I chuckle every time I see the Surrogate Sharers videos by Rhett and Link. It seems like this happens to me frequently because I’ve known so many gamers over the years. Most of them I have known by their online alias. When I meet people in person at LAN parties or live events, it gets worse because not only do I forget their alias, I may end up not known their name. The good thing, I have a photogenic memory so there are many occasions I’ll recall meeting them at one time. That’s what I get for meeting so many people huh? I usually just wait for others to call out their name. I feel so bad when I have to ask for their name again or ask them when I met them previously.

I have too much to say since I last wrote so take what you will with this post. Categories for you skimmers.

Deadspace Parody is hilarious
You have to stop by GameSpot to watch the Deadspace parody. Definitely worth viewing whether you’re a gamer or not.

Castle Crashers, game of the year? HECK YEA!
Oh yeah, my brother DarkViper (Jacob) was in town a few weeks back and we played tons of Castle Crashers. I had finals for college that weekend and it was really bad because he kept wanting to play co-op. r a while I really had to finish two papers and his wife played. This is the first game I have seen my sister-in-law play. As I mentioned in my GameSpot blog, I wish there was more figures for these guys! The mounts and majority of the characters are awesome looking. The Star Wars inspirations in the game with the light sabers, hooded guys and such is a total rip off, but it just add the icing (yes, I’m a SW goober). I won’t spoil any more things with this game if you haven’t play it. Let’s just say there’s tons of hilarious moments. Even though we finished the game during a weekend there is still plenty more things to do.

Rome Series is just wrong… in a bad kind of good way
I pretty much have dug deep into the Rome Television series abyss; watching episode after episode for days. A friend wanted to watch some episodes so I stopped, watched the first few episodes again. I shouldn’t have committed to only watch the show with my friend. I’ve waited all weekend with the Series 2, disk 1 on my desk. I’m going to have to watch it soon….. maybe I’ll pop in a disk right now… *evil grin*

Can Facebook do a tweet?
Now, I’ve said this before but I am known to update my GameSpot blog more frequently from being an addict of video games. I try not to spread myself out too thin on many sites. I’ve been thinking for some time now to register at Twitter and tonight I finally did it. lol I am trying to figure out how to associate it with my facebook account because I already update there and can use my mobile phone.

Throttle failure with the Scooter
Earlier this year my older scooter died on me. I purchased the same year and make and now my latest scooter has had throttle issues. I have stalled so many times. Thankfully I have a friend that is superman, so I can usually get rescued when I am stranded in a bad neighborhood near downtown. Other days I would end up walking my almost 300 lb. Scarabeo 150 scooter blocks to the dealer. Let me tell you, people are RUDE when you walk a heavy bike. They love to honk as if you can go any faster.

After many attempts to see what the issue was at the dealer, they think they found the issue. They think it was related to the vent not releasing enough air? Gas was getting in an area and it would end up making my scooter boost from barely moving the throttle or just go out in the middle of riding it. I was extremely frustrated that I almost got rid of it this last time. I warned the dealer that I planned to get rid of it after this fourth time taking it. I was thinking about getting a motorcycle but these hills in San Francisco are too steep. Anyways, it has been running fine the past two days since I got it back. If I had to ride any more San Francisco buses, I swear…. I dont know what I would have done. So many creepy people try to talk to me on the bus. They find that a redhead on a bus is approachable or something. And calling them creepy is just me being nice. I could say some really weird things that happened just in the past few weeks. Guess I could tell some of you in person.

Here’s my latest beauty. 2001 Aprilia Scarabeo 150cc. I would describe the color as a pearl green color. I took the old ugly helmet case from my the red scooter and put it on this one.

Rhett and Link take me away
Last Saturday I was supposed to study for my two new classes, but instead I watched a six hour marathon of Rhett and Link’s SuperNote championship. I have to say these guys are addicting. I don’t think it’s just their charm and good looks either. They seem so genuine. I was in the chatroom as my MMO alias and youtube name, Calitia. The funny thing is how much I feel like I grew up with these guys. They just seem like people I would have hung out with. When I watch their videos I have this urge to sing. Check out their road trip videos and the Surrogate Sharers videos.

