Welp, it’s been a week! A nice, relaxing week off from school and almost every other responsibility. A week of rest.

I left on Friday night to my dad’s, where I stayed for the weekend. I live in the heart of a busy suburb, with my apartment directly next to the busiest highway in the area. I take public transport to get everywhere, I go to school in downtown Montreal, and my entourage generally consists of condos and shopping malls. My dad works in the same downtown area (a 20-minute walk from my school, which is pretty cool) but lives a 45-minute commute away, in the Laurentian country. Surrounded by mountains, forests, dirt trails and half-paved roads, I felt like it was the perfect place for me to take some time off. It certainly helps that I don’t get to see my dad as often as I’d like, too.

And so, I went over and had a great time. Accompanied him for the few errands he had to run, which ended up in buying a bunch of bread for me to make french toast with, and Krispy Kreme doughnuts. On Sunday, we went hiking out on a local trail, with the weather being perfect. The weather was warm, the sky was completely clear of clouds, and there was absolutely no wind.

I got back on Monday, and it’s since been a mixture of relaxing, drawing, playing games, hanging out with friends, catching up on TV shows, (Finished LOST and Metalocalypse!) and cleaning up. I also did some fun arts and crafts non-sense, like make a display of my favorite albums.

It wasn’t exactly the most productive of breaks, but I took the time I needed to chill out from the regular routine. I feel a lot better, even if I didn’t exactly accomplish much.

Though I played the usual SSX and Modern Warfare 3, I started a new Mass Effect save earlier this week because I lost my original saves when moving to a new 360. It’s been an interesting experience, to say the least. A lot of what Mass Effect great is still there, but there is also a lot that has not particularly held up well.

The inventory is still total garbage, the loading screens between individual sectors on the Galaxy Map is a drag, the shooting is acceptable at best, and there really needs to be an actual running speed when holding down A. But even still, the game remains great. The story is still my favorite, the characters are still great, and the game still has a sense of style that I sorely missed in 2. The B-movie, 80’s sci-fi look and feel to everything... I felt like it really defined what Mass Effect looked like, and that Bioware departed from that saddens me. Maybe it will come back some time in the future. One can hope, really.

This weekend was also the start of the 2012 Formula One season. I haven’t kept up with the sport for the last... two years or so, so I got really excited when I became able to watch it again.

The qualifying session on Saturday was surprisingly entertaining, with some really surprising results coming from it. Ferrari placing so far back was my biggest surprise. I mean, I know they haven’t been doing that great as of late, but that bad? Really rough. Vettel not being in the top three was also surprising, though I can’t say I was disappointed with Hamilton and Button taking the top spots. I was disappointed with Kimi Raikkonen placing so far back, though. For a return to F1, I was sad to see him not reach the potential he had with the Lotus car.

Even more entertaining was the race on Sunday. As a Button fan, I got all giddy when he blasted into the lead straight out of the first corner. Even more impressive was his ability to not only stay there for the majority of the race, (eventually winning it! :D) but that he managed to create an 11 second lead between him and Hamilton in second. The battles between Hamilton and Vettel were also a ton of fun to watch, though I was bummed that Grosjean and Schumacher got taken out of the race so early. Rosberg did a pretty good job with his laps, but I felt like there would of been a lot more action at the front and middle of the top-10 pack if Grosjean and Schumacher would of been there. Even still, there were a lot of great moments, like Perez being terrific on defense, and Kobayashi showing confidence and aggressiveness in his overtaking. The weather was beautiful, the track was in great condition, and there were a lot of really good moments in the race--like the hilarious radio conversation between Raikkonen and his crew about the blue flag. That had me giggling for a while. Good stuff.

It was a really great start to the season, and shows promise that this year might not be a Vettel/RedBull runaway like it was last year. Mercedes has an extremely competent car, McLaren has two world champions driving their brilliant car, and Lotus is also showing a good amount of promise. It’ll be interesting for sure, and I can’t wait to watch the Malasyian race next weekend.

Also, I guess the F1 part of the blog will return next week. And every subsequent week. I want somewhere to talk about it. Maybe I should spin this off into its own thing? I don’t know. I guess I’ll keep it here for now.

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And that’s it! See you next week. :]

How do I listen to this?

KAIDAN IS THE BEST

@artofwar420: With your miiiiind.

@AjayRaz: FFffasjfskdhkshfskjfhksjdhjskfdkjhI didn't write anything about them because they don't deserve anything to be written about them.

Oh, you finished LOST? What did you think?

@Voxel: Bananas. I think I saw the ending coming, but it certainly didn't bother me like it seemed to for the rest of the planet. I actually kind of liked it. That series is pretty fucking amazing, overall. Really glad I watched it.