We might be playing poker a little bit too much, and we’ve been having a lot of fun. Adding two and two together, poker usually means fun–and you also have pocket twos. Junior won the two dollar game with the quickness. Carlo took five people out within seven hands, then decided his win last night was enough and threw it all away. Ten-thirty was much too early to head home, so some of us picked up some food before starting up a second, one dollar game. Cards went down the drain for me until the last few hands. Most of us just wanted to sleep, so people were playing crazy. After losing 90% of my chips to Harvey, I doubled up on Curt, then tripled that up on Jerry and Harvey. A comeback was being mounted, so we just decided to play another winner-takes-all hand. It’s not about the money, and that’s something I really like.

Something I also really like is winning the money. What in the world would I do with that seven dollars if I won? Back to the hand, Curt was dealt nothing worth remembering, but Harvey got a queen. I saw a queen on the table, so he had the high pair and I thought it was over. Then I remembered to take a look at my cards. It looks like the seven bucks is going towards the room for the Manage a quatre between me and the three queens.

Party up! I had plenty of fun, and I’m sure everyone else did. We sipped on tea, watched Junior walk around, and then the food came out. I decided it would be a good idea to take small portions of the food on the Sterno heaters. After seeing so much space left on my plate, the carver would slap a massive chunk of prime rib onto it. That was the plan at least. Instead, the exact opposite happened and the carver probably thought I was a small eater and gave me a piece the size of a deck of cards. Seconds came and I was a happy boy again.

Next were the ceremonies for the eighteen roses and eighteen candles. There was also a video slideshow where we all got to see Pam grow up. More important, though, is that we got to see Retro Chris. A few people sang to Pam, then came time for our feet to hit the dance floor. Jason, Maggie, and Danielle did the Thriller dance from 13 Going on 30. It was faded quickly when Jamie broke it down over Ocho-Ocho. Slow motion for us.

Karaoke started off with a bang with Pam’s My Heart Will go On. Curt and Cindy stole my jam and did alright, I guess. Jason was wonderful tonight. I had to say it. Curt’s solo got the top score of the night, but everyone knows those scores are backwards. After all, these two guys only got a 72 after they grabbed the microphones and murdered it on A Whole New World. The guy singing Jasmine’s part was ravishingly fine.

Overall, it was definitely a fun night. And I forgot to mention the cake. It looked like a wedding cake. Bridges and a fountain connected four or five round cakes. That’s cool and all, but the fatso awesome part is that three were cheesecake.

This has nothing to do with anything, but Jon told me a joke. A magic tractor turns into a field. Nevermind, I forgot how the rest goes.

A full week has passed since my last post, so here’s another long, fun post with subtitles.

Camera Five megapixels is a lot. Honestly, I don’t think I’ve truly been in a situation where five was necessary. Of course, the biggest use I have for this camera is a final output at 500×375 pixels. I’ve had more than fifty pictures ready to print, but haven’t taken the time to stop by Wal-Mart to upload them. Shutterfly is a consideration. Rewind to the intro sentence. Six megapixels is more, so I am having a pretty hard time justifying a Canon 300D.

Axim My first Pocket PC was definitely worthwhile. I have used it everyday since I opened that little brown box. Some uses aren’t so productive. Actually, I estimate that I only use it for my original, legitimate organizational uses 5% of the time. But the sun still laughs at us and summer is raging on. Wake up, eat, poo, shower, and work are about the only things I can really plan at the moment. Please make sure to acknowledge the comma between eat and poo. For the other 95%, I am watching movies or listening to music. Actually, that’s probably just another 5%. So what makes up the other 90%? Morphgear, a SNES emulator, and an RPG.

Earthbound This game is classic. I didn’t care what reviews said back then, and I don’t care what nostalgic reviews say now. Actually, they are both right for the most part. The graphics are horrid and the sound is worse. But there aren’t too many things in the world that can bring me back to fourth grade more clearly. And something about the game really entertains me. Eight years ago, I never really did catch the humor, but I loved leveling up all the same. The world doesn’t really seem to be in any true danger, there aren’t any huge twists or dramatic story elements, the characters aren’t seriously motivated or out for revenge, and I even fought a giant evil tent as a boss. It’s not an epic RPG. That’s what I like.

