Online Journal

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Saturday, May 31, 2008--I saw Iron Man today. It was pretty sweet. I liked how they had a reference to War Machine and a reference to S.H.I.E.L.D. I also didn't catch this one, but found out about it later, apparently, they also had a very obscure reference to the Mandarin. Now that was sweet. Sweet like this chocolate I'm eating.

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Friday, May 30, 2008--The Leland Math Team was expecting me, so I planned to go to Leland after school to visit them. On my way, I visited Conifer Ho again, because I wanted to get a picture with her to prove that I exist.

Afterwards, I visited the Math Team proper. Apparently, Mr. Yim has been telling them stories about me, so when I arrived, they treated me like an honored guest. Unfortunately, Mr. Yim himself couldn't be there, since he was going to the doctor.

In any case, the Math Team current Captains Jennifer and Wanni were doing a presentation on phi. Also, there was a girl sitting off to the side who apparently wasn't officially part of the Math Team but was just hanging out that day who talked a lot. Unfortunately, she refused to take a photo with the Math Team, so I don't have any proof that she exists.


Later that day, I took the CalTrain to San Mateo to have dinner with Joyce.

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Thurday, May 29, 2008--Previously this month, on AIM:
me (to Conifer Chu): I'm going to be in San Jose for a week around Memorial Day!
Chuchu: We should hang out!
Chuchu: Haha, this time I'm the one who suggested it!
me: (Yes, well, if you hadn't suggested it, I would have.)
Chuchu: We should go to Chili's, like we were going to last time before I cancelled out.
me: Sure!

This morning, on AIM:
Chuchu: Oh, thank goodness you're online!
Chuchu: Yeah, I needed to talk to you.
Chuchu: ...I just realized I don't have the car, so you'll need to give me a ride.
me: Whew! For a moment, I thought you were gonna last minute cancel on me again.
Chuchu: Haha, I knew you were gonna think that!
Chuchu: In fact, I did it on purpose, just to make you think that! d=
me: Heh. Clever little girl.
me: And yes, I can give you a ride.

So Chuchu and I went to Chili's and ate food and hung out. It's interesting. I haven't seen her in 3 years, and now she's all grown up. She's bigger, taller, and her eyes aren't so . . . something . . . anymore.

Later, I went to Leland to visit Conifer Ho, because I said I would. I gave her the chocolate that I promised her. Also, while meeting Conifer in the Journo room, I ran into Florence, who was also in Journalism. When she first saw me, she had this look on her face that was like "Who is that guy? He looks familiar." Then, when she recognized me, her face turned into "Oh my god, it's him!" It was amusing. So I waved at her, and she came over to talk to me.

Excerpted:
Flo: So what brings you to our lovely Journalism room?
me: I came here to visit Connie. She and I know each other.
Flo: Well, that makes two of us.

Conifer then took me to go see Mr. Yim, who I hung out and chatted and got caught up with. Apparently, Mr. Yim will be leaving Leland. That makes me sad.

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Monday, May 26, 2008--Happy Memorial Day!


For lunch, I went to go meet Princess for at Macaroni Grill over in the Eastridge district. Apparently, Macaroni Grill is a pasta restaurant, and I couldn't find any macaroni on their menu. In any case, Princess likes orchids, so I bought her half a dozen orchids.

Then, at night, I took Kellie to see Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian. Connie couldn't come because Connie was lame, and Little Vivian couldn't come either because Little Vivian was also lame. So it was just me and Kellie.

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Sunday, May 25, 2008--Today, I went to go visit Chao up in Mountain View. He showed me Lost Odyssey and Crisis Core, and we played a few other video games I don't currently remember.


We also went to In-N-Out Burger because I haven't had one of those in a while. I only got a Triple-Triple instead of a 4x4, because I wanted to cut back just a little. Chao got a 3x0, which is essentially a Triple-Triple without the cheese.

Chao: I'll have a 3x0.
clerk: That's a Triple-Triple without the cheese, right?
Chao: Yeah.
me: You shoulda said, "No, I want a grilled cheese sandwich."

