I'm heading out to hang with Staci and Mark soon...so since I haven't said anything since the Christmas Party(which was last year) I should say something.

2008 started off the same way 2007 ended with me working. I closed New Years Eve with Mark and opened the next day to cover for Mark. Well, not exactly opened...I was up at 9 to meet Staci for coffee for her shift at 10 and Mark wasn't feeling too well a few hours into his shift so I came in and manned the gun for a bit. I've worked New Years Day the past two years, so a third makes sense. It's nice to see all the hungover partygoers barely conscious. She's been sending me random pictures...it's amusing.

I got out from under the Telus boot that morning to. I manned the gun while Staci did my phone port. It was a well oiled machine. I have a hi tech piece of mobile phone technology: the slick Sony Ericson w580i in "urban grey." I'm getting a extended card too.

So New Years Eve is the only night of the year when I get a good night's sleep. I was up early today too. I had a lot of things to get done. Haircut, Xbox Guy, course registration recap and I needed a box of razors + Bus Pass.

I'm not going to sum up 07 at all because for the most part I want to forget at least 90% of it. A couple good parts here and there, but nothing worth noting. Ever. I spent Christmas with the Family and Saint. A good time was had by all. Random moments with Olympic mascots and outbursts over a game of Clue. My cool poker hat with Across the Universe and House season 1 soundtrack. She got me this awesome umbrella with a sling on it. It's so well built I could probably cave someone skull in with it if I had to. I hope it comes up soon.

 The first two days of 2008 have been alright. I'm on the medication and doing alright. Classes start in a week and I might get excited for those.
I have fill in a couple more to make the set, but first I must speak to an academic adviser...again...and probably have them ball me out for a while then help me.

Music of 08 so far:

Damhait Doyle(Pronounced Dav-Net)
The Entire Rockband Setlist. I should probably tag those to avoid going "What the fuck is track 10?!"

 Eight is my lucky number. Here's hoping.

-Cleric 

Day Three of 08 was eventful. I was up at about 11 in the morning and I made a pot of coffee. I was contacted by Staci an hour or so later and she was shocked that I answered my phone! Anyway, we decided to hang out for a bit and get a bite to eat. Before I left though, I got a call from the Sarge care of Mark who informed me we got Rockband Kits. Two of them. So Mark and I got one each...Anyway, I left it in Pyro's capable hands to set up and went out for lunch with Staci. After some random shopping that ended with a couple CDs and Sweaters(I'm not buying anything else until at least March) we had a coffee(in Mugs!) at the local Starbucks and talked about nothing like we always do. At least it's nothing with improved digital communication. 

The power also went out for half an hour after we all arrived to play Rockband.

(sigh)

but we finally ended up setting it up much to the shock and awe of my parentals.

We rock by the way. But the night got late. Staci and I worked tomorrow anyway. Our hands hurt, but we're all awesome. Even Pyro...who tends not to co-exist with Staci very well...but when we stuck him on the guitar, he seemed alright.  

Not like it means anything(because my Psych says it won't) but I've spent 100% of 2008 with Staci...and Mark too for that matter...but mostly Staci.

And Dani's Profile picture is so awesome I just might cry.

That is all.

-Cleric  

Five for Five keeping "regular" hours in 08 despite working until 12:30 last night. It was my first close with Lucas, but it worked well enough. I close with him next Friday too I believe. I've never been his biggest fan at the Firm but I'm beginning to come around. Saint still hates his guts, but we'll see where this all leads.

Work was alright yesterday. At least I'm not working today. I wish I wasn't working tomorrow so Mark, Staci and I could go play Rockband, but I'm in until 9:30 while Mark gets off at 3:00 and Staci takes her usual Sunday Grace.

CoH News? Pfff. Freedom Franny is having trouble taking on the Elite Boss lvl 47 Nemesis Positron Automation during the Dark Watcher's mish arch. She can fight a melee Elite Boss no sweat, but when it's a radiation defender Elite Boss...different story. The HotShotKid walked into the Pocket D chalet and saw at least 3 of the 4 major RP villains last night. She believes it's a sign of bad things to come. Heck, seeing Dr. Crom and Run Riot in one room with random members of the Fifth Remnant is trouble enough. I'm not playing anyone else, but I have been tempted to work Redside for a while just to get Ol' Nicky up for some more thugs and a couple fitness powers.

Since I was up early yesterday, Pyro and I went out for lunch at a nearby restaurant. I was shocked when the cheap bastard paid the whole tab. Of course, I think mum told him to before we left. He still had to go to the Sev afterwards for more food. I got an odd combo of a large iced tea and a big box of Tic Tacs. I blame Katie Kelton for my interest in the tiny mints...or House...or Machall....either or. Mostly Katie though.  I bought a few boxes when I dropped into work this morning after coffee with Staci.

