I really liked the story in this book, it had a typical setup of magic that was long lost coming back, but it was especially well done in that. The magic of the world is very interesting, with it pulling from the life force of the user, or those around the special users.
The lore was decently developed, but it ended at a huge cliffhanger. I’ll have to wait for a while for the next one to come out.
I finally got around to taking a video of the new place. You can see the dragon head door knocker, the new big red couch, and the nice dining room table.
I have moved to a new place in Mountain View with the lovely Stephanie. We decided to get a place together, and it went pretty quickly after that. We went to several places and decided on the current one because of the location, the people we knew there, and that it is just really nice.
We did two rounds of interviews for roommates that turned up two really cool guys, Ray and Mohsin. There were a good number of other people that would have been fun to live with, but we got our top two picks.
I moved all of my stuff in the day the lease started, and got some help from Steph for it. I’m still organizing things, but that is nearly done.
We’ve been using the hot tub some, even though it isn’t really all that hot. We’ve met some of the neighbors and they are nice. Steph still needs to get her stuff moved in, which is planned for the 28th.
We went to lunch with Steph’s parents and went to Habitat for Humanity Restore, where Steph’s dad volunteers. They had all sorts of furniture and appliances. We ended up getting a sofa and a dining room table. Both items were very high quality and we spent about $500 total for them. I helped Steph’s dad pick up a large Christmas tree, and he helped us move in the furniture. I was worn out by the end of moving everything, so I can only imagine how tired he must have been.
The cats are getting used to the space, and have found a couple places to hide that we have had trouble figuring out. The best one was under the yoga mat in my closet. They also really love the new cat tree I got for them, and the much better views out the windows.
I’ll put some pictures up once I take them.
Steph hosted a majong night with us going to Sicuan Bistro beforehand. The ma po tofu was delicous, as was the rest of the food there. I had a lot of fun learning and playing the game, which was more complex than I thought once you added in a few more restrictions. It still relied a little to heavily on luck for my taste.
Steph and I went to Andrew’s place to hang out. We ended up playing poker, so Steph went to hear a friend play jazz at a bar in Mountain View. I had a good time losing a lot, but still learned a lot about how everyone in that group plays. I’m picking it up pretty fast, but losing a good deal of money in the process.
We played a couple simple card games at games night on Thursday. Chris taught the simple game of Loot to us and we had some good fun playing it. They were too afraid of me for me to get very far, but I had a good time playing it. Chris won the first and second rounds, mainly because he was able to manipulate the others into doing his bidding. I was enjoying the laid back simplicity of the game.
We next played smash up, and I was able to get some pretty amazing combos off against Chris. He was able to stop my early and mid-game, but my late game still came through strong and clinched a pretty significant victory for me.
On Friday Steph and I went to dinner with her parents, at Burma Ruby. The food was great but the noise level in the place was way to loud. Afterwards we went by the beam store and her parents were pretty impressed by the beams there. I think they really liked seeing something that Steph had been working on up and around. There was an actual product she could show off after a ton of work and headaches. We also told them about us moving in together, and I think they took it well. They were concerned about certain parts, but we have most of their concerns covered.
This show was hard to watch because of how close so many parts of it hit to home. There are tons of stereotypes portrayed in the show, where I know an exact person that is represented by that portrayal. I also have a lot of cringe moments of times that remind me of things I went through with my attempts at a startup. I don’t think I’ll watch any more of it.
The arguments put forward in this book do not flow logically. The author does a decent job of poking the proper holes in the atheistic views on religion, but does not touch on the more pertinent views of humanism. The author also goes off the deep end in the assumptions about Christian faithfuls. I could more easily draw the conclusion that Christians should be the least desirable people, because their faith says they don’t need to be good or nice to their fellow man, even if they should. They don’t need to make anything right if they hurt others, instead all that is required is that they ask forgiveness. They don’t have to ask the person they hurt, only an unknowable being that will then forgive them of everything that they repent. There are some good points in the book, but they are drowned out by the satisficing and logical hoops that the author jumps through.
It's an Exciting World 