Diary of Jack Driscoll
(Editor's Note - Jack Driscoll is the unfortunate playright hired to accompany the cast and crew to Skull Island where they have a run-in with a rather large monkey. Their story is told in a recent art house movie called King Kong. Perhaps you've heard of it. Said story is also told in a game called Peter Jackson's King Kong: The Official Game of the Movie , a game that takes about as long to play as it does to speak the title. This diary is a recollection of Jack's encounters while on Skull Island, as we see in the game. How we got it, I don't know. I tend not to ask too many questions as it only gets me into trouble when I have to take the stand.)
Day 1
Well here we are, beautiful Skull Island. The trip was OK, and mostly uneventful except for the part where I got nailed with a rock in the rowboat. Ouch. Head trauma aside, I'm not so sure about these people I'm traveling with. I don't know how to explain it, but when they talk, their mouths don't match up. I'm not speaking in metaphors here, their mouths literally don't move to match the words they're saying. Weird. Maybe that rock hit me harder than I thought. Plus, and I'm sure this is just me being picky, but I thought we were supposed to be in a glorious new age. If that's the case, nobody told these people because they look like shit. I'm sure I look fine, but without a mirror, it's hard to tell. My hands look wonderful, that much I can tell you.
...
5 minutes on the island and we've already been attacked by giant crabs. My traveling companions weren't much help. I hope they understand that I'm a playwrite, not the great white hunter. If I have to kill everything on this trip, it's going to be a short trip.
...
Our pilot can't land, which doesn't bode well for the trip. He's been able to drop supply crates everywhere, which is good, I guess. Man, they sure brought a lot of guns along on this trip. I'm beginning to think that answering that ad in the newspaper wasn't such a good idea. Limitless earning potential my ass.
...
Managed to burn some brush away to clear a path. Apparantly, I'm the only person here who can wield a burning spear as the other 3 just stood around barking orders at me like I'm their lapdog. Then, once we moved along and all got attacked by giant millipedes it was all "Jack save me!", "Jack where are you?" "Jack, it's eating my liver!" Jesus people, try to do something by yourself. When I get back home, the union is going to hear about this.
...
Man, Skull Island is dark! Most of the time I can barely see anything, and then, when I get bitten by something (which happens a lot), my vision goes all dark, things slow down and I hear angels. The music is nice, but when it gets dark like that, it makes it hard to hit whatever is trying to digest me. I can only assume this is a side affect of the blow to the head I took earlier. Sometimes, when things are really dark, everything gets a lot brighter, but washed out, as if some benevolent being somehow adjusted the world to be brighter. Not being an idiot, I use these time to figure out where the hell I'm going, but once I do, the affect mysteriously fades. I think I have a concussion or something.
...
For a portly guy, Denham can really move. This is doubly impressive because he's got that camera on his back. Once he sees where he wants to go, he's off like a shot. Ann too, and Hayes now that I think of it. Maybe they're all on something.
...
OK, now this is really weird. I was following a path that led into a valley. Ann was climbing the rocks to meet me there. I wasn't paying attention to what she was doing, because frankly she's very annoying, but I could hear her grunting away so I just assumed she was making progress. Well, I get to the valley and she's still grunting, grunting, grunting. I look up at the rocks to find her and she was climbing up into the sky. I'm serious. She was floating in the air. I looked away, and when I looked back, she was gone, but I could still hear her grunting. I found a ladder that would get me to the door lever, but I had a horrible rope climbing incident in PE as a child and ever since then, I can't climb ladders, ropes, really anything vertical. Just as I was standing there trying to figure out what the hell to do, I blacked out. When I came to, we were all standing there, Ann included as if I had never gone into the valley. This time I paid attention to Ann and shot a millipede that was trying to eat her. She then met me in the valley and opened the door for me. I think we're all being worked a little too hard to get things wrapped up for Denham's movie. I can't think of any other explanation.
...
More blackouts. Sometimes I really feel like I'm on Skull Island, like I'm a part of the whole thing, then I black out and I swear I see the word "Loading", whatever that means, and some other words that foreshadow what ends up happening. It tends to break the spell that Skull Island weaves. It's probably a tumor.
Day 2
Ann's gone. A big monkey took her. Yeah, I know. Looks like we won't be getting out of here any time soon.
...
Met up with Hayes. Man, he's bossy. The worst part about it, is he doesn't even pay attention. He's all like "Jack, you have to burn the bushes." So I do, the bushes are on fire and everything and again he's telling me to burn the bushes. So now the bushes are completely gone, and I'm walking up the path and he's telling me to burn the goddamned bushes. Jesus man, open your eyes! Denham isn't any better, in fact he's worse. I swear, I don't know what kind of cologne that guy uses but every creature on this island tries to eat that guy and it's up to me to keep them off of him. I knew I should have taken that job writing soap commercials.
...
Sorry I haven't written in a while but I've been pretty busy. Here's what I've been doing for the past few hours. Walk into a clearing, spear/shoot some dinosaurs, find some fire, burn some bushes, find a lever, open a door, walk to the next clearing. Occasionally I'll have to spear a grub or a big bug and throw it to get the swarming spider off of said lever. Good times. That Ann better be very appreciative of what I'm doing to rescue her, if you know what I mean. Very appreciative.
...
I blacked out again, and this time I dreamt that I was the monkey that took Ann. It was pretty cool to swing around and beat on other monsters, but just as I was getting into it, it was over. Based on our experiences, I don't think Denham should call his movie King Kong, I think he should call it "Spearing Monsters and Burning Bushes in a Very Dark Jungle". Catchy!
...
More monsters. More spearing. More burning bushes. Is it possible to be bored when one's life is constantly in danger? Allow me to answer. Yes, yes it is.
...
I don't think I've ever seen so many crates with so many sniper rifles. Next job I'm hired for, I'm going to ask how many sniper rifles they have laying about. If it's more than three, I ain't taking the job.
...
We found Jimmy. Man, that kid is annoying. All he does is whine. Of course, when we get on the rafts in the river, I'm stuck with him while Denham and Hayes are on the other raft. Once again, they're just bossing me around the whole time. Yes, Hayes, I know I have to burn the bridges. That's why they're on fire.
...
Had another blackout where I thought I was Kong. He fought some big V-Rex beast things. He seems to live the same repetetive life we're living at the moment. Beat up on some beasties, lift a pillar, break a door, wait for Ann to burn some brush, swing to the next clearing, beat up on some beasties, blah, blah, blah. He is a giant monkey, so I'm not sure what I'm expecting him to do, but Denham better hope that Kong does something other than this, because people won't stick around for it. I heard that Denham wants his movie to be 3 hours long. 3 hours long! A 3 hour King Kong movie? That's absurd!
Day 3
We got Ann back. Had another strange blackout. I got attacked by the V-Rex I was trying to distract while Ann opened the door, and when I came to, there was this horrible roaring in my ears that didn't subside even when I had another one of those weird Loading blackout thingies. This is starting to really bother me. I slept for a couple of hours and that seemed to fix it. As soon as we get back to civilization, I'm going to the doctor for my head and to the gym to learn how to climb a ladder. Let Ann distract the dinosaurs while I open the door. I mean, seriously.
...
Ann is gone. Again. We got trapped and she had to call Kong. Great idea except for the fact that he's not in love with the rest of us so he took her and just left us to die. Nice! Denham is gone too, which I'm OK with. His mouth movement were really starting to freak me out.
...
The pilot managed to land, which was good, except for the part where Jimmy got on the plane and they fucking left me here. Hayes was busy being eaten by something. Good riddance I say. Now it's up to me to find Ann and get back to the boat. Whatever. Next time a millipede wants to takes a chunk out of my leg, I may just let it. Hayes certainly looked happier.
...
We're leaving! Finally! After hooking up with Ann again and then losing her, I managed to make it down to the beach in time to see her and Kong come crashing through the trees. They gassed the crap out of him and he passed out. Denham wants to take him back to New York. Can you believe it? As if this whole trip wasn't bad enough, now we have to share the boat with a giant, stinking ape. Lovely. Dibbs on Hayes's suite. He won't be using it.
Two Weeks Later
Well, that was a disaster. Denham put up this big show, to unveil Kong and Kong managed to escape. He did a pretty good job of tearing up the joint, throwing cars and busting up stoplights. Eventually he grabbed Ann and climbed the Empire State Building where he was promptly shot down by planes. Oh well. I know I'm supposed to feel bad for Kong, but I didn't spend a lot of time with him. That was Ann's thing. Plus, after he dies, Denham said some sappy crap about it being beauty that killed the beast and his mouth didn't move at all. It just gaped open. Kind of hard to feel bad about a big dead monkey when a guy in tux and tails stands there, mouth agape, trying to wax philosophical. Frankly I'm just glad the whole trip is over. This is the last time I take a job based on the advice of someone who's high. Fucking Brits.
Monday, January 30, 2006
Friday, January 27, 2006
Parenting Lessons I've Learned
Now that I have a few years of parenting under my belt, I feel that I've learned a number of things that I'm now prepared to pass on to you. Those of you without children, but thinking of obtaining some can use these nuggets to prepare yourself for the ordeal, er, journey ahead. Those of you with children can hang your heads in shame because you know that you've done similar things but you're too afraid to share your knowledge. Be afraid no more!
Hand Lotion and Snow Globes Don't Mix
So there we were, the day before we were going to take Ben to a family party for his grand unveiling. Up until this time, Linda's parents were the only people in her family who had met Ben. Her parents were throwing a July 4th party in upstate NY for the family to meet Ben and my brother-in-law's soon to be wife and stepson. I'm against facial and head trauma on general principal, but even more so when you're meeting people for the first time. I've never had an introduction go well when one or more parties have gaping head wounds. Your experiences may vary.
So it's the day we're leaving and it's my turn to put Ben down for his nap. Given that it was a bath day, I decided to give him a bath before his nap, rather than before bed as we were flying up that day and I wanted him to be able to go right to bed that night should the traveling prove exhausting. As any good parent knows, you can't just bathe a child, you have to slather them with lotion, post-bath, lest you dry out their skin and they crumble into dust at the slightest breeze. This invariably makes your hands slippery for several hours. I once gave him a bath, put him down to bed and then used the bathroom, where I was trapped for 9 days because I couldn't open the doorknob. If this were a poorly made thriller, the camera would be lingering on my slippery hands for several shots, as if to tell you, the viewer, that something important was afoot.
Ben used to have this John Lennon Imagine snow globe in his nursery.
Note the faux rocky base, as this too will be important. It matched the decor of his room and played a soothing lullaby rendition of "Imagine" when wound up. The usual routine was to put Ben in his crib, wind up the snow globe so that he could see it, place the globe on the dresser and then leave the room. This morning, for reasons unknown to me, I decided to give him a closer look at the globe after I wound it up. He got a closer look all right, as after I showed it to him, I lifted it up about 6 inches to remove it from the crib, it slipped out of my lotion-y hands and promptly proceeded to nail him in the forehead, faux rock base first. Ben looked at me stunned for a second, as if to say "did you just drop a snow globe on my head?" and then proceeded to scream his head off as if to say "YOU JUST DROPPED A FUCKING SNOW GLOBE ON MY HEAD!!!"
Now, accidentally injuring your child is bad enough, but showing said injury to the child's mother is about a million times worse. This is especially true if a) the child has never had anything of real size dropped on their head b) the child is going to be unveiled to a significant portion of the family soon and c) whatever fell on the child's head appeared to have left a permanent indentation in said child's skull in the form of faux rock. Linda was not pleased. Ben was not pleased. By extension, I was not pleased, especially at the notion of telling multiple family members that the reason my son's forehead has been cleft in twain is because I dropped an ornamental music piece on his head. Doubly so because this was my wife's family, and relations between them and I had been rocky in the past so bludgeoning the only grandchild would not endear me to them. After checking to make sure he didn't have a concussion, we iced and treated the wound and put him to bed. The rest of the day went by without incident. The trip was successful and when I told people what happened, they looked at me as if to say that by this time they expected me to have sold the baby for cd money, so this was a minor infraction. There was no permanent scarring, but to this day, when we play "Imagine", Ben drops to his knees and clutches his forehead.
Bath Time Is Not Fun Time When Blood Is Involved
If it's not apparent yet that I really have no business raising, caring for, or even being left alone, for even a minute, with children, allow me to spin another tale. Abby absolutely hates to have her face wiped, washed, or in any way subjected to moisture. Even the slightest wind on her face makes her scrunch up her features as if someone had just dropped a snow globe on it. Prior to a week or so ago, this behavior did not extend to the bath, which was odd, because water is one of the defining characteristic of a bath. We've tried bathing them in tubs of dirt and that seemed counterproductive.
Last week, as Linda was giving Abby a bath, I heard screaming from the bathroom the likes of which one would attribute to a child being savaged by wolverines. I checked the wolverine pen and they all were accounted for, even crazy ol' Zeke who likes to try and gnaw through the cage as he hungrily eyes your tasty neck flesh. Oh Zeke, you're a hoot. Anyways, after the bath I asked Linda what forest creature came and devoured the baby and she told me that a little water got on Abby's face and as a result she cried to the point where her head popped off and rolled around the bathroom floor like a little purple turnip. Being the attentive father that I am, I filed this info for future baths.
Fast forward a couple of days and it's my turn to give Abby a bath. Things are going smoothly enough, and I've been able to keep water off of her face by letting her play with a hair dryer as she splashes around. What? Oh, right. Don't worry, I put it on the "Cold" setting. Anyway, as I'm cleaning her, a single drop of water leaped angrily from the washcloth and proceeded to speed through her hair, over the crest of her skull and land on her face. Fearing that this was but a precursor to a Niagara Falls type deluge, she proceeded to scream. Loudly.
Now, I'm usually one to let my kids cry it out, because as children, they spend 95% of their time crying about something and frankly I can't be bothered to deal with ministrating to their various concerns. I paid for them to get here, I'm paying for them to go to college, the in between is mostly up to them. But, this being a bathtub, and she being a small squirmy baby, I figured that I should make some small effort to calm her down. This is when I always get into trouble.
I grabbed this plastic swimming dog thing to make it dance around and splash in the water to mollify her. I moved the dog forward, looking away for a second to pick up the washcloth, she moved her head forward at considerable speed and dog met baby skull with a force slightly more than what I would have intended. This time there was no pause before the screaming, but I think it's because she was screaming already. She did bring her volume level up to a point I've never heard before. I can assure you that her lungs and vocal cords work just fine. I quickly finished the bath and got her out of there, where she promptly calmed down and played with a brush, none the worse for wear except for three somewhat noticeable scratches on her forehead.
Again, the worst part about the ordeal was presenting the injured child to her mother. Why this woman stays married to me I have no idea. Guys, head trauma is not something your spouse will "get used to" so don't think that she'll just brush off the second busted baby skull as the same old, same old. I think she was actually more upset this time because Abby is a girl and Linda has to give Abby a bath next, so you know, good luck with that one. The next day I had to explain to the daycare coordinator what happened. Strangely enough, she looked quite concerned with my fitness as a parent until I told her about how I caved in my son's skull with a snow globe, then it seemed as if she thought that head trauma was just a parenting tool we utilized, like family beds or time outs. "Oh, the Cackowski-Schnell's? Yes, they hit their children about the head and neck. It works wonders!"
Thankfully the baby doesn't seem to have suffered any ill effects, which is important as she's walking now and we want her to be able to retain her balance. Thank the gods we're not having any more children. At this rate, I'd have to figure out how to drop a refridgerator on the third on.
Hand Lotion and Snow Globes Don't Mix
So there we were, the day before we were going to take Ben to a family party for his grand unveiling. Up until this time, Linda's parents were the only people in her family who had met Ben. Her parents were throwing a July 4th party in upstate NY for the family to meet Ben and my brother-in-law's soon to be wife and stepson. I'm against facial and head trauma on general principal, but even more so when you're meeting people for the first time. I've never had an introduction go well when one or more parties have gaping head wounds. Your experiences may vary.
So it's the day we're leaving and it's my turn to put Ben down for his nap. Given that it was a bath day, I decided to give him a bath before his nap, rather than before bed as we were flying up that day and I wanted him to be able to go right to bed that night should the traveling prove exhausting. As any good parent knows, you can't just bathe a child, you have to slather them with lotion, post-bath, lest you dry out their skin and they crumble into dust at the slightest breeze. This invariably makes your hands slippery for several hours. I once gave him a bath, put him down to bed and then used the bathroom, where I was trapped for 9 days because I couldn't open the doorknob. If this were a poorly made thriller, the camera would be lingering on my slippery hands for several shots, as if to tell you, the viewer, that something important was afoot.
Ben used to have this John Lennon Imagine snow globe in his nursery.Note the faux rocky base, as this too will be important. It matched the decor of his room and played a soothing lullaby rendition of "Imagine" when wound up. The usual routine was to put Ben in his crib, wind up the snow globe so that he could see it, place the globe on the dresser and then leave the room. This morning, for reasons unknown to me, I decided to give him a closer look at the globe after I wound it up. He got a closer look all right, as after I showed it to him, I lifted it up about 6 inches to remove it from the crib, it slipped out of my lotion-y hands and promptly proceeded to nail him in the forehead, faux rock base first. Ben looked at me stunned for a second, as if to say "did you just drop a snow globe on my head?" and then proceeded to scream his head off as if to say "YOU JUST DROPPED A FUCKING SNOW GLOBE ON MY HEAD!!!"
Now, accidentally injuring your child is bad enough, but showing said injury to the child's mother is about a million times worse. This is especially true if a) the child has never had anything of real size dropped on their head b) the child is going to be unveiled to a significant portion of the family soon and c) whatever fell on the child's head appeared to have left a permanent indentation in said child's skull in the form of faux rock. Linda was not pleased. Ben was not pleased. By extension, I was not pleased, especially at the notion of telling multiple family members that the reason my son's forehead has been cleft in twain is because I dropped an ornamental music piece on his head. Doubly so because this was my wife's family, and relations between them and I had been rocky in the past so bludgeoning the only grandchild would not endear me to them. After checking to make sure he didn't have a concussion, we iced and treated the wound and put him to bed. The rest of the day went by without incident. The trip was successful and when I told people what happened, they looked at me as if to say that by this time they expected me to have sold the baby for cd money, so this was a minor infraction. There was no permanent scarring, but to this day, when we play "Imagine", Ben drops to his knees and clutches his forehead.
Bath Time Is Not Fun Time When Blood Is Involved
If it's not apparent yet that I really have no business raising, caring for, or even being left alone, for even a minute, with children, allow me to spin another tale. Abby absolutely hates to have her face wiped, washed, or in any way subjected to moisture. Even the slightest wind on her face makes her scrunch up her features as if someone had just dropped a snow globe on it. Prior to a week or so ago, this behavior did not extend to the bath, which was odd, because water is one of the defining characteristic of a bath. We've tried bathing them in tubs of dirt and that seemed counterproductive.
