Alfador

We were actually home yesterday, but desperately needed some social time and so spent the evening at Ryan and Caytlin's place, playing WoW.

The building manager showed us a great parking spot that'll be ready by the end of the month... but until then Zeph has to squeeze his way in to a very tight parking spot that's right next to the sewer line (so, y'know, high stakes in not brushing the sides).

We've got a couple of lists up of things we need to do (eg. submit Zephie's form for adding to the lease) and things we need to buy (eg. another surge protector). And Scott needs to come over and pick up his stuff (hopefully most of it today, otherwise some of it tomorrow) so we can make room for autumn cleaning (like spring cleaning, but at the other equinox).

Right now, he's setting up my avatar on his XBox. About the same level of complexity and customization as a Mii, but no ability to move features around, so no crazy fun avatars like turning eyebrows into fox ears.

We're home.

Forgot to post last night; we made it in to Rapid City and will be seeing Mt. Rushmore today. And YES, we will be taking pictures. Lots of pictures. And we have BEEN taking pictures, too.

Well, we're off to a good start... made it all the way to Tomah, Wisconsin in the first jump. Found a Super 8 and are sacking out. We might make it all the way to our midway destination (Mt. Rushmore) by tomorrow. Bit over 11 hours of driving according to Google Maps, so we'll see.

Today Alex took me to the Detroit Zoo followed by Lily's Seafood restaurant, while Zephon had some one-on-one time with Keeya. Then after we got back to Alex's place (and had some snuggle time), we went out to a theater to see Where The Wild Things Are.

After the movie... we hugged a lot. We had to.

Now I should be asleep... but I kinda couldn't get to sleep, I had to write this down. Tomorrow Zephie and I begin our epic road trip of awesome. :3

Went to an apple cider mill/fudge and candy place, with Alex, Zephon, Misbah, and Alex's grandfather. Yummy stuff and a nice walk partway down a forest trail. It was cold out, but the walk invigorated me.

Then we watched some random videos till Misbah had to go to class. Zephie and I were feeling a bit tired so we napped and snuggled upstairs for a bit. Then it was time for me to pop open my lappy and catch up on some stuff. Plans for tomorrow include the zoo that was the inspiration for Alex's story "Bartleby and the Infernal Menagerie" and some theater somewhere to see "Where The Wild Things Are".

Zephon and I are also plotting out who along our route we have the time to visit, given that I have to be back at work next Tuesday. (Though I'm reasonably certain that if we go over by a day, they will be understanding if I call in.)

Leaving for the airport now... next time I'm online will be in Michigan with Zephie and Alex. *huggles*

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&source=s_d&saddr=1115+north+wilson+avenue,+royal+oak,+mi+48067&daddr=13000+Highway+244,+Keystone,+SD+57751+(Mount+Rushmore+National+Memorial)+to:4040+7th+Ave+NE,+Seattle,+WA+98105&geocode=%3BCQJgzO1lhhB5FfOJnQIdglbV-SFIN7YOgZP0rw%3B&gl=us&hl=en&mra=pe&mrcr=0,1&sll=45.078125,-102.723449&sspn=23.22922,57.084961&ie=UTF8&t=h&z=5

That is the route Zephon and I will be taking from Alex's place to my place, visiting Mount Rushmore along the way. If you live reasonably close to this route, and would like us to visit, let me know!

According to UPS tracking, my new headphones have been sitting in Portland since 7:20 P.M. last night, after making it across the country from New Jersey in less than 24 hours.

I know I paid for 3-day service and not 2-day service, but you'd think they wouldn't just let it sit in a warehouse for a day if it gets ahead of schedule! I'd gladly have accepted it today...

Update: Apparently it left Portland at 4:39PM... TODAY. Almost 21 and a half hours just sitting there. WTF, UPS.

Update 2: Especially when it takes less than three and a half hours to get from there to Seattle. AAAAAAAH! *jumps down a bottomless pit*

World ?-?
Alfador ׶

Awesomeness linked to by the comic Skin Horse, so if you read that already (or the Cake Wrecks blog directly) you'll probably already have seen these.

http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/2009/10/sunday-sweets-steampunk.html

A few months back, I was playing Fallout 3 and collapsed in a fit of giggles, because I'd just entered Andale and begun to find out its secrets, and "Butcher Pete" started playing on Galaxy News Radio. (You'll understand if you follow the link.)

Well, it MAY just be observer bias causing me to notice whenever the music matches up in an amusing way with something that's just happened in-game... but it also might be clever scripting causing certain events to increase the chance of Three Dog queueing up a particular song.

