Roadwolf's Blog

I just finished reading The Ice Beneath You by Christian Bale.  It is a wartime novel set in Somalia and follows the life of a Private during the war, before the war, and after the war.

I must say that a lot of the story seemed to revolve around the main character trying, and failing, to really come to terms with his purpose in life.  In some ways it is a story about how someones life can begin to tumble slowly, and then cascade into an epic downfall.  And after reaching rock bottom, the climb back up to a somewhat ‘normal’ life, was long and difficult.

In many ways the book caused some self reflection on my own situation.  I now wonder if I have indeed fallen though the thin ice, and am falling uncontrolably, or if I am still trying to maintain my balance ontop of that ice.

2 posts ago, I wrote about how I wished to become a Police Officer.  Well as it seems, even though nothing officially forbids it, no single departments in the US that I am aware of, will recruit a Canadian with a Green Card.  In 3 years, I will be able to become a full US Citizen, and then I suppose I could be recruited.  But I’ll be in my early 30’s by then.  Too old to be a police recruit.  Perhaps I am already too old?

Sure I made some bad choices back when I had the whole world infront of me.  For one, I think the biggest mistake was staying on at the Radio Station.  Sure it was a cool job and all, but in the end, it was meaningless, in the long run.  And now I am growing older, and doors have already closed on some of the things I wished I could of done.

For the record, I have sent out about 500 resumes over the last few months.  I have only heard back from 4.  Of those 4 I was uninterested in 2 of the jobs, and overqualified for the other 2 (and thusly didn’t get the job).

I suppose I have resigned the fact that I will likely never find a job I enjoy, nor will I ever really achieve my dreams.  I am a pisces and as such, I do generally give up easily when problems fall outside of my realm of control.  I set my sights lower when things are looking down, so as to make my dreams appear more attainable.

I do however have love.  And that love keeps me going.

I think that this novel has helped open my eyes to my current situation.  Keeping in mind, I am not depressed.  I am fully accepting at my unsuccessful life, and where it has put me.  “Meh, its just how the cookie crumbles, right?”  Not everyone can be successful and have a cottage on a lake in Central Ontario, and be able to completely re-decorate it 8 or so times before finally deciding that it looks good.  There has to be some people who make up the lower percentage of the statistics right?

I think perhaps I am sounding too bitter or something.  Well, I am tired, so I am typing what comes to mind.  Besides, since the blog went down a few weeks back, people haven’t been visiting it quite as much lately.  So I don’t feel as compelled to censor myself.  Honestly though… Fuck.. America Sucks!  No jobs,  lots of crime,  and hell..  every company has those stupid minority compliance forms to fill out when you apply for them…   And I know EVERY TIME I fill it out, by selecting White, I am basically kissing that job away.  Not to mention the fact that I am a Canadian, trying to take jobs away from the thousands of unemployed Americans…   I can totally understand why I don’t have a job yet.   Experience aside, my situation sucks ass, and a lot of factors are working against me in my current situation.

I met up with a friend last weekend, and he said he would try to get me a job in Canada.  Honestly I hope he pulls through, because shit, things aren’t working out down here.

Sure I may have to start off fresh yet again.  But hell, I’ll be back in Canada at least.

Tags: Buffalo Life, Immigration, Roadwolf's Rants by Roadwolf
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There are a few reasons why I love Team Fortress 2.  One being that Valve is such a cool company.  Okay, sure, they tend to fuck up every now and then whenever they update the game, and end up breaking some other aspect of the game, and having to do an emergency patch to fix things.  But that is forgivable if you really get to know them and follow the community.

TF2 is a work in progress, like many Valve games.  The thing about Valve is that their updates are free, unlike other companies which make you pay for extra content (or pay to actually play the game).  TF2 has nine classes which you can play, with rumors of a tenth class which will be revealed down the way.  Over the last year or so, Valve has been releasing periodic updates which expand the capabilities of specific classes.  This started out with the Pyro update, and then the Medic update, and the Heavy update.  The Scout update was the most recent and in some aspects kind of dissapointing.

Every time a class gets updated, Valve will post information about the new class weapons and such on their blog.  Usually they will tease us by releasing this information over the course of a week, letting one item or piece of information slip each day.  Every time this has happened, there has been a crowd of people on the TF2 forums who would speculate that the update is actually a Spy update, and Valve would reveal that the update character in the teasers was actually a disguised Spy.

Well it seem that these conspiracy therorists were right…  at least 20% of the time.   There is supposed to be an update coming out on the 19th of May which was going to be the sniper update.  The Sniper is getting some new weapons, like the Longbow, and the Razorback Shield.  As well as the speculated Jarate from the April Fools ‘joke’ – although Valve has not confirmed or denied this at this point.

There seemed to be a theme through all of this however.  Jarate, and the Razorback Shield are both very effective anti Spy weapons.  So started the Spy update crowd.  Well as it turns out, yesterday, May 15th, Valve shocked the world by letting the Spy backstab and sap the Sniper update.  They also unveiled 2 new Spy unlockables; The “Dead Ringer” Spy watch, and “The Cloak and Dagger” Spy watch.  They also pushed the Spy update back to May 21st.

