Once again, I must offer more apologies. Due to a hectic schedule, I will not be posting again. In fact, the prospect is looking very grim for about a week or so. I start classes again this Tuesday, so I am incredibly busy preparing for that. Try to cope as best you can readers.

Rather busy today, so there will be no post. Instead, I give you another one of my favorite LOLcats.

I forgot my belt yesterday. I did, however,remember to bring an orange for a mid-afternoon snack. It sure was tasty, Imight add. Anyway, I did not realize I had forgotten my belt until after Iarrived at work. Suddenly, I felt like I was naked (and very unbusinesslike),so I did what any man would naturally do. I asked my buddy / coworker if I couldborrow his belt when he left for the day. He said "sure" and we hadan accord. A little later, but before the switch, we were both talking with afemale coworker / boss and my buddy mentioned nonchalantly that I was going toborrow his belt. From the look on her face, we may as well have been performinga ritualistic kitten sacrifice in the middle of the floor. She seemed horrifiedby the idea and said that, so long as the pants don't drop down to my knees(a.k.a. "gangsta" style), I don't need to borrow his belt. I don'tsee what the big deal is. I mean, it's not like socks or underwear that comesin direct contact with our filthy skin. It's a belt that stays safely on theoutside of the body. Maybe she knows something about my coworker that I don't. Does he beat his children with that belt? I doubt it, or there would likely be more stains on it. Either way, it's just a belt, and what I don't know will not hurt me. Now then, I would like to ask the rather sizable femaleproportion of my readership whether this was a confined incident, or whether itis a more gender-wide issue.

Picture hardly related, but I sure think it's funny.

Here is what I am watching this current anime season, listed
in order of priority.

Spice and Wolf
(Genre: adventure)

Ass, gas, or grass; nobody rides for free

This is a story about a traveling merchant and the wolf god he
finds huddled up in his cart. I'm sure there's more to the story, but I've only
seen the first episode thus far, so that's all I can say. I have read a few
chapters of the manga, and it looks fantastic, so this one earns the top spot
this season. I'm no furry, but even I will admit that Horo, the female lead, is
adorable. It must be the ears.

True Tears
(Genre: drama)

Somebody was staring at the girl's track team a little too intently

What do you get when you combine a helpful guy, a socially
outcast tree-sitter, and a girl who lost her parents? While I would love to say
you get a harem-comedy, that is not the case with True Tears. It's a drama surrounding the characters and how they
handle their issues. I have no idea why this cliché story structure is so
entertaining, but darn if they don't pull it off somehow.

H2O - footprints in the sand
(Genre: drama)

Blind guys have natural pimpin' canes

This one isn't quite as dramatic as the above True Tears, but it's close. It follows
the once blind protagonist as he uses his newly discovered sight to try and
help the girls around him. It also features one of the most messed up school
settings since Akira. Seriously, it's
hard to believe that there can be a student body that screwed up.

Rosario + Vampire
(Genre: fan service romantic-comedy)

Where have I seen this before?

I will not attempt to define fan service, but I'll know it
when I see it. Needless to say, if anyone asks you to define it, you can point
them to Rosario + Vampire as a
reference. Everything from frequent pantsu
shots to unnatural breast physics is present. Still, beneath all of the smut is
a generic romantic-comedy between a vampire, a succubus, and an ordinary human
caught in a school for monsters. Y'know, you're usual anime setup.

The carry over from
last season:
Clannad
(Genre: I don't even know anymore)

Kimi-kiss ~ pure rouge
(Genre: romantic-comedy)

Shakugan no Shana II
(Genre: action)

Note to self:
Check oil.

(What? It's my blog. I can make a note to myself if I want to. Here, if you really want something, have a YouTube video.)

So, I got to see I Am
Legend the other day...

Spoiler alert!

Condensed review:
It was mediocre.