On my new game on my desktop (instead of the old save on the laptop) I hadn't gotten any of the Shishkebab schematics, but today I went and gathered up all three, and made a trio of fully-repaired flaming swords with a small fraction of the materials I'd been gathering all over the Capital Wasteland.

The song that queued up?

"I Don't Want To Set The World On Fire".

(I DO! I have the Pyromaniac perk, it's practically mandatory!) XD

Yeah, since it's on sale, I finally caved and bought it. TOTALLY worth it in my opinion. Now to edit that zombadge I got into a spray... :3

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ht96HJ01SE4

Seriously.

So this evening as I go home from work, it's drizzling a bit.

Unfortunately, for some reason my nose has also started to drizzle. Why oh why is this the third week in a row I get an illness that isn't at all debilitating, but is just plain ANNOYING? I'm not complaining about it not being debilitating, mind, just grumbling that annoying minor sickness keeps coming back in different locations.

And from the lightning and thunder outside, I gather it's more than just a drizzle by now...

"Good morning! It's been 393 days since I saw you last!" --Wii Fit

EDIT: Still with a "Fit Age" of -1 year from my real age, tho. :3

...does anybody else see the similarities between Uldum's (World of Warcraft, in the upcoming Cataclysm expansion) magical illusion concealing a huge zone with a city inside that was there all along, and Esthar's (Final Fantasy VIII) optical camouflage system concealing a huge zone with a city inside that was there all along?

Zephie is here!!! Been here since a quarter to one, actually--just been busy with the snuggles and the talking and suchlike.

*huggles*

Tonight: Ran ToC10, picked up a decent ring, next boss dropped a way better cat ring but the DK who wanted the previous ring outrolled me... so we traded and both got a better ring for our spec. Ulduar10, got several awesome achievements, including steamrolling through the Conservatory in under 20 minutes. Upgraded shoulders to Triumph emblem gear with epic gem installed.

Tomorrow: ZEPHIE ARRIVES!!! <3 <3 <3

Saturday or Sunday, depending on my luck with ram racing: VIOLET PROTO-DRAKE. >:3

UPDATE: Here's a scan of my badge (mine's in the lower left): http://www.furaffinity.net/view/2819283

This year, unlike any previous, I attended the whole weekend of Rainfurrest without having a hotel room, by commuting back and forth to my apartment. (Conifur 2000 almost counts, but I only attended one day so I didn't technically NEED a hotel room.) It worked out alright, but I'd prefer a room next year; I just did it that way this year due to poor planning and wanting to see if it worked.

I ended up spending far more time talking with people and playing games than attending actual events, though I did have a lot of fun with the former and the latter.

Friday I had to work, so I ended up coming in around 7:00 in the evening, which was enough time for Rocky to zombify me with a card, and to attend 2's standup routine.

Explanation of the zombification thing--There was a game: people could purchase Survivor badges, Medic badges, or Zombie badges at the con store, or pick up a Non-Participant badge at no cost. (I got souvenirs of all four.) A Zombie could infect Survivors by shambling up and touching them, and handing over a Zombie card. A Medic could cure Zombies just by touching them and handing over a Survivor card, but could not cure more than one every 60 seconds. A pack of three or more zombies could infect a Medic, but that usually ended up meaning four or more, since Medics would usually say they'd cured one before we could turn them.

In case it wasn't obvious, I played Zombie most of the con, trying to avoid getting cured by Medics, and spending a quarter a piece to get extra Zombie cards to infect people with. They stopped selling Medic cards early on because it was getting a bit unbalanced. Towards the end, a medic started curing people and handing out Medic cards, so I got one of those too.

If I were running such a game, I'd hand out Survivor cards (optionally swappable for Non-Participant cards) at registration, with a small percentage being instead issued a pack of half a dozen or so Zombie cards, to make it easier to spread the infection. Then I'd start selling Medic cards on Saturday morning, then start passing them out for free on Sunday as the cure spreads. Of course I'm a bit inspired by the zombie invasion of last November, at the opening of WotLK.

Saturday I spent mostly hanging out in or near the games room; the bag check was a neat place to stash my backpack, and I repeatedly verified with them that they had no problem keeping it there all day as long as I took it back before the room closed for the night. :3 Attended a babyfur Q&A panel, but the intended audience was non-babyfurs to try to clear up misconceptions, and about 95% of the room was either babyfurs or people who already have cleared up their misconceptions.

