When I was driving home yesterday afternoon, window down, I was marveling at how nice it is to have springtime in Atlanta. Here it is the middle of March and the skies are blue, the temperatures are in the 70's and the trees are starting to bloom. Then I passed one of those trees and my sinuses exploded with a force that could destroy baby stars. I'm back to thinking that spring is overrated.
I usually don't use this space to comment on things that are happening in the gaming world, as I'm not sure the audience of this site, both of you, are at all interested. Sure, I'm happy to talk about games I'm playing, but I leave the commentaries on current gaming events to other, more informed people. This time, however, I feel the need to comment.
EGM (that's Electronic Games Monthly or something) and it's sister site 1Up.com have a podcast and in their most recent podcast they invited a one Denis Dyack to join them. Denis is the man in charge of Silicon Knights, the development house extraordinaire who gave us Eternal Darkness and the Metal Gear Solid remake for the GameCube. Currently their working on a game called Too Human for the 360 which, from what I gather, has something to do with people being half machine and named after Norse gods. This is what I meant by others being more informed. Anyway, last year, Silicon Knights invited someone from EGM to go up to Canada and see what was going on with Too Human. The EGM writer thought the game was the bomb, came back saying such and wrote up a cover story preview thingy.
Fast forward to E3 where Silicon Knights brings a demo that leaves everyone, including Silicon Knights, extremely disappointed. Frame rate issues, camera issues, ugly textures the whole shebang. The EGM folks on hand who were writing up their impressions of each game for the magazine pretty much tore the demo apart and said, I'm paraphrasing here, that it shouldn't have been shown at a high school science fair, much less the premier gaming event of the year.
Was this demoralizing for the Too Human team? Yeah, it probably was. I've worked in software development long enough to know what it feels like to have a build you feel really good about, only to see it all go to shit a build or two later. It's frustrating, maddening, disheartening, you name it, to feel as if all of your progress has gone out the window. To take this step backwards and then show your product publicly, knowing full well that it was much, much better just a build or two ago would absolutely suck.
Despite the fact that E3 was 10 months ago, Denis Dyack is still pretty pissed off. He joined the EGM guys, including the writer who first ventured up to the cold North to see Too Human, and the dude who wrote about it from E3, for their podcast, and basically went off on them for an hour. Now, I understand completely how it would have felt right after E3 to see the press tear apart your epic, 10 year in the making project. I also can understand Dyack's befuddlement over getting such a harsh preview from a magazine that devoted an entire cover story to how great your game was looking. At the same time, E3 was 10 months ago. 10! By now, shouldn't he have moved on? I mean, the rest of the gaming world pretty much had.
Now, some points that Dyack made, I completely agree with, and some were so off base as to be in a sport that doesn't even have bases like curling, or archery. His assessment that gaming journalists can't effectively pass judgement on preview builds of games is pretty on the mark however, I don't think that means that previews themselves have to go away entirely.
Here's what I think in regards to previews. Previews, as they are now, are usually bloated, PR fest pieces of shit used by magazines and gaming sites to garner good feelings from publishers so they, the magazines and gaming sites, continue to get exclusive previews and early review copies and such. See, the average gamer can get reviews of games the day said games comes out, from pretty much any site out there. As a result, where the sites distinguish themselves is by getting the early scoop on new upcoming games. That and a complete and total aversion to editing, a la IGN. In order to get these early scoops, and trips to studios to see games in progress, blah, blah, blah, the sites/magazines have to write pretty glowing previews, and at the same time, take for granted that the big, glaring bugs they do see will be fixed by the time that the games ship.
All too often, these bugs aren't fixed, or others pop up, or the game changes entirely so that the game that makes it to retail is but a quality-less husk of a game compared to the game that was previewed. The gamers that read said preview are now, at best, left wondering why the final game is so shitty compared to the preview and at worst, left having purchased a copy of the shitty game and have no recourse to get their money back. The development houses say "Hey, we don't control what the magazines write." The magazines/sites say "Hey, they said they'd fix these bugs, and it was only a preview." The consumer is left trusting no one, which is a pretty shitty place for a consumer to be, especially when you're asking said consumer to shell out 60 bucks a game and upwards of 600 bucks for something to play the game on.
Does this mean that previews should be done away with entirely? I don't think so. I do think that the gaming sites need something to differentiate themselves from each other, and previews can still be that thing, just not as they are now. In short, we need more previews like the E3 "preview" of Too Human and fewer of the cover story preview. Well, maybe not as harsh as the E3 report, but certainly not as glowing as the cover story. Previews should stick to the facts, and leave the embellishment to the reader. The game has these features, this kind of story, this kind of gameplay, supports these multiplayer modes, et cetera. It should also point out the fair criticisms of the game, including issues that the developers are planning on fixing. In other words, give the reader honest impressions of the game, rather than some fluff piece.
Oddly enough Dyack seemed to agree with this, and stated that gaming journalists should be "more critical" of games despite the fact that EGM being critical of the E3 demo is what got him all in a lather in the first place. I say "seemed to agree" because honestly, this dude was all over the map.
Dyack also said that magazines and sites shouldn't look at games until the games are "in the can" and that the marketing effort shouldn't begin then either, and the way a marketing push can be built for a game is to hold on to the finished game for 6 to 12 months and then release it. With the rising costs of game development, I'm not sure how studios could spend millions of dollars on a game to then hold on to it for a year. Where would they get the money to work on their next project? This is especially true for the smaller development houses. Silicon Knights has an impressive pedigree, and now with Microsoft behind them, I'm sure they could easily work on another project while Too Human was in the can, but not every studio can do that. Not every publisher is going to agree to fund another development effort without seeing some return on their investment on the game they just paid for. I agree that it'd be great to hear of a game first on Monday, have it ship on Tuesday, read a review on Wednesday and play it on Thursday, but I don't see that as being a viable business model.
These comments didn't really bug me that much, as I just don't agree with them. The comments of Dyack's that bugged me were that he felt sorry for the guy who wrote the E3 write-up because when Too Human is released, the E3 writer is going to have to stand by what he wrote about the game's E3 build. Mind you, he's basing this on the fact that people "in the industry" have seen Too Human and they all say it's super awesome, so we should just all automatically believe him. After all, every god in the Norse pantheon is represented! I guess that's a good thing because Lord knows we wouldn't want Freya to get pissed.
My response to this was the same response that the E3 writer had, which was basically to ask why it would be a problem for him to stand by what he wrote about the E3 build? By Dyack's own admission, the E3 build was a mess, so why would the brilliance of the final product make the author of the comments about an 18 month old build look silly? At no point during the E3 write up did the writer say that no one should buy Too Human. In fact, the overwhelming response to the E3 build by most of the gaming press wasn't that Too Human was going to suck, but that the demo should never have been shown in the first place. I understand the logistics of showing a demo are such that you can't pull a demo last minute just because things aren't working as you expected them to, but at the same time, if the build that the first EGM guy was so good, why not show that build, rather than the one you brought to E3, especially if you knew that the E3 build was a mess? I find it very hard to believe that they don't have the ability to roll back to earlier builds. Maybe that would have meant that it was no longer playable by the press but just watchable, but that still would have been a better way to go.
Of course, debating what should or should not have been shown at E3 isn't really the point. The point here is that Dyack seemed to want it both ways. He said that he didn't like the E3 write up because he didn't want people to discount Too Human based on what they read about the E3 demo. He also felt that because EGM had seen an earlier, better build of the game, they should have given them the benefit of the doubt and not been harsh about the E3 demo. Well, which is it? You can't say that you don't want people to have a bad impression of your game based on a demo that's at least 12 months out from the finished product but you do want people to have a good impression of your game based on a demo that's even more than 12 months out from the finished product. You either take the position that your demo, good or bad, isn't indicative of the final product, or you say that this demo is pretty damn close to what we're going to be showing, so it better be fucking aces.
I can see his point about people getting the wrong impression, especially at E3 where there's like 5000 games being shown and you have a very limited amount of time to make a good impression. This is especially true now that there are 3 consoles, 2 handhelds, PC's and a gazillion PDA/cellphone platforms out there are all competing for gamers' time and money. At the same time, most gamers know that E3, and the things shown at E3 are, for the most part, illusions. Taking anything that originates from that marketing cesspool even remotely seriously is an exercise in folly. Despite what Dyack's condescending tone seemed to imply, we're not all idiots. We know that sometimes builds go bad. You decided to still show it. OK, bad move, but whatever. Just fucking man up and move on. If your game ends up being Teh Sh1t, then people will play it. Hell, look at Crackdown. Most folks believed that it was a throwaway, GTA ripoff that was using the Halo 3 beta to move copies. Now that it's been out for a while, most people seem to love it. I know of at least 3 folks who were incredibly harsh in their comments about it who are now running from rooftop to rooftop with glee. Gamers are a lot of things, but holders of long attention spans isn't one of them.
There was more to his comments that made me feel like he thinks we're all idiots, or that the EGM E3 writer was an idiot, but I think I've written enough here. Don't get me started on his failed Okami argument as that's another post entirely. If you'd like to hear it for yourself, please do so. The first 45 minutes or so is where the real meat of the discussion is. The second hour is just Dyack going on and on and on about how great Too Human is and all the fantastic things that Silicon Knights did before anyone else did, like creating fire and inventing language. In the end, I was left thinking that he should have just stayed up in Canada and worked on making his game as good as it could be, rather than taking a page from the Book of Harrison and opening his mouth and looking like an asshole. As Mark Twain once said, "It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt."
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
Crackdown
Before I get too much into talking about Crackdown, I want to talk about something that Bones told me about today, namely that Marvel comics is planning on killing of Captain America in an upcoming issue. Now, maybe this isn't true or maybe Cap won't really die similar to when he "died" back during WWII, but my gut feels me that it is true. If so, this is very, very disappointing. Cap has always been an amazing character and given the United State's position in the world today, I find it very hard to believe that there isn't someone out there that can't write a decent story for the spirit of America made flesh. If a character becomes irrelevant, it's usually the fault of the writers, not the fault of the character. It would seem to me that the solution to this would be to get better writers, not blow Cap's fucking head off. Whatever. DC's last big crossover was Infinity Crisis, which followed on the heels of Identity Crisis, two amazing pieces of work that examined what it meant to be a superhero in modern times. Marvel's was Civil War which had Spider-Man unmasking himself for no good goddamn reason and other pointless "wow" moments. Cap's death will just be one more example of them trying to gain readers by having "big" moments that do nothing but damage their properties. On the plus side, this seals the deal on my next tattoo. I had been toying with the idea of getting Cap's shield on my left forearm, to compliment Spidey on my right. If Marvel isn't going to care about Cap, I will.
So, Crackdown. I've been playing it for a couple of weeks now, and I've been having an absolute blast. This game kind of snuck up on me. I had read about it before, and seen screen shots but didn't get interested until watching a gameplay video. When I played the demo, I was completely sold though. This is a game that really has to be played to be fully appreciated. Screen shots of the game are kind of "eh". The videos give you a better idea of what the explosions and game mechanics are like, but until you take your agent running from rooftop to rooftop, targeting a gang member in midair and cutting him down with a rain of bullets, you really won't "get it". And by "it" I mean a near obsessive desire, nay need, to pick up a dumpster and throw it a hooligan.
In the past few days I have done the following in game:
It's not all perfect though. The camera, which is usually done very, very well, sometimes moves into your agent's body when you get too close to a wall. This isn't a problem most of the time, but when you're trying to make a certain jump to try and get to the top of the ferris wheel and complete the rooftop race you've been working on for the past 45 minutes.
The driving is probably my biggest complaint in the game. When you start out, you can't drive for shit, however the main way to get better at driving is to complete races, perform stunts or kill gang members by driving. All of these are next to impossible with your crap-ass driving skills. Add to this the fact that all cars other than Agency cars handle like shit, and Agency cars can only be obtained if you kill yourself and go back to the Agency Keep. Thankfully, if you find enough hidden orbs you'll raise all of your stats a little bit, including driving, and finding enough hidden orbs will raise your driving skill enough for you to start having fun behind the wheel. It seems to me that if you want people to drive in the game, you should make it easier from the start. That's just me though.
The other skills work remarkably well, and the ability to equip yourself with machine guns, rocket launchers and grenades all at the same time means that a group of gang members milling on a rooftop aren't so much a potential threat as an opportunity to increase three skills, possible at once. Yes, if you shoot a gang member in the legs by locking on and targeting their kneecaps, then chucking in a grenade to liven up the party and ending the evening by stomping them to death, you'll get skill points in firearms, explosives and strength. It's truly time management at its finest.
It seems like the game is doing fairly well, no doubt helped by the Halo 3 beta invite packaged with it, which is a good thing, because I think they've got a really strong foundation to build from. The funny thing about this game is that there are so many people I've talked to that had no interest in it, thinking it was a GTA ripoff, only to find themselves having an absolute blast once they play it for some time and give it a chance. Given that this is the case, putting the Halo 3 beta invite in with the game was genius as it allows people who may have written it off as a GTA clone the opportunity to play it and fall in love with it. Hopefully the good word of mouth and strong sales will warrant a sequel as this game is just too much fun for only one outing.
So, Crackdown. I've been playing it for a couple of weeks now, and I've been having an absolute blast. This game kind of snuck up on me. I had read about it before, and seen screen shots but didn't get interested until watching a gameplay video. When I played the demo, I was completely sold though. This is a game that really has to be played to be fully appreciated. Screen shots of the game are kind of "eh". The videos give you a better idea of what the explosions and game mechanics are like, but until you take your agent running from rooftop to rooftop, targeting a gang member in midair and cutting him down with a rain of bullets, you really won't "get it". And by "it" I mean a near obsessive desire, nay need, to pick up a dumpster and throw it a hooligan.
In the past few days I have done the following in game:
- Jumped from a rooftop and taken out 6 gang members with a rocket launcher, while in midair.
- Killed a gang member by kicking a vehicle on to him after pulling him out of said vehicle.
- Killed a bunch of gang members by chucking a 2 ton metal globe at them.
- Kicked a gang general off of a rooftop.
- Run down gang members in a semi cab.
- Performed various barrel rolls in a tricked out SUV.
- Gotten killed numerous times trying a frontal assault on a steroided out gang general holed up in a quarry cave filled with explosive barrels and missles. Found a back door by leaping into the air off of a billboard and hanging on to a rock ledge and eventually making my way to a tunnel that allowed me secret access to the gang general. Threw in enough grenades to take out a small office complex, detonating all of the explosive materials in the process and taking out the holed up general. Picked up the general's corpse, targeted a gang member on the highway below the caves, hurled the general's corpse and killed the gang member.
- Ran from rooftop to rooftop collecting agility orbs.
It's not all perfect though. The camera, which is usually done very, very well, sometimes moves into your agent's body when you get too close to a wall. This isn't a problem most of the time, but when you're trying to make a certain jump to try and get to the top of the ferris wheel and complete the rooftop race you've been working on for the past 45 minutes.
The driving is probably my biggest complaint in the game. When you start out, you can't drive for shit, however the main way to get better at driving is to complete races, perform stunts or kill gang members by driving. All of these are next to impossible with your crap-ass driving skills. Add to this the fact that all cars other than Agency cars handle like shit, and Agency cars can only be obtained if you kill yourself and go back to the Agency Keep. Thankfully, if you find enough hidden orbs you'll raise all of your stats a little bit, including driving, and finding enough hidden orbs will raise your driving skill enough for you to start having fun behind the wheel. It seems to me that if you want people to drive in the game, you should make it easier from the start. That's just me though.
The other skills work remarkably well, and the ability to equip yourself with machine guns, rocket launchers and grenades all at the same time means that a group of gang members milling on a rooftop aren't so much a potential threat as an opportunity to increase three skills, possible at once. Yes, if you shoot a gang member in the legs by locking on and targeting their kneecaps, then chucking in a grenade to liven up the party and ending the evening by stomping them to death, you'll get skill points in firearms, explosives and strength. It's truly time management at its finest.
It seems like the game is doing fairly well, no doubt helped by the Halo 3 beta invite packaged with it, which is a good thing, because I think they've got a really strong foundation to build from. The funny thing about this game is that there are so many people I've talked to that had no interest in it, thinking it was a GTA ripoff, only to find themselves having an absolute blast once they play it for some time and give it a chance. Given that this is the case, putting the Halo 3 beta invite in with the game was genius as it allows people who may have written it off as a GTA clone the opportunity to play it and fall in love with it. Hopefully the good word of mouth and strong sales will warrant a sequel as this game is just too much fun for only one outing.
Friday, March 02, 2007
Show and Hell
Somehow, through no fault of my own, Thursday night has become Arts and Crafts night at our house. It doesn't seem like it was that long ago when Thursday night was 2AM Denny's night because you didn't have any classes on Friday, or Thursday night was lie on the couch and watch "Friends" night and try and get through to the weekend when you can sleep all day. Those days are over. Now, Thursday nights are spent gluing and drawing and trying to explain what "nervous" means to a 4 year old.
