Can you believe it?!?

I hardly can!
I BOUGHT A HOUSE !!!!
Wow, this is surreal. I've lived in apartments and rental homes for so long I can hardly believe I am actually paying for something that will be an investment as opposed to a waste of money. Moving commences tomorrow. Utilities are being switched over soon (the builder is leaving them on until they're put into my name). We closed today and I now have the keys in my possesion! I went and did some cleaning tonight in preparation for tomorrow.

More to come soon and pictures to ensue. :)

Holy Crap!

Closing is MONDAY the 19th !!!! I'm totally not prepared as far as packing goes. I have a lot of stuff packed, but I know what I'm going to be doing ALL weekend. =/ My last Final Exam is Friday so after I grade those and get those entered I'm going to pack, pack, PACK! Tuesday I have a U-Haul rented and will be trying to move furniture. If you're in the Atlanta area come help me! I'm really worried about not having enough manpower, as many of my friends are going of out town for the week as soon as classes are over. We'll see how it goes. Well,.. going to go pack more. Cya soon! :)

Collage of Mom Pictures. 

Today was difficult.

Today was especially difficult to get through without breaking down. December 1st was Mom's Birthday. I love you mom. I miss you. I did well today, as I kept busy for the most part. I was somewhat in a daze though, not thinking incredibly much about things. It wasn't until later at home that I lost it.

I got home and turned on the television after supper and was watching the movie "trekkies" - funny flick. James Doogan, "Mr. Scott" was talking about a fan writing him a letter that was really a suicide letter, and how he encouraged the lady to come see him at the upcoming convention,.. and at the next convention,.. and the next,... until 8 years later after he stopped seeing her, he got a letter saying she'd gotten her Master's in Electrical Engineering and she wanted to thank him for saving her life. Jimmy Doogan was crying at that point, and so was I, as silly as that may seem. Then I flipped over and watched the last half of the movie "Switch" with Ellen Barkin and Jimmy Smitts. I like that movie, always have,.. but at the end, Ellen (the new mom) dies after childbirth, and the final scene sets Jimmy Smitts and a young daughter placing flowers on her grave as the little girl proclaims, "I love you, mommy." As if I needed anything more to prompt me. =/

I miss you mom. I love you. You are now and always will be in my heart and in my thoughts. Damn, this is tough.

Thanksgiving Holiday & The Future

Thanksgiving break offered a welcomed relaxation. My Dad and Mom (Lynn) and Grandma (My Dad's mom) - I call her Dot Dot, all came up from Florida and visited for a few days. Then all of us went to Western Tennessee to see Aunt Kathleen & Uncle Andy's new log cabin home that they're building near the TN river. It was a nice trip. As you can see, we even found time to drive down to Shiloh battlegrounds and take some pictures at the McDowell monument.

So this year, what do I have to give thanks to?
First and foremost,.. I have to give thanks that I had many years of closeness with mother. She was an amazing woman and she will always continue to be in my thoughts and memories. Believe me, she is a portion of my conscience and when I need her, she is still in my mind, offering me advice and guiding me.

Next, I have to be thankful I have the rest of my family and friends, as they too guide me and shape me. Having my health is also a thing for which to be thankful. I know I'm not in the greatest shape in the world, but I am somewhat healthy with no major problems (not that I know of anyway).

What's on the horizon for me? A new house perhaps,.. as I signed a contract to buy the ranch style house you see on this page below. Closing is supposed to be December 19th. We shall see. There was a plumbing issue that now may or may not need to be resolved and they're adding a few items such as a tile backsplash in the kitchen, etc. I'll take interior pictures sometime soon and post them. Other than a house,.. what's on the horizon?

I'm teaching two new classes next semester; Play & Technology,.. and Public Speaking for Health Occupation Majors. I also am tossing around the idea of writing a textbook / companion guide,... as if I didn't have enough to do, right? We shall see. I guess it all depends on how addicted I stay to World of Warcraft or some other game. ;)

Mcdowell monument in shiloh

Tn river from the front porch of our rental cabin

Were in tennessee on the way to aunt kathys new place and encountered this 40 ft chicken - what the hell?!?

A New House - Part Duex,... and a Speech Contest too!

First, for the house info:
As you can see from the new picture below, I put in an offer on a totally different house. It only has a few (four) drawbacks as I see it (or things that conflict with items on my "dream-house" list), but I guess I can compromise on those or fix them. Here they are;

1) The subdivision is a lot tighter, meaning the lots are skinnier (but deeper) and therefore the houses are closer together. I've met one neighbor already and they seem really nice, plus this house is on a court (one house from the end of a cul-de-sac). That's great because cul-de-sacs tend to cut down on traffic and loud thumping music driving past your house all the time. If you know me you know I'll get into fights with assholes who drive past my house thumping bass. So far it seems that I'm cool with this subdivision. It has class. :)
Result: Not really a problem - if loud noise eventually becomes a problem, I'll complain to the neighborhood association and make them earn their $400 a year dues.

2) The house is on a slab instead of floor joists. This has always worried me as repair costs are higher for plumbing problems. I guess I'll deal with it. This also means it has no basement. This is disappointing seeing as now I won't have room for a pool table. But if I get to the point where I'm ready to buy one I can always build a bigass "storage building" out back to "store" my pool table. ;) The covenant says I can't build one over 20'x20'. Mine would be 25'x25' - Oops! Sorry, apparently I can't measure well.
Result: Not really a problem, but high added cost later - I am dealing with it.

3) There is no screened porch (I love screened porches). Maybe I'll figure out how to design and build one eventually. It will be tough considering the gable of the roof, but I know it can be done. There is no shelter under which I can put my grill. I'm going to keep my grill in the garage for now since it is CLOSE to impossible to drive my truck inside without turning in the side mirrors. No biggie, I park outside all the time as it is now anyway.
Result: A bit irked by small frikkin garages - not happy with this item entirely, but I'll deal with it.

4) The drainage on the lot seems "okay" - the only place that concerns me is in the backyard. But then again I have NOT yet seen this lot under a heavy rain. There is a slight hill that comes down toward the back patio prior to a small drainage trough taking it around the house to the front. It will be no problem for me to fix that given my civil engineering design years. :) But I think a simple solution would be to ditch-witch a trough to the front, lay in a pvc pipe, making sure it gravity feeds to the front ditch, and putting in a grated box in the back close to the patio, to take off excess standing water.
Result: fixable IF it is actually a problem - I guess I'll find out when it rains hard - and from the sound of it the builder would probably even ditch-witch it for me and give me the pvc

Secondly, the Speech Contest:
I started an annual speech competition last year. This year I had 2 former department chairs and the President of the University as judges. Each Public Speaking instructor (8 of us) had one student and his/her persuasion speech entered into the contest.

I raised the money and hosted it. $400 for 1st place, $300 for 2nd, $200 for 3rd, and $50 for each other place,.. plaques for each person, and certificates for each contestant ... not bad, eh? I think I did fairly well. :) Also, the contest speeches were recorded and McGraw-Hill publishers will transfer it to a DVD for me, which we will sell with next year's textbooks at cost + $1. These will make great sample speeches for our students. Those $1's will add up and be put into a fund for our department for eventually building a new speech lab. Groovy eh? :) It is even more groovy that MY student won 2nd place! Yay me! :)

New home? Just put in an offer. Sure, it's a slab instead,.. sure, it's in a tighter subdivision,.. but hey, it's a cute house with a decent backyard and plenty of room inside. :) 

Incompetence, Apathy, or at least a Lack of Pride

I really hate it when people are incompetent then don't admit it. The builder I was working with knew from the VERY FIRST day I'd walked into that house that the floor was a major issue. If it had been built right in the first place things wouldn't have been an issue. If the builder had admitted the flaw and properly corrected it this wouldn't have been an issue. Now, due to pure stupidity or stubborness on the part of the builder (I'm not quite sure which), I am not going to buy the house that I loved so much. Thanks a lot for ruining that, you dillweed. Let me give you a quick time travel recap.....

