...and the rest (AKA: fuggit!)

So, I had all these lofty ambitions of how I'd do an individual post for each of the top 10 games of '06 and each one was going to have a homemade picture and blah blah but fact remains, I have a life and if I've got an option of writing about video game or actually playing said games, well...guess which one I'm gonna chose. So yeah, here ya go...don't spend it all in one place:

My top 10 video games for the year 2006:

10. Dead Rising

9. Lego Star Wars II

8. Guitar Hero II (Red Octane for Playstation 2)
Better songs, better co-op, and Suicidal Tendencies! The only thing that sucks about this game is that it didn't make it to the 360 in time for '07. All the PS2 version's goods + hi-def, DLC, 5.1, and Achievements. It's gonna give a whole new meaning to March Madness...

7. Okami (Clover Studios for Playstation 2)
The only good thing that came out of my originial 360 breaking down, is that I got a chance to play this game. Easily the most original Zelda clone ever and a last breath in a dying generation. It hurts me to think that the company that made this is now defunct. Let's hope those developers continue on to push the boundaries of what can be done in this industry, rather than just being willing to crank out clones of sequels of roster updates of shitty licensed games. *sigh...*

6. Rainbow Six: Vegas (Ubisoft Montreal for 360)
Gadgets, guns, and gambling! A match made in heaven. This game that finally made me appreciate the much-loved R6 franchise. Come for the cover system, stay for the 4 player co-op.

5. Marvel Ultimate Alliance (Activision for Multiple Platforms, played on the 360)
Sure it's buggy as hell, but drop-in/drop-out co-op and a huge 24 character roster makes it a Marvel geek's wet dream come true. It's clobberin' time!

4. The Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess (Nintendo for Wii)
It made it to #4 based purely on potential, and the fact that I needed to justify spending $300 just to play it. Considering the rate I've been slogging through it, I'll probably end up beating it some time around June so, more about it then...

3. Wii Sports (Nintendo for Wii)
A shallow experience for hardcore gamers, but by far the most fun game out on the system. I think Nintendo really nailed the "casual gamer" demographic they were aiming for with this one. The proof is the fact that my mom will call me up and ask me when she'll be able to play Tennis again which, as far as I'm concerned, is a much more compelling reason to own the Wii than Zelda is. Plus, bowling with Big Lebowski Miis is an experience to behold...

2. Gears of War (Epic Games for 360)
A. The best looking game you've ever seen. No, really.
B. Co-op throughout the entire campaign.
C. Hella fun 4 on 4 team deathmatch.
D. Your main character is voiced by John "Bender" DiMaggio.
E. You'll never forget the first time you chainsaw a motherfucker in half. And yeah, it's still just as fun the 100th time you do it.
F. The only reason it's not number 1 on my list is that it's not...

1. Viva Pinata (Rare for 360)
Yeah, I said it. For fans of Sim City, RTSs, Pokemon, and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder...Rare presents an incredibly deep game with brilliant art direction, clever achievements, and mad legs. The reason this hits number 1 is due to the fact that I'll probably be playing this loooong after some of the others on this list are collecting dust on a Gamestop shelf. Check the sales and pick this one up when it hits $30, you'll be glad you did.

P.S. If your friends are laughing at you for playing this, then they're not really your friends, are they? Viva!

It was a very good year, for games to play on my TV...Part 2

Man, 2006 may have sucked for a lot of things, but gaming certainly was not one of them. Hell, I probably left more games off the main list than I even played last year…and 07 is only gonna be better. So, here you go, my top 10 games of 06. And then some.

9. LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy (Traveller's Tales/LucasArts for Multiple Platforms)

"As far back as I can remember,
I always wanted to be a [Jedi]."

Seriously. The first movie my parents ever took me to see was Star Wars. Every year, for every birthday, I had a Star Wars party. For Halloween I dressed up as Chewbacca, a Stormtrooper, R2-D2, and Darth Vader. Every Xmas, I'd beg for big ticket toys like the Death Star, an AT-AT, or the Millenium Falcon. I never went anywhere without carrying around a little C-3P0 or Boba Fett. I had New Hope wallpaper, Empire sheets, and Jedi curtains in my room. Yes, for most of my childhood, I was a Star Wars junkie.

