October 3, 2004 -
Right now, Ashley is in my room watching Forrest Gump. I haven't seen that movie in...well, an awfully long time. It's pretty good, although comes off as a bit cheesy now. If anything, it only reminds me how much of a great actor Tom Hanks is. He hasn't had any stand-out roles in the past couple of years, but that doesn't take away from his greatness. Unfortunately, his next film is the CG-animated version of The Polar Express, which looks terrible. Pixar should be the only company sticking its hands in CG films; they're the only company that handles CG humans without making me cringe everytime. There's one point in The Polar Express trailer where Tom Hanks' character does a flip, and its animation is so incredibly awkward it almost made me flip out. Blargh.

I ended up making it through the Week from Hell (tm) in one piece, and it didn't even end up as bad as it could have been. GMR added another review to my pile, but pushed them all back to the next Monday, so I didn't have to work on them till Sunday. The CGW piece wasn't due till Monday, either, and even then, CGW decided to push that piece back until the next month and assign me a compeltely new story about the Valve Software and Vivendi Universal legal case over Half-Life 2 - which caused all sorts of stress last week. Tonight, I have to finish up the rest of the new story by making changes my fab. editor Mr. Darren Gladstone suggested on Friday. I haven't yet decided what those changes will be, but I ought to soon -- I have to turn in the story before I go to sleep, and there isn't much turnaround time now between when my story is turned in and the issue goes to press.

I've decided that I'm going to start up a secondary blog over at 1up, where I'll try and discuss different aspects of the journalistic work I do. There aren't many people who care to listen to me rant and rave about my assignments and experiences and I doubt there are even less people who visit this space, so I figure it's as good a place as any. Then again, I'm having trouble finding the time to update this place more than once every two weeks, so how the hell I'm going to manage a dual-blog system remains to be seen. Maybe it'll teach me to beocme more efficient. Doubtful, my friends, doubtful.

On a sadder note, Lord Voldemort passed away about a week ago today. He was a good hermit crab that didn't last more than three weeks of life, but that wasn't my fault. It wasn't his fault. He simply woke up one morning and forgot to stop living. That sort of thing happens sometimes, and there's nothing you can do except deal with the cards life deals you and move on. Sad, yes. Sad, but true. I've moved on, however, and have basically resigned myself to the fact that having pets is probably not something I should keep doing. I'd like another hermit crab, but I'm probably just not responsible enough to keep up with all the day-to-day tasks to keep things like that alive. Live on Lord Voldemort, live on in hermit crab heaven, wherever that happens to be.

September 16, 2004 -
Damn, I haven't updated this thing in over a week. Sorry about that. I've just been rocking so hard over here at "college" that I haven't had time for something as strange and foreign as a...blog. I suppose that's what you'd call this, anyway. I've been tempted to actually download some blogging software, which would make updating this site a hell of a lot easier, but then I'd have to conform to some random blog template that wouldn't allow for the full creative expression that I so desire when updating this random part of the internet. Because, as you know, every update brings such grand new ideas, such as placing a usually semi-relevant picture to the left or right, alternating sides depending on the update. Fantastically genius, I tell you.

I finally had a chance to see Napoleon Dynamite last night. Even though the film has been severely overhyped to me by friends and by the world at large, it was still really great. Napoleon is such a memorable dork that you can't help but love him. I'm not trying to argue that Napoleon Dynamite isn't an unforgettable comedy; it's just been slightly overrated. I don't like saying that, though, because it really is a damn good film. No one should go through the tortures of life without the wit of Napoleon and Pedro to help back them up. Check it out, but at this point it won't be long before theaters start pulling it. The DVD release is probably January, anyway, so it isn't very long to wait until you can have Napoleon in your very own home.

We have decided that there aren't enough speakers at the school to get us excited, pump us up or make us want to "be a man." So, we decided the only person to solve this dillema is none other than Macho Man Randy Savage, the baddest motherfucker this side of...well, anywhere. Tell us one other wrestler who can match the hypnotic rhymes of Macho Man -- Hulk Hogan might have the classic rock ballad "Hulkster in Heaven," but he simply can't keep up with the speed and ferocity of Savage. Logically, we decided that since Macho Man's album bombed on the charts and is regarded as nothing but sheer novelty, he must have nothing else to do with his time. Obviously, he'd want to come do a combination speed/concert at the University of Illinois, right? Right. I fully plan to make this a concentrated effort, too; tomorrow afternoon Big 3 productions will receive the first step: an e-mail. If the e-mail receives no response, then it's a phone call. If the phone call goes nowhere, it's a petition. There's no way I'm leaving sophomore year of college without having rocked out with the fucking Macho Man.

Next week is not looking too good right now. GMR assigned me three reviews (of awesome games, mind you, but that's still a considerable amount of work), deadline for the next CGW story is next Friday and I have three tests and two homework assigments due in school. Shit, man, when the hell am I supposed to get all of this stuff done? Needless to say, whenever Friday rolls around seven days from now I'm planning to pass out, dance my ass off at a frat party and forget the previous week ever happened. In other words, I'm bringing a Macho Man mix tape to a party and am going to fucking rock out with the cock out, Little Donny style.

September 7, 2004 -
Somehow I neglected to mention the fact that Mary Spacapan gave me a most stupendous gift after coming back from the wonderful world of ISU: a hermit crab. I had been thinking about picking one up ever since Dan and Zobo were talking about growing a lobster in their dorm and spotted some fish swimming around in Erik and Alex's room. I had hoped to have something a little different in my own room, but something still yet aquatic-related and very much alive. A hermit crab would be a formidable substitute, and so it was to my grand surprise that there was one very active, very alive hermit crab crawling around his plastic container right alongside several Tim Burton figurines. In a way, it's rather fitting: hermit crabs are pretty ugly creatures, as cool as they are.

I haven't come with a name for the creature yet. I figure that one will just come to me. In keeping with the current them of all things related to The Nightmare Before Christmas, I'd hoped to name him after a character from the film. Jack leaps to mind right off the bat, but it's too boring -- it doesn't sound like a cool name and Skellington is too long, nor does it make sense as a first name. So that kind of scratches Tim Burton's creations out, as none of the other names really fit. On the other hand, Harry Potter is another love of mine. Voldemort could be a suitable name. That's evil and menacing and altogether ugly. Or Snape. No, not Snape...not enough zing to it. Okay, I've got it. He won't just be Voldemort. Instead, it'll be Lord Voldemort. That's a name suitable for a creeepy, crawly craustacian, or however you spell its damned proper creature name.

I wish the crab would do some more stuff, though. I didn't expect it to jump around and freak me out by clawing at its container, but it really just chills out inside his shell all day long. Maybe if I start taking him out and playing with him some more he'll become a bit more friendly. There's a good chance he's just stupid and shy like me. Then again, it is just as hermit crab. Maybe I'm taking all of this stuff a little to deeply. Maybe I'm just a little crazy.

This evening was the kick off of the Quentin Tarantino week in my room. We were originally scheduled to start the viewing with Pulp Fiction, but seeing as how my roommate had to wake up for a 9:00 am class and I didn't feel like sitting through 2 and a half hours of a film - no matter how good it's supposed to be - we ended up popping in Reservoir Dogs instead. Man, I'm glad we did. That is one hell of a no-nonsense, kick ass film. It's an action film with so little action you'd have trouble classifying it as such, but damn if it doesn't have some incredible dialogue. Tarantino certainly has a knack for vernacular and he absolutely nails it to a t in this early film from his career. After checking out Reservoir Dogs, I'm really anxious to see how Pulp Fiction plays out. I've already encountered spoilers galore, but the thing about Tarantino movies is that no matter how much you think you know about the film, it doesn't mean shit until you see it for yourself.

I'm tired, don't feel like writing anymore, and I still have to send an e-mail to Xbox Nation inquiring about the possibility of writing news stories for them. I'm not sure if that'd be pushing myself too far with work, though. School's pretty easy right now, but it might ramp up once tests and such start cramming into the picture. We'll see...

September 6, 2004 -
It's true that life does suck sometimes, but not all the time. Just some of the time. And you can't sit dwelling over how bad it can be sometimes, 'cos the rest of the time it's usually pretty great. The moment you let go of what once made your life great is the moment your current life starts slipping away. Anyway, enough pretending this is a pseduo-LiveJournal. Pretty soon the song of the moment's going to turn into a Taking Back Sunday track.

I spent the weekend at Illinois State University, which was as much of a ghost town this holiday weekend as my own school was. With the exception of the chicks rushing, pretty much the entire school went home. I went home enough last year, though, so I wasn't really in a rush to go back there when it wasn't necessary. Chances are I'll make it back for a weekend in October, though, as I'd definitely like to say hi to my mom before Thanksgiving. This is the part where you go 'aww.' Even though there wasn't much going on at ISU, it was still rad. It's a lot more fun to spend a boring time with your best friends than it is to spend it without them. On both of the nights I was there we broke into a local water park and had all sorts of fun on the slides and diving boards. For as much noise as we were making, I'm not sure how we weren't caught, shoo'ed away or at least spotted. There had to have been cars on the road that saw us, but no one picked up their phone and dialed the fuzz, thankfully.

Amazingly, did any of you watch the Olympics? While we were at the pool, we saw someone swimming laps. This wasn't just anyone, though. This was mother fucking four time gold medal winner Michael Phelps, the most incredible man on the planet. No one believed it was him, though. I mean, why would he be breaking into a water park and doing laps? He doesn't NEED a reason, because he's Michael fucking Phelps, so you'd do best to stop questioning the reasons behind his actions and wondering why you aren't his best friend. He's a really cool guy. You might think he looks an awful lot like that Brian Zabawa kid, but you'd be wrong. Dead wrong. If there was ever any doubt, a picture of me and Michael shaking hands will be up on the site pretty soon with an assortment of pictures taken that weekend at ISU.

On Sunday, Dan and I were supposed to join up with the Medieval Combat Club. They invited us to join one of their meetings on the ISU Quad, but we were on our way to eat and didn't have a camera battery charged in time to participate. However, we fully intend to track them down the next time I'm down there and Dan and I will get in on some medieval ass whuppings. Even though they're probably a bunch of EverQuest-humping dorks that will beat our ass severly, it's guaranteed to be a hilarious good time when it does go down.

It still doesn't feel like school has started at UIUC. Even though I've been in classes for almost two full weeks now, I haven't had a homework assignment due, no quizzies and tests are still another two weeks away. Of course, there's a journalism assignment due at the end of the week, but that shouldn't take more than an hour or so to put together on Thursday. You're supposed to write a memoir about a memorable time in your life. Or, at least, one that you could describe really well. I haven't picked which one would work yet. There's the day that Mary and I spent in Chicago when we first starte dating, but I'd like to try my hands at something else. I'll have to think on it a bit more, and chances are I won't even start on it until Thursday night. I'm supposed to conduct interviews for the assignment, but that's what AIM's for. Thanks God.

September 2, 2004 -
2nd Update -- You know, sometimes life really fucking sucks.

1st Update -- It turns out that I'm not allowed to post any of the material I've written that hasn't actually been published. I understand the reasoning behind this, but it's still a bummer. Oh well. You don't want people stealing your stuff (*cough* Halversoidngoisjd *cough) anymore than people already do. I still plan to get all the material I have written up here in some sort of archive form, and I still haven't checked what the deal is on all the additional information I researched for the Computer Gaming World stories, as they were never turned over to the magazine. So, we'll see. I have to write my third story for Computer Gaming World this evening, as all the information for the story is finally pouring in this morning and afternoon. I already conducted interviews with Bill Roper (ex-Blizzard, now at Flagship) and Mark Rein of Epic Games, but those interviews were mostly for supplemental information to the rest of the story, which relied on comments from executives at Konami, Namco, Midway and Sega.

On Saturday night I'm headed to the wild world of Illinois State University, which is about an hour north of here. Mary is having a friend come down this weekend to visit, so I thought it was a good time to go visit Dan and Zobo. Ashley is making her way out there, too, but she'll be there from Thursday to Monday, which is just a little too much time for me. Then again, I don't have a boyfriend waiting for me at school. I'll be there until Monday, and it makes me wish that my camera was fixed. It still blinks innocently when it's turned on, acting as though it works but it doesn't, which is a strange contradiction that makes me want to smash the digital technology into itty bitty pieces, hopefully sending metallic splinters into the eyes of several people down on the courtyard outside of my room. OK, that's kind of mean spirited, but hey, uh, whatever.