Perhaps some backstory is in order. My son is 4, which puts him in Preschool II at his daycare, or what I like to call the Pre-Harvard Program. For some reason, his school does everything a year ahead, so the PS II kids are doing what you'd normally do in Pre-Kindergarten and the Pre-K kids are doing what you'd do in Kindergarten. Not sure what the private Kindergarten kids do, probably work Pi out to 8 billion digits, and we'll never know because I'll be damned if I'm going to pay property taxes for full day school and then pay for private full day schooling on top of it. Actually, I know why they do everything a year ahead, it's to satisfy a generation of parents who think that if Timmy can't conjugate Spanish verbs by age 5 he's going to end up homeless and living in a refrigerator box.
When my son first joined this class, the kids were allowed to bring in whatever they wanted for Show and Tell. Being that they're all small kids, they brought in toys. Linda and I were pretty restrictive as to what toys he could bring as we tried to put ourselves in the teacher's shoes. Basically, nothing too big and nothing that made noise. Other parents apparently didn't feel the same way, shocking I know, and Show and Tell day descended into a cacophony of toy sounds, screaming children and a lack of attention to the day's activities. For this reason, Show and Tell in its toy free for all form came to an end.
In it's place, Ben's teacher put "projects" for the children (parents) to do to help relate to the week's lesson. Now, I'm all for activities that get kids and parents working together, and I'm all for projects that reinforce the week's learnings for the children, but some of these projects are not designed with 4 year olds in mind. To me, the project should be something that the kid can at least come up with the ideas for, and just require parental assistance with the implementation. Not create an internal combustion engine from twigs and leaves.
The first sign of trouble was in October, when the project for Show and Tell was to have your kid draw a cornucopia and put in it pictures of all of their favorite foods from magazines. OK, most adults I know don't know what a cornucopia is much less a kid who, when asked what he does on the weekend, tells his teacher "We go to the jungle." Plus, the magazines I read are Game Informer, Playboy and Cooking Light, none of which have pictures of Yogables and Cheezits, his favorite foods. If the cornucopia needed pictures of Master Chief, an Easy Ravioli Bake and Ms. April's boobs, we'd be all set. We settled for me drawing a corcucopia with drawings of Ben's favorite foods as told by Ben and him coloring everything in. That seemed to work fine.
The next big project was to create a 3-d cat, owl or some other animal. Ben chose a cat. It took me some time to come up with a design that didn't involve papier mache or some kind of elaborate scaffolding. I also tried to avoid the craft store as much as possible, but ended up relenting as we, strangely enough, don't keep a readily available supply of pipe cleaners at home. Should you be of the mind to search out some hot, 60+ action and they won't let you loiter around the nursing homes, might I recommend the craft store at lunch time. The combines age of the shoppers in that store exceeded the age of our galaxy.
The cat ended up being a smashing success. You may remember it.
Perhaps some backstory is in order. My son is 4, which puts him in Preschool II at his daycare, or what I like to call the Pre-Harvard Program. For some reason, his school does everything a year ahead, so the PS II kids are doing what you'd normally do in Pre-Kindergarten and the Pre-K kids are doing what you'd do in Kindergarten. Not sure what the private Kindergarten kids do, probably work Pi out to 8 billion digits, and we'll never know because I'll be damned if I'm going to pay property taxes for full day school and then pay for private full day schooling on top of it. Actually, I know why they do everything a year ahead, it's to satisfy a generation of parents who think that if Timmy can't conjugate Spanish verbs by age 5 he's going to end up homeless and living in a refrigerator box.
When my son first joined this class, the kids were allowed to bring in whatever they wanted for Show and Tell. Being that they're all small kids, they brought in toys. Linda and I were pretty restrictive as to what toys he could bring as we tried to put ourselves in the teacher's shoes. Basically, nothing too big and nothing that made noise. Other parents apparently didn't feel the same way, shocking I know, and Show and Tell day descended into a cacophony of toy sounds, screaming children and a lack of attention to the day's activities. For this reason, Show and Tell in its toy free for all form came to an end.
In it's place, Ben's teacher put "projects" for the children (parents) to do to help relate to the week's lesson. Now, I'm all for activities that get kids and parents working together, and I'm all for projects that reinforce the week's learnings for the children, but some of these projects are not designed with 4 year olds in mind. To me, the project should be something that the kid can at least come up with the ideas for, and just require parental assistance with the implementation. Not create an internal combustion engine from twigs and leaves.
The first sign of trouble was in October, when the project for Show and Tell was to have your kid draw a cornucopia and put in it pictures of all of their favorite foods from magazines. OK, most adults I know don't know what a cornucopia is much less a kid who, when asked what he does on the weekend, tells his teacher "We go to the jungle." Plus, the magazines I read are Game Informer, Playboy and Cooking Light, none of which have pictures of Yogables and Cheezits, his favorite foods. If the cornucopia needed pictures of Master Chief, an Easy Ravioli Bake and Ms. April's boobs, we'd be all set. We settled for me drawing a corcucopia with drawings of Ben's favorite foods as told by Ben and him coloring everything in. That seemed to work fine.
The next big project was to create a 3-d cat, owl or some other animal. Ben chose a cat. It took me some time to come up with a design that didn't involve papier mache or some kind of elaborate scaffolding. I also tried to avoid the craft store as much as possible, but ended up relenting as we, strangely enough, don't keep a readily available supply of pipe cleaners at home. Should you be of the mind to search out some hot, 60+ action and they won't let you loiter around the nursing homes, might I recommend the craft store at lunch time. The combines age of the shoppers in that store exceeded the age of our galaxy.
The cat ended up being a smashing success. You may remember it.
We had a small respite over the holidays when Show and Tell involved nothing more complicated than wearing a particular color on a particular day. At one point, Ben had to bring in something that could go in the water and something that couldn't. I suggested he bring in a boat and a cat tied to a brick. Linda didn't appreciate this suggestion so he brought in a Matchbox boat (ok in water) and a Matchbox car (not ok in water).
Then came the Tome of Feelings. The week's lesson was feelings, which is probably a good idea considering that these kids are volatile powder kegs of emotion just waiting to explode in fury. Ok, so maybe that's just my kid. Anyways, the project was to create a book of feelings. Not too bad as you'd expect that for a 4 year old, they'd cover the old standbys, your happy, your sad, your mad. Oh no, not this class. The five feelings were happy, sad, nervous, scared and excited. Nervous? How the frak do you explain nervous to a 4 year old? When the hell are 4 year olds ever nervous anyways? I don't think the emotional spectrum of kids this age is finely tuned enough to register nervous. Scared? Sure. Happy? Sure. Nervous? I don't think so. Rather than give him examples of things that could cause him to be nervous, and risk making him nervous about things that used to never bother him, I simply made the book, drew a smiley face on each page for the associated feelings and had him draw whatever he associated with the feelings. For the record, green ladders make him both nervous and excited.
This past one was the toughest one of all. I got a week's break when the Show and Tell item was a family photo on a piece of paper. I let Linda hande that one as she's our resident photographer. In retrospect, this was a bad idea as the picture was poorly placed and didn't allow for writing and/or drawing all around the picture. Strictly amateur hour but understandable given her self imposed distance from the crafting process. Apparently I posess craft chops where she does not which is how I got roped into this whole thing in the first place.
But I digress. This past week's lesson was life cycles as in eggs -> tadpole -> frog or catepillar -> cocoon -> butterfly or 80's hair band star -> washed up drug addict -> "Surreal Life" cast member -> washed up drug addict. The exact assignment was: "This week I would like for the children to Pick one out of the three and make the life cycle using a variety of things: Frogs, flowers, or a butterfly. Example: {frog} I would collect a leaf from outside and make it my lily pad then I would draw an oval and color it green and add glitter, and the frog can be made from toilet paper roll." OK, I can handle the leaf thing, and I know what glitter is but how the hell do you make a frog out of toilet paper rolls?
As it's "his" project, I asked Ben which life cycle he wanted to do. I was pushing for the flower. I figured some construction paper, some glue, an unpopped popcorn kernel and a daffodil culled from the front yard and we'd be done. Of course, Ben wanted to do the most complicated one and tackle the frog. Behold the finished product!
The eggs are cotton balls marked with a Sharpie. The tadpole is a construction paper creation, illustrated by yours truly. The frog is construction paper glued together by Ben and myself with eyes of Ben's creation. He went for two different colors for the eyes. A bold choice to be sure. The lily pad is an actual leaf. I cribbed from the teacher on that one. In retrospect I should have made the frog's body more elongated, but I was working from a design that used a paper plate to make the frog, and once I got locked on a folder circle for the body, I didn't think of anything else. I have no idea what's going on with his legs. I think he's jumping but now that I look at it, it looks like he's been run over by a semi. I wanted to make more eggs to use as googly eyes but Linda thought it'd be unsettling to have a frog with eggs for eyes. She's got a valid point there. Ben also helped with the spelling of the words as I felt that having him write "tadpole" would take us well into the next millennium so I took care of that for him.
I think it turned out OK, and it's certainly better than my original idea of gluing a toy frog to a foam plate, but it's not as good as it could be. There's certainly room for improvement. Ben seemed satisfied which is the important thing as it's his project. Actually, he seemed fairly oblivious and this morning wouldn't have even remembered it had I not pointed out where it was. Ah the joys of youth and short memories.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
Go Rampage, It's Your Birthday
Oh the feelings of excitement that Soundwave must have felt when he got the call from Megatron to return to his rightful place at Megatron's side. As it turns out, Megatron wasn't in need of Soundwave's highly specialized listening skills. No, they just needed some tunes.
Even Rampage is getting his groove on, although it is a wee bit hard to make out from this picture. Now that I've called a ceasefire, our disguised, robotic friends have no way to work off all of their extra energy. Perhaps they have learned to settle their differences through the universal language of dance. Perhaps they know that Jetfire is coming and they want to get down with their bad selves before the party gets crashed by the resident scientist. Who needs a wet blanket Poindexter ruining all the fun anyways?
In other news, I saw Downshift when I was out and about today and couldn't resist. Between his very badass pseudo-muscle car mode, his rocket launchers, and his vaguely ninja-like appearance, I felt he'd make a good addition to the other toys. Plus, he has this claw thing that pops out of the front of him. Good times. Now that I have another Autobot, I need another Decepticon to bring balance. I think I'll go with the version of Skywarp that comes from the same toy line as it doesn't require me to buy Ultra Magnus with him and he's not just a repaint of a toy I already have. Now I just have to find him, which is kind of funny as I've seen him everywhere during my searches for Jetfire, so now I'm sure I won't ever see him again.
I have completed my first three bowling lessons and I think they're starting to pay off. Today I bowled in the 150's, in the 120's and in the 130's. Before my lessons, the low score in a day's outing would be in the 20's, not the 120's, so clearly we're turning a corner. There's still a lot of work to do, as picking up spares isn't exactly my strong suit, but I feel like I'm getting somewhere. I'm sure I'll descend back into the depths of mediocrity come our league game tomorrow, but for one brief shining moment, I looked like someone who kind of knew what they were doing. At this point, I'm not asking for much more. Reach for the stars, I always say.
Be sure to come back Friday when I spin the tale of one man's journey through the wilds of the craft universe with only some construction paper, some glue and a 4 year old at his side. Stay tuned!
Even Rampage is getting his groove on, although it is a wee bit hard to make out from this picture. Now that I've called a ceasefire, our disguised, robotic friends have no way to work off all of their extra energy. Perhaps they have learned to settle their differences through the universal language of dance. Perhaps they know that Jetfire is coming and they want to get down with their bad selves before the party gets crashed by the resident scientist. Who needs a wet blanket Poindexter ruining all the fun anyways?In other news, I saw Downshift when I was out and about today and couldn't resist. Between his very badass pseudo-muscle car mode, his rocket launchers, and his vaguely ninja-like appearance, I felt he'd make a good addition to the other toys. Plus, he has this claw thing that pops out of the front of him. Good times. Now that I have another Autobot, I need another Decepticon to bring balance. I think I'll go with the version of Skywarp that comes from the same toy line as it doesn't require me to buy Ultra Magnus with him and he's not just a repaint of a toy I already have. Now I just have to find him, which is kind of funny as I've seen him everywhere during my searches for Jetfire, so now I'm sure I won't ever see him again.
I have completed my first three bowling lessons and I think they're starting to pay off. Today I bowled in the 150's, in the 120's and in the 130's. Before my lessons, the low score in a day's outing would be in the 20's, not the 120's, so clearly we're turning a corner. There's still a lot of work to do, as picking up spares isn't exactly my strong suit, but I feel like I'm getting somewhere. I'm sure I'll descend back into the depths of mediocrity come our league game tomorrow, but for one brief shining moment, I looked like someone who kind of knew what they were doing. At this point, I'm not asking for much more. Reach for the stars, I always say.
Be sure to come back Friday when I spin the tale of one man's journey through the wilds of the craft universe with only some construction paper, some glue and a 4 year old at his side. Stay tuned!
Monday, February 26, 2007
Gametastic
It's been a while since I've rapped about games to ye, well, rapped about anything in fact, but that's besides the point. Today it's all about the gaming.
Well, not quite. Despite weeks and weeks of searching, I have been unable to find Jetfire, despite various accounts of sightings from like minded toy hunters. As much as I enjoy spending my lunch time searching in an ever expanding circle of retail establishments, I have caved and ordered the toy online, from Wal-Mart of all places. I do not wish to disparage those that shop at Wal-Mart, however I will say that I'm a Target person and just leave it at that. This is clearly a situation where the toy must be served, and in order to do that, we must shop in places we find less than ideal. I mean, for chrissakes, they had him labeled as a Decepticon. Jeez. At any rate, I should have him soon, and when I do, we shall sing and dance all the live long day.
In a quest to obtain Crackdown solely through trades, we have been burning the midnight gaming oil at the homestead. I am now prepared to issue judgement on a number of titles. I apologize if I end up repeating things I've already written about, but I don't feel like going through old posts, and really, what else do you have to do?
Red Steel (Wii) - Somewhere out there is a game that shows how good the Wii will be with first person shooters. This game ain't it. The controls were ok, except for the part where you had to turn the volume of the Wiimote speaker all the way down lest your aiming reticle jump around like a seizure victim. The zooming in for sniping was absolutely awful as the Wii doesn't exactly excel at determining changes in the Wiimote's distance from the sensor bar, and you zoomed in by pushing the remote towards the screen. The sword fighting controls were somewhat unresponsive and the whole idea of gunning down rooms full of bad guys with your submachine gun just to then pull out your sword to fight someone with a baseball bat was silly. To top it off, I hit an issue in the game that gave me the choice of either starting the entire mission over, or calling it quits and trading it in. I chose the latter.
Elebits (Wii) - An interesting concept and nice, bright visuals however the game play was very repetitive and the voice acting was so horrible that it made small mammals bleed from the ears. I know others enjoyed this one, but there just wasn't enough to make me want to keep playing.
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii) - While not the best Zelda ever, that's still Ocarina for me, this is one of the best games I've played in a very long time. The art direction was particularly impressive and very easily bests all other entries in the series. Some of the horseback stuff got a little annoying, but the beast form mechanics were integrated nicely and the expanded repetoire of sword moves was a nice addition. Boss battles weren't too difficult, in fact the only time I ever died in the game was when I fell off a ledge or something, however what the final bosses lack in difficulty they make up for in length. You better pack a lunch when going up against these guys. Speaking of boss battles, your very last battle is a straight up sword fight against Ganon, which was a nice addition to the usual "use every item you found in the game" kind of fight we're used to. While the ending wasn't as dramatic as Wind Waker's ending, it was still immensely satisfying and left me with that familar mix of joy and sadness that I get when finishing a Zelda game. I can't recommend this game enough for veteran Zelda players and folks new to the series.
Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando (PS2) - I always find it odd that when folks talk about the big, PS3 exclusive franchises, they consistently fail to mention the Ratchet and Clank series. These games are easily, some of the funniest, best written games you'll play on any console. The action is equally well done with massive guns, huge explosions, tough enemies and a nice mix of platforming and straight up destruction. When the next one comes out, I'll be horribly, horribly jealous that I won't be able to play it. Guess I'll just hold off on playing "Up Your Arsenal" and use that to soothe my jealous soul.
Transformers (PS2) - Not a bad title, I just didn't have it in me to "catch 'em all". I like Pokemon and I like the Transformers, but if they're going to be combined, I want it to be a situation where I throw a Pokeball and Metroplex comes out and stomps the shit out of Squirtle, not me playing as a Transformer on a quest to collect and subjugate other, lesser Transformers. Plus, the ending movie, with the fireworks display was dumb.
