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Post by Bob on Jun 20, 2014 11:45:22 GMT -8
Hi all! This forum's been pretty quiet lately. I think so many of us have "grown up," so to speak, and we're all so busy that we don't have as many conversations anymore. That, or we've finally run out of Final Fantasy "what if"s.
I wanted to make a thread about us! Just...what we're all up to. I know stuff about some of you, but it's been a long time since I've talked to anybody about actual life stuff. So if you're up for it, just post what you've been up to lately! As much or as little as you want to say.
I'll start.
What About Bob?
As many of you know, my son Dean was born in December. He is large. He started kinda small, but is now gigantic. Despite only being six months old, he is already wearing clothes meant for kids twice his age. It's been a trend since he was about one month. Moral of the story, if you have a baby someday, do not overload on newborn sizes. When my wife and I searched for clothes when he was first born, my wife pointed out some cute 6 month, 9 month, even 12 month clothes, but I was like "let's just focus on what he'll need like, in the first few months and worry about the rest later." Yeah, that "later" part happened a whole lot sooner than I thought.
The school year ended a couple weeks ago and I THOUGHT I'd be free to play games and such, but between a teething baby and the suckage that is the world, I haven't had quite as much time as I'd hoped. Sure, I still play lots of games, but not like I used to. Thinking about games a lot as I look over the Steam Summer Sale (woo!). I've recently played all the Bioshock games, The Last of Us, and Super Meat Boy. I bought Playstation All-Stars: Battle Royale because it was cheap, but it's...umm...bad. Like, really bad. I got it on sale at Toys R Us for like $6, plus we had a coupon, so it works out to being less than $4, but still kind of a waste of money.
What's really been sad is my recent addiction to Magic: the Gathering. I've been playing it for awhile now, especially after getting some competition at my school's game club that I host, but now I'm even spending money on it. Lots of money. For the first time in my life, I bought a booster box (36 boosters). I bought one to divvy up most of it as Christmas gifts last year, but we didn't end up using as many for presents as we initially predicted. And then, I bought a box all for myself. Oh, then another. And then a third. And a couple fat packs here and there. See, Magic plays in blocks of 3 sets. So three sets are all kinda grouped together in a block. The most recent block, Theros, is pretty much my all-time favorite block. The block is derived from Greek mythology, which is awesome, and incredibly well balanced for single-colored and multicolored decks. So I basically bought a booster box and a fat pack from each set of the block to make pure-Theros decks (no cards from any other sets). So I've been doing a lot of that.
I'm starting Summer School on Monday, but they're only half-days and I'm hoping to still have a lot of fun time this summer. I just have to get done with a bunch of crap. Seriously, why can nobody do their jobs? Most of what I have to do this summer is fix other people's mistakes. For instance, I applied for a home loan (that I turned down because it was super far from what I'd hoped) and got my credit score attached to it. I've had a credit check fairly recently, so in the few months in between the first and second check, my credit dropped nearly 100 points! Come to find out, it's because of my student loans, which 2 of 3 credit companies believe I am in default on, but it's just because the Department of Education handed off my loan to a new creditor and forgot to tell anybody, so it looks like I haven't paid a loan in over a year, despite my fuggin' auto-pay that pays automatically every month. Seriously, just about everything I do anymore is met by an error of some sort. Am I the only one that feels like the new system is "screw everybody, then if somebody complains, just be friendly and give them what they SHOULD'VE had and ask them to rate our customer service." I'm calling it Stupidnomics. Profit off the people that are too stupid to double-check to see that they've been screwed.
Also deciding now whether I want to continue to rent the house I rent now or move in with in-laws to live rent free for a couple years to save up for a down-payment on my own house. It's the decision that I've been struggling with for about three months now and I just can't make up my dang mind! *sigh* Do I like money, or do I like privacy?
Anywho, I'm hoping to get the site going again soon, but it'll kind of depend on how quickly I can sort out my crap. Thinkin' I'll put AFFR Seasons 1 & 2 on fanfiction.net. Might use the results to decide if/when I'll write my final two seasons of AFFR. "People interested? Sure, let's find time to write it. Not interested? Ehh, maybe I have better things to do."
