Be Bold, Be Bold

eibborn @ 2013-10-29T00:13:00

2013-10-29T06:15:45Z

So this journal is straight up defunct but i guess you all can check out what a nerd past me was. I'm too lazy to lock it down

Haha my icons are awesome though, I was really rocking the 'peering blankly' thing.

eibborn @ 2011-10-13T20:55:00

2011-10-14T02:55:50Z

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LILhai7IHI

Phoenix Wright in the next Marvel vs Capcom? IS THIS REAL LIFE

eibborn @ 2011-09-07T14:18:00

2011-09-07T20:18:10Z

SO YOU MAY HAVE NOTICED MY PROLONGED ABSENCE.

It is because I moved and my new place will not have the internet until the fourteenth. I am in the middle of a soft detox from my internet addiction. It is painful and boring, and means that I can only go online in public computer labs because my stupid dumb laptop doesn't want to connect to the university's network, but this is actually pretty good for me, probably. SO MUCH FREE TIME.

Also, I did a thing.

Your rainbow is strongly shaded brown and gray.

What is says about you: You are an elegant person. You appreciate the roughness of nature. You depend on modern technology and may feel uncomfortable without it. You feel closer to people when you understand their imperfections.

Find the colors of your rainbow at spacefem.com.

Aside from the whole elegant thing, this is actually really weirdly accurate for a quiz as flighty-seeming as that one.

eibborn @ 2011-08-18T01:21:00

2011-08-18T07:21:58Z

Huh. I don't know if any of you out there have a plurk, but since it seems to be the popular way for roleplayers to communicate and stuff, I made one. And also because I suck at being on AIM, so this is more convenient.

http://www.plurk.com/eibborn

Add me if you happen to have one! I would be delighted to regale you with mundane details of my life online and off. Or whatever's supposed to happen with that, I'm a little unclear.

Homestuck Update

2011-06-08T08:30:35Z

So. This pretty much confirms what I've suspected for a long while now. All these deaths are a running gag.

eibborn @ 2011-04-28T18:18:00

2011-04-29T08:00:21Z

So hey, quick state of the nation: I'm living at home for the summer, working the museum beat with filing at the clinic filling my free time. Looking forward to an election for the first time in my life, even though I'm betting that nothing will change. I will a little upset if the first Canadian government to ever be held in contempt of Parliament wins a majority only a few months later! And also I kind of think that Tory policies are generally pretty not awesome, especially when they have to do with going prorogue and putting the good of their party over the nation, their bizarre hatred of statistics, and being otherwise unpleasant in time-wasting ways.

Of course I don't really know which party I actually do support, so I guess I need to sort that out probably. I can't shake the belief that any other party would be just as bad in their own way, so we need a minority government in order for them to balance each other out (and also fail to accomplish anything in a timely manner, but no change is better than negative changes as far as I'm concerned).

Also hey, my sister bought me a paid LJ account, which is exciting! I promptly realized that I have no idea what real people use for icons. My first instinct was to just upload a big pile of super jittery gifs because I hate my eyes and everyone else's, but I guess I ended up just dumping neat icons all over the place and if I find something better I can always go ahead and change things up. I don't even know when this thing expires. I don't even know how to know when this thing expires. But that's cool, I am okay with a bit of unpredictability.

Joined entanglement_rp as Tavros. He is being adopted by a genetically modified robodolphin from a sci-fi novel, so that's pretty much every kind of awesome. I am lone canon warrioring it up in there, so uh if anyone feels like dumping a HS kid or troll in there, that would be pretty cool. It is not a big thing, either, though; playing him on his own is fun enough as it is so far. I think I am not very good at it yet, but I will get used to it eventually.

Elsewhere, I had a terrible rap-off, roleplayed a moving duet between Gamzee and Tavros, and somehow convinced a Karkat to tell Tavros a bedtime story. I will probably copy/paste some excerpts and things some time because it was kind of fun and hilarious.

dear almost everyone, you will not miss anything if you skip over this

2011-04-09T01:47:20Z

HEY couldbesunshine

PO: I think it would be nice to be a seadweller.
PO: I would have a lighthouse.
PO: And I'd plunder sea wrecks.
EA: + no you wouldn't, you'd be like a blackrom hussy. piss everyone off and need a million auspitices, and then someone would eventually kill you!!!!!
PO: Naw.
PO: I hate people.
EA: + exactly!
PO: Hmm...
PO: Actually, that sounds awful.
EA: + yepppp you'd be all 'NO JESUS I HATE YOU PLATONICALLY' and they'd be all
PO: And since I hate everyone, and for trolls hate=love... I'm sure I'd find a way to make this work.
PO: Yes!!
PO: Platonic hate for the wins!!
EA: + "cmon stop playin these games wwith me its not fair"
PO: NOT ERIDAN OH GOD NO. THAT IS HORRIFYING.
EA: + "you knoww you want a piece a the prince so lets stop doin this and just get together already"
PO: STOP TRYING TO BREAK MY BRAIN PLEASE
PO: I would just get a stable kismesis and tell everyone I'm taken.
PO: Problem solved!!
EA: + "horrifying i had no idea your feelins for me wwere so strong dont you think youre movin a bit fast"
EA: + "not that i mind glub glub"
EA: + THAT WOULD BE YOUR LIFE

AND LATER:

PO: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH
PO: NO WAIT. Eridan would love you!!
PO: Because you pity him.
EA: + woooooow look at those strong fee
EA: + what
PO: You are flushed for Eridan!!
PO: Hate vs pity!!
PO: You are all about the pity!!
PO: HA HA
EA: + uhh
PO: BACKPEDDLE NOW, BITCH!!
EA: + it's not a very strong pity though
EA: + so
PO: Yeah, but it's more than he gets from anyone else!!
PO: He'd be all over that!!
EA: + i mean it's more of a conciliatory pity!
EA: + like uh
PO: HAHAHAHAHA
EA: + I wouldn't mind hanging out with him & giving him relationship advice
PO: YOU ARE PALE FOR ERIDAN!!
EA: + i mean im horribly ill equipped but
EA: + oh god shut up
PO: WHEREAS I JUST WANT TO DRIVE A STAKE THROUGH HIS HEART!!
PO: I SO WIN!!
PO: You're even considering how it would work!!
EA: + fine you can be the blackhussy and i'll be a pink two wheel device!
PO: lol!!
PO: Okay, fine. My option is the better one, anyways.
EA: + not so sure about that
EA: + you're the one filling pails with him!
PO: Whaaaaaaaat??
PO: No!!
EA: + yeppppp
PO: That is not what would happen!!
PO: It would be unrequited!!
EA: + oh come on this hate is so pure
PO: UNREQUITED!!
EA: + i'm only looking out for my moirail here
PO: MY HATE FOR EVERYONE IS SO PURE YOU MORON
EA: + there's really no reason for you two to deny what you have
PO: I AM BLACKROM WITH THE WORLD!!
EA: + i mean ok he can come on a bit strong, but you basically just admitted that-
EA: + yeah
EA: + see, you do too!
PO: NO!!
EA: + no one is safe from your dark flirtations
EA: + so why not give the guy a chance!
PO: I do not come on strong. Everyone is safe!!
PO: And I will not!!
PO: Ever!!
PO: Ever ever!!
PO: Never!!
PO: Ever!!
EA: + oh wow this is so adorable
EA: + neither of you could confess your feelings
EA: + well don't worry i could act as a go-between
PO: NO
PO: NO NO NO
EA: + WHO'S A DEAD RUSTBLOOD NOW, FISHFACE?
EA: + hehehe

SPOILERS FOR ALL OF HOMESTUCK

2011-04-07T08:43:07Z

Um. So I set out to put my understanding of Tavros' relationships with his fellow trolls down on paper since I'm planning on trying to RP him, and it got really, really long. Stupidly long.

