on the verge

Current Mood: pensive

Somehow this wacky work schedule that I have opened up for a bit this month, and I just got back a few days ago from a whole week home, and I have to say it was one of the best visits home I can remember. Some highlights:

Got to hang out with Jared (one of Sis's college friends). Went swimming a lot. Burned myself lighting some rockass fireworks that we bought from a shady guy. Ate me some Gold Star chili. Visited Sis and Bradley's church and got to see what that was like - and hear Sis read one of her poems. Ate some of Dad's grill cookin'. Heard from an old friend that I kinda had fallen out of contact with. Gave some presents, got some presents like Bradley's old TV tuner card and a Carson Palmer jersey for my upcoming trip to Green Bay. Saw my Grandma's new apartment and learned some stuff about my grandparents. Rode a bike into a pool. Watched some great new movies. Went to a waterpark with some of my family courtesy of a family friend- and got my first sunburn. I ate downtown and tried sushi for the first time.

It was kinda like a whole summer break of fun compressed into a whole week. Awesome.

One other thing I got to do, which I'm setting aside as a special mention, was go target shooting with Mom and her fiancee Scott.

I've got "learn basic marksmanship" on my LoTtDBID. Previously, I've gone to the callout of the Purdue Rifle and Pistol Club and fired some handguns, I'd taken potshots at turtles with some small .22 rifles at Ronnie's house (waaaay back in the day), and fired some rifles and pistols with Kamikaze last summer. Still, I've never considered any of those any formal test of my ability, which is why I was excited to get to go target shooting. Up until that day the best I would say was that I'd messed around with some weapons but nothing more.

We went to the Elk Creek Hunt Club, a national target shooting circuit stop in Kentucky. I shot 12 and 20 gauge shotguns at small clay targets that were launched into the air by a mechanical thrower. I've never fired a shotgun before, never at a moving target, never at clay targets, and was using unfamiliar guns at a strange course - and I think I did pretty well.

Scott gave me a quick tutorial, and from there I shot four times at each of the 14 stations (for a total of 56 rounds, instead of the standard 100, to save money). The target shooting reminded me very much of Duck Hunt or similar games (which I suppose is the point) - except that it was much harder, and the targets moved with much more variety. For example, some arced down from over my right shoulder, some pairs criss-crossed, others rolled across the ground (called "rabbits"). I would guess that being good at shooting video games is a crossover skill to target shooting? I also learned the scoring system, the etiquette for being the thrower, and s'more gun safety. I ended up with a 54% accuracy over the entire course, with my best station being 4 of 4, and my worst 1 for 4.

I'm now a bit more confident that I can handle a gun, should the unthinkable happen.



And while I was home I really missed doing improv. It's been a long while since I've felt that...

forecast

Current Mood: pensive

I'm not a fan of laundry list posts, but this is more for me than anybody. Plus I just rolled out a survey post, which is pretty lame too. Deal :D

So it's about halfway through June, which means summer is approximately half over for me.

Finals ended Saturday, May 3rd. As soon as I was done with all my finals and a paper, I left Purdue. Jenny and I went to Cincinnati for about a week, went to Union Terminal to see Bodies (the Exhibition) and went to a Red's game. Then I came back and moved into Earhart, and had a week of straight training before jumping right into work. Since then I've beaten Metroid Prime: Corruption and read some books I've wanted to for a while (mostly stuff I put off during the school year). I went to Joey Steenbergen's wedding, and Benji & Corrie's wedding reception. My 22nd birthday came and went. I performed a special summer improv show for Earhart Hall summer school residents with most of the SoF. I've gone to see Iron Man and Indy 4. I've posed as a model for a Purdue brochure. I stopped biting my fingernails! I've kept up on my goal of posting here and on my other story site at least once a week (but not much more). I have also picked up a few extra hours helping with Day on Campus Tours, but for the most part I've been relaxing and hanging out with my friends that have been here (including a game of the new D&D 4.0 rules).

Pretty busy, I think. I am trying not to waste away my summer, but really relax and not overstress. I need some time to recharge my batteries. Thinking back to last summer, I should've either gotten more rigid deadlines from Dr. D for our research, or seriously considered limiting myself to just either a job, or my fellowship.

So where does that leave me for the rest of the summer? I've got from now until summer "ends" with the start of class- Monday August 25th. As of now:

I have about 25 hours of work every week for most of the rest of that time. I don't know when my last day will be, but the last day I could possibly work is August 8th.

That's also the last day for my current apartment lease, so sometime around there I'll need to move. That means up until then I need to continue whittling down the things I have here at Earhart. Peace has to move out, and I'll have to sort out everything there between me n' Alex. Then between Jenny, probably Greg, and hopefully mom coming to help, I'll move everything out of Earhart and Harrison over to my new apartment on the landing.

