Tastefully Odd Blog Entries

Wow, never thought I’d be glad to go back to work after a holiday. This weekend was jam packed with activity and stress.

Most of the stress was brought on by Baxter and his ailment. I found out last Tuesday after several messes and several hundred dollars that he has crystals in his bladder, making #1 painful and frequent for him lately. This is bad enough, but couple this with the fact that he is a very uncooperative patient and you get a cat throwing temper tantrums after a day or so. A couple days of him throwing a fit nearly every time he saw me left me at my wits end. He’s my cat, I have to take care of him, but I upset him. What to do? I didn’t think there were any options left but to give him up for adoption. Long story short, this upset Francie and Jim far more than I expected so they’re taking care of him for now and I’m avoiding Baxter as much as possible. If he gets better and I feel like it’s safe for me to be around him again, wonderful. It feels odd having to rely on others to take care of my cat, but I guess he’s not mine anymore anyway really.

Avoiding Baxter was fairly easy the rest of the weekend (although there were still a few incidents). My parents came down shortly around lunchtime on Saturday to install a cabinet in my half bath. After that we spent the afternoon shopping until supper when we went out to dinner with Francie’s parents and mine followed by Indiana Jones. It was a nice evening and we even discovered that my dad and Francie’s dad have some common friends. Sunday was another busy day starting with another of Fr. Marty’s “first” masses, brunch, graduation party, bike riding and a cookout. Finally Monday was a bit more relaxing as I just watched Iron Man and then lounged around and played video games with Francie.

It seems bastardizing popular culture is a universal theme for commercials of Honda dealerships. Hidy may not even be the worst offender. Ok, that’s a lie. I’ve narrowly stopped myself from destroying my TV with the remote countless times due to his commercials.

make the bad man stop

Whew, what an exhausting weekend. After taking a half day off work friday to recover from the Bennett virus, I dressed up and went to Cinci to see Francie’s uncle Martin Pitstick ordained as a preist at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption in Covington. I’m glad I went but I can’t say I recommend going to ordinations unless you’re really into that sort of thing. Over two hours of chanting while I was shivering/sniffling was not the greatest. Comfort takes a back seat to formality as a rule at such events though. At least next time I go to mass there I can wear my sport coat whereas usually I’m sweating at church anytime but winter and there’s no such simple solution for that.

Also on the brighter side there was a nice reception afterwards for Fr. Pitstick and Fr. Schomaker and Francie and I got a special blessing and a picture. 

Got up Saturday, dressed for success once again and cruised to Columbus for Clint’s wedding. The ceremony was short and simple, leaving us 3 hours to kill until the reception.  There wasn’t enough of a buffer for a movie so we just hung out at the mall for awhile. The reception was held at the ritzy Confluence Park Restaurant.  The hall there has a beautiful view of where the Olentangy and Scioto rivers meet. Other than the exceptionally classy location and food it was a fairly typical reception and we had a good time.

Sunday was yet another tie day as we helped Fr. Pitstick celebrate his first mass at his home parish in Fairborn.  Once again it was pretty long mass but I’m sure it was much more exhausting for Marty than me with everything he had going on that weekend.

Well, back to enjoying a relaxing Monday after a busy weekend. The first of many such weekends for awhile it seems. I don’t have a free weekend until mid July. O_o It’s far from the worst problem in the world to have of course, it’s just a surprising realization I had.

Luda and I got to talking on netops today about the new Mario Kart after I sent him a comic about the randomness of items.

(12:16 PM) Me: http://digitalunrestcomic.com/index.php?date=2008-04-28

(12:17 PM) Luda: sigh…it’s true sometimes unfortunately

(12:17 PM) Luda: i’m not sure what they can do exactly as the powerups are fun to use and even with their help i still can’t win races

(12:19 PM) Me: I think computers shouldn’t get them as often

(12:19 PM) Me: and first place shouldn’t be pummeled into the ground repeatedly

(12:19 PM) Luda: well i agree computers shouldn’t get as much

(12:20 PM) Me: first place just seems heavily targeted

(12:20 PM) Luda: and they could probably modify some of the more powerful stuff to just target anyone in front of you

(12:20 PM) Luda: or not give that stuff out so often

(12:20 PM) Me: sounds good

(12:21 PM) Luda: but honestly, i got raped in 9th or 5th place on several occasions too, since i can’t really relate to 1st place punishment

(12:21 PM) Me: I guess it was pretty ridiculous how far ahead of the pack you could get in previous versions and they’re trying to keep it interesting for the whole race

(12:21 PM) Me: 1st place punishment is more evident in single player grand prix mode

