I normally get paid for doing this, but MMOs have a speical place in my heart.

From: LotroAccountSupport (at) Turbine
To: ClandestineTruth (at) Gmail

Subject: Your Beta Invitation for the Lord of the Rings Online(tm): Shadows of Angmar(tm) Beta Program

Dear Astralmagi

Welcome to The Lord of The Rings Online(TM): Shadows of Angmar(TM) Beta Program!

I can't divulge any of the rest of things they've told me because of the NDA I signed with turbine. I'll make sure to tell you all that I'm leagally alllowed to as I learn it.

Too many good things

I'm trying to buy a hoodie, and like all clothing I buy I'm buying something that's black, has a clever phrase on it, and is only availible on the internet. There are just so many options though.

Candidate #1
Candidate #2
Candidate #3
Candidate #4
Candidate #5

Currently #4 and #5 are in the lead. I'll decide later though.

Threshold.

Today is a day of great significance. Today my status is officially upgraded from "Tight Situation" to "Peril." Let's start at the beginning.

I got up this morning, walked out the door and paused to think.

Hmmm. It's pretty cold, maybe I should go back for my winter coat.
I doubt it'll be necessary. While the snow is still on the ground it stopped snowing sometime last night, and there aren't many clouds in the sky. Also while it's cold now it's also pre-dawn morning. The coldest time of day.
True. It would be a burden to store anyway, lets skip it.

When I arrived at work I found that Richard Cho had once again lied to me, bottomless well of lies that he is, and I was not on a list for that day. I signed on to bullpen and was lucky enough to make it in. During the day Josh, one of the leads, kept cheering for snow. The M$ NDA requires us to keep the window blinds down, presumably to prevent Sony's telescopic recon drones from watching a bunch of kids run meticulous test cases. When lunch rolled around Josh got his wish. It was snowing pretty significantly, but when I went outside to inspect I found that it was only 50ish. I wasn't concerned. I know from personal experience that I can be outside in 50 degree weather for several hours before the cold begins to phase me. The day wraps up, I was on repro which alternates between boring and annoying, but is a great team for people who know that they're on repro ahead of time and bring a book.

From now on I'm always packing a book.

The day ends and I exit to find that, as always, the sun has set and the temperature has dropped. This drops was much, much greater then normal though. Around freezing, easily below 30. I also noticed the massive storm head clouds that had materialised ominously in the last four hours. It wasn't snowing at the time, but the key words there are "at the time."

Interesting thing about Seattle. While rain is a staple of everyday life around here, snow is pretty rare. It's near enough to major bodies of water to have a moderating effect. I've seen snow a total of four times since I came here. Once last year at lander. Saturday morning when I was getting off my shift at the Bellevue Homestead, but that was light snow that didn't stick. Sunday morning which was a repeat of Saturday, and last night, which was only the second time I saw it begin to stick. This means that people in Seattle aren't really prepared for this, and they certainly don't have snow gear with them. Keep that in mind.

So back to my story, I'm at the bus stop, it's freezing weather, but my cold tolerance is holding. The 291 comes at 3:55. 4:25, 4:55, etc. VMC lets us out at 4:30, so it's a 25 minute wait for the bus. It's about five minutes into that when the snow begins to come down. Not gentle Disney movie snow either, frozen rain snow. It's like... Do you know the story of Ragnarok? That kind of snow.

Another fun fact. The time I can be in hard snow and sub freezing temperatures before the cold begins to phase me. Thirty Minutes.

And even funner fact. Bus delay caused by unprepared bus drivers, lack of snow gear, and clueless/panicky drivers. Fifteen Minutes.

And quite possibly the funniest fact. Total time spent waiting in the torrential frost 35 minutes.

That's not why I'm in peril though. Spending five minutes freezing to death isn't really all that big of a deal, the significant thing is the effect it's having on the rest of the city. Traffic is slowed to a crawl, buses are massively delayed and some are going out of commission, and everyone has decided at once to beat traffic and leave early creating a form of Uber-Rush that only occurs when all of the rush hour traffic synchronizes itself in glorious calamitous unison. The roads aren't blocked by car crashes yet, but it's only a matter of time.

And to top this off I don't have work tomorrow. The problem with being part of a highly effective testing team is that we can get done a day early, but we're paid by the days so it's kind of a screw over in the end.

