Yeah, we're done here

So, the blog here is officially going on long term hiatus. It's been a good run this time around, but I am pretty much done with this format.

So. If you really want to, follow me here.

And I generally have some pictures here.

So long and thanks for all the fish.

What is this November of which you speak?

Ok, who let it get to November? This is just ridiculous. Especially as I can't be bothered to even remotely keep up with the things that I need to. And there are. Things. That need to be kept up with. Or was that Jones's? I have a hard time telling them apart. The things. And the Jones's.

G had a pretty good birthday. He now has 2 foam swords. And he is not afraid to use them. Well, ok maybe a little afraid as there is a core that runs through most of the sword except for the tip and he's afraid the tip will tear off if he's too violent with it. So he as 2 foam swords that he's only moderately afraid to use.

We did have a good time at the Community musical, The Magical Adventures of Merlin. There were some magic tricks and some songs and some Arthurian nonsense. Plus it was right around an hour long. Which was just about right.

Watched Iron Man 3. That series actually seems to get better as it goes along. Weird...

I didn't actually make it all the way through The Shining. First it was a full screen edition (which is now incorrect thanks to widescreen tvs) and it was pretty badly scratched and I just wasn't as into it as I could have been. Kind of sad really. Still pretty eerie in places though. For the bit that I watched.

Happy Halloween

Honestly that's about all I've got. Hope you've had a chance to watch some spooky movies this month. (We watched Frozen again [still great] and I'm going to watch The Shining and possibly Poltergeist).

Go figure

So realistically I could point out that the Government decided to get its act together the day after we left. Or that it rained the entire time we were at Capon. But honestly those things didn't really bother me. I'd have stayed inside a good portion of the Capon trip reading or visiting anyway (although I would have liked to play some shuffleboard) and we got to wander around the memorials in a much less packed DC. Plus we even snuck into one and how often can you say that?

I am surprised none of the vendors had a "I came to DC and all I got was this lousy t-shirt, thanks Government shutdown" shirt though. Those things would have made a bundle...

Read through John Dies at the End again. I really liked it this time. Weird. It was just much funnier and a little creepier. Or something. I'm starting Doctor Sleep, the sequel to The Shining, at the moment and that thing just jumps straight in with both feet. It doesn't mess around at all. It's already pretty disturbing. And also includes a NOS4A2 reference.

Anyway, the vacation was nice. Photos and commentary can be found elsewhere.

Wait for the beep

You have reached the on hiatus blog of the letter d.

 I recommend hitting the tumblr feed which is actually being updated at the moment. There are pictures. And cookies*.

A happy birthday to lovely wife. I managed to loudly proclaim her age (40!) whilst at dinner the other evening. I shall proclaim it on the internet now as well.

*You brought the cookies right? You didn't? Well, there are no cookies then. Shame on you. I hope you feel bad.

Something about Castle

I really have nothing to comment on as pretty much all of our free time has been taken up by marathon-ing season 5 of Castle. I'm glad we're almost done. Mostly because it would be nice to have a touch more variety in our free time. But the season has been pretty good. Strangely filled with movie homages (lovely wife calls them rip-offs) but good. The 100th episode (a Rear Window nod) was rather funny. Although I'm still not impressed with the new season...

I've been playing San Juan and Ghost Stories on the iPad. They are both well done. Ghost Stories is insanely hard. I'm starting to understand how it works a little better, but I am nowhere close to winning. In a related tidbit, the iOS version of Pandemic comes out today. Looks like it's about $7. Will probably pick that one up as the boardgame is pretty fun.

The city in the desert

Serendipity allowed me to stumble across Welcome to Night Vale (or was it?!) and I find it to be terribly entertaining. You need to check this one out K. It's a semi-monthly podcast that is basically a news show for an odd little town in the desert where very strange things happen. (Dogs are not welcome in the dog park) Each episode tends to be fairly short and there's just enough out of the ordinariness that you want to find out what's going to happen next. (The Sheriff's secret police are watching you. And have some friendly advice) Definitely recommended. I would play a game set in this town.

Card Hunter and Knights of Pen and Paper have really made me want to get back into some sort of RPG... I just want to create a character of some sort and roll some dice and have an adventure. I might have to look into getting the Baron Munchausen story game and play it at Drucon or something.

Castle season 5 continues to be enjoyable. Although I wasn't too impressed with the series premiere the other night.

Need to play Formula D again. And possibly Dungeon Fighter...

Checked out Neil Gaiman's latest book, Fortunately the Milk and it was a good amount of fun. I read it to G and used all the fun voices. You have to read this one that way. It's a moral imperative. Anyway, if you're looking for a delightful little tale to read to your kids, give this one a go. It has wumpires. And not the cute misunderstood kind.

Card Hunter is my newest addiction. It's a little free to play online game (really hoping for an ios client) that takes a Dungeons and Dragons theme, throws in card driven combat mixed with strategic character placement and uses them all to great effect. It's got a great sense of humor and is pretty thoroughly wonderful.

For something that's sort of similar on ios, check out Knights of Pen and Paper. It also uses a Dungeons and Dragons setting and mixes in old school console RPG combat. You can set the difficulty yourself as it allows you to determine (for the most part) the number and type of enemies you face off against. Also a lot of fun to play.

Littlest sis managed to get Haven season 3 for her birthday but then it went and showed up on Netflix so we're enjoying it as well. Mwa ha ha ha. Although we're going to have to start watching Castle season 5 as it's on hold at the Library. Hmm. Too many shows. (And I don't even want to go into how many books I'm reading at the moment...)

Went ahead and updated to ios 7. It's very different. There are certainly things I like about it, but it's a little odd too.

