I think I’ll actually hold onto the blog. I’ll continue living in my fantasy world where there are a few people (hopefully that I know) who actually care what I write. I may try to fix this place up a little more. I may even try to make better blogs with better content. Don’t get too excited about that one, though. I still have a strong sense of not caring. Or, maybe I’ll use this as a self-promotion tool. I’m not sure what I would be self promoting, especially since this is sort of my uncensored thoughts blog, but something.

Regardless, semester’s over, I feel like I can finally breathe. After realizing I never had to see people in my group project for class, I felt like a huge weight was lifted from me. I have been happier than I’ve ever been since the semester started. I still have a ton of work that needs to get done such as studying for finals, a homework redo for a class, catching up on some of my German online stuff I fell behind in and finishing up my internship hours, but ya know, I feel much better about it now and in control of my life again. I was hoping this is how things would turn out as opposed to being in a constant state of depression, and it did. Another point for me, and another point away from psychologists.

So now I am going to take all one or two people who still read this blog way back to the first thing that got me into public relations. I was a part of the Area Government on campus. For those who don’t know what that is, it’s an organization that plans social events, handles complaints and builds community in the residence halls. If that doesn’t sound familiar, don’t worry, most people who have lived on campus don’t even know what it is.

Anyways, I had run for vice president after saying how much I hate Area Government when people were trying to get me involved. They told me I should run for office if I hate it that much. So yeah, I did, and I won by a landslide. One of the issues I noticed with Area Government was that they had poor communication, especially in advertising things to residents. Thus I ventured into something that other people seemed to not think about–using Facebook as a tool to advertise what was going on in the residential areas on campus!

It really was brilliant. Before I was event planner, the number that was considered a great attendance to a social event was 20, which was considered really lucky to reach. Well, I was able to pull in an average of 70 people per event. On my second term as VP, I hosted a Halloween party that had easily 150 people in attendance. So yeah, that’s the power of social media in advertising.

Zaknafein, Drizzt's father, being sacrificed to Lolth.

I’ve been in contact with a good friend of mine who is a guitarist/vocalist for an amazing local progressive metal band called Blind Defeat. Currently, he is busy recording material for their upcoming album. However, during that time, I will be hitting the books and paper hard coming up with lyrics for a power metal side project we agreed to work on.

I don’t know if my friend plans to do any lyric writing yet, but so far I have planned out four songs for the album: two that are inspired by a lady interest, but written in complete epic fantasy romance and tragedy, and two that will be inspired by R. A. Salvatore’s The Legend of Drizzt series in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting: one based on the tragedy of Ellifain, a female elf that Drizzt had spared during a drow raid on the surface world, and a five or more movement epic detailing the events in The Dark Elf Trilogy that lead to Drizzt’s betrayal of his evil race and quest to reach the surface world alone. I may write one more song based on the rivalry between Drizzt and Artemis Entreri.

Most of our influences for the album come from the German power metal band Blind Guardian, however I wouldn’t be surprised if we ended up drawing up more progressive influences from bands like Dream Theater and Opeth. We are planning to have strong choruses, powerful vocal leads, and everything else you’d expect out of a fantasy cheese power metal band. In addition to writing lyrics over winter break, I’ll also be working heavily on building my vocals and my trumpet playing. There’s a chance we’ll add an orchestra track to the album, mostly synthesized but with live trumpet recorded.

Regardless, what I feel will really separate us from other fantasy-inspired bands is topic matter. While telling the stories of Drizzt, the lyrics will contain deep topics such as taking control of one’s life, dealing with racism, losing a father and vengeance. The two romance songs I’m planning are going to deal with love (obviously) and dealing with losing a loved one.

I will write more on this as more news arrives.

However, the main story I want to tell is not of the robbery itself, but what came of it. When I first found out, I didn’t know if any of my stuff was taken. I just know my roommate was able to peek her head through my door to see if anything was taken. That was enough for me to know my room had been broken into because my door was locked.