This combined with pre-existing economic annoyances has pushed me across the threshold, and so I'm cracking my reserve. This means that I have a great deal more economic power, but also that I don't have another card to play if something trumps this one. Also since I have tomorrow off, which sounds a lot better then saying "since I'm unemployed again," I'm going to do a bit of shopping. I need:

1. A hoodie, or some kind of medium level cold weather wear. The coat is great but usually overkill.
2. More food.
3. More food for my private stock of food.
4. More cell phone minutes.
5. To go to the bank.

The frozen winds have forced my hand, but I won't deny that part of me enjoys it because now I'm back in the game.

Nocturnal Musings

Lets start on the subject of my car. I've been thinking about it a lot recently because it presents an interesting duality. If I have my car I don't have to pay for the bus, and the amount of time I have to spend getting places is halved, if not thirded. However, if I have my car I'll have to pay the various up keeps on said car. This rather obvious and temporally displaced problem is met in equal measure by another such automotive duality. If I have my car I can get one of the seemingly endless stream of delivery jobs that are being advertised, and I can make a great deal more money, but I can't get my car up here because I don't have the money to fix my car.

The latter is the immediate issue. I can think of four places in Redmond that are offering circa $14/hour + mileage compensation for delivery drivers. I think the weather around here would make delivery a pretty big market, and I'd love to get a piece of that proverbial pie. I also think that for a truly self sufficient person it would only be an okay salary, but I'm still a semi-dependant, so I don't pay car insurance.

This rather tempting offer doesn't change the current state of my car though. My mother has been keeping watch over it while I'm gone, and she discovered a problem with the roof. She also still considers the breaks a "malfunction" while I'd come to think of them as "how the car handles." The story from there is that she took the car in to an auto shop in Montrose, I think, and they were apparently able to do fix all of the things that performance Saab was never able to. I've been told the whole thing performs better, that the brakes are now highly responsive, but that the problem with the roof is going to be incredibly expensive. I'm not sure when exactly the sub-motor that drives the roof burned out, I remember it being slightly unresponsive last winter, but early last summer it was working fine, and as it got around to being the summer swamp rain period I just stopped using it. I left the roof up all the time and didn't really have any complaints. Now, to my understanding, the roof is locked in the down position, and it'll cost $700 to get a new motor.

This is actually a running theme with my car. It was purchased used from a man who purchased it at Police Auction, so it wasn't too expensive for a European sports car. It turns out that when repairs roll around everyone suddenly remembers that it's a European sports car, and charges you brutal long distance fees.

If the world suited my whims, which it should, I would have this repaired at either a Nil cost, or a cost within my limited budget, and return from my excursion home by car instead of by plane. I've thought about it and it's really an easy route, you get on 10, you drive to L.A., you turn right onto 5, you drive to Seattle, you get on 520, exit 40th and bam. I'm pretty sure I could do it in 3-4 days too, I'd just join the collective at audible.com, download the last 2 years or so of "This American Life" which can be downloaded for free even though you can't join audible for free, and then just drive 14-16 hours per day. Sleep in the car, and subsist primarily on value menus.

It probably won't happen though. The world continues not to suit my whims, and I run into another key example of the fact that money is power. Money is power, power is freedom, and right now I seem to be trading them both for knowledge. This continues to not be the knowledge I came here seeking, but the lessons learned here will no doubt serve me for years to come. And I am getting closer to learning things about the intended topic, because I've become damn sure I need a college degree.

I've also come to accept that my job will serve as funding for a myriad array of hobbies. Despite being impoverished and completely unable to do any of these things I've been trying to learn to draw, learn Aikido, and I've been writing the occasional outline to what may some day be a seven book fantasy epic inspired by a series of D&D characters I made up. If I had enough money to have enough power to have enough freedom to actually do any of those things I think I'd be a lot happier, and so my search for spiritual fulfilment has lead me to be driven by the least spiritual of all forces, money.

My evil takes some pride in knowing that once again the things I'm saying aren't nice or pretty, but in then end you know they'll be right.