How on Earth is September mostly gone?

Hmm

I have no idea what to put on here any more. The random commentary on movies/books/games is wearing old and I think I'd like to look at different ways to share it anyway. I've started playing around with Tumblr some. Well, very little really. I follow a few feeds that I find interesting and I sent a post to the As Seen on Tabletop feed about how I tricked out our copy of Love Letter.

So yeah, I've seen stuff, and yeah we've played stuff and there have been some books, but I'm not convinced this is the format for that stuff any more. We shall see. So posting here will probably go completely random until I figure out what I want to put where and how I want to put it.

Inconceivable

I have finally watched an action movie that had too much action. GI Joe: Retaliation (or whatever it was called) left me slightly motion sick and numb. The fight scenes were badly shot and horribly edited and comprised the bulk of the film. I didn't think such a thing was possible. Well, I know Hollywood is prone to bad action shooting/editing.

Which is a little funny as Hansel and Gretel could have used a little more action. The best bits were certainly the fighting the witch bits...

Other than that, I'm not sure I can come up with anything else to rant about.

I finished The Last Policeman. It was an interesting pre-apocalypse tale following a detective that wants to continue to solve a murder investigation while the world dissolves around him due to an impending asteroid impact. Pretty fascinating and I'm looking forward to the sequel.

String or Nothing

Here we are playing String Railway. I managed a pretty stunning victory in this one. But fun was had anyway. Except possibly by lovely wife, who thought we were all ganging up on her. She did lose a few points to us, but that's because she gained a lot early on. And I cleverly tried to misdirect how I was doing. I feel I should point out that if you do not let M place the mountain (the gray loop in the middle) she will wall you off with the river in retaliation. (See McK's corner in the lower right to see this in action.) You lose points for crossing the river. She does seem a little vicious...

Lovely wife and I also played Takenoko this afternoon. That's a pretty fun game too. I managed the title of master gardener in that one as well. It was a good boardgaming day for me.

Mental Disarray

I am finding it hard to focus on anything at the moment as my brain is occupied by far too many things to keep track of. So things are working as designed you might say...

I read Doubt v.1 recently. A horror graphic novel in which some teenagers are abducted and forced to play out a real life version of an online game called Rabbit Doubt - where one member of a group is secretly a wolf in rabbit's clothing slowly killing off the rabbits unless they can figure out who it is. This first volume was pretty good. I look forward to reading more.

Season 2 of VGHS is still lots of fun. Yay.

I received my kickstarter copy of Dungeon Roll. It's a pretty fun little push your luck dice game. Roll up your party of heroes and slowly chip away at them as you descend the levels of the dungeon. Lots of different characters to play as that give you special abilities as you make your way through the dungeon. Good times.

Kids are back in school. That summer went pretty quick. They seem pretty excited for the most part. I think McK is a little unsure about math, but that's about it. Lovely wife seems a little confused as to what to do with her time. I suspect she'll sort it out pretty quickly.

I'm sure there's other stuff, but I'm tired and can't think straight so go find something interesting to look at...

Cadet training

Managed to get in most of a game of Space Cadets over the weekend. I had forgotten several of the rules so play did not run very smoothly. Lovely wife and kids were only sort of tolerant of this fact. I find the game to be pretty fun, but there is no denying that it boasts one mean learning curve. And if you don't re-familiarize yourself with the rules prior to playing, it won't go especially well. So I'll just have to tattoo most of the important ones on my forearms or something. Or find a dedicated group of sci fi fans that want to get together regularly enough that we manage to get things right.

Watched what turned out to be the first season of a webseries called Video Game High School. It was silly and predictable and a lot of fun. I suspect I shall start watching season 2 on Youtube.

Finished reading Blackout by Mira Grant, the third book in the Feed/Newsflesh series or whatever it's called. It was decent. There's something about those books that's just compelling. They're not the greatest books, but they're fun to read. Or something.

I did not finish Cinnamon and Gunpowder. Mostly because I had like 5 books out at once and so I just turned a couple back in and may try to read them later. It still sounds fascinating and I liked what I did read, so there's that. I'm currently reading The Last Policeman because apocalypse story about the last cop that takes his job seriously.

We saw the new Percy Jackson movie. Mostly because M wanted to for her birthday. If you liked the first one, you'll like this one I suspect. I find it hard to say whether it's better or not. In a lot of ways, it's the same. Dunno.

And while the subject is sort of up, happy birthday to M. Not convinced she's allowed to get another year older... But we love her anyway. She seems to think we need to play Summoner Wars tonight. And really, who can argue with that?

Still addicted to FTL. Just sayin.

We call him Mr. Bullets

Here he is, direct from Aperture Science via Thinkgeek. Such a friendly homicidal sentry.

Captain's Log

Star date 2013.08.xx

The maiden voyage of the Kestral class starship the Hunk o' Junk launched under an ill fated star. The journey started well enough with the crew working together to overcome Federation ships as well as some scurvy pirates. But then disaster struck and we took several direct hits that led to fires breaking out. The Captain, moron that he is, tried to vent the affected cabins by opening a path to the airlocks. But the doors wouldn't open. Too late he realized that the chamber most affected by fire and damage was the door control cabin. By the time he deployed crew to try and contain the fire it was too late. It had spread too much and started to affect other nearby systems. The fires consumed the crew and left the Hunk o' Junk drifting dead in space, possibly to be discovered by others.

FTL reminds me a lot of Dark Souls in that it's easy to build up a narrative in your head while you watch your little ship get pummeled to death. I am very addicted, I picked it up for $2.50 during the recent Steam sale and am very glad I did. So worth it. I can't stop playing it. I have heard rumors that they might develop an iOS version. Oh I hope so. Although if they do I will never see my family again...

