Highlights

Cytoplasmic Writings - December 2006 Archives

December was a very mild month in terms of weather. Toronto and Waterloo did not have a white Christmas. As with every year, December is the time where things get crazy at the malls, but everything slows down at work. People take their vacations and spend all their time fighting for presents to give each other. It is always fun to watch shoppers during the Christmas season. Albeit stressful when you have to actually shop as well.

Friday, December 29th 2006

Wow, I just perused Cyberforce #1 by Ron Marz and Pat Lee. It sucked. I don't understand why Pat Lee still gets work in the comic book industry. His art hasn't changed much since his Darkmind days. The backgrounds still suck and his characters are always a little...skewed. His work is never consistent and sometimes half-assed. After reading that he may have paid another artist to do "work" and then claimed it as his own, well, I try not to buy any of his work. I guess it's the same with Rob Liefeld. I bought X-Force and actually enjoyed it. His Youngblood stuff was horrible and his new stuff? The same old stuff. When Liefeld drew ankles, it was okay. Artists on projects have prevented me from picking up comic books. Besides the fact that the Onslaught Reborn mini-series is stupid, Liefeld solidified my decision to skip this series. It doesn't matter that Jeff Loeb is writing, comic books are still predominantly a visual medium and if I can't enjoy the art...well...forget it.

So with bad artists comes bad comic books right? Yup! Although having to delay issues due to the lack of commitment by the artist is very annoying. Sure there are people who would attack me and say that these artists have a ton of commitment. I don't buy it. If an artist is a "perfectionist" and takes 4 years to draw a 4 issue mini-series, well, it is total bullshit. Comic books should be about deadlines. If the deadlines are unrealistic then change them in the future. However, if they are realistic and the artist takes on too much work and can't meet deadlines, they get no sympathy from me. Jim Lee, Bryan Hitch and others are in this group. I still buy their comics, but I don't buy their excuses.

I know that the detail and quality of the art in comics now require that an artist take more than a 4 weeks to produce. That's fine, the publishers should be soliciting 8-10 books a year instead of the standard 12. I'm really sick and tired of publishers announcing new artists and then 4 issues later we have a replacement or fill-in artist. It's false advertising and it sucks. I've stopped listening to the hype that publishers produce. When a creator does put something out, I'll get it. Both DC and Marvel are guilty of this, but moreso Marvel. With such a huge pool of artists, Marvel has abused the hype machine once too many times. I'll be glad when Joe Quesada leaves the company. He's a great creator, but I don't agree with his business practices. Once such act? With Marvel's major crossover being late, Marvel decides to put new "extra" one-shots out to cover the time. Or when Joe Quesada purposely lies or gives false information to generate hype for one of their titles. Total crap. Then again, stupid fanboys hang on his every word so there is a demand for this kind of stuff.

Just wanted to vent a little here. I've probably mentioned this topic before in other posts, but I felt the urge to kick and scream again. The only good thing about late books? My wallet is temporarily lighter, but it's a facade as the books eventually come out and I don't save any money. Oh well.

So there you have it, my last Comic Book Rant of the year. Excelsior!

DRAGONCRYPT 12/30/2006 11:37:34 AM

Tuesday, December 26th 2006

Boxing Day

So did everyone go out and buy televisions, computers, toaster ovens, clothes and tons of other stuff?! Boxing Day has really become Boxing Week over the years and the few things that do go on sale aren't the greatest deals in the world. I remember going down to Sam the Record Man and when I got there, I didn't really want to buy anything. I ended up forcing myself to purchase some DVDs and CDs to at least make the trip worthwhile. I would rather avoid the crowds now than to save a few hundred dollars here and there. After perusing the flyers online, I found nothing that I really needed or wanted. There was a santoku knife, but I already have a kitchen knife and it's doing okay.

There weren't many calls today at work so there was time to talk. None of my co-workers that work near me were here today so it was pretty lonely, but I did overhear a few conversations that reminded me of when I was younger. There are a lot of guys that have the gadget bug. Y'know where you need the newest gadget or you compare what you have and then start spewing the specs? One guy was talking complete crap. He was spewing the sales sheets of the manufacturers. I hope I wasn't that naive when it came to new technology. His reasoning for getting Klipsch speakers? Because they are high quality sound with a high power rating. The sad thing is vaguely remember me saying something like that when I was researching my Klipsch speakers. The he did make the mistake of saying the Klipsch had a better THX rating than the Logitech. Uhhh...no. That's what irked me. The blatant bullshit that goes across in conversations. It constant stretching of the truth when it comes to which product is better. To be honest? Who cares? In 3 years, your tech is obselete and you'll be wanting the next new thing. The only good thing that came from my gadget-feverism was that I bought quality parts that I knew would last. I still use a 6 year old computer. Sure some parts are failing but that's an eternity for a computer. Still watching people enthralled in blind gadget-fever is amusing and irritating.