OH! And next year, I'm going to be teaching AP Computer Science! It'll be interesting since I'm not a computer teacher and the content is mostly javascript, which I don't really...umm...know. So this summer will also be largely about learning javascript and other computer-y things. I'm kinda hoping this is the kick in the butt I'll need to start learning other programs and maybe make my own video game(s) someday. Now if only I knew how to draw...
Anyway, that's it. Thanks (or maybe sorry is a better word) for reading, if you did! Hoping to hear about the rest of you guys! I think I can safely say that I don't know what ANY of you are up to anymore... *sadface*
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Post by Fleck on Jun 21, 2014 1:44:16 GMT -8
Hi everyone. I'm still alive.
My life has been comparatively interesting the past few weeks and months (compared to my normal schedule), but unfortunately the most interesting parts are rather personal (and long stories). Suffice it to say, I have an innate talent for getting involved in situations and with people who are too complicated for my tiny brain to handle. This is why I don't go outside and/or socialize. It always ends badly.
So lately I've been doing what I normally do when things go poorly: lurk on the internet and binge watch anime and other TV shows. Orange is the New Black is an awesome show. Sword Art Online is overrated and stupid. Bakemonogatari is fun, but holy shit does it have some weird moments (eroticized incestuous toothbrushing, anyone?). The fourth season of Game of Thrones has a dry spell in the middle, but it starts and ends awesomely. Kill la Kill is fun and quirky, but it's basically a weaker clone of Gurren Lagann.
When I can tear myself away from anime and TV shows, I still chip away at Future Bound. It's almost done now. 54 of the 60 chapters have been uploaded to fanfiction.net and my site. However, I've basically hit a wall, because I'm just not happy with the story and I want to move on to other projects, but I don't want to abandon the story so close to the end. So it's been a battle to try to get the rest of this finished. Blah.
In real life, I've gotten super into working out. I work out 6 days a week and I've put on 13 pounds of muscle. I don't look that much bigger because my body type doesn't really flesh out, so much as get firmer. Anyway, I'm over 130 pounds for the first time in my life, which is cool. I didn't even weigh this much when I was in the army.
Also in real life, I've been promoted at my job and I recently submitted an application to be promoted to supervisor. Waiting to hear back on that. On the one hand, being a supervisor means I can finally get off of listening to people's boring ass phone conversations, plus better pay and whatnot, but as you guys probably know, I am the Lord Commander of all introverts, to the prospect of being in charge of 20-30 workers keeps me awake at night.
I'm also making a concerted effort to be less of a terrible person. So there's that.
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Post by wyvernxk7 on Jun 21, 2014 7:41:39 GMT -8
Rock it! I'm glad to hear that things are moving in what seems to be generally positive directions for both of you. I just realized yesterday (before Bob made this thread, in fact) that I've known the two of you for over ten years now. That's crazy to think of... but a lot has happened in ten years! I, of course, miss all those days when we chatted for hours as we tried to navigate the circuitous path of adolescence, but I'm also glad that we've moved forward since then. As you know, Brittany and I moved down to Austin in September. It's been a pretty excellent experience so far, despite having had what turned out to be one shitty hell of a bad apartment with a list of maintenance issues longer than my car and a laissez faire attitude about the well-being of their clientele. Suffice to say, fuck Centennial Place. Anyway, we made two friends in November (Rich being one of them), who have turned out to be really solid (as I'd initially suspected): lots of good times, Pokemon Tabletop, which is both as nerdy and as awesome as it sounds (at least for combination Pokemon lovers/novice tabletop gamers like ourselves [apparently, a lot of hardcore tabletoppers are annoyed by it, and sure it's got some hiccups, but we're flexible, so we've just fixed the little broken bits, big deal.]). Blah blah blah. Anyway, down here, we've ended up getting into the habit of working together, which is awesome. Our first job was for October at a a costume shop, which we followed up with a few months at a behind-the-scenes-call-center (skip this part if I've babbled about this before, it's not really vital: at the place, we essentially steered a computer system down the right conversation paths to allow idiot customers for apple, electric companies, etc. to get shitty customer service from a lifeless shell of a computer voice. Stupid and soulless, we were gone by March). Since November, I've also worked as a one-hour-a-weekday,two/three-a-weekend caretaker for the 34 year old president of a company that makes cars that allow people in