elevature

The hardest thing I've ever written

2009-07-07T07:59:00.002-06:00

(WARNING: This is likely going to end up to be a bit of a tear-jerker. I take no responsibility if you read this anywhere except within the safety of your own home, but if your workplace is cool with you getting all weepy and shit, hey, go for it!)

Disclaimer aside, I guess I feel obligated to say that despite the fact that I'm having a bad day, bad days are not a characteristic I associate with my life. I think, despite my various deficiencies, that I live a pretty good life. My last week was a ton of fun; I got a chance to hang out with both friends from Texas and Curt and his wife Kristin (It's pronounced "Christine"!), and I had a lot of fun.

The highlight? Having a fancy meal at the Five Fisherman (I tried the Seafood Curry, I liked it!), and not paying a dime for it (Thanks Kirill!). Our server, a former roommate from a few summers ago, even comped us the bottle of wine we had, which was incredibly nice of her.

My weekend was spent essentially doing what I do best: playing video games.

I cannot complain about my life, because there's so many people who don't have all the things I do. There was this guy who used to work with me at Canadian Tire, but was fired for perfectly legitimate reasons (he was chronically late). I've heard rumours that the guy is now living on the street, which is stupidly ten times worse in my head than all the thousands and thousands of people living on the street that I didn't know on some "standing outside Tim Hortons asking for change" kind of level, but I digress. There's a lot of good in my life, and even when it all goes tits-up I've got a lot of good family and good friends who will unselfishly catch me.

So when I say I'm not having a good day today, it's not because life sucks, nor is it some plea for sympathy. It's simply what it is.

* * *

Here's a gigantic secret of mine: I get incredibly emotional hearing about a mother or father dying. I swear, I was watching Star Trek (the new one) and (spoiler) there's a scene at the start of the movie where poor Kirk loses his father. My friend Sarah was sitting next to me, and you have no idea how badly I was holding it in. I like Sarah, and she's a good enough friend that I don't think I would be embarrassed breaking down and balling like a kid in front of, but come on. It's friggin' Star Trek. I mocked my brother for years for crying when we watched Disney's "The Fox and the Hound." Crying during a science-fiction movie would probably destroy any chances of me being a dude bad enough to rescue one or more Presidents.

Some of my friends got me a Nintendo DS game called Elite Beat Agents (I've mentioned it a few times in this blog) and oh yeah, there is a whole scenario where a little girl tried to bake a cake for her Dad (who died in an unrevealed accident). I was heaving huge sobs of sorrow as I tapped the little DS screen, wiping the salt from my eyes so I could properly hit the little circles the game was throwing at me. The little girl popped up during the ending to cheer for my victorious well-dressed Agents and I immediately broke down.

* * *

I read somewhere that the most traumatizing thing that can happen to a man is to lose his mother (for women, it's apparently divorce). I make no secret about that fact that I've lost a mother twice. I mean, it's not something I just bring up in casual conversation, but sometimes you just have to slip it in there you know?

I was registering university debaters for a tournament once, way back when I attended classes (well, sometimes) at UNB. We were putting on our first ever "Cup To Be Determined" tournament, and I'm sitting at the table collecting names and money. This slender, handsome blonde man comes up. I've never met this guy in my life before, so I ask him for his name. I'm pretty sure this is a conversation he's had a painful amount of times in his life, it went something like this:

Me: "Hi, can I have your name?"
Him: "Patrick LeGay."
Me (trying to spell his last name): "L... E... G-g..."
Him (scornfully): "G. A. Y."
Me (sheepishly): T-thanks.

Now, Patrick is an incredibly cool guy, and I don't think his last name is silly. But I don't know, when someone has an awkward name, I think peoples natural instinct is to feign ignorance.

I think it's in the same vein that no one wants to assume that your other died of cancer when you were seven; that's a horrible horrible thing to think. No, they want to believe that each time you mention "step-mother" or maybe "my mother used to..." you're not suggesting that there is something darker behind it all. But I can't pretend that my step-mother Selina (who I want to mention, is a wonderful woman and I'm incredibly happy my father found her) is the same woman who raised me, and hey, it's particularly troublesome when I'm trying to refer to her as a different step-mother than Nette.

If anyone reading this ever gets the chance to work for Oxford or Webster, please invent a word that means "second step-mother," please. You would make things so much easier on me.

To avoid confusion, here is how it went:

First mother: Jeanette. Passed away due to cancer when I was about seven.
Second mother: Jeanette (Nette). Passed away in 2003 in her sleep.
Third mother: Selina. Currently kicking my dad's ass, God Bless Her for it.

* * *

So I have bad days. I'd like to think that every day a small sliver of the love that my mothers gave to me just slips in, and eventually it just becomes too much and I just need to take a day off to let it all out. The last time this happened was in or around the 4th of April, 2008. This is the day that Dan Savage (the awesome sex-advice columnist who writes "Savage Love")'s mother passed away, and it came up in the next column he wrote. It was the straw that broke it all I suppose; the next day I was a total wreck. I guess I was having a panic attack of some sort. I called my close family and brother and Ali and I'm crying and batshit insane and I'm worried that maybe I've turned into one of those psychics who can feel when something horrible has happened and oh-my-god-someone's-hurt and...

... no one was hurt. The only one who wasn't fine was me. I think I sent my sister Janis into a panic; I got a string of text-messages from her asking if I was okay. My Dad and Selina handled me being crazy well.

Well... yesterday I was talking on the phone, and the episode where Nette passed away came up. It wasn't anyone's fault, lord knows I didn't want to talk about it. But the conversation wormed it's way there.

* * *

I was talking about how much I miss my brother John. It's not hyperbole or exaggeration or anything when I say how much I love him. Anyway, I was talking about him, and I was asked when was the last time I lived with him. The last time I lived with him was Fredericton in 2002.

We lived with a roommate named Greg in a three bedroom apartment somewhere off of Regent Street. It was a nice place, and John and Greg were great. But I wasn't. Another year at university had started, and it was going poorly for me. I didn't attend half of my classes, and the ones I did attend I was doing miserable in. Money was tight, which didn't help. I ended up making the decision to quit university, which in retrospect was I think a good choice, but hell. I think it took a lot out of me personally.

It was a huge defeat in my life. I mean, I was a fairly bright kid, who got fairly bright marks in school. It didn't help having a twin brother who stuck with it, and was much more successful at it than you were. This is no complaint about John, because again-- best dude ever-- but all of this lead me to decide the morning that the bus was supposed to leave back for Fredericton to not get on it, and stay with Netter in Sydney. I was tired. I needed out, away from John, away from UNB, away from failure.

Nette was living in our place on Grey Street in Sydney. It's not there anymore, the people who bought it tore it down. Dad was working out in Alberta, and I'm pretty sure was having a rough time with it, but I don't begrudge him; he was doing what he could for all of us, and he certainly wasn't the only father to part from family and friends just so he could provide. And I don't want to portray Nette as a shut-in, becuase she totally wasn't. She had her wonderful daughter, Janis, nearby, and three grandchildren who were the light of her life. She lived with our dog, Dusty, who was pretty attached to her for obvious reasons.

She had gone through so much during her life. It was only recently that her first child, a child she was forced to give up for adoption, found her. She never talked about this, but again, no grudges. She dealt with a lot of shit in her life, from a miserable first husband to my extended family, which certainly didn't treat her with the respect she deserved.

But she was always there for me and John. She was, and still is, the most important person ever in my life.

I had just gotten a job at one of the local call centers in Sydney. We were both happy I think, me and her. I'd like to think for the short time we were both supporting each other. Not too long after she had gotten some coupons for Swiss Chalet. She really liked Swiss Chalet, and we agreed to go soon.

* * *

It was the next day. I was still in my training period at the call center, and that involved waking up for 9am or whatever to go down and train with the rest of the new recruits. Her bedroom was right next to mine, and she rarely had the door closed. I remember walking by and seeing her lying in bed, and feeling something was strange. But I ate breakfast anyway.

I was about to leave for work, when I felt I just had to check on her. I don't know if I can describe how she looked, or even if I want to. This is difficult enough. But the second look confirmed the worst. I remember bits and pieces of the phone call with 911. I was crying and hollering in the phone, our damn dog was braking at me. The operator was asking me to try and lift her out of the bed, I couldn't. She was asking me to check for breathing, I couldn't. I couldn't do anything. I couldn't do anything but collapse in a ball against a wall as a pair of paramedics confirmed the worst.

* * *

So I'm having a bad day, and that is certainly the root of it. Every year since 2003 I've tried to sit down and write something about it. I wanted to write more, but I think the above is all I can muster.

Look, if you've read this far, thank you, that's enough. Please, tell your parents, your brothers and sister, tell them you love them. Tell them as often as you bring yourself to, because I can tell you what it's like when all of a sudden you can't.

I'm having a bad day, but I need these bad days every once and a while. They remind me of how lucky I was, and still am.

- Eddie

all you need is Love

2009-04-22T14:05:00.008-06:00

It's not my procrastinating from studying for my final exam this semester! I swear!

I've been feeling pretty shitty lately (don't worry, no emo-blog post from me this time) but a random e-mail from a friend of mine really picked me up. He was just asking for his friends phone numbers and addresses (for a new palm pilot device he just got) but he signed his e-mail "all my love", and heck, that cheered me right up.

So this post is all about love. My love for you guys, my friends.

Rock Band crowd

Shawn. you've been there a lot for me lately to remind me of the more important things in life: Treasure and EPs. Thank you for the dark, bleeding weapon you gave me. It was a really nice gesture.

Sarah P. I don't know how I can express my non-romantic love for you and Dan. We should borrow those Lost DVDs and devour them this summer.

Ryan. You're a role model whose humour and enthusiasm keep me glued to your blog.

Jen. I dub thee an ultimate lady. This is not an award I hand out with regularity.

Morag. I find it incredibly disappointing when our little social netball clique gets together, and you're not there. When I think of the word "classy" I think of two things: Humphrey Bogart, and you.

D&D crowd

Pierre. My absolute favorite person to chuck dice with. Your enthusiasm more than makes up for my deep, dark, hatred for that Ninja you used to play.

Susanne. You brighten up the room with your infectious smile. Also: probably the only other person I know who has read a book cover to cover looking for the occasional cool spell or magic item.

Nathan. You're the cool uncle I never had. I'm sorry that makes you sound old :(

Bradley. I'm sorry for every time I've started an argument with you. I consider it an honour to play with you.

Mike. you're one of the nicest people I've ever met. Your adherence to "role" playing is inspirational!

Craig. You're one of the best GMs I've ever played under. You're ability to weave the story into interesting encounters is commendable. I apologize in advance; I've got a plan to really kick the pants off your Beholder!

School friends

Kate. You're a lot better person than you think you are.

John G. Don't blame ladies for falling in love with you so easily. There's just something about the PEI farm boy that makes a person pine.

Sarah C. Your father must be Mickey Mouse, because you're so animated. See what I did there? I'll always be up for egging an ex-boyfriend of yours' house.

Sharon. We haven't played Scrabble in forever! One of the coolest Caucasian women I know. What? You're Asian?

Friends who fall outside a neat catagory

Mike D. Coolest manager I ever had, and I've had some pretty hot managers!

Ingrid. Okay, we don't talk much at all but you totally deserve to receive a shout-out. If Justin and Jen didn't exist you'd be my favorite red-head (but officially: I love all my carrot-tops equally).

Daniel. I miss playing soccer with you. Tell Sarah I'm sorry I'm so gay for you, but how can I not be after hearing her talk so lustfully about your abs?

Good friends.

Curt. I love you man. More than I can express in words.

Justin. I would like to star in a movie with you, a movie about "bromance." I really hope I can see you in TO before the year is up.

Terry. While you stay in Calgary I'll forever miss the occasional nights where we'd just drive around and shoot the shit. I sincerely miss the hell out of you.

Ali. I hope your baby is as beautiful a person as you are. I'll always, always love you(r sister).

Dave. I love the heck out of you and Julie. I'll never forget about you (and Ali's sister).

Kristin. You're an amazing person, and I'm glad you found him. I feel like I don't tell you (or him) that enough.

Carmel. Don't let me lack of, er, keeping in communication, fool you into thinking that you're not one of the most important ladies in my life. You did so much for my brother, and I can't thank you enough for it.

Seema I cant' wait to see you again.

The most important person in the world.

John. I'll always support you! FIGHT-O! FOR EVERLASTING PEACE!

- Eddie

RAGE

2009-03-25T09:55:00.002-06:00

Background:
http://www.dalgazette.ca/?cmd=displaystory&story_id=2969&format=html

Long story short: I invite all who are outraged at the DSU Executive's treatment of Bethany Horne to write the entire DSU executive and let them know:

Courtney Larkin
(902) 494-1277
dsupres@dal.ca

Daniel Boyle
(902) 494-1276
dsuvpi@dal.ca

Matthew Golding
(902) 494-1278
dsuvpfo@dal.ca

Mark Coffin
(902) 494-1275
dsuvped@dal.ca

Kris Osmond
(902) 494-1281
dsuvpsl@dal.ca

I'm utterly outraged by this news, so I'll keep this post short. Thanks!

- Eddie

Failing to review The Watchmen

2009-03-06T23:39:00.003-07:00

I was going to write a mostly positive review of "The Watchmen" movie, and then I read this:

"100 million dollars—that’s what they spent on the Watchmen film which nearly didn’t come out because of the lawsuit, that’s what they spent on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen which shouldn’t have come out but did anyway. Do we need any more shitty films in this world? We have quite enough already. Whereas the 100 million dollars could sort out the civil unrest in Haiti. And the books are always superior, anyway." - Alan Moore (source here)

I know Moore is a crotchety dude, but he knows how to deflate a movie review.

I leave you with this:

"... this world's smartest man means no more to me than does its smartest termite." - Dr. Manhattan, from Alan Moore's The Watchmen.

- Eddie

Elite Beat Cheerleaders

2008-11-11T19:49:00.006-07:00

Something I had to share with everyone.

Now, most of my friends are familiar with the video game Elite Beat Agents. The premise of the game is that when people/animals/white blood cells get into trouble, the Elite Beat Agents are there to help encourage them through song and dance.

Now, some people know that Elite Beat Agents is based off a Japanese game called Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan! (translation: "Hey! Fight! Cheer Squad"). Like it's spawn, Elite Beat Agents, Ouendan is about a group of male cheerleaders who encourage those in need. The rhythm game was a hit in Japan, but there would be a few issues with porting the game over to America. First, male cheerleading isn't popular at all in America. Secondly, a bunch of Japanese songs no one knows (and would be unable to read the subtitles to while playing, let alone get licensed in America) would be a hard sell.

So Nintendo did a remarkable thing, by keeping the core game of tapping to the beat of songs, but made the "male cheerleaders" instead a sort of dance group, and using more familiar songs to rock to. They even went as far as to replace the Japanese "story" bits with new ones for America. All in all, an incredibly gutsy thing to do.

The game is amazing. Buy it. But that's not the point of this post!

The point is to talk about a few Ouendan videos that are on the internet, done by a game nicknamed Tasian. You may or may not be familiar with "Let's Play"'s, but for the uninitiated, regular Something Awful forum members started playing chronicling themselves playing video games that they love (well, usually ones they love), either through screenshots or video. The game gets divided into chunks, with all the other forum users contributing advice, pictures, humour, etc. It's a subject for another day, but the context is important for the rest of the post.

So Tasian decided to "Let's Play" both the first Ouendan game, and it's sequal (Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan 2). You can find his videos of the first game here, while his videos of the second game are here. One more diversion...

... the second Ouendan game was released about six months after Elite Beat Agents hit America. Ouendan 2 borrowed a few tweaks from EBA, but one thing I noticed, after watching the videos, is how they took the 'feeling' from EBA's final two levels (which involve an alien invasion) and put the heart of it (and to be honest, a lot of the 'plot') into Ouendan 2's final two levels (the last of which you can somewhat see here).

Now, the special bit that makes my heart aflutter is the commentary that Tasian puts into his videos. First of all, he does all the voices during the cutscenes, and translates any relevant text for the viewers in his videos. The little *wink* to the camera however is that he doesn't always translate everything 'correctly.'

More than that, it's important to keep in mind that he wasn't just playing this for himself, he had a small legion of people watching his progress, and well, cheering him on! The 'Goons' as they're called on the Something Awful forums all wrote (perhaps on his request, but does it matter?) encouraging messages to go along with his commentary. The result?

Genius.

Enough commentary! I present to you, the final two levels of Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan 2 in all there Let's Play glory. Trust me that the final video is absolutely worth your attention!

The second last level: Ice Storm of Doom!

Cheertapping 2 Level 18
Uploaded by Tasian

And without further ado, the last level: The Sun

Cheertapping 2 Level 19
Uploaded by Tasian

- Eddie

Oh god, I think I've crossed some sort of line

2008-08-23T13:10:00.010-06:00

(Warning: image heavy, and sadly incredibly geeky and unnecessary. Proceed at your own risk, or at least not on Facebook such that you can see the images)

So due to a forum thread I started playing a somewhat old, but very fun game from the Nintendo 64 heyday called Ogre Battle 64. Astute readers might remember me gushing about the original Ogre Battle back in the day, and now I'm back. With pictures! And commentary!

This is the lead unit. "Your" character gets thrust in here. I'm purposefully keeping this unit at a lower level compared to every other one, so it's units haven't made the jump to a promotion yet.

I had decided to name as many characters after my friends and acquaintances as possible, so I'll be pointing out who's who as the units go on. The Priest (top right) is Jen (or as I named her, "Jennifer"), while the Fencer below is Mike (Michael). The unit in the top left (and angel knight) is Sarah (Sarah), while the Knight protecting her is Dan (Daniel). Knights, Priests, and Angels (and to a lesser extent, Fencers) are all lawful units, so since I figured that 3/4 are lawyers, it only made sense to turn them into lawful units. Sarah actually used to be a Valkyrie (kind of the female knight). I made Jen the Priest after the awesome hosting she did at Mike's birthday.

Technically Sarah never turned into an Angel Knight (that was from another unit) but you can change names whenever, so I switched the units and renamed them. Ha!

This unit is probably my worst overall, mostly due to it being under leveled. It will kick it up a big notch however once everyone upgrades; We'll be getting 9 attacks from the front (instead of the current 3), Jen will be healing multiple units, and Sarah is going to be nuking the entire enemy unit with holy bursts of THE LAW.

The only legitimate time Ali has ever been a priest. Fun fact: In the Ogre Battle world, only women can be priests.

That hot valkyrie to the left of Ali is her sister, Janice. The rest are all people from one of my D&D groups (yeah I'm pretty geeky, there are two of them). Susanne is the Valkyrie, and the Knights are Pierre and Nathan. This is a pretty average lawful unit; The two Paladins are great, and the Valkyries have been with other long enough to team up and bring the thunder down on enemies together. When they both upgrade, they should be able to nuke the entire enemy unit themselves, twice.

There was only one man who could possibly be a master of puppets. One of the golems in front of Ryan is named "Dalhousie." I asked him what would he like the other golem to be named, and he answered very quickly: "The World."

This is a workhorse of a unit. The two golems can take a lot of abuse, and with 8 total attacks it pretty much wears down enemy units as they struggle to get past their incredible defense (for comparison: their physical defense hovers around 65. Everyone else's physical defense hovers around 20). They're also my Cockatrice killin' unit (in this game, you need at least one) as the golems are immune to petrification (or status effects, for that matter).

One interesting struggle I had with this unit was keeping it's alignment down. You see, McNutt could only transform into an "Enchanter" if his alignment was below a certain amount. The Golems tho, they would just keep rising in alignment, dragging McNutt up with them. Anyway, I managed to class change him JUST before his alignment would be too high. Phew! Once he turned into an Enchanter, he could go wild with whatever alignment he wished, thus I accidentally tripped into another lawful unit.

Dio is a special character you get during the game. His unit used to involve him and 3 knights beating up on things with him in the middle row, while a special priest (Katreda) healed from behind. I noticed that after he changed classes however, that he's gotten a third attack up front, so I took out one of the knights and replaced it with Saradin, a special warlock.

Since three of the units are 'special' characters, I could only name the two knights. They got named Mike and Bradley, from my other D&D campaign. They'll make fine future Paladins.

My first evil (er, chaotic) unit! Terrence is a black knight, tearing things up from the front while Craig and Shawn, both evil DMs, help him carry out his dark plans. Behind Terrance sit Shawn's sister Shannon, and to her right Sharon (the evil Tapioca Ball princess).

This is a bit of an awkward chaotic unit; the two Sorceress'es combine their magic for nice damage, and Terrance is a great black knight, but the two Beast Masters are a little weak. The plan is to eventually turn one of them into another black knight (I've got the maximum of 3, but I've yet to get a Dragoon), but I don't know if that'll save this unit. Don't get me wrong, this unit tears it up, but compared to my other evil unit it's a little lackluster. I'm hoping that as a Beastmaster, I can lift their stats enough to turn them into Ninja Masters without sacrificing their strength.

There's not much to mention about this unit, except that it looks pretty similar to the previous unit, except that the Beast Masters are Ninja Masters, and the Sorceress'es have been replaced with Archmages. The big difference is that the Ninja Masters get three attacks up front to the Beast Masters' two.

Asnabel is another one of them special characters, but if you compare him to my other Black Knight you can see that their stat differences are minimal (Asnabel is actually a bit behind). The two Ninja Masters are named after the only two Ninja I know, myself and one Dave MacKenzie. The Archmages are two Sydney Academy boys, Jonny P and Ghengis Khan.

This is my 'chick' unit. It's basically... not very good. Valkyries are okay, but not great on the front lines, the only real source of damage coming from Leia and her Valkyrie partner dealing decent lightning damage to their enemies. It's big problem is that Valkyries take a long while to turn into Freyas, and which time Leia and her partner could then probably rain lightning death apon thine enemies. The Valkyries upfront are really the ones that need replacing...

... the Valkyries + Priest here are all named after girls who have lived upstairs from me. The Priest is Jenelle, the other Valkyrie in the back row is Erin, and the two upfront are Jenny and Laura.

My third Black Knight is Curt. He was for the longest time a Beast Tamer, with two Wyverns taking hits/dodging blow/dealing all the damage up front. After I got a black dragon, I knew this unit could kick a lot of butt if I turned it into a Tiamat and threw it in back. So I did.

This unit isn't anything special, but with the Tiamat getting two area attacks that can put enemies to sleep, it's a tough one to beat. The Wyvern in the back row is a bit of a waste, I'll probably replace it with something in the neat future.

The Wyvern is named Neklidny, something maybe only Curt will get. The Tiamat is named after his girlfriend. A ha ha!

Another special character filled unit, this was my first attempt at a neutral unit. You see, it's important if you're doing for a 'good' ending + a good portion of the special characters to have units are various alignments. Chaotic units are easy to make, just level a unit too much (usually through training) and watch as it's alignment drops as it "bullies" weaker units (who have a lower level). You do the opposite for a high alignment unit, deliberately having them only fight units with a higher level. Neutral? Neutral is not so easy. Not only do you need to worry about the level of an enemy unit, you need to then worry about their alignment. Killing a unit with a high alignment drops yours, and vice versa. So that means Neutral units can only kill either.. high level-high alignment units, or low level-low alignment units. This is known as a 'pain in the ass.'

So this unit is slightly lawful. Close to Neutral (enough for all the units to be considered such) but not true neutral. Three of the characters are special; Troi is basically (supposed to be) a defensive tank, while the unit behind him, Vad, is a Grappler (you can only get one in the game). The Siren next to him is Liedel, and she's a very awesome archer. The two Sword Masters are Rob, a late D&D player (he didn't die, he just had a kid) and Mark (an old friend who always wanted to look slightly like a Jedi).

This unit used to be trash, but since upgrading to Sword Masters, the unit has the ability to dish out quite a bit of damage. You can't tell, but after deliberation I put Vad in the front row, knocking Troi back slightly. I get an extra attack this way.

This is my flying, neutral unit. It has a specific job, and does it well, yet it not so weak that it crumples in a fight. It's still a bit of a weak unit, but well, if it's getting into much combat I'm not using it right. The three units up front are Ravens, while a Wyvern backs them up from behind.

The leader is of course named after a former Coast "Best Salesperson" winner. Behind him, the monster, is his boss. To his left is former roommate, and entirely embarrassed by me when I came over to his house to play Guitar Hero II, Speedbag. The raven to his right is named Ma'dog. That's the randomly generated name. It was so awesome I couldn't change it.

This is entirely a unit that I got for being awesome at the game. Ankiseth is the main character's father, and he's an absolute beast (just compare his stats to any of my other leaders). I'll probably disband this unit at one point, because right now I don't see any point in using it...

... Ankiseth and a spare Knight I have might be the ones to perk Leia's unit up. Yeah, that's it. I just need to add more men!

My Dragon unit! Well, to be specific, my NEUTRAL Dragon Unit! My girl Carmel the Dragon Master is the one ordering those two beefy units behind her. The left one is Craig, and he's a Quetzacoatl. His job is to attack all the enemy units with damage and a paralyze effect. The dragon to the right is a Salamander, who can hit all the enemy units twice for damage and a power-down effect.

Needless to say this unit can decimate most enemy units, but it has that 'neutral' problem, thus I try and keep it out of combat.

Now for some characters that aren't in any unit:

You might be wondering why I had a level 14 wizard just sitting out on the side. The reason is that he's there to become a Lich. You see, the way units level in this game, I'll end up with a stronger unit if I level him entirely as a Lich (which is one of the, if not the strongest unit in the game). The only sad part was that it took me till level 14 until I could get his alignment low enough to become a future Lich.

