Brain Dump
March 30, 2004
So really I have not updated because I don’t have anything to write about. I will officially begin in my new position on Thursday and I’m getting training in the meantime. I’d write more about it but I’d rather not. There are too many bitter people who would probably love to read about things like that. I am bored stiff. I need a new game. I went browsing in the stores here and all imported games have been translated into Japanese and cost 2-3 times more than what they would online. No way am I paying a hundred bucks for Warcraft III. I’ve been pondering about making a new webpage from scratch but I’m lost as to what I want. LoGD is getting boring but it’s become so routine now and I strive on routine and consistency in my life. The weather has been becoming much better – this morning was so nice that I’d just opened my balcony doors and let the sun and wind blow all morning. I have a day off tomorrow and I’m hoping I get the same weather. I think I might tote my lovely camera around and snap shots at everything and I mean everything. Wow, even in a brain dump am I having trouble thinking of things to write.
I guess I’m trying to be Organized Man lately. I’m trying to catalog and categorize and organize and detail everything in my apartment and all sorts of notes from my Japanese class and from work. Organized Man fights the dastardly Messy Man and Chicken Scratch Man.
Writing sucks.
Done
March 18, 2004
I found out I got the promotion today. Woohoo.
On Being Happy
March 15, 2004
Being happy is a choice. I choose to be happy. To be truly happy, you must do these things:
You must innately love yourself and accept all your shortcomings. If you hate your weaknesses, you will not be happy. Instead, embrace and improve or improvise.
You must be able to be happy with everything that your are, no matter how much you think they are weaknesses. You must be happy with nothing before you can be happy when you possess something.
You must be happy being single and alone before you can derive happiness from others, no matter how much you love them. Happiness is found in oneself, not another.
You must find happiness from what’s inside you… be it your soul, your heart, your spirit, your guts and blood, before you can find happiness from external sources. Materials bring happiness only when there’s nothing inside you to give you happiness. Do not equate this to a poor person rationalizing his poorness. You must be happy with what you have instead of being sad about what you don’t have, when compared to others.
You must be happy in the long term and accept short term losses and sorrow. Sadness is a normal part of life but I choose happiness whenever I can.
You must find happiness in small things as well as big things. The first breath of morning mountain air is just as satisfying as reaching the peak of the mountain.
You must love being happy and strive to bring yourself more through self improvement and mental and spiritual development. Don’t become a stagnant person.
Responsibility
March 09, 2004
From the Mainichi News website that I visit daily: Poultry farm chairman hangs self over bird flu.
In case you’re too lazy to go there and read the article, I will give you a brief summary.
About 2 weeks ago in Kyoto, someone tipped off the police that a local farm tried to cover up the deaths of 10,000 chickens. The authorities raided the place and found the crazy bird influenza in some of the birds and even in some crow carcasses around the farm. The chairman and later his father the previous chairman held a press conference to apologize because, “(they) caused great trouble.”
The reporters jumped on this opportunity and grilled him with questions about the former chairman’s personal responsibility, what happened, who’s to blame, and all sorts of questions. I watched some of the footage and all the 67 year old said was, “Shirimasen. Shirimasen” (I don’t know / I don’t understand). In the article it even said that he leaned over and asked his lawyer for advice on what to say.
Personally, it seems like a crock of shit that he didn’t know anything. BSE, Bird Flu, and SARS have dominated the airwaves in this paranoid country for months now. When your poultry suddenly die off in massive numbers, you can’t just hide behind a veil of silence and possible criminal negligence (I believe hiding so many deaths is against some sort of Poultry Farm law here).
The kicker.
He hangs himself.
To mine eyes, this just cements his guilt in this whole case. It’s like an admittance of guilt in front of a supreme court judge. He couldn’t accept the outcomes of his actions and ran away in the only way he knew. He, and his wife, hung themselves. Apparently in this culture, to kill oneself is an honorable thing. You’ve seen The Last Samurai when the general guts himself before the enemy. I see CEOs, education workers, Politicians kill themselves in face of social and legal accusations.
Running away never solved any problems. There are still 10,000 dead chickens with an infectious disease and someone must be held accountable.
I feel sorry for the guy, I really do. He was doing what many people in his position would’ve done – he protected himself, his family, and his business in a way he thought most appropriate but unfortunately for him and fortunately for the general populace, someone saw that this was wrong and called the cops. Now, his son faces the press and the authorities alone.