Needless to say, I freaked out. I had no clue what of mine was still there or gone. For all I knew they had swiped everything of value from my room. My computer, Nintendo DS, swords, sound system, numerous CDs, my checkbook, prescription medications and cash. During that time of not knowing, I came to a huge realization.

The only thing I really was scared of being taken from my room was the $120 of cash I had loosely hidden away. I was ready to handle anything else being taken. Why so scared of just $120 of cash as opposed to everything else? Well, I’ve been saving that money up for visiting a very special girl I had met long long ago online. Yes, online. I know it’s pretty messed up to think about dating someone you met online, but trust me, I’ve been trying to kill any feelings I developed for her…for at least four years now.

In that moment with nearly everything of mine gone, I realized she was the thing I value most. It may be a losing battle–she’s in a relationship, after all. Even then, it would still be one hell of a distance. Murfreesboro to Dallas is pretty long distance. However, the robbery made me realize that I need to stop worrying about such nuances. I know my feelings, along with the many questions they raise. The main question being, how do I know I’m not just in love with the idea I’ve built up of her as opposed to her because we’ve never met? Well, I need to go meet her and get those questions answered.

What’s the worst that can come of it, anyway? She’s been one of my greatest friends. I’m not afraid of losing my feelings for her. I know we’ll always be great friends. If it wasn’t for her, I may not have discovered the music I like, and who knows, I may not have been able to make it through some very tough times she was there for. It’s crazy how close you can get to somebody miles away just by playing online games with them and talking on the phone.

Regardless, I’m sick of just dating around. I’ve gotten close to quite a few girls to only find things not working out mostly because I hadn’t gotten over this girl I met online. It’s not fair to those who I have tried dating. That’s one of the big reasons I’ve pretty much remained single for all of college. I need to get these questions answered. It took being robbed to make me realize just how important this is to me.

So yeah. This is one of my most heartfelt posts on here. Why publish it for the world to see? Well, I’m already working on a song dedicated to her that will be recorded in a power metal side project I’ll be working on over the course of next semester, which will be available for anyone online. I’ll blog more on that later.

First of all, their social media manager is not the only contributor to the blogs. Pretty much anyone involved with any aspect of the PS3 posts on there. They also do not just put a blog up and leave it alone. The blog originally launched in June 2007, and since that point, the least active the blog has been was September 2007 with 23 posts that month. The most active the blog has ever been was October 2009 with 104 posts. The bottom line is, they keep it updated.

Another thing they do right is they allow users to rate the blog posts and comment on them. Not only do they allow users to comment their blogs, but they actually will respond to the comments…or at least their social media manager does. Regardless, they don’t lie about who they are. All their posts have their name along with their title in the company with it.

Due to their great upkeep of their blog, the PlayStation blog is one of the top resources that PS3 and PSP owners turn to for news regarding new games, content updates, etc. It’s much easier to go see what it’s all about, so go! Read it! Become addicted and buy a PS3!

A little quick history. Mr. Walrus was created to be sick and twisted humor in the form of children cartoon, but containing parody content similar to that of South Park and Family Guy. It is intentionally over the top content-wise to build the contrast of its childish presentation and actual content matter. It is unintentionally a little like Happy Tree Friends, which debuted around the same time as Mr. Walrus.

Most of the Mr. Walrus content exists in comic form. He started off to exist mostly in a literary format of poems, short stories, et cetera, but most of the originals have been lost.

This story has been unedited and unaltered from its original form in 2002.

By Zero Stralem

© March 15, 2002

CAUTION!
The contents of the story ahead contains very graphic cartoonish-like violence and extremely censored vulgarity. Some of the things described may leave a sense of fear towards anything along the lines of walruses, teddy bears, candy canes, and toiletries. Please refrain from smoking while reading this and keep all hands and feet inside the couch until it has ended. E.S.R.B. has rated the following story “E” for everyone. Have a good one! By the way…Don’t let my mom know about this! She’s more paranoid than Bobby Buchez’s mother in The Waterboy.