I met up with too many people to list here, but a few stick out in the mind: Mikau, who set up "Stepmania" (a DDR clone) on his laptop in the games room for people to play on for a buck; Urthdigger, who despite living in the area I only tend to see at Rainfurrest; KT, who as always had a book of neat art to show, and turned the pages for me when we met up at Sunday's ice cream social so I wouldn't get the pages sticky (with ice cream); Rocky and Fractal, who had to work Saturday and so were only there Friday.

I got two zombie-themed badges to add to the two I'd already gotten; one a full-color from Touchmybadger, the other a "post-apocalyptic badge" for $1 on creased and torn brown paper, also from Touchmybadger. Added some of the latest Ozy and Millie books to my collection--which is good since I have no idea which bin the rest of said collection has been stuck in for the past few years.


So I had quite a lot of fun and didn't spend a lot of money compared to other conventions I've gone to in recent years. And I managed to take one last thing away from Rainfurrest this year...


...con crud. ARGH. *coughscratchythroat*

So to avoid the expense of a hotel room, I'm commuting back and forth from Rainfurrest to my apartment, which also gives me the opportunity to grab stuff I forgot on my first trip there yesterday. Like oh, additional food, fox hat, and BADGES.

And an explanation for the title of this entry: Rainfurrest this year is zombie-themed, and today is Talk Like A Pirate Day.

So me and me dread crew be shamblin' forth ta plunder yer brains! Avast! Graaaargh!

So the hint was "Trick or Treat." The obvious solution would have been to give the kids outside some candy. Instead I put on a mask, scaring them off and earning the "Pariah" merit.

Would've been better if I'd thought to go all the way and write in a hockey mask and chainsaw. >:3



And has anybody else noticed that the ditty you get when you grab a Starite is almost IDENTICAL to one from E.V.O. (a SNES game)? It's one that usually comes up when you come across random creatures that talk to you.

Today I bought Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story and picked up my preorder of Scribblenauts.

Scribblenauts has me hooked already and I've only been playing for a few minutes. On the title screen.


I already know this is going to be a Best Game Evar for this: When I typed in "slime" it asked me "Did you mean: slime (material) or slime (creature)?"

>:3

(note: I have two evening RPG groups, this refers only to the Saturday group that has been using a modified version of Star Wars D20 to test out their emerging RPG system and campaign world.)

FREAKING EPIC. We finished the campaign with a climactic final battle. We were all granted "destiny points," basically free criticals, in the last portion of the final boss's final form, just so we could do the coolest moves we could make up after having burned through 500 hit points' worth of boss (not counting the two times he went into a cocoon to heal himself!!). We only lost one party member who sacrificed his physical body to merge with the dying spirit of the GALAXY and save the entire campaign world. We came close to losing the cutest member of the party, who kept casting spells at the expense of her own health and ended up with ONE HP at one point.

I stayed up far later than I'd've liked... didn't complain once. This was an AWESOME end and I think the only time I've actually been in a campaign that HAD a definitive end. When next we see that world, it will be 10-20 game years later and we'll be using a new system. Old characters may make an appearance, but will start fresh in the new system.

So I was stuck in a labyrinthine train station somewhere in South America, trying desperately to find one that would take me back to the U.S.A. I had no idea how I'd gotten there, or when, just that I needed to get back. Oh, and at one point I had to carry four gallon jugs full of something lighter than water, possibly bouncy balls.

Interestingly enough, this giant mecca of transit in a far-off country past the Panama Canal, over which I don't think ANY rails go, had separate signs for trains to Olympia, Seattle, and Bremerton. O_o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWhxx8P_4d4

>:3

My mom's here, till the Thursday after next. I may be busy at any given time.

This morning, I yawned, and my jaw popped. Only it popped way louder than normal, and I immediately said "OW!!" For though it did not feel permanently dislocated, the normal temporary dislocation had hurt way more than usual. I think I must have bruised something inside, because all day it's been a very low-level ache on the left side of my jaw. Not hurting badly enough to prevent me from eating, or talking, or even to make those activities miserable... just a low-level annoyance.

Not trawling for sympathy, nor trying to disgust anyone... just significant enough I thought I'd share it. *shrug* Hopefully it'll be fine by tomorrow or so.

25 quests left for Loremaster of Kalimdor!

Blizzard is quite definitely trying to lure all the furries over to the Alliance side by putting the Worgen there.

Seriously.

Clouded leopard kitten photos!!!

So over the past few days, a lot has happened.

First off, my brother got a job offer. In Alaska. On a little over a week's notice. Since he couldn't get a larger storage space on such short notice, he ended up storing a few boxes over at my place. This few boxes turned out to be many boxes, but still not more than I had space for. So yesterday night/this morning, he zoomed off. I'll see him again in a couple months...

