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Coma Toes

The synopsis on The Obscure Store seemed like a perfectly heartwarming story. A dad promises his kid a new Corvette if he wakes up from his coma. Guy wakes up, gets sweet car, everyone lives happily ever after.

The Stackiewiczes went to Poughkeepsie Chevrolet, where Jason ordered a 2005 torch red Corvette, equipped with a flat-screen television, DVD player, global positioning system, satellite radio, and chrome wheels.

"It's so new," said Thomas Carter, a salesman at the dealership. "He got the first allocation probably in this area. You can't get it any more loaded."

Jason Stackiewicz's new car will arrive at his home in September, his father said. The Corvette will replace his $40,000 Mustang Cobra convertible.

Yeah, I'm glad he got better, but he pretty much dropped off the Sympathy Scale right there.

What I Did On My Summer Vacation, LA Edition

I had a month back in the states to pack up stuff and prepare for the long-term move to Taiwan. There was the trip to Origins, of course, but that was hardly the only thing on the schedule. Was back from Ohio for only a few days before driving down to LA with the parents to finally meet Michelle's folks. Of course before that could happen we had to find a kennel for Laika. Thankfully we found a vet nearby who offered boarding and still had space for the long weekend. Got Laika chipped, too, as long as we were at it. Booked a hotel in Old Pasadena because it's about mid-way between Agoura Hills and Diamond Bar, plus I know the area well. Just barely had time to check in and catch our breath after the long drive before we went out to San Gabriel to meet up with Sam and Michelle to check out a potential Chinese caterer. Mom and Dad got a aste of LA life as I had to drive down the interminably long local roads to cover the limbo between the 210 and 10 freeways. Was only 30 minutes, close by LA standards, but it felt almost as long as the seven-hour drive down I-5.

Michelle's friend Betsy was also there to meet us at the restaurant. Met her when the whole gang visited San Diego. She studied fashion design, which was handy as she's been helping Michelle with the wedding details, much to Sam's relief, I suspect. She taught English in China with Michelle, except she stayed longer and studied the language, such that she spoke Chinese almost as well, if not better, than Sam & Michelle, certainly without the tone errors and other mistakes common to native-English speakers. This impressed mom greatly, of course, although I suspect Betsy is tired of being treated as a novelty, like a talking monkey or something, by Chinese folks. She was probably just as bemused by some of the random superstitions that mom dragged out of the closet (e.g. no duck or other flat-beaked fowl for the wedding banquet, and the wedding should be on a double-digit date that's felicitous on the Chinese lunar calendar). The boss lady was nice enough, and it's easy to see how she pulls in the big wedding bucks but the food was only okay, which is just fine for wedding food, really, but hardly inspiring. Got back to the hotel room and it wasn't long before we all crashed after the long day.

Got up the next morning and went down the street to the Coffee Bean shop on Colorado. Finally got to cash in my punched-out frequent-drinker card that's been sitting in my wallet for literally years. That alone made the whole trip worthwhile. Took my monstrous (and free!) cup of vanilla latte back to the hotel room to go with some red-bean toast that mom brought. Yum. Had to wait around for at least one trip to the bathroom before I felt ready to hit the road. 134 west to the 101 north to Michelle's house. The drive went surprisingly quick, but driving through The Valley is always so depressing. Just doesn't seem to be much civic pride to be had from being a Reseda resident. Agoura Hills is a perfectly pleasant outer-ring suburb situated almost on the edge of wilderness but not really. Although to be fair Michelle's family was there before most since her dad worked at Amgen which is headquartered in AH. Mom finally met her match in Mrs. Hsiang, who manages to keep her 15-year old house looking spotlessly new even while raising kids, running her coffee shop, and flying between coasts. Even Michelle concedes that her mom is a little obsessive.

After all the pleasantries there was the inevitable exchange of gifts. We'd just got back from Taiwan so Mom brought tea. They'd just got back from a Mexican vacation so they gave us a massive bottle of Kahlua. Should go well with the bottle of Baileys that's also sitting in the cupboard. It's a lot of Mud Slides. Sam didn't get Michelle a ring, but Mom made up for the difference and then some with the excuse that grandma insisted. So there was a bracelet-necklace-earring set in gold from grandma, and a silvery ring-pendant-earring set with heart-shaped diamonds from mom, plus those traveler's checks that I brought back from the office to home through US Customs all went into a red envelope. Hopefully that'll cover our share of the wedding expenses.

