Game : The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Good gravy, this game is _HUGE_. Where can I even begin?

I chose a dark elf thief/mage as my avatar. Being a dark elf meant that I got to summon an ancestral ghost once a day, and that I was mostly immune to fire. For my birth sign, I took the sign of the Mage, which granted me a bonus of 100 magic points at the expense of an increased sensitivity to magic. Since I was a thief/mage, I put all my skill points into agility, intelligence, speed, and wisdom. That being, I was a weakling who could barely carry his own armor, let alone lug around 20 freaking daedra hearts (2 feathers each!) just to make up for killing some stupid mages guild member. But that's okay, because being turned into a vampire had the side benefit of increased strength, never mind that it turned me into a nocturnal recluse who had trouble completing simple tasks because A) daylight would fry him to a crisp and B) because no one talks to a blood-starved husk of hideous skin anyway.

Ha ha ha. I hope you enjoyed that. I figure if I can spend 20 minutes per session arranging my character's inventory, you can handle just a sample. :)

Seriously though, this is the thing with this game. The ridiculous amount of detail in this game is both its blessing and its curse. It is an amazingly immersive world, filled with life, with countless stories, with tons of places to explore.. but sometimes, it all just got to be, well, too much. Because of this, I spent the last third of the game just trying to get through it, stubborn as I am, because while I enjoyed playing the game, I also wanted to move on to other things.

If anyone out there has played, I completed all four guild quest lines, the arena, the main storyline, and a shitload of the smaller stuff. Favorite item? Cowl of Nocturnal! Funniest item? Monkeypants!! (Find them in the general goods store in Bree; the stats are funny.)

This game is gorgeous. The flora, the textures (I hope you like normal maps), the skyscapes, the lighting, and the architecture are all top notch and will be memorable to me. If you are an RPG fan, do yourself a doggone favor and play this game. Yes, it will destroy your "normal" life. Yes, it may take freaking forever, through not if you just play the main story arc, but good luck with that. But despite all these things, I can say with confidense that Oblivion represents the culmination of all RPG history and is probably the best classic form RPG made to date. If you are a fantasy fan, play it. You'll have a blast!

Yuck

Jenine is in Maine
My juice is brown and mushy
Sad summer Sunday

Book : Hyperspace

The cover reads, "A Scientific Odyssey Through Parallel Universes, Time Warps, and the 10th Dimension." This is an apt, albeit understated, description of what goes on inside this book. The author, theoretical physicist Michio Kaku, does as a great job of explaining more than a few current theories all relating in some way to the larger picture of higher dimensions and the grand unification theory. He explains how Einstein's discovery of the theory of relativity leapfrogged over many (yet to be discovered) mathematical and physical sciences and that in many ways today's theoretical physicists and mathematicians are backtracking in an attempt to fill in that gap.

Reading this book was not unlike reading the technology tree for Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. For the uninitiated, SMAC, as it is often called, is a futuristic turn-based strategy game in which numerous factions vie for control of the first human colony in the Alpha Centauri star system. Terms like super string theory, Kaluza-Klein theory, and Condensed Yang-Mills Field litter the pages. While I did my best to absorb all of this, I couldn't help but feel like an intern on his first day who gets handed a stack of papers 18 inches tall; that is to say, a little overwhelmed.

You see, I spend my days drawing pictures and pushing vertices around. Much of my reading takes place in imaginary worlds where the effect of science (or magic) on society is important, not the details of the science itself. I stopped doing well in math after geometry; as a visual person, abstract numbers don't click together in my head very well. For me, understanding higher science is like trying to be an astonomer in the Los Angeles basin.

That's not to say I didn't gleam anything from this book. While I failed to retain most of the specifics covered (I would certainly fail a test on this book), I did gain some understanding into theoretical sciences as a whole. In a broader sense, I even learned how scientists think and process information a bit better.

Near the end of the book, Kaku spends two chapters discussing the fate of both humanity and the universe itself. This was my favorite part of the book. Here, he spoke broadly of overarching concepts, patterns, and principles which I absorbed easily enough. It was fascinating to read ideas about the possible future for our species, but also sobering to be reminded that unless we can start playing nice, we may never get there. This part, where science met and mingled with politics and philosophy, was a delight to read and I would recommend it to anyone.

As for recommending the book as a whole, well, if you have any desire to understand the details behind many theoretical technologies that we see in sci-fi movies and books (like the infinite universes in Jet Li's The One, the warp drives from Star Trek, or the shennanagins in Quantum Leap), grab it - you will certainly get your fill.

Tubes

If you heard or read any part of Senator Tom Stevens' speech regarding the internet, you will enjoy the remixed version.

Here's the speech: http://www.chezlark.com/?p=666

And the remix: bhttp://alternet.org/blogs/peek/38797/

Karaoke

This weekend. Our friends Angie and Josh drove up to visit us from New York. The main event was our trip to downtown Boston, where we followed the freedom trail from one graveyard to the next. Sobered by skulls and seraphim, we headed over to The Tap (our favorite Haymarket pub) for “a [singular] beer.” One pitcher turned into two, and while Josh and I were lost in Arcade Bowling (the AI cheats, I tells ya!), the barmaid decided to fetch us a third without our consent. (Question: There’s a cold pitcher of Sam Adams Cherry Wheat beer sitting in front of you. How do you send it back? Answer: You don’t. [Nyet would also be an acceptable answer.]) After that, we stumbled out into the early evening sunshine, already sloshed, and wondered what to do next. Historical sites were obviously out, and I was only getting worse at the Bowling game. Then Angie said the magic word: Karaoke. And who, if anyone, would know where to find Karaoke? Sasha! So we stumbled over to his place, pushed the buzzer until he came down, and forced him out the door and towards the nearest Karaoke joint. We ended up at Limelight, a slick place with modern décor and a huge songlist. We rented a room for an hour, which to me personally was the most fun, then hit a bar down the street for drinks before returning to play the main room. After an awful duet with Sasha of Depeche Mode’s People are People, where the only person who could sing couldn’t see the damn screen, we were pretty much finished and called it a night. There were too many hard acts to follow, so next time I’m sticking with the private booth. We made it home (before midnight!), looked at our crooked pictures, and finally ate some dinner. (Oops, wrong order.) Patches was not amused.