As I got older, interest began to wane. I flirted with other franchises. A Die Hard here, a Terminator there but in the end, it still always came back to the Holy Trilogy. If you'd asked me in 1997, after the severly compromised Special Editions had been released, I'd still have defended them to the death. Then, one day in 1999, the unspeakable happened. The horrific abortion of George Lucas's original vision of a Galaxy Far, Far Away was vomited forth on screens, store shelves, and novelty drinking glasses as far as the eye could see. I speak, of course, of Episode I. Almost overnight, my love affair with Star Wars vanished.

Clock wipe to 2006 and the release of LEGO Star Wars II...the magic is back! Every classic scene of the first three movies is here for you to play through again and again (with over 50 different characters.) Saving the Princess from the Death Star? Check. Riding your speeder bikes through the forests of Endor? Check! Luke's showdown with Darth Vader and the Emperor? Double check! Shit, even taking out AT-ATs with a snowspeeder's tow cables (a set-piece that has been in like EVERY SW game for the past 25 years) still seems fresh.

In fact, playing through this game is probably the closest I'll get to even being remotely interested in watching a Star Wars movie again for quite some time (which is probably for the best since it's going to be a while until they have a clean DVD/HD anamorphic print of the "Han shoots first" originals with a 5.1 soundtrack, fuck-you-very-much-o-flanneled-one.) Add in tons of hilarious cut scenes, bonus extras, and the ability for a second player to jump in and out at any time and you've got a game that'll warm even the most jaded former Star Wars fan's heart. Huzzah, Traveller's Tales...now bring on LEGO Batman!

It was a very good year, for games to play on my TV...Part 1

Man, 2006 may have sucked for a lot of things, but gaming certainly was not one of them. Hell, I probably left more games off the main list than I even played last year…and 07 is only gonna be better. So, here you go, my top 10 games of 06. And then some.


10. Dead Rising (Capcom for Xbox 360)

To paraphrase, "Dead Rising is one of the best broken games you'll ever play." That is to say, that this game has a lot of strikes against it (and let's not even count the bug that ended up killing a bunch of people's 360s, since that wasn't prevalent in every copy.) One save slot, unreadable tiny text on SD TVs, respawning enemies, mentally retarded AI, an aiming mechanic that is somehow worse than Metal Gear Solid's, and Otis…motherfucking Otis. Of course, you'll pretty much forget about all of this once you've started bashing zombies with electric guitars, knocking them over with bowling balls, mulching them with a lawnmower, or simply knocking them down and twisting their heads off like grapes.

And the achievements… There's definitely something to be said for a game that asks you to murder (or re-murder, I guess, since they're technically dead already) 54,000+ zombies for a lousy 20 Points. I mean, shit, I got more than that for clicking on a particular menu in Madden. Then again, I probably would have jumped at the chance to do the same thing in Madden (replacing "zombies" with "football fans") for no points at all. Plus, there's nothing like having the word "Genocider" on your gaming resume. As far as bragging rights go, it certainly beats the shit out of "Hatched an egg using Cluckles," don't it?

Learnin' to Wii with my left hand...

By combining two of my favorite things (video games and bulleted lists) I've come up (and by come up with, I fully mean "Steal content from other people's sites) with some good web picks for both savvy Wii owners (which is probably nobody that's reading this right now) and people who like cool game-related stuff (which is also probably nobody that's reading this right now.) Don't say I don't know my demographic...

Anyway, about a week or two ago, Nintendo released an Opera-based Internet Browser for the Wii. Reactions were decidedly mixed. Most people, myself included, felt that a browser was nothing but a slight, but wholly unnecessary, diversion. especially considering that 90%-100% of people who own both a Wii and a wireless router also own a computer and tend to browse the internet on that.