Yeah, I've got a lot of dragons. This one is a Bahamut, kind of the opposite of a Tiamat, except without the cool 'put all the enemies to sleep' attack. Still a strong unit in it's own right, I've been trying to figure out which unit I could possibly throw this in. For those who don't know, monsters take up the space of 'two' characters (which is why you've seen units of 5 or 1 + 2 monsters).

This is a special priest who appeared in the first game. The problem is she's actually weaker than my other Priests. I'm still wondering if there is any good unit to throw her in...

... the only I could think to replace with her is Jenelle in Leia's group. It's be slightly worse 'Int' (Intelligence), but better 'Men' (Mental). I uh, don't really know if a priest with more Men will be necessary once I add that Knight and Ankiseth (get it? GET IT?)

Finally, you don't think I would leave out my brother would you? Sadly, these units suck!

Well, it was either this or the Cockatrice...

(Ha, I kid. The Salamander in Carmel's group is the character who's ACTUALLY named Johnny. You see? Because he's flaming? Oh never mind.)

- Eddie

Someone please spoil the ending of "The Dark Knight" for me

2008-07-18T00:33:00.004-06:00

How to make an entire theatre of people who showed up for a midnight screening of the new Batman film extremely angry:

1) Hold the movie in a venue with no air conditioning. This is to make the experience as uncomfortable as possible.

2) Delay showing the movie for a half an hour.

3) Have the movie cut out several times during the commericals/previews beforehand, letting everyone know that there is nothing wrong with the projector or components.

4) Have said components fry... over two hours into the film. Have no backup, such that people cannot even sit in good humour while you fix things, so they can at least watch the end of the movie.

5) Give people a free movie pass at $3 off their next concession purchase as a refund. Thanks, I traded over three hours of my life for a buck an hour.

- Eddie

p.s. VAGUE SPOILER BELOW

p.p.s. What happens after the line that goes something like "When an unmovable object meets and unstoppable force"?

p.p.p.s. Juggernaut beats Blob, obviously.

Why YOU "musts" be against the idea of Global Warming

2008-07-05T21:17:00.003-06:00

This is a post in reply to a friend of mine's called "Three Levels of Activism", which you can read here . Please read his case too, because well, my entire argument is a little weak if you don't!

I think the biggest problem with 'coulds' is that they don't work in the 'big picture' contest.

We've spent a lot of time talking about 'coulds' in our society. "We 'could' save the environment by driving a more fuel-efficient car instead of SUVs", "we could help the environment by replacing light-bulbs with more energy efficient ones", "we could do a lot for the environment by buying local goods and cutting meat out of our diets." These are all 100% true things, but "could" just doesn't cut it.

I understand that people with a libertarian outlook would be opposed to any kind of government intervention on this (i.e. 'musts'). But keep in mind that the environment isn't something that can be tackled on an individual level. It's too big. It's more than your backyard. It's about the next guy's backyard. And the guy across the street's backyard. And the company that employs that guy's backyard. It's about the poor kid you'll never meet who lives in India and will die at the age of 13 due to malaria's backyard. The environment is a global problem, and it's completely unreasonable to believe that every individual on the planet who is 'supposedly' contributing to global warming can independently solve such an issue.

Maybe you don't agree there is a problem. Maybe you look at Al Gore's argument and you see all these other scientists going on about weather patterns/ouiji boards/ whatever. You say to yourself "Sure, all "the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries" support the idea of global warming, and a recent study found that out of 928 papers on climate change, 3/4 supported it, while the rest did NOT reject it (see here, page 3 or here)...

...but did you see the list of scientists who reject the idea of global warming? Their numbers are staggering, almost totaling fifty individuals!

There have been 'coulds' forever, and where did they get us? Not nearly as far as simply skyrocketing the price of oil seems to have. Whether you believe the experts or not, as long as I can remember we've been given 'coulds.' I'd say most people prefer 'coulds,' but I think it's only because there is no coercion involved. You don't have to follow a 'could,' that's the whole point of them. They rely entirely on politeness to get their message across. the best part about them is that when they're not looking, you can go ahead and ignore them! And why not? Who's going to stop you? And hey, who are YOU to tell me how to live my life, look in a mirror!

I'm not David Suzuki here, I'm not really the most energy efficient guy I know. You know what my using energy efficient bulbs, and not drinking bottled water is doing for the environment? Absolutely nothing. Coulds are too small scale! It's the entire voter apathy thing, "my vote/environmental concern doesn't count if I'm the only one doing it.

And that's what could does. It takes all the problems facing the world and dumps them on your doorstep, and laughs at you to try and solve it.

So me need those musts. Musts can do something that coulds can't: They can create consequences for breaking the "must." With consequences, now people are going to be forced to change. And you know, some of this change REALLY isn't that bad. Replace your light bulbs? Meh. Recycle? Meh. There's a lot of musts, and you've got to admit that some of them aren't really that bad, and hey, some are pretty good! "You must not break into another person's home and steal their cookies." "You must not strip naked and run around chasing pre-schoolers." etc.

So we get governments who say "hey stores, you must not sell non-energy efficient bulbs." Maybe they give people an incentive to use them. You use musts to try and help, because people are a lot more likely to listen to you if you tell them that they must pay attention, this is important and there will be a quiz later and you can't afford to fail another one kid!

(I'm not going to talk about the "shoulds," which basically just straddle the fence between "coulds" and "musts.")

Let me tell you what a must does in the case of the environment. A must sees a problem, and recognizes that the ordinary citizen cannot hope to solve a problem that exists on a global scale. This is the entire reason people create interest groups and vote for governments, because there are problems that YOU (the royal 'you,' as in every individual) are probably incapable of doing. YOU cannot get a road paved if it's full of pot holes. YOU cannot decide to impose a law requiring that dogs be kept on leashes. YOU cannot decide how best to distribute natural resource revenues. YOU cannot declare war on a country. And YOU cannot decide to fix the environment. So we create these interest groups, have them lobby the government, and maybe vote in some people who will do something to fix a problem you have, such as the environment. It's democracy, and the brilliant part is that you can be like those 50 scientists, and vote against the crowd. And that's cool! (Democracy yeah!)

But let me REALLY get to the heart of this. Do you know what a "musts" really is? It's something that everyone hates: Change.

CHANGE! *brr* oh god!

People hate change. And hey, change is scary. You don't know exactly what you'll get with change. You know what people like? what they had yesterday. You know why we like Big Macs? Because we had them before. Change the formula for Coke? Are you out of your mind? D&D 4.0!? DAMN YOUR BLACK HIDES WIZARDS OF THE COAST. People want to go to sleep knowing that the sun will rise tomorrow, exactly like it did the day before, and when their head hits the pillow they don't want a damn thing to happen to their lives.

So hey, I sympathize with you if you don't want to see action against climate change, not until you know more. You want those other 25% to move from being on the fence to being for climate change? Fine. You want those 50 scientists to change their mind and start rooting for the other team? Okay. But recognize that one, the entire thing about science is that it's NEVER 100% true. Any scientist who says something is 100% true isn't a scientist. Falsifiability is about never being absolutely right. It's about being "more right" than the next best theory. You teach a course about chemistry, and you talk about Argon being a noble gas, but it's only because that's the best way to classify Argon that you have.

This also means that science is only as reliable as what you're willing to believe. Do you know why two people can have differing opinions on climate change? Because science allows them both to have their opinion. They can both have contradictory platforms, and both claim being 'more correct' simultaneously!

So when someone like me says that I'm with the "humans are causing climate change" side, it's because, like that professor talking to me about Argon, it's the best explanation I can get to explain what is happening. And it's not crazy to trust a bunch of men in lab coats I've never met; we have faith in a lot of things that we don't necessarily completely understand. How many people watch TV, but actually know how a TV projects it's signal to the screen? We trust it involves some combination of the colours red, green, and blue etc. because it's the best explanation a scientist can tell you to explain what is actually happening. You're more than welcome to believe the other guy who says that TV is actually "the devil, projecting his thoughts INTO YOUR BRAIN" and that's cool. Or, in a more serious example, you can believe global warming is due to solar radiation. A guy named Khabibullo_Abdusamatov will totally back you up, even if you're like me and can't pronounce his name correctly. And that's fine, if I do anything with this post I want to make it 100% clear that there is nothing wrong with going upstream/against the flow in the realm of anything. It forces the guys whose science I trust in to examine the effects of solar radiation, and see if hey, "maybe they're wrong."

But for now, if a guy like Dion gets elected, there is the possibility that we're going to have to prepare for change. Any person who votes for him or a fellow liberal is doing so, whether they realize it or not (and they'd be pretty silly not to) that he currently wants to make environmental change a top priority. And if he gets in, it's going to hurt! It's change! We're going to snarl our teeth and whip on a frenzy on our blogs about what a moron he is, and how he's ruining Canada and Canadians, and he's stopped any chance of Christ returning because damn it, we've just entered Ragnorok and...

... if it hurts it's because we voted him to hold our hands as we tried to do what, as individuals, we're completely incapable of. We can't elect a world gov't to handle this, so we hand the reins to the highest power we CAN, and hope that he can do more than the last guy.

And if you disagree? Then I have a 'must' for you. Don't "you could read the counter-arguments to global warming." Don't "You should read the counter-arguments to global warming." No, if you have a problem with all these other "musts" telling you to believe in global warming, then my suggestion is not to be a 'could' or 'should.

If you want to live in a world where people take a step back and reexamine whether global warming is the rule, then you damn well better be a "musts" as soon as possible.

- Eddie

Parallel Play

2008-07-05T07:26:00.002-06:00

(I'm not McNutt, but here goes)

Sloan - Parallel Play

(warning: excessive use of italics and Sloan albums ahead)

I'm writing this in between doing laundry at a nearby laundromat, and on the trip back I started attempting to compare this record to one of Sloan's old records. I remember reading a small preview/review of this CD in one of our local rags, and it commented how Parallel Play was the first non-"lackluster" CD since 1999's Between the Bridges but that's both the stupidest thing I've ever heard and cements my hatred for Metro.

Last year's Never Hear the End of It is a terrific record, standing with pride next to the Holy Trinity (One Chord to Another, Navy Blues, Between the Bridges). And you know, I think Pretty Together (2002) was pretty okay. Their only real embarrassing album was Action Pact (2003/4 according to their website), and that's mostly because we were stuck with 3 songs that Patrick and Chris had to awkwardly compose to fill the void that a lack of Andrew Scott does to an album (that's not just Sloan albums, that's every album). Still, it's kind of remarkable that Patrick's songs are actually (gasp!) highlights on the album. Also, "The Rest of My Life" remains a catchy song that I still like to play every once in a while.

But I'm getting off track (!) here. I kind of wanted to compare Parallel Play to Smeared (1992) but thinking about it during another return trip from the laundromat, determined scientifically that Action Pact is a better fit for that kind of comparison. No, Parallel Play stands unique in Sloan's arsenal, for better or worse.It's an album that feels like an EP. The album is a little short (cloaking in under 35 minutes. This isn't drastically shorter than most of their albums, which mostly all hover around the 40 minute mark. Never Hear the End of It was well over an hour, which probably doesn't do Parallel Play any favors), but mostly it feels like there's a lot of songs on here that don't really need to be here.

So okay, you keep the first track, "Believe in Me", because you want your radio-friendly single, and also something by Patrick (I prefer track 5's "Burn for It" myself). You keep Jay's "Cheap Champagne" (track 2) and "Witch's ~~Brew~~ Wand" (track 6). Andrew contributes "Down in the Basement" (track 10), and you keep Chris's "I'm Not a Kid Anymore" (track 12). That's a solid 5 tracks, and it's be a great little EP.

Sure, the rest is decent to good quality, (your mileage with "Emergency 911" might vary. I liked it for the record (!)). The problem is that the album feels like it's incomplete. It feels like Sloan went into the studio a mere year after recording their last album, and oh hay guyz I think I just figred it out!

I read an article recently that had Sloan suggesting that they have enough material to release an album every year. Well, if an album like Parallel Play is what we can expect, lets split the difference guys. Give us your best 5 or 6 songs every year in EP form. Keep songs like "The Other Side" (track 9) on the burner until it can I dunno, shape into something more worthwhile.

Fictional EP: 4/5

- Eddie

p.s. Dear Jay and Andrew, could you write Patrick a few songs, slap his name on it, and secretly slip it into his hands while he's sleeping. Maybe you can convince him they're his own work when he wakes up.

Sarah and Dan's Wedding Reception: The Review

2008-06-29T15:43:00.002-06:00

I want to start out by saying that this reception was fucking classy. The pair held it in the Maritime Nautical Museum or something. They had people walking around with trays of fish cake things and shrimp, and were serving Cosmopolitans (finally allowing me to figure out the popularity of "Sex and the City") amongst other free beverages. I feel I should mention "Team Titanic" (named after the table we were sitting at. But don't worry, the only thing going down at our table were the drinks), and give a shout out to the core members who made the evening so enjoyable:

Ryan McNutt: Gentleman, Scholar, Rocklogist. Despite his beau's attempts to encourage him to dance McNutt stuck to his convictions and refused to shake it to any song which infuriated him, at best offering the old awkward shuffle from side-to-side. Some would call this behavior stuffy; me, I believe it just shows his conviction.

Susanne MacNeil: Won the award for most ~~intoxicating~~ intoxicated. Susanne quickly became one of my favorite people ever, and I look forward to her and Ryan trading rings and smooches. The highlight was our plan to blame Jen Bond for all the wine she was adorning the tablecloth, floor, and Ryan with.

It's cool, Jen wasn't there at the time.

Jennifer Bond: this girl continues to scare the hell out of me. So hey, open bar, lets go get a drink Jen? Sure she says, and gets this martini. Figuring she probably knew how to blend into these classy affairs, I get the same. Jesus Christ. I get told after that yeah, the drink I have is like, pure gin or something. This thing is burning my lips, I cannot handle more than a small sip every minute or so, and Jen is here drinking it like it's orange juice. Damn.

Ingrid Grant: Chief Engineer. Up from Toronto, it was quickly decided that Ingrid and myself should get hitched in a Galaxy Far, Far, Away. She'd dress as Leia (Empire Strike Back hair), I'd be Solo, Darth Vader would give away the bride, R2-D2 would be the ring bearer, as well as projector to beam our priest (Obi-Wan) onto the wall. We'd have the Cantina band playing music, and at the end we'd have a wookie yell as John Williams sent us off in style.

John LaRusic: It was quickly discovered that I uh, apparently wasn't invited. However, my brother's name was on the list of eligible guests, so much like the "JetsGo" incident of 2004, I once again assumed the identity of my sibling. Byt he end of the night, I had not only lost my first name, but one guest referred to me as "John Gainer."

Notable events at the reception:

1) There were tragically few speakers to embarrass the bride and groom. So here's the scoop. I asked Sarah once when she knew she liked Dan. She explained to me that they were in a large group playing soccer, and it was pretty hot out. As Sarah watched Dan give 110%, with his giant grin and devilish good looks, her defenses melted as she watched Dan perform an act that captured her heart and lifted her twelve feet off the ground:

He removed his shirt.

2) Meeting, and dancing, with Mrs. Butler. It occurs to me that I should have bothered Mr.B too. She looked at me like I had just survived either a shipwreck or a reality TV show, which makes me wonder what they're saying about me back in Sydney...

3) The house band at the reception playing one of Team Titanic's requests: Billie Jean. Sadly, our other suggestions of "Ghostbusters" and "My Heart Will Go On" went unplayed.

All in all, a very successful engagement. Dan, Sarah, if you ever get married again invite me back!

- Eddie

2008-06-22T21:51:00.002-06:00

I was going to blog about paintball, or D&D 4.0, or something but instead I'm posting this link to a 'Lets Play' of the videogame Clock Tower 3. It is hilarious.

Lets Play: Clock Tower 3!

- Eddie

p.s. a "Lets Play" is a kind of 'run-through' of a videogame, highlighting it's strengths, failures, and often the hilarious commentary by the author who is playing the game. Look em up!

2008-06-16T22:55:00.006-06:00

(Facebook readers beware! The images in this post will not show up on Facebook. Please go to my blog to see them!)

There was a small point in time when I thought about using this blog to post funny images from comic books (the first meeting between Ultimate Spidey and Ultimate Jean Grey comes to mind...) but it turns out I don't have the ambition to scan/edit the images required.

As some people may or may not know, I read a copious amount of webcomics, but I also read a ton of manga that you can read for free (*cough*) online. It's kind of a love hate thing, because as anyone who has read manga before knows, most is TERRIBLE. For every School Rumble (5/5) there's twenty Jojo's Bizarre Adventures to make you wonder why you're reading these things in the first place.

But there are some genuinely good comics that can be read. I like Perfect Girl Evolution (despite the art being kind of shitty), Hayate the Combat Butler, Parfait Tic (which sadly hasn't been finished), and Shin Angyo Onshi among others, and newer comics like Yankee-kun to Megane-chan look like they'll be a hilarious read.

Even in the pretty terrible manga however, you can find the occasional funny page or two. See, despite it's faults, a manga art style is MUCH better at conveying emotion/feelings than most American artists you'll find. There are exceptions of course; I find Steve Dillon (of Preacher fame) very good at it:

... but even some artists I like like are kind of shitty at doing them:

...but once you read enough of thems Japanese comics, you realize how they're ability to distort their characters eventually does not come off as weirdly unnatural, but instead, helps convey a whole series of things at once, like mood (i.e. anger), tone (i.e. sarcasm), feelings (usually lo~ve), etc:

(I chose this image not because it's an alright example of the format's abilities, but because Carmel, if she reads this, will probably recognize it. Remember to read it right to left instead of left to right!)

Anyway, the whole journey to get here was to show you this image (the set-up):

And then present a link to the punch-line.

- Eddie

2008-06-13T20:15:00.002-06:00

I didn't really want to talk about chaos theory, I wanted to talk about breaking my arm when I was young.

The butterfly effect. A man and his wife are traveling to a hospital. The woman, named Sophie, does not usually get to go on such trips, but his husband is somewhat famous, so is planning on visiting some people he knew. He agrees to allow his wife to accompany him as an anniversary present (rough!). On the way to the hospital, the driver takes a wrong turn, and as he's backing up to return to the correct route, a man steps out and shoots Sophie and her husband. She takes a bullet to her abdomen, and her husband in the neck, and both of them end up dying to their wounds.

Poor Sophie, reportedly, is buried eighteen inches below her husband, signaling her lower social class. Her husband's death, typical of the gender inequality that pervades throughout the world, causes World War I.

While poor Sophie is introduced to anaerobic organisms, her husband causes The Holocaust. Well, I guess she got the better deal on that one...

Whether you believe the ideas behind the butterfly effect, we've all looked back at certain moments on our lives and wonder "if only that hadn't happened..." and try and imagine what life would be like. I guess it's fair to say that our imagination is a dangerous tool here; as easily as easy as it is to delude ourselves into thinking that regrettable decision to be a Maple Leafs fan would mean...

...more chest hair -> (more?) sex -> literary award named after you...

...the sad part is that chaos theory filtered through the lens of your image-nation means you throw out the possibility of becoming a hobo instead of that student-debt ridden stud, believing instead that you should have been on the fast-track to winning America's Top Model.

When I was young, I liked to climb trees. In our backyard on Kennedy Ave, myself, John and our older cousin Jamie used to climb the trees there. We brushed on unused "paint-by numbers" paint to represent how far we'd climbed, eventually developing a complex ranking system for determining self-worth (based upon Roy-G-Biv notation). I think I was a pretty good tree-climber. I made it almost as far as my cousin, and he was a good few years older than me. Why, I was a rising (*swish!*) star in the world of aceraceae!

And then I broke my arm. It was my cousin, the same tree-climbing companion, who dun it. What was supposed to be a friendly game of hide-and-go-seek tag turned into a fractured arm and a great hospital story. More to the point, it drove into my body a fear of heights.

I found myself unable to climb half as high as I used to. I would tell myself "you're not going to fall, you're not going to break anything" to myself over and over but it didn't help. My body just wouldn't take the "risks" it used to, the "risks" it had taken time and time again before with a 100% rate of success. Whereas before I was inches away from indigo, now I found myself struggling with even reaching green.

A great man, cut down in the prime of his youth.

I was thinking today, I'm almost positive my one experience resulted in my fear of heights... what else did I become afraid of? After all, it's not like I broke my arm falling from a ladder or plane or something. The drop was slight, I had landed wrong. While I could see this ruining any future at figure skating or pro wrestling, that such an incident could warp my courage lends itself in some frightening directions. Maybe the fear of breaking another limb caused me to want to spend less time outdoors and more time inside playing video games (mission accomplished!). Maybe I could have been a pro-football player had I gone another few years without a major injury. Maybe...

- Eddie

2008-06-10T23:15:00.004-06:00

I thought instead of going to bed at a decent hour (I don't work tomorrow, which is pretty much a recipe for me staying up much much too late) I'd mess with my blog a bit. While I'm not as ambitious enough to mess with my template, I did take the time to do some spring cleaning. I removed a few blogs that are never going to update/I don't read for starters. Apologies if this in anyway insults you, but chances are you're not reading this bitch either. Adding the "Living Between Wednesday's" comic book blog was a natural fit.

The link to the speeddemosarchive was long overdue; even if my internet connection sucks I do enjoy popping by there every so often. I dropped several webcomics from the list, including possibly the two most popular, Penny Arcade and PVP.

I don't think anyone should be too surprised by Penny Arcade leaving the list. Is it good? Sure, but I dunno. I think a web comic about people playing video games just isn't going to cut it anymore. I need more. I'm a little sad to remove PVP from the list, because honestly, I've been reading it pretty much continuously for years. I even think Kurtz's recent stuff is some of the best he's ever done... but the recent storyline feels like an "end" to me. So away it goes.

I haven't watched anything at Homestar Runner for well over a year now, I'm sure it's still really funny. I will probably be getting the Wii games that come out about it, who knows. I took Overcompensating off the list too, which, if Curt still read this, would probably make him raise his arms in triumph. I once called it my favorite webcomic ever, and he thought I was nuts. Well, I think the early stuff (when it was my favorite) was gold. Now it's just such a depressing webcomic. Oh I dunno, I just read the last two comics, and they were hilarious. But I'll never be a major league pitcher without some conviction here!

Dr.McNinja is on the chopping block, for being funny but not funny enough.

I'm pleased to welcome two new web comics to my little list however. The Dreamland Chronicles is well, it's a really good all-ages fantasy strip. In 3-D. If I had to describe "Octopus Pie" I'd use an image from the webcomic:

(warning, the comic is occasionally not work-safe. But you'll still love it!)

- Eddie

2008-06-08T13:48:00.006-06:00

Hay guyz. I thought I'd start a blog.

Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney

The Ace Attorney games (that is, the three Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney games that precede this game) are a favorite of mine. Now, granted, the Ace Attorney games have always been kin to a graphical novel; Blah blah linear games blah blah but the point is that the games have always been about having a fun gaming experience whilst solving about four murder mystery stories. As it's predecessors, Apollo Justice puts you in control of a guy named well, Apollo Justice, who is tasked with defending his clients from murder charges. The Japanese title of these games, instead of Ace Attorney, is "Turnabout Courtroom," which pretty much sums up what you can expect to happen in each case.

Turning each case on it's head is half the fun of these games; as the layers of the cases peel away you go through some extreme cross-examination until you get to the truth behind each mystery. Past cases have involved everything from discovering that a sister had switched identities with her dead sibling in order to extract revenge, to supernatural possession, to what I believe to be the highlight, the interrogation of a parrot... in court! While these games never take murder lightly, they present each case with a certain flair for the dramatic, and a healthy dose of hilarious writing.

Now, a game like this requires a certain level of disbelief. I was playing this game at work during my lunch hour, and a co-worker asked me what I was going. As I described how I was trying to prevent this kid from being labeled with a murder charge (he was thought to have shot a dude with a gun) she asked me if they had found any gunpowder marks on his clothes.

Erm... no I don't think they even checked.

And it never comes up, because it's not how the story goes down. Even in court, there will be times where you say to the game "I just want to talk about this piece of evidence I found, because it's more important than what we're talking about here" but you're at the mercy of the game, if the judge would rather talk about solving a magic trick than THE evidence that will prove your client not-guilty. Still, the game telegraphs it's moves well, and as long as you're willing to go with the flow, the stories are all entertaining.

Now, if you've played any Phoenix Wright game, then you're pretty much prepared to jump into Apollo Justice; the differences between the games are largely negligible. As this is the first Ace Attorney game to be developed originally for the Nintendo DS (the three PW games before it, although all released here on the DS, where originally Gameboy Advance titles), the developers have tried to make an effort to incorporate the touch screen into your crime-solving capabilities, sadly to minimal effect. Anyone who had finished the first Phoenix Wright (specifically, the DS exclusive "case 5") can know what to expect.

Most evidence is viewable in 3-D, and you can twist and turn it to examine it. The reason it's disappointing is how gimmicky the feature feels. There is plenty of evidence you can twist around, but so few of it that actively REQUIRES you to examine it from all sides. In addition, there are a few mini games splattered around that require for example, making plaster casts of footprints. These are fun, but sadly are all one time affairs, and are few and far between.

The cast of Apollo Justice is fantastic, perhaps better than any of the Phoenix Wright games. While obviously missing some of the highlights (Prosecutor Gavin is fun, but no Edgeworth or Gadot) the introduction of Trudy over Maya as the games 'helper' is welcome. Maya always came across as well, completely useless (despite being genuinely funny), whereas Trudy is actually... smart. Emma Sky (from PW1's Case 5, also seen at the end of this hilarious promo for the first game. Sadly the games don't actually feature voice acting) is waaaay better than Gumshoe. Also, and perhaps the most welcome part, Apollo himself is a very likable character. He comes off as more resourceful and intelligent than Phoenix ever did, especially in his ability to come to conclusions without needing hints from, er, otherworldly spirits.

