My Car Got A Big Owie

So the other day, I was just driving along, minding my own business, just going straight on my own lane, when suddenly some guy in a big truck on a different lane decides he wants into my lane. Problem is, when he tried to go, I was there. So bam, he crunches the side of my car, and the side-view mirror is literally hanging by a thread (as seen in the picture above, it has now been duct taped back on -- Thanks Rae!). Driving without a side-view mirror is not fun.

Thankfully, no one was hurt and double thankfully it was 100% the other driver's fault so all repairs are covered and I won't take a hit on my future insurance premiums.

P.S. - I haven't had a Hit List type post in a while (Nov. 27 to be exact) but there should be a big one soon, so keep checking back.

More on Rock Band

Here's a picture of the band that my friends and I use when we play Rock Band, "Vegetarian Spank Inferno!" Bonus points for anyone who gets that reference.

I really love the look of Rock Band. The graphics and customization options in this game really put Guitar Hero III to shame, I would compare it as going from last-gen to next-gen, like comparing the graphics of Playstation 2 to Playstation 3. Although it's a blast to play, sometimes it's just cool to sit back and watch the game in motion because it's beautiful. The lip-syncing for the singer really matches well. The drummer actually hits the proper drums in his or her drum set. When you get a close up of a guitar getting played, you see the strings vibrate when they're strummed. The camera angles and stage design is varied and superb. Every so often there are cool special effects like the camera going black-and-white or hazy. The lighting on the stage matches the music being played. All-in-all, the game's presentation is excellent.

Everybody's practicing and gearing up for Endless Setlist. If you don't know what it is, you basically play through all 58 songs included on the original game disc back-to-back-to-back without breaks. Apparently it takes about 5-6 hours to do this. Sounds daunting, but we're gonna take an entire day, get as many people as we can together and make a party of it all. This way we can rotate and swap out people when we get tired or if a song is too difficult for someone.

That being said, here are some more reasons that I heart Rock Band:
- Big Rock Endings. I just wish every song had one
- the ability to still be able to get get more Overdrive while you are engaged in Overdrive mode
- your Star rating is displayed prominently so you know how far away from the next level you are. This way if you're near the end of a song, you can play your ass off to get that next star
- tambourine and cowbell playing for the singer. What a great touch, the first time I sang (Don't Fear) The Reaper, I was in love. I had a fever over the Xmas break and more cowbell really was the only prescription
- new downloadable content every week. By year's end, they say there will be over 200 extra tracks available for Rock Band. While not every song is gonna appeal to everyone, I've already downloaded over a dozen extra tracks. I'm already looking forward to mid-March when they release a Nine Inch Nails track pack. Let's hope that it's the first of many to come.

To end, some song requests:
Queen - Bohemian Rhapsody, the absolute holy grail of rock. I've been dying to get this song in either a karaoke game or guitar hero, but what better place is there than Rock Band. If made as downloadable content, this is guaranteed to be the best selling song of all-time. Also, any other Queen would be greatly appreciated.

Jimi Hendrix - you always see those tidbits about Jimi during the load screens, but yet there is no Hendrix to play in the game. It's like dangling a carrot and pulling it away at the last moment. The holy grail of Jimi's catalog of course has to be Voodoo Child (Slight Return), and other great fits would be Fire, Purple Haze and his cover of Bob Dylan's All Along The Watchtower.

U2 - I'm not really a fan of their entire catalog as a whole, but I cannot deny the greatness that is their 1987 album, Joshua Tree. Anything from that would be a must buy. They are undoubtedly one of the most popular bands of all-time, but strangely enough, I don't believe that they've been featured in a music/rhythm game to date.

NIN - Anything. Ok, half of NIN's catalog just doesn't translate well to the Rock Band format (See: most of Year Zero). However, there are some absolute gems that would translate masterfully to Rock Band. Some of my favorites would be: Anything from their Broken album, HYPERPOWER!/The Beginning of the End (bundle em together like Boston's Foreplay/Long Time), and Head Like A Hole.