wheelchairs to drive themselves around ( www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-lqr_TXRcQ - you may notice a familiar drone narrating [one commenter reviewed the voice as "like a tired truck driver," but apparently, Stacy was fine with how it sounded, and she's the president, so w/e.]) It's a pretty good supplemental gig, although it definitely makes the days just that much longer. Blah blah blah again. I'm narrating this entire shindig as I type it, and I'm boring myself. Sorry if this is dryer than a sandy hamburger, but you know me - sometimes I'm needlessly thorough. Alright, back on track: in March, I started working at Children's Center of Austin with three-to-four year-olds, and it's been a remarkably regenerative experience. It's great to finally be working with nice people (they're at an age that generally ensures that they don't really understand how to be otherwise except accidentally), and doing something that matters, even if the kids themselves probably won't remember me in the long run. It's great to be appreciated by the director and, more importantly the parents, for looking out for and helping to shape these children during their formative years. It's been a time-consuming, but fantastic experience so far. I hope I stay there for a good while if possible. Brittany joined me two weeks ago (after a two-month stint at the Olive Garden) at CCOA as a swim instructor during the mornings and an assistant teacher during the afternoons. Supposedly, they're planning on keeping her on after the swim season is over. Hopefully they do, because she's been getting a lot out of it too and we only have one car. Meanwhile, we've watched some shows (a bit more mainstream: Person of Interest [which gets progressively better and deeper and has Michael-f'in-Emerson, who I'm a huge fan of], HIMYM, Community, Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Impractical Jokers, and Agents of Shield [which started off really clunky, but turned out to be really well-crafted and enjoyable by the end of S1], but most of them are off-season or over now, so going to have to go back to the well soon), and I've been reading a lot more than I had been in a while. Read a bunch of poetry books during April (national poetry month), now finally catching up a little on my backlog of regular books. Read House of Leaves finally - it was a memorable in particular for the experience of reading it. It is onomonopaeic in that the books itself essentially warps along with the house and, in some instances, the psychological/physical experiences of the characters within. A lot of reviewers and whatnot said it gave them nightmares apparently, but I didn't have that problem. Yet. Let's hope it stays that way. I rarely experience my dreams (although this past month has been a bit more restless than normal, but I'm chalking it up to routine shift more so than long-term psychic damage), so maybe I have been having some nightmares without even knowing it. Doubtful though. Anyway, the point is I'm in more of the reading cycle of writing, and I've been enjoying it. I have so little time to read though, because my days start at 7:20, when we leave so B can get there at 8 (although I don't start until 9, so I've got ~1 hour to read/do other things), and end at about 7:30 on average, when I get back from Stacy's, so my reading pace is kinda glacial. We're finally a step above the stupid paycheck-to-paycheck purgatory for now though, so that's definitely a great thing, and it allows my mind to be less cluttered by the bullshit of empty stress. Right now, we've got steady jobs we like that brighten our overall existence, and good friends to hang out with and a world of our own making (story-wise at least, with Pokemon Tabletop) to explore, so things are going well. Brittany just took the GREs for graduate school yesterday, and I constantly toy with pursuing another MFA at my program, because I grew a lot as both a writer and a person, and I think it's always important to pursue opportunities like that which allow me to continue doing so (did I mention I rocked the graduation speech? It was awesome)... but we'll see how that goes. For now, I'm just glad to be happy and healthy, and grateful that you guys are around to share my life (no matter how boringly presented) with. Oh, and there've been video games too, but that goes without saying. The Ps3 continues to be a tremendously enjoyable system for me.
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Post by Bob on Jun 21, 2014 9:44:22 GMT -8
Hooray! We're all still alive!
I'm back to reading Future Bound, but you know me and my slow reading and lack of time to do so. With luck, I'll be caught up RIGHT before it ends! Woo! I have a lot of time this week, despite working summer school, so I'm hoping to read a bunch. Also hoping to catch up on some shows and movies, too, so we'll see how that goes. I've seen a couple Orange is the New Black episodes and am interested in watching--maybe I'll start into that since it got the Fleck bump. Lately been rewatching Always Sunny because it's a good background show and I've been cleaning the hell out of my house lately.
