I'm soliciting feedback on my applied project - I have to create a project that shows what I've learned during my academic career AND that reflects my major track of literature and film. What do you think? And know that I may be hitting you up for help depending on which one I pick. ::grin::

1) Work with SafeZONE curriculum to expand it and add some literature, film and music components. For those who may not know: SafeZONE is a program designed to increase the overall campus community's understanding and awareness of issues faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer/questioning (LGBTQ) and other marginalized persons. SafeZONE was created to provide a safer, more receptive, and accepting campus climate by preparing members of the ASU community to serve as a resource on LGBTQ issues while educating the campus community about the SafeZONE Program. (www.asu.edu/safezone)

2) Create a curriculum for a Gay Identities class using literature & film - there is such a class at ASU, but it's horribly done and I think I could do it better.

3) Write a research paper on mythology's role in our society and how literature and film fill that role.

4) Adapt a piece of literature into a screenplay and film it.

5) Examine a particular tv series (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for example) and create a multi-media exploration of the role of mythology in the film and literature components of the fandom.

6) Examine a particular film franchise (Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter films) in terms of adaptation - the creative process that is literally the marriage of literature, writing and film - create a PowerPoint presentation.

7) Explore fan fiction - its impact on the writers and readers and how it expands on the initial work. (The legal implications of this seen in the recent JK Rowlings lawsuit could be an interesting angle as well...) Write a paper that utilizes research and interviews to present a sociological picture of fandom.

8) Write a series of short stories inspired by a world created by a film maker, such as the Matrix world.

9) Reflect on the influence of film and literature in the shaping of my own world view - create a multimedia presentation that includes images and reflective essays.

10) Create a college-level curriculum that incorporates any one (or more) of the above-ideas.

Hello,

Please allow me to start by apologizing for the frustration and disappointment that the last few days have caused.

Everyone here has taken this situation very seriously. The president and CEO of Blizzard Entertainment, Mike Morhaime, posted a message to all Blizzard gamers last night (8/13/08) in response to this issue. Here is that message in its entirety:

-----------------
Blizzard Gamers,

On behalf of everyone at Blizzard, I want to apologize for the challenges and frustrations you experienced while trying to purchase BlizzCon tickets on Monday and Tuesday. BlizzCon is about the positive experiences you all have had with Blizzard games. As a result of this week's events, the excitement that many of you felt about the show has turned into dissatisfaction and disappointment.

Due to these circumstances, we've reevaluated our convention hall space and come up with some solutions that will allow us to offer 3,000 more tickets for sale. We know this will not be enough to satisfy the very high level of demand for tickets this year, but we want to ensure that BlizzCon remains a great experience for those of you who are able to attend. To avoid the issues many of you faced this week, we'll be selling these 3,000 via a lottery. We'll post further details once our plans are finalized. Please note that the lottery will only be open to those with an active Blizzard Account as of 9:00 PM PDT on August 12, the time that the "Sold Out" notice was posted.

I, and everyone else at Blizzard, share the frustration and disappointment that many of you have expressed as a result of this process. We'll do what it takes to avoid this type of situation in the future.

Sincerely,
Mike Morhaime
-----------------

At this time we do not have any additional information on the lottery or how the signup for it will work. I encourage you to watch (www.worldofwarcraft.com) and the BlizzCon Forums (http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/board.html?forumId=9391140&sid=1) as details will be posted in both locations once they are available.

Thank you for sending us your concerns.

Regards,

Jim G.
BlizzCon Support
http://www.blizzard.com/blizzcon/

To Whom It May Concern (though it would appear that would be no one):

I am writing in protest of the handling of the BlizzCon sales. I'm quite sure I'm not the only one.

Here's my experience: Like most people who were interested in attending, I watched the forums to see what time the tickets would go on sale. At 8 AM PDT Monday morning, I was in front of my computer, trying to buy tickets for my husband and I. It was going to be our anniversary gift to ourselves after a rather rough year. The experience was a horrendous failure. Clearly Blizzard didn't effectively plan for nor provide resources for the sales event. To make it more confusing, Blizzard didn't communicate to potential attendees in a clear and forthright manner. Two members of my guild were able to purchase tickets over the phone though others, including myself, were told that wasn't possible. The site didn't function properly all day. I got to the point of confirmation numerous times, only to be looped back to the same page over and over.

