The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

By the way, I typed the title as “I’m alone at home with the god” three times before I managed to type it correctly.

So the parents are back, and I survived the dog. Good for me!

Overall, it was a fairly positive experience. I got her to actually eat her dog food, which was good. She slept with me in my bed pretty well without issue and without waking me up at odd hours, which is awesome.

Still, she was really kind of annoying at times. She does NOT like being near my computer, and still constantly tried to get me away from it. Eventually, she gave up, and decided to climb into my lap while I was on the computer. This created its own issues, because she would keep moving around, making it near impossible to type, and leap up any time I readjusted myself in the chair to try to make me run to a more suitable location.

Still, all in all, I have no complaints. She was mostly behaved. I got along with my life normally with no issues.

She sure made quite a mess downstairs, though, which I didn’t have a chance to clean up. Oh well.
Back to business as usual, I suppose.

Time Hollow is pretty well exactly what I thought it would be.

It’s an adventure game that’s on the DS. You click on things, and are given descriptions, and you solve puzzles! There’s a story involving a pen that can draw holes in time. It’s pretty well the perfect rental if you’re an adventure game genre fan, and that’s exactly what I did with it. I rented the shit out of it.

I didn’t beat it, though, because it creates several affronts to fun that kept me from wanting to move forward.

One, the entire game is a game of “Find the Cutscene.” You literally have to tap on everything until specific events occur. You can have the solution to a problem way, way before the game wants you to have it, and it will either ignore you, or you will be told you need to come back later, with no real reason given why that’s the case.
Two, the game is full of tiny little miss-able, important items. There are also tiny little things you wouldn’t notice that you have to find to move forward. What’s worse, the game makes a “mechanic” of this, where you have to use the D-pad to pan the screen left and right to see small corners of the scenes for absolutely no reason other than to make the game more difficult.
Three, everyone’s name is an awful clock pun. Every. Single. Name. I could deal with that in a better game, but ugh.

So I sent it back around halfway through. I was having to FAQ my way through it’s generic anime sort of plot, and it just didn’t seem worth my time to keep going. Plus, Gamefly said they were sending me Scribblenauts. Mmm, Scribblenauts.

So yeah, I can’t recommend the purchase unless you are the more die-hard of adventure game fans. But eh, you could rent it if you were really bored. It’s certainly better than, say, Miami Law.

So, David Foster Wallace was a name I had heard of, vaguely, before. I knew I’d heard of him from somewhere. But I got into a conversation with Airek at the office, and he gives me this note, telling me to go watch this Youtube video of him. I put it in my pocket, set it on my desk, and promptly forget about it.
A week or so later, I find the note and, having nothing in particular to watch while I eat, I used the information to pull up this video.

About, oh, 28 minutes and 2 seconds later, I’m on Amazon, ordering every book of essays by him I can find.

I fucking LOVE a good essayist, and especially if you watch that video, you’ll know that David Foster Wallace was one. Those little tidbits are so fun, and so well realized, I can’t help but love them.

A couple days later, I go up to Airek and I thank him for telling me to watch that, because it was awesome. And then he tells me David Foster Wallace killed himself.
That kind of put a damper on things. It’s a shame. He had skills. One would assume he could have paid bills with them. But yeah… sad.

Anyway, we’ll see how me reading those books goes. I’m excited! But I also suck at the whole “Reading books” thing. So we’ll see how well it all goes.

This page of Homestuck has made me very happy, honestly.

Why?

I dunno. I mean, all of everyone’s interests has only had a sort of passing, thematic significance to the story thus far. Maybe it’ll tie in more? Maybe it won’t? But I guess the point is that the fact that Jade likes furry stuff is just a thing. It’s just something in a list. It’s not anything to laugh at, perse. It’s not anything to make her less of a character and a person. It’s perhaps a bit silly, but come on, furry stuff is a bit silly. But it’s just a thing. A part of her, but not all of her.

That’s awesome.

I mean, not that I’m some fursecution type or whatever, but it’s still nice to see such things portrayed in a manner that isn’t just to make the author feel better by “Well, at least I’m not one of THOSE” means. Everybody has stupid interests. Everyone does weird things. Granted, some people do weirder things than others, but it’s so pointless to judge. If it’s not ruining your fun, who cares? I know Mr. Hussie won’t make stupid jokes like that. I know he cares about his characters more than that. And that’s neat. (Then again, he was also the person who drew Humanimals, so…)

So yeah, I’m kind of happy about a stupid thing. Gotta take the little stupid happy things when you can get them, yes?

