Revival

Yes it's been a long time. Yes I've been busy with things other than EVE, and other than games even. This winter I pushed my drumming to the limit with my drumline, going even as far as playing my own drumkit with the drumline. And one does not simply do that without ungodly amounts of practice. Therefore, no gaming, no blogging, and only flams, drags and paradiddles.

As the drumline is taking a short break before the start of the CFL season I am also about to move house, so yeah, I feel like I no longer have any control over anything even resembling a schedule. But me being me I do find a way to put some gaming in and am even subbed into EVE at the moment, though I'll admit that apart from skilling I'm not doing much because playing EVE on a tight schedule is an impossibilty for me; and I don't want to hear from anyone with advice or anything of the sort. I can't. Period. But as I slowly skill up for my suitcase Nidhoggur, here are some other games that received my attention:

- Trackmania2 Stadium: while I don't think I'll ever be competitively fast, I found a lot of interest in building competition tracks. Maybe I can bring down the pro players to my level :)

- Kerbal Space Program: because rockets and MOAR BOOSTERS!

- Skyrim: I still check out new mods and take the occasional romp through the countryside.

- Quake Live: because I need to check once in a while if I still got it. I do >:)

Anyway, here's to hoping I get some handle on my play time; yes playing drums is tons of fun but there are some times when it starts to feel like a chore and that's never good.

Fly more than I do

o7

Finding time to blog

One of the things keeping me out of EVE - my best creation to date :)

Hello! Yes I'm alive. I've just been so busy with all sorts of stuff and projects that I barely have time left to update my blog anymore, and when I do have time I just chill out and become a massive couch potato. Needless to say lots of things have happened since the last post so it'd be hard to tell everything in detail; hell sometimes I have trouble remembering what day we are! Let's do a paragraph-by-paragraph recap and let's see where it goes.

EVE Online

Though I am still in the same corp, there has been a change of alliance after some nifty drama. Thankfully our old alliance mates now make for some juicy targets. The downside of the alliance switch is that we have gone through a lot of moves in a very short time and with a few people (myself included) becoming very busy activity has dwindled. Hopefully the coming holidays and the new expansion will set this to rights and we shall gleefully blow shit up soon. The times where I do get to log on are usually fun though, and this corp is the best corp I've been a member of in my soon-to-be 6 year career. I don't see myself moving out of this corp unless we keep moving every other week, but we have been promised that our current HQ should remain the same for a bit as we are pretty close to a lot of fun places. I haven't experienced the new expansion a lot; the new SOE ships are still pretty exhorbitantly priced and my interceptors are out in Null-sec. I did get to fly a Wolf to a system next door this morning and I could see the warp speed difference. I like a lot!

TrackMania

Speaking of speed, I've been falling deeper and deeper into this community of high-speed eSports, not only as a driver but lately as a map maker, which is a total first for me. I'm aiming to build competition-style Tech tracks but I still have a lot to learn before I reach the level of the tracks seen in TmT, ESL and ESWC competitions. As a driver it's the style of map I prefer to drive; I don't find any fun in the super-fast Full Speed tracks where a very subtle slow-down in a particular part of a track can mean that some jumps or sections are impossible to pass. I've been idling in the Twitch channel of one Acer|Frostbeule, one of the best players in the game and I must admit, these are very laid-back guys. On a side note, the current and newly-crowned World Champion is a Quebecer; Dignitas|Carl Jr, je te salue!

Drums/Drumline

I thought I'd be taking a break after the CFL season, but the drumline has my soul apparently! No seriously, when word came out that the Rockline would be participating in another fundraiser Metal Show of Pure Awesome after skipping this year's edition, I couldn't pass it up. So in mid-January we'll be starting the long process of rehearsing the 6 tunes from the 2012 show and learning 5 more. I should still be on the bass line but there's a chance I may move to the snare line if the line is not populated enough. Unlike this summer where there's wasn't a lot of time for actual teaching, this time there will be so come mid-October 2014 when the show arrives I would be more than capable of playing even the trickiest parts.

In another musical subject I am also starting a band with some old friends. I haven't played in a band setting in way too long and I just can't wait to see my drum kit set up again. But there will be an adaption period even here; to get our music machine going we chose a bunch of covers to practice and two of them require double bass drums, or at the very least a double bass pedal. So I went out and bought one! Coming from the John Bonham School of  Single Pedal Speed Freaks, I will have to relearn and start playing the bass drum as i would with my hands, doing rudiments and stuff. Things will get interesting!

Now, does anyone wonder why I sleep so well and why it takes me 4 coffees to wake up? :)

Fly busy... it's less boring that way!

o7 

My paintjob of choice for my Trackmania car

My next tool of the drumming trade :)

A new drug...

As I wait for the perfect opportunity to resub to EVE (yeah I could do so pretty much now and skill-flip but the temptation would be too great and I'd play too much for my own good), another new drug has started having its effects on me, waking up my competitive side as well as my ever present need for speed. In the very near future, expect my blog to have a lot of this:

Welcome to Trackmania Nations Forever!

^_^

Friday's Electric Lunch Hour - Where The F*** Have I Been Edition

This is where I've been, among other places! So yeah, I still live. I still play games here and there. I still play drums with the funnest bunch of drummers. And I'm still patiently (OK, not so patiently) waiting for spring to hopefully maybe perhaps arrive to Montreal; at the time of this writing a mix of freezing rain, sleet and wet crud is falling. and it's beyond depressing out there. I have rarely seen so many Montrealers looking so grim. At least it's NOT because our hockey team sucks this time; on the contrary, the Habs are finally playing back up to their reputation.

Another game I've played a lot lately is TrackMania Nations Forever and the beta of its successor, TrackMania 2 Stadium. This extremely simple yet highly addictive and very popular racing game appeals to the Speed Freak in me. On the world ladder I'm currently #1323169 out of about 7-something million users on the planet, #11203 out of 100000+ in Canada, and #6177 out of 45ish thousand in Quebec. It's also a very exciting eSport to watch.

Last time I checked in I talked about a then-upcoming LAN party, and yes it was quite the success with 14 gamers crammed into Cartboard Box's apartment for the entire weekend, with a slew of epic and unhealthy meals. CB works at Ubisoft and also managed to have some give-away prizes for various mini-competitions thoughout the weekend. Great success all around!

To finish on an EVE note (this started as an EVE blog after all!), pilots Cartboard Box, Ilinane and Letrange will be attending FanFest 2013. Everybody is already preparing their livers for the alcohol assault that will surely happen. At least they don't have to drive anywhere XD

On that note, don't be too good and fly dangerous!

o7