Lucky me, I got to go to both Canadiens games this week, both of which they won. Random observations:

- If I ever want to really simplify my life, I’ll quit my job as a producer and become a Molson Ex bimbo. I can clap, clap, cla-cla-clap, cla-cla-cla-clap, cla-clap and use a tambourine like they do. Work 42 nights a year, see all the home games. Not bad.

- It doesn’t matter where you sit, seeing the Habs live rocks. Having every little “Yeah-yeah go! Go! Skate! Skaaaaa- AWWWW!” reaction simultaneously with 20000 other people provides a great sense of community. It doesn’t get much more Montreal than this.

- It sucks that everything about the game has to be branded (”who the lucky Pom bread fan tonight?”), but I have to say the show was so good that I managed to tune most of it out. Except the PSP commercials, which were actually fun to see.

- Youppi, honey, I loved you as a kid, but it’s over. The Expos are gone. I only gave a shit about them for one year, and that year ended in a strike. Time to go.

- Exchanging contact info with coworkers by beaming PDA to PDA at a game is reassuring. You may be drinking bad beer and screaming yourself hoarse like a hooligan, you’ll still be a geek in the morning.

- Seeing my hero score the winning goal on a breakaway in overtime, like I did tonight… well, it will never get old.

Me: I’m conservative about scope because I’m about making sure we deliver on time. Maybe if I was less anal about that, we’d crunch more but the game would have more features and more fun.

Him: Well, I’m not convinced that anal means no fun… oh wait, let me rephrase that.

You know, I really like to sleep on my back; that’s how I get my best rest. But every once in a while in that position, I wake up and realize I’ve been sleeping with my mouth open. When that happens, much as I want to stay on my back, I change positions because I’m actually paranoid about bugs crawling into my mouth. Isn’t that silly?

My life is a kid-free zone. There are no children in my life. This is not a good thing, it’s not a bad thing, it’s just the way it is.

I am an only child, so no nephews or nieces. Of my cousins on my mother’s side, I am the fifth of seven. The oldest had a child first, then the second oldest, and so on. When it got to me, the baby train stalled for a few years, then it hit the next one in line, my cousin Anik. That was a milestone for me, an official realization that I was “skipping my turn”. The next one (and last) in line just dutifully reproduced, completing the cycle. I feel I have very little in common with the rest of my familial cohort, and hardly ever see them. They have bungalows, I have underoos. They hang out with my parents. I mean, I adore my folks, but I wouldn’t hang out with them if they weren’t my folks.

These differences always make me feel like an adolescent, a woman-child, not fully grown. For some reason, mortgage doesn’t count when it’s on a condo.

I’m thinking about all this because the universe has lately been conspiring to make me ovulate. Spring is springing. Last week, Paolo and his beautiful daughter Eva came for a lovely visit. Yesterday, I spent the day focus-testing my game with 5- to 7-year-olds. This morning, I went out for breakfast with Lynne and little Justine. I’ve seen more kids this week than I do in a typical season, and they are fantastic. I tend not to realize that.

It reminds me of what you end up not having, when you want it all. There was a time when this line of thinking would have been depressing to me, but no longer. I no longer feel like I could have made different choices, considering who I am. It probably helps that I’m surrounded with like-minded individuals who will either reproduce very late or not at all. Thank you education, thank you choices, modern life, individuality, egocentrism, thank you irrepressible wanderlust. Part of loving oneself is owning who you are, not constantly judging it. And if I ever reproduce, I’ll own that too.

As pseudo-wise as that sounds, it’s still probably easier to feel grown-up when you shop at Loblaws for bulk butt-wipes.

Now every teenager will be able to fulfill their accordion idol dreams!

…when you wish you would have just kept your mouth shut.

I’m at the gym yesterday, waiting at the front desk to hand in my membership card. The client in front of me is arguing with the attending clerk. All of a sudden, I get a whiff off him, of that cologne I hate so much. I make a little face, and the man behind me catches it.

- Patience, he says.
“Oh, it’s not the wait”, I say confidentially. “It’s that horrible Gaultier scent I can’t stand.”

