need to vent a bit and don't have an appropriate forum.

They said they would add days on my schedule to protect my few days off since they've been making me work 6-7 day weeks. they added them, and turned them into additional work days. i realized at that point that when they said they would get me a "day off" they were literally talking about getting that day off to work that night. alright, i'm in the military, can't complain too much about that, should have expected it really.

Then the career projection that's been in place for several months after about a year's worth of discussions was tossed out the window (which almost never happens) and in the next day or two i find out if they decided to go a completely different direction with my career. It's frustrating that there is this huge process in place that doesn't even matter at the end. At this point i figure this is the third big decision point where they've asked what i wanted, gave it to me, and immediately retracted it... maybe that's how it's supposed to work.

two quick things that dropped out of the blue that have unpleasant impacts on my next ten years.

and now i'll quit my bitchin.

or as it shall henceforth be known in this here household, the GRIND.... part 3.

These achievements are ridiculous, but i completely understand where they come from. Gears of War 2 was an immensely popular game that earned more than it's fair share of fans, and definitely still brings people to the figurative table. I should know, because every time i heard the call about 22x xp events i logged in to play a few rounds of a game i didn't particularly care too much for. Turns out, i was just experiencing only the parts i hate. So when Gears of War 3 came out i decided that i wouldn't play at all, never played the first one, enjoyed the story of 2 but didn't care for multiplay, so no real need to spend money...

and then i bought it, and it is exactly what i think every xbox owner should have. It has the solid story, it has multiple enemy types (kinda reminiscent of Halo, but then again what shooter genre game doesn't look a helluva lot like every other shooter genre game?), and as I have sine discovered loads and loads of fun multiplayer options. I absolutely hate team deathmatch in the Gears of War world. playing against other humans rolling around like it's some sort of Gymboree class and our supersized COG warriors are 4 year olds covered in explosives, its not my thing. I've never been a fan of any game where it takes a clip or more to down a foe. So that's why i started exploring the other game modes. Horde mode is the standard fallback for any Gears fan, and now they've included some tower defense mechanisms to really up the ante when it comes to fighting wave after wave of enemies. Round 10 they have added Boss fights which draw out the curse words in my small team and really tests our willpower to play one round over and over as the bosses destroy our defenses completely. i doubt i'll ever finish 50 waves, but wouldn't it be great if i did?

Another mode, Beast, allows the player to become the creatures we've learned to just despise with all our hearts... and you find out that it's just about the most satisfying experience one can have in a video game world. Each beast has it's own benefits and working as a team in this realm really pays off. For instance, near the end of the first time i played i found that i could best help my team by starting as one of the non explosive tickers that have the ability to just tear through enemy defenses to allow the bigger guys on my team to wreak havoc. Once i finished making a path to the enemy i switched to the higher end beasts and had fun eliminating the main characters of the game.

Here is a tip to you Gears of War 3 players out there. If you're playing multiplayer and care AT ALL about ever finishing every onyx medal (the Grind i associate with this game) then play as a woman character. If you need to knock out those ribbon associated medals and unlocks, then I suggest you play a lot of private KoTH matches with 60 points, casual, fill, and choose map. you'll find that you can typically get a shut-out, MVP, Executioner, Button-up, Match, Match win, pistoleer, K/D, and a few other ribbons EVERY time you play.

where is the fun in that? the achievements you get every now and then, but you don't play gears for the fun, you play for the grind, knowing that this game will still be around in 2 years when you've maxed everything else out and want something to do. i'm about over the Call of Duty franchise, but i know it's still my go to game for 5 minute rounds. i'm also starting to feel really scared about how Battlefield 3 will come out. It looks so damn beautiful, and they didn't have to change much to do well, and they did, so we'll see how that pans out.

Anyway this post wasn't so much about Gears of War 3 as it was about the original Gears of War, i picked it up for 7 bucks since i've never played. And according to the Grind 3, i have a few achievements i have to earn there to unlock stuff in Gears 3. Already i'm making steady progress through the game, the COG tags are WAY easier to find, and i just finished Act 1 on hardcore.

