MegaBrain

Ding, 65 and counting...

Tue, 23 Jan 2007 13:31:01 GMT

...and due to ding 66 later today, currently being 50% through before the server went down for maintenance, and being one of the reasons I'm actually taking a break and writing up another LJ post. With luck, I'll reach 66 before any others in the guild reach 64 - and whilst I love the fact I am the fastest in the guild, the main motivation is just because the game is so gosh-darn fun - and having seen a glimpse of what's to come, I'm really pumped to see the next thing that's in store.

800g saved up towards a flying mount so far, and that's just from selling all the trash, soulbound, and most greens that I can't be bothered selling on the AH unless they're exceptional - and even then, I've yet to actually put the half dozen or so good items up. Realised I'd maxed out my mining skill, which means I should head back to Hellfire Peninsula to snag those dastardly Khorium veins that were taunting me shortly after first heading through the portal. Don't actually use 'em yet, but worth saving up.

Can't wait 'till people start wanting to do more instance runs - only been on like three through Hellfire Ramparts, and one through the Blood Furnace, both uncompleted. Through my questing, I'm all ready to pop in to do quests for Coilfang reservoir and Auchindoun.

Kind of a pity about the warpstalker not grabbing aggro properly when sent in to attack a mob, but hopefully they'll fix that sooner or later. In the meantime, picked up a brown owl from Nagrand and called him Owlriginal for lack of being able to come up with anything but a bad pun, and once i hit 66 plan to pick up one of the new spider models from Blade's Edge Mountains, and finally one of the differently skinned warpstalkers found in Netherstorm, provided aforementioned aggro gets fixed properly.

But must actually get a couple hours sleep whilst the server's still down, so I'm all ready to hop back in the moment they're back up...

Oh Emm Eff Gee

Fri, 19 Jan 2007 18:34:09 GMT

I have just gone into WoW sensory overload, and have been left utterly and totally flabbergasted.

It all started with what was only meant to be a nice little jaunt to Area 52, but I had no idea what was in store for me along the way. The variety, the surprises, the... well, everything, was just absolutely stunning and simply amazing. There's too much to describe, and I'm just lost for words at how wicked it all looked. Which makes this post probably entirely pointless because I can't describe it. ;)

I will say that Blizzard has blown everything prior in Azeroth completely out of the water in comparison to the content in Outland. It's like... I dunno, comparing Ragefire Chasm to Molten Core. But a much bigger gap.

As I said, sensory overload. Time to take a break and watch some stargate with choccy icecream for breakfast.

wahoozle for BC!

Thu, 18 Jan 2007 15:18:42 GMT

So yippee and all that, Burning Crusade is finally out for WoW. Just been too busy playing to say anything earlier ;P

Back on Tuesday I'd slept half the day away, got up, butchered the lawns with the mower again, and headed into town to see 'Night at the Museum' prior to the midnight launch at EB games, popping into meow_tuna at his new flat first. Haven't gone to see anything for ages, and took a look at the trailer online the previous night and it seemed amusing enough, good for a laugh if nothing else. And it was. Kinda silly & stupid, had it's good and bad moments, but not horrible either, mediocre in a good way.

Went to EB games, waited boredly in queue for half an hour, then zipped off home to install/play.

And dayum. It is *good*.

In the next 48 hours, I've achieved lvl 62 and rolled a new now lvl 10 BE Pally, Ellysiana of which in no way I could have come up with a serious sounding name like that by myself, thanks to graphitelion's suggestion at least a month or so in advance. Example of recent futility in my own unique naming system was taming a ravager and calling it Yakabakaka, of which I'd been tempted to create an alt just to use that name in the past. Bonus points for anyone able to get the obscure reference and who says it. The only hint I'll give is that it comes from the same source as where I got the name for my hunter, Tuscansalami.

First in the guild to 62, and not exactly *trying* to grind through the fastest - I'd just enjoyed the whole thing so much that I was just blitzing through all the quests on offer. Still made sure I sat down and read every single description of what I had to do and why, so I'm not just glossing over just for the sake of leveling.

Essentially finished all the quests in Hellfire Peninsula aside from the group/instance ones, and made a good profit in the process. Most fun quest gets awarded to the windrider bombing runs, of which you get to toss explosives down on demon encampments doing 15000-30000dmg per blast. Lotta fun.

Looks like the rumours were true, in which quest reward items that are greens were replacing even tier 1 amour sets - some of the stats just look absolutely insane for the item quality compared to what I've been used to seeing...

