The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

So, time for some more self-promotion. My poem, Release and Repercussions, is in this weeks Deadpan podcast. Also a clip of me making an ass of myself while doing a mike check, as I do when I actually record me. You can go listen if you’d like. I’m thinking about recording my essay The Specialists to send in for next time. But I dunno. I should really write something new, maybe.

So, yeah, remember when I said I was going to make three posts on Sunday and now it’s thursday? That’s why you should never post “Part 1” in the title of something. Maybe I’ll make it a multiple Sunday event so I’m not a complete liar. Then again, who knows if people care anyway.

I also want to try that program Pixel used to make all the awesome Cave Story music to try to make some music for Roleplaying… yes, I’m thinking of working on that again… man, I dunno, I’d like to have something like that… and when I move servers, which I honestly should get on sometime this week or next, I’m going to have shit-tons of space and nothing to put there, so I might as well host audio files, eh? Anyway, tell me to work on Roleplaying, as well as other things. Projects are good. If I’d just do a little project every day, I’d probably be a happier person overall. But man, video games are just so fun.

Here’s the Chrissymas Shopping List Update you don’t care about.

Mom: Check Plus (Present plus other SECRET PURCHASES completed)
Dad: No Check
Jonathan: No Check
Grandma: No Check
Grandpa: Check.
Brer: No Check.
Kale: No Check. (Apparently he has some secret plan for getting me something. He told me not to worry about getting him something back, but I really don’t roll that way. Unless I get completely stumped, I’ll get him some little thing.)
Friends Gift Exchange: No Check
Friends White Elephant: No Check (The new plan is to draw one name and then invite the whole extended friend group over for White Elephant. I like this plan.)
Talking Time Festivus: Check (I got lucky on the draw, and drew someone who I had no problem thinking of what to send them. Just waiting at least until it’s December for a bit to get it into the mail, though.)

So my 9 hour Black Friday shift is complete. Exciting, isn’t it? I even wore proper footwear so that my ankle isn’t COMPLETELY shot like it normally is. I might not limp much tomorrow! Yay!
But yeah, even though this is over, next week is going to test my endurance… I have work constantly and I need to keep my spirits high enough to get a paper written and turned in… it’ll be intense. I’ll hope for the best.

Man, I still haven’t written about Rune Factory yet, have I? I suck like that. I also should probably write about Mass Effect at some point, as that’s been my current timesink… and it’s drawn Jonathan in, too. It’s interesting to watch him play, because unlike me he hates the long conversations, and will be an ass to get out of them quicker and start shooting people. It certainly makes the game feel a lot different from my “complete a mission, then spend the good part of an hour talking to everyone on the Normandy” style that I experience. But that’s later… I should just sit down and write bulk review-impressions tomorrow… if you’re someone whose inclined to, make me do that.

Anyway, I guess since the Chrissymas Shopping Season has offically begun, and you’re no longer a complete tool for having Chrissymas decorations up and stuff, I should start my stupid yearly CHRISTMAS GIFT BUYING CHECKLIST. So here we go.

Mom: Half Check (Conceptualized but not bought due to potential complications)
Dad: No Check
Jonathan: No Check
Grandma: No Check
Grandpa: Half Check (Got a good idea, if nobody else uses it)
Brer: No Check
Friends Gift Exchange 1: No Check
Friends Gift Exchange 2: No Check (Don’t even know if we’re doing it, much less who I have)
Talking Time Festivus: No Check (Don’t know who I have for this either. Come on, Rei, get on the ball!)

Hmm… I have a decent bit to buy this year… and also maybe Chrissymas cards for Kale and Ecks, if I get off my ass…

Hey, look, my GLaDOS opening is the opening of the newest Deadpan. I really need to send in some more poetry and essays… I was going to write an essay about me and music as related to all these Listening Time CDs I’ve been writing about but I’m so moody… bleh.

Anyway, what I really want is a Smash Brothers Brawl soundtrack.

Basically every time they post a new song on there, it’s such a great remix of a classic game tune. And I want it. I want it all. Like this one. Or this newest one here. Or, hell, even this one is pretty damn awesome. I mean, I know the internets will enable me to find it after the game comes out, but I want it noooooow… and I mean, there’s going to be so much music… each stage has 4 different songs you can pick from. I waaaaaaant.