So, ok. Let's do this from the top of the hemospectrum to the bottom.

Feferi: He has never talked to her in canon! I think that he is probably intimidated by her and by what the other highbloods would think if he went out of his way to speak to her, but if they ever did have a chance to talk they would get along very well. I think that her energetic personality would -EXCIT----E him, and although she is mischievous, she isn't dangerous or hostile like many of the others.

Eridan: Probably never talks to Tavros is he has a choice. Tavros has the dubious honour of being one of the few people Eridan hasn't hit on, so I think he's too low for the seatroll to dirty his hands with. Possibly he jealously stares Tavros down if he ever so much as looks in Feferi's general direction.

Gamzee: Probably the person Tavros feels most comfortable with, because Gamzee is the least judgmental person ever. So Tavros can open up to him and not worry about looking stupid, or offending him, or anything like that. Because of this, he is Tavros' best friend after Aradia dies... but Tavros isn't his. }:( Unfortunately, in a way Gamzee's friendship is so cheap that it doesn't count. He is everyone's friend to the same degree, always willing to offer advice in a useless, spacey way. But it doesn't matter to Tavros that his advice is terrible and that his interests are inscrutable as long as they can rap together and he doesn't have to worry about any hostility. Tavros needs this relationship, I think, even though one side of it might not have a lot of real substance. He has a lot of respect for Gamzee. Maybe red feelings, if you ship that way.

Equius: He probably never spoke to Equius before the Veil. He'd never initiate that conversation, at least, although Equius might have objected to his friendship with Nepeta. Later on, I imagine he is ridiculously thankful for the legs and goes out of his way to awkwardly thank the guy over and over, which possibly the blueblood can appreciate since it's Tavros showing proper respect to a superior.

Vriska: Um. I imagine he didn't know her very well before the accident. If he did, he would know about the whole "man-eating spider" issue. Post-accident, he wants nothing to do with her. At all. Him telling her that Rufio didn't want them to talk kind of implies that she kept in touch with him in the time between the accident and SGRUB. He has no idea why she'd talk to him, but I imagine him trying to give extremely booooooooring answers to try to ward her off without her figuring it out. And she figures it out every time.

During SGRUB, I think a big scene between them is when she tries to make him apologise for being handicapped, and he tells her no, that's unreasonable and I don't want to, and he doesn't back down even though he is sad and alone. This is important! He doesn't do everything she says and even at this point he isn't a coward or deathly afraid of her.

With some prompting from Kanaya, she helps him achieve his lifelong dream of flying. He gains an army of monsters and solves puzzles and it's so awesome wow and Vriska isn't making him feel terrible or anything! He is having fun and he is mobile and he even lets some of his dorky language slip ("strict progress"), which mostly only happens with Gamzee. Then Vriska gets bored because let's be honest, finding segments of a puzzle when they're scattered throughout a desert that is all the same is ~~like playing Diablo II all over again goddamn it Act II~~ pretty dull. Anyway, whoops, fun is over, and the strict progress gets tucked away. He doesn't have any choice but to do what she tells him once more.

And whoa, suddenly he's in her hive and she's dressed as a fairy and oh god what limbs will she ruin this time??? Now that they're face-to-face and she's holding him up, the genuine terror kicks in. And then lots of confusion. He is almost immediately worried that he upset her, and he apologises in the wimpiest way using the memo. But Vriska is a big girl, she gets over it and they go back to having a good time! They are finding treasure and zipping through the air and oh look, now his former friend is murdering the person who he's been having fun playing with. GENUINE DISTRESS!!! Since I ship ridiculous numbers of things, it's not impossible that he started developing red feelings for her in the period leading up to this. Or not, whatever. Point is, he was enjoying playing with Vriska until Aradia popped up and ended that.

And then he failed to kill Vriska and retreated to the dream world for more-or-less the rest of SGRUB. He failed her big test for him and let her bleed out painfully, and he can't deal with it so he proceeds to basically avoid her as much as possible. Her dreamself is gone, after all, so Prospit is safe for him.

The next time they speak, they're in the Veil and Tavros finds out about her involvement in the creation of Bec Noir. He tells her that he's going to try and stop her, getting over both his fear of her and his escapist habits, but too late and in the wrong way. Possibly she would have let him live it if it was a caliginous thing, but he never hated her even at that point.

Post-death, I have a hard time thinking he holds it against her. His quality of life is vastly improved by it, so to speak. He has successfully absconded from the unpleasant sequence of events that made up his life and can hang out with people who he respects and likes (Jade, Dave, Aradia).

Wow that was outrageously long. Jeez, Vriska.

Terezi: His only interaction with her is through FLARPING. Presumably he knows her as poorly as he does Vriska, but he does turn to her for help after Aradia fails to respond. I think that he probably knows about his involvement in her blinding, but once again he avoids the issue. It's noteworthy that she did ask Aradia how he was doing after his accident, so she may keep a closer eye on him than he knows.

Kanaya: Although they never speak onscreen, Kanaya offers him advice for improving his self-esteem pre-SGRUB, and twice he wants to solicit her help for dealing with Vriska, once successfully. The other time, he doesn't get the chance. I interpret their relationship as being like one between a teacher and pupil. He turns to her for advice, but he wouldn't goof around with her or really spill his guts like I could see him doing with Gamzee or Nepeta. She is probably the driving force behind him getting new legs from Equius, which he is incredibly grateful for even though it was kind of upsetting having his legs chainsawed off.

Nepeta: A friend! A real, completely sober person who has no reason to feel guilt for his condition, which means she may be his most genuine friendship since Aradia's death. He is a pretty awkward roleplayer, but I see it as a regular thing that the two of them do, even throughout SGRUB and in the Veil. He cares for her safety and trusts Equius' judgment on the matter.

Karkat: "HEY ASSHOLE, STOP PLAYING GAMES FOR GIRLS."
Tavros thinks Karkat is mean and intimidating, but he trusts him as a leader and as a source of advice, kind of like a Kanaya who yells more. He thinks Karkat dislikes him, so he avoids him unless something important is happening. I wonder how many times I can say "avoid" in this analysis.

Sollux: Is unpredictable and sometimes worse than Karkat. The two of them have so little in common that they probably never talk ever.

Aradia: The best friend Tavros ever had. His partner in Team Charge and one of the few people in the comic to say genuinely kind things to him and to appreciate and encourage his dorky, fanciful ideals. "y0u might be the 0nly flarper in the w0rld wh0 really understands the true spirit 0f the game"

He didn't know why (Aradia asks Nepeta to keep either her death, or her integration with Frogsprite a secret in 4093. I assume it is her death), but his closest friend suddenly dropped all of her interests and had a personality reversal. Suddenly she was spooky and depressing, and much less talkative. I imagine eventually he stopped trolling her.

The next time he sees her, she beats Vriska to death before his eyes,was scarring him forever. Any desire he might have had to talk to her vanished at that point. She is a major contributor to the situation he is trying not to think about.

After his death, Aradia is back to normal and Team Charge rides again! }:D yEAAAAAHHHHHHHH! Sure, she's busy flitting around dream bubbles and expositing, but who cares!? She is herself again.

by the way, my (LJ) notifications don't work because LJ is a spammy bag of dicks

2011-03-16T11:15:23Z

Ugh. I told my parents that I got diagnosed with depression and social anxiety and now they won't leave me alone. This is so dumb. So dumb. And tiring. I can't even object because really I'm pretty much useless at everything I've tried to accomplish in the past little while, so I guess I need them to hold my hand and clean up my stupid messes instead of letting me passively accept the consequences my dumb frustrating irrational behaviour and probably failing out of university, never getting a job, and never leaving my room slash roadside cardboard box slash correctional facility in some farflung alternate universe in which I have become a hardened criminal. And apparently gotten caught because, let's face facts, I'd be terrible at it.

