Well, it's been a while since I said anything here.  I truly am a horrible correspondent, even with myself... Anyway, I made another music video and I hope people enjoy it.  It was for an anime called Rideback.  It contains spoilers so think of that what you will.  ( Watch a video )

Jesus himself said that the path of righteousness was narrow and difficult, but that the road to condemnation was broad and smooth.  I have always imagined a rocky mountain path, twisting this way and that.  I think I will expand on this allegory in this post.  The road is rough and the rocks sharp on the soles of your worn sneakers.  You carry a heavy pack which makes you sweat in an effort to be ready for anything.  The road twists and turns so that you cannot see more than a few feet ahead, although every once in a while you may catch glimpses of where you are headed.  But if you take a second to look around, you'll see that you are surrounded by great beauty.  The kind that you'd never seen on that broad road that leads through the easy land.  And you have a traveling companion.  He never out-paces you, just walks by your side.  He keeps asking you, "Can I take the pack for a bit?  Better yet, just drop it here.  You don't need it.  I have all the resources you need with me."  He's not carrying anything you can see, but when you find that you need some rope and you have none in your pack he produces some from somewhere.  And every once in a while, when you give in and let him carry your heavy load, you feel lighter than the air.  Sure the path is still steep, but you find you can take your eyes from it more often and enjoy the beauty around you.  The hike becomes more pleasant.  You stop and gaze at a beautiful field of wildflowers, sitting down for a bit.  You hear your name and look up to see your companion gesturing you on.  It hasn't been long, but you feel rejuvenated and you get up and move on.  At some points along the path, you come to a crevice that you must pass through or some other obstacle and your pack gets in the way.  You don't want to drop it all because, although you trust your companion, you're not sure if he really has everything you need.  So you pull out some of the things that you thought you would need but haven't yet, and your pack is lighter on the other side of the obstacle.  You can tell that he thinks you should just drop it, but it means so much to you.  It is your sense of self sufficiency and without it, you would feel lost, although so far it has done little to help you.  And the road never seems to end, it just winds on and on, but whenever you reach the point where you just can't put one foot in front of the other any more, you come around a corner and find a resting place and you sit and admire the scenery and get up feeling refreshed.  If you look at your companion at this point, you might see a look of nostalgia or some other sign of recognition, because he has walked this road many, many times before.

Soooo, I was working at my Labor Ready, moving stuff for a company, which I will abbreviate to HIM.  I mentioned that I was a Chemical Engineering graduate with experience in the molecular biology field and they pretty much interviewed me on the spot and told me to come in for training on Tuesday (this was Wednesday).  I mentioned this to my Labor Ready boss this morning and found out that since I was under contract with Labor Ready, they serve as a sort of finder agency and I have to do a temp to permanent interim position for 160 hours before I can be fully hired by the company.  I gave the phone number of the hiring agent at HIM to my boss and she called up to inform them.  The HIM lady apparently became somewhat heated and threatened to call her lawyer against my boss.  My boss, unconcerned, continued to try to reason for a brief time (Labor Ready has a department of lawyers for situations such as this, I suppose) and then hung up the phone on her.  In short, things didn't go well.  I just finished an email to the hiring agent at HIM stating that I feel it would be a betrayal of trust and that it would go against my morals and my integrity to go further with the hiring process until the matter was resolved.

This makes me a bit sad, but I comfort myself with the thought that all is not yet written and that there are plenty of other job opportunities out there.  It also makes me think about my alignment in D&D terms because I am a NERD!  miss_arel once told me that she thought I would be a Paladin class, which necessitates LG.  I myself have found that I do enjoy a bit of chaos in my day-to-day and my social interactions.  This latest episode, however, makes me nigh on certain that I am Lawful Good.  I think that I am a LG servant of a NG god (if I could presume to characterize God).  I also am pretty sure I am not a Paladin.  I don't have the Smite Evil class feature.  I might have the Pity Evil class feature if there was one, but I (and my God, I think) are more inclined to wish evil people changed than to wish them struck down.  I might be a monk, as I would prefer to deal non-lethal damage whenever possible and use my hands instead of a weapon (although I enjoy collecting weapons).  I was also thinking rogue, but I didn't feel that rogues had a close enough spiritual connection.  I was looking at stealth because I tend to prefer it, just ask the large number of people I sneak up on.

