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thessalianIt's been pointed out to me that I have lived in the UK longer than I did in Canada. In fact, I've lived in the UK longer than I have in Canada and in the US combined.* Despite that, I have maintained a love for snow that harkens back to the little six-year-old in snowboots I used to be. I just have to be out in it. Weird, but true. I suppose it's a weird combination of novelty and nostalgia. The nostalgia is fairly obvious; the novelty is that it didn't snow much in New Jersey when I lived there and it's snowed more in the UK this last month than it has for the sixteen-odd years I've lived here, so it feels like such a new thing, yet such a comforting and homelike one at the same time.
Lo! A Snowbeast Is Me!
*ahem* In any case, much of this afternoon was spent playing FFXI - notably, back on the quest to unlock Dark Knight. Great swords are not good weapons. Well ... okay, if you've got some strength behind you, it does a fair bit of damage, but the delay between strikes is horrifying. Beasties tend to hit you at least twice between each of your hits and if you're fighting a Monk class beastie using hand-to-hand, that's two strikes per 'hit' and your only hope is very high Evasion. I have to massacre 100 beasties** with this stinking slow sword and then go to Home of Quadav Doom to get cutscene. Woo. I'm not even sure why I'm doing this beyond novelty value. Eh, it saves me having to worry about router bork while I'm in party.
And I promised another lot of interviews, so here we go with Annette M Dodd:
1) So, err, the naked yoga. Do you get complaints from the neighbours? Or unwanted attentions from the local red-blooded males?
Not so much, really. See, my parents totally hated the remarks the neighbours would make about the garden - stuff like how they ought to plant something different or how they got their roses so healthy or whatever - so they had a whole bunch of hedges and trees and stuff planted around the outer edge to, like, keep the neighbours from looking in and stuff. I mean, it's not like they're all that tall yet or anything but it means that you have to be on the first or second floor and, like, really trying to see anything in our garden, which is useful for when Bixby's weeding and everything because that would totally freak people out - self-weeding garden, you know? So, anyway, I think that guy next door might have got some binoculars awhile back but it's not like he says anything about it - I mean, wouldn't you be embarrassed admitting that you get your kicks watching the wacky neighbour girl do naked yoga in her back yard? Besides, most people aren't looking farther than, like, their cups of coffee when I'm actually ... you know, yoga-ing. So, no, no complaints and no hassle or anything, but thanks for asking!
2) Do you mind HIPPIE taking over your house? Don't you wish you had it to yourself?
Oh, gosh, no! I love having them here, really - it's, like, really boring and lonely with the big house and all the bedrooms all empty except for Bixby. I don't get Carl and Emma's music, like, at all but that's what headphones are for, and it means I don't have to do all the cooking and cleaning myself, and movie nights are fun, whatever they say about my anime and stuff. And I get to borrow Emma's shoes, which are, like, totally cool!
3) How on earth do you stay so cheerful when you deal with the sorts of things you deal with day in, day out?
...You know, I never really thought about that! I guess I figure that, like, there's no situation so bad that it can't be made a little bit better with a positive outlook, you know? And besides, some of that stuff is really funny so you've just got to laugh, right? Better than running around like a headless chicken going 'woe' ... mostly because I've seen that at one of Mama Jez's voodoo ritual nights and that's kind of messy.
4) Seriously, what's with the valley speak? Don't you find people underestimate your intelligence because of it?
Well, I was actually born in the Valley, see, and we moved here when I was like nine or ten or something and then I got a bit homesick so I watched a lot of US TV on VHS and then on DVD, so I never really lost the old accent. I think it kind of suits me, anyway, and if people underestimate my intelligence or whatever, that's fine, because the look on the faces of anyone that shallow when they find out that I, like, have a brain and stuff? Totally priceless.
5) Mike's the newest member of your team - how are you getting on with him?
Oh, Mike's a sweetie; a little bit dense and everything, but I know from experience that it takes way longer than just a year to get used to things, so it's no surprise he's still a bit flummoxed and flustered and everything. I try to get Emma and Carl - especially Carl - to be nicer to him, because how's he going to get comfortable if people aren't being nice to him? I know it's probably a lost cause and everything but at least I'm, like, trying. He's always been nice to me, anyway, and he's like the only person I know who actually doesn't mind coming with me to Market, even though it kind of scares him. I guess he's kind of like the little brother I never had, which is kind of weird and everything because he's actually older than me but it's an experience thing, you know?
