thekog

[thekog]

"You know those water bowls that magically refill themselves? The humans don't drink out of them. THEY POOP IN THEM!"

[thekog]

Saturday playdate with a couple of the siblings!

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Took the pup out for her first beach trip this past Sunday.

[thekog]

"You know how an F-14's wings fold back so it can go faster? THAT'S HOW MY EARS WORK!"

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New photos of the pup are up on my Flickr page!

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Today's Flickr Explore page is highlighting portrait photography. My photo of this baby Gidget is one of the featured photos!

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A white-breasted nuthatch checks to make sure the coast is clear before leaping over to an open bird feeder.

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Got the rest of my Southeast Arizona Birding Festival photos uploaded, and it's not all hummingbirds either! Behold, a Grace's warbler!

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Another photo from the Ash Canyon Bird Sanctuary. Despite there being an abundance of feeders, each hummingbird seems to have a preferred seat. If two have chosen the same seat and want to feed at the same time a fight breaks out!

[thekog]

Started going through my Southeast Arizona Birding Festival photos this past weekend. I'll be posting all my keepers up on Flickr. The first batch I've uploaded is from before the festival even began!

This photo in particular is from our first visit to the Ash Canyon Bird Sanctuary. Filled with feeders, dozens of hummingbirds come by to drink up and they don't mind posing for pictures!

[thekog]

In Street Fighter, you lose a round if you let your character's health drop to zero.

My winning strategy: I don't let my character's health drop to zero.

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Last night's thunderstorm passed just to the north of Ridgeville.

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Last Saturday night I played in a local Street Fighter 6 tournament at Retro Rev Arcade in Moncks Corner. Wound up finishing 9th out of 32!

I played some online ranked matches to warmup before the tournament. My rank has somewhat plateaued so lately I've been trying to focus on playing smarter and not leaving myself open to as many counterattacks by overextending.

In this clip from my warmup, landing Ryu in the corner would typically have me throwing out a kick as they stand up, only to eat a super move to the face losing me the round. This time I remembered to keep the defensive play in mind. Figuring a super move was coming, I instead neutral jump over the predicted play, giving me the chance to counterattack and turn what should have been a loss to a come-from-behind victory in only four ticks of the timer!

As luck would have it, nearly this exact same scenario came up in the tournament. We both had won one game each, and were on the final round of game 3. Winner advances in the tournament, and the loser gets eliminated. I corner my opponent and, instead of attacking, I back dash at the last moment. My opponent stands up with a super move thinking they caught me off guard, whiffs it in the space where my character was just a split second earlier, and I counter with my own to advance one step farther in the tournament!

[thekog]

Been able to get in a few short sets of Street Fighter over the past week as the new pup sleeps at night. Got up to Platinum rank with Lily, but there is a noticeable skill gap between there and Gold. Ping ponging between the two ranks, I'll get into Platinum for a bit, go on a short losing streak, get demoted down to Gold, then absolutely obliterate the poor sap I get matched up against to get myself back into Platinum.

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New pup in the house!

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Played a few more rounds as Lily before heading to bed last night. Not only did I get her up to Gold rank, but I'm already rated higher with her than I am with Ryu!

[thekog]

Got a good couple of weekends of online matches in with Ryu, the comfort food of Street Fighter. Figured it was time to start branching out into some of the new characters in this installment.

First up is Lily, the successor of Super Street Fighter II's T. Hawk. With some distance from her opponent, she can summon up wind to power up the abilities she uses to hurl herself forward and go on the offensive.

After a few casual warmup games, I jumped into ranked. Did mediocre during my placement matches and was seeded into Bronze rank. It did not take long after that for Lily's play style to click with me. Wound up going on a crazy 14-game winning streak rocketing me to the upper end of Silver!