Another Year Past
And I was hardly around to enjoy it. 8 months in Georgia sure sounds like a long time but it didn't feel like it. It feels like I never left even.
I'm being stationed very close to home. Probably as close as I could get. It's nice because I won't have far to move but then I'm also not really going anywhere outrageous. I was hoping for that elusive Alaska assignment, which one kid in my AIT class got, but it escaped me.
This has been a very lucretive christmas. A new motherboard, a new keyboard, Painkiller, Homeworld 2, a book of daily Buddhist reflections, volumes 2 and 3 of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, and a pile of candy. Xerxes' motherboard is shot (AGP slot's gone rotten) so full replacement of the mobo, processor, RAM, and video card are in order. Thank god for that steady Army paycheck and ready availability of any credit card of my choosing. I'll spend a good chunk of tomorrow cleaning out Xerxes' case and mounting the new motherboard.
Anyway. Here's to another fun year!
People Who Died
I'm home. For about a month. 17DEC04 till 15JAN05.
This entry brought to you by Jim Carroll Band's "People Who Died", the exit music to 2004's Dawn of the Dead, an excellent mistitled film.
"Brian got busted on a narco rap
He beat the rap by rattin' on some bikers
He said, hey, I know it's dangerous,
but it sure beats Riker's
But the next day he got offed
by the very same bikers "
96
In about 96 hours, I'll be back at home. For another 4 days. After that, I'll have a little over two weeks before I come back for a month.
Katie and Chris came down last weekend to bring me my car and so that we could all go to my dad's place in Florida. It took way too long to get to my dad's house because stupid Yahoo and Mapquest sent us on a trip through Orlando, aka DISNEYWORLD, and there was insane traffic. We spent at least 2 hours (maybe 3) stuck in traffic. It was insane. But we made it there and the weather was fantastic and his house was really nice so we had a good time. And then it was another 10 hours on the road to get back to Ft. Gordon.
So now I've got my car here and I filled out the paperwork for it last week and the only thing stopping me from driving it is that they haven't returned said paperwork to me yet. It had to be signed by the first sergeant and company commander first but I'm pretty sure they signed it Friday and the drill sergeants on duty this weekend are just too lazy to go looking for it for me. One of them outright told me that she won't look for it because I'm not in her platoon. What a pain in my ass.
I think I should really work on that FAQ, especially since I'm going to be coming home for a while soon.
I'm bored. And the people next to me are watching stupid videos really loud. Turn up the CD player and tune them out. And I'm bored.
P.S. Halo 2, Metroid Prime 2, Killzone, Half-Life 2, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, and the Nintendo DS all make for some very hard decisions for PV2 Hubbard. Hardware issues and Katie have ruled out HL2, V:TM-B, and the DS but that still leaves H2, MP2, and KZ. On top of the handful of big console games that came out while I've been in basic and stuck here. I told Katie to get me Halo 2 for this four day weekend but I think I'd rather have Metroid Prime 2 first. I still haven't beaten the original Halo but I kicked Metroid Prime's ass quite a while ago. But I'm going to die when I come home in mid-December and Katie takes every game I touch out of my hands before I can get it to the cash register.
P.S.S. I really liked the Dawn of the Dead remake but they should've called it something else. It wasn't like the original much at all. But it is a very well done zombie movie.
P.S.S.S. All these games are on top of all the stuff for my computer that need updating. Like Firefox 1.0. I'm this |-| close to ordering a Firefox 1.0 release t-shirt.
Bored and Tired
So I'm in class. And bored. So I've been reading over OLD entries. I was so much more vocal then. More verbose even. But all I ever do is whine about work and school. Eh. Oh well. I guess I'm still whining about work and school.
Tomorrow is Friday. The day before the weekend. Here at Ft. Gordon, we live for our weekends. It's almost the only thing we have to look forward to. Nielsen hasn't seen Team America: World Police yet so Meeker and I are going with him to see it for the second time. Meeker got her POV (privately owned vehicle) last weekend and I'm pretty sure she got her POV packet approved. No more expensive taxis! And I'm still playing the waiting game on my car. It looks like Katie and Chris are going to bring it down the weekend of Halloween. And that is outstanding.
So I had an assignment to go to Ft. Campbell, KY after AIT. Then that got deleted. I still have no assignment and now my instructor says that Ft. Gordon is on Stop-Movement (where no one stationed here leaves or retires until Ft. Gordon is up to 100% strength) so there's a good chance I could get stationed here. It's no Alaska or Korea or even Ft. Campbell but I could live here for a while. I don't think they're deploying out of here either, especially if they're on Stop-Movement. Here's to the unknown future!
Life (in General)
So I came home last weekend. It was fan-freaking-tastic. I had tons of fun and 4 days is nowhere near long enough.
It's hard coming up with stuff to put here. My days are pretty monotonous. I'd explain everything but you'll have to wait for the FAQ. Katie and I are going to put together an FAQ about me since we're tired of answering the same questions over and over. We'll just start handing out the FAQ instead.