The character designs are rock solid too, much better looking than the previous PW games, which is both a blessing and curse. While the new sprites and animations are awesome, old sprites pop up every once in a while, and well, look like shit compared to the new stuff.

In conclusion, Apollo Justice, while a fun playthrough, never really lives up to its potential. In a genre where replay value is a negative slope approaching zero, it's going to be hard to justify paying $30 for the next game if they don't get their act in gear and spend more time crafting a more interactive case.

3/5

- Eddie

2008-03-12T10:48:00.003-06:00

Old, but thanks to Adam Rogers and the New York Times for this loving tribute to Gary Gygax:

- Eddie

2008-01-23T10:41:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a little weird, especially in light of not having posted in forever, but it'll be short, which is more than I can usually say about my blog posts.

I had a dream last night, and while I can't remember the specifics, something about a trans-gendered person came up in it. It probably has something to do with the latest Order of the Stick comic (for thsoe who don't want it spoiled, the word 'hermaphrodite' pops up in it), but regardless when I woke up this morning it made me think about an incident back in my UNB days.

It was 2001 or 2, in my second year living at Lady Beaverbrook Residence (LBR), which is a pretty small and generally pretty tight-knit residence. Of course there's always drama in such a small place, and the ugly head of gossip would occasionally creep through the halls and shake us up every once in a while. One such incident involved a woman named Happy.

Happy was a guy who wanted to be a girl. He grew his hair out long, wore dresses, and yes, he wasn't a very convincing woman. He was something of a humourous figure, living in one of the bigger residences, but a little infamous, because how often do you see someone like that?

He was friends with this girl who moved into the residence during my second year (she was totally hot, but I digress). Every once in a while we'd see him in the house visiting her. Still, no big deal right? Well, one day the gossip chain started floating around. Happy wanted to move into LBR.

To say that looking back the uproar the house made was sick is an understatement. The university called in a mediator to try and discuss this with the house. One guy in the house, who was well, the president of the house (at least formally? I remember him having a VERY high position), described the feeling in the house that the reason we didn't want him in there was for the same reason we wouldn't want someone in the house who was diagnosed with some for of paranoia. In other words, he was equating Happy's 'problem' to a mental illness.

And I'm ashamed to admit that I got caught up in it. Despite any changes to my attitude, personality, whatever, it still doesn't excuse what I did all those years ago, and it took a dream of mine to remind me that just because I forgot about it, doesn't make it okay to bury the fact that I supported the general consensus to prevent this girl from entering the house.

So despite how unlikely it is, if Happy, or anyone else who remembers this incident reads this, I want to apologize for what I might have did, thought, or said that day, half a decade ago.

- Eddie

2007-12-05T12:03:00.000-07:00

In case anyone was wondering what I was doing when I'm not studying for exams, it's this:

By the way, here is the part of the game that made me cry. Test yourself and see how well you score!

- Eddie

p.s. yes I'm a cheerleader!

2007-12-03T09:25:00.001-07:00

So, quite the weekend. Here is the recap:

1) Went to both school and work in different shoes, by accident/inattentiveness. Decided while walking to work and noticing that I was wearing two different shoes, that it was meant to be and left them on all day, and loudly proclaimed by stupidity to anyone who would listen.

2) Received both Zelda: Twilight Princess (for the Gamecube) and Elite Beat Agents (DS) from the holy quadrinity known as Sarah, Jen, Ryan, and Shawn. Thanks guys!

3) Completely forgot everything that happened after the second shot of tequila.

4) Woke up the next morning at about 1pm, did not throw up the entire day even though I felt generally shitty.

5) Played Elite Beat Agents. Cried. Thanks Sarah, Jen, Ryan, and Shawn, I haven't cried from reading/watching anything since I read the "Little Matchstick Girl" as a kid at the age of 6. I joke about crying during the train scene in Spider-Man 2, but it's a joke. Elite Beat Agents? Heaving sobs.

6) Learned just today that I might have loudly proclaimed my distaste for a girl who attended the party with her new boyfriend. Spent the entire morning working out how exactly I was going to apologize to her for something I don't remember.

7) Apologized to her, only to find out she didn't hear anything, and now was forced to apologize for something I only vaguely remember. Fuck!

- Eddie

2007-11-22T08:08:00.000-07:00

What does everyone think?

Should I go with...

... the "High Five" t-shirt?

... the "Rock-o-clock" one?

... the "Lochness Monster Adventure Club" shirt?

... the "Secret kisses" T?

... the "A wizard has turned you into a whale" on royal blue?

... the "Everything is ruined forever" w/ plaid purple elephant?

... or something else?

So many choices, such a small limit on my credit-card!

- Eddie

2007-10-23T14:28:00.000-06:00

This is a post about the DANGERS of being polite.

So I've just finished my Poli 3492 class (up on floor two of the Henry Hicks building) and I open the door to go down the stairs and see a pretty lady on her way up those same stairs.

Now, I'm always one to hold up a door( particularly if there's a pretty lady who needs a door being opened), so I figured that holding this door open for her would be a good thing.

The problem this pretty lady had of course, was that she was only half-way up the stairs while my goofy grinned self was proudly holding this door open for her. So, in her effort to congratulate my efforts, she subsequently sped up...

... causing her to trip on the last step...

... and fall face first into the door I was holding open for her.

Uh, oops.

- Eddie

2007-10-11T14:15:00.000-06:00

So okay, this not having a working computer at home is really cramping my literary style...

... but regardless~! I spent all last night specifically NOT doing the readings I was supposed to, but instead reading about an impossibility. I don't remember if I've raved about the book(s) before (and if so, I'm certainly too lazy to use my internal blog's "search" function) but I'm thinking I have a bright future as a SUGGESTION man. Lately, I've been reading thems "comics books" and I've got a pretty good suggestion: Someone should turn one of em into a TV show.

Which one?

One man once described Eagle: The Making of an Asian-American President a "wild tangle of sex and secrets and hate and Machiavellian intrigue. It's Primary Colors in a really bad mood."

That man wrote Nextwave, so I trust his opinion even I liked the book before I both
a) loved Nextwave and
b) hated most of the other stuff of his I read.

It's a tricksy relationship, my trust.

But why should YOU want it as a TV series, to be shown on prime-time and ingested? I'll tells you why!

The core of the entire book (all 2300 pages of fantastically drawn artwork... hey, it's manga, yet people actually look their ages!) involves a reporter named Takashi Jo, a reporter of little renown in Japan.

His mother has recently passed away in a tragic accident at home. He never knew his father, save for a photograph that his mother took of themselves together. His father was an American who had a stay in Okinawa during the Vietnam War. He was injured in action and returned to America, and Takashi grew up hating a fuzzy photo of a man who left his mother to raise him alone.

While still struggling with his grief, he gets a call from his newspaper. They want to send him to America to cover this new presidential candidate, who happens to be a 2nd generation Japanese-American, Senator Kenneth Yamaoka.

Takashi is fairly confused about this, because politics, especially foreign ones, are hardly his beat. His boss lays it on him tho. It was the request of the senator to have Takashi assigned to have exclusive coverage of his campaign.

Takashi arrives in America, and is told two things.

One, he has full access to the campaign. He's allowed to meet and interview anyone he wishes, and also tag along wherever he wishes to go.

Two, the only stipulation Yamaoka has is that nothing of what he learns is to be published until either Yamaoka is finished in the Presidential race. No one, not even his newspaper, is to learn any details until it's all over.

And then, in private with the Senator, Takashi learns the shocking truth: The man in the photo who his mother pined over until her death, the man Takashi hated growing up, and the Senator he's standing in front of, are the same.

Yes, here's a man running for President, and he not only has an illegitimate child, he's assigned his illegitimate child to cover his campaign.

That's only the briefest of introductions to the series, but it sets the tone. Is Yamaoka making some brilliant play, or is he entirely arrogant? Issues such as race of course come up during the story, and I'll be the first to admit that some of Yamaoka's ideas are INCREDIBLY controversial, and perhaps the author (Kaiji Kawaguchi) was being a little too optimistic of a Japanese-American's chances of getting well, anywhere in the presidential race.

And make no mistake: Yamaoka, as a fictional character, is an absolutely fascinating character. His confidence and yes, arrogance, really help carry his story. We're not only told the story of one man's struggle to connect with his father, but of a father who's done terrible things in his life, and whose redemption (if there can be any) can only be reached by maybe being that heartless bastard that Takashi so wants to label him as.

After all, the story that all children are told in America, that you TOO can become President, is a lie. It takes a combination of charisma, intellect, and a hell of a lot of money, and how Yamaoka delivers on these aspects is both fascinating and scary, because he's not the only shark in the water. Sometimes in politics, morality has to be tucked into a box and locked away under the bed for a while.

Ans hell, we've had a fictional black president, and even a fictional woman president on 24, and Americans ate that up. Granted, we couldn't have Jack Bauer to kick some terrorist ass while Yamaoka um, debated a candidate whose loosely based off Al Gore (of could we? There's a role for a secret service agent later in the story...).

I'm saying the book is pretty awesome, and I think a TV show based on this book would be awesomer.

So come on, less CSI, more shows about politics! Anyone with me? Anyone want to borrow the books? Yes/no?

Alright.

- Eddie

2007-10-02T09:29:00.001-06:00

Okay, so my computer is broken, and I'm forced to look at stuff at the library for the time being, but you know what?

This is hilarious.

Particularly the videos at the bottom. This game is going to be AWESOME.

- Eddie

2007-08-29T20:57:00.000-06:00

It's no secret that I love to read comics. I read at least 10 of the damn things online (usually daily), and while my collection may not have the girth that Shawn Kehoe's has (note: a comic book collection is like an extension of a geek's penis!) I'd like to think it's respectable.

I mean, I'd read these damn things all day probably if I could. Now, I've talked about the webcomics I read and I'm sure I've mentioned the Sandman somewhere, but one of the nice things about the internet (to uh, a degree) is that there's tons of manga from Japan being thrown online for consumption. Of course, not all of it belongs there (the general rule is that if it's been licensed to a U.S. publisher, the translating team willfully removes the series from all it's distribution outlets, i.e. mIRC usually.

Now, don't get me wrong. This isn't a love letter to Japan. Fan-translated manga is often poorly edited, with glaring punctuation and spelling mistakes. And well, most of it sucks. But hey, maybe you're bored.

Maybe you're bored, and you want to read some. Somewhat legally. I've mentioned Anime-Source before in here when talking to manga that they host online, and today I'm going to point out 10 manga that they host, why it's good/bad, and whether it'd be worth your time to read it.

(Side note: the word "whether" always looks weird to me, but Mozilla Firefox isn't underlining it, so it must be correct!)

You do need to register to view some of the manga, and I'll note which ones you can view without much trouble, and those which you can hijack my username/password if you're that keen on reading em (Becoming a 'level 3' user is easy, 'level 4' forces you to make some dumbass posts on their message board). Note: If this goes how I think it'll go, my east/west rival known only as "Bo" might night enjoy this.

You can find links to all the manga here.

A Bat in Blue Sky (level 1)

Gist: A fallen ninja named Bat is taken in by a family of kind strangers. Can Bat escape her murderous past and find happiness?

Pros: Short (one chapter). By the author of Full Metal Alchemist.
Cons: Not really breaking any new ground

A simple story, and quite frankly a little boring. Now, after reading the Fullmetal Alchemist manga, I might have been a little hasty in declaring Hiromu Arakawa (the author) as a genius (to myself, in private). While the Fullmetal Alchemist anime is excellent, the manga is quite frankly, a little boring. Her wiki says that she didn't write the anime, so yeah. Anyway, "A Bat in Blue Sky" isn't offensive. It's just average. As you'll see tho, average really puts you neat the top of this list.

Rating: *** (out of five)

Addicted to Curry (level 1)

Gist: Makito Koenji, a young curry chef, takes over a restaurant to help the owner and of course, get close to his beautiful daughter. The world naturally conspires against this.

Pros: It's a manga about curry! Has recipes scattered through out for budding curry chefs.
Cons: A manga about cooking curry isn't very entertaining.

The problem with "Addicted to Curry," along with all 'cooking/baking/creation' mangas, is while the CONCEPT is interesting, it doesn't lend itself to an ongoing series. There's only so much you can do with curry before as a reader you say to yourself "why don't the guy and girl get together, have babies, and let the author do something productive with his time." I guess the Japanese love for curry is just too great.

Rating: **

Arcana (level 1)

Gist: He was a cop WITH AN ATTIDUDE. She was a medium WHO COULD HELP HIM FIGHT CRIME. TOGETHER, THEY FIGHT CRIME. I think.

Pros: um, I don't remember anything bad about this manga.
Cons: um, I don't remember anything good about this manga.

I guess Curt would like this? Because the girl has amnesia? And he says you can't do a bad movie about amnesia? I don't remember anything about this manga, yet I know I've read it.

Rating: ????? (out of five question marks)

Black Lagoon (level 1)

Gist: A Japanese salaryman is held hostage by a group of pirates named "Black Lagoon." His bosses ditch him, and he decides to join them. Oh yeah, one of them is a crazy motherfucker. I'll let you figure out which one (hint: it's probably the menacing looking girl with the dual handguns on the cover)!

Pros: This manga is a lot of fun. It doesn't break ground, but it knows what it is, a manga about bad guys shooting the hell out of bad guys, and sexy russian mob women with giant burn marks on their face. OH YEAH.
Cons: It sometimes sounds like the author is trying to have a conscious.

Do you like action? Pirates? Ridiculous characters? Here!

Rating: ****

Crossover (level 1)

Gist: An amazing basketball player joins a loser team, and together they try and take the high school basketball world by storm. Oh Coach Bombay! Where are you when a team needs you?

Pros: I hate sports manga.
Cons: Fuck, this is a sports manga.

You know how some people say, "If you're a fan of 'X', you'll like this, otherwise you won't?" Okay here goes: If you're a fan of basketball, you'll hate this manga as much as the rest.

Rating: *

Devil & Devil (level 1)

Gist: While in battle, a demon and an angel fall in battle, and their spirits enter the bodies of two human brothers. The devil lands in a wuss, the angel lands in the body of a delinquent. (Oh god).

Pros: As far as shonen (boys) manga goes, you could do worse.
Cons: I don't know what's worse. The fact that this book makes allowances for um, two "Satan's," or that the Angel is totally ripping off FF7's Sephiroth. At least steal from something good!

Devil is strong. Meets someone stronger. Devil becomes stronger and wins. Devil meets someone stronger. Devil becomes stronger and wins. Devil meets someone stronger... This is Japan pissing on Christianity for the umpteenth time.

Rating: **

Elfen Lied (level 3)

Gist: A murderous mutant with the ability to psychically tear to pieces people and things within a short radius around her loses her memory and becomes a harmless girl who loves breasts. I had the same idea in high school! Damnit!

Pros: The author decided to not stretch out the weak 'romance' thread in the series.
Cons: Okay, seriously, there's a character in the book who is constantly pissing herself. What the fuck? Oh yeah, the art is terrible.

I can sort of see why people are drawn to this manga. I mean, Elfin Lied's author tackles some serious shit here, but he's just not talented to pull it off, pulling back from what could be a violent, but satisfying read, and instead intertwining the moments of horror with panty shots and girls who have bladder problems. Seriously, there are adult diapers people!

Rating: **

Record of Fallen Vampire (level 1)

Gist: The king of vampires is searching for his queen, who has been imprisoned. A group of vampire hunters try to stop him.

Pros: Actually a somewhat entertaining read. There are enough twists to keep a reader interested.
Cons: Art style definitely has this 'gothic lolita' thing going on with it.

I initially disliked "Record of Fallen Vampire," but while it's plot is somewhat slow, it turns into something that isn't terrible. It's biggest problem is that the author knows where he's going with this, but the viewer doesn't always follow.

Rating: ***

Girl Saurus (level 2)

Gist: a huge (re: fat) woman declares her love to a gentlemen named Shingo. His shock at her confession causes her to beat the shit out of him, putting him in the hospital, with multiple scars, broken bones, and worse: he's now afraid of women (I was too lazy to look up what the phobia was called. Gynaphobia?)

Pros: Hilarious. A complete reversal of the traditional 'boy attracts women, can't choose.' Instead, 'Girl Saurus' is, 'boy attracts women, shits his pants in fear when they come close.'
Cons: HEAVY fanservice (re: panties and side-boobs).

This is one of my guilty pleasures. Look, there are plenty of manga out there with boobs and stuff, but damnit, this is the only one I find genuinely funny instead of 'oh ha ha, that crazy teacher and his crazy sneezes which blow the clothes of his students!'

Rating: ****

Hot Milk (level 1)

Gist: A beautiful girl puts a glass of milk into a microwave. Watch out little girl! Your bodyguard can't save you if you drink that! Get it? Because it'd be 'hot milk?' And hot milk sucks amiright? Yeah, I'm right. This is basically "Baby's Day Out" except with a teenager.

Pros: Short, mildly amusing.
Cons: I could only think that it was short and mildly amusing as positives.

So the bodyguard see? He's super tough, and he's got to protect this girl because she's the daughter of a mob guy, and they'll kill him if he doesn't! Ah, just like back in high school.

Rating: **

- Eddie

2007-08-09T21:34:00.000-06:00

I've always known my arms are shorter than average, but I never really knew HOW short they were until today, when I got fitted for a tuxedo.

I mean, no man (I mean NO MAN) likes hearing that they're two inches shorter than the average...

... so I'm going to go cry myself quietly to sleep.

:(

- Eddie

2007-07-23T17:06:00.001-06:00

Time for elevature.blogspot.com's first ever... shitlist! But since I don't really hate anyone, this is more of a 'wag of the finger' kind of list.

[b]The Daily News[/b]: I don't hate ALL of the Daily News. I find their comics section one of the most entertaining parts to read! Okay okay, ragging on the Daily News is like punching a cripple. No one gives you a high-five afterwards for THAT. And I'll even give em that one of their recent headlines, "Police Probe Pimp Pipeline" was solid gold. Whoever thought of that one deserves a gold star on the ol' "Elementary Skool Bristol Board Award Board (ESBBAB)." There are a few of their columnists I want to have a small word with however.

First, there's Charles Moore. When he's not talking trash about Harry Potter ("The Harry Potter phenomenon is... part of a broad cultural assault on Christianity") or defending Conrad Black ("it's cold comfort that they acquitted Black of nine counts, including the more serious (and totally absurd) charges of racketeering and money laundering.") he's bemoaning liberals for pretty much everything that's wrong with the world.

But my beef with him isn't his right-wing views. No, I just hate how he looks.

He looks so... so... Penneresq! I feel like he should be crawling through a log, sing me a song, and then go see what the Word Bird is up to.

He could wear a pink and purple sweater unironically, just like Fred.

And when he was done bemoaning the lack of Christian values, socialists and the gays he could crawl back into that log again where I wouldn't be able to see him again for a week. It confuses my mind! PLEASE Mr. Moore, I'll make you a deal: you shave your mustache, and I'll agree never to kiss a boy without marrying and having five kids with a woman (who will agree to stay home and cook and clean) immediately.

Let it be known however, that my hate for the Daily News does NOT extend only to thier conservative leanings, but also to their liberal! Yes, Rachel Dodds, who may, or may not, have achieved her own little fame for getting fired (and then re-hired) for her column about using fruit as a substitute for vaginas.

Now, whiel I don't really like her column, I think that's mostly because a) I read Savage Love and b) there's no way she can write like Dan Savage without ACTUALLY getting fired, like permanently.

No, if Charles Moore's entry here wasn't enough of a clue, my beef with her is COMPLETELY nonsensical. I just don't like the name of her column.

Sure, it's the name of the company she runs, and teaching women to be sexual creatures is worth at LEAST two gold stars on the ol' "ESBBAB," but man, I cringe everytime I read the column name. It's not that she's not 'sexy' I guess (I'd do her) and I'm okay in seeing it in an 'empowering' kind of fashion. But it's not clever! Here are my top three column name suggestions:

1) Dodds on Rods
2) Rach-el Ravanger
3) Sex with Charles Moore

You can use them. I mean, anyone, they're free.

Next we turn to a writer I have a love/hate relationship with named Bobby Crosby. You might remember Bobby from a post I did back in February where I talked about some of the new webcomics I was reading. He um, replied, which pretty much shocked me because I've always considered my blog pretty low-key.

It turns out his brother just likes googling their names or something, I guess. Anyway, I have a lot of love for him and his brother. His brother Chris writes two comics I always read on M/W/Friday mornings Sore Thumbs and Wicked Powered) and Bobby ain't so bad himself. He's got a pretty swell comic about online poker of all things called +EV (whose name I don't get, but it's still an entertaining comic) and I do really like the comic I mentioned in particular back in February, Marry Me. Not much to say, except it's both sweet and funny, and the art is amazing...

... when it's updated.

But I'm not here to rag on it's schedule, because lord knows 250+ people do everytime he posts. No, I just think he's got a poor attitude about the entire thing. In some ways it's refreshing to see an outspoken creator, but the man can't resist responding to all the idiots who leave comments on his page. "You know what they say, arguing on the interent is like winning the 'Special Olympics...'" but man the guy gets into it.

At the very least he's tossing out spoilers, and the very worst he's calling people who criticize his comic idiots. And it's weird, because I think some of the criticism the comics gets is very valid, but not to Bobby Crosby. You see, as far as I can tell (and I'm sure he'll leave a comment on here and correct me... somehow...) Bobby Crosby doesn't think he's writing a comic. The entire thing about "Marry Me" is that he's going to use the comic to pitch it as a movie, I think. Thus, some of the criticism he gets (well, okay, particularly the update schedule) don't really apply to "Marry Me," because it's a product he's using to pitch the idea first, and a comic second.

And to be fair, the update schedule is entirely not his fault. The artist he has doing it, Remy Mokhtar is one of those poor, unfortunate comic artists who's still saddled with a job. I'd love nothing more than to see him be able to cartoon full time (if that's even a possibility, or even an option he'd want to explore). As it is, the need to produce a fully coloured page every two or three days is difficult for the guy, and this causes the chain reaction which turns Bobby Crosby from the mild-mannered writer he is into his alter-ego, "Bruce Crosby" who wishes "puny idiots would leave update schedule alone."

Thus, even if the majority of comments are 'positive' in nature, I'd really wish he'd just shut em down. Create a message board, and having moderators to ban all the idiots so he doesn't come off looking like a bit of a dick.

Lastly, this is for that guy with the TERRIBLE w/g deck who managed to break our amazing league deck on MTGO: FUCK. Yeah, I take it all back, I hate one person now, and it's YOU. Being 9 and 1 is cold comfort.

- Eddie

2007-07-16T21:47:00.000-06:00

You know, I really don't know how I'm going to explain why my browser history has 'www.shirtlesshunksbagginggroceries.com' in it.

Maybe I can lie and say my brother was on my computer recently?

- Eddie

p.s. It was a good Colbert Report episode.

2007-07-03T19:35:00.000-06:00

Oh fuck!

Guitar what?

- Eddie

2007-07-02T18:28:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I wonder I don't know how to shill things. I mean, okay, there's this pretty good anime you guys can go and download here called "Toki wo Kakeru Shoujo" ("The Girl who Leaped Through Time") which is pretty much as the title suggests. Average, kind of slacker girl gets into a small accident, and from then on finds that she can somehow leap backwards through time.

I've never personally had a problem with time travel, probably because I read too many comics. If you're one of those people who's heads explode (probably because you, unlike me, took Physics in highschool) at the mere mention of time travel, well, I don't think this one is so bad! The message is your typical one: make use of what time you DO have.

Of course, our heroine Makoto doesn't realize the power she has, so instead of being responsible she uses her new-found ability to do silly things, like extend the time she can use to spent singing karaoke. I think one thing this movie does right however, is point out the problem with being able to change the future: all of a sudden you become completely responsible for EVERYTHING. The most dangerous aspect of time travel isn't the potential for abuse. No, the worst part of time travel is knowing the future.

I'm not going to try and spoil anything, but be ready for the science-fictiony thing they throw in order to explain Makoto's powers, because it really does distract from what was a fairly funny yet thought provoking production. It doesn't come out of left field however, which is nice, and the ending pretty much gives Makoto what she deserves (which, as all good time travel stories, is of course less than what she would have gotten had she never been so careless with her ability).

But hey, it'll be a good hour and forty minutes. I promise!

- Eddie

p.s. you'll need a .mkv player to play the movie. I know most of you have VLC, and that'll play the movie itself and sounds, but VLC doesn't handle the subtitles of a .mkv file well at all. So I'm asking a lot from you, but if you want to watch it you'll probably need to grab a codec pack and Media Player Classic. Details here. And yes, this probably has stopped the whole lot of you from downloading it.

2007-06-27T21:27:00.000-06:00

Oh, Baby B is being a nerd again.

I'm just curious if any of my D&D playing friends would be interested in a Play-By-Post game. I think I've got one Curt Crane, Justin McNeil, and maybe possibly Shawn Kehoe in on it, but I'm looking for 5-6. It shouldn't be a problem at all to find extras via the Giant in the Playground message boards, and we wouldn't start until around the middle of July.

The basic requirements to play are:

1) General knowledge of the D&D 3.5 system. You can go to http://www.d20srd.org/ for the basics; if you've played any d20 system you should be fine.

2) You've got to post on a message board at least once a day. That's pretty low commitment. Games tend to move slowly because of this, but as long as everyone is contributing it doesn't seem so bad.

I'll post all the specific rules and such later.

- Eddie

2007-06-07T14:53:00.000-06:00

I don't know if you've heard of Rock Band, but you can consider it the game that has the best chance of dethroning Guitar Hero, what with it's four player internet band madness.

