Bunnies, bunnies, it must be bunnies!

My favorite poem

2008-11-05T20:41:51Z

The Highwayman
by Alfred Noyes

The wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding--
   Riding--riding--
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn-door.

He'd a French cocked-hat on his forehead, a bunch of lace at his chin,
A coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of brown doe-skin;
They fitted with never a wrinkle: his boots were up to the thigh.
And he rode with a jeweled twinkle,
   His pistol butts a-twinkle,
His rapier hilt a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky.

Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard,
He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred;
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,
   Bess, the landlord's daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

And dark in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim the ostler listened; his face was white and peaked;
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like moldy hay,
But he loved the landlord's daughter,
   The landlord's red-lipped daughter,
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say--

"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart, I'm after a prize tonight,
But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light;
Yet, if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
   Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way."

He rose upright in the stirrups; he scarce could reach her hand,
But she loosened her hair in the casement. His face burnt like a brand
As the black cascade of perfume came tumbling over his breast;
And he kissed its waves in the moonlight,
   (Oh, sweet black waves in the moonlight!)
Then he tugged at his rein in the moonlight, and galloped away to the West.

He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon;
And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,
When the road was a gypsy's ribbon, looping the purple moor,
A red-coat troop came marching--
   Marching--marching--
King George's men came marching, up to the old inn-door.

They said no word to the landlord, they drank his ale instead,
But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed;
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets at their side.
There was death at every window;
   And hell at one dark window;
For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that he would ride.

They had tied her up to attention, with many a sniggering jest.
They had bound a musket beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast.
"Now keep good watch!" and they kissed her. She heard the dead man say--
Look for me by moonlight;
   Watch for me by moonlight;
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way!

She twisted her hands behind her; but all the knots held good.
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood.
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years,
Till, now, on the stroke of midnight,
   Cold, on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!

The tip of one finger touched it. She strove no more for the rest.
Up, she stood up to attention, with the muzzle beneath her breast.
She would not risk their hearing; she would not strive again;
For the road lay bare in the moonlight;
   Blank and bare in the moonlight;
And the blood of her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to her love's refrain.

Tlot-tlot, tlot-tlot! Had they heard it? The horse-hoofs ringing clear;
Tlot-tlot, tlot-tlot, in the distance? Were they deaf that they did not hear?
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,
The highwayman came riding,
   Riding, riding!
The red-coats looked to their priming! She stood up, straight and still!

Tlot-tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot-tlot, in the echoing night!
Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!
Her eyes grew wide for a moment; she drew one last deep breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight,
   Her musket shattered the moonlight,
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him--with her death.

He turned; he spurred to the west; he did not know who stood
Bowed, with her head o'er the musket, drenched with her own red blood.
Not till the dawn he heard it, his face grew gray to hear
How Bess, the landlord's daughter,
   The landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.

Back, he spurred like a madman, shouting a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high!
Blood-red were his spurs in the golden noon; wine-red was his velvet coat,
When they shot him down on the highway,
   Down like a dog on the highway,
And he lay in his blood on the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.

And still of a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
A highwayman comes riding--
   Riding--riding--
A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.

Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard;
He taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred;
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,
   Bess, the landlord's daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

Undead Journal

2008-10-27T15:29:19Z

Haha, I love it. Livejournal is now Undead Journal. :D

Make the bad horse gleeful, or he'll make you his mare

2008-09-25T17:58:17Z

He rides across the nation, the thoroughbred of sin....

Evil League of Evil FTW:
http://www.evilleagueofevil.com/

Seriously?

2008-09-22T14:17:56Z

$5 for a WoW talent calculator app for the iPhone?? If I even played WoW any more (and had a Mac) I might go out and develop my own out of spite. Wish I could charge for the Talent Calculator I created back in the day....

Update (9/24): Price lowered to $1 after many negative reviews about the price, haha. Too bad for the few who bought it at $5.

Dr. Horrible Soundtrack on iTunes

2008-09-03T13:45:01Z

Must... not... click... buy.... Arg, no self control. :P

Buffy MMO?

