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I am so bad at finishing games. Allow me to outline a few of the ones I would most like to finish, why I want to revisit them, and explore a few reasons why I dropped them in the first place.

1. Ōkami:
I’m a little surprised that I haven’t revisited it in two years. It has a gorgeous, original aesthetic and character design, and I really got into the my role as a sun goddess in wolf form, saving the world from corruption manifested in the natural world. I’m easily seven hours into the game, and I think I’ve had a hard time getting back into it because the game mechanics, though very cool, are also so novel that you mostly forget how to play if you walk away from it for a while.

2. Katamari Forever:
Taking a strange turn in level progression in an already bizarre franchise, you play alternate levels for the comatose King of All Cosmos, and the robot King that’s running things in his place. This game is a shade easier than it’s immediate predecessor, and a certain hot/cold themed level comes to mind when I say that. I’m pretty sure I’ve got only a few more levels to play, but without a continuing story to drive progress, I don’t have much motivation to slog through more random levels unless I’m in a specific mood to roll a Katamari. I never dropped this game entirely, but I have been taking it at a glacial pace.

3. God of War:
This is an example of a game that I haven’t finished, even though nothing specific is holding me back. It’s not hard, the story is pretty good so far. Now I have two unplayed games in the franchise, a promise of epic closure, and all I have to do is pick up the controller and finish it. I guess I find the gameplay kind of repetitive, punctuated by occasional confusing and cheap death. The story will carry me through this time, all I need is the will to grind it out.

4. Fallout 3:
I’ve really taken to exploring the map, having all kinds of self-narrated adventures revolving around random encounters in the wasteland, making cool toys, and completely ignoring the main storyline. I like this character that I’ve cultivated without much help from the moral choice system, but I guess I will eventually have to depart from this surprisingly rich salvager’s game, and meet my destiny.

5. Harvest Moon: It’s a Wonderful Life
I tend to let games that give me administrative duties devolve into anal retentive spergfests. One day, I will get to a place where I can put the spreadsheets away and let the game take me through it’s charming pastoral fantasy-on-rails.

There has been a lot of moral and political uproar in my network over the Live Oak High School incident on Wednesday. While I chose to engage a few comment threads on the subject, I made an effort to argue only on the constitutionality of the school official’s decision to censor a few student’s symbolic speech.

I came up with some legal references to help clarify the motivations of the school authority. In U.S. courts, in loco parentis is a doctrine derived from English common law which in part deals with how schools function in the place of a student’s legal parents. To put it another way, the school authority takes on some of the traditional parental role, to act in the student’s interest while preserving their civil liberties.

But in loco parentis allows officials to play quite the tyrant towards students, particularly when order and discipline are substantially threatened. The Supreme Court has upheld invasive searches of lockers and personal property in New Jersey v. T.L.O and the suppression of some vocal, printed, and symbolic speech while acting “in the place of a parent” (Bethel v. Fraser, Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier, and Tinker v. Des Moines respectively).

It is important to note – the Supreme Court has repeatedly made clear that the constitutional rights of students, while in school or at school-hosted functions, are not automatically coexistent with the rights acknowledged for adults and juveniles in other settings. If that seems severe and draconian to you, I think you’re right.

However, a child would see parenthood at times to be nothing short of utter tyranny. When school authority tries to censure, it certainly impinges on the student’s preferences, but it is not always a constitutional violation. Under specific circumstances described in Tinker v. Des Moines, even silent symbolic speech is not protected by the First Amendment.

If you heard news that a good many students were sufficiently upset by the patriotic symbols to ditch school and directly petition City Hall, then you’d see the official’s situational assessment of “incendiary speech” was evidently accurate. Patriotism is emphatically not under attack at Live Oak, but the official likely sought to temporarily suppress the speech of a few students to halt a major disturbance, either present or imminent, in an environment where education trumps political discourse.

Americans seem to cherish speech protections more than anything else enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, and I’ve recently heard a lot of ardent opinions about censorship. I’m not interested in attacking anyone’s nationalistic sentiment; Personal values are the culmination of the individual life experience, and I simply can’t argue validity one way or the other. I offer only one criticism, but I need to first give a brief explanation:

My decision to research and focus my comments on constitutionality was largely guided by the many declarations of national pride and patriotism posted to one particular thread before I even opened the text window to respond. I wanted to bring a fresh perspective because there had been no mention of the Supreme Court rulings I cited earlier. In fact, there had been little else but opinions based on value judgements and the hearsay of the initial media coverage.

My criticism is for the people who call for lawsuits and administrative dismissal and seem to be entirely ignorant of the extensive jurisprudence over protected speech. I’m beginning to suspect that many people have the erroneous understanding that they can pull a copy of the Constitution out of their desk drawer and glean all there is to know about First Amendment rights.