He immediately looks hurt, and I understand that he’s the olfactory offender, and that I am an idiot.

“I’m sorry”, he says, “it was my ex who gave it to me”.
“I’m such an idiot”, I say, wanting to crawl into my gym bag. “I had no idea it was you”. As if that’s supposed to make him feel better.
“Eh, don’t feel bad. Can I make you feel better by buying you a coffee afterwards? I’ll wash it all off first.”

But I guess I wasn’t that sorry.

It’s been four years this weekend since I tentatively made my first post on this blog, from a hotel room in Banff, March 2002.

Lots has happened since that fateful day. A career change, a change in personal status, my first house purchase, my first race, lots of trips and a new furry friend. An entirely renewed circle of great friends, too numerous to all link, but all of whom met through my blog. The realization that I’ve found the expressive outlet I’ve always sought.

As I pass this milestone, my concern these days is how my current and potential future employers feel about my blogging. It’s becoming less and less possible for me to hide behind the alias. Many people have associated me with lightspeedchick in the past months; I knew this would eventually happen, and it is just going to increase. I have no problem standing by my words and opinions as a person, but I am also part of a company that may feel differently about my writing. Luckily for me, there is precedent. Many well-known videogame producers blog, using their real identities. Also, I do not and will not blog specifics about my projects, clients or employees. Hopefully, this will be enough for two very important elements of my life, videogame production and blogging, to peacefully coexist for many more years.

But blogging would be nothing without people contributing, commenting, caring, reading, reacting. So thanks everyone for making this little experiment so rewarding!

I just found out what happens to casual Friday when you can wear jeans anytime you want.

My designer is sitting on the floor, having a conversation with someone. I enter the office, and have to go around him to get to my desk. It involves some contortion on my part.

“Sorry for having my ass in your face, there”, I say.
- Eh, it’s Friday, he replies.

I’ve been playing 24: the game since it came out last week. Wow. What a great license for a game. What a great game use of a license.

I was reluctant to purchase it, fearing it would simply be a shooter (not my favorite type of game) with some 24-style graphics cheaply slapped on. I am so happily mistaken. The 24 look-and-feel is very distinct, but their use of it goes beyond the obvious split-screen and beep-beeping counter in the middle. The composition of the frames in the cutscenes, the music, the story, all are 24, not 24: the marketing prop. I’m impressed.

The gameplay is surprisingly solid for a game that has so many different mechanics. So far I have enjoyed:
- third-person shooter missions, playing as Jack, Chase, Kim and Michelle;
- stealth missions;
- puzzle minigames aimed at defusing bombs, unlocking doors or retrieving data from a self-destroying hard drive;
- sniper missions;
- driving missions, in which they were smart enough to perfectly mimic the Grand Theft Auto controls, making the controls immediately intuitive;
- interrogation missions, a sort of rhythm game in which I have to decide to be tough or conciliatory, or try to break the subject.

Not only is the storytelling style extremely faithful to the show, but the story is engaging, taking place between seasons 2 and 3. We also get background on how Chase, Chloe and Kim came to work at CTU. The important characters are all there: Chappelle, Michelle, Tony, Jack, Palmer, Nina Myers, Aaron Pierce, etc.

All too rarely does a license-based game actually contribute and add to the content of the original license, but 24: the game does just that. For a 24 fan, it’s a real treat. I had to force myself to watch the show live rather than tape it and play the game.

(Incidentally only available, like Guitar Hero and God of War, on Playstation. I’m just sayin’.)

I had promised myself I’d be gracious tonight, if we succeeded in winning. We succeeded. I failed.

Once again our trivia gang *owned* the other teams tonight. There’s nothing like standing among the corpses of your opponents, wiping the sweat off your brow after a trivia bloodbath to make you feel alive.

Can’t wait for next month, for another CARNAGE! friendly meeting of the minds.

UPDATE WHEREIN I WUSS OUT AND BACKPEDAL: It occurs to me that some people might take this arrogant tone at face value. This post is written in the spirit of poking friendly fun at our opponents who might be reading this, nothing else.