Having played both now i can see there are a lot of improvements between the two. I remember when it first came out the cover mechanic was a HUGE deal, and honestly it still is, not many games can pull it off effectively, and my experience with it in 3 is that it's more useful than annoying, and when you are trying to run between two points and your dude just flattens himself on a wall, it's thrown controller worthy. I still appreciate it though EPIC games, you done good by me. You have sold me on every chapter of this Gears Saga when i don't really care about any of them, that takes skill. I'm like the Eskimo with the Refrigerator.

Why did i buy Gears 3? enough people said they were buying it around me that i did, now that i see most of them never play or stick to casual... maybe i need to rethink that strategy.


What's next on the gaming list? Skipping Rage, Skipping Batman, Going for BF3 and MW3, that's it for the year. Unless Star Wars the Old Republic can generate some non-hype with some great reviews i might even pass on that. It's starting to feel a bit like the hype that came along with Star Trek Online... i know, i know, it's too soon to talk about it. you're still sore and i'm sorry.


Lastly, I joined Major League Gaming, probably won't compete as the last time i did some kid named Justin Beeber kicked my ass at modern warfare 2 (a game i hadn't touched in a year), you know i may have lost, but that kid deserves as many wins as he can have thrown his way, poor kid has to go through life like Michael Bolton in Office Space.

Drink NOS, send me your can codes, and have a great day!

Hey all, just got the beta invite to Battlefield 3. I've been playing for an hour, so here are my impressions, and yes i understand some of the more technical bits are still being polished for release day (in 4 weeks mind you, a little late to find out some stuff just doesn't work i would think)

It's Blue- like the Matrix had that weird green yellow filter, this is the blue filter equivalent. And to an extent it gives the false impression of clarity, but what it really does is make your friendlies look like light blue triangles, and your enemies (that normally are red) look sort of like purple blue friendlies. It's too much blue for my taste, but i imagine i'll get used to it.

The environments- Awesome, Battlefield is known for its ability to create fun destructible environments and this game delivers. more places to hide, more avenues of approach, lots of fun with the environment.

prone- i kind of miss the days of crouch and stand. the beta so far has been a world of campers hiding in the dark spots, laying down, and waiting for you. The map you can play currently is in a subway station, the streets, and a park in what sounds and looks an awful lot like france. anyway you'll be killed by people laying in bushes, laying behind dark cornered trashcans, laying on a street a few feet above where you are, and much much more!

the firing- i'm going to assume there is lots of lag currently because there aren't that many beta players so it's hard to consolidate and relay info in a timely manner. the end result is i die before the enemy shoots on my screen, or i put a clip in someone and they turn around and shoot me once to kill me, or i stab someone 3 times and they turn around and stab me once and i die. i'll chalk this one up to beta issues, not necessarily gameplay issues. in 2 months, i will legitimately be cursing louly in my apartment when there is not an excuse.

the menus- okay i get it you like blue and red lava type streaks (tanks meet fast and furious artwork), good for you. everything seems so big and bloated, i want clear, i want simple, i want it to not take up my entire screen for every little thing. it feels a bit kid like currently, you know when you leave your 5 year old in charge of power point and he makes several slides that say poo in 48 pt font. it doesn't have to look like modern warfares menus, you had a good thing going with classic Battlefields, the 1943 arcade and the bad company series, why change it up too much?

the online website, battlelog... easy to interface with, so it gets a ton of points there, instant updates, more points, and i can't wait to see what else i'll be able to do there.

I love battlefield more than i love Modern Warfare, the allure is that each round REQUIRES team work, and that means it also takes more time. Modern Warfare is a quick cheap thrill that i can do with friends to kill time between the first half and second half of a sporting event.

And I just started playing Gears of War 3 (or the worst F'ing grind to get achievements that i've ever seen). The good news about GoW3 is that the company behind it legitimately stands behind their product and interacts with the users consistently over lonnnnggg periods of time. they had a 22x xp event a few weeks ago, and that certainly helps people in their grind to level 100. I'm currently level 16 and i don't think i have the grind in me to participate weekly in whatever they have going on. but if BF3 continues down it's current path it may end up like Medal of Honor did for me and only last about 3 weeks in my house, boy that game had some things going for it but just failed to deliver. Call of Duty MW3 is only a few weeks behind Battlefield 3 so i'm looking forward to being able to compare it all. Can you say i've already got Elite going? cause i can't, invite me! BF3, MW3 elite, and GoW3 season pass, looks like i have a lot of gaming to do, and lots of other games are not going to get my attention (unless target has one of their buy 2 new games get one free deals, i love those)

Coach McGuirk is the father figure we didn't really ask for, but here is his advice on cursing.

but Rick Santorum has a point, the military should not be used for social "experimentation" so i'm sure he's going to ban women and minorities from openly serving as such just as soon as he is elected.

