Some Goodies for a Few Days

Well, I have a smidgeon of free time today to get some posts on here, so I’ll get to it already. There will be some smattering of posts for a few days. I don’t know how many, or for how long, but they’ll be things that 1) I like, and 2) I think I may like in the future. If you agree with my opinion, that they’re good enough to post here, then I will be successful, and you will be entertained.

Frenching

I remember when I finally really kissed a girl (at age 18 or 19, I was not a social teenager), I was surprised with just how hollow a French kiss was. I don’t mean emotionally, but somehow I thought there wouldn’t be room for much movement. The inside of another person’s mouth is surprisingly cavernous on the scale of the tongue. I thought there’d be more of a smooshing somehow.

I don’t like people

I posted this, because I feel the same way sometimes. But I’m not quite tired of not liking people yet. A person is awesome…people can be rather daunting to handle.

I Pronounce “Cereal” Similar to This

I give my wife crap for using the word “Bought-en”, as in “I should have boughten that shirt when I had the chance.” I use the word cereal, pronouncing it “SIR-ree-uhl”, not “SEAR-ree-al”. I don’t know why, I’ve always said it this way. It take pride in my neutral mid-western accent, but this is one of my tells.

This Headline from Yahoo News Made Me Chuckle

Okay, so North Korea just failed their fourth major rocket launch since 1998. So, attaching a nuke to a missile that is doomed to crash right back to the Earth (or, at worst, the Sea of Japan) is only going to hurt…the North Koreans? POSSIBLY Japan? Least of all the USA, however. Since the UN sanctions North Korea if they even test their missiles (which, as a result, they don’t, and then fail on the public stage, over, and over, and over again), there’s no way they’ll ever manufacture a working Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile that can reach the United States of America. Ever.

Egad! I missed the 4000th post!

I somehow missed my 4000th post on this blog known now and forever as Bugloaf (previously as Kraznoy, Dakota East, and The Best of Omaha). It posted sometime within the last week, since this is post number 4056. I don’t know which one it was, but I’d like to think it was Cary Grant derping. At any rate, arbitrary numbers that are divisible by 1000 are sweet!

Now, for no reason, here’s Charlie Chaplin’s classic, “The Gold Rush”.

A Couple Days of Unnecessary Guilt

This morning, I’m filling up Bugloaf again with some stuff I’ve grabbed from the blagawebosphere. For the past two days, I’ve thought that my supply of posts had run dry, but I have been too busy with college, work, and a new exercise program, to check it and be sure. Finally, this morning I get a chance to look around, and I find out that I was supplied up until this morning! Thank you, past-self! You deserve a pat on the back! Since I can’t pat you, I will pat myself. The fact that it takes time for the neurons in my brain to process the command to “pat back”, pat the back, and then realize that the back was patted, I have essentially patted the back of my past-self regardless. So, mission accomplished. No banner necessary.

So, yeah, I got a tattoo

(This is a partial-post I started last year on this date, when I got my first tattoo. I never completed writing the post, and now I can’t quite get back into the groove to finish it properly. So I’ll post it as is.)

Back on September 2 (2011), I got my very first tattoo at the age of 35. I meant to write down my thoughts right away, but I had a little issue with WordPress and their handling of what should have been a very simple problem. Basically, I had a picture on here that I grabbed from someone else’s website (as I and countless others do everyday). Someone threw a claim saying I couldn’t post it, and instead of pulling that one post, WordPress killed all of my moderating abilities. So I couldn’t post, edit, or remove anything until days later.

So, I wasn’t really in the mood to talk about much that made me excited, happy, etc, and so I let it rest for a while. Now, since that episode is over, and the 10th anniversary of that tragic even (I’m of course talking about the release of Nickelback’s big breakthrough album) are finally behind me, I figured I’d share about the experience of getting a tattoo.

First, a little history. I’ve been wanting a tattoo for about 15 years. I’ve actually drawn out many times the tattoos I’ve wanted, where I wanted them, in what order, and so on. It went like this: Captain America shield on the right forearm, near the shoulder; Big black cross on the left forearm, “Taranis” in some kind of fancy lettering across my back, a dragon swooping in kind of a lazy figure-8 on the middle-right of my back, and Popeye on my right calf.

In tattoo waiting room. Thoughts: I hope they don’t discover I’m a fake, a poser, a geek, that I don’t belong here…I feel like I’d fit in more if I were in a Star Trek Starfleet uniform and playing the old “away party” bit.
I wonder if they already know that I have no skin art, no ‘ink done’, that I’m naked beneath my clothes?

Again, Sorry for the Missing Days

So, yeah, life is just one damn thing after another. My job and my schoolwork have kind of ganged up on me lately, and Bugloaf has suffered by having a couple days with nothin to show. So, I’m going to taper down to only 15 posts a day, so I can stretch out the number of days in the bin a little further to almost a week. (WordPress.com only allows for up to 100 pre-dated posts).

Along those same lines, does anyone know what I need to buy from WordPress in order to post more than 100 posts in advance? Do I have to sign up with WordPress.org? I kind of don’t want to do so, since it’s a bit pricier, and I’d almost HAVE to put advertising on here at that point. (Sorry, but advertising on here is inevitable, but I’d like to put it off for a while if I can.)

Thanks for any comments, or thanks for no comments if you simply continue to peruse the site. Have a happy April Fool’s Day. And check out Google’s post today.

