I finished up my last half-day of shadowing with Mardis Howell and Doug Barton in telecom. I got to see a lot of radio equipment and fiber switching in the various communications rooms we visited, covering from the peak penthouse to the lower-most basement of the APCO building. I was quite surprised to learn that a substantial amount of Southern’s older network infrastructure is built off of digital microwave radio. In truth, I really didn’t realize that long-distance radio commuinications were even viable for high-speed networks. After the tours were over, I thanked everyone and made a small excursion to Inverness.
I skipped lunch and made for the Southern Nuclear building, where I found Doug McComb, a good friend of my father’s and an all-around nice guy. I mean, I just showed up out of the blue and he made time to share some of his experiences with me and even offered to buy me lunch. I thanked Doug and went next door to meet with SNC IT manager David Cox, also unannounced. I caught David just before a meeting, but he graciously offered to make time for me afterward. David has done very well in the company and I felt like he was the kind of person I could learn a lot from. I shared my thoughts on the company and probed for opinions on graduate school, MBA’s, and the work environment. I felt like the meeting went very well and I think I got a lot out of it.
On the way out of town, I did some quick shopping. I found Dark Cloud for $7.99 used and Star Ocean: The Second Story new for $19.99 at EB Games. Star Ocean sells for upwards of $30 used on eBay, so I felt like it was quite a lucky find. I wouldn’t have even gotten it if I hadn’t asked. I also searched for a CD binder to compress my games shelf to a more manageable size, but I couldn’t find just what I was looking for.
Vance didn’t get to see his friends again today, so he had to put up with his cousin instead. We pushed closer to the end of Tales of Symphonia. The road to Yggdrasill is littered with teary farewells and cheesy reunions. I can’t say I was terribly impressed.
Cribbage matches resumed as Aunt Kathy and I teamed against Mom and Granddad. We won each game until Grammy subbed for Granddad; we promptly lost afterward. I’m still unsure how much luck plays a factor in Cribbage. I feel like there is a strategy to the play, but one can only do so much with a crummy hand.
I put in a motion for Baskin-Robbins after Cribbage. I had my favorite Daiquiri Ice; Mom and Aunt Kathy had Margarita Ices. Aunt Kathy wasn’t enthused with her Margarita Ice, but then she didn’t like my Daiquiri Ice, either. There’s no accounting for taste.
Vance showed me Tales of Symphonia, a cel-shaded RPG for the GameCube featuring anime cutscenes. The real-time battle system reminds me of another RPG I liked quite a bit: Star Ocean: The Second Story. Tales is the first cel-shaded game I’ve experienced first-hand. The effect is interesting, but not revelatory. Tales also sports multi-player support, but Players 2–4 are limited to control within battle. The camera only follows Player 1 so control can be difficult.
Achieving a concensus for dinner proved to be more difficult than I expected. We settled on LaBamba, but Granddad opted to stay home. Vance and I rode separately so we could go our own way after dinner. I quickly started to feel like a fifth wheel after we ran into Vance’s friends at the mall; Vance did say they were mallrats, after all. Vance eventually did eventually find his GameCube 1019 memory card.
The PlayStation 2 game console I had purchased arrived. It’s lightly used with all cables and documentation in the original box. The seller included Kingdom Hearts and Medal of Honor: Frontline for good measure. The plan is to hook up the PS2 through my monitor and somehow route the audio through my PC speakers. I’m uncertain exactly how to do the audio, though.
I was pulled aside to help set up a special batch of laptops for our maintenance training department. These machines are not leased equipment so we generally aren’t obligated to service them. Billy made the exception and Nate needed help so I was pulled off workstation deployment. It worked out well because we set up shop in a quiet trailer where I could load workstation images on the laptops and pump tunes from my iPod through a set of cheap speakers.
I hit the road directly from work, taking Highway 95 North to Abbeville and cutting over to 431 from there. I arrived at the Roberts’ house around 4:30 p.m.
This was the first time I’ve seen Vance since he returned from Japan. He brought back a copy of “Tenjo Tenge” Vol. 1 at my request and a cool T-shirt from the Hard Rock Cafe Tokyo. The Roberts treated me to a dinner at the Ruby Tuesday in Auburn. After dinner, Aunt Kathy and I played two-hand Cribbage. Aunt Kathy and I split two games of Cribbage. She landed a monster 24-point hand in the second game that pretty much sealed my fate. Vance showed me some of his pictures from Japan and, in return, I showed him some of my pictures from China.
I was also introduced to Kingdom Hearts for the PS2. It appears to be another classic Squaresoft game in Disney clothing. The combat system seems more akin to the Secret of Mana series than the Final Fantasy series. Seems like exactly the kind of game I could spend all too much time playing given the chance.
With most of my work out of the way, I made it a true Saturday. With the arrival of another stack of manga on Friday, I was able to resume the excellent “GTO” manga series. “GTO” aside, I was absorbed in Morrowind for much of the day. It’s amazing how large the game feels and at the same time, how small it is in comparison to its predecessor Daggerfall. The latter truly defined the epic CRPG. Speaking of which, I noticed that Bethesda has released the first Elder Scrolls game Arena as a free download in celebration of the series’ tenth anniversary. It might also be worth checking out.
