PDComic 007

The newest comic is simply cheap humor.  Nothing like offending your optic nerves!

Now playing: Muse - Blackout

Bling Bling

This morning I stopped for gas at Sheetz.  As I was standing there at the pumps, this big black sedan with tinted windows drove up.  The car stopped, and the back window rolled down to reveal a car full of black people.  The guy in the back seat pulled down his sunglasses, and said to me, "Hey man, you interested in some beautful 14 caret gold?"  As he said this, he tugged on the bling bling he wore around his neck.

I said no thank you, and he said, "All right man, you have a great day!", and the sedan drove off.

Weirdest.  Thing.  Ever. 

Cursive

I read a comic this morning that took a jab at how we as a society are less adept at writing in cursive because of the heavy use of typewriters, followed by word processors, followed by just about every person in the country having a computer, and finally the rise of texting and smart phones.  This made me remember when I was taught how to write in cursive in elementary school, and got me wondering if they still actually teach it in school today. 

I remember when I was taught cursive, I utterly hated it.  I still do, of course, because I really feel it was a worthless venture.  I felt this way and I didn't have my own cell phone yet, and I had just got my first Atari computer.  I didn't even know how to type yet.  (We're talking first grade, here.)
One of my co-workers has a young daughter, so I asked her about it and yes, apparently they still do teach cursive writing in elementary school.  According to Wikipedia though, it's taught with a lot less emphasis today, which is a good thing, I think. 

My own handwriting is a bit odd...and incorrect.  I write in all capital letters, with letters that are to be upper-case simply larger than letters that are to be lower case.  SO, I BASICALLY WRITE LIKE THIS.  This is mostly because I hate writing in cursive, and I dislike how lower case letters look when handwritten. It's a lot easier to write neatly in all caps, too, given the block nature of the letters. 

It's all moot at this point in civilization, though, since the only time I hand write anything is when I'm making a note to myself or when I'm signing my name.  No one needs to be able to read my signature anyway (it's basically just two capital letters and some squiggly lines). 

PDComic 006

I’m a little late on this one, but by the time I remembered that it was actually time to post the comic last night, it was already around 2:30 AM and I wasn’t about to sit back down in front of my computer.  In any case, I never did say what TIME on Monday I would post the comic, now did I?  Yay for loopholes. 

BC2 is actually a really good game, it just has a few shortcomings.  One of which I’ve highlighted in this issue.  Before they hotfixed it, people were actually sniping others with SHOTGUNS from across the map.  Not cool. 

In other news, Splinter Cell comes out on the PC this week.  I’ll be playing that one. 

In other, other news, Blizzard announced some relatively explosive changes they plan on making to the structure of raids in their next expansion, Cataclysm.  I always gauge the “explosiveness” of any proposed change by imagining to myself what would happen to the game if that change appeared RIGHT NOW.  I imagine it that way, because that is the narrow minded philosophy that most of the community seems to use.  So as you can see, I don’t use it as a means of predicting how good or bad the change will be.  I use it as a means of imagining how much QQ I can expect to entertain me over the next couple of days. 

In any case, the fact that my guild would cease to exist as anyone knows it were these changes implemented today gave me sound reason to suspect the forums were about to explode.  And so they did, I certainly wasn’t disappointed in that regard. 

For the record, I approve what they’re doing.

Now playing: Bush - Testosterone - Winamp *** 476. Bush - Testosterone

Unexpected Recognition

Tonight, I went out for dinner and drinks with my boss and two other people that I work with.  We’ve all been a part of the same project that has been on-going for more than a year now, and the occasion for the dinner/drinks was to celebrate completing a very huge chunk of the project, on time and successfully.  More or less, our boss just wanted to show his appreciation for our hard work.  It’s something he doesn’t get to do very often, since he’s a VP and there are days where he doesn’t even have time to take a proper lunch.

There’s a pretty cozy restaurant/bar right down the road from our office, which is where we chose to go.  Nothing fancy.  We got a few sandwiches, a basket of “loaded fries”, and some wings.  I had three Captain and Cokes.  After our first round of drinks arrived, my boss proposed a toast to the three of us for all the hard work we had done over the past year and a half, stating that he really didn’t think anyone else in the company would have been capable of pulling such a project off successfully. 

As we clicked our glasses together, both of my co-workers stated that the success of the project was due in large part to me.  Neither of them needed to include that, and it was nice surprise that they did.  All of us already knew it — we divided the project up to conquer it, and this particular portion we completed was the portion that I had decided to tackle since it was the most tuned to my personal expertise as an algorithm analyst.  So, it was a nice gesture. 

