel better.

I don't have the cleanest (or messiest, on the other hand) apartment by a longshot, but someday, whenever I truly have my shit together - and this day WILL COME, one of these years!!!! - I would like to spend some money and actually put a decent little pad together. Just a nice space that is comfortable and looks cool and is all well-organized and neat. I am not too far from it, but I have a lot of levels to pass through before I get close. I definitely am not gonna be able to be concerned with this stuff for some.. years...!!

I guess I bring this all up as it sorta resonates in my brain - I am getting close to 34 years old now. I make a decent salary and have a reasonable residence in one of the most sought-after cities in the world. I have a girlfriend, a job, my car runs, there's health insurance. I don't party THAT much (anymore). I kick my ass to do a good job, at least I think so. So then, when will I quit lingering and get to that next level - or am I just due for some horrible cosmic slap in the face to watch it all unravel in one fell swoop? Or is that due just after I "make it," if even? This is life, right? We are always waiting to get to that level, the plateau where we can relax and look down over all we've traversed, and rest on our laurels, as they say (what a stupid saying, where does that shit even come from anyway...) Am I losing my ability to know when I am "there?" Almost 2am. Perhaps it's a good time to think about wrapping up the night, getting ready for bed.

pARSe

hey, happy planes crashing into buildings day. now that would make quite a cake. wait 34 more years and it will be totally in style for our culture to be truly tacky and tasteless about that particular subject (for real, not out of mere irony, i mean).

it is late and i am looking at a small picture of me drunk, somewhere, yelling at someone and pulling a banner off of a wall, or something. things are weird, the past week has been weird, i always say things are always weird (and they generally kind of are, by default) and that makes me not want to state such things anymore, but it's part of my process to revisit and rerevisit it, so i will continue to do so until my hands and eyes no longer function. Speaking of which, did you know that the venerable Roger Ebert has lost the ability to speak for some time now (stroke i think) and yet he continues to review movies, well at least he can still view and write about them.

yeah i too am getting old. one day the front page of Yahoo! will read "Optimus Prime dead, for real." Honestly, wouldn't it have been somewhat remarkable (though sad) if Peter Cullen passed away in 2005? How come 2005 still sounds very much like the far-off future, though it's getting on 3 and a half years ago already?

There's a lot of kerfludgery flopping through my head right now. Tonight I ducked out of working late to have dinner with my girlfriend and her buddy and her buddy's new husband - they actually got married this morning, which is strange, "whats up - WIFE!" Man it is weird to think about that. My girlfriend and I will mention it every now and again, a real sticking point is that she doesn't want to be May Alpert - she jokes that i should take HER last name. Then my name would be Ron Long. Most people consider such a concept to be emasculating, despite the double-standard, but personally I think it would be sort of amazing if my name really were Ron Long. I look at my driver's license and try to picture that. It would be pretty rad.

So I was being, uh.. intimate, shall we say, in that way a man can be with his computer this evening, and I moved my foot and felt a piece of paper fall off of it. How did a paper fall on my foot, my concentration broke long-enough to wonder, and I looked down. The piece of paper turned out to be a cockroach, and he scuttled away as I observed him.

Man, I hate roaches. I have a thing about the creepy-crawlies. I think bugs look super-cool, design wise, but I still have this primal "ewwwww" response to such things, I know they are all over the place and shitting and peeing and spitting on everything everywhere, and shedding pieces of their little antennae and thoraxes, and I don't care so long as I don't see it (out of sight, out of mind). But yeah I don't like to see them near me, or near my food, or ON me. So when I see a fuckin' cockroach clambering off my goddamned naked foot, my first reaction is "all right now that there is pretty fuckin' gross," and the next reaction, immediately following, is "all right now you are gonna fucking die, you abomination of nature!" Now, roaches move pretty fast in my experience. For such a low form of life, they have a pretty hardy hide, a pretty damn smooooooth command of gliding over damn near any terrain, and a pretty good notion of what is the best escape route from any damn situation. I was expecting this dude to get out clean - but something in my brain was especially-designed to seek out and destroy such vermin, NO MATTER THE COST. He matched me as I moved across the carpet, scurrying in parallel with me, hoping to find a crevice, a hole, anything to get back and out and away - he went for the door, I saw a cardboard box and dropped it on his ass. Expecting him to have whizzed away, i picked it up for a peek and saw him still moving, but definitely fazed - the dude was hurting..

He retreated behind the bookcase, between some old AA batteries which had long since fallen behind there - I lifted the heavy bookcase, my girlfriend's long-ignored LSAT study book in my hand, it's large spine eager to smash some bug pelvis. I brought it down hard, with the full back cover squarely landing on the little bugger. Then I smooshed the book with my foot, a good couple of times - then got a paper towel to grab the messy remains, half-expecting the destroyed creature to somehow leap from my clutches and escape down some unseeable hidden passageway. I flushed the poor dude, cleaned up the book, and got back to my porn - case closed. A busy night indeed.