13 pounds of muscle, Fleck? That's pretty awesome. I'm pretty sure I have like, one pound of muscle in total. Most of my body's muscle has been replaced with fat, it seems. Then again, I'm getting a bit stronger now that I have to carry a five-million pound baby around. He may only be about 20 pounds, but when you carry around 20 pounds in the store for almost an hour, eventually you lose the ability to bend your elbow. I'll trade off with the wife, and it goes something like, "Here take him--I can't hold him anymore. No, I can't hand him to you, you need to TAKE him because my arm is basically broken right now." Good times. But hey, that 13 pounds of muscle you put on will be GREAT if you become a supervisor! Intimidate them! Push them around! Threaten them with violence! But seriously, I totally get the worry of being in charge of 20-30 employees. As a teacher, I'm in charge of about 150 kids and it's hard for an introvert. People assume teachers are extroverts because so many are, but not me. It grows on you though. The responsibility is tough at first, but eventually it becomes natural...ish. I still suck at parent contact, like phone calls home, which I've done umm...once? Yeah...
So Gabe, what was the inspiration for the move to Austin? Your current job sound awesome, but I assumed you moved for jobs, but it sounds like your first jobs there were kinda crap. On the topic of your current job, yes, working with kids is awesome for one fact: they can still change. Everybody is capable of change, but when you meet an asshole adult, you figure that he's set in his ways and he'll be an asshole forever. You meet an asshole kid and there's still this glimmer of hope that maybe you can help break him of that. Granted, I teach high school, so kids are already pretty set in their personalities, but there's still that hope. But yeah, a three-year-old kid does something bad/mean and it's actually very likely he/she didn't do it intentionally, or at least can be lectured about it and learn from it. Grown-ups? Yeah, lecture them. They'll probably show you their tallest finger to show their appreciation for the lecture.
Glad to hear some updates! Hope to hear from some more people! Hell, wouldn't mind if newbies like Rich popped in here, too, just to learn a little about them, too!
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Post by countlieberkuhn on Jun 26, 2014 11:44:04 GMT -8
Well, I've been super busy with university, but I finally graduated this month with a first honours degree in computer science! So yay! Ungodly amounts of hours were spent achieving that which more or less killed my social life, which includes this website. I took to spending less time on strategy and just shoving whoever seemed a good fit and had stamina to play matches, as I haven't had any time to read through the match logs to see what works and what doesn't. SM7 are doing ok right now though, so that's cool. The day after my final exam, I started volunteering at the Oxford College as an IT teaching assistant. Since it's about who you know more than anything, and a friend of mine is also an IT teacher, things have gone well. I've been doing 10-12 hour working days there 5 days a week for the last month or so, and I am well in there. I've got my PGCE (higher level teaching qualification) planned to start in September, and I've applied to become a full time, paid teacher at the college for the next educational year. The long hours of volunteering have paid off, and my prospects are very promising right now. I may know for sure by the end of next week! So me and Bob are in similar territory here, teaching IT stuff in the near future. I've also been consistently hosting a D&D campaign roughly 2-3 times a month for the last year and a half, and host my own minecraft server for friends, which included building my own modpack. It's a very time-consuming hobby. In addition, I'm now in a classic rock band, and we recorded a demo at our friend's recording studio. A rough version of it is here if you're bored soundcloud.com/daniel-homer-1/sets/matts-band (I'm on guitar and backing vocal duty this time round). Our singer isn't the most tuneful, but he gets away with it on the merit of having charisma out the eyeballs. He's good at singing punk though. I found time to finish Tales of Xillia somewhere in there too. Excellent game, but not perfect. If you were to pick the best elements of Tales of Graces (combat & levelling system) and Tales of Xillia (world & story) you'd have possibly the best JRPG of the PS3 console generation. Planning on asking a girl out if I get the job. After getting a first honours degree and a good job with a salary, I'll feel like a real man, and not come across like some layabout waste of space! Glad everyone else is doing well! I need to hit the weights a bit more than I do now, more like Fleck. My body's metabolism has slowed noticeably over the last year, and I've finally started putting on weight I should have been putting on a decade ago. I now want to replace said fat with muscle, particularly in the upper body area. I also discovered that the latest actor to play The Mountain in Game of Thrones is a mere 25 years of age, making him younger than most of us if I'm not mistaken. Crazy stuff! Edit: I got the job! Starting September, I'll be a teacher!
