The Secret Life of Pudding

Stolen from lordameth.

The Rules
1. Open your music player (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, etc).
2. Put it on shuffle.
3. Press play.
4. For every ’scene,’ type the song that’s playing. When you go to a new question press the next button.

+ Tagline: Matt Haimovitz - Suite from 44 Duos #2

Uh oh, I think this is going to be an art film.

+ Opening Credits: Billy Preston - Outa-Space

Bouncy, upbeat instrumental. We open with a crane shot of the suburban neighborhood in which our hero lives. The credits roll.

+ Waking Up: David Bowie - Drive-In Saturday

Wow, this is really going to be a weird movie. Wikipedia says this best: “Drive-In Saturday” describes how the inhabitants of a post-apocalyptic world have forgotten how to reproduce, and need to watch old porn films to see how it’s done.

+ Working Song: Hikaru no Go - Tomadoi (Piano Version)

(Wow, lordameth ended up with a HNG track for this one too… go figure.)

This is a very slow, melancholy kind of track. I guess our hero doesn’t really like his work very much.

+ Falling in Love: The Tiger Lilies - The Dreadful Story About Harriet And The Matches

Um, no comment. Harriet, the love interest in this movie, is going to be really quite screwed up.

+ Sex: Ringo Starr - I Think Therefore I Rock

A happy, hard-rock anthem. “In her eyes I saw our future / She opened my mind to see…”

+ Lusting: Nine Inch Nails - Terrible Lie

“Why are you doing this to me? Am I not living up to what I’m supposed to be?” Our hero is filled with angst, but I kind of think that Harriet is probably just screwing with his head.

+ Cooking Dinner: Marillion - Beautiful

Our hero and Harriet make up, kiss, and cook dinner together. It is Very Moving(tm).

+ Walk in the Park: Meat Loaf - Bolero

They go for a ride on the parkway on Harriet’s Harley. Our hero is somewhat disturbed by the fact that Harriet keeps taking cats out of her shoulder bag and throwing them in front of the bike.

+ Working Out at the Gym: Great Big Sea - The Mermaid

Our hero takes a break from all this excitement and goes to the gym. The music gets considerably calmer, probably because Harriet is nowhere to be found.

+ Fight Scene: Paul Simon - Crazy Love, Vol. II

“I don’t want no part of this crazy love / I don’t want no part of your love,” our hero sweetly and softly tells Harriet. Predictably, she is somewhat upset.

+ Breaking Up: Jethro Tull - Rosa on the Factory Floor

Fine, then, says Harriet. I am just going to go back to my ex-husband, Santa Claus.

Whatever, you crazy bitch, scoffs our hero.

+ Secret Love: Jethro Tull - Astronomy

In a shocking plot twist, not to mention sudden change of genres, Harriet goes back to her ex-husband, Santa Claus.

(Yes, there is a method to this madness. Just wait for it, mmmkay?)

+ Life’s Okay: Silly Wizard - The Secret Portrait/Wha’ll Be King But Cherlie

Meanwhile, back in Suburbia, everyone is hanging out their Christmas decorations. The stockings are hung from the chimney with care in hopes that St. Nicholas soon will be there.

+ Mental Breakdown: The Nite-Liters - K-Jee

Unfortunately, St. Nicholas does in fact show up, along with his ex-wife, Harriet. Our hero comes to the sudden and painful realization that he may just have been wrong about her.

+ Partying: Mark Knopfler - Sailing to Philadelphia

At the office Christmas party, with his boring cow orkers, our hero just can’t seem to enjoy himself. His thoughts are constantly on his lost crazy girlfriend.

+ Long Night Alone: The Doors - The Crystal Ship

In an extremely artsy and emo dream sequence, our hero realizes where he must go: the North Pole, to fight Santa and win back his Harriet.

+ Final Battle: Blackmore’s Night - Ding Dong Merrily On High

(I told you there was a method to this madness.)

Our hero faces off against Santa and his hordes of elves. Fortunately, elves are real wimps.

