Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Rhianonymous' LiveJournal:

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Thursday, October 19th, 2006
1:30 pm	Corpse of Habeas Corpus Habeas corpus- Law. a writ requiring a person to be brought before a judge or court, esp. for investigation of a restraint of the person's liberty, used as a protection against illegal imprisonment. That thing there? The one in italics? America doesn't have that anymore. We gave it up when congress passed the terror bill this week. It allows the president to designate anyone as an enemy combatant and imprison them without trial for however long he sees fit. Oh, he can also torture them too. Geneva conventions are gone, stretched beyond recognition. I really don't know what to say. You could see this coming a mile away. 1984 was not a goddamn motivational speech, people. It was a warning and we have failed as a country to pay any attention to it. You, yes you, can now be taken to a secret prison. No crime has to be committed, no charges have to be filed. All you have to do is catch the negative attention of the man in the oval office. Do you fucking hear me? I mean YOU, sitting there at your motherfucking desk, right now. You have NO RIGHTS if he wants your ass. NONE. If you aren't taking this shit seriously it is time to start. Every time a president has had the right to imprison people on a whim, he has abused it. Alien and Sedition acts? Newspaper editors went to jail. World War II? Japanese internment camps. Fucking Civil War? Abe Lincoln himself threw thousands of US citizens in jail without trial. The men who abused this power before were far nobler, far smarter, and far more accountable than the monkey who currently wipes his ass with the flag. He lied to get this power, he lied as it was handed to him. If you think he is going to use it honorably, you are a fucking fool and I hope they get you before they get me. Peace. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, October 2nd, 2006
12:12 pm	Wal-Mart Diaries, Day 1. My friends page is very screwed up. I don't know what's wrong with it, but since the new LJ layout started I haven't seen a single update on it. Sorry for not commenting on you all, but I haven't been able to see your posts! I got a job at Wal-Mart T&L for 7 bucks an hour, full time. Given the cost of living in Rolla, that's a pretty decent starting position. They're looking for management too, so I'm hoping to be bumped up within a month or so. Today was the first day of on the job training. Having worked at Wal-Mart and about 50,000 other big box stores before, I'm pretty familiar with the training regimine. Safety first, customer care, code babystealer, how to survive in a wal-mart firefight, proper procedures in the event of someone spilling three drops of liquid soap, and so on and so forth. Nothing that actually relates to the job I'm supposed to be doing, but it's all pretty entertaining nonetheless. Of particular interest this time were the co-trainees, and the trainer himself. Frank, our safety supervisor, is an old man who looks a little bit like the James Stewart from "It's a Wonderful Life." Sounds like him too. Only, Frank is missing one of the fingers on his right hand. It's sort of a glaring omission, the kind you can't really look away from once you've noticed it. I've had a long history with this sort of thing- my shop teacher in middle school had two fingers missing, my deli supervisor was short a few digits. I don't know why losing appendages makes you a safety authority, but he was clearly respected (and he told stories about Nam) so I decided to give him a pass on that one. The coworkers were a little scarier. First there's the obviously gay sporting goods trainee. Now normally I don't jump to conclusions, even when presented with a lisp and a distinctive swaying of the hips. This guy certainly didn't jump out at me- scruffy beard, ragged dress, going into a job involving rifles and sports equipment. Then as we were standing around, I noticed the small, pink hoop earrings. Then the stars tattooed on his left forearm. Fascinated, I observed him for a bit. Definitely not a fan of the ladies, this one. Next we had the lady who felt it necessary to share the trauma that moved her to get a job at Wal-Mart. There's one of these in every group. This time, though, it was quite a story. Then another trainee topped it. I'm sitting in the training room watching the clock tick minutes of my life away, waiting for the supervisor to get out of a meeting and come back to move us along through the paperwork. There is some sort of personnel survey going on, and little old ladies keep coming in and sitting at the computer across from me. I've been spying on them, and am really amused to note that all of them click "Extremely dissatisfied" with every option on the survey, as quickly as they can. Most of them miss a box or two and are then stuck, hitting the "Next" button over and over as the computer prompts them to finish the damn survey, please. Then I tune into the story my co-trainees are going through. I am immediately horrified. "75 feet? Off a cliff?" "Oh yes. Well, not a direct fall, I bounced off it a couple of times. I have scars. See?" She lifts up her shirt and flashes the room a nice jelly roll, with a hideous two foot scar extending from the front of her stomach to her lower back. "I gained a lot of weight