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Packing on the Pixels

As if I need Wii Fit to give me a fresh reminder every day, I am a lot heavier that I should be right now. I am making some slow progress in turning that around, but even given the best of scenarios I will continue to be fat for the near future.

Yeah, I said it. FAT. Not “husky” or “big-boned” or any of that other baloney.

Thus, when I play games that have character creation, I like to make a character that looks somewhat like myself, and thus, I’ll kick up the ‘weight’ slider in an attempt to have my fat-assness reflected in game…but somewhere along the way, they stopped letting you create fat characters in games.

I first noticed this in one of the many flavors of The Sims; all of the characters are Ken and Barbie dolls with the heaviest one sporting just a slight pot belly. Disregarding my own situation, what if I wanted to create Santa Claus? There’s no P90X at the North Pole!

I was quite happy, then, to find that Guitar Hero:World Tour allowed me to present myself in all (and I mean all) of my 268-pound glory. I even have him doing the Elvis bit at the end of shows. Perhaps I will slim him up in the future if things go well, but until then I will be happy to see him stomping around the stage like Meat Loaf.

Thankyavurrymuch, Neversoft!

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I’m A (Christmas) Creep…

I love the Christmas season: the music, the hustle and bustle, baking Christmas cookies, shopping for gifts. Unlike most folks, I actually like listening to Christmas music, and keep my radio locked onto the local radio station playing 24-hour-a-day Christmas tunes.

My favorite contemporary Christmas song is the Eagles’ rendition of “Please Come Home For Christmas.” Its actually a pretty depressing song, go figure.

Anyways, I was happy to hear that the Christmas-a-thon was going to begin today, until the alarm clock went off and I heard “Baby, Its Cold Outside” somehow, it just didn’t feel right. I guess even for me its a little TOO early right now.

Maybe next week. 🙂

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Why You Should Not Vote

I would like to begin by thanking those of you that did not register to vote in time for the election. I would also like to thank those of my fellow citizens that will be too busy, away from their home districts, or that will simply forget to vote. This message is not intended for you, as you are already supporting my campaign and I thank you wholeheartedly.

Instead, I wish to address those of you who intend to cast your vote. If you have already voted then I have come to you too late, but there is always next time. I encourage you to print this out and place it next to your voter registration card.

Who am I? I may be conservative, liberal, or somewhere in between. I may be pro-life, pro-choice, or perhaps I do not care. I may be rich from birth, rich from hard work, living from paycheck to paycheck, or struggling to survive. I may have been born on the same day as you; or be old enough to be your parent, or young enough to be your child. I may be happily single, happily married, or even happily divorced. I may support your views entirely or find them to be absurd.

I assure you that I am a fellow citizen of the United States of America, and you can trust me to vote in your best interests.

You will be told: “If you do not vote, then you have no right to complain.” I would like to remind you that this is the land of free speech, and thus, you have the right to complain as much as you wish. I will be more than happy to listen to your complaints when the propositions that you support are not passed. When candidates that share your views are not elected, I will be there to listen to your complaint as well. Rest assured, I will use my vote wisely.

Another reason I do not want you to vote is that by not voting, you increase the power of my vote. If every able-bodied citizen voted, then every person would possess an equal amount of power. When fewer people vote, those that do vote have move power. Consider this: if 1 out of every 4 people votes, the one person who does vote is making decisions and electing officials for the other three. I rather like the idea of representing multiple citizens with my vote. I could be considered a representative myself, albeit of a very small district. You can be confident that I have every intention of putting your non-vote to good use.

Perhaps the best reason I can give you not to vote is that I wish to become the President of The United States of America. There is nothing wrong with that; I believe every citizen does at some point in their lives, whether it is in the wistful daydreams of childhood or the aspirations of a congressperson or a governor. My plan is simple; if I can convince every other person in the United States of America to abstain, then I will simply walk into the voting booth on Election Day and write myself in. That said, under such circumstance there would also be nothing to stop me from being your governor, mayor, councilman, dogcatcher, or even all of them. Don’t worry, I will do a good job and support all of your interests once I am in office.

