Friday, October 24, 2008

The Savage Beast

Myth Busted! Yeah, you know what I'm talking about. The Mythbusters is one of the greatest science shows on TV. Each week they have various theme's or groupings of myths. They take a skeptical look at the myth, and them put it to the test. It's a great show, and I would highly recommend it as something to watch as a family (if it wasn't on so late.). Anyway, the entire cast is awesome. Kari Byron is hot! Anyway, Adam Savage (get the title now?) is my favorite. He is just awesome. Hilarious, and excellent at what he does. He's a prankster, and is not afraid to use science to his advantage. Below would be an excellent trick to play on someone for Halloween, well, except sulfur hexafluoride is quite expensive. Anyway, enjoy.

8 Bit Metal

There are two things I love. Okay, there are a lot of things that I love, but two of them are video games and music. I've played many different video games over the years, but some of my best memories are from when I was a kid playing my old NES games. I also like most different kinds of music, but my favorite genre is probably hard rock/metal. What do you get when you combine the two? 8 Bit Metal! Below are some my favorite 8 bit game songs done with a metal flair.

First up, almost everyone has played one version or another of Tetris. You know, little blocks of varying geometry fall at increasing speeds and you have to stack them properly. Very addicting. Of course, if you've spent many hours playing this game, you'll recognize this first tune.



Another of my favorite games growing up was the Megaman series. They are still making them, and most of the old ones are available. WiiWare anyone? Anyway, the best song in the game, in my opinion, is Dr. Wily's theme. Here it is in an awesome arrangement.



That brings us to my all time favorite video game theme song. I played this game for hours a day, weeks at a time as a kid. I borrowed it from a friend, and I had it for well over a year before returning it. I beat both the first "world" as well as the alternate "world" that comes after that. What can I say? It's an awesome game. The overworld theme may be one of the most recognized theme songs in video game history, possibly even more so that Mario! Below is an awesome metal rendition of the Overworld Theme from The Legend of Zelda.



And there it is. Some of my favorite 8 Bit metal. Rock on, and game on!

Friday, October 17, 2008

To Boldly Go...

It's no big secret that I'm a huge Star Trek fan. My favorite series will always be The Next Generation. It's the series I grew up on. However, I like them all. I was a big fan of Enterprise too, and was very disappointed when it was canceled.

Regardless of my favorite, I know it all started with Kirk, Spock, and the rest of the original NCC 1701 crew from TOS. Imagine my excitement when I first heard that they were going to "reboot" the series with a prequel TOS movie. It's directed by J.J. Abrams, and is slated to release on May 8th, 2009. The teaser trailer first came out early this year, and the first full trailer is showing before the new James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace, in November. Gonna have to go see that!

I think the casting looks very good. Lots of names I don't know, but several I do know. Most notably Zach Quinto, who most may know as Sylar from Heroes, as Spock. I think that could be spot on. It looks like a very fresh look at the franchise, which admittedly could use it.

Below, are a couple of my favorite images that have been released so far. First is a pic of the crew, minus Spock.


The next is a shot of the new bridge. It's very bright and Shiny. Not in complete contrast to any of the other series, but much brighter and shinier than anything we've seen before.


I'm very, VERY excited about this movie, and I can't wait to go see it. I'm not sure if my wife is nearly excited, but I've made her watch it before and while she'll deny it, she does like it. And if she doesn't, I'll just go without her! I'm not missing this!

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Blasphemy!

That's probably what my grandma would tell me. About what? Why, my religion of course. I am fully committed as a member of The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, or a Pastafarian as we are known. Since becoming a member of the church in late 2005, I have enjoyed many happy times with fellow worshipers. If you are interested and want to learn more about my faith, visit the link below. Everything you need to know is available there, as well as many testimonies. Who knows, maybe you too will be touched by his noodly appendage!


RabbitHoles?

Could this be the future of movie posters? I ran across this on Digg the other day, and it is one of the coolest things I've seen in a long time. It was created by a company called RabbitHoles. It's basically just a hologram, but it incorporates over 1200 individual frames. There are some really cool graphics. There are many possible uses, but the article states that James Cameron has expressed interest in the technology in the past. With some non-documentary movies coming soon (he's been a fan of documentaries lately), maybe he's looking to incorporate this into his advertising campaign. Check out the video below, also available in the original article. Pretty sweet!



RabbitHoles 3D Motion Holograms: Gnomon Gallery, SIGGRAPH, and Pixologic / Gnomon Party from douglas johnson on Vimeo.

Monday, October 13, 2008

Turtle! Turtle!

So I'm at work today, and I get an email from my wife saying that her mom found a baby turtle in front of our porch. Not really surprising since we live about 100 yards from a river. I remember seeing turtles all the time when I was growing up here.

