L I S T S


   Foods
  • Denny's Nachos
  • Pizza w/ bell peppers
  • Kit Kats
  • Extra Extra Sharp White Cheddar
  • Ranch and Bacon Pasta Salad
  • Reuben w/Russian or Thousand Island
  • Rotisserie Chicken
  • Ma's Pork Chops
  • Ma's Cottage Fries
  • Chocolate Malt Shake
  • Cheese & Potato Pierogies
  • Wurfy's Pimento Celery
  • Wurfy's Pepperoni & Cheese Croissants
  

Musicians
  • Beck
  • Creedence Clearwater Revival
  • Rolling Stones
  • Eagles
  • Antonio Carlos Jobim
  • Bert Kaempfert
  • Bitter:Sweet
  • Portishead
  • The Shins
  • The Strokes
  • The Vervepipe
  • The Cranberries
  • Smashing Pumpkins
  

Authors
  • Terry Brooks
  • Clive Cussler
  • Scott Lynch
  • R.A. Salvatore
  • Margeret Weis
  • Tracy Hickman
  • Stephen King
  • Tolkien
  • John Grisham
  

TV Shows & Anime
  • Daily Show
  • Burn Notice
  • Tosh.0
  • How It's Made
  • Aqua Teen Hunger Force
  • Tim and Eric Awesome Show
  • Cowboy Bebop
  • Trigun
  • Hajime No ippo
  • Yu Yu Hakusho
  • Grappler Baki
  • Wild Arms
  • Hunter X Hunter
  • Cooking Master Boy
  • Naruto
  • Yugioh

Movies
  • Usual Suspects
  • See No Evil, Hear No Evil
  • Killing Zoe
  • Hamburger Hill
  • Rambo 1-3
  • Invasion USA
  • Kickboxer
  • T-Bone N' Weasel
  • Paint Your Wagon
  • Mixed Nuts
  • Stranger than Fiction
  • Novocaine
  • Delta Force
  • Dan Candy's Law
  • Jeremiah Johnson
  • Gone In 60 Seconds

Hobbies & Interests
  • Videogames
  • Hiking
  • Cooking
  • Cycling
  • Playing Guitar
  • Reading
  • Bowling
  • RSS Feeds
  • Typography
  • Game Making
  • Bossa Nova
  • Reggae
  • Classic Rock
  • Russian Gypsy Folk Music
  • Computer Software
Favorites | Videogames | White List | Black List | The Perfect Mod

VIDEOGAMES YOU MUST PLAY
  • Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 (PS2): Hands down the best racing game I'll ever play. This game features car design customization that is still unparalleled by any racing game before or since. On top of that there's 500+ rivals to race and secret rivals, the list goes on and on. Play this game. Sell ALL your Need for Speeds if necessary! Also! There's NO RUBBER BANDING IN THIS RACING GAME!
  • Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution (PS2): My all time favorite fighting game. Out of all the fighting series out there (KOF, DOA, Soul Caliber, Tekken) VF4 Evo feels the best control wise. The controls just feel natural, and that's a lot more important than a roster of 5,000 fighters.
  • Front Mission 3 (PS1): A mech-based strategy RPG that is very deep and has a great story line. Tons of customization in the way of mech equipment and skill learning is available. When you're done with the first 40 hour playthrough, you can start a "New Game+" and play the OTHER story path for 40 hours.
  • Final Fantasy Tactics (PS1): A fantasy strategy RPG that gives the player a very enjoyable class and ability system to play with without being needlessly overwhelming *koffkoff-DISGAEA-koff*. Don't try to follow the story, though; it's worse than Splinter Cell:Pandora Tomorrow.
  • Jade Cocoon 2 (PS2): Despite the fact that this game has a special place in my memory with Naomi, this monster breeding game stands on its own merits. The breeding consists of finding eggs to hatch or crossbreed as well as evolutions. Very enjoyable, I'd pick this up before Pokemon.
  • Tetris Attack (SNES): Without a doubt my favorite puzzle game, if only for the Puzzle mode.
  • Borderlands (PC): One of the only FPS RPGs out there I know of and it's AWESOME. Randomized loot in the form of firearms, shields and class mods. I have played through this literally 8 times so far just because of the random loot.
  • Fate (PC): A top-down dungeon crawler with random dungeon layouts as well as randomized loot. Days and days of enjoyment. Unfortunately, the two sequels to this (Fate 2 & Fate 3) as well as the spinoff Torchlight can't hold a candle to this.
  • Mercenaries (PS2) , Just Cause 2 (PC): Two of the only "sandbox" games (I HATE that term) I love. Tons of exploration and multiple ways to complete your missions in both and very, VERY satisfying endings! They're so similar I listed them both but they're both worth a playthrough.
  • Code Name Viper (NES): One of my favorite platformers while I was growing up. Very fluid controls for its time and just plain fun.
  • Urban Terror (PC): To this day, I say this is the best mod ever made for any FPS. I wouldn't be surprised if I've logged over 50,000 hours just playing this Quake 3 mod. If you can, try to get UrTs 2 and 3. UrT 4 nerfed the weapon damage and took out bots.
  • Baten Kaitos (GC) & Etherlords 2 (PC): Two card-combat RPGs that will give you hours upon hours of enjoyment to the point of sleep deprivation. Now is that a glowing review or what? Just don't play Baten Kaitos Origins and you'll be fine.
Favorites | Videogames | White List | Black List | The Perfect Mod
5 THINGS I'M GLAD ARE GONE
(This list will be updated periodically.)
  1. Whispering on commercials
  2. "Horror" movies with "spooky" children as the antagonist
  3. Fauxhawks
  4. Popped collars
  5. Jerry Fallwell 

