Memoirs of a Dragon Knight

LEGOs

2008-07-17T23:19:13Z

Hey, if anyone wanted to pick up a Star Destroyer or a Death Star II from LEGO, they're both on sale right now... only $200 each!

http://shop.lego.com/SalesAndDeals/

Song Summoner

2008-07-14T23:33:24Z

Song Summoner is turning out to be a pretty cool game so far. I'd love to know more about the mechanics of creating a Tune Trooper, because it all just seems so random so far, but overall, I'm pretty pleased with the game.

The controls are pretty smooth once you get used to them (though my click wheel has a tendency to not respond at times). The story, while clichéd out the ass so far, is relatively engaging. The dialog is respectable... I mean, how much text would you expect them to fit on that screen? All in all, it's actually quite fun.

I mean, it's replaced Final Fantasy VI as my commuting entertainment since I bought it.

Hmmm... I just had myself an idea. *grin* Those are never good. ^_^;;;

SquareEnix X iPod = ?!

2008-07-08T23:41:10Z

Song Summoner: The Unsung Heroes is a tactical RPG by SquareEnix... for your iPod (classic, nano, and 5th gen only)! That uses your music to create characters!

And has a boss named Number 42!

I'm not sure if this is the greatest concept since sliced bread... or a total crackpot game that I want nothing to do with. For $5, I'm thinking it might be worth finding out...

And omg if I knew how to make armor I would **so** cosplay the Neon Knight card.

Tuck it...

2008-07-05T13:36:49Z

We're going to escape the tuckpointing today by heading out to see Kung Fu Panda and then spending some time down at the Taste of Chicago. So much good food, so little appetite in comparison...

I'd still love to know how the landlord got guys to do tuckpointing on the 4th and 5th of July...

Woo-hoo!

2008-06-29T14:14:46Z

So, we got up early this morning and arrived at the Target on Petersen about 6:50. There was already one car with people sitting in it there, so we chilled in the car for a bit, and then decided to go sit on the bench they have.

The other couple joined us (one of whom was a "crippled pregnant lady" according to the next girl that joined us, cause she was visible and had on a ankle brace) when we got out of the car, and they were shortly followed by a gamer guy and his friend. I was playing FF6 to pass the time.

We were then joined by an older lady who heard they had a bunch of Wii Fits in stock, and also filled us in on how they handled the Wii console sale last week. After a while, we got to talking about games and such (Animal Crossing, and DDR, and some stuff on the 360), and manged to get to Tickle-Me Elmo and Cabbage Patch Kids while talking about rarity. It was actually a pretty fun bunch of people, and they helped pass the time well. The line built up behind us, and a couple people drove through the parking garage, saw the line, and then drove right out of the parking garage.

About 7:45 the manager comes downstairs with two stacks of vouchers. She came out and asked what we were in line for, everyone said Wii Fit. They only had six of them - so only our friendly little group managed to get them. So many people went home disgusted (or went to other Targets disgusted), and I can certainly empathize with them after our experience with Circuit City two weeks ago. But we had our voucher and we were set!

So they opened up the store, and we got our Wii Fit!

They also had a crapton of Mario Karts sitting there, so we got that too, along with a second wheel. YAY!!! I'm guessing that's what the larger stack of vouchers was for.

When the woman came out with the vouchers, there was this other guy there who was totally confused about what they were handing vouchers out for. He had no clue why there was a line outside the store. Heh heh... it would have been perfect YouTube fodder if we'd been able to video tape it.

Now to grill up some maple sausage, and then open up the games. ^_^

Wizard World

2008-06-29T00:22:34Z

Despite the 50 minutes spent waiting in line to buy badges (and that was after being in like the 5th group of people in line after they moved us inside unused convention spaces from outside), Wizard World was quite enjoyable.

Got some really nice bargains, too: a set of the Mattel Squad 7 Naruto figures from a $5 bargain bin, and the Chocobo Tales chocobo reading a book for $12! Plus 4 "30 card ready-to-play" introduction decks of Magic: The Gathering cards (1 White, 1 Blue, and 2 Green) for free! That's because they were sitting in bags near where the line was, and they also handed them out while we were waiting in line... I would have tried for one of each color, but wasn't about to dig through the huge pile of bags to find the right ones.

A nice, enjoyable, tiring day. :)

And tomorrow morning, I'm hoping to finally score a Wii Fit. Just got to figure out how early I want to arrive at Target.

6:10:50

2008-06-26T22:56:30Z

God, I'm such a geek. I remembered that.