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Post by Bob on Aug 7, 2014 9:19:35 GMT -8
Didn't even notice the Edit, Count. Congrats!
Time for a Bob update (hoping others follow, too, because I'm curious about how things are going now).
I've been AWOL for quite a bit. Summer was super busy. The wife and I decided to move in with her parents. My pride took a good kick to the nethers, but being that this move will save us about $2000 a month, it'll be a good move. That kind of money can help us build up a down-payment on a house someday, plus some extra money for other stuff (like a new car for the wife since hers will likely explode in the next few years).
So in the last week of summer school, we started the moving process. It's been tough since we're moving into occupied territory, so we can't just move in, we have to move out, too. Plus, we're condensing, so we have a lot to go through to either put in storage or outright get rid of. We already donated a lot of stuff and even put some stuff outside with a "Free" sign on it. Luckily, our old place was in a lower-income area, so all of it went! ...Except the books (outdated textbooks, mostly), but that was assumed. But hey, I'm just proud of people for riffling through the books at all. Way to consider literacy, guys!
After moving in, I visited home, but I'm back now. Back to my mess. So much crap to go through. We moved like this. Step 1, move furniture. Step 2, move things we want. Step 3, bitch and moan about how we don't even WANT the stuff that's left. Step 4, move all that extra crap in giant boxes that now occupy our hallways and baby's room. So it's cluttersville over here.
Now, I'm stressing over teaching a class I don't really know. I MIGHT get approved for a cool online program though. It has a per-student fee, which will be the tough part, but if we get it, it'll make my life SO much better. It's a program called TeenCoder that has a series that goes through Java and hits on all the topics included in AP Computer Science, plus it gives all the materials needed for 20+ hours worth of labs and the 3 required AP CS labs. Long story short: it'll teach the class for me. So if I just go through the program myself ahead of the students, then I should be set. Yay! ...if it gets approved, but I'm hopeful.
The downer in all of this is that I didn't get to do ANYTHING I wanted over the summer. Wanted to work on my website, read Future Bound, play a few select video games, all that good stuff. But nope. Sad panda. I played through some more of Demon's Souls in my "I'm too tired and/or angry to move stuff or clean stuff" phases. Stupid game is kind of fun, but still frustrates me a lot. But it was kinda all I could do since I didn't have my computer hooked to the internet in so long. Most of my browsing as of late has been on my smart phone, which isn't my favorite method, but it works.
What About Dean?
In case anybody was wondering, my kid is amazing and a genius. He's kicking all sorts of benchmarks in the butt, generally falling in the early ranges rather than the late. For instance, they say crawling is something like 7-10 months and he did it at 7. He's doing a lot of that. He has stood for a matter of seconds, but still not enough to count it...although he fooled himself into standing for a long period of time by holding a small cord not attached to anything. Stayed up for probably around 15 seconds. Before that, his record was about 5 seconds.
Lately, he's started "talking." He knows two key sounds: M and B. So he has already said his first word: "Mama." It tends to be a lot of "mum mum mum mum mum," but there's a mama in there! Also he's definitely said Mama. Does he know what it means? Maybe? It means "I need my mama, probably to feed me," which is close enough to the true definition of mama. He also says "baw baw baw baw baw," a lot and has said "Bob" many times. So now, my wife and I are "Mama and Bob." It's like I'm dating his mama or something. It's weird, but kind of awesome.
EDIT: Oh, also, Dean claps. He started that yesterday. Just kinda came out of nowhere. He sits up and starts clapping.
Well, back to cleaning and/or preparing for school. Starts next week! Not happy about that, but whatevs.
Can't wait to hear any updates from ya'll!
