Twirling Towards Victory

Exit Pursued By Bear

2007-01-23T23:27:00.000-08:00

I have decided to change locations, use the new Blogger dashboard settings and options, and get more of a fresh start. So much has happened to me since I started my little site freshman year of college, my catestrophic first break up, struggling with school, that time I saw the lead singer from Everclear on the street. I thought maybe I should jettison some ballast and move on to a brighter future. The new Twirling Towards Victory site can be found at: http://tasteslikefreedom.blogspot.com/
Come check it out, or even better, link to it so I can once again rise like a phoneix from the pits of Google.

Vae Victus

2006-02-15T01:17:00.000-08:00

I am sure in my increasingly long abscences I have alienated all of my dwindling readership, although I suppose I maintain this site for my own amusement and reflection. For the last several months, I have gone with and without internet, a computer, housing or food, and a variety of other niceties in a disappointed paralell to my three months of semi-homelessness (self-imposed of course, if I ever write an autobiography, I'll call it an "inward journey" or something) so I guess there is at least some reason for my inability or disinterest in posting.

Regardless, I re-assure the cold, pitiless vaccuum of the internet that I will attempt to be more faithful to you, oh mistress of digital thaumaturgy, in the coming months.

And now for some linky. All hail the future prototype of Optimus Prime.

Elephant Gold

2005-11-01T08:25:00.000-08:00

It has been some time since I last posted, but I have been in that state lately where I just live one day to the next, without concentrating too much on what has been happening or what is to come. For Halloween, I saw Shaun of the Dead with my friends, which despite its moments of shocking gore, was extremely funny and enjoyable. My various gaming activities are still serving as a focal center for my social life, everything else revolving around them in a fashion quite common for the subculture in which I have emersed myself.

On a side note, I have found that I really love Hamlet. I've spent the last two weeks pouring over the text in my Shakespeare class and I can see why it has earned its noteriety. The "To be or not to be" speech cused one of the most intense and thought provoking debates yet, and while I'm excited to move onto Othello soon, it makes me a little sad to leave Hamlet, which I feel you could spend an entire semester studying.

Anyway, hopefully I'll post again soon when I have something more meaningful/interesting to say.

A Pox Upon Me

2005-09-28T20:18:00.000-07:00

To my great joy, I have been afflicted with some sort of hideous disease, the likes of which has not been seen in the world since the Black Plague escaped the dark continent and devoured the villages and homes of our forefathers. You know what I think had something to do with this was that Coloubos monkey from Africa that bit me, I knew that would come back to haunt me. Suffice it to say, I have been suffering general "cold" symptoms for a week and a half now, but at least my four days of feverish delirium are over. After solitary confinement to my bed and computer for so long, with limited food, water, and social contact, I literally stumbled out of my Residence Hall seeking morbid companionship late friday night. However, all of my friends ABANDONED me for "real life" such as going downtown or somesuch. Fortunately, by the end of the evening, I managed to find Adnan and Brendon, who I can always count on to be invariably be there, playing video games or watching movies. Now I merely roam the campus reminding the young, happy, carefree students of the cruelty of fate as my body has been transformed into a grim spectre of death.

But enough about my fun times. Life goes on in the wide world, much as it always has. Since school started almost a month ago, I have been off-campus but once, and that was a brief visitation to that cold, unfeeling world brought on by Nastassja basically dragging me around Portland like some flimsy marionette (ie typical woman to man relationship). I hope to change that fact by making more excursions to the local theatre where I can enjoy upcoming "motion pictures" which are now in color, I am told. However, I still require money to exchange for goods and services, I'm working on that part of the equation, we'll see what happens. Other than that, I'm still a bore, a layabout with no job, no girlfriend, and I more or less attend class and do homework in some haphazard fashion; life couldn't really get any better, really.

Catch you all on the flipside.

Now is the winter of our discontent

2005-09-21T16:25:00.000-07:00

Made glorious by this Sun of York.

As usual, I have nothing to say about what I have been doing at school, even though I am doing a great many things. Some things Jedi would consider unnatural. About a week ago, I acquired through VERY LEGITIMATE means a copy of Final Fantasy: Advent Children for my computer's over-taxed harddrive and it is worth every megabyte. The movie was clearly made for nerdy boys as the CG is incredible, 70% of the camera time is action, action, action, and there is no romance to speak of to slow down the all-important animated violence. If you anime, you'll like this movie, and if you don't like anime, you'll still probably like it to a certain extent. While the film was made to capitalize on the enormous fanbase of Final Fantasy VII, it's still quite appealing to the Squaresoft "layman."