Playing FTL has made me want a fun space exploration/light combat board game. I will have to investigate to see if such a thing exists.

Watched Kick Ass the other day. I liked it. Some good humor and certainly an interesting twist on the average Joe tries to be a superhero conceit. Seems like I also watched some random goofiness on Netflix, but I forget what now. The Bay was one I think. It was ok for yet another found footage style horror flick. Certainly some creepy culprits for the horror/gore.

Oh, we watched Tai Chi Hero, the sequel to the brilliant Tai Chi Zero. It was ok. Second half was pretty great, but the first half was on the slow side. I liked it, but the first movie was better. Sad.

Roll and Movies

Pacific Rim was everything I wanted out of a giant robots vs giant monsters movie. The scale was awesome, the fights were epic and the story was serviceable. What more do you really want? Good job del Toro. Good job. I had a decent amount of faith that he'd pull it off, but it really was a thing of beauty. Might have to see this one again in the theater.

Red 2 was thoroughly silly. Which, really, was to be expected I guess. It was funny and the action was pretty good, so I guess I can't really hold the silliness against it. If you liked the first one, it's probably safe to say you'll like this one.

Managed another couple games of Formula D. We played the Singapore track and the road track on the flip side of the Monaco track (I forget the name). I really like that game. We're still playing the easy rules, so we should probably start to look into some of the advanced rules, but it's nice to know there's plenty of room to grow with this game.

Joyland, by Stephen King was really enjoyable. It's billed as a crime novel, and while there is a murder mystery at the center of it, it's very much a coming of age novel. I liked the amusement park locale and the characters and pretty much everything about this story. Certainly worth reading if you get the chance.

Absentia was an interesting little indie horror flick. I don't really want to say too much about it as that would ruin some of the surprises, but it's good. Give it a watch.

Had a nice visit with Dad. Ate some yummy steak and watched some movies and played some games. Definitely a good visit. They're always over too soon. He did have some funny stories about bears.

Random Geekery

So I ordered a few things from Thinkgeek. They have arrived. I am now the proud owner of a Bag of Holding and a plush Portal 2 turret that talks and senses movement. (I see you!) The bag is fairly nifty. I really like the material and several of the pouches. It could really use a few more pockets and the existing phone pockets need to take into account newer smartphone sizes. But other than that no real complaints. The turret is amusing and fun. The kids like it. I'll have to take a photo and post it up. I also snagged a birthday gift for lovely wife and another for the letter 'r'.

I am on the verge of having 5 different books checked out. I just recently finished Drive, by James Sallis. It was a pretty interesting book. You can see the elements that got turned into the film, but they are somewhat different experiences. I'll have to check out the sequel. But not until I've done something about this ridiculous logjam I've found myself in. 5 Books. Eesh.

Watched The Incredible Burt Wonderstone. It was relatively fine. I think they spent a touch too long on how much of a jerk he was before moving on to the redemption bit, but that's about it. Carrey was pretty amusing as the Criss Angel/David Blaine character.

Other than that, things are sort of a blur. Dad is in town, so that's nice. Had to get the van fixed. Kids have had various camps and treks and whatnot. They all had good experiences. I'm pretty amazed that the girls were so excited for Trek. I'd have not been at all excited about that at their age. Glad they went and had a good (if hard) time though, sounds like parts of it were pretty neat.

Waving around

So I finished Rick Yancey's The 5th Wave. I gave it three stars, but that's a little misleading. It was a decent book, but I'm not really the target audience for it. It was certainly a little more female friendly than I expected it to be. I don't know I'd go so far as to call it chick-lit, but it's close. It did get a little better as the story progressed, but I dunno... It was ok. I don't mind female protagonists, and I don't suppose I really mind love triangle stuff (not that this story had much of a love triangle) but it was just a little too meandering or something. Which is weird given that Yancey is known for the Monstrumologist series.

Anyway, it might be worth checking out if you like alien apocalypse type stories, just know that it's a little wander-y. Or something. I'd be interested to see someone compare it to The Host...

We got to see little sis and her family last night. That was fun. Too bad we couldn't get a game of something in. Oh well, next time. Littlest K makes me laugh. He's a goofball in the best sense of the word.

We've been watching The 50 Greatest Magic Tricks on YouTube over the last couple days. I really like magic... Did I mention we saw Now You See Me? It was really good. I'm not completely convinced the ending holds up, but the show itself is a lot of fun.

And now to enjoy a rather long weekend.

Oh check out #YABooksWithALetterMissing on twitter. It's pretty funny.

Let's see...

Books to be mentioned/commented upon:

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman's latest novel has a quiet, haunting quality to it. It focuses on events that happened during the childhood of the narrator and features Gaiman's usual blending of mythology and reality into an enchanting dream-like musing on the events that shape us and the choices we make in life. It's relatively short, but I think that just means it's easy to read again. Which I can see myself doing as I think there is indeed more depth to be found. Much like Lettie's titular pond/ocean.

5 Centimeters per Second by Makoto Shinkai. I first ran across Shinkai when he did the film, Voices of a Distant Star, which was both beautiful and heart breaking. This is a graphic novel version of his newest film. It is also beautiful and heart breaking. I really like Shinkai's work, but dude needs a donut. And a happy thought.

The Diaries of Adam and Eve, by Mark Twain was a lot of fun to read. Definitely worth tracking down. It's a wry look at the first couple and how they came to know and love each other.

Vader and Son was the first of this series I believe. It's more cute comics about Darth Vader, this time raising Luke. Worth flipping through.