I'm already starting to fall behind on reading on my classes for school. I didn't meant to, though. We ended up staying later at late night over at ISR (which is bad ass and way better than both PAR and Gregory's) than I thought and then Mary had to finish her art work, so I didn't have a chance to work through a couple of chapters. That's OK, though; I have plenty of time on the bus this weekend that I can use to catch up. Then again, there's a good chance I'll just sit and play some Game Boy Advance...

August 31, 2004 -
Okay, so I didn't end up updating this site whatsoever over the summer break. I thought that I might do it at least one night, but that never happened. There's good reason for that, though; I had too much to do all summer! In adddition to working around 45 hours a week at United Airlines, I was writing stories and reviews for Computer Gaming World and GMR and trying to squeeze in hanging out with a girlfriend and friends. So, the summer was good, bad - mostly good. Except for Luke leaving, it was good. But I try not to dwell on that aspect too much, as it has a habit of bumming me out. Thankfully, though, he just called me and we were able to chat it up for about half an houf, which was awesome. He seems to be doing more than okay - he claims that he'll probably be in the Army for the rest of his life. I'm glad that his life heading down a good track, but he also mentioned that it's virtually guaranteed he's heading to Iraq for at least a six month tour. Bummer.

Let's see what I've been upto over the summer. I started writing for Computer Gaming World, doing news feature for them every couple of weeks. So far, I've written two stories - one about a new licensening policy from Warner Bros. and another about a Vivenedi Universal programmer suing for overtime wages - and am in the process of writing a third one this week. You'd think that this would exclude me from having to complete the intro to Journalism course at school, but I've received no indication that any such luck is headed my way. Writing the stories has been both a nerve wrecking and exhilarating experience for me, as it's everything I've ever wanted to do and suddenly my work is being thrusted onto the top pages in a major national print publication. These stories aren't being tucked away into the back pages, these are the top stories in the magazine's news section. That's some pretty "holy shit" stuff, you know? It has me pretty pumped, and every time that I think I'm tired of writing and can't find the energy for a new story, I come across a cool idea, pitch it and suddenly I have an endless supply of proper work ethic.

I'm going to try and get those stories archived onto the site pretty soon. In fact, I'm going to try and get all of my freelance material archived here for easy access. I also have piles and piles of interviews from the stories I've wrtten for CGW and E3 interviews not used for GMR that could find a place here. I have to double check that it's OK they appear on here first, though.

Additionally, I might appear in a book tomorrow. There were murmors that a story of mine would be quoted in a book called "Power Up" about the influence of Japenese video games in its section dedicated to Dance Dance Revolution. I haven't been able to strangle a straight answer from the author on whether or not the quote has been included in the final product, but I'm crossing my fingers. It should appear in book stores tomorrow, so I'm making a trip to Borders over the weekend to see if I can check off something else from my list of "things to do in life." Getting into a book at age 19 is a pretty good start, if I do say so myself.

Not much time to write up anything else. I have stuff to read for class tomorrow, and we're supposed to watch Evil Dead 2 at some point tonight. I'll try and write more about how school is going tomorrow.

may 31, 2004 -
yikes, it's been a whole month since i've touched this site. i don't expect that i will be updating this anywhere near to a day-to-day basis, though i would want to. unfortunately, the demands of life, work and the pursuit of happiness prevent me from finding the half hour or so to write down all the pointless details about my life that somehow, a few of you still come here every day to try and read about. so, in an attempt to make sure that this site isn't completely void of content between now and the start of the school year (which is when i assume daily updates will make a triumphant return to normalcy), i will make a pointed attempt to get something up here. an attempt, i say. not a promise -- merely an attempt.

last night, i rented the newest bruce campbell release, bubba ho-tep. in it, campbell plays an old, broken elvis impersonator who belives he's actually elvis. he teams up with a man who thinks he's JFK, the CIA told the public he was assassinated, they took out his brain, replaced it with sand and turned his skin black. the both of them team up to fight a mummy. reading that setup, it sounds like comedy gold. sadly, it's anything but. the pacing is snail-paced, and while that leads to a good amount of interesting back story for campbell's character, it doesn't lend itself well to a sizzlin' comedy. in fact, the funniest parts of the film happen within the first 15 minutes when campbell talks about his penis. granted, there are a few scattered laughs found before the credits roll, but i certainly wasn't belting out much more than a hearty chuckle. fortunately, the blame is mostly on the script and editing; campbell does a fantastic job as elvis.

on a better note, harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban comes out on friday. thursday night, i'm headed to the theater in barrington to see the midnight showing with a couple of friends. when chamber of secrets came out, i decided to read the book before seeing the movie, even finishing up the last couple of pages while sitting in the theater before the reviews ran, but this time i'm doing the reverse: seeing the movie on thursday night, and then reading the book the following week. previously, it kind of dampened the movie experience for me; i was picking apart what wasn't in the film and not enjoying it for what it was. when i saw the film a second time, i enjoyed it a hell of a lot more. so, that the plan so far. right now, i'm trying to find a copy of the soundtrack online so i can get into the harry potter mood before thursday rolls around. no better way to spend time at work than listening to some sweet orchestrated john williams goodness.

ah, yes, work. i started that last week at united airlines, pumping in a little under 50 hours of work into that office job. i'll be doing that most of the summer, which looks to have its ups and downs. it pays good, i don't have to come in on weekends and the work isn't hard, but i have to wake up at 6:30am monday through friday and i do very, very repetitive, motonous work every single day. i work with a few other people in the same department, and the girls are pretty cool. this geek dude kinda freaks me out, though. he keeps trying to convince me to pick up magic: the gathering, 'cos he could teach me how to play. thanks, but no thanks, bro!

a few nights back we had a party for luke celebrating his leaving of arlington heights for the army in a little over a week. an enormous amount of fun was had by all - although the night almost ended on a bummer note. the stripper we had previously booked ended up having a 'personal emergency' at the last second and had to cancel. in a rush, we called up a bunch of places and managed to find something even better than our previous booking - an african american stripper. ah, yes. it was pretty awesome. she was ugly and disgusting, but luke was flipping out and had the time of life as the girl shook her booty in his face. the rest of the group took a little while to get into the whole thing (dan carron especially had an 'OMG WTF' look the entire time), but a great time was, indeed, had by all.

later this week is prom, which should be okay. i'm not particularly pumped for it, or anything, but it was a good time last year, so i'm hoping for the same this time around.

may 8, 2004 -
despite the fact that classes are over and i haven't had to do much studying (yet), i have still managed to avoid updating this web site on a daily basis as i had promised. it's okay, though, i've just been busier than usual in other areas lately, and it has compromised my ability to post a blog-like-emo-update that i'm sure you're all eagerly anticipating. at least, a bunch of you visit this page every day now, so someone's looking forward to it! whoever you are, you are loved and appreciated.

next week is the electronic entertainment expo!! there is a feeling of nervousness mixed with excitement that comes with this fact. excitement because it's the 'vacation' i get to have to myself every year, and it's a chance to just hang out with a bunch of cool ass people that i would otherwise never have a chance to see. there's the games and all that stuff, but it's really secondary compared to the social aspect that comes along with the show. the nervousness comes from the new attitude i have to take towards the show; i'm doing actual "work" for once, and i don't want to screw it up. some of the appointments i have scheduled for GMR could be on-the-spot interviews, which is something i haven't really dealt with before. i'll have to do some minor mental preparation for all of the games before hand, but still, i'm mostly going in blind with my brain and a tape recorder. so, here's to patrick doing a good job and not making himself to be a laughing stock.

i ended up waking up at 6am on friday morning and heading home with my dad. it gave me a chance to see mary one more time before i head off to the show, which provided a well needed boost of confidence. the next time we get to really hang out, it will be when school is completely over and the summer is here to rawk. that is a great feeling. also, i went into office max to pick up some audio tapes for my tape recorder. i only needed a few tapes, but the freaking store only carries packs of eight, which means i can record something like 16 hours of audio. woo-hah! i'll have to rap record and keep track of all the conversations i have during the show's duration in order to use up all of the tape time i have available; it's not like i use a tape recorder outside of the show.

on monday i have two finals, psychology and human sexuality. i have to mass study for both of them tomorrow, which kinda sucks. i have a small head start on psychology, but not that much; it takes like 30 minutes to study a single chapter in that class, which means it's difficult to find time to sit down and make it through a bunch. however, i've finished most of my E3 preparation this evening, which means i am free to pound in the mental information for both of those classes throughout tomorrow. hopefully it's enough to let me rock both of those finals; i'm already feeling incredibly anxious about leaving this damn school, and heading off to los angeles the next morning certainly is not going to help things at all.

i think tomorrow night i will go chill out at a coffee shop and drink some apple cider and do the study thing. maybe. i don't quite know yet. who knows what the excitement of a sunday will bring! oh yeah, someone asked me to prom today. whoooo could it beeeee?! of course, now it doesn't even look like we're going to prom, but hey, at least i can say i was asked. also, a bunch of updates from the site have been added to an archive of stuff. there'll be an official link on here somewhere eventually.

may 4, 2004 -
school might as well be over; there's one more day of class left, and i have two finals to kick off the end of the semester. thankfully, neither of them is turning out to be difficult, and as long as i do pretty good on 'em both, i should end up with As in both classes. i fucking roxxor, duders. of course, there's always the opportunity that i might mess up entirely or have a massive brain fart, but i'm jumping onto the personal bandwagon that is "patrick will do well on his tests, in complete opposte of last semseter's mostly disastrous results."

some cool stuff also happened today, as well. i was assigned several konami-centric appointments for GMR magazine at E3. i'm not sure what i have to do with the information i take in, but hopefully it means patrick will be doing some writing for the publication after the show is over and done and can get back on the fast track to doing published work that isn't on GameSpy. i like GameSpy and all, but i like seeing my name in print way more. so, that's good. i'm also freelancing for the Xbox Nation section of 1up, but i haven't found out what the details of that are just yet. however, the prospect of it is fantastic. this will be the first E3 where i'm actually a "working" writer, instead of a well-liked-but-mostly-pushed-around online web editor. that's right, industry, i'm one step closer to complete domination.

in bad news, this cough of mine still doesn't want to disappear. i'm continuing to take medicine that's supposed to "suppress" it, but maybe i'm putting it in the wrong hole or something, because it sure as hell isn't doing much to supress the cough. if i wasn't mistaken, i'd say the cough is being irritated by the medicine! oh well. i guess i'll just keep swallowing the red-colored evil liquid in the hopes that the rampant lung smashing will work itself out before the show next week. i'd hate to be shooting spit all over an assortment of japanese video game developers, but if that turns out to be my calling - well, i accept it now.

i sent off a package today to a certain someone. they don't know it's coming, and in the oft chance that they check this update, i should probably keep mum about it. i think they'll like it, though. it felt cool to stop in at the post office and not have to dig through my backpack for a mailing address. instead, i just whipped out my wang. i mean, i whipped out my palm pilot, looked up the information in the handy database-o-love and wrote it up on the package. that, my friends, is called using technology to your advantage. who knows what other grand uses could be found hidden within this device. say, i might just even put in reminders to brush my teeth! now i'm on to something.

well, i should do a bit of studying for the cultural anthropology final before hitting bed. i debated just not studying at all, but i thought that was a bad idea, even if it was perfectly acceptable for me to walk into the final without having looked at a single set of notes. oh well, just means i'll rock the test even harder. oh yes.

may 3, 2004 -
look at me. this web site is starting to fall apart because of the lack of upddates from me. tsk, tsk, tsk. i'm sorry, folks, but unfortunately i was sick most of last week and couldn't find the motivation to do much more than update the bits of Gaming Age that i could find the energy to and get through school. as a result, site updates here ended up falling to the wayside and unfortunately, my sickness still lingers on. fortunately, most of the major symptoms seems to have made their exit, but a nasty cough is here to stay and i have my doubts that it's leaving anytime soon. i'm crossing my fingers that it disappears before next week's E3, but i'm not so sure. hopefully it'll at least be down to a dull roar.

