Addiction

Excuse me if I don't post for a while.

You see, I just bought myself an XBox 360, and I'm playing through Dragon Age right now. It currently has almost all of my attention. If you don't mind, I'm going to go back to playing it.


-David

My Christmas loot.

I'll go ahead and say this right now: This was a good Christmas.

My first Christmas where I actually had to come home from school, my first Christmas in our new house (Is it really that new? It feels much older), and a lot of other things that just made it spectacular.

Last night, for instance. I went over to the Davis household for a delightful dinner with some cool people (And Emily was there, too) and had a wonderful time being moderately social. Did I use enough descriptive terms in that sentence?

After that, we went to my Grandmother's house for some hot wassail (My favourite Christmas tradition) and our tradition reading of "The Night Before Christmas" and Luke 2:1-20 and then lighting the candles on the tree. With Uncle Mike there, it was very enjoyable. :)

And then the Christmas Eve service at 11:00. I showed up at 9:30 because I was playing trombone there and I needed to rehearse with the choir before-hand. I met this girl named Mary (A fitting name for Christmas) and she was singing with the choir that evening. I played the 6 songs in total for the service:
Two variations of "Good Christian Friends, Rejoice"
"Riu Riu Chiu"
"O Holy Night"
"O Come, All Ye Faithful"
and "Away in a Manger"

Overall, I did pretty well. I kind of botched "Away in a Manger" because it was right after Communion and goddamn, that wine dries up your mouth. Other than that, though, it went well. Oh, and I got paid $100 for my services (Which was an unexpected gift).

After the service, Mary and I went to go get some food at IHOP because both of us were hungry. We saw Mr. Starling there, along with his wife and (What I assume are) some friends. I talked to him for a bit, and he mistook Mary for my girlfriend (AWKWARD).
>.<
But, it was still neat.

So then I took Mary home and then went home and slept. I woke up dreadfully early this morning, but it's okay because it's CHRISTMAS. So I woke up my parents and sister at the bright hour of 7:30, and we began our festivities.

Here is all my Christmas loot:










And, in case the picture quality is bad, here is a list of everything I've received thus far:

Edibles:
-A box of Pizza Rolls
-3 boxes of Hot Pockets
-Marshmallows
-Hot Chocolate
-A shit-ton of chocolate (Not pictured)
-Satsumas (Not pictured)
-Assorted nuts (Not Pictured)

Stocking Stuffers:
-$35 worth of iTunes cards
-$50 Best Buy gift card
-Tic-Tacs
-A comb
-A toothbrush
-Carmex
-Dentine Ice gum
-A Mario Kart PEZ-style dispenser
-2 bags of Pop Rocks
-Air Heads Xtreme Sweetly Sour Belts
-2 Pokemon Pencils (Featuring Chimchar and Piplup)
-Trolli Sour Gummy Worms

Actual Presents:
-A microphone
-"The Ultimate Nap Kit"
-"The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks"
-"Roger von Oech's Ball of Whacks"
-A black dress shirt
-A T-shirt with the image of a trombone and the caption "WWJP? What would Jesus Play?"
-A T-shirt that says "Haikus are easy/But sometimes they don't make sense/Refrigerator"
-A Trombone (Not yet, actually, just the promise that I'm getting one)

Actually, on that note, I'd like to talk about my potential trombone for a bit. It's going to be a Shire, which is a great brand. But that also means it's going to cost close to $4,000...
But it's a great horn, and I'm excited! We're going to go up to Birmingham sometime soon and get one custom-made. :D


Oh, and I'm also excited because I have enough money (I'm fairly sure) to buy myself a 360! So yes, this has been a great Christmas.
We're going to my Grandparent's house again this evening for Christmas Dinner and more presents.

Happy Christmas to all of my readers. :)


-David

After all, there's only one more sleep 'till Christmas...

Oh, right. I have a blag. I'm sorry.

Well, I will do a quick recap of the past week:

Friday: Spent the day with Rin, went to a party, met people, had fun. I ended up shirtless at the party, like I always do. It was fun.

Weekend: Went to New Orleans with the band. What happens in New Orleans STAYS in New Orleans.

Week: I wrapped presents and hung out with people. Saw Avatar, too.

Actually, I'll take this time to put my thoughts about Avatar on paper. Er... in text.

It was a beautiful movie. The CGI was stunning, and the effects were amazing. It also had one of the best action scenes I've EVER seen in a movie.
But...
It was slow. Very slow. It didn't feel like a movie, it felt like a documentary. I know that was the direction they were going for, but all it did was make the movie drag more than it needed to. Also, the plot was pretty weak and extremely predictable. Predictable to the point where EVERY SINGLE THING THAT HAPPENED AT THE END, I called a hour earlier. That bad.
Avatar also villainised the wrong person. Instead of making the head-of-operations there the bad guy, the made the leader of the military the bad guy. Sure, he loved killing and mercilessly attacking the natives, but what do you expect? HE'S A MILITARY LEADER! And I must note here that he was also only acting on the orders OF THE GUY IN CHARGE. Blech. Little things like that bug me.