If you have opinions about me, I would love to hear them.

So I watched the end of Avatar last night.  I can only say, "Wow".  That's really all.

In other news, I have an interview at Boeing on Wednesday and I am beginning to be nervous.

So I have been stalled in the story that I have been writing because I am having difficulty coming up with a clever idea.  I need a guy to die in order for the story to progress.  It needs to be an accidental death and he is an incredibly powerful master of the element of Fire (he can control it).  He is accompanied by a stronger master of Wind who also has considerable skill with Fire.  So far, I think that perhaps a cave-in could work, but I'm not sure.  The Wind master might be able to move the rocks.  As for drowning, the Wind master can fly by making a supporting layer of air so that would be an easy fix for him, I think.  The problem I have with the cave idea is that they are currently living on Tierra del Fuego which has no real mountains to speak of.  If an idea strikes, please let me know.

Well, my grand scheme for my future has collapsed around my ears, not that I hadn't seen it coming for the last 1-2 months.  In case you are not aware, most graduate programs require some kind of qualifying exam at some point.  Ours happened to be at the end of the first year and at the end of the second year (we get 2).  That, taken with our course and lab work, determines if we can stay in the program or not.  Whatever the specifics of the situation, I will not be allowed to continue in the program next year.  Disappointing, but like I said, I saw it coming.

I Am A: Neutral Good Human Cleric (3rd Level)
Ability Scores:
Strength-12
Dexterity-14
Constitution-13
Intelligence-15
Wisdom-13
Charisma-12


I'm not gonna include the descriptions 'cause if you're reading this, you probably understand them.  I do want to point out that there was only one point of difference between my neutral good score and my lawful good score and one point of difference between my human score and my elf and halfling score.  It appears the only job I was qualified for was cleric, though.

Recently I wrote about a manga called Bitter Virgin.  If you want to know more about it see my previous post, but it sparked a train of thought that I followed up on in the entry.  I'm going to be doing similar stuff here.

I have recently read two comics that deal with sexuality in different ways.  The first manga is called Hourou Musuko and it is about a boy in late elementary school that likes to cross dress.  This isn't your typical cross dressing manga, though.  The boy seems to actually gender identify more comfortably as female.  He has a female friend (actually most of his friends are female) that cross dresses also (similar situation with the gender identifying).  Then there are various other supporting characters, some of whom cross dress and some of whom don't.  It raises issues such as "what does it mean to be a boy/girl" and "what is the nature of sexuality".

The second manga that I have read recently is I.S. not to be confused with I"s or whatever.  It is a series about intersexual individuals (commonly called hermaphrodites).  The first 5-6 books are quite good and explore issues that intersexual people have from outside pressure to change to internal struggle over how they should define themselves.  Books 7&8 are more purely shoujo slice of life/romance and aren't as good.

Both of these have made me wonder about the nature of sexuality.  Is it possible that, just as out bodies have a gender, our souls have a gender as well?  Are they not always in sync with each other?  Does the young boy in the first manga have a female soul in a male body?  What about intersex individuals?  Does their soul have a gender while their body does not?  These are questions that I cannot, of course, answer.  It might explain some things, but I honestly have no way of answering these questions.  Speculation can abound, but proof is impossible to come by.  What I can say, is that I am certain that even if a female soul ends up in a male body (or whatever combination comes up) it is not a mistake made by the Most High or an accident of random chance.  I feel that I can safely say that God loves ALL of his creations and would never look upon any of them as flawed ('cause we're all flawed, I suppose).