Yes, they do actually serve grilled cheese at In-N-Out.

Also, mmm... pink lemonade...

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Saturday, May 24, 2008--At night, there was a party at my place. Little Vivian couldn't make it because Little Vivian was going to Senior Prom with some boy. Connie couldn't make it because Connie was being lame. Kellie made it, though, so I had to entertain Kellie.


Also, I bought and ate some of the Lindt Excellence 85% Cacao I mentioned earlier. It was sweet! And by sweet, I mean awesome! Because dark chocolate is bitter! And it is awesome!

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Friday, May 23, 2008--Today, I went to work, then went and picked up my new glasses (which work great this time around, thank you very much), and then after work, Abhi drove me to SeaTac airport, because today, I'm flying down to California. Sweet!

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Thursday, May 22, 2008--On impulse, I decided to start Disgaea PSP.

My goals for this playthrough were to challenge myself--this time, not only would I avoid levelling up and beating the game efficiently and quickly, but I would also try to beat the game with as few characters as possible. To that end, I played through the entirety of chapter 1 with just Laharl, Etna, and a female Cleric. (I created a Fire Mage and an Ice Mage just to give her offensive spells.) I ended up clearing chapter 1 quite easily with 2:20:03 on the clock, a level 5 Laharl, level 4 Etna, and a level 5 cleric. I did use the Fire and Ice Mages for the battle, but they were both level 1, and I only used them for throwing, and they were wiped out the next turn.

My other goal for the PSP version of Disgaea, since because Disgaea PSP has PvP, I want to level up to multiplayer-capable characters as quickly as possible, which means I should avoid powerlevelling at early parts of the game, because powerlevelling is a lot better after you unlock the post-game maps and have some uber gear.

So yeah. That was me and Disgaea.

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Wednesday, May 21, 2008--Today, after work, a bunch of doods came to my place to play Mario Kart Wii on my big HDTV. (Unfortunately, Mario Kart Wii (or any Wii games, for that matter) aren't HD games, so while the bigness of the TV helped, the HDness didn't.)

It sucked. Mario Kart Wii is the lamest Mario Kart ever.

It might just be because I'm one of the few people who enjoyed Battle Mode, but they really lamed down Battle Mode in Mario Kart Wii. First of all, you're required to play in teams of something like 6vs6. There's no Free-For-All option. Second of all, the battles are based on number of hits within a time limit rather than popping all balloons to eliminate players. (I don't even know why they still have balloons. They are irrelevant in this version.)

Also, there's no random course option and there's no 2-player Grand Prix, which are minor nuisances compared to the lamed down Battle Mode.

Yeah, it was so bad that I just stopped playing right there and then to post on Facebook about how lame the new Battle Mode is.

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Tuesday, May 20, 2008--Normally, I wouldn't make a pointless entry just for the On this day, but today's On this day is so important, it deserves an entry all by itself.

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Monday, May 19, 2008--After work, after gym, while restocking on OJ, I decided to by some Ghirardelli Intense Dark Twilight Delight 72% Cacao. It was sweet! Next, I want to try the Lindt Excellence 85% Cacao, if I can get my hands on the stuff.

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Saturday, May 18, 2008--Today, I decided to play more GTA4. Apparently, there's a dood in GTA4 named Dwayne. Now that is some awesome sauce.

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Saturday, May 17, 2008--Today was insanely hot (I wish I were insanely hot), so Chris and Abhi and I (after lunch) went to buy me a fan, then hung out at my place playing Army of Two. Then, I played GTA4 while Chris and Abhi went to some concert, because, hey, GTA4!

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Friday, May 16, 2008--After work today, I went to Uncle's Games at Crossroads to play a Shadowmoor draft. So my first pick was an Incremental Blight, so I decided to go black. My second pick was a Burn Trail, which is good, because red is a good secondary color to black, but I was sticking primarily to black because I wanted to send a good signal for the guy on my left to not go black. (Which he did anyway.)

Unfortunately, it seemed that the black was cut off pretty quickly. Fortunately, all the black came back in the second and third packs, so I got some decent picks. That and, I opened a Demigod of Revenge.

