Scratch that, here comes the rain

So. We were supposed to start tearing off our old roof in preparation for the new roof today. It's raining. A lot. And has been for a few days now. This is making things difficult. Also, due to unfamiliarity with new basement layout due to new couch I decided to seriously stub my toes resulting in one partially ripped off toenail and a possible second toenail that may fall off. And last night G crawled into bed claiming fear of rain or something, took over most of my side of the bed causing me to sleep in some odd contortion that has left me with debilitating neck/back pain since this morning. Which 3 Motrin and 2 Aleve have done absolutely nothing to fix.

I am not a happy camper right now.

I could relay the True Tale of Postal Stupidity that occurred yesterday, but that would just push things over the edge. Rest assured that there is indeed a reason the USPS is going under right now. And I am privy to it.

We managed to give our talks last Sunday. It went fine. I had to chop mine roughly in half as there just wasn't a lot of time left. I was ok with that.

We are currently caught up on our DVD viewing from the Library. Weird. I have no idea what to do in the evenings now. Although tonight will involve the Mentalist season finale. Lovely wife seemed to think we could actually talk to each other. I may start referring to her as Silly wife if that keeps up. (Actually we talk all the time, I blame that for our upcoming anniversary. Hmm. Maybe I'll get her a lack of talking for an anniversary gift...)

Anyway, I absolutely can not focus any more due to the spike that is currently being driven into the back of my neck. So, go forth and internet.

Here comes the sun

I've actually been able to sit outside at lunch time and read. It's been quite nice. Although it means that once again the grass (and the dandelions, oh the dandelions) will start growing uncontrollably.

Christopher Farnsworth's The President's Vampire is the sequel to Blood Oath. About, well, the President's vampire. (Attack vampire! Attack!) It's a decent summer popcorn book. There are a lot more overt Lovecraftian nods in this one (my favorite was Connecticut Hulu or something along those lines) mostly to the Innsmouth bits. I will have you know that my Rock Band band name is Innsmouth Look. This did not color my judgement of this particular story however. Cade is back with Zach who is once again playing go between for him and the real world. Things are bad, world is in danger, etc. etc. Like I said typical summer popcorn book. Or beach read if you prefer. It succeeds at what it is. I enjoy the series well enough and will read more. If you like action-y books with slight horror overtones, pick this one up. Also Bin Laden is killed off at the beginning. I believe the book came out something like 4 days prior to the real world execution. I don't think Farnsworth minded the timing...

I finished Heavy Rain. I did not get the best ending although I didn't do too badly. It was quite a game. Very tense. Probably one of the most immersive games I've ever played. I suspect I'll play through it again to see what I can change in the story line. I've been pretty impressed with the PS3's library so far. Of the handful of games I own a lot of them are games that I would play through multiple times (or have). That doesn't happen a lot. I tend to play through and be done.

McK is now officially a teenager. And she has officially acquired her Kindle. After playing with the device some I have determined that they're not really for me. I keep wanting it to do other things. I suspect I'd be far more at home with an iPad. It can do the ebook thing and also surf the web and play games and handle video content and yadda yadda. I don't really feel the need to have a device that's just for books like an iPod is for music. It's cool that you can shove a bunch of them on there and I can see how it would be handy when traveling, but that's about it. Otherwise I'm fine with an actual book. (In fact I think I like them better) Although it is pretty cool to have all of Lovecraft's stuff on the device. Well most of it. Hey look, Innsmouth...

Lovely wife had a suitably lovely Mother's Day. I missed Mom some once again, but it was fun watching the kids try to spoil lovely wife. She even managed to get the girls to make a passable Chicken Divan.

Neverending amusement

Let's talk about Haruhi Suzumiya for a second. Lovely wife and I just finished watching the second season of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya. It's sort of an odd creature, much like Haruhi herself. It's an anime series that follows some high school students as they are drawn to and influenced by the titular Haruhi for varying reasons. She forms an afterschool club (the SOS Brigade) in order to solve mysteries and hunt down aliens, time travelers, espers, etc. Never cottoning on to the fact that 3/5 of said brigade is made up of just that. Haruhi has the ability to alter reality to suit her whims. Kyon, the male protagonist, is your relatively normal high school guy who just happens to be the one guy Haruhi secretly relies on. The rest of them are trying to keep an eye on her/keep her from destroying the universe. It's good wacky fun.