This funding becomes intended from principle, that's what I called the principle when I wrote it on my arm while philosophising all this on the bus a few days ago, brings me to the next stumbling block in my path. This one is particularly annoying because it's me. While I'm not in trouble I have set my own plans back a number of times by mixing the Internet with a brain incapable of sleep, but too sleep deprived to think clearly about budgeting. You have to understand that my list of potential entertainment purchases is essentially infinite, and every now and then forces conspire and I end up breaking the impulse threshold and buying one of them. While I'm yet to actually purchase anything which isn't a quality product, I still wish I was able to stifle these fleeting moments of financial recklessness.

Which brings me around back to now, because as we can all see the running theme here is "Poverty Sucks." Because it sucks, I've gotten a 2nd job, giving me 1 and 1/2 jobs in total. I only count the volt job as 3/4 because it's unreliable and doesn't pay well, and I only count my graveyard laundry/hotel job as 3/4 because it's reliable and pays well but is only two days a week. I have more to say on my new job, but I've run out of literary steam, and I'm going to go try sleeping again.

Also my cell phone is dead. It turns out that I'm out of minutes, and I'm not confident enough in my finances to buy more until after paying rent. I'm sure I can afford rent, but I'm not sure how much I'll have left over.

Weeeeeeee!!(ii)

Select scenes from my Wii camping expedition.

5:30 P.M.
Kid in Purple Shirt: "Hey, are you the back of the line?"
Max: "Yeah, I just arrived."
Kid: "Cool, I was just counting you're about 80th in line."
Max: "Yeah, I was really surprised to see a line this long even after I showed up six and a half hours before it opens."
Kid: "Oh yeah, I've actually been here since 9. I'm number four."
Max: "Nine this morning? That's intense."
Kid: "No no, 9 yesterday morning. I'm that yellow sleeping bag up by the front."

12:01 a.m.
Woo! they're opening. The line moves forward and we come to a solid halt about 30 feet ahead of where we started. Turns out they were just condensing. The line proceeds to move forward at a glacial pace.

2:53 a.m.
I finally get up to the front.
Gamecrazy Employee#1: "So what'll it be for you."
Max: "I'll take... A Zelda, A Red Steel, and... give me a copy of Ultimate Alliance."
Gamecrazy Employee#1: "All right a Zelda," He pulls a copy out of the giant box they've been keeping close to the desk. "Hey do we have any Red Steels left?"
Gamecrazy Employee#2: "No, all we had in were the reserves and the display, and somebody already bought the display."
Max: "Damn. What about Marvel Ultimate Alliance?"
Gamecrazy Employee#2: "Same Story."
Max: "Damn."

3:20ish a.m.
I arrive back. I've been awake for the last 21 hours. I begin opening the box, but then decide against it and begin repacking.
Kevin: "Not going to play?"
Max: "No, too tired. But I am going to put Zelda out on the front table to mock Catie. Then I'll put the Wii on the high shelf in my closet. If she wants to play she'll have to danger the heights in the lair of a slumbering ogre."

Epic

I'm going to do something I thought I would never do. It is an act of nerdity so great that it can only be called Epic. And not just because of the nerd association with WoW in which epic items are the top teir, but because of the deeper nerd association with Dungeons and Dragons in which Epic Characters refer to those above and beyond the normal maximum levels.

I am going to go camping.

I couldn't get a pre-order, but I know the store in Redmond that is having the official Nintendo launch, and at 12:01 Western time tonight I intend to purchase a Nintendo Wii. I also intend to get in line for that at around 4 p.m. today. I have my iPod, an arsenal of books, and D&D project to occupy my time. If you have any need to call me this would also be a good time. I would bring my laptop but, much like an Eva, it can only go for 5 minutes before needing an external power source. That whole 3 year old battery thing, ya'know? I'll see you on the other side, for today I become not just a nerd...

Today I am Epic*.

*Epic items in WoW are this color.

When it rains it pours

So I'm defiantly not unemployed anymore. I am, in fact, in the same annoying position I'm always in. I have a new contract with volt playing classified games for M$. This contract starts Friday, goes Monday through Wednesday of next week, and Monday and Tuesday of the following week. It's only 6 days of work over three weeks, so by no means have I stopped being a slacker. I also got a phone call today from a gentleman who saw my resume and wants to offer me another job. I applied for a lot of jobs, and I didn't want to make the faux pas of asking the person I was arranging a job interview with which job it was, but it turns out it was this one. I think it shows just how much meaning I've put into the phrase "Carpeting the web with my resume" when the description of "Laundry attendant at a hotel in bellevue" covers more then one of the the jobs I've applied to.

