Current Ramblings
Tuesday, November 30, 2004
Christmas List: Addendum, and Some Other Ramblings
Just a couple things I wanted to stick on there, in categories I left out last time:
CDs; or, where you get to make fun of my lame music, more or less in reverse order of guilty-pleasure-ness:
* Postal Service, "Give Up"
* NOFX, "The War on Errorism"
* Snow Patrol, "Final Straw"
* Green Day, "American Idiot"
* Dashboard Confessional, "A Mark, A Mission, A Brand, A Scar"
* Switchfoot, "The Beautiful Letdown"
* Also, I would kinda like the "Shaun of the Dead" soundtrack, having learned that it has an exclusive Ash track on it, but it's only available as an import. However, that might be a really nice thing to look out for on a trip to England... :)
Books, which somehow I don't get enough of working at a bookstore:
* The Bone complete collection, which Mid-Ohio-Con's Jeff Smith love has made me hanker for.
* Dinobot Hunt, the Titan UK Transformers collection that I'm still missing.
* The Dreamwave Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover, which I also need to be all collector-y.
And that's that.
Sometimes, when you look back on the behavior of adults around you when you were a kid, things that seemed strange and nonsensical suddenly make sense. And then sometimes you come to the conclusion, in your newfound adult wisdom, that the adults involved were sick and/or insane. I was thinking back today on my high school and their hat policies. Around 10th grade I wore hats all the time, and though we had to take them off in class some of my friends in other grades said they couldn't imagine me without one. I had a variety, though there were a few favorites, including a beaten up, navy and gray old knit cap with a Transformers puff-sticker decal on it that Billy dug up from his house. By 11th grade, though, our school had decided that hats were a scourge to proper education and that none would be tolerated in the school building during the school day. Now, this was a public school, and one where, like many high schools, problems like smoking, sex, and drug use were prevalent. But apparently the numerous kids smoking in the bathrooms were nothing compared to the disruption and delinquency caused by those of us who dared wear hats between periods. The school administrators bragged about office walls covered in confiscated hats, not to be returned until the end of the school year. Security people who should have been checking out that group of cheerleaders smoking in the girls' bathroom between classes were too busy scanning the crowd for those who dared test their authority, who dared question the seriousness of their threats against their headwear. In retrospect their obsession with hats was absurd, bordering on some kind of sick power-mad hat fetish. It continued through my graduation, and to this day the administrators likely sit in their offices during first period, masturbating over the look on that poor boy's face as his new Linkin Park cap was swiped from his head as he entered the building, to be locked away for 6 long months until the end of the school year.
I had two things happen to me at work today which merit blogging for posterity. I picked up the phone today, greeting the caller with my customary cheerful "Half Price Books, Bethel Road." The fellow on the other end asked, "Is this Bethel Sawmill?" This is a pretty common identifier, as we're at the corner of Bethel and Sawmill roads, so I said, "Yep." And he proceeded to explain to me that he sold chain lubricant, and that he had been advised to call around to some sawmills, since they would need lubricant for the chains that pulled things into their kilns. I blinked to myself for a moment, then explained to the poor man that Bethel/Sawmill was our LOCATION, and that we didn't HAVE kilns. We're a BOOKSTORE. He was pretty nice about it. Though while I'm sure there was a sawmill on Sawmill Rd. at some point, I don't think there's currently a Bethel Sawmill, and I have no idea why, of all the stores at that busy intersection, he got the number for us.
Also, some guy who was selling us stuff asked me out on a date, and he totally wasn't creepy and was possibly even close to my age, which is a major improvement over what I generally deal with there. Hell, if I wasn't otherwise occupied, I would have taken him up on it. He was that not creepy.
posted@2:09 AM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Sunday, November 28, 2004
We Are All Adults Here
(But first, a quick note: Transformers: Legends is out now, and I strongly recommend anyone so inclined to go find themselves a copy. This is the payoff for buying those ghastly "adult novels" iBooks put out. Sometimes you just have to be patient and support something long enough to let it get better. Though yes, I realize this concept was an abyssimal failure when I applied it to Dreamwave. But this...I cannot remember the last time I grinned so much reading a Transformers story, and I'm sure it's been longer still since it was because it was actually a solidly enjoyable story and not just from fangirlish glee.)