It seems these days, I see more negative gestures from people.  I see people doing rude things to each other (including me, sometimes, I’ll admit) when I’m driving to work, when I’m at the supermarket, I read about things in the news, and don’t even get me started about how ignorant people can be when you give them the anonymity of a keyboard and computer monitor.  All of that makes experiencing these two gestures — of my boss personally thanking us for our work in the way he did, and my co-workers unexpected recognition — refreshing, and makes me glad that perhaps not all people should be dragged out into the street and shot.

Now playing: The Constellations - Felicia

PDComic 005

This comic is just a commentary about Rule 34.  Rule 34 states:  If it exists, there is porn for it. 

Now playing: Yeasayer - Madder Red

Cowboy Bebop

I'm a really big fan of the anime Cowboy Bebop.  It's simply a piece of art, to put it mildly, and it's one of the few anime's that I can actually watch dubbed without cringing.  "Sympathy for the Devil" is my favorite episode of the series, and just thinking about the episode right now makes me want to watch the whole show right now.  (It's been a few years since I've watched it.)

I'm bringing this up because I've been semi-following the rumors floating around that a live action Hollywood version of CB is going to be made.  As you can imagine, this has most fanboys in an uproar, since obviously Hollywood is going to make a train wreck out of it.  Of that I really have no doubt either, but I won't be overly upset about it.  The thing that prompted me to share my thoughts about a possible CB movie is that most sources state Keanu Reeves is going to play Spike.  This has the fanboys in even MORE of an uproar, since the general consensus of the man is that he can't act worth a shit. 

I'm making this post to state that I support having him in that role.  I think he's be great.  I won't even go into the reasons why I think that, because they don't matter.  I just think he'd be great, and I want to see it happen. 

PDComic 004

The first Borderlands DLC was a lovely thing.  It added zombies to a game I already loved.  There was no way it could be anything less than win.  The other two, well that’s another matter entirely.  Thus the topic of the newest comic. 

So I looked up from my cell phone, that I happened to be using to text someone, and realized that I was also having a conversation on Facebook and also chatting with people in IRC.  At that moment, my AIM went off, letting me know that someone was sending me an IM.

My first reaction was to post about it in my blog.

Help me. 



I’m going outside.  Pronto. 

Now playing: People In Planes - Pretty Buildings

PDComic 003

Oh yeah, it’s Thursday.  That means it’s comic day.  Go check it out.

First off, allow me to apologize for how shitty that site looked.  Allow me to explain — it’s been like three years since I’ve created a simple webpage from scratch, so I’m a little rusty.  I utterly forgot that you won’t see my fonts if you yourself don’t have them installed on your PC.  I rectified that by making the top title of the page an image and using a simpler font for the body of the index.  It should look more presentable now.  Additionally, I also forgot that the command to remove the fucking underlining on hyperlinks is different if you want them to disappear in IE than if you want them to disappear in, say, Firefox.  So I took care of that as well.

Now about the comic, it pretty much sums up the whole cycle of MMO games for me.  Your character starts out with nothing, you spend vast amounts of time building him or her into something spectacular, and then it all gets taken away for you to start all over again.  Hey, it’s what we do. 

Now playing: Switchfoot - Bullet Soul

The Great Outdoors

The cool thing about having XM radio in my car is that my head gets filled up with the names of all kinds of new bands (or new to me) that I want to check out in greater detail.  Anyone who might read one of the emails I send home to myself from work would be utterly confused, or would think that I'm using some kind of strange crypograph.  The email I just sent off said "Civil Twilight Drunk Girls Jupiter One".  Heh.

And now to totally derail that subject and move on to something else...Over my long weekend (Sunday and Monday to be exact), I went outside.  That's so fan-fucking-tastic and unbelievable that I really don't even need to say anything more, but I will anyway.  I started doing the typical spring clean-up things around the house, such as getting the flower beds around the house ready for planting.  I'm a fan of flowers and gardens in general.  I worked as a groundskeeper while I was in high school and I also took three courses on horticulture, floriculture, and hydroponics.  So I like to grow stuff.  We recently redid the whole landscape around my house, in the form of basically ripping out most of the God-forsaken shrubbery.  (Insert "Bring me a shrubbery!" joke here.)  My Dad constructed new flower beds using weather proofed lumber for borders.  The result is gi-fucking-normous boxed flower beds that I'm now rubbing my hands together in anticipation of filling with whatever the hell I choose.  On Saturday, I spent about $200 ordering a bunch of stuff from a catalog for planting -- trees, perennials, summer bulbs, etc.  And then on Sunday and Monday I did a little work getting the place ready by weeding and applying Preen.  If you're any kind of gardener and don't know what Preen is, go look it up.  It's great stuff. 

PDComic 002

Yup, the second issue is up.

