so I walk amidst the many-tongued
my ear jumping to any slight-recognised sound
        was that a scrap of Japanese?
                or Vietnamese or something else entirely
so many faces, flashes of colour, glances of eyes
a child's laughter a teen's silence
        .....
glancing over my eyes fall on a boy
(maybe a couple of years younger than me)
and it's the briefest of moments but---
        my eyes light a little
        though I can't explain exactly why
                cos he's cute
                cos he looked a little like Bono would have at that age
                ...cos of something instantly familiar in his eyes
A half-meeting - not even that, not a single word was exchanged between us
        lifted my gaze a bit as he walked past
he and his companions (a boy a bit younger, an older man) sat at the table beside us
I looked over occasionally, trying not to be obvious, not trying to accomplish anything just wanting to look at the boy, perhaps learn something of him...
They had accents, I think British (though they talked too little for me to not be completely sure it wasn't Australian)
He had a camera slung across his shoulder, as did I
He walked past a number of times...
One of the many sparrows about scrounging for food hopped across the ground near his feet - it had caught the corner of my eye and I smiled a little at it - then glanced up and saw him doing the same, smiling at the sight of this little sparrow so close by...
He moved to a different table
        still adjacent ours, still in sight, but I could only see his back
        and neck and short brown half-curls (not full or tight curls,
        wavier larger ones rather like my own)
It sprinkled now and again, we got up to go elsewhere...and as we walked I saw him and the two he was with walking just ahead of us.
They began to run to try to beat the rain...
And he turned back and looked at me.
        and maybe he was just making sure of the person following
        behind him
        but our eyes (and it felt something more even still) met and I
        smiled...

And in two weeks' time I may not be able to recal his face but for now.....
he's a stronger presence in my mind than all the reputed wonder of Niagara Falls,
this boy I never even spoke to

And it's just as with the blond-haired boy I sat across the sidewalk from in Milan three summers ago...our eyes met but that was all, a look, a smile, a memory that both warms you and tugs at something a little like regret...

 
So, despite the fact that more'n half this corner of the country is out of power... we lost ours for maybe thirty seconds, if that - Daf said their power dimmed, but never went out; our microwave was blinking and my pc'd restarted, but yeah. It's freaky tho cos like, the other side of the *street* hasn't got power, but we do. (This isn't the first time this's happened, tho - we're on a different power company, I think we're on RG&E and the rest're on Niagara-Mohawk, which I know's the one that's out.) merani-chan and I were at mom's, about to eat dinner, and the power went out and it got dim and very very quiet. Called the grandparents and they had no power, but grandpa had a radio and'd learned that it was all over... Mom called matantis whod' gotten home from work fine - the traffic lights were out but he'd come home on the expressway anyway. And we had power at home. So we were like, well, ok then.. *laughs*
But I was mad-worried about Megs cos I knew she'd've been on her way home when the power went out, and we'd heard about people getting stuck in subways and all this dreadfulness and Megs is SICK! and has had a very angsty few days! this shite can't all happen NOW! *grrrr* *hisses*
So I called a few times, finally got hold of her about an hour ago.. she *did* get stuck in the subway, and had to walk, in the dark, and wound up in a strange neighborhood and had to take mad-crowded busses and it wasn't cool. And she couldn't find her boyfriend, so since I have internet and she doesn't, I looked up a number for her and she's trying to figure out where he is... (she knows he's ok tho at least cos she talked to him briefly earlier and he was like lost in the midst of manhatten and it wasn't cool but yeah.)
And merani-chan and matantis are making fun of me cos I was all worried about Megs, but I doubt if *they'd* like it very much beign stuck in the midst of a bigfriggin'hugecity with no power and sketchy ways of getting home and not knowing where your significant other is and-- blah to them anyway. :p

So, am waiting about for awhile to see if Megs calls me back... phone's in my room anyway, s'all good. 'Course, I'm supposed to *sleep* tonight cos the grandparents are taking merani and I to Niagara Falls tomorrow... (great timing, ne? not only's there no power, one of the suspected causes was lightening hitting/a fire at a plant up that way.)

