Go Caleb!

My nephew Caleb is in San Antonio for Spring Break but he is not getting much of a break. He is competing in the Paralympics Swimming Can-Am Championships. He placed 4th in both events he was in yesterday and knocked off a bunch of time on his personal best for both events. You can read more about him on his blog as well. He has more events today and tomorrow and is very relaxed and doing well. He has a good cheering team as well. Grandma, Grandpa, Audrey and the girls flew down to San Antonio on Tuesday of this week to cheer him and give him support.

Gaming Update

Well it has been a while since I last posted so I will do a gaming update. I have not had a ton of time in recent weeks to do much gaming due to work and family stuff. Audrey is in school and has been utilizing the office for studying. I do not honestly mind her taking over that space and using it to it's full advantage so she can get some quiet to get her papers and studying done.

I do tend to game on the weekends and recently have played some TF2, Bioshock (Trying to finish this for Bioshock 2), Borderlands (Walkthrough 2 and I may pick up an add-on here soon), and just started Mass Effect. (Quite good and in the same vein of KOTOR, though a bit more FPS).

If anyone is interested in doing Borderlands add me in game or on steam and we will get to it. I heard one of the add-on's has a safe so you can store guns in it which is awesome. I have a few I would like to keep so I can swap out sets etc.

Anyway I am still gaming just doing a bit less during the week.

The future of Radio

So here in PDX we have had a an upheaval in good Radio DJ's. The main Rock station KUFO Friday, Oct 23rd fired all morning and afternoon staff as well as a ton of other DJ's. Honestly in this listeners view it was the largest mistake they could have done. The Rick Emerson Show (mornings) and Cort and Fatboy (Afternoons) were staple listening for the ride to and from work.

I just saw the new site and dj line up and man they look lame. Good job KUFO and Alpha Broadcasting to go an ruin a good think. If it is not broken don't fix it. These guys don't look like they can tie there shoes between the lot of them. Take a gander at the KUFO.com page and you will see what I mean.

If you like good radio do your self a favor and let KUFO programming managers know what you think.

Again a huge hand to KUFO and Alpha for screwing up a perfectly great radio station.

{UPDATE:}
A great article on the situation Here.

Sorry KUFO your new DJ line up after I got a listen this morning seriously suck. Good job at keeping your talent "Local" by hiring ID10T's from out of town.

Vikings/Twins

Ok the last couple days have been awesome for Minnesota Sports. This last monday the Vikings (With #4 at the helm) smoked Green Bay in a Titan battle that will go down in the ages of sports. Farve was in top form and it is so great to see the Vikings doing well for once early on in a season.

That was then overshadowed by the Twins and Americas Pastime game of the year. Game 163 of regular season to see who goes to the playoffs and who goes back to Detroit. Yes the Twins came back to win it to grab the Division Championship out of the Tigers Claws. It was an amazing game and went to 12 innings.

I have not been this happy for Minnesota Sports since '87 and '91. I would love to see the Twins take down the Yankee's as they are a team to truly hate.

Go Twins! We believe in you!

Inglorious Bastards

I saw the new Quentin Tarantino movie last night and my initial thoughts are "Man, Tarantino likes to hear himself talk about movies" It is a lot of referencing 20's, 30's and 40's movies and Tarantino seems to like to hammer it home with this script on how much he knows about movies in general and wants you to know it. It is kinda annoying in some respects as I wish he would tell a story not show off.

The new Tarantino movie is set in a fictitious WWII timeline where the Third Reich is really into propaganda movies and all the high ranking members decide it is a good idea to all go to a single screening in France of the newest Propaganda movie about a Sniper who killed a lot of allied soldiers in Italy. Being that they are all in one place the Inglorious Bastards, a group of OSS agents behind enemy lines causing the Nazi's trouble in France, are tasked with blowing the Cinema the viewing is in up. There are a few more plot twists then that but that is the gist.

The idea is good and over all the acting is good as well. Tarantino brings his very violent scenes if Nazi killing to the screen with gory detail like his other films. I like Brad Pitt but could not for the life of me get over his very badly acted accent of a man from Tennessee. That just brought me out of the movie each time he talked. I cannot believe he thinks that was good acting in any way and my take is that is how Tarantino wanted him to act.

The best part about this movie is the Villain. He is played by Christoph Waltz. He is super Creepy and very well acted. Tarantino also did his chaptered flash back style of movie which honestly was well done for this story but is getting old with his stuff. To me he feels like he has lost his range of innovative ways to tell his story.

