enjoy the silence

x-men: first class

2011-06-06T09:33:00.003-04:00

x-men: first class - 9.5/10 - fan of the x-men franchise? go see this movie today! this movie is mind blowing! by far the best x-men film that has been released. about time they actually made a great movie with these characters. obviously with the era that the film is set in, a lot of the familiar x-men are not a part of the film (storm, cyclops, gambit, rogue, jean grey, etc.). the only reason this movie doesn't get a 10/10 from me is the way they portrayed emma frost. i don't think it was january jones' fault that this character isn't as bitchy, self-absorbed, and pretty much in charge as emma should have been but more a writing flaw. although as my dad pointed out this is when emma was much younger and maybe i'm being a bit too harsh as i'm used to the emma of generation x who doesn't give a damn about anyone but herself and would have had sebastian shaw working for her...anywho, spoilers ahead, ye have been warned...wolverine makes a small cameo and it was quite appropriate. i really enjoyed that they took a lot of time to work in all the mutants' abilities and show them off whenever there was an applicable moment. rather than just see kitty pryde or colossus for two seconds and not really get much out of their character, this film really brought out a lot of lesser well known mutants and put them in the spotlight. it was also great to see moira mctaggert in a starring role rather than a bit part albeit that her occupation and ancestry was a bit skewed from the comic. i was a little disappointed in the writers' decisions to change a lot of the x-men's origins to suit the film but i guess that's common practice when it comes to movies about comics or books. things that were a bit off were: professor x's initial paralysis incident, i don't think tempest (angel) was ever a member of the hellfire club, the death of darwin (he's pretty much invincible folks), how charles and erik meet, and the death of sebastian shaw. shaw's pretty much a key figure in the sentinel program so either magneto doesn't really kill him in this film at all or they're going to take the films to very different places.

all in all go see the movie, you won't regret having spent the moola as it is incredibly entertaining!

enjoy the silence.

the blog is back!

2011-06-02T10:00:00.004-04:00

wow! it has been almost a year since my last post. here's a quick update on me. my entire life has changed drastically with the addition of robert as of january 14th this year. if you read some of the previous posts then you know he was due around january 3rd but apparently decided to wait a while to make his appearance. he's a ball of fun and growing so quickly (they do that or so folks tell me). i'm still working at usc in the biology department trying to obtain the illusive phd while teaching biology 102 labs. in fact i'm working on some research right now. i'm also still part time at vista psychiatric in the billing department. sean's still working at his family's trucking business - choice trucking and things seem to be going pretty smoothly all around.

precious - 9.5/10 - i realize this movie has been out for quite some time and that i should have watched it before now as it has been sitting in our netflix queue for at least two months. anywho the movie was great! the acting and the directing were phenomenal! i actually had some empathy for the characters. for those of you that aren't familiar the film is about a girl, precious, who grows up with an absolutely horrible family life in harlem. her father rapes her, her mother beats her and is emotionally abusive, she's overweight, and illiterate. precious already has one child by her father and the story starts with her pregnant with her second child. i don't want to give too much away for those of you that haven't seen it but i found the movie to be fantastic. it is a hard film to watch but definitely worth it in the end.

in everquest 2 news they are finally recognizing the ultimate race - ratonga of course! they've introduced a new history book detailing some of the ratonga heritage (titled out of necessity) as well as a free ratonga illusion and free seeker of cheese house pet (both for a limited time in the station marketplace), and they have released the ratonga heritage armor! pyper and all her friends are thoroughly ecstatic.

well enough for now. glad to be back and hope to keep myself around. as for now, enjoy the silence!

grown ups, predators, inception, and the last airbender

2010-07-17T13:03:00.003-04:00

let's start off with the worst and work our way up...

the last airbender - 3/10 - eh the acting was just sucky...we've watched a good bit of the cartoon and none of the humor was present. i was let down.

predators - 5/10 - it accomplished what it came to do, keep me preoccupied for an hour and 47 minutes. it had a good bit of action and a small twist that was pretty obvious early on. i suggest renting it for sure. if you're a huge predator fan then head to the theaters, i doubt you'll be disappointed.

grown ups - 5/10 - i laughed a lot more than i thought i would with this film. even though it contains a large number of big names [adam sandler, kevin james, rob schneider, chris rock, and david spade] i still found it to be quite enjoyable. a definite dvd rental.

inception - 7.5/10 - i feel that this movie is getting a lot of crap for being too intelligent. in my opinion they dumbed it down for the masses and anyone with a semi functioning brain should have no problem understanding this film. i'm not a fan of leonardo dicaprio but he and the other actors in the film [joseph gordon-levitt, ellen page, tom hardy, cillian murphy] do a wonderful job with their individual parts. a lot of the scenes are visually stunning as well. i definitely suggest catching this one if you're up for a tiny bit of concentration rather than a summer popcorn flick.

enjoy the silence.

toy story 3, knight and day, the a team, the karate kid

2010-06-26T09:28:00.003-04:00

hi folks. really short reviews coming your way this am.

toy story 3 - 7/10 - if you like the others, you're sure to like this one. a little darker than the other two toy stories but a good film nonetheless.

knight and day - 6/10 - definitely a dvd rental if you don't catch it in theaters. an okay amount of action mixed with humor. the plot could have used a little more creativity but eh it works out alright.

the a team - 8/10 - i really thought i was going to be bored during this film and that i'd seen all the funny parts in the previews. action packed, hilarious, extremely enjoyable. i say go see it today if you haven't already.

the karate kid - 5.5/10 - eh, the original was way better. i suggest dvd rental.

so here's to hoping that they really are planning ghostbusters iii for sometime in 2012 as imdb says is rumored. or maybe that beetlejuice sequel that michael keaton and geena davis wanna make...

in other life news, sean and i are expecting to introduce a new gamer into the world around or about january 3rd! excitement, i know. also sean caught a 3 foot eastern king snake in our computer room the other day. how did that sucker manage to get in the house?!?

anywho, have a fantastic week and as always enjoy the silence!

prince of persia: the sands of time, splice, and the sims 3: ambitions

2010-06-06T08:05:00.002-04:00

prince of persia: the sands of time - 4.5/10 - i thought this film would blow. i have not played the game so i have no idea how well it portrays the game at all. i'm really not a big fan of jake gyllenhaal either except for his role in donnie darko. we'll just overlook all of gemma arterton's role as she was a bit much. the movie, however, was actually somewhat enjoyable. there was enough action to keep me preoccupied throughout the film and the plot was okay even if it was somewhat predictable. i wouldn't go rushing to theaters to see this one but i think it'd be an okay popcorn flick dvd rental.

splice - 3/10 - bah! this film was so promising. i love horror. i love science. mix the two together and voila; perfect freaking movie...not so much in this case. so the movie starts off well enough in a lab where scientists are mixing animal dna to try and find proteins that will help solve diseases in livestock. so they decide to get carried away and go for a human/animal cross even though they're directly told not to do so. surprise surprise they do it anyway. spoilers ahead: so they create dren (nerd backwards) which is a pretty neat looking critter. here's where the movie becomes idiotic. so the two idiot scientists, clive and elsa, are in a relationship and have sex in front of dren (by accident of course, they just couldn't possibly think that since she was behind that curtain she would hear them). so dren decides this looks like a good idea and starts getting all affectionate with clive. well one day she kisses clive and apparently this is just too much because he drops his pants and they have sex (images i will never be able to get out of my head) but he doesn't finish so she doesn't kill him as they get caught by elsa. fast forward a bit and it looks like dren is dying since her growth rate was so quick. well turns out she was just changing from a female to a male so after being buried dren comes out of the ground to kill any competing males then manages to grunt out "inside you" when elsa asks what he wants as he proceeds to rape her. elsa manages to kill him after he's finished as clive comes in and stabs dren before dren kills clive. the movie ends with elsa pregnant - hello splice 2. i suggest skipping this one altogether. i mean species is a much better representation of what i guess the director was trying to go for here so go watch it instead.

sims 3: ambitions - i really dunno what i think of it at this point. the new occupations are pretty neat. you can be a ghost hunter, a designer, all sorts of nifty new things. there's even a new neighborhood to play in, granted it's a swamp, and i'm not kidding there, but at least it's a new neighborhood. now i find that i cannot for the life of me get past one thing they added that is completely ruining my game in my opinion. for any of you that played the sims2 and got the seasons expansion, weren't you really annoyed when it was fall and the leaves would drop from the trees and your sims would spend hours raking leaves? i know i was. well unlike seasons where you could just delete the trees or get rid of autumn all together, this expansion comes with an even more heinous task: laundry. those freaking sims change clothes all the time and leave little piles of laundry all over the place. they forego urinating to go move the clothes to the dryer. i play the sims for fun. to lord over my minions and have them do my bidding. i thoroughly dislike this humdrum task being placed in the game. oh and think you can get away with not doing laundry by deleting your washer and dryer? hell no! your sims will have to take their clothes to the laundromat, i kid you not. so for now the expansion has left me a bit deflated as my sims are too busy with laundry to do much and i really don't see why adding this feature in brings anything whatsoever to the game.

eh enough of my ranting about splice and the sims 3 expansion. enjoy the silence.

shrek, whip it, and eq2 addition: halas reborn

2010-05-27T21:07:00.003-04:00

alrighty so i figured i ought to get back into blogging since i've let it slide a bit but now find myself with a smidgen of time to report on my movie and random video game experiences. the movie reviews are going to be short for now but hopefully in later posts i'll have some more time to elongate later reviews.

shrek forever after - 6/10 snaps - i actually enjoyed this film a lot and think that it's great for families as the humor is somewhat adult but the kiddies seem to enjoy it too so at least rent it. i have to admit i'm not the hugest fan of the shrek series and have yet to see shrek the third. don't get me wrong, they're funny and definitely enjoyable but just not my favorite film series. the only qualm i have with this one is that it had a rather short running time (about an hour and a half). i only wish that donkey/dragon crosses were real...

whip it - 7/10 snaps - roller derby is bitchin! i like ellen page and a ton of the other actors/actresses that were in this film (drew barrymore, alia shawkat [arrested development], kristen wiig, juliette lewis, the list goes on and on). i feel that this was a nice chick coming of age story for our time and find it definitely rent worthy.

eq2: halas reborn - for a free update to the game with a new starting city that i'm just beginning to explore with my new baby wood elf illusionist i have to say that i'm enjoying the questline. my only problem thus far has been lack of mailboxes in various outposts so that i can expand my inventory. my favorite addition has been the new sets of armor. check out my beautiful illu with her kicking threads (it even makes her facial tattoos look good).

granted she's only a level 14 illusionist but i may keep this look for her for awhile. plus it's really chilly in halas with all that ice and snow.

well off to play some more everquest 2 and work on thank you cards. have a fantastic evening and enjoy the silence.

insomnia - the cure for forgotten blogging

2010-03-05T06:00:00.003-05:00

okay so obviously i have been away for quite a while. i lead an incredibly busy life ha ha ha. what with teaching, class, research, working, wedding planning, gaming etc i find myself with little time. well since i'm a bit insomniatic this morning i've got a tiny bit of time to actually blog.

teaching front - i'm still in the 102 labs and i really enjoy both classes that i have this semester. i'm currently teaching tuesdays and wednesdays at 8am. it is a bit of a pain to have to get to usc by 7am but i rather enjoy the early classes as opposed to those later in the evening.

class - just research for me this semester...i don't have time for an actual class. next semester i'll have to squeeze one in somewhere.

research - i'm getting places, just slowly. i wish it would go a tad bit faster. i can't wait to have something publishable on the dengue virus.

work - same old same old. insurance work never ends. everyone in the insurance field is trying to go paperless so that's a whole new problem in our office since they love their paper ;)

wedding planning - i'm down to the small things i think. invitations should be going out soon. if you don't get one and you want one bug me about it, i'm sure i didn't remember everyone when making up the invitation list.

gaming - raiding two nights a week right now instead of three. sentinel's fate came out and i have to say i'm enjoying the new expansion but i'd like to get through the quest lines. i keep getting interrupted by random jazz.

if you haven't tried it out yet give pandora radio a go round online. it's a pretty neat little device that allows you to mix up all sorts of genres and plays songs based on previous choices. i thoroughly enjoy it.

as for now, i'm out of time as i need to be at usc by around 7:30 this morning so everyone have a fantastic day and i'll try to spit out some more blogs more often. especially movie-wise since we still tend to go to at least a movie a week. this week's obvious film is tim burton's alice in wonderland. as for now, enjoy the silence.

procrastination what?

2009-10-01T13:58:00.003-04:00

well again i have forsaken my blog duties for things that are i suppose technically 'more important at the moment'...having said that i am currently studying for a statistics exam and most of my motor functions and thought processes have ceased to exist for the moment so i've decided to quit procrastinating [don't worry, we'll still unite tomorrow] and type up a quickie blog with the short version movie reviews of the last month and change.

district 9 - 7.5/10 snaps - enjoyable and a different kind of alien film. nice to see something new and innovative. i like the documentary style when it's not all jumpy to where i feel motion sick in the theater [blair witch project/cloverfield style]. not a bad theater flick if it's still available in theaters at the moment which it may or may not be.

9 - 5.5/10 snaps - cool up until the ending which i think they could have done a much better job with but i was pleased enough with the film. wait for video in my honest opinion.

informant! - 1.5/10 snaps - whoever thought up the preview for this should be shot. this movie is a very serious take on price fixing and i was insanely bored. i went into the movie thinking it would be fairly humorous...boy was i wrong. skip it all together.

pandorum - 6/10 snaps - actually more enjoyable than i thought it would be going in. i vote to watch this one on dvd.

extract - 6/10 snaps - pretty humorous, very nice cast. i think i was just in a bad mood this day so this one may be getting a little short changed here.

the final destination - 6.5/10 snaps - well it was just as much fun as the other final destinations BUT IN 3D!!! fun times were had by all yet i was thoroughly disappointed in the ending of the film. it should have been a way cooler death for those remaining...

inglourious basterds - 7/10 snaps - 'he speaks i - talian 3rd best.' 'i don't speak italian at all.' 'that's why you're 3rd best.' interesting film. definitely a watch on dvd, possibly a theater go if you're into alternate history films.

so that's it in the film department. i'm still working, doing biol 102 lab stuffs, planning a wedding, gaming, and trying to learn statistics all at the same time however i read recently that one should try to multitask less. i think that may have been written by someone who did not have a job and/or life.

anywho back to stat for the next 2.5 hours. wish me luck on my exam and as always...

enjoy the silence.

words like violence, break the silence...

2009-08-10T11:22:00.003-04:00

i'd like to start by apologizing in that i have fallen down in my blogging duty and have not posted for far too long now. so sorry folks. now on to the movies and rather than review them i think i'll just tweet on them all brieflike.

harry potter and the half-blood prince - 8/10 snaps - if you like the others you'll like this one, pretty true to the book...

year one - 2.5/10 snaps - i was bored to tears, not humorous, huge waste of time...

gi joe: the rise of cobra - 5.5/10 snaps - i'm waiting for a live action my little pony movie, this one's worth at least a rental if you're a child of the 80s.

transformers: revenge of the fallen - 7/10 - uh loads of explosions along with loads of plotholes. let's not talk about the stereotyping...

orphan - 5/10 - i was a bit disappointed. rental worthy at best.

the collector - 6/10 - i think they could've added a tad more plot to this one and it would have risen at least 2 snaps. very gory in saw-like fashion. rent it and watch it at night.

proposal - 6.5/10 - completely transparent but reynolds and bullock make a good pair. rent worthy.

i think that covers all the movies i've seen since posting last.

my grandfather hall passed away somewhat unexpectedly and i know he is missed by many. we now have his amazon parrot which i call velo [short for velociraptor as he'd take your arm off in a heartbeat] whose real name is cocky [which i refuse to recognize for obvious reasons].

i was recently at the parent preview night for gilbert marching band and witnessed michael gilpatrick pass out while playing the trumpet. my prayers and thoughts go out to the band and his family. he is currently in the icu but things are not looking good at the moment. having been invested in marching band for years i know how close those students become to your heart and can only imagine how terrible this must be for everyone involved.

as for me, i'm getting ready to start back into teaching while taking class, researching, and working. life is about to get pretty hectic all over again.

back to sorting through my epitopes so for now enjoy the silence.

up, drag me to hell, and the hangover

2009-06-18T13:45:00.002-04:00

well good afternoon everyone. i'm keeping them short this week so let's jump right in shall we?

up - 8.5/10 snaps - the movie was very well done. voice acting and animation were both excellent. i cried twice in the film and not about animals. that's always a sign of a good script. i think you should go see this one while it's still in theaters.

the hangover - 4.5/10 snaps - apparently a guy film sean says as he enjoyed it a lot more than i did. i think you saw the best parts in the preview and most of it was fairly predictable. eh it's good for what it was which is a mindless comedy. rental worthy although sean might disagree.

drag me to hell - 3/10 snaps - i really like alison lohman and thought she did a great job in matchstick men, however, this movie was funny as it should be and had several jumpy moments but besides that was pretty much a waste of time. if you like these kind of films then rent it otherwise just ignore it all together.

other than that i'm currently busy researching, just thought i'd stop by for a brief moment with the quick movie reviews. have a great day everyone!

enjoy the silence.

tips for walt disney world

2009-06-02T09:19:00.005-04:00

after having returned from our trip to walt disney world [wdw] which i think for me makes trip #6 to the most magical place on earth i have decided to put some well learned tips here for anyone who is planning on going anytime in the future:

1. do NOT attempt to go to wdw in the months of may thru september - it's hot and the rides are a pain to get on because apparently everyone likes going when it's a dutch oven down there in florida.

2. stay in a wdw resort - there's buses that take you to every park that wdw owns and you can affordably stay in one of the three all-star resorts or pop century resort for $82/night. you really can't beat that price.

3. go with the disney dining plan - you would think we would have figured this out before this trip but we finally learned of the disney dining plan. we were on the basic plan that is around $40/$45 per person per day. the food at disney is EXPENSIVE as it is in any other theme park. if you get the dining plan here's what you get per person:
1 snack per day - can include any non-alcoholic bottled drink or ice cream item typically under $4.00
1 quick service meal - entree, dessert, and non-alcoholic drink at any of the burger/pizza/salad/fast food joints in the park - these meals typically run around $15 to $20 per person
1 table service meal - entree, dessert, and non-alocholic drink at any of the very nice sit down restaurants in the park - these meals typically run around $40 to $80 per person
the only problem with the dining plan is if you somehow manage not to use all of your dining plan so make sure you're spending the correct meals and keep track of what you've got left which is pretty simple as it's listed on your receipt after you're done eating.

4. get to the early parks when they open - if you're staying at a wdw resort and you have the parkhopper pass for the four main parks [epcot, mgm now known as hollywood studios, magic kingdom, and animal kingdom] which you should have if you're going then you're allowed to go into a park a day an hour earlier and a park a day will stay open three or more extra hours. the ones that open early that day are the ones that you want to hit. as soon as you get to the early park hit up the most thrilling ride for a fastpass and then go ride the second most thrilling ride. by the time you're done with the second most thrilling ride it will be time to redeem your fastpass and walk straight to the front of the line of the first most thrilling ride. i know that sounded sorta involved but read it through a coupla times and it'll make sense.

5. make your reservations for food 90 days in advance - this is as soon as you can book your reservations and the good ones will be gone if you wait too long. here's a list of where we enjoyed eating the most. every single restaurant is at epcot.

Yakitori House - Japan - i suggest the ninja alcoholic beverage which is a mix of sake and plum wine along with the teriyaki steak and ice cream - most excellent service i have ever seen
Les Chefs de France - France - even with the disney dining plan you can still do the traditional three course meal here and get an appetizer if you order off their exclusive three course menu - i highly recommend the french onion soup - second most excellent service i have ever seen
Le Cellier - Canada - steak...eat the steak...
Coral Reef Restaurant - Living Seas
The Garden Grill Restaurant - The Land - i always suggest everyone get dirt. what meal is complete without it?

6. get a photo pass - they're free. you can look at all the pics before purchasing them and the disney crew can do some really neat stuff with your pictures. plus all the photo pass folks will take pics of you with your own camera if you let them take a couple with theirs as well. apparently nowadays they'll give you every photo they've taken for a whole $11.95 onto a memory card. i find that a pretty good deal as it can literally contain HUNDREDS of photos. i'll have to make sure that's completely accurate though because we didn't do it, just heard it in passing.

7. if you're at least two days out from departure have whatever you buy in the park shipped to your room - make sure to tell the cashier this in advance otherwise they have to complete your purchase all over again but it's a great way to get the stuff you want and not have to lug it around the park.

for now that's all the tips i can think of but i may remember more later. here's a really specific one - if you end up staying at the sprawling coronado springs resort and wonder where all the wdw buses are, they stop initially at stop 2 and barely ever make it to stops 4 and 1 as they are always full by that point so go to stop 2 first.

anywho for now...enjoy the silence.

wow it's been over a month...

