Peer Pressure Works!

Well, when last we tuned in our band of mighty opposition ‘leaders’ had gathered together at the round-table, determined that an official policy of ‘All for one and one for all!’ (with a secondary slogan of ‘Let’s slather Quebec in gold like a husband towards a wife he’s been sleeping around on!’) would be the way to take the reins from the Conservatives and ensure that Canadians could benefit from their ideas of how the country should be run (and to make sure their healthy egos could benefit from power itself).

Well, the new season of the show started up today…and WOW have they changed it! Of course, since people felt the Stephane Dion character simply wasn’t working…he came off as weak and small, not qualities most people want in a leader…the Liberal Party decided to perform an urgently needed rewrite. And in walks Michael Ignatieff! He’s outspoken, he appears to actually be in possession of a working spine and set of gonads, and he…well, he seems to like ties that resemble candy canes a lot. Seriously, look at this photo spread…the man seems to be wearing some sort of mint around his neck in every friggin’ shot! (continue reading…)

Aaaah, PETA. They go on and on about how they’re helping animals, but then they spend the donations well meaning people have sent to them on getting that societal sage known as Pamela Anderson to say “Fur coats are BAD” and sending out commando teams of society’s uber geniuses to ‘rescue’ lab animals who have never lived in the wild, and so are brutally slaughtered within minutes by anything tougher than a stiff breeze.

Or, maybe they decide to COMPLETELY lose their fucking minds, and they produce…this.

No, I am not linking to the stupid commercial they did with women basically pleasuring themselves with vegetables. They clearly did it for the free publicity since there was no goddamn way in Hell it was ever going to be broadcast, so fuck them…if you want to see it, go find it yourself.

This is something different. If you don’t have a Google Reader account, you didn’t see when I shared this bit of wisdom there, and I decided I may as well just tell everyone to “Look, look, the retards have soiled themselves again!”

PETA are upset that people are still eating fish. Problem is, fish are slimy and smelly and not very pleasant creatures…how to make people stop wanting to eat them? Wait! I HAVE IT! We’ll REBRAND fish! Yes, no longer are they to be called fish…they are now SEA KITTENS! I swear to whatever deity you wish that I am not making this up. Hell, I COULDN’T make this up! A tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist who collects his own stool in jars to keep the Government from reading his thoughts through his fecal matter couldn’t make this shit up! (continue reading…)

Having finally watched the first season of The Wire, I now completely understand the hype it received during it’s run. Over the course of two days I watched all 13 episodes…I could quite happily have sat there and watched…no food, no drink, taking a crap in an empty Chapters bag sitting near the chair…you know, if that wasn’t so decidedly gross and stupid. Still, great show. I’ve got season 2 locked and loaded and ready to go, so more on that later.

I’ve also been watching the first season of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations. Bourdain has basically become my hero…the man’s living the life of kings. Man becomes chef, man becomes traveler, man travels the world eating whatever bizarre (and tasty) stuff he can fine and engages in bizarre behavior with the locals whilst mocking anyone who enters his mental cross-hairs. He singlehandedly gives me hope that maybe something worthwhile can actually be salvaged from the French. Anyway, the current episodes are also running on Discovery…don’t ask me what day or time because I keep forgetting…you obviously have access to the Internet and Google, so luck it up your own goddamn self.

Finally, 24. Aaah, 24. Two seasons ago was one of the best runs of television that I have ever seen. Simply fantastic. Hell, at the end Bauer was taken by the Chinese to a life of torture and interrogation and that was actually kinda ho hum. Then there was last season. Last year might have been written by 12 different sets of writers. I haven’t seen anything that uneven since the last time I drove the roads of Edmonton. Early on there was promise…Jack’s been brought back from China to be handed over to terrorists for them to torture and kill, and in exchange they don’t nuke the country. And he was ready to do it! Of course, it went wrong and he ended up kicking ass and taking names, but he didn’t seem…’right’. And that was awesome! It seemed like he could fall apart in to a drooling pile of defeat at any moment! Unfortunately, one episode they’d show a little weakness, and the next episode pretended like it had never happened. Absolutely terrible. I didn’t even watch the last 8 hours or so, which just degraded in to a bizarre personal revenge story where the same Chinese agents who didn’t REALLY want to give him back have taken his woman and he needs to get her back…if I want shit like that, I’ll rent a Van Damme feature.

