I’m pretty sure I’m not bipolar….

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     I think I found the secret to losing weight.  It’s called being sick.  I got sick over 11 days ago after I came home from the city at around 2 AM.  I was already feeling sick that whole day, so going out was the straw that broke the camel’s back.  (As an aside, what big-ass straw would you need to break a camel’s back?  I mean camels can take a lot of weight on their back, and yet some tiny little straw has the ability to break their backs?  Seriously!  How big of a straw would you need to break camels’ backs!).  The day after that, I wished I was dead.  My head ache.  My throat felt like I just swallowed barb wire.  And my nose deicided to manufacture snot for profit.  For 4 days, I was miserable beyond belief.  Fortunately, I knew how to look for the silver lining in the clouds.  I have this tradition where I would eat something reallly, really greasy once I get well, because I can’t enjoy such luxuries while I’m sick.  So despite my misery, I looked forward to the day when I get well enough to enjoy my greasy meal.  Last Friday, I felt well enough to go out and eat my celebratory meal.  I love those meals.  They make me feel alive.  Also, during the 5 or so days when I was sick, I must’ve lost about 3 pounds.  If I can keep that weight off, I might be able to keep my weight loss resolution after all.

     In case you’re wondering, yes.  That was the reason I haven’t blog in the past week.  The thought of writting under such conditions nauseated me to no end, but now I’m back.

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     Alright, let’s take a vote.  How many of you know what I’m talking about when I say "The Doctor"?  I see one hand over there….and that’s it.  "The Doctor" is a character from the BBC show "Doctor Who", and no Who is not his last name.  He is simply known as "The Doctor".  The show is about the Doctor and his adventures through time and space.  You see, he has a time machine that can travel through both time and space.  In every episode, he averts some major crisis usually of world (or universe) destruction level.  Sometimes it’s on earth and sometimes it isn’t.  The show ran from 1963 all the way to 1989.  I should know because I’ve been watching "Doctor Who" reruns since around 1997.

     You see, one late 1997 new year night, I surfed the channels looking for something to watch.  For some reason or another, I stopped at some KQED-wannabe channel named KTEH, and an episode of "Doctor Who" was on only I didn’t know that at the time.  It simply caught my interest.  Unfortunately, my fatigue overpowered my interest, and I went to bed.  Oddly enough, I did the exact same thing next week, that is I surfed the channel again for something to watch and again caught an episode of "Doctor Who".  That time, I watched it through.  That was the first episode I’ve ever seen, and week after week I kept watching the show.  Mind you these episodes were aired on Sunday nights at 11 PM and doesn’t end until 2 AM.  Sometimes it ends at 3 AM!  "Doctor Who" episodes don’t last 3 or 4 hours, but each episode is part of a story arc.  That was what got aired every Sunday night.  I think for a full year and a half, I stayed up every Sunday night to watch "Doctor Who".

     My dad, noticing my growing obsession, asked me why I do it.  Why do I stay up every Sunday night just to watch some 20 year old BBC show with really, really low production values?  I have no idea.  I was hooked on something that I barely understood.  Each story arc’s convoluted plot barely made any sense to me.  Even the ending always seemed iffy to me, but for some reason, I just kept watching.  It’s like crack except you don’t get a high.  You just get the addiction.  Fortunately for me, I got to the series final story arcs, and I could see why the show went off the air.  I started losing interest because the episodes being aired just started being bad.

     Fast forward to 2005.  I was perusing the magazines at Borders when I came across a Sci-Fi flavored magazine pronouncing "The Return of Doctor Who."  I was shocked, excited, happy, and confused as I read the article.  Apparently, BBC decided to revive the show, and lucky for me, it will be aired on the Sci-Fi channel.  I couldn’t believe one of my favorite shows is getting a second chance, and this time, I actually get to watch it develop.  Unfortunately, my Sci-Fi channel reception here sucks.  I mean really, really sucks.  I watched it anyways, and this time, I actually understand what’s going on.  They aired all of season 1 last year and is currently airing all of season 2.  Also, the DVD for both seasons is in stores.  The season 1 DVD just recently went down in price, so I took the opportunity to buy it.  60 dollars is better than 100 dollars any day.  So now I’m re-enjoying the show without the terrible picture quality.  Stupid reception.

