my brothers just teamed up against me to defeat me in settlers of cataan, as should rightfully happen. jon became 'lord of cataan' and we all paid him his due homage as was formally required of us on page twelve of the official rules. i wish all kingdoms came with a nice little rule book that told you what was what. heck, i bet a lot of serfs did (do?) too. are there still serfs? serf is such a much cooler title than peasant. what is the difference between serfs and peasants? see, this is where i feel that engineering didn't adequately prepare me for the real world. what really matters to me this very second is why serfs and peasants are different (are serfs russian peasants?), and no amount of differential equation solving is gonna give me the answer. i bet all of my jobless history degree carrying friends know this answer. jobless history degree carrying friends: TELL ME.

this is the holidays. incessant troublemaking and mocking of/with the brothers, watching movies mostly made for girls to humour your mom, visiting those crazy cousins, and having coffee (er, warm drinks) with old friends. i wish there was some better euphemism for having a good talk with a friend than 'having coffee', 'cuz i really am not too found of the black death, or, as graeme likes to put it, the devil's breastmilk.

although not all talks with old friends go the way that you would like. today i had a long conversation with my old friend d, whom i have known since i don't even remember when. he and i are now travelling quite different paths through this universe. this saddens me. i sometimes wish that those people were right and that you could argue people into believing what you believe, or in hoping what you hope for, or in loving what you love. but you cannot. words (especially argumentative ones) can be pretty empty sometimes.

fare well.