Nine months later, and I can honestly say that my feelings on Japan were pretty well-founded.

Though the younger generations are pretty indifferent toward us, most of the older folks are still bitter about an event that they brought on themselves that I personally had zero hand in, nor any of the other folks I'm over here with.

The exchange rate is getting better, but fluctuates, currently sitting at 93 JPY to 1 USD, which means that stuff is generally more expensive to purchase out in town.

EVERYTHING is more expensive out in town. And in the country at large.

There's nothing that I can do over here that I can't do back in the states for a substantially lesser price.

Climb Mount Fuji? Why? Though it's a good hike (at 12,388'), America's got Mount McKinley at 20,328'.

As far as I'm concerned, I've visited a legitimate Pokémon Center, and thus have put my check in the obligatory Japan box.

Heh... box.

So yeah, got deployed to Japan for the next three years.

The initial shock wore off, and now I'm bored.

...For three more years.

Side note: Apple's MacBook Air is freakin' slick.

So to Aphinity, if you read this: You'll be tickled pink to know that I went from my rather strong opinion against Apple products to now owning an iPhone 4S, iMac, MacBook Pro, iPad 2, and having my sights set on a MacBook Air. It's a beautiful company with beautiful products that just... they just work. And they do it well.

That being said, I'm now in San Diego, California for a few months of school.

Beautiful place. The people kinda suck, though. At least the other Navy people do.

Also, still kinda frustrated that I have yet to receive anything but a handful of excuses from Jace on a simple commission I paid for almost 8 years ago now.

Dammit.

So maybe it's just a personal experience and I'm absolutely nucking futs, but... as gay acceptance is becoming more widespread, are gays turning... straight?

I just... I don't...

What...

Damn you, Apple. Damn you to Hell.

For making such a fun and intuitive experience, but making Flash an unwelcome visitor on such an otherwise dynamic device.

If you don't have one, you should check them out at your local Best Buy. If you're thinking about getting one, get a 3G model.

FA is neat when you can pinch to zoom in on the juicy bits.

Netherwing Drakes are still the best flying mounts in the game.

Period.

That is all.

Each time Microsoft releases a new operating system, I'm hesitant to upgrade. I've been like this since 98 SE: I avoided Windows XP like the plague. Hell, I upgraded to 2000 before I even considered XP. Eventually I came around, though. My hesitation served me well when it came down to ME, though! So I'm not entirely wrong.

This time, I was REALLY wrong, though. REALLY... REALLY wrong.

That wrongness is only amplified by my nice new 23" touchscreen I bought to fully take advantage of Windows 7's gimmickry. Oh, Microsoft... how I <3 thee.

Apologies for the blatant product plugs, but... come on, 7's just slick.

Did I mention that this is my first 64-bit OS?

Got my Kindle in the mail, and she's a thing of beauty.

Named it after someone I'll never have the chance to personally get to know.

Akeakamai, rest in peace.

I can't recall how I found these, but I'll be damned if they're not incredible for reducing eyestrain.

http://www.gunnars.com/remix/metallic_marley.php

Great for those long-term WoW sessions.

Or Mass Effect 2.

WHATEVER SUITS YOUR FANCY.

Linked by a friend on Facebook.

Funny stuff, very clever commercial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YqlQS5CCmwI

So yeah, I didn't realize it the first time through, but after reading the ME Wiki, I was able to find out that the intercom is very much usable to get Tali up to your quarters post-suicide mission.

All I can say about resting in the bed:

D'awwwww...

srsly, BioWare?

It's bad enough that she's the shortest romance scene of all the possible romances, but not showing me her face?!

DAMMIT.

Mass Effect 2 is epic though, folks. Get it if you haven't already.

So I'd never heard of this film until I was down at the local Barnes & Noble, and I saw a rather suave lookin' CGI canine on the cover of a Maya training book.

Turns out Disney got together with some Indian animation studio and produced what looks to be a movie that failed horribly.

Nevertheless, it still looks rather slick, so I'm gonna see if I can't track down a copy. Be it Amazon, YouTube, or whatever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6p_uZWSBX0

Copying and pasting from my Facebook entry.

TLDR: You guys were kinda right. The movie didn't suck, but IMAX didn't enhance it all that much for me. Save the flying seeds and HUD's (when present). Not a movie I'd sit through in the theaters again, but it's not Avatar's fault: my attention span for movies that long is nearly non-existent.

* * * *

Prolly not gonna be too long a post, since if you wanna know more about the movie, you can just go and read the Wikipedia entry. Just putting this in a note since it's already past the 160-character limit, and I need space to stretch.