I finally decided on a Monday and Thursday schedule.  One week seemed too long.  In choosing the days, I totally copied LFG. 

This issue is in response to this contest.  The mere fact that Zynga got as far as they did made me want to stab someone in the face.  Sure, I myself play games on Facebook.  And I will even go so far as to state that I think what they are doing is a pretty entertaining and fun thing with their games.  But to compare them to developers who actually use a graphics engine is blasphemy.  I don’t give a fuck if you love Farmville all night long.  If you think they make the “best games”, then I think you’re a fucking idiot.  Still, this whole contest was nothing more than a popularity contest, so I wasn’t getting my panties in too big of a bunch. 

I was pretty happy that Valve beat Zynga, however, and then I saw that the final round was Valve vs. Bioware.  It was the only round I didn’t vote, because I couldn’t.  There’s no way to decide which of those developers I like better.  Absolutely no way.  Impossible. 

You will see that Valve won by a mere 159 votes.

Now playing: Dead Confederate - The Rat

Shoot Me Now

So I finally got every single episode of The X-Files.  It’s one of my favorite shows and I wanted to have the complete collection.  Now, keep in mind that I already HAVE all the episodes in DVD form.  But I fucking hate watching proper DVDs.  You gotta put the disc in, then you gotta wait for the fucking previews and ads to play, then you gotta fucking click on a bunch of shit, and then you get to play ONE FUCKING EPISODE before you gotta press more buttons. 

Fuck that.

I downloaded them in AVI format.  I can put 12 of the fuckers on a disc.  I put the disc in, and it starts fucking playing automatically.  And it plays the whole fucking disc.  I can sit and not move for 12 fucking hours if I so choose.  That’s what I’m talking about.

Yes, I just described pure laziness.  You’re damn fucking right I did.

ANYway, I just downloaded them all in AVI format.  Today I looked and found DVD rips in MKV format (much better). 

So now I’m re-downloading the whole series all over again.  For a third time.  LOL. 

Now playing: Gorillaz - 19-2000

PDComic - The Beginning

All right, I’ve got 6 comics done.  If I plan to load one once a week, that’s a five week buffer.  (Because I’m giving you TWO comics tonight instead of one.)  If I can’t keep ahead of that, I should just quit anyway.  Besides, I have five pretty good ideas written down that I’ll save for when I can’t think of anything else.  /rollseyes. 

In any case, here’s the quaint unveiling.  I’ll work on making a navigational page for the comics soon, but for right now they are just images.  It’ll probably auto-adjust to your browser (the images are all 1280 x 1024, so quite large), so if you can’t read it easily make sure you make it full size. 

So here you go.  Issues 000 and 001 for your viewing pleasure. 

I suppose I can use my blog to sort of provide some “making of” notes for each comic.  Let’s see:  The reason I’m starting out with two comics instead of one is because Issue 000 isn’t really a comic and more of an introduction. 

The idea from Issue 001 came about simply from playing the game World of Warcraft.  A lot, and I do mean a fucking God damned huge fucking amount of time is spent waiting on other people.  Sadly, I wish that comic was a mere exaggeration, but it’s damn near an exact screenshot…

Ok, so I’m lying.  But only a little.

So this is the 666th post I've made in my blog.  On my birthday.  Coincidence?  I THINK NOT!




Never mind the fact that I made this post soley for this purpose.

Today is my birthday, and I'm now 29 years old.  As such, I present you with the song that I think I relate to the most, for whatever reason.  Or for no reason.  Who gives a fuck?  Anyway, it's a great song, and if you're not familiar with Cage the Elephant yet, you obviously need to crawl out from under that rock you're living under.  Seriously.

Ain't No Rest For The Wicked

Last night, I created three more comics for the upcoming "PD: The Webcomic" project.  That brings the total to five, and if I'm feeling overly creative this coming weekend I might unveil the first comic next week sometime.  Right now I'm planning on maybe releasing one comic a week.  We'll see how that goes.

Back to the topic of my birthday, today is actually my Friday, as I'm off Thursday, Friday, and Monday.  Niiice.  I play on doing a lot of things on my days off, and the only problem I see is that the weather isn't going to quite cooperate with my plans to do some work outside.  It's supposed to rain the next two days, and Friday is supposed to be quite cold (like 47 degrees for the high).  Saturday is supposed to be nice, but I doubt I'm going to be in any condition to do anything that resembles work on that day.  Following a late lunch, we're going gambling at the casino down in Washington, PA, followed by a BBQ.  It should be good times.  It's a shame I probably won't remember much of it. 

