Things I overheard while talking to myself

So last night was fun.

I went and met Lisa and her friends at the Pru, and then we walked to Fire + Ice. I wish I'd thought to call ahead for reservations so we had to wait an hour and a half for a table, but one person had an iPad so we played Scrabble on it and talked. I also got a (alcoholic) strawberry daiquiri because I'd never had one before. It was pretty good.

Once we got upstairs we did the usual spiel with putting our food together and watching them grill it, but unfortunately there was a small sauce mixup and my alfredo sauce wound up on one of the other people's food when it wasn't supposed to. But they were very nice and remade it for him and brought it to the table. Lots of nerdy conversations were had.

And in the end, we didn't actually wind up singing karaoke. We were at MIT's Anime Club, and the last person who used their TV didn't do it right so we couldn't get it hooked up right. So instead we played Dominion. I'm infamously impatient when it comes to card games, hence whey I never got into Magic cards, but I eventually got it. I did, however, lose. Twice. Also, MIT's Anime Club room is amazing, they have DVDs that haven't been in print for years and allegedly the largest private anime library in the country. I believe it. We also talked about DnD and everyone instantly understood what I meant when I said that the group I used to play with more or less imploded after two of the members started dating each other. It doesn't matter who's involved, that's the kiss of death for most DnD groups.

The one bad part was that when I finally left I was too late to catch the last inbound train, so I caught a cab. It wasn't too bad, but I'm usually not out late enough to have to worry about that. I got home safe and sound.

Spoilers for Mass Effect



My favorite comments after the cut.

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This is what I get for playing Mass Effect 2 and then going out to do laundry with Lady Gaga on my Mp3 player. I just couldn't get the idea out of my head, maybe because I realized that the beats synced up.

The joke, for those that don't get it, is that during the game you're on a mission when all of the sudden this guy walks onto the dance floor and starts dancing like he owns the place. You're also supposed to be updating one of your team members by hitting a button periodically while this is happening, but I don't know a single person who didn't get distracted by the dancing guy and missed at least one. I added the audio of this version. Yes it's dorky, but what else did you expect from me?

Oh, and someone else came up with a similar idea using a different Gaga song. I didn't see that one until after I uploaded mine.

Oh man, I just had an even better idea... be back later. *wicked grin*

New phone acquired, and yours truly is slightly less stressed out to learn that on the off chance I do find the old one I can return the new one and only get hit with a $30 restocking fee. The guy at the store was very nice and didn't try to upsell me from what I wanted to get, either, so that helped. I (probably) wouldn't have bit his head off if he did since I used to work retail and I understand it's part of the job, but I think he correctly guessed that I was in no mood for horseshit, so it was appreciated.

This whole thing managed to totally derail what I had planned for the day, mainly call the maintenance guy again since the stove is only working intermittently again and call a guy about possibly getting a futon for this place, both of which were impossible to do without a phone, but I'll try to relax and make up for some lost time. Also, eat, since I tend to find that when I'm in a fowl mood I can usually reduce that feeling by eating something.

I've also decided that the new phone's name is Amaterasu (as in the wolf Goddess from Okami, see my journal header), since the old one was Mokona, and if it's not blatantly obvious already I am a dork. Don't ask why, it just makes sense for some reason. It's an LG Prime, and has a moderate amount of bells and whistles. It also charges off a USB cable in addition to a regular charger, which is handy since it cuts down on the number of cables I have to have hooked up to my power strip.

Oh, and the cherry on the crap sundae that was today was when I was walking home and some assholes driving by in a car decided to comment on the size and shape of my posterior in what probably passed in their minds as a compliment. For the record, that's called being creepy. They got the finger since I was in no mood to deal with that.

I didn't get much sleep last night because I was having stomach trouble, but I lasted most of the day until about 4 today when it felt like I got hit by a truck.

I mostly avoided the Valentine's stuff, though I did have a moment where I was looking around at a crowd and thought "A lot of people are wearing red" before I looked down at my own red coat. Oh. That wasn't intentional, it just happens to be the color of my coat.

My day was also made when something I ordered a while ago finally showed up in the mail today. This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, but I got something dorky. Mainly, Wonder Woman panties. Yeah, I know, but what else did you expect from me?

I also had something cooking in the crock part all day, and it was so worth it. I had some 15 bean soup mix and added chicken sausage to it with a chicken stock base. I had cornbread and a salad with it, and it proved to be just what the stomach needed.

I've started the process of packing my stuff up so I'm not doing it at the last minute, and today I bought four cardboard boxes made of recycled material and filled three. And I'd say about 75% of that space has been taken up by my DVDs and books, though the books outnumber the DVDs about 3:1.

Yup, I have priorities. I will also not be surprised at all if I own more books than clothes.

So my first time playing DnD was interesting, and I can tell it's a great group. For one thing on the way there I did manage to get on the right number bus... the only problem is that it was going the wrong way. I figured this out at about the time we starting passing Simmons, so I jumped out and caught the next one going the other way. Most of the other girls were running late too so it didn't to much damage.

The actual game took a while to set up since my attempts to set up my character sheet on my own proved to not be so good, so we started from scratch. Elizabeth, who invited me to this thing in the first place, is a very understanding GM who basically let me make an earthbender by fudging some stuff and combining monk abilities with some other things. I was getting a sinus headache through much of this so the numbers were a bit confusing, but they were patient with the n00b and explained stuff to me.