I look forward to not seeing you at the polls in the future and I hope you will help spread my message from sea to shining sea across these United States of America.

After all, if you cannot trust me, than whom can you trust?

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Translating a Job Description to English

I get emails from recruiters every so often about jobs. One of the fun parts is trying to read between the lines to figure out what the job description really means. After all, if the job is going to suck like a Hoover they aren’t going to SAY so, because then no one would apply for it. So much like someone trying to sell a car or house with ‘personality’ they try to make the faults look as pleasant as possible, for example:

• Flexibility, not require too much structure to program
You will get no help at all.
• Team player, willing to go above and beyond the call of duty
You will be doing other people’s work as well as your own.
• Flexible on hours
We will work you until you drop dead.

I don’t think I’ll be applying for this one (the money sucks anyway). Color me just a little jaded, I guess.

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Is MediumSeaGreen even a color??

I’d say this is a pretty good match:

you are mediumseagreen
#3CB371

Your dominant hues are cyan and green. Although you definately strive to be logical you care about people and know there’s a time and place for thinking emotionally. Your head rules most things but your heart rules others, and getting them to meet in the middle takes a lot of your energy some days.

Your saturation level is medium – You’re not the most decisive go-getter, but you can get a job done when it’s required of you. You probably don’t think the world can change for you and don’t want to spend too much effort trying to force it.

Your outlook on life is brighter than most people’s. You like the idea of influencing things for the better and find hope in situations where others might give up. You’re not exactly a bouncy sunshine but things in your world generally look up.

the spacefem.com html color quiz
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Death Notes…or “Those Damn Otaku”

“Death Note” is the name of a suspense manga series that was been adapted into a pair of live-action films. I learned from San Japan’s website that a special showing of “Death Note II” was scheduled for tonight at a local movie theater. I saw Metropolis on the big screen a few years back and enjoyed it immensely, returning for a second viewing the next week.

I am something of a casual anime and manga fan; I have a sprinkling of anime in my DVD collection, and a few manga sitting among the comic books. I went to the San Japan anime con a few months ago and except for the heat and crappy parking, I enjoyed myself. I was overjoyed to recently see Robot Carnival again for the first time in about twenty years, and think that our friends in Japan make some pretty cool stuff.

I figured, why not watch a live-action suspense film from the Land of The Rising Sun? While I’m not a big fan of the genre, I figured it would be a good way to burn a Thursday evening usually spent playing Rock Band (sorry, RavynX).

So I hopped into the Reliant and headed out to the theater across town, stopping for a quick burger on the way. I was surprised to see the price for the movie was $10, but hey, its a limited engagement and I don’t go to the movies very often, so why not? Of course, for all I know all movies are $10 here in San Antonio now…

Watching the movie, I learned why it was a limited engagement. While there was an interesting story at it core, it had a “Godzilla” quality to it that made it unintentionally funny. I may track down the anime or the manga to get a better idea of how the story should be told.

The experience itself was also ruined by a portion of the audience (the aforementioned otaku) many of whom insisted on making loud snarky comments throughout the movie and laughing and ooh-ing and aah-ing very loudly at certain points. It was like being at a kids’ movie; actually it was worse, considering there weren’t many kids in the audience. It was funny for about the first 10 minutes, but grated on me as it continued. If this was supposed to be something like watching the “Rocky Horror Picture Show” it should have been advertised as such. I paid to watch a movie, not Amateur Night at the Otaku Comedy Club.

Ironically, those who were looking forward to the movie the most ruined it for everyone else. More events like are needed to expose people to anime and manga and Japanese media, but I can’t see anyone ‘on the fence’ wanting to be associated with the otaku after sitting through their poor behavior tonight. I certainly would not want to be labeled as such.

I am still looking forward to future events related to Japanese media, but will think twice the next time Viz decides to come into town.

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