Thanks everyone for the support I and my wife have received on all channels over the past week; she is finally home from the hospital. Her head looks a bit like a potato at the moment (I will produce pictures when she has regained something of a sense of humor) but the surgery was, by the doctor's measure, a complete success. Here's the X-ray post-op: X-Ray

Two teeth were taken instead of the three predicted.

They left the jaw hinge in place, which is fantastic news for flexibility and not having to rely on wires.

They saved the nerve that had been running alongside the tumor. Now that's fantastic because if they hadn't, she might have come out looking a bit like Sylvester Stallone with one half of her smile paralyzed. As it is, while the doctors never make promises where nerves are concerned, there is the expectation that she should regain control of her lips and might even get sensation back after a while (six months to a year?). So at the end of this process Wyla will at least have her smile and might make a complete and total recovery.

Baylor medical took really good care of her and while I am absolutely dreading the hospital bill, that hasn't come through yet so for now it's all smiles and the doctors, nurses, and lab technicians did a fantastic job. I can say their floors are not comfortable, having slept on a few while she was in ICU, and their "transport service" leaves something to be desired. We called for a wheelchair to take her to the front door and an hour later the nurse attending gave up and drove Wyla down herself. (We actually passed the lady from transport "on her way" in the hall. Unless she drove in from Dallas to wheel my wife downstairs, that's not good service time.) As a result of the late transport we got caught squarely in five oclock rush hour. A happy coincidence is that the storm that devastated areas of DFW yesterday blew through while she was having her x-ray at the oral surgeons. By the time we brought her out, the only part of the storm I saw was some of the build up and then my car was wet. So perhaps it's all part of Gawd's plan to not put hail damage on the Focus. Who knows. We got home all right, though it took something like three hours and an act of congress to get her prescriptions filled. I took my wife home in the meantime and made her comfortable.

Now the bad news.

I'm her nurse.

She won't EAT. My gawd such a complainer. I can't even quote her because her jaw is wired shut and she can't actually speak. But her phone has told me in no uncertain terms that the swelling is making everything uncomfortable and she has to concentrate on breathing, and "trying to clear" the mucus she winds up drinking water.

"What?" says you. "There's nothing wrong with that." "Yes there is," says I. Her jaw is WIRED SHUT. She CANNOT EAT SOLID FOODS. Therefore all of her nutrition, ALL OF IT, comes from liquids. If she keeps filling up with water she's going to die of malnutrition She will get PLENTY of water from her FOOD. She's expected to lose weight as it is eating what the DOCTORS are telling her to eat. Well fck that shit, I can't even get her to drink pedialite (it's too sweet) Ensure (too thick, would make mucus) any kind of whey mix (grainy) Oh my GAWD woman just fcking eat. I don't care if it's too sweet, too thick, AND too grainy, it's still better than you going to the hospital because you're on the verge of dying of malnutrition. (I will in a second, give me just a moment...) and then I wait a damn HOUR while she sits there and breathes, melodramatically. I eventually got back on the floor (at my own house) and went back to sleep waiting for her to eat. When I woke up? She'd taken her medicine. THAT"S GAWD DAMN IT, and that was three hours later. As I'm writing this she's sitting in there staring at Tomato soup getting cold. Let me go check and see if she's had any at all yet...

....

NOPE (cooling it off.)

Of course I can't straight up flip my shit at her because I'd see tears and then be unable to do anything. Her tears absolutely rape my resolve folks, it's feminine domestic abuse. I'll do anything, ANYTHING to keep her from crying. "Drink all the water you want hun just don't tear up. I'll handle those mean ole doctors and the negligence charges from the police when they're filed, do whatever you want just don't cry."

I don't know when/if she'll read this but I may go in and tell her she's not allowed to until she's better. What I need all of Y"ALL to do is spam her page with exhortations to eat (and pay attention to her husband when HE tells her to eat).

Screw that get well soon non-sense. She will. IF SHE EATS.

My wife goes in for surgery tomorrow. The severity actually straddles the line between life and death and cosmetic. It's completely medically necessary, yet not immediately life threatening.

She has a tumor in her lower jaw that requires the removal of a significant portion of said jaw. So while I'm usually so common a sight here on FA, I may be slightly less so </sarcasm> in the coming weeks or months.

However, I will be offering my thanks to those who care to proffer their aid to  Wyla through a "Gofundme" thing. See Wyla's account for details. She and I will be going over the details over the next twelve hours or so.

The long and the short of it is I will offer my services as a chain mailler making custom jewelry for those who request it, and I may put up a slot for a written piece, though the details for that are still cloudy in my mind. I'm not fond of writing for other people and I haven't written at all recently owing to life, the universe, and everything, so this may just be a flash in the pan, all sound and fury signifying nothing.

Those of you who pray, please do so for my wife.

Thanks for your time.

Especially if you're in High school.

