Woah, parties, prostitutes and a chinaman grocer! I'm in. Still I bet there's no nudity in these movies. Gotta forge me a copy from the library.

Mice and Men was the best man. Sorry to hear you didn't like it too much. Maybe it was a remedial english Cooks class book that I really enjoyed. =) Since no one enjoyed the harrassment and obvious Nazi master race propaghanda.

jk!

Steinbeck is awesome! I probably haven't read Grapes since high school, but I remember really liking it. I'll have to give it another go this summer. I started reading Cannery Row after visiting Monterrey/Carmel recently and it was okay. Didn't really grab me, but having the area fresh on my mind was kind of cool. I don't remember liking Of Mice and Men but I THINK I liked East of Eden (if I've even read it, don't remember.) Steinbeck rulez!

Saw Super 8 this weekend for Father's Day. It was pretty fun. Totally brings back that early 80s kids-adventure vibe pretty well. Saw a preview for the latest Transformers, blah. Loud, breaking glass, shiny metal, puke.

| Just finished the Grapes of Wrath

Loved it. Was too lazy to read it through high school. Maybe I wouldn't have appreciated it back then either. For me, I just liked it as life isn't much different today. Is that who we are as well? Poor migrant farmers struggling to find our livelihood in the internet farms of 0's and 1's? As much as the "big money farmers" still exists in the forms of large corporations, government, too big to fail, with workers sustaining the status quo.

Why do such people need a million acres of land these days? They have a black hole that can never be filled with happiness on the backs of the misery of others.

On the other hand, reading an old book though is like watching an old movie. Feels like a black and white with no Larry Flint hug-dance sequences. Kinda sucks since it takes 8 hours to read a 500 page book, for me at least.

Played some co-op Portal 2 with Jon tonight. That's fun stuff. Right off the bat, it was more complex and interesting than I'd imagined. Can't wait to go through the entire campaign.

Hadn't been on Steam in awhile and just noticed they added a few of those "free 2 play" games to their store. There's Champions Online which is fun (there's Steam Achievements for it now) and a new fantasy-mmorpg in the WoW style (hear it's kind of boring though.) What stood out and which I got to try a little tonight was an action-rpg called Spiral Knights from Sega. I had fun with it. Sort of Zelda/Gauntlet/Torchlight-esque, overhead view. Think you can do dungeons with 4 dudes and then there's hub worlds inbetween. It was very arcadey but had a nice cartoony style. It's free to play and how they get you is by limiting your daily play time to around an hour or so. So you could pay real money to play more or buy better stuff. The time limit actually felt about right, but if I was a kid and really into it, I could see it being frustrating. Of all the free2plays that they now offer, I'd say give Spiral Knights a try, it's good clean fun.

At work right now and took a nyquil earlier in the day to get to sleep. 10 hours later, I'm still feeling traces of that nasty drowsy feeling.

| A-1 Capone

One of the many bootleg books I'm reading is a history of Los Angeles in the 30s to 50s, focusing on mobster Mickey Cohen and LAPD Chief William Parker. Part of Cohen's history was his relationship to Al Capone during the 30s. For some reason, when the book was converted into whatever format I'm reading now, Al Capone became A1 Capone, as in A-1 Capone. A-1 Capone.

| My Evening

I ate nachos, and now I'm drinking Alka-Seltzer.

Dude -- you should! We've even been getting in a fair amount of roleplaying in this year (one guy is running a 4th ed campaign we play once a month, and I've been running 3rd edition WFRP every month and a half or so).

Yeah 7th Wonder is good stuff, huh? Fast as hell once you explain it. I wish we'd had a chance to break out Dungeon Lords -- it's really solid. Played it twice in Mexico and once the other night and now I'm kinda obsessed with it. Maybe a Man-Con is in order in September?

You've already dropped a Wheezy on Kindle books? Dang son, that's impressive. Some books are really good deals on the Kindle, others are outrageous. Ie you can get the whole hitchhiker's series for $10, on the other hand a single book from Terry Pratchett's discworld series also costs $10. The last books I've read on it were Joe Abercrombie's Best Left Cold which is part of the First Law series (the first three book, starting with Before They Are Hanged, is really solid and totally worth reading, Best Left Cold was kinda bad and not really worth it), some free HP Lovecraft, and now I'm working on this big book called Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace that I tried, and failed, to read in college so now I'm trying again. This is a nice book to read on Kindle because it's 1000 pages long and has a bunch of endnotes that you are frequently flipping back and forth between.

I actually pre-ordered the hardcover for new-grrm. I think it was $17 bucks or something. I didn't know you had a kindle. There's a new nook that looks pretty sweet but I'm already heavily invested in my kindle ($1000's worth of books!)

7th Wonder was really fun! There's an expansion coming out with 40 new cards, called Leaders if I remember correctly. I should move to the bay just to play games with you guys every single night :)

Fool! I've had a Kindle since two thousand ten (AD, Earth reborn).

I like it, especially the idea of not having more books lying around. I'm going to get the new GRRM book on it ($14 I think). I can always pick up the paperback in a year or two if I really want it.

| PS

how weird, I thought the minecraft server was supposed to be gone by now too. Maybe it goes till JULY 7th or something. I will check.

ya oops, it's good till 07/06/2011, play up ladies! (i'm too busy reading 2500+ bestsellers on my KINDLE, bitch.)

Ended up ordering Earth Reborn from a game store in Jersey that's blowing out their stock:

Toysforthought - Earth Reborn for $27 bux (Shipping to Cali brings it up to $41, but that's still cheaper than anywhere else so far.)

Supposedly it underperformed and Z-Man is dropping it. It's got positive reviews so I'm going to give it a shot. Sort of a Space Hulk/Claustrophobia type skirmish game for 2-4, dystopian setting and pre-painted minis.

The con's not that far away... GenCon, that is! Not too late to join the joyride! I hear they have fantastic grapefruit fruit juice.

When does the Minecraft server end? I tried logging in anyway, thinking it was done and I'd get a rejection message (which I'd have a single tear roll down my cheek then blog something poignant) and instead everything loaded up just like normal. Worked a little more on my air gardens and mostly finished the catwalk to the Lode. Anyway, thanks for running that bad boy, definitely fun while it lasted. (Tear rolls down cheek.)

There's a carcassone dice game that looks fun. Anyone play it? I don't think it's even new, should have brought it to the con. Why is the con always so far away?! :(

r00d, glad you liked the images. It was nice to see the wide angle group shot of Dixit. Gives a feel for the group living it up at the Con. I was surprised at how few photo ops I actually took. Maybe next time I will get some more action shots.

jr0n, I do not envy your three weekend iron-man event. I was wrecked with just the con. I can't imagine book-ending it with a bachelor party and a Matt wedding. Tired indeed. Hopefully you will back and up in fight shape soon. I'm sure the other Matt wedding will be a tad more tame.

D>M>

| Lord, I am tired

I am so tired.

Had my third weekend of debauchery in a row, near Puerto Vallarta for Matt Z's wedding. This after the bachelor party and Kubla. I can't tell if my liver is failing, or has entered some super-evolved state; liquor now seems to be a sort of nourishment more than anything that actually gets me buzzed. Nothing too bad (I stuck to beer at the wedding itself, and left the party once it got down to nothing but fifteen bottles of tequila), but jeez. I'm ready to have a rest for a while and actually super pumped to be at work.

(Unexpected bonus: Nathan is really into boardgames now, so I got in not one, but two games of Dungeon Lords. I wasn't even able to play that at Kubla!)