We were planning on going down to Portland for Halloween, but work kept me up for the weekend. So we went to Halloween Party 2004 presented by Keith and hosted by Nishan and Anthony. We had tons of fun, and had fantastic (and ultra geeky) costumes thanks to Kara's stupendous needlework. Here are some pics of us as Mario and Princess Peach (circa Mario 3 thanks to the raccoon tail and ears!).
Mario and Peach
Mario Front
Mario Side
Peach Front
Peach Closeup
The Halloween pictures below were taken with our new digital camera that we bought on Saturday. Before Sat. our only digital camera was on our camcorder, which is simply too large to carry around for snapshots (plus it’s only has a 1 mega pixel CCD). I did a taste test of the two cameras and I am completely stunned by the results (especially the tree picture). Check them out, old on left, new on right:
I can’t get enough of this late night election coverage. Four years ago I watched with a passive curiosity, but the recount debacle sucked me in. I’m pretty grateful for that bizarre adventure because it really got me interested in politics. This was back when I was in school and I had quite a bit of free time, so I would watch hour upon hour of political news. Now that I’m employed, I have much less time to sit in front of the TV, but I have been trying to keep up on the campaigns as best as possible. I watched all four debates, and I weekly watch Meet the Press... so who did I vote for? No one. I guess I planned on voting, but my absentee ballot never showed up and I didn’t really notice until it was too late. But honestly I’m kind of glad I didn’t vote because I’m not particularly fond of either candidate.
I fall pretty firmly into the Republican camp on social programs, spending, size of government, environmental issues, etc, etc. However, I’ve been pretty unhappy with Bush’s performance in the past four years (foreign policy and spending stand out as the two biggest problem areas)... but my views still line up better with the GOP. Kerry would probably be better at “being president” but he’d be passing policies that I don’t agree with. Do you see my dilemma? Thankfully I didn’t have to make a decision (and even if I DID vote, it wouldn’t have made a bit of difference). So it looks like Bush is going to be reelected... I think it’s probably the better outcome, but I’m definitely not overjoyed or think that “my guy” won, or anything like that... C’mon 2008!
So Donkey Konga sucks. The song selection is really lame, and you don’t get the feeling that you are playing along with the songs. Fortunately I got it for free, so I traded it in today, along with Soul Calibur 2 and La Pucelle, for Dead or Alive Ultimate. I also renewed my subscription to Game Informer, the best video game magazine I’ve ever read. DOAU has been a lot of fun already and I haven’t even played it online yet! It’s not drastically different from DOA3 (which I also have) but it does have better graphics, bigger and more levels, and more costumes to unlock. Plus it gives me a new excuse to stare at the hottest videogame girls ever created. It runs in widescreen at 480p, so it looks absolutely gorgeous on the big boy.
Should I have to sign up for some stupid website, just so I can watch a commercial for a movie?!? Hello? Lucasfilms? It’s a damn advertisement; you should WANT me to see it. Well, I ain’t signing up on principle. I’m not going to jump through hoops to help them sell their movie. Plus, I’m sure I’m not missing much since the movie’s going to be crap anyway. I hate you George Lucas.
Someone at work downloaded the Episode III trailer and shared it out, so I got to watch it without signing up for anything... I watched it, and I got all excited in spite of myself. I can’t help it; I think it’s a battered wife syndrome kind of thing...
Things started off really good between me and George, but then he neglected me for far too many years. Recently I’ve been getting more attention from him, but it’s bad attention. He’s hit me a few times in the last couple of years, and each time I run off and live with my mother for a while (in the basement, obviously). But then I remember the good times, and he promises things will change and I start believing him. Well, I’ve moved back in with him, and so far things are going OK (the Special Edition DVDs were the equivalent of verbal abuse, but at least he hasn’t hit me). Well May 19th is when the next movie comes out... He wouldn’t hurt me 3 days before my birthday, would he?
Before today, I was on the fence about Pixar. I really liked the Toy Story movies, A Bug’s Life was just ok, and I disliked Monsters Inc. and Finding Nemo. By my count, they had as many hits as misses, so I decided that The Incredibles would be the tie breaker. But I have to admit that I wasn’t approaching the flick with an open mind. I fully expected to hate the movie; The only trailer I saw was the “try to get belt on” teaser (as discussed at Static Zombie) and I thought it was just stupid. Even when I read Kieran’s positive review on Saturday, I just mentally rolled my eyes and still expected the worst.