+ Death Scene: The Vitamin String Quartet - If You Love Somebody Set Them Free

As Santa lies on the ground, dying, Harriet weeps over his dead body. Oh well, says our hero, I guess you’re stuck with me now.

Are you out of your fucking mind? says Harriet. Seriously, I’m not sure what he was thinking - who hooks up with their husband’s killer?

+ Funeral: Mason Williams - Classical Gas

Suddenly, down from the heavens comes Jesus himself, along with a band of angels. They bury Santa, and explain to our hero that he is the new Santa Claus now. Ho ho ho!

+ Closing Credits: Styx - Clair De Lune, Ballerina

As the credits roll, the audience is left wondering why they paid $9.50 for this crap.

It looks like I’ve got an extra ticket for the Rush concert at the Tweeter Center on Sunday, June 15, at 7:30 PM. This is a reserved open-air seat.

I think the ticket was something like $45, but I’ll have to check it once I get home. Any takers?

Friday, June 6, at 7:30 PM at the Oasis Coffeehouse (which is at the First Presbyterian Church, just off Moody Street). $12 apiece. Who’s in?

(Jim’s Big Ego, for those who haven’t already heard me yammer on and on about them, is one of my favorite pop/folk bands. Their web site has a lot of songs you can check out.)

Hey Dreamhost customers: looks like you now have a reasonable option for deploying Rails apps!

(Found via the official Phusion blog.  Congrats to the Phusion boys, this is really great news.)

Concom Minutes
10 May 2008

• Hotel Liason
  • Check arrived
    
• Bid Chair
  • Not here, sent a report:
  • “One game added, More games needed, Woot”
  • Talk about results of Bidcom Open Meeting
    • Went through all text shown to bidders and cleaned it up for accuracy and clarity
      
    • Bidcom promises to give a decision on games in no more than a month after submission
    • Laid out guidelines for use of fast-track option:
      • Only to be used in cases where there is time pressure and the bid committee can’t reasonably be contacted in the necessary time
    • Laid out guidelines for use of bidcom decision override by con chair:
      • Should be used as sparingly as possible, if at all
      • Con chair will give bid commitee an explanation of why it was deemed necessary to override decision
        
• Information
  • Not here, attending memorial
• Con Suite
  • Not here, attending memorial and taking certification exam
• GM Coordinator
  • Hi!
  • Nothing to report; GMs relatively quiet.
  • Suggestion: Poke early-bid GMs later in the year (before signups) and make sure their blurbs still fit.
    
• Treasurer
  • Check from hotel arrived: $1090
  • H final total: profit of $302.69!
  • I total: $1862.83
  • NEIL total: $5460.60
  • State paperwork taken care of
    
• Ops
  • Sam’s investigation of dates from last year:
    
    • Buttons were Sept last year, maybe should be earlier this year
    • Shirts and program booklets not till February last year
  • Andrew went through surveys:
    • Con suite
      
    • • Everyone loves con suite
      • 1 or 2 people wanted larger dinner period
      • 1 or 2 wanted kosher options (probably impossible)
      • More drink options?
      • Some complaints about Saturday, nothing we don’t already know
      • Suggestion: hand sanitizer out near con suite
    • Hotel
      • Key card system malfunctioning for some folks
      • Some complaints about the state of the hotel
      • No bacon at hotel breakfast
      • Hot water system malfunctioned
    • Vendors
      • People liked the vendors
      • Many people are too poor/don’t have time to see vendors
      • Everyone loves Rising Phoenix
    • Advertising
      • We should advertise at Mythical Journeys
    • Intercon has gotten big in general
    • People liked Randy Milholland’s tabletop game
    • One person worried that theming is getting too strong… but we got the opposite feedback from Intercon G, so this might be an outlier
  • Sam to find out whether StitchAmerica will do 1 design/2 shirt types at same price as 1 shirt type (www.embroiderysuperstore.com)
    
• Pubs / Art
  • Probably not here, sent art collateral schedule with request for dates
  • Barry replied to some of these with dates, and added some of his own
  • 
    
  • Initial ‘I’ ad for program book back cover for Intercon H - done.
  • Web banner for Intercon I site - done.
  • Button art for I - it is the same format as last year, Sam suggests September for buttons.
    
