First day of "real" work

Today was the first day of my actual, realistic, "socially accepting" day of work. I changed from Sunday through Thursday (3:30 pm to midnight) to Monday through Wednesday and Friday and Saturday (10:30 AM to 7:30 PM). I am glad I was moved off of typical customer service calls and onto AoL (Assumption of Liability) calls. Basically, I move wireless phone lines from one account to another. I handle those almost all the time. Out of my team, I am the only one who does them. I listen to all the bad calls that happens, and I feel sorry for them. I rarely have to deal with it anymore. Yay!

I have been watching pretty heavily the anime known as Darker Than Black. I am only four episodes away from finishing the series, and if it finishes along the same lines as how it has been progressing, it may very well become my second favorite anime. The series reminds me of Heroes, in a way. A very dark, evil form of Heroes. More evil than Heroes can become. And better written.

Gwah! Nothing more to say! Oh noes!

~Koubo

As we draw this meeting to a close...

One week left in training, then what is left of my training class at ACS goes to the status of 'regular employee.' It is about freaking time! Eight weeks of training is long!!!

It has been interesting, though. After two days taking customer care calls, our class was trained to do 'assumption of liability (AOL)' calls, which is basically where we move phone numbers from one account to another, and create accounts if necessary. Although all of us were trained to do it, only six of us (out of 30) ended up staying with that type of call, myself included. I like them, they are easier (due to constant repetition) and the customers are generally happier when calling in to complete them.

I also completed, after some great, great length of time, the third and final part of my Clannad posts on The Collateral Otaku, titled "~After Story~." It took me a long time for a few reasons. Clannad has a particularly close position to my heart; I wasn't sure if I wanted to give all the main details (you will see what I mean if you have read the first two posts in the series and then read this one); and Batman: Arkham Asylum was released, which took up a lot (no exaggeration) of my free time, if not all of it. I plan to do a review article on Batman, by the way. That shouldn't take nearly as long to post something about.

Oh well. I am now watching an interesting anime called "Darker Than Black." I have only seen a couple of episodes, but it has caught my attention. Until next time, I am off.


~Koubo

End of week three

One more week of classroom-only training, then it is transitioning into taking actual calls and learning from mistakes before we do it full time. I am exhausted.

Seriously. But it has been quite fun. I had some issues with some of my fellow employee-classmates, but those have been resolved and now, for an honestly inexplicable reason, I seem to get along with all of them just fine.

And this blog continues to not get much attention due to most of it being focused on the other blog. What Bryson and I are writing there is good stuff.

Well, I will now rest from crazy work.


~Koubo

Posting

Uguu~

Sorry I don't post on this blog as much as you or even myself would like. Granted, this is the blog watched by more people. But I am enjoying the blog Bryson and myself are working on, and writing for that is taking up what little time work and sleep are leaving me. But like I said, I enjoy it. You should support it. We put a lot of effort, heart and soul into it. We want it to be alive. Support it, please. Read our stuff and leave comments.

The Collateral Otaku

Anyway, work is going pretty well. Tiring, but well. We just entered into our second week of training. The material isn't hard to understand; the difficult part is remembering it all, and especially remembering it when we are on the phones with customers and have to remember where to find the information they are asking about.

I suppose I should explain who I work for and what I will be doing. I work for a company called ACS (Affiliated Computer Services), and the branch of the worldwide company that I am in is one of many that handles the customer service calls for Verizon Wireless. And in four to six weeks, I will be one of those Customer Service representatives. This should be entertaining, at least.

I will try to keep this updated at LEAST once a week, but I make no promises. The Collateral Otaku, on the other hand, is updated several times a week, and should be checked out. And commented on.

Later!

~Koubo

The video game movies epidemic

I hate movies/shows based off of video games. Too few have any potential, and they can potentially ruin the franchises they are based off of. Two in particular are making me mad.

This is a movie in the works based on Warcraft. Who cares if it is produced by Legendary Pictures (one of my favorite movie companies), and directed by the man who directed the Spider-Man movies? It is a great game series. It may be a good movie. I still hate the idea, and will continue to hate it until I die.

Here, here, and here all state the existence of a work in progress of a Halo anime. There was a movie in the works a few years back, but that was scrapped. So, in a new move, they decide that an anime may bring in the same amount of dough as a movie? Both are bad ideas.

Article after article after article state that movies based off video games are unsuccessful. And those are just some examples. Articles about the topic are all over the internet, like a plague.

Movies based off of video games need to stop.

Based on the last link's researched information, Mortal Kombat was the highest rated video game-movie adaptation to date (it was posted in April of this year) according to Metacritic, with a measly score of 58 out of 100. Only two professional reports gave it anything above a 70.

At least Blizzard didn't give the movie priveleges to Uwe Boll, who has an impressive track record of making bad movies.

I post no pictures on this post, they remind me of the stupidity of this field of releases.

I may regret asking this, but what do you think about this atrocity?

~Koubo

End of week one

Week one of eight for my job training is now over. I am exhausted. Seriously.

Thankfully, I don't hate the place I am working at. Nor do I hate anyone in my training class. Yes, it is a class. Training is like you were taking a college class there. Everyone is very lively, active, and there for a reason, so distractions from trying to learn anything is at an absolute minimum. The teacher is nice, the lessons are easy to understand. Things are going well. I have made many friends.

I even ran into my last missionary field companion. He works there, and is in his fourth week of training.

I hope things continue like this. I would like that a lot.

~Koubo

Out with a bang...

It was my (second) last day in the deli department yesterday. I got a new job at ACS down in Salt Lake, and will be starting there tomorrow. I still work at bowmans; Randy (the meat department manager) really wants me to continue cleaning the department for as long as I can.

