Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in derangedparrot's LiveJournal:

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Friday, February 18th, 2005
11:55 am	DDR! Oh, and I beat like ten five foot songs today on DDR. I'd never beaten one before today. I can even read the up-left up-right down-left and down-right combinations without thinking now. Hella yeah. My feet are sore though. :B Current Mood: rejuvenated Current Music: Sandstorm- DDR Extreme (Comment on this)
11:43 am	This is the best ever. Thanks to TheFerrett. http://www.compfused.com/directlink/615/ I'm going to detroit tomorrow. Jeez. I hope I do good. A box would be cute, a pin would be neat, but an envelope is what I really want. Gimme my fucking envelope. Current Music: Baby got Book (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, February 16th, 2005
5:19 pm	Math I just started playing Magic Online. This is really bad. It has the potential to be a total disaster becuase I may never do actual school work again. Look out folks. I'd like to make the statement that I have never gotten better at anything, but the more I do things the more I realize why things are easy instead of being as hard as I choose to make them. Also, physics is really boring. I hate Kentucky. I made the top four of a ptq there and my constructed rating went up a whole big fat seven points. SEVEN. Kentucky, please get better at magic. Or, don't, and I'll keep winning there. :B (Comment on this)
Monday, February 14th, 2005
10:48 pm	Religions of the World Agnosticism: Maybe there is shit or maybe it happens; then again, maybe not. Atheism: I don't believe this shit. Buddhism: If shit happens, is it really shit? Catholicism: If shit happens, you deserved it. Existentialism: Shit doesn't happen; shit just is. Hare Krishnaism: Shit happens shit happens shit happens rama rama ding ding. Hedonism: Fuck that shit; let's party! Hinduism: This shit happened before. Nihilism: No Shit. Platonism: There is an ideal shit, of which all the shit that happens is but an imperfect image. Shinto: Shit is everywhere. So as long as you're stepping in it, show it some respect. Zen Buddhism: What is the sound of one shit happening? Courtesy of http://www.wherewasigoing.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=26&POSTNUKESID=eeedb45640fdebb28c09a2df0edcfeff Also, I suck at life becuase I cost myself a ptq next weekend. Ring a ding a ding ding dong. Ding. Current Mood: lol@me Current Music: Madden NFL 2003 (Comment on this)
9:35 pm	Some random thoughts First, if you want to appear as impressive as possible, share as little information about yourself as possible. This will make you seem enigmatic and make everything you do seem that much more awesome becuase no one will know how you do things. Second, plan ahead. Having a plan is really really good, and it makes things infinitely easier when you mess up. I messed up this weekend, but I had a backup plan so the disaster was mitigated. Last, being obnoxious for no reason to people who can potentially be assets to you later is really dumb, so don't do it. This applies to two different people I know, one of whom is defined in terms of the exponential function and one of whom is not. Current Mood: Game Theoretical Current Music: EMERGENCYBOT Final- LEMUR Guitarbot (Comment on this)
Sunday, February 13th, 2005
8:06 pm	Trying again So I might start LJing again. If I ever start getting depressing again, please scream at me in the comments and I'll stop immediately. LJWhoring is not allowed. Observation: The Killers are like the livejournal whores of the music world. They're really catchy, but you start liking them and all of a sudden they're really really depressing. (Comment on this)
Thursday, September 23rd, 2004
10:15 pm	I'm Fired! lol@me Current Mood: Triumphant, sort of Current Music: Sheryl Crow, "Leaving Las Vegas" (Comment on this)
Wednesday, September 22nd, 2004
7:45 pm	This is the best thing I've seen in my entire life. http://www.400monkeys.com/God/ The Official God FAQ. Beautiful. By the way, my grandfather died tonight which is interesting. My mom's family was like straight out of Long Day's Journey Into Night or Going, Gone or something like that, and he didn't really take care of himself, and wasn't really happy, so I don't know what to think. The sad part is I'm actually kind of mad becuase I can't PTQ now becuase the funeral is saturday. It's so bad, but that's how things were. Bleh. Classes kick ass at least. I'll be proving billions of shit now. Current Mood: I can't ptq dammit! >:[ Current Music: Art of Noise, "On Being Blue" (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, September 21st, 2004
