It's about time

I finally got my hands on a bottle of Mountain Dew Throwback. I searched all over the South Bay back in California and couldn't find anything. However, I just ran out for a few slices of pizza and spotted a row of bottles in the pizzeria. I excitedly grabbed one and rushed home to try it. I mean, c'mon, pizza and Mountain Dew is a top combination.

First off, the most appealing thing about Mountain Dew Throwback is the design of the logo. It's much nicer than the new modern crap they've started sticking on the bottles and cans. And now for the hilariousness that is me trying to describe and critique food. Anyway, as for the taste - Throwback is sweeter (as you might expect), which cuts down on that tart/bitter kick you get when it hits the back of your mouth. Some people may welcome it, while I found myself missing that familiar tingle. To it's credit though, I will say that Throwback feels smoother when it goes down your throat, like a well brewed beer. Also, I would say that a sip of Throwback is self-contained satisfaction, meaning each drop gives you the taste and feeling that you want. Typically I guzzle down 8-15ozs of the regular Dew before I feel satisfied. I think ideally I'd like both versions to remain as options. While I'd likely drink the regular Dew more frequently, it'd be nice to have some Throwback as a break every now and again.

I poured a little into a glass and asked my mom to try it. In a glass Throwback looks lighter in color and slightly more natural, compared to the nearly nuclear look of regular Dew. My mom took a sip and immediately exclaimed "that's retro" and dove into the story of how when she was pregnant the nurses told her not to drink coffee, and then someone asked if she had tried this new thing called "Mountain Dew". Misunderstanding the context my mom thought Mountain Dew had no caffeine in it and replaced her frequent coffee drinking with the Dew, so as to not damage her unborn son. So I may not have been born in a cross-fire hurricane, or under a bad sign, but I was born with Dew in my veins.

It's safe to say that it's worked out well for all of us.

Infomercials in Heaven

Despite my mom's warning for my own safety, I have gone ahead and posted some of the gems I came up with immediately after hearing about the death of Billy Mays. My only hope, that God doesn't owe Billy a favor or else I'll be smite-ed.

Joke the first: Billy Mays died today. According to Al-Jazeera the Sham-Wow guy is claiming responsibility.

#2: Are your angel wings grey and dusty? Now you can get them as white as the light at the end of the tunnel with Oxi-clean!

#3: Everyone is going nuts over those delicious mini burgers. From Elvis to Ghandi, everyone agrees that they are heavenly. Now you can prepare them quickly and easily with the Big City Slider maker. They're so tasty you'll think you were on cloud 9 with Farrah Fawcett.

#4: Death of a Salesman, starring Billy Mays

#5: (less of a joke and more of a skit) Billy Mays doing "high end" infomercials in heaven. All I have so far is Ed McMahon voice over "Heeeeeere's Billy!" and Billy Mays asking the rhetorical question, "I think this may be the best product ever", while Ed replies "Hii-oooh! You are correct, sir."

These Moments

It was one of those nights down in New York City. Without explaining the whole night (mostly because I'm tired and have no patience to explain all the plots and sub-plots of the evening), let me cut to the part that makes me happiest.

My friend Tim drops my sister and I off at home, somewhere around quarter to 4 in the morning. We walk into the house together as I am asking her if she is still hungry. She says yes, take my car and get me some food. My mother, who is still sleeping/living in the living room while she recovers, is slightly awake thanks to the side effects of everyone's favorite corticosteroid - prednisone - she asks me to pick up a copy of the Daily News and if I'm at a gas station, a Joey's black and white cookie. I take the keys, some cash and I'm off.

On my way I witness 2 different cars being pulled over by state troopers. For those of you in California (or elsewhere) let me explain what a New York State Trooper is. It's like a CHiPS officer or your local cop, if they had a nearly unlimited jurisdiction, supreme authority and didn't care about your feelings if you cried when they pulled you over for speeding. And if that doesn't work for you let me put it this way - they (many of them) drive supped up Camaros which are capable of catching your "pimped out" Honda Civic no matter how many inches you lowered it or how big of a stupid fucking ass spoiler you put on the back of it. Got that Fast and the Furious?

