I Combo-Broke Myself

Me, walking down a hill on the phone. Sidewalk, slippery from the days wet snow. When I fell backwards I definitely had that hang-time moment. In general I think most people hate falling on their ass in public more because of the embarrassment then the physical damage it inflicts. Physically I was fine after the fall, although I think I bruised my back a bit (too lazy to check) on a metal Cabury's Chocolate tin. I was mildly disappointed that the tin got crushed. I was way more disappointed when I found out the corner of the tin punched a hole in my laptop screen.

Tasty and FIX ME!

So I've been healthy all year, and I go back to work for 3 days, and BAM. Sore throat, head ache, other junk.

ANYWAY, this situation reminded me of something I've believed for a long time.

Advil, of all brands of ibuprofen, TASTES THE BEST!

Just needed to get that out there.

Gotta be IN it to WIN it.

Though I haven't watched the film yet, the DVD cover conveys a true message.

You HAVE to be 'IN' it, if you want a chance to 'win' it.

True story, on Monday night, out of no-where , I decided that, though I want to see the film DEFENDOR (with Woody Harrelson, coming out this week) I didn't want to pay for it, as I'm kinda broke.

So, I entered an Eye Weekly newspaper contest for a chance to win tickets.

And I won.

The point is, if you wanna win things, like contests, you gotta be in them. So, enter some contests. Free stuff is awesome.

Combo Breaker

Even with it's ludicrously long string of ultra combos, flashy characters, gore and wicked theme song, Killer Instinct has not managed to maintain a footing in the fighting game genre. Back when video games upped the ante by being louder with more attitude killer instinct was definitely New Pepsi. The game(s) were enjoyable albeit some-what forgettable, except for one thing C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER!

Ass Full Of Pipe Wrench

The Take On Me Literal Version has got to be one of my all time favourite youtube videos. With hilarious dialogue and a spot on imitation it's no wonder why everyone who watches it, loves it! But success spawns imitators and now you can pretty much watch literal version of any music video you want. Thing is, they are all bad, not just bad, painful because people are trying to sing and be funny at the same time. Now that American Idol is in it's 100th Season i think it's safe to say that bad singing means people are laughing at, not with. So people who make bad literal videos I ask you, why spend hours making a horrible parody when you can just film yourself crashing into something instead? Equally embarrassing, saves time and it'll hurt you more than me...and if you're lucky people watching might feel a little bad about laughing at you.

Noodle-do

A thought occurred to me, and by thought, I mean I blurted this out loud the other day during dinner.

In some cultures like Japan, where the louder one slurps one's noodles at a restaurant, the more they indicate to the chef their appreciation towards it's quality; wouldn't the idea of being the 'loudest noodle slurper' trigger our human tendencies of competition?

Or at the very least, be a tool to impress others. Now take that thought to a dinner date setting.

Wouldn't a guy really wanna impress his date by being the loudest noodle slurper in the restaurant?

Now let's take this one step further.

What if the date of the gentleman in question had previously gone out with someone who was even louder at noodle slurping?

It would start to feel like a pretty lackluster date, wouldn't it?

Just a thought.

Leaving On A Jetplane

A good friend of mine is flying off to teach in a foreign land. Most people already suspect that using a cellphone wont interfere with the airplanes computers (and they are right), here are a few other facts about airplanes.

1. Air quality in airplanes is actually excellent. Airplanes use the same kinds of air filters hospital ORs use. If you do get sick it's probably through touching i.e. sharing arm rest, tray tables.

2. Still with the air quality thing. Lots of people think that the airline gives you less oxygen to make passengers more docile. This isn't true, in fact a lack of oxygen causes confusion, nausea and headaches.

3. Turbulence is nothing more than a bump on the air road. The likelihood of a plane crashing from turbulence is pretty much zero. If the plane is going to crash it's because of equipment failure and human error which probably happen taking off or landing so no point in worrying in between.

4. If you walking down the aisle back toward your seat and an angry terrorist runs at you drop down onto your back and kick at him.

Blu-Ray Dismay

Not only do they rhyme, but it has come to a time that the words ring synonymous.