Recently I have been sampling new manga (at least new to me) out of boredom more than anything else.  I'm now going to talk a bit about some of them:

So I have finally done what has been in my mind for at least half a year.  I made an AMV for Melody of Oblivion.  I don't know how long it will stay up, since I think Gainax or Geneon is pretty rapid about their shows.

I have been thinking, off and on, about the various sorts of technology that pop up in science fiction novels.  Some of them are fairly constant and made necessary by the vary nature of the story such as faster than light travel and artificial gravity technology that doesn't rely on a large spinning ring.  Some of the technology is fairly unique.  There is also the miracle technology that cannot possibly exist.  Let's do a comparison of some sci-fi series:  Vorkosigan Saga, Star Wars, and the Foundation series.

Vorkosigan:                                          Star Wars                                                            Foundation
Uterine replicators                              Light Sabers                                        pocket-sized nuclear reactors
Gravitic imploder lances                      Bacta                                                     Math that predicts the future
Necklin Rods                                       Planetary Shields                 Instruments producing effects on all senses

The list goes on and on, but I'm gonna stop there.  I want to point out something here.  Although many sci-fi stories claim to have made advances in medicine technology, they are rarely mentioned.  Take a look at Star Wars' advance in medicine: Bacta.  It's impossible.  It speeds the healing process, eliminates viruses, and serves as a powerful anti-biotic.  FOR EVERY ALIEN SPECIES.  Of course there are some differences between the Bacta that humans use and the Bacta that, say, Gand use, but still.  Then there is the Vorkosigan Saga.  This series has the most specific and realistic medical technology of any series I have read.  Seriously.  Scientists would LOVE to be able to work with uterine replicators.  They are a geneticist's dream system.  Also, I imagine there would be plenty of females glad to NOT go through the pain of labor.  Maybe not; I'm not a girl and can't say, though I find it telling that a female author was the one to come up with this idea.  In case you're forgetting or didn't see Star Wars 3, yes the SW universe still requires body births.  Despite their vaunted technology.  Imagine how Darth Vader/Anakin's story would have been different if Padme hadn't died giving birth to their children because they were vitro babies.  I can't speak for the Foundation series here, because I don't remember any pregnancies taking place.

Moving on...I really like the tech in both the Vorkosigan and Foundation books.  They seems natural extensions of assumed technology and present technology.  Gravitic Imploder Lances are basically a military application of grav technology.  As for the pocket sized nuclear reactors, I'm sure that in a thousand or two years we could produce something like that.  Light Sabers, on the other hand, are absurd as far as I am concerned.  Any way, just thought I'd share some thoughts on futuristic technology and technomancy.

Well, I know that this comic has been up for a bit now, but I thought I should just link to it anyway.  I read a comic called Goblins.  It's essentially D&D with goblins.  However, I found the comic that is currently up to be funny and also rather telling about D&D character attitudes in general.  So here it is: http://goblinscomic.com/  I hope it stays up long enough for people to read it...

Today I started reading a manga called "Bitter Virgin".  I started reading it because it was the featured manga at a site that I commonly use to download manga that I can't read online elsewhere.  It is, ostensibly, a Shoujo manga about love and relationships.  What makes it extraordinary is that the main love interest for the boy was raped multiple times by her step-father, had a miscarriage and a child who was adopted as soon as it was born.  Hence, she has an intense fear of men.  Now in a comedic/normal shoujo manga this would mean that the guy has to pretend to be a girl or use some other elaborate ruse so that the girl will get to know him first.  This series, however, treats the issues with respect.  The boy just wins her trust by protecting her from various situations while asking nothing in return.  Her fear begins to lessen at the first because she over hears him saying to a classmate that he is not interested in her in the least.

I have thought about this to a fair degree, which says nothing about its accuracy, and have come to a theory that explain, at least to my satisfaction, the nature of the paradox of God's omnipotence and our free will.