An open letter to Calgary and Balzac.

 

Dear Calgarians.

I am a British Columbian that is in the graduated licensing program.

As such, I have to have a little green ‘N’ on the back of my car when I drive around.

Now, because this always has to be present on my car, I usually forget that you don’t need them in your oddly-shaped province of Alberta.

And for some strange reason, you have some odd fixation with taking mine.

Don’t do that.

I know it is a nice, fancy magnet, but it does not look good on any fridge.

Not even yours.

Thank you.

 

To the residents of Balzac,

You actually had nothing to do with the theft of my poor magnetic ‘N’ sign, but I couldn’t help but call you out for living in a town called Balzac.

You are nutz.

Nutz that live in Balzac.

Happy Cinqo de Mayo!

And a belated Star Wars day!

I don’t know what anyone else did for May 4th, but I totally went back and watched the Phantom Menace.

UGH.

It’d been years since I’d seen it, and I’d totally forgotten how bad it was.

Okay, so Qui-Gon is a total badass, and that’s cool.

Also cool to see Obi-Wan as a padawan.

But Jar-Jar? WHY. OHGODWHY.

And then the podracing was just so bad.

Why didn’t Obi-wan just kill the guy that owned Anakin? He’s a slimy, gambling, slave trader!

Or, even if somehow, it was still against his morals, why didn’t he just convince another store owner to trade his republic credits for the tatooine currency, and then buy the part after that?

rantrantrant

 

Aside from that, I also recently went and saw the Source Code.

I freaking loved it, but it’s one of those movies that is hard to talk about without spoiling anything.

In fact, I might have just spoiled something. 

What I use my iPod Touch for:

The sad truth.
I got the Free App a Day app a while ago, so I download all the free apps that look somewhat decent.
Then I use them once, then realize that I have real games to be playing.
And then the next day I download more.

In other news,I’ve fully recovered from my illness now, so that’s a good thing!
Girlfriend also got sick for a while, at one point, she had a frog in her throat and sounded like a pubescent boy. It was absolutely terrible.
In other other news, I went out and bought Lego Star Wars 3 for the 3DS¹. Aaaand it’s mainly responsible for the late blog post. Woops.
Well, and friends from around the province came down to visit, so I spent a lot of time hanging out with them as well².
In fact, being gluttons for punishment, my friend from Victoria and I started playing Star Ocean: The Last Hope for 360.

Frankly, the game is just absolutely terrible. So my next post will likely be a review/huuuuuuge rant.
To bide time until then, I’ll leave you with this awesome Tetris game.
It’s Tetris inspired by xkcd. 

Edit: This was posted right after.

  1. I was soooo damn sick of Monkey Ball, but I’m still reluctant to buy an FPS game for a handheld, so I ended up with Lego Star Wars.
2.Mainly Lego Star Wars though.

In which I get sick and review games.

I’m not sure what made me sick. It was probably taxes.

Yes I do my taxes in a sombrero.

Anyway, most of my illness was a pretty hefty fever. At one point, I took my temperature, and it was so hot that the thermometer shattered.

So then I had a fever and mercury poisoning.

And that left me too lazy to get up. So, I ended up playing a lot of xbox Arcade Games. And now I am going to review them so that you don’t make the mistake of going out and buying UNO.

First Game: Pac-Man Championship Edition: DE

This is the game I played the majority of the time. Mostly because I was pretty freaking good at it. Now, it’s not really even Pac-Man. Only the graphics are the same; it doesn’t play like Pac-Man at all. More like Snake 4.0.

So, it may not be your typical Pac-Man experience, but damnit is this game ever fun. There’s something insanely satisfying about devouring 90 ghosts in a row.

And the leaderboards are done really well, giving you a ranking right away that is generated by comparing you to other players. So if you’re in the top 10% of players, you get an A rank, 20% will net you a B rank, etc.

My score attack is in the top percentage of score attacks.

Overall, I’d say this one gets a solid 90 flashing ghosts/ 100.

 

Second Game: Torchlight

This one I got just out of pure craving for Diablo. It’s basically just a straight Diablo ripoff and a mad lootfest.There are plenty of randomly generated dungeons and such, but it all feels like grinding after a while. Also the fact that there’s no multiplayer really kills it. That was the most alluring feature in Diablo, so it’s weird that they didn’t throw it in here.

