thehowe_v7.1

So, I was taking the garbage out yesterday, and I happened to walk past some dandelions. I kid you not, my first instinct was to harvest them for ingredients.

I think I've been playing too much Oblivion.

Halo 3 launched today. So begins the war of attrition. My plan is to get a 360 & Halo 3 at Christmas. The question is: can my willpower hold out that long?

It just so happens that today is also the College of Engineering Career Fair here at U of M, which means Microsoft is here. And of course, they had Halo 3 at their booth. And of course, I played it for an hour after class. Tonight, I'm going to a special Halo 3 tournament.

So, can I hold out? This morning I sang the Halo theme song in the shower. Multiple times. Smart money's probably on no.

Well, I went out and saw Sin City tonight. It was gory, disturbing, messed up shit. I loved every bit of it. Usually I don't really like those mega-violence type movies (if you haven't seen it, think Kill Bill and you'll be close), but for some reason I really enjoyed this one. Maybe it was the color thing, maybe it was the cheesy one-liners, I don't know, but it was awesome. Plus, I think watching all that violence helped vent some of the pent-up rage that always accumulates this time of year due to the utter imbeciles that live in Ann Arbor. I was so worked up after the movie that I played an hour of Halo. It was great.

To sum up the experience: cathartic.

Just a quick note - some early info was released on a new Star Wars strategy game called Empire at War. They're talking about pre-Alpha code, so the info is obviously very tentative. However, from what they've said about it so far, it sounds awfully similar to the best Star Wars strategy game ever: Rebellion. If they were to update that, add more strategy to planetary conquest, and make the ground battles something more than clicking the "invade" button, all of which they seem to be doing, this could be a very very good game.

Here's hoping!

Well, here I am again. It's the weekend before finals and, as usual, I don't feel like studying. My exams aren't too bad this semester - there's only one that I'm worried about, but I'm going to devote a full day and a half to studying for it, so I should be okay. Overall, this was a pretty easy semester. I'm going to be paying for it in spades next semester, though. I have 16 credits, half of which are 400-level EECS courses. Not fun stuff.

Christmas is shaping up to be pretty uneventful this year. All I asked for was some shirts from ThinkGeek and Xbox Live. I won't even be able to play on Live until I get back to the dorm. I might get a few other games, but nothing mind-shatteringly good. Hopefully Dahlke will do an alumni swim meet over break like he has the past few years. Those are always fun. I'll probably also get lunch or something with Ashley, which is always entertaining.

Damn. I'm out of stuff to ramble on about. Guess that means I have to go back to studying.

Gee, it's been awhile. Let's see, I managed to make it through Thanksgiving break without getting any work done. As usual. That, combined with mounds of mouth-wateringly good food, made me a very happy camper. I ended up not taking the ole Xbox home over break - I'm blasting through Legendary on Halo 2 faster than I thought as it is, and I'd like to leave some for Christmas break.

So my DVD/CDRW combo drive on my laptop broke, and the company I bought it from has since gone out of business. One of the prices you pay for buying cheap from a small company, I guess. On the downside, this means I'm going to have to spend between $80 and $150 of my own money to get the damn thing replaced, which is definitely not cool. You really have to pay for the slim design on those internal drives. On the other hand, I now have a fun, broken toy to take apart. I plan on attacking it Tuesday after my Latin exam.

In other news, I've played enough Halo 2 by now to come to the conclusion that it's not as good as Halo 1. However, with a few new maps and some bug fixes over Xbox live, it has the potential to be much better. I'll write up a more detailed review sometime over Christmas break. I won't really have time before then; the semester's winding down. Two full weeks of classes left, then a final week during which I have two days of classes, four exams, two projects, and a paper due. Fun fun. (Of course, on the plus side I'll be home a whole week before some chumps. Ha ha.)

Just an F.Y.I., the management (a.k.a. me) is on moratorium for the rest of the month, and probably most of the next two. Halo 2 has become the exclusive, all-consuming focus of my free time, and I don't foresee being freed from its grasp anytime in the near future. When I've gotten a little more experience in the multiplayer, I'll post some of my thoughts on the game and how it compares to the original.

Stupid cheap-ass bastards. That's the last time I let them set up the game - three on two capture the flag with ghosts on Blood Gulch is not my idea of a fun game.

*Takes a deep breath...*

So besides losing to a bunch of smug jackasses, it's been a pretty uneventful weekend. Got the new and improved website up and running (although it still needs some work), but didn't accomplish much else. Lots of people went out to party and whatnot for Halloween. I didn't. I probably should, one of these days. Maybe I'll let Sam take me out partying like he always offers to. Sam's kind of a dim bulb sometimes, but he's a good kid.

I think maybe when I'm older I'll be a hermit. That way, I won't have to put up with all these stupid people all the time. I'll buy a house out in the middle of nowhere and be the crazy old man with the shotgun. That would be great.

Okay, time to cut off this incessant babble. Off to bed I go.

I'm sorry to say I haven't had much time to work on the website lately. I have two programming assignments due, a paper due, and an exam all on Thursday. That isn't why I haven't been updating, though. I borrowed this great game from Tom called "Rise of Nations", and I think it may be the best RTS ever. I don't know why anybody else didn't think to combine the uber-classic board-game Risk with a Real Time Strategy game. It's just like playing Risk, only instead of rolling the dice to compute the outcome of a battle, you actually fight the battle. Genius.

Seems like I had something to bitch about today... Ahh, yes, that's it: construction workers. The University of Michigan uses our tuition money to fund a free bus system for transportation between central and north campuses. Normally it doesn't really bother me when non-students use the buses. It did bother me today, however, when the damn bus was packed full of engineering students all dressed up trying to get to the career fair. Six dusty, dirty, paint-covered construction workers jammed themselves into the bus, and I have to say I was a little irked. If you're going to take advantage of our money at work, construction workers, at least have the decency to wait for a bus that isn't packed tighter than a can of sardines on interview day. Bastards.

...Not that I said anything at the time. You try telling someone wearing a helmet and several blunt objects on their belt to get off the damn bus.

I was also considering using the analogy "Mexicans in a bus" instead of "can of sardines", but I figured that might offend someone.

I have an admission to make. Today, I was beat in Halo - by a girl.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not sexist. There's nothing wrong with a girl playing Halo. In fact, I wish more did so. It's just that I've never met a girl that played Halo, and she was pretty damn good. To top it all off, she was even attractive (remember the hot girl at the Wolverine Soft meeting I mentioned a few entries ago? That one.) To sum up, she's hot, into video games, and really good at Halo. Somewhere Hell is freezing over while simultaneously being flown over by pigs. It's a friggin' fleet of aerial freezing swine.

Still, I can't believe I got beaten by a girl!