It's the beginning of a hellish two weeks. All voluntary of course. I cannnot miss out on the extra cash they pay us to work this week. It's a great opportunity to earn some extra cash to pay off the holiday bills. I work until Saturday midnight and then get Sunday off and then work 12 am New Year's Day. Yeah, I volunteered for a stupid shift so I took the whole week of midnights. So I'm going to be dead tired for a little while. Sigh. Maybe I'll get some data-mining for the site done. Till next time.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/27/2006 12:24:42 AM

Monday, December 25th 2006

I hope that everyone had a decent holiday and it wasn't too stressful with family get togethers and shopping. It is a damn shame to see holidays stress people out. It ruins the whole idea of the holidays does it not? This year my gift-giving was centred around books. It was either a book, books or gift cards. Hmmm. Waitaminute, there was chocolate for my roommates and the computer for my parents. The computer doesn't really count because I get to use it when I'm there. I'll actually be using it more than my parents I think so it's really my new computer hehehehe. I didn't give too many presents out and I wasn't expecting any presents in return. In fact, Jenn got more presents than I did! My relatives decided to get Jenn gifts and not me. Too funny.

The really good part about the holidays is seeing relatives I haven't seen in a while. The last time I saw my sister's children was last Christmas and boy have they grown! I admit, I had lost track of their ages so it was crazy when I found out how old they were. It made me feel a lot older. Well, thinking that I'm 28 and not 29 made me feel a lot older. It's amazing how you quickly forget your age.

Dinner as always was awesome. I was able to help out a little in the kitchen too so that felt great to be helping my mom out. I did the annual tradition of wrapping the spring rolls. Jenn helped out and she got the hang of if after a few hours. How many spring rolls did we make? Over 300! I also learned how to cook a ham. It was already pre-cooked but the reheating and glazing was needed. The ham came pre-cut and had the glaze mixture included. Costco sells everything, it's amazing. Other food included the traditional turkey, stuffing, curry, fish and veggies, sea cucumber, yellow sticky rice. So much food! Jenn's parents came over too and her mom made sticky rice flour balls with red bean and soy bean filling. So yummy! I took pictures of the food but since I do not have a gallery in place, you'll never see them!

DRAGONCRYPT 12/25/2006 11:04:59 PM

Tuesday, December 19th 2006

I am definitely enjoying this warm weather that we've been experiencing in Waterloo. Though I'm a little weary of what the Winter weather will bring next year. It's been more difficult to adjust to the cold this year and I find that I'm constantly cold. Maybe I've just lost more fat. Nah. Well, the warm weather means a green Christmas, which means no snowmen, snow angels, yellow snow, brown snow, dutch ovens, black snow and those other great colours of snow. Hmmm....maybe it's a good thing that we don't have any snow this year. Seriously though, I wonder if this weather is just the beginning of global warming. We've been feeling the minute effects of global warming but lately, weather has been more haphazard and freaky around the world. Let's hope our politicians do something about it.

Has anyone noticed that the holiday movies this year were pretty uneventful? The biggest draw was James Bond and that was beaten out by Happy Feet on the opening weekend! Hollywood is really losing ground to television. I look forward to more television programs than I do movies. Look at some of the Return Sequels coming out. You've got Rocky Balboa and then the trailer for Die Hard 4, starring Bruce Willis, came out last week. You know Hollywood is looking for some action heroes when they have to resort to these old-timers. I wonder if it's because all we see now are pretty-boys onscreen. Where are the Rutger Hauers? Steven Seagals? even Jean-Claude Van Dammes? Too many special effects and not enough hardcore action. Sigh. At least 300 is coming out soon.

