The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

The Mass Effect 3 demo is kind of a clusterfuck! It really frustrated me. I will record those frustrations here for future generations. Or something.

First off, why the hell won’t this demo let me load my Shepard? It lets you make all these decisions at the beginning to try to approximate your Shepard, but you know what would be easier? Just loading my save file. Maybe this is only a problem for me as I’ve only played the games once, but the demo getting facts wrong from the previous games just made me angry. “That’s not true!” I told the screen! And it would have been completely avoided if they’d just loaded my fucking save.

I play an Engineer in Mass Effect. I am a motherfucking SPELLCASTER, and I love it. I have never really used guns that weren’t pistols in a Mass Effect game, and I have no intention of changing that in Mass Effect 3. Mass Effect 3 even has this new “weight” system to help me do that: the more weapons you carry, the more cooldown you have, so if you’re just rocking a pistol, your skills refresh super-fast. That’s great! However, the combat portion of the demo loads you up with a small arsenal of weapons. However, it still let me roll an Engineer. So I have all these cool spells, but I can’t USE them, because I have all these guns I don’t want to use that makes me have to wait like a full minute in between casts. This totally invalidated my strategies for enemies I used in ME2. I died so much because I could not rely on what I had learned in previous games. It was so stupid. Why didn’t it have an Engineer Weapon Loadout for me, since I picked that class? Why was there just this Soldier loadout? Ugh.

Finally, let me talk about the multiplayer. When you try to go to the multiplayer, it says it “can’t connect.” It doesn’t say why. Just that it can’t. I knew people were playing the multiplayer right then, but it just wasn’t working for me! What’s wrong! It turns out you need a special code from Battlefield 3 to play the Multiplayer demo early. The demo makes absolutely no indication of that whatsoever, though. If the demo had just told me “hey, only those with Battlefield codes can access the early multiplayer, come back Friday,” I would have said “Cool, see you Friday.” But the fact that I had to look this shit up online just made me angry. Would it really have been that hard to just put that information in the error message?

So yeah, that demo is fucked up. I’m sure the game will be fine, but goodness. Way to make a shitty demo, Bioware.

Well, I certainly had a dream! Let me tell you about it.

I was in some big city. I don’t know which one. But there were skyscrapers kind of everywhere. So big. I was staying in this hotel/mall complex that was, I believe, 22 floors tall. Most of that was hotel. I was there on some sort of business. That was never clear. But I was there to work, and while I remember enjoying crazy-ass Vegas-style buffets and stuff, I was working. Surely.

Anyway, I had brought Q along with me, because why wouldn’t I? I was doing a bunch of work! He wanted to hang out with me. However, work called, and said I needed to go somewhere else, and I needed to go quickly. This was a situation where I couldn’t take Q along. So I was trying to come up with a solution on what to do with him. I wasn’t home, so I couldn’t just give him to my mother, and I couldn’t leave him in the hotel. I ended up calling a bunch of people, and I found a service that would let me send him back to my mother. It looked legit, so I called them and tried to set things up. They were really eager to work with me! But for whatever reason I couldn’t meet all their requirements on how to get Q sent home. They said, though, that I shouldn’t worry, and they’d work something out. I was confused, but I said, okay.

They called me back later, and said they found someone in the hotel to take care of sending him back, and I was supposed to go to room 2020. I thanked them, picked up Q, and went to the elevator. My room was on the ground floor, so I went in the elevator and hit floor 20, because, you know, 2020, that means floor 20, right?

The elevator was huge. Like, it was a small room. It also moved super fast. It knocked me off my feet as it raced up, as well as to the side (apparently it had to shift left and right around the building to keep going up). I was pinned against the glass of the thing, holding on to Q, and being very worried. Elevators should not go this fast! Still, I made it to the floor, and got out. I looked all around, but there was no room 2020 up there.

