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Well, I
don't know how the hell you found this place, but here you are.
This page is basically the ass-end of the Rossman web world.
I write boring stuff down here about me and things that happen
to me. Don't ask me why.
If you read this you're even lamer than me for writing it.
Older "Daily
Rossman" Readings: At the ARCHIVEs
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Note to self 77: 01/07/2K
Ughhhhh....
-_- Tired as *&$#...... Some idiot in my apartment complex
on the first floor set his patio on fire last night at around
12:30 in the morning... He either fell asleep with a lit cigarette
near some newpapers or his grill got out of control. What a git!
The alarms started BLARING (the loudest sound I've ever heard)
and eventually (25 minutes later) the fire department arrived.
By that time, the flames had krept into the outside wall and
were up to the roof. The moron who started the fire was working
with his neighbors in putting the flames out (they were doing
a pretty good job too) when the firefighters told them to get
out and away. They then took about 8-10 minutes to get their
equipment ready and ladders up in which time the flames had regained
some strength. After 10 more minutes in the cold I got tired
of waiting to kick the moron's ass and asked the fire chief if
anybody'd have to evacuate. He said it was under control and
there was nothing more to worry about. So I went back to my apartment
and tried to sleep. Last look at the clock was around 3:30am........
G'night.
Note to self 76: 01/03/2K
Well,
well, well.... What can I say? Y2K a bust.... well, at least
the buggy side of things.
I had a pretty good Christmas down at the homestead.
Spent a lot of money, got a lot of stuff in return. Got a bunch
of clothes, shoes and Playstation games. I even got One Night
in Eden (Sarah Brightman's concert DVD:). All in all a pretty
good haul. I hung out with a bunch of old friends I hadn't seen
in a while, and then got prepared for all things Y2K. I took
a bit of money out of the bank, filled my gas tank up beyond
the limit and bought a bunch of stock in canned food and shotguns.
The usual.
Then
12/31/99 rolled around. And I partied like it was 2999!!! I went
over to a fun little get together consisting of about 20+ friends
and we just hunkered down waiting for the "New Year Before
the Next Millenium". Lots of beer and wings later I can
recall most of the night with a fairly clear memory: Firecrackers,
Killians, Firecrackers, Bud, Bud, Bud, wings, Baby's Lovin',
thick fog, Firecrackers in somebody's mailbox (several strings),
running, Bud, Killians, Bud, Bud, Bud, Bud, wings, Firecrackers
(almost blowing off my fore and middle fingers on my right hand
due to a farged up fuse [lost all feeling in fore finger tip]),
Midnight!, Auld Lang Syne, Olvie proposing to Millie, Millie
tackling him with a "Yes!", Firecrackers, expensive
champagne, Killians, Bud, Bud, Bud, Bud, Dancing with the moose,
calling somebody I know at around 1am to make fun of him for
working on the Y2K prob at that time, Bud, Bud, passing out at
4:30am.
A good time by all! the next morning I awoke to sounds
of Reba retching (not a pleasant wake-up alarm), so a few of
us went to the store to get her some ginger ale and medicine.
Then we hung out for a while watching Ice Pirates on Cinemax
while I rehydrated myself and listened as the toilet on the first
floor backed up causing a disgusting mess (I never looked, but
I heard it was bad). Then after a quick BK breakfast I
went home to crash for good.... Next thing I knew it was Monday
and back to work time.
Now,
being 1/3 of the UGA Millennium readiness office I knew that
jack was going to happen (I mean, only my dog blew up, and we're
not even sure that that had anything to do with Y2K), but it
was fun preparing a bit and listening to the hype and all :).
That kind of thing only happens once in a few thousand years,
ya know. HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!!!
Note to self 75: 12/23/1999
I
finished Nadesico last night and I remembered what always
bugged the hell out of me in the last few episodes (well, basically
the last scene in the last episode). I don't mind the fact that
the last five episodes are a bit rushed and that the writers
could have scrapped a few of the filler shows in the middle of
the series to flesh out the ending a bit better. I don't even
mind that the explanations (for everything in the entire story!)
come fast and furious in the last two episodes and that
most seemed made up or tacked on at the last minute.
Nope, what bothers me beyond words is another animated
use of women as punching (or slapping) bags. Why the $%*# did Akito have to physically
harm Yurica to get her attention?!?! A kiss (at that moment)
would have been 100Xs better! I guess I was raised differently
than most TV show writers, but it is NEVER right to hit
a girl! NEVER! This is why I can't enjoy Tenchi the Movie
2 anymore. The Ryoko bitchslap by Tenchi just ruined his
character for me. I hate the bastard now. There are so many other
ways to get a female's attention than by slapping the bejesus
outta her. -_-
Other
than that I still love Ines' ending and final realization of
who she is/was, and the build up of Akito's acceptance of Yurica
was a bit more visable this time (which made the slap all that
mush harder to accept). I still wish they had a few more episodes
to work with though, and I really wish that Izumi (the bestest
character :) had an ending.... well, I wish that a few more people
other than Akito, Yurica and Ines had completed endings. I do
understand that the Gekiganger OAV and the Prince of Darkness
movie were planned from the beginning to help tell more of the
story, but a more complete finale for the show would have been
much appreciated.
