Well, year two of college is over, and that means I'm halfway done! Yay! Sometimes it's hard to believe that two years of college has gone by. Sometimes I can't believe the stuff that has changed in a year. In a year, I've found myself in a new major from what I once believed for most of my life that I was going to do. Some people I've grown apart from. Others I've grown closer to. Especially a certain nerd boy. ;) I've found that I've grown more outgoing and independent than I was during freshman year, when I spent most of my time in my dorm on my computer.

...okay, I still spend a lot of time on my computer when I'm alone, but I've been spending more time hanging out with friends and just being outside the dorm.

My summer so far has been great. Phil came home with me to stay for the first week, and we had an amazing time. I of course went through my asthma/allergy hell, but I still had fun. We went bowling, I showed him some cool places in our area, like Made In Japan, where he wanted to buy everything in the store. ;) We of course did our usual of playing games together, and my dad even showed him how to ride an ATV and took us out on the trails, where he got to see the hills of Broome County. Phil loved trying all the local foods like spiedies and Brozetti's pizza, and I got him to try bubble tea. We even played Scene It against my parents one night, and it was so funny doing a victory dance after they did theirs in front of us the previous game. ;)

I loved having him here. I don't remember a time I wasn't smiling when he was around, because he was being his sweet self. He even tucked me in one night because he wanted to, and that was so sweet. I always woke up before him, even though I was usually up for an extra two hours on my computer after he went to bed, and when he woke up he would come over to me and give me a kiss or a hug, or both. When he left I tried not to cry at the bus station, and I was able to keep distracted for most of the day, but that evening I cried really hard. It's funny, I don't think I've cried that hard over someone leaving. I mean, it's sad when people have to go home, but I just outright bawled. I felt kinda pathetic, but it also showed how much I missed him.

My plan right now is to go visit sometime in July, but no date is set. I am thinking sometime in mid-July, but there's two things I need to plan around. The Unadilla race is July 15th, and I go every year with Man and my family. However, Phil's family wants to see me before they go to Florida, and they leave the 21st as far as I know. I'd like to stay a week like Phil did. We've got time to figure this out though, so no worries.

Oh, and we're planning on going to see The Birthday Massacre on August 10th! They're playing at the Blacksun Festival in New Haven, CT, which is a Gothic and Industrial music festival. It lasts 3 days, but Phil and I just want to see The Birthday Massacre, so we're going for one day. It should be fun, because I get to goth myself out again. That's the one time I enjoy wearing makeup. ;)

Other than that, my summer will just be filled with me keeping myself busy. I've applied to places for a job, but so far I've heard from nobody. I've applied to more places than last year, and called and visited places asking about my application, so it's not like I'm jobless through lack of effort. If I don't get a job, I might do some volunteer work instead. I've also got many new games and old games to beat, like Twilight Princess, the other endings of Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VII, and...Pokemon Diamond. Stop laughing.

I'm also going to do some computer science stuff, like learning a new language or two, and reading up on stuff for my next courses to get a head start. I'm also thinking of making my own design for this page, or even my own webpage. Yeah, I know I've talked about a webpage a long time ago, but I kinda want to make my own from scratch just for the hell of it.

Oh, and of course, the Boba Fett costume. ;)

My biggest goal, however, is to relax. So far I've been having moments this summer with worrying, stressing, and other things, for no real rational reason, and I hate it. My worrying has gotten in the way, and I do not want that on myself, or to put others through it any longer. It's going to be hard, because I've always been a worry-wart. However, if I'm truly going to be happy with myself, then I need to learn when I need to worry, and when I need to just back off. I've got nothing to worry about in my life:
-I'm in a wonderful relationship that has been making me extremely happy.
-I've got friends who I enjoy being with.
-School has been fun, despite the difficult times, and I love being at college.
-While my health could be better, it could've been a lot worse. :P
-I've got hobbies and interests that make me happy, like knitting and gaming.