Anyway, I still should talk about Rune Factory… I dunno. I’ll write it up later.
Everything can happen later.

So Droid tells me I should probably get my own web hosting. I’ve been mooching off of him for a long, long time. It’s probably time I went out and handled it on my own. I’ve no complaints… I’m pretty sure I know where I’m going to move and shit, but if some random internet person knows a really good cheap host for my little bloggy site and personal site, let me know.

Anyway, for the past few days I’ve been sick to my stomach constantly, and it’s probably due to nervousness, and I just wanted to ramble about it. It’s depressing shit, and you probably shouldn’t read it.

It’s really all a control thing… I don’t feel like I have any, and then I go and do things to make me feel like I have control… but in the end, this just gets me more nervous, because I feel like I need to do X or Y to please “them” (them being… I dunno… the world? It’s not anyone in particular, it’s just this force I always feel is wanting me to do things, or else) and doing my little whatevers to feel better about myself hurts that… it’s just… really frustrating.
Basically, I’d just like my decisions to matter, and what I do to be… I dunno… appreciated? Even quietly. Having Jonathan telling me I’m an ass for not telling him I took care of having sodas for the get together (which doesn’t affect him at all, I took care of it) is not making the effort, however big or small it was, feel appreciated. I don’t like repeating things like that 40 times. I would also like the decisions I make to be respected. I’m open to advice, give me all the advice you’d like, but I’ll make the decision. When little stupid things like “I am full and done eating” require me to convince my parents multiple times that I do not want any more, it’s fairly obvious what I want has little bearing on anything… at least to me…

I don’t know, I know I’m being moody, and that makes me take things out of proportion. It’s probably not worth worrying about. But it’s things like that that make me want to move far away from here as fast as I can, so I can start anew and not have these ghosts of people’s wants, real or imagined, trying to change every little thing I do… to just live for myself and not worry, that’s really all I want…

Oh well… I beat the first boss in Rune Factory, so I should write up a little bit about that soon… also, I asked Parish to let me write for Gamespite. He still hasn’t gotten back to me, so, you know, hell, I might not get to, and that’s fine… but you might be seeing more content from me over there eventually. Cross your fingers for me.

JUST BECAUSE I CAN!
“Talking Themes – Nich’s Michs”

Track 1:Debaser by The Pixies. I’ve heard of the Pixies… I don’t really care for this guy’s voice… he’s like screaming but not screaming? It’s kinda weird. The song isn’t bad, though… but it’s not like… clicking into me and energizing me like I like my music to do. It’s in that large grey area of songs I can say “Yeah, that’s alright” but then never listen to again… then again, this project is supposed to expand my music experience… or something…

Track 2: Ageless Beauty by Stars. Female vocalist… that’s nice… it’s all like airy and barely there, though… and I dunno, there’s not a lot happening in the background or whatever… it’s just like this steady constantly repeating thing that occasionally changes pitch a little but doesn’t change… it’s kinda hypnotic, I guess, but not doing a lot for me. I guess it does make the refrain like… kick it up a notch… but it’s still so… subdued. Sure seems to go on for a long time, too…

Track 3: Last Dinosaur by The Pillows. Oh yeah, this like the first track from the FLCL soundtrack… the Pillows are good stuff… first song and band I actually know, too… Oooh, lyrics. This is an expanded version, or the one on the FLCL soundtrack was a shortened one. Yeah, good track.
I will admit, though, that I think I’m sorta getting what they mean by flow…? All these songs have a sort of similar… background feel. I don’t think the current draft of my mix has that… I switch it up a lot… ups and downs. This has kinda been one constant sort of feeling. (although maybe a little different with the vocals in track 1) What does this mean? Fuck I dunno. Just trying to think like… something about it.
Oooh, back to the song, I love this bridge… that’s nice.

