Yeah, I put my phone number out on the internet. I'm sure it was a stupid thing to do, but whatever. Yeah. I got a cell phone for Christmas. It's schnazzy. It's got a camera in it, even. But yeah, I'm on Sprint, so I guess that people with Sprint are free or something. I dunno. This is my first one of these. Oh well. Also, I ended up with a few Transformers, including the awesome Omega Supreme! Also, I got a 200 gig external hard drive, which is good, cuz I was down to my last 10 or so gigs out of 60 on my laptop. No PS2, or games for it, but I got couple of GBA games for my birthday, FF1&2 and Metroid Zero Mission.
I've also pretty much stolen my cousin's copy of Pokemon, cuz I'm trying get females of all three of starting Pokemon. I'm going to start breeding!!! O_O So far, though, I've just got a Squirtel-ette. Working on the other two. Lemme tell you, it's annoying as hell.
Okay, that's about it for now. I'm gonna get on Amazon later and refresh my wish list a bit. Surprisingly not much of it was given in the past few days. u_u; Anyone feel like donating to the Greg Levine Get Cool Stuff Fund?
25.12.04
22.12.04
Small Miracles
So I made it home. I hate this house. It’s always a mess. Nothing works. NOTHING. Our 6 foot TV’s projector is being fixed and as such, we can’t watch anything on it. It’s Tuesday now, so we probably won’t get it back before I leave for Jersey… Sigh… All those Christmas gifts of movies and games are gonna go to waste. Hrmm… I was hoping to beat Kingdom Hearts on the big screen. I’m on Hallow Bastion right now, ready for my first fight with Maleficent. So it shouldn’t be long now, I’ve just got to do some more leveling up. I’m 44 now, so maybe at 47-50 or so…. I should be fine. Now I’m actually doing runs through the Hercules Cup in the Coliseum. Cloud is a bitch, but I can beat him, and then lose to Hercules. X_X Speaking of which, I’ve been bad again. I hope none of you bought me the GTA Double Pack, cuz I bought that at Walmart yesterday. Vice City really is a blast to play. And I know we already had GTAIII but that was Danny’s copy. He won’t let me take it off to college, so now I have my own. Here’s hoping Disgaea is in the cards on Saturday too. And my whole list, for those of you not in the know, is available through a link I should have placed over to the right. Yeah, I plan on actually keeping that one more or less updated year round, which really makes no sense, because there’s only one time of year when people need to get me stuff, but oh well.
I failed English and Political Science this past semester. No real huge surprise, its just what happens when you stop going to classes for half the semester. The surprise, to me at least, was that I actually passed Calculus and Computer Science, getting a B+ in Calc and a C in Comp Sci. I really hated Comp Sci, mostly cuz I’d basically learned ALL of that stuff years ago. I was tired of it. So my next course should hold my attention and I plan on getting the A. The B+ in Calc is quite simply a miracle. Either that or some poor schmoe got my grades mixed with theirs, which I wouldn’t doubt too much. Ah well. Onward and upward, right?
After Christmas, it seems that I’m going to Jersey, as I’ve mentioned. I plan to see at least a few old friends, and if I’m lucky my dad will let me borrow a car so I can drive off on my own and find them. Gonna have to spend some time with his family, I suppose. I dunno, they’re not all bad. I still say Wendy’s a little nuts, but then again, I’m pretty sure I’m nuts too, so it all evens out. Dylan gets along great with PJ and Dan, being another musician in the family, while James and I have a surprisingly large amount in common. I still need to get him to run a Magic Tournament quick before December 30th so I can get my pal Rob (who’s also visiting Jersey from Lakeway – small world, eh?) in on the fun.
Agh…. I’m tired. And my computer is NOT working properly, so I don’t know what I’m gonna do with it. I’ve half talked my mom into giving me the unused third desktop computer as a fixer-upper, and I may need it to get online if this laptop fails, like it seems to be going. If my uncle can’t get me hooked up, I’m thinking I’ll send it in to HP for refurbishment again, while I’m still on vacation, keeping all my files backed up on my shnazzy new 200 gig external HDD that I’ma get for Christmas. Anyway, night for now.
I failed English and Political Science this past semester. No real huge surprise, its just what happens when you stop going to classes for half the semester. The surprise, to me at least, was that I actually passed Calculus and Computer Science, getting a B+ in Calc and a C in Comp Sci. I really hated Comp Sci, mostly cuz I’d basically learned ALL of that stuff years ago. I was tired of it. So my next course should hold my attention and I plan on getting the A. The B+ in Calc is quite simply a miracle. Either that or some poor schmoe got my grades mixed with theirs, which I wouldn’t doubt too much. Ah well. Onward and upward, right?
After Christmas, it seems that I’m going to Jersey, as I’ve mentioned. I plan to see at least a few old friends, and if I’m lucky my dad will let me borrow a car so I can drive off on my own and find them. Gonna have to spend some time with his family, I suppose. I dunno, they’re not all bad. I still say Wendy’s a little nuts, but then again, I’m pretty sure I’m nuts too, so it all evens out. Dylan gets along great with PJ and Dan, being another musician in the family, while James and I have a surprisingly large amount in common. I still need to get him to run a Magic Tournament quick before December 30th so I can get my pal Rob (who’s also visiting Jersey from Lakeway – small world, eh?) in on the fun.
Agh…. I’m tired. And my computer is NOT working properly, so I don’t know what I’m gonna do with it. I’ve half talked my mom into giving me the unused third desktop computer as a fixer-upper, and I may need it to get online if this laptop fails, like it seems to be going. If my uncle can’t get me hooked up, I’m thinking I’ll send it in to HP for refurbishment again, while I’m still on vacation, keeping all my files backed up on my shnazzy new 200 gig external HDD that I’ma get for Christmas. Anyway, night for now.
16.12.04
All I Want For Christmas
Greg's Amazon Wish List
I spent all night looking through the Amazon.com files, searching through and clicking on things I wanted, didn't want, already had, etc. I made the mistake of saying I owned Shrek 2 (SHHH someones getting it for Christmas), and so it recommended GARFIELD of all things. Agh. Anyway, I eventually got them straightened out. They recommended a few different manga and anime titles for me. I still need to get that one title from James about the robot-battle-school-girl-thing. Yeah, that's about the broadest manga description possible, but he knows what I'm talking about. Anyway, gonna go get some sleep before my big drive tomorrow morning. Night all. Merry Christmas!
I spent all night looking through the Amazon.com files, searching through and clicking on things I wanted, didn't want, already had, etc. I made the mistake of saying I owned Shrek 2 (SHHH someones getting it for Christmas), and so it recommended GARFIELD of all things. Agh. Anyway, I eventually got them straightened out. They recommended a few different manga and anime titles for me. I still need to get that one title from James about the robot-battle-school-girl-thing. Yeah, that's about the broadest manga description possible, but he knows what I'm talking about. Anyway, gonna go get some sleep before my big drive tomorrow morning. Night all. Merry Christmas!
15.12.04
The Long Awaited Relgion Post...
...is getting dropped. You know how I feel about religion, and right now I'm just a little bummed out about having failed at least English and Political Science, and possibly Computer Science and/or Calculus. *Sigh* What am I going to do? I don't wanna end up in some dead end stupid job. No offense to anyone out there holding a highschool graduate level job, but I am capable of much better than that. I just don't know how I'm gonna get there. If anyone out there is reading this and thinking "Hey, I wanna employ this kid in a writing job," I'll give you a yes. Anyone wanna buy my stories I wrote in here? Please? Something I can do? Anything? Sigh. I'm screwed.
