First post

OK, so I had an old blog over at blogger but I decided to move it over here since I have my YA lit blog (and someday sci-fi blog) at wordpress.  So here I will write down my observations and ruminations on the fine art of knitting.  And sometimes I might post pictures.  So if you’re not a knitter or one of my friends (or even if you are) this will probably be boring as hale but otherwise, um, enjoy.  I guess.

Slayer/World Painted Blood

Formed in 1981, Slayer are an Extreme Metal band from California. Considered to be one of the “Big 4″ of Thrash/Speed Metal bands alongside Metallica, Anthrax and Megadeth, the band has dealt with a wide variety of subjects including serial killers, Satanism, Religion and warfare. The band is a 2 time Grammy Award winning band, and this release [the band's 11th], was issued in Nov. 2009.

World Painted Blood—-Beginning in a rather plodding, dirge manner with lots of added soundbites and odd noises, the song does not take long to enter the fray and blast of your forehead. The sound is less deep than the last release, the vocal is clearer and more down to earth. The pace of the song remains frentic….faster than I can move my fingers across the keyboard. The lyrical content is as dark and dense as you require…a good kick off.

Unit 731—-Grasping ahold of the more brutal pace that the last track seemed to lack, the song is violent in feel and a freakin’ free for all. The voice seems a little misplaced to me…like the passion is not quite as intense…..to me, compared to some of the Norwegian Metal bands I love, this is rather mild and sits well next to modern-day Megadeth.

Snuff—-Brutality from the onset….the guitars are in your face and the pace of the song is really incredible. It kills me that so many words can fit into a single sentence, but Slayer never lets you down. I would prefer the vocal to be a bit deeper, but I think that is just personal taste. All in all, this is standout…love it!!! And the lyrics…you have to read them to appreciate them!!!

Beauty Through Order—-For the song title alone, the song gets an automatic thumbs up….me being one of those anal retentive compulsively orderly people…you have to love it!!! The entire mood of the song is formed by the brutality of the lyrics that even after all of these years still manages to surprise and moderately surprise. The music is slower and really deep in sound, the song is driven by the voice and the evil word pukes into your headphones….this is freakin’ classic. A rant that includes death, mayhem and God can’t be wrong!!!

Hate Worldwide—-Moving at a much faster pace, this song really drives you to lose control. The chorus is a huge affair that will make you crazy…the words are spews of hate and distaste that makes you question your own beliefs…..the true message is a current look at the world we live in he outer edges of the shiny photographs of life we all wished we lived in…this is real and frightening. Slayer remain masters.

Public Display Of Dismemberment—-What a great title!!!! The music is relentless….better than Cannibal Corpse in recent years. This is dark…electric…full of dirge and moving all at the same time at an incredible pace. This is not to be missed. The downshift of the music in the middle of the song gives it that classic Slayer sound of older recordings…this is incredible…you will love this…I said so!!!

Human Strain—-Really dense in sound, the song never really breaks any new ground. Of course, that is what we all live for. I wish the sound of the song had just a tad bit more treble added in the studio, but that is just me…the musical breaks are nice and show diversity…this makes me smile…the band speaks of a future retirement…this just shows the enduring quality of the music they are making.

Americon—-Sounding much more current and clearer in sound, the voice is up front in the mix and you catch some nice clear vocals. The song reminds me..almost…of the classic days of Marilyn Manson….he could have really pulled off this song. The drums seem really up front…they get in and repel from your forehead….this is really favorite of mine.

Psychopathy Red—-Brutal from the very first note, this song travels at an incredible pace. The frantic pace of the music will leave you excited, in awe and lying on a heap on the floor by the end. This is pure brutality and the finest the band has issued in quite some time. The down shift of the nmusic…allowing the bass to come up front, and then the guitar…the structure is awesome…don’t miss this.

Playing With Dolls—-Odd from the onset, the lyrics of this very clear and concise song leaves visions in your head best not pondered on. Not as laughable as Cannibal Corpse, that is the precise thing that makes the song scary. The lyrics and the delivery are from a band that has mastered the dark and unnerving undersides of life that exist more than we would like to admit. This is great!!!!

Not Of This God—-Much more traditional Thrash Metal, the song begins from the very first note. The lyrics are shoved inside each bar at an amazing pace and the lead guitars are allowed to soar and shine. A classic Slayer tirade against religion, the song never loses its pace or intensity despite the drum interlude and the shiny delivery of a nice bass solo. Fantastic!!!

**** out of 5

Dragon Age review

Dragon Age Origins is out now, and much like I had hoped, it’s RPG gold once again from Bioware. I was cautiously optimistic about the game going in, and had avoided digging too deep into the pre-release hype, really only setting up a character with the free character creator and playing Dragon Age Journeys to get some more backstory. I’m about 5-6 hours in as of this writing, and I’ll warn you now that the below can be summed up as just me repeating ‘that was awesome’ over and over.