I pulled out my cell phone and called the front desk, and asked them where room 2020 was. They said it was on the first floor. I complained about how stupid that was. They just kinda said “well, that’s where it is,” and hung up. Needless to say, I rode the elevator back down.

When I found room 2020, it was basically like a utility closet. It was this big room, with a concrete floor, and there seemed to be a guy living there with a bulldog. He’s like “Oh, there you are! Been waiting for you! Got everything ready.” He showed me a large plastic bag with a blanket it in, and started putting Q in there. I noticed it had a US Mail shipping label on it. I asked him if he was going to mail my dog. He said Q would be fine. I tend started going on and on about how terrible an idea it was, and the many ways Q could be hurt. He could suffocate in the bag. He could tear his way out of the bag in a shipping center and escape. The people loading him could put him on the bottom of a stack and crush him. Basically, I made it clear there was no fucking way he was mailing my dog.

Then I woke up.

I’m not mailing Q anywhere, do you hear me? NEVER.

Well, my first foray into writing out and GMing a Mafia game has come to a close. It’s kind of a relief! It was a ton of work, though work I was glad to do. But now the game is over, chaos reigns over Equestria, and I’m left to think back on my experience. Here’s some of where my head is about it right now.

First off, I think my ruleset was pretty darn good, as I originally thought. But there were certainly some interesting power things to come out of actually seeing the game in action.
I was surprised at how much people were thrown off by Lies. We’ve played games with forgers before, although I suppose not without a coroner to counteract them, so I didn’t expect people to react so badly to that aspect. In general, I think people are overreacting to how he “ruins the game.” He only ruins the game if you let him. His is a power to help create more paranoia. That’s what being a bad guy is all about in Mafia. As town, you just have to not give in to it! Be logical! Don’t be silly! Don’t pointlessly start extremely clear bandwagons that the Mafia can predict! Still, there really is a lot of hatred for it. I have a feeling I’ll probably have to temper Lies slightly if we do this again, either by having a coroner role, or outlawing the super easy move of hitting yourself with the Lies power so the town never knows your dead, which is what happened this game.
I also feel like I accidentally missed the mark with Applejack, and I felt bad about it. For whatever reason, the fact that Rarity and Rainbow Dash were underpowered didn’t bother me TOO much. Not all powers could be winners, even though I would probably switch them out for better powers if I did this ruleset again. But the fact that I felt Applejack’s roleblocking power, once the game got started and I could see it in action, was actually pretty well a stupid power to ever use made me sad. Torgo put it to use confirming himself, which was good, but yeah. It certainly needs a tweak of some sort. There’s a difference between “tension on how to not fuck up this power use” and “My best move is not to use my power.”
Mutiny, as well, was more neutered than I thought it would be. Brick’s plan was very simple, and made it so Mutiny couldn’t use their power. However, Brick’s plan really fucked with the game overall, I feel. It made it feel like the whole game day was only viable in the last 24 hours, and that had an impact. A huge one, I think. Mutiny wasn’t completely useless in that regard. But still, what’s the fun of having a power you can’t use? I’d want to fix that next time around too.

All that said, I keep going back and forth about how much my ruleset favors the Mafia. Unlike Brick, I’m pretty sure it does, but unlike most of the other players, I am pretty sure it doesn’t in a huge way. It’s really close. Is simply powering up the weak Mane 6 going to be enough to fix this? Do they need something more, to help them not fuck over each other? Or an extra “Mane 6” in the coroner role to weaken that win condition for the Mafia without giving the town too much more power? I don’t know. I’m going to have to think long and hard on that one before I do another pitch based on these rules again. Decisions! Playtesting! Oh my!

