I crave DDR and RP, and I can't have either because my DDR pads have mysteriously disappeared, and nobody is online, pretty much. 'Cept Winter, who doesn't do fandom-RP (still, anybody up for it later, as per my last post? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?). And my house is full of dumb, by which I mean teenage boys, so I can't go smash stuff in KH or DMC or something and work out my annoyance, which is why I'm sitting on my back walkway at quarter past midnight, leeching my next door neighbors' wireless.

...And my dad got a Death Cab for Cutie song stuck in my head. Argh kill it with fire.


EDIT: Okay, cityofmako totally brought the love tonight. I am laughing my ass off, and my inner Tseng is headdesking because he knows he's partially responsible for anything the other Turks do. Ahh, eyeballs.

At Mara's house right now - I'm not entirely certain when I'll be home again, because I may be going out to the Berkshires after this, but I should have some internet either way. I also have my new laptop after a lot of headache - UPS came by to deliver it, and the only one awake and in the house was my brother's utterly dumbass friend who didn't bother asking if he could sign for it, just said he couldn't and that the guy should come back tomorrow. Which necessitated driving a town over at eight to go pick it up, ugh. But it is here and lovely.

Yeah, I know, the trip was three weeks ago. I'm horrible and slow and the world's greatest procrastinator (somewhere, I still have a half-finished con report from Shoujocon '03. I someday may actually finish it) so it's getting done now. I'm also cutting it to spare all of you that don't want to read it's massiveness, because I know I have a tendency to ramble, and we did lots and lots. I'm also likely to forget big important things that happened beause my memory fails at life, and it's almost two am. So there may be a secondary NYC post later.

( I want to wake up in a city that never sleeps )

And for anyone who doesn't want to read that, but just wants the photos, they're up here, although intermixed with Boston and Salem.

I just got soaked, and it makes me totally happy. I decided to go for a walk and return some movies we rented, because while I wanted to sit around and spaz at people about Nocturne, the only two friends I have who actually play it both have real lives and thus were not online. Such is the downfall of small fandoms, I guess.

So, after seeing vague flashes of bright blue thunder off in the background for pretty much all evening, it decided to finally start pouring rain about fifteen minutes into my walk, complete with soundtrack provided by my mp3 player - it decided to put on Zelda: Ocarina of Time Riveroftime AmIEvil, from OC Remix, which has rain and thunder in the background, just as the rain was starting. It was glorious, even if it did mean I got two sets of perfectly clean, dry clothes soaked today (Grace dragged me, Ben, Anthony, and Dan swimming at the state park - I wasn't expecting to go in but did anyway).

And Tseng's profile is now a thing of beauty, even if I still need to make icons for that account. It even has a little header and everything. Mostly because the screenshot was too awesome not to use, but iconned poorly.

Do not project your desire to own large-caliber revolvers onto Tseng. Instead, sit down and and figure out what Tseng would like to own.

This was a lot easier for Asher and Ally, mostly because there were some definate situational limits. Asher only has one gun, and as they're not really his thing, it 's something basic that can be found on the black market for cheap. His knives are definately black market, and basic military issue. Ally's main gun is also basic military issue, as it was her dad's (probably 9mm), and while she's got others, most of them are other varieties of semi-auto pistols. Maybe one revolver, although it was probably pretty beat up when she got, and if she's got a rifle, it's more of curiosity and rarely gets fired.

Tseng, however, doesn't really have the limits of cost and avalibility that they have. He's the leader of the Turks, he can pretty much own anything he wants to. Some things seem unlikely - assualt rifle, machine gun - but there's still enough variety that it's hard to pick.

...I'm going to end up going with the large-caliber handguns, aren't I.

Was going through Last Order yesterday to get some Tseng screencaps (the man has like...three facial expressions, total. Argh), and I realized that while Squeenix didn't quite royally fuck up the timeline, they came damned close. Mostly because when Tseng leaves at the end, to go after Zack and Cloud, all the BC Turks are still there. And it's kind of implied that Cloud's escape was really near the start of the game (although correct me if I'm wrong, my memory of FF7 is not the world's greatest). I guess it could be argued that they either all left right before the game started, or that there were more Turks we never see in-game (although, again, it may be canon that there's only Reno, Rude, Tseng, and then Elena - can't remember). Also, Tseng is apparently allowed to fly the helicopter, whoo. And on further consideration is also probably something of a lightweight when it comes to drinking, being not!Asian and all. Working in a bar (my backstory; it, uh, kinda happened) and going drinking with Reno and Rude have probably increased his tolerance some, but not that much.

And entirely unrelated to that, playing John Crichton in a multiverse game like Canon Wars or the Nexus would pretty much be the greatest thing ever. Because he's all about the pop culture, and pop culture references, and would also think the whole thing is another hallucination. And then complain that the one with Crais in the red heels was a lot more interesting. Because John is totally and completely nuts. I am sadly not skilled enough with the pop culture and the crazy to pull it off myself, but I'd love to see someone else try.