On the other hand we have the cripplingly lazy. These fervent defenders immediately praised the fact that they no longer needed to get up off the couch to check Gamefaqs to find that last piece of heart container in Zelda. The reality of this, of course, is that to do so they would actually need to quit out of the game and boot up Opera to do so, which would take roughly as much time as just going over to your PC to check the same page. Factor in the fact that without keyboard support, you’re forced to hunt-and-peck out the address on an onscreen QWERTY display (which, to be fair, is not 100% horrible as long as you’re not trying to send an email or post a blog or something) it ends up taking about twice as much time as using a computer terminal in another room, or a full four times as long as using a couch adjacent laptop (in case you were wondering the science behind my discoveries, cease all pontification…I’m making this up as I go along.)

Oh and in case you were wondering, on an 42” HDTV running at 480p (which is not the resolution you get with the standard set of Wii cables) the internet looks like complete and utter shit…which, if you think about it, sorta makes sense since the internet is pretty much comprised of complete and utter shit…but I digress.

Now, I’ll admit, I bought into the Wii browser strictly for the novelty factor. As a free piece of software, it works pretty well, and certainly stands to extend the life of a console with an anemic batch of launch games and the inevitable Gamecube-esque drought that’s sure to follow. So then, the question is: Now that you’ve taken the plunge and downloaded the browser, just what in the hell do you do with it?

• If you’re anything like my friends and I, the first thing you do is try and find porn…I mean, it is the internet after all. Now, of course, we’re not the only people that thought of that. That’s why (at least according to this guy at Ars Technica) the fine folks at www.tiava.com (NSFW, btw)have designed a Wii friendly version of their site. Regardless of my personal feelings towards pornography, I’m very impressed that the Wii is already having that much of an effect on how people are designing their websites, especially considering that the browser has only been around for about two or three weeks now. It’ll be interesting to see how many other sites and blogs will start coming up with Wii-friendly layouts if console browsing really does take off. Then again, anyone remember WebTV? Yeah, me neither.



• Another site that’s been specially designed for the Wii-web’s crap resolution. Large fonts and big, colorful GUI buttons make this Pandora-lite internet radio “station” worth checking out…just make sure that you hate good music before visiting.



• I have to admit, quality aside, this is the site that I’m most impressed with the design of. With an interface built to mimic the Wii’s startup screen, this little collection of Flash games does a reasonable job in simulating an actual (albeit, somewhat sloppy) Wii minigame experience by offering point-and-click versions of games like Simon and Duck Hunt. Sure, they don’t run as well as games specifically designed for the system but, like Nintendo’s entire online approach, you get what you pay for! The best thing about this is that if you weren't lucky enough to score a Wii console at launch, you can just bring this site up on your computer and totally front like you've got one...at least until someone asks to play...



• Finally, the best of the best. The fine folks at Red Kawa bring us Sofatube, a way to effectively browse and watch YouTube videos on your couch via Wii or PS3. Now I personally was never bitten by the YouTube bug as hard as a lot of people I know (mostly due to the fact that I can’t get it at work and by the time I get home, I’m loathe to sit in front of a computer monitor any longer than I have to) but I’ve got to admit, this is pretty fucking cool. In addition, if you’re planning on using your Wii as a media hub (I don’t know why you would, but that’s just me) check out Red Kawa’s video converter here. It should let you convert all of your .avi, .mpeg, and .divx files into Wii-able files. I haven’t had a chance to try it out yet, but if anyone else does, let me know.

Hell, if anyone even has a Wii, for that matter, let me know. I’ve got some Big Lebowski Miis with your name on them…

Barney vs. Velociraptor

Yeah, this is a repost from my MySpace blog but whatever. I'm gonna try and keep them both current with eachother, if not current with the date.

Me or the mirror

I genuinely can't decide if I want to keep trying to resurrect this blog or just say fuck it and stick with the Myspace one. I guess I'll just use the two as mirrors for eachother since I've probably got a total of 5 readers between the two. Either way, I'm gonna kick off the new year with a random picture of Anton LeVey as the Iron Chef. Enjoy!

