It’s been a while, yeah?

Long story short, I’ve spent the last 3-4 months (when did I even post last?) slaving away at Robot Bomb, before falling into an inevitable pitfall: boredom. It’s a personal failing, but the truth of the matter is that I’ve got a short attention span, and tend to get tired of things quite easily. Case in point, attempting to run a multi-writer website with long-term goals probably wasn’t the best idea I’ve ever had.

*Shrug*

Life goes on, right? Something like that. Anyway, I ought to be writing here on a semi-regular basis again, though I’d still like to move to independent hosting at some point. The brief flurry of insanity that was Robot Bomb going live will probably make for good training when that happens. Until then, I’ll be making every effort to soldier on over here.

CoD Modern Warfare 2: I’ll pass, thanks

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 came out today. Hordes of fans stampeded stores at midnight, grabbed their own copy, and ran home to play the damn thing. Gamers have proclaimed it their favorite shooter ever, a generic shooter, an excellent story, and a practically non-existent one. Worldwide, it’s retailing for more than most AAA games do. From the US to the UK to Australia and everywhere in between, gamers are grumbling and kicking and generally raising hell. Right before, you know, they eagerly swipe their credit cards at the checkout line.

Me? I haven’t bought it.

Episode 5283: In which I adopt one child, but neglect the other

 

Robot Bomb!

In my desire to make sure Robot Bomb become something worthwhile, I’ve fallen into the habit of ignoring most all else, most directly evidenced in my lack of posting here on T+L, or on TouchGen, or on Indie Clauses, or on Blogcritics (save for that 3-part train wreck in which I offended fans of various bands by not loving the groups as much as they themselves do). My other big writing project right now, my first attempt at a novel, has temporarily been placed in second-class status – frankly, I only work on it two or three times per week, and only right before the deadline each Wednesday (or directly after, when I don’t finish in time).

 

Though my actions haven’t shown it of late, I have no intention of letting this blog end or fade away. Most of the reviews I write from here on out will appear on Robot Bomb, but all other content should continue to be posted here. The plan, eventually, is to move T+L to independent hosting, though I’ve yet to settle on and purchase a domain.

The main point of this post, though, is more to inform the teeming masses of Robot Bomb, not blather on about T+L. So, with that in mind…

 

Robot Bomb.

FAIL WHALE

I just got my first failwhale! Now I feel like a true Twitter user 🙂

An Update, A Date-up, A Cop-out

Life: it’s a bit ridiculous. I’m busy as anything, and this blog has suffered as a result. Rest assured that my time has not been spent in vain; I’ve been a busy little bugger.

Here’s what’s up: I’ve been writing a novel, for starters, and I’m an estimated 15% done. That might seem a little exacting, but I’m estimating the total at 70,000 words based on what I’ve plotted out and how much I’ve written as of yet. As much as I love it, finding a regular time to work on it has been… difficult.

I’m putting a lot of time into making sure Robot Bomb ends up something slightly better than still-born. My original goal was for it to go live on October 9, but that’s looking nearly impossible without cutting a lot of corners. In an effort to make it more solid, the deadline has been changed to a decidedly more nebulous October 2009. Hopefully it won’t be more than a week or two late, but I’m not holding my breath.

In slightly better RB news, there’s a good chance we’ll have some actual semi-pro video types helping out with our periodic video shoots. I’m not entirely sure how soon I can get them in on the process, but it might be as early as this week. If that’s the case, it’ll be a huge load off the rest of us. Finally, we’re revamping the structure a little bit so that it’s divided into more manageable chunks. Basically, that means I’ll be doing a little less editing and a little more shameless whoring and promoting of the website, getting referral accounts set up, sucking up to PR reps, and all that jazz. Instead of me editing and approving everything that gets posted, I’ll have four section editors that will be in charge of the individual areas of coverage. I haven’t yet informed those folks of my intentions for them (shhh, don’t tell).

Additionally, I’ve still got that pesky business known as college. When random school diversions get mixed in, it makes keeping this up nearly impossible. As a matter of fact, even this post is getting squeezed in at the Houston airport, simply because I’m tired of writing reviews of music and books, and I wanted a change of pace (ironically enough, that means going from writing for Robot Bomb and Indie Clauses to writing for T+L).

I hate to make every post on here an update on how other things are going, but that’s what it’ll have to boil down to for at least a few weeks.

Upcoming content will consist entirely of Austin City Limits Music Festival coverage, by the way. It’s this next weekend, Oct 2-4, and I couldn’t be more excited to be writing about it for Blogcritics. Everything written for it will be re-posted here as a poor excuse for content. Forgive me that laziness, but all my extra writing time is occupied with the novel and building up content for Robot Bomb.

Until next time, I leave you with a thought: if a college-age girl wears a North Face jacket despite the fact that it’s 92 degrees outside, does that absolutely, definitely make her a sorority girl, or could she merely be silly? Discuss amongst yourselves.