    OK so how does Al Bundy fits into all of this?  Well, this is Al Bundy (View this photo).  And this is the Doctor in season 1 as played by Christopher Eccleston (View this photo).  Please tell me I’m not the only one to see some kind of eerie similarites between the two!

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No blog other than my gaming blog.  Hope you like it though.

Gaming Blog

Next time:  The Doctor VS Al Bundy.

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     A couple of days ago, Lemon broke the news that he’s been assigned to a project.  It’s good news of course.  That is if he wasn’t assigned to a project IN SAN RAMON FOR A WHOLE YEAR!  That means he’s going to have a 2 hour commute just to get there and 2 hour commute just to get back home.  It’s so far away from where he lives that he’s thinking about finding a place to live there.  Either way, I won’t be seeing him for a whole year.  Fortunately, he has time to find a place in San Ramon….Wait what…oh that’s right.  He starts this Monday!  As in today.  In our effort to make him feel better, Steve and I decided to treat him to dinner at Red Lobster.

     The day started with me coming over to his house and show of my Wii THE Wii.  I got there at 11:30 AM, but to my surprise, he was still asleep.  Apparently, he stayed up till’ 6 AM playing Oblivion.  Amateur.  Once he freshened up, I showed him the wonders that is Wii Sports and The Legend of Zelda:  Twilight Princess.  We got so hung up on Zelda that we lost track of time.  The original plan was for us to pick up Steve from his work place at 3, but at 3:15 we were still well into Zelda.  If Steve hadn’t called, we probably would’ve kept playing until well into 4 o’clock.

     After we picked him up, we headed over to Red Lobster post-haste.  Neither Lemon nor I had lunch or breakfast, and Steve was hungry because he just got off work.  Fortunately for us, people don’t normally eat at 4 o’clock in the afternoon, so we got a seated instantly.  Lemon ordered the steak and lobster combination as you can see here (the steak is hiding behind the big-ass lobster).  Steve had….something, and I got the…something else.  I know mine involved shrimp prepared three ways while Steve’s involved some dungeoness crabs as well as some shrimps.  The only reason I remember Lemon’s order as clear as days is because Steve and I are footing the bill.  Also we ordered the delectable lobster pizza for appetizers.  If I was on death row or something, I’d order that as my last meal.  We had a damn good meal that day, and as usual, another "bet" was challenged to me.  For some reason or another, whenever the three of us are eating in a restaurant, one of them comes up with some kind of dare involving me and our waitress.  This time around Lemon will pay for my dinner if I can get our waitress’ phone number.  Now, the waitress was attractive, but I didn’t feel the attraction needed for me to ask for someone’s phone number.  Besides, I really don’t want the reason that I have someone’s number was because my friends pressured me into it.  That just feels wrong to me, so I turned them down.

     After dinner was done, we decided to rent You, Me, and Dupree from Blockbuster.  To my surprise, I still have my Blockbuster card.  Not to my surprise, the card was issued in 1992.  So we stopped by Blockbuster and got the movie.  We headed over to Lemon’s house to watch the movie because he’s the one with the sweet 40 something inch HDTV, 5.1 Surround sound Home Theater setup, but before we watched the movie, I decided to introduce Steve to my Wii’s THE Wii’s Photo Channel where you can show off your photos on an SD memory card.  Steve just recently came back from his Las Vegas trip and had over 600 photos on his memory card.  After the slide show was over, Steve started worhipping my Wii THE Wii.  Obviously the Photo Channel is a shutterbug’s dream come true.  After we peelled Steve off the ground, we started the movie.  It was better than I thought, but I thought the ending could have been much better than how it was.  After the movie, Lemon decided to treat us to ice cream from Albertsons.

     We drove over to the Albersons on Sloat.  We could have went to Safeway, but Steve knew a code that would get us a 5% discount from Albertsons.  After some debate between the classic Drumstick or the newer Drumstick, the newer one won out.  We walked around the area while we ate the Drumsticks.  Once we were done, we figured the wise thing to do was to go home and get ready for tomorrow.  Lemon had to get up bright and early at 6 AM to get to work, and I think Steve had to get up even earlier then that.