That being said, I finally did go and see that damned movie, and I'll be honest: it was good. I went in with preconceptions that the story was just gonna be recycled from one or more sources, and all it'd have to show for itself are the flashy graphics everyone screams about.

I'll say this: the graphics were superb.

But they weren't in any way, shape, or form, enhanced by the "IMAX 3D" experience. Truth be told there, I saw more 3D in the trailers for Alice in Wonderland and How to Train Your Dragon. The Cheshire Cat's head was actually creepily 3D.

Mere inches in front of my face creepily 3D.

But yeah, as far as the movie itself is concerned, I immediately forgot about any similarities to any stories that this may have had out the window (though upon further thought, it is very Pocahontas-esque), as I was swept up in the movie. The 3D effect suffered (to me) what can be likened to the same problem that this item suffers:

http://www.xump.com/Science/MagicIl.....sionSaucer.cfm

If you didn't click the link, 's to one of those saucer-type deals that comes with a small rubber pig figurine. Viewed from a certain angle, it appears that the pig is floating on the top of the saucer on a mirrored surface. You can even shine a light on it. Change your angle enough, though, and the pig instantly becomes 2D as it approaches the edges of the rim of the saucer.

And that's what happened in Avatar: as stuff came nearer to the edge of the screen, the illusion was shattered. They instantly became 2D on the screen once more.

And that happened a lot.

Except to the flying seed dealies.

And anywhere that there were need computer HUDs being displayed.

Anyway.

Visuals were great, the fact that Cameron made an actual language specifically for the movie was a bonus, and the bestiary... wow. The flying lizards made me all hawt and bothered.

That being said, the movie was good, and I'll buy it when it hits DVD or whatever, but only if I've got a 120hz TV at that time, as that's what you need to enjoy the graphics of the film's namesake game.

As I said in a previous post: if you haven't seen it in 3D, don't stress it. You're not gonna notice too much of a difference. If you're gonna see it, see the matinee and save yourself some bucks.

Well whaddaya know, it was rather lengthy.

So I still haven't seen Avatar. And seeing as how there's only one IMAX theater playing with it remotely near me, I guess that means it's not gonna happen. Not really a bad thing, though, because I'm also prolly not gonna go see Sherlock Holmes, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, or Daybreakers.

The motivation just isn't there.

Main point of this post: The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks is just crazy.

I'm a little under halfway through it, and I've become both excited and terrified at the prospect of a genuine zombie outbreak.

One thing's for certain, though: gotta go get me one of them Gerber machetes and a SPAS-12.

Now that I've got any hardcore Avatar fans in here, I can elaborate:

I haven't even seen the movie. I'm just basing my statement off the fact that I've been "wanting to see it" since it came out. I've had the money, I've had the time, I just haven't actually had any true desire to see it.

I've read the Wikipedia entry on it, and as a coworker friend told me, the story is nothing more than a revamped Pocahontas, with a smurf as the titular character, and a crippled Marine as John Smith (to break it down for those of you disagreeing with the assessment).

Bleh. That being said, I can't rationalize spending $10.00 on that.

And coming from a guy who can rationalize spending money on just about anything, that's just bad.

Just felt I had the need to make a post on this given how many Na'vi avatars I've seen around these parts lately. I don't see the draw there, myself. They've got the whole butterface goin' on. Eyes are too big and spread apart, nose is too big, et cetera and so forth.

Again, may just be me—and prolly is.

Literally, that's what January is.

This past Tuesday saw the release of Bayonetta and Darksiders.
On a somewhat related note, check this out: http://www.synergydevwerks.com/images/uhh.jpg . It's what it looks like when I try to play Darksiders. It only happens during gameplay (i.e., not in the menus, cutscenes, FMV's, etc.), and only in this one game. Bayonetta plays just fine. Bayonetta, by the way, is softcore pr0n. Beautiful game, and very over the top.

Tuesday after next is Dark Void.

Tuesday after that is Mass Effect 2.

Tuesday after that is Dante's Inferno. That puts us in February, but it's so early in February, I'm actually deeming it January. Yeah, I just did that. For realsies, babe. For realsies.

My wallet is officially raped.

Thanks, Firefox, for not automatically re-caching FA's stuff so I could get past the "content not found" error. I'd completely forsake you, except that the only reason IE was able to see FA just fine was because I'd never used IE up to that point.

Anyway.

So I just got done playing through Prototype, and I've gotta say (OMG SPOILERS), it's a cool game.

Though the fact that you can't completely destroy all the hives and bases and such really bothers me.

That is all.

So over the past few days, I've been distracting myself with new toys. I've gotten a brand new Flip UltraHD camera, a new PS3 (as well as inFamous and Assassin's Creed II, both of which are beautiful games), and a new Motorola DROID on Verizon.