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Post by Fleck on Aug 7, 2014 14:08:51 GMT -8
Not much new here. After about two weeks of sweating and being nervous and wondering, I found out a that I did NOT get the supervisor job, so that was kind of a let down. But then I decided that I'd rather have the free time than the extra money, so I've been working harder on my various projects. Future Bound is almost completely done. Seems like Bob's hope of catching up to me before I finish is all but impossible now. I'm almost done with chapter 59 of 60, and I expect to be completely 100% done on the Saturday after next. So less than two weeks left now. Surprisingly, people still seem to like the story, even though I wander back and forth between liking it and hating it. If you guys have a chance, check it out, but I'm not happy enough with the story to really recommend it.
I'm working on two major projects and a few side projects as well. I'll have more news about those when FB officially wraps up. Other than that, I've just been reading a lot and wasting a bunch of time on the internet when I'm not working on FB or some other project. I went and saw X-Men: Days of Future Past a little while ago, and I'm planning to see Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as well. I don't have high expectations (or any expectations at all) for TMNT, but I loves me the turtles too much to not at least check it out. I might put up a review if I'm so inclined. Other than that, nothing new on my front.
Bob:
Walking, talking, and crawling aren't milestones! Tell me when he beats Nemesis in FFX or beats Jordan in GH2. Those are milestones worth noting.
And obviously he's not saying your name, Bob. He's trying to sing, "Ba ba ba, ba Barbara Ann." Jeez. Even I know that.
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Post by Bob on Aug 7, 2014 17:10:55 GMT -8
I KNEW the Beach Boys (all of them) were his real fathers! And it is true that Jordan is the ultimate milestone. I still haven't even reached it yet!
Do review TMNT if/when you see it. As the trailers come out and I get more used to seeing those ugly turtles, I'm getting less annoyed as I was initially. Still doesn't look good, but yeah, TMNT fo' life, so I'd be lying if I said I'd never see it...
Sorry-ish to hear about the supervisor thing. It's always a letdown and having extra money IS amazing, but now that I'm at the opposite end of the free time spectrum, I'll just start shouting "USE IT WHILE YOU CAN!" Ah, free time. I miss you more than anything else. I've talked to students before about how unfair life is because I currently own a ton of video games, but don't have the time to play them. I love having lots of money and, for instance, being able to buy a Wii U just cuz (I did that last weekend while visiting my family so we could play the new Mario game together). Sweet. Spending $300 at the drop of a hat! But now that I'm back home, I'm wondering when the HELL I thought I'd be able to play the dang thing! P.S. if you've played Mario Wii, then Mario Wii U is almost the same exact thing only kinda...worse. The Mario series seems to be about perfecting the same exact game instead of making new games. This feels like they tried to fix all the problems with Mario Wii and re-release it almost, but they forgot to have exciting power-ups (though the Squirrel suit IS cool...).
I'm very much annoyed at myself for not being able to be current with Future Bound. I really wanted to read at LEAST the last episode with the crowd, but ehhhhh. Tiiiiiime. Neeeeed. Oh well...
BTW, Count, I gots to know...
Count: "I've applied to become a full time, paid teacher at the college for the next educational year." Count: "Planning on asking a girl out if I get the job." Count: "Edit: I got the job! Starting September, I'll be a teacher!"
*lies on bed, twirls hair, and kicks feet in the air* Soooo...how'd it go? ;P
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Post by countlieberkuhn on Aug 8, 2014 6:05:17 GMT -8
No luck But that's ok. I'm still gonna be a teacher starting on Monday, so I'm still at the stage where I'm happy to have a job that doesn't feel like a stop-gap, even though actual teaching won't start until September. I've got until then to figure it out! I'm expecting to dislike I've also got to re-learn Visual Basic, as well as learn Adobe Premiere and Flash before I start. They've assigned me most of the programming subject except C (thank god), but since I know a little about sound engineering, they decided that meant I knew all digital multimedia, and gave me those to teach as well. My friend who works there and helped me get the job previously taught programming, but he wanted someone else to teach it so he could take on all the HTML/web design and gaming modules. When I volunteered there for a bit to help in getting the job, I sat in on one of his gaming lessons, where he asked the students in groups to write down a list of game genres, and then followed it up by asking of a game that fits into each example. Only ONE student was able to name a real-time strategy game. Furthermore, a student who turned up late had to do this individually, so my friend asked him the same questions. His first question was to name an adventure game, and the student was unable to, at which point my friend helped him out by asking 'what game is Lara Croft from?'. The response? "Who's Lara Croft?". I died a little inside. Bob: I want videos of Dean singing Barbara-Ann when he learns the words! Glad to hear he's a smart lad though. I hope if/when I have a kid, mine will also be a smart cookie, with good manners. Which probably means he won't fit in with today's youth and will get bullied, BUT IT WILL BE WORTH IT. Fleck: You better inform us what these new projects are soon! Unlike myself and Bob, you're actually flexing that creative muscle a bit, and I expect you to be a published writer by age 30. GET TO IT MAN!
