This is what happens when I try too hard:

You Complete Me.

I didn't make this, but I love it nonetheless.

L'amour est dans l'air...

Today is VALENTINES DAY which means that everyone who is in a relationship should DO NOTHING EXCEPT TALK ABOUT HOW MUCH THEY LOVE THEIR SIGNIFICANT OTHER and everyone who is single can't do anything except BITCH ABOUT HOW MUCH VALENTINE'S DAY SUCKS. Those are the rules.

But I actually like Valentine's Day. I don't know why, really. I mean, honestly, it's no different than any other day except with more chocolate. Maybe that's why I like it, the chocolate. But regardless, I don't mind it. And I don't see the point in bitching about "how much it sucks" or how "it's nothing but a gimmick to try to market love" and such. It's just a day and if it sucks it's YOUR FAULT, not the holiday's. People need to learn to enjoy themselves.

Which is what I've been doing these past few days. Because it is Mardi Gras! So I've been partying and parading. I walked alongside a float in the MOJ parade on Friday, and I played my trombone in the KOMM parade. Luckily, I don't think I'll be conned into participating in any more parades, so I can just relax and watch the ones coming up. It'll be fun.


Speaking of relaxing and having fun, I'm going to Ben's tomorrow. With the gang. It'll be awesome. I mean, -technically- they have school, but the school board is dumb (for more reasons than just this) so pretty much everybody is skipping anyway. So, yeah, tomorrow is Ben's and then another game night at Macey's. Hurray!


Also, I went to the movies today with Emily, Jen, and Sara. Saw Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, which is apparently based off of a book that I've never heard of. My thoughts on the movie:
Enjoyable and entertaining, but it suffers in terms of characters, I think. Well, the main character. The biggest flaw of the movie was that Percy, who JUST FOUND OUT TWO DAYS AGO that he's a Demi-God (Spoilers?) is kicking the ass of people who have been training ALL OF THEIR LIVES. The second he's introduced to people, he's put up on a pedestal when that shouldn't be happening. It really took away from the immersion, I thought, because instead of getting into it and really enjoying the film, I was caught up in the scepticism. Overall, I'd give it a 7/10.

And that's about it, really. Have a good Valentine's Day, I suppose.



-David

Pokémon

So, they've confirmed that a fifth generation of Pokémon games are on the way, and have posted pictures of the first Pokémon from Gen V:



That's Zorua on the left, which evolves to Zoroark on the right.

First of all, I think that's pretty badass. On February 7th, they showed a silhouette of Zoroark (I love this name, by the way- it's right on par with some of the genius names they usually have. More on this in a sec.) and I managed to accurately predict that it would be a Fox and that it would be Dark type.
Which is where the name comes from. "Zorro" is Spanish for fox, and the "ark" at the end of his name likely comes from the word "Dark." Thus, he's a dark fox. Fairly creative, I'm impressed. Although, the creators of Pokémon don't get nearly as much credit as they deserve.


Which brings me to my next point: the social stigma of teenagers (and older) playing Pokémon games, when they're clearly marketed to kids. I don't know how many times I've gotten a "Aren't you a bit old to play Pokémon?" or "Yeah, I played Pokémon when I was a kid, but I play games for my age group now. I've grown up." comment from someone, and I find it amazing how incredibly stupid these comments are.

As a comparison, I'll use Disney.


As you can see, pretty much anything you can say about Disney applies to Pokémon.

I mean, the Pokémon games have the exterior of friendship and love, but if you look past that godawful message and ignore the stupid (lack of a) plot, Pokémon is one of the most extensive and in-depth competitive RPGs in existence.

I link you to sites such as Smogon, The Libelldra Forge, and Shoddy Battle as examples of how large the competitive Pokémon community is. The mechanics of the games are extremely complex and the metagame is constantly changing. It's a game of prediction and skill, kind of like chess but more difficult. Like Disney, if you look past the kiddy façade, there is a ton of stuff made just for older gamers.

And then you have the purists, who believe that the designs for the newer Pokémon are getting more and more lazy and uninspired. I can't help but to disagree there as well- the original 151 have more lazy, lackluster, and uninspired Pokémon than any other generation. I'll give you a sample of a debate I was in earlier today:

In each newer generation of pokemon, the pokemon are always lamer and less-creative than the previous generation. so i'm kind of scared to see what they come up with this time considering they started to make pokemon out of inanimate objects in the 4th generation.