Day ONE of finding the house: I noted the floor and pointed it out.
Day TWO: signed a contract and made sure to note the floor as a MAJOR item.
Week One: nothing at all was done to the house.
Week Two: not much at all was done (maybe 5 hours work for 1 man total)
Week Three: Carpet was laid down on top of the UNFIXED floor !!!!!!!!! (What the fuck was this idiot thinking?) Isn't it a bit insulting he did that, as if trying to cover it up so I wouldn't notice?!? "Oh yeah, they did some bracing to fix it." I was told ... lies,... no change in the deflection of the floor whatsoever. Because of the builder I had to postpone closing. I tell them to fix the floor again.
Week Four: Honestly, a lot of items got addressed here,.. guess what,... still the floor is not fixed. I tell them again to fix the floor.
Week Five: Due to unfinished items had to postpone closing again. Home inspectors finally came. That's $300 out of my pocket. A lot of items fixed again,... still the floor is not fixed. Inspectors recommend having a structural engineer analyze the floor, joists, and foundation wall.
Week Six: Closing postponed indefinitely due to builder not taking care of things he ought to have in the first place - the floor (big surprise?). I spoke with 10 structural engineers and showed them pictures and described the deflections / beam layout / joisting. 5 told me I should walk away from it considering this house is only 1 year old and brand new. The other 5 told me they charge $500 minimum for "a letter of recommendations" and they'd suggest making sketches for $1,000 - $1,500 since the builder has not fixed this item to date. They said "since his contractors probably have no more than an 8th grade education (looking at the way this joisting was done) it is obvious they need sketches to follow." Notice that is in quotation marks? That's for a reason - two engineers told me almost the exact same thing.
Week Seven: The builder calls me and tells me he found an engineer for $500 and suggests we go with him since he can come out right away and he's cheap. I tell them great, hire him, pay for it, go for it. Builder says he won't pay for it.

Okay, let's take a moment here. WHAT THE FUCK?!?!? This moron says he won't PAY for it when I don't even own the house yet? HELLO? Isn't this supposed to be a NEW house?!? You know,.. one that is completely safe and structurally sound, with all the major items from the initial contract already addressed and FIXED ?!?!? BEFORE the buyer ever does a walk through?

Look, asshole.... learn to do the type of work that you can take pride in. Sure the house looks really nice, and I'd have loved to move into it, but YOU broke this deal when you didn't meet the contract by fixing the major items listed on it. A new home should be built to where it is structurally sound and a buyer should NOT,... absolutely NOT have to worry about a beam popping up in the kitchen floor in front of the dishwasher,... or the floor deflecting half an inch down along a wall in the living room where a tv or a couch is going to be. This is especially true in a house that is less than ONE YEAR OLD !!! Get a fucking clue. Grow up. Take responsibility for your work and fixed the God Damned Floor like you should have in WEEK ONE, instead of covering it up and feeding me bullshit every week about how you did something to better it when you obviously didn't!

Yes, I already packed a lot of my stuff in order to move. Yes, my landlady found someone to rent my current apartment on December 1st. Yes, I wanted to move into that new house, but ya know what? I gave him PLENTY of chances and time to fix it and make it right. Ever played baseball? He had more than 3 strikes on that floor issue, and he still fucked it up by being a dorkstick.

So yes, I'm out a lot of time and effort and money due to him. Home inspectors, tons of gasoline driving out there and back every other day, and two frikkin months that I feel are wasted due to his incompetence. Not to mention the wonderful Dana (my Realtor), who drove back and forth out there trying to resolve issues, and the mortgage people who dealt with this case.... what a shame that he wasted their time too.

Some time ago...

Remember when I told you Elvis et al. came to visit? Well,... I forgot these pictures were on my cell phone. And now that I figured out how to send them directly to my blog from my phone, I'll send them over. :)
Enjoy,.. and Elvis,.. sorry in advance palso that you're in them. I know how you hate that. But hey, I have you in them so I can remember you - AS IF I could forget your wacky self, eh? =p ;)

Look! He's peeing in the middle of the road!
Nobody ever drives backwards anymore.
It's a test!
Black Capped Chickadee day? Why yes, it IS on the calendar.
Of course we can go on a field trip. All we need is keys to a state vehicle.
Chris,... I thought you were my friend.
Dude, you could be a better host than this you know.
Bubba, give me my damn briefcase.
Freddy Wisham - OB-Gyn
Butch would do it for a case of beer.
You did SO fart on the wall.
It's only a shark wound to the head.
Umm... basket #2.
Why the hell would you raise 60,000,000 artisans, Troy?!?
Antidisestablishmentarianism.
Yessir,.. 365 Miami.
Hair Helmet!
Hey Larry, Let me drive your car.
Can I hold your pen? No, I won't break it.
Boone's Farm.
Soft Batch!
What? Cisco and 7? Isn't that the same as a hurricane?
90 shrimp for the bar please.
signed,..... James Douglas Morrisson

The wall above is about where you see the text - 3' 6" to this side of the existing laminated beam, parallel with it. In the distance on the right you can even see the hairline fracture in the front foundation wall if you look closely (it is at a 45 degree angle almost, indicating the load has stressed to that one side. The wall above the text is the divider wall between the living room and the kitchen where a stove rests, and an entertainment center will be. This house is one year old and I'm trying to buy it, but I want to be sure the framing / foundation is strong and will last. Thanks! 

The Wall above is parallel with this beam, 3' 6" to the right of it. 

New House?!? Not home quite yet......

Those wacky builders... they're giving me headaches. What's going on with the house, you say? Here's what's going down:

• 1st Major Item: When we first looked at the house I noticed that the living room floor was sunken in a little bit. I asked the builder to do some bracing to resolve that problem, but today the home inspector came and together we figured out why their new "bracing" didn't work. The morons who built the thing put the load-bearing wall 3 feet too far to the right of the laminated beam that's meant to support it. And that's why the front foundation wall now has a hairline fracture in it, due to the sheer pressure of it sitting there for one year not correctly supported. Now they're going to have to hire a 3rd party structural engineer at THEIR cost to analyze the situation and determine a proper way to fix it. 'Cause I certainly won't buy a damn house that's going to crumble the foundation due to code violations as major as that. They're going to have to add either another laminated beam (which would mean taking out a french door and making it a single door - GRRRRRR!!!!) or they're going to have to add some support beams, in effect reducing the size of the large downstairs room I was hoping to put a pool table in. (another GRRRRRRRR!!!!!!) They're going to have to PROVE to me that it's fixed before I'll EVER pick up a pen. You'd think people would do their jobs right in the first place so they'd save money in the long run.>.<

• 2nd Major Item: They used sheetrock instead of greenboard around the showers and tubs in the bathrooms. Hello!?!? How stupid do you have to be to do that as a contractor?!? In the upstairs bathroom there's not only sheetrock around a regular height tub that has a showerhead above it, but there's not even a shower stall or tile or anything protecting the sheetrock! What the hell is wrong with people that they'd do such a shitty job?!? Don't people take pride in their work any more?!? Grrr! >.<

There are quite a few other 'major' and 'minor' concerns, including a few safety issues as well. If this builder doesn't fix EVERYTHING on the inspector's list and quite a few things on my 'cosmetic' list, like proper caulking and painting,... guess what. They can kiss my ass and keep the fucking house. I'd be willing to bet they'd rather fix the items than sit on another year of financing. But who knows if they will. If I don't end up buying it, I sure hope that whoever comes along after me hires an inspector.