Track 4: What’s Mine Is Yours by Sleater-Kinney. Another female vocalist…? Heh, maybe not… no, that’s a girl. Mmm, not bad, so far… yeah, if it keeps slowly building like this, I could get into it… mmm, it isn’t getting much more… powerful… like I was hoping… but it’s still good… what the hell is up with all this random stupid reverb guitar…? Okay, dislike building… this section is kinda stupid and it just won’t end… now they added some bass to it… okay, starting to get back into the song proper… and it’s starting to build again like in the beginning… but yeah, I never really want to hear that section in the middle again, it was kinda annoying. Wow, that ends abruptly…

Track 5: Soft Power by Ladytron. I have some Ladytron CDs, but this song doesn’t immediately spring to mind. Their music tends to be a little too slow for me to completely get into them, even though the female vocals and electronic music seems like a good fit… but this one isn’t too bad… I could probably have guessed it was a Ladytron song without reading the track list, though… something about how the lyrics are sung just reminds me of their other song. They do that DA DA da da DaDa DA! thing with the vocals all the time. This is definately one of the better Ladytron songs I’ve heard, though. Oooh, drum track with some energy added… and now we’re into an Ahh ahhh ahhhh section…
In general, I really want this mix to kick up the energy, but I know that’s just a personal bias… that’s what I turn to music for. To energize me. It’s why I do things like collect boss battle themes, because they’re sort of designed to do that.
The Aaaaahs are apparently the end, but they’re just going on forever and ever… I really sorta dislike songs that do that… it seems kinda pointless, really. The interesting part is over, you’re like… wasting my time.

Track 6: I Spy by Pulp. Whispery… hmm… lots of whispers… and now it’s picked up a little with some nice background stuff… but man, all of the tracks on here have this sort of subdued energy, though… like… almost to the point where I can rock out, but they’re keeping it down… on the down low… keeping it calm… sorta thing… I do like the little bell-y noises, and the little tiny bits of sound from the guitar… we’re back to whispering now, though… apparently the singer wants to be caught fucking someone’s wife…? What’s up with these LA LA’s… hm… yeah, I don’t know… it’s… yeah. Now it’s all slow again towards the end… I don’t know if there’s enough time for it to pick up at all again…

Track 7: Blood Tree by Mary Timony. Still the same sort of feeling going on with the subdued music… yeah, I already don’t like this song… also, my brother is back in here now which makes me annoyed that I’ll have to get out the headphones… Oh, it changed… that’s better… let’s see what it does after this point… yeah, it does the little change thing again… I like the refrain, but the rest isn’t doing a whole lot for me…

Track 8: Accused of Stealing by The Delgados. Sort of a methodical walking forward sort of feeling… more… more… and now they went to this echo-y piano… and what’s probably the refrain… which is only in the right speaker, which is… odd… oh, okay, so they have a male voice on the left… alright. Well, now it’s back to the original… okay, so just going through the various parts again with different lyrics. It’s alright, but again, it’s not clicking and interacting with me. It’s alright, certianly. If someone put this on, I wouldn’t complain. But that describes so, so much of the music I listen to… probably like… 70%… 20% I don’t like… 10% I love… maybe something like that. Hmm, the music is building slowly… has been over the whole song, and now it’s pretty like… strong… not like… powerful but just… louder… I guess a little more powerful…

Track 9: Pyrite Pedestal by Pretty Girls Make Graves. I think these guys opened for Franz Ferdinand when I saw them… they kinda sucked in concert. This one starts out promising, though… nice and fast with neat little keyboards… Oh yeah, this is nice… all energetic drum roll behind the sorta slowish lyrics… it… yeah. I could do this… this is closer to what I want… knowing how he’s slowly moving in energy or whatever, this might bode well for the end of the CD. Mmm, yeah, now the music is even stronger… yeah, that’s nice… Jonathan left, I can take off the headphones, thank goodness… yeah, it’s got my head nodding to the beat and whatnot. Good job, song. But… it’s got the long fade out… bleh, why? And Jonathan comes back in after leaving. Wonderful.

Track 10: Dark Matter – Andrew Bird. Mm, whistling…? Oooh, lots of building… lots of building… yeah… yeahyeahyeah… mmm, a little slower now that it got going than I was hoping…. yeah, Nich definitely has a style he likes… and I guess everyone else likes it on the board, as he’s got nothing but praise for this mix… hm… is this leaving any kind of impression on me…? It’s all kinda fading together, they’re all kinda similar and this isn’t really affecting me in any strong way. I keep wanting to use the word methodical again… it’s very like… marching in the background… duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh constantly… like a lot of these songs. Hmm… sorta ending kinda sad or something.

