9:06:41:10

That is exactly how much music I have in my entire iTunes library. If I listened to it all straight, it would take me nine days and almost seven hours. That is a nice vacation. On January 28th, 2008 I embarked on a journey to listen to my entire library. Half of the music didn't even have a "last played" date, mostly because it consisted of old albums and mixes that I burned onto my computer so I wouldn't have to dig through my physical CDs. Instead of organizing my music by artist and listening straight through, I organized it by time (length of song) from shortest to longest so I could get a good shuffle. It has been pretty enjoyable so far. There have been a few complaints though: when we got married, my library merged with Kathy's to form a Voltron-like archive of music. We do have a lot of common taste, but I could care less for some of her music (Dashboard, Fall Out Boy, Panic At The Disco are the worst so far). Right now, my scroll bar is about halfway through, which is good, but that means that I've only listened to the shorter half of my library. I want to say that I've at least listened to 3 of the 9 days available for my listening pleasure. All of the songs I'm currently listening to are 4 minutes and some seconds, and the songs are only getting longer everyday. I can't wait until I get to the good chunk of 10+ minute songs towards the end of my giant playlist. The last few songs I'll listen to include the longest underOATH song to date "And I Dreamt Of You," the 20 minute epic that is 2112 by Rush, and of course the grand finale: a live turntable set by Skywarp clocking in at 1 hour and six minutes. Good stuff. Of course my journey gets a little longer every time I add new music, so I make sure to listen to any new songs I add the moment I get them. I'll be sure to fill you in when my journey is coming to a close.

Where have I been?

Yeah, so since I got Smash Bros. Brawl I haven't posted a single thing on my blog. My bad. Things have been somewhat crazy lately. After acquiring Brawl, it consumed my life for a good few weeks. It is a great game. The graphics are some of the best on the Wii, and the gameplay is the best of Melee and Smash 64. It is pretty much everything I had hoped for when I saw the first teaser trailer. The only thing that sucks is that I really don't have anyone to play with in real life. I play with my brothers online every once in a while, but there is always a slight bit of lag no matter how good our connection is. I'm really looking forward to going to El Paso in a few weeks to finally play with them in person, or should I say PWN them in person.

After my Brawl phase, my brother and sister-in-law (Mark and Sarah) all of the sudden really got into Guitar Hero, so they were coming over at least every other weekend to get down on some faux-guitar rocking. I hadn't really been playing that game, so it was a nice change of pace from Smash Bros. Then Ikaruga came out, which I was addicted to for a good week. I've gotten much better, but not anywhere near as good as the insane Japanese players who can beat the game without continuing. It's still a fun game to play every now and then though. It wasn't too long after Ikaruga that Kathy and I headed over to a friend's house to finally play Rock Band together. We were pretty much instantly hooked. Th drumming is awesome, and with the singing thrown in, I like to think of it as Extreme Karaoke.

A few days later we bought Rock Band. Yeah. We went from "hey, we'll get it eventually" to "ok, we need to have this game." Luckily, being the bargain hunter that I am, I was able to secure everything I needed to play for only $50, an accomplishment I like to brag about. So we've been playing that a whole lot. Mark and Sarah are hooked too, which is cool because when they come over we can have someone on every instrument, which is almost the epitome of the party video game. I don't think I'm going to be purchasing any new games any time soon. We just bought a house (more on that later), and we have to cut costs everywhere we can, and I figure I have enough video games to last me a decent while.

On another note, Activision just announced that Guitar Hero IV is pretty much going to copy Rock Band, adding drums and vocals to the mix. I think it's kinda retarded. No wait, I think it's really retarded. First off, it's called GUITAR hero. I think they should have made a completely different franchise to compete with Rock Band. Maybe Band Hero or something. Alls I know is that Activision probably won't make the Rock Band instruments compatible with GHIV, and I am definitely not going to have two sets of fake drums and 4 fake guitars cluttering my living room. It's pretty bad as it is. I think I'm gonna hold out to see what Harmonix does for the next iteration of Rock Band before I purchase any more music games.

Why can't you just GIVE ME A SNACK PACK?!