And for the record, I have no school debt, no degree, and am in the top quintile of earners following the advice here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzKzu86Agg0

Knowing is half the battle folks. In other related news, put the teaching gig on the back burner since I've come to find out it's only a viable option about 9 months out of a 12 month calendar... which is a bit awkward if you aren't a bear.

Have gone to work for a fairly sizeable company, which is both good and bad. It's good, in that as long as I don't set anything or anyone on fire, I'm good to go, and bad in that I hate. Hate. HATE corporate culture. Every day I relive Office Space.

I get my own desk (good)
My cube has half walls (bad)
The work is incredibly varied (good)
I come home mentally exhausted (bad)
I come home to my wife every night (good)
... What? That's it. It all ends on the good note.

between never posting updates at all and posting updates so often that the people who watch you pretty much automatically delete all your journals?

I watch quite a few people that shall remain unidentified who post journal updates with such rapidity that I could not be PAID to care what content those journal updates contain. Is there an abbreviation for "You post too often, did not read?"

I might understand if there's an event going on in your life and for a few days there's a spurt of posts on said event. Like an orgasm, these spurts should be short lived and long remembered. If your orgasm begins to really last, you probably need medical attention and are about to die.

I only broach the topic because I am both genuinely curious as to the thoughts of those who watch me and cognizant of the fact that I haven't posted in quite a while.

I understand that there are self-help groups for people who have diahretic posting habits, places like Twitter and Facebook. Well, as I consider, these aren't really helping, but rather exacerbating the problem. But even in those venues where it is clearly inappropriate, people seem unconcerned with the sheer volume of garbage that spews from the mouths or rather fingers of people who you may watch because they have demonstrated themselves to be otherwise talented people.

At least two folks possessed of GREAT talents I have been forced to 'un-watch' as it were, because their considerable artistic talents simply do not outweigh the annoyance felt at yet ANOTHER plea for help, excuse, or 'my mother is such a bitch I hate her and so should you' post. I had to drop one person in great measure because this person was seemingly incapable of avoiding the use of internet speak. Saying things like, 'stuffs, yanno, dramahz, manz,' etc. is not funny, does not connect you with the plebs, and it certainly does not give the impression that you are part of the in-crowd. It just says, "Retardation is strong in this one. Drugs present in great quantity. Avoid if possible, break in case of emergency."

So is this a question anyone else has given thought to? What exactly is the threshold at which one should post a journal as opposed to using some other outlet? Am I just being odd because after all, journals don't even appear on the same page as submissions? Or like me do you find that once you've taken the measure of a person and found them wanting, the great skill with which they may perform otherwise no longer appeals?

hasn't really changed me that much, or so I like to think.

I still go about finding things to do, still obsess about video games, still keep a clean place... but there are a few things I do differently in deference to my wife and the fact that my marriage means there are things I give up to be on this side of the fence.

I suppose not everyone agrees that marriage is a trade-off. I really don't wonder how long my marriage will last. I knew the answer to that question when I popped the other one. With this other marriage though... if you don't wonder how either of them could possibly be taking it seriously visavis their behavior on television... I don't think you really have or have ever had any skin in this game.

Just a passing thought.

I'd been on a wow kick lately when some friends of mine told me that pretty much all of them had bought into FF XIV (hereafter known as FF because fckin' Roman numerals)

When I was a kid, I LIVED FF I II and III (Here in the states, I'm not interested in the Japanese numbering system, I didn't and don't live in Japan.)

I picked up X^2 when I was in the military and regretted it immediately. It was essentially Anime Barbie Dress-up, and I never finished it and swore off the FF series. Xeno Saga was by then much more compelling and it wasn't more than a year or two later that I pretty much quit console gaming entirely.

Then lo' there stood XIV. There stood my friends and family playing it... and here stood I with a recurring wow obsession. How prone am I to obsession when it comes to WoW? This latest time I farmed up the Recipe for the Vial of the Sands. I made two. THAT is how obsessed. The first time I played I got to Field Marshal under the old vanilla ranking system and was only moved to quit the game because they took said ranking system away the week I was to become Grand Marshal.

So I get pretty into it.

I figured it was time for a change, so I cancelled my battle.net account and bought FF. I've played it for a few days, and here are my observations:

After WoW, FF seems to take itself seriously. VERY seriously. Ludicrously, are you fcking kidding me? seriously. That takes some getting used to. You are not one of a horde of players in FF. You are a gawd damn hero. YOU. HERO. Can't handle it? NEED the tongue in cheek sarcasm to get through your questing? You won't like FF. Some of the quest lines are punny in name and they put Biggs and Wedge in as not quite pilots, but that's pretty much it. Other than the occasional Easter egg reference to this game or that movie, you're on your own for humor.

Now having just said that, I have to say this: Clothing.

If you aren't laughing, you haven't played FF within the last oh... since the days of 16 bit. Armor and clothing in FF ranges from the really cool to the outstandingly stupid. And guys I know what you're thinking: Chain mail bikinis? I'm in!