I woke up yesterday morning thinking that I'd be able to purchase the tickets. There was a notice on the website indicating tickets would go on sale at noon PDT. I logged in at noon. The site was down. I logged in at 12:15. The site was down. At 12:30, the site was down. I took a 40 minute break for lunch. When I came back, the site was up. I placed my order, got to the point of confirmation, only to receive a notice that tickets were sold out. Alarmed and annoyed, I contacted the service line listed to confirm the tickets were indeed sold out. The Blizzard representative assured me that they were not, but again claimed to be unable to sell tickets over the phone. At about this same time, a guild member was purchasing his tickets - over the phone. I continued to try to access the site, and finally discovered a post on the forums indicating that they had indeed sold the bulk of the tickets after the late opening of the store and that some small additional amount would be made available at 8 PM PDT. Discouraged but not defeated, I waited faithfully, only to have a repeat of my earlier experience - tickets in the cart, order looped, finally a notice that tickets were sold out.

I am utterly disgusted with the way this was handled. The notification system was ludicrous. There was no consistency in the handling of phone sales, nor was there any system in place to record the phone calls of frustrated customers so that they could later be assured of receiving a ticket. Blizzard should have either contracted a vendor midday on Monday, when the website was clearly not going to be able to handle the traffic, or they should have created a lottery system so that people could have fairly been given a chance at tickets. As it is, tickets are already showing up on scalper websites for thousands of dollars and most people are not going to realize they can't even use these tickets because the credit card with which they were purchased must be presented at the convention. Blizzard has not looked out for the players at any point during this process - they were simply looking to maximize tickets sales. To suggest that buying the "privilege" of watching the event on tv is some kind of consolation prize is insulting. Conventions are successful because of the social aspect, not because of what's presented on a screen. Blizzard isn't getting a dime of my money.

I started my online gaming with GuildWars. I was won over to World of Warcraft because I found the game to be superior in design and in the social aspects. We stayed because we found a great guild - one which now has several disappointed members because their experience mirrored mine OR because they got tickets over the phone but will now be attending without their guildmates. This experience has left such a bad impression on me and my husband that we are quite seriously considering a return to GuildWars. Blizzard has done nothing to deserve our business, so we feel that perhaps the dollars spent on our three accounts would be better spent elsewhere. I hope that Blizzard learns from this experience and that next year's ticket sales are handled in a more equitable and technologically sound manner. You can bet that I will tell everyone I know about this experience so that they can avoid the frustration and anger I've dealt with over the past two days.

---

Naturally the support sites are down. I'm sending this via snail mail AND in an email. To quote my most excellent friend toasterstrumpet, I am thunder pissed. I wasn't just buying tickets for Jeff and me, I was hoping to take hewet_ka_ptah along as well.

Yes, good news for our state!

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2008/07/29/20080729biz-windpower0729.html

Check out this very cool survey at http://www.viasurvey.org - based on positive psychology. My top 10 strengths were as follows:

Your Top Strength: Creativity, ingenuity, and originality
Thinking of new ways to do things is a crucial part of who you are. You are never content with doing something the conventional way if a better way is possible.

Your Second Strength: Love of learning
You love learning new things, whether in a class or on your own. You have always loved school, reading, and museums-anywhere and everywhere there is an opportunity to learn.

Your Third Strength: Perspective (wisdom)
Although you may not think of yourself as wise, your friends hold this view of you. They value your perspective on matters and turn to you for advice. You have a way of looking at the world that makes sense to others and to yourself.

Your Fourth Strength: Appreciation of beauty and excellence
You notice and appreciate beauty, excellence, and/or skilled performance in all domains of life, from nature to art to mathematics to science to everyday experience.

Your Fifth Strength: Capacity to love and be loved
You value close relations with others, in particular those in which sharing and caring are reciprocated. The people to whom you feel most close are the same people who feel most close to you.

