3840×1080

Alright, in all seriousness I’m not one for having New Year resolutions. That and the screen resolution joke is made way too much. Although it would be nice to have a second 1080p monitor just so that my secondary can match the size of my primary…

Anyway, I’m not going to label this as a resolution as such, but I will try to make sure that I blog just a bit more this year. I will also look into streaming a lot more on Twitch, I’ve been lacking in that aspect a fair bit.

Some of the things I hope to achieve this year, in no particular order:

• Get a YouTube partnership.
• Upgrade my PC rig – ideally once the LGA-2011 components start coming out.
• Attend almost all the anime cons, depending on timeframe.
• Get a smartphone and start posting tweets and pictures on-the-go.

Not much else I can really think of at present. I suppose that’s good because if I do think or anything else after this, it just goes to show that it really doesn’t work as a resolution at all if I can’t remember it after only two days!

Friday night started out a bit disastrous when I realised that there was probably going to be a lack of games equipment available – and compounded a bit more when we heard the news that our Guest Liaison was involved in a car accident that put his car out of commission – but all managed to eventually get back on track following a quick trip home to Dunboyne to pick up things, as well as a quick purchase of some new TVs in town!

I had to go back home as I had gone in that morning with just myself, my laptop, and a few small things I could fit in my bag, which turned out to be socks+jocks, my LAN switch, and chargers. So when I heard about the accident, this meant I had to leg it onto the next bus/train home to pick up the rest of my things and equipment (including extra clothes, costume, Xbox, monitor, games and other stuff) I was going to bring and ferry them over in a taxi. So I managed to lose of a couple of the early opening hours on Friday, but the other Games guy Conor, and our assistant Sairus (who might I add is a bloody machine at all of this!) covered things brilliantly.

One of the very few decent images of me from the weekend...

The rest of the weekend worked grand, with the only niggling issue being that my Keyblades had still been in an International Hub in Coventry on Friday morning. I only found out that they weren’t when I checked the tracking during the middle of the day on Saturday to find it had updated during the night to show that they had arrived in Dublin mid-Friday. Annoyingly I had found this out after 1pm when the delivery office in Dunshaughlin had already closed for Saturday. So unfortunately, there was no panicked phone call home to say “Go Dunshaughlin, get package, bring to Helix, kthnxbai”.

Another fact was that as I was working most of the weekend, to wear the wig I had got for my cosplay would have been a very bad idea. The heat in the games room alone was… well, suffice to say it was rather toasty and you could have probably cooked some eggs and sausages on top of the consoles. This explains why I looked rather half-assed for most of the weekend, and also why I’m definitely going to have everything sorted out and looking proper at Akumakon in January.

One thing that still baffles me a bit about conventions are the drink-fests, especially on Saturday night. I swear it took about an hour from the first time the bar announced they were closing to the time everyone actually left campus. 20 minutes to clear the bar, another 20 to leave the Hub, and the final 20 to get to the Ballymun Road. Being one of the few non-drinkers, it is a bit perplexing, but still can be fun nonetheless. Until random photos start happening that is.

Don't ask, and I won't answer.

Sunday was probably the real testing sort of day, primarily as it consisted of mayhem, nerves, exertion and… well, it’s hard to describe. Combining having to go back out on-stage for another closing ceremony games awards ceremony, with the long-lasting fear of last year where I utterly froze and choked up just trying to say stuff… In the end though it wasn’t as bad, particularly as I had to rescue Conor from reading out the slightly cryptic page of winners after he had started to screw them up. I can definitely say one thing though – the bright lights of the Theatre do help the public speaking as they blind you so much you can’t see half the crowd!

And then there was the rush of putting Games Soc’s equipment away since they couldn’t arrive to help do so, which was not helped by the Helix staff practically heaving out the last few stragglers in the room by 6pm (even though we weren’t set to close until 7.30pm) and then what I can only assume was them making the volunteers there move all equipment out of the room and into the foyer…

Yea, I had a couple of run-ins with the Helix staff over the weekend with regards to closing times, but apparently no-one else had any problems, so I guess they just need to work with us a bit better in the future with regards to timings and whatnot.

