6 to the left of

Ahem. Its been awhile since I've done this, or maybe not. Either way it has been long enough so that I feel justified in saying its been awhile. So I got this walmart gift card for christmas. I hate going to walmart. I never buy anything in any quanity to make it worthwhile going to that horrible store. It is always crowded after or before work. And whatever it's fucking walmart the place sucks. I ended up gettin an 8gb memory card from there though. With my psp dead I need a new source of audio entertainment for my car. Looks like the DS is getting drafted. ALso with 8gb I'll be able to use it for all sorts of crazy things. I'm pretty much massivly excited. Woo!

So I've decided to do two things at the same time. One I decided to play Kingdom of Loathing again after a really long absence. that I don't understand myself. Man I like that game. Its also so strange. People put more work into playing that game than anything I've ever seen before in my entire life. It is increadble the amount of time and energy people put into dissecting ever aspect of the game just to figgure out how it works. That's fine. What's even cooler is that the game developers cater to this mindset in dozens of diffrent ways. For example every summer they have an event where a puzzle is released and pretty much the whole community works together and tires to solve it, together. It is pretty epic, I mean the forums get flooded, there are large debates acrost some of the chat channles, the whole community works together. The end reward? Is usually something of dubiouse value. That's alright it isn't the reward, it is the puzzle. There is a life and vibrancy to that game's community that just doesn't excitst on the interwebs in many other places. OH OH it also has moderated chat rooms. YES let me say that a fucking gain, moderated chat rooms. If you don't know why this is a big deal go get a 15 day trial of WOW, now roll horde and go the the Barrens. You will understand why the idea of moderated chatrooms has me shitting with joy.

I also decided that I wasn't going to play non KOL video games for awhile. Why? Well the main problem I have with video games is that they produce nothing. It takes 40 hours to beat your average rpg. In 40 hours I could read over 5 books, do tons of writting, paint a warhammer army, learn something new, touch up old skillz, and so many other things. So I am giving up video games for a bit so that when I start playing them again they won't dominate my life like they had been doing.

I am very sleepy

I might just fuck off early tonight.

Well I feel like painting warhammer mans for a bit so I am off.

Swan Song

It occures to me that I don't know what swan song means. Okay well correction. I know that it means "the end of something" but I don't actually know how I get from that meaning to the phrase swan song. Wierd, I've never actually heard a swan make a sound let alone sing. Whatever none of that is important.

What is arguably important is that my PSP died. Unlike my Blue DS which has lived a long, epic fucking life, my psp sort of died an ignomouse fate when it fell less than a foot onto the soft ground while it was in a hard plastic case. Now it won't boot. Honestly? I can't really be bothered to get enough righteouse indignation to be mad at the whole thing. I mean when you just hold a psp you can feel how easy they are to break, they aren't paticularly sturdy at all. I'm slightly annoyed that it broke in such a stupid way, but really? What can you do? Yeah pretty much just shrug your shoulders and move on.

I dunno. I've had such an easy come, easy go additude twoards the stupid thing that...well I dunno. The only thing I'm disapointed in is the fact that there are two games coming out for it I dearly want to play. The new Prinny game which I played 5 minuts of and hugged, and FF Dissidia in english. Dissidia is fun but its flaws become readily apparent when the AI just blocks 12 of your attacks in a row then beats you to death. But oh well.

On tuesday I might go get it fixed but I really have no real desire to do so. I mean if it is some quick little thing that got knocked loose I'll plunk down the cash to get it fixed. Otherwise I am not all that interested in it.

IN other new that pisses me off I am never EVER pre odering anything from Barns and NOble ever a-fucking-gain.
SO yeah back around January 5th or so I preordered Batman RIP along with Gaurdians of the Galaxy. I am so excited about Batman RIP I can hardly hold it in. Man I love Grant MOrrison, I love Batman, and I love ultra trippy headfucks. It is the sort of thing I live for and lookit that I get all three things together in one omega awesome package for the love entry fee of 16 bucks. Hell yeah sighn me up. So I get an e-mail from them telling me about how my shit's been delayed. Then I get half my order but not Batman. I'm tempted to just go out and buy it, then return my copy of Batman that comes in the mail. You know what fuck it, I am doing that. Tomarrow. I'll show up late to roleplaying, it isn't like they can start without me. Yeah bastards.

So that's that.

dice, minatures, comics, and drugs

well okay no drugs but whatever. So I'm in a mood to write, but not write for Exalted which is what I should be doing. I now see all the massive flaws with that game. I'll run it for a couple of more story arcs at least and then shut it down. Its alright for the most part but oddly enough I end up feeling restricted by the types of stories I can tell? Buh? Well let me explain. Exalted takes place in a diverse, well rounded, interesting world that is incredibly well supported background story wise. The is a variety of things for the players to go do an see, and all that is pretty neat.