I ended up with a black deck splashing red, but I still didn't do well, so I won't bother listing out my deck here.

Highlights of the day

1. Eugene beats me by stealing my Demigod with Biting Tether, then smashing me with it, not just in one game, but in two.
2. Steven manaburns me to death with Valleymaker.

Foo. Better luck next time.

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Tuesday, May 13, 2008--Today, I went to the Eye Society (not to be confused with the Soul Society) to get a third opinion on my glasses. The optometrist gave me a prescription that measured close to my old glasses and noted a rather large difference between my old glasses and my new (currently defunct) glasses, so I'm more inclined to believe that she's correct. She also made a contraption from a bunch of lenses that supposedly matched my prescription and told me to wear them and see if I felt comfortable in, which I did. She also did a smart thing and opted to err for a prescription that was too weak rather than one that was too strong, and thus, she gets extra points in my book.

In any case, I sent my new glasses in for a re-lensing. Hopefully, they'll get done in time for my flight down to California.

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Monday, May 12, 2008--Woot! The alpha for Solar Vengeance 5 was released today! Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to go and actually play it, but I like the idea of it anyway.

(For those of you who don't know, Solar Vengeance is an amateur RTS that plays much differently than, say, Starcraft. It's fun, though, despite not being Starcraft. It's also unique in that I get to script my own AIs for it, and I've always considered writing AIs for this game quite fun.)

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Saturday, May 10, 2008--I was feeling a little sick today, so I decided to play GTA4 for a few hours. Fun fun fun.

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Friday, May 9, 2008--After work today, I went to Uncle's Games at Crossroads to play a Shadowmoor draft. Unfortunately, I didn't do very well. I won only one round out of four, and in the one round I won, it was because they guy forfeited after we each won a game.

I think it's some kind of cosmic karma. Since I beat Alan Comer on Tuesday, I guess the Magic gods decreed that in order to balance it out, I needed to lose badly today.

Ah, well. I'm just waiting for the Constructed season.

(I won't bother posting my draft deck from tonight.)

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Thursday, May 8, 2008--After work today, I went to the gym and benchpressed 120 lbs on the free weights. I'm getting stronger every day!

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Wednesday, May 7, 2008--Today, I picked up my new glasses from Lenscrafters. Unfortunately, the lenses were all wrong. The right eye was just way too weak (and the left eye was non-ideal as well). Lenscrafters measured the glasses again and said the lenses were according to the prescription. They also measured my old glasses and noted that the measurements on my old glasses were way different than the measurements on my new glasses.

So either Lenscrafters or my optometrist fucked up. I'm not sure which. I'll have to get a third opinion.

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Tuesday, May 6, 2008--After work today, I went to Cafe 16/17 to play Magic the Gathering with the guys. It was my first Shadowmoor draft.

In any case, my first pick was a Torture, so I went into black. In my second pack, I opened a Incremental Blight. Sweet...

Toward the end of the draft, I tried to go into a 2nd color, but the other colors seemed to be solidly taken. I was able to get a few red cards for a splash, though. Here's how my deck ended up:

13xSwamp
4xMountain
3xManaforge Cinder
Scuzzback Scrapper
Scar
2xTorture
Emberstrike Duo
Pili-Pala
Sickle Ripper
Inkfathom Infiltrator
Puncture Bolt
Cinderbones
Fulminator Mage
Beseech the Queen
Hollowsage
Crowd of Cinder
Sootwalkers
Wanderbrine Rootcutters
Wild Swing
Kulrath Knight
Gloomlance
Incremental Blight

Anyway, today, I played against Alan Comer and won. The MVP of both game was Incremental Blight. It was pretty sweet.

I also played against Jon and Julien and blew them away two games straight. Then, I played against Akio, who beat me two games in a row. He had a pretty solid mono-white deck.

But yeah. Normally, the Microsoft players kick my ass. Today, I managed to best some of them, plus a Hall of Famer. Am I improving? Or was it just luck? Only time will tell.