2008-09-03T13:28:30Z

To say I am skeptical would be an understatement... not that it might be happening, but that it will be any good. It would have to be seriously awesome to live up to any expectations I might come up with. Since I will most likely be disappointed, I do not have any expectations. :P

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/twentieth-century-fox-licensing-/story.aspx?guid={037588F7-4697-47E5-8ECF-A99752DD2249}

The Problem With Teleportation

2008-09-02T01:38:44Z

This is my exact argument for why teleportation should not be invented:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eTUz61LNjo

It scares me to think that it is entirely possible it WILL be invented at some point in the future and that there will be no way to know what the actual experience is like until you try it yourself. If a person's molecules are disassembled and then new molecules are assembled in the exact same structure, the person would have all the same memories as the original person who was disassembled and would be otherwise indistinguishable from the original person. The original person might have had his or her consciousness destroyed and would have ceased to exist. However, the newly assembled person would tell you the teleportation worked just fine!

Hopefully I am overestimating the possibility of advancements in science and this dilemma will not be an issue in my lifetime. :)

Buffy Score!

2008-08-29T15:32:38Z

They are finally releasing more Buffy score music on CD!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001DMW2AK

I'm so excited, not only that they are releasing it officially, but that there are a lot of tracks on there I don't have! It doesn't have everything, but all my favorites (up through season 5) are on there. Just put in my preorder. :D

Menace on the Roads

2008-08-27T18:11:28Z

Quick update for anyone reading this who I haven't talked to. Daniel and I were in a car accident last Friday (in his car). We were pulling left into a parking lot and some lady pulled out right into us. She was looking right at us and didn't stop.

Damages... Daniel got bumped good on his head, we both have whiplash, and his car has seen better days. On top of that, the lady was uninsured. She didn't seem like she knew what was going on. They really need to start taking away licenses from people like that. Grr.

Yosemite Fires

2008-07-29T13:53:07Z

There are wildfires burning just outside Yosemite. Power in the park is out, and ash is falling over the area. Some people are leaving, but the park is still open. Kinda scary considering I'll be going there with my family in 2.5 weeks.

When I was 10 or 11, my family was visiting Yosemite in August and there were massive wildfires which forced the park to be evacuated. A park ranger stopped by our campground at about 6 AM to tell us the park was being evacuated and we had to leave. We packed up and drove out, and on the way out we could see lots of smoke and haze and even portions of forest that had already burned. It was nice to go back in following years and watch it all grow back.

Snap, Crackle, BOOM!

2008-07-08T01:38:26Z

As holidays go, the Fourth of July is actually pretty high on my list. It's midway through the year, so it offsets the winter holidays, and usually comes with an extra 2 days off. Not to mention that it is just an excuse for fireworks. :)

I spent this Fourth of July in San Angelo with Daniel, which is always wonderful. He and his friends had about $300-$400 dollars worth of fireworks that we took out to the spillway outside of town where everyone sets them off on the fourth. It was quite fun, and the only thing missing was my Dad's fireworks music. No serious injuries, but I'm glad I wasn't the one throwing fireworks into the fire. :P

Another Fourth of July tradition my family and I had growing up was going to the movie theater. This year was no different, complete with three movies. First was Hancock, which I think could have been better, but I still enjoyed it. Will Smith was not in his usual kick ass role... he played the character well, but it wasn't quite what I expected. Wanted was the next movie we saw, and though I had a few issues with part of the premise and storyline, it had some good action scenes, which is really all I was expecting from it anyway.

By far the best movie I saw was Wall-E. Pixar produces quality movies, and this one did not disappoint. Despite the main character being a robot, Wall-E is adorable and the movie is very touching. The animation was, of course, amazing, and it had plenty of great humor. It is definitely a movie to see!

Lions are just big kitties

2008-07-02T13:39:32Z

This actually made me cry:
http://mfrost.typepad.com/cute_overload/2008/07/eat-your-heart.html

I don't know how accurate it is, but damn it, it's touching!

Surprise! No root canal!