Well yeah, chain mail bikinis... but FF is equal opportunity. YOU, my hulking, burly, icon of maleness, will at one time in your adventuring career have to wear said bikini yourself. This brings us to the next point. If you are an American Male, you are going to have to enter the closet to play FF. In Japan where this game was made, apparently men and women run the same playbook and this includes things like standing, running, and pretty much anything involving movement. The animators used females for ALL of the motion capture. This is a certainty of mine based entirely on the results, not research. I made (for instance) a male dark elf with the grizzled features of an old man, a veteran of many wars so to speak. When I stand to speak or be spoken to, my feet are at 9 and 12 and my hands are held out from my sides like I've got some kind of invisible dress on. It's humiliating.

Well okay Ceb, given all this you're still playing the game?

Yes. Because aside from that the game is pretty good. The dungeons are accessible through the main storyline quests and you can't get into said dungeons unless or until you progress that questline. Remember what I said about being a hero? Treat this like your average MMO sandbox and you won't get very far. As well, I've not had to grind YET. The quests in the areas the main storyline takes me are enough to keep me current with the storyline level requirements. So while this is an MMO and there are other players, I remain the focus of the story and it moves as I move. That's pretty cool and is something WoW didn't do until fairly recently.

The mechanics are familiar and yet different enough that they keep me interested. I will say the global cooldown is slower and I'm not sure if that's deliberate to keep something of a turn-based feel or what, but it does give one ample time to actually think about what ability to use next. The battle isn't as fluid as it might otherwise be but positioning is more important and even trash mobs have avoidable attacks which are costly if not avoided or interrupted. The dungeons are well-laid out and more to the point the quest givers actually have solid reasons for giving you what quests you get. Some of them go to great lengths to apologize for or justify said quests, which range from the consequential to the silly. Want to make friends with the sylphs? Guess what... you'll be dancing. That's right. DANCE, MONKEY! 'Hi, how are you?' isn't good enough for sylphs.

If you can take yourself seriously, you can really get into this game. While the quests do have much the same flavor that they've had in all other games, go here kill x of these for y bits and pieces, etc... I've yet to have the feeling I often got in WoW of, "If I kill yet ANOTHER one of these fckin' things and somehow it doesn't drop a 'head' I will put MY head through the fcking screen." Doesn't happen.

Another thing I like about this game? NO LOOT!

Wait, WHAT?!

That's right loot whores, no loot. Or rather, no looTING Of course you get rewarded for kills and quests, but you don't have to stoop and loot the bodies. They've pretty much completely done away with any kind of looting mechanic outside of click this chest, it opens. Once it opens, you get whatever was in it, or whoever in your group is assigned that treasure gets it. EVERYTHING you get in game is either crafting material or useful; there is no vendor trash. Big whoop you say? Yeah, reading it now I would have said the same thing but having played the game I can say that it has saved quite a bit of time in both stooping to loot and vendoring garbage. Kind of like how no game ever puts in a mechanic whereby you have to stop adventuring periodically to drop the duece and I haven't seen food and sleep as necessary since the original Everquest.

I also love the monster designs, the world, and the music. The music in WoW has made great strides and is now awesome, but FF music has ALWAYS been awesome and lives up to it's reputation here. There are the familiar riffs for the crystals and the chocobo that everyone is familiar with as well as tunes that fit the locales quite well. I've not been tempted yet to turn off the music.

Backing up a bit, character creation is quite customizable. Within the scope of the various races, you're free to play. I did not spend much time with this but saw the potential there readily enough. The last time I spent time really thinking on a character concept was when I was playing Champions... and MAN do I miss THAT game. In it's heyday it was nirvana for a four color comic book geek such as myself.

But I digress. Final Fantasy XIV has kept me hooked for the last week and I'm quite happy with it overall. As with most Japanese products, the laughs you get out of it will largely be those the designers didn't intend, like gravity defying shorts and the auto-nekkid feature inherent in switching classes, which I didn't even mention but which is very cool. Want to play a different class? No need to make a new character, just run a quest and pick up a new primary weapon, but be careful! If you aren't eligible to wear the same type of armor/clothing as the class you're leaving, the game strips you down to your skivvies... so do your changing in private for Gawd's sake. I sold all my game start clothes so when I switched to a new class I wound up questing naked for the better part of two hours until I got a decent set of quest reward clothing because vendors do not SELL level 1 clothes... I mean that's silly, who would buy level 1 clothes right?

So yeah, grizzled dark-elf running around with a curly ass conjurer's twig in skivvies solving people's problems. Nothing wrong or laughable about that right?

(you should have seen my wife giggling over my shoulder....) =^_^;=

I've spent most of the last year trying to get my life in some new kind of order.