Sleepless In Lubbock
I can't sleep. It's 4:00am. I have a final in 6 hours. And I can't sleep. This is what I get for throwing my sleep schedule into the trash heap during finals week. Sigh. One more test, and I'm done for the year though. Yay Christmas. It really is my favorite time of year. Why? Because I'm human, I'm greedy. Christmas is the one time of year when people give me stuff for being alive. And, yes, I give them stuff too, but I'm special because my birthday is then too. So I end up getting not quite twice as many presents... thank goodness for Santa Claus. Yeah, I know, I'm too old to believe in St. Nick, but the beauty of having a big family is, there's always SOMEONE young enough to still believe. Santa isn't mean; he wouldn't slight the rest of us just because we didn't believe, and only give Lena and Clara presents. So I end up with about a dozen gifts from family members, and then around 10 more gifts from S.C. Of course, there is always a difference in the quality of gifts. Santa never brings us the PS2s or guitars or what have you, those are always from a family member. Best I can expect from a Claus gift is a GBA game. Oh well. In any case, the over-all present quality drops between my birthday and Christmas Day, but only because it is diluted by a bunch of lesser North Polean gifts. Not to say that I don't appriciate everything I get, because I honestly do. I have a terrible tendancy to complain about things in my life, but really, I shouldn't. I have it really well. I am somewhat scarilly reminded of the whining of Harry Potter's cousin Dudley, complaining that he only has 37 presents when he got 38 last year. "Ah, yes, but some of these gifts are quite a bit larger than-" "I don't care!!!" *Sigh.* I'm not like that, honest. I'm lucky, and I know it, most of the time. I guess that's why I like the Christmas season. It reminds me how truly blessed my family is, to be so happy together with each other, and really, quite well off, for the time being. I'm fucking spoiled, if I hadn't mentioned that before. I do hope I don't come off as spoiled rotten, but just spoiled, I won't argue about.
Got a couple of gears to shift through before I'm done tonite. First I wanted to point you to this little discussion I've got going on at the PSPvsDS forums. I've pretty well flip-flopped my earlier decision on the DS. Of course, my earlier decision was made well before the DS was released, and was partially based on the fact that the forums two admins were pretty obviously PSP fans. Since the entire site is based on which system is better (an argument I think should be null and void, but I'll get to that), I felt a little counter culture was in order, so I raised my flag in support of the DS. Of course, as time went on, I discovered that A) the DS wasn't going to be able to run any of my older Game Boy games - for some reason they decided to only let it go back as far as GBA, and I have no idea why, and B) the DS's launch titles weren't all that great. It's for those reasons that not only did I refrain from saving my cash to buy a DS, but I have actually made it known that I do not want one for Christmas, thus my current position on the system. Here's my take: The DS is an expensive toy. I mean, yes, all video game systems are, but the DS is more like a Virtual Boy than a PS2 or GBA, in my book. If you don't remember what a Virtual Boy is, then you are a luckier person than I. It was, for all intents and purposes, a gimmick system, much like the DS. The DS's primary pitch is not "Look at the amazing games you could be playing, it's "Look! I got's two screens! And one's touchable! Ain't it cool? Don't you wanna touch it?" That's not what I look for when I decide to get a game system. I look for the games I want to be able to play. Which goes back to where I thing the forums premise argument is a moot point. The PSP and the DS shouldn't be competing. They're two different animals. The PSP is a high end multimedia system, primarily for gaming but it could just as easily be a pocket PC. The DS is an experimental system, and even Nintendo says it isn't meant to be the next level in Game Boy Evolution. More like an offshoot. So the two shouldn't be competing. Ah well, people are dumb. But like I say, I'm not deciding that the DS is worse than the PSP. I don't know enough about the PSP yet to really decide whether I want one, though I'm leaning towards yes. I've decided though, as far as the DS, that not having one is better than having one. It's just one of those things I don't want, just like the other things I've listed in the thread - Virtual Boy, X-Box, Segway, Aztek, Super Mario 2, etc. Anyway. I've got to get a move on.
As I stayed up tonite, I glanced through various people's blogs in my insomniatic state (no, they weren't really updated). And I wondered. Who the fuck reads this? The last comment I got was from Gina being a sobbing mess because I'm a dumbass, and she didn't even care enough about what she was saying to reply to the right post. What does that say about this sad excuse at journalism? That people only write in it when they're mad me, and even then they don't care enough to make it clear why they're mad at me? Unless Gina was mad at my hot dog contest thread, in which case she's got further issues than me. (And no, I don't think she does. I know she was just upset, and I'm up too late to make good jokes.) But seriously, why do I write in this thing? Does anyone care that I don't like the DS, or that I'm listening to the Kingdom Hearts soundtrack (which I'm loving by the way ^_^)? I mean, really, who am I? Some random college student who's never done anything for anyone. I'm a non-player character for 99% of the world. And I need this shirt to identify that fact to people. Anyone wanna get it for me for Christmas? ^_^?
Oh well. I've been blogging for a good 40 minutes. I should try and get back to sleep and get ready for that test. Sigh. I hope I do alright. Nah, fuck that. I KNOW I'll do alright. Night folks. Folk. You there, my ~1 person audience. Thanks for listening.
Oh yeah, I still owe y'all that treatise on my religious beliefs. I'll get it out tomorrow, again, after the tests.
Got a couple of gears to shift through before I'm done tonite. First I wanted to point you to this little discussion I've got going on at the PSPvsDS forums. I've pretty well flip-flopped my earlier decision on the DS. Of course, my earlier decision was made well before the DS was released, and was partially based on the fact that the forums two admins were pretty obviously PSP fans. Since the entire site is based on which system is better (an argument I think should be null and void, but I'll get to that), I felt a little counter culture was in order, so I raised my flag in support of the DS. Of course, as time went on, I discovered that A) the DS wasn't going to be able to run any of my older Game Boy games - for some reason they decided to only let it go back as far as GBA, and I have no idea why, and B) the DS's launch titles weren't all that great. It's for those reasons that not only did I refrain from saving my cash to buy a DS, but I have actually made it known that I do not want one for Christmas, thus my current position on the system. Here's my take: The DS is an expensive toy. I mean, yes, all video game systems are, but the DS is more like a Virtual Boy than a PS2 or GBA, in my book. If you don't remember what a Virtual Boy is, then you are a luckier person than I. It was, for all intents and purposes, a gimmick system, much like the DS. The DS's primary pitch is not "Look at the amazing games you could be playing, it's "Look! I got's two screens! And one's touchable! Ain't it cool? Don't you wanna touch it?" That's not what I look for when I decide to get a game system. I look for the games I want to be able to play. Which goes back to where I thing the forums premise argument is a moot point. The PSP and the DS shouldn't be competing. They're two different animals. The PSP is a high end multimedia system, primarily for gaming but it could just as easily be a pocket PC. The DS is an experimental system, and even Nintendo says it isn't meant to be the next level in Game Boy Evolution. More like an offshoot. So the two shouldn't be competing. Ah well, people are dumb. But like I say, I'm not deciding that the DS is worse than the PSP. I don't know enough about the PSP yet to really decide whether I want one, though I'm leaning towards yes. I've decided though, as far as the DS, that not having one is better than having one. It's just one of those things I don't want, just like the other things I've listed in the thread - Virtual Boy, X-Box, Segway, Aztek, Super Mario 2, etc. Anyway. I've got to get a move on.