2008-07-01T18:45:43Z

Yesterday I was scheduled to have my third root canal (in the past few months). Originally I was scheduled to have four, but in one of the teeth the decay had not gotten into the root, so it just needed a filling and crown instead of root canal and crown. So when I went in to the dentist yesterday I was expecting another root canal, but apparently this one hadn't gotten into the root either. Yay!

I still walked out of there completely numb and with soreness to come later, but at least not another root canal. Overall they aren't nearly as bad as they are made out to be. There's no or very little pain during if you're numbed correctly, but it does end up sore. I've heard of people taking two weeks to recover, but my soreness went away after a few days. Still, if I have a choice... :p

Diablo 3!!

2008-06-28T13:16:36Z

WOOT!! Diablo 3 site and Cinematic Teaser

Now the waiting game starts....

Two decades have passed since the demonic denizens, Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal, wandered the world of Sanctuary in a vicious rampage to shackle humanity into unholy slavery. Yet for those who battled the Prime Evils directly, the memory fades slowly and the wounds of the soul still burn.

When Deckard Cain returns to the ruins of Tristram's Cathedral seeking clues to new stirrings of evil, a comet from the heavens strikes the very ground where Diablo once entered the world. The comet carries a dark omen in its fiery being and it calls the heroes of Sanctuary to defend the mortal world against the rising powers of the Burning Hells – and even the failing luminaries of the High Heavens itself.

Features:

Explore a fully-realized Sanctuary – the living, breathing gothic fantasy world of Diablo III rendered in gorgeous 3D.

Battle the unholy forces of the Burning Hells with all-new character classes like the otherworldly Witch Doctor, or with re-imagined warriors from Diablo’s past: such as the fierce Barbarian.

Rain Hell on your enemies wielding the interactive environment as a weapon: lay cunning traps, turn destructible objects against your foes, and use environmental obstacles to your advantage - all powered by the Havoc physics system.

Experience the intensity of multiplayer Diablo III over an all-new, wickedly-enhanced Battle.net platform with numerous enhancements to make connecting with your friends easier – and cooperative gameplay more fun.

Stay a while and listen!

2008-06-26T17:16:52Z

Diablo III?? Signs point to... yes! I'm not usually one to get my hopes up, but this is sounding more and more likely.

http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/53312

I'm starting to have a case of too many games, too little time. Not that I'm complaining. :)

Back on the Health Train

2008-06-24T17:25:34Z

My recent stomach problems are very likely due to eating too much crap that my body can't handle (it tasted great though!). So, I'm going to try to get back to eating healthy. Luckily I still love oatmeal and eat it every day for breakfast (hard to imagine having anything else). Now I just need to add more fruits and vegetables and try to have less processed food. The hardest part will probably be Daniel tempting me with cheap chinese or ordering in. :p So I'll allow myself crap once in a while as long as I don't make a habit of it.

Exercise is also something I need to get back into. I'm lifting weights about twice a week now, so if I can get that up to 3-4 times a week and add in a little more cardio I should be good to go. I always forget how much better and more awake I feel with exercise. It might even help me sleep better again.

My stomach hates me

2008-06-19T19:57:02Z

That is all.

MMORPG Junkie

2008-06-17T14:04:08Z

Apparently I can't go for longer than a few months without playing an MMORPG, ever since I was first introduced to them in 2000 with Asheron's Call. AC is still very nostalgic for me (/atoyot!), though I'm sure I would find the game tedious now. The list of MMORPGs I've played is continually growing, but when there aren't any interesting new ones to play, I long for familiar ones.

I just canceled my WoW account (for the second time), but then I started reading up again on EQ2. There have been two more expansions released since I quit about two years ago... new races, new content, plenty to do. So the other day I downloaded the trial and played around with the new fairy races. It's starting to suck me in again, and I will probably end up getting the uber all inclusive expansion pack and subscribing again.

Does this qualify as an addiction?

It's alive!

2008-06-13T16:47:24Z

I'm actually going to start posting here instead of on Dark Isles (which has been stagnant for months now). Stay tuned...

Dark Isles

2007-01-12T05:01:30Z

My blog and personal website can be found at www.darkisles.com. Read about news, movies, tv, games, fractals, cross stitch, and other things I'm interested in.