The problem is that the players are not some dudes with swords who decided to wander away from whatever shithole village they live in and go and see things. No they are incarnated gods. And not crappy gods, they are the gods who boss the other crappy gods around. They take part in world shaking events, they do BIG things. It is what they do. It isn't so much that I can't think of big things for them to do. That's easy. It is just that everything has to be big. One of the main advantages of D&D is that you can make the world huge and shit can hit the fan in only one tiny little area which they players will help out in...

You know I realize now that I can justify this all day. It is just that I don't like storytelling in exalted. Which is a shame because I bought all those fucking hardbacks :-). Not really a shame though because I love to read them and think aobut them, and think up antagonists. But I realize that when I GM I like to tell these really labrthine stories that my players just about never fucking pick up on. But that is okay because I always got them trying to guess where I am going to hit them next, all the while I am adjusting the web to their screwings around. I kinda wish I sucked it up and just rand shadowrun instead. Now there is a game. I think I might start writting up a campain for it on the sly. I think after I conclude Exalted Andrew might take over again or it might go back to me. I don't know. Anything but 4th edition D&D. Playing the awesome miss game is NOT awesome.

So I bought a box of 5 Chaos space Marines to paint up. Yeah guess it is that time again where I all the sudden want to play warhammer 40k again. I really do this time though. I halted the sisters of battle army because I realized I didn't really want to play them. As cool as they are fuck that. Just...just doesn't work for me. So if I do end up playing anything it will be chaos. Like it should be. I mean come on I personally identify with 3 of the 4 chaos gods. It is where I belong. SO once I get these 5 mariens assembed and painted I'll see where I stand on the whole thing. No sense in plunking down 90 bucks on a battle force and realizing it was just a passing thing.

In video game news I am winding up Ar Tonellico 2. I'll be taking down another swath of it when I am done here and I am moderatly excited about it. I acidently chose the wrong girl friend. I am still angry about that. I mean seriously? At the start of the game when you have to choose paths she seemed so sweet and nice. Then not an hour later she tells you she just said all thouse things so she could infiltrate the knights and find her sister. BITCH.Then she formed a flawed Malefacta and spent the whole time complaining about how she grew up poor and didn't feel loved by her mom and HOLY FUCK worst part of the game. I wanted to strangle her by the time that shit was done with. And her cosmosphere is a bloody wreck. She glued all the little parts of her personailty to make a "perfect" one. Fuck that is one scary bitch. She is everything I hate about certain women wrapped into one person, lying, manipulative, weasily, and a coward. And look at that I acidently started dating her. In the game not real life. I real life I'd dump her ass and go chase down the Jacquli. Man I want to play the first game so badly, it is pretty fucking crazy. Unfortunatly finding it is next to impossible. Here's hoping to a reprint.

Despite that last paragraph of bitching I absolutly love the game. The combat system is wild crazy fun and for a long time I geninely didn't know what was going to happen next in the story. I'm really enjoying it. I just ended up dating the wrong girl, and a second play through just isn't going to happen not for a long while. Not while I have persona 3 sitting right there taunting me. I kinda want to play an actual hard rpg...and there it is. But I also genuinely want to know what will happen in Ar Tenellico 2 so its currently winning my time.

Hrm. I'm thinking about stealing a dining room chair from work. I think I will next Gala. Or NO the next first sunday.

Oh fuck yeah that Phonogram comic I pointed out a couple of posts ago? Fucking awesome, yes it is!

Alright I am done now.

Filling of the Sausage is with this and that

Yeah yeah so what I have a soft spot for Webber musicals. If you don't know what I am talking about then just be satisfied that I shared an embarassing secret with you because you just caught an extrodinarly obscure reffrence. So there.

A few things. Saw Friday the 13th part 3. Ugh, just ugh. I have no idea how this series managed to get off the ground. See the thing is despite its massive campyness I enjoy watching part 6. 6 is a pretty damn fun movie when you get right down to it. 3 was just painful and I ended up ignorning most of it. I mean christ. Oh and the 3d gimicks make me want to go find the person who thought that was a good idea and strangle them. I also want to see a porn in 3d. I also want a good horror movie in 3d. While I am wishing for things, I'd like to pet a deer. Anyone up for a trip to the zoo?

