Finally, months after the Chocolate M-Pire dark chocolate M&Ms disappeared from the market, I saw new normal packaging Dark Chocolate M&Ms at the 7-11 near work. Instead of being labeled "M" they are labeled "M" with a smaller font "DARK" underneath.

I had the strangest dream this morning. Normally I don't journal my dreams. Oh, sometimes I think about it, but to actually do it? That's very rare. Anyway, I was living in a world that was an amalgam of the Desire and Fashion House soap operas (despite never having actually seen an episode). I doubt it was factually accurate, but it had the actors from those shows playing characters who were trying to commit adultery all over. Meanwhile, while I avoided various advances, I came down with the strangest affliction: trilobite shapes crawling underneath my skin. It felt like a traveling bruise wherever they were. While I tried desperately to the attention of someone in a doctor's office, eventually the nurse came by and thought I was delusional, not seeing where the trilobites were. Luckily, the doctor finally came and knew of the affliction, having suffered it before. He suggested that I had been at my work, as that was the last place he had contracted it. The only way to get rid of them was to squeeze them out of the pours of the skin, just as they had made their way in when they were much smaller. It was pretty gross, squirting guts out of my pours like a fist-sized zit. Then I woke up to start another day, and I decided that was bizarre enough to journal. I hope you enjoyed it.

Your Geek Profile:

SciFi Geekiness: Highest Internet Geekiness: High Academic Geekiness: Moderate Movie Geekiness: Moderate Music Geekiness: Moderate Gamer Geekiness: Low Geekiness in Love: Low Fashion Geekiness: None General Geekiness: None

"Every Christian needs a half an hour of prayer each day, except when he is busy, then he needs an hour." ~Francis de Sales

Sledge Hammer, Season One is out on DVD-Video. That was such an awesome show. It should be required watching for those with access to a DVD-Video player and monitor.

Wow, yesterday's entry was rather incoherent.  I started it in the afternoon with the intention of doing a month recap, then after diner and mass with my mother it turned into a Sunday recap.  Sorry about that. 

I did go to CopperCon today.  There really wasn't much left of the con, but I got to see the Dealer's Room, ConSuite, Opening Gaming/Computer LAN, and the Art Show (after it had closed and was being torn down).  But I got to play four games of Shadowfist with Ken and 1 six player game of Star Wars Epic Duels with Sean, Ben, Wayne, Ivan, and Gilead.  It definitely wouldn't have been worth it had I not already earned a free membership from running Shadowfist demos and tournaments last year.  Unfortunately, without the opportunity to run Shadowfist this year we've probably lost momentum.  I totally need to ensure that a Proving Ground starts here in the valley and soon.

Thanks to felgild for this quiz:

"You don't stop laughing because you grow old. You grow old because you stop laughing."  ~Michael Pritchard

Arizona State has more Catholics than Notre Dame according to this video.

So, where have I been?  My leg has been healing over the past few weeks.  The freezing tip seems to be working.  The other Saturday I lifted a heavy box without thinking, but otherwise I manage to avoid having really bad days anymore. 

At mass today I made a mistake during the Prayers of the Faithful.  I said, "Let us pray to the Love," instead of "Let us pray to the Lord," at the end of one of the petitions.  Oops!  My mother said that it was a Freudian slip.  I guess I could have said something even more embarassing.  As usual, Father Milt gave another great homily, so hopefully people will remember that more than my slip up. 

Well, I'm falling asleep here at the computer, so maybe I should go to bed.  This episode of SG1 is a repeat anyway.  I think I might go to CopperCon tomorrow.  We'll see.

Thanks to felgild for this quiz:

?? Which Angel Or Demon Are You ??

Magic
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I finally retyped my review of Friendship Sunday as I had promised.

Thanks for the return welcome similar_stranger, felgild, and bassaf. It's nice to be missed. I miss reading my subs, and hope to return to reading my online friends' exploits soon. But for now, I thought I'd finish up posting my thoughts on .

So, normally when I am sent a link to an online comic I'll go read it. If I liked it or am otherwise intrigued, I'll attempt to start from the beginning and read up to the current entry. Short archives I'll usually make it through if it's a quality comic. Long archives usually defeat me, as I eventually lose interest or run out of time. Yet I'll bookmark the site and promise myself that I'll read the rest when I have some spare time and inclination. QC was so engrossing that I couldn't send myself to bed, instead reading hundreds of comics a night until I couldn't concentrate on reading another. Then I'd crash on the couch, too tired to go to bed.

In two nights I completed 650+ comics, so when I woke up the morning of the third day I finished the rest. Then, craving more, I decided the best thing to do was blog it out. And unlike other things which I have wanted to blog about in this past month, I finally did (and still am several days later). I think the main thing is that I empathise with the characters.