So the last big states have done their share of voting in the primaries, and it seems that the democrats are still in a deadlock. Well that's just GREAT. Meanwhile, the 70+ year-old alien from mars with the acorns hidden in his cheeks has swept the Republican nomination. Isn't that GRAND. Quite frankly, I'm a bit upset.

I am a registered Republican, so naturally I was looking for a good republican candidate when this whole thing started last year. After doing a little bit of research, I set my sights on Ron Paul. His ideas were crazy and radical; it was a campaign aiming to go back to the roots of the constitution, and I liked what I heard. Sadly, Paul simply didn't get any huge endorsements, and everyone thought his ideas were too out there. When the primary voting began in January, it was clear that Paul wasn't able to sway a large amount of Republicans, so I shopped around for my next candidate of choice. That's when I learned about Obama.

Now most people are thinking, "What? You are a Republican supporting a Democrat? What in the blazes?!" Here's my reasoning: I wanted to support the party I was registered with, but the remaining candidates just weren't that great. Mitt Romney was a wacko. The only thing he had going for him was that he looked like Bruce Campbell's twin brother. McCain is Bush 2.0. That has been apparent for a while now, and re-affirmed today when Bush gave McCain his endorsement. Voting for him would be like saying, "I'm fine with the way things are in our country right now," which I am definitely not. And of course there was Huckabee. I will admit that I did vote for Huckabee on Super Tuesday in the Arizona primary, but that was mostly because he was the best Republican choice, and as registered Republican I can only vote for those in my party. I also thought that Huckabee would be a far more interesting opponent for a Democrat in the National Presidential Election this November. A lot of Huckabee's ideas and values I agree with, but there are also a lot that I don't. I was not a big fan of the whole "dismantle the IRS" deal. I am, however, a big fan of my tax return. And his ideas on how to handle the war weren't too different from that of Bush. The remainder of the Republican party was rubbish, which left me to seek out a candidate in another party.

Which brings us back to Barack Obama. He has got some GREAT ideas and plans. I love the idea of universal health care, and I definitely would not mind getting out of Iraq ASAP, as well as completely avoiding anything to do with Iran. He does share a lot of views with his opponent, Hillary Clinton, but man I hate her! Er...I should say, I heartily dislike her. She doesn't even care about her own party. Just the other day she said that McCain would do a better job with the war than Obama. That makes NO sense. All she cares about is getting into the white house, whether it be by becoming the first female president or by becoming John McCain's vice president. Lol.

So yeah, that's pretty much why I am frustrated with the whole democrat deadlock deal. At this point, even if either democratic candidate wins the remaining states, they will still not have enough delegates to win the nomination, so it looks like this thing is going to last until the Democratic Convention sometime this summer. Oh well. At least I'll have Smash Bros. Brawl to preoccupy myself until then.

The Mondo Spider

Definitely one of the coolest things I've seen on Youtube. DO WANT.

I Have Tasted Glory!

Yes, it’s true. Today I had the glorious opportunity to test drive the greatest game-to-be. How lucky was I that some guy who worked at a Game Crazy in Arizona happened to have a Japanese Nintendo Wii with a Japanese copy of Smash Bros Brawl? As soon as learned about this rare occasion, I knew I had to make the trek out to Surprise, AZ, about 50 miles from where I live. I left at 4:30pm and didn’t get home until 9:00pm, and it was in that glorious 4.5 hour time frame that I was able to finally play the game I’ve been so eagerly anticipating.

The first character I tried out was Wario. I had been wanting to play as him ever since I saw the first teaser video. He was pretty fun; I love his fart attack and biting/chewing people is just plain awesome. I had a chance to use his final smash as well, but it wasn’t as great as some others: while a good majority of final smashes are more of a 1-hit KO, Wario’s final smash makes you do all the work. After playing as him, however, I’m pretty sure that he’ll be one of my main characters.