Coming back to the states from the desert was a shock to the system. I spent months trying to buy a house only to be stymied by the fact that since I own my own business now the banks look at me differently and won't give me a loan. Moving myself, moving my woman, getting used to a new dog, then ANOTHER new dog, getting married... all while sorting out a new work situation.

I look back on the year and realize I've done practically nothing creative.

One might argue getting married is an act of supreme creativity and I might be inclined to agree but that's not exactly something I can post is it.

I can't even post a picture of that... well I suppose I could but it would be unAmerican not to charge for those kinds of images.

So I'm sitting here looking at the class in front of me who are all working on an IP troubleshooting lab thinking to myself that I need to get back into writing.

I have some checks coming in and this class will bring me another one; the contract I'm looking at picking up is likely a few weeks off yet, so why not focus on writing in the intervening time?

I'll have to spend SOME of that time studying, such is the nature of the job, but surely I could take some time off from games and invest that time in something a bit more productive if not lucrative.

Some of my time will of course be spent on BtV. Right now we've been coasting on material that was written last year. The pace of the comment is subject to forces outside my control, but still I should go ahead and work out more of the finer details. In broad strokes I know what's going to happen but if I don't start getting more specific I may miss foreshadowing opportunities which will lessen the impact of the story overall.

Still, BtV can't be my only creative outlet. I have been thinking semi-seriously about making a real effort at publication. It's been many years since I dusted off that dream and took a look at it, but in those intervening years I've lived quite an interesting life. I've seen much of the world and garnered experiences that I think will make it easier for me to write with a better grasp on character development and human nature.

If I do decide to take a serious shot at a novel though it will almost certainly not be anthropomorphic. There just isn't enough demand for that sort of work to make it profitable, and I'm not the sort to be satisfied with being a big fish in a small pond. That's one of the reasons I gave up Air Hockey. I got tired of having to explain a sport I was good at but that no one else knew was a sport. It's still a fun game but there's just no local competition, my associates having also left the game years back. Likewise I look at most of the stuff I've done in furry and no matter how much I personally may like it I understand that it's just not publishable in the broader sense.

I had a few ideas about stories set in an alternate past, just after the Civil War. I may dust some of those off and have a look, but if I do make a serious literary effort in the next year I definitely need to organize the attempt so as to give it the most reasonable chance at success. Thus this journal, to organize my thoughts.

Oh, and I love my wife dearly, which is an afterthought in this journal but not in my life. Her support and the changes I'm forced to deal with in order to live peaceably with a lovely woman I deeply love has made me a better person.

Married.

Ring, wedding, the whole bit.

Waxing poetic is something I might do for my woman, but here I'll just say it.

I married the woman God put on this earth just for me.

When I'm old and gray and have forgotten just about everything else in my life, I will remember today.

I don't do commissions, I understand that about myself.

No, this commission is 150 dollar piece done by BOTH  DreamTaker and  Wyla

DT will do the sketch and lines and Wyla will do the color and shading.

Interested? Reply here or to lordneverwinter[at]yahoo.com with the references and a description of what you'd like done, single character furry OR human. We posted the details in the blog for the latest BtV comic but I figured I'd have the artists disseminate for wider coverage and I further figured to do it myself. Background will be simple.

Once I have confirmed payment the finished piece will be done and in the buyer's hands within 7 days.

Which is a crap title for a journal involving something so significant.

In brief, I'm getting married. I proposed to Wyla, and she accepted on 5 September.

In not quite so brief... man it's been a long road, and there's still so far to go... and there's no one else I'd rather have in the seat next to me for the ride.

If I told the whole story I'd have a book on my hands (so maybe someday I will tell the whole story, who knows?) but for now I'm going to keep this relatively short. My life has gotten busier, not easier, since I came back from the desert. Now my job actually requires I do more than show up and occasionally fix something. Now I'm engaged at work, all day every day, because I teach.

So I don't have much time for creativity, and what little time I have I sink into Beyond the Veil. That's why most of my updates lately have been reposts from the comic or one of the artists who works on it with me.

With immigration and all the practical crap that comes with getting hitched, I can't imagine that things will get any less busy anytime soon.

Nevertheless, it's work I happily undertake. The smile when I walk into the classroom is almost never fake, and the hardest part about the travel is no longer coming home to an empty house, but leaving one so full of love and affection. I even love the damn dog, and he shits on my carpet when he thinks no one's looking.

In completely unrelated news... is it just me or are the lives of almost every other fur I know or watch here on FA imploding? I just waded through about 30 journals over the past week, and at least 16 of them were titled something like, "more bad news" "there goes the day" "why me?" "soul crush" "medical news not good" "need help!" etc.

I then look over at the list of MY past journals with such scintillating titles as: "Raw testosterone and other positive cultural influences" "No one was murdered because of the image in this link." "Not porn but will still give you wood" "I am smoking a Texas Jewboy." and my personal favorite, "Have a face full of awesome. It's on the house."