10:32 am	An entry in two fits Fit the first: Live, from the twilight zone! College is the goofiest thing ever. Right now it reminds me of a badly done summer camp. There are some random mandatory activities that are scheduled every once in a while, but in general we have billinos of free time and absolutely fucking nothing to do. It's so strange. If we had, say, classes, with, for example, homework, it wouldn't be so bad. But as it is, this is a totally foriegn situation to me. I'm in a new place with no peers I really know and can really talk to in real life, and there's nothing to take up time. So I've been randomly finding social things to do, like seeing Shrek 2 on a gigantic screen. I also went to a christian group's picnic today. They had free food and the kids there were nice. Like I just don't know what to do with myself. Tom at a Christian group. Meh. Radiofreedan's journal has made me chuckle- he's in the same situation as me now, and his first reaction is "wait, there are girls here and I'm not doing anything about it!" I know I'm not going to suddenly start running around and screwing people or whatever, but I obviously can't just sit in the dorm room all day either. I just want to start learning shit. The larger function of learning shit is to meet other people who are learning the same shit as me. These are the Awesome Math People, who I'm sure I'll end up hanging out with way too much. I met two of them today. They both rocked. Fit the second: Even Ogres There was a big-screen showing of Shrek 2 today on a big lawn here. Ogres can't be happy. In all the fairy tales, if you look, there are no ogres. Ogres are evil and bad and sad all the time. College is where you go and get drunk and have sex with everybody you meet. Everyone who doesn't do this sits in their room and does nothing and is miserable. Lies. Shrek is wonderful becuase it so perfectly skewers all of society's bullshit that they try to feed you. Big Fairy Godmother says no ogres are happy! Big Fairy Godmother is watching you! It's such shit, and it was exactly the movie I needed to see tonight. I got to be with other kids, disctract my mind by analzying subtext, mise en scene, and all the other normal dumb english stuff, and the message itself was exactly what I needed to hear also. I'm allowed to have fun being myself. I'm still Tom, and that won't change no matter what crazy situations I get thrown into. Consider the real Tom to have stood up. Current Mood: contemplative Current Music: Lemon Demon, "I've Got Some Falling to Do" (Comment on this)
Saturday, September 18th, 2004
6:53 pm	My dad is funny. First, something I think is interesting. I have noticed that a lot of the time when I'm around people who are aware of the fact that I'm an atheist, they will randomly apologize to me before saying something that involves god or even a biblical allusion. You don't have to do this, I swear. Any sort of belief in god does not offend me. I happen to think that belief in god is inaccurate, but I'm not going to yell at you or anything about it unless you yell at me first(Hi, Mr. Bohne!). So stop apologizing. After all, I never apologized for what I think, and if I did I certainly wouldn't mean it. I was discussing this with my parents as we drove to the Cincinnati art museum today. Then my dad said the following: "Maybe you and god are just playing hide and go seek, and he's the one who is hiding right now. *beat* Maybe someday you'll yell 'ollieollieoxenfree' and you'll meet then." My dad has a strange sense of humor. Also, everyone should immediately download the five minute demo of the one-man show One Man Star Wars at http://www.onemanstarwars.com/starwars_com.html . It is by far the funneist thing I have seen in a long time, assuming you've seen the original trilogy. This man knows his funny. Current Mood: amused Current Music: Art of Noise- "Rapt: in the Evening Air" and "Metaforce" (Comment on this)
2:08 am	Eric "Danger" Taylor is a master I saw this this morning, written by the amazing edt: http://www.livejournal.com/users/bonerici/36629.html It's really neat, and you should read it. It hit me becuase of the experiences I've had this Magic season. Basically, there is one deck that is insanely overpowered in the format in question and a lot of decks that aren't as good. People still play the bad decks, for some god-knows-why reason. Oh wait, there is no god. So no one knows. I mean imagine an actor saying the following: you are walking down a hallway. You see a sign that says "You will soon come to two doors. The right door leads to a room where we will deposit billions of dollars in your bank account. The left door leads to a place where you will have your legs broken." The next sign you see says "If you take the left door, you are a fucking moron. Why would you ever do that?" The last sign before the doors says "Please, for your own sake, take the right door. We warned you." People will still take the left door. They will crawl out the other side saying "Wow, they actually broke my legs." Everyone else will have billions of dollars. Then inflation will go crazy, but that's another story. Those left-door people are dumb. Don't be like those people. It is neccesary for the species that they exist, but it is better