last thursday i wrote up an article based off an e-mail interview i conducted with the director of the dance dance revolution series, yasumi katase. it's a sweet article, if i do say so myself, and i'm awfully proud of it. it's been linked on several places on the 'net, including slash dot, so it's nice to have people reading something you've worked hard on. i managed to turn the story into more of a feature, although that would not have been possible without skewing the angle of the story a bit. instead of being a straight up interview with katase, it was more of a look at the evolution of the DDR series as a whole, with katase as a commentator through the whole thing. it turned out rather well, and gives me hope for future stories.

right now i am the midst of working out the final plans for E3. i'm attempting to nail down party invitations (ziff davis' being the most important, at the moment), figure out how freelancing works at the show, scribble down cell phone numbers to people i'm helping to get into the show and hanging out with, doing last minute booth appointments, etc. it should be the best show yet, and things usually end up getting better when i actually arrive, so i'm very much excited to get my ass out of this school and into the shithole they call los angeles, california. only two more days of actual "school," then finals start rocking me and then it's time to bounce. freshman year, you're almost out of here, you stupid bastard!

it is interesting how fast the past couple of months have sped by. really, the whole semseter has been a bit of a blur. i can't complain, and i feel like i've made some rocking strides professionally, personally and academically this semester. it's only going to make the next semseter rock even harder, but i'm more excited about the summer; for some reason i have a feeling it is going to be one of the most memorable ever. i just have one of those feelings, YOU KNOW. a feeling. a feeling in the pants. oh, i love those FEELINGS.

quite a bit of studying will have to happen tomorrow, unfortunately. as much as it pains me, finals really are about to crush the bones within my body and even though the ones on wednesday (cultural anthropology and political science) aren't looking to be too bad, i still need to make sure i'm not blowing them off. i want to end up with a solid set of As and Bs at the end of this semester, and that is completely possible as long as i don't fuck up too badly at the end.

april 27, 2004 -
son of a bitch. i was hoping that the sickness would disappear this morning, but it managed to get even worse than before. coughing felt like someone was scraping nails down the back of my throat, which i can assure you is an altogether unpleasent feeling to have. as the day has worn on, however, i have felt better, but i'm still nowhere near 100%. a good night's sleep should help ward off furthering of the rampang sickness, i think, so if this update seems a bit rushed and short sighted, that's the reasoning behind it. i just want to get better, you fools! i also still want to jump into a steaming hot bathtub, but i still cannot do that. damn you, life.

i am a bit nervous about an interview i have with zoonami's martin hollis tomorrow. i make a point to avoid phone interviews because they make me a bit nervous and i'm not confident in my ability to write down what people are saying. i really like to have some sort of recording available to me, but that wasn't possible with this opportunity. the tape recorder i do own is sitting at home, and there was no way to get it here before the interview on wednesday. so, i'm going to have to attempt it solo with my keyboarding skills. i'm going to see about setting up alex's microphone on the other phone, but i'm not sure if that would work or not. the more i think about it the more it seems possible, but i'm not counting on it.

also, as i expected, this weekend isn't going to turn out as hoped. her parents dashed down the idea of mary showing up this weekend to rock out one final time at pennsylvania avenue residence halls before the end of the year. just as well, i guess. i'm not sure what we would do here, anyway. it's sad, though, 'cos now it seems like i'll never have luke here at college. for the next three years, he'll be away at the army. sure, he will make it back once and a while, but for the most part it will be pretty improbable to have him hang out here. the quicker the first week of june approaches, the freakier luke leaving leaves me feeling.

listening to the ben folds recording of the UIUC show has left me in a bit of a somber mood. i didn't realize that one of the songs, "late," was a tribute to the recently deceased songwriter elliott smith. he's a personal fave of mine, though i never had a chance to see him live before he passed away. as i was discussing with a friend, it's incredible how ben is able to transform even the cheekiest of songs into bonafide, heartfelt piano ballads. take, for example, his cover of wham!'s careless whisper, which i have included as the song of the moment. i think you will see what i mean if you listen in.

april 26, 2004 -
i haven't been sick in a long time. recently, i told mary that i hadn't been sick in so long, that it was impossible for me to become sick. well, karma (and god's ironic sense of humor) have come to bite me in the ass; i'm becoming rapidly sick. this morning, i thought it was just a bit of dehydration during class. as the day went on, however, my coughts started to become more intense and a slight throbbing in the back of my throat became more apparent. soon enough, i was dry coughing like crazy, my throat had swelled up and i was feeling pretty miserable. i want nothing more than to sit and soak in a bath right now, but since i'm not at home and i don't have a laundry bag to makeshift a bathtub, i am out of luck on that one. alex came down with the same symptoms this weekend, so that's probably where this came from. he says he pulled out of it in a few days, though, so at least that's reassuring.

i'm not sure what is going to happen next weekend. the current plan is to have matt, luke and mary all come down and have a little funky fun before finals kick into gear and the year is over, but i'm not sure about that one happening. that's quite a bit to coordinate, and i'm sure that someone will end up bailing, making the whole plan fall apart and i'll end up heading home like usual. maybe not, though. stranger things have happened, so i will do my best to cross my fingers and hope for a rocking weekend. 'cos matt seems to really want to get me out and partying a bit, so if he shows up here, partying like a mofo is what i plan on doing!

the dance dance revolution interview was delivered back to me this evening, which rocks. although the answers are a bit on the short side, it's nothing i can't work with. i haven't come up with a specific angle for writing the story, but as i've mentioned before, i don't want it to be a standard cut 'n paste interview piece, so we'll see how that goes. one of the responses was pretty hilarious, though. in reflection of a question asking what would be the ideal music game, director Yasumi Takase said, "Please pray for me that when I finally get to find the ideal concept, I would not have to worry about the project budget at all." i will pray for you, Mr. Takase. i will pray you get to make that grand music game one day and i will rock to it so hard. i promise.

lots of E3 appointment stuff was done this afternoon. i realized i hadn't done any of that and the show was only two weeks away, so getting on the ball was probably a good idea. i am sad that no one else on the Gaming Age staff seems to be showing an interesting in organizing coverage for this year's show, so i guess i will be on my own. since no friends are in attendance this year, i should have some more time to dedicate to writing. it also doesn't look like i'll have a chance to attend appointments via GMR, which is kind of sad 'cos that would have been an important step up for me. that's okay, though, there is still the possibility of me writing for the news section, which is great. i'm hoping to come up with a 'clever idea' to pitch tomorrow, in the hopes of nabbing one of the last few spots in the current issue. wish me luck.

april 25, 2004 -
look at this! i'm updating on a sunday night. monday morning sorta, but that's really pretty besides the point. it was definitely a sweet weekend full of good memories, though. i can only hope that weekends like that are common during the summer. if so, the summer of 2004 looks to be one of the absolute best yet. on friday night, the weather took a turn for the better (just like i'd hoped for...rock), which meant i could skate around in my roller blades a little bit (which is harder than i thought) and put together a good group for a fire pit experience. luke, mary, mary's friend nikki and i started things out while matt went to meet up with dustin and such. being fire experts, luke and i got the ball rolling with a great log-cabin design. schuessler showed up pretty soon, too, and helped the fine tuning process when the starter log wasn't cooperating. it wasn't long before a bunch of my bro's friends showed up and we suddenly had a party on our hands. later, after they left, matt and his crew finally showed their asses up, and we sat around talking, chilling and drinkin' some brewskies until 5am. yes, it was awesome.

tonight i picked up luke's palm pilot. i only had to pay $40 for it, making it a sweet deal i could not pass up. i don't particularly want or need a palm pilot, but if for such a steal, i would have killed myself for not buying it. so, i spent the entire bus ride back to school punching in names, e-mail addresses, phone numbers and other misc. information about my friends and business associates. somehow, i didn't get bored and managed to waste over two hours learning how to properly write letters like 'Q' using the palm pen, which requires a looping motion, sort of like a shoe lace. there's a USB cable included in the box, so i'm going to plug that in tomorrow, download pictures to put next to people's names and hopefully transfer some cool apps. over to the machine. i have no idea what's out there, but i'm bound to find some cool, pointless stuff.

mary and i spent a few hours at woodfield today, and i let her indluge into a fantasy that i promised last weekend. i thoroughly dislike the kinds of clothes SHE would like me to wear. it's just not me. but, we went into abercrombie and she picked out some clothes and i put them on to amuse here. i realized that she really likes those clothes on me, but more, i realized how much i really hate those clothes on me. so, unless i have a brain meltdown later in life, it doesn't look like clothes of that nature are to find their way into my closet anytime soon. yuck.

as of right now, there are two weeks left of school. in fourteen days, i will leave this room having completed my first year of college. i'm going to have a massive reflection about what i've figured out over the last 9 months or so when that time comes to pass (probably after i've come back from E3), but i'm pretty sure things have gotten better, despite not being great all the time. i don't know, though. things are hard and seem to rapidly fluxuate between being better and worse, but i'm still here, so that's what counts in the end, i guess.

april 22, 2004 -
shit, i can't believe i missed an update. sometimes i don't have time to mix in the late sunday night updates, but it's been a long while since a week day has gone by and i haven't tossed some pointless text up. so, i apologize. that's not the way i like to do things 'round here, and since more and more people are starting to visit (where are you all coming from, anyway?), i need to make sure things are continually rocking as hard as possible. unfortunately, i do have some work i have to finish up tonight, so i can't spend time adding more content to the site. that will happen next week when there is more free time and i don't have more committements to tests, projects and stupid crap like that. i will have to start preparing for finals the next week, though, so it won't be complete relaxation...

the emotional stuff seems to have worked itself out. even though it's not altogether stable, it is managable now, so i am okay. i just cannot wait to make it home tomorrow. i am taking an earlier bus than usual, which is nice. spacapan is working until the early evening, so i'm going to bother her at work by strapping on my roller blades and pulling some cool tricks (like falling on my face and cutting up my knees) in front of starbucks to impress her and the co-workers. there's no way i won't be seen as a total hottie amongst that crowd once that happens. plus, it's an excuse to get out on the blades and see if i can still stay standing up. i just hope the weather is nicer tomorrow. i have heard that it's supposed to be ugly throughout the weekend, but maybe it can clear up and let the sun shine for just a little while so patrick can skate to his little heart's content. you know? that would be nice.

i'm writing a paper for cultural anthropology right now that's supposed to be 3 to 5 pages. i'm already 2 full pages in and i haven't even finished talking about the first part of the assignment. so, uh, i think i'm going to have to hack up some bullshit and put it to rest. at least that means i'm almost done. didn't realize the paper would actually take an hour like he said. it's funny, though, i get to describe rivers cuomo to be a worshipped god; i have to describe my room from a third person perspective of someone who would have no idea what it is, and sine there's so many pictures of his wacky self on the walls of my humble abode, you might think he's my personal savior.

konami informed me yesterday afternoon that the responses to the dance dance revolution questions would be delivered on monday. i'm so excited! even though i still have a ways to go on the MMORPG story (more on that in a second), i am more excited to see how the team responded. i haven't decided if i'll write it up as a straight up interview or go for more of the feature format that i did with the "meet the forum" pieces. personally, i like writing more feature-esque articles, so i'm going to make sure that's the first plan of attack. blizzard finally returned an e-mail to me just as i was about to call them up, and oddly, they are the last company that is going to help me. i can't even schedule an interview till a week after E3, and the answers aren't going to come back till a week after, i'm sure. that really bites. :(

the pixies announced a bunch of new dates for chicago, which makes me feel not so l33t anymore. it's okay, i guess. the more people who get to experience the pixies the better, but i felt cool that i was getting one of the few dates on their initial reunion tour. i kind of wish i could pick up a ticket to another show, but it'd conflict with school and stuff, so no dice. still, i heard a live recording of their recent show in minnesota and they sounded so fucking on top of things it was insane. i put up an MP3 of 'Where is my mind?' from that performance. hopefully some of you downlaoded and enjoyed the greatness that is the pixies.

april 20, 2004 -
it has certainly been a more exhausting day than i had previously anticipated. lots of emotions went flying around. i think that it's all under control now, but who knows what tomorrow will bring. it seems like i don't know what to expect anymore, other than holding onto the rails of life with everything i've got. but i'm still upbeat and optomistic and stuff. mostly. things should be getting better once school is over and done with. just a few more weeks until that dream is a reality. just a few more weeks before i don't have to worry about disappearing for a week and reappearing on the weekends, only to jump ship again a few days later. sigh.