Full review:
I had such high hopes for I Am Legend. I have the book and thought it was average. I set my
hopes up that the movie will be one of those few that prove better than the
book (the only other I can think of is Forrest
Gump). Unfortunately, the movie fell short and ended up being about as good
as the book. It actually turned out to be a radical departure from the book. While
the book dealt with more intelligent vampiric enemies, the movie seemed to teem
more with relatively dimwitted zombie-like enemies. They both had that great
last-man-on-Earth scenario, which I think is great, but they just presented it
differently. With that I shall stop mentioning the book and focus on the movie.
The movie was fun, but it ultimately fell short in all of
the areas that it tried to excel in. While there were a few startling moments,
it was not a very scary movie. While it tried to slide in a lot of dramatic
scenes, they ultimately seemed boring. While it tried to make you feel sad for
Robert, you never (or, at least, I never) get very attached to him. What it did
exceed in doing is make it feel like New York was completely dead. The scenery was
fantastic, and it reminds me to make a note on my calendar to watch Life After People on the History Channel
on the 21st. Anyway, to make the movie just a little worse, it left
a lot of loose ends untied by the film's finale. It especially did not explain
how the virus worked and spread very well. It gave you all the necessaries,
like how it was contagious airborne or tactile, but it left so many things
unanswered. I also did not like the whole "God told me" premise. I
felt that was incredibly cheap and unrealistic. I did, however, love the
ending. The hero needs to sacrifice himself more often.
Would I recommend the movie? Not really. To be honest, I'm
rather depressed I passed up another opportunity to see Charlie Wilson's War. Well, I have tomorrow off as well, so we
shall see what happens then.

And now for something completely different...

The faithful Ye Olde Anime DVD Shoppe that I live near
is, unfortunately, closing its doors. To leave on a high note, however, they
are holding a twenty-five percent off sale on all of their merchandise. I took
full advantage of this to pick up the first two DVDs for Rozen Maiden, the first 009-1, and the last Utawarerumono.
There's a bright side to everything, but sadly I have to start buying my anime
from the only other store in the area that sells the stuff... Best Buy. While I
do love them, they are not known for their anime collection.

I had a very peculiar dream last night. It
involved two things: an ostrich and logistics. You see, for reasons that were
not made clear to me during the dream, I was riding an ostrich to work in DC. I
should point out now that, while I do live near DC, I have never actually
worked there. The only thing I can imagine is that there was either some
unscheduled meeting at the capital building or I am several years older and
have a better job. Anyway, back to the ostrich, I was taking several of the
smaller back roads and just casually riding along. At one point, there was some
construction going on in my lane, so I had to slow down and ride on the
shoulder for a little while, but it was otherwise uneventful. Near the end of
my dream my ostrich was starting to slow down and get sluggish. Obviously, I knew
that adding some oil would not be effective for an ostrich, so that's when my
brain began thinking. Unfortunately, I don't think very clearly when I'm
dreaming, but this one seemed to make sense. My ostrich was probably getting
thirsty. I'm guessing my ostrich was some sort of diva since all I could think
of giving it was Evian. I, personally, don't like Evian, so it had to be for
the bird. I didn't have any Evian with me, so I was saying to the ostrich that
it would have to wait until we stopped in Washington. After that, I looked back
up to the road and wondered if I could make my ostrich amphibious if I tied on
some floats. It was at this thought that I awoke. This is the first time that I
can remember waking up not out of fear but out of stupidity.

1. I am always paranoid that I left the lights of my car on. There are not many things that I am afraid of, but this one tends to worry me more often than not. I am always worried about the lights on my car, and that when I get back to my car after school or work I will find a dead battery. Even if I know for sure I turned them off, my mind always repeats the same "well, am I really sure." I don't really know why. During my entire driving career, I have only left my lights on twice. It's a completely unfounded and almost obsessive fear that is probably going to be stuck with me the rest of my life.

2. My first Harry Potter book was actually a gift from my school teachers. This is one of those nice things that teachers are occasionally capable of doing. I wasn't much of a teacher's pet. I was just smart, so I guess the teachers doted on me. At the time, my parents were going through a divorce, and I believe it was around the time I got hit by a car and broke my arm (long story that's not particularly interesting). Everyone seemed really concerned about me when my parents were getting the divorce, but I can't imagine why. It was just one of those things. Still, I got a great book out of it, so maybe I should start working on getting my stepmom a divorce (I'm kidding, geez).