Just put out the weekly comic book list and why are there so many Civil War crossovers? Civil War has definitely lost its appeal with all its delays. The stupid thing is that the super-fans will still pick it up and say how awesome it is. Almost all the flagship titles from Marvel have been delayed by this crossover (and Marvel said it's a contained crossover). Infinite Crisis was late at times but never this late (plus there were more pages per issue). Now there are "extra" Civil War specials. I'm an idiot for picking them up but I'd rather have a full set then to scratch my head wondering what's going on when one of these writers references an event in some other book that wasn't supposed to have any reference. Argh! There's a reason why I dropped most of Marvel's books. The same old crap all the time.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/19/2006 11:19:10 PM

Sunday, December 17th 2006

Friday's Feast of Feasts was AWESOME! There was a great tender chicken breast, salmon and roast beef. Not to mention mixed beans, cheese tortellini, broccoli and much more! I had two plates of food as it was sooo good! The only downside to eating two plates? We missed out on some really good desserts I think (Sorry Jenn!). We didn't stay too late afterwards as the music was way too loud. I must say though, working in a building that is predominantly male, there were a lot of nicely dressed women at the party. To me, there was such a difference in morale...all the service centre people were a little subdued whilst other employees seemed to be enjoying themselves more. Oh well.

Larry came up over the weekend and he dropped off my new LCDs. Thanks dude! I love them and it's nice to know I'm saving energy and my eyesight with them. Staring at a computer for 8 hours at work and then another 4-6 hours at home can be straining to my eyes and these LCDs will definitely help with lessening that strain. I'm still amazed at the amount of desk space I have now. After 7 years of two 19" CRT monitors, I'm feeling a little empty when I look at the desk. LOL.

Jenn and I finished our Christmas shopping this weekend as well. We got some books for my nephew and nieces. I didn't realize how crazy huge the selection of books is now for children. It's definitely a huge market and also a huge rip-off. The prices for some of the chidren's books were astonishing. I couldn't believe a 100-page novel with large text would cost 24 dollars. Especially when you have kids reading the books, you know that the books won't stay in the greatest condition. Perhaps kids aren't encouraged to read books as much as parents can't afford to pay for their novels. I know my kids will be going to the public library more often than Chapters.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/17/2006 1:00:46 PM

Thursday, December 14th 2006

One more day until the feast of feasts! Woohoo! Okay, not THE feast of feasts but at least a free feast courtesy of RIM. I've been looking forward to the RIM Holiday Party for a few months now. If the food is as good as it was last year, I won't be disappointed. Let's just hope the speeches are more entertaining this year around. Last year's were a little long.

Can't really do much tonight as I had to work overtime and now I have to hit the sack early as I"m working en early shift tomorrow. The Leafs won their 2nd straight after a 7-game losing streak. I hope they mount a nice winning streak before the holiday season. The Eastern Conference is tight with so many teams sucking. On a side note, I'm not a huge Toronto Raptors fan but it is nice to see them winning more often now. I remember always hearing about their losses last year but now there's a little more optimism this year around.

Jenn is coming up for the week until the Christmas holidays! Woohoo! She'll definitely help me survive these last few weeks of 2006. It's been an interesting year and lots of changes have happened (Some good and some bad) but overall a great year! I'm hoping to have a more stable shift year which will eventually lead to a more stable life in general. I've finally started the Ebay selling and hopefully next year will see the online store coming to life. This site has suffered due to the lack of updates lately and I hope I'm revitalized for the new year. I'm looking forward to trying to integrate some PHP and SQL into the site to make updates easier. I'm sure I'll come up with a list of things to do in the New Year.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/14/2006 10:38:43 PM

Sunday, December 10th 2006

My Hayden Christensen autograph auction ended today! The final price definitely surpassed my expectations but didn't go as high as some previous auctions for the same card have. I'm still elated that the card fetched a really good price. I'm also glad that this will be a great addition to somebody's collection. Now I can use some of this cash to get some other cards to start up the online store. Well that's the plan anyway.

I'm working with 4 hours of sleep and a 2 hour nap today. It's been a little surreal today. I've been feeling light-headed and found it difficult to concentrate at times. I'm hoping to go back to the normal sleep schedule by tomorrow. It's a good thing I'm working a later shift on Tuesday otherwise I'd be dead tired by the end of the week when Jenn comes up for the RIM Christmas Party. Speaking of which, I'm dressing down this year. No suit, just the dress shirt, tie and prolly my dark blue Dockers. Hopefully I won't run into any big-wigs at the party.