I’mma trying to do things
Some of the other things I still plan to do is get another I’mma Hotline video done. I already have a variety of wigs I can use. I’ve been thinking about skits. The first video I made just came naturally. The plan would be to have only three girls this time instead of six. That way the video isn’t long. I also want to finish Nariko’s circlet and her makeup. Oh and that secret in case you didn’t check out my youtube video was about creating game character make-up tutorials. The first of the series is the Heavenly Sword’s Kai Make-up. For some reason many people assumed that I planned to be Kai for Halloween. I wasn’t her for Halloween but I did use that black wig I got from Japan. I dressed up with the black wig and wicked hot topic outfit with tall boots.

Buy Gears 2 for me, teehee
What else? Nothing else but wishing I was rich. I still need to buy the Force Unleashed and Gears of War 2. I’ve totally missing out. Every time I log on to Xbox Live I log off because people are playing GoW2 without me. :/

I’ve been on the hunt for Heavenly Sword’s Kai cap for a project I haven’t revealed on youtube just yet. I am actually waiting on one thing that is being shipped from Japan. I contacted them yesterday because I purchased it on October 2nd. They said I should receive it some time next week. However, I am thinking about finishing this project without it this weekend. I cannot wait to show what I want to do. I’ll have to compromise with something else I have in my closet. teehee.

After about three days of internet browsing and many attempts of different keywords known in the English language, I realized that I needed to make it myself. Sure, I found some cute cat and bunny headband ears and different fox ear hats. Those fox ears were very, very tempting to buy just because! I figured out later that these animal style hats were related to cosplay and anime on many of the sites I visited.

The more I looked around, the more I realized that Kai’s cap was just that unique. The fabric on the hat kai is wearing reminded me of a fisherman’s hat; definitely not a typical hat found on ebay.com or Etsy.com. I did tons of research and found this bad ass website called gobbolino.co.uk. This rapunzel hat here reminded me of Kai’s hat, but it looked more like a beanie. I thought about it a long time and realized it would cost more to have it mailed to me and it would have taken much more time to get.

I had a variety of friends tell me that if I figured out a way to make one I should tell them how I did it. I was so determined to have a similar hat that I made up my mind that I needed to at least give it a try. I ordered a skull bandanna cap from this place on ebay.com. Once I received the bandanna cap in the mail I took it to the fabric store and found a similar color of fabric. The silk fabric was more than I wanted to spend on fabric for the hat, but I was that crazy….. seriously. That same day I also went to a neat craft store a block away for the buttons and paint.

Then, last weekend I stayed up all Friday night to get some of the video recorded while creating the hat. Woke up early enough to get some more done and it was done! On Sunday I edited the video and uploaded it. Here’s the final result.

The interesting part about the video was the introduction. If you watch the shadow in the background it looks like Batman. Yes, I’m that silly to notice and get excited about that. lol!

I haven’t forgot about you! The past few months has been insane. Most of my latest happenings have been posted on youtube or gamespot blog.I also posted pictures from E3 and Quakecon in my smugmug page. Other than that, I’m extremely stoked about Lego Batman. The game will be released on store shelves tomorrow!

Also, I recently was able to get internets again from home. Other than school and other nonsense. Oh, and might I add my desktop computer is dead. Not sure what happened to it. I am contemplating on whether or not I should try to buy a gaming laptop, a new computer or to hire someone to fix this one. decisions, decisions….

I have been too busy to talk about life in general. I went to Seattle for the first time, E3 week and Quakecon week. I thought about doing a type of CaliGirl Tour article about my experiences bundling all of these events into one! Have some pictures uploaded on my smugmug page (link is available on the menu). It’s been fun but extremely exhausting, especially when I have tried to keep my grades in good standing at school. A few days ago I celebrated my birthday. Posted a video about it on youtube. Nothing special other than showing off make-up and boots!