Yesterday was the very first time I have ever attended a convention by myself. I have always had at least one and in recent years a gaggle of friends to go to things like Mid-Ohio-Con with me. But Steve-o was out of town, Walky...works at TRU, and Graham just didn't feel like going. Admittedly, we didn't have anybody TF-related to pester this year like our previous merciless harassment of Marv Wolfman, but I still wanted to go. After all, I had asked for the Saturday after Thanksgiving off work, and you just don't do that in retail without a very good reason. As it turned out, it wasn't a bad choice. Shortly after arriving I ran into some guys who recognized me from online, so I chatted with them for a while about the future of OTFCC and other assorted Transformers geekery. Then I attended the panel about working as part of a comic creator collective, which featured my friend and coworker Matt Kish. (There, Matt, I'm mentioning you! ;) ) I had noticed looking over the panel schedule the night before that he was hosting a surprising number of panels, so we shared convention war stories for a bit after the panel. I cruised the exhibitor room and was struck by just how much T&A there was. I don't know why, after over ten years reading comics, including the Image era, this should surprise me, but it did a little. There were also a lot of artists of serious artistic merit, but they were easily drowned out by the boobies. So, not really intending to shell out the cash for art anyway, I headed back to the dealer room, bought myself the first Cowboy Bebop soundtrack and a Christmas present for someone, and decided to brave one of the largest McDonald's in the United States on Black Saturday. I don't recommend it. I got back to the convention (stopping at the Friends of Lulu table to buy their anth book on the way) in time to catch the "Developing the Feminine Character" panel, featuring...the woman who played Lois Lane in the 50s Superman show and the woman from Tron. But hey, I got to sit down. I ran into Jeff later, who I previously thought of as "Jeff from the Laughing Ogre" but who will now be "my friend Jeff", because anybody who will go through a box of yaoi dojinshi with you is truly a friend. I also got asked if I was over 18 not once but thrice, first by an Asian man as I poked at some stacks that I only realized then were hentai dojinshi, then by Jeff's friend as we shared questionable jokes, and again by a guy who was easily 5 years my junior at the table with the yaoi. Yow. So Jeff and I shopped until the show was about to close, then I called it a night with the Cowboy Bebop theme carrying me home.
On the subject of dojinshi, I looked up the URL to a legendary site called Happy Hentai Home after I got home last night, becasue it came up in conversation. Happy Hentai Home is a store site, and while the site itself doesn't have anything beyond smallish cover scans of (primarily hentai) dojinshi, the Engrish descriptions of the books are priceless. One of my favorites is for a Street Fighter book: "Chung Li ( game character on the cover page) is licking a male genital and takes all extreme amount of protein riched liquid in her mouth. She takes a position of dog like pose and asks putting a big one in it." The whole site proceeds in about that same fashion. The main site has taken down the index page for most of it, though the "Doujin For Girls" (primarily yaoi and stuff like Sailor Moon) remains and is also a comedy goldmine. But the actual pages for the rest of the site remain, so through the magic of the web archive you can still visit them. I strongly recommend both the Street Fighter and Sailor Moon sections.
posted@5:44 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Wednesday, November 24, 2004
Channeling Bruckheimer
Driving across the desolate plains of Ohio somewhere near Upper Sandusky, I flipped through the radio stations and landed on a news report talking about the ridiculously bad weather throughout much of the country on through some sick coincidence the busiest travel day of the year, when millions of people like myself were out driving or flying or otherwise leaving the safety of their homes. Tornadoes in Texas, snowstorms in Missouri and headed straight for my own location, massive storms throughout the southeast. The news report ended, and, hitting the seek button again, I found a station just starting up AC/DC's "Highway to Hell". I'll never refuse some AC/DC on a road trip, but as I looked back at the busy four-lane highway stretching out through the bleak grey curtain of rain ahead of me, I couldn't help but think, "This would make a perfect beginning to a disaster movie. Start the opening credits."
posted@5:54 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Back Friday.
We're heading to Troy, MI to be with Graham's family for Thanksgiving tomorrow morning. We'll be back for me to work on Black Friday, then we're going to Mid-Ohio-Con on Saturday. (Ron, are you going to that? Walky's gotta work and Steve'll be out of town.) Happy Thanksgiving to all you Americans and happy Thursday to the rest of the world!
posted@1:33 AM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Sunday, November 21, 2004
And thus my tormet began...
Woo! My DS shipped!
...to my mom!
...and I can't have it until Christmas.