Season two of the show is infamous for one (well 8) specific reason(s). The Endless 8 arc is eight episodes where the characters are caught in a time loop reliving the same 2 weeks of summer over and over. And the eight episodes are virtually the same. To be fair, the first, second and final episodes do have some differences - the introduction of the arc, the cottoning on to being stuck in the loop and the resolution, but the other 5 are all variations on the theme. The outfits they wear to the various activities change, the lines are spoken slightly differently but that's about it. It really is the same episode eight times. And it's brilliant. Personally I found it to be a great rendition of the "stuck in a time loop" story. And it makes for a great joke. Mostly because they actually carried it on for eight episodes. If they'd gone fewer, it would have lessened the impact and more would have killed it. There are those that think that eight killed it. They're wrong. I hadn't actually intended to watch all eight episodes, but found myself intrigued by what little changes would occur and so went ahead and watched them all. The rest of the season involves a trip to the past to see the event that started everyone's interest in Haruhi and the making of the movie they show in season one. Also fun episodes.

So yeah, Haruhi is pretty great...

Uzumaki is a silly Japanese horror movie. The spirals are going to get you. There are a couple moments that are decent, but over all this one is a pass.

McK officially joins the ranks of teenager-dom in a few days. She's not as ready as she thinks she is. Although certainly more ready than I think she is too. Lovely wife's Dad decided she needed a Kindle to celebrate the occasion. I'm not as convinced, but it's already in the house, so I guess we'll see how that goes. Considering I don't really spend money on books now that I work in a Library, it may end up being the emptiest Kindle in existence. Feel free to contribute to the Kindle fund if you feel so inclined. Although the first thing I'm putting on there is a collection of Lovecraft. After that she can start to tailor it to her interests. Mwa ha ha ha ha. (While it's nominally hers, the rest of the family gets a chance to play with it too)

G once again decided to add character to his face by throwing himself off his bike. Managed some pretty good scrapes in addition to a black eye and some swelling. Little dude looked pretty pathetic that first night. Especially after lovely wife insisted on mummifying him in gauze and tape. He's doing better now, although there's definitely still some bruising.

I guess I should mention M, lest she suffer even more from middle child syndrome. She had a concert last night that ran far too late and neither of us made it to. (Although apparently we should have gone as we might have missed getting asked to speak in Church in a week...) So we are indeed doing our part to make sure she has Severe Parental Issues. Other than that she's fine. Girl is part weed - she lives outdoors and insists on growing no matter what you do.

Never play 7 Wonders with the letter 'r'. Unless you like losing. Badly. Good thing the game is fun to play, pretty much regardless of how it ends. I just like seeing my little civilization take shape.

Yeah, I got nothin'

I hate Spring. It plays absolute havoc with my sinuses and forces me to get out the lawn mower. Stupid Spring... Summer isn't much better.

We watched Harry Potter 7.1. It was horrible. This is mostly due to the fact that the first half of the seventh book is just about the most wretched thing in existence. I actually have some small hopes for the second half this summer. They are based on the fact that the end of the first half did start getting a touch better. It will be interesting to see if nothing else. I really don't know why they let Rowling get away with that travesty that was the first half. Oh yeah, she made a ton of money...

Lovely wife and I went to Rubio's the other day. Fish tacos are yummy. I had the blackened mahi mahi and it was great. I may have to learn to make fish tacos now. I wonder if I can pull that off on the grill... Hmm. How exactly do you grill fish? Don't you need a smaller grill surface? Do you put something down? I shall have to investigate.

20th Century Boys continues to be fun to read. I'm somewhere in the middle of the series, so I won't bore you with details.

I suppose I should have an opinion on the absolutely massive data theft Sony went through this past week. Especially since I'm one of the people affected by it. It doesn't look like credit card data was stolen, but just about everything else was. I'm certainly a touch annoyed, but mostly we're trying to keep an eye out to make sure our accounts are ok. Time to change some passwords as well I suspect. I can tell you that I'll pretty much stick to prepaid cards from this point on. I almost tried to figure out how to yank my credit card data out of there a while back as well... That'll teach me.

Bigger on the inside

I don't remember quite how old I was when I started watching Dr Who. Very few of my memories are tied to specific dates. Honestly very few of them are tied to specifics. I remember snatches of things and emotions attached to those bits of ephemera. But I remember watching it. Tom Baker was the current incarnation (he of the scarf and curly hair) and of the companions that orbited around him Sarah Jane was the one that stood out. I have fond memories of those times and, to me, Elisabeth Sladen was the epitome of the Doctor's companion. I loved her - she was funny and smart and cute and tough and you get the idea. Which is why I was terribly saddened earlier this week to learn that she had passed away. I'm not sure why it's hit me the way it has. Part of it is probably the little memories that people are sharing around the internet that match my own. Part of it is nostalgia I suspect. But regardless of why, she will be missed. It was great to see her again on the new series and from the sounds of things I need to give her spinoff a try. Rest in peace Elisabeth, you will be missed. Here's a lovely little song that Neil Gaiman tweeted right after the news broke.