 
Dad's getting us a goat.
No joke.

Cos instead of it just being idle wishing on his part again, this time he knows someone with goats that ended up with a few more than they could keep. Sp Dewalts up the street are getting one, we're getting another.

There will be a goat living in our suburban backyard.
There is nothing more to say.

 

KAWAAAAIIIIIIIIII~~~~~~!

*dies giggling*
(but you can't tell me it's not cute. looks better in the game itself - I ganked the images to make this from the images stored in the game's files, due to my higher resolution outside the game it got mad tiny. but the thing's adorable, I don't even know what it is, but it's the thing from Bunguru Wa and it's somewhere between an aquatic Pikachu and The Cheat. *giggles*)

Hi. I've spent about the past..lessee..ten hours or so, less the few hours I talked to Megs (*huuugs*), playing freeware computer games. poking thru rom sites. and sites full of old computer and video games.

You'd never imagine that commadore 64 games would be so damned difficult. ^^; ...well, actually, most of my time was spent figuring out the emulators. First off, the sites to get them on were made by the people who *MADE* the emulator. Think about this. This is someone who sat down and coded and created something that acted like a user-unfriendly old-school computer system. Uh-huh. The sites are full of more technical details than I can even wrap my brain around. It's kinda scary. So once intimidated-lil-me made her way thru the geek-speak and downloaded the emulator, unzipped it...opened it. uhhh... *laughs* Yeah. Unlike the SNES and DDR emulators I'm accustomed to, the bugger thing acted just like a commadore 64. Same interface.
I've definitely never used one, and the commands are NOT the same as old-school dos. like, at all.
So then I poked thru the faqs and other files that came with my emulator, and the guy's all like well if you don't know how to work it then you sholda read your commadore 64 user manual! I'm like..uhm, hi. I doubt if I was even a year old when the bloody things came out, I don't even know. [later note: these games are ranging in date from like 1979 - 1991 and stuff..so yeah.] So, we googled, and found online versions of c64 user manuals. (I'm not joking. Punch in "Project 64" and you'll find them.) Skimmed thru that, figured out how to run programs on a c64.
Not, of course, that I knew what the hell the keyword was to open my games. So I picked the easy one, where the file name was just one word, and punched that in. (Once, that is, I finally figured out how to get quoatation marks. apparently c64 keyboards weren't identical to our nice little standardised qwertys. " are where we now have @, oddly enough.)
Then it told me to press 'play' on the tape.
I was like o_O;;;; hi I don't have this tape set-up of which you speak, we have disks and reasonable things now.
So, I forget exactly why but I started going thru and methodically pressing every key on my keyboard. (Might've been trying to figure out how to close the emulator, not sure anymore.) And happened upon F10. Which, really, I should've known to try before...it's rarely used now but back in the days of monochrome screens and DOS-based games, it was used incessently. F10 pulled up the emulator-menu-stuff. I was like SCORE!!!! so I poked into random things and found something about the tape-thing. Figuring that it might let me tell it to NOT look for an actual tape, but a file elsewhere, I went into that...
...and found a list of my games.
^____^

From there, well.. the one game doesn't work, one is a semi-illustrated text adventure (wherein I get stuck alot - having only played maybe two or three of these ever, I'm not used to knowing what to tell it to do.. there's a gardener and a gravedigger sitting nearby and I say "talk to gravedigger" and it's like "try a different verb" or something and I'm like no). The other two are my Dangermouse games. ^___^ One of them is a semi-illustrated text adventure, which is amusing due to random one-colour line-drawings of DM and Penfold, and the fact that if you wander about in the woods long eough Penfold falls asleep, or when you run into a bear on this bridge Penfold flips out and jumps into your arms and knocks you both into the murky moat. *giggles* The other DM game is, well.. more of a game. It's... wow. *laughs* I've played about ten rounds so far, and I *still* don't understand the third part. I won somehow at one point, but I honestly don't know what I did. I button-mash and stare at things, and try to figure out what's making my points go up. *laughs* Seriously, I can't figure out what to do, there's this grid of random circles that're changing colours in front of DM, and I can make him jump up and lean over this wire fence surrounding said circle-light-things, and he can bounce on his hands from one pole-thing at the end of each row to another, but that's it. When it makes the higher-pitched beep, your points go up. This seems to coincide with a circle being yellow in the row you're bouncing at the end of. This, however, is as much as I've managed all ten times I tried. *laughs*
Also can't figure out what's up with the jungle-bit, cos you can climb the tree but then a herd of elephants (I think) goes past and the panther's gone but when you walk to the next screen you're back dealing with crocodiles again, it hasn't gone on to the afore-described circle-thing.