One thing I didn’t realize before I GM’d a game is how talkative players in the game are with the GM. I have never thought about PMing the GM of any Mafia game I’ve played for anything other than rules clarifications, but I was pretty constantly getting PMs complaining about things, venting frustrations, saying “Tell the Champagne Room This” and so on. It was really interesting. It was an extension of that feeling I have to want to really over explain decisions I’m not sure of to people who understand. They couldn’t do that all out in the thread, so they tell me, who knows they’re innocent/guilty and thus understands what they’re frustrated about. It was cool. Maybe I’ll do that next game. I dunno.

As far as writing went, it was a fucking blast. I think I’ve converted one and a half people to watching Ponies, too, so that’s nice. Heh. But yeah, I’ve went on and on here about how I love to envision children’s characters taking on actual consequences and problems outside of their normal reach. I don’t know if I did that real well? It did get kind of silly dramatic at times. But it was fun to try, and for the most part, I am VERY happy with how I treated the characters. I panic so much when working with stuff that isn’t my own. I don’t want to change it. I felt like I did a damn good job of keeping Twilight acting like Twilight, Applejack like Applejack, and so on. I especially felt really good about the sequences I wrote with the Cutie Mark Crusaders. I often left those feeling I nailed it. Heh. If I had to do it over again, though, maybe I wouldn’t have little flavor interludes at vote counts? Fuck, that took up a lot of my free time. Then again, I got to tell the story I wanted to tell better, which is why I wanted them in the first place. I can’t be too mad about it.

The last thing I want to talk about is the bad blood in the game. Man, I don’t know, I felt like more people got hurt in the silly pony game than in games before. It was so frustrating to watch that from my position and be unable to do anything about it. You have to let people berate people. That’s just how the game works. You can’t do social manipulation unless you’re free to socially manipulate. But fuck, I would have hoped people could keep the game separate from how we all really feel about each other. We’re friends on Talking Time. Basically as close of friends as a bunch of people who haven’t met posting on a message board can be, at least in my opinion. I have screamed at people in games before, called people assholes, told them to sit down and let the adults play, and such things. But while I was frustrated then, as I said them, the moment the game ended, the feeling was gone. It was just a game. It was meaningless outside of gameplay. I don’t mind getting mad or pissy in a game of Mafia because I know, in the end, it doesn’t mean anything. I wish that was clearer to people. I don’t want to be excluding people or scaring people off, because Mafia is fucking awesome.

Anyway, I totally am calling this game a success. It had its hiccups, as any would, but overall there were no big explosions and everyone seemed to have a great time! Would I GM again? Absolutely. But I’m probably not even going to try to pitch a game for at least two more rounds. It’s an exhausting experience, doing all that stuff alone! I need to just chill and enjoy playing for awhile.

Sherclop Pones put a teaser image of Friendship is Witchcraft Episode 6 on their youtube page, so I was all like “SHIT, gotta find out when that comes out!” There are links to their tumblogs or whatever the fuck that’s called, so I went and looked at them to see if they had said any sort of timetable. (For the record, take your time, Sherclop Pones! I’m excited, but do that shit right, you know?)

I didn’t find anything, but the guy who does a lot of the editing and stuff had a link to this album. It had appealing art and wanted to give me a seizure, so I figured, you know, I’d try it. It was alright, so I downloaded it, and threw it on my MP3 player. I have then proceeded to listen to it constantly since. Like, constantly. I’ve pretty well fallen in love with it. It’s really silly mashups of songs with video game tunes and all kinds of shit, and… yeah. I like it a lot. I would recommend trying it. Here’s my favorite track, if you need convincing.

But yeah, anyway, I was surprised, so I’m like “Who is this Truxton guy? I bet I’d like more of his stuff.” So I do some searching and stumble onto the website with all this stuff on it. And I’m like “Wait, I remember this ridiculous nurse herm bullshit.”
Anyway, apparently there’s a guy with like a million fursonas that makes concept albums as different people? And Truxton is his most recent creation or whatever? I don’t know. Good for him? Though it makes me kind of feel all the weirder about really liking this album. I don’t know. I remember being like “What the hell is this?” the first time I saw some of those album covers that he’s had done. Plus, since I really enjoyed this album, I’ve been seeing if anything else he has done clicked with me, and I just have stumbled upon stuff that just makes me close my browser in shame.