I don't even remember what that last one was about but it must be good. I'll probably go read it after I finish this journal.

I guess the long and the short of it is if I look at what other people are posting, and look at what I'm posting, clearly either I or they aren't doing it right. (the journal thing, not life in general... I'm not THAT conceited.)

....

Perhaps I should host a journal writing symposium. I am a teacher after all. :P

Post Script:
SHE SAID YES!!!! HOODY HOO IMMA GET MARRIED! HOLY JALAPENOS (ONNA STEEEEECK)!!!!

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster.....ith-cat-687453

And remember, pot is completely safe. Not a gateway drug at all. In fact, it's easier on your system than cigarettes!

in comics, I am rarely struck by one. This is an exception. As I was reading through the xkcd archives, I came across this little gem.

http://xkcd.com/1227/

While I was taken aback by the enduring nature of some of these most urgent arguments it took me but a short time to realize that however enduring the argument may be, thereby suggesting the urgency implied in the argument is ephemeral... tis not so.

It is simply that certain prized institutions have always been prized, and their preservation has always been of paramount importance to the socially and civilly aware. That someone a hundred years ago or more mourned the desecration and destruction of an institution that I hold dear ties me as a conservative more strongly with my forebears. It in no way invites me to surrender to the same destruction they fought so vigorously, for no better reason than that the fight is a surprisingly old one.

I think I'm going to have to give this stuff a shot. With a schedule as chaotic as mine... I could really benefit from not having to worry about meals.

https://campaign.soylent.me/soylent-free-your-body

And of course for those of you who are movie buffs... it's not people... but if it were I would probably still give it a shot. Because people is food too.

An ingredients list can be found in this article (thanks Wyla!)

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/a.....ner-glass.html

It's a furry side-scroller with a hint of the kingdom hearts combo mechanic and pretty good voice-over.

15 bucks on steam.

I picked it up and it's a good game for the price. Check it out.

I was disappointed with ESG.

This is not due entirely to the venue, but mostly. Previous ESG's have been in Orlando, and have typically taken up more of a percentage of the hotel in which they were booked. (this is my understanding from others who have attended, this year's was my first.)

Hard Rock Hotel in Vegas is a comparatively small property in Vegas, but it completely swallowed ESG and left barely a trace. As well, the hotel seemingly arbitrarily decided to cut the space allotted for the convention into two halves, each at opposite ends of the hotel. The cohesion of the con was thus... lacking, to say the least.

Also on the downside were the fact that there were at LEAST three other major events going on consecutive to ESG and they all seemed to involve ridiculously loud dubstep and bad remixes being blasted in the pool area until 3am. I was on the 16th floor and was still kept from sleep by the repetitive boomboomwubwub. I didn't have many reasons to like dubstep anyway, now I've even fewer.

I did meet some friendly folks and to those of you watching, well met.

I also for the first time got all three of the principles for Beyond the Veil in one room. That was pretty cool too.

I won't go into the personal experiences (I had a running battle with the hotel that lasted the duration of the con having to do with the ah... conditions of the bathroom) suffice it to say that I will never, EVER, get a room at ANY hard rock property again. I'd rather chew fiberglass.

In other news... I quit my job today.

*sighs* I've been home from Kuwait since April Fools, but until today it was under the guise of leave. I have finally let go the vine and am currently hanging in mid-air, fingers outstretched for the next bit of ropey greenery in this aerial jungle metaphor. I have to take a test the 21st. Assuming I pass, I have to go to Miami for a week for a class that culminates in another test, this one an 8 hour exam, and then I have to teach the next day.

I am not happy at the moment, because the first test is one for a certification I already possess, but because I haven't taken the test RECENTLY I must retest. While I am confident I will pass, there is still an element of risk and if I fail, everything unravels. The second test, the one in Miami, I am actually more confident of despite it's VASTLY more expensive nature and the fact that it will be new ground.

THAT test though, has caused me to miss Confuzzled. I have had to cancel my plans for attendance in order to take advantage of this test, which is only being offered once anytime in the next four months. While I could quite adequately live unemployed until the end of summer and then look to take the class/test at that time, I really don't want to be apart from my girl for that long, and I can't make permanent living arrangements until I have the job secured, which won't happen until I pass this second test and start taking on a schedule.

Assuming it all works out, I'll be making VERY good money which at first will be a bit less than what I was making in the desert but which has the potential to be much more. People in the position I hope to attain can rake in a quarter million a year and more, and I'd be in the states to boot. As well I would have unlimited free training in whatever aspect of tech I care to master, and the more I learn the more I get paid. It's a dream job.

So of course I have to jump through more than a few hoops to get it, and the heights at which I am being asked to make these otherwise simple jumps is dizzying... so if you don't see me around for a few weeks, at least now you know why.

This isn't something that just started, it's something that's been going on for a few weeks now.