Austin City Limits: The Movie

Nah, not really. There’s absolutely no movie. Actually, this is a semi-post, semi-announcement, semi-plead-for-input sort of a beast. Here’s what it all boils down to:

I’ve managed to score a press pass for the Austin City Limits Music Festival, courtesy of Blogcritics. This means several things. First of all, it means I’m going to ACL for the second time in as many years, and without having payed for either experience. That’s pretty awesome in and of itself. It also means I can sell my two day passes I’d previously acquired. No, I’m doing any scalping – my friend Nick is picking them up at cost, theoretically in exchange for allowing me to crash at his apartment in Austin.

With regard to all of you internet-people: no, this isn’t a meaningless gloat (though that would be horrifically annoying, huh?). This is where the announcement bit comes in: I’ll be working with the wonderful editors over at Blogcritics to produce a three-part series covering ACL, hopefully published at the end of each day of ACL (Friday-Sunday, October 2-4). Additionally, I’ll be tweeting the whole business, which you’ll be able to follow here. Finally, I’m trying to arrange an interview with Suckers, an indie-rock outfit from Brooklyn, New York. That’ll go up on Independent Clauses, which I’ve mentioned so many times previously that if you haven’t checked it out already, there’s probably something wrong with you.

See all that? I’m earning my keep with this press pass. Don’t think I’m not!

Finally, there’s this: I don’t know all of the bands that are playing. Sure, there’s a list I can look over, and a handy schedule with which to figure out where I should be at any given time, but there are over 100 bands that will be performing over three days. Frankly, I haven’t heard of half of them, and I don’t want to miss any wonderful indie-gems just because I don’t know how awesome they are. Check out my planned schedule below, and if you think I should make any changes, don’t hesitate to let me know!

Friday, October 2nd

Saturday, October 3rd

Sunday, October 4th

In Interim

I’m home. As in really, truly, home. It feels strange, but oh so good – like returning to some really comfortable clothes after not wearing them for a while. Yeah, that’s nice.

China was cool, don’t get me wrong, but half of my time there was spent learning to make do with inferior products and amenities. Music? All through the speakers on my MacBook. Don’t get me wrong, they’re actually pretty decent as far as laptop speakers go, but woefully inadequate compared to my surround sound setup (which in truth isn’t even that great, but compared to a laptop? Auditory nirvana).

Also, my 24″ monitor looks positively gargantuan against the 13″ laptop screen. Believe it or not, there were several times in China when I started thinking that my laptop’s screen was nice and big. ‘Cause, you know, who needs more than thirteen inches? On that note, I’ve had my bigger monitor connected to my laptop for ten or fifteen minutes, and only just now did I think to actually take advantage of all that space and move a window over. That makes me feel silly.

I Am A Horrible, Horrible (Internet) Person

It’s been a while, huh? It’ll be a while longer, too. CBF posting anything for a bit. Hang in there, internet kids. T+L will be back up and running shortly, albeit in a modified form.

And then there will be cake.

My iPod Is On Life Support

White Screen Coma

My iPod is currently in the gadget version of an intensive care unit. It’s near death, and I’ve got absolutely no idea what caused it. Everything is playing out like an episode of House, where every treatment come up with by the doctor (ahem, yours truly) only makes things worse. This is no fun.

I use my iPod on a daily basis. I need to walk somewhere? Bam, in go the earphones. I’m driving somewhere? Bam, my iPod gets plugged in, the tunes blast, and away we go. I’m studying and using my laptop would be too distracting? Out comes the iPod, in go the earphones, and Ratatat or Architecture in Helsinki or Norma Jean serenade me. Beyond the basic function of listening to music, I use my beloved iPod Touch (which is named Lisa, by the way) to play games, check email, and scratch out notes for writing ideas. It’s absolutely essential to my always-on lifestyle. Only now I can’t do any of that.

Ever so briefly, I considered turning this into some sort of admission to being too dependent on electronics, that everyone voluntarily cuts themselves off from the world with them, that we need to lose the gadgets every now and again and just appreciate life.

Screw that.

Access Denied.

I officially declare myself on sabbatical until, say, July 9th (or maybe the 10th). There will still be a Weekly Shenanigans going up on Sunday, but that’s only because I just wrote and scheduled the wretched thing.

I’ve got finals to focus on at my Chinese university. Maddeningly, while the professors were perfectly willing to tell us what to study for the midterms, every single one of them has told us that the content of the finals are a secret. It looks like I’m actually going to have to study. Curses.

On a side note, I would like to express a rather strong dislike for receiving text messages from China Mobile on consecutive days, each cheerfully informing me that they’ve removed money from my account when in fact I haven’t even bothered using my phone in three or four days. Taking money from me two days in a row for unknown reasons is not cool, China Mobile. I don’t like you very much.