3. My favorite pizza topping is mushroom and onion. If I can only have one topping, I would pick onion, but I like it best when they're together. For the longest time, I did not like anything on my pizza, and for some pizza joints that is still my preference. However, about a year ago, my dad and I went to a local pizza place and ordered a pie with mushroom and onion, and I loved it. Mmm... I'm thinking about having one of those for dinner tonight.

4. I don't know how to study. Seriously, everything I ever learn just goes straight to my head. I have never once needed to study. As a result, whenever I do have a huge test coming up, I can take out my notes, books, flashcards, whatever, and not be capable of using them at all. I can just stare at them, but nothing sinks in. It may be handy, but it's troublesome when I take online classes which require studying.

5. I hate and love being an introvert. I like being introverted because it allows me to spend days by myself and have it not faze me. I hate it because I just cannot start a conversation when I am with people. I'm probably going to be single forever. Sigh... (editor: insert sad face emoticon here)

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

Where I work, I have the privilege to look at
several handwritten forms a day. To make that more entertaining, I get to
actually sit down and speak with the people who filled them out. This is
usually uneventful. However, sometimes I have to ask for clarification on some
of the blocks, which leads about seven out of ten to comment on how they have
bad handwriting. For a large percentage of that percentage, their handwriting
is fine and they are just being modest. The problem wasn't with their
handwriting, but the data they put in. For example, an e-mail address is not a
satisfactory substitute for your first name. It just isn't. I don't care how
bad your handwriting is. There are those few, however, that have dreadful
handwriting and admit to it. The worst part is that they are already near
retirement age, so they have been living their life fully aware that nobody can
decipher their hieroglyphics. This is amazing. They have done nothing during
their life to improve their handwriting. Then, of course, there are those
people who have terrible handwriting but do not admit to it. They are stuck in
the mindset that since they can read their writing, everyone else should be
able to, including those that cannot, technically, understand English. They
even have the audacity to get angry at me about it. I ask them to translate
their mysterious pictograms, and they get huffy as if it is totally obvious. I'm
supposed to know that something that looks more like several apostrophes and
right parentheses is supposed to say "Joseph" with unerring accuracy.
That's not the worst part. The worst part is when the customer leaves in a huff
and I get a poor customer service review on my quarterly because I could not
read somebody's writing. I lose more and more faith in humanity with each
passing day.

Every now and then, during the course of a somewhat normal conversation, the
question of life’s meaning comes up. This is a fun question because it gives me
the ability to be silly without even trying. You see, it’s a loaded question.
There is no “serious” answer to it. Here are some of my favorite answers. “What
is the meaning of life?”

“Nothing” – It should be noted that an anagram of "the meaning
of life" is "the fine game of nil". This is one of my absolute
favorites, and it’s probably the most likely to be true. Most people don’t like
hearing this one. It’s funny because they don’t believe me. It’s as if they
have some proof that there is no possibility in this one. It should be noted
now that most all of my answers are equally likely.

“To create plastic” – I actually did a post on this one a while back.
This one requires the belief in some sort of active involvement in our being,
intelligent design or otherwise.  The planet desperately wanted a nice,
thick layer of plastic, so we were created to make it all. Remember, equally
valid!

“To serve God” – Ha ha. I’m just kidding. I’ve never actually said
this one.
“The further spread of life” – I use this one sometimes, but I think
it’s a silly answer (ask a silly question…). It’s like saying the meaning of tides
is to erode the coastline. It’s redundant and would happen anyway, regardless
of whether it’s a grand purpose or not.

“To make the universe more entertaining” – This is, hands down, my
favorite answer. The ultimate meaning of life is the make this universe just
more fun. Sure, stars exploding and asteroid impacts are all well and good, but
human beings sending out ancient radio signals of Chubby Checker makes the
universe a more “rocking” place.

“Search for the meaning of 42” – Douglas Adams really made quite the
conundrum in his famous sci-fi books regarding the number 42. Apparently it’s
the answer to life, the universe, and everything. That’s great for an answer,
but it lacks a question. Perhaps life’s meaning is to figure this one out.

“Destroy the planet” – The ultimate pessimistic
answer. If you pay attention to the news, this one is starting to seem more and
more plausible.