Cindy and Miya were up here for the weekend, so I suggested seeing it as a kid (and hopefully adult) friendly thing to do. I was blown away. About 1/3 of the way in, I started thinking “y’know, this is dealing with interesting ‘grownup’ issues” (Bob pining for the glory days, his dead end job = lack of engagement at home, and his total turnaround when he gets to do what he loves, etc). Sometime shortly after the villain was revealed did I realize that this wasn’t really a kid’s movie at all. Sure the kids still enjoy it, but it seemed to me that the target audience was someone a bit older than the 6 year old that we brought along.
Anyway, Pixar won me over (at least until that horrible looking Cars movie comes out). Not only is this the best Pixar movie, I’d say this is the best superhero movie I’ve ever seen! Look at me, I’ve gone all Brett.
Today was my third visit to the podiatrist, and all was not well. Apparently the warts decided to spread from the last treatment of the blister beetle venom. So, I got “zapped” (the doctor’s words, not mine) with the juice again. I didn’t realize how much stuff he put on until this evening when I took my sock off. I slowly peeled back the bandage and was shocked when I saw what he had done. He must have used the whole bottle of goo on my foot because the blister is gigantic! I’ve taken some delightfully disgusting pictures for your enjoyment.
I told you all to start watching Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn. You didn’t. And now it’s cancelled. I watched the final episode today, and it made me sad and mad to see it go. This was one of the few genuinely funny shows on TV and it got canned... Sigh, why can’t I like the same stupid shows the rest of the world likes? I mean, it’d be so great if I loved Friends and Everybody Loves Raymond. Then I could watch the same five jokes played out week after week and never have to worry about the show being cancelled. Or I could get a lobotomy... it’d be about the same.
When I started dieting and exercising 11 weeks ago, I set a goal to lose 20 pounds (which would put me in the Normal range on the BMI scale). Last night I hit that goal; it's been 3 weeks since I quit eDiets, and I lost the last 5 lbs. "on my own." I'm still pretty suprised at how easy it's been! But, now that I'm at 169, I see that I've still got weight to lose, so there's no reason to stop now. I'm afraid I won't be satisfied until I look like Kate Moss! (which, honestly, is going to take a lot of facial reconstruction surgery...)
I am in awe of the multiplayer experience of Halo 2. It’s the first game to fully deliver on the two-year-old promises of Xbox Live. Where to start... First, the matchmade games are perfect when none of your friends are online. It’s so nice to have a guarantee that you will be only playing against people at the same skill level as you. It’s also awesome to see your level increase as you defeat higher level players. I even ignored a game invite from “K Smooth” Keith last night just so I could keep playing ranked games to bump my level up. I talked to him today and apparently he was sitting in a room all by himself waiting for me to accept... loser.
And when your friends ARE online? It’s such a slick online experience that really feels like you are all hanging out in the same room. Previous Live games required everyone to congregate before starting the game, which meant you had to prearrange a game time, or luck out by finding your friend idle while you were. Not with Halo 2; you can join a friend’s game at anytime. And once you and your friend(s) are joined in a party, there’s no separating you. It ends up making the online gaming feel just like gaming at a LAN party. Like two days ago, I messaged Micah (oh, the new voice messaging also is an awesome feature that streamlines pregame communication) and we got in a game together. We were talking in the lobby, when INfINItE ENdING (a guy I was playing against earlier) joined to me. We played a game with just us three, but then INfINItE ENdING had to leave. So Micah and I started a one-on-one game, but halfway through Brett showed up. And then 3/4 of the way into the game, Jeff showed up as well! When that game ended, we were all in the lobby and ready for another game.
And as if that wasn’t enough, Bungie has put up a sweet website that shows stats on every game played. Here is a list of my recent games, where you can look at who I was playing with, who won, and even detailed stats like hit percentages! There is even an RSS feed for each player’s games (which I am trying to get integrated into my site)!
So basically, this is the best online game ever made, ever. I don’t think there is even a point for companies to make new Xbox games, because I think all of our Xboxes just became Halo 2 boxes.
Ok, here come the Halo 2 gripes... First, I should have been more precise when I said that it’s the best game ever. It’s the best online multiplayer game ever, but the single player game is blah. It’s basically the first Halo (which also was no big whoop) but with more vehicles. It’s plagued with the same problems of the first game, primarily the absence of feedback on which freaking way you’re supposed to go (made only worse by the boring and repetitive level design). But Bungie has been making the biggest deal about how great the story is... um, ok. So far it’s been pretty standard fare, and the gameplay feels REALLY disconnected from the story in the cutscenes.