The visuals are really stunning - you can really get a feel for how the land in Hellfire Peninsula is breaking up and fragmenting all over the place - and you really have to have draw distance on maximum to get the full scope on the place. I pity anybody who comes in without an epic mount. Speaking of which, no epic-hawkstrider-chocobo-wannabe-pvp-mount like I was hoping for. ;( Guess it'll be back to turning in the runecloth stacks to try for exalted rep instead, methinks...

There's one ruined city with ghosts in that gave me a bit of vertigo or something, as the whole thing was tilted on an angle, as though the camera was on a tilt and I was the one leaning over. A bit of confusion when rotating the camera and expecting it to move with the level of the landscape, that's for sure - and because of this, I loved how Blizzard pulled the effect off. ^^

Then there's the upgraded voidwalker models, now actually wearing some gear on them to make the types look distinctly unique.

Back in Blood Elf land, I was in for another visual treat with more lush expanses and new architecture, particularly Silvermoon City. For some reason the streets kind of remind me somewhat of Sandoria in FFXI - and I can imagine the whole place must be an RP'ers wet dream with the settings it offers. Oh, and general chat in the BE areas is the new barrens chat, just 10x as retarded.

Havn't actually bothered to train up engineering past 300 quite yet, but figure I'll start on it after I finish up this entry. And to think that I'll be revisiting the whole starting area all over again once I finally get a flying mount at 70 and see it all from a new perspective...

Server stability has been kinda so-so - launch night, it was perfectly stable and everything! But during peak time during the day, when it starts getting overloaded with the majority of people logging in, it's crashing left right and center. Still, a handy DS + Metroid Pinball makes downtime less of a frustration. All in all, I'm still kind of surprised how smooth it was for the first 12+ hours at least, though I'm guessing there were less people stressing it out as they thought they would experiance or something...

Then fastforwarding to tonight, my keyboard starts to suddenly have half the keys not working. However dirty it may be, it definitely wasn't due to obstructions, so guessed it must be b0rked wiring. Thankfully, whilst not officially supported, my G15 still works with regular keyboard functions to use as a backup instead. Replugged the mac keyboard in, and seemed to be working fine for the time being, but wouldn't be surprised if it b0rked up again. Decided to pop off all the keys and clean out the year or so worth of mouldy crumbs from beneath the keys just in case I would have to take it in to get fixed/replaced/whatever. Nice and clean looking now, along with the first time I gave the screen a good wash down a couple days ago too - it's amazing how much of the dirt you can see on a white background to really realise how grotty it has really been.

Anyway, back into BC...

By gad, it's hot...

Sat, 13 Jan 2007 11:32:20 GMT

From what I heard, we reached up to 30deg in the CBD in palmy today. Probably even higher in some particular spots, such as work where air conditioning was next to non-existant due to the main motor driver the whole thing having been burnt out since... well, I'm guessing for about two years now that it's been on the blink. We've a fan up behind the counter, which is small comfort until we actually have to get up and actually do something around the store...

And then I find out about 10pm that the drinks chiller which I now assume is run off the same main AC motor or something, is overstrained from the 'heatwave' and just can't keep everything cold. A couple frantic phonecalls later to the manager and a repair guy coming in, it's pronounced hopeless to do anything about it 'till morning as said motor is located on top of the canopy above the forecourt, and out stepladder doesn't reach two stories up to be able to get to it. ;P Thankfully, aside from the uncooked chickens which get tossed up to the other store at Tremaine, the rest of the drinks shall do fine whilst the chiller gets turned off to give the system a rest.

And despite this all, I thankfully still manage to get away at midnight as normal. Only good thing about the day is that it's perfect weather to ride about on my scooter if nothing else...

Back in WoW, I'm busy grinding for 30 of each BG token to get myself a Hawkstrider (aka, chocobo clone) pvp mount on BC release day - and they better damn well offer one as a pvp reward like all the others!

Sat, 06 Jan 2007 23:09:34 GMT

No, I've not broken the new year's resolution on posting here more often - just absolutely zilch has been happening really to qualify posting anything that would be remotely noteable.

Some power blip at church today - something screwed up with the electrical system as only half the lights and powerpoints were working, and zilch in the way of the audio system and data projector. Still, made do with hastily photocopied hymns for everyone, so all went down well.

And I forgot completely that my brother was in town from Auckland, and would be at the church service - nor did I actually spot him there. Still, he'd rung up and we caught up for lunch before he had to leave for Wellington.