Back to class on the Monday. (Sigh) I hope things go better.

Since I haven't had the chance to explore the solo aspects of Rockband, I hope I can change the look of all of the members of my band and not just my solo character. Either way, he's going to be wearing a suit and glasses aptly named "The Costellos."  Of course, the Doctor "What" coat/scarf combo with fingerless gloves, goth pants and Chuck Taylors sounds pretty cool too. The guitarist I created a couple days ago had the hairstyle called the "emover." Awesome.

Anything else?

Nope.

I just have to let things go. This is my New Years Resolution.

-Cleric 

Oh Man. I finally looked at which Boleyn Girl Natalie Portman plays in the movie. Strike that one off the list along with Goya's Ghost because it's not going to end well for her. Why can't she be in movies where she doesn't get tortured, beheaded or is a redneck? Maybe Mr. Magorium's Magic Emporium won't be as bad as people say.

My tuesday night/Wenesday look pretty clear academic wise meaning I can attend Brett's HaloRock. Fantastic. I do have to double check with the academic counselors tomorrow and cancel my psych appointment next week.

I have a copy of 3:10 to Yuma and In the Land of Women sitting in the living room. I might watch them both tonight is time permits. At least In the Land of Women. I need some romantic comedy to break up all the action movies I've been watching lately.

I'm trying a new diet to live on nothing but Tic Tacs and Coffee...I wonder how long I'll last. Place Bets Now!

Kidding. Anything else? Well, I'm getting fasting at texting on my new phone.

That's is.

-Cleric 

So, my project proposal for Creative writing came back with a green light, I guess. The prof would like me to start with realistic fiction before I can branch into the meta-human ethics thing I want. My third one might continue the Meta Thing.

And just so I can sort things out. Only in North America is a Misto separate from a latte. The term "misto" is actually almost exclusively Starbucks. It's better known as the Cafe' au lait, which I assume means coffee with milk. Cafe' au lait also tends to be made with a strong drip or French Press coffee in place of espresso like a latte. The Macchiato is a shot of espresso with a teaspoon of milk and a drop of form on the top. Macchiato means "marked" essentially stating the espresso is marked with milk. Note that a Latte Macchiato and a Cafe' Maccihato differ in that the Latte is steamed milk with a short or less of espresso.

A Misto, Latte and Micchiato are all pretty much the same ingredients just vary in quantity of each. I notice when the local Starbucks makes the Misto, they pour very little milk into the standing shots of espresso then add a bit of water. I should see in what order a latte goes in.

Oh a Cappuccino is 1/3 espresso + 1/3 steamed milk + 1/3 foam.   

I'm also a little stoked to find out that the Americano was first made for GI's serving in Italy during WWII when the Italians rarely had the drip coffee the Americans were used to. So with an espresso machine handy, they created an espresso drink that was similar to plain drip coffee. One of the explanations of the name "Americano" was an insult to the GIs who wanted their espresso diluted.  An Americano is water added to standing shots of espresso. However, if you add espresso shots to standing water, you get the Long Black, which is a drink from Australia. It seems the Long Black preserves the espresso taste .

 A...Lungo? is apparently A LONG SHOT from what I can read...where the espresso is  made with more water. The resulting taste is richer, but bitter. Which makes no sense to me because they also state a Lungo is weaker.

Hmm, I should order a Long Black. Apparently it’s supposed to be stronger and richer than an Americano. Though, I get four long shots...and that'll get strong and rich fairly quickly. Other coffee vocabulary? The creamy foam of espresso is called The Crema. I'll assume after a town in Italy of the same name.

Got it? Good. Now give me one of those black aprons! And Crema will fit nicely into my future writing projects.

Yeah, I have nothing worth while to talk about. I'm bored with a lot of the things I used to do for fun. Movies and CoH seem a little stale as of late. I'm enjoying reading things for class. A complete change from last year.

Staci is Staci. Emotionally absent and unstable. She’s also a little childish at times.

My psych keeps canceling appointments. Well, just the one. He canceled before I could. So I guess it evens out.

It looks like I've retired my Ipod. The w580i is in.

Done and Done. I'm out of tic tacs.

-Cleric 

Ok, an hour or so ago when the Lt. told me that an entire 18 box of 420g bags of Peanut of M&M are now .47 cents each it seemed like a good idea. Yes, I bought ten bags. It seemed like a really good idea. I've just torn through half of my first bag and it's suddenly less of a good idea. They'll be put out in the morning, but the Lt and myself got first pick.

Now I'm a little ill.

However, this more than makes up for the fact our store is no longer carrying large boxes of Tic Tacs.