afterwards, because of all the damage I couldn't move. I lost two ribs, broke my arm, fractured my clavicle, my kidney was hanging out right here" and here she gestures to the scar, "attached only by the veins. So we moved here." Her target for this story considers for a moment, and then launches into his tail of woe. The little old ladies have paused in their clicking at this point, the room is silent. "I was in a car wreck. My dad bought me a camero when I got out of high school, and I was going way too fast on a back road. I hit a bump and lost control, off a shoulder and over a hill. They told me later I hit a tree almost twenty feet in the air, and then the car rolled. I hit my head and passed out early. I was in a coma for weeks, but I can remember everything people said to me at that point." Cliff lady is shocked. "It's amazing you weren't killed! Were you wearing a seatbelt?" Car wreck nods. "Yes, but my two friends in the back weren't. They both died." I thought the room had been silent before. New levels of quiet are being reached, here. "When I woke up they said I was being charged with involuntary manslaughter, and one of the parents was suing me for a million dollars. At that point they didn't know if I was going to live or not, and I hadn't been drunk, so they dropped the charges. But I wound up having owing 50,000 in insurance for the payout. It's been a year and I don't hold myself responsible for their deaths, but it's still hard to cope. We moved out of that town and came here, and this is my first job- I need it to pay off the insurance." Cliff lady tries to lighten the situation. "Boy, after an accident like that, I think I'd take to drinking. You're doing pretty well." Unfazed, car wreck continues. "I can't drink. There was so much blood in my brain that it felt like a vice on me, all the time. I had migraines so bad I couldn't sleep for weeks. They finally gave me pills, but I'll probably always have this headache and if I drink while I'm on the medication, it'll kill me." Welcome to retail, kid. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 22nd, 2006
1:42 am	I suppose I really should put up the miniatures I paint on here occasionally, just to show you all that I'm not a complete lump when I'm not writing. Lately my project has been "Model and paint banners for all the squads in the army" and it turned out really well. People occasionally ask me how it is that I manage to produce some of the stuff I do. I usually get this about miniature painting, but occasionally I get asked about my writing or my photoshop projects. It is always really gratifying to hear this question, though the answer is a bit embarassing. The answer is "I fail twenty times and go back to the drawing board." Each time I make a little improvement, learn a little more technique. My painting is going well- I'd say I'm really putting some interesting stuff out now, though it takes me about 5 hours per 1-inch mini. What I don't normally say is that I'm on my fourth army and I've been at it for over 2 years, just now showing any sign of success. My writing is much the same way. I can show a story I've written, not mentioning that it was actually put through about five rewrites in my head, in notebooks, and on the computer before I ever managed to show it to anybody. Photoshop is a different beast entirely though. Tonight I'm going to go over one of my (nearly) finished projects with you, just because I can and you might find it interesting. I'll walk through it step by step, detailing what I did. See, when you screw up in photoshop, there's no point in throwing it away. You can turn your mistakes right back around and use them again. ( Read more... ) (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, August 19th, 2006
12:45 am	Page-a-day continues Today isn't going to be a continuation of yesterday's story, because I'm not feeling that particular muse at the moment. I'll probably just ramble for a little bit and then nod off, like an old man. Roni moved into MBU today. It wasn't all that interesting, just another big dorm room with some particularly uptight rules. She seems happy enough, and that's fine with me. I'm coming to realize that I probably won't be seeing her every day, though. She still doesn't have a car and going to get her (and bringing her back) is a pretty long round trip. Still, it makes visiting friends significantly easier. New job is making me wait another 2 weeks before they'll tell me if I got it or not. I have the money to go that long (I think) but I'm not sure if I have the patience. I try to kill time by daydreaming about my own place to live, what I'd put where, how I'd do the kitchen. My dreams are starting to look like "Trading Spaces." Surprisingly, all this domesticity makes me happy. I like being inside under a blanket when there's a storm out. Now don't get me wrong, I'd still rather be outside in the storm (I'll be going in a moment), but I am starting to see the appeal of a quieter life. There are so many pieces of daily life that seem to be missing right now. It's almost impossible to get cookable food on the budget I'm working with, for example. It's completely impossible to get any sort of decent furniture, and if I did it wouldn't really fit the decor around here. I don't have a bed, I barely have a place to sleep at all. It's weird that I'm judging my quality of life by the amount of useable furniture I own, but seriously- try living without a kitchen table for a while, you'll see what I mean. Still, I can wait. Patience is one of the virtues I like to pretend to, once in a while. I have two weeks to fill with visits to friends and family, so if you have some free time and you'd like to see me, let me know. I'll come around as soon as I can. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 17th, 2006