So, yeah, I've just got to concentrate more on the good stuff in my life, than worry about the "what if"s in life. Despite that one factor that needs to be worked on, I've got many things to do this summer to keep my busy, and having fun. :)

Well, seeing as how I haven't updated this thing in forever, I thought I might do just that. (AKA: I need to study for Calc II, but I hate Calc II, so I want to do this instead)

Over the past two months, I've realized more and more things I have learned about relationships, and the ones I've been in. Firstly, I've learned to listen to the voice in my head. The first two relationships had their good moments, but they were clouded by the bad ones enough that I could not be involved anymore. There were times that in my mind I was hearing "this isn't right. Get out now," but I didn't listen. The first one I waited WAY too long to listen to the little voice. The second, I acted on it sooner. It did help in that one though that neither of us felt the same anymore, so it worked out for the best. I still hang out with the guy, too, which I feel quite lucky about since it's a rarity apparently for people to go from a relationship to friendship with no hard feelings at all. :P

My biggest mistake was just jumping into dating someone instead of getting to know them first as a friend. I was able to manage a little with the first one, but I sadly learned about the bad things about him too late, and it hurt. The second one I saw what I didn't like early on, but tried anyways. We both realized that we could be friends, but not a couple, because we just acted like friends only, and not really anything more. So, my advice to you all (AKA: whoever reads this damn thing :P,) is to learn to be friends first. From my experience, it makes everything so much better. Phil and I have been friends since freshman year. We hung out a lot, learned about all the things we had in common, and were there for each other when we had problems and needed someone to talk to. I've learned so much about him, good and bad, that I was able to see clearly what I would've been getting into if I attempted to date him.

And you know what? That was the best thing ever.

It's been said that the best relationships were friendships first. I can say with all my heart and soul that this is very true. It's only been a little over two months into this relationship, and I've felt more connection and affection than I've ever felt before.

I'm not saying I regret my past relationships. Far from it. I savor them as learning experiences. I've been able to think about what I wanted out of a relationship, and out of life. I've been able to see what makes me happy and unhappy, and make decisions on what to do. I noticed as time went on that I was able to be more outspoken about things that were bothering me. I was too meek at first to say anything, and that caused me months of stress and aggrivating my nervous habits. Now I only get those habits back over school stuff. I was also able to gain a few more friends out of the second relationship, and something to do on Friday nights (yay Dungeons and Dragons!)

I've learned that I'm the type of person who likes being given lots of affection. Things like holding my hand, looking at me for no reason, and small kisses on the hand. That's what I like. I love being surprised. I love being with someone who can act goofy when needed, and serious when appropriate...but mostly goofy. I also love being reassured when I'm feeling sad that the world isn't ending, and that it'll get better.

When I was having problems in a relationship before, Phil told me that everything was going to be all right. Fast forward a few months, and he and I are together. One night, he gave me a hug, smiled, and told me "I told you everything was going to be all right."

And he was right.

Yeah, read the title of the post. :P I'm not talking about me breaking one of the Ten Commandments, taking the Lord's name in vain, or anything like that. Nope, not going to hell for that. What am I going to Hell for?

Playing Dungeons and Dragons.

Back in the 70's, when D&D first started coming out, some people began to freak out thinking that the people who played it would be able to summon demons or use "real magic" and stuff like that. A bunch of crap got posted in the media about how kids were killing themselves and/or other people with D&D, parents bought the hype, and were like "RARRRRR, BAN D&D!!!1! PROTECT THE CHILDREN!!1!!!!!"

For those who aren't up with popular culture, Dungeons and Dragons is a role playing game (RPG) where a group of people create fantasy characters on special sheets of paper, roll lots of dice, and have a Dungeon Master (DM) that leads the campaign, tells the story, and walks people through the battles. Dice is rolled to see if we succeed in doing things, such as using a rope, or attacking a monster.

Satanic, isn't it? (Although my black/grey dice with red numbers is soooooo evil looking...)

Unfortunately, some people just can't get their heads around the fact that a bunch of people sitting around a table with pieces of paper, dice, and pencils, are not going to summon hellspawn by adding numbers, which is what we do most of the time besides actual roleplaying. And also unfortunately, people still believe this crap that came up in the 70's today. There's a comic done by Christian Fundie Jack Chick called Dark Dungeons, where he shows the "evils" of D&D. Of course the people in the comic don't play the game right at all (you need to roll a dice to see if the theif actually failed to see the trap, Ms. Frost. You can't just delare them dead. What kind of DM are you, huh?!) For the curious, here's a link to the comic: Dark Dungeons

Because I'm bored and don't feel like working on stuff, let's see how I'm going to Hell based on the campaigns I've participated in, shall we?

