The UN team played soccer today, and I think I have found a new hobby. Thanks for helping create the perfect day, team!

I often see things that I want to take pictures of and wish I had a camera.

Today I realized that so much of the time the picturesque image I see is influenced by the music playing in the background, or the way the clouds are moving in the sky, or the feeling I have in my heart.

Perhaps that's what photographers are continually attempting to capture: the sounds, the movement, the feelings.

Moving

This weekend has been HECTIC! Saturday was graduation for the seniors, and I went and watched most of my good friends walk and receive their diplomas. From there, I spent the whole day with families, celebrating the graduates' achievements. Yesterday was perhaps the longest day of moving I have ever experienced, and today I woke up sore and sleepy. After a delicious breakfast at The Skinny Pancake in downtown Burlington, Nick, Kate and I made our way over to Spinner Place to begin the moving process. From 12 - 9:30PM (not exactly straight, but almost), we were packing up my things, packing up the car, and packing up my new life here in 414. After that long day, there was no way I was going to start unpacking. (See picture below). This next week is going to be a long one because of that. It is incredibly exciting to have my own place, though, despite not having any silverware, cookware, dishes, or normal everyday necessities. There are so many things that I never realized I had until now because I don't have them anymore. I'll have to start making a list.



This is what my apartment looks like this morning, and with work and festivities going on later this evening, I wonder if that will change by tomorrow.

Today was a fabulous day at work! Work really is a pick me up, especially today. I felt like a lot of great things got accomplished, and now that RA training is complete (for now), I am able to completely focus on game development.

A large part of why today was so exciting is because of our newbies! The UN project just hired some new artists, programmers, QA and a designer to the team, added on top of our new writers we hired a few weeks ago, and we had an informal "welcome" meeting today. I'm crossing my fingers for more funding to help this awesome team succeed and continue on through completion. There were a LOT of applicants, and the competition was crazy. I'm looking forward to seeing what we can accomplish.


How can't we succeed with awesome smiles like that? (Welcome, Joel, our new QA Lead!)

Tomorrow, bright and early, we're making our first trip up to the middle school where we'll be doing our focus testing in a few weeks. I'm excited to scope out the location and get some more information on how we can truly make the most out of our testing.

psst it's 2am and I'm still awake.

I went on a nighttime adventure with Woven tonight. I generally really hate walking alone at night, but sometimes the walls itch and amplify my solitude. I like to watch the people, too. It helps. Hunger was my main motivation for heading out tonight, though. Damn, I'm hungry.


I'm not quite sure why I like this picture. The bright spot in the background is the light from the clock tower, but the streetlamp is drowning it out, and the porter-potty really draws your attention from the thing that is truly beautiful here.


It's 11:22, and I'm wondering why I haven't fallen asleep yet.

Today was the first day of RA training for my next semester abroad in Montreal! It was an interesting experience, but it was dampened by the fact that I felt a little out of place -- I was officially hired just this last Friday, and a lot of the things discussed today didn't really apply to what my experience will be like in Montreal. I think tomorrow will go better, though, and I'm keeping my heart open to it all.

I started playing Oblivion, and I have to admit, the immensity of a video game has never intimidated me this much. There is a ridiculous amount of customization, and the world is so vast and complex that I am cautious of every action I take. I thought that getting the strategy guide would help me, but that thing is bigger than the Bible, and I'm not even sure where to start. I think I just need to give it more time to really allow the world to suck me in.

Last night I went and saw X-Men Origins and thoroughly enjoyed it. Keep in mind, I am not a huge X-Men fanatic and do not know much about the origins of characters such as Deadpool or what have you, but I found the movie to be quite entertaining and exciting. I suggest that if you have any liking for Hugh Jackman that you go see the movie and get blown away by his incredible acting skills (and his physical features =D).

Just before seeing the movie, Nick and I downloaded the X-Men Origins: Wolverine video game and I have to admit that it is the first game-based-off-a-movie that I have seen and been excited about. This is the real deal, in my opinion. This game is like God of War mixed with Prince of Persia: Sands of Time all nice and conveniently on my Xbox 360 for one time only. Seriously, people, I was pretty blown away. It is so fast paced, bloody, gorey, and made me feel like a badass. I love a good button masher, and this game totally tickles my fancy. I'm hoping that the full game lives up to the demo.

I've been addicted to the Trance station on my Pandora radio and I found a great dance CD that I highly recommend so far. It's called My Frequency by Mona Lisa Overdrive, and it is a great cd to put on in the middle of the day and dance around your room too.....(it's not like I did that today or anything...). Upbeat tunes with a heavy bass are great for working out, so I'm starting up a collection for this summer. Any suggestions?

Alive Again

Fear not! As my post title suggests, I did NOT die and then come back to life (yet). Instead, my COMPUTER IS FIXED. And for FREE. As much as PC lovers love to bitch about Apple users, they can't deny that Apple has some of the best customer service/warranty deals out there. I got my computer fixed fo' free.

At this very moment I am taking a break from cleaning out my room so I can give a quick update. Unfortunately for my roommates, I've left a nice obstacle course of my stuff in the hallway, so I must be brief.

The main thing in gaming these days is twofold: we just went through a ton of interviews to add new artists, programmers, QA-ers and Web Development people to the UN project team. We should know who is chosen by this next Monday! I'm very excited to add a new designer to the team to focus on helping me complete the paper prototype.

The next main thing is that I finally purchased the Game of the Year edition of Oblivion. It has FINALLY gone down in price, and I'm looking forward to spending many hours on learning and mastering its mechanics and RPG systems. I also purchased the strategy guide to help me along the way.

As for now, I'm off to Manhattan Pizza and then to Nectars for a show. Not quite sure what the show is, but live music is almost always worth the money (unless it's a lot of money or a really bad show, of course).