A Pixelated Mind » pixelated gaming

Prospie Week Games

Pixel — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 00:44:12 +0000

As part of our program here, every year we have to convince a new gaggle of prospective first years (‘Prospies’) to come to our program. The program sets them up in a nice hotel, treats them to good food, shows them the campus, and even lets them go to a few classes. They trust the current graduate students to pick them up at the airport, drive them around, and take them out in the evening. We even have a party.

Naturally, this opens up the ground for fun games at the prospies’ expense.

I’m making a list of things all of the current graduate students could do while the prospies are here. The winner will be whoever does most.

Who can make the most Facebook friends with prospies.
Who can get the most prospies to hug them.
Who can get into a drinking contest with a prospie (and win).
Who can get into a philosophical argument with a prospie and make him concede the point.
Who can get a prospie to tell them a secret (extra points if it is a member of the opposite sex).
Get honesty from a Super Prospie (a prospie with multiple acceptances to top-ranked programs. Honesty would be something along the lines of “I just came here for the free trip.”).

There is also another, top secret game between me and another graduate student here. One of us is trying to get at least five people to decide not to come here and the other is trying to thwart that goal.

Update: I was just reminded that we were also supposed to get a sex story from the prospies or get a kiss from them. Although I imagine that if anyone is actually going to get either of those, then they’ll win the contest by default.

Anyone have any ideas for other games?

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Laughing while doing the ‘daily grind’

Pixel — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 06:08:54 +0000

Here’s a fun game I call the ‘euphemizer.’ Basically, come up with a nickname for your naughty parts that is also jargon you hear in your work/field/profession.

I call mine the “Nomological Dangler.” What’s yours?

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Have you ever seen American Pie?

Pixel — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 06:37:54 +0000

At the basketball game:

Me: Who’s Apple Pie?

John: She’s the last cheerleader on the right. The blond one.

Me: Dude. She looks like she’s Thirteen.

John: You don’t think I should call her Apple Pie?

Me: To be honest, no.

John: What do you think, then? Peach Pie? Blueberry Pie?

Me: Blueberry would be better: it is the Duke BLUE Devils.

John: Pumpkin Pie? Pecan Pie?

Me: I don’t know, but definitely not Cherry Pie.

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Logical Fallacy Sheet

Pixel — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:27:43 +0000

So, you might be wondering what I’ve been doing since this post. If you guessed reading and studying for some major things I have to do…. you’re WRONG.

I’ve been making a Spot the Logical Fallacy Cheat Sheet for my party in two weeks. Actually, the idea has been pinging around the Internets for a little bit now and people seem to really be responding to it. I’d link to the sites, but I don’t want to connect my professional life with my blog in any serious way.

Anyway, I should probably go do something productive…

This should be fuuuunnnn

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Spot the Logical Fallacy

Pixel — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 15:11:26 +0000

While I was watching the political convention last week (and the week before as well, actually), it astounded me at how often the speakers would resort to obvious logical fallacies. I counted five false dichotomies and four straw men within the Sarah Palin speech alone. Now, just to not be political: I’m sure Joe Biden also committed a whole bunch of logical fallacies, I just didn’t think about it until I heard Sarah Palin ‘poison the well‘ against Barack Obama.

As a result, I’ve decided to throw a ‘Spot the Logical Fallacy’ party during the first debate September 26. You can participate too, but I probably won’t be paying as much attention to you as I will to my guests. I’ll come up with a list of logical fallacies, along with their definition, and print them out in a handy two-sided sheet.

Here are the rules:

The first person to spot a logical fallacy must exclaim it, but only AFTER the speaker commits the fallacy.
The winner is the person who catches the most logical fallacies.
After the debate, a discussion on psychological, rhetorical, and propagandistic techniques will commence, but nobody is allowed to have a debate over the issues, unless there is a direct appeal to their logical consequences.
No headbutting is allowed.

Update: Wow, speak of the devil. Someone seems to have come up with the same idea at around the same time as me. Weird..

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Grad School Games

Pixel — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 00:44:29 +0000

98. I have terrible posture, but I’m working on it.

This is basically just the Pixelated Games taken to grad school, so I’ll just introduce the games as I develop them, rather than try to make this a running Olympic-style series:

The Syllabus Hunt

Participants have seven days to collect as many syllabi as they can. They may sit in on the classes, or e-mail the professors for them, but they may not print out syllabi from school Web sites (unless they are registered for the class).