i was supposed to participate in a psychology experiment this afternoon, but when i reported to the room, i was told another experiment was in progress. uh, ok. after 10 minutes of searching for the experiment in other rooms with two others who were scheduled for the same experiment, we decided it wasn't worth the effort and left the building. after walking back to the dorm, i sent an anger-toned e-mail to the researcher and the subject pool administrator, and received a response back in the evening with an apology - and i was awarded credit for the experiment. so, that rocks. i didn't have to do anything stupid, only wasted 15 minutes of my time and i have one less experiment to complete for class. one more to go and i'm all done!

i'm all set for the MMORPG story for Gaming Age, but i still have not worked out an interview with blizzard. i keep meaning to call them, but i put it off. well, no more. i am determined to have a solution to the problem tomorrow at whatever cost. i have worked hard to have the other companies figure out their stuff and it would be costly to the integrity of the story not to have blizzard in the same spot. so, that's one of the biggest things i have to do tomorrow, next to studying for the political science exam. i'm hoping the emotional stuff is worked out tomorrow so i don't have to be mentally bothered during the studying process, but life has a way of kicking me in the nuts before important tests, so who knows?

that's about it for tonight. i don't have the energy to write any more, and i need to try and spend that time accomplishing other tasks. sorry. hopefully i'll be in a better mood tomorrow, but i'm not counting on it.

april 19, 2004 -
okay, so i lied. i ended up procrastinating so much last night that after i did minimal studying for the quiz in the morning, i decided it was time to sleep. i had to wake up at 8am on sunday to attend an interview with panera bread, and while i was able to sleep for a couple of hours after the interview, i never really got the full rest i needed to function. as such, i was falling asleep in psychology today, which sucked. i did get the job at panera bread, though, but i'm hoping that some other jobs come through, like one at united airlines i'm working out with my aunt, and i won't have to resort to whoring myself to a food place. i don't even like panera bread's products, so it'd suck ass to not only learn about them, but probably eat it during my lunch breaks. oh well. i'll just cross my fingers something else works out and saves me from the dreaded task of a food-centric job.

this weekend was kick ass. the most important discovery was that my roller blades still, in fact, fit me. you wouldn't think it, but they do. it's as if they'd never left my feet when i slipped them on saturday afternoon. i haven't had a chance to go gliding around in them quite yet, but the few quick spins i took to freak mary out were more than enough to remind me that driving a car is pretty overrated. if things were closer (or i had roller blades with rocket attachments), i'd probably do more of that when the weather was nice. maybe i'll make it a point to do more roller blading to places over the summer. i'll just need to convince mary that riding a bike is cool. i'm not sure how she feels about that one. dan, ashley and luke went riding around on bikes and roller blades on saturday night, and i'm sad to say i didn't join them. i vow to be involved on the next adventure.

kill bill volume 2 was the order of the day on friday night, as it seemed to be with just about every single one of my friend's. i ended up liking it more than i thought. i went into the original kill bill hearing such wild reactions from my friend's and others that i was completely sure it couldn't live up to the potential - it sounded like a very style oriented film. in the end, it was. but i still liked it. however, i'd dare say i almost liked the second part more. i think i need to see the first installment again to come to a solid conclusion. the second one had great story elements, but the pacing was also brutually slow at times. the dialogue was fantastic, but that didn't stop the movie from focussing on conversation trees lasing more than 15 minutes long. compared to the amount of action featured in kill bill volume 1, however, it makes sense to have the other side of the coin - it just would have been nice if it was more spread out.

i have realized that there are only two more full weeks of school left, and i am in the process of finishing out one of them. it's not long at all. in less than a month, i will be rocking it at the electronic entertainment expo yet again. soon after that, it will be a summer of love and fun (and working). that, my friends, i am very much looking forward to. lake geneva looks to be a blast this year, and i hope to invite a few friends to join me for the escapade. it was looking like we might have our own place this year; a lady across the street died and the family was debating putting the house on the market, but so far i don't believe that opportunity will come to fruition before the summer comes to pass. either way, i am very much looking forward to sitting back, reading some books, making a video with the gang (i am thinking fountain of wayne's 'it must be summer' may be the inspirational key this year, but it's too early to say so just yet) and recovering from this rough year before the next one, the better one kicks into gear.

this week is a mix of things to do and things not to do. tomorrow i have to attend a psychology experiment (second to last, yay!) and commence studying for a political science test that's coming up on thursday. there's that paper thing, too, but i'm not the least bit worried about finishing that.

FYI, a new pictures gallery has been added. it features the somerside concert that went down on saturday night, in addition to random pictures taken that day. there are some awesome ones of luke and i messing around with the firepit that my family picked up for my dad's birthday last weekend.

april 15, 2004 -
send some praise to the heavens, for the research paper has been completed. it wasn't as difficult as i thought it was going to be. in fact, it was probably the easiest paper i've had to write for this class. however, it was also twice as long as the other papers we've had to write. so, while it was easier, it was offset by the amount of damn words needed. it's finished, though, and i think i did a fine job on it. i'm most proud of the introduction, and the rest is just so-so. none of the material here is worth condensing into an article on gaming age; there's inaccuration information all over the place, but it's enough to pass through the school system unharmed and hopefully with a rocking grade. i decided to pass on the editing process, though, instead giving it a look-see during my lunch time tomorrow.

the mysterious figure known as hazama finally decided to show his ass up! he's been in hiding for weeks and weeks, and i was starting to wonder if he was going to show up at all before E3. like usual, he pops up out of nowhere and acts like nothing's happened and things go back to normal. thankfully, he is still headed out to E3 with his girlfriend (both of whom can be seen on the friends page), and it should be a kick ass time. craig majaski from gaming age is coming out to the show again, so it'll be just like old times. ah, memories.

i'm headed home tomorrow, which is incredibly exciting. it has been a busy sort of week here at school, and i'm looking forward to chilling with mary all weekend long. don't have too much planned except all sorts of hanging out and the coolness that goes along with such activities. well, we do want to catch kill bill volume 2 and the show my brother's band, somerside, is playing on saturday night, but besides that, the slate is clean and the eraser is ready to bust loose. it's just a rest period before next week, though, which is the last week of actual "work" before finals kick in to gear. i have a quiz and paper due in cultural anthropology, a second exam in political science. all i'm worried about is the exam in political science. i kicked the last one's ass, but the new material isn't so clear. looks like i'm studying is in my future.

i've started receiving interviews back from companies participating in the MMORPG feature for gaming age, and the answers are fantastic. i believe i'm going to have a great story at the end of at all, and i'm very thankful for how cooperative some of the developers have been with the interviews. some of the questions are tough on the genre and i was glad to see them seriously thinking them over. so, it will be another two weeks before all of the interviews are back in my possession, but i can't wait until then. i'll probably start writing it when i have the majority back, though.

i see that no one has posted in the message board in over a week's time. i'm starting to think that the forum was a failed experiment. oh well. guestbook's are stupid, anyway. i have been checking out people's blogs, though, and i do like the comments system. i'm not sure what it would take to implement a comments system into the web site, but as soon as i have a lazy day on my hands, i'm going to commence some investigation of the situation.

no more updates for the rest of the weekend. i have a quiz on monday morning, so i don't know if i can update when i get back from the bus ride, but i'll give it a shot (aka procrastination will kick in and i will update).

april 14, 2004 -
well, my ego took a beating today. i sent along all the information to wired last night, with the hope that a positive response would ring through the inbox within a week or so. unfortunately - or fortunately, depending on how you look at it - the reply came before noon this morning and was short and to the point: no luck, suckah. it's okay, though, i was bumbed about it at first, but then i realized it was just one publication, one that i had absolutely no contact with prior to the e-mail. hell, it's nice of 'em to take me seriously enough to respond! or, at least, that's how i rationalize not being too disappointed with the outcome. in response, i've decided to redouble efforts in the area of features to come up with a new pitch i can toss at 1up or GMR.

this afternoon i picked up tickets to another ben folds show taking place in chicago this upcoming june. he's doing a double bill with rufus wainwright, who i have heard a few songs from before. i'll have to check him out some more before the show. mary, my mom (hah!), my brother and mr. matt kahler will be in attendence at the show. i have also discussed an interesting, yet surprisingly doable surprise slash plan for the ben folds show with a friend, but i'm not at liberty to discuss it on this web site at this time. if certain plans are to come to fruition, however, i'm sure i'll tease about it to the point where i don't know how to hold back from spilling the beans. i have a tendency to get worked up about stuff ahead of time, though, so i should just shut my mouth for the time being. in other news, that same friend (mr. jon, who will be added to the friends page soon) might join me for the pixies concert in november. rock-tastic.

i'm supposed to be working on that research paper now. i've been putting off writing it since i returned from fat don's and each minute that passes by is another one that i don't put an effort into the paper. the longer i put it off, the more i'm going to hate myself tomorrow evening, so i don't know why i'm not saving myself the trouble and the pain of a late night. then again, i seem to enjoy the pain of finishing assignments at the last possible second, so go figure. as long as i contribute a few pages to the cause tonight, though, i'll be satisfied. every sentence written tonight is another sentence that doesn't have to be bullshitted tomorrow! well, if you want to get technical, it's actually later today. but i digress.

as expected, i ended up not taking a shower due to the avalanche of activities that seemed to fall on this fateful day. i could have taken one after psychology class, but i figured that after 3pm hits, unless you have a reason to take a shower, you may as well chalk it up to laziness and wait till the next morning. as such, that's what i'm doing. tomorrow i'll be all spiffy clean, just one night before i make the return back to the homeland and check out kill bill volume 2. hell yeah, bitches. tonight, though, i ran into the fat monster of a woman who's attempted to ask me out several times, and freakin' jesse decided that it'd be a nice gesture to give up his seat for her to sit down -- right next to me. of course, he wasn't aware of the whole saga with this abnormally large chick until after the incident, but i almost smacked him across the face and told him i was rick james. thankfully, we were able to sidestep her when the bus arrived at the six pack and avoid a further conversation where she might attempt to slip her cell phone number in. yikes.

tomorrow i will have to finish that damn research paper, in addition to preparing a few other stuff for the ride home. i don't have other assignments due, which is nice, but i'll have to squeeze in talking to sony online entertainment about the new questions for the MMORPG story and blizzard's lazy ass still hasn't contacted me. i need to write up additional impressions of hitman: contracts, too, but it didn't look like that's going to happen before eidos shoots over a review copy. ah well. i tried...

april 13, 2004 -
i apologize for the late night update. i also apologize because the update isn't going to be as lengthy as i would originally aim for. i need to make sure i get enough sleep for tomorrow, since i have to pump out most of the research paper due on friday. i don't want to be up until 3 in the morning on friday finishing it up, so i'm trying to do something new for a change and get shit done ahead of time. so, because i was working hard to finish up other loose ends in anticipation of having this newfound work ethic make its debut, i didn't have a chance to incorporate an update to klepek power this evening. however, i double promise that there will be goodies tomorrow night in celebration of the research paper's completion (or, at least, a vast majority of it).

on a happier note, i sent in pitch to write for wired news. i've heard the online sector is looking for more writers to contribute to their video game coverage, so i saw no reason why is shouldn't become a part of that new movement! especially considering i'm hoping to write more feature stories, which is all i'd be doing for wired - if they let me, that is. so, i sent an e-mail pitch with writing examples and an updated resume to wired news' managing editor around an hour ago. all i can do now is cross my fingers and hope i didn't come across as an idiot in the e-mail message. i have a hard time figuring out if i'm writing too bland or too casual in "professional" e-mails. oh well.

i still haven't heard back from blizzard on the gaming age story. grr. i'll have to phone up the public relations chick tomorrow evening if i don't hear back. however, i'm supposed to go to fat don's around 6 and i have an assignment due for psychology at 5pm and i have to attend a psychology experiment at 11am, which directly cuts into my showering and eating and sitting around before classes start up again time. so, that's sad. i don't particularly enjoy busy days, but i suppose it's better than sitting around unhappy. fortunately, i've been filled to the brim with work to accomplish, making it difficult to keep myself too occupied with my personal misgivings.

that's it for today, folks. send a prayer to the freelance gods for that wired opportunity. i have no idea if such a set of gods exist, but if they do, it'd be nice if they'd smile down upon me later this week!

