Down With the Sickness, Episode 3: Road to Recovery

Man, this bug has completely and thoroughly kicked my butt this week...at the present, I sound like I've been smoking five packs a day for 40 years. I'm hoping that's temporary...my father has compared it to a broken stereo speaker, where the sound will pop in and out midstream. I will agree with this, as long as the speaker is also continuously coughing up some rather unpleasant looking stuff...I'm hoping that's also temporary.

The best thing about this is, I've at least been able to get some work done from home via VPN. The worst thing about this is, I haven't been able to make any progress on packing. I don't think I've mentioned it on here before, but I'm moving a week from Saturday to a new apartment. I suppose my one saving grace is that I don't have very much to pack in the first place, so I've got that going for me.

Luckily, I believe I'm making progress healthwise, and might be able to resume some life normalcy tomorrow. I'll never be so happy to return to work as I will be when I get back in from this crap...

I missed my "What I'm Playing" post for the week, so I'll just add it in here. I tried some Castlevania from XBLA, and it seems decent so far. Haven't really paid a lot of attention to it yet, but it should remain in the rotation until it gets beaten.

I've also downloaded the Oblivion expansion "Shivering Isles" and began that. In playing that initially, I've found out how much my playing style has changed since I started Oblivion last year. When I started out, I would try to find some way to keep from killing regular townspeople if it could be avoided. I would pretty much let the guards handle their business if I was ever attacked for something, and save my weapons for more meaningful pursuits.

However, now I find myself just offing denizens of the Isles with impunity. I've already completed three side quests which had me kill townsfolk "just because". One guy I pushed off the top of the palace while a guard stood 10 feet away. Another I murdered in silence whilst he prayed in the chapel. My gall knows no bounds.

Down With the Sickness, Episode 2: Revenge of the Sick

So, just when I thought last week was bad with the sore throat...boy, was I wrong.

It all started early Thursday morning, when I awoke with a pretty bad cough. I thought, "Crap, what an inconvenience." In fact, it was more...so much more.

I went in to work Thursday morning with the bad cough, thinking it was just a little bug I had probably picked up from one of my co-workers the day before. See, he had left early on Wednesday with a pretty bad cough. So, I spent the first hour of my work day coughing through a meeting. I was trying to make it through as long as I could, seeing as I had just missed the previous Friday with the throat problems I wrote about previously.

Turns out I was unable to make it through very long, as I left at noon. On getting home, I lay down for a bit...at least, as much as I could with all the coughing. I get up later that night, and find that I had a fever of 100.8. I am then faced with the decision of waiting it out and seeing if I get better with rest, and over the counter pills (stupid), or go to the doctor and get some good meds (smart). Well, seeing as I'm pretty stupid, I attempted to wait it out.

So, I wake up Friday morning, and my fever had gone below 100, which was good, but I still had that stupid cough, which at this point was causing my chest to ache. So, I call it a day and lay back down. I sleep off and on into the afternoon. When I get up, I find my fever has risen back up over 100, about to where it was the previous night. So, I lay back down after taking more Dayquil Cold & Flu (would have liked Nyquil, but didn't have it).

When I get up again, my fever is 102.8. At this point, I wise up and realize that I might need to get this checked out. So, my mother was nice enough to drive me up to the urgent care place in Fair Lakes. By the time I get there, my fever checks in at 102.4, and my pulse is racing. So, I get set up for some chest x-rays, to make sure it's not pneumonia or something equally as sinister.

Now, one of the x-rays required that I hold my arms over my head for a couple minutes while they get their equipment ready. Upon doing this, my body decides that it would very much like to pass out. How nice of it...So, the doctor and nurse give me some water and some ice packs for my head and chest. Turns out I was pretty badly dehydrated.

The x-rays came back clean, at least, so that's good. The doc then wants me to go to the laboratory at Inova Fair Oaks to get some flu tests done to make sure that's what I had. So, we head over to the hospital, and have to get registered before we can get the tests done. Unfortunately, the registration desk is closed (why would a registration desk at a hospital ever close?), so we have to go to the ER to get registered.

Apparently, there was a run on sick folks at that time, as the waiting room is full. Great...and what makes it even better is that I'm not actually an ER patient, so I get low priority over everyone else in the waiting room. Every time some new person came in, I get knocked down the list. In the end, we sit and wait there for about an hour. At least the TV was on the basketball games, so we got to see the end of the Georgetown game (that was a travel, BTW), and saw that the Gators won. Huzzah.