The Dead Ringer is a throw back to the Original Team Fortress game, where spies could drop corpses of themselves to confuse the enemy into thinking they killed the spy.  The Dead Ringer will automatically drop a corpse of the spy if he takes a non lethal hit of damage.  At the same time it will instansly cloak the spy, and also place a false kill message in the top right corner of the screen.  My theory is that since this device is passive, it will likely replace the Spy’s Revolver.  Since Spies will, or should still have the ability to cloak whenever they wish, and this device does not allow spies to choose when to cloak.  But it is very possible that there will just be 2 new watches, and the Spy can choose which one to wear, with the Dead Ringer, providing a little more security, but giving up the ability to cloak whenever you want.

The Cloak and Dagger is a Spy watch, which is similar to the original spy watch, but instead of being able to replenish your cloak using metal, it will only replenish if you are standing still.

Valve has confirmed that both updates will happen at the same time.  So the Snipers and Spies are both happy.  Another thing that is kind of driving people crazy is that Valve has all but denied that the Pyro is a female.  In Yesterdays update posting, the original text was “Holy hell. All those conspiracy theorists on the TF forum couldn’t have been right all along, could they? When the Pyro hears about this she’ll be inconsolable.” This goes along with another Quote from Robin Walker, one of the lead designers of the game, which states “The Pyro is the focus on the next pack. We’re making some significant changes to the base Pyro class & weaponry, in addition to the three unlockables and thirty-five achievements. We’ve never been terribly happy with the Pyro, in particular with her shallower skill curve than other combat classes…” .  Valve removed the ’she’ll’ part of the original post on the teamfortress.com blog about 20 minutes after it was posted – only creating more mystery.

But that is what Valve will do, they will hint at things, and then sit back and watch the community troll their forums and argue about conspiracy theories and all that, while Valve sits back, and laughs.

What will we expect in the next 4 days left until the update?  Well I suspect that the knife replacment will likely be a Garrote or something which will allow the spy to silently kill someone, while they remain disguised.  However I imagine it will freeze the spy in place, and take a good 5 to 10 seconds to actually kill the target.  This will mean that targets will have to be able to call for help quickly and ensure their not far away from team mates.  Other possibilities, would be a knife which would perhaps deal more damage, yet you wont get backstabs anymore?  Or perhaps a DoT type weapon, like a needle, which the spies could use while disguised, which would slowly kill a target unless they get to a health pack, or medic.  In fact the more I think about it, the more this sounds like something that would be realistic.

I honestly believe that the Jarate is part of the Sniper update…  But we shall see.

Tags: Computer Game Reviews, FastLane Crew (TF2 by Roadwolf
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I am sure some of you may have noticed I haven’t been posting a lot lately.  Truth is I have been kind of hiding in the land of online gaming.  I am running a server for my clan, and babysitting everyone who plays on it.  It is an addiction / distraction which I have been using to avoid ‘real life’.

Granted, I have been doing this to some extent for the last 3 years.  Three years ago I made a choice to change my direction in life.  I still have yet to find that direction, the compass needle needs to steady itself and point me towards my true North sometime soon.  I know I have grown distant from some old friends, and even some family, but I think that is mostly because I am ashamed that I haven’t been able to pull myself together and make a life for myself.  It seems like everyone I know, even in these difficult times, seems to be doing alright, and moving forward, even if its ever so slightly, compared to myself.

As many friends and family already know, nightbird (my wife) has lost her job due to cut backs.  With both of us now barely able to maintain our rent and bills, we are both desperately looking for a job in todays tough job market.  Things seem hopeless, and thusly I want to just dissapear and hide on some game online, where I can actually have some semblence of a social life where I am somewhat successful.

It took Kelly, my girlfriend, to help me realise just how far I had fallen in terms of my self esteem.  You see, I had a lot to write about this past month… a few road trips, and a lot of other stuff (the photo above of Niagara Falls, was taken on the 11th of May when I decided to drive to Niagara Falls, Canada for fun).  But I just didn’t want to write.  Why?  Because writing about these fun things seemed to depress me even further.

Taking Kelly’s advice, I went for a short drive tonight, and took some notes about what I want to do with my life.  For starters, I believe I want to become a Traffic Cop.  All my Adult life, I have kind of danced around the whole Police Officer thing, saying, oh no, i couldn’t do that. blah blah blah…   But – my interests all point in that direction.  And being that I am a very fair, and very patient person, perhaps that would be something that I would be good at.

Granted, I do have some low level volunteering experience, and I have a few friends who have been / are police officers.  But I have never really done a ride along or anything.  I think I would like to do this, to see if its really something I would enjoy.  So if any officers want some company, give me a shout

I would like, for by the time I am 32 to own a house with some property, possibly backing onto a body of water.

These are some goals I have to work towards.  If I can not become a cop due to physical issues, then perhaps a Tow Truck driver.  I would like to get my own rig and maybe contract for a company or something.

I think however, that I will really need some encouragement to help get myself going in the right direction.  I understand that it is something I do have to do alone, but some form of support would be helpful.

On the job search front, things are very depressing.  It seems either, I am overqualified, and would be taking a HUGE pay cut from my last pay rate – OR I have experience in a field, but since I don’t happen to have a degree in said field, the job goes to someone who actually has some accredations (even though I may have more actual work experience then them).  While now I kind of have a goal to work towards, I still have no clue where I will end up geographically speaking in the next year or so.  I may end up back in Ontario for all I know.   I am really just taking that day by day.

Anyhow, yeah I am still around…  

Tags: Buffalo Life, General by Roadwolf
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