Not books:

Mama was pretty good. I didn't find it to be very scary, but it's definitely got some creepy moments and was a really nicely told tale. I especially liked the montage during the title sequence where they illustrate the girls' first few years through a series of childish drawings.

The Imagine Dragons CD is downstairs waiting for me. I am looking forward to listening to it. I just might have to play Radioactive very loudly on my way home...

I really need to get Space Cadets back to the table...

Formula D and Wallflowers

Got in a game of Formula D tonight. Let's see if I can get this link to work so you can see the pictures.

It was a pretty fun game. I managed a pretty steady lead thanks to some smart gear shifting and some decent rolls, but there was a lot of position jockeying for the rest of the spots.

In more depressing news, we watched The Perks of Being a Wallflower last night. Reminded me a lot of high school. Minus the abuse and institutionalization. Most of my friends my freshman year were juniors so I didn't have to deal with the bulk of people leaving, but a lot of those experiences were pretty similar. It was kind of rough to watch even if it was relatively happy at the end.

Enjoying the silence

The house has been pretty empty these last couple days. The girls are off at camp and G has been in and out with friends. Ah blessed silence. Lovely wife has managed to tidy up G's room to some extent. Who knew he had a floor in his room?!

We've watched a couple B grade action movies these last couple days. The Numbers Station with John Cusack and The Double with Richard Gere. They were serviceable action/thriller movies. Not great, but not horrible.

I finished reading You by Austin Grossman. It was a lot of fun. Similar in some ways to Ready Player One and different in others. It tends to cover the history of video games as opposed to the future, but they both deal with people that let their lives revolve around them or the industry. Pretty fascinating. I've read some negative reviews by people that had issues with the point of view changes and so on. I think they're idiots. It's not that confusing. Admittedly 2nd person does take a little getting used to if you've never read something like that before, but it makes perfect sense in this context as Grossman is discussing a medium that is all about player interaction.

Apparently G is scared by Betrayal at the House on the Hill. This could have had something to do with the fact that he ended up getting selected as the traitor, or it could be that he just finds the game spooky. Not sure. The girls still love it though.

Random things we've noticed recently: chocolate chips make pretty much all breakfast foods better, home made ice cream is still really good, grilling on a serious bbq grill is pretty awesome, serious bbq grills still have problems with odd hot and cold spots.

I should also mention that I rode a zip line.

Vroom Vroom

Formula D is pretty great. G and I played a quick game once we got back from the camp out just to give it a go. We then played a big game Sunday with Lovely Wife's Mom and the whole family. We had a pretty good time. Although G started to lose a little interest about 2/3 through the course. I think selecting gears and optimizing your lane selection might be a touch above him. Although not much. It's definitely a better game with more cars on the track as you really do get to jostle for position and fight for corners and so on. Definitely a fun game and I highly recommend you give it a go. (And there are more tracks you can pick up and beginner's rules and advanced rules and...)

Managed to survive another year of Fathers and Sons camping. The hike wasn't too bad (although the short way down in near dark was not the best of ideas). Breakfast was good. There was absolutely no sleep. I need either a cot or one of those self inflating/deflating pad things. Something...

If you're following E3 at all you're aware of the new consoles coming out and how Sony stomped all over Microsoft in their press conference when it came to privacy rights and consumer rights and a few other things. It'll be interesting to see how things play out once Fall comes and people actually buy the things. And if you haven't seen it, this is hilarious.

McK has started volunteering up at Timp Caves. That's a little fascinating to me. M has had Day Camp for Girl Scouts this week. And G has Day Camp for Cub Scouts this weekend. I think lovely wife thought that Summer would be less busy. She was wrong.

Father's Day this weekend. Too bad Dad is far away. Will have to get him to actually use his iPad and video chat. And maybe play some Ticket to Ride.

Our love is like a golf course

If you substituted holes for years. Or something like that. (This is just a ridiculous way to say we hit 18 years this past week on our anniversary) In a lot of ways it doesn't seem that long, but then McK decided to go to the DMV and get her learner's permit (in spite of the DMV guy telling her she had to be at least 5 feet tall). And yeah, that and two other kids and other assorted parts of life chimed in and it's actually not that hard to realize that it has indeed been that long. But they have (for the most part) been great years and lovely wife is as lovely as ever, so there you go.

She even bought me a game for our anniversary. In spite of all the other games we've gotten recently. True love folks. I got Formula D the racing game and I can't wait to try it out. Little cars and lots of dice and fun race tracks and... Heh.

We've been having a pretty good visit with lovely wife's Mom while she's in town. So that's been fun. She had a birthday and my Dad had a birthday. It's kind of an event filled week.

Alas there is camping waiting at the end of it. I guess it goes to show that nothing is perfect.

A little of this, a little of that

I finished up Nos4a2 by Joe Hill. It was pretty darn good. It's the most Stephen King-like book he's written (in my opinion) but that's not a bad thing. I liked all the little nods to his previous books. I always find it interesting when authors build their own world over the course of their books and put little nods here and there. I also found this one to be pretty spooky and certainly horrifying in lots of places. Definitely some characters you wouldn't want to run into. So if you like horror/fantasy stories, give this one a go.

Waiting in the Summer was a sweet little anime series. And that's really all I have to say about it. It almost had the most depressing ending ever, but fortunately they fixed that.

We've been watching more Hemlock Grove. I think it's growing on me some. It's not bad, I'm just not convinced it's good either. Of course, I'm pretty sure I had that same impression of the book.

We had a pretty good holiday weekend. Games were played, managed a nap here and there, other games were played. It was nice.

G managed to place third in the Writer's Olympics with a story featuring a squid and unicorn doing battle to see who would win and who would be lunch. I ... actually have very little to say about this as well.

