Wednesday, June 17, 2009

You Know, I Bet I Could Fry an Egg on your Head Right Now, if I Wanted To...


Nope, not a clue. Not a blasted idea. Absolutely nothing. The Empty Set. Null and void and everything in between.

THAT, my dear friends, is what I have in my mind to write about tonight. So, I will just begin to type, and we shall all see together where it ends up... think of it as a literary adventure. Let's all take hands here, and form a chain, and together we can circumnavigate, traverse and otherwise cross this great ideological morass. I found it, I did! A way through the marshes... Orcs don't use it. Orcs don't know it... they go around for miles and miles... you may ask, "Dave, how is this any different than every other night?"

Whoa, lady, I only speak two languages... English and bad English. Well, it's a good, reasonable question! I guess it ain't any different!

I've discovered something interesting about the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. They ain't as good as I remembered that they were. I've read the first six so far, and I have found them quite lacking. I don't know whether to keep reading them or launch into The Lies of Locke Lamora or give Sword of Shannara another try... what do you read, my lord?

I went to the book store today to see if Best Served Cold was out yet - I thought it was supposed to be out mid June for some reason. But, nope, it won't be out until the very end of July. So I got that goin' for me, which is nice. I should post pictures of my shelves full of books, and color-code them in Photoshop, so at a glance you and I can both see which ones I've read, which ones I haven't read, which ones I started but didn't finish, which ones I have read more than once, and which ones I bought because they look impressive but I have no intention of ever reading. I keep those books in an effort to impress my wife, in the hopes that she'll like me someday... Actually, the only thing that impresses her is really aggressive driving. Which means I'm sunk.

I came to a Battlefield 2-related realization today as I studied my stats... other than my next increase in rank, there is really not much else, as far as achievements, that I will likely ever earn. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of badges, medals and ribbons I haven't earned, but I'm trying to be realistic. The odds that I will get almost any of the remaining ones are slim.

Since I know you are dying for a list, here it is. I aims to please...
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- I'm 95.84% toward earning the Sergeant Major rank. Odds: It's a lock. Easy-peasy. Gimme a week.

- I need 33 more knife kills to get my Expert Knife Badge. Odds: Pretty good. Should take me about a month. I've been getting 1 or 2 a night lately.

- I need to run over 5 people in one round to get my Veteran Transport Badge. Odds: Meh. If I focus on it exclusively, I think I could do it. That's a big maybe.

- I need 20 kills in one round combined from the mounted machine gun or TOW missile to get my Expert Ground Defense Badge. Odds: Slim. It's very difficult. Maybe on a marathon round where I can shoot down 10 attack choppers (1 pilot & 1 gunner each) with the TOW, maybe. But it would be lucky. I am a stud on the TOW though.... so you never know...

That's it, really. The rest of them are either impossible, or would take many rounds of focused effort on my part to try and obtain them, and after a while, it becomes work and not play. I want to enjoy the game. If you want to see all the awards I will not be winning, go to my stats page, and scroll down to the Awards section. Put your cursor over each award and it will tell you what would be required to earn it. Then you can scoff at my abject mediocrity.

Wow, how "scraping the bottom of the barrel" does it get when discussing meaningless statistics in an obscure game can take up so much air time? I mean, does making a man a knight make him a better fighter? Well, we all have our passions, I suppose. Mine is PC Gaming. And whining. And history...

Todayve in History: June 18
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- June 18, 1812: The War of 1812 begins as the US Congress declares war on Great Britain and Ireland. (There was nothing good on TV that night, so they though, "Hey, why not?")

- June 18, 1873: Susan B. Anthony is fined $100 for attempting to vote in the 1872 presidential election. (It was an honest mistake... no one told her the election wasn't until November...)

- June 18, 1908: The University of the Philippines was established. (An honorary degree to the inventor of lumpia! Mmmmmm!!!!)

- June 18, 1930: Groundbreaking ceremonies for the Franklin Institute are held. (They were more civil than the windbreaking ceremonies held later that night...)

- June 18, 1940: Winston Churchill delivers his famous "Finest Hour" speech. (He misspoke... it was supposed to be a bread recipe which called for "our finest flour"...)

Let's see if I can't find a Funny Picture for ya...
The ol' "Levitating Cork Trick." Yawn. That is soooo 2004.... Man, you just can't find a decent, modern cat magician anymore... the last good one was Furry Houdini...

I just discovered that when you think you've scraped the bottom of the barrel, look again, because you can usually find another lame joke in there somewhere! "Furry Houdini"... what was I thinking...? You have my profuse apologies... I know, I can hear you now... "You think that by saying 'I'm sorry,' all the past can be corrected?" No, I most assuredly do not.

Well, I could always default to the "cute animal" video clip... here's one where a guy is teaching a baby wolf to howl...


Oh, come on... you gotta admit, that was pretty cute...

