Manic Miserable Monday

I am miserable. Because I hate my new job.

It's also possible that I don't actually care that much one way or the other about my new job, or about my old job, and that I am only miserable because it's Monday.

I would probably not be miserable if I were at home. I hate coming to the office. It is like, way too far away from Assassin's Creed II.

-t

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More Than A Mortgage

House buying is going well. We are mere days away from closing, and giving away a significantly smaller percentage of my money than I thought would be necessary (100% of all my money).

Tonight we're going over to make some final measurements and to make sure that my ping pong table and couch will fit through the basement door. (Sam has still not come around to the idea of a ping pong table in the dining room)

Once we close the fixing up can begin! Upcoming changes:
(1) cut grass, trim hedges, tend garden
(2) replace the electrical service/circuit breaker
(3) rewire the kitchen
(4) buy this
(5) play this, this, and this:


And play as loud as we like.


-t

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Achievers

I've noticed decreasing number of references to how much I hate work here, and an increasing number of references to video games. This is due to the fact that I spend most of my time at one or playing the other.

I should probably be (first person) shooting for a different audience.

Left the house t-shirt design @ © SplitReason.com

-t

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President Elect

My ideal election day would look like this:

After waking early and lining up for the opening of my local polling place, voting, and getting a sticker I would

Return home, NOT go to work, plunk down in front of my multiple monitor setup:

(1) television hooked up to my xbox for playing Call of Duty 4 and discussing polling results and pundit predictions with others online (while "fragging n00bs")

(1) television set to automatically skip from MSNBC to CNN to CSPAN every five to seven minutes (with the top-of-the-hour check on Fox News)

(1) computer running multiple tabs including but not limited to fivethirtyeight.com, youtube, google reader, and some news aggregate site, let's say Yahoo.

Also, there would be snacks.

Then, near 6 o'clock, when the projections and predictions start rolling in for real, I would tune each monitor to a different network, run them all simultaneously and cheer/boo every result as it is announced.

And, snacks.

-t

Braid: Best Official Walkthrough Ever

The artwork and story have been praised for the whimsical visual style, haunting
score, and perception-bending effect on the player.

I tried the demo. I'd say I'm familiar with the side-scrolling platformer mileu.

But then I visited the developer's page, and I am going to buy this game based solely on the official walkthrough. (It's a relatively quick read, don't worry, you can take a look:Braid walkthrough)

Best walkthrough ever man.

-t

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RRoD - F#@K!!

This is the Red Ring of Death:



It has its very own wikipedia page.

To save you some time, the basic gist is this:

To save money, Microsoft decided to manufacture their own graphics chips rather than contract the job to a graphic chip company.

The Microsoft chips, turns out, sucked. They overheated and fried the motherboard. The indicator is, you got it, the three flashing red lights, RRoD.

Consumers were pissed. So, Microsoft, to their credit, decided to comp the repair costs, refurb console, gratis. They also decided to start contracting out for graphics chips.

I've been pretty lucky, so far. The consoles were failing at something like 17% (acceptable levels are normally near 1-2%) and I've had my system for a while.

Well, today, after work, as I was sitting down to play a few rounds of Call of Duty 4
RRoD

And boy, did that suck.

I called the repair hotline, they walked me through some troubleshooting steps, took my information, and will be shipping me a prepaid box in a few days.

So, I guess I'll have some time to catch up on my reading. Or Red Sox watching. Or I could just play more Super Mario Galaxy.


-t

4

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Endless Rock

So, ask me what I did all day Saturday?

I played Rock Band a little.

And when I say "a little," I mean, "the whole freakin' day."

See, here's what happened. I thought, let's throw Rock Band into the Xbox, play a few songs, then see if there's any good cartoons on tv.

So we played a few songs, earned some stars, and unlocked "The Endless Set!" and I thought, hey, that's pretty cool.

I was wrong.

The endless set is 58 songs. Fifty-eight! Ok, so, imagine something you like... Playing Wii Sports. Eating a chocolate cake with frosting. Playing a game of racquet ball. Your girlfriend.

Now imagine doing it fifty-eight times. In a row.

