Happy New Year!

Although I wish a very Happy Columbus Day to my American friends, today is actually Thanksgiving Day in Canada. And, when I look at all the scary things and injustices that are going on in the world, I'm most thankful for the fact that all my worries are relatively petty ones in comparison.

On the whole, I'm actually doing rather well. Nothing notably good or bad has been happening lately, which is probably why I haven't posted often. I was just so amused (and annoyed) at my ability to chip my tooth while eating salad that I had to post.

That weekend was a good one for me. I went home to spend a bit of time with my family, but mainly to run the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. My goal was to finish it without burning out and having to walk for the last part, like happened last year. I did it! And I even managed to do it faster than I did last year, which was nice. (: It would have been a bit humbling to know that I run a race no faster than I run-too-hard-then-walk it.

Even more awesome was that my parents surprised us and came out to watch us run! That was really a boost. They've only done that once before.

My comedy of errors from my last post has one final addendum. I must have parked too close to a curb at one point on my drive home, because I ended up putting a scratch in my sidewall. I didn't notice anything untoward until last night, when I went to drive again for the first time in a week, and found my front right tire was completely flat. Doh! That blew the appointment I had planned for that evening.

I learned something quite interesting from a car buff at work: If you do happen to get a flat tire on one of your front wheels, and if you have a compact spare tire (not a full-sized spare), you should actually put the spare on the rear of the car, and move the good rear tire up to replace the flat. The reasoning is that your transmission has a harder time if you try to drive with front wheels of different sizes. Fascinating, eh?

By the way, that's probably backwards for rear-wheel drive cars. If you do have a rear-wheel drive car, don't put your compact spare on the rear, but on the front. (Just be ready for some steering weirdness.)

Today's been an amusingly aggravating mess. In travelling back home from my parents' place, I had a shortcut go long, and locked my keys in the car at a service station. (Fortunately, a skilled truck driver helped me get into my car.)

The icing on the cake is that I just managed to chip my tooth eating a salad. With no nuts in it. Who does that?!

I'll post about my weekend some other time. Short version: nobody died, but not all of us finished.

I was wandering around on TVTropes the other day, and I happened upon the article And Knowing Is Half The Battle. Upon hearing that iconic statement, everyone always asks what the other half of the battle is. And everyone on the internet will gladly answer "ha ha, it's violence! I'm so witty."

If you'll forgive me passing that particular comedic gold mine without my pickaxe, I'd like to put forward that I think the other half of the battle is actually putting your knowledge to use. Knowing something is important, but if you don't act on it, you're only halfway there.

By the way, I'm not dead.

I've always been a sucker for vocal-only music. I guess that's why I so enjoyed being in my church's choir and dabbling in barbershop quartetting.

My mother emailed me this video, by Slovenian group Perpetuum Jazzile. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a capella music done right. The vocal harmonies actually made me mist up, they were so powerful, and the effects at the beginning are just astounding.

I've been playing Chrono Trigger DS on the bus to and from work, from time to time, and I've found my way to the first set of new levels. (At least I'm assuming there will be more.) I can see why the hardcore fans were disappointed with the Lost Sanctum. It takes pretty much everything wonderful about CT, then distils it down into a bunch of fetch quests. All the quests are kept within the same area (but two times), which further adds to the predictability.

One quest even goes as far as to break the game's model of time travel. You need two of something side by side, but only one exists. So what do you do? Go to the past, put it there, go to the future, take it back, go back to the past, and put it beside itself. The act destroys both items to create a new one, which makes me wonder how it still lasted long enough for me to grab it from the future.

On the other hand, it is nice to see some non-violent Reptites. And it is effectively a place to power-level. I've got money to last me the rest of the game.



Oh, and I ran a half-marathon a few weeks ago. And another two weeks before that.

I've been thinking. Many of us, if not all of us, mocked George Lucas when he was continually re-releasing the original Star Wars trilogy. New scenes! New graphics! Digitally remastered! THX enough to crumble the foundations of the movie theatre! Why, we wondered, could he not just let it go?

Square Enix does the same thing. Most of its Final Fantasy series, and (of course) Chrono Trigger, have been re-released several times. Not just in new formats (Playstation, GBA/DS, ...) but with new scenes, new graphics, digitally remastered...

We roll our eyes at George Lucas. So why are we glad when Square Enix does it?

My mother wants me to get on Twitter.

I broke down and bought Chrono Trigger for the DS. I felt silly since I still own it for the PlayStation, but I know I'll get use out of it on the bus. (And the loading time of the PS version won't put me off this one.)

I'm enjoying it so far. It's the nostalgic rush it's meant to be, of course. I'm still adjusting to the two-screens approach though. On the one hand I like not having the battle screen cluttered with gauges and such, but on the other, I'm missing important info on the main screen as I consider my options on the touch screen. I'm tempted to go with the classic interface, but I'm sure I'll get the hang of this one in time.

They've changed some of the dialog, too. Generally it's minor wording, but I found one instance so far that was notable. In the original version, if you enter one of the residences in Truce, there's a placid-looking woman sitting in a chair, and if you speak to her, she says, "I'm so happy I could scream!" The disconnect is amusing. Well, in the DS version, she instead says, "I think I'm about as happy as I'll ever be." She almost sounds depressed this time! Interesting change.

And what was wrong with an item called simply Revive, anyway?