Um. Yeah. So that whole “getting kicked in the shins” incident at work was apparently supposed to be more of a pseudo-promotion than a “you suck at your job” meeting. So I guess I’m not quitting, for now. Oddly enough, everybody was willing to just write off my outburst as a bad day; I didn’t even get questioned about the unsubstantiated (in the cold, hard, fact sense) accusation I wantonly hurled at Debbie. (I hear that the higher-ups had a chat with Debbie about avoiding Marin, after I had stormed out…not sure what happened there.)

In other news, I saw the Best First Episode I’ve ever seen in an anime series: that from Saishu Heiki Kanojo (She, the Ultimate Weapon). It’s not released yet (Marin managed to acquire the first episode somehow), but it’s joined Rahxephon as a Will Buy Even If Broke series. Ask John has a much better summary of the show than I could give here…he calls it “one of the finest anime series ever produced,” and I’m leaning towards agreeing with him.

Marin and I also sampled the first episode of Ai Yori Aoshi last night. Unfortunately, we did it after watching SaiKano, and it fell rather flat.

Later in the evening I headed over to Andy’s. There I lost to Andy in War (yes, the card game) while waiting for Nate to find a save point in Xenogears, and then joined them on a walk to Safeway (we’ve been having 90 degree days and 50 degree nights; very nice!) to acquire ice cream. Andy has informed me that he’s divided the cost of his education between two items now: a $15,000 black cap, and a $15,000 beer glass. Nate argued that Andy should also consider the ($10,000) “free beer” coupon that Andy received but did not use, and Andy had a hard time arguing against that. Nate and I played a game of War over ice cream, and I handily trashed him.

Carl then came over and played Andy in Guilty Gear XX, while Nate and I had a War rematch. This match will forever be known as The War of Legend. I originally had the upper hand, and had managed to steal all four aces from Nate; we got to the point where we had a war when Nate had four cards remaining in his hand (i.e. he used every card he had), and he won it. From there he made a dramatic comeback, and soon I found myself staring loss in the face. Undaunted, I turned the tables myself and regained control of the game…only to lose it to Nate, again. By the end of the game, Nate had made four comebacks from death. I made three. You can do the math as to who won in the end.

Our War rematch went on for at least an hour. We obviously deserve a place in The Guiness Book of World Records. Hell, in 1989 (my latest copy) they didn’t even have an entry for the game.

Partway through the tense struggle, I heard/saw a car pull into a nearby driveway. (Since it was so hot during the day, we had opened all the doors and windows in the apartment to cool it off.) This car, as many college cars, had music blasting. The music? “I’m All Out of Love,” by Air Supply. I never thought I’d hear that blaring from a car. Nate and I kept it light the rest of the time by repeatedly commenting to Andy about what a game of skill we were involved in. I also spread my Voice Actor knowledge whenever (in)appropriate; did you know that the VA for Baiken in GGXX also was the VA for Kenshin? How about that the VA for I-No was also the VA for Belldandy, as well as that weird S+M queen in Miyuki-chan in Wonderland?

The last real highlight of the evening was when Andy and Nate faced off (in GGXX) with Jam and Chipp, respectively. (This battle occurred in the middle of Andy’s quest to win 20 consecutive times with Jam, rotating opponents between Carl, Nate, and me. Nate finally was able to put Andy down after Andy’s 18th win…I, sadly, could only repeatedly get close to defeating Andy with Bridgett, the guy-dressed-as-a-girl.) Jam had Chipp pinned in a corner, but both attacked (at least, the best I could figure out) with the same level attack at the same height at the same time, resulting in a lightning flash. The match quickly devolved into a button-mashing affair, and Carl and I stood witness to about thirteen rapid-fire lightning flashes before Andy caved. Alas, Andy defeated Nate in that battle, in the end—nevertheless, it was a clear moral victory for Nate. I’ll never see that many consecutive lightning flashes again in my life…we all found it pretty funny, but it was also pretty late.

Today was a much lower-key day. I primarily decided that I wouldn’t study for my banking final, like I really ought to. Instead I took a nap (ostensibly to allow myself to stay up this late to type this overlong blog entry). Later I had an enjoyable evening with Eric, beginning with dining on the coveted Arby’s “Five for 5.95” special. We then watched some Rahxephon (featuring what might be the second-best anime opening I’ve seen), the Fist of the North Star-inspired episode of Excel Saga (the only reason that I’ll ever appreciate having seen the Fist of the North Star movie), and the said opening episode of SaiKano. I then got to show Eric the pictures documenting my European Vacation of the Gods. I had it so good back then.