(Maybe Incremental Blight is overpowered in draft.)

[EDIT: Apparently, I'm now cursed. After this incident, I've had many losing drafts and tournaments in a row.]

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Monday, May 5, 2008--Happy Cinco de Mayo!

Today, I ordered HD cable from Comcast and picked up an HD box. It was pretty sweet.

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Saturday, May 3, 2008--Today, I went TV shopping with Abhi and Chris, and we ended up getting me a Sony Bravia KDL-40V4100. It's a pretty sweet TV. Heh, Abhi and Chris commented that since I have a Sony TV with an XMB and a PS3 with an XMB and a PSP with an XMB, I have a Sony-filled electronic house with lots of XMBs. Even crazier was when I booted up the PS3 on the new TV, and I had not one, but two XMBs on screen.

Now, I need to get rid of my old TV. (Zach already claimed it.)

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Friday, May 2, 2008--After work today, I went to Uncle's Games at Crossroads Mall to play in the Magic the Gathering Shadowmoor release event.

In any case, a few of the key cards I opened were a pair of Beseech the Queens and a pair of Incremental Blights, so I knew right away that I'd be going black. I also had a Glen Elendra Liege, so I decided to play blue as well. However, while trying to thin out the cards for my deck, I found it harder and harder to justify playing heavy blue. That and, since I had a Reaper King and some playable scarecrows, I decided to cut blue (or at least, non-black blue) altogether and run mono-black with scarecrows.

Adding in one of each non-black basic land, here is the deck I ended up with:
13xSwamp
Plains
Island
Mountain
Forest
Manaforge Cinder
Smolder Initiate
Scar
Sickle Ripper
Disturbing Plot
Blight Sickle
Gravelgill Duo
Ashenmoor Gouger
2xBeseech the Queen
Wanderbrine Rootcutters
Crowd of Cinder
Glen Elendra Liege
2xIncremental Blight
Corrupt
Scuttlemutt
Wingrattle Scarecrow
2xLockjaw Snapper
Scrapbasket
Grim Poppet
Reaper King

Round 1, I had the bye. The secret truth is that I was unable to build the deck in time, so during the bye round, I just continued to refine the deck. (It was at this point that I brought in the Reaper King and his scarecrows.) I considered switching to green, but I decided against it. Needless to say, I beat bye. Bye never wins. Record: 1-0

In round 2, I played against James. He was playing a blue-black deck. In game 1, he had a whole bunch of bomb rares that killed me, and in games 2 and 3, I had mana issues (mana-flooded and mana-screwed respectively, but I still won when mana-flooded), so I lost the round. Record: 1-1

In round 3, I played against Colin, who just wiped the floor with me in game 1 with blue-white creatures and Steel of the Godhead, hitting me with unblockable lifegain turn after turn until he was at thirty something life and I was dead. In game 2, he had a very similar play, except I was able to take control of the game much more quickly this time. Unfortunately, he got out a Mistmeadow Skulk and was pinging me down 1 life at a time. Unfortunately, the key misplay was when I had the Corrupt in hand and was at 1 life, but I didn't play it because I didn't realize that Colin had a way of dealing with both of my blockers. Oops! Record: 1-2

In round 4, I played against William. In game 1, I ran him over with a horde of critters. In game 2, he managed to get out a Spiteful Visions and a Hollowborn Barghest, which caused me to bleed a little. Fortunately, I was able to take him down one turn before I would have died. Record: 2-2

Somehow, I ended up in 5th place and won a booster and a playmat (prolly because it was the Release Event, and therefore, everyone must have prizes). In any case, a kid wanted me to trade him my booster, so I found he had a Flame Javelin and a Boggart Ram-Gang, so I figured I should take those 2 uncommons I want instead of 15 random cards I statistically won't want. So I did.

All in all, it's not a very good result, but that's Sealed for you. At least I had a taste of Shadowmoor.

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Thursday, May 1, 2008--After work today, I meant to go to the gym and do more bench presses on the free weights, but none of my spotters were available, so I just used the Gravitron instead. FAIL

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