So, a week ago, I went in for surgery to have my tonsils taken out and to get some other various work done on my nose and sinus. What they really did, I don't know. I should probably find that out or something. Either way, here is the chronicle of my journey under the knife.

I arrive at the hospital about 2.5 hours before my surgery is scheduled. Its around 9:30 in the morning and I'd much rather be in bed than walking through the hospital doors. I make a few turns and reach the ever ominous "day surgery admission" sign, which helpfully directs me to the desk where I sign myself in. I present my health card to the nurse there, who verifies that I am who I claim to be. It was an existential roller coaster, talking to this woman. She tells me to have a seat in the waiting area and someone will call my name.

Entering the waiting area, its full of people who share my predicament. Some look like they need surgery bad, which kind of sucks. There is a TV there, but its tuned to a really lame Canadian cable TV game show (Inside the Box for those interested), so that was of no help to me. Luckily, I brought a book with me as I figured I'd be waiting a while. I read the book for a while, chuckling to myself at its dry wit and humour, until it happened. They called my name. It was time.

A lovely older gentleman who was apparently a volunteer escorted me into a changing area where I had to put on one of those really uncomfortable hospital gowns. I put on the gown, feeling really weird and awkward in it and waited for someone to get back to me. So, I walked around the changeroom a few times and read the stuff on the walls. Apparently, hospital gowns are one size fits all and that should a gown be torn, it should be placed in an adjacent laundry hamper. One day, I will find out what happens to these unfortunate gowns. But before I could begin my in depth investigation into the location of the tattered garments, the volunteer guy came back and took me over the the pre-op area. Turns out, this wasn't as simple as I thought it was going to be.

The old man gives me some papers to give to a nurse who eventually comes around and she leads me to a bed and tells me to get comfortable. I climb into the bed and its all hard and well...hospital bed-like. The nurse says she'll be back in a second with some warm blankets for my left arm so they can get the IV ready. Now, no one told me that I would be getting an IV put in, and I've never had one before. So I start to freak out just a bit. The heart rate monitor they had on me definitely verified that as it was beeping like crazy. At least it didn't make any siren-like noises like it did for the guy in the bed next to mine.

The nurse comes back with a cart full of needles, tubes and IV solution bags. She raises the bed up to what seems like her height and tells me that "this may bite a bit". Let me tell you...she was not kidding. As the needle slid into my vein (which is apparently very strong and healthy), it hurt like a bitch and continued to do so until the endorphins kicked in. So, I had the IV in me, pumping me full of saline solution. At this point, my parents show up, so I've got a bit of company. We talk for a while until my surgeon comes by and talks to me. She tells me what she's going to do and about how long it should take. She also informs me that they're running behind so my surgery will be later than originally scheduled. Hurray. So, I sit there in pre-op for until around 1:45pm or so, someone comes to my bed and tells me that they're going to take me into the operating room.

They wheel me in there on the bed, which was pretty cool and all the nurses are getting ready. There are some sharp looking instruments lying around as well as various chemicals and tubes. I jump over to the operating table, which is hard, cold and scary. I crack a few jokes with the nurses, and we all laugh. They tell me to lay down and they hook me up to another heart monitor and blood pressure monitor. I swear, the readings must have been through the roof at this point. One nurse comes over and puts an oxygen mask on me while another one starts to administer the anesthetic that will knock me out. Now, I'd never been put under before, so I didn't know what to expect. Holy crap, it was easily the most intense experience ever. Better than any drug or alcohol I've ever had. I started feeling warm and dizzy, kind of like I was drunk, but then things got trippy as fuck. You know when the v-hold is out on a TV and the picture starts to roll? Yeah, that's what I was seeing. It was very cool, but unfortunately, it didn't last long. Soon after the rolling started, I went under.

The next thing I know, I wake up in some strange room with an oxygen mask on and a REALLY sore throat. Apparently, the surgery was over. At this point, I was super groggy and out of it, so I just went back to sleep and communicated using either a thumbs up or a thumbs down. Eventually, I get transfered up to a bed in one of the ward rooms for further recovery. I was still really groggy and out of it, so I don't remember too much. After a while, I came to and got really bored really fast. The pain medication they had me on was awesome, so I wasn't feeling any pain. After lying in the bed for about 4-5 hours, they discharged me and I got to go home. Hurray.

The next week involved my throat looking all gross and swollen while I sat on my ass, eating popsicles, drinking ginger ale, talking on MSN and playing copious amounts of Halo 3 and Guitar Hero. Both games I'm probably better than you at. Well, Jercurpac and AfroNinja are better than me at Guitar Hero. But that's it.

Also, if anyone finds two tonsils lying around, those are mine.

Here's the lowdown on what's happening in my life, quick-styles.