It took the whole freakin' day! We played fifteen songs. I paused it, and took a break. Got a drink. Played another ten songs. Ten. Songs. Songs that are like, six and seven minutes long. That is seventy minutes, for the ten songs. That is more than an hour. Plus the fifteen before that. AND I WASN'T EVEN HALFWAY THROUGH.

This game is totally awesome. We kept plugging away. The halfway mark was awesome. We were all "woo! halfway done! only four more hours of songs!" (the songs kept getting longer and longer).

Let me tell you. At nine-thirty, almost ten hours later, we certainly appreciated the name of the achievement.

I have taken a break from Rock Band for a few days.


Just kidding. I'm about to fire it up right now.

-t

All-Points-Bulletin

I'm too tired to do most all of the work on my desk right now. And there is certainly a lot of it.

Dozens of problems, and hundreds of trades due to the audit cycle for two of the most active funds, and we've got another fund (a big one) that is selling off all of its holdings. Liquidating everything. I imagine some Hedge Fund Advisor somewhere owes a lot of money to some somebodies and is trying to cash in while the cashing is good (and all of his bones are still unbroken).

Incidentally, I'm in the middle of a book about Murder Incorporated, the enforcement and contract killing arm of the national crime syndicate ("The Syndicate") in the 1930s and 40s. The stories are incredible. Every two-and-a-half pages they detail another gangland execution and I've got to imagine screenwriters would be tripping over themselves trying to write these up into guaranteed hits staring all of Hollywood's tough guys. None of this Tom Hanks as a gunman baloney. The Coen brothers would be a shoo-in to direct anything from this narrative. Or Coppola.

And another thing! The language is amazing! I'd love to hear this book as told by the original author (B. Turkus, a NYC ADA) instead of reading the transcript. I think people really did talk like this, everyday, not just in the movies:

There was no method of murder their fiendish ingenuity overlooked. They used the gun, the strangling rope, the ice pick -- commonplace tools for homicide. There was the unimaginative mob-style ride, the shotgun blast on the lonely street. And there were the bizarre touches, too. Dozens were dropped into quicklime pits. Others were buried alive, cremated... Fantastic? It can't happen in your town? It did!"

The book is strewn with alliteration, catchy phrasing, and amusing direct address. "Fiendish ingenuity," "parasitic pirates..out to foment or break strikes for fancy fees." It is fantastic.

And speaking of gangs...Real Time Worlds, the makers of Crackdown for the Xbox 360, have just announced their next project: All Points Bulletin. A cops/criminals real time MMO action title set in a current day urban landscape. Looks incredible. Great concept, great team behind it, solid premise, here's a preview.

That's just a quick update. I'm heading out to grab a cup of coffee to combat my fatigue. Hope all of you in Boston are enjoying the snow.

I am an Assassin - I wear my hood Up.

I have been playing a lot of Assassin's Creed lately.

To the exclusion of almost everything else. Towhit: I woke up saturday morning at 9:30AM and played until 11:30PM(ish).

I haven't spent this much time playing since KOTOR, or my first foray into THPS (N64) a.k.a. "The greatest video game ever invented for any video-gaming system ever."

-T

Solo Legend

Hey, readers!

I'm too busy with work to post a lengthy and interesting entry, but I can still try to post a significant entry:

I just got Rock Band and am a pro on Medium difficulty, and Hard is kicking my ass.

Also, Samantha totally rocks on drums. Like, seriously.

You should come over and play.

Later tonight we're opening in Moscow for Oasis. Bam.

-t

Be My Friend

You guys remember when you first decided to start blogging, and you didn't know anyone, and you didn't have any links in your sidebar, and you only read mightygirl and dooce and nytimes.com?

You'd spend weeks trying to attract commenters and other bloggers to set up a link network, blog friends.

Or AIM! Man, that totally sucked. The only people on your buddy list was your older brother who set up your screenname, and your cousin from California who never signed on anyway and even when she did she'd just put up some boring away message like "hw sucks" and go idle for two weeks.

Well, I'm in exactly that position now on Xbox Live. I'm new, I don't have any idea what's going on, and I have no idea how to add people to my friends list. Or find people to add, for that matter.

So, naturally, I turned to the blog.