Additionally, this week marks the kickoff of my Vampire: The Masquerade game that has had much anticipation here at school, and it seems to be shaping up nicely. I have spent countless hours writing complex characters, what I feel is a layered plot, and made preparations to have two experienced Storytellers aid me in running the game, I think it's going to be great. I have to practice my improvisational speaking and acting skills, as well as prepare some nifty costume switches, as nerdy as all that sounds, everyone seems to have a really good time.

This semester I've been taking a course concisely titled "An Introduction to Shakespeare" which has been going wonderfully; some of you may have noticed the tagline title from Gloucester's opening speech in Richard III. I have long been a critic of lionizing the man, but upon in depth study of some of his early works I am beginning to appreciate the brilliance that many an English scholar has discovered buried in the texts.

Exit pursued by bear.

Responsibility, what's that?

2005-09-12T08:05:00.000-07:00

Well the summer came to a spectacular finale (sarcasm) and I am finally back in school (sorrow). So far, I've been showing a surprising amount of enthusiasm for my classes, particularly my English literature courses (dim hope) both of which I was somewhat dreading for my previous lack of interest in stodgy English writings (reminiscence). With Erik overseas and Stephan graduated many of the responsibilities of the Lewis and Clark Gaming Society have fallen upon myself and Brian (dread). We've already had two very successful nights of 'Ninja' and we had over 30 new signups for the gaming society this year, putting at us still being the largest and longest running group on campus.

This year I have papers due almost every week starting this week, and while that isn't the most terrific news (truth) on some level I enjoy flaunting my natural talent and interest in non-fiction prose (total bullshit). Finally, I close by mentioning the annual cross-dressing dancing is coming up, and in pervious years I have shunned it, this year I may just give it a whirl (confused excitement).

A Serious Moment

2005-08-13T14:23:00.000-07:00

Last monday night, almost a week ago now, my sister was in Salem, drinking with a number of boys (this being the second time in her life that she has gotten drunk) and she fell out of a second story window. After most of them fled the scene, a paramedic found her, called an ambulance, and she was rushed to the Salem hospital where she was placed in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU). Her entire right side of her body was paralyzed, and she was unable to regain conciousness for several hours.

As you can imagine, this was something of a... shock for my mother and I. Seeing my little sister Tanya (barley eighteen years old) hooked up to all the machinery, with a neckbrace, a triple pump IV, it was a bit much. She was discharged from the hospital on thursday, and we took her home, where she is slowly regaining the ability to walk. Fortunately, it looks like Tanya will make an almost full recovery, although it is unknown at this time if she will ever completely recover movement of her right foot and ankle.

It's hard to imagine that my entire family is just my mother, Tanya, and I. All of our relatives are far away and we keep limited contact with them, if something happens to one of us, it'll just be two left, which isn't much of a family in a way. I'm spending more time with Tanya now, and we're trying to keep her spirits up, as she was robbed of her much vaunted independence for some time; I just hope this is a wake up call for her to get her life going in the right direction.

For anyone that reads this and knows my mother and/or my sister, you can contact me or them to arrange a visit if you would so like, I'm sure they would appreciate it.

One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish

2005-08-12T11:13:00.000-07:00

A few nights ago I got to see a DVD version of Constatine and I was really impressed. Despite my unremitted hatred for Keanu Reaves' acting, I thought he did an okay job in the film. I typically enjoy movies that capture that "world of darkness" style, and no matter what you may have thought about the plot or the characters, you cannot deny that the editing and camera shots throughout were amazing. The idea of Angels and Devils competing for the souls of the living is an intriquing plot, one that I enjoy, but I think it is often poorly executed in cinema. I would recommend the movie, if for nothing else, but to see the amazing job they did with Satan at the end. Watching Constatine reminded me that Nightwatch is coming out, something I have high hopes for, see for yourself.

I am the Lord of Death

2005-08-07T14:54:00.000-07:00

Dr. Binford, one my bosses here in the lab, is taking a trip to South Africa to catch spiders for about two weeks, and since the majority of her research students are gone for the rest of the summer, it leaves it on my shoulders to take care of the entire spider room. She came down on friday and had a chat with me, and I got to ask her some questions about the spiders here and it's really cool the work that's being done, if you're into that sort of the thing. For instance, the sicarius spiders (a relative of the brown recluse that is found in and around Argentina) is so rare and little studied that for a variety of the specimens, myself and a few of the other research students are the only people in the world to observe them hunting and feeding, which I personally think is really cool. But for the next few weeks I'm spending double shifts in that tiny, hot, spider-filled room, which despite my previous post on the subject, I have come to enjoy working in anyway.