I really don't want to deal with part 2, and it kinda drives me nuts because I do have better movies to watch. So why bother? It's because Friday the 13th isn't like any other horror series on the map. It is totally unique when you consider how it evolved and changed over time. Both the images of Michael Meyers and Freddy Kruger were more or less set in stone by end the ends of the first movies. Visually and themeatticlly they became fixed almost instantaeously. Dryly I could say it is because they got it right the first time but I don't think that is entirely it. There is something diffrent about Friday the 13th which caused the series to grow, change, and evolve into the matichine which it became. Take the hokey mask which wasn't introduced until the 3rd movie, and even then it was part of a throw-away plot element. This girl was assaulted by Jason years before and she was returning to crystal lake for the first time and being retarded she didn't realize the masked killer and her assailent were one and the same until he took the mask off. OOOOERS. Yet this mostly ignored side plot has become an institution, people don't think of Jason without his mask it just doesn't happen.

As the series goes on it becomes more interesting to me.

And my hands hurt so while I have much more to say I am cutting it here.

Where Babies Come From

Firday the 13th part 6

NOTES!:

Lets face it the movies while as a whole are interesting to me, individually they do not warrent a whole heck of a lot of atension. I really don't understand my own intrest with the series but here it goes anyway. Theres are going to be a series of notes which I hope will become...something awesome, someday. While looking at another writting project I realized my proximity to the actual friday the 13th like in real life. I'd like to pretend that it is a coincidence. It isn't but then again its a day devoted to luck and coincedes so maybe it is.

Jason's eyes are brown. In this movie his resureaction is coming about through lightning. Like ties to Frakenstien, and the sort of drama intrinsic in that.

Also not that there is an attempted death via fire, perhaps a crossreffrence with Freddy vs. Jason.

Heh clever a little James Bond reffrence thrown in there I like that sort of thing.

So why am I not starting with the first movie? Well the first disk didn't burn right that's why. Also, really, REALLY, it isn't like the chronology matters a whole lot. The motherducker just got rezzed via lighting.

MAN I miss rated R movies. People in movies just sound like idiots dancing atound swear words. In the real world people do say fucked up. Then again it is nice to have movies feel like movies sometimes which is what happens when everyone runs around doing thier very best not to swear even though they are very much in a "oh fuck situation"

HEY SASHA a charecter just made a reffrence to a horror movie in a horror movie and the understanding that no man in the middle of the night wearing a mask is friendly. She's going to die now because because she listened to her dumbshit boyfriend...what the hell are there people even doing here, they aren't even on a road. Whatever.

Camp Blood, what an awesome name. Oh and it explained what thouse people were doing camp counsilers.

Man movies before cell phones. God I hate cell phones. I wish I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I could go to walmart...I have sunkist I care about nothing.

I think these moviesd make less sense to me because I've never been to summer camp. But I've met people who have become camp counsilers. They would be much better off with Jason in my opinion.

OH HEY this is one of the one's I've seen before. It is actually the movie that started this whole project.

Oh oh paintballers. With the rediculouse conversation about a man's game. Linked with idea that it is almost always a woman that ends up killing him. Lots of women die first but you know how it is.

I should do something with the humour in these movies. I should also touch on the fact that most people have only seen one Friday the 13th movie, along with cultural momentyum on the scale of superman/batman along with the horror movie crash, along with the horror movie revival, along with...space. I just wanted to see how long I could make that go, how disapointing. I should do Lepperchaun next. Or hellraiser which for two movies is actually good.

Ah alchoholic elderly humor!

Lots of cross visual irony. What overly violent cops. You know a lot of people kicked up a fuss with they changed the guns to walky talkies in ET but not me. That freaked me out as a kid. I mean he was clearly just a little boy running around and these cops are chasing after him with guns drawn. I knew full god damned well what guns drawn meant at that age and it really frightened me. I had already had an unhealthy distrust of adults as it was, cops running around with intent to kill some little kid really bothered me. DON'T argue with me gun out=intent to kill.

"No it was real just like on tv" quote for the ages ladies and gentalmen. Spoken by nacy the mcguffin. All children in this movie are essentially mcguffins.

Guy came to early=male inadiquacy=important!

One thing I like about Jason is his taste for horror. I mean the guy is, in this movie, dead, ressurected from fucking lightinging. He is super strong, and unless it is the end of the movie he is indestructable and yet he still takes the time to sneak around, be stealthy, and to kill people with finess, instead of just juggernauting at them pointlessly. No he took the time to sneak onto that camper and was all Solid Snake about it. Good job Jason.

Oh hey this movie takes place on friday the 13th wasn't sure about that.

One black girl down one to...oh wait one black person per movie my bad.

Yay Nancy our little prophet just woke up and saw jason.

I wanna learn how to do a bootlegger turn.