As I stayed up tonite, I glanced through various people's blogs in my insomniatic state (no, they weren't really updated). And I wondered. Who the fuck reads this? The last comment I got was from Gina being a sobbing mess because I'm a dumbass, and she didn't even care enough about what she was saying to reply to the right post. What does that say about this sad excuse at journalism? That people only write in it when they're mad me, and even then they don't care enough to make it clear why they're mad at me? Unless Gina was mad at my hot dog contest thread, in which case she's got further issues than me. (And no, I don't think she does. I know she was just upset, and I'm up too late to make good jokes.) But seriously, why do I write in this thing? Does anyone care that I don't like the DS, or that I'm listening to the Kingdom Hearts soundtrack (which I'm loving by the way ^_^)? I mean, really, who am I? Some random college student who's never done anything for anyone. I'm a non-player character for 99% of the world. And I need this shirt to identify that fact to people. Anyone wanna get it for me for Christmas? ^_^?
Oh well. I've been blogging for a good 40 minutes. I should try and get back to sleep and get ready for that test. Sigh. I hope I do alright. Nah, fuck that. I KNOW I'll do alright. Night folks. Folk. You there, my ~1 person audience. Thanks for listening.
Oh yeah, I still owe y'all that treatise on my religious beliefs. I'll get it out tomorrow, again, after the tests.
14.12.04
Giant Fighting Wheelchairs!!
I WANT!!!
I'm sure I've told you that I want to live out my days in a robot body. If not, consider this my way of telling you. When my currnt body craps out on me, I'm gonna hook it up to a robot body, and live that way. Nothing fancy. I don't want a Gundam or Battletech mech. Just something that'll fit me and every day life. Either a spider-type thing or a transforming body: robot to helicoptor, personally would be my favorite alternate mode. Normal, human size - six foot tall, tops. But yeah, point is that they're developing my technology for me.
Meh, final final tomorrow - Political Science. I should do okay on it. If not... I dunno. I'm prolly redoing most of the other classes this semester, so what's one more, eh? X_X My mom's gonna kill me. Anyway, I've got a blog entry about religion brewing in my head, but am too tired to put it up now. Maybe tomorrow. Also have to see if I can snag a Christmas gift for my mom before she picks me up on Thursday... I gotta stop Christmas shopping for myself. I picked up Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories the other day, and it's been on my Christmas for like a month. So I'm gonna prolly get it again. Which means I'll have to return it. *Shrugs.* I got a buncha other games to trade in... Armored Core 3 sucked ass, as did some other games I have. Oh yeah, I need to trade in Iridian 3D, for GBA - that game was absolutely terrible. Or maybe I just sucked at it. In any case, I don't want it any more. Oh, and a really old game of Pokemon Blue that decided to stop working. I wonder if they'll take it. *Shrugs.*
Okay, I gotta go. I'm expecting a call from a special someone. ^_^; Ciao.
I'm sure I've told you that I want to live out my days in a robot body. If not, consider this my way of telling you. When my currnt body craps out on me, I'm gonna hook it up to a robot body, and live that way. Nothing fancy. I don't want a Gundam or Battletech mech. Just something that'll fit me and every day life. Either a spider-type thing or a transforming body: robot to helicoptor, personally would be my favorite alternate mode. Normal, human size - six foot tall, tops. But yeah, point is that they're developing my technology for me.
Meh, final final tomorrow - Political Science. I should do okay on it. If not... I dunno. I'm prolly redoing most of the other classes this semester, so what's one more, eh? X_X My mom's gonna kill me. Anyway, I've got a blog entry about religion brewing in my head, but am too tired to put it up now. Maybe tomorrow. Also have to see if I can snag a Christmas gift for my mom before she picks me up on Thursday... I gotta stop Christmas shopping for myself. I picked up Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories the other day, and it's been on my Christmas for like a month. So I'm gonna prolly get it again. Which means I'll have to return it. *Shrugs.* I got a buncha other games to trade in... Armored Core 3 sucked ass, as did some other games I have. Oh yeah, I need to trade in Iridian 3D, for GBA - that game was absolutely terrible. Or maybe I just sucked at it. In any case, I don't want it any more. Oh, and a really old game of Pokemon Blue that decided to stop working. I wonder if they'll take it. *Shrugs.*
Okay, I gotta go. I'm expecting a call from a special someone. ^_^; Ciao.
13.12.04
I'm Popular
I've just gotten messages from two random people. It's rather interesting. One of them went like this:
(Sigh, so much for formatting that... oh well.)
And then this one, who caught me as deceptikhan34 and squirrelmonger34. (Stupid thing merged them, so I've gotta split em up.)
----------------------------
Anyway... I'll go and relax. I had my computer science final earlier today. Just gotta get through Political Science and I'll be alright. ^_^
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: hello
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: wats ur name
me: xxl33tn1nj4xx
me: yours?
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: streetrace4livin
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: lol
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: no but im serious
me: kay
me: im greg
me: u?
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: greg wolf
me: nope
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: greg wat?
me: greg "i dont give my last name out to random people online"
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: i go to horner
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: im chris
me: howd you get my screen name?
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: i got it from nicholes profile buddy list
me: ooh
me: k
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: yea
me: wheres horner?
me: nvm
me: your xanga was quite helpful
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: quite helpful?
me: eys
me: chris
me: *yes
me: from california
me: you're 12
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: yes
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: yup
me: and you like ddr
me: heh
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: yup
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: so do u go to horner junior high
me: i live in texas
sTreEtRaCe4LiVin: oops
me: i go to texas tech university
me: so... nope
(Sigh, so much for formatting that... oh well.)
And then this one, who caught me as deceptikhan34 and squirrelmonger34. (Stupid thing merged them, so I've gotta split em up.)
UAroRock: yo
me: hello
UAroRock: u no me
me: i do?
UAroRock: IM NOT ANDREW
me: oh
me: alright
me: who are you?
UAroRock: HIS FRIEND HES AT MY HOUSE
me: okay
me: whos andrew?
UAroRock: UARO ROCK
me: oh right
me: i dont remember him
UAroRock: K
----------------------------
UAroRock: HEY
me: hey
UAroRock: DOES ANDTREW NO U
me: im not sure
me: you're already talking to me on deceptikhan, btw
UAroRock: LOL
Anyway... I'll go and relax. I had my computer science final earlier today. Just gotta get through Political Science and I'll be alright. ^_^
11.12.04
One Down
...three to go... x_x. Finals, that is. I managed to muscle my way through the calc final earlier today, and it wasn't as bad as I'd feared. Luckily, that was supposed to be the hardest one, so it should be smooth sailing.
It looks like I'm gonna go Christmas shopping tonite. Dunno why, because I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping. I need to find something for my mom. I have something in mind, but I dunno if they'll have it. I'd better go check quick before I get swept away and forced into something else. Bye!
It looks like I'm gonna go Christmas shopping tonite. Dunno why, because I'm almost done with my Christmas shopping. I need to find something for my mom. I have something in mind, but I dunno if they'll have it. I'd better go check quick before I get swept away and forced into something else. Bye!
9.12.04
Hot Dog Whating What?
I can't believe this is real. O_O
Time for a nice light subject - hot dog eating. I just saw the greatest thing on ESPN2. Of a contestant in the contest, one announcer said: "She doesn't let emotion get into the game." The game of HOT-DOG EATING?! I'd always considered it was a completely emotion drivin sport. *Shrugs.* Live and learn, I guess.
Time for a nice light subject - hot dog eating. I just saw the greatest thing on ESPN2. Of a contestant in the contest, one announcer said: "She doesn't let emotion get into the game." The game of HOT-DOG EATING?! I'd always considered it was a completely emotion drivin sport. *Shrugs.* Live and learn, I guess.