I'd offer cookies to anyone else who can identify it, but I suspect too many people can...

Er, this wasn't supposed to be a post about cosplay...

2008-06-23T23:10:57Z

Oh god, this is so bad. I was flipping through a clothing catalog I got through the mail (that I was supposedly receiving my last catalog of about 5 catalogs ago), and think I might need to dye some fabric for a costume - Keneth from Suikoden IV. It's the first time since, oh... about 1992, that I've seen a short sleeve hooded shirt for sale anywhere. The rest of the costume actually seems relatively doable, even more so now that khullkhuum showed us the base he made for his Sugar figure and told us the stuff he crafted it out of can be found at Michael's.

Getting the crotch straps to be comfortable should be interesting though... will have to research someone who made THF AF and see how they did it. ^_^;;;

Now, Jen and I are off to try and find a WiiFit, because both Target and Best Buy claim there are stores with it available.

Edit: Struck out. Still no WiiFit. :(

Nostalgia

2008-06-16T23:08:34Z

Over the weekend, I finally found a copy of FF6 Advance somewhere. In a Kmart, of all places. Wow, guess you'll never know what you're going to find until you actually look around.

Looking forward to reliving that game, as it was a great game that I loved playing the first time through (oh, those many years ago).

*sniff* The nostalgia...

Cha-cha-cha!

2008-06-11T23:18:59Z

Last night, I messed around with creating a new mii for us, since we were at 8 and figured if I made a new one we'd at least have a full baseball team in WiiSports.

Had no clue who I would attempt to make, and just started messing with the hairstyles to see what was there. Jen has jokingly suggested I should create Orihime (from Sakura Taisen), but I knew there wasn't a good enough hairstyle for that. She did, unfortunately, start the wheels turning.

Because the mii that I finally wound up creating, was good ol' Sumire ("cha-cha-cha") Kanzaki from Sakura Taisen. I haven't decided if I'm ready to share her with the world yet or not... we'll have to see. ^_^;;;

Extreme Grilling!

2008-06-08T01:34:25Z

Well, the rain held up long enough for us to get the fire started, cook the veggies, and cook the chile-lime chicken burgers... but the downpours did catch up to us. We had to finish the brats on the stove, cause the torrential downpours (yay thunderstorms!) were playing havoc with one of the hottest fires I've ever created.

I cleaned up whatever could go in the dishwasher, but my back is saying no more, unfortunately. Just means more to do in the morning, I suppose. Oh well.

Great Joke!

2008-06-06T22:46:14Z

http://flyderrie-air.com/

A joke ad campaign that was *all* over the Philadelphia newspaper today.

...Although, I have to admit. It's probably going to wind up being the next bit thing in air travel.

This just in!

2008-06-05T23:03:16Z

Got this in one of my industry newsletters today. Have to share. ^_^

CNN reports that Tyson is saying that a flock of its chickens at a northwest Arkansas plant has tested positive for what is called “a mild strain of avian influenza,” which the company says shows “no signs of illness and the situation poses no risk to human health.” The 15,000 chickens will be immediately destroyed as a precautionary measure.

However, ArkansasBusiness.com reports it much better: Tyson Depopulates Flock After Detection of Avian Influenza

Isn't "depopulating" an amazing word?

Also, seen on Alla's forums today: Scholar is the Wesley Crusher of mage jobs. LOL

ZOMGSQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

2008-05-31T04:11:32Z

Thanks to everyone in the static, I am now a Paragon of Red Mage Excellence and have my pimp hat a good 10 levels before I can wear it. Thanks guys!!! <3 <3

I racked up deaths 142 and 143 to the Guardian Statue. :p

Why?

2008-05-30T11:19:39Z

So... if it's a musty tome containing the words of a long-forgotten incantation in a language long dead, whose diagrams suggest a magick capable of destroying Ivalice... why the hell can I find them on creepy teleporting medusa-horses in a freaking mine that looks like the New York City subway system? And then why are there freaking dinosaurs in the subways?!

Sorry, thinking again. Need to remember to not do that while playing video games.

This post was inspired by the Grimoir Togail loot item in FFXII. ^_^;;;

Chainspell Warp ftw!

2008-05-25T13:56:14Z

Went treasure chest hunting in Crawlers' Nest this morning, after picking up a key while hunting genkai items last night (thanks jedijenchan, yume_no_tenshi, and Mike!). Subbed my level 17 BLM "just in case". And man, good idea that was.

