So besides the ever-present Bejeweled 3, which is my go-to when I'm completely bored, I've had a short attention span for my games lately.  Over the last week I tried out a few different demos, and here were my impressions:

This was a lot more fun than I expected.  I thought it was along the same lines as Portal - a puzzle game that forces you to be creative to get past the task at hand.  I didn't complete the entire demo, but according to steam, I played it for almost three hours.  The little goo balls reminded me of the minions from Despicable Me.  I may go back and purchase this game.

This game peaked my interest mostly because it's an RPG, but also because you play as a caster no matter what.  And I love my finger-wagglers.  Even more interesting was the idea of combining spells to create new ones.  So I tried it out.  Sure enough, the combining spells was pretty cool.  But for me, the interface of a game is very important too, and if I'm not feeling it within the first short while, that may well kill the game for me.  This was the case in Magicka.  Our normal WASD keys are actually spell keys, along with a few others.  You have to remember which one is which element so that you combine them properly, as some elements do not mix.  The other thing that kept tripping me up was having to pre-load every spell.  So it would be click a letter, or a few letters, then mouse click.  Melee is a different mouse click.  AOE is a different mouse click.  I just think that while the game itself was great, the implementation could have vbeen better.

So again, sorting through Steam demos, I came across Dungeons. Basically, it was described as a Diablo-type dungeon crawler, where you're actually the dungeon boss, and you get to kill heroes that come into the dungeons that you build.  I was intrigued, so I downloaded it.  This was definitely interesting.  I think I'd have to call it a strategy game, as there were various things to strategically deal with.  You had to build your dungeon, make sure heroes don't make off with your gold, and keep monsters away from the heart of your dungeon.  The heroes spawned about every minute.  The game had a bit of an Overlord feel to it, which was fine as I enjoyed that game too.  I think I'd like to play the demo more before I decide on a purchase or not.  So far I'd only spent a little over an hour on it.

What an awesome weekend!  Usually in the Puget Sound area, the nice days are during the week when everyone's working, and then we get the crap weather during the weekend.  But this past weekend was the opposite.  Yesterday we got up to at least 65 degrees, maybe higher.  I know it felt pretty damn warm while I was out there mowing the lawn and pulling weeds!  Here's to hoping we get more weekends like that.

So my financial aid packet came in.  After federal student loans, I still need to come up with $10,000 to cover tuition costs (not including all the nickel and dime costs like parking, books, etc).  It seems I didn't qualify for any grants, and am going in with no scholarship money.  My credit sucks thanks to being out of a job for two years and coming close to losing my home at one point.  Somehow, in the next month, I need to find money.  I'm stressed, but I know that it will work out somehow.  Most likely I'll have to get a cosigner for a private student loan.

On the bright side, I found out that I got in under regular admission, and not access admission.  The access admission program was a program that looked at things besides the student's GPA and LSAT scores, and is more for students who come from disadvantaged backgrounds.  I was told at one point I was being considered for access admission.  Why is this good?  Because I can now be proud that I got in under my own merits, and was not given special considerations.

I'm not going to go into all that crap.  Yay, we got him.  He had already gotten to a point of irrelevancy though.  And of course, Obama takes credit, like any politician in office would have done.  The only reason I bring up the OBL situation is this:  My 11 year old, 6th grade daughter had no idea who he was.  When I said he was responsible for the 9/11 attack, she still seemed confused.  A lightbulb finally went off when I said the Twin Towers.  WTF are they teaching these kids in school?  She doesn't know what 9/11 is, or why it's called the 9/11 attack?  She had no idea who OBL was?  I mean, he was big figure even before 9/11 thanks to previous acts and attempted acts of terror.  How disappointing.

I guess that's it for now.  Really should actually get some work done!

By the way, if you're a minor... this still applies, trust me.

The day after high school graduation, I moved out of my family's house.  I had only just turned 17.  Legally, I couldn't really have bills in my name.  So imagine my surprise a month or two later when I got a late/collection notice from the local cable tv company.  Family of mine was using my info to garner services from the local cable tv company, along with some other stuff that I found out about later.  Here I was, not even 18, and I already had outstanding debt.  My credit score was fucked before I even turned 18.  And all it took was a name.  No social security number needed.  No driver's license number needed.  Obviously date of birth wouldn't have even been helpful.  Just a name and address.

If you're younger, you may not understand how important your credit is.  It affects SO many things, from whether you can get a Best Buy card or not, to whether you can finance a new vehicle.  In most places in the US it even affects things like the price of your car insurance.

In January of 2010, my bank (a local credit union) sent out a notice to many of its members.  Apparently some merchants had been hacked, and they were afraid that members' info might be at risk.  So they were just going to automatically replace everyone's cards.  A few months after we had gotten the new cards, we noticed some very odd charges on our bank account.  After a discussion with the bank, it turns out that the charges were made to online businesses with my husband's debit/credit card info.  We're pretty sure that a restaurant that we had visited somewhat recently was to blame.  We shut down my husband's card immediately, and none of the charges went through (they were still on hold for approval).