Favorites | Videogames | White List | Black List | The Perfect Mod

37 THINGS THAT NEED TO DISAPPEAR FOREVER
(*Disclaimer: The number of things will grow, like the bubonic plague. There have been some taken out to protect the tender fragile emotions and egos of idiots as well as in the interest of keeping whatever employment I may have at the moment. Contact me for the zip file of the blog's edited content. I'm afraid it will have to remain this way until society stops being so fluffy-wuffy-handy-holdy.)

    1.  
    2. "rethink/unthink/rebranding" - If your product/service sucks, nothing will help you. Get over yourself.
    3. Shiny Icons - Great. Now every button & icon on the web or in applications has so much glare it looks as if it was a picture taken by a monkey. Your nondescript icon didn't make any sense and now you've added an immense amount of shine. Good job.
    4. .
    5. .
    6. 3D Movies - Ok it was cool back in IMAX. IMAX was supposed to be an experience. But now every other movie sacrifices story & plot & developed characters for things flying at the screen. I want my money back. Give me a copy of The French Connection or Invasion USA instead.
    7. Shaky Cam - HOLY %$#%@! This does NOT make your filming look gritty and edgy, it only gives people headaches! The human eye compensates for sudden jars and bumps even when you're getting knocked around. NOT realistic, NOT enjoyable and you get NO COOKIE. Which brings me to...
    8. Mini-Zooming - This cinematography technique is horrible. The only emotion this technique captures is "Why did we let great grandpa Rutherford film the family reunion?!" More camera sins coming up with...
    9. Bullet Time - You've seen this before; camera zooms in, time slows down, something happens, camera speeds up. Yawn. Didn't need this tripe in Rambo: First Blood and I SURE as hell don't need it now.
    10. Forum Jockeys - These are the people that post anything just to get more points, stars, ranks or any other meaningless metric they can show off (shame on you forum moderators!). If someone needs an answer they couldn't find online after 2 hours and post their question, this is what they get: "Google it", "Have you tried the search function?", "Are you stupid?". These are the same people that post grammatical corrections for no apparent reason besides to be a douche nozzle.
    11. FPS & RTS - (If you don't immediately know what these acronyms are, skip this section.) For a while now, actual strategy games have been on the wane and we've gotten bombarded with these piles of crap; and it just got worse in 2010. I got only one acronym for these games: ADHD. Made for the new generation of gamers, n'est-ce pas?
    12. Touchscreen - RAGE CANNON! Must we pinch zoom and slide everything now? I like these things called BUTTONS. You know, I hit the "K" button and my keyboard and a "K" shows up; instead of formatting my camera after my digital picture frame calls my employer from 2003 while zooming in to my ninth "dashboard" on which my ADD meds are listed. And you know what? Physical keyboard and solid state screens have been working efficiently since the SEVENTIES with the advent of the SINCLAIR, so why must we ogle haptic touch interfaces at all? If I want to cut and paste something I ain't doing calisthenics, which actually segues nicely into...
    13. Motion Control - When you played Super Mario 3 after a day of exhausting yourself with physical labor or running errands, wasn't it nice to know you could relax and enjoy hours of gaming? I thought so too. There's no reason Project Natal, Sony Move or the WiiMote should give us tennis elbow/carpal tunnel syndrome/AIDS neck after a tiring day. In SMALL doses it's genius (Zack & Wiki, Lost Winds), but I hope to god it's merely a trend business consultants are riding which in turn brings us to...
    14. .
    15. .
    16. Metacritic - One of the contributing factors to the horrible $hit-filled downward spiral that is modern gaming. Developers make games only in accordance to ratings now as opposed to, well, gameplay or ingenuity.
    17. Touchscreen Layouts on Webpages - This is getting more and more frequent as I surf around (Ninite.com, Dilbert.com, grooveshark.com). HUGE search boxes, HUGE buttons, HUGE text. Give it 3 years and websites will just be two huge buttons you press on the screen. Maybe some text.
    18. I-"everything" - ipod, imac, iphone, ipad, ivomit. If your overpriced products are that good how about showing some creativity. At least Amazon's e-reader actually sounds like someone put thought into the name, the Kindle. And don't get me started on every other phone in existence as in Omnia, Versa, etc. I have actually seen this phenomena in the form of iFan, a cheap plastic hand held fan that was in the same quality packaging as a Cracker Jack box.
    19. "win", "epic", "fail", "best ___ ever" - I admit I use these (albeit rarely and only in jest) and I just hope this is another passing trend like "groovy" or "rad".
    20. Reality Shows/Dramatic Music - Alliances, drama, voting, drama, challenge, drama, crying, drama. All to the "music" of reverse cymbals and that all-too-familiar drama music, which pervades almost every show on tv nowadays. I miss the days of Taxi, M.A.S.H. and all the other shows that didn't reuse DECADE-OLD FORMULAS over and over. Patton Oswalt had it right on the button.
    21. .
    22. Flash & Java - Sloooooowwww, huuuuuuuuuge, blooooooated, limited. I despise these methods of programming almost as much as Linux (triple slam!). I can't WAIT for HTML5 to get widely adopted, which does everything these two golems can do and more as well as being quicker and the fact it actually works! Just like Windows! Wow!
