trachalio

Hope y'all like. I had a blast makin' it :D

Currently Playing: Deadly Premonition (360), Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PS3), Picross3D (DS)
Currently Reading: Revenge of the Giants, Orcs of Stonefang Pass, Heroes of the Fallen Lands, Player's Handbook (3.5)

Fargo Half Marathon

This past Saturday I competed in my third Fargo Half Marathon. I was trying to break 2 hours this year, but fell short by about 5 minutes. A combination of lax training and crazy humid weather did me in.

When we were down in Arizona back in April I found it hard to get my runs in. No matter what time of the morning I woke up, it was already too damn warm. I'd gone from running in -15°C weather to +15°C weather in the span of a day. Not something my body was ready for. So I slacked out on my runs.

Unfortunately I kept slacking when I got home. I went from running 2 to 4 times a week, to maybe once a week. I didn't get in any speed work, nor did I do some of my longer runs. If you look at the Garmin data from my Fargo race, it really shows. My pace was great up until the 1:30 mark and that's where it all fell apart.

I had a pace range between a 4:45 km and a 5:24 km, and I did manage to stick close to 5:20. That would have gotten me in just shy of 2 hours. But because I didn't train like I should have and wasn't able to maintain a faster pace it all fell apart at 1:30 :(

The weather didn't help either. When I woke up there was a 80% chance of thunderstorms happening during the run, so the air was humid, hot, and thick. Unfortunately for me, the thunderstorms never happened so the entire race was super humid and not something I was used to running in. Towards the end I almost took my shirt off (and I never take my shirt off 'cause I was overheating so damn much.

But I still have a chance to break 2 hours this year. There's the Imagine Run out in Niverville this fall, and Terry's been talking about running the Las Vegas Marathon in December. I know that I need to get my ass in gear (and in shape!) and stick to the schedule when I'm training.

Currently Playing: Dead Rising 2: Case Zero (Xbox 360), Deadly Premonition (Xbox 360), Picross 3D (DS)
Currently Reading: Revenge of the Giants, Orcs of Stonefang Pass, Heroes of the Fallen Lands, Player's Handbook (3.5)

Sedona, AZ

Terry and I spent the better part of April (17 days!) in Arizona for our winter vacation this year, visiting my parents, visiting friends, and celebrating my Dad's 65th birthday.

We landed in Phoenix the morning of April 1 and were on the road to Tucson by 2 in the afternoon. We spent an awesome 5 days at the "Z&T Resort", hanging out with Todd, Zach, Shawn and Justin. Drinking beer by the pool, eating good food, and playing games like Reverse Charades and Gestures.

Taking the long way back to Mesa, we popped over to the Kartchner Caverns for a tour of the Rotunda/Throne room, followed by a visit to Tombstone.

The following Friday my sister and her friends arrived. And, like the good WInnipeggers they are, we were at Ikea within 2 hours of their plane landing. Saturday morning they dragged us up to Anthem to the outlet mall and that evening we were celebrating my Dad's 65th birthday.

The following Tuesday saw us back down in Tucson. Todd and Zach didn't feel they had a long enough visit with us the first time so we had to come down again before we left. Zach took us to the Desert Museum Wednesday morning and we met Todd for lunch and prickly pear-a-rita's at El Charro.

We headed back to Mesa on Thursday morning, having breakfast with the illustrious Homer before stopping at Biosphere 2 for a tour. Got back to Mesa later that afternoon, hung out with my parents and their friends for a few hours, and headed down south to Maricopa that evening for dinner and drinks with Shawn and Justin.

Friday we met the infamous cecilgene for burgers at Delux, having a far-to-short lunch before he headed out to work. That evening we went down to Tempe for Thai food with Jeff and Rick.

Saturday Mom, Terry, and I drove up to Sedona for lunch and spent the day just wandering around the town taking pictures. I definitely want to spend a whole weekend there with Terry next time we're down. Sedona is so incredibly beautiful and calming.

Sunday, our last day there, was spent hanging out with my parents again. Now it may seem like we didn't get much of a visit in with them, with all our travelling to visit friends, but we did see them quite a bit. Honest!

It was a fantastic trip, filled with family and friends. Terry and I can't wait until we're down there again. I've put a bunch of pictures in my Flickr photostream if you want to see.

Currently Playing: Dragon Age 2 (Xbox 360), DJ Hero 2 (Xbox 360), Portal 2 (Playstation 3), 9 Hours, 9 People, 9 Doors (DS)
Currently Reading: Dungeons & Dragons Player's Handbook 3.5 by Jonathan Tweet, Monte Cook, and Skip Williams, Penny for My Thoughts by Paul Tevis

Seriously. You're killing me.

In January I discover Four Tet's "There Is Love in You".

In March you release Goldfrapp's "Head First".

In May you hit with with a triple shot of UNKLE's "Where Did the Night Fall", How To Destroy Angels self titled EP, and LCD Soundsystem's final album "This is Happening".

June 15 you release Robyn's "Body Talk, Pt. 1" and Scissor Sisters' "Night Work".

September you release Robyn's "Body Talk Pt. 2" and Röyksopp's "Senior".

