Tuesday, July 14, 2009
-What is up all, I swear I am blaming the convenience and ease of use of Twitter for my increasingly spaced out blogs. I keep telling myself to update this beast a little more frequently so my blogs will not be as crazy long, but then I hear those addictive videogames calling my name. :)
-For the first time I cannot remember, maybe three or four years I managed to get the 4th of July off and catch the fireworks. Managed to catch them with my parents, Ann and her son son Carter, and Ann's friend Stephen. Afterward we all met up for a bonfire. Joey, Scott and Beth joined us later too, and damn did it ever seem way too Americana stereotypical for us to gather around a bonfire roasting smores and hot dogs on Independence Day.
-Since my last blog I have conquered four more games this year bringing my tally to 14. First off I finally beat Metal Gear Solid 4 to make it game #11, nearly a year after starting. Though within 3 week timespan I finally devoted some serious time and powered through the last 3 and a half acts in a grand total of 19 hours. Games #12 and 14 were the recently released Punisher: No Mercy on PSN. Its an FPS in the style of Quake 3 arena based shooter. It does feature a "story" mode, which is only four stages of bot matches with mild variants that took me about a 30-45 minutes to beat on two separate occasions, one of which was in online coop with PSnation host, Glen Percival. Game #13 beaten was Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard. Very generic 3rd person action shooter, that is only worth playing through due to its satire-esque narrative (for more check out my review).
-I have been playing a ton of other stuff too recently. Finally getting back into Saints Row 2. Scott helped me out in this mission I was stuck on in online coop which motivated me to finish the rest of the Sons of Samedi missions, only two more gangs left to finish off! Also finally found the demo derby location and I breezed through those missions and the snatch missions also. So many activities in that game. Gears of War 2 I have played online a lot with Rich lately. I blame double XP weekend for me clocking in a solid 10 hours into that game and going from level 7 to 17 in the process! On The PS3 Matt and I have been competing in a friendly rivalry exchanging high scores almost daily in Zen Pinball. It has been getting pretty intense lately, and at least it has led to me improving my game! I have finally started Uncharted, after failing to do so when Chris loaned the game to me for a good three or four months and finally buying this nearly two months ago I motivated myself to start it in hopes of finishing it before the sequel. Damn is this one helluva game, I am playing on easy so I'm breezing through it and am already 25% through in under two hours, but I am taking in each and every minute of it...what a game!
-Finally got my first tennis action in of the year last week with coworker Sean. Played a bunch of first to 7 point matches, of which I only won a single match of. I must develop a fast return dammit!
-I was ecstatic when Marc Henry got his huge push when he debuted on RAW a couple weeks back and defeated Randy Orton. Out of nowhere, the guy has been a heel for about the past 6 or 7 years, and just shows up on RAW doing one of those instant, unjustified turns WWE has been addicted to lately, and somehow the crowd totally went with it and gave Henry the biggest pop I can ever recall seeing. I hope it leads to better things for him, the guy has went through so much adversity in his 13+ year run in WWE, and despite his limited in ring skills he has the intensity and charisma, and cut damn good promos that it is about time he gets even a big time run on RAW. Anyone catch past couple shows of ECW? It got pillaged in the "blockbuster trade" and in its place was a bunch of new guys brought up from developmental and/or repackaged stars like Zeke and Zach Ryder. Will have my eye on it as to see how the brand develops over the next few months.
-Latest podcast plugs - After a two month hiatus, the Cheap Pop Wrestling Podcast is back, and this time we brought Dick back to the show via VOIP, Give it a listen. For On Tap #101, we do a show all about the recent BluRay release of FFVII: Advent Children Complete - Download.
-Aside from the mega improved Advent Children Complete, I saw a bunch of other flicks recently. I finally got around to watching The Big Lebowski, courtesy of Netflix recently. I immediately fell in love with it, and I think for a good two or three days afterward I was calling everyone "dude." Another movie I checked out through NetFlix was the mockumentary "Comic Book: The Movie" where Mark Hammil gets carried away by making a fluff 10 minute DVD bonus feature into a feature length "making of." Pretty decent, but its nothing compared to a recent mockumentary I saw based on the world of pro wrestling - Kayfabe. Last night I got a chance to visit my buddy Brent and we watched this crazy scifi action movie, Push, which reminded me a bit of Day/Nightwatch, but Push was far better. In the theater Matt practically dragged me to Transformers 2, and I hate it as much as the first. Granted, has some amazing CG and action, but damn is it way too cutesy for me to have any interest in. In return I made Matt endure Cena's latest and greatest with 12 Rounds on DVD. Finally, saw Bruno yesterday in theaters with Matt, and yeah that one is as crazy and out there as Borat, with just as many disturbing and messed up parts.