11:53 pm	I need to actually post some of my writing in this writing journal. I'm trying to write on a schedule these days. Right now that just means a page a day, no throwing it away no matter how much I hate it, and it can be on anything I want. I will continue throwing it up on this journal as I finish it, though I may not always be working on the same story. Today's page is from a story I am writing about a man who goes to prison and meets his father. It's not so much about the prison, as it is about how when we try to hold our parents accountable for their actions in our youth, we often find that they've grown into different people. This is the opening section, second rewrite. As I post more on a story I will link back to previous pages. ( Read more... ) (Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 15th, 2006
3:19 am	Life update Mark 2.0 We (the Royal We) will do this update in the form of a lymeric. It won't be very good but it will rhyme. Suck it. There once was a man from Missouri, who quit his old job in a hurry. The business was shit, the pay didn't fit, so he punched his boss where she was furry. His girlfriend soon would be going to a baptist school known as MBU. Excited she was to be there because it was nearby the boyfriend (and zoo). He found a new job right away, where he happily goes to this day. It pays quite a lot, though the work is not hot, he'd eat horse buttholes for 30k. Deep Space Nine he is watching right now, in order when he finds them, somehow. Cisco and Dax and Cardassian Attacks, He might be too nerdy for WoW. (6 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, August 9th, 2006
9:03 pm	Book Review: The Dark Tower A lot of people think Stephen King is a really good writer. Let's not mince words. Those people are idiots. Oh, he's no Dan Brown, don't get me wrong. He can string a plot together without resorting to the most basic of stereotypes. But in the encyclopedia, next to the entry for "Hack" there is a picture of Linus Torvaldis, inventor of Linux. Then underneath that, there is a picture of Stephen King. Because he is a hack, people. Who reads this guy? What poor schmuck has such bad judgement that they read not one, not two, but all seven of the Dark Tower books? As it turns out, I do. I actually really liked The Stand. I don't really know why, maybe because it was the first King book I ever read. It had a fairly good pace, a lot of good vs. evil apocalyptic bullshit, a wise old black lady, an enigmatic villain with no motivation, and a very unsatisfying ending. I was 16, I loved it. Now that I think about it, the first time Dark Tower was recommended to me was in high school, by a friend who was (at the time) the biggest stoner in North America. I probably should have suspected something then. Somehow though, seven years later, I was desperately casting around for a book to read and Ryan offered up what looked like some interesting fare. The first book was The Gunslinger and within a day I was hooked. Now, let me give you a brief overview of the Dark Tower series. It concerns a cowboy named Clint Eastwoo- er, Roland. He's a cowboy from the future, and he is looking for this dark tower at the center of existance. Precisely why he's looking for it is never really explained, nor is its purpose, but we should all probably assume it's important. Anyway, Roland picks up a crew of ne'er do well people as he goes along, and molds them into gunslingers. These include Eddie the Junkie, Susannah the Jive-Talking Black Woman Whom Stephen King Cannot Help But Include In All Of His Stories, and Jake the Psychic Child Who Stephen King Also Writes Into Every One Of His Goddamn Stories. There are villains, of course, and monsters aplenty. The gunslinger from the post apocalyptic future fights robots and cowboys and robot cowboys and robot bears and robot robots and evil trains, among other things. Susannah says "Sho Nuff" and other vaguely offensive things, Eddie whines, and Jake has convenient flashes of insight which tend to fix whatever tight spot the crew is in. In fact, there is a whole hell of a lot of deus ex machina in this series. Like, more than I have ever seen. I'm pretty sure there isn't a single situation in about 4,000 pages of text that gets resolved through intuition or plot development- it's pretty much all messages and portents from on high here. It gets so bad that towards the end of the series King actually writes himself into the book, as the author and then proceeds to leave notes for his characters. There are a lot of weird high fantasy elements in here, too. Did I mention Roland is not so much a cowboy, as a knight errant? Because he is, but in his universe they wear six shooters and dusty blue jeans, or something. The whole logic of his world is never really explained, but it's got witches and magic balls and a vaguely christian religion, so that's all right. Oh, and lots of made up words. I should probably note here that if you finish this series you will find yourself talking