Who wants to be my friend?! Seriously. Leave a comment or send me an email, then I'll kick your ass in Burnout Paradise. Or Crackdown. Because I love Crackdown.

Dan Goldin Day 2007

I was a little down on Monday, seeing as it's the start of the week, and my job isn't the greatest thing going right now, and I'd really, really, really, like to keep playing Halo (btw, I just bought Halo - the original - and I'm dying to finish the campaign), and, plus, it's Monday morning. Five days to freedom, right?

WRONG! Because I quickly realized that it was Monday the twelfth, which, as we all know, is only four days away from Friday the sixteenth! Which, as we all know, is the day we will observe DAN GOLDIN DAY 2007!!

Four day work week! Wooo!

I celebrated this realization last night by playing more Halo. Friday Samantha and I are going to see American Gangster.

Dan Goldin Day is like, far and away, my favorite holiday for which I am responsible.

DON'T FORGET! DGD '07 celebrated THIS FRIDAY, 11/16/07! Take the day off, take half a day, have a beer at lunch!

-t

Wishlist

Topping out my wishlist this holiday season (specifically the time between Halloween and Dan Goldin Day) are these two video games:

Assassin's Creed:

Ok, I'll be honest, this game looks totally awesome. You're part of an assassin's guild, and you're taking out the Templars...or you are a Templar and you're taking out their enemies...or something. Anyway, the game looks sweet, and early reviews have compared its style of gameplay to Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time which is a totally awesome game.

Check the trailer:



The Orange Box:

This is basically five games for the price of one. Half Life, and Half Life 2, bestsellers and world famous PC games (Counter Strike, which some readers are familiar with, is a Half Life mod). The disc also has Portal, a puzzle/platforming game which utilizes portals that will transport you instantaneously from one to the next, like in cartoons. And finally, Team Fortress 2, a multiplayer shooter with nine player classes, like Sniper, Doctor, Engineer, Soldier, and DemoMan. The game is designed in The Incredibles style and the promos are hilarious.

Portal:



The Engineer:



The Soldier:



The Heavy:




There's also a rumor about A Prince of Persia prequel trilogy. Sweet.

-t

Skate

skate is awesome.

It's a video game, about skateboarding. EA is looking to upset the Tony Hawk Pro Skater monopoly on next generation consoles with this title, and, after playing the demo, they just might.

Now, I've gone on record citing THPS for N64 as the greatest video game in the history of video games, a stance I will maintain forever.

It was so crazy awesome that the series quickly grew from a "skate and collect demo tapes to get sponsors!" game to "try to go off this ramp and attain near-earth orbit then grind on the Great Wall of China in a three million point combo" game.

But it was still awesome. Sure the controls were getting a little repetitive, but if it's not broke... and sure, they were running out of cool places to skate (how many generic skate parks in West Coast cities can you see before getting bored?), and sure, the only thing gamers kept coming back for were ridiculously inflated combo scores and Newtonian-defying inertia bonuses (it's physically impossible to speed up while grinding a level rail, as it turns out).

So THPS went on to tremendous heights (literally, I once jumped into a sixth story window), and raked in the cash hand over fist.

Enter skate. The demo takes place in an ordinary skate park. You're an ordinary skater. You do ordinary skater things like ollie, kickflip, heelflip. This game is aimed toward realism - you won't see any of these skaters magically pull a boombox out of their backpack in the midst of a one-footed smith grind.

But the real magic is the control scheme. It's new! It's exciting! It barely uses the face buttons at all! (seriously, "A" to push off was the only one I used the whole time).

You control the board with your right joystick, your body with the left. Tricks are performed by moving the joysticks up, down, left, right, and rotating them in either direction.

In no time I was flying around the park jumping over obstacles, pulling sweet looking grabs, powersliding into quick turns, and grinding low rails. And loving every minute of it.

Because as phenomenal as I am at Tony Hawk Pro Skater (I am phenomenal, seriously), I'm already feeling how easy this game will be to pick up. I'm going to dominate.

Exaggerated vs. Real - Button Mashing vs. Inuition

Everybody wins! (unless you're playing me... then you will lose.)

-t

Round-up Post!