Anyway, after collecting the Sunday paper and a pair of Joey's black and whites (not bakery fresh but a definite #2 after Zarros) I headed on to the local 24 hour McDonalds. Or as it would be perhaps called on the West Coast - ..., honestly I have no idea what they'd call it. Magic burger joint? Intergalatic time warp food spot? How you can't find anything open after 11pm astounds the hell out of me, so a 24 hour fast food place would confuse the hell out of them so bad that people would stop driving hybrid cars and eating tofu just out of sure mental fucktatood from something so alien entering their grey matter. While waiting for my food I tuned in to the presets on my sister's XM radio and found "She's got a girlfriend now" by Reel Big Fish and gleefully sang along.

Unfortunately, XM get's pretty poor reception and I had to sit many a minute listening to radio static instead of the song - joy. I was finally able to pull all the way in (that's what she said) and pay for and collect my order. On the way out of the drive thru back on to the main road I tuned into the 90s station, where I heard "Step by Step", the ultra incredible dance tune that should live forever (and if it's up to me will) by New Kids on the Block. At this point there was only one thing to do...

Put the windows down and crank that bad boy while singing at the top of your lungs. I now have a sore throat and likely won't be able to speak tomorrow, but you know what? It was all worth it - that song is awesome.

The King is Dead

Yeah I know, no one needs to read another Michael Jackson reaction/tribute article but this is a major pop-culture event so I've go to write something about it.

First off this is huge because he is/was a prominent celebrity of my generation. Take a step back babies of the 80s and realize this - our celebrities are starting to die. Now of course you'll always have your "die young types", your River Phoenix's, Kurt Cobain's, Chris Farley's, but Michael Jackson died outside of one of the typical overdose, car crash, suicide, etc. celebrity cliches. The people we grew up watching and thinking were cool are old and getting older, hell Guns N' Roses has been on (good) classic rock stations for almost a decade, and they're soon going to be the celebrity deaths the world is talking about. It's a bit worrisome when you use it to look back at yourself and realize you're not a kid anymore.

Okay now for the historical pop-culture placement. Michael Jackson was the King of Pop. No one can take that away from him - hear me Justin Timberlake? Usher? (queue video clip from the Boondocks where Martin Luther King Jr. tells Usher "Michael Jackson is not a genre of music!") Thriller is still to this day the best selling album of all time, and thanks to the music industry being a bunch of jerks it seems like that will never change as tech savy teens find new ways to "obtain" music. Michael Jackson was the front man of the great '70s motown group, the Jackson 5 with his brothers, then went on to the most successful solo career ever, his Pepsi ads in the 80s were classic, he married Elvis' daughter, was accussed of molesting little boys, had a 3-D movie adventure in DisneyWorld, was controversial for grabbing his crotch and wearing one white glove, starred in a music based movie - Moonwalker (I'm tentative to call it a "musical") and the subsequent video game (which was awesome), lent his speaking voice (but not his singing voice) to a classic episode of the Simpsons, dangled his baby off a balcony, actually changed his skin from black to white, outbid Paul McCartney for the Beatles catalog and then licensed their songs for commercials, was a prominent child rights and health advocate via the Heal the World Foundation, had Jon Landis direct a 14 minute long video for Thriller and on top of it all amazed everyone with the moonwalk, which has to be the most attempted to impersonate dance move in the history of humankind.

In short, the man is a pop-culture legend. For all his good and evil (which I believe was the result of a tortured soul thanks to the well documented abuse at the hands of the Jackson Family patriarch - I mean, look at that family, all the kids are screwed up. Michael as the youngest and most talented, probably also got it the worst), it's up to us now to decide how to remember him. It shouldn't be too difficult though, his music and his (dance) moves will live on forever. Don't believe me? When your kids get to be around age 5 show them the music video for Billie Jean and be ready to scrub up scuff marks as they try to moonwalk across the kitchen floor.

Personally, I'd like to think that the Michael Jackson we all loved still exists, somewhere out there.

It's my Citi

Tonight I made my long anticipated debut appearance at Citi Field, the new home of the New York Mets. Since I did it after visiting the New Yankee Stadium, here now is my opinion/reaction to the new Mets ballpark.