Anyway, I’m off back to trying to find any pictures of me that may have floated up on the Internet somewhere. I always need to go see how shit I look in them…

Upon the page loading, I noticed that it had been given a little facelift, with a nice fresher-looking login screen.

After getting in, I noticed a myriad of new links on the left-hand side, and one which piqued my interest long enough to delay me sending my text for a while, was this “My Usage” tab. Inside was basically a breakdown of all my calls and texts, similar to what you would get on a bill. It definitely reaffirmed the fact that I don’t actually use my phone very much!

However, I began to notice the charges in my usage history were not adding up too well with the advertised 29c a minute anytime to any network or landline plan I’m supposedly on.

Looking through this history, firstly I was confused by all the ex-VAT numbers. All the text charges worked out (€0.0992 = 12c with VAT), all of the call charges did not. Particularly the two and three second calls – where I hit voicemail and hung up immediately (I don’t do voicemail) – in which I was charged 10c on both occasions.

So, it was off to Twitter (@Meteor_Mobile) and it was confirmed that I am apparently charged a 9c connection fee for every single chargeable call.

Nine fucking cent? Particularly when the call per minute is only 29c, a text is only 12c, and I get charged it every single time I connect, even if it’s straight to voicemail? That’s a lot of bollocks right there.

And yet a Google search for this indicates that all three major networks charge this connection fee for their PAYG customers, and Meteor had only increased the charge from 5c just a few months ago!

This is a load of bullshit, in the future I’m just going to continue to send texts since it’s only 3c more than the connection fee, and I’ll probably be able to say more than I can in 6 seconds on the phone!

Not much has really gone on over the past few weeks. I’m still making my YouTube videos, doing a lot of streaming over on NGame, and getting pissed and annoyed with a few people as always. The NASCAR, F1 and IndyCars have also sucked away a fair few hours.

More recently however, there has also been a couple of cases of conflict in areas.

Aspies

Over on one of the many forums I regular, it was noticed that there was a member on the forums who seemed to have quite a bone to pick with a few people with regards to having an opinion on things. I really can’t remember what sparked it at this stage.

A few threads later, and after a temp forum ban iirc, another brawl brewed between herself and a couple of people, during which I noticed that she claimed to have Asperger’s. Upon noticing this, I took it upon myself to try and use that common ground to try and reason with her and to try and figure out what was upsetting her and causing all this conflict.

Nope. Got my attempts at calming thrown right fucking back in my face.

It was then in that same reply that to me pretty much read out like she used her Asperger’s as a defence whenever things go wrong. This pissed me off to no end. I can understand people with Asperger’s having trouble communicating and getting things across, especially as it took me the best part of primary and secondary school to get around several of my issues when it came to anger management, social interaction and the like. But using it as a shield so that after you cause havoc, you can hide behind it and feel untouchable? That’s just fucking wrong.

Edit @ 2011-11-08 00:03 - Just to add more to this, this is the same person who says:

Why are boards.ie moderators some of the most corrupt individuals on earth? The site is a joke and seems to do little to improve it’s reputation. You may as well call the “Dispute resolution” forum “Forum where you get to be shouted at by a SECOND mod”. I am deadly serious, they are some of the most disgusting people I have met online who do nothing but abuse their power and defend each other.

A quick browse of the DR forum, I seem oddly drawn to this thread!

Comment Trolling

So, I had a video up recently which has a bit of a questionable motive about someone I had had a few problems with recently; when not too long after it going up, I started receiving a ton of spam from people who really didn’t grasp the full extent of the situation.

I’m not sure what these people are thinking, but it is obvious that they don’t understand the full extent of the situation, are are attempting to use my mental health issues as ammunition against me. I really don’t know where the hell they all came from, especially as only a few weeks ago I would have considered most of them to be alright people, but now they are seriously turning into asshats.

Donation Streams

The whole donation stream aspect is also complete bullshit to me. Why the hell are people, like UltraJMan, who make videos and play games for the Internet looking for their viewers to foot their bills by sending them money to buy new equipment or whatnot? I paid for all of my equipment out of my own pocket: my 360, my PC, my Intensity Pro, FRAPS, XSplit, everything; and I don’t even get all that much a week. Yet people who work for ages – or in same cases, don’t seem to work at all – are looking for money from the everyday viewers.