You may have noticed by now that this is another part time job. A part time job that doesn't conflict with my other job, and yes, I'm planning to do both. This is assuming I get the graveyard front desk/laundry attendant job, which is not yet guaranteed.

Also, if this other job pays enough, I'm going to stop working at Volt altogether. There's a beautiful little bit of trickery that states that normal people don't want to work graveyard shifts and never see the sun. They want to be awake at the hours their peers are awake, and hence don't want to work graveyard. This is what I assume anyway because night jobs have a tendency to pay more. I would prefer a night job, and I nothing short of love money. There's nothing like poverty to give you a first hand lesson in the whole "Money is Power" thing I've been ranting about for a year or so now. This is to say nothing of my "Money is Freedom" doctrine. In either case if I can get enough funding from the night job I'm going to put it to use trying to secure another night job.

The one key thing I've learned is that I can't confidently say what my employment future will be, but I can say with confidence that I'll figure something out. I may not have gained much of the inner clarity or purpose that I sought from this trip, but I have gained a great deal of self confidence, and I've learned from years of playing leader in Boy Scouts that if you do it right you can cram confidence into the holes created by a lack of vision or overall strategy. I feel almost traitorous saying it but the key thing I learned about leadership in the scouts is that it's more important to look certain then to know what you're doing. If you stand tall and look like you know what you're doing people will follow, and once you have them following you then you can worry about where you're leading them.

Free Plug

Every now and then I feel it necessary to plug something that I find incredibly amusing. This is one of those moments.

Low Voltage

It's just too easy to make a pun when you work for a company named volt.

In either case the actual story here is that I'll probably leave Volt soon. You may even say that I've left Volt now. They haven't had a contract for me the last three times I've tried, and I was already looking for another job when before the lapse. I still intend to check up on them, and until I get another solid job I'm going to keep trying at Volt, but you may hear about my new job soon.

What it will be I'm not sure but when I get it you'll hear about it.

Guitar Hero 2 is fun

An Excerpt from my internal dialogue:

I should probably get up, seeing as how I just beat the entire game on medium.
Good game.
Yeah.
So we've been sitting here for?
Four hours.
Good thing volt didn't have a contract for us today.
That's one way of thinking about it.
Our legs are asleep.
And my hands hurt.
Worth it.
...
Agreed.

Re-List

This is entirelly for my own uses. If you're reading this and not me there are 3 new postings below, you can just ignore this one.

Remaining items to be posted.
-Voltage
-Car, Money Becomes Freedom, and the price of wisdom.
-GH2, 360, And the invisible exprense of console gaming.
-'Ween
-$40 Impulses

New Items for the list.
-The Profane Saint Baelnazzar, the Hellspun Nightmare Blade
-Teamwork (Must be posted after the invisible expense of console gaming)
-Camping trip.
-If RP was a requirement

Minimalist.

I went into the apartment with the plan of having next to zero furniture wise. My plan then was to have a mattress, a desk, a chair, and the things I was bringing which include my computer, and my Erics' 'fridge.

It turns out I managed to outdo myself. The cost, and the sheer annoyance of getting a ride made buying a table out of the question for a fairly long amount of time, and C&C who had an abundance of furniture put a thee shelf bookshelf up for grabs, and with my refined college student instincts I immediately jumped on the free thing. I also have a set of Japanese style mat beds on load from the Wilsons, proving that I'm still just a punk kid slacker who can't afford to buy his own mattress. However after using these for as long as I have I've become convinced that I'll return them not when I buy a mattress, but when I buy my own set of Japanese style sleeping mats. I'm really quite fond of them. At this point I'm done with furniture. Let me explain.

The Bed is against one wall, the bookshelf faces the bed with it's back to the other wall. One side of the minifridge is placed against the back of it. The computer is placed along a wall such that it faces perpendicular to the bookshelf, and the back of the computer faces the same general area as the back of the minifridge. The placement for the two heat producers may seem bad but it's actually quite strategic because the window is directly above that spot, and the cool northwestern air creates a great cooling current.