Another problem I had was occasional freezing. It always started working again after a few seconds but it happened quite a few times, and got a little annoying.

Aside from those few quirks, it’s still a fun little game that shows quite a bit of polish.

I’ll give it 6 randomly generated dungeons out of 10.

Third Game: Uno Rush

Now, I know what you’re thinking. UNO? Is that even a real game? Why do I even have this?

Okay, that’s just what I’m thinking.

Well, I was going to spend the points on Portal, but apparently I missed the sale. UNO was on sale instead, so I bought that.

And regretted it.

It was fun for a while, but there were just a few things that frustrated me as a gamer.

Firstly, the rules for calling UNO are BS when playing with computers. Sometimes they won’t call UNO at all, and you can just challenge them right away, giving them extra cards. Then other times they’ll call it so blindingly fast that there’s nothing you can do. The same applies to when they try to challenge you.

You end up just mashing your controller like a madman.

The second major problem I had was that those f*^&ers work against you. They’ll use their wildcards just to screw you over, or to let the other computers win.

And third was the general lack of control over gameplay. I’m used to games where if I lose it’s my fault. In this one, you can go an entire game without ever getting a turn, or when you do, you can just not have any cards to play because you’re just not getting dealt them.

Rantrantrant.

Naturally, UNO is a party game anyway, so it’s most fun when you’re playing with other people. Unfortunately, the learning curve on this one is pretty high, so it takes a while for new people to grasp the controls, and the game goes by too fast to really explain it to them.

If you couldn’t tell by now, I didn’t really like this one.

Also I swore more while playing it than I did in Ninja Gaiden 2.

Overall, this one gets 3.5 blindingly fast cheating double-teaming two-faced rude jerk-headed computers out of 10.

 

Maybe I’ll actually play some disc-based games now.

Also I could not be sick anymore.

The problem with driving a crappy car.

If you’ve been reading the blog for a while, you’ll know that for the longest time it was solely about my Mazda 323, and how bad it was.

If you haven’t been reading the blog for a while, then you’re in luck! You only have to read this and this, and you’ll have read pretty much every early post!

Anyway, I drive a less bad car now. It’s a ‘95 Civic, and it doesn’t have any exhaust problems or any other bad things.

So the titular problem here is that driving a crappy car that could break down at any second has ruined my driving experience.

If, at any time, I hear a noise that is out of place, my first thought is “Oh crap what now!”

This is especially bad on days when there is lots of construction.

Picture my horror when I hear things like this.

The same goes for smells as well.

It’s just terrible.

The other day I went to a store and bought things.

The other day being yesterday.

Anyway, some friends and I decided to break out Rock Band again. So we did.

And that’s all for this week, folks. Come back on Friday!

…

Right.

Anyway, we were playing Rock Band for quite a long while, until we were all mostly hoarse and tired from singing and playing drums. This is when we decided to go buy Rock Band 3 and a new keyboard!

So we drove to the nearest Wal-Mart, which is at least half an hour away, just to discover that they didn’t have any Rock Band keyboards or the new guitars.

So instead, I decided I’d buy a shiny new 3DS.

But more on that later.

I still had my friends with me, so instead of breaking out my new toy and completely ignoring them, we started playing the new Kinect game I grabbed instead. Yoostar 2.

The name absolutely killed me. Being a writer, that disgusting yoo felt like a knife to the gut. The only reason I bought it was because it sounded interesting- it gives you a script, and Kinect films you as you act it out, then it puts you in the movie. What got me was the movie list. 300, The terminator, the hangover, Zoolander, and the matrix. THE MATRIX.

Anyway, shenanigans ensued.

We did Norbit and 300.

And good times were had by all.

And then I got to break out my new DS!

Wow. Just wow. The hardware and built in software was absolutely fantastic. I’d get some pictures in here, but you really just can’t even understand it until you’ve got it in your hands.

 

The AR games, coupled with the 3D is just freaking astounding.

And then the new StreetPass features seem like they’ll be pretty sweet. When the 3DS is in standby, it acts as a pedometer, and you get coins depending on how many steps you take. So you’re encouraged to get your DS outside and start walking around with it. Then also while it’s in standby, it’s an improved version of Tag Mode from the regular DS. It’s constantly looking for other DS’s to trade information with, and different games can use that in different ways.