First thing I want to mention is my experience with Direct2Drive and my preorder. As readers here know I’m a huge D2D fan (and greatly prefer it over Steam), and their execution for Dragon Age was spot on for me. I was able to pre-download it a few days ago, and thanks to their online countdown widget, I knew exactly when the activation key was being release to allow you to install and play the game. I got the key promptly, the install went smoothly, and in less time than it would have taken me to even put the physical DVD in, I was installed and ready to go. Very happy with this experience overall, as I usually am anytime I’m dealing with D2D.

I was able to fire up the game, download all the pre-order, special edition, and DA Journeys content after logging in to my EA account, get my pre-generated character loaded, and start playing. Just as with D2D, everything here was flawless, and really set the tone of an extremely polished and well thought-out execution. Hats off to Bioware and EA (yes, good job EA).

It took only a few minutes in-game to make me realize I’m playing 3D Baulders Gate, and I mean that as the highest compliment. It really was a ‘holy shit’ moment too, as I had to blink, stop, and just marvel at the fact that in 2009, with a gorgeous game on my screen, I really was looking at Baulders Gate. The adrenaline was flowing at this point as highlights of Baulders Gate flashed in my mind and I could only begin to speculate what Dragon Age was going to offer. Yes, I was hyping Dragon Age in my mind to an almost unfair level after only having played it for about five minutes, but so far it’s lived up to all of it and more.

I have a rather high-end system (especially now thanks to the 295GTX), and the game picked up on this and defaulted the settings to the highest level, which I’ve left as is and not tinkered with. At this setting, the game is just flat-out beautiful. Characters look amazingly real while somehow avoiding the uncanny valley, great details fill every shot, and the animations are both epic and fitting in combat. The engine is this amazing mix of hack-and-slash LOOKING action will PLAYING exactly like a slower-paced, pause-at-any-time, tactical RPG. It really is the best of both worlds here, and an amazing accomplishment for Bioware. The sound, voice acting, and music are all top-notch as well. I’ve had zero crashes or errors in the 5-6 hours I’ve played, which is just fantastic for keeping you in-game and focused on the story.

Gameplay is Baulders Gate. You have a party of four you can switch control of at will, pause at any time, and highlight interactive objects with the tab key. You have a hotbar for character skills and items, there is poison/trap/potion crafting, and your party members will gain/lose respect for you depending on your actions. You loot barrels/chests/sacks, you slay monsters, you talk to NPCs using dialog options, etc. Dragon Age has all the ‘basics’ you would expect, perfectly executed so that they become second-nature within the first hour or so of gameplay. So far nothing feels like it’s missing, and there is nothing that sticks out and makes me wish it was different. This is exactly how I expect a ‘traditional’ RPG to play.

One aspect that brought a huge smile to my face was when I lost an early encounter because I just stumbled into it and got overconfident, and then got defeated again when I went into it with a poorly thought out plan. Dragon Age is no push-over on Normal difficulty, and rewards smart strategy well. The first ‘boss’ encounter took me a few tries before I was successful, and that ultimately made the victory that much sweeter (not to mention watching the jaw-dropping ‘finishing move’ that happens without any loading or switching from the in-game engine. You don’t have a pulse if after watching that the game does not leave you impressed)

The story/setting so far has been very solid. I was half-expecting a Witcher-like world due to the mature rating, but Dragon Age is more NWN/BG-harsh than Witcher-harsh, think PG-13 rather than R. Which is not to say it’s all fairies and rainbows, it’s not, but it has so far lacked that very gritty tension that the Witcher had with it’s theme of racial prejudice and true ‘no right answer’ options, where most choices resulted in something bad happening, with the choice usually being ‘to who’. The Witcher really made me stop and think about some of decisions you had to make, and while the choices in Dragon Age are not always the clear-cut good/neutral/funny (there is never a true evil option) of NWN, I do wish they were a bit tougher/grayer at times. That aside, the story so far has been very interesting and well executed, while moving along at a good pace.

Obviously, I highly recommend Dragon Age to anyone with even a slight RPG interest, as so far it’s played as just one of those games that’s head and shoulders above the norm. I write this while sitting here excited to get back into it, and baring a complete 180 at some point, Dragon Age should put itself among the top RPGs I’ve ever played.

The Plan Keeps Coming Up Again

I have a plan.

For the entire month of November I am going on a diet, which I have made up myself.  Because I don’t care to follow diets made up by random people I don’t know.  This one’s for me.

I tried it out for a week last month, and it was kinda hard, even for a week.  But I’m going to stick to it.  So far (all three days) it’s been going all right.

Here’s what I came up with.