april 12, 2004 -
it feels as though it's been a long time since i've updated this place. i had meant to write up some stuff last night when i got back from home, but i was too tired to come up with a few paragraphs of bullshit. so, sorry about that. i hope i haven't driven off the few visitors that do make it to this location on a semi-daily basis. however, i'm back on track and should have some nifty updates headed your way in the next couple of days. that is, before i leave for back home again. i don't plan on being here at school for a weekend unless mary's allowed to visit for whatever unlikely reason, so weekend updates won't be making an appearance until the summer. the true test of this site will be if i can sustain it during the alluring free period of may through august. i feel i am up to the task, but i have said i could do stuff like that before -- and haven't.

it's been a good day for patrick's writings. i was able to have a chat with the rep. at sony online entertainment and work out the problems with the original batch of questions for the feature on gaming age. though i'm disappointed i can't continue down the same line of questioning i've had for the other companies i've contacted, i believe i can rephrase the questions for the everquest, etc. teams and still come up with information that'll help out for the feature. so, that's good. all that's left is hearing back from blizzard and i'll be done with preliminary research. i also heard back on a second story, the one about the dance dance revolution creator. i'm not sure what angle i'm even headed in on that one, but i need to come up with a series of questions to fire back to konami this evening. either way, i'm interviewing the fuckin' creator of dance dance revolution! how fucking cool is that! i also picked up a preview from gamespy today for some random todd mcfarlane action game, and found out i can help out GMR at next month's E3. yay for money (and, er, experience)!

in celebration of the good times, let's rock!

i would like to thank mr. greg sewart for adding a link to this ol' site. even though he's fudged up the link twice now, i commend him for even bothering to add it to his list of visited locations on this grand place we call the internet. maybe that big ol' canadian really does love me.

this week is when i have to turn in the research paper on the psychology of video games. originally, i had intended to try and write something good enough that could be turned into a piece for gaming age, but i'm quickly learning that such an effort would require much more thought and time than i am willing to spend on a paper that i'm already growing a rather large hatred for. so, instead, i plan to half-ass the writing process as much as possible, without sacrificing the ability to nab myself an A at the end of it all. i already wrote two pages and a few lines, but then i realized that those pages didn't have the correct margins, so it's more like a page and a half now. son of a... ah well, it just means i have to ramp up the bullshit-o-meter that much higher.

i'm starting to get tired, though, and i still have a bit of work to do. so, i need to get over to that and get my ass to bed. tomorrow i have another boring session of political science. i think we're starting a movie, though, so i can't complain too much. we're starting another movie in writing, too, the michael moore documentary "bowling for columbine." i feel like i'm in high school again!

april 7, 2004 -
what the hell is up with this weather. i keep expecting it to slip back into the dreaded cold and bitterness that the midwest is known too well for, but so far, urbana champaign is still moving forward with its promise of spring. in fact, i'll be grabbing a few pairs of short from home this weekend in ancitipation of continued good weather outside. however, i fully expect nature to laugh in my face and unleash a hellish combination of rain, sleet and cold next week to make my efforts to embrace the new temperatures a pointless one. i'm thinking i'll take advantage of the weather tomorrow, too, by reading for a little while near allen hall. there's a nice hill bordering a pond that's just begging for me to sit on it and open up the next dark tower book.

right now i'm just about finished with the contact portion of the MMORPG story. i have to talk to sony online entertainment tomorrow about some of the questions, though; a few of 'em weren't quite to their liking. also, blizzard and ncsoft still haven't gotten back to me. so, ugh, i guess i still have a bit of a ways to go. tomorrow is thursday, though, and i made a personal deadline to have these issues sorted out before the weekend, so i'll have to make some phone calls tomorrow to ensure that the story continues to move forward and not fall victim to my increasingly annoying fits of procrastination. plus, there's about five pages of a research paper that need to appear in a word document tomorrow for class on friday. i have no idea how i'm going to come up with those, but i suppose i'll manage somehow.

i have to come up with another story idea, too. so far, i haven't been struck with inspiration from the message boards or the normal avenues. i'd like to just sit and think about it, but i'm a little too tired to attempt that. so, hopefully a little more web surfing will help me devise something simple enough to start acting on in conjunction with the other piece. stuff like this is starting to make writin feel more sastisfying, and even though my nerves are being tested in setting up all these intervies, i feel like i'm progressing as a journalist to some extent. i can deal with people in person and through e-mail just fine, but the phone freaks me out for some reason. argh.

i have realized that i will not have to pay a rental fine at the local video store until september. see, i used to rent about a movie a week, but i ended up weeding out that after about a month. i wish i hadn't, but i've found other uses for my time now and it doesn't look like i'll be reversing the personal policy anytime soon. anyway, i returned the texas chainsaw massacre a few nights late to the store, which means i have late fee charges looming. fortunately, though, i only rent movies now when mary visits school, and since it's unlikely (however unfortunate) that she will be making another stop here before she's here permanently, i won't be touching the video store until the start of the next semester. so, i have several months to come up with the $2 i'll owe at that point. fantastic. why the hell did i just tell you that?

i can't think of much else to talk about. there isn't much bothering me in any real capacity, and i'm looking forward to heading home on friday afternoon. i tried to nab a ticket for an earlier bus, but unfortunately the soonest i could manage was the same ol' 3:55pm bus that i've jumped on almost every week this past year. i'm not sure what the game plan is for the weekend, but it'e easer, so it's nothing too exciting, i don't think.

april 6, 2004 -
ah, back to normal. back to updating these entries at an ungodly hour at night, the times when i work the best. i wish i could transfer the same amount of creative energy and motivation i come across aroung 2am to the afternoon hours. it would be so nice. however, right now that doesn't seem to be happening. although, i did manage to write like 15 freaking news articles for Gaming Age this afternoon, so maybe i'm starting to make a bit of a turnaround now that i've started to do some more enriching journalistic work for the site.

i'm starting to make real progress on that MMORPG story. at first, it seemed like only one PR firm was going to respond, but after constant e-mails fired off to different individuals and properly placed phone calls, i have the ball rolling with all but one contact. i hope to iron that out tomorrow, so hopefully i'll have interview questions out to every development team on my agenda before the end of the week. i'm hoping to come up with another story to start researching, too, so that i'm constantly on the move with my writing, as opposed to having lulled periods where i wait for something to magically walk itself across my computer desk. i'm tired of that, so i don't plan to do it anymore.

the ben folds concert was absolutely spectacular. there are not enough words of praise to give to that talented piano man. at first, i thought ben was going to cop out and give a shady performance. his voice was a little off and he didn't talk to the crowd through the first four songs. soon enough, though, it was the ben i'd waited years to finally see in person and he was more than i could have imagined. with the exception of emaline, he pretty much played every single song i could have wanted to hear. plus, i was the one that started the chain of 'rock this bitch' yellings to ben, which prompted him to bust out a polka-style rendition of the classic live tune. some of the best moments at the concert were ben switching from piano to bass for "rockin' the suburbs," his renditoin of the darkness' "get your hands off my woman, motherfucker" and a story about stealing money from the hardee's register to pay for college tuition.

ben is playing another concert in chicago in june, and i expect i will be picking up tickets to check him out there, too. he's playing with rufus wainwright, who i have heard is alright. i've only heard a few tunes from him here and there, but he did do a nice cover of john lennon's "across the universe," so props have to be given to him there. i can't wait to see mr. folds again. i'd love to sit down and interview him sometime; he seems like such an interesting person.

tomorrow doesn't look to be much of an exciting time. i think i'll have to get started on the research paper pages that are due on friday, because i don't think i'll have enough time to get them ready on thursday night. i thought i had a psychology experiment around lunch time, but i mistakenly made the appointment for next wednesday, which means i won't be able to take a shower till later in the afternoon that day. oh, the humanity! also, i need to finally get impressions of hitman: contracts up on Gaming Age, as i've been putting it off for several days now and it's starting to irritate me. so, that has to be done first thing. i need to write about Shrek 2, too, but that's not such a big deal.

april 5, 2004 -
no matter how must i curse it, time always wins. it doesn't stop for anyone. it's a bastard invention that thinks nothing of others. which, of course, is why i hate it so much; it seems to move so quickly. as such, the weekend has now come to a close and dan, ashley and mary all went home on the 6pm bus back home. there was all sorts of fun had this weekend and like it usually does, it reminded me how sadly unspectacular every other day of the week is here at college. i take solace in the fact that one weekend behind me is one weekend closer to the start of next year, but that doesn't make the wait any more bearable. i think i've bitched about this fact at least once a week, though, so i suppose i'll just bite the bullet and move on. at least, until another batch of emo activity seeps within.

tonight is an important one, as it marks the first time i'll have a chance to see the one and only mr. ben folds in concert. i tried to organize hitting up a previous ben folds concert last year, but it didn't really work out. however, i am really anxious to see him tonight, as i hear he will be debuting new material that's been worked on in the studio in preparation for the upcoming album later in 2004. so, that's awesome. liz, one of my concert companions, has unfortunately come down with another bout of sickness (which is nothing new for her!) and won't be able to attend. in her place is mr. cheapskate chan, who originally wanted to go but didn't want to pay. so, now he's set! i'm hoping that foellinger auditorium will let me bring a digital camera with me, but i'm not sure how light security is going to be. it'd be sweet if i could take a few short movies, too.

over the weekend, while heading out to rent the texas chainsaw massacre (which was fun for the first half before becoming bleh, predicable and ending with a whimper instead of a bang), mary and i stopped by the union to check out a karaoke session. man, there was some funny stuff happening there. there were all sorts of bad singers, obviously, since that's what karaoke is all about, but the real fun blew up when the DJ decided he would take a chance at the mic. keep in mind this DJ is obviously middle-aged, probably mid to late 40s, and about to sing in front of a group of college kids. i didn't know how this couldn't be awesome. and it was. he covered a jimmy buffet song, complete with over-the-top hand gestures and body movement. so awesome, in fact, i made a mini-movie of part of it, which you can download by clicking on this link. i was tempted to jump up on stage and perform a song, but i'm too much of a wuss. i needed a bro there for emotional support.

if you're interested in seeing what the weekend was like from a visual point of view, i've added all of the photos taken from my camera into the pictures section. dan took a few, too, so hopefully i can add those later this week. plus, he has a ton of spring break-related pictures i wanted to get my hands on.

cameras were a source of trouble over the weekend, too, as dan had a brain fart and left chan's camera on the bus as he was leaving. despite a desperate attempt to run back to the bus stop, it was too late. while it's pretty certain the camera was not stolen and is sitting in a lost and found right now, it won't be until tomorrow that the camera will be able to make the rounds back to the suburban express office. we're all hoping it turns up okay, cos if it doesn't, dan will have to fork over nearly $400 for the camera and equipment that was lost. that really fucking sucks. i know he was saving up for some cool shit, too, so i'm going to make sure i slap down some prayers for my bro. i know how it is to lose stuff, so i know how dan feels. of course, i've been forunate enough to have only really lost my stuff. but that still sucks.

no more respones about that MMORPG story, so it looks like it's time to bust out the ol' telephone and bug the PR bums who are ignoring patrick's pleas for help. if that doesn't work, then it'll be time to lay the smack down with a virtual metallic baseball bat. related to this online business, you should all check out the newly formed blog of a canadian friend of mine (canadian? friends? i know.), greg sewart. it's called, rather appropriately or inappropriately depending on who you talk to, 'the new hotness.'

i'll add another update after the show to tell you guys how roXx0red i got from the magic of ben folds' piano.

april 4, 2004 -
i have to admit. i am really tired. so, instead of updating, i've decided to hit to turn in a little earlier than usual. sorry, folks. look for a proper emo-centric entry tomorrow afternoon.

april 1, 2004 -
i have decided it's time to make an announcement that might come as a shock to some, not so surprising to others. however, it's one that i've been mulling over for many months now, and today seems like just as good of a day as any to say it. so, here it goes. are you ready? you should probably sit down before you read this. i'm moving to mexico with kahler. we've decided that it's in the best interests for us and the rest of the world if we pick up our stuff and head south of the border, where we can do crack and drink hardcore liquor all day long. man, am i glad to have that off my chest. anyway.

