First of all, thanks for the questions.quote:
Originally posted by yakusoku:
1. What one piece of advice would you like to share with others to help them be more successful or be happier?
-
A: Just be yourself and worry less about how other people see you.
2. What failure in your life have you experienced that you feel is important to have lived through to help you grow?
A: Not long before I left for Japan I had a relationship with a woman that treated me like a piece of garbage. My friends saw what was going on, saw that I was being manipulated to a severe extreme by this woman, but not one of them intervened. After I finally wised up and got rid of her I asked them why. The response, to a person, was that they saw how head-over-heels in love I was with the woman and they knew I would respond negatively to their observations. They knew it would likely make no difference to my perception of her and that it would likely cause a rift between us as friends. It was a lesson I took to heart and from then on I always try to take a step back in situations of extreme emotional response.
3. What would you like to do right now that is just outside of your reach because of one thing (money, people, other resources)?
A: Be mortgage free. It would allow for a lot of other great things to happen for my family. Our mortgage is in fact very reasonable, I just have an intense dislike for debt.
4. Aside from server/forum/site changes, what is one thing that you would like to see changed about MOTL?
A: I would like to see people look down on other sites/groups of players less. The look-down-our-nose attitude we have towards other sites (salvation etc.) is, to me, rather immature.
5. What is something that you feel that you are better than most other people at doing?
A: Identifying songs/melodies that go well together. I was a DJ for a long time during University and one of the things I felt really separated me from the crowd was my ability to mix two tracks together in a way that sounded fantastic.
quote:
Originally posted by ogre:
1. Favorite food?
A: Italian, hands down. When my wife and I were on our Honeymoon is Italy we couldn't believe how good the food was.
2. Ten favorite movies?
A: In no particular order:
Casablanca
Blade Runner
Clerks
American History X
Dodgeball
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Usual Suspects
The Dark Knight
I Am Legend
Unforgiven
I'm sure I missed something since I haven't thought about or watched movies in a long time.
3. When did you get into Magic cards and who/how did you get involved?
A: I got into Magic between Legends and Revised. Some friends of mine played and invited me to join in on a few games. I had to wait for Revised to be released before I could get a starter deck as no one had enough spare land for me to build my own deck so I just borrowed decks. My first Revised Starter contained a Veteran Bodyguard and a Castle (along with a Sol Ring wooo!). So I built a really passive white deck which kinda sucked to play against but it won the long game eventually. I was hooked, for life apparently :P.
4. Are we (America) going into a depression?
A: Looking at the unemployment rate, I would say the States is already there.
5. Where do you see the future of America's economy and general state heading and what could be done, in your opinion, to better it?
A: I don't see a lot of positive in the future for America's economy. China is only getting bigger and eventually that will become the biggest market in the World. The bailout/mortgage crisi really handcuffed the nation in terms of being able to plan for the future and deal with up and coming economies.
Peace,
Jesse
Bonus question: who has been your biggest surprise player, both + and -, so far this year in fantasy hockey? Not 100%, but believe you are from Canada too so for the economy questions if you could put them in relation to Canada that would be fine. Thanks again
A: Biggest letdowns - Iginla, Zetterberg, Ward. Three key guys I took fairly early all not producing to expectations.
Biggest surprises - Vanek, Lehtonen and to some degree Hartnell. Great performances from those three so far.
quote:
Originally posted by AlmostGrown:
1. How old are you?
A: 36.
2. How far have you gotten in education (High School certificate, grad school, etc)?
A: Have a BA, Double Major in Philosophy/English Lit. Used it to great effect when I was teaching in Japan. I taught both at private institutions and companies as a corporate trainer.
3. How many kids do you have? Do you want?
A: One girl who turns 3 next month and a boy on the way. Two is good for now 
.
4. East Coast or West Coast?
A: In what regard? If we are talking Rap music/allegiances then definitely West Coast.
5. Favorite format?
A: EDH by far, Draft/Cube coming a distant but clear second. I don't really care for any other formats.
quote:
Originally posted by Thanos:
If you don't mind me asking, what made you leave Japan?
A: Simply put, the opportunity for advancement professionally just wasn't there for me in Japan. We knew we wanted to have another child and it wasn't going to happen on our salaries in Japan so we needed to make the move back to Canada in order to improve our quality of life in the long term.
Don't get me wrong, I loved living in Japan. It is an awesome place to live, great people, very convenient. But if you are not fluent enough in Japanese to get a job other than teaching your prospects in the long term are quite limited.
quote:
Originally posted by Tha Gunslinga:
Why stab107?
A: When I played Quake online back in the day I went by the handle Stabmasterarson (like the DJ in CB4) and the name stuck through many iterations of online games. But eventually when I got to ICQ/AIM the handle was taken and I had to pick something else (and iirc, Stabmasterason# was actually too long if you can believe it), so I shortened it to stab and added numbers I thought sounded fine with it.
quote:
Originally posted by Volcanon:
Why would you ever leave Japan? The food is so good!
Was it the complete lack of affordable cheese?
Or the lack of certain vegetables?
Or the obscene rents?
A: Food is fantastic in Japan, no doubt about it. You just have to find the right places to go. Cheese is affordable but somewhat bland. Vegetables are plentiful too. The rent is actually quite reasonable unless you live around central Tokyo.
Do you like to bathe in bacon grease?
A: No.
Do you like to eat lard?
A: No.
Do your friends you know you bathe in bacon grease?
A: WHAT EXACTLY ARE YOU INSINUATING YOUNG MAN?
Do you eat magic cards?
A: High in fibre, my friend.
Does your magic card eating habit affect your overall health?
A: See above.
Do you have a preponderance of ambiguities that affects your persistent phlegmatizations?
A: I bite my thumb at you.
quote:
Originally posted by CubFan81:
1) Favorite Magic card?
A: Back in the day, Force of Nature was the bomb to me. Now, it's really hard to say. My favorite card to resolve in Commander games is a toss up between Phthisis and Time Spiral.
2) Favorite Magic color?
A: Let's say not white. White is the slice of the color pie I like least in terms of mechanics. I'm a big fan of Red but it lacks the tools to make itself consistent solo that black has.
3) Favorite Magic deck?
A: Back in the mid ninties a friend and I entered a partners tournament with decks based around Ritual of Subdual with Ernham Djinns as finishers and Crumbles to dirupt artifact mana. We won the tournament and the deck was eventually featured in an issue of the Duelist. Highlight of the tournament: A frustrated opponent picked up one of my Rituals and bit it... he actually bit the card! Sometimes people let their emotions get the best of them.
4) Favorite Magic format?
A: EDH/Commander hands down. Great fun to be had there!
5) If you could make or unmake any one change to Magic what would it be? Why?
A: I would probably take Planeswalkers back (as in, not have had them printed in the first place). Trying to teach both old players that have taken a break from the game and new players how they work is the biggest hurdle to helping them understand what is happening and have fun. Sure, they are splashy, neat and powerful but their complexity is way off the charts.
Bonus: When people are asked "if they had a time machine" type questions, which event do you think gets changed the most often and which event do you think would be a more interesting one?
A: The most common answer is going back in time and killing Hitler/stopping the Nazi's. I think a more interesting answer would be to go back and prevent Gutenberg from inventing the Printing Press. How much farther would the Dark Ages have extended? Where would we be today? To me that is much more interesting.
[Edited 2 times, lastly by stab107 on December 06, 2011]
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posted December 05, 2011 07:22 AM
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