IF and ONLY IF they fix all the items, and fix them properly and DAMN WELL, will I buy the house. Below you can see some pictures of the exterior. I took them today. It was a beautiful day for it.

Looking almost due North. Apparently she comes with the house. 

Rear Eleavation Looking NE 

Rear Elevation 

Looking at back corner of house so you can see the backyard 

North to South photo 

Front Porch View toward East / SE 

Front Porch View toward SouthEast 

Front Elevation 

Garden Spot at SeaWorld Florida :) This summer we took a trip down to SeaWorld. It was a ton of fun. We got soaked by Shamoo, got to pet Dolphins, went over to the west coast of Florida to do some antique shopping, etc. Wow, we had some terrific seafood too! Ha! Pet them then eat them,.. ahh what a way of life. (No, we didn't have dolphin! =P but Shrimp,.. mmm... yummy shrimp were NOT spared!)

A new home

A new home is on the horizon. I've been cruising subdivisions for months looking at features I liked and disliked. Then one day I decided, "Well,... its about time to find a realtor." I found one on a Friday. Saturday I looked at homes all day long with her. Sunday I signed a contact on one. Closing is the 31st of October. I guess I should start packing, eh? hehe!

All the necessary functional rooms are on the main floor. There is also a "bonus room" upstairs with a full bath, and a full unfinished basement. It is at the top of a hill with an incredible view. It is on a cul-de-sac too! :) I'll post up pictures of it soon. It was raining today or I'd have taken some.

EDIT: Closing was delayed until the 4th, and now will be delayed indefinitely until they address ALL the items on the home inspector's list. See post above pictures for details.

Enter October

The end of September came but not without sadness.

My mother died.
Fuck you Cancer.
Fuck you Chemotherapy.
I love you mom - always will.

Carol Lynn Marchbanks
(formerly Pasterniak, McDowell, and Weidner)
At 58 years of age she passed from our physical presence on Monday, September 12, 2005 at 11 a.m. in Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital.

She was born in Cleveland, Ohio, had lived a long time in Miami, Florida, and in Cordele, Albany, & Leesburg, Georgia. The Rev. Bobby Moye officiated the ceremony. She graduated from North Miami High School. She had an Associate's degree in Journalism from Dade Junior College.

She worked years in Advertising & Marketing, becoming a partner in an advertising firm. She was President of the Lee County Chamber of Commerce for ten years. She also worked for the Georgia Department of Investigative Services. She was a longtime member of St. Theresa's Catholic Church in Cordele, Georgia, where she had many friends.

She was one amazing woman. She was a Super-Mom. She worked HARD to support my brother and me when we were kids. She also taught us SO incredibly much about life and love and poetry, how to cook family recipes, how to laugh and be laughed at, how to get our points across and not burn bridges, how to be kind and compassionate, how to appreciate music & communication, and taught us a ton of values one couldn't begin to list. She was the kind of mom many kids dream of having. She was awesome. And very importantly, she will not be forgotten.

At her memorial service my brother and I did our respective duties. My brother is a music teacher. He played Amazing Grace on the Uillean pipes (similar to bagpipes) at her service, then I said a few words about mom then recited one of her poems about Ogden the Turtle and his trials in life.

Ogden's Demise
by Carol L. Marchbanks

There once was a turtle named Ogden
Who was left all alone and forgotten.
On the side of the road
He lay in the cold
Feeling unloved and lonely and rotten.

Then it came to his mind in a flash
He'd resemble a gray bag of trash!
Surely, someone would care...
Pick him up, if they dare.
A worthwhile deception, 'tho brash.

He thought....

They'd discover he really was nice.
Turtle soup or a steak wouldn't suffice
'Cause the love of a friend's
Better than a sad end
And a friend..... they would love him for life!

Sure enough....

A kinf lady drove past him that night
And so saddened by poor Ogden's plight
She'd risk life and limb
Rescuing him
And attempt to set everything right.

But alas, she arrived much too late.
Poor Ogden had gone to his fate.
He died in a heap
On the side of the street,
Never meeting or knowing a mate.

We'll remember poor Ogden so well
And his story, so often, we'll tell.
We'll all shed a tear
Whenever we hear
Of the turtle whose life was such hell.

There is an additional stanza I'll add to this post soon that she wrote 3/4 down in the poem. She added it I'm sure as a result of meeting Larry, her last husband. He's one hell of a guy and treated her well. Thank you Larry, for being such an amazing guy.

Fall Semester 2005 - A Few Surprises

Hmm.. it has been a while since my last post. To catch you up-to-date,

Elvis et al. came to visit and we had a grand time! Thanks to "Dude" for having all the gaming group hang out at his house for one awesome night of friendship reminiscing. Thanks to Keith of course for running an impromptu session that unbelievably got us all doing something. Thanks to Mama Parr for hosting one heck of a gathering for us so we could visit. Thanks to the Cali-Parrs for making the traverse and thus prompting all us nutjobs to get together! :) It was spectacular!

Nattsu quit her job at the Registrar's office and is now working at Honda Precision as sortof an executive assistant. She likes it so far even though she's putting in some long hours since they're opening a new facility.

Surprise! The Fall semester started for me and my new class "Play & Technology" got pushed to the Spring. That's okay with me though, as it just gives me more time to work on the content and arrangement. I also spent some time speaking with other departments. It seems I can override the cap for my class and add some engineering folks, some education folks, whomever I wish, and they can count it as an elective - without me going through OODLES of red tape. YAY!

With this gaming thing in mind (isn't it always with me?), I thought this was appropriate to mention. Some of you know I got my Master's in Communication at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign almost two years ago. I focused in "Mediated Entertainment Communication." Christian Sandvig was already there and as I was leaving, Dmitri Williams got hired, whom I suspect are some of the culprits behind this research study - especially Dmitri, that wascally wabbit, but I could be wrong. Check this out: It is a WoW Gaming Study. Also speaking of gaming, that hunter you heard about I had created on Icecrown - is now 45. Go me! ;)

Yet another surprise - The first day of school I was teaching 4 classes. Then a colleague of mine logged into his class to find that instead of the normal cap of 26 students, he had over 50 in one class. Yikes! So, being the crazy guy I am, I spoke up. Now I teach five classes. Oh well, at least I'll get the five out of the way and only have to teach 4 in the Spring. :)

One more surprise - Last year I created and hosted the First Annual Chester Gibson Public Speaking Contest. This year is obviously the 2nd Annual Gibson Public Speaking Contest and Dr. Gibson really came through. He and his wife Faye have donated $1,000 + the cost of plaques for contestants, so that our winners can earn some cold hard cash! That's AWEsome! Last year students were ecstatic that they could win $300 for 1st, $200 for 2nd, and $100 for 3rd place. Imagine how they're going to freak out this year. :) Thanks Gibsons!

Since school has started back I haven't had time to relax too much. I've been filling my free time with scholarly endeavors for the most part - I guess that's a good thing. But I'm itching to play some more MTG soon. I've GOT to. I NEED to. So maybe soon Chang and the Gang will hang out with me and we can throw down some cards. The only thing I've had time to do a little bit of is WoW and you know where I stand on that one now. But I'm also looking forward to a few new things so I can diversify the games we analyze in the Spring class. I signed up for - and who knows if I'll get into - Pirates of the Burning Sea. And I recently pre-ordered City of Villians, the companion (although NOT an expansion) to City of Heroes. It looks like some fun times are on the horizon!