*shakes head, laughs* Wow. The things I do with my time..... I dunno. The scary thing is, it feels like I've been productive today, somehow. Learned plenty about Commadore 64s and emulators of, anyway... *g*

 
DUDE!!!!!!!!!! I FOUND THE DANGERMOUSE GAMES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
*SPAZZING A LOT*
I've been looking for these for AGES!!!!!! They were for Commodore 64, they're friggin' anceitn and low-tech and AHHH!!!!! *DOWNLOADS*
*DOWNLOADS COMMADORE 64 EMULATOR*

*settles in for a long night of old-school gaming goodness*
^_______^

...to find these games, and info on emulators, go here. wonderfulwonderful awesome. <3 ^_^
(and yes.. those are c64 sex cartoons you see a link to on the most-downloaded list. I'm not sure whether the concept amuses me or is just.. *shakes head* I don't even know.)


Btw, a note to the paranoid: I've virus-scanned everything I've downloaded and mentioned on here, it's all been clean. The sites I'm on..well, maybe reputable isn't the right word, but they're gamers and coders and they're the sort of people who get annoyed by losers who throw viruses into files for a laugh.

And note to me.. go thru here. Lots. Dude, guys, this's awesome, they've got ROMS for friggin' EVERYTHING.....this site, yeah, haven't gotten anything from yet, virus-scan if you're paranoid. (roms are generally notorious for viruses..but if it was that bad here it wouldn't've been recommended by the one site I was on, so yeah.)

 
Ok, so, I took this quiz like ten times, and stared at the code and all, cos each time I picked a different number I got a different answer. So I don't tihnk it's fair. *giggles* Thus, this is not what I got as an answer, but it amused me greatly.
Tell y'this much, tho, its descriptions are *dead* friggin' *on*...


You are a drummer. You tend to be very wild and
loud. Bordom often gets the better of you and
you go nuts, beware you don't get to wild.


What musical instrument are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

*laughs happily* Too perfect. If you get clarinet it says you're sociable and a bit of a perfectionsit. Also very apt. *blows raspberry at the overly pride-ful 2nd clarinets* *hehe* ^_^

Which reminds me.. best line of Anything Goes? (quote ganked from Laurel's profile cos I couldn't describe it better *giggles*)
Scott Horsington, playing clarinet in the pit orchestra: "I confess! Once I--I almost played a wrong note!" ::slumps over music stand, racked with mock-sobs::
*dies giggling* We don't even know for sure if it was scripted, unscripted, planned, un-planned..but if you know Scott, it was far too wonderful. *g*

Also: If you haven't, dude, really. Go get free games. Akuji the Demon r0x0rz, cos it's random, easy, fun, unlimited fire to shoot with.. and be sure to not skip over the opening story. *giggles* The premise of this game amuses me far too much. Bunguru Wa is still my main addiction tho cos it's CUTE! and pretty and addicting and yay.