Anyway, I finally get registered and go to the laboratory to take my tests. Fun times. So, as we sit there awaiting some results or whatever, in case this night hadn't been surreal enough, this dude comes into the lab dressed as a penguin. Like, a huge penguin costume...I wish I had brought my phone with me so I could have taken a picture. Apparently, the guy is one of the technicians that works in the lab. I never did find out why he was dressed up like that, but whatever...

So, to make a long story short (too late!), my flu tests come back as negative, so it's determined that I have a bacterial infection (awesome!) and need to get on antibiotics. So, that's where I am now. On some powerful meds (which apparently don't put me to sleep though, which stinks) and trying to take it easy.

So, how are you?

Weekly: What Am I Playing?

As expected, this was a GRAW 2 kind of week. I was able to finish the single player campaign on 'Elevated Risk'. There's still one more level higher to finish the game at, so I may attempt that as well. My impressions:

Pros:
- Terrific visuals. A little more blurring then I would maybe like, but overall the game has a very good look to it.
- Nice action. Much like the first game, this time around there's plenty of firefights to get your teammates and yourself through.
- Blackhawk machine gun. This was my nemesis in the first game, as I would constantly be killed right as my gun started overheating. It was much easier going this time around.

Cons:
- Length. I actually said to myself "That's it?" when the credits started to roll. I guess I was surprised at the ease with which I was able to finish the final group of tasks. At least in the first game, the final boss had tons of baddies coming at me from all sides.
- Story. You'd think a Tom Clancy game would have a decent story, but alas, you'd be wrong.

I still have yet to try out the multiplayer, so I will post impressions of that whenever I get around to it.

I also played some Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles on XBLA. The game was just like I remembered it back from my arcade days. Only this time, there was no constant begging for quarters from the nearest passerby.

This week, the new game on XBLA is Castlevania, which should be very good. I will definitely be picking that up when it comes out Wednesday.

What are you playing? Let me know if there's some game out there that I'm totally missing out on.

Down With the Sickness

So, it seems I've come down with some funky, "scratch the hell out of your throat so it hurts to breathe" bug...good times. Just what I wanted to kick start a fun weekend.

This has at least given me a chance to catch up on GRAW 2, which I haven't had the chance to play much of this week. I'm not entirely sure how far into it I am, because I have yet to get the achievement for completing Act 2. If I really haven't, and the game isn't just screwing me out of this achievement, then this is the longest freakin' act in a game EVER.

Oh well...the new Maxim came in the mail today, so at least I have a new magazine to keep me company while I try to force down some more orange juice and chicken noodle soup.

Weekly: What Am I Playing?

Every Monday, I'll try to update what I've been playing over the last week on my (insert game system here).

This past week, I started off playing Crackdown on 360. It's a pretty nice game, if you're into being able to run around in a pretty open environment and kill people just because they're in your way. Is it a great game? No, but it's worth at least a rental. It also has with it an invitation to the Halo 3 beta testing, whenever that goes live.

I also played Worms on Xbox Live Arcade when it was released Wednesday. I never really got into Worms on the PC, as I was usually just into playing something else at the time. This is a pretty nice game, though, and the online multiplayer is fun. Costs $10, so if you're interested, be sure to try out the demo first.

Then, yesterday, I started playing Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 on the 360. So far, it's showing itself off as a must buy. If you liked the first GRAW last year, you'll like this one too. I definitely recommend it, and that's just based on the single player campaign. I have yet to try out the multiplayer component, but I hear it's supposed to be the best multiplayer on 360 yet. With as good as Rainbow Six Vegas multiplayer is, I'll be interested to play GRAW 2 online soon.

So, there we are...it's been a 360 kinda week. This week should have more GRAW 2 and a new entry, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, that will be released on XBLA this Wednesday.

R.I.P. Richard Jeni

Comedian Richard Jeni died of an apparently self-inflicted gunshot to the head today...I remember his comedy special 'Platypus Man' as being one of the funniest bits of stand-up I've seen. I have no idea why this pretty successful guy would want to kill himself, but that looks to be what has happened.

Richard Jeni: 1962-2007

3 straight!

Congrats to the boys of Florida, who just won their third straight SEC Tournament Championship. Now, it's time to turn the attention towards defending their National Championship, trying to become the first team in 15 years to do so.

Congrats also to Al Horford, who was named MVP of the tournament.

So, here I am...

Jaxjaggywires checking in...and no, that is not my real name. In this blog (theoretically) you'll be able to follow my various misadventures. I will (supposedly) chronicle my journey through days and whatnot. I may even post a picture for others to mock, which I know people tend to enjoy doing.

The more likely scenario is that I'll forget I have this blog altogether, and the posts will have about, oh, 6 months between them (give or take). In the event that I actually remember I have this blog, I will try to keep it as up-to-date as I can.

In closing, screw Flanders.