Marcus Aurelius

So I imagine that it's safe to assume that when, after 3 hours and 15 minutes of playing a game, you finally arrive at the Title screen, you can expect to be getting a good amount of gameplay out of it, huh?

I picked up Kingdom Hearts 2 yesterday. I have to admit, they had me pretty well hooked through the whole 3 hours too. I never finished KH, because it was a rental and I had to take it back (and go back to school, I think) after getting really close to the end... and then I never could convince myself to rent it again just to play a very small amount. (or at least I think I was close to the end... I remember beating Maleficent at about 4am before finally getting to save and go to bed) Kept on thinking that at some point I'd just buy the game, but I never did. So anyway, I was a little lost, but as far as I could tell, the ending was summarized (in fragments) throughout the intro gameplay... and the confusion added to the hook, kinda like trying to figure out what in the world is going on every week when watching Lost.

On another note, if anybody wants to see a few pictures I took during a camping trip I went on with my church youth group, I posted them on my Xanga account, which I originally set up just for comments on other church people's journals. Since most of the people who would actually be interested in them are over in that world, it made sense to go ahead and break into uncharted territory.

And that's it for me, for a day or two hundred. :o)

Found this on my sister's Xanga site as apparently the one thing that she hasn't copied over to LJ as well... and it was kinda fun. It's hit and miss, of course, but I wasn't expecting so many that made sense or were funny.

MP3 Survey: Put your MP3 player on random and put the song that comes up as the answer
Personality
How would you describe yourself?:	So Far, So Bad (Five Iron Frenzy)
How would your friends describe you?:	An Ordinary Day (Vanessa Carlton)
Your family?:	Some Kind of Zombie (Audio Adrenaline)
Are you generous?:	Chapter 2 (Project 86)
Do you have a short temper?:	Blame (Cadet)
Are you a procrastinator?:	Invincible (Skillet)
How do you feel about yourself?:	Jigsaw (Supertones)
How do you feel about others?:	Brother's Keeper (Rich Mullins)
What do you think of puppies/kittens?:	Thrive (Newsboys)
Friends
How would you describe your best friend?:	48 States (Smalltown Poets)
What do you like to do with your friends?:	Forfeit (Chevelle)
Where is your favorite hangout?:	Suspended in You (Skillet)
A phrase or word that would describe your group of friends::	Guilty Either Way (David Wilcox)
What do you say about your friends when they are not around?:	The Ninety and Nine (Andrew Peterson)
Name something you'd like to do with your friends, that you've never done::	Pushing the Sky (Cowboy Bebop OST)
Love
So what will or is your true love like?:	Fakin' It (Simon & Garfunkel)
What does he/she think of you?:	Tank! (Seatbelts)
What do you guys like to do?:	Remember Me (Mark Shultz)
What will everybody be saying at your wedding?:	The Man Inside (Bebo Norman)
What will your honeymoon be like?:	Amon Hen (LOTR OST)
Any kids in your future?:	Peace (Third Day)
Describe the love you share::	A Storm Is Coming (LOTR OST)
Describe:
your job:	A Page is Turned (Bebo Norman)
your car:	Everything Will Be (Relient K)
your house:	Live in Stereo (Newsboys)
your family:	Arms of Change (j.r. hunger) *a song by my brother, actually...*
your next vacation:	Happiness (The Elms)
the sky:	Unqualified (Eli)
flowers:	Who You Are (Caedmon's Call)
riding the subway:	I've Searched For Gold (Delirious)
walking down a dark alley:	Laden With Guilt (Delirious)
waking up early in the morning:	Little Boy Heart Alive (Andrew Peterson)
stubbing your toe on the door:	Joey Sanders (j.r. hunger)
Random
What quote will you be remembered for?:	Before There Was Time (Caedmon's Call)
What does the bumper sticker on your car say?:	Responsibility (What's That?) (MXPX)
What is the first thing you say in the morning?:	Chase the Sun (Supertones)
What is the last thing you say at night?:	These Are Not My Pants (FIF)
What are the words that you are just waiting to say to the world?:	Locked In a Cage (Skillet)
To your true love?:	Lover (Derek Webb)
What will your gravestone say?:	All the Way Home (Andrew Peterson)
Take this survey | Find more surveys You've been totally Bzoink*d

Having a job for only 7 months with taxes deducted at a full-time salary rate = rather substantial tax refunds.