Round-up of sorts

Fewer Teens Having Sex - Study Finds: More Condom use, fewer STDs, more parents reading young children, rainbows and puppies index on the rise.

My girlfriend loves the Cubbies, so I'm sorta half bound to root for them as my National League team of choice, but if there's one sure-fire way to make sure I hate them (though it's probably the absolute right thing to do), it's this: Mark Cuban looking to buy Chicago Franchise.


I love those crazy MIT guys. I want to get one of these for my next barbecue.

More baseball news: Laughing at ridiculous baseball card photos. Special nod for having a super great blog name.

Still in sports: For anyone who cares about basketball, Miss Gossip's interview with Greg Oden is supposed to be pretty good. Also, the current front-runner for Oden nicknames is "Pops."

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the kitchen: Killer Microwave!

Foster's Home For Imaginary Friends is coming to the Nintendo DS!. Great show, great potential.

And after you buy a DS for Fosters, you can take it with you to the ballgame! Seattle's SafeCo field is rolling out an in-park DS network that'll let you see instant replays and order food from your seats!

World Takeover Update: I'm pro gun control, so when my beaked be-goggled minions fly into your little hamlet on their customized rocket jet packs to subdue the populace, they'll be firing these suckers. Watch out.


-t

Superfriends

I got a couple emails after the last post asking for some more me-centric details: What did I do at the wedding/reception.

I had a seat at table five. Adina and Mr. Anonymous also had places there. Adina, I saved your name card. I might mail it to you. Also, I ate your dessert. And Mr. Anonymous's.

The rest of the table was made up of...Christina, her boyfriend, Heater, her boyfriend, Joe, and Emily. Christina had moved to New York three months ago and had taken a bus to Boston for the wedding. It was an eight hour trip because of the snowstorm. She also repeatedly said she lived in Boston, not New York, explaining that "being here with all my old school friends, it's like I never left, so I'm sort of slipping back." Which, I know from experience (having never moved away and visited Boston) could happen to anyone.

Emily is from Australia. Naturally by way of introduction I said "So, you're from Australia....do you watch Lost?


Actually, I said "So, you're from Australia...Queensland?" and she was all "DUDE! YES! Why would you say Queensland? That's so killer!"

And I was all, well, it was either that or Sydney...those are the only two place I know. Then I asked if she watched Lost.

I'm not kidding. I spent the first twenty minutes of dinner rehashing season 3 so far, then I ate three desserts, then there was some crazy dancing going on. I requested some Jude - but the DJs didn't have it, so I requested something Irish for St. Patrick's Day, and they were like "...um, Cranberries?" and I was all, "dude, that is so lame" and then they were like, "Pogues?" and I was like, "Now we're talking."

I also requested some Bee Gees. Which, serendipitously, Erin had forgotten to give to the DJs as part of her required playlist, as she and her dad apparently dance to "Stayin' Alive" at every wedding they attend. So, Tom's phenomenal taste in music saves the day! I'm the hero of the wedding!

I then spent about half an hour talking video games with some of JP's high school friends and Emily, the Australian, because, it turns out, they're all we're all huge nerds, and two thirds of them work in the video gaming industry. I told everybody to play Prince of Persia, Emily made sure I'd promise to try Elder Scrolls Oblivion, and there was a general consensus that Burnout Revenge is an awesome game.

Then there was more dancing.

And then I was invited to the after party. Which was a freaking blast. I discussed movies all night with these people who were carting around liters of alcohol (becasue the hotel bar closed at 10 (wtf, RI?) to all floors and lounges of the hotel (eventually settling in the lobby - where they had COMPLIMENTARY COFFEE! which was totally sweet), specificaly Cohen brothers movies, and also did a fair share of debating comic-book-to-movie adaptaions, specifically alan Moore's V for Vendetta and Frank Miller's 300.

I was genuinely impressed by the caliber and quality of Erin's friends. I would not hesitate to place erinire's bunch right up there with our 18aers. I found it very encouraging that there are other awesome people out there, and that folks who aren't me had opportunities to be a part of that. I've got a small notion that maybe we could get everybody together. Erin's friends, my friends, and form the Superfriends! (You know, like Spiderman and his Amazing Friends (Firestar and Iceman) - also, I'd get to be Spiderman.)