People were sad(?) to see me go, as is evident by this cake...


There was a little party, but it was almost stopped completely by a store-wide failure of cooling units. Walk-in coolers and cooled display cases in the dairy, meat department, and deli suddenly stopped working. All of us took our stuff out of the cases that we could and put them all in the freezer to save them. I took a picture of the deli case after we emptied it. I doubt anyone will ever see it that empty for a long time...


That is just all the ends in there, since we WERE still technically open when it happened. The stuff was only in the freezers for about half an hour, though. The cooling guy came and fixed everything. Still, it caused a decent commotion amongst the departments.

~Koubo

not as angry at Blizzard anymore

Blizzard has no doubt been pounded with more than just two sites about why they won't support LAN, but the two sites I referenced can be seen at my other blog.

I would still love LAN play, since that was basically the only form of multiplayer I did with StarCraft I, but what Blizzard says at least has some sense to it.

~Koubo

Snowman in July '09

(The snow is just a pile.)


(The means of transportation to bring said snow out of the mountains and into Farmington.)



(Working on the snowman.)

(The finished snowman, with everyone that helped at some point or another.)

(The finished snowman with nobody around.)

This event has, apparently, been going on for AT LEAST 27 years, said one lady that was there. This was my first year doing this, and I loved it.

I went to work shortly afterwards, and when I said I helped build a snowman this morning, they all asked, "out of what?" or something similar. What would you build a snowman out of? If you say poo, it would be a pooman, or if you said rocks, it would be a rockman. Duh.

It took between one and two hours to get it up and finished. I have no idea how much time it took to drive up the mountains, grab the snow, drive back, and drop all the snow off. *update* They went up farmington canyon at 6 am, grabbed a bunch of snow, put it in a truck, and came back. It took a couple of hours. Thank you Zach, for the information.

It was fun. To see the larger album, go to the album on my Facebook page for the album.

Jealous?

~Koubo

Up and running

The Collateral Otaku is up and running, and has a couple of posts now. You all should check it out. Often. Not necessarily because it has my own posts, but because it's purpose is to inform you all about the things we love and read about often, and to inform you of them. And with (currently) three of us posting, it should get filled pretty fast.

Based on the first major post from that site, as well as the random picture posted on my first post for this blog, you can probably guess that I like Clannad, which is true, but also an understatement.

Now, I head off to make a snowman.

~Koubo

The other blog

Out of some sort of irony, I came up with the name of my other blog shortly after I posted the last story on this blog. Check it out. But, like, tomorrow evening. I don't have time to do anything on it yet.

The Collateral Otaku

Myself, my sister, and my best friend will all be posting on it from time to time.

~Koubo

Baaah!

Okay, okay. I changed my mind. Until I can get the other blog up and running (just needing a name for it), I will do reviews and thoughts on animes and games and such here. Todays is Hayate no Gotoku!! Well, I will introduce it to you all.

A quick rundown of what happened to him.

Christmas rolls around, and Hayate is trying to earn money so his family can have a good christmas. He is the one earning the money, since his parents are idiots, and refuse to work. He gets fired because his employer found out he was underage, and when he goes home, his parents left him a 158 million yen debt as a christmas present. Conveniently, the debt collectors come to get him, since the debt was obviously not paid, but Hayate escapes.

No money, and no house to go to, he tries to figure out what to do. Then he sees a girl, who obviously looks really rich, and decides to kidnap her and hold her ransom for the amount he was put in debt for. Before he could get to her, a couple of other men approach her and start to hit on her, and he leaps in to save her. She was grateful, and then wants to thank him somehow. He decides to ask her if he could kidnap her, but he says it totally wrong, and she takes it as him wanting to go out with her. She gives him her number so he can call her guardian, and he leaves to make a call about kidnapping her. But thanks to not being able to do it right, someone else kidnaps her and he ends up saving her again. The girl, who is named Sanzenin Nagi (in Japan, last names go first, remember?), decides to take him and make him her butler.

That is really the only thing that needs to be known for the rest to make any sense at all.

This is Hayate, and his master, Nagi.


(Hayate on the left, Nagi on the right)

And... Hayate in a maid outfit. It is becoming common knowledge among the characters in this anime that Hayate looks unnaturally good in girls clothes, so much so that he generally looks better than most girls would in the same clothes.


(Hayate is a boy. BOY.)

The episodes I watched just recently were about this girl, Katsura Hinagiku (most people call her Hina). She is my favorite character.



She is apparently in the same situation as Hayate. A large debt was forced on her and her sister by her parents. From what I gathered, however, they were able to pay most of it off due to her sister dealing in... questionable actions.

This is a clean anime, so get those dirty thoughts out of your head. I guess I could have used the word "dubious" like wikipedia.

Anyway, it is also her birthday in the latest episodes, so everyone gives her some presents, and Hayate, whom she has a crush on, forgets until the last minute that it was her birthday due to being cursed by a hina doll maker that liked to cross-dress. He comes to see her at the last minute and gives her some home-made cookies.

I recommend this show to everyone. I haven't seen an episode yet where I haven't laughed.

I am off to watch more anime. I may comment about the next episode, or I definitely will if I can start up the other blog by then.

~Koubo

Blog created?

Erm, I failed. I never intended to blog, but that changed a month or so ago. So here we are, and here I am with one now created. This may end up being my personal blog, since my original blog intention was to make one dedicated to news, reviews, and previews of video games, manga, and anime, and I wanted to come up with a name for it that would match what it conveys.

I may still end up doing some of that here, but I don't have that motive at the moment I am writing this.

Oh well, here's a Clannad picture.