Back ... once again

So ... I guess I should finally drop by and say 'hi' once again, after being absent from dA for quite some time. Real life's call was getting rather urgent in the past two months. I had a lot of tests in school, and the tonsilitis from my last journal entry proved to be only the tip of the iceberg: Between then and now, I also managed to geht the flu and a big fat sinusitis, so I spent a lot of time on my couch reading or watching tv because I couldn't do anything else. I have no idea what's wrong with my immune system this winter, but it sure sucks!

Anyway, I hope y'all had a very nice christmas and a good start into the new year!


Dragon Age or: The Paralyzing Fear of Finishing a Game

I admit it: I haven't finished Dragon Age yet. I guess I've come to the very final moments of the game, being in Denerim fighting my way to the Archdemon and all that stuff. And I've been at this point for the past two months.

Why? Because I hate it, when games end. I always was like that, after having hours and hours of fun with a game, I simply can't bring myself to end them. So, at the point where others can't stop playing because they badly want to find out how their adventure ends, I just quit playing. Yep, that's my logic. I'm that weird.

Don't worry though, I'll finish it eventually, it'll just take more time.


Vampires - True Blood vs. The Vampire Diaries

And yet another outing: I'm quite obsessed with vampires. Though that doesn't seem so unusal at the moment, considering the mass of vampire novels and tv shows that keep popping up at the moment.

With my being ill so much, I had the time to check out some of them, and here's my opinion - even though there's no way I'll be able to fill the layout's sidebar after this.



True Blood

I started with True Blood, since I got the first volume of the corresponding novels as a christmas gift, and I liked it. So after hearing that these books made it into a tv show, I checked it out.

It's somewhat hard to summarize the plot in a really short way, so I'll stick to the real basics, though that's somewhat shallow: Sookie, a young woman who's telepatically gifted (an almost driven insane by it) falls in love with a vampire, Bill Compton. And apart from the usual impediments of being with a vampire - and Bill's rather violent vampire buddies - there's also a murderer who chooses women who've been with vampires as his (or her?) victims haunting the small town she's living in.

So far, I've only watched the first two episodes; I have sort of mixed feelings about this show.

I like most of the character portrayal so far, and the quirky humor is certainly a big plus. The fact that vampires don't hide ther existence but, due to synthetic blood, live as a heavly frowned upon minority among humans is a nice, fresh change from the usual secrecy that comes with vampires.
On the other hand, I think they overdid the sex and violence thing (and I'm normally fairly tolerant of both), and so far, this has been turning me off of watching another episode.


The Vampire Diaries

Shortly after True Blood, I discovered The Vampire Diaries.

This show is about Elena, a highschool girl who recently lost her parents in a car accident. Now, she meets Stefan Salvatore, the mysterious new guy at her school. What she doesn't now is that the reason for Stefan's sometimes odd behaviour and his secrecy is that he is a vampire. Shortly after, Stefan's brother Damon arrives, wreaking havoc whereever he goes and seemingly having only one goal: Making Stefan's life miserable. In the meantime, Elena's friend Bonnie starts to realize that her grandmother's talk of her being a witch is more than just talk, and Elena's little brother Jeremy, not being able to cope with the death of his parents, spirals down a dark path of drug use, alcohol excess and the love for an older woman.

I watched the first four episodes so far, and I really like the show. On occasions, it's just a little too much highschooley for my taste, but this seems to get less as the series progresses. The humor is okay, and character constellations and character depth seem to be a real strenght of this series. There seems to be a lot of history between the two vampire brothers, causing an odd love-hate-relationship between them. As a plus, both Paul Wesley and Ian Somerhalder (playing Stefan and Damon) are rather hot.

Do I need to mention that I immediatly went for Damon, even though he's being a manipulative, violent and unpredictable jerk most of the time, instead for Stefan? My faible for the bad guys got me again, I fear.


Anyway, that's enough talk of vampires and tv shows for now, I've prattled long enough already. This is what happens when I search for something else to write about besides me being absent form dA (again) and short note on my Dragon Age progress.

Now, I have a lot of catching-up to do.

Have a nice day!
-Aisling