Last week, as Linda was giving Abby a bath, I heard screaming from the bathroom the likes of which one would attribute to a child being savaged by wolverines. I checked the wolverine pen and they all were accounted for, even crazy ol' Zeke who likes to try and gnaw through the cage as he hungrily eyes your tasty neck flesh. Oh Zeke, you're a hoot. Anyways, after the bath I asked Linda what forest creature came and devoured the baby and she told me that a little water got on Abby's face and as a result she cried to the point where her head popped off and rolled around the bathroom floor like a little purple turnip. Being the attentive father that I am, I filed this info for future baths.
Fast forward a couple of days and it's my turn to give Abby a bath. Things are going smoothly enough, and I've been able to keep water off of her face by letting her play with a hair dryer as she splashes around. What? Oh, right. Don't worry, I put it on the "Cold" setting. Anyway, as I'm cleaning her, a single drop of water leaped angrily from the washcloth and proceeded to speed through her hair, over the crest of her skull and land on her face. Fearing that this was but a precursor to a Niagara Falls type deluge, she proceeded to scream. Loudly.
Now, I'm usually one to let my kids cry it out, because as children, they spend 95% of their time crying about something and frankly I can't be bothered to deal with ministrating to their various concerns. I paid for them to get here, I'm paying for them to go to college, the in between is mostly up to them. But, this being a bathtub, and she being a small squirmy baby, I figured that I should make some small effort to calm her down. This is when I always get into trouble.
I grabbed this plastic swimming dog thing to make it dance around and splash in the water to mollify her. I moved the dog forward, looking away for a second to pick up the washcloth, she moved her head forward at considerable speed and dog met baby skull with a force slightly more than what I would have intended. This time there was no pause before the screaming, but I think it's because she was screaming already. She did bring her volume level up to a point I've never heard before. I can assure you that her lungs and vocal cords work just fine. I quickly finished the bath and got her out of there, where she promptly calmed down and played with a brush, none the worse for wear except for three somewhat noticeable scratches on her forehead.
Again, the worst part about the ordeal was presenting the injured child to her mother. Why this woman stays married to me I have no idea. Guys, head trauma is not something your spouse will "get used to" so don't think that she'll just brush off the second busted baby skull as the same old, same old. I think she was actually more upset this time because Abby is a girl and Linda has to give Abby a bath next, so you know, good luck with that one. The next day I had to explain to the daycare coordinator what happened. Strangely enough, she looked quite concerned with my fitness as a parent until I told her about how I caved in my son's skull with a snow globe, then it seemed as if she thought that head trauma was just a parenting tool we utilized, like family beds or time outs. "Oh, the Cackowski-Schnell's? Yes, they hit their children about the head and neck. It works wonders!"
Thankfully the baby doesn't seem to have suffered any ill effects, which is important as she's walking now and we want her to be able to retain her balance. Thank the gods we're not having any more children. At this rate, I'd have to figure out how to drop a refridgerator on the third on.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
On the Existence of Wooden Pots, Part 1
Greeting Science Squaddies! Welcome to the maiden voyage of the SuburbanJoe Science Squad, an intrepid group of knowledge seeking adventurers. Good to have you along. I should point out that while writing this post I'm watching my "Butch Walker Live in Budokan" DVD, thereby keeping to two of my resolutions at once. Impressive, I know. For the record, for those of you not morally opposed to rocking out at dangerous levels, you could do worse than buying Mr. Walker's DVD. I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'. Do not be scared by the fact that it's from Sony. As far as I know, it has not installed any rootkit software on my DVD player, however if porn mysteriously shows up in said player, blame it on the hackers.
Today's scientific inquiry comes from a conversation me and the missus had many years ago. As I was cooking, and stirring something on the stove with a wooden spoon, Linda asked me why people use wooden spoons instead of metal spoons. I told her that some people think that metal imparts a bad taste to the food. She then uttered the classic question, "Then why don't people use wooden pans." That's my wife ladies and gentlemen.
As I was coming up with my first entry for these posts, she recommended I write about why people don't use wooden pans. The more I thought about it, disregarding the obvious reason of course, I thought that it was an excellent question, so today we tackle the question of the ages:
Why Don't People Use Wooden Pans?
One caveat before we get started. I'm not a scientist, I'm just a guy who likes finding things out. I say this because I don't want to give the impression that the answers I'm giving here are the end all and be all to the question at hand. It's just one explanation. The beauty of the sciences is that often times, there are multiple scientific explanations to things and if you extend your view of fields that the term "science" encompasses, you can find even more answers. So far, I've found that for every answer I find, I find 5 more questions, but that's a good thing. OK, caveat over. Let's roll.
The first thing to talk about is that heat will always go from a hot object to a cold object, provided that the system isn't so well insulated as to prevent the transfer of heat. This is why, when ice is placed in a cup of hot water, the ice melts (gets warmer) and the water gets a little cooler, rather than the ice getting colder and the water getting hotter. That would be some fucked up shit. Heat transfer is dependent upon the substance that is between the hot thing and the cold thing. In our example, it would be whatever the pan is made of. Every value has a constant called the thermal conductivity (k) that defines the rate that energy will transfer through a slab of material of a given size and thickness at room temperature. Bigger numbers mean that heat transfers more quickly, lower number means a slower transfer. For the record, this constant is also a good measure of electrical conductivity, with some exceptions, if that's how you roll.
For the sake of our discussion, we're going to assume that our non-wood cooking pan is made out of cast iron. I don't know how the various non-stick coatings would affect heat conductivity and such, so I'm going with cast iron which is a little more manageable. Wood is just, well wood. If you can find a tree out there that acts like metal, feel free to let me know and I'll specify a less conductive wood accordingly. Good luck.
OK, so, thermal conductivity. For cast iron, the thermal conductivity value is 55 (forgive me for not using units. Physics teachers everywhere are cringing.) In comparison, wood has a thermal conductivity that ranges from 0.04 for balsa to 0.35 to fir. As you can see, heat goes through cast iron like a hot knife through butter, and through wood like something less hot and less buttery. The difference in heat conductivity also explains why you can pick up a stick that's burning on one end and not have any adverse affects. Pick up an iron rod that's glowing on one end and most likely you won't be shaking hands with anyone for some time. Now, one thing to keep in mind is that you don't want too high of a thermal conductivity for your cooking surface, as you want to allow the heat to diffuse throughout the pan's surface as well as transfer to the food. Otherwise you'll only get heat right over the heat source, which leads to scorching and bad feelings.
It's not really fair to compare wood and cast iron in terms of thermal conductivity. Cast iron is a (mostly) pure solid with a crystalline structure that just begs to conduct heat. Start agitating the atoms and electrons at one end and those vibrations will move through the substance and heat up the whole thing. Wood on the other hand, is a paella of water, cellulose, lignin and other loosey-goosey compounds. That being said, here's your simple answer as to why there are no wooden pans, wood has a shitty thermal conductivity value, and therefore would not transmit heat from the heat source to the food effectively enough to cook well, if at all. Strangely enough, you'd be better off with a pan made of ice (k = 2.2). Chew on that one.
Also, people use wooden spoons so as to not conduct heat away from what's being cooked, which can happen with a metal spoon. That's not really a concern when making stew, but when making candy you can end up screwing up your crystallization. That's right, somewhere out there there's a guy at the 3 Musketeers factory stirring a big vat of nougat with a massive wooden spoon.
That's not to say that there aren't wooden pans out there. Go to any gourmet food stores and you'll see fancy-pants cedar planks for grilling. The idea is that you soak the plank overnight, fire up the grill, place your meat (usually salmon) on the plank and grill with the lid closed. As the meat cooks, the plank smokes and chars and adds some smokey goodness to the meat. You can then serve your meal on a smoking, charred hunk of wood, which then makes your guests smell like smoking, charred hunks of wood. Now, as the lid is closed in this case, it's the indirect hear circulating through the grill that cooks the meat, rather than heat being transferred from the heat source through the plank and to the meat. Given that this is the case, the pan in question is more like a baking sheet and less like a frying pan. If you want to go this route with your baked goods, more power to you, but forgive me if I skip the cookies.
Next week: On Wood and Melty Things
Sources: Fundamentals of Physics, Extended Edition, Halliday, Resnick & Walker
Wikipedia - Thermal Conductivity
Thermal Conductivity - Ulf Bolmstedt
The Physics Hypertextbook - Conduction, Glenn Elert
Today's scientific inquiry comes from a conversation me and the missus had many years ago. As I was cooking, and stirring something on the stove with a wooden spoon, Linda asked me why people use wooden spoons instead of metal spoons. I told her that some people think that metal imparts a bad taste to the food. She then uttered the classic question, "Then why don't people use wooden pans." That's my wife ladies and gentlemen.
As I was coming up with my first entry for these posts, she recommended I write about why people don't use wooden pans. The more I thought about it, disregarding the obvious reason of course, I thought that it was an excellent question, so today we tackle the question of the ages:
Why Don't People Use Wooden Pans?
One caveat before we get started. I'm not a scientist, I'm just a guy who likes finding things out. I say this because I don't want to give the impression that the answers I'm giving here are the end all and be all to the question at hand. It's just one explanation. The beauty of the sciences is that often times, there are multiple scientific explanations to things and if you extend your view of fields that the term "science" encompasses, you can find even more answers. So far, I've found that for every answer I find, I find 5 more questions, but that's a good thing. OK, caveat over. Let's roll.
The first thing to talk about is that heat will always go from a hot object to a cold object, provided that the system isn't so well insulated as to prevent the transfer of heat. This is why, when ice is placed in a cup of hot water, the ice melts (gets warmer) and the water gets a little cooler, rather than the ice getting colder and the water getting hotter. That would be some fucked up shit. Heat transfer is dependent upon the substance that is between the hot thing and the cold thing. In our example, it would be whatever the pan is made of. Every value has a constant called the thermal conductivity (k) that defines the rate that energy will transfer through a slab of material of a given size and thickness at room temperature. Bigger numbers mean that heat transfers more quickly, lower number means a slower transfer. For the record, this constant is also a good measure of electrical conductivity, with some exceptions, if that's how you roll.
For the sake of our discussion, we're going to assume that our non-wood cooking pan is made out of cast iron. I don't know how the various non-stick coatings would affect heat conductivity and such, so I'm going with cast iron which is a little more manageable. Wood is just, well wood. If you can find a tree out there that acts like metal, feel free to let me know and I'll specify a less conductive wood accordingly. Good luck.
OK, so, thermal conductivity. For cast iron, the thermal conductivity value is 55 (forgive me for not using units. Physics teachers everywhere are cringing.) In comparison, wood has a thermal conductivity that ranges from 0.04 for balsa to 0.35 to fir. As you can see, heat goes through cast iron like a hot knife through butter, and through wood like something less hot and less buttery. The difference in heat conductivity also explains why you can pick up a stick that's burning on one end and not have any adverse affects. Pick up an iron rod that's glowing on one end and most likely you won't be shaking hands with anyone for some time. Now, one thing to keep in mind is that you don't want too high of a thermal conductivity for your cooking surface, as you want to allow the heat to diffuse throughout the pan's surface as well as transfer to the food. Otherwise you'll only get heat right over the heat source, which leads to scorching and bad feelings.
It's not really fair to compare wood and cast iron in terms of thermal conductivity. Cast iron is a (mostly) pure solid with a crystalline structure that just begs to conduct heat. Start agitating the atoms and electrons at one end and those vibrations will move through the substance and heat up the whole thing. Wood on the other hand, is a paella of water, cellulose, lignin and other loosey-goosey compounds. That being said, here's your simple answer as to why there are no wooden pans, wood has a shitty thermal conductivity value, and therefore would not transmit heat from the heat source to the food effectively enough to cook well, if at all. Strangely enough, you'd be better off with a pan made of ice (k = 2.2). Chew on that one.
Also, people use wooden spoons so as to not conduct heat away from what's being cooked, which can happen with a metal spoon. That's not really a concern when making stew, but when making candy you can end up screwing up your crystallization. That's right, somewhere out there there's a guy at the 3 Musketeers factory stirring a big vat of nougat with a massive wooden spoon.
That's not to say that there aren't wooden pans out there. Go to any gourmet food stores and you'll see fancy-pants cedar planks for grilling. The idea is that you soak the plank overnight, fire up the grill, place your meat (usually salmon) on the plank and grill with the lid closed. As the meat cooks, the plank smokes and chars and adds some smokey goodness to the meat. You can then serve your meal on a smoking, charred hunk of wood, which then makes your guests smell like smoking, charred hunks of wood. Now, as the lid is closed in this case, it's the indirect hear circulating through the grill that cooks the meat, rather than heat being transferred from the heat source through the plank and to the meat. Given that this is the case, the pan in question is more like a baking sheet and less like a frying pan. If you want to go this route with your baked goods, more power to you, but forgive me if I skip the cookies.
Next week: On Wood and Melty Things
Sources: Fundamentals of Physics, Extended Edition, Halliday, Resnick & Walker
Wikipedia - Thermal Conductivity
Thermal Conductivity - Ulf Bolmstedt
The Physics Hypertextbook - Conduction, Glenn Elert
Monday, January 23, 2006
I Heart Shooting Nazis
The first time I played Call of Duty 2, Activision and Infinity Ward's WWII shooter for the Xbox 360, I got my ass handed to me. I was playing the game at a demo kiosk in Wal-Mart, marveling at the graphics as me and my squad mates were driven into a small African town that was infested with Nazis. Once we arrived, I jumped out of the truck, stood straight up, looked around and got shot about a dozen times. Once the game reloaded, I resisted the urge to stand up, followed my squad mates around a corner, hunkered down and got blown up by several grenades. This went on for about 20 minutes before I realized that I was being watched by a 10 year old. Not comfortable with him witnessing all that violence I left. He promptly picked up the controller and personally drove the Germans out of Africa with only a broken bottle and a book of matches.
Based on this experience, I assumed that CoD2 wasn't going to be my cup of tea and that the Allies would have to win this one without me. Oddly enough, a few months later, CoD2 became the first 360 game I played and finished once I finally got my hands on the console. All this despite the rather long list of things I hate about today's shooters, which I shall discuss at length. Welcome dear reader, to this week's gaming post.
By all accounts, I should have hated Call of Duty 2, and probably not even purchased it in the first place. Let us, as the kids say, break it down.
Storm Omaha Beach! Again! No, Really, It's Different This Time!
Based on the sheer number of WWII titles out there, you would think that the heavy hitters of the video game industry found a way to go back in time and start the Big One so they would have a wealth of material to mine for our digital entertainment needs. I usually shy away from WWII shooters as I played "Medal of Honor: Allied Assault" on the PC and truthfully, if you've shot one Nazi, you've shot them all. I'm sure for the WWII aficionados, there are subtle differences between Bombed Out French Town #43 and Bombed Out French Town #57 but it's all rubble to me. There are only so many variations on the "Noun of Noun" title theme to keep me interested so I found myself intrigued at my interest in CoD2. What CoD2 does, better than any other game yet, is make you feel as if you are right in the heart of the conflict. The 360 can have a frackin' huge number of things going on at the same time, so the level of immersion makes it feel as if you've never actually played a WWII game before. Plus, the fact that you play as three different soldiers, a Soviet, a Brit and an American, in three different points in the campaign, you see the war at various points, with very different goals and objectives. Staving off waves of Germans as you attempt to defend Stalingrad is very different from moving through the African desert as you take out anti-tank guns. It's all very different and it's all very well done.
Behold My Backpack! It's..big.
As shooters have evolved, designers seem to have equated more realism with more evolved, which has resulted in one of the more annoying aspects of today's shooters, namely the ability to only carry one or two weapons at a time. Shooters are there for us to shoot things, with as many weapons as possible. I understand the need to make things are realistic as possible but let's be honest here. The odds that a theoretical physicist can pick up an assault weapon and start taking out Delta Force commandos and black-ops ninja chicks in Half-Life are small enough to exist in a state unobservable to the naked eye. We do not suspend our disbelief when we play shooters, we fucking expel it. Our disbelief is in juvie for burning down its uncle's barn. Give us our weapons, let us carry as much as we want, and just be judicious with ammo if you don't want us rocket humping everything. Plus, I always thought it was annoying that in Halo you're a massive supersoldier in your two ton armor, but you can't carry more than two pistols? Yeah, OK. That being said, CoD2 only allows you to carry two weapons at a time. I think that the reason it didn't bother me is because you're constantly surrounded by your fellow soldiers in the game, and they're backpacks aren't bristling with a startling array of destructive power. Most shooters have you going solo, and rarely offer 3-way mirrors so that you can check out just where you're keeping that rocket launcher, so you never see how ridiculous it would look to carry a dozen firearms. With your squad mates, CoD2 offers you constant reminders of what you look like, so it'd be worse in this case, if they're all carrying one weapon and you have half of the Allied armaments in your knapsack.
Somebody Saaaaaaaveee Meeeeeeee!!!
Finally, CoD2 uses the checkpoint save system which I abhor. Technology has moved us forward to the point where you can comfortably fit enough storage space on a memory card to allow users to save whenever and wherever they want, the only limiting factor being the number of saves. To not allow this always smacks of laziness to me. Oh sure, you can say that you don't want the users constantly stopping and saving because it will ruin the flow of the game. By the same logic, we shouldn't have the ability to pause DVD's because we don't want the viewer ruining the flow of the movie by constantly pausing and going to the bathroom. Bottom line is that if I've paid 50 bucks, or in the case of CoD2, 60 bucks, for a game, the flow of the game is entrely up to me. Besides, I don't always have a full hour to devote to a game, so if the devs make the checkpoints too far apart, you're forcing me to play something other than your game, lest I make progress and then lose it. That hardly seems like a good design decision. CoD2 manages to place checkpoints early and often enough that on the "normal" level of difficulty, you rarely have to replay portions over and over. The highest compliment I can pay to the save system is that, with few exceptions, they saved for me right where I would have saved myself.
I have to admit that when I bought CoD2, I was concerned that I was buying it simply to fill the void that my still absent 360 wasn't filling. I had gone to Target, watched someone who wasn't retarded play CoD2 and then, using what I had seen, managed to get through the African level without getting blown up. It seemed like fun, but would it be enough fun to last for the entire game, or was I just looking to bring home anything for the 360, to get me through those long, cold nights? I'm certainly glad I purchased the game, and might actually go back and attempt the levels at harder difficulty levels to unlock additional achievements, which would be yet another thing about this game that I normally don't do with other games. I don't think it's going to get me to play additional WW2 shooters, but it's a fair testament to the idea that a good gameplay can get people to play games that they normally wouldn't, and forgive faults not forgiven in lesser titles.