Well, they've started taking requests, so you can write in YOUR four songs to be considered for Rock Band. Of course, your songs don't stand a chance of making it into the game, because if you're like me you pick bands that either don't exist or aren't Nickleback.

The entry form is here, my four picks were:

1. "North Dakota" by Thrush Hermit. I wanted something rockable at number one.
2. "Fell from a Cloud" by Tricky Woo. I wanted something rockable at number two.
3. "Oh, But She Did!" by The Meligrove Band. I felt giving these guys some small props was a good thing!
4. "Boys on the Floor" by The Stolen Minks. I felt I should maybe support a Halifax band, and I also cross out something for those ladies who wish to belt a tune out perhaps.

Worst case: This is an EASY blog post for ALL of you. Four songs. Come on.

- Eddie

2007-06-05T23:01:00.001-06:00

This video is pretty much 100% true.

- Eddie

2007-06-04T20:46:00.000-06:00

About a million years ago, I wrote a FAQ for a game called Neverwinter Nights, and every few months I still get an e-mail from someone who is playing as a Monk (the focus of my FAQ). The other day, I received this:

I have a question about the monk on neverwinter nights. I always pick a
monk on all the rpgs that you can pick one, and currently I have a level
5 character that is a lv 4 monk and a lv 1 fighter I want to have him be
a few levels in fighter, ranger, and rouge but also have all 20 monk
skills level gains(i have neverwinter diamond). How many levels of
fighter rouge and ranger would you recomend that I use on him to make
him strong? Also Would I lose bonusis if I had my monk go one level in
sorcerer so I could summon a dragon henchmen.

Now, I just want to make something clear. I played this game 5 years ago. I played it through once, as a monk. It was also on a rule-set that has since changed, so I'm mentally confused when thinking about the game. Also, there were several patches, which invalidate some of my FAQ as well.

That, and I don't have a fuck what he's asking about,

I get the level 4 monk / 1 fighter. I don't know what Neverwinter Diamond is. I can take a guess on 'making him strong...' maybe he's talking about taking 4 levels of fighter for the Weapon Specialization (and better Base Attack Bonus). Adding more classes? Christ, did he not hear about the EXP penalties? Summoning Dragon Henchman? I don't have a clue what he's talking about.

Anyway yeah, I just wanted to say that spam isn't the stupidest thing I recieve.

- Eddie

2007-05-27T18:41:00.000-06:00

Elevature.blogspot.com proudly presents...

IF I RULED A COUNTRY IN THE 18TH CENTURY

Eddie's seeing double says:
I'm going to be a sexy, swinging country!

Justin-- Jesus is my health insurance. says:
You.... you're mad!

Justin-- Jesus is my health insurance. says:
it'll never work!

Eddie's seeing double says:
I'm going to mingle and when they least expect it... I'm going to nuke em all!

Eddie's seeing double says:
And I'll be so popular they won't believe I did it!

Justin-- Jesus is my health insurance. says:
Wow

Justin-- Jesus is my health insurance. says:
Nobody'll be able to stop your 18th century nukes!

Eddie's seeing double says:
See, that's the genius part

Eddie's seeing double says:
I don't NEED to build nukes

Eddie's seeing double says:
I just need to build a time machine!

- Eddie

2007-05-23T20:56:00.000-06:00

Look, I'm trading pictures of animated womens who act out ridiculous plots and situations, for pictures of real-life women who act out ridiculous plots and situations. It's a step up!

Hana Yori Dango, Episode 1

It's always kind of cool to find out something you never knew about a person. It's like finding out your friend practices the violin, or maybe they secretly always wanted to roll a twenty sided dice every six seconds or so. Now, I've always liked Carmel. Even when I first met her, insulted her, later insulted her deabting methods, then her fiance, her wedding... and that's just the stuff I'm aware of... I always knew that deep down, way under they have a secret passion.

Sometimes, that passion scares the hell out of me. Luckily, it turns out that Carmel just has a deep-seeded passion for Japanese Drama, and not for... I dunno, bee porn or something.

I admit, I sometimes let my absolutely 100% heterosexual MANLY blog delve into the arts a little. Japanese Drama (or "J-Drama" as it's fans like to call it) isn't really too far outside something I'd watch. I mean, J-Drama, especially Hana Yori Dango is essentially... wait, I think I need to define some stuff here.

manga: Basically the Japanese word for comics, in case you've lived under a rock and hadn't heard of what Pokemon did to our nations beloved cartoons.

anime: Essentially Japanese animation, but most often refers to the graphical style, which was created effectively by one man, Osamu Tezuka, who was heavily influenced by Disney cartoons. You've seen some of his work (sort of) before, if you've ever watched an episode of Astro Boy, which set up a long standing tradition of equipping little boys with machine guns in their rear end.

shoujo manga: Girls comics. Different from "shonen" manga was is boys comics. Shoujo manga is created primarily to be read by girls, and therefore contain sugar and spice and female leads who struggle with love. Shonen manga contains frogs, snails, and giant robots. Some of them are naked women robots. Well, actually, I think they all are. Shoujo manga is primarily written and drawn by women, and vice-versa with shonen manga.

So (if you follow me) this show is based off a shoujo manga by Yoko Kamio. The name translates into 'Boys over Flowers,' which you can look up in a wiki if you want it explained.

Shoujo manga has several conventions generally. For one, the lead should be attractive, but not TOO attractive. Generally in shoujo manga, that means she doesn't have boobs.

No seriously.

I mean, hell, it's Japan. It's biological! But I'm guessing chances are that the majority of their female readers/watchers are kind of lacking in the cleavage department too. Listen, I really don't like talking about boobs, ESPECIALLY under-aged boobs, on my blog but it is what it is. Identification. In Japan if you've got boobs you're set. They'll pay you literally to eat ice cream, so they can film it and sell it to guys. It's a cross-market you see, because they get both boobs and dairy there, which is more important than you think because most are lactose intolerant you know.

Anyway, I know Carmel will understand what I'm talking about here. It's about identification. A million small chested Japanese girls are going to root for your female lead if she can still bag the dreamy guy whilst avoiding the knife and a a few pounds of silicon.

It's like Harry Potter, as Carmel herself would surely use as an example. Millions of readers around the world, both male and female, can identify with that rapscallion at Hogwarts because, like Harry, they don't have boobs either. Wait...

... right, Cho Chang. I hate her. I hope she gets killed in the final book. DO YOU HEAR ME ROWLING?

She's probably popular to cosplay. Shit.

cosplay: For people who can't stand being restricted to one day a year to dress up in a costume. Essentially, people who wish to honor their favorite characters by dressing up as them so other fans can creepily take pictures of them. It ranges from kinda hot to OH GOOD GOD WHY WAS I BORN WITH EYES in quality.

Some fans have WAY too much time on their hands, so instead of compiling World of Warcraft Dance Videos they compile WoW Cosplay. The general rule is that if you're a Japanese Cosplay, you've probably spent enough time on your costume to be mistaken for a company mascot, and if you're American... well, I think one link of bad cosplay is enough.

But I'm off topic. This blog post is ALL about the first episode of this series. And yeah, this kind of stuff isn't really outside my geek 'comfort' zone. I mean, I've been watching anime and reading manga for years, and have in fact dipped into the shoujo bin from time to time looking for a deal. I think I've already defined those. But yes, this is the equivalent of reading trashy romance novels.

Ridiculous things are going to happen. I think everyone realizes that love isn't something that happens because you get stuck in an elevator together. Seriously, show of hands of the number of people who fell in love with someone they got stuck in an elevator with them. That stuff doesn't happen! But on some level I think we DO wish we could have a storybook romance. We want the jealousy, the impossibly sweet gestures, and the entertainment of watching love blossom out of bitter hate.

That's the first rule about shoujo by the way. NEVER go with your first instinct. This is important! If you ever get trapped in a shoujo romantic novel/manga/tv series you'd do well to heed my advice ladies, because I'll be honest when I tell you the crying does nothing for me.

1) Skip your "first" love
He's not the one. He's either harbouring a deep unrequited love with another woman, or he's secretly plotting to ruin you and your family. At best, he'll be wisked away to a foreign country where you'll never see him again. No, see, it's number two you want. Safe, reliable number two.

2) The person who has the least reason to hurt you, has probably been planning it for some time.
I think this gets most people who start watching these things. Maybe it's all these female writers overcompensating somehow. "My ex dumped me via a text message... so in revenge my character will be forced to flip back and forth between boys, never truly having a meaningful relationship."

Hey, I ain't judging. Text message break-up? That is cold.

3) Bathe in milk daily for that silky soft skin.
This doesn't actually help your romance in any way. I think it's for the sake of all the tentacle monsters who live in Japan. Because... not... calcium?

4) Never go home. Your family is probably crazy.
This isn't actually a shoujo convention, this is pretty much an apparent truth in Japan. If you're father isn't blindly dumb, he's probably attempting to look at you in a perverted manner, and failing that he's probably a robot clone who's sleeping with your mom. Yeah, that'd scare the ol' psyche.

5) Carry an umbrella and scarf at all times
It's going to happen: there is going to be rain. Rain is the perfect opportunity to get close to that special #2 in your life. The scarf is for when you get trapped alone in the woods with #2. See, in Japan, all body heat exerts from the neck, allowing you to be nice in toasty in any weather, even in a skirt that goes up to here.

So like I was saying, the premise of the show is basically, like all shoujo work, how a cute but not extraordinarily hot girl gets multiple amazingly handsome guys. I mean 'amazingly' in the Japanese 'hottie' sense, which is VERY different from the traditional definition of a male hottie over here. For one, it doesn't matter if your teeth are bad. I mean, worst case, they cast you as the brooding, silent type, so it's not like you're smiling anyway. Your hair can also look COMPLETELY ridiculous. I'll be fair, North America has had a long history of bad hair. We're practically JUST getting over mullets.

I'm sure it's some crazy 'they've got to look like women' fetish. In Japan, I think the rule is that the more metrosexual you look, the faster the women will flock to your beck and call. Heck, I think being gay increases your chance of scoring with hot Japanese chicks by like, 60% (they love their guy on guy love out there).

Wait... bad hair... bad teeth... mistaken for a gay man on several occasions...

Shit, I should book a ticket there. Dye my hair red again and I'll be knee deep in 膣.

But seriously, their hair is totally bad. Why must the Japanese be 20 years behind North America on everything but Pokemon and Vending Machines?

At the very least they could do something about their English. I swear, without those subtitles I don't think I would have been able to understand a word that they said.

So that's episode one of Hani Yori Dango. Expect summaries of other episodes in the future! Maybe.

Hoping to be your number two choice,

- Eddie

2007-05-18T23:28:00.000-06:00

Oh god, what have I turned into?

So, 4.4 gigs later, I have all 26 episodes of this absolutely adorable anime called Aishiteru ze Baby (roughly translated: "Lovin' ya Babe") which stars an amazingly adorable kid named Yuzuyu whose left in the care of her aunt when her mother abandons her for an as of yet unexplained reason. The show is 100% solid sugar when Yuzuyu is on screen, as she adorably turns her uncle Kippei from a playboy into a responsible adult.

I've been brushing my teeth twice as long since I started watching this. This is one of those shows that makes you feel all warm and tingly over. I'm tentatively giving this show a 5/5, because aniem has always been known to rip my heart in two metaphorically (usually because of something ridiculously stupid happening) but let me be clear to the creators of this show: IF YOU BREAK YUZUYU'S HEART I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!

5/5

Meanwhile, Carmel dared me to watch this show called "Hana Yori Dango", which is based off the shojo (girls) anime, which is based off the shojo manga. I'm really not too sure how to feel about this show. I mean, I'll admit it, I'm a sucker for Shojo manga.

Don't mock me! You girls have all read romance novels! And you guys? F-f-fuck you!

Anyway, the elements are all there, right down to the always ridiculous 'how the fuck did they accidently kiss?' moments. Now, some might be surprised to find out (while watching the show) that a girl can fall for a dude with ridiculously bad hair, who has made your life a living hell at school, up to the point of

a) pelting her with garbage
b) indirectly getting people to write 'she had five abortions' in big red spraypaint and
c) nearly indirectly raping her

but that is honestly pretty standard fare for Shojo manga. Guys like to read about giant robots, and girls like to read about sexual assault. Hey, I never proclaimed to get it. I mean, except the giant robots. Pew pew!

Anyway, a DARE it was, so expect my full highlights after I finish watching the first season. CARMEL! THIS IS A DECLARATION OF WAR!

- Eddie

2007-05-14T21:07:00.000-06:00

One of the great things about not living in residence is that I can download torrents to my hearts content, no longer being stopped by the University. Now, while most normal people would download the old standards (movies, music, and pornography) I picked up a bit of a habit of downloading fan-subtitled anime. This is no secret to anyone who reads my blog, but it takes a lot for me to try a new show. The last one I tried with zero knowledge of it's contents was Bleach, based entirely on the fact that I saw an ad for the comic book/manga in a book once and I thought it might be cool. Luckily, it was.

Today, and especially since well, most of the anime you'll find on the interwebs is shit, it takes some heavy lifting before I'm willing to try a new one out. There's three I've tried lately, and the thing that attracted me to them is mostly their pedigrees, which I'll get into with each.

Ouran High School Host Club

This one might take some explaining to do, but let me try. This anime is essentially about a group of male students who effectively entertain the ladies of their school with their charm and good looks. The Ouran Host Club has everything your aspiring japanese school girl could want from a club. From the handsome foreigner down to a pair of twins who portray a vaguely homo-erotic relationship for their clients. It's the kind of romance that I think only a Japanese schoolgirl could get, because honestly I don't see the appeal with half of them. Maybe romance IS more then a pair of tits and a broken condom, but I'm not buying it.

No, I don't really get it. But regardless, the basic premise of the show is that a student named Haruhi accidently breaks an expensive vase that belongs to the Host Club, and they immediately try and get him to become their personal slave. This ends shortly, after one by one the members discover that not only does Haruhi actually have some gorgeous eyes behind his glasses and a cute face (perfect for dragging in those ladies), he is actually a she! Hijinks ensue.

I had heard some good things about this show before hand, and after hearing that it was being animated by the same people who did one of my favorite shows, Full Metal Alchemist I decided to give it a try. And for all the stupid gender-bending and mutliple accounts of yaoi-type scenes, this anime is actually pretty funny. It doesn't quite fall into the same trap as most comedy tpye shows do, which is to shoe-horn in a bunch of drama at the end. Mind you, the drama factor does pick up as it progresses, but it has enough common sense to not portray each of it's characters as a tragic figure. Sure, some of them have problems, but more then half of the main characters are surprisingly NOT harbouring some secret guilt. That is RARE in anime!

Probably not the best anime you'll ever watch, but you'll walk away feeling good about yourself. (4/5)

Lucky * Star

This review isn't REALLY about Lucky * Star. You see, Lucky * Star is pretty bad. It's got a somewhat humourous opening which really is probably just a rip-off of the Haruhi Suzumiya closing. I don't really know when dance numbers became popular, but whatever.

But it's interesting to mention the The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya because it's what the studio who is doing Lucky * Star did beforehand. L.S. is based off of a 4 panel manga (think your typical four panel newspaper comic strip), which means that the humour doesn't translate well or at all into an animated feature. Whereas before one could easily see the three panel setup with the fourth panel punchline, in animated form you really don't know when they've stopped one joke and are onto the next. The other thing is that being a strip about everyday life, they're talking about well, nothing. It's like Seinfeld gone horribly wrong, because you don't have Jerry Seinfeld going 'what's up, with that?' after a character asks how they eat a pastry.

The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is an interesting show about a girl who thinks life is boring, and wishes out loud that she wants to meet time-travellers, espers, and aliens. Shortly afterwards, she does, even if she's not entirely aware of it. Except for Kyon, who takes an interest in Haruhi, and eventually is forced to start a club with her, secret forces from space and time are all taking a vested interest in this young girl, because if their suspicions are correct, Haruhi, unbeknownst to herself, has the power to shape the world. Thus their challenge: making sure she never gets bored enough to accidentally destroy it.

Lucky * Star on the other hand, has no interesting concept in the least. It's so bad, that the animation director was changed after episode 4. Personally, I think they should change the source material to something that doesn't try and be a Seinfeld episode in small indistinguishable chunks. (1/5)

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann

The latest anime by Studio Gainex, who are most famous for their Neon Genesis Evangelion (but whom I'll love instead for their FLCL anime), this show is somehow both easy yet difficult to describe at the same time.

At a glance, this show has pretty much all the traditional workings of a successful (re: sterotypical trash-like) makings of a hit show:

1) Giant robots who fight things. Gotta have giant robots.
2) A slightly unconfident male protagonist, whom young Japanese males can project themselves unto
3) An outrageous male partner who yells everything, and comes off as cool on account of his rugged good-looks and tattoos
4) a buxom red-head who weilds a giant gun.

Looking deeper however, I'm pretty sure this show isn't trying to be stereotypical. Maybe it's so subtle that in fact, it WILL be considered a stereotypical show, but if they aren't doing it for the laughs, I'm pretty sure Gainex is lampooning that traditional mecha anime. Here's some things I've noticed:

1) Kamina (the blosterous male partner with the stupid looking shades) ends up piloting a mech that according to the script, he should be unable to pilot because he's not an enemy 'beastman.' Your traditional anime might suggest he can do it "because of some deep dark past blah blah half-beastman blah blah" but if my hunch is correct he can do it SIMPLY because the plot says he has to. Why? Because it's cool! He did it with force of will. He's that good.

2) Kamina suggest that his mech should join with Simon (the aforementioned meek male character, the one with the goggles in the above picture) to become a more powerful robot. This should theoretically be impossible, and in fact, they end up 'combining' by robot A drilling a hole in robot B. It looks dumb, and it doesn't work. Until it does. Why? Because it's cool! They combined because they believed they could. No actual reason given.

And ultimately, isn't that how this stuff works in other anime? People do crazy things, and they always try and present some convoluted reason why it worked, when ultimately the audience is sick and tired of hearing 'there's a .000000000001% chance that this will work!' Of COURSE it will work. They wouldn't try it if it wouldn't. In fact, Kamina, who is awesome, ends up rejecting Simon's attempts to merge their robots together in a later episode because Simon isn't trying to combine robots LIKE A MAN.

Maybe this anime will crush my dreams and turn into something horrible later. But for now, it's a ridiculous ride, and I'm kind of glad to be on it. (4/5)

Download Ouran High School Host Club episodes here
Download Gurren Lagann episodes here
You can find Lucky * Star episodes your goddamn self.

- Eddie

2007-05-07T21:21:00.000-06:00

Alright Alright.

Spider-Man 3: Not only did a lot of people dislike this movie, apparently at least one of my Facebook friends doesn't know me at all because she invited me to an anti-Spidey 3 group. I mean, I'll level with you.

Was it as good a Spidey 1 or 2? No. If you disliked either of those movies you'll hate Spidey 3. Me, I liked the movie. Flawed? Sure, but I went in hoping to see some cool special effects, JJJ, and a dude swing around in red and blue underwear. And the movie delivered.

The bottom line is that if you're a Spider-Man fan, and you're not one of those dumb 'but that's not how it is in the comic!' fans, then you'll probably be okay watching it.

If you simply aren't that big a fan, then you'll dislike it.

If you think that Spider-Man should have beat Sandman easily, just like he did in the comics (the first time by vacuuming him up, the second time by RUNNING HIM OUT OF AIR) then you'll hate it.

New Place: I'm subletting a pretty nice apartment for the summer. I've got two pretty cool female roomates (which means they, along with the maid who comes once a week, keep the place pretty tidy from my boyish good looks. Also, it means that I've got a hundred dollars worth of shampoo and conditioner in my bathroom. My hair has never had this much bounce!

New Cellphone: One thing the place DIDN'T have is a phone-line, so I broke down, sold my soul to Mephisto, and got a cellphone. E-mail me or MSN me or whatever if you really think you'll talk to me.

New Job: I'm working at the Canadian Tire on Quinpool Rd. for the summer, and once I go back to school. I apparently didn't tell many people about this, or at least I didn't tell Jen Bond about this, so drop by if you want an outboard motor or multi-tool knife or something.

Or a screw.

(It's a pun!)

Level 5: Judicious use of a Grease spell against a Barbarian Were-Baboon has put Callipalore Viano, the ever cranky Grey Elf Wizard into the realm of level 5. We're still stuck in the 'dungeon,' but once we get out expect another 'why the fuck does he post this shit?' posts.

Watch out creatures and magical beings of evil alignment! Callipalore now has the ability to cast Haste AND summon Celestial Bison!

- Eddie

2007-04-22T12:21:00.000-06:00

I was cleaning my room, packing books mostly, for my impending residence departure, when I found a blue duo tang folder after my old Sydney Academy yearbook full on my toe. Inside were amazingly, rules for playing Chaos Magic.

Carefully handwritten by whom I assume to be Chris Batstone, this folder contains over 300 'rules' and effects for modifying your multiplayer "Magic: The Gathering" game that I used to play. Well, I've long since sold my cards, but I thought I'd share some of the 'Persona' Lands in the book. Obviously, this post won't make any sense if you weren't part of our clique back in grades 11 and 12. I've cleaned up the cards so they're somewhat properly worded.

To repeat, if you weren't my friend back then, this post won't make a lick of sense. Heck, even if you were my friend back then some of this might be undecipherable. Treat with full warning.

1. Chris: Put a Spawn Token into play. Treat this as a 10/10 creature with flying, trample, first strike, rampage 4, phsaing, creature with haste that has "sacrifice : deal 2 damage to target creature. If you are Chris, this token cannot be targeted by spells or effects.

2. Paul: Put an Ultimaspike token into play. Treat this as a 0/0 green spike with the following abilities: When comes into play, put six +1/+1 counters on it, and one +1/+1 counter for each other spike in play. Remove a +1/+1 counter: prevent all combat damage that would be dealt this turn OR gain 4 life OR gets +2/+2 until end of turn. If you are Paul, you may sacrifice this creature to deal damage equal to it's power to target creature or player.

3. Eddy (sic): Put a Nekid Boy (sic) token into play. Treat this as a 5/5 creature that is all colours (ha!) that has the following abilities: is unblockable, and cannot be the target of spells or effects. 1: gets +1/+1 until end of turn. If you are Ed, whenever deals damage to a player, destroy target creature.

4. Justin: Put a Soul Judge token into play. Treat this as a 2/2 white cleric with the following abilities: Cannot be the target of spells or effects. Each time a creature comes into play, gain 2 life. If you are Justin, each other creature you control gains the following ability: Whenever another creature comes into play, gain 1 life.

5. Bo: Put a Bo token into play. Treat this as a 3/3 red creature with the following abilities: You may play enchantments from your hand without paying its mana cost. Tap: search your library for an enchantment, reveal it, and put it into your hand, and then shuffle your library. If you are Bo, your enchantments cannot be the target of spells or effects, and you may pay 0 Mana rather than pay the upkeep cost for enchantments you control.

7. Shane: Put a Jar Jar Binks token into play. Treat this as a 4/4 blue Gungan token with the following abilities: All blue creatures get +1/+1. All Gungans get +2/+2. If you are Shane, you may play blue creatures from your hand without paying their mana cost.

9. Mark: Put a Saproling token into play. Treat this as a 2/2 green creature with the following abilities: At the beginning of your upkeep, put a spore counter on . Remove three spore counters from : gets +1/+2, OR you gain 2 life OR prevent all combat damage creatures would deal this turn. GG: add a counter to . If you are Mark, all Thallids get +1/+1.

- Eddie

2007-04-21T10:27:00.000-06:00

Sorry for not posting for the last week or two; in addition to exams, job-hunting and um, crushing hu-mans for honor and marks, Blogger decided to go all bitchy at me when I was forced to transfer my account to Google. Long story short, it's fixed now ("obviously Edward" - You) and I notice now I can label my posts.

This is a very dangerous proposition for me; I've got several hundred posts here, and if I start adding labels now I'll have to go back are re-label everything, because... because! Not to mention that I can't take anything too seriously, so any tags I make will probably be pretty inane.

Oh well. Here's a kick ass video by Deerhoof! Thanks John!

- Eddie

2007-04-13T17:06:00.000-06:00

I've got a blister on my thumb. Now, before you guys jump to any ill-conclusions involving a single dude, a lot of free time, and the internet, let be say that this blister I received at the hands (pun?) of a Playstation 2 controller yesterday while I was over at my friend Shawn's.

You see, he popped in some Street Fighter.

You never forget the quarter circle and 'dragon punch' motions, but damned if my skin didn't forget. I used to play quite a bit of Street Fighter at my friend Chris's house when I was a younger lad. Hours spent playing Street Fighter Alpha 3, or Marvel vs. Capcom, mostly with a losing record. I mean, Chris was a 360 degree machine. If I can pull of a spinning piledriver, it's because the game took pity on my flailing attempts to rotate the directional pad. Chris tho, he could WILL those 360 motions out. Lets not even get into Paul, who pretty much only needed one hand and a power ap to beat me.

The only game I ever got half-decent at was Marvel vs. Capcom, the gimped Playstation version that didn't allow tag-teams. I poured over FAQs and sites online for my edge against Chris, and it came to me as air-combos. I went on a bit of a tear with Gambit and Spider-Man, launching whoever Chris was playing skyward and then bringing them back down to earth. I remember Chris getting kind of bad about it, but soon he remembered he could block, and well, there went my edge.

Yesterday myself and Shawn partook in Street Fighter 3, the Street Fighter Anniversary collection (where I went on a noggie streak with Dhalsim), and wrapped it up with some Alpha 3. I was weird not remembering most of the moves. In Street Fighter 3, it was a case of not knowing ANY of the moves, tho I got along well with the skimpily dressed dancer chick. That's the one comfort in fighting games, you always know that if you want a half-decent character, the girl with the least amount of shame is probably your best bet.