A side note of something else that bothered me was the fonts he used though out the movie. The title sequence he had over three different fonts to give the credits. The all seemed to clash with each other even if they were planned that they should do that they should have picked a few better ones to clash.

In conclusion I would give this a 6 out of 10 rating. You could wait to see this on DVD if you wanted and not miss much. It is no Kill Bill and definitely no Reservoir Dogs/Pulp Fiction but worth watching if you like Tarantino films.

Some Game Reviews of games I am currently playing.

So many Computer Games and so little time to play/enjoy them. The following is a few games I am enjoying at the moment and my feelings about them.

First up: Fallout 3 - I have been playing this for actually quite a while. I have beaten the main games missions and have The Pitt and Operation Anchorage addons. I currently am trying out The Pitt but am disappointed that you basically have to start over with weapons and clothes. I may leave that one for later. I have not tried Operation Anchorage yet but plan on trying that next. I also have to explore a ton more in the game as I went directly to finishing the game as fast as I could. I think I may start over with a new character and try to explore as much as I can this time around. Plus with this game there is a ton of downloadable content at the moment so the game is well worth it.

Second Up: [PROTOTYPE]™ - I just started playing this and it seems to have a great story as well as great visuals. Runs really smooth on my machine (which it should as I just upgrade to 8 gig of memory and have a decent video card.) I have been taking this game slowly as I am still trying to master the controls. It is a third person view game that is a mix of GTA4, Tekken fighter, crysis (for tank/helo game play), and Assassins Creed for acrobatics. I have been only playing one mission and a couple EP Point games each time I play it to enjoy it and get used to it.

Third Up: FarCry 2 - I have been playing this game for what seems like forever. I am not as impressed as when I first started it. It takes a while to get anywhere and the fights are fairly predictable. If you like hunting for diamonds you will like this game as it takes forever to upgrade anything. Leave it for the cheap bin when you have finished all the other good games.

Fourth Up: Crysis and Crysis Warhead - I recently finished both of the single player of these and may try out Crysis War Multiplayer here when I get a chance. Quite good games but you have to have a beast of a system to run them on full Graphics. Single player is quite fun and challenging. Great story and Crysis 2 looks really promising.

Fifth Up: BioShock - I have been in the middle of this game for a while as well. The reason for this is my disk got scratched and I have not been able to play much since then. I may have to find a no-cd crack to finish this game but for the moment gave up. Loved the game but got lost a few times so that made it not as fun. Overall a great game and worth the now 30 dollar purchase.

Sixth Up: Assassins Creed - I am really stuck in this game at the moment so have given it up till I get interested again. Great game but a few missions are very tough so beware for some frustration. I may have to get some ideas from Tutorials (which I hate to do) to get ideas for how to complete the one I am on. Great game and again should be about 30 bucks now.

Seventh Up: Halo and Halo 2 (Both PC) - Yes I have this game and never completed the single player. I got so far and then gave up. Since I have been watching Red Vs Blue again I have been wanting to replay this badly and may re-install it again. UPDATE: Just bought Halo 2 for the PC since it was 15 bucks at Fred Meyer. So far very fun but seems to be quite redundant of Halo. I doubt Halo 3 will ever go to PC so I may never get to finish the story and will never own an XBOX 360 or console platform other then Nintendo Platforms. (Getting a Wii this fall)

Well there you go. A run down of a few games I am in the middle of and never have time to finish. I did not even talk about the games like FT2, L4D, or COD 4 that I play online so when all is said and done there are plenty of things to occupy all that free time I have. (LOL) Enjoy your gaming and look me up if you want to play something online. Steam ID: EDOX, MSN Gamer Tag EDOX33

Debt...

So everyone it seems is in a tizzy about how much we are spending and how large the national debt is growing. People are of course blaming President Obama for this but remember who came before him and caused a lot of this. A person and person's many in this great country voted for: George W and George Senior. The younger one let the country collapse into decay and let the mortgage market get away with anything. Honestly it has been almost 6 months for Obama being in office and everyone is turning on him. Remember people who let the country get this way and give the man some slack. Also congress has had a lot to do with how much of a national debt we have had and remember you can call your congressman/woman and let them know how you feel you should be represented.

I for one am sad that we got put in the position for the greatest country on earth to be placed into these circumstances. Quit throwing the blame around and lets get back on track and figure out how to get the economy back on track.

And just for fun do you really want this person running for President in 2012? I didn't think so...

kthxbye