Hour 36

Aaand I'm watching Alex play.  I got past the dude who thoroughly stymied me and instantaneously ran into another impossible boss which made love to me several times in the worst possible ways.  I simply was not high enough level.

It's a shame... we were neck in neck for so long, but somewhere along the line he inched ahead, and that inch got wider and wider probably as a result of the psychological effects of being behind, but also his (frankly) superior fighting strategies.

So he's fighting the first incarnation of Sin and it seems to be doing alright.  Heck, he may be able to do it!  As a "true sport" I truly do want him to beat it, because than I can still feel part of some kind of victory.  The victory of trying to do something silly and hilarious and succeeding.

Again thanks to the spectators.  Without you guys... well, honestly we probably still would have done it, but it sure made it less unpleasant having some pretty and smart folks milling around.

So I bid you all a fond farewell, and may all of your fantasies be final.

No wait, may your final fantasy come true...

Here, maybe I'll try to get the X in there:

May you finally engage in all of your disgusting X-rated fantasies.

s

Hour 34

We're nearing in on the longest FF Race of all time!  I'm both happy and sad about this!

Final Fantasy VII took a gruelling 37 hours, and we are 4 hours away from that crazy landmark, so here's... hoping?

I dunno.  I'm a good (bad) hour and half behind old beardy, corpse-arm and I don't particularly foresee catching up, but I'll keep trying.  Being a good sport is key to, if not happiness, at least a mild satisfaction.  The satisfaction of not being a big baby.

And I beat the boss who was wrecking my life!  Basically Haste seemed to be a non-starter, and I think I just got lucky too...  All the huge counterattacks just weren't successful.  Someone down there likes me!

The body achieved some kind of begrudging equilibrium where if I promise not to shock it with say, sunlight or vegetables, it'll try to find a way to not shut down and die.  It's a tenuous contract, but I trust that the two parties can make it work.

xoxo,

Robert Pattinson

Hour 32

Oh heavenly father.  Apologies for the late post (I imagine nearly 10 sets of teeth are a-gnashing).  Still at the exact same point as before.  Al and I have discussed it thoroughly (truth be told, fun stops for both when an enormous lead is taken) and we've pinpointed the difference in our strategy for this boss down to just one lil' spell:  Haste.  This may be the issue, or Al may have gotten legitimately lucky.  I am about to find out.  Stay tuned.

love,

your boy

ps: FUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.

Hour 30

So I just lost a major battle with Maester Seymour again... Alex was stuck for a while too, but I'm afraid I may not have enough levels to do it.  So, do I keep rolling the dice and wasting time that way, or do I take the precautionary approach and level up for a while?  

You'll have to stay tuned for the answer to that pretty obvious question, because I don't have all of my faculties!

So I mean, when I beat him, does that mean 4 hours left?  10?  Is it the halfway mark?  We just don't know!  And unfortunately (fortunately) I certainly can't give another night and day to this...

Oh well, watch and wait I suppose.  Mr. L is probably about 45 minutes ahead now, so I'm basically rooting for him to find the last level, last boss, etc.

Also, it pisses me off that I'm doing this right now.  What the hell.  It's a beautiful Sunday afternoon.  Maybe our last ever.  Crumbs.

s 

Hard as can be

Hello everyone,

This is a guest blog by Brian "the beej" James.  I'm a former roommate of Sandy and Alex'.  It's been at least 2 years since i've attended a Final Fantasy race and  I must admit that it's more entertaining than I remember.  The 2 big screens filled with impossibly proportioned magic women and She-creatures is way better than the tiny screens and 16 bit graphics that I remember from back in the day.  

When I walked in at 11am Sandy was in a battle for the ages against a giant stone punching machine man.  I was instantly caught up in the urgency of the situation.  The Stone punching man was nearly indestructible but only really had one form of attack.  Unfortunately the attack was punching Sandy's characters so so so hard.  So hard to death!!  "hard as can be.", as Sandy put it, trying to put a brave face on things.  Alex watched out of the corner of his eye, remembering how much he hated being punched so hard to death by this same character hours earlier.  Sandy did prevail in the end.  He found the combination of using one character to continually blind the puncher and another character to continually slice the puncher and still another impossibly beautiful she-character to continually keep the other 2 alive was the key to victory.

As I continued to  take it all in some familiar trends emerged.  It seemed that Sandy and Alex were neck in neck in the story line but while Sandy plunged forward recklessly the most direct route to victory, Alex took the time to strengthen and equip himself for what was sure to be the fight of his life at the end of the game.  I seem to remember this being the case years ago.  

Since Sandy has never ever one a FF race I would be tempted to question whether he ever learns from his mistakes but instead I find myself sympathizing.  It's so natural to just want to put yourself in a position where you COULD end up victorious instead of just doing a lot of busy work to be extra prepared.  I mean,  if you're willing to put your neck on the line and stand up to horrifying forces of evil on principle than isn't it really up to fate to hand you the victory?  Isn't it selfish to hoard "levels" and weapons and money while the people of Final Fantasy land suffer?   I respect Sandy's commitment to defeating evil over his commitment self improvement or even learning from past mistakes.  If Sandy doesn't win some sort of fluke David vs Goliath victory over his far superior foes than he can't be blamed.  He showed up.  He made a stand, and in way that's the real victory.  Right?  A moral victory.  

That's why when he asked me, "so do you think I'm gonna win?",  I replied, "well, if you don't win it's not your fault.  How bout that?"

It's not your fault Sandy.  It's just a cruel evil world that despises courage and won't cut you a break.

I realize I've focused a lot on Sandy to the exclusion of Alex but I don't really worry about Alex too much.  He can clearly take care of himself.  Because he's evil.

Thank you both for your courage against boredom, eachother, giant stone punchers and that smell.  

May fate favor the bold.

Sincerely,

the beej

Hour 28

Hey!  28 hours!  How great.  And Brian's here!  And Alex and I are basically tied!  It's all so great!!

I'm at a lower level though, so it may be getting a walloping when things get tricksy.

Also not great?  Exhaustion.  I keep dozing off and having deeply messed up 3 second dreams.  I'm a bit of a sleep talker, and I keep waking up with a very odd, potentially embarrassing sentence right on the tip of my tongue.  If I sleep even a couple seconds longer, who knows what may be revealed?

So right now we're on cat-mountain, and I had to beat a dude who punches THE HARDEST to get there.  So, obviously, things are going pretty darn well on the game-front anyway.

In the physical realm, there's a feeling that I have that seems related to hunger, but definitely isn't.  This particular feeling makes me never want to eat again, yet I don't want my stomach to be empty.  Perhaps I can stuff it with newspaper?

Please advise,

-s

Hour 26

There's an ethernet cable resting gently on a cupcake this fine Sunday morn.

My cat-man jumped very high and killed an angry ghost with stone on his back this fine Sunday morn.

Alex is mewling about the irregularities of his heartbeat this fine Sunday morn.

My cardiglazer (blazigan) has some mysterious stains this fine Sunday morn.

Aladdin's voice is enjoying a digital kiss!

Could this be the ruinous nadir of the experiment called Western civilization?

You betcha! ;D

l8er,

-s