So, I finally picked out and bought a laptop. I ended up going with a ThinkPad T60, mostly because I know someone who was able to get me an employee discount, and for the 'can withstand nuclear apocalypse' factor the ThinkPads have. The specs:
-1.83 GHz Intel Core Duo processor
-15" screen
-1GB RAM
-100 GB harddrive
-DVD-Recordable optical drive

...And a bunch of other stuff that comes standared, like an integrated fingerprint reader, and wireless card, but those are the big shiny ones. Final cost was just over thirteen hundred US, which is pretty sweet. It's coming with XP Home to save some money, but I'm probably going to install Pro myself.

Getting this done before I get around to the gigantic NYC post of doom, because I need Jo around to remind me of all the shit we did for that.

On Saturday, we headed in to Boston for our second day there, because I can spend days and days in Boston. This time we opted to kind of just wander and be touristy and stuff. Unfortunately, we quickly learned that most of the historic sites close relatively early, so we ended up more just taking photos of the outside, wandering through the shopping districts, and hitting up some of my favorite stores. We also spent some time hanging around the Harvard campus after buying snacks, and made lots of jokes about how pretentious Harvard is (Harvard students don't need maps; they can use the stars to navigate the campus grounds). We also went for an early dinner at Legal Seafood, and got to hear the table of forty-somethings next to us discussing Snakes on a Plane. We then did some wandering, and in a moment of silly stupidity, decided to run through the fountain outside of the Christian Scientists' building. We pretty much got totally soaked, and then had to wander more to dry off before finishing the night of with dessert at Finale.

Sunday we drove up to Salem - I'd never been, either - and discovered that not only do things close early, they're almost all horribly touristy and kind of pricey. So we did one really touristy witch-trial related thing (the Witch Dungeon), and then spent the rest of the afternoon walking along the waterfront, which was pretty and free, and I got to watch Jo realize I wasn't exagerating when I said the Atlantic was fucking freezing.

On the normal-life front, I'm still looking for opinions on laptops, and got most of the school stuff sorted out, thank god. Just wish I didn't have to go back to work tomorrow.

It is really, really frustrating to have a class I'd love to take both be full and conflict with my required classes. Yeah, I would love to take Japanese. But all the sections are full, and if they weren't, I have three three-hour science labs a week (one for a course I don't even want, but have to take), which I can't reschedule. And I can't put off my remaining arts credits because then I won't be taking enough to qualify for housing (the three-hour labs don't count for any extra credit), but if I take them this year, the requirement for graduation is filled and there isn't really any way to justify the expense of taking them later to my parents, because half the point of the Academy and getting all my credits transfered was so we didn't have to pay as much tuition.

And I'm getting more upset about this than I probably should, but Winter was talking about how she's planning on taking Japanese earlier. (And yes, we're back from NYC, but I'll post about it when it's not five am and me being stupid and upset).

I should totally be asleep right now, as it is five am and I am incredibly tired, but I know if I don't, I won't get around to it later, and it is probably worth posting about. Jo and I went into Boston today, and managed to not get totally lost finding the Riverside station, despite missing the exit at first because we were talking (note to people visiting from outside the area - the Riverside T station is easy to get to, has a huge lot, and ridiculously cheap parking). Headed into Boston on the T with a crowd of Red Sox fans going to a game, and decided to hit the Museum of Science first. We basically stayed until closing, because the exhibit halls are awesome, and while I've seen a lot of it before, it's been a while, and the MoS never gets old.

We left to grab a quick bite to eat at the Cambridgeside Galleria, and then did the requisite throwing of a tea bag into Boston Harbor (okay, the Charles River, but it's close enough, damnit). And yes, there will be photos with a slightly more coherent explanation later. We then headed back to the museum to see an IMAX showing - Greece, which I thought was okay. I'm not so big on the history ones, but it was the best thing showing, and Jo liked it, so it's all good. We opted to explore a little before finding dinner, and wandered through the MIT campus, played super-cheap DDR (and augh, I suck now, I'm so out of practice), and up through Central Square, where we got drinks at the Starbucks.

Then we finally headed up to the North End, and after a little exploring (I'm used to being in Boston with people who know the city better than me, honestly), we found a nice little Italian restaurant, and Jo learned that at real Italian restaurants, the portions are huge. I've known this since about age six, so I had no trouble finishing my pasta (fetticcine alfredo, mmm), but we brought half of her's home. We did a bit more wandering, and discussed a whole bunch of S_F stuff (which may end up deserving it's own post later, because I <3 S_F), and continued discussing it on the T and then in part on the car ride home, among other things.

Then I mostly just played the original RE for a while and came to the conclusion that Chris is a huge idiot, Wesker's voice actor is the only one who isn't a total moron, and nobody can escape the power of Capcom's terrible one-liners.