It's actually kinda nice, since up to this point I've always had to pay out come tax time because of my college scholarships.

I've finished setting up my photojournal from last weeks trip to Trinidad and Tobago. Check it out. If you click on the images to view the larger size, you'll find descriptions or stories about each picture.

I am really angry right now. I think I just witnessed the corruption of the Seneca police force first hand. I got pulled over today on the way home from work for going 62 in a 45. Problem is, I am absolutely positive I wasn't going anything over 55, and probably wasn't even going quite that fast. The policeman claimed that a car I passed was going 58 and that he was going to pull that car over until I passed it. But I passed that car because when I was following it, it was going about 44 mph.
The thing about this whole incident is that I was very aware of my speed at the time. There are plenty of times when I forget about looking at the speedometer and end up going too fast, and there are also times when I am aware of my speed and still go too fast... But this was not one of either of those times. I was aware of my speed, and checking it pretty constantly. If I had gotten up anywhere close to 60 I am absolutely positive that I would have noticed it.
The guy claimed he was doing me a favor by knocking the violation down to only 54 in a 45. I wonder if that's what he really clocked me at, and he wanted to make it seem like he was a nice cop. I would have believed 54. I probably would have believed 56. But there's simply no way he seriously clocked me at 62.

Apparently I've been out of the serious gamer scene for too long. I finally bought Metroid Prime: Echoes the other day, and this evening I gave myself a blister from playing it.

Must be those gamecube controllers. I was only playing it for 2 or 3 hours straight...

By popular request (which on a journal like mine means one person mentioned it), here are a few pictures of my hair, as discussed in my last entry. Not much of a sampling, since I took them all this evening, and every day my look is determined by how my hair dries that day. (Or whether I decide to put gel in it. Which I didn't have for these shots.)
( Not to ruin your friends page with my face... )

Enough discussion of my hair. Although, perhaps you will agree that it is in some way better than 3 months of silence?

Sometime in the past week or so, my hair has gotten long enough that, even with the curl, I can see it in my peripheral vision. It's so much fun!
Course, that makes for some nice wild hair when the wind blows, or I run around or something... But I can handle that, I guess.

Anytime I come home after dark on a clear night, I step out of my car and am taken aback by the beauty of the stars. Tonight I was stopped in my tracks by the sheer glory of the heavenly jewels, not twinkling but piercing the night sky, shining so brightly.

All my life it seems that whenever I look at the stars, Orion has placed himself there in front of me. I recall as a child lying in the back seat of the car and looking out the window at night, and somehow Orion would find his way into that small field of vision I was afforded. Always, he was my companion in the sky, and now is no exception. As I step out my car door, there he his above my neighbor's house, stalking his eternal prey, the ever vigilant hunter.

Well, I've been at Square D for 5 months now, and I'm already moving up... up the aisle, that is. We hired a new guy who I get to train (figure that one), and then when he takes over for what I've been doing, he's also gonna take the spot I was sitting at, and I get to move up the aisle where I'll be up near our team leaders. Which I guess means that I'm supposed to be team leader material, and up there I can get the mentoring I need or something.
What cracks me up about it, though, is that all this time I've been doing this work that makes me print out tons and tons of paper, a few at a time, so I have to walk to the copier and back all the time. Now that I won't be doing that any longer, I'm moving to within 5 feet of the copier. And the guy that will be doing my old job will be back where I was... all the way against the back wall.
Maybe now I'll start putting on the weight that everybody told me I'd gain when I started my desk job, although looking at Dad, I sorta doubt it.

Ah, Relient K... These guys are so much fun.

"If you had to make your own toothpaste, what would you call it?"