today was a slightly busier day than most. instead of sitting around thinking about writing stuff all afternoon, i had to head over to the beckman institute and participate in a psychology experiment. i seem to always pick the boring ones. which, i guess, is a blessing, 'cos i could be involved in the ones that have the experimenters shoving glue all over your head. that would do wonders for my hair. the experiment i became the guinea pig for today involved memorizing the different features of hand-drawn bugs and correctly identifying them when their features are mismatched. it was horribly confusing the entire time and at the end, they pull the rug from under your feet and make you recall information from the very beginning, which hadn't crossed my mind for over an hour! of course, that's the whole point of psychology experiments, but it doesn't stop me from feeling frustrated.

it runs out that i can't make it to the nobou uematsu concert the week of E3. this makes patrick so, so sad. i had planned on rocking out with the orchestra blaring final fantasy tunes before heading into the show, but sadly, i forgot which day it took place on. somehow, i built up in my mind that the concert was the night before E3, when, in actuality, it takes place two nights before -- right when my psychology and human sexuality finals are taking place. so, instead of listening to some sweet video game tunes in a majestic format under the direction of their composer, i will be remembering the various methods of learning intelligence and what's the difference between a transvestite and a transsexual. argh. maybe next year i'll have better luck.

also, i'm glad my human sexuality teacher is so nice. it turns out the final takes place at the same exact time as my psychology final, but she agreed to meet me a few hours earlier and let me take the test then. phew! second E3 crisis averted. should be clear sailing from here on out. as long as hazama doesn't suddenly announce he won't be attending the show, that is. then, i have an ass to kick.

tomorrow is when the rawking weekend begins. mary and ashely are scheduled to come on the 6pm bus from woodfield, which means they'll arrive a little after 9pm. ashley has tiring cheerleading tryouts happening in the morning, so i doubt she'll be doing something too exciting that night. however, mary and i will have to go on a quest to find something to do other than sitting in my dorm room and watching a movie. which is okay, but now that i have the chance, i want to do something a bit more adventurous. maybe we'll kill someone and drink their blood. that would be particularly exciting. either way, we have to come up with something decent to do when dan arrives. when he came last time we just sorta sat around, which was okay for alex, dan and i, but there has to be some excitement on this campus somewhere. and i am determined to find it!

i actually did start research on a story last night. for gaming age, but that's okay. i need to start moving into the mentality of writing more complex news pieces that aren't summarizations of press releases or screen shots from japanese web sites. so, i've decided to investigate the launch problems associated with massively multiplayer online games. i sent out interview requests last night and one of them responded this afternoon. i'll probably do a round of phone calls tomorrow to make sure all the other public relations people know what's up and should do well to get back to patrick soon. there might not be an update tomorrow. okay, there probably won't be. but maybe. you might be lucky.

march 31, 2004 -
katamari damashiii fever has taken over here at klepek power. i think i'm going to feature a different awesome track from this fantastic japanese game each day, just to make sure that you dopes are exposed to it. if the actual game is half as good as the music suggests it is, i'm going to be doing cartwheels and head spins on my 'fro. and that would make my hair awfully dirty, so you have to be aware how exciting times like these are. as you probably already noticed, an enlarged version of a katamari damashii icon has taken over the banner area at the top of the page, too. awesome.

let me go check my e-mail right now. . . . dot dot dot . . . guess what message still isn't there? that's right, the one from the political science teacher from procrastination hell. i understand he might be a busy guy, but he promised to e-mail me on tuesday! i'm afraid that if i approach him at class tomorrow he might bite my head off. so, instead i think i'll see if he says anything to me and send him an e-mail this evening. last time he acted like he wanted to crawl in a hole, so i don't want to scare the man. i'm not even that intimidating. heck, most people intimidate me. so, weird role reversal happening here. UPDATE!!!! my teacher got back to me and to my surprise he has...agreed to let me attend E3! hurrah! holy crap! i'm so excited! things are looking up! i'm pumped! i want to touch the sky with my tongue and drink lollipop cherry milkshakes! SPAZMO.

i forgot all about the movies i saw over spring break. i didn't have a chance to check out the ladykillers, but that is at the top of the anticipating list for when i have the opportunity. hellboy is coming out this weekend, though, so that might take some priority. anyway, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind was all i was hoping for and that much more. charlie kaufmann has proved to me he is not a one (or even two, counting being john malkovich) hit wonder after adaptation. his look into love and its possibiltites is lovely, beautiful and enchanting. jim carrey is definitely in his prime here. i don't care what made him successful years ago. try and watch bruce almighty after seeing eternal sunshine of the spotless mind and watch your head explode. jim is shy and gentle and actually reminds me quite a bit of myself in a few respects. i actually figured out the movie's "trick" about half way through and mary almost knocked my skull when i asked her if i was right (which i was). oops.

there are still not enough posts on the message board, which is disappointing. i know there are about 10 people who regularly visit this site every day and i'm not sure what exactly they're looking at other than my blog-like updates. you really should be posting in the forum, which means infinitely more to me. so, please do that. even if you don't post anything of value. that's really not the point. march 30, 2004 -
it didn't take long for school to begin taking its toll. i'm already feeling the grind of sitting around all day, running through the same routine over and over. however, this week happens to be moving past at a decent rate, and the weekend promises to be all sorts of fun, so at least not everything is so bad. the countdown to summer vacation definitely has begun, though. well, for me, it's not so much the countdown to summer vacation as much as the countdown to E3. five and a half weeks and counting...

speaking of E3, i had to talk to my political science teacher about that whole deal, seeing as how that class's final is the only one that conflicts. unfortunately, he managed to avoid answering my question yet again. every time i bring it up i'm told that "next time" he'll have an answer or he's "working on it" and he "hasn't forgotten." i'd like to believe him, but at this point i'm starting to become aggittated with the entire situation. if it wasn't for the fact that i have to run this by him, i would have said fuck it and moved on long ago. he told me to expect an e-mail explaining what the deal was, but as predicted, no such e-mail has appeared in my inbox. i'll pin a hope on one appearing tomorrow, but to say i'm counting on it would be a pretty bold faced lie.

so far, my bold experiment to expand the extent of my freelancing writing has fallen flat on its face. i'm not giving up yet and might go about the same ideas for gaming age all the same, but i've definitely run the gamut of emotions regarding the whole situation. i've gone from extreme confidence and even excitement (last night when the idea was conceived and enacted) to disappointment and an overwhelming sense of WTF. ah well. it's possible today just wasn't the day for it to come together and tomorrow will be better. maybe? you never know. stranger things have happened to me.

i've been hearing rave reviews for a japanese import called "katamari damashiii," where the objective is to roll around and gather objects on your character. okay, i don't really undestand what that means either, but the screen shots look awfully cool and above all, the soundtrack is supremely bad ass. i have fits of fixation over video game soundtracks once and a while, but the accompanying music to katamari damashiii is not included in that fit; these are just some awesome tunes. i recommend downloading the track featured at the top of the page, as it's a good example of what to expect from the soundtrack. if it doesn't suit your fancy, i hate you and you probably also hate the jet set radio soundtrack, which really should be clear justification for murder.

tomorrow marks the start of the second half of the week, which in itself is an exciting personal milestone. let's hope something cool happens during the latter half to help spice up my mood. right now i'm not doing so hot.

march 29, 2004 -
hail to the king, baby, 'cos i'm back. back in black. except i'm white. oh yeah, suckah! somehow, an entire week has passed by and i can't even tell you what i did during those nine days away from school. i know that the time was spent doing stuff, stuff that lasted until 3am most of the time, but none of it was really worth noting. i mean, there was hilarious hanging out at alex's for "chanapalloza 2004," bumming around with mary and doing entertaining things like wal-mart shopping sprees and filling out job applications to shitty retail outlets that have a good certainty of not replying to me -- but other than that, it was a pretty average spring break. okay, i take that back. it was above average -- pretty enjoyable, even. however, i don't think it was as good as last year's spring break, where i went hopping around san francisco. then again, that is a pretty tough vacation to top. maybe one day.

as i mentioned, i did start filling out job applications. i knew that this moment was coming up as every school day passed, but it seems to have come all too quickly. i don't mind having a job, what i hate is finding one. if there was a government program where i could shove my name in a jar and be handed a boring, slightly above minimum wage job for the summer, i would be perfectly content. i want to work about 30 hours a week doing pointless labor so that i can have some spending money at school next year. i put applications into places like circuit city, pinera bread, alrington theaters and the like, so hopefully one of them will respond with a thumbs up. i kind of lied about my college experience, though, 'cos i figure if i put down i'll be heading back to college at the end of august, they'll be less inclined to hire me at the places that aren't just busy during the summer (like the theater).

one really exciting thing that did happen over break was registration for the nobou uematsu concert happening the night before E3. i didn't order a formal ticket because i was unsure that i'd even be showing up at the show, but now that the pieces are starting to fall into place, i was disappointed i wouldn't be able to attend the concernt. thankfully, though, square enix has a bunch of press tickets to hand out and i was able to register in time to receive one. that is, if nothing goes wrong and i'm still able to properly work out this E3 business with finals. that i'll find out about tomorrow when i bug my political science teacher for the billionth time. that jerk better have a good answer this time, 'cos i'm starting to get anxious about this whole thing. the plane tickets have to be booked in less than two weeks or i'm screwed!

this weekend promises to be the best one i've had at school yet. in addition to the fact that mary, ashley and dan (maybe matt!) are all headed down via the handy dandy bus system has in place, i'm attending the ben folds concert on monday. his new album is wrapping up right around now, too, so that means there is bound to be new material shown off at the show! ahhhh! i'm wetting my pants in anticipation already. i don't know what to do! who cares, 'cos it's a kick ass way to kick off the weekend after spring break as i head into the last weeks of the semester - right around five and a half, to be exact. not that much, really. after that, i'm home free and it'll be time to prepare for the real start of college. at least, unless something goes horribly wrong. but so far, so good.

i'm starting to lose motivation for writing again. i need to do something outside of this gaming age stuff. it's starting to wear on me. i like writing for GMR and GameSpy, but it's the same ol' stuff i do for gaming age, 'cept i get paid. i need something more exciting or i'm going to burn out. so, i've determined i need to come up with a few news stories to pitch to GMR and Xbox Nation. i kind of ducked out of this offer with Xbox Nation a few months back, which was stupid of me to do. however, i think i can still wrangle something together. so, finger's crossed, 'cos i want to do well.

oh, and post on the message board, please! we're starting to see some real traffic and i've seemed to have worked out the kinks as far as avatars go, so let's start rocking the vote. and stuff.

march 18, 2004 -
well, guys, this is it. this will be the last update from school before i head home. i'm not sure if i'll have the ability to do constant updates at home, but i'm going to make a concentrated effort to ensure the site is still refreshed with spanky new content as often as possible. and anyway, it's freakin' spring break, what do you expect! if i'm not hanging out with mary, i'm going to be rocking it with my friends. and if i'm not rocking it with my friends, i'm either sleeping, watching the weezer DVD or playing video games. so, really, that doesn't leave too many options for filling the front page of klepek power with useless text. nonetheless, i will try.

i'm disappointed in all of you. despite the fact that nearly 20 people have visited the site since the message board went online, only chan has made a post. dammit. so far the experiment is not a success, but that's okay. it's new, it's strange, it's alien, i'll just assume that everyone is afraid to touch it right now. remember, though, you don't have to register! just enter your name in the username space and type away! if you register you have the ability to add an avatar and a personalized tag (which i set) and stuff, but it's not really that important. please, someone, anyone...post something on the board to make me feel less like the loser i am.

i have to find a fax machine on campus. as far as i know, there are no fax machines available in the dorm and the school doesn't exactly make a concerned effort to make sure it's students are aware of all the places with a built-in fax machine. but thankfully someone i was bitching to suggested going to kinko's, which is actually only a few blocks down green street. kind of out of my way, but it's okay. if i don't sent it in gamespy doesn't pay me, so i think i can sacrifice the half hour out of my time it takes to track down a damn data communication device. or something.

the new wilco album, a ghost is born, leaked onto the 'net today. it is, as expected, complete awesomeness. the track "hummingbird" is my personal favorite at the moment, and i have personally decreed it to be the new album's "heavy metal drummer," one of the best tracks off of wilco's previous release, yankee hotel foxtrot. i suggest all fans of kick ass music investigate this new release immediately.