Next week: Monkey Lovin' or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Kong
Based on this experience, I assumed that CoD2 wasn't going to be my cup of tea and that the Allies would have to win this one without me. Oddly enough, a few months later, CoD2 became the first 360 game I played and finished once I finally got my hands on the console. All this despite the rather long list of things I hate about today's shooters, which I shall discuss at length. Welcome dear reader, to this week's gaming post.
By all accounts, I should have hated Call of Duty 2, and probably not even purchased it in the first place. Let us, as the kids say, break it down.
Storm Omaha Beach! Again! No, Really, It's Different This Time!
Based on the sheer number of WWII titles out there, you would think that the heavy hitters of the video game industry found a way to go back in time and start the Big One so they would have a wealth of material to mine for our digital entertainment needs. I usually shy away from WWII shooters as I played "Medal of Honor: Allied Assault" on the PC and truthfully, if you've shot one Nazi, you've shot them all. I'm sure for the WWII aficionados, there are subtle differences between Bombed Out French Town #43 and Bombed Out French Town #57 but it's all rubble to me. There are only so many variations on the "Noun of Noun" title theme to keep me interested so I found myself intrigued at my interest in CoD2. What CoD2 does, better than any other game yet, is make you feel as if you are right in the heart of the conflict. The 360 can have a frackin' huge number of things going on at the same time, so the level of immersion makes it feel as if you've never actually played a WWII game before. Plus, the fact that you play as three different soldiers, a Soviet, a Brit and an American, in three different points in the campaign, you see the war at various points, with very different goals and objectives. Staving off waves of Germans as you attempt to defend Stalingrad is very different from moving through the African desert as you take out anti-tank guns. It's all very different and it's all very well done.
Behold My Backpack! It's..big.
As shooters have evolved, designers seem to have equated more realism with more evolved, which has resulted in one of the more annoying aspects of today's shooters, namely the ability to only carry one or two weapons at a time. Shooters are there for us to shoot things, with as many weapons as possible. I understand the need to make things are realistic as possible but let's be honest here. The odds that a theoretical physicist can pick up an assault weapon and start taking out Delta Force commandos and black-ops ninja chicks in Half-Life are small enough to exist in a state unobservable to the naked eye. We do not suspend our disbelief when we play shooters, we fucking expel it. Our disbelief is in juvie for burning down its uncle's barn. Give us our weapons, let us carry as much as we want, and just be judicious with ammo if you don't want us rocket humping everything. Plus, I always thought it was annoying that in Halo you're a massive supersoldier in your two ton armor, but you can't carry more than two pistols? Yeah, OK. That being said, CoD2 only allows you to carry two weapons at a time. I think that the reason it didn't bother me is because you're constantly surrounded by your fellow soldiers in the game, and they're backpacks aren't bristling with a startling array of destructive power. Most shooters have you going solo, and rarely offer 3-way mirrors so that you can check out just where you're keeping that rocket launcher, so you never see how ridiculous it would look to carry a dozen firearms. With your squad mates, CoD2 offers you constant reminders of what you look like, so it'd be worse in this case, if they're all carrying one weapon and you have half of the Allied armaments in your knapsack.
Somebody Saaaaaaaveee Meeeeeeee!!!
Finally, CoD2 uses the checkpoint save system which I abhor. Technology has moved us forward to the point where you can comfortably fit enough storage space on a memory card to allow users to save whenever and wherever they want, the only limiting factor being the number of saves. To not allow this always smacks of laziness to me. Oh sure, you can say that you don't want the users constantly stopping and saving because it will ruin the flow of the game. By the same logic, we shouldn't have the ability to pause DVD's because we don't want the viewer ruining the flow of the movie by constantly pausing and going to the bathroom. Bottom line is that if I've paid 50 bucks, or in the case of CoD2, 60 bucks, for a game, the flow of the game is entrely up to me. Besides, I don't always have a full hour to devote to a game, so if the devs make the checkpoints too far apart, you're forcing me to play something other than your game, lest I make progress and then lose it. That hardly seems like a good design decision. CoD2 manages to place checkpoints early and often enough that on the "normal" level of difficulty, you rarely have to replay portions over and over. The highest compliment I can pay to the save system is that, with few exceptions, they saved for me right where I would have saved myself.
I have to admit that when I bought CoD2, I was concerned that I was buying it simply to fill the void that my still absent 360 wasn't filling. I had gone to Target, watched someone who wasn't retarded play CoD2 and then, using what I had seen, managed to get through the African level without getting blown up. It seemed like fun, but would it be enough fun to last for the entire game, or was I just looking to bring home anything for the 360, to get me through those long, cold nights? I'm certainly glad I purchased the game, and might actually go back and attempt the levels at harder difficulty levels to unlock additional achievements, which would be yet another thing about this game that I normally don't do with other games. I don't think it's going to get me to play additional WW2 shooters, but it's a fair testament to the idea that a good gameplay can get people to play games that they normally wouldn't, and forgive faults not forgiven in lesser titles.
Next week: Monkey Lovin' or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Kong
Friday, January 20, 2006
New Year's Resolutions
Well here we are, with the first on-schedule post. Woo-hoo! We've got a 100% success rate. Maybe I should quit after this post and go out on top, before the crushing weight of failure snuffs my spirit from existance. Out, our brief candle! Thou art brief. And, um, candle-y.
I know it's late for resolutions for the new year, but I've been very busy shooting Nazis in Call of Duty 2 and now I'm trying to liberate Earth from the Combine in Half-Life 2 so excuse me if I put aside my own personal betterment for the sake of freedom. Yeah, I thought so.
As a rule, I don't do resolutions so these may not be your traditional "I'm going to stop beating my kids" resolutions. For the record, I have no intentions of stopping the beatings. It's the only thing keeping those monsters in line.
Stop Being So Goddamned Awesome
I am just a supremely amazing human being and sometimes it's offputting for those that are just meeting me. They don't come right out and say it, but I can tell that the sheer brilliance of my personality only lengthens the shadow of their own inferiority. I try, I really do, to make them feel as if they have some sort of chance to achieve the level of superawesomeness that I've achieved, but truthfully, I think they see it for the fallacy that it really is. It's not my fault I'm so neato keen. Just the luck of the draw, I guess. But, I'm tired of people avoiding me, presumably because I rock so hard, so I'm going to try and tone it down a notch and be more like those that should be groveling at my feet as I claim my rightful seat of Lord and Master of All Creation.
Smoke More
No, not weed you stoner bastard, although I haven't rolled in a fatty in well, never. Anyways, I hold smoked meat on a pedestal that is usually reserved for revered dieties. The process of smoking meat is one of science and art, careful monitoring of temperatures, liberal amounts of spices and slathers, copious amounts of malt beverages. It is truly the hobby of the blessed. It is also a hobby for those with lots of time on their hands as a pork butt doesn't turn into deliciously tender pulled pork with a wave of one's hand. Since moving to GA, I've smoked twice. Once I did a brisket that was pretty damn good and recently I did some pork butts that were so good, I question the sanity of the individual who does not eat precious little piggly-wigglies. I also have not been grilling, which is a shame, because my mad culinary skillz shine brightest in front of the Weber Genesis Silver B. My meat wrapped in meat recipe is one for the ages. So, with these shortcomings in mind, I resolve to smoke once at least once a month. Be it ribs, chicken, meatloaf, pulled pork, brisket, hell even a bucket of peanuts, they shall all fall to the smoke and flame. I'm also going to try and grill more and reclaim my throne as Lord of the Flames.
Obtain Super Powers
I have wanted super powers since I was a wee lad, and now that we're going on close to 26 years in this quest, it's become a tad ridiculous. I mean, come on people, how hard is it to bestow me with powers beyond those of mortal men? I've tried dousing myself with chemicals in hope that an errant lightning bolt will merge me with the Speed Force, but all that's happened is that I've grown 5 extra nipples. Actually, I had grown six, but the irradiated spider bite took care of one of them. In my quest for powers I have decided that I have to be a little more picky with my abilities. As a child, I wanted to be Spider-Man, however now that I live in the suburbs, web slinging is an impractical mode of transportation. Being the Human Torch would be cool. There are countless times when, sitting in a boring meeting, I've wanted to say "You know what? Fuck this. FLAME ON!!", burst into flame, burned through the window and took off, soaring into the sky, cackling with glee. However, without the proper flame retardant suit, those powers could be potentially embarassing for someone as out of shape as myself. Plus, and here's the important thing, any power that brings the watchful eye of our government on me will most likely result in me being stuck in some eastern European prison as they try to harvest my DNA to create super-soldiers. So crime fighting is definitely out. Adamantium claws would be cool, but other than opening cans, probably not all that useful. I think I'd like either mind control, so that I could convince my boss that I actually did show up for work or the ability to stop time so that I could boost shit from stores. Noble goals, I know.
Watch More Movies That I Own
At last count, I have 160 DVD's, not counting tv shows on DVD. This is just movies and concerts. Since bringing them into my home, I've watched 100 of them. That means that there are 60 DVD's (more when you factor in the TV shows) that have been purchased, opened and put on the shelf without even visiting the player. Oh sure, I've seen Bring it On and About A Boy at least a half dozen times each, but perhaps I should spend some time with some of the other movies. So, I'm going to start watching movies, or TV shows when I usually play games. Not too much, maybe a movie a week, but enough to use my kick ass home theater for something other than Geometry Wars.
Post More
Hopefully the schedule will take care of this one. If not, then I'll have to turn this blog into the premiere repository of hamster porn. Rowr!
I know it's late for resolutions for the new year, but I've been very busy shooting Nazis in Call of Duty 2 and now I'm trying to liberate Earth from the Combine in Half-Life 2 so excuse me if I put aside my own personal betterment for the sake of freedom. Yeah, I thought so.
As a rule, I don't do resolutions so these may not be your traditional "I'm going to stop beating my kids" resolutions. For the record, I have no intentions of stopping the beatings. It's the only thing keeping those monsters in line.
Stop Being So Goddamned Awesome
I am just a supremely amazing human being and sometimes it's offputting for those that are just meeting me. They don't come right out and say it, but I can tell that the sheer brilliance of my personality only lengthens the shadow of their own inferiority. I try, I really do, to make them feel as if they have some sort of chance to achieve the level of superawesomeness that I've achieved, but truthfully, I think they see it for the fallacy that it really is. It's not my fault I'm so neato keen. Just the luck of the draw, I guess. But, I'm tired of people avoiding me, presumably because I rock so hard, so I'm going to try and tone it down a notch and be more like those that should be groveling at my feet as I claim my rightful seat of Lord and Master of All Creation.
Smoke More
No, not weed you stoner bastard, although I haven't rolled in a fatty in well, never. Anyways, I hold smoked meat on a pedestal that is usually reserved for revered dieties. The process of smoking meat is one of science and art, careful monitoring of temperatures, liberal amounts of spices and slathers, copious amounts of malt beverages. It is truly the hobby of the blessed. It is also a hobby for those with lots of time on their hands as a pork butt doesn't turn into deliciously tender pulled pork with a wave of one's hand. Since moving to GA, I've smoked twice. Once I did a brisket that was pretty damn good and recently I did some pork butts that were so good, I question the sanity of the individual who does not eat precious little piggly-wigglies. I also have not been grilling, which is a shame, because my mad culinary skillz shine brightest in front of the Weber Genesis Silver B. My meat wrapped in meat recipe is one for the ages. So, with these shortcomings in mind, I resolve to smoke once at least once a month. Be it ribs, chicken, meatloaf, pulled pork, brisket, hell even a bucket of peanuts, they shall all fall to the smoke and flame. I'm also going to try and grill more and reclaim my throne as Lord of the Flames.
Obtain Super Powers
I have wanted super powers since I was a wee lad, and now that we're going on close to 26 years in this quest, it's become a tad ridiculous. I mean, come on people, how hard is it to bestow me with powers beyond those of mortal men? I've tried dousing myself with chemicals in hope that an errant lightning bolt will merge me with the Speed Force, but all that's happened is that I've grown 5 extra nipples. Actually, I had grown six, but the irradiated spider bite took care of one of them. In my quest for powers I have decided that I have to be a little more picky with my abilities. As a child, I wanted to be Spider-Man, however now that I live in the suburbs, web slinging is an impractical mode of transportation. Being the Human Torch would be cool. There are countless times when, sitting in a boring meeting, I've wanted to say "You know what? Fuck this. FLAME ON!!", burst into flame, burned through the window and took off, soaring into the sky, cackling with glee. However, without the proper flame retardant suit, those powers could be potentially embarassing for someone as out of shape as myself. Plus, and here's the important thing, any power that brings the watchful eye of our government on me will most likely result in me being stuck in some eastern European prison as they try to harvest my DNA to create super-soldiers. So crime fighting is definitely out. Adamantium claws would be cool, but other than opening cans, probably not all that useful. I think I'd like either mind control, so that I could convince my boss that I actually did show up for work or the ability to stop time so that I could boost shit from stores. Noble goals, I know.
Watch More Movies That I Own
At last count, I have 160 DVD's, not counting tv shows on DVD. This is just movies and concerts. Since bringing them into my home, I've watched 100 of them. That means that there are 60 DVD's (more when you factor in the TV shows) that have been purchased, opened and put on the shelf without even visiting the player. Oh sure, I've seen Bring it On and About A Boy at least a half dozen times each, but perhaps I should spend some time with some of the other movies. So, I'm going to start watching movies, or TV shows when I usually play games. Not too much, maybe a movie a week, but enough to use my kick ass home theater for something other than Geometry Wars.
Post More
Hopefully the schedule will take care of this one. If not, then I'll have to turn this blog into the premiere repository of hamster porn. Rowr!
Thursday, January 19, 2006
Scheduled Appearances
We have a lot to cover, so let's get right to it.
First of all, much props to the Football Gods. Yes we lost, but not for lack of opportunities. I mean, they gave the NFL MVP a concussion, thereby eliminating him and his wily running ways and we do nothing with it. Such is life with only 2 receivers, one of which isn't even a wide receiver. I think that if we get a good complement to Moss we'll be doing well next year. For now, I'm less excited about the post season now that the Colts and the Pats are out of it, but the Super Bowl still holds its usual junk-food and summer movie commercial filled allure so I'll be there regardless of the combatants. And by God, there will be Poppers.
As you are all well aware now, this site has not become synonymous with regular content. Oh sure, every week or so I drop by to blather on about things, but were there some sort of time keeping device that measured weeks, rather than seconds, I would not suggest you use this site to synchronize said device lest you end up with a horribly unsynchronized situation.
I am making moves to rectify this, but first, an explanation. I'd like to spin a tale now about personal woe and how after volunteering at the animal shelter and the retirement home, I barely have enough time to rehabilitate injured seabirds, but the fact is that I am a supremely lazy human being. I actually have reams and reams of ideas to write about, but the effort involved is something I can't be bothered with. That's not entirely true. I enjoy writing and knowing that the half-dozen of you actually read it, but I always find something else to do, something else being video games. Seeing as I have no plans to give up playing video games, I've decided to implement a schedule here at the homestead. Behold the majiks of the calendar!
I know that many bloggers, although I am loathe to call myself one of those, hate schedules because they like to update when the mood hits them. Well, at 33, I'm well aware of my failings, and being unable to do most things without at least a smidge of prodding is one of them. The schedule shall be that smidge. This will also give you, dear reader, assurances that when you come here on key days, there will be new content, glistening like a newborn, just without all the snot and horribly swollen genitalia.
This brings me to my next topic, which is what shall we be writing about? As you know, we cover a bunch of topics here, but my interests lie mainly with video games, and every other thing in my life that isn't video games. To that end, I'll have one post a week that focuses on video games, and one that doesn't. For those of you that don't care about video games, please don't take this as an excuse to not read my ramblings, because I can assure you that my posts about gaming will be filled with the same fluffy goodness as my other posts. That's like, a fuckload of fluffy goodness.
Finally, and this is what I'm actually most excited about, is that I'm going to do a weekly column about science. Yes, science. I have a degree in Physics, and presently all it does is annoy my father with its spent promises of scientific glory and its massive higher educational pricetag. Well, that ends now. I read few blogs every day, but John Scalzi's Whatever is one of them. In this stirring post, he talks about his unmet life goals. One of them was to evangalize science. When I read that I was like, "Hell yes". I love science, and all of it's scientific goodness, and it pains me to see folks not be as excited about the underpinnings of their universe as I am. To that end, I'm planning on writing a post every week that takes something scientific and breaks it down in readable, hopefully humorous English. This will take research on my part, which means I get to learn things too, so it's a win-win. I would also like to open this part of the site up to you, dear reader. Through the comments, or by emailing me at suburbanjoe at gmail dot com, send me any scientific questions and I will endeavor to answer them.
That being said, I'm not going to write your goddamned thesis, neither will I do your book report on Madame Curie. Goddammit Timmy, you've had that assignment for weeks, just sit down and do it. I am also not going to limit myself to the hard sciences like physics, chemistry, coke and heroin. I'll also do columns on the soft sciences like psychology, anthropology, weed and whippets. Heh-heh, whippets.
So, my little calandar monkeys, the schedule looks like this. Monday is gaming day, as I'll be fresh off of a weekend of digital tomfoolery. Wednesday is science day, for those of you that need a healthy dollop of fancy book learnin' to get them over the hump, and Friday will be freestyle day. Freestyle Fridays, if you will. Yes, I will. I will indeed. I'll still drop knowledge on you on unscheduled days, to ensure things stay unpredictiable, so make sure you come back daily. Hourly is preferable. Hopefully this will keep me writing, keep you reading and we'll all learn something. Well, mostly you, because I'm like, wicked smart.
First of all, much props to the Football Gods. Yes we lost, but not for lack of opportunities. I mean, they gave the NFL MVP a concussion, thereby eliminating him and his wily running ways and we do nothing with it. Such is life with only 2 receivers, one of which isn't even a wide receiver. I think that if we get a good complement to Moss we'll be doing well next year. For now, I'm less excited about the post season now that the Colts and the Pats are out of it, but the Super Bowl still holds its usual junk-food and summer movie commercial filled allure so I'll be there regardless of the combatants. And by God, there will be Poppers.
As you are all well aware now, this site has not become synonymous with regular content. Oh sure, every week or so I drop by to blather on about things, but were there some sort of time keeping device that measured weeks, rather than seconds, I would not suggest you use this site to synchronize said device lest you end up with a horribly unsynchronized situation.