2009-05-31T23:29:00.003-04:00

okay so i've been insanely busy. isn't that ridiculous? on top of research, class, working, raiding, the pets, and other gaming life has left me with little to no time. today i had time and i used it to do 4 loads of laundry, the dishes, some vacuuming, and was even able to squeeze in some quality time with rukia and eros. we'll start with movies, move to life in general, and finish up with games i think.

x-men origins: wolverine - 6.5/10 snaps - better than x3, pretty on par with x1, not better than x2. seeing as how gambit is my favorite of favorites comic character i was excited to see him in the film. he didn't have a large enough role and his accent slipped from cajun to southern to non-existent. the fighting scenes he had were nice and he looked hot enough so we'll forgive the accent bit. the other acting was pretty good in the film and i can even overlook some of the inconsistencies with folks' powers but [SPOILERS] the deadpool crap at the end was freaking ridiculous! let's pull off this bullshit move where we combine a whole bunch of mutants' powers through genetic engineering and make deadpool a controllable robot. who writes this crap? there are plenty of evil folks you can combine to have a kickass battle...why not do that? also some mutants had incorrect powers but hell in x3 they just kept adding mutants that to my knowledge don't exist in the x-men universe. eh if you love the x-men i'd say rent it. i don't suggest going to the movies to see it. also there are separate endings post the credits and we happened to get the 'drinking to remember' bs as opposed to the deadpool still being alive ending. at least make the endings comparable if there are going to be multiple ones.

star trek - 9.5/10 - FANTASTIC! i'm not a trekkie [spelling?]. i'm not a real big fan of the series. this movie is one of the best action films i've seen in a long time. it literally felt like i was in the theater for 20 minutes whereas the movie was actually 2 hours or so. i was surprised by a lot of the acting in this particular film as i'm used to silar in heroes and shaun from shaun of the dead and whatnot. a lot of big names. go see it if you haven't. even if you're into the series i think you'll find it enjoyable. i went with 3 trekkies who seemed to really enjoy it as much as i did.

terminator salvation - 5/10 - um...there were a lot of inconsistencies with this baby that really dropped it's score. the ending was another one of those 'you have to be shitting me i can't believe the editor let this go to production' endings. to tell you the truth, the ending of the film dropped it 2 snaps just by itself. i do think sam worthington did a really great job as marcus wright and look forward to seeing him as perseus in the remake of clash of the titans [as the old clash of the titans is one of my favorite films], anton yelchin also put in a good performance [charlie bartlett, also in star trek as chekov], in fact a lot of the actors were above par for this particular film. the screenplay is what gets them all in trouble. i find it hard to believe that christian bale read this and agreed to do it with that ending but as one of our other movie going friends stated it may be the millions of dollars that pushed him to it lol. also who the hell names their child moon bloodgood? seriously? um, i say wait for it to come out on usa...forget even paying to rent it unless you're a huge fan of the series and even then just go watch t2 and some of the sarah connor chronicles...

night at the museum: battle of the smithsonian - 6/10 - i swear to god amy adams is related to nicole kidman. anywho. movie was enjoyable enough. if you loved the first one go see this one. it's not quite as good but pretty close, otherwise rentable. eh you know the premise, stuff in the museum comes to life, there's some kind of evil bad guy they must overcome. would've been a lot more fun i think if jonah hill had more than a walk-on spot. he and ben stiller seem to play off one another really well.

alright done with movies. i think we're going to see up friday or next week. also i really want to see drag me to hell. i may have seen something else these past four weeks but apparently it's not as important as to post. if i remember later i'll stick it here somewhere.

life in general. aurora had her puppies. she had 7 total. 2 were stillborn. of the other 5 only 1 was born inside the placental sac. so i took all 5 to the vet when they were one day old as some of them weren't breathing well and weren't nursing so i was bottle feeding two of them. the vet told me that they all aspirated during birth and gave one of them oxygen and two of them a shot of antibiotics. sean and i took them back home and held 4 of them while they died. it was awful. i feel awful for the puppies, i feel awful for us, i feel awful for aurora but she seems pretty happy with just the one. so sean decided that we have to keep the remaining puppy [SEAN DECIDED, can you believe it wasn't me begging to keep the dog?] anywho so we didn't get her tail docked and her name is kuma [japanese for bear] as she looks like a little bear. i'll post a pic of her soon when she gets a little older. there's a cute photoshopped one of her on old school's myspace page wearing an old school shirt.

went to disney world with the folks, sean, and johnathon last week. we just got back yesterday. it was a fantastic time but man i have to lose some weight and get more fit. my feet were absolutely killing me the entire time after the first day. i'll get some pictures up from that trip as well. this semester went really well. i passed my qualifying exam for my phd. this means i've just got my comprehensive exam and my thesis defense to go. i wonder if i could do it in 3 years like my friend stephanie has done. time will tell i suppose.

on to the games. everquest 2 is my addiction of choice right now of course but i've been playing viva pinata again like a mad fiend as well. i found a pc copy for 7.99 at gamestop last week. i already have it on the 360 but man is it quicker with a mouse. also this week is SIMS 3. i cannot wait! i only have one more day to go huzzah!

eh i'm getting a bit tired so i'm heading off to bed. hopefully i'll be able to keep up a bit better with the blog now that it's summertime.

as for now...enjoy the silence...

fast & furious

2009-04-29T23:08:00.004-04:00

so sorry i haven't been keeping up with the blog but the end of the semester is tres horrible...this week is finals week...boo...next week is my qualifying exam for my phd which in all truth i'm more prepared for than the final i have tomorrow at 2pm. granted i've put a lot of time into preparing for the final tomorrow at 2pm but i still don't feel ready yet. hopefully i'll reconcile that tomorrow morning...we shall see..

so on to the review - fast & furious [new model...original parts...] - 5.5/10 - i like the fast and furious series. the southern accent in tokyo drift was a bit much but the movies are just what they promise to be...action packed and full of hot bodies for guys and girls alike. we went to see this a little bit over a week ago because sean enjoys the fast and the furious and i enjoy vin diesel ^..^ my main problem with the film is that i love michelle rodriguez and she's just not in it enough for me personally plus jordana brewster cannot act to save her life in this series...maybe it's a proximity to vin diesel issue, if so, who can blame her right? anywho if you enjoyed the others it's safe to say you'll enjoy these as it's more of the same. if you're on the fence wait for the dvd...

i so cannot wait to see wolverine tomorrow night [midnight showing] even though i'm going to be insanely regretting it friday morning when i go help proctor dr. hughes' exam for his avian class at 8:45am...we have a copy of the movie pre all the finishing production fun but i refused to watch it. sean tells me gambit didn't have a cajun accent in it but i hope that's not how it turns out tomorrow since the copy we've got is missing all sorts of effects and whatnot...somehow i have a feeling they're just going to have him talk normally which doesn't make any sense but i guess they did take a lot of liberties with other aspects [especially age] of a lot of the x-men in the previous films as well so i shouldn't be surprised...

uber props to terence for having this on his blog and now it must go on mine...

enjoy the silence...

cat shit one...

2009-04-22T10:25:00.001-04:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOAPKxqutv8

sean was laughing his ass off...only the japanese could pull this off. plus - side note that obviously some of the american rabbits are voices from naruto...

monsters vs aliens, happy 10th anniversary everquest, and the broken warden mythical /cry

2009-04-07T10:53:00.003-04:00

happy tuesday! we went to see monsters vs. aliens in 3d at columbiana grande on wednesday of last week. 6.5/10 snaps - the movie was cute. if you've got kids i think this'd be a great one to go see with them. lots of famous actors/actresses - reese witherspoon as susan, hugh laurie as dr. cockroach, seth rogan as bob, kiefer sutherland as general monger, rainn wilson as gallaxhar, will arnett as the missing link, paul rudd as derek, and stephen colbert as the president [anyone think there was a little undertone to that ha ha?]... if you've seen the previews then you've basically got the entire plot. i do NOT recommend going to see this in 3d as there are maybe 4 scenes that actually appear to be in 3d. granted they were 4 great 3d scenes but it's not worth an extra $6 per person to tack onto an already outrageous movie ticket price and it doesn't really add much to the film. after watching it, i find myself with an urge to review all the episodes of invader zim which i am sure to do in the near future.

eq2 news. happy 10th anniversary everquest! sometime recently everquest celebrated its 10th anniversary which is rather exciting. if you play eq or eq2 you could pick up a copy of beckett massive online gamer and there is an in-game item code to celebrate. the eq2 one is pretty bitching in that it's a statue of nagafen [bad ass dragon] that gives you 1,000 rent status reduction on your housing - huzzah! i'd personally like to thank the creators of everquest because i thoroughly enjoy your products and have ever since i started playing everquest online adventures when i was in high school. all four members of my family owned their own ps2 so that we could play together. i also thoroughly enjoyed champions of norrath when it was available on the ps2 and have been playing everquest 2 on the pc almost since it was released [my poor computer at the time couldn't run the darn thing]. no matter what other mmorpgs i have tried [lotro, wow, chronicles of spellborn, d&d, swg, vanguard, etc] i always end up returning back to everquest 2 as it is just the game for me. i personally love being a ratonga and a warden [lotro is about to adopt this class but in researching it further, they don't appear to be making it a healer]. my raid force cleared veeshan's peak for the first time last night and it was an awesome feeling. the raid wasn't even full...it was just excellent. thanks for the many ways in which you manage to keep me amused almost on a daily basis everquest 2 - i look forward to many more years of fun with the many friends i've made and those that i already knew!

on another sad note on eq2 [hopefully getting fixed in the hot fix as i type] my mythical weapon was broken last tuesday when they uploaded the new x2 raid zone and lavastorm content. this was how my badass weapon used to work - it had this neato effect called nature's restoration. here's the quote on what nature's restoration does off the weapon itself 'When target castes a critical healing spell this spell has a 50% chance to cast Nature's Restoration on caster...Increases power of caster by 349-523'...what does this mean? this means that every time i critically heal someone i get a nice chunk of mana back. what is my main job? healing...how often do i currently critically heal? about 80% of the time...so i NEVER run out of power. this comes in handy all the time, for example, in groups, in really long fights where other healers are out of mana, whenever a manadrain occurs i can use my manastone then pop a coupla level 10 heals and be back up to 50% power in no time to save the day...so what happened to my weapon with the update??? well now instead of it giving ME the power after i've been trained since july of 2008 to not have to worry about power it accidentally gives the power to whoever i critically heal. this means that for a week i've been power feeding my group like i'm a troubador, dirge, illusionist, or coercer, yet barely able to keep power to continue healing myself. i actually fed more power to my group than an illusionist i was playing with the other day. this could be great for the group and main tank but it's absolutely awful for me. i didn't roll a power regen class, i rolled a healer. that happens to be the bonus to getting my epic weapon and i want to be able to reap the benefits. hopefully it's getting fixed today ALONG with tortoise shell which was also broken with the new update. i'll save trying to explain tortoise shell for another day.

anywho, i've got work to do.

invaders don't dance! errr, enjoy the silence...

the haunting in connecticut and ghost town all while zack and miri make a porno...

2009-03-31T11:36:00.002-04:00

good afternoon over here on the east coast. we'll start with the best ratings on these and work down. obviously ghost town and zack and miri were rentals as i did not get a chance to see them in the theater. i also still have nick and nora's infinite playlist to watch and seven pounds...who knows when there'll be time? plus i plan to go see monsters vs aliens sometime this week as well.

ghost town - 8/10 snaps - hilarious! you have to like the sarcastic smart ass british humor for this one but both sean and i really enjoyed it...ricky gervais was great. i'm not the biggest fan of tea leoni either but she put in a good performance for this as well. spoilers ahead [hell spoilers in all the reviews so :P in advance]...premise of the film is that ricky gervais who is a dentist goes in for a colonoscopy and ends up dying on the table for several minutes which allows him to see ghosts. per the norm of films such as these the ghosts have unfinished business which leaves them lingering about. turns out the unfinished business is actually that of the living and not the dead and it obviously ends up having a gigantic effect on the dentist's life. the film makes for a cute, funny, heartwarming tale. several laugh out loud moments. well worth the rental/download!

zack and miri make a porno - 7/10 snaps - don't go see this with your parents...one of those fantastic kevin smith films. plus you get to see jason mewes [jay from the other kevin smith films] with short hair and naked. huzzahs all around! i surely hope those tattoos are real but why wouldn't they be? plot is about high school buddies zack and miri not being able to pay their bills so they decide to try making a porno when they meet some gay porn stars at their high school reunion. turns out zack and miri have actually been in love this entire time but neither of them realized it so the movie is more about the story of the two of them figuring this out with the porno making as a great background. if you're thinking about not renting/watching it, i have two words for you: star whores...

the haunting in connecticut - 5.5/10 snaps - i decided to go see this yesterday all by my little lonesome. i don't do well in scary movies even when i go with someone else but sean thought the film would be 'dumb' so he didn't want to go. interestingly enough, this was the most random set of previews i have seen in a long time. started out normal with drag me to hell [scary gypsy curse movie with alison lohman from matchstick men], then there was a crank 2 preview which regardless of how completely idiotic the premise is promises to be a fantastic action film, following crank 2 was an extended x-men origins: wolverine preview which i thoroughly appreciated for all the gambit that was added into this particular preview [i still have yet to reach a decision on what a great gambit taylor kitsch'll make until i hear him speak...sorry hun but the cajun accent is at least 60% of the role], so the final preview ended up being hannah montana [wtf you say?!? i know i said the same thing]...why would someone think that the hannah montana movie would be an appropriate preview before the haunting in connecticut?...

now on to discussion of the actual film...i'm going to have to research the true story to see how much the movie stuck to it as it had random moments where you're trying to figure out why the hell they put the father's alcoholism in the movie since it was only a fifteen minute scene that had absolutely nothing to do with the remainder of the film, almost a lack of editing unless it meant a lot to the actual family. so per the film, not sure about the real story, oldest son [matt] has cancer and the family decides to rent a house closer to the hospital where he's receiving treatment. turns out said house used to be a mortuary and that the mortician [aickman] there practiced 'necromancy' on hundreds of corpses and would replace their bodies in coffins with sandbags so that people were unaware of his grave robbing. so matt is plagued by these visions/possessions by the spirit of a boy in the house [jonah] who was apparently the mortician's apprentice. turns out jonah is a medium back in his time and aickman is using him to make money via having all these seances. aickman tries to amplify the seances that his mortuary is now famous for by using these corpses. so matt is supposedly more apt to see all of this as he is dying from cancer...enter a reverend who is also dying from cancer that can see the spirits as well. reverend ends up removing jonah's bones from the house thinking it will help the family when it turns out jonah was the only thing keeping the other spirits from killing the family [surprise, surprise]. so matt finally figures out where all the bodies are hidden in the walls of the house and lights the bitch on fire. according to the end of the film, matt was found to be cured of cancer after that evening and the house has since been rebuilt/renovated. none of the tenants since have complained of anything out of the ordinary. again i'm still going to have to check into the real thing. the acting performances were all worthwhile. i was pleasantly surprised to see that the reverend was played by elias koteas [casey jones from tnmt yo] who does act in a good bit of films nowadays but they aren't movies i've been to see. if you enjoy horror movies it's definitely worth a rental.

enjoy the silence.

huzzah i have my mythical!!!

2009-03-24T11:15:00.006-04:00

wow a post within one week of the other. what happened you might ask? i finally got my mythical!!! to those of you not in the everquest 2 world this is the bestest weapon for my class and requires a ton of effort to obtain. i've had my fabled bite of the wolf for a while now, i'm sure i could search for the post to find when i actually obtained it but last night we finally beat all the odds and got my mythical! to make things even sweeter i was able to drag one of my dad's characters along and he got his necromancer mythical as well! what a fantastic time! one of the really neat things about getting your mythical is that it is broadcast across the entire game so everyone who is on knows when you get it. i'll post the pics i've got.

here i am in the moors of ykesha with my badass new weapon...it looks similar to the fabled version but has a lot more bells and whistles. if you look closely you might be able to tell that even my pixie on a string is impressed lol.

so here's the screenshot of my name/guild being sent across the entirety of norrath for everyone to see. there were lots of gratz! to follow but i took the screen shot as soon as i saw it for fear of it disappearing. i didn't realize my quest would update as soon as i used the item so i still had a crap ton of windows up for the screenshot lol. i guess now everyone knows my spell order heehee. the screenshot isn't nearly that grainy either, click on it and you'll see the nice quality one since it's so large.

and finally here's the pic of me in the guild hall as phinneas' [dad] name/guild is also announced across all of norrath. way to go dad! same deal with the graininess. same as before, just click on the image to get the nice quality one!

i have to say that it all feels pretty damn good. special thanks to my family, south, knights of the shadow dragon, order of the golden staff, pheonix, and the crushbone raid alliance brigade 8. i couldn't have done it without any of you. thanks so much!

have a fantastic day! enjoy the silence especially as norrath is still for a moment...

i love you man and the last house on the left

2009-03-22T13:43:00.002-04:00

happy sunday everyone! i just got back from playing with the ponies [brushed both of them down and lunged petie for a bit] where i had a fantastic time so let's start in on the reviews from the past two weeks.

the last house on the left ~ 6/10 snaps ~ this film runs just as you imagine it to although it's a bit more graphic in nature than i thought it was going to be...spoilers per normal, here they come...so when i say graphic i was pretty sure we were going to see a lot of violence. the rape scene was a bit more than what i expected and you genuinely felt bad for the girls. the whole time i was watching the film i had this recurring memory of eye for an eye...film with kiefer sutherland and sally field in 96 where sutherland rapes and murders sally field's daughter. she proceeds to purchase a gun and finally ends up murdering the son of a bitch. granted i never saw the 1972 original for the last house on the left but i would guess everything would be somewhat similar. i do have to say that after this and the recent friday the 13th remake that apparently the anti-drug commission has their paws in on a lot of teen horror/suspense films. the girls in last house wouldn't have been in trouble if they hadn't traveled to a hotel room in order to smoke up on a really awesome bag of weed and the same for all those teens in friday the 13th who went out camping near camp crystal lake because they had heard of some magical stash of marijuana in the forest...look out kids, apparently murderers and rapists are luring you out into the woods with the promise of great weed...the movie is worth a rent. i'd say wait for rental rather than seeing it in theaters. i plan to get my hands on the original soon to see if it's better/worse...

i love you man ~ 8.5/10 snaps ~ this movie was pretty hilarious. i kinda relate to the main character 'pistol' peter played by paul rudd in that i'm in a similar boat. i'm about to get married [next year, but granted that's kind of soon] and a lot of my good friends from college have moved away. here in columbia, i have new friends, they just aren't nearly as close as those i've had before. don't get me wrong, i knew right off the bat who i was going to ask to be my maid of honor but i definitely identified with the poor guy. if you really liked forgetting sarah marshall, head to the theaters for this one...otherwise definitely worth a rent once it comes out.

in eq2 news, i'm so close to my mythical i can taste it. hopefully we'll get to that mob this week but there's no way to tell until it happens. pyper's got 3 pieces of tier 2 shard armor and is at 170 aa. can't wait to keep leveling her up.

in the world of biology, i went to two most excellent seminars this week by dr. kevin padian from uc berkeley. one on dinosaurs [i bet you're all jealous] and the other on evolution. dr. padian is most famous for being a witness in the kitzmiller vs. dover area school district trial regarding whether intelligent design should be taught in public schools as an alternative to evolution. i got to eat lunch with dr. padian and a good chunk of other grad students. it was extremely enlightening and as always incredibly interesting to hear the questions/thoughts of others on this intense topic and on dinosaurs [just because they're so damned cool]. not only were the seminars informative but also totally enjoyable because dr. padian has a great sense of humor. i suggest checking out some of his work in nature [since you can get it for free] or elsewhere if you've got access.

carpal tunnel wise, i am to wear a brace for two months then if still in pain, i am to return to the doctor for cortisone shots in my wrist [apparently they've lost their minds]. if that doesn't work i'll have to have surgery so if you see me looking like a moron with this thing on my wrist, i'm doing it as a preventative measure. be glad you don't have to wear one all the time. well for now i'm off to work on the laundry and the dishes before gaming at 3pm.

have a great day everyone and make sure to enjoy the silence...

watchmen

2009-03-12T12:21:00.002-04:00

welcome again to the weekly edition of my short movie reviews.

watchmen - 8.5/10 - this movie is a lot longer than i thought it would be. not that i didn't check the times before i went to see it but it was about a 3 hour experience. i would like to never again see an electric blue schlong for several years but what can ya do right? lol. anywho i have not read the graphic novels. sean has and says they stick well enough to them to be reputable. i feel the audience could tell right away who the bad guy was going to be and how everything was somewhat going to turn out. i suggest going to see it if you're a comic book/superhero kinda folk. otherwise wait for dvd or ignore it all together.

nurse betty - 8.5/10 - i haven't seen this film in forEVer but i found myself watching it today and i forgot how much i really enjoyed it. huzzah for a lot of actors i don't watch all that often anymore. i vote go buy it today. a little bit of violence. a lot of drama. well worth it.

as for everything else, we're currently on spring break. this would be a happy time if i weren't running a fever and currently doing what i've been told not to do by my physician with my carpal tunnel. turns out i may have to have surgery because well surprise surprise i spend about 18 out of 24 hours a day on the computer. i waited until i couldn't possibly stand it anymore to go to the doctor and now i have this huge bracer that i think i could knock people out with. on top of that i'm meeting with usc orthopedics students on monday to see what they think. i hate that my insurance here at the school only covers these orthopedics students. i'm thoroughly frightened but eh whatever. sure it'll work out somehow and if it doesn't maybe i'll have a lawsuit of some sort worth something lol. so i'm heading back into the other room to put my brace back on and stop typing as it is apparently taking away my movement slowly.

anywho hope everyone else is doing well...enjoy the silence...

i don't have sharingan...so sue me...

