Ohio walk failure

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Mission “Walk to Ohio” was a failure. I skipped out at the 26 mile mark (just past Midway, which is a suitable name) and came home. I probably could have made it to dinner (another ~5 miles) and maybe West Virginia (another ~6 miles after that), but a car was being called for some other people anyway, and the decision at that point was either heading back or finishing the entire 45 miles, which I didn’t feel like I could do. (Route here.)

I think having done the West Virginia portion before made me less inclined to push myself, which in retrospect was the right decision. Final count is five blisters and one (still) red sore spot, which means continuing onward for another 11 miles would not have been smart.

For self reference, in the (likely) event that I attempt such a walk next year, shoes are hugely important. The pair I wore today I had only worn once before, and for less than three miles. I found that the tops pinch my foot too much, causing pain starting even before mile 10. Wearing my old pair of boots would have been a better idea, since they have more top padding. Also, I need to buy medical tape or similar to bind my toes before starting. My feet and toes are kind of weirdly bent, so the way I walk causes lots of rubbing of toes together and of toes and sock. Protecting them beforehand would have helped greatly.

Still, I think it was a good experience. Photos will be posted at some point.

Greg, Keith, and David are still going and hoping to hit Ohio around midnight. Best of luck to them.

Edit: Photos have been posted here.

Edit edit: Ohio group made it to Ohio and back safely. Huzzah!

Edit edit edit: Greg has a much more comprehensive writeup here. Yay for anti-aliasing weeds! :D

Whee trip

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I suppose I should write an update given I’ve been away for a month and I’m about to head home.

I have been in Thailand, with a week-long excursion to Japan. I’ve had multi-day excursions to Chang Mai and Amphawa. I have eaten lots of good, and lots of not-so-good food. I have taken a few thousand photos. I’ve gone shopping nearly every day (although much more rarely for things for myself or for gifts; my parents recently purchased a condo and we needed to outfit it, culminating in a bed and mattress which were delivered yesterday). I’ve spent lots of time with relatives and been missing people back home and had a much-needed break from work. And I’m sad it’s almost over.

Photos will be forthcoming at some point, maybe. Possibly not, given I still haven’t done anything with the photos of my last Thailand trip and Europe excursion. We shall see.

Meme: KoL and board games

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There was a Pittsburgh marathon a while ago. I failed to post photos from that. Here’s a Chris and bblum.

Continuing meme topics, we have KoL and board games.

With most video games, I tend to go through phases of obsession followed by periods of general disinterest (and, if they have enough social pull, I go back to being obsessed). I went through this with PSO, and I go through this with KoL.
KoL, as a game, is awesome, but extremely repetitive (much like PSO, actually)… once you get reasonably good at the game, you just do the same few things over and over every 5 or 6 days. But a couple things make it worthwhile… first is that the devs are extremely involved in the game and therefore new updates (or world events) happen fairly frequently. These are usually extremely fun and interesting and break up the normal grind of the game. And there are also seasonal challenge paths which change the core of the game (either slightly or drastically, depending on the path). And those are always pretty awesome.
Second, it’s always fun to talk to people about the game. My periods of inactivity in KoL roughly correspond to times when I know people that play. For example, I played a lot in undergrad when most of the housing group played (at least casually). And I play a lot more now since I know a few people that play (and talk to them about new paths and items pretty regularly).
I suppose sometimes the world events bother me though, because I somehow feel obligated to participate or I’ll miss a one-time item. I was burned out of the game back when they released the Haunted Sorority House clan dungeon for Halloween, and somehow forced myself to finish the run I was in and get some dungeons completed. In retrospect, I’m glad I did, because there were a bunch of awesome things that can no longer be obtained, but that probably just reinforces the requirement that I play when I sometimes don’t want to. That’s the downside of having invested so much time (and real-life money in the form of donations) into a game, I suppose.
But in general, I think KoL is pretty awesome. It also limits the number of turns you have per day, which means I don’t have to obsess over it and spend as much time as possible playing.
I think I’m approaching a period of inactivity again in the game, since the new challenge path isn’t too appealing to me and I’m going to be out of the country for a month. But it was still fun.

Board games are one of those things I wasn’t really into before college. The group of friends I lived with liked board games, and they were fun, and I liked being social, so I kind of got into board games. (In high school, I was much more about video games, but those seem to hold little to no appeal to me now.)
I suppose they’re good because they involve a lot of social interaction and are (usually) short (so you can play a lot of different games in one sitting) and there are so many options so you’ll always find something that you like.
With the absence of Tim, I’ve been trying to build up a meager board game collection so I can have people over to play them. It’s unfortunate most of the good ones are so expensive.
I’m not sure that I really have a preferred type of game, or even a favorite one. If you count card games as board games, then I generally am a fan of TCGs (creating and collecting and playing). But as far as actual board games, I’ll play anything from quick pointless games (Pokemon dice game!) to long strategy games (Through the Ages) and enjoy pretty much everything inbetween.

Meme: The Tartan

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The year is a third over, which means life has been updated both with new photo stats and with new main life updates. Yay.

Continuing Jess’ meme topics for me, we have The Tartan, CMU’s student newspaper.

The Tartan is one of those things I wish I had done in undergrad, because it’s just *fun*. I had previously tried joining their photo staff during an activities fair my freshman year, but no one ever emailed me or anything, so I joined The Thistle (yearbook) instead.

After I moved back to Pittsburgh, it came time to put together the Orientation issue of The Tartan. Not having much to do on weekends, I tagged along with Greg to help lay out the pages. We pulled some crazy hours (finishing and sending pages to the printer as the sun was rising), but got it done, and I was kind of hooked.

After that, with permission from the editor-in-chief and publisher, I joined the staff mostly to do layout. At some point, I got copy certified and started doing copy editing as well. And at some point I submitted some photos (because they needed last-minute ones and I happened to have some on me), so I kind of joined photo staff as well. I wrote one opinion piece last Carnival on the new hardhat requirement, so I guess the only thing I haven’t done for the paper is ads-related things. And apparently, they like me, because they gave me the title of senior staff.

I think the best part of The Tartan is the people. It’s not a social organization, because everyone is there to get things done and everyone has a job to do, but sometimes it feels like it’s as much about being around awesome people as actually producing a paper. And you pick up a lot of good skills too. (And, if you’re still in school, it’s excellent stuff to put on your resume.)

Not really sure what else to say about it.