In an obvious segue, the new season of Dr Who starts up this weekend. I'm sure we shall be gathered around the tv to watch. If for no other reason than to see what happens until Neil Gaiman's episode shows up to make little kids hide behind the couch and cry.

We wrapped up the second season of School Rumble. It was a different sort of experience from the first season. There was a very loose plot that wandered through the episodes (Tenma still pines for Karasuma and Harima still pines for Tenma and so on) but for the most part they focused on parodying various sources - Power Rangers, sports shows, I think there was even a Drifting Classroom reference. So if you knew what they were going for it could be pretty amusing. Other times it was just weird. And, of course, in typical romantic comedy fashion, they didn't really resolve any of the relationships. In fact I suspect things were actually a touch murkier than they started out. The manga is probably still ongoing and the anime may well be also. I liked it, lovely wife a bit less so, but I'd certainly be open to more. And if there was some progress, so would lovely wife.

Polished off Making Money by Terry Pratchett. It was typical Discworld fun. I don't know that I have that much more to say about it.

A Happy Easter in advance to all of you.

I dunno . . . stuff

Honestly I don't know that there's really anything worth rambling on about. I'm getting some enjoyment out of the Tomb Raider Trilogy currently out. I'm playing through Anniversary at the moment as I wanted to see how they handled the remake of the original game. It's fun. And far easier to play in parts than the original was. Which isn't to say it's without fault. The camera in this game is downright swimmy. I actually can't play too much at a time or it just leaves me with a headache. It's too loose or something. Not entirely certain how to describe it. And there are still some needless deaths due to not being able to quite line up. That's one thing I like about Uncharted. For the most part it knows where you're jumping and just lets you do it. Occasionally you'll be a little off, but not nearly as badly as here. Look forward to the other games.

I picked up Dungeon Hunter: Alliance as I wanted a fun little hack and slash game. It's just now out on PSN. If there are any other dungeon crawling dudes out there that want to co-op through the game, let me know. (And the Might and Magic demo is pretty cool too...)

A Happy Birthday goes out to little sis. She claims to be getting old. I roll my eyes at her. And her comments about getting close to 40. Close. Ha. I'll show her what close is in November. And then start the slow march to the top of the hill.

The lawn seems to think it needs to grow. I'm unimpressed with this notion.

Rumor has it that a family picture is being taken this week. In order to make sure it is as interesting as possible, G decided to throw his chin at the concrete steps in front of our house. He is patched up now. And insists on being called Indiana Jones as he now has a scar on his chin. Well, at least, that's what lovely wife claims. I have yet to find any ancient artifacts or dead Nazis, so I'm a little skeptical.

Similarities noted, ends reached, paper folded

I have finished Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. I'm not entirely certain what to say about it. There are things I was surprised by (the amount of time spent at the University) and things that were grand and things that were foreboding and things that were funny and... well, you get the idea. It's a great book. I'm not sure if it's better or worse than Name of the Wind, so I'll settle for equal. I certainly look forward to the last book and have some slight fears that things will Not End Well. I shall have to read it again.

We're currently watching season 2 of School Rumble. I've missed this show. It's still absolutely hilarious. The 2nd and 3rd episodes reminded me of the paintball episode of Community, except that instead of riffing on 28 Days Later, they were going for Battle Royale. Without the silly weapons. Although there was a silly outfit. It's great.

It is now the stupid weather phase here. I rather dislike April and May because the temperatures are all over the place. We're supposed to have some snow over the next couple days and it looks like it's thinking about it at the moment. Bring back late Fall... Of course now I have to start worrying about the lawn and getting the mower into some state of readiness. Bleh.

I have learned to make jumping frog and wing flapping crane origami. They are quite fun. I was hoping to make a time delayed frog as seen in the first episode of The Mentalist, but apparently there is no such thing. Clever TV trickery!

In which I express frustration with technology

We finished watching season one of the British Being Human. I'm not entirely certain why people like this show. Or thought it needed a remake. The first 4 episodes (maybe 3 1/2) of 6 were not particularly enjoyable. George (the werewolf) is probably the standout character. Annie (the ghost) wasn't that great (barring her brief tenure as poltergeist) and mostly suffered from being far too predictable in her plotting. The killer was X? Gee, I didn't see that coming two seconds after she was introduced... Mitchell (the vampire) suffers from some predictable plotting as well. They do have good chemistry, but I'm in no hurry to see season 2.

