To read archived news posts from 2007, click here!

Valken Punch!
Monday, April 14 2008

Things may seem quiet, but behind the scenes, my future is being decided. So mysterious!

What isn't mysterious is my participation in GameSpite Issue 6 - Extra Deluxe Action Edition! You can check out my article on the wonderful SNES action game Cybernator by following any of the handy links above. (You may also notice that my article made the coveted issue banner as well, surely due to the stunning quality of its writing.) This article marks my debut as a, I kid you not here, a Professional Game Writer. Because the only requirement for being professional writer is that someone is paying you to for it.

Trapped beneath a winter wonderland
Tuesday, March 11 2008

Snow is the best thing about winter. Think about it: without snow, winter would be cold, dark and ugly. Add in that magical white fluff and suddenly everything is beautiful! You can ski and sled, build snowforts, jump off of buildings and, best of all, everything gets magically quieter when there's a nice layer of snow on the ground.

But this is maybe taking things a bit far.

We're approaching a record amount of snowfall in Montreal this year, and due to the design of our back yard there is a mountain of the stuff currently piled up behind our apartment. Not quite sure what I mean? Bear in mind that the snow is almost piled up to the window...on the second story. To give you a better idea, here's a view from our living room:

It's impressive, but also kind of creepy. At this rate there's a decent chance that we'll be shoveling out our back yard in mid June.

Full disclosure: the major snowstorm that drove things from "pretty" to "overwhelming" actually happened a little over a week ago. Since I can't seem to update in a timely manner, I've decided to backdate this entry by a week. This also means that I have the prescience to know that my new Nephew-to-be-Named-Later will be born tomorrow morning in Victoria. Happy birthday, buddy! You'll soon come to appreciate Uncle Mike's talents for divination.

The one true purpose of the internet
Monday, February 18 2008

Here is a picture. A picture of my cat.


(It's a bit blurry, as the rules require it to be.)

The cat is a fairly recent addition to our household, we picked him up from the SPCA about 2 weeks ago. He's adorable (naturally), friendly and fairly energetic. Despite his looks, he's a mere 6 months old and still behaves like a kitten more than a cat. He has taken to climbing into all sorts of places where he really shouldn't be going, but I'll be damned if I have a clue how to prevent this from happening. I imagine that experience will eventually teach him that certain places are better left unexplored (how many times must I rescue you from behind the TV??), but one should only expect so much rationality from a cat.

You may notice the prevalence of impersonal pronouns in the above paragraph; this is because we have yet to finalize a name for our kitty. Several have been proposed and internally I am currently thinking of him as Nigel. There is no reason to believe, however, that this name has "gone gold" and will be presented to the public. Suggestions are always welcome, but be forewarned that I will under no circumstances give my cat a name like DeathBringür or Flan.

Also of note: today, upon flexing my right arm, I made my shirt explode. This was kind of sad, because I really liked that shirt; on the bright side, I now have one more thing in common with Hulks both Incredible and Hogan. I'm not at liberty to say what other traits we share, but I will say that I am completely green from head to toe. Actually, I just totally made that up.

Year of the KitKat
Thursday, January 10 2008

Would you look at that, it's 2008. Another digit gone forever, another calendar thrown away and another chance to make the same mistakes all over again. Or to make all new ones, whatever you prefer. Since the beginning of the year offers us a proverbial blank page with which to start anew, I thought I would literally offer you a blank page and push the old news posts into their own little corner. If I had some sort of blogging software, it would probably do this for me automatically, but as it stands I like to get my hands dirty mucking about with the innards of this site manually.

It's still a bit early to determine just how 2008 is going to go, but if there's a theme to it thus far it is clearly Japanese snacks. I'll admit that I'm no stranger to Pocky (since I am a huge nerd), but 2008 looks like it will be a banner year for exotic snacks that come from shiny bags within stylish boxes. Behold: the chestnut KitKat!

One of the PhD students in our lab went to Japan over the holidays and was kind enough to bring us back some of the wacky KitKats they have over there. There was also a green tea flavored KitKat included in the haul, but since I don't really like green tea I elected to try this one instead. Turns out it's actually pretty tasty! The most surprising part was not the chestnut-flavored filling (which was actually pretty subtle in its chestnuttiness), but that the wafers were coated in white chocolate. Truly, a wonder to behold.

Since inaugurating the year with a description of a foreign candy bar seems a little weak, I'll throw in my latest media consumption and some annotated thoughts about the various items consumed.

Shake Hands With the Devil

About once every two years I give myself a "serious" book to read, which ends up taking a good 6 months for me to get through. Such was the case with Romeo Dallaire's recounting of the Rwandan genocide of the early 90s, although I actually read about 60% of the book in the space of 3 days at my parents' house. It's a chilling tale of man's barbarity and unwillingness to help people in need! Not the feel-good book of the year by any stretch, but I'm glad I fought my way through it - hopefully some of the important messages contained within will stick with me for a little while, despite the best efforts of videogames to dislodge them.

Half-Life 2 and Episodes One & Two

Speaking of which! I've spent a lot of time playing these games, included as they were in The Orange Box. They were good. Maybe an 8/10 on my personal scale, good fun but not (as I'm fond of saying) life-altering. The included Portal was a neat little bit of entertainment as well, although it suffered greatly from the ridiculous overhyping that the internet has been inflicting upon it since its release. With my expectations set that high, it was impossible for it not to disappoint a little bit - if Valve gets around to releasing some new content for it, I'll snap it up right away and hopefully get to play through it without bias. Finally, there was Team Fortress 2, which surprisingly seems to have become my favorite part of the whole package. Why that surprises me is a mystery, since I basically spent an entire summer doing nothing but playing the original Team Fortress (via Quake) while working at IBM in Bromont. It was fun then, and it's fun (and pretty) now.

I think that's about it for now. I'm currently tackling The Yiddish Policeman's Union by Michael Chabon, which I'm very keen on so far, while simultaneously getting in touch with my geeky roots by replaying Final Fantasy IV. Well, not actually simultaneously, but maybe we could agree on "concurrently". Yes, that's what we will call it.

Anyway, let's all try to make the best of 2008. Keep your eyes peeled, hopefully soon I'll have another article posted over at GameSpite.net for your perusal. In the meantime, why not go back into the news archive and relive the glories and tragedies of 2007? It beats working for a living.