Sorry About Yesterday

Hey, sorry about there being no posts on Sunday 3/25. I goofed, and thought I stocked up enough stuff to last through till then. But, as you can see, I didn’t. So, I’ll get more posts rolling this morning. Again, sorry about that. I shall now return you to your regular viewing.

My Ice King keychain came in the mail today!

I’m a big fan of Adventure Time. That is all.

Holly and Lila, our Munchkin Cats

 

This is a response to some questions I was answering on Reddit about our two munchkin cats. I got really long-winded, so I figured I’d save some Reddit bandwidth and just post it here. I also have two previous posts about the cats here and here.

Lila (the Lynx-Siamese on the left) and Holly (the smoky Calico on the right) are out Munchkin Cats, meaning they have shorter-than-normal legs, but regular-sized paws, spines, and everything else. Because of their flexible spines and joints, munchkin cats won’t experience the hip/spinal problems that dogs like dachshunds and corgis often experience. Both cats were rescues from the Middleburg Humane Foundation near Middleburg, Virginia. (Feel free to donate. We do about once a year). The cats were rescued from an animal hoarder who had 117 animals on her property, including 27 cats, and various birds, horses, etc). After that, they spent 6 months at the shelter, mostly just waiting on the legalities of being able to adopt them out. Unfortunately, the shelter was unable to legally spay either cat until after everything was sorted out, and both cats became pregnant. Lila had a healthy litter (a mix of munchkin and regular-sized cats), while Holly’s litter were stillborn, probably due to her mating with another munchkin cat, which causes various problems that usually prevent the litter from surviving to term. All of Lila’s kittens were adopted out successfully.

I should note that both cats (Holly and Lila) have warmed up to us quite a bit. Lila is lynx-siamese cat, with polydactyl toes (7 toes on her front paws, 6 on the back). She’s very curious, and will follow us when we do chores, and will sniff our hands, but we can’t pet her unless she’s sleeping on the bed. At that point, she’ll wake up, and begrudgingly accept being touched, and will remain relatively relaxed at that point.

Holly, on the other hand, has really warmed up to us. Nearly every morning, after I’ve gotten up and started to get ready for work, she will jump up onto my side of the bed and meow until I pet her. Between my wife and I, she’s basically chosen me, and will come visit me in places she deems safe, like on our bed, and the bathroom. I was reluctant to have her in the bathroom with me, but she started out so skittish that I finally gave in. It was (and is) one of the few places she’ll consistently hang out without becoming scared.

When we first got them, Lila was extremely shy, and wouldn’t leave the pet carrier. (I should note that we actually got Lila for free, since the shelter knew she would almost never be adopted out if she didn’t go with her buddy Holly.) Holly was about 90% as skittish as Lila, but by lying prone, flat on my belly, I was able to coax Holly out to get pet. Even then, she’d only allow it for a few short minutes before retreating. Thankfully, both my wife Sarah and I are very patient, and were able to slowly get the two cats to come around, through many months of effort. Holly (as you can see by her pudgy belly) can be bribed with treats, which I rarely give her anymore, but Sarah often needs to in order to bond with Hol’. She isn’t a huge cat (yet), but I want to make sure she stays healthy and long-lived. Lila doesn’t like treats for some reason, but she does like to play, which helps bring her out of her shell. If you put out your finger, Lila will stretch her neck and smell you like a dog would. This seems to be her way of being friendly, but at least it’s something.

Neither one will ever be “normal”, but they’re both great fun. They just needed a nice, quiet house with patient humans to take care of them. However, we’re planning on having kids sometime in the future. I guess they’ll adjust, one way or the other.

I Just Had My First Successful “AskReddit”.

On the front page this morning, I saw the /AskReddit “Reddit, what is your most compassionate act of kindness that was completely unintended? Mine just happened.“. I couldn’t think of anything truly nice I’ve ever unconsciously done to/for someone else that affected their life for the better, but I could think of several unintentional acts by me that went the other way. So, I asked a response question, “Reddit, what is your most accidental act of evil that was completely unintended?“, and posted one example that I still feel a smidge guilty about, despite the fact that I couldn’t have known what life-changing events a simple act could have caused. As more memories come up, I’m thinking that I won’t be trying to jump off any bridges near Bedford Falls anytime soon, or else an angel-in-training might hold me under water. (If you don’t get that last sentence, or the photo, then here’s a reference.)

Dreams Come True

I actually haven't tried these yet, for fear that I'll like them too much. They're available at Sheetz Gas Stations / Restaurants.

This is a big bowl of Vietnamese Pho soup. And a ten dollar bill for scale.

This is a plate of red cabbage, spaetzel, and some pork (mostly gone) from last year's Augustoberfest in Hagerstown, Maryland.

More German food, this time from Doener Bistro in Leesburg, Virginia. This is some currywurst, a big cup of fries, some vinegar, and a Warsteiner beer.

And finally, a photo of the sign outside one of my favorite burrito joints, Moe's Southwest Grill.