Gears of War (360) - Technically I haven't finished this game as Joel and I are still rocking the co-op on Insane, but I did play through it on hardcore and had a fantastic time. When all is said and done, this will be the first game that I a) played through co-op and b) played through multiple times at different difficulty levels. It's such a different game when played with another sentient being that it warrants an additional playthrough. The change in difficulty also forces you to use different weapons and different strategies, thereby making it a different game as well as developing skills that are beyond mad and safely exist in the realm of the furious.
Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: And Justice For All (DS) - I'm almost done with this one. Well, truth be told, I'm on the last case, which, like the first entry on the DS was as long as all of the other cases combined, so in actuality, I'm about half way done. If you like the Phoenix Wright games, you'll like this one and if you don't like 'em, there's nothing here to change your mind. I fall in the former camp, so I'm in judicial heaven right now. After this I plan on picking up Hotel Dusk so I can continue my DS adventuring in earnest.
As you can see, I've been quite busy and I don't see it letting up any time soon. Crackdown is proving to be as much fun as the demo, even more so as my destructive powers have surpassed the levels achieved in the demo. There is something immensely satisfying with standing your ground as a tow truck bears down on, only for it to then be turned aside with a kick of your incredibly strong, genetically modified leg. I usually follow up these actions with either dropping a grenade on the overturned vehicle, flambeeing the occupants in the process, or I bring the weight of my titanic kicks onto the fleeing gang members, disposing them in the process. Shooting is fun too, but right not I'm getting my kicks through kicks. Last night I tried to scale the Agency tower, however she is a harsh and unyielding mistress, and I was unsuccessful. I shall return and conquer her at a later date.
SSX Blur comes out tomorrow or Wednesday with Tiger Woods for the Wii shortly afterwards. I'm surprised and vaguely unsettled with all of the attention EA has focused on the Wii. For now, I'll take my titles and be happy with them, however I am prepared to combat what ever dark designs they have for my happy little, white box.
Finally, this past weekend Linda and I were paid a visit by Bones and his lovely wife Cathy. We had a fantastic time, which was nice as, up until that point, Bones existed only in the world of Teh Intraweb and could have been a homicidal maniac or a maurading android bent on world domination. He may still be, but at least now I can tell the police that he seemed like a nice guy. It is so easy, in these days of instant communication and virtual gatherings of like minded people to feel as if someone you are speaking with would be cool to hang out with, only to find out that they're so completely not, that you start to assume that the people you meet online are best left there. It's nice to be proven otherwise.
Well, not quite. Despite weeks and weeks of searching, I have been unable to find Jetfire, despite various accounts of sightings from like minded toy hunters. As much as I enjoy spending my lunch time searching in an ever expanding circle of retail establishments, I have caved and ordered the toy online, from Wal-Mart of all places. I do not wish to disparage those that shop at Wal-Mart, however I will say that I'm a Target person and just leave it at that. This is clearly a situation where the toy must be served, and in order to do that, we must shop in places we find less than ideal. I mean, for chrissakes, they had him labeled as a Decepticon. Jeez. At any rate, I should have him soon, and when I do, we shall sing and dance all the live long day.
In a quest to obtain Crackdown solely through trades, we have been burning the midnight gaming oil at the homestead. I am now prepared to issue judgement on a number of titles. I apologize if I end up repeating things I've already written about, but I don't feel like going through old posts, and really, what else do you have to do?
Red Steel (Wii) - Somewhere out there is a game that shows how good the Wii will be with first person shooters. This game ain't it. The controls were ok, except for the part where you had to turn the volume of the Wiimote speaker all the way down lest your aiming reticle jump around like a seizure victim. The zooming in for sniping was absolutely awful as the Wii doesn't exactly excel at determining changes in the Wiimote's distance from the sensor bar, and you zoomed in by pushing the remote towards the screen. The sword fighting controls were somewhat unresponsive and the whole idea of gunning down rooms full of bad guys with your submachine gun just to then pull out your sword to fight someone with a baseball bat was silly. To top it off, I hit an issue in the game that gave me the choice of either starting the entire mission over, or calling it quits and trading it in. I chose the latter.
Elebits (Wii) - An interesting concept and nice, bright visuals however the game play was very repetitive and the voice acting was so horrible that it made small mammals bleed from the ears. I know others enjoyed this one, but there just wasn't enough to make me want to keep playing.
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii) - While not the best Zelda ever, that's still Ocarina for me, this is one of the best games I've played in a very long time. The art direction was particularly impressive and very easily bests all other entries in the series. Some of the horseback stuff got a little annoying, but the beast form mechanics were integrated nicely and the expanded repetoire of sword moves was a nice addition. Boss battles weren't too difficult, in fact the only time I ever died in the game was when I fell off a ledge or something, however what the final bosses lack in difficulty they make up for in length. You better pack a lunch when going up against these guys. Speaking of boss battles, your very last battle is a straight up sword fight against Ganon, which was a nice addition to the usual "use every item you found in the game" kind of fight we're used to. While the ending wasn't as dramatic as Wind Waker's ending, it was still immensely satisfying and left me with that familar mix of joy and sadness that I get when finishing a Zelda game. I can't recommend this game enough for veteran Zelda players and folks new to the series.
Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando (PS2) - I always find it odd that when folks talk about the big, PS3 exclusive franchises, they consistently fail to mention the Ratchet and Clank series. These games are easily, some of the funniest, best written games you'll play on any console. The action is equally well done with massive guns, huge explosions, tough enemies and a nice mix of platforming and straight up destruction. When the next one comes out, I'll be horribly, horribly jealous that I won't be able to play it. Guess I'll just hold off on playing "Up Your Arsenal" and use that to soothe my jealous soul.
Transformers (PS2) - Not a bad title, I just didn't have it in me to "catch 'em all". I like Pokemon and I like the Transformers, but if they're going to be combined, I want it to be a situation where I throw a Pokeball and Metroplex comes out and stomps the shit out of Squirtle, not me playing as a Transformer on a quest to collect and subjugate other, lesser Transformers. Plus, the ending movie, with the fireworks display was dumb.
Gears of War (360) - Technically I haven't finished this game as Joel and I are still rocking the co-op on Insane, but I did play through it on hardcore and had a fantastic time. When all is said and done, this will be the first game that I a) played through co-op and b) played through multiple times at different difficulty levels. It's such a different game when played with another sentient being that it warrants an additional playthrough. The change in difficulty also forces you to use different weapons and different strategies, thereby making it a different game as well as developing skills that are beyond mad and safely exist in the realm of the furious.
Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: And Justice For All (DS) - I'm almost done with this one. Well, truth be told, I'm on the last case, which, like the first entry on the DS was as long as all of the other cases combined, so in actuality, I'm about half way done. If you like the Phoenix Wright games, you'll like this one and if you don't like 'em, there's nothing here to change your mind. I fall in the former camp, so I'm in judicial heaven right now. After this I plan on picking up Hotel Dusk so I can continue my DS adventuring in earnest.
As you can see, I've been quite busy and I don't see it letting up any time soon. Crackdown is proving to be as much fun as the demo, even more so as my destructive powers have surpassed the levels achieved in the demo. There is something immensely satisfying with standing your ground as a tow truck bears down on, only for it to then be turned aside with a kick of your incredibly strong, genetically modified leg. I usually follow up these actions with either dropping a grenade on the overturned vehicle, flambeeing the occupants in the process, or I bring the weight of my titanic kicks onto the fleeing gang members, disposing them in the process. Shooting is fun too, but right not I'm getting my kicks through kicks. Last night I tried to scale the Agency tower, however she is a harsh and unyielding mistress, and I was unsuccessful. I shall return and conquer her at a later date.
SSX Blur comes out tomorrow or Wednesday with Tiger Woods for the Wii shortly afterwards. I'm surprised and vaguely unsettled with all of the attention EA has focused on the Wii. For now, I'll take my titles and be happy with them, however I am prepared to combat what ever dark designs they have for my happy little, white box.
Finally, this past weekend Linda and I were paid a visit by Bones and his lovely wife Cathy. We had a fantastic time, which was nice as, up until that point, Bones existed only in the world of Teh Intraweb and could have been a homicidal maniac or a maurading android bent on world domination. He may still be, but at least now I can tell the police that he seemed like a nice guy. It is so easy, in these days of instant communication and virtual gatherings of like minded people to feel as if someone you are speaking with would be cool to hang out with, only to find out that they're so completely not, that you start to assume that the people you meet online are best left there. It's nice to be proven otherwise.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
Behold, My Iron Clad Will!
The toy hunt continues in earnest. Thanks to my frantic checking of Gmail, I was able to read the notification from Toys R Us in regards to the reissue of the G1 Soundwave, and order one before they ran out. Actually, I ordered two and managed to snag my manager into my web of toy neurosis. A week or so later, Soundwave arrived and he's everything I remembered him to be, just...smaller. He is a reissue in every sense of the word, right down to the "1983" copyright date stamped in his battery area. He even came with the original decals so that you could make him even spiffier.
His transformation is pretty simple, not at all like the complex rituals of mechanical tomfoolery that come along with the new classics series. I mean, I'm a smart guy. I have a couple degrees and everything, yet I still can't transform Grimlock from memory. Soundwave is child's play by comparison except for his legs, which stick a bit and always make me think that I'm going to turn him into a double amputee every time I transform him into his oh-so imposing microcassette recorder. Speaking of which, I know that at a kid, I didn't think twice about him being a microcassette player, and not a full sized tape player, but now I find it kind of odd. I mean, I know that were he a full sized tape player, the tapes would transform into birds and jaguars bigger than Soundwave himself, further screwing the Transformers' already messed up sense of scale, however I find it hard to believe that there was a significant number of 10 year olds who were both robot fans and reporters in training.
I was also surprised to see that he had a belt clip. This made me laugh at the idea of some kid clipping Soundwave to his belt and strutting to school thinking that he was 100% Hot Shit, a real playa with his very own homicidal robot attached to his hip. Then I shuddered in horror as I considered the very possible idea that I was Johnny Hot Shit. I certainly don't remember skipping to school with a Decepticon on my belt, however it could be that the merciless mocking of my peers drove the memories deep into my subconscious. If that's the case, I'm oooookay with it. That's a memory that needs to stay buried.
I'm still hunting for Jetfire and despite reading of sightings in the general Atlanta area, my little corner of the world is still Jetfire free. I finally saw the Ultra Magnus - Skywarp two pack at Target today, which gives me hope that soon Jetfire will show up. The two pack is certainly cool, and getting both for 20 bucks saves you 10 big ones, but I just can't pay for them knowing that they're exactly the same as Optimus and Starscream just with different paint jobs. I guess this means that I haven't gone entirely around the toy bend yet. I expect whatever remaining willpower I have will evaporate completely when the Transformer movie toys drop as I've seen pictures and they're damn cool. All of the Autobots look like badasses, even Bumblebee and while I'm not a big fan of Megatron being some kind of jet/spaceship thing, Barricade looks awesome and Blackout is a massive helicopter, so you know, everybody wins. The movie toys drop June 2nd-ish, so if you see lines forming at Toys R Us, Target and/or Wal-Mart at that time, you now know why.
I finished the Transformers game on the PS2, or, rather, I finished being interested in the Transformers game. It's not that it wasn't any good, there just wasn't enough there to keep my interest. Plus, every time your autobot got knocked to the ground, there was this really annoying animation that took forever, and by the time you recovered from it, every enemy robot in the area was all over your metallic ass. Instead of playing through the game, I busted out the cheat code to unlock all of the extras, some of which were PSA's from the original cartoon. Some of them were the usual PSA fare, things like don't run away from home and make sure you wear bright clothing when riding bikes at night. Then it got strange. First, some young lads were sailing and right after the "cool" kid went on about how he didn't need a lifejacket, the skipper of their vessel cheerily swung the sail around, clocked the kid on the head and knocked his ass into the water. The best part was how completely and utterly clueless the skipper was to the fact that he may have just killed one of his crew members. Thankfully Seaspray showed up in the nick of time, and despite his speech impediment, was able to convey how important it is to wear a life jacket.
After this PSA, we were entertained by the story of two youngsters out looking for a good time, who decided to supplement their night's activities with a little grand theft auto. The first car they tried to steal ended up being Tracks, but unfortunately our Autobot friend didn't deal with the two thieves by dispensing some Autobotian justice and instead gave them a lecture about not stealing cars. The best part was at the end, when the one kid says "Now I know!" as if to say that, up until this point, he was completely oblivious to the laws of the nation he'd been living in for the past 17 years and thought it was perfectly acceptable to steal cars. I wonder what the next PSA was. Perhaps Skids counsels some youths on why they shouldn't push old ladies in front of subway cars. Thanks Skids, now we know! Ah, the halcyon days of my youth, when the lessons of morality could all be summed up in a 30 second spot from huge, transforming robots or highly specialized, trained killers. Let's see the Backyardigans take out an APC with a rocket launcher.
His transformation is pretty simple, not at all like the complex rituals of mechanical tomfoolery that come along with the new classics series. I mean, I'm a smart guy. I have a couple degrees and everything, yet I still can't transform Grimlock from memory. Soundwave is child's play by comparison except for his legs, which stick a bit and always make me think that I'm going to turn him into a double amputee every time I transform him into his oh-so imposing microcassette recorder. Speaking of which, I know that at a kid, I didn't think twice about him being a microcassette player, and not a full sized tape player, but now I find it kind of odd. I mean, I know that were he a full sized tape player, the tapes would transform into birds and jaguars bigger than Soundwave himself, further screwing the Transformers' already messed up sense of scale, however I find it hard to believe that there was a significant number of 10 year olds who were both robot fans and reporters in training.
I was also surprised to see that he had a belt clip. This made me laugh at the idea of some kid clipping Soundwave to his belt and strutting to school thinking that he was 100% Hot Shit, a real playa with his very own homicidal robot attached to his hip. Then I shuddered in horror as I considered the very possible idea that I was Johnny Hot Shit. I certainly don't remember skipping to school with a Decepticon on my belt, however it could be that the merciless mocking of my peers drove the memories deep into my subconscious. If that's the case, I'm oooookay with it. That's a memory that needs to stay buried.
I'm still hunting for Jetfire and despite reading of sightings in the general Atlanta area, my little corner of the world is still Jetfire free. I finally saw the Ultra Magnus - Skywarp two pack at Target today, which gives me hope that soon Jetfire will show up. The two pack is certainly cool, and getting both for 20 bucks saves you 10 big ones, but I just can't pay for them knowing that they're exactly the same as Optimus and Starscream just with different paint jobs. I guess this means that I haven't gone entirely around the toy bend yet. I expect whatever remaining willpower I have will evaporate completely when the Transformer movie toys drop as I've seen pictures and they're damn cool. All of the Autobots look like badasses, even Bumblebee and while I'm not a big fan of Megatron being some kind of jet/spaceship thing, Barricade looks awesome and Blackout is a massive helicopter, so you know, everybody wins. The movie toys drop June 2nd-ish, so if you see lines forming at Toys R Us, Target and/or Wal-Mart at that time, you now know why.
I finished the Transformers game on the PS2, or, rather, I finished being interested in the Transformers game. It's not that it wasn't any good, there just wasn't enough there to keep my interest. Plus, every time your autobot got knocked to the ground, there was this really annoying animation that took forever, and by the time you recovered from it, every enemy robot in the area was all over your metallic ass. Instead of playing through the game, I busted out the cheat code to unlock all of the extras, some of which were PSA's from the original cartoon. Some of them were the usual PSA fare, things like don't run away from home and make sure you wear bright clothing when riding bikes at night. Then it got strange. First, some young lads were sailing and right after the "cool" kid went on about how he didn't need a lifejacket, the skipper of their vessel cheerily swung the sail around, clocked the kid on the head and knocked his ass into the water. The best part was how completely and utterly clueless the skipper was to the fact that he may have just killed one of his crew members. Thankfully Seaspray showed up in the nick of time, and despite his speech impediment, was able to convey how important it is to wear a life jacket.
After this PSA, we were entertained by the story of two youngsters out looking for a good time, who decided to supplement their night's activities with a little grand theft auto. The first car they tried to steal ended up being Tracks, but unfortunately our Autobot friend didn't deal with the two thieves by dispensing some Autobotian justice and instead gave them a lecture about not stealing cars. The best part was at the end, when the one kid says "Now I know!" as if to say that, up until this point, he was completely oblivious to the laws of the nation he'd been living in for the past 17 years and thought it was perfectly acceptable to steal cars. I wonder what the next PSA was. Perhaps Skids counsels some youths on why they shouldn't push old ladies in front of subway cars. Thanks Skids, now we know! Ah, the halcyon days of my youth, when the lessons of morality could all be summed up in a 30 second spot from huge, transforming robots or highly specialized, trained killers. Let's see the Backyardigans take out an APC with a rocket launcher.