Caught making out in the cemetary! For shame!


I'm scared.


2cute


i want those shoes!


It's time to rock.


"Take it, Jenine."


Girls gone karaoke.


I'm so hungry and angry, I could eat this microphone!


"So a guy walks into a karaoke bar..."


Okay, now I'm scared.


Air keyboard!


Bump and grind.


Out there and loving every minute of it.


God help us.

People are people, so why should it be
that Dan can't sing and Sasha can't see?

Portland, Maine

One week ago. Jenine and I took the Miata up to Maine to celebrate our birthdays in earnest. It was our first vacation since our 1-year anniversary, so we were very excited to go. Driving up with the top down was lots of fun, and cranking up the AC in the hotel room was possibly even better.

Welcome to Portland, Maine. Lobsters, as far as the eye can see. I swear there were a thousand if there was one. We spent much of our time lighthouse hunting, zipping through quaint coastal towns around Cape Elizabeth's vicinity. Other activities include driving past exactly 2-kabillion ice cream shops and, even more exciting, strawberry picking! What better way to spend your 1st-world vacation then by living the life of a 3rd-world migrant worker?! Experience back pain, repetitive stress injury, and sun-stroke, all without ever leaving the comfort of the field! Seriously, watch out for the kids, though. On exiting the labor camp, I mean, the field, I noted to the staff that they should weigh the children before and after they "pick" their strawberries, and then charge the parent for the weight difference. It's only fair.

But seriously, it was all very beautiful and relaxing, and we ended the day with a bottle of cheap champagne and a soak in the hot tub. When Dan needs his soak, ol' Bessie and the kids will have to wait.

On Sunday we drove into Portland proper (our hotel was actually at the airport, you know, because we like airports so much) and got a taste of real Maine hospitality. First we went to the center of downtown Portland, expecting to find a thriving community populated with summer tourists and all the associated trinket shops and restaurants. Using a hotel lobby trifold, we steered towards a cool looking place called Portland Public Market, a massive indoor market built with huge pine cross-beams.
The pictures sure looked festive, but, arriving at the scene, we wondered if we had stepped into a post-apocalyptic world devoid of law and life itself. Upon parking our car, we noticed three kindly gentlemen "casing" us as we walked several blocks to the market. Next we were greeted at the stoplight by a mentally disturbed man who was probably the victim of jungle warfare. Crossing the street, we gave our respects to a young lady who's physique and palor had certainly seen better days. (I'll refrain from the derogatory term because it made me sad.) Lastly, Jenine spied a group of three people passed out in the street. We gave each other looks and walked right back to our car, happy not to have been jacked and to be moving on.
Finally we made our way down to the Wharf section of downtown Portland, and it was made immediately clear that this is where all the action was to be had. Six square blocks or so were packed solid with friendly locals, tourists from distant lands, and many qualitie eateries and nonsensical shoppes. The whole scene was very much granola, hippie, free spirited, and internationally cultured. (I tried to think of a word that described all those things, and never could.) At the end of the day, we made our way to Ri-Ra, an Irish pub where we shared a Black & Tan over fish and chips and corned beer with mashed pototoes. Oh, how I love the corned beef.

The trip was lots of fun and a great getaway. I even bought a cap.

No lobsters were harmed in the filming of this trip:

Baghdad's Bananas

Two weeks ago. For my B-Day weekend, Jenine and I went ice skating at a local community rink. It was cold in there, on a hot day, and every part of me except for my right ankle bone had lots of fun.

Other activities included sandal shopping and chinese buffet. So good.

On Sunday, the one day a year where Jenine has to do exactly what I tell her to do, the two of us sat down to a game of multiplayer Civilization 4. Jenine had played the tutorial before, so she knew the ropes. Playing as the Greeks, she was the proud ruler of glorious Athens, a city of splendor and power: home to Stonehenge, The Pyramids, and The Oracle. As her weaker neighbor, my Egyptian cities found themselves plagued (literally) by an over-abundance of surrounding flood plains. Jenine propped us up long enough for me to assemble a decent army, and then we marched together against the neighbors who had so rudely boxed us into a corner. The foul Persians lost two cities within several turns of our attack, as our war elephants ran right over their pathetic defenses. Then all of a sudden it was 8:00 and we realized we needed to eat something. But to this day, Jenine shakes her fist at the sky and swears an oath to plunder Baghdad and take back the bananas for the motherland.

Game : New Super Mario Bros.

Ah, what escapist fun the original SMB was. The newest iteration in the series, New Super Mario Bros., is actually a re-tooled version of the original! A simple rehash this is not. NSMB packs to the mustache tons of new features, including big Mario, small Mario, shell mario, giant monsters, and countless contraptions, all the while keeping faithful to the tried-and-true simple formula that made everyone love the original.

Jenine and I had a blast tearing through this game together, taking turns at beating on goombas, turtles and other fantastical beastiary while the other looked on. An excellent game, and a fabulously lazy time in bed. If you have a DS, you really should buy this one.