One of the big points that would make the transition difficult is the lyrical content. To remain a T-rated game, some songs featured in Rock Band are censored. Certain songs that would translate well but would have to be heavily censored would be You Know What You Are? and Only; songs which contain 'fuck' in the chorus. Censoring might work for some songs, but for others it would just ruin it. Although for a lot of the censored songs, when we play them, we like to belt them out with the swear words intact.

Rock Band = Best. Game. Ever.

The hype is real. When you spend 4+ hours with friends staying up until the wee hours of the morning playing the same game for 2 days straight, you know you've got a special game.

What makes this game so cool? How about getting together with 3 of your friends and rocking out to classics like Blue Oyster Cult's Don't Fear The Reaper and personal favorites like The Hand That Feeds by Nine Inch Nails. You can play drums, bass, guitar or sing. Get tired of drumming? Try guitar or bass! Get tired of that? Try singing! Tired of that? Well I feel like drumming again! Up for a challenge? You can even try playing an instrument and singing at the same time!

It'll never get old because you can play 4 different instruments at 4 different difficulties and there's over 50 songs with new songs being made available every week (for a somewhat reasonable fee, of course).

Absolutely phenomenal.

This definitely makes up for me being sick through Christmas, my birthday and New Year's!

My New Year's Resolution....

...Is to play this as much as possible:



Fuck yeah.

Eric's Last Day of Freedom

With less than a week to go before Eric & Christine get hitched, a bunch of the boys got together last week to celebrate "Eric's Last Day of Freedom."

So without further ado, here are a few select highlights of the night: (Warning: some of the following content is NSFW!)

First up, a picture gallery that chronicles some of the events of the evening are available with a click of the pic:


Secondly, we've got Eric serenading a Speakers Corner booth with his own personal mashup/remix of a couple of his favorite songs:


Next Up, is Eric playing a game of "Pin the Pasties on the Showgirl":


Next we also have Edmond playing "Pin the Pasties on the Showgirl" or in his case "Find the Pasties on the Floor":


Finally, Carmen shows those two chumps how to properly pin pasties on a showgirl (with a little inadvertant help from some of the boys):


So there you have it! After this Saturday, Eric will always be able to look back at this as the good old days :)

Congratulations and best of luck to the future bride and groom, you'll need it!

What's That? Even MORE Free Stuff!

Found these on my doorstep today, 10 identical sets of pins from Disney Pixar. Strange thing? I never ordered them. Tried looking for a number to let them know of their screw up, but can't find one yet. I'm still waiting on something else I ordered from them and expected that to come today, but not these, although this is pretty cool.

Maybe it's just good karma because I'm such a big Pixar fan?

Snow Snow Go Away, Come Again Another Day

As soon as I pipe up about the rain it snows (see previous post below). Such is life, might as well make the best of it! Halo 3/NHL 08/Any other online game anyone?

The Hit List: Fall/Winter 07 Rain Rain Go Away, Come Again Another Day Edition

With Fall in full bloom here in Vancouver comes rain. With it raining all the time, there's not much to do besides stay home and watch movies and play games (although that's usually what I do regardless). So without further ado, here's another fairly long list of some great stuff well worth seeking out: (remember, I always keep a fairly recent and regularly updated list of music/books/movies/tv/comics I've enjoyed over on the right)

Movies:
The Lookout - No question, this is one of the best movies of the year. This is the story of Chris Pratt (played so convincingly by Joseph Gordon-Levitt in what is surely a star-making performance) who one night goes joyriding with his friends but foolishly gets into a preventable accident. Lives are lost, but not Pratt's, although he suffered brain trauma which prevents him from remembering things for long periods. As such, he keeps notes in a notepad to help him through daily life. The former teenage hockey star now works as a night cleaner for a local bank.