2009-03-06T14:38:00.002-05:00

ah well as the title suggests this is mainly regarding naruto...i understand they've made this a kids show over here in the us of a but it just isn't that kind of show...apparently in japan they watch anime as opposed to soap operas. i can't blame them at all. when i was a freshman at clemson my roommates loved to watch soap operas. i did end up attached to passions for a while but thank god now that's over. anywho back to the anime. i've seen lots of it, not a few as some may imagine but when i say lots, i mean lots. i have the entire elfen lied series on dvd AND i didn't get upset at all when lucy offed all those peeps. don't mess with me, my conscience doesn't agree with you. anywhos back to the point...i really enjoy two animes that are both making their way into our mainstream television - bleach and naruto. bleach is by far my favorite. well naruto is enjoyable to say the least but i have yet to figure out how america is going to handle the intense violence that is inevitable in this show. i have also realized that whichever naruto character you find as your favorite will tell a lot about the type of person you are/or intend to be...anyway, i have been catching up on the series today and just found myself adoring the current storyline. i'm past the time skip and i really appreciate how all the characters have grown at this point. i highly suggest the series in japanese...it's odd to watch it in english at least for me...bleach in english isn't so bad...

eh off to do whatever...enjoy the silence...

slumdog millionaire

2009-03-05T20:05:00.002-05:00

well folks - it's the once a week blog for everyone. sorry that it hasn't been more...

slumdog millionaire - 9/10 snaps - normally i'm not a huge fan of the oscars movies and last year i went out and rented there will be blood which by the way does not have nearly enough blood in it to warrant that title but in my opinion nothing in the film was all that fantastic...slumdog however was fantastic. it also makes you really appreciate the fact that you're american. i felt utterly awful about how those indian children were growing up and i have a good many indian friends since they're pretty prevalent in higher education around these parts. spoilers ahead...again consider yourself warned. if you haven't heard about the film besides the oscars, the premise is that an indian boy is trying to find the love of his life [as it has been destined] by becoming a contestant on who wants to be a millionaire in india. i really enjoyed the three musketeers reference throughout the film as my cat is named aremis [although it should be spelled aramis] and so i immediately picked up on it becoming the million dollar question. well written, fantastic acting, captivating...definitely worth a trip to the theater...if not there rent it...you'll enjoy it i promise...

besides that nothing much else going on...research per normal. i've been grouping my sequences and working on getting them into the four different serotypes. shortly i'll be aligning them once i've finished placing them into the correct serotypes.

i've also noticed a huge increase in my interest for music recently. i'll have to delve into that later.

as for now...enjoy the silence...

taken and friday the 13th...

2009-02-25T11:28:00.005-05:00

well i should have gotten these up sooner but as always time is a precious commodity around here nowadays.

taken - 8/10 snaps - except for some idiotic moves on the american teenagers' parts [apparently they are that dumb] the film was riveting. lots of action. very worthwhile. liam neeson put in a stellar performance. i also appreciated that they took a good bit of time to set things up rather than just jumping right into the fray. go see it if you get the chance and enjoy a lot of action. a definite rental if it has already left your area.

friday the 13th - 3.5/10 snaps - booooo. i don't even know if this is rent worthy unless you're a huge jason voorhees fan and to tell you the truth i'm not sure that's enough. the film was disappointing to say the least. spoilers ahead, ye have been warned. let me start at the beginning...we see 5 teenagerish scalliwags with camping gear near camp crystal lake. they are there why? any guesses? yeah, to find some supposed stash of marijuana growing in the woods...does this sound completely idiotic to anyone else? i was happy when they died. do they make movies anymore where you're empathetic towards the characters at some point? there's some nudity and i think two sex scenes if i remember correctly. the only saving grace in the film was aaron yoo's role which as normal was pretty freaking hilarious. i was sad to see him and arlen escarpeta bite the dust because they were the only characters worth watching. the preview also shows how many people are murdered so once you hit that quota the mystery is kinda gone as to what's going to happen in the end.

eh enough about the crappy film. in other news i've caught up on naruto. i was thoroughly surprised to see they killed off asuma as he was somewhat a main character and not quite old enough to die yet plus his wife is pregnant. other than that the series has been pretty entertaining as of late. glad to see two more members of akatsuki killed although i think we'll end up seeing the immortal sadist again; hence the word immortal. it was also nice to see another jinchuuriki but she wasn't in the series long enough to get any kind of grip on how powerful other jinchuuriki may be.

i'll post later about research and life in general. i'm running late for my grant writing class!

have a most excellent day!

enjoy the silence...

push

2009-02-11T10:02:00.002-05:00

push - 7.5/10 snaps - sean and i both enjoyed the film. i really like dakota fanning so i thought i may be a bit biased. i think there's a comic that the movie is based on but i am not positive. it's your normal superhero film with a tiny twist. i read some critic's review that said this movie had a bit of a memento feel and i have to agree. you've got all sorts of powers: bleeders [although sean and i think they should more aptly be called screamers] who function like banshee, movers - obviously your telekinetic folks, pushers - push whatever thoughts they want into your head, watchers - those that see the ever-changing future, stitches - can manipulate your insides by touching you...ew, shadows - can hide people and apparently locations, wipers - can get rid of certain memories [hello eternal sunshine of the spotless mind], and shifters - can change things appearances. i would definitely want to be a shifter. dude was spending paper as money - so totally super cool! anywho i think if you like such films as jumper and memento then you'll enjoy this one as well.

have a great day - i'm off to school...

enjoy the silence...

oh teh sims...why have ye forsaken me?

2009-02-11T09:51:00.003-05:00

so i've been anxiously awaiting the sims 3 which was due to come out at the end of february ever since my sims 2 game decided to ingest a bug and stop working correctly even when reinstalled. on february 3rd the idiots at ea decided that they were going to postpone the title until JUNE. /cry

coraline

2009-02-10T11:33:00.004-05:00

coraline - 8/10 snaps - saw it in 3d - one can see the film either way and prolly come out with the same experience. it stuck to the book like glue. very cute. feel free to drag along kids and adults of all ages regardless of whether they are willing. it's a nice lesson movie for kids too about how they should appreciate what they have or maybe more about how the grass isn't greener on the other side...

i have yet to see push but may get a chance to do that today depending on sean's work schedule [spooky that the first time i typed sean's name i listed him as fievall - who's been playing too much everquest? that's me...but i have my cloak of the harvester so :P]

sean's birthday is coming up and we had a small family party at my aunts last sunday. it was a dual birthday party for sean and thomas' new girlfriend laura. i HATE giving out gift cards to people for any special occassion but i don't know laura well enough and that was about all she had on her list so we got her a gift card to barnes & noble. i'd have much rather purchased a book but what can you do? i've started reading a new manga called fairy tail. it's fairly interesting as the characters who are all powerful wizards also seem to have something odd wrong with each of them. ex: one gets carsick all the time, another is perpetually removing his clothes, one chick is an alcoholic. i've read the first two and i'm enjoying it thus far. i really need to catch up on bleach. i've obtained all the episodes, just haven't watched them yet.

also the wonderful card company holiday is looming around the corner. i have no idea what we should do for valentine's day. i have obtained a present so at least i'm that far into the game. last year we ended up eating at a waffle house on singles awareness day as we had to go help tandy [sean's stepdad] because he had blown a tire [or tires...i'm fuzzy on this] on his 18 wheeler on the way back to south carolina from georgia so we drove to georgia and sean helped him do some kinda work on the trailer which ended up pulling it up higher so he could ride back without two tires. by the time we got back to lexington nothing else was open making waffle house our only option. we ended up sitting next to a group of teenagers who all magically had free waffle coupons [appeared as though they had copied them or some such] which caused the manager to call another waffle house that had supposedly issued the coupons and ended with the teenagers all having a free meal. hopefully this year we'll be able to either go somewhere or do something nice at home.

enjoy the silence...

careless whisper

2009-02-05T17:36:00.001-05:00

i know, i know, i already posted today but then i ended up listening to seether's new single careless whisper which is a remake of the 1984 wham! song and i've just got to say i totally love it. way to go guys. yet another thing you've done right.

enjoy the silence...

just a scoche of time

2009-02-05T11:43:00.002-05:00

well i have just a tiny bit of time to post. only 2 on the movie front until after this weekend [should be adding push and coraline most definitely]. we saw my bloody valentine in 3d with my parents, johnathon, and his girlfriend [quiche - i would put your entire name here but i'm not sure how to spell it and you've listed yourself as quiche on myspace...doh!]. i'll give it 4/10 snaps as i was at the least amused the entire time. per any normal hollywood scary movie [even a remake in this one's case] the characters are just moronic during most of the film but a whole bunch of them get hacked and slashed or i guess more appropriately perforated as the weapon of choice was a pickaxe. the original was just as good and probably just a tiny bit better as at least the story made a bit more sense and if you watch the remake which has a lot of added stuffs you end up with a different retelling. i do NOT suggest going to see this with your parents as there's a scene of complete frontal nudity that lasts for a good 8 to 12 minutes. the chick isn't bad looking so hey added bonus for most gentlemen and some ladies out there, but the experience was most uncomfortable sitting next to my mom.

let the right one in ~ 6.5/10 snaps ~ foreign film regarding a boy who befriends a vampire. the film is very gory in parts and not that adorable 10 year old kirsten dunst vampirism gore, this vampire is a bit frightening regardless of the 12 year old facade. i suggest reading the book BEFORE viewing the film as i spoke with my friend rhiannon who also saw the film and she was able to explain a lot that i could not figure out as i had not read the book. makes a lot more sense and i'm currently on the waiting list for the book at the richland county library. it surprises me that between the richland county and lexington county libraries there is only ONE copy of this book. oh well, i'm sixth in line. not like i have much time to read anyways. anywho back to the film...i enjoyed it. it's currently downloadable and i think still playing at the nickelodeon theater if you live in columbia, sc. it's worth a shot for anyone who is interested in something a bit off from the norm of hollywood.

so i haven't posted about actual life in a while i suppose. i'm currently busy [as always]. my list of priorities are as such: research [dengue virus], class, vista psychiatric, eq2. i'm currently picking up some veterinary transcription which will be fun i think. i'm taking a look at the preparing future faculty program but doubt that i'll step into that until the fall semester of 09 or 10 even.

sean [south] and i have set a date for the wedding. may 8th, 2010. i know that it's over a year away. i was fully aware of that fact when i decided on it and there are multiple reasons behind it. i'm getting on my wiifit almost daily trying to lose pounds so i can get back to a happy weight and i've been sticking to the 1300 calorie per day diet for almost a month now. i'm not losing tons at a time but i'm losing and that's all that matters. the wiifit says i'm doing well even though it makes my little mii fat all the time. in fact i currently have 4 stars in regular hula hoop, super hula hoop, step, and advanced step. i am super proud of the 4 stars in super hula hoop. go play the damn thing and see how long it takes you. back to the wedding i'm trying to save money at every turn. sean and i have designed and created our own invitations that we adore for about a quarter or two per invite. i'm currently looking at online flowers as we're getting married outside at the sc botanical gardens in clemson so i won't need much in the way of flowers besides some corsages and bouquets at the actual ceremony and the reception is going to be at the madren center so i've got to get together some centerpieces there but i don't see needing to hire an actual wedding florist for any of that as their prices are about $1,000 plus compared to me being able to do it myself at around $300. i had a gorgeous dress that i loved but have realized that the $4,000 price tag is just a bit much regardless of the fact that i plan on only getting married once. plus i cannot find a picture of the dress looking very becoming on an actual person. it looks fantastic on a mannequin but the pictures of the dress in ceremonies are somewhat depressing so i guess i'm going to have to go on a hunt for one myself but i don't think i'll start that until may of this year as hopefully by then i'll have lost some weight.

we're going back to disneyworld with my family again in may. we almost decided on universal but i told them i'd rather wait till hogwarts was open to head to universal again. we also thought about a cruise but we have a member who'd be alone in a room yet the cruise still charges as if it were doubly occupied so that ups the price by about $1,500.

the kids [animals] are well. we now have two gerbils and i'll throw some pics up soon.

anywho i've rambled on enough and it's time for evolutionary history. have a fantastic day everyone and a great weekend!

enjoy the silence!

hotel for dogs, gran torino, yes man, bedtime stories, and the house bunny

2009-01-20T17:43:00.003-05:00

okay so i'm incredibly sorry that some of these are way after release date and the house bunny i just caught on dvd so i'll throw it in for fun. these will be short and sweet as i have to pick sean up from kung fu in 13 minutes so here goes.

hotel for dogs - 5/10 snaps - really great movie for kids. you can see the ending coming from before you even enter the theater but eh it was entertaining enough. i'm a little disappointed in the lack of corgis and catahoula leopard dogs. i know we own odd breeds but they're just so adorable!

gran torino - 8.5/10 snaps - awesome. lots of racial slurs but it's to be expected when you're watching an old white war veteran in the middle of a neighborhood becoming very ethnic. eh he also makes fun of himself a bit too...people actually walked out of our theater in the middle of the film so don't say i didn't warn ya. really emotional but duh, that's obvious. it's probably what you expect if you're going to see this film.

yes man - 6/10 snaps - it was funny enough. i say wait for dvd but my brother loved it and i think sean enjoyed it more than i did so maybe if you're a guy it's worth a visit to the theater. i really like zooey deschanel, but i like her acting in basically everything.

bedtime stories - 6/10 snaps - cute. another save for dvd. adam sandler is one of my favorite actors and this film was fun but not quite his normal work. most kids would enjoy this one. the guinea pig with the crazy eyes actually didn't look half as bad as i thought when i saw the preview.

the house bunny - 6.5/10 snaps - i really enjoyed this one but again it's another one you've probably figured out the ending to before even seeing the film. it's out on dvd. i vote rent it for a fun time.

in eq2 related news i have recently joined a raid alliance and got the update for the second part of my mythical. only one more part to go - huzzah! i'm having a pretty good time and feel like i'm playing my class as well as possible with the gear that i'm currently using. knights are about to ding level 64 which is pretty impressive for the number of active players in the guild. most of the levelage is due to several crafters who keep cranking out writs for us and i sure do appreciate all of you!

i really enjoy my classes this semester. i've got evolutionary biology, a grant writing course, and unix/linux fundamentals. i've really got to step up my researching soon though as i'd like to get a paper published this semester.

anywho my 13 mins is up and i've got to go grab sean. hope everyone is enjoying getting back into the swing of things after the christmas/new year break.

enjoy the silence.

despereaux, the spirit, and doubt among other things

2008-12-30T10:02:00.002-05:00

well i'm still slacking on the blogging even though i've been on christmas break...family and whatnot is obviously my primary concern compared to that of the internet world...just ask pyper...she hasn't really been played for several months now...we're not going to rehash that awful raid before christmas, i just have to let it go...anywho back to what everyone's here for...

tale of despereaux - 8/10 snaps - wonderful. lots of really great actors in this one as well...example: besides mattthew broderick there was christopher lloyd, dustin hoffman, and emma watson [hermione]. i really enjoyed the different art style. i do NOT suggest it for younger children. i'd guess ages 8 and up maybe. there's a bit of a backstabbing story here even though it resolves itself. i intend to eventually read the book although i also intended to do that for the golden compass but i kept falling asleep reading it [not a good thing for a book mind you]....je t'adore regardless...

doubt - 6.5/10 snaps - spoilers ahead...stop reading if you're planning on viewing...you've been warned. eh. the acting was FANTASTIC. i can't make it bigger than caps although it really needs more. however the movie was not so much...i pretty much figured going in that we wouldn't get the answer to whether or not the priest was abusing the boy which is exactly what happens but i did expect a little more insight so here's what we figured went down. apparently the priest was gay and possibly the boy as well. therefore the priest was the only one that understood the boy but they did end up ousting the priest even though he became the head of another school...i enjoyed the film and it was a bit different from what we normally peruse. meryl streep's performance and amy adam's are pretty unforgettable.

the spirit - 9/10 snaps - HILARIOUS!!! again with the caps right? if you're not a sin city fan not to fret. this film is nothing like it whatsoever. there's still a black/white/color bit going on but it really doesn't affect the film at all to tell you the truth. i cannot recall which scenes were in color and which ones weren't. spoilers ahead. consider yourself warned. i do remember the tie being red and the shoes being white but that's seriously it for me on the color front. i LOVED the names of the women as they were all hilarious...silken floss, sand saref, plaster of paris, etc. scarlett johansson was by far my favorite charachter as silken floss. i really suggest going to see this film. you have to have that insatiable comic bookish appetite on top of a great sense of humor but i really enjoyed this one. i laughed an awful lot. good film. definitely worth a rental if not a trip to the theater.

in other news i received way too much for christmas and all the gifts are lovely. i've received many dvds, video games, and a food processor among other things. i appreciate everything given to me and the fantastic people who gave me those gifts. i'll have to post a pic of the pwnies shirt at some point because it is oh so AWESOME. i really enjoy the holidays and had a fantabulous time with my family and sean's family. i'd like to add a little more about sean's family's christmas but i'm not sure who all reads this so if you want to know - send an e-mail and i'll fill you in - otherwise you're in the dark for now.

i'm off today and tomorrow. woot - part of my christmas break - next week is included, thank god! anywho...have a great day and i hope your holidays were as fruitful as mine.

happy new year!

enjoy the silence...

madagascar 2 and more life

2008-12-15T10:38:00.004-05:00

sorry it's been a while and as normal i'm behind on posting. i really haven't had much time to see movies lately or do much of anything to tell you the truth what with finals week and lab finals week, things were just piling up left and right.

madagascar 2 - 8/10 snaps - i enjoyed it more than the first one. very humorous. definitely worth a dvd rental if not a trip to the cinema if it's still playing anywhere...

i thought about bolt a bit more and realize that i felt like i watched toy story all over again but with animals. if you've seen it maybe you can let me know if you felt the same, not that it's really a bad thing, just i'm sure they could've made it a bit more original had disney given it a shot. i'm really looking forward to several movies that are coming out such as harry potter, monsters vs. aliens, desperaux, the spirit, marley & me [as long as they don't ruin the book too incredibly much], amusement, the unborn, star trek [even though i'm not an uber fan], x-men origins: wolverine, alice in wonderland [granted it is set to release in 2010] and even bride wars looks like a fun time...we're definitely going to have a hard time finding the actual physical time to go to these films, at least the most recent onces coming out, but i'm sure we'll work it out somehow. where there's a will there's a way right?

in other more exciting news i got my actual diamond engagement ring which is gorgeous...mad props to sean [love you :*]. and somewhere in there i turned 27. sheesh closer and closer to 30. anywho i'm still loving school although the toll school, teaching, and work is taking is a bit stressful. nevertheless hopefully i've got at least a coupla days of vacation squished into christmas break somewhere. i promised dr. presberg i'd babysit her kids sometime during the break and i don't yet have dates plus i'm holding these make-up exams for biol 301: ecology & evolution. i may or may not be teaching next semester. they're just not exactly sure what they want me to do yet. if i teach i think it will either be biol 102: general bio for science majors again or biol 460: physiology which could prove to be interesting but thoroughly time consuming. i'm taking a unix/linus comp sci course, evolutionary biology, and graduate grant writing/intro to being a phd student course.

sean and i took eros and rukia to get their shots yesterday at one of the vet mobile places and that went pretty well considering it was dark and raining at the time. rukia was a bit nervous but eros just wanted to make friends and sniff everyone's butts. fun times were had and they're both completely inoculated for a whole $28.00. i'm trying to convince sean that both i and the cats need a bunny for christmas but i doubt that's really happening as he has some sort of aversion to rabbits. not like i need a rabbit but i think it would be fun to stir up the current mix of 3 dogs versus the 3 cats.

frostfell is in full effect in eq2 which is wonderful. we completed the heroic quest last night with my mom and dad and everyone got their most excellent fighting baby dragon plushie to put in their house. i spent 25 of the frost coins on the sleeping baby dragon plushie as well. it's so freaking cute! OH I ALMOST FORGOT that i FINALLY have my unicorn mount that i worked 25 hours tradeskilling in game to achieve. he is a most fantastic mount and i've only seen one other person riding one around. i was hoping for the discovery but i did get started on the expansion tradeskilling a bit post release as school/work is of more importance. i did get the discovery on the provisioner book however which made me a happy camper. now i can make some awesome berry charms but only god knows where you find the berries to make it with as they're selling on the broker for 20 some odd plat and i'm not paying that price for 3 to make one item only for a possible server-wide disco.

i'll have to post some pics of the dragon plushies and my unicorn mount. i don't have any great ones yet but i'll work on it. anywho i need to get to editing a website that should have been fixed before now but there's been this shortage of time everywhere.

have a fantastic day/week/month and enjoy the silence...

bolt and all sorts of fun

2008-11-25T19:27:00.003-05:00

well let's start out smoothly...

bolt - 8.5/10 snaps - do NOT go see this film in 3d. i did and actually saw maybe two or three bits of the film that were in 3d. a great family film. a definite go see for any pet lover. sean and i both had a fantastic time.

hmm what else. the whole family went to biltmore. search it up if you're not aware of the biltmore phenomenon. biltmore is a castle in nc. it's a castle that's still available for everyone to enjoy. sean and i went on the horseback tour which was so totally excellent! we start out on the ride and the trail guide [ryan] told sean that roman [his horse] was a big fan of chomping grass and if roman decided to graze then sean should yank on the reins and give him a swift kick. well sure enough, 10 mins away from the barn, roman gives grazing a damn good shot. sean yanks up the reins and gives roman a kick to find out that he has magically BROKEN the reins. impressive to say the least. anywho, so then we ride back to the barn where we get a new bridle for sean's horse and begin again on our way. we have a fantastic time and end up in a surrealistic area at some point. we're riding around and there's a small meadow in the middle of these woods. we look at the meadow as we're riding up and notice that there are two deer grazing. how freaking awesome! anywho the deer decide to let us continue on and ignore us as we continue our ride back to the barn.

we've got several pics i'll have to post so that everyone can see what a great time we had!

for now...as always...

enjoy the silence...

role models, max payne, saw v, and life

2008-11-20T07:17:00.004-05:00

well as is obvious i'm limited on time and haven't been able to post too incredibly much.

movies worth going to the theaters: role models - 9/10 snaps. hilarious. we're going to make shirts. that's how funny it was. i think you'll enjoy it more if you're of the gaming, d&d, classic rock persuasion.

max payne - 6.5/10 snaps. was a lot more impressive than i thought going in. had a constantine-ish feel but unlike constantine max is apparently high most of the time. doesn't quite follow the game storyline but was entertaining nonetheless.

movies that can wait for video/dvd [do they even make video anymore?] or that are already on dvd: saw v - 5.5/10 snaps. if, as i was informed at the box office, this is part of a series of 8 films, then it reminds me a bit of saw iii which was kinda crummy until you viewed saw iv. let's hope they were telling the truth. there were a lot of questions answered about the others if you're a fan of the films.

madagascar [the first one] - 7/10 snaps. was really quite funny. the penguins were hilarious. lots of references to older stuff that kids would never get so the movie isn't a waste for adults. was a tad bit short for my taste but how long do kids' attention spans last these days anywho?

everquest 2's new expansion came out this week so can anyone guess what we've been doing? the shadow odyssey seems pretty cool but we're quest addicts so since i've personally been maxxed on achievement for about 8 months now we're hitting the rise of kunark zones and finishing up all those quests we refused to do when we hit the max.

sean and i dressed up as hogwarts' students for halloween. we went all out. i'll have to post a picture at some point. oh and obviously we were from the gryffindor house. duh...

teaching the last of my labs for the semester this week. this lab is actually quite fun as we're looking at the effects of alcohol on water fleas and checking out some fresh pig organs. all we have left is the practical the week after thanksgiving. i think i'll miss my students but i suppose next semester i get all new ones...

registered for my courses next semester. taking a unix/linux comp sci course, evolutionary biology, and a grant writing course. i think next semester looks like fun. anywho i'm off to school for the day. have a great one everybody!

enjoy the silence.

biology revisited

2008-10-15T20:33:00.001-04:00

if you're of the adult persuasion and enjoy those evil, gross, disturbing things in life then i suggest some reiko.

enjoy the silence.

we cleared protector's realm!