like a Barbary Coast Pirate. Lots of "If it does ya" and "Aye, me cullies" and so on. I don't know why the cowboy knight from the future talks like a sixteenth century deckhand, but he does. I'm guessing Stephen King really liked the adventures of Horatio Hornblower or something. Plot development is clunky at best, but if there's one thing Stephen King does well, it's set up scenarios for his characters to blast their way through. The problem is that he only knows two or three really good ways to add tension. About the fifth time the characters were being pursued down a dark corridor by an unnameable horror, I started to wonder if the series was going anywhere. By the seventh time they were facing down thirty-to-one odds I realized it really wasn't. At the fifth climactic confrontation with a villain who died in about two seconds once the shooting began, I was ready to drop the whole project. Reading these books was, much like Roland's journey to the Dark Tower, ultimately a long hard slog with very little payoff at the end. Also like Roland, I had to kill a random little boy in the middle of my trek, but then he came back through a magic door and loved me and called me dad later on. So that was okay. Basically what I'm saying is, these books are a big steaming turd. They are a big steaming turd encompassing all of Stephen King's other novels and pretty much summarizing his whole universe, but... Well, to use a bad metaphor, you can shit a rose but ain't nobody gonna want to smell it. If you like books with swords, monsters, no character development, wooden sex scenes, magical plot devices, and astounding egotism from the author, then go read R.A. Salvatore's work. Seriously. At the end of the last book, Stephen King actually warns his readers not to read the ending. His warning is pretty insulting- he suggests that anyone who's read that far should be interested in the journey, not the end, and anyone who reads farther is doing a disservice to the spirit of the book. He pleads that you let his characters rest instead of condemning them to further drudgery in the service of the King. Strangely, I find myself in agreement with him, only I don't think he went far enough. Don't just skip the ending. Do him one better and never pick up the book to begin with. Do not under any circumstances read the Dark Tower series. (7 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 3rd, 2006
11:30 pm	Calvin's dad is a smart man So, I never understood the old comic book cliche of the dad who forces his family to go camping. Why bother? Why drag a bunch of people out to a miserable hell hole where it's always raining and you all come back stressed? I have been on plenty of camping trips before, but if one were ever that bad, I would run back home without a second glance. So it came as a bit of a surprise this weekend when I went on one of the most miserable camping trips of my life, and had a great time. We started camping on Sunday, and it was a blistering 102 degrees outside. My car is in an eternal state of disrepair, and on this particular trip the right window, air conditioner, and engine mount were malfunctioning. So it was a very hot, bumpy ride to pick up Roni. We packed a metric ton of bottled water into a small cooler, and off we went to the state park near Macon, Missouri. We picked a walk-in campsite, meaning you have to park some distance away. Oddly enough, we were the only ones in that part of the campground. I was not aware, but apparently people are lazy. Even when camping. They bring their RV's out there, park as close to the shower building as they can, pay extra for water lines and electricity, and use gas grills to cook. In my opinion that's not camping, that's going to a lot of trouble and expense for a shitty hotel experience. Anyway, the point is that our area, being non-electric and something of a walk from the parking lot (maybe 1 minute, tops), was completely deserted. Not a soul for miles. Not only that, but it was tree lined and it actually had its own private beach, facing out on the big lake. Now I've seen the ocean, and I've been to a lake or two in my time, but rarely have I seen a more perfect beach. White sand, blazing sun, crystal blue skies, and equally blue, if somewhat muddy, water. Warm, too. It was more relaxing than any hot tub, mostly because of the currents. Now, there were problems. It was like being next to a blast furnace most of the time- so hot that by the end of the trip we had gone through about 24 bottles of water. Our fan died on the first night and after that sleeping became a bit of an issue. There were the usual giant bugs, and giant swarms of small bugs, and annoyingly loud boaters. On the way home my tire blew and I was late for work. Despite that it was a wonderful time. The swimming was wonderful, we each got a lot of reading done, we had a few adventures, the sex was phenomenal, and we didn't have a single real argument in the whole course of the trip. In short, the camping was so terrible that it induced a sort of zen-like calm and actually wound up relieving a lot of stress for us. I will probably never get over the sunburn I picked up out there. I won't ever get over the memories of the trip, either. (17 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, July 29th, 2006