Summer Halfway Over

Summer is nearly gone... and all is well. Most of my students are kicking butt and doing great jobs. Mom and Larry came up to visit one weekend and we had a good time with them. :) We took them over to Oxford to go "antiquing" and had fun spending time with them. Elvis is coming to Albany next weekend with his wife and baby. We're REALLY looking forward to going down to see them! I miss Elvis somethin' awful.

That reminds me,... I'm no longer playing Bullox to the extent I used to. Once I got the warrior to 60 it seemed like all that was left was raiding and pvp. Well for raiding he kicked butt, but for pvp he absolutely sucked. Warriors to me anyway, are not fun in pvp. We charge in, AE fear, kill 1 person (maybe 2) then die. I watched Kotori in AV BG at level 54 and she kicks ass. She can DoT like mad, kick back, get mana, and do it over again and only die every now and then. On top of that she can heal people that are hurt. It seems like contributes FAR more to pvp than a Warrior ever could.

For that reason I made a new character. But then because I miss my friends so much (eg Elvis as mentioned above) I figured, "wait a minute! Why make new characters on this server when I can make one on Elvis' server and torture him daily?!?" So voila! My new character is a hunter on Icecrown. Sure sure, I still have Bullox the 60 tank, Andirak the 39 warlock, and others on Proudmoore, and sure I still have Itzded on skywall, but my favorite so far is Swiftangel the 30 Hunter Night Elf on Icecrown. I'll have to get a pic of her up here soon. Yes, I said "her." No, that does NOT mean I'm gay. Just ask my wife and she can verify I'm not. =Þ I just thought she looked cooler than a Night Elf male. You've gotta like the way your character looks or they're no fun to play.

This reminds me, speaking of playing,... a lot of articles of late, and a lot of the talk in-game lately is about Chinese Farmers. No, I am not talking about the Asian Carrott-Grower's Association. By "farming" I mean the continual gathering of in-game resources. It has become a large problem recently. There are a lot of people in China being paid to 'farm' items and cash in these games like WoW and EQ, etc., and then the items and cash are sold via Internet sites for cash - U.S.A. cash.

What's wrong with this? Game-makers believe this to be illegal because in their EULA (Electronic User's License Agreement) that each player has to acknowlege and agree to in order to play the games, it states that in-game property may not be sold for real world profit. EverQuest (EQ by Sony Online Entertainment) finally gave up on this and is allowing it. But several other games like World of Warcraft are up in arms against this idea, stating that it ruins game economy.

I think it partly ruins the game for honest (Notice my terminology there? Isn't that interesting?) players due to the fact that it makes it harder to gather those resources. For example,... my warrior is a miner. One very common way that chinese farmers make cash is to mine all the Thorium ore (and the gems that come out of thorium veins) in the world then sell it for cash. The gems in Thorium veins are very rare and EVERYbody wants them because they're used in a plethora of tradeskills and quests. The only way to get them is either by 1) mining thorium (OOPS! All the Thorium is gone due to Chinese farmers that comb areas all day long looking for the veins and snatching them as soon as they pop-up!) or 2) Buy them from the monopoly the farmers have on the market for unreasonable prices.

I say unreasonable because I think it is true. Let me give you an example. My warrior mines but he is also a Blacksmith, able to make swords. He has some smithing plans to make a very nice sword, one that he could use, but he can't make it because I don't think he'd EVER find enough gems to be able to make one for himself, much less make them for other people who want one. Why? The sword requires 8 of one gem that costs around 14 gold each and 15 of another gem that costs an average of 34 gold each. Other items are also needed, and to buy everything off the auction house would run around 850 gold. That's 850 dollars for a sword that shouldn't cost more than ZERO dollars IF I had a chance at mining the gems I needed. Farmers are ruining the game for me. I became a Master Swordsmith so I could make great weapons for people. Now I can't afford to make them. Therefore, I will never do Blacksmithing again, and therefore I feel that between this problem and the pvp inadequacy (remember my pvp discussion above?) render my Warrior useless. Bye Bye Level 60 Warrior. Thanks a lot Blizzard for not figuring out a way around those problems. =Þ

Yay for my Hunter !!! Alchemy and Herbalism here I come! Okay, now that that is off my chest, I need a rum & coke.

Anyway, wouldn't it be interesting to research this "Chinese Farmer" phenomenon? I find it pretty fascinating despite my ill will toward their success. I often go out of my way to ruin business for them in-game. I'll see some idiot spamming a sale in the auction channel. I figure either he/she is 12, is a complete moron, or is a farmer trying to make desparate cash since they have daily quotas to meet or they're fired. I will send them /tells (direct one-on-one messages) asking for them to mail me the item C.O.D. - C.O.D. items remain in your mailbox 30 days before returning to the sender if the receiving end doesn't pay for them. Then I just let the items sit there. Another way I do it is that once I find out a farmer's name, I write it down, then I go bid on the items they have for sale in the auction house. I know that they have separate accounts allowing them to outbid people and jack up their prices, so I only bid once or twice on their items, let them outbid me, then I leave. I hope they have to buy their own items and pay the costs to post the items again! HA!

This makes me wonder if other people do the same things. I wonder if other people hate them ruining our economy and tradeskills system as much as I do. I wonder if people hate those who violate the rules and thusly make the game less fun for others like I do. I wonder a lot..... then I end up at a conclusion sometimes ... sometimes.

Onyxia Copied and Pasted - THANKS Guys! :)

Phase 1

Special Attacks:
Fire Breath: Cone shaped fire AE that hits everything in front of her for 3000-4000 damage. Solution: Always keep her pointed north, away from the groups on the sides.
Knock back: AE knock back that throws you really far, likely well into the eggs if your back is to them. Solution: Correctly position yourselves at her sides as far away as possible while still being in melee range, keep your back away from the eggs.
Tail Whip: AE 2-3 second stun that hits everyone behind her and does 200-300 damage. Solution: Never stand behind an angry dragon.
Positioning:
Odd numbered groups run to the NW corner:
West side/odd number group positions:W = Whelp GroupR+C = Ranged and CastersM = MeleeMT = Main Tank
Even numbered groups run to the NE corner:
East side/even number group positions:W = Whelp GroupR+C = Ranged and CastersM = MeleeMT = Main Tank
Big screen shot: overall positioning.
The south is a death zone.
Plan:
MT rushes in a good 20-30 feet ahead of everyone to make sure he gets initial agro. No one is to attack Onyxia until the MT is in position and has been in position building agro for at least 60 seconds.
Whelps that are still spawned from the last wipe are pulled off the MT with light AE damage (ie: Consecration) and dealt with quickly. There are usually only a few whelps on each side so this is never a big deal.
Groups 7 and 8 deal with whelps on their sides in the marked area. These 2 groups should be doing nothing but whelp duty throughout all phases. During phase 1 whelps will spawn at ~30 second intervals and come ~10 at a time. One group on each side can handle them without any problem. If someone is poorly positioned and gets knocked into the eggs, they are about to train 20-30 whelps on their side. Groups on that side can stop attacking Onyxia and kill the large wave of whelps, but the run is likely over since dealing with a whelp zergrush damages our long term survivability significantly.
MT slowly moves into position at the north center of the lair. The MT's exact position is very important due to the knock back. He needs to be 10-15' away from the north wall. When positioned correctly the knock back should bounce the MT against the north wall and have him land very close to his original position.
Onyxia should always be facing north.
Once the MT has built 60+ seconds of agro, everyone can attack. Mind your DPS, hunters FD as often as you can, rogues feint when it's up, mages don't over nuke, and so on. If the MT loses agro, she will turn to one of the sides and kill everyone with a Fire Breath.
At 80% life everyone but the MT stops attacking for 30 seconds for agro management. A heal rotation can keep the MT alive forever during this phase so there is no rush to kill the dragon.
Keep attacking slow and steady until 70% life when we take another 30 second break.
Drink a fire absorption potion during the break.
At 65% she will walk from the north to the south and take flight. Phase 2 begins.
Ramblings:
Agro management and MT positioning are the most important parts of this phase. This phase is remarkably easy compared to the next two due to its straightforward "MT tank with a heal rotation, everyone else kill slow and steady" strategy. There should be 0 deaths and no whelps alive when phase 2 starts. There shouldn't be any need to drink any potions (except the fire prot.) or use anything with a noticeable cool down during this.