2008-10-12T09:02:00.003-04:00

that's right ladies and gentlemen...our measly casual raid force cleared protector's realm last night! huzzah! this was the first night we were able to get past doomcoil [evil mechanical snake of doom - hence the name] and we even managed to finish off the last two encounters which was awesome because i got my first mythical update. i know this means little to nothing to those of you who don't play eq2. let's just say we've come a really long way from running courts. i'm just very excited. also in other eq2 news knights of the shadow dragon now has a guild hall. complete with giant baby dragon of course! anywho i'm off to work my arse off for a guild harvest box and to grade some more biodiversity reports. have a great day everyone.

enjoy the silence!

quarantine and other stuff that has absolutely nothing to do with the movies

2008-10-11T12:51:00.003-04:00

good afternoon. i'm not going to apologize anymore as i've already explained that i'm so freaking busy i can't see straight so we'll just get started with the review and move on from there.

quarantine - 8/10 snaps - i was thoroughly impressed with the film, i expected a lot less than what i ended up with. i hate the jumpy camera films [blair witch, cloverfield, etc] but this one didn't make me so motion sick so yay! i think i may like this just a tad bit more than others due to my veterinary science background. when you see the movie you'll understand. i just like being able to figure things out and i especially enjoy turning to sean and going oh but this won't work because in real life you can only do it this way THEN having the character on screen say the same thing verbatim. huzzah for knowledge! anywho. also the film has marin hinkle in it who plays judith in two and a half men which is one of my favorite tv shows. all the actors did really well for a horror. like any other suspense/horror film they make lots of dumb mistakes where you sit there going uh maybe we should barricade ourselves in one room and wait this out or maybe we shouldn't go near that person who bit five other people...for this one, go see it if you like horror/suspense. you can wait for the dvd but i think it'll be much more fun on the big screen. i jumped an awful lot.

other stuff that has absolutely nothing to do with the movies...warning: rant to follow...

/rant_on

i saw a billboard this week that was completely in spanish on jarvis klapman boulevard in west columbia, south carolina. first off, i have absolutely no problem with people immigrating to this country. i just expect them to learn the damn language. it really pisses me off that you can move here and speak spanish and never have to learn english. i don't want to have to learn spanish in an english speaking country so that i can understand a billboard. if i moved to mexico, i would expect that i would have to learn spanish. if i moved to france, i would expect that i would have to learn french. i know lots of people from india and china that live here and THEY have to learn the language. why should it be different for mexicans? proximity? what a load of crap...

it also annoys me that our government wastes tax dollars on putting something in another language for people who moved here who should in my opinion have to learn the language. oh wait you say. the government didn't put up the billboard did they? au contraire [my tiny bit of french in my rant heehee]. the billboard is for a type of medicaid [first choice] which is a government funded insurance policy for people that are well below the poverty line [i only know this because i'm in the health insurance field]. so not only was the billboard put up by our government but it's also offering people who immigrated here health care out of tax payer money. i have an issue with this as well. i work hard and have not had insurance for 4 years because i worked. if i had stayed at home and not made money and not paid taxes i would have qualified for medicaid but my measly paycheck was too much for me to qualify for medicaid yet not enough for me to be able to pay the approximately $150/200 per month for private health insurance. my job just didn't offer any plans [they still don't] and i couldn't find another one that paid as well that did offer benefits. i am finally working two jobs and paying for the mandated student health insurance at usc so that i can teach there yet they won't even file it from their health center [which is also a load of crap as the health insurance requires you to use the health center first before they will even pay for any outside appts so the least they could do is file the claims]. so as i'm sure you can see i'm a bit irked. so here's my outlet in my blog as there really isn't much else i can do except try to evade taxes and end up in prison. sounds like fun [heavy sarcasm]...

anywho. /rant_off

back to work.

enjoy the silence.

eagle eye igor

2008-09-29T22:28:00.004-04:00

hello everyone. long time no see. i'm loving life right now but it's insanely busy with teaching, my own studies/research, and working at vista so i'm a bit preoccupied lately. i've actually been on eq2 3 days in the past 7 which is pretty impressive considering my current time constraints. i've found that even though my backpack weighs 25lbs with my laptop in it [oh we've weighed it just to see how hefty it is] that i really should haul it to school everyday because if i have extra time and if i'm caught up on grading i can actually get some writs done for the guild while i'm waiting betwixt classes plus then i get a tad bit of my game fix releasing those oh so necessary to function endorphins. let's get on to the movies. they're both receiving the same score this week.

igor - 5.5/10 snaps - it's funny for us older kids/adults but not as laughable as the emperor's new groove. and if you don't find the emperor's new groove the brightest ray of sunshine on any otherwise cloudy day then i'm very very sorry for you. but cute film even though the ending is obvious from the beginning and the town's king is a direct rip off for the mayor from nightmare before christmas. just in case you missed it before this movie is a tad bit above your average kid's head. we'll quote a woman i saw coming out of the movie with her daughter. woman's blonde offspring, "igor was funny." woman, "i'm pretty sure i got a lot more out of it than you did." eh it made me laugh. if i were you i'd wait till it came out on dvd but would definitely check it out once it did.

eagle eye - 5.5/10 snaps - granted i knew going into this movie what was causing jerry shaw and his accomplice and the however many other people in the film involved to do what they were doing and that kinda jaded me so maybe my score is a bit low but it's one of those leave your brain at the door films and you can enjoy it. the action was exciting. i enjoyed shia labeouf [even though every time i hear his name pronounced it's a completely new experience], michelle monaghan, and billy bob thornton's acting jobs. they were pretty flawless. there's just a lot of moments where you go there's no way in hell this would work out that way but i guess a large sum of movies are like this and i shouldn't be giving this one such a hard time. i do love jurassic park but who sees that happening in reality anytime soon right? if you need an action fix go for it in theaters, otherwise wait for the dvd.

speaking of dvds go pick up iron man this week. i mean it. there's no hesitating here. robert downey jr killed this film. it is FANFREAKINGTASTIC! so again go buy it. i think it's available in around 1.2 hours.

anywho life is good. aurora gets her last heartworm treatments this week and hopefully that's cleared out all of the little bloodsucking fiends. you better bet i've shelled out the money to get everyone else tested and all sorts of treatment.

i hope everyone has a great week.

enjoy the silence.

snake porn

2008-09-18T11:33:00.003-04:00

well i originally thought about entertaining you with the story regarding the title of today's blog but i've decided it'll prolly just be better for you to make up a more interesting one all on your own. this was all started by sean finding a baby snake outside our house this am and our capturing it in our attempt to identify it to make sure it was safe to leave outside. we're thinking it's an eastern hognose snake but aren't completely positive. i've decided to call him hamlet since he has the word hog in his name and i'm assuming he's a he, i'll prolly never really know. and as i'm sure you all guessed we went to see burn after reading this weekend with my folks.

burn after reading - 9/10 snaps - 3 words. ha ha ha. i've come to the realization that actors WANT to make movies with the coen brothers because it looks like they have a great time doing such. i suggest going to see it if you have that sarcastic sense of humor required for the coen films. actually i suggest going to see it just to see what george clooney creates in the film. oh i'm hardly able to type i'm laughing so hard. i have to finish downloading no country for old men cause i still have yet to see it /gasp!

eh besides that everything seems to be going well. coming down with another throat sickness but maybe i've squished it already by downing half a gallon of oj yesterday. i'm well enough to work so i'm not too worried about it. i'm going to guess i'm getting it from all these students who keep telling me they are ill. then don't come to class! heehee. i'm loving teaching and getting back into the groove of class. just wish i had some more time for gaming. spore has been great fun. i only have one creature that i came up with and made sean design for me that looks like a cross between a squirrel and mr. snuffleupagus [yes i looked it up for correct spelling]. then we played a little bit at my aunt's house and came up with another creature called the johnavore [ha ha aren't we creative - my brother's name {johnathon} mixed with the word carnivore] that looks like some kinda mosquito with two really tall legs. if you need a spore friend send me your name. mine's nightpyper and sean's is gonei95. sean's on the space stage, i'm about to start the civilian stage [i told you i haven't had time for gaming] plus i want to start back up on knocking out the bleach game on the wii. unfortunately i'm at the stage where i have to play as hanataro yamada and i just think that's going to end badly several times over as he's a healer in the anime, not quite that great a fighter. anywho, back to the daily grind!

enjoy the silence.

hamlet 2 and mirrors

2008-09-06T12:00:00.003-04:00

i've gotten back into listening to avril lavigne recently. i think it's because i find it really fun to sing along with, 'i can hardly breathe, you make me want to scream.' anywho. i finally got the chance to go see mirrors last sunday. huzzah!

mirrors - 6.5/10 snaps - there's a little bit in mirrors that's your normal 'this would never happen horror movie jazz' but all in all i enjoyed it a LOT. you do have to take into consideration that i already have a somewhat odd fear of mirrors to begin with but i still think keifer knows better than to sign up for crappy movies so i think others will find this a good film as well. sean started bitching near the end of the film about how it had taken a turn where everything was crap but then the movie redeemed itself [surprising sean] and we'll leave it at that so that you have to go see it if you're interested in knowing anything about the ending. however, i will tell you they killed off amy smart insanely early in the film and i was thoroughly excited to not have a main character make it through to the end of the movie. not to mention they did a really good job on the cg of her death.

hamlet 2 - 7/10 snaps - i thought i would hate this movie. it was a lot funnier and a lot more engaging that i had hoped plus it wasn't nearly as sacrilegious as i had pictured. lots of interesting actors in this one as well...

nothing really stellar about either film. go see them if you're thoroughly interested in either, otherwise wait till they're out on dvd. they're definitely both worth a rent.

in other huge news...sean and i got engaged! the excitement! don't ask about the date cause there isn't one and i'm not getting married until i'm 70lbs thinner. if you'd like to support the quick method of april getting lypo then please e-mail me and we'll discuss where you can send the funds. just kidding. i do find it hilarious that we told our raiding crew in eq2 about it last saturday night and two DIAMOND rods dropped in the shard of hate raid that we were in. coincidence? i think not.

well break time's over so back to work.

enjoy the silence.

babylon ad, death race, postal, and the rocker

2008-08-30T12:16:00.003-04:00

oh my here we go. these will be brief as, like always, i am pressed for time so here goes.

babylon ad - 4.5/10 snaps - this movie lost 2 snaps just for the ending so this one's going to have some spoilers. you have been forewarned. i enjoy vin diesel films. not only is he good looking but like bruce willis and kurt russell he tends to look fantastic even when mangled up a bit. his job was to put on the normal diesel tough guy and he does it well. melanie tierry, michelle yeoh, and the rest of the cast also put in great performances. the action scenes in this movie are fun. everything keeps you pretty interested until about the last 30 minutes of the film where apparently mathieu kassovitz [director/screenplay writer] lost his mind. i can deal with the fact that the main character aurora is supposedly this cross of genetically modified organism with artificial intelligence [which they elude to quite bluntly with the "extinct in this era" siberian tigers that are 2nd generation clones], i can deal with the post-apocalyptic earth and everyone fending for themselves, i can see how putting everything on an evil religion made sense to help explain away any reasoning, i can even almost put up with the fact that because she's a gmo/ai hybrid she somehow has all these mysterious magical powers such as being psychic, an empath, automatically knowing an infinite bank of knowledge, and the ability to avoid bodily harm BUT when aurora is mystically pregnant with twins [so we've now moved on to asexual gmo/ai hybrid] and ends up killing off vin so that he can handily dandily be resurrected by her father whose also some walking lab experiment in order to rewind his brain back to when he died to figure out where she's gone and then manages to die in childbirth after amazingly avoiding all sorts of other life-threatening damage is just a bit much. the movie is worth watching when it hits dvd and i only say this if there are alternate endings available. let's hope the new fast & furious film blows us all away to redeem vin just a bit. at least that film has michelle rodriguez.

death race - 8/10 snaps - not many spoilers here. i was thoroughly surprised by this film. i expected it to be total crap. figured i was going to see a b movie and ended up happily entertained. definitely worth a dvd rental. go see it at the theaters if you're a jason statham fan. plus it has inspired me to rent death race 2000 because apparently it's even more fun than the remake.

postal - uhhhh i'll say 7/10 snaps - this film is the only film i've seen by uwe boll that's worth a damn. i can see why it didn't have a huge release in the us [especially here in sc] because wow is it offensive. if you're american, jewish, white, black, muslim, a midget, christian, overweight, handicapped, live in a trailer park, work in a coffee shop, are a policeman, are handicapped, are a child molester, well basically if you're living you will be offended. worth a rent if you can handle the offensiveness. it does have a slew of pretty famous actors such as zack ward, verne troyer, chris coppola, and dave foley plus uwe makes fun of himself as well he should since the majority of his other films are utter crap. not to mention if you need a really great stress reliever the video game is most excellent as you can kill whoever you like and then urinate all over them. it's fairly interesting.

the rocker - 8.5/10 - i really didn't know too much about this one going into it. really enjoyed it. i love the music industry and this story takes a big punch at it. my favorite line in the film was mattie saying, "i mean look at him. it's like abercrombie's making people now!" i think i'll start using that more often. don't you always hate when you see someone who looks like they fell out of the pages of the abercrombie magazine? well now it's just plain laughable. worth a trip to the movies and most definitely worth a rent and/or buy.

other than that not much else going on. staying really busy with the phd work and haven't even had all that much time to game. hopefully monday will allow for a bit of r&r. i did get a fantastic new laptop and here's a link to her gorgeous self. that was christmas coming early so i'm very ecstatic about playing on it. anywho i'm working so everyone have a great holiday weekend and enjoy the silence.

tropic thunder, clone wars, and pineapple express

2008-08-23T11:20:00.002-04:00

oy vey! all this graduate school business on top of regular life is taking a large toll on my blogging. i apologize if you ended up stranded with not knowing which movie to go see recently as i haven't posted. i haven't even seen a movie this weekend yet and there were 3 large releases [the house bunny, the rocker, and death race] and a limited one [hamlet 2] that i am somewhat interested in attending on top of still not having seen mirrors [i already have a slight fear of mirrors so i'm sure i'll appreciate this a bit more than the average movie-goer] or henry poole is here [which looks fairly interesting]. time will tell if i end up being able to view any of them at all. i am also going to apologize in advance for the brevity of the reviews. we're working on borrowed time here.

tropic thunder - 8.5/10 snaps - very comical. seeing as how ben stiller was the director and one of the writers i can't see anyone being surprised by this. robert downey jr just seems to always put in a great performance. the rest of the stellar cast did well. i would not take anyone under the age of 17 to this film [eh well maybe 16, depends on the 16 year old i suppose]. a great time for any crude humored fun-loving adult.

pineapple express - 8/10 snaps - also a good humorous film. if you're anti-drugs obviously you should not go see this movie. james franco was by far my favorite character in the film and made for a hilarious stoned weed dealer. again another film i wouldn't take anyone under the age of 17 to see. if you enjoyed superbad and knocked up i think it's safe to say you'll like this one as well but superbad has in my opinion completely surpassed knocked up and pineapple express in its level of comedy and enjoyment value.

i haven't seen many bad movies recently. thank you so much george lucas for creating the load of crap known as star wars: the clone wars which i'll give 1.5/10 snaps. the only reason you're getting over .5 is because i like the clone wars illustration style [apparently most everyone else does not but i am an anime fan so maybe that's why i personally prefer it]. i really enjoyed the shorts that were released on dvd [i think they were originally on cartoon network betwixt other shows] before this film. i fell asleep in this movie at least 5 times, so in a moment where i was actually awake i tried taking a new perspective on it and thinking maybe it's just aimed at kids and i'm not getting it. then i looked around the theater and realized the majority of the kids there were also asleep. it's pretty bad when you put an 8 year old who actually adores characters like jar jar binks to sleep...i don't know if lucas has just gone mad in his old age or what has happened but i think indiana jones and the crystal skull along with this clone wars crud speak for themselves. i'm surprised he actually got actors to voice these parts in all reality. just because someone's made great films in the past doesn't mean they should be allowed to do whatever they want in the future because unfortunately for mr. lucas he's ruining his own brands. i appreciate that the top critics on rotten tomatoes gave the movie 4 out of 100%. i think mr. gleiberman from entertainment weekly says it best, "George Lucas is turning into the enemy of fun." so in my honest opinion i would suggest staying away from this tripe at all costs. do not go see it, do not rent it, do not download it, do not watch it on fox when they air it for the first time for free. you're just better off not having seen it especially if you like the star wars saga [which i do].

in other non-film related news. had a fantabulous time at the baruch marine science laboratory in georgetown with several marine science and biology majors. i drove a boat, i heard about some interesting research projects currently going on, and i climbed to the top of a very scary firetower. there are loads more to be said about the trip but time is not on my side.

graduate school has been very enjoyable thus far. i get to start teaching biology 102 labs next week. i've been to one population genetics course and we didn't really do much besides go over the syllabus but i think it will be a very fun semester. i start my bioinformatics course on monday and cannot wait!

on top of all that had a great set of guild writ raid runs on thursday night with a lot of good friends. wonderful times were had by all even though we were bugged on receiving guild status. i'm still waiting for a reply on the eq2 forums regarding whether or not it was a bug or if the rules have changed somehow.

anywho i'm off to reading, working, and possibly seeing a movie this afternoon. oh and i might be getting my christmas present early as i have need of a laptop.

enjoy the silence!

holy hell

2008-08-05T10:25:00.004-04:00

woohoo. i landed the day off from work. oh wait. have i mentioned i'm currently dying of some unbeknownst disease? apparently i have a cold. ick. it is teh uber suck. i cannot breathe (through my nose at least) and speaking most definitely sucks. i just drove to a gas station to get 2 tropicana orange juices for 3 whole damn dollars! booooo!

anywho so in my sick annoying rage i shall post movie reviews...i know you're all happy face now aren't you heehee ^..^

swing vote 8.5/10 snaps - i actually almost cried in this film. it was wonderful. it was feel good, it was insightful, just plain awesome! i heart kelsey grammer. all the acting was just plain wonderful. my only problem with this film is that the audience it is aimed at [lower middle class and below] just won't get it at all and will leave the movie bitching. sean and i adored it. great job kevin costner. way to go! can you tell i'm a bit ill with all these damned compliments?

oh look! here we have a guest review for the mummy: tomb of the dragon emperor [i normally see most every film but this looked like so much shit i could not actually pay for it...ever] by my mother, the biggest brendan fraser fan on the face of the planet - she gives the film 7/10 snaps and all i got when asking about this score was that she got to see brendan fraser with his shirt off and that was worth going to see the film but she and my dad both enjoyed the ENTIRE movie. i have yet to call my dad and verify this.

i'm currently watching grandma's boy on tv and my god i forget what an awesome ass film it is! maybe because i LOVE video games but it's just a good movie. even with all the added in bonus evil you can get with the dvd.

listened to the new shinedown cd that came out in june day before yesterday. half of it is fantastic. half of it is filler shit. i figure half an album being great is a good job on any artist's part so yay for shinedown.

anywho i've drank my oj and am completely pooped so off to bed for my sickly ass. have a great day if you're up and about! oh if you only knew the typos i had while working on this being insanely sick....

as always...enjoy the silence.