My first campaign (AKA: Me the newbie): I played with my brother and his friends, and I was a fighter. We didn't do much except take TWO HOURS to kill a bunch of goblins, because most of the time was spent with them throwing dice at their heads or humping each other.
Reasons for going to Hell: Murder and homosexuality.

Rob's Mini Campaign (AKA: "Uhhh...internet?"): A one-day game by one of my first boyfriend's friends, he was making one for a convention and wanted to test it out on us first. I was a Rogue. I of course stole shit from people, including the other theif/swashbuckler. I threatened the shady NPC wizard to go help the team or I stabbed him in the back. When the wizard was down, and our Lawful Good paladin was looking away, I stabbed the wizard and stole his stuff. And of course there was the killing of monsters as usual. We did almost save the princess, but she was already dead when we found her...whoops.
Reasons for going to Hell: Murder and theivery.
Funny moment from this campaign:
(We're fighting some ghost thingys, which can only be hurt by magic. My rogue stole a wand from the wizard I killed, so he pulls it out and uses his "Use Magic Device" skill to cast spells. After the battle...)
Jaque's character: "Hey, where did you get that wand?"
Me: "Uhh...internet?"
Jaque: "Okay, let's roll a bluff check." *rolls die, and so do I. He sighs* "I believe that you found that off the internet..."
Ross: "Hmmmm, I want to see what this 'internet' thing is..." *rolls die...mind you he has a good skill in this for his character.* "...I have no clue what the internet is."

Ross's Campaign (AKA: "Yay, fire!"): During winter break last year I participated in my then-boyfriend's campaign. I was a sorcerer named Haggis (though we didn't really use names besides our real ones. I jus put that one down for fun.) Our group was mostly a bunch of pyros, so we regularly set shit on fire, like shooting fire arrow into bushes for no reason other than they moved. During our first quest, we ended up killing a band of lizard folk with torches because we thought they burned down the village we saw, and they were heading for our town. Of course we get to our town and our king is like "Dude, why did you kill my lizard army?" Oops. We got thrown out of that town. Then we trick another lizard army who was pissed off at us for killing their people by giving them a torch that was the "Sacred Fire" of one of our characters's hometown...but it was just a regular torch. We then went on a side mission to rescue some blink dog pups...which ended in stabbing the owner of the pups, burning down his mansion, and setting the creatures inside free. Didn't do anything else besides the "killing monsters and doing quests" thingy. Might've done more with this campaign, but considering I broke up with the DM, I doubt I'll be participating again. (Which is good, because I threw out my character sheet. :P)
Reasons I'm going to Hell: Murder, lying, vandalism (Hey, things kinda burn when they're set on fire, okay?), and use of magic, which is a part of witchcraft.

Ben's Campaign (AKA: "I stole your pants!"): Okay, this one I'll definately go to Hell for due to the concept of it alone. It was an Evil campaign. We all were evil characters. I was a Rogue again. I didn't do much in the campaign because they tended to play on Fridays and Saturdays, which was when I had work. My character did do a lot of stealing, though.
Reasons I'm going to Hell: Theivery