So uh, I have those illnesses, which I guess I never mentioned in a blatant violation of the silly code I was trying to establish for myself, to be honest and unashamed about Things That Are True which I am pretty sure I mentioned in my journal a long time ago. So there. Obviously because I decided not to be ashamed of any aspect of me, I won't be, how's that for me being irrational in the hilariously optimistic direction? Whatever, shut up, I'm still doing that thing even if I'm bad at it. The optimism thing, apparently, and also the being not ashamed thing. Those things.

Now that I'm done vomiting melodrama of the hilariously immature variety, let's indulge in my current vehicle for escapism, because hey, I may as well be self-aware as long as I'm doing it. Also I swear to god if anyone starts taking the things I say seriously because of this I'll make a truly pathetic attempt at gnawing your face off. Because seriously, I poke fun at my quirks and am kind of sarcastic about myself in a mild kind of way on this thing all the time and if you read too far into it (or not far enough, I guess!) there's a chance you'll misunderstand my whimsical doubletalk.

Okay right, um, let's talk about the new Homestuck album instead! Or actually, just one song on it, which is actually a revamp of a different song, and that song is the one that I really wanted to talk about in the first place. So hey, okay, let's do this! The Alternia Theme did something that I thought was impossible: it broke through the thick callouses that have developed on my understanding of music. I mean, dang.

It's a melancholy piano theme, for christ's sake. It's such a desperate tug at the hearstrings. Melancholy piano themes are the sad child of music. If you want to make the viewers sad when they see your movie, you include a sad child with a speech impediment asking when daddy's coming home. If you want to make your listeners sad when they hear your song, you do a tinkly sad piano thing and suddenly everyone's weeping helplessly.

And I think that's it's really overdone! I was pretty sure that I was at the point where my immersion would be completely broken in the same way that sad children in movies do. Being aware that it's a shallow emotional grab effectively detaches me from the scene instead of drawing me in. Entertainment is all about emotional manipulation, but it stops working when you use the same tricks over and over!

So why is this song a punch in the gut to me? I'm not really sure! Maybe because it was composed without that agenda in mind, well before anyone knew how sad and involved the associated characters were going to be. Maybe because some wise guy copy/pasted Karkat's moment of helplessness into the comments below it, and I guess it's kind of sad thinking that he hasn't been really happy since his guardian died, even if he is ridiculously hyperbolic all the time and probably even there. Or I don't know, I guess that it might just be the ultimate fate of all the trolls. They've been through a lot, and not just in SGRUB. It doesn't matter, I guess! Whatever the reason, that's the only sad piano piece in years that has actually slipped through and gouged at my emotions.

So I was really excited to see it on the newest album, Alterniabound! Unfortunately, despite the fact that Alternia expands on its previous iteration beautifully, it sacrificed the simplicity that I guess really got to me. Maybe the reason it had a lesser effect on me is that the original didn't make use of the same emotional crescendos and decrescendos, it wasn't slow and hesitating, either. Maybe that's why it slipped under my radar, it didn't use as many of the usual tricks? But the point is that the new version didn't hit me all that hard at all until right near the end. For just a moment, it was beautiful, and it blew me away... and then the song continued. Dangit. If they'd ended it on the rest after the fermata just a few measures before the end, I'd have been in love. The chord would have been heartbreakingly and perfectly unresolved, and it would make me insane. Oh well, it's still a very nice song along with the rest of the album.

I'm especially pleased with the existence of Trollcops and She's A Sp8der! The former because hahaha Cop!Sollux is hilarious and the latter because I had no idea how much I wanted Vriska to have a Pirates of the Caribbean-inspired song until it actually happened. Arisen Anew is awfully -EXCITING, too, with its Dr. Who and Megane Luka samples! And, hehe, FIDUSPAWN, GO! gets special mention because of the Pokemon references.

Really, just go listen to this thing, gosh.
http://homestuck.bandcamp.com/album/alterniabound
http://homestuck.bandcamp.com/album/alterniabound
http://homestuck.bandcamp.com/album/alterniabound

---
Hehe, in other news, a friend of mine is apparently reading webcomics! Some good, some less good. I showed her Homestuck and Basic Instructions, which I consider to be waaaay better than anything Tim B^Uckly could hope to produce. I didn't realize that I am kind of a webcomics snob until she said she'd been reading CAD and my automatic response was "oh no, but it's kind of bad compared to all these! :O " Which I guess makes me kind of a huge prick, but I didn't say it aloud, I just recommended things that I thought were better in a manner which I hope was appropriately mannerly.

That was a joke because I am always mannerly. Hoo hoo hoo.

eibborn @ 2011-03-09T06:11:00

2011-03-09T12:16:49Z

Guhhh, what kind of incredibly shitty biologist can't even keep his venus flytrap alive for one stupid year. Some kind of white mould got it while it was hibernating in my stupid fridge, and I am stupid, stupid, stupid for not noticing until it was too late. And by "too late" I mean probably at least a week and a half after all hope of effectively dealing with the problem had passed.

On the bright side, I now have
uh
a jar of mould, which is pretty cool even though it makes my room smell kind of musty. Which I don't find unpleasant, actually, but which people who don't spend time up to their elbows in worse than it might find kind of gross. WHATEVER. Will it produce sclerotia? Can I diagnose it with my limited experience? There are a lot of white moulds out there, and it could be anything from anywhere! ...It's probably just boring Penicillium,, though, and even though I don't have any kind of propensity for breathing problems or allergic reactions to moulds, it might not be. um. strictly healthy. To keep around, just pumping out those spores into the air.

It's possible--just possible--that I have problems with admitting when I need to throw things out. Um. Cool as fungi are. And relevant. Or maybe I just want to keep it around as a transparent and humiliating vehicle for self-punishment because I'm mad at myself for killing an awesome plant, but that would be just plain unlike me, gosh. Much more probable that I just love fungus.

Yeah, umm, I'll throw it out tomorrow.

tl;dr: borrowed laptop. that's all that really matters.

2011-03-04T01:08:35Z

Okay um, because I know you were all on the edge of your seats worrying about my computer woes, I'm borrowing liquidbiohazard's old laptop until mine is done being complete garbage. It is a mac, so it's kind of stupefying, but I think overall it is probably a good thing to have an opportunity to get my claws into a new operating system and figure out its quirks and all that. It's actually kind of awesome. Although geeze, Sarah, you don't even have ad block plus on this thing, what's up with that? You're going to get embedded advertising malware which does exist for macs no matter how rare it is. Umm, so I'm going to add it to the short list of add-ons that you said it was okay to download. Just for the record, I guess. I could leave it when I'm done with the thing, if you want? If not, then uh I'll just kill it with the rest of the garbage I download. It is probably not a thing that matters very much at all.

And uh, thanks again, by the way.

...Wow okay there used to be three more paragraphs but something dreadful happened between the post button and the part where you actually get to read what I wrote. It involved every word being surrounded by = signs and " marks, and I don't want to go through half an hour of correcting it because geeze what's up with that, what a pain. It wasn't important anyway, just my typical wordvomit and rambling metaphors (which I am finding increasingly amusing and conductive to rendering everything I say as illegible as my handwriting is).