*sob*
I went to Target tonight thinking I might see one in package to drool over, and also with the much more attainable goal of buying one of those cases of tasty Jones Soda they've taken to carrying. The shelf was berift of DSes, however, so I drooled on the demo model for a bit before leaving with my delicious soda and some My Little Ponies. Walky says his store had a lot of them when he left, so maybe I'll drop by to molest theirs later.
I'd like to take a moment out of my handheld gaming geekery to address a worrisome trend I've noticed while running the Religion section at my store, specifically Christian diet books. Books like The Weight Down Diet, The PRISM Weight Loss Program, and the ubiquitous T. D. Jakes' Lay Aside the Weight, among numerous others, all get God involved in our culture's relentless struggle to make you hate yourself and your body. I'm not a religious person, but I can't help but criticize these things with a religious perspective. Did being fat become some kind of sin? Did somebody other than God give you that metabolism? Doesn't God love you even if you can't get rid of that last 10 pounds, and really, shouldn't everybody else? It makes me want to write my own book, drawing from all the parts of the Bible that talk about how you are the way God made you. I will call it God Wants You to Be Fat.
Though on the subject of disgusting-by-their-own-standards religious books, I'm bothered every time I see a copy of God Wants You to Be Rich, which yes, I did totally rip my title off from. Once again, I'm not up 100% percent on my Christianity, but didn't Jesus have a lot of good things to say about poverty? Do monks traditionally take a vow of affluence? Yeah, I didn't think so.
In other news, someone is way too into Chobits.
posted@8:12 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Saturday, November 20, 2004
Victory!
HA! My superior immune system defeated Walky's formidible California germs in a mere 24 hours! I reign supreme!
posted@6:20 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Friday, November 19, 2004
Bleh.
Walky gave me his California germs. Bleh.
It seems like it would be very surreal to be in a band and have a cartoon made about you in another country in a language you barely know. Yeah, I'm talking about Puffy AmiYumi.
posted@10:35 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Thursday, November 18, 2004
Acquisitions
Every three months at work we get a profit-based bonus check. In my two years there I've seen them range anywhere from $50 to close to $500. But they're a random factor, so I try not to make any plans based on them. The one that showed up on Monday, however, was quite good, so I spent yesterday and today (well, today as in Wednesday, since I'm typing this in the middle of the night as usual) spending large quantities of it. I found myself on a few occasions cursing my Christmas list, much as I did leading up to my birthday. "Oh!" I would think to myself, "I could finally get Energon Prime! No, wait, I put it on my Christmas list..." I would mull things over a bit more, then think, "I could go to Charley's on my dinner break, then run across the street to Toys R Us and see if they have Ricochet in yet! No," I would admonish myself after a moment's deliberation, "he's on my Christmas list too." It did, naturally, occur to me that if my parents hadn't already preordered me my beloved Nintendo DS, I would have now had the funds to stand in line in front of Target at 6AM a week and a half from now and buy it on the release date. Curse you, cruel hand of fate! But I still found plenty of good things to do with it:
1) I bought a new coat, since my foo-foo glam coat looks about how you'd expect a tan suede coat to look after two years of heavy use. It's a nice dark-grey wool peacoat from Old Navy, which all my friends thought was great because they're boring guys.
2) New jeans, also from Old Navy.
3) Mirage, who I hadn't bought yet, but Meijer still had, and I know everybody thinks Dreadwing is so much better and prettier, but Mirage is the one in the show and he's got the colors that match Sharkticon and make them sort of a Decepticon Naval Team. And he's a character, even if that character is just Tidal Wave again. I swear, I'd be 500% more inclined to buy redecos if they'd just put the bios back on the boxes.
4) Also, Duststorm (the last combiner limb out now that I hadn't picked up) and Shield Breaker (the last Xevoz I needed to be all caught up).
5) The Martini print from my last post and the frame it's in. The print ended up not costing me anything becasue they give you some store credit on your employee ID card on your anniversary, which I had forgotten. It's now in my kitchen.
6) Shockblast and Battle in a Box Magnus and Treadshot for, respectively, Malin and Fin, which I'm being paid back for so they really don't count.
7) Some new undies.
8) Also, today when we went to pick up comics it turned out the Laughing Ogre had overordered the new 20th Anniversary Don mega-litho, so they were selling them for $15 each instead of the usual $25. So I bought that and, later, a frame at Meijer. I moved the Transformers: The Movie poster to the hallway across from the Death's Head art and put the litho behind the couch instead.
