Monday, October 31, 2011

What I see on my coffee cup...

I had to draw the rest of him...kind of reminds me of Die Fledermaus from The Tick cartoon no?
I don't know if it's the fact that I've been up since 5:30AM or maybe the dentist sucked up my brain with the spit sucker thing earlier...but this is what I saw when I bought my coffee today.  I just had to draw the rest of him.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

Ice T & Video Games...they do go hand in hand actually

Nog it up!
Coffeemate Egg Nog creamer is at our grocery store.  It's officially the holiday season!  Time flies huh? It's already Halloween next week.

This past weekend, I finished Ice T's latest book, Ice, and I have to say, there is NO way you can read this book and not think that Ice T is the man.  His views on life (love the little Ice-isms at the end of the book) and how he took what he went through, flipping it to be a positive fuel to get himself to where he is today...really inspiring. Absolute must read for anyone who watchs Law & Order: SVU, listens to Body Count or even knows who Ice is.  Added plus: he's a gamer also!

Spent most of the weekend in the insanity that is Staten Island with the future in laws, had dinner & drinks with some friends visiting from VA...nothing too crazy.

Thanks to CheapAssGamer's trade forums, I recently got Star Wars: Force Unleashed 2!  Really enjoying it now that I can go and finish this storyline.  Only a few hours into it, but I am already seeing some recycling of levels here and there.  I don't really care cause the gameplay is a lot of fun.  How can you NOT enjoy duel wielding light sabers and changing their crystals?

While that scratches my sci-fi itch, I also played a little Arcania: Gothica 4 yesterday (another game I got thanks to CheapAssGamer's trade forums).  This game didn't have many good reviews, but I am enjoying it...call it RPG lite compared to Oblivion being RPG heavy.  Still VERY early in this storyline but it's nice that I can pick it up from time to time and move through it at my own pace.

Today, we start Wicked.  Let's see how this goes...

Monday, October 17, 2011

Tired & Mindless Serenity

This past weekend felt long and trying on our emotions.  We've been spending most of our days & nights at the hospital visiting my future father in law (he'll be fine and is getting out today!).  Running errands for my future mother in law and just being there, while the act of being there is just that, is tiring on the mind.  Just wondering if everyone's all right, if my fiance is holding up okay...a lot of thinking.

We came home yesterday afternoon and just both collapsed on the couch and relaxed.  We began going through the various shows that the DVR has recorded (Up All Night is our new favorite show).  It was much needed.

After a few shows, I went to relax with a little 360 time.  I found that I wasn't in the mood for games like Fallout 3, Oblivion or even Borderlands.  I just didn't feel like I wanted to deal with questing, strategic fighting and everything else that comes with those RPG games.  I ended up playing Torchlight for HOURS...basically just mashing buttons and moving my warrior deeper and deeper into the world.  It's games like that and the Marvel Ultimate Alliance series that I love where I don't have to put too much thought into the story or action and just enjoy the bells & whistles; it has a calming effect.  So far I'm down 17 levels into the world and i'm trying to find out what's causing the earthquakes.

In other news, I'm just about halfway through Chuck Klosterman's Killing Yourself to Live.  He's one of my favorite writers of pop culture always referencing aspects of life to music & entertainment in his essays/stories.  Really digging this book as I whittle down my pile of To Read books in my library before I tackle the 1,000+ page Storm of Swords!

Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Korean Food, Cocoa Bar & Games

It's been a crazy past couple of days with work and some family issues.  I'm sure everything is going to be all right but cross your internet fingers, would ya?

Games:

I've recently decided to go back into the world of Fallout 3 to finish the DLC that I've bought.  This past weekend, I finished Broken Steel and started Point Lookout. Broken Steel kind of felt all over the place with the storyline but I did enjoy the ending with the Air Force Base.  Tons of great weapons and lots of loot!

Point Lookout on the other hand is HARD!  I'm going into it as level 28 and i'm having a rough time.  I love the different location; kind of a run down Coney Island / swamp theme going on.  Let's see how this goes.

From Point Lookout: Doesnt' he look like Sloth from The Goonies?
Also, thanks to trying out the demo on XBLA, I've picked up my DS again to play out Might & Magic Clash of Heroes.  Huzzah for puzzles RPGs!

Books:

I'm only about 50 pages to the end of The Princess Bride and this will absolutely get 5 stars from me on my GoodReads page.  The edition I have contains the next chapter of the story, Buttercup's Baby, which is where I am.  The way Golden writes this entire book is fascinating.  His narration, comments and sheer insanity by creating a story within a story within a story is so much fun to read, I have to remind myself that everything he's writing is fiction.  There is no S. Morgenstern (the real title of the book is actually The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love & High Adventure), there is no abridgment of the book, there is no Florin...it's all made up!  A must read for any lover of high adventure / fantasy and the movie.

Life:
Over the weekend, the fiance & I had a long overdue date over in Park Slope, Brooklyn.  I was finally able to calm my stomach for the desire of Korean food I'm happy to say.  We had a wonderful dinner at Moim.  She had a hot seafood Bibimbop in a stone bowl which looked and tasted amazing.  I tried the Dak Bok Kum which had little Korean style gnocchi in them that I gladly welcomed into my belly.  :)  The prices were just right for our tight little wedding saving budget.  Definitely going to go back again to try their Kim Chi Fried Rice.

We sat right there :)
After, we headed to a place that we've been wanting to go to for a LONG time: Cocoa Bar.  This is a coffee / wine / chocolate bar...and coming from a person who does NOT like a lot of chocolate, I loved this place.
Coffee & tea in the front...wine in the back.
You can't help but have a good time here (especially after having a few glasses of wine).  I had myself a homemade ring ding and a peanut butter patty along with a pinot noir.  She had a raspberry chocolate cake mini cake...thing, along with her merlot.  After a few glasses talking over our wedding plans, we left here very happy and wishing we had enough money to stay for more.

Thursday, October 06, 2011

Thanks

This was my first iPod.  Thanks for redefining how I listened to music.  R.I.P. Steve Jobs.

Wednesday, October 05, 2011

iPhone 4S Two Cents

Yesterday Apple announced the new iPhone 4S and people were very sad/upset that it wasn't the iPhone 5.  They also disregard the fact that they normally debut new complete iterations of the iPhone at the WWDC.  Apple was very quiet about this press conference (probably because Amazon was holding an event the week before for their new tablet).  Normally there's a lot of speculation, the various tech sites would have stories about different ideas on what the new phone would look like or even a leak that someone found the new iPhone.  None of that happened (at least from what I saw).

Personally, I switched from iPhone 3G to Android and haven't looked back.  I have a Samsung Captivate and love it because I can do practically anything with this little thing.  You can call the Android platform the PC to the iPhone's Mac.  I do find, however, the price drop of the iPhone 4 to $99 intriguing...but not enough for me to go back.  New camera...new chip...not interested.

Their introduction of Siri is pretty interesting though, I must say.  You know you live in the future when people say, "That's it?" to a program that basically acts like your own personal assistant.  That's it???  You can talk to this program, it understands you, and will tell you what your day will be like.  Previously, Siri did not handle voice recognition but now your able to just speak to your iPhone, conversationally, and Siri will answer you via text and speech.  How can you NOT be impressed?

Oh...that's right...it's not a newer, prettier iPhone.

In other news, the new Machine Head album, Unto The Locust, is out and you all should give it a listen.