Painting the Horizon

I have this odd habit: I "collect" nice-sounding names. I don't know why I do it; I rarely need to name anything. I've never had a pet and do not plan on having kids, at least not anytime soon. I don't even name my computers, which I understand is a major nerd faux pas.

This post was brought on by the realization that "Johan" is a very nice name and OH GOD I WILL NEVER USE THESE NAMES FOR ANYTHING WHY DO I KEEP A LIST.

I haven't really had any interest in playing WoW for the past couple of days, since I've been distracted by, among other things, playing Sam & Max and watching My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic (shut up it's actually good!).

But just now, I tried to login and it won't even open the launcher because it says it can't obtain data. =/ My Internet connection has been behaving a little wonky lately, so I guess that's just it getting worse. The funny thing is that now that I know I can't play I kind of want to. Haha.

It probably says a lot about how exciting my life is that the high point of my weekend was watching some Babar with my cousin/roommate.

This amount of excitement is perfectly all right with me, though, because I'm a thoroughly boring individual.

It must really suck to be a prosecutor in Phoenix Wright's town. The guy ruins perfect records like nobody's business.

Though to be fair it's because he's always representing an innocent person.

In other words: OMFG I'M ALMOST THROUGH THIS GAME WHERE CAN I GET MOAR?

Also, my computer mouse is apparently about to click the bucket. The cursor keeps stopping at inopportune moments and it's probably only a matter of time before it ceases to function for good. I've all but given up WoW and Sims 2 as a result. It's probably just as well that I have a shiny new DS and PW and Pokémon to keep me occupied.

Plus, I'm going to see Dark Knight tomorrow. Excitement!

Oh, yeah, and I need to make a sketchpost sometime soon.

Attention, duelists Americans of my friendslist! (and why not everyone else too, if you feel like it)

I want to ask you something.

Let's say you're having a conversation with someone. They don't use your name once during that conversation. Will you notice? Do you consider this impolite or offensive?

I'm asking because I once noted to my mother how, in Hollywood movies, people seem to sprinkle their sentences with the names of the people they are currently talking to ("Well, Dave, I better get going now."), and how odd it seemed to me. She said that it's an American thing and that over there, people would consider it rude not to keep saying each other's names every now and then.

Is there any truth to this?
Because I know that here in Finland Ican bluff my way through entirely natural-sounding conversations with people whose names I can't for the life of me recall. People don't notice, because they don't generally expect to hear their own name in the middle of a conversation. Overall, I usually only have to resort to calling people by their names when I'm trying to get their attention, not when I'm already talking to them. As it can, at worst, take me up to two months to learn new names, this is a relief. Would that strike an American person as rude?

Just got back from seeing Sex and the City (shut up, it's a guilty pleasure of mine, much like Eminem's music [shut up]).

It was exactly like the TV series, which means that, for a Sex and the City movie, it was perfect. Not the best movie I've ever seen, no, but quite enjoyable nevertheless. It was also longer than a movie has any right to be. Of course, that seems to be the case with pretty much every movie I've watched in the past... 4 years? Not that 4 years' worth of movies amounts to all that many in my case.

I noticed they're still showing Iron Man in the local movie theatre. I wonder if I should go to see that, too. I'm pretty meh on the comics, but I've heard that it's a really fucking amazing movie.


ETA: Oh, yeah, also paid a visit to the local emplyment agency today, since I am now officially unemployed (at least until I find out if I got into that school). And I had to bother the folks at KELA (Social Insurance Institution) because they couldn't word their forms could any less clearly if they tried and I won't get a dime in the way of unemployment benefits unless I fill them. So I went in to have a few parts clarified for me.

Okay, so, I remembered an old riddle I once heard and was never told the answer to. It occurred to me that maybe my friendslist could help.
varoitusmerkki, I know you've heard this, too. If I'm misremembering a detail or you have the answer now, do tell.

So. Anyway.

A man enters a town. On the balcony of one of the houses he passes, there's a woman hanging laundry. The man pulls out a gun and shoots her. The police do nothing.

Why?

Now, if memory serves, the answer is not that the authorities never find out. They're aware of what happened, but the they take no action against the man who shot the woman.

It's more than likely that this riddle exists in a variety of forms with the exact same answer. If you know the answer to a similar riddle, it just might be the answer to this one, too.

Something I've been wanting to rant about for a while:

So, one or two years ago, there was an ad campaign in the finnish women's magazine MeNaiset (the name can be translated as WeWomen or UsWomen) to raise awareness of breast cancer. The ad features a picture of a shirtless woman dressed in pirate garb and wearing a large "eyepatch" over one missing breast.

Now, when I first saw it, I thought it was creative and powerful and would make people stop and think. But get this, apparently there were people who just plain missed the point and complained about the other breast, which was bare. I saw some discussion about it on the 'net some months ago and all I could think was: "We're FINNS, for God's sake! The average woman reading this magazine is between 25 and 60 years of age and must've seen thousands of boobs belonging to other women she's never even spoken with, thanks to public saunas and whatnot. Bare nipples in women's magazines are not unheard of, and the ad was not a sexual one, so I fail to see the problem.

I'm including the picture here for those of you who are interested:

( As much as I want to not cut it, I realize that not every country would consider it worksafe, especially taken out of context )

A bit of a c-c-c-combo breaker artpost to prevent three Harry Potter posts in a row. Because I know there are people on my flist who don't care about Harry Potter.

( Here's a handful of drawings for you to look at )

They're not going to air Mi Gorda Bella during the summer. D:

That means approximately three months' lack of more or less hot Venezuelan people screaming at each other in a language I don't really understand, being attracted to basically everyone but the person they're currently with and trying to kill each other when not masquerading as someone who doesn't actually exist. WHAT AM I GOING TO DOOO?

You'd think that would be the ideal summertime program, but no. I guess I'll have to tape a few episodes to watch over and over if I go into withdrawal, which I probably will, because I'm so hooked on the stupid telenovella that every weekday on six o'clock I just drop everything and sit down in front of the TV for the next 50 minutes.

Well, as usual, I'm exaggerating. Except for the "drop everything" part, because I do that. I don't throw tantrums if I'm not home at six, though. Yet.