So, I have this kid in my class. He is like… the sort of person you would put next to the term “Emo kid” in the dictionary in look. Wears all the clothes, has bangs that cover his eyes, stays in the corner, never says anything, you know. Stereotype, through and through.At the same time, he’s a nice kid. Turns things in on time. Never an issue. It’s not like I hate him. It’s not like I have anything against him wanting to play that emo role, either. If it makes him happy, more power to him. It’s fine with me.

At the same time, I do things like, say, play Forumwarz, which is awesome. But I play an Emo Kid, and so I’ve sort of gotten myself used to laughing my ass off at these ridiculous emo things. I mean, they are funny! That’s why I laugh. It’s motivated by some of the same reasons I would, say, laugh at more ridiculous aspects of the furry subculture, or the gamer subculture. Any group is likely to have aspects of it that are ridiculous, you know?

Still, I get his papers from class, and I read them, and I’m met with a problem. This is exactly the sort of text that is displayed in Forumwarz when I make an emo attack. Exactly. Like, I could cut and paste parts of it and put it into the game, and nobody would know it wasn’t parody.

This puts me in a spot. I just don’t know how to react to this genuine, heartfelt text that is, at the same time, hilariously an emo stereotype. I know this guy takes his writing seriously, and is wanting to write something good. Though his style is so painfully, painfully emo, he is trying to cultivate a style, and I should encourage that. It feels very wrong to laugh at him. I don’t want to do that, just like I don’t want people to laugh at me for my oddities, or at the very least laugh with me, you know? But damn, separated from him, in my office, grading these papers, it is really hard to remember there’s a person behind it that I shouldn’t make fun of. Incredibly hard.
So I almost always have to take these long breaks before I write comments on his paper so I don’t write anything weird. But it’s hard.

It just goes to show you how dangerous stereotypes can be, I guess. I mean, I feel like I’m pretty good about such things? But then here’s this clear situation where I’m fighting with it? I don’t know. I guess it’s, to some extent, inescapable.
Somewhat.

Molly does not like that I hang out in non-Molly approved places.

She does not like the computer room at all, and, well… that’s kind of where I spend, oh, 95% of my leisure time. All day she has been trying to get me out of the room constantly. I gave in a few times, but then I’m like, “Fuck it, I have Brutal Legend to play.’ So I stopped giving in. So she got more insistent. So I said “Okay, let’s compromise. I’ll sit on the couch while I play so you can sit with me.” That helped for a little while, but then she started climbing all over me and trying to lick me until I stood up.
This kind of behavior is really cute when I don’t feel bad locking her out of the room when I’m fed up with it, because she can just go back to my parents. In short bursts, it’s really cute. “Aww, she wants my attention!” When I’m alone, and I don’t want to lock her out? It’s really aggravating. My temper started flaring. It was difficult resisting pushing her away forcefully. It pretty well sucked.

I just put in her ear medicine, and now she’s mad at me, and hiding, and honestly, that’s pretty great. Relaxing.

Man, maybe I couldn’t handle having kids… that’s kind of a depressing thought, though…

Ugh, hopefully it’ll be easier when I’m at the office for most of the day. I wasn’t expecting to get this annoyed this fast.

I’m acting like this is going to be a multiple part series, but it probably isn’t. I’m just THAT AWESOME.

So, my parents are all taking a vacation to beautiful San Francisco. I don’t know exactly why they wanted to go to San Fran, but they did, and good for them, I say! But that leaves me at home with Molly who can be a handful. While I love her and how she follows me around and constantly begs for my attention and stuff (she’s too adorable) she is also an incredibly picky, and overly pampered dog. My parents normally take care of that part, so I just have the fun cuteness part. Now I’ve got to take care of all of it. Joyful.

Night 1 did not go off without issues. I got to clean up dog pee, which is always exciting, but that’s mostly because I wasn’t thinking. I knew I should take her out before I go to bed, but I wasn’t thinking about the fact that when I go to bed is not when the parents go to bed (although more and more it is. I’m old, gah) and that Molly was used to doing her business then. So, right around the time when the parents would normally take her out? Peed in the floor. I won’t make that mistake again.