The internet is a messed up place. It is truly the box of pandora, i hate it, i hate it. it gives, I mean it gives us so much - but it also takes away. i wish it would just leave, like right now. I often see things in there that i wish I could unsee, but can't. i am not talking specifically about the usual primal things one's mind may race too (though those are covered as well, i suppose) but the deeper, more dramatic things that can jostle one's mind. We are too small and simple to deal with the juggernaut this has become. I seriously wanna bring my box to the office and leave it there, so there's no connection when I get home. It makes me feel so trapped.

I found a weird website tonight, not sure how/why. I had a bizarre event in my life with a particular person some years ago, and I found this person's website, and it just made my head go a little sideways with "huh? what?" It's like you have that part of your brain which fills in the gaps "oh this probably happened, or that" and then the stupid internet gives you a fucked-up window into the actual reality, but that window is so limited and out-of-context, so you are just as confused before but differently, and in an unsettling fashion. Anyway, whatever. This always happens.

I am getting off my project at work in 2 days. I have been working on this game for 1.5 years, very very intimately, and now it's over. Well it's not over, but she and I are through, and I am instantly going to start seeing someone new, her name is Eileen. I have seen her around a little, and I don't really know if she is my type - initially, I got in with Ape hoping to find a way to get to Eileen, but Ape sort of grew on me in the way that bad relationships do. She devoured me. God, I hate relationships. Well, now Ape has dumped me but strangely Eileen wants to see how I handle. She's got lots of suitors, and I don't imagine she'll notice me much at first - but we will see. Personally, I have had enough with these women. I just wanna sit on the beach all day and be left alone while they enjoy their stupid drama without me.

I see a cricket cruising by on the floor. He's harder to kill, he hops. I am gonna get my laundry out of the dryer and get ready for bed, adios fools.

go die in hell, pigs!!

yum. they just brought some BBQ in for dinner. that was some tasty food right there. sadly when i am eating dinner at work, it means i am in for (ya guessed it) another late night.. i seldom seem to leave this place before midnight, these days. But all i really wanna do anyway is complain about working long hours, alright?

drunk journal entry - well i went out with my buddy last saturday night. I'd not been out in about a month, and i certainly hadn't seen him in a good bit longer than that. We hit a place that was new to me, which he liked - it wasn't bad, just small and uppity. i like the trashier, homier places myself - that's the kind of guy i am. they're friendlier. They have the type of people arond who actually might be interesting to talk to. i guess it goes to say you could find that similar type, easily, at the more classy places, but i guess i kind of have a permanent chip on my shoulder. i have got over it, but it'll always leave kind of a lasting imprint i suppose - so what, it is still fun to go to different places. You just kind of go with your vibe.... Anyway we drank a bit too much and I ended up with one of those bar bills that makes you cough quite sharply when you surprisedly pull it out of your wallet the next day, but as i said - I had not been out partying for quite a long time, so all told I suppose that will even out. Anyway I am not gonna lose sleep over it, besides I have been mega-grinding at the office lately (have I mentioned this?) so I guess I am allowed a little compensation, of sorts...

i am thinking how nice it would be to get out tonight, as well - it being thursday of course - and I am pretty much pushed to my threshold with thinking about business and life and all the usual stuff right now. Escapism is such a sweet, sweet fruit - however, not without it's consequences. Anyway, I might get a fire under my ass to pack it in and screw it and do it, but i very much doubt it. It would make me happy, but... I doubt it.

I don't know how many of my peers actually read this, and of those who I deal with in my day-to-day, but I wanna apologize if i have been excessively assholish lately. I mean, I am never really that much of a pain in the ass, when I am at my worst - I like to think - but I have been told by more than a few people that i can be a good bit of a drag at times. Though I will always say 'who cares what everyone thinks' well now is now different, but if I am kinda being a pill and you have to deal with it on something of a normal basis, then for whatever it is worth, i do apologize. I do mean to try to turn it down, I just need something to help alleviate - take the edge of. God, I would make such a good stoner, right? Oh well, too late.

The state of affairs in the political world have got me good and riled right about now. I am watching it from the sidelines, feeling a distinctive mixture of fascination and disgust. Seriously, I have such shame that people can be so blind and stupid - I guess it all makes sense, we are still pretty early on in our cultural history, coupled with the fact that there's always gonna be a gulf between the smart, rich minority and the expanses of idiots. As usual I will lay it down that "people are not genuinely stupid, they have so much potential" but the system does a wonderful job of keeping EVERYONE down, and it does so for it's own sustenance. That's the model, and for our society to continue to work this way it must be steadfastly adhered to. It's alright though I like to sit here at my desk and pretend I am a smart fella with valid opinions on all these things, at the end of the day I am still kicking my ass (quite heartily) only to make other people, who don't even SEE or KNOW me, slightly more rich while they sit back and shoot golf balls into little holes. If I could break my program, I sure would - I would run away - but the best I can do is try to erode it, while simultaneously becoming more set in my ways "as the cement continues to harden." Don't you just love equilibrium?

So yeah, these upcoming election debates and further process will certainly be interesting to watch. It's exploding with kind of a cartoony amount of drama. i have some stuff to say about it, but for now, i will be gettin' back to work...