There's some shit I *really* can't do. Like colour. Like general emotion.

I bet you're reconsidering your decision to attend The Vulcan Academy of the Arts.

Logic is hella seductive. I can't lie.

John Hodgman is going to appear on Community, for those who haven't spotted him in the trailer I linked to. I'm so excited for the rest of the season, I want to write something inappropriate about my panties. But I won't, because I'm demure.

Sending good vibes to Suzi on that new bionic arm of hers!

And have a great vacation, Consuela!

funny nice men make life better, just saying.

They are certainly a positive, I'll say that.

I am so excited for your classes, ita !! We have enjoyed the hell out of the two classes we took on this trip. We were super charmed by the French and Italian executive chefs who taught, and got more than our money's worth.

I think everyone should take classes in stuff they find interesting!

Next up is the last thing on our schedule, the Japanese baths at 10,000 waves. We thought we might get snowed out, but it's still lovely here, if chilly.

Then we deliberately planned nothing for the last day and a half of our trip, so we could just relax and not come home from vacation all frazzled. It's been really good.

Peel-off charcoal pencils might be a good transitional step. You'd have more control and familiarity from using the pencil shaft (plus cleaner fingers afterwards), but the lead itself is wide and leaves dark, partially blendable charcoal marks.

For dog lovers: [link]

oh, everyone going on vacation soon should assume the role of sarameg, if you know what I mean. good times.

GOOD TIMES.

On the allergy med tip, Claritin or whatever makes me feel like my head is stuffed with cotton. I decided that being snuffly was better than that, but I don't have severe allergies.

I think everyone should take classes in stuff they find interesting!

After asking you people a while ago, I ultimately signed up for the make-and-take cooking class, not the Mexican one, after consultation with a friend who pointed out that I probably won't start making more authentic Mexican food at home, when the half-assed kind I currently make is easy and delicious, and I should just take that money to a restaurant.

I am currently super happy that my 1pm got cancelled, and it is gorgeous outside.

good times.

Oh yeah, I'm totally having vacation sex, but it's handy because I brought my nookie along with me.

I linked this on FB but thought I'd toss it up here.

I heard Jane McGonigal on the radio the other day. She's a game designer that applies game design to real life. When she was recovering from a traumatic brain injury she was depressed and unmotivated and having a hard time moving forward. So she decided to create a social game with her sister called, "Jane the Concussion Slayer." (She's a Buffy fan.)

It was a combination of social media, social support group and game design to create Quests, identify Obstacles/Bad Guys and assign points and leveling up to achieve goals.

There are several interesting aspects to the game design, including the necessity of depending on other people to assign you quests (which take you out of own ruts), and hold you accountable and measure your progress.

A guy who was recovering from an accident where he was run over while riding his bicycle, talks about how he used the program (now called SuperBetter) to achieve his Epic Win.

In her discussion on the radio, she also talked about creating a game for the New York Public Library to draw more kids to the library. It was pretty fascinating to hear how she worked out the game design. Her first thought was of classic children's book From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler and asked if she could lock people into the library overnight.

Once she got approval for that she designed a game that involved overnight research quests by the game players (I think they took 200 out of 10,000 who applied).

The epic win was that the process of doing the research wound up creating a collaborative book. They had a bookbinder on-site who completed a finished volume that the library put into its Rare Book collection. All the gamers get listed in the Card Catalog as authors and have rights in perpetuity to visit the Rare Book Collection. Pretty cool epic win.

Those pencils look great, Matt. I'll have to check them out.

I can't properly articulate how big a step this class is. It's been, what, 23 years since my last art class? And before that, I was 14 when my art teacher kinda asked me to stop coming to class? I've been partially afraid/disbelieving of learning art since then. I'm the worst kind of self-taught. Not an arrogant sort, but I just don't believe I'm teachable. It's not that you don't have anything to teach me--I just don't think I can learn.

So going out and dropping a wad of cash as an old dog--I don't even know what I'm doing. And this teacher doesn't know what he's gotten into either.

Speaking of game playing, anyone here play Mass Effect? Specifically are you/will you be playing ME3? Is it the sort of thing I would be swallowed up in, never to return? I'm watching IO9 writhe in orgasms over it, and I'm perplexed. They don't want to be spoilt, they're irate they can't import their Shepard's faces from ME1->ME2->ME3, and have to start again from scratch and can't replicate the faces they've spent so many hours with, and and and...and I realise I really have no idea how complex computer games have gotten these days. Last time I was a "person" in a computer game, my name was Larry, and I was wearing a leisure suit.

I am agog.