Video Game Heaven

I had a great time with Yachi's family for the last three days. Her brother had just bought a WII and a 360 so I got to play my fill of games. The second day we were there her younger brother and I beat Gears of War in one day. It was a good time but I doubt I will play the game again. The rest of the time we watched video games and played some WII. I think I will probably end of buying one of those machines. They are a lot of fun. Hell I would get it just for tennis.

Here is a picture of all of us at lunch. I thought it pretty amusing that I was a full head above the rest of her family and friends:


We also played some poker with her family which was cool. Her mom was quite a force to be reckoned with at the table. I managed to squeak out a win though.

Here is a picture of Yachi and I with some of her friends:




UPDATE:

Cleaning up the tags as I am still getting used to this jazz.

From the Air

On the flight from Seattle to Detroit, there were two thoughts that I spent a lot of time with. The first was about the war in Iraq and the impact it has on people's life.

In Yachi and I's row there was a guy from some branch of the army. I am guessing he was in a special sort of unit because he had a beret and when I see a beret I think of green beret which makes me assume special. I was reading articles in the Washington Post about the war in Iraq. They were talking about the impact of the ISG report and how that would affect our progress on the war.

It was surreal reading about something that played such a large part in this guys life and I wanted to talk to this guy about his feelings on being a celebrity. I was not curious what his politics on the war were and to be honest I had / have not the right to ask him about his convictions. I was just really curious about seeing something that envelops your entire life be one of the main topics of discourse in America. It would have to be an interesting feeling.

Any ways I am doing a poor job of explaining this as it is really late and I think I lack the words to adequately express what I am thinking. Look at this pretty picture from the plane.


The other thought occurred to me when we flew into Phoenix. The way we build our civilization is fucked and backwards. All we try to do is increase our distance from one another. Seeing a city as big as Phoenix from the air really drives this point home.

There are a bunch of single family homes with as much distance as possible between one another and miles of concrete connecting them. This just is not a sustainable model and it saddens me to see this happening in the second fastest growing city in the US.

A large part of me cannot wait for the peak oil moment to occur. A city carved in the midst of a desert is a monument to hubris and this part of me would like to see the fall.

Enough ranting, I need to get some rest. One last picture from the sky.

The Hidden Meaning of a Children's Story

Yachi and I went to see the Nutcracker as performed by the Pacific Northwest Ballet last night. Overall the performance was really entertaining. The dancing was good and the set was amazing. As Yachi pointed out though there was a weird air of racism to the whole story. The mouses were very African and the soldiers very German. Guess who was not portrayed in the best light, like running around with spears light.

Here is a cute picture of us though:


Also I got a piece of mail that I think might be the most awesome thing I have ever got. I apparently am a good driver according to Pemco even though my last insurance company had to give me $2000 less than MSRP on the car I broke.

Ohh Arty!

My holiday party for work was a while back. It was not terribly exciting so basically I killed a lot of time by messing around with my camera. Here are the results of that boredom:

This was fun just because of the ceiling:



For some reason I really like this picture:



This one would have been cooler if I had held the camera a little more steady and Yachi was not blurry but it was fun to try to get this effect:

Snow Day

Due to more extreme weather in Seattle, I got another snow day on Friday. By extreme weather I mean 69 MPH winds. I have never really experienced a wind storm and most of it happened while I was asleep but it seemed to be more intense than I would have originally imagined. The power is still out on most of the east side of the Seattle metro area. Also they closed the bridge across the lake so of course I could not go to work.

I love snow days. Marques, Eric and I finished up our holiday shopping, making new friends along the way:


Afterwards Marques and I drank some beer and watched movies. All in all a most relaxing day. Makes me keep my fingers crossed that the electricity is not back up on Monday.

Picasso?

Not sure where I ran into this video but it reminds me of why I like the interweb. This is something I doubt I would have seen without it:

Better than hipster bingo

It is the new fad sweeping the nation, the ugly dress drinking game. At the Joanna Newsom show it was in full effect. Backing up a step, Yachi, Marques and I went to the show last night at the Showbox. As we walked in I realized Smog was the opening band which was cool because I really like his records. Unfortunately he is the sort of performer not suited to a venue as large as Showbox (the start of a trend). He was a little too quiet and reserved to be engaging.

So I was left to look through the crowd making fun of their clothing choices. I determined that a) ugly dresses are the new female hipster style of choice. These are dresses with puffy sleeves and fabric in weird places. One woman I was particularly hard on later ended up on stage playing with Joanna Newsom so I guess in the grand scheme of things I really do not know much. B) was that Yachi and I’s fleeces are mega-uncool like so uncool I think they should have turned us away at the door. Fortunately I have ass of iron so they let me in because that bumps me way back up the cool ladder. Yachi basked in the halo effect of the butt of steel.

Her show in itself suffered from the same problem as Smog. It was great music but not a show. It was as if you were watching a recording session for her album. The interest in seeing someone playing a harp on stage quickly faded as she and her fellow musicians proved to lack the ability to put on a good live show. The worst was that she had 5 other musicians on stage that played every 3 songs. In between they just sat there and stared admiringly / creepily at her while she played.

Maybe Blood Brothers next week will put on a better show.

Partying like my 2nd Senior year

going to a club and a show all in one night, reminds me of why I was in college so long. Details to follow maybe.