Mom wants me to try and go to an airshow July 19 and 20th, but I don't know if I'll be able to get off of work then. Similarly, my favorite holiday (4th of July) is coming up, and I'd like to hang out with everybody near Purdue and watch the fireworks, but I may have to work.

I'd like to go to Ft. Wayne and visit Andy and Jacque, and possibly someplace in Chicago - maybe see Scott? On top of that, Monday August 11th, Jenny and I are thinking about going to Green Bay WI to see the Bengals play the Packers @ Lambeau for the preseason. This may or may not count as our anniversary celebration. :D All of that takes a ton of money and gas is a lot more expensive than past summers, so we'll see. I will probably go home after apartment moving and before classes.

GenCon in mid-August, maybe? Also if I can get the right ticket, maybe a Judas Priest concert with future roommate Greg (how much would that rule?)

I will try and make it through the rest of my pile of books, Beard's comics, and finish at the very least Pokemon Diamond and Super Mario Galaxy. I've also got some computer maintenance to do (clean out bookmarks, clean up music files, etc.) but that's not high priority.

I'm going to make a point to keep posting to my blogs. By my best estimate, I have 14 chapters of my story left until I hit my goal [(50k - current 31,819) / 1300 word/chapter average) = 13.9]. I won't stop until I hit 50k, but I also won't quit until I've told my story. At one chapter/week average, I'll be done in 14 weeks, which means I won't finish before the summer ends. Fine, except my posting rate plummets as school picks up.

I should go give blood again, soon.

The last thing I'm writing about as a goal for the summer directly parallels my feeling about it. Something I've been putting off since the end of school. I need to talk to my counselor and get registered for the fall, and possibly take a summer class for July. Ugh.
Do. Not. Want.

amateur AND prolific

Current Mood: anxious

As the midpoint of October passes, I find myself contemplating participation in this year's National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo for short (an idea I've toyed with before). The basic idea is that many people would like to write a novel at some point, but either never start or quit easily because of lack of commitment, motivation, endless editing, desire for perfection, and other reasons. NaNoWriMo seeks to throw all that out the window and impose an arbitrary deadline - 30 days of November to write 50,000 words of new fiction in hopes of motivating people to finish, not to worry about quality. I think it's a novel idea. I find myself with a little bit of extra time this fall (and I'm a bit crazy), so I could give it a shot? I've got a few ideas for some stories, I enjoy writing and I wouldn't mind testing my endurance, story planning skills, and my wrists. I have until the end of this month to decide, knowing full well I'd probably blog less (and those posts would probably just be word count updates). I think I would start another blog just for this, so you could read along.

Thoughts? Like giving blood, I think this is something that's easier with support, so if any of my readers want to join along, that'd be great!

Also, I am addicted to the NaNoWriMo forums. The variety of general questions for aspiring novelists is fascinating.

...

On a semi-related note, I am chomping at the bit to hear back from a woman about a possible new job. I've been looking for a new one that I don't hate since leaving my previous job as Student Office Staff at Hillenbrand (which is Jenny's new job, actually). If something comes of it, I'll write more.

...

More stupid Bee Movie shorts in my The Office commercial breaks this week. Didn't really matter, since tornado warnings in the area cut out about 1/3 of the episode. I'm trying not to complain, though, since there really was significant weather. A tornado apparently touched down a few miles south of here. We set up the emergency broadcast system for a reason, no?

Also, if anybody wants a free one month trial to Netflix, I've got the hookup.

plans gone awry

Current Mood: awake?

Hey all. Did anybody else watch The Office on Thursday night and really dislike the Bee Movie ads/shorts they showed? Normally I enjoy Jerry Seinfeld material, and up until that night I was ambivalent about the movie (it seemed kinda kid-oriented, but probably had a few zingers in it, similar to Shrek or something). The ads, however, really turned me off. So much that by the third one, I actively wanted to NOT see the movie. Way to go, advertisers.

On a completely unrelated note, I finally beat Shadow of the Colossus! It was a fantastic game, very stylized and artsy in a good way, with a unique concept and dynamite execution. Highly recommended.

Also, new Rabbit and Mouse.

alternate income

Current Mood: awe

The following is a very R-rated trailer for the upcoming film John Rambo (set to release in January). It looks like the "Batman Begins" of the Rambo series. Awesome.



As the guys at Cracked.com put it, I love the part "where Rambo starts decapitating people and turning entire human bodies into hamburger meat".

quarbolous

Current Mood: you are just in time for moviestime

Here's a little tip.