He seems to be looking out for that young person who hasn't enlisted yet and now won't because that young kid is now afraid some guy might stare at his junk in a war zone. This sort of logic is for 3 year old's. Seriously, if you are a young person and the deciding factor between serving your country and avoiding it is that someone of the same sex might bunk in the same tent as you, you should definitely not enlist. We want professionals, people good at their jobs, people who can get along and put their differences aside to accomplish a mission. It isn't sex parties, it isn't all fun and games and rich white kids.... in fact the rich white kids are few in number. You see, a good chunk of the military is women and minorities people who over time have fought hard to be treated as equals, to prove they can do what any hateful ignorant man could do without fear of what "might" happen in a war zone.

he's never been in the military, he never will be, he doesn't know what it is like to know the person next to you counts on you to save their life and you can count on them to save yours and do the mission without fail day in and day out. but he knows what's best for the country... fear of your fellow American.

I'll admit it, i'm straight, i love the ladies (they just don't love me, but enough about why i have free time to blog)... can you imagine if a law were passed that if it came out that you were straight you would be fired from your job? or if it came out that you attended church you would be dishonorably discharged? or if your birthday is on a leap year you could be given the pink slip? that's how stupid the rhetoric coming out of rick santorum's mouth appears to be.

I will gladly serve with anyone who chooses to defend our country, anyone who is dedicated to doing their job well, anyone who wants to make the world more peaceful and safe, a world that is free from unmitigated hatred towards others due to differences in culture, or skin, or language, or any other number of things. Our job is to stop bad people from bringing hatred/harm/fear to our country, foreign OR DOMESTIC.

and i really wish i was drunk while i wrote this, really there is no excuse for my poor writing skills, but when our elected officials let people blatantly yell very hateful things at THEIR gatherings without correction or acknowledgement, i think you can forgive me for quickly expressing what's on my mind.


(My opinion does not reflect the view of ANYONE OR ANYTHING ELSE, so i can say things like "i'm pretty sure we're generating enough hate during these republican debates that someone could yell 'Yeah, Kill the Poor' and even that wouldn't be corrected" and you can read it and chuckle for a minute until you realize it's true, and then who knows what would happen, maybe someone would stand up and take responsibility for the American Right rather than trying to be it's manager. you know, a "Leader")

continued on page 43A...
(or is it?)

we all have our distractions, for some its dropping loads of cash on wings, beers, and football, for others it's collecting coins, playing video games, listening to music.

i wonder what would happen if we gave up our distractions for a little while.

lets play great idea that will never ever get by republicans. social responsibility is not something they want differed to government, to an extent i'd agree. i'd like to hope that people would do what's best for their community/country, but left to our own devices that will never happen.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-14962769

This is something akin to the idea that every American has a responsibility to volunteer within their community, whether its as a military member, a park member, a quick cleanup crew once or twice a year, or police of fire work. It's something people should do, they should want to do it, but a vast majority will not do free work out of their own sense of responsibility. If you're confused as to why i'd think there was a free version of military, fire, or police. well, you have volunteer sheriff's deputies, volunteer firefighters, and everytime they threaten to shut down the government we get told, you will show up for military duty or you will go to prison. So i'd count that as potentially working for free.