It was just another normal day in Tringle Castle. Mr. Walrus and Napolean [the teddy bear] were drinking their beer while watching TV.

“You know what Napolean?”

“What?”

“I feel like killing someone.”

“OK. Lets go!”

It wasn’t long until Mr. Walrus and Napolean came by a hobo on the street. The hobo, who was obviously drunk, looked up to them and said, “Beware the Ides of March!”

Mr. Walrus and Napolean looked at each other greatly confused. Mr. Walrus looked down on him and said, “You’re gonna die you fucking bastard!” With that being said, Mr. Walrus took his candycane staff and…”Gwaag!” <Squish!><Pop!> Gib flew everywhere.

“That little bitch thought he could scare us! You sure showed him!” Napolean exclaimed.

Suddenly a mob of angry hobos jumped out and began throwing pork chops at Mr. Walrus and Napolean. That is when it happened. A strange energy covered Mr. Walrus and his muscles grew bigger, and he grew really pointy hair. He had gone into Super Duper Kick Ass mode! He faced the hobos and released a large amount of cheap beer on them in the form of a beam attack. The hobos all got drunk on the cheap beer and ended up killing themselves.

“Hey Mr. Walrus!”

“What?”

“These damn hobos dropped a letter.”

“Well, what the hell does it say?”

“It says, ‘Bring the walrus and Napolean back to me DEAD. I’ll be waiting in Iraq.
-Sadam Hussein’

They want to fucking kill us!”

“Then why don’t we just go kick his ass?”

“OK! That’s a great idea Mr. Walrus!”

After some hours of travel and binging, Mr. Walrus and Napolean finally arrived in Iraq. Many people jeered the walrus and his companion as they tried to find Sadam, so they just killed them.

Finally, they came to a sign which said “Sadam’s House of Joy.” They went in to find out that it was not Sadam’s quarters, but a prostitution joint. A prostitute went to greet them.

“Hello big guy. You got a nice candycane there…how about 70 bucks?”

“What the hell is your problem bitch?” Mr. Walrus responded. “I don’t want to fucking get crabs!”

So Mr. Walrus stabbed her and blood flew everwhere.

“Hahaha! Good job Mr. Walurs! Now lets find this Sadam bitch!”

At last they found what they thought was Sadam’s house. After searching it, they found a letter in there saying “Hey there! Meet me in the cave!” After coming all this way, Mr. Walrus and Napolean felt broken since there are caves everywhere. Then they found a map leading to it, however, on the back! Their spirts were raised, and they sought out for Sadam.

They came to a very rugged land which seemed to be in the middle of no where. That’s where they saw the cave! Cautiously they entered. As they neared the main chamber, they began to hear strange moaning like sounds. Mr. Walrus turned a corner and–

“Oh my god! Sadam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden are BFing eachother! That’s fucking sick!!!” Mr. Walrus yelled in disgust. He was about to charge in when Osama and Sadam stopped their love making and saw Mr. Walrus and Napolean.

“Ooo! My Taleeban scouts did not kill them!” Osama said in horror.

“Hey relax big guy, lets fuse together so that we may destroy them!” Sadam said to Osama. Then they fused together to form a very disturbing thing. A figure that looked like Sadam except with Osama’s stupid hat on and a long thin beard and slightly trimmer body! It carried an AK-47 (since that’s all they could afford). Sadam Bin Laden acted first and began frantically shooting his weapon at Mr. Walrus. Mr. Walrus swiftly blocked any accurate shots with his candy cane.

Napolean charged at Sadam Bin Laden yelling, “Beware the Ides of March!” He flew by clawing his claws into Sadam Bin Laden. However, Sadam Bin Laden didn’t even twitch! He dropped his AK-47 and threw Napolean into a box. Napolean was knocked out. Mr. Walrus then went into his Super Duper Kick Ass mode. He charged Sadam Bin Laden with his candy cane staff, but it was in vain. Sadam Bin Laden sent Mr. Walrus back into the boxes that Napolean hit. Mr. Walrus was nearly defeated, but something fell into his hands! It was a bottle of his favorite beer!

