Gobble, gobble

Well it was a wonderful long weekend filled with copious amounts of food and relaxation, mixed in with a bit of FFXII. This weekend is Mike D's birthday. He's 40. That's really old. It puts things in perspective, like when I was a kid we had already invented the wheel. I mean wow. I bet he has wrinkly balls, but not like normal wrinkly balls; I bet he has wrinkles ON his ball wrinkles. It's like a wrinkle convention where people reminisce with their peers from 30 years ago and try to hook up with that pubic hair that used to be ass ugly but is looking pretty good in her silver years.

On Saturday I am having another friend's birthday which sounds terribly exciting. It involves a limousine bus and bar hopping. What could go wrong?

An update on the Europe trip: We have settled on visiting Britain. So we are all researching different places to go in England, Scotland and Ireland. Neat! So far I am keen on visiting:

England:
York Minster (it's a town where lots of beer is made)
Covent Garden
Tower of London

Scotland:
Edinburgh Castle
Some inn that my great, great, great, great grandmother owned.
A battlefield with a metal detector and a shovel
Glenamorange Distillery

Ireland:
The Blarney Stone
Temple Bar
Guinness Brewery

Any other suggestions are welcome!

In other news, I am waiting a good three weeks before attempting to buy a Nintendo Wii because I dislike those stupid fanboy lines. Sure, I am a fanboy, but I'm not dumb enough to sit in a line for half a day for the *chance* at something a few weeks early.

-Aaron

Atheism

So I don't know for sure if I have ever mentioned it here on my blog or not, but I guess it is worth noting that I am indeed an atheist. There are some other groups that try to re-define atheism in nicer ways or from different angles (like the Brights) but as far as I can tell it is about the same thing. Additionally, most agnostics are really just atheists without balls. Lately this term, 'atheist' has been thrown around as a derogatory term, as if prejudice for this particular belief was acceptable. The stereotype for it seems to be that atheists are people who lack morals because they have not been taught by a very old book. This makes me sad as I consider myself to be a person of very high moral standards. I counter that religion does not make one morally correct. I fear that the only hope for atheists to make this opinion known is to be open about our beliefs and not give in to the shame being showered on us by society. At any rate, I came across a quote that I really think sums it up for me.


"For those who believe in God, most of the big questions are answered. But for those of us who can't readily accept the God formula, the big answers don't remain stone-written. We adjust to new conditions and discoveries. We are pliable. Love need not be a command or faith a dictum. I am my own God. We are here to unlearn the teachings of the church, state, and our educational system. We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us.

-Charles Bukowski (1920 - 1994)"

On to winter

So Halloween was fun. It took quite a bit of courage to come into work with no shirt on, especially considering my sexy physique. It had everyone there in good spirits despite their burning retinas so all is well. In the evening Pardis and I went to Randall's house for some great vittles and relaxing conversation. We decided against going downtown for a few reasons. For one, it was cold outside and my costume was not designed to insulate me very well. The other is, the city of Santa Cruz decided to turn downtown into a military zone. There were multiple helicopters with search lights flying overhead, fences and about 75 officers in riot gear. This follows their TV and radio ads that say if you are drunk downtown you'll be arrested and fined triple the normal amount. In my mind, this lowers the fun factor by more than a tiny bit. So we went to Adam's house to give our costumes some more face time and that was about it.

Now we look forward to the "family" holidays. This is always an awkward and somewhat stressful time as I, like most, have to split time between separate factions of my family. My Dad and fam should be around Santa Cruz from what I hear while my Mom and fam should be at my Sister's house. I might be able to make everyone happy and visit both, we'll have to see how that goes. The Xmas holiday there is also talk of hanging at the sister's place. All fine and dandy. I wonder what I'll do for gifts...

There was a commercial on TV that I thought rang more true than funny. It said, "After the holiday vacation, what you might need is... a vacation." So speaking of that, I am meeting with Adam and Jordan to plan a possible trip to somewhere in Europe. I was planning on going to Scotland with my Mom and fam, but now with a baby and the accident it looks like that is a ways off. I am going to just go for it I think, so here is to saving up! I am thinking Scotland and Ireland or maybe Amsterdam or Prague. Sounds so exciting!

In home-land I am taking a little break from imbibing alcohol. Sometimes one needs a break from such things. This does contradict my upcoming purchase of a compact keggerator but I am sure that'll take a while to get here and it has certain social purposes. One of these purposes will be to dispense beer at Mike D's bachelor party. Wait, did you hear that right? Yes, Mike D is hitched from what I can tell by the glitter on Jackie's finger. I am in charge of the Bachelor party which is going to be a hefty job.

In other news, game season is coming. I plan on purchasing FFXII and I am OF COURSE looking forward to the Nintendo Wi... Revo... You know, I am probably going to have a hard time avoiding the new name. I hate to admit it but I might take back what I said about ignoring the new name. I DO think it is a terrible name, but at the same time it was probably one of the more brilliant names in marketing history. It was so bad that every game news site, magazine and blog in the world mentioned it. You can't get better publicity than that. At any rate, I'll be swinging that Revwiimote around like a mad evil monster that points at things, and I'll love it!

-Aaron