7:04 am	Helicoptorzzz I have a guilty pleasure that I rarely share with anybody. I like helicopters. There, I said it. I don't mean in a passing "Oh, that's cool" kind of way. I mean I am obsessed, utterly, with helicopters. If there is one dream I have beyond being a writer, it is being a helicopter pilot. The reason this is a guilty pleasure is because helicopters are almost universally associated with catastrophe. That movie Black Hawk Down? Yeah, I've watched that a few times for the chopper shots. When I see an accident on the highway my first instinct is to look for the Life Flight. Once I saw two at one scene! As morbid as that is, I was very excited. During traffic jams I'll roll down the window and look up above to see if there's a copter following the road yet, reporting to some news station. I heard a news report the other day about Black Hawks being landed on high school football fields for recruitment, actually. If they'd done that at mine, I probably never would have made it to college. What caused this obsession? I can't rightly say, but it's always been present. I believe it was started by a flight sim, though. Jane's AH-64D Longbow, about the only helicopter sim I ever heard of, but it was perfect. So accurate it made your teeth hurt. If they plugged a mouse and keyboard into an Apache today, I could probably fly it. But I've found other ways to satisfy my fetish since then, most recently as a pilot in the game Battlefield 2. There are probably other reasons, too- dreams of flying, my constant drive to adventure. I can't really count the number of mornings I've lain awake, dreaming about walking into some Army recruitment facility and being like "Copter me. Now, boy." Giving up most all my other dreams (save writing, perhaps) and most of my anti-military moral stances as well, just for a chance to fly one. Sometimes, in those waking hours, it seems worth it. I got my letter of acceptance from MENSA the other day. The test was harder than I expected, I didn't realize I had made it until the letter came. I suppose I'll go ahead and pay the fee to join, but I'm still leery on the whole thing. Work continues to suck, in that strange exponential curve of suckage that only the truly shitty jobs can follow. I've been passed over for assistant manager for a guy twice my age and half my experience. I suppose that's the signal that I need to move along, move along, find something else to work at. At the moment I'm still concerned with keeping all my financial stuff together, though. I don't know when that will change. Probably not ever. (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, July 21st, 2006
10:42 pm	Work sucks. I really don't like this work schedule stuff. I got off at 10 tonight and I go back in at 6am tomorrow. Then another 6am shift and then I'm on midnights starting monday. I hate that crap, if they're going to mess up my sleeping cycle they can pay for my anti-depressants. I don't get paid until next thursday, either. I really do have the second half of the wiccan manifesto coming out, not that anyone but me cares. I also have the prison story cogitating but until I get a day off and a moment's peace around the house, I don't know when these things are going to get written. I have to say, life sucks right now. I thought getting out of college would be a ticket to a decent job. I could have done this cashiering 5 years ago, and saved myself the trouble. I really want out of this trap. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, July 19th, 2006
8:53 pm	This is an update This is a post. This is a paragraph about my life. This is a paragraph making promises about writing I will not fulfill. This is a paragraph bemoaning my inadequacies. This is a paragraph full of biting sarcasm about my coworkers. This is a series of photos, mostly featuring me. This is a stirring conclusion that rocks your world and changes your life. This is a post script with some things I forgot to write about in the post. Use your imagination, people. (Comment on this)
Monday, July 17th, 2006
11:30 pm	Number of things This week has been a little nuts. This new job has got me running myself into the ground to impress the managers, and I'm still not sure if I get the assistant position or not. It's alright, I'm just glad to be working (but I'll be happier when I'm getting paid). I think I'm going to keep up the job hunt though, as 12 hour shifts aren't much fun. My ex, Carol, keeps coming up. First there was some issue with her abusing one of our cats (the one she thought of as "Mine"). Then Roni and I went to a bowling game with her former roommate, and I heard a lot more about her than I really thought necessary. Then I found her friends coming up on a couple journals of people close to me. *Sigh* I don't know what happened. We ended on bad terms and that was somewhat my fault, but this is just ridiculous. I hadn't thought about her in months and all this coming up is making me wonder about her mental state. I really don't like to talk bad about people behind their backs, and that goes double for ex's, but this is upsetting me. The funniest part is, I never lock posts, so if she feels like torturing herself she can read this stupid journal all day long. There's no need for the subterfuge. I have a couple of stupid writing ideas but I need opinions on which one to go with. Just some summer projects to keep me entertained and in practice. The options are: Dungeons and Dickings: A Musical Pornographic Spectacular Life Inside: A story of a prison guard who discovers his own son in jail, thanks in no small part to his upbringing. Mobil Home: A cashier's fantasy Or insert your own. (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Thursday, July 13th, 2006