Added some television shows to the TV section but I didn't get a chance to make actual pages for each show. I'm hoping to put together at least an episode guide and some information about the cast. Some of the shows are huge in scope so they might take awhile. Star Trek The Next Generation for example, has 178 episodes spanning 7 seasons. Wow. What have I gotten myself into? More fun and games I guess.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/10/2006 10:38:43 PM

Saturday, December 9th 2006

I used to be a pretty heavy fence-sitter. Throughout my life I've never really made decisions on very many things. Sure I'd been very vocal about issues, but I never made choices and stood by these choices. I realized this over the past few years and I had made a conscious effort to voice my opinion (even a wrong one) and stand by it. Of course there have been times that my opinion has changed. This could be due to new information convincing me that my stance was incorrect. I'll gladly fight it (as I should) and when I've realized that I was incorrect, I hope that I would be able to change my mind and my position. I think I've done this a few times over the last few years and I hope to continue to do so in the future. That is the nature of opinions.

Now with every opinion and rule, there are exceptions. If I have an opinion or rule that is not adapatable to exceptions, then it's a useless opinion. Nature is ever-adapting and to try and enforce a "set of rules" 100% of the time would be, in my opinion, absurd. I firmly believe in Capital Punishment but I know that there are cases where it would not work. Is that a double-standard? No, it's being adaptable which, in my opinion, much better than a strict set of rules which determines who dies and who doesn't. I don't live in Fantasy Land.

Some people may say that this is a "double-standard". Well I guess it can be looked upon as that. But guess what? Equality is unachievable in anything. There will always be somebody complaining that they were mistreated or discriminated, or that it wasn't fair. Of course I have different sets of rules for different groups. Who doesn't? If someone was to tell me that they were completely equal to everyone on everything, I wouldn't believe them. Is it not a double-standard to treat your family better than a stranger? People feel comfortable with commonalities, that's nature. My belief is to accept that there are double-standards but to reduce the negative effects of it. Double-standards are not negative, people just think they are. It allows for those judgement calls, but people tend to pounce on them as if they were evil things. It goes back to being adaptable and dynamic. Now, there is a very negative double-standard where people will say something one day and completely renege on it the next to further benefit themselves. This isn't about double-standards, it's about people lying to get what they want. These people will lose credibility when they do this often. I sincerely hope that I'm not like this and I hope my friends and family will point this out to me so I can rectify it.

Over the last few years of posting entries, I've said published a lot of opinions. I'm for Capital Punishment; I'm Pro-Choice for Abortion; I think white-collar crimes need to have stiffer punishments; I believe all religions are bad; I'm not very happy with how democracy works; I don't like capitalism; I think our environment is suffering and we're not doing enough to change that; I think kids are over-protected nowadays; the Leafs still suck but I love them; I support same-sex marriages; and the list goes on. I hope that all my opinions are good opinions but I know that many will disagree. I want to also note that many of my opinions have exceptions to them. An example is abortion. I fully support abortion and think it's the woman's right to choose to have a child. However, I do not support women who go for an abortion because they aren't responsible enough to use birth-control methods time and again. Abortion is not a form of contraception. I don't think I'm being hypocritical or that I have double-standards. I think I'm strengthening my opinion because by abortion is not black-and-white.

I always welcome discussion when it comes to my opinions. However, I would like to say I tire of one-way discussions quickly. If I'm not presented with new facts, information or just points, I see no gain in continuing a discussion. Personal character attacks will cease any discussion because it should never get to that point. Heated debate is great, but when people start attacking one's character, to me that means the good points have been used up. Some topics will be one-way, so I avoid them to prevent the waste of time and energy and I'm sure some of my friends avoid them with me as well. Yes, I'm a very stubborn individual but I've been trying to be more open to new suggestions and view-points; if the argument is convincing enough. I hope that my friends and family will always think I'm approachable when it comes to debate about my beliefs.

So why am I writing all this out? I figured it was a good time to let everyone know where I stand. I hope that most of my friends already know my personality (especially if you've been reading this journal over the last few years) but let's just be safe. I'm a very opinionated guy and I know my comments may be offensive to some. No worries, I'm sure some of your opinions would offend me. I want to believe that I'm being reasonable and that my views can be challenged. Again, if you don't think I'm very open to debates, well, let me know and we can discuss it further. Bring your facts, read up on the topic, don't hide behind generalizations and definitely do not make personal character attacks. Hopefully it will be fun and a learning experience for all. Cheers!