It's a tiny little snapper turtle. She has it in a small tote in our kitchen right now. Her and our daughter were going to take it back to the river tonight, but it got dark before we finished with dinner. (Sucks, seems like just yesterday it was light until 10 O'clock at night!) Anyway, they will have to take it back tomorrow and set it free.

I told her, my wife, that she couldn't keep it. She's a sucker for pets, and would own a zoo if I let her! Hey, I have to draw the line somewhere! We already have a dog, two cats, two newts and two kids. She used to have two birds, a prairie dog, and two frogs as well. Not to mention the other two cats that ran away after we moved. See what I mean?

WoW Patch

Well, the last patch for World of Warcraft before Wrath of the Lich King drops tomorrow, and boy is it a doozie! I downloaded most of it tonight. It's in three parts and is about one gig in size. A buddy of mine uses satellite internet, which has a daily download limit, so I was getting it for both of us. Tomorrow, that last small piece of the patch will be available.

This patch will contain most of the stuff that everyone needs for the expansion, which comes out next month. Basically, it's because if you don't buy the expansion, you still need to be able to "see" the gear and such that other people who do get expansion will have. It won't contain the new continent of Northrend, but just about everything else is most likely in this patch.

I haven't been playing WoW since I've picked up Warhammer. I plan to get WotLK, but I'll probably wait for a month or two after it comes out. Then things won't be so crowded, and they'll have worked out most of the bugs. Until then I'll keep cracking on Warhammer. I'm certainly having a lot of fun with it!

I would recommend either game to anyone in a heartbeat. WoW was my first MMO, so it will probably always be the best to me. But I certainly won't hold that against any new games that come along.

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Party

We had my daughter's B-day party today. All her grandparents and aunts and uncles. Shot got lots of good loot. She's playing with some of her toys and watching Nim's Island right now. She's been going non-stop, so she should sleep really well tonight. Yay!

After most of the family left, my brother and his wife stayed, and we went out to the back yard, got a fire going, and had S'mores. Gotta love them! Then we came in and ordered a pizza for dinner. First real food I'd had all day.

Well, that was pretty much our entire day. Just gonna chill until the kid's bedtime, and then play me some Warhammer before bed. Woot!

Saturday, October 11, 2008

Plink! Plink!

One thing I remember doing from a very young age is shooting guns. I used to go hunting with my dad, and it was always fun. I didn't really stick with the hunting, mostly because if you kill it, you have to clean it. Cleaning animals never really struck me as fun. I was more a fan of just the shooting. We used to go out to my great-grandparents house and just shoot at various things like pears, pine cones, pop cans, or anything else that made a decent little target.

My daughter just turned 5 on Wednesday. Today, while working on the "Honey Do" list I mentioned earlier, I ran across my old Daisy BB gun. I got that gun as a gift when I was 5, so I figured it was the perfect time to take my daughter out in the back yard and have her give it a shot. She watched me shoot it for a little while, and then she finally decided to try it. I had to help her with holding and working the safety the first few times, but within about 10 minutes, she could do everything but cock it. She had a huge grin on her face. Her grandpa will be so proud. We got some pictures of her shooting it and will be sending them to him.

I look forward to many years of going out and plunking things. Hopefully when she grows up, she'll look back on it with the same fond memories that I do. And if she decides that it's just not her thing, that's cool too. I just want her to at least try and experience everything she can. You never know what you might find that you really like.

Saturday

Yep, it's Saturday. Got up with the kids. Made breakfast. Watched TV and played with the kids. Made lunch. Put the boy to bed for a nap. Hopped on the computer. Yeah, that about covers most Saturdays. I can't complain though. I'm not at work!

Of course, that doesn't mean I don't have work to do. As usual, there's the "Honey Do" list. It's not too bad this weekend. We're are having my daughters birthday party tomorrow, so I have to clean up the front and back porches. I also have some old end/coffee tables I need to put under the house. Those are currently in the family room which we are turning into an apartment for my mother-in-law. I also have some of my parents stuff to pack up into totes and put into the shed.

That's the long (short) term project that I'm working on. Getting that room all cleaned up so we can paint and have the carpets cleaned. I also have some finishing work to do in a few places. My sister and her fiance are taking the piano, table and chairs, and the love seat that are all currently out there. At that point, most everything will be gone and we can really get to getting everything fixed up. My wife is actually bribing me to get it done quicker. She told me that when I got it done, she would get me Rock Band 2, or maybe GH: World Tour. I haven't decided yet. Sweet.

What do I think about my mother-in-law moving in? I've got no problem with it. We get along just fine, and she'll be a built in cook and baby-sitter! I certainly can't complain about that!

Well, the "Honey Do" list isn't getting any shorter. Might as well get on it and get it done. Later!

Friday, October 10, 2008

Back.......yet again!

Well, it's been a while. A long while. Not like anyone reads this anyway.

My wife has been getting into the blog thing pretty heavy lately, so I figured I'd give it another go. I'll be working on getting everything updated so it doesn't look like total crap. Then we'll just see where it goes!