Overall rating: 8/10
I'd certainly watch it again when it comes out on DVD, but there's no way in hell I'm going back into the theatre to see it.



And then two nights ago was OPERATION: DRAGON ROLL. Macey, Hannah, Chis, Erin, and I all stayed the night at Macey's house and played Dragon Age: Orgins the whole time. I was the last person to fall asleep, at around 6:00 AM. It was a good night.


And now, today is Christmas Eve. Woo. Tonight, I'm going to the Davis household for food, and then to my grandparent's house for holiday stuff, and then to church to play music. And then, it will be Christmas and I will post again tomorrow.

So... Yeah. I'm sorry for letting you all down by not delving into the mundane details of my life more often over the past few days. This problem will be alleviated in the coming weeks. Thank you for your patience.


-David

Busy day, busy day.

As you can undoubtedly tell by the title of today's post, today was busy busy. But in a good way.

Well, I woke up exceptionally early today (Around 10) and got up, got dressed. That stuff. I was planning on meeting my grandmother at around noon to bake some delicious cookies with her. :3
So, I went to the Coffee Loft to get some breakfast and kill time. I just got a cup of coffee (a medium roast, pretty good) and a hummus bagel with sliced tomatoes. Yum.
I sat down with my breakfast and read the latest issues of This That and the Other and Lagniappe. It was a pretty relaxing morning.

I called her when I was finished, but she wasn't ready for me to come over yet, so I decided to go home and REVIEW SOME MUSIC.
I recently downloaded some Lady Gaga stuff (I'd never even heard "Poker Face" until about a week ago), but I hadn't listened to it yet. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about, so I sat down and listened to all 20 tracks I've downloaded. I was originally going to do a song-by-song review and post it here, so I wrote detailed reactions to the first 9 or so songs, but around track 10 or 11, I just stopped caring.

Overall, it was a lot better than I expected it to be. She has her share of mindless pop tracks (I counted about 4 of the 20 I sampled) and then she has her masterpieces (5/20). Everything else was somewhere in between. But seriously, I can see what all the hype is about. Now, I don't think she deserves all of the hype, but I can at least see where it's coming from (Something I'm STILL trying to find with all the "musicians" Disney is spouting out).

DAVID'S OFFICIAL RATING:
ORIGINALITY: 6.5/10
LYRICS: 4/10
MUSIC: 8/10
EFFECTS: 9/10
OVERALL: 7.5/10
RATING: "Pretty Okay."


So, after my MUSIC REVIEW SESSION and EXCESSIVE USE OF CAPS LOCK, I headed over to my Grandmother's house to begin our awesome cookie cooking... thing.
Anyway.
I get there, we made some delicious cookies. While the cookies are cooking, we play cards. She hands my ass to me, seriously. >:|
But the cookies turned out well, and I had a lot of fun. And we (she) melted a spatula!




After that exciting installment, our hero finds himself in the dreaded Middle School Car Line, waiting to pick up his sister from school. He succeeds.

After briefly stopping at the house (I had to finish the touches on my Christmas Present to Macey), Sarah and I decided to do some Christmas Shopping up in Malbis. On the way, though, we stopped at Macey's house so she and I could exchange gifts.

I GAVE:
-A bag of cookies that I baked today
-A Christmas Mix CD that is simultaneously AWWWWWWWW and KICKASS
-An insense burner in the shape of the Triforce. (That I made in Art)

I RECEIEVED:


This. Sorry for no direct picture, Blogger is being retarded. Just click this and behold the adorable-ness.

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D



Not only is Spheal my favourite Pokemon, he's the MOST ADORABLE Pokemon, too! Macey made this for me, and I think that she is the most amazing person ever for doing so. And, for those of you who know nothing of Pokemon, here's a picture of Spheal's art:






...Pretty spot-on. You're the best, Macey!



Then Sarah and I went on our CHRISTMAS SHOPPING ADVENTURE and we ended up just buying 2 DVDs, some candy, and some other assorted things. Yay Christmas!


And that brings us to the highlight of every Wednesday ever: Youth Group.
Wally, Mosher, and Kathy (Plus other little kids) were there, and it was alright. But then, Cleveland and I decided to play Ping Pong. But oh no, this wouldn't be REGULAR Ping Pong. We ended up inventing the game SUPER RIDICULOUS BOOGIE BALL, and damn, this needs to be like an Olympic Sport or something.

It's basically Ping Pong mixed with Calvinball. In other words, the best thing on earth. Ever.