for the individual that he or she not be one of them. This is the point that Eric Taylor misses in his entry- the key to this knowledge is that you let everyone else figure out what's going on by walking into the door that says "Dangerous tiger!" and then use the information they get for your benefit. You don't have to be the one to try goofy shit and get burned. You really don't. It's something that I've understood for a long time but most people don't I think. I've never been able to put it into words as nice as Taylor did though. So if you're going to play in a Pro Tour Qualifier anytime soon, play affinity becuase it's the best deck ever. You'll get to be the tiger instead of walking into the room and only surviving if the tiger is full already with previous dumb people. (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 16th, 2004
8:17 pm	This made me laugh. jeek> Parrot: Get on my shoulder, fucker. MrParrot> pls jeek> ARR jeek> I BE PIRATE JEEK :D Current Mood: giddy Current Music: Survivor starts tonight! (Comment on this)
Wednesday, September 15th, 2004
1:38 pm	Wow. So I went to chicago last weekend for a Pro Tour Qualifier. I lost in the first round to a total buffoon with an awful deck, won the next six rounds, and then my last round was going to be a draw becuase we ran out of time and that would have put me at ninth, but instead my opponent conceded becuase he coudln't make the top eight. I got lucky in my quarterfinal match and mashed, and then a guy hit a two-outer on the last possible turn on game three to not lose. I shipped the guy who scooped to me a lot of packs afterward, becuase he made my big trip not a waste. Heh. I thought I had lost rating on the day becuase of my loss in the first round. Instead, I find myself this morning at 1972 constructed, which is good for: 316th in world 117th in north america 105th in united states 8th in ohio 1st in cincinnati This is insane. Work pays off, blah blah, etc. I have one more chance to qualify outright, or else I probably won't for Pro Tour Columbus, but whatever. Also, I´m going to Moeller today to see some teachers again before I leave for osu. If I were feeling mean, I´d go to Mr. Bohne and be like "Nope, haven't found God yet. Sorry," but I don't think I can do that. At least I'll get to see Mr. Ward and Mrs. Keyser. (Comment on this)
Monday, September 13th, 2004
11:01 am	Haiku! These are some haiku that some random LJ tool found in my writings. there is no prize but the invite i am getting better at this game i have to win one of these damn things or else i'm going to be sad now the catholic church brainwashes its followers into believing bonerici made fun of joseph campbell which made me angry like is basically just that he likes to compete too much to stay out i actually have a friend now so i'm going to try to update the bear went over the mountain it's really a pessimistic song The clear best is the last one. I'm not blogging my chicago trip yet. I have too much to think about, and my entry on that may or may not even be public- I just want to make sure that I remember what happened. I will say that I T4'd the ptq because of the generosity of a good man who had the good sense to concede when an unintentional draw would have knocked us both out of contention, and then I didn't get the slot so it sucked. Yay for figuring out how to do mood and music. Heh. Current Mood: mellow Current Music: William Shatner, "Common People" (9 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, September 9th, 2004
1:15 pm	I am strange. I have a very different approach to everyday living in general than most people I know. I tend to be prepared for everything long before it happens. When I'm in school, all my work is usually done and ready to go on the proper day assuming I don't forget something. I don't deliberately let anything go later than I should. At work, I always had money for food. Before a magic tournament, the night before I have my deck sleeved in fresh sleeves and if it's a PTQ I already have the full $250 I would need to buy out the slot from someone in my wallet. Ben is the opposite of me. Today he AIMed me and asks me what deck he should play at a local tournament today. He has no clue. It starts in 5.5 hours. He does this alllll the time. At PTQ's, he builds his constructed decks only in the half hour between arriving at the site and the tournament's scheduled start time. That sort of unpreparedness is so foriegn to me that I can't even imagine what it's like. I guess I'm wierd or something, but all I know is that any unpreparedness of that sort would drive me nuts. If I didn't have a deck 5 hours before a local tournament I wouldn't even play becuase I didn't think I had a chance to win. Heh. Edit: change of name to protect the innocent (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, September 5th, 2004