So. For some time our receiver has been slowly dying. There's a short that causes the center channel to just stop working. Which makes hearing dialog difficult. Ran into a nice sale at Amazon and picked up a new one that has apparently just arrived. Which means I now get to pull the tv out, yank out the old receiver try to sort out what's plugged into where and then get everything plugged into the new receiver. And hope it all works. I am not expecting to enjoy this process.

However it will be a cakewalk compared to replacing our computer. It's also slowly dying and in need of an upgrade. I suspect we'll stick with Apple, but I'm really not looking forward to getting everything working again. Mostly as I need to transfer all the music and so on over to the new computer. I'm sure it will go well.

There needs to be a way that this just happens. That doesn't involve paying teenagers to come do it for you. I am looking forward to the fact that apparently the new receiver auto adjusts the speakers for you. That will be nice. Assuming I can figure out how to make it all work.

Finished up Emily Strange: Dark Times. It wasn't quite as good as the first one, but it wasn't horrible either. Some nice quirky humor.

M is currently performing in Mulan as a background singer. It's a little ridiculous the lengths they're going to for a grade school musical, but they do a good job. The costumes and set are all really nice and there are only a few things that remind you it's a grade school. Not convinced it's worth the money they've required for it (we had to pay so she could be in it and pay to go see it and make her costume and...) but she has had fun. I think it's starting to wear on her a little, but that's not surprising. So good job M!

Spoooooky

Finally got a chance to take in Paranormal Activity 2. I really liked it. I enjoy these movies quite a bit actually. I find movies that are more on the psychological side to be spookier than their slasher counterparts (although they can certainly be fun). Lovely wife continued to be freaked out by this series. So that's a plus as well. I found the way that the sequel intertwined with the first movie intriguing. And of course the next morning I left all the cabinet doors and drawers in the kitchen open as a nice wake me up for lovely wife. Alas, McK was the first one downstairs and ruined the joke. At least she called everyone down to see my handiwork. M seemed to think someone had broken in and rifled through the kitchen. I'm unsure why her brain is wired that way...

I'm getting very close to the end of Uncharted 2. It's definitely worth playing. This series could do with a touch less shooting and a touch more exploration, but other than that it's just about perfect. So fun.

Courtesy of a kind father in law, I now have my signed copies of Name of the Wind and Wise Man's Fear. I'm currently about half way through the latter and enjoying it immensely. I'm a little worried it's going to be sad, but it's an absolutely brilliant book.

Got in another game of Mansions of Madness. This time I managed to crush those poor investigators and left poor McK without a brain as my Mi-Go took it and left for outer space. Mwa ha ha ha ha. We played another scenario and it was interesting to see the differences in them. The first one was more like a chase sequence in which the monsters showed up early and harassed the investigators while they searched for clues. This time it was more of a slow burn as the investigators tried to unearth what was happening at a school before everything erupted in a sudden burst of monsters and gray matter. Good times. Also I highly recommend Plano tackle boxes as a storage solution for games with lots of bits. They're brilliant.

We've just started watching the BBC version of Being Human. It started off a little oddly, but we'll see where it goes.

I should probably talk a little more about Heavy Rain, but I think I'll save it for another time. Other than that things are just far too hectic at casa del 'd'. We've gotten a bit of a glimpse of the next few years as the girls get old enough to have after school activities and so on. It's not terribly pleasant. Far too much running around for lovely wife. That coupled with the various reasons that we're out of the house and I suspect we'll start to wonder who these people in the house with us are. If I start referring to lovely wife as lovely stranger send help.

Grim Pursuits

The Social Network was a pretty fascinating story. And continues to cement my desire to stay far far away from Facebook. Zuckerberg (as portrayed) seems pretty willing to sacrifice all in pursuit of his idea. (And given his standing on privacy rights - at least as far as Facebook is concerned - he will sacrifice plenty) Fincher is still one of my favorite directors and this movie didn't really alter that at all. May have to track down the book...

The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski is a collection of short stories loosely woven together. It's where the video game The Witcher got it's titular character from. I've heard about the game some and decided to track down the book. I liked it. It's a shade darker twist on classic fairy tales. The witcher is a troubled soul tasked with fighting monsters for people that either actively dislike him or, at best, tend to ignore him. There's a bit of an overarching frame story where's he's recovering from his last fight and some of the time is spent telling or remembering previous such tasks. It's fun to figure out which story is getting told this time (you'll spot Snow White and Beauty and the Beast among others). I think I'll track down the next book as well. I like the characters and the world.