I am making moves to rectify this, but first, an explanation. I'd like to spin a tale now about personal woe and how after volunteering at the animal shelter and the retirement home, I barely have enough time to rehabilitate injured seabirds, but the fact is that I am a supremely lazy human being. I actually have reams and reams of ideas to write about, but the effort involved is something I can't be bothered with. That's not entirely true. I enjoy writing and knowing that the half-dozen of you actually read it, but I always find something else to do, something else being video games. Seeing as I have no plans to give up playing video games, I've decided to implement a schedule here at the homestead. Behold the majiks of the calendar!
I know that many bloggers, although I am loathe to call myself one of those, hate schedules because they like to update when the mood hits them. Well, at 33, I'm well aware of my failings, and being unable to do most things without at least a smidge of prodding is one of them. The schedule shall be that smidge. This will also give you, dear reader, assurances that when you come here on key days, there will be new content, glistening like a newborn, just without all the snot and horribly swollen genitalia.
This brings me to my next topic, which is what shall we be writing about? As you know, we cover a bunch of topics here, but my interests lie mainly with video games, and every other thing in my life that isn't video games. To that end, I'll have one post a week that focuses on video games, and one that doesn't. For those of you that don't care about video games, please don't take this as an excuse to not read my ramblings, because I can assure you that my posts about gaming will be filled with the same fluffy goodness as my other posts. That's like, a fuckload of fluffy goodness.
Finally, and this is what I'm actually most excited about, is that I'm going to do a weekly column about science. Yes, science. I have a degree in Physics, and presently all it does is annoy my father with its spent promises of scientific glory and its massive higher educational pricetag. Well, that ends now. I read few blogs every day, but John Scalzi's Whatever is one of them. In this stirring post, he talks about his unmet life goals. One of them was to evangalize science. When I read that I was like, "Hell yes". I love science, and all of it's scientific goodness, and it pains me to see folks not be as excited about the underpinnings of their universe as I am. To that end, I'm planning on writing a post every week that takes something scientific and breaks it down in readable, hopefully humorous English. This will take research on my part, which means I get to learn things too, so it's a win-win. I would also like to open this part of the site up to you, dear reader. Through the comments, or by emailing me at suburbanjoe at gmail dot com, send me any scientific questions and I will endeavor to answer them.
That being said, I'm not going to write your goddamned thesis, neither will I do your book report on Madame Curie. Goddammit Timmy, you've had that assignment for weeks, just sit down and do it. I am also not going to limit myself to the hard sciences like physics, chemistry, coke and heroin. I'll also do columns on the soft sciences like psychology, anthropology, weed and whippets. Heh-heh, whippets.
So, my little calandar monkeys, the schedule looks like this. Monday is gaming day, as I'll be fresh off of a weekend of digital tomfoolery. Wednesday is science day, for those of you that need a healthy dollop of fancy book learnin' to get them over the hump, and Friday will be freestyle day. Freestyle Fridays, if you will. Yes, I will. I will indeed. I'll still drop knowledge on you on unscheduled days, to ensure things stay unpredictiable, so make sure you come back daily. Hourly is preferable. Hopefully this will keep me writing, keep you reading and we'll all learn something. Well, mostly you, because I'm like, wicked smart.
Wednesday, January 11, 2006
The Football Gods Kick Massive Ass
First of all, please let me apologize for football having hijacked this site for the past few weeks. It's an exciting time for the Redskins, and as long as they keep winning, I'll keep praising the Football Gods. Personally, I hope it never ends.
Thanks be to the Football Gods, who, in their infinite wisdom, used the Redskins as their instrument to show how offense wins games, but defense wins championships. Granted, we haven't won the championship yet, but with only 120 yards in offense last Saturday, only our defense, or a spectacular miracle were going to let us win that game. I think we got a little of both, as luck was definitely on our side. Now we head to Seattle and face a well rested and pumped up Seattle team. The odds are stacked against us, but I know that the Football Gods will smile upon us and provide ample opportunities to take control. We just have to make the most of those opportunities.
Now that I've given the appropriate thanks and praise to the Football Gods (praise be!), I would like to take this time to address the team. Gather round gentlemen.
I know it's been a long season, and many of you are banged up, tired and running on fumes. Well, I feel for you, I really do, but we're not done yet. In a few weeks you'll have months and months to relax, get healthy again and get your energy back. For now, however, we still have a job to do, and we need to do it better than we've ever done it before.
I don't need to tell you that 120 yards of offense will going to cut it against the Seahawks, but I'm going to anyway. 120 yards will not cut it against the Seahawks. No way, no how. You are on the road, 3000 miles from home, against a team that is well rested, motivated, undefeated at home, and eager to break a twenty-two year long string of lost playoff appearances. If you don't think that string of losses is the biggest motivation for them this week, then you're fooling yourselves. Shaun Alexander is very pround of his MVP award, I"m sure, but I would bet hard cash that he'd give it up in a second to be remembered as the focal point of the offense that broke the post-season losing streak. Do not underestimate their motivation. Add to this a city that gets behind, in full force, whichever pro team of their's is in the playoffs and you face a daunting challenge.
But, just as history is working to keep the Seahawks from advancing, I believe that your history is working to help you advance. There are plenty of players on your squad, and on the Seahawks team, that will end up in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, but you have the advantage of having one man on your squad who already is in the Hall of Fame. That man is Joe Gibbs. Just as you can not underestimate the motivation of the Seahawks, do not underestimate the intangibles that Gibbs brings to your game. I don't have to tell you about how this season has progressed. You lived it. I can tell you that the coaches in the NFL today that could have turned his team around in the manner that Gibbs has done are few and far between. One, Jon Gruden, you beat last week. The other stands on your sidelines every week. Take advantage of his presence and his experience.
I am not going to give the speech that points out how proud you should be despite the outcome. I don't want to give it, and you don't want to hear it. You know, just as I do, that there is only one outcome to this game. Winning. There are no other options, and we will accept no other outcome. Winning truly is the only thing. I will say, however, that you should know how incredibly exciting and fun it has been to be a Redskins fan these past 6 weeks. I'll admit, that, like many fans I'm sure, I was ready to give up on this team once we had gone 5-6. "I"m not wearing their jerseys anymore", I told my friend Mark. I was disgusted and downtrodden, as I'm sure you were. Despite my statements, come Sunday I found I was unable to make good on my promise and I wore the traditional burgundy and gold. Then you won, and won, and kept winning until you brought us here. In looking back, I'm glad I kept my faith, as I know that it wasn't misguided. I'm glad that you kept it too, because without it, we wouldn't be here. Know that we are behind you, the tens of thousands of fans who have waited years to see a team as talented as this one, compete in these games, at this time of year. On Saturday, if the game seems out of your reach, look to your teammates, look to your coaches, look to yourself, your faith, your training, and look to the stands, because even though they may be hard to see, the familiar colors will be there, specks of burgundy and gold in a sea of blue. They are there for you, to support you and revel with you in what we've done this year.
As I said, we're not done yet, not by a long shot. Let's get out there, stick to the plan, execute, tackle and keep these bastards from getting any farther. This is your game. Take it.
Redskins on 3.
1
2
3
REDSKINS!!
Thanks be to the Football Gods, who, in their infinite wisdom, used the Redskins as their instrument to show how offense wins games, but defense wins championships. Granted, we haven't won the championship yet, but with only 120 yards in offense last Saturday, only our defense, or a spectacular miracle were going to let us win that game. I think we got a little of both, as luck was definitely on our side. Now we head to Seattle and face a well rested and pumped up Seattle team. The odds are stacked against us, but I know that the Football Gods will smile upon us and provide ample opportunities to take control. We just have to make the most of those opportunities.
Now that I've given the appropriate thanks and praise to the Football Gods (praise be!), I would like to take this time to address the team. Gather round gentlemen.
I know it's been a long season, and many of you are banged up, tired and running on fumes. Well, I feel for you, I really do, but we're not done yet. In a few weeks you'll have months and months to relax, get healthy again and get your energy back. For now, however, we still have a job to do, and we need to do it better than we've ever done it before.
I don't need to tell you that 120 yards of offense will going to cut it against the Seahawks, but I'm going to anyway. 120 yards will not cut it against the Seahawks. No way, no how. You are on the road, 3000 miles from home, against a team that is well rested, motivated, undefeated at home, and eager to break a twenty-two year long string of lost playoff appearances. If you don't think that string of losses is the biggest motivation for them this week, then you're fooling yourselves. Shaun Alexander is very pround of his MVP award, I"m sure, but I would bet hard cash that he'd give it up in a second to be remembered as the focal point of the offense that broke the post-season losing streak. Do not underestimate their motivation. Add to this a city that gets behind, in full force, whichever pro team of their's is in the playoffs and you face a daunting challenge.
But, just as history is working to keep the Seahawks from advancing, I believe that your history is working to help you advance. There are plenty of players on your squad, and on the Seahawks team, that will end up in the Pro Football Hall of Fame, but you have the advantage of having one man on your squad who already is in the Hall of Fame. That man is Joe Gibbs. Just as you can not underestimate the motivation of the Seahawks, do not underestimate the intangibles that Gibbs brings to your game. I don't have to tell you about how this season has progressed. You lived it. I can tell you that the coaches in the NFL today that could have turned his team around in the manner that Gibbs has done are few and far between. One, Jon Gruden, you beat last week. The other stands on your sidelines every week. Take advantage of his presence and his experience.
I am not going to give the speech that points out how proud you should be despite the outcome. I don't want to give it, and you don't want to hear it. You know, just as I do, that there is only one outcome to this game. Winning. There are no other options, and we will accept no other outcome. Winning truly is the only thing. I will say, however, that you should know how incredibly exciting and fun it has been to be a Redskins fan these past 6 weeks. I'll admit, that, like many fans I'm sure, I was ready to give up on this team once we had gone 5-6. "I"m not wearing their jerseys anymore", I told my friend Mark. I was disgusted and downtrodden, as I'm sure you were. Despite my statements, come Sunday I found I was unable to make good on my promise and I wore the traditional burgundy and gold. Then you won, and won, and kept winning until you brought us here. In looking back, I'm glad I kept my faith, as I know that it wasn't misguided. I'm glad that you kept it too, because without it, we wouldn't be here. Know that we are behind you, the tens of thousands of fans who have waited years to see a team as talented as this one, compete in these games, at this time of year. On Saturday, if the game seems out of your reach, look to your teammates, look to your coaches, look to yourself, your faith, your training, and look to the stands, because even though they may be hard to see, the familiar colors will be there, specks of burgundy and gold in a sea of blue. They are there for you, to support you and revel with you in what we've done this year.
As I said, we're not done yet, not by a long shot. Let's get out there, stick to the plan, execute, tackle and keep these bastards from getting any farther. This is your game. Take it.
Redskins on 3.
1
2
3
REDSKINS!!
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
The Football Gods are Generous and Benevolent
Praise be to the Football Gods, for they have delivered us victory over our accursed foes, the Eagles of Philadelphia. Praise be!
Man, what a game that was. I've never been so sick about a game in all of my years of watching football. The first half was torturous to watch, especially considering the fact that Keg and I had a bet, a bet he ultimately lost. On the subject of the bet, I have to give Keg a lot of credit. Many people would hem and haw about having to pay the piper and he held up his end of the bargain with flying colors. Keg, I got yer back brother, and that's for damn sure.
When I was watching the game, I was disgusted to see that Clinton Portis's mother had to be escorted from the stand because some Philly fan was throwing stuff at her. Then I read that she punched said Philly fan in the nose and I laughed and laughed. Now, I'm not one to advocate violence, especially at sporting events when everyone has paid good money to watch the game, support their team and have a good time, but I bet when that Philly fan woke up Sunday morning, the last thing she expected to end the day with was a knuckle sandwich from Clinton Portis's mom.
Now that the dust has settled, we set our sights on Tampa. Ah, Tampa, the site of our last playoff appearance, back when Brad Johnson was throwing the ball for us and we were giddy with playoff fever. Let's hope this game turns out better. Whatever happens, it should be a good game. I'll just have to make sure I keep my mouth shut, as the kids learned a few choice words as they lay snuggled in their beds during the Eagles games. Personally, I think Ben learned to say "What the hell are you doing?", "Goddamn it!" and "Stop fucking committing fucking offside fucking penalties! Fuck! Fuck! Fuckheimer Fuckenstein McFuckyFuck!" from the Wiggles.
Oh, and I won my Vegas Odds Pick'em pool. The Football Gods truly are generous.
Fuck!
Man, what a game that was. I've never been so sick about a game in all of my years of watching football. The first half was torturous to watch, especially considering the fact that Keg and I had a bet, a bet he ultimately lost. On the subject of the bet, I have to give Keg a lot of credit. Many people would hem and haw about having to pay the piper and he held up his end of the bargain with flying colors. Keg, I got yer back brother, and that's for damn sure.
When I was watching the game, I was disgusted to see that Clinton Portis's mother had to be escorted from the stand because some Philly fan was throwing stuff at her. Then I read that she punched said Philly fan in the nose and I laughed and laughed. Now, I'm not one to advocate violence, especially at sporting events when everyone has paid good money to watch the game, support their team and have a good time, but I bet when that Philly fan woke up Sunday morning, the last thing she expected to end the day with was a knuckle sandwich from Clinton Portis's mom.
Now that the dust has settled, we set our sights on Tampa. Ah, Tampa, the site of our last playoff appearance, back when Brad Johnson was throwing the ball for us and we were giddy with playoff fever. Let's hope this game turns out better. Whatever happens, it should be a good game. I'll just have to make sure I keep my mouth shut, as the kids learned a few choice words as they lay snuggled in their beds during the Eagles games. Personally, I think Ben learned to say "What the hell are you doing?", "Goddamn it!" and "Stop fucking committing fucking offside fucking penalties! Fuck! Fuck! Fuckheimer Fuckenstein McFuckyFuck!" from the Wiggles.
Oh, and I won my Vegas Odds Pick'em pool. The Football Gods truly are generous.
Fuck!
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Praise Be to the Football Gods
Praise be to the Football Gods, who, in Their divine wisdom, have smiled upon the Redskins thereby allowing the 'Skins a chance at the post season! Praise be!
I have been a Redskins fan since they beat the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl XVII. I can remember my 5th grade teacher giving us extended recess every time the 'Skins won a playoff game, culminating in a full day of recess after the Super Bowl win, and a party, complete with popcorn, to watch the homecoming parade. I can vividly remember watching TV as John Riggins barrelled down the sidelines, a Miami defender helplessly hanging on to his leg. Since that time I have enjoyed watching them win the Super Bowl twice more, and have suffered through many the losing season, these past 6 years being nigh unbearable, particularly because I was living in DC and unable to escape the endless coverage of their craptitude. The signing of Deion Sanders was a particularly low point in my life, and one that I look back on with scorn and derision.
Through it all, I have never once entertained the notion of liking another team. Sure I have shown interest in AFC teams due to certain members helping me to win FFL Super Bowls (Steve McNair comes to mind), but even when the Redskins were at their lowest point, I have never waivered in my devotion. Complained? Yes. Bitched and moaned? Certainly. But waivered? Never. I have also never missed wearing a jersey on game day since I started the tradition several years ago. My children now share in this tradition and I have told my wife that my kids can be whatever they want, gay, straight, whatever, but if they become Dallas fans, they're out of the will.
I believe in the Redskins. I also believe in the Football Gods, that mystic pantheon of deities that watch over football matches and grant their favor to those teams that show guts, patience and fortitude on the field. The Football Gods smile upon those teams that use the run to set up the pass. On those that go for it on 4th and 2. On those that aren't afraid to try for 2 to avoid overtime.
On many occasions, the Redskins have run afoul of the Football Gods. Having a phenomenal running back in Stephen Davis, and wasting him on some god-awful pass-heavy, Steve Spurrier offensive monstrosity incurred their wrath. Insisting on signing talented individuals who were concerned with nothing but their own stats, rather than the good of the team, cost them the favor of the Football Gods. Even this season, when their balanced attack and stalwart defense were pleasing to the Gods, they ran up the score against the hapless 49ers one week, and were rewarded with a full-on ass whupping at the hands of the Giants the next. Trifle not with the Football Gods, lest ye be punished.
So, as we entered these last few weeks of the season, and the Redskins faced down three divisional opponents in a row, a stretch of games the outcome of which would decide whether or not the Redskins made it to the playoffs, I turned to the Football Gods for help. As anyone who plays in Fantasy Football Leagues will tell you, the FFL playoffs and Super Bowl are all held in the weeks leading up to the end of the regular season, the idea being that the star players are all still playing well to get those coveted real life playoff spots. I was well on my way to making an appearance in my FFL's Super Bowl, and while money wasn't involved, a lot of effort is involved from week to week to not care about the outcome of the season.
With this in mind, I made a plea to the Football Gods on the day of the Dallas game. Take my FFL Team. Take my Vegas Odds Pick'em Score. Take them both, but smile upon the Redskins. For the Football Gods are the Old Gods, and the Old Gods demand sacrifice. The Redskins completely demolished the Cowboys, I moved into first place in the Vegas pool, and moved on to the FFL Super Bowl. While I was happy for the Redskins, I was concerned for it would appear that my sacrifice was not accepted. As it turns out, I was incorrect. Both of my running backs were injured, causing me to make last minute drafts. I entered the FFL Super Bowl unsure as to my prospects, but mindful of my promise.
Again, prior to the Giants game, I made the same promise. This time, the Football Gods took their payment. The Redskins beat the Giants, and I lost to my opponent in the FFL Super Bowl, by an amount that would have been easily surpassed had I started one of my original WR's. The full measure of the Football Gods' plan was then apparent to me. The sacrifice that I was making would be the hardest to make, only if it were the championship game, and only if it were such that I felt it was preventable. They are wise in their ways, the Football Gods are. Was I upset? Surely, for one doesn't play unless one expects to win, but my dissappointment in losing is nothing compared to my excitement that the Redskins are one win away from their first post-season appearance since 1999.
This week, I have nothing to give but my Vegas Odds score, which I will gladly give up for their favor. It is a small price to pay to see my beloved Redskins achive some semblance of the glory that they once held. Plus, I really fucking hate the Eagles.
I have been a Redskins fan since they beat the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl XVII. I can remember my 5th grade teacher giving us extended recess every time the 'Skins won a playoff game, culminating in a full day of recess after the Super Bowl win, and a party, complete with popcorn, to watch the homecoming parade. I can vividly remember watching TV as John Riggins barrelled down the sidelines, a Miami defender helplessly hanging on to his leg. Since that time I have enjoyed watching them win the Super Bowl twice more, and have suffered through many the losing season, these past 6 years being nigh unbearable, particularly because I was living in DC and unable to escape the endless coverage of their craptitude. The signing of Deion Sanders was a particularly low point in my life, and one that I look back on with scorn and derision.