As a pre-adolescent I was verbally cruel to those who were closest to me and I was totally unable to allow courtship between myself and interested parties. Faye has these traits due to the trauma of seeing her father commit suicide, while I had these traits following my parents' divorce. Luckily, therapy did help me out of that.

As an adolescent I was able to hang with the ladies and fit in as the nice, safe guy, just as Marten does. I think that stems from many of my family activities growing up being with my mother and grandmother. Since college I've been unable to get a group of female friends like I did in high school. Most of my female friends these days are in mixed groups, and paired off with someone. I did have a lot of fun earlier this year when Kim, Lisa, Trevor, and I hung out to clean Lisa's old apartment before she turned over the keys to the management. There's something special about the group dynamic when hanging with ladies that isn't there when hanging out in mixed gender groups or all guy groups. It's definately something I miss in my life.

I recall when in college my friend Nich warned me that our friend Sheila had designs on me. I totaly dismissed him. Yet, a few weeks later we were seeing each other. The obliviousness of myself and the suddenness of the relationship reminds me of Marten and Dora.

The cast's desire to not be caught up in societal norms is definately something which anyone who knows me knows has always been a part of my personality. Marten's willingness to take things slow with women and wait for them is definately a trait of mine. His willingness to take physical harm without vengence in mind when said violence was not intended in a negative way is also a trait of mine. (I winced at the threat to his shins!)  I, too, have a crazy cat and a penchant for black clothing without being goth, as Dora does. 

I've always enjoyed angst in my literature and music whether it be horror stories or unrequited love songs. This comic has a great mix of angst and levity, all with a healthy dose of reality. It features amazingly well-crafted foreshadowing. character development, and continuity.  Although I have absolutely no indie cred, no emo cred, no gothic cred, no interest in alcoholic beverages, et cetera, I "get" QC. It's joined Onna Chance as one of the only two online comics I check regularly.

Now that I've journaled it all out, I feel a whole heck of a lot more whole.  :^)  God bless y'all this Labour Day Weekend!

Your Quirk Factor: 75%

You're so quirky, it's hard for you to tell the difference between quirky and normal. No doubt about it, there's little about you that's "normal" or "average."

"The world is a tragedy to those who feel, but a comedy to those who think." ~Horace Walpole

Sorry I haven't been posting.  I'm in one of my no-time-to-do-the-stuff-I-want-on-the-computer periods.  If only Xanga would do the lj thing and let me literally phone in entries while I'm on the road commuting to and from work.  That'd be awesome.  I found an entry I left unposted, but it seemed to be only missing a title.  So I made one real quick and posted it for y'all. 

When I could have been blogging, reading message boards, or otherwise catching up on the various communities I already exist in here in cyberspace these past few days, I was instead reading all 700 comics at .  I'm officially addicted, having been put through the emotional ringer by this comic.  In. Two. Very. Late. Nights.

I've been to a few birthday parties recently, finally bought a new headlight and taillight this past Sunday which I used for the first time last night, renewed our biweekly hiking group, plus all of the usual things in my life.  I'm working a six day work week this week, meaning that CopperCon XXVI will be the first CopperCon since 1994 I haven't attended. 

If I had more time, I'd elaborate.  Instead I will head to work slightly behind schedule.  While I suffer from QC withdrawl.  QC overdosing is my friend. 

You Are a Visual Learner

You tend to remember what you see, and you have a good eye for aesthetics. You excel at art, design, and computer programming. You would be an excellent film director - or the next Bill Gates!

Thanks to Matt for the scarily accurate quiz:

What Kind of Geek are You?
Name
DOB
Favourite Color
Your IQ is	high
You are a	word nerd
Your strength is	you never need to sleep
Your weakness is	chocolate
You think normal people are	strange
Normal people think that you are	weird
This quiz by owlsamantha - Taken 274785 Times.

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The Chosen One, is this what was promised?

Saturday, Kitty had us watch Gamers, an interesting movie that was obviously only fit for direct to video.

Sunday, I attended services at Church for the Nations, at JC's request. Tonight's power outage during the thunderstorm wiped out my cftn review. I'm not going to rewrite it all right now. I need to spend that time on HLA3.

Father Milt's homily was right on, comparing the chance to rest and renourish in mass to that of the Apostles when crossing the lake. Mass is the one place where I don't have to be "on", whether for my cat at home, coworkers and customers at work, or family and friends when out-and-about. Mass is a place where my concentration on prayer is rarely divided by outside sources. Mass is one of two places where I feel comfortable enough that I can fall asleep even when I'm well rested. The other place is when I'm a passenger in a moving vehicle. What?! Yes, I can fall asleep during mass, even during an amazing homily, because of how much of refuge it is from the work-a-day world. There have been times where I have fought the oncoming sleep to the best of my ability, and others when it snuck up on me, only to have me notice as I woke up. They always end up being micro-sleeps, unless I actually come to a mass unrested. Amazingly, Father Milt discussed such rest in his homily, exactly as I have experienced it since childhood. It's not something I've discussed with others, yet he descibed my exact experiences. So I suspect that he has encountered it in multiple parishoners during his years in the priesthood.

