25 Sep
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Will and I attended the midnight release of Halo 3 at our local GameStop. We were 18th and 19th in line. There were a mix of gamers and onlookers in the line and at some point during our time on the line, we felt our intelligence draining from some of the conversations we were hearing.
Our plan was to play our DS for the duration of our time in line. I failed that mission because I decided to bring my dead DS Lite as opposed to my half charged DS fatty. We also brought snacks and game fuel to ensure that we were wired for the evening. The evening started with a Halo 2 tournament. I was the only girl that entered (although one of the female employees filled in for one of the matches - and she owned all of the guys she was playing with). I was dead last with 1 kill due to my assault rifle/butt-stock to the head combo. I was really there as a stat boost although the winner’s kill count was less than 15. Will played next and came in second (the fem employee played in their game, so her 1st place win didn’t count).
After the tournament, we gathered back outside in numerical order for the most part. *Thought breaking rant: Some little a-hole flipped his number 51 and claimed he was 15. It was all kinds of stupid because the actual number 15 was 3 people in front of me. Needless to say, he didn’t get in front of us, but he did get in front of about 20 other people that had been there longer than him. To make matters worse, I overheard him bragging about cutting the line to one of his friends after his purchase…but back to the story.* Numbers 16 and 17 were a couple of young guys that were super cool to talk to. Jeff and Joe told me about their weekend in Ocean City, their jobs, their links to the military, their favorite football teams, oh and video games. I shared our game fuel and snacks with them since they had not eaten in several hours. Will was on the phone with Marvin who was waiting in line at his GameStop. Marv said that he was number 115 and that there were 1100 reservations made at his store!!! Good thing he got there early! Sean (who bought a new DLP television and a 360 just for this game…*sidebar: sold his PS3-haha Sony!!!*) waited here in DC for his copy.
Although I didn’t get to say goodbye to Jeff and Joe, we obtained our legendary box set and headed home. After unboxing the game and the helmet, we checked to see how many of our friends were playing at that time. Not too many at first, but as the night went on, it was the only game being played. We finally made a room with Jbug and SCKain (see cards below) and started the storyline mission. We played until 0330 when my eyes started to burn out. Good thing I took leave!
Was it nerdy? Totally! Would I do it again? In a heartbeat!
22 Aug
My sister sent this to me. I wonder how effective their plan is going to be if radio stations are already telling their listeners about it.
Starting today, New Jersey will launch a 30 day speeding ticket frenzy. The state estimates that 9 million dollars will be generated in speeding tickets. 1 million will go to pay state troopers’ overtime.There will 50 state troopers on duty at all times patrolling the 9 main intersections and highways. They are the following:
> I-295 north and south
> 1-95 (Jersey Turnpike) north and south 1-80 east and west
> I-287 north and south
> I-78 east and west
> 1-195 east and west
> 1-280 east and west
> Rt. 130 north and south
> Garden State Parkway north and south
5 mph above the limit can justify a ticket and every state trooper is supposed to pull a car over and write a ticket every 10 to 20 minutes. They have issued 30 brand new unmarked Crown Victoria cruisers and are bringing in all of their part timers on full time. If you work in NJ, NY, DE or CT you will probably take one of these highways. It’s up to you how fast you are going when they clock you.
101.5 FM confirmed all of this. So be safe and don’t forget speeding tickets are on you.
Driving Ticket fine increase in NJ:
Starting on August 15th, the price of a ticket for violation of NJ Law39:3-29 (failure to show your driver’s license, registration, or insurance card at the time you are stopped) is going from $44.00 to $173.00. Please make sure your vehicles have the proper documents in them. If you jump in the car to run to the store and forget your wallet with your license in it and you are stopped…. Oh well… you just spent $173. And the fine for not having all three documents is $519!!!
Forward to people in NJ, and let them know of this change. And be careful, the fine for hand held cell phone use while driving will be going up to $180.00.
Be wise and careful!!!!!
If anything, this will cause motorist to slow down and travel at safe speeds. The NJT is notorious for speeding because the distance between exits are so great.
Safe and happy travels!!!
21 Aug
As I write this, I am still recovering from attending this concert. It has been many moons since I’ve been to a concert. In fact, the last major concert I went to was when Bobby Brown wasn’t a crackhead…yeah…the Don’t Be Cruel Tour waaaaaayyyyyyy back when. I did go to a free Hed PE/Papa Roach concert, but it was more of a promotional thing than a concert.
Rebekah, my cropping turned concert buddy, is in love with My Chemical Romance. I couldn’t ID these guys in a lineup, so I wasn’t sure what I was in for. Once I saw that Linkin Park was the headliner, it was all good! The Projekt Revolution Tour consisted of 2 stages and 11 bands. I found 2 new musical obsessions that will make their way to my permanent playlists - Styles of Beyond and Mindless Self Indulgence. SoB was the hip hop/rock combination that also has nice bass lines. MSI was enchanting with their heavy bass and playful lyrics. They also had 2 females in the group that really rocked out - I think they were the only femmes on the tour!
I was not prepared to go to a concert. Actually, it is possible that I was over prepared. I had a large bag with food, water, DS, and other essentials (forgot the blanket…damn ants tore us up!). Other seasoned concert goers had little more than the clothes on their back and maybe a beer in place of water. There were lots of mosh pits and crowd surfing, dark clothes and mohawks, painted boys and girls who could have used some more covering and enough black finger nail polish to cover the sun…almost…
One of the most interesting things was the ’send a text message for all to see’ feature. It gave us the ability to send a message to one number and hope that it shows up on the screen. I have never seen so many informal requests for marriage!!! The best was screaming if something applied to you like “scream if you like the Redskins!”. It was definitely a good way to tie us over as they changed the sets for the next group. I even had my name on the screen! Didn’t mange to get a picture though…
I had lots of fun and I look forward to attending more concerts in the future. If this tour stops in your city, definitely check it out!