Through it all, I have never once entertained the notion of liking another team. Sure I have shown interest in AFC teams due to certain members helping me to win FFL Super Bowls (Steve McNair comes to mind), but even when the Redskins were at their lowest point, I have never waivered in my devotion. Complained? Yes. Bitched and moaned? Certainly. But waivered? Never. I have also never missed wearing a jersey on game day since I started the tradition several years ago. My children now share in this tradition and I have told my wife that my kids can be whatever they want, gay, straight, whatever, but if they become Dallas fans, they're out of the will.
I believe in the Redskins. I also believe in the Football Gods, that mystic pantheon of deities that watch over football matches and grant their favor to those teams that show guts, patience and fortitude on the field. The Football Gods smile upon those teams that use the run to set up the pass. On those that go for it on 4th and 2. On those that aren't afraid to try for 2 to avoid overtime.
On many occasions, the Redskins have run afoul of the Football Gods. Having a phenomenal running back in Stephen Davis, and wasting him on some god-awful pass-heavy, Steve Spurrier offensive monstrosity incurred their wrath. Insisting on signing talented individuals who were concerned with nothing but their own stats, rather than the good of the team, cost them the favor of the Football Gods. Even this season, when their balanced attack and stalwart defense were pleasing to the Gods, they ran up the score against the hapless 49ers one week, and were rewarded with a full-on ass whupping at the hands of the Giants the next. Trifle not with the Football Gods, lest ye be punished.
So, as we entered these last few weeks of the season, and the Redskins faced down three divisional opponents in a row, a stretch of games the outcome of which would decide whether or not the Redskins made it to the playoffs, I turned to the Football Gods for help. As anyone who plays in Fantasy Football Leagues will tell you, the FFL playoffs and Super Bowl are all held in the weeks leading up to the end of the regular season, the idea being that the star players are all still playing well to get those coveted real life playoff spots. I was well on my way to making an appearance in my FFL's Super Bowl, and while money wasn't involved, a lot of effort is involved from week to week to not care about the outcome of the season.
With this in mind, I made a plea to the Football Gods on the day of the Dallas game. Take my FFL Team. Take my Vegas Odds Pick'em Score. Take them both, but smile upon the Redskins. For the Football Gods are the Old Gods, and the Old Gods demand sacrifice. The Redskins completely demolished the Cowboys, I moved into first place in the Vegas pool, and moved on to the FFL Super Bowl. While I was happy for the Redskins, I was concerned for it would appear that my sacrifice was not accepted. As it turns out, I was incorrect. Both of my running backs were injured, causing me to make last minute drafts. I entered the FFL Super Bowl unsure as to my prospects, but mindful of my promise.
Again, prior to the Giants game, I made the same promise. This time, the Football Gods took their payment. The Redskins beat the Giants, and I lost to my opponent in the FFL Super Bowl, by an amount that would have been easily surpassed had I started one of my original WR's. The full measure of the Football Gods' plan was then apparent to me. The sacrifice that I was making would be the hardest to make, only if it were the championship game, and only if it were such that I felt it was preventable. They are wise in their ways, the Football Gods are. Was I upset? Surely, for one doesn't play unless one expects to win, but my dissappointment in losing is nothing compared to my excitement that the Redskins are one win away from their first post-season appearance since 1999.
This week, I have nothing to give but my Vegas Odds score, which I will gladly give up for their favor. It is a small price to pay to see my beloved Redskins achive some semblance of the glory that they once held. Plus, I really fucking hate the Eagles.
Wednesday, December 21, 2005
Best of 2005 Awards
It's that time of year again, time to dig deep into ye olde memory sack and recognize the best moments of 2005. Rather than have some formal award categories I'm just going to bust some crazy freestyle shit on ya. Time to get crack-a-lackin'.
Best Trip
One would think that the trip we took to get our daughter would be best trip, but that trip was an excersise in pure fucking misery. Yes, the end result was great, but the trip itself was shit. No, this year, the Best Trip award goes to the trip that we took to Atlanta to buy our house. That trip had it's share of misery in it as well, but we did manage to have some good dinners out, we got to spend more time in Atlanta to be sure that we wanted to live here, and we ended up being in the right place at the right time to get our house, at about $40k less than what it should have been priced at. We also got to spend 2 days with a realtor who was spawned in the pits of Hell, which gave us plenty to talk about for months and months.
Best Movie I Saw In the Theater
It's rare for the missus and I to actually go to the movies, due to the fact that we have kids, and we have a theater in our basement that neither a) charges 20 bucks for movies, b) smells like popcorn and cat piss and c) has unruly teenagers who can barely control their hormonal responses. However there are a few movies that we will make the trek out to take in. This year, I distinctly remember "Star Wars Episode 3", "Fantastic Four" (I had a free ticket), "Batman Begins", "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" and this year's hands down winner, "Serenity". Along with being just a kick-ass movie, Serenity was the extension of one of our most favorite TV shows ever, so the level of excitement was very high. Add to that the fact that it actually delivered, and I ditched work to see it, and you have a very hard film to beat. I know that some of you (Bones, I'm looking at you) will be shocked and dismayed to not see Batman Begins take this prize, but allow me to explain. There's a scene in "Saving Private Ryan", where Tom Hanks is talking about his wife working in the rose garden, and when he's prompted to talk more about it, he says something like "No. That one's for me." That's what Batman is. I have a great deal of emotion invested in that character to the point where no movie could ever live up to what I have in my head, nor would I want it to. To paraphrase, that one's for me.
Best Magazine That Makes Me Feel Like An Idiot
That would be The Economist. I started reading The Economist to get a more worldly view of things, as well as get a view of the US from outside of the States. The Economist fits the bill for both things nicely. Plus, it covers pretty much the entire planet, so it's guaranteed that every week I'll learn something new. For example, did you know that in Quebec, margarine has to be white? Yep. The dairy council doesn't want the citizens of Quebec to confuse margarine with butter so in order to sell margarine in Quebec, it has to be white. Never mind the fact that "Margarine" and "Butter" only share two letters, and that they aren't packaged in clear boxes and that my margerine comes in a big brown tub and my butter comes in a box with an indian on it. I guess when all of your country's citizens have health care and all consenting adults can be in legally recognized committed unions, all you have left is to worry about dairy. Ha! Actually Canada is in the midst of some fucked up shit, fucked up shit I learned about by reading The Economist. One word of warning, a lot happens in the world in one week, so if you do decide to subscribe, don't plan on being able to take an issue into the toilet and finish it up over your morning constitution, unless said constitution spans several days.
Best Sandwich
This one was pretty much locked up until this past weekend. There's a chain of delis here (Jason's Deli) that has a sandwich called the New York Yankee. It's about 3 pounds of corned beef, three pounds of pastrami and some swiss cheese all on rye bread. No condiments, no vegetables, just paper thin brisket mingling in spicy harmony. Combine it with their potato salad and you'd be hard pressed to beat it. Or so I thought. Enter Bobby G's a Chicago style eatery here in Alpharetta. They have a sandwich called The Superior Avenue Super Combo that is the Divine come to Earth and made sandwich. Imagine a hoagie roll, sliced open and filled with either hot or mild sausage. Now place tasty, simmered meatballs every place that there isn't sausage and lovingly drape Italian Beef over the whole thing. Cover all the meat with mozzerella and provelone and toast the sandiwich to melt the cheese and crisp up the bun. It is fucking amazing. And at 7 bucks a pop, you'll be in the ICU in no time.
Best Potato Chip
What's a sandwich without chips? Target sells these Archer Farms Parmesan Garlic potato chips that are like little crack snack chips. The fact that I'm at Target every week buying some movie or cd means that I can get my fix weekly. Alas, this will have to end with the new year as I'm starting to gain back all the weight I lost in Russia. I'm lovingly staring at a bag now, trying to figure out how to tell it that our illicit union can't continue.
Best Despoiled Starlet
This one is pretty much a no-brainer. Some may think it's Britney Spears, but she was never unspoiled in my opinion. No, this year's award has to go to Katie Holmes. I got nothing against Tom Cruise. He's a good actor. I count many of his films as some of my favorites, but I think he's somewhat crazy. The fact that he's now pulled Katie Holmes into his web of lunacy and used her to sire his heir, kind or irritates me. Not that I ever had a chance with Ms. Holmes, but up until now, she was my go to actress in the event I had to pick someone from Hollywood to think of in naughty ways. No more. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. Obviously more so for me than for her.
Hottest Woman on TV
Man, was this a tough one. This year has just been overflowing with attractive women on tv. First we have the return of Alyson Hannigan on "How I Met Your Mother". She's always been a favorite of mine, but between being a lesbian, and channeling massive amounts of dark power on Buffy, I felt Willow to be a tad inaccessible. Her new character, Lily, is a cute, hard partying kindergarten teacher. The character plays well to Hannigan's strengths and is extremely well acted with the right touch of Willow innocence and American Pie lustiness. Then you have Cobie Smulders, who plays Robin on the same show. Wow. She reminds me very much of Jennifer Connelly which is like being reminded of sunshine and apple pie. The show itself is really funny, and the fact that there are two very attractive women on it don't hurt. We also have the return of Paula Marshall to tv, on "Out of Practice" also a very good sit-com on CBS. Charlize Theron was on "Arrested Development" for 5 episodes, Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledell look better every year on "Gilmore Girls" and Emily Deschanel elevates the tank top to high art on "Bones". Hot, hot, hot, hot and hot. However, one woman, rose above all the others to take the award for this year. That would be Kristen Bell, who plays Veronica Mars on the series of the same name. A fantastic actress on a great show and she just happens to be drop-your-laundry, amazingly hot. Check her out in the movie "Spartan" or in the first season of "Deadwood" as half of a conniving brother-sister team. The only thing better than snarky Kristen Bell is angry, profanity spewing Kristen Bell.
Best Use of Carla Gugino's Assets
"Sin City". Wow. I mean, just, wow.
Best Slogan I Saw On A Church Messageboard
"Worry is the thief of joy." I liked this one because it wasn't preachy, it didn't rely on puns, but mostly because it was 100% correct. This was a big year of worries for us. We were worried about the move, then worried about me being unemployed, then worried about the adoption. All of it turned out ok, and in retrospect, our worries were unfounded. Granted, hindsight is 20/20, but hopefully a year of worries that ended up being nothing will teach me that worrying does nothing but make you miss out on the life you're currently living.
Ugliest Chicken
Wow. That is one fucking ugly chicken.
Best Trip
One would think that the trip we took to get our daughter would be best trip, but that trip was an excersise in pure fucking misery. Yes, the end result was great, but the trip itself was shit. No, this year, the Best Trip award goes to the trip that we took to Atlanta to buy our house. That trip had it's share of misery in it as well, but we did manage to have some good dinners out, we got to spend more time in Atlanta to be sure that we wanted to live here, and we ended up being in the right place at the right time to get our house, at about $40k less than what it should have been priced at. We also got to spend 2 days with a realtor who was spawned in the pits of Hell, which gave us plenty to talk about for months and months.
Best Movie I Saw In the Theater
It's rare for the missus and I to actually go to the movies, due to the fact that we have kids, and we have a theater in our basement that neither a) charges 20 bucks for movies, b) smells like popcorn and cat piss and c) has unruly teenagers who can barely control their hormonal responses. However there are a few movies that we will make the trek out to take in. This year, I distinctly remember "Star Wars Episode 3", "Fantastic Four" (I had a free ticket), "Batman Begins", "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" and this year's hands down winner, "Serenity". Along with being just a kick-ass movie, Serenity was the extension of one of our most favorite TV shows ever, so the level of excitement was very high. Add to that the fact that it actually delivered, and I ditched work to see it, and you have a very hard film to beat. I know that some of you (Bones, I'm looking at you) will be shocked and dismayed to not see Batman Begins take this prize, but allow me to explain. There's a scene in "Saving Private Ryan", where Tom Hanks is talking about his wife working in the rose garden, and when he's prompted to talk more about it, he says something like "No. That one's for me." That's what Batman is. I have a great deal of emotion invested in that character to the point where no movie could ever live up to what I have in my head, nor would I want it to. To paraphrase, that one's for me.
Best Magazine That Makes Me Feel Like An Idiot
That would be The Economist. I started reading The Economist to get a more worldly view of things, as well as get a view of the US from outside of the States. The Economist fits the bill for both things nicely. Plus, it covers pretty much the entire planet, so it's guaranteed that every week I'll learn something new. For example, did you know that in Quebec, margarine has to be white? Yep. The dairy council doesn't want the citizens of Quebec to confuse margarine with butter so in order to sell margarine in Quebec, it has to be white. Never mind the fact that "Margarine" and "Butter" only share two letters, and that they aren't packaged in clear boxes and that my margerine comes in a big brown tub and my butter comes in a box with an indian on it. I guess when all of your country's citizens have health care and all consenting adults can be in legally recognized committed unions, all you have left is to worry about dairy. Ha! Actually Canada is in the midst of some fucked up shit, fucked up shit I learned about by reading The Economist. One word of warning, a lot happens in the world in one week, so if you do decide to subscribe, don't plan on being able to take an issue into the toilet and finish it up over your morning constitution, unless said constitution spans several days.
Best Sandwich
This one was pretty much locked up until this past weekend. There's a chain of delis here (Jason's Deli) that has a sandwich called the New York Yankee. It's about 3 pounds of corned beef, three pounds of pastrami and some swiss cheese all on rye bread. No condiments, no vegetables, just paper thin brisket mingling in spicy harmony. Combine it with their potato salad and you'd be hard pressed to beat it. Or so I thought. Enter Bobby G's a Chicago style eatery here in Alpharetta. They have a sandwich called The Superior Avenue Super Combo that is the Divine come to Earth and made sandwich. Imagine a hoagie roll, sliced open and filled with either hot or mild sausage. Now place tasty, simmered meatballs every place that there isn't sausage and lovingly drape Italian Beef over the whole thing. Cover all the meat with mozzerella and provelone and toast the sandiwich to melt the cheese and crisp up the bun. It is fucking amazing. And at 7 bucks a pop, you'll be in the ICU in no time.
Best Potato Chip
What's a sandwich without chips? Target sells these Archer Farms Parmesan Garlic potato chips that are like little crack snack chips. The fact that I'm at Target every week buying some movie or cd means that I can get my fix weekly. Alas, this will have to end with the new year as I'm starting to gain back all the weight I lost in Russia. I'm lovingly staring at a bag now, trying to figure out how to tell it that our illicit union can't continue.
Best Despoiled Starlet
This one is pretty much a no-brainer. Some may think it's Britney Spears, but she was never unspoiled in my opinion. No, this year's award has to go to Katie Holmes. I got nothing against Tom Cruise. He's a good actor. I count many of his films as some of my favorites, but I think he's somewhat crazy. The fact that he's now pulled Katie Holmes into his web of lunacy and used her to sire his heir, kind or irritates me. Not that I ever had a chance with Ms. Holmes, but up until now, she was my go to actress in the event I had to pick someone from Hollywood to think of in naughty ways. No more. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. Obviously more so for me than for her.
Hottest Woman on TV
Man, was this a tough one. This year has just been overflowing with attractive women on tv. First we have the return of Alyson Hannigan on "How I Met Your Mother". She's always been a favorite of mine, but between being a lesbian, and channeling massive amounts of dark power on Buffy, I felt Willow to be a tad inaccessible. Her new character, Lily, is a cute, hard partying kindergarten teacher. The character plays well to Hannigan's strengths and is extremely well acted with the right touch of Willow innocence and American Pie lustiness. Then you have Cobie Smulders, who plays Robin on the same show. Wow. She reminds me very much of Jennifer Connelly which is like being reminded of sunshine and apple pie. The show itself is really funny, and the fact that there are two very attractive women on it don't hurt. We also have the return of Paula Marshall to tv, on "Out of Practice" also a very good sit-com on CBS. Charlize Theron was on "Arrested Development" for 5 episodes, Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledell look better every year on "Gilmore Girls" and Emily Deschanel elevates the tank top to high art on "Bones". Hot, hot, hot, hot and hot. However, one woman, rose above all the others to take the award for this year. That would be Kristen Bell, who plays Veronica Mars on the series of the same name. A fantastic actress on a great show and she just happens to be drop-your-laundry, amazingly hot. Check her out in the movie "Spartan" or in the first season of "Deadwood" as half of a conniving brother-sister team. The only thing better than snarky Kristen Bell is angry, profanity spewing Kristen Bell.
Best Use of Carla Gugino's Assets
"Sin City". Wow. I mean, just, wow.
Best Slogan I Saw On A Church Messageboard
"Worry is the thief of joy." I liked this one because it wasn't preachy, it didn't rely on puns, but mostly because it was 100% correct. This was a big year of worries for us. We were worried about the move, then worried about me being unemployed, then worried about the adoption. All of it turned out ok, and in retrospect, our worries were unfounded. Granted, hindsight is 20/20, but hopefully a year of worries that ended up being nothing will teach me that worrying does nothing but make you miss out on the life you're currently living.
Ugliest Chicken
Wow. That is one fucking ugly chicken.
Friday, December 09, 2005
Xbox 360 Initial Impressions
I finally got my 360 and it was not without drama. As I mentioned before, I didn't get one at launch, but I finally managed to snag one off of the mythical second shipment. Not sure how that happened. When I called the store on Tuesday I was told that they only got 2 units in, one was for a preorder and one was for someone who needed their busted unit replaced. 20 minutes later the store calls home and tells me (well, not me, my brother-in-law if you want the truth) that they had an "extra" one. Um, OK. No, I didn't ask where the extra one came from. My initial thought was that maybe they were going to give me the one that was being returned as defective, but all the parts were safely entombed in plastic upon opening the box, so I'm pretty sure that tampering was nonexistant. There's still some preorder credit business I have to work out with the manager, but I wasn't about to leave my console there over a measly 20 bucks.
Setup was uneventful. I think that Microsoft must have controlling interest in a plastic company as pretty much everything was nestled in it's own bag. I gave them to the baby to play with. In minutes she was sleeping, so mission accomplished. I kid! All the cables were plenty long enough to accomodate my setup, which was refreshing. Usually I need to move things all over the place to get it the way it needs to be.
The unit itself looks pretty nice, certainly better than the Xbox. I've heard the words "sleek" and "sexy" bandied about but personally, I think it's rubbish. A 350Z is sleek and my wife is sexy but their sleek-and-sexiness is important because neither one of them have been shoved in my entertainment cabinet where noone can see them. The PSP was sleek and it had shit for games. The iPod is sexy, but my Creative Zen player had more functionality and cost less, so let's not get too caught up in how the damn thing looks.
The controller isn't something I think about, which is probably the biggest compliment I can give a controller. The original Xbox controller was a painful exercise in anti-ergonomics. The 360 controller is very much like the WaveBird (big surprise there) in that it's small, it's wireless and all of the buttons are very easy to find. I do like that I can press the Guide button and turn the unit on from the seat, but seeing how 9 times out of 10 I'd have to get up to put a game in, it isn't as useful as the remote for your TV.