Spam, or Mars Volta song?..you decide.

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Clickity-clack...bring it on back! (Link roundup for 8/10 & 11/06)

• So, you say you need a great way to fuck with one of your vacationing co-workers, but covering their cubicle in foil is just so passé? Well, I'm sure Mike's coworkers would have a couple of clever suggestions for you...



• While this is probably one of the most heinously laid-out sites I've ever seen, it's also a veritable comedy goldmine (providing you're willing to put the work in.) I'm thinking about trying my hand at some of those OSHA signs after consuming gallons of coffee and letting my caffeine-riddled id take charge...



• I can't decide which is worse in terms of journalistic integrity, grabbing your ankles, shitting out whatever press release Tony Snow just jammed up there, splashing it with colorful 3-D graphics, and tagging it as "news"...or saying "fuck it!" and just making it up? It's obvious that the only way this can be settled as a Thunderdome-style cage match featuring Jayson Blaire vs. Bill O'Reilly*. Shit, I'm going to get on the phone with pay-per-view about this right now! If this idea catches on, I may make a million by 35 after all...



• PS3 vs. Wii? Think differently. I know which one I'll be picking up!



• 5 albums in heavy rotation this week:
  -Firewater: Psychopharmacology
  -Shapes and Sizes: s/t
  -Islands: Return to the Sea
  -Tapes 'N Tapes: The Loon
  -Teenage Fanclub: Bandwagonesque
  

*I actually checked the Faux News site to try and find the name of an actual reporter, but I'm pretty sure they don't actually hire them any more. It looks like what they're doing now is just grabbing other people's stories off Knight-Ridder and Reuters and having one of their 10,000 "Commentators" shout about it in highly arguementative tones. Additionally, going to their site also let to some information that reminded me why I stopped paying attention to the news in the first place (and why I rarely, if ever, talk about it any more.) Apparently, not only has the Terror-Threat-Level-ometer been raised from Burt to Ernie but, due to some Die Hard 3-esque "liquid-bomb" BS, you can no longer carry-on suntan lotion, toothpaste, or even fucking bottled drinks on planes! So now, the list of verboten items has been extended to such WMDs as nail clippers, knitting needles, and the most dangerous element known to man...water. Fuck trying to smuggle uranium, I know I sure feel safer now that the friendly skies are free of the deadly H20!

When reached for comment, every single fucking passenger from every single fucking interview from every single fucking news outlet could be quoted as saying, "Sure, it's a pain in the ass, but what are you gonna do?" Personally? Since we're gonna get fucked in the ass either way, why not just tell DHS and the FAA to go to hell, and get an IT?

Webnotes and such for August 7, 2006...and stuff.

• Wait...intelligent discourse revolving around Sony's entrance into the whole next-gen console wars that doesn't completely break down into wild fanboy speculation and rabid name calling?! Yeah, I didn't believe it either...



• No more words and/or guitar? Sigh...Here's a link to the full MP3 version of Sleater-Kinney's last DC show ever. Thanks, Matt...and yeah, I cried a little too. (Incidentally, I still have some amazing pictures somewhere that I shot of a 9:30 SK show from, I wanna say, The Hot Rock tour. I really should try and dig those out...)



• In honor of next week's 2nd Season premiere of Showtime's Weeds, I decided to see what their official site had to offer. Turns out, there's a slew of (*shudder* there's that word again!) Podcasts up there, featuring the cast and creators. I've yet to listen to them but I assume they should be at least as informative/interesting as the commentary tracks on the Season 1 DVDs. At the very least, there's probably no screaming babies or idiot stoners in the recording studio this time around...



• Though Sunday's ads have told me otherwise, I prefer to hold to the belief that Capcom's Xbox 360 ode to the lighter side of the zombie holocaust Dead Rising, is actually going to ship on its ship date (which happens to be tomorrow.) After playing the demo last night, I absolutely need to get my hands on that game as soon as humanly possible.
  