I found a chest in the middle of the Exoray room. Happily dropped Invis to trade my key, so I could get the Crawler Blood. Didn't notice that Sneak wore off as I trading my key, so just put up Invis and tried to high-tail it out of the room. Aggroed two of the Exorays. Oops.

Thankfully, I'd set up a Chainspell + Warp macro for a situation just like that. Got back to Jeuno with about 100hp, one hit from death. ^_^

Headed back out to the Nest, and in about an hour and a half or so, I can log back in to pick up my AF Boots! It'll be 2 levels until I can equip them, but AF1 will be done!

Now to see what everyone else's AF1 quest is...

Happy little crossovers...

2008-05-23T22:07:53Z

Ok, so it's not really a crossover (at least I hope to Altana it's not) yet, because I had to stop reading because the train was close to my stop.

But for the love of all that is holy, seeing a Starfleet commander make reference to Douglas Adams in the midst of a storyline for reference purposes, freaks me the hell out.

And I am one of the kings of crazy crossover ideas.

ACen Recap!

2008-05-19T23:49:05Z

I wrote this on breaks and lunch today, but emailed it to myself to post after getting pics of the swag tonight. And I'm going to put it all behind a cut, because it's a lot of text.

2</i> Chester figures out of this set.

We were a little disappointed that they were all sold out of HALCALI CDs, but we settled and picked up a t-shirt for them to sign. Then we stood in line for the autograph session. They were about 10 minutes late (reminiscent of the "we start on time in 10 minutes" from Friday morning), but the line started moving at a decent speed once they arrived. It was awesome that you got to take a picture with them if you were having them sign merchandise, but Bandai was really cool about having a supply of Eureka 7 posters for them to sign for people who weren't having CDs or t-shirts signed (they did the ending theme, TIP TAPS TIP). They seemed to be having a lot of fun doing autographcs too, considering it was their third session of the weekend.

They even recognized our costumes and struggled to come up with the English title for Tennis no Oujisama... it was so hilariously cute to watch them in shock and then try to get the English. We did manage to get it right and they had fun with it. Halca decided to do Charlie's Angels gun poses, but Yukari made like she was holding a tennis racquet in the picture. They even argued about it for a couple seconds afterwards. Of course, I didn't even think about giving them our tennis racquets for the picture until after we were away from the booth. I'm sure they would have had a blast with them, if they would have posed with them. They were just so much fun! And took up like the entire back of the t-shirt with their signatures!

-=- Purchases -=-
Final Fantasy XII Play Arts figure - Balthier (an awesome deal at $20 - cheapest in the dealer's room for him, though some people selling him at $30 had Ashe and Vaan for like $15)
6 Tales of Phantasia Trading Arts figures on Friday
- 1x Cless Alvein
- 1x Mint Adenade
- 1x Klaus F. Lester
- 1x Suzu Fujibayashi
- 2x Arche Klein
3 Tales of Phantasia Trading Arts figured on Sunday
- 2x Chester Barklight (woo! complete set of non-secret figures!)
- 1x Cless Alvein
2 Final Fantasy IV Trading Arts figures
- Cid and Rosa (though I really wanted Edge)
Mithril Messenger Bag (from Full Metal Panic)
2 mini Black Mandragora plushies from FFXI

Jen bought me an FFXI moogle, and I got her a Death Note ^_^

Oh yeah, and I can't forget the HALCALI t-shirt that they autographed for us!

Pics of everything except the mini Black Mandragora are here!

-=- Notes -=-
If I can interest anyone in a couple of Tales of Phantasia figures, let me know. I've got 2 extras of Cless, 1 of Mint, 1 of Arche, and 1 of Chester.

I always hate the first day after a con though. Ugh. I was tired, a little sore, and work just sucked.

ACen: Tomorrow?! (part 2)

2008-05-16T03:24:23Z

So, after much digging... I have no clue where the hell my McDohl tunic is (but I found everything else, which is highly upsetting), so Suikoden cosplay is out.

I found versions 2 (manga style in red) and 3 (TV style) of Sorata from X. With all the CLAMP photoshoots, I might just decide to wear version 3 (the one lacking the racing stripes), but I dunno how the collar fabric paint will look once I put it on and I'm too tired to test it right now.

I also remembered my Ginji costume after finding the vest in the closet, so that's also an option.

Plus I pulled out all of my Prince of Tennis uniforms for possible options as well.

Sounds like Jen will be in Haruhi mode both Friday and Saturday because of photoshoot and panels, so I may just go in Ginji for the comfort factor. And to be in a costume, because the more I think about it, the more I don't want to not cosplay.