I wouldn’t take so much offense to this if it was maybe $100 every year or so with a small amount from loads of people. But no, they can earn from $500 up to $1000 for all of this. And sometimes they do it at least twice a year! I mean, just check JMan’s last donation stream he did with someone else, where they gleaned $1130 from their viewers, and they even specifically state that they money is going straight to them! I’m sorry, but that is just the epitome of laziness. If you want money for your videos, get a partnership with Machinima or something (like raocow recently did) and earn your money that way, don’t suck the wallets of everyone who watches you. It’s not a full-time job until a proper contract is signed, don’t work to rule or for a bounty provided by everyone else.

I’m done ranting here, I’m off to play some video games, and stream and make videos for the Internet for no reward other than self-esteem and experience.

While I thankfully haven’t had to rely much on the bus service since the train line opened – which by the way has always been pretty much on time, no sudden cancellations, or instance of just plain not operating – I did hear quite a few horror stories, including numerous tweets from Elly and George over the snowy period in which DB were too scared to send the 25B’s to Adamstown – i.e. their only bus service – as well as other stories on Boards of buses not turning up for an hour, 39A’s stopping in the City Centre for no reason and no notice to passengers, and some routes just not running at all owing to a lack of passengers.

Yesterday, I had the misfortune to fall foul to an instance of a bus just plain not bothering to run at all. The plan was to leave the village on the 1402 departure of the 270 to get into the Blanch Centre for about half two, in absolutely plenty of time to meet up with a few friends in Leisureplex for 3 (off topic a bit, but since when has the Plex been free entry? I’m surprised they’ve stopped being bloody gits in that sense…). All seemed grand, so out of the house about half one, down to the village for a quarter to, into Spar for about five minutes for lunch, and then across to the terminus by ten to.

Now it was a bloody cold day, and I hadn’t exactly tried to dress for the weather as: 1. There was to be a lot of physical activity with my friends when I got there; 2. I wasn’t exactly planning on having to wait on a bus that long; 3. It wasn’t really all that long of a walk from the bus stops to the places I needed to go to.

Two o’clock comes and goes with no sign of an arriving bus. As does 1405, 1410, 1415… At this point it’s started to shower slightly, so I trudge down to the second bus stop on the route since it actually has a bus shelter – and on the way not even a bus waiting in the set down area on the way into the village. 1420, 1425… And now arrives a normal 70 – obviously the 1330 departure from town. But wait, still no 270, which was supposed to have left the Centre at 1332 and been back there for 1432 to leave again? Fuck’s sake…

1435, the normal 70 is leaving the village, and given how close we’re getting to the meeting time, I have no choice but to get it down to the very end of Littlepace, then walk through to Huntstown to wait for a 39 to drop me down to the Centre.

And yet, on the way back home after all of this, the 1832 from the Centre was running no problems, having been in the set down area at the Centre since about 1820.

I am going to e-mail DB to complain about this, but in reality, what sort of thing is that going to accomplish? Are they going to reprimand the driver? Nope. Are they going to apologise? Doubt it. Are they going to possibly blame me? Maybe. Are they going to bin it? Almost guaranteed.

• Shower cubicle leaking even more than before, now affecting downstairs.
• An Post apparently not even bothering to deliver a massively huge parcel containing two pictures, it being so big it wouldn’t even fit in the car and so the boot had to be left hanging open with my sister squashed in behind my seat and the picture.
• Finding the hammer that was supposed to be in the cutlery drawer in the toolbox with the other hammer. When sliding the toolbox out to get it, something fell in behind it and so when having to take everything out of the cupboard to lift the thing to slide the toolbox back in – which I think was the massive extension cord – something fell out and left a huge gash in my left foot.
• The last Lucozade bottle of the pack, after my sister had been at them getting one for herself, practically exploding on me at my desk.
• While attempting to remove the address from the parcel to prepare for recycling, after removing the bit that was taped on, to find a part-written address underneath on the main layer.
• A very weird dream in which all of a sudden my relationship with the rest of the UKCS TF2 admin team takes a massive nose-dive after I join a game around half 9 in the evening, spawn as Pyro and literally 2 seconds later die to a Sniper headshot, before uttering “What the flying FUCK?” in the presence of Funky, Odgor and someone else, causing them all to suddenly turn on me. Even this one doesn’t make sense to me.
• Going to bed before 11 after almost falling asleep while watching another one of my YouTube subscriptions, finding myself lying awake in bed at half 3, and unable to fall back asleep for the next hour, hence me getting up and finishing this off.