The Video Game Entertainment Curve

I have a very difficult time playing and enjoying video games lately. It’s like a binge for me, where once every few months I devote a week to beating one game. When I first moved to Virginia, while I was looking for work, I devoted hours to playing The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. The game had been out for over ten years by that point, but I had never beaten it. I finally did, and I even found work within 3 weeks. Since then, I don’t have a gob of time to play games, let alone for hours at end, the time necessary to really crack into many of the newest hits out there. Even Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest (which I downloaded on the Wii Console specifically because I remember it being both easy and short) is too long for me to really get into enough to have much fun. So, I might be beyond this curve, when it comes down to it. I don’t know if I will ever truly enjoy video games again. But there’s always books.

Someone Found This In a Department Store Dressing Room

So, do you agree? I’m pro-life, with friends that aren’t, and I tend to agree with this pamphlet. It starts out looking REALLY crazy, but the final point is a good one. Personally, I can’t be sure when an embryo actually knows it’s alive. I’m in favor of the morning-after pill (RU-486), mainly because at such a tiny cellular state, there’s a very, very low possibility that the embryo is self-aware. There’s more of a chance that an amoeba could relate to you, in an intelligent manner, how its day was. However, once that embryo starts to grow into a human, at what point is it too late to abort without killing a human? A month? Three months? I don’t know for sure. All I can say is that I hope those choosing to abort do it as soon as possible into the pregnancy, to reduce the chance of possible awareness.

Sorry, I tend to stay away from landmine-topics, but I thought that this was worth sharing, and something I would want to read again in ten years when I’m paging back through this site.

Yes, But I Can’t Give Up Hope Either.

We Met Online

I actually did meet my wife online, despite the fact we worked about 1/4 mile from one another. However, we met in an AOL instant message chat, not an MMORPG. My wife has/will never play/played an MMO. No, my wife was searching profiles, found mine, and opened an instant message chat. She was never a fan of chatrooms, which is funny because that’s how I’d met all my previous dates. Apparently she didn’t think I was too bad, and I obviously felt the same, because we’re still together after over 10 years of dating / marriage.

The thing is, we probably wouldn’t have stayed together if it wasn’t for my joining the military. When we met, I had already signed on the dotted line, but I had not yet started Basic Training for the US Air Force. I was living at home in my mom’s basement, working as a pizza delivery guy for Domino’s, with no other real ambitions at that point.

Another fun fact: I had originally planned on signing a few months earlier, but I was dating someone else who was opposed to my joining. I got into excellent shape, but then never signed. It took the terrorist attacks on 9/11/2001 for me to finally sign up. At about the same time, I broke up with the girl who didn’t want me to sign.

So, something I may (or may not) tell our kids someday, is that the attacks on 9/11 are the reason why I ultimately joined the Air Force, and part of the reason why my wife and I got together, and so, at least in part, the reason why they were born.

I kinda believe in fate, that the universe has a previously laid-out plan for us. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t. It doesn’t help me to think about this too hard either way. However, I like to let the actions of the universe dictate my choices in life. For instance, I like to let traffic dictate what I’m going to have for lunch. If there is heavier traffic from the left than there is from the right, then I will turn right and go from there, where 4 restaurants I enjoy dining reside. From there, I like to continually let traffic decide where to go by how easy it is to change lanes toward one of the places I desire.

Sometimes, when I’m bored, I like to walk down a hallway, then pull over to the right and pause for ten seconds, then continue walking, just to frak with fate. This action ultimately changes everything I do that day in a subtle fashion. I might clock out at the same time, or because everything I do tends to be at least a few seconds later than it would have been otherwise, I might clock out just a tad later, drive just a tad later, miss that green (or better yet, that red) light, and arrive at a different time. I will talk to different people, who will then talk to different people, and everything is just a little different than if I hadn’t paused for ten seconds.

Along that same path, I met my wife out of random chance, that she happened to be on, that she happened to do a search for local boys with profiles she sorta liked, and it was random chance that she decided to open a chat window. for everything in my life right now, I can thank the random chances that allowed it to happen. My two cats, my job, the fact I live in Virginia, my pair of glasses, everything comes back to a few random coinflips that could have gone another way.

If you get the chance, watch the movie “Lola Rennt”, (or “Run, Lola, Run”). It concisely demonstrates what I’m trying to say in a fashion that is my more cogent than my method of information transference.

In closing, don’t worry to much about the right answer, and let life choose for you once in a while. Ultimately, you will likely end up in an equal place than you would have otherwise, but at least you won’t have to waste time and/or energy agonizing over which choice to make.

Minor Tweak to Bugloaf

I changed the number of viewable posts from “10” to “20”. This is because lately I have been posting 20 things a day, in order to somehow get ahead of the huge backload of stuff I had building up. (You may note that most of the items I have posted date back to the tail end of 2011, or earlier.)

I like to peruse Bugloaf on my own, since I tend to have a short memory for the items I’ve posted. And I found, as a visitor to the site, having to click the link for more posts was a little tedious, especially since those additional posts were less than a day old. So, I upped this to 20 posts. I hope it doesn’t take too long to load all this stuff on your computer.

Eventually, when I’ve worked past my backload of material, I may crank it down to only 10 posts a day again, and thus, cut the viewable number of posts back to 10. Or, if I can keep this pace up, I may never drop it back to 10. I haven’t decided yet. Until I do, enjoy a longer daily helping of my Bugloaf.

Take that as you will.

I Get Bored In Class Sometimes…

I created a “timer”, where I could cross off a square for every school day I attended. I got bored with it the next night and threw it away shortly after taking this picture. Some classes are more boring than others.