Mansions of Madness did indeed get played over the weekend (and will get played again in a couple days). It's a pretty interesting game. It takes forever to set up and that's saying something. This is a Fantasy Flight game, so some set up time was inevitable, but this is borderline ridiculous. Because it's a story based game with various scenarios you get to set up the board in addition to all the bits that make up the meat of the scenarios. So, if you're the keeper, plan to spend time setting up the tiles and then wading through the myriad cards collecting the ones you need and then placing them in the right order and then placing those stacks in the right places and then mixing the proper decks and so on. Once all that's done, the game itself is pretty interesting. The investigators get a bit of a story to set the stage and then explore the mansion trying to find clues and prevent Ominous Things from happening. The keeper does his best to drive them insane or kill them while striving to achieve his own nefarious goals. I like the way attributes are checked and puzzles are solved and so on. Plus the critters are cool.

Lovely wife found it to be a better first impression than Arkham Horror and M was occasionally unsettled by the mood music (the soundtrack from 28 Weeks Later) and the story. So that's a win in my book. If you're looking for a game with theme and some unique interaction, this is it. Just know that the theme is dark and Lovecraftian...

Heavy Rain finally went Greatest Hits the other week pushing it into affordable game territory. So I snapped it up. I find the way it's played to be probably the most immersive I've encountered in a video game. And it's pretty gorgeous to look at as well. I really want to see where the story is going to go. Plus it wins the best distraction while the game is installing award (previously held by Metal Gear Solid 4). It teaches you to make the origami critter featured heavily throughout the game. Too cool. Don't be fooled by the opening moments of the game (as lovely wife was) - there are certainly grim things ahead. It's not all birthday parties and toy sword fights. I really like the way the opening moments teach you how the game is played by introducing innocuous versions of things you'll be doing later.

So, that's what has passed for entertainment in the land of 'd' lately. I suspect I'm going to have to give the dentist a holler tomorrow. I do not care for the jangle I get whenever I drink/eat something cold. Lovely wife is trying to convince herself that Spring Break will not be an exercise in annoyingchildrenicide and hopes to catch up on some lost sleep. I wish her luck. We'll all need it. I could use some sleep myself. Ah well...

In which normalcy returns

We had nice visits with lovely wife's Mom and Dad over this past week. Her Mom, unfortunately, got to spend most of the time working on a costume for M for Mulan. But the costume was completed, so yay I guess? M certainly seems to think so. We also had a fun dinner at Teppanyaki during her stay. We got to see some new hibachi chef routines as well as a magic trick. Mostly due to the family we were seated with, but a show is a show.

G dragged Grandpa over to Cabelas and convinced him to let him play the shooting gallery game. I took advantage of the leftover tokens and had a go myself. It was fun. G needs to work on his aim. ^_^ Kids were glad to see family as were lovely wife and I and now we get to try and calm them down from all the excitement.

Also, congratulations go to nephew L on his Baptism.

We finished off season one of Community. It was great. The paintball episode was indeed amazing (a 28 Days Later reference in addition to some John Woo and a couple others). This may become the 2nd show that I actually bother to watch while it's broadcasting.

I have had my first tooth filled. It theoretically wasn't a cavity - just a small hole on the biting surface of my tooth. But once they drilled in they discovered it went all the way down my tooth. Still a very small hole, just very deep. It wasn't the most pleasant of experiences. I'm trying to decide if it's not completely better. I get a bit of an ache when I eat crunchy things like chips or cereal. Is that normal a week later?

Mansions of Madness is out. And I have my copy. I am very much looking forward to playing it. Puzzles, monsters, loss of sanity, stories full of dread and intrigue... what's not to love? I'm going to try and convince lovely wife and possibly McK to give it a go some time this weekend so we can get some of the rules down.

I'm ready for a bit of quiet. And a nap...

In which random things are discussed very briefly

Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson was a fun read. It's part epic fantasy and part con job. Think Ocean's 11 meets Lord of the Rings. An odd little mish mash to be sure, but one that worked pretty well. Sanderson sets up a world in which certain people have the ability to "burn" metals in order to work various types of magic. A group of thieves which specialize in the various types of magic get together to overthrow the government via a con. Oh and it's set in a world where the original "Hero of the Ages" (think Frodo from LotR) failed. Yeah, that's right Sauron won and the thieves are out to bring him down. It's pretty fascinating. It's also the first book in a trilogy (following standard Fantasy rule #3) that I'll probably get around to finishing. I'm gonna take a bit of a break first. Other things to read.

