I wrote about the Halo 5 Guardians Beta Thing a couple weeks ago, and it's all still true. It may even be truer, now. There's some really neat new maps to look at, especially the ones that take place in some kind of simulated environment; it's similar to the vibe Titanfall was playing with in the DLC. Cool stuff. But at the end of these matches, for some reason, these war-hardened cyborgs get a little… whatever it is.

The Recommended System for The Witcher 3 is serious business, as you would expect; but even the minimum numbers resulted in a marked elevation of the left eyebrow. My home machine juuuust squeaks through. but I don't want to squeak through: I want to liquify this thing and DRINK IT.

I'm trying to get in the habit of drawing more often. This is an idea I had the other night and just had to draw. I really like the idea of the nimble acrobatic Hunter.

You used to have to be a real fucking nerd to be festooned in the kind of dorkery you see all over the place now. It wasn't that long ago that having an iPod was some kind of status marker, the headphones their distinctive shade of "Rob Me" white, and now I would probably say that such devices were - if not outright garbage - certainly approaching proto-filth status. If I saw a person with an iPod in one hand, I would assume sight unseen that they had some kind of obsidian hatchet in the other.

Is it? I don't know. Maybe? Sorry I'm still reading "Trust Me I'm Lying" and learning about creating viral headlines.

When you start something, you just hope it will make sense to other people. We have been lucky in this regard, I would say, and nowhere luckier than Child's Play.

I don't really have 5 facts. I'm just reading Trust me I'm Lying right now and trying to move my story "up the chain". I've only just started it but already I am equal parts terrified and intrigued. I thought I sort of new how shitty the blogosphere was but I apparently had no idea.

I'm trying to figure out which rituals are meaningful to me. I did not catalog the year on the site proper, though we did contribute to the aggregated lists of others. I've read a lot of lists that purport to describe the year, but are instead communiques from an alternate universe where Kentucky Route Zero did not win this year and also win permanently in every category. Or maybe I am the one in the alternate universe. Here, let me subtly adjust the atomic weight of hydrogen. Are you picking up on that? How's your hydrogen doing.

As picked by me.

I am especially bad at gifts.

Last year I celebrated New Year's Eve in the bathroom after an especially toxic meal at the Olive Garden. This year it seems I'll spend it in bed thanks to the super virus I've contracted. I went back to the doctor yesterday and this time got four different prescriptions. I took a handful of pills this morning and once this post is done I'll crawl back into bed.

In real life, it was not I but Kara who demanded that he keep the fires of Mt. Doom stoked. But I can be much, much meaner than she can in the strip. Thus was Grabble made to suffer twice.

My kids are always coming home with some exciting new virus they picked up on the playground. This particular one is a real treat that sent me to the emergency room because it felt like I was swallowing shards of glass. Thanks son!

I suggested how it should go in the third panel, but the things I quote in the second panel are what he actually said to give someone that impression.

The principle enunciated in the strip is true, I suspect, for many lives. The solution may be unique. And I don't know how effective such techniques are long-term; one imagines this might get very expensive. And even then, there's no guarantee of success. A man may leer over a Virgin Mai Tai just as easily as he may leer over a hot cocoa.

I hope that if you celebrate Christmas you had a good one. Santa dropped off some cool stuff at my house. I mentioned the Anki DRIVE race set before Christmas and now that we’ve had some time to play with it I can confirm it’s pretty rad.