Phase 2
Special Attacks:
Engulfing Flames: She spits fire at random people. When the fire hits you, you're on engulfed running around confused and will take around 1500-2000 damage over 5 seconds. Even worse, it will spread to anyone near you. And, of course, it is not dispelable by anyone. Solution: Do not cluster together. Stay a good 5-10' away from the person closest to you.
Deep Breath: She will emote "Onyxia begins to take a deep breath" and CQOnyxia will warn you a deep breath is coming in <5 d =" The"> = Fiery death.Solutions: If you aren't bunched together and spread nicely apart, deep breath likely won't ever even happen. She will only do deep breath when everyone is bunched together and she will intelligently target the largest bunch of people. However, you need to be prepared if it's coming, run to the wall, as far as you can go against the wall, away from where the breath is going to go. We have people on Ventrilo giving position updates constantly so we always are ready to move out of the way if a deep breath is coming.Currently the entrances to the eggs are safe from deep breath attacks no matter where she is. This is changing in the very near future according to patch notes.
Positioning:
West side positions:X = Players
East side positions:X = Players
As you can see, everyone is well spaced apart so when someone is on fire it shouldn't spread to anyone else. Also note you are pretty much where you were during phase 1.
Onyxia will be flying around in the lair so people doing ranged damage need to be keeping in range. Your healers know you are going to be moving around and will stick with you, but try to stay as close to your side as possible. It's okay to do ranged damage from most of the lair as long as you aren't clustered together and get to the wall immediately if she is going to deep breath.
Plan:
Right as she goes into the air the first wave of whelps is like 15-20 so everyone needs to help with whelps immediately. After the first wave is dead groups 7 and 8 are still solely focused on keeping them under control. If they get out of control everyone needs to help deal with them and go right back to attacking Onyxia once they're dead.
Everyone moves into position and spreads out. Warriors are now taunting whelps off of casters since they are worthless at ranged. Paladins are AEing whelps and healing. Groups 7/8 are ignoring Onyxia, everyone else is doing ranged damage to her.
Healers need to be watching for people burning (especially Priests). Use first aid.
Ranged damage is the most important thing. The goal is to get her back on the ground as quickly as possible. Do every DoT, curse, damage spell you have. Zap wands. Currently melee people can still use their special abilities when she is in the air if they are positioned directly under her. This will be changing in the next patch. Remember this phase is long and you will need to recast curses and DoTs as they wear off.
At around 45% the MT starts building rage on whelps to pull Onyxia back onto him when she lands. At this point ranged DPS should be unloading, the whelps should be under control, and the MT should have rage.
40% she is going to land any second (we've seen her land as late as 35% but it's almost always at 39-40%), MT moves under Onyxia ready to get agro and everyone stops attacking the second she is on the ground. Phase 3 begins.
Seconds before she lands we move away from the egg entrances to avoid being feared into them.
Ramblings:
The whole key to this phase is positioning. If you are spread out enough Onyxia will only hit a couple people at a time with Engulfing Flames and she will likely never take a deep breath. Even on our best executions of phase 2 she has taken a deep breath. This isn't a big deal at all as long as everyone is ready to react and knows exactly where to go. A hunter is designated on Ventrilo to give us updates on Onyxia's position. The only hard part about this phase is the last 5% of life right before she is coming back to the ground. Then the transition into phase 3 is the hardest part of the entire encounter.

Phase 3
Special Attacks:
Everything from Phase 1.
The cracks in the floor shoot lava every 20-30 seconds fearing everyone near the crack which usually sends them running through other lava cracks for a good 1500 damage. The fear isn't dispelable and fear ward doesn't work. Solution: Stay off and away from the cracks. Hug the wall. When you get feared, immediately get back into position. Mithril Insignia works for anti-fear but switching stances to break fear is dubious at best for the MT.If you are moving forward and backwards rapidly while meleeing you will not run around when you're feared, you'll stand in one place feared. Anyone who can should be rapidly moving forward/backward to avoid being feared through lava.
Positioning:
R = Ranged/CastersM = Melee
The positioning is the same as phase 1 but much tighter due to the exploding lava cracks. Remember, it's now okay to bunch together again so cluster up and stay off the cracks. Melee stay as far away as you can off the cracks. Ranged people hug the wall away from the cracks.
Be careful not to get too far in front of her along the wall. The MT will slowly be moving her north, don't go too far north and get hit by the fire breath. Keep your back away from the eggs incase you are knocked back.
Whelp groups get a break because there are very few whelp spawns as long as no one gets knocked into the eggs. They need to be positioned further away from the eggs so they aren't feared into them. Near the leftmost/rightmost R spots on the above map.
"Plan":
Big dragon lands, MT is waiting under her with rage, slaps her in the face, and questions her mother's sexual orientation. Nobody else is attacking and the MT has agro.
MT moves to the phase 1 position but mindful of cracks in the floor now.
It's likely that the MT will get feared and lose agro before he's in position. Assuming the MT has enough agro she will chase him around while he's feared. If she doesn't, #2 on her agro list is promised a swift death. If she fire breaths a bunched up side while the MT doesn't have agro the run is over.
The MT is going to lose agro more than once because he gets feared, teleported, knocked around, and downright violated by her special attacks. Stop attacking, get ready to move to avoid fire breaths/eggs, and move back into position for attacks when she is back on the MT pointed north.
Beyond the floor exploding with lava, being feared into the lava, the MT losing agro or changing positioning often, and everyone being very low on survivability, this is exactly like phase 1. Mind your DPS and position. Deal with the whelps. Let the MT tank and keep him alive at all costs. If the MT dies even at 5% the raid is over.
Anything that can do damage should be focused on balancing DPS and surviving. Anyone that can heal should be healing the MT. If your priests say the MT is under control backup healers should be keeping DPS alive.
At around 5% her damage output will go up noticeably (by 25-30% I'd guess) and pretty much everyone in the raid who can heal should be spamming their fastest ones on the MT. Like I said, if the MT dies at any point the run is almost certainly over.
Don't die.
Reduce the dragon's life to 0% calmly and steadily. Keep things under control.
Ramblings:
Total chaos. Stick to the plan, stay calm, and be at the top of your game. Your MT has a lot of learning to do during this phase. He needs to be ready to deal with fears, agro, positioning, knock back, teleports, everything. The MT makes or breaks this phase.
The most important thing everyone on the raid has to know is not to get overconfident when she is really, really low on HP. We had a run where we had her down to 5% and had the people alive to kill her, but in a blink of an eye here's what happened: 2 extremely experienced people got knocked into the eggs (it happens, this phase is very chaotic), 30 whelps come out and start one shotting ranged DPS dealers along their side, heals from that side are focused on the whelp killers instead of the MT, the MT dies due to lack of healing, Onyxia and her 30 whelp minions go on a killing spree and we wipe at 1% hp. The entire breakdown happened extremely quickly as you can watch in the video below.