I Drew This A While Back

It was supposed to be the cover of an action-comicbook I was writing…but I never got around to doing much with it. So, here it is.

So, I Was Bored Last Time We Went to Five Guys Burgers & Fries…

So I did this. See, there’s a “fan board” where you can fill out kudos for Five Guys, so I did this. Not the most clever one on the internet, but it amused me for a few minutes.

So, I Emptied My Car Today

      

I found this somewhat appropriate photo at The Missoulian. Click the photo for an interesting article...but remember to come back here. Welcome to Bugloaf. I love you.

I drive a Chrysler 300. What do you think this says about me? Okay, now I’ll share why I purchased it. First, I needed a car that was rated highly for commuting. The ‘300’ and it’s sister cars, the Dodge Charger, Dodge Magnum, and Dodge Challenger, are all largely the same car once you get past the 1/4″ of outer body plastic/steel/aluminum. [Random fact: Did you know that aluminum used to be a precious metal, more highly valued than gold? That’s why the tip of the Washington Monument is made of the stuff. I had no idea until last week.] And all four cars have really good seats. If you google “good cars for people with lower back problems”, then these cars are in the top 10, along with the Toyota Prius.

Second, I wanted something with a bright interior. If you don’t already know, I’m a Trekkie. (Not a “Trek-KER, get it straight.) Half of my Reddit karma is from a picture I posted of Picard and Riker (actually Stewart and Frakes) on the Paramount backlot. That being said, the biggest problem I have with every Star Trek TV series after (but not including) The Next Generation, up to Enterprise is the drab interiors. Seriously, if I’m going to be in outer space for a week in something as dull gray as the interior of the Voyager, I would probably be looking for the nearest airlock to hurl myself to my death. If I’m going to be cruising through the Delta Quadrant for years, or potentially DECADES, I’m going to do something with the hallways. Loosen things up a bit. We’re not a freaking submarine for crying out loud. Even if there weren’t initially families on the ship, after a few years, there will be. Crewfolks (or, for an Air Force-ish term, Spacemen) are going to start hooking up. I don’t know how contraception works in the 24th century fictional universe loosely based on 20th century technology, but since I didn’t hear any mention of condoms or vasectomies from The Doctor’s weekly diatribes, I’m going to have to assume it doesn’t exist. Maybe the pro-lifers won, and then Christianity went out of vogue because we don’t hear mention of it either. Either way, there are going to be some babies happening (assuming that Captain Janeway doesn’t come back to the past in some kind of temporal prime directive breaking MacGuffin or something. Not that I wasn’t satisfied with the series finale, because I was extremely satisfied…but it was really, really convenient all the same). Okay, so maybe Starfleet protocol doesn’t allow for you to commit acts of interior design. How about when the Voyager stumbled across the pseudo-Starfleet vessel “The Dauntless”.

Isn’t this a much happier looking bridge? It’s bright for one thing, and even though there isn’t a ton of color, tans are much brighter out in space than drab grays. It isn’t as colorful as the colors on almost any NFL team, but it’s alright, I could live with this. Even the Prometheus, a real, honest-to-garsh Starfleet vessel that they shoot The Doctor into a couple seasons later has really great looking rooms. Their bridge makes me want to relax, maybe take a nap with a bag of Funyuns and a Sprite Zero.
So, getting back to my second point, if I’m going to be cruising through “outer space”, or in my case, dealing with hostile commuters for roughly 100 miles every day, I want a car that is slightly cheerier, with a brighter interior that doesn’t make me want to veer into a metro train bridge support.

(I should say right here that I really hate my commute, and in fact, I have never been a fan of driving. In South Dakota, where I grew up, I could have acquired a learner’s permit (or a limited Driver’s License) at age 14. Instead, I waited until age 17. Think of this…three years to a teenager is roughly a fifth of a person’s life. Take into account that any usable memory really started to kick in when you were about 8 years old [or at least it did for me]. So, I had about six years of memory by age 14, then nine years by age 17. So, I waited roughly 1/3 of my strong-memory-ridden life to get my license. That’s a freaking eternity. Then, I get into a nasty accident when I’m 18. Everyone got minor injuries, but it really kind of sucked, and it put me off driving even more. My wife wonders why I’m so obsessive about knowing what other drivers are up to, and trying to predict actions of everyone around me. It’s because I know, deep down, that everyone on the road is unconsciously trying to kill me. All the time. It’s worse than Mad Max out there, because at least Max’s adversaries knew they were trying to kill Max. My adversaries don’t even know they want to kill me, but they’re doing it, all the same. So yes, I hate commuting.)

Back to my second point again, I wanted a car that reminded me more of the interior of the Enterprise D (that’s D for Delightful), than the Voyager (with a V for Vacuum, as in a vacuum of good taste). So I got a car that somewhat reminded me of a shuttlecraft from a more delightful era of Trek.

Third, I wanted something that could potentially allow me to survive a massive car wreck. I feel I’ve already covered what I think of the other drivers on the road. The safety ratings on my car were pretty good, and the Chrysler/Dodge platform that pooped out the 300, Charger, etc…well, they all look kind of brutish, like you’re driving a brick down the road, looking for a window to smash. Even if the car’s first line of defense is a plastic and styrofoam bumper (which is supposed to be better for keeping you alive, but frankly, I’d still like to have a steel battering ram strapped to the front of my car to utterly destroy my enemies before they destroy me), sense that my car “looks” tough was enough to sell me. The 300/Charger looks like it could easily win a fight against a Ford Five Hundred/Taurus or a Chevy Impala, with two wheels tied behind it’s…trunk.