-pyper

remy (both of them)

2008-07-29T14:41:00.006-04:00

alrighty so i haven't posted in a while. life is just so very busy what with all this exciting grad school business and preparing for that on top of work and obviously my in game eq2/lotro adventures. so i saw the following two movies this week.

the x-files: i want to believe ~ i'll give x-files 5.5/10 snaps. i think the reason it's getting played down as crap by reviewers are that for this film you HAVE to be a fan of the series. there's not really that much to say about the film itself. it was an extended episode of the tv series in all reality. no really alien references. i liked it. it kept me entertained. i enjoyed seeing the characters farther in their lives.

charlie bartlett ~ 8.5/10 for mr. bartlett. first, i in no way see this film as a ferris bueller's day off for this generation. ferris was a free spirit and matthew broderick was all about enjoying life in that film. charlie, played by anton yelchin, is still about enjoying life but unlike ferris doesn't have the at least semi-normal family life at home. his father's in prison though he tends to lie about him a lot and refer to him as being dead in about 65% of the film and his mother is on klonopin and somewhat of an alcoholic who is present in body but absent everywhere else [i really got a royal tenenbaums feel off her from this film]. charlie's story deals more with how screwed up the american family has become and how that effects the kids produced from these families. a lot dealing with mental disease and treatment in a serious manner while still poking a bit of fun. tyler hilton who played murphey bivens put in a fantastic performance as did robert downey jr and hope davis. everyone else in the film was above par as well but how hard is it to play a screwed up teenager in high school when in reality you are or just were a screwed up teenager in high school...food for thought. i really love the tagline for this film too: popularity is a state of mind. so if you don't enjoy teen movies such as 10 things i hate about you, the breakfast club, the new guy, not another teen movie etc, i suggest you stay away because in all probability you won't like this coming of age tale either, but if those are your cup of tea then rent this sucker post haste.

in other news rukia and eros are both negative for heartworms and are now on prevention which is most excellent. aurora had her teeth removed friday and as you saw in the previous post the quote was listed as $200 but we came out at $374 so it's amazing how these prices keep rising from week to week in exponential bounds. i guess at some point i should call the vet out on this bullshit but right now it's just a growing credit card balance that i will resent for years to come but at least my pets will be healthy. aurora now needs to get started on her heartworm treatment which is going to be 12 weeks long and is quoted at about $300 so i'm going to assume $500 to $600 is going to be my upcoming bill.

sean last week was on bower parkway and happened to see a kitten get hit by a car. seeing as how we're alike in a lot of ways, you know...loud, obnoxious, gamer geeks that love animals...he stopped to check on the kitten who is most feral and continues to bite sean on the hand most viciously. so now we have another 10 week kitten [i know, i know...like we need another kitten...] who will at least let you pet her now and pick her up without hissing who lives in a crate in our room until we can get her checked for fiv/felv tomorrow at sunset animal clinic [hmm appears i may be on the verge of not going to grace for much longer, time will tell]. oh and i forgot to mention she's a grey tabby and i have named her remy after some news below that will excite most x-men fans. no pics today, i'd rather wait until she's a bit more calm before shoving a flash in her face. back to remy's rescue story. sean ends up at the emergency room two days later because i get a bit worried this adorable cat may be carrying rabies as she's acting odd and i'm not sure whether it's a) neurological damage from the wreck, b) really scared feral kitten just being a really scared feral kitten, or c) rabid feral kitten. so just to be safe we call doctor's care because well i'd like for sean to keep living at least until i'm the primary beneficiary in the will [just kidding] and doctor's care states to go to the emergency room. so sean heads there and they put him in a room and get all his info and inform dhec that he's been bitten by a wild kitten and then prescribe him some antibiotics for the infection the bite has caused. this is so they can charge him the $500 emergency room fee for a prescription of 10 augmentin. what a rip off. then they inform sean that only dhec has the rabies shots and dhec tells them not to worry if we have the cat because the cat will show signs of rabies before sean dies or we can let them kill the kitten now and dissect her brain to see if she's got rabies. we decide to stay away from the latter option and watch the cat. dhec wants to make sure we have the cat so they make us take her carrier and put it up to a window so they can look in while we're not home. i'm a little confused as to how much you can tell about an animal by looking into a crate from a window but eh whatever. remy appears to be doing better with maybe a broken tail and i'll know more after tomorrow's vet visit.

in other remy news...god bless the brave person who taped the x-men origins: wolverine preview at comic con. if you search for it on google you'll eventually find one that works and you'll know its the one from comic con cause it's all slanted as the brave soul tried to hide whatever recording device they were using. so as the screams from the fans at the con watch wolverine and sabretooth's stories evolve there in all his card throwing, bo staff swinging explosive fury was the man himself...remy lebeau aka gambit. far and away my favorite x-man since i was oh 4 years old and i've been so freaking pissed that he hasn't been included in any of the movies thus far but i'm okay with him not having to share a film with halle berry as storm. while i like halle berry in most roles, i think jada pinkett smith [or is she just jada pinkett now?] would've kicked halle's ass at being storm. but back to gambit the most awesome x-man ever...not only is he hot, he's cajun, he's cool, and he makes being a superhero look fun. okay so my first thoughts were holy hell it's about time, then the logical part of me got to thinking that my favorite pick for the role gambit would've been heath ledger [way before he was ever thought of as the joker, because really...who saw that coming?] who unfortunately is no longer with us. so then i couldn't for the life of me think of another actor who would be HOT enough to pull this off. then i see the man [26 years old] they've picked and i'm a little more at ease. ladies and gentlemen, taylor kitsch. i know nothing about his acting whatsoever so i'm hoping he can also land the hot cajun accent gambit is supposed to bring along with the bad boy attitude. speaking of teen movies from earlier i've been dying to see john tucker must die and he's in the film so away i go to obtain it sometime in the next few weeks. i'll be bubbling over with happiness about this until it finally hits the big screen sometime around may 1st, 2009. and yes i will be at the midnight showing and possibly more showings the following day if he pulls the role off.

we're getting very close to the return of collegiate activity and i am getting more anxious because i just can't wait! i've got 3 quizzes to take and i've taken the first 2 already. you only have to make 80% but i'm getting that ocd vibe that i sometimes get and took them until i made 100. i never made below an 80 but i did get a coupla 86s and 93s. i just feel better seeing the 100. oh well, i learned some interesting things about breeze for powerpoint and am going to try playing with it soon.

well i've gone on for quite awhile but i guess that's what happens when i don't post often. hopefully i'll get some more time to post soon but time apparently is slipping away quicker than it used to so for now...enjoy the silence.

-pyper

ain't that a bitch

2008-07-23T12:17:00.004-04:00

well as is life as sean would say...things were looking up, bills were being paid off, and then everything comes crashing down as it inevitably always does. so wednesday i get a phone call and petie [one of my horses] is showing signs of colic again. he had surgery back in 2000 and since then likes to scare the hell out of us with symptoms every year or so of a relapse to make everyone think that he's going to need more surgery which i cannot at this point in time afford. so i head on out in the dark to the crouts [jake, justin, jess, and their parents, donnie and cindy] to see what's going on. petie isn't too bad so i make up a mixture of poo soup [bran, oil, jello mix, brown sugar, purina senior horse feed, water, metamucil, and corn oil] and he eats some of it which is a good sign. i come back thursday and do the same for him for breakfast [6:30am ouch] and dinner and he cleans up all of it. friday i head back out there and he's acting like his normal perky self trying to stick his head in the bucket i mixed everything up in before i could get to his feed bucket. cooper seems to be doing well but a bit thin. i'm going to start taking some beet pulp/molasses mix out to him three times a week to see if that'll bulk him up some.

so friday sean and i take aurora and constantine to the vet. constantine needs a booster vaccine and aurora needs her yearly examination with all the bells and whistles. as we're leaving with our $210.00 bill the vet tech comes out and says we need to go back in the exam room because the vet needs to talk with us. we head back in and they tell us aurora has heart worms. this could have theoretically been prevented had i given her monthly heart worm treatment but my brain decided that she was an indoor dog so what were the chances of her being bitten by a mosquito infected with these little buggers. apparently those chances were higher than i thought. i forgot to mention that aurora decided to eat my lg chocolate one day when she was out at home and we were at work leading to her breaking off a tooth that also needs to be removed which is going to cost $200.00 minimum. i think my vet may be a bit on the pricey side. anywho so now he talks of using this immeticide treatment and hands us a sheet outlining what happens. so basically it's a shot given twice to kill the worms in her heart which will painfully disperse into my dog's lungs once they evacuate the heart and we have to keep her on exercise lockdown for about six to eight weeks. this is no big deal and of course we're going to treat her for them and get the other two dogs checked out but then he goes to tell me the cost is $350.00 for the treatment. two shots and an oral wormer [ivermectin which i give my dogs anyways which is $10 for a 1,000 lb animal] for $350.00 seems a bit much. he tells me the immeticide costs a good bit and that's why the price is so high. well lucky me, i worked for the surgical referral for a few years so i call to see how much the bottle of immeticide runs and turns out it is less than $40.00. yes you heard right, $40.00. so then i think okay well they're assuming i'm the average idiot owner who won't be able to deal with watching my dog in case she ends up passing a clot and they've worked in keeping her at the facility each time she gets a shot just in case something happens. then i'm reminded of how er knowledgeable the staff at the clinic was when i went to get my cat spayed there. they called me three times. the first time they asked if i realized that my cat was declawed. gee really? i had no idea. [heavy sarcasm] are people really this stupid that they don't know if their cat has claws or not? they called me again to ask if i was sure my cat hadn't already been spayed and the second time to ask if she had gone into heat recently to make sure the cat wasn't spayed yet again. so this leaves me a little worried with letting their employees watch my dog when she could possibly need emergency services plus the fact that they are thirty to forty five minutes from the emergency clinic in case such does occur. so i figure you can see my quandary here and once i get rukia and eros tested to see if they are positive this friday i'm going to call jonathan suber at the referral and see if he'll do the shots for me as opposed to having this done at my vet clinic.

in other news there was a huge storm monday and we lost power for 4 hours. when the power came back on we had no cable service. so i call time warner to report my outage and they state they'll set up a work order. i get home tuesday and still no cable. i call time warner and they tell me my work order is scheduled for thursday. i bitch and whine but they won't move the appt any nearer even though they don't show any other outages in my area. what really takes the cake is that my grandfather lost cable, called tuesday morning and it was fixed within 3 hours. so for now i'm being made to watch dvds and read! how dare they not fix my cable. grr.

oh well.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

the dark knight vs. mamma mia

2008-07-19T14:28:00.002-04:00

thursday night we traveled to dutch square to see the dark knight at midnight with some of our friends. i'm going to give it 9/10 snaps. it could have been 10, really. for those of you who haven't seen it yet, do not wait till the end of the credits, there's nothing there and skip the rest of this paragraph and the next if you don't want spoilers. it's definitely theater worthy and being that it brought in over $66 million on its opening day pretty much everyone else agrees. i'm going to stick to what i thought were the worst parts of the film since 85% of the movie was great and i don't have the time to post about 85% of the film. the dark knight had this unfortunate thing i call the ai effect. named for steven spielberg's artificial intelligence: ai. in ai the movie should have ended when david [haley joel osment] ended up in the bottom of the ocean with his lovely teddy bear but instead spielberg decided to throw in aliens just for shits and giggles. this year's batman film had a similar deal going on. they should have stopped the movie with the portion where the joker escapes prison and proceeds to blow up gotham general. but no, christopher nolan decided that they could fit two-face into this film as well. unfortunately for mr. nolan, movies have some sort of time constraint unless you're quentin tarantino.

maybe heath ledger was a bit crazy before he died because he sure as hell did an awesome job acting psychotic. anytime the joker was around, a great scene was unfolding. phenomenal in fact. then you have the rest of the cast...christian bale did well, but in scenes not involving the joker, he just didn't seem as invested in the role of batman/bruce wayne. michael caine, gary oldamn, and morgan freeman were spot on with their roles. maggie gyllenhaal was just plain boring. i really didn't care that they killed her off. i felt no empathy whatsoever. the only pang of sympathy i did experience was for batman for being tricked into rescuing the wrong person. the sad thing is i know she could've done better. i've seen her in other films where she's done wonderfully well such as mona lisa smile and stranger than fiction. aaron eckhart by far gets the award for most awful performance in the dark knight. while eckhart makes for a great harvey dent, he is uber awful as two-face. i guess this could also have to do with my preconceived notion of how two-face would/should act. he needed to be crueller and obsessed with that coin deciding everything for him. and because of the ai effect the movie experienced, there just wasn't enough time to fully explore and build this character because in essence he was ai's aliens. more of an afterthought that would have been better to leave out of this particular film. he needed more time to grow into the role and i think a separate film featuring two-face and possibly another villain from the batman universe would be more appropriate. it doesn't help eckhart either that ledger's job was so wonderful, his seemed even worse in comparison. i fully expected them to kill the joker off at the end seeing as how NO ONE will be able to perform that role as well as ledger did and yet they kept him alive and apparently killed off two-face. i would not be surprised if two-face resurfaces as they never show an actual funeral [the bit at the end could've just been a press conference]. if i could vote on villains for the next batman movie i'd love to see some actual kick-ass women playing harlequin and catwoman [i vote michelle rodriguez and milla jovovich, they did a great job with resident evil].

on friday i again visited dutch square this time with my aunt to see mamma mia. i was actually surprised by how much i enjoyed it. 8/10 snaps. everyone did a great job and it was neat to see colin firth, stellan skarsgard, and pierce brosnan in flamenco dancer outfits. pretty humorous film but definitely more of a chick flick plus you're going to have to enjoy musicals a bit if you're going to see this one as well.

i'm back at work on a saturday so i'm going to get moving so i can get out of here.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

constantine and the weekend

2008-07-14T19:10:00.010-04:00

interesting things happened this weekend. i was very busy. so let's get started.

friday. went and saw hellboy 2 which i'll give 7.5/10. stop reading now and skip to the next paragraph if you haven't seen it unless you don't plan on going to see it. i was kinda peeved at how easily they rid themselves of this damned ancient crown because if it was that easy, really that easy, then the pieces wouldn't have survived all those years and they could've prevented the two elves from perishing in the end. plus it was oh-so-obvious that the princess was going to kill herself from the beginning of the film in order to end the evil prince's reign of terror. other than that i thoroughly enjoyed the film. although apparently sean resembles ron perlman so maybe i'm a bit biased. i thought it was better than the original hellboy. i do think the idea of him [hellboy] having children, especially twins, is a bit frightening.

so friday after hellboy 2 sean has promised i can have a new kitty! so we go to pets inc to see if they have anything we like. sean finds a cute calico kitten that he likes. i'm happy with anything sean likes so we go to the desk to get the paperwork for the kitten. we fill it out. it asks about the other animals we have and then we get to the difficult questions dealing with is your current cat declawed. me being the truthful person i am put yes on the front paws only. more questions. i finally finish [it was really only two pages] and take the papers up to the front desk. the workers take my application and get this look on their faces. one of them comes around the side of the counter and tells me that we can't adopt this kitten because their number one rule at the adoption center is not to allow these cats to ever get declawed. so i say, "i understand" and so does sean and we nod as she says their managers will call us to let us know whether or not we can adopt the next morning while the whole time we both know we'll never get any call whatsoever [and we didn't] on top of me thinking shouldn't spaying and neutering be your first priority but surprise surprise they send animals home completely intact expecting you to go get it done or you forfeit your $125 deposit. we leave and i get all sad and depressed and break out into tears that i'm not good enough to adopt a kitten from pets inc which i volunteered at for years of my life when i was younger back when it was called adopt a pet and lived behind kimbrell's furniture in west columbia. so i finally come to the conclusion that we'll go get a kitten at the shop road animal shelter since it's probably an animal that needs a home more than any of the animals at pets inc and the animals at the shelter are actually healthier than those at pets inc that are being neglected as the staff is too busy being teenagers and just chatting it up and ignoring the smell of urine that pervades their facility. so i chalk it up to fate that that pets inc kitten [they called it gumdrop...ick...] would find a fantastic home and that i am destined to have another at the shelter where i've adopted before and got kairi who now resides with nick in west columbia.

so we decide to go to the animal shelter saturday morning at 9am when the shelter opens because saturday is my dad's birthday and we're going to the village at sandhills to see journey to the center of the earth in 3d and to eat lunch at 10:45am. well we get to the shelter at 8:45am and sit in the car with the windows down listening to all the dogs bark and npr as we wait for them to open. the shelter opens and they have a huge cat room to the right filled with cats running every which way. adorable kittens everywhere! there's a sign on the room that says no entry. so we ask the shelter worker [very interesting accent...we've decided she's either french canadian or german] if we are allowed to see any of them. turns out the room is full of cats passing around some nasty upper respiratory infection so none of them are available for adoption. well i know they have another room with kittens and what they also call the fat cat lounge. so we head into the kitten room and sean goes, "oooh look at the white one!" seeing as how we currently have a black cat, it would be rather cute to get the white one. well so we look at all the kittens and sean can't tear himself away from the tiny white one. he's obviously fallen in love with it. so we go to the front desk and tell them we want to adopt him. turns out he was found earlier in the week at the shell station on north main in columbia. lucky kitty. he's not completely white. the shelter has him marked as a flame point siamese which i suppose could describe his cream color with the tan points on his ears, paws and tail. he's not quite so striking as other flame point siamese colored cats that i have seen but he is gorgeous. so we fill out the paperwork and take him home. he was a whole $68, 8 weeks old, neutered, one round of shots, two ear mite treatments [i'm still working on fixing that], microchipped, negative fiv/felv test, and dewormed. so not only has he thus far turned out to be perfect for our household and fit in great with the corgis and aremis [took her a whole two days to get over the fact that we'd brought another cat home] but he was an even better buy [not that it matters because i would've paid $125 for him anyways]. so sean calls him ghost at first then learns that he's a flame point siamese [at least in color] so we decide to call him blaze. which leads sean to think of hellblazer which obviously leads to us calling him constantine. and that's his name and it shall stay that way because he already has a vet appointment for friday when aurora goes in for her shots so it's already that way in the vet's computer [plus i like the name]. here he is trying to be a keyboard [or a mouse i suppose] on sean's desk.

i know...adorable isn't he? so then we're taking him to my work so that we can leave him there in a crate in the air conditioning while we go to the village at sandhill with the family. i hear a ticking noise as i'm driving to work and ask sean if he hears it too. at first we think it's the motorcycle behind us but then the ticking gets louder and the motorcycle hasn't gotten any closer so i pull over and it turns out my tire had blown out. not just any tire but the brand new one we had to get when there was a carpenter nail that somehow managed to make a hole in my original tire that couldn't be patched because of its location. so we then can't find the jack for yoshi [my silver yaris...yes i know yoshi wasn't silver...the name just fits]. turns out it is under the driver's seat when there is a space for it in the back next to the spare with the arm for the jack as well [go figure]. sean changes the tire once we find the jack [with a helpful 15 minute call to the toyota service department to find out where it was since my user manual had been removed when i refinanced my car at half the interest i had initially several weeks before]. we make it to work just in time to drop off the kitten and head out to the sandhills. here's another picture of constantine cause he's just so cute!

oh and those eyes are currently blue but i'm guessing they're going to change as he ages. anywho journey to the center of the earth in 3d gets a 6/10. not really too much to give away here. i figure most of you have seen one of the other versions of the film or have read the novel. i was somewhat disturbed by how much i could see brendan fraser's nipples poking out in the outline of his sweater/shirt through a lot of the movie. my mother thinks he's the hottest thing ever so she loved the film. i don't know how good it would be if not in 3d because a lot of good parts were made to be much more thrilling in three dimensions. i was preoccupied enough for one and a half hours to give it more than an average of 5. on a sidenote i cannot wait to see bolt in 3d as well! "i eat danger for breakfast!"

we then headed to red robin to eat lunch. i've never eaten there before and it was a nice experience. plus my mom yelled at our waiter, joel, that it was my dad's birthday and they came over and shouted some rhyme really loudly embarrassing him as they should on your birthday. plus he got a free sundae out of the deal. the food was pretty good and i think we all enjoyed the adventure to the outskirts of camden err i think we're now calling it a portion of columbia.

saturday night brought a shard of hate raid. sean got a nice wrist item. we then helped beline, phinneas [dad], singinliz, and fuzzypawz with their epic updates in chardok. dad also won this sweet warg off the queen in chardok with some awesome mage stats on top of his epic update. we had a pretty fun time with several friends.

sunday we headed to work for a bit. sean hadn't worked on saturday so he went in on sunday to make up for it and i worked on reading my biology text, trying to awaken some of this knowledge i supposedly absorbed in high school and college. we had lunch at aunt nita and uncle ed's house in honor of dad's and amanda's [cousin] birthdays. we got dad all 3 resident evil films in blu ray, for amanda i picked out some really pretty jewelry at hand-picked [which now has a location at lexington in that strip with the new target.../cheer...], and i brought jessica [thomas' (amanda's brother, obviously another cousin) girlfriend] one of those ikea fangst closet storage dealies in blue. i have one in teal and i love it. she's moving into a dorm room and she seemed to really like the fangst once she opened it...she even knew what it was, i was somewhat impressed. her birthday was several weeks earlier, but the fangst hadn't shipped in time to make it for her party.

we finally made it home and i promptly passed out while watching tv because i'm having wonderful allergic reactions lately and the benadryl allergy formula makes me sleepy. eh it's been an awfully long post and an awfully quick weekend.

so for now, enjoy the silence.