Thursday, February 08, 2007
School Daze
Last night I attended a registration seminar for my son's daycare to learn about the differences between the daycare's private Pre-K and Georgia funded public Pre-K offerings. As he's already in daycare there, we already knew which one we were going to go with, however they didn't give out the registration packets until after the hour long ordeal was over, so I ended up being subjected to their propaganda anyway. I felt the explanations of what each program offered was a little one sided, however that may be because I was hungry and tired and wanted go get home in time to play some Transformers on the PS2 before watching TV. Realizing this, I have typed up the comparison information they gave us in the interest of letting you read it and decide for yourselves. Oh how I love an elaborate setup.
Greetings and thank you for attending our Pre-K registration seminar. This packet of information will explain the differences between our private Pre-K offering and our Georgia funded Pre-K offering that, by law, we have to let anyone into. Both offerings will prepare your child for the rigors of Kindergarten and beyond so whichever program you choose, rest assured that your child is getting the best education possible. (Note: Some educations are more best than others.)
This packet is structured to explain the differences between the Pre-K offerings as they apply to the various aspects of your child's learning experiences. Please do not hesitate to ask questions should you have any, however please keep in mind that questions asked in regards to the public Pre-K offering may not be answered so that we have time to answer questions from the parents who actually give a damn about their child's education.
Class Structure and Syllabus
If your child is in our private offering, the teacher is provided with a detailed class syllabus on every theme possible, structured so that every waking moment of your child's day is spent having the week's theme hammered into them. These syllabi were developed by educators and scientists, all of whom are far, far smarter than you. With this syllabus the teachers are encouraged to develop their own materials as well, as long as it doesn't interfere with, or in any way impede in them teaching the materials we paid so very, very much for. Your child's day will be similarly regimented with set times for set learning activities so that they never have to step outside the warm, comforting bounds of a strict schedule.
In the public Pre-K offering, the teacher is left entirely to their own devices and are free to come up with whatever material they choose, provided it adheres to the Georgia state guidelines, which may or may not include reading this year. We're still checking. Your child's day will be "unstructured" and "free" and will allow your child to wander the classroom with their peers like a roving band of feral dogs.
Mathematics
Our private offering has workbooks and textbooks and special paper and helps to teach your child basic mathematical concepts like patterns, sorting, charting, linear algebra, n-space polynomials and Topological Hochschild homology of twisted group algebras. Your child's work will be available for you to review each week so that you can help reinforce concepts at home.
Our public offering offers a rich mathematics program with activities such as counting, counting some more and counting even more things. Your child's work may or may not be available for you to review, depending on whether or not the teacher had time to get it together, what with all of the lesson planning she needs to be doing.
Reading and Writing
The private offering has an award winning system of phonics and sound recognition that allows your child to not only see the sounds that letters make, but how those sounds combine to make words. Special paper is provided so that they can practice learning how to write letters and words. Our current class will be finished with Anna Karenina by March and are looking forward to ending the year with some Nabokov
In our public offering, left over pencils and discarded pieces of paper from our private class are made available so that they can scribble and "write" in an attempt to ape the efforts of the kids in the smart, er, private class. The reading exercises are pulled from mostly fast food menu boards to prepare your child for their career in French Fry Management.
Science and Technology
Science and Technology are very important for our private offering to prepare your child for living in the 21st century. Every child will have access to a laptop and will attend classes on software design, object oriented programming and successfully moving tech support jobs overseas. The rich tapestry of scientific discovery is also presented to them in experimentation activities, thesis defense and time spent in our very own linear accelerator.
In our public offering, we don't have any computers but we have a box we've painted blue to act as a monitor and a dead phone to help simulate the tech support experience. As for science, well, this is a Georgia funded program so we're not allowed to teach science. Hope you like Intelligent Design!
Foreign Languages
Our private program sees the importance of living in a global economy and recently introduced Spanish into the syllabus. When Arturo the Burro shows up, the children know it's time to speak in Español, por favor! Children learn to count in Spanish, learn their colors in Spanish, learn basic words in Spanish and learn how to say useful phrases like "How are you this morning?", "Where is the police station?" and "Don't cut the goddamn hydrangeas back so much!" in Spanish.
In our public offering, maybe your kid will learn Spanish, maybe they won't. Maybe your teacher will have the time to come up with a rich Spanish lesson plan or maybe she'll just let them watch Telemundo while she texts her boyfriend. Caliente!
Personal Development
Our private program emphasizes the need for children to not only develop as smart, forward thinking individuals, but as kind, caring, generous individuals as well. Different positive character traits such as honest, generosity and respect are taught as well as one can to beings who are so self centered that the rest of the universe is rendered effectively absent.
In our public program your child's teacher will do their best to ensure your kid doesn't grow up to be a total shitheel. If they do, 9 times out of 10 it's your fault anyways.
Academic Development
At various points in your child's time in our private program, your child will be tested and placed in groups to help your teacher tailor the learning environment to them as well as let the other kids know just how far behind your child is. By the end of the year, all children are in the "smart" group and no child is left behind.
In our public program, children with academic disadvantages are helped with a two prong approach of beatings and public shamings. Children deemed "dumb" are humiliated and stoned by the children deemed "smart". By the end of the year, all children are fully prepared to act out their preordained roles for the rest of their natural born lives.
Attendance and Holiday Schedule
Children in our private program can attend as much or as little as you want them to. You're paying full price either way, so we really don't care. Should you choose to spend no time with your children, we will happily dress them in their pajamas so that you can being them home and put them right to bed without spending any additional time with them. Ask about our weekend nanny rates!
As our public program is Georgia funded, your child will be expected to be in class and on time every day. Unexcused absences are not tolerated and may result in a visit from Knee Breaking Nicky our resident Attendance Counselor. Absences due to doctor's visits must be accompanied with an Excused Absence form filled out in triplicate, a sworn affidavit from your child's physician, a second opinion from a non-network physician and a character reference from your state's representative in the Senate and/or Congress. Your child's day will end at 2:15 and all children must be picked up promptly by 2:17 or a $50 per minute fee will be assessed. After school care is available at the rate of $975 a week. We also offer full day care for the 115 or so days off your child will have at the rate of 70 hojillion dollars a day. Special financing is available.
Graduation
Your child will graduate from our Pre-K program with all of the pomp and circumstance that should accompany a child leaving a program that isn't actually real school. This is but the first of many graduations, pageants, plays, recitals and other events you'll have to attend, all in an attempt to make your child think they're special before being thrust out in the real world where they'll find out they're exactly like everyone else.
Georgia doesn't care about graduation, and by extension, the self esteem of your child so graduation isn't funded. If you'd like, we can hum a jaunty tune as they walk down the hallway when leaving. Don't let the door hit them on the ass on the way out.
We hope that this information will help you make an informed choice in regards to your child's education. Obviously, by being attending this seminar you have an interest in providing your child with the finest learning experience possible. Don't fuck it up now.
Greetings and thank you for attending our Pre-K registration seminar. This packet of information will explain the differences between our private Pre-K offering and our Georgia funded Pre-K offering that, by law, we have to let anyone into. Both offerings will prepare your child for the rigors of Kindergarten and beyond so whichever program you choose, rest assured that your child is getting the best education possible. (Note: Some educations are more best than others.)
This packet is structured to explain the differences between the Pre-K offerings as they apply to the various aspects of your child's learning experiences. Please do not hesitate to ask questions should you have any, however please keep in mind that questions asked in regards to the public Pre-K offering may not be answered so that we have time to answer questions from the parents who actually give a damn about their child's education.
Class Structure and Syllabus
If your child is in our private offering, the teacher is provided with a detailed class syllabus on every theme possible, structured so that every waking moment of your child's day is spent having the week's theme hammered into them. These syllabi were developed by educators and scientists, all of whom are far, far smarter than you. With this syllabus the teachers are encouraged to develop their own materials as well, as long as it doesn't interfere with, or in any way impede in them teaching the materials we paid so very, very much for. Your child's day will be similarly regimented with set times for set learning activities so that they never have to step outside the warm, comforting bounds of a strict schedule.
In the public Pre-K offering, the teacher is left entirely to their own devices and are free to come up with whatever material they choose, provided it adheres to the Georgia state guidelines, which may or may not include reading this year. We're still checking. Your child's day will be "unstructured" and "free" and will allow your child to wander the classroom with their peers like a roving band of feral dogs.
Mathematics
Our private offering has workbooks and textbooks and special paper and helps to teach your child basic mathematical concepts like patterns, sorting, charting, linear algebra, n-space polynomials and Topological Hochschild homology of twisted group algebras. Your child's work will be available for you to review each week so that you can help reinforce concepts at home.
Our public offering offers a rich mathematics program with activities such as counting, counting some more and counting even more things. Your child's work may or may not be available for you to review, depending on whether or not the teacher had time to get it together, what with all of the lesson planning she needs to be doing.
Reading and Writing
The private offering has an award winning system of phonics and sound recognition that allows your child to not only see the sounds that letters make, but how those sounds combine to make words. Special paper is provided so that they can practice learning how to write letters and words. Our current class will be finished with Anna Karenina by March and are looking forward to ending the year with some Nabokov
In our public offering, left over pencils and discarded pieces of paper from our private class are made available so that they can scribble and "write" in an attempt to ape the efforts of the kids in the smart, er, private class. The reading exercises are pulled from mostly fast food menu boards to prepare your child for their career in French Fry Management.
Science and Technology
Science and Technology are very important for our private offering to prepare your child for living in the 21st century. Every child will have access to a laptop and will attend classes on software design, object oriented programming and successfully moving tech support jobs overseas. The rich tapestry of scientific discovery is also presented to them in experimentation activities, thesis defense and time spent in our very own linear accelerator.
In our public offering, we don't have any computers but we have a box we've painted blue to act as a monitor and a dead phone to help simulate the tech support experience. As for science, well, this is a Georgia funded program so we're not allowed to teach science. Hope you like Intelligent Design!
Foreign Languages
Our private program sees the importance of living in a global economy and recently introduced Spanish into the syllabus. When Arturo the Burro shows up, the children know it's time to speak in Español, por favor! Children learn to count in Spanish, learn their colors in Spanish, learn basic words in Spanish and learn how to say useful phrases like "How are you this morning?", "Where is the police station?" and "Don't cut the goddamn hydrangeas back so much!" in Spanish.
In our public offering, maybe your kid will learn Spanish, maybe they won't. Maybe your teacher will have the time to come up with a rich Spanish lesson plan or maybe she'll just let them watch Telemundo while she texts her boyfriend. Caliente!
Personal Development
Our private program emphasizes the need for children to not only develop as smart, forward thinking individuals, but as kind, caring, generous individuals as well. Different positive character traits such as honest, generosity and respect are taught as well as one can to beings who are so self centered that the rest of the universe is rendered effectively absent.
In our public program your child's teacher will do their best to ensure your kid doesn't grow up to be a total shitheel. If they do, 9 times out of 10 it's your fault anyways.
Academic Development
At various points in your child's time in our private program, your child will be tested and placed in groups to help your teacher tailor the learning environment to them as well as let the other kids know just how far behind your child is. By the end of the year, all children are in the "smart" group and no child is left behind.
In our public program, children with academic disadvantages are helped with a two prong approach of beatings and public shamings. Children deemed "dumb" are humiliated and stoned by the children deemed "smart". By the end of the year, all children are fully prepared to act out their preordained roles for the rest of their natural born lives.
Attendance and Holiday Schedule
Children in our private program can attend as much or as little as you want them to. You're paying full price either way, so we really don't care. Should you choose to spend no time with your children, we will happily dress them in their pajamas so that you can being them home and put them right to bed without spending any additional time with them. Ask about our weekend nanny rates!
As our public program is Georgia funded, your child will be expected to be in class and on time every day. Unexcused absences are not tolerated and may result in a visit from Knee Breaking Nicky our resident Attendance Counselor. Absences due to doctor's visits must be accompanied with an Excused Absence form filled out in triplicate, a sworn affidavit from your child's physician, a second opinion from a non-network physician and a character reference from your state's representative in the Senate and/or Congress. Your child's day will end at 2:15 and all children must be picked up promptly by 2:17 or a $50 per minute fee will be assessed. After school care is available at the rate of $975 a week. We also offer full day care for the 115 or so days off your child will have at the rate of 70 hojillion dollars a day. Special financing is available.
Graduation
Your child will graduate from our Pre-K program with all of the pomp and circumstance that should accompany a child leaving a program that isn't actually real school. This is but the first of many graduations, pageants, plays, recitals and other events you'll have to attend, all in an attempt to make your child think they're special before being thrust out in the real world where they'll find out they're exactly like everyone else.
Georgia doesn't care about graduation, and by extension, the self esteem of your child so graduation isn't funded. If you'd like, we can hum a jaunty tune as they walk down the hallway when leaving. Don't let the door hit them on the ass on the way out.
We hope that this information will help you make an informed choice in regards to your child's education. Obviously, by being attending this seminar you have an interest in providing your child with the finest learning experience possible. Don't fuck it up now.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Ramjet
Here are some shots of the newest addition to the Transformers party.
Dig that crazy cone head. Here he is with the others.
Parts is Parts
I realized the other day that part of the reason I'm not posting as regularly these days is that I wait until I feel I have enough to post about. This seems to be antithetical to the idea of blogging what with it's offerings of instantaneous publishing. I could be posting all the time, as things popped into my head, but that seems silly to me. It would appear that I don't "get" blogging. I tend to think of this place as more of a collection of columns, rather than just a place to record my various thoughts, which, on the one hand, leads to what I think are more entertaining pieces, but on the other hand, they come less frequently. Honestly, I don't see that changing any time soon, however I'm going to try to pop in more frequently with smaller bits if anything just to keep the hoards clamoring for content in between bigger pieces. Keep clamoring hordes!
That being said, today's post is a collection of these aforementioned small bits. I have a mind to parcel them out over the next few days in some sort of advent calendar of useless content but that serves no one well. Plus, this new Blogger keeps forgetting who I am and the sign in process is unnecessarily shitty, so I'll just stick to the one trip down Blogger lane for today.
Recently, when Linda and I were out and about, we saw a sign for a restaurant's breakfast offerings. The sign said "The best parts of breakfast." For some reason, this struck both of us as very unsettling, as if breakfast at this place was just an assortment of cooked animal parts, a plate of limbs and wings and other appendages all akimbo. Perhaps they were swimming in a sassy sauce, perhaps not. Eggs and hash browns may also be present, however it's not guaranteed. We're not sure if they meant to say that their breakfast was the best part of a morning, in an attempt to wrestle the title from Folgers, or they meant to say that their meals were the best part of breakfast, unlike toast which is just lazy and brings nothing to the table. At any rate, the misplaced "s" ended up screwing up everything and instead of visions of a hearty morning meal, we had visions of dismembered farm animals. Think The Shining meets Animal Farm. Not pretty.
Thanks to some diligent searching on my part, Ramjet has now joined the Transformers party. He's a pretty cool model in both robot and vehicle form, despite his robot form looking like a mechanical Conehead. This helps bring the Decepticons to within one of an even playing field. I guess I could buy Astrotrain, but come on, it's Astrotrain. How evil can a supply vehicle possibly be? Thankfully my reissue of the classic Soundwave is on it's way and the Decepticons will once again be on equal footing with the Autobots. Plus they'll have tunes. Linda scoffed at my notion that Soundwave needs to be a tape player and not some lame ass stealth bomber, but at least tape players don't have that DRM bullshit. I bet if I showed some youngster how I could take a tape and play it in any tape player ever built he'd shit his knickers. Try doing that with your fancy iTunes songs. The best part of getting Soundwave is that I didn't have to go anywhere. Toys R Us emailed me (it's a TRU exclusive) and I made with the clickage. I realize that the hunt is half the fun, but I don't have time to flit from store to store. I'll gladly pay the shipping.
Target has an exclusive Ultra Magnus vs Skywarp set for the low, low price of 20 bucks. It's tempting except for the fact that Ultra Magnus is just Optimus painted light blue and white and Skywarp is Starscream painted black and purple. I'm ok with that last one, as the Decpticon air corps members all pretty much looked alike, but I remember Ultra Magnus looking decidedly different from Optimus. Still, 30 bucks worth of toys for 20 is a pretty good deal. I'm just not sure if I'm ready to have the conversation with my coworkers about Ultra Magnus not being just a repainted version of Optimus when he is totally just a repainted version of Optimus. I've seen the classics version of Cliffjumper out there too, but he appears to be just a red version of Bumblebee which means he's just a different shade of lame.