     I drove Lemon home first, and in front of his home we said our goodbyes.  With a little bit of hope I reminded him that we’ll still have the weekends to meet up sometime, but unfortunately that was of little comfort to him (and me).  We did make a promise to have a party over his new place in San Ramon if he decides to find a place to stay there.  "See you next year," I said to him as he left the car.  After that, I drove Steve home and called it a night.

    On my way home, I wondered when will I see him again.  I’m sure he’ll find a place to stay over in San Ramon.  That way we can have a mini-party over his new "bachelor’s pad" where we will wake the neighborhood with our loud music and strippers will be invited to liven up the party.  Yeah.  I wish.  Chances are we’ll just come over with a big KFC bucket in one hand and a six pack of Crystal Geyser in the other hand because that’s how we roll.  God we’re boring!

     Anyway, here’s to you lemon.  I raise my cup of water in your honor.  May we see each other again before Armageddon strikes.

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     For my final resolution, I resolve to at the very least be decent at Virtua Fighter 5.  It may sound stupid, but trust me, this one won’t be easy.  I bought Virtua Fighter 4 when it first came out, and I quickly learned that the learning curve is very, very, very steep.  So steep in fact that I got frustrated with the game and gave up.  This time around, it will be different.  I’m going to take it nice and slow.  I’m going to take the time and learn it slowly which I believe was the main reason I got frustrated with the previous iteration.  You’ll see.  By the end of this year, I want to at least be able to beat the single player game without breaking too much of a sweat unlike what happenned the last time.

     I was a little surprised at myself that I decided to pick this resolution instead of my usual resolution, namely gettting a girlfriend.  Maybe I just wanted a resolution that I can actually accomplished this time around.  Also, I believe I need a steady income first before I get a girlfriend.  I refuse to be a gold digging boyfriend.  If I have a girlfriend, I want to be on some kind of an equal level with her and not be the dependant-on-my-girlfriend-for-a-meal guy.  I do hope to get a girlfriend after I get a job.  The whole couple thing intrigues me, but first things first.  Getting a job.

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     SUCCESS!!!!  Remember when the guys over at EGM took me for a girl by mistake?  Well, I wrote them back, and they’ve officially rectified their mistake by pointing out the fact that I’m a guy on this week’s podcast.  I was truly elated to hear it.  My last name was still pronounced wrong, but I’ll let it slide.  You take your victories where you can get it.  Also, I attached another question for them to answer, and they did!  As usual, they answered it very well.  I wonder if I can pull of a 3 for 3?  Problem is that it took me about 45 minutes to come up with the last questions.  I don’t know if I can come up with another good question for them to answer.  Hell with it!  I’ll give it a try.

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The last 4 days were quite crazy, and I will write about it later.  Today, let’s get on with my 3rd resolution.  This year I resolve to improve my handwritting.  I’m sure all of you have been tormented by my crazy-alien-language like handwritting.  Only now do I finally decided to do something about it.  Sorry about that.  I really should have improved it years ago, but I was lazy then.  Helll I’m still lazy now, but at least this will give me something to aspire to.  Tomorrow, I’ll actually take the time to blog about the last 4 days.  It’s quite an epic saga.  Well OK it really isn’t.  I just like to blow stuff out of proportions.  Well.  Goodnight.

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     Not that Linda, but another Linda.  I’ll explain at the end.

     I am a huge, huge fan of the EGM magazine.  I’ve read it for over 4 years.  I’ve watched them redesigned the magazine twice now, so I was delighted to hear that they started a weekly podcast a while back.  Along with talking about video game industry issues, they also answer reader mail.  It took me forever, but I finally came up with a question worthy of getting air time of the podcast.  Unfortunately, it ended up being a very, very mixed bag.  I will transcribe the part of the podcast that is pertinent along with my thoughts at the time I hear it.  Also, the initials you’ll see stand for Jennifer Tsao, Greg Ford, and SHane Bettenhausen .  They are the host/hostesses of the podcast.

JT:Allright well that’s our news, let’s move on to our wonderful, wonderful listeners slash readers have to say.