Well, if that didn't do it for you, try this article over at IGN that discusses the 25 Worst Wrestling Gimmicks of All Time. They've got descriptions, pictures and even video clips! Hours of fun reliving all those weak wrestling memories from your childhood! All those weekend afternoon hours spent watching wrestling, the Monday Night Wars, renting all the VHS wrestling tapes, practicing moves on your little brother, rooting for Hulk Hogan, even when he turned heel...

Wait... you weren't a wrestling fan? Well, okay then!

Another Rug Shop Day slated for tomorrow. Let's see if I can get to bed at a decent hour tonight (as opposed to an indecent hour, I guess) so I can wake up at a decent hour and get into work at a decent hour. Well, it's a good thing I'm such a decent guy!

Oh, man, that reminds me... I could REALLY go off on a theological rant right here, but I think I'll save it for another day. Pull in those reins, Davey Boy... Whoa, boy! Don't go there just now...

Whew, that was close.

My 20th High School Reunion is about a week away. I'm about 99% sure I will not be attending. I hope it's a great event and well-attended and all, but I think I'll pass. If I go, I'll have to bring wifey, who is SOOO not into it. I'll have to guard my every word and move, lest she think I'm trying to rekindle some old high school flame or something. It would be a dazzling evening full of the most exquisitely uncomfortable pins and needles! And I certainly couldn't go alone and expect to ever hear the end of it. Besides, there's really no one there I feel an overly strong urge to reconnect with face to face. I've become "friends" with a handful of my old classmates on Facebook, and that's pretty much good enough for me. I think I'll stay home and get some knife kills in BF2...

Well, I suppose I'll pull the plug tonight. Not bad for a guy that had absolutely nothing to talk about, eh? Good luck with the Movie Quotes. Until tomorrow, remember, if you had known anything about the true nature of the universe, anything at all, you would've hidden from it in terror!

14 comments:

havah said...

Kill Bill and Lord of the Rings: Two Towers.

:D

Bobinho said...

@havah: what about those two movies? :P

@dave: last sentence is from Flash Gordon! :)

Bobinho said...

"what do you read, my lord" is from Hamlet

havah said...

Oh, and The Fifth Element

Bobinho said...

"I aims to please" is from Malcolm X

havah said...

Sorry, did I have to say which quotes they were? Title is from Kill Bill, the orc thing is from the Two Towers, and the bad English bit is from the Fifth Element.

Oh..and almost missed it...the making a man a knight is from Kingdom of Heaven

And that's it for me. I'm not good at these things. :)

BTW, Dave, at least you're becoming knightish..all I'm becoming is a better poker play. 8-|

Abbie said...

cute video dave :)
20 years from high school already!! whoa.... thats a long time! and didn't you go to Ramona high? weirdness.... to me, haha :)

David Wagner said...

Well, 15 points for Bob! And while technically, there's a 3 quote per day limit in place, I'm sure Havah didn't know that, so I'm going to give her the 20 points this time, but now you know!

There are still several more quotes to be had, Abbie and Shannon and whomever! Hey, what ever happened to Grace?

Yep, Abbie, Ramona High class of '88. I know, it's technically been 21 years now, but they were late getting on the ball with organizing the reunion...

grace said...

i feel so old. this is my 10 year reunion for high school, but my school is even more lame so we aren't even having one. i don't really care about connecting with any of those peoples anyway, except for 2, one i am friends with on myspace, one disappeared off the face of the earth and was excommunicated literally from his fam
quote:
saying sorry- gone with the wind

totally agree about sherlock. but you have to remember that those are classics and forerunners. i grew up on sir arthur when i was like six through ten. now i have read much more suspensful, and gory mysteries, that sherlock is too g rated for me. but it got me started on a life long love for forensics and criminal behavior. did you ever read agatha christie?

Paula Titus said...

At least you actually type something when you have nothing to say, I just stare at the screen until my eyes glaze over.

Your bookshelf sounds a lot like mine with dozens of books I haven't finished.

If you want, I think you should go to the reunion and talk to whoever you like.

havah said...

Oops! Sorry about the three quotes a day thing...but appreciate the points all the same ;)

I won't be going to any high school reunions. Trans-Atlantic travel is just too much trouble to go to for people to gloat at how much weight I've gained. :D Besides, most of us are scattered all over the globe now. It's a South African thing.

As for Sherlock, I haven't read that in a while, but I did start reading an Agatha Christie the other day. Did you know she introduced all her dialogue with "he said: " or "she replied: " ? All those colons are making me nuts. (Not that it takes a lot, to be honest...)

havah said...

So I'm assuming three a day means I can do more today? Hope so...

"So I got that goin' for me, which is nice." comes from Caddyshack.

Sodi said...

Well, Dave, I don't know what happened tonight but I stayed up to read your blog... Hope You don't end up skipping a day. :(

David Wagner said...

Sorry, Shannon. I try to get it done each day before midnight... I'll try to post it earlier in the evening from now on. I'll be good, I promise!

Oh, and 5 more points for Havah and 5 for Grace!

My mom used to be big into Agatha Christie (I think)... at least, I remember seeing a large collection of her books in the house growing up. I don't know that I read any of them before... I'll have to track one down and give it a go.