Let me just make one thing clear. Apparently this is this guy’s job. This is how he makes money. That’s fucking amazing. Awesome! Clearly he loves doing it, and I don’t want to come off seeming like I think he shouldn’t create it and make money off of it. Doing what you love and being paid for it is basically the goal of life, and he made it!

But it just seems in many ways to represent that part of furry culture I just kind of want to be distant from.

I’m a furry, and I certainly don’t think I’m ashamed of it? I certainly make it pretty clear and am not shy about it. Any time I am asked to explain why the hell I am a furry, or what a furry is, I have an explanation, of course, but I know that what it all means to me is pretty different than the fandom at large. I see the furries in my little group, who are a big open accepting family, very inviting, always ready to try something new. The fandom at large is the sort of people who go to conventions, dance, hook up, all this shit. I don’t think if I ever went to a furry con I would feel that sense of family I do with most furries I meet online. Maybe they’re the same people. I know Aesa has gone to these things, and I love him to death. But in a group, it’s just… scary. The overall effect is wrong. That keeps me away. This music reminds me of that in a lot of ways. I can see the bunch of people that want a song entitled “Thorough Pinata Dicking Amateur XXX” and that bunch of people doesn’t seem like people I want to be around.

I suppose this whole “brony” whatever is the same way. I have accepted I’m a super-fan, but I tried watching panels and stuff from BroNYcon, and it just embarrassed me and I had to stop. It was no longer this kind of uninhibited love of something childish and nice which I feel when I talk to people one on one about ponies. It was no longer, say, Molestia’s “let’s make pointless dirty jokes about this because it is silly” fun. It became real. All the fun playing around became super serious and “no, I seriously believe this.” That put me off.
Maybe I’m a hypocrite. I certainly have super-serious but very stupid thoughts about “but no, seriously, if the Mane 6 were lesbians, here’s who I think would fuck based on personality compatibility” and completely ridiculous crap like that. That doesn’t really feel that wrong to me. Similarly, I can have similar dumb conversations about why Fluttershy would actually make a pretty good dom with a small group of friends and it doesn’t feel wrong. It’s just all of us joking and having fun, even if we seriously argue points. But when the scale gets that big, somehow that breaks.

I think I just figured it out. When this stuff scales, I can no longer trust that someone is doing this because it’s fun, and not because they’re insane. One person, one artist, one whatever? I can get that. My brain can handle processing motivations for doing this sort of thing that aren’t creepy or crazy. I can give someone the benefit of the doubt, or see where they’re coming from. Same with a small group. I can process each person individually and make that assessment. But when the group gets too big, suddenly individually working through each person is daunting. I don’t have enough information about each person. I can’t do it. So I can’t be sure their intentions are good. So the idea of being associated with them creeps me out.

I’m not better than anyone. I’m plenty fucking creepy and weird when I want to be. I don’t feel like I’m being unfair here. But fuck, maybe I am. I don’t know. Maybe if I just gave in and didn’t worry about this bullshit, just assumed the best about people like I normally try to, I would be able to go have a good time. Who knows.

Wow, this blog sure went weird places! But seriously, try that album. It’s fun.

I was going to write about music. Maybe I’ll do that for tomorrow. But I had this conversation with Cara and it just blew me away (IGN.com) and I just have to ramble about it a little. Luckily, I have this blog to do so. It’s like I planned this or some shit!

Anyway, I was telling Cara about the student not knowing he was taking the test and the eventual failure of basically everyone in the class on that test. She has been substitute teaching in local high schools for awhile now, and offered me some stories to attempt to explain this thing. If anyone else but her told me these stories, I would have said they were made up to fuck with me. I was literally floored. I will share them with you now.