I don’t live in a very populated area, but I could see it being amazing if you lived in a city. Bodacious, even.

Aside from that, there isn’t a very wide selection of games available out now. Pilotwings and Street Fighter were sold out, so I got stuck with Monkey Ball as a starter. It’s alright, but I definitely can’t wait for the Ocarina remake, or for whatever Mario game they come up with for it.

 

If you couldn’t tell before now, I’m kind of a gamer.

A day for serious news and things.

This is a thing that I found that is real.

Also it is my birthday, and uhhh… A new press release dictates that instead of putting red stop signs on places where you have to stop, the government is putting green go signs on places where you have the right of way. This is to reduce the stress of today’s busy world.

Yes, that.

Also this. And this.

Alright, that’s enough of that. Good luck surviving April Fool’s Day!

I went on a trip and now you can read about it.

Some interesting things even happened!

Firstly, shortly after starting my voyage, a wild dog appeared!

Honda Civic used Rollover!

Honda Civic missed!

The Wild Dog ran away!

I did the picture the wrong way, damnit.

My next stop was a terrifying little town called Yahk. This is the place where people go to get murdered.

Firstly, you’re greeted with this sign:

This is a perfectly fine way to enter a town. Welcome to Yahk. Okay, that’s great.

The next sign you see says “Best lip balms on the planet!”

The planet? Really? That’s a lofty claim. I’m no lip balm aficionado, so I didn’t try any, but I’m doubting that it’s the best on the planet.

NEXT SIGN says something along the lines of having the most romantic feeling in the country.

Sure, if you think murder is romantic.

Next sign is on another hotel. It claims that they have “Reasonable Rates.”

…

ANYWAY, the last sign you see on your way out is this one:

What. The. HELL.

I can honestly say that I don’t want to go back. Also the town has a population of like, 50. 50 people. NOTHING about it makes you want to go back.

It reminds my of the sign for a small town called Midway, whose slogan is “Come to Play, Here to Stay.” The problem is that there is NOTHING in the town.

Anyway, after Yahk I emerged from the mountains, to the fields of Alberta.

Last shot of the mountains before you reach flatland forever. FOREVER.

Nothing about the prairies is notable, except that I got my ‘95 Civic up to 180kph.

After the prairies, I pulled into Calgary, and have been here for a week.

We’ve had artsy moments:

Artsier moments:

And the artsiest moments:

I got Chlamydia in a candy store. =[

Just Making Graphs.

In the vein of all the Graphic Truth articles on College Humour, I’ve decided to make some graphs. A graph. Maybe more later, we’ll see.

There’s a joke in there somewhere.

And if that wasn’t enough for today, I’ll just leave this right here.

The default voice of the translator is just so damn funny.

St. Patrick’s Day!

Was yesterday.

It was on a thursday, so I assume all the stumbling is going to happen this weekend.

It was still the day to wear green though, and it reminded me of something from my childhood":

Kids would insist that they were wearing enough green. They’d be wearing all blue, or something, and have just a tiny bit of green on a decal on their shirt, or some green on their shoe. It was obvious that they had totally forgotten about it, and were just making excuses.

No.

Green laces, do not count. That is not clothing. Back off.

And then it got even worse when they would do things like:

Come on. That’s like, 3cm² of green. There’s no way that counts.

I propose some ground rules. You have to wear a shirt or a hoodie that is at least 90% green.

Green pants are a go, but nobody has green pants because they’re ugly.

Shoes do not count at all. Shoes that are green in their entirety are bonus points.

 

This might be a little unfair, seeing as how 80% of my clothes are green.

…

But no, I would still never wear green pants.

I made a youtube video and you should go and thumb it down.

It's a parody of every bad country song ever written.
It includes trucks, tractors, whiskey, and a dog.
It is probably the most country song you will ever hear.

Be warned, we showed this to our mothers beforehand, and they liked it.



I'm sorry.

Also, I was moving to make the blog posts a bit more steady, thinking every sunday and every wednesday, but it's not working out that way.
You'll just get a post EVERY DAMN DAY until I figure it out.

The deal with high fives.