M decided to use her head as a mitt the other day during the teacher/6th grader softball game. She claims to be fine.

Is summer over yet? What do you mean it just started?! Ugh...

Playing around

Mostly wanting to try out a blogging tool I ran into. Technically this is attempt 2, but the first was lost due to my own ineptitude. Alas.

As an addendum to the previous post, I should point out that teenage girls are very loud. You wouldn't necessarily think that five teenage girls would be that noisy, but you'd be wrong. They are very noisy. And only some of it was game related. This is really just an observation, but if you find yourself in the midst of a rampaging group of teenage girls, hope,that you have some earplugs. 

Went and saw the new Star Trek today. It was fine. Lovely wife liked it a touch more than me, but I suspect that's due to the Cumberbatch factor. It's interesting to see how they are creating this new reboot universe. Little twists and so on. I wonder what people that have never seen the originals think.

Urge to play games rising. Very glad of the three day weekend.

The dice, they mock me

Finished the 4th Reacher book. Enjoying that series quite a bit. But I am taking a break while I have lots of other things to read. I'm getting close to the end of NOS4A2 and You by Austin Grossman is pretty interesting too. So many books... (There's a new Hex Hall spinoff that's out as well!)

Watched the Persona 4 anime series. Mostly as I knew I'd never get around to playing the game (I'm still lost somewhere in the midst of 3) and wanted to know a little about the story. It was actually a lot of fun to watch. And I felt it said some really nice things about the ties we have with those around us.

McK had her birthday party and unleashed some board games on her friends. Escape: the Curse of the Temple was enjoyed by all, although I believe it did stress several of them out. We later tried out Dungeon Fighter - a dexterity game where you have to throw dice at a target on the table in order to fight the monsters found in the dungeon. The trick is the dice have to bounce at least once before it hits the target and occasionally you have to throw them in strange ways as you encounter certain types of monsters or equip certain types of weapons and so on. So basically it's an excuse to look silly in front of your friends while having a good time and losing badly. I rather enjoyed it. But the dice in both of those games are quite merciless.

Lovely wife will probably tell you that she's very glad school is out next week. Mostly as I think she needs a break. It will be interesting to see what mischief the kids get up to this year. Sadly far too much of it will probably involve a car...

If you're expecting something other than movie or game commentary, you're in the wrong place

Got to see John Dies at the End finally. It was good fun. I liked it quite a bit in spite of the large plot chunks they left out. Of course the movie was never going to contain everything, so I think they did fine. It managed the humor and the horror pretty well. Plus the weirdness. Can't forget the weirdness.

Cold Prey was a perfectly serviceable slasher film that suffers some in a post Cabin in the Woods world. It's Norwegian (I think). I liked it.

Les Mis was Les Mis. Unless you have absolutely no exposure to the musical, you know what you're getting.

For grins and chuckles I watched From Beyond again to relive some of my misspent youth. It's still an enjoyable Lovecraft flick from the Stuart Gordon/Jeffery Combs era.

McK decided she would be perfectly happy with a trip to BGR for her birthday gift. So she got a copy of Escape: the Curse of the Temple. It's a real time co-operative dice game. Each game lasts exactly 10 minutes. In that time you roll dice like mad to try and explore the temple and activate gems. Twice over the course of the game a gong will sound (there's a soundtrack) and you have to make it back to the starting chamber or you will lose one of your dice. And that's bad. At the end you have to find and make it to the exit and then roll more keys than there are gems left in the vault. And if one of the players doesn't make it out, you all lose. So it's a tight little game where you have to weigh sticking together (you can help each other unlock some of your dice if they land on the evil black mask side) and getting around and exploring tiles so that you can find the exit and free up the gems. Lots of fun to be had here. Plus it plays up to 5 and you can play it with kids pretty easily.

Other than that it's been a week. I'm ready for some form of vacation. Sadly that is not in my future.

Hitchcock and Pi

Hitchcock, the film detailing the making of the film Psycho, is pretty brilliant. I found it to be funny and sweet and pretty amazing as it showed what Alfred Hitchcock and his wife went through in order to make that film. Of course, now I want to see Psycho again...

Life of Pi was very beautiful, but also a little odd. I think I'm still coming to grips with the story and what it entails and how it fulfills its central conceit (a story to make you believe in God). I think I've finally wrapped my head around bits of it. So it is worth seeing, but also know that it's one of those films that requires some investment and will stick around in your head for a bit afterwards.

Had a great visit with Dad. Got to see McK in Pirates of Penzance, which was quite good (especially for a middle school production). Ate far too much good food. Failed to fix the sprinkler line, alas.

Introduced Dad to String Railway. Still thoroughly enjoy that game. Didn't manage a game of Space Cadets though. Did get in some Ticket to Ride Europe however as I managed to get him set up on his iPad. Now we can play long distance.

And finally a happy birthday to McK. She seems to think she needs to learn to drive soon. I have my doubts about this...

String or nothing

So we watched The Hobbit. Peter Jackson needs to step away from the franchise. I've seen Lord of the Rings and it was fine. Good even. He is ruining The Hobbit. It's my favorite book of the series and I don't need all the extra stuff shoved in and three movies. Guillermo del Toro should have done this film. So yeah, not really a fan. When it actually was The Hobbit, it was good. The rest of it is really unnecessary.

Still reading the Reacher books. Still decent (if silly) fun.

I think I've read some other stuff, but I have no idea what it was now. I've been bad about throwing things in Goodreads lately. Alas. I am, however, currently reading Nos4a2, the new book by Joe Hill. So excited.

