Just a quick word: my computer crashes seven times a day, and I've grown really sick of not being able to use the internet. So today I went out and bought a PS3 keypad to get my proper surf on and so far love it. I know I could've bought a USB keyboard, but having a keyboard on my lap would be much more annoying than this, and the old way of pressing X four times for one letter makes message board posting near-impossible. For the time being I don't even need a PC, and I'm so glad the PS3 has a web browser. You never think you need it, but having it is a life-saver.

I like money, I like having it and I hate wasting it, as I have done all too often since opening an eBay account. Since finally joining the now-gen I'd figured I'd be buying more games, but I knew my wallet couldn't take it so renting was the real choice. And hearing so many good things about GameFly (mostly from X360 achievement whores) I decided to try it for myself, save one problem: GameFly is continental U.S. only. Before I really startikng digging around, I found GameAccess.ca completely by accident and immediately filled my queue with games I know I'd buy if I was a little less frugal. (Seriously, I spent almost what my PS3 and games cost on eBay crap last year. I really needed to reel it in.) First arrival was Dead Space, and playing the first two chapters and jumping out of my chair yelling when my cat nuzzled my leg was enough to convince me to buy it outright. Despite what some pessimistic Aussie might say, Dead Space was really fun, scary as f&(% and a game I'm glad I bought. Two games (Call of Duty 5 and Prince of Persia) later, I declare the experiment a success.

Not that it's been flawless. I want to rent some things because buying them outright would be stupid, like Guitar Hero Smash Hits. I've made good buys in Orange Box and inFamous, but I abolutely refused to even look at GHSH prices online. However, when I found myself in a Videotron/Microplay searching for a used copy of Burnout Paradise, I saw SH on the shelf and gave in. The guy working that day turned out to be a friend I had not seen in months and months, and we must've talked for almost an hour when he wasn't serving other customers. I tried resisted that purple box's siren call, but GameAccess had no copies and I knew there wouldn't be many people playing it online by the time I received it. I became extremely pissed later when I discovered that my Rock Band drums don't work with it. They work with World Tour and Metallica, so why not Smash Hits? What The F**K Activision? But I digress.

(EDIT 7/14/2009: My RB1 drums DO work. I realized the problem: when I tried them the first time, the drums were automatically assigned to slot 7 on the PS3. Why do all my music game peripherals get assigned to 7 when pretty much every game only recognize up to slot 4? Geez. Well, at least I didn't go out and buy GHWT drums only to discover this afterward, huh?)

I've sadly also become a trophy whore. I don't have any platinums yet, but I actually seek out games that have easy trophy accomplishments and look up how to get simple or obscure ones, going so far as to reset Prince of Persia a couple dozen times to ensure I got the Speed Demon and No Time to Waste trophies. But I'm not a complete slave to "the system": I can't push myself beyond what I'm capable of and I know it. For example, World at War has numerous (bronze) trophies for finishing each mission on Veteran (expert) difficulty, and the only reason I ever played Veteran was to get the Purple Heart trophy, which is essentially the 'die 20 times without quitting' award. That's also the biggest reason I caved to GHSH: easy trophies for winning online matches, but not close to worth the $60 I paid. Why didn't I just go back to RE5? I dunno.

GameAccess has one quirk that so far has bugged me: the game they send is practically random. They have you set up a ranked list, the ranking being the game you'd prefer to receive next. My first rental was Dead Space, and it was #1 at the time, as was Call of Duty, but the next game after WaW I was sent was Prince of Persia, which I think had been at #6. Two weeks and some $10 DLC later I've decided that getting sent PoP wasn't so bad, but now I've been sent Far Cry 2, which was #7 out of 11! There was some malarky on their front sign-in page about the 'Game Reserve' feature 'increasing your odds,' and maybe an extra $2 a month wouldn't be so bad, but on top of the $17.95 per month and the $4 for the "Fast Return" feature I feel slightly like I'm being milked here, which is ironic because the entire reason I rent is so I don't have to be milked at retail if I wanna play ten game this summer instead of two. But why bother having rankings if I have to shell out an extra two bucks to ensure that the game in my #1 slot is the game I receive? Maybe I'll be singing a different tune if Far Cry 2 turns out good, but if the game after that isn't Ghostbusters or Terminator Salvation (nothing but Gold trophies in the latter) I'll be making an angry phone call or two.

And that's how you all know I'm still alive. (...Aperture Science, we do what we must because we can...)

No updates for months at a time? Makes sense, considering my emotional state, school workload and the fact that I had nothing to say about games I had no chance of playing or owning. Well, that era is over and I have officially joined the current gen:

The Playstation 3 is finally mine, the most expensive birthday present I've ever received, but the game library will have to come slowly. I'd forgotten just how bloody expensive games are! I suppose rental is the way to go, but knowing me I'll be blowing a lot of money on Rock Band DLC in the coming weeks when I'm not playing RE5 or the soon-to-be-acquired MGS4. I have other games in mind: Dead Space, CoD4, Fallout 3, NHL 09, and who knows what else. I also wish I'd bought that $15 copy of The Orange Box I saw earlier, but I didn't have my $20 gift card on me. I hope it's still there next week.