4:30 pm	Life update Putting the writing journal on hold for a minute, to do a life update. I should do these more often than I have been, just to keep track of my progress. Semi-regular literary posts will begin again after these messages. I have a job. I'm working as a clerk for Mobil, and will probably be an assistant manager within a month. Nothing spectacular but it's a relief to have an income again. I am going to take the last class I need from Rolla next semester; It will be a night class and hopefully distance learning as well. I am already putting the degree down on resumes, it'll be nice to be able to back that up. The car is falling apart, but isn't it always? I'll fix it when I can. My depression is as strong as ever but I've learned a couple of new tricks to fight it off, and they are working for the time being. I still don't feel like a normal person, but I am accomplishing more on a daily basis. Eventually I'll get it pushed off enough that I can squeeze some quality writing time out of the day. The wiccan manifesto will get finished in the next day or two, but right now I am in serious need of a nap. (7 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, July 11th, 2006
1:04 am	Unfinished. A book, I would think, recording my life, would mostly be pretty white pages. You might notice a title, a copyright date, but it's not seen the sun in some ages. It seems almost mournful, alone on the shelf, saying "Please put me to good use." It should be more worried about its own health, as it's likely to see some abuse. You could make a case that the book is still good, unmarked and so undiminished. But I say it's naught but a waste of fine wood, worthless because it's (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, July 5th, 2006
9:08 pm	A Wiccan Manifesto Normally I do not talk about my religion. Mostly this is because I like to be taken seriously, and as a rule talking about Wicca in polite company gets one a bunch of credulous stares (at best). That's a sad state of affairs in and of itself, but hey- I'm not out to make any converts. I would like to be taken with a slightly smaller grain of salt, though, and in the interests of this salt reduction I am putting my dignity on the line. This is a manifesto in which I explain what I believe as a Wiccan, what I do not, and what rumors are just so much bull. --Manifesto Begins-- ( Read more... ) (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, May 30th, 2006
6:09 pm	A few words Too much is going on, and my brain is hurting. Seriously it hurts, I am going to scoop it out soon if it doesn't let up. Anyway, I would like to say a few words. Safari. Cultural. Eurythmics. Thank you. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, May 26th, 2006
9:42 pm	X-Men 3 review I am appalled. No seriously, I am literally angry with rage. That was the worst trilogy ending I have ever seen, and I watched Star Wars. I knew going in that Ratner had taken over as director, but I had no idea how absolutely bad it was going to be. If you have any enthusiasm for the X-men franchise, absolutely do not go see this movie. Avoid it like the fucking plague. Spoilers follow. Jean Grey kills the Cyclops. No, not making it up. She just offs him, in the first ten minutes of the movie. How did she come back? (puzzled look) "I don't know." Seriously, that's how it happens. And then the camera cuts away and Scott dies. End of that love story, I guess. Jean Grey kills PROFESSOR FUCKING X. Oh, where to even start on this one? Apparently Prof. X, the most tolerant mutant in the universe, was using mind control on Jean all these years. He split her personalities in two and suppressed her powers, for "Her own safety." He actually tells Wolverine "Who are you to question me?" Way to go there, Prof. But it's okay, he gets what he deserves. Phoenix makes him evaporate in what may just be the lamest death scene ever. Poof, gone, no coming back, X is dead. Wolverine kills Phoenix. No seriously. Despite the fact that she tosses him around like a ragdoll earlier in the movie, at the very end he walks up to her and stabby-stab, end of Jean. So much for THAT love story, I guess. Magneto ditches Mystique. And I thought Xavier turned into an asshole. Mystique takes a bullet for Magneto that removes his powers, and he just shrugs and walks off. What happened to him as the ultimate tactician? He flies a fucking bridge to Alcatraz and then lets about 40 mutants get wasted for no reason whatsoever. Then he throws flaming cars for a while. He could, you know, use the metal to shred armies. Pyro, his buddy, could BURN PEOPLE. But they team up for the flaming car attack, clearly their ultimate weapon. What's more, in a shot shortly after this, all the cars they were throwing are back on the bridge, good as new. Did I mention that while they do this, their ally Phoenix is literally just standing behind them? For about 20 minutes, just standing? So it should really come as no surprise that... Magneto loses his powers. The X-Men, ultimate forces for mutant goodness, actually stab him with the anti-mutant cure bullshit. Go good guys. Oh, and guess what? There's a mutant with anti-mutant powers and they make an anti-mutant