There's a new version of Movable Type out. Entirely new. With tons of new stuff. And an enormous price tag. $60. And it's still limited to a certain number of authors and journals. I want to support Movable Type but Katie would absolutely MURDER me if I spent $60 on something crazy like Movable Type. Especially since I still don't have steady internet access. Maybe I'll get it once we move to my permanent duty station and I've got my computer again.
So how about some unwarranted free information? I've become a buddhist. It's not something that I'm going to go insane with but when people ask, that's what I tell them. I'm buddhist. And part of that is doing things like not cursing. So I'm working on it. Being here it's like impossible to not curse but I'm working on it. On top of other things.
Anyway. I'm off to enjoy my weekend.
I’m Coming Home
It's true. For 2 days I'll be home, in Springfield. October 9 and 10. I'll probably be rather unavailable, seeing as I'm only going to be ther for 2 days but there's no way in hell I'm spending the ENTIRE weekend holed up at my parent's house so I'll be out and at the mall and crap. Some of you will need to call me though as I've gotten a new cellphone and lost all of your numbers. So call me. Leave a voice mail so I know who's number I have.
Edit: Oh my god. I just noticed that on my Links page, none of the navigation links work. At all. I'm such a shitbag.
P.S. Shitbag is my new word. Usage: The days are all shitbags. Eff the days.
P.S.S. (or some crap) I can explain later, when I come home.
It’s a Blast
I'm bored. Rather bored. Very bored. And not in a great mood. What better place to go than my own website? (at 15 cents a minute)
Things aren't as exciting at AIT (here at lovely Ft. Gordon, GA) as they were in basic. Until my classes start, which should be Wednesday, I've been stuck on stupid detail after stupid detail. Mowing, pulling weeds, etc. Nothing as exciting as being shot at or the obstacle course but not nearly as much of a strain on my body.
I want my gameboy. Badly. And my CDs too. I spent $30 on two mediocre new CDs (Pennywise "From the Ashes" and Kittie "Until the End") because I was tired of listening to the CDs I have with me. I've got that itch. Where I want something I can't have so I try to substitute it with something else. I want to be listening to Weezer "Pinkerton" and Nine Inch Nails "Still" (for the "Something I Can Never Have" re-recording) but no. And I want to play Doom 2 on my gameboy. And Metroid. And Castlevania. And Ninja Five-O. These are all things I can have here and they're not here. They're a thousand miles away or in a box on their way here but they're not in my hands.
I'm frustrated. Rather frustrated.
Okay fuck it. I'm frustrated because I finally got a chance to call Katie and she was busy. I'm selfish, I know. I can't get over it. It burns in the back of my mind. I don't have a fucking clue what it is either. This isn't a big deal. But it nags me. It follows me. It consumes me. I can't even enjoy a stupid cartoon without it totally overwhelming what little attention span I have.
And my typical outlet for this kind of shit? Video games. Where's my fucking gameboy? I blew $3 playing Virtual On for like five minutes. Five minutes is not enough time to squash this. I need like an hour or two. And at $3 for five minutes, $36 is a little much to spend for a full hour of robot smashing action.
Anyway. I'm done. I'm going to sit in front of a TV and mope. Or blow more cash sitting here on the internet. Oh well. Fuck it.
I Live… Again
Or not. But I am on a laptop in a little phone center across from my barracks, on shitty dial-up, paying 18 cents a minute for internet access.
I'm alive and well. I'm on the fifth day of my seventh week. I've only got nine actual training days left and the rest is cleanup. I just wanted to drop in here and let everyone know that I miss them and I'll be much more easy to get ahold of soon enough.
I have to go now and try to visit a few more websites and call my beautiful and loving wife.
So Long and Thanks for all the Shoes
Well, this is it. In 12 hours I'll be on a van to St. Louis and within 2 days I'll be at Fort Benning. It's been a very short 3 weeks.
I'd like to thank everyone who's wished me luck. Two months will fly by, I swear to god, and then I'll be back and hopefully way easier to contact.
Don't make too many messes, keep your heads up, and don't count the days.
My Last Single Day
Yes, today was my last official day of being single. Tomorrow, I'm a married man. This entry is mainly here to date this fact.
We did things today. We picked out rings. I got down on one knee and proposed. She giggled and told me no. And then I spent a while hanging out at Gamestop.
I spent 3 hours playing Minesweeper. I finally figured this game out. I've never beaten a single game of minesweeper till now.
I don't know what's going to happen to this frontpage while I'm gone. I'll probably make an entry dating the time I leave but who knows if Katie will this this up or just maintain the forums. I really keep my nonsense to the forums now. It's probably because I never have a ton to get off my chest anymore and it's much quicker to just say something there instead. I even think I'm going to disable the comments on this frontpage too. They just don't do me much good anymore.