After mass, one of my fellow parishoners noticed my limp and asked me a few questions about it. He suggested that the sheath housing my tendons ripped and was ripped again and again before fully healing. He discussed how such a rip occurs, what causes it to heal so slowly, how such slow healing lends itself to retearing before completely healing, and what to do to speed up the healing. He had learned of this from his sports doctor, from his days as an athelete. Just as Father Milt's homily fit me exactly, so too did this conversation fit my injury. I caused the injury just as he described. I'd feel better and worse just as he described, and he made it all make sense to me for the first time. So, of course as soon as I got home I began preparing the treatment he suggested. How can anyone doubt the movement of the Holy Spirit through His Church after two such synchonistic occurrances within an hour of each other?

Well, it's only a few days left until I'll be running Shadowfist demonstrations and co-running Hogwarts Live Action: The Centaur of Hogsmeade. I have lots of work to do before Thursday morning. See y'all on the flip side (unless I see some of you there).

Thanks to Kitty for the quiz:

You Have a Melancholic Temperament

Introspective and reflective, you think about everything and anything. You are a soft-hearted daydreamer. You long for your ideal life. You love silence and solitude. Everyday life is usually too chaotic for you. Given enough time alone, it's easy for you to find inner peace. You tend to be spiritual, having found your own meaning of life. Wise and patient, you can help people through difficult times. At your worst, you brood and sulk. Your negative thoughts can trap you. You are reserved and withdrawn. This makes it hard to connect to others. You tend to over think small things, making decisions difficult.

What Temperment Are You?

Saturday Mike showed me The Batman versus Dracula.  It wasn't bad.  (Very minor spoilers are in my review.) 

Yesterday I was surprised to show up for mass and see the second lector's name removed by whiteout.  If someone knew that early, why not give me a call?  I mean, we prepare both readings anyway, just in case, but it'd be the polite thing to do.  Oh well.  I rolled with it, and mass went quite well.  At five 'til the church was emptier than Superbowl Sunday, but by the time of the first reading the pews were more full than most summer Sundays.  They had a hard time getting enough EMs because of that as well.  Father Milt's homily dealt with our call to discipleship, which fit right in with our second collection for Black and Native American Missions and today's blood drive.

Speaking of today's blood drive, we might have surpassed a parish record for donations.  Usually fewer people show up to donate and they turn away more people than they did today.  We had a slight complication during the second return of my double red donation, but the technician was able to move the needle to quit returning my red blood cell free blood into my arm outside of the vein.   I guess I might get a bruise, but it would have been worse if I hadn't spoken up and let it continue. 

Thanks to Kitty for the quiz:

You Are A Maple Tree

There's not anyone in this world quite like you. You are full of imagination, ambition, and originality. Shy but confident, you hunger for new experiences. You have a good memory and learn easily. You are sometimes nervous and always complex (especially in love).

Check out Zombie Arcade, a cool what-if scenario.

I felt like a zombie last night and this morning. I ate chili-cheese corn chips for dinner last night, and the corn chips tasted like motor oil. After dinner, my stomache was all in knots, leaving me less than patient during the online HLA3 meeting. When I woke up, I didn't feel ant better. In fact, the smell of cooking breakfast kick-started the forceful release of bodily fluids from both ends of the digestive track.  I was running to the facilities every couple of minutes for the next several hours.  I couldn't even keep down water. 

In fact, I had to make several stops on the way to work.  Eventually, I was running behind and called in.  Just as I figured, they didn't even want me to come to work.  That's exactly why I didn't call before leaving.  Once I gave up on drinking water on the way down, I was able to quit expelling bodily fluids.  Unfortunately, not hydrating while exercising during an extreme heat advisory left me weaker amd weaker.  Only my willpower got me the rest of the way to work.  I guess I looked as bad as I felt, so I went next door to 7-11 and bought an overpriced refridgerated 2L of Coca-Cola Classic in the hopes it would settle my stomache.  I felt a lot better after chugging 8 or so ounces, and continued to drink it throughout the day. 

I ate a few crackers on my morning break.  Later, I finished the rest of the crackers and the soda for lunch.  However, I couldn't really eat much of my chicken vermicelli.  I guess I'll have it for lunch tomorrow.  I'm cooking up an English muffin right now, which I hope to have with peanut butter and jam as my dinner. I'm guessing that the oil in the corn chips went rancid, causing food poisoning.