Well,
the office is dark and everybody's gone, so a Merry
Christmas to all and a
happy new Century!!!!! (Remember, the 3rd millennium
ain't till 2001..... Hmmmm, would that make the next century
2001 too? Ah, who cares. Happy 2000!!!!!! ;).
-the Rossman
Note to self 74: 12/20/1999
It's
alllll done! All of my Christmas shopping is completed :) It
was an expensive season this year, but everybody should be happy
on the 25th (I'll be happy until the Visa bill arrives -_-).
Well, the beard is now a part of me, and it's interesting
to think that people that I meet from now on will only know me
as "Wilderness Man". But change is good.... every once
in a while. And unlike my shoulder-length hair I once had, I'm
keeping this for a while now.
I
also caught two movies this weekend: Deuce Bigalow - Male
Gigolo and Mononoke Hime. Deuce was the bigger
surprise! It was hilarious!! There were so many funny parts (my
fave was the tall Swedish chick ["Dat's a huge b*tch!!"])
and every character was great. Especially the man-whore pimp.
He rocked!
As for Mononoke, well, I own it subbed and
have seen it 7 times in the past year and a half, but never on
the big screen. It was gorgeous!!! I was so awed at how bright
and crisp it was! The voices weren't even that bad... Well, except
for "valley girl" Daines. But as the film went on she
got better. Hopefully I'll be able to see it again soon with
that incredible surround sound and giant silver screen @_@ Heaven
I tell ya, heaven.
And
finally, I've gotten past the half way mark through Nadesico
again..... Now, I still like Nadesico a bunch, and it's
a really fun show to get into, but I have to admit that the fourth
time seeing it is bringing a bunch of stuff to light that I hadn't
noticed or thought about before. For instance: Ruri now bugs
the complete F*** out of me!!! I can't stand her!!! I still like
the episode in Peace Land, but her "Baka ba'ka" got
old after the second time she uttered it -_- Urgh! It's also
moving a lot slower this time through. Great anime series (and
stories in general) hold up no matter how many times you
view it (see Eva, Nadia, Giant Robo, Porco Rosso, Mononoke,
Macross, UY, etc. etc.). I don't know right now if I'll even
buy the DVDs when ADVision actually gets around to releasing
them (and I won't even think about doing so if they don't include
the original display screens that they covered up in the dubbed
release with their horribly cheesy CGI). I'll continue through
till the end and see if the finale still holds up along with
the movie Prince of Darkness. Then I'll get back to you.
Note to self 73: 12/07/1999
Where
to start @_@?
Hmmmm, I guess it all began back in the middle of
November with a little game called "Final Fantasy VIII".
Final Fantasy VIII
Review
Well,
once again Square has made another fine game, but unfortunately
labeled it with a "FF" in the title. Now, newbies to
Japanese RPGs will wonder what I'm talking about, so I'll try
to 'splain it to you in as few words as possible. Final Fantasy
used to mean "great story, huge world, involving quest,
great characters, medieval setting, gorgeous music, beautiful
graphics and enough magic and weapons and attacks to choke a
chocobo".... Now they don't.
Don't
get me wrong (where have I heard this before:), I really
liked FFVIII. It had a bunch of the qualities that I listed
above to make it a great game, just not the ones necessary to
really make it a true FF game. It might as well have been called
Xenogears 2. The setting was wrong, the magic system sucked,
and the fact that you couldn't save up for better armor (you
had to wait till the right time in the game before you could
even find the parts to upgrade your weapons -_-) destroyed any
feelings of nostalgia I might'uv felt and any memories of classic
FF gameplay. And while the story was pretty good and I cared
about the characters a lot (especially Rinoa ^_^), I found that
the whole "we knew eachother before but forgot because of
the Guardian Forces (don't even let me get started on the lameness
of having them fight for you for about 3/4 of the whole
game!!)" was kind of tacked on and almost ruined even the
fun and fairly involving story.
The
world map was also severly lacking in necessary details, like
say "cities" and countries. What were there, like 4
cities and one town in this whole world? And they need all these
hired guns (SeeDs make up more than half the world's population!!)?!?!
What a violent world this is. I didn't miss the super deformed
character designs too much since the new designs were pretty
good. I also really liked how the two timelines merged so well
into the final story. What I liked best, however, was Nobuo's
blessed soundtrack :) He really put his all into it. It
still didn't match FFVI's audio perfection, but it came close.