  While most of the game seems to be focused on squishing, bludgeoning, decapitating, and coming up with other new and clever ways to help shuffle the walking dead off this (im)mortal coil, I personally am far more interested in the whole photojournalistic aspect of the game. See, your character in the game is a photographer who gets choppered into an undead-infested shopping mall in the hopes of scoring himself the scoop of a lifetime. Since you're there first and foremost to get some amazing pictures, I'm curious to see how they plan on handling that part of the gameplay.
  
  Sure, I'm prepared to risk my (virtual) neck to capture that perfect "holy-Jesus-I-know-I'm-about-to-get-my-fucking-face-bitten-off-but-I'll-be-damned-if-that's-not-a-great-fucking-shot!" shot, but the real question remains: can I do anything with these pictures once they're taken? In the demo version, I noticed that you can save individual shots to an "album" of sorts, but honestly, that's just not enough. With any luck, Capcom will take a note from the 360 version of Burnout: Revenge and let you upload them to some kind of server and share them with your friends. If not, I think I might just have to figure out a way to do it my damn self, because there's just too much potential situational comedy in this whole premise to just let it go to waste.

A case of "that book learnin'"

I don't know how it happened, but I seem to have caught a case of Litmania recently. That is, I've been reading a lot. And not just comics like usual (though I'll debate, or possibly even go so far as to fight anyone questioning the legitimacy of the graphic novel as a viable literary and/or artistic medium.) In the past 2 weeks, I finished Sarah Vowell's Assassination Vacation and Steven Johnson's Everything Bad is Good for You and am currently slogging through the last 60 pages of Greg Palast's incredibly dense The Best Democracy Money Can Buy as well as MTX's Dr. Frank's clever first novel, King Dork.

My goal is to keep 1 fiction and 1 non-fiction title going at a time. Next up on the non-fiction block is either Bloodsworth or Bowling Alone, two titles I picked up last week based on recommendations (and, in the case of the former, seeing an absolutely heartbreaking CSPAN rerun of an in-store appearance of Kirk Bloodsworth, the titular character and first US death row inmate to be exonerated based on DNA evidence.) As for the fiction, well...I don't really have any. Maybe someone could recommend some that are actually worth spending the time on since I'm drawing a complete blank. I like Elmore Leonard if that helps at all...

Incidentally, this whole thing also begs the question, do Audiobooks count as reading? I mean, sure, the whole concept of "reading" implies that your eyes are physically moving back and forth across the page, but theoretically you are engaging just as much of your mind by listening to them as you are by reading their printed counterparts, right? Just because you happen to be using a different input medium to transfer that information, shouldn't devalue the information itself. Plus, in the case that the author themself is also wearing the hat of the narrator, a unique layer of perspective is added to the experience while still simultaneously engaging your imagination. I know that they probably don't hold the same amount of street-cred (or whatever the literary equivalent of street-cred is,) as actual books do, since I'm not a pretentious fuck who goes out of his way to make sure you know just how well read I am, I'm gonna count them in tandem with the books...so take that nobody!

Other things that are awesome today...(with links!)

• A new LOST podcast from last week's San Diego ComiCon! Lots of new info...plus the mystery code "VIX7ZXT97." Where does it go? Hansoexposed.com? What does it do? Hmmm...



• Fall comes early! The second season of Prison Break starts up on August 21st and one of my favorite character-actors William Fichtner is going to be joining the already stellar cast! Information courtesy of...Myspace?!
  
  
• Ever wonder what 5 albums your favorite musicians would want to be stuck with for the rest of their lives, were they stranded on a desert island? (I think Hurley's advice there would be "Dude, bring some extra batteries") Well... wonder no more. See how your choices match up...