The other weekend I smoked another meat loaf and while it turned out well, it wasn't as spicy as I had intended. I'm mulling around in my head a recipe for a meat loaf so hot, so spicy, so decidedly caliente that I've decided to call it Heat Loaf. We're still in the planning stages but at some point I'll be going into prototyping. The problem is that I want to balance good taste with heat which is often difficult to do. Also, a lot of hot sauces have a vinegary flavor to them which doesn't jive well with what I think a good meat loaf should be. One thing I did think of was crushing up some wasabi peas into the bread crumbs but I'm not sure wasabi is the right flavor. We'll see. I like the idea of a very hot meat loaf as it's a nice surprising juxtaposition of comfort food and searing pain. It's as if your mom called you over for a hug and instead she poked you in the eye. This also got me thinking of different flavored meat loafs such as an Italian meat loaf with parmesan and mozzarella cheese, green peppers and pancetta and sauced with a spicy tomato sauce; a buffalo wing meat loaf made with celery, carrots, blue cheese and sauced with a spicy wing sauce; a bacon cheeseburger meat loaf with chipotle peppers, smoked mozzarella and bacon bits, "sauced" with slices of provolone cheese and the aforementioned Heat Loaf. I think we may have the beginnings of a good restaurant here. Think Zaxby's, but with meat loaf. Inquire inside about exciting franchising opportunities.
I have some gaming to speak of too, however I feel this is better left to Friday's post when the weekend lays before you and perhaps you can take a moment from the toil and drudgery of your every day life and engage in some digital shenanigans. Oh the times we'll have!
That being said, today's post is a collection of these aforementioned small bits. I have a mind to parcel them out over the next few days in some sort of advent calendar of useless content but that serves no one well. Plus, this new Blogger keeps forgetting who I am and the sign in process is unnecessarily shitty, so I'll just stick to the one trip down Blogger lane for today.
Recently, when Linda and I were out and about, we saw a sign for a restaurant's breakfast offerings. The sign said "The best parts of breakfast." For some reason, this struck both of us as very unsettling, as if breakfast at this place was just an assortment of cooked animal parts, a plate of limbs and wings and other appendages all akimbo. Perhaps they were swimming in a sassy sauce, perhaps not. Eggs and hash browns may also be present, however it's not guaranteed. We're not sure if they meant to say that their breakfast was the best part of a morning, in an attempt to wrestle the title from Folgers, or they meant to say that their meals were the best part of breakfast, unlike toast which is just lazy and brings nothing to the table. At any rate, the misplaced "s" ended up screwing up everything and instead of visions of a hearty morning meal, we had visions of dismembered farm animals. Think The Shining meets Animal Farm. Not pretty.
Thanks to some diligent searching on my part, Ramjet has now joined the Transformers party. He's a pretty cool model in both robot and vehicle form, despite his robot form looking like a mechanical Conehead. This helps bring the Decepticons to within one of an even playing field. I guess I could buy Astrotrain, but come on, it's Astrotrain. How evil can a supply vehicle possibly be? Thankfully my reissue of the classic Soundwave is on it's way and the Decepticons will once again be on equal footing with the Autobots. Plus they'll have tunes. Linda scoffed at my notion that Soundwave needs to be a tape player and not some lame ass stealth bomber, but at least tape players don't have that DRM bullshit. I bet if I showed some youngster how I could take a tape and play it in any tape player ever built he'd shit his knickers. Try doing that with your fancy iTunes songs. The best part of getting Soundwave is that I didn't have to go anywhere. Toys R Us emailed me (it's a TRU exclusive) and I made with the clickage. I realize that the hunt is half the fun, but I don't have time to flit from store to store. I'll gladly pay the shipping.
Target has an exclusive Ultra Magnus vs Skywarp set for the low, low price of 20 bucks. It's tempting except for the fact that Ultra Magnus is just Optimus painted light blue and white and Skywarp is Starscream painted black and purple. I'm ok with that last one, as the Decpticon air corps members all pretty much looked alike, but I remember Ultra Magnus looking decidedly different from Optimus. Still, 30 bucks worth of toys for 20 is a pretty good deal. I'm just not sure if I'm ready to have the conversation with my coworkers about Ultra Magnus not being just a repainted version of Optimus when he is totally just a repainted version of Optimus. I've seen the classics version of Cliffjumper out there too, but he appears to be just a red version of Bumblebee which means he's just a different shade of lame.
The other weekend I smoked another meat loaf and while it turned out well, it wasn't as spicy as I had intended. I'm mulling around in my head a recipe for a meat loaf so hot, so spicy, so decidedly caliente that I've decided to call it Heat Loaf. We're still in the planning stages but at some point I'll be going into prototyping. The problem is that I want to balance good taste with heat which is often difficult to do. Also, a lot of hot sauces have a vinegary flavor to them which doesn't jive well with what I think a good meat loaf should be. One thing I did think of was crushing up some wasabi peas into the bread crumbs but I'm not sure wasabi is the right flavor. We'll see. I like the idea of a very hot meat loaf as it's a nice surprising juxtaposition of comfort food and searing pain. It's as if your mom called you over for a hug and instead she poked you in the eye. This also got me thinking of different flavored meat loafs such as an Italian meat loaf with parmesan and mozzarella cheese, green peppers and pancetta and sauced with a spicy tomato sauce; a buffalo wing meat loaf made with celery, carrots, blue cheese and sauced with a spicy wing sauce; a bacon cheeseburger meat loaf with chipotle peppers, smoked mozzarella and bacon bits, "sauced" with slices of provolone cheese and the aforementioned Heat Loaf. I think we may have the beginnings of a good restaurant here. Think Zaxby's, but with meat loaf. Inquire inside about exciting franchising opportunities.
I have some gaming to speak of too, however I feel this is better left to Friday's post when the weekend lays before you and perhaps you can take a moment from the toil and drudgery of your every day life and engage in some digital shenanigans. Oh the times we'll have!
Thursday, January 25, 2007
The Book of Dad
Greetings. Sorry for the long time between posts. Much like Stella, I am working on getting my groove back. It is a work in progress.
Anyone with small children knows that parenting is 50% common sense and 50% saying 5 or 6 phrases over and over and over again. Most of the time, I think that a cardboard cutout of me and a tape recorder could do the same job I'm doing while at the same time freeing me up to play Ratchet and Clank. I'm assuming that when your kids are older you have to listen to them and deal with their problems, or at least feign interest, but for the toddler/young child set, it's basically just telling them for the 15th time to stop playing on the goddamn furniture.
This morning for some reason, I delivered one of my pearls of wisdom to my daughter as if it were from the Bible. I don't know why. Last night I rapped "Mama Said Knock You Out" while I gave her a bath. I'm a strange cat. Anyways, while I don't think the message got through any better than when I just say it like it is, it was fun for me and the momentary look of confusion on both kids' faces was worth it. If you haven't confused or upset your kid at some point in the day, you're not doing your job as a parent correctly. I prefaced my statement with "A reading from the Book of Dad" which gave it the gravitas I felt my words deserved. For your enjoyment I have compiled these nuggets of wisdom so that you may use them with your own children, starting with the one I delivered this morning. Enjoy.
"For lo, a hunger did fall upon the land, and this hunger was called morning. The children who ate their dinner the night before were happy, while those that were banished from the table for misbehaviour had empty stomachs, and their mouth did taste like ash."
"Dirty hands shall touch no dinner. Crying mouths shall taste no snack."
"Why dost thou not use thy words? Were thou not raised as a man? Does a man not speak? A child who speaks in tears and wailing will not receive help, for their parents can not understand them. Rejoice, for thou have been given the gift of speech! Use this gift and all shall be delivered unto you."
"The child who raises his hands in anger shall be banished to his room. And his sole companion shall be hunger."
"And the child did play on the furniture and a fall was taken. The child, seeking sympathy for his injury met only with rebuke for he had been told that the furniture was forbidden. And lo, his tears dried as tracks of shame upon his face."
"Thy pants are not a napkin, nor is thy sleeve nor thy hand nor the furniture nor the dog."
"Pick not thy nose, lest a booger be delivered unto you."
"And the child did ask 'Father, why can we not listen to our music in the car?' And the Father replied, 'Child, one day you shall have a job and with that job you shall have money and with that money you shall have a car. On that day, you may listen to whatever music you like. Today you have no job so you have no money so you have no car so we shall listen to My Chemical Romance.' And they did. And it was good."
"And the child who asked nicely was rewarded while the child who did not was given only shame."
"The magic word is please and please is the magic word."
"Listen to thy parents for thy parents hold the keys to the kingdom. When thy parents give thee a task, do not make them ask you again and again, for your only reward shall be righteous anger."
"Do not take toys from thy siblings or thy toys will be taken from thee and thou shall have only shame to play with."
"And the child did cry for no reason. And soon, a reason was delivered unto them."
I particularly like that last one. I think it'd make a good shirt. You know you've made it when one of your phrases makes it on the chests of aging hipsters and emo kids everywhere.
Anyone with small children knows that parenting is 50% common sense and 50% saying 5 or 6 phrases over and over and over again. Most of the time, I think that a cardboard cutout of me and a tape recorder could do the same job I'm doing while at the same time freeing me up to play Ratchet and Clank. I'm assuming that when your kids are older you have to listen to them and deal with their problems, or at least feign interest, but for the toddler/young child set, it's basically just telling them for the 15th time to stop playing on the goddamn furniture.
This morning for some reason, I delivered one of my pearls of wisdom to my daughter as if it were from the Bible. I don't know why. Last night I rapped "Mama Said Knock You Out" while I gave her a bath. I'm a strange cat. Anyways, while I don't think the message got through any better than when I just say it like it is, it was fun for me and the momentary look of confusion on both kids' faces was worth it. If you haven't confused or upset your kid at some point in the day, you're not doing your job as a parent correctly. I prefaced my statement with "A reading from the Book of Dad" which gave it the gravitas I felt my words deserved. For your enjoyment I have compiled these nuggets of wisdom so that you may use them with your own children, starting with the one I delivered this morning. Enjoy.
"For lo, a hunger did fall upon the land, and this hunger was called morning. The children who ate their dinner the night before were happy, while those that were banished from the table for misbehaviour had empty stomachs, and their mouth did taste like ash."
"Dirty hands shall touch no dinner. Crying mouths shall taste no snack."
"Why dost thou not use thy words? Were thou not raised as a man? Does a man not speak? A child who speaks in tears and wailing will not receive help, for their parents can not understand them. Rejoice, for thou have been given the gift of speech! Use this gift and all shall be delivered unto you."
"The child who raises his hands in anger shall be banished to his room. And his sole companion shall be hunger."
"And the child did play on the furniture and a fall was taken. The child, seeking sympathy for his injury met only with rebuke for he had been told that the furniture was forbidden. And lo, his tears dried as tracks of shame upon his face."
"Thy pants are not a napkin, nor is thy sleeve nor thy hand nor the furniture nor the dog."
"Pick not thy nose, lest a booger be delivered unto you."
"And the child did ask 'Father, why can we not listen to our music in the car?' And the Father replied, 'Child, one day you shall have a job and with that job you shall have money and with that money you shall have a car. On that day, you may listen to whatever music you like. Today you have no job so you have no money so you have no car so we shall listen to My Chemical Romance.' And they did. And it was good."
"And the child who asked nicely was rewarded while the child who did not was given only shame."
"The magic word is please and please is the magic word."
"Listen to thy parents for thy parents hold the keys to the kingdom. When thy parents give thee a task, do not make them ask you again and again, for your only reward shall be righteous anger."
"Do not take toys from thy siblings or thy toys will be taken from thee and thou shall have only shame to play with."
"And the child did cry for no reason. And soon, a reason was delivered unto them."
I particularly like that last one. I think it'd make a good shirt. You know you've made it when one of your phrases makes it on the chests of aging hipsters and emo kids everywhere.
Monday, January 15, 2007
2006: The Year in Music
As music goes, this was a pretty good year. After all, any year that has a Pearl Jam album in it is right up there with the best of them. I should warn you that I am a piss poor music reviewer, so prepare for lots of "I liked it, but not as much as the last one" something like 15 times. As with the games and the movies, I'm limiting this list to music that came out this year.
Super 400 - Live 05
Super 400 is a tremendously talented power trio from my home town of Albany, NY. They bring the rock in copious amounts and their love of Led Zeppelin is palpable. Plus, they have one of the hottest women in rock on bass, the lovely Ms. Lori Friday. Check them out at Super400.com.
My Chemical Romance - The Black Parade
One of the best albums this year. An amazing mix of Green Day punk, Queen bombast and dark, death emo imagery. Plus, it's got a cameo by Liza Minelli which fits the album to a "t". The opening 5 songs are genius and if you can listen to "Dead" and not rock the fuck out, something is totally wrong with you. My daughter loves it and she's only 2. She's off to a great start.
Angels and Airwaves - We Don't Need To Whisper
Yes the lyrics can be a little too uplifting, but this band has some serious talent and the hooks are undeniable. Great music to play Uno on the 360 by too.
Snow Patrol - Eyes Open
Good hooks, plenty of emo angst. A fun little record. I give it an 8.
Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere
Sometimes the lyrics can be a little too strange, but the beats kick ass, and if you like songs about fucking dead people, this is the album for you
Matisyahu - Youth
I'm not a fan of reggae, so I'm not sure how reggaeish this album actually is, but this dude has a great flow and his songs always pick me up.
Queensryche - Operation Mindcrime: II
A complete and total fucking waste of money. Not only is this a shitty record, but it manages to taint the original in the process which is a shame. Ronnie James Dio sings like ass too. They should have never recorded this piece of shit.
Sarah Harmer - I'm A Mountain
Not a bad album, but I like her earlier stuff a lot better. At the same time, if you like bluegrass, you may get a kick out of this one.
Bruce Springsteen - We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions
The most fun album I've heard in quite some time. The level of talent on this album is amazing and all of the songs are kid friendly, perfect for getting your rock on while you make dinner. "Erie Canal" is a work of genius.
Pearl Jam - Pearl Jam
Hands down, the best album of the year. Now, I'll agree that I'm biased towards The Jam, but objectively speaking, this album kicks ass. Filled with amazing melodies, blistering rock riffs and their usual penchant for stellar lyrics, this is not only one of Pearl Jam's best albums, but one of the best rock albums to come out in some time. Plus, it brought Pearl Jam back in the spotlight where they so rightfully deserve to be. The kids of today need rock. They need Pearl Jam.
Angie Aparo - El Primero Del Tres
A fun EP from one of the best independent musicians out there. Translated literally, it means "The First of Three". I look forward to the next two. If you get a chance to see him live, do so. "Stairway to Freebird" is well worth the price of admission.
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium
Usually, I'm of the opinion that a double album should be cut of the filler and made into a stellar single album, but two discs of the Chili Peppers is always better than one. Maybe there's half a disc of filler, but that's OK with me, because the rest is kick ass funk rock.
Guster - Ganging Up On the Sun
These guys get more and more talented with every record. A great band to see in concert too, should you get a chance.
Keane - Under the Iron Sea
Some good songs, some OK songs. In totality, it's nothing you'll keep coming back to, but when you do, you won't have wasted your time. It's reviews like this that explain why I don't work for Rolling Stone.
Butch Walker and the Let's Go Out Tonights - The Rise and Fall of...
Butch Walker makes the most fun records in rock today. This one is his best yet. If you can score a copy of Live at Budokan on DVD, do so, if only for the acoustic performance.
Tom Petty - Highway Companion
Tom Petty makes amazing records. This is a Tom Petty record. Ergo, this is an amazing record. Seriously, why aren't you out buying this now?
Outkast - Idlewild
The first time I listened to this album, I was like "There are some good songs in here." The second time I couldn't bring myself to listen through the shit to find them. Oh well.
Pete Yorn - Nightcrawler
An uneven effort. Pick up "Live in New Jersey" instead if you're down for some Yorn-age.
Citizen Cope - Every Waking Moment
A good follow up to his last effort. It improves with every listen too, which is always a good thing. "Brother Lee" is spectacular. He puts on a good show too.
Barenaked Ladies - Barenaked Ladies Are Me
Should have been titled "Barenaked Ladies Are Boring". Not sure where the fun band of "Stunt" and "Maroon" went, but hopefully they'll come back soon.
John Mayer - Continuum
This dude has talent. Plus, he's willing to do skits with Dave Chappelle which puts him at the top of my list of rock-pop guitarists.
The Killers - Sam's Town
Brandon Flowers seems like a bit of a dick, and sullies my good name in the process. This is a fun record, but nothing that will go down in the history of rock. I did find it interesting that prior to the release, everyone was all like "The Killers! The Killers! They're trying to sound like Springsteen circa Born to Run!", but once the album came out, people knocked them for trying to sound like Born to Run and failing. Well, duh. No one can sound like Bruce did on that album, not even Bruce any more, and certainly not a band that spent its first album trying to revive the 80's.
Lindsey Buckingham - Under the Skin
Pop's most underrated guitarist. This album has some songs that are a little hard to get into, but all of them are technically impressive and most of them have some damn good hooks. This dude is a genius.
