Mixed Emotions

Today, I am at the 3rd government hospital that I visited this week. Assisting the system users before the Governor visits to check if the users are using the system.

Mixed emotions came rushing to me. I have always been having travel sickness and all these traveling passed through my defenses. I want to go home already and miss the comfort the office gives me. I miss my family and my friends. I miss my bed, which is far greater than the one I am sleeping on right now.

I want to take on a different career or maybe find another company and learn as many new things as possible. I feel as though I am eating PHP, java and javascript everyday. I feel tired of adjusting to people that are very unprofessional and immature. But I don't want to leave yet because I am a software developer and part of the reason why I am a developer is because I want to make things easier for our clients. When all this is done, maybe next month or next few months, I think I can free myself from the worry of leaving the client before everything is set 100%.

February 2010 FNM Card - Ghostly Prison

Two months in a row now that the selected FNM cards are very cool and usable! Ghostly prison is a very good card that is definitely usable in legacy and in EDH format. Personally, I would be playing FNMS this Feb to get a play set of these cards. Usable both in control White-x decks and also aggro white decks, this February's FNM card is Ghostly Prison.

Feb 2010 FNM Card - Ghostly Prison

Competitive Tournaments

Against a monster proceeds an intentional unfortunate...

The statement above may be the reason why several players continue to prefer playing casual decks rather than competitive tournament-level decks. I have started as a casual player and I have been afraid to engage in big tournaments before. But As I joined tournaments, I looked at it as an avenue to improve my deck and to explore the different styles to be a better player.

January 2010 FNM Card - Tidehollow Sculler

Finally, a very useful FNM card that runs in standard. This is a great start to begin the New Year. This month's fnm card is Tidehollow Sculler from the Shards of Alara set. With the minimal number of playable discard cards in standard, Tidehollow sculler is a great option for Esper decks as it has a 2/2 body that can pressure combo decks.

Jan 2010 FNM Card - Tidehollow Sculler

Grixis Agadeem Deck

I used this Grixis Crypt of Agadeem deck during the Magical Christmas Tournament 2009 here in Davao City. The deck basically finished bad with a 2-3 record but one thing that I noticed is that the deck had several bright spots as I won in 4/5 game 1s of each round. This may note that either decks have a lot of dead cards when facing this deck OR I just need a good sideboard to finish better.



Crypt Combo Decklist:
Creatures(30)
4 Extractor Demon
4 Sedraxis Specter
4 Viscera Dragger
4 Architects of Will
4 Monstrous Carabid
2 Fatestitcher
4 Hedron Crab
4 rotting rats

Spells(6)
3 Tomescour
3 Grim Discovery

Lands(24)
4 Crypt of Agadeem
4 Crumbling Necropolis
4 Drowned Catacomb
2 Scalding Tarn
2 Marsh Flats
3 Terramorphic Expanse
2 Island
2 Swamp
1 Mountain

Sideboard:
3 Pithing Needle
1 Kederekt Leviathan
1 Banefire
4 Spell pierce
4 Negate
2 Deathmark

Round 1 vs Naya Aggro (L 1-2) : 0-1
Notes: G1 won because of hard-casted Extractor Demons (unsual win condition). G2 and G3 mulled to 4 and just got beat down by his creatures. In the 3 games, not 1 hedron crab nor crypt of agadeem came into play! I guess this was just bad luck or bad shuffling.

Round 2 vs UG Control (W 2-1) : 1-1
Notes: Sided in banefire and for all the risk and minimum chance of drawing banefire, I drew the card in crucial times. The crypt was not shy in this round.

Round 3 vs MonoW Soldiers (L 1-2) : 1-2
Notes: It's difficult to race with the tokens generated by conqueror's pledge. The lack of removal spells in the deck made it hard to keep up especially when there are no hedron crabs to fuel your graveyard early in the game. Toolittle basic lands in mainboard resulting to non-fetching of lands with PTE.

Round 4 vs USA Control (W 2-0) : 2-2
Notes: Good sideboarding made his luminarch ascension useless in the board. Players usually think that you use the hedron crabs and tomescour to fuel your graveyard with unearth creatures. But instead I experimented of milling the opponent and hard-casting creatures to use up his removals and counters. Rotting rats is really powerful against control decks.

Round 5 vs GW Aggro (L 0-2) : 2-3
Notes: The late setup nature of the deck made it difficult to take care of early game exalted attackers. The usual answer is to race with the opponent by unearthing your biggies early instead of waiting for one big strike.

Overall notes: The deck was really really fun to use and I think there is a big potential for the deck. A good fix in the lands will accommodate more basic lands for the fetches and for PTEs. Only 3 cards in the sideboard were used. Most of the sideboard cards were not meant for the metagame of the city.

A Happy New Year

I was really shocked to know that my last post in this blog dated back to July 22, 2009. Yep! that was 5 months ago!.. I totally forgot about this as I got very busy and had to deal with a lot of pressures. I was away for around 2 months and I had to work outside Davao and here I am again, with internet access and wanting to get life back on track.

Today is New Year's Eve and I spent my day cleaning up my room. hehe. It was somehow a tradition in the household that we should clean the house before the New year comes to do away with the bad luck and misfortunes of the previous year. It symbolizes the act of removing the bad things in your home. After several years, I found the time to clean my table, it was originally my study table when I was still in the elementary days but I still use it when I was in college or even now at work; a place to put my laptop when I take my work home. I was struck to find a poem that I wrote way back, I didn't even know I could write poems. hehe It was not that good, but, eventhough I cannot remember the experience of writing it, the thought that I wrote it before makes it worth sharing. It has no title but here it is.

once I did not like words
they seem incomplete to describe my feelings
I hated them once and again, today
for the scarcity if to you I'll say
I hated poems of conspiring hearts
coz in these few years we'll be apart
I hated poems, those poems of heartaches
also this poem, as my hand shakes
I hate myself for closing my eyes
with one or two of all those smiles
three or four, if it's with me
will be meaningless as for sure
I hate those feelings that evolved from like
promises slashed and sliced
Alright, it is that I guess
whatever it is, timing's a mess
As before I said, why feel and care?
when I knew it will be the same
I hate myself for the easy ins
and the difficult outs from deep within
Today I wanted to release myself
damn words.. Forgive me, again shorting out
On bended knees, I ask the one above
please carry me out of these chains of L...

well, that's it.. I still can't find the meaning of this. but it looks like I deny something.. hehehe

anyway, a blast from the past and it is really fun to find things that are part of ourselves and try to look back for the reason why the exact moment came to. But we may spend all day searching through the archives of the past, today nothing is more important to me than to act and see what the future holds for me.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!!