Also, Brian- the individual I'm living with- and I have been playing this old, old rpg/rts game called "Warlord: Battlecry II" and despite having very dated gameplay and graphics (we're talking WarCraft II/Age of Empries quality here) it's a really fun game. It's probably the only successful merging of rts and rpg I've played, since WarCraft III deceptively masqueardes itself as one thing, but is really just a strategy game. This is the kind of game that is in your local EB bargain bin for $3 and is worth $30. I have probably spent more time playing this old, overlooked game that won no awards than both Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords and Halo 2 combined, which is saying something about the quality of both those games and the quality of the product in question.

It's like playing something made by Looking Glass Studios all over again. If you're interested, you should be able to find information about in on the Ubisoft page (yes, the people who made Splinter Cell). Check it out.

Spinward, Corward, Backward, Forward

2005-08-03T19:26:00.000-07:00

How about a post that isn't so intimidatingly long? Working in an office is really a different experience than my usual lineup of jobs requiring more physical labor or tending to human larvae. I seem to be exploring the stereotypical office "characters" more every day. One thing I've noticed is the back office is entirely crewed by Vogons. Yes, Vogons, the villians from Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. There is a collection of older individuals who all have raspy voices and stooped backs working in a darkened collection of cubicles like some kind of Turkish slave galleon. Navigating the complex inter-department network of the college buearcracy is akin to running through a maze to find, not a block of cheese, but the entrance to another maze, typically one that requires me to make copies to three different people. But it's not all that bad, I'm not moving 200 gallon containers of boiling soup in a factory floor in unsafe conditions getting yelled at in some kind of Slavic language I don't recognize (that was earlier in the summer, before I decided I wanted to have a future after all). Plus, the kind of work I do in the office is reserved for the most temporary and unskilled positions, so I imagine it's not quite so bad when you get higher up, not that I'll work at the college for too long anyway.

Moving from the summer housing to my Fall 2005 room on the 16th, it's confirmed and I have one less thing to worry about now, I'm so tantalizingly close to being ready for the 2005-2006 year I can taste it. In the meantime, I have more summer to frivolously enjoy.

Charles

France, France Revolution

2005-07-29T21:21:00.000-07:00

I understand that writing is supposed to be a better way to organize and collate your thoughts, or so that hobo told me. Of course, it is entirely possible he said this to dissaude me from eating his brain to gain his insight.

It has come to my attention that I have not posted in a signficant time, and that this may have a detrimental effect upon my somewhat limited readership, but perhaps as the aforementioned passage indicates, this will be an exercise for myself more than for anyone else.

Of particular interest have been my activities during the long summer months in which we all must endure this abomidable weather. Well, after a brief hiatus from college and a greater wealth of social activity I have returned to the campus to live (not at home) and work for money, which I am exchanging for goods and services. I have two part-time jobs, one is in the mornings, the other in the afternoons, a clever organizational ploy by myself.

The morning job is for the Lewis and Clark College biology department where I help them keep everything organized and running smoothly so the professors and student researchers can concentrate on, well, their research and not menial tasks left to the students of humanities. I do things like fill deionized water carboys, wash dishes, feed spiders, and in general do little "go-fer" tasks for my employer, whose task it is to bring order and harmony to the naturally chaotic environment of the four to five research programs that are all happening at the same time (in the case of this year, four). The majority of my time is spent happily washing dishes, which is more personally rewarding than it sounds. I have an entire lab station to myself, which is strategically placed in the center of the entire cluster of labs, where I am left to my own devices as I turn piles of slimey and odorous dishes into scientifically sterilized glassware ready for the mighty auto-clave (one of my favorite machines). For the most part I enjoy it because the lab is kept cool and I get to stand up and walk around.