PD: The Webcomic

So as I may or may not have mentioned (I'm going to go with "may not" here), I'm in the process of creating a new webcomic.  I've completed the first two comics already, but I'm going to wait until I have about twenty of them created before I start posting them so I have a huge-ass buffer to compensate for all the times I'm too fucking lazy to do anything creative.

To properly describe it, the comic will be quite irreverent.  You'll understand more of what I'm talking about when you actually see it.  Also keep in mind that I can't even draw stick figures well, so obviously you shouldn't be expecting any cartoons.  They'll all be screenshot based, ala Garry's Mod and such.  And naturally, most of the topics will be about gaming, because that's what I do.  Duh.

In other news, I just splooged Mtn Dew all over my desk.  Time to go find some paper towels. 

Monday.  Let's just skip talking about that, shall we?  It'll just end with me saying something rude and inappropriate anyway.  (Such as talking about the woman in the BMW this morning who thought she was going to cut me off until I threatened to drive my car up her sandy cunt.)

Ooops.

In any case, I have a new song for you to start out your week.  It's one of those cases where I heard a song, I wanted the song, I downloaded the entire album that contained the song, and as a result found ANOTHER song that I liked.  I enjoy when that happens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6eSksEp27U

Incidentally, the first song that led me to download this album was "How Do You Like Me Now?", which appeared in a car commercial during the Super Bowl.  There's some more utterly random information for you.

Yesterday was Easter of course.  Brandon and Lori were over to celebrate the holiday, and to also partially celebrate my birthday (which is on Wednesday of this week).  The day consisted of great food (meatballs and hot sausage was the main course, and I also made my nacho cheese dip), some TV (we watched some United States of Tara), some Wii playing (I bowled left handed), and basically just hanging out.  Oh, and naturally, some presents for me and a cake.  (No, the cake was not a lie.  It was strawberry.)

My gifts were simple things.  The problem with me is that I tend to go out and buy whatever it is that I need.  This drives gift buyers CRAZY.  You just have no idea.  So when they ask me what I would like for my birthday, it's usually very simple items:  A bottle of Hershey's syrup, pens, sticky notepads, blank DVDs, candles.  These are things that I use all the time, but I never bother to go out and buy.

Oh, and since it was Easter I also got a bunch of candy.  Twix, Crunch, Butterfinger, chocolate covered pretzels...

All in all, for a weekend that was of the normal size (two days), this one had more fun crammed into it than your typical run-of-the-mill weekend.  I like those. 

I'm currently living in the afternoon THAT WOULDN'T FUCKING DIE.  It is hell incarnate. 

A Commentary on Platforms

The gaming community as a whole hate each other. Most of this is due to the fact that a vast majority of them are teenagers or college kids, and hating their peers still comes naturally to them.  If you're a PS3 gamer, the Xbox350 gamers think you are trash.  If you're a PC gamer, the console gamers think you should be put our of your misery.  If you're a console gamer, the die hard PC gamers think you're stupid for using something with inferior capabilities.  The wars rage on and on and on.

This is why I found The Escapist's March Madness mock up on game developers very interesting.  If I had to categorize myself, I would definitely consider myself a PC gamer.  That's where 99% of my gaming time and money is spent.  I have a Wii, and I have a PS3 (and I had a PS2).  I'm not ignorant to other games, and if something comes out that is platform exclusive and it's good, I will play it.  No problem.  In my opinion, I *do* think that all video games should be made for all available major platforms.  But I realize that it would take lots of time and money to accomplish this and sometimes a game developer want to keep it simple and make the best game they can make only once, or they go where the most money is.  That's fine.

Anyway, I'm getting completely off-topic.  Back to this March Madness contest between all the major game developers.  Here's what I find interesting:  There are so many critics of PC gaming out there, including some game designers who once created only PC games and now refuse to even look at making a game for that platform.  They talk down the PC so much, saying it's so inferior to consoles.

Now, I realize this contest that the escapist is doing is quite unofficial, but look at the final four.  They are all PC game developers.

Bioware:  Sure, the Mass Effect and Dragon Age games were made also for the consoles, but they got simultaneous PC releases and the game wasn't just cheaply "ported".  The KOTOR games were at first PC exclusive.  The TOR MMO will be PC exclusive.  They're a PC game developer at their core.

Zynga:  The developer of all those Facebook games you're so addicted to.

Valve:  Half-Life, Portal, Team Fortress, Left 4 Dead...

Blizzard:  Warcarft, Diablo, Starcraft

There's your final 4.  All the major console game developers have been eliminated in good fashion.

I approve.

On a side note, this summer (July 30th to be exact) will mark the 5th anniversary of my blog.  It would be cool if I could manage to make that day be my 1000th entry, but in order to do that I would have to do 2.8099173 posts per day from this day forward.  Yeah, that's not going to happen.