Christians Will Need to Be Mystics, Says Theologian
Warns of Challenges of the Secularized World

Four simple words. It would have been nice if I could have just said them. I'd turn around, and be pleasently greeted with a sight which would bring those word to mind, but not out of my mouth. Four occurrances became four lost opportunities, all due to fear. What was there to fear? People don't generally dislike compliments, especially sincere ones. It's the same fears that drove my cruelty as a pre-teen. The same fears that drove my timidity as a teen. The same fears that drive me to make cryptic blogs as an adult.

Anyway, less crypticly and more on topic, it was a great weekend. I did chores around the house until it was time to go to Jay's place Saturday night.  I received a cool T&T mini-comic in the mail from the Trollgod, which was funny enough to have me lol.  I need to jump back into Trollhalla when I have more time. I need an extra day or two a week. 

It was the first time I met Kim's co-worker and husband. I guess they had been at the other game night I had missed. Lisa made lasagna (only one kind, which I found slightly odd, but didn't say anything) which we all ate with salad and garlic toast before playing Battle of the Sexes. I wasn't that impressed with the game. I already wage battle against societal gender roles as it is. There are things that are definately gender-biased in this world, but many of the things this culture would have you believe are gender-biased really are not. And the questions from this game are firmly rooted in that nonsense. I think I would have flunked just as many "male" questions as I did "female" questions. In fact, I was easily the weakest link on the team.

After that the one couple called it a night, so I pulled out Torches and Pitchforks. It was a hit, just as I knew it would be. Now my friends want to get a copy for their son. Then we all called it a night. I read Legacy #1 while my phone annoyed me with low battery warnings until I turned it off. The next day we all gathered again for a day of shopping at Ikea (my first time) and the AZ Mills. I picked up a few gifts and a hardcover copy of Survivor's Quest. Who knows when I'll get around to reading it, but it was only $6.97! Gotta love outlet malls. I did discover that I was right to be curious about the lasagna the previous night, among other things, as I had the opportunity for one-on-one, two-on-one, and three-on-one conversations throughout the shopping day. Eventually we ate at Johnny Rocket's, where we had a new, slow, and bumbling server. Not everyone in the party was willing to cut him some slack, but nor were they willing to back up their words by talking to the manager. Luckily, I was the one with control over the tip, so we didn't shortchange the poor guy.  I wouldn't have had a problem doing so if people were willing to talk to the manager, but there's nothing worse than shortchanging on a tip without explanation.  What does that really teach? Thankfully, the food was great, and of the course the company was excellent, so I was able to overlook our minor troubles. 

Obviously I had an awesome couple of days with my friends. We ended the day by playing another round of Torches and Pitchforks (now that they were familiar with play) before I had to get ready and go to mass. Going shopping was one of my favourite activities growing up. Neither of my parents would necessarily buy anything, but loved browsing. In my teens I'd go shopping with my mother or my friends in much the same way. I've always associated shopping with a social activity, so I tend to put off non-essential shopping until I can go shopping with others. Essentials are different, as I can only postpone so long before I have no choice but to go. I especially enjoyed this shopping trip because...as I said, I had time with each of my friends.

Father Milt gave another excellent homily, comparing Mark 6:4, Ezekiel 2:5, and 2 Corinthians 12:10 first with how veterans who are honoured in USA Independance Day parades, then with how Christians approach the Gospels. Vets being honoured inevitably run into people wondering why they're being honoured, in much the same way Jesus was treated when he came to Nazareth. Similarly, when we hear or read the gospels--The Word, Jesus revealed to us--we can end up not really honouring them due to familiarity. We can start to hear which reading it is, and go "I know how this one goes," and quit giving the Lord your undivided attention.

I can totally understand both of these analogies, as I believe that the religious are way more heroic that soldiers. People who will willing living among and minister to the least of us: lepers, AIDS victims, addicts, soldiers, and prostitutes--they are the real heroes, no matter what society tells us. I know that I, too, once treated The Word with the contempt of familiarity until I became a Minister of the Word in the mid-90s. Ministry training really opened up the Hebrew and New Testaments to me. And, hopefully, a little of that gets transmitted to the assembly via the presence of the Holy Spirit.

When I got home I plugged in my phone and found a slew of voice messages from different friends all wanting to do something with me that day!  Oops!  I guess I need to keep my phone charged.  Sometime this week I'll get back to everyone. 

Yesterday was a long day. I didn't have that much phone work, but I did get a lot of web site data entry done. We had a power fluctuation occur that knocked out one map entry right before I saved, as well as knocking out the registers up front mid-sales. So, that was a lot of fun cleaning up. All-in-all a productive eleven-hour day. Today was a typical Tuesday at work, so the rest of the week will probably be as well. Tomorrow should see another HLA3 meeting, as we get back on track.