(12:21 PM) Luda: yeah without any special powerups, i have no doubt you 3 would lap me

(12:22 PM) Me: I’ll open up a wide gap in the first two laps and around the start of lap 3 I’ll get hit by a pow block followed by blue shell topped with lightning bolt

(12:23 PM) Me: and the pack will be a second behind me again

(12:24 PM) Me: maybe the secret to grand prix is keeping the gap within a range so you’re too far to be hit with regular shells but close enough that the heavy artillery isn’t used

(12:24 PM) Luda: yeah i could see that being a strategy

(12:24 PM) Luda: i use to find mario kart less frustrating than smash in the past versions, but now the opposite is true. i don’t win at smash much still, but im having more fun with it

(12:25 PM) Me: maybe we should plan with wavebirds next time

(12:25 PM) Me: *play

(12:26 PM) Luda: you mean you and jim for smash?

(12:27 PM) Me: that too

(12:27 PM) Luda: okay i wasn’t sure

(12:28 PM) Luda: definitely no to you guys in smash

(12:28 PM) Luda: for mario kart, i don’t think it would help me that much as i am just plain bad at keeping vehicles on a track in any race game

(12:28 PM) Luda: which is probably why the death by level is so much more frustrating to me

(12:29 PM) Me: yeah

(12:29 PM) Me: you were doing better than I thought you would with the steering

(12:29 PM) Luda: i also noticed that they made driving off the road, like on grass, much more of a slowdown penalty than in previous versions…another challenge added for me

(12:29 PM) Me: I struggled with that quite a bit at first

(12:29 PM) Luda: yeah, i transitioned the steering okay and was mostly just left with my usual racing skill

(12:30 PM) Me: yeah, it seemed like off road was death

(12:30 PM) Me: that is a category for karts, some are better at off road than others

(12:31 PM) Me: mine has that maxed out but it’s still a stiff penalty

(12:31 PM) Luda: oh interesting…perhaps i should choose one of those to help offset my unintentional offroading

(12:31 PM) Me: maybe

(12:31 PM) Luda: hmm

(12:31 PM) Me: I haven’t tried many to compare

(12:31 PM) Luda: i notice, since i spend a lot of time in grass, how much faster people were passing me when i was only in it for like a sec.

(12:32 PM) Me: I feel like I’m crawling unless I’m using a boost of some kind

(12:32 PM) Me: on road or off

(12:34 PM) Luda: yeah

(12:37 PM) Me: As far as battle, it’s really confusing with huge levels made for 12 players instead of 4 and it’s hard to find people. I like that you can come back though

(12:38 PM) Luda: agreed on those points

(12:38 PM) Luda: although i think the balloons are kinda pointless, as i said. it seems like you come back pretty damn quick to me

(12:38 PM) Luda: i still miss the bomb though

(12:38 PM) Me: yeah

(12:39 PM) Me: hehe

(12:39 PM) Luda: and the coin version is a cool idea, but it suffers the same 1st place rape problem…there are too many things that cause you to lose too many coins

(12:39 PM) Luda: considering the record was like 12 for us, having a level obstacle take away 5 upon contact is pretty harsh

(12:40 PM) Luda: 2 mins of collecting…0.5 sec. of mistake

(12:41 PM) Luda: i’d prefer it be divided into 2 distinct games. One item that is fought for and dropped a lot or just plain collecting without much penalty that way i don’t feel like i’ve lost so much

(12:42 PM) Me: like the shine game on gamecube

(12:42 PM) Luda: right that was okay with me because it wasn’t such an investment lost…you were just going around attacking people which is fun by itself and if you happened to get the item then bonus

(12:45 PM) Me: interesting that you actually did well at the coin collecting

(12:45 PM) Me:

(12:45 PM) Luda: yeah

(12:45 PM) Luda: i think it was my strategy was not aggressive

(12:45 PM) Luda: i decided that since you lost coins when hit, i would try hard to not get hit

(12:46 PM) Luda: so i would drive around the perimeter edge of levels or areas that didn’t have people. i would kinda drop in grab a few coins and then run back to a safe area. i don’t think i used an item or attacked anyone the whole time

(12:46 PM) Me: yeah, that sucks

(12:47 PM) Me: …like a fox!

(12:47 PM) Luda: like in the sand level i was around the tip top away from the quicksand and would pick off the coins right next to the cactus by driving up to it very slow and no one seemed to bother me

(12:47 PM) Luda: hehe

I just want to pat myself on the back here for installing two bike lifts this weekend all by myself. I can park my car in the garage again!

installing bike lifts, +2 manliness. riding a bike: -3 manliness