(In strangely related news, The Name of the Wind is just as good the third time through and I've picked up a couple details I missed the first couple times through. Such a good book.)

Lovely wife and I have been making our way through season one of Community. It's been pretty good so far. I really liked the Halloween episode with Abed as Batman. Joel McHale is pretty amusing and I'm glad to see the writers continuing to work in Seacrest jokes. (For fans of The Soup)

We have family in town this weekend for nephew L's baptism. So things will be a little on the hectic side, but hopefully the fun side as well.

In which nothing of consequence is considered

The long weekend was great. Got together with some friends of the family (well, the kids and lovely wife were a little more invested, but we all had fun) and managed to introduce them to 7 Wonders. I really do like that game a lot. Enough that we managed to play a couple more times with different friends. Never play 7 Wonders with the letter 'r'. He will stomp all over you.

We watched both Easy A and Salt over the course of the last few days. One was funny but I don't feel the need to ever see it again and one was an ok action flick with an oddly open ending (are they really thinking franchise for this? Really?). I'm not certain which was which at this point.

I've been messing with demos on the PS3 again. Hoard is strangely addictive. You play a dragon burning towns, ransoming princesses, defending your hoard from thieves, bbq-ing knights - that sort of thing. You can play with or against others. It's fun. Give it a look. Yakuza 4 was simply a look at the fighting engine in the upcoming game. Not terribly helpful if you want to know more about the game. Dragon Age II looks pretty interesting. It's an RPG where you put together a team and kill goblins and whatnot. Good times. I might have to track down the original game and give it a go.

Psst, Wise Man's Fear comes out next week. I am very excited. I'm hoping to score an autographed copy courtesy of my Father-in-law as he lives near a bookstore where the good Mr Rothfuss will be appearing.

In other not inconsequential news, thoughts go out to little sis and favorite niece. Get better.

And I think that about does it.

Too many books, too little brain cells

So, I read a lot of graphic novels over the weekend. Another 5 volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist, 4 volumes of Naruto and School Rumble Volume 1. They were all decent in their own little ways. I will single out that I didn't really care for the Ishbalan war flashback volume of FMA, time passes almost as strangely in the graphic novels of Naruto as it does in the anime (something both lovely wife and letter 'r' expressed an interest in. I've only seen a little of the anime, but I know what they're talking about - serious time dilation in Naruto's world), and School Rumble is a sweet romantic farce. We've actually been watching the anime version of it as well lately and it's also a lot of fun. I get a kick out of the characters in this one.

A small further note on School Rumble. I was expecting it to be something of a fighting storyline given the title. Not so, it's actually a high school romantic farce. Not quite as out there as Ranma 1/2 (and certainly lacking the battle sequences) but still pretty wacky. So far my favorite bit has been the message arrow story line. Although there are others that are close.

Iron Man 2 was better than the first movie. I was pleasantly surprised by this. I actually enjoyed it quite a bit.

And that's really all I can scrape together at the moment. Brain no worky. Glad it's a three day weekend.

Elementary

The Sherlockian by Graham Moore was pretty darn great. It's amazing how much of that book was real as well. Told via two different time periods - one in the past following Arthur Conan Doyle and one in the present following Harold White - the story features mystery, murder and intrigue. Harold wants to know what happened to Doyle's missing journal and who killed the man that claimed to have found it. Doyle wants to know who sent him a letter bomb and almost killed him. If you enjoy mysteries or Sherlock Holmes then there's plenty here for you. Truly a fascinating read.

I've pounded down 4 more volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist as well. Still great. What's going to happen next?!

Red was a fun little movie. I found the pacing to be a touch strange (I think it probably should have been just a bit shorter) but overall it was a good time. This is what The Expendables should have been. Four aging CIA agents, the up and comer charged with taking one of them out, intrigue, romance, yadda yadda, you've probably watched it by now. And if not, you should.

Baccano was an entrancing, if occasionally gruesome, series. There's something about a train, some mafia turf wars, the spreading of joy, dominoes and too much else would spoil some of the surprise. If you're in the mood for something that takes a little effort to keep up with and aren't bothered with a somewhat dark overtone, this one's also worth looking into.

Blokus continues to make us think way too much.

Casa del 'd' is a little under the weather at the moment as 2 out of 3 munchkins are down with something or other. Alas poor munchkins. 'd' is a harsh task master when it comes to being sick. Not a lot of tv viewing to be had for those poor souls. Plenty of rest and fluids though. And books.