Let's start with things I hate/don't like at all. Obviously numero uno is the ripoff Dominos pizza logo that some genius came up with for the inagural patch and all of the Citi Field marketing materials. We're talking about the #1 market in the country, how the f did anyone think that they could pass the Dominos Pizza logo off without anyone noticing? Okay, so that's terrible. Moving on, it would be easy to jump on the bandwagon and bash the lack of Mets memorabilia and history, which the team has already acknowledged and is working to fix with the building of a Mets museum. While walking around the outside my friend Scott and I discovered that there is plenty of space in Citi Field for them to build this, so it's not that much of an issue. It was stupid to not have it built into the stadium from the beginning, but c'mon, these are the Mets, you had to expect something like this. Or how they were going to paint over Doc Gooden's signature on a wall in one of the fancy restaurants. Great idea by Doc and the bartender who encouraged him to do it, and another piss poor idea by the Mets brass. Fortunately New Yorkers aren't exactly the most passive bunch and after word got out the PR backlash was so great that they had to leave the signature and encourage other former players to sign as well. Honestly it was easy to expect this, these are the same guys who were going to build Citi Field without a new home run apple, or bring the original home run apple over from Shea - until the fans again raised their voices and shouted out "What are you f'ing nuts?" Besides those, other things I had a problem with - so many ad billboards, all over the outfield wall and hanging from every ledge; if you're sitting on the right field side the flagpoles in the Pepsi Porch partially block out the info on the electronic scoreboard which shows the actual stats for the players; same issue as with the new Yankee Stadium, namely, put the information on the big scoreboard and put the players pictures on the smaller one.
Anyway, with the ads, I suppose I can't get really upset about the amount, every stadium from now on is going to be ad filled because there's no other way to pay for these new state of the art stadiums. Fortunately none of the ads were obtrusive and actually do a fairly nice job of framing the Citi Field jumbotron, rather than leaving it out on it's own like some weird floating lcd screen. The flags blocking the view was annoying and they should fix that after the season. They could easily be placed in left center field in a gap between the stands and the jumbotron where they wouldn't be blocking the view of anything. I'm not sure how no one realized that would happen when the plans were drawn up, but since it's only moving a pair of flagpoles it shouldn't be a tough fix. I mean, it's not like they have to consider moving the outfield fences back because home runs fly out of the ballpark like whoa.

So those are the problems with Citi Field. Maybe it sounded like I was digging too hard to find something to be mad at, considering that most of the issues are either already being addressed or are simple fixes, which is quite possible because in all honesty the bad is so far outweighed by the good. Here, I'll spell it out for you:

Citi Field is Amazing

The Jackie Robinson rotunda is one of the, if not the, most beautiful entranceways to a ballpark I've ever seen. It's spacious, elogant and really quite aww inspiring. But the journey doesn't even start there. Right outside the gates are bricks purchased by Mets fans, adorned with special messages, names of family members, or just proclaiming their undying love for the Amazings. It's at this very first step that you begin to realize that there's something different going on here than at the New Yankee Stadium. But I'm not going to explain what it is to you just yet, you'll have to read the rest.

Once you're inside the ballpark proper you can take a few steps in and get a view of the diamond. It was overcast and a bit drizzly when we got to the ballpark and even so, the grass was so green it felt like my first game all over again, like I had never been to live baseball game before. It was a great feeling.
My friend Scott and I walked around the stadium since we got there about a solid hour to 45 minutes before game time. The stadium is done in a sort of light orange brick all around, which gives it a bit of an old time feel, despite all of the new amenities (see Camden Yards for an example). There are tons of restaurants and eateries, and although I couldn't get into any of the fancy restaurants like the Acela Club or the Ebbets Field Club or even the Excelsior Club, I was more than satisfied with what's available. One subtlty I noticed and appreciated - you can't get a Philly Cheesesteak anyway that I saw. For those of you who are not well versed in the New York Mets, their most hated rival (at least at present) is the Philidelphia Phillies, so the lack of cheesesteaks is a very New York way of handling a rivalry. Okay so back to the food that actually is there. Brick oven pizza, chicken rolls, a tacqueria, catch of the day seafood, sushi, a world market cafe (a popular thing in NY and maybe some other cities), footlong hot dogs, Italian sausage as well as, as previously mentioned, it's own Shake Shack and Blue Smoke. Not to mention, in the centerfield area near Blue Smoke and Shake Shack there is a small hut which is just stocked with beer. What a fantastic idea.

