Attempt at Blogging #113384797514

Hey there, dearest Journal!

I'm sorry I've been such a bad friend to you. I haven't written. I confess, sometimes long stretches of time have gone by without even thinking about you. But you don't have feelings, because you're just a website, so I know you'll forgive me.

Where to start? So much has changed since 2009, when last we spoke. I was an office worker back then, filling my days with files and an enormous Google reader list that I never seemed to get through. I've since left behind that cold world of fluorescent lights and business suits (not that I ever wore them, but saw them all the damn time) for the much more glamorous world of professional baking. I filed my taxes for 2010 today and got to adjust my profession from "Executive Assistant" to "Pastry Cook". It was oh-so-fulfilling, especially since my plummet from wealth to near-poverty comes with a massive tax refund, unlike last year when I had to pay the guv'ment a few hundred bucks. I got a lot out of my years as an assistant, but oh boy, was it time for a change. I'm sooo much happier now, wearing my bright bandannas and eye-catching chef pants to work every day. Sometimes, I get to see the pre-dawn hours and walk through the city as it's just starting to wake up. I even got to work a few late night baking shifts, rotating dozens of pies in and out of the ovens while playing loud metal music.

My days are full of hard work, so much learning about food (my very favorite thing) and eating my fill of sugar and flour (sometimes in actual pastry form and sometimes just plain sugar; I have no pride). I fulfilled my recurring daydream of working for Joanne Chang (of Flour Bakery and Myers+Chang). Many a day in the office, I would wish that I had the skill and knowledge to just jump careers, but I never thought it'd be possible. Then, the opportunity arose to radically change careers and I emailed Joanne about the possibility of interning at Flour for a few months to see if I really wanted to do it. She said yes, and I became Flour's first official intern. Naturally, I'm awesome and they decided to keep me when my internship ended. Social media at work, people! Magical. I foresee many delightful years ahead of me, continuing to learn about the things I love, and hopefully getting better at them.

One of my favorite series of fantasy novels is written by the delightful Lynn Flewelling. I always remember first picking up Luck in the Shadows and reading her author blurb, which lists a collection of random jobs she's held, including "necropsy technician". I loved that, because you only get one life and why not fill it learning as much as you possibly can. Not everyone is lucky enough to figure out when they are 18 what they want to do forever and always, so I'm totally fine figuring it out as I go.

So, here I am. That's my work life. I'm also enjoying the most delightful and easy relationship with Cody, a fellow neighborhood wierdo that I have obsessed over since he first came into my life as my coffee shop crush at Ula. My perseverance in wooing him finally yielded fruit after a year or so and here we are, nine months later, a JP fixture that all the lesbians try to emulate.

There's surely more to come as I get back into regaling my dear, sweet Journal with all of the books I'm reading, games I'm playing and food I'm eating. But we'll ease back into it for now. I also made a tumblr, but I'm not sure I'll use it, cause I rather like blogger. I don't know, maybe I can link them?

Love,
Jon

Return to Innocence

Hello dear blog,

Alas, it has been quite some time since I graced you with my presence and don't think for an instant that I forgot about you. Every day, I've been plagued with the guilt of my abandonment of you. Every day, I keep wishing and hoping for some inspiration to strike, some flash of insight that will give me a topic to expound upon within your illustrious 'pages.' And yet, every day you weep silently to yourself...your creator has left you. He built you up from scratch and thousands of lines of html (which He doesn't write because Blogger does it for him) and then left you like some cheap hooker on the side of the road after having his way with you for these long years months.

Now you know how mankind feels about God. I mean, honestly.

Fear not, kind blog. I have returned, brimming with wit and charm, overflowing with depth and clarity into the trueness of the world around us. It is within you, of all the free webspaces in existence, that I choose to leave my mark on this cruel, cruel world. Much like a dog pissing on a tree, so I shall piss forth my wisdom unto you. I shall chronicle my triumphant return to the glories of my youth and spend the remainder of October 2008 honing my already razor-sharp skills in preparation for NaNoWriMo 2008, or The Year Jon Finally Accomplishes Something, Anything, For God's Sake Do Something With Your Life, Man!

No one knows, least of all me, what direction this blog will take. Most likely it will contain some parts Sarah-Palin hatin' and some parts Gastrointestinal Diary (or, why I am so very, very alone) and maybe some parts random shit that flies out of my head like a way less impressive version of Athena. Any which way you slice it, though, the world (of the Interwebs) is a better place for my being in it.