Replaced my mobile with a cheap and ugly secondhand nokia that works, due to mine just refusing to charge. Only really need a phone for alarms and for answering calls, so didn't need anything fancy - but despite lacking a colour screen, pxt & wap (which the latter two I never used), seems equally useful with a sort of dictionary thingy that may help with texting.

Picked up the 'Yesspeak' twin dvd set from Heroes for Sale nice and cheap - there wasn't a price on it, so I was told I could have it for $30, which I'm sure is a bargain...

Bored, bored, bored.

Thu, 04 Jan 2007 11:13:37 GMT

Burning Crusade's not out for another fortnight, don't have a working pc, and just finished .hack//infection and still need to find a copy of part 2 before I can continue through to #3 & #4.

So thought what the hey, should finally get around to playing FFX-2, specially given how cheap it is. Barely played through the intro so far, but the whole dress sphere system's looking interesting enough at any rate. Much fun to be had, I'm sure...

Stupid thieving bastiches

Mon, 01 Jan 2007 16:49:13 GMT

Yeah, so had a stupid !@#$ shoplifter at work. Older guy just walked out with a couple bags of lollies without paying, when confronted already had opened one and claimed he thought his 'friend' had paid for them - yeah, right. Which then means seeing there's an opened bag, he can't just get told off and grab the goods back. No money on him, so we're supposed to call the police, then trying to deal with them on the phone whilst serving customers, and barely having a clue what to exactly say in the first place to anyone - thank goodness the usual security guard was about to deal with the most difficult bit of actually talking to the shoplifter instead of me. Shove an unavoidable, unpleasant situation like that in my face and I just freeze whilst not being able to decide what needs to be done next. At any rate, can't exactly legally detain the guy as we've got the (opened) packet back, and since he's said he'll 'come back and pay' (yeah right), nothing can be done 'till he fails to turn up anyway. Was a perfectly fine shift 'till that happened, and just came home feeling all mentally exhausted and fed up from it all.

Ah well, sleep will cure that - I hope

And on a side note - HELL YES! http://www.videogameslive.com is coming to Wellington - and should be possible to attend without having to take any time off work to boot! I cannot wait...

Whoop-de-da.

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 17:50:51 GMT

So the new year came in with a bang. Lots of bangs, actually, by the sounds of the fireworks going off in the square. Unfortunately, I was still cashing up at the time, and missed the lot despite running around like a madman trying to close the store to attempt to be out of the door five minutes before everything happened, all to no avail. Only a minor disappointment really, as I don't normally do anything anyway, and was only hoping to take advantage of my hours working out to technically finish at midnight. Ah well.

Tried kiting Teremus the Devourer to Booty Bay for a lark, but found evade bugging is rather counter-productive. Successfully found I could solo Zul'Farrak, but takes far to long to be worth the monetary rewards. Guess it's back to Maraudon for all my farming needs, now that I'm down to about 20-25 mins for 10-12g worth of loot after skipping the Princess. Too much fun just running past all the mobs without even being glanced at, much less aggroed, and so far the process has netted me about 150g since I started up the farming runs once or twice a day.

Gnargle! Or, Why I took 2 hours to cut my hair

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 04:58:19 GMT

Stupid freaking hair clippers, just up and breaking down completely halfway through clippering my hair... Stores were still open, so no problem there. Finding a hat to hide my butchered haircut however was. Then the first place I went to had all sold out, so had to go further into town to pick up the first pair I see. Then once back home and trying them out, my hair gets caught up 'cause the blades aren't aligned properly. Two hours later, and I'm finally done.

And incidentally, shaved off what little sparse facial hair I had for the heck of being complete. Not as though there was much to grow back or anything. Pity I can't be arsed getting a digital camera, or I'd have done a before and after shot with my mop-top and lack thereof.

Yup, riveting stuff.

New Year's Resolutions

Sun, 31 Dec 2006 00:10:52 GMT

For once, I'm actually going to make some resolutions that I plan to stick to. And serious ones at that.

1. Give up pr0n and piracy. Yes, really. Of my own free will, and because I want to, not just because Christianity doesn't like that sort of thing and just says I should. That, and they take up too much time that can be better spent paying attention to far more legit pursuits that I keep on neglecting and meaning to do anyway.

2. Go to church *every* week. Weather permitting, given I'm on a scooter.

3. Actually clean my room once a week. And start sorting out all the crap that's piling up, sell old anime on trademe etc. as I go.

4. Actually update my LJ more often. Ideally every night just before I go to bed or something.

5. I'm sure I'll think of something more to add later, so shall edit and amend as nessecary.

RPG Player type

Wed, 29 Nov 2006 06:25:11 GMT

And a quick delurk for one thing that actually seems interesting enough to remember to post...