We picked up String Railway and the expansion for King of Tokyo. Looking forward to playing both. Dad is in town and I plan on making him play String Railway. I think he'll get a kick out of it.

Life continues to be a muddle of kid centered activities and the occasional random form of entertainment. G managed to score a goal at his soccer game the other night. That was fun. He also managed to kick the ball into the face of one of his team mates. That was slightly more fun (for the adults watching).

Maybe it's time to make some ice cream...

Holistic Detectives and Chinese Cinema

We watched the first season of the BBC Dirk Gently based on the old Douglas Adams books. It was fine. Sort of a quirky Sherlock that couldn't ever quite get out from under that shadow. And it was a little odd seeing how they chopped up the books for the episodes. But it was relatively fun to watch and that counts for something.

I've also been watching a lot of Chinese films lately. The Great Magician was a rather fun little movie with some pretty good magic performances scattered throughout. But Let the Bullets Fly has probably been my favorite. Sort of a Chinese Western in the vein of Yojimbo or A Fistful of Dollars. You have your bandit pretending to be the mayor, his potentially traitorous adviser and the crime lord that runs the town. Lots of things ensue including some hilarity, some drama and lots of twists and turns. And bullets. There are those too. It's currently on Netflix so give it a go.

I've been wandering through the Jack Reacher books. The first two were pretty decent, I currently have the third and I'm reading some random one in the middle as I snagged the ARC for it a while back. (2010 I think?) I may have to pick up the movie here in a couple weeks.

Courtesy of the Flip the Table podcast we played a round of Wrong Scattergories the other day. It was rather amusing. It's basically madlibs with Scattergories. We also played Castle Panic which is a fun little cooperative tower defense board game. Lovely wife had a pretty good time with that one.

I broke down and picked up the 1910 and Switzerland expansions for the Ticket to Ride: Pocket iOS games. That Switzerland map in an odd little beastie. It didn't keep me from thrashing lovely wife in a game, but we're pretty new to it, so I suspect there will be lots of ups and downs there.

Oh. We watched Pitch Perfect as well. Really great music. Plot was a little cruder than I expected, but it was still pretty funny. Apparently they're making a sequel.

Have I mentioned that Tabletop is back with Season 2? It is. Today is an episode about the game The Resistance.

Lovely wife and I have also been watching Strip Search over on the Penny Arcade youtube channel. I am amused by how much she likes it. It's reality tv with webcomic artists. I tolerate it because of the art and the Penny Arcade vibe. (It's a pretty good show)

Zoned out

Well, Spring has managed the first blow with a lovely sinus infection. Remember kids, Mother Earth hates you and will do her best to kill you every chance she gets. Fortunately antibiotics seem to be doing their job. Mostly.

Tabletop day was last Saturday. Hope you all managed to play a game of some sort. McK and I managed a game of Cargo Noir. Interesting little bidding game.

I also managed a good chunk of the new Tomb Raider when I wasn't trying to claw my throat out. I like it. It's certainly darker than some of the previous entries. Well, maybe grittier is a better descriptor. But I enjoyed traversing around the island and looking for things while fighting off the creepy cult.

I finished Darksiders as well. It was pretty fun and I look forward to the sequel. It might indeed be a shame that there may not be more of them.

The first Jack Reacher book, Killing Floor, was pretty good. I'm reading the second one now and am enjoying it as well.

Lovely wife's Dad is in town so he's been treating the kids to all manner of junk food without me. He also took them to the local petting zoo type place and now everyone is screaming about getting a baby goat. Supposedly they are cute. I have my doubts.

Spring yadda yadda yadda

I still hate Daylight Savings Time with the passion of a thousand burning suns. So that's good to know. The weather is absolutely off its rocker today. Snow, rain, blue skies. It must be Spring I guess...

Jungleland, by Christopher Stewart, was a book in the same vein as The Lost City of Z. Take one reporter following in the footsteps of a famous explorer as he tries to retrace the journey of the explorer and find a lost city in the midst of the jungle. It's a fun book. The explorer being shadowed was a pretty interesting person (he also served as a spy during WWII) and the journey was pretty interesting to follow.

The World's Strongest Librarian was written by a co-worker (Josh Hanagarne) and follows his struggles with Tourette's. I liked this one quite a bit as well. Some nice humor along with all the trials. Plus I have similar reading tastes as Josh. His Mom sounds awesome too.

We've watched a lot of stuff (Sinister is a pretty good horror movie) but I can't remember half of it. Played some stuff too. I backed my first Kickstarter project. (A fun looking push your luck dice game with a dungeon crawl theme)

The new TMBG album, Nanobots, is pretty good. I was also thrilled to discover that Poe's album, Haunted, is available on Freegal. I can attest to the first 10 songs being great. Give me a couple weeks and I can tell you about the rest.

Zoning out

Watched Argo the other night. It was pretty good. I have vague memories of the hostage crisis. We lived in PA at the time and one of the hostages was local so my third grade class wrote them letters. A couple of the kids and I got to deliver them one night. So it was pretty interesting to learn about this other aspect of the situation.

Braved a blizzard to watch McK at her archery tournament. It was fun. Except for the blizzard part.

Finished reading Gun Machine by Warren Ellis. I liked it quite a bit. Nice quirky police procedural. Some of the characters were pretty fun.

Haven't managed a game of All Creatures Big and Small since we got the expansion. Mostly because life has been far too hectic in the evenings. And when we do have time I'd rather sleep. So very tired...

I have far too many movies to watch at the moment. And about half of them are of the horror variety. Heh.

How is it basically March already?

Oh and apparently March 30th is Tabletop Day. At least according to Wil Wheaton.