This season, though…we’re a quarter of the way in and so far I’m likin’ it. The funny thing is, I actually don’t give a shit about the massive government conspiracy angle. Seriously, they’ve done this so many fucking times by now it seems like half the entire US prison population must be made up of evil Secret Service agents, members of government and their various associates. I’m over that. What IS interesting is that everything has been blown wide open in terms of possibilities. There is no oversight…because there is no CTU (the agency Bauer’s worked for for all these years). Hell, the first episode sees Jack on the stand being lambasted by senators at a congressional hearing for his…’interesting’ interrogation techniques. Nope, him and a few other ex-CTU flunkies are working against a massive corrupt force in government helping to prop up a strongman general in a fictional African country (that’s also kind of refreshing for the same reason the movie Tears of the Sun was…you don’t typically see that material covered). Admittedly, it’s rather silly that Tony Almeida is one of them…this fucking guy has been resurrected more than Jesus. The fact that he’s actually been working WITH the bad guys for awhile, though, is interesting…and I just don’t know fo0r sure that he still ISN’T. Fuck, I wouldn’t be surprised if they ALL are up to something wrong. For the first time ever in the history of the show it is actually conceivable to me that Jack might end this season bleeding out in a street somewhere, and that’s AWESOME. Lack of predictability with main characters makes for big entertainment!

So, yes, there you go. And no, Sean…still haven’t watched UFO yet.

Yes, it was ’shiny new job’ time for Cliff. The main reason…old job had morphed in to me pretty much pushing shipping paper. That was it. Didn’t take long for me to get a little antsy. Anyway, my dad’s gotten to know some people at a sandblasting company in Nisku (their companies do a lot of business with one another), and he found out they were looking. So, I went and met with the guy and took it. Not being one who tends to move slowly with these things, I start at the new place middle of next week.

Best part of the new gig…the shift hours. 4 pm until 1:30 in the morning. I don’t have to get up early, I get to stay up late, and I’m not living some complete bozarro schedule in total opposition to that of the rest of humanity. And it’s Sunday-Thursday, so I still have my weekends free to do stuff. And this…THIS should be the most telling part of how much I wanted a new gig…I am going to have to work Super Bowl Sunday. My screaming fatwas issued against Kurt Warner and the Cardinals will be in the company of 3 other guys in front of a radio. And if THAT doesn’t get me labeled as ‘interesting’, I don’t know what will!

As for what the job is, a good portion is still shipping/receiving. Up until now they haven’t had someone in that capacity on nights, so someone just basically received and then it was left for days to deal with. Trouble was, if nights needed something on an order they grabbed it, and that led to a lot of confusion because then days couldn’t account for everything. So now I get to do all that. I also get to multitask, though…do some prepping, do some painting, do some sandblasting, do a little bit of everything. I’m looking forward to doing a little grunt work…I need to do a little sweating after being trapped in a goddamn office chair for the past little while.

So, there you go. Now you know…the rest…of the story.

Why don’t they notice? Two reasons. First off…a long haired dude in robes and sandals isn’t actually going to attract near as much attention as one might think. And the instant he tells the first person of authority he sees that his name is Jesus it’s off to a jail cell until Immigration can find a way to get him back in to Mexico. Secondly, with Barack Obama basically already being declared ‘Greatest Human Being to Ever Exist’ Jesus is utterly irrelevant! Cancel religion, we’ve got Barackocentrism!

Now, I like Obama. Nobody with a working set of ears is going to deny that the man is an incredible, inspiring public speaker (well, unless their ears and the rest of their head is covered by a pointed white hood and their best buddy goes by the name ‘Grand Wizard’…THEY might disagree).  And the guy certainly can be inspiring…anyone who can speak as well as he can can inspire a nation. Maybe he CAN be the next John F. Kennedy…narrowly stave off global nuclear annihilation, start a war in some godforsaken backwater country nobody can even find on a map, and bang himself the sex symbol of our time (hopefully he’ll avoid that pesky ‘brains splattered all over his wife’ aspect of Kennedy’s presidency). Or maybe he’ll inspire his people to rise as one, fight off economic hardship, begin throwing anyone he doesn’t like in to slave labor camps and instigate a massive conflict that will leave Europe a smoldering wasteland before shooting HIMSELF in the head (hmmm…speakers who inspire their people seem to fixate on the shot to the head, don’t they?). (continue reading…)

Yes, we are now officially two weeks away from the day of the final game (well, sure there’s the Pro Bowl All Star game, but I think viewership of that matchup might consist of crackheads so zonked out of their minds they no longer possess the wherewithal to change the channel and tinfoil hate wearing conspiracists who are convinced the game is chock full of secret messages from the Illuminati). And in that final game shall be the titanic clash between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the…the Arizona Cardinals…Jesus, I was hoping maybe that had been some great mistake that had been rectified by now, but apparently the great joke is being allowed to continue.