6:13 pm	PTQ... So I got off of work yesterday and drove to Indianapolis with some friends and played in a Magic: the Gathering Pro Tour Qualifier. I made the finals. This involved a lot of work, but was irrelevant really becuase the only prize in a Pro Tour Qualifier is the Qualification, so you have to make the top eight to even play for any real prizes. In the top eight of a Pro Tour Qualifier, generally each player recieves a box of product. The winner of the qualifier recieves a $250 check for travel and the slot. Generally in the finals, if one person wants the slot and the other does not, then some sort of deal is made that involves one person giving up the slot in return for getting more of the prize. If both players want the slot, generally some sort of split is made of the prizes and then they play for the slot. My opponent offered me his box and all of the $250 for the slot. I couldn't say yes. To keep this in perspective for those who are not magically inclined, he has offered me $250 in cash plus product worth about $80. To me, the opportunity to play in another professional tournament can't be given a price. That was not going to cut it. I offered him the same back. He said no. I suggest that we split the money and play for the slot. He says "I don't like splits. Let's play for the slot and money." I think he was trying to gain some sort of psychological advantage by refusing the split, but we were both playing the same deck and such mirror matches are generally very draw-dependent and I didn't want to leave that much money up to chance. However, I had no choice. So obviously he got lucky in two straight games and bashed me. So I'm going to a qualifier in Chicago next weekend. The creepy thing is, I don't regret my decision to not take the $250 and box at all. I would never have been able to live with myself if I had taken it. It was just regrettable that we couldn't make the save on the cash, and that is what stings more than anything. On the nonmagical side of things, I move to OSU in two weeks. I'm looking forward to it, but I want to game billions before I go. Dan, call me about beangaming. Anyone magical, I want to draft. I have like 24 sets that I need to burn through at least some of before I go, so sooooooooo draft? (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, September 3rd, 2004
5:01 pm	I am not the only on Here is a video of an interview of Dave Williams, winner of 3.5 million dollars when he placed second in the World Series of Poker Big One this year. The interview is from the Magic: the Gathering World Championships. http://webcast.wizards.com/04sf-worlds/day2/d2-seg7-dave_williams.zip To those who think I am the only person who is crazy about fighting people with my mind, here's another one. At one point, the interviewer asks Dave why he still plays silly games like Magic when he has billions of money from poker. His answer is basically just that he likes to compete too much to stay out. I'm not the only one. See? Also, when you are at a theme park and someone makes an announcement over a loudspeaker, try to listen. It is probably important and probably relates to you directly, and it will probably annoy the shit out of someone when you don't and have to ask a dumb question later. On another random note, it never ceases to amaze me how having a plan can cause small mistakes to become irrelevent. If you know what you want to do, you can usually mess up a few times and still get it done. I find this interesting. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, August 29th, 2004
5:22 pm	Bleh Work is almost over. I am so glad. I can't wait to actually start learning stuff again. Magic touranments are set up strangely. Basically, if you lose two matches, you cannot make the cut to elimination rounds. Yesterday at the Pro Tour Qualifier I got unlucky two matches in a row against the most gigantic buffoons ever, so I didn't make top eight. Oddly, this is the one way that poker tournaments are superior to magic tournaments. In a poker tournament, if you get dumbly unlucky, you can just fold and you don't lose more than you already put in. In magic, you only have X matches and that's it. In poker, you can wait for the right spot to play. It seems like I only lose to idiots now. I beat good players, but I get the awfullest draws against the awfullest people. Bleh. I'm off to start looking at my laptop. (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, August 25th, 2004
