Over the last couple of weeks, I've been mentally composing a list of wrongs - here it is.
- Tiger Woods. Enough already. Who cares? I'm sure there is a time in many marriages when one partner would very much like to take a stiff shaft of steel and strike it against a thin pane of glass. Most of us are lucky that our lives and indiscretions are not written about in the tabloids. I do feel bad that Tiger thinks we're all so dumb as to believe his story. It also sucks that so many of his fans won't be able to see him play this week-end. I'll be glad when this story isn't the headline of every news report.
- People shooting one another. There was just another incident in Seattle where someone took it upon themselves to kill random (or not so random) people. We need to find another way of dealing with our frustrations people! Step away from the gun! And yes, guns do kill people - when they are held by angry mentally unstable people. America - It's way past the time to review the 'right to bear arms'. Seriously.
- Party crashers in DC. Obviously this couple is completely classless - way to inspire terrorists - Good job Secret Service. Get over yourselves. If that couple does appear on the Real Housewives of DC, yes I will watch, but I will do so knowing they are douches. Yes, douches.
- CBS sports coverage of football. PLEASE! Stop showing fantasy stats 2 minutes into the first quarter! Just give me the scores. FOX tried this one week, then they realized it is very annoying. The CBS pre-game hosts are so stiff, serious and boring - they need to re-think their coverage. Also - please get the grown men dressed in suits OFF a mini field recreating plays. It's embarrassing to watch them fake passes, pretend to block and run about in slow motion while telling us lowly viewers what is going on. Who thought this was a good idea? Even the superior FOX pre-game does the 'All State Covers the Field' segment - it's just terrible!
- VOX. I like so many things about VOX, but you'd think they'd have the bugs worked out. I can rarely comment on other blogger's posts. I would say my success rate is less than 10%. For a month I couldn't load any books... It seems like there aren't many 'real' people out there... only ads and tweets...
- The music in the Big Break. The Big Break is a compelling (although slightly cheesy) golf competition reality show on the golf channel. The 'background' music is so loud it's difficult to hear them speak! The music is full of 80's inspired gratuitous guitar riffs chock with dramatic starts and stops. It makes the show nearly unwatchable. I swear the guy editing the sound is also the writer, producer, and composer of said crappy music and he thinks it's the most important part of the show. ARG!
- The service at RBC. My mom isn't exactly mobile right now. After a rough hour of therapy the other day, she asked me to run into the Royal Bank to make a deposit. She handed me her bank card and a personal check written to herself from her CIBC account. The place was completely empty, and the teller asked me if I had an account there, and I told her not for about 8 years or so - and informed me I couldn't deposit it for her. She called over a supervisor and they told me it's illegal for me to have her card - I pointed to my mom sitting in the car and told them it's difficult for her to walk. No go. She has been banking at RBC so long her account number is like '8'! I have been making deposits for my mom at CIBC for 20 years. Random vacationers deposit money in our account in Tennessee all the time. When in real estate, it was a well known fact that RBC lacked customer service. They told me my mom would have to come in. I pointed at the teller and supervisor and said, 'This is exactly why I don't bank at RBC - your customer service it terrible!' My mom then limped in, and we had to wait a few minutes for the supervisior to re-appear - although the place was empty - they told her to swipe her card in the card reader, it didn't work, oh wait, no you have to sign this... they have no idea what they are doing there... they told my mom, now that they 'know' her, (she has been banking at that location since it opened more than 30 years ago...) if she needs to do another transaction, they can come out to the car (no drive up window...). Sure. Brutal.
- Tim Horton's. I was at the drive thru last week, and after making my order, the girl working the drive thru said, '$1.32'. No drive up, no please - just the total. When I picked up my coffee, she never said a word. Not the amount, not the change she gave me and not a 'have a good night'. Nothing. I should have said, 'HEY! You may hate your life and your job, but you're paid to be nice. It's your job to be polite, follow policy and smile.' Ah well, I'll put that retort in the vault and use it next time - I'm sure there will be a next time.
- People who are all show and no go. I know people who brag about the parties they attend, the rich people they know, the cars they drive - and when it comes to being generous - nothing. If they donate anything it's used and worthless. There is a Sutton Creek Ladies Christmas party next week where we all bring toys and canned goods to donate. Believe me - I'll be watching to see what this one lady brings. She is so pathetic. If she doesn't bring anything I will say something to her.