It is during his time working for the bank that a group of criminals aiming to rob it look to use him to make their jobs easier. Throughout all this is an intricately planned heist and sequence of events that really pulls you into this movie. What really makes this movie work so well is the absolutely fantastic script which pieces everything together, doesn't rely on fuzzy logic and leaves no dangling plotlines. There are so many fabulous callbacks and little character moments (the type of stuff that really puts a smile on your face because it's done so well). So many of these heist movies rely on contrivances and happenstance, but not here. It all makes sense, and is that much better because of it. I think this is a type of movie that`ll hold up on repeated viewings, because even though you know how the heist will go down, the characters are so well-developed and endearing that you can`t help but care what happens.

Flags of Our Fathers & Letters From Iwo Jima - proof positive that Clint Eastwood is still the man. Can you believe this guy is 77? It seems like he gets better with age, perhaps being an even better director than he is an actor (and he's one of my favorite actors ever). Following Million Dollar Baby (Worth every bit of praise it got) with the back to back war epics, Flags of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima, Eastwood gives us a harrowing portrayal of war from opposing views.

The legacy of WW2 is seen today in the United States as a war that needed to be fought, and one that was triumphantly won with much credit given to them. Flags explores how that opinion wasn't such back then. Back then, many Americans had no interest in a war thousands of miles away and thought that it would have no impact on them. It raises the interesting story of how that famous flag raising picture was staged, but even so, it helped turned the tide of the opinion on the war in the US. Tremendous performances all around, and of course all under the steady hand of Eastwood.

Letters From Iwo Jima centers around the fruitless Japanese defense of an important strategic point. The great moments in this film are the small interactions between the men. It is here we realize that these men could be any men, anywhere in the world. Similar people fighting over similar things, both sides believe they are right, and neither of them is wrong. Despite being from opposing viewpoints, both movies are decidedly similar in their anti-war stance.

While both movies were received warmly, Letters seemed to be the one people enjoyed more. Personally, I enjoyed them equally and found them to be great companion pieces. I hope Clint Eastwood lives forever, as long as he's churning out the movies he's been churning out as of late, the world is a better place because of it.

49 Up - This is the latest in a truly compelling series of films that has followed the lives of several Britons since they were 7 years old and returning to document their lives every seven years since. The fascinating part of this series is that the people they follow come from varying social and economic backgrounds, thereby creating a compelling case study of British society. Does a child born into a certain socio-economic background have a predetermined fate in life? Watch and find out.

Being the seventh film in this series, newcomers might feel like they've missed something if they haven't seen the series before. Not so, in fact, you can go into any of the films with a clean slate. In fact, the films are made to be new-viewer-friendly in that they give a short primer on what has happened to each individual before. This not only helps new viewers up to speed, but also reminds returning viewers (there is a seven year gap between films, after all). The entire series should be readily available on DVD at your local library, and are shown periodically on PBS.

Television:
The Unit - My 2nd favorite TV show, with The Office being the first, but this is a very, very close second, and if it's quality continues to rise, may someday surpass it. This TV show follows a top-secret military group as they wrestle with many unseen and unknown foes around the world (unseen and unknown to the public that is). What sets this apart from your typical top-secret military type-show is that there is also a heavy focus on the domestic lives of the soldiers. It shows us not only their work-lives, but what happens in their every day lives, because their families are all involved as well, by proxy. This is one of those programs that might seem like it has nothing that makes it stand out from the crowd of other TV shows, but it really does offer a unique and most of all, entertaining take on a familiar idea.

Pushing Daisies - this new show tells the tale of a unique individual, our lead character Ned, who has the special ability to bring back the dead. It's not without it's consequences though, as if he brings back someone (or something) for more than a minute, someone (or something) else will perish to balance it out. His ability to bring people back also gives him the power to take life away, if he touches someone alive, it kills them. The Pilot episode saw Ned bringing back an old childhood love of his, Charlotte (Chuck for short). One of the main focuses of the show is the romantic tension between Ned and Chuck, which is made all the more palpable because the two can never touch, or else Chuck would die (again).