You scored as Storyteller. The Storyteller is in it for the plot: the sense of mystery and the fun of participating in a narrative that has the satisfying arc of a good book or movie. He enjoys interacting with well-defined NPCs, even preferring antagonists who have genuine motivations and personality to mere monsters. To the Storyteller, the greatest reward of the game is participating in a compelling story with interesting and unpredictable plot threads, in which his actions and those of his fellow characters determine the resolution.

With apologies to Robin Laws.

</td>

Storyteller

85%

Character Player

75%

Casual Gamer

60%

Weekend Warrior

45%

Tactician

40%

Power Gamer

40%

Specialist

35%

What RPG Player (Not Character) Type Are You?
created with QuizFarm.com

I've been a gooooooood boy

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 19:42:43 GMT

Dear Santa...

Dear Santa,

This year I've been busy!

Last Wednesday I put money in bl0d's expired parking meter (14 points). Last Saturday I gave foosan a wet willie, then I took it back (-5 points). In November I caught a purse-snatcher who stole prophecyr's purse (30 points). In March I bought porn for greytail (10 points). In September I saved a busload of nuns in Angola (326 points).

Overall, I've been nice (375 points). For Christmas I deserve a new bike!

Sincerely,
m3gabrain

...how exactly does one take back a wet willy? And apparently buying pr0n is a good deed to boot. :D But save a busload of nuns, that does the ticket to be guaranteed to get a bike for Christmas...

Your Language Arts Grade: 95%

Way to go! You know not to trust the MS Grammar Check and you know "no" from "know." Now, go forth and spread the good word (or at least, the proper use of apostrophes).

Are You Gooder at Grammar?
Make a Quiz

I told you my Mumma taughted me gudd englands!

You paid attention during 74% of high school!

68-84% Pretty good, you know that there are libraries and newspapers, and you remember what you've read. You were a child that wasn't left behind!

Do you deserve your high school diploma?
Create a Quiz

Fat lot of good high school did me - no history, no general knowledge, no nothing that helped me out in a number of the questions in the above test. That, and I generally suck as some of those types anyway...

My mumma taughted me gudd englands

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 18:47:50 GMT

Your Vocabulary Score: B+

You have a zealous love for the English language, and many find your vocabulary edifying.
Don't fret that you didn't get every word right, your vocabulary can be easily ameliorated!

How's Your Vocabulary?

So I'm not quite a walking dictionary - at least I know what I'm talking about the majority of the time. :P

Remembering to update sucks

Wed, 15 Nov 2006 11:57:14 GMT

Jeeze, I'm poor at remembering to update this thing. Must try and get into the habit of like updating each night after I get home from work and doing an AH scan in WoW and can't actually play during that 10-15 minutes. :P

Anyhow, hopefully EB games have got their shipment of WoW TCG cards in when I head into town tomorrow. I want my box of boosters, dammit!

I really need to get out the clippers and give my head a shear tonight - air conditioning's been broken at work, and I'm surprised I didn't think of it earlier, given how unbearably stuffy it's been.

Only just realised yesterday that my new work timetable means I'll be able to make it to singing practice on Wednesday nights for church again - and can finally join back in the music group for when we're rostered on. :3

Got a nice big pay bonus this week too - our union payrise went through, backdated to the end of july, meaning an extra $200 or so in the bank coffers, which suitably covers the money spent on the WoW booster box. And then I believe that I'm entitled to a years service allowance that I was elegible for prior to joining the union under the old contracts, which if I actually managed to get now that I've got a manager who actually gives a damn, means I would be due about two years worth of 20c an hour extra backpay somewhere along the line. I'm not holding my breath on that front however, as I'm sure they won't give it up without a fight. But it's nice to think about what sort of lump sum that would result in at any rate... :9

It had to happen sooner or later...

Fri, 03 Nov 2006 12:30:51 GMT

And my scooter went and broke itself. Or something.

The thing starts up just fine and dandy, but when twisting the throttle - there's practically no power being transferred to the wheel. Not properly revving up or something - it'll still go, albiet something at like half walking speed. Just happened to be a night that I had a bagload of shopping to drag home too - at least I could just put it on the scooter and push instead of carrying it (the food, not the scooter). Didn't do anything different than usual - rode into town fine, just wouldn't start up properly whilst trying to start off home after work.

Yeah. So looks like I'll have to take it in to get looked at sometime - dunno when exactly though. Can't imagine that it'll be horribly expensive or anything, given it's only a scooter. Just having to deal with it in general's all annoying and such.