It's such a freakin' slick device, I honestly don't know where to start with the praising.

One thing is for sure, though: everyone's been making huge deals about alleged iPhone killers.

This one is it.

Adieu, Apple.

Remember, remember, the fifth of November.
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot.
I know of no reason
Why the Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.

Happy Guy Fawkes day, all.

So I got my pew pew eye lasers done on Monday morning. It's actually a pretty crazy thing to be able to see clearly without eyewear.

...And they gave me vicodin to cope with the discomfort of the post-surgery recovery, so that's always a plus. First time I've ever had access to a narcotic AND be ordered to take them, along with sleep, so... life is good for the time being.

Also, adopted me a Dog on Friday o' last week. Her name's Brooke, and she's a beauty.

And so help me, I'll never have a child. Ever.

So my Facebook account is pretty much locked down in what I can and can't post, because it's got a fair number of my co-workers on that particular list.

That being said, this particular journal entry is looking for an unbiased opinion on who you guys think is in the right here, if such a position does, indeed, exist. It's gonna be one of them TLDR things for sure, but... if you're bored, well... humor me.

The skinny of the situation...

Four months ago, I had a co-worker approach me with a sticky note that had the following three options on it:

 Yes
 No
 Maybe

Problem was, she approached me with this particular sticky note on a Friday, and I was mere minutes from being let go for the day. So, I hurriedly added and checked my own box to the bottom:

 All of the above

She saw that, and was pretty much shut down. She had no idea how to respond to that, and frankly, I had no real concerns either way. Don't get me wrong, she's quite attractive, but I didn't know if she was serious, so I went ahead and added my own bit of playfulness to it.

The next week when I was at work on the midshift, I got a call. Long story short, it was her, and she was at a bar with our boss. She was completely smashed, but the call was distracting from the mundane bit remaining in the shift. She ended up calling me a fag for putting that checkbox on the sticky note, and abruptly hanging up on me, after telling me that she'd defriended me on Facebook.

Okay, no big deal.

So I finish the shift, and get home, only to have a call from her a couple hours later. ANOTHER long story short, she wanted to know where I lived so she could come over and "fuck me". Not knowing how to handle the sudden bout of awkwardness, I told her my address, but I didn't give her my apartment number. Eventually, she gave up and we talked for a couple hours before her phone's battery died.

Two weeks later, she calls me and asks if she can come over to my place just to hang out. Someone naively, I agreed, and told her that that'd be fun, since I had no other plans.

So she comes over, we're hanging out and having fun, when she tells me, and I quote, "I wanna make out with you so bad right now."

This goes in the only direction it could possibly go from this point. But what really gets me is that after it's all said and done, she says, "You know, in another life, I think I could love you."

What she meant by this was "in another life where I'm not married".

Yeah, I'd officially just engaged in an affair with her.

Alright, the scrollbar is starting to grow a bit thin on the side there, so the story is getting a bit longer than I'd intended.

Since August 1st, however, things between us have gone south. Horribly south. Somewhere along the lines, she decided that I was a stalker, had placed a GPS tracking device on her car, and was out to get her.

Ultimately, the problem is that she's incredibly promiscuous. Not only has she been engaged in an affair with ME behind her husband's back, but there's been AT LEAST one other, as well. And she's used my knowledge of this to seriously rape my heart strings by flirting with other males in my presence.

But these days—and now, the point of this journal—she thinks that she can fix the problems between us by ignoring me. Which of course doesn't fly for the following reasons:

1. We're co-workers, and we exchange information between ourselves daily in the pursuit of accomplishing our work-related tasking.
2. As co-workers, we have to deal with each other nearly every single day.
3. Though she might be over me, the fact that she simply cut it all off without a single explanation about ANYTHING has left me completely clueless, confused, and disoriented.

Call me a monster for engaging in carnal acts with a woman that's already married, I don't care. My ethical and/or moral beliefs don't really acknowledge the concept of "cheating". If I had a partner that was doing that with me and I found out, I'd be more interested in finding out what the relationship was lacking more than I would be angry at the other individual.

So yeah... based on what completely sporadic information I've provided, what do you guys think?

About everything.

...If the name "Netherwing" doesn't ring a bell, I envy you.

So much sleep... lost.

Am I the only one who thinks that human babies are the least cute of all the animal babies?

Like, not cute at all?

Or maybe even the anti-cute?

Just checking.

It just makes me lol to realize that of all the sites that my work proxy has blocked, FA isn't one of them.

The day that FA becomes known by Websense is the day that Quetzalcoatl will make himself known, and the world will come to a complete stop.