FML

The post that started it all is viewable on boards.ie here.

So apparently the timetable for the new Dunboyne rail link has been posted by Irish Rail.
Only the timetable shows that every single Dunboyne train serves Docklands and not Broombridge, Drumcondra or Connolly.

This is fucking retarded. I know a good few people who would be using the new train line who would want to go to Drumcondra as part of their commuting journey. This move by Irish Rail was made without any research or any consultation with people in the area to ensure a satisfactory service for the majority of it’s commuters.

See the timetable here.

After a very quiet Friday (which was the actual day itself), with just a trip down to the bar in TGI Friday’s in the Centre for some bar food, cocktails and watching the Dutch dump Brazil out of the World Cup; I met up with a few friends for most of the day on the Saturday, with some general hanging around and doing whatever came to mind. One thing of note was the odd trip to the Asian market grabbing some very cheap Pocky, which I unfortunately munched through rather damn quickly after getting him, seeing as it’s so damn addictive. I really need to make some plans to go get a crate of so of them and start stocking them up in the wardrobes before Eirtakon…

Speaking of that, I really need to go sort out my plans for Final Form Sora now that I have time – and money.

Dinner with family later on that night was a massive affair – sixteen of us in all squeezing into the restaurant part of Ho Wun here in Dunboyne. It was a great night, getting everybody together for a night out to celebrate not only me, but my aunt Paula as well (whose birthday was the day before mine!), before heading home for more drinks and cake. And unfortunately no dog seeing as a couple of my aunts have some issues with canines.

Felt great the next day after a great 24 hours prior to it – and maybe a little bit because of the “personal ATM” feeling I had in my wallet following it.

So, what’s left in the summer? Well, finding a damn Blackmagic Intensity Pro somewhere in this country would be a great start, as I want to get into streaming my 360 online and maybe doing a Let’s Play of something on it – specifically Naughty Bear, which I was given on my birthday itself and I haven’t yet played it because I want to LP it blind if I can…

It’s also a case of the fact that very little seems to help alleviate the effects. Daily doses of Zirtek don’t seem to do much, but without it my nose’d be snivelling and running like a tap, and I’d be practically unable to open my eyes. The accompanying unrelated really annoying chesty cough isn’t helping procedures either.

Anyway, Friday and Saturday. That’s all I’m looking forward to. I just want to get to those two days already – and preferably not be suffering from this crap! If that means it pisses down like a monsoon, then so be it!

Despite the fact that my sister’s father kind of fills the father role (despite not having to), I still wouldn’t consider him my proper father.

That’s really all I have to say about that. Now, back to making the bear popular.

So my plan for Eirtakon in October this year is to go as Sora from Kingdom Hearts 2. But not just in his plain self, I’m going to go as him in one of his “Drive Forms” – basically alternate coloured costumes. However, I can’t pick which one, so I’m asking for a little help with this

All five of his Drive Forms can be found here: http://www.finalfantasyworld.co.uk/khextreme/kh2/kh2_drivemode.php

There are the three more basic options in the Valor, Wisdom and Master forms.

However, there’s also the more complicated choices in his Final form, and finally the biggie – his Anti form.

Any ideas what you think would go well? I’m not going to say what one(s) I think would work best until a bit further down just in case it influences your decision

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Right, this should be far enough.

While I would love to try Anti form, it’d be too much work, especially with the all-black might mean the character is unrecognisable!

Personally, the two I’m thinking of doing one of are firstly Final form, and if that doesn’t work out Wisdom form.