Incubus - Light Grenades
A nice way to end the year, with a kick ass rock record from one of my favorite bands. If you have any Xmas money left over, this would be a good thing to spend it on.
Super 400 - Live 05
Super 400 is a tremendously talented power trio from my home town of Albany, NY. They bring the rock in copious amounts and their love of Led Zeppelin is palpable. Plus, they have one of the hottest women in rock on bass, the lovely Ms. Lori Friday. Check them out at Super400.com.
My Chemical Romance - The Black Parade
One of the best albums this year. An amazing mix of Green Day punk, Queen bombast and dark, death emo imagery. Plus, it's got a cameo by Liza Minelli which fits the album to a "t". The opening 5 songs are genius and if you can listen to "Dead" and not rock the fuck out, something is totally wrong with you. My daughter loves it and she's only 2. She's off to a great start.
Angels and Airwaves - We Don't Need To Whisper
Yes the lyrics can be a little too uplifting, but this band has some serious talent and the hooks are undeniable. Great music to play Uno on the 360 by too.
Snow Patrol - Eyes Open
Good hooks, plenty of emo angst. A fun little record. I give it an 8.
Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere
Sometimes the lyrics can be a little too strange, but the beats kick ass, and if you like songs about fucking dead people, this is the album for you
Matisyahu - Youth
I'm not a fan of reggae, so I'm not sure how reggaeish this album actually is, but this dude has a great flow and his songs always pick me up.
Queensryche - Operation Mindcrime: II
A complete and total fucking waste of money. Not only is this a shitty record, but it manages to taint the original in the process which is a shame. Ronnie James Dio sings like ass too. They should have never recorded this piece of shit.
Sarah Harmer - I'm A Mountain
Not a bad album, but I like her earlier stuff a lot better. At the same time, if you like bluegrass, you may get a kick out of this one.
Bruce Springsteen - We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions
The most fun album I've heard in quite some time. The level of talent on this album is amazing and all of the songs are kid friendly, perfect for getting your rock on while you make dinner. "Erie Canal" is a work of genius.
Pearl Jam - Pearl Jam
Hands down, the best album of the year. Now, I'll agree that I'm biased towards The Jam, but objectively speaking, this album kicks ass. Filled with amazing melodies, blistering rock riffs and their usual penchant for stellar lyrics, this is not only one of Pearl Jam's best albums, but one of the best rock albums to come out in some time. Plus, it brought Pearl Jam back in the spotlight where they so rightfully deserve to be. The kids of today need rock. They need Pearl Jam.
Angie Aparo - El Primero Del Tres
A fun EP from one of the best independent musicians out there. Translated literally, it means "The First of Three". I look forward to the next two. If you get a chance to see him live, do so. "Stairway to Freebird" is well worth the price of admission.
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium
Usually, I'm of the opinion that a double album should be cut of the filler and made into a stellar single album, but two discs of the Chili Peppers is always better than one. Maybe there's half a disc of filler, but that's OK with me, because the rest is kick ass funk rock.
Guster - Ganging Up On the Sun
These guys get more and more talented with every record. A great band to see in concert too, should you get a chance.
Keane - Under the Iron Sea
Some good songs, some OK songs. In totality, it's nothing you'll keep coming back to, but when you do, you won't have wasted your time. It's reviews like this that explain why I don't work for Rolling Stone.
Butch Walker and the Let's Go Out Tonights - The Rise and Fall of...
Butch Walker makes the most fun records in rock today. This one is his best yet. If you can score a copy of Live at Budokan on DVD, do so, if only for the acoustic performance.
Tom Petty - Highway Companion
Tom Petty makes amazing records. This is a Tom Petty record. Ergo, this is an amazing record. Seriously, why aren't you out buying this now?
Outkast - Idlewild
The first time I listened to this album, I was like "There are some good songs in here." The second time I couldn't bring myself to listen through the shit to find them. Oh well.
Pete Yorn - Nightcrawler
An uneven effort. Pick up "Live in New Jersey" instead if you're down for some Yorn-age.
Citizen Cope - Every Waking Moment
A good follow up to his last effort. It improves with every listen too, which is always a good thing. "Brother Lee" is spectacular. He puts on a good show too.
Barenaked Ladies - Barenaked Ladies Are Me
Should have been titled "Barenaked Ladies Are Boring". Not sure where the fun band of "Stunt" and "Maroon" went, but hopefully they'll come back soon.
John Mayer - Continuum
This dude has talent. Plus, he's willing to do skits with Dave Chappelle which puts him at the top of my list of rock-pop guitarists.
The Killers - Sam's Town
Brandon Flowers seems like a bit of a dick, and sullies my good name in the process. This is a fun record, but nothing that will go down in the history of rock. I did find it interesting that prior to the release, everyone was all like "The Killers! The Killers! They're trying to sound like Springsteen circa Born to Run!", but once the album came out, people knocked them for trying to sound like Born to Run and failing. Well, duh. No one can sound like Bruce did on that album, not even Bruce any more, and certainly not a band that spent its first album trying to revive the 80's.
Lindsey Buckingham - Under the Skin
Pop's most underrated guitarist. This album has some songs that are a little hard to get into, but all of them are technically impressive and most of them have some damn good hooks. This dude is a genius.
Incubus - Light Grenades
A nice way to end the year, with a kick ass rock record from one of my favorite bands. If you have any Xmas money left over, this would be a good thing to spend it on.
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
2006: The Year in Games
Jeez, what a year for gaming 2006 was. I'm not going to get into a big recap as anyone who is interested in this post already knows all of the gory details. Two consoles launched (3 if you consider the DS Lite), Sony stumbled, Nintendo soared, Microsoft stayed the course and a whole bunch of really, really good games were released.
As with the Year in Movies post, here's a list of every 2006 release I played. Well, bought and played is more like it, I'm not counting demos. Huzzah!
Xbox 360
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - Put your best foot forward, I say, so this game is the first one listed as it was, hands down, the best game I played all year. How it did not get Game of the Year over Gears is beyond me, but I'm not a big, fancy pants game site editor. Oblivion is one of the finest RPG's I've ever played with a scope and level of character customization unparalleled in console gaming. Once you taste the joyous freedom this game gives you, you'll find it impossible to go back to a traditional game's linear structure. Sure there were some framerate issues, particularly when on horseback, and I had my game lock up once or twice, but the issues were worth it. I have 90 hours logged and I haven't even completed everything that shipped with the game, not to mention all of the extra content I've downloaded. It also kept me playing my 360 for the boring summer months of zero good content on the console, so Microsoft better make sure that Bethesda gets a nice "thanks for keeping our console relevant" bonus.
Gears of War - While it didn't seem possible for Gears of War to live up to the hype, it did with lots of action, gore and sky high production values to spare. If Oblivion is the reason for RPG fiends to buy a 360, Gears is the reason for shooter fans to do so. The game is amazingly beautiful, packs a powerful audio punch and keeps the adrenaline fueled pace up througout. Multiplayer is a blast, and co-op is tons of fun. I'd like to see a more flexible multiplayer experience, or a way to save your co-op progress for those of us who are Dom-curious, but these are minor quibbles in an otherwise spectacular shooter experience.
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter - Multiplayer was a hoot, especially the co-op maps. I got one level into the single player before Oblivion came and I never went back. I hear it's good. I'll never know as I traded it in months ago. It sure is pretty though.
Burnout Revenge - It's the same game that came out in 2005 for the other consoles, just with better explosions and a better crash junction mode, which is like saying it's like sex, only with better orgasms. The online mode had some problems, which is to be expected with an EA game, but once you got racing, it was a blast. Literally. Saying I'm excited for Burnout 5 is an understatement of mythical proportions.
Dead Rising - Great concept, great variety of weapons, great zombie mashing sounds, shitty, shitty, shitty save/mission system. Oblivion ruined this game for me which is a shame, but I'm a stickler for flexible save systems, so it's not all Oblivions's fault.
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance - An excellent action-RPG with tons of cool Marvel heroes. The individual simulator missions helps to extend the game, and the cutscenes were some of the finest CGI productions I've seen in some time. I thoroughly enjoyed this game from start to finish.
Uno - The sleeper hit of the year! Easy to pick up and impossible to put down, Uno remains my go to game when I want to play something for only 5 minutes. Granted it never lasts only 5 minutes, but that's OK. It has also started Linda and I playing the real life version when we watch TV which is great except for the fact that I lose pretty much every game.
Texas Hold 'Em - It was free, which is pretty much all it has going for it. The Hold 'Em game I have on my phone is better, and I can play it at red lights.
Sneak King - As stealth action games go, it's pretty medicore, as a sign that the apocalypse is upon us in the form of a corporate mascot hiding in a garbage can, waiting to force hash brown nuggets down an innocent passerby's gullet, it's top notch.
Pocketbike Racer - A fun little Mario Kart-esque racer. Where else can you race as the Subservient Chicken? Where else would you want to?
Nintendo DS
Elite Beat Agents - This game really has to be played to be fully understood. As rhythm games go, it's a blast, and quickly ramps up in difficulty. It also has an incredible sense of humor and style. It's one of the few games I can think of that would be just as much fun to watch being played as playing it yourself. Agents are go!
Tetris DS - It's Tetris, in many, many forms, all with a unique Nintendo feel. If you like Tetris, you'll love it. If you don't like Tetris, what the hell is wrong with you? A great game to show off the DS's new screens too, as the colors in this game are delightful.
Metroid Prime: Hunters - A great Metroid game and a great shooter and it's the first and only Metroid game to have online multiplayer. The mission and save structure don't fit with the pick up and play for 10 minutes style of a handheld, but if you can get past that, you're in for a real treat. It also helps fill the Metroid void (hey I rhymed!) until Metroid Prime: Corruption.
Clubhouse Games - By far, the best gaming value out there. 42 card, board and "other" games all with different difficulty levels and game specific missions. If you wanted one game to keep in your DS so that you'd never be bored, this is the game. Where else can you play darts, then go bowling then play a game of Rummy?
Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day - Lots of fun for the various puzzles, but entirely worth the 20 buck price tag just for the Soduku. The handwriting recognition can be a bit dodgy, but that may be a result of my crippled chicken scratch.
Star Fox Command - A dissappointing mix of 3-d space shooting and turn based strategy. I wish they had just stuck with the flying as it was fun, what little of it there was. The game is incredibly short, despite the multiple endings, as it wasn't fun enough to go back and play for the various outcomes. I've heard the multiplayer is fun, but I can't attest to it.
Big Brain Academy - The puzzles in this game were more fun, and more colorful than in Brain Age, but there's no Soduku, so ultimately it's a wash.
Uno / Skip-Bo / Uno Freefall - The reign of Uno continues! I have no idea what those other modes are, as I haven't played any of them, but I've played a ton of Uno and it's just as good on the DS as it is on other platforms. And hey, I can actually win a game or two, unlike when playing Linda.
Nintendo Wii
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - One of the best games I've ever played, and probably the best Zelda games ever, but I'd like to wait until I finish it before making that decision. As with all of the Zelda games, it's an absolute joy to play and the production values and art direction is top notch. The Wii control scheme makes the shooting much, much easier, and shaking the nunchuk to perform a spin move is tremendously fun.
Rayman Raving Rabbids - Lack of progressive scan is dissappointing because the Rabbids are so much fun to watch, you want to make sure you can see every detail. The sense of humor in this game is fantastic, and the mini games swing from extremely easy to extremely frustrating with plenty of middle ground. Highly recommended.
Wii Sports - The smartest thing Nintendo did with this launch is packing this game in with every system. I now use it as a workout disc of sorts for my Wii Sports Weight Loss plan and these minigames have gotten Linda back into gaming at a level not seen since the halcyon days of Super Monkey Ball and Tiger Woods.
Elebits - The game looks and plays great. The voice acting makes you long for the eternal silence of death. Thankfully you only have to endure it in the cut scenes. I haven't played it too long, so I can't speak to the fun factor over a long period of time, but any game built on the concept of enslaving sentient beings for our power needs is OK in my book.
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz - Controlling the single player game with the Wiimote is intuitive and lots of fun. Sadly, the same can't be said for all of the minigames. With 50+ minigames, some were sure to be stinkers, but so far we're averaging about half which is a bummer. Oh well, the half that are good, are a lot of fun, however I don't see Linda and I returning to this game with the same fervor as the original Super Monkey Ball.
Red Steel - Amazing only in it's medicority, this game shows that the Wii can be a viable platform for the FPS genre, as long as it's a competent team making the game. I'm still not sure why I put down the very powerful shotgun when someone comes at me with a sword, but I'm sure it has something to do with honor or some shit. Whatever. I'll keep playing it to see what happens, but I can't really recommend it. Not at 50 bucks anyways. At 20, sure but not at 50.
PS2
Okami - I haven't played this one yet, but I'm really looking forward to it. A Zelda-esque action adventure game steeped in Japanese lore? Yes please!
Black - For 50 bucks, this game was supposed to be a dissappointment. For 15 it looks like just the thing when I want to get my violence on. Yay for Costco.
For the PS2 I also have to finish Guitar Hero and Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando as well as start Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal, Kingdom Hearts and Transformers. I also have Killer 7 and Eternal Darkness for the Cube/Wii. Verily, lots of good gaming await me, and it's not even 2007, the year of Mass Effect, Bioshock, Too Human, Phoenix Wright: And Justice for All, The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, Metroid Prime: Corruption, Super Mario Galaxy, Alan Wake, Burnout 5 and Guitar Hero 2 for the 360.
On that last one, allow me to take this time to thank the Gods of Rock and their human conduits over at Red Octane for including not only Pearl Jam but My Chemical Romance at launch for GH2 on the 360. My prayers have been answered and I look forward to continuing to pray at the altar of rock in March. God of Rock be praised!
As with the Year in Movies post, here's a list of every 2006 release I played. Well, bought and played is more like it, I'm not counting demos. Huzzah!
Xbox 360
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - Put your best foot forward, I say, so this game is the first one listed as it was, hands down, the best game I played all year. How it did not get Game of the Year over Gears is beyond me, but I'm not a big, fancy pants game site editor. Oblivion is one of the finest RPG's I've ever played with a scope and level of character customization unparalleled in console gaming. Once you taste the joyous freedom this game gives you, you'll find it impossible to go back to a traditional game's linear structure. Sure there were some framerate issues, particularly when on horseback, and I had my game lock up once or twice, but the issues were worth it. I have 90 hours logged and I haven't even completed everything that shipped with the game, not to mention all of the extra content I've downloaded. It also kept me playing my 360 for the boring summer months of zero good content on the console, so Microsoft better make sure that Bethesda gets a nice "thanks for keeping our console relevant" bonus.
Gears of War - While it didn't seem possible for Gears of War to live up to the hype, it did with lots of action, gore and sky high production values to spare. If Oblivion is the reason for RPG fiends to buy a 360, Gears is the reason for shooter fans to do so. The game is amazingly beautiful, packs a powerful audio punch and keeps the adrenaline fueled pace up througout. Multiplayer is a blast, and co-op is tons of fun. I'd like to see a more flexible multiplayer experience, or a way to save your co-op progress for those of us who are Dom-curious, but these are minor quibbles in an otherwise spectacular shooter experience.
Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter - Multiplayer was a hoot, especially the co-op maps. I got one level into the single player before Oblivion came and I never went back. I hear it's good. I'll never know as I traded it in months ago. It sure is pretty though.
Burnout Revenge - It's the same game that came out in 2005 for the other consoles, just with better explosions and a better crash junction mode, which is like saying it's like sex, only with better orgasms. The online mode had some problems, which is to be expected with an EA game, but once you got racing, it was a blast. Literally. Saying I'm excited for Burnout 5 is an understatement of mythical proportions.
Dead Rising - Great concept, great variety of weapons, great zombie mashing sounds, shitty, shitty, shitty save/mission system. Oblivion ruined this game for me which is a shame, but I'm a stickler for flexible save systems, so it's not all Oblivions's fault.
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance - An excellent action-RPG with tons of cool Marvel heroes. The individual simulator missions helps to extend the game, and the cutscenes were some of the finest CGI productions I've seen in some time. I thoroughly enjoyed this game from start to finish.
Uno - The sleeper hit of the year! Easy to pick up and impossible to put down, Uno remains my go to game when I want to play something for only 5 minutes. Granted it never lasts only 5 minutes, but that's OK. It has also started Linda and I playing the real life version when we watch TV which is great except for the fact that I lose pretty much every game.
Texas Hold 'Em - It was free, which is pretty much all it has going for it. The Hold 'Em game I have on my phone is better, and I can play it at red lights.
Sneak King - As stealth action games go, it's pretty medicore, as a sign that the apocalypse is upon us in the form of a corporate mascot hiding in a garbage can, waiting to force hash brown nuggets down an innocent passerby's gullet, it's top notch.
