Game : Dungeons & Dragons Online

Friday saw the launch of a certain company's first new title in 4.5 years! I sure hope all those kiddies out there are buying this one up, stealing their parents' credit card or whatever it takes to pay that monthly fee. Homework sucks, anyway.

Amazingly enough, the game is actually fun! Yesterday my friend Jeremy and I launched an adventure together. Our characters, who I assure you were created quite independently, bear a strikingly similar resemblance to one another. Our main problem is that both our character classes (Bard and Sorcerer) require high Charisma scores, so we're both [numerically] scorching hot, but relatively worthless in a scuffle.

Don't mess with neutral-good sorcereresses.


Storm clouds brewing in Stormreach


Nose stud


Double-trouble

Lola & Ashira = BFF

Pale Thunder Rolls On

Pale Thunder is no longer mine to ride. Last night I passed the reigns to another, may he brush her rusty coat and tend her soggy insides well and often. Alas, my days of panicking women and children into a desperate dash for the sidewalk are over. Days when the world reckoned with my coming. Now, I have a huge plastic ass to wrestle into the driveway, an engine that sounds like an old man's dying whisper, and a window sticker that says "Support Our Sheriffs." Jenine just needs to pop out a handful of kids and then we can move to New Jersey and end it.

Work is going well, and although i'd have to shoot you if I told you what I did all day, I can tell you that I spent hours last week modeling and texturing an old lady's sunken chest. Yowza!

Yesterday I went for a nice 2-hour power walk to the Arboretum and on to Wing's Kitchen for some tasty teriyaki chicken. ("Wing, you magnificant bastard, you've done it again!") I made it to some as of then unexplored Arboretum territory, where I danced between conifers and birch in the brisk 25 degree afternoon air. Today the storm hit (a blizzard in some areas) and I am enjoying the view of the swirling snow from my perch among the rooftops.

Movie : Max

Max is an indie flick about a 1920's art dealer (John Cusack) and his somewhat twisted relationship with a young Adolf Hitler. Though it is a fictional story, it is nevertheless enlightening to see how the rejected young Hitler ends up on the political path. The tension between the two futures facing Hitler (art and politics) reaches its breaking point when he realizes that "art + politics = power", a remedial math equation that actually does a great job summing up the birth of propoganda.

While not an excellent film, I personally thought the film was very worthwhile as a means to humanize the man behind the Holocaust. It is worth seeing just for the sense of pity is invokes.

Cigar Masters

This last week I went with some work buddies to Cigar Masters, a place for "Premium Tobacconist and Relaxation Enthusiasts." I smoked a Fuente while allowing the sofa to "engulf my body and unwind my soul." Not an exagerration -- the chairs were quite comfortable. The place was a bit small, however, and we were really very lucky to get seats at all. Some people were standing for hours, waiting for spots to open up. On the down side, their humidor was, for a place called Cigar Masters, rather small. On top of that, their beverage selection was extremely limited. Forget having bourbon, brandy, or benedictine with that cigar -- only beer, sherry, and wine is available. Now, if you'll excuse me, my soul is an unraveled mess and I have some serious winding to do.

Game : Silent Hill 3

Scary, scary. The whole ten hours I spent playing SH3, I just wanted it to end. The game is stressful, and when I can't find the fucking rope which I need to climb down the elevator shaft, I want to toss myself down the shaft, sans-rope, and walk away from it forever. In other words, it does a great job of making you feel the protagonist's sanity slip away.

Graphically, the game is really slick. The sets are gorgeous. Konami did a great job of reusing the playing areas to differeing effects, just by switching the textures around. The only slightly creepy mental hospital you just explored suddenly becomes a portal to hell where everything is either dripping blood, on fire, or both. The characters look great, and the monsters are well devised. The story, however, is smoking some wacky-tobaccy, and becomes a convoluted mess by the end. But this game was like homework, and I'm just glad its over. I'll miss you, Heather!




luv the katana..

Book : Ilium

Ilium is a science fiction novel by Dan Simmons. The main protagonist, Thomas Hockenberry, PhD., of twentieth century Indiana University, has been recreated from his ancient DNA by a race of post-humans turned Greek-gods to act as scholic witness to the gods' painstaking recreation of Homer's Iliad.

It is a unique blend of sci-fi and classic literature. It introduced me to Proust and even helped me to appreciate Shakespeare a bit more. He also milks the opportunity and manages to squeeze in more than several Helen of Troy lovemaking scenes. What the book does remarkably well, however, is bring the Iliad to life in a way which Homer's text never can. The author has taken ancient history and turned it into an engrossing story.