Chest Infection < The World.

Well, the madness of this short, hectic project is almost over, and my body has chosen to respond to this by acquiring a chest infection. Hahahackhack. I'm finding it difficult having to classify things coming out of my throat as either 'mint' or 'olive' green. I am vaguely unhappy.

On the other hand, there is no shortage of things already present in the world which make my suffering less suffery.

To quote the Angry Video Game Nerd, do you know what's bullshit? Fucking ads on the internet. I'm not even talking about pop-up ads (which are special kind of evil). I'm talking about those usually-innocuous ads that are present on the sidebars of sites like CNN and GameTrailers. Usually quiet and nonoffensive. Lately, however, I've noticed a disturbing trend of the ads ballooning up and occupying large portions of your screen. This I dislike. Enter Add-Art. Add-Art is an add-on for Firefox users (because, really, if you're not using Firefox, everybody thinks you're stupid... I mean seriously. Internet Explorer? Come on. Let's all use AOL to go check our Geocities accounts while we're at it. So last century.) that blocks all those ads and replaces them with works of art. Remember art? Remember how nice it makes you feel? When was the last time you were deeply affected by a blinking banner for Continental Airlines?

My friend Paul directed me to a flash game. I have no idea what it's called, but I think it may represent gaming in its purest form. Click the picture to go there.


I told you previously about a wonderful, wonderful bar in Denmark called the Scrollbar (best nerd bar name EVAR) that hosted a Mario night. Well, the sons of bitches went and had a Final Fantasy-themed night recently. What the fuck. I live in New York City. Where is my Final Fantasy-pathetic-drunken-cosplayer-night bar? I am scandalized.

Oooh, speaking of scandal. Now, I'm a huge fan of Tolkien's work. Of course I am. And I loved the movies that Peter Jackson did. I could have done with more Tom Bombadil and less Liv Tyler, but you take what you can get.

Now we learn that Guillermo del Toro will be directing the film based on The Hobbit. He'll also be directing a second, original, film set between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

*COUGHHACKSPLUTTER* I beg your fucking pardon? I am distinctly uncomfortable with this. It smacks of the same sort of commercialization that made the Dune series into a laughing-stock, and which clogs the science fiction/fantasy section of every bookstore with Star Wars and Star Trek "novels." Tycho Brahe of Penny Arcade sums up my anxiety well, and graphically. I hope it's unjustified.

This young fellow has a few good points to make about videogames and sex.



My friend Paco is, apparently, not as busy as I am, and has drafted himself into my service as "interesting-link-getter." He notified me yesterday of two things: First, the ability of monkeys to control robotic arms. His evaluation was, "it doesn't say how many monkeys control how many arms, or how big the arm is." I agreed that this ambiguity was actually far more entertaining than the content of the article itself. Second, well, just read the article's title and you'll understand.
Katie likes Hello Kitty. A lot. Therefore, I also kind of like Hello Kitty. Therefore, the upcoming release of a Nintendo DS game entitled Hello Kitty Panda Sports Stadium has me very interested. Any game which permits you to dress Hello Kitty up in a panda suit and then do judo is well worth the price of admission.

One last thing before I go. Metallica has apparently taken some notes from Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead's books on how to not alienate the shit out of the people who like the music (ie: make your music free to download, sell tickets for concerts, and don't sue your fans). They've started something called "Mission: Metallica", where you can sign up and get some free shit, and then, later, buy their new album. Not download it for free (like NIN and Radiohead have done), buy it. The general consensus on Metallica's "new" approach seems to range from "too little, too late" to "fucking metalica are a fucking stupd band anyway and their all homos." Me, personally, I think they topped out with Ride the Lightning and haven't sung a decent song since The Black Album.

Well, time to go put a few bullets in the head of this Spanish Math project...

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
A: Follow my lead!
B: Screw that!

No Me Gusta Trabajar.

So, I ventured into Spanish Harlem last night to try my hand at Rock Band. (My friend Paco owns the PS2 version.) It played out much as I expected. I was fair-to-middling at the guitar (having failed to invest adequate hours into my own copies of the Guitar Hero trilogy) and too intimidated to sing. Luckily, Paco's girlfriend Sarah is an excellent sport, sharing the vocal duties with him, allowing me to focus...