I'm Scum
I've been lying to all of you. All of you. And I'm not proud of it, not at all. I'm scum. I'm fucking lying scum. Here's why:
You see, I'm shy in real life, but as many of you know, I'm a huge flirt online. Or something. I dunno what it is, but I can make chicks online feel loved or whatever. It's a good feeling, I think, to make other people feel happy about themselves. Problem is, I've got a tendancy to take things too far with them. To each one of you out there who think's you're my only one, I'm truly sorry. I really hope you didn't have to find out about it through this entry, and that I'd told you about this on my own, but if not, well, I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt anyones feelings. But I did. What I thought was harmless flirting ended up snowballing, and now I'm fucking screwed. I can't do anything to take it back, though. I can understand any feelings you have against me. I deserve it, because, like I said, I'm scum.
I want to especially apologize to my one true girlfriend, Jackie. She was actually the one who brought it up. If it wasn't for her, I would have continued my dumbassery. She's been really cool about this, and I really love her for it. I'm so lucky I found her, and luckier still that I've been with her for nearly a year. So why, then, didn't I tell anyone about it? Quite honestly, I'm a pussy. The last time I had a girlfriend, I'd met her online, and my family teased me to no end over it. So I decided I'd be secretive about them in the future. Thus, my current mess.
Okay, enough apologizing. To all you non-Jackie girls, sorry, but I'm taken. Commence the Greg-Hate in 3...2...1...go. X_X
You see, I'm shy in real life, but as many of you know, I'm a huge flirt online. Or something. I dunno what it is, but I can make chicks online feel loved or whatever. It's a good feeling, I think, to make other people feel happy about themselves. Problem is, I've got a tendancy to take things too far with them. To each one of you out there who think's you're my only one, I'm truly sorry. I really hope you didn't have to find out about it through this entry, and that I'd told you about this on my own, but if not, well, I'm sorry. I never meant to hurt anyones feelings. But I did. What I thought was harmless flirting ended up snowballing, and now I'm fucking screwed. I can't do anything to take it back, though. I can understand any feelings you have against me. I deserve it, because, like I said, I'm scum.
I want to especially apologize to my one true girlfriend, Jackie. She was actually the one who brought it up. If it wasn't for her, I would have continued my dumbassery. She's been really cool about this, and I really love her for it. I'm so lucky I found her, and luckier still that I've been with her for nearly a year. So why, then, didn't I tell anyone about it? Quite honestly, I'm a pussy. The last time I had a girlfriend, I'd met her online, and my family teased me to no end over it. So I decided I'd be secretive about them in the future. Thus, my current mess.
Okay, enough apologizing. To all you non-Jackie girls, sorry, but I'm taken. Commence the Greg-Hate in 3...2...1...go. X_X
Meanwhile...
The Inner Workings Of A Ph34rBot.
I don't know why I linked that. You all know where Megatokyo is by now. Oh well. I like it. Also, I wanted to point out they're RSS feed. I discovered them when I got Firefox, because it will single out sites with such a feed and allow me to link to it, which I usually do. I now have six of my twenty of so webcomics linked via RSS, as well as a number of blogs. Unfortunately for all you Xanga users, Xanga doesn't come with an RSS feed, at least as far as I've been able to discover. If you find one, please feel free to tell me. Thus far, however, I've found that Blogger and Live Journal both have feeds for their users, as well as something called Moveable Type, but that's a professional tool, and as such a pay service, and I don't have the money for anything like that.
Okay, I've wasted enough time talking about this stuff. I'm gonna sleep. G'night.
I don't know why I linked that. You all know where Megatokyo is by now. Oh well. I like it. Also, I wanted to point out they're RSS feed. I discovered them when I got Firefox, because it will single out sites with such a feed and allow me to link to it, which I usually do. I now have six of my twenty of so webcomics linked via RSS, as well as a number of blogs. Unfortunately for all you Xanga users, Xanga doesn't come with an RSS feed, at least as far as I've been able to discover. If you find one, please feel free to tell me. Thus far, however, I've found that Blogger and Live Journal both have feeds for their users, as well as something called Moveable Type, but that's a professional tool, and as such a pay service, and I don't have the money for anything like that.
Okay, I've wasted enough time talking about this stuff. I'm gonna sleep. G'night.
8.12.04
I Need A New Risk Board
South America is unifying.
*Shrugs.* I found it interesting. It'll make all my frequent trips to Rio De Janero (so far none) that much easier. Yay Carnival!
Anyway, I'm watching Jon Stewart on Larry King Live. He's raising some interesting points. He always does, really. I suppose I'm a dumb person because I trust a comedian more than trained political analysts. Or maybe he's just more likeable. Politics today is just so depressing. The current administration is ready to tell us that there are boogie men out there ready to kill us every waking minute. They are PROUD that the terror level has been at the second highest for a full year. And the other side really can't do anything but complain about they're opponants. It's all fucking rediculous. Okay, back to pool. Bye.
*Shrugs.* I found it interesting. It'll make all my frequent trips to Rio De Janero (so far none) that much easier. Yay Carnival!
Anyway, I'm watching Jon Stewart on Larry King Live. He's raising some interesting points. He always does, really. I suppose I'm a dumb person because I trust a comedian more than trained political analysts. Or maybe he's just more likeable. Politics today is just so depressing. The current administration is ready to tell us that there are boogie men out there ready to kill us every waking minute. They are PROUD that the terror level has been at the second highest for a full year. And the other side really can't do anything but complain about they're opponants. It's all fucking rediculous. Okay, back to pool. Bye.
Tic Tac Toe is HARD!!!
...or coding it is. When my brain was unable to fathom creating a set of rules for a computer to follow (mostly because I had painted myself into a corner with my earlier "dumb" design), I set out to encoding every possible situation that could arrise, and the approrpriate action for the computer to take. It was all going rather well... Until the compiler decided I had too many nested "if statements." Sigh. So I gave up. Cropped the situations list to an acceptable amount, and had my dumb function solve anything it couldn't. And you know what, I'm tired, I don't care right now. In future, though, I'll give myself more than a night on programming AIs.
7.12.04
'Go Canadian'
CNN.com - Company lets U.S. travelers�'Go Canadian' - Dec 7, 2004
This is just hilarous, I think. My family often goes on long out of state vacations, and this is just the thing I need for my next trip out of the country. (Note: My first was when I went to China last year.) Or I could just wear it domestically for fun. That would be great, show up at class wearing a Canada shirt. ^_^
On a more serious note, I just wanna add that it is something of a sad state of affairs that Americans are so hated around the world that they need to travel abroad disguised. And no, I don't want to blame this on Bush, or at least not completely. My mom spent a year of college in Scotland, and was so polite to the locals that no one would believe she was American, she had to be a Canadian. And this was thirty years ago, about.
So why are Americans so despised? Are they just jealous of our status as the most powerful nation on Earth? Or is there something we have done to make them angry? I wish I could tell you. Unfortunately, I fear our domestic news services are in fact blinded by bias towards the US. Not just Fox News, either, though that was the channel where I heard an anchor declare, "Am I slanted and biased? You damn well bet I am." So I doubt that if we DID do anything wrong, it wouldn't make major headlines. I wish i could say that's why I started subscribing to the BBC website, but really its just because they're the only ones who've got an RSS feed, and I love those things. ^_^
In other news, I've contributed close to 1000 hours of CPU time to the SETI@home project. For those who don't know, its a program that runs in the background of your computer, using all time that would be spent idle to instead analyze incoming signals from space. Most is just normal radiation and such, the static of outer space, but the goal is to find some form of a signal with an intelligence behind it. Anyway, it's also a cool screensaver, and hell, why not, right? I'm not using those cycles anyway.