As some few of you may know, my contract at my current company is up in April. While I have signed on for another six months, I also requested and received two and a half months off w/o pay. I'm going to use this opportunity to go home and search for a job because I'd really rather not come back here. I miss my friends. I miss my godkids. I haven't seen either of my parents in what, three years? Haven't seen my dad in five. Travel is fun, but it's long past time I went home for a while.

As for jobs I've got a few prospects, one of them solid and very promising, but one never knows with these things and actually, I didn't want to write this journal about that.

I wanted to write about packing.

I've done probably more than my fair share of packing over the years, but this time it's a bit different because I've been here and slowly accruing crap for the past two years. I knew that it'd take a while to pack properly if I didn't want to just give it all up (and I've done THAT before too, but that's for another time) and having spent the past two weeks packing and shipping and packing and shipping... ugh. I used to pride myself on packing light. What the hell happened here? How did I get so much CRAP, and why am I bothering to keep it?

Well some is nostalgia and some is stuff I've found I quite like and use often. Some is just the fact that I buy too many fcking cigars and there's no way I could smoke them all before going home. 3 humidors is probably a bit much. That Keurig is coming with me come hell or high water. Why would I leave these dvd's? I bought em, I'll keep em. How on EARTH did I get so many sata ribbons, usb, camera wire, SPEAKER CABLE? how many sets of headphones do I fcking need and where have THOSE been for the past year and a half?!

And so on.

Half or more of my crap is now state bound and this place is only JUST starting to look like something's amiss. All the same stuff that's been floating around the room for the past year is still floating around the room (albeit recently moved) but the drawers are empty, the closets bare.

I'm absolutely dreading the dismantlement of my computer system. I'm running a hybrid air and water cooled system (I wanted to see if there was a performance gain through watercooling. Thinking seriously about upgrading the system when I put it back together to be completely watercooled not because the performance is that much better, but because it's that much quieter, but we'll see.) and taking it apart without making a mess will be a fun science project. That's next week though, when I get within the seven day window for shipping out of this dump. Even then I'm not looking forward to living through a netbook for a week.

Here I am so looking forward to getting home and then what... oh joy. I get to go looking for a house. >.<

This is why I stayed here when my contract was up LAST year... not because I liked it, but because I was too lazy to do all this packing.

If this doesn't get the real man in you hard... there may be no hope left for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEMtlxGzzZE

Imma get me one of these when I move back to Texas. It's just too cool not to have. New computer or one of these? One of these.

GOTTA CATCHEMALL!

I am finally a fully credentialed CCNP.

Long (unnecessarily so) road, but it's finally done. Yay. Now I get to start on my CCNP Security specialization which is only.... *checks*

five more tests.

*faceplant*

COME ON YOU HIPPIES! THEY NEED YOUR HELP!
Brazilian Bikini Waxes

"She a pass, or a fail?"

"She's a pass."

"I knew she would be."

Gun Control.

(It has been pointed out to me by a very kind soul that the tone of the following article is somewhat self-defeating if its purpose is to convince people. I agree that this is so. If you find my tone offensive so be it. It is yours to allow that tone to put you off the message but know that the message is more important than the messenger and such being the case I hope those of you who've come genuinely interested in solid argument will forgive the messenger his bit of catharsis.)

I shall refrain in the following FROM the following: anecdotal evidence, hyperbole, pleas to emotion, straw man arguments and MOST importantly, ad hominem against proponents of the policies I intend to tear limb from metaphoric limb. If you've the stones after I'm finished to take issue, please also have the intelligence to make cogent arguments. If you lack this, I shall mock you mercilessly. Here we go.

To begin I will tell a story (which will not comprise evidence, just anecdote). I was recently in England visiting my one and only when I had the great good fortune to spend Christmas with her family. I was upon first meeting and continue to be at each subsequent event amazed at how well adjusted every single member of that family is and though some of them seem dedicated (to a fault in my view, but that's for later) to certain propositions I find absolutely appalling, they are in fact genuinely excellent people and treated me very well.

Post food conversation turned inevitably toward topics of a global concern, and as you well know one of the more gut wrenching events in recent history was a school shooting involving child victims. As mass shootings often do this one sparked a renewed national debate on arms control in the United States. My gracious hosts immediately took the position that arms in the possession of the populace, particularly those in the assault rifle class, should under no circumstances be permitted because their ownership by private citizens leads inevitably to tragedy. A member of the family waxed eloquent on how manifestly stupid it was that everyone didn't see the folly of owning weapons, and I took it for only so long before I spoke up, carefully mind you, saying that I was in fact a proponent of the second amendment and approved whole-heartedly of the ownership of weapons by citizens. In fact I believe, and forwarded the belief, that everyone ought to own or at least be certified to carry a firearm who is not precluded by mental health or previous criminal activity.

I am afraid that the animation that ensued prevented me from making a completely cogent argument in defense of this belief, and I left off rather early to prevent bad feeling because as my hosts pointed out, the English are raised to an entirely different culture and as they put it, in England such a thing just absolutely would not work.

