The cage is very small
A tiny silver ball
That makes you a hero
The moment you step inside
The world is watching you
What you’re about to do
Will live on forever
Even though you’ll be dead
And gone
Buckle up
We’re about to turn the engines on.

Boyoyoing

Hello from Sputnik 2
I am receiving you
Thanks for the dog food
I’m somewhere above you now
Guess what Malashenkov?
I took the collar off
I’m holding my own leash
And walking myself outside
This door
I don’t think
I want to be a good dog anymore.

Now I’m floating free
And the moon’s with me
And it’s bright enough
To light the dark

And it’s so high up here
And the stars so clear -
Are they close enough?
Will they hear me bark from here?

Moscow to Sputnik 2
I think we’re losing you
Your life signs are fading
We can’t really say that we’re
Surprised
It’s a shame
There is always something that gets compromised

Now I’m floating free
And the moon’s with me
And it’s bright enough
To light the dark

And it’s so high up here
And the stars so clear -
Are they close enough?
Will they hear me bark from here?

- Jonathan Coulton
(Masters of Song Fu Challenge)

Perhaps it’s a slightly good thing I no longer live in the UK. Or else I would be going, to hell with university. Sigh. Who am I kidding- I’d love to be able to attend any of his concerts. I’m making it a priority. One day I shall attend a Jonathan Coulton concert.

Goodbye, you foul-mouthed old man. I enjoyed your view of the world.

Oblivion, most of you should know it. The amazing game which should, by all rights, suck you in for a couple of months, at least. The one which deposits you in this world, this beautiful virtual world, which seems perfect. Which capivates you so much, that even when you discover that it’s not perfect you stick around. You keep playing, whether it be to level or to complete quests or to just explore.

For me it was exploring. I loved exploring the province of Cyrodiil, loved trudging through Black Marsh and leaping around the snow-capped mountains to the North. Loved opening up all of those map markers, to show how far I had traveled.  Loved taking time, days and days in Real Time, to traverse the land and behave how my character would have.  It was amazing. And why am I speaking in past tense?

Because I’m now a real student. I honestly, unfortunately, have very little time for gaming. I spend my free time with people, and for the first time in my life I’ve truly been accepted into a group. Any gaming I do is tabletop (DnD for the win), and the only time I’ve touched a computer to frag was in a hall full of people, to show the boys that yes, the girl could game. I do miss Oblivion, because it took up so much of my time. It sucked me in, it made me download hundreds of MB of mods. Made me get involved in my characters, write biographies for them, write journals. And I loved it. But for now, real life beckons. I occasionally want to slip an Oblivion reference into a DnD game, and I still might.

Everyone, meet Dack Nesrash. That’s an RP journal for him, but nearly all of his actual RPing was done via MSN. He was pretty much a middle-of-the-line Imperial officer, shoved into a desk job because of a busted knee and a tendency to overdo the alcohol. He was a lot of fun to play, because he was so different from the rest of my characters, but his time has passed. Katie Toran, his partner in crime, got caught up in RL issues. If Katie’s ever around, though, she’s always welcome to throw me an email or IM. It makes me smile that her (long outdated, surely) profile at EZBoard/Yuku still includes a shoutout to Dack.

I miss all of my Star Wars characters, at one point I had 4 running around, but all of them are retired now. In fact, I haven’t played an active character in an RP for about 2 years now. Not that it’s not tempting to jump back in. Not that there aren’t more stories to tell for Monzz, Movan, Dack or Valo. Not to mention Lorna or Julie, or Liam. It’s just that those communities have moved on. The writers have had to move on, life has happened, for me as well as everyone else. When I started online RPing, I was 13. Now I’m 18. A lot happens in 5 years.

I’m always tempted, still, to continue writing in an active RP. The longer I think, though, I remember why I stayed at those sites. The people behind those characters. The writers who had dynamic, fresh ideas. The friends who stuck together through board crashes and rewrites. It was the Golden Age of RPing, for me. The little kid was given an opportunity to improve her writing, to develop her characters and spend time with people so dramatically different from those around her in the real world.