Anyway, great idea. Now we can follow up with "is it legal", "is it what the people want" and "seriously, 99.99 percent of you will never ever ever fall into the category of people this affects, why do you not want this to help offset the real, actual, dollars and cents financial burden you face every day?"

you'll hear the phrase redistribution of wealth used a lot over this. the plan isn't calling for everyone to make an equal share, the plan isn't saying that the rich should be penalized for being so good at whatever it is they are doing, it's just saying, at a certain point kicking a negligible amount of your income to make a huge impact on the people working for you isn't a bad thing.

anyway that's my wine fueled rant for the evening. if i wanted to go on longer i'd talk about why Ron Paul is about 70% the person i would vote for. sneak peak:

If a person who can easily afford health insurance chooses not to (hence the point of insurance) and then gets sick or injured and can't afford the hospital bills, then yes he should be on his own. the 30 percent i didn't care for was the idea that church and charity should care for him, and the fact the crowd went a bit extreme on the let him die thing. really an older white crowd in florida should be the last people cheering for both a removal of government medical benefits and punishing those without health insurance. I believe the government should provide a safety net, not a huge one, but one that cushions the blow for emergencies and large accidents. Having seen a hospital bill, having seen what insurance companies do to lower that bill by an enormous amount, i can attest, you don't want to be the guy without insurance. but that wasn't the point of the questions asked. he phrased it such that the person could afford it, actively took the risk of not having it, and then got sick. All insurance works like this.

Which would lead to my "i get your Ponzi scheme analogy Rick Perry" argument. Basically, we all pitch in a little to help people out a lot. i love that idea. when you say the money won't be there when larger numbers need it, i get it, it sounds like we pitch in for an idea we won't get the reward for. no reason to get rid of the program. make it work, that's what taxes are for.

education, infrastructure, science and medicine... we can't let fear drive our country away from progress, we must move forward, always.

(as always my views reflect my personal opinion, however uninformed it may be, and does not reflect the opinion of those around me, above me, below me, who have heard of me, those haven't heard of me, those who might think they know a guy like me, or their pets. you are free to disagree, to present facts, to whine a tiny bit, to sell me products i might actually use, seriously stop with the car ads, i get it already, my dream car, can't have it, i'll never be a super-millionaire, i have to plan economically, be responsible with my money, plan for my future, etc... Anyway, if you're still reading this i think you are clever. you can tell your mother someone called you clever today, she'll be impressed, really she will. aside from that, the bottle of wine is empty, my netflix has finished the movie, my laundry has gone ding, and i have to wake up early in the morning. good evening, have a wonderful night, and be especially nice to someone tomorrow)

PLEASE!

http://news.yahoo.com/obama-yields-boehners-sept-8-speech-timing-023856606.html

Well now that the all important speech is not conflicting with a small scale debate not many people will watch everything should be JUST FINE... except for the whole conflicting with the start of the NFL season, the one with the concerts and fireworks and jet planes and everything America seems to get a hard on for. I would wager more jobless people will watch the football game/preshow than will watch the actual speech. Republicans win yet again, i have to hand it to them, they play some good politics. As long as they keep their response respectful and not inflammatory, i'd say they'll look like the good guys in a week or so.

I was told earlier today that this type of request is rarely if ever refused, it was brought up that it actually has never been refused. I'm not even sure how to fact check that. But it was certainly true tonight. The Right cries you didn't cater to us, and so we do as they wish. Image wise it would seem very dumb to say its a joint speech and then not have the people on the other side there. Furthermore, i understand how these schedules work, and i have to wonder who in the world would book it the same night and time as another perceived large political event? Someone set him up to fail on this one, i don't get why, i don't see the strategy, what is the point of all of this? the story isn't even about what he'll say, it's about who he upset scheduling the thing, doesn't that scare anyone else?

Avoid the speech, just send out a simple letter written in plain English at a 6th grade reading level (the Average American reading level) that describes the plan. Inspire the country to do something greater, to help each other out for our collective success, get called a socialist or whatever hateful term they want to throw out there at you. wear it with pride because the truth is if we don't start working together and helping each other out, things will stay the same. the rich will get richer, the poor poorer, and no incentive will exist to change that.

or we could go the route of Lewis Black and build a Big Fucking Thing in Mississippi. Our generations version of National Parks. Even better, invest it all in lotto tickets.

Love,
your resident "liberal, atheist, communist, hippie" Jeff. I

For a while now my opinion has been that Fox news exists to make people angry, and the CNN's and MSNBC's of the world are there to make people disappointed.