Still, she slept very well, which is something I was worried about. I put her in my bed, and she slept next to me all night. I even woke up before she did, which I felt wouldn’t be the case because I figured she’d bother me to go outside around 6. She slept right up against my armpit, which was… annoying. I normally sleep on my side, with one arm under the additional pillows on my bed, and she got right there under my arm. Still, it was cute at the same time, since her head was on the other pillow.

So yeah… I’m sure it’ll go alright, but it is a lot more to think about. I’m going to have to work at home more instead of at the office, which, honestly, is an issue, because I do things like write this bloeg post instead of grading papers. Distractions are like that. But we’ll see. I’m sure if anything particularly noteworthy happens, you’ll hear about it.

I think I’m almost more savvy a consumer. Almost.

I remember back in the day, when I was working as a janitor and was getting paid to essentially play GBA and read Manga, and I’d buy so much Manga. So, so much. (Now I’m down to Yotsuba!& and xXxholic. And, I guess, Hourou Musuko, though that isn’t translated officially so I’m not buying it, perse. Oh, how I’ve changed.) I’d walk into Waldenbooks and they would have a sign that said “Buy four books of manga, get one free!” And I’d do it. Every time. Even when I only had, say, 2 titles I wanted. I’d buy five. Every time. I couldn’t pass up the deal, even though it was a shitty deal, and I was getting books I didn’t really want. I was awesome.

Now, Toys R Us and Amazon are both having Buy 2, Get 1 Free game deals, and I keep looking and looking for what to buy, and I can never find three. Instead of just buying something I didn’t need, I have, gasp, not purchased any games.

I’ve worried somewhat, since starting Gamefly, that I haven’t really cut down my game purchases THAT much. But then, when things like this come along, and I realize all the titles I could buy are all titles I was just going to rent, and there’s no good reason to change that plan? That really is like… $100 or so I’ve saved. That is savings. I am saving. I am doing better.
Probably.

It’s fall break!

Sort of!

Last week was so shitty, oh yes it was. I was so busy. I was so looking forward to this break. I’d get to sit back, relax, and play Brutal Legend. What more could you ask for? I even started it off on a good foot this past day, with a monster Beatles: Rock Band session where we actually took time out for Vocal practice to hit the harmonies. It was so sweet and so fun.

Now, I’m thinking about what I have to do this weekend, and I pretty well have work to do every day. I have a midterm I have to take, papers to grade, a teaching journal I should probably catch up on… suddenly, my break has disappeared.

Man, is this what it’s like to grow up? Fuck that shit. I dunno. Bleh blarg.

I mean, it’s not really as bad as it looks. The vague plan is to finish it all today, but I kind of doubt that will happen? So probably the midterm today and the grading Friday or something. It really won’t be that bad, and I’ll have plenty of time to take ample breaks. I just…
Man, I’ve really got myself into a fuck-ton of work, you know? I really have.
I’m making it. I’m surviving. But I really have.
Man.

Man, I continue to feel like I got really lucky having gotten into the Lucasarts adventure games and such. Every time I really get into looking at these Sierra adventure games, I go “Man, I am so glad I never tried to play one of those.” Well, okay, I tried to play the time travel Space Quest, but that went really shitty, so… makes me glad I didn’t continue to try.

Anyway, I watched a pretty good LP of King’s Quest V awhile back, and it made me feel the same way. This post is mostly to say, hey, feel free to check that out here. It’s pretty good.

But yeah, goodness. Some of the stuff in that game? So completely dumb. And I understand this was the start of games that had voice actors, but goodness.
Goodness.

Maybe if I’d been with King’s Quest the whole time. Maybe. But man, that game…
Just watch it, and be amazed at how random and nonsensical it is.

I do feel kind of bad, though. I saw a link to this LP in the thread for Sky Render’s LP of the game, and it’s probably going to make me not read it. Sky Render has done some awesome LP’s of this series of adventure games, called the Kyrandia series, that I didn’t even know existed. He’s pretty awesome. So you should give his LP a look, too. Or at least go back and read his other ones. They’re also worth your time.