Leaving aside the question of cultural ability or lack thereof to accept the responsibilities that come with firearm ownership for the moment, I will detail instead the rather potent arguments FOR said ownership, arguments which the recent speech made by an NRA representative left woefully unattended. (That man, who shall remain nameless in this article, is a fcking idio... oh wait, no ad hominem... well no, this man is on MY side so I can rip him at will. He's a fcking idiot.)

First I need to lay some groundwork for those who have been misled as to the solid rationale behind gun ownership. It actually doesn't start with the guns themselves, it begins with, surprise! the law. Specifically what the law does and does not do.

What it DOES NOT do: prevent crime. I don't need statistics because it is a manifest truth. If in fact the law prevented crime then there would be no crime because no one would engage in legally prohibited activities. They (people) do (commit crime), therefore the law does not prevent crime. This is a logically solid, incontrovertible truth. Don't fight it; you'll only hurt yourself (or more likely make yourself look stupid to anyone who even pretends to use logic to make arguments, though granted that group is shrinking.) I will take this argument a logical step further and surprise all of you again! Ha ha! IF in fact the law DID prevent crime, then there would be absolutely no reason whatsoever to prevent ANYONE from owning ANY TYPE OR NUMBER of weapons on grounds related to criminal activity. We could give assault rifles to children, so long as the law outlawed their use. Also an incontrovertible argument. (Don't even try. I promise, you're pissing on a brick wall hoping to knock it down and that, as any drunk will tell you, is a losing proposition.) If you have your head even loosely screwed on you've accepted the premise that the law does not prevent crime and we may thus move to point the second. (No I haven't forgotten you folk who scream about gun 'accidents.' Making that argument would require further that no one be allowed to drive an automobile, the use of which kills far more people in western society 'by accident' than guns. So don't go there, it's just silly.)

What the law DOES do: give society recourse against the criminal. As a fine author once said and I now paraphrase: once you turn your hand against society, all of society turns its hand against you. Laws give us justification to curtail the activities of those who turn their hands and set their wills against society, and nothing more. Our various societies have various limits on what punishments we consider it appropriate to impose, but in deciding to impose any punishment at all we have clearly availed ourselves of the social contract of which I have earlier spoken. Life in society is tacit AND explicit agreement to abide by social rules. Break those rules and be subject to punishment by the concerted will of the people in the form of government.

So if we're all on the same page (and Dear Gawd I hope we are because this is keeping things painfully simple) it is the punishment promised by transgression of the law which is supposed to deter crime, and it does! Yes it does work, but only so far, only so much, and only so often. As I said I will provide no anecdotal evidence, you've only to turn your mind to the most casual of historical considerations to realize that even the punishments wrought by the law only go so far to deter crime. Note my choice of word here because it is crucial. DETER.

Neither the law NOR its just application of punishment does the following: PREVENT crime. It never prevents crime, ever. Think about that for just a moment. At no point has the law or the promise of punishment ever physically manifested and stopped a crime. It just hasn't happened. It is in fact, beyond the realm of probability. I won't say impossible, because well, anything is possible. To MY knowledge however, it has never, ever, ever happened.

Not once.

Plenty of people thought of the risks involved in committing a crime and were deterred or talked down from the cusp of commission, but not one person in history ever decided to take those risks and been prevented from doing so by the law or its attendant punishments. This isn't Minority Report; the world just doesn't work that way.

NOW! YES! I've laid the cloth and set the table, now to dish up the meat of the argument. I do so with a question to which the answer SHOULD quickly manifest absent any further prodding from me. What does actually prevent crime?

Got an answer? Are you sure?

Did you say guns?

If you did I'm sorry to say that you were too eager to go for the obvious answer and you are sadly, wrong.

Guns do not prevent crime. Guns are, as we shall see, only a tool. What prevents crimes ladies and gentlemen? The answer is, drum roll please....

YOU!

ONLY those present at the commission of a crime have the power to prevent it. Well, they and Gawd, but since He seems to have left things in our generally capable hands I wouldn't pray too hard for Gawd to miracle you or an innocent bystander-cum-victim out of a jam.

If the criminal has no weapons and is weaker than the potential victim (a vanishingly rare occurrence I might add), this is a generally simple task. If he has weapons and/or is not weaker than the potential victim... well things get a bit harder. Nevertheless, here's the tricky, hard to sell point that most people just can't or won't accept: You are responsible, regardless of the odds for or against you, of stopping the crime in progress. If you do not prevent the crime, then it will not be prevented. By all means weigh the odds and decide they are so overwhelming that your chances of success are far outweighed by your value alive and (perhaps) unharmed to your family or the future, but that argument really only works if you're a bystander. If you're the victim and particularly if you are alone, the buck stops with you. That's it. There is no one else. If you do not stop the crime, then the very BEST you can hope for is vengeance. That's it, because that's all society can give you.