Atonai (and Don), Alexander Alethia (and Winston and Phantaris), Eden Kisori (and her, that dark mistress who lingers in the shadows still… enough said), Kiel Tremor, Jarom Amroth, Kenshin Katarn , Deythia/Tyrael (and his brother), Link Hurali, Jeren Skywalker, Sir Wallace (and Twoface), Kamon (who’s last name started with a V but cursed if I’ll ever remember the correct spelling), Teuila Nightdreamer (and Gabriella and Moriah), Arklite Stormrage, Haike Ryuune, Dorean, Malice, Soldoran, Vince Kieff, Katie Toran, Silyara, Merrick Hellbreacher and all of the others: I salute you. Thank you for creating an awesome world for us all to play in.

(PS: Totally going on memory here, so please forgive me any spelling errors or forgetfulness.)

So, it seems that the librarian Jedi has done her task after all- recording long fallen heroes ages after they have passed.

I’d like to take this opportunity to shamelessly plug the amazing that is Jonathan Coulton. The gamers might know him from the Portal ending song- “Still Alive”, but this guy is truly talented. His music is funny and original, and I love it. I even donated, believe it or not.  My favourites include ‘Codemonkey’,  ‘I Feel Fantastic’, ‘Skullcrusher Mountain’ and his faboulous cover of ‘Baby Got Back’. Please guys, most of his songs are available free to download from the site. Give him a listen, you won’t regret it.

You’re returning to university with a friend, having drove almost two hours to take a third friend to the airport. On the return leg of the trip, the second two hours, you can literally see the town in front of you when the car slowly slides to the right. Into incoming traffic. Due to the combination of hot weather, lack of sleep and a long drive, your friend has fallen asleep at the wheel. There is a car approaching, and the whole scenario is head-on collision material. What do you do?

1. Grab hold of the wheel and jerk it towards you.
2. Scream “Fuck!”, “<Insert Name Here>!”, “Car!” or any other excusable epithet before smacking your friend into action.
3. Scream “Dude!” like some cliché college kid before smacking your friend into action.

Yep, I picked the third option.The word ‘dude’ is now a complete part of my vocabulary, and I hate it. Not too many people seem to say it, so I’d love to know why I’ve picked it up so quickly. For the record, we didn’t hit the oncoming car or the nearby cliff-face and escaped safely. My friend, however, will have the crap kicked out of him if he ever tries driving on such little sleep ever again.

Ah, university.

I don’t have internet here (in computer labs at the moment), but I am working on getting hooked up. We shall have to see what happens. In regards to everything. Especially G-Guy.

Living in residence is strange. The girls (and guys nearby) are nice but everyone seems quite crazy. I supposed we have to be to be here. This week has been all pre-lectures, to give me a taste of what subjects to pick. So far I want to take:

• Classical Civilization
• Latin (A requirement for Classical Civ)
• Computer Science OR English Language and Linguistics
• English

Not a bad batch, hey? I have to make my mind up when I go to register on Friday, then real classes begin on Monday.

Apart from that side of my life, things are pretty normal. The family came around last night and made me very sad about leaving them. They even got me a chocolate brownie with a candle in to say goodbye. You know people love you when they bring you chocolate.

The packing is going averagely well. All of the stuff is packed- the cutlery, toiletries, stationary etc. But I still have to finish packing my clothes, as well as all of my gadgets and their wires. With any luck, we’ll leave early in the morning, drive all day then sleep over in Knysna. Then we drive some more on Saturday, and arrive at Rhodes University in good time for registration.  I’m very nervous and sad about leaving now, though I’ve been fine all summer.

Because I’m taking my PC (good old James Bond) up to Uni with me, the family had to get a new house PC. They’ve picked this shiny new one, who’s currently nameless, which of course I was expected to set up. Everything’s running fine so far, though I still reckon we need more RAM to run Vista properly. It also freaked out when I tried to install the printer, and sucked up the last of our bandwidth allocation when it updated. Sigh. The joys of Windows.

I don’t know why this has shook me so badly, but it has. Movie-stars aren’t supposed to die.