Well, my parents were in this weekend - it's always cool to have them. They don't make it down here enough, really... ...and we don't make it up to IN much either.

After they arrived on friday, we went out to play some golf. I played only using 5, 7 and 9 irons and a putter. I have discovered this does not negatively impact my game - in fact, I think it makes it a bit better overall. I've decided i'm not cool enough to use other clubs, so i'm gonna stick with these for a while. Or, as Jody put it, I haven't "unlocked" the other clubs yet. I think I need to reach 200 good shots with the 5 before I unlock the 2 iron...

I think my dad fixes something every time he comes to see us. This time, it was a leak in the shower dripping into the basement... ...oh, and also our outside water spigot which seems to have developed a tradition of freezing and breaking every year, no matter what I do to prevent this. We think it's good this time though. Probably.

On saturday, we gave dad an early fathers' day present. It was a picture frame. He'd said he wanted a print of one of my photographs so I decided I'd let him pick one. Well, we got to talking and he said he really liked several of them, but asked if I had a picture of the creek from the Laurel Falls trail (which we'd hiked earlier this week on Memorial Day), but with smoother (aka "fuzzy") water. I said no, but that I could. I'd wanted to go back there anyway, since we had some trouble finding part of the trail last time. This, in turn, spawned an expedition.

The four of us (dad, mom, me and Sheri) went out to the Laurel Falls trail again with the intention of me taking a particular photo. We waited till mid-afternoon (so that by the time we got there it would be late afternoon), and then headed out to the trail. I took quite a few more pictures this time - including some slow-exposures with a tripod (which i didn't have with me on monday). I got some pretty awesome shots, I think.

We ended up hiking the whole trail which, contrary to what i'd previously heard, isn't really any easier than the upper trail: it's difficulty is just a bit more spread out (as opposed to being incredibly rough at the end). On average, I'd say the two trails are comparable.

Aside from Sheri's ankle (which has been sore for a while), it was a good time. I've recompiled the pictures that I took on monday and added the new ones to the collection in the Gallery. Dad ended up choosing the wider shot of the falls for his frame, though we got prints of two others as well (since he couldn't pick just one).

They headed back to IN this afternoon. Back to the normal routine.

~PS

This last week has been pretty crazy. A lot of out-of-the-ordinary has gone on. This is really 3 or 4 blogs in one - and is mostly just a 'state of the penguin' address.

Last Tuesday, Sheri and I went to Milligan's faculty/staff picnic - which was open to "many" part-time employees this year (the wording of the invitation email left something to be desired). It was actually pretty cool. I knew quite a few people there and got to talk to some I didn't know so well. I also got to talk to Dr. Beck for a little while, which was cool. She was one of my Sociology profs at Milligan and one of my favorite professors overall. She told me i could sit in on one of her classes if I want sometime - which I'll probably do if i can find one at a time that doesn't conflict with other stuff too much.

Last Thursday I got to join Patrick's Star Wars game. I've generally enjoyed the Star Wars games i've played in before and the rules for the new system are fairly simple (which i like). It was a lot of fun and i'm looking forward to continuing it in a couple of weeks.

On Friday, Kevin and Steph (his fiance) came into town, along with Mike and Bethany (some friends we don't get to see much). The girls all went out to have a sort of bachelorette party for Ginger and Mike, Kevin and I went to see a (decidedly mediocre) movie.