If you watch a foreign film, and the first five minutes seem confusing, one of two things is probably happening:

1) It's a foreign film. Subtitles and SparkNotes help, but you're out of your element here, so just hang on, watch carefully, and try to watch body language and facial expressions to catch what's going on. Cut yourself some slack!

2) You're a dumbass. You put the DVD in upside-down and are watching side 2, which is why the action started without warning, there was no title screen or credits, and you don't know who any of the characters are.

On a related note, I recently watched Das Boot (recommended to me by several people). I'm trying to use my Netflix subscription to watch some classic movies as part of my LoTtdBID. I thought it was a really good (if lengthy) film and recommend it, especially if you like war films, specifically submarine films.



Additionally, Bradley shared a video with me the other day that I found fairly offensive, but also hilarious. Alex told me it was flat out "the worst thing he'd ever seen in his entire life". Curious?

long shot

Current Mood: sad
Current Music: "Too Late For Love" by Def Leppard

Does anybody know where my Clerks DVD is? Did somebody borrow it? :(



(Why am I sad? I should just use this as an opportunity to buy the newest collector's edition, because I'm a consumer whore...)

the projector can't handle this much win

Current Mood: AWESOME
Current Music: "Beyond The Realms Of Death" by Judas Priest

Re: Transformers movie

Holyfuckingshitawesome.

dork peppermint patties

Current Mood: ig-nor-a-moose
Current Music: "Still Loving You" by Scorpions

Jenny and I are very pleased with our current subscription to Netflix. We've essentially exhausted my personal movie collection, so it has allowed us to start chewing through some of the movies we've missed, or even classics that one of us has not seen. Also, it's a lot cheaper (~$20.00 a month) than two $8.50 tickets and $7.00 in popcorn and drinks for a single movie theatre experience.

Recently, we watched Superman Returns. Similar to Batman Begins, I'd not seen any of the previous franchise films (which I'm told is generally a good thing). Most people seem to think that SR was an effects show and not much else, I thought it was pretty entertaining. Perhaps I did get a little irritated by the casual bending of physics, but hey- it's a superhero movie! My favorite superhero movie to date is probably The Punisher.

At any rate, it's not giving away plot to tell you that the setup involves Superman returning to earth after a five year hiatus (he travels to his destroyed home world). The entire movie, then, I was imagining the five year gap being troublesome and annoying to the Man of Steel. Something like this...


Superman couldn't get Lois Lane out of his mind. Engaged?! She was the one woman who made him feel connected to the fallible humans he'd sworn to protect with truth, justice, and the American way. Even worse, he didn't understand why his computer kept freezing up. How was he supposed to maintain his disguise as mild-mannered Clark Kent when this unfamiliar Vista system kept crashing? Even his x-ray vision revealed no problems, and he was toying with the idea of showing the hard drive the business end of his laser vision when suddenly - like a freight train - he felt the urge of citizens miles away from Metropolis needing his help. He stood up, adjusted his glasses, and sprinted for the door, narrowly missing Mr. White.

Out on the busy city streets, Clark quickly scanned the nearby sidewalks. With his super hearing, he knew dozens of helpless hardworking men and women were near death as their building threatened to collapse. He looked around again. The familiar phone booth on the corner of Main and Central Avenues was gone, as was the booth at the intersection of 5th and Washington. He ran to the other side of the courtyard and saw that even the old booth on the corner of Main and Burrard St. was missing!

"Clark!" cried out Jimmy Olsen. "What's wrong?"

"Jimmy, where are all the phone booths?" Superman asked, impatiently.

"Well, you see, Mr. Kent, you've been gone for a while. The past few years have seen a marked growth in the telecommunications industry, while miniaturization and more efficient manufacturing has led to the proliferation of affordable cellular phones that are now nearly ubiquitous."

"I see." said Superman, quietly.

"Furthermore, competition has spread between the major media conglomerates, such that consolidation has become the norm and large networks are being formed, competing for the business of the masses. Verizon, Vonage, AT&T, Cingular, Sprint, T-Mobile, GSM, Nextel, Virgin Mobile, Alltel, U.S. Cellular and -"

"Jimmy! Look over there!" Superman interrupted.

Frustrated, Superman used the momentary distraction to simply take off from the sidewalk, pedestrian observers be damned. He quickly flew several states away and used his super strength to hold up the side of the crumbling office building while the employees were safely evacuated, and then rocketed back to Metropolis, back to his office to change, and then quickly rejoined Jimmy in mid-conversation.

"and you can even use Skype or other freeware programs to set up a VOIP network on your computer to make free telephone calls over the internet! You see Clark, nobody uses land lines anymore except for emergency systems. The last telephone booth was removed from Metropolis several years ago. Why do you ask? And...where are your glasses?"