Pocketbike Racer - A fun little Mario Kart-esque racer. Where else can you race as the Subservient Chicken? Where else would you want to?
Nintendo DS
Elite Beat Agents - This game really has to be played to be fully understood. As rhythm games go, it's a blast, and quickly ramps up in difficulty. It also has an incredible sense of humor and style. It's one of the few games I can think of that would be just as much fun to watch being played as playing it yourself. Agents are go!
Tetris DS - It's Tetris, in many, many forms, all with a unique Nintendo feel. If you like Tetris, you'll love it. If you don't like Tetris, what the hell is wrong with you? A great game to show off the DS's new screens too, as the colors in this game are delightful.
Metroid Prime: Hunters - A great Metroid game and a great shooter and it's the first and only Metroid game to have online multiplayer. The mission and save structure don't fit with the pick up and play for 10 minutes style of a handheld, but if you can get past that, you're in for a real treat. It also helps fill the Metroid void (hey I rhymed!) until Metroid Prime: Corruption.
Clubhouse Games - By far, the best gaming value out there. 42 card, board and "other" games all with different difficulty levels and game specific missions. If you wanted one game to keep in your DS so that you'd never be bored, this is the game. Where else can you play darts, then go bowling then play a game of Rummy?
Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day - Lots of fun for the various puzzles, but entirely worth the 20 buck price tag just for the Soduku. The handwriting recognition can be a bit dodgy, but that may be a result of my crippled chicken scratch.
Star Fox Command - A dissappointing mix of 3-d space shooting and turn based strategy. I wish they had just stuck with the flying as it was fun, what little of it there was. The game is incredibly short, despite the multiple endings, as it wasn't fun enough to go back and play for the various outcomes. I've heard the multiplayer is fun, but I can't attest to it.
Big Brain Academy - The puzzles in this game were more fun, and more colorful than in Brain Age, but there's no Soduku, so ultimately it's a wash.
Uno / Skip-Bo / Uno Freefall - The reign of Uno continues! I have no idea what those other modes are, as I haven't played any of them, but I've played a ton of Uno and it's just as good on the DS as it is on other platforms. And hey, I can actually win a game or two, unlike when playing Linda.
Nintendo Wii
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - One of the best games I've ever played, and probably the best Zelda games ever, but I'd like to wait until I finish it before making that decision. As with all of the Zelda games, it's an absolute joy to play and the production values and art direction is top notch. The Wii control scheme makes the shooting much, much easier, and shaking the nunchuk to perform a spin move is tremendously fun.
Rayman Raving Rabbids - Lack of progressive scan is dissappointing because the Rabbids are so much fun to watch, you want to make sure you can see every detail. The sense of humor in this game is fantastic, and the mini games swing from extremely easy to extremely frustrating with plenty of middle ground. Highly recommended.
Wii Sports - The smartest thing Nintendo did with this launch is packing this game in with every system. I now use it as a workout disc of sorts for my Wii Sports Weight Loss plan and these minigames have gotten Linda back into gaming at a level not seen since the halcyon days of Super Monkey Ball and Tiger Woods.
Elebits - The game looks and plays great. The voice acting makes you long for the eternal silence of death. Thankfully you only have to endure it in the cut scenes. I haven't played it too long, so I can't speak to the fun factor over a long period of time, but any game built on the concept of enslaving sentient beings for our power needs is OK in my book.
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz - Controlling the single player game with the Wiimote is intuitive and lots of fun. Sadly, the same can't be said for all of the minigames. With 50+ minigames, some were sure to be stinkers, but so far we're averaging about half which is a bummer. Oh well, the half that are good, are a lot of fun, however I don't see Linda and I returning to this game with the same fervor as the original Super Monkey Ball.
Red Steel - Amazing only in it's medicority, this game shows that the Wii can be a viable platform for the FPS genre, as long as it's a competent team making the game. I'm still not sure why I put down the very powerful shotgun when someone comes at me with a sword, but I'm sure it has something to do with honor or some shit. Whatever. I'll keep playing it to see what happens, but I can't really recommend it. Not at 50 bucks anyways. At 20, sure but not at 50.
PS2
Okami - I haven't played this one yet, but I'm really looking forward to it. A Zelda-esque action adventure game steeped in Japanese lore? Yes please!
Black - For 50 bucks, this game was supposed to be a dissappointment. For 15 it looks like just the thing when I want to get my violence on. Yay for Costco.
For the PS2 I also have to finish Guitar Hero and Ratchet and Clank: Going Commando as well as start Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal, Kingdom Hearts and Transformers. I also have Killer 7 and Eternal Darkness for the Cube/Wii. Verily, lots of good gaming await me, and it's not even 2007, the year of Mass Effect, Bioshock, Too Human, Phoenix Wright: And Justice for All, The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, Metroid Prime: Corruption, Super Mario Galaxy, Alan Wake, Burnout 5 and Guitar Hero 2 for the 360.
On that last one, allow me to take this time to thank the Gods of Rock and their human conduits over at Red Octane for including not only Pearl Jam but My Chemical Romance at launch for GH2 on the 360. My prayers have been answered and I look forward to continuing to pray at the altar of rock in March. God of Rock be praised!
Friday, January 05, 2007
2006: The Year in Movies
Welcome to what is the first of three "The Year in..." posts. This one focuses on movies while subsequent posts will focus on games and music. As I'm a selfcentered son-of-a-B, I am of course referring to movies that I've seen and not some general here's how the movie industry did as a whole in 2006. Not only am I not smart enough to make the critical observations necessary for that kind of post, I also don't care. I've decided to limit this post to movies I saw this year that actually came out this year, as trying to remember all of the movies I watched this year would be an exercise in futility.
One thing I should point out before giving my little mini-reviews is that, of late, whenever Linda and I watch a movie in the basement I end up sleeping through part of it. As a result, I may be giving a movie somewhat of a bad review because it didn't make any sense, a direct result of my narcoleptic tendencies. Thankfully I seem to remember that most of the movies I didn't like, Linda didn't like either, so you can rest assured that the movie was probably still bad, just not for the reasons I'm listing. On with the show!
Hostel - I rented this one to see what the hubbub was about. By hubbub, I mean that I heard there were some pretty hot topless chicks in it and there were . It is not lost on me that the lustful urges used to lure the young men to their dooms in the movie were the same urges used to get me to watch the movie. I'm OK with that. After all, my achilles tendons remained intact. The movie was OK. Certainly entertaining but nothing to get all jazzed up about. It's not for teh squeamish though as some of the violence is pretty brutal.
Glory Road - Linda and I rented this over the summer. Think Miracle but with basketball instead of hockey and with boredom instead of emotional resonance and national pride. Total waste of Emily Deschanel too.
Underworld: Evolution - For the life of me, I still can't fathom how it is I can watch these Underworld movies and not understand a goddam second of them. I've seen the first one like 3 times and I still have no idea what happened. Oh well. Kate Beckinsale is smoking hot in her leather catsuit thingy and Bill Nighy is always a hoot. It was a little on the long side and I'm pretty sure I slept through part of it.
Final Destination 3- Not as good as the first two, however if you're a Final Destination fan, you'll still be entertained. The DVD has an interesting cut and paste feature that allows you to put together how the different folks die. At least I heard that it does as I could never get it to work.
Running Scared - Suprisingly enough, this hyper violent "fairy tale" was one of my favorite movies of the year. Paul Walker did an excellent job as a low level mob flunky who finds his life turning to shit when the gun he was supposed to get rid of, due to it's use in a shootout with some corrupt cops, gets stolen by the neighbor's kid and used for an attempted patricide. It's dark, funny, extremely violent at times and filled with a bunch of really memorable characters. This movie will put your sound system to the test too, particularly in the opening shootout. Plus, it's got Chazz Palminteri who is always worth the price of admission.
16 Blocks - You'd think that a movie with Mos Def and Bruce Willis would be pretty good. You'd be wrong. Mos had this really annoying nasal voice througout the whole thing and the bad guy was the blonde dude from St. Elsewhere. Ooooh, very scary. I slept through a big chunk of this one, so maybe it was better, but if it was better I probably wouldn't have fallen asleep.
Dave Chappelle's Block Party - An excellent concert film if you're into hip-hop and such greats as The Roots, Kanye West, Erykah Badu and Black Star. A not so great concert film if you're into Dave Chappelle as he does very little, if any standup. It's still funny at times, especially when he walks the streets of his home town giving out golden tickets, but those expecting a laugh out loud movie will be dissappointed.
V For Vendetta - A pretty accurate rendition of the seminal comic mini-series, especially for an Alan Moore joint, which usually end up getting raped over a barrel when made into movies ("League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", I'm looking at you). Natalie Portman was hot as usual, and Hugo Weaving did an excellent job emoting behind a plastic mask for 2 hours. I was glad to see that they kept V's identity a secret througout the film, as they did in the comics. All in all, a very entertaining action movie.
Inside Man - Spike Lee - good. Clive Owen - good. Denzel Washington - good. Need I say more?
Slither - A hilarious horror-comedy movie about space slugs that come to Earth and prey on the populace of an unsuspecting town. Nathan Fillion is in it, which makes it a must watch in my book. It's a shame this movie didn't do better as it's quite good and Fillion deserves to have some serious leading man money pushed his way so that he can show how he can hang with the best of them. Bill Pardy fans unite!
Lucky Number Slevin - An interesting little crime noir movie with Josh Hartnett, Lucy Liu, Morgan Freeman and Bruce Willis, among others. The movie's got style and keeps you guessing throughout. Plus, for once I didn't find Lucy Liu annoying. Worth a rent if you see it on the shelf.
The Sentinel - Utter shit. The movie made no sense, and it had Eva Longoria, who is one of the most annoying people working in Hollywood today. Avoid at all costs.
Mission: Impossible III - Once you get past the fact that Tom Cruise is in it, you'll be treated to the best Mission Impossible movie of the three and a damn good action movie in it's own right. Turn up the speakers for the bridge scene and rattle the neighbor's house. Ving Rhames is his usual badass self, Maggie Q is fucking gorgeous and the brief appearance of Keri Russell made me remember why I loved "Felicity" so.
Over The Hedge - Absolutely hilarious animated movie based on the comic strip of the same name. The voice talent is amazing, the animation is top notch and it's damned funny. Buy it for the kids, watch it for yourself, or hell, screw the kids. They probably don't deserve it anyways.
X-Men: The Last Stand - Well, Colussus looked cool and it had the Fastball Special. On the one hand, I'd hate for the franchise to go out on this particular note, but on the other hand, the potential is there for them to go out on a far worse note. Let's hope the Wolverine spin-off is better.
The Break-Up - Jennifer Aniston seems to get hotter and hotter in every movie, while jon Favreau gets bigger and bigger. Vince Vaugh was his least outlandish and created a character that was very realistic while still being Vince Vaughn funny. The fights were actual arguments you would expect normal couples to get in which made the movie painful to watch at times, but ultimately entertaining.
Cars - The animation is great, but at 2 hours, it's just too damned long for a kids' movie. My son got up to do other stuff at one point, which he never does when watching a movie. Warning, after watching this, your children may want you to smash into other cars when driving. If you already do that, good for you.
Superman Returns - The best movie of the year and one of the best comic book movies ever made. It pains my soul to see that the aforementioned X-Men piece of crap made more than this movie. I still react with incredulity when I hear that people didn't like this movie, but I also don't understand why people like bananas. No accounting for taste, I guess. This movie will be on permanent rotation in our house for a long time to come.
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest - Good, with amazing special effects but ultimately too long and too meandering. Hopefully the third one will be a little tighter and act as a good bookend with the first one. Not enough Keira Knightley in a bodice either.
The Descent - Best horror movie of the year. I was scared out of my mind before they even came across the beasties, so well did the film the claustraphobia of spelunking. Carniverous cave dwellers aside, you couldn't pay me enough money to crawl around in some tunnel under the ground. Neil Marshall now lives atop my must watch list for directors.
Feast - Linda and I watched the making of this movie on Project Greenlight, so I felt obligated to buy it and help John Gulager out. It's actually a really good movie, with lots of gore, humor and hot chicks. I know that IMDB lists this as a 2005 release, but I'm not counting film festivals. I'm talking wide release or DVD release.
So there you have it. 2007 looks to be a stellar year with 300, Ghost Rider, Spider-Man 3, Transformers and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix among others. I may actually see one or two of these in the theater. How exciting!
One thing I should point out before giving my little mini-reviews is that, of late, whenever Linda and I watch a movie in the basement I end up sleeping through part of it. As a result, I may be giving a movie somewhat of a bad review because it didn't make any sense, a direct result of my narcoleptic tendencies. Thankfully I seem to remember that most of the movies I didn't like, Linda didn't like either, so you can rest assured that the movie was probably still bad, just not for the reasons I'm listing. On with the show!
Hostel - I rented this one to see what the hubbub was about. By hubbub, I mean that I heard there were some pretty hot topless chicks in it and there were . It is not lost on me that the lustful urges used to lure the young men to their dooms in the movie were the same urges used to get me to watch the movie. I'm OK with that. After all, my achilles tendons remained intact. The movie was OK. Certainly entertaining but nothing to get all jazzed up about. It's not for teh squeamish though as some of the violence is pretty brutal.
Glory Road - Linda and I rented this over the summer. Think Miracle but with basketball instead of hockey and with boredom instead of emotional resonance and national pride. Total waste of Emily Deschanel too.
Underworld: Evolution - For the life of me, I still can't fathom how it is I can watch these Underworld movies and not understand a goddam second of them. I've seen the first one like 3 times and I still have no idea what happened. Oh well. Kate Beckinsale is smoking hot in her leather catsuit thingy and Bill Nighy is always a hoot. It was a little on the long side and I'm pretty sure I slept through part of it.
Final Destination 3- Not as good as the first two, however if you're a Final Destination fan, you'll still be entertained. The DVD has an interesting cut and paste feature that allows you to put together how the different folks die. At least I heard that it does as I could never get it to work.
Running Scared - Suprisingly enough, this hyper violent "fairy tale" was one of my favorite movies of the year. Paul Walker did an excellent job as a low level mob flunky who finds his life turning to shit when the gun he was supposed to get rid of, due to it's use in a shootout with some corrupt cops, gets stolen by the neighbor's kid and used for an attempted patricide. It's dark, funny, extremely violent at times and filled with a bunch of really memorable characters. This movie will put your sound system to the test too, particularly in the opening shootout. Plus, it's got Chazz Palminteri who is always worth the price of admission.
16 Blocks - You'd think that a movie with Mos Def and Bruce Willis would be pretty good. You'd be wrong. Mos had this really annoying nasal voice througout the whole thing and the bad guy was the blonde dude from St. Elsewhere. Ooooh, very scary. I slept through a big chunk of this one, so maybe it was better, but if it was better I probably wouldn't have fallen asleep.
Dave Chappelle's Block Party - An excellent concert film if you're into hip-hop and such greats as The Roots, Kanye West, Erykah Badu and Black Star. A not so great concert film if you're into Dave Chappelle as he does very little, if any standup. It's still funny at times, especially when he walks the streets of his home town giving out golden tickets, but those expecting a laugh out loud movie will be dissappointed.
V For Vendetta - A pretty accurate rendition of the seminal comic mini-series, especially for an Alan Moore joint, which usually end up getting raped over a barrel when made into movies ("League of Extraordinary Gentlemen", I'm looking at you). Natalie Portman was hot as usual, and Hugo Weaving did an excellent job emoting behind a plastic mask for 2 hours. I was glad to see that they kept V's identity a secret througout the film, as they did in the comics. All in all, a very entertaining action movie.
Inside Man - Spike Lee - good. Clive Owen - good. Denzel Washington - good. Need I say more?
Slither - A hilarious horror-comedy movie about space slugs that come to Earth and prey on the populace of an unsuspecting town. Nathan Fillion is in it, which makes it a must watch in my book. It's a shame this movie didn't do better as it's quite good and Fillion deserves to have some serious leading man money pushed his way so that he can show how he can hang with the best of them. Bill Pardy fans unite!
Lucky Number Slevin - An interesting little crime noir movie with Josh Hartnett, Lucy Liu, Morgan Freeman and Bruce Willis, among others. The movie's got style and keeps you guessing throughout. Plus, for once I didn't find Lucy Liu annoying. Worth a rent if you see it on the shelf.
The Sentinel - Utter shit. The movie made no sense, and it had Eva Longoria, who is one of the most annoying people working in Hollywood today. Avoid at all costs.
Mission: Impossible III - Once you get past the fact that Tom Cruise is in it, you'll be treated to the best Mission Impossible movie of the three and a damn good action movie in it's own right. Turn up the speakers for the bridge scene and rattle the neighbor's house. Ving Rhames is his usual badass self, Maggie Q is fucking gorgeous and the brief appearance of Keri Russell made me remember why I loved "Felicity" so.