- No response. I hate when I ask people to get back to me on something and they don't. Even if they don't have the answer, then just tell me that! I'm guilty of this occasionally, but I always apologize and have a reason... some people are just lazy, afraid so say 'no', or are trying to piss me off.
Oh, there's more... but I have to run, and wow, I really feel better now!
Ok, it's been a while since I reviewed anything game related so I thought I'd bundle up the recent influx into a single post and catch up with things.
First up, I've got back into using the PSP on the train, having bought an 8GB memory card for it. I bought a few extra games to while away the time on pubilc transport. Notable entries are Mercury Meltdown, Bloodbowl, Castlevania Dracula X Chronicles and Final Fantasy Crisis Core.
Mercury Meltdown is a cel-shaded update of the original Archer Maclean's Mercury that is a fun little puzzle game that is a lot more grown-up than its cartoon graphics would have you believe - well worth investigating as a way to make your journey more enjoyable. It's a bit of a slow-burner as you spend a fair while getting introduced to new puzzle elements, then it drops you in at the deep end and becomes a very mature puzzler indeed.
The nice thing about this game is that you don't need to be a gamer to get the control system - it's one stick to do everything and the graphics are clear and logical enough that your mum can have a go without getting confused!
Next up is a reworking of a classic old game - Castlevania Dracula X Chronicles. Basically, you play a vampire hunter (Richter Belmont) and his plucky girl (Maria Renard) as you battle ghouls, ghosts and vampires in a sprawling epic platform adventure game. This is basically a reworked, graphically gorgeous omnibus of Castlevania: Rondo of Blood and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on one disc (with an original PC Engine version of Rondo, as a bonus) and, as both games are rather excellent in their own right, it proves to be a bit of a bargain. One thing to note is that the gameplay is geared very much towards those who know how to wield a gamepad - these games are part of gameplay folklore for a reason: they are very punishing to the novice, yet very rewarding once you get into the swing of things. It's funny to note that games such as Tomb Raider that took the same adventure/platform mix and pushed it into 3d seem to be a lot more gentle in ramping up the difficulty, yet the heart-pounding, sweaty-palmed nature or Castlevania is one of its greatest appeals. These games hark back to an age when split-second timing and pixel-perfect judgement of jumps meant the difference between success or failure and there is something very engaging about their honesty and purity in gameplay terms. The fact that the games look gorgeous and genuinely suck you in is a major bonus, too.
Bloodbowl is another train-journey favourite. It's a totally accurate recreation of the Games Workshop board game, in 3D. The graphics aren't great, there is a missed opportunity as far as injecting some humorous video clips in-game, but overall it's a good little turn-based strategy. Not much to say, other than it's like Marmite - I like it, you might, or you might hate it, but it makes a change from the usual football manager games, etc.
There are few games with more heritage than Final Fantasy and there have been a few attempts over the years to break the games out of their turn-based RPG genre, notably Crystal Chronicles on the Gamecube.
Crisis Core mixes some real-time action, with turn-based combat in 3d and attempts to tell the story running up to the events of Final Fantasy VII. I won't go into plot detail, as it would spoil the experience. However, if this game appeared on PS2 it would be a triumph, so for it to be available in your hand is nothing short of astounding - high production values abound and it's easy to lose an hour or longer when you'd just sat down to play for ten minutes. Buy it now - you won't be disappointed.
However, my gaming is not limited to the PSP and there have been a couple of major events on the PS3 that have hit our household. First up, we got the Eyepet - which is cute and is a great way of entertaining our six-month-old daughter. Not much more to say on that, expect it's a clever mix of user input and tamagotchi-style gamplay, like Nintendogs witha webcam, really.
The two big hitters in the new game lineup have been Uncharted 2: Among Thieves and Assassins Creed 2. Previous posts here have made no secret of my admiration for the predecessors of these two titles and I have to say that the sequels improve in ways I thought impossible on an already high standard.
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves weaves a tale that runs from a museum break-in to a Balkan state in turmoil, to Tibet. You meet the odd weird creature (hence my alluding to Yetis, but I won't spoil the surprise) and spend a large amount of time with your heart in your mouth as you leap from adrenalin-soaked action sequence to gunfight to puzzle. The plot is not going to win an oscar, but the Uncharted games are all about that B-Movie romp feel and it hits every note perfectly. You care about the lead characters, you engage with the cut scenes and the action is non-stop. The only complaint I have is that I've finished it!