If you are raped or murdered, social vengeance will not give you back those horrible moments and take away the nightmares, or restore to you your life. There are no guarantees that if the criminal is later caught what treasures were stolen from you will be recouped. The toil it took to achieve what you have lost vanishes with the commission of the crime.

Add all the preceding arguments up, and Gun Control laws start to look a bit... flimsy. We know they don't work, the proof of the pudding is in the eating as they say, and in the most recent case, the guns used to massacre children at the school were not legally allowed to the man who used them. He STOLE THEM from his first victim.

I can hear it now, "If SHE hadn't had the guns, he wouldn't have been able to get them either!" Look in the mirror. Look yourself in the eye and say that with a straight face. If you can... well, you and I know either you've not given it any thought at all, or you're delusional.

A casual traipse through history shall illumine us: Was there a SINGLE GUN on ANY of the three planes that destroyed the Twin Towers or plowed into the field in Pennsylvania? Did Timothy McVeigh need a SINGLE bullet to kill 168 people including 19 children UNDER SIX YEARS OLD in Oklahoma? Even if we were to assume for a moment that the man involved in the recent shooting hadn't been able to lay hands on a single firearm, can we seriously say that he would have thrown up his hands and lived the quiet life? Without recourse to firearms and given his universally attested to intellect... well, let's simply say that any such argument treads firmly on the grounds of wishful thinking.

A gun is simply a tool, and one of many, that makes both the commission AND the prevention of crime easier. So, that being manifestly the case, in which scenario is it easier for a criminal to commit crime: In the first scenario, it's illegal for anyone to own a gun and the criminal knows that as long as he's robbing law abiding citizens, he's the only one in possession of a firearm. In the second scenario the criminal still has a gun, but he has no idea who else is armed. The little old lady could have a .22 in her bag which makes her MUCH more lethal than the brawny but obviously unarmed jogger next in line at the grocery store. See what I mean?

With the realization that only those present can prevent crime, those actually INTERESTED in preventing crime MUST be in support of as wide as possible a dispersal of guns in society because gun ownership works on precisely the same principle as immunization. We cannot prevent diseases from entering our bodies, but we can inoculate against them. In refusing the vaccine, we have opened the door to infection.

People who honestly believe that a society can be free of firearms hasn't been paying attention. NO society ANYWHERE has EVER prevented a single thing they didn't want from getting into the country. Not guns, not bombs, not viruses or disease, not drugs, not even pest plants or animals. As the drug war in the states suggests, the harder you fight it, the more widespread and robust the underground market for it becomes. England has been vehemently opposed to guns in the hands of its citizens for a long long time... and gun crime there is on the rise.

In the case of Gun Control laws, all you have done in taking firearms out of the hands of law abiding citizens is ease the commission of crime against those same citizens. You've not prevented a single crime. You've not saved a single innocent life. You have in fact made it more likely that innocent lives be taken because those victims who are not cowards will defend themselves even though the assailant has a gun... and they don't.

And if a representative of the NRA had stood up and made THAT speech, I dare say the national conversation would have taken quite a different turn.

Point the first: I almost did one of those little answer question memes and then thought better of it. While I do admit to some amount of (won't say how much) voyeuristic pleasure out of reading these when done by people that interest me, I feel no compunction to pass that pleasure on to others who are interested IN me, because I just don't roll like that.

Point the second: I play Guild Wars 2 on Seafarer's Rest server (European) and I can be found under Cebelius.6742 Don't ask me why the numbers, they're appended to every name. There is an explanation provided that I did not bother to read.

Point the third: Kuwait still sucks. (for those of you wondering)

Point the ah hell, last but not least: Democrats suck even more than usual because one of their representatives is putting this atrocity on the docket for a vote next week:
Senate bill rewrite lets feds read your e-mail without warrants
Comics are rarely so insightful. Furry would be punks take note... I see you.

“Always see the dangers first.
Always protect your feet.
Always be ready for cold.
Always be ready for heat.
Always know where good water or a source is.
Always master the skills necessary.
Always get the job done.
Always know your place.
Always disallow foolishness.
Always rest whenever you can.

Ten fingers, ten laws that I live by.
(Ten fingers, ten laws that I live by,
like all signs they keep me on track)

It could be that we’re all musicians
just singing our way through life together.
”
— East Forest
“10 Laws”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3vDBYshUYM

Yeah... not much to add here. I have a hard time imagining disliking someone who followed these rules. Particularly the last 5. Rule 9 pretty much exempts anyone in furry though, so even I can't say I follow these. Oh well.

There's an incentive this time around on topwebcomics to vote.

Would you like to see what Aliana looks like under new ownership? Go vote for us on topwebcomics.com! I made it easy, there's a freakin' button on the journal under the post!

http://beyondtheveilcomic.com

Do eeeet.