They've done some really cool things with how all of the different parts of the 360 work together. I haven't spent much time with the media streaming functionality as I'm usually playing games that require me to pay attention to the ingame sounds, but should I ever get my hands on a racing game, I'll definitely be looking into how to stream music off of my iPod. The ability to pause your game and interact with the dashboard is very cool, although it's not as robust as I had imagined. There are still a fair number of things that will end your game session, but I guess that's to be expected. Not having read too much about it ahead of time, I expected a lot more. Curse my foul ignorance!
Games look good. Call of Duty 2 is pretty damn good looking and has a ton going on at once. Those pesky Germans are at it again, and it's up to you to recreate some of WWII's hairiest battles and lead the allies to victory. Or something. Perfect Dark Zero looks kind of plastic-y, like the special effects in the Star Wars prequels, and the movement speed is slow to the point of being distracting. Condemned has some nice menus but I haven't touched a lick of gameplay. The games aren't anything I would expect from a Next Generation system however they're exactly what I'd expect at launch, if that makes any sense. 6 - 12 months from now, the games that will be coming out for this thing will be probably be nothing less than staggering.
The Xbox Live Marketplace is where this thing really shines. On Monday, the trailer for X3 was available online. I watched it on my laptop and thought it was pretty cool, despite Dr. Frasier Crane being cast as Beast. By Thursday I could download the trailer to the 360 and watch the trailer in glorious Hi-Def on my 92" movie screen. That's cool. There's a ton of game related content to purchase as well, including themes for your 360 and pictures for your Gamercard. There are also demos of classic arcade games like Joust and Smash TV as well as new games such as Bankshot Billiards and other more puzzle-type games. I think that Bankshot Billiards is the most expensive at 1200 points (around 15 bucks). Given that it's a full blown billiards simulator that allows you to play online with other people, it's an incredible bargain for 15 dollars. I know it seems silly to pay 400 bucks for the console, just so you can play pool, but these kinds of games are games that the casual gamer can play, which is always a good thing. Also, it provides a distribution model for developers that create simpler, non-multibillion sellers. Basically it allows independent developers to bypass the retail chain altogether and get their games in front of folks that usually wouldn't look at them. The fact that you can download free demos of the games is brilliant too. This, and the ability to offer gamers things like new content, or just theme packs for them to customize their 360's, is what will really set the 360 apart from the other consoles.
It's too early to say whether or not the wait was worth it, but so far things look promising. The games that come out in another few months, once the original launch games have been exhausted will really tell the tale. In the meantime, who's up for some 8-ball?
Setup was uneventful. I think that Microsoft must have controlling interest in a plastic company as pretty much everything was nestled in it's own bag. I gave them to the baby to play with. In minutes she was sleeping, so mission accomplished. I kid! All the cables were plenty long enough to accomodate my setup, which was refreshing. Usually I need to move things all over the place to get it the way it needs to be.
The unit itself looks pretty nice, certainly better than the Xbox. I've heard the words "sleek" and "sexy" bandied about but personally, I think it's rubbish. A 350Z is sleek and my wife is sexy but their sleek-and-sexiness is important because neither one of them have been shoved in my entertainment cabinet where noone can see them. The PSP was sleek and it had shit for games. The iPod is sexy, but my Creative Zen player had more functionality and cost less, so let's not get too caught up in how the damn thing looks.
The controller isn't something I think about, which is probably the biggest compliment I can give a controller. The original Xbox controller was a painful exercise in anti-ergonomics. The 360 controller is very much like the WaveBird (big surprise there) in that it's small, it's wireless and all of the buttons are very easy to find. I do like that I can press the Guide button and turn the unit on from the seat, but seeing how 9 times out of 10 I'd have to get up to put a game in, it isn't as useful as the remote for your TV.
They've done some really cool things with how all of the different parts of the 360 work together. I haven't spent much time with the media streaming functionality as I'm usually playing games that require me to pay attention to the ingame sounds, but should I ever get my hands on a racing game, I'll definitely be looking into how to stream music off of my iPod. The ability to pause your game and interact with the dashboard is very cool, although it's not as robust as I had imagined. There are still a fair number of things that will end your game session, but I guess that's to be expected. Not having read too much about it ahead of time, I expected a lot more. Curse my foul ignorance!
Games look good. Call of Duty 2 is pretty damn good looking and has a ton going on at once. Those pesky Germans are at it again, and it's up to you to recreate some of WWII's hairiest battles and lead the allies to victory. Or something. Perfect Dark Zero looks kind of plastic-y, like the special effects in the Star Wars prequels, and the movement speed is slow to the point of being distracting. Condemned has some nice menus but I haven't touched a lick of gameplay. The games aren't anything I would expect from a Next Generation system however they're exactly what I'd expect at launch, if that makes any sense. 6 - 12 months from now, the games that will be coming out for this thing will be probably be nothing less than staggering.
The Xbox Live Marketplace is where this thing really shines. On Monday, the trailer for X3 was available online. I watched it on my laptop and thought it was pretty cool, despite Dr. Frasier Crane being cast as Beast. By Thursday I could download the trailer to the 360 and watch the trailer in glorious Hi-Def on my 92" movie screen. That's cool. There's a ton of game related content to purchase as well, including themes for your 360 and pictures for your Gamercard. There are also demos of classic arcade games like Joust and Smash TV as well as new games such as Bankshot Billiards and other more puzzle-type games. I think that Bankshot Billiards is the most expensive at 1200 points (around 15 bucks). Given that it's a full blown billiards simulator that allows you to play online with other people, it's an incredible bargain for 15 dollars. I know it seems silly to pay 400 bucks for the console, just so you can play pool, but these kinds of games are games that the casual gamer can play, which is always a good thing. Also, it provides a distribution model for developers that create simpler, non-multibillion sellers. Basically it allows independent developers to bypass the retail chain altogether and get their games in front of folks that usually wouldn't look at them. The fact that you can download free demos of the games is brilliant too. This, and the ability to offer gamers things like new content, or just theme packs for them to customize their 360's, is what will really set the 360 apart from the other consoles.
It's too early to say whether or not the wait was worth it, but so far things look promising. The games that come out in another few months, once the original launch games have been exhausted will really tell the tale. In the meantime, who's up for some 8-ball?
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Stop Me Before I Prune Again
It has come to my attention that we face a grave crisis in this country. The ease with which clumsy, incompetent yard-oafs such as myself can obtain deadly weapons is staggering. No, I'm not talking about your conventional weapons like pistols, shotguns or tactical nuclear missles, I'm talking about that subset of devices used to tame the most overrun of yards and bushes. Since moving here, I have obtained a number of these items with nary a backround check or even the most rudimentary investigations into my sanity or mental condition. In the hands of someone slightly more unhinged than I, these items could weave a tapesty of destruction across this land. Bear witness to my horticultural arsenal.
The Pruner
Imagine, if you can, a 9 foot long flexible shaft, capable of extending to 14 feet. Take said shaft and attach a 13 inch saw blade on the end of it, right above the hook that hides a springloaded blade capable of taking off a man's finger. Now add a 12 foot long length of cord that's anchored by a half pound piece of wood and you have 14' Compound Action Tree Pruner.
This particular piece of lawn equipment looks less like something you use to trim trees and more like something you get when you face down a mini-boss in your AD&D campaign. In fact, were I to come up with a name and a mythical backstory for my Tree Pruner, it would look something like this:
Three Brothers
Horuk, Chakti and Kural were simple farmers who wanted nothing of battle until an evil overlord invaded their lands and demanded that all who lived there swore fealty. Wishing nothing more than to be left alone, the brothers tried to avoid conflict until the overlord raided their village, killing all but the three brothers. Realizing that they were unable to defeat their foe on their own, the brothers prayed to their gods for the power to deliver their lands from oppression. This power came in the form of an idea, that separate they were but simple farmers, but together they were a force to be reckoned with. They challenged the overlord to battle, and the overlord, foolishly thinking he was no match for 3 peasants agreed. If he were to lose, his forces would withdraw forever, if he were to win, the brothers sacrificed their lives. As the battle started, the brothers circled their foe. With a quick strike from Horuk's staff the overlord was caught off balance and forced to focus his attention on Horuk, allowing Chakti to ensnare the overlord with his chain and pull him onto Kural's saw. In a moment the battle was over, the overlord was defeated and nothing remained but repayment to the gods. In a flash of lightning, the brothers were gone, called to the gods they prayed to, but this weapon remained, a testament to the power men can wield when working together.
+3 to hit
1d10 blunt damage
2d4 slashing damage
25% chance of casting Entanglement on successful hit
See! That's some serious shit! At the very least I feel like some sort of mythical warrior as I teach my holly trees just who is boss. At night I can hear their fevered whisperings, as they wonder who will be trimmed on the morrow.
The Blower
Technically this is a blower and a leaf vacuum, however there's not a lot that's dangerous about a leaf vacuum unless you decide to try and simulate some hickeys and end up pulling your jugular out of your neck. The blower, on the other hand, is a force to be reckoned with.
As we were researching blowers, it would appear that the number one factor into how well your blower can clear yard debris is the speed in which the air will come roaring out of your blower. 240MPH!!!! the boxes all scream. Their leaves must be heavier than my leaves. Perhaps they have cement trees or bedrock bushes, but to clear my leaves you need to go 40, maybe 50 tops. 240 MPH seems a bit excessive. Now, leaves, by themselves won't cause too much of a problem as long as they stay under light speed, but what can cause problems are these spiky horse chestnut things that drop from the trees and promptly harden up to the consistancy of diamond. If given a choice between carrying an M-16 into battle and carrying a 240MPH leaf blower and a bag of death chestnuts, I'll take the deathnuts any time. One shot from my Deathnuts and you'll have a hole in your chest bigh enough to store a loaf of bread in. Granted I need an outlet to keep my blower powered up, but I'm sure there's some sort of backpack generator that the military has come up with. They're smart fellows over there.
The Hedger
A hedger by itself is kind of scary. This one has a battery pack so that I can run rampant over the entire neighborhood for a horrifying 40 minutes before having to recharge for roughly 17 days. This thing is loud, like loud enough to cause startled expressions on small children and it can cut through a 1/4 inch branch like no one's business. What makes this particular hedger even scarier is the person who wields it. Consider these facts. Fact 1: Upon using my super-sharp Santoku blade for the first time, I ran my finger along the blade to remove the chopped carrots, almost removing my finger in the process. Fact 2: I have, on several occasions, cut my leg with the same knife because I wiped it clean on my pants, forgetting the fact that I was wearing shorts instead of pants. Fact 3: I have very little feeling in the tip of my left thumb, the hand that is used to hold whatever I'm chopping, due to the fact that I've repeatedly sliced, chopped and otherwise let blood from it. In fact, now, unless I get a good 1/4 inch cut there, it doesn't even bleed. Take a set of moving, clattering death blades and putting them in my hands is the very definition of lunacy.
You may have noticed that all of these tools are either red, or bright orange as if to unleash primal feelings of rage as I tend to my bushes. The very fact that I have to tend to my bushes gets me angry enough. You throw a screaming orange blower in my hand and I'm going to be looking to tear shit up.
I have mentioned, on many occasions, my concerns regarding my imminent delimbification when pruning to my wife, in the hopes that she would see that I am uniquely unqualified to wield these weapons of mass deforestation but she is singularly unrelenting. Once my Accidental Death and Dismemberment plan comes through, I may have to see what the going price is for losing a finger. That'll teach her a lesson. A five thousand dollar lesson. Cha-ching.
The Pruner
Imagine, if you can, a 9 foot long flexible shaft, capable of extending to 14 feet. Take said shaft and attach a 13 inch saw blade on the end of it, right above the hook that hides a springloaded blade capable of taking off a man's finger. Now add a 12 foot long length of cord that's anchored by a half pound piece of wood and you have 14' Compound Action Tree Pruner.
This particular piece of lawn equipment looks less like something you use to trim trees and more like something you get when you face down a mini-boss in your AD&D campaign. In fact, were I to come up with a name and a mythical backstory for my Tree Pruner, it would look something like this:
Three Brothers
Horuk, Chakti and Kural were simple farmers who wanted nothing of battle until an evil overlord invaded their lands and demanded that all who lived there swore fealty. Wishing nothing more than to be left alone, the brothers tried to avoid conflict until the overlord raided their village, killing all but the three brothers. Realizing that they were unable to defeat their foe on their own, the brothers prayed to their gods for the power to deliver their lands from oppression. This power came in the form of an idea, that separate they were but simple farmers, but together they were a force to be reckoned with. They challenged the overlord to battle, and the overlord, foolishly thinking he was no match for 3 peasants agreed. If he were to lose, his forces would withdraw forever, if he were to win, the brothers sacrificed their lives. As the battle started, the brothers circled their foe. With a quick strike from Horuk's staff the overlord was caught off balance and forced to focus his attention on Horuk, allowing Chakti to ensnare the overlord with his chain and pull him onto Kural's saw. In a moment the battle was over, the overlord was defeated and nothing remained but repayment to the gods. In a flash of lightning, the brothers were gone, called to the gods they prayed to, but this weapon remained, a testament to the power men can wield when working together.
+3 to hit
1d10 blunt damage
2d4 slashing damage
25% chance of casting Entanglement on successful hit
See! That's some serious shit! At the very least I feel like some sort of mythical warrior as I teach my holly trees just who is boss. At night I can hear their fevered whisperings, as they wonder who will be trimmed on the morrow.
The Blower
Technically this is a blower and a leaf vacuum, however there's not a lot that's dangerous about a leaf vacuum unless you decide to try and simulate some hickeys and end up pulling your jugular out of your neck. The blower, on the other hand, is a force to be reckoned with.As we were researching blowers, it would appear that the number one factor into how well your blower can clear yard debris is the speed in which the air will come roaring out of your blower. 240MPH!!!! the boxes all scream. Their leaves must be heavier than my leaves. Perhaps they have cement trees or bedrock bushes, but to clear my leaves you need to go 40, maybe 50 tops. 240 MPH seems a bit excessive. Now, leaves, by themselves won't cause too much of a problem as long as they stay under light speed, but what can cause problems are these spiky horse chestnut things that drop from the trees and promptly harden up to the consistancy of diamond. If given a choice between carrying an M-16 into battle and carrying a 240MPH leaf blower and a bag of death chestnuts, I'll take the deathnuts any time. One shot from my Deathnuts and you'll have a hole in your chest bigh enough to store a loaf of bread in. Granted I need an outlet to keep my blower powered up, but I'm sure there's some sort of backpack generator that the military has come up with. They're smart fellows over there.
The Hedger
A hedger by itself is kind of scary. This one has a battery pack so that I can run rampant over the entire neighborhood for a horrifying 40 minutes before having to recharge for roughly 17 days. This thing is loud, like loud enough to cause startled expressions on small children and it can cut through a 1/4 inch branch like no one's business. What makes this particular hedger even scarier is the person who wields it. Consider these facts. Fact 1: Upon using my super-sharp Santoku blade for the first time, I ran my finger along the blade to remove the chopped carrots, almost removing my finger in the process. Fact 2: I have, on several occasions, cut my leg with the same knife because I wiped it clean on my pants, forgetting the fact that I was wearing shorts instead of pants. Fact 3: I have very little feeling in the tip of my left thumb, the hand that is used to hold whatever I'm chopping, due to the fact that I've repeatedly sliced, chopped and otherwise let blood from it. In fact, now, unless I get a good 1/4 inch cut there, it doesn't even bleed. Take a set of moving, clattering death blades and putting them in my hands is the very definition of lunacy.
You may have noticed that all of these tools are either red, or bright orange as if to unleash primal feelings of rage as I tend to my bushes. The very fact that I have to tend to my bushes gets me angry enough. You throw a screaming orange blower in my hand and I'm going to be looking to tear shit up.
I have mentioned, on many occasions, my concerns regarding my imminent delimbification when pruning to my wife, in the hopes that she would see that I am uniquely unqualified to wield these weapons of mass deforestation but she is singularly unrelenting. Once my Accidental Death and Dismemberment plan comes through, I may have to see what the going price is for losing a finger. That'll teach her a lesson. A five thousand dollar lesson. Cha-ching.
Tuesday, November 29, 2005
Hiatus Over
Howdy. Well, that hiatus ended up being longer than I expected. This would be the point where I apologize for being gone so long. Some folks don't believe in aplogizing for being gone, but I want you to actually come back, so I feel that some effort should be made to be the least bit conciliatory. Sorry I was gone so long, I was obtaining a child. Happy?
Said child is thriving, well as much as one can thrive and refuse to eat solid food at the same time. This is a point of contention at the moment as her age (13 months) says that she should be wolfing down t-bone steaks and glasses of Crystal but the sad truth is that she reacts to microscopic Cheerio pieces as if we're making her consume evil. I think it's a developmental delay. 12 months in an orphanage can tend to make one lag in some areas, for her it's eating. Frankly, I'd rather it be walking as I'm tired of walking around my house hunched over with a baby attached to my fingers, but when requesting our child, there was no checkbox for 'hobbled'.
While we have been unsuccessful in getting her to eat, Linda did manage to teach her how to clap, a major milestone if ever there was one. Now she can show appreciation and "give it up" for the opening bands. By January she'll be able to throw up the horns. She's generally pretty happy, except when being restrained. In other words, she's happy as long as she's not in the car seat, in a shopping cart, in the high chair or in the stroller. This rules out eating, driving, going for a walk and touring a retail establishment lest you want to put up with a symphony of unhappiness. She just has to get used to these things, but man, if ever someone wished that their child could walk, that someone is me. And Linda. That somepeople is us.
On the plus side, her brother absolutely loves her to the point where sometimes I feel he's a better parent than we are. He's very sensitive to her crying, which can make for some tense moments, especially at 3 in the morning when she's up crying and then he's up crying and the house sounds like a nursery of devil children. When we put Abby down for a nap, she usually protests, as children are wont to do, and does so by screaming to the point where her lungs leap from her chest and adhere to the ceiling. Ben will bring this crying to our attention and we'll tell him that his sister is fine. Nothing makes you feel like a good parent like your 3 year old giving you a look that plainly says "do you not hear that?"
They seem to be sharing things well, but invariably, whatever he's playing with she wants and whatever he's playing with she wants, which is fine most of the time, until he starts playing with something she can't have like firearms or battery acid. We have strict rules in our home, one of which is "No solid food, no shotguns" so she's pretty much SOL. We've been able to manage the conflicts reasonably well so far which means that the police haven't been called. Yet.