i suppose that about does it. i hope my mood improves tomorrow. tonight wasn't exactly the best. sigh. just keep thinking about ninjas, patrick, just keep thinking about ninjas. everything will be okay.

march 17, 2004 -
ATTENTION: a klepek power message board has been created! feel free to check it out and discuss stupid topics amongst yourselves. i will also join in the fun. that is, if anyone even bothers using it. it might be kind of fun, you know? anyway, keep in mind that you DO NOT need to register an account to start topics or reply. just enter in a username (i don't think it matters if you enter a password or not) and type away! let me know what you guys think!!! an official link will be added to the main graphic tomorrow, i hope.

hurrah for patrick, as he was able to finish his review of bomberman jetters for gamespy this evening. well, ok, so it's actually around 3:00am. i know that i don't end up writing more than 1,000 words for these articles, but somehow it takes me hours upon hours to finally piece them together. i'm sure the speed will come more naturally over time, but man, i just like to make sure that everything's perfect. seems like a cop out to get paid to have the copy editor's fix mistakes. ah well, anyway. now that i have that story out of the way i can return to playing game's i really care about, like ninja gaiden, which alex is already ahead of me in. dammit.

this afternoon alex was able to head home early cos he is a jerk. i know that i've already bitched about this fact plenty, but i feel compelled to mention it one more time, as the thoughts exit my system and i come to the realization that i'm going to to have to wait another whole day before i'm out of this hell hole. spring break, here i come. spring break, here i come. spring break, here i come!

i'm not exactly sure what do do over spring break, though. mary and i have come up with some preliminary plans for what to accomplish during a few of the days, but it's certainly not enough to fill up a whole week! we need to see a bunch of movies, that much is true. especially since i forgot i need to see the passion of the christ again. looks like my mom will be coming with this time, too. damn. i'm going to look like such a dope in front of everyone if the movie strikes me as hard as it did last time. oh well, what can you do. on friday, we're hitting up california pizza kitchen for some rocking good food, a welcome change from the school trash (besides fat don's, of course). saturday is occupied by a family party my mom is holding for my grandma's 80th birthday, but i'm sure i can sneak out of that in the evening. that next tuesday is a religious holiday on the patrick klepek calendar, as it marks the date when weezer drops the Deluxe Edition of its first self titled release and their first DVD. i'm so excited!!!

but, well, that leaves a whole lot of days of my vacation left open with nothing to do. so, if anyone has any ideas of what to do, please let me know. not that anybody e-mails me to begin with, but i know that some of you suckers read this every day, so if you'd like to slyly pretend you don't read this and just mention some kind of spring break idea to me at some point, that's cool, too. i understand. this is kind of like a tame version of a live journal, which are the source of the internet's overwhelming amount of emo-centric literature.

i think i should probably sleep in a few minutes. maybe i'll watch some futurama before hitting bed, though. that show kicks so much ass.

march 16, 2004 -
the first day where nothing had to be accomplished was indeed a good one. okay, so i still had to attend class, i still had to do reading for classes the next day and i still had to go to a stupid political science extra credit...other than that, however, it was pretty much school-less the whole day! instead, it was spent rocking out to unreal tournament 2004, laughing it up with futurama episodes and doing some productive writing on the computer. yes, i managed to whip up a review of pitfall: the lost expedition for gaming age, which i'll probably toss online tomorrow. maybe. depends. we'll see how it goes. i also need to come up with questions for the next "meet the forum" segment, as i don't want to start running behind again as i did with the last installment.

looks like i might have a chance to contribute one more piece of writing to the prospector before ms. wilson leaves it behind and all my connections to the publication are lost and forgotten. i brought up the idea of writing an opinion piece on ninjas vs. pirates, one of mankind's never ending debates, and megan rowe decided it would be a good idea to put forth this idea and that i would be able to help write it from the pro-pirate stance. in all honestly, i'm more pro-ninja, but i think the pirate stance will be interesting to argue from and i am looking forward to a rounded debate on the pros and cos between being a pillaging sea captain or a masked stealth assassin. let's cross our fingers that ms. wilson gives the story a thumbs up!

tomorrow, my rhetoric class takes places in a different building, which means i have no chance of running into ms. fatty again this week. as long as i'm careful about getting off at a stop earlier from now on, i shouldn't have to deal with another sickeningly awkward situation again. at least, i hope. chances are i'll be hunted down like the dog i am. oh, lord, help me have the strength of solid snake.

chan is one hell of a lucky bastard; his parents are coming to pick him up tomorrow afternoon, which means he essentially has a week and a half spring break. short people have all the luck! okay, so maybe that does mean he's ditching class, but that's okay, because alex doesn't "advocate missing school," he's just taking advantage of an option to not attend class. at least, that's what he tells me when he asks if i want to "not attend school" for the rest of the week. unfortunately, i have a quiz on friday that could be avoided, but i'd rather not take my chances, you know? so, instead, i'll be hitching a ride with the bengtsen's at 4pm.

i kind of started playing bomberman jetters a little too late. i have to write a review for gamespy tomorrow evening and i haven't even really started playing. withing an hour or so i was able to make it through the first 'world' but i haven't even touched the multiplayer modes, which are really the meat of the bomberman experience. hopefully i'll be able to spend some quality time tomorrow and crank out a few sessions with alex.

march 15, 2004 -
oh no! if you look at the date, it's been like four days since i've updated this piece of crap! nooooooooooo! it's okay, though, the last of my midterms if finally out of the way (which i'm pretty sure i aced through this morning - BOOYAH!) and it's smooth sailing until the end of the week. and what awaits me at the end of the week? spring break, of course! it's too bad i couldn't just head home now, or, at the least, in two days, like chan is doing. oh well. a week is better than three days, that's for sure. i'm looking forward to hanging out with mary, ye ol' friends and indulging in proper amounts of laziness, movie watching and video games. oh yes, it will be a grand spring break time, indeed.

i must relay a saddening experience that happened on the way to my rhetoric class this afternoon. first, a little setup. last semester, i shared a bus a few times a week with this, um, 'large' girl. we were headed to the same class, so we would talk about how things were going for the each of us and it was all okay. then, she started getting a little too friendly and was on the verge of asking me out on a date when the bus was crowded with people and she wasn't able to finish her sentence. thank the lord! well, except that everything from that experience came to bite me in the ass. see, after this class was over with i thought i'd never see her again. with 40,000 students at this school, it's kind of tough to run into people. but, lo and behold, she appeared in front of me as i approached everitt lab just before 1pm. the scariest part? she hugged me, man. she HUGGED me. i feel the need to sit in a shower for hours upon end just to get rid of the feeling. but i digress. after that, we talked about how things were going as i frantically looked for a way out of the conversation. eventually, i just said i needed to head to class and as i'm leaving, she goes 'we should have dinner sometime. call me.' my jaw dropped as i turned away, barely managing to say 'okay' and yelling 'FUCK' very loudly as soon as i was out of ear shot range. god damn.

there are quite a few movies i want to check out over the break: eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, the ladykillers and dawn of the dead. those are listed in the order i want to see 'em in, really. dawn of the dead is more optional than anything else; i'd honestly rather check it out on video, but chan and i watched a 10 minute teaser on TV tonight and it looked hilariously awesome, so it bumped itself up a few notches 'cos of that. eternal sunshine of the spotless mind is the next film from scribe charlie kauffman, who i worship for his work on adaptation, the first movie i came out of saying "i now understand the meaning of life." plus, it's jim carrey in another serious rule. he needs to leave comedies behind; his serious stints are far better, nowadays. i caught a clip of bruce almighty at DJ's a few weeks ago and almost cried at how unfunny it was. poor jim. lastly, the ladykillers is a hilarious looking new film from tom hands that i've been itching to see since the teaser trailer.

this weekend we were able to check out timmy's band play another show, and they were pretty good. actually, it's the best i've seen them before. in fact, there intro was actually bad ass. which, considering my opinion of that genre of music, is a respectable thing to say. too bad i forgot my camera, or else i'd have some pictures to pop up on the site. next time maybe.

also, ashley's bio has been re-added to the site. she complained the picture before were not up to snuff, so i had dan send over some new ones and they have been replaced.

march 11, 2004 -
unfortuantely, i do not have the time to put togther a proper update for the site. an all new, fun-filled entry will likely have to wait until monday evening. i'm sorry, guys, i hope it's not too much of a disappointment. finishing two paper's has taken up the majority of my spare time this afternoon and evening and i still need to study for a 9am quiz in political science. on the good side of things, both of those papers are finally done and i scored my first A on a midterm here at college in political science. kick ass!

march 10, 2004 -
this is an especially late update thanks to that research paper for human sexuality taking up a few hours of my time. it actually took less time than i thought to put together, but because it required a title page, a reference page and because i still haven't been able to find two proper academic resources to quote in the paper, it took probably twice as long as it should have. oh well. it just meant i wasn't able to update gaming age tonight, which was kind of sad. i will try to make up for it tomorrow, but i have class in the evening and another five page paper to complete before friday comes. plus, there's a political science quiz on friday. oh, joy!

speaking of the other paper i have to write, i met with my TA this afternoon to discuss the finer points of the essay. as i expected, he didn't even like my thesis statement, and we ended up coming up with a skeleton outline of an all-new paper. that's right, boys and girls, i wasted six hours putting together that piece of shit on sunday night. i could have sat back and busted through a few levels of ninja gaiden that evening, but instead i was pouring efforts into producing a literate response to a writing prompt. now, i'm having to start from scratch with a new thesis requiring five more pages of bullshit to accompany it. ah well. i got a bit of a head start on it yesterday, so it shouldn't take nearly as long to finish off as last time. still sucks, though. god damnit.

tonight marked the return of the weekly visits to fat don's near the six pack residence halls. it was a welcome change of pace after the terrible string of meals i've been expericing here at PAR. i don't know what happened, but i went from telling everyone the food was actually "pretty good" to living off of late night food on some days. fat don's, however, is kick ass. steaks, grilled chicken and the bast damn ice cream you can find on campus. there is no other location at this school where i can heap on as many fresh strawberries onto vanilla ice cream as i can at fat don's. the ice cream, my friends, makes it worth staying at this school. almost.

in just a short amount of time i'll be heading home again. it's been another two weeks since i've been there, and i miss sleeping in my own bed a heullva lot. good thing that spring break is just around the corner; i'm about to lose it here. after that, it's only five more weeks of school (with a ben folds concert smacked in-betwee for good measure) before it's all over.

march 9, 2004 -
i'm going to apologize in advance. if you happen to call me one day and that call wakes me up in the morning, i'm going to sound cranky. i might just sound like an asshole. i don't mean to and half the time i don't remember the conversaions that happen when i pick up the phone, but i'm told i respond like i'm pissed off. ok, so the majority of these conversations have happened when mary is being funny and calling from starbucks at 7am, but earlier today this happened and it was 10am. i was concious the conversation was taking place, but i think i was aggitated that i had been woken from my slumber a whole half hour early, so i became a groggy monster. oh well. i wish i could say that's something i'm going to work on, but how do you work on something you can't control? i'll have to work on working on stuff like that. er, right.

productivity got the best of me today, as i started back into the routine of updating gaming age on a daily basis. last week's barrage of tests forced me to push that into the background, but now i'm back in the groove. i even wrote a review of champions of norrath, if you can believe it! i know i can't. i'm also working up a review of the new pitfall harry game, which is surprisingly decent, although that's about the highest amount of praise i'd heap upon it. also, gamespy is sending the next bomberman game my way for review, which is nice. i likes the bombermand and it's even nicer to get paid to likes the bomberman. everyone wins!

tomorrow is looking to be a rather writing-oriented day, as i have to meet with my rhetoric TA to go over the craptacular essay i wrote on sunday and i have to write a four page research paper for human sexuality. four pages, though...i don't know how that won't be easy to crank out in less than two hours. at least, i hope. i'm almost tempted to put it off until thursday afternoon, but i know that's probably not the smartest move in the world. i'm already pretty sure i did iffy on the midterm, so i better not take a chance with the one part of the course i can virtually guarantee myself an A in. the first part of the day, however, worries me, because i hold such a distaste for the essay i wrote that i don't know how my teacher can possibly help me construct deceny out of it. a girl in my class did say i have "neat word choice," though, so maybe it's not ALL bad.