Way to go, dad.
LORD (or LOGD)
March 08, 2004
It goes without saying that I’m the biggest geek on the game right now. I’m at level 12 while everyone is about 5-7. I just looked at the news and I’m on day 31 while others are around 18-20. That means I’ve played way more than others. I can’t help it! It just so happens that the four game days per real day sort of coincide with my schedule. Well, I had to adjust my schedule a bit to fit in all game turns on a couple of days (sleep a bit later, go to work a bit later) but for the rest of the week, I just play right before the day changes and then right after.
For some reason, the level master kept attacking me when I wasn’t ready so for three or four days, I kept going in the forest unable to level up. When I finally upgraded the weapon and armour, I kicked his ass and found I had enough experience for an additional two levels. Then the next day, after several thrill seeking, I’m ready for two more but lost the second.
So I don’t know how many of the players actually read my webpage but that’s my strategy so far. Thrillseek until I have enough experience for the level up, then slum/look to save up gold to upgrade gear. For me, it seems to be the fastest way. I am never going mining again… I’m 0/2 at the mines. Just doesn’t seem worth it.
I have killed off the ADMIN character because for some reason people were attacking the invincible player… perhaps in hopes to gain his massive holdings. In his stead, my character has superuser status but I won’t abuse this power. It’s not fun that way… yet. Superusers can pretty much edit any part of the game, including users and their stats. So, if one were really inclined to do so, one change give oneself a thousand charm and five thousand attack power. Or one can make another have two charm and one attack power. One can be very selfish and cruel. My character remains fleshy and mortal with no artificial changes, sweeteners, or colors. (I’m just 5 levels higher than the next player heh heh). Fear not for I remain a fair and just geek who intends to make fun of your spelling mistakes.
Jeez, what a geeky update today.
Learning To Shut Up
March 05, 2004
One of the benefits of living in a country that predominantly does not speak your language is that even when you talk aloud in your native tongue, most, if not all people will not understand you.
In the past few months I’ve taken full advantage of this. Alongside my chums and cronies, I will speak whatever I want whenever I want, uncaring about reactions or suitability of language. In short, I talk about the dirtiest, nastiest, most politically incorrect things anytime I want and none are wiser.
Last night after some secret shopping (tee hee) with some friends, we went and had some Mexican food. This restaurant is a little place located in an old building in the middle of Shinsaibashi. It’s on the eight floor. There are two sets of stairs in this building. Someone was thinking when they built this building – you’d think with two sets of stairs, the chances of fire fatalities would be very low. Sadly, being jackasses they are, the tenants in this entire building leave their shit in the stairs. I looked into both stairways and should a fire break out on the lower floors, I’m pretty sure I would be burnt to ashes faster than a cigarette.
I digress as usual.
This restaurant caters to the foreign crowd, specifically, the English-speaking crowd. This is something I had to keep in mind all night because me being me, I started conversations about tits, my lovely ass, embarrassing stories of old, and all sorts of stuff I wouldn’t be caught dead speaking about in an Earl’s or The Keg. Yet talking about inappropriate dinner table topics is so much fun especially when you’re munching on BBQ wings and downing a margarita (don’t ask why they have BBQ wings in a Mex dig). Luckily we were a bit late to start dinner so no one was really in the restaurant.
Towards the end, a couple of the caucasian persuasion came in and sat behind our table. Oblivious to the fact that I could hear them speaking English, we continued our rather interesting but perverted conversation. It was not until one of the girls, who will remain anonymous, asked the boys in a fairly loud voice,
Do you like big hard tits or small soft tits?
At this point common sense snapped back into me and I hushed this friend. We all had a few giggles and continued our conversation in a quieter volume. Neither me nor the other guy answered this question because it was weird… I mean… how “hard” did she mean? Like concrete slab hard or bicycle helmet styrofoam hard? It was too weird even by my fucked up standards.
Dethforce kisses Violet and then slays Adonis
March 02, 2004
Justin has worked his magic and placed Legend of the Green Dragon on this here site. If you know what 9600 bauds, 14.4, or 28.8 mean, you will know LOGD. If not, then you are probably too young or had a life when you were a teenager.