1. Old lease expired at end of August, did not renew lease. Moved out of apartment. All were sad.
2. Found new apartment...yay! Oh...I don't take possession until October 1? Fuck.
3. Living at home again sucks balls. At least its only a month.
4. Commuting an hour to work sucks.
5. Surgery on the 27th? Fuck.

Comments?

So, the other day I was needing some action, adventure and random Asians in my life. Seeing or knowing nowhere else to turn, I immediately looked into the depths of my DVD collection. Which incidentally, is better than yours. Scanning through the collection, one disc stood head and shoulders above the rest, with heavenly light raining down on it from some divine digital god. What movie is this, you ask? Why none other than the greatest movie of our generation, Big Trouble in Little China.

Just the mere thought of this movie makes other movies crap their pants. There's a reason Marlon Brando is dead and its Big Trouble in Little China. He saw it and it was simply full of too much awesomeness that his head exploded (like in that scene from Scanners). I'm pretty sure that if given the chance, this movie would kill you and everyone you love. Why? Its not for us to know. The movie is too bad-ass to play by anyone's rules.

Around this point, you may be asking yourself, "what makes this movie so awesome". Really, it boils down to three things. They shall now be presented in non-sequential order:

3. Some old Chinese mystic guy named "Egg".
- Seriously. His fucking name is "Egg". I mean, you have to be a complete badass to even get through elementary school with that name. I can only picture some Chinese school with Egg kicking every kid's ass for making fun of his name. Also, this guy is a mystic. Yeah, I know that sounds lame and World of Warcraft-ish, but when someone can magically create a knight using nothing but his hands and some random gem that is never really explained in the plot, it instantly becomes awesome. Let's see your level 60 rogue mage do that, mother fucker.

1. Lo-Pan.
- Enough said. This man is the epitome of movie bad guys. An immortal, mystic who can create knights using his fucking fingernails and is hell bent on world domination. Yeah, complex character development be damned, this guy is the greatest. He's actually kind of the anti-Egg in a weird sense. Also, he's got some kinky fetish for chicks with green eyes. While this may seem weird, the man knows what he likes in a woman. Also, he has his own army of ninjas and super ninjas. What other movie villain has that? Yeah, that's right. No one. I'll get back to the super ninjas later. Sure, he goes out like total bitch, but we will always remember him for what he was. Pure, concentrated bad-ass.

2. Kurt Russel in a wife beater, shooting guns.
- This was the role Kurt Russel was born to play. I don't even think he was acting. He was probably just living out a typical day in the life of Kurt Russel. Also, I think the wardrobe was either his too or leftovers from Escape From New York. I think they blew all of their budget on fingernail knights and forgot about Kurt Russel's costume. Whatever. His uzi was his costume. He didn't need anything else. Oh yeah...he was a truck driver. If that's not awesome and manly, I don't know what is. And frankly, I wouldn't want to know.

So, for those three reasons alone, you should have stopped reading this, gone to Best Buy and bought this movie for the low, low price of only $9.99. If you are still reading this, the movie had damned well better be in your DVD drive and running in the background. If you still need further convicing as to why this movie is face-meltingly awesome, read on, oh gentle reader.

Earlier on, I mentioned super ninjas. Yeah, there are super ninjas that have totally awesome powers and would kill you five times before you hit the ground. The first of them is, unfortunately the lamest. He's a guy who can shoot lightning and manipulate electricity. In other words, a Raiden rip-off. I mean, he even had the same hat. Hold on...wait a minute. This movie was made in 1986. Mortal Kombat didn't come out until like 1994. Correction. Super ninja 1 is the greatest of them all. He's the inspiration for Raiden. Yeah. Awesome. Super ninja 2 is your run of the mill "I'm good at everything" ninja who upon the realization of the Raiden ninja's originality has been demoted to lamest. He really doesn't have any powers, he's just an awesome fighter. Kind of like Batman. Yeah. He's their version of Batman. Super ninja 3 is someone, who much like my father is easily angered and when angered destroys things. I like to call him Angry McHamfists. He gets mad and becomes practically invincible. He also has the greatest death scene in the history of film. He gets so mad that he fucking explodes. Yeah. He kills himself with anger. Let's see Citizen Kane do that.

So, if by now, you still don't agree that this movie is the greatest work of film ever made, you are either clinically retarded or a robot. And since even retarded people would like this movie, you are a robot. Please program yourself some taste so you can enjoy this movie. For those non-advanced robots, bleep blorp bleep. So...stop reading this and go buy the movie already!

WOO WOOOOOO!

So, some of you might know that I have a particularly raging hard-on for roller coasters and anything theme park related. Those of you who didn't know, now know. Since I was down in Virginia last week, I decided to take a stop by Busch Gardens in Williamsburg to ride some rides and get my coaster fix settled for a little while. I figure I might as well start using this user page thingy with something. Sure, it might not be something good, but its something. And that's a start.