Went out to Malibu Lakes to check it out the site. It's near AH, but nestled in a little valley in the mountains, on the shores of a man-made lake. The lawn was impeccably manicured and the ranch-style hall actually has a little history behind it. Convenient, pretty, and available on the one date that satisfies both the practical and the superstitious requirements. Book it. Malibu itself is just over the mountains from Agoura Hills (who knew?), so we took the twisty roads over the hills and right down to the beach to the Sunset Restaurant for lunch. Right on the beach, with great view of the ocean, potential rehearsal dinner site? The folks had the conversation volume dialed up to packed-HK-dimsum-hall rather than nice-low-key-brunch, but whatever. Mom loved the Asian chicken salad, and the halibut was quite good, too, but I was disappointed with my Cobb Salad. I always order Cobb Salad when I get a chance because it's got so many random ingredients that it's impossible to make at home. However, their Cobb didn't have avocado, chicken, or even bacon, instead there was an overwhelming amount of ham which got old real fast. Shoulda gone with the fish.

Drove back to Pasadena to get some rest and got to cruise along Pacific Coast Highway for a nice weekend drive along the way. Thankfully we were going in the good direction, as the road was jammed solid with beachgoers coming off the I-10, and it's always fun to drive the 110 between Downtown and Pasadena. Killed the afternoon in the hotel room and then it was off to Monterey Park for the evening meet-and-greet. The LA uncles and Michelle's grandparents joined us for dinner. The grandfather was quite the character at 90-some. First he broke out the bottle of XO and tried to get everyone to drink, but the uncles had to decline as they were driving. No matter, as he managed to polish off half a bottle of hard liquor virtually by himself without missing a beat in the conversation. Our green-leaning relatives had to bite their tongues a bit while the former air-force general expounded on Taiwan politics, but things loosened up once he moved on to history, poetry, art, and all his other hobbies. The rest was just your typical polite-but-loud dinner talk. Lots of pictures taken after dinner, with every possible combination of family units. Thank goodness for digital.

Got up early the next morning to hit the road to Irvine, 210-605-405. Dropped mom and dad off at uncle's house and picked up Alan. Uncle actually wanted to come along to Anime Expo, but thankfully we managed to talk him out of it. Wanted to get there early to avoid the crowds. Turned out that the crowd for registration was the day before, and the Exhibit Hall doesn't open until 10am anyway, so not much to do for a while but wait in line and chat. They finally let us in and Alan promptly went nuts buying Gundam model kits. By the time Abby met up with us at 10, he'd already spent almost all his money. Wanted to fill up some DVD series, but the prices at the dealers weren't that great, at least compared to online deals. The freebies didn't really measure up to my experience at last year's ComicCon, and you had to jump through more hoops (i.e. fight off mobs) to get them. Oh well, it wasn't as if I had anything better to do. Turned out that I spent the least money of all, as Alan had his models and Abby spent tons on manga. But they can afford it and it was a good time for all. I even managed to pick up a couple of free t-shirts despite the relative stinginess. Tonight was the big family dinner, including the GF+sis+mom, who were visiting people in LA before coming up to SF to stay with us. Really should get a little something for the GF. Thankfully the Brea Mall was on the way and Abby knew the place well as the Nordstrom salespeople knew her mom by name. A 10-minute in-and-out and I had some chocolate in pretty gold boxes. Plunked the cousins at Abby's house and went back out to pick up GF and family from where they were staying in Walnut. Good HK-style seafood, ate way too much, and took more pictures. Took the GF back to Walnut and then picked up mom&dad from Diamond Bar before zipping back to Pasadena.