She first told the story of a straight A kid that slept through a test she was giving to the students. When asked if he was feeling sick, the student told her that he’s fine, he just didn’t get enough sleep, so he’ll talk to the teacher and take the test another day. This seemed crazy enough to me. But Cara then told me that it is school policy to let students retake tests until they “get a grade they are happy with.” So this student, who has seen the test now but not even attempted it, will now go look up the answers and then retake the same test and ace it. If he doesn’t ace it, he can try another time. This is apparently a thing a real high school is doing.

It didn’t end there, though. Cara then told me about a school that had a “no 0 policy.” Basically, a teacher can’t give you a 0 on an assignment. A bad grade, sure, but not a 0. So if you don’t want to take a test, you just need to write absolutely nothing on the paper. Then they are required to let you take it again, but again, you now know exactly what’s on the test and if you aren’t an idiot, you’ve looked up the answers. The same goes for assignments. If you don’t turn them in, you’re pestered to turn them in because the teachers can’t give you a 0. Apparently you have to go to Saturday school and do the assignments there? But you have help. You don’t need to worry about it.

This doesn’t even count stories I’ve been told about how there aren’t enough books to have take-home reading assignments for literature classes.

This made me really angry. Like, really angry! At some point, I have truly become a teacher, and I really care about the quality of education people are given. I looked at Cara, walked off, and said “We’re all doomed,” because that’s how I felt. The next generation has no fucking chance if this is really what we’re doing. No wonder I see so many students struggling with the very concept of actually having to turn things in on time and actually putting forth effort in class. It made me very glad my parents decided to pay to send me to a private high school where I actually had to do shit. I mean, I breezed through that too. But at least I had responsibilities. Goodness.

I’ve heard I’m a pretty strict and demanding teacher. But dammit, my students who don’t drop out LEARN SOMETHING. They tell me they learn something. They tell me they’ve learned more than they thought they would in my class. That’s because I make them put forth effort, and once they have to try, they can figure this stuff out. Once you give a shit, magically, things happen.

Ugh. Doomed, I say. We’re all doomed.

Today I gave a test, which is kind of the first actual like… test test I’ve given. I’ve always been a writing teacher. No tests there! Tests are stupid in a writing class. So I gave one this time, because I am teaching a non-writing class, so that seemed like the thing to do. It was a long test. Maybe it shouldn’t have been? I figured more questions = more room for error, so I went all out. But I’m new at this test-giving thing.

But during this test… well, I have to tell a story of what happened during this test.

So the test is in two parts. Part One is all open computer. It’s about research skills and whatnot, so they can look up whatever they want on the computer in front of them. Part Two is closed-book or whatever. No computer during that part. They have to give me Part One back before I give them Part Two to do, and once they turn in Part One, they’re in deep shit if they use their computers.
I hand out Part One, and everyone gets going. Of the two problem guys I talked about before, only one of them has decided to show up for the test. He’s clearly not working too hard on the test. I see him pull out his cell phone at least once during it. But fuck, it’s part one, he has the whole internet to refer to, so I don’t much care if he does something stupid with his phone. If he’s really having someone text him answers, more power to him. That has to be way the fuck more work than just looking them up in an online dictionary like he’s supposed to for the test.

Anyway, time passes. There’s maybe 10 minutes left of the test. He hasn’t even turned in part one yet. He packs up all his books, comes up to the front, and says “Hey, I gotta leave, I’ll finish that for homework.”
So, of course, I go, “No, you won’t, this is a test.”
He seems confused. “What?”
“This is our first test. We’ve been talking about it for over a week.”
“So I can’t finish it at home?”
“No, it’s a test.”
He pulls the test out of his bag where he had placed it, hands it to me, and walks out. I flip through it. He’s maybe, MAYBE halfway done with Part One after the hour and 15 minutes of this test. I staple a blank Part Two to his test, and put it away.