Oh, I'm sorry, did I mention feeding spiders? That's right, spiders. Now, when I applied for this job, I actually wasn't required to fill out any paperwork, or go through an application process, I was immediately accepted for the job on my basis of being willing to do it. I am the third person to hold this position this summer, the previous two both quitting within a week of starting. Why? Spiders. The Binford lab has a two-year grant to do research on little known spider toxins, specifically those of the Brown Recluse, which has cousins within its geneis all over the planet. Well, how do we feed spiders? I walk down a long hall from the central lab complex to a small, smelly room full of chirping crickets completely unaware that their sole purpose in life is to become spider compost. There is a door set into the back wall of the last lab, at least four inches thick with a tiny double-layered window and a heavy locking mechanism. Beside the door is an array of gauges and swithes that carefully manage the delicate ecosystem inside. I am then locked inside this room, which is in dimension similar to a walk-in closet, which has only one working, flickering flourcent light and I am left inside for over three hours as I tend to some three hundred spiders that line the walls in small clear plastic cages that go above my head level. To feed these arachnid horrors, I must take a device known as a "puter" (I'm not sure I spelled that correctly) which consists of a plastic tube with some nylon inside it to create a thin physical barrier between both ends. I place it over one of the crickets in the broiling mass of insect apendages and I suck it into the tube. Yes, I suck a cricket up into a tube I am holding in my mouth. I have the sexual innuendos repeatedly mentioned to me, my only response is to remind everyone that it was a biology major, not I, who invented this method. I then open one of the spider cages and blow (yes, suck and blow) the cricket inside and quickly seal it before my poisonous prisoner desides I'm more palatable than the cricket and I watch nature take its course. Maybe I'm being overly verbose about this, that I'm making it worse than it actually it is, I dare you to come down and do this shit for three to four hours, locked in that tiny room with spiders that ALL will send you to the hospital if they bite you, well, assuming you don't die before you get there. So yeah, I had to conquer some fears of poisonous spiders that kill me during the course of the summer, good stuff.

On the other hand, in the afternoon's I work in the McAfee office, specifically in the Lewis and Clark Department of Public Affairs and Communications. My job titly is Student Media Analyst. That's fancy talk for "copy bitch." See, whenever anybody in any newspaper, magazine, TV, or Radio spot mentions "Lewis and Clark College" in any way, no matter how small, a copy gets sent to the college via these large organizations that do nothing but look for such things. The articles go to my boss's boss, who reviews them and picks out important articles about the president and such, and then sends me hundreds of clippings. I fit them into 8.5x11" or 11x17" copies to be distributed for review, then take the originals and enter them into an electronic database with about 16,000 articles about L&C and categorize them and sort them into the electronic archives. I then take the reviewed copies, copy them some more and distribute them to know less than five different people within the college bueracracy, sometimes by hand, sometimes by mail. I then personally make envelopes and mail the articles about faculty to each faculty member, and then I take my master copies, sort them by a number of categories and sort them in our massive physical archives, which take up a monolithic basement in the bowels of Lewis and Clark, where few students have roamed. It's more boring than it sounds, and it sounds pretty boring, but it's kind of neat to be the central conduit in which an unfathomable amount of information flows. Even my position in the office behind a cubicle wall, but in front of the central copying cluster makes me something of a wallfly to ALL THINGS that happen in the PubCom office. The knowledge, it fills me, it is neat.

Anyway, that's a lot of text, but it's good to sit down and just write, so enjoy the fruits of my labor. I know it's customary to read a blog, say "that's neat" and then go to the next page, but if you could leave a little comment, even unrelated, I would be greatly abliged to know if anyone reads my web page anymore.

Charles

Set all power to front deflector screens

2005-02-15T14:25:00.000-08:00

As some of you may be aware, I have a passing interest in roleplaying games and have grown to be quite fond of Blizzard Entertainment's latest product, World of WarCraft. My main character (by the way) is a level 48 Tauren Warrior named Targos on Cenarion Circle.

Anyway, I have recently locked my s-foils in attack position as a volley of poo-matter is fills my view screens while attempting to walk through a simple town. This thread, which I suggest you do not read the entirity of, epitomizes the sad depravity of some players in search of a little coin. If you read far enough, you will find accounts of players providing cyber-sex services (although hotly denied by their leadership) for the exchange of in-game money. Now, I realize that different people enjoy the game in different ways. These people happen to be different to me in the fact that they enjoy the game in a disgusting, stupid, and unintended way. Fortunately, I play the Horde, which has races that are, albiet cooler, but more gross looking (unless you're a furry, Tolkien-nut, or a good ol' necrophiliac) so I see much less of this kind of stuff.

On the plus side, I got my financial aid back, and I'll be heading back to school in the fall, which means I can continue to watch the Cubs lose.

Adversity in the Face of Triumph

2005-02-06T10:16:00.000-08:00

January was an interesting month for me. After an awesome new year's party, I spent about four to five days searching for an elusive copy of World of WarCraft, which I eventually obtained on a hope and a prayer and immediately set myself to playing during the last weeks of break. I pretty much moved into my friend Brian's room (who was staying on campus) and we did nothing but start characters that went from levels one to thirty-three in about ten days. Pretty good times. By the way, if you're interested, I have a level 43 Tauren Warrior on the server Cenarion Circle. Go Horde!