One thing that I thought I would hate was the area with a dunk tank and wiffle ball field. The thought of it angered me as I shouted in my own head, "what the hell is this here for? You're here to watch a baseball game!" But being at the ballpark early and walking around I realized what the point was. Citi Field isn't just for the game, it's a place you can enjoy yourself before the game as well. Now sure, if you're out there playing wiffle ball during the 7th inning of a close game you're a jerk but during batting practice or an hour before the first pitch - it's a great idea. And when I saw Mr. Met walking around and all the little kids smiling and happy, it dawned on me. This isn't an abomination of baseball, it's a great thing. When they put this section of the ballpark together they followed the song - "bring your kiddies, bring your wife, guarenteed to have the time of your life." We kept walking around, got up to the Pepsi Porch, which helps to add to that "old time" feel with it's classic Pepsi-Cola signage and the porch itself which overhangs into right field. Unfortunately there was some sort of private event going on so we couldn't get down there, but was able to look into the bullpen gate area where the original home run apple now sits for excited photo ops. From my view I could look down and see the old apple and then look out to center field and see the new apple. That old apple was always so big when I was a kid, and now I could see families standing right in front of it, and it didn't look so big. I looked out into center field and the new apple is massive. No matter who was standing next to it, that apple would look monumental. I looked back down and saw another family lining up in front of Shea's Home Run apple. I looked up at the Pepsi Porch, the new apple, down at the field and up at the scoreboard and suddenly the thought hit me. I can't wait to take my kids to their first game here.

It's just a feeling you get from Citi Field, when you walk in you feel like it's home. That's something I didn't get from the billion dollar palace in the Bronx. That stadium is gray, it's cold and it's impersonal. Baseball is played there. Citi Field has life, it's got spirit, it's got personality. There's color and energy all around. From the Pepsi Porch (Pepsico headquarters are in Purchase, NY), to the Mo's Zone (short for Modell's) to the Bob's Discount Furniture billboard, a Shake Shack and Blue Smoke with the old skyline from Shea on top of it, to Mama's of Corona to the much talked about original home run apple - the ballpark is New York.

And even though the game wasn't close, the Mets blew out the Cardinals 11-0, it got loud. The Yankee game I went to was fairly close, even though they were playing the worst team in baseball (coincidentally the game I went to was the only one that the Yankees won against Washington) but it never seemed alive. But like I said, that's nothing for me to worry about.

The simple fact is this - Citi Field is beautiful, charming and everything a ballpark should be and what Mets fans deserve. It'll be a treat to watch games there for years and years to come.

Operation Vegas

In order to get into the Vegas Bachelor party spirit, some friends planned to go and see the movie, "The Hangover" tonight. Since I've been in town to take care of my mom, I was able to join them.

The movie was hilarious, but I'm not going to write a review about it. Chances are if you're interested in seeing it, you will or you won't independent of my words. But if you're a guy you should see it.

Anyway, early in the movie we started assigning character roles. It's a common practice for our group. We did it with the show How I Met Your Mother after Scott and I previewed it and gave CBS the go ahead to put it on the air - coincidentally, when we were in Vegas.

Now I'm not ashamed to admit it, I'm not the best looking of the guys, so I wouldn't be Phil (Bradley Cooper's character), I'm not the one getting married, so I'm not Doug, and I'm not dating/engaged to a horrible shrew of a women so I'm not Stu (Ed Helm's character). Which means, although I'm not fat, and since I am the only one who can grow a red beard, I've been designated as Alan (Zach Galifianakis character).

So we're three weeks out from our massive Vegas party, so no more shaving if I want to pull of this look. It's going to be a great time. At last count I believe we had around 15 people going. So I've only got 1 question for you...

Are you ready to let the dogs out?

One Two Punch

My mom is sleeping in the living room on the pullout couch because she isn't able to climb the stairs up to her room yet.
I was in the kitchen eating Oreos and milk for the first time in way too long.