• Not desert island, mind you, but these are the top 5 albums I've been rocking the hell out of this week (in no particular order:)
  
  1. Tapes 'N Tapes: The Loon
  2. Queens of the Stone Age: Lullabies to Paralyze
  3. Finks: More Songs About Robots and Black Things
  4. Clem Snide: The Ghost of Fashion
  5. Maritime: We, The Vehicles



• The 33 1/3 book series. When Monica and I were at a party at Last Gasp Press in San Francisco, I stumbled across a couple of these in their warehouse. They're basically just little books that are supposed to accompany your favorite albums, but they've got so many amazing ones out there already, I think I just may become obsessed. All I know is I'm going to put up the first round of orders for Paul's Boutique, Daydream Nation, Dolittle, and In the Aeroplane Over the Sea as soon as the last shit I ordered from Amazon comes in.



• Touch and Go's 25th anniversary megashow! Pegboy, Man...Or Astroman?, Big Black, and Three Mile fucking Pilot!!! After missing Lollapalooza this weekend, I need to make this happen...



• One word, Superchunk. NC, here we come!



• Two awesome (and extensive) pieces of info from gaming site Gamasutra:
  
  1. Telltale Games is finally making a sequel to Sam & Max: Hit the Road, probably my favorite computer game ever (Lucasarts has been repeatedly shitting on the license for the past 10 years, constantly shelving it to make room for more and more lousy Star Wars games.) There's 2 interviews up with members of the Telltale staff here and here. Great stuff in there if you're interested...and if you are, I'd recommend going to the Telltale site and reading the brilliantly original Sam & Max webcomics they've got up there. 21st century storytelling infused with vintage Steve Purcell humor. God Steve, we're sure glad to have you back!
  
  2. Two audiocast interviews (yeah, I've got an iPod too...fuck, I've got three...that still doesn't mean I can stomach the word "Podcast") with John Baez of The Behemoth, the company that completely blew my mind with the spectacularly simple Alien Hominid. A good listen if you're interested in breaking into the gaming industry or if you want any inside info on AH...or the upcoming Xbox Live Arcade exclusive Castle Crashers, which I know you all do...



• Finally, I am totally addicted to the all too sweet "Islands Gone Bad" by this new Canadian band Shapes and Sizes. I'm so fucking buying this album this weekend...
  

Well, I guess that's it for today. Hopefully you'll all find something on here that tickles your fancy...or your grundle...or whatever it is that's in dire need of a ticklin'...

Random nothing

Words I like today:

exculpatory
Scrimshaw.

Words that make me want to kill today:

Memecurve
Memecloud.

Spam Poetry II

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And in that space, an empty place...

I'm currently undergoing Battlestar Galactica withdrawal. I don't know how this happened but I suppose I can attribute it to that Sci-Fi channel magazine I was thumbing through at Monica's last night. I guess it was the fact that for Sci-Fi's biggest show, you think there'd be more than just a 100 word boxout on Starbuck's new haircut but, well, I guess not. Anyway, that got me thinking that in my mad race to play catch up (I started watching the miniseries/first season about 4 episodes before the end of the second season) I didn't really give this show the attention it deserved (including watching 3 eps back to back to back in a room full of people who just couldn't shut up, as well as watching the amazing S2 finale on the 2x1.5" screen of my fucking iPod!)

Now the good thing is, I can really take my time and actually pay attention to what the hell is going on since the good folks at Sci-Fi have successfully forced me onto their timetable by wating until Mid-September to release the second half of the second season on DVD followed closely by the start of Season 3 in October. The bad thing is, once I'm done with the DVDs we already have (and by 'we' I mean 'Jon',) I have to wait until goddamn September to actually finish it up. Oh well...I'm sure I'll find something worthwhile to occupy myself in the meantime (and by worthwhile, I'm pretty sure I don't just mean scouring the internet looking for pictures of Tricia Helfer's ass...but I make no promises.)

P.S. Here's a picture of Tricia Helfer's ass...

Duck and cover...

I've only been awake an hour and I've already gotten shampoo in my eye and almost got my car door taken off in the parking lot. I think I'd better try and keep my head down for the rest of the day, lest it get chopped off or something...

MS Painting!

Basically a repost from my Myspace blog, but here's a picture of a Werewolf and a Robot having a drink, done in MS Paint. You can click on it to make it full size, if that's the kind of thing you're into...

A few bullet points.