DRAGONCRYPT 12/9/2006 2:12:16 PM

Wednesday, December 6th 2006

Man, I've been fighting some virus the last few days. I'm really tired, cold and just feeling crappy. Hopefully I'll feel better with a little rest in the next few days. I have a midnight weekend shift but I'm hoping it won't be too busy and I'll have things to do. It will be really nice to have some peace and quiet at work. I sit in a hub where there's a lot of activity and I'm being constantly watched by supervisors (they sit nearby) so it's really difficult to relax at times. Looks like I'll be here for a while which kinda sucks. Bleh.

Today during dinner I saw an episode of Law and Order SVU and it dealt with a 13-year-old sociopath. The kid murdered another kid and had no remorse. He even pretended to have remorse and tricked lots of people, including the courts to sentence him as a child, thus freeing him when he was 18. The victim's father, completely fooled by the acting of the murderer, finds out about the sociopathic behaviour and is outraged that he tried to help the kid. So instead, the father shoots and kills the 13-year-old killer. Of course this is all fictional but it could've happened right? What would I do with a sociopath? It seems that there is no treatment for sociopaths and the only alternative is to be institutionalized. So the government spends thousands in locking these dangerous people up...or a father shoots the kid before he grows up to murder more people? Interesting stuff. Are we too lenient on criminals? Especially the underaged ones? Criminal justice has always been tricky. You don't want to condemn an innocent man, but all the safeguards ultimately turn into leniency for the guilty. I'm a firm believer of capital punishment but only for those rare circumstances where the individual is guilty beyond doubt. Meh, what am I trying to say? I think we all spend too much time protecting the innocent and forgetting that by doing so, we ultimately give more power to the criminals. There's too much emphasis on sheltering our children or giving second chances that we don't know when to cut our losses and just give up.

I have no idea what I was trying to say. My point is in there somewhere LOL. I'm just too lazy to clarify. Too much typing and not enough sleep over the last few days. Guess I'll try to sleep earlier tonight so I won't feel like a truck hit me in the morning. Nite everyone.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/6/2006 11:32:48 PM

Sunday, December 3rd 2006

Wow. Stéphane Dion has won the Liberal leadership. Dion went from fourth place after the first ballot to the surprising leader of the Liberals. He beat favourites Michael Ignatieff and Bob Rae. Congratulations to Dion and I hope that the Liberals will unify behind him and provide for a solid campaign in the next election. It's also interesting to see that both Ignatieff and Rae are still planning to run for seats in the next election. I think the Liberals can use both of them. Both are well respected by Canadians and will do lots to re-establish the credibility of the Liberals after scandals by the previous Liberal government. Canadian politics have gotten interesting again.

Went home this weekend to do some grocery shopping and to pick up some stuff. I'm not going back to Toronto until the holiday weekend so I needed lots of groceries and wrapping paper for all the presents this year. I'm thinking of getting all my nieces and nephew presents and also some of my relatives. It's been a while since I could afford to get presents. I still can't really afford to get too many presents but it will be nice to get into the giving spirit again. As for Jenn's present? Since she reads this, I'm not saying anything related to it.

On Saturday, Jenn and I met up with Mark and Milana for lunch at Congee Wong. Missed the food there. Not the greatest Chinese food, but very consistent with very large portions. We ended up playing mahjongg at Mark's house. I haven't played since high-school It was awesome! I want to play all the time now. Maybe I should've brought the set up to play when Jenn comes up in a few weeks.

Finally put my Hayden Christensen Autograph up for sale on Ebay. I'm hoping to get a decent amount from it. For those who want to check it out, here's the link. With the money from here, I'm hoping to start up the card and hobby business online. I've also got an autographed Rupert Grint Harry Potter that should fetch a few hundred dollars. I'm thinking about posting that one as well. One new series I've started to look into is Benchwarmers. It's a trading card series with models, Playboy bunnies and celebrities. It's not pornographic but some of the shots are a little racy. The cards are on 42 pt stock so they're thick and they're nicely done. Check out the site at here. I love the wide range that non-sports has to offer.

Got to go to work tomorrow. Back on the phones....bleh. Oh well.

DRAGONCRYPT 12/3/2006 11:55:38 PM