Even though it was 20 after 1 in the morning, my mom was awake watching TV thanks to everyone's favorite corticosteroid - prednisone. Suddenly my mom says out loud, either to herself or to me, "I don't believe it. I found the Rocky Horror Picture Show." I peaked my head in to see that it was just about time to enter the Time Warp. I ran back, grabbed my milk and a few cookies and re-entered the living room just in time to jump to the left.

During the number I mentioned to mom that if we don't do the Time Warp at Mike's wedding in August, or even if we do, it will certainly happen at my wedding. So for all you single girls stalking me by reading this, that's wedding hint #2 for ya.

After doing the Time Warp I asked my mom if she thought that there was a better back to back of songs in a musical than the currently in progress Time Warp/Sweet Transvestite pairing. She didn't have another contender to offer.

Think about all of your favorite musicals. Sure they have a couple of great songs but they're usually far away from each other. "The Oldest Established" and "Luck Be A Lady" in Guys & Dolls; "You Won't Succeed on Broadway" and "His Name is Lancelot" in Spamalot (as examples). The Rocky Horror Picture Show puts two of it's best songs back to back with only about 5 lines of dialogue in between, and while those lines are being said the beat for the next song is already starting to creep up in the background.


If you think you know a better musical 1, 2 punch let me know. But it's going to be tough to beat doing the Time Warp with a Sweet Transvestite.

Guess who just got back today

My mommy, that's who. She's home from the hospital and resting. This makes me happy albeit a bit nervous because I can't get beyond thinking that they sent her home because they couldn't find a non-ICU bed for her. Regardless, I'm glad she's home and I'm going to take care of her.

And on the selfish side, perhaps she doesn't need as much additional care as we all originally anticipated, which means that I may be able to turn the tail end of this visit into an enjoyable vacation.

In which case, there's a double meaning to the lyrics because "The Boys are Back in Town" is the theme music of my trips home, has been since college. So fingers crossed, knock on wood, rub a rabbits foot and all that jazz, that this may become something good.

Elite Beat Agents

This afternoon while I was visiting my mom in the ICU I beat the final level in the Nintendo DS game Elite Beat Agents (EBA). I got pretty excited and was definitely impressed with myself. You see, EBA is a rhythm game and I suffer from a condition that makes these types of games more difficult for me - namely, being white.

However, I pushed and powered my way through the game to reach the final level. The game is great fun when you have a few minutes to kill during a commute or sitting at an airport. Basically you control the Elite Beat Agents as they help people around the world with actually minor problems that are major to them. Examples - a high school girl who is babysitting three kids while trying to ask her football player boyfriend to "go steady"; a sea captain who is the victim of a mutiny by his crew after failing to find buried treasure, and so on in that order.

Actually, the situations are very cute and lighthearted, save for one really touching level where you are trying to console a little girl who is sad because her daddy went on a business trip before Christmas and obviously died, breaking his promise to be home in time for Christmas. It's weight comes out of nowhere compared to the other levels but it does sort of make you feel good when you complete it. I think the final level jumps pretty far in difficulty, considering how many times I failed, although that could also be the result of the fact that I was grooving along with "Jumpin' Jack Flash".

If you have a DS I suggest playing Elite Beat Agents because it's lots of fun and has a pretty good soundtrack, although all the songs are covers.

The House that Corporate Sponsors Built

Tonight I went to my first game at the New Yankee Stadium after years of going to games at the House that Ruth Built. Since this is all part of my impromptu NY trip I didn't have a camera with me, but I doubt my pictures would be anything special compared to all of the images already available from the Yankees propaganda machine or other people who have visited the new stadium.

Full Disclosure: I'm a lifelong Mets fan. I don't think my opinions come from some deep rooted Yankee hatred, as opposed to an objective look at things from the perspective of a fan, but I realize that it's likely some small amount of bias will inevitably creep in. But I've warned you about it in advance, so deal with it.

In journalism school they teach you the golden rule: don't bury the lead.
I wasn't all that impressed with the new Yankee Stadium. I'm not entirely sure if it's because I think you should get more for your money for a billion and a half dollars or because there's a bunch of useless stuff that needed not to be included. So here we go with the rundown.