Frogblast the vent core

This will be very short.

Stuff: I have watched it.

Other stuff: I have read it.

Still more stuff: I have played it.

I will mention one thing specifically. If you have an ipod/phone/pad and some friends with access to those devices as well you really need to be playing Space Team. Because it is brilliant. Instant good time. Far too much of it was played over the weekend.

Also, thoughts go out to all the folks affected by the 1up layoffs. I found the site as I followed Jeremy Parish's musings on video games. The podcast was a staple of my morning commute. (And I still listen to Weekend Confirmed which is hosted by 1up alum Garnett Lee) I hope everyone affected lands on their feet.

This is the spooky holiday right?

It's not? Hmm. Well that's too bad because I'm going to briefly comment on Paranormal Activity 4. At this point you either like the series or you don't. This particular iteration was not as creepy as 3, but not as slow as 2. It offered a decent amount of lore for the series, so that was nice. And there were indeed some nice creepy moments. So it gets a "yeah, it's good" from me. Lovely wife merely commented that it wasn't too scary. Guess I'll have to try harder. In spite of her recent comments that we've seen an awful lot of scary movies lately. I blame release schedules.

I also finished Revenge, 11 Dark Tales by Yoko Ogawa. It was an interesting series of interlocking short stories that dealt with various and sundry slightly off kilter characters and plots. I liked it even if it made my head hurt.

McK has joined the ranks of the glasses wearing set. Like myself. And pretty much my entire family. Some would say she was doomed. But she doesn't seem to mind. In fact she was a little perturbed that she didn't get more comments on them the first day she wore them. Good on her.

Sounds like littlest sis has managed to complete both seasons of Haven that are currently out on DVD. Now she gets to wait with the rest of us to see what happens next. She too was less than thrilled with that season cliffhanger. Show needs to be on Netflix.

We have acquired Space Cadets as a somewhat belated Christmas gift from sis-in-law. It's a co-operative game where each person is responsible for a station on a starship and has to play a mini-game to achieve goals for that station. It has a timed element that adds to the tension and sounds pretty fun. Will certainly take a bit to play with a new group as you try to explain the roles, but I think once it gets going it should be pretty good.

I drank what?

I finished reading Hemlock Grove last night. I picked it up partially because I heard Netflix was turning it into a show and I thought the premise sounded interesting. It's a literary-ish horror novel with some rather unique takes on archetypal horror icons (vampires, werewolves, Frankenstein's monster, etc.). Honestly the story tends to fall on the confusing side of things, but there are some pretty fascinating bits to it. I think I'll check the show out when it becomes available.

Jack Reacher was pretty good. I think I'll have to read some of those books now. I've been meaning to for a while, but this may give me the push I finally needed.

The Total Recall remake was ... interesting. The plot manages to be kind of different while still hitting all the notes of the original. Weird.

Cliffhanging

Finished off season 2 of Haven. It was quite good and that last episode was quite mean. I want to see season 3 pretty much right now... So many niggling questions.

We also finished season 1 of White Collar. Also quite momentous. Fortunately we could watch the episode 2 season opener the next day.

Over the weekend we watched Brewster's Millions (still holds up) and Zorro the Gay Blade (what on Earth did I just watch?!) We were really hoping to watch Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins but the tape is MIA. We also played Smash Up (some interesting ideas that after a couple plays will probably gel a little better. It seemed to go on a little longer than it needed to, but I think that will tighten up once you know the cards and the factions a little better.) and String Railway (a clever little area control sort of game where you build railroad lines using strings and small tokens. It was pretty brilliant actually.)

G had his first Pinewood Derby. A couple second place finishes and a couple third place finishes. He had fun though so that's great. And he did pretty much the entire car by himself. McK has obtained the role of Pirate in the Jr High's upcoming Pirates of Penzance performance.

I finished off Bioshock. It's a pretty interesting game. Certainly some disturbing themes and moments. Also some pretty unique choices on offer. After I finished the game I watched a couple of the extra videos that were available. I was completely uncreative in my methods of dispatching enemies apparently. I tended to just bludgeon things with my wrench. Less ammo used that way... Figure I'll play Darksiders since it looks completely silly and goofy and then head back for Bioshock 2. (Not so much on the silly and goofy in that one.)

There's a lot of snow around here...

Waffling

So, first things first. If you find yourself in downtown SLC and you're hungry, go to Bruges and have a Torpedo with some creme fraiche and your choice of fruit. It will be amazing. Have some cocoa to go with it. That will also be amazing. Then tell the owner to buy Parker's Drive-in in AF so it's a lot closer ok? Thanks.

(Seriously though, those are some pretty awesome waffles)

Looper was ... honestly I have no idea. I liked parts of it, found the prosthetics they used on Joseph Gordon-Levitt distracting, and the ending made my head hurt. Because I think I'm overthinking something that wasn't really the case, but an argument could be made that it was implied. So, not the best Rian Johnson film (still Brothers Bloom) but interesting nonetheless.

Did have a good visit with littlest sis while she was in town. Introduced her to Ugg-tect and Kingsburg and got her hooked on a random episode of Haven. Heh. Speaking of Haven, where is the new doctor girl? I haven't seen her at all this season, and don't remember her disappearing at the end of the first season. So confused. It's still pretty good though.

Never play Bioshock for an extended period of time. Gave me a serious headache that I didn't realize I had until I stopped playing. I am very close to the end though.

The Uncharted book was pretty good. Not quite as good as playing the games, but a fun little diversion. I would read more of them.

Unsafe Haven

Yay! We're watching Haven season 2. So far the first few episodes have been pretty good. Looking forward to more.