Perhaps someday a future people will dig up the bones of our civilization and discover my blog over all others (and pray to whatever you pray to that they don't find Perez Hilton first..).

This is a topic I'd like to return to, but for now, I must go download Enigma.

Yours, ever and always,
Jon

Mass Effect Retardation - UPDATE!

Hello, reader, and welcome to my corner of the intarwebs. As you may have noted yesterday, I got a little heated in my discussion of Fox News' treatment of the video game, Mass Effect. Seeing as I discovered the story via several gaming industry blogs, I was hardly the only one to flip out over the unfair treatment the game received on Fox. But today, I come bearing happy news. Not only has the gaming community pulled a stupendous prank on the Amazon page for Cooper Lawrence's new book, The Cult of Perfection, but EA (the company that owns Bioware) released a statement urging Fox to clean up its story and directly refutes the lies that were claimed about Mass Effect.

First, the prank. Seeing as Lawrence spent the Fox segment basically spouting total shit about a game she admitted to never having played, gamers have flooded the Amazon reviews section for her books with one-star reviews in which the comments are typically along the lines of, "There's full on sex that is inappropriate for the children this book targets. I've never read it, but I feel secure in making judgments about it." There have been over 500 of these reviews in the last few days. Now, obviously, there's a level of immaturity in doing something like this, but at the same time, it's nice to see some action taken against someone so dangerous to open discussion. Like I said yesterday, I'm happy to watch a group of people with valid, researched opinions on something, but if these negative reviews mean than 100 less people will pick up her crap and think it's valid, then I'm a happy camper.

Secondly, EA released a great statement in which they attack Fox News' assertion that the game has "full digital nudity" (which it doesn't), interactive sex (which it doesn't) and that it is marketed to kids (which it isn't). Even though it's a video game distributor that is doing the defending, it's always nice to see someone with visibility take a stand to defend the integrity of gaming. The guy from EA pointed out that the side-boob and profile shots of the 'sex' scene are no more risque than you see on primetime television, and certainly less than seen in Fox shows like The O.C. and Family Guy, which is a very good point. Also, he points out that the ratings system on video games is more effective than say, the ratings system on TVs. This is also a great point, seeing as network TV is free to watch for anyone with a television. A game like Mass Effect is hardly available to the vast majority of Americans, seeing as there are only around 17.7 million Xbox 360s sold worldwide as of a few weeks ago.

And that, as they say, is that (for now) on Mass Effect. I will be sure to update all of you on my final feelings about the game once I get an HDTV and an Xbox and can finally play through the whole thing. Until then, I'll have to find something else to write about on here.

Return to Oz

Ah, my blog. Well, it's certainly been a while. I've been meaning to start writing in this again since I failed miserably at NaNoWriMo. This is now year 4 or so that I have failed, but I still don't want to give up. I mean I was REALLY close this time. There were extenuating circumstances...and those circumstances were not FFXII. My intention is to start writing more often, both in this blog about whatever comes to mind and in a more creative setting, to help myself write faster and thus be marginally more efficient during November. Of course, if I'm still in this job, which I intend to be, November will be a horrible month again...but life will always get in the way if I let it, so I won't. Bitch.

So, update on my life. Obviously, due to my extenuating circumstances, I am single once more. This is me waving my white flag and giving up for a while. I really want 2008 to be the year of me. I want to get re-acquainted with what I like about myself and whatever it is that other people like about me. Sometimes, it's difficult to see the good in myself. It's far easier to slip into a self-fulfilling prophecy about my being boring, but I know I used to think I was a fun, interesting guy. Sometime back in college probably, but I know I felt that way once. It would be a nice change to get back to feeling like that.

Hmm, what else... Been getting into watching politics even more than I used to, so yay for that. I <3 Hillary.

On an unrelated note, while it is obviously sad that Heath Ledger died, let's try to remember that celebrities are no more valuable human beings than anyone else who dies every day. Let this spur people to vote to get us out of Iraq or something.

Also, go see Persepolis, cause it's amazing. Um, pretty much out of stuff to say right now, but lovely to be back and I'll be sure to post something soon about Mass Effect or something. Digital orgy. Plz.

Random Ramblings and...OMIGOD DRAGONLANCE MOVIE!?