This is just hilarous, I think. My family often goes on long out of state vacations, and this is just the thing I need for my next trip out of the country. (Note: My first was when I went to China last year.) Or I could just wear it domestically for fun. That would be great, show up at class wearing a Canada shirt. ^_^
On a more serious note, I just wanna add that it is something of a sad state of affairs that Americans are so hated around the world that they need to travel abroad disguised. And no, I don't want to blame this on Bush, or at least not completely. My mom spent a year of college in Scotland, and was so polite to the locals that no one would believe she was American, she had to be a Canadian. And this was thirty years ago, about.
So why are Americans so despised? Are they just jealous of our status as the most powerful nation on Earth? Or is there something we have done to make them angry? I wish I could tell you. Unfortunately, I fear our domestic news services are in fact blinded by bias towards the US. Not just Fox News, either, though that was the channel where I heard an anchor declare, "Am I slanted and biased? You damn well bet I am." So I doubt that if we DID do anything wrong, it wouldn't make major headlines. I wish i could say that's why I started subscribing to the BBC website, but really its just because they're the only ones who've got an RSS feed, and I love those things. ^_^
In other news, I've contributed close to 1000 hours of CPU time to the SETI@home project. For those who don't know, its a program that runs in the background of your computer, using all time that would be spent idle to instead analyze incoming signals from space. Most is just normal radiation and such, the static of outer space, but the goal is to find some form of a signal with an intelligence behind it. Anyway, it's also a cool screensaver, and hell, why not, right? I'm not using those cycles anyway.
6.12.04
Enchanting cards
So I came home today and decided to finally make the Green and Blue Enchantress deck I'd been thinking about for a while. After digging around and seeing what I had, I settled on the following janky little build:
4x Elvish Pioneer
4x Llanowar Elves
4x Verduran Enchantress
4x Enchantress's Presence
4x Wild Growth
3x Seal of Strength
4x Centaur Glade
2x Words of Wilding
3x Shimmering Wings
2x Future Sight
3x Standstill
3x Words of Wind
2x Yavimaya Coast
1x Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers
(Wow, that took a while to type out. Don't expect me to make a common thing of this.)
Yeah, it's pretty janky. Anyway, the gist of the deck is, get an enchantress card into play, then start playing enchantments. (Really Greg, I couldn't tell!) (Shut up, you. x_x) The deck runs really slowly, but it isn't REALLY for competition as much as a fun combo thing. The real fun starts when I get out a Words of Wind, an Enchantress effect, and a couple of cheap enchantments. At that point, you can flip the two back and forth, skipping the draws you get to the Words of Wind. While you're returning Wild Growth or whatever for the umpteenth time, you're opponant runs out of permenants to return, and has a very full hand. Granted, it takes several turns to pull it off effectively, but when you do, the game becomes pretty much locked unless your opponant has some one mana enchantment removal spell, and even then, you should have enough of an advantage to beat the other guy easily.
At least, that's how it usually works. When testing it out earlier tonite, my opponent refused to accept that he was locked out of the game. In any case, I won, but only because, really his deck isn't that great. In other words, this deck I have made is bad. I'll have to work on it some more. If any of you Magic savvy peoples have anything to say, I'm open to suggestions. Until then, I'll need to go find food and water.
4x Elvish Pioneer
4x Llanowar Elves
4x Verduran Enchantress
4x Enchantress's Presence
4x Wild Growth
3x Seal of Strength
4x Centaur Glade
2x Words of Wilding
3x Shimmering Wings
2x Future Sight
3x Standstill
3x Words of Wind
2x Yavimaya Coast
1x Okina, Temple to the Grandfathers
(Wow, that took a while to type out. Don't expect me to make a common thing of this.)
Yeah, it's pretty janky. Anyway, the gist of the deck is, get an enchantress card into play, then start playing enchantments. (Really Greg, I couldn't tell!) (Shut up, you. x_x) The deck runs really slowly, but it isn't REALLY for competition as much as a fun combo thing. The real fun starts when I get out a Words of Wind, an Enchantress effect, and a couple of cheap enchantments. At that point, you can flip the two back and forth, skipping the draws you get to the Words of Wind. While you're returning Wild Growth or whatever for the umpteenth time, you're opponant runs out of permenants to return, and has a very full hand. Granted, it takes several turns to pull it off effectively, but when you do, the game becomes pretty much locked unless your opponant has some one mana enchantment removal spell, and even then, you should have enough of an advantage to beat the other guy easily.
At least, that's how it usually works. When testing it out earlier tonite, my opponent refused to accept that he was locked out of the game. In any case, I won, but only because, really his deck isn't that great. In other words, this deck I have made is bad. I'll have to work on it some more. If any of you Magic savvy peoples have anything to say, I'm open to suggestions. Until then, I'll need to go find food and water.
Hail!
So I wake up at 10 and decide to actually leave for class. 0_0! Good thing too, I managed to figure out when my final in that class is - Monday at 7:30. One down, three to go. Anyway, the reason I wrote this log is that it's hailing. That's right. When I arrived at class it was a beautiful day, if a little cold. After a short class (just a over view of the final details and then a teacher evaluation) I came outside, not a half hour later, and its raining. And by the time I made the five minute bike ride back home, it's HAILING. Tiny blocks of ice, pelting me... Garr... Anyway, I guess I'll get back to work and procrastinating it. ^_^
5.12.04
Under Construction
Not really, but yeah... I've been going through fixing up little things, working on my blogger profile, what have you. Check out the cute picture I put in there. I had a hard time deciding what to use, because most of my pics are of cute girls, but I was worried that might give people the wrong impression about me, as I am not, in fact, a girl. So I put the Tails plushie up instead. *Huggles.* Hrmm... maybe I AM a girl. O_O!
I put up a few links to the side, but it feels empty. I don't wanna link to ALL my webcomics on rotation, just those two for now, anyway. If you think of any I should include, feel free to tell me. For now, I'm off to fill in the blanks in my profile, why not? Chao! (No, I didn't misspell it, it's a pun. Nevermind.) x_x;
I put up a few links to the side, but it feels empty. I don't wanna link to ALL my webcomics on rotation, just those two for now, anyway. If you think of any I should include, feel free to tell me. For now, I'm off to fill in the blanks in my profile, why not? Chao! (No, I didn't misspell it, it's a pun. Nevermind.) x_x;
Late Night Linkings
Hikikomori
I found this hitting a little too close to home. Thought I'd link it. Anyway. That's three posts tonite. I'm tired. Oh yeah, while I'm linking things, did I show y'all these? They're awesome. I need them. I will have them re-enact WWII battles on my shelves. Okay, enough linkings. I'm gonna sleep. For real.
I found this hitting a little too close to home. Thought I'd link it. Anyway. That's three posts tonite. I'm tired. Oh yeah, while I'm linking things, did I show y'all these? They're awesome. I need them. I will have them re-enact WWII battles on my shelves. Okay, enough linkings. I'm gonna sleep. For real.
4.12.04
Version 2.0
After over a year looking the same, I decided that I needed a new look. So voila! It's Blue!!! I'll have to redo everything sooner or later, with links and such. Ah well. It was getting pretty bland though, so... enjoy.
My Deck Is Cursed
I just played like a dozen games against Matt with my random red deck. I made it using just random, cheap, efficient burn and creatures. Not my best work, but I like it. Anyway, despite it not being that good, it as a fool proof secret weapon - luck. Out of most of the games, I won due to him not getting enough or the right color mana. One game I actually lost due to the same fate, and then one he won through a long drawn out battle. Anyway, I like that.