The whole bringing back the dead deal might make this show seem dark in tone, and it has its moments, but it's mostly a light-hearted and sweetly told tale of life and love. It has such a sense of wonder and whimsy, that special feeling of magic that you very rarely feel when you watch a television show. And that romance where the 2 love interests can't even touch each other? I can`t wait to see where that goes. It's quirky, funny and really engages the viewer.

Games:
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (Xbox 360/PS3)
Game of the Year! This is one of those games that you buy a next generation console for. I enjoyed the first two Call of Duty games very much, but by the third, I was starting to get sick of the World War II genre shooter. That combined with this being the third Call of Duty game in three years, made me very apprehensive. But the reviews were not only good, they were overwhelmingly great, so I had to give it a shot.

Where do I begin among a large list of superlatives for this game? Let's start with presentation, between missions you get these nifty campaign briefings that segue directly into the mission, it makes it feel like there's no loading at all. Graphics wise, this game has the best looking shadows and environmental effects (smoke, snow, rain, etc.) I've ever seen in a game.Audio wise, you'll really feel like you're at war, with bullets whizzing past you and explosions going off closer than you'd like, sometimes too close. The in-game chatter is well-acted, almost always constant and never repeats. The game's levels are varied gameplay wise, you've got some stealth sections, helicopter sections and all out firefights. The atmosphere created is second to none. Some levels are so tense that you'll be on the edge of your seat with your heart racing.

All in all, the single player campaign is one of the greatest gaming experiences I've ever had. Most of this can be attributed to the fact that this is also one of the most polished games I've ever played. You can tell that the people who made it fussed over every single little thing. It doesn't feel rushed, it's not buggy, and there's no filler. It's what all games should be.

Ok, the single-player game is fairly short, but it's so fun you'll be playing it over and over. And I haven't even checked out the multiplayer aspect of this game, which I've heard to be very robust and very fun. Even without it, the single player aspect stands on its own. Co-operative play through the campaign mode would have further cemented this game's greatness (Call of Duty 5 anyone?).

Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (PS3) - finally, my PS3 is no longer just an expensive DVD player/somewhat cheap Blu Ray player. The latest in a long line of fun action-platforming games is back, and its a blast. So fun and addicting, I've already finished it twice! For those who don't know what this series is about, just picture your typical 3D platformer, like Mario 64, but unlike typical platformers, you've got tons of varied weapons and gadgets, and that's what sets this apart from your typical platform game. Add the cutesy fuzzball Ratchet and his robot toaster sidekick, Clank and you've got our main characters. Add in varied levels and worlds to explore an RPG-like leveling system and varied gameplay and you've got the Ratchet & Clank series.

Addicting game play aside, the game is a tad on the easy side, but the leveling system and collecting all the secrets give this game enormous replay value. Furthermore, unlike its predecessors, there's no multiplayer component whatsoever. Finally, there's not much here that differentiates this game from it's predecessors, so if you've played the games before it and didn't like them, this game probably won't change your mind about the series.

The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass (Nintendo DS) - oh cel-shaded Zelda, how I missed you. I haven't finished Twilight Princess, and honestly I don't really feel that compelled to. I really, really missed the fantastic art style of The Wind Waker. As such, I was hyped to no end for this game, and the verdict? Awesome. Triumphantly returning are the cel-shaded adventurings of little-boy-Link and his pirate-gal-friend Tetra. New to this DS edition of the franchise are unique touch-screen only controls and gameplay which make great use of the DS's unique touch screen and dual screens. The story picks up not long after The Wind Waker and is a satisfying addition to the Zelda mythos.

However, the touch-screen only controls can be a little awkward (I still can't get Link to roll at will) and it can be a detriment to the gameplay at times. Thankfully, it's not a detriment often and for the most part, the controls are great. The length of the game here is not short, yet it's not long either. I don't wanna say it's just right because by the time I was finished, I wanted it to last longer, but that's because the game was so fun. Note to Nintendo: more cel-shaded Zelda games please, thanks!