A little background here is necessary. The Arizona Cardinals (ex Phoenix Cardinals, ex St. Louis Cardinals, ex Chicago Cardinals) are basically a joke of a franchise. Having them appear in the championship game is like having a ‘Greatest President Ever’ competition come down to George Washington and Dubya…it’s like having some sort of All Time Awesomest Humanitarian award come down to a choice between Mother Teresa and Idi Amin. It makes no sense! This is a team that, prior to this year, had won a grand total of TWO playoff games since 1947! Yet here they are, about to compete for the NFL championship?! It’s like waking up and being told that Obama was shot during the inauguration and the government decided to replace him with a cardboard cutout of himself…sure, it’s TECHNICALLY still the president, but it isn’t REAL. Hell, even one of the Cardinals star players (receiver Anquan Boldin) doesn’t really seem to want to be there! Well, actually he just wants to be there with a LOT more money, but this is my blog so I get to decide his motivations…and I have decided that he has been angered by the fact his joke of a franchise is polluting the game with their very presence! (continue reading…)

A new series seems to be starting on The Escapist, the site you might remember from other such hilarious material as Zero Punctuation and Unforgotten Realms. It’s called Unskippable, and delightfully rips to shreds those annoying, godawful and unskippable cinematic scenes that Japan in particular seems to enjoy shoving up our ass (incidentally, fuck you Japan). In the first episode, some JRPG called Eternal Sonata gets raked over the coals…and deservedly so, as this near 10 MINUTE INTRO is one of the most appallingly arrogant loads of crap I have been exposed to in some time. So, as it plays the two mockers give it the Mystery Science Theater treatment. As was the case with MST3K, not every joke hits, but several boot it squarely enough in the nuts as to make it worthwhile. They also tore apart Lost Planet’s introduction here.

So, I recently FINALLY started playing my long-neglected copy of Assassin’s Creed. I have other games that need playing. Yet, what is it that’s been tying up my gaming time? The demo of a little independent title called Crayon Physics Deluxe.

It’s a simple little concept done really, really well. On each level, there is a ball and a star…your goal is to hit the star with the ball. How you get there is the interesting part. Draw in whatever you think might work…draw a staircase and drop something on the side of the ball to propel it. Draw a weight on the end of a conveyor the ball is on to shift it forward. Draw a square to drop on the far end of a catapult, propelling your ball across the screen. Draw a golf club on a hinge that will swing down and shoot it forward. It’s a really neat idea, and it’s done well. Everything about the damn thing is best described as whimsical…the simple, crayon line graphics…the music…if you don’t smile or at least have fun while messing with this, you might be a reanimated Hitler.

The full game is $20 and comes with more objects you can draw, plus a full level editor and the ability to play levels built by others. Considering this is already seeing a level building community build up around it, it’s probably worth snagging just for that (much like World of Goo). Anyway, the demo is at least worth a try. Hell, if Penny Arcade likes it, chances are it’s the shit.

You may also discover (as I did) that your ability to draw anything resembling a straight line with a mouse is utterly nonexistent.

Normally, when something funny on Fail Blog pops up, I just share it in Google Reader and am done with it. This one deserves a special place on the mantle (hmmm…you know, The Mantle wouldn’t be a bad blog name for somebody).

An old commercial for a diet product…called AIDS (well, it’s SPELLED AYDS, but it’s pronounced like everyone’s favorite slow killing STD). The result…hilarity. Even better…I checked Youtube and discovered additional ads glorifying losing weight with the help of AIDS. Well, two are funny…one sucked, so I’ll skip it. Enjoy.

This last one actually kinda sucks, except for the last line in the ad.

So, late last year a little cat named Spook entered the lives of the household. He was a tiny little 4 month old kitten curious about everything, and who seems to have a bizarre interest in watching me play computer games. The more shit going on on screen at one time, the more enthralled he is…unfortunately, that typically means he leaves his position to the side of the monitor and begins to encroach in to my view…this tends to make me die…A LOT. Seeing what utter bastards cats are, though, I suspect this may be on purpose. Anyway, here’s a picture of the little bastard.

How can such a giant head contain such a tiny brain?

And, a little evidence of his typical felinious chicanery…

There's nothing blowing up here! Come ON!

(continue reading…)