One unfortunate side affect of having a baby in the house is that Ben, who used to be so good with the talking, has regressed. Before Abby, he used to rattle off 6 - 7 word sentences in very clear English. He'll still do it sometimes when she's napping or not around, but for the most part he's happy to repeat whatever she says or try and teach her gibberish words like "Lee-loo" and "Studa". Maybe there's some sort of toddler language I'm not aware of and if they both speak it they can plot against us, but to the untrained observer it sound like he's trying to teach her to be stupid. I think it's because in her, he has a captive audience, even if she's not imitating him but is looking at him as one looks at a very dull child, or a very ugly puppy. We're hoping he grows out of it because I don't speak toddler and when I ask him what he wants to drink for dinner and he answers "Lee-loo" I want to shove the cup places cups truly don't belong.
In other news, I'm patiently awaiting my 360. "What?" you say, "Didn't that launch last week?" Yes, it did but only for people that either a) started waiting in line in October or b) went back in time and preordered it in June of 1865, Foolish person that I was, I only preordered it in June of this year, stupidly thinking that preordering the unit 5 months in advance would guarantee me a copy. Ha! That's funny. Microsoft says that the manufacturing process is very complex and that there are 1700 parts in the 360 so people have to be patient, to which I respond, "I don't fucking care." I don't care if each 360 has a little world inside it filled with gnomes and fairies and wood nymphs that dress up as Germans for me to shoot in Call of Duty 2. You're the ones who decided to launch in November, so fucking launch in November. Don't launch and then not have any units for anyone other than the fervent MSFT heads and Ubergeeks to obtain. You're already missing out on the holiday buying season, so why not launch in December when you have plenty of units made and then at least give people a fighting chance to get the damn thing? Bah! I'm just bitter. I should, should being the operative word, here be getting mine by the end of the week, unless MSFT miscounted and there are actually 1900 pieces inside and their shipping plans didn't account for those extra 200 pieces.
One area of pixelated entertainment I can recommend without hesitation is the joyous online experience provided by Mario Kart DS. If you have a DS and have a wireless router in your house, it is so easy to go online with this game that if you can't, you should be tested to ensure you are not developmentally delayed in some way. This is the nice way of me saying that if you can't go online with your DS, you're fucking retarded. The online experience is pretty damn good, even if it is lacking some of the subtleties of Live, but Nintendo is just getting started in this regard so I can cut them some slack. Plus, this is Mario Kart, so short of them punching me in the eye every time I boot the damn thing up, I'm willing to let a lot go. I have raced a number of times since getting the game and have wracked up an impressive 1 - 23 record. Yes, that's right, one win and 23 losses. If you're searching for a Regional game in the Atlanta area and you see that Brandon has joined the match, you are all but assured victory. This is a similar service to what I provide on Xbox Live as Team Binky, namely, I lose so that you can win. No need to thank me.
From what I've read, there are arcane combinations of button mashing done at opportune times such as when powersliding or right before starting the race that allow your kart to tap into the speed force and go back in time and catch Tachyons or some other Barry Allen type shit. Knowing that these tips are out there helps explain why the only time I see my opponents is when we're all lined up to start the race. I swear it's like one minute we're all waiting for the flag to drop and the next moment they've all finished the next 4 races. Nothing is quite as humiliating as being lapped by a dinosaur driving a polka-dotted egg. One thing that I've noticed about this service is how different it is from Live. On Live, you have names like "Reaper" and "BulletMan" and "Annoying14YearOldWhoNeedsToGetOutMore" but on the Nintendo service, I race against Josh, Todd and JojoPumpkin. If course, when you get fucking owned by JojoPumpkin, it doesn't help your ego any more than getting shot in Halo 2 by BulletMan. The only difference is that I can play another race while Jojo has to go to bed because he may have a pop quiz in spelling tomorrow.
Finally, the good folks at Penny Arcade have fired up the Child's Play machine for this year, so please visit the site, pick a hospital and buy some toys for sick children. Trust me, you'll feel better.
Said child is thriving, well as much as one can thrive and refuse to eat solid food at the same time. This is a point of contention at the moment as her age (13 months) says that she should be wolfing down t-bone steaks and glasses of Crystal but the sad truth is that she reacts to microscopic Cheerio pieces as if we're making her consume evil. I think it's a developmental delay. 12 months in an orphanage can tend to make one lag in some areas, for her it's eating. Frankly, I'd rather it be walking as I'm tired of walking around my house hunched over with a baby attached to my fingers, but when requesting our child, there was no checkbox for 'hobbled'.
While we have been unsuccessful in getting her to eat, Linda did manage to teach her how to clap, a major milestone if ever there was one. Now she can show appreciation and "give it up" for the opening bands. By January she'll be able to throw up the horns. She's generally pretty happy, except when being restrained. In other words, she's happy as long as she's not in the car seat, in a shopping cart, in the high chair or in the stroller. This rules out eating, driving, going for a walk and touring a retail establishment lest you want to put up with a symphony of unhappiness. She just has to get used to these things, but man, if ever someone wished that their child could walk, that someone is me. And Linda. That somepeople is us.
On the plus side, her brother absolutely loves her to the point where sometimes I feel he's a better parent than we are. He's very sensitive to her crying, which can make for some tense moments, especially at 3 in the morning when she's up crying and then he's up crying and the house sounds like a nursery of devil children. When we put Abby down for a nap, she usually protests, as children are wont to do, and does so by screaming to the point where her lungs leap from her chest and adhere to the ceiling. Ben will bring this crying to our attention and we'll tell him that his sister is fine. Nothing makes you feel like a good parent like your 3 year old giving you a look that plainly says "do you not hear that?"
They seem to be sharing things well, but invariably, whatever he's playing with she wants and whatever he's playing with she wants, which is fine most of the time, until he starts playing with something she can't have like firearms or battery acid. We have strict rules in our home, one of which is "No solid food, no shotguns" so she's pretty much SOL. We've been able to manage the conflicts reasonably well so far which means that the police haven't been called. Yet.
One unfortunate side affect of having a baby in the house is that Ben, who used to be so good with the talking, has regressed. Before Abby, he used to rattle off 6 - 7 word sentences in very clear English. He'll still do it sometimes when she's napping or not around, but for the most part he's happy to repeat whatever she says or try and teach her gibberish words like "Lee-loo" and "Studa". Maybe there's some sort of toddler language I'm not aware of and if they both speak it they can plot against us, but to the untrained observer it sound like he's trying to teach her to be stupid. I think it's because in her, he has a captive audience, even if she's not imitating him but is looking at him as one looks at a very dull child, or a very ugly puppy. We're hoping he grows out of it because I don't speak toddler and when I ask him what he wants to drink for dinner and he answers "Lee-loo" I want to shove the cup places cups truly don't belong.
In other news, I'm patiently awaiting my 360. "What?" you say, "Didn't that launch last week?" Yes, it did but only for people that either a) started waiting in line in October or b) went back in time and preordered it in June of 1865, Foolish person that I was, I only preordered it in June of this year, stupidly thinking that preordering the unit 5 months in advance would guarantee me a copy. Ha! That's funny. Microsoft says that the manufacturing process is very complex and that there are 1700 parts in the 360 so people have to be patient, to which I respond, "I don't fucking care." I don't care if each 360 has a little world inside it filled with gnomes and fairies and wood nymphs that dress up as Germans for me to shoot in Call of Duty 2. You're the ones who decided to launch in November, so fucking launch in November. Don't launch and then not have any units for anyone other than the fervent MSFT heads and Ubergeeks to obtain. You're already missing out on the holiday buying season, so why not launch in December when you have plenty of units made and then at least give people a fighting chance to get the damn thing? Bah! I'm just bitter. I should, should being the operative word, here be getting mine by the end of the week, unless MSFT miscounted and there are actually 1900 pieces inside and their shipping plans didn't account for those extra 200 pieces.
One area of pixelated entertainment I can recommend without hesitation is the joyous online experience provided by Mario Kart DS. If you have a DS and have a wireless router in your house, it is so easy to go online with this game that if you can't, you should be tested to ensure you are not developmentally delayed in some way. This is the nice way of me saying that if you can't go online with your DS, you're fucking retarded. The online experience is pretty damn good, even if it is lacking some of the subtleties of Live, but Nintendo is just getting started in this regard so I can cut them some slack. Plus, this is Mario Kart, so short of them punching me in the eye every time I boot the damn thing up, I'm willing to let a lot go. I have raced a number of times since getting the game and have wracked up an impressive 1 - 23 record. Yes, that's right, one win and 23 losses. If you're searching for a Regional game in the Atlanta area and you see that Brandon has joined the match, you are all but assured victory. This is a similar service to what I provide on Xbox Live as Team Binky, namely, I lose so that you can win. No need to thank me.
From what I've read, there are arcane combinations of button mashing done at opportune times such as when powersliding or right before starting the race that allow your kart to tap into the speed force and go back in time and catch Tachyons or some other Barry Allen type shit. Knowing that these tips are out there helps explain why the only time I see my opponents is when we're all lined up to start the race. I swear it's like one minute we're all waiting for the flag to drop and the next moment they've all finished the next 4 races. Nothing is quite as humiliating as being lapped by a dinosaur driving a polka-dotted egg. One thing that I've noticed about this service is how different it is from Live. On Live, you have names like "Reaper" and "BulletMan" and "Annoying14YearOldWhoNeedsToGetOutMore" but on the Nintendo service, I race against Josh, Todd and JojoPumpkin. If course, when you get fucking owned by JojoPumpkin, it doesn't help your ego any more than getting shot in Halo 2 by BulletMan. The only difference is that I can play another race while Jojo has to go to bed because he may have a pop quiz in spelling tomorrow.
Finally, the good folks at Penny Arcade have fired up the Child's Play machine for this year, so please visit the site, pick a hospital and buy some toys for sick children. Trust me, you'll feel better.
Thursday, October 13, 2005
Media Day
What up buttercup?
Not that anyone comes here and reads with any frequency, but for those that do, starting tomorrow I'll be on hiatus as I head back to Russia to claim my rightful heir. We'll be gone a week, provided they decide to waive the 10 day waiting period between the court date and the date of baby retrieval. If they don't waive the waiting period, I'll be on hiatus longer because I'm going to fucking shoot myself. I'll try to take pictures so that I can regale you all with tales of Russian infant purchasing, er adopting.
Before I go, I thought I'd share with you my thoughts on a bunch of fantastical purchases I've made in a quest to go completely bankrupt before the second child arrives. October has been an expensive month for stupid, useless purchases and only serves to get more expensive, stupid and useless. Huzzah! Technically some of these purchases were back in September, but the bill didn't come until October, so they count too. I'll put links where available.
Music
Ringside - "Ringside" - the Amazon review says that this is a serious band despite half of it being actor Balthazar Getty, to which I respond "Who the fuck is Balthazar Getty". Well, it's a good album despite me not knowing who Balthazar Getty is. Not the sort of music for those that want actual humans playing all of the instruments, but if music created on an iBook is your thing, it's a solid album. "Tired of Being Sorry" may have graced your radio at some point.
Citizen Cope - "The Clarence Greenwood Recordings" - Again, referencing Amazon, the review says that those who have both Jack Johnson and Mos Def in their catalog would like this cd. In my case, it's true, however that makes it sound like CC is a mix between Jack Johnson and Mos Def and he isn't, although I'd like to know what hip-hop-surf-folk sounds like. This is an amazing album, and CC lays down some soulful shit. You may have heard "Son's Gonna Rise" as it's on the radio and possibly on a car commercial or something. The album version is superior to the radio cut, as the guitar solo is infinitely more blistering.
Fiona Apple - "Extraordinary Machine" - I had "Tidal", I sold "Tidal". I never bought that Pawn album. This album kicks ass. It's an amazing piece of music and no longer sounds like the journal writings of a tragedy stricken 7th grader. The album took quite a ride before coming out, having been produced by two different people. Two tracks from the first producer remain and act as bookends for the album, which works, because their style is much, much different from the second producer. BTW, the second producer has produced tracks for Eminem, which leads us to the idea of Fiona Apple and Eminem touring, a spectacle of dysfunctional entertainment the world has never seen.
Liz Phair - "Somebody's Miracle" - Liz Phair is one duet with Don Henley away from becoming Sheryl Crow. Not a bad album, but nothing particularly impressive.
Dane Cook - "Harmful if Swallowed" and "Retaliation" - Fuck bees. Fuck bees. Honestly, this guy is hilarious despite his comments about disregarding some of our more important insect friends. If you had to just buy one, get "Harmful", but try to get both. And while we're at it, fuck shoes too.
DVD
Gilmore Girls Season 1 and Season 2 - OK, I love Gilmore Girls. It's well written, the characters walk the fine line between too nutty to be believable and extremely genuine and Lauren Graham is hot enough to fry an egg on. Plus I like Luke, so if that makes me even more of a woman then send me a dress and I'll suit up. Both seasons were on sale at Target for 18.88 each one week, so I snagged both of them on the cheap. Cha-ching!
Veronica Mars Season 1 - Picking between this show and Lost for best show on TV last season would have been very, very hard. So far this season, Lost has continued on last season's momentum while VM appears to be taking some time to get back to it's chewy center, but during season 1, VM was amazing television. Very well written, good characters, good mysteries and in the egg frying contest, Kristen Bell would incinerate said eggs before they could even get close to her. Plus, I don't get UPN in Hi-Def, so the choice was between faint memories of shitty broadcast Kristen Bell and Kristen Bell on tasty DVD. A no brainer if ever there was one.
"The Fly - Collectors Edition" - Be afraid. Be very afraid. You're goddamn right. This movie is one of the few remakes I consider to be better than the original. It's short, it gets to the point and it takes no prisoners. The performances are amazing, the effects still hold up and where else can you see such a calamitous relationship between vomit and someone's hand? Don't get "The Fly 2". That movie sucks ass except for the dream sequence, where she births a giant maggot.
Video Games
X-Men Legends 2 - Rise of Apocalypse (Xbox) - Given that there was only a year between this game and its prequel, there wasn't a lot to add other than a boatload of new mutants and co-op over Live. The Live co-op kicks ass as it gives you a chance to make fun of the voicework with something other than the chair next to you. Plus, you can let the AI handle all of your leveling up for those that care more about the action part of an Action-RPG. The only thing that sucks about co-op is that everyone has to have the same tv settings, so if you game with people who don't have an obsessive desire to amass Hi-Def tv equipment, you have to turn off all of your bells and whistles. It sucks to have to do that, trust me, but it's still playable and highly enjoyable. For the record, the team of Iceman, Wolverine, Storm and Cyclops is a quartet of unholy destruction.
Far Cry Instincts (Xbox) - I haven't touched the single player mode, although the demo was good, but multiplayer kicks ass. It's very fast and loose and has a ton of vehicles, which despite the shitty controls, are still fun to ride. The multiplayer modes carry all of the usual multiplayer favorites but add a Predator mode where a bunch of mercenaries face off against one, or multiple jacked up super-soldiers who can jump high, hit hard, track by smell and regenerate health. When you're the predator, you track someone by smell and take on your prey and all of his cronies, it's an amazing feeling to emerge unscathed amongst the corpses. There's also a mapmaking portion which has gotten my gaming group in it's grip and will not let go. We used to talk about games. Now it's like being on a fucking landscaping committee.
Indigo Prophecy - (Xbox) - I've written about this game at length before, but now that I've finished it, I'm comfortable recommending it to anyone who wants something different or likes adventure games. There are some major plot holes which are best to just ignore, but the control is good, the story is cool and it provides an experience that you can't seem to find in other games. Plus, in addition to peeing there's necrophilia.
Trauma Center: Under the Knife (DS) - As much as I love Nintendogs and Advance Wars, this is the game that got me to buy a DS. When I first heard about a surgery game that uses the stylus exclusively, I figured that I'd end up buying the game, and the console to play it on once it came out. It's a lot of fun despite some of the surgeries being part of some plot about medical terrorists and as such, relatively unrealistic. Some of the surgeries are extremely difficult and will have you resisting the urge to let your DS take flight. The dialog can be annoying too, especially the in-surgery dialog which can only be resolved by fervent tapping. It's still tons of fun and the first time you remove a foot long piece of glass from some dude's heart you'll be asking for random strangers to come and mop your brow.
That seems to be it for the time being. Future weeks will bring the release of Batman Begins on DVD, as well as the release of Tales from the Crypt Season 2 on DVD. October may not be the cruelest month, but it's turning out to be the most expensive.
Not that anyone comes here and reads with any frequency, but for those that do, starting tomorrow I'll be on hiatus as I head back to Russia to claim my rightful heir. We'll be gone a week, provided they decide to waive the 10 day waiting period between the court date and the date of baby retrieval. If they don't waive the waiting period, I'll be on hiatus longer because I'm going to fucking shoot myself. I'll try to take pictures so that I can regale you all with tales of Russian infant purchasing, er adopting.
Before I go, I thought I'd share with you my thoughts on a bunch of fantastical purchases I've made in a quest to go completely bankrupt before the second child arrives. October has been an expensive month for stupid, useless purchases and only serves to get more expensive, stupid and useless. Huzzah! Technically some of these purchases were back in September, but the bill didn't come until October, so they count too. I'll put links where available.
Music
Ringside - "Ringside" - the Amazon review says that this is a serious band despite half of it being actor Balthazar Getty, to which I respond "Who the fuck is Balthazar Getty". Well, it's a good album despite me not knowing who Balthazar Getty is. Not the sort of music for those that want actual humans playing all of the instruments, but if music created on an iBook is your thing, it's a solid album. "Tired of Being Sorry" may have graced your radio at some point.
Citizen Cope - "The Clarence Greenwood Recordings" - Again, referencing Amazon, the review says that those who have both Jack Johnson and Mos Def in their catalog would like this cd. In my case, it's true, however that makes it sound like CC is a mix between Jack Johnson and Mos Def and he isn't, although I'd like to know what hip-hop-surf-folk sounds like. This is an amazing album, and CC lays down some soulful shit. You may have heard "Son's Gonna Rise" as it's on the radio and possibly on a car commercial or something. The album version is superior to the radio cut, as the guitar solo is infinitely more blistering.
Fiona Apple - "Extraordinary Machine" - I had "Tidal", I sold "Tidal". I never bought that Pawn album. This album kicks ass. It's an amazing piece of music and no longer sounds like the journal writings of a tragedy stricken 7th grader. The album took quite a ride before coming out, having been produced by two different people. Two tracks from the first producer remain and act as bookends for the album, which works, because their style is much, much different from the second producer. BTW, the second producer has produced tracks for Eminem, which leads us to the idea of Fiona Apple and Eminem touring, a spectacle of dysfunctional entertainment the world has never seen.
Liz Phair - "Somebody's Miracle" - Liz Phair is one duet with Don Henley away from becoming Sheryl Crow. Not a bad album, but nothing particularly impressive.
