Yes, yes, I'm a raging geek, I could have written a small novel with what I've done already--but it's FUN! Ye gods I've never had so much fun writing.

The project had been running out of some steam several weeks ago. With any fan-made project like this, most people get progressively more bored/frustrated and just leave. Personally, in some cases, I wouldn't blame them. Over the course of the last three years, we've seen:

*The founder and first leader suddenly cut and run with no explanation, destroying our entire FTP database and about a year's worth of worldbuilding and item creation data.

*The second-in-command and some other dude getting bored, giving no direction, and basically letting the fruit die on the vine.

*A complete re-organization and integration with a new team from Europe.

*Losing 5/6th's of the first team..and bits and pieces of the 2nd one here and there.

*Mediating the fallout between the current leader and the now ex main plot writer.

But through all of that, I've kept at it. Fortunately we had a recruitment process recently and got the team back up to 15 people. And for the first time, we actually have a decent staff of writers: about 5, myself included. I've been running a pretty tight ship to make sure people know what's going on and what needs to get done. Haven't seen any production yet, but that should start soon. It'll be a welcome change from being the only active writer for, well, the last year and change.

For the last several days, the leader and I have been going through 2nd revisions of the main plot. It's seen more action than a Bangkok hooker, yet (much like a Bangkok hooker) needs alot more touching up before it can be used. Back in ye olde days when I was just a peon with a peon with an inkwell, I wasn't even allowed to see what the brass was cooking up. And now, basically the new brass and I spend hours ripping, adding, and editing--mostly ripping and adding.

[/geek]

Ok, so now that I've put the Linux OS, Anime, and other geeky paraphenelia down on the ground...

Life has been good in general. The lab is going decent again after another error due to lack of training. The monkeys are doing alright. And I've gotten to talk to some old friends recently.

One thing that's been bothering me is lack of contact with the person I'm supposed to see in mid-August. For some bizarre reason she's just fallen off the radar recently. There ain't a thing wrong with this, 'course. I do this sometimes..ok..more than sometimes. The problem, however, is that I need confirmation from her roommate that I can stay before I reserve tickets. Now, y'all know how much airlines love to save customers money. They love to save customers so much money that fuck other customer's in the ass. So the savings to ass bang ratio goes up the more I wait. I'm sure something's come up or other, but I'm getting ansy about these sudden price hikes.

Other than that, I may have mentioned before that I'm going to be a teaching assistant. One of the courses I'll be a TA for will be psych of motivation. Now, I took one personality class while I was a psych undergrad. It was a good course. Quite interesting. My background is....let's be generous and say not ideally suited. When it comes to TAing, though, it's more like wanting a fresh body than anything. Even so, apparently I might get to teach a class about my stuff.

Why do I bother mentioning that? Well, I got a copy of the textbook sent to me. I like psych textbooks. I just like psychology in general. S'pose that would make sense, getting a Ph.D. for it and all. That still seems so bizarre. To me, I'm just doing research I want to do. But it's also for a big ol' "ooo you're teh fukkin roxxorz uber genius" degree. Of course, I think that's bunk. College degrees ain't what they used to be, and doctorates (i.e. Ph.D's) ain't either. There are some incompetent bastards out there with Ph.D's. And really: yeah you have to be intelligent, jump through the grade point average hoop and the standardized testing hoop...but it's like alot of stuff: if you want the bastard bad enough, you'll likely get it.

And of course I think my research will make a huge impact. You gotta raise your hopes and ideals above the terpentine chainsaw fields of the day-to-day. The day-to-day rots away and kills a motherfucker something dead without some lifepreserving device like idealism.

So yeah: besides wanting to make plane reservations and fearing a 747 shaft sans lube, I'm splendid.

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