Rich's Campaign (AKA: "You get punched in the face."): My current campaign. Right now my character is Siver, a Rogue (I love playing Rogues, can't you tell?) The other characters are/were a half-orc barbarian named Raz (Shane's character, and dead), Seighail the wizard (Gabe's, and dead), Gabe's new character who I forgot the name and vocation (sorry Gabe!), a sorcerer (Chris's, and I forgot the name, too. Sorry!), and whatever Shane's new character is since he hasn't rolled one up yet.
We've all done bad things in this campaign, but as for Sivir, so far he has:
-Broken out of jail, where I was in there for stealing
-Stole from a drunk guy who was in the jail with us
-Lied to said drunk guy when he confronted me later, accusing me of stealing, and gave him a third of his gold back
-Was basically an ass to our late half-orc Barbarian, Raz, just because I could. ;)
-Drank my ass off in almost every town I've been in. "Alcohol is the Devil's drink!"
-Stole from some travellers who was asking our Wizard for help for their poisoned friend. (I ended up getting shot in the back for that.)
-Stole from a magic user while I was on the island with all magic users...I could've been put to death/set on fire for doing that, but somehow I rolled a 23.
-Took up Bounty Hunting with my comrades.
-Broke into a house to go interrogate a guy about one of our bounties and his wherabouts.
-Knocked out a woman in said house while she was asleep thinking it was the guy, then tied her to the bed and gagged her so she wouldn't scream and/or go get the town guards. (Hey, I wasn't the only one who was doing this, shut up. :P)
-Looted the house after someone stole our bounty...unfortunately, the wizard stole more shit than I did.
-One of the items I tried to sell to a pawn shop and kept on being told to get the fuck out by the owners...was a golden urn filled with the grandparent's ashes of the owner of the house. I ended up dumping them out and selling the urn. (Hey, I didn't know what I picked up when I was looting, but next time I'm going to check inside anything I see before I steal it.)
-Looted the houses of a ghost town. (And the sorcerer found the richest house on the street and got more stuff. What the fuck...)
-I'm partially to blame for the deaths of two other players. Gabe's character, Seighail, casted a higher level spell than he can safely do, failed his will save, and went nuts. He started running around like crazy in the burning lighthouse we were in, and I told Raz to knock him out and get him out of there. (Shane wasn't there to play his character, Raz, so Rich was taking over.) Raz failed to knock Seighail out, Seighail killed him, and Seighail went running through the town on 2hp, and tried taking on some undead skeletons. He died. And Sivir, being a good rogue, looted Seighail's body when he found him.
-Besides the theivery mentioned above, Sivir is also guilty of many other "sleight of hand" moves...and failures. I fucking swear, he's been punched in the face more times than he's actually succeeded in stealing things. He's even been shanked with a knife, and ended up laying on the ground until he recovered enough HP to be able to drag himself back to his inn room to rest and heal. I've been picked on by the guys for this. :P
Reasons I'm going to Hell: All of the above, and cross-dressing since I'm playing as a guy.
Funny moment from this campaign:
(While Seighail and I were going through the house looting stuff, I ran into him. He wouldn't allow me to steal the jewelry of the lady we tied up because he told her he wouldn't do that, and threatened me with violence if I did.)
Sivir: But...!
Seighail: No, you are not allowed to touch it.
Sivir: But I want to steal stuff!
Seighail: So go find something else to steal!
Sivir: I COULDN'T FIND SHIT TO STEAL!!!
(At this point Seighail has looted many other rooms, and Sivir has found nothing. Everyone in the room bursts out laughing after my/Sivir's outburst of anger. Sivir...you suck as a rogue.)

Basically, if what the fundies say is true, and D&D is the work of Satan, then I've got my seat on the bus to hell right now. Which is fine, because apparently we play D&D there. There's probably a catch to that, though. Like all we roll...IS ONES!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Leave the comments about how I'm a devil-worshipper or something. I liiiiiike comments. Don't make me force you. Seriously, don't make me come over there and make you type.

Okay, you asked for it. *rolls a d20, and comes up with a 1.* Damn...

So, a couple days ago was my most favorite holiday of the year: Halloween. The chance to dress up like an idiot and not be questioned (too much), to get candy from strangers for no reason other than saying "Trick or Treat," to go to Haunted Houses, and many many other things that make this holiday awesome.

So, here's how my Halloween weekend and Halloween day was:

Friday we were supposed to play D&D, but we couldn't (again...). Shane said he had to do something that night, so we were going to play on Saturday (little did we know, Rich, the DM and therefore the one who makes the final call on when/if we play, had no idea about this...whoopsie.) Anyways, so Chris (who is part of our D&D group), Phil and I went to dinner at Sbarro's. At Hunt we saw a sign for a free Haunted House and corn maze thingy in Cooperstown. So, we pack into one of the vans being driven back and forth there, and off we went. After a long drive, we got there. It's at the Cooperstown Fun Park, which has an arcade, batting cage, and go-karts, too. First we ran through the corn maze. We mostly cheated and ran off the path, but we got to the other end and back. Next we went into the Haunted House. The best room was one that had a girl on a table begging us to help her, and Leatherface came and sawed off her hand. He flung the hand at Chris and it bounced off his chest, which was wicked funny. Then we raced Go Karts, which the whole time I think all of us pretended we were playing Mario Kart. There was also a "Cinema Scare" thing where it was an interactive movie. We basically sat in the theater while a DVD played and things came out at us (and I tossed one of the rubber spiders thrown at us over my shoulder at the girls behind us. Fun times. :)) Anyways, then we just played arcade games and waited to go back. When I got back I played a couple rounds of Mixed Match on Tetris & Dr. Mario with Phil, then hung out with Rich and Gabe until 5am. The only bad part about this day besides no D&D was that I lost my cell phone in the corn maze. Oh well...

Saturday, alas, no D&D again. Phil came over and he, Briana and I watched The Wizard. Afterwards Phil and I went downtown to Eckard so I can grab some Halloween stuff. Phil was supposed to go out with Gabe and Shane to a party, but plans changed. Phil still wanted to go out though, so I said I'd go with him. I threw together a rediculous costume that consisted of:
-Black t-shirt saying "I'm like a superhero with no powers or motivation."
-White long sleeve shirt underneath.
-Plaid pyjama pants.
-7-up boxers over the pants.
-Combat boots with pants tucked into them.
-Brightly colored beach towel hanging on me like a cape.
-Hair in pigtails.
-Two different pairs of big earrings.
-Tiara
-And lastly, facepaint.
Anyone who has a facebook has seen this picture. When I went upstairs to meet up with Phil and see who else was going with us, Rich opened the door, looked at me funny, said "What the fuck?!", and tried to shut the door in my face. Chris ended up coming with us dressed as a pizza. We at first were waiting for one group of people to go, but they took too long so we just left. We all ended up going to the same house anyways, though. :) We chilled out there for about two hours before we left and came back. Got a sub from Mills, watched a couple episodes of MASH with Rich and Shane, and then I went to bed.

Sunday sucked. There was no D&D again, and for some reason I just wasn't in a good mood to begin with, so I was getting really pissed about this since it that made it the 4th week straight of no D&D. We've only played twice so far this semester. I was tempted to burn my character sheet, but my senses caught up to me before I could get the lighter. I felt really unmotivated, so I basically just sat around all day...

Halloween I planned on running around campus dressed up as a Ghostbuster. I got the costume on, and went to breakfast like that. Unfortunately, my stomach was bothering me, and I got overheated, so in the middle of my Programming class I had to take off the costume. :( So, I ran around my classes in my pj pants, boots, and a black t-shirt. My Women's Studies discussion group was disappointed when I didn't show up in costume, but they understood. After class I went downtown with Abby to get some stuff for her to wear while trick or treating. Then I went to dinner with Phil, Chris, Gabe, and Rob (guy from Hulbert). Afterwards, Shane, Sam (Shane's gf), and Abby joined us, and we went out trick or treating! Here's what we were dressed up as:
-Me: Ghostbuster, complete with inflatable Proton Pack.
-Phil: Luigi
-Chris: Giant Pizza.
-Gabe: Wore Roman armor that he made himself, and it looked AWESOME.
-Shane: Wrapped his bedsheets around him and went as a philosopher.
-Sam: Marylin Monroe
-Abby: Ghost of Christmas Past
-Rob: Mobster.
The first couple houses had nothing, but once we got to one with candy we started getting a lot. Here's a few things that happened:
-A few times when someone said to take one piece of candy, Phil took a handful. :P
-When we were walking away from one house, a guy with a mask who was shuffling along weridly jumps at Gabe, and keeps on shoving up against him while screaming. Gabe was like "wtf?!", and Shane slams the guy away from him and the guy falls into a couple of little girls. There was a stunned moment of "WTF just happened?!" and us laughing about it. Poor Gabe.
-Phil and I getting being told by a woman that we had "such nice parents for getting us these costumes." We didn't mention that we were college sofmores. :P
-Seeing two guys dressed up as boobs...literally.
-Shane chasing after the bus when we tried to get on it and it took off without us. He ran a block before falling to his knees crying "Nooooooo!" Luckily a bus pulled up after that.
-By the time he went back to Hulbert later, Phil had rubbed the black hairspray he had on all over his face, so he looked like a coal miner. :P
Afterwards we hung out upstairs, gave away the candy we didn't like to other people, ordered Dominoes, and played some Smash Bros Melee before we all retired for the evening.