Anyway, after reading an article suggesting we should get rid of the National Weather Service in favor of the free market alternatives we apparently all can afford and pay strict attention to (you know like the Weather Channel), I found another interesting link, and well...

i got to the point where they equate not supporting child labor with supporting child starvation and prostitution, and my faith in humanity suddenly diminished. Maybe john stossel will get his wish and someone will blackmail him for one of his organs so it can be sold on the open market to pay for hanna montana tickets and a t shirt made by some kid in genericistan who doesn't have to whore himself today. but that's an exaggeration of his intent, which i'm hoping is just an exaggeration of proposed ideas about what is culturally acceptable.

Surely he understands that the ideas in his piece are there to protect human dignity, life, and in the case of scalpers their wallets.

Why is the only alternative to child labor prostitution? wouldn't it make more sense to put into effect a greater coordinated plan beyond just education for the children? is it because they are poor that we would rather write it off as okay for them to work than to help ease the burden that forces them to work as KIDS in the first place?

Sure you could also make the argument that Ticket Scalpers should be legal, that they are saving you time in line... but as it happens now a lot of events are sold out within minutes, online and off, and there really isn't any time that would have been wasted. for instance Blizzcon last year sold out in about 10 seconds, and many of us had been waiting for hours for that window and simply missed out. Scalpers were selling the tickets at roughly 8 times the original price. Supply and Demand suggests they would sell them only at the price which people valued the tickets at. But the whole point of the tickets being what they were was that the Company decided that the ticket value would both be fair and profitable at that point. The argument seems to be that fair as a principle has far less value than what you can get away with. which is fine if you are rich, or have that thing in your head that says exploiting your fellow man just because you can is culturally or ethically acceptable... which leads to the next argument

Selling your organs should be legal. Right, in a perfect world... well in a perfect world your fellow man would help out another ailing man, so let's just forget about that. In this world, i'd like to think we don't allow the sale of organs because it then creates a market for said organs. People aren't nice, they will work to exploit each other for financial gain. If that argument is invalid then so there would be no point in Stossel addressing any of these issues. Why would i sell my organs when it would be much more cost/life effective to sell other people's organs, sort of like a scalper. I got to the organs first. Sure there would be some people who are one check away from helping their fellow man out, but again this feels like another argument that feeds on plight of poor people. Not to mention the opposite side, if a poor person needed an organ instead of fairly waiting in line they would continuously be sidelined while the rich could simply buy the next one that comes their way. ugh, 3 AM logic, i'm sure there are holes in mine, but gosh how can you not feel some sort of sadness/pity for the logic being pushed from this article alone?

Blackmail, great if you can pay off people to keep quiet. Horrible if you can't. Well the argument he posed was that if blackmail were legal, people would behave better. Humans will be human, and if we make it too easy to leverage and exploit another one, a human will. Pay me $10k or i'll tell the cops you touched my child. That would NEVER happen (obviously i don't have all the facts this was literally a 5 second search on google.. oh and by the way Blackmailing is illegal, can you imagine if they could get away with it?)
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I'm not rich, i'd love to be rich, but it probably will never happen. I don't have the connections and we all know that hard work alone can only get you so far, and to a certain extent i like it this way. I still have a memory to what it is like to be poor, maybe that will always mean i have sympathy for the people out there that work very hard to try and live comfortably. Not everyone who is poor is the evil social leech the right side media wants you to think they are. Some people genuinely just need a little help. Maybe their company doesn't pay enough and no other companies around them are hiring, they can't afford to go back to school, and they certainly don't have the free time to sit at home and innovate. Every day i become more enraged at the ideas being pushed by the right to take away that buffer, that help, the guidance the lower rungs of American society need just to get by. The company will always pay the lowest it can and still retain the worker. If they weren't forced to pay minimum wage, they would pay less. How do i know? look at the unregulated sectors, the illegal worker force, look at what happened to the meat packing industry after the destruction of their unions. Undocumented workers are making far less in these markets simply because it is still more than they can make where they are from. I absolutely hate the argument "if you don't like it then you can just get out". 

Do i support illegal immigration, no. I figure there is a method to become a legal citizen. If it seriously is not meeting the demands of the citizens we can expand or rewrite the rules. Do I support Unions, i support the idea of Unions, but i also find that they too are exploiting the system they should be using to simply protect the valuable workers within them. Do i think the governments role should be about what it is now? yes, protect the citizens, support them in their endeavors, and employ our power across the globe in support of humanitarian missions so that the World can grow together.