I am also kind of digging her music collection, which I asked if I could snoop through because man, music is personal, okay? I am not the sort to go rooting through this stuff casually. I have found some that I love and some that I do not! I like that you have the Fantastic Mr. Fox soundtrack because seriously I listen to that on YouTube sometimes, seriously it is like having sex in my ears. And I am kind of getting educated on bands that people actually listen to instead of my typical fare of, I don't know, synthesized Japanese voices and baroque. Speaking of baroque, did you know that one of Mozart's Horn Concertos plays in a scene in Fantastic Mr. Fox? It is when some human or other is in a security room with all the screens and whatnot. I've actually played that very song, so I thought it was pretty awesome. And kind of interesting.

Wow okay pulling out of that rambling nose-dive of a paragraph, back to my ever-so-fascinating laptop adventures. Sarah also had the unfortunate foresight to invite me to mess with her Facebook account and the like, completely robbing it of any fun whatsoever however sarcastic the invitation may have been. This, I think, is the biggest hazard that comes with being friends with someone you've dated. They already know how to utterly defeat you. WELL FINE, I DON'T KNOW HOW TO USE FACEBOOK ANYWAY, SO THERE. Also, apparently hijacking peoples' journals to make hurr durr goofy entries is perfectly acceptable good fun for everyone but digging through their music is not, great job on those priorities, self, that's not screwed up at all. I guess the difference is that I wouldn't actually be snooping, just impersonating. And not even impersonating so much as writing " i="I" am="AM" sarah="SARAH" and="AND" i="I" smell="SMELL" like="LIKE" butts"="BUTTS"" or="or" something="something" equally="equally" as="as" obvious.="obvious." i="I" don't="don't" know,="know," why="why" am="AM" i="I" even="even" trying="trying" to="to" justify="justify" a="a" hypothetical="hypothetical" prank="prank" that="that" i="I" probably="probably" wouldn't="wouldn't" have="have" even="even" thought="thought" of="of" if="if" she="she" hadn't="hadn't" mentioned="mentioned" it.="it." it's="It's" not="not" like="LIKE" i'd="I'd" have="have" known="known" she="she" was="was" logged="logged" in="in" to="to" facebook="Facebook" if="if" she="she" hadn't="hadn't" joked="joked" about="about" it,="it," and="AND" i've="I've" never="never" actually="actually" done="done" that="that" kind="kind" of="of" thing="thing" before="before" so="so" um.="um." wow="Wow" look="look" at="at" where="where" this="this" paragraph="paragraph" is="is" going!="going!" turns="Turns" out="out" it's="It's" not="not" a="a" thing="thing" i="I" was="was" talking="talking" about="about" at="at" all,="all," it's="It's" an="an" excessively="excessively" descriptive="descriptive" metaphor="metaphor" for="for" a="a" plane="plane" crashing="crashing" into="into" the="the" ground,="ground," which="which" is="is" a="a" thing="thing" that="that" i="I" have="have" reason="reason" to="to" talk="talk" about!="about!" the="the" perfect="perfect" cover="cover" story,="story," bless="bless" this="this" sharp="sharp" mind.="mind." but="But" hey,="hey," while="while" i'm="I'm" being="being" grossly="grossly" intrusive,="intrusive," let's="let's" go="go" all="all" the="the" way="way" and="AND" talk="talk" about="about" what="what" our="our" computers="computers" say="say" about="about" us.="us." me,="Me," i've="I've" crafted="crafted" my="my" very="very" own="own" labyrinth="labyrinth" of="of" folders="folders" with="with" misleading="misleading" or="or" self-referential="self-referential" names.="names." my="my" pokemon="pokemon" folder="folder" is="is" named="named" "there=""there" are="are" many="many" things="things" wrong="wrong" with="with" me",="me"," for="for" example.="example." or="or" uh,="uh," i="I" have="have" "awesome=""Awesome" party="Party" tricks"="Tricks"" which="which" is="is" full="full" of="of" cool="cool" miscellanea.="miscellanea." and="AND" then="then" there="there" are="are" weirder="weirder" things!="things!" like="LIKE" um,="um," pressing="pressing" the="the" insert="Insert" button="button" while="while" my="my" browser="browser" is="is" open="open" will="will" bring="bring" up="up" an="an" error="error" message="message" reading="reading" something="something" along="along" the="the" lines="lines" of="of" "nenio=""Nenio" tetsiu"="tetsiu"" which="which" is="is" not="not" any="any" real="real" language="language" at="at" all,="all," but="But" may="may" possibly="possibly" mean="mean" "nothing=""nothing" found"="found"" in="in" esperanta.="Esperanta." i'm="I'm" a="a" little="little" unclear="unclear" on="on" why="why" exactly="exactly" this="this" is="is" a="a" thing="thing" that="that" happens,="happens," but="But" i="I" like="LIKE" it.="it." my="my" computer="computer" is="is" a="a" mysterious="mysterious" slab="slab" that="that" i="I" could="could" not="not" hope="hope" to="to" comprehend,="comprehend," so="so" why="why" shouldn't="shouldn't" it="it" have="have" completely="completely" bizarre="bizarre" quirks="quirks" that="that" i="I" can't="can't" make="make" sense="sense" of?="of?" this="this" is="is" a="a" cool="cool" thing,="thing," and="AND" it="it" is="is" the="the" product="product" of="of" my="my" combined="combined" intentionality="intentionality" and="AND" natural="natural" attraction="attraction" to="to" disorganisation.="disorganisation." i="I" always="always" wanted="wanted" my="my" computer="computer" personalized="personalized" like="LIKE" that.="that." i="I" named="named" it="it" trap="Trap" for="for" a="a" big="big" bunch="bunch" of="of" reasons,="reasons," and="AND" that="that" is="is" one="one" of="of" them.="them." i'm="I'm" not="not" really="really" going="going" to="to" go="go" into="into" what="what" i="I" think="think" sarah's="Sarah's" computer="computer" says="says" about="about" her="her" because="because" i="I" think="think" it="it" would="would" be="be" kind="kind" of="of" rude,="rude," actually,="actually," and="AND" it="it" is="is" probably="probably" kind="kind" of="of" uncomfortable="uncomfortable" for="for" her="her" to="to" be="be" reading="reading" about="about" me="me" assessing="assessing" her="her" based="based" on="on" this!="this!" (and="(and" also="also" i="I" am="AM" not="not" actually="actually" rude="rude" enough="enough" to="to" go="go" digging="digging" through="through" this="this" thing,="thing," i="I" am="AM" only="only" using="using" the="the" internet,="internet," mostly.="mostly." this="this" is="is" all="all" inspired="inspired" by="by" the="the" thing="thing" that="that" pops="pops" up="up" when="when" you="you" open="open" a="a" new="new" tab="tab" which="which" has="has" shortcuts="shortcuts" to="to" all="all" of="of" your="your" most-used="most-used" sites="sites" and="AND" stuff)="stuff)" but="But" i="I" kind="kind" of="of" wonder="wonder" if="if" i'm="I'm" the="the" only="only" person="person" whose="whose" computers="computers" really="really" reflect="reflect" them?="them?" i="I" mean,="mean," it's="It's" pretty="pretty" much="much" an="an" adage="adage" that="that" peoples'="peoples'" workspaces="workspaces" reflect="reflect" their="their" personalities.="personalities." and="AND" um,="um," i="I" think="think" that="that" i'm="I'm" probably="probably" way="way" too="too" straight-forward="straight-forward" to="to" be="be" really="really" properly="properly" represented="represented" by="by" the="the" ridiculous,="ridiculous," inconvenient="inconvenient" maze="maze" that="that" i="I" turned="turned" my="my" computer="computer" into,="into," but="But" in="in" other="other" ways="ways" i="I" think="think" it="it" must="must" say="say" a="a" lot="lot" about="about" me!="me!" but="But" maybe="maybe" not="not" a="a" lot="lot" that="that" you="you" could="could" actually="actually" make="make" sense="sense" of="of" without="without" knowing="knowing" me="me" already,="already," maybe.="maybe." um,="um," i="I" don't="don't" know.="know." it="it" would="would" be="be" interesting="interesting" and="AND" embarrassing="embarrassing" to="to" see="see" my="my" most-used="most-used" sites="sites" laid="laid" out="out" for="for" all="all" to="to" see="see" like="LIKE" that,="that," probably,="probably," because="because" it="it" would="would" probably="probably" mostly="mostly" focus="focus" on="on" places="places" revolving="revolving" around="around" either="either" complete="complete" anonymity="anonymity" or="or" only="only" the="the" most="most" transient="transient" of="of" identities.="identities." gosh="GOSH" could="could" this="this" be="be" social="SOCIAL" anxiety="ANXIETY" disorder="DISORDER" manifesting="MANIFESTING" in="in" my="my" browsing="BROWSING" habits,="HABITS," i="I" don't="don't" know="KNOW" (i="(I" have="have" that,="that," by="by" the="the" way;="way;" i="I" forget="forget" if="if" i="I" ever="ever" mentioned).="mentioned)." in="in" other="other" news,="news," tangentially="tangentially" related="related" at="at" best,="best," i="I" played="played" some="some" of="of" persona="Persona" 3="3" when="when" i="I" realized="realized" that="that" my="my" entire="entire" life="life" revolves="revolves" around="around" having="having" internet="internet" access,="access," which="which" i="I" was="was" desperately="desperately" lacking.="lacking." and="AND" um,="um," i="I" am="AM" pretty="pretty" sure="sure" that="that" the="the" protagonist="protagonist" is="is" a="a" huge="HUGE" bitch="BITCH" (bluh="(BLUH" bluh).="BLUH)." seriously,="Seriously," i="I" am="AM" the="the" most="most" manipulative,="manipulative," insincere="insincere" douchebag="douchebag" in="in" existence.="existence." i="I" don't="don't" even="even" like="LIKE" most="most" of="of" these="these" people!="people!" i'm="I'm" just="just" using="using" them="them" to="to" power="power" up="up" my="my" personas.="Personas." it="it" is="is" horrible="horrible" because="because" i="I" can="can" already="already" tell="tell" that="that" they're="they're" going="going" to="to" spill="spill" their="their" teenage="teenage" guts="guts" to="to" me="me" and="AND" i'm="I'm" going="going" to="to" swallow="swallow" it="it" all="all" up,="up," all="all" the="the" while="while" thinking="thinking" "score,=""score," social="SOCIAL" link="Link" rank="rank" up!"="up!"" and="AND" then="then" just="just" toss="toss" out="out" some="some" advice,="advice," maybe,="maybe," just="just" so="so" it="it" seems="seems" like="LIKE" i'm="I'm" paying="paying" attention.="attention." so="so" there's="there's" that</i>. I actually kind of want to roleplay the guy that way, a cold but very stable guy who goes out of his way to make friends and root into peoples' business, but only because it benefits himself. Because emotionally healthy characters apparently aren't things that I can write well at all, not unless they're completely obnoxious in some other way. Which is why the whole Quatre Winner thing was a complete bust.