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Post by Bob on Aug 8, 2014 10:15:02 GMT -8
Wow, only one RTS? I can probably name...well, a lot. Between all the Warcrafts, Starcrafts, Civs, Command and Conquer...wow, so many!
The adventure thing, like, I get it a tiny bit because it's such a broad genre. I think almost any game can fit in there, really, save sim games. If you play as a character, then it's adventure. But poor Lara. No love for the raider of tombs.
My wife and I talk a lot about kids today and the general lack of respect and such, but as a teacher, I can say that this is only half true. Kids are worse on average as far as respect goes, but it's not as bad as it seems because the good kids just blend into the background. I still have a ton of kids, probably 1/3 to 1/2 of the class, that are good-natured and respectful. It's just hard to notice the good kids when you're so furious at the bad ones--they tend to command your attention more than the good 'uns.
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Post by countlieberkuhn on Aug 8, 2014 16:55:53 GMT -8
My friend was pretty accepting of many games people previously had suggested as adventure game titles because of the broad nature, even though I personally see them as games like Tomb Raider, Zelda, and Shadow of the Colossus. But it's a more of a super-genre like action games, which you could file loads of games of various genres under.
There's plenty of good kids at the college, but unfortunately there's a bunch that are also there so they can avoid going into full-time employment, and have no actual inclination toward learning the subject. Plenty seem to be there under the misconception that doing IT is picking an easy subject, and then complain about having to learn programming as part of the course.
I don't mind kids struggling with a topic so long as they're trying, because then when they get something it's that much more rewarding for both student and teacher. The ones who ask you over so that you can do their work for them and clearly have no intention of even attempting to listen to help you give are ones that annoy me. Especially as several of them are intelligent enough to do it if they actually put their mind to it.
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Post by Bob on Aug 8, 2014 19:04:41 GMT -8
I'll learn pretty soon if my students are anything like that. I'll try my best to never write or dictate direct code to people. I had a TA that literally sat at my computer while on the ph.o0ne w 1ith041410. 0120.101
...whoikile on the phone with somebody else, not talking to me, typing my code for m ;le234100
...typing my code jfor me and giving me an A for the assignment. It was annoying and kinda degrading.
This message brought to you by me and my son. He's like a cat.
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Post by Fleck on Aug 8, 2014 21:58:37 GMT -8
Since I don't have a baby or a teaching job to brag about, I guess I'll brag by saying that I just did 180 pushups (in 6 sets of 30) as part of my workout tonight. I also did 60 situps, 60 one legged squats, 60 tricep dips, 120 forward lunges, 120 Russian twists (with a 15 pound weight), and 60 Turkish get-ups tonight (all in 6 sets of 10 or 20). Took me about 50 minutes total, with 2 minute rests between sets. Towards the end, my arms were shaking so bad I could barely hold myself up, but hey, I did it.
So I mean, that's pretty much all I've accomplished lately.
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Post by Bob on Aug 9, 2014 10:54:16 GMT -8
That's a lot. You must be total beefcake by now. And I'm going on probably a full year without even really stretching.
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Post by Fleck on Aug 9, 2014 12:01:07 GMT -8
Eh, my beefcake status is in dispute. After you can do 100 pushups or so, it stops being a strength exercise and turns into just an endurance test. So I haven't really gotten much bigger recently (most people don't even seem to notice that I've been working out at all), but I am a lot firmer. Seriously, you can break a baseball bat against my asscheeks. That's how solid they are.
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