Specific Techniques that work and don't work:

Heal rotations. Obvious big one. Only really effective during phase 1 in my opinion. We usually have 3 priests in rotation healing to 25-35% mana before swapping out. The MT should be able to literally solo Onyxia down to 60% if he wants to since we can keep him alive forever via rotation. During phase 2 people really aren't taking that much damage. Engulfed people are easily healed with first aid 80% of the time. The other times not much more than a flash heal or, very rarely, PW:S is needed. I, as a priest, usually end phase 2 with nearly full mana. We've got into heal rotations for brief periods during phase 3 but with the fears and the amount of damage the MT is taking (especially when she gets really low on HP) it would be impossible to not keep him alive without everyone healing as fast as they can.
Offtanking. Never really did it. If our MT died the run was over for us. A few times a second warrior successfully obtained agro but he never would last very long. We preferred simply never letting our awesome MT die.
Carefully popping eggs for a more controlled whelp killing. Tried it. Didn't work. They respawn too fast and your whelp teams should be able to deal with the waves as long as no one is knocked into the eggs.
Turning Onyxia south during phase 1 if/when the tank gets knocked far to one side. Tried it in our very very first runs with little success. Once your MT knows how to position himself so the knock back isn't a big deal, Onyxia should never ever face anywhere but north during phase 1 and the majority of phase 3.
Hunter AE frost slowing traps at whelp entrances. I would remind the hunters to lay a trap if they could at the very start of phase 3. One hunter accomplished this once. They simply get into combat too quickly after FD to lay a trap. I guess it would be worthwhile if hunters could consistently get traps down at key moments.
Battle resses! Obviously. Druids would battle res priests usually towards the end of phase 2. Priests would come alive and immediately res someone useful near them before they are put into combat. Sometimes they got someone ressed, sometimes they died instantly upon being battle ressed, sometimes they were put into combat immediately and never got a chance to res. Also, the more you wipe for a night the less effective this gets due to res timers on Druid resses (being patched though).
Double soulstones. Ideally everyone would begin phase 1 with around 7-10 minutes left on their soulstone. That way if they died during phase 2 or phase 3 they could reincarnate and get another stone a few minutes later thanks to cool down. Honestly, we never really used this to it's full potential. And I never even used my first soulstone on the run where we killed her. Reality is, if you do the phases correctly you shouldn't have your raid relying on battle resses or soulstones in the slightest. These people shouldn't be dying in the first place (but it happens).
Blasted Lands Quests. Get your MT +50 STA things from Blasted. Healing a MT with 7500 hp is pretty damn easy.
Cozy fire is essential at all times in all positions. Fire! Her one weakness! We should have known!
Your chances of success go up exponentially with every ninja and/or pirate at the run. Also, when your MT dies the only way to beat her is by having a paladin pirate start tanking and furiously smash his win button while dancing.
The Warders dropped 1 blue the entire time. It was a nice mace. We killed around 150 Warders.

Videos/Screen shots:

Onyxia Kill from JOINKTHEWIZARDLVL700 (best video) 3-17-05Onyxia kill from Kilranin the Paladin 3-17-05 he gets ported under the world at the endWipe at 1% from Kilranin 3-17-05Wipe at 28% from Joink the Mage and Varlock the Priest 3-16-05Arkaine tanking Onyxia while turned into a pirate dancing
The kill raid groupThe body shotThe loot (grats to Licid, Rapportus, and Gilliam) A rather awkward encounterSo easy to heal the MTAnother dead shotDance party in IF afterwards + video

Credits

Information was compiled with the help of , , , on Kel'Thuzad Alliance over 4 nights of raiding. We all rushed into our first run with only the plan of "Odds go NW, evens go NE, let's see what happens" and over the next 4 days we compiled the above strategy that works using only knowledge we gained after each of our 45+ attempts.There are so many more players who put serious amounts of time into our Onyxia journey that weren't present for the kill. We couldn't have done it without everyone who participated, even you lame east coast people who claim to have jobs.This guide was made by Hocken of Contact(specific questions will likely not be answered, please use the forums for that)The 1% wipe and the kill were supervised by several GMs and every strategy here has been verified legitimate.
"... the biggest challenge the fight poses is that individual player performance is tremendously important. In many other 40-man fights, if you have five idiots, those five idiots will die and the other 35 can finish the job. With Onyxia, any one player can pretty much sabotage the entire raid, rather than simply getting himself or herself killed. I'd say the key to our success was trying to get as many of the same people for each attempt, of which there were many. We've been wiping to the bitch all the past week, pretty much, including one heartbreaking wipe at 3%. But by bringing back as many of the same people as possible, we benefited from our experience in all those wipes instead of having new people coming in and making the mistakes we'd all learned not to make four wipes prior.
The fight is more about executing on an individual level than any grand master plan. To put it in simplest terms, stage 1 is all about agro management, stage 2 is all about positioning, and stage 3 is just chaotic as all hell.
It's just a matter of getting a group of people together and staying motivated through the required wipes needed to learn the encounter."-- Gurgthock Mal'Ganis

IT'S JUST A DRAGON.

Summer Students

Wow! I have some terrific students this term! They're mature, willing to do their work, and like to have fun. I have a good attitude about my students this semester. It is really encouraging to see people coming to class who just look like they want to learn.

This summer session meets only 15 times, for 2.5 hours each class. That means we have to give a speech every other week to get the four required speeches in. I told them this and they didn't complain a bit. They expected it. I can't tell you how happy that makes me. :) I'm looking forward to our activity days. I think they're going to be a riot and come up with some inventive ideas.

I think one reason they're not complaining about the work is that a great many of them are older or "non-traditional" students. I remember when I went back to college. I was older, more serious, and focused on learning. I'm really glad to see people doing this - going back to college in the summer if they teach the rest of the year, going back at the same time as holding a job, and for what; so they can advance themselves. This is admirable. Of course not all of my students this term are "non-traditional" but they definitely set the mood for the younger students since they are the majority. Thanks!

There are only a few I worry about so far, and those are the students that skipped 1 or 2 classes already to go to a music festival. Of course I can't blame them because I know how it is when you love music, but I still think it was a bit dumb to skip the first two days of class when there are only 15 class days. I'm really afraid those students are going to get behind and not be able to catch up. We'll see though. I hope they're ready to bust their butts with hard work in order to catch up when they return. ;)

Long Lost Friend!

My good friend Allwyn just called me and I was SO happy to hear from him! I've been thinking about Allwyn and have been trying to find his number or e-mail addy among the myriad of papers stuffed into boxes from the move. The only thing we didn't sort out was the boxes filled with papers (other than bills).