Either way, I seriously hope I can get this sorted for October. It might seem like ages away but it’s closing in really fast

Although really, to be perfectly honest, there’s not much when it comes to this. It’s a chicken burger, small fries and a small amount of soda pop for four quid. And I was hungry and needed something quick to pick up and eat while I was on my way home from college tonight. The Crispy Chicken is nothing more than chicken in a bun with lettuce falling out of the sides as the guy who assembled it probably couldn’t have bothered, and rather a little too much mayo. And the chicken isn’t exactly top of the line either, it’s like a mix between a McChicken Sandwich and a Chicken McNugget. Or at least, it’s Burger King’s version of that cross-breed.

Now for some proper damn junk food chicken that doesn’t make you feel bad about yourself, walk another thirty seconds or so down Grafton St. to McDonalds itself and pick up some Chicken Selects. Great quality, not too overly fried breadcrumb coating, and premium dips to go with them. Worth the price tag of four quid for 3, or 6.20 for five. Probably not worth the so-called "5 minute" wait when you only got off the bus at Trinity at 2110, and have to catch your "sweet feck all of a service" bus back to Dunboyne back down outside Ulster Bank at just after twenty past. Smokey barbeque dip is good though

On a less food-related note, I decided to succumb and set up a Formspring page. Not that I couldn’t already have done something like this with a page on my site, but… meh.
Find it here: http://www.formspring.me/TheChrisD
Don’t expect prompt responses, if any response at all.

So, last Thursday morning (the one with the random snow) I was heading in towards college, hitching a life with my mom who at the time was going… well, somewhere. Half expecting to get off somewhere in Blanch and get a bus to town, firstly I realised the time, and then the fact that she was going via Carpenterstown. So I then decided to give the train a shot, since it would get me into Drumcondra much quicker than a bus into town and then back out would have.

Walking up into the station, fumbling around trying to figure out which pocket I had my pass in. As I’m going by the side windows of the ticket office, I see them shut, which I find to be quite odd, as it’s only 9.20. Round the corner – and the main shutters of the office are closed as well. Well, that’s just fucking brilliant…

The one annoying thing about train travel with the Free Travel Pass, is the absolute need for a manned ticket office to be open in order to get a ticket, as there’s no way otherwise to get through the ticket barriers onto the platform (well, except for hopping them of course). It’s also annoying how the ticket vending machines have no option for people with their pass to get their ticket from it. It’s as if Irish Rail haven’t put any thought into designing their system for passholders.

So I did a little searching around to try and piece together some things. Unfortunately, Google doesn’t seem to have a decent enough result for "irish rail free travel pass ticket office closed", and rather annoyingly has links to the Irish Rail website which just says "Free Travel Pass". However, I did find some half-decent links out there with regards to others in a similar situation.

• Firstly, a link to Irish Rail’s "Guide for Rail Passengers with Disabilites" (PDF). On page 4 (really page 5…), it states:
  

  Free Travel Passes must be produced at the ticket office in order to receive a valid ticket to travel on the train.

  Fat lot of fucking help when there’s no open ticket office.
  The same sort of thing is repeated on the passenger charter.

• A link to a thread on RailUsers.ie, detailing how Irish Rail were forced to pay compensation to a visually impaired man in possession of a Free Travel Pass as well as review their policies on the matter – because of the fact they don’t provide social welfare tickets for any day other than the one you’re getting the ticket on.
• A link to a report on the accessibility of public transport in Ireland for people with disabilities. On page 14, section 2.2.2:
  

  All People with disabilities in Ireland have a free travel pass but must get a ticket for travelling on both long distance and intercity trains. Ticket vending machines are not accessible for disabled people.

  Nail on the head right there.

• And finally, the least "on topic" of all of these, a link to a thread in the Commuting and Transport forum on Boards from three years ago. While not necessarily about the Free Travel Pass, it still highlights the fact that passengers might not have a choice in the matter when there’s no way to get a ticket at the station, either by the office being closed or vending machines being out or the like; and how staff at Irish Rail react to such a situation.

All in all, stuff giving out shit about this.