Rules:

No sharing syllabi, nor borrowing or stealing syllabi from other people.
No revealing the nature of the game.
No one can suspect that you are not actually in the class.
You may not actually lie to anyone. If anyone asks you your name, you must be honest, even if it violates rule 2.
Violating rule 2 or rule 4 disqualifies you, so try not to be asked any questions

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AIM Transcripts II: How to screw with a person’s sanity

Pixel — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 08:33:57 +0000

44. I’ve driven across the country 8 times. On 7 of those occasions, I had nobody accompany me. Several of those trips involved 12 hours of driving or more at any given time. Four were all in one go. It is a mind-altering experience to spend 33 solid hours driving. I wasn’t the same person on January 4, 2004 as I was on January 6.

First, read this. It says stuff like this:

My memory is failing me. To be fair, it’s been failing me as long as I can remember (*rimshot*) but it seems to be getting worse with time.

A good friend of mine pointed out to me recently that I couldn’t remember having been in the same class with him just a few years ago (andI still can’t remember no matter how hard I try, but to my credit I don’t remember ANYONE ELSE either. I’d forget I was in the class entirely if all the subject material wasn’t stlil so fresh in my mind).

…When I worked as a secretary I reguarly forgot to tell my boss when her husband called. Two hours after he’d called I’d look up and say, “Oh yeah, your husband called, he said he was outside waiting for you so you guys could go to lunch. Umm….I guess he’s gone now?” No wonder I got fired.

…What was the point of this entry…? Hey look at the time! I should really get started on that term paper.

Then, read this:

Her
Hey when am I getting that first chapter of my book back?

Me
Um. Sunday?

Her
which sunday?

Me
Sunday the 20th

Her
Of this month?

Me
Of April

Her
of this year?

Me
Yeah, no promises

Her
well…I don’t need it NOW. I have two term papers and a final due in the next few weeks. but I don’t want you to completely forget about it

Me
I’m sorry, forget about what?

Her
how the hell should I know? you contacted ME

Me
Who did? Who ARE you?

And our little operetta begins:

Her
I’m your worst nightmare. Or that chick that you sometimes talk to. Pix…were you REALLY in the Paradoxes class?

Me
YES!!

Her
lol. Why the hell can’t I remember?

Me
Wow. just wow

Her
I feel like such a jerk. Was I just totally OUT OF IT that whole semester or what? Jeez…. It’s not that I don’t believe you. I just have no way of knowing if you’re lying because I CAN’T REMEMBER! It’s like I have some weird spotty amnesia or somehting. You’d think I’d remember the one class we had together in college. That was the only one right?

Me
Where the spot just blots out my face and nothing else. NO!

Her
Oh God, don’t tell me…

Me
wow You’re like self-absorbed or something

Her
No, it doesn’t just blot out your face. It blots out EVERYONE’S face. What other class did we have together? in college

Me
Ancient Philosophy

WILD GUESS! I never even took that class!

Her
What?? What the hell? Weren’t we friends in college or what? Didn’t we talk to each other?

Me
*sigh* I talked to YOU. jeez. what. the. hell. seriously. ouch. that hurts

Her
Okay, I am seriously freaking out here. What the hell is wrong with my memory? I’m sorry :{ I’m not doing in on purpose. What the hell is wrong with my memory seriously? I remember being in classes with you in high school pretty distinctly

Me
uh huh
yeah
sure
whatever myrna
whatever

Her
hell I remember when we went to the art museum with Mr. Perez
I remember YOU convinced me to get into AP History
And that I have your voice on tape somewhere where you read some passage for me for a project

Me
And I remember YOU were in my high school or something

Her
I remember all kinds of stuff from high school. :{
I’m sorry!! Why can’t I remember?? Who else was in ancient?

Me
K-Bobb? Vincent!

Let me stop here for a bit, use the “below the fold” line, and inform you that these are both names I pulled out at random. I was never really in her ancient philosophy class, I just wanted to see how long I could keep it up. *ahem* Below the fold.

(...)
Read the rest of AIM Transcripts II: How to screw with a person’s sanity (1,107 words)

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When wrong number text messages fight back

Pixel — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 01:09:53 +0000

27. I have scars on each wrist that look like I tried to kill myself with an ice pick. The true story, sadly, is far more lame.

(Apparently this happens to me quite often. Check out these posts: 1, 2, 3. Then see this one for something a bit different.)

Wrong number text message:

From: +19153281605
To: Me
03/23/08 18:03

Hey thats MEST up

My reply:

From: Me
To: +19153281605
03/23/08 18:05

Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize I’d taken the door off and left the microwave on instead of house sitting this week.