I was just kind of floored. I mean, if you aren’t going to take the test, don’t show up, right? A better use of your time, right? But I’m just more shocked that he didn’t realize it was a test when I really have been talking about it for awhile, and I had Test-taking procedures written on the board, and the damn thing said “test” on it. The note I left on the board of the normal classroom to point him to the computer lab to begin with said that my class was “in the computer lab for test-taking times.” It’s not like this was a secret.

This whole scenario just involves a level of not paying attention that I cannot even fathom. Why is he here? Why does he keep showing up only to leave in the middle of class, or walk out in the middle and walk back in right when everyone is packing up? He doesn’t participate in activities. He doesn’t do homework. Why is he wasting two hours a day attending my classes? I want to understand, but back when I was a slacker, I wasted my time wisely. I stayed at home and played video games. I didn’t go and sit through classes I didn’t want to be in. I did something fun instead! Why isn’t he off doing something he finds more valuable?

Again, I was a shitty student once, mostly due to depression. I always feel like I understand the students who don’t show up or don’t do homework because I have been there. I think they should do those things, but I get why they don’t, and I don’t take it personal. It’s their tuition money to waste how they like. But this guy… I just don’t know. I can’t understand it. I mean, if he’s not disrupting the class, it’s fine. Him not taking this test for no reason didn’t hurt the other students, so whatever. But goodness. What’s his motivation? I want to know what makes him tick.

Well, the trip is over, and this’ll be the last of the little visit blogs, I suppose. Back to my normal blogging stupidity tomorrow.

Our last day together was nice, but much too short, of course. I taught, and he made French Toast, which I had shown him how to make. It turned out well! Then we left for St. Louis. We had some sushi! I had had sushi before, but only like… shitty sushi, and not like… a meal of it. Just like a single sushi people had handed me to try. It was really good! I really enjoyed it, even though I made a fool of myself with chopsticks. The lady at the restaurant swooped in with a fork for me, and kept giving me sushi lessons because she could tell I was completely clueless. It was very appreciated.

Then we drove past the arch, so he could see it, and then we went to the airport. We parked and I cried a lot again. I wasn’t going to, dammit. But I did. He was all “It’s going to be okay” and had, several days ago, bought tissues intelligently, and had some to give me. I got my crying done, and then we played one more game of Carcasssonne. Then I dropped him off. We hugged and kissed, and hugged some more. And that was it. I drove away.

His texts since were very sad. I’m all scared that he got emotional after I left, because he felt he couldn’t with all my stupid crying. But he’s home safe, so that’s good.

If there’s one thing this trip taught me, it’s this: I did so much worrying about making this a relationship. I was so scared about getting hurt again, about hurting Brer, about so many things. I wanted it, but I didn’t think life would let me have it. Well, it has. It has, and it’s wonderful. It was the right decision. It was all the right decision. Maybe at some point in the future things fall apart. I don’t think it will, at least not in a huge disaster way, but that happens to things sometimes. If it does, so be it. But the time I’m having now will make it all worth it. This is something worth trying for. With Brer and Aesa… people who love me by my side… how can things be bad? How can life be shitty with so much love?

It can’t be. It can’t be.

Another day down! It’s almost over…! That’s unfortunate. Still, it was time to do some cool shit, so we did some cool shit, I suppose! Yay.

We were mostly lazy. We threw down in some more YDKJ, for instance, and we watched more stuff. I showed him the joys of Mah Jong anime, for example, because I am lame. Who wouldn’t want to be shown that! Most people, I guess, but that’s nothing to concern yourself with.

But yeah, we cooked some rice and marinaded some chicken. We played Kirby’s Return to Dreamland and Kirby’s Dream Course! He seemed to enjoy both.