After a match lasting close to an hour, the final score was
David with: 3 Ghosts (Not counted)
29 Dinosaurs
619 Points

And Cleveland with: 0 Ghosts
201 Dinosaurs
310 Points
1 Boogey Man

So, of course, Cleveland won. The game ended with us going into Boogey Man (Which is the most exciting round of any game you will ever play ever), and since he initiated it, I challenged him. I barely failed the challenge, so Cleveland was considered the Boogie Master and the game was over. It was a great match.

After Youth, I went over to Cleveland's house for a bit. We played the Left 4 Dead 2 Demo (Yes, I know it's already out, but he doesn't have it yet. Stfu) and then ate some delicious Ramen-hotdog-cheese mix while we watched a new X-Men motion comic (Based off of Amazing X-Men and WRITTEN BY JOSS WHEDEN). It was a pretty good night.

And now I'm here, in front of my dad's computer (Mine isn't connecting to the internet), typing all of this up. Hurrah.

Quick notes about THE FUTURE:
Friday will be amazing. Going to spend all afternoon with Rin, and then go to a Dirty Santa party hosted by her friend. I'm excited.

Saturday will be like negative amazing. Fuck you, Saturday. Leaving the house a little after 6 to drive to Hattiesburg so the band can go play in some stupid football game in New Orleans. Blech.

Sunday will be a continuation of Saturday.

And we have two events in the making:
"Operation: Dragon Roll" and "Operation: Lovecraft Bludgeon."
I feel like both are aptly named and both will be glorious.
No details on either one, yet.


And that is it. I will be going to bed early tonight (Well... Before 300) because I am relatively tired. Until next time.



-David

What's the difference between ignorance and apathy?

I don't know and I don't care.

A Short Christmas List

I really don't want too much this year.
But if any of you would like to buy me something, here goes:

Listed in order of importance:
1)X-Box 360*
2)A TV
3)"The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks"
4)The 2nd season of "Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles" on DVD


*If I get a 360, I'll also require (at least) one game.
Listed in order of most wanted to least (but still) wanted:
1) Dragon Age: Orgins
2) Mass Effect
3) Left 4 Dead 2
4) Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
5) Fable 2
6) Bioshock


...And, that's it. Like I said, not a terribly long list. Promote capitalism! Buy me presents! :D



-David

Weekend Update.

Ah, so I haven't updated this weekend. Oh well, I decided to just compile all the events of this weekend into one nifty post.

On Friday afternoon, we all went out and got our Christmas tree!



This makes me happy. I can't wait for it to be Christmas, to be honest. And getting the tree has always been one of my favourite holiday thingies that we do.
The downside: it was cold as balls out there. Like, seriously.


Anyway, after cutting down the tree, I drove to Mobile to spend time with Rin. We grabbed some fast food to eat and then went to Hollywood Theatres to see a movie. But oh yeah, Hollywood Theatres sucks and there weren't any good movies and all the mediocre ones were sold out. So we went back to her place and watched Across the Universe. It had been a while since I'd seen it, so that was nice.


Cue Saturday.
I slept in that day (When don't I sleep in these days? I really need to work on my sleep schedule) and then went over to Macey's house to play some Dragon Age: Orgins.
For those of you that care, I'm playing as a Human Female Noble, named "Devia." Yes, she is based off of my character Devia. >_>
I even went so far as to make her look the same and I'm planning on only picking dialogue options that are "in character." So, in short, I'm an even BIGGER nerd than you thought.
Macey and I also discussed the details of Operation: Dragon Roll while I was there, and we decided on one thing: We have no clue when this will be. Woo, secrets, I guess.

I then went home, had some Chinese takeout, and enjoyed watching "A Nightmare Before Christmas" with the family. When that was over, I started a new game in Fable, played for a bit, and then called it a night.


Sunday morning, church, blah blah blah. Bought and wrapped Rin's present, toyed with other people about whether or not I was getting them a present (Spoiler warning: I'm not), and then played Fable all afternoon. Oh, the excitement! And that, ladies and gentlemen, was my Sunday.

Also, I am a tad bit upset because of a conversation I had with a friend earlier tonight, but I'm not going to get into that here. Not now, at least. I'm onto you, though.


And lastly, here's my plans for this next week:
Monday: Maybe spend some time with my dear mother. Or get farther in Fable. Who knows?
Tuesday - Thursday: No plans.
Friday: Abigail's Party
Saturday: Leave for Hattiesburg. Blech. I really do not want to go to the Bowl Game in New Orleans this weekend. I have *plenty* of other things that I could be doing! (See: "Operation: Dragon Roll")
Oh well. At least Kate and I are going to go to Cafe Du Monde. That'll be fun, I guess.


People I still need to get presents for: Sarah, Mum, Dad, Macey. Everyone else is either accounted for or insignificant.
And now, I think it's my bedtime. Hello, sun. :)



-David