The Hit List: End of Summer 07 Edition

Here you have it, the absolute tops of what I've been enjoying lately and would whole-heartily recommend to you all:

Games:
Picross (DS) - Short for Picture Crossword, this is a great little game for those who love puzzle games like Sudoku.

Here's the game in a nutshell: "Like finding the underlining 'picture' in a 'crossword puzzle', the goal in Picross DS is to fill a grid with squares and crosses in order to 'paint' a picture. Numbers at the head of the puzzles' columns and rows signify how the grids need to be filled out, but it will take a sharp mind to figure out the solution - and some speedy fingers to defeat the competition. The game's main Picross Mode offers a staggering 300 puzzles available to play at your leisure."

Ok, it's hard to explain, but once you try it and figure out how it works, it's very addicting. Easy to get into, hard to put down, all at the bargain price of $25 new.

Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (Wii) - Wow, what a great game. I knew it was going to be all along, and it lived up to my high expectations. The controls are really quite wonderful, though they take a while to get use to and it's not quite perfect since there are still a few quirks. I would love to play a multiplayer FPS with these type of controls.

Nintendo finally delivers what all us hardcore gamers want. Finally a Wii game that doesn't have N64-quality graphics. It's not as technically proficient as any 360 or PS3 game, because that's impossible given the hardware limitations, but for the Wii, it looks great. Art direction goes a long way to help too. Also, in what I believe is a Nintendo first, full voice during cutscenes!!! Yay!!! When it's done right, like it is here, it really does help make the game better. Now give us a Zelda game with full voice.

Finally, love or hate these games, all 3 games in this series have some of, if not, the best menu design and accompanying music ever. Actually starting the game can be a challenge because I just load up this game and sit at the menu and just watch and listen. I can lose myself for minutes, easily.

Among disappointments, despite the implementation of full voice, there's still a ton of reading to do. Also, where's the multiplayer? I thought that extra year to finish this game would implement that, but I guess not.

Earth Defense Force 2017 (360) - This is one of those lesser-known titles that you might have heard some people rave about. It's an old-school sleeper title. Basically, giant bugs have invaded Earth and you gotta kill em. It's pretty much mindless killing of bugs with a fully destructible environment (So funny how you're suppose to be saving Earth, but blowing up buildings is just so fun). Add in 2-player coop (offline only, sadly) and you've got a fun game that hearkens back to the old days. It's not deep or challenging, but it's mindless bug-killing fun.

Movies & DVDs:
Hud - here's a movie I've never heard about, and it doesn't seem well known, but the few people who have seen it, call it a classic, which I cannot argue after watching this film.

Watching old films, it's easy to become distracted by the acting. What many perceive to be bad can usually be attributed to the style of a certain era. Having said that, that is not a problem here as all the performances are uniformly fantastic and will stand the test of time for decades and centuries to come.

Everything about this movie is fantastic; there are oscar-worthy performances across the board, gorgeous black and white cinematography, and a really well written script all under the stern direction of director Martin Ritt. Once in a while a movie you've never heard of comes out of nowhere and surprises the heck out of you; this is one of those movies. I'm so happy I stumbled upon it at the library.

The Harold Lloyd Comedy Collection - what a complete joy this entire set is. I rented this entire set for free from my local library, enjoyed every minute and would have gladly pay full price to buy it. You all know who Charlie Chaplin is, you probably know Buster Keaton too, but Harold Lloyd, probably not. He is widely considered "The Third Genius" or "The Lost Genius" of the silent film era. The word genius is widely used, perhaps too much or in exaggerated terms, but here, it is completely just.

Even if you haven't heard of him, you have most likely seen his most iconic moment ever captured on film. It is of Lloyd's "Glasses" character, hanging by his fingers from the clock of a high rise building towering over crowded streets below. You know what I'm talking about. This moment is taken from his feature film Safety Last and is one of the many dozens and dozens of gems on this 7 DVD set. The set includes a heaping of Lloyd's short films as well as feature films. If you like movies, you will love this. If you like to laugh, you will love this. Those last 2 statements probably apply to virtually everybody alive, so what are you waiting for?