As far as my character, one trope I love is the tiny, 100 pounds soaking wet girl who can throw guys twice as large as her around (Toph, River Tam, etc.) so my character was made with that in mind and has that sort of personality. I list her as Chaotic Good, but she's willing to do stuff like take the wallet of a dead guy (who she did not kill, btw) who owed her money and take out what he owed her, plus interest. She also buried the guy using her sorcery since it wouldn't have been right to just leave his body there in the street. So she does have standards, she just does good stuff on her own terms.

The basic story of the campaign is that their group managed to knock out the government of a major city, piss of a worm-god (seriously) and get some merfolk mad at us so they're sending a supernatural storm at us. My character comes in because a giant death tower (described as the cousin of Barad-dûr) suddenly appears in her city and she wonders what's happening, and runs into a group coming out the tower consisting of a woman with a Bra of Holding (basically a bag that's bigger on the inside than the outside, only stored in a bra) a drunken halfling, a sheltered cleric, a warrior who didn't say much, and an elven telepath trying to summon a snake familiar and who once drowned someone by casting a spell on them that made them laugh uncontrollably while they were swimming. And not present tonight was an orc brawler who met her girlfriend while mud wrestling. Interesting group, and they accepted me pretty willingly. My role seems to be the deadpan snarker type, and at one point after a group of paladins got zapped by lightning the first thing I could think of to say in character was "Geez, what God did they piss off?!"

I couldn't help but find it hilarious that the very first roll I made in my entire life... was a 1. Aka a Critical Failure. It was just a listen check and I basically just heard nothing but faint muttering, but when I tossed that die I'm sure I had a priceless expression on my face.

Overall it was fun, and it should go quicker since we don't have to make my character from scratch next time.

After the last line of in the post about Bitey the Cat I had to.

So this is dedicated to every cat tsundere ever, and I've known quite a few. Shamelessly ripped off from Billy Joel, but I wouldn't be surprised if the song was originally about a cat.

She can kill with a purr
She can wound with her teeth
She can ruin your hand with her clawed little feet
And she only reveals what she wants you to see
She’s a white and orange cat
But she’ll always be Bitey to me

She can lead you in close
She can simply ignore you
She can ask to be pet
Then she'll try to destroy you
And she'll take what you give her, as long as it's free
Yeah, she hated my guts
But she’ll always be Bitey to me

Oh--she takes care of herself
She can wait if she wants
She's ahead of her time
Oh--and she never gives out
And she never gives in
She just changes her mind

And she'll make you believe
That it’s petting she’s needin’
Then she'll carelessly scratch you
And purr while you're bleedin'
But she'll bring out the best
And the worst you can be
Blame it all on yourself
Cause she'll always be Bitey to me

She's frequently kind
And she's suddenly cruel
She can do as she pleases
She's nobody's fool
And she can't be thrown out
She's got her pedigree
And the most she will do
Is give love bites to you
But she'll always be Bitey to me

Since I can put pictures on my new phone via chip I spent a while looking for a wallpaper, and then I came across this one:



One not secret about me is that I love Mokonas and actually have several stuffed ones, including a backpack of the black one. For this I just shrunk down the wallpaper made by this girl so it would fit on the chip. Since my phone can actually display it two ways, horizontally and vertically depending on how the phone is held and if the keyboard is out, I wanted to find one that would work either way, and this one did the trick.

It's also a little bit of a joke since when my mom and I were in Japan we rented two phones, a white one and a black one, that we could use to call each other if we got separated. I, naturally, nicknamed them White Mokona and Black Mokona.

So yeah, this week's over, all my assignments save one take home test are in, and besides the finals next week I'm done... God, I can just feel all the tension in my shoulders melting away.

I also swung by the comic shop at Kenmore on my way home, since to my great surprise and irritation the Newbury Comics at Fanueil Hall did not have the new Wonder Woman volume. Or any any Wonder Woman volumes at all. Seriously, they have 10 million Batman books, 10 million Superman books, but not one stinking Wonder Woman?!* The three of them are supposed to be equals! They're the Trinity, the three people who can take out each other and are the embodiment of the greatest virtues in superherodom! Gaaahh!

So I was in a huff and went to the place at Kenmore instead since I know they have it, and when I found it I chatted with one of the girls there and mentioned that. I think it helps that this shop actually has women on its staff, and I go there because they're genuinely nice people who will talk nerdy with me.

I also told them that I'll be back in there the day the first volume of the new Birds Of Prey series drops. That series is written by Gail Simone, the same person doing Wonder Woman right now, and she's awesome. I'm sad that she's leaving Wonder Woman, but I'm glad they're bringing back BOP and I love pretty much anything she does.

I'm just worried that the next guy, J. Michael Straczynski, will horribly fuck it up and undo everything that made Simone's run so much WIN, since apparently the first thing he's doing is destroying Paradise Island... again. I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt until I read it, but really? They just did that a few years ago and are still cleaning up the damage from that event! Like I said, benefit of the doubt, but I hope J. Michael Straczynski really is as good as they say. Though Wikipedia does say he got a degree in sociology, so that does earn him some points (yes I'm biased).**

* (okay, they had Amazons Attack, but that's a series people like to pretend never happened because it sucked horribly, look up Linkara's review of it to see why)

** (also, I don't blame J. Michael for the horrible One More Day arc in Spiderman that involved Spiderman selling his marriage and unborn child to the Devil [no really] since he was pretty much forced to write it with a gun to his back in the person of Joe Quesada, and he actually managed to fill up that story with every reason why it shouldn't have happened and do a pretty good job on it)