My Wife Is An Absolute Trooper!

For anyone who doesn't know, my wife is the most absolute trooper ever!

You may ask... "Why is your wife so awesome? What makes her so tough and amazing?" Well first of all, she's pregnant; that's enough right there that she has to go through that process and make it out the other side! Let me tell you it was pretty bad with the first one on the way how sick my dearly beloved Carley was feeling each and every day... pretty much like morning sickness on crack! This one will be our second child together and oh my goodness, I didn't possibly think it could ever get worse!

It's a special thing when your wife isn't able to get around and do as much as she wants to... not because it's hard to move around when pregnant, but because she's just so sick that she can't get out of bed without puking almost every morning. Medications don't make the sickness go away; they only serve to make her tired and keep her locked in bed like a caged animal instead of spending good time with her family as she would prefer to do. I can't imagine what it would be like to go through that each and every day, but I would gladly share the burden with her if I could even up to the point of taking the full sickness upon myself if for nothing else than to give her a much needed break.

Now of course we can't be sure of the final result, but perhaps the reason for the increased sickness is due to this child being larger than the last? Our first daughter was quite small... I believe 4th percentile if I remember correctly? And... based on the ultrasound results from recently, this one MIGHT.... be around the 94th percentile mark. Of course there's still a few months to go before we find out the end result, so maybe that size will level out to be closer to her older sister, but I do still think that an increased size may be the cause.

So here I am trying to help out by doing dishes, laundry, transport the child to daycare, and make enough money to get by... only hoping that I'm able to do a fraction of what needs to be done to make it all the way. I can't imagine where I'd be without such a tough woman in my life right beside me each and every day.... that I wake up in bed.

Wish us luck with our upcoming second child. I've heard it gets more difficult when more come along and I haven't yet figured out whether I'm excited or scared for what's in store for us.

~ Kyle Welykholowa

UPDATE

Back to Family / Life

=== PC Game Review -- Dungeon Siege - Action RPG - 7/10 ===

What Are We Reviewing?
This is a game dear to my heart as one of the older games I got myself into back in my younger years. This game is the original Dungeon Siege developed by Gas Powered Games back in 2002. So keep in mind that I'm reviewing a game from a while ago by how it holds up (in my opinion) by today's standards on today's technology.


Gameplay:
As an action RPG game, you start as a tiny character and build your way up through combat and experience gaining great power and equipment along the way. Dungeon Siege differentiates itself from games like Diablo by having a party system of up to 8 characters. Each character can level up in different skills including Melee, Ranged, Combat Magic, and Nature Magic. In this game, the way experience works is that experiences is gained each time an enemy is hit by the character, so in theory... a single character would have tons more experience than a party of 8 due to being the only character hitting all the targets would generate much more experience on one character. Unfortunately other than the spells which I believe have a max scaling to their skill level, melee and ranged attacks seem to be unaffected by the skill level.

It is certainly possible that one could beat the game as a single character without a party... though I'd think that would be quite the challenge even for the seasoned veteran of these types of games. I personally enjoy doing fun challenges in games, but even I think that would be an insane thing to try to do.

The game can be paused and unpaused at any time and commands can be issued in either state. Most of the commands required outside of having the right weapon or spell equipped is only to move the characters around to avoid damage rather than standing and fighting strong monsters or getting hit by projectiles. This starts off pretty nice, but I found it started to get rather tedious as the game went on with 8 characters in the party.


Graphics:
As you can see, the graphics are a little older and boxy. Seeing as the game came out in 2002, I would say the boxy 3D models with the ability to turn the camera 360° at any time... that's completely reasonable compared to the iconic Diablo II (2000).

I will however say that some of the enemies are difficult to see through all the vegetation and some of the effects can be difficult to catch as well with all that's going on. For the most part I'm quite happy with the look of the game all things considered.


Sound:
I have no complaints about the sound design of Dungeon Siege. There's good feedback on actions being taken and nothing seems very out of place. The only complaint I have is that sometimes that sound bugs out a bit with repeating of earlier played sounds when going back along the path you came for some... unknown reason.


Replayability:
Would I call this game replayable? Sure... if you wanted to try different compositions of groups, whether that be in numbers or types, then yes I would say this game is replayable to some degree. For most people however, this game is a play once and you're done sort of thing.


SUMMARY:
Dungeon Siege seems to run just fine on Windows 10 and is still a fun experience to play through as it was so many years ago. Compared to the newer games out there these days, it's getting a little bit older and is certainly showing its age, but other than that, it's still a pretty good experience and for the low price of only $7.79, it's really not a bad buy to keep a person entertained for many hours of gameplay.