They were some great people. Everybody, the whole time. It was wonderful.

-t

Best laid plans... to rant and ramble

I've been invited to a wedding this weekend. (woo!) I've also been invited to a wedding near the end of April. (woo!)

I'd planned to buy a new suit for the occasion(s), something light, and spring-y.

Then I found a suit store on the same block as my new job and it was having a sale!

So...I decided it would be way easier just to wear one of the suits I already have.

Also, it'll save me some money.

Ok, quick updates: I've been singing "More Than A Feeling" in my head for days now. I still don't know any of the lyrics. This has, of course, earned me a few funny looks from my coworkers, but I don't care. I'm pretty sure you're civicly obligated to love Boston if you're from Boston. I'm pretty sure that also goes for Boston Baked Beans, the Boston Red Sox, and the Boston Strangler - I mean the Boston Pops.

For those of you wondering if I'd finished my book, I have. I loved it. I've moved on to Bram Stoker's Dracula. I've also decided to really sit down and update the hell out of my LibraryThing booklist this weekend. Right now the only things I've got on there are some trade paperbacks and sci-fi/detective novels. (Actually, when I'm finished, that's still probably all that will be there, there'll just be a ton more of them).

For those others of you who care nothing for what I do for recreation in my spare time, but instead smugly enjoy the thought of me toiling away for hours, nay, days, upon end here at my new job, slaving over a blurry CRT and tiny-fonted spreadsheets, get over yourselves. "Lo," they say "Tom has work to do now. No longer can he cast his web of laziness and inefficiency outward to his readers and drag them into his loathful existence, he has been smited (smoted?) and we rejoice!" (I imagine that's what they say. My enemies usually appear biblical in my imagination)(or Amish?).

I'd like to address that point by point:
- I have not yet toiled for days. No all-nighters or sleep-overs at the office.
I did come in on a Saturday, which turned out to be a total waste of time, and gave me cause to rededicate myself to never ever ever coming in to work on a weekend ever again. It's not worth it.

- I don't stare at a blurry monitor or tiny spreadsheets. We've all got nice big, giant flat screens - and I know how to change font sizes in Excel.

- I do have work to do now - I'd just like to point out that I used to have work to do then as well. Way back then, when I was still working under hypermanager's tutelage. Loads of work. Which I hated. I've got plenty of work now, and it's a pleasant change from trying to figure out how to kill eight hours of doing nothing at my last job with Insolent Bob staring over my shoulder. And it's not difficult, it's just constant. But, I've resolved to leave every day between five and five-thirty from here on out. Last week I was stuck at work until after six four out of five nights. I'm trying not to let that happen again.

- I have not been smoted (smitten?) and wasn't dragging you readers into my miserable lazy existence in any case. You're here because I write brilliantly and hilariously, and also because you think I'm the coolest thing to hit blogging since sliced bread - until you see this little number.

And I guess that's it. No new suit, I haven't started my taxes, I have started a new book about the most nefarious of evil creatures, and I fully intend to beat Super Mario 64 DS soon. Oh, and try this game, it's a blast.

Catharsis

I was having a little trouble deciding what I was going to do with three weeks off between jobs.

After last night's Patriot's loss I think I'll break out my copy of MLB 2K6 and put together a roster of Red Sox players the likes of which the world has never seen, and take them through to the World Series.

Imagine Beckett, Schilling, and Papelbon starting, each going for 18 wins. Imagine Foulke and Clement healthy, and in top form. Imagine Gonzalez hitting for power. I'll probably put Arroyo in the starting rotation, and finagle a deal for Clemens too. Also, it's entirely possibly that seven of the eight Yankees everyday players will retire early, or get traded to the Diamondbacks, Royals, Devil Rays, and Reds.

I'm sure a few weeks working on a rigged world series win will help me get over this funk, right? I hope so.

In the meantime, I hope Manning and the Colts trounce the Bears, because as much as I would have loved to see him choke yesterday, there is no way, No. Way. Rex Grossman deserves to win a Superbowl over Peyton.

-t