FINALLY.

MASSIVE UPDATE:
I have found out that I will be getting my 360 back within the next week.

OLDER NEWS:

I've heard the stories about the Xbox 360 and the Red Ring of Death. I thought: "Well, as long as I keep this thing properly ventilated, nothing should happen, right?" Sadly enough, I got the Red Ring of Death.

I've owned this console since December 23, and signed up for Xbox Live somewhere around December 25. The manufactured date was September 20th, 2006, well away from the units that had most problems (AKA: Mine had a different revision.) I have never kept the unit in enclosed areas, making sure that the 360 had proper ventilation to avoid overheats.

Fast forward to 09/20/07.

This was the year where [my] console hit one year old. Everything was still running smoothly. I thought to myself: "Sweet, nothing happened to it at all, I guess I'm safe."

Fast forward to 11/17/07, 12:00 PM.

It all started when I was playing Call of Duty 4. I already beat the game on Normal, so I thought I should go and try the game on Hardened on the second time around, and play Veteran later. Right when I had to defend War Pig (the stranded Abrams Tank,) I noticed that when I took any form of damage (indicated by the screen having a red border,) lines would flicker on to the screen, and the textures would appear watery and blurry. I passed this off as an engine glitch, as the HUD was fine. Crue the Cool (or Crue,) invited me to a game, which I joined. I then learned that the lines and the blurry textures were now staying on the screen under any circumstances. Being (mostly) mature on Xbox Live, I finished the match, then restarted my 360. It powered on, but nothing was being displayed when the A/V cable selector was set to HDTV. I tried again with TV, which it worked, but the same graphics glitches appeared on the Xbox Dashboard. The "Oh Shit" feeling appeared in my mind, because I knew that my 360 was going to give me the Red Ring of Death. Paranoia taking control, I called Xbox Customer Support, where I was put on hold for a good 20 or 30 minutes. The customer support technician ran me through troubleshooting, but I could not get a chance to clear the Hard Drive cache, because the 360 was refusing to send any A/V signal. He got a repair order for my 360, which should be completed in 4 TO 6 WEEKS. I was then told about Microsoft Repair Center guidelines, which are very strict. If any signs of tampering is found on the console (not on my console,) the warranty is immediately voided, and I will then have to pay the massive shipping and repair costs. After the call was finished, I powered up my Xbox 360 again, to find out that it gave me the Red Ring of Death. I already knew how to find the "hidden" error code generated by the Red Ring of Death, which the error code is 0020, so now I am stuck with a non-functioning Xbox 360, for about 4 to 6 weeks.

[EDIT] The box has been shipped out. Now I am just going to have to wait out the 4-6 weeks.

In the meantime, I have been playing Perfect Cherry Blossom while I try to kill time without the Xbox 360. Screenshot below.

[EDIT] NEW LINK! Download the game here.

Ending Part 1
Ending Part 2

Well, it was all fun and games. After the second part of the ending appeared on the internet, the Master Chief is not dead. He is now Missing In Action.

Blam points are where it's at.

Summer's over, and today I began what is the first day of school for my Junior year. I woke up around 5:30 to eat breakfast, get ready, and leave for the bus stop. I was wearing my Newgrounds T-Shirt today, just because I felt like it. My sister, now a freshman, was joining me for her first day at high school. Now since I go to Herndon High School, my classes are split up into Red days and Black days. I was able to talk to some of my friends around 6:45, about 35 minutes before first period, but since I take a bus to get to my first period class, I won't really be late for class.

7:00 AM - Bus to Chantilly High School Academy.
I have to take a bus to Chantilly High because my first period class is over in Chantilly High, as a part of this academy program. I met up with some more of my friends here, who threw away their iPods for Zunes. Apart from that, nothing much happened here.

7:30-ish AM - Computer Systems Tech.
I got into the class around 7:30, and it was noticeably quiet. People were filling out worksheets about themselves, about their personal interests. About 30 minutes later, everyone was in the class (about 11 or 12 people) and we were introduced to each other and our teacher. She seemed pretty nice, and we learned that we are going to be doing paper work until October, which by then we will start building computers (off of salvaged parts from old, early Windows XP era computers.)

8:45 AM - Return back to Herndon High.
The bus ride back pretty much sucked for about 10 minutes. We had to be combined with South Lakes High School students in one bus, and it was made worse by the fact that our bus was a handicapped bus. I shit you not, the bus had a whole middle section missing. We had to fit 3 students to one seat. The situation was made better (for me) because there was this blond girl (who is hot, by the way) had to sit next to me. She was nice, and we talked for a few minutes. My friend, sitting behind me, noticed that the bus had not moved for about 10 minutes. Needless to say, since body heat builds up, we had to open a few windows to get some of the heat out. 2 minutes later, a new bus arrived, and took some students. Once again, I talked to the girl sitting next to me. Since she was a South Lakes Student, she got off before me, so then I was talking to a friend and another guy for the rest of the ride (and the time we had to sit in the cafeteria to wait for 3rd period to end.)