Anyway, I guess a part of me just wants my thumb back.

- Eddie

2007-03-31T10:41:00.000-06:00

Hopefully you all know better then to assume I do these quizzes more than ever once in a blue moon, but I figure if Carmel is doing em, then they must be back in style.

1. Is that your natural hair colour?
unfortuantely

2. Where was your default pic taken?
My facebook picture was taken down at the beach near some park in Halifax by Sharon Keobounma. I like it except if you look closely, I'm kind of sneering.

3. What's your middle name?
Bryce. There was a girl back in grade 4-7 who had a crush on me who would always mention how she loved my middle name. That's really about it with that girl.

4. Your current relationship status?
Pretty single.

5. Honestly, does your crush like you back?
I am, at any one time, crushing on about seven different women, so I'm going to have to play the odds and say 'no.'

6. What is your current mood?
I've got a lot of work to do this weekend, but I'm playing D&D tommorrow so I'm pretty happy.

7. What colour underwear are you wearing?
Grey. Aren't you thrilled to know that.

8. What makes you happy?
Certainly not quizzes. Uh.. Guitar Hero?

9. Are you musically inclined?
I've gotten quite a bit of mileage with the phrase "The only thing I can play are CD's"

10. If you could go back in time, and change something what would it be?
Well for starters I would have messed around a bit with that girl who thought my middle name was cute back in grades 4-7...

11. If you MUST be an animal for ONE day- what would you be?
A human being. But a successful one.

12. Ever had a near death experience?
I play lots of videogames, every five minutes is a near-death experience.

13. Something you do a lot?
Procastinate, wish I was playing Guitar Hero.

14. What's the name of the song stuck in your head right now?
I honestly don't have any songs stuck in my head right now. Thinking about it gives off a Fiery Furnaces type of vibe, I guess. I more often than not have stories stuck in my head.

15. Who did you copy and paste this from?
Carmel's facebook. She's my second dad.

16. Name someone with the same b-day as you?
God, that would be too easy. Um Mark Twain?

17. When was the last time you cried?
A few months ago. I was ridding myself of some heartache.

18. Have you ever sang in front of a large audience?
I used to be in the school choir when I was young, so all the time.

19. If you could have one super power what would it be?
Read minds.

20. What do you notice first off in a guy?
If I can see his schlong or not. Seriously, that's the first place all guys check, just in case.

21. What do you usually order from Starbucks?
Venti Chai Tea Latte.

22. What’s your biggest secret?
You honestly think a survey presented to the entire interweb is going to drag my biggest secrets out of me?

23. What's your favorite color?
Dark green.

24. When was the last time you lied?
I was out yesterday with Sharon at the mall and she asked me if the clothes she was trying on made her look fat. I lied to her and said that no, I didn't mind waiting as she tried on clothes for six hours.

25. Do you still watch kiddy movies or TV shows?
I try but it's been unsuccessful. We don't get YTV here in Residence.

26. Do you have braces?
Nope.

27. If you could change one thing about yourself what would it be?
I'd like to be twice as funny as I am now.

28. What are you eating or drinking?
What, right now?

29. Do you speak any other language?
Not according to my french teacher.

30. What are your favorite smells?
Fruit smells.

- Eddie

2007-03-18T21:54:00.000-06:00

There are two things we can learn from this panel.

1) Iron Fist is going to go fight the Hulk armed with nothing but his badass kung fu. That makes Iron Fist the baddest motherfucker alive.

2) Luke Cage chooses to hang back and offer words of encouragement. That makes Luke much smarter than Iron Fist.

- Chris Sims, The Invincible Super-Blog

Do you like comics? Did you like comics? Then this blog totally rules. From Civil War in 30 seconds to a review of sorts of Chuck Norris Karate Kommandos #1 (mispelling 'c' words well before Mortal Kombat) there's a lot of interesting and hilarious stuff on comics that I could only dream of transcribing into my blog. I mean, it's so easier to pretend your talented by linking people who are!

Also, while we're on the subject of comic books, I present The Non-Adventures of Wonderella.

- Eddie

2007-03-17T10:52:00.000-06:00

Man, I dunno, my post 'word count' has severely dropped hasn't it?

Once again, there's a YouTube video here, so if you're reading this on Facebook you might need to view the original source.

- Eddie

2007-03-14T23:45:00.000-06:00

Stuff like this happens when I'm not kept occupied.

- Eddie

2007-03-09T16:49:00.000-07:00

- Eddie

2007-03-07T09:22:00.000-07:00

No doubt you've heard all the great and wonderful things about Conservapedia (a wiki for those who believe the liberal bias presented in vanilla Wikipedia should be replaced with a pro-Christian pro-American bias). There are plenty of examples over the interweb of articles on the conwiki ranging from misinformed to downright stupid, but that's not what I want to talk about. The idea, it got me thinking.

The idea of a 'conservative approach' to history isn't really a bad idea, it's really a shame that Conservapedia is too narrow in it's definitions, which I guess is the liberal in me talking. I mean, the statement that Wikipedia is too anti-Christian and anti-American has some basis in fact; The majority of the population of the world ISN'T Christian, and certainly not American. Still, I like the IDEA. I just don't think it takes it to a place where anyone can reach a middle ground.

So my proposal is to create a 'Liberalpedia' to compliment Conservapedia, but the idea that the two aren't separate, but in fact conjoined such that for each entry one could look up a Conservative list of facts, and a Liberal list of facts. The great part would be that you then have a THIRD category which is made up of facts that both sides can agree on.

I mean, not that I'd ever implement this but I think it'd be a cool idea.

- Eddie

2007-03-06T17:04:00.000-07:00

I'm listening to this "Radiohead" album called Computer OK or something and it's pretty good. You guys are always introducing me to music, so I thought I'd share one them 'indie' people you've never heard of.

They're pretty good! You'll thank me!

- Eddie

2007-02-28T20:47:00.000-07:00

1) Yes, I traced this instead of working on my poli-sci paper
2) No, I don't expect anyone who reads my blog to get it
3) Yes, that's supposed to be Stephen Harper
4) Yes, I've got a blank template
5) No?

- Eddie

2007-02-27T21:16:00.000-07:00

I felt I should update.

I guess this is a music post, but here is some of the stuff I've been listening to lately, in alphabetical order!

The Arcade Fire: EP
I'm sure McNutt has a lot more to say about this band then I do, but I like their EP. Both No Cars Go and Vampire Forest Fire are pretty swell!

The Beastie Boys: Paul's Boutique
I haven't quite finished this album, but I felt I should mention Johnny Ryall because I tried to interview a few homeless people today and none of them would consent! Egg in their face!

Buck 65: Talkin' Honky Blues
I of course enjoy the classics like Wicked and Weird and Craftmanship but I really like one of those Riverbed songs, but damned if I remember which one.

The Firey Furnaces: Quay Cur
John played one of these people's albums over Christmas, and I shocked him when I said I liked it. And I do! The Firey Furnaces bring such a unique sound and rhyme (or half-rhyme as John describes it) and well, I enjoy it. Even when I don't understand what the fuck they're talking about, which is usually often.

Final Fantasy: He Poos Clouds
I tried playing this for Justin when he was down and I don't think he noticed. Still, like everyone it seems I'm in love with the guy. Platonically, my homosexual love is reserved only for local artists.

Guy Terrifico: Bring it Back Home
I should sadly mentioned I managed to return my brother's copy of the movie sans the actually DVD, so his shelf now contains a great DVD case.

The Inbreds: 1997 - Live
I don't know if it's an actual album, but live versions of Amelia Earhart, Matterhorn and Any Sense of Time (all lined up one after another) is a trio so sweet I would recommend ripping my brothers mp3's off to get them.

Sufjan Stevens: Illinois
Okay, everyone who's cool will kill me for not listening to this album more probably, but I really dig The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us!

Thrush Hermit: Clayton Park
I figured I'd be listening to Sweet Homewrecker more, but having lost my Clayton Park CD (along with two Flashing Lights discs) to utter stupidity, it's good to have the pure sweet Halifax rock and roll back in my ears.

Tricky Woo
Speaking of rock, Tricky Woo's songs all sound the same yet somehow I can't bring myself to care.

Commence to musical snobbery!

- Eddie

2007-02-25T17:00:00.000-07:00

Before he came up this weekend to visit me, myself and Justin were brainstorming a short list of things to do, i.e. go to Strange Adventures and play Master of Orion II, when naturally the suggestion of a movie came up. No sooner had I said it when Justin replied with two words: GHOST RIDER.

There was to be no argument, no discussion, and I understood this. Having seen the trailer, we of course had both pegged it as a terrible movie from the get go, and certainly not one of those movies where you'd go 'MAYBE it might be good' because the trailer pretty much shows you what to expect: cool looking CG scenes and miserable dialogue. The reviews at Rotten Tomatoes are very telling, giving the movie a mere 'freshness' rating of 27%. And hey, those critics are absolutely correct in saying (which I assume they have since I haven't read any of their reviews) that the movie has a cool premise ruined by inane villians, love interests, and yes, even manages to completely ignore the criminal justice system by arresting a man in jail with mere circumstancial evidence, all without the presence of a lawyer.

Oh, spoilers.

I'm not trying to take anything away from Nicholas Cage (who plays Johnny Blaze, the lead character), who I honestly really liked the movie. It IS a bit wince inducing to see a man who brilliantly played twins in "Adaptation" to end up in a superhero movie, but if Patrick "I've Seen Everything" Stewart can play Professor X, honestly I certainly can't begrudge anyone for wanting to play hero. Not that Nicholas Cage really ADDS anything; I mean, Ghost Rider is a big CG effect; they could have Drew Carey under there and it wouldn't look any different.

Hell, there was even a scene where they frickin' CG'ed Nicholas Cage a six-pack to DIE for. Which is ironic, because he can't! Okay, I'll leave the jokes to the movie.

I want to take a bit of time to talk about Ghost Rider, and in particular his villains. The plot is ESSENTIALLY that Ghost Rider needs to take out four brothers, led by the evil Blackheart by pointing at them and I guess, being near them. To say that all four fall with little difficulty is an understatement. The first guy? Okay, he wasn't aware that Ghost Rider could simply turn him to ash by smacking him with his chain. The second? Alright, I don't blame him either. See, he can turn into a gaseous form which means nothing solid can hurt him. How was HE to know that Ghost Rider could whip his chain around and cause some sort of "hell suction" which would kill him? I mean, no one. The third guy tho was a tool.

Dude, I don't care if you can turn liquidy. Were you using the washroom when Ghost Rider was killing your brothers? Being near him is ASKING to be killed. So what's he do? He pulls Ghost Rider underwater. And then grabs him and sits right in front of him. And is killed, once Ghost Rider realizes 'hey, he's right in front of me! I should kill him!' And then he does.

No big final fight scene either. Just a shotgun, and the ol 'penance stare' And more pointing. I should explain the pointing a bit; see, Nicholas Cage kind of badly points at the villains and kind of snears a bit. Honestly, it was the least threatening pointing ever. Like, the kind of pointing you do when your dog has done something bad, and you're going all 'bad dog' on him.

Special mention goes to Eva Mendes's cleavage, which stars as Johnny Blaze's love interest whose name I forget. There were a couple of scenes where I thought 'surely no self respective pair of breasts would bare themselves in this situation' but if you think that, you are, like me, wrong.

Talking about the movie afterwards, me and Justin attempted to remember some of the dialog from the movie unsuccessfully, concluding that in retrospect, any attempts to paraphrase the quotations would not do justice to the script, for our faulty memories could only make the dialog better. Luckily for you the Ghost Rider Internet Movie Database has quite a few choice quotes. You know what they say, go out on a high note, so...

Awesome Bad Movie rating: five flaming skulls out of four.

- Eddie

2007-02-22T23:48:00.000-07:00

Well, it's quarter to three in the morning, and my next door neighbour is pumping music in an attempt (I believe) to romance a lady friend. Se,, I'm not really sure if it's a bad thing, because without the music I'd probably be forced to listen to him apologize all night.

But seriously, he's on my facebook and might read this, so if you're reading, I'm kidding!

I've also lost-ed a card from my deck of cards while shuffling it mindlessly (which is my new stress ball). It's the 6 of hearts if anyone was wondering, which means my Color Monte trick is safe.

I've pretty much wasted reading week by doing anything but reading. I really don't have any pressing work to do, so it's not like it'll kill me, but a week without serious work still kind of bugs the hell out of me. There's only so many songs in Guitar Hero II I can play before I have to stop and wonder why I'm not doing something else.

I guess I've reached a kind of stale point of the month. I mean, I'm a guy who hates to ask anyone to do anything, I always feel like I'm intruding, and lets face it, I'm not exactly a great conversationalist unless the topic is perhaps, Megaman 2. I mean, take two of my favorite people, Shawn and Jen. Whenever I'm over at Shawn's, we can talk about video games and possibly prestige classes, but we're not on that level that I can really seriously talk to him about just, 'stuff.' Ali? Sarah? I for whatever reason can talk about my day with them, and not feel totally embarassed.

Speaking of embarassed, going out to Alexandria's with Jen, and noticing she was getting more enjoyment out of watching "King of Queen's" then talking to me? It really makes a guy think. How do I bridge this gap? I mean, I'm not at the level of friendship with either Shawn of Jen where I'm not constantly thinking 'don'tsaysomethingstupid' on repeat the entire time I'm around them.

I like em both tho. Shawn always tried to make conversation with me, and I enjoy that because it shows that for all my bumbling, I think he thinks I'm a somewhat swell guy, no matter how well I take apart his vampire bugbear creatures he sends after me. And who can't like Jen? I remember at her birthday party last week, an older woman asking if there was more then one person having a birthday party, stunned that Mrs.Bond can literally fill a pub with her comrades (I'm chalking most of it up towards her being a red-head). Still, I see her pop on MSN and I think "I should say something" but then I think "I'll probably say something stupid and never get invited to her parties again."

The music stopped 10 minutes ago, but let me blather on a bit more.

I guess it doesn't hurt that I find both of them a little intimidating. Shawn to me, is like that wise old ancient master who teaches you kung-fu and strokes his beard while saying cryptic (but important!) words of advice. He's got an actual job! A really interesting one! The hell if he's only on contract, did you know that Shawn does engineering work on frickin' military vessels? Yeah!

As I've told many people, thinking of Jen Bond makes me shiver a little, because it reminds me of a debating tournament where she scared the piss and vinegar right out of me. And she's a law student! Who's totally into politics! And journalism! Being as I am a poli-sci student with an eye on journalism, she's pretty much a role-model for me.

Anyway, just what I was thinking about. Sorry about all these posts, I think I'm just insanely jealous of Ryan McNutt's blog.

- Eddie

2007-02-21T09:28:00.000-07:00

I've been trying out a few more webcomics lately, so here, you guys can have the fruits of my research:

No Pink Ponies: Okay, the premise is kind of lame (a girl sets up a comic book store in an effort to impress a guy she likes) and it's totally 'She likes him, but is afraid to ask, and he likes her, but is afraid to ask' but the comic drawn well and it's generally pretty funny to boot. Perhaps my favorite part is that there's maybe 7 or 8 characters, but only three of them actually have names. That tickles me a bit. Which leads me to...

Marry Me: Drawn by the same guy, but written by Bobby Crosby (brother of Chris Crosby who is know for his Superosity and Sore Thumbs comics) who also does this comic about vampires and zombies which... kind of stinks, but the idea is cool. What was I saying? Something about this comic is new, but it looks like it could be good. I mean, ~~Chris~~ Bobby Crosby is hoping to turn this into a movie, which is actually kind of stupid insane (read Brian Michael Bendis's "Fortune and Glory" if you don't know how insane that is). I dunno, I'm keeping an eye on this comic.

WICKEDPOWERED: I don't know if anyone's heard of this, but Keenspot and the guys who do the aforementioned Sore Thumbs comic basically... teamed up? With a company that makes lasers or something and so now we have one of the first sponsored webcomics. It sounds absolutely stupid, and you know, the comic that these guys are sponsoring IS in fact, stupid, but it's the fun stupid that goes into Sore Thumbs comics, which I'm pretty sure is spoofing about seven things at once.

Penny and Aggie: I suppose this is what you'd get if you had an Archie comic where Archie didn't exist, and instead Betty and Veronica were at each others throats all day and... okay so basically it'd look nothing like an Archie comic aside from there being girls in it. People who remember Cool Cat Studio, the comic which was good until the author decided to introduce aliens and lesbians and possibly alien lesbians into the mix, will recognize the artist Gisele Lagace at work here. The comic switches from her oversized head style to a more proportionally accurate one as the series goes on. Anyway it's classic (can it be classic?) girl versus girl an pretty entertaining to boot.

Looking for Group: A relatively new comic that spoofs World of Warcraft, Looking for Group can pretty much trace all it's characters to time honored 'deal makers' such as the Warlock = Black Mage from 8-bit Theater but I don't read 8-bit Theater anymore so... anyway I guess if you like WoW and Black Mage you'll like this comic. But yea, if you already read 8-bit Theater maybe don't bother.

Happy reading?

- Eddie

Edit:

I felt I should clarify for um, the author of Marry Me / Last Blood who commented on my blog (which I'm actually pretty suprised about since I think my total readership I can count on one hand) about the stupid insane part about turning things into movies.

I wasn't calling his idea/method stupid insane, merely the process of getting a movie made is stupid + insane. I wish him luck because if Brian Michael Bendis can pitch a movie about America's first serial killer, which combines both Eliot Ness (from the Untouchables fame) and even a small dash of Hitler, and not get anywhere until Todd McFarlane stepped in... well, good luck Mr.Crosby. I have no idea what Marry Me is about yet, but Last Blood has a pretty cool 'summer popcorn flick' idea to it.

Sorry, this is still akward.

2007-02-20T18:33:00.000-07:00

I was over at Sarah's house tonight for some stir-fry and a movie (We watched Kung-Fu Hustle, which I've seen now something like seven times), but in between cutting the vegetables and watching Terry Tate skits, I mentioned how Justin was coming up this weekend.

Sarah: "Justin, the redhead right?"

This segued into a short conversation about our mutual love of redheads. We agree: If you have red hair you're 500% sexier. I'm only lucky enough to know two redheads personally, but finding a comrade in arms for my appreciation is great! It makes me want to start a facebook club.

So, as tradition whenever I talk about hot things, here is my haiku to redheads:

red strands of autumn
expanding the horizon of beauty
splash!

yeah, I think a facebook club sounds pretty nice! Yup, red hair is the ONLY THING stopping Salma Hayek from being the greatest thing since Spider-Man 2.

- Eddie

p.s. yes this post is partially an attempt to cover my D&D post, but redheads are still fucking amazing!

2007-02-19T21:24:00.000-07:00

From the diary of the late Callipalore Viano, translated from Elven to Common:

When I came to this plane, I was not entirely aware of all the heavy lifting I would need to do for our group. I'm not so obtuse to ignore the fact that the great arcane energies that I have devoted my life to learning are beyond the grasp of the majority, but I believe my companions could rely a lot less on their shoddy combat skills and perhaps use their head a little more.

As I mentioned in my last entry, any respect I had for Red has died. The man wouldn't know a good plan if he met it in one of his whore establishments and then a year later to cries of 'dad.' I think perhaps he just enjoys being the stupid broody type. I'm sure this life was 'a great tragedy', but I think he could do a world of good by investing less time into his terribly ineffective archery skills and more time into being useful.

The gnome Sorra at least has some backbone.

I suppose I should be looking for a new place to live. I enjoy this inn, and if fortune is on my side I'd even enjoy purchasing a place like this in the future. For now however, my goal is still not complete, and the future shall probably demand significant amounts of resources, so no time like the present.

- Callipalore Viano

p.s. killed a vampire today. Was a rather amusing display.

2007-02-14T12:50:00.000-07:00

I've been handing out creepy Nintendo Valentine's today, but I know I won't get EVERYONE so here's a giant list of people and their associated Valentine, in first name alphabetical order:

Ali: Super Mario Bros. #1

Curt: Animal Crossin #1

Dave: Zelda: Ocarina of Time #1

Jen: Super Mario Bros. #2

John : Animal Crossing #2

Justin : Super Mario 2

Sarah and Dan : Zelda: Ocarina of Time #2

Sharon: Luigi's Mansion

Shawn : Zelda: Twilight Princess

And last but not least, but certainly not a Nintendo valentine,

Carmel: Ham

- Eddie

2007-02-13T08:06:00.000-07:00

The incorrigible Jen Bond has put up a list of her 10 favorite love songs. I thought about doing one myself, except I don't have the musical range to put together any serious list that wouldn't be anything but "Deeper than Beauty" listed ten times, and I don't even listen to that one anymore.

Instead, here is my counter, ten songs that are kind of about bad loves. With lyrics! Some of these songs might actually be bad. Not in any particular order. Certainly not from the top to the bottom of my iPod list. Nope.

1. "4th of July" - Aimee Mann

A song about a guy who gave up too easily on lover I guess, leaving the girl to wonder if he realizes what an idiot he was. I guess.

"You'll wake up / and say 'my god I should have told her / what would it take?'"

BONUS LYRIC: "She's got the river / down which I sold her"

2. "Hiro's Song" - Ben Folds

Your typical song about a Japanese business man who leaves his family for his secretary, who was best friends with his daughter. A timeless tale of the gap between 50 year olds and girls in their early 20's.

"She wants to show to her mom and dad / I told her 'I would not be down with that'"

BONUS ANECDOTE: I once basically dug myself into a corner in a public speaking round when I used the basis of the song as a base to build my triple-speak apon. My picks handed me a situation where it was a tv drama, starring Jackie Chan, involving hot pants somehow. I cried.

p.s. yes I realize that Jackie Chan isn't Japanese; it led to my best and possibly only joke in the round so w/e.

3. "Ban Marriage" - The Hidden Cameras

Okay, I don't really listen to this song, but my brother's band did a cover of it! That's exciting!

"Ban marriage wooooaaaaaah ooh waaaaah oooooooh!"

BONUS ANECDOTE: I hope if I ever get married, John will play this at my wedding. I hope Mrs.Hayek doesn't mind!

4. "She Won't Come to Me" - Cord Lund Band

Lord knows I've scared enough ladies off. Heck, pretty much every time I drink I frighten at least two, which causes me to drink some more, and cycle. The lyrics are a little weird, but this song is from Alberta, and they've got some weird mating songs out there.

"She rears her head / as I approach / her nostrils flare with fear / her eyes are wide / her mane is flying / she's pinning back her ears"

BONUS LYRIC: "She broken well / her gain is sound / she'll pack a man all day" Ed. note: deep

5. "Da Black Market" - Crazy Crakaz"

This is a really touching song about a guy whose life is measured in dimensions. His attempts to measure the love he has for his sweetheart unfortunately, extends past the standard 18" ruler her carries. His sorrow is drowned in making explosives.

"Swing batta-batta / take a bat to the face! / Mutha-fucker! / Ya sucker! / I'll beat you like no other! / From Onett to Threed / Doing what I need / to save the day and keep Gygas at bay"

BONUS LYRIC: "apparently it's a three-dimensional plastic case with a modern day circuit board mounted inside!"

6. "In Love" - Fear of Pop

This song is about William Shatner's love for Ben Folds..

"For months on end, I maintained, a veneer of sincere... interest. As if I were listening, as you, relived, every, page, of self-help, and new age that you'd read."

BONUS LYRIC: "At puberty, I was sworn to secrecy, by the international brotherhood, of lying, fickle males!

7. "Let's Make Love Again" - Guy Terrifico

Basically a song about how a guy was cheating on his girl, but it's okay, because she was cheating on him too.

"Burn in hell / you hurt me / my love hasn't died / lets make it right / lets not fight, the way we did back then / let's play nice, and break the ice / let's make love again

BONUS ANECDOTE: I totally have my parents convinced that Guy Terrifico existed.

8. "Summertime Intro" - Mary Cobham

Oh man, so I got this CD from Strange Adventures for like, 5 bucks. Have you heard of it? It's like, a small CD of songs dedicated to Sloan's Jay Ferguson. Best concept album ever!

"Mary: 'you know, the only thing that could make this day any better, would be Jay Ferguson right here! He could come swimming!'

Friend: 'But Mary you know Jay hates swimming don't you?'

Mary: 'What!?"'

BONUS LYRIC: "NONSENSE! I'll just have to coax him into the water somehow! Maybe through a seductive song..."

9. "Hospital Information Desk" - Tigre Benvie

I don't really like hospitals, I think they smell funny. I'm told this song is about Joel Plaskett! No wonder they broke up! I wouldn't want to get hitched to Rob Benvie either! Ha ha I kid. Nude Disintegrating Parachutist Woman was gold Benvie!

"I'm soliciting information / I'm giving the name of the patient"

BONUS ANECDOTE: I asked Joel Plaskett to play Nude Disintegrating Parachutist Woman once at an Emergency show; he said that Benvie did all the awesome guitars. Have you heard that cover? Those are some awesome guitar!

10. "Tired of Sex" - Weezer

Boy am I ever! *sob, sob* have a good valentine's day folks! *sob* I'm not crying, this is cataracts *sob*

Oh god. *sob* Why Salma? WHY WON'T YOU WRITE BACK!

- Eddie

2007-01-24T20:54:00.000-07:00

Mans, I knew there was a reason I was avoiding this Facebook thing. Is Facebook killing anyone else? Slowly?

- Eddie

p.s. please join my 'Ali Sampson is a Vampire' club if you haven't already.

2007-01-23T20:12:00.000-07:00

I mentioned about the awesome Wii/Guitar Hero II party we had last weekend, and Shawn and Ryan McNutt's (facebook account...) have posted some of the liquid rock we fueled up on on Sunday.

We've got an encore planned for next February, and chances are good we'll see some epic guitar battles between myself and Shawn! Much like Spinal Tap, these parties go up to 11.