-Last week I made one of my increasingly frequent trips to the downtown bar scene with coworkers Dave and Adam since all three of us have the same nights off. We usually start off at this bar, O Reilly's since it has a beat the bartender in paper, rock, scissors for a free drink and we usually end up scoring a few from there. After O Reilly's we stumbled across the street to Crosstown, a pool hall that usually has a few tables always on free play. Right when we started shooting some cutthroat, a random stranger walks up to see if he can join in on some doubles and offers to buy us a round. Turns out the guy, San is on a cross country vacation from Oregon and is just wanting to have a fun time. We end up shooting a bit of pool and we proceeded to drool all over his rad iPhone, which they do not even sell up here.
-Last weekend the family made the trek out to visit my sister in Montevideo. They had the second straight Rock the Park fest, which was an all day tribute band concert with five bands playing. First band was a local cover band group called Kill Baxter. The main four tribute bands were for Leonard Skynard, Led Zepplin, Heart and Van Halen. Had a great time taking in all the music and drinking beer all day and eating horribly overpriced-yet oh so sweet live event food like Hobo/Indian Tacos. The day before the concert and right when we arrived in town my sister gave me a buzz saying to come out and see her at the bar. She was on the local committee for putting the event together and was showing a couple of the bands some of the local water holes. So I met up with her there, and on top of receiving a bunch of free drink coupons I arrived at the establishment to see it was karaoke night! Free bar + karaoke = bliss! Had enough time to rock out three songs: Green Day's "Minority," Iron Maiden's "Run to the Hills" and Guns 's Roses' "Paradise City." The last song I was feeling really good with all the free drinks in me so I started doing a weird ass dance on stage and got a fairly good amount of the bar to dance with me to Guns 'n Roses. Fun times, I love karaoke!!
-Want to give a mad shout out to Brock Lesnar for winning the undisputed UFC Heavyweight title over the weekend from Frank Mir. He sure did have some interesting theatrics for the fans after his win, and man did it take some balls to publicly call out the sponsor for the show "screw Bud Light I'm drinking Coors Light all night!"
-Sorry, but I have to do this, it is time for a long winded rant. So I had a peculiar encounter at Burger King recently. Now being a former fast food employee myself you just know how crappy of a job it is so I can sympathize with most of them and don't mind the occasional poor service, but you think a manager can at least lead by example. Most of the BKs I have frequented across the country have the same counter dining room layout where you pick up your order there is a little ledge over the counter with condiments like BBQ, Zesty sauce, etc that cashiers can retrieve for the customer upon request. Now I am admittedly a moron who frequently forgets to ask for Zesty sauce when receiving his food and usually when I turn around to go back and ask for some there are no cashiers in sight so I reach over and grab a couple. I have done this countless times before with no problem.
So I was there today and as usual forgot to grab my Zesty sauce and backtracked to the counter. Now the actual manager was there but was occupied with another customer, I waited patiently but he was still dealing with the customer so I did what I do worst and presumed, "well why bother the manager I'll just grab my Zesty sauce and be on my way." In the midst of reaching around and getting it (mind you its a very short reach and is not like I am stepping into the employee's area to retrieve it)the manager literally just grabs my wrist and thrusts it aside and raises his voice to nearly the point of yelling and glares at me as he shouts "Don't reach over the counter." Holy crap, I didn't even verbally or physically harm the guy to provoke that fierce a reaction out of him. I should have just flipped out on him then and there, instead I kept it together and responded with what came to mind: "Hey now, you don't have to give me the evil eyes I just want some Zesty sauce." I was already embarrassed in front of my friend and several other customers, so luckily he handed me the tasty condiment and I was on my way without any more of a scene transpiring.
I was still quite peeved though and called BK corporate and filed a complaint after telling them this exact same story, and got the "we'll look into this matter" response, so who knows if anything will happen than more of a slap on the wrist. Sorry to just go off on this seemingly minute situation, and even though it's just fast food I think it is the principle that is of issue here where the manager is leading by example by displaying that it is A-OK to verbally and physically abuse the customer without being personally provoked whatsoever. Anyone in the blogosphere here have any familiar cruddy service encounters before?
