cassiusdrow | Questions from suburbangenius (Reply)

1. Where did "Cassius" come from?

The name came from a D&D character a friend of mine had out in California. He was an human assassin character, and thoroughly sarcastic and twisted. After I moved out here I used that character as a bit player in a game I was running for my ex-wife. But this time the character was drow.

The character/persona of Cassius that I have "portrayed" (and I do use that very loosely because I don't consider it acting) at medieval events for so long came about because of the involvement I had in FALO. I was heavily involved in a D&D campaign that centered around a bunch of drow characters, and I decided that I wanted my character for FALO to be drow. It just evolved from there. I dropped the assassin bit very early on. Just wasn't me at the time. Cassius has gone from a 110 yr old drow warrior to a 4000+ yr old mage over the last 15 or so years, mostly due to my own life changes.

2. When and how did the computer-work-as-career start for you?

When my parents bought me an Atari 2600 game console sometime around 1980, I decided that I wanted to be able to write video games. That is first time I really knew what I wanted to do when I grew up. And while I don't write video games, I do write goobs and goobs of computer programs.

In 1991, I got my first job I had that actually paid me to work with computers, and I was working for an Albanian import/export company doing miscellaneous office stuff. I managed a customer database that I wrote myself in Foxpro. After that, I worked independently on a couple of consulting projects. Then in 1993, I got my first real programming job for a consulting firm in Summit. That job is where I really learned what I was capable of.

I now have about 12 years of experience designing databases and programming them, and I am just a high school graduate with no degrees or formal training beyond that.

3. Pick 3 laserdiscs (not DVDs -- the big ones) in your collection that you couldn't bear to part with.

The only discs that I couldn't bear to part with would be the original theatrical versions of the Star Wars Trilogy, as I don't think those movies will ever be available on any medium. I have two copies of them. In fact, the reason I bought the laserdisc player and uber-tv I have is to make those discs look as good as they can look.

The Criterion release of Monty Python and the Holy Grail come to mind because that disc has the French taunting scene with the literal translation of the Japanese dubbing below it. It quite funny to compare the original english dialog with the Japanese dubbing.

But I also have a number of other movies that have yet to make it to DVD: The Keep, Aladdin, and a whole slew of Japanese Samurai movies. And some that are on DVD but are not 16x9 enhanced and therefore not worth replacing yet: Dune, Flash Gordon, the Batman movies, Blade Runner, Dragonheart, The Game, Star Trek Generations and First Contact, Strange Days, and many others.

And then I also have some that I'll never get rid of just for sentimental reasons: the Indiana Jones movies; the big box sets of Alien, Aliens, and The Abyss; the Japanese edition of Star Wars Episode I; and the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition (the ones released in 1997). I'll also probably never actually play them again either, but they'll be nice to display when I finally get a dedicated theater room in the next house.

4. If you're at a diner (c'mon, we're from Jersey -- it's possible :) ), what are you most likely going to order?

I was at a diner just a week or so ago. And I ordered my usual: a bacon-cheeseburger deluxe with fries and a side of mayo.

5. You've lived in alot of places. Apart from where you are currently, which did you like best?

The place I have the fondest memories of is the apartment in Raritan that we just moved out of. It was the first place that I lived on my own with no roommates. I was living there when Michele and I started dating, she lived with me there, we were married while we were there, and our son Ben was born while we lived there. But I actually hated the apartment itself. It was old, cramped, and never felt clean no matter how much you scrubbed. And the most recent upstairs tenant was a jerk.

I do miss the house up by Lake Hopatcong, but I am very glad I don't live there anymore.