On the DRUMS. Oh, the drums.

Rock Band for PS2 was a Lightning Deal on Amazon just two days ago, and I now wish I had gotten it. I don't want to work, I just want to bang on the drums all day. I love the drums. I love to bang them. So fun. SO fun.

All right, and what have the internets vomited up for you today...

First: this may go over the heads of anyone who is 1) unfamiliar with the sidescrolling shooter Gradius, or 2) unfamiliar with old-school text adventure games, like Zork. If, however, you have even a passing knowledge of these two, dare I say, cornerstones of modern gaming, then you will enjoy this:

If that was a little too silent, then you can check out this next, fantastically noisy video.

Someone got their grubby little hands on a SNES emulator and created a series of insanely complex levels, that, when Mario (and sometimes Yoshi) is catapulted through them, play music. Wow.

Finally, I am ashamed that have kept these two websites from you for so long.

The merits of icanhascheezburger.com should be readily apparent to anyone with a computer and eyes. I recommend going to the beginning and working your way forward, but be warned: the people who inhabit the intertubes have nothing but time to waste on these endeavours, and the LOLcats number in the bajillions.

On the other hand, graphjam.com can be a bit more abstruse. It consists mainly of graphic representations of songs or memes from film, video games, etc., such as this one:
Hilarious. (Check the "Friday" column closely if you still don't get it.) Each post on Graphjam has a "Cheat Sheet" button that will give you a video or something to provide a frame of reference if you don't understand something right away.

Well, have a good weekend. I'm going to finally buckle down and finish Rogue Galaxy. Plus, Katie and I are going to become not just fit, but Wii Fit.

Jolly nice!

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
Poppin' up like crazy.

There are so many cool things in the world that I'm seriously starting to freak out.

Okay, I mean honestly.

Let's start off with an easy one. An article in the Washington Post that is actually titled Republicans Vote Against Moms; No Word Yet on Puppies, Kittens. Somebody deserves a Pulitzer for that one.

I have a Wii. I love my Wii. But they're making it very difficult to not buy a PS3.


Alas, when Final Fantasy XIII comes out (completing the GTA4/MGS4/FF13 trifecta), I am sure to be lost.

There is a person somewhere that calls himself Blu. Blu paints on walls. But he doesn't just paint on walls, he animates on walls. It's creepy and brilliant. (I personally would like to see this sort of thing done with ninjas flipping all over the walls rather than creepy neuters climbing out of the chests of other creepy neuters. But beggars can't be choosers.)

I found the following video on one of the Wired blogs.
When I was in South Africa, I didn't make it to Kruger National Park, where this video was filmed.


Totally awesome.

(Brilliant segue approaching!)
Oh, speaking of totally awesome, some crazy Swiss motherfucker has built a rocket pack and flies at 180 miles per hour with his rocket pack.
I am suffused with jealousy.

Let it also be known that I love Ricardo Montalban. I used to watch Fantasy Island, and I just thought he was completely the shit.

Check this commercial for the Chrysler Cordoba ("The Small Chrysler" LOL). You're probably familiar with the phrase "fine Corinthian leather", used to describe the leather in a car. Well, this is not the first, but the best-known utterance of the phrase (although it's actually "soft", not "fine").



Corinthian leather, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with Corinth. It was just a buzzword drummed up for the leather in Chrysler cars in the 1970s. It was made in New Jersey. I just love how completely enamoured with the Cordoba Ricardo Montalban is.

What a stud.

Last thing: there is a cat in England named "Macavity" who rides the bus.
That's just wonderful.

My sister and her boyfriend are leaving tomorrow, so pictures of their adventures are sure to follow.

My friend Oliver plays musics, and you may go to his website and listen to some of these musics.

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
Go Cavs!

Review: Grand Theft Auto IV

Well, no, I don't own either a PlayStation 3 or an Xbox 360. No, I haven't technically "played" the game, as such. But since when has the internet frowned upon someone taking a stand on an issue they know absolutely nothing about?