Blah.

Edit: Just took it into Phil Turnbull's the next morning, and all it was was a blocked exhaust. Easy cleaned out in under a minute, no charge, and all's running like a charm again! You can bet I'm going back there again for any future problems with that kind of service... :)

Edit^2:

Well !@#$. Mowing goes all fine and dandy, then I decide to nip down to the supermarket to pick up a thingy of milk. That goes fine, 'till I come back out of the supermarket and attempt to ride home: all of a sudden I have a flat tire for some unexplained reason that wasn't there when I entered the shop, unless I'd punctured it on the way in or something. Irony is abound, as whilst the supermarket is right across the street from Turnbulls where I went earlier today and would have returned to again to deal with it, alas - they're already shut for the day, given it's a weekend and all. So it's back to pushing it all the way back home. With a flat tire, which increases the traction and thus making it require more effort to push. And after having a) pushed it into town earlier and b) mowing extremely long lawns, causing me to c) collapse back in once I finally got back home. Just my luck, and I'll have to push it all the way back out again on Monday when they're open next. And it's defiantly a puncture, as I tried pumping it at a gas station on the way home, all to no avail. At least I'm not attuned to take part on the Onyxia raid prior to MC in WoW tonight, or I'd have been late. Yay for small miracles that don't really matter squat. ;(

Edit^cubed:

And a 230 odd long queue to log into WoW to boot. Just fabulous.

Boatloads of fun.

Tue, 31 Oct 2006 11:26:51 GMT

Lan = good.
Lan + 170gb of stuff leeched = good.
Lan + lack of sleep in order to leech and have fun = good.
Lack of sleep = headache = bad.
Headache + bad cold = bad.
Headache + bad cold + work = badder.
Headache + bad cold + work + painkillers = barely bareable.
Headache + bad cold + work + scooter = good.
Headache + bad cold + plenty of sleep = gooder.
Plenty of sleep + work = good.
Scooter in general = fun.

And that in short sums up my last couple of days/weekend, which was all worth it despite the bad sicky bit inbetween then and now.

I could list all the stuff I leeched at the lan, but it's too much and I'm too lazy. Biggest points of interest though are a whole boatload of Macgyver in relation to Stargate as I got Quantum leap as to Enterprise, if you catch my drift. Also loads of X-men, transformers, and lots of other misc stuff thrown in like Duck Tales, Who's Line Is It Anyway and Clone Wars.

And games - mainly Warcaft III + Frozen throne for the WoW backstory/lore (and of which I'm cheating my way through because I'm a) impatient and b) suck horribly at it), and Matrix: Path of Neo which asofar is uber-fun, even if the graphics are semi-horrible pc port on the PC in comparison to the other platforms it came out on. Still a heck of a lot of fun beating the crap out of anything that moves in a variety of styles. :3

Oh yeah, and just before the lan, leeched a whole lotta comics off a flatmate who'd leeched the whole lot off of someone else who had their comp around or something. Lots of stuff like Aliens, AvP, Asterix, Sin City, The Tick and practically all of Jhonen's stuff which is the best of the lot, should I actually get the time to read it. ^^

I can't be that good, can I?

Sun, 22 Oct 2006 12:43:08 GMT

The Dante's Inferno Test has sent you to Purgatory!
Here is how you matched up against all the levels:

Level	Score
Purgatory (Repenting Believers)	High
Level 1 - Limbo (Virtuous Non-Believers)	Moderate
Level 2 (Lustful)	Low
Level 3 (Gluttonous)	Moderate
Level 4 (Prodigal and Avaricious)	Low
Level 5 (Wrathful and Gloomy)	Low
Level 6 - The City of Dis (Heretics)	Very Low
Level 7 (Violent)	Low
Level 8- the Malebolge (Fraudulent, Malicious, Panderers)	Moderate
Level 9 - Cocytus (Treacherous)	Very Low

Take the Dante's Inferno Hell Test

Busy doesn't even begin to describe my day

Fri, 20 Oct 2006 11:33:38 GMT

Many surprises and such happening. I zip out of the door whilst getting ready for work, and lo and behold - my learners exemption, finally! No more of the not being able to ride a scooter between 10pm-6am anymore, and to and from work I shall zip in a fraction of the time!

So it's supposed to only be mon-fri, but I doubt I'll get pulled up just for filling in extra hours on sat/sun whilst otherwise having the exemption on-hand whilst wearing my work uniform too...

