Classic Plastic

I've been wanting to write about video games for a while now, but didn't know what exactly to focus on. I still am not really sure where this is going to go, but with a notebook pc on my lap I have no problem rambling on about one of my favorite hobbies as I watch the TAMPA BAY RAYS WIN THE ALDS WTF???? (With my NL pick the Cubs eliminated my full support is now behind the Rays. Tampa Bay all the way.)

Like many people in my generation, I can remember the first time I saw Super Mario Brothers on the NES. At the time it was like nothing I had ever seen (the Atari 2600 and its counterparts were before my time.) I told my dad how awesome it was and within a week we had an NES in our house. I remember going to Sears with him to get it. It was so cool. We played SMB/Duck Hunt for hours upon hours.

"I wish I could shoot that effing dog!!!"

While the NES was quite a family affair for a short while, I particularly enjoyed the Super Nintendo when it was released. Unlike the NES, I felt like the SNES was 'mine' alone. Afterall, my family's interest in gaming had died out and the SNES was my Christmas present from Santa the year it came out.

My love for gaming continued on through each generation, and in 2000 I got both a Sega Dreamcast and an eBay account and so the cycle of buying/selling/collecting had begun. From then until about the time I started hanging out with Eileen I would buy a system and some games for it off of eBay, play it for a few months, and sell it back on eBay later to get something else.

Nowadays I pretty much have a no selling rule. I have found myself revisiting older games that I liked in the past more and more often so I've just decided to hold on to everything.

Until this summer I wasnt really concerned with retro-gaming or collecting. For my birthday however, one of my co-workers gave me a Sega Genesis (Model 1) with a Power Base Converter (an attachment which plays SMS games on Genesis) and a very nice array of complete Genesis and SMS games. It was such a nice assortment of goodies in that box that I was sucked right back into old-school gaming again.

Rather than trying to pile up games like trading cards regardless of my interest in playing them (something I have been guilty of in the past), I have really been actually playing most everything I have been adding to the shelves lately. Here are some of my observations.

1. You can still love a TERRIBLE game because of sentimental value.

Such is the case with Hard Drivin' and its sequel Race Drivin. I can't remember where I ever played this in the arcade (the Rockaway Mall or Wheels in Motion) but I recently got a copy for Genesis and it brought back some great memories. This game is one of many polygonal drving 'simulators' from the early 90s but with one awesome addition: the instant replay of every crash. The music is priceless, and once you realize the gameplay is essentially broken you'll realize it is more fun to slam your brakes at the top of the loop-dee-loop.
Look at this shit.

2. I can't believe what they got away with back then.

Today gamers are blessed with something called the internet. We can read reviews and view screens and even play demos of a game before buying it. In the 80s and early 90s we did not have this luxury.

Recently EB/Gamestop stores have begun liquidating Gameboy and Gamboy Color games, so I stocked up on quite a few, most for less than a buck each. Here's something funny I discovered. One of the screens below is from Baseball, the other is from Bases Loaded. Which is which? It doesn't matter. The gameplay is identical. Now, I could care less because I payed about fifty cents each for them, but what about the sports fan who payed twenty to thirty bucks for them back in the day? I think that would have sucked. You may ask "what do you need with more than one baseball game?" Well some people do like sports games.


Oh now I see, in one game you get the players' first names and in the other you get their last names.

Well this has been fun. More to come on this topic, hopefully very soon.

My ANTM Picks

Usually I watch America's Next Top Model so I can yell at Tyra Banks, and marvel at the vapid, empty, disgusting contestants.

This cycle (why do they call it that? am I getting my period?) the model hopefuls are much less vapid and vaccuous than usual, and I am actually enjoying this group a lot more than most because I am not getting as angry while watching.

The girls I pick never win. I tend to go for the best combination of personality and looks, which would make sense. My personal tastes don't agree with the judges I guess. Also as was noted in the last episode, there is a difference between being gorgeous and taking gorgeous photos.