"FITHOS LUSEC WECOS VINOSEC", "Succession
of Witches" and even the highly criticized "Eyes
on Me" (which rather grows on you) made this game much
better than it really should have been. Well, the FMV cut scenes
did have a major role in that too, but when combined with the
music it makes a great one-two combo. One of my favorite parts
of my 35 hours of game-play time was the assassination attempt
on Edea. Incredible!! Great tension and follow through.
Now
on to the story. It started out at a good pace, but slowed down
a bit till the characters met Irvine and got their mission for
the capital. I thought that the whole love story took a bit longer
than expected in finally getting off of the ground though. Only
at about 2/3 through the story does Cloud- er... Squall come
to the realization that he actually loves Rinoa. What took him
so damn long!?!? She was a cute buncha polygons, I'll tell you
what. It kept up a good pace with some good curves (and excellent
CG!) until the whole "Orphanage" business. Where the
hell did that come from? After that though, it picked up its
pace and kept it till the end. And finally meeting Laguna and
Co. was pretty cool, even though he was a wimp and a dork most
of the game.
Then came the hardest bosses in RPG history! Holy crapatutimous!
Not only were they tough, but they just kept coming!! And because
I didn't really level up before the final castle (the MAJOR weakness
in this game being how enemies level up with your characters,
soooo why bother?), it took a loooong while to take them out.
But boy was the ending worth it!! The music and visuals were
unparalleled in any rendering graphics I've seen! And the final
party aboard Balamb was worth the $40 admission price alone :)
I just couldn't believe that there was NO STARFIELD!!!!!!! What
was up with that!?! A decade old and 7 game tradition was ruined!
UUUuuurgh! Oh well, all in all I'd give Final Fantasy VIII
- 8 out 10 Rossman medals of valor. I hope they bring Yoshitaka
Amano back for IX.
I
also caught a bunch of movies since my last update. They include
the most awesome and most darkly entertaining Sleepy Hollow
(one of the top 3 of the year!!!), the so-so Bond: The
World is Not Enough (well, it did have Denise "Wild
Things" Richards in it... so it weren't all that bad), and
Toy Story 2 (almost as good as the first one!). I hope
that Sleepy Hollow at least gets an Oscar for some of its great
visual elements and costumes.
I was able to keep another tradition going this year
in the gathering of old friends for the holidays. I got the Wolfman
and Chi-Chi to meet for a dinner a few days before I left for
Grandma's. Unfortunately Jen will never be a part of this again,
but that's her loss :p We didn't do much this year,
but it was fun to joke around and tell stories together again
with everybody's comments and laughs. Hopefully we can do it
again before Christmas.
Then
I joined my sister and parents to visit my Nana in North Carolina
for Thanksgiving. It was an adventure, but we all had a good
time and Nana really appreciated it. She's now back in NJ with
the rest of the clan.
During my holiday (that's European for "vacation"
^_~), I also got to finally finish watching Escaflowne
(once more) and in a two day stretch of time got to see all of
Shin Seiki Evangelion for the 7th time (the 26 eps, Death
[True] and End of EVA)...... It was the first time I watched
everything in that short a time period in order... It really
hits you hard when you see NERV getting "erased" in
EoE after just seeing the build up of characters in the
series. I was depressed for a while after that..... That is until
I got on a plane and went to SCOTLAND!!!!! (well, England first,
then Scotland)!!!!!!
Note to self (continued): 12/07/1999
Well,
after I got back from Grandma's for Thanksgiving, I packed up
and hopped the pond for the British Isles with my friends Angus,
Alec and Meg. To make a looooong story short, we had a great
time and I was the first Ross or Taylor to see snow fall in Edinburgh
since my Grammy in 1911.... Now to make the story long.
We left late Tues 11/30 and arrived a wee bit before
noon on Wed, 12/1 British time at Gatwick Airport. We checked
into our hotel (a pretty nice and relatively cheap place) and
then we went walking around the British Museum and saw all the
mummies and other cool stuff (Let me tell you, Cleopatra got
the royal shaft with her mummy. Her sarcophagus was wooden and
her cheaply wrapped mummy had kindergarten fingerpaintings on
it). Then we wandered the streets looking for a Tavern when we
had to eat because somebody (not me dammit! I wanted a damn tavern
>:( got hungry and made us eat at the s***tiest sandwich
shop in all of London.... That sucked. After that we went back
to the hotel and they crashed for the rest of the night (at 6:30pm....
on vacation.... half the world away).