Next surprise was actually going out the front door to head to work, and finding a package just lying on the front doorstep for me - my Logitech G15 keyboard! Suprising on multiple accounts - first, sitting there outside, though kind of looked like it'd been signed for - not to mention I'd only made the deposit on the darn thing yesterday, meaning that it got cleared super-fast, and mailed promptly with extremely fast delivery. @.@ Not that I'm complaining, mind you...

Then at work, the other staff member goes to empty one of the bins into the dumpster, only to find someone had tossed a handbag into said dumpster without either of us having seen anything. So after a peek inside to realise that it wasn't empty, it was a quick jaunt over to the police station. Of which as it turned out, there was an elderly lady right there ahead of me reporting it having been nicked! Needless to say, she was very thankful that I'd headed over so promptly and to have gotten it back with everything still there bar some money in the purse within.

But when I took it in, I didn't realise it was hers straight away - because me and the other staff member had not noticed the old lady's driver's license, but some asian guy or gal's one instead! (can't remember, only took a brief look at it). That, and the lady was more talking about how she'd get home without the keys to her car/house before I realised what she was there to report. At any rate, I'd pointed out the second drivers license that we'd spotted in there, of which it seems that our thief had left something critical behind. Either that, or someone else who got robbed or something, but it felt good to be the good guy and do a good deed like that for the day.

And after that, work as usual - except a *whole* lot busier, giving the long weekend with labour day on monday. Not that I'm complaining - it made the day go by fast, and should do likewise sat/sun as well.

First time riding the scooter at night too, but managed to avoid all boy racers completely. For some reason it just felt kinda faster on the way home from work than the way on in - probably something to do with the chilly air rushing by or similar enhancing the sensation or somesuch.

So now I'm back, it's writing this up then unpacking the keyboard and finally setting up WoW properly with my finished gaming system assembled! Nice and fast too, given how it seems like I've gotten all the upgrades in at once - memory, videocard, monitor & keyboard all within about a week or so. All I need to find is those laser light thingies to illuminate the inside of my case, and I'll be all set for tcosy next weekend up at Massey to kinda show off with. :3

Funfunfun, that's what it all is. And with the extra hours at work (19 days straight, 58 hours a week for the last two), the extra cash has just made the upgrades really affordable too!

Oh yeah, and as of this past wed, I'm now a quarter century old. I consider previously said upgrades and license exemption etc as being the best birthday presents I could have timed to give myself unintentionally. ;)

Work, work and more work

Thu, 12 Oct 2006 12:05:42 GMT

Well, arse - my boss at work just up and resigned/quit with little to no warning. Well, some of the other staff apparently knew back Tuesday, but the info hadn't filtered through to me yet. In short - there goes my weekend, maybe the next one as well if they've not found someone to cover the hours yet. I'll be working something like 55 hours in total this week, and 12 days straight - but of my own volition, mind you. I could probably do with the extra money, after another large power bill from this past month anyhow.

No word on if we're just going to be clumped in with the Gull on tremaine, and the boss there managing both sites, or if we'll get a replacement boss instead, so it's kind of all up in the air at the moment as to who's doing what. Not that it changes too much on my end, as I never got trained up to do anything besides milk orders in the office, so shan't be counted on to do any extra work around the shop, I would hope. And besides, even though it's long 9-10 hour shifts or so over the weekend, it's still going to be dead quiet giving me plenty of time to read newspapers and write more of my story on the pda or just play games on it between customers. ;P

In other news, I'm putting in an order for a 19" widescreen viewsonic lcd for a mere $373.50. Funny thing was that I found the same thing on amazon.com whilst looking for reviews, and they had it listed at US$399! So yippee, once that arrives and I bother picking up my videocard where it's waiting at the courier, I'll finally be able to play WoW in all it's glory at 1440*900 at max resolutions/settings. Speaking of which, so much for free time and any chance at guild raids this weekend, so I figure I'm going to go on a WoW binge this week 'till I know I'm getting a weekend off again.

A lot ado about nothing

Tue, 10 Oct 2006 11:59:11 GMT

Finally splurged out on an epic mount this weekend, leaving me broke with only 35g or so to my name. Well, Tuscansalami's at least. And boy, is it fast - especially with spurs/riding enchant/carrot on a stick! No more being late for raids - or at least, not quite so late.

And now that I loot the mailbox, back up to about 160g from auctions again. ;P

Yay for daylight savings, I can actually get in an AH scan after work before the server shuts down for maintenance again on a tuesday night. Methinks I'll go chuck on another loaf of bread when the game goes down...