Literally the day I came home from that soul-losing venture, I got my walking papers from Lewis & Clark. My grades had continue to drop, and I being on academic warning already, lost all financial aid. Now, in case you weren't aware, a full year at Lewis & Clark runs to the tune of about $32,000. However, they give generously on both need and merit bases. However, if you fuck up (like I did) you're pretty much SOL. My immediate and current plan: I've taken a "Leave of Abscence" from LC, which means I'm still a student but I'm not attending classes this semester. I've returned to *shudder* live at home with my family and I'm currently working to get money up for a down payment on a loan. That loan being to pay for two sessions of summer school, which is much cheaper than regular classes, so that I can raise my GPA to more acceptable levels. This whole experience has been kind of surreal and terrifying, as dealing with my depression and anxiety has never been more important than it is now. In the long run, I don't know how I'm going to make up the credits or the grades in a more overall sense, but I figure I'll figure that out when I get back into school.

Speaking of work, the day after I got home, I already had a meeting scheduled with Express Personnel, a lovely Portland-wide Temporary Employee service that has had me working at a food production facility on Airport Way called Harry's Fresh Foods. Those of you who are in college and think that school is hard: real life sucks way, way more. I don't care if you have ten thousand hours of homework every week and your midterms regularly cause students to combust with demon flames and excrete motor oil from their pores, it's not as bad as being stuck out there in the blue collar working world. I very quickly realized I'm not cut out for this kind of work, at least, not a job involving so much food. College at its hardest was a breeze compared to the soul-crushing nature of looking at a futureless career at a place like this.

So, that's the long and short of it. I haven't been blogging for a month because it seems like everything was going crazy or I was too tired or I was playing World of WarCraft shifts, and I sort of forgot about this whole thing. I do have a lot more free time, as temps don't really get to work everyday, and if anyone wants to do something, shoot me and e-mail. I'm rarely on AIM as I don't have much to do online (besides the obvious). I spend every weekend at the Lewis & Clark, playing games with my friends until 1 am, when I get my weekly fix of ninja. By the way, those of you who were bugging me about a "ninja rule post," if you still want one, I'm sure I whip one up, otherwise, I want bother boring the rest of you with my clandestine activities.

Go infinity and beyond!

I'm afraid that I don't take much solace in the fact that the implosion trigger functioned perfectly

2005-01-02T10:37:00.000-08:00

The holidays have finally come and gone, I'm better for it. Christmas time seems to breed this infectious optimism and insistence on family "togetherness" that I would rather just avoid, thankyouverymuch. Fortunately, my mother recognizes my desire to be left to my own devices, and does so with a moderate degree of success. Besides, my mom and sister are far to absorbed by their new little puppy, a hyperactive breed called Blue Healers. His name is Ike.

New Year's was a lot of fun for me, though. I went to see a friend who is a Lewis & Clark alumni who lives near campus and some of my college friends who are living around town had a little (non-alcoholic) party. We played Mario Kart- where I owned everyone, as usual- and some Mario Tennis where I most certainly DO NOT own. Besides that, I stayed up until about four in the morning gossiping with a bunch of girls Brie brought over and managed to lose really badly at the Great Dalmuti. I hope everyone else had fun, or at least, decent New Year's parties (especially poor Andy who got screwed with working the whole night).

Now most of the people I know around here are gearing up to jump back into school while I get to linger on in this limbo-like state of over two more weeks of break. If anyone ever wonders what I'm up to, I can assure you that it involves nothing interesting.

Leviathan

2004-12-24T13:46:00.000-08:00

I am beginning to face the very real prospect of either seeking professional help or not being able to continue college. Ever since last march everything has gotten so much worse: my anxiety attacks are so severe that I can't talk to anybody in person, my mood swings are swift and strong, and almost any little thing can trigger an intense feeling of depression. I believe that I will at least get to continue through to this next semester, but if I screw up one more time, I'm done with school until I can take care of this problem. Coming from high school where I was happy, productive, and I felt so successful in most aspects of my life, I feel like I'm in hell, even though I know it could be so much worse.

My apologies for the more serious post, but it seems like everything is so much more serious and less fun these days.

Death is the only way out

2004-12-06T13:35:00.000-08:00

I'm too lazy to make any kind of real post right now, since my life is pretty uneventful anyway, so here's something to distract yourself from finals for a few minutes. It is likely that you will find this either a) really funny or b) incredibly stupid. Please comment on which reaction it provoked.