Tried to check out as early as possible for the long drive home, since GF, etc. were taking a Chinese bus-shuttle from Monterey Park to Oakland that same day. We were cruising along I-5 when mom got a call on her cell from GF's mom saying that they couldn't get on the bus because their friend didn't actually book the reservation and the bus was full at the end of the long weekend. Turned out that a college guy also missed out on the bus, and offered to rent a car to drive them to our door. I'm dubious as to the wisdom of three women in a foreign country getting into a car with a total stranger with long stretches of road in the middle of nowhere, but I guess there's still the built-in trust among Chinese. Of course, there's more than enough Chinese wackos to keep the Taiwan news stations in business, so that's hardly a guarantee of safety. Anyway, everyone made it home safely. I managed to drive Pasadena-home in almost exactly six hours, which may be as fast as I've ever done it. Helped that we didn't stop for lunch and I was driving a nicer car, but there was more traffic on the highway than usual plus mom&dad were along. In the end, Laika might've been the happiest one. He was jumpy and cringing when they led him out of the kennel, but once we took him outside and he realized that he was going home he almost jumped out of his skin with excitement. Should've given the kennel some of our regular pet food, as Laika pooped some nasty shit for a few days. It was good to be home.

Travel Note

Back in Taiwan. Two words: Humidity Sucks.

Good news: We finally got an IC card for the BS Digital Japanese satellite TV box, so we can get digital-TV-goodness for grandma's NHK variety shows. Plus they run lots of MLB games. Now I just need to go get an iLink cable so I can run a fully digital video signal down to the plasma's media box.

David brought his PS2 and apparently he has an XBox now, too. I packed the GameCube (hey, it doesn't take nearly as much space as the Box), so between us we have the complete console trinity. None of it is hooked up, though, because we're suppose to be working men now.

Origins Notes, Everything Else

Woke up early while Mike and Chris were still dead to the world. Banged out the Day 1 Notes and then took a shower. Hampton Inn provides free breakfast, and their coffee is pretty decent... for freebie hotel coffee, anyway. That's not really good enough, so I wandered cross the street to the North Market for a little continental breakfast. Of course, on the Continent, said breakfast would be a demitasse of espresso and a small but perfectly flaky croissant. Here in the midwest, I got myself a 16oz latte and a maple roll the size of my face with icing thick enough to pave the freeway. Damn it if it didn't taste pretty damn good, though. Went back to the hotel's breakfast buffet to top off with some fruit salad. Mmm... fruit.

Wanted to finish blacking out my Looney Lab Little Experiment badge. Chrononauts has a fun theme and actually has educational value, but it didn't have much more strategy than Fluxx (i.e. memorize every win-condition card and check the discard pile so you know which win-condition is still available), and it didn't play as smoothly as Fluxx. Cosmic Coasters is simple to play and oh-so-cheap, but then they try to spice it up with various special powers which I'm almost sure are not balanced, although the imbalance may be swamped by the variance in the rock-paper-scissors combat system. Besides, I think it's also one of those games that's solvable by a computer. Are You A Werewolf is a huge hit in the late hours, with three or four games going on simultaneously with twenty people a game, and NanoFictionary is a clever idea, but I was so not in the mood for social games. Didn't really feel like socializing with gamers at all, really. So I'm afraid that I wasn't a very good sport in order to try to get it over with ASAP. Got my Fluxx promo card, so of course I had to go buy a copy of Fluxx to go with it. By then it was time to head over to the conference rooms to check out Peter Adkinson's seminar/story-time about the origins of Magic. It was a little self-indulgent, but it was cool to hear the story from the horse's mouth. Also interesting to see things from the art-buyer's side, as Adkinson's relation with Jesper Myrfors and his art-student friends allowed them to bootstrap Magic by buying 300 pieces of color art for $50 a piece. Of course, you end up with some pieces like Word of Command, but that's what happens when you have no budget and deadly deadlines.