eibborn @ 2011-03-02T17:00:00

2011-03-02T23:00:38Z

Wow uh there is pretty much no point in trying to use the university's internet with my blackberry.
That's really all there is to say on the matter.

eibborn @ 2011-02-27T00:40:00

2011-02-27T06:47:37Z

Bluh, broken laptop. Expect to not hear much from me for a while. I mean, I'll use the university's computers or whatever, but I'll feel like a monstrous goob if I waste as much time there as I normally do online. And without my firefox add-ons it kind of feels like I'm typing by smashing a rock into another rock and praying to the sky god for my message to find its destination. How spoiled I have become.

Just, um. So you know or whatever, I guess. Because I have no pre-existing history of vanishing without a word for months at a time.

eibborn @ 2011-02-15T03:38:00

2011-02-15T10:35:04Z

According to the timestamps on deviantart, I told my friend Nicole about Homestuck one day ago. Which isn't very specific, but okay.

Six hours ago, she called me and told me she was outside my dorm. With Gushers by Betty Crocker. And then we had a tea party at her residence with popcorn and gushers and a few of the people who live there.

I expect that she'll be finished reading Homestuck by the end of the week, and then we can hang out and discuss all the plot twists! All of them!!!!!!!! Also I had to tell her what shipping was so that she'd be prepared for Nepeta. It is so funny when people don't know internet things like that! I bet she doesn't get the jokes about furries even a little bit.

Oh man I wish I could see the look on her face when she sees Equius' hive for the first time, hehe. I am totally missing out!

The moral of the story is that I have a refreshed appreciation for my friends who do these kinds of things for me. Valentine's Day and romance and all that is great, sure, but I think the best kind of relationship is still friendship.

JUST IGNORE EVERYTHING I WRITE AS IT IS ALL EXTREMELY SELF-INDULGENT. JUST LOOK AT THE PICTURE.

2011-02-14T22:27:52Z

Hehe, Valentine's day art! There is so much Valentine's day art in the Homestuck fandom. Now that I am done being uncharacteristically irritable (seriously what was up with that? jeeze), I love it all in embarrassingly childish ways. Is this seriously what people have been doing in fandoms all these years? I've always kind of stayed on the edge and enjoyed the show, but mostly didn't care. But wow okay I'm sorry but I guess I can say that I can get weird happy feelings from seeing all this cute happy art!

So uh, happy Valentine's Day! Go get cheap chocolate tomorrow, guys!

Um, I started drawing something nice but then I got bored and did it all on like two layers, and it stopped being nice when it started being Karkat yelling "Fuck!" and throwing his arms up in melodramatic disgust. The nice thing about Homestuck is that I don't feel as insecure about drawing terrible things because I can just pretend like I meant to do it like that. I even go through some very real effort to make it look appropriate. Rough edges and stuff. Except I'm actually pretty terrible at this specific brand of incredibly sloppy, so I think that I am exploring new avenues of awful. I took a right turn at Neckless Street, bumped into Hands Crescent, and finally went for a joyride down Apathy Boulevard where it crossed Background Lane and crashed dead on into the lazy tree. Now I'm passed out and broken, waiting for the life to slowly drain from this body that's just lying there all sprawled out and bleeding incredibly shitty pictures all over my friends' list.

Okay seriously I tried to make the dialogue something nice or witty but nothing was quite as succinct as what I ended up with. So here is my half-hearted (hehe) attempt at a Valentine's thing concealed behind a cut so you don't have to look at it if you don't feel like seeing a picture hacked out in a few minutes with minimal effort. Marvel as I obfuscate my flaws with one hand and describe exactly what I'm doing with the other. Presumably the other has two eyes drawn on in and likely a tongue on the thumb or something, and I'm moving it to imitate speech motions as I speak aloud. The point is that this is a fairly regular thing for me. I cannot resist the urge to explain jokes, and this "taking refuge in apathy" is kind of a funny thing that I frequently do. Uhhh my lazy picture is behind the cut.

Someday I am going to come back to these entries and want to smack myself for abandoning all form and writing entirely string of consciousness. This is not a good way to convey ideas, what's wrong with me. And when did grammar become the enemy I hope this phase passes soon.

eibborn @ 2011-02-13T01:42:00

2011-02-13T09:47:27Z

Malaysia releases 6000 GM mosquitoes into the wild

Nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnngh

Aaaaugh

This is a thing that I'm not sure I'm okay with! At all! I mean uh it might in theory save a bundle of lives and who the hell am I to make that call? but it could also lead to way worse things like worse strains of the disease or ecological disasters! Or maybe an ecological disaster is less bad than people dying, because people are the most important things on earth, right??? Maybe we are! I kind of think so, mostly? I am pretty sure that when when you get down to it, most people care more about their continued life than they do about the preserving the environment! I don't blame them, I probably do, too. Or I would if I actually held determinate opinions instead of flopping all over the place.