cure from him. Gosh, that sounds exactly like the plot of the second movie. But it's not, because this time... I don't really know. It was pretty much the plot of the second movie. Just not as good, at all. No Nightcrawler. At all. They don't even mention him. But Beast is there, just one of the team, since we've seen him all over, right? He looks completely retarded, by the way. Seriously, it looks like they painted Kelsy Grammar blue and stuffed him in a suit. Which is what they did. They get rid of rogue too. She runs off to get the cure and doesn't get to do a fucking thing. Archangel is there, but he's not an X-man, doesn't fight, and has about 2 minutes of screen time. There is no resolution. None at all, seriously. Dead people stay dead, motives are not explained, people without powers stay that way, and nobody is punished. Magneto kills about 4 billion people (approximately) and at the end he's playing chess in the fucking park. Guess losing his powers is punishment enough, right? This movie is a horrible joke. Cyclops dies, Jean Grey dies, Xavier dies, and for what? No reasons are given, no motivation, just a cold hard fucking to one of my favorite story lines. Phoenix is just a schizophrenic demon-woman, no cosmic power or anything. She can do "Anything" as long as it involves either making water fly around or making people disintegrate, that's about it. Juggernaut looks like Fred Flintstone, just comes out of nowhere to join Magneto, and has no development. Same for every other mutant in the movie, actually. There are no sentinels. This isn't a very coherent review. It wasn't a very coherent movie. It was the shortest of the three, so maybe that isn't surprising. In sum, I hated this movie. I want everyone involved in it to die. In a fire. I want a fourth movie, featuring Bret Ratner being flensed as he apologizes for his mistakes through screams of pain. In this movie they will explain that the third movie was an alternate, sucky reality. Then Cable shows up outta nowhere. Then some sentinels. Gambit too. I just... damn. Fucking hell. I am saddened. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, May 19th, 2006
11:54 am	Summer Campaign Nathaniel sat on his camp stool and wiped the sweat off his forehead with a pocket handkerchief. It had been a long day and they hadn't made much progress. He surveyed the train from his position on the small hill. The land out here was so flat, this one hill meant you could see a good three miles in any direction. Kansas was a hellish place. Nothing but open sky as far as the eye could see. Nowhere to hide... The men down below were moving sluggishly. He couldn't blame them. Two attacks already today, and now the sun was going down. The natives hated this locomotive project. They sabotaged the rails whenever they could. As the only remaining Priest it was Nathaniel's job to bless the rails once they were laid, so no amount of blasting or digging would dislodge them. He also saw to the souls of the workers, of course. So far from home, a lot more of them were feeling pious these days. The other two priests would have been a big help now. If only they were still alive. The rhythmic thunk-thunk-thunk of the driving hammers continued. He'd have to get up soon, or he'd be passed right by. They were laying track at about 2 miles per hour out here, with nothing to slow them down. The graders and levellers were almost two weeks ahead, scouting and preparing the way. The train itself moved much more slowly, loaded as it was with food, bunks, chapels, brothels, armories, smithies. It was a town on rails, slowly making its way across the burning Great Plains to the uncharted west. The pounding slowed, shifted. Nathaniel looked to the workers, but they had all stopped and were staring, seemingly at his hill. The thunk-thunk had become a more rhythmic, rushing, flapping sound, from behind him. Dreading what he would see, knowing what it was, he turned anyway. Leathery wings, great scaled body, long neck and fierce jaws. Eyes of molten bronze. It came flashing out of the setting sun, at least two of the Kansa riding on its back. It was so close now, not even a mile off, he could see the flashing on the metal of their spears. He drew his pistol, hurried back down the hill, and joined the firing line. He'd be damned if he was going to let that Bronze get him like it got Father Mark. Eyes hard and hand steady, he waited for the dragon to crest the small hill. The train steamed behind him. ( Read more... ) (Comment on this)
Thursday, May 18th, 2006
9:12 am	Things I have to do I am wasting my time here. That much is patently obvious. Painting warhammer models, re-reading classic literature, and generally putzing around is not what I need to be doing. But I feel like I'm out of the game. I feel like I'm a million miles from anywhere. You know, since I've been home, I've only seen my family maybe 20 minutes a day? I'm still on my weird sleep cycle and I can't seem to bounce myself off it. No incentive, I think. I've got to get moving or I'm going to be in trouble, but I can never seem to motivate myself. I need to be around people who care enough to push me, and who know me well enough to push me correctly. I just don't get that here. School starts on June 12. Before then I need to: Submit a request to BC to have them mail a transcript to UMR. Contact DirectLoans and ask for a six month deferment. Purchase another six months of car insurance. Secure 1600 dollars to pay for summer classes. Find a place to live in St. Louis and move there. Find a job, preferably a real job, before my money runs out. Start a weight loss program again. Get my car's engine looked at. Fix the family computer. There are all sorts of ways to order those. Sort by order of importance, descending. Sort by order in which I can actually do them. Sort by the number I can actually do on my own, when I still have trouble moving my ass out to do grocery shopping alone. What is wrong with me that I can't take care of my life when left to myself? Why do I need someone in the car with me to go anywhere? This is the fundamental problem with my life, I think. I can't think unless I'm alone, I can't act unless I have company. (Comment on this)