Now it's back to the Exhibit Room. Went to Ed Beard to get Magic cards signed. He usually limits the number of cards he signs, but I chatted him up about his seminar and Camelot Legends, the game he worked on, and he became amenable to signing the entire (relatively small) stack. Picked up a copy of St. Petersburg from Rio Grande because the game is awesome. Finally got a chance to roll the big D20 at the WotC booth with my punched-out demo sheet for a copy of Axis&Allies: Pacific. Just had to roll more than a 2, and thankfully I had at least that much luck. Took the big boxes back to the hotel room, then headed over to Mayfair. Wanted to play La Strada but couldn't get a game started, the guy explained the rules, though and it seemed interesting. It's a road-building game where you try to connect randomly placed towns of various sizes. Each town you connect gets you points. The bigger the town, the more points it's worth, but the more players that connect to a town, the less each player gets from that town. No text to read, no cutesy themes, the only slight downside is that it doesn't play as well with only two players, as it becomes a simple race game since only one player can occupy each town in the two-player game. Got into a game of Settlers of the Stone Age instead. It's interesting in that the resource squares are pre-printed on the board rather than randomly set like Settlers of Catan, and there's more developmental tracks that have effects on the game. But there's almost too many options at times, and it starts kinda slow as it takes quite a few rolls before your explorers have the resources to leave Mother Africa and head out into the world. We really didn't get very far before it got close to closing time. I still wanted to head over to ZMan Games to check out Camelot Legends. Wanted a copy of the game to get the cards signed, but didn't really want to shell out the 25 bucks. Good thing there was a tournament that night. Managed to run through the basic game before the hall closed. Always good to learn the rules before you play for stakes.

Time to get some dinner before the Camelot tournament. Was sick of convention-center rip jobs, so I wandered down High Street hoping to find college-student-type places to eat. Turned out that all the cool kids were hanging out at the Columbus Community Festival. We couldn't just have the Columbus Pride Holiday all by itself now, can we? Wasn't all that comfortable in the hip crowd as I was still in game-geek mode, but the smell of smoky ribs made me get over it in a hurry. Thanks to the Great Migration there was a black man with two huge smokers cranking out tasty pieces of pork for all. Stood in line for a while, but it was well worth it for the half-slab of ribs and a slice of sweet-potato pie. Took it back to the Convention Center and got a root beer from the soda machine. Ate in the Looney Lab just as Mike, et al, were just starting the Icehouse tournament. Mike's dad drove up from Kentucky earlier in the day to have lunch and to drop off Mike's tux. So if nothing else, Mike definitely wins the Best Dressed award at the tournament. Enjoyed my meal of meat and finished just as they finished the preliminary rounds. Mike and Eric (who flew in with Mike) were both in the finals, so Bay Area was representin' in the Lab. Would've offered them some ribs, but BBQ sauce is not good Icehouse etiquette. Meanwhile, I was off to play my game (after washing my hands, of course).

Only three people showed up for the tournament. Understandable since it's a brand new game (got drop-shipped from China just in time to make the show) from a small company at the very edge of the Exhibit Hall. None of us were exactly experts at the game, but they had folks there to follow along and make sure we didn't make any irreparable mistakes. We were going to play two games, one with Standard Rules and one with Advanced Rules. Didn't think I got a great draw in the first game, as I had only one mediocre Knight to go with a handful of Ladies. I stuck them all at Cornwall, where their strong Cunning and Diplomacy stats would come in handy. A bunch of Cornwall Events showed up, and my knight picked up the Love Potion and Guinevere as his mate. I was building up nicely and was about to score a bunch of Events when disaster struck. One guy flipped up a Tournament Event, and my less-than-awesome knight was forced into a contest of Combat against other players' champions. He was defeated and returned to my hand. This put me two turns behind, as I had to replay the knight on one turn before I could score the event next turn. My opponent was able to move into Cornwall and score the event, whose benefit was to kill one opponent character at the location, which wrecked my development. Managed to score a few more events here and there, but I was always a turn behind in terms of the people I needed to put in play, or in terms of the location where I needed my people to be, an unfortunate side effect of limiting the number of actions (play, draw, or move) per turn. It also bothered me that some knights are strictly better than others, when there's no play cost (other than the action limit). I guess instead of land-screw you just have knight-screw, plus it fits better with the backstory. At least I managed to tie the other guy for second place, which matters since it'll be the combined placings from the two games that determines the winner.