9) Also also, I bought lots of food. Mmmmmmm, Long John Silver's.
Now I have to go back to Saving Mode so I can actually get some people Christmas presents. :)
posted@1:23 AM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Wednesday, November 17, 2004
GEEK
The first person to figure out why I bought this wins this week's Geek Prize.
(Though it's not that hard, really.)
posted@2:20 AM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Sunday, November 14, 2004
JUST TOUCH HIM
Some meaningless ramblings here, bear with me...
After glancing at an article on IGN's Nintendo DS site about some stores getting their demo models in, I made a point while I was hunting for toys with Graham tonight (Found Beachcomber and Mega-Dinobot, but I have no money so I'll play with his. :) ) to check the electronics departments for it. It was the third store we went to, the shiny new Wal-Mart on Georgesville Rd, that actually had one out to be touched. I TOUCHED IT. *drool* They had the Metroid demo that comes with it set up, naturally, and I got to poke at it for a little bit before Graham got tired of standing there with nothing to do. But I NEED. The graphics were impressive, the display really does benefit from being backlit instead of frontlit like the SP, and OMG IT WAS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL THING...
*pant* *pant*
I did actually start writing my Universe story after the previous post about writer's block. I feel an unquenchable need to write the next part of it with an actual pencil and paper, though. I don't know why. It just needs to be written that way. Maybe on Tuesday when I'm off work and Graham's in school I can curl up on the couch with my notebook and take care of that business. I'd be sorta tempted to use that need for really paper interaction to work on it during lunch breaks at work, but, well, I'm in the middle of a book.
Said book being the novel version of the notorious Japanese action-horror-teensploitation movie Battle Royale. We watched Ron's import DVD of the movie (after Nate hacked his DVD player to be region free) at our New Year's party a couple years ago, so when the book popped up at work I snatched it up for a good gory read of the source. (The novel came first.) The translation is loyal to the point of being slightly awkward, which isn't much of a surprise since it's published by Viz, but if you're used to dealing with translated manga and the like the going won't be too rough. And it's a really intense read. For those who aren't familiar with it, the concept is that, under a totalitarian Japanese government, each year a few classes of 15-year-old students are picked at random for something called "The Program". The class is taken to a remote location, each student is given a random weapon ranging from an Uzi to a kitchen fork, and they are released to kill each other. Only one is allowed to survive; if there is more than one student remaining when time is up, all survivors are killed. It's a really hard book to put down. I find myself milking every second out of the end of my lunch breaks to get to the end of whatever battle I'm in the middle of. Will the unsuspecting student realize they can't trust Mitsuko in time? Will Shinji's plan work? Will Shuya find Noriko and Shojo? Will Kazuo show up and kill everybody? I recommend it, assuming you're not squeamish. And I gotta finish so I can concentrate on my fic.
posted@11:34 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Friday, November 12, 2004
And a bonus meme.
Your Lightsaber is Blue
Blue is often associated with depth and stability.
It symbolizes trust, loyalty, wisdom,
confidence, and truth.
What Colored Lightsaber Would You Have?
brought to you by Quizilla
posted@11:12 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Christmas List
Some people (okay, mostly Graham's mom) have been wanting some idea of what I want for Christmas. Usually I'll just set up an Amazon wish list, but they don't even have a DS section up yet, so poo on them. So here, complete with links:
Video Games:
Nintendo DS:
* Feel the Magic: XY/XX
* Super Mario 64 DS
Game Boy Advance:
* Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories
* Final Fantasy I&II: Dawn of Souls
* Megaman Zero 2 - or 3 if that isn't around anymore
* Final Fantasy Tactics Advance
GameCube:
* Megaman X Command Mission
* Pokemon Box - though this is only available from PokemonCenter.com
DVDs I Want and/or Need:
* The last Transformers G1 set, Season 3 Part 2/Season 4
* The first Transformers: Armada DVD set - Yay Mini-Cons!
* Invader Zim Vol. 3: Horrible Holiday Cheer
* The second and third Machine Robo DVDs - but those might be kinda hard to find off Amazon
* Oh yeah, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Toys:
* Energon Optimus Prime - No, I don't have him yet.