So, I got into the park around 10:45am and made a direct a path as the park would allow towards their newest roller coaster, Griffon. It was my main reason for really coming to the park since it was built just this year and looked all around badass in every picture/video I had seen of it. I got to the line and it was already an hour long wait. Luckily, there was a single rider line and no one I was with wanted to go on it. So, instead of waiting an hour, I waited maybe 20 minutes to get on the ride. Let that be a lesson to you, always use the single rider line for new attractions. So, as for my take on the ride? I felt it was a bit over-hyped. Sure, the drop was freakin' amazing and produced some nice floater airtime, but it was rather short and sort of a one trick pony, you could say. I still had a blast on it though, and I could probably put it somewhere in my top 10 coasters I've ridden. It gets a solid 8.5/10 in my books.

Next up was their inverted coaster, Alpengeist. I was walking by it and noticed that there was absolutely no line, so I just walked on the ride. I was on and off in about 5 minutes. Woot. Now, I had ridden this back in 1997 when it first opened, and again in 1999 and 2001 on other visits. The ride has gotten a bit rough in places, especially in the cobra roll, which was being taken at ridiculously high speeds. The transition into the mid-course brake run also gave my head a good whacking on the shoulder restraints. But, there was some good news to be had. The trim brake at the top of the lift wasn't on too hard, so it provided some of the intensity that was seen in 1997 when the ride opened. And the zero-G roll is still awesome. Best element in the entire park. Back when I first rode it, it blew my mind away, but it is lacking now. Overall, I would give it about a 7.75/10. Not quite worth that 80%, but a good ride, nonetheless.

After getting off Alpengeist, someone said "I want to ride DarKastle". So we did. Yeah...about that. The ride is supposed to be a kick-ass motion simulator like The Amazing Spider-Man at Universal's Islands of Adventure in Orlando, but it doesn't even come close to being as good as that. The ride was very, very, very underwhelming. The movie was blurry in places and didn't synch with the motion in a lot of areas. It kind of felt slapped together at the last moment. Needless to say, I won't be riding that again. It did have one cool part where it spun out of control for a bit, so it gets some redemption...I guess. Overall, it gets a 5/10.

After lunch at some crazy Oktoberfest-esque place, I hit up what was my first "big" coaster, Big Bad Wolf. Now, I knew this coaster wasn't meant to go fast or do crazy stuff like that, but the ride was really lackluster for some reason. It didn't swing much at all going through the first section of the ride and the swinging was even lackluster after the big drop. That big drop by the way was horribly braked to the point where I thought, "so, what's the point of the drop then". Maybe the coaster is just showing its age, I mean it is as old as I am. It was a resounding "meh" for me. Overall, about a 6.5/10.

So, after that ride, I did some walking around, looking at the awesome scenery of the park and taking some pictures. The park is absolutely breathtaking. Its easily the most beautiful park I've ever seen. Nature interacts extremely well with very detailed theming. If you can go, you should most definitely go, just to see the place. Its that nice.

I wandered for a bit and ran into my next coaster of the day, Apollo's Chariot. Again, I had ridden this in 1999 when it first opened and again in 2001. Both times, it didn't really do much for me in terms of airtime or forces of that nature. This time however, HOLY FUCKING SHIT! From the back row of the ride, I got crazy ejector airtime over every hill that should definitely not be on a B&M designed coaster. For those of you who read this far and are coaster geeks like me, it was acting more like an Intamin coaster than a B&M. Awesome. The thing was freakin' hauling ass through the course and the trim brakes were barely even noticeable if on at all. That was what a hyper coaster should be, full of crazy-ass airtime and lots of fun. It was easily the best ride I had in the park all day as well as the biggest surprise, too. The ride couldn't have been any better...10/10.

Although that was the best ride of the day, I needed to get one more coaster in before I could be satisfied, the classic (read: old) Loch Ness Monster. For being built in the 1970's by a certifiable nutjob, the thing still runs pretty damn good. And the interlocking vertical loops never get old. The hill going into the first loop was pretty heavily braked, but that was my only real problem with the ride. Its not showing its age at all. A nice fun ride from a simpler time in roller coaster design. 7/10

After that, I did some more walking around, hit a few water rides to keep myself cool since it was well over 100 degrees outside and I didn't feel like paying $4.00 for a drink or $6.00 for a beer at one of the drink stand things. I hit up Griffon one more time, bought one of those on-ride photos since mine was hilarious (and no, there's no way I'm posting it here) and then decided to call it a day. All in all, it was a great day at a great park. Again, if you ever have the chance to go to Busch Gardens, either in Tampa or in Williamsburg, definitely take the opportunity. You won't regret it.