PSN ID (add me): T-Prime85

Today 1UP.com was sold to UGO by Ziff Davis and all signs point to it being an empty shell of its former self. Most of my favourite 1UP personalities were let go and it looks like all of the podcasts are dead in the water, something that I have a hard time with. 1UP Yours was the bedrock of my Friday nights for almost three years and now it's gone, which is doubly painful when I realize how ironic the last show was, looking forward to 2009, promising to be back and Shane proclaiming an "epic" show for CES. No more Shane, Skip, Ryan, Milky, Philip, Chuff, Fitch and everyone else...I know they're just voices on the internet that have never actually been next to me, but I loved those guys. Sam Kennedy is trying to put a brave face on it, but really, it's no more. EGM has been disconnected from the life-support it's been on for some time, but how do they think they're "going to continue to work [their] hardest to make 1UP the best site it can be and to produce the very best content [they] can" without any audio or video shows? I could really care less about the business side of it all, and I somewhat understand the need to trim the fat in some areas, but to gut the best staff and destroy the only things that made the site worthwhile? Shame on you, UGO. Shame on you as well, Ziff-Davis.

R.I.P. 1UP.com.

This isn't exactly a "been gone for two months" blog: I hope to do one soon enough, because plenty has happened in that intervening period. No, today I will share some very recent heartache, some that I hope by sharing will lift me just a little. Where to start? At the beginning, I suppose.

There's a girl I've worked with for a year and a half and had a crush on forever, but because I don't have a spine or a stomach I never asked her out. We made out once at a Christmas party (we were both tipsy, but not drunk) and I told her somewhat how I felt, but neither of us ever followed up. She'd just ended a long-term relationship and I'm a long-time loner, so nothing was gonna happen. In the last couple of months (coinciding perfectly with my dead blogging habits, now that I think about it) I've seen her more, be it on the way to school, more shifts at work together, and random run-ins. I even asked for her help with a class she'd gotten A+ in last year, but when I say I have no spine, I mean it: just knowing she had no boyfriend made me stutter around her. I exude confidence and am always "on my game" if I know a girl is taken, so the fact that I could have a simple conversation with her without feeling like a complete idiot is a big deal to me. (An aside: I've gotten all my 'firsts:' flirting, kiss, sex, dirty phone calls, etc. Thing is, in that case it was her who did all the work, and I just went along with it. It worked out fine while it lasted, so I'm not speaking as a total rookie here). Thing is, when we're working together I feel nothing but platonic towards her: she's very pretty, has great hair and a killer butt, but I feel nothing more in those three to five hours. However, moments after departing work, all my thoughts turn to her. They're envious and jealous feelings, and I've known for a long time that I was out of the running. Since she so easily had to go get birth-control pills when we were hanging out one time, and "What if I meet someone tomorrow?" was her response when I asked her if she had to do it 'now,' I took the hint. I tried to distance myself by not walking her partway home after work, but even then she was still officially single. Well, now that's over.

The first hint I got was when I saw her Facebook status updated several days ago as "X is finally happy," which made my stomach turn, and throughout tonight she was constantly on her cellphone, talking in a tender, whispering voice. My boss said to her that he's "happy for her," and just an hour ago I saw that she'd changed her Facebook profle picture and relationship status after both have been stagnant for over a year, which is always a sign of things. The worst part, I feel, is that she looked right through me. I know, I know, I should've been more assertive, but I'm not a big party guy and I guess I'm wired wrong or something, due to TV and my previous relationships. Still, she rejects me and starts doing the freaknasty with some motherf***er she's known a month and gets wasted with in some shed until dawn. I don't know him, I've never met him and his Facebook profile is set to private, and God that makes me angry, and I have the sore knuckles, dented walls, shivers, loose keyboard buttons and noose-building instructions to prove it. But I'm not suicidal: that's no fun. So instead I bought fresh headphones because I'm going to wear out the ones I'm using playing these break-up songs far too loudly:

Daughtry - Over You
Bob Marley - No Woman, No Cry
Cutting Crew - (I Just) Died in Your Arms Tonight
The Police - Every Breath You Take
Three Days Grace - (I Hate) Everything About You
Puddle of Mudd - She (F***ing) Hates Me
Simple Plan - Your Love is a Lie
New Found Glory - My Friends Over You (this one describes me perfectly at the moment)
Tom Petty - You Don't Know How It Feels
Fleetwood Mac - Go Your Own Way
Simon & Garfunkel - I Am a Rock ("a rock feels no pain, and an island never cries")
Gin Blossoms - Found Out About You
Ben Folds Five - Song for the Dumped
Linkin Park - In the End
Disturbed - Stricken
Ratt - Round and Round
The Offspring - Self Esteem
Weezer - Perfect Situation (also perfect for my situation)
Bon Jovi - You Give Love a Bad Name
Green Day - Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Adam Sandler - Somebody Kill Me
J. Geils Band - Love Stinks
Louis Armstrong - What a Wonderful World (I need something to pick me up, don't I?)

Depressing and angry songs that make me feel better, and I've also deleted a whole lot of songs that remind me of her from my iPod. (If I ever hear "Mr. Brightside" again, I will kill myself.) I know my anger shouldn't be directed at her, but what can I say? It's totally wrong but I do partly blame her, and rational thought and red-hot emotion do not mix. I just don't want to feel worse.

I keep wanting to say "I hope you die, you b!tch" in my head, but how can I? I think I can still consider her a friend. Besides, I know this whole thing is my fault: I just could never tell her how I really felt, if I did indeed feel that way and didn't just want to make out and touch her boobs again, which is a definite possibility, but either way I've officially blown it. However, this is likely a good thing; now that she finally has a boyfriend maybe I won't be such a nervous wreck around her when we work together again, like with all the other girls. Still, this is really gonna suck for a while.

I hate feeling emo, but writing all of this has helped me feel a bit better, so a big thank you to whoever reads this. (***personal obligatory game reference, being Gamespot and all***) Before blogging, not even my two new Rock Band Track Packs helped me feel better; forget black, I'm back in blue at the moment.