This game is classic, and it is also the number one daily battery drainer on my Axim.

Final Fantasy V Along with Earthbound and Chrono Trigger, I’m pretty sure that this was only other SNES RPG I beat. It And it took me three years in all—maybe four or five. I was stuck on the last boss and quit for two of those three or four or five years. I finally picked the game up again to beat that giant tree, and that’s when I found out it was the end of the game. As far as I remember, I logged in 72 hours before I saw the ending. I estimate I was stuck at the end for more than fifteen hours. I’d say that I don’t want to brag, but that’s what I’m doing. Yes, I am bragging about taking more than three years to beat a single game.

It was in Japanese and I started in third grade. Maybe it’s not so amazing to these modern, Pokemon-raised RPG children, but I am proud of the accomplishment. I really doubt that I’d be able to do the same if someone offered me $1000 to play through it now. I had no idea what spells were doing, and it would be common for me to travel around the world map for a few hours before finding something new to do and progressing the story. Thinking back, I can’t imagine how much free time I had in elementary school.

I tried to do the same with a Japanese version of Chrono Trigger, but was fittingly stopped at the end of time. How stupid is it that you had to walk around Spekkio’s room three times to move the story on? Very, that’s what I say. It was put in the game just to keep stupid American kids like me from getting farther. Even though that probably isn’t the reason, I wouldn’t blame Square anyway considering how well it worked.

Alderwood Mall I dropped a decent amount of money on a trio of items. But it was worth it, and the trip was a lot of fun. Chris, Paul, Glenn, Junior, and Curt went and we met up with my brother. We’re officially the slowest mall-walkers ever. People were passing us left and right. We played with the gadgets in Brookstone for an uncomfortably long time. Junior and I quit early and just had a conversation with one of the workers there. Like our Wild Waves trip, food was big on our mind and we ate at The Steak Escape. It was good, but a little overpriced. When it comes to mall food court food, quantity is definitely a priority in my head, and Quizno’s has meatier sandwiches for the price. The Steak Escape’s Loaded Fries are nothing to scoff at though. Then we bought Bumbershoot tickets and headed home. A little known fact is that the name Bumbershoot comes from the Muckleshoot tribe. I know this because they both have shoot at the end.

Movies Here are some of the movies I have seen recently and my opinion. The Village, Bad. Kill Bill 2, Good. Collateral, Good. Rounders, Good. Pumping Iron, Good. Bourne Identity, Good. Good Will Hunting, Good. I just read through my list again. It sure looks like I love Matt Damon.

That’s the end. Hopefully I post more than once a week. Until then, update your Xangas and Blogspots so I have something to inspire me.

After work, we all went to Curt’s house and partied up for Russ’s second going away party. Greg won in a MvC2 best of five series with a comeback from being down 1-2. I schooled Colonel Krenil with Mitsurugi. Paul got a world record ten fourth place finishes in Double Dash. And I finally won in Hold ‘Em. Definitely a fun night for a sad event. Russ should be a third of the way to WSU.

Take care in Pullman and stay crazy. If ever you do buy a Mercedes Benz, try not to run me over. See you at the Apple Cup. And all the school breaks before that.

Monday was fun, even though we left Wild Waves earlier than usual. As far as we could tell, the wave pool was broken. We left it the first time thinking we just caught the end of a wave session, explaining the weakness of the waves. We came back and froze for the entire fifteen minutes with little luck and small waves. It was the first time I ever rode a wooden roller coaster and now I am starting to understand why the purists always say wooden is the best. Speed best describes the experience. Considering how new the coaster is, I wasn’t worried about the structure to just crumble to the ground, but I sure was scared my arms would break off if stretched out far enough. The other rides were still as fun as usual. We also saw the African American Hulk, who felt boxers were the best attire for the water.