Allwyn, pal,... you have a SAFE trip back home, and I hope you have a good time seeing family and friends there. Best of luck with that Visa issue! Give me a call when you return to the States, but until then at least now we have e-mail. :)

"Off"-Roadtrip 

Summertime... and the fish are jumpin'

Hey all!
Well, it is summer break. Spring classes are OVER! Yay! I've been sleeping in late and staying up late like my body's clock is set. Thanks a lot mom, for that marvelous oddity. :p

I've been playing a lot of World of Warcraft, and am happily moving along in levels on a few of my characters, most notably my Warrior on Proudmoore. Right now he's level 58 (out of 60 levels). Nattsu and I both made Hunter alts on Elvis' server so I could chat with him more often, and we're Loving the Hunter thing. Nattsu likes it because she can name pets, make clothes, and fight from a distance. For me, it is a welcome change - fighting from a distance that is, from the Warrior - plus, pets are cool. :)

I'll be teaching two classes soon for Summer 2nd session. I have no idea how I'm going to squeeze all that content into two months' time. It just doesn't seem right they offer these classes and give the same amount of credit for them in so short a time in the summer. I think it is wrong. The state Board of Regent's should mandate that lesser credit shall be given. There's NO WAY to cover the same content and require the same work for some classes. =/

In the Fall, I HOPE I'll be teaching Play & Technology. The course was approved and is on the list, but as of right now I only have 6 people in the class. I need to do some marketing this summer and try to boost those numbers so they don't close it. Perhaps I can talk to some other department heads and convince them to give credit for it in their departments. Then I can open it up to Engineering and Education majors as well. That'd be super!

Sunshine, Pollen, A New Outlook, Random Happenings

What the hell does the title of this post mean? Seriously? I don't know other than the fact that it is sunny outside and I'm feeling good despite the pollen. I mean really, what else am I supposed to title a post?

Lately I've felt really well. I know I shouldn't be saying this or I might jinx it, but what the heck. I figured I have enough sad, angry, and complainant posts already. Why not post a happy one for a change? :)

The weather has been absolutely gorgeous as of late. I like opening the windows and doors of the house to let the breeze flow through and to let the sunshine in. When I sit in the warmth of the sun it feels as if my energy is restored. It feels as if my internal mechanism is rejuvenated. I love this time of year - not too hot, not a ton of bugs, always a nice breeze. It puts me in a good mood. This past weekend I went shopping and got some new clothes. For some reason it feels good to buy clothes in the spring.

Spring has such an effect on people they ought to make "Spring resolutions" instead of ones for New Year's. Honestly, who keeps a New Year's resolution when it is colder than Dennis Miller on a grumpy day? But who would keep one if they made it in the Spring where the air is fresh and inspiring? I would. I'd bet a great many people would, sans allergies. Those allergies I'm sure would make it difficult for some.

I went to see the movie Constantine - it was "okay". It was actually pretty decent except that even though the plot follows a person who can see the demons and knows tricks to banish them (a unique perspective), the overall principle of a war between the angels and demons to influence mankind has been done a gazillion times in different yet very similar forms.

On the gaming front; I am jonesin'. I am twitching. I am getting the shakes. I want this semester to be over so I can take a short break and relax! That means I am ready for some relaxed gaming! I have a few MTG ideas in my head of decks I'd like to put together but I just don't have the time to do so. I want to get done with all the grading and dedicate some time to that. Get ready pals! New decks incoming!

The World is a Vampire

"Despite all the Rage, I'm still just a rat in a cage."

Sometimes I'm angry.
Sometimes I'm sad.
Sometimes I'm a goody-goody, and
Sometimes I'm bad.
Most of the time I'm just surviving.

Life, Love, Peace, War, Apathy, Care, - we all live in one whacked out world. There was a great cartoon I saw today; in it the man at the bar said to his neighboring patron, concerning the television up above them, "Yeah, I used to get depressed watching the news too. Then I discovered the miracle of apathy."

Since my recent posts have been about students' work, I figured why change from that. Obviously sometimes my students excite me by expressing their eagerness to learn. Also obviously, sometimes they piss me off by not following simple directions.

(Recent Ex: I posted directions to follow one of two formats for their speeches. One format has TWO main points, the other has FIVE main points. What did many of them post? THREE main points! Go take fucking 2nd grade again, people.)

Anyway, right now we have only a few weeks left in the semester. Many of my students are whining because they say they don't have enough time to do the work. Many of them complain, "What?!? I can't give my speech. Thursday is my last day on campus! How do you expect me to get my speech comments back and give it on Monday?!?"

All I can say is, Get a damned clue. Drive up here again. God forbid you'd have to do some work on the weekend. "Oh my, do homework over the weekend that entails me making one extra trip to campus? Oh NO!" Get over it. Grow the fuck up. Getting an education means you have to WORK for it. This isn't kindergarten, kiddies. This isn't even High School. This is COLLEGE. You know, the place that is supposed to prepare you for the work force, for the "real world" if you will. You think they don't work on weekends in the work force?

So at this point I'm fed up with the whining. I'm sick of the childish complaints. I don't want to hear them and because they've whined so much, I don't care. Do the work or FAIL. See if I blink. Huzzah! APATHY!

Ya know,... re: students

Ya know, even though oftentimes the students who are late with their work make my life a living hell, the job still balances out on the happiness scale.

I am extremely happy teaching. I often have students who call me, write letters, e-mail me, or who just drop by that tell me how much my class has helped or changed them for the better.

Those statements, those thoughts, and the fact they bothered to express them to me, mean a WORLD. Sometimes people aren't happy at their jobs. There's a big difference in not being happy WITH one's job and not being happy AT one's job. Everyone has days where they hate work. Lucky people are the ones who enjoy their jobs even though they have an occasional unhappy day. I'm lucky. :)

Thank you to my former students that remind me from time to time what rewards teaching brings. And on that note, I'm writing e-mails to my former professors thanking them for all they've done. Let the cycle continue!

Late Students Can Bite My Ass

Thank goodness it is Friday. I'm so frikkin' worn out. This last week was one where all my students hand in outlines then within either 28 hours or 56 hours (the outlines come in waves) I have to have them graded and get them back to them. That's a lot of work. These aren't like math tests where I just have to check the answers. HOPEFULLY they're intellectual pieces of work written well in order to be presented to the class in speeches.

There's one problem with this - students who don't do their damned work. Fuck those dumbass slacker students who make my life hell. Yeah yeah, they were sick. Yeah yeah, their grandma died. Yeah yeah, they had to fly out of the country. I don't give a shit - especially if they didn't call me to let me know! What the fuck is up with that?!? I can't wait till these kids get out in the real world. Try pulling that shit at work, fuckup. Your boss won't give a damn if you had 14 family members die in a bizarre electrolysis accident in the jungle of Brazil and you had to fly out of the country then got sick while there so bad you barfed up a kidney. You know what he'll say when you get back if you didn't call him before you got on that plane? "Don't bother coming back Monday. Your office shit has been mailed to you already."

Turn your work in on time. Turn it in with all the required materials. God damn, I go over this shit in class, I provide you a handout with the requirements on there, and I even make myself a tally of how many times I say it in each class so I know I've covered it. Hell, I told them five times to provide me photocopies of the title page, copyright page, credibility page, and the pages they use. I told them, "If you give me your folder without all your source materials I'll just hand it right back to you and it will be considered late and counted at half credit." How many students do you think didn't do this? About 30 of them didn't. Damn America is in trouble. If this is the efficiency and ability to follow simple instructions we have to look forward to in our future leadership, we're doomed. Plain and simple, doomed beyond repair. No wonder politicians are so retarded sometimes, hell, look what we're letting out of High School as "competent in the English language!" My wife from Japan has better grammatical sense than some of my students raised in America!!! How sad is that ????