  • Intercon I Flyers - we are updating them monthly as per last meeting Anna has been sending the monthly new game roll ups.
  • Intercon I Ads - we need to plan and coordinate dates for the following ads: Origins, Mid Atlantic, Arisia. Also, are we going to place ads in other events? Please advise dates and formats and or contact person.
    • We probably aren’t going to be able to do an ad for Origins based on last year’s experience (they forgot about our ad exchange).
    • Mid Atlantic may or may not be doing ads in their booklet this year - will have to ask Gordon about that
    • Arisia - we haven’t done an ad for them in the past as far as we recall
    • So probably only need to worry about Mid Atlantic, if they’re doing ads.
      
  • Intercon I Shirt Design - we will be going with StitchAmerica again.  Instead of 2 designs, we’re considering offering polos and babydolls assuming price works.
    
  • Intercon I badge design - yes, same as last year’s format.  Nat will look at changing the badge format back to large nickname, small real name.
    
  • Intercon I program book cover design - “As late as 14 Feb but would like it in Dec if possible”
  • Intercon I program content dates - 25 Dec will be ad and bio deadline; 2 Feb will be schedule changes deadline if possible
  • Booklet draft available - January NEIL meeting (Arisia?)
  • Final booklet editing pass begins - 2 Feb
  • Booklet complete and ready for Ops to print - 16 Feb
• Registrar
  • 93 attendees so far for Intercon I
    • This is inbetween G and H numbers
    • At this point it doesn’t look like we’re breaking records this year (whew)
      
  • Everything running OK with PayPal except one person tried to use PayPal Mobile which didn’t automatically pingback to us
    
• Vendor
  • Positive comments coming back from vendors
  • Some vendors want to change spaces
  • 8 space allocation was right; squeezing in a 9th, although it worked out, probably wouldn’t have been OK for a different vendor
  • Rising Phoenix has been promised a party at I and wants to throw one
    
  • We need to find out whether Randy Milholland will come back or not
    • He said he’d love to but he’s moving out of the area
    • If he comes back, he might be a GM instead of a vendor
      
  • R. Craig Enslin
    • We’ve had complaints about him in the past, both business-related and behavior-related
    • He’s applied to be a vendor at I
    • Further discussion needed
      
• Web
  • Not here
    
  • Jen is going to contact Barry to see about getting a vendors page on the site
  • Site still says Angel/Devil shirt - probably should fix?
    • Someone ordered one, so shirts are $20 this year
      
• Con chair
  • Contacted LARPA folks about pencils recently; haven’t heard back yet
  • Talk about Thursday
    • Went over already-discussed tentative plans for a separate event on Thursday night-Friday afternoon
    • Still looking for someone to head up efforts
      
• Schedule
  • Next concom meeting: June 22, 2:00 PM - place TBD

So, this now seems settled enough for me to officially announce it: this June, Viktoriya and I will be moving to lovely* Fitchburg, Massachusetts!

We’re going to be renting a condo in Bridle Cross Estates, a fairly new development on the outskirts of town.  Here’s a picture:

That’s not a faked picture; our street really does look like that.

So yeah, come visit us (once we live there)!  It’s a really, really nice place.  And Fitchburg isn’t as far away as you think.  Seriously, I tried the commute this morning: door-to-door, it’s about 50 minutes from Somerville in no traffic, and 1 hour 10 minutes in traffic.

* OK, so Fitchburg itself isn’t really that lovely.  But just outside of Fitchburg there are some pretty nice neighborhoods, and this is one of them.

This is a continuation of a discussion that started on a friend’s LiveJournal, in the comments thread.  For the background, go here.