Mr. Walrus drank the beer and he suddenly became more powerful! His eyes glowed red and Sadam Bin Laden bursted into flames! It ran around hollering, and Mr. Walrus drove his candy cane into Sadam Bin Laden killing him. With that being done, Mr. Walrus and Napolean returned to Tringle Castle to binge in peace. However, when they returned, the Taliban and Iraqi Military blamed the US for the deaths and started a nuclear/biochemical holocaust. It all began on the Ides of March.

The Fucking End

People from the ass cracks of the Earth seem to always want to find some way to bring me down. I have yet to figure why there are always a couple of people wherever I go that, not only hate me, but want to bring me down as much as they possibly can. It’s usually not a big deal. My reputation always precedes me, and the people who do such things become laughing-stocks with, typically, no effort on my part to bring them down. The only times it bothers me is when I let it. Well, some of them found the weakness to getting under my skin–be in a group project with me and accuse me of doing no work. Oh yes, I will take taht as a challenge. Then for every time they raise a voice, no matter how much work I’ve done and they blame their fallings on me (even though they clearly are just being lazy), I take all of that as a challenge.

Unfortunately, I’m the type of person who’d rather just lower my shoulder and plow through rather than get others involved to deal with a situation. So instead of getting a “hey, good job on setting up the client interview,” “hey, good job for teaching yourself DreamWeaver to set up a home page,” “hey, good job keeping the minutes at every meeting,” “awesome work creating a central communication hub for us to get out messages and files to each other,” “thanks for teaching me what each portion of a campaign is because I can’t read my own notes or listen in class,” “great job for solely taking up the presentation part because we all suck at it,” “thanks for scheduling our meetings,” “thanks for picking up our slack and hunting down broken URLs to set up MLA citations we were supposed to do,” “thanks for covering our asses on research reports we aren’t giving to you even though we promised them 48 hours in advanced,” or any thing like that, I get…”You don’t have these two things for us yet? You’re holding US behind! Omg, the world is going to end! We can’t make 2 blank pages in a Word document that can be easily CTRL+C CTRL+Ved into in 5 seconds!!!!” Or I get “I don’t have my stuff done because YOU only tell us every time you see us and only send one or two e-mails out” or “I don’t have that with me because when you said it’s yours and I can only have it for 3 days, it’s YOUR responsibility to get it back to yourself.” Whenever they don’t have things, I tell them it’s alright and sit down to work something out to keep moving forward. I never accuse them. Then they call me childish and unprofessional…Yeah, I’m glad they’re attacking me on my strengths that have been proved time and time over in the Journalism department. Not to mention, I won’t give any names, at least one of the members of my group is apparently reknowned for poor work ethic.

I’ve never worked with such an immature bunch in my life. Don’t worry, I’m about to get to the positives.

And now for the fun part–why I am not holding my head low despite this previously crappy semester. I believe everything is a state of mind. I keep myself generally positive and try not to push my problems onto other people. I prefer to sit down, meditate, and heavily focus on the issues at hand. Then once they’re resolved in my mind, forget about them and move on. I’m doing just that next semester, which should be my last semester in school. If everything falls together right, I will have no classes on Thursdays or Fridays!

Yes, I’m finally going to have the time I wish to devote to extracurricular activities and job hunting. Not to mention, I will be taking the Wine Appreciation course (once my POD goes through, anyways). I’m really looking forward to that class because I love cooking and pairing my foods with the proper wine. I also like to host small get togethers, and having the right kind of wine always adds to the atmosphere.

Also, back to the state of mind comment, kitties make me happy. I love kitties. I want a kitty really really bad. When I was younger, I always told myself all my life issues would be solved once I had a girlfriend. Well, before even getting to that stage in a relationship with a girl, I realized how wrong I was. Girls cause issues even before a relationship! And they always need to complicate everything.