Speaking of TV, we're probably just about done with satellite. Rates are getting a little too out of hand for what we really watch. Kids will miss it, but unless they want to start paying for it and get some jobs they're out of luck. I'll miss a couple things (Eureka mostly) but, eh, that's what DVD is for. So if you have any good tips for getting deals from satellite providers send them to lovely wife.

Strange days indeed

So let's see. I have plowed through 4 more volumes of Fullmetal Alchemist. I continue to enjoy that series quite a bit. It's fascinating to watch that story unfold. There are some wonderful heartfelt moments. And some shocks. I was not expecting one of the plot twists that happened in volume 4. I think it was. Might have been 5.

Lovely wife and I are currently watching Baccano, the anime series. It's been pretty great, if confusing. There's a pretty large cast of characters and it's a touch hard to follow. If things manage to wrap up by the end though, this one will definitely be a gem. And Isaac and Miria are awesome. Right you are letter 'd'. Right you are.

So I have now befriended someone on the PS3 that has a copy of Need for Speed. This is a blessing and a curse. It really does make the game more fun (the wall serves a purpose now as does Autolog recommends) but also more frustrating. I can't put the game in after 9:30 now or I will be up all night trying to beat just "one more record" or trying to beat the same record "just one more time". Devious. And compelling.

I've started up Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson. It's pretty good so far. It's fun to read fantasy again. I think I've said this before. But there you go.

We (and by we I mean lovely wife) recently made some homemade chicken noodle soup and some pulled pork. Both were quite excellent. The pulled pork was Carolina based, so it was a vinegar sauce as opposed to bbq sauce. It was quite good. Always fun to try new recipes. Now I want bbq. Or maybe chicken soup.

Owls and such

300 + owls - blood = Legend of the Guardians (the Owls of Ga'hoole). Given that it was directed by Zack Snyder this should not be a surprise. It was actually pretty decent to watch. Standard fantasy fare to be sure, but fun nonetheless. And some of the animation was amazing. The rain and fire sequences especially. So very pretty. There are worse ways to spend some time with your kids. Or whoever you watch movies with.

We finished off Castle season 2 and now I want to watch season 3. Why is it not on DVD yet? Because it's tied down to a broadcast schedule is not really a good reason. I've really come to enjoy this show, I look forward to more of it.

We had ourselves a game day this past weekend and much fun was had. We played Dixit, 7 Wonders, Sequence, Zooloretto, and a couple others. We also learned to play Blokus. It's quite good as well. I have a sneaking suspicion it may make its way into our home sooner rather than later. You can pick up a pretty nice version for the PS3 in their online store for around $5. We may have to convince little sis to do this so we can play online against them. Well, after we add each other as friends.

I also have a lovely Nintendo customer service story. I'd always heard about how they treated their customers well and I can now confirm it. G went to play Lego Star Wars the other day and the Wii wouldn't take the disc. It also made a strange noise upon powering up the unit. After some brief online searching it was discovered that this could really only be fixed with a repair at ye olde Nintendo. So I called up Nintendo only to be told that our machine was out of warranty and would need to send some money to get it fixed. I asked if they had any loyal customer discounts and the wonderful service rep gave me a one time waiver on the service fee. So the Wii is on its way to California to be fixed. Hopefully it will come back with all our saved game data. Thanks Nintendo for remembering your customers.

(DirecTV on the other hand does not win any customer service points, but that's probably a story for another time.)

A belated happy birthday shout out to nephew K. Hope you had a great day little dude.

Insert witty Castle joke here

Season 2 of Castle has been pretty decent thus far. The mystery plots are pretty secondary to the banter and I'm fine with that. It's certainly worth watching on DVD.

Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson was a fun fantasy book. It features a pretty unique magic system and some fun characters. Lots of little twists and turns before wrapping things up. I suspect I'll read more of his work now. I've heard his Mistborn series is worth checking out as well. It's nice to find some more fantasy again.

Death of a Scriptwriter is a Hamish Macbeth story by M.C. Beaton. If you've been here a while, you might recall me mentioning that we enjoyed the TV series. The books are fun too. Nice little mystery story. Makes me want to watch the show again...

In other news G has been practicing his writing by writing down little stories. Thus far we have had The Fish and the Turtle, The Shark, the Fish and the Dolphin and The Dragon's Gold. One of the stories featured a human on fire and one featured a lovely dinner for a hungry aquatic animal. Hmm. He may be ready for shark week now.

In other other news I got to tell a couple at the Library that it wasn't really the appropriate place to be making out.