Oh, in the end I ended up just buying a single ticket from the vending machine there, as I wasn’t going to try "fare-dodge" and risk getting caught – which I wouldn’t have by the way. Thankfully I actually had enough change in my wallet to be able to buy the €2 ticket…

And on a related note, I see Dublin Bus are still sticking with the whole "you need the photo ID, period" sort of attitude after another ticket inspector on the 70 recently; all despite the fact that it is specifically mentions living in Dublin, not Meath. They really should get it changed to say something along the lines of "In order to utilise Dublin Bus services, and Bus Eireann city services in (whatever the other cities are), you need this photo ID". Although at least the inspector was a bit more passé about it and just kindly mentioned to me that I "only have to go to O’Connell St. It’ll take 3 minutes." Rather than the situation of the driver almost not letting me get the last bus back home from town one night.

Things like:

• Writing more blog posts
• Writing more blog posts from the bear
• Commenting on other blogs
• Continuing my SoulSilver LP now that my sister returned my DS
• Making an effort to go see people that I haven’t seen in a while
• Upgrading my crummy laptop from the Windows 7 RC before it starts expiring
• Redoing my site. Or at the very least get a new header and redesign the front page.

All that stuff, and the new dog on Saturday doesn’t help.

Oh right, did I mention my mom and sister are getting a dog? Probably not…

So for the first one, I’m kinda lazy and just used it as an excuse to give some more details about that bag of copper change money contest in the last post. Ummm, yea. Watch it and then make your guess on the previous post

Also, 1080p hells-yea

When what seems like every second blog post I read, every fifth tweet, and every radio new bulletin I listen to mention Haiti, it’s more a case of jumping on the bandwagon rather than genuine concern. Now I can deal with that no problem (I just ignore you…), but what irks me is that the majority of these things also involve somewhere an attempt to get you to go donate money to some random charitable organisation that claim they are going there to use that money to help rebuild and rescue and whatnot.

Bullshit.

And it’s made an absolute fuckton worse when every third e-mail I get is from some random site I’m on sending a circular to all members bugging them to go donate.

I can deal with this thing poisoning my feed inbox, infiltrating my Seesmic, and being blared out by my clock radio beside my bed – but when it starts to get shoved down my throat in my inbox, now that’s just crossing the damn line. If I was going to donate to this crisis, I’d do it of my own accord out of the goodness of my heart. But when you’re agonisingly bugging me – almost to the extent of shunning me when I do nothing – then I don’t see the point in bothering, when all I’m going to end up doing is jumping on this bandwagon.

The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few? How about everyone else on earth living their life as normal, versus a country that doesn’t seem to have prepared for this sort of situation, despite being located practically right next to the edge of the Caribbean Plate, which has had a fair few quakes over the past few decades? (Provided these images on Wikipedia are anything to believe.)

I’m sick of it. All of you bugging me about it have caused me to close my wallet back up and put it back into my pocket. Well done.

If your first instinct right now is to scroll right down to that comments box and ask me “Why?”, I’m just going to say right now “Why not?”. There’s not much different to a normal fancy dress or costume party (especially when it’s one of Elly’s!) – you’re just being someone from anime, manga, video games etc.. It’s along the same lines as LARPing (Live Action Role Playing games, for those of you who are uneducated), just not with a game in mind, only fun. So I’d like to see you turn around and tell me it’s not normal.

I’ve already started planning for next year’s anime convention schedule, so that I can hopefully go as part of a cosplaying pair or group, and possibly even have skits prepared for some of the more major cons. Why start planning so early? Well, everyone else seems to be doing so as well. Plus, the more time I have available, the more time I have to actually get something made for it, and that doesn’t look like crap. Or so I can just continually go on about how much time I have left, only to procrastinate and realise two weeks before the con that I’m royally fucked. The latter option is very likely to happen, unless those who I’m cosplaying with start beating me with sticks to get me to get stuff done.

I would start arguing about why should things like this be limited to conventions, but the main thing about that is the point of view of the public, who may not exactly consider this sort of thing to be normal or acceptable behaviour. Yes, this is something probably best kept to group meetings with like-minded people who are actually into this sort of thing. Doesn’t mean that meetings can’t be arranged though. Several times throughout the year I hear of cosplay photoshoots wanting to be held, that would interest me, again if I was actually half-decent at costume creation so that I’d look good on camera – and if that one decent picture of me I found from Eirta this year is anything to go by, I sure as hell don’t!