Them:

03/23/08 18:08

Oh cool lol i guess so are you going to wear your beach gear

Me:

03/23/08 18:11

Yeah, to go hiking, then to the prom. You?

Them:

03/23/08 18:14

Wat you mean

Me:

03/23/08 18:17

Wait. This is Gladys, right?

Them:

03/23/08 18:19

Yeah why

(...)
Read the rest of When wrong number text messages fight back (359 words)

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Unnecessary Qualifiers

Pixel — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 07:43:56 +0000

17. When I was in high school, I would relentlessly tease a kid I couldn’t stand by giving him nicknames. I also teased people I really, really liked by giving them nicknames. The fact that I treated people I hated and people I liked in the same way always seemed schizophrenic, but it amused me just the same. I don’t do that anymore, because most of the people that still talk to me are people I feel neutral toward. I wonder if there’s any connection…..

Here’s a fun game: in a regular conversation, throw out qualifiers which raise more questions than they answer. Example:

My day was fine. Unlike some people, I didn’t accidentally have my fly down all day.

I haven’t ever been caught cheating on my girlfriend.

~~I don’t have herpes anymore.~~ No, I don’t have herpes outbreaks.

I was really good last week: I didn’t pick up any hookers.

I didn’t stab any hobos… last night.

Get it? These are all true statements, but the unnecessary qualifiers completely change their meaning. You try!

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Pros and Cons of ‘Horse’

Pixel — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 21:25:04 +0000

Actual conversation:

Pixel: Okay, let’s list the pros and cons of Heroin. I’m for it. PRO: New circle of friends.

Yoshi: But you get AIDS.

Pixel: Good point… okay, PRO: Learn valuable skills in using hypodermic needles.

Yoshi: CON: You lose all of your teeth.

Pixel: I think that’s meth.

Yoshi: Okay, CON: You lose all of your former friends.

Pixel: That’s good, that’s good. Okay, PRO: It feels really good.

Yoshi: CON: You use it too much and it doesn’t feel so good anymore.

Pixel: PRO: Yeah, but it feels really, really good.

Yoshi: CON: So does sex.

Pixel: PRO: Sex with heroin would be even better still.

Yoshi: CON: You won’t be able to get a girlfriend if you’re on heroin.

Pixel: PRO: You don’t need one, there’s plenty of heroin-using attractive women.

Yoshi: CON: That are all gangly and disgusting.

Pixel: PRO: So are you.

Yoshi: CON: But they have AIDS.

Pixel: PRO: Needle exchanges lessen fear of HerpeAIDS.

Yoshi: CON: You get arrested.

Pixel: PRO: Free housing.

Yoshi: CON: You die.

Pixel: PRO: You really live.

Yoshi: CON: Track marks.

Pixel: PRO: “Euphoria Trails.”

Yoshi: CON: Sell all of your possessions.

Pixel: PRO: Ask anyone who has both done and not done heroin, they’ll tell you that it was worth it.

Yoshi: Actually, no they won’t they’ll tell you it ruined their lives and they are better off without it.

Pixel: Good point. So I guess we agree: both sides are equal. We should teach the controversy and let people decide.

Yoshi: Okay, Mike Huckabee.

Pixel: I mean, if you’re not into Heroin, that’s your addiction. If you are, then that’s your addiction too. Both are equal.

Yoshi: You need a job, bad.

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An Audience of Two

Pixel — Tue, 25 Sep 2007 07:11:32 +0000

Sometimes the people I write silly letters to are foolish enough to respond to me. They do this for a variety of reasons including being ‘nice,’ finding me ‘interesting,’ and writing ‘cease and desist’ letters.

That’s usually the part I look forward to. (Not the cease and desist letters– although that is fun–, just people writing back.) You see, after most correspondence, the previous messages between the two writers is included.

Example:

2: dancing LOL

1: What r u doin’????

2: Come chill with me at the club. is FUN!!!1!! OMG

I’d clean that up, but that’s really what messages between people really look like: yucky.

It’s so yucky, in fact, that most people just skip past it, thinking they already read it. This is where my anti-socialness and constant need to write to entertain myself pays off.

Whenever I start to notice that the tail-end of a conversation has become rather lengthy (hereby defined as messages averaging 40+ kb), I start to tweak it just to see if anyone will notice.

Example:

2: dancing LOL

1: What r u doin’????

2: I ate a big sub and it gave me gas. How FUN!!1! OMG

The trick is to keep the length and end of the messages about the same.