To which I replied

That simply isn't true.

For one, they've had Pokemon based off of inanimate objects in 1st Gen (Voltorb, Electrode, Magnemite, Magneton, Grimer, Muk, Porygon) and the first gen was extremely uninspired and lazy (Seel/Dewgong and Jigglypuff/Wigglytuff are some of the most uninspired Pokemon I've seen; Diglett -> Dugtrio is lazy, along with Magnemite -> Magneton, Grimer -> Muk, Voltorb -> Electrode, Poliwag -> Poliwhirl -> Poliwrath are all examples of laziness in designing evolutions for the original Pokemon.)

Also, the simplistic nature of the first gen is something that simply doesn't exist in a natural setting- the newer Pokemon are much more detailed and defined.... See more

And that's just in the first gen. There are good and bad Pokemon in each Gen, but if you look at it objectively, you have to see that the first gen was the worst. Each subsequent game improves the gameplay mechanics and the concepts. Take off the nostalgia goggles.

And lastly, the Pokemon they've revealed for Gen V so far are extremely badass: http://www.serebii.net/generation5/

If you're going to make a point (Newer pokemon are inferior to older Pokemon) at least cite some examples. :3

(If you'd like some examples as to the aesthetics of the Pokémon in each generation, you can look here for the sprites of all 493 Pokemon, divided by generation)

Arguing Pokémon like it's srs bsns. Awwww yeah.

I really don't know where I'm going with this. I guess TL;DR is that if something is fun when you're a kid, don't limit yourself by societal standards. There's no reason you're ever "too old" for something that you love, and if other people tell you that you are, they're idiots. You can never be too old for fun.

And that's why I still play Pokémon.


-David

Show your Valentine that you really care. Use a condom.

MAN this weekend was exhausting. I really don't know where to begin. We had Trombone Day on Saturday, so that was a pretty big deal.

Friday, I got to sleep in because there was no Theory. Sleeping in is always a plus. So, waking up at 10:45, I strolled over to Anthropology sat through another boring lecture. And then, at noon, I was free! I went and grabbed some lunch before heading over to the Performing Arts Center (PAC) to get out my horn and practice before a lesson with Tom Riccobono, a renowned trombone player visiting for the weekend.


Tom Riccobono


He's an extremely nice guy, and in the short amount of time I spent in the lesson (Only thirty minutes), he taught me quite a bit about how to better my breathing and tonguing technique.
After my lesson, I went down to the lobby and began constructing my BRAND NEW BASS TROMBONE.

I met with the guy from Sheridan Brass, and we began picking out slides, leadpipes, bells, valves, mouthpieces, tuning slides... Basically, building a trombone from the ground up. My parents arrived shortly afterwards, and we spent a good two hours mixing and matching until we got one that everybody thought sounded great.

Eventually, we decided on a horn with a gold alloy coating, a B1 1Y bell, a 2G mouthpiece, and a Tru-Bore valve system.


Not mine, but a Tru-Bore valve with a B1 1Y bell.


Overall, it was a very sexy (and expensive) horn. I got to really play on it that evening at the dress rehearsal and the difference was astounding. It sounded great and it played very well.

After the dress rehearsal, I went to have an amazing dinner with family and some family friends in town. It was a great dinner, and I ended up going to bed early.
I woke up the next morning at 8:00, and I headed over to the PAC to get ready for Trombone Day.

There were some warm-ups, some master classes, blah blah, nothing that exciting. Got some Mexican food with my family for lunch, and then back to the PAC. The afternoon is when things started to get exciting. Mark Mullins, the principle trombonist for the band Bonerama, gave a masterclass and showed off some of his electronic gear.



Mark Mullins.


Yes, electronic gear. You see that mic connected to his bell? It goes to a gateway connected to a floorboard with a Wah-Wah pedal and a Harmonizer, leading out to an amp. Essentially, an electric trombone. It was awesome.


Here's an example.

And then, a little after two, there were some concerts. First, Tom Riccobono performed for us, mostly classical etudes and such. It was great. And then, Mark Mullins played with the Hub Bones, playing some jazz, funk, and rock. It was amazing.
After the concerts, we rehearsed again for the final concert, and then dismissed for dinner.