*laughs* right. now I'm looking up copies of like, commodore 64 games... I love the internet. ^_^

 
Fun free mostly old-school style computer games here.
Bunguru wa is the cutest funnest thing ever. ^_^

Ok, so, yeah. Anything Goes...what can I say. Blake was friggin' AMAZING. It was *the* most un-him character he played, Sir Evelyn, this moronic British gentleman type. Very loud and gestural and..well..silly. *dies giggling* Props to Blake tho for keeping the accent as well as he did, even while singing. And for literally leaping and spinning across the stage singing about the gypsy inside of him. And appearing onstage in front of us all in t-shirt, waist-length dressing gown, boxers, and socks held up by the garter-things. Blake..you were awesome. ^_^
Show itself was quite good as well.. we talked with some of the orchestra cos it was like yay we know people, and Daf and I missed being in there..... Pete Myers came over to talk to us for a bit - a happy surprise for Daf and I. (He's our bass player. He's awesome. And cuute. And nice. And funny. And he looks rather like a brunette Adam Clayton *ghee*. And he's one of those people that I'd always wanted to get to know better, but never really managed to...) The orchestra was only given ONE rehearsal with the cast. Friggin' ridiculous..plus, despite her many other acclaims, Mrs. Walsh is NOT a conductor. So YAY for the pit orchestra trying their hardest and pulling off a passable performance despite all odds. ^_^

Great Northern Pizza trip was yesterday...*that* was interesting. Himeros and I were a bit late, cos he'd had something else going on... got directions online cos we were paranoid about getting lost. And we did just fine. eeeeexcept for turning onto Straub Road. cos we were nearly past it and I realised it was our turn and so, instead of finding elsewhere to turn around and come back to it, like any normal person, Himeros decides to act the teenage guy that he is and pull a *mad* sharp fast turn. And we didn't die or anything but, uh... *laughs* yeah. It was fun.
So we got there and found people and had pizza. And near-all the guys there kept dragging the conversation back to Dungeons&Dragons and I was like *face-palm* I HANG OUT WITH GEEKS HI. *giggles* But then they talked video games and that was better cos Himeros knows video games and I was like yay. And I don't think Erik stopped talking for more than thirty seconds the entire hour or two we were there. *giggles* But then, we only stopped picking on him for abouy sixty seconds, sooooo.... *hehehehe*
So, pizza. Then Calypso suggested we all go down to the Abbott's at Charlotte beach. Himeros and I headed outside to wait while people sorted things out and were generally slow. *giggles* Calypso (supposedly) gave everyone directions, an' he drove Daf and Jayj, an' Himeros an' I followed them. And he turned off the parkway and took some random way but whatever. We got there. And waited. And waited and waited and waited.... and no-one else ever showed. Worst of it was, *we* had a cell phone, *they* had cellphones, but no-one knew anyone's number. *giggles* So, about 8.30, we gave up, got ice cream, they tried to give Himeros a peanut butter sundae when he'd asked for a blueberry..*giggles*..we straightened that out, and made it across the street without being killed and took a walk down the pier. Which was nice, it was mad humid and hot and kidna icky, and it always smells bad, but the mood was red (thus "One Tree Hill" popped into my head and I sang it to myself for a bit) , and you could barely tell where the lake ended and the sky began, it was all a cloudy grey-blue... got to the end, and stood around half-reading the graffeti on the lighthouse (err, well, such as it is..it's not really one, I don't think, it's a big metal thing about five feet in diameter and..I dunno..20' high? with a light on top).. Daf and Calypo'd been mostly holding hands and things, their usual cuddliness all night, but really, Himeros and I hadn't... *shrugs* I dunno. At the pizza place his leg was swaying back and forth a bit, mine was brushing up against his (and ALLLLL I could think about was high-school Adam and Bono and this past weekend's slash and oh dearrrrr ^___^), but.. so I don't know.
I felt so bad, tho.. Himeros had a cell phone with him, one of his sisters called *twice*, harassing him about the ride he was supposedly supposed to give her home (nevermind that she works half a mile from home..and he was out in Charlotte, 30, 40 minutes away 9_9 ), then as we were out at the end of the pier, one of his parents called cos it was 9pm and they were flipping out about him getting caught out driving past 9. Nevermind that the chances of being so are literally next-to-nothing - are cops gonna randomly stop cars to see how old the driver is? no. So, we headed back down the pier, and no-one really said much... Daf and Calypso were holding hands and then skipping and whatever other gooshy shite they enjoy doing *giggles*... I felt bad for Himeros cos of his parents and sister and all.. so as I was walking beside him I slipped my arm around his back for awhile, and he put his around mine and gheeee. Only it's not very conducive to walking, so later we just held hands, but that was lovely as well, just.. walking back along the boardwalk, the sky dark cerulean, the lights around the beach casting a warm golden glow on everything, holding his hand and pulling close to his side as we walked.....
All apologies and sympathy to Jayj, btw - I've been fifth wheel *far* too many times myself.. but I don't think it was too bad, nobody was being really exclusive an' like I said, Himeros and I really barely did a thing the whole evening.. *shrugs* I dunno.
So, we all headed back... he and I were quiet most of the way back, but we did talk for awhile which was nice.. just, random stuff, he has a te---oo, shite, yeah, his final test for summer school (math) is tomorrow (babe, if you read this at all...good luck.....)..
Pulled into my street, he said it'd been a nice night out, I said yeah, and thanked him again for coming with and putting up with my random bunch of friends (well, mostly..some of those that were there, I really don't even know that well, just through grad parties really) and everything..... sat in the driveway a minute, and I leaned over to kiss him goodnight.....
*smiles*
I don't know, it was just... uneventful as the whole night really was (well, apart from most of our group getting lost and never making it to Charlotte ^^;;;; ..next time, we're all getting cell #s, guys..I feel so bad, not that there was anyting I coulda done but yeah), it was just.. *laughs* It was a nice, normal sort of date. Which he and I've never even remotely managed. *giggles, blushing a bit* But yeah. Hand-holding and holding and walking and sweet soft kisses and just.. I don't know. He just looked into my eyes and I kissed him and he nuzzled his nsoe against mine and I kissed him again and he kissed me, soft and sweet and that was all.... and it was nice. *smiles*
*coughs*
Ok enough lovey-dovey shite. *giggles* Sorry. Anyway, yeah. Have been downloading OCremixes of all sorts of video games... seriously, anyone who's ever played an old Nintendo game, go to this site and look for it, these remixes *rock*... also poked around to find old school video games for the pc, and wound up on a very nice little freeware site, as also linked above. *giggles* Yay for simple pleasures. *G*
And they had an ascii-prog. to download that'll turn images into ascii-form. I played some, results weren't, y'know, things I could do much with, but it's amusing to a degree.. ^_^