Track 11: I Summon You – Spoon. These are the guys who did the soundtrack to Stranger Than Fiction, right? Essner likes them… I like like… the theme song to the movie. I don’t know what it’s called… but yeah, this is definitely an Essner-like song. Nothing wrong with it… and it has a beat I can nod and tap my foot to and general get into a little bit… ooh, tambourine. And see, this is different from the other songs because it has… what’s the word… a syncopated rhythm…? Go go, Wikipedia… yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s what this is. That makes me get into it a little more. Maybe I just like syncopation? Abrupt stop… man, no in between stops for Nich…

Track 12: Lord of the Netherword by Shoji Meguro. Organs… oh, this is the song from one of the MegaTen games… not Persona 3. But the same guy. Yeah, it sounds like his softer less hip-hoppy energy pieces from Persona 3… that means I really appreciate it, but have no real want to listen to it outside of a video game context where it can set the game’s mood well…I worry about setting my mood to anything but happy in my spare time…

Track 13: Skip Divided by Thom Yorke. Beepy… hm… weird… definitely differentish… hmm, I wasn’t expecting a male vocalist even though Thom is probably a male name… his voice is kinda getting eaten by the sorta annoying electronic noise music… it’s like deep bass that eats everything… and there are weird noises in the background too… yeah, it’s just like totally eating the singing… it’s hard to focus on it… I guess that’s the idea they’re going for… but it just makes me feel distracted, like I’m missing something… or I could miss something, if I don’t keep the two things like… separate… The vocals are a little louder now, but they seem focused more on the left side which still makes me feel kinda awkward… Also, the like… emotion of the song doesn’t really change at all when the music changes, it’s still giving the same feeling out… it doesn’t really feel like a break or whatever.

Track 14: Seven Swans – Sufjan Stevens. This is an Essner band… I’ve heard them before… I think they’ve even played one of his songs in Kohl’s, though it was an upbeat one… this one is all this acoustic something… and very slow… so I already hate it. It’s kinda haunting, I suppose, but if I wasn’t trying to like… be open and was just listening for something to listen to I definitely would have already skipped this… ooh, they added some piano now… but it’s probably going to be more of the same only with some piano behind it… I guess the instrument is like… a Ukulele maybe…? It has a kinda toy-ish quality… Wikipedia go… oh, he’s holding a Banjo… yeah, that could be a really slow banjo. Another vocalist… female… just on the left… hm… mmm, they keep building… I’m liking this a little better at the end with the sorta full group going at it.
Nich seems to be about… haunting… they all have that kind of quality… is that all he listens to…? Or was he just trying to make a haunting mix? See, I dunno… I was trying to make something entertaining as well as a cross-section of what I enjoy listening to while trying to keep things maybe a little more obscure so that it would be new to people… I wonder if that’s what Nich did, or just put a lot together with similar themes… music people might be able to do that.

Track 15: Ladies and Gentlemen, We Are Floating in Space by Spiritualized. Started with a voice saying the title… and there are vocals sorta fading in… Hmm, you’ve got a singer and another singer whose voice seems to be pumped through a filter to make it sound like a radio… and now it’s all grown out and built… but still very slow… and walking slowly forward, like I was talking about before… they keep adding more and more vocal parts overlapping each other, though, that’s kinda neat. Sorta like a round I suppose. It definitely builds the intensity. I keep spelling definitely incorrectly and using spell-check to fix it… I wonder how many times I’ve done that so far… oh, look, yet another vocal part. Another abrupt end.

Track 16: Warm Night by The Concretes. Mm, what is this start reminding me of… “In the good ol’ suuuumertiiiiiiiime!” Or something… it’s like… carousel-like? Does that make sense? Goes around and around and around, slow and gentle… not too bad, I suppose… but yeah, definitely that sensation I said… of moving but not really going anywhere… gentle… got some violins in there… hm. It’s interesting, but again, not really my thing. It does sort of invoke a mood, though. And we all fall down. Hey, it didn’t end abruptly or forever!

Track 17: Debaser by Feed. Last track… a cover of the first track, or so I understand. Only with a female singer. Ooh, I like those drums… hm… what are they going to do with them? Mmm, taking awhile to get going… and like… modem noises in the background…? And dogs barking… that’s… hm… not really enjoying that… weird little stall pointless point here with some big like… cymbal hits and more weird seemingly random beeping… now those drums I like are coming back… and some more music is coming back into it… Ooh, there we go… that’s more my style… I could get into a whole song like that. Ooh, guitars… yeahyeahyeah, that’s much much better! A little repeating, but nice… and now it’s fading away and… done… that’s the CD.