Then we sat down to dinner and I started crying because the trip was almost over.
It was kind of stupid. We still had all night and a lot of today left. But I just couldn’t help myself. I never realized how depressed I really was until I stopped being depressed, you know? And then I’m like “woah.” In the same way, I never really understood how empty this house felt and how much I wished my loves were here until one was here, and I was just doing my daily work shit and stuff, nothing special, and it was wonderful. I was hit with preemptive loneliness. I mean, I know it’s temporary. Brer will get here. Aesa will visit again. But fuck. Heh.

Anyway, so we went over to my brother’s watched some Puppy Bowl and played some Dominion (which I somehow squeaked out a win for out of nowhere! Yay me!) and then watched Tangled, which neither of us had seen. Tangled was really good, by the way. A children’s film, of course, but quite entertaining. I liked how they messed with the Rapunzel story and whatnot. Plus having watched it, I can now appreciate this fanart more, which is always nice.

Anyway, last day. Going to try to keep it together and have fun. Also do a ton of work. Goodness, so much work.

Today we watched some movie films, and played some vidjeo gaemz. We also went to the home of the thrown rolls! It was fun.

Basically, we woke up, and made a homemade pizza. Like, for serious. Aesa made dough, and I fried some beef for toppings, and we cheesed it and everything and cooked it. It was pretty darn good! It took awhile to make, but it was fun, and delicious.

While we ate that, we watched The Producers. The musical version, not the original. Aesa hadn’t seen it, and I wanted to show him. I think he liked it? I don’t think all of the over-the-top exaggerated stage humor in the movie completely clicked with him. But in general, he found it an entertaining film! Which is was. Though I still don’t know why the hell they cut out King of Broadway.

After that, we played some games. We beat the first level of FThreeEAR, which was… bad. I dunno. It is definitely a shooter, and the sort of thing I would play all the way through with a friend. But Aesa is a PC gamer person, and wasn’t too good with the controller and not used to the small view of a split screen game, and it just kind of caused problems. It happens! We switched to YDKJ after that, though, and then things got more awesome. We also threw down in some Carcassonne, which he squeaked out two victories in versus my one. Can’t believe that guy.

We also ate at Lambert’s. Because, you know, if you’re visiting this part of Missouri, I felt like it was necessary. It was a damn good meal. Aesa liked it! But we got all gypped on the roll-throwing! The only rolls thrown at us were from a distance of about a foot away! Totally unimpressive.

Finally, we ended up bumping into Essner at the grocery store before we went to watch The Fantastic Mr. Fox, another movie Aesa had not seen and I felt he needed to see. The Essner encounter was… odd. He was obviously a bit uncomfortable. I could theorize as to why, but, you know. Hopefully in the long run it’s not a big deal.

The trip is winding to a close. That’s… sad. I’ve really gotten used to him being here. Having someone here is very nice. Dammit, Brer, get your ass down here faster! Beat up the Wal-Mart corporation until they let you transfer! It’s going to be real lonely when he leaves…

Another visit day down!

It started with a really good peer review session (seriously, my students were totally into it! Always nice) and then it went pretty good after that! Pretty really good. Like good pretty really pretty good good really. You know, words in a sequence to denote a day being good!

We did the class, and then I showed Aesa around town. I don’t know if he really cared? But it seemed like a town tour was the sort of thing one does. So I showed him where I worked, and where I went to school, and I showed him the river, and so on and so forth. Surely seeing where I went to high school is SUPER EXCITING! Something like that.

In any case, we had a pretty good time. We mostly just snuggled up on the couch and made ample use of Netflix, which was cool. That was something I don’t get to do very often.

In the evening, though, we went out to eat with my parents. I couldn’t stay stuff to them about our relationship. I just… bleh, I wanted to. I really did! But I couldn’t have that fight right now, and Aesa was telling me NOT to have that fight anyway. Still, the dinner went great. Aesa made a great impression on them, and I tried frog legs and crawdads for the first time. They were both… fine? But I’m not going to go out of my way to get them again. Heh.

Anyway, it was an uneventful, but nice, day. I have no complaints.