grimhild

Got to my first dance with Melissa in quite a while on Saturday night! It was the PEERS 12th Night Victorian Ball. It was also the most crowded PEERS event I've been to... perhaps ever! Yeah, folks said that the LoTR ball back in 2004 was crowded, but not like this. And the Girl Genius ball was certainly more dangerous, but that was a combination of crowds, not-so-great dancers, and many kids underfoot. Last night, though, it was just a huge throng of mostly good dancers. I do believe that PEERS may be outgrowing its hall in San Mateo. And while I understand that there are folks from the uber-south bay who may be too wussy to drive up to Oakland or Berkeley... come on, you pansies! Some bashers come from freaking Sacramento, eh? The extra trip won't kill you.

So I'm seeing if, by posting this to LJ, it will automatically get crossposted to FB with the default Notes security settings I've put in place for that. Here goes....

And to add to the experiment, I'll edit it and see what happens. Ahem. After the ball, Melissa and Katherine and I found our way to a great Middle Eastern restaurant close by. So it wasn't the official afters, but it was great food and top-notch entertainment for 1:30 am on a Sunday morning in San Mateo. It's called Tartousa, and it sort of rocks.  A great bellydancer danced to the rhythms of the DJ/synthesizer player.  The owners, members of the same (Lebanese? Turkish? Egyptian?) family, really made us feel at home.  The food was quite good, and my prawns were cooked perfectly.  And the real thrill came when the general clubbin'-style dancing began on their modest floor.  Melissa and I got up and did some cha-cha, and we were immediately inducted to the center of everything, with folks hollering and waving us on and grinning and taking pictures.  Gooood tiiiimes.  We may have the makings of a post-PEERS tradition, for as long as it stays in San Mateo.

Getting safely to the old Sac... check
New vehicle registration... check
Appointment with new dentist... check
Paying contacts bill... check
Unpacking... check
Dinner at friend's house... in progress
Studying in-depth... not until January!!!

Today, to kick my running back into gear, and to do so without drawing attention to how much I've fallen off the wagon, I ran intervals!  I haven't done this since high school, as far as I can remember.  Specifically, I did six repetitions of running ~500m as quickly as I can and walking ~250m, back to back.  It feels good!  And... it gives me a new thing to improve, rather than giving me a previous goal that I've lost (I got as high as ~8000m in a straight run earlier this summer, but it'd take a fair bit of work to do that again).  In sum, go me!

Well, I'm back from Paris.  aviatrix1879 and I kept a travelogue during our trip, and we were super-disciplined about it!  At some point, I'll transcribe it.  For now, it was a super-exciting trip and I'm looking forward to sleeping.

Today I ran 3.25 miles, and ended up with not very much knee pain at all!  The longest run yet.  And I'm sort of happy to say that I've definitely hit the point where fatigue makes me stop rather than pain. 

So sure, the ability to have more stamina for dancing is nice, and was my original goal, blah blah blah.  But a hidden bonus has eclipsed that, at least for now:

I GET TO EAT LOTS AND LOTS OF CARBS!!!11oneoenoen

Well, I joined the bandwagon (read: aviatrix1879) last Saturday and gave blood... for the first time in six years.  It went quite smoothly, with a minor dizzy spell when I was done.  No tissue caught in the needle, no red visual static, no inattentiveness on the part of the workers.  I was glad for all that.  We got some very nice hot chocolate on the way back, and I (for one) proceeded to absolutely pig out at the Whole Foods hot bar later on.  Good times. 

Also went to an Alara Reborn launch party on Sunday, which was... frustrating.  Granted, I may not be the best Sealed player in history, but I am sure that my record would have been better had two of my four opponents played more quickly rather than forcing draw games due to time limits. 

Also, this was my first time in any sanctioned Alara block tournament (heck, first time since the Future Sight pre-release), and the colors were... confusing for assembling a deck.  I got metric buttloads of mana fixing, and so I decided to go domain.  In retrospect, I might have also done better by going Jund (BGR).  Just a question of Knight of New Alara (fan-freaking-tastic... if the opponent has zero removal) vs. Violent Ultimatium (not really playable with domain mana).  If anyone's interested, I might post (or talk) about what I got and see what y'all think. 