    23. Reaction Videos - No doubt you all heard about 2 Girls 1 Cup or Numa Numa Dancer a few years ago, but what irritates me about this crap besides the attention-starving nerfbags who film themselves is the reaction videos. Absolutely unnecessary, unoriginal and a waste of data transfer.
    24. .
    25. .
    26. CGI Animation - Do you know why Nightmare on Elm street and Hellraiser were so scary? Do you know why Chuck Norris' motorcycle with rockets as so friggin awesome? Do you know why explosions were so awesome in Invasion USA? And do you know why the original Transformers cartoon was so high quality? Because none of it had CGI. THAT'S why. Horror movies were so scary because you had artists making actual props behind the scenes. Those things were REAL (either props or hand drawn cartoon cels) and it just involved the viewers that much more. I don't care how many high school students Michael Bay has dicking around on their IMacs, they will never capture shadows and light and altogether PRESENCE like one of those prop/stunt masters did back when movies were good. I watched an 80's movie about some dragon and it had a HORRIBLE story and actors. But holy crap that dragon made me take a triple take, it was so well made. Do yourself a favor and do the movie industry a favor and refer to any movie with an abundance of CGI a CARTOON. Cause that's what it is.
    27. Extreme Social Networking - I'm talking about things like rating comments, points on forums and social bookmarking. Holy CHRIST must we have literally over 100 social bookmarking sites? And do you really care if Joe Blow gives you a thumbs down or a point for the comment you just put up on that forum? "Rate this comment!" No! I decline! You mindless troll! Now take this feature out of your forum!
    28. Everything-gate - Any scandal or irrelevant issue automatically gets the suffix "gate" on the news. Troopergate, housegate, gardengate, goldengate bridgegate STFUgate. Almost as insufferable as i-everything.
    29. Sliding Pseudo-Transformer effects - It was a novelty with the first Bay-formers movie, but even then that was a little too far fetched. Now we're inundated with the frigging effect in commercials and tv and just stop it. It's ridiculous, played out and it sucked the first time I saw it. Not to mention it ruined that G.I Joe movie. Good job you 16 year old computer graphics student.
    30. Talking CGI Animal Movies -  If I had a drop of water for every talking animal movie churned out by the trend riders, I'd have flooded the universe threefold. Not cute, not funny, not wasting my time with it.
    31. Lightbox - You click on a picture on the internet nowadays and are forced to wait through some cheesy-ass animation while the background darkens for no good reason. How about you just show me the picture today. Another gay-ass Apple artist piece of shit technique. Which segues nicely into...
    32. Cover Flow - This is ALMOST a horrible way to navigate anything. PC users have had access to image-embedded tables since time immemorial. The only context that cover flow would be acceptable is AN ACTUAL FUCKING JUKEBOX. And even then, Wurlitzer's geniuses knew humans in the 1950's could comprehend English, hence, many jukeboxes have NO VISIBLE ALBUM ART.
    33. Pointless level/point systems on websites and apps - You've seen this before, most likely. You get points for each message you post, you go up "levels" based on points or how many days you've logged in. For what. Nothing. No incentives whatsoever. Some sites do this right, like gamefaqs.com. But if it's inconsequential fluff, don't even bother coding this garbage and concentrate on quality content for once. If I'm getting points and levels, I better be able to purchase gun-tank-swords for my diamond-armored avatar of destruction, and THEN be able to test out my skills on hordes of enemies. Yeah, sounds fun, dunnit?
    34. Online Game Authentication DRM - Greedy billion-dollar game companies are worried about the loss of 0.7% of their revenue every year from "pirates". So what do they do to the general public? They require you to have an internet connection not only to install the game, but also to PLAY the game every time you start it up?!!? This backfired when Ubi-Crap's servers went down for a day, successfully fucking over all of their paying customers. The general idea of "backup the games you own" turned into "pirate this shit" BECAUSE developers started churning out broken crap games for unreasonable prices. After gamers got tired of flushing $50-$60 down the drain time after time, whaddaya fucking THINK was going to happen?!?!?!
    35. Unboxing Videos - Do I even have to address this? Seriously? These dipshits buy some gadget and apparently want to be the first to have something like they're in middle school, being that rich kid we all hated anyways. So what do they do? They FILM THEMSELVES OPENING THE BOX. Some people just need attention despite being surrounded with fake friends who also have a Mac. I don't fucking know what mental instability led to people thinking unboxing videos were worth the intangible data and bandwidth they consume.
    36. "Adult Toddler Music"- I'm talking about songs with abundant whistling, single-key piano notes, unnecessary ukelele/PALM MUTING (John Mayer, Jason Mraz!), kiddy lyrics ("...my breath fogged up the glass and so I drew a new face and I laughed"?!?!?!?!!?) and just childish shit. Been hearing this in commercials now so you KNOW it's trendy at this point.
    37. Audio Clips in Music - Okay this was cool and new IN THE NINETIES. You know, songs with audio clips from movies or tv shows or even just sound clips. Sorry, no caustic insults or evil commentary. It's just old and tired. Stop this.
      Favorites | Videogames | White List | Black List | The Perfect Mod