Wow this whole thing is so hysterical. I should have majored in knitting or something, since apparently all biology does is paralyze me with conflicted moral values and make me hate everyone terribly. I'm becoming obnoxious in entire new ways. Grumpy ways. I made a sign in the shared kitchen out of cardboard that someone threw away.

aaagh I don't like me so much any more. There was a time when I was kind of pleasant sometimes! It's like suddenly I grew up and developed standards and now secretly hate myself and everyone else for not meeting them. On the bright side, I get to call people numbnuts via pseudo-passive-aggressive signs.

FOR THE RECORD I WAS 100% RIGHT ABOUT VRISKA AND TAVROS BECAUSE I AM A MASTER OF READING SOCIAL CUES

2011-02-10T10:14:03Z

Wow, I know it's an old joke by now but uh it's after 2:30 and I'm awake and TVTropes is responsible, what a surprise. Also Homestuck. The two combined are probably the most sleep-depriving force in the universe. But I guess I'm here for a reason.

"It's even more meta than that. It may be reasonable to call the Homestuck fandom community a Launcher of a Thousand Shippers, for its tendency to make shippers and romance speculators out of ordinary readers that swore they'd never do such a thing, and certainly not for a webcomic about a bunch of human and alien kids."

SERIOUSLY NO KIDDING I HAVE NEVER BEEN A SHIPPER EVER. I HAVE JOKED ABOUT IT DOZENS OF TIMES BUT THERE HAVE BEEN MAYBE TWO OR THREE SHIPS IN MY ENTIRE LIFE THAT I HAVE HALF A RAT'S BUTT ABOUT.

AND THEN HOMESTUCK.

YOU KNOW WHO I SHIP? KARKAT♠KARKAT. THERE. I SAID IT.

STOP SNICKERING THIS IS LEGIT. THIS IS A THING. JADE IS ALL MESSING WITH MY AUTOEROTIC HOMOSEXUAL CROSS-TIME HATE OTP WITH HER DANGED DAMNED AUSPITIZING

(Which is adorable in its own right, don't get me wrong.)

BUT SERIOUSLY I ALSO SHIP OTHER THINGS

LESS HILARIOUSLY STUPID THINGS LIKE ROSE♥KANAYA AND VRISKA♠/♥TAVROS (WAIT NEVERMIND THE LESS STUPID THING THAT I SAID) AND SOLLUX♥ARADIA AND UH VRISKA♠ARADIA, ARADIA♠/♥EQUIUS, UHHHH EQUIUS♠/♥PRETTY MUCH EVERYBODY IN HIS OWN HORRIBLE WAY AND UHHHH

WELL UH THIS IS KIND OF ENTIRELY UNSUBSTANTIATED AND EXTREMELY UNSETTLING BUT DAVE♠/♥TAVROS

(My justification being that Dave secretly enjoys all of the things that he pretends to be ironic about, including him playing gay chicken with Tavros. It is admittedly one of those "one is not interested and the other is just messing around" kinds of ships, but sometimes that's the most entertaining thing.)

AND WE'RE NOT EVEN GETTING INTO PALER QUADRANTS HERE WHICH IS REALLY TOO BAD BECAUSE BELIEVE ME I HAVE MATERIAL. I HAVE SO MUCH MATERIAL BUT GEEEEZE I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M LEGITIMATELY INTERESTED IN ALL THE SHIPS THAT WILL NEVER HAPPEN

SHOOT I JUST REALIZED THAT ALL BUT LIKE TWO OF THOSE SHIPS REALLY WILL NEVER HAPPEN DUE TO DEATH

That dealt with, let's talk briefly about something that isn't Homestuck for once, jegus. This extremely classy lady who I happened upon a while back: Jacqueline du Pré. She is just the most passionate cellist I have ever seen. Just the look on her face and the way she moves as she plays... seriously wow. I am sorry if this is weird but the way some musicians move as they play, it's just so gorgeous. I could never do that, not with my horn. Not like that. You can't exactly lean into a thing like a horn. Uhh look, just watch this and you'll get what I'm freaking out over. Maybe.

Geeze, I'm kind of a freak. OKAY JUST WATCH

Camille Saint-Saëns - Allegro appassionato in B Minor, Op.43
And then when you're done watching that, listen to this.
Edgard Elgar - Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85 Adagio. Moderato
The way she plays is just amazing. Seriously, what an incredible feel for the music she has. I am in love with cello all over again, but what I adore most of all is the performing motions. Because I think that being a musician is more than just producing music. You need to experience it at the same time, and I'm kind of in love with the unrestrained way that she does so.
E.Granados (arr.Cassadó) - Goyescas, Intermezzo

What's that, you say, you want to watch from another classy dame from a few decades ago perform? Well, you can't go wrong with Maria Callas singing Habanera from Carmen. What a smile, wowee. Hers is maybe not the best rendition of the song you'll ever find, but her motions and expressions just draw you in.
Seguedill and L'amour Est Un Oiseaux Rebelle from the same opera, performed on a different night from my first recording.

Okay so apparently I can't post a song without listening to the whole dumb thing because I have no self-control or common sense, so I'm going to cut this off here and go sleep.

After I go BACK TO HOMESTUCK BECAUSE I GUESS OBSESSED WOULD BE A GOOD WORD FOR MY CURRENT FEELINGS ON THE MATTER OF IT.

APPARENTLY WE CAN ADD A NERVOUS LAUGH TO MY "QUIRK" LIST. I USED AIM FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MONTHS THE OTHER DAY AND SERIOUSLY LIKE A THIRD OF MY LINES STARTED WITH "haha, [words words words]". Hooray, I'm even more annoying than I dared to dream. This had better not be a thing that I do in real life. Surely I would know and oh god I do sometimes, don't I.

...MUSICIANS HAVING FUN

*(a "me" trait than a "you" trait so that probably won't happen) Apparently there is a size limit for cut text. who knew?

eibborn @ 2011-02-04T02:28:00

2011-02-04T08:29:23Z

Okay, so uh I'm doing this in kind of semi-Homestuck style because I'm pretty much a huge, obnoxious fantard for it and it's appropriate considering the conversation. Shut up. :|

Me: Okay, so.
Me: Say there is a show or something in which every character is represented by a zodiac symbol. And say you're a fan of that show, but your favourite character does not match your zodiac!
Me: And uh. Also say that they are selling shirts with the symbols right on the front. Do you get one that doesn't match your zodiac?
Brother: Why not? Since the symbol is for the character and not astrology.
Me: Yeah, that's what I thought. I guess I'll do it.
Brother: So, what's Sagittarius like?
Me: Uhhhh what does the symbol look like again? (Oh god, isn't that Equius)
Brother: It's an arrow.
Me: Um. He's. ...
Brother: It's something bad, isn't it. Sagittarius is always bad.
Me: No, I like him! A lot. He uh.
Me: He builds robots.
Me: And is STRONG.
Brother: Yeah, that's actually better than I expected!

AND HAS A PERSPIRATION PROBLEM THAT MANIFESTS WHENEVER SOMEONE TRIGGERS HIS OBVIOUS FETISH FOR BEING DOMINATED BY ANYBODY

AND ALSO THE MUSCLEBEAST THING

BUT I'M NOT TELLING MY LITTLE BROTHER ABOUT EQUIUS' KINKS GEEZE EVEN IF THEY'RE LIKE THE THIRD THING THAT SPRING TO MIND WHEN DESCRIBING HIM

I DO LIKE EQUIUS A LOT, THOUGH. HE IS ADORABLE.

errantAverter:

2011-02-01T10:56:17Z

SO UH I RECENTLY STARTED READING HOMESTUCK AGAIN. I called it quits when the trolls were first introduced because I ReAlLy cOuLdN'T DeAl wItH ReAdInG ThIs, GeEzE cOmE oN gAmZeE but then I guess I steeled myself and started over from the beginning a while ago. I had to. it is a very good story. I finished it just recently and I have been yammering about it to anyone who will listen ever since.