Hey all.  Thanks to those who filled out my survey a couple weeks ago.  I now have a better idea of what kind of game I plan to run.  It seems that people wanted D&D 3.5 and Home Brew/mix, so... it turns out that I already have a setting that should fit both of those preferences nicely.  If you played (or heard of) my Humors & Heathens game, it'll be in that world. 

At this point, I'm realizing that I can't actually see who all filled out the survey!  So, if you're interested (again, depending on timing this summer), please comment!  This should also post to Facebook, so either way is fine.  I just want to know how many people to expect.

Oh, and also... let me know if you'd prefer (a) creating characters on the spot, (b) dividing up time by having a separate character creation session, or (c) using pre-made (by me) characters.  H&H folks: if you reeeeally want to use your old characters, we can talk.

Today I ran 2 2/3 miles, and I think I'm approaching the point at which I get tired before my knee tells me to stop.  That's the longest I've run yet in this training time, and I'm really happy with that.  My knee is definitely in better shape than it was in 2003 when I sent myself to a physical therapist.  Heh.  And this after I left work after a couple hours due to a headache, upset stomach, and bout of general wooziness.  Bonus: I got an hour-long nap this afternoon, and felt much better afterward.  I might even study for a third hour tonight, after study group.  Oh, speaking of which...

Poll #1387046 I'm going to organize an RPG day/night in order to stay sane and keep up with my Bay Area playahs.
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None, participants: 5

Would you be willing and able to host myself and perhaps 5 other people for a day or evening of RPG fun?

Are you able to travel to a place in Oakland for this if need be?

Your preferred system(s)?

Your preferred setting(s)? I can accomodate most D&D 2E published settings, as well as Greyhawk and Oriental Adventures for 1E. P&P, Exalted, Talislanta, and Vampire settings would likely be defaults, though I'm all eyes about preferred locations within those. Otherwise, I'm happy to come up with something new!

Your preferred plot/struggle? (Social intrigue, self-interested dungeoneering, rival kingdoms, Bad Guys, modern social allegory, odyssey, or whatever you think is cool).

Are you okay playing with some folks you don't know yet (but whom I will guarantee with my seal of awesome)?

A'ight, fellas.  It's on.  For one day or evening this summer, i will have had enough of this studying frivolity.

Partially, this is because I feel as if I've been living under the shadow of job applications for the past 3.5 months of so.  And I still am.  And these have really sapped my will.  Plus... there's always the fact that I've been doing my best to study 8 hours per week for the board exam.  Well, perhaps I can call myself happy at the progress I've made in the past year in total.  And perhaps, once the exam is over, I'll suddenly gain lots of energy and perspective again, and I'll write a New Deal supplemental, with possibly new ideas and directions.  Hooray!

For now, I'd really prefer to write about happy things rather than studying and work hurricanes and possible reasons why a potential employer is taking so long to get back to me with any words at all since the last couple of interviews (which I think went well...). 

Ronit's and Dominic's wedding!  It was a super blast.  I loved my cute little fish sign on my name placard.  And... it was the only wedding I've been to where there has been some dancing _before_ dinner!  That makes it starful in my book.  Bucking chairs?  Awesome!  The main dancing, too, was great.  More focused on partner dancing than I've seen before, which is kewl, as it let me show off a slightly different subset of my skillz.  When aviatrix1879  broke off and did a fast waltz among the tables to the last song, it was more than awesome.  It was hecka awesome.  Oh... and I got the garter.  It flew off in the wrong direction, and I happened to be the first to come to my senses and run for it, throwing in a desperate dive for entertainment value.  So... this makes three for me, now.  Had I known when I got the first, I might have started a collection.

Galette!!  I made one for pi day -- an umami one that featured leeks, goat cheese, parsley, vermouth, and cream (reduced).  It took me... what, over four hours to make?!  But it goes with my Lenten promise to bake something to share with someone else each week.  I really like how well goat cheese goes with parsley, especially in the presence of carbs!

Okay, enough for now.  Time to get some running shoes.

I really miss the East Dorm lounge.  Now when I finish an evening of studying, I'm like, "Great!  Thank goodness that is done with; it made me really feel really restless and isolated.  Now, time for some... dishes?"