Wednesday, May 17th, 2006
12:29 pm	I was thinking I should do one of those "Ten Anonymous Things" entries, but on second thought I would rather make it un-anonymous. Not like enough people read this to make much of a difference. 1.I don't know where we're going, but I'm glad to have you. You mean an awful lot to me, and even though I don't like the current distance, I feel like it will be good for us in the long run. Things aren't so great here, but I look forward to this summer and next fall with you. I love you. (Roni) 2.You didn't miss much at the graduation, but I do regret that I haven't gone out drinking with you at least once. We should do that soon. Don't wear yourself out working 12 hours a day, that shit is no way to live. You have a degree, keep plugging away at it until you have the kind of job you've been working for. (Mike) 3. Damn am I tired of your shit. I mean seriously, I got over you almost a year ago, and yet I still have to get daily updates about your life. You think I have feelings for you? You're right. I loathe you. No no, don't thank me- you earned it. Leave my girlfriend alone, and step off. When you grow up, come and see me- I'd like to tell you why I dislike you as one adult to another. I'm willing to wait. (Carol) 4.What the hell? I know that deadbeat dads are sort of a trend these days, but this is ridiculous. Are you really so mad about my leaving at Christmas without calling you? Funny, I thought I was saving you the trouble of lying when you forgot the gift. You've certainly never had a problem taking off without a goodbye. I even tried to smooth things over, but to hell with it. No ultimatums, nothing. You missed the graduation, you missed christmas, you will miss the birthday. I am not going to pretend like you have another chance. I won't set myself up for more disappointment. The only thing you've left to me is a desire to get published, and show you up. I'm already closer than you ever got. (Dad) 5. Mom- It's been odd these past few days, being back here again. I think you and I are growing apart, into our adult relationships. I have a whole other family of people now, and it's hard to put you in that role anymore. I am really uncomfortable living here. Your habits aren't mine anymore, at all. I have some that are better and some that need work. But I think I've learned what I can from you, and now I'm just a burden. I will move on as fast as I can. 6.Haven't heard from you since before last Friday, which is alright. I doubt we'll ever be great friends. I'm still not sure what you really want, but friendship is all I have ever been after. I will tell you this- honesty is the fastest way to my heart. I am inclined to trust Roni over you, strangely enough, and I don't like what she has been saying. I don't think she's the jealous type, and that makes me wonder- why all the games? I doubt I'm attractive enough to you that you'd ruin a ten year old friendship over me. So why? (Sarah) 7.*Sigh* I admit it, I've been avoiding you. Not because I have nothing to say, but because I am totally not wanting to hear what you'd say in response. Canada has been postponed again, indefinitely. I really do like you- I just can't stand to talk to you. Sorry, but in the end I suspect you haven't given it two moments thought. I hope so. (Skyler) 8.One minute I like you, the next minute I am wondering if you're legitimate. I don't mind June 4 as a meetup date, but that's two full weeks past the time you said you were going to set. What happened to wanting committed initiates? Show some commitment yourselves, please. It would also be nice to have a bit of follow-up correspondence. I am aware that not everybody is online 24/7, but I've sent messages to you and that was a week ago. If you want any of us to come back, you need to show some interest in us as people. (Coven) 9.*Big ol' Sigh* Some days I don't know what to do with you. You give me an order like this and then I don't hear one word from you in a week? That's unlike you, and it leaves me wondering what I am doing wrong. I'm trying, damn it. I have virtually no resources left, I've burned everything getting here. Now is the time to start the next phase of my life, and if that involves tearing off on a quest for you then so be it. But I need your guidance, especially when life seems to be stalled. Maybe it's me, maybe it's the stress here... I'll meditate and see if I can find you there. I heard an awesome quote the other day, I wanted to share it with you. "Moral indignation is jealousy with a halo." I miss you. (A) 10. That's enough for now. (4 Comments |Comment on this)