After that, we all met up again to throw Kevin in the creek at Milligan around midnight. That might require a little explanation for some of you. Apparently Milligan has a "tradition" wherein guys who become engaged at Milligan are thrown into the creek by their buddies. The triggers for this operation have since been blurred to include Milligan alumni as well, so Ginger and Steph decided Kevin was fair game. I've personally always thought this tradition was dumb, and strikes me as locker-room behavior. (Sidenote: When I proposed to Sheri, I made it quite clear to some friends that this would not be happening - or, if it did, people would be physically harmed in the process and we might not all consider each other friends afterward. I have found that being physically forced into something I don't want is one of the few things that will trigger a violent reaction from me. I am very thankful they respected my wishes here.) Everyone else, however, seems to think this is great, and as long as all involved are reasonably amenable, it doesn't inherently bother me. The only reason I was involved, however, was because Ginger asked me to take pictures, which I did. Those have been posted in the Gallery :)

Saturday was moving day for Ginger. A bunch of us descended upon her apartment and possessions and spent the hours between 10am and 4pm (more or less) packing up stuff and loading it in a u-haul. After that we all went out to Mid-City Grill and had a good time relaxing and talking after a tiring afternoon. Unfortunately then we had to say some goodbyes, which sucked. I think things will be a little better for her up in VA, but we all miss Ginger a lot. Hopefully we'll get to see her from time to time. It's not the same when someone's missing.

Sunday was "recovery day" from the late nights and monumental-packing done earlier in the weekend. We went to church, but beyond that we didn't do very much. I briefly considered mowing the lawn, but decided against it (in part due to rain). That'll probably get done today.

Yesterday was Memorial Day, so we had an extra day off. In order to take advantage of the warm holiday, we decided to go hiking. The weather threatened to rain us out, but we decided to go anyway. We went out to the lower entrance to Laurel Falls and hiked around there for a while. Due to some trickiness in the trail, we never actually *found* said falls. Yes, I know that sounds ridiculous. At a certain point, none of us could find the trail and, given its location perched above the creek, I was disinclined to mess around too much since I had my camera. We talked to some people later who explained it to us and we think we know where it is now. We still had a great time and I got some good pictures, which have been posted in the Gallery.

After the hiking we grilled some hot dogs and then Sheri and I went into town and ended up buying some bicycles. Before that sounds totally random, let me give you some background:
Some time ago, we decided the 5th Anniversary is the Bicycle Anniversary and so we decided we'd get some bicycles as anniversary presents for each other. Sheri had said she wanted to get them before our actual anniversary because by the time we get to late July, a lot of the good cycling weather for the year is behind us - so we'd been looking around. We initially looked at Dick's Sporting Goods, but most of those seemed really expensive and we didn't really need anything amazingly cool. We also looked at walmart (though I was/am disinclined to buy a bicycle from them), target and even toys-r-us - just trying to see what was available and to evaluate some prices. So yesterday, we decided to go to the mall for something completely different - something we'd never actually end up doing, as it turns out.
We entered through Dick's (as we usually do) and decided to go look at the bikes again - just for fun. We ended up finding a couple that weren't much more expensive than one's we'd priced elsewhere and this was actually the first time Sheri found one she really liked. So after quite a bit of discussion, we decided to go ahead and get them.
I'm glad we ended up buying from an actual sporting goods place. The guy there was able to answer some questions and when we'd decided to buy something, he went over everything (gear changers, brakes, tire pressure, etc) on both of them, making sure everything was working smoothly and correctly and in good condition. IMO, this was worth the $20 price difference.
So we're excited about this. We know of a few places around here that will be lots of fun to go and ride (which will be practical once we have a carrying rack - getting them home last night was *possible*, but not pretty) and i'm sure there are quite a few others.

So now we're sort-of back to the usual grind - but not completely. It'll be a short week for me as I'm taking this Friday off since my parents are coming into town this weekend... ...so we'll be getting ready for that this week. That'll be fun too.

~PS

Yesterday, my friends, we feasted.

In the interest of using up some of the contents of Ginger's fridge & freezer before her move, we had what turned out to be a monstrous cookout last night. It would seem we fell victim to an overcompensation for a worry about having enough food to the point that we had more than we could have possibly eaten if we'd all been fasting for a week. For 7 of us, we had a couple of steaks, some hamburgers, some sausages and a small mountain of chicken, mushroom, zucchini, onion, pepper and pineapple kabobs as well as a tray of fries and a couple quarts of ice cream for dessert. When we began to realize were were going to have so much food, we tried to think of some others to invite, but most of the likely parties who were not already present were off doing other things. Despite hearty appetites, there were lots of leftovers. Not that that's a bad thing.