hafta pick up bus tickets tomorrow. heading home early on friday, woo! i think i can afford to miss one psychology class; rhetoric is cancelled that day 'cos our papers are due and the engineering department is taking over the building. before then, i need to figure out how to burn this AVI of the movie 'love actually' to a DVD so i can watch it at home this weekend...

also, if anyone cares, my brother has is playing a show on saturday - and it's $5 to get in. i know, i know, but apparently it's really important to him. so, if anyone would care to join me (and probably mary), let me know.

march 8, 2004 -
this morning i woke up and wasn't sure if i'd be able to make it to class. the whole upper half of my body ached with pain. ugh. not really sure how that managed to happen, but that, fused with a lack of sleep from finishing my paper, created a terrible dynamic for my first class. i was alright for most of the day, but an overwhelming feeling of sleep fell over me when i started to catch up on readings i'd missed over the past week. figures, but oh well. i usually avoid naps like the plague, but i let myself slip into one and i paid for it pretty badly. i really, really hate the feeling of waking up from a nap. your brain is dead and it literally takes half an hour before you're able to coherently think about anything at all. i'm not sure why napping causes that feeling so much more than regular sleep does. wacky.

the paper i was bitching out was indeed finished last night, though i ended up changing its focus. instead of talking about a stereotype created by video game publications, i switched to how the video game industry creates an identity of sexually obsessed, violent-prone individuals with its content. i don't even agree with the statements i'm making in the paper, but whatever manages to get me to 5 pages of words that building upon a logical argument and result in patrick with a good grade for his rhetoric class is all i'm aiming for. i actually think the paper sucks pretty hardcore, and i'm sure i can come up with a decent solutoin before it's due on friday. i think, at least.

tonight was sad, as i kind of sucked it up in unreal tournament. we played assault mode, which i don't have much experience in. still, a forum guy named 'pixelated' completely demolished me. no matter how much i jumped and jinved, i couldn't avoid his rocket blasts. i cry to the heavens, for i have been de-throned! son of a bitch. at least the rest of the lackies are under my control still.

on a more positive note, i didn't end up losing money in eBay! people actually bid! of course, there was no bidding war, so i didn't really make anything more than what the asking price was. it's ok, though, i put the games up more as a test to see how eBay works, rather than to start sleeping in piles of money, although that would have been a nice side effect. now, i just need to figure out where the nearest post office is here at school so i can send these puppies out.

ninja gaiden is really, really fucking hard. i actually thought the difficulty was pretty overstated when i first started playing, but soon enough these exploding ninjas showed up and shoved their bullshit down my throat. it's been a long, long time since i've thrown a controller at the ground in frustration and swore out loud. i guess you could say that ninja gaiden brought out the repressed fifth grader in me. this afternoon i was able to pass the area with the exploding ninjas, though. nunchuck combos + fire spells = exploding ninjas become patrick's bitch.

march 7, 2004 -
the weekend has now come and gone. which is to say that i'm left with feelings of both happiness and sadness. i realized that i truly have been missing out on a lot of what college can be about when mary came to visit, and it's sad that i can't have that every weekend. and now she's gone, so it's back to the same ol' grind. that's the sad part. on the other hand, we had an absolute blast. we didn't even do anthing particulatly exciting outside of walking around and exploring the campus together, but that is all i have really wanted to do since i've been here. i just haven't had the opportunity to. so, at least i was able to have that, and the both of us calculated that there's less than two months before this whole freshman year is over, anyway, so it's not much longer to suffer through the madness.

mary did almost miss her bus, which would have been the absolute worst thing that could have ever happened in the entire world. there are no more bus rides after 6pm on sunday; she'd have to wait until thursday if the school was going to give her a lift! man oh man, i don't even want to think how we would explain to our parents that someone had to drive six hours to bring her back home. they'd probably just go "figure it out yourself." but we made it (with two minutes to spare), so we were good to go.

for some reason i couldn't sleep last night, either. usually, i lay my head down and boom!, i'm out. not so this time. sure, it wasn't until 4am that we actually decided it was time to sleep, but it wasn' until 6:30am that i even found some real sleep. if i didn't feel hot, the door's noises caused by the wind were bugging me or i was focusing my thoughts on the fact that i couldn't sleep, thus making it all the more difficult to actually get any sleep. eventually, i decided that i might just get out of bed and go for a walk to clear my head. just as that scenario passed over, i was out like a light. but since the experience was so wobbled i've been left feeling awfully crappy through most of the day, which sucks, as i have a 5 page paper due, which i, of course, haven't started.

the paper is on a specific identity created in a medium. i'm choosing to do the teenage male geek stereotype protrayed in video game publications. i figure, i write for that audience, so i know how well that stereotype is held up (and both true and not true in several respects). i really want to take a nap, but i don't think it's possible or beneficial to try and do that at almost 9pm. so, it looks like i have to stick it out and try and finish this puppy. i don't know what i'm going to ramble on about for 5 page, but i figure if i at least get 4, i can ask for suggestions at the peer reviews and go from there. man, i really don't want to write...i just want to sleep. sigh.

i don't have the energy to add any new pictures or people to the web site, nor do i feel compelled to add new video descriptions to the schumanfu studios page. i do, however, want to take pictures of each of the videos that will be described on that page so that you'd have an idea of what the video was before you downloaded it. i have a feeling it'll be a while before THAT happens, though.

ah well, back to the paper, i guess. maybe i'll try an hour nap. i'm damn tired. :(

march 5, 2004 -
technically, it's actually march 6, but the way i figure it, i haven't gone to sleep and woken up, so it's not tomorrow - yet. thus, the date shall stay march 5, even though it's actually saturday, march 6 at the moment. you do not have to understand the logic behind this decision, you must only accept it for what it is and know that i am aware of exactly what i am doing. okay then.

picked up ben folds tickets. only three, though, which makes me sad. mary's starbucks compadre never got back to her on going to the concert, so she wouldn't have had a ride back if she came. oh well. so, now it's just erik, liz and i. which is cool, and should still be lots o' fun. i listened to the ben folds live CD to get myself in the mood, and was reminded about how much that guy kicks ass live. and i've never even seen him life for myself! i have resigned myself to find some way to meet him while he's here, but i don't know how. maybe i can pretend gaming age is a music site and that i should be allowed to interview him? hmm, i'll have to think on it and come up with a proper plan.

a few new additions to the site have occurred. the movie on the schumanfu studios page has been replaced with the "Max Payne Auditions," a personal favorite. it's a bit big on the file size, but that's okay; the school's server is wicked fast. secondly, ashley and hazama have been added to the people i know section. and finally, all of my pictures from the electronic entertainment expo last year have been put online. that was the first year my friends came with, and there are lots of hilarious pictures to be found (for example, why did they sculpt a penis in the giant hulk statue?!). all the planning over whether i would be attending E3 this year got me in the mood to become nostalgic over last year's pictorial. man, that was so much fun. i have to go this year!

tomorrow mary is taking the magic bus down here. she won't be here until at least 4:00, so i can stay up late and sleep in like a putz. so, that's what i'll do. i think i shall go back to playing ninja gaiden now and then read a little before i fall into a deep slumber. check you fools later.

p.s. i apologize to the people outside my dorm window who may have saw me rawking out to the climax portion of weezer's "only in dreams."

march 4, 2004 -
ok, so maybe i was wrong. sometimes miracles to happen! as it turns out, mary is being allowed to jump on the bus and spend the weekend here. although i'm not particularly sure what we will even do, that is completely not what counts. the news is especially nice after the ugly midterm i just took. looks like i underestimated how picky the writers of that exam would be. i definitely didn't put in enough time to study, but it's ok, i am pretty sure i managed enough to not bomb, so i can make up for the lack of points with the research paper next week, etc. i knew those freaking diagrams were going to kill me. i have no idea how to study for them, so i always blow up during those sections. argh.

after the test i did jump into an intense game of onslaught mode in unreal tournament 2004 with the gaming age crew, where i proceded to dominate the competition. during one of the games i managed to score just under 100 points (kills), with the 2nd closest player nabbing less than 50! i knew all that practice with the mantra would pay off at some point!

i'm glad i started keeping track of the number of hits this web site receives. i never knew there were 20 different people who were so interested in my life. or maybe not. it's more likely that they're part of the mob who heard there was a nearly naked photo of brian zabawa placed on the site. yes, it's true, ladies, the fart master can be seen in a rather provacative position with a plastic sword in his profile, which was recently added to the 'people i know' section. i'll have a whole evening to do nothing tomorrow, so i hope to add all sorts of stuff to the site. oh, how exciting!!

no one is bidding on my eBay auctions. that is very sad. i'm going to end up LOSING money now. can't one of you bastards just make a bid that you'll pretend to pay? it'll make me feel better about myself. :(

march 3, 2004 -
well, that's two midterms down, one more to go. although the psychology midterm didn't go over as well as political science, it wasn't anything i'd consider difficult, so i'm confident i nabbed a B, if not something higher. it's going to take an enormous amount of effort to find motivation for studying for the human sexuality midterm, but i suppose later on tonight i'll find a reason to start filling out the study guide. i just keep telling myself that after tomorrow night, it's finally over. except that i have to write a five page paper at midnight when i return to school on sunday, but that's something i'm trying not to think about just yet.

as i figured, no miracles happened that are going to let mary make her way to school this weeekend. it was starting to look like we could figure out a plan with the bus system, but nope, the same friend who copped out on us at the last minute on her birthday was the same one who decided to jump ship this time. figures, huh? i don't understand how girls can be such bitches. it just doesn't make sense. maybe i've just gotten lucky with my friends; i've never had to deal with such senselessness before. so, looks like i'll be picking up a bus ticket to head home tomorrow, hopefully resulting in an enjoyable weekend, albeit obviously not the one i had intended to have. :(

at least heading home this weekend will mean that i can check out starsky & hutch, the new ben stiller/owen wilson flick. it looks freaking hilarious, and i've heard it billed as "zoolander 2." i don't know how that could possibly be a bad thing. if anything, that's the best possible description for a comedy ever. i think i'll rent school of rock, too, since i missed out jack black's antics when it hit theaters.

yesterday was mary's birthday and today is my mom's birthday, so happy birthday to her! she has no idea how to use a computer, however, so e-mail shout outs will not be necessary. however, if you see her in the near future, feel free to give a high-five for making it thorugh one more year of life. i hope to pick up her birthday presents on saturday, so that i can get them to her as soon as possible. i am sad that i could not be home or have the presents delivered in time for them to arrive on her actual birthday, but that is just the way things worked out with my schedule. it's okay, though, she'll like all her stuff a lot. i need to figure out which sex and the city boxset she doesn't have yet...

i also need to stop playing so much unreal tournament 2004. it is starting to creep into my study activities. onslaught mode is so damn good, though. i can't help but participate in just one more match, instead of covering vocabulary from chapter 7 of my psychology book. that's just the way it works, okay?! i can't help that i'm so damn good at piloting the mantra.

cross your fingers that i'm allowed to pick up ben folds tickets without interference with my exam tomorrow night. that would piss me off royally. i think i might have to ditch the exam if it conflicted. :)

march 2, 2004 -
UPDATE:
looks like mary can't come down this weekend. figures that her friends manage to screw something else up. one more weekend i could have been spent actually enjoying myself at college is flushed down the drain. sigh. figures.

----

happy birthday, mary! today is her actual birthday, and anyone who wishes to be nice and drop her an e-mail can do so at chiceroo@hotmail.com. go on, i know you want to! this year she's turning the magical 18, which means she's allowed to purchase pornography and cigarettes despite the watchful eye of the law. how wonderful life is! this also means we're back to being one year apart from each other in age. that's nice, because for some reason being two years apart for a month makes me feel slightly creepy. it wasn't so bad this year (17 to 19), but last year (16 to 18), made her seem so young while i felt so old. anyway, i'm retarded.

the first of the trifecta of midterms went down this morning in political science 100. have to say that i kicked that test's ass outta the ball park. i felt really confident going into it, which paid off big time. i've been studying for my psychology 100 midterm tonight, which i'm less confident about 'cos there are about a million and a half different terms to memorize and there's no way they're all being logged away in my brain. i rocked 2 out of the 3 quizzes so far, though, so i think i should be OK. after that, only the bullshit human sexuality midterm is left for the week...

on the way to my midterm, there was a lady in the middle of the hallway yelping for