Anyway here are my top three and also the one chick I can't stand (because theres always at least one):

1. Analeigh - Figure skater with a cute little head, big hair, doe eyes and big puffy lips. Cuteness piled upon cuteness. She won't win because she looks as young as she is.



2. Marjorie - I like Marjorie because she is compelling to look at, yet she is not "sexy," at least not in a typical way. I'm pretty sure she will not get far at all though. She has a lot going against her. She is very shy and has busted teeth for starters...



3. Sheena - I like Sheena and would like to see her stay on the show not because of how she looks or photographs, but because she seems like an awesome person. She adds a laid back style of positivity to the show that I have never seen before. Models such as Analeigh are nice to look at, Sheena is nice to listen to.



Before I rip on Elina, I'd like to make a comment about Isis. In the past I would have labeled Isis the "novelty" for this cycle and declare that she will never win as such (Isis is a pre-op transgender). However last cycle set the standard for the novelty contestant going all the way when they crowned their first plus-sized model as the winner. I don't give Isis much of a chance, but I won't write her off just yet.

As for Elina, I cant effing stand her. I yell at her more than I yell at Tyra, which is a lot. I've never yelled the phrase "Shut up!!" in 30 minute intervals more often. Elina is a self-righteous, self-centered, narcissistic idiot. Did I mention she is vegan? Did I mention she is a lesbian? Did I mention she is vegan and also a lesbian? Did I mention she is a vegan lesbian who hates her own mother? Yeah she is annoying as hell, and she does not look like Angelina Jolie, as the judges think she does. I hope she gets the boot asap, lest pretentious phony lesbo vegan brats permeate the modeling world.

The worst pitch-man ever.

No this isn't another poor attempt at sports writing. I just can't help but express my disdain at Sharp Electronics' choice of the star of their latest ad campain for their LCD Televisions and Sharp Solar Power.

His name is Gerard Fasel. He starts the commercial by smugly telling me "it seems like you need to be a physics professor to be able to pick out an HD tv..." I don't think it really seems that way at all. But then there is an inexplicable cut to an extreme close-up of Fasel where the albino braggart boasts: "Luckily, I am one."

As a matter of fact, Dr. Fassel is a professor of physics and mathematics at Pepperdine University. But he is physically unattractive and comes off as a show-boater right from the onset of the ad.

I guess Sharp is trying to appeal to the elitist in all of us the same way luxury car companies do in their commercials. I could accept that, maybe, if they had chosen a physics professor who looked more like a sexy librarian. After all this seemed to be John McCain's strategy when choosing his running mate for the upcoming presidential election.

I know I said this would wouldn't be a sports post, but I guess it is important to note that these commercials air with incredible unrelenting frequency on the YES Network.

Teach Them Young

What follows are two reasons why we are fucked as a society.

9-year-old boy told he's too good to pitch


Eight year old guitar player told to stop playing


As you can see, these two stories came out within a week of eachother and it quickly seems we have a rash of over-achieving youngsters being held back because they are "too good." Congratulations America, we have been punishing adults for being successful for a long time, now it seems the next logical step is to squash any attempt by a child to rise above the status quo.

This shit makes me absolutely sick.

Baseball

Ah how exciting it is that playoff baseball is only a month away! How excellent it is that this year's pennant race is one of the most exciting I have seen since recently (in the past five or so years) becoming a fan of baseball. How sad it is that the beloved New York Yankees have a very slim chance of getting into the playoffs.

I don't know enough about baseball to write a really smart analytical article on the sport, so I'll just tell you what I think right now.

First of all, even as a Yankee fan, I feel some people need to learn that the Yankees are not entitled to a playoff spot. Unless they win something like 22 of their last 29 games, they won't have earned it. To be honest, thats fine with me. Over the past few years I have evolved from liking the Yankees in the playoffs, to liking the playoffs in general, to liking the Yankees in general, to liking the American league in general, to liking baseball in general. Easy enough right?

So what happens to such a wishy-washy Yankee fan the first time they don't see the post-season since 1995? I'm jumping on the Tampa Bay Rays bandwagon of course! Oh, and the Cubs too.