-pyper

yahtzee reviews lego indiana jones

2008-07-13T09:42:00.003-04:00

i really liked this week's zero punctuation of lego indiana jones so here it is. if you'd like to see more, visit yahtzee's videos at the escapist magazine. i enjoyed the psychonauts review an awful lot because i liked psychonauts and yahtzee did too. also, the escapist likes to give some of their other shows some advertising by putting them at the end of yahtzee's videos. once you get to the unforgotten realms portion, yahtzee is finished and that's another one of their random series [oddly enough on their site it was a drawn by pain advertisement, makes me wonder if the adverts change every time you load up the video...hmm...].

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

field trip!

2008-07-11T09:47:00.004-04:00

well as you've prolly gathered by now i'm starting back to school in august for my phd. i'm ecstatic and cannot wait! so i get this e-mail the other day telling me there's a coupla extra spots available for this trip to georgetown to the baruch marine laboratory for those of us who aren't in marine biology and would i like to go...of course i'd love to go! so i hastily send back my reply and i currently feel like an excited 5th grader.

"To this end, we cordially invite you to join us Friday, August 15th for this orientation at the Baruch Field Lab. We will provide the transportation, but you will need to bring food for breakfast and lunch, sleeping bag, old shoes, etc."

so i'm off to find me a sleeping bag as the one i have currently is of the 101 dalmatians variety and is being used by my dogs as a bed. jon tells me i ought to buy a viva pinata sleeping bag. i think i'm going to opt for a solid color.

also i've picked up playing lord of the rings online again recently on top of my normal everquest 2 duties. i'm hanging out on the brandywine server as that's the server i was on in beta. i've got two minstrels [pyper and lealwyn] and a loremaster [rawien]. if ever in game feel free to look me up. i'm actually enjoying the slow solo leveling right now [talk to me next week and see if i still feel the same].

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

the death of customer service

2008-07-10T09:44:00.005-04:00

having worked in the retail or customer service industry since i was 15 years old [cashier at publix] i have somewhat high standards when it comes to how i'm treated at various locations. i don't expect someone to offer to carry out my groceries or give me something for nothing, i'm just looking for a modicum of courteous behavior from those in any customer oriented job. so in the past six or so years i've had some bad experiences with customer service ranging from best buy to petsmart and everywhere in between. my recent encounters with mcdonalds have led me to want to put them here.

first, you need to know that sean and i go to the same mcdonalds every morning on sunset boulevard in west columbia about 5 minutes from my work. i ALWAYS [look caps, it must be true] order 2 fruit & yogurt parfaits and sean either a. orders nothing, b. orders hotcakes with sausage, or c. orders a sausage biscuit with pancake syrup [apparently he likes syrup on his sausage as i like syrup on my bacon...sweet]. so on july 8th i order 2 parfaits and sean orders a sausage biscuit with pancake syrup. with those wonderful digital screens you can tell up front if they've got your order correct [if they use the screens since half the time they don't] and the person working the cash register put hotcakes up on our order. sean responded saying he just wanted the syrup not the hotcakes and she removed the hotcakes from the screen. we pull up to the first window and pay for our order. we travel to the second window to receive our grub and lo and behold there is no syrup. so he asks for syrup and the employee proceeds to argue with him about it saying that he didn't order it [first off - it doesn't even matter whether or not he ordered it (which he did, i was there) the customer is always right, second - what the hell difference does it make if you give this guy one small pancake syrup anyways?]. so then after sean insists that he ordered the syrup the employee proceeds to tell him it's going to cost him if he wants pancake syrup. he says fine and hands her some change. it then takes about four more attempts to prove he ordered the syrup before she finally goes to get the pancake syrup. we leave to realize there were no spoons and no granola in with my parfaits. i decide we should just go to my work and not go back and start another conflict.

okay so at this point, sean is mad. i'm a little angry but not too upset. why even argue with a customer at all over something so trivial? and why make such a huge deal about pancake syrup when it's doing nothing but making your job harder? maybe she had a bad day at that point or hates her job at mcdonalds or whatever but that's not an excuse for the amount of time and energy wasted not to mention the horrible experience she just provided a customer with. not that we're the end all of customers and mcdonalds everywhere would shut down without us but we are constant return customers and regardless should have been treated with a bit more service and a lot less disrespect.

so let's fast forward to today, july 10th. same mcdonalds. this time i'm ordering just the 2 parfaits. the girl from the magical drive thru voice machine tells us that it'll be $2.14 [which is what 2 parfaits cost with tax]. on this particular morning she did not employ the use of the drive thru screen. alright at this point in the story the mcdonalds' employees are not the only ones at fault here. i will take the blame for not looking at my receipt as i have been conditioned through many years of quick drive thru experiences. i gave sean my debit card. he handed it to the girl at the cash register and she handed it back with the receipt. he pulled forward and i crinkled up the receipt. the receipt had the wrong order on it. i should have looked at it. so we pull up to the next window and the guy standing there says, "sausage, egg, and cheese biscuit?" sean says, "no, we had two parfaits." another employee comes up and she begins to argue with us about how we paid for a sausage, egg, and cheese biscuit [which we did, which is more ($2.35), and i should have looked at the damned receipt] and how we didn't order 2 parfaits. but again why even argue with us over this? why would we lie about what we ordered? i was to the point of using foul language today in the drive thru. i was that mad.

suffice it to say i will not be going back to this particular mcdonalds and i'm sure it won't hurt their business at all. but just as i e-mail companies about when i have a great customer service experience i sure as hell e-mailed them this morning about the bad experiences i've had this week. i just can't wrap my brain around the reasoning behind being so rude to a customer. i would have been fired had i ever acted that way toward a customer at eb games, hollywood video, publix, lazy creek, clemson dining services, or at the surgical referral [i've worked at a lot of jobs that require customer service obviously]. it's not like i haven't been there with a jackass customer before and have wanted to say all sorts of things yet i have held my tongue because i knew that it wouldn't do anything to help me or my current position at the time to argue with a customer or tell them they were wrong [i have explained to many customers why they will never see pokemon or mario on the xbox]. and i would be a bit more sympathetic with the employee if we had been rude and hadn't ordered correctly but we were perfectly normal everyday customers.

off to work with insurance companies for now...

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

you want me to go where?

2008-07-08T08:55:00.005-04:00

so in the wonderful world of everquest 2 we're working on the newly released epic weapons [newly released meaning 6 to 8 months ago plus]. i have mine ::grin::, my dad has his [in fact he's almost got his second one], and my mom has hers [which required an incredibly difficult final fight to obtain involving me yelling 3 3 3 at the top of my lungs while at my parents' house followed by my mother and i screaming and jumping up and down]. sean on the other hand does not have his yet. so these epic weapons are all nifty and you typically have to be maxxed out at level 80 to start the quest lines required to obtain your weapon. so for most epic weapons there are these series of difficult kills that requires a group of level 75-80 toons or even a coupla groups depending on mob difficulty...well...sean's starts that way and we kill the two initial mobs. not so bad, we're on our way. the next step for the brigands is a bit ridiculous. you have to obtain 4 robes. the robes drop off mobs that are currently grey to sean's character. when you kill a mob that is grey to you in everquest 2 as with many mmorpgs, you get no loot. therefore the only way to get loot in everquest 2 is to find a lower level toon who will go with you to the zones that said mobs are residing in and mentor to make yourself a lower level and allow the mob to drop loot. we find a guy who's willing to help us with the first named and get him out of the way in sos. the second robe is from a heritage quest that we complete so fantastic! robe 2 out of the way. the third and fourth mobs are in not so easy places to drag a lower level character. so looking at the quest there are alternate ways to obtain the 3rd and 4th robes by clicking two chests in some higher level zones known as karnor's castle and sebilis. so karnor's castle and sebilis are some high end group zones and we decide to hit up karnor's castle first because we've been to the area where eq2i suggests there is a chest. so we get in there and see this guy just run past all the initial mobs which are really nasty high level 73 and 74 ^^^ heroic drolvargs [imagine a werewolf that's in control of himself but extremely angry at the world and wants to kill you for no apparent reason...now you've got a drolvarg and heroic mobs are those meant for a group of six]. so we try it, like idiots, about 5 times. we die about 5 times. so then sean [fievall] realizes he has his god power that will drop all aggro from the group so we attempt the run a 6th time and make it to where the drolvargs keep their riding rhinos which don't hate us and drop all the mobs from the entrance. we then fight our way up the stairs and along the ledge on the outside of the castle slaying drolvargs as we go. we make our way to the hallway with the stairs leading down to the undead spirits that are some other inhabitants of karnors. for some reason these undead are unable to see past invisibility or stealth so fievall invises himself and i use a jaguar totem for stealth. we creep down to xalgoz's lair. he's floating there with his mistmoore emissary both of which can see through our invis. the chest is supposed to be behind xalgoz so in thinking that somehow i can rescue fievall if he is seen i remain in stealth on the stairs in front of xalgoz as fievall goes to sneak around behind him for the chest, hoping not to get close enough for xalgoz to spot him. fievall finally makes it around behind him and spots the small chest. he creeps up and waits for the other floating spirits to move away and quickly opens the chest, retrieving the robe! fievall recasts his invis and makes his way back to the stairs where i immediately cast escape and we're out of the castle with robe in hand.

next we're off to sebilis where the mobs become level 80 and 84^^^ heroic. we get pretty close to where the chest is supposed to be located and are slain several times when we finally give up. more attempts to follow this evening.

eeep! time to get back to work.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

sunday sunday sunday!

2008-07-07T13:23:00.005-04:00

we went to meet tandra [carole] and her husband [tony] at ihop on st. andrews. this is so incredibly totally super cool seeing as how most of the people we play with in game, we don't ever get to meet in person. tony doesn't play but carole and i hang out a lot in game even if she is a fae [heehee]. we had a really great breakfast and saw them off on their way back to florida from their family camping trip in north carolina. i'll post a picture later cause tony took one of the three of us and carole promises to send it to me tomorrow.

wanted 8/10 - finally convinced sean to go see it...actually it was his suggestion, maybe i put something in his lemonless water [he also said i could get a kitten so i obviously drugged him at some point]. anywho. it was great. i'm normally a bit more critical of movies but lately we seem to be on some plateau of sorts where most of the movies i've gone to see have been pretty spectacular or at least entertaining. the action scenes were fantastic. i liked everyone's role in this film; all the performances were well done. i have not read the comic and have heard from those that have read it that there is nothing in the movie that is in the comic except for the mention of one of the character's names so i apologize to those huge fans who were expecting it to be along the comics' lines. but to those fans i'd like to remind them that i have yet to see my favorite x-man [gambit] in any of their films although i did get his actual name [remy lebeau] on a computer screen [yeah i feel he was just a skosh overlooked] so i understand how you can be feeling if you were looking for it to relate a bit more to the comic.

i've dvred the ant bully and still have yet to watch charlie bartlett as i had some killer migraine yesterday and just zonked out on the bed when the power went out in concert to a really nice storm that made the dogs a bit anxious. aurora basically landed on my head as she flew onto the bed to get closer to me.

in other news i'm still behind on reading that bio book and didn't even crack it this weekend which isn't good. joni's out at work this week so rita [mom] and i have to do her job and ours so i'll be working a little more than normal. other than that not much other news.

have a nice day everyone and enjoy the silence.

-pyper

pyper and her bite of the wolf

2008-07-05T11:45:00.006-04:00

oh and in case you haven't been to my myspace page to check out some pics of pyper here she is with her bite of the wolf. eh just to tie the comic together with the actual in-game image. i'll take a brighter pic at some point to show it off a little better prolly on sean's comp with the graphics as high as they'll go [they even warn you when you select that option...spooky huh?]. the vines wrapping around the bat'leth are barbed and if you look closely you can see that there's images etched into the actual metal itself. we finally turned the graphics up all the way on sean's new amazing computer and saw that they are wolves which are the warden's natural form so it makes perfect sense. here i am. oh and the shield in the picture is also a badass fabled drop from shard of hate and it emits a black mist with a glowing red orb in the middle mwha ha ha.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

happy 4th of juliet

2008-07-05T11:16:00.003-04:00

hope everyone had a happy 4th. mine was basically spent keeping in touch with my family via cell phone, playing video games, and watching tv. nothing special. i was feeling somewhat lazy. my grandfather (on my mom's side) had a minor stroke on thursday but they were at the beach where he has a house [well we'll call it a house - it's really two trailers stuck together]. so my mother and aunt traveled down to the hospital at the beach and they are still staying there hence the family cell phone convos. granddad is doing fine now so hopefully they'll be headed home today.

of the movies i perused yesterday they were mostly on the adolescent front:

nanny mcphee 5/10 - cute [again cute actually meaning cute and not badass]. great little lesson film for children about misbehaving. i really loved the use of the bright colors. very visual. extremely straightforward. watch it if you're watching it with your kids, otherwise i say pass.

daddy day care 7/10 - funny. it's a geeky kind of funny what with all the comic book and trekkie references. i'm not the hugest star trek fan but even i realized that kid was speaking klingon...maybe that has to do with the warden epic weapon featured in the comic strip below. eh who knows? anywho i like steve zahn, eddie murphy, and jeff garlin in this film. they work well together. not to mention i adore films with anjelica huston. regardless of the role she's playing she always gives a fantastic performance. seeing as how i just recently saw wall-e, it was nice to put a face to the voice of the captain of the cruise ship since i haven't seen that many movies with jeff garlin in them. very entertaining and worth watching with or without the kids.

nothing much else going on this weekend. i'm at work currently [::gasp:: on a saturday!] trying to clean up my desk as i'm starting school shortly and stephanie will need a clean work area when she comes in to take over my position. hopefully i'll get some reading done today and get a chance to watch charlie bartlett as dad burned it for me and i'm still dying to see it. shortly i'll be getting a copy of in bruges which also looks hilarious and unfortunately did not play at any theaters in the greater columbia metropolitan area ::growl::.

have a splendiferous weekend and as always, enjoy the silence.

-pyper

bat'leth by brasse

2008-07-03T18:13:00.006-04:00

i found a brasse comic i just had to post. she's a hilarious dwarf that makes some wonderful eq2 comics. myself, being the healing warden that i am, found this one quite humorous. you can go to here to check out some more of her comics. not all of them being eq2 related btw. some are lotro, wow, and other mmorpgs. i really miss how farming used to be in lotro /cry.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

hancock and some epic eq2

2008-07-03T09:44:00.006-04:00

hancock 7/10 - the movie was cute [and when i say cute this time i mean cute...not badass]. it was really short [1.5 hours] and with the digital theater we saw it in the really neat fight scene was so quick you couldn't keep up with it to see what was going on. besides that i really enjoyed it. entertaining enough but still left you wanting some more. some really great scenes. it's one of those films you can see now or wait till it comes out. either way you should prolly give it a go at some point.

last night's eq2 run was great! we went into chardok which is an evil evil zone and finished this horrid wyvern who goes by the name of severclaw. our group consisted of keline [beline's guardian], fievall [sean's brigand], phinneas [dad's necromancer], ritan [mom's conjuror], and fantar [ranger]. so fantar needs severclaw as the last named in his epic. fievall and i have fought severclaw before. the sucker has killed us at least twelve times if not more. well so we start the fight and things are going well. i burn one of my tunare powers that gives me 50% extra heals for 30 seconds and then it wears off. severclaw is down to 50% health and our tank drops. and then mom's pet is magically staying alive tanking the mob and then he goes down and she goes down and dad and his pet go down and fievall has feigned death in the corner. fantar starts kiting the mob around and so i'm basically out of mana but i start rooting the mob. and we're down to 5% of his health remaining and he starts moving so very slowly when he breaks my roots so i'm popping mana stones, necro hearts, and conjurer shards to try to get the teeniest bit of mana to keep at least one of my roots holding him still so fantar can pummel him with arrows. finally, finally i have enough mana to burn him and i cast a fire spell and he goes down! then he promptly respawns about 5 feet from my toon and i scream out of pure fright that he's back but apparently i was far enough away for him not to notice me ::quiet sigh of relief::. so then we evac as golems and di'zoks are repopping all around us and taking notice that we're still there and head down to court of korucust where we get phinneas his update for his epic by killing korucust although the first time we got to cok none of us had a key so we had to go kill the bridge keeper in order to obtain one and then got in no problem. we tried to go back down again and get to beline's [keline's main] epic spot but we weren't able to so we have made plans to go back next wednesday to get his update from the chardok library and the sebilis research area. all in all had a great time and am insanely ecstatic that we got both of those updates.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

about a boy

2008-07-02T12:19:00.006-04:00

about a boy - 8.5/10 - i loved it. it's a given that i like hugh grant regardless of how many hookers he sleeps with [the same goes for charlie sheen] but the whole film was just great. granted i missed the last minute or so due to my dvr cutting it off but just a really nice piece all together. deals with a lot of issues that are typically handled in a rather more serious or flippant way depending on the film. other movies tend to go way over either side of the border when addressing things such as suicide, depression, death, dating, and life in general but about a boy pokes some fun while still showing a sincere effort regarding the somberness of some of the topics. i like british humor a lot too so if you're not a fan avoid the film.

nothing much else going on. i've really got to read this biology book. last night's attempt to read while transmuting ended in another charasis: voes and charasis: maidens run. which in all fairness were actually very nice runs for me as i looted my wayward moon tunic (which i've been dying for) and ::gasp:: my defender of the forest master!!! masters in this game are totally way too expensive to ever afford unless you spend all your time trying to make money and not playing so i was completely ecstatic! wootastic!

anywho nothing much else for now.

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

brokeback, wall-e, and wedding crashers...it almost sounds like you could put them all together somehow...

2008-07-01T09:17:00.003-04:00

doh dee doh. so i watched several movies this weekend and have two on my dvr that i've got to finish. let's get started.

wedding crashers 8/10 - i found it hilarious. in some movies the blatant disregard for our morales is a bit much. in this one they found a way to make fun of it and turn it around. i laughed a lot. vince vaughn and owen wilson are a great pair. i also LOVED isla fisher's role in the film. i thought she was fantastic in definitely, maybe though as well playing the part of moi.

wall-e 8.5/10 - really cute. obvious underlying message about not ruining your planet and getting off your ass every once in a while. when we go see these films on the days that they premiere i always enjoy the reactions from the eight billion kids in the theater, especially the one behind us asking if she could have more of her chicken mcnuggets. it was quite an enjoyable experience.

brokeback mountain 7/10 - i was thoroughly surprised by this film. i'm not homophobic or anything, just not a big fan of watching two guys make out or go at it which is what i wrongly assumed would be the majority of the movie. plus apparently millions of women think jake gyllenhaal is sexy or some such. i am completely the opposite and find him rather unattractive. heath ledger on the other hand was immensely adorable and it rather stinks that he passed away earlier this year. the movie rather shows their relationship in a very tasteful manner. eh so the first twenty minutes of the film ennis (ledger) and jack (gyllenhaal) meet and are up in the mountains and do their relationship thing. after that they both get married [to women] and end up having kids. the boys reunite after a four year stint of not being together and ennis' wife sees a most passionate kiss betwixt the two which ultimately sets his marriage into a downward spiral. anywho i could keep going and give a complete synopsis of the events that followed but we'll stop there and leave it at the movie dealing more with the ethics of society and how the homosexual community was treated years ago. it's enlightening and saddening all at the same time. i think it's worth seeing if you have the opportunity.

last night got on eq2 and helped galubot finish up his epic by taking out the dread pirate jones in chelsith. then we ganged up with cara's alt lulla (dirge), an assassin from zealous (eluna's alt i think), galubot (swash), brigon (guardian), and wizairde (coercer) to go run charasis: vault of eternal sleep so brigon could get the last mob for his epic. the run went phenomenally well if i do say so myself and i'm giving myself props for solo healing a less than 40 minute run of the zone. it's safe to say others can do the same but man they kept me on my toes with gal running out there pulling mobs continuously and the falling into holes that happens occassionally (granted i fell into a hole and ended up causing the only death [sorry lulla] that happened the entire run but still). also got my transmuting up to 305 so i'm slowly but surely making my way to that 400 mark.

eh back to work for now. apparently i might go see hancock tonight or tomorrow...

enjoy the silence.

-pyper

eh change and all that nonsense

2008-06-30T11:05:00.004-04:00

wow so i found my blog from forever and a day ago in 2003...obviously. it's amazing how your life changes, your views change, your goals change, the people around you change, and how you just literally "grow up." i look at things i worried about then that aren't a big deal now and how things are different in just 5 years and how lots of people i know have had things happen in their lives that are incredibly worse than how my life has turned out. it's amazing how everything changes!

so there are some blog postings that would cover a tad bit of the lapse that can be found at my myspace page if you're in for some movie reviews and light reading about my life.

brief synopsis of what's going on atm. i own a house in lexington, sc. i'm about to start grad school at usc in biology for my phd. i'm dating the man of my dreams who goes by the name sean south. the current animal population is as follows, aurora (corgi), eros (corgi), rukia (catahoula leopard dog mix), aremis (cat), petie (horse), and cooper (horse). a lot of the other animals have new homes. luna unfortunately passed away when she managed to get out of the house a coupla years ago and run straight into the highway in front of my home. my address is on hwy 6 and it's a very dangerous road. sean and i live together and we have a roommate jon. amy and jason got married! my plans are to get through my phd as quickly as possible and start post-doctoral work and hopefully get a teaching position at clemson so i can sell the house in lexington and move back to the area i love so much.

if/when you read this before i was about 40 lbs overweight. well since then i've gotten up to 100 pounds over and now i'm back down to just 80 lbs over so i'm on a diet that i've been sticking with for about 2 weeks now and i exercise at least 4/7 days per week. i don't get to see the horses very often as they're back at jake's place but i'd really like to start riding again. although i think if i do start riding again i would actually like to go bound back into the world of lessons and just let petie and cooper hang out as yard ponies since they seem to enjoy that lifestyle.

i still hate capital letters. i drink way less and can moderate it much better now than before which is most definitely a good thing as getting overly drunk has gotten me into way more trouble than i ever want to be in again. i haven't had a drink in a month and a half as part of a four month stint of not drinking that i'm currently working on.

i'm an everquest 2 addict. i'm quite good at it if i do say so myself. i've graduated from eqoa and moved on to bigger better things. my main is pyper who is a level 80 warden/80 provisioner with 140 aas and is currently working on transmuting skill levels on the crushbone server (previously innothule) if you ever want to play. i play with a great group of people that i love and enjoy spending time with. and i'm sure you all knew i'd end up as a druid in eq2 just like i was in eqoa. i'm a healer through and through.

anywho i'm currently working, sending claims and entering payments for vista psychiatric consultants so i really should get back to the end of the month crud right away.

i hope everyone is having a wonderous day!

enjoy the silence.