Matt: "Jesus Crest. "

I discovered yesterday that two of the guys I went to high school with are in a screamo/hardcore/punk band that is apparently really popular in the indie music world. I found some of their songs and a music video online, and they sound decent, if you're into that type of music... Not that this means much to anybody reading this, perhaps, but their style is a whole lot like the band Staple.
So yeah, they sound ok, but looking at the lyrics there's really not much there except rage and sexual frustration. Which I guess sorta goes well with this type of music, given that the guys screams most of the time instead of singing... Still, it's not really my cup of tea. Oh, and the lead singer gives me the creeps, with his weird piercings and makeup.
I guess I haven't mentioned the name of the band... they're "The Secret Lives of the Freemasons." Which is really long and strange for a band name.
Now I'm just left to wonder whether the reason I kinda enjoy this music (or pseudomusic) is that I know the guys in the band, or if it's really something I like to listen to. I had the same questions about Staple, since I found out about them because they're a band of people that met at Rosedale Bible College, and I worked with the lead singer's sister (Krista Keim). Would it be normal for my tastes to be influenced by some sense of connection to the artists?

...

What criteria are used these days to classify a book as "young adult?" Is it based on the age of the protagonist? I just finished reading Eragon, which is found in the YA section of the library, but the book is thicker than almost any of the ones I have on my bookshelf. In fact, the vocabulary in the book is so expansive as to give the idea that the author is trying to show off his knowledge, or prove himself intelligent (which may be the case, considering how young he is.) Several of the words were ones that I didn't recognize, and I consider myself to have a pretty broad vocabulary. The story itself is an epic one, in a detailed world that seems to be very Tolkien-inspired; it is Tolkienesque to the point of having an appendix describing the elements of the various languages used by the different races in Eragon's world. So, since this book has so many similarities with The Lord of The Rings, what causes it to be relegated to the youth section of the library and bookstore shelves, while Tolkien's books, well, grace every shelf the bookstores can find room on, I guess...? I imagine it can't be anything else other than the fact that Eragon himself is only 15 at the start of the book. Perhaps adults these days are unwilling or unable to relate to a young hero. Perhaps I'm an oddity, enjoying children's books as much or even more than books that are supposedly written for adults. But then again, I guess I'm not that far from childhood yet... Someday, when I grow old and no longer enjoy Dr. Seuss or Harry Potter, I will be able to see the distinction between books that are fit for real men and women, and those that are only worthy of being read by the simple-minded.

Sometimes I wish I could just step back and watch myself for a while... Although sometimes that's not enough, and I'd have to wish for some night-vision goggles as well.
Case in point. Last night as I was preparing for bed, I finished brushing my teeth and all that good stuff, and headed out of the bathroom, turning off the light in the process. Now, all the other lights in the house were off, but my bedroom door is only about 2 feet from the bathroom, so I figured it wouldn't be that much trouble to step over and reach around for the light. So there I was, walking slowly forward, with my hands out in front of me feeling for the doorway or a wall or something, but somehow I got turned just a little bit. I didn't feel anything in front of me at all, until all of a sudden I smacked straight into the door frame with three toes, my collarbone and my head, all at the same time; a trifecta. My hands had gone to either side of the doorway, and I was turned enough that I didn't touch the wall. It must have been a sight there in the total blackness as I staggered a bit and crumpled to the floor mouthing my pain and rolling in agony... my groans fading to laughter as I realized just how hysterical the situation was in spite of my bruises. My shoulder is still sore right there on the collarbone where I took the real brunt of the blow.

Mom and Dad came down this past weekend to celebrate Dad's birthday and finally see my house... While they were here, they helped me do some painting which has made the place just feel more like mine, and so much more like a new house, too. I can't wait now to get the rest of the place painted.
I'm extremely satisfied with the color I picked for the living room, and after living here for a few days, I'm happy with the second color in the DR too, although at first I almost wished that we hadn't covered up the plummish color that was originally there. However, it had to be painted one way or the other, and it looks so much better overall now. We also used some of the leftover paint to paint one of the horribly bright bedrooms, it's an improvement, although I'm not sure how much. Anyway, I'll stick some pictures in, and you can decide yourself... All you have to do is click...( ri'chere )