It has been a week since I have injured my toe. I worked from home all last week and let me tell you it pretty much stunk. I hate not seeing human beings in real life. I guess some people would be excited, “hey, I get to work from home and I can do what I want.” Not me. Once Wednesday came along I was in jail.

I decided that it was best not to take any pictures because it’s un-lady like to show ugly feet. This toe was so ugly black; it looked like it was going to fall off by Monday afternoon. Having an ugly toe is fine but it hurt to an extreme while I slept; when I woke up in the mornings; when I stood for too long and when I hobbled. Any type of pressure gave an electricity of pain. This week I was supposed to be moving into my new place. I also have some traveling to do near the end of the week and of course my buddies decided to have PaintBall this coming Saturday. I’m not sure if I can safely do all three.

Backing up a bit, last Monday morning I hobbled my way to the Doctor’s office to grab a slip that would allow me to get x-rays at another place. I hobbled back to my truck, drove to the next place and hobbled into the X-ray place. Let me tell you, people sure look at you weird when you hobble. The nurse offered a wheelchair and I hesitated at first. The thought of getting in the wheelchair was a bit humbling but that wasn’t the problem. I had this sense of being an old lady and imagined myself 30-40 years from now. Being in so much pain from standing I ended up sitting down in the wheelchair. It was actually a lot of fun riding in it because the nurse drove the wheelchair pretty fast. The nurse mentioned that she didn’t get any tickets from driving crazy with wheelchairs yet. lol.

The x-ray experience was kind of weird. Even though I was in pain the nurse mentioned that my toes would be doing some stretching while she taped them to the x-ray board. She avoided touching the 4th injured toe by taping my pinky toe to the x-ray board. Then she taped the other two toes in the opposite direction from the pinky toe. The x-rays looked hilarious when I saw her loading them on the monitor screen. The cool part of the visit was how she kept me in the wheelchair and offered to drive me out to my truck. I had to wait 3 and half hours for my actual Doctor appointment so I drove another 45 minutes to get home. I should really change doctors closer to the city.

I spent about 3 hours total driving that day. I was very happy that I injured my left toe instead of my right. I wouldn’t have been able to drive that long if it was my right toe. The doctor didn’t do much but tell me about four steps to do, which anyone probably could have told me. Although, the Doctor was right about how I would have bruising farther up the toe near the veins of the foot.

My right leg and foot have been sore from shifting all of the weight to hobble. Since Thursday I have been walking extremely weird from having something wrong with both legs. What does not help is that I live on a hill. Any errands for food or anything means I have to park down the hill (darn truck is too big for SF neighborhoods!) and hobble up the hill. These are times to beg friends to drop off food. Sadly, some of my friends don’t have cars in the city to do any food drops.

An elective course I am studying in college involves culture and diversity. One of the assignments this week was about how I defined my race and ethnicity. Oddly enough, my background would be considered multiracial. However, when friends have asked me to describe my racial background I would tell them I was a mutt. How do I describe that I have Irish, Scottish, English, German, a small percentage of Spanish, and possibly about 2% French? I may also have Jewish as well.

Before my grandmother passed away she believed that her husband’s German ancestry possibly led to Jews. How confusing could this be to describe to someone? There is a newer technology that is supposed to define someone’s racial origin through their DNA. Of course, identifying an individual’s racial origin can also cause some prejudices according to this article published in the NY Times last winter.

Does it really matter where my racial origin is from? I believe everyone should be proud of who they are and where they come from. However, when someone’s racial origin becomes a matter of downgrading others, this is where I draw the line. Everyone should be treated equally and respected for who they are and where they came from.

I find so many different cultures fascinating because someone can have some traits or even natural talent like art just because one of their ancestors happened to be talented at something. The odd thing was how I rented about three movies this week without realizing that they were all related to Ireland. I have always wanted to visit this country before any other country. Although, there are some areas in the North San Francisco Bay area that constantly remind me of Ireland. These places near San Francisco have allowed me to imagine how amazing it would be to visit Ireland one day.