Lately I've been wondering about the possiblities of sentience (which is basically being alive or self aware, either artificially or otherwise.) For instance: Given the stated (actually false, but work with me) premise that the Furby toys learned, how long do they take to become self aware? Matt and I debated this to some length whether or not a Furby even had the memory capacity to store sentience. While he used the fact that no advanced computers have achieved sentience, with undoubtably more memory than a Furby, to prove that a Furby doesn't have the memory, I counter by saying that sentience isn't about memory, but rather programming technique, So memory shouldn't be a factor. Anyway, that's just one of my little ponderings. I know Furbies don't have the capability to reach self-awareness. However, it is NOT because they lack the memory, so much as they're not really learning.
I still want to figure that out, though. The way to give a computer sentience. Having a computer child of my very own (most likely shut off from the outside world, so he doesn't cause trouble) would be very cool. That's what i want for Christmas. A self aware computer program. Please Santa? ^_^
Okay, I'll sleep now. Or just shut up. Either really works. G'night!
If Johnny Cochrain gets to play the race car, I want the thimble.
Lately I've been wondering about the possiblities of sentience (which is basically being alive or self aware, either artificially or otherwise.) For instance: Given the stated (actually false, but work with me) premise that the Furby toys learned, how long do they take to become self aware? Matt and I debated this to some length whether or not a Furby even had the memory capacity to store sentience. While he used the fact that no advanced computers have achieved sentience, with undoubtably more memory than a Furby, to prove that a Furby doesn't have the memory, I counter by saying that sentience isn't about memory, but rather programming technique, So memory shouldn't be a factor. Anyway, that's just one of my little ponderings. I know Furbies don't have the capability to reach self-awareness. However, it is NOT because they lack the memory, so much as they're not really learning.
I still want to figure that out, though. The way to give a computer sentience. Having a computer child of my very own (most likely shut off from the outside world, so he doesn't cause trouble) would be very cool. That's what i want for Christmas. A self aware computer program. Please Santa? ^_^
Okay, I'll sleep now. Or just shut up. Either really works. G'night!
If Johnny Cochrain gets to play the race car, I want the thimble.
Happy Blog Birthday
Yeah, apparently I've had this for a year. Not much has changed. Hrmm... Maybe over Christmas break I'll actually break down and write those stories I was talking about a year ago. Oh well. And I've been getting shorter winded. I used to type out pages of stuff. I guess I've just gotten it all off my chest. I dunno why. Oh well.
Anyway, I'm watching White Chicks right now. It's a TERRIBLE movie, but not as bad as I'd feared. Like, take every buddy comedy ever, it's terrible. Wait...
Oh my God. I've been doing this for a year and I was about to my first anniversary rant about White Chicks! Someone kill me. So, new topic... Ummm.... I've got it. A brand new story, which I will make up right here on the spot. There's no telling whats going to happen. Ready? Here I go. (Yeah, I have a tendancy to write myself into my stories.)
------
Greg rapelled down the tunnel. His rope was tied to his truck, currently on the surface twenty meters above him. He glanced up, at the daylight rapidly grew smaller and farther away. He glanced to the sides, and saw the dust covered walls all around him. Looking down just revealed more darkness, rising up to surround him. It was in this darkness, as his body thoughtlessly plunged deeper, that Greg's mind began to wander. He thought back to his ships long journey to get here, and how that even after this, he still had another month in hyperspace, alone, before he reached the nearest colony world. Another three months after that he would spend traveling with some company, at least.
Greg sighed. "Another four months till Virginia Prime, and Mayleen..." It'd been that long since he'd said goodbye to his beloved wife. He hated that his job was keeping him away from everyone he loved, but the money was good. Very good. And in between the months of travel, he did usually get a good solid day or two of fun work. That's the real reason. Love what you do and do what you love. That's what Greg's dad had taught him. And besides, after only 5 years of treasure scavaging, Greg had earned 40,000,000 Unicreds, enough for he and Mayleen to retire on for a long while.
"After this last find, at least." Greg focused on the light now coming into vision beneath him from the drill scout he'd launched earlier, creating the tunnel he was now dopping down. Greg's time in hyperspace hadn't been spent idly. He'd spent his days pooring over maps (both starmaps and the usual kind) and historical essays, searching for this one site. The last of the original fourteen Earth Venture Expiditions.
The EVE project had been humanity's first careful steps into deep space. Over a dozen probes, loaded with stasis-helf crews and enough supplies to start a colony that would hopefully one day contact Earth again. It was a terrible failure. After a millennia, none of the colonies had been heard from. The main flaw in the plan was that for the most part, the probes had been launched blind. Remains of seven of the fourteen ships had been found inside of stars or gas giants. Four had landed, and the inhabitants were found mauled by the native predators. Two more, surprisingly enough, had been passed by ships traveling at lightspeed, found drifting hundreds of light-years from earth. The last one, Pod 14, was similarly dismissed as lost.
By most, anyway. Greg thought he'd been able to track it down. Using collected readings of anomalous readings of sublight drive trails intersecting hyperspace drive trails, along with Starmaps dating back to the early Third Millenium Standard Years, he was able to track down a possible landing spot for the mysterious EVE Pod 14. As he touched down on his drill pod's landing pad and looked around, Greg started to believe that he was right. Two hundred lightyears from earth, this planet, Marvis 87, was a footnote to a footnote on Unification Starmaps. It was set apart, though far from unique, by it's pecular structure, having a thin crust surrounding a light atosphere underground, and a lower, more fertile surface under the darkness. On his initial approach, Greg's scan's had revealed a single hole in the outer crust, just the size that an EVE pod would have made if it had tried to land.
As he looked now, he saw no ship where it should have been, but what he did see amazed him. A gigantic city had sprung up, seemingly abandoned now, with buildings growing almost up to the roof. Apparently the colonists had been fearful of piercing the crust, for fear of causing a cave in, crushing their budding settlement, so many buildings were exactly the same hight, and no higher. A more detailed look showed a large garden had been build under the inital impact hole, directly in the only direct sunlight their claustrophobic city ever recieved. Aside from that, apparently they had set up a number lamps to light their lives.
Also, as Greg looked upon the land, he found a number long unused drilling vehicles. "Apparently they found something worth digging for," Greg mused. He wandered into the villiage, his visor feeding him still more miscelanious facts from around him, all of it being recorded into a computer on his back. He looked past it, at the marvelous archetecture surrounding him as he walked through the city streets. The computer was just showing him data and figures, but he was walking through history. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. It was very much in an Ancient Earth style, obviously free from the much more cosmopolitan tastes Unification Citizens were surrounded with from the myriad of species comprising it.
As he thought about that, his mind wandered back on course: the colonists. Where were they? Surely some remains had to be here. Greg flicked a switch on his side, activating the bioscanners in his visor. Slowly the green, almost ghost-like sillouettes of decayed bodies appeared, contrasting and overlaying the dirty-yellow sides of the buildings. As he followed them, slowly creeping through the barren streets, he noticed a definite cluster effect to the bodies, a focal point of death, so to speak. Greg felt a grim look come upon his face. The worst part about relic hunting, he thought, was the dead. He couldn't stand looking at them. Eventually, though, the bright green filled up his vision, and he had to flip his vision.
Once he did, he was able to see unobscured the reason all these people had died like this. A treasure room. Glimering piles of gold, the kind of stuff told in legends. This couldn't be happening. It didnt. It just didn't happen. Sure, relic hunters loved to dream about it, but honestly, this wasn't supposed to happen. And yet it was. Greg was face to face with an honest to God treasure room. And aparently a rather fatal one, judging from the piles of dead bodies littered among the piles of gold. As Greg surveyed the room, he found a central point, to both the treasure and the corpses, appeared to be a large altar in the middle of the room. He walked up to it, in half-disbelief of where he was. Greg looked at the dust covered plaque adorning the monument.