The other new purchase is Assassins Creed 2, which pretty much picks up straight after where the first game left off, with your character breaking out of the Templar research lab and joining some sort of underground resistance.
www.babymattison.blogspot.com
Ok, so I broke the screen on the Vaio. something got between the screen and keybaord when I closed it for the night and I opened it the next morning to find the glass cracked and a couple of bleed points in the LCD, although it still works if I don't move it at all. Bugger.
First port of call was Google to see how much a replacement screen is going to cost (£100 give or take), which means I'll have to get the toolkit out when I'm off for Christmas and repair the injury. However, I was in the market for a mobile 3G dongle, as I spent three or so hours on the train every day and it'd be nice to get some studying done (network security - rock and roll it ain't!) and the iPhone is a pain for reading text-heavy stuff. I know I can tether via the phone, but that's prohibitive if you pay O2 for the extra plug-in and whilst I can do it using a downloaded profile, I'd rather not risk the wrath of a telco legal team if they decide to go after everyone who has figured out how to work around the controls. Besides, once I go back to working for myself, I can charge the usage to the client, so hence the search. I figured I'd go for 3 or Orange as my iPhone's on O2 and at least this way I should be guaranteed network coverage from someone - although it's not 100% infallible. So it was that on Saturday I came into possession of a free Toshiba laptop with Windows7 Home Premium on it.
Oddly for me, I couldn't tell you the model of the laptop - it's named something snappy like LQ500-qzw13abc - catchy. However, it's a nice looking beast, with a 15.6" glossy screen, DVD-RW, 4GB of RAM, 250GB hdd, etc. The older model had an AMD CPU and NVidia graphics, but mine's a T6600 Core 2 Duo with Intel integrated, which I chafed a bit about, but the fact is that this is going to be used for web surfing, MS Office, watching the odd movie and a lot of DOS prompt stuff means that I don't actually need a Geforce GTX - that's just my ego being bruised!
One thing I noticed is that it feels a lot lighter than my old 15.6" Vaio - then again, that's got magnesium and the like in it's case, whereas the Toshiba is plastic-central - whilst still feeling pretty solid in build. It's stylish enough whilst still looking business-like and, given that it's free (or part of the bundle), I am not complaining - it's also great for running ScummVM, so I'm happy - if I can play Monkey Island and Broken Sword I'm generally satisfied, as I play most of my games on the PS3 (or the PSP if I'm on the train). Result!
Windows 7 has been a pleasant surprise - after the nanny-state of Vista, it's been pretty unobtrusive, it's zipping along on the Toshiba (although with 4GB of ram and two 2.2GHz cores, I'd expect it to!) and it's almost Mac-like in it's user experience. Almost. It's nice to be able to zoom in and out using two fingers on the pad, but I still have to find a little strip on the right for scrolling, which is a minor annoyance but nothing show-stopping. It's annoying that you are forced to use a slideshow as your wallpaper and the only way to fix the screen is to deselect all the other images in the collection (of course, these are first impressions - this might all change as I discover more about the OS) and the real pain in the ass is that Microsoft is only allowing Windows 7 Business and Ultimate owners to download and use XP Mode, which has killed off any hope of playing Sam and Max Seasons 1 and 2 from Telltale games, although I just downloaded their new Monkey Island season 1 and that works fine, so it's not all bad news. I guess I can install VirtualBox or similar and run XP as a VM, anyways...
So, it's not always bad news when I discuss things from Redmond - credit where it's due, Windows 7 is actually pretty good. OK, it's not as simple as OSX or as powerful as SGI Irix, but it's easier to use than Linux, faster than Vista and has 64-bit support. Nice!
It's Week 12 of the NFL season. How's your team faring?
Not so great, but thanks for asking, Vox.
I can't believe how fast this football season is flying by. I can't believe how terrible I'm doing! This week is tough... there are some games that really could go either way...
GB @ DET - I chose GB for this game. I thought Detroit would fare better, then poor Stafford went from being a SuperStar against the BROWNS to throwing 4 (at least at my last count) interceptions against GB.
OAK @ DAL - I picked Dallas and it proved to be a wise choice.