-For the first time I cannot remember, maybe three or four years I managed to get the 4th of July off and catch the fireworks. Managed to catch them with my parents, Ann and her son son Carter, and Ann's friend Stephen. Afterward we all met up for a bonfire. Joey, Scott and Beth joined us later too, and damn did it ever seem way too Americana stereotypical for us to gather around a bonfire roasting smores and hot dogs on Independence Day.
-Since my last blog I have conquered four more games this year bringing my tally to 14. First off I finally beat Metal Gear Solid 4 to make it game #11, nearly a year after starting. Though within 3 week timespan I finally devoted some serious time and powered through the last 3 and a half acts in a grand total of 19 hours. Games #12 and 14 were the recently released Punisher: No Mercy on PSN. Its an FPS in the style of Quake 3 arena based shooter. It does feature a "story" mode, which is only four stages of bot matches with mild variants that took me about a 30-45 minutes to beat on two separate occasions, one of which was in online coop with PSnation host, Glen Percival. Game #13 beaten was Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard. Very generic 3rd person action shooter, that is only worth playing through due to its satire-esque narrative (for more check out my review).
-I have been playing a ton of other stuff too recently. Finally getting back into Saints Row 2. Scott helped me out in this mission I was stuck on in online coop which motivated me to finish the rest of the Sons of Samedi missions, only two more gangs left to finish off! Also finally found the demo derby location and I breezed through those missions and the snatch missions also. So many activities in that game. Gears of War 2 I have played online a lot with Rich lately. I blame double XP weekend for me clocking in a solid 10 hours into that game and going from level 7 to 17 in the process! On The PS3 Matt and I have been competing in a friendly rivalry exchanging high scores almost daily in Zen Pinball. It has been getting pretty intense lately, and at least it has led to me improving my game! I have finally started Uncharted, after failing to do so when Chris loaned the game to me for a good three or four months and finally buying this nearly two months ago I motivated myself to start it in hopes of finishing it before the sequel. Damn is this one helluva game, I am playing on easy so I'm breezing through it and am already 25% through in under two hours, but I am taking in each and every minute of it...what a game!
-Finally got my first tennis action in of the year last week with coworker Sean. Played a bunch of first to 7 point matches, of which I only won a single match of. I must develop a fast return dammit!
-I was ecstatic when Marc Henry got his huge push when he debuted on RAW a couple weeks back and defeated Randy Orton. Out of nowhere, the guy has been a heel for about the past 6 or 7 years, and just shows up on RAW doing one of those instant, unjustified turns WWE has been addicted to lately, and somehow the crowd totally went with it and gave Henry the biggest pop I can ever recall seeing. I hope it leads to better things for him, the guy has went through so much adversity in his 13+ year run in WWE, and despite his limited in ring skills he has the intensity and charisma, and cut damn good promos that it is about time he gets even a big time run on RAW. Anyone catch past couple shows of ECW? It got pillaged in the "blockbuster trade" and in its place was a bunch of new guys brought up from developmental and/or repackaged stars like Zeke and Zach Ryder. Will have my eye on it as to see how the brand develops over the next few months.
-Latest podcast plugs - After a two month hiatus, the Cheap Pop Wrestling Podcast is back, and this time we brought Dick back to the show via VOIP, Give it a listen. For On Tap #101, we do a show all about the recent BluRay release of FFVII: Advent Children Complete - Download.
-Aside from the mega improved Advent Children Complete, I saw a bunch of other flicks recently. I finally got around to watching The Big Lebowski, courtesy of Netflix recently. I immediately fell in love with it, and I think for a good two or three days afterward I was calling everyone "dude." Another movie I checked out through NetFlix was the mockumentary "Comic Book: The Movie" where Mark Hammil gets carried away by making a fluff 10 minute DVD bonus feature into a feature length "making of." Pretty decent, but its nothing compared to a recent mockumentary I saw based on the world of pro wrestling - Kayfabe. Last night I got a chance to visit my buddy Brent and we watched this crazy scifi action movie, Push, which reminded me a bit of Day/Nightwatch, but Push was far better. In the theater Matt practically dragged me to Transformers 2, and I hate it as much as the first. Granted, has some amazing CG and action, but damn is it way too cutesy for me to have any interest in. In return I made Matt endure Cena's latest and greatest with 12 Rounds on DVD. Finally, saw Bruno yesterday in theaters with Matt, and yeah that one is as crazy and out there as Borat, with just as many disturbing and messed up parts.