Overall, yeah, this CD is not for me. At all, really. It’s mostly the sort of music I’m indifferent to and never seek out… I might give it a second listen sometime just to be fair, but… yeah. It doesn’t make me want to do so besides out of a duty to this whole mix CD project…
I do feel like I might have a good grip on the musical whatevers of Nich, though… I wonder if that’s everyone’s goal or if I shouldn’t assume I can get that from these CDs… hmm…

So we’re doing this thing on Talking Time called Listening Time, where we’re sending each other mix CDs… my week isn’t until December, but I kept thinking about it, so I thought I’d work on it… this is what I came up with so far. If you’re a random person from Talking Time who came here for some reason, you might not want to look at it because it might ruin the surprise… maybe. I dunno. Maybe you don’t know any of the songs…? Who knows.
Also, I need a name for this… if you can think of one, let me know.

1. Mono Puff – Creepy
2. The Boy Least Likely To – Fur Soft As Fur
3. The Life Aquatic Soundtrack – Ping Island/Lighting Strike Rescue Op
4. Mike Doughty – 27 Jennifers
5. David Sugar – Warm Analogue
6. My Robot Friend – Sex Machine
7. Guster – Barrel of a Gun
8. Goldfrapp – Number 1
9. Blue Man Group – I Feel Love (featuring Venus Hum)
10. Cake – Satan is my Motor
11. Jamiroquai – Black Devil Car
12. Ok Go – Invincible
13. Daikaiju – Showdown in Shinjuku
14. Persephone’s Bees – Nice Day
15. Soul Coughing – Screenwriter’s Blues
16. My Robot Friend – swallow

You can test it using the power of the internet, or ask me to share it with you… I need testing… I need this to be good… or good-ish… people on the boards are talking about mix CDs have flow and this and that and I dunno about any of that… so… gotta run through drafts, you understand.
Oh, also, this made me get a WMA to MP3 converter, which means I can now listen to The Boy Least Likely To in the car, which is a great bonus.

Been having depression fits again. Yaaaay! It really is related to how much I work… it can’t be coincidence that I’ve only worked two days over two weeks. But enough of that.

See, I can’t really play Phoenix Wright while I listen to podcasts, because I want to pay attention to what’s going on (although the Milkshake reference in the beginning of PW3 was uncalled for… if you’re going to make bad references in games, make bad video game references, dammit!) so I randomly started playing Castlevania: Dracula X Chronicles on the PSP while listening to the new Retronauts and such… and man, it’s good. I never really played the old school Castlevanias… I mean, I’ve played Castlevania, sure… but I sucked at it and never got anywhere and never built any fond memories of it… Talking Time got me into the “Metroidvania” style of gameplay hard, and I caught up on what Symphony of the Night style Castlevanias I hadn’t played… the game is mostly a remake of Rondo of Blood, though, and that’s the last old school level based Castlevania… and it’s really damn good. Hard as shit, but really good. I’m dying a lot, but it lets me restart at the beginning of any level I’ve gotten to with full lives, and I’m playing with Maria (thanks, Jakanden, for telling me where she was) so that makes the game easier, (plus, I get to throw cats Student Witch Soul style) so I am making progress. The fact that I’ve only found one alternate route so far (The route into 3′, and only because someone told me how to get there, since the thing that unlocks Symphony is in that level) bodes well for how long the game will distract me… but who knows. I may hit a wall soon where I can’t beat any more levels and get distracted again.

In other news, what? Really? I would have thought Metaknight was enough… really? Well, okay… I guess HAL is making the game, after all They can put more of their characters in. No Lolo? He could… push… blocks? Turn people into eggs? Eggs are cool, right? Yoshi likes eggs and Yoshi is cool. Maybe.

Jonathan bought Clive Barker’s Jericho. I don’t especially know why he’s so damn excited about the game, but he was so much to rush out and buy it the moment it came out… I’ll probably give it a try later, since it’s here, but I think the darkness is going to get to me. Scare me in bright light, dammit… I’m tired of games and their “we have a great flashlight simulation” shenanigans.