First the Rays, Im pretty sure they have been the worst team in the A.L. East since their inception, and they have never won more than 70 games in a season, which is pathetic. This year they have lead the division for pretty much the whole season, and I say Tampa Bay all the way! Maybe if they win a world series they can sell some tickets to Tropicana Stadium, but prbably not.

And how about the National League? Im pulling for the sentimental favorite, the Cubs. Again, a bandwagoneer am I, but why not? They now have the longest standing dry spell in baseball and it just may be their turn on the 100 year anniversary of their last win.

So yeah, its an exciting time, even for a real pedestrian baseball fan, such as myself.

Christina Applegate

So my friends and my wife know I have a long list of celebrity crushes, both male and female. It is understood however, that it's not just an issue of "she's so hot." As it goes for a lot of people, there has got to be some substance to back up a pretty face and earn my admiration.

All of a sudden a few days ago, It struck me how rediculously gorgeous Christina Applegate is. You may ask "where the hell have you been for the last fifteen years?" but trust me, I've always been aware of her. My dad was a big Married With Children fan, and though I remember not really be allowed to watch it, I do remember seeing it sometimes. I imagine that most of the show consisted of airplane jokes for me around the age I was at when it was on. And sure, Christina as Kelly Bundy was quite hot even back then, but she was never a big deal to me.

So comes the news that Ms. Applegate recently underwent a double mastectomy to defeat breast cancer.

All of a sudden I think Christina Applegate is the greatest thing since sliced bread. I think she looks better now than back in the MWC days, and I only half know why. Am I all of a sudden enamored with her because I just realized how well she has aged, or do I admire her so for her courageous battle with cancer?

I don't know, but she is now on my list, and I wish her many years of good health.

Your art should be free.

You may or may not be aware that I play guitar and sing in a band called Annoying Customer. You also may or may not be aware that we recently completed an eight song piece of work entitled "Mongoose." (We don't know whether to call it an lp or an ep. It is eight songs and clocks in at about fifteen minutes. It is really a conundrum.)

In any event, we as a band wanted to make a quality product for the handful of people who have heard of us to enjoy. At first we struggled with the choice to self-publish or pay someone for pressing. In the end we went for self-publishing, and I am very glad we did. The final product is something all three of us are extremely proud of and we can say every copy was hand-made.

Though certain parts of recording and publishing were extremely stressful, we made it. One of the last minute decisions we made was how much to charge for a cd copy of "Mongoose." When all was said and done, it cost us ninety dollars to make 100 copies of a cd that, if I may say, looks pretty damn professional. In the end we decided to give our cd away free of charge. But we didn't come to that decision instantly. I'd like to discuss the actual concept of paying money for a piece of art, specificallly in the context of the band I am in and the cd we just made.

There are two schools of thought that come to mind for me when "this business of art" is brought up. The first comes courtesy of Joe Barbiere, the brilliant father of two former bandmates of mine. When faced with the "give it away or charge money" question in regards to a demo we had made, Joe offered these words of wisdom: When you give something away, there is a perception of worthlessness.

The second take comes from one of my favorite tv shows, Six Feet Under, in which one of Claire's art school professors proclaims "All artists should want to give away their work for free!"

Of these two ideas, I am lately leaning towards the latter.

We as a band have almost never made money for playing music in our near-decade together. It has never been our business to be in business. When we were in high school, we were happy to have gigs. Now we all have full-time careers, and are happy to have gigs in this hobby of ours. We are, and have always been, in the frame of mind that we are delighted that anyone would want to spend some of their valuable time listening to us. For that, you can have our cd.

What price can one put on a good album? With huge profit margains on cds and the industry leading to internet/digital publishing, what band can honsestly say they deserve money for you to listen to the work they did? I am leaning towards a rant so I'll wrap in up right here. I'll just say if you make art, consider the fact that you could be (or maybe are being) completely ignored. Someone's interest in your work is priceless. We should be grateful for anyone who shows interest in soemthing we created. Artists should want to give away their work.