-Last week I made one of my increasingly frequent trips to the downtown bar scene with coworkers Dave and Adam since all three of us have the same nights off. We usually start off at this bar, O Reilly's since it has a beat the bartender in paper, rock, scissors for a free drink and we usually end up scoring a few from there. After O Reilly's we stumbled across the street to Crosstown, a pool hall that usually has a few tables always on free play. Right when we started shooting some cutthroat, a random stranger walks up to see if he can join in on some doubles and offers to buy us a round. Turns out the guy, San is on a cross country vacation from Oregon and is just wanting to have a fun time. We end up shooting a bit of pool and we proceeded to drool all over his rad iPhone, which they do not even sell up here.
-Last weekend the family made the trek out to visit my sister in Montevideo. They had the second straight Rock the Park fest, which was an all day tribute band concert with five bands playing. First band was a local cover band group called Kill Baxter. The main four tribute bands were for Leonard Skynard, Led Zepplin, Heart and Van Halen. Had a great time taking in all the music and drinking beer all day and eating horribly overpriced-yet oh so sweet live event food like Hobo/Indian Tacos. The day before the concert and right when we arrived in town my sister gave me a buzz saying to come out and see her at the bar. She was on the local committee for putting the event together and was showing a couple of the bands some of the local water holes. So I met up with her there, and on top of receiving a bunch of free drink coupons I arrived at the establishment to see it was karaoke night! Free bar + karaoke = bliss! Had enough time to rock out three songs: Green Day's "Minority," Iron Maiden's "Run to the Hills" and Guns 's Roses' "Paradise City." The last song I was feeling really good with all the free drinks in me so I started doing a weird ass dance on stage and got a fairly good amount of the bar to dance with me to Guns 'n Roses. Fun times, I love karaoke!!
-Want to give a mad shout out to Brock Lesnar for winning the undisputed UFC Heavyweight title over the weekend from Frank Mir. He sure did have some interesting theatrics for the fans after his win, and man did it take some balls to publicly call out the sponsor for the show "screw Bud Light I'm drinking Coors Light all night!"
-Sorry, but I have to do this, it is time for a long winded rant. So I had a peculiar encounter at Burger King recently. Now being a former fast food employee myself you just know how crappy of a job it is so I can sympathize with most of them and don't mind the occasional poor service, but you think a manager can at least lead by example. Most of the BKs I have frequented across the country have the same counter dining room layout where you pick up your order there is a little ledge over the counter with condiments like BBQ, Zesty sauce, etc that cashiers can retrieve for the customer upon request. Now I am admittedly a moron who frequently forgets to ask for Zesty sauce when receiving his food and usually when I turn around to go back and ask for some there are no cashiers in sight so I reach over and grab a couple. I have done this countless times before with no problem.
So I was there today and as usual forgot to grab my Zesty sauce and backtracked to the counter. Now the actual manager was there but was occupied with another customer, I waited patiently but he was still dealing with the customer so I did what I do worst and presumed, "well why bother the manager I'll just grab my Zesty sauce and be on my way." In the midst of reaching around and getting it (mind you its a very short reach and is not like I am stepping into the employee's area to retrieve it)the manager literally just grabs my wrist and thrusts it aside and raises his voice to nearly the point of yelling and glares at me as he shouts "Don't reach over the counter." Holy crap, I didn't even verbally or physically harm the guy to provoke that fierce a reaction out of him. I should have just flipped out on him then and there, instead I kept it together and responded with what came to mind: "Hey now, you don't have to give me the evil eyes I just want some Zesty sauce." I was already embarrassed in front of my friend and several other customers, so luckily he handed me the tasty condiment and I was on my way without any more of a scene transpiring.
I was still quite peeved though and called BK corporate and filed a complaint after telling them this exact same story, and got the "we'll look into this matter" response, so who knows if anything will happen than more of a slap on the wrist. Sorry to just go off on this seemingly minute situation, and even though it's just fast food I think it is the principle that is of issue here where the manager is leading by example by displaying that it is A-OK to verbally and physically abuse the customer without being personally provoked whatsoever. Anyone in the blogosphere here have any familiar cruddy service encounters before?
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