And now, random links.

LINK GO! I don’t know what exactly is to be said about this, but I know the digg article link said it wrong.

LINK GO! To the delight of both Pikachu and the many children!

Anyway, so I was listening to last week’s Wingin’ It, and they were talking about the idea of your self being just this floaty thing and having different bodies and being something different every day. And I guess I’m weird, but that really doesn’t appeal to me. I’m a creature of habit who likes things to stay the same unless for a real good reason. Sure, being able to swap bodies might make bedroom antics more fun, and I’d be all for it, but in general I’d just want one body (not the one I have now) that was just how I liked, and that would be it. Having something I liked and being used to it being there is more worthwhile to me than making that choice of “who do I want to be?” every morning. I see the appeal, of course, but it’s not for me. I would get the side benefit of getting to choose the one body I got stuck with, though, so I’m all for this tech being magically developed magically, however.

LINK GO! Useful image for your forum shenanigans!

Note that this is written with love, because I continue to listen and am entertained.

Joe: Well, I got Game X that everyone is playing, got great reviews, and everyone loves.
Chris: It sounds like crap. Like crazy joke time. It’s not a realistic shooter. Who cares? I don’t care. I saw a trailer. It was all silly. Wacky fun time. Not interested.
Joe: Well, it’s not that bad. I can see why someone would like it… you know, for the kids… in the same way they like those… you know… kids toys. But it’s not really doing it for me.
Chris: I just really don’t get why they just can’t make good games! Just make good games. No more jumpin’ around, running around, good games. Go make good games. I remember when they made games that were good.
Joe: I don’t really know why I buy games anymore…
Chris: Me either. Me either.

They’ve spent the last two episodes talking about how they hate the gameplay of Team Fortress 2 based on Joe playing it from the Orange box, and now I just listened to Chris buying it on Steam, so the next podcast will be all about him hating on it. I just really don’t get it. I get they like their little genre of realistic military games, but that doesn’t make everything else bad. Just… different. I dunno, I enjoy their crazy opinions, but it’s just… reviews purely for them and for nobody else.
Honestly, listening to anyone who isn’t a hardcore gamer or part of the gaming press talk about games is really sort of surreal… like when Leo talks about this or that that he’s playing on his 360 on This Week in Tech… it’s just… odd. I know those sorts of people are the norm, as opposed to people like me who read gaming news blogs for fun… but it’s just interesting seeing that different point of view, I suppose, because it’s something I don’t have at all. I know everything about any game I’d want at least a month or two in advance, if not more… but there are people out there who just walk through the store and buy things for their PS2 or whatever just based on the title and some art… who don’t know the release dates of this or that game, or even if a sequel to a game they like is being made. It’s kinda weird and wrong that I can’t imagine me not knowing these things… I guess it really is just that much a part of my life…

Things What I’ve Been Doing Instead of Blogging

• Having possibly migraine-level headaches on a regular basis.
• Playing the games in Orange Box.
• Spending time with friends doing friend-like things.
• Working.

So, yeah. I guess that’s my excuses. I kept meaning to, but every time I sat down to write I had a headache and it was starting to come off very “god I feel so horrible god have pity on me” which I don’t want to come off as. So… yeah.

If you’ve been on the internet, though, you know Portal is fucking AMAZING. It’s short, but it’s one of the best gaming experiences I’ve had in awhile. I felt completely immersed in the world, much more so than even, say, Half Life 2. (even though it admittedly employs many of the same strategies to do so and I appreciate them… I’m just often too busy being incredibly mad at design decisions to become fully engaged) The last time I felt like that was starting up Bioshock… and I don’t know of another game off the top of my head that made me feel like that… so… that’s awesome. Also, it’s hilarious, and the game play is solid. It’s just… great. If any of the other pieces of the Orange Box interest you, pick it up so you can play Portal. Seriously.

What else… Phantom Hourglass is still fine, though I’m only playing it while waiting for classes to start, so I haven’t been playing over the long weekend… it’s very… by the numbers? Though I appreciate some of the little tricks they do with both screens during the bosses. Anyway, hopefully I can finish it up before the new Phoenix Wright comes out… I have over a week, so I don’t doubt I’ll be able to, but we’ll see.

On an unrelated note, what the hell.