Over The Hedge - Absolutely hilarious animated movie based on the comic strip of the same name. The voice talent is amazing, the animation is top notch and it's damned funny. Buy it for the kids, watch it for yourself, or hell, screw the kids. They probably don't deserve it anyways.
X-Men: The Last Stand - Well, Colussus looked cool and it had the Fastball Special. On the one hand, I'd hate for the franchise to go out on this particular note, but on the other hand, the potential is there for them to go out on a far worse note. Let's hope the Wolverine spin-off is better.
The Break-Up - Jennifer Aniston seems to get hotter and hotter in every movie, while jon Favreau gets bigger and bigger. Vince Vaugh was his least outlandish and created a character that was very realistic while still being Vince Vaughn funny. The fights were actual arguments you would expect normal couples to get in which made the movie painful to watch at times, but ultimately entertaining.
Cars - The animation is great, but at 2 hours, it's just too damned long for a kids' movie. My son got up to do other stuff at one point, which he never does when watching a movie. Warning, after watching this, your children may want you to smash into other cars when driving. If you already do that, good for you.
Superman Returns - The best movie of the year and one of the best comic book movies ever made. It pains my soul to see that the aforementioned X-Men piece of crap made more than this movie. I still react with incredulity when I hear that people didn't like this movie, but I also don't understand why people like bananas. No accounting for taste, I guess. This movie will be on permanent rotation in our house for a long time to come.
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest - Good, with amazing special effects but ultimately too long and too meandering. Hopefully the third one will be a little tighter and act as a good bookend with the first one. Not enough Keira Knightley in a bodice either.
The Descent - Best horror movie of the year. I was scared out of my mind before they even came across the beasties, so well did the film the claustraphobia of spelunking. Carniverous cave dwellers aside, you couldn't pay me enough money to crawl around in some tunnel under the ground. Neil Marshall now lives atop my must watch list for directors.
Feast - Linda and I watched the making of this movie on Project Greenlight, so I felt obligated to buy it and help John Gulager out. It's actually a really good movie, with lots of gore, humor and hot chicks. I know that IMDB lists this as a 2005 release, but I'm not counting film festivals. I'm talking wide release or DVD release.
So there you have it. 2007 looks to be a stellar year with 300, Ghost Rider, Spider-Man 3, Transformers and Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix among others. I may actually see one or two of these in the theater. How exciting!
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
A Merry Illness to All
Greetings. Welcome to the new year. I hope it is a good one for you and your's. I also hope that your holiday was a good one as mine was conjured from the blackest pits of hell. What, pray tell, could cause such problems over this, the gloriousest of holiday vacations? Why, a sick child, that's what. And not just a sick child, but a SICK child. Come with me as I spin a tale of woe, but be warned for here there be monsters.
Before we get started, I should point out some things, things that every parent knows but are loathe to admit. The reason for me doing this is that Greg, a blogger whose work I have come to enjoy, and his tastefully named wife Linda, are expecting their first child in summer of this year. This being the case, I feel it my responsibility to lift the curtain from their eyes so that they can see the truth of what they can expect from the years ahead. No longer will I live in this code of silence perpetuated by fellow parents with the hopes of ensnaring other child free couples into our web of shared misery! No longer!
First, and this really shouldn't come as any surprise, but children have a tendency to ruin everything. OK, not necessarily everything, but most things, and certainly the important things. It's not really their fault, most of the time, it just happens. It happened when you were a kid, and it will happen with your own kids, or has already happened. I remember putting my arm through our front door's window the day before we were going on vacation and requiring 15 stitches on two cuts. This required us to have to find a doctor in Cape Cod who could remove the stitches, causing my mom to almost pass out in said doctor's office in the process. While we could still go on vacation, I dare say it was pretty damn close to being ruined. If you have an event, or a vacation, or you just want to go out with the family for a change of pace and have a nice dinner, invariably, someone will get sick, or fall off of the roof or just act like crazed monkey children in the restaurant and get you slapped with a restraining order. It's the universe's way of testing the boundaries of your love for your children. It also helps keep all of those boarding schools open as parents give up in fits of exhaustion and pack their kids off to be raised by strangers. Good luck Timmy, see you in June.
The reason that parents are so insistent on their kids having kids is because they know what's coming, and they want revenge for having all of their activities ruined for 18+ years. No one really wants grandkids, they just want to hear about how their grandchild ruined their son's/daughter's vacation/holiday/ski trip. I know I can't wait to hear about how little Abby junior threw up all over Thanksgiving dinner, a dinner I missed because Linda and I were vacationing in New Zealand. Similarly, people with kids naturally want others to share in their misery, so they want their child free friends to have kids too. I say nuts to that. The world doesn't need more people, and I like to think that someone is having a holiday not tinged with unhappiness.
The other thing is that the simple act of you commenting on how well things are going is enough to cause it to all come crashing down around you. Maybe this is just something with our family, but if either Linda or I notice some positive aspect of the children's behaviour, and we comment on it to each other, sure as the sun rises in the morning, that behaviour will change. Case in point, we had a good couple of weeks where Abby was sleeping fine and not getting up in the night. Linda says "it's nice that Abby sleeps through the night now" and that night she was up like every half hour and we haven't had a stretch of more than two good sleeping nights in a row since. I have tried to tell her that our words have power so we shouldn't abuse that but does she listen? Noooooooo! After all, what do I know? She says that she likes to say nice things about the kids. My response is that you can say nice things, you just have to be careful. You can say that they're nice kids, good kids, good looking kids, smart kids, creative kids, whatever. You just can't say something like "I'm glad none of the kids have held up any liquor stores" because if you do, our 4 year old will be picked up that night for trying to knock off the Beverage Mart.
Which brings us to our story. Abby has a long, proud history of getting sick every time family comes to visit (see everything, ruining of). Usually she gets sick a few days before they arrive so that she's well into it by the time they get here. This time, as of Thursday night, she hadn't, which led Linda to utter the fateful words "It's good Abby didn't get sick for your mom and sister's visit." At that point, I knew we were doomed. "Why would you say that?", I said. She brushed off my concerns, but I knew that the die had been cast and we would come up big losers.
Sure enough, Friday morning, not only is Abby miserable but she has an elevated temperature. Linda kept her home for a little bit to make sure she was OK. Once Abby was behaving like her normal self, Linda brought her to school. We went to the airport, got my mom and sister, had lunch and all was well until daycare called at 3:30 saying Abby had a temperature of 103. Yikes. It was on, 'til the crack of dawn.
Over the next few days Abby's temperature would range from a normal temp in the 98's up to a high somewhere in the 102's. Sometimes she was irritable, sometimes she was fine. Every night she was up screaming around 10PM and then later on around 1 or 2 in the morning. Fun!
On Tuesday, a day in which Linda and I had planned on bringing the kids to daycare so that we could enjoy a day of shopping and eating out with my mom and sister, we brought Abby to the doctor instead as, at this point, she had had a fever for going on 5 days now. There she was diagnosed with hand, foot and mouth disease and we were told that she should be over it in no time as that particular virus only lasts for 5 days max. Also, she was showing signs of the blisters that come with the disease which means it was on the outs.
On Wednesday her fever was worse than before, and then her eardrum exploded. Yes, you read that right. One moment she was fine, the next she was screaming and a bloody discharge was coming out of her ear. We thought that maybe she had a blister in her ear and it broke, but when Linda brought her to the doctor and the doctor took a look, the ear drum was perforated. Apparently, sometimes kids will get really fast, aggressive ear infections and the ear drum blows from all of the pressure. Ooookay. The doctor also noticed a rash on Abby that's usually indicative of sepsis so she had to get a whole mess of blood work done, and get two big antibiotic shots, one in each leg.
On Thursday, her fever was gone, and she was fine, but a little irritable until one point in the morning when she collapsed screaming for like 20 minutes straight and was completely unconsolable. As this was a symptom of further trouble to look for, Linda brought her back to the doctor. The doctor called the Center for Infectious Diseases to make sure Abby didn't have some strange jungle virus (she doesn't) and Abby got more antibiotic shots. The rash was still there, but hadn't spread, which pretty much ruled out sepsis, and the CID said that sometimes when kids get the flu, or other viruses, they can get the rash. The doctor said that it's possible she got the flu, plus the hand foot thingy, plus an ear infection, plus some other unknown infection. When this kid gets sick, she gets sick.
On Friday she was somewhat irritable but no fever, no exploding parts and she was eating more.
Saturday, Sunday and Monday found her more irritable than usual and with a slightly elevated temperature which we attribute to the fact that she's cutting her last tooth. Not the most convenient time for this tooth to make an appearance as the elevated temperature made us think she was having a relapse, but given that she's a) still on antibiotics, b) in a much better mood, c) eating normally and d) showing the signs of the tooth protruding from the gum, we're taking it as business as usual for a teething child. This is a good thing as neither one of us could take any more of her being sick, and I'm pretty sure she wouldn't want to be sick any more either.
It's dissappointing that all of my holiday vacation was taken up by a sick child, and that Linda's holiday vacation was taken up by getting ready for Christmas and then a sick child, but it has taught me a valuable lesson, which is to never, ever, ever save up all of your vacation until the end of the year. It's better to spread it out over the calendar year so that your kids can get sick once per season. In fact, it's probably better to never take any time off at all. While it means you'll never take a vacation, it also means that your kids will never get sick. Once the kids are in school, rather than daycare, I think we'll be able to take time off as long as it corresponds to their breaks, as kids rarely get sick and wreck their own shit.
All in all, I'm glad that Abby is feeling better and glad that the break is over. I'm hesitant to say that now we can all just be normal for fear that the bubonic plague is just waiting to come back in one of my children. Instead I'll say that I'm glad the Earth is still orbiting the sun. That way, if that changes as a result of these words, at least I'll take all of you down with me.
Happy New Year!
Before we get started, I should point out some things, things that every parent knows but are loathe to admit. The reason for me doing this is that Greg, a blogger whose work I have come to enjoy, and his tastefully named wife Linda, are expecting their first child in summer of this year. This being the case, I feel it my responsibility to lift the curtain from their eyes so that they can see the truth of what they can expect from the years ahead. No longer will I live in this code of silence perpetuated by fellow parents with the hopes of ensnaring other child free couples into our web of shared misery! No longer!
First, and this really shouldn't come as any surprise, but children have a tendency to ruin everything. OK, not necessarily everything, but most things, and certainly the important things. It's not really their fault, most of the time, it just happens. It happened when you were a kid, and it will happen with your own kids, or has already happened. I remember putting my arm through our front door's window the day before we were going on vacation and requiring 15 stitches on two cuts. This required us to have to find a doctor in Cape Cod who could remove the stitches, causing my mom to almost pass out in said doctor's office in the process. While we could still go on vacation, I dare say it was pretty damn close to being ruined. If you have an event, or a vacation, or you just want to go out with the family for a change of pace and have a nice dinner, invariably, someone will get sick, or fall off of the roof or just act like crazed monkey children in the restaurant and get you slapped with a restraining order. It's the universe's way of testing the boundaries of your love for your children. It also helps keep all of those boarding schools open as parents give up in fits of exhaustion and pack their kids off to be raised by strangers. Good luck Timmy, see you in June.
The reason that parents are so insistent on their kids having kids is because they know what's coming, and they want revenge for having all of their activities ruined for 18+ years. No one really wants grandkids, they just want to hear about how their grandchild ruined their son's/daughter's vacation/holiday/ski trip. I know I can't wait to hear about how little Abby junior threw up all over Thanksgiving dinner, a dinner I missed because Linda and I were vacationing in New Zealand. Similarly, people with kids naturally want others to share in their misery, so they want their child free friends to have kids too. I say nuts to that. The world doesn't need more people, and I like to think that someone is having a holiday not tinged with unhappiness.
The other thing is that the simple act of you commenting on how well things are going is enough to cause it to all come crashing down around you. Maybe this is just something with our family, but if either Linda or I notice some positive aspect of the children's behaviour, and we comment on it to each other, sure as the sun rises in the morning, that behaviour will change. Case in point, we had a good couple of weeks where Abby was sleeping fine and not getting up in the night. Linda says "it's nice that Abby sleeps through the night now" and that night she was up like every half hour and we haven't had a stretch of more than two good sleeping nights in a row since. I have tried to tell her that our words have power so we shouldn't abuse that but does she listen? Noooooooo! After all, what do I know? She says that she likes to say nice things about the kids. My response is that you can say nice things, you just have to be careful. You can say that they're nice kids, good kids, good looking kids, smart kids, creative kids, whatever. You just can't say something like "I'm glad none of the kids have held up any liquor stores" because if you do, our 4 year old will be picked up that night for trying to knock off the Beverage Mart.
Which brings us to our story. Abby has a long, proud history of getting sick every time family comes to visit (see everything, ruining of). Usually she gets sick a few days before they arrive so that she's well into it by the time they get here. This time, as of Thursday night, she hadn't, which led Linda to utter the fateful words "It's good Abby didn't get sick for your mom and sister's visit." At that point, I knew we were doomed. "Why would you say that?", I said. She brushed off my concerns, but I knew that the die had been cast and we would come up big losers.
Sure enough, Friday morning, not only is Abby miserable but she has an elevated temperature. Linda kept her home for a little bit to make sure she was OK. Once Abby was behaving like her normal self, Linda brought her to school. We went to the airport, got my mom and sister, had lunch and all was well until daycare called at 3:30 saying Abby had a temperature of 103. Yikes. It was on, 'til the crack of dawn.
Over the next few days Abby's temperature would range from a normal temp in the 98's up to a high somewhere in the 102's. Sometimes she was irritable, sometimes she was fine. Every night she was up screaming around 10PM and then later on around 1 or 2 in the morning. Fun!
On Tuesday, a day in which Linda and I had planned on bringing the kids to daycare so that we could enjoy a day of shopping and eating out with my mom and sister, we brought Abby to the doctor instead as, at this point, she had had a fever for going on 5 days now. There she was diagnosed with hand, foot and mouth disease and we were told that she should be over it in no time as that particular virus only lasts for 5 days max. Also, she was showing signs of the blisters that come with the disease which means it was on the outs.
On Wednesday her fever was worse than before, and then her eardrum exploded. Yes, you read that right. One moment she was fine, the next she was screaming and a bloody discharge was coming out of her ear. We thought that maybe she had a blister in her ear and it broke, but when Linda brought her to the doctor and the doctor took a look, the ear drum was perforated. Apparently, sometimes kids will get really fast, aggressive ear infections and the ear drum blows from all of the pressure. Ooookay. The doctor also noticed a rash on Abby that's usually indicative of sepsis so she had to get a whole mess of blood work done, and get two big antibiotic shots, one in each leg.
On Thursday, her fever was gone, and she was fine, but a little irritable until one point in the morning when she collapsed screaming for like 20 minutes straight and was completely unconsolable. As this was a symptom of further trouble to look for, Linda brought her back to the doctor. The doctor called the Center for Infectious Diseases to make sure Abby didn't have some strange jungle virus (she doesn't) and Abby got more antibiotic shots. The rash was still there, but hadn't spread, which pretty much ruled out sepsis, and the CID said that sometimes when kids get the flu, or other viruses, they can get the rash. The doctor said that it's possible she got the flu, plus the hand foot thingy, plus an ear infection, plus some other unknown infection. When this kid gets sick, she gets sick.
On Friday she was somewhat irritable but no fever, no exploding parts and she was eating more.
Saturday, Sunday and Monday found her more irritable than usual and with a slightly elevated temperature which we attribute to the fact that she's cutting her last tooth. Not the most convenient time for this tooth to make an appearance as the elevated temperature made us think she was having a relapse, but given that she's a) still on antibiotics, b) in a much better mood, c) eating normally and d) showing the signs of the tooth protruding from the gum, we're taking it as business as usual for a teething child. This is a good thing as neither one of us could take any more of her being sick, and I'm pretty sure she wouldn't want to be sick any more either.
It's dissappointing that all of my holiday vacation was taken up by a sick child, and that Linda's holiday vacation was taken up by getting ready for Christmas and then a sick child, but it has taught me a valuable lesson, which is to never, ever, ever save up all of your vacation until the end of the year. It's better to spread it out over the calendar year so that your kids can get sick once per season. In fact, it's probably better to never take any time off at all. While it means you'll never take a vacation, it also means that your kids will never get sick. Once the kids are in school, rather than daycare, I think we'll be able to take time off as long as it corresponds to their breaks, as kids rarely get sick and wreck their own shit.
All in all, I'm glad that Abby is feeling better and glad that the break is over. I'm hesitant to say that now we can all just be normal for fear that the bubonic plague is just waiting to come back in one of my children. Instead I'll say that I'm glad the Earth is still orbiting the sun. That way, if that changes as a result of these words, at least I'll take all of you down with me.
Happy New Year!
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