I first started it as a way of sneaking messages to people in the hopes that once we stopped talking (as inevitably happens), they would eventually peruse an e-mail or two — and rather than read each e-mail individually, they’d read the attached “original messages” — and get my hidden notes. This would cause them to check every e-mail I ever wrote to them, and, in reading them, they would just laugh and laugh…

This has never happened. In fact, nobody has ever realized that the messages I forward are never the same messages twice.

I’ve probably written a novel’s worth of unread messages now, but I’m not going to stop. It’s just so much fun to write things that nobody will ever see. I feel like the writers for the Daytime Emmys.

(p.s. Don’t check your e-mail. I did it to everyone but you

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I’m immune to guilt

Pixel — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 19:24:21 +0000

“Don’t tell me you’re actually going to listen to my advice. I give bad advice on purpose! Listening to my advice is a very bad idea. I’d advise you against that.”

- Pixel to friend Moira on advice he’d just given her about boys

In looking for an image to perfectly illustrate this post, I realized that in the movie Bambi, we never actually see Bambi’s mother getting shot. This, obviously made me very sad.

To cheer myself up, I went to my St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital collector’s cards. I have nine so far and hope to collect them all before Chili’s stops running their “create a pepper” promotion. This promotion, as far as I can tell, is specifically aimed at depressing people who wish to eat a good meal.

On Sept. 24 of this year, Chili’s will donate all of its profits to St. Jude’s. To prepare everybody for this, they’ve been scaring away their clientèle for weeks with special St. Jude coasters that each have a picture and profile of a different sad child’s story.

Now, like most people, when something gets so sad that you either cry or laugh, I laugh. Often uproariously. It’s just so sad that it causes a gut reaction. In my case, most of my gut reactions lead to some form of humor. It’s a real problem, actually…

Anyway, here are some of the saddest stories I could ever imagine and I read them all within ten minutes while waiting for a meal.

Taylor, age 4: Just three months after her adoption was finalized, wide-eyed, rambunctious Taylor was diagnosed with Wilms tumor.
(...)
Read the rest of I’m immune to guilt (226 words)

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Why does everyone wrong number text message me?

Pixel — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 21:31:44 +0000

Them:

From: +19152614940
To: +19158678669
07/02/07 15:08
Hey sexy thing what you doing

Me:

From: +19158678669
To: +19152614940
07/02/07 15:10
Plotting. What about you? Umm… equally sexy thing?

Them:

07/02/07 15:13
Well just here cooking getting things ready for tomorrow what’re you plotting??

Me:

07/02/07 15:15
Revenge. No, just kidding. I’m not. I’m plotting vengeance.

Them:

07/02/07 15:17
Lol your funny

Me:

07/02/07 15:20
I know. It’s a chronic medical condition. I can’t help it. Thanks for bringing it up, you insensitive bastard!

It gets boring from here.

(...)
Read the rest of Why does everyone wrong number text message me? (136 words)

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Seventh Generation Insustainability

Pixel — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 06:43:40 +0000

“Does the word ‘selection’ in Natural Selection imply a conscious agent?”
Don’t be silly. Natural Selection is named that to contrast with Artificial Selection, which has gone on since agriculture developed or since the first tamed animals (whichever came first).

So when I drive down my road and I run over a cute bunny, is that artificial selection or natural selection? Suppose I kill every cricket in my house or every dog in my neighborhood, what sort of selection pressure is that?

The Iroquois had a law: “In every deliberation we must consider the impact on the seventh generation… even if it requires having skin as thick as the bark of a pine.”

I try to think of the far distant future whenever I see some insane custom or habit. Specifically, I imagine what life would be like if humans kept running over most rabbits that ran into the street for the next generation. In my imagination, 175 years from now (2083), most suburban-area animals will have a morbid fear of asphalt. In 2083, we’ll also have the most resilient or reclusive bugs on the planet.

Also superviruses.

Try it some time. It’s fun to imagine what ridiculous ways we’re affecting the ecosystem. Interestingly, in every single projection I’ve made, there are no humans alive in the future.

I know, I know: I’m such an idealist.

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2006 Redux

Pixel — Tue, 26 Dec 2006 08:01:27 +0000

It’s a bit early to do my year-end recap for my New Year’s Resolutions, but I doubt I’ll have a chance on the 31st and doubt I’m going to do any last life goals in the next week, so please indulge me. . . (...)
Read the rest of 2006 Redux (872 words)

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