How to Kill a Mockingbird.

In my opinion, best book report ever.

Rego Mortis

2004-11-20T21:10:00.000-08:00

As is customary, I have a post dedicated soley to my new schedule for next semester. Unfortunately, it looks like that young college upstart, Nathan, has beat me to the punch this semester. I have an odd semester this spring, with it being both "front-loaded" along the week, and with an evening class almost every day.

Monday
10:20am - 11:20am History 259 India: Age of Empire 500-1800
5:30pm - 7:00pm Education 275 Developing the Potential of the Learning-Disabled Child
7:00pm - 8:30pm History 225 Europe-Age of French Revolution

Tuesday
9:40am - 11:20am English 208 Prose Writing: Creative Nonfiction
7:00pm - 8:30pm English 206 Major Periods and Issues in English Literature

Wednesday
10:20am - 11:20am History 259 India: Age of Empire 500-1800
7:00pm - 8:30pm History 225 Europe-Age of French Revolution

Thursday
9:40am - 11:20am English 208 Prose Writing: Creative Nonfiction
7:00pm - 8:30pm English 206 Major Periods and Issues in English Literature

Friday
10:20am - 11:20am History 259 India: Age of Empire 500-1800

So, as you can see, my course load really seems to soften up as the week goes on. I hope this works out well. In addition, as soon as I figure out how to post pictures on my blog, I will make a post fully fleshing out the rules for "Ninja," as requested by Nathan and Peter.

Roll for Initiative, Monkeyboy

2004-10-28T09:19:00.000-07:00

If you understand "initiative" but don't know where this comes from, please take the time to visit the Knights of the Dinner Table part of Hoody-Hoo. "When Critical Hits Attack" and "Man versus Archeticture" are the best, in my opinion.

The last few weeks of school have been spent desperately trying to keep up (a failing effort) with my gargauntuan reading schedule. In between sortes with my books, gaming has thrived in the dark places of Lewis & Clark. There is much D&D afoot on campus, much of which I have participated in. Additionally, I plan to pick up the Vampire: Dark Ages book to run an elders game; should be fun for all.

But the most engaging activity has taken place on the weekends... "Ninja." Several gamers on campus have combined capture the flag with boffing weapons. Every saturday night, about a dozen of us gather in lower campus (where all the classrooms are and such) at 1 am. There are two teams, one are the gaurds who have an "object" (i.e. a flag) to protect. The other team are the ninjas, who must start at the top of the field and sneak/run/fight there way to the object and make it back up to their starting point again without dying. The ninjas are clad in all black and wield black boffing swords, while the gaurds wear white shirts and get to use walkie-talkies to communicate. Without getting into too much, the game has bunch more rules, like one gaurd is a Shogun who coordinates gaurds and ninjas can kill with unarmed attacks making it a "stealth kill." Needless to say, the game is awesome. There have been all kinds of crazy stunts attempted by the ninjas and gaurds such as:

Ninjas hiding in the rafters of a small covered area on the field
An epic battle that was fought down approximately two flights of stairs
Ninjas leaping off a ten-foot wall with varied success (I sprained my ankle, for instance)
One Ninja killed five gaurds by himself... At the same time
Another ninja managed to evade eight gaurds at once without getting hit, even when surrounded

We've become lore on campus now. Whenever some of us are seen carrying weapons late at night, people who walk by will say "he's a ninja, I heard about that..." Every week more people show up, even though we're not supposed to talk about it much on campus; much like fight club. Someone here in Stewart (my residence hall) wants to come film and photograph us, which I will post online as soon as they're available to me.

Oh, and if anyone requests it, I can post pictures of Adnan in drag, if you'd like. Apparently, he was a big hit at the drag ball this year.

From Canille to Gallipoli

2004-10-17T23:53:00.000-07:00

I recently returned from seeing the latest version of King Lear in Portland. I can't say that the director captured Lear perfectly, but the play is such that the admirable effort was pleasing enough. The advertiesments spoke of a modern Lear, where the King is transformed into a CEO. I cringed at this, but held out hope. It turned out that they used the exact (almost) same lines from the Shakespearean play, they just used a "modern" theme for props and the like. It turned out really cool. The same group did this for a showing of Antigone many years ago (when I was much more young and venerable).

It's definetely worth it if you feel like doing something a bit more intellectual and you've got extra cash to blow, especially if you've read King Lear before. If you do end up going, check out the performances of both "Edmund," "Edgar," and "Kent;" all of which are superb.