Dearest Journalman,

I know it's been some time since we last spoke. Nay, 'tis been almost four whole months. Four months without my sweet nothings whispered tenderly in your ear. Four months shivering in cold darkness of your lonely, lonely soul with nary a breath of fresh air or a shaft of penetrating sunlight from my brow, which glistens with the sweat of my intellect. Four months, in short, of Hell. I feel your pain, or rather, I caused your pain and thus bask in it, drawing strength from your suffering, O Journalman. O, how I long for the days where I would post in ye once, twice, thrice, sometimes even thrice plus four times a day! Time flies when you're growing up, living in what passes for poverty among the middle class, working retail and then entering the real(ly boring) world of professionalism.

Yet you've been a constant rock, Journalman. The veritable St. Peter of my soul. Never-changing in your affections and unwavering in your steadfast solidarity.

Enough with the buttering up of my inner parliament, and onto the show: Per usual, I lack a topic for the day. It has been suggested by John Barleycorn that I write an entry about the posts I see all the time in the GameFAQ forums, but he ninja'd that one straight out of my cold, dead hands and I am left with nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

I often miss the capacity to spout off quotes in the most obnoxiously erudite manner that I had in college. Time and lack of constantly being exposed to new poetry and novels have taken their toll on me...

On the other hand, who really cares? I'm moving on to new and better things, like my obsession du jour, www.allposters.com. I've spent the majority of my working day ($18/hr!) browsing movie posters on this website, in an attempt to find either a) new movies to netflix or b) movie posters of movies I have seen to put up in my new apartment with Tara and Jason. The best find of the day is clearly this:



I'm not usually one to fall for pulp-y posters and such, but this movie clearly cannot be anything but amazing. I mean, THIS is what Pathfinder should have been. Of course, Viking women (even scantily clad ones) do less for me than a big, sweaty Eomer, but we can't have everything. I can only hope that netflix has this movie and that I can somehow get my trembling hands on it before I'm forced to run around my apartment in rags, brandishing a spatula spear and making Amazon warrior calls, just to get my fix of bad movies. Not to go entirely off topic or anything, but can we all just note that Eomer played Caesar on Xena: Warrior Princess?? That's hot!

I may have to buy Xena on DVD. I know what you're all thinking. There goes Henry A. Tilney again, buying up DVDs of fantasy shows, but come on. Awesome. I wish Lucy Lawless had been in more stuff.

I'm sorry, can we BACK THE FUCK UP! JUST ONE SECOND!

In my IMDB perusal of Lucy Lawless' career, I just saw that she is providing the voice for Goldmoon in the animated feature film Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight! I'm sorry, why did I not know about this!? If this is some sort of internet rumour, and is not real, I will cry. How awesome! and let's look at who they say is going to be doing voices!!!

Michael Rosenbaum - Tanis Half-Elven
Kiefer Sutherland - Raistlin Majere
Lucy Lawless - Goldmoon
Michelle Trachtenberg - Tika

I may die if this actually comes out. I think I'm actually TOO excited to write anything else about it. /end geek rant.

Book clubs

After a grueling couple of months under the strict taskmistress that is Erika, I finished the first (and least difficult to read) selection of our Sexy Book Club (tm), Post Office. As you all know, I have long wanted to be a postal employee, spending my days in long shorts, walking through the bustling city streets to deliver girly mags, manly mags, personal letters and bills, bills, bills to the people. Right. [ir]Regardless, we (me, Jason, Tara, Erika and John Barleycorn) met up at Bukowski's (naturally) for some beer-infused conversation about the life of Chinaski, that raucous drunk who is worlds different from his creator, Charles Bukowski.

The consensus was that Jason and Tara have no taste and Erika, John and I are clearly awesome Literature-types. I kid! But I think more people should have bookclubs, because they arouse a certain sort of controlled anger, which I feel is conducive to building and maintaining strong friendships. At the end of the day, no one hated one another because someone liked Chinaski's ass all covered in geraniums and someone else liked when the book was over because it meant he or she could move on to greener literary pastures.

To follow up drunken screwing, I made an executive decision to read Neverwhere, the first novel by the inimitable Neil Gaiman, who warms my heart and my pants whenever I think of his writings. He has a greater imagination than almost anyone I have encountered either in person or in writing. This may be because he tends to write about fantasy worlds on the cusp of our own, which seem to be such a small step to the side of our reality as to almost seem believable. But I don't want to rant about Neil here; I'll save that for the bookclub.

In other news, life continues on as life tends to do. Not that I want it not to, but you know, it does and that's that. It seems some people whose pseudonyms resemble taco bell have an issue with my old-school MUD name from High School. So! I am changing it. but not to my real name; rather, to the name I could only be so lucky to have.

Love and buttercups,
Henry Tilney

p.s. - What would he have to say about me writing a journal and signing off as him. LOL!