NYG @ DEN - Damn the formidable power! of Manning - at least Indy will win this week. Because I hate Denver so much this NYG loss was a big surprise and disappointment... ah well.
TB @ ATL - Blah - TB
MIA @ BUF - I'll take the fins.
CLE @ CIN - Oh the pain! Oh the agony! Poor Cleveland! Even with a Cinci loss in week 11 against the Raiders of all God forsaken teams, I'm still not confident in the skills of my Brownies... Someone said last week that Quinn works out too much for a quarterback...
Yep, he big... does it hurt him and the Browns? I don't know! All I know is I love the Browns and am looking forward to going to Cleveland next week! Yeah! Oh, yeah, I'll take Cinci, although it kills me to do so. I shall don my gear and cheer heartily for the Brown Boys. SEA @ STL
CAR @ NYJ - Hm... never bet against the Jets versus Delhomme realizing throwing multiple interceptions doesn't win football games... dilemma dilemma. Jets at home! Carolina is decent! Heads - Jets. tails Carolina = Go Jets!
WAS @ PHI - Phi. And I hate them still
IND @ HOU - The power of Manning! should result in a Indy win. The balance must be restored! Indy.
KC @ SD - SD
JAC @ SF - American quarter says - Heads Jacksonville, Tails San Fran = Go JAX.
ARI @ TEN - TN is on a 4 game winning streak... ARI is on a 3 game streak and at the top of their crappy division... TN is at home - ARG - well I'll pick TN and from this I should determine if the quarter makes better choices than I do...
CHI @ MIN - Min
NE @ NO - Dilemma, dilemma... William is convinced that NO is not that awesome... Tom Brady bothers me... so does his coach... NO at home... I'll take the Saints.
Yikes, this week could be scary.
Well, American Thanksgiving is over, and it was, (if I say so myself) quite successful. It was a good time, with one very odd, slightly awkward pop over. Ah well... We had a few people cancel, and one guy (who could have potentially brought up to 5 people) thought we were having people over on the Saturday after Thanksgiving... uh, no - but now we probably are.
Last Sunday the Jude and I
attended the Lions V Browns game in Detroit. It was the best, most exciting game I've ever seen, even though the Browns lost - it was an amazing time. It was interesting to see how Detroit hosts a football game - I've only ever been to Cleveland and the Silverdome, so seeing the difference in the tailgating (we only saw a bit)
and the atmosphere downtown was really cool. Ford Field is pretty nice, but so different the the Browns Stadium - and a totally different vibe.
We went to Cheli's Chili first and it's absolutely stupid that they can't serve alcohol before noon. That Detroit by-law is costing businesses some serious dough. All in all, it was a great time, and when they play each other again I would certainly go.
This is what $585,000 can buy you in the Toronto area:
1,300 square feet, 2 bedroom condo in downtown Toronto... the monthly fees are $800+ a month.
This is what $585,000 can buy you in the Detroit area:
That's right. Recently the Pontiac Silverdome sold to a Toronto businessman for $585,000...It was built in 1975 for 56 million. That's some serious depreciation...
Another year toward the bottom of the NFL football pool. I took another beating this week with losses in very close games. The Falcons lost in overtime and Detroit beat Cleveland by one point. Apparently there are some accusations of Detriot faking injuries to stop the clock / pace of the game.
It appears that my chances of catching Picklez or Screamin are all but gone.
On NFL Sundays, I've had the pleasure of watching a few games with Picklez this season and he has shared his "Manning Theory" with me on several occasions. Since I've been entertained with it, I thought I would share it with all my blog readers.
The theory is this... Eli and Peyton Manning share a common pool of football talent and only one of them can access the "talent" at a given time. If their respective teams play on different days or at different times, then everything is fine. If they play at the exact same moment, then only one of them can be successful. Being a geek, this of course reminded me of the "Marvel Family" that had to share the power of SHAZAM!. If Mary Marvel and Captain Marvel were active at the same time, then they were only half as powerful.
The point? I have no idea. I am just going to shout SHAZAM at Picklez whenever I see one of the Mannings on television.
#42 Cross Country by James Patterson. Good Dr. Alex Cross
novel - quick, fast paced read.
#43 The Sinner by Tess Gerritsen. This book started off a little slow, but picked up about half-way through. I haven't read her novels before, but I would read her again.