- Eddie

PROTIP: Playing the guitar behind your back is really easy, and is incredibly easy to fool friends into thinking you are in fact, a guitar god.

2007-01-23T13:20:00.000-07:00

The quest to becoming a Guitar Hero is not an easy one, but here's my current '5 star' progress on 'hard':

- Mother
- Surrender
- Tonight I'm Gonna Rock You Tonight

- Struuter
- Heart-Shaped Box
- Message in a Bottle
- You Really Got Me

- Monkey Wrench
- Them Bones
- Search and Destroy
- War Pigs

- Cherry Piue
- Girlfriend

- Killing in the Name
- Last Child

- Less Talk More Rokk
- Parasite
- Trogdor

'4 stars out of 5' sprinkled throughout; groups 6-8 are still all '3 star' affairs sadly.

Just something for Shawn to aim for.

- Eddie

2007-01-21T19:46:00.000-07:00

It's been a pretty awesome weekend, what with Curt and Ali providing boardgame action on Friday and Saturday, and Shawn being a gracious host for myself, Jen, Sarah and Ryan McNutt for some Nintendo Wii + two-player Guitar Hero II. Brownies, pizza, and good times were consumed!

McNutt promises incredible photos of the event, and I wait with baited breath. While I wait, I reorganize my links.

On a much more somber note, and the reason for this post, I present A very sad story. I remember reading this story when I was young from a giant book of stories, and well, I cried as I read it. Disney decided to animate it, and someone snapped it up and threw it on Youtube. I remember the written story being a little more emotional, but I dunno. I just felt like reminding everyone about this little gem. Yeah, it's kind of meant to pull the heart, but I still liked it, and hey, it's wonderfully animated by Disney so...

...

- Eddie

2007-01-16T21:23:00.000-07:00

- Eddie

2007-01-15T20:28:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I don't get Curt. I think we have different types of humour, I guess, so when I show him something awesome like Overcompensating he gives me this 'meh' sound.

And today, I showed him this totally awesome cartoon, called Adventure Time, and he 'meh'd' again. AGAIN.

So please, do me a favor. Watch Adventure Time, find out how completely awesome it is, and then comment telling Curt what a loser he is for not thinking it's awesome.

- Eddie

p.s. Curt's still cool, just not cool when it comes to awesome cartoons.

2007-01-12T22:05:00.000-07:00

Oh crap. Fuck the iPhone news, you're telling me I can take YouTube videos and convert them to play on my iPod!?

Sold!

- Eddie

2007-01-12T13:08:00.000-07:00

Josh, the ever lovin' Australian who graced myself and Ali's apartment many moons ago showed us this neat and interesting tile based city game called Carcassonne. Loosely based on the actual french town of Carcassonne, the game is essentially a tile based game, where the players score points by placing men onto the board. There's numerous expansions for the game (two of which I was be showing you guys here) and it's a pretty good game if I say so. It's not as fun as Ticket to Ride, but it's still worth a play.

Essentially, the board begins with one tile. If you're not playing with 'the River', there's a specific tile in the box (different from all the rest due to it's mis-coloured backing) that you place in the center of the table to start your game. 'The River' goes through some different tiles first, but there is a beginning and end to the tiles used.

From there, players pick tiles randomly from a pile or bag and have to place them adjacent to ANY tile currently on the board. There are restrictions tho; each tile's picture needs to logically connect to all the others. This means that if you have a tile that has a road running off of it, the road can't be placed next to any tile that doesn't also have a road that would 'connect' the tiles. Once placed, the tile stays there the rest of the game. To score points, you can place one of seven or more men onto the tile you just placed to try and score yourself points either that turn or later. The turn is passed to the next player, and a new tile is drawn, and so forth. Here's a picture of 'The River' all laid out, along with some description on what's going on in it:

As you can see, this is 'The River.' It's not terribly long, but it essentially cuts the board in half, starting with the 'Spring' (shown in the top right) to the 'Lake' (shown in the bottom left). The rules of the river are that the starting tile is the Spring is played first, and the Lake last, and THEN you delve into the bag o' tiles. The player who places the Lake gets an extra turn (although he can place men on both tiles). Finally, the river cannot be made to 'u-turn.' Here are some highlights:

1. All three of us (I'm yellow) randomly grab tiles with roads on them here, and palce men on said roads. Men on roads are called 'thieves.' When a road reaches a complete stop on both ends of the road (via a crossroads, monastery, building, etc.) players score one point for each tile that their road runs through. If a road is not completed by the end of the game (that a player has a thief on), that player scores one point for each tile his road runs for. Completing a road allows you to remove the 'thief' and play him on the following turn somewhere else if you want (does not need to be played again as a thief).

There's looking to be some conflict here, but I'll get into what happens when roads and buildings become 'shared' later.

2. Me and green both have a mans on 'cities' here. Men on cities are called 'Knights.' If you can 'enclose' a city (i.e. leave no open ended tile areas) you get two points for each tile that makes up the city. Some tiles also have a 'shield' icon on them, which give you an additional two points. The 'Traders and Builders' expansion add tiles that have trade goods on them, which give the person who completes (but does not necessarily own) the city little markers that signify that they own a certain number of production for that good. More on that later. At the end of the game, any incompleted cities that have knights on them score are counted as normal but only given half points. A completed city that contains only two squares is the one exception to the city rules, scoring any player who owns it a mere two points instead of four (this encouraging you to build larger cities). You remove any men from a city once it becomes completed.

3. Monasteries (churchy like buildings) when laid can have 'monks' placed on them. A monk stays there until the tile is surrounded (in all eight major compass directions) , at which point the player gains nine points. Incompleted monasteries score a player one point for the monastery itself, and any tiles surrounding it. A completed monastery allows a player to remove the man.

4. Farm land. This will hopefully be made a lot clearer later, but you can place men on fields as 'farmers.' Unlike Monks, Knights, and Thieves, once a man is placed as a farmer there is no way to remove him as one until the end of the game (peasentry is a rough life). A farmer's effectiveness is based upon how many completed cities that peasent's 'field' is connected to. Roads, rivers, and buildings can block a peasent. The litmus test over whether a peasent can 'feed' a city is if you can follow a grassy path to the city without crossing one of the above. I'll explain how to score them at the end, because well, there's three editions, and it really depends on which edition you choose to use, because the scoring is down a different way in each.

The score is kept track on a seperate board (the computer version I'm using here keeps track of it automatically). I just wanted to point out a few things on this first; From left to right are the following: Followers, a 'meeple,' a pig, and a builder. To the top right of that is the score, and bellow that the amount of 'resources' (from cities) that you've gained.

Followers are the thieves/knights/peasents/monks I told you about earlier. You traditionally start with seven. The 'meeple' is effectively a 'big' follower. He can placed just like a regular follower, but he counts as 'two' followers for the purpose of deciding ownership (which will be explained soon). A pig can be placed in any field for which you control a farmer. It gives you an extra point per completed city that farmer feeds at the end of the game. The builder can only be placed on a building or road for which you already control a follower. It allows you an extra turn if you place a tile that furthers/finishes that city or road (but only once a turn) and is removed once the city or road is completed.

The meeple is from an expansion called 'Inns and Cathedrals,' and the pig and builder are from an expansion (that Ali owns) called 'Traders and Builders.' Most games online use 'The River' and 'Traders and Builders' expansions but forgo all the Inns and Cathedrals tiles minus the meeple.

Just so you know, the way the resources are scored is that the end of the game, the player with the most/tied for most of one of the three resources gets 10 points.

I avoid 'sharing' the city with the green neighbour here with a tile, forcing him to build away from my city as well. Sharing works like this: the player with the most 'men' on a city or road when it is completed scores the points. Players with less men get zip. If there's a tie, both players get the points. So for example, if a two people own a man on a road that is completed that is five tiles long, both players get five points. This ends up being good for me, because his follower is that aforementioned 'meeple' and would 'outnumber' my one follower.

Now, the trick is that you cannot place a follower in a city, road, or field that already has a follower in it. This counts for all followers, even your own! The trick is that because the city is 'gradually' laid out. Just because a city or road or field is probably going to be connected in the future, doesn't mean it will. If you can place a follower on a city tile, and then link that city to another player's city, voila. essentially you turn what 'could' be two or three 'seperate' roads or cities into a single one. Whoops! City planning has it's problems sometimes!

As a side note, you can see that I placed a builder on my city. The chance of drawing city tiles is pretty good, so this allows me to captialize on the 'free turns' early.

Here, the Red player lays down a tile that cuts the green guy off from potentially sharing the road. The crossroads is considered a 'stop,' and since the road the green thief is only has a beginning and end, Green scores two points. This is probably a good deal for red. There's the threat of getting connected to my road however...

Okay, a few things going on here:

1. I place a city tile here. Note that while that tile (hi-lighted) is one tile, there is potentially three cities that could be made from it. I choose not to make a 'two tile' city (which would have been possible, and worth two points) in favor of making a larger city that will hopefully be worth 6 or more points. The other aspect to this tile placement is that to place a tile above it requires a city section to the south, and a road to the east. Effectively, I'm limiting the number of tiles that can be used to 'lengthen' that road. This might seem weird, because really, I have a man on that potential 'road' and I could possibly be denying myself points. I've got a good reason tho, at '3.'....

2. I also manage to find a curved turn here while red draws some city tiles (and thus can't add onto his road). That curve forces one of two things: a) he'll connect our roads and I'll get the points for the road two if it's ever completed. b) he finds a crossroads (much like the tile he used to block green) and cuts me off. That would finish his road, but he'd get his builder and man back (and 3 points). Therefore I'm going to do my best to connect it.

3. Ah, his builder. This is the reason why I wanted to make the road potentially 'harder' to complete. The builder can be a powerful tool; If I can strand it here at all, it'll make winning easier.

Here's what happens:

1. 'A' happens and the road gets connected. I lengthen the road myself; I might as well profit from this (see the new city I control).

2. Red tries to do something sneaky here; he's looking to connect his road to this one, and since this one has a man, he'll outnumber my lone guy, losing me the points!

1. Ah ha! I draw the same tile he does, and simply 'continue' the road to the west. There's now zero chance of him stealing it!

2. The interesting part about this 'empty' space is that out of the 100 some odd tiles we're playing with, only two can fill in here. They're both Monastery squares, and therefore there's a good chance that both are men (and his builder) are going to be stranded here most of the game. That's okay with me however; him losing his builder sounds like a sweet 'trade' to me. Of course, if he draws that tile surely he'll place it there for an easy 9 points + points for the road + his builder back + an extra turn (for the builder), but his odds aren't great. Both me and Green can draw those tiles too, and damned if either of us will be placing it there.

Here's an extreme example of a city with multiple followers. I'll leave it to your imagination how the city ended up this way. We've each got two followers, our meeple, and builder on this city, so if it's completed we'll be sharing the glory (52 points at least plus some resources. That's huge in this game!). I try and sneak another yellow knight in there (you can see him in the south-west) but eventually the strain of having so many men on that city causes me to complete it. Me and Green both get 50+ points, but I get 'two barrels and a grain' of resources, which could translate into more points at the end of the game.

Here's what the game board looks like at the end, with all the tiles laid out and all followers except pigs and farmers removed (click the picture to enlarge it if you can't see it). It's probably hard to tell from a brief glance, but essentially Red took most of the cities in the top left, Green in the bottom right, and I took shit. Here's a better look at how it 'played' out (note, the top left is a mess!):

Any cities that are incomplete or are not being farmed are marked with a black X. Effectively, Red sneaks two farmers up north to outnumber my lone one, and even has a pig there to increase the effectiveness. Green sneaks a few around. Again, whoever gets a city depends on which player 'feeds' it the most farmers.

Here's a less messy, more spray-painty look at the farming situation:

In the first edition, you score 4 points for every city you 'feed' (5 with a pig). The second edition gives you only 3 points for every city you feed (4 with a pig) (it's what I used there).
The third edition scores you three points, but with a major difference: You can 'score' for a city multiple times. In the above example, green shares multiple 'fields' with the large south city, so scores multiple times for that city. Still, at least in the online game, the points awarded like that are inconsisant. Therefore, I prefer to go by the 'second edition' rules. To give you an idea of how I can't figure out how the points were actually calculated, red got 35 points (just like he would in 2nd edition) but green scored 30. I don't understand. If I were to calculate it like I THINK it should work, Red would get 38 points, and Green would get the 30 points.

So, yeah.

Eh I still won. I'll explain how to play online perhaps in another post if there's some interest. Warning: the game is almost entirely NOT in English!

- Eddie

2007-01-10T20:44:00.000-07:00

The first time I watched it, I cringed a little. I mean, it was enjoyable, but I couldn't help think 'oh man, what a deus ex machina.' There was a little romance thing in the movie, and it felt out of place.

The second time I watched it, I realized I didn't care. This isn't a movie you nitpick; This is a movie you sit back and enjoy. The nearest analogy I can draw is that this movie is a modern day Blues Brothers. Except with more Kung Fu, and certainly less blues.

That movie is Kung Fu Hustle.

Okay, I'm terrible at build-up.

Several awesome things about Kung Fu Hustle:

1) All the pretty boys who don't get their name on the DVD covers are either killed or not in this movie
2) The movie's kung fu masters are awesome, part in because the majority don't look the part in the least.
3) There's some genuinely funny scenes; Sometimes asian comedy comes off as too explicit (they tend to explain their non-pun jokes), but since a lot of the physical humour is drawn from cartoons it's... awesome? Yeah I'm the worst reviewer ever when Teletoon is on.
4) I've watched it 4 times.
5) It makes me glad that 'embarrassing people by pissing on them' doesn't come up in most American productions. That's frickin' humuliatin'!

- Eddie

2007-01-08T18:23:00.000-07:00

BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!

- Eddie

2007-01-06T21:45:00.000-07:00

These choose your own adventure books just ain't what they use to be. I mean, no offense to Ali's present, but my first time through I choose (very early) to go to flight school (in outer SPACE) and I get an ending, telling me that I get my own ship and go off to explore the stars.

No conflict.

A bad ending would have been better! Oh well, there's always next time...

- Eddie

2006-12-25T13:35:00.000-07:00

Out with the emo post, in with the Christmas loot post!

Okay, if there was a theme going on this year, it was 'give Edward stuff that will distract him from his schoolin.'

In other words, looks like I'm repeatin' next semester. Sigh.

Objects that will contribute to this failin' are the following:

- Beyond Good and Evil, for the PS2
- Dragon Quest 8, for the PS2
- Guitar Hero 2, for the PS2
- Final Fantasy 3, for the DS
- 800 pieces of Lego
- Kung Fu Hustle DVD
- Shogun Assassin DVD
- 51 Episodes of Full Metal Alchemist via John's interweb connection

I mean Hey Zeus Christ people. Every Christmas afterwards shall be an utter disappointment compared to this one. Thanks.

On a completely 'wow, that was kind of odd' moment, Curt sent me some Full Metal Alchemist figurines and postcards for Christmas, which was kind of flukey considering the 51 episodes I downloaded. That time of the season I guess! Thanks Curt!

Now excuse me, I've got about a billion things I can do instead of working on women. Out with the old, in with the new!

- Eddie

2006-12-10T23:05:00.000-07:00

I feel empty.

This isn't a post about me being depressed. I mean, I had a great time last night doing everything but playing D&D with Shawn (lots of stories mostly) and today I hung out a bit at Strange Adventures and watched some Arrested Development with Sharon, and then read the rest of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing.

I'm about level 60 in Final Fantasy XII, I've got about 50 or so green guitar picks that say 'Tenacious D: The Pick of Destiny' and I'm sure my brother will love them (for the novelty, he's probably too indie to listen to Jack Black).

I've got a can of Energy Drink I bought about a month ago from Freak Lunchbox. It's a thin blue can that has Mario on it (w/ mushroom) and it's labeled 'Power Up Energy Drink.' I haven't opened it and honestly, I don't plan to open it. It'll serve as a nice shelf decoration I figure.

I've still got that large green beanie baby frog I got from Seema years ago in the mail, which was delivered years later to me. It has a tag with it's name on it (Legs) but I crossed it out with a pen and wrote a new name (Starscream).

In front of it is 2/3rds of the first season of Arrested Development. The other 1/3rd is in my compy's DVD player (the 2nd disc). I've watched it all but the very last disc, and I don't know if I'll finish it.

Underneath Arrested Development is my Spider-Man notepaper/envelope combo which still has more paper then I have addresses. I wrote a letter to Sharon in it:

Dear Sharon:
I am pregent
and it is yours.
Donot tell a
teacher or dad!
Love, Edward

p.s. I am not
jokking. I have
Aids. xoxoxo

I no longer wish to send it. It was funny at first conception. Sharon told me her parents read her mail. I thought 'Well, I wonder what they'd think if they read this.' The Aids part is not mine, and I both half-regret that it isn't and half-regret putting it there in the first place. I should know better, Aids isn't funny, but the idea of a middle-aged Asian man with a fondness for kareoke reading it, raising the eyebrow, and wondering 'Who is Edward and why is he not in jail' tickles me a bit.

Of course, the Spider-Man letter/notepaper is now on top of the Arrested Development CD.

A plastic sleeve that once held comic books, then a birthday card from my parents, folded up notes from History (on an exam I've long since finished and can't imagine not passing) and below that more history notes. The stuff from class, not my minaturization. The top sheet reads

'The Imperial Harem: Royal Women of Oct 17/06
the Ottoman Empire (1520-1656)

It's not nearly as sexy has Holywood has made harem's out to be.

Below is where I suppose, I need to get to if I want a clean desk.

I'm going to tell you a story. One day I was feeling kind of depressed. Sharon came online and asked me how my day was. I told her it was kind of bleh. And she asked me, 'well why are you feeling depressed?'

I think about a lot of things. I'm not going to lie to you: when I'm walking down Morris (which turns akwardly into University) I'm listening to my iPod. I almost always put it on shuffle, and I'm not sure why. I've got 700 songs on my 20 gig iPod (shut up) and of those 700 songs, I probably want to listen to 10 of them. Currently, it's mostly Pavement. There's this one Sloan song that John turned into a blog post title (hfxnshc) and in my head I'm turning it into a music video. For a webcomic.

In my imaginary music video I'm highlighting the characters of the comic. We have the leading man, and the two leading ladies of course, so they come first. Forgive me, this was heavily influenced by Joel Plaskett's 'Written All Over Me' but I hear imitation is the sincerist form of flattery (but flattering yourself is kind of liek narcism isn't it?) but anyway, like my imaginary video for 'Written All Over Me' we've got this divider of some sorts which, when it shines/passes by the subject, we see a different side of them. It's not a true side. It's shock. In 'Written All Over Me' it's a spotlight, which shines over a group of scared people from an imaginary webcomic that never surfaced and never will. They're scared of the light, and when it passes over them we see not frightened looks, but grins. The evil within? I'm not trying to make a statement here, I just think it'd look pretty cool. You've got to imagine it in three colours (black, blue and white)

Someone's (character trying to open a door) picking leaves (tugging on this door, it must be locked) from the family (he tries a third time, and falls, nails scraping against the door) tree (the blue light creeps into frame, as it slowly makes it's way across the frame) and I've got trouble (it's on him now, and is passes we see 'cool.' He's not scared, he's Brad Pitt cool) written all over me

hfxnshc is kind of similar in idea, except the song is kind of punky (wtg Sloan) and (a Tenacious D pick is now in my mouth) we'd create transitions using moving lines and stars and whatnot. And they'd have their 'normal' picture and then teh stuff would pass over them and they'd look like they were punk fans. The hair, piercings, bad jewelry, I mean, I don't like punk music but they'd look like they did.

And that's kind of ironic you know? Because the strip is about indie music. I'm not sure any of the characters actually like punk music. I assume one of them must, but it might be out of place. I really just like the song and the idea. And one of the characters, Raven, see she already has a bunch of piercings, so she'd actually lose them and adopt an 'I'm an angel' pose when the lines or whatever passed her and...

The pick is out of my mouth.

That's not what I was thinking that night. Normally it's about me being a superhero. Of a fashion. That night, I was, like one Dallas Clark, going deep (that's a football joke Ali).

My imagination is scenarios. They're not always pretty, but they're mine, and in they're in my head, so you're safe. Sometimes it's unrequited (had to look that up) love. Sometimes it's death. Sometimes it's when I'm a superhero, and I'm trying to express love or I'm dealing with death. This was a scenario of a different kind. An actually imaginable one where I'm not a ghost and the girl has always loved me. This was a scenario where something I didn't like turned out for 'the best'.

And I still wasn't happy with the outcome.

The idea that I could imagine a 'better' scenario, but then realize that it's really only better at the beginning. Neil Gaiman once wrote that the trick to a happy ending is knowing where to stop. It's the big secret, that I'm sure someone wrote before him. If you keep going, Cinderella and Prince Charming are no longer happily ever after. It could be finances, it could be divorce, it could be anything. Eventually, if all goes well, it will be death. Knowing where to stop, that's the key.

But I continue down this better path, and I realize that the end result still stinks. What good is change if it doesn't actually make anything better? The happy ending was actually just a happy beginning. I know how it'll end. And it's not that I'm a pessimist, it's that I know. I've got facts. The facts are indisputable.

So, I feel empty.

- Eddie

2006-11-29T21:23:00.000-07:00

So, okay, this month kind of went bust. Oh well, I'm 24 now.

Here's a quick review of everything I forgot to mention this month:

Video Games:
Final Fantasy XII: 4/5, Pending beating the game. Could move up, but probably not down.
Bubble Bobble: 3/5

Comic Books:
Fables: 4/5
Preacher: 4/5
Ultimate Spidey: 5/5

Movies:
Casino Royale: 3/5

Technical review score of Final Fantasy: Advent Children, if I rated it as a 'good movie' or not based on the story: 2/5

Amazing mind blowing un-probable action scened holy fanboy review score of Final Fantasy: Advent Children: 5/5

The Queen: 5/5

Shows
Final Fantasy: 5/5

Friends
Carmel, for not liking my cowboy hat: 0/5
John, for making a weekend awesome: 5/5

Letters sent to various individuals
John's: 4/5
Ali's: 3/5
Carmel's: 10/5

- Eddie

2006-11-20T08:54:00.000-07:00

Latest T-Shirt worn by the Conservative Wearing a T-Shirt Fuck (C-WTF):

"Guns don't kill people, Abortion Clinics kill people."

So hard to love!

- Eddie

2006-11-16T16:16:00.000-07:00

Yeah that question thing unofficially fell through, but officially answering Justin's questions cleared my blog up for the entire month.

Okay, hopefully everyone who's anyone knows that John is going to be down this weekend and me and him are going to celebrate ourselves a birthday party. We're going to go see Final Fantasy at 8pm, and commence with drinking afterwards.

If you want to come to the show with us, tickets are $12 and I think you need to get them at the CD Plus on Barrington St.

Now, I know this is going to cause some issues because well, the show is probably going to end around 11pm and that sir, is late. The mere coordination involved in herding those who don't attend the show to a bar is staggering, which is then multipled by what those math types call a factor due to me not knowing what the hell John and Carmel are planning to do after the show.

Since John is not currently online to answer any of your questions I think I'm going to have two solutions here. First, MSN me with some contact info so we can put John's cellphone to good use. Second, come to the show!

Final Fantasy + Guests @ St Matthews United Church.
$12adv @ Cd Plus Barrington and www.ticketpro.ca 8pm

If I find out any new info, I'll post it here before then.

So I don't leave you without your dose of comedy, here's a portion of the conversation I had with the ever lovable Morag (whom debater types should know) last night. Hope to see you this weekend!

brasschick says:
I you were going to be reborn again, what would you want to come back as?

Eddie says:
Spider-Man

Eddie says:
But the old one

Eddie says:
not this new one

Eddie says:
with his funkier powers

brasschick says:
You'd come back as a fictional character? Interesting...I don't know what the stance is on coming back as fictional characters..

Eddie says:
I'm not allowed to come back as a ficitional character?

Eddie says:
Sheesh

brasschick says:
Maybe fictional characters are real characters in an alternate universe somewhere.

Eddie says:
okay

Eddie says:
then I'd come back as Optimus Prime.

brasschick says:
That would be cool...and we could find a portal to the alternate universe and live in it, just like in Pleasantville...and we'd change it so it was like our universe. Stupid us...we ruin everything.

Eddie says:
Man I'd be awesome

Eddie says:
I'd be a frickin' truck!

Eddie says:
I bet I wouldn't need to get a drivers license

Eddie says:
and all my friends could get free rides

brasschick says:
I read that, somehow, as fuckin' trick...which is not what you meant at all.

Eddie says:
I would be a fuckin' truck! Just not in a sexual way

Eddie says:
Although I'd probably get it on with Porches or something

Eddie says:
I figure hu-man women would not be in my league

brasschick says:
as optimus prime.

Eddie says:
No, as a mach track

brasschick says:
ah...I've never seen automobiles have intercourse. I imagine it would be interesting...from an anthropological point of view.

Eddie says:
I mean, I can't even begin to fathom the mechanics that would be involved to propogate with a hu-man woman as a truck

Eddie says:
I'm sure SOMEONE out on the internet has figured that out

Eddie says:
but that is someone I never ever want to meet

brasschick says:
Have you seen the saturday night live sketch where there's a new input hole on a new model of car, with the sole purpose of "cleaning the pipes" for men? I never thought, but why didn't they also have an "outlet" for the ladies...

brasschick says:
Not that I'd want to relieve the pressure, so to speak, with an car.

Eddie says:
See, there are cars like that

Eddie says:
but you women don't want to drive Standards

brasschick says:
I drive standard.

