The Angel

First, I LOST MY FUCKING PENS HOLY FUCK 100 USD IN PENS JESUS!!!!!! THREE YEARS I HAVE THESE THINGS AND THEN BAMN ONE STUPID BAG LATER.

Second, So today I go to Dasa Books and trade in two books. It is possible I lost my pens here. I don’t know. I go to the Doctor’s for my klinefelter’s results and I’m negative. He seems happy and cheerful this time. My chromosone is typically male he tells me. I was kinda ready for this, I was kinda 1/2 way expecting the hemaphrodite status, but it raises questions. Why did I grow up wanting to be a woman? Why was I beaten by my peers? Why did I have to kill off so much just to fit in? or did I? is masculinity the repression of emotion? Who am I as usual? Am I just a guy with OCD deluded into thinking the way he feels about women is different than other men? Why do I understand women and not guys? WHY DID I LOSE MY LAMY FOUNTAIN PENS????????? or did I? Did I just leave them at home? Why do I feel like I used to be a girl? I had resolved to learn my base lesson, that in some way I have destroyed myself, but what have I learned?

-
Andrew

The Apocalypse / McCarthy / The Road

“Dreaming of Islands – whether with joy or in fear…is dreaming of pulling away, of being separate, far from any Continent, of being lost and alone” says Delueze in Desert Islands and other texts. The Deserted Island, that fabled space is inherently a place of Isolation. The Apocalypse is an Island. In it we find that simultaneous distance, yet desire for destruction that supposedly runs identity anew. The Apocalypse destroys all social identities, it cuts its subject down to alienation and into introspection. The stories are usually populated by a few sparse characters, hence there is rarely complete isolation, but their relations become strained, they lack the world of relations they once inhabited. Its isolation is unique because of the liberation it provides, yet it often brings to bear the price of destroying civilization, as one of the characters in Dawn of the Dead proclaims about Zombies, “They’re us!”.

In Cormac McCarthy’s The Road all such pretensions such as Zombies are dropped. In the desolate Apocalypse, man is a cannibal. McCarthy’s book are usually rather brutal. They are studies in masculinity, but their bare frames are populated with ideas. The Road is something of a study in morality, its protagonists refuse cannibalism, but suffer greatly for their ethical fortitude. It is however the complete nothingness of the novel that makes it unique, McCarthy isn’t interested in anything more than the context, the novel’s characters never become clear, its plot is at most minimal, what McCarthy is in love with is the bleak alienation of the environment and the questions it can provide. The novel is full of cheesy little comments about God (which is interesting because so many Apocalypses are either ecological or scientific these days), but its the setting that matters, the way McCarthy manages to remove all hope of rebirth. His prose has always been iconic, landscapes become maps of the unconsciousness, alienation is cherished in mute bluffs and streams become stories. McCarthy is adept enough a writer to make his landscapes characters, and the environment is the most novel’s most developed character, but it says a lot about us the reader that we desire such environments, that desolation is our imagination’s playpen, and does it make us cannibals, that we desire alienation of this level, that we wish away humanity on occassion?

Calculate your Alara Reborn booster box

Ok so this is in no way an accurate emulation of a real box of Alara Reborn. Magic boxes are in reality not as random as this demonstration makes them and they also usually contain fewer repeats. However, this is a little game I play when a set is drawing me in to buy a box. Each box is rumored to contain 4 Mythics, 32 Rares, and 1 Foil rare or mythic and then some foil commons and uncommons. Alara Reborn contains 10 Mythics and 35 Rares. You calculate your box the following way.

Go to: http://www.random.org/integers/

For mythics generate 4 random integers from 1 – 10

Write them down in the comments section and match the number to the name.

Example: 2 9 10 4

Defiler of Souls, Jenara, Maelstrom Nexus, & Lord of Extinction

Which isn’t a bad pull

For rares generate 32 integers from 1 – 35 then match the numbers

I got: 28 31 20 20 18 35 4 4 31 14 21 7 14 4 15 7 29 19 12 7 23 5 31 26 14 17 11 1 24 7 32 23

Realiator Griffin, Wargate, Engima Sphinx, Enigma Sphinx, Maelstrom Pulse, Unknown, Lich Lord of Unx x 2, Wargate, Mycoid Shepherd, Glory of Warfate, Time Seive, Mycoid Shepherd, Lich Lord of Unx, Knotvine Paladin, Time Seive, Finest Hour, Dauntless Escort, Spellbreaker Behemoth, Time Seive, Sages of Anima, Nemesis of Reason, Wargate, Madrush Cyclops, Mycoid Shepherd, Spellbound Dragon, Blitz Hellion, Aven Mimeomancer, Unscythe, Time Seive, Golden Xerox, & Unknown

Which is actually a pretty good pull, a lot of Time Seives and Wargates two Engima Sphinxs, a Knotvine Paladin, and a Maelstrom Pulse.

For the foil Create 1 integer from 1 – 45 with the mythics being 1 – 10 and the rares starting at 11. Aven Mimeomancer is 11 in other words.

I got 37 which translates to 27 in the rares a foil Mayeal’s Aria.

The spoiler for Alara Reborn is here

You can pre-order Alara Reborn from MtgFanatic.com.

Mythics

1. Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund

2. Defiler of Souls

3. Dragon Broodmother

4. Lord of Extinction

5. Sen Triplets

6. Sphinx of the Steel Wind

7. Thraximundar

8.Uril, the miststalker

9. Jenara, Asure of War

10. Maelstrom Nexus

Rares

1. Aven Mimeomancer

2. Filigree Angel

3. Meddling Mage

4. Lich Lord of Unx

5. Nemesis of Reason

6. Soulquake

7. Time Sieve

8. Deathbringer Thocatar

9. Lightning Reaver

10. Thought Hemorrhage

11. Blitz Hellion

12. Spellbreaker Behemoth

13. Knight of New Alara

14. Mycoid Shepherd

15. Knotvine Paladin

16. Necromancer’s Covenant

17. Spellbound Dragon

18. Maelstrom Pulse

19. Dauntless Escort

20. Enigma Sphinx

21. Glory of Warfare

22. Lords of Forgotten Alara

23. Sages of the Anima

24. Unscythe, Killer of Kings

25. Lavalanche

26. Madrush Cyclops

27. Mayael’s Aria

28. Retaliator Griffin

29. Finest Hour

30. Vedalken Heretic

31. Wargate

32. Cloven Casting

33. Fight to the Death

34. Identity Crisis

35. Predatory Advantage

I’ve done this before with other sets and found that it usually brings me down to earth with a box, however assuming that Maelstrom Pulse, Jenara, & Lord of Extinction all go for 10 USD or more directly after the initial release and the Enigma Sphinxes and other cards will retail for around 5 USD or more for a few weeks after the official release, a box is more than worth buying. I’ve calculated two or three now and the numbers do seem to add up. The added incentive of uncommons like the new Warhammer also make the set slightly more appealing. Hence, chance seems to favor cracking a case with in a week of the release.

back

That guy could be anyone. He was amitious, he pushed aside himself. I’m gonna be anyone, I’m gonna be famous. To be back there is a little bit of torture, to see yourself pulling yourself apart again. Keep the course bitch, keep the course.