So, I got a Chrysler 300, with a bright tan and brown-ish interior that reminded me of Star Trek. Unlike my previous car (a 2002 Saturn SL-1, a wonderful car whose only real fault were being smaller than a Chrysler 300, and giving me lower back pain due to the many hours driving it back and forth to school and work), the Chrysler gets much worse gas mileage (around 10mpg worse), but it trades this for having an absolutely enormous interior and trunk.

To my detriment.

I’m a bit of a slob. Not a hoarder-slob (although I watch “Hoarders” on A&E for those times when I’m getting a bit out of control with my stuff), but I don’t tend to clean up the way I should. I don’t leave too many food bags or containers sitting about, but I do tend to hang onto books I haven’t read, hand-outs for classes I took several months ago, and receipts for places I haven’t shopped at in many months. (Did you know that Borders was closing? That’s so sad, I really need to get there before…oh yeah.)

So, today being President’s Day, one of the rare holidays I actually get off from my job, I decided to de-clutter my car. I figured it would take maybe ten minutes. Nope, it took almost 90 minutes to get everything, then vacuum the weird scraps of paper that I seemed to get like I was in some ticker-tape parade with my sunroof open, and then a coating of Armor-All on my seats and dash for good measure. I was smart enough, at some point, to pack a few reusable canvas grocery bags in my car, but unfortunately I buried them underneath all my stuff. Through various trips, I filled up 8 of those suckers with my books, papers, decks of cards (because, heck, you never know when you’re going to be stuck somewhere boring, somewhere that doesn’t allow electronic devices, and maybe you forgot to grab that latest issue of Esquire or that awesome trade paperback of Uncanny X-Force, so what do you do? Play a weird form of solitaire whilst keeping all your cards in your hands, that’s what. Mix up the cards. Put them in order. Mix them up again. Put them in a different order [ace of spades, two of hearts, three of clubs, four of diamonds, five of spades, etc…], and repeat until you can get off of this drudge-duty you’ve gotten placed on), and receipts for places that have sadly closed up shop, forever.

Yes, 90 minutes, which is roughly the same amount of time I have now spent writing this post. That’s three hours to clean my car, because that’s how I do my accounting. That’s a big chunk of day, especially when I took a nap from 11am to 1pm. That’s insane. I can’t ever let my car get that dirty again, for at least six months. Tops.

To recap, 1) Driving really sucks. 2) The Enterprise D has a really sexy bridge, and the Voyager does not. 3) I apparently did something with my car, I can’t really remember because this post is really, really long.

I hope you had a great President’s Day. I hope you read up on Chester A. Arthur at some point. If not you really should, because the A is for AWWWESOOOOOOMMMMME! Goodnight, and take it light.  -Aaron

YuGiOh!

When I only had 2 1/2 channels on my crappy (but free) TV, living in the Air Force Dorms/Barracks, I got hooked on two shows that I would not have under other circumstances: Gilmore Girls, and YuGiOh. GG was reran every day, and YuGi was on close to the same time. I kind of miss those times, the days of no DVR, no choice…simplicity.

What the Heck is Yaphet Kotto Doing Right Now?

So, How Do I Get In On This?

This diagram has been floating around the internet for a week or so. See, it seems as if Zynga has swiped the basic layout of its game “Dream Heights” from Nimblebit’s “Tiny Tower”, which kind of swiped their game from “Corporation Inc.”, and “Sim Tower”. This happens a lot, since it’s hard to copyright a lot of the basic aspects of sim games anymore. Nothing is truly original, because it seems that there has always been a predecessor doing something vaguely/exactly similar, just yours does it in a more graphical/colorful/simpler/lighter/whatever way.

Well, that being said, I’d love to create my own game. I’m just an untalented programmer. Despite the fact that I was in the US Air Force for 4 years as a programmer, I have always been a stinky programmer. I am technically able, but I’m not creative, and I don’t see the bigger picture very well. So, when I have created a chunk of code, I can see how it interacts with itself and its immediate neighbors, but I have a hard time backing off a few steps and seeing the big picture. It’s like creating a subway stop on a single line of a subway that intersects the boroughs of New York City. My stop may make a lot of sense to me, but when the line is ultimately going to end up in the East River, I may have a problem that I just can’t see beyond my little microscopic view.

(Note that I have no geographic knowledge of New York City, and my complete knowledge of the city comes from TV shows like How I Met Your Mother and Friends.)

Moving to the creative side, my idea for a game would borrow bits and pieces from at least four other games, dating from 1986, to 1992, to 2008, along with a couple sci-fi elements from at least two famous sources. I don’t really want to get more specific than that, because if I am eventually able to create such a game, I’d rather not share where I pulled its bits & pieces, and I’d also rather not have someone else make the game before I can, and thus profit from it when I get pride in knowing that I was first.

Eventually, when I’m done with college, along with building an R2-D2, I’m going to create this video game. I have no idea what the timeline will be, one year or 20, but eventually I’ll make it, and it will amuse myself, perhaps a few others, I don’t know. I’ll let you know whenever I get around to completing it.