Trying to explain its plot would be kind of hellish for both me and you, so uh here, someone else summed it up well enough on anoncomm recently: "Like people have said, it's about a group of kids who play a video game that lets them manipulate each others' environments -- think Sims, but instead of building houses for little imaginary people, you're building houses for your neighbor and watching the construction out your window. Turns out the game plays a role in the end of the world, through time travel and alternate realities and the like. I'll say more about it if you want me to, it's a pretty fun story to explain."

It is really good and worth reading ....although people who aren't complete dorks and intrigued by weird terminology and game mechanics apparently find the first act or two kind of dull while the readers are trying to figure things out? NOT ME, THOUGH.

wow okay uh off topic. Let's do this again. Early on while everything was being set up, the author took suggestions for what actions his characters would make which is pretty much the coolest thing ever.* But then when the story started rolling, he closed suggestions and just let things work their course. And it has been frigging awesome.

geeze wow do I ever meander. I will have to revisit this topic because I apparently have a million things to say about it, but my point here is just that I want to jot down something entertaining. I was talking about how the trolls type to my sister and Scott, and he asked me if I had any typing quirks.

And I said, "uh."
And then I said, "uhhh, I guess my uhs" because (although I usually don't post them on my journal because I'm a stuffed shirt on my own turf) I do tend to spam them in instant messangers, texts, et cetera.
It turns out that he had a typing quirk as well, one no less obnoxious than any of the trolls when he used to muck around in chats and stuff. After every line of writing he would add a question mark on its own.

So in theory us talking would be like:
eibborn: uhhh Hi Scott.
Scott: Hello
Scott: ?
eibborn: What's up?
eibborn: Are you doing anything tonight?
Scott: No, I don't have any plans
Scott: ?
eibborn: Oh, uh
eibborn: you should invite me over so we can play with my new Wii or something.†
Scott: That was incredibly subtle
Scott: ?
Jen: Am I not invited? You guys hate me!!
eibborn: Jen you live with Scott
eibborn: it uh kind of goes without saying

My sister types with two exclamation marks. She has done so without fail for years. It is a PRETTY TAME QUIRK but I guess it will have to do. The point is that apparently real people do kind of type a little bit like the characters in the comic do! I guess we're all more similar to the human characters, though, which probably makes buttloads of sense.

Okay, so mostly I wanted to write about this before I forgot. I am going to make fun of the addicting powers of Homestuck another time for sure, though, because it is kind of pathetic how addicting it is. Seriously people have designed 1) a program that checks the site for updates every minute =2) an IM client that is based on the one used in the comic (that I love very much. IT LETS ME USE WHATEVER EMOTICONS I WANT. MY :)S REMAIN :)S INSTEAD OF BEING HIJACKED BY HIDEOUS YELLOW TERRORISTS AND CRASHED INTO MY UNPREPARED SENTENCES) and 3) its own record label. Seriously, what kind of webcomic has stuff like that? A very good webcomic, that's what.

also, I finally got a proper mood theme. I liked the old one because it was so comically easy to avoid saying anything about your actual mood, but homestuck won out over my usual contrariness in the end.

*I always meant to write about TGchan, which has a lot of stories like that, but it's embarrassing because half the quests are furries furrying it up and the entire place is stagnant so I probably won't ever. I don't even go there anymore. I can dig furries as long as they don't furry too furrily up in my grill if you catch my meaning, but the place is stifling. It feels like every quest gets the same suggestions, which is too bad because it's a really neat way of telling a story!

†HINT HINT KEEP THIS IN MIND IF YOU SOMEDAY READ THIS SCOTT

Ode to the Bridge Builder

2011-01-15T12:02:16Z

It is kind of frustrating that the only think I'm really passionate about these days is video games and what makes them special. It makes me wonder if I should have gone into journalism so that I could have even fewer interesting job prospects than I already do but be able to write about this thing that fascinates me in a respectable way. Obviously I am unfit to take part in the actual process of creating such games, but by god's balls do I love to interpret them.

...Someone on rpanoncomm asked for recommendations for Mac-compatible games for Steam. I offered some. ...Look, it's 0600 here and I haven't slept; you'll have to forgive me my incoherence. In some ways, I am dreadfully unhealthy.

Here is my friend recommendation for Lugaru:

Lugaru is pretty dang excellent. It is not my normal style of game and its graphics, physics, and story are all what you'd expect from a small, independent studio, (simple but functional) but oh man did I enjoy it. The combat is unlike anything else. It really conveys the sense of danger from battle, and the controls are very immersive. That alone is enough to make the game worth buying. There are like a million videos on Youtube of people being badass and kicking butt, but I spent most of my time yelling and mashing buttons in the hopes of not getting murdered before I could murder the prospective murderer. Or something.

I am really terrible at making things sound appealing since I feel like I ought to warn people about their downsides first and foremost, but basically you play as a JUDO RABBIT who JUDO FIGHTS other rabbits and stuff. And then they throw weapons in there, too, which are pretty awesome. Combat is based mostly on timing. Despite its unrefined graphics, this is easily worth the 10USD they ask for.

And then there is Recettear. "Capitalism ho!" Basically the point is to run a successful fantasy adventure business. It sounds like a glorified Lemonade Stand (if you remember that game from when you were a kid), but you've got to barter with your customers and learn how high they'll pay, and you enter dungeons with adventurers to restock your wares (unless you want to just buy them from a supplier). I haven't beaten this game yet, unfortunately. It has some pretty high expectations of you. If you ever fail a dungeon, I'd recommend just starting over from your last save because you'll be paying for it for the rest of the game. This is not a forgiving world. It is pretty expensive compared to my usual games, 20USD. I've already spent over ten hours on it without finishing it as I had to start over once, so that's pretty good value anyway.

World of Goo is a puzzle game wherein you need to construct towers and the like using balls of Goo. It has a healthy dish of social commentary regarding consumerism and just how terrifying monolithic establishments like, say, Google really are woven into the story along the way (as well as an unfortunate odour of sexism). But for the most part, it's just puzzle solving. How can you build a bridge that won't slump too much in the middle to reach this point without using any more goo than absolutely necessary. This game makes good use of solitude in my opinion, the only characters you interact with being the gooballs themselves (they have eyes), bugs, The Friendly Sign Painter (who you never meet face-to-face), and [spoiler]. Definitely worth the 10USD, although keep in mind that you can get it for the Wii as well if you have that.

Another game, this one notorious for its use of solitude to play with the player's emotions, is Portal. This game is even better known than World Of Goo so I won't go into depth, but the idea is that you're a test subject for the Aperture Science Enrichment Institute being put through a series of tests with the goal of finding out the capabilities of a newly designed item, the portal gun. It's a puzzle game bred with a first person shooter, interestingly enough, one of the most innovative mainstream games of the decade. 14USD, although I would bet good money that it will go on sale withing the next several months considering its sequel is due to be released very soon.

VVVVVV is another innovative game. It is entirely based on the ideas of up and down, I suppose. You essentially navigate 8-bit corridors littered with improbable obstacles with only one button other than the arrow keys at your disposal, a button that reverses your personal gravity. Death is absurdly easy to come by in this game, but it doesn't matter in the least as there are checkpoints every few feet. You can't really go wrong for 5USD.