Seriously, 30 students is FAR too many to deal with. I'm giving them the option to make up this speech within ONLY two time slots. If they can't do it, tough shit. 30 is ludicrous. I refuse to do this shit again. I schedule my time to grade. Fuck them if they can't turn shit in on time. I am modifying my syllabus to read, "NO LATE WORK, WHATSOEVER, WILL BE PERMITTED. IF A WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT IS NOT TURNED IN ON TIME, YOU GET A ZERO FOR IT." That will count for the people who can't follow directions too. I won't accept it without the proper source documentation - and tadah! they just earned a ZERO.

Put that in your bonnet, slackers.
Damn I feel better now that I've vented.
But for some reason I still crave the urge to kill virtual creatures. :)
Too bad my server is down for maintenance. Grrr....
I need to vent about that too I guess.....
Another day perhaps.

We got squashed by a BIG bug in Razorfen! If you look carefully you can see me under his right front leg. Hey, I go for the heart of the problem. :) - Bullox tells the group, "I wonder what banging this Gong does..." - famous last words. 

Bullox and Kotori share a sunset 

Never Light all the Candles! 

Same Game, Same Job - New News for You

Several things have been happening since my last post - most of which are good news. Yay!

JOB News:

• I got a letter stating that if the budget remains the same I'll still have a place to work at the University of West Georgia. Woo!
• I finally got that laptop I'd won. The department bought and installed Dreamweaver for me. It is software that is great for webpage design. I plan on requiring students to use it to make their webpages in that new class in the Fall. I'm also helping out with the new Speech Communication website we'll post for the University. When it gets published I'll let you know. Now they're investigating purchasing some RAM for the laptop as currently it is extremely slow in running the applications I need for the class.
• I got invited to the University of Illinois to present a project I'd done a few years ago. I created a Virtual Forest to represent a communication social network. This was done inside ALICE (Adaptive Laboratory of Immersive Cognitive Experiments) for a interdepartmental project class funded by the National Science Foundation. Many thanks to Noshir Contractor, Michael Twidale, and Narendra Ahuja, the three professors of that course I so fondly remember. Here you can read about ---> ALICE.

GAME News:

• I was in the alpha test (a time for friends and family of employees to play a game in order to find problems with it and to make suggestions for changes and/or new ideas to the game) and beta test (for a larger group of gaming enthusiasts than just friends and family of the employees) for a combined period of just over a year for a game called World of Warcraft.
• World of Warcraft, or WoW, is a MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game). If you'd like to read about MMORPG's, you can do that here on a page I created for another project.
• WoW is a game that allows players to create a character to control inside a virtual world. This virtual world looks very similar to earth in that it has forests, cities, swamps, and many of the same natural features of a civilized planet. The characters you can create can be of different races (if you've seen Lord of the Rings, imagine making a dwarf, elf, orc, or human), and different classes (this determines the characters function in the world - warriors can take damage, priests can only wear cloth armor but are powerful healers, etc.).
• Now that this game has been released, both Nattsu and I play it very often. My main character is Bullox the warrior, and Nattsu plays Kotori the priest. We group up with the characters some friends have made and go adventuring together. This allows us to stay in contact with people we know from Albany, Atlanta, and Urbana-Champaign now that both we and they have moved.
• I have several other characters I play. Below you'll see a screenshot from inside the game of my warlock named Andirak. Yes, he is a gnome, and yes, I chose green hair for him. In this game you can learn different professions such as leatherworking, tailoring, and blacksmithing. It's no surprise that Andirak is an engineer. :) /wave Rick - hehe

This is my gnome warlock Andirak, in WoW. WoW stands for World of Warcraft which is an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game). 

On my way to class...

Wow, I have a lot to catch you up on but it will have to wait for now. Rest assured I'll fill you all in soon. Right now I'm getting ready to go listen to my students' first round of speeches. So far the speeches are decent - a few wonderfully mastered marvels and a few that lack insight and/or preparation. There's always some of each level in every bunch. We'll see how today's go. :)

I also have my students rank each other using a "rank order" system - on a scale of one to five, with five being the best (just like a 5-star restaurant or 5-star hotel). They rank each other on:

• Delivery (eye contact, posture, gestures, and fluency), and
• Content (main pts in into/body/conc, Attention-getter, Final thought, also on Audience adaptations, source citations, and a descriptive passage).

So on their papers they write: Name, Thesis topic, D #, C # (for each person)

Then at the end of each day's speeches they circle the best speech of the day. At the end of the entire round (I call the speeches Rounds like in a boxing match), they vote for whom they think did the best job. Winners get prizes! Wheeee! :)

Amazing how time creeps up - it is almost time to go to class. More to come later.

New Year Update - January

So far this New Year has been going fairly well. Here are some notable events:

• Marc Smith came over from Atlanta to see where we live. /wave Marcus
• School started back and the University changed its name from the "State University of West Georgia" to simply, "University of West Georgia."
• If the University rehires me for next year then I have my courses approved. I'll be teaching a class of "Play & Technology" in the fall of 2005. Exciting!
• We still are having problems with our internet but at least we have some access.
• We went down to visit my brother Ken and his wife Sherry over the MLK holiday weekend. It was a great trip and they have a beautiful home! We had FUN! The guys went shooting (yay for blowing up water-filled jugs at 300 yards!) and the women went shopping. We played Taboo!, ate low-country boil (YUM!) and Ken gave me a trombone! Thanks little brother! =) I love you and miss you already! It was SO great to see them!
• Regarding that "shopping" trip... can you believe I gave Nattsu money to spend at the outlet mall and she didn't spend but 10% of the money?!? Damn, a woman who won't spend her cash on clothes?!? What's up with that? I guess I'll have to take her to a mall in Atlanta now... maybe the Mall of Georgia will change her mind. ;)
• While returning from the trip to South Georgia (Ken & Sherry's house) we stopped in Swainsboro and met Chang's parents and saw their restaurant. VERY nice place, both business and home - and wonderfully nice parents. No wonder Chang's such a well-adjusted guy. Hehe - It was good to see ya pal, thanks for meeting up with us! Now learn how to make those two dishes!!! I want some! Mmmmm!!!
• My classes are going well. So far I can tell I have a few slackers and a few really motivated people. Overall they seem to be a fun bunch of students. We'll see how they do as the semester progresses. Good Luck!

That's about it so far this year. I hope it gets even better. Stay tuned blog fans. :)

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!!
Well, it is now 2005. What does that mean? It means we're now in an "odd" year. So, what's going on since the peach dropped? Hmmm...

• Caryl, Nattsu's former college roommate visited us from Boston.
• Santa brought me some poker chips. Anyone up for Texas Hold'em?
• I start back to work on the 10th but have already gone in to get prepared.
• My proposal for a new course won me a Dell Inspirion laptop (which will likely belong to the department but be under my 'control')
• My lame-ass cable company, CHARTER COMMUNICATIONS is neglecting maintenance on their lines, causing my connection to be REALLY slow and its pissing me off. The trouble started 3 weeks ago RIGHT at the most critical time - when we got off for the holidays and wanted to do some online gaming. Fuck you, Charter.
• I visited John McDole's new house - very nice John, very nice.
• I saw John May's busted ass car - yes, the new one. Go go speed racer. But grats on the fiance.
• I'm teaching five classes this semester. 4 Public speaking 101 classes and 1 Public speaking for Engineering students class.
• My aunt Kathy didn't call me back about visiting during Natalie's stay. =p
• We did drive over to see Thomas, Hiromi, and Theo while they were down. Thanks to John and Alice who have a beautiful home underground.

That's about it so far. This is only the first week of the year. We'll see how the rest of it goes. I am hopeful for a great year, 2005.