I managed to finish off the first Uncharted. It was a lot of fun. I've started the second one and it had one of the best beginnings to a video game I've seen in a long time. Really enjoying this series. And Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit is a frustratingly good time. My driving skill are not that spectacular. But it's a lot of fun to try. Donkey Kong Country Returns is pretty good as well. The collector in me is going to hate this game as some of the levels are fiendishly difficult. I may never finish the bonus temple levels. In spite of G telling me to try at every other moment.

The girls explored mummification for their science projects. At least there were no coat hangers involved. I'm sleeping with one eye open just to be safe.

Nothing to see ... move along

It feels like there should be things to talk about, but honestly I've not got a clue what they are. I suppose if I bothered talking about anything other than games, books and movies I'd probably have a couple topics, but I really can't be bothered.

I did finish volume 12 of 20th Century Boys. It looks like we may now know who the mysterious Friend is. Although it's been long enough since I started the series, that I'm still not entirely sure who it is. I still really enjoy reading the series though. I think we're roughly half way now even! ^_^ Heh.

The Expendables was pretty much a lost opportunity. When I heard about the movie (mostly the cast) I had hopes for a slightly campy, self aware non stop action flick. What I got was a straight up action flick. Now, there is plenty of action, but it's played way too straight. So it wasn't really as good I was hoping it would be. Alas. If you have interest in seeing it (and you somehow haven't already) just know that it takes itself very seriously. Slight Spoiler: Oh and my favorite complaint about the flick is how can you have a group called the Expendables and then let them all live through the movie?

We're about to watch the A Team movie and season 2 of Castle. So good times ahead.

M has decided she wants to be in the school play/musical Mulan. They're letting the fourth graders participate in the background choir stuff. And she's about to start selling GS cookies again. Lovely wife is thrilled.

I have discovered that they're about to release glow in the dark hexbug nano stuff. This is very exciting news. Now you can be strangely hypnotized in the dark!

New Year Get

So. We meet again. You really need to stop hanging around these sorts of places. All manner of trouble they are.

Frozen has pretty much the silliest plot outline of any movie: three people stuck on a ski lift. The movies itself is actually surprisingly tense. Much like Open Water from a few years back we get to watch a small group of people abandoned in an unfriendly environment. Unlike Open Water they don't fight the entire time. So it comes out slightly on top for that reason. Although that shot at the end of Open Water with the lightning and the sharks is still the best moment in either of the movies. Frozen focuses on two guys that have been friends forever and the newish girlfriend that has tagged along while they go skiing. The movie doesn't waste too much time before stranding them up in the air and then doesn't take too much time before the surprisingly logical ending. That's actually probably the best thing about the movie - everything you think you might try in this situation is covered and it's all pretty realistic. Although lovely wife thinks the guy that jumped was an idiot... So, this one is recommended. Especially to little sis and 'k'.

Gran Torino is pretty much a western set in Detroit. I had it recommended to me as a remake of Shane. I haven't seen Shane (although I might have to now) but I like westerns, so we gave this one a try. If you can get past the racism and swearing it's actually a surprisingly sweet movie. And I think Clint Eastwood is about the only person that could get away with playing the main character. Anybody else probably couldn't have pulled it off. You'd think they were the biggest jerk on the planet. I think part of it is due to all the characters Clint has played over the years. Anyway, this is another one that we liked and you might give a go.

The BBC show Sherlock is also a lot of fun. I wasn't sure I'd like a modern day Sherlock Holmes but they pulled this off as well. Nice banter, clever cases, nods to the original it all works pretty well.

I'm still in the midst of Warbreaker so you don't really get an update on it. Except for me to say that I'm enjoying it.

We managed a couple games of 7 Wonders and Dixit over the break. They're both pretty enjoyable. Dixit is an easily picked up party type game that encourages creativity from the players. It's a little like Apples to Apples and occasionally suffers from some of the same problems, but not to the same extent. (You'll occasionally have a hand of cards that doesn't seem to work, but if the storyteller does a good job of not being too specific it's not really an issue.) 7 Wonders has a bit of a learning curve, but ends up being pretty enjoyable. It will take a few games to start to see how strategies emerge and how the wonders are best utilized but that's ok.

So, that's some of what's been happening around Casa del 'd'. We had a great visit with Dad while he was here. He needs to live much closer so we can get together more often. We also had a great visit with lovely wife's Mom. It was good reconnecting with her as well. I am glad the holidays are over and hope you all had a wonderful time.

Condolences go out to little sis on the job loss. Glad you have a few months to get things in order. Here's to hoping the rest of the year is better.