Meal 1: Cereal

Meal 2: Yogurt

Meal 3: Soup, Sandwich or Salad

Meal 4: Fruit

Meal 5: Whatever (within reason)

Rules: 1) Meals can be in any order  2) I reserve the right to substitute lunch with leftovers so I don’t waste food (because food wasting is bad!)  3) It is required to drink at least 5 glasses of water per day 4) Diet soda and ice tea are allowed

That’s all I can come up with right now.  I’ll let you know how it goes at the end of the month.

I’d also like to start some sort of exercise routine but it’s hard trying to decide what will fit into my schedule in the long run.  The only exercise I really enjoy enough to stick with is yoga.  Right now, I could start going back to my gym for yoga class, but the time is so inconvenient.  The gym is on my way home from work which would be great if the class didn’t start at 7:30 pm.  I’m not staying at work that late.  That’s just craziness.  4 pm and I’m outta there.  And when I get home… it’s just so hard  SO HARD to go out again.  And then there’s Matt.  Now that I’m home during the week, I get to spend more time with him.  I don’t want to waste that time by driving half an hour just to go to yoga class and back.

I know, I know.  Excuses excuses.  I have a couple other options.  A new yoga class just started up at my apartment complex.  I could try that for now, at least until next semester at school starts and my schedule changes again.  There’s also $5 yoga at a studio right down the street from my office.  The time’s a bit inconvenient for that too, but I might try to work something out.

In other news, I’m participating in the month long writingfest otherwise known as NaNoWriMo.  And I haven’t written one speck of a novel yet.  Ok, that’s a lie.  I wrote a little bit last month because I was inspired for some reason.  But it seems that inspiration went out the window with the end of October, or the end of the field season in which I spent many hours on the road dreaming up what I’d write in aforementioned novel.  Thoughts, however, are no good unless I write them down.  I really need to kick it up a notch.

Not tonight, though.  Tonight I have to eat dinner and watch Dancing With the Stars with one very good-lookin guy.

My passing encounter with Charlie

I know that a lot of people mind this end to Daylight Savings Time. I’m not one of them. I enjoy driving to work in the morning sunshine. But I especially enjoy coming home in the dark. I love the cold air as I leave work, the stars coming out (Or the sun setting if I’m so lucky!), the streetlights shining my way home. I especially love the warm glow of the light in the windows. I love to catch a glimpse of a family. (not a peeping tom, just a passing glimpse as I drive by). Of course, my favorite home to view is my own, looking inviting as ever to me, the warmth waiting for me.
Yeah, I love that.
~~
Today after work, I stopped at the grocery store on the way home. The lights there just remind me that I need to open my wallet, but that is not part of this story.
As I left my car, I noticed a man putting flyers under the windshield wipers of all of the cars. I immediately got kind of pissy to myself. You know, snobby about it, judgemental, thinking perhaps he is promoting some new weirdo church that worships a holy goat or something. He was very friendly as I walked past him, furthering my notion that he IS the minister to the goat. He was, in fact a good looking middle aged man but I did not give it another thought as I rushed past him into the store.
My bag full of my purchases, I noticed the flyer under my windshield wiper. I was suprised to see the heading: HANDYMAN. Hmm. I guess Mr. Handsome was not His Holy Goatness. He was a regular guy trying to work in a tough economy. His list was quite extensive. He is a licensed air conditioning and oil and gas technician. He could do emergency heat calls, furnace repairs, he would cut your lawn, clean up your yard, trim your trees, landscape your property, clean your gutters, seal your driveway, do general household repairs, painting and odd jobs. He would even plow your snow. All for the asking.
I climbed in my car, reading that flyer, feeling a bit bad for my judgement call, feeling a WHOLE lot lucky for my job and paycheck.
Well, if you live in my area and are interested in a kind of cute handyman that is a self motivator, call Charlie at 978 290 3613. Tell him you got his number from a friend who shops at Shaw’s.

God jul

Blåste nesten bort på vei hjem fra jobb siden Bergen har bestemt seg for at det ikke bare skal regne konstant, men også være storm. Slikt gjør underverker både for sminke og humør merker jeg…

Heldigvis hadde jeg fått århundrets pakke i posten da jeg kom hjem, og endelig kan julen begynne. Du skjønner det at julen begynner ca samtidig som man mottar årets jule-CD fra verdens fineste Elin, så siden den kom i dag ER det jul. HURRA!!! Nå skal jeg plage hybel-dyrene med både den engelske og den norske jule-CD`n sånn ca konstant. Livet er herlig!

November

I helgen har jag levt lantliv på Värmdö hos Linas bror och räfsat löv så att jag har träningsvärk. Sov som en stock inatt så den friska luften och motionen var nog precis vad min kropp behövde. Dessutom fick jag utlopp för min humor när vi sjöng låtar om löv. “If you leave me now…”

Idag blir det jobb med Bellas och mitt projekt. Det blir en kul men tuff dag och jag hoppas på minst 7 stycken “där satt den”.

På onsdag hör ni förresten en dokumentär jag har gjort i Christer i P3.