----------=$MM#####################M@X;=========;
---------+@#####H%/;;;;/%XH@M########MM@X+===;;;=
---------%@MH/==-------==-====/$M########M@/=;;;;
--------;H@/;===-----------====;;/H#####MMMMX/;;;
,-,,,,--%X+/;==--------------==;;;;+@######M%/;==
,,,,,,,;$%+;====------,------==;;;;;+@#######H;-=
,,,,,,,+$/===-----;+$XH+---;;==;;;//+HM######M/==
,,,-,-$M#######################M$//+$@#######M/--
--,;M##########M##################@$XM########$--
,,,/#########@=-%#############################X-,
...;M#######M/-==/M#######MMM#################@=-
,,.=M######M+=-====%H@H%;-==;;;/+$X@#####MM###M;-
,,,,,H$/;/+@#M@H@@H$;=;%%/=-==;;//+/+H$;/H@X%#M;=
,,,,;H$%$%X#####H+;;;===;%$//+///+++%++++-=$$@M;-
,,,,;MH@X$@##H%++++++/+%%/++/++//++%+==+%/;;$#M;-
,,--=@X%H###H%+/==;;+$H$+/;;/+///++++;====;%##@-,
%%%%$@#@$%$$%%$%%/;/;;;;;=;++//++++++=--==+###@$$
########@%+%+++%+/;;;===;/++//+%%%%%X#@$$H#######
#########$++/;//;=====;;///;;+%%%%XXXH###########
#########MX$+/%%/;;;///++///+%$$H@HH%$###########
#################@HXX$$$X$$XH@MMM@X%+H###########
#############################MH$%%++%M###########
########################@@HX%+//+/++X############
#####################@X$%++/;;;///++X############
###################H$+/////;;;;///++$############