Finally got the entire Robotech dvd series out of the way on dvd too. About bleeding time, given it's 85 episodes long across 14 dvd's. Still got plenty more left to watch from last armegeddon though - I think I'm down to around another 30 left at most.

Hopefully should have all the files on my computers sorted out by the end of the week too - then I'll finally know for sure how much space I have left to rip dvd's to make AMV's with.

The 1gb memory finally arrived for my pc - after too long waiting for the next shipment of samsung chips to get in, I got offered to swap it out for renditon ones instead. Hopefully shall be just as good, though I wouldn't know jack about the brand.

Still waiting for a) videocard to arrive, b) taverncast beer stein to arrive, c) learners exemption to arrive and d) one other thing to arrive that I can't say 'till it arrives. :P

Just stuff

Thu, 05 Oct 2006 12:30:09 GMT

Damn this icy artic wind! ><

First off, was bored at work so happened to be reading the latest Time magazine for lack of anything else that wasn't sport, cars, gossip or girly/guy mags. And came across

If God really is God, then God must, by definition, surpass out human understanding. Not entierely. We have scripture; we have reason; we have religious authority; we also have our own spiritual experiances of the divine. But there is still something we will never grasp, something that we can never kow - because God is beyond our human categories. And if God is beyond our categories, then God cannot be captured for certain. We cannot know with the kind of surety that allows us to proclaim truth with a capital T. There will always be sonething that eludes us. If there weren't, it would not be God.

Doubt is not a threat. If we have never doubted, how can we say we have really believed? True belief is not about blind subnission. It is about open-eyed acceptance, and acceptance requires persistant distance from the truth, and that distance is doubt. Doubt, in other words, can feed faith, rather than destroy it. And if forces us, even while believeing, to recognize our fundamental duty with respect to God's truth: humnility. We do now know. Which is why we believe.

In this sense, our religion, our moral life, is simply what we do. A Christian is not a Christian simply because she agrees to conform her life to some set of external principles or dogmas, or beacause at a particular moment in her life, she experianced a rupture and changed herself entirely. She is a Christian primarily because she acts like one. She loves and forgives; she listens and prays, she contemplates and befriends, her faith and her life fuse into a unself-conscious unity that reaffirms a tradition of moral life and yet also makes it her own. In that nonfundamentalist understanding of faith, practice is more important than theory, love is more important than law, and mystery is seen as an insight into truth rather than an obstacle.

And that is how that kind of faith interacts with politics. If we cannot know for sure at all times how to govern our own lives, what right or buisness do we have telling others how to live theirs? From a humble faith comes toleration of other faiths. And from that toleration comes the oxygen that liberal democracy desperately needs to survive. That applies to all faiths, from Islam to Christianity. In global politics, it translates into a willingness to recognize empirical reality, even when it disturbs our ideology and interests. From moderate religion comes pragmatic politics. From a deep understanding of human fallibility comes the political tradition we used to call conservatism.

The 18th century German playwright Gotthold Lessing said it best. He prayed a simple prayer: "If God were to hold all Truth concealed in his right hand, and in his left hand only the steady and diligent drive for Truth, albiet with the proviso that I would always and forever err in the process, and to offer me the choice, I would with all humility take the left hand, and say, Father, I will take this - the pure Truth is for You alone."

which seemed to really speak to me. Religion stuff, best not to click if you're not interested.

Moving on...

Collecter's edition of The Burning Crusade announced! I am *so* getting it, given it includes:
- Both on CD & DVD
- Behind the scenes DVD
- The Art of WoW:TBC book
- In-game pet - Netherwhelp
- Two WoW TCG starter packs + exclusive cards
- Map of Outland mouse pad
- WoW:TBC Soundtrack CD

Pity there's no price/release date *yet*, but pre-ordering at EB games also nets a WoW:TBC poster and 20% off the strategy guide for the expansion. Oh happy days! Also have preordered/paid off a starter pack and three boosters for TCG in the meantime.

Speaking of buying stuff, mower got delivered today. Which just leaves waiting for a little dryer conditions to start tackling the overgrown grass...

And also bought home a breadmaker - now soon as I have the stuff to make it with, I'll have fresh bread on demand. And no more going to Pak'N'Save to find they've run out of cheese & bacon pullaparts!

Also yippee, Lost is finally back on. Just in time to replace the break in Stargate/Atlantis for my weekly fix. Not that I *need* more to watch, given I'm still slowly making my way through last Armegeddon's anime haul - I reckon I'm only a wee bit past halfway now.

Anwyay, I'm off to nosh on cornflakes and go catch up on watching stuff whilst downloading the WoW/South Park episode...

Candy!