Eddie says:
oh, well there you go

brasschick says:
That might be misconstrued. My car is a manual transmission.

brasschick says:
Well...my mommy's car.

brasschick says:
Standard stick shift

Eddie says:
(Woah, is this conversation stepped over the line? I think... I think it has!)

brasschick says:
I'm not even sure what part is wrong...I just know that something is...very, very wrong.

Eddie says:
I think it has something to do with machines and women. But honestly, sometimes that's kind of hot. Just not trucks I think.

Eddie says:
But I think even then we're crossing a line there

brasschick says:
You're thinking about it now, just to see if it is hot, aren't you?

Eddie says:
Man I've had the interenet for years. There's nothing I haven't seen.

brasschick says:
Um...we've crossed the line...now.

brasschick says:
See, before we were talking about trucks and women...unnamed trucks and unnamed women.

Eddie says:
Okay, first off

Eddie says:
you brought the sexual posibilities

Eddie says:
I'm just putting that out there

brasschick says:
Or rather, optimus prime and unnamed women.

Eddie says:
ha ha

Eddie says:
I am perfectly willing to 'park' next to fancy cars to fufill my perverse sexual lust as a motor vehicle. I am excluding women simply because of the unreasonability

brasschick says:
Okay...and I was just discussing the mechanics of this seemingly unreasonable situation.

Eddie says:
Great, as long as we're both being unreasonable

brasschick says:
Right-ee-o.

Eddie says:
... I wonder if I was Optimus Prime if there was anyway for a chick to make out with me in my backseat

brasschick says:
Wouldn't you have to eat her first? How does that work? Is the hood his mouth? How would she get inside?

brasschick says:
This all seems backwards?

Eddie says:
Maybe she could make out with a cupholder or something

brasschick says:
Or the steering wheel?

brasschick says:
Or does he have a computer on the dash like Knight-rider? She could make out with that.

Eddie says:
Or maybe the stick shift oh ho ho

Eddie says:
what she doens't know won't hurt her

brasschick says:
Didn't we already determine the stick shift was another anatomical equivalent? Oh...I see what you're saying...trickery.

Eddie says:
No one said that Optimus Prime wasn't a great strategist

brasschick says:
No...I guess they didn't.

Eddie says:
Yeah this Optimus Prime thing just keeps getting sweeter

Eddie says:
My theme song would of course my David Hasselhoff's 'Jump in my Car'

- Eddie

2006-11-02T16:21:00.000-07:00

Ali writes,

Do you think I'm sexy?

Clearly a complex question that would usually involve measurements and comparisons, but fortunately for science the answer is as easy as describing why Rod Stewart is still sexy even tho he's 104.

The truth is that all my female friends are incredibly hot. I don't know how I do it, but I assume they are just unconciously drawn to me. I mean, there was (in 'spit out from blogger' order) Sarah, and Alexa, and Jen, and Sharon and Seema (who I cannot find pictures of on the internets).

Do I think you're sexy? I think I've reasonably answered that.

- Eddie

2006-11-01T11:12:00.000-07:00

Okay, this demanded an immediate answer. I mean, not even FFXII is worth postponing this. LEt this be a lesson to all of you who dare try and push this guy around:

1) Brad and Jen: what went wrong?
Well, some people say it's because Jen didn't want to have kids (something she has denied) and others point to the 'Mr. and Mrs. Smith' movie where he met Angelina Jolie.

Ultimately I believe the biggest problem they faced was that they were two gorgeous celebraties. You know how the tabloids is, Brad couldn't take a piss without them reporting how much his urine was a big problem in their relationship.

2) Nature or nurture. What makes us what we are?
I think it's foolish to believe that there isn't ANY amount of nature or ANY amount of nurture involved in raising a child. Ultimately, I believe in nature.

The reason I pick nature is that unlike nurture where we can't accurately prove that you can raise a boy as 'a girl' (or vice versa) we can easily point out gender differences. So yeah, nature. It's wild.

3) Why in the hell did you like Final Fantasy 8 when it obviously sucked so hard?
Well, I guess the biggest problem people had with the game was a) the summons and b) the retarded 'draw' magic system. Me? I found the characters to be a likable bunch, the story to be muddled, but somewhat interesting, and I loved Diablos and Cactaur. Also, abusing Limit Breaks never got old!

4) Does this look infected to you?
I don't comment on Zerg foreign policy.

5) Do human beings have free will?
Heck noes! We are free to do whatever we want until the consequences of our actions impact others (See John Stuart Mill's harm principle). Also, there are limits on 'free will;' we can't decide to move to say, The Ukraine, without first ponying up the money to get there. Nothing in life is 'free,' it's one big giant cost/benefit analysis.

6) Boxers or briefs: A meta-analysis.
Okay.
PollHead: boxers = 35.8%, briefs = 64.2%
Random Geocities poll : boxers = 42.7%, briefs = 57.3%
Fresh Pair poll + Cotton Inc. poll = 30% boxers, 31% briefs (F.P.) & 40% boxers, 39% briefs (Cotten Inc.)
Opinion.com poll: boxers = 45.2%, briefs = 54.8%
Mister Poll: boxers = 46%, briefs = 54%

The Fresh Pair + Cotton Inc. Polls had other choices, so we'll just include the votes made for either boxers OR briefs, and come out with results of boxers = 49.2% and briefs = 50.8% for the Fresh Pair poll, and boxers = 50.6%, briefs = 49.4% for the Cotton Air. That way our numbers aren't lower then they should be.

TOTALS:
boxers = 44.9%
briefs = 55.1%

Looks like men don't value their sperm count as much as they used to.

7) Clint Eastwood vs. John Wayne. The brawl to end it all.
Ok, first we need to place these guys in their PRIME. Clint's stare ain't do no good, because the Duke fears nothing. Likewise, Clint's too eagle eyed to fall for any 'I ain't gonna hit ya' stuff, so they have to fight it out... LIKE MEN.

Poker: I give Clint the nod here, he'd definately be harder to bluff.
Whiskey: John Wayne holds the weight advantage, so I have to give it to him.
Fist Fight: Epic battle. It would last 40 days and 40 nights (coincendence, purely) and therefore no one would be able to properly watch it, because they'd die of hunger or thirst before it ended. Rumors have it that they eventually just stopped fighting and went on to drink and play cards.

8)The democratization of the Middle East: Pipe dream or possible reality?
Well, technically they were urns, not pipes, but I guess Mario could still warp through em. So yeah, no reality.

9) Why the fuck do people consider these women attractive: Jessica Simpson, Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan
I can only assume that the same people who find those women attractive are the same people who believe the democratization of the Middle East is a possible reality.

10) No seriously, why the hell did you like FF8?
I'm very big on interesting systems of gameplay! I mean, FF7 tried that bullshit Materia stuff, but FF8's was much more interesting.

11) Conservative fucker: Forerunner of a new Invasion of the Body Snatchers?
Man, what I would give to have his body replaced by a murderous doppelganger....

12) Just how awesome is Justin anyway?
Just once went skydiving. It was the next day when he was having sex that he remember he had forgotten to wear a parachute.

13) Best James Bond. Maybe want to go see Casino Royale first. That Daniel Craig has a rugged beauty about him.
While Bryan Bosshardy is probably a solid choice for number two, I have to go with Wouter Jansen. He beat Goldeneye's hard mode in a mere 47 minutes. That's like, a full hour less then what it took Pierce Brosnan to beat it.

14) Cognitive Behavorial Therapy or Humanistic therapy: which is better? Don't know what they are? Do some research, wuss!
I give the nod to Cognitive Behavorial Therapy, which aims to turn those frowns upside down! Humanistic therapy just seems too broad.

15) Dr. Doom vs. Lex Luthor. The brawl to settle it all.
Oh please, one on one Lex Luthor is dealing with a dude he's pretty much Iron Man + Doctor Strange with Reed Richards IQ. Lex doesn't stand a chance. Heck, Superman probably couldn't save him if Doom was determined enough.

16) So why is Mohammed suddenly not a political leader? That makes no fucking sense.
Fuck man, I don't know where Ali gets these crazy ideas. Whatever, I've got a scholarly source who's a doctor in history that says he's a political leader. She also gave me a 94% on the midterm so I'm inclined to believe anything she says, and hell, she's kind of hot for teacher if you know what I mean!

17) And why did you care, anyway? I mean, let's face it. There's no possible way anybody's beating you at Scattegories anyway. They should have been spotted 10 points to begin with.
Well, I practically did spot Ali 10 points that game, so I'm just miffed that her religious bias cost me the game.

18) How's the Pacific Rim doing? It's been a year since I heard from them last.
They're doing okay. California hasn't broken off the United States, and the recent console releases have tripled Japan's electornics sector profits, so look forward to good news from them in the future!

19) Brad and Angelina: It's got to go wrong sometime, right?
Well, apparently Brad wants marriage but Angelina just wants more kids, and apparently Brad had seen a hooker recently, so I wouldn't expect them to be together a year from now.

20) Can Bono do ANY wrong?
Well, the fact his private equity firm, "Elevature Partners" have invested in several video game companies, who produce war games from time to time (Mercinaries 2 being the most notable) is kind of a negative.

He also moved his businessed out of Ireland for tax reasons, yet petitions the Irish govenment to give more aid to its citizens.

21) 80s Prince: He was hot, right? I can't be the only one.
I think any criticism of Prince in the 80's is easily deferred when you realize who he toured with.

22) If you could play one Block party deck, what would it be? Fires? Ravager? Rebels? It's been too long since you talked about Magic!
Oh come on. Give up the chance to play Domain? NEVERS!

23) So if a tree falls in the forest, and it falls on your pussy elf wizard, is there any way your pansy ass would live?
I can't imagine how my imaginary character getting hit by a tree would kill ME.

Ha ha, j/k I knew you were talking about Callipalore in both instances! Lets turn to the rulebooks!

Damage for falling objects is 1d6 for every 200 pounds of weight. It's also an additional 1d6 for every 10ft increment that the object falls from (DMG, pg. 303).

I've included a link to a tree weight calculator, but we'll just use some imaginary figures here.

My puny Elf Wizard has 5 HP, and an additional 3 bonus HP for his toad familar. In Dangerous situations, my elf prepares 'False Life' beforehand, which would give him an additional 4-14 Hp. We'll go with an extra +9, so a grand total of 17hp.

Now, going to zero HP isn't fatal, and even going to -9 isn't fatal as long as I could make a stability roll. In the interests of not complicating this question however, lets just assume -1 is the basis for getting poor Callipalore killed.

The MOST height/weight that Callipalore could take would be 17d6 worth of damage, assuming planets aligned and one's were rolled all around. On the other end of the spectrum, 3d6 worth of damage could kill me (mental note: Avoid large sized Greatswords). The best way to combat this is to assume that on each dice, a '3.5' is rolled (oh, the irony). In that case, 5d6 is pretty much the maximum.

We can translate this into a tree that either falls 10 feet and weighs 800 pounds, or falls 40 feet and weighs 200 (or anything in between). As long as the tree resides within or above those bounds, it's safe to assume Callipalore would be deader then disco!

24) Fries or salad: a comparitive essay on North American eating habits.
I think I answered the previous 23 questions in enough detail to simply answer this with 'What do I look like, a fuckin' rabbit?'

25) Men you would sleep with. I know there's gotta be a few. I can't be the only one with a list like this running around.
George Clooney
William Shatner
Henry Simmons

26) Mark Millar or Brian Michael Bendis: who's behind the success of the Ultimate line?
I'd have to give the nod to Bendis. Ultiamte Spidey was the first and probably the best Ultimate book back then and now, and his Ultimate Marvel-Team Up books + Ultimate X-Men run + co-creation of Ultimate Fantastic Four probably puts him under 'biggest influence.' Millar is definately a close second however.

27) Why the hell do the combat rules suck so much in the Palladium system? I have seven different weapon proficiencies that give me different bonuses! Who playtests this crap?
I think the guys who made the Palladium System were like 'Lets have rules for EVERYTHING' so they did and it sucked.

28) Why the hell did you not think that I would make you blog every day? You had to see this coming. It's like that asshole game. You just don't know the depths to which I'd stoop.
Fuck man, you know I like a challenge.

29) a) So if Train A leaves Boston travelling to Oklahoma City going at 50 Miles an hour, and Train B leaves Houston going to Sacramento going at 70 MPH, which train will be closer to its destnation? b) What if one is powered by gas and the other is powered by LOVE?
a) Distance from Boston, New York to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma: 1122 miles
Distance from Houson, Texas to Sacramento, California: 1605 miles

You didn't mention how much time has elapsed, but Train A arrives in Oklahoma 22.44 hours later, while Train B takes 22.93. So the Oklahoma train will always be closer.

b) Trick question! Trains don't run on gas. Some run on diesel, but that's not the same thing. Also, love is an merely a concept and cannot power trains nor tear down walls without a physical force behind it.

30) All of this is great, but where are your East picks?
Well, I figure I'd let you and Curt have a shot at winning this year, but if you HONESTLY want to know, here's my prediction:

Isreal, but it's only because I flipped a coin and they won.

- Eddie

2006-11-01T09:09:00.000-07:00

Okay, two questions today. I'm breaking rules already! That's why my blog is so hip!

Ah, ah, ah, ah ah ahaaaaa DELETED!

Dear Eddie,

This is a two part question. What do you think is more important in a utopian view of liberal democracy: civil liberties or national security? And with that in mind, do you think I'm sexy?

Love, Ali!

That's an interesting Question Ali. Being able to do what you want, how you want, when you want is one of the four cornerstones of Classical Liberalism (the others for those who aren't amazing like me, capitalized, are Limited Poltical Power, Equality of Rights, and a Free-Market Economy). Governments telling you what to do is bad!

(sidenote: If you're unsure where your feelings about political thinking lie in regards to Civil Liberties, use this handy dandy reference guide:

Classical Liberals: Hate government, want freedom.
Reform Liberals: Government is necessary to ACTUALLY be free.
Classic Conservatives: Government needs to be a guide
Neo-Conservatives: People make more money without gov't
Communists: Death to the bourgeoisie!)

Now, Ali's question concerns what seems to be what most people believe, which is that there is a trade-off between freedom and safety. If you remove security regulations are airports, you run the risk of your average Joe hijacking planes and little Timmy bringing three (3!) carry-on pieces onto the plane. Oh, uh, terrorism mumble mumble.

I'm here to tell you however, that studies have shown that you can have freedom AND security. All you need is a little dose of vigilantism with a dash of spandex!

I mean, how many crum-bums hijack planes in Metropolis successfully? That's right, none. Stats show, Superheroes save, on average, money for taxpayers and governments alike. By fighting crime for free, your average citizen can sleep comfortably in bed while the Gov't takes those precious tax dollars away from law enforcement and puts them into things that matter, like tanning beds.

Of course, to truly implement this policy, we're going to have to really start dropping the ball in the transport of dangerous materials. Also, we need to open our borders up not just to our friends around the world, but also from around the galaxy and beyond!

And that's how I solved crime.

Tune in tommorrow when I answer the third question!

- Eddie

2006-10-30T17:33:00.000-07:00

It's almost the end of Rocktober and of course, November 1st heralds the thirty day countdown towards the greatest day on earth.

Last year saw me pick 14 topics and write about them, and that was cool, but it really hurt my possible blog discussions. So this year it's going to be different. Last year was about me, and this year it's about YOU. You about me that is.

So what I want to see from you, loyal reader, is questions/topics you'd like to see me talk about. I'll try and entertain any request, and those who've read this blog should know that all you need to do to get me to write about something is to dare me to do it. I'll do it.

You can leave topics/questions in the comments, or e-mail me em. Remember: No comments = I only update sporadically. Think of this as your way to see constant blog updates.

- Eddie

2006-10-24T09:46:00.000-06:00

For those about to colour between the lines,
we salute you.

- Eddie

2006-10-23T22:00:00.000-06:00

NEW LINK!

Animals have problems too!

- Eddie

2006-10-22T12:56:00.000-06:00

So I did a small interview with that Conservative fucker who lives in my building today. I was going around attempting to do a Journalism project, and since my interview questions were about politics I figured I just HAD to tape this fucker.

It was somewhat horrifying to say the least. I do have to give the man one thing tho: he's incredibly passionite about politics. I mean, I figured going in but wow, this guy is never at a loss of words. We talked a bit after, where he tried to convince me that if I really was in support of gay marriage, I should vote Conservative (A+ for effort) but I really tried to keep my political views out of, to try and find a middle ground with him.

I don't think he's moved from the 'I hate him' thing, because he's personally against gay marriage, and the fact that he's fine with 'civil unions' doesn't really change my mind how I view him or other Conservatives, but hey, I've never said I was neutral on the whole issue. To me, like I'd hope others, gay marriage shouldn't be political. Regardless, we talked.

The journalism assignment is about how people vote: party, or person? I went into it thinking that most people vote for the party rather then the leader behind the party, and I'm a little suprised based on the short sampling I got that the number who said they actually care about the leader. It's not that I don't care who leads the party I vote for, but I've always assumed that the majority of voters vote traditionally for a party rather then for the values and policies a leader would actually bring to the table. That might sounds stupid, I don't know. Regardless, I wasn't entirely proven wrong, but definately not as solid an assumption as I had thought.

I actually interviewed that conservative bastard because I was looking for the opinion of people through-out the political spectrum, and had found absolutely no one who would admit to being a conservative. I don't mean this in a bad way; I had only met one person who would admit to being a Liberal too. Lots of NDP/Green voters around here. Regardless, I wasn't conducting a survey so in a small effort to introduce some balance to my intervews, I interviewed him.

He did not like to play in the realm of the hypothetical. I asked him hypothetically, if there was a candidate who embodied his ideas and values but DID NOT belong to the Conservative party would he vote for them or the Conservative party? He factually told me that my example had no bearing in a 'Westminster political system.' I can't fault him for seeing the problem with my example, but I really just wanted a 'Do you think on average you vote for a party or for a person?' and he just wouldn't answer that. I'm chocking him down under 'party' ultimately, because it's my research to distort.

- Eddie

2006-10-20T12:26:00.000-06:00

Some people might have been wondering what I've been up to. The following is a completely true story, told with the use of pictures.

WARNING: Pregnent women and people with heart disease should go no further. This stuffis dangerously sexy after a little while. Lucky for the crowds I left the hat at home.

The night started off innocently enough. It was myself and a group of friends/aquaintances at the seedy, Thursday night fire-hazard known to Halifax as ~~Power Hour~~ The Split Crow. Now, I won't be able to tell you EVERYONE'S name but I'll make it up when I don't remember. Sadly, there were lots more pictures taken that night, so I'll try and 'fill in' the picture gaps with words, while still urging the photographer (seen later) to post the others ones. As always, this is all true baring the stuff I made up.

Okay, to start, that picture above: I'm teaching them how to properly hold a cigarette. To the right of me, we have some dude I'ma gonna call Josh, and Kaela. Kalea was easy to remember, because one of my best friends back in junior high/highschool had a really bratty sister named Kaela. She was pretty cool, but man, once a few drinks get into her look out.

As you know I'm always up for introducing a little 'culture' into the lives of, well... anyone... so here's my attempt to be all arty. The picture of course raises the idea of the old saying 'is the glass half-empty of half-full?' Clearly the picture has be siding with the 'half-full' side of things, indicating the artist's optimism (especially towards 3 for $5 beers).

The plebiens examined the artistic work with great thought. So many concepts swirling together. Example: The man holding the glass was incredibly handsome. Is the artist trying to say through his work that life is fragile, and that duracell batteries are slowly being replaced with internal rechargable batteries? Or is this a comment on the decay of the modern newspaper?

The crowd goes wild for the work! They state such true things as 'the human condition has never been represented by a guy holding a glass of beer so well,' 'one thumb sometimes is just not enough' (see picture) and one guy who was totally not the guy IN the picture even proclaimed 'I'd hit that.' However, not everyone understood the work of genius this project had been...

My arch nemesis in the world of art, The Animal! With his clawed barbs and sinfully silky fur, the artist knew this fight wouldn't be easy. Several insults involving mothers were traded until both realized the fragility of life and apologized. Seeing now verbal way to win this war of the catwalk, The Animal and the subject of the artist settled things the way things used to be settled before you could just google an answer:

STREET FIGHT! As in all great battles between master combatants, The Animal and the subject gradually unleashed new and new powers into an escallating arms race of street rage. One combatant would pull out his drunken master style, the other would pull out his incredibly gross 'body weapon' style (no, not like that gross). Ultimately both sides were spent, so using the last of their energy, they released one final desperate attack. Who would win?

Not The Animal Not today. The critics were on the Artist's side after all. The following haiku was said in memory of the event:

Deep autumn scuffle
beast and culture love-making
Splash!

Yeah I don't understand poetry either. On the bright side, another point goes to house Renaissance!

The winner of course was completely not cocky about his victory, congradulating The Animal for making the pictures he was in look really good. I mean crap, usually I'm cringing through these things once the alcohol wears off, but that night I can reflect on all of my pictures and tell myself 'at least I'm a winner.' Then things of course, got spicy!

First, that guy I named Josh turned into another ninja babe and together with the other two hot ninja babes started slopply making out over my victory. I mean, as all ninja babe porn is, it was of course disappointing, but I totally turned that guy into a chick. I mean, I could probably charge for that. I'll still call her Josh, just so we don't get confused.

It's really hard to properly describe what then went on, because there are some 'gaps' here in the photos. While this one of me showing off the 'Scud Missles' (they never miss) was posted, others involving the ninja babes trying to take pictures of their cleavage didn't come out (but to be fair, in the intoxication they mostly came out as pictures of necks. Ninja babe necks to be sure, but still). That's actually why I brought out the big guns, because Josh started bragging about the size of her boobs, and I'm all like "lets see how 'great' they are when we put them next to THESE" but that picture seems to have been lost.

Once inside we started doing impersonations of famous celebrities. I am of course channelling Stephen Colbert and Sharon here is of course, Snoop Dogg. Clearly the antitheses of each other. Alright, I don't really know what 'antitheses' is, or even if it's a word. I just believe I'm correct, so refuse to look it up.

Here's a group shot of all of us (minus The Animal who of course went home to lick himself). From left to right: Kaela, Zach, Sharon, 'Josh' and me. Of important interest is in the background: The drunk guy to the right is completely sickened by my muscle mass. The drunk guy in the top left? It turns out I know him! Seriously, it's people like him who make me feel really bad for having a terrible memory.

His name is Adam, and I went to elementary school with him. We were sort of friends; I believe he attending a birthday of mine, I attended a birthday of his... I was just floored when he was like 'EDWARD LARUSIC' because I seriously hadn't seen him since grade six or seven. Even more however, I was jealous of his ability to wear facial hair. Damnit, I wish I could wear unkept facial hair. It was nice meeting you Adam (even if you tried to hit on my ninja babes) but I'll never forgive you for the hair reasons.

After the Split Crow, me and Sharon headed for the Pogue Fado for extremely expensive doubles and several hours of dancing. Bets were placed as to who would win the prize for 'best moves on the floor.' I of course predicted victory, but Sharon caught a new guy dancing up a storm. He was vaguely latin looking. He too, could roughly wear some beard growth without looking like a tool. I named him...

Rick Martin.

I knew I'd have to bust out my best moves to beat this guy. It was a matter of honor.

I did it all. The bump, the blues brother, the batman... I laid all the Aliterative Dance on thicker then a tall thicket of trees. The final verdict?

VICTORY.

Now I really need a shower.

- Eddie

2006-10-15T08:31:00.000-06:00

Tiger says:
the worst part of having your parents visting ..... is the cleaning

Eddie says:
You aren't coming over to my room right? I don't need to clean up this ungodly mess right?

Eddie says:
Your parents aren't coming up here?

Tiger says:
no, god no

Tiger says:
no

Eddie says:
great

Eddie says:
Oh god

Eddie says:
she's into Yaoi

Tiger says:
who is?

Eddie says:
Vera's sister

Tiger says:
wha ........ nofuckingway

Eddie says:
Oh yeah

Eddie says:
read her Livejournal shit

Eddie says:
'draco/harry'

Eddie says:
'hary potter slash'

Eddie says:
I guess I've read one yuri comic before so no complaints

Tiger says:
how far back do I have to go?

Eddie says:
for what?

Tiger says:
for the yaoi post, I haven't seen it yet

Eddie says:
ha ha she likes lord of the rings too. I bet she's totally into Legolas/Gimli
pairings

Eddie says:
No no, in her userinfo

Eddie says:
here's a LJ community she's part of: http://community.livejournal.com/harrydraco/profile

Tiger says:
hot

Eddie says:
Ha ha ha

Eddie says:
I cna't imagine the Star Trek pairings

Eddie says:
Scottie + Sulu!?

Tiger says:
it's best you didn't ty

Eddie says:
(too late)

Tiger says:
well, it's best *I* don't try

Eddie says:
You're a better man then me Curt

Tiger says:
wehat can I say, i have a knack for not imaging star trek characters "getting it on"

Tiger says:
Riker/Picard

Tiger says:
fuck

Tiger says:
fuck

Tiger says:
fuck

2006-10-09T22:41:00.000-06:00

THE SOUL STILL BURNS

- Eddie

2006-10-07T10:59:00.000-06:00

From the diary of the late Callipalore Viano, translated from Elven to Common:

I'm beginning to wonder about my companions. I confess, as much as I will require their aid in the future, their current competency does not fill my heart with courage.

Bhama, our hot-headed dwarf, seems to be in some miserable collusion with our cleric, Steele. Far be it from me to question two 'devoted' servants of St. Cuthbert, but intelligence does not seem to be one of their strong points. They spend forever and a day making decisions, even when I present perfect plan after perfect plan. I suppose the simple-minded have a harder time seeing what is right in front of their eyes.

I especially shall need to keep an eye on the Cleric, because I've found his conduct in the past to be rather low for a 'devoted' priest.