The
next day I made sure we toured London properly. We got on a double-decker
tour bus and spent most of the day hitting the main spots: Buckingham,
Trafalger Square, Big Ben, the London Dungeon, Tower of London
and Harrod's. Near around 7pm, we were headed towards a show
(Phantom of the Opera) to make sure we did something big
that night to make up for the previous night, when our plans
changed to Les Miserables instead, and then to nothing.
They didn't want to do anything again and I got fed up and just
bought a ticket for myself to Les Mis. They eventually
came around and joined me in the theater and we had a fun time.
Then while looking for food after the show, Angus led us through
the *ahem* gayest district of London... There were some interestingly
disgusting.... naw, they were just some of the most disgusting
scenes I've ever seen... -_-. Urgh! We ate at some truly trendy
Italian Cafe (great food!) and stayed way past their closing
time (we didn't much care though). It was at that cafe though,
that the three others decided that they didn't want to go to
Paris the next day after all. This disappointed me a bit, but
then I decided to go by myself to Edinburgh for the day (my original
plans since I first bought my plane ticket :). So after a mad
dash to catch the last tube from the theater district to Russell
Square (and after Meg almost broke her back), we tried to catch
some sleep. I was too excited though and just lied awake allllll
night, well, the 4 hours between crashing and when I had to arise.
Then
came Friday! I got up at 6:30 to catch the 8:30am train to Scotland,
paid for the room, let the others sleep, missed breakfast and
hurried to the station. I didn't have any cash on me, but I thought
that I'd be in Edinburgh by 1:30 and could catch lunch there...
I thought wrong. An hour and fifteen minutes into the ride, the
wind was so bad that we had to slow down to a crawl before coming
to a complete stop in Grantham station. The electric wires were
blown down and a train was stranded up ahead of us. We stayed
there for 3 hours waiting for any kind of movement (other trains
were coming up behind us and people wanting to go back to London
could get on them, our train would wait for the lines to be fixed).
Then, after all that, we were told that our train would return
to London too!! With the help of an angry Scot, though, me and
some new friends found out that we could take busses around the
trouble in the line and catch a train on the other side to the
land of the kilts and bagpipes!... So we did.
We
traveled by road through Sherwood Forrest and saw some gorgeous
visions of the English countryside! Then we hooked up with our
awaiting train and eventually rolled into Scotland.... We arrived
at around 7pm and I was famished (no food since dinner the previous
night) and tired (no sleep for two days really). So I got some
currency and then I got a really cute redhead to help me book
a room (at a great 3-star hotel right around the corner from
the station). I got her picture too :). The Jury's Inn rocked!
Their bar was even better!!! Because of a family reunion in the
main restaurant, I had to eat in a little guest-room restaurant
down the hall, which was okay ('specially cause my waitress was
so lovely and had such a great accent!). I had an incredible
meal despite the company of a few disgruntled and drunk Brits
and I got my picture taken with my cutie-pie waitress too.
After dinner it began to snow and I chased flurries
for a long time before eventually crashing the private family
reunion
in the main restaurant (hell, I was probably somehow related
to them anyway). I was kicked out though after 45 minutes cause
I took a picture and they apparently thought I stole their souls
or something. Eh, what ya gunna do?
Sooooo,
the next morn I walked around town taking snapshots of the glorious
scenery blanketed in snow as I made my way up to the castle.
Edinburgh is one of the most beautiful towns I've ever seen,
and it has some of the cutest girls I've ever seen too!!
I soon made it to the Castle Gates and took the whole
tour of the grounds. I saw the oldest building in the city (St.
Margaret's Church, close to 1,000 years old), the Royal Dragoon
Museum (where I bought a scarf to bundle up with from the -2
degree F windchill), the Scottish Crown Jewels and Stone of Destiny, and eventually
the giftshop where I spent over 145 pounds on silver and gold
gifts for my family that they collected (yup, could only
be from that giftshop :) and a great Celtic Music CD for
myself (the lady behind the counter was really nice and freindly
:). Soon after I saw the 1o'clock gun and raced back to the hotel
and the train. I had an infinitely better time on the ride back
(I listened to 4 Scottish teenage girls talk and talk for a couple
of stops. I didn't really listen to the conversation, but just
to their wonderful accents @_@). And except for the poor-little-rich-boy
ranting about how stupid Americans were (his arguments were ever
so laughable, and embarrasing to his mum [as she sat across from
me and could see just how American I truly was, though he was
looking only at his friend or straight ahead]).... What a smeg-head.
Well,
back late on Saturday in London and I had one more night to hit
the town. I basically just walked around and visited a few pubs
before retiring to my crappy hole-in-the-wall hotel and crashed
(but not before watching a bit of late night Brit TV 0_o). Then
the next day I talked to the Canadian cutie-pie at the front
desk for a while, got her picture and then met everyone at the
airport for the long 9 hour trip home.... The END!
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