-pyper aka ach

2003-11-09T16:01:00.000-05:00

heading to columbia again...damn these ears...

- ach

2003-11-05T22:30:00.000-05:00

drink deeply the illusion of your safety...my how wishful thoughts inebriate...

- ach

2003-11-05T18:32:00.000-05:00

here's today's away message if you'd like to see what i'm currently thinking...

cloud died... :'( ...yeah this is the part where cute boyfriend consoles april but oh wait...there's something missing...merde again...

and merde means shit in french for those uncultured brutes visiting the scary blogworld of april. yay for french.

in other news of the single girl...i've decided to go all practical magic or i suppose magick would be more correct on this one and do as the young girl in the movie does...instead of waiting around to find some guy that will probably make me miserable at some point and time or continue to be miserable waiting i'm going to make up characteristics that i want that are impossible in a guy. then i won't even hope to find one that fits them so the thought of even falling in love becomes obsolete leaving me with one less thing to worry about or to ruin my day. i'm so practical sometimes...i hope everyone else followed that thought just as well as i did.

school sucks...all the jobs suck...life sucks...and i'm hot on top of that...why the hell doesn't the air conditioning reach the top floor?!?...

- ach

2003-11-05T15:31:00.000-05:00

arrgh today couldn't get much worse...

- ach

2003-11-04T17:36:00.001-05:00

yup...good morning. yesterday was cool. we took a field trip to a slaughter plant and i got the privilege of sitting next to someone the whole time. mmm a slaughter plant...yeah not exactly romantic eh? new favorite song away from me ~ puddle of mudd. the band practiced last night and when i say the band i mean amy, jason, and me. still doing alright in school. making an a in theriogenology, b in biochemistry, a in organic lab, a in sociology, a in avian pets, a in meats...hmm i wonder if i could get a 4.0 this semester. i did get a 4.0 the one semester i took like 20 hours and was taking senior level classes my sophomore year. now that i type that i wonder what the hades i was thinking.

doing better on the sober front...last week 2 nights sober this week hopefully 3 and then hopefully just keeping on trucking from there. going to see one of my old high school pal's band friday in columbia. bet he won't even remember me. mike marchbanks was his name. best damn drummer our band ever saw. he graduated two years before me so it wasn't like we were close or anything but i've been to see their band several times...they're pretty cool. speaking of pretty cool check out www.sevenwiser.com. listen to take me as i am.

that's all for now...i'm out to backstreets...enjoy.

- ach

2003-11-02T12:50:00.000-05:00

yeah so i made another post but blogger um decided to log me out or some shiznit so there was a post sorry it's not there now.

- ach

2003-10-28T13:06:00.001-05:00

okay yeah so that last part about someone was definitely while drunk. fuck if i know what was going through my head then. i guess i'm just giving up or at least saying so to make myself believe it. i'm tired now...i've been tired all week. this previous weekend was so busy that i just need to catch up so i don't stress myself out anymore. i'm bleaching my hair and it's kind of working. Hopefully the third time will take care of it all together. oh my god, i typed a capital letter...there is obviously something wrong with me. arrgh.

well i think we're going to make a huge following for kill bill on thursday. hopefully filling the astro...its worth a darn good shot now isn't it? my hair will be teal by then too. ha ha ha ha. i've lost my mind.

sleepy time now...after a little computer battleship.

- ach

2003-10-28T01:18:00.001-05:00

dude i just can't get past this someone thing...somehow managed to procure his screen name and everything that's his away message including his name make me want even more for him to get to know me better. i feel stalkerish but i'm not stalking...seriously. i really have feelings for this guy and he's just oblivious...i don't know what to do...anyone with hints please feel free to chime in...i'm cryin in fact and that takes a lot. what the hades is wrong with me?...

- ach

2003-10-20T12:44:00.000-04:00

hey there's a band named the clear...check them out at www.theclear.net...i guess they heard about this cool girl with that nickname. yeah whichever they had the name first. i also found out jake's band has the same name as another band too...ha ha.

yeah i'm leaving i'm leaving...

- ach

2003-10-20T12:24:00.000-04:00

going home for today and tomorrow...just thought i'd let you all know..

peace.

- ach

2003-10-19T15:30:00.001-04:00

wow again...i'm not dead...just forgot to type for a while.

pleasantville is a very awesome film that i am currently enjoying.

nic moved out after 6 days. wish i coulda helped him some. wrote a new song.

so what to do now
what comes next
you were something
that i didn't expect

i don't like
what i've become
all i want is
to start feeling numb

to the pain to the pleasure
whichever will be
my heart keeps breaking
why can't you see

someone else is
stealing your soul
screaming from inside
i don't want to let you go

we could make memories
to keep forever
we would be perfect
an everlasting endeavor

no matter what
i'd stand with you
we'd touch the sky
change it to yellow from blue

its about a different guy that i was crushing. i don't care anymore whether or not these guys read blogs so yeah his name is someone (identities now withheld that i'm older, sober, and seem to have grown a brain). i'm not going to go into any more detail about that cause he likes this girl c.d. and i know her pretty well and let's just say that i would be happy for him if he liked about any other girl in the world even if it wasn't me. i give up on love entirely. people don't love fat kids anyway, they just point and laugh and we grow up alone cause no matter what you hear when you're a kid about it being what's on the inside that counts, it's always what's on the outside first. take c.d. for example...heinous bitch that drags boys along sucking their emotions (emotional vampire i suppose) until she finds something cuter to hump or until they just can't take anymore and crumble. she did this to another guy in our major when one of my other friends liked him. i mean c.d. was nice to me sometimes. went to a coupla really wild parties at her apartment. and now all i get is the occassional hello when she runs into me in lab on fridays.

we'll come back to that later...i'm having marching band epiphanies. we had upper state yesterday and came in 7th out of 16 bands. unfortunately only top 6 go to state so we're done for the season but winterguard season is just about to start so that's awesome. i think pleasantville would make for an awesome marching band/winterguard show where you could start with everyone being black and white and change them to color. i'm going to state for 2a bands next week to cheer my alma mater gilbert (1st place at lower state) since i trained their guard. unfortunately i know pendleton is going to beat them...my mother would shoot me if she heard me say that. oh yeah back to cool shows i think alice in wonderland would be a most amusing marching band show. or how bout 101 dalmatians...ha ha ha! i'd put the colorguard in spots and ears. i miss the old shows everyone used to do like cats and les miserables, etc.

so back to this whole someone/c.d./me no longer caring cause i'm out of the picture thing. someone's an april norm...he's jake with better music taste and more intelligent. long hair, shy, tall, and skinny ~ completely my type. okay so i figured let's get some personality out of him since he's so shy and found out that my friend john and my sorority sister kelli all know someone so they tell me what they know and damnit i think we'd get along pretty well. anywho again i'm over this i've decided. but the emotional vampire claudia was a sorority sister who got deactivated due to not being able to keep a 2.5 gpa on a 4.0 scale. this all just bothers and depresses me because c.d. is a size 2 italian model looking type and i'm well quite frankly not anywhere like that. so i'm hoping that someone isn't just liking her for her looks because that seems so shallow and unlike him but she's a moron, she's mean, she doesn't like the same things, and she most definitely doesn't like the same music...you guys all know by now that i feel you have to like the same music...at least 75% of the same music. that's the rockstar in me i suppose. okay so enough. i've spilled and there it is. i'm putting it down on paper (well on computer but same thing). there's the song. i'm over him. if he doesn't want to even give me a chance then his loss and i'm moving on.

new subject school...dropped organic 2...majorly got a b on biochem after just precursory studying and bsing an entire 15 point question on which i got full points. yay for me and amphipathic. made an a or b on everything else thus far.

new subject again...alcoholism...definitely have decided to decrease the amount and frequency i drink. i guess i kinda turned to the alcohol when dan went to charlotte and i was left alone. now i'm used to being alone i just need to be used to being alone without the alcohol. dan won't ever forgive himself for going to charlotte. i don't think we would've worked out anyway but charlotte definitely didn't help. dan made the decision to go to charlotte when he was offered a coop here and ended up living alone miserable for a semester. cheating on me with his ex (not that i didn't cheat on him with jake) but his ex is married at the time and other details previously disclosed but removed again due to that whole growing a brain bit...boy doesn't that make a girl feel inadequate. anywho enough...back to the alcoholism. i really want to lose some weight and have more free time instead of spending it catching up on sleep i missed when passed out. my room disgusts me and i want to clean it and maybe unpack, etc.

i'm pet sitting the equestrian team's dogs this weekend...there's my two, amy's roxy, ashley's foxy, and lindsey's termite. roxy and foxy play together, my two play together, and lindsey's termite is already trying to protect me from everything else.

hmm i'm cold.

gee i think this may be getting long. i'm going home to get my hearing tested for an aide tuesday cause i'm losing out in classes. i now have a pet ferret named crawl that was abused and now lives in a purple hammock in my room. i also bought another gerbil for jim the male gerbil i bought a coupla weeks ago. her name is jynx and they're adorable. now if they'd only just get along.

i'm tired like usual.

peace.

- ach

2003-09-09T11:30:00.000-04:00

my cuz nic moved in today. musical tastes clash. besides that its pretty cool cause there's another alcoholic in my midst. not much to say today. school still sucks...i'm tired...4 jobs and a full time college student later is me...

peace.

- ach

2003-08-23T18:48:00.001-04:00

hey there hello...i shall call him squishy and he shall be mine...

all my friends have someone to go home to. damnit i want someone in my bed too...rowr. i'm watching the disney channel and one of their random movies...how sad is that? i'm kinda glad the equestrian team is going to start working out in the mornings but really 6 am seems extremely early.

went to see the goo goo dolls last night. they were awesome. i think smoking may have ruined the lead vocalist's pipes though cause he didn't sing any of it in the higher key that it was written in. he was so fucking hot i don't care what he's smoking... the band still doesn't practice very much. i'm considering joining a new one if ours keeps going this way. i want to have the funnest job in the world and that's gotta be being in a rock band.

anywho. school has begun. it sucks. i don't think i've ever liked school. i have organic chemistry 2, biochemistry, equine theriogenology, marriage and intimacy, meats, and avian pets. i might be taking christmas tree production as well but i'm not quite sure yet.

anywho there's really not much to say so i'm going to go sleep or watching tv or something.

have a good night

- ach

2003-08-15T20:14:00.001-04:00

okay i bet you thought...hey...she must be dead. we haven't heard from her in a while what happened to her? well i'm still alive and kicking. marching band gives me a reason to live. god i love it. i think i love marching band to the point that it may be kinda scary. oh yeah last time in april's life she was headed to see her babe dale at the concert in athens. i'm going to make this long long story short and just say that we sat in a car at a standstill for two hours just to finally get to the concert which was closed because there were already too many people. fucking sucked some major ass man. it ended up that we all just went and drank. i bought a handle of everclear in athens...yay for georgia and alcohol stores that stay open past 7. damn you bible belt. i mean come on, jesus turned water into wine, take a hint.

anywho...the band has been on some kind of sabbatical. i hope i spelled that correctly. good grief now i have to look it up and everything. i think amy, jason, and i will practice tonight with our new crowd of high schoolers that like to come hang while we play. let's go over the group. thus far the high schoolers consists of june, kara, and eric. we've also had june's boyfriend casey [high school drop out and i'm not sure if his name was danny or not - well it definitely started with a d] and june's sister val [already graduated]. tonight we're supposed to be getting another one robbie whom is most definitely an interesting character. heck they're all very interesting characters but this is by far one of the best bands i've worked with.

well now i'm working at the barn two days a week as well. i have no life and no money though i work my ass off. we really don't have internet connection yet at the apartment but there is a phone line so ha ha i shall overcome. i hate dial up.

okay so i'm crushing this guy. don't know yet whether he's into the blogs or not so i'm not mentioning his name. my friends and i got into a blog discussion the other day and i really hope they don't ever read mine. it might worry them and i'd just rather them not worry. anywho again...i'm rrrreeeeaaaallllyyyy crushing this guy. rowr. he doesn't seem my type either. he's not the norm of what i would pick as cute but i think he's adorable. do guys like being called adorable?

carrier pigeon is now my favorite phrase to type to people in aim cause it just catches them off guard. if by now you haven't checked out something corporate and their awesome music do it now. yes right now. stop questioning me and download the following: if you c jordan, i want to save you, konstantine, and punk rock princess. oh and if you find a good copy of if i was a terrorist i'd bomb your high school graduation please send it to me. kewlness.

well i'm tired and i should call my band and see if they're coming to band practice seeing as how they're some kind of integral part or something like that. just kidding.

today i love you all...especially that guy i'm crushing :) ...

- ach

2003-07-25T12:11:00.002-04:00

wow i just read that last post and it is mega long. i think i can wait till next saturday to ***omission...so that band camp is over by then. maybe i'll just get it over with now and ***omission...

i read all the posts i had made today and i'm now a little worried about myself. course i'm always a little worried about myself. i'm just going to take it at face value that i'm a scary person and i shan't worry about myself. i'm thinking about dying my hair before leaving for the concert this evening. think i can do it in less than two hours? i do...hee hee.

the clothes are now in the dryer. starting sunday night i am going to go a week without getting drunk. you see that? take that alcoholics anonymous. before i was an alcoholic i went to some of those meetings with a friend who was in a rehabilitation house and the meetings did not appear to help anyone at all. basically its an excuse to start another addictive habit instead cause every single one of those people smokes.

yar well anywho i'm gonna watch some tv until the clothes are dry and then i'm going to go dye my hair again. yeah...rock on redhead! rock my world dale! mmmm...

- ach

2003-07-25T11:37:00.001-04:00

fuck...sometimes i wonder what's going on in my head. like how did i let the apt. get this disgusting. i mean it disgusts myself even. blek. i'm ashamed of my apartment. i should hope it wasn't all my fault. i hope that part of it was my roomies faults too. that'd make me feel a little better. although i pretty much know it's all my fault.

sorry i haven't posted in so long. i'm a busy kid. what with marching band and the rock band and work and all. i'm really busy. the rock band played all the songs we knew last night and it equaled an hour straight through all 14 songs which is pretty damn good. so far away by staind has quickly become my favorite song of the week. "i'm so afraid of waking please don't shake me afraid of waking please don't shake me" i dunno what it is that draws me to that song.

my damn cats are pissing me off. i went home for a total of maybe 24 hours and those stupid things got into everything. i knew i shoulda locked up my room. i just didn't. dumbass me.

god i'm depressed. i talked to my cousin nic last night. his girlfriend of a year broke up with him cause her sister has leukemia and may die. fuck if that was me, that was when i would need somebody more than ever. he's going to come live with me for awhile [yay i get to share my bed with somebody even if it is a relative nic is cool so i don't care]. my bed is big enough for the both of us to never touch one another anywho. i wanna have another band sleepover where we all fall asleep in the same bed. that was fun.

oh yeah i think adam and i are becoming closer friends or either he tells everyone everything. i assume the previous seeing as how we're so very much alike and i most definitely do not tell everyone everything hence the blogspot. so consider yourself lucky that you get to read my most inner emotions. ha ha. okay even that got me laughing. i just wish adam the best and hope he gets his 3some.

on a different note there's a concert tonight and i've already called shotgun! woohoo. i think i'll take the freshmen pimp book with me as well and pimp out some freshmens to upperclassmen cause we're leaving when its still light. but yeah the concert is shinedown, our lady peace, 3 doors down, and *me screaming continuously* seether...i love dale! dale if you ever read this you fucking rock. i want to marry you and have your children.

"a victim of apathy"

i think i'm going to write a new song about the bloodhound gang singing about chasey lain. i bought my brother the cd having no idea how crude it was. i'm either the worst sister in the world or the best depending on how you look at it.

i hope i remember to go buy batteries for my camera this afternoon before we leave cause hopefully we can capture dale again. i'm sure since that since they're not headlining they're gonna head off to drink. pouvre petite avril. i really need to start packing my apt but i'd much rather spend time online or in everquest or at concerts. i must make myself pack this weekend...especially sunday cause that's the only day i have before band camp that is basically free before i "move."

okay for some reason i really want to **** (again omitted cause of that damned brain...someone ought to have stopped it from growing up) cause i haven't done it in a while and i'm down and i really want to and its taking an enormous effort to not do so at the moment. i wonder how long i can keep this up. i should wait till after band camp so that the girls don't see. i don't want them to know. especially for some reason not kara and june. for some reason i have connected with them more. i think its cause the other girls are so emphatic on the christianity front. its kinda scary how their church is brainwashing them. i mean i'm christian and all but i don't believe all other music is the devil's music. i mean come on. they're just a little odd. very straight arrows this group consisting of ashley, whitney, and dakota. then i've got the wiccan meredith. i'm sure that's gonna throw some kind of kink into the christian group. then there's the christian bad girls that i can related to blake, june, and kara. i wonder what category i can place the other girls in...i don't know them as well yet. hopefully i will soon. i love that job. its something i like to do and its fun.

i wonder if my clothes are done washing...i suppose i should go check and put them in the dryer...maybe i'll wait another five minutes.

"it was you who could get me high with whatever you say you're telling me something real...what we do doesn't matter now whatever it takes for you to stay with me...trading thoughts across from the room i saw you surrounded...i was caught in the rain wasting my time on the ground..."

i want to trade thoughts across the room with someone. hello someone. of course if you've read this you're probably like wow this girl is mega fucked up screw ever talking to her.

anywho speaking of myself and being fucked up i think i do the most eclectic activities in the world. okay so my three jobs, cancer research at clemson, dining services data entry, and colorguard instructor at dwdaniel high school. then i sing in a rock band. then there's the activities. i'm a member of block and bridle [fun redneck drinking], 2nd vice president of sigma alpha, treasurer of the equestrian team, and head of the big brother/big sister program for the animal and veterinary sciences department. what the fuck is up with that? is that shit not weird? oh yeah and i love hockey. its the only sport i've ever been able to beat my boyfriends at. [ha ha] inline skates and regular skates. music. ponies. dogs. geez i'm a weirdo. i love it.

ah so now its been five minutes and i'm going to go check on the magical machine of laundry. enjoy your afternoon. thank you god for seether and dale stewart. speak to me baby.

- ach

2003-07-13T20:11:00.001-04:00

okay i have written a new song that the band really likes...i will warn you now. it is emotionally charged. extremely charged. it is depressing. if you don't like depressing, don't read it. its been a depressing summer. blek. the song's called silver earrings.

a blood soaked armband
lying near the sink
and you’ve been sleeping for hours

how quiet can i be
to keep you from waking
i wrote you a note while you were sleeping

the silver earrings
i got for christmas
you gave me everything
and i could give you nothing
i lied, i cheated, i was untrue
why would someone like you
ever tell someone like me, i love you

i know when you wake
you’ll cry at the sight
but i can’t lie to you anymore, i can’t make this right

i’ve gone too far
and now i can’t stop
please forgive me…i didn’t mean to

the silver earrings
i got for christmas
you gave me everything
and i could give you nothing
i lied, i cheated, i was untrue
why would someone like you
ever tell someone like me, i love you

the world’s turning black
and i want to be with you
i see you wake, you know the truth

you’ve run to grab my arm
it’s already too late
damnit…please forgive me

so that's the song. i hope you either enjoyed it or ignored it. i just got off work and i need to clean my apt but i can't purchase the cleaning supplies cause wachovia won't put the money in my account that i deposited saturday until monday...fuckers. anywho. i'm bored and alone. the crew went to a concert - finger 11. i really don't know their stuff very well and i really can't afford to go either so i just didn't. i worked instead. i want a boyfriend. i miss having a boyfriend.

well i just thought about drinking tonight but i don't really want or need to. it'd just give me something to do. well i guess i'm going to go halfass clean what i can in my apt...

- ach

2003-07-12T14:48:00.000-04:00

i wrote a new song last night...it is titled hold me and here it goes...

unwanted, yet still here...i'm heading to sleep...the bed yawns, my mouth screams....oh please save me...

scarcely clothed...i can't help but scream...ma chienne barking...someone please save me....

this black dream ends all...there's nothing there for me...this black dream scares all...away from me...

i can't...feel myself...on the grass...

someone...hold me...tight and fast....

amy says its depressing. i think most people relate to depressing more than they relate to happiness. i mean some people are happy just not all people or most people for that matter. i'm still in a hate people mode anywho so what the fuck do i care if they're depressed or happy. i guess i don't.

- ach

2003-07-12T14:32:00.000-04:00

you know what is so damn great about pets. i come home and i can be as fat as i want to be and they don't care. three kittens come running up to me to hold them cause they love me anyway. [cry...a coupla tears] i don't want to get rid of any of the kittens. i wish i could keep all three. i hate people.