So after spending quite some time cooking, grilling and otherwise preparing our tastiness, we enjoyed a leisurely and abundant meal while chatting about various things. This was followed by some enjoyable games and general relaxation to go with our ice cream.

All in all, a good way to spend a nice, spring evening.

~PS

...that D&D is going in a direction I don't like. It could just be that I'm unfairly biased against 4e (which i probably am) and so tend to look down on a lot of their marketing - and maybe i misinterpret things - but some things just rub me the wrong way. And I also know it's more what you *do* with it than what they tell you to do with it, but still. Often, I overlook such things, but when something strikes me as blatantly as this, I feel somehow compelled to respond - at least to myself.

On Penny Arcade, I just saw a banner ad which read:

If you want to play this guy [picture of mini], you pick up this box [picture of mini in packaging] /cut. tag: Play the character you want. Player's Handbook Heroes: Series 1. Logo: Dungeons & Dragons. Subtext: Never Split The Party

Problems I have with this (these are actually all inter-related, but they break down into 3 broad points):

1) Product == fun (ala tabletop minis games, ccg's, etc). "If you want to play this guy, you pick up this box". One of the biggest strengths of the roleplaying hobby is that it doesn't require spending lots of money. The books are typically expensive, but really, while it's good for all the players to have a players book, a group really only *needs* one (I played for several months before I had any gaming books[/uphillbothways]). Here, it's telling me that I'll need something *else* to play their game, or at least to play it the "right" way. Oh, and so will all my friends. Oh, and the GM will probably need a bunch of these things to depict npc's, etc.

2) Stifle Creativity (ala video games). "Play the character you want. Player's Handbook Heroes: Series 1". What? The game is meant to have a near-infinite number of character possibilities. Do they also have a near-infinite number of miniatures to depict all possible combinations and styles? Doubtful. No, these are minis depicting the iconic characters from the books. What happened the the creativity of coming up with your *own* stuff? Now i'm expected to pick something from a store shelf to be "my" character? It's one thing to try to go find a mini that looks like your character because you *want* to - it's quite another to say "this guy looks cool, I think i'll play him".

3) Encourage Poor Roleplaying / Winning Is What Matters (ala mmorpgs) - "Never Split The Party". Ok, I know a lot of players who live by this mantra, but I personally hate it. Not because it's tactically unsound (which is generally their reasoning), but because it's unrealistic. No matter how much your characters like each other, sooner or later they're going to have things they want or need to do by themselves. It's one thing when you're in some cursed dungeon, it's quite another when you're in town or somewhere your characters would not expect trouble (even if the players are). The whole "Never split the party" idea makes me want to force them to roleplay bathroom breaks and then send a rabid krenshar after some character peeing in the woods. The players in my games are usually pretty good about this, but that's because most of them are there to roleplay, not simply "defeat" the challenges presented.

Ok, I'm done.

~PS

...that i can mash the button on the jeep's clicker for five minutes and it will not unlock for anything, but i can then hand it to Sheri and she'll push the button once and, click, it works...???

Research is currently underway to determine if this is also related to the Pickle Jar Phenomenon.

And now, the news (in no particular order):

Getting new tires on the jeep tomorrow. Yay rah exciting, i know, but it needs done.

We played catch in our backyard today. This seems random, and it is, but Sheri had been saying for a couple years that we should get some ball gloves and baseball and play catch because it would be fun. We had a couple of walmart gift cards, and it seemed an amusing thing to spend them on.

I think the last of Hikaru's current computer problems has been isolated and (somewhat) solved. I love my computers... ...when they work.

Had a great time jamming at the Hippie Hut yesterday. I think we're still one band member short, but it's going pretty well.