* Energon Megatron
* Ricochet - G1 reissue Toys R Us exclusive
* Invader Zim figures - The only ones that seem to be out so far are Hot Topic exclusives, though
Clothes:
(These are admittedly all things from online stores. Anything with Invader Zim or Nightmare Before Christmas or Hello Kitty or size-small men's Transformers shirts or large kids' shirts or assorted other things that aren't covered in logos would also be awesome. I'm only so picky. Or pants. Pants are also good. I'm a 5/6.)
* Mr. Period from Penny Arcade
* Any of these three tees from ThinkGeek.com to celebrate my new path in school :)
* And CartoonNetwork.com's store has nice Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends and Megas XLR kids' shirts. (They don't seem to have much adult stuff in small. :( )
Oh, and Hot Topic's site also had this Invader Zim record, which would be awesome if anybody found one.
But you guys know me. I'll be happy with whatever people want to get me. :)
posted@10:56 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
Hee hee.
No, I don't usually just post other people's jokes from the channel, but I can't get over this one...
[Monzo] And - as in shot #5 - Signal Flare seems to be intently focusing his radar dish on their backsides.
[McFly] Does he then create another Energon Star?
[Monzo] "Honey, your bumper is so fine, I spontaneously generate a condensed form of an unstable energy source."
Also, info on the final form of the Nintendo DS. I droooooooool. "Touch the Touch Screen to continue..." *whimper* And you tell it your birthday!
posted@1:08 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
The first sentence is always the hardest.
Those who keep up with my occasional bouts of fanfic have probably realized that I'm having one heck of a dry spell lately. I haven't finished a story since my little Armada one-off, The Last Mini-Con, and that was a good...damn, I don't even want to think about it. Two years? Almost right on two years. Last year was the first year I had not a single new thing eligible for ATT's "Trannies" since I joined the internet fandom circa 1997. (And yet I still got five votes for "Best Fanfic Writer Ever", possibly just due to #wiigii! ballot-stuffing, but I still think it's reasonable grounds to declare retirement.) I've decided I need to start on one of my several ideas now that Graham's back in school, and I've decided the Universe story I've been wanting to write is a good starting point. It's not as overwhelming as my Armada ideas, and it's easier for me to swing into than the really complex, high-concept affair I had planned for my next Firestormers story. But now I'm at a loss. It seems more often than not that the single hardest sentence to write in a story is the very first one. This is actually what's held me back on a lot of my stories, the daunting task of simply writing the opening paragraph, deciding where in the continuum of the story to actually begin telling it. I feel very strongly, though, that once I find that perfect opening for this Universe story (predictably starring Air Raid and Fireflight, for those who might be interested) the rest will come gushing out of me.
In other news, I registered for classes at Columbus State last week. Look! I'm a student!
I even got a student discount when I went to see "The Incredibles" this weekend! (And it was amazing, don't even get me started, just go see it already.) I'm really thrilled to be going back to school. I'm registered for two classes this quarter which will take up three nights a week. I'm taking PC Applications (the beginning computer class for people who don't need "Computer Literacy" class first) and an Algebra class. While I got perfect scores on both the writing and reading parts of the placement test, in math I performed about like you'd expect someone who has not had an advanced math class in 8 years to perform. So I have to take Algebra I and II before I can start the computer-major math course, but that's okay. I'm really determined to make this work. And textbooks are all kinds of thrilling when someone else is paying for them. I have a shiny new TI-84 Plus, and I still need to go to Target and pick up a nice thick notebook, some cheap pens and mechanical pencils, and maybe one really nice pen with a gel grip. This is going to be awesome. And I'm hoping having paper in front of me all the time will help a little with my aforementioned writer's block. But hopefully not to the detriment of my learning like the last time I was in school. Ah heh.
(Oh, and in case anybody was wondering, I'm just skipping political commentary altogether right now. I just don't have it in me. Give me a few weeks.)
posted@1:36 AM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Friday, November 05, 2004
Bitch.
(I can totally see Slingshot going around calling everybody "bitch". And occasionally getting his ass kicked for it.)
posted@5:24 PM by:Trixter: 0 comments
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
Hate.
You do not FUCKING change someone's FUCKING work schedule that has been POSTED for DAYS without FUCKING ASKING THEM FIRST.
Calm down, repeat the mantra...
I am going back to school. I am going back to school. I am going back to school.
posted@9:30 AM by:Trixter: 0 comments