Ah, hell. Gloves. Shit. To get a pair with metal plates, I'll need to go back into the cosplay box. Damn. Maybe tomorrow morning. Or I just cheat it with one of my regular pairs, for comfort reasons (so I'm not peeling the damn gloves off, that is).

Tomorrow is another day. And the first day of the con. Damn.

edit: also found my Chichiri bead necklace and wig in the bottom of the box. day-yum.

ACen: Tomorrow?!

2008-05-15T23:09:21Z

I'm actually kind of sad that I didn't get a new costume for this year. Earlier today, I even briefly pondered raiding the old cosplay supply boxes to see what sort of shape my old Sorata shirts are in. It's the costume that would work the best with my current short hair of my non-Prince of Tennis options (I'm still undecided if I'm going to pull one of them out yet... after all, I do have until tomorrow morning to decide for Friday cosplay. :)

I'm also just a tad upset with Nintendo at the moment, for the GBA cartridge slot on the DS. See, the GBA SP's played import GBA games just fine. But with both the original DS and the DS Lite, Nintendo added back in the little cartridge nubs that keep import games from fitting in the slot. Only discovered that out this morning when I wanted to put the Sakura Taisen GameBoy Color game in and I couldn't. Bastards.

Final Fantasy XII

2008-05-12T23:19:01Z

Been playing FFXII a bit lately. I guess I would say I'm enjoying it so far, but the story seems just a little confusing so far. And the license system, ugh. Materia plzkthx (or magicite. or, y'know, actual CLASSES). Leveling seems to be a tedious process... especially when you accept a posting that puts super-monster smack dab in the middle of your path to enemies you can get decent XP on (here's looking at you, Nidhogg).

I do have one observation so far, though.

What the hell is up with Princess Hot Pants???

Hmmm.

2008-05-07T23:04:20Z

Today, while browsing on lunch, I came across a banner ad for some site that had information about degrees and various professions. Each of the professions in the banner ad were little smilies with some sort of characteristic (hair or hat, for example) that sort of identified the job in question.

For both graphics designer and web designer, the smiley was essentially Naruto.

Hmmm. Wonder what they're trying to say...

Parents safe in NJ already!

2008-05-05T23:45:51Z

So we actually convinced my parents to do something touristy. *shock* We took them down to the Shedd Aquarium yesterday, and I think we all enjoyed it. They're renovating or something there, though, and had closed off the hall of the brightly-colored tropical fish and anemone.

For dinner, we went to Claim Jumper.

The weekend included a grand total of way too much good food out. Jen and I are stocked with leftovers to last all week.

And they called me about a half hour ago to say they were already back home. Which is pretty amazing. 11 hours of actual drive time (plus like 2 hours for breaks and stuff) in the Mustang. And that was with a state trooper pacing all of the cars on one of the turnpikes for over 50 miles.

Outlet Shopping

2008-05-04T13:16:54Z

Outlet shopping in Pleasant Prairie with Mom and Howie went pretty well yesterday. The weather was icky and rainy pretty much all day, but it wasn't pouring at least. And we did all manage to get what we went there for (plus the inevitable very nice additions), except that the Black & Decker Outlet closed down, so Jen wasn't able to get a normal cordless drill (time to start scouting ads at work, I think).

Ghirardelli has come up with a wonderful new chocolate square - filled with peanut butter! Like a Reese's, but better (because it's Ghirardelli chocolate, and the PB is smoother). We couldn't pass up the bag of 50.

Got more polos and a pretty nice t-shirt at Izod, a replacement pair of shoes from Timberland for work for when my current pair gets shredded, and a nice rain jacket with hood from Columbia. All in all, didn't spend all that much either.

We had dinner at the Texas Roadhouse up in Kenosha, and man was that good. The ribs literally fall off the bone from this place - clean as a whistle. And the steak was pretty good too. Going to really enjoy those leftovers. :)

Now, we've got no clue what we're doing today. I know a visit to Menards is in the cards, along with a test drive in Howie's Mustang... but beyond that, not sure. I have a feeling that either Gurnee Mills or Woodfield are going to come up as possibilities though.

Do I need a license to post here?

2008-05-01T00:58:28Z

yume_no_tenshi, I finally spent your Christmas gift at Target. :) Picked up Jak & Dexter along with Final Fantasy XII. Jak has been amazingly fun and frustrating.

Watching Jen play Final Fantasy XII tonight made me remember a VG Cats comic: Wardrobe.