Really, to be honest, I'm just jealous. It seems like everyone else in the world has been giving GTAIV perfect or near-perfect scores, so I just didn't want to be left out. (Also, I've decided that I'm going to refer to the game as though the acronym was a word. So, whenever you see "GTAIV" in print from now on, here or elsewhere, please vocalize it as "guh-tave". Thanks!)

So, on to the review. Well, gtaiv is... ummm... a massive, open-world sandbox title that takes the... uh.... open-world sandbox experience to a new level. The main character is Niko Bellic, an Eastern European tough who comes to America (possibly North America) to chase the American Dream (possibly the North American Dream*, but there's a chance it could, in fact, be either the South American Dream** or the Central American Dream***), only to find that his arsehole brother (or cousin, whatever) lied to him. Niko gets caught up in a whirlwind of stealing cars and murdering hookers, while occasionally doing some missions before getting bored, entering a God code and standing in the middle of an intersection slaughtering thousands of civilians, police and soldiers.

There's some sort of online mode, but whatever, I don't care about that.

Some people aren't happy unless you give a game a numerical score, so here's one.

Final score: 10.

Well, that was fun. I guess I'll become a professional game reviewer now. Maybe next time I'll review a game I've actually played.

I just today downloaded a drawing program that lets me sketch on the computer (as you can no doubt tell from the leading graphic above). Whee! Fun!

Oh, speaking of professional game reviewers, there's a lucky sod named Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw who creates a series called "Zero Punctuation" over at The Escapist. It is, without a doubt, the funniest series of game reviews on the internet. I can't recommend them highly enough. Set aside a long afternoon and watch them all.

I've slashed most of the chaff from the links section in the sidebar. Katherine, Johnathan, Jillian, Dana: you have all failed and have been banished. I feel bad for your poor, orphaned websites, as you callously flit off to Facebook with the rest of the sheep. I honestly can't think of anything sadder than a blog that hasn't been updated in six months, and the most recent post is something pitifully self-effacing like, "I bet nobody checks this anymore." (I check it. Well, I used to.)

I also got my Economic Stimulus Payment cheque. I didn't think I would, on account of me not being an American, but I pay my taxes, so apparently I was eligible. Thanks, Dubya! Now get the fuck out of that office and let Obama lead us into the recession you set the world up for, you stupid fucking TWAT.

A-hem.

Jessica and Vincent are currently visiting. I'll put up some pictures of the madness we get up to whenever any two of the Hunt children gather in one place. When there's three of us, we sort of reach critical mass, and sparks start hopping about. All four of us haven't been in the same place together since Dad and Liz's wedding, for fear of causing a singularity and destroying time.

Oh, and Iron Man was absolutely brilliant.

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
Hold still, you little prick!

* To spend one's $300 Economic Stimulus Payment on crack cocaine.
** To, someday, stop being raped by North America.
*** To finally be declared the Eighth Continent.

SWEET JESUS.

You know what babies don't like?

Being dropped off a FUCKING TOWER.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2008/05/01/india.baby.toss.cnn

Sweet monkey-fucking Jesus Christ.

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
What in the blue fuck is that all about?

It is May!

Congratulations. You have survived your trials thus far. But the road ahead will only become more difficult.

It's dangerous to go alone! Take this:

The Angry Video Game Nerd has lost his mind. (I know the beginning is just a bunch of shitty youtube clips, but stick with it. Trust me, the payoff at the end is worth it.)

Also, some of you may have played The Last Stand when I told you about it not too long ago. (No, not the X-Men movie, the zombie-hordes-descending-upon-your-fortified-position flash game.) Anyway, they've made a sequel, and it's harder.

If you've never been rickrolled, consider yourself lucky. If you have, and you know who Robo is, then this will be hilarious:


Finally, Taiko Drum Master is an institution in Asia. Apparently, it's so popular that it's spawned a claymation animated series. All the (four-minute) episodes are available on youtube.
I present the first episode here. Enjoy.


I'm off to kill zombies.

Now fuck off.

Love, Adam
But why?