And today I discover that Underworld's latest album "Barking" was released last week? Robyn's "Body Talk Pt. 3" and Ninjatune's 2CD "XX" compilation are still due to come out? Good god, what are you going to do to me next?

Currently Playing: Persona 4 (PS2), Picross3D (DS)
Currently Reading: The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass by Stephen King, Apocalypse World by D. Vincent Baker

Two years ago this shelf was practically empty. A handful of 2nd edition modules and basic guides that an ex left behind; an old 1st edition rulebook an uncle gave me when I was 10.

4th Edition Dungeons and Dragons was my gateway drug into the world of RPGs.

4e is how I met my gaming group: brennildandd yanked me out of my comfort zone and got me hooked on Don't Rest Your Head, Gaald had us giggling like little kids in games of OG, Certis took us across the ocean to the city of Ptolus.

4e has led me to amazing blogs like The Mighty Atom, Newbie DM, and Neo Grognard.

I love all that 4e has brought me, but unfortunately we've stopped playing 4e. Our gaming group is small: 4 people. When one of us DMs, that leaves 3 people to run the party and 4e really likes you to have 5. We've tried, with a decent amount of success, to have two people run two characters, but those that do end up feeling burned out. I really miss it though, so I've decided to try my hand at DMing.

I'd thought about doing it last year and had this huge adventure planned. I had a big plot and grand ideas. I even bought dungeon tiles and props! But the more I read of the Dungeon Master's Guide, the more I realized I was started way too big. So I picked up Dungeon Delve with thoughts of starting small. Try my hand at a few encounters and grow from there.

Then I got distracted and I never finished reading the DMG. But for some reason summer gets me in the RPG mood all over again, so I'm re-reading the it. I like what I see, but there's also a lot of work ahead too. Like I said before, 4e really is built for parties of 5 people and you have to do a bunch of tweaking to get it to work with 3. So while I'm trying to figure that out I might try DMing something else: Dragon Age.

I picked up Set 1 on Friday on a whim and I like what I see so far. It's built for parties of 2 players or more, it's not too rule heavy, and only uses 3d6! Can't get much simpler than that! Everyone in my gaming group loved the CRPG so I think this'll be an easy sell for them.

I just need to finish the GM guide first. Here's hoping nothing shiny distracts me this time!

Currently Playing: Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap (GBA), Demon's Souls (PS3)
Currently Reading: Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin

Pixeljunk Shooter by Q-Games




OMG Livejournal,

I won a Playstation 3 this weekend! A fuckin' PS3!

Terry and I were at a wedding social this weekend for my hairdresser/sister's best friend Cynthia. Typical of a rural social, the silent auction table had a gaming system and a plasma TV in with the usual prize packages. I put 4 tickets in the PS3 bag, thinking there was no way I could possibly win. The bag already had a lot of tickets so the odds were against me in a big way.

Well look at me now, the proud owner of a PS3 slim!

I still had some funds left over in my Canadian and US PSN accounts, so I picked up Pain (a fun party game IMO), Pixeljunk Monsters, and Pixeljunk Shooter. The PS3 prize pack also came with an extra controller and a copy of Gran Tourismo 5 Prologue, and I picked up Metal Gear Solid 4 when it came out too (listen, I'm a sucker for limited editions and I love the series. Don't give me that look! I knew I'd be getting a PS3 some day, just not this soon!

While there's a lot more on the PS3 I want to check out (ferricide's entries on Final Fantasy XIII have really piqued my curiosity), I'm on a self imposed hiatus from buying games this year. I'm not allowing myself to buy anything game related until I'm debt free. That's not to say I wont be borrowing and renting, but I've got more than enough games that need finishing before I start buying new ones.

So, if you've got a Playstation 3, feel free to friend me up!

Currently Reading: "Winter's Tale" by Mark Helprin
Currently Playing: Metal Gear Solid 4 (PS3), Pixeljunk Monsters (PS3), Pixeljunk Shooter (PS3), Darwinia+ (Xbox 360)

I'm training for the Fargo Half Marathon again this year. Unfortunately for me, my schedule overlapped with my vacation down in Mexico. 9 km in 80% humidity and 25°C was NOT FUN. Sure, running on the Malecón is pretty and all, but that was only like 4 km of the run. The rest was running on cobblestones and beside the highway. I was supposed to maintain an average pace of 6:30 min/km and stayed pretty close to that, despite the terrain and the heat.

Unfortunately I didn't stick with the rest of the schedule and didn't do any other runs afterwards. My first run back home, the day after we go back, was a 10 Km long distance run, and it was pretty damn rough. Took me a good two weeks for my body to catch up with the rest of the group!

Currently Playing: Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor (DS), Dragon Age: Origins (360)

Master Chief catchin' some rays

Puerto Vallarta. My first time there and I can't wait to go back. Terry and I went for 10 days, and we could easily have stayed another week. The beach was beautiful, the waves were fun, and the food was AMAZING.

Friends of mine have been going to PV for a few years now, and every year the come back raving about how awesome it was. I forced myself to put money aside all year so I could join them this time and I'm glad I did. I've got pictures up on flickr if y'all wanna see.


Currently Playing: Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes (DS), Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
Currently Reading: The Hero from Otherwhere by Jay Wiliams