This post is not an answer. It is a question.

Earlier this evening, Coey and I were discussing the semantics¹ of high fives.

We had short contest to see who could obtain the highest quantity of this bizarre gesture, and during which, we realized that no matter what was occurring, or what had previously occurred, anyone, anywhere would produce the resulting end of a high five.

We discussed different cultures, and how it might be insulting to someone around the world, but I sincerely don’t think a high five can be insulting. I think that pretty much no matter where you are, anyone will give you a high five.

Literally anyone in the world will give you a high five. So, internet: High fives. That is the question².

And now a short shot back to Pokemon:

When you go into a Pokecenter to heal your Pokemon, they say “We hope to see you again soon!”

Really? You hope my Pokemon get hurt again really soon?

Real Mature.

 

1: I only vaguely know what that means. Thank you, internet.

2: To answer this question, I’ve made a couple of small changes to the blog. Firstly, links are now Purple. Cool, I know. Secondly, I have the most useless Contact page in the history of the internet. Use it well.

This blog post…

Is pretty much 100% about Pokemon. So don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Now, I haven’t even been playing Pokemon White¹ for very long, but it’s already gotten kind of weird. Firstly, there’s the whole idea of Pokemon.

To start with, you've got the whole technological problem, You have these advanced devices like the pokeball and pokedex, but no cars or anything.

Secondly, the people there are barbaric. Almost everyone, from small children to old ladies are solely interested in battling their Pokemon. It’s absolutely bizarre.

Anyway, the new games make things even weirder, because they start questioning their own games. Right near the start of the game, they introduce Team Plasma, who come in saying they want to liberate Pokemon from their aforementioned barbaric trainers.

I mean, that sounds like a good cause. When you first see them, you’re really not sure if they’re the bad guys or not.

Of course, being a Pokemon game, that just won’t work out. I mean, the first generation’s villains’ sole purpose was causing trouble (and making it double).

So the game quickly takes Team Plasma and their good cause, and smashes it into a thousand pieces. Seriously. They turn these guys into the biggest douches.

Within a few minutes of introducing them, they start robbing little girls, stealing from museums, and they even kick a Pokemon. Wow. Like, that’s just bad.

And I picked Snivy, in case you were wondering.

 

       

 

 

 

    

 

 

Haters gonna hate.

 

^{1- My friend bought Black, so I had to get white. I had no choice in the matter.}

Apples to Apples to Apples to Apples

Well, there was no beating up people’s beloved pets and then taking their money. Unfortunate, I know. Turns out I just have too many games on the go at once. I still haven’t beaten Red Dead Redemption. Or AC: Brotherhood. Or Mass Effect 2. Or Dragon Age. I could go on for hours.

I did, however, get to play some Apples to Apples.

And soon I will play a LOT of Apples to Apples.

That there is the party edition. Over 1000 cards. That’s a lot of Apples. Too many apples, even. There is room for some very dangerous, crass combinations.

This is a game where you can match Funerals with Hilarious and win.

Ah well, As long as it has Beowulf and a Rock ‘em Sock ‘em Robots cards, then we’re all good.

 

But that is not the only thing that is noteworthy as of this writing. Today for breakfast I had Cinnabon Cereal. Whaaaaaaat.

Cinnamon Toast Crunch has nothing on this.

I’m about to go have it for lunch too.

And also dinner.

 

And finally, a shoutout to my friend Coey for his birthday.

In which I post things that are interesting.

First, we’ll start off with the best bedroom ever.

http://thechive.com/2011/03/04/the-bedroom-i-shouldve-grown-up-in-12-photos/

Somewhere in the world is the raddest kid ever. Or he’s some spoiled jerk, who laughs at people who sleep in normal beds in normal rectangular rooms.

Either way, I’m pretty mad.

The other very very important piece of news is that there are new Pokemon games.

Last year, this would not have been good news. In fact, it wasn’t. This comic explains this.

That is the main thing.

The other thing is that the games are named Black and White. Which transfers over to racial jokes very easily.

Too easily.

Now excuse me as I go capture cute creatures in tiny balls and force them to battle one another. After I find somebody and knock out their pets, I’m going to take their money.

Because that’s how it works.

The Skech Case

So today was the second day with my hair cut.