But then there are kitties. Kitties are lovable, adorable, cuddly and ninja-esque. Once you’ve shown you deserve their respect, they will respect you and purr up a storm. Yes, I’ve tamed some of the meanest of cats. Some of my friends refer to me as “The Cat Whisperer.” Now, don’t expect me to come to your home and tame your mean cat for you…All I can do is make a cat like me, not anyone else. You must get down on their level and think like them. I’m good at this because I myself am a ninja, and ninjas contain many feline traits.

In my opinion, this is a very effective marketing ploy. According to this snappy little ezine article (no, I did not verify if it’s a credible Web site. Refer to an article on “If it’s on the internet, it must be true“), 39% of all gamers are women. Historically, that demographic has been largely ignored by major gaming companies.

However, marketing to the more attractive members of the gaming community is only part of the purpose of Sony’s latest campaign. Sony also is getting the word out about their lowered price tag on the formerly unaffordable system to $299.

And hey, that’s not too shabby considering the PS3 only does everything! Yes, the third part of their campaign. I’d like to elaborate on this point of their ad campaign. I own a PS3, it freaking does everything. I hook up an external hard drive, I can watch the movies and music stored on it! I put in data discs, they work! The DVD upscaling works beautifully, and the BluRay player on it is one of the top in the markets. PS3 has become one of my central hubs for music, actually. I mean, you can just hook things up to it and it’ll recognize the music and play it. I also will use the web browser to load my Pandora radio stations and listen to them through our ghettoed out sound system for the TV. I haven’t run into any compatibility issues yet.

Oh, I also tried to have my PS3 cook for me. Sadly it didn’t work very well. Despite the fact it looks like a George Foreman grill, that’s one thing it can’t do. But you can use the web browser to find recipes!

Grade expected is usually the first field I look at on a Web site. For one of my classes, there was only one person who reviewed that professor for that specific class. The grade he was expecting was a C+. So, I’m thinking…crap, this is going to be a hard class, terrible professor. But then I decided to read on. I mean, the guy did have a 2.9 GPA, so maybe a C+ isn’t such a bad thing for the guy. Anyways, I read on to the comments/suggestions section and read this: “This guy is the MAN!!!! He is a genius. Any question you ask he doesnt even have to think to tell you. and hes a young teacher and seems like a student teacher, but hes very professional. ONE OF THE BEST!!!”

Apparently I’m in for a pretty good semester. And even if the class is hard, maybe I’ll still find it fun. I’m not looking forward to it too much. It’s a databasing class. I hate databasing. I guess it’s useful, even possibly in my field of PR, but it’s just a lot of tedious work. Also, my history in database oriented classes consists of professors who tell you to do something but give little guidance on how or what to do. After said assignment, they wouldn’t go over it either. So yeah, learning has been pretty nonexistent. Sometimes I wonder why I’m paying for “education.”

I load it up. First of all, it requires a GeForce 6600 or higher graphics card. That’s ridiculous because the graphics aren’t even that good. I got this computer with a GeForce 5500 FX about five years ago and used it for playing games like Doom 3 and Half-Life 2. The graphics are extremely choppy in here, the interface is laughable. It forces you to use arrow keys to navigate. Sorry, no using the standard WASD navigation! Hell, you can’t even click where you want to walk and watch your character walk to that area. What game with an engine like this doesn’t have that feature? Well, Second Life doesn’t.

As for what my character can do, I don’t know. Here’s how the game works for me. I hold forward, watch nothing happen, release it, watch nothing happen, then watch my character take some steps forward. It’s pretty god awful.  I want nothing to do with this poorly packaged crap with terrible netcoding.  I’m just going to drop the picture of my avatar, Zero Drachnyd, somewhere around here. It probably won’t look good. I hope it doesn’t look good. That’ll give more testament to how horrible Second Life is. Also, I’m pretty sure that early on in jumping in, a “girl” was already trying to hit on me. That made me respect the community of this “game” all the less. The game is horrible. Don’t play it. Stay far, far away from it.