The next level of detail is really where the genius is. The three tiers of the bookshelf each serve their own distinct function. The bottom one is a nightstand because it's level with my head when I'm lying down. The Middle one is a media center because my laptop slides in nicely and is visible from a nice reclining position, and the top shelf becomes the miscellaneous flat surface that is used while pacing my room. It currently has a tupperware full of rings I've collected from the free soda volt gives me, A large tin of caramel corn I bought from a local scout troop who was doing a fund raiser outside of QFC, my dice bag, and the book "Imaginary Weapons" which I'm reading on and off. That solves my entire sleeping situation. The other function my room has to serve is to provide me with my portal to the internet, which I consider my native land. This was actually amazingly simple. I put the monitor on top of the mini fridge, facing away from my bed. I then sit with my back to the wall in the space between the fridge and the wall next to the computer. The keyboard sits on my lap, and mouse is on a mouse stand. By mouse stand I mean that I got two small empty boxes, duct taped them together and put my mouse pad on top.

I've managed to get myself a great environment, by my standards, and the total cost?

Zero.

Well I guess like 20 cents worth of Duct tape, but essentially 0. Besides I didn't even buy it, it was Chris's duct tape so the cost to me is still nill.

This also gives me an extremely open room. C&C have the master bedroom which is larger but still feel painfully occupied to me. It's a very typical master bedroom. Single large bed, night stand, dressers, lamp. It's nice, and I think it's something that most people would find far superior to my degenerate setup, but it's not suited to my desires. Kevin's room is almost exactly like his room at his house in that it's filled with miscellaneous objects and in an eternal state of disarray. You could say that mine is similar, but the eternal state of disarray is easily understood as long as you remember that an items proximity to the computer shows how recently I've been using it, and I keep my miscellaneous objects on the shelves in my closet.

I'll post a picture later, once I have better lighting and have charged my camera.

Land Line

I'm going to knock this one off the list real quick because it's painfully easy.

I have a land line!

If you want the number e-mail me or call me on my cell. If you don't have my e-mail or my cell then I don't know you well enough to give you my land line.

GH2, True Heroism, and the Duncan Hills Batsfyrd coffee jingle massacre fest

The answer to your first question is Guitar Hero 2.

That should also answer the second question.

The third question though is the fun one. If you don't recognize the phrase "Duncan hills batsfyrd coffee jingle massacre fest" then you don't watch enough TV, and I have one and half words for you. Metalocalypse. The show is hilarious and the music is suprisingly good. It's good enough that it could support itself on its own.

Now that you know that I direct you to this. There's a lot of great songs on that list, but there are two that prove to me that Harmonix is the true voice of the gamer. You've got to stay true to your roots people, and harmonix is grounded in the heavily protected pockets of nerdcore. So what are the two songs that matter?

Thunderhorse. By Dethklok, the band from Metalocalypse. And yes I'll admit that I have ranted more then once that thunderhorse was a bad choice, but those rants are entirely based on the greatness of the song Mustakrakishn. I would also have supported the actual song from the Duncan Hills Batsfyrd coffee jingle massacre fest. This dosn't smother my elation at dethkloks presence in the game though, and I think it's a move that shows how well the company is tied to its playerbase. It gets better though. The connection is shown well by catching dethklok, but nothing shows it better then this. The ultimate song, the grand master of them all.

Trogdor. By Strong Bad. That's right. The Burninator made it on to GH2, and that's Totally Metal.

Blue Team Has Taken The Lead

There's a lot I could say about the midterms. I could say that it was a victory for me, but my absentee ballot, if it was counted, is one of the 0.04% of libritarian votes in harris county. That's okay, I knew that would happen, and the party that I disagree with the least is getting some ground. They're not in power, but they have been let back in to the playground.

But really, did any of us not see this coming? There's only so much internationally shameful corruption a group can commit before someone steps up and gains a minor lead over them in one aspect of one branch of that countries government.

And yeah, that's incredibly cynical, but if you really think that a turnover in the house of representatives is going to undo all of the corruption you've got another thing coming.

Damnit, now that song is stuck in my head.

Anyway I've got three signifigant things to say.

#1. It's really a shame kinky lost. I liked that guy, even though I know nothing about him politically. Really I'm just sick of Perry.

#2. We just missed our chance to take down Ted Stevens! I've got to grab an Alaskan residency so we can send him down the series of tubes.

#3. You Cannot Stop Joementum!!!

Listing.

I have the following items written on my left forearm under the header "Blog Notes" I hope to get to them all eventually, but almost certainly not right now.