In the meantime, Tiny Tower and Corporation Inc are two fun little games that are worth a couple minutes of your time. Especially Corp Inc, since that game has a definite ending, unlike so many mobile-device games these days. A game needs to have a way to complete all in-game goals. Whether you wish to continue should be left to the player. You can create some insanely huge mega-corp tower in Corp Inc, but you only really need enough offices for 300 employees, max, in order to finish the game. Tiny Tower is cool, but to my knowledge so far, it just goes on and on for a very long time. Maybe I just haven’t gotten far enough, having only reached the 14th floor.

Anyhow, wish me luck that I will actually follow through on my vow to make a game.

Just a note: Assload of Posts Today

Just a quick note: I put an assload of posts up today (about 10, I think) because I have a huge backlog of photos and videos I need to post, and I’ve hit my limit of future-posts I’m allowed to load in WordPress (about 100). So, every once in a while, I’m going to dump a bunch of posts in a single day, in the hopes that I can get down below 200 pictures/videos waiting to go. Which is, I guess, good news for you! I just felt the need to explain.

One more thing: I added an “About Bugloaf” page, located on the top bar. Click on it if you’re prepared. Otherwise, carry on.

Dude! 3001 Posts!

So, “Elephant Decks A Tourist” was my 3000th post, making this 3001. If you count up the posts that are actually “active” on Bugloaf, you’ll come up a few short. That’s because some of the posts are sitting in a bin on some server in Kansas City, Tulsa, Omaha, somewhere, waiting to roll out. I stack several posts because I don’t like Bugloaf to go a single day without something on it. If I’m having a rough day, with too many commitments between work, school, social life, etc, then I might not post for a day. So, there really are 3001 posts on Bugloaf, and they will all soon see the light of day. Anyhow, here are some cupcakes from Gabriel Iglesias’ Google+ account to celebrate.

I present to you: Holly, my Munchkin Calico Cat

This is a rare moment in which Holly was relaxed enough to show her belly. Especially since my wife took the photo, and I’m just off-screen to the right, reaching over to pet her.

Holly, and her cousin Lila (a Munchkin Lynx-Siamese) are two rescue cats that my wife and I found at the Middleburg shelter in Northern Virginia a little over 2 years ago. The cats (along with a couple dozen others) came out of a hoarder’s house, with over 100 animals on the property in all.

As a result, both cats are very skittish, and prefer quiet places to chill out. They get freaked out by sudden movement or noises, and it was really special that Holly finally relaxed enough to show her belly, a sign of submission and trust.

They’re both great cats, even if we have to be extra patient with them.

10 Years Ago, I Started Basic Training

Who else is still a little freaked out by Air Force Form 341? We had to carry five of these little forms on us at all times. If someone came across us, and we had a pocket unbuttoned, a scuffed or untied boot, or any other number of things “wrong” with our appearance (in the eyes of whoever was walking by), then they pulled one of these, and sent it onto your commanding officer (or non-commissioned officer). Who would then make you do pushups or some form of bitch-work as a result.

I still owe SSgt Jamie Simpson a few dozen push-ups. Sorry ma’am, ain’t gonna happen.

By the way, my Basic Training Instructor’s body looked something like this:

And she was about 3 years younger than me. You might think this would be a benefit, but it was SO NOT. She was an abusive mother, someone who made me feel very small indeed, and she was not at all sexy. In the least. Which made her super-effective as a Basic Training Instructor, and got me to do what I was supposed to do. SSgt Simpson was awesome, and I’d tell her, but seeing as how she was a blue-rope (or the instructors who know their shit to such a degree that they train the other instructors), she already knew it.

Basic Training, for better or much worse, made me stronger, and better able to take criticism. It was not a good time, but it was only seven weeks. I recommend it for those who just can’t get their shit together in life by their mid-20’s. I signed on 9/12/11, and went to basic the next January, when I was 25 years old. I was a grandpa by most standards. It was rough, but I made friends, actually had fun at times, and I came out a stronger person.

I’m not necessarily saying it makes you a better person, but the military can give you an armor that nobody can get through. Plus, I don’t feel “civilian guilt”. That’s the feeling of guilt that some people feel at having a military protect your way of life without feeling like you’ve properly contributed to society as a whole. Now, no matter how much or how little I do, I know that I’ve given four years of my life to the government. I could have given more, but I don’t feel as if I absolutely should. I’ve done enough.

And so ten years down the line, I don’t have any big regrets about my decision to join the USAF. I don’t feel that everyone should join the military, but everyone should support those who join. But not necessarily those in charge of said military. That’s a topic for another day.

Sorry for the YouTube Problems the Last 2 Days

Sorry about that folks. Apparently either YouTube or WordPress changed how you can grab YouTube videos. So, only one of the videos I’ve posted for the last couple days have been viewable. I’ve fixed it by taking 2 extra steps and getting an embed link inside the video, so all is right with the world once again. Have a nice day, if the world will allow it. If not, there’s always anti-depressants or an hour on the treadmill.

Happy Birthday, Me

YOU’RE GONNA BURN IN HELL! (Contrary to popular belief, listening to the devil’s music will, in fact, condemn you to hell. Listen at your own risk.)