- ach

2003-07-12T14:28:00.001-04:00

okay so i shoulda posted sometime between then and now...at the moment, having some weird breakdown. **** (omission) and it is pissing me off. fucking a. caught in the rain by revis has become my favorite fucking song of the month. [had to add fucking in that sentence cause remember i'm fucking pissed]

so i'm out with the band at this all day party hosted by this frat. the guy playing guitar is cool, he sings and plays well, but the party's at this pool where amy and jason live at berkeley place. seeing as how i still need to lose a good 30/40 pounds i don't like to appear in public in my bathing suit for obvious reasons. so we're sitting at this table away from the pool and i'm perfectly fine, happy even. then everyone wants to move near the pool and there are all the little skinny ass girls with their fake ass boob jobs and their come and fuck me bikinis. no offense, i'd love to be one of them, but i just can't sit in my windsuit pants and t-shirt and watch these girls parade around the pool. so i decide to give it a try but there's only two 'lawn' chairs left so adam and chelsea [adam's ex who's kinda klingy {yes i like spelling it that way} but really nice] take those. amy and jason go to stick their feet in the pool leaving kyle and i who aren't donning bathing suits to stand there looking stupid so i just say i'm going home and that's what i do. so then i get the two sympathy calls from amy and adam but i just don't want sympathy right now. i just want to use these stick thin boob job queens as posts for my jumps and let petie knock them down a few times or so. that's what i want to do. don't give me sympathy...give me tied up social sorority girls to run over with a tractor. so now you see why i want **** (another omission). i'll be back i promise but i'm going to go find them right now before i go crazy.

- ach

2003-06-28T21:57:00.000-04:00

trading spaces knows what's going on...between ty and this new guy carter, they've got women across the globe salivating. well i have to be at work early tomorrow at around 6 and they scheduled me for the 3rd and 4th even though i wasn't going to be here. i got my tartblossom hair in the mail today for jessica's my little pony that i'm working on. i hope that it will hold the purple dye. if it doesn't i'm at a loss for fake pony hair.

i'm extremely depressed today. i think its cause everyone has gone home for the weekend and i'm alone. amy and jason went to york, jess is in north carolina somewhere, adam's in myrtle beach, and here i am in clemson. i wish the whole of the sorority wouldn't have gone home for the summer.

anywho...i'm doing laundry so i guess i better get back to it. have a good evening.

- ach

2003-06-28T15:09:00.000-04:00

okay well i feel i left you guys in the cold for a coupla days...guess what? i mopped my kitchen! this may not seem a big deal to you guys but it is to me who never cleans anything. i just drop stuff where i stop. what's really weird is i feel pretty obsessive compulsive about everything, there's just so much more stuff that's fun that i could be doing instead. woohoo. pauly shore is on tv and there's a jackalope on the table in the restaurant he's sitting in. if pauly shore ever reads this or michael j. fox for that matter, i would marry either of them in a heartbeat!

anywho so i called jake last night when i was drunk or something so he called me as well at 4:30 but i was passed out by then and left me a huge message with his buddy natedog. the message was about 3.5 minutes long and it turns out jake was booty dancing with a married woman. ha ha. anywho i keep hoping that him and nathan'll come up here and go drinking with me. all of a sudden i have a bad feeling i'm going to be moving my stuff out of my apt and into the townhouse during band camp! ahhhhh. i hope not.

anywho again. i better start getting dressed for work or i won't make it there. i have to do laundry tonight or i'm going to go crazy. have a fantastomatic day.

- ach

2003-06-26T01:39:00.000-04:00

well folks, it's almost 1:30. i'm insomniatic again. i mean i like drinking and everything, but when i can't drink or don't want to, i can't sleep. so adult swim has unfortunately started playing reign and lupin again. i really dislike those shows. kikaider is starting to grow on me but i really want some fucking mission hill, home movies, oblongs, cowboy bebop, inuyasha, futurama and family guy. i mean i'm not picky. look there's a lot of suggestions right there. oh and if you don't watch any of those you should. especially cowboy bebop because ed is so fucking funny. she makes the show!

anywho back to myself and away from cartoons. work was okay. i talked to them about my back problems and so i get to swipe cards now instead of working the buffet. oh and get this, sunday, i work from 6:30 am to 7:30 pm. ain't that a kick? so after work i went to do cooper's recuperation business. he was pretty good about all of it. petie was the big baby who flipped out after we took cooper away from him. damn my horses are so gay...ha ha. two geldings in love with one another. went to subway today and talked to the cute guy. he calls me the wild one now when i go in with amy and jason. i'm assuming that being the wild one is a good thing. i love that subway. i have a feeling that guy is too young for me though. oh how young is too young for me? i only look 15 even though i'm 21.

oooh. on another note, i figured out how to get the kids out of the cafeteria earlier. i just have to play some music really loud and they go away! isn't that great? a combination of the two things i love most. children getting out of my way and music. woohoo! the band [adam and myself] have started to write songs. for some reason i can edit his much easier than i can edit my own work. i think cause when it is your own, its never good enough but when its someone else's it always seems awesome so you just change around a few things to make it more pleasing to the ear. i think we've got some fucking potential.

late night tv is starting to suck...have a good evening...i'll be awake!...

- ach

2003-06-25T14:44:00.000-04:00

woohoo. went to bed at 4 friggin am. adam and i got drunk last night after a very productive although interesting practice. i bought us all pizza. i only ate one piece too. maybe i have succeeded in making my stomach shrink so i don't need as much.

when i went to see the horses yesterday, they had gotten in a big fight and now cooper is going to have to recuperate (ha ha cuper...cooper...sorry i think it's funny) before he can be ridden again. he also has an abscess on his left front hoof so i can't go to the hockey game tonight cause i work till at least 7 and then i've got to go hose his hip for 15 minutes and then soak his hoof for 15 minutes. awww poor cooper. petie just got bit, i'm sure trying to defend cooper. it made his shoulder swell some but he appears to be doing just fine. i might ride him this evening. depends on how bad my back is hurting from work.

i'm about to get dressed to head off for work. i feel like i haven't been paying enough attention to my dogs so even though i told them that i promised i would take them to the lake tomorrow, i'm going to put it here in writing so they know i mean it and so i don't forget. luna, aurora, i promise to take you both to the lake tomorrow! and so there it be. alright off to getting dressed and then off to the hell down under harcombe. have a super day.

c'mon you have to admit that batman is so much cooler than spiderman and superman. he's an average joe with a cool belt...he deserves some fucking props.

- ach

2003-06-24T17:38:00.001-04:00

okay kids. i took the final. made an 89! i'm pretty proud of my accomplishment. i just got home from work which was only 2.5 hours worth to begin with [at least i get free dinner] and i'm pooped. it's hot outside. i want a sprinkler so i can run through it. ooooh and i want a slip and slide with some dawn detergent so you go faster with a little crocodile pool at the end. do you remember the ones with the crocodile pools? i can even see the commercial. wow i'm a child of the 80s. why is it that i'm the only one of my friends who likes 80s music? 80s music is good stuff. you know what else is some good stuff. everquest on the ps2. my whole family is addicted. i haven't played it in a while. maybe i should.

i think i'm about to take off to go ride the horses. i don't know yet. i might wait till it is a little cooler out. i do want to soak my hair with the hose before getting on though either way. oh yeah guess what? i got a speeding ticket yesterday. i, the clemson speed demon, got a speeding ticket. 44 in a 35...well he says he clocked me at 51 and was giving me a break. they just changed that speed limit to 35 from 45 in the first place which should never have happened. hmmm maybe i'll sleep some and then ride. i'm tired. well i hope everyone is having a wonderful afternoon and i am going to retire to do something. haven't yet figured that out. oh by the way. i am looking for a bad boy to date until i move to california next year. my pic is up under april at campushook.com. *wow i wonder if it's still there 5 years later ha ha ha* ha ha. peace.

- ach

2003-06-24T13:12:00.000-04:00

blek...well folks i'm going to take that damn final now. i have a goal for left over bridge [the band in case you don't remember]. i want us to play at backstreets before we all move to california. if we can reach this goal, i can promise you the band will be famous one day and you can say "hey, i used to read their lead singer's blog...damn she was hot." ha ha. just had to throw that in there for fun. but i can see the future and if we play backstreets we're going to be famous. who can resist a girl singer anyway? oooh who can resist a girl singer who likes to sing she fucking hates me by puddle of mudd and currently has fiery red hair? well for now i am testing. yay for the band. boo for fleas. maybe i'll write a song about fleas...do you think that would offend flea of the red hot chili peppers? anywho...testing now so shhhh.

- ach

2003-06-24T12:10:00.000-04:00

rowr rowr rowr...okay i thank god that falkor is still alive. i hope that i have subsided the fleas in the room where i have placed them. damn fleas. fleas suck ass. i am so ready for a senior trip. too bad i have to complete my senior year first. ha ha. well i have a final today and i have to work so i guess for right now i'm going to have to leave you hanging. have a wonderful day.

- ach

2003-06-23T20:33:00.001-04:00

well i just read the post from last night and i must say that i sound sober to me...what about to all of you? anywho. i put up this ad on campushook.com just to meet people to go out and drink with. so okay first day of ad being up i get a message from this guy. im me and i'll e-mail you my pic. so i say hey why not. i im the kid. he sends this horrible picture of him really close up with zits and braces and everything. i tell him it's not bad trying to be polite. well damnit this got me into some fucking trouble. now the kid won't stop iming me. he tried to "cyber" with me as well. i think it's absolutely wretched that i can't put up an ad that says looking for drinking friends and get this guy that just wants to meet me to fuck. i mean come on...we aren't just put here on this planet to put out, contrary to popular belief. so i haven't figured out what the next step is from here. hopefully he doesn't know about blogs and isn't reading this right now. okay so that just spurred me to check his aim names in front of blogspot.com and neither worked so maybe he doesn't know and hopefully won't ever know. i may have told him when drunk. oh i just can't remember.

anywho. went riding today with adam [have i told you amy and jason think i put a spell on him to make him want to ride?] well i did not put a spell on adam. i don't really put spells on anyone. first off i don't fuck with my good friends. i will however, in the event that one should cross me terribly, exert a little bit of evil on their ass. oh yeah forgot the point. riding was good, i had a great time. adam fell but basically on purpose so he was fine. he even jumped bareback! and then we soaked our hair cause it's fucking hot outside and i got to spin out better than he does in my car on the way down the driveway :). pc [purple car] kicks some major ass. well i have practice tonight and i should best be on my way. enjoy your evening and please spend it with someone you love for me.

i want a japanese made motorcycle.

- ach

2003-06-23T00:14:00.001-04:00

first off...i'm drunk as shit...well not that drunk. just a little drunk. obviously otherwise i wouldn't be spelling shit correctly. okay today was of great depression. first off. i mean i hate...absolutely hate...to rely on some fucking physical disorder to blame shit on but i can't help it. i have scoliosis and i have it bad. the only option is surgery. i refuse to have surgery on my back for several reasons i wish not to go into that i assume everyone can figure out on their own. okay watch adult swim damnit. it's fucking awesome. one of my kittens [tiger town] died today. i am extremely sad. i hope that it wasn't anything i had done. my apt is infested with fleas and i hope they weren't the cause of death. i fed falkor a ton today cause he's about 1/2 of the size of the other three kittens [pudge, explorers, and backstreets]. falkor is solid white and i hope that there isn't anything incredibly wrong with him. i don't know why he isn't evolving like the rest of the kittens. anywho. **** omitted. i told dan about it but no one else. it's horrible, i can't make it stop.

on a good note. adam and i went to ride the ponies today. he likes petie more than cooper cause petie goes whenever you want him to. cooper requires some effort [aka a crop]. so i rode cooper and adam rode petie and eventually my damn scoliosis started to hurt. well amy and jason [no offense to them but they are joined at the hip] showed up and amy said my hair looked like fire when i was cantering cause it flew out behind me and reflected the sun. that made me a little happy. the riding did as well, but the rest of the day made me so upset. tomorrow is my english final. tuesday is my marketing final. i've set the alarm. i'm good to go. life sucks. "i want to save you...save me too." thank you something corporate and i want to save you one of my favorite songs. you guys have a good night/morning and adult swim.

- ach

2003-06-21T21:46:00.000-04:00

hiya...okay back from work which sucked even more than yesterday. i'll have to get into all that later though cause i have band practice so i'm about to head out. just thought i'd drop a line to anyone who happens to be reading. my ponies were good today though. i rode petie and let jason ride cooper cause cooper's 21 and slow and petie's 12 and fast. they were both very good. amy's horse rimrock has yet to learn to canter and if you aren't a horse person i'm sure you could care less. amy has some retarded kitten she took home from work. she works at a vet clinic so people drop stuff off there all the time. anywho the ramblings must end. on to band practice.

new song...check out ana's song (open fire) by silverchair...

- ach

2003-06-21T14:16:00.001-04:00

oh yeah i forgot...i wrote a song a coupla days ago and i wanted to post it...i like it. i hope you do too. there is no tune quite yet but that will come in due time. so here goes. oh yeah it's entitled these words i can't remember.

why do you think you’re my muse
you’re not
there’s things you should know
but i can’t tell them to you

why
because i don’t want to hurt you
why
because you break so easy

god
i can’t remember the words
wait
there they are

yeah
there’s no refrain
why
cause i don’t feel like any of this needs repeating

and verse
it’s not there either
just jumbled up words
that got stuck up in my head

when you thought it was you
that i needed
too bad
you were wrong

you aren’t responsible for any of my songs
these words i can’t remember
come back
when you’re gone

so there it is. i hope everyone has enjoyed it. i am off to circumambulate [another word i made up meaning to walk around] with the dogs. enjoy.

- ach

2003-06-21T14:11:00.000-04:00

yeah so i just got up around 1:30 and took a shower. woohoo [imagine hot naked girl...just kidding...trying to lose 40 pounds so how about don't imagine anything...ha ha]. my hair is still really red which is cool. and i have sweet home alabama until saturday...yippee skippee i can watch it for many nights. so today i get a phone call from dan. he's in charleston playing frisbee with his friends which all used to be my friends as well but i wasn't invited so i'm sure i'm not their friend anymore or else they would've asked me to come along. i guess when you break up with your boyfriend your mutual friends pick sides. the same thing happened with jake and the people whom i used to be really great friends with don't talk to me anymore. i mean they do when i'm around him but otherwise i'm not invited. that really sucks. why can't people be friends with both of you if you're still friends with the guy? so anyway back to this phone call. why would you call someone who wasn't invited and tell them that you're having a great time in charleston and would you like for them to call later tonight [basically i feel like i'm just being reminded that i'm alone while at the same time knowing that he's having a great time]. well damnit stop calling me.

i really want to go see dumb and dumberer. i heard the hulk was awful [come on jennifer connelly, get your act together and do a good film]. but yeah dumb and dumberer cause dumb and dumber was funny so how can i go wrong with a prequel? i think i may go this evening. amy, jason, adam, and i all went to see the italian job last week and it was great. go see it. i like it better than the remake of ocean's 11, of course i like seth green a lot better than anyone from ocean's 11 in the first place. i might go see it at the dollar movies tonight. i am indecisive. it would be cheaper than going to see dumb and dumberer but not much cause the dollar movies aren't really the dollar movies on the weekend. who came up with that idea? they should be shot.

anywho i need to walk my dogs and i wish they weren't so damn interested in those kittens cause then i could let them run around the apt some. i've got to start cleaning this week cause my apt is a jungle. have a fantastical day everyone. hopefully i can get out of cleaning urinals at work.

- ach

2003-06-21T00:30:00.001-04:00

well it's past midnight here so look...a new day...i hope someone enjoys all the time and effort i'm putting into this blog...ha ha ha. yeah i know i'm bored and maybe someone will get enjoyment from it. well i finished the movie [sweet home alabama] and i finished dying my hair and it is electric red. it's been really red before but now it's rrreeeaaalllyyy red. yeah i refuse to use caps. i'd rather exaggerate with more letters. posted on campushook.com today. some younger kids turned me on to it. um so now i'm watching the south park episode where they don't stop saying shit. the dragon is cool. and so are the knights on their little ponies. awww...ha ha ha. anywho. everyone have a spontacular (word i made up) night.

- ach

2003-06-20T21:20:00.000-04:00

okay yeah so work sucked as usual...you know what the worst thing is about my work? cleaning the urinals after 400 or so soccer boys use them. i kinda just spray, flush, look the other direction, and hope my manager doesn't check behind me. at least you get free food when you work at a dining hall. the only problem is the kind of free food you're getting. by the time i'm allowed to eat i had a cold hot dog, cold cheese mashed potatoes (that wouldn't come off the damn spoon by the way), and a handful of potato chips. everything else scared me too much to touch.

then we had band practice but we had it early cause adam had a date. amy never came cause she didn't get off work in time. so jason and adam basically jammed while i sat on the couch which otherwise would've bugged me but was fine this evening because i was shit ass tired. oh yeah...amy is the bassist, jason and adam play guitar and i already told you i sing. but of course as the night wears on i wake up more and more expecting alcohol but i've stopped keeping it in the house so i don't have it available to drink. there is this half bottle of gross wine one of my roommates left when they moved out and a margarita someone made maybe 3 weeks ago in my fridge but i'm obviously not that alcoholic to touch either of those.

okay so now i'm back home. the lights on the exterior of only my building in the complex are still out so i walked the dogs early instead of waiting till 1. there are kittens everywhere in my apartment. since 5 of the 8 cats are kittens and the kittens just realized the world is bigger than their box today, they are all over the place. kittens kittens kittens. that was for amy although she'll probably never read this cause i'm not planning on asking her to. i've decided to redye my hair this evening with a new kind of dye i've never used. same coca cola red color though. anywho...have a good evening. i will be watching sweet home alabama which happens to be my life story except i'm a little young to have figured out i want jake back and dying my hair.

- ach

2003-06-20T15:33:00.001-04:00

yeah so i've been watching a wedding story on tlc after finishing my english project and my god this is sickening how depressing i feel after watching it...i mean seriously again i'm only 21. i don't want to settle down or anything it would just be nice to feel wanted by someone i suppose. my relationship life = interesting. i haven't been single until a coupla months ago for five whole years. i dated jake in high school until i was a freshmen in college. i was really in love with him and could still easily marry the boy but i fucked it up and broke it off cause i'm a stupid kid. so then i dated dan for 2 years here at college. we're still great friends but it just didn't measure up to jake and myself. i don't know why. i love dan, just in a different way. and now i've been single and depressed cause i don't know how to be single. at least the cute guys at subway have been flirting with me. maybe one of them will finally ask me out.

yeah so this whole depressing bullshit. i used to think you couldn't be depressed. it was just some excuse to want a way out of life. a reason for suicide. but you don't understand it until you feel it. i've basically become an alcoholic. and i understand some types of alcoholism as well. it's not that you can't stop, it's that you don't want to. well i haven't had a drink for two days and it saddens me cause i want to drink. my poor tolerance can't get much higher. i've thought about trying drugs but the more i think about that the more i think damn you're getting stupid. so instead of killing brain cells or drinking i just **** omission. i know i'll never kill myself but that's also a very addictive habit and i have yet to meet anyone that can stop.

enough depression...blah on those wedding story people. i wouldn't want my wedding televised anyway, unless i become a famous actress/rock star and it's going to be that damn good. so any agents out there who need some new flesh, i'm in. i'm crazy and i love to act/sing. enough for now cause i have to be at work in an hour. i've already put 6 quarters in the dryer and my clothes still aren't dry...arrgh! rowr!

- ach

2003-06-20T13:51:00.000-04:00

well it's friday and i have finals next week...oh yeah. you know nothing about me at all so i will tell you. i'm sure no one will read this but for the hell of it i'll put some info in here for those who get lost and end up reading this blog. my name's april. i'm 21 (born in december so what's up with my parents?). i attend clemson university and i am currently majoring in preveterinary medicine. i don't want to be a veterinarian. i want to act or sing or something. i mean i love animals but i'd much rather breed them or pet them or feed them not stitch them or stab them. currently i'm in a band called left over bridge (amy named it...blame her...just kidding) that was started by my friends (amy, jason, and adam). i sing. i have a family that lives about 2.5 hours away from here. it consists of mom (rita), dad (vaughn), and 15 year old brother who just got his license [me screaming] (johnathon). i work at harcombe the main dining hall on clemson campus where i do all of the managers' work but get paid a very shitty salary. i think i am going to quit soon. i also teach colorguard/winterguard at d.w.daniel high school in central and i love it. we don't really start until july 7th but i've already been out there a couple of times to meet everyone and see the potential the girls have and they are an awesome bunch!

currently i live alone but only for about another month. well i guess not really alone with all these animals. there's 2 dogs (luna and aurora), 8 cats (piper, grace, sammy, falkor, pudge, backstreets, explorers, and tiger town), and a sugar glider (dharma). oh yeah and the 2 horses (petie and cooper) but they obviously don't live in the apt. anywho besides the animals living alone is depressing. don't do it. moving in with amy august 1st so that will be so so much better than living alone.

i'm slack so i'm taking two courses over the internet this summer. business or technical writing (fuck if i know which one) and marketing...what possessed me to take marketing i don't know. i thought it would be fun. who in their right minds thinks that marketing will be fun? i suppose you should know by now if you haven't already figured it out that i am definitely not in my right mind nor have i ever been. and on that note i think i will return to my english that is due today because well i have to be at work by 4:30 and english is due at 7 and i definitely won't be out of work by then. so nice to meet you if you've decided to be bored and read some real life soap opera. have a nice day.

- ach