The thing I head the most was, “Oh, did you get a hair cut?”

Normally, this is a legit avenue of inquiry. In this situation?

Not so much.

The last thing you want to hear after losing a vast quantity of hair is nothing.

There was a lot of nothing today.

I think I’m having a hairt attack.

 

Now back to the Skech case.

Today, my friend dropped his iPhone. Uh oh.

Whatever, we think. It has a phone case on it, it’s not a big deal.

He picks it up. The case is still quite intact, and so is the phone.

But when he tried to turn it on, it didn’t quite work.

Well, everything worked except for the display. You can still lock and unlock it, and my friend was actually able to make a phone call. In fact, the touch screen seems to work perfectly fine.

“Give it to me,” I say, “My magical hands will bring this phone back to life!”

They didn’t.

While I was handling it though, I noticed the case said Skech on it.

It’s a sketch case. A sketchy Skech case.

This brought out a deep, hearty, laugh from me.

My friend didn’t join in on my laughter, because he has no sense of humour, but that is a different matter.

Moral of the story: Skech cases are sketchy cases.

Unless it’s pronounced Skeck. In which case none of this is funny.

 

Also, I couldn`t find any images of the case in question, but I did find some etch-a-sketch cases.

No word on if these are as sketchy though.

The Hair Cut.

A blog post. About a hair cut. You can tell how it ended.

It all started with my hair, because that’s what a hair cut is all about.

 

My hair was like this. But longer. Almost down to my knees.

Gorgeous, arguably luscious, and warm.

 

It was long, and it needed to be cut, so I did what had to be done.

I went to a barber shop, and politely asked for them to cut my hair.

I figured ordering a hair cut was similar to ordering a salad, so I went in and asked for “a straight-up caesar.” That was my first mistake.

Now she assumed I knew what I was talking about. I knew the lingo.

She cuts back with “How do you want the side? Like, a 3?”

I don’t even know what that means, so I went with the worst possible thing.

“Yeah, sure. Whatever.”

Never EVER say that to a hair dresser. That was the second, and largest mistake.

Less than 2 minutes later, I emerged to the snowy wasteland, like this:

Do you see that hair? No?

That is because there is no hair there.

There is snow, however. And a thermometer.

And the thermometer shows –100.

-100, Kelvin.

 

In other news, It is almost March, which I now dub Nintendo March.

Why, you ask? The 3DS.

Or, more specifically, this.

The Ocarina of Time is coming back, prettier and more dimensional than ever before. And you know what that means.

I’m sorry.

The Nintendo Drinking Game*

1. Find some old Nintendo games.

2. Try to 100% them.

3. Everytime someone swears, take a drink.**

The games we had as kids were actually really damn hard.

Like, I’ve been playing Donkey Kong 64 again, and some of the Minigames are just damn obscene.

You go to the internet for help, but find only:

“That ****ing b*tch the bug you have to race as Tiny in Angry Aztec while SLIDING and collecting 50 ****ing coins.. I STILL CAN'T ****ING BEAT THAT ****ING PEIECE OF ****ING S**T!!”

To translate, You have to race this bug. Easy, right?

No.

Firstly, the bug is fast as shit. Secondly, to win, you have to collect enough coins. Finally, If you lose, you restart. If you fall off, you restart. If he hits you, you lose coins, and you restart.

 

   This is the bug in question.

That asshole.

 

 

 

And that’s just the n64. Those games were easy.

Damn it.

 

* Have a paramedic with you. Speed dial is not fast enough.

**Do not do this with NES games. This will result in death.

I was a stupid child.

I found a bunch of messages left over on my email account today, and I spent quite a while reading through them. There were several important things I gleaned from them.

1. I was really frigging annoying.

2. I had no concept of grammar at all.

3. Homework in grade 8 was stupidly, stupidly easy.

And finally, (I can’t count to 4.) I had absolutely no social skills at all.

And now I am writing a blog.

I guess some things never change.

 

On the note of the blog, it’s been an interesting road thus far. When I first started it, I leapt on linking my blog to my Facebook and everything, so my only views were coming from people I knew in person.

Then I took the break, and started working actively on other things.
When I came back to do my few recent posts, I noticed I was getting less traffic from Areas I knew, and was getting way more hits from the world.