Romanticism in an era of social obfuscation

2004-10-14T09:25:00.000-07:00

I think it would be really romantic if a girl told me: "Oh Charles, you make wounds bleed and flesh crawl." But then again, my dear Lenore, I shall see thee, nevermore.

In case you are wondering why I am romantically attatched to an entropic corpus, watch the timeless classic, Nightmare Before Christmas, which remains one of my favorite movies ever.

Nothing really happens when you're on campus all the time, but I still manage to squeeze out a charming little social niche every once in a while. School plods on, inexorably with lots of reading and discussions and papers and bears. Oh my. My Great aunt and uncle came to visit yesterday from Missouri, and in preparation I had my fingernails painted black (like my foul heart) in preparation. As expected, they noticed them, but said nothing. My mother on the other hand pitched a fit about the corruption of the youth and so on. I was pleased with this result.

I've been thinking I should grab somebody's digital camera and take some pictures to post. There are lots of cool happenings on campus, and I should share some of them. For instance, I must post a picture of my sexy roommate, Adnan, because when he dies I GET DIBBS ON HIS THIGHS. Going along with that, I'm still the only person who has "human cannibalism" as an "interest" in his Blogger profile. That makes me a sad panda.

I'm about to be whisked off to go "spandex" shopping with a cute girl, so no matter what happens, I'll have a pretty damn good day.

See you later, space cowboy.

Swiftly Flying Swallows

2004-09-28T09:09:00.000-07:00

I had almost forgotten that I have a web log and that I have friends with blogs of their own. Sophmore year is an all-consuming endeavor, despite those of you who scorn my "squishy" humanities courses. Now that my "three Goddamn essays due on the same friday hell week" is over, I find myself in a slightly more comfortable position, except that midterm examinatinons are beginning in earnest.

How is everyone else's school year going? The increasing latency of web logging has led me to believe that most others are at least as busy as I am, but if anyone actually reads this thing, grace me with a comment or two so I can feel important. Plus, I just saw the South Park version of Great Expectations which involved robot monkeys and Ms. Havisham creating a Genesis device to give herself immortality. Anyone out there in blogger land who lives near Portland, please, for the love of God, contact me to go hang out or game or something; because I'm getting institutionalized on this damn campus.

Finally, like Megaman games? Do you like the song Bohemian Rhapsody? Curious as to what the hell I'm talking about? Then check out the "Titanium Rhapsody."

Skyline Swaying in the Breeze

2004-09-16T09:13:00.000-07:00

So, I haven't updated in a while because, well, school is really busy. Due to my two 200 level English courses and my History course, I read over 100 pages every day. Plus, I have lengthy logic problem sets on top of that; all of which keeps me pretty busy considering I stop to play video games, socialize, and play tons and tons of ultimate frisbee (the definitive college sport). For those of you who may be mildly curious as to what I do, here's an example of some of the work I do in Major Periods and Issues in English Literature. College English courses are not so kind as to give you translated texts when reading Middle English works such as Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, so the student gets to do all the fun themselves. This is part of a larger stanza from the prologue to the Wife of Bath's tale. A small group, including myself, were given five minutes to translate a relatively easy passage. Here's the original middle English:

I trowe I loved him best for that he
Was of his love daungerous to me.
We wommen han, if that I shal not lie,
In this matere a quainte fantasye:
Waite what thing we may not lightly have,
Thereafter wol we crye al day and crave;
Forbede us thing, and that desiren we;
Preesse on us faste, and thanne wol we flee.
With daunger oute we al our chaff are:
Great prees at market maketh dere ware,
And too greet chepe is holden at litel pris.
This knoweth every womman that is wis.

Not too bad, considering some of the other older works we've translated. But it's really difficult when you're being timed. Here's my shitty translation; I focused more on presevering the original meaning and word order than the poetic meter and rhyme that you will find in professional translations.

I thought I loved him best because
his love was hard for me to get.
We women, and I shall not lie,
In this matter have a strange fantasy:
Whatever thing we may not easily have,
Will cause us to cry all day and crave;
Forbid us a thing, and we will desire more;
Press upon us fast, and we shall flee.
We carefully show our wares:
Great crowds at the market make our wares more expensive;
And too good of a bargain is of little value.
This every wise woman knows.

I suppose I should appreciate all of the work I'm doing and the new things I'm being exposed to, but this sort of work is really tiring considering I have to translate hundreds of lines for each class. I'll try to put a more interesting post for those of you who are less concerned with my academics in the future.