9:31 pm	Post-Christian Nihilism and RadioFreeDan I was talking to Dan the other night about life and such things. Here is a transcript of the parts of the conversation that I think are important. Dan: Your last update was dumb becuase you can say about any experience that it is something you should do. Me: But I was right. I like to fight people with my mind, and I did it at the highest level possible, and it was awesome. Dan: You are sick. Eventually you will decide that fighting people with your mind is dumb and stop becuase nothing is worthwhile really in the long term. Me: Whoa! Dan: Also, you're wrong about "The Bear Went Over The Mountain," it's really a pessimistic song about how human life is stupid and repetitive, not a positive existentialist thing. I was shocked. Seamless Transition! One thing that I have noticed about people who have stopped believing in Christianity is that there is a sort of void of value. The Catholic church brainwashes its followers into believing that they are, in essence, worthless bags of flesh whose lives only have meaning in terms of some cosmic God thing, and without said God thing they are stupid and worthless and would go to Hell and burn forever. Now, when someone stops believing in said God thing, their first impulse is to condemn themselves to worthlessness becuase that is what the Church said happens when you lose God. This is something I like to call Post-Christian Nihilism. God is gone, so nothing is worthwhile, including me or anything I do. Life sucks and is pointless. With the external God thing gone, the trick is to reset one's moral center to within himself or herself. Many ex-Christians cannot do this becuase they are trained to think that it is evil. Once one does this, however, one becomes an existentialist in the tradition of Camus and Frankl and then you have meaning again, rainbows appear in the sky, and something else ridiculous but vaguely positive happens. I can't think of anything else humorous there, sorry. Seamless Transition 2: Son of Seamless Transition! From the above conversation, Dan sounds like he is suffering from a really really bad case of Post-Christian Nihilism. I cannot possibly imagine anyone ever thinking that The Bear Went Over The Mountain is supposed to discourage the bear from climbing mountains. The bear loves to climb mountains! The more mountains he climbs, the happier he is, no matter how many more mountains he sees. Remember Sisyphus? http://stripe.colorado.edu/~morristo/sisyphus.html We've been over this before, Dan, but whatever. Sisyphus and the bear are the same. And I'll never stop wanting to fight people... with my mind. It's who I am, and if you fight who you are, you will not ever be happy no matter what you do. Speaking of which, being who you just kind of are is something else that both Christianity and American values discourage, so losing both of those can help in that regard also. However, that conversation did make me laugh becuase it made me imagine a version of the Bear song that was in the minor key and with halved tempo. Imagine the following: Singer: "And what did he see?" Bear: "I saw another goddamn stupid mountain. This is such shit. Mountains, mountains, and more fucking mountains. I hate my life." Singer, singsongy like normal: "He saw another mountain...." This is not the song we grew up with, but the idea of it made me laugh. (9 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, August 23rd, 2004
9:16 pm	He saw another mountain For a long time, one of my goals was to make the top eight cut of a Magic: the Gathering Pro Tour Qualifier. Although I was getting good, I still had never done this, and all my friends were starting to. It bothered me. I was questioning myself. I got ninth on tiebreakers a lot. I kept testing. At Origins, I finally made it, but only barely. It felt like a struggle. I lost in the quarterfinals. I was happy. I had done it. At Gencon, on Friday I did godawful in the Vs. Pro Circuit. I wans't prepared, got unlucky pairings, got stuck in The Jungle, and then I dropped once I got my fourth loss. It sucked. I hate that game. I played in the Pro Tour Qualifier on Saturday. I went 6-1 in the swiss and T8'd, beating two sometime pros on the way. This time, it wasn't a struggle. It was effortless. I ended the swiss in first place. My quarterfinal matchup was the best possible matchup ever. I couldn't possibly lose. But I found a way to. I tried to get cute and wrecked myself in game three, and that was that. I left the convention center at 3 AM holding nothing but a box of product. This time, I felt like shit. I didn't win the whole thing. There is no prize but the invite. I am getting better at this game. I know this becuase I have found a new mountain to climb. I have to win one of these damn things or else I'm going to be sad. Now, about the Pro Circuit. Doing something- anything- at the very highest level is an experience that everyone should have at one point in their lives. I am happy that I did it, even though I got totally crushed. Now I know what it is going to take to be successful the next time I do something like that, and that is to practice billions. The guys who did well did nothing for the two weeks before the tournament other than go to one guy's house and test test test test and test. They deserved to dominate, and they did in fact put four people in the top eight. I'll be better prepared next time. If anyone ever has a chance to do anything at the highest level possible, do it. It's worth it, and you'll learn billions. That's all. (1 Comment |Comment on this)