Go to the Up

I had my golden 25th birthday a few days ago. As usual nothing changed much.
My friends BD is the day before mine, so we went bowling, had a good party and a good time. The BD boys went through a mini keg of Heinekens.

There are a few, shall I say unruly, people in my Japanese class. They constantly talk about crap during class making it hard to hear and concentrate. I don't get these youngsters. I can say that now cause I am 25. :) They pay good money to take a Japanese class, but they don't seem to put any effort into actually learning it. There are a few exceptions of course, but they are all much older than the young ones. I just don't understand some people.
There is two especially disruptive people. One which constantly interrupts with questions that the teacher has answered three times already. He continuously asks the same question over and over again and just does not seem to get it. I am pretty sure that he has some sort of mental disability, but it is still disruptive to the class. The other person is more obnoxious. He always butts in when someone is asking a question and sensei is attempting to answer it. I know that sensei sometimes struggles with conveying the meaning and answering the question, but this guy just is so brazen and crass when he interupts her . The worst thing is that he is not really that reliable with his answers that he gives. He is one of those know it all types that acts like they do, but is unable to deliver.

On the plus side I am learning Japanese! There are a few people who are in the class to actually learn Japanese for real. One is actually planning a trip to Japan fairly soon and he has been there before. The other is going to be moving to the Naval base not far from Tokyo, so he wants a nice jump start to learning the language.

I have been spending too much time playing video games and not doing my studying. I have barely read any of my Business Law, so I am like 3 chapters behind. I have a test coming up this weekend. My Comp class tonight I have not read any of the chapters for. I got a test tonight too, but it should be super easy. Japanese class is at the point where I am really learning new stuff that I have not gone over repeatedly on my own. However I still need a lot more practice.

Here is a completely random selection of thoughts.
Lately I have not had much to do at work so I end up reading random things on websites. The trouble is that I am running out of ideas for things to google.

I found a new sushi and bar place that opened up just a couple of blocks from the college. I am going to try and stop by soon and see if it is any good. I like Hiyashi, but they don't have a very wide selection of food, plus it is a little on the pricey side. I don't really expect to find a Japanese restaurant that is not a bit on the pricey side though. Maybe I can invite some people in my Japanese class to come with me and maybe get to know them a little bit. Most of them seem like they are fresh out of high school. They seem so young to me. I must be getting old, ugh.

I am growing my hair long now. It is at the shaggy length. The back near the neck is already starting to do its curl into coils thing. I have though a little about slightly dying my hair to maybe a bit of reddish brown color. I have also been thinking about shaving off the beard. I don't really like shaving though and don't know how long I could go with keeping a clean shaven face.

I love the game Okami for the PS2. It is a wonderfully colorful and easy to play game that is a joy to wander around and look at the scenery in. It is using up all my studying time.

I seem to be doing well above average in my Japanese class. I am trying to not let it go to my head, there is still so much that I don't know or understand.

I found the site talking about a real neat sounding strategy wargame boardgame called BattleLore. http://blog.battlelore.com/en/
I would like to start playing board games more frequently.

I found myself doing searches about social anxiety. I am not entirely sure what prompted my to look for it. I think I will take a look at my insurance and see what they cover for therapy. I think that I could really benefit from it and it couldn't hurt to see if my insurance would cover it.

I have gotten back to doing yoga. It feels great to be able to stretch out and release all the built up tension. I don't know if it is true or not, but I feel like my legs are getting more definition especially in the front upper thigh area. I have really been working on stretching out my legs and groin area.

Lately I have grown somewhat tired of playing D&D. On the other hand I would love to play a game of Mutants and Masterminds, but I am not sure if I could keep a M&M game running for long. I fear that my knowledge and creativity for superhero themes would soon run dry and the game would quickly fall apart. With little modules to rely on it would be up to me to create everything.

I wonder if it is the method in which we have been playing D&D that is what I am tired of. We are a pretty much wargame oriented group. We don't do much in the way of character development and such. Probably because we have been running the Adventure Paths from Dungeon. The APs are great games, but I think that as a DM running them they tend to turn off the creativity and just let the module do its thing. That is why they got the module isn't it, to do the work of providing the adventure for them. I agree with that, but at the same time you lose out on the customization and personalization that occurs when the DM creates a game with the players and characters in mind.

I think that maybe a change in genre can enable us to get out of the roll playing rut and into more dynamic role playing and character oriented games. The problem is that I am too lazy to actually do anything about this.

Two good friends of mine are shipping out in the next two months. I don't know what I am going to do without them. Most of my socializing (can I even call it that?) is done with them and I fear that I am going to end up withdrawing into my shell even more when they are gone. It would certainly be a lot easier than obtaining a new group of friends.

As for meeting new people, I have dabbled a little with online sites to meet people, especially those of the opposite sex. Most of the postings are not that interesting honestly, but what can you really tell from a couple of paragraphs? However, this one really stood out to me. I am not a paying member of the online site yet, but I sent one of those I liked your profile kinda things. I think I really wanted her to respond in some way. It is strange how disappointed one can get from something so small and not even important. Anyway, I think I will try and get a decent photo of me and put it up on the site. Maybe I will try and send a more direct message to her. Advice for the clueless anyone? It is so strange to feel this way about a person I have not even seen with my own eyes or even talk to. But the small description just kinda caught my eye.

Any way enough rambling for now. Gosh, how many topics and off topic things did I puke up into this post. Well, Jaa ne.

My classes are going fine. I was needlessly worried about my Business Law class. The professor basically said if you do the work you will get an A. I am so far cruising along in Japanese based on what I had self learned online, but being able to use it a bit more has helped greatly. I do need to focus more on learning the vocabulary. Maybe I should make flash cards with the hiragana and the english on the back and learn them that way.
Taking three classes does eat up most of my free time and I have been slacking off doing my exercise. I really want to keep up with doing the yoga. You can already see the difference it has made.
Apart from that nothing interesting has come up lately. I will be 25 in just under 2 weeks. I am both looking forward to that and also not. In a way it reminds me that I have many years ahead of me to do whatever I want with, on the other hand part of me is chiming in saying that I won't really ever do any of those things. It is slightly depressing to realize that I have been listening to that voice. I want to ignore it, but any argument or excuse that I come up with it has a rebuttal for. How do you win an arguement with your own mind?

I found an interesting site Meetup.com that lists groups that get together periodically to enjoy different things and meet with people. There are several groups that would interest me, but right now I am making excuses to myself why I am not joining any of them. The excuses suck and are lame so maybe today I will work up the courage to join a group or two and go from there. I know that there is no obligation to actually attend any of the get togethers, but that does not stop my irrational fear. Curse you fear, I will overcome you soon!