GH:Wow!  They do it all.  They listen and read.

JT:They also write as we learned this week, but I figured since you’re on today, Greg, and you’re the Reviews editor we would answer…Karli

(Huh, what!  Are they answering my question!  OHH SWEET).

JT (cont’d): huh, I want to say her name

(WHATTT!!!!)

JT (cont’d):Winata because it’s spelled like Pinata but with a W.

(NNNNNOOOOOOOOOOO! {at this point I’m on my knees squirming in agony})

GF:You’ve probably, like, horribly offended her.

(STOP IT!   STOP IT!!  MAKE IT STOP!!)

JT:Karli Winata (still pronounced like pinata with a W) from somewhere in California.

SB:Does she have Enya in her name?

(WHAT!!!!!!!{side note, I don’t think he said Enya.  He probably said the name of that little accent symbol you would put on top of the n in pinata, but at the time I didn’t know that})

JT:No, but I put it there because it looks right.

(BUT IT ISN’T!!!)

JT (cont’d):uhm, she’s 1up user, she or he it’s spelled with a K so I don’t know.

(THANK YOU!!  JESUS!)

JT (cont’d):So, Arts of deception ask….

     The rest doesn’t really matter, but…..oh jeez.  I have been mistaken as a girl before because of my name, but it’s never happen  as publicly as this!  I’m glad that they answered my question, but not like this.  Don’t worry though.  I’m gonna send them another message.  I’m still working on the details, but it’s going to be good.  This mistake will be rectified, even if I have to go there and fix it myself!

     You’re probably wondering about how Linda have anything to do with all of this.  Well here’s a hint View this photo.  Sorry about the photo size, but it was a necessary evil.  Intrigued?  Well, I’ll talk about it more later.  Someday.

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     Resolution #2 will hopefully dominate most of my coming time because it is by far the most important one on my list.  I resolve to get a freakin’ career this year.  Just be warned.  I’m going to be doing it in my own pace.   So if I don’t do interviews after interviews, it’s not because I haven’t been trying.  It just means that no one likes a newbie in the field.  Oh I can’t wait to go to interviews and tell them that I have absolutely no skill they possibly need.  Quick! Hire me!  Do you know Cobol?  Why yes sir I do!  I don’t know why they don’t just call it blue though.  Do you know C#?  I don’t play a musical instrument.  Have you ever programmed a Red Black Tree?  I thought trees are green.  Oh the possibilities of walking into an interview and shooting myself down in every question.  Just gotta love it!  It’s almost better than going to a job fair where I shoot myself in the foot multiple times in a row within one hour.

     Oh yeah.  This year is gonna be fun.

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     I can finally write an official "I’m Back" blog.  Yesterday’s doesn’t really count seeing how "hung over" I was from drinking a lot of apple cider for our New Years party.  (the bubbles really gets to me after a while).  So today I’m going to set an agenda for the rest of the year.  Kinda like a Table of Contents blog if you will.

1. Write resolutions blogs (yesterday is the first of many).
2. Wrtie about the time between now and the last time I blogged last year.
3. Write about my kick-ass friends.
4. Write about my fears.
5. Write about my room.
6. Write about my views on religion.
7. Write about every job I’ve ever had.
8. Write about….other stuff.
9. Write about….more stuff.

     I guess you can tell that I haven’t thoroughly thought this through yet, but I’m sure I’ll be able to come up with something good to write everyday.  Even if it’s gaming related.  Speaking of which, did you notice the little link at the end of my last blog that took you to my 1up.com blog?  Well, if I have a game related blog, I’ll put it there.  Stop by to see a glimpse of my gaming obsession.  Who knows, maybe you’ll finally understand its appeal to me.  Also, I’ll be keeping a MySpace page as well, but all the blogs will be written here.  Basically, all the blogs on MySpace is just a link back here, so exactly what is the point then?  Well, Steve keeps his blogs there, and I want to read them.  The only way to do that is to join MySpace.  Beyond that I probably won’t be using it for much else.

     Anyways, it’s good to be back.  I can feel the words oozing out of me once again like before.  Who knows.  Maybe some of it will actually be coherent.  See ya later.

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