Dane Cook - "Harmful if Swallowed" and "Retaliation" - Fuck bees. Fuck bees. Honestly, this guy is hilarious despite his comments about disregarding some of our more important insect friends. If you had to just buy one, get "Harmful", but try to get both. And while we're at it, fuck shoes too.
DVD
Gilmore Girls Season 1 and Season 2 - OK, I love Gilmore Girls. It's well written, the characters walk the fine line between too nutty to be believable and extremely genuine and Lauren Graham is hot enough to fry an egg on. Plus I like Luke, so if that makes me even more of a woman then send me a dress and I'll suit up. Both seasons were on sale at Target for 18.88 each one week, so I snagged both of them on the cheap. Cha-ching!
Veronica Mars Season 1 - Picking between this show and Lost for best show on TV last season would have been very, very hard. So far this season, Lost has continued on last season's momentum while VM appears to be taking some time to get back to it's chewy center, but during season 1, VM was amazing television. Very well written, good characters, good mysteries and in the egg frying contest, Kristen Bell would incinerate said eggs before they could even get close to her. Plus, I don't get UPN in Hi-Def, so the choice was between faint memories of shitty broadcast Kristen Bell and Kristen Bell on tasty DVD. A no brainer if ever there was one.
"The Fly - Collectors Edition" - Be afraid. Be very afraid. You're goddamn right. This movie is one of the few remakes I consider to be better than the original. It's short, it gets to the point and it takes no prisoners. The performances are amazing, the effects still hold up and where else can you see such a calamitous relationship between vomit and someone's hand? Don't get "The Fly 2". That movie sucks ass except for the dream sequence, where she births a giant maggot.
Video Games
X-Men Legends 2 - Rise of Apocalypse (Xbox) - Given that there was only a year between this game and its prequel, there wasn't a lot to add other than a boatload of new mutants and co-op over Live. The Live co-op kicks ass as it gives you a chance to make fun of the voicework with something other than the chair next to you. Plus, you can let the AI handle all of your leveling up for those that care more about the action part of an Action-RPG. The only thing that sucks about co-op is that everyone has to have the same tv settings, so if you game with people who don't have an obsessive desire to amass Hi-Def tv equipment, you have to turn off all of your bells and whistles. It sucks to have to do that, trust me, but it's still playable and highly enjoyable. For the record, the team of Iceman, Wolverine, Storm and Cyclops is a quartet of unholy destruction.
Far Cry Instincts (Xbox) - I haven't touched the single player mode, although the demo was good, but multiplayer kicks ass. It's very fast and loose and has a ton of vehicles, which despite the shitty controls, are still fun to ride. The multiplayer modes carry all of the usual multiplayer favorites but add a Predator mode where a bunch of mercenaries face off against one, or multiple jacked up super-soldiers who can jump high, hit hard, track by smell and regenerate health. When you're the predator, you track someone by smell and take on your prey and all of his cronies, it's an amazing feeling to emerge unscathed amongst the corpses. There's also a mapmaking portion which has gotten my gaming group in it's grip and will not let go. We used to talk about games. Now it's like being on a fucking landscaping committee.
Indigo Prophecy - (Xbox) - I've written about this game at length before, but now that I've finished it, I'm comfortable recommending it to anyone who wants something different or likes adventure games. There are some major plot holes which are best to just ignore, but the control is good, the story is cool and it provides an experience that you can't seem to find in other games. Plus, in addition to peeing there's necrophilia.
Trauma Center: Under the Knife (DS) - As much as I love Nintendogs and Advance Wars, this is the game that got me to buy a DS. When I first heard about a surgery game that uses the stylus exclusively, I figured that I'd end up buying the game, and the console to play it on once it came out. It's a lot of fun despite some of the surgeries being part of some plot about medical terrorists and as such, relatively unrealistic. Some of the surgeries are extremely difficult and will have you resisting the urge to let your DS take flight. The dialog can be annoying too, especially the in-surgery dialog which can only be resolved by fervent tapping. It's still tons of fun and the first time you remove a foot long piece of glass from some dude's heart you'll be asking for random strangers to come and mop your brow.
That seems to be it for the time being. Future weeks will bring the release of Batman Begins on DVD, as well as the release of Tales from the Crypt Season 2 on DVD. October may not be the cruelest month, but it's turning out to be the most expensive.
Friday, October 07, 2005
When Giant Reptiles Fight, We all Lose
From the always hilarious Dubious Quality comes this link to a BBC News story about an unfortunate relationship between a 13 ft burmese python and a 6 ft alligator. You know how these things go, python meets alligator, python falls in love with alligator, python eats alligator, alligator explodes out of python's stomach, python dies, alligator dies, the end. I guess this settles the age old question of who would win between a burmese python and an alligator. That would be no one. As disturbing as the picture is, what's even more disturbing is that when the remains were found, the python was headless. That means that there's some critter in the swamps of Flordia snacking on a python head. Maybe it's a zombie python. Brains!
In other news, emboldened by having this outcome of such a magnificent animal battle literally fall into their laps, scientists are now scouring the coasts of Africa in the desperate hope that the remains of a great white shark and an elephant wash ashore. Either that or the battered remains of Batman and Superman.
In other news, emboldened by having this outcome of such a magnificent animal battle literally fall into their laps, scientists are now scouring the coasts of Africa in the desperate hope that the remains of a great white shark and an elephant wash ashore. Either that or the battered remains of Batman and Superman.
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
The Atlanta Driver's Handbook
Greetings fair driver! Welcome to Atlanta, the city too busy to follow basic traffic laws. Here in The ATL, we're known for two things, naming everything after peach trees and sitting in traffic so bad you want to find a peach tree and bust your head against it. We didn't get this way by accident, oh no, it takes years of careful civic planning and a complete and total lack of competence on the part of you, the driver, to make this city the congested commuter shithole it is.
This handy guide has been created to help out those new to the area, who may have come from cities that know what a stop sign is. With the tips in this guide, and a liberal amount of head trauma, you too can drive the way Atlanta wants you to. Horribly!
Everywhere the Signs
As you drive around Atlanta, you may notice a lot of streets named after peach trees. With a language spanning some 600,000 words, you'd think we could come up with some more street names. Not so! Besides, what do you have against peach trees anyway? Getting around Atlanta is easy. Imagine a grid where some streets run North to South, some run East to West, some go diagonally, some go in a circle, some make an 'S' shape and some go absolutely nowhere. Now, if the North-South streets are named one thing, then the East-West streets will be named the same thing, but appended with a "SE" or the number 3, or the letter 'Q', or a very small dot of orange paint. Simple! You can also use handy city landmarks to get around. For instance, if you're driving along and you see the sign for The Varsity, you're in downtown Atlanta. Or you're in Alpharetta. Similarly, if you're in Marietta and you see the Big Chicken, then you know you're in Marietta. Piece of cake! If you see homless people then you're in some bizarro alternate universe, as Atlanta has made homelessness illegal. As we all know, the best way to fight poverty is to criminalize it!
Stop Me Before I Stop Again
During your travels around Atlanta you may see strange, red, octagonal signs asking you to stop your vehicle. We all know that when going 65 mph in a residential area, stopping is just a recipe for disaster, or at the least, undue wear on one's seat belts, so feel free to ignore these "Stop" signs. If you feel like you have to slow down, do so, but try not to go under 45. The people behind you have places to go. Similarly, if you're on a highway and a flashing sign is telling you to merge left or right due to a lane closure, what they mean is to continue driving until the lane ends, possibly by slamming you into a piece of heavy machinery, and then swing in to the next lane as quickly as possible. The person you cut off won't mind. And if they do, it's probably their fault anyway. Had they rocketed down the shoulder at 85 mph before merging, everyone else could have all gone a little bit faster. This strategy is also helpful for "Exit Only" lanes. If no one will let you merge, simply stop your vehicle and wait until someone lets you in. Those people behind you will just have to wait. They don't mind. Honest. As for traffic lights, don't worry if the light has turned red and you're still in the intersection, thereby keeping the opposite lanes from getting through. That's what those cameras are for, to capture your wacky hijinks. Oh how we laugh when we see the pictures of the other drivers as they get red faced with rage while all the time you sit there and desperately try to ignore them so you won't have to make eye contact and admit to them that you're a total fucking idiot. Thanks for those fun times! You know who you are.
Can't Stop the Signal
Legends tell of strange devices attached to our cars that, with a flick of one's finger, can indicate to other drivers that you're intending to switch lanes, or turn a corner. Here at the Atlanta Traffic Council, we don't hold much with legends and tall tales. I mean, a flashing light, on a car? That's madness. What would these strange, blinking, flashing, signal devices be called? Flashers? Blinkers? Signals? Flablinknals? The things people come up with. No, fair driver, these items exist only in stories, and it's a good thing too, because how are you expected to drive, hold your cellphone, change the radio station and operate a signalling device? You'd need like 4 arms! As it is, you need 3 just to be able to hold the steering wheel, and you've been doing just fine without doing that, so a fourth arm would be absolutely unnecessary. Plus, think of what would happen to the global sleeve industry if everyone now needed 2 more sleeves on every piece of clothing they own. Demand would outstrip supply and we'd have a garment recession not seen since the Great Zipper Collapse of '08. Just as people don't need to know that your uncle likes to dress in women's clothing, they also don't need to know every time you want to make a turn. Too much information people! Besides, it's a nice surprise, when they expect you to go straight and then you veer off wildly. It's especially surprising if they're trying to make the same turn! Good times. As for lane changes, if you feel the need to tell the other driver that you're planning on occupying the space they're currently occupying, a roll of the eyes, or pointing of the finger will suffice. Honestly, none of this is necessary as physics won't allow both you and the other person to occupy the same space at the same time. Simply get into the other lane and let Classical Mechanics do the rest!
Bumper Cars
On rare occasions, and we mean rare, like it almost never happens, you may find yourself in bumper to bumper traffice on an Atlanta highway. When this happens, it's absolutely imperative that you get as close to the car in front of you as humanly possible. This will ensure that more cars can fit on the roads and that we all get home as quickly as possible. You wouldn't think that 6 inches makes a difference but they all add up to a whole bunch of inches. At least a dozen. We've come up with a handy formula to decide how close you should be to the car in front of you. Simply take the distance from the ground to the top of your front bumper and subtract it from 10. This is how many inches you should be from the car in front of you. SUV owners, this may mean that the front axle of your car is in the back seat of the car in front of you. If so, be sure to buckle your axle in. Safety first Atlanta! Not only will this get us all home faster, but larger cars will be able to shield smaller cars from debris and low swooping pterodactals should a dimensional portal to The Savage Lands be opened and the creatures of prehistoric days thunder across Atlanta's roadways.
Civic Planning
Here at the Atlanta Traffic Council, we too are doing our part to ensure that Atlantans look forward to prostate exams more then their daily commute. That's why we've laid out Atlanta's roads and streets as if the city's infrustructure was planned by drunken howler monkeys. In fact it was. Skippy has been a civil engineer with the City of Atlanta for 20 years now. Say hello Skippy. "*BURP* SCREECH!". Ha! Too true. Anyways, here in Atlanta, we feel that the best way to tangle you up on your drive home is through a cunning combination of single lane roads, left turn only intersections and retail plazas. For example, can you imagine a two lane road with an intersection that leads to a Wal-Mart and behind the Wal-Mart an elementary school? We can, and did! Nothing adds time on to ye olde commute like waiting for buses to take a left in the morning, and shoppers to take a left in the afternoon. Future plans involve putting a landfill behind the elementary school that's behind the Wal-Mart and making it a left turn only intersection so that those that could have taken a right into Wal-Dump Elementary have to go down the road to another left turn only intersection, complete a dangerous and illegal u-turn, and then take a left into good old WDE. That's right Atlanta drivers, we don't expect you to be the only morons in the state. We're dumb two! That is to say, we're dumb to! No wait, ah, forget it.
So there you have it Atlantanoids, all the tips you need to make sure that anyone even attempting to get from one place to another in under an hour have their hopes and dreams smashed like a tail-gating bumper at 4:30 on a Friday afternoon. Remember, Atlanta is the only city to have traffic cops at intersections with fully functioning traffic lights. It's your incompetence that makes Atlanta so fun to get around. Happy driving Atlanta! Take it away Skippy!
*BURP!*
That guy. He kills me.
This handy guide has been created to help out those new to the area, who may have come from cities that know what a stop sign is. With the tips in this guide, and a liberal amount of head trauma, you too can drive the way Atlanta wants you to. Horribly!
Everywhere the Signs
As you drive around Atlanta, you may notice a lot of streets named after peach trees. With a language spanning some 600,000 words, you'd think we could come up with some more street names. Not so! Besides, what do you have against peach trees anyway? Getting around Atlanta is easy. Imagine a grid where some streets run North to South, some run East to West, some go diagonally, some go in a circle, some make an 'S' shape and some go absolutely nowhere. Now, if the North-South streets are named one thing, then the East-West streets will be named the same thing, but appended with a "SE" or the number 3, or the letter 'Q', or a very small dot of orange paint. Simple! You can also use handy city landmarks to get around. For instance, if you're driving along and you see the sign for The Varsity, you're in downtown Atlanta. Or you're in Alpharetta. Similarly, if you're in Marietta and you see the Big Chicken, then you know you're in Marietta. Piece of cake! If you see homless people then you're in some bizarro alternate universe, as Atlanta has made homelessness illegal. As we all know, the best way to fight poverty is to criminalize it!
Stop Me Before I Stop Again
During your travels around Atlanta you may see strange, red, octagonal signs asking you to stop your vehicle. We all know that when going 65 mph in a residential area, stopping is just a recipe for disaster, or at the least, undue wear on one's seat belts, so feel free to ignore these "Stop" signs. If you feel like you have to slow down, do so, but try not to go under 45. The people behind you have places to go. Similarly, if you're on a highway and a flashing sign is telling you to merge left or right due to a lane closure, what they mean is to continue driving until the lane ends, possibly by slamming you into a piece of heavy machinery, and then swing in to the next lane as quickly as possible. The person you cut off won't mind. And if they do, it's probably their fault anyway. Had they rocketed down the shoulder at 85 mph before merging, everyone else could have all gone a little bit faster. This strategy is also helpful for "Exit Only" lanes. If no one will let you merge, simply stop your vehicle and wait until someone lets you in. Those people behind you will just have to wait. They don't mind. Honest. As for traffic lights, don't worry if the light has turned red and you're still in the intersection, thereby keeping the opposite lanes from getting through. That's what those cameras are for, to capture your wacky hijinks. Oh how we laugh when we see the pictures of the other drivers as they get red faced with rage while all the time you sit there and desperately try to ignore them so you won't have to make eye contact and admit to them that you're a total fucking idiot. Thanks for those fun times! You know who you are.
Can't Stop the Signal
Legends tell of strange devices attached to our cars that, with a flick of one's finger, can indicate to other drivers that you're intending to switch lanes, or turn a corner. Here at the Atlanta Traffic Council, we don't hold much with legends and tall tales. I mean, a flashing light, on a car? That's madness. What would these strange, blinking, flashing, signal devices be called? Flashers? Blinkers? Signals? Flablinknals? The things people come up with. No, fair driver, these items exist only in stories, and it's a good thing too, because how are you expected to drive, hold your cellphone, change the radio station and operate a signalling device? You'd need like 4 arms! As it is, you need 3 just to be able to hold the steering wheel, and you've been doing just fine without doing that, so a fourth arm would be absolutely unnecessary. Plus, think of what would happen to the global sleeve industry if everyone now needed 2 more sleeves on every piece of clothing they own. Demand would outstrip supply and we'd have a garment recession not seen since the Great Zipper Collapse of '08. Just as people don't need to know that your uncle likes to dress in women's clothing, they also don't need to know every time you want to make a turn. Too much information people! Besides, it's a nice surprise, when they expect you to go straight and then you veer off wildly. It's especially surprising if they're trying to make the same turn! Good times. As for lane changes, if you feel the need to tell the other driver that you're planning on occupying the space they're currently occupying, a roll of the eyes, or pointing of the finger will suffice. Honestly, none of this is necessary as physics won't allow both you and the other person to occupy the same space at the same time. Simply get into the other lane and let Classical Mechanics do the rest!
Bumper Cars
On rare occasions, and we mean rare, like it almost never happens, you may find yourself in bumper to bumper traffice on an Atlanta highway. When this happens, it's absolutely imperative that you get as close to the car in front of you as humanly possible. This will ensure that more cars can fit on the roads and that we all get home as quickly as possible. You wouldn't think that 6 inches makes a difference but they all add up to a whole bunch of inches. At least a dozen. We've come up with a handy formula to decide how close you should be to the car in front of you. Simply take the distance from the ground to the top of your front bumper and subtract it from 10. This is how many inches you should be from the car in front of you. SUV owners, this may mean that the front axle of your car is in the back seat of the car in front of you. If so, be sure to buckle your axle in. Safety first Atlanta! Not only will this get us all home faster, but larger cars will be able to shield smaller cars from debris and low swooping pterodactals should a dimensional portal to The Savage Lands be opened and the creatures of prehistoric days thunder across Atlanta's roadways.
Civic Planning
Here at the Atlanta Traffic Council, we too are doing our part to ensure that Atlantans look forward to prostate exams more then their daily commute. That's why we've laid out Atlanta's roads and streets as if the city's infrustructure was planned by drunken howler monkeys. In fact it was. Skippy has been a civil engineer with the City of Atlanta for 20 years now. Say hello Skippy. "*BURP* SCREECH!". Ha! Too true. Anyways, here in Atlanta, we feel that the best way to tangle you up on your drive home is through a cunning combination of single lane roads, left turn only intersections and retail plazas. For example, can you imagine a two lane road with an intersection that leads to a Wal-Mart and behind the Wal-Mart an elementary school? We can, and did! Nothing adds time on to ye olde commute like waiting for buses to take a left in the morning, and shoppers to take a left in the afternoon. Future plans involve putting a landfill behind the elementary school that's behind the Wal-Mart and making it a left turn only intersection so that those that could have taken a right into Wal-Dump Elementary have to go down the road to another left turn only intersection, complete a dangerous and illegal u-turn, and then take a left into good old WDE. That's right Atlanta drivers, we don't expect you to be the only morons in the state. We're dumb two! That is to say, we're dumb to! No wait, ah, forget it.
So there you have it Atlantanoids, all the tips you need to make sure that anyone even attempting to get from one place to another in under an hour have their hopes and dreams smashed like a tail-gating bumper at 4:30 on a Friday afternoon. Remember, Atlanta is the only city to have traffic cops at intersections with fully functioning traffic lights. It's your incompetence that makes Atlanta so fun to get around. Happy driving Atlanta! Take it away Skippy!
*BURP!*
That guy. He kills me.
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