Breach Hull, All Die... Even had it underlined

2004-09-01T18:42:00.000-07:00

So, for those of you who ever try to contest me on religious grounds, I have a wonderful quote from South Park which pretty much sums up my attitude; you know, if I were a Black and White-style evil God.

"It is sometimes hard in times like these to understand God's way. Why would He allow nine innocent people to be run down in the prime of their lives by a senior citizen who, perhaps, shouldn't be driving? It is then that we must understand that God's sense of humor is very different from our own. He does not laugh at the simple 'man walks into a bar joke.' No, God needs complex irony and subtle farsical twists that seem macabre to you and me. All that we can hope for is that God got His good laugh and a tragedy such as this will never happen again."

There it is, folks, the true nature of God's tragic humor.

Approaching Perihelion

2004-08-31T10:48:00.000-07:00

That was the title of a post I had written over a week ago, however, Blogger decided to fuck with me and delete the damn thing mid-posting process, and I havne't had solid internet access since. Yes, I am in school again, just in case one your missed that, and yes it is awesome. I love my new dorm and and my new room. It's so much bigger than my old closet of a room, and although I am waging a constant war of cleanliness against the encroaching hordes of Adnan-crap (my roommate) It's much nicer than my shithole last year.

Small things: Adnan and I picked out an awesome 20" flatscreen Emerson television that kicks major ass; as such Jon and I have been playing tons of the PS2 game, Samurai Warriors. This is the next logical extension of the Dynasty Warriors series, so if you liked that game, you'll love Samurai Warriors. It's like Diablo II, but with less RPGness and more action with combo moves and such. Plus, it's set in one of Japan's most interesting periods: the unification of Japan under Nobanaga Oda and the Tokugawa revolution.

Also, Nikolai, a friend of mine, has been going Viking crazy this last week. Everyone knows that he's a big fan of the lovable northern barbarians, and this is evidenced by the Viking fever we've launched into a bit. One, I've been listening to a Swedish death-metal band called "Finntroll" which specializes in hard metal that has songs about Viking pantheons and such. If you want to get a good example of their music, trying locating the song "Trollhammaren." Also, we've been playing the old UT engine-based game "Rune" deathmatch like crazy the last few days. It's very akin to Jedi Knight 2 deathmatch, which was also quite fun. Finally, Nikolai modified the White Wolf system for a Viking roleplaying game, which we have had one session of; it's pretty rough and could use some more work, but it's a lot cooler than I expected it to be. If we continue in our current game, I plan to gather a group of warriors and unify as many of the Swedes under my flag and go conquer Norway or something. Maybe Kiev...

Lastly, school is great. I just can't say that enough. By far, my coolest class so far is Middle East in Modern Times. Right now, I'm getting sort of a crash course in Islam before we start laying into the foundation of the various conflicts that are raging in that region right now. It's really, really cool. Reading my textbook, I can see how much Islam has been changed and crapified already. I look forward to learning more...

Oh, and Brad, just to irk you, Islam was Christianity. It's the same religion, except they incorporated the customs of the old Arabic animistic religion to make the assimilation easier. So they're basically the same religion.

Sea God of the East, Azure Sea of the West

2004-08-18T10:48:00.000-07:00

This last sunday and monday, I participated in the great Andy/Brad move-in downtown, and it only reinforced my desire to get back to school where I have privacy and freedom from my family. I ended up hanging out with them for a few days, reading Brad's roleplaying books and playing tons of Soul Caliber 2 on the Xbox. One interesting note though. I decided to crash on their couch monday night, and go home tuesday afternoon. But in deciding to go home, I thought it would be cool to try walking home from downtown Portland. "Why?" you may ask.

Whimsy.

Only, I chose a bad time for it. For one, I left Andy's apartment around 11:45, which was when the sun was just getting to heating up the Portland area. Basically the entire time I spent walking were the hottest hours of the day, which sucked because I got really dehydrated. Also, on monday, I didn't want to be a total moocher, so I avoided borrowing food from Brad and Andy until they offered me some leftover Chinese food, which became my only food for that day. On tuesday, I only consumed a single brownie (the Girl Scout, not the dessert, but she was small) before treking about 10 miles across Portland and the various Eastern Suburbs. Suffice to say, I was starving by the time I collapsed at home.

The funny thing is, this isn't the first time I've done something like this. In fact, it's the third time I've hiked across Portland like that, and both of the other times I was just as dead and exausted afterwards... You'd think I would learn my lesson. Of course, my next goal is to walk from my house to Lewis & Clark College, but maybe I'll save that one for a while.