Speaking of seeing family again, Mom's coming around the end of August.

Evenings are free again! Rouk cancelled the raid because too many core raiders dropped out, and he doesn't want to play WoW any more.

...whoa, hold up. Now Invisibo (the old raid's master looter) wants to start a 10-man group with some of the old core group, including me. Fortunately, it'll be only TWO nights a week, and it'll start a bit later so I won't have to dash home from work all the time. IMPROVEMENTS!

Bank of America had one last backstab for me. Fortunately, I had the Razorback. A few months after I closed out my account, they suddenly decided I owed them ten bucks overdrawing. I called customer support and called bullshit on it, toning down my seething anger because it was not directed at the person on the other end of the line, but whatever babbling bureaucrat caused this fuckwittery. And within minutes (fewer minutes than I spent on hold, to be sure), they had righted the wrong, and I thanked them profusely.

After months of pain, my laptop is finally fixed, and I am busily re-synchronizing it with data on my desktop. ...I may have spoken too soon, there is a smudge at the bottom of the screen that does not appear to be dirt, but perhaps a burnt-out portion of the backlight. Goddammitagain.

And back to WoW, my plodding through the requirements for Loremaster of the first two continents proceeds apace, and I've even rediscovered the desire to play around with my death knight, though respeccing Blood. Definitely will be charging in to Onyxia's Lair with some friends tomorrow, since very soon the old 40-man version will be gone forever... replaced with a 10/25 man version, just like Naxxramas.


Finally, excuse me, but I feel I must link to something I agree with: http://calapine.livejournal.com/569192.html

At long last, my laptop not only has XP Pro reinstalled...

...with all drivers...

...and most of the data I needed recovered, recovered...

...but they brought out the old hard drive and a connector so I could copy over the few remaining subdirectories they missed (mostly Steam save data and some other things in the Program Files directory).

While I'm waiting for all that to copy over, I can at least use their wireless network to post this!! XD

First off, my Wii had stopped reading discs, so I sent it in for repairs. It came back today, fully functional!!! ...and according to the log, the testers must've played Super Smash Bros. Brawl for exactly one minute. Long enough to boot it up and see it was working, I guess. XD

My DS's R button is shot, so I'm patiently waiting for another packing label to send that in, too.

Patch 3.2 is out! New feral forms! (video is from the PTR way back when) I have Jeeves and the Northrend Wormhole Generator! Blazed through the new five-man and five-man heroic instance! Tried the 10-man challenge and... well, we learned how to do it through several wipes. We would've had it the last time if one of the rogues hadn't failed to dodge the charge that was aimed at a priest. Oh well.

New piccie of me! ( So NSFW I really have to put the link behind a cut... )

It's cooling down a bit these days, so I'm back to wearing my cloak in the morning and can probably get away with stowing the air conditioner again.

Ooh, the download of the 3.2 trailer is done. I'll go to watch it!

...which means that with the AC and fan going full blast all night, I got cold and pulled a blanket over me sometime in the night. XD

Also I dreamed of lightcycles. GEE I WONDER WHY. ;) There was also a giant spider the size of several buildings, used as transport like a ferry.

It's not as bad as it was the past couple days, thanks to the AC... but it's still hot enough to keep me awake at night until the apartment cools down a bit. Fortunately, that's happening faster... it's about as cool now, at midnight, as it was around 3 in the morning yesterday...morning.


In happier news... For all that Electronic Arts shovels copy protection and junk onto their games in a futile effort to prevent piracy that only really hurts legitimate users...

...their customer service on that front really is first-rate. Seriously, when I ran afoul of the five-install limit because the idiotic de-authorization tool has never worked on any computer I've run it on... I put in a support ticket and within mere hours they'd given me more install authorizations. And when I discovered that Galactic Adventures requires you to have the DVD installation verify the DVD IN THE DRIVE... but that the digital download version does not... I called shenanigans on it, citing their FAQ which states that a legitimate DVD key can be used to authorize a download (I'd tried it and it said the key was already in use, since I'd used it to install, without which I couldn't have discovered the DVD-insertion requirement), and within hours, again, they fixed the problem by enabling the direct download. One reinstall later, and the DVD is tucked safely in its case, and I can still play.

I think that the customer service division is so helpful because they're embarrassed at the way the antipiracy division ends up treating legitimate customers like thieves, and wants to make it up to us. Or something. Maybe it's just a good-cop-bad-cop ploy to get me to sing the praises of one part of the company while in the same breath bad-mouthing another part. If so... apparently it WORKED. >_>

Anyway, it's getting cool enough to TRY to sleep, so I'm going for it. G'night!