Nancy was also walking around with Jason's bloody machette she is now both everyman and the greek chorus. I will just throw post modern theory at it until you either believe me or unable to understand what I am talking about. It's like cheeze you just keep adding it until whatever you are eating tastes great.

God people in horror movies have shit peripheral vision
THis movie really really works well with what I want to do. It is very much the quinticential Jason movie that people think about when they thing Friday the 13th.

BUG MURDER!

Lots of insanity in the whole series. I can work with that extreamly easily. Reporcussions of battle.

That's right jason straight for Nacy!

And saved by the bell. Oh wait no they show her praying. Virgin mary to boot.

Man I can't think of camp crystal lake without thinking of that scene where Freddy jumps out of the water. That is so fucking cool.Yeah that's right fucking I AM RATED R. Cockslab!

I don't know why they bothered with the "is he dead thing" he got raied by lighting the shotgun isn't going to stop him... hell even Jason gives up on it after one shot.

Returning him to his original resing spot. There is something about that. Its like a kind of sacrifice in its own right. "What ere you going to be when you grew up, this movie is hilarouse".

God the main charecter bitch in this movie is stupid as fuck, she is running around screaming at the top of her lungs. I mean fuck. I can't beleive she gets to live she is by far the dumbest charecter.

If at first you don't suceed set something on fire.

Yeah see its the end of the movie so he looses his super strength.

And a man gets the kill in this movie. Wierd! Especially with all the chickzors power at the start...oh wait no she got him...with a boat propller. Good status quo maintained.

Oh and she gives crazy dude mouth to mouth and bringshim back to life YAY! I guess.

And the movies ended with terrible 80's music! Woo!

Made in 1986 3 mill budget 19 mill revenue.

Fuck.

Okay well that's how babies are made.

Cooking!

I'm cooking lunch and writting is fun. It also feels kinda like crack. So lets see what to write about.


Comics I've been reading.

Scalped. I don't care if you don't like comics get on line a buy copies of it. Not because I want everyone to read it but because I want it to last long enough so that it can reach its natural conclusion so I can read it. Scalped isn't really like anything I've ever read. The whole thing takes place on a native american reservation and it is an increadbly unique look into both crime, poverty, and a people wrestling to hold onto ancient customs. It is jaw dropping in quality, and one 6 issue story arc just covered the events of one night, told fragmentary style through the eyes of several of the charecters. I really want to go indepth with scalped but I am not even really sure how. There are so many ways to go about it that I am kinda mindboggled. It is a world compleatly divorced from my own and yet it is a reality that is right around the corrner. It is also so flipping well written that all I can do is just sort of fling around praise. Arrgh. It is something I would teach.

Thor. So people have been talking about how good the new thor book is. I didn't beleive them. Why? Well I always thought that Thor was a really stupid concept for a super hero. I really did. I mean to have the god of thunder running around calling people knave and throwing his hammer at them is sorta...dumb? He kinda filled the role of heavy artiliary, he'd show up, zap whatever the fuck and wander off. Mostly to asgard where things were his calliber. I dunno I might pick up one of the collections of older books, perhaps I've been unfair to him. I doubt it though. ANYWAY. So Thor is back. Apparently Ragnarok went down thanks to Loki, Thor and all the other gods died, but thor's human host brought him back...that was neat. I really liked that part. Then Thor rebuilt Asgaurd in the midwest, I really like that too. Although it was kinda random. So anyway thor goes and starts resurecting gods who all ended up in human hosts. While this happens some of them end up interacting with citizens of the small midwestern town that they are next to with hilariouse results. The whole series has this insanely charming feel to it. and it told the civil war to fuck off which made me happy. Oh which reminds me I want to do something on power and politics in a bit. Maybe after lunch which is ready now.

Scatter Shot

Oh man the things I want to write about have reached critical mass. Unfortunatly, the things I want to do have also reached critical mass so we have the unstoppable force versus the immovable object.

Heaven or Hell
Duel one let's ROCK

So a scatter shot, a sort of abstract of what is going on in my mind.

Activate!

Comics: Jesus what a month for comics. I mean holy shit. The way I break up my money now is that I spend 50 bucks on whatever comics I want, and I also have a list of discresionary comics which I will buy regardless of bugetar concerns. This month though? All Star Superman vol2, Batman RIP, DMZ Vol 6, Walking Dead Vol 9, and Simon Dark Vol 2 all come out. Most hit on the 17th, some hit on the 10th. Batman and Walking Dead are already in the mail the rest will be following shortly. I might be raising some eyebrows with the inclusion of superman in that list. However, it is the conclusion of the Grant Morrison run on that book and man. The first book I find to be simply breath taking. It is nothing short of mythic in size and stature. I love it so much. It is so big and so...warm is the only way I can think to describe it. It is like getting a metaphysical hug. I don't understand the way I feel about it. I do understand that I want it's conclusion.