Film: Veronica Guerin
This movie caught my attention because my last course at college was about the history of media in relation to newspapers, magazines, television and the internet. Watching this movie and seeing how courageous this woman was just liberating in some way. Of course, dealing with crime in the way she did, I think she could have laid low for some time after the injuries she would have. Make it look like she wasn’t investigating while she really was. Anything to keep from being a target. Cate Blanchett was a very good Veronica Guerin. This was a a tragic yet inspiring movie all in one package.

Film: P.S. I love you
This movie made me cry, sob, wale, cry, laugh. cry, giggle, cry and laugh. I have never been so angry while watching a so called comedy film. I avoided watching it for months because it looked like it would be romantic. Without reading the storyline I rented it. I have not cried watching a movie this bad since… well, I never cried from grade to high school when watching movies. For the past 6 years I have noticed that I care so much about how people feel while going through circumstances. Movies like these are just plain mean to people who care. Just as I went to return it a friend wanted to watch it. I watched it TWICE! I was so mad that I watched it the first time because it made me angry even if the ending was kind of cute. However, the second time I didn’t experience any of the emotions. Maybe it was because I didn’t want to look like a big baby. Watching it the second time, I was able to see the movie from a different light. I appreciated the shots they showed in Ireland. I also started noticing how handsome two of the actors are. Gerard Butler and Jeffrey Dean Morgan portrayed very dreamy Irish men in this movie. Worth watching if you’re willing to risk being emotional for the chance to see some eyecandy.

Film: Once
One of the guys I used to work with recommended this movie last year. I avoided it for some time because it really didn’t look like it would be that interesting. However, I wish I saw it months ago when Alex recommended it. The film has some amazing music. Youtube has clips of my favorite songs: “when your mind’s made up,” “Falling slowly” and “If you want me.” Falling for the songs before I hear the chorus doesn’t happen that often for me. These songs grasp your heart and make you think about life as we all know it.

Yes, I have always dreamed about going to Ireland even before my mother did the family tree investigation. I think it was partly about leprechauns and the magic I would see on television or films but who knows. Maybe there was another reason why I longed to go there as a child.

I know I have hurt you so many times. I know I’ve promised to update caligirl.net more often. I realize that updating youtube and my GameSpot blog means that a variety of my friends feel disconnected, especially when they don’t play video games. I also realize that I don’t have time to update ladygamers.com as much as I used to. I have to blame going back to school and playing on my Xbox 360 for that. That’s a blog post in itself! I may end up turning ladygamers.com into a resource site that links to content about female gamers and developers. Then possibly start releasing articles like the Focus of the Month again to keep it fresh and interesting. That site needs a redesign pretty bad. The one I put up there was rushed.

I have so much to say but here is one last apology with a gift. Well, really a gift for me from my brother, Jacob aka DarkViper. You remember him, right? I met some of you through him so why don’t you stop by his page some time? www.darknews.com

Jacob was kind enough to create and develop this wordpress redesign for me. I was excited about this page, so much that I knew about 10 different posts I wanted to talk about but it was under construction at the time. I haven’t forgotten some of the topics I want to talk about. Although, I should leave them for another day. The picture that Jacob used in my California Girl logo was taken by Brian Hess. He took this picture when I visited Austin last Thanksgiving. This place we went to reminded me of the Goonies film for some reason. If you ever visit Austin, you should stop by to check out the Hamilton Pool Preserve in Travis County.

I have a little youtube video with a few clips of my trip last Thanksgiving. There are some pictures of the Hamilton outdoor pool in it. Okay, I’ll save the rest of my ramblings for another day. You have been warned!

I’m very excited that I have California Girl’s Corner of the Net back. It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to get my thoughts out to everyone.

Page content with links to former content on caligirl.net is still under construction. <3