Our dark halfling companion, Sorra, I am currently neutral with. The wench has a bit of a tongue, but at least she knows her place is in the shadows. She does has the benefit of at least some measure of intelligence however. Perhaps I shall take her aside one day and see if her mind is quicker then I give it credit for.

Red is perhaps my favored of the group. I doubt his name has any meaning beyond 'hack and slash' but at least he can see the bigger picture.

We've thus far manged to bungle nearly every assignment that didn't involve putting one foot in front of the other. The less said about the mimic, the better. The shapechanger however?

Now, I expect this party to pull it's weight. When I summon the arcane energies to attack a foe, I expect some help. Yet, the four of them put together could not take down our lupine foe. Bad enough my life was nearly extinguished, but surely after the trouble I went to ensnare our foe, the four of them can come up with a plan to immobilize our enemy. Sadly, the 'wish' spell I required back there is still far beyond my talents. They say they are prepared for her next time, but my confidence is not high. Luckily, I've got something for that bitch the next time I encounter her.

Perhaps weighing heavier on my mind is that half-elf know-it-all who thinks he can disrupt MY scribing to correct perfection. I suppose it as well, he cowardly ran off when confronted with superior intellect. He mentioned something about dating the maiden who runs the front desk of the inn! I thought she'd have more class then that.

So now, we are to embark on a mission to stop some goblins. You'll pardon my excitement. I suppose I should be grateful! Surely my companions can take care of a few weaklings.

- Callipalore Viano

2006-09-28T20:06:00.000-06:00

My two favo-rite 'J's' are going to be up this weekend, so I think it's safe to say that OMG my English teacher TOTALLY slapped down that Conservative T-Shirt wearing guy (his name is Johnathan, but I refuse to call him that) in class. It was awesome. I mentally popped some champagne.

Here's some important things I should get out of the way:

While Curt was up for the weekend, myself, him and Ali played us some Scattagories. I only managed to lose by two points to Ali, even WITH getting an entire round save one question wrong because I um, somehow... forgot... the letter... but the REAL 'news' came when both Curt and Ali smacked down my suggestion that Muhammad didn't qualify as a "World Leader/Politician" even tho he was both.

I'm sorry Curt, I don't care how badly you want to think the catagory only included 'current' world leaders and politicians, because that's not what the catagory stated.

I'm not sorry Ali when I tell you that no matter what you think, creating a religion that now counts over 1 billion followers does put you on the 'map' so speak. Heck, he unified Arabia. I think that puts you safely into the 'world leader' part. Being a religious leader (and in fact, the leader of the Muslim community in Medina) I think also qualifies him to be a 'politician.'

In fact, I brought this serious matter before my History professor, and she said (and I quote) "Those bitches totally cheated you out of a solid point Ed."

And there were at least two other things shot down in that same catagory that would have easily tied the game, even with my throwing away an entire round due to stupidity.

So basically what I'm saying is Your ass is so mine the next time we play. I will be the one to dethrone you as the Scattagories Monarch!

- Eddie

2006-09-21T20:56:00.000-06:00

How I lost my innocence.

- Eddie

p.s. yes it's real.

2006-09-20T19:18:00.000-06:00

We all know that YouTube is a gigantic waste of time, but did you know you can watch entire episodes of Sailor Moon on it? Illegal? Probably! Entertaining? You bet! They're even in Japanese with subtitles so you can experience how everything sounds a lot better when you can't understand a word they're saying! And the censorship!

GET THIS: SAILOR MOON SCRAPED HER KNEE IN THE FIRST EPISODE.

Yeah, they TOTALLY cut that shit out.

They've got at least the first 23 episodes up, and there's bits a pieces of other episodes but who wants to watch all that crap?

You can watch Episode one here and subsequent episodes are listed in one of the scroll bars. Heck, you can even watch Episode 2 which was NEVER AIRED HERE.

It's because Serena dresses as a bar slut or something. Fuck, you know how Japan is.

*edit* I did some research, and it's episode 6 that Serena sluts it up. Sorry for the confusion.

- Eddie

p.s. That Conservative T-Shirt fucker won the house Treasury position! I am so super pissed I might flip out!

2006-09-18T19:38:00.000-06:00

update: That fuckin' conservative t-shirt wearing prick! HE LIVES IN MY FUCKIN' BUILDING.'

I was flip-flopping on things to post here, but when I came across the following I had to share it with you all:

This is from the webcomic Sexy Losers which is ridiculously not work safe. I mean, it's usually pretty funny (I found it linked at Websnark and sooner then later I was through the archives) but it's also incredibly wrong. Have you ever read Savage Love and thought 'man, that sexual deviancy is fucking weird.' Well, Sexy Losers pretty much illustrates that point.

Anyway, the reason I linked the above comic (note, the word 'Hard' in the last panel is referring to the writer/artist) is because it's a guest strip. But it's no ORDINARY guest strip. Can you tell who drew it?

Here's a hint.

That's right, he was drawing gay smut before he did American ninja delivery girls!

- Eddie

2006-09-15T09:13:00.000-06:00

Conservative fucker from English class update: Today he appeared in a t-shirt that said 'Don't blame me! I voted PC!'

I told a few of you that I'd be posting my Journalism assignments this week here. I'm going to try and put all that stuff up here, a) because I'm highly egotistical and b) just becuase writing is interesting, and well, this is (supposedly) academic stuff.

I'm throwing em up here as I submitted them. I had a few newspaper no-no's (You're supposed to refer to people by their last name) and the biggest complaint seemed to be that each piece read like a laundry list, which is something I'll definately need to work on. Anyway, enjoy:

Assignment #1
Focus: Writing a story about campus life (slice of life-- We were just told what a focus is, so the 'foci' for these two pieces is wrong. They'll be correct in future assignments)

Joshua uncomfortably speaks about his destination today. His classes don't begin until tomorrow, but this is something he knows he shouldn't put off. Nearly every night, Joshua and a group of friends drink and play poker, but it seems to hurt his pocketbook every time he simply attempts to be social. Josh's destination today is the bank, which he hopes will provide him with the means to bridge the financial gap between his costs and what the government provided.

As is the case with many students, his education is not cheap. Josh has taken out a student loan to help shoulder the costs, because scholarships and bursaries only assist a few. Dalhousie is nice enough to estimate the costs of enjoying a year at their residences and school for him, but unfortunately that amount is roughly fifteen grand a year. Perhaps even more unfortunate for Josh, his student loan can't cover all the bills.

A meal plan that feeds him eighteen times a week won't cover all his food costs, and the estimate of "a thousand dollars" for books a year that Dalhousie provides him is certainly optimistic when some textbooks cost over a hundred dollars each. After you cross your fingers and hope that's everything, you then realize that there are pharmaceutical products one must purchase, laundry costs, club dues and, unfortunately for the likes of Josh who enjoy a few drinks with their peers, the costs of being friendly.

With a heavy smile Josh starts hiking towards Spring Garden Road, hoping that he'll be able to enjoy a drink while playing poker with his friends for a little while longer.

Assignment #2
Focus: Describe your best friend, family member or town (slice of life)

Justin is roughly five foot ten, has short red hair, is slightly lanky (although he’s filled out a lot since high school) and is incredibly hard to describe.

A physical description is completely inaccurate, because like most people, Justin is more then a set of statistics you'd find on a typical autopsy report (minus the 'high school filling out' thing). When asked, Justin will tell you with complete confidence that he has no issues. He's a year away from completing his psychology degree at Cape Breton University, and his intelligence is matched only by his sarcasm. Even with that information, he's still unlike anyone you could meet. Even an intellectual description is misleading; perhaps an example of the way he thinks is the best way to describe him.

When Steve Irwin (also known as the 'Crocodile Hunter') was killed doing what he loved, Justin mulled over the situation in his head and attempted to make sense of the tragedy by putting it in terms of “Dungeons and Dragons." He began by looking up the 'stats' of a stingray in a Monstrous Manual, and then spit balling Steve's level (Justin figures Steve was about level seven, and a ranger of course) and then determining how the encounter could have gone down such that a stingray would emerge victorious. Difficult to believe, and even more difficult to explain. His best theories are either that the stingray was not alone but was in fact part of a swarm, or that the stingray had class levels.

Those who don't follow how he came to that conclusion won't understand Justin, and he's one hundred percent completely alright with that. Perhaps he has never been described so accurately.

- Eddie

2006-09-13T16:57:00.000-06:00

Time for a kind of random blog post! Instead of being wordy however, I'll simply describe everything in one sentence! You win this way, trust me!

Halifax: It's good to be back!

Strange Adventures: $170 credit????

Gerard Residence: Kind of cool even tho my entire floor parties (without me)

English 1010: I hate everyone in my class becuase they obviously don't know what they're talking about, especially the guy who proudly wears a 'Tory for Ontario' T-shirt!

Poli-Sci 1103: Doesn't have the 'Tory for Ontario' guy!

French 1005: Je ne parle français!

History 1501: Marco Polo was a hack!

Journalism 1001: Best five hours ever!

Ali Sampson: Haircut buddy 4eva (but where's the mohawk?)!

Justin McNeil: Wrote a journalism piece on him!

Curt Crane: Disappointed that I didn't write a journalism piece on him!

John LaRusic: RATING: Totally awesome!

Arkyhm Horror (board game): Where's the rulebook (3/5)?

Ticket to Ride (board game): Really fun (4/5)!

World of Warcraft (for PC): I haven't played this in almost a month!

Galactic Civilizations II (for PC): I'm miserable at this game! (?/5)

Jade Empire (for XBox): White Demon wins, Drunken Master loses (3/5)!

Indigo Prophect (for XBox): Orange, Purple, not as cool as planning a murder (4/5)!

Feel the Magic XX/XY (for Nintendo DS): I felt creepy rubbing the dirt off her (3/5)!

Space Channel 5 (for PS2): It can masterbate, and it's a lot better at that then me (?/5)

Dungeons and Dragons 3.5: Sunday fun with a level 3 mage with 5 hitpoints (5/5)!

d20 Superheroes: No idea if this is still going on but would still love it (5/5)!

Atlantic Filmfestival: I owe Curt $35!? (0/5)

- Eddie

2006-09-09T22:05:00.000-06:00

Wizard card game final scores:

Ali: 250 pts.
Justin: -300 pts.
Me: 960 pts.

It was closee then it looked. I think next time Justin won't be going easy on anyone.

- Eddie

2006-09-05T21:35:00.000-06:00

I just watched Ali attempt to pick lice out of strangers hair, ride a chair like a porn-star, and preform oral sex using both hands (Justin is a lucky dude let me tell you). How was your night?

- Eddie

p.s. she was a terrible American Idol judge tho.

p.p.s. this is all true.

2006-08-30T17:54:00.000-06:00

Oh that fucker.

That fucker Curt didn't shut down his blog because of all the 'personal' stuff on it...

... he shut it down so he wouldn't have to give me multiple bloggies this year! I HATE YOU CURT.

- Eddie

p.s. that curry you cooked today was delicious.

2006-08-23T20:54:00.000-06:00

Okay okay okay, it's list time!

Ten things I've did since I left Alberta

(in reverse... nah, fuck it. In a randomly numbered generated order! The uh, numbers don't actually correspond to any order. Of course.)

#5: NES Games!
John, as many know, is the owner of numerous awesome NES games. I've mostly been playing Faxanadu and Metal Gear but I've also popped in Megaman 2 and Ducktales. They've... all been pretty much crushing me. Well, except Megaman 2, but I'm awesome at that game. I know Ducktales isn't a particularly difficult game, but I think I've just gotten extremely cocky (or extremely sloppy) because I'm taking many needless hits.

Not much to say about Metal Gear and Faxanadu, except 'trail' and 'error.' Mostly 'error.' But this was back before games really gave gamers a fighting chance off the bat.

#10: Fredericton and Camping
It's always lovely to see Carmel, and he's got some pretty cool friends who don't mind me being a social loser every once in a while. I got to try 'Apples to ~~Oranges~~ Apples' and honestly, I don't think I really like it. Maybe we were playing it wrong, but John described it as a 'debating game' but hardly any debating ever went on. I mean, I tried, but my brillant picks were losts among the more 'obvious' choices.

On the bright side, I completely got hammered and threw up many many times, which was a first in about a year or so. Horray!

#3: Picto-chat
Look I'm stretching a bit to get to ten okay? Me and John picto chatted a bit, and it occured to me that this whole 'psychic link' thing might be true between twins! BOTH times one of us started to draw a penis, so did the other one! Even more unbelievable, we both started to draw crabs at the same time once! It was pretty awesome. I mean, my crab. John's sucked.

#6. You-Tube
From John: Gopher Moat
From Eddie: N64 Kid
From Carmel: The Darkest Sketch

#7. Trauma Center
Man, I am a glutton for punishment! This game is really really hard. I'm seriously on chapter 2 and if it gets any harder I think it might be entering 'Advance Wars Hard Campaign' territory, except instead of surgically capturing an enemy HQ with only an APC, two infantry, and a single gun (no bullets) while up against 4 MdTanks, it's trying to close 5 things that are growing QUICKLY while I race to remove them. It's a race that I'm sure the Flash and maybe Quicksilver could win, but I unfortunately chose teleportation as my super power, and fat lot of good THAT does against a tumor.

#8. Advance Wars 2
I finally S Ranked the final mission after putting it off for a year. That makes every single AW2 Hard Campaign mission S Ranked! My enthusiasm to get through the AW:DS Hard Campaign... two more times... is not (however easy it is) there however. Maybe next year...

#2. 'Arry Pottar n' th' Alf Blood Prince
I started reading my brother's copy of that new fangled Harry Potter kid's book, and it wasn't too bad. A little stupid in some parts, I'm actually pretty glad to hear the direction the book is taking. It unfortunately has little of the magic that made the first 4 books great however. I'm regulating it a 3/5.

#4. My Dumb Friends
Seriously, Curt? Justin? You're both dumb friends and you know exactly why! Okay, I don't think either of you are dumb. It's actually just me, being completely out of the loop. Justin's dating Ali? WTF? Seriously, I'm actually a little sad how me and Justin haven't talked in sometime, because I'd love to know when that (and well, several other things) happened. I guess a lot of you have a lot of explaining to do once I hit Halifax on the 3rd of September. Actually, I guess I need to give props to Curt for filling me in on some of the finer details of his life lately, which I guess means I'm giving Justin slops. But I can't blame him, because he goes to bed at a decent hour unlike uh, me and Curt.

#9. Freedom Force
I picked up this gem of a game for a mere 5 bucks + tax (Alberta tax!) Best fiver ever spent?

Favorite heroes:
one) Man-Bot: Transfer is the bomb! It makes...

two) El Diablo.: Kick twice as much ass twice as much. Of course, ever since the dreaded 'inferno + transfer' combo, civilian property damage kind of rose five fold.

three) Alche-miss: Probably the best character in the game, who makes the last few stages and the final boss a total joke. Seriously, a ranged Shove attack? And the ability to make the Final Boss pee his pants with a delibating Status Ailment at will? A decent Ranged attack too!

four) The Bullet: Not exceptionally powerful (at least, in terms of 'burst damage') but extemely fun to use. Many robots cursed his name.

five) Liberty Lad: The guy grew on me. I firmly believe that he's better then Minuteman (except in the 'do horrendous damage' department, but El Diablo is so much better at that anyway, might as well have some versatility).

#1. JOEL PLASKETT DVD
I'M ON THE DVD! It's a little hard to see me, but only becuase there's this tall guy in front of me. Who's standing next to Ali. I don't know why he's there, I don't think he was that big of a Plaskett fan.

But I'M IN IT MOTHER FUCKERS! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

- Eddie

2006-08-15T23:55:00.000-06:00

In about nine minutes (that is, 11:51pm, which is the time I started writing this), it'll be August 16th. My last full day in Alberta.

This also means it's late so here you get the crib notes:

1) I go to Moncton on the 17th of August and go straight to a gay kareoke bar with my brother to drink and be merry. This sounds disaterous, which is exactly where I want the next few weeks to head.

2) After staying with John for an indeterminate amount of time, I'm hoping on a bus to hit Truro to see one of thems long-lost friends I've missed so much. Will he recognize me? Does he remember that Desolation Giant without me being around to remind him every ~~ten~~ five minutes? I DON'T KNOW AND IT'S KILLING ME.

3) Hit Dal for residence. I guess 'Frosh' days are the 3rd to 6th (what ever happened to an entire week?) But I might skip em to hang out with Curt.

4) I've got a cowboy hat and tight jeans boys and girls. Sometime between right now (11:55pm) and Halifax I'm going to pick up some Cowboy boots to really complete the ensamble. I'm thinking.... The D&D Cowboy.

5) I watched my second (althought admittly, only partial) episode of this cartoon on Teletoon called 'The Boondocks.' It's a very well animated series which clearly takes it's cues from anime, but eliminates all the cutesy crap. I guess it's kind of funny, but um, it's very... black. I'm not trying to sound like a scared white guy here, but the 'n' word is frequently and often used. The first episode I saw involved a pimp and his white ho, the second one involved a black man having a vision of meeting Ronald Regean in heaven and learning that to get into 'White Heaven' he must hate himself. So he becomes a preacher of sorts, telling his fellow black people to hate their fellow African-Americans. Oh, and women are openly hit on this show too. I... see, this is one of those shows that makes me uncomfortable. Is it good? I'm afraid to go either way with it!

6) Saw part of Batman Returns (that's the one with Catwoman). I watched for 5 minutes and wondered why I ever thought it was good. It must have been that SNES game based off the movie I never played. That game looked pretty sweet.

7) Bought John a new NES game! Fortunately, it's a really good NES game, that you might know as 'Megaman 2.' Unfortunately, he already owns it. Fortunately, I think that it'll be great trade bait, amiright?

8) Also, while and Value Village, I picked up an awesome game for only $4.99. And that's without any of that PST I'm leaving behind in about 31 hours. So for a mere $5.29, I got.... this! This is what I'll be playing when John's out working.

- Eddie

p.s. all that in only 15 minutes? I must be slipping.

2006-08-12T21:52:00.000-06:00

I hate 'spin.'

This might be a little strange coming from a guy who (god/buddha/oprah willing) wishes to become a journalist of some fashion, but it's out there: I hate spin.

Take this 'documentary' airing on CNN about an airplane crash. Bad enough the title included the words 'No survivors' (or something to that effect) but essentially there are and were airplanes that are unsafe due to some wiring or something. It's playing right now, but I've stopped watching.

For the first half hour, CNN is basically showing us images, interviews, etc. about the reactions of people and family immediately after the crash. To say it bluntly, the words 'terrorism' are thrown about liberally (ironicly) within the first half hour (including a picture of Osama Bin Laden during this sequence, which amsuingly enough had nothing to do with THIS documentary but rather was an ad for an UPCOMING documentary).

I mean, they've got experts and they're showing pictures of the president (It was Bill Clinton at the time) and they're showing pictures of planes that terrarists took out. And an ad in the middle involving Bin Laden. But hey, guess what? Terrorism was not involved.

I hate spin.

I hate reading a newspaper like the Edmonton Sun, and seeing a letter to the editor praising the paper for presently fair coverage to 'both sides' (third letter in). THIS IS IMPORTANT: Having Sheila Copps write a column in your conservative rag does not make a paper 'fair and balanced.' THROWING A BIT OF RED PAINT ON A BLUE WALL DOES NOT MAKE IT PURPLE.

Lets be fair though: Fuck Michael Moore too. I'm fucking fucking all of you 'spinners.' Hey, I liked your books (the part where you listed all those places to get stepladders was genius), but look, I'm no longer going to be your cabana boy.

That's right you assholes! I'm going to be the first journalist who avoids spin like it's sour milk that you know is sour without even smelling it or pouring it on your Resse's or anythin'. I'm going to be the fuckin' Miles Edgeworth of the newspaper businesses! FACTS. NOT WAR. (except when war is a fact)

- Eddie

p.s. OH GOD I HOPE ANY FUTURE EMPLOYERS IN THE JOURNALISM SECTOR DON'T READ THIS

2006-08-10T18:43:00.000-06:00

I could have sent this in an e-mail, but he HAD to push 'the buttons' with my last post, so...

... The bloggies are SUPPOSEDLY supposed to happen in five days. Are you ready for that action Curt?

- Eddie

2006-08-04T23:53:00.000-06:00

To John:

Server name: Dethecus
Character names:
Wütend, Level 60 Tauren Warrior (ü = alt 0252)
Einsamer, Level 7 Orc Hunter

Feel free to be pretty much anything. I CAN'T play Alliance on this server because it's PVP. I leveled my Hunter to level 7, so go ahead and play some of your new character.

- Eddie

2006-08-03T21:35:00.000-06:00

Well, I'll be on a plane to Moncton on the 17th. Look out Atlantic Canada, I'm coming back to fill that void I left behind!

- Eddie

2006-08-01T23:40:00.000-06:00

I think we all have a pretty good idea who Ann Coulter is, or at the very least have heard about her. She's the ultimate conservative female. She quite possibly believes that liberals are in league with Satan. We don't hear too too much about her up here in Canada, but she's pretty good 'friends' with Michael Moore, so that's where I first learned about her. Anyway, here are a few quotes by her for the few lucky people who don't know her:

"We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war."

"The ethic of conservation is the explicit abnegation of man's dominion over the Earth. The lower species are here for our use. God said so: Go forth, be fruitful, multiply, and rape the planet--it's yours. That's our job: drilling, mining and stripping. Sweaters are the anti-Biblical view. Big gas-guzzling cars with phones and CD players and wet bars -- that's the Biblical view."

"I think [women] should be armed but should not vote...women have no capacity to understand how money is earned. They have a lot of ideas on how to spend it...it's always more money on education, more money on child care, more money on day care."

"Frankly, I'm not a big fan of the First Amendment."

"[Canadians] better hope the United States does not roll over one night and crush them. They are lucky we allow them to exist on the same continent."

So, if you didn't before, do you hate her now? Alright guys, how about...

... now?

Damn. Okay okay okay, yes she's 45, yes she has said some pretty disgusting things, but I can't hate anyone who looks as good as she does at that age. Now, this isn't going to be some 'It's okay that you said we should televise the torture of Arabs on national TV because you're kinda hot,' because obviously she has said a few (ha!) things in the past that I don't and never will agree with.But... damn.

Now, I'm sure the few women who read this blog are right now shaking their heads, but I think the guys who read this blog can back me up here. Us men love them women villains, and I think we've loved them for sometime. There's something about the actual 'bad girl' that pleasures (figuratively) the mind.

The only way I can rationalize it, is that villainous women present the ultimate contradiction. Sure we want to stop them from destorying the earth, but damn would we like a piece of that ass. And that's the problem, for we can't have our cake and eat it too! I'm going to leave out any jokes about those villainous women just need some deep-dickin', becuase some of you haven't watched Chasing Amy I've heard.

For your amusement, I will now present some famous women in history (i.e. my childhood) who have irreversably made us love the bad girl.

Case 1: Dr. Blight
An ecoter-rar-ist from the popular cartoon Captain Planet, Blight enjoyed making chemicals to destroy wildlife and those pesky Planeteers! Notice the hair falling over one eye! The giant black gloves for working with chemicals! That trendy belt! It's a well known fact that before any mission, Kwame and Wheeler would high five each other once Whoopie Goldberg told them they'd be facing her.

Case 2: Scorpina
Gotta love thems women in battle armor. For those who don't remember her, she was a short lived character on the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. She was like Rita, always laughing and taunting the Rangers, except she was cute. I think the best thing about Scorpina however, was the fact she changed into a giant snake like being when she was angry. Now, most people might see this as a negative, but I think that it'd be great if more women radically changed their appearance when they were getting emoitional.

Case 3: Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy
What's better then one bad girl? It's a well known fact that Harley was created specifically for the cartoon, and I'm sure we all remember that one episode where she tried to go straight, and it involved a dress I think, and then I think Batman thought somewhere and anyway SMOOCH! Us 12 year olds live for the smooches in cartoons. Poison Ivy smooched bats too, but she was wearing poisonous lipstick, which is such a rip off of that one episode of Get Smart.

Case 4: The Baroness
Two words: Glasses. Before The Matrix ever came out, many a boys heart was broken by this leather clad vixen. I guess she's from Europe, and you know what they say about European chicks. That's right, passports. Well, I think the rest of the internet has said more important and funnier things about her.

Case 5: The Misfits
If there's one thing hotter then one bad girl, it's three bad girls. The only thing hotter then three bad girls, are three bad girls who rock and roll. Not many people remember Jem and the Holograms, and I'm almost one of them! All I can clearly remember are an episode where Jem lost her earrings, and constant 'music videos' in each episode. Clearly ahead of it's time!

Now, one thing some of you might be noticing is that I seem to talk waaaaaaay too much about anime and manga on here, yet there are no Japanese like characters on the examples above. There's a good reason for this! To show way, I present you three examples, which will be below. You're goal is to examine the three images, and then decide apon viewing whether you'd consider them a 'hot girl' or not. Readygo!

Now, maybe you might look at thems pictures and say 'I don't consider any of those girls hot.' Maybe you might look at them and say 'Those girls are kinda hot.' Maybe however, you might look at those pictures and realize the truth:

None of those people pictured above are women.

That's the big problem with anime characters, the gender is sometimes vague to downright wrong! Heck, somtimes you can't even trust the gender you're told! Take for example, this 'lady:'

This is Zoicite. Now, everyone and their dog knows that Zoicite was a man in Japan, and a girl in North America (from the famous Sailor Moon cartoon), and that's my point! Sometimes men become women once they hit here, so with that in mind who can you trust?

Okay, this post went a bit wayward, but I think I've made my point. Ann Coulter? You are so the object of my hate once your age starts to catch up to you.

- Eddie

p.s. wait, is that even my point?