One More Thing

Of course, if you’re reading this in reverse-chronological order, then this is the first of 3 things. I have some guys installing a new door onto my townhouse at the moment, so I had to stop playing The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for a little while. This gave me some time to make some tweaks to Bugloaf while I wait. You can easily find out what the other two tweaks were/are, but this one, the last (maybe), is that I’m going to start using tags again.

Tags are searchable items that you can place on individual posts. Since my purpose has never been to have huge readership on this blog (although it’s kinda neat to have happen now and again), I gave up on using tagging a long time ago…I’m guessing 2009-ish. But, things change. I’m putting a little more time into this blog lately, making it look slightly more professional, and maybe having some more people visit wouldn’t be a terrible thing. So, I’ll be using tagging once again. Whenever I remember to do so

“Dear Me: A Letter to my 16 Year Old Self”

“Dear Me: A Letter to my 16 Year Old Self”.

via “Dear Me: A Letter to my 16 Year Old Self”.

I read the Stephen King excerpt from this book, and it’s pretty apt. His entry was basically, “Don’t do drugs, or you will miss out ten years of your life, basically your thirties.”

The book, if you don’t already know, is a grouping of celebrities writing letters to themselves at age 16. What would you want to have known at that age? What would you change?

Me, in the end, I wouldn’t want to change much. The mistakes I’ve made have put me where I am today, and I could be doing a whole lot worse. Sure, my friends, on average, are more successful than I am, and have been more places around the globe. But really, I’m still alive, in relatively good health (although about 60 pounds heavier than I should be), I have two cool (although emotionally damaged) munchkin cats that I wouldn’t trade in for the world and a box of Gobstoppers.

Most of all, I have a wonderful wife who I actually get along with rather well, and love more than I thought I’d love anyone else. What’s weirder still, is that she loves me back.

If I had to write a letter to my 16 year old self, I guess it would go like this:

1) Stop putting yourself down. You’re awesome, and you’ll find your place in the world. Just relax and keep pushing forward.

2) I know you aren’t dating. That won’t change for a couple years. One thing to remember: The internet is your friend. Chat with local girls, and invite them for coffee. Don’t be afraid to get close to people you meet there either. Sure, most are wacko, but some are actually neat people that, while you might not ever want to date them or sleep with them, they’re fun to hang with, online or otherwise.

3) Driving two hundred miles to date someone is just a bad idea. Don’t do it.

4) Joining the military is not an awful idea, but you might want to try anti-depressants and/or some therapy first. What the military will do is give you a solid foundation that allows you to tell the rest of the world, “GO F**K YOURSELF, I’M AWESOME!” when necessary. Sometimes the world needs to hear this. In hindsight, I don’t know if you could ever get this solid foundation any other way. In gaining this, you will lose some of your more flighty artistic talents, but there was never any way to transmit that stuff into anything you could really share with anyone anyhow, so maybe it’s all for the best.

5) Getting out of the military is not an awful idea. In fact, with the merits of military experience (and the GI Bill), getting out of the military is a fantastic idea.

6) Stay away from the crazy horse girl. You’ll know who I’m talking about.

7) Drive the speed limit, or no more than 7 mph over. You’ll thank me later.

8) The world doesn’t care what you think. Don’t care so much about what the world thinks.

9) Stay away from BMW’s. Every one you own will have expensive problems to fix. Reliability is sexier than a nice car that breaks down a lot. Think a Honda Civic, Toyota Corolla, or a Geo Prism (which is the same car as the Corolla, by the way). Great cars, even used. And make sure you get a warranty! Car warranties are AWESOME! And totally worth the money!!!

That’s probably enough things to share with my 16-year old self. I’d post some power-ball numbers, but I don’t think I was meant to win the lottery, and I’m afraid of what I’d do if I won it at any point earlier in my life. So, I guess that’s enough to tell my younger self. I hope I appreciate the advice.

Christmas Birthdays Are A Rip Off

 

Christmas Birthdays Are A Rip Off.

via Christmas Birthdays Are A Rip Off.

Yay, someone else is in the same predicament as me! My birthday is this Saturday, 12/17, and I go through a semi-hatred of Christmas every year as a result. I tried moving my birthday 6 months, like this blogger is trying, but I find it just didn’t work for me. My family was not in on it from the start, for one thing. Also, do you schedule it for the first six-month mark (June 17, 2012, in my case)? Then it seems almost greedy, since you just had a birthday back in December. I finally just gave up. However, I’m alright with it today, because two things have naturally occurred. 1) My tastes have gone down in price considerably. I just got a Wii as an early Birthday gift, and I’m amazed with how cool it is…and how cheap 5-year old games are. And 2) I have a job where I can make a casual purchase of $10-15 every few weeks without missing it. So, with my lowered standards, I can have birthday presents any damn time I want to, I just buy them. For my real birthday, my wife has to work. She’s a retail manager, and it’s almost Christmas, and she’s worked retail ever since we met, so this is no surprise. So, the evening after she gets off work, we’re going to a movie, and I’m going to drink some beer. (Cobb Theaters are awesome by the way. Beer…in a movie theater! So great!). Originally, Mission Impossible 4 was supposed to open this week, but it’s been pushed back. I’ll either go to Carnage (the latest Roman Polanski flick), or Sherlock Holmes, whichever one is more tolerable for my wife. I know, it’s my birthday, and I can watch whatever I want…but it’s more fun if she’s into the film, and not just me.