And if you think I’m already off my rocker with all this, I’m probably going to make me sound even more insane to you right now – I’m even thinking about having a cosplay party for my 21st. Yes, consider me sad if you will, but I would certainly enjoy a party where everybody is in a character not them. Sure it’d probably alienate a fair few of my friends and would probably be just eirtaku peeps attending, but all I’d say to that is that anyone not being there would be missing out big time.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off back to deviantArt to go gawp at people…

Other than the con, there’s also a bit of work we on the Games Soc committee will be doing to get ready for the BYOPC LAN the weekend after. So the majority of Friday will be spent in the Helix checking out the space that we have (which, rather handily, is known as the space ) and just making sure that everything is running fine. Most important thing is to check the Internet connection and to make sure that all the ports are available for use, as we can’t have people arriving with their machines and then finding that half of the competitors haven’t got all their games and Steam up-to-date. And there may also be a general issue of overall room, but that really does depend all on numbers and whether we get them or not. Still it should be a good weekend, as this is the first LAN we’ll have had where I have an actual decent computer. <3 TheAlmightyBear!

If you’re looking for specs of the machine, apparently Xfire has them.

As for the con itself, I should be there for the whole weekend. I’m definitely going to be there Friday night for the quiz (since I’m around campus that day anyway!), although whether you will see me as Hibiki like you will both other days, I’m still not sure about. But yes, I’ll be there the whole entire weekend, from opening Saturday to closing Sunday. How long I spend in the middle is the real question, although I think one of my friends who lives nearby is loaning me his couch for the night so I don’t have far to go after whatever trip out Saturday night, and I can actually make it in on time Sunday morning

I still have a couple of things I need to do for my cosplay, but for the most part things are done. I say for the most part, because I’m not entirely too sure if I can be bothered to finish it off – and it’s not like I’m going for full-blown accuracy or anything. Then again rushed jobs never hurt people. No sneaky previews still (because I’m not arsed trying to photograph myself), but no recoiling in horror when you do see me. One problem with trying to do a circa ten-year-old kid is that your body’s physiology is much different.
Brrr, my legs are cold

One good thing that I did manage to come across yesterday, while in Penneys exchanging down a size for my costume (while the size I had was fine for me personally, it didn’t work too well for the actual costume itself) was in Smyths with a whole bunch of little plastic Pokémon figurine sets going on BOGOF. So, now my con bag is filled with them, just in case people still have no idea who I am. Also, I think Fiona is loaning me her Togepi plushie for the weekend (that she had when she went as Misty for Halloween), which will definitely help! Now, I just wonder whether or not I’m going to make the bear into a Teddiursa or something…

Starting this week is the RedBrick Halloween Intersocs Ball thingy. Tbh I’m really not sure what point there is to it other than to go to a bar, get buy one get one free drinks all night, and have an excuse to wear your Halloween costume again. None of which really helps me since I don’t drink, generally go to bars unless they serve good food (like the nuBar!), nor did I have a Haloween costume, since I laid low this year. Well, technically I could go in the costume that I’m planning for…

Eirtakon – the weekend after next. Otaku and other anime, manga, and possibly video game nerds congregating in the Hub to do what we would usually do, parading around pretending to be people we’re not, and making the place smell so bad that everyone will notice it on Monday morning

I’ll hopefully be there for the whole weekend, or at least that’s what my pre-registration ticket is saying to me. I actually found it a little scary that my reference number was number seven, and I’m not even a bigger nerd than some of those who frequent the Eirtaku forums, and IRC channel that I always lurk in when I even get the chance to connect because the server the channel is on doesn’t like so many connections from Redbrick at the same time… No matter what, I’ll be going as Hibiki from Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, even if my costume is half-assed and nowhere near as accurate as some people have managed to do.

Please no glomping, as I may be carrying my laptop in that bag, as well as having my DS in one hand playing some Pokémon game, and my internet tablet in the other tweeting my way through the con via LapLan. That is, if they keep LapLan on. They better fucking keep LapLan on, else I’m breaking into either Clubs and Socs or the Mezz and then tweeting my way through.