-Voltage
-Car, Money Becomes Freedom, and the price of wisdom.
-GH2, 360, And the invisible exprense of console gaming.
-GH2, True Heroism, and the Duncan Hills Batsfyrd coffee jingle massacre fest.
-Land Line
-Minimalist
-'Ween
-$40 Impulses

Nondisclosure

I'm legally forbidden from giving my rant on this subject.

One thing I can say though, is that if you mod your console and then it's not compatible with the standard software you have no grounds for complaint. You're the one who deviated, neither M$ nor any other manufacturer is responsible for dealing with client side mods.

Outrage

Craigslist job listing for a dishwasher, Know how much they make? 9.50/hour. That's a buck twenty five an hour more then I do. The intangible benefits of gametesting are great but you can't stand on intangible things. Nor can you eat them or live in them.

Day of Reckoning.

I have a story. The story starts at 2 a.m. last night and ends with me taking off my shoes, putting down my backpack, and returning to my room, all of which signifies the fact that I'm not going in to work today.

I didn’t sleep well last night. This is by no means a rare occurrence, and with the increased stress of my life’s most recent change in direction it’s something I can rely on happening 3 to four times a week. I understand the cause of it much more then I used to though. The key pattern I’ve noticed is that I can sleep well only on nights when I don’t care what’s happening the next day. Nowadays that means Saturday night. Sunday through Thursday I’m thinking about the delicate balance between work and errands, running over my finances in my head, planning future finances, and spending a fair amount of mental effort silencing the part of me that simply does not want to go to sleep at 9 p.m. On Friday I’m scheduling in my head. The time juggling that comes with having work hours that make you leave before banks open and get home after they close with the unpredictably lengthened D&D games, and the ever present need for someone to go grocery shopping.

What it all comes down to is stress. I hate to say that because I still think I have a fairly good life. Even though I’m subjecting myself to a harsh existence I have the option to pull a rip cord and hop back to Houston for a few months before I re-enter the Bauccian excess that is the American college.

Spell check doesn’t know the right spelling of Bauccian, and neither do I. Remember Baucus? Well Bauccian should be a word. If it turns I’m wrong and it isn’t get some white out and write “Hedonistic” over Bauccian on your monitor.

So, Stress abounds, sleep fails and I lay in thought. Technically I get up, read my e-mail, check out facebook, make sure nothing big has happened on YTMND, and play my Warrior on the PVP server while listening to the latest “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me” podcast, and then about an hour later I lay in thought. I have much to think about. How much of a benefit would it be to get my car up here? I’ve heard rumors that there’s going to be a price drop on 360s after the holidays, should I wait? With my current financial situation should that even be an issue? Is there a place in Redmond that offers an earlier aikido class? In the philosophical debate between relativism and absolutes will you inevitably find that all absolutes are simply a mass consensus, and if that is true doesn’t the school of relativity and perception based reality declare them functionally absolutes? How can you measure the strength of a consensus? If a consensus is an absolute how does one decide who is counted in determining consensus? What is the threshold of intelligence necessary to effect perception based reality? Is stimulus response enough? Does mechanical interaction count as stimulus response? Is the Universe itself, by virtue of its reactionary mechanical nature, aware? Is this universal awareness the basis of the common perception? Is reality based on multiple perspectives determined by that which has the strongest force of will?

I went on in this grand thread for a few hours, and my alarm went off, shaking me back to the pressing matters of tooth decay and clothing, and shaking my train of thought back to the more pressing matter of finance. I went through the routine of readying myself, but I did so without any presence of mind, and shortly before I left I decided that I needed another job. I can not progress without a greater degree of freedom and I can not attain that freedom until I have the power born of economic influence. So a question arose.

Is it worth going to work today, or would today be better spent trying to find a new job?

I made my decision, and here I sit. I still have enough money in my reserves to screw around for about 2 weeks, after which things will get increasingly shaky, but I don’t plan to take more then today off anyway.

I won’t lie and say that I do this with absolute resolve. Like most things I do, I’m doing this with just enough resolve to actually get it done, but fear is the bedfellow of discovery and if I was going to do things the safe way I would’ve stayed at college. I’ve got much to do, and little to go on, but I am not deterred. I’ll let you know how things go.

12:01

Happy November everybody, and if my inability to sleep is any indicator, November will be month exactly like every other month.