My parents and I went to Raising Cane's for some chicken fingers before going back to campus. There, we got ready for the final performance, featuring both guest artists, the USM trombone choir, the USM Hub Bones, and the festival choir of all the trombone players that came up for the day. It sounded great, and everyone liked it.



The Trombone Choir playing with the festival choir for the last piece. Try to find me!


Afterwards, we cleaned up and went back to our rooms. I got to talk a bit to both the guest artists some more, which was neat, but I ended up going to bed fairly early again.

The next morning, Sunday, I woke up at ten to go get some breakfast with the parents before they headed home. We went to IHOP and had a pretty great meal. But they left and I went on my way. I did some homework, but then I went over to Gamestop and picked up Left 4 Dead 2. I've been playing that since. It's a great game.


EDIT: Oh, and the title. I'm sure you're wondering about that. In the Hub, they had a table giving out condoms to promote safe sex for Valentine's day. Not very funny in itself, but the sign they had said what's quoted in the title. It made me and my friends laugh.

I lol'd.

A quick little funny story.

I went to log on to /b/, but found out that the IP was banned- someone else at the school had done something stupid and ruined it for everyone. However, there is a "Contest ban" form at the bottom.

Well, this is what was there:

"This IP is from University of Southern Mississippi wireless internet for students. Any of several thousand students could be using it on any given day. Please unban. Thanks.
(Update) This ban was placed on me as well. for the same reason.
(Update 2) I am also affected by this ban.

Original offender here, I would still like to know when this spamming happened if possible. And to the USM students who keep checking this. Problem, Golden Eagles? *trollface*

Update: Original offender is an awesome bro doing the students of USM a favor.

Update: Successful troll is successful?"


Successful troll is VERY successful.

Said Sytherin, "We'll teach just those whose ancestry is purest."

Thursdays are blah. Especially when it's cold, wet and dreary like today is.

Some things I thought I'd let you all know:

Regarding the title of this post, I recently found an AWESOME Hogwarts House test. It's pretty in-depth, and instead of just saying which House you'd be in, it gives you percentages of each house, so you can compare.

My scores?
Slytherin - 79
Ravenclaw - 73
Gryffindor - 65
Hufflepuff - 50

It's pretty close to how I imagined it, so hurray. Here's the link, if you'd like to take it, too. Tell me your results! :D

Another kickass Harry Potter resource, while we're on the subject:

The Parselmouth

It's a website that lets you put in any word, and it TRANSLATES IT TO PARSELTONGUE and then plays it back to you. It's useless, but that's what makes it awesome.


Also, the Brawl tourney is going to start tonight, and it'll last throughout all of February. The rules are as follows, copied from Crim's blog:

*3 STOCK
*LOW ITEMS
*NO HAMMERS/GOLD HAMMERS
*SPAMMING MOVES OR STAGES AND LEDGE GRABBING ARE FROWNED UPON
*TAUNT AT YOUR OWN RISK
*PLEASE TRACK YOU AND YOUR OPPONENT'S NUMBER OF LIVES AT THE END OF A MATCH AND TELL ME
*YOU WILL FACE EVERYONE TWICE BY THE END OF FEBRUARY
*WIN BY SUICIDE MOVES WILL BE CONSIDERED A LOSS IF YOU BOTH HAD ONE LIFE
*ANNOUNCE A SP GRANDE MATCH AT THE CHATZY FIRST!
*YOU CANNOT DO BOTH MATCHES AGAINST SOMEONE IN THE SAME WEEK

Pretty meh rules, but definitely do-able. Personally, I'd like no items except for the Smash Ball, and move-spamming and ledge grabbing are both techniques that are easily avoided, so I don't see why they'd need a specific mention. Other than that, it's going to be a pretty alright tourney, I think.

The participants:
Crim
Isaac
Kat
Ang
Argol
Nights
Davidio
Crimshad
Fridge(Will possibly try)


I'll try to do one or two of my matches tonight, so expect another post later.


Last thing: Tomorrow I start getting ready for Trombone Day. And my family is coming to visit. D'awww.

Have a good Thursday!


-David