Extras - Ricky Gervais & Steven Merchant's follow-up to The Office is not as funny as it's predecessor, but The Office was an unquantifyable classic. Still, Extras delivers where it counts, laughs. The first season introduces us to the main characters of Andy and Maggie, best friends and fellow Extras in the movie business, or "background performance artist" as Andy likes to call himself. Maggie is happy-go-lucky and enjoys her place in life, but Andy wants to hit the big time. The second season shows us Andy finally hitting the bigtime as he gets his own TV show, but it's not all that he thought it was, as being a minor celebrity just raises even more problems for him.

Of course, one of the big selling points of each episode is that it features a different well-known celebrity, such as Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Stiller, Ian McKellan, Patrick Stewart, David Bowie, Daniel Radcliffe, etc. Even though the stars are playing themselves, they are clearly having fun with their personas. For example, Patrick Stewart presents himself as a pervert, while many others play themselves as egotistical and foul-mouthed.

United 93 - The thought that crossed many of our minds (mine included) when this movie was announced was most likely "Is it too soon?" But after watching this film and the excellent accompanying documentary on the DVD, that thought quickly turned to "Was it soon enough?"

This is a story of a group of people who personified heroism. The real-time, documentary-style of the film really puts you back into the moments on that fateful day. There are no big stars in this film to distract you, and the entire cast delivers on what was most important: doing the real people they portrayed and their families justice. By the end, it was hard to hold back the tears. It is not an easy journey, but most definitely a worthwhile one.

The hour-long documentary on the DVD is just as compelling if not even more so than the feature film itself. It focuses on the families and their reactions to the loss of their loved ones and immortalizing their memories into a movie. One particularly heartbreaking story tells of one of the passengers who was not supposed to be on that flight, but instead on an earlier flight the day before, which was canceled due to bad weather. How her family can cope with that, I'll never know, and it grates on my soul knowing that such a situation has to exist. Like the film, this documentary is a must-see companion piece and also well worth your time.

P.S. - RE: Vacation stuff, vacation pics and Eric So stories are coming. Patience, piggies.

It's Been A While Since I've Won Something...

Good things come in pairs, as after picking up my free Chris Cornell CD from The Fox headquarters in Downtown Vancouver, I decided to get a haircut at my normal barbershop in Chinatown. The wait was several people long as there was a lone barber there when normally there are 2-3 others (they were either sick or on vacation). I waited as several people got their haircut and even let some people ahead of me as they were either in a rush, or were there earlier but it was busy. I ended up waiting an hour or so before I got my haircut, but it was ok since I had nothing else better to do anyway. The barber was really gracious as I waited quite a while and let others ahead of me, and as thanks gave me a free pass for myself and a guest to see Werner Herzog's new film Rescue Dawn.

It's not quite a 37" LCD HDTV, but cool nonetheless.

It's funny how this is the 2nd thing I've won from The Fox (U2 DVD last time), and I can't even stand listening to them!

The Fox Rocks! (Not listening to them, but when they give you free stuff!)

Vacation Blog: Beijing, China

Day one in Beijing was terrible. 17+ hours of flights in a seat with barely any room at all. It wasn't that I didn't want to sleep, I just couldn't. Getting into Beijing was another thing, it had been rainy in Vancouver during the time before I left and was blasted by 30 degree heat as soon as we hit the Beijing airport. So basically, recovering from the flight, combined with the culture shock made that first day terrible. But day two, things were looking up.

Day two began with Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. Many people can't think of Tiananmen Square without the word Massacre immediately proceeding it, which is unfortunate, because it's existence today is suppose to mean the exact opposite of Massacre. Following that we visited the Temple of Heaven which featured a few very intricately detailed structures. You could spend all day looking at it and fine a new detail every minute. Of course, I could say that about almost every temple we saw in China. The Summer Palace followed, which is situated on a giant man-made lake, although you'd never know it unless someone told you, or if you fell in somehow, since the depth is approximately 7 feet.