Over the course of the thread, it became increasingly clear to me that l_the_fangirl and I weren’t talking about the same things when we said “Gamist,” “Narrativist,” or “Simulationist.”  Well, ok, I think we mostly mean the same thing by “Gamist,” but not the other two.  Now, of course, I don’t think GNS is the “one true model” of roleplaying, but I’ve found it to be useful in the past.  I do, however, agree with the “big model” theory that gamism, narrativism, and simulationism are only three of the possible universe of creative agendas, and there are really a lot more of them than just those.

Anyway, I’ve come to think that I myself may not have a 100% conventional view of GNS, and so I’m going to follow l_the_fangirl’s lead and rename the three points of the model I use to more accurately reflect the way I think of them:

• Goal-oriented (formerly “Gamist”): Primarily playing in order to accomplish character goals, or “win.”
• Event-oriented (formerly “Narrativist”): Primarily playing in order to participate in an interesting series of events.
• Character-oriented (formerly “Simulationist”): Primarily playing in order to explore an interesting character.

Now, l_the_fangirl renames her three points differently, and I’m going to quote from her comments about them here:

• Challenging (formerly “Gamist”): LTF didn’t elaborate on this one in the comments thread, but I assume from the name she gives it that it’s primarily about encountering and surmounting challenges.
• Thematic (formerly “Narrativist”): “…entirely about themes - if you define a theme as ‘What happens when you choose one of two good things at the expense of the other?’”
• Genre (formerly “Simulationist”): “…the game is entirely about simulating a living, breathing situation and setting in a particular genre. If you wanted to run a game that was Just Like Tolkien, it would be simulationist/genre.”

(l_the_fangirl, I’m sorry if I’m misrepresenting your point of view here; I’m restating it as best I understand it, but if I’m wrong, please comment on this post and say so.)

I should also mention here that I’m coming almost entirely at this from a background of theatre-style LARP.  I don’t know what LTF’s background is, but her latest comments lead me to believe she plays at least some tabletop RPGs, so that may account at least somewhat for the difference in our perspectives.

Anyway, I thought this was an interesting discussion and that ryuutchi probably didn’t want it happening in a comment thread on her unrelated post, so I’m reposting it here in the hopes of continuing it.

Stolen from belu.

How many songs total: 5368
How many hours or days of music: 16 days, 20 hours, 57 minutes
Most recently played: Charles Douglas - She’s An Angel
Most played: 3-way tie!  Mark Knopfler - Marbletown, 3 Doors Down - Kryptonite, They Might Be Giants - The Cap’m

Sort by song title:
First Song: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists - 2nd Ave, 11am
Last Song: David Bowie - Ziggy Stardust

Sort by time:
Longest Song: Excluding podcasts and audiobooks: Jethro Tull - A Passion Play [0:44:57]
Shortest Song: 5-way tie: Clerks - Dante’s Lament, Jim’s Big Ego - Intro, Spur of the Moment - Untitled, They Might Be Giants - Who’s Knocking on the Wall?, They Might Be Giants - I Heard a Sound [all 0:00:04]

Sort by album (full album):
First album: Dance Dance Revolution - 2nd Mix.  Excluding video games: A Blinding Silence - 17th and K
Last album: Police - Zenyatta Mondatta

Search the following and state how many songs come up:
Death: 21 (mostly from The Aquabats vs. The Floating Eye Of Death)
Life: 36
Love: 174
Hate: 29
You: 395
Sex: 18

Ten shuffled songs:
1. Moldy Peaches - Who’s Got the Crack?
2. Marillion - Assassing
3. Weird Al - It’s All About the Pentiums
4. Squeeze - Pulling Mussels
5. Lonnie Mack - Wham!
6. Yat Kha - Amdy Baryp
7. Ian Anderson - Not Ralitsa Vassileva
8. Motorhead - Killed By Death
9. The Reverse Engineers - Mercury in Retrograde
10. Marillion - The Answering Machine

For a long time now, if you went to my “home page”, natbudin.com, you would be confronted with a page that looked something like this:

While true, this message is somewhat less than informative. Today I decided it’s been up there for damn long enough, and finally replaced it with this somewhat-pretentious page:

It’s also not incredibly informative, but it at least gives you a better idea of what you’re looking at. What do y’all think?