Then the weekend after that again is the Games Soc BYOPC LAN, which will be the first one I’ll have attended with an actual desktop computer of mine that can actually run Source! Sure, it’s not going to be the most blinged out thing there (I’m looking at you, you Alienware-purchasing knobheads), but at least it’s something half-decent. Don’t expect much tweeting as I’ll be too busy gaming

And finally in the last weekend of the month, several of us from Games Soc are going to Video Games Live. It will be epic. Maybe I’ll se some of you there, provided you’re going on the 29th?

Anyway, I’m off to go source out a supplier of very cheap energy drink, since I’m going to need a hell of a lot of it to keep me awake this month…

So, seeing as I had to leave very quickly this morning and wasn’t able to clean up the kitchen downstairs before I left, I told myself I’d go back home much earlier than normal tonight and get it done, as well as maybe making something for dinner with the random crap lying around in the fridge or freezer. With the aim and intention of getting the 1950 to be home by around nine, I left at around a quarter past seven.

Now while services from DCU to town are plentiful and regular, they still tend to come in a clump. And when those clumps generally mean that you only have twenty minutes to get into town and you have no idea how bad the traffic and/or demand for the bus will be, you have the hard choice of risking it in town, or going through Phibsborough and then hopping on one from there to Cabra where you can meet with the bus you actually want. Which is what I did, since I wanted to actually get back home.

So, I arrive in town at just before a quarter to eight, and check the timetable for the 38, which shows one having left town at 1940. Grand so, it’ll be here in about ten minutes, and I can be up at Cabra Cross within another five, meaning I’d only have about a ten minute wait for my 70. Ten to eight – no sign. Probably just slow out. Five to eight – nothing. Eight o’clock – still nothing. OK, maybe he’s just around the corner and I can’t see him and it’s been a torrid night getting out. Five minutes past fucking eight (actually 8:04 to be precise) and he shows up, not even half-full. Right, let’s get on and get the fuck up to the top of the road already. If I’d have known it would have taken so long, I probably would have gotten the 122 that went by about ten minutes ago.

A very slow drive to the top of the road, not helped by a bunch of old ladies (obviously a bingo party) getting on halfway, and we reach Cabra Cross – only to see a bus coming from Stoneybatter-way and going ahead. As I was near the back of the bus, I couldn’t make out the number on the back too well (from far away 39 and 70 do look alike), and was seriously hoping that it was the one I didn’t need.
A minute later when we got close to the back – fuckit. It was my 70. The 38 lost those ten minutes to the 70 somehow for some unknown fucking reason on the way to Phibsborough. At least I was hoping that we’d eventually catch up to it while stopped somewhere, or even overtaking it.

Well, that plan got off to a high when the 70 stopped at the next stop up, outside the Navan Road entrance to Coláiste Mhuire (where I used to get on/off the bus to and from Blanchardstown every morning for the last three years of my secondary education) – and was scuppered almost immediately when the guy who got off it flagged down the 38. And it was only made worse and worse, so that by the time the 70 had arrived at the last possible stop I could have changed at – the stop outside St. Brigids GAA Club on the dual-carriageway – we were stuck down the other end, passing by the Phoenix Park racecourse apartments.

So I give the parent a ring asking if she can drop down and pick me up since I’ve no chance of getting back soon – and I get a response saying there’s not a chance of it happening as the place was left in a state and that I should probably just get a taxi back.

Which destined me to at least an hour and a bit wandering around Blanchardstown while I waited for the next 70 to come, which leaves town at twenty past fucking nine. After wandering for said time frame, including getting dinner in KFC since I knew I’d be home late. So, I sit down at the stop at the Blanchardstown Centre at about nine-forty and wait for him to come.

And wait.

And wait some more.

Until at ten past ten, me and two others who had been waiting on it, give up resigned to the fact that the driver was a lazy ass and decided not to to through the Centre, despite that fact that every normal 70 after seven is supposed to go through it since the fucking 270 stops service at seven for some unknown fucking reason, even though it runs all the way through to midnight on Sundays! – and end up splitting a taxi home, which I could have just gotten myself originally, as despite the fact it was split with one of the others in the car, as the other one was only going to Clonee, I ended up paying him full price anyway since myself and the driver were both having a bad night with the maths.

This shit really pisses me off. Really.

Dublin Bus need to get their fucking act together, before I have to write another letter of complaint…