Continuing to go over the Mouse Guard rules and trying to get one of the current D&D story arcs wrapped up so i can put it on the back burner for a while in the interest of something new.

Been looking over some camera lenses and reviews of them. I know i want a long telephoto, a super-wide-angle and a wide-aperture prime (probably 50mm), but i keep going back-and-forth regarding exactly which ones i'm after. Oh well, i've got time.

Had a going away party for Ginger last weekend - which she almost missed ;). I think we had a dozen people or so. I took a few pictures - but didn't get too many before my flash batteries died. I hadn't thought about bringing the camera until right before we left and at that point i didn't have time to charge them. Anyway, we had a bit of a cookout and then sat around and talked for a good while. Later we played a game of Apples to Apples, which is always fun. It was a good time. We're going to miss Ginger a lot. :(

~PS

Well, Hikaru is back, up and running. I've yet to see any of the symptoms of the problems i was having before, but as it's only been going for a couple hours now, it's still far too early to tell. Still, i was reasonably certain the video ram was the problem when i took it in, and since the vram chip has been replaced with a nice shiny new one, I expect the problem is fixed. For now, anyway.

It's nice to have it back again.

~PS

First off, had a great time playing Pirates' Cove last night. It's a fun game that I believe lives up to the Days of Wonder name with such greats as Ticket to Ride and Shadows over Camelot.

Secondly, I finally got the Mouse Guard Roleplaying Game book. Like i've mentioned before, i tried to order it through Mt. Empire Comics because I know the guy who runs the place and thought i'd help him out... ...but apparently he had some trouble getting it and so i resorted to Books-a-Million (partly because i was tired of waiting, and partly because if it *was* getting to be hard to come by, I wanted to get it while i knew i could). Anyway, it looks awesome. I've read the whole thing once and several parts of it two or three times. I'm nearly ready to do something with it.

Thirdly, I still want to continue my Little Fears game from RuchtCon. I even went on amazon.com to see if i could find the book. I did. Starting at about $60. I should point out it's a rather small and flimsy softcover with innumerable typos - not exactly the kind of thing i'd consider spending that much on. Thing is, it's out of print. Luckily, i really don't *need* the book to run the game and Rucht has a copy of it if we find we do. I have learned, however, that as of February Little Fears: Nightmare Edition is in progress yet again. Apparently it's been a long time in coming as it was announced in 2006. I also read on the Little Fears Yahoo newsgroup yesterday that the author's production computer is in the shop (I feel his pain). If and when this finally gets published, i plan to pick it up. Hopefully for considerably than $60.

On a quasi-related note, my iMac is still in the shop, but i'm hoping to get it back soon. I'm pretty satisfied with how my macbook has risen to the challenge of being my primary work machine, but it's not a good desktop replacement.

~PS

So, it had been about a year or so since I redesigned this site, and I felt that the time had come. I mean, more than a year with one design is about 4 times as long as they usually go.

I liked my previous design a lot. I spent a lot of time on it and I thought it looked really nice (probably why it lasted so long). Still, my urge to redesign was not something I could ignore, and I think this design is at least as good and probably a bit better. *I* like it better, anyway.

This version of the site has a lot of more sophisticated functions than the previous incarnation. Some of that might be apparent to you all, some of it won't be.

Anyway, here it is!

~PS

EDIT: Also, I should point out that I'm a terrible webmaster, as I forgot the site's birthday this year. Yeah, I'm in trouble. Anyway, Sushiday the 4th was back on Feb 1st - taking the site to 4 years up and running.

Just got off the phone with the repair place: After about a week of testing, they finally saw the error i was talking about. I've been told they've ordered the part from Apple and will let me know when it's been installed and tested.

I've also been told that if this same problem comes *back* up in the future (even if i'm no longer under warranty), since they have a history of the problem, i should be covered.

I'm guessing this'll take another week or more, but what can ya do?

I love Kotoko, but i do miss Hikaru.

~PS