As for multiplayer gripes, my single biggest complaint is the way, way, WAY overpowered plasma sword. The one hit kill thing is something I can live with, but that lunge covers far too much distance. Join that with the generous “auto aim” and you’ve got an ultra-powerful weapon that is far too easy to use. Slayer matches devolve into “get the sword” matches; most anytime someone comes across the sword, it becomes their primary weapon. This is similar to finding the rocket launcher, however rockets take some skill to use and they can be risky. In smaller maps, using the sword is almost guaranteed to grant you a kill or two. Lame.
Finally, let me ask you what you think the defining characteristic of a map called Colossus would be? Did you guess its enormous size? If so, you get a cookie. Maps of enormous size, however, should not be used for 8 player slayer games! I can’t even describe how crappy slayer games on Colossus are. Well wait, let me try... Do you like running? Of course not, no one does! But that’s mostly what you’ll be doing on Colossus. Running from ridiculously distant spawn points to the same spot of the map where everyone congregates. Weak.
What’s grosser than a giant foot blister? How about a giant foot blister that’s turned brown and has started peeling off...
We’re back in Seattle after a 1.5 year sabbatical in Redmond and I must say it’s good to be back. Yesterday Kara and I woke up in the townhouse in Capitol Hill that we just started renting and one thing was for sure... we were hungry! Cereal sounded good, but alas, no milk. No problem, Kara walked across the street and bought some at the little store one block down. Beautiful. I walked down there last night to see what they had to offer, and I realized how more alive the city feels. Redmond, with all its green grass and leaves, can’t be called dead, but maybe asleep.
One of the main reasons we moved out there last year was to escape the commute, but this time I’ve joined a carpool. As of this morning, I am officially a Beaver! (BTW, you probably shouldn’t follow that link, it’s officially the Worst. Blog. Ever.) Kieran drove while Jeff regaled us with stories of post hockey puking (not to be confused with pucking).
Everything is well in the world, except for one thing... My big TV wouldn’t make it up the stairs to the living room! So it sits in the garage, covered by a blanket from Mexico, and waits to be loved. If I start missing her too much, I might try to turn the garage into a theater room (it’ll need some carpet and a heater). I can see it now, me and the spiders watching movies together...
It's been 1 year since I set up Less Than Me, and if you thought last year was good, just think about what we have in store for this next year! The extended version of Return of the King, Star Wars Episode 3, the Firefly movie, my acquisition of a piano and my feeble attempts to learn to play, DS vs. PSP, Maui, a year's worth of doggy hijinks, and WILL I EVER GET THAT FREAKING iPOD?!?!?! Stay tuned!
Last week Tivo recorded an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space 9; it wasn't a bad guess on Tivo's part since we regularly watch Enterprise and have watched a bunch of The Next Generation in the past. Seeing it in the Now Playing list, though, made me confront an issue I've been meaning to deal with for years now.
I started watching DS9 back when it was first on, but the whole "look at us, we're just running a space station" spin on the Star Trek universe never interested me much. So I stopped watching the show (I'm guessing somewhere in the middle of season 2? I'm not exactly sure when it was.) But now every time the show comes up in conversation with fellow geeks, it's made clear to me that I stopped watching just before the show got good. Apparently after I stopped watching, the station got a ship and started fighting the Dominion over in the Gamma Quadrant or something like that. So I ought to have started watching reruns, but I have a crippling aversion to watching episodes out of order! The episode Tivo recorded, however, was a "sequel" to a TNG episode that Kara had seen, so I thought it might be fun to watch.
The great thing is that Kara is getting a decent amount of Trek knowledge under her belt. She might not know everything about a race or faction, but she knows enough for me to describe another episode that we've seen that deals with the same people. Yesterday's episode was about Thomas Riker (a clone of William T. Riker created by a transporter anomaly) stealing The Defiant. When it was revealed that Riker was working with the Maquis, Kara asked who they were I was able to say "Remember that episode of TNG were Ro was infiltrating a group, but at the end decided to stay with them and leave Enterprise? That group was the Maquis." The BEST part of the night was when Tom (who, up to this point, was pretending to be Will) pulled off his sideburns to show who he really was. Kara said "Of course, he's gotta have a goatee because he's bad!" I was totally oblivious to the sideways nod to Mirror, Mirror but Kara caught it! (I think she more recognized it from the alternate universe episode of South Park, but still...)
Anyway, watching that one episode made me start thinking that once I have more free time, I should probably sign up for Netflix again and start renting the DS9 DVDs...
I saw wasabi potato chips today and was so intrigued that I bought them. I thought "what does wasabi actually taste like, except for spicy?" Then I ate a chip and thought "Oh yeah."