I say to them directly: Patriotism constitutes more than passion.

I am aware that some of you have endured extraordinary sacrifice for the sake of our country’s security and way of life. Your selfless contribution is not in question, but I am not alone in the belief that the enfranchised are obligated to have at least a rudimentary command of how judicial doctrine relates to our civil liberties.

In the present era, it is easier than ever to access the resources necessary to inform yourself on the half-century of judicial review governing this particular incident at Live Oak. You can start with the hyperlinks I posted earlier in this note. Also, Stanley Fish recently wrote a good primer on the history of First Amendment theory and how it pertains to the controversial ruling on United States v. Stevens last month.

I look forward to engaging you all again as appreciably more empowered citizens.

I just worked out some fun figures to lend perspective to the amount of crude oil hemorrhaging into the Gulf of Mexico every day:

It’s the volume of 35 average bedrooms (100 sq ft) filled up to the ceiling.

If people could eat crude oil, the daily spillage could sustain Chicago.

The gasoline that could be yielded from the lost oil could top off the tanks of 3000 Hummers every day.

That’s enough fuel to drive that entire fleet of Hummers from Seattle to Niagara Falls over the course of a week.

Let’s stop calling it a “leak”, okay?

1. Mirror’s Edge:
This game is just hard. Worse, the difficulty has more to do with shoddy level design and serious compromise of the innovative free-flowing parkour experience the game sold itself on. I always hated how Fayth is constantly hounded by SWAT teams and snipers, especially since the combat system is so rough, and it’s often impossible to ignore them even as the game makes it clear that direct confrontation is an unhealthy option. As it was, I just got sick of not having fun. I left Fayth at the foot of the tower of the Big Bad with less than an hour of game left. Chances are excellent she’ll remain there indefinitely.

2. The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion
Epic, sprawling Cyrodiil has weak emersion, and the stretched execution of practically every aspect of the game frankly gets on my nerves. I won’t go into much detail here because internet game critics have picked Oblivion apart very ably elsewhere. I’ll just say that the broken leveling system was the last nail in the coffin for me. If you’re anything but a melee martialist, it seems you wake up as a 10th level adventurer made of wet paper maché. Every.fucking.time. The story isn’t going to see me though this either, because it’s the same bland child of destiny plot hook that’s designed to fit your character’s exploits no matter what kind of person you character is. So, I’m really not interested in how this game ends.

I love summer.

I love summer fruit at the peak of flavor, which I purchase to be eaten by next breakfast. I love sailing on my bicycle through the heady aromas and seductive botanical pageantry along mountain roads.

I do not, absolutely do not love summer crowds.

The malls and markets of summer are flush with day shoppers, students, and tourists. People generally move in crowded places with oblivion and clumsiness, like blind cattle. Amid the chaos, I get anxious, annoyed, and soon feel exasperated and bitchy.

A few things I’d like to see more people doing in a crowd:

1) Carrying their belongings in such a way that makes their personal sphere well, not so spherical.

2) Travelling generally on the right of a path, with the swifter walkers a little further to the left.

3) Moving in such a manner that allows others to anticipate their actions, neither darting anywhere suddenly, stopping abruptly, nor weaving side to side.

4) Generally paying attention to what other people are doing. This may not only help clear up clogged areas, but also protect them from pickpockets.

I think maybe we’ve been a car culture too long to have much common sense about this issue. But as our country graduates more architects and civic designers interested in creating attractive public spaces, this apparent lack of crowd sense is something that I’d like to see addressed more often.

This curry employs the typical technique and ingredients for Thai curry, except you should roast the squash first. You can do the roasting step days in advance.

Supplies and Equipment:

Optional :

Roasting the Squash:

The Curry

Into the Pan!

I’ve become a fan of this geek rocker who writes really wacky songs. Here is a top ten of my favorites.

10. Better: A man is falling out of love with his girlfriend who is addicted to cybernetic augmentations.

9. Tom Cruise Crazy: Tom Cruise is probably the only man on earth who couldn’t enjoy Tom Cruise.

8. First of May: Celebrate the coming of spring with joyful, indiscriminate outdoor sex.

7. Your Brains: Tom has fortified himself inside the mall against a zombie invasion. His zombified coworker, who probably was a particularly annoying power suit in life, opens one-sided parlay on behalf of the grey matter hungry masses.

6. Mandelbrot Set: The fun and magic – of fractals! A heroic ode to Benoit Mandelbrot.

5. Chiron Beta Prime: The irrepressibly cheerful Anderson family sends holiday greeting from their slave colony run by evil robots.

4. Mister Fancy Pants: “Say a little prayer for Mr. Fancy Pants. The whole world knows it’s only clothes. Deep in side, he’s sad.”