Once again Bible Study tonight was very fruitful... Toward the end I brought up some of my beliefs as a Mennonite in a world where we have the realities of things like the war in Iraq, and government encroaching on religious freedom. It was very helpful to me to actually state my beliefs, and they came much more fluently than I expected. Doubt I can express myself as well again, but here are some of the points that I brought up:
One of the things that we discussed before is how to justify the Biblical passage about submitting to authority with the pronounced anti-Christian governments we see around the world even today; my thinking on that is that when the government orders something that I can't faithfully comply to, perhaps I am called not to compromise my morals but to accept the punishment that is given for breaking those laws. I guess that's the whole idea behind conscienciously objecting to something, at least in my mind: don't do it, but be willing to accept the consequences that your actions may bring. Yeah, that's a tough thing to really be willing to do, but God never called us to a life of comfort, and never promised to make the way easy for those who follow him. There are plenty of references to the trials that we can expect to face because of our faith. The beauty of it, though, is that "our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."
Brandon's question was: what if I were placed in a situation where I was face to face with one of the Republican Guard in Iraq, and it was either I kill him or he would kill me? Put in that situation, I hope I would allow him to kill me, because I have faith in the fact that death isn't the end; I have the hope of meeting Christ in heaven after I die, so the prospect of being killed shouldn't be the defining point of my decision-making. Jesus took away the sting of death, we should no longer have to fear it. Faced with the option of either dying or killing another, the best option for any Christian should be to die, because they know without a doubt that after their death they will be with God. In killing someone else, though, you could be taking from them forever that possibility. Can we really be so selfish as to rob another of eternal glory simply to give ourselves a few more days of scratching out a living here on earth?

So I spent basically all evening making my own custom-sized miniblinds... And you better believe it, I'm proud of them! The backstory for this is that all of the windows in my house have an inside width of 28.5" Since miniblinds only come in 27" and 29" sizes, (which fit windows as large as 27.5" and as small as 28.75", respectively) I had to settle for putting my blinds up outside the window indention. This is fine, except that in the master bathroom, there is a little ledge near the bottom of the window that the blinds slide out in front of, leaving a nice wide gap between the blinds and the wall. And wonderfully enough, this gap is pointed straight at both the toilet and the shower. Added to the fact that the window opens onto the parking area beside the house, and it seems a little strange to think that anybody arriving while one was in the bathroom could be greeted with more of a view than they were expecting.
So I set out to solve the problem. cut off part of each end of the mounting bar, then trim every single blind, and then pull off the endcaps of the bottom bar and cut it shorter as well... That's all it takes!

Yes, I drew a line on each end of every single slat in my miniblinds, and then cut every single one with a pair of scissors that had one handle basically broken off... We all do the best we can with the tools that we've been given. :o) My woodcarving knives came in handy to cut the thicker stuff.

End result? My hands hurt pretty bad, but the blinds fit into the window like a glove.
Oh yeah, speaking of hands hurting, you know the saying that a dull knife is more dangerous than a sharp one? Well I was working with a knife that was sorta sharp, but I was putting a pretty good amount of force into the thing, and my hand slipped at one point... Yeah, I cut my finger, but it wasn't the knife that did the cutting, it was the thumbnail on my other hand.

So today is the day that I get all of the paperwork in my house sorted out, and go through the stuff I brought back from Mom & Dad's. Going through the Clemson folder, where I had put all kinds of stuff that I got before and during college about the school, I found a letter that got sent to me my senior year in high school... you know, one of those "you should definitely choose Clemson over whatever other schools you applied to" letters. But this one was written by Matthew Kerr, who was at the time a freshman... and who I met a couple of years later without ever realizing he'd written me. Small world, I guess, but I couldn't believe it when I first looked at the name.

I've also been going through old letters and cards that I'd saved since high school, and man does it bring back memories... I never realized just how many girls I had after me back then. :o)

My favorite line so far from things that I've read? The closing sentence in a letter my sister wrote me:
"And I was very much irked."

having seen the personality cocktail on ahirusensei's journal, I had to try it... No, I tend to never post these things, but I'll usually try them out, and keep the results to myself, because I'm lazy, and actually posting stuff on here requires extra time, that I could spend doing who knows what other time-wasting thing. Anyway, this one was interesting. Wonder how they come up with these things?

How to make a jamahu

Ingredients: 5 parts intelligence 5 parts crazyiness 3 parts joy

Method: Stir together in a glass tumbler with a salted rim. Add a little curiosity if desired!