I'm currently reminiscing over AD&D 2nd edition, having pulled out Combat & Tactics from my storage box.  Oh, those were the days!  It took me about three minutes to find a rules loophole that would be hilarious to take advantage of!

Okay, now they really are playing the same song again.  Honestly, I do enjoy Christmas music, but any music on such short non-voluntary repeat is not to be desired. 

So the radio has been playing Christmas songs all morning, per usual.  I just thought I heard the same song as now played only a half hour or so ago.  It had the same awkward fermatas and artificial instruments and everything.  Then I realized that the songs were not related by blood -- they come from different lineages (Hark, the Herald Angels Sing, and O Come All Ye Faithful), but just have the same congenital malformation, or possibly the same syndrome.  That is, the sort of thing that makes two people of otherwise very different genetic heritages look as if they're related.

Regardless, I've seen the great good that can be done if one dons a specially formed helmet early enough....

Hey, all.  Thanks to ejwu 's post, I just donated to No on Prop 8 , as polls don't look all that great at the moment.  Yikes.  Also, it seems that contributions through Sunday will be dollar-matched.  So, if you have the money to spare and want to move the state with more than simply a vote...

This is the first year in living memory in which I get to renew my vehicle registration without needing a smog test!  Yeah, I've been moving that often.

Was going to write about amazing weekend.  Vintage Invasion, Saturday FNW, seeing aviatrix1979 , riding the trains with the Blackstons, and then chillin' wit my peeps at Chez Darcy. 

But for tonight, I feel like writing about Toastmasters.  Yeah, that crazy club that I regularly nag and groan and goad myself about until I have a real speech that seems to impress folks.  Tonight was the area competition for the Humorous Speech Contest, and I've been sort of practicing my silly "The Great Dance Schism, Exposed" speech like a dutiful communicator.  When I got there, I learned that I'd also been signed up for the Table Topics competition... which was first on the agenda!  

So Table Topics is basically extemporaneous speech-giving.  Here's your subject, you have one to two minutes, go.  It's a very adrenalinny thing that I always worry will clear my RAM if I do it before my actual speech.  But there I was, the second of four contestants, with the unhelpful topic of, "I remember when...," recounting my fighting game saga when Ryu managed to goad me into hitting a ceiling pipe IN REAL LIFE.  The audience really laughed at my foibles there.  It was only after I gave that that I learned that the Table Topics didn't really have to be humorous.  The guy after me launched into a literally tearful memory of putting his beloved dog to sleep and how it was the humane thing to do.  Yeep.  Oh well, I guess.

Then came the real speeches.  I was only competing against one guy there, and he went first, also potentially fuzzying my crammed memory of what to say.  He was funny like a manic cartoon character -- but very funny at it.  I was more like a silly fanatic who mocks himself by taking himself so seriously.  But I remembered all my funny parts!  Evidently, there's a form of memory beyond the very-short-term, that is also useful for occasions like this, and that I'd oddly built up for this night by practicing the speech on several occasions over the past month or so.  Fascinating.

And the results?  First place in both events, baby!  My competition for the humorous speech part had actually gotten disqualified for going overtime, as he hat tried to fit in way too much for his speech.  A similar thing happened for one person Table Topics, but I still beat two others on my own merits there -- and for a thing that I didn't know I was doing!   (The euthanasia guy took second for Table Topics).

So yeah.  I gots me two plaques... and a VHS tape.  Next stop... the Division contest on October 17th!

Let's see if this entry appears in my Notes page in Facebook.  And what bells and whistles it can include.  I am grimhild !  Hear me roar HOORJ! Here's a link!  Here's a picture behind a cut!

( Very little effort made to find something. )

Now, let's see if this all works.

So part of my mostly daily routine here at work is to check on presidential election polls, occasionally with visits to Intrade to see what investors think of the likelihoods of election.  Normally, the likelihoods of the candidates to be elected are found at the top of the list of Major Things.  Today, though, the one on top is, "2008 US Election - Sarah Palin to be withdrawn as Republican VP nominee/candidate."  Granted, it's only trading at 5.6(%) right now, down from close to 10% this morning.  Still amusing.  And almost thrice the currently predicted likelihood of Hurricane Hanna making U.S. landfall.