As for my 3AM rant, i think it's done... you've probably already labeled me a commie hippie liberal atheist, i wear the label with pride when i'm sitting on Alert in the field as part of the military. That's right, I do the job most "and i proudly stand up, next to you and defend her still today" singing hypocrites won't, and i prefer it that way, because when push comes to shove, i'd rather have me being the guy behind the gun than someone who would exploit the poor. (see it's not so nice to have someone give two alternatives that clearly don't make sense)

-Jeff
(obviously everything here is MY opinion and does not reflect the views of anyone else on the planet, i'm weird like that, and it definitely does not reflect the thoughts, opinions, policies, et cetera of the people i work for, their families, their imaginary friends, their real friends, their local restaurant owners, or anyone named Steve... specifically that last part. In no way is what I write to be thought of as Steve's opinion. If YOU have a pet Kangaroo that voices opinions similar to mine, i suggest you youtube that kangaroo and profit, and then refer people to me because i pointed out your kangaroo's talent. By the way, kangaroos should not be owned as pets, even highly intelligent ones, i'm fairly sure it's illegal too, for your safety, not Kangaroo Steve's)

Hey everyone, Jeff Here live from Indianapolis Indiana for the next week and a half bringing you my take on several great things taking place.

-First, from now until August 8th i'll be covering GenCon 2011, the world's greatest 4 days in Gaming.
I
-'ll have a short break until the 11th in which i hope to cover some of the local sites.

-Finally, from August 11th to August 14th i will be covering the 2011 Drum Corps International World Championships.

So let's get started. I landed here today at around lunch time to the sound of the pilot blessing the passengers with the mantras "May the force be with you, and live long and prosper". Though the cute girls next to me on the plane looked confused (they are here for Softball), nearly half the plane made what i'd describe as a nerdgasm sound. There were plenty of people who would fit the stereotype of comic book guy nerd in your head and a few who resemble the cast of the Big Bang Theory. But between my airline experience and my first few hours in the exhibit hall, hotel, and surrounding area, i've noticed one thing i think you should all be aware of:

The people are incredibly nice.

It is amazing, you can talk to almost anyone, and though you do run into the occasional social outcast introvert that just wants to do his own thing, most of the people realize that this is a convention where socializing is the point. Oddest compliment i received today involved an attractive lady saying my watch gave me a very primal look. It's one of those Fossil watches with the thick leather band and the changing face. I'll take any compliment and dish them out just as fast.

It's still day 0 so there wasn't much to do after picking up my badge aside from inwardly laughing at all the people who were showing up around 4pm and having to wait hours to get their badges and tickets while i lucked out and waited maybe 5 minutes.

I did attend one event, it was called "The Announcement" and had no description, no real clue as to what it was aside from some mentions of press passes, celebrities, and a good time. It turned out to be a Live Action Role Play groups take on WWE fights and their 5 year anniversary announcement. It was a mock weigh in where one performer played Bret Michaels and the other Bret Hart. I was mildly irritated that this was all it ended up being, an invitation to an event later at night. But, i realized that this was at its essence what the Gencon experience should be. A bunch of friends getting together, doing what they love, bringing a bit of childhood to life for others to enjoy. It wasn't high tech, it didn't take a huge budget. All it took was a scale, some rope for a ring, a fake belt, and a couple of women in the front row screaming "take it off". Most importantly it required imagination. I think video games have spoiled some of that fun for the world as it basically is crack for your eyeballs and very little of anything for your brain. So i'm pumped for Day 1.

Speaking of, for day 1 i'll be enjoying some eyeball crack by playing in a modern warfare 2 tournament, learning the ropes of the World of Warcraft Trading Card Game by entering a beginner's tournament, learning how to play Killer Bunnies, the Lord of the Rings Card game, and attending a Burlesque show around 10 pm.

Finally, let's not forget i LOVE to eat. Today i found a Shula's about a block away. TGI Fridays does room service. The complimentary breakfast bar looks amazing from what i've seen. Tomorrow, i'll be heading towards CVS to pick up the necessities (red bull light, amp, water, snackie cakes), but i'm still looking for places for lunch. So if you live in the Indianapolis area and have a suggestion, shoot it my way.