So, in a nutshell, good luck fellow blogger with your birthday-in-June plans. You’ll need it.

Sleeeeeep……

I meant to post this yesterday, but I was too tired.

My State Of Being, Right Now

I’m not explicitly trying to be a prick today. Just go away. Right now I’d rather create a pie-chart graphing the likelihood of my greeting you than actually greeting you.

Best Wishes

Although he probably doesn’t visit Bugloaf, I want to send some best wishes to my friend Ken. His dog got his leg stuck in a hole, and ended up breaking the leg in the process. Which is why I’m working today instead of him, so he can take care of his dog and his family. Best of luck, hope everything turns out okay. -A

Golly Gee Willikers

I don’t know if that’s the right spelling of Willikers. It’s kind of bothering me, but I really wanted to type it out without having to Google it in order to find the correct spelling.

So, yesterday in my Environmental Science class, the professor basically tells us what’s on the final. Note that this is the first day of class, so as long as I study the notes I took yesterday, I should have a good idea of what’s coming up after 4 1/2 weeks of accelerated classes.

After that was finished, the prof also writes a big diagram on the board of another thing we have to hand in. It’s a Life Sheet, where on the left is the past, on the right is the future. The left says where we’re from, what kind of work we’ve done, etc. The right says, “What would you most like to do in your life after graduating?”. We write that at the bottom, and then we write down about 20-30 steps we need to take in order to get to that point.

When I take these somewhat cheezy tests that teachers hand out in order to break away from the strict mold of a class like Environmental Science, I take them at face value, and I take them seriously while most of the students might just make up some bullshit in order to complete the assignment. Getting to the point, I want to be an app/cartoon designer when I grow up.

I have several ideas, including some unusual egg timers, various flow-chart short games like this one, and a couple other things. I have no idea if I can make any money at this, but it’d be fun to see what I can do.

The thing is, until this point, I’ve been too chickenshit to try to learn how to do this. When this blog/site started, there was going to be this really annoying flash intro, and the site was going to be like a dumbed-down Homestar Runner. Instead…it’s a junk blog like a million others. I’d love to make it something more than that, but for right now, this is what you get.

Maybe with this class assignment, I will be able to accomplish something I’ve always dreamed of doing. And to think I almost dropped the class before showing up yesterday.

Kent

This was written by a friend of mine named Kent. And to be truthful, I’m mainly posting it because I’m very sleepy at the moment and I can’t keep his words straight. No really. I have my eyes closed right now, laying back on my couch cushion, leting my fingers do the work…and mistype along the way, but who cares, the job is getting done. Sort of. Like hiring cheap contractors to install your new bathtub only to have it leak and taking another week to get someone out to fix the problem. This did not happen to me, but it’s an example of the sorry state of work ethic among today’s plumbing industry. I have no idea what I’m talking about, so here’s something else. By Kent.
…………………………………………………………………….

I’ve been involved in a variety of conversations lately on topics such as religion, evolution/creationism, global warming and politics. If that list doesn’t make it clear enough, those of you who have been in those conversations with me can attest that I certainly enjoy a good argument. However, two things about those conversations began to wear on me. The first was encountering the same forms of argument over and over in different contexts. The second was a tendency to word play masquerading as a significant point, or worse yet, as proof of an idea. In order to take my best shot at resolving both problems I’m going to attempt to build my case from the ground up and open it up to criticism/support from all comers.

If you are tagged in this note, you are particularly invited to join the discussion. I had initially thought to only send this to those that I wanted to explicitly invite, but I see that Notes don’t work that way. Apparently this is an open invitation. So be it. You are free to invite anyone else you would like anyway. Although I may strongly disagree with you (and this is primarily addressed to people who are not on ‘my side’ of these issues,) if I have invited you to this conversation it is because I respect you and care about you. There’s a reason I’m addressing you all and not random anonymous folks on the many internet forums hosting variations on this theme. I think one thing that we can agree on is that it is frustrating to see people you think well of cleave to ideas which you find misguided. I have used the example that if I were to suddenly become enamored of Scientology, I would hope that you would care enough about me to challenge my beliefs. There are folks I have invited where I fear I may be risking a friendship… If you don’t care to participate, whether from a lack of interest or a fear of drama, I won’t be offended in the least.

Since one of my key themes will be that I do not have access to any special or absolute truth, I am going to set this up as a wiki which only I can edit, but anyone can comment on. That way I can continue to build and modify my argument as weaknesses are exposed (and they will be,) but the record of the conversation will be there for all to see without starting all over from scratch. I’m not sure how this will work in practice, if it turns out to be clunky then I will either look at installing some basic forum software or else retreat to just holding the conversation on my blog. There isn’t a great deal of content yet, basically just an intro on the ‘How do we Know’ page and a few brief conversation starters, but if I held off until I felt it was ready then it would never get started. Feedback and criticism will help by giving me a direction and something to sink my rhetorical teeth into. You can read the wiki anonymously, but in order to comment you will have to create an account. Sorry about that, but it’s necessary if I’m to have a hope of A) avoiding a deluge of spam and B) keeping track of the conversation. However, no one will have access to your password and you’re welcome to use a throwaway email and/or a pseudonym if you like.

Here’s to all of us learning something.

http://www.job-run.com/wikka/ReductioadAbsurdum