      The Perfect Mod
      Game mods are third-party programs and/or patches that effectively modify retail PC videogames. There's thousands upon thousands out there for any game that's moddable, and some that aren't. I've used mods since Quake 2 came out, and I've come to know what I like; so I present to you all the features I can think of that need to be in "The Perfect Mod". It would help if some of these things were in the base game, too.

      1.  Bots - A.I. opponents always help. Mario would just be running through eight worlds jumping over pits if it weren't for some semblance of A.I. Some argue that A.I. can be programmed way too dumb, which I don't think is a problem. It adds to the enjoyment. A stray shot from a bot can even things out, too; like the frag leader being on the wrong side of a random head shot from a bot who's stuck in the door.
      2. LAN Play - Recently, multiplayer games have been locked down to require the internet to install and logging in to Battle.net or GameSpy for multiplayer. While there are some developers that aren't fucking IDIOTS, some games have no LAN capabilities.
      3. Mines/Traps - These can be strategic and loads of fun. One of the earliest mods I played was Weapons of Destruction for Quake 2, which is surprisingly still going strong I'm happy to say. In WoD you could set armed trip laser traps in strategic locations.
      4. Auto Turrets - Another strategic must-have. In a map with over 5 possible routes, auto turrets can not only defend areas but also allow you to set up choke points.
      5. Multiple Ammo Types - Another idea I loved in WoD, which had NINE distinct types of grenades that were different enough to merit praise. On top of that, WoD had secondary weapon types that were different than the bland primary, such as machine gun/rocket machine gun.
      6. Classes/Powers - I'm not talking about minor differences, I'm talking about differences you can FEEL. Classes with noticeably faster movement, higher health, walking on walls/water, power of flight, invisibility, special tools, etc... I loved these in Superheroes Quake 3, which had both.
      7. Additional "Juggernaut" Gameplay Type - One player is randomly selected every map/round. They get considerably more health, speed and armor but only get a melee weapon (which is usually a 1 or 2 hit kill in most games). All the other players try to kill the 'juggernaut", and the one that does becomes the juggernaut.