3. Skullcrusher Mountain: The clumsy flailing of a mad scientist in love.

2. I Feel Fantastic: The tragically funny inner dialogue of an acute pill-popper.

1: I’m Your Moon: Pluto isn’t a planet anymore, but Charon will always be there for him. An astonishingly poignant song of unconditional love.

I beat my normal ride time to the station by ten minutes, whoo!

Sure I used the fancy bike, clipless pedals, reduced gear, and a broad interpretation of traffic signs. But gosh darn it, I smashed the hell out of my record this morning and I am just glowing with self-congratulation. Pat, pat.

American culture got hooked on the private auto because it meant a greater measure of freedom. One could go wherever roads are – on his own terms, at his own pace, limited only by the constraints of time and budget that were not so intensely impacted among the expanding middle class.

Autos for a time did not just symbolize freedom in use, but also in upkeep. Fuel was cheap, but the cars themselves were also mechanically simple. With a modern car, all but the most simple maintenance tasks are inaccessible to a home mechanic. Before the 1980s, an enterprising youngster could build his first car.

When cars later became accessible to teenagers, freedom took an extended interpretation, as the car represented refuge from their parent’s house. Since I came of age to drive, my parents continually pushed me to learn. They even pledged to buy the car, which was generous of them. I believe they saw my ownership of a car as a means of escape in a town I found smotheringly dull.

But I never liked cars. I’ve always looked at them like a sickly, troublesome pet – more trouble than it’s worth. I knew that if I had a car, I’d have to hold down a job to support it. I was way too much of a band geek to give up an hour of my spare time. Driving a four-seat car always felt like I was taking more space than I felt entitled to. It doesn’t help that I’ve always been a lousy driver.

I’m observing that private autos have been steadily falling out of use in American society. They are becoming unsustainably high-maintanence for lots of people. More trouble than they’re worth. Where cars were once associated with freedom, they are now more commonly a stone around the owner’s neck.

I prefer bicycles because of the open, non-invasive interface with the environment. The area extends evenly fore and aft, and I know exactly where I begin and end. It’s so much harder to get that sense of boundary when operating a vehicle that is largely empty space.

I’ve also enjoyed how bicycles are much easier to maintain. All the moving parts are out there in the open, obvious and self-evident. One does need special tools for some jobs, but these are much more accessible than the diagnostic computers needed to service modern cars. Fortunately, the special tools do not need to be called upon often, as long as one keeps diligent about the basic maintenance.

I don’t own a car anymore, nor do I miss it. I use a combination of bicycle, train, bus, taxi, and rideshare to get around. Some people have described my commute as epic, but I don’t find anything heroic about it. I see hundreds of workers making a similar journey every day. It’s just the direction society is going now.

I make curry quite a lot, because it’s fast, flexible, tasty. Until today, I have relied upon prepared sauce concentrate to make it. It’s cheap and convenient, but every dish tastes the same, give or take a certain degree of intensity.

Curry paste is not complex – blend some ground spices into a pool of chili oil. My boyfriend had gifted me some spice powder, so I thought I’d try to make curry from scratch.

I wasn’t particular about authenticity, but I wanted the curry to feature my favorite flavors. I chopped a handful of fresh ginger and garlic, and plucked a handful of fresh basil leaves. The spice melange composed mostly of cumin, coriander, cardamom, and chili flakes.

These things should blend in chili oil to make a thick paste, which you dilute with water to simmer bite-sized food chunks. I selected firm tofu for it’s neutral flavor, because I really wanted to see how my sauce would hold up on its own.

I had some issues with proportion of paste. At first, I added way too much to the simmering pot, and the texture was unpalatably gritty. I had to act fast, ladling out bubbling curry water while adding clean water. As a rule, I think three tablespoons of paste is appropriate for two capsicum-dependent diners.

I should note that the amount of water needs not be an exact and arbitrary volume. The role of the water is to regulate the cooking temperature and hydrate the spices to avoid burning. Most of the water eventually cooks out.

The last step involved what I call an “unctuous fluid”, usually yogurt, coconut milk, tomato sauce, cream, or peanut butter. The unctuous fluid brings a pleasant texture to the party, and helps the spices cling to the food.

When it comes to unctuous fluids, feel free to mix them. For example, my tofu curry was mostly coconut milk, but I found the taste to be lacking. Despite the ample spice, the underlying flavor was flat. I added a couple ounces of tomato sauce, knowing it’s acidic fruitiness loves the basil. The overall dish instantly snapped to life with full-bodied goodness. Always follow your hunches – just keep a fire extinguisher and your favorite takeout number ready.

Curry is usually accompanied by grain. I like classic Indian staples, like long-grained rice and flat bread, but there are more interesting companions, like quinoa and udon noodles. I am a big fan of curry sandwiches.