Increasingly, the trend now to get people to buy blu-ray instead of regular old DVDs is NO MORE SPECIAL FEATURES!

You see, if special features were on the regular old boring DVDs, then they wouldn't be special on blu-ray, would they?

So the solution has been to make what we've all come to expect as 'included special features' a blu-ray exclusive. Behind the scenes, making ofs, studio tours, deleted scenes; all of it, gone (except for the commentary...and really, who even-)

In many DVD movies I watched recently, the DVD experience has gone back to the time when DVD's were new and just having an interactive menu and a trailer were described as "special" on the back of the box. To be honest, those of us who haven't made the jump to the blu-ray are quickly being forced into a retro stasis of technology even before our time.

SO, there you go, the solution to make blu-ray 'the next best thing', is to make it exactly what we already had.

...and in some cases, including the regular DVD copy in the box, just in case you don't have a blu-ray player.

Black Dynamite!

Yesterday I was out looking to buy Black Dynamite which The Star said came out this week…they lied, it comes out on the 16^th. The clerk where I was being informed that Black Dynamite was not yet released said that “Maybe it’s the US release date” so I went on my computer and checked Amazon.com. Apparently it’s the same date in the US as it is here but in the US you can buy it for 16.99 and here it’s 10 bucks more, go figure. I think I’m writing this blog because I love writing (and saying) Black Dynamite! What an awesome name! It’s not as easy as it looks to come up with an awesome name…or is it Purple Octopus, Blue Defibrillator, Green Bean, Red Death unite!

Digital Watches Aren't Cool

Over the years it’s become very apparent to me that digital watches aren’t cool. I remember a time in grade school when everyone had digital watches. Kids would boast that they had 8 lap memory and 100 meters underwater. Now most kids probably don’t even know what lap memory is and I doubt they ever went a hundred meters into the depths of the see. But that didn’t matter, because all we knew was that a hundred is better than fifty, thus proving who was cooler.

So the digital watch battles waged. Like an arms race, kids would bring in bigger and more powerful digital watches. 8 lap moved to 10, 100 meters went to 1000, one kid had a calculator watch. Then a kid showed up with a massive watch that enveloped his arm, I think he said it had a built in laser pointer…anyway, it was a utility belt masquerading as a watch.

Then it stopped. One by one people stopped wearing digital watches. I think the girls changed first, it makes sense, they mature quicker than boys. Some people stopped wearing watches altogether, but most moved to analogue.

It’s quicker to tell time from a digital watch but analogue has a few things that digital watches don’t. Analogue is simple, it’s classic but most importantly it can be customized and designed. It’s beautiful, the circular shape, numbers written in different sizes and shapes. You don’t even need numbers at all, not to mention the various pictures that can be placed behind the hands.

Now that everyone has a digital clock on his or her phone the watch has become even more of an aesthetic accessory. These days digital watches have 50 lap memory, but lets face it, digital watches aren’t cool…yet I still cling to my blue Timex Ironman, the one everyone bought in grade school. I don’t know why, laziness probably…or maybe because the moment I’m drifting to the bottom of the ocean when my boat gets attacked by a colossal squid, I’ll be able to tell the time.

Do People Still Buy Calendars?

There are usually two proponents to a wall calendar, the calendar and the picture. Now days with all this fandangled gadgetry people have access to calendars that can zoom in/out, get reminders and are at their finger tips. The wall calendar on the other hand has a puny little box to write everything down in, not to mention writing against a wall is a pain. Also, who walks around with a pencil? And then the picture part, it’s artwork that CHANGES each month. Well if you like moving images then just mount a TV to the wall and flip it to one of those random digital channels of fish or a log fire, which would be weird floating up high…but you get the point.

But people still buy calendars probably because of the fine tradition of hunting one down after Christmas and the amount of joy people get out of looking at pet animals posed in awkward anthropomorphized positions.

February

Do you ever feel sorry for February? Sometimes I picture all the calendar months hanging out. January the alpha dog, November mellowed out, April is the trickster with sass and then February, the wishy washy runt. I mean that’s what you get when you have 28 days. It’s like the month that can’t quite make it onto big kid rides. Sidenote: Why are calendar names all girl names? April, June, May, January I guess February would be a guys name…