( more )

I hit 62 with Lil last night. It didn't take long and I did simply by killing boars (I needed the leather anyway) in Hellfire Peninsula. I'm hoping to have a bit more time tonight to do some quests... hopefully joined by javias and perhaps even hewet_ka_ptah.

Last night was subsumed by getting the house ready for Boo's return and a late celebratory dinner re: my admittance into grad school. Tonight, gaming and dying of the gray hairs. Hopefully, that's all.

javias doesn't have to work this weekend, so hopefully we can get more playing in, sandwiched between useful things, like, y'know, actually getting that bookshelf wall up that separates our bedroom from the rest of the house. And maybe moving the rest of my stuff over.

Your result for What Mage Are You?...

Sage

Take What Mage Are You? at HelloQuizzy

I've been officially admitted into the Master in Education program at ASU - I start in the Spring semester!

I can't even describe how it feels... I have butterflies (the good kind)!

I remember at one point in my blogging have a zillion filters for every different facet of my life and asking various people to opt in or out. Now I have a few topics I lock down to a few filters for privacy's sake... and you all get to read about World of Warcrack or my neurosis around writing or my love/hate relationship with the desert whether you like it or not!

Seriously, I wonder what my psyche was up to when it was trying to compartmentalize my life and then allow people to only partake in pieces of me?

After fabulous help from hewet_ka_ptah last night, I got Lilhuntress to a bar and a half from 62. But it was so late... I just couldn't bring myself to stay up past midnight just to push it. I did, however, pick up several quests in Zangarmarsh, so I guess that will be next. I will get Lil to level 70 by week's end. Oh yes.

And then I'll work on Laguerre, who current sits at 50. I wonder if I'll get lucky enough to find an icon that looks exactly like her, too?

I noted that we're middle-aged last night, what with being 70, 61 and 64, but it was too close to home to be funny. Heh.

ASU's Polytechnic campus is xeriscaped - it actually looks like desert out here. It's been a nice reminder of what I like about the desert - the smell of creosote and sage, the buzz of the cicadas during the humid monsoon and just now, I saw a roadrunner toodle by the door to my office. Now if it were only favorite time of the day - which is to say, the night - or my favorite time of year - yes, the two months of winter... though I'll take the humidity and thunderstorms over the baking hot "dry" heat of the rest of summer any day.

Hey, check out the latest diet craze:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/diet.fitness/07/18/weight.loss.sujit/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

Get this guys... he cut his calories and lost weight!! Wow! Who knew that would work?!

/sarcasm

Seriously, this cracks me up. When I lost weight last year by simply watching the amount of calories I was eating (and not obsessing about carbs or any other stupid fad) and exercising, people were disappointed I didn't have a magic bullet to give them. ::shakes head:: Really, sometimes the simplest solution IS the right one.

I need your help getting a new housemate for Deb so I can stop paying rent at two places! Please click the link below, download our flyer and distribute liberally! The sooner we can get someone in the better... Ideally I don't want to pay rent for August. :-)

Clicky!

Feel free to post anywhere you think we might find someone to take my room. Please leave a comment and let me know where you post so we can thank you when we find the right housemate!

Anyone out there who's done Nutrisystem? I'm wondering how the food tastes. It's appealing to have everything done EXCEPT eating - i.e. nutrition taken care of, meals planned, delivered to my door, etc., but it's all meaningless if it tastes like crap.

Boo (a.k.a. The Housemate) and I watched The Orphanage last night. In an interesting set of coincidences, I had read about a particular scene in this film early last week and put it in my queue at Netflix. That same day, I came home to find it sitting on the kitchen counter - Boo had picked it up at Blockbuster. The week was busy, busy so we didn't get to sit down to watch it till last night.