In the afternoon we went to a "Chinese" restaurant for our set lunch. It sucked. It sucked bad. It's Chinese food for Westerners. Vancouver has some of the best Chinese food in the world, but this was complete shit. It's understandable though, because these set lunches are prepared for Westerners who tend to enjoy it.

It's also interesting to note how the Chinese restaurants that cater to tour groups/foreigners work. There are separate sections (usually rooms, sometimes even floors) for each language represented. So one room would have servers with English-language skills, and another would have French or Dutch, and so on. In addition there is another section for tour guides, who presumably are eating real Chinese food(bastards!).

Those of you used to free water and unlimited refills will be in for a shock.

On the recommendation of our tour guide, Tony, we then went to separate Pearl and Silk factories. I gotta say, those sales associates are good, they speak perfect english and tag team to get you to buy stuff. Which is what I did, hey, Mother's Day was coming up, as they told me several times. Wish I had a pic of Phil modelling pearls though (SEXY!). It was because he's the same height as his mom so he could get an idea of how it looked. Don't believe him when he says I modelled some for my mom though, I'm wayyyy taller than she is.

Following this we went to the Silk Factory which was much more interesting than you think. It begins with a tour of the actual factory and how silk is made, quite intriguing really. Following that we were treated to our very own private fashion show, for the three of us, at our tour guide's request.





After that we were hushed into their gigantic sales area which has everything imaginable, done in silk. Phil bought silk bed sheets with a Dragon and Phoenix design, which symbolizes marriage. It doesn't look like he's getting hitched anytime soon though (bad luck). Also the sheets are for a twin-size bed, so even when he does get hitched it wouldn't cover him +1, so that's double bad-luck. These won't be the only cases of bad luck that Phil will create for himself this trip.

When I get rich(er), my entire wardrobe and bedsheets will be 100% silk.

If there is one thing I truly regret during the entire trip, it was that I did not get those Star Wars silk boxers (They weren't my size anyway). Just think about it, the power of the Death Star, in my pants.

To be continued....

There's No Place Like Home

aka Home, Sweet Home aka Home On The Range aka Home Is Where The Heart Is, etc.

Currently: HOME!!~!@@

So despite being stopped by customs at YVR (The guy went quick once he found out all I had was smelly clothes) I was greeted by the above image last night. Despite customs, I _still_ got home before my cohorts. As great and beautiful as the rest of the world is, I never saw that any day I was in Asia, and here in Burnaby I get to see that _every_ day.

So I just got up around 3pm, after going to sleep last night around 11:30pm. Almost a good 15 hours sleep. Breaks my old record of 13 back when I pulled an all-dayer/all-nighter at the Vancouver Film Festival a few years back. I pretty much did an all-dayer yesterday anyway. If you think air travel by economy class sucks, try going cross-pacific over 16 hours and being my size. _That_ is the definition of suck.

Also got home to promptly find out that my Xbox 360 finally kicked the bucket. Damn, another month without it?? Sucks how the company who has the console with the best games and best online service (I've got all 3 current consoles, that's my opinion and I'm stickin' to it) has the shittiest hardware. Will Sony please release some decent games for the Playstation 3??

Anyways, I'll probably have a series of posts dedicated to each place I was at in the coming time, depending on how I feel - inspired or lazy. Right now, I'm feeling pretty lazy.

That and I'm catching up on all the stuff I missed during the past month, specifically all the TV shows I missed during May Sweeps. People who spoil how certain TV shows have ended this season will have their house or apartment or living establishment burned down. For reals.

Oh, and if you thought Eric So was weird, creepy, shady and a jerk, you didn't have to spend a whole month living with him. Words have not yet been invented to describe his level of weirdness, creepiness, shadiness and jerkiness. And I know for a fact that I'm not the only one who feels that way. I'm sorry, I take the earlier thing back, living with Eric So for a month, THAT is the REAL definition of suck.