So, word up Portugal. Vamanos.

Somebody buy this car.

This car is the BEST CAR.
IT'S name is BONESAW!
This bitch is RED. Like, CAMARO RED.
It's a MAZDA. Those suckers last FOREVER.
This car doesn't have POWER STEERING.
You can tell your friends and your girlfriend(s) that it's you steering this bitch, not the other way around.
It's got power braking though, bro. Now you're just being crazy.
This sucker has WINDOWS.
You can roll them down to let in the WIND.
Even if there's no breeze, you can just make one because this thing has got A FOUR CYLINDER ENGINE.
That's more than 3, but less than 6!
It's like saying "Hey man, this bitch has got more power than your shitty Chevy Sprint, but it's not going to cost me a fortune."
I mean, what's up with gas prices, right?
In this car, DON'T EVEN WORRY ABOUT IT.
$50 is getting you 550K. At. Least.
We don't fuck around.
It's a hatchback, so none of that walking around to the back bullshit. Just get your passengers to reach back for you!
Unless you want to walk around I guess, I mean, the hatch does open.
But you DON'T HAVE TO.
You can't hide shit back there.
BUT that means NO more being accused of hiding BODIES in your trunk!!
THIS CAR even comes with DUCT TAPE.
FREE. OF. CHARGE.
Finally, This thing has a FUCKING MUFFLER.
This car is BADASS and also MANLY.
BUY IT.

Beer Review-a-thon

Sleeman’s Honey Brown Lager:

This dark lager has a medium head with an earthy honey smell. It tastes like classy hops with a nice honey undertone. Very crisp at first, but quickly mellows out. This beer is a classic, and should be treated as such.

Rickard’s Variety Pack:

Rickard’s White Ale:

This beer has a very frothy head. With a smooth texture and hints of spices and orange flavour, this beer is a great addition to any beer line-up. It’s pretty damn good.

Rickard’s Red. Not ale, not beer, just Red.

This beer is red. It's good. Not much of a head on it, and there’s not much else to say. I prefer the white ale.

Pabst Blue Ribbon:

Strong beer, ha. It just smells like cheap. Probably the grossest beer.

Rickard’s Dark:

haha, dude, this says it’s made with maple syrup. I think i taste it dude! no, wait, no. No, this just tastes like beer.

Keystone:

It says ist always smooth man, but i don’t think it’s smmooth it’s not really crisp either just kind of tangy but whatever, it’s like totally cheap bro

Sleeman’s

MAn this beer is so good it’s just the best. it’s cool that it doesn’t have lablels on the bottles.

Hipster pabst Beer lol!1!1

Man this beer tastes like root beer! come try this man, it’s so good! and look, it’s like, 7% and it’s almost as cheap as keystone! I know dude!

Rum and Coke;

Dude this is so good i love rum and coke. it’s oliek beer anyway righte??

G33k B33r:

man check this out its an enegy drink that taste s leik root beer I nkow dude it’s like good rot beer too not like cheap gorss root beer.

Rum and Coke:

haha, were’s the rum gone?

What. yeah dude a’ll hget back to beer in a bit whatever

kraft dinger

man who made kart diner man this is so damn good i love kraft diner so much man i love you dude bro

Bud.

amn what is budwieser weven mean anyway

Damn it, Facebook.

Or more specifically, Facebook Games. I’ve managed to avoid them until now, mainly just because I hate everything that they’re based around.

Farms? I hate Farms.

Frontiers? What the hell is a Frontier.

Cities? It’s Sim City but stupider.

But I’ve finally been snagged. They released a game based on… Monopoly.

Damn it. Double Damn it.

Nobody ever wants to play Monopoly anymore, so I figured man, this is perfect. I’ll just play Monopoly with the internet!

But no. It’s all about building a board. Building up your city, by bombarding your friends with invites and notifications, or by spending money to play a “free” game.

And that is the problem. Who else is going to play Monopoly Facebook?

Nobody I know.

In a related note, isn’t it weird that the cheapest area and the richest area are on the same corner?

Definitely prostitution.

 

And now an unrelated note, watch this video. It’s the best thing ever.

http://wimp.com/reliantrobin

And then come play Monopoly with me, so I can finish my hotel in the (brown?) red light district.