We left early because of our stomachs. I really wanted to stay to see another set performed by the singing and dancing trio, but the temptation of Chang’s was too strong. We stuffed ourselves and walked around Ross afterward. Most of us went pillow crazy, and I picked up socks and a cd case in addition. The ride home was fun, though I can’t remember anything really specific.

Oh yah, there was a giant stuffed animal crane game at Wild Waves and I won an electric orange lion. Cess with two S’s has a video of my glory, so I’ll try and post a copy.

1. Grow some huge lips.

2. Find some friends to take a picture with.

3. If you can, try to get to the middle.

4. Try to sneeze as the flash goes off.

5. Make sure you look like your older brother is protecting his younger blind brother.

If you followed the above steps correctly, you’ll achieve something like this:

I’m finally making use of the wireless access on my Axim. Still, I could just use a computer in one of the other rooms. Everyone I rode with is at Club Soda, and I decided to stay and lose ten dollars to Jonard. I lost twice on triples, and folded a big pot when a straight came on the turn card. Bummerific, but still fun.

Typing with the on screen keyboard isn’t so bad. Work sucked today, but it was our fault mostly. We ate at Hooter’s and saw a guy jump right into the ocean. Overrated? Definitely not. I ate a steak sandwich and have now eaten some form of steak five days in a row.

Ok, I’m tired of this keyboard.

If I have done nothing productive by seven tonight, I will have officially wasted an entire work day. Last week I signed up for a free month of Blockbuster’s online service. Today I received Kill Bill: Vol. 2 & Bus 174. That’s two of my first trio of movies. As of right now, I have no complaints, though I do wonder where Trainspotting is, especially considering that it shipped before Kill Bill: Vol. 2. I haven’t watched either of the two yet, but I plan to watch Uma kill Bill immediately after this. Hopefully they receive my returned discs on Friday and ship the M. Night Shymalan movies I queued up. Later tonight we’re planning on catching Collateral in Mt. Vernon, so there should be a few brief front-page movie reviews tomorrow.

Morning workouts are going ok, but I think I need to exert myself a bit more. And I am pretty sure I’m going to have to intake a bit more food to put more muscle on my already ravishing body. Hopefully the sarcasm managed to transfer through the previous sentence’s text. But I really am having trouble gaining muscle weight. That would be a good way to spend time before we leave for Collateral. I’ll set some time aside to form a workout and diet plan, then sometime in the coming years, or decades, I will really have that ravishing body. Like Rick Rude. Or I’ll just give up again as usual.

In a closing note, I have been playing the stuffed animal crane game at the Navy Exchange and finally won Bum Wolverine, the single best stuffed toy in any glass enclosure nationwide.

Jerry’s picture is no longer on the front page.

Russ beat me two nights in a row during our Hold ‘Em showdowns. We don’t take the games too serious and our buy-in is only a dollar, but that combined eight dollars makes all the difference. It can get pretty intense, but the important thing is the amount of fun we have. Every card drawn is good for Curt, I take Paul out all the time (once, but it was a good one), and we love going all-in. Our skill is inversely proportional to the entertainment. We watched Rounders to top tonight off and keep the poker theme going. It’s a great film and it definitely makes me want to become a professional gambler. Goodbye college. Hello thug debt and police beatings.

My Axim is treating me well. I’m still trying to work out a few kinks to make it suitable for everyday use. Trials of workout programs are ready to be run through.

An infrared keyboard from eBay isn’t working, and I thought it was just incompatible at first. After testing the unit with my brother’s old Palm, I now believe the keyboard itself isn’t functioning. Luckily, the seller is awesome and has helped a lot. Now I just have to wait for Monday to roll around so I can call customer service. Once that 512 Secure Digital card is in hand, this will be a multimedia machine. Then I’ll need another battery. And it goes on and on. I played Earthbound on a SNES emulator yesterday. Morphgear runs the game smoothly, but I still need to get the sound working.

I’ve been back to the gym and that feels good. What would feel better is if I kept it up, which I hope and plan to do. Too tired, time for bed.