My score for Dungeon Siege at this point of it's life will be 7/10 as it was a well-made game and is still good to this day.

~ DaemonVirus

=== Food Review - Aurora Sushi - Asian Cuisine - 8/10 ===

Just the other day we had a lovely dinner and a movie for a date day where we decided to go to Aurora Sushi in Moose Jaw. I'm a huge fan of Asian food and definitely don't mind doing the buffet thing, especially when I haven't had much to eat earlier in the day. If you've ever been to an I Like Sushi, this place is pretty much exactly that... without the cool iPads... and I think it costs a little more.

I'm not a fan of sushi, so that part of the place doesn't really appeal to me, but the buffet here is very good. The selection of things to choose from isn't as big as I Like Sushi, but the quality of the food is good and there are enough options that you should be able to find something to keep you happy. If you are a person who likes sushi, they do offer a selection of sushi you can order with your mean which doesn't cost anything extra unless you order extra things and don't eat it.

For the cost of about $25 per person for an endless buffet, bottomless drinks (which they refill OFTEN by the way), and a selection of sushi, I do think this is a pretty good place to eat. You aren't getting to take home any leftovers unfortunately due to it being a buffet, so you do have to go when you're hungry to make it feel like you've made good use of your money.

I'm scoring this place as a 8/10 because the food is very good and they're super diligent about refilling your fountain drinks compared to other restaurants where they tend to forget about you. If you're not going for sushi then there are other options for an Asian buffet which cost a little bit less than Aurora Sushi though the cost may be made up just by the refilling of the drinks. I would definitely highly recommend this place for a dining experience, especially for anybody who likes eating sushi.

~ Kyle Welykholowa

Jaw Surgery Adventure - The Beginning =2=

     We have been through quite a crazy jaw surgery adventure in the past few weeks. I don't know yet whether it has been all worth it to go through, but I think once all the healing is compete that Carley will be much happier with the events than she currently is right now.

     The couple weeks leading up to the surgery turned into stress-city around here. I had no idea Carley would get so worked up about something she had been looking forward to for such a long time. She had previously told me about how huge of an effect this would have on her and how she would have a much better self-image. I'm all for supporting her through something that would make her feel better about herself; she fought for this and wrote countless letters to get this whole process started years ago before she even met me. The worst part about the experience for me has been how stressed she started to get leading up to the surgery.

     We reached a point where pretty much everything set Carley off and either started a fight, or she would yelling at me because tasks weren't being done right away or not going her way immediately without questions. I absolutely understood her being in such a stressed position; she was about to go through a very intense process including pain and weight-loss. I think anybody would be stressed knowing they would have to be going through that in such a short time.

     As much as I wanted to explode sometimes, I did my best to keep clam and be as supportive as I could be. We got through the bad feelings by indulging on things that she wouldn't be able to have for a while after the surgery, like pizza, steak, and other fast foods. There are people out there who think stress is nothing and can be pushed aside no problem. Unfortunately that's not the way it is for everybody and that does include my dear sweet Carley. It's really hard sometimes to handle the levels of stress that pour out of this beautiful lady, but I just remember what she is willing to do for me and I put myself next to her to support her and lift her up. We can get through anything together.

~ Kyle Welykholowa

"Life doesn't happen to you... it happens FOR you."

     I heard this quote by Jim Carrey in a video on Facebook just last night. It was a video of a bunch of things he has said, but this one really got my attention. I've been thinking about it pretty much all night.

     Sometimes I find myself guilty of thinking "Why has this happened to me?" or "What have I done to deserve this?" It's a mindset that promotes the idea that Life is out to get me. The reality of it, is that my life isn't trying to get back at me. Things come and go as life goes on, and it's up to whomever is living that life to either take those experiences that happen and do something with them, or forget about them.

     People like to label some experiences they regret as "mistakes"... but they're still an experience that you have now had. Whether it was in fact a mistake or not, I don't think it's right to forget about; It's something you chose to do. I don't think something can be a mistake if you didn't make the choice to do it. I think these experiences should be taken, remembered, and learned from.

     Now of course there are some experiences in life that some would rather not remember. These are usually the experiences that were not the choice of the life-user, but rather they tend to be the choices of others. Though these are harder to think about, I still think they are a part of a person's story. Every story has good and bad parts to it. In the end, it's the journey that matters. Nobody would have a story without a journey. We're here to work through our journey so that in the end, we have a story to tell about how we got there. After all... isn't that what history is all about?

~ Kyle