10:35 AM - US VA History.
I met my history teacher, Mr. Gannon. He seems to be a pretty nice guy, and the class seems easy, since he says he's lazy. We spent the first 30 minutes before lunch filling out another about me sheet.

11:05 AM - Lunch.
I really had second thoughts about lunch, considering how the shit they serve in the cafeteria is barely edible. I met up with my friends again, and we talked about random stuff, while one was busy making a "Eject Button that is to be used in the event of a communist revolution" out of a lunch tray. We poked fun at the second LCD HDTV that the school bought that was to be used to broadcast SDTV HHS announcements.

12:35 PM - US VA History (again.)
We returned to history class, where we got a better idea of how the class worked, and received our textbooks, which, is pretty large and heavy. Apart from that, nothing much else happened.

12:45 PM - Geosystems.
When I entered the classroom, I noticed that the teacher seemed rather... insane. Her personality makes her look like she was dragged out of a mental asylum. During that time, I got a nice 100 question quiz so the teacher sees how much we know. Needless to say, I barely knew anything on the quiz (big surprise there.) Then school ended at 2:10 PM.

UPDATE: September 5th, 2007.

As promised (to all my non-existent readers,) I will now write about the rest of my classes.

7:05 AM - Bus to Chantilly High School
Need less to say, this bus ride was rather uneventful like yesterday, so there is really no need to cover this again.

7:30 AM - Computer Systems Tech.
I take this class every day, so that's why I am bringing this up again. Today we were given our Final Exam (just like what my Geosystems teacher did) so our teacher knows how much we know. There were 200 questions, and I only finished about 160-180 questions. I only knew names of the components, how some things work in a computer, but the rest of the questions (pertaining to memory banks, COM ports, DIMM, SIMM, EPROM, EEPROM, etc.,) I had absolutely no chance of understanding.

8:45 AM - This time, we (Herndon High students) were not given the fail bus (long, handicapped bus with the middle section removed,) but instead, our bus broke down. Now one might say that this was a good thing, but standing outside in the heat made me say otherwise. A new bus got there around 9:15.

10:35 AM - English 11
I met with my English teacher, who was my English 10 teacher. I already knew how the class worked, since I had to sit through a boring lecture on the class syllabus. We learned that we had to be perfectionists (no tears in the paper, blue or black ink only, neat handwriting or typed,) but I also learned that we get A LOT of extra credit in the class. If we type our homework (whenever applicable,) we get 1 point of extra credit. I can probably pass this class with an A with out even trying!

11:35 AM - Lunch
I met up with more of my friends today, but apart from that, nothing much else happened.

12:05 PM - English 11 (again.)
We did class introductions for the remainder of the time. I think I might of made a bad label of myself by saying I am Newgrounds user, gamer, and geek in training (Computer Systems Tech, anyone?)

12:45 PM - Algebra 2.
I noticed our teacher gets straight to the point here in this class. We didn't really cover the syllabus (since he knows we don't read these things anyways,) and I learned that he has an odd sense of humor. In what sounds like sarcasm, he "explained" why we needed a binder, while claiming (at the same time,) that he took a 6 week class on binders. We also did a couple of odd riddles to get the class talking to him. Then we took notes, did our homework, and that was the end.

In case you decided to pull a tl;dr, school seems really enjoyable for me this year, I have nice teachers, and everything seems to be going well.

FOR ALL PEOPLE ON MY XBOX LIVE FRIENDS LIST:
I WILL NO LONGER BE ONLINE MONDAY TO THURSDAY FOR GAMING DUE TO SCHOOL, UNLESS THERE IS A SCHOOL HOLIDAY. I WILL STILL BE ONLINE ON FRIDAY, SATURDAY, AND SUNDAY.

I just love the 360, because it crashes way too fucking much. My 360 crashed when saving a game, effectively fucking up all of my progress in FarCry Instincts: Predator, crashed when hitting the "Y" button in Gears of War, crashed on the Dashboard, and crashes just about anywhere else. Should I call Microsoft about this?

Yep. Check your secrets page, because "The Last Piece of Cake" and "Banned in the USA" lead to the 404 page. Nice to unlock secrets that no longer work...

Late and overdue edit: This has been fixed since god knows when.

Personally, I have mixed feelings about it at this point. Everything feels, slower...