So I catch flack from the boss for deciding to work from home--apparently he'd wanted to schedule a meeting for today, but hadn't bothered to tell anybody or actually put it in the schedule... but I dared to do my job from outside the office, so I'm inconveniencing him. I'm sorry, I'm inconveniencing "many people," none of whom he cared to name. (I'm also not going to name names because this journal is public.)

Anyways, I went on to do my job unfazed by this, after a short email exchange in which I was FAR more diplomatic than I felt like being. And I put my laundry in, which was part of why I'd wanted to work from home, and wandered up the Ave to pay the power bill, which was the other part.

Apparently the payment center is closed, just for today, for a meeting. And I didn't know about this because the only time I ever go there is to pay my power bill every two months. I picked the exact worst day. I'll have to go after work Friday instead.

On the plus side, my broken air conditioner still works, though in a plastic bin to catch the water that leaks out of it. It's looking like I'll have to empty it every day, but it's worth it to make my apartment inhabitable again. I was barely able to sleep at night, it was so hot. Over 80 degrees 24 hours a day, over 90 most of the time. Sure, the temperature says it's still around 85 now... but cool air is blowing around with those fans instead of hot air, so it's far more bearable.

Also, I decided to get with the times. Starting with next month's pass, I'm using the new "ORCA" card for my bus pass instead of buying a new card each month. This has the added benefit that I won't have to scrounge in my pockets for change whenever I take a 2-zone bus. It even works for the ferry!

Oh, and on the video game addiction front, I gravitationally attracted Ryan and Caytlin back to World of Warcraft (I still want to help you guys with some instances while I can still chew through everything without breaking a virtual sweat!) and went ahead and bought Spore: Galactic Adventures and the Creepy/Cute Parts pack. And now I'm wondering if, in Space stage, they'll ever give me any NON-Adventure missions any more...

(A creature with wings can make many adventures FAR easier.)

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americas/07/23/wus.warfare.remote.uav/index.html

Also, our Ulduar raid came through today, and finally laid the smackdown on Thorim and General Vezax, breaking our several-week backslide. Monday we won't be doing Yogg-Saron attempts, but running Naxxramas and associated-tier bosses to gear up alternates, since half our problem is a lack of standbys.

*HUGS EVERYBODY BECAUSE I LIKE TO MAKE PEOPLE FEEL BETTER*


Ooh! Also, I'm going to work from home for half of tomorrow... because my laptop is finished!! And I need to pick it up before the tech leaves at 1:00pm.

It's 92 degrees inside my apartment. Fortunately, the wind chill factor means I'm still comfortable. Time for some ice cream.

Tooth-falling dreams are bad enough... but then my nightmares start to include an extraordinarily nightmare-fuelish version of Spelunky, complete with Ancient City, vengeful-but-single-wish-granting genie, and an open nuclear reactor.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantastic_Mr._Fox_(film)

Zephon and I had a WONDERFUL time over the past two and a half weeks. We played. We cuddled. We went to Anthrocon.

Last Wednesday was our "Adventure Day" since it's the only day out of the week I have absolutely nothing planned for the evenings. We went to the Pacific Science Center, the Sci-Fi Museum, and the Experience Music Project. All three were MOST enjoyable. We finished out the day with dinner at Todai, and stuffed ourselves silly on nummy sushi.

The rest of the time... we played video games, watched movies, and snuggled a lot. We had the time to just BE together. We had the time to confirm that yes, we want this living-together thing to be a more or less permanent thing.

So when he comes back in September, we'll be looking for a house together. Preferably one big enough to also accomodate Alex and Gekko eventually.


I didn't know people were still allowed to accompany friends and family to the gate at an airport. The lady at the United counter, however, gave me a special pass to go through security so I could be with Zephon that much longer. I left my pocket knife with her, since it was the only thing I had that would definitely NOT make it through security. We were a little groggy, having stayed up all night so as to make the Night Owl bus in order to get to the airport on time to make his flight (7:00am but of course we had to arrive really early as always). The plane didn't have a breezeway, just a marked walkway on the tarmac, so I was able to wave at Zephie as he walked out to it.

Then I went home and crashed in bed, taking a few extra minutes to locate the nice ticket lady, who'd changed counters but recognized me by my orange fox hat.

A two-donut brunch later, I'm up to date and a couple hours from the start of another Ulduar week. Oh, and the donut shop guy apparently remembered the two occasions Zephon and I had eaten there--when I showed up alone, he popped two extra donut holes into the bag. I didn't notice till I got home--glad I remembered to tip!

( Oh, and something delightful... )