Second game went better. Instead of wimpy no-name-guy I had Sir Gayreth followed up by mighty Sir Lancelot. Paired up Gayreth and Queen Morgause to score the Love Potion. The other loser from the first game was building up a huge army at Camelot, and with the Honor of DeGanis in play his company's chivalry was off-the-charts, so he basically scored any Camelot event at will. Another Tournament came up, but no man can defeat Lancelot in single combat. The Isle of Avalon was in play, which awards victory points based on a Knight's Adventure stat. The catch is that the Knight must be accompanied by a Lady and they can never leave the Isle. Gayreth and Morgause can move together for free thanks to the Love Potion, but Lancelot had the higher Adventure stat. Also had the Archbishop of Canterbury in my hand, and the Theft of Excalibur event was in play in the Perilous Forest. The Final Event was about to come into play, so it was time to make my move. On the eve of The Final War, Lancelot went to Camelot, where he met up with the Archbishop who crowned him the High King. Morgause left Gayreth to go to Camelot, where she met Lancelot and they ran off to the Isle of Avalon together. Gayreth went to the Forest to join with various Cunning characters that I've been playing. Wasn't going to score the Theft of Excalibur in time, but the guy who was about to score the Final War and end the game decided to wait one more turn so he could send a pair to the Isle of Avalon. By sending Guinevere to Avalon for four victory points, he allowed me to score the Theft, which gave me Excalibur the sword, totaling nine points, plus Guinevere adds one to all of Lancelot's stats, so he gave me another point on the Isle, too. That locked up the win for me. So the winner of game 1 had 30 points to two of us at 18 points a piece. In the second, I got 30 points and first place, while the first winner had 18 points alone in third. So I won by half a place in the combined result. Yay me. Had our choice of prizes. There was a nice Pendragon banner, but I couldn't really pack anything delicate, so I decided to take a free copy of the game, which was my goal all along.

Went back to Looney Labs just in time for the last game of the Icehouse finals. Turned out that they'd taken a dinner break between the prelims and the finals. Mike was still there in his tux and so was Eric in his utilikilt. The final game ended. The atmosphere was tense as the judges totaled the scores. Looney folks are usually easy-going, but every game player wants to win deep down. Eric was pronounced the winner, and to say that he was excited would be a grossly misleading understatement. It is only a game, but everyone was happy for him, so it's okay, as long as he didn't actually get seizures (just really close). Mike got to his goal of making the finals, and he got a ribbon, too, and it's all about the swag in the end. They all went out to celebrate, and I went back to the room to play my own spatial logic game, namely how to pack all the big game boxes into the suitcase. I could expand my roll-on bag slightly, and dirty clothes made for good padding, but it was going to be tight. Went to bed and woke up with the brilliant realization that since I had to check my now-oversized suitcase anyway, I could carry-on another plastic bagful of games, so I could actually pick up another box and still get everything home. Flight was at 1:40pm, so I still had the morning. Got some breakfast from the hotel buffet, then went over to get in line for the Exhibit Room. It wasn't as if I had time for anything else, and it's time for some Power Shopping. Didn't have long to wait, as I passed the time by chatting with some Magic players from Canada who were looking to do some shopping of their own, although I sure didn't see any Magic deals from the ripoff artists in the booths (great for sellers, though). Went around getting my Camelot Legends cards signed by the artists present. Most of them haven't even seen the actual game yet, so they were interested in seeing how their art showed up on the cards. Mark Poole was real nice about signing his Magic stuff, as I kept asking if it were okay as I kept adding cards to the stack as he said yes. Although his big bold Magic Marker signatures did obscure the rule text for a couple of the CL cards. Wasn't going to quibble over that, though. It's not as if they're pseudo-$100-bills like the Ancestrals and Libraries that people were bringing him.

Really enjoyed chatting with the artists. At least it made me feel as if I wasn't treating them as just autograph machines. Didn't leave me much time to do much else, though. Couldn't resist spending the rest of my Mayfair Demo Bucks on La Strada. Wandered by Crystal Caste, and got sucked into a demo of their Dwarven Metal dice. Solid steel alloy, with a gorgeous copper finish, with a real heft that makes them roll oh-so-true. Wandered away, but couldn't help stopping by on the way out to pick up a set. Yes, it's $25 for a set of dice, but god-willing it's the last set of dice I'll ever need.

Just had enough time to stuff my last few purchases into the suitcase before I caught the cab to the airport. The flight home went smoothly enough, although it did take forever for my suitcase full of games to show up on the carousel. Sure, I'll never find enough time or people to play half of them, but I do enjoy just reading the rules, like an exercise in Applied Math with a dash of artistry. I think everyone had a good time at the con, as long as one doesn't think about the cash outflow, anyway.