It's been a little while since I posted anything on here so I guess I'll give a brief rundown on what's been going on in the past week or two. Join me, won't you?

• Monica and I saw Superman last night. The movie was pretty good, both from a story and action standpoint, although I did start to fall asleep towards the end. I've gotta say, that new dude made a pretty solid Superman. The rest of the cast? Well...um...the guy that played Jimmy Olson gave me a few laughs. But Parker Posey and Kal Penn, what the fuck?! Hope you guys got a nice paycheck...



• Went to a pretty fun little BBQ on the 4th. I didn't drink that much and no real veggie food to speak of, but damned if we didn't get to shoot off a hell of a lot of fireworks. Thanks Chris!



• Finally finished up Call of Duty 2 on the hardest possible mode. It took about 3 weeks of plugging away but I finally liberated France from those "dirty Kraut bastards." Now what the hell am I gonna do?



• Got through the first season of Prison Break in about a week. Not nearly as good as its Monday night follow-up (the still impressive 24) but with a pretty decent gimmick (the clues unfold from the main character's full body tattoos) and some fantastic casting (Peter Stormare, John Heard, and Stacy Keach to name a few...as well several excellent unknowns) I'll make sure I'm around for the Fall season.



• Speaking of shows I'm looking forward to next season, if the rest of Supernatural is as good as the episodes I'm watching now, I'm going to have to add it to my ever increasing DVR queue. The way it deftly juggles mystery, humor, and genuinely scary horror, honestly reminds me way more of Buffy than the X-Files (the show I've heard it most often compared to,) a compliment which I do not give out lightly. Plus, I love the fact that the source music for the show is based pretty strictly in one of the character's old rock casette collections and hits on Sabbath, Rush, Metallica, Van Halen and pretty much any other awesome rock band from the 70s or 80s, which is a gimmick I can 100% get behind.



• Item: I need a hair cut. All of them, actually...



• So, I've been reading a bunch of awesome comics lately and I would recommend looking into any, or all, of them. They are as follows: Ultra: Seven Days (miniseries,) Fables, The Walking Dead, and Runaways. When I'm finally caught up on all of those, I think I'm going to finally borrow Monica's League of Extrordinary Gentlemen books. I've been really meaning to check those out for some time now, even though I've just about had it with Alan Moore and his particular brand of bullshit.



• After about 2 years of searching in vain, I was able to score a LP copy of Les Savy Fav's The Cat and the Cobra on ebay. I bid far too much on it, but since I haven't seen it pop up on the internet in over a year, I was not going to let it get away. I sincerely hope it makes it to me safe and sound so that I can finally mark that one off the list.



• Finally, I made pretty much my first successful spike last night in volleyball. I think I'm actually getting better which, to me, is pretty exciting.

That pretty much wraps things up, I suppose. I don't exactly know how to tell if people read these since nobody ever comments but yeah, with any luck, someone out there gives a shit...

God of W...hat the fuck?!

If you thought that the Star Wars Kid was retarded, you ain't seen nothin' yet...

YO SOY KRATOS!!!!!!!!

I was going to make a clever soccer-related headline here...

...but then I thought, "You know what? Fuck soccer!"

How did soccer become hip all of the sudden? That's all I ever hear about anymore. Blah blah, "Brazil this" and "red card that." I mean everywhere! From friends who NEVER, EVER talk about sports down to goddamn video game sites, it's been buzzing around in the background for the past 3 weeks or so now. Did I miss something? I mean, we are talking about the same old soccer that I used to play on rec-league when I was a kid, right? They don't allow kung-fu or guns or chainsaw-equipped-robot-tanks out on the field, right? It's still just a bunch of assholes with high socks trying to kick a ball into a net, right?

I just don't get it. Maybe FIFA finally got around to changing their ad campaign to something with a little more kick (Edit: oh dear god, no pun intended) than their previous outings: "Soccer! If Argentina thinks it's cool, then it must be cool!" or "Soccer! The only sport more boring than Baseball." Either way, I ain't buyin it...