The free game for Playstation Plus members this week was Darksiders. The sequel just came out a month or so back and I'd heard good things about both games so I thought I'd give it a go. It is terribly silly in an amusing sort of way and I look forward to playing more of it. It's sort of God of War (combat) meets Zelda.  So that's a little weird, but it works. The story is absolutely ridiculous and I won't say anything about it because you wouldn't believe me if I did.

Bioshock continues to be interesting. Although I'm a little tired of the hacking mini game. I guess I should just start wasting my money as it seems there's plenty of it.

Littlest sis is theoretically in town now and we're supposed to get together with some of her friends to play games tonight. Poor G is a little under the weather so hopefully that doesn't throw a wrench in things.

I am very glad it's a long weekend. Very. Glad.

G has gotten his Pinewood Derby car cut out and painted. It probably needs some more weight, but I have no idea if we'll get that accomplished. It also has slightly crooked wheels. So I suspect there are no victories in his future, but stranger things have happened.

M participated in her first (and last? I forget what grade they stop) spelling bee. She made it to the fifth round or so before misspelling "enact". She had focused so much on the harder words that it was an easier one that got her. She did great though. (and apparently she had written it out correctly as well as the incorrect version and just went with the wrong spelling)

Caught the first episode of Wallander. I like it. Will watch more. I also watched the first 30 minutes of Iron Sky. It is truly ridiculous. (Secret Nazi base on the moon)

It's cold! Just sayin'.

Snowpocalypse

That's what they're saying anyway. I'll believe it when I see it. Although it is now rather dark gray outside as opposed to the nice sunny 47 degrees it was earlier.

I have acquired Kingsburg and it's expansion. I shall let you know how it is once I actually get a game of it played. It's been that kind of week. Littlest sis might get to help test this one out as she is supposed to be in town this next week. I suspect we shall also force her to play Ugg-tect. Because we all need a little more caveman in our lives.

Got together with J&K over the weekend and watched Beastmaster. It was still shockingly bad/good. So silly that movie. I don't normally do MST3K type stuff, but for some reason this one dragged the comments out of me. "I come from the village of NO BUTTONS" Alas Marc Singer. And who knew Tanya Roberts went on to be the redhead's Mom on That 70s Show? Weird.

Sand Sharks was enjoyably horrible. As was Lockout. (Think Escape from New York in space for that last one.) White Collar also continues to be enjoyable.

I can't honestly remember too much of what's happened over the last little while. It seems like there was lots of watching and reading stuff, but who knows?

Have I told you that Tichu is good? I finally caved and picked it up for the iPad after enjoying Haggis so much. This is a similar idea in which 4 players (it's a partnership game) try to get rid of their hands whilst scoring points. If you think you can go out first you call Tichu in the hopes of scoring yourself an extra 100 points. There are some special cards and some special rules and bombs and so on. It's good fun. I have a sneaking suspicion that when we get around to getting the physical version I will not be allowed to play...

Same as it ever was

So. 2013. Guess we can finally say good bye to 2012. Not sure I cared much for 2012. I suppose it had its moments. Did get to see a little more of family, so that was something. Need to convince Dad to move closer.

The letter 'd' clan had a good Christmas. Dad was there as was lovely wife's Mom. Kids once again made out like bandits. I got a couple nifty things and lovely wife got some nice stuff too. It was mostly a chance to watch the kids have fun though and that was indeed worth it.

Dad got us hooked on White Collar over the holiday. We're rather enjoying that show.

While exercising one morning I was dismayed to note that Netflix had dropped FLCL (and I was just about done watching it too). Stupid Netflix. I did, however, stumble across Sand Shark. It's a wonderfully horrible B movie that is basically a mish mash of Jaws and Piranha. (Moreso the newer version than the old) All I really need to sell this movie is two words: Corin Nemec. That's right, Mr Can't Lose Parker Lewis plays a relatively sleazy guy trying to "save" his home town with a Spring Break Party while the titular sand shark munches on people every 10 minutes or so. So wonderfully bad.

In case any of you have ever wondered, do NOT put a mini disc in an iMac. It will only end in tears. And possibly ruin your new computer. I'm pretty sure we avoided that, but time will tell. And the way to get it out? Stick a regular sized disc in and when it tries to eject, yank it out really quickly. The mini disc should follow. It took us a few tries. No wonder Apple is removing the disc drives on all their computers...

New Years was fine. Mostly as I went to bed at a reasonable time... The kids stayed up this go round.

Wreck it Ralph is indeed good. I liked it quite a bit as did the kids.

If you like ukulele music, give Jake Shimabukuro a try. He plays a mean ukulele. Manages to almost make it sound like a guitar to some extent and he's only using a 4 string uke. His renditions of Bohemian Rhapsody and While My Guitar Gently Weeps are pretty amazing.

I like Bioshock. Yeah, yeah, late to the party, but I got a PS+ membership for Christmas and one of the free games was the sequel, so I finally decided to pick up the original. Farcry 3 is interesting as well, although the save system is just plain odd. And annoying. And Quantum Conundrum does indeed scratch that Portal itch.

Ever wondered what D&D Alignment you were? Wonder no more.

I am mere pages from finishing Breed. It was decent for a reverse Rosemary's Baby sort of book. Certainly horrific in places. I'm not entirely convinced I recommend it, but it's not bad either. Probably not a Christmas book after all... (these are the jokes kids)

I managed to pick up John Dies at the End and a book based on the Uncharted video game series with some birthday money I still had. I'm looking forward to reading the Uncharted book probably a little more than I should admit to. I almost snagged one based on Ico...

Well, here's to hoping for an enjoyable 2013. And managing to keep up with my exercising.