"For helping us to get where we were, this great wealth is left in loving memory of our forefathers, the first generation of Earth Venture Expedition Pod 1" Pod one? That had been found decades ago. That couldn't be right. Greg extended a hand, and wiped some dust from the plaque, revealing instead, Pod...
"18?" Greg said aloud. "Then this means, there were survivors of the survivors? Fourteen launched her own pods!" That last bit Greg said excitedly, and a little too loud. The cavernous room began echoing, and as it did, heard an inhuman rumbling coming from all around him. "Oh shit, I woke the guard dogs." Greg grinned at the two sentry robots slowly awakening from their centries slumber. He wasn't going to wait for their systems to boot fully. Reaching for a pair of pistol blasters at his hips, Greg set at a dash for the door, and back to his ship. He'd done enough treasure hunting for one day.
The machines, however, were not as friendly. A pair of lumbering, ten story, faceless metal golems came charging out of the treasure room, each one more than armed to take out any would be bank-robbers the colony could spit at them. Greg, though, had half a millenia and the combined technology of ten thousand square lightyears of civilization. He could hold his own against these relics. The real challenge, for Greg, was bringing himself to shoot up these antiques, no matter how deadly they were. As the machine's gunfire traced its way closer to his path, Greg leapt into the air, and a pair of hover jets on his back fired, propelling him higher into the air. Greg spun and looked at his adversaries, and saw that they were indeed able to raise their guns above the horizon. "Fuck, and I thought you guys wouldn't use drones to go duck hunting." Greg took a few potshots at the drones before juking and hiding on the top of a building, out of range, for now.
Unfortunately, it wouldn't buy him much time. Looking left, Greg saw another building with a wall torn in, seemingly by those guard drones in one such chase. He wasn't safe for long. Even now, the sound of bullets ricocheting of the side of his own building rang clearly to his ears. Greg peered over the ledge and took a couple of shots at the "head" of one of the monster robots, managing to take out its sensor unit, effectively blinding it. After ducking for cover, Greg looked over again and tried to similarly blind the second unit, but found that both it and the "blind" bot were prepared for him this time. "So, you can talk to each other, hmm?" This was going to be a little harder than he thought. Greg rolled away from the edge and stood, surveying his landscape weighing his options. Straight ahead he was what might be his only option. A river, and crossing it a golden gleaming suspension bridge, apparently leading off to the mines.
Greg launched off, and dove in over the mechs, distracting them from their twisted demolition attempt. He zigged and zagged down the streets in front of their fire, dancing, occasionally taking a random shot back at his persuit. He was actually enjoying the danger, in spite of it, or perhaps because of it. As he neared the bridge, though, a stray shot blew out his starbard hoverdrive, causing him to lose altitude. Greg hit the ground at a run, and dashed towards the bridge, off to the left side. He started firing in two different directions. One gun shot behind back at the walking death mechs chasing him. The other, though, was shooting ahead, fraying the delicate suspension wiring. Meanwhile, the sub par accuarcy of the robots was completing the job on the wires Greg passed. Greg soon felt the bridge starting to sway.
After the twenty somethingth cord broke, the bridge jerked to its side. Using his remaining hover turbine, Greg was able to maintain his footing on the tumbling tower. His foes were not so lucky. The lead one, the blind one, fell first, landing in the water and frying out, just like that. Apparently the colonists weren't expecting much rain. The second drone, though, was a little smarter. It jumped off the bridge, and landed with one foot on the island that was its compatriates head. It stood there, for a second, balanced like a six-year-old balerina, until it made a surging lunge to shore.
Greg, meanwhile, had made it to the cover of a mine. The drone followed him in, but was unable to see where he had gone. It's visual sensor no good in the pitch black mine, the machine began to improvise. Bang. A bullet rang from the machine's turret into the nothingness. Bang. Another. Bang. "Sonar," Greg thought to himself. "I am impressed." Unfortunately for the machine, the colonists hadn't seen any reason to program the caves topography into the machine, so it couldn't recognize a man resting flat against the wall. After the tenth step into the building, the machine found itself as Greg's new mount. Like an unscratchable itch, Greg was in the machines blind spot. With surgical precision, Greg sliced into the top of the machine. Just above the sensor unit was computer core of the robot, its "brain". And Greg wanted it. Let the historians have their eighteenth pod out of fourteen. Greg wanted the machine who could use sonar.
When he slipped the computer core out of the mech, it went dead, silent in an instant. Greg sighed with relief and slid off to the ground. He packed the core in his pocket, and headed out the door. After surveying the rest of the city, finding nothing of particular intrest, returned to his drill probe, and began the long slow trip to the top. "So," he thought. "There are still four other EVE Pods out there. I wonder if they're as interesting as this one...."
The End.
------
Wow, that was fun. Alright, I'm off to bed. Be sure to tell me what you thought.
Anyway, I'm watching White Chicks right now. It's a TERRIBLE movie, but not as bad as I'd feared. Like, take every buddy comedy ever, it's terrible. Wait...
Oh my God. I've been doing this for a year and I was about to my first anniversary rant about White Chicks! Someone kill me. So, new topic... Ummm.... I've got it. A brand new story, which I will make up right here on the spot. There's no telling whats going to happen. Ready? Here I go. (Yeah, I have a tendancy to write myself into my stories.)
------
Greg rapelled down the tunnel. His rope was tied to his truck, currently on the surface twenty meters above him. He glanced up, at the daylight rapidly grew smaller and farther away. He glanced to the sides, and saw the dust covered walls all around him. Looking down just revealed more darkness, rising up to surround him. It was in this darkness, as his body thoughtlessly plunged deeper, that Greg's mind began to wander. He thought back to his ships long journey to get here, and how that even after this, he still had another month in hyperspace, alone, before he reached the nearest colony world. Another three months after that he would spend traveling with some company, at least.
Greg sighed. "Another four months till Virginia Prime, and Mayleen..." It'd been that long since he'd said goodbye to his beloved wife. He hated that his job was keeping him away from everyone he loved, but the money was good. Very good. And in between the months of travel, he did usually get a good solid day or two of fun work. That's the real reason. Love what you do and do what you love. That's what Greg's dad had taught him. And besides, after only 5 years of treasure scavaging, Greg had earned 40,000,000 Unicreds, enough for he and Mayleen to retire on for a long while.
"After this last find, at least." Greg focused on the light now coming into vision beneath him from the drill scout he'd launched earlier, creating the tunnel he was now dopping down. Greg's time in hyperspace hadn't been spent idly. He'd spent his days pooring over maps (both starmaps and the usual kind) and historical essays, searching for this one site. The last of the original fourteen Earth Venture Expiditions.
The EVE project had been humanity's first careful steps into deep space. Over a dozen probes, loaded with stasis-helf crews and enough supplies to start a colony that would hopefully one day contact Earth again. It was a terrible failure. After a millennia, none of the colonies had been heard from. The main flaw in the plan was that for the most part, the probes had been launched blind. Remains of seven of the fourteen ships had been found inside of stars or gas giants. Four had landed, and the inhabitants were found mauled by the native predators. Two more, surprisingly enough, had been passed by ships traveling at lightspeed, found drifting hundreds of light-years from earth. The last one, Pod 14, was similarly dismissed as lost.