BoOks: I've been reading Issac Asamov's foundation trilogy, slowly but surely. Man I like it. The best way to describe it is a collection of 6 novellas broken into two books themeaticly, and chonologically arragned to show how the development of empire. I really like it. It shows its age more than just a little bit at time, but instead of annoying me it just makes the book seem all the more allegorical. Not so much that it is a product of it's time, which it once was, but it is now a product for all times. Its one of those things that has this sort of keen grasp on human culture, society, and empire. And how understanding all these aspects can show us how to break the cycle of expansion, war, decadance, and downfall. They are an astounding piece of work. I'm 3/4th through the last one and I am dragging my feet now because I'm not sure what I want to read next.

Video Games!: Christ. I quit WOW because it was sucking up my soul and giving me SO little reward for time invested. Jesus. Now I am playing city of heros again and everything is amazing. God that game is so much better in so many ways. I've also started playing Ar Tonelico 2 which is increadble. I didn't have the money to pick up the first one when it came out and I regret that still to this day. Its sequal though is a mightly impressive game and I look fowards to playing some more of it relatively soon. There is ALOT to say about it but I also find the plot genuinely unpredicatable and it is interesting. It takes tropes which I have grown to understand, and become annoyed by in japanese cinema and it very specificly deconstructs them in a series of psychological excercises where you dive into the depths of their mind and rummage around. It's really neat at times and kind of silly when I think about how well done it is. It isn't perfect, I'll go with an 80% on this one, but when you consider the fact that it is deconstructing basic japanese tropes while telling a story at the same time...well done. Well done.

Oh yeah and persona 4 is out. I'm going to trade in all my psp games and buy it today. Pretty much as soon as I am done writting this. I don't really have the money for it but I figgure 6 or so psp games should be enough so that it is only 20 bucks or so. I NEED it. I also need to beat Persona 3. But I am lazy.

Also Dwarf Fortress is awesome. I want to post pictures of my current fortress and I might do that soon much to all of your bordom.

Theory: So there is a new Friday the 13th looming on the horizon. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited. I got this idea a while ago for an extended essay. Basicly I take Friday the 13th as a franchise of movies and treat them all as one singular text instead of 11 diffrent texts. When I do this I think all sorts of really wierd themes and ideas, along with this increadbly wierd morallity all comes to light. For my foundational theory I was going to use Rene Girrad's Violence of the Sacred and analyze the idea of revenge and the problems associated with it in terms of the movies. I am going to suggest that the leap Rene makes from religion to the justice system may be correct mechanically. Erm for all of you that don't know. Girrad claims that revenge violence is one of those things that society is constructed to prevent because it can rip apart communies at its core. Don't beleive me go look up blood feuds and stop argueing. He claims that a lot of religious cermimonies, including sacrfice help prevent this cycle of revenge violence. He then argues that the emergence of the justice system has taken on this role, I still think he is correct however, our justice system doen't moralize the masses. So instead of putting the burden soley on the justice system I am going to split it between the justice system and movies because I think I am right. Friday the 13th presents an utterly perfect example of how all this works for the first movie, second movie, and Freddy vs Jason. The rest of it makes things interesting.

They are all downloading now, it occures to me that I haven't seen half of them. Well that's about to change now innut?

Comics Again:
Look what I found-

Phonogram: Rue Britannia-

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Britannia is ten years dead. Phonomancer David Kohl hadn't spared his old patron a thought for almost as long... at which point his mind starts to unravel. Can he discover what's happened to the Mod-Goddess of Britpop while there's still something of himself left? Dark modern-fantasy in a world where music is magic, where a song can save your life or end it.


YEAH! It's in the mail along with some other extreamly rad books. That's the one I am most excited about though.

I'm also going to start collecting Y's the Last Man. I have no idea why I haven't done it already.

Sasha and I want to go to Azerbaijan she found and deserves all the credit for discovering how cool it is. I just fully agree with her.

Sasha found this which is just about the coolest thing ever

For thous of you who don't know Ceci n'est pas une pipe is one of my favorite paintings/ideas ever.

I want to do more calligraphy. AND THAT'S A WRAP!

Jesus.

UPDATE: YAY I turned in 6 psp games and found a used copy of persona 4 so I only ended up paying 4 bucks for it. I also pre-ordered the new Devil Summoner game:



It may or may not be soley for the plushie. Man I am a dork. AN AWESOME DORK!