World of Goo and Lugaru were both available from the Humble Indie Bundle (http://www.humblebundle.com/) in both their first and second promotions. There's a pretty reasonable chance that you can hold off on buying them for now and get them for around ten dollars whenever a new Humble Bundle is released, but there's no saying when that will be. I'm not absolutely in love with any of the other games in the bundles (I haven't played most of them to any great extent yet), but it's worth it even if you want just one or two of them.

[And then in an addendum:]
Okay, I can't shut up apparently but. Each of these games has a very functional soundtrack, but the best by far is World of Goo's, in which the music itself--melodic music, which is what makes this exceptional--is fully incorporated into the levels. It is usual for a game to appear in which I consider the music an irremovable aspect of it, but a person's experience of World of Goo would be significantly altered if it was played while muted.

Both the game and the soundtrack are strong alone (and you can get that soundtrack for free here: http://kylegabler.com/WorldOfGooSoundtrack/) but together they are amazing.

So there's that. This probably isn't half as useful as I hope it is, but we shall see once I have slept for a few hours.

how about some advertising

2010-12-16T02:11:21Z

We all love advertising, especially when it means you can choose between getting a small pile of games for essentially free or donating money to charities (please choose the second option).

Check out the Humble Indie Bundle #2 and see if any of the games there interest you. If so, you get to choose how much you pay for DRM-free copies of all five games as well as where your money goes: to the game developers, to either Child's Play or the Electronic Frontier Foundation, or to the organisers themselves.

I am pretty excited about this because let me tell you, I have been wanting Braid for ages. By reputation, it panders to uppity artgame dorks like me pretty hardcore. Most of all, though, I want this to succeed because of how interesting it is. PC games-and more than ever now, console games-are pirated at an amazing rate. I don't think anyone can question that anymore. The popular response to this culture is to add DRM, which is inevitably patched away by hackers in a matter of weeks. DRM is always annoying to paying customers, but I can hardly blame them for trying to stop people from pirating their game.

Anyway! What they did with this bundle is they took it in the opposite direction. Suddenly not only are the games completely free of any pirate protection, but they're effectively free if you want them to be. And people apparently do, which is kind of discouraging. As expected, when asked to pay what they feel developers deserve most people will give something around a tenth of the retail value. I suspect they would give even less if charities weren't involved.

I don't know. I see the entire thing as a fascinating experiment and a chance to do something for others and for yourself at the same time. I can guess blindly about why people pay the amounts they do, but when you get down to it the moral is go buy these games, they'll do you good.

--

In other news, I finished Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box a little while back and I have been choking back the urge to write like Layton speaks ever since. I honestly had to put effort into making this entry more natural. I always do this. If I read Shakespeare, my speech always wants to pick up a rhythm like his characters'. If I play Phoenix Wright, I have to ignore the impulse smack tables for emphasis. If I play Pokemon, I always want to capture animals in small capsules and have them fight to the death. It is a silly chronic ailment of mine.

eibborn @ 2010-11-26T15:19:00

2010-11-26T21:20:17Z

Dangit. I suddenly want to make a Kadabra character using the username nurskcolc.

It is even more deplorable than lookouthalifax. Sure, it doesn't make light of the deaths of hundreds, but it's a genuinely terrible joke. The pokedex says that Kadabra make clocks run backwards just by being near them. "Clocks run" backwards is "nurskcolc". Why do I want to make this.

I really ought to be locked away. I hardly roleplay anymore. Why is this character cruising around my head like he owns the place and why is he attached to such an abominable username. I need to produce something better.

eibborn @ 2010-11-19T07:33:00

2010-11-19T14:09:16Z

Come on, self, are we seriously falling into a "12 hours sleep-36 hours awake" pattern? This is terrible and you know it. On the bright side, I'm much more sociable when I haven't slept in 30 hours or so. Less restrained, more inclined to casually insult people in a friendly way. Also to ironically pretend like I'm someone whose opinion matters (and thus highlight how that isn't the case at all). Who knows, maybe I'm more likable this way. I talk more.

But hey what I'm here to write about is something I haven't brought up in a while: Vocaloids. Specifically a recent concert put on by Vocaloid featuring Hatsune Miku and co., or rather holograms of them. I am torn between being impressed out of my mind and being giddy with excitement at the idea that holograms are this awesome. I went into this expecting to feel some sadness at humanity, but one line from the The Escapist article prevented it.

"I'm not sure how I feel about all of this. While I appreciate that the technology is somewhat amazing, especially the combination 3D holograms, with a software voice and live musicians. Hatsune Miku is clearly popular, judging by the hundreds of adoring fans in these videos, so there must be a place for a fake popstar."

Once more,
"there must be a place for a fake popstar"

hahahahaha oh goodness me. It's called POP MUSIC. That is the place where fake people grow and flourish. Are raised and flourish. At least with Vocaloids, there's no deception involved. Miku is fake. She has a giant bobbly anime head with big goobly eyes and no one thinks otherwise.

The most exciting thing, though, is that she blurs. The future is here, and it's everything we hoped for. Check out when she starts running around at about 22" here. Just like all the dorky sci-fi predicted! So magical.

Oh gosh they even used the Disappearance of Hatsune Miku to considerable effect. I expected to be disappointed until the end. I was hoping for them to really take advantage of the fact that here was a song about a program being corrupted being performed by a program that is being projected into the real world, and in the end they did. But not until then. I was hoping for glitches to show up throughout the song and stuff, but man it was satisfying the way things worked out.

What's really fascinating is seeing the crowd respond to the performances. Part of it must be for the sake of the other performers-the percussionists, the guitarist, etc. Part of it must be for the producers, the technicians, for everyone whose work goes into it. But the hushes in Kokoro... those are for the performer. For the symbol of a person that's been put on stage as the focal point, that represents the source of the music they hear without actually being it. Ha, but once again, I just described your standard pop performer anyway, so maybe Vocaloids aren't such a big change anyway.

Anyway, I think this is cool and everyone should think so too.

eibborn @ 2010-11-14T07:20:00

2010-11-14T13:20:28Z

"In 2006, Govenlock had a population of 0 living in 0 dwellings, a 0% increase from 2001. The hamlet had a land area of 0.00 km2 (0.0 sq mi) and a population density of 0.0 /km2 (0/sq mi)."

Wikipedia are you trying to tell me that there is nothing in Govenlock, is that it. Because there are easier ways, you know.

I'm amused by places like this, though. Check this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_places_with_fewer_than_ten_residents

I like how apparently Saskatchewan has more uninhabited places than the rest of Canada combined. Are we the only place that keeps track of this stuff or what? It begs the question of at what point a place stops being a place and starts becoming just more prairie, you know? It's like Lipsit, which shows up as a small community on just one map that my grandpa owns and nowhere else, ever.

Haha oh Robsart, Saskatchewan. Motto: A Town With A Bright Future. Residents? Nine as of 2008. We could have driven right through some of these places when we went to Grasslands National Park this summer, how would we even know? They're all right near the border of SK, AB, and the USA.

oh man I think I found one that we passed through! Kind of! The church in Scotsguard was totally weird and out of nowhere, but we were lost trying to find the Great Sand Hills when we drove past it. Weird to find out that it used to have six grain elevators. I guess that doesn't mean much to people from non-farmer places, but Scotsguard was kind of a minor big deal in its time.

A lot of these southern ghost towns are tied in with rum running from the States. Very cool. I also like that Ardill apparently doesn't let having a population of zero prevent its local bar from opening. Live the dream, Ardill.

eibborn @ 2010-10-29T17:44:00

2010-10-29T23:45:42Z

My grandma e-mailed me today. She still writes today with a dash.

"to-day"

It is just the cutest thing.