By most, anyway. Greg thought he'd been able to track it down. Using collected readings of anomalous readings of sublight drive trails intersecting hyperspace drive trails, along with Starmaps dating back to the early Third Millenium Standard Years, he was able to track down a possible landing spot for the mysterious EVE Pod 14. As he touched down on his drill pod's landing pad and looked around, Greg started to believe that he was right. Two hundred lightyears from earth, this planet, Marvis 87, was a footnote to a footnote on Unification Starmaps. It was set apart, though far from unique, by it's pecular structure, having a thin crust surrounding a light atosphere underground, and a lower, more fertile surface under the darkness. On his initial approach, Greg's scan's had revealed a single hole in the outer crust, just the size that an EVE pod would have made if it had tried to land.
As he looked now, he saw no ship where it should have been, but what he did see amazed him. A gigantic city had sprung up, seemingly abandoned now, with buildings growing almost up to the roof. Apparently the colonists had been fearful of piercing the crust, for fear of causing a cave in, crushing their budding settlement, so many buildings were exactly the same hight, and no higher. A more detailed look showed a large garden had been build under the inital impact hole, directly in the only direct sunlight their claustrophobic city ever recieved. Aside from that, apparently they had set up a number lamps to light their lives.
Also, as Greg looked upon the land, he found a number long unused drilling vehicles. "Apparently they found something worth digging for," Greg mused. He wandered into the villiage, his visor feeding him still more miscelanious facts from around him, all of it being recorded into a computer on his back. He looked past it, at the marvelous archetecture surrounding him as he walked through the city streets. The computer was just showing him data and figures, but he was walking through history. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. It was very much in an Ancient Earth style, obviously free from the much more cosmopolitan tastes Unification Citizens were surrounded with from the myriad of species comprising it.
As he thought about that, his mind wandered back on course: the colonists. Where were they? Surely some remains had to be here. Greg flicked a switch on his side, activating the bioscanners in his visor. Slowly the green, almost ghost-like sillouettes of decayed bodies appeared, contrasting and overlaying the dirty-yellow sides of the buildings. As he followed them, slowly creeping through the barren streets, he noticed a definite cluster effect to the bodies, a focal point of death, so to speak. Greg felt a grim look come upon his face. The worst part about relic hunting, he thought, was the dead. He couldn't stand looking at them. Eventually, though, the bright green filled up his vision, and he had to flip his vision.
Once he did, he was able to see unobscured the reason all these people had died like this. A treasure room. Glimering piles of gold, the kind of stuff told in legends. This couldn't be happening. It didnt. It just didn't happen. Sure, relic hunters loved to dream about it, but honestly, this wasn't supposed to happen. And yet it was. Greg was face to face with an honest to God treasure room. And aparently a rather fatal one, judging from the piles of dead bodies littered among the piles of gold. As Greg surveyed the room, he found a central point, to both the treasure and the corpses, appeared to be a large altar in the middle of the room. He walked up to it, in half-disbelief of where he was. Greg looked at the dust covered plaque adorning the monument.
"For helping us to get where we were, this great wealth is left in loving memory of our forefathers, the first generation of Earth Venture Expedition Pod 1" Pod one? That had been found decades ago. That couldn't be right. Greg extended a hand, and wiped some dust from the plaque, revealing instead, Pod...
"18?" Greg said aloud. "Then this means, there were survivors of the survivors? Fourteen launched her own pods!" That last bit Greg said excitedly, and a little too loud. The cavernous room began echoing, and as it did, heard an inhuman rumbling coming from all around him. "Oh shit, I woke the guard dogs." Greg grinned at the two sentry robots slowly awakening from their centries slumber. He wasn't going to wait for their systems to boot fully. Reaching for a pair of pistol blasters at his hips, Greg set at a dash for the door, and back to his ship. He'd done enough treasure hunting for one day.
The machines, however, were not as friendly. A pair of lumbering, ten story, faceless metal golems came charging out of the treasure room, each one more than armed to take out any would be bank-robbers the colony could spit at them. Greg, though, had half a millenia and the combined technology of ten thousand square lightyears of civilization. He could hold his own against these relics. The real challenge, for Greg, was bringing himself to shoot up these antiques, no matter how deadly they were. As the machine's gunfire traced its way closer to his path, Greg leapt into the air, and a pair of hover jets on his back fired, propelling him higher into the air. Greg spun and looked at his adversaries, and saw that they were indeed able to raise their guns above the horizon. "Fuck, and I thought you guys wouldn't use drones to go duck hunting." Greg took a few potshots at the drones before juking and hiding on the top of a building, out of range, for now.
Unfortunately, it wouldn't buy him much time. Looking left, Greg saw another building with a wall torn in, seemingly by those guard drones in one such chase. He wasn't safe for long. Even now, the sound of bullets ricocheting of the side of his own building rang clearly to his ears. Greg peered over the ledge and took a couple of shots at the "head" of one of the monster robots, managing to take out its sensor unit, effectively blinding it. After ducking for cover, Greg looked over again and tried to similarly blind the second unit, but found that both it and the "blind" bot were prepared for him this time. "So, you can talk to each other, hmm?" This was going to be a little harder than he thought. Greg rolled away from the edge and stood, surveying his landscape weighing his options. Straight ahead he was what might be his only option. A river, and crossing it a golden gleaming suspension bridge, apparently leading off to the mines.
Greg launched off, and dove in over the mechs, distracting them from their twisted demolition attempt. He zigged and zagged down the streets in front of their fire, dancing, occasionally taking a random shot back at his persuit. He was actually enjoying the danger, in spite of it, or perhaps because of it. As he neared the bridge, though, a stray shot blew out his starbard hoverdrive, causing him to lose altitude. Greg hit the ground at a run, and dashed towards the bridge, off to the left side. He started firing in two different directions. One gun shot behind back at the walking death mechs chasing him. The other, though, was shooting ahead, fraying the delicate suspension wiring. Meanwhile, the sub par accuarcy of the robots was completing the job on the wires Greg passed. Greg soon felt the bridge starting to sway.
After the twenty somethingth cord broke, the bridge jerked to its side. Using his remaining hover turbine, Greg was able to maintain his footing on the tumbling tower. His foes were not so lucky. The lead one, the blind one, fell first, landing in the water and frying out, just like that. Apparently the colonists weren't expecting much rain. The second drone, though, was a little smarter. It jumped off the bridge, and landed with one foot on the island that was its compatriates head. It stood there, for a second, balanced like a six-year-old balerina, until it made a surging lunge to shore.
Greg, meanwhile, had made it to the cover of a mine. The drone followed him in, but was unable to see where he had gone. It's visual sensor no good in the pitch black mine, the machine began to improvise. Bang. A bullet rang from the machine's turret into the nothingness. Bang. Another. Bang. "Sonar," Greg thought to himself. "I am impressed." Unfortunately for the machine, the colonists hadn't seen any reason to program the caves topography into the machine, so it couldn't recognize a man resting flat against the wall. After the tenth step into the building, the machine found itself as Greg's new mount. Like an unscratchable itch, Greg was in the machines blind spot. With surgical precision, Greg sliced into the top of the machine. Just above the sensor unit was computer core of the robot, its "brain". And Greg wanted it. Let the historians have their eighteenth pod out of fourteen. Greg wanted the machine who could use sonar.
When he slipped the computer core out of the mech, it went dead, silent in an instant. Greg sighed with relief and slid off to the ground. He packed the core in his pocket, and headed out the door. After surveying the rest of the city, finding nothing of particular intrest, returned to his drill probe, and began the long slow trip to the top. "So," he thought. "There are still four other EVE Pods out there. I wonder if they're as interesting as this one...."
The End.
------
Wow, that was fun. Alright, I'm off to bed. Be sure to tell me what you thought.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