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to play as long as I wanted, so I didn’t get to try out every character. The newcomers I didn’t get to try out were Olimar, Toon Link, Lucas, Snake, Diddy, and Ike. Pokemon Trainer was a little hard to get use to, probably because he just has so many stinkin’ moves. Pit was OK. I couldn’t get a good grasp on Robot’s moves. Wolf is like a Ganondorf’d Fox, which was fun. Lucario is Mewtwo 2.0. His moves are almost the same, but not quite. Sonic, Meta Knight, and DeDeDe just plain PWN. DeDeDe is so strong, I loved playing as him. Sonic is fun and fast, and his final smash is frkn’ sweet. And Meta Knight plays like a dream. I didn’t think I would like him that much, but he is definitely in my top 5 now.

As far as veterans go, most that I played with weren’t changed too much. Bowser was pretty much the same, with the exception of his forward special, which was changed in a good way. Sheik plays the same too. Falco is pretty different. You can’t hold his deflector, but instead he throws it every time. And instead of kicking with his forward smash, he does a sort of headbutt. I don’t know how to feel about his new moves, since I played with him so much in Melee. And finally Ganondorf is awesome. Sad that he still has the same moves, but they’ve been tweaked quite a bit, making them almost new.

When I went to play I brought my Classic Controller setup to see just how I would like it. It took a little while to get use to, but after a while I was smashing scrubs left and right. I think I just might prefer it to the GCN controller, mostly because of how the analog/buttons feel, and because it’s so light weight. If the Game Crazy wasn’t so stinkin far from my house, I would probably make another journey before the game came out, but I can wait. I really only wanted a taste, and that’s exactly what I got. Besides, one month from tomorrow, and I’ll be able to smash it up with anyone I want from the comfort of my couch. w00t.

The Cat Is Out Of The Bag

So after months of speculation, the the secrets are finally out. Sweet. Pictured above is the 100% legit final roster for Super Smash Bros. Brawl. While most noobs are busy complaining on message boards about how their favourite character didn't get in, I am quite happy with the turnout. We've got some great veterans returning, i.e. Marth, Falco, Ness, Captain Falcon, and Ganondorf. These are the characters I was really hoping wouldn't get cut, but I can breathe a sigh of relief knowing they are back for round three. In terms of new characters, I don't think anyone quite expected some of the characters that were revealed. I mean, who would have thought that Toon Link and R.O.B. would be playable characters? Those two definitely took me by surprise. But when all is said and done, I am very much looking forward to the new 35-character roster. Here's to counting down 40 more days of patience.

Put Some Swagger In Your Dagger

This pic is a small preview of things to come. Yesterday I met with my cousin and his sick wicked band Drive Like Weather to work on my up-and-coming youtube feature: Mic Skillz II. In case you haven't seen the first one, check it out here. It was so good, Blessed By A Broken Heart decided to post it on their page, which pretty much generated the 40K+ views. w00t. We worked on the main set of shots yesterday, but there is still a whole lot of work to do. I am hoping to have it done sometime in February, so stay tuned for the official release!

I've been playing a whole lot of Advance Wars: Days of Ruin lately. The series is so stinkin' addicting. I think I've been getting better, seeing as I have about 14/30 S ranks, the highest rank possible on any given mission. The way I see the game is just an intricate version of Chess. You have your basic pieces that can move in certain ways, and each piece has its vulnerabilities. It's good stuff, and it is definitely holding me over until Super Smash Bros. Brawl comes out on March 9th. Speaking of which, that is seriously going to be the best game ever. I haven't been this stoked for the release of a game since like...ever. I'm really looking forward to the end of this week; the lucky citizens of Japan will be getting the game a month earlier than us, this Thursday. It won't take long after the release for all the secrets to be revealed, finally putting an end to all the speculation of secret characters. Alls I know is if Mega Man got in, that would be stinkin sweet. We'll know soon enough.

So my pic didn't get onto Conan. Oh well, it was worth a shot at 30 seconds of fame. It was all good though, because he showed some other art that simply awesome, and he even re-enacted one in which he saves President Lincoln from being assassinated. Good stuff. Man, I was thoroughly enjoying Conan, and for some reason last week they started showing re-runs again. Blast this writer's strike to hades. I hope it is finished REALLY soon. I'm starting to have Heroes withdrawals.