So with two movies in tow in an almost full case of M&M's I trekked home with grand plans of spending my Lazy Monday off eating candy and watching "White Noise 2" and "Sunshine" back to back. I should try to pick up a DVD player tomorrow too. The Xbox isn't back yet and it's always nice to have a back up when you can get a fairly nice Toshiba for less than 50 bucks.

For some reason I can't comprehend the parents who have no problem with their children watching a terribly violent movie, but when there is even a mention of sex they get all worried. I can say that both sex and violence are human nature. I just prefer the first one, since it's the reason you, me and everyone else in this world is running around.

I'm just saying...

Also, after stumbling across her videos on Youtube , I'm fairly smitten with this woman. She's like a redhead .45 toting Dani Clone. Of course, she's probably a little older than me oh...and married.

I've recently lost the ability to estimate ages except for the vague "Older than Me/Younger than Me" Range. Even that is proving difficult. I have moments when I comment about Pyro's friend "No way is he/she/it younger than me" type of thing. Or you realized you just ID'd a 31 year old for an 18A movie....of course, most of the woman relish in it.

I think I was angry at Staci for no reason today during the hour or so we shared a shift. Yep.

Freedom Franny has stalled at 49 while I consider respec-ing her to move MoG up a couple lvls. While most Regens do not take the move, I've seen that it is a very powerful move in the right circumstances. For example, it would have made her Elite Boss fight against Silver Mantis really easy because Mantis' poison spikes wrecked her Regen Rate.

To deal with the stall, I've created a Energy/Willpower stalker and continued to work with Grav-Star, my only controller of the gravity/kinetic variety. The Kid gets work every now and then. Blizz is being retconned for a fairly awesome background involving The CoT and the reason Iona took Laura under her wing.

This all while I'm working on my Meta-Human oversight story AND thinking of something realistic for my first piece. I'm probably going to keep exploring my main problem with that one and maybe, just maybe I'll deal with that "Wow, your life must suck" line I came up with a while ago. Something about your Ex and your Secret Crush going out...and the fact I seem to like lesbians more than the average man. All men like lesbian, I tend to have a little stronger emotional attachment. Of course, neither of them can be proven, it's just circumstantial.

Done? Done.

I work tomorrow night too. Woo.

-Cleric

Oh, I talked to Vanya at the Bux and she'd never heard of a Long Black. Maybe Sue and Celeste do, since they wield coffee master status...

There are things I could talk about. Of course, top of that list is the fact Staci's bed is really comfortable. Ha. No, it's not what you think but it's nice to think of it even for a moment. I do value Staci as a friend but every now and then it is a purely lust thing which won't work for a variety of reasons. I need to get out more and meet more people. Or get to know the people I meet better. Like that wonderful redhead with glasses or the vaguely Iranian girl with the bob in Sociology....it's just a thought.

Franny hit 50 on the 23rd. I've been working on a couple story arcs including the reason why she needed a specific psionic profile for the sword and serum to work. I'm thinking both are vaguely empathic and needed a certain level of psionic control to be used to their full effect. I've been watching old Angel episodes to get a better handle on the Amy Acker experience. She is effectively Franny with about thirty lbs of lean unstoppable muscle attached. I've also noticed Fred loses a bit of her Texas accent as the show progresses...and I watched Fredless again and I'll say it again...since I saw the season five episode with the Burkles I never believed they were bad...I love em' like Pancakes! Staci suggested a pen a short where Franny meets the Army Metahuman mystical armorer, a Westley type character, and hilarity ensues when she refuses all these awesome modern weapons in favour for her sword, her M3 fighting knife and her skill. Staci suggested a Westley like character without even thinking of the Amy Acker reference.

The next patch has an improvement to MoG which should make it better. Of course, last night Franny tore through Neuron, Diabolique and Battle Maiden on Unyielding...so I'm getting better at fighting high level EBs.

And if I can't sound like any more of a nerd at this point, Mark might have gotten me interested in Warhammer 40k. We're heading on Monday morning to pick up supplies...and I might start playing as an Imperial Guard Unit. I keep running it through my head and I shouldn't be exciting about painting tiny figures, but I am. Also, they have bolters and something called the Kraken Pattern Penetrator round. Sign me Up. I almost have to keep it from my parents...it's that embarrassing.

At the beginning of the week I did have Friday and Saturday off which is just unheard of. I enjoyed my Friday off seeing Cloverfield with Pyro...but early Friday morning Staci called informing me the Lt. forgot to schedule a closer Saturday with the Sarge. Staci didn't want to take my Saturday away from me(so I assume that's why I was the last one called) but no one else could do it(no one else wanted to do it). I didn't have anything planned anyway so I took it. I joked with the Sarge that they all should be glad I'm a social outcast. The Sarge agreed.

Class is going pretty good. I don't want to talk about simply because I felt good about last semester and look where that got me....

Done? Done. I work in a couple hours anyway.

-Cleric