Wed, 04 Oct 2006 12:27:51 GMT

My LiveJournal Trick-or-Treat Haul
m3gabrain goes trick-or-treating, dressed up as A long green bent thing with a sort of knob on the end.
bl0d gives you 13 mauve passionfruit-flavoured nuggets.
datdudegil tricks you! You lose 6 pieces of candy!
foosan tricks you! You get a wad of paper.
graphitelion tricks you! You get a rock.
makojin gives you 1 orange coconut-flavoured gummy worms.
meow_tuna gives you 10 light green passionfruit-flavoured jawbreakers.
prophecyr gives you 7 yellow coconut-flavoured gummy bats.
reioki gives you 8 teal root beer-flavoured gummy bats.
thepinkferret gives you 5 softly glowing watermelon-flavoured wafers.
tonicbh gives you 4 softly glowing strawberry-flavoured wafers.
m3gabrain ends up with 42 pieces of candy, a wad of paper, and a rock.
Go trick-or-treating! Username:
Another fun meme brought to you by rfreebern.

Chain letter, woohoo.

Sun, 01 Oct 2006 13:37:15 GMT

Like graphitelion, I'm not the sort to pass these onto others either - I prefer to leave it up to whoever sees them if they want to copy them. But tagged by reioki regardless.

Once tagged by this entry, the assignment is to write a blog entry of some kind with six random facts about yourself. Then, pick six of your friends and tag them; no tag backs. This explanation should be included.

1. I dislike all drinks except for milk, water, and chocolate variants thereof. No fizzy, no juice, no alchohol, no coffee, no tea, no nothing. Furthermore I actually *like* tap water over purified - it just has more 'taste' to it compared to bottled being just bland. That and for some reason it always tastes better out of the basin taps in the bathroom. Something to do with the material used in the pipes being different from the kitchen or something I think...

2. I rather actively collect figurines like you'd probably expect of an anime otaku. Not that I'd call myself that, but I collect 'em nevertheless. Not just anime, but several videogames as well; Quake II, Final Fantasy, Warcraft & Halo.

3. My father's a Lutheran minister. And no, I'm no goody-two-shoes because of it, nor a rebel. If anything, very well-adjusted, imo.

4. I can never be buggered making my bed, so I just use a duvet and a sleepingbag instead. Saves a whole lot of bother.

5. I could have gotten my learners license 10 years ago, but never bothered 'till now.

6. I actually *enjoy* squeezing zits. One reason I never minded acne. ;P

I'm sure that's more than anyone ever wanted to know about me now... ;)

Long time, no update

Sun, 01 Oct 2006 09:49:47 GMT

At a suggestion of Rei's - here I am again, if nothing else to remember to check my friends page regulary.

Onto other stuff.

Funny thing, how my last entry was about scooters. Funny thing, how this entry is thus about scooters as well. In short - I now own my own set of wheels for the low price of $0.00. In other words, a friend I know through church was upgrading to a car, knew I was in the market for a scooter and she just decided to give it to me. :)

No more walking to work, yay! Well, that's almost a lie. Still have to wait for my exemption to be able to ride on a learners between 10pm-5am, given I only finish at midnight. Irrespective, cheap travel, here I come!

Kinda odd to be riding in the middle of the road for once, compared to keeping as close to the side as possible on a regular bike though. Not quite enough room to fit a pizza, so there's a couple disadvantages to the deal - but I won't complain. I think I'll actually get off my lazy butt and get to church on Sundays for a change, given I don't have to walk anymore. It wasn't as if it ever conflicted with my raid schedule in WoW in the first place...

Speaking of WoW, my cloak got an upgrade [Cape of the Black Baron] which basically added 20atp & 1agi, and the Baron in UD Strat also dropped my [Beaststalker Leggings] which gives me a bit more flexibility for trying to get the best dps possible out of my equipment, which ended up in netting an extra 3.5dps juggling equipment about, taking my total to 172.0 ranged dps @ 479 agi. See here for full details on current setup etc.

Had daylight savings sneak up on me too - only realised it when all my computers started changing the time putting my watch out by an hour!

Just means that I have an hour's less sleep after the AQ run that starts at 5am this morning instead of at 4am, but that's what caffeine tablets are for. ;)

Whoo.

Sun, 15 Jan 2006 04:52:30 GMT

Too flipping long since I last bothered. I think I just forgot since migrating to the mac though, but eh. Got a mac client, and with luck I'll remember to post something every now and then or something. Chances are half the stuff I mention are about WoW or something, but eh. Not as if I do much else these days anyhow.