Right. Now off to Home of Turtle-Based Evil to see if I killed my 100 mobs yet.
* - We are not counting the eight-odd months I spent bouncing around the East, West and Gulf coasts.
** - And the final blow, I find, cannot be a Weapon Skill. I think I may have lost a lot of mob kill count to that. ARSE.
Lo! A Snowbeast Is Me!
*ahem* In any case, much of this afternoon was spent playing FFXI - notably, back on the quest to unlock Dark Knight. Great swords are not good weapons. Well ... okay, if you've got some strength behind you, it does a fair bit of damage, but the delay between strikes is horrifying. Beasties tend to hit you at least twice between each of your hits and if you're fighting a Monk class beastie using hand-to-hand, that's two strikes per 'hit' and your only hope is very high Evasion. I have to massacre 100 beasties** with this stinking slow sword and then go to Home of Quadav Doom to get cutscene. Woo. I'm not even sure why I'm doing this beyond novelty value. Eh, it saves me having to worry about router bork while I'm in party.
And I promised another lot of interviews, so here we go with Annette M Dodd:
1) So, err, the naked yoga. Do you get complaints from the neighbours? Or unwanted attentions from the local red-blooded males?
Not so much, really. See, my parents totally hated the remarks the neighbours would make about the garden - stuff like how they ought to plant something different or how they got their roses so healthy or whatever - so they had a whole bunch of hedges and trees and stuff planted around the outer edge to, like, keep the neighbours from looking in and stuff. I mean, it's not like they're all that tall yet or anything but it means that you have to be on the first or second floor and, like, really trying to see anything in our garden, which is useful for when Bixby's weeding and everything because that would totally freak people out - self-weeding garden, you know? So, anyway, I think that guy next door might have got some binoculars awhile back but it's not like he says anything about it - I mean, wouldn't you be embarrassed admitting that you get your kicks watching the wacky neighbour girl do naked yoga in her back yard? Besides, most people aren't looking farther than, like, their cups of coffee when I'm actually ... you know, yoga-ing. So, no, no complaints and no hassle or anything, but thanks for asking!
2) Do you mind HIPPIE taking over your house? Don't you wish you had it to yourself?
Oh, gosh, no! I love having them here, really - it's, like, really boring and lonely with the big house and all the bedrooms all empty except for Bixby. I don't get Carl and Emma's music, like, at all but that's what headphones are for, and it means I don't have to do all the cooking and cleaning myself, and movie nights are fun, whatever they say about my anime and stuff. And I get to borrow Emma's shoes, which are, like, totally cool!
3) How on earth do you stay so cheerful when you deal with the sorts of things you deal with day in, day out?
...You know, I never really thought about that! I guess I figure that, like, there's no situation so bad that it can't be made a little bit better with a positive outlook, you know? And besides, some of that stuff is really funny so you've just got to laugh, right? Better than running around like a headless chicken going 'woe' ... mostly because I've seen that at one of Mama Jez's voodoo ritual nights and that's kind of messy.
4) Seriously, what's with the valley speak? Don't you find people underestimate your intelligence because of it?
Well, I was actually born in the Valley, see, and we moved here when I was like nine or ten or something and then I got a bit homesick so I watched a lot of US TV on VHS and then on DVD, so I never really lost the old accent. I think it kind of suits me, anyway, and if people underestimate my intelligence or whatever, that's fine, because the look on the faces of anyone that shallow when they find out that I, like, have a brain and stuff? Totally priceless.
5) Mike's the newest member of your team - how are you getting on with him?
Oh, Mike's a sweetie; a little bit dense and everything, but I know from experience that it takes way longer than just a year to get used to things, so it's no surprise he's still a bit flummoxed and flustered and everything. I try to get Emma and Carl - especially Carl - to be nicer to him, because how's he going to get comfortable if people aren't being nice to him? I know it's probably a lost cause and everything but at least I'm, like, trying. He's always been nice to me, anyway, and he's like the only person I know who actually doesn't mind coming with me to Market, even though it kind of scares him. I guess he's kind of like the little brother I never had, which is kind of weird and everything because he's actually older than me but it's an experience thing, you know?
Right. Now off to Home of Turtle-Based Evil to see if I killed my 100 mobs yet.
* - We are not counting the eight-odd months I spent bouncing around the East, West and Gulf coasts.
** - And the final blow, I find, cannot be a Weapon Skill. I think I may have lost a lot of mob kill count to that. ARSE.