Now yes, we have fraud protection.  Yes, that means we can get our money back easily enough if someone does use our info to make purchases.  It means filing a police report, filling out paperwork, and of course, cancelling your card ASAP and waiting to get a new one in the mail.  Have you thought about what life is like to go 2 weeks without your debit card?  Try it.  Don't take out cash first.  Just take your card right now and put it somewhere for two weeks.  See how that works out.

    So my husband and I previously only had one car, which he usually had for work.  It's a 1999 Ford Explorer Sport (2 door).  I love my SUV's, and this one was cute, and the price was right when we bought it.  But it's an SUV, which inherently means it sucks for gas mileage.  And the hubby has it most of the time anyway.  Considering I'm starting school soon, and will be in Seattle till late in the evenings, we needed a second vehicle - something with good gas mileage.  We settled on trying to find a Ford Focus, since their gas mileage is great.  (And we try to stick with domestic vehicles.)  After some run-around, some stress, and some crappy financing, Friday night I drove off the lot of my local Ford dealership with a 2008 Ford Focus.  The MPG's on this manual bad boy are 24 City, 35 Highway.  Great stuff.  It also has SYNC (the hands free voice recognition which hooks up to your phone, USB media, etc), which was fun as hell to mess with.  This car is also peppy as hell.  It's like an econo-sport car.  And it purrs like a kitten.  I'm quite happy with my new car, even if I'm not thrilled about car payments.

Another Convention

So there's this convention in the Seattle area every year called NorWesCon.  It's a sci-fi convention.  I have some friends who have been going for years, and some who've been on staff for years.  They've been trying to get me and the hubby to go forever.  So this year we finally went for a while on Saturday night.  I was disappoint.  

First of all, I guess this year was their biggest year yet with around 3,600 people.  Uh... yay?   Rink-a-dink.  But then, my first ever convention was the 10k plus of PAX. 

Second, I found out that the celebrities there will almost always be crap because the convention staff refuse to pay a celebrity to show up to their convention.  Their loss I guess.

Third, the convention seems like nothing more than an excuse for people to dress up weird, and hang out and get drunk.  Now while the free booze was nice, if we were doing this convention right, we would have needed to get a hotel room.  I'm not paying for a hotel room just to get drunk when I can do that in the comfort of my own home.  I'm not really a big crowd person, and people-watching can only keep me entertained for so long, no matter how cool or weird they all look.  And I understand that lots of the guys go there to watch the chicks, but honestly, only like 10% of the chicks there are even worth checking out.  Trust me, I check out chicks too.  But here are a few pictures that I lifted from someone's Flickr of the weirdness that is NorWesCon.  I will never go again, I don't think.  But I will now drag my friends to PAX so they can see a REAL convention.

 Woah... These are not the droids I was looking for.
   Ok, this guy actually did look pretty neat.  Hell, the suit would have been cool even without all the glowy.
   Don't ask... I dunno.
   One of the decent ones.
     Sorry if I've scarred you.

Easter

I realized I almost forgot about Easter.  So we didn't do much.  I got everyone some candy and a chocolate bunny.  Got an Easter present for the kid.  Did a nice stuffed salmon dinner.  But it turns out that my ungrateful child believes that 11 is definitely NOT too old to still have her Easter morning egg hunt around the house.  She was also quite pissed that the mall and Gamestop don't seem to realize that Easter should only be celebrated first thing in the morning when kids get their baskets and such, and that the mall and Gamestop should be open after that.  I didn't take any pictures, but here's an old one for the holiday spirit:

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is a very good book, part of quite an interesting series.  I'm on the 2nd book of the series right now.  My daughter had originally got The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo  for herself, but it was too slow of a starter for her.  I'm kind of glad she decided not to read it, as some of the sex crimes that are discussed are something she can live without reading.  I've yet to see the movie for the first book

HBO's Game of Thrones premiered last night.  It should be no surprise, given that it's an HBO series, that there were lots of boobs in the episode, and some straight-up, no-doubt-about-it fucking.  But for anyone who's read the books, the show follows them quite well so far.  I'm still not terribly keen on Lena Headey as a blonde, but at least she's a good actress.

FOX's Fringe kicked off it's season finale countdown on Friday night with an episode that can simply be described as trippy.  From Fringe to the Matrix to a comic to zombies, with entering someone's mind and LSD and trying to download a consciousness to a computer.  Leave it to Fringe.

 

In other news... I found out on Friday that I've been accepted into Seattle University's School of Law.  There are two main reasons this is a big deal.  First, it was the only school I applied to.  I don't believe in putting all my eggs in one basket, but it's the only school that offers night classes so I can continue to work.  Second, I knew that my GPA and LSAT scores were good, but not spectacular, and the more that time passed without hearing anything, the more concerned I was that I would have to reapply next year.  But I'm in, and if all goes according to plan, I'll start classes this June and graduate in 2015.  Exciting!  And stressful!