As Guillero del Toro's name is most prominent on the case, we both thought it was directed by him, so we were a little surprised at the look and feel of the film. Turns out it was produced by him, directed by Sergio G. Sanchez... and because of that, it was a quietly haunting ghost story rather than a brightly grotesque fantasy. The film was visually compelling, set in Spain in a gorgeous old Italianate house near the ocean. The horror was story-driven, rather than gore/scare driven, though there was one scene that made me jump. I appreciated the writing and the story's slow build to climax. The hall scene with Tomas is one of the creepiest I've seen, primarily due to the disturbing mask he's wearing. Michael/Jason et al wish they could be so unnerving.

What didn't work so well was the old cliche of the bereaved mother who sees things no one else sees, and so they think she's crazy and/or not dealing well with her grief. The ending, as well, was somewhat of an emotional "flinch" where the director and writer decided to give mom what she most wanted while simultaneously punishing her for being a "bad" mom - even though dad is notoriously absent from parenting duties. Also interesting was the presence of HIV in this film - seen only once and never spoken of, though its shadow was cast over the lives of everyone involved.

As I mentioned, there were some horror cliches in the film and some gaping plot holes - how did she come to live in the old orphanage, for one, and how could the terrible thing that happened there go unnoticed by the locals? Still, above all it was a creepy little old-style ghost story and that was a welcome change from the blood-and-gut-fests that pass for horror these days. If you're into old haunted houses, it's a visual treat at the least.

Most of you fellow Warcrack addicts have probably already seen this because you're far more net savvy than I, but in case you've missed it, check out The Guild on YouTube. If you've ever played WoW and been in a guild, you'll be amused, promise. You'll know the characters, albeit perhaps by different names...

from the lover-ly artemis112:

When you think of me, what music comes to mind?

Why?

I've been doing a lot of research on working out in water. I have a built-in pool. Sweating and being hot is a major deterrent for me in working out. I'm supposed to be working out at least four times a week as treatment for dysthymia, let alone as a way to get back in shape. The pool is a great solution. I like my workouts there. And what's better, according to just about everything I can read, working out in the pool can be just as intense as working out on land. In some ways, better. So I'm starting a regimen working out at home, supplemented by two weekly water aerobics workouts at the gym. My experience with water aerobics (which is admittedly QUITE dated) was that it was kinda lame. I'm hoping, based on what I've read, that they've made some serious strides in that regard.

Any pool workout folks out there?

My goal this summer is to get at least one essay or short story published. Most likely the essays... I think I've learned that therein lies my strength as a writer. I've taken two creative non-fiction/essay writing classes since January and I have plenty of material to submit.

I've been looking at essentially three options for grad school. The practical option is the Master of Education in Postsecondary/Higher Ed. That degree is only 30 hours (basically done in a year) and opens almost any door to me at the university, save those involving teaching. The second most practical option is a Master of Counseling, which would enable me to work as a counselor, either at the university or on my own. This is work I'd be good at, work I'd find fulfilling. But to get the degree I have to take the GRE ... and spend more time in school. The least practical option would be a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. This would probably most be useful in terms of teaching writing, publishing, editing, that sort of thing. This final option is the one that most wants me to be published.

At any rate, I have some decent resources, places to submit. At this point, I just want it published - don't care if I get any money. Since I'm taking two survey lit classes this session, I won't have time to write anything new, so I'll just be cleaning stuff up and sending it out. It's interesting how some want electronic submissions and others don't. I'll keep you all posted when/if something gets picked up!

If I hear one more very young and childless person say something about the habits of "today's parents," I will completely lose my shit.

When you are a parent -- and even then, I'd add that perhaps you need to be the parent of more than one child -- THEN you can gripe about parenting. Until then? Shut. Up.

Oh, I know, psychology says it's all about the parenting, blah blah, the experts say, yadda yadda, and so on and so forth. But until you've actually given birth and attempted to raise children in this world, you really have no idea what the hell you're nattering on about.

I certainly did my best parenting before I had kids. My second best parenting when I only had one child. It's easy when it's all about theory. The reality of parenting is it's damned hard, kids are very different and what works for one doesn't work for another. All I've learned over the years is that the experts speak in generalities and the best I can do is love my kids as individuals, give them some moral guidance and be interested in their lives. After that, it's a crap shoot.

Sheesh.