So, all in all, those days were fun (minus Sunday...) And now...CANDY! *eats a tootsie roll*

I got my helmet! The problem is, I got it about 3-4 days later than I should've. I paid about $13 extra for shipping to get priority 2-3 day shipping. I got it in 5-6 days. :/ Oh well...

Okay, I forgot to take some "before" pictures before I started to work on it, but here's a pic I found online of what it looked like.



















The paint job sucked, the visor was crap and I could only see a little bit out of it, it's not as "wide" as the movie Fett helmet, and I couldn't move the rangefinder up. Somehow Rich got the finder to move up, and he got bored while Chris and I were playing Star Wars Battlefront II, and used a pocketknife and pliers to rip off most of the clear plastic on the visor.

Yesterday, I spent most of the day at the art building. I used a Dremel and cut off the rest of the visor, and sanded off the plastic pieces left on. I also sanded the whole helmet, and the copyright info off the back of the helmet. I spray painted the brown parts of the helmet a burgandy color. That paint took only 15 minutes to dry, but the green paint was regular spray paint, so it is still drying despite me painting it at around 11pm last night. It's dry enough to touch, but I got a little green on my fingers from touching certain places on it. I REALLY want to put the paint damage on it, but I have to wait until the paint is completely dry since I'm not sure if the painter's tape will pull off any paint. The red I'm sure won't come off, but the green...just to be safe, I'm waiting until either tomorrow or sometime later in the week depending on the weather.

The cheek area between the red and the green still needs to be painted, but it looks great so far:















































Once I'm done with the paint job, I'll be putting in the new visor. :D

For awhile I've been wanting to make a certain costume just because it'd be awesome, but I was thinking I'd start working on it next summer since I'd have more money and time. Yesterday, after being inspired to begin it by seeing Rich making the armor for this character out of sheet metal because he was bored, I bought this:

w00t!

Ladies and gentleman...I'm gonna be Boba fucking Fett!

Now, there is no way in hell this will be done for Halloween this year, but that's fine. This costume would just be awesome to have. The helmet is going to be repainted, the visor replaced, and just fixed up in general. The hardest part of this costume is probably going to be finding a jumpsuit that not only fits me well, but is also the right color and style. The armor is not going to be made with sheet metal like Rich's is, but Sintra, which is a special PVC plastic that I can put in boiling water to make it soft and then form it over a mold. Can't work on the armor here since the dorm hall has no stove, so it'll be a special project to work on over breaks or when I go home on weekends.

I'm glad I got the helmet. Sometimes I have a tendency to say I'm going to make things, but never follow through with it...well, now that I'm getting the helmet, I'm more likely to work on it. There will be cursing over the process, and the fact I might have a hard time finding some materials, but hopefully in the end I will be successful.

And yes, I'm going to be one short-ass Boba Fett. (I'm 5'2", he's 6'. :P)

For the curious, here's the sites that talk about ways to make the costume:
http://www.skaines.com/fett/
http://www.tk409.com/fett.html
http://www.jedi-academy.com/fett_tips.html
http://www.bobafett.com/manual/costume/

Leave the comments about how nerdy I am, please. :P

(P.S: If you don't know who Boba Fett is...sit your ass down in front of a TV, watch all 6 Star Wars films, and don't talk to me until you're done, got it? Good.) ;)

I'm currently in the computer lab of my dorm, working on a project for programming. I look at the time, and it says 3:14. The first thing in my mind is this: "Mmmm, pie."

Damn I'm nerdy. :D


Speaking of nerdy, Weird Al's new song, "White and Nerdy," is about 10000 degrees of awesomeness. Go to my Myspace to hear it since it's now my profile song.

Now I'm hoping there's some tasty pie for dinner at Wilsbach. Preferably apple or chocolate pudding...