The walk in from the outside of the stadium is a nice upgrade, and actually gives you that whole "cathedral of baseball" feel to it. In my opinion they should have just added it to the old stadium and made a few minor improvements. At the entrance "guests" have to scan their own ticket rather than having ushers or ticket checker people do it with a hand-held device. This is a bad idea because people are stupid and most of them can't operate technology correctly. Given that there is no manual override for a scanner that just isn't picking up a faded barcode or some other issue and you're going to have backed up lines of angry New Yorkers - which is never a good thing.
Anyway, the interior is much roomier, which I guess is nice and it's also brighter/better lit. That I will say is a nice improvement. Stairs replace ramps, which means as far as I can tell the whole place is a lot less handicap accessible. I believe Handiman will have something to say about that. Now with all of these new stadiums they have increased concession stand offerings (and prices) to cater to the casual fan or as we used to call them - bandwagon jumpers, jag-offs, fair weather fans, or simply "that f'in guy doesn't know s*!t". But fine, while these new ammenities will bring that specific clientele it does of course offer a benefit to actual fans - call it a positive externality. Economics degree in action. The new Yankee Stadium has it's own steakhouse, a la AT&T Park in San Francisco. Yeah, that's right Yankee fans, this wasn't some brilliant idea you came up with, you swipe it from another team like a high priced free agent. Anyway, besides that you've got your typical fair - chicken fingers, hot dogs, hamburgers, philly cheesesteaks, pizza, Italian sausage and nachos. The food was good, so at least you feel like you're getting your arm and a legs worth.

The seats are more comfortable than the old stadium, so that makes for a much more pleasant experience. Especially when the Yankees are playing a pathetic team like the Washington Nationals. The JumboTron is approximately 700 feet high and is used to display facial images of the players for the previously mentioned fair weather fans, who don't know the guys who play on their own team, rather than interesting or important information such as their batting average and other statistics. Those tidbits are relegated to a much smaller board cramped with the batting order, and current pitcher. The configuration makes for a more difficult read and really should be on the big board. That's to the left. To the right is a pitiful out-of-town scoreboard which displays 4 games at a time and has to continuosly circle through all of the days games. Haven't full out of town scoreboards been adopted as the norm since the mid 1980s? Then there are two "old fashioned" scoreboards embedded in the outfield wall. Question - who the hell is looking at those? There's a 700 foot jumbotron showing the same information. They are a pair of wastes - a useless aesthetic someone diagrammed out to try and give a billion dollar stadium a more "old fashioned" feel, I suppose. Besides the poor treatment of the right field bleachers. Connecting them to the rest of the stadium - good idea; blocking off part of their view because you want to build a restaurant or some other ridiculous attraction for the wealthy - bad idea. I guess that's a good enough segway into the now infamous "moat" that seperates the expensive seats from the common folks. I wasn't close enough to them to see how the whole process works so I won't comment further beyond what I've read from the various papers and sports reports who have been there and experienced it - that's just wrong.
Around the stadium I found an AT&T cell phone kiosk and an art gallery. I was upset with the serving of wine in San Francisco but these two things put that to shame. I'm sure this isn't the only stadium that does it but I expected better from the Yankees. They're the Yankees. They're supposed to be the only thing that people who don't know anything about baseball, know about baseball. It sure be pure, like the old stadium. More Derek Jeter and less A-Roid.
I like to think that Jeter is sad deep down inside with the direction the organization has taken. It allows me to not hate the Yankees, believing that at least one of them is still about the game.
But to me, this new stadium isn't about baseball, it's a sideshow. I miss the old place.

I'm hoping to go to Citi Field before heading back to Cali. If I do I'll review that too, and I'll probably be even harsher, because after all, it's supposed to be for me. "New" Yankee Stadium not being the single greatest achievement of humankind - I could care less - Yankee fans have to deal with that when they stop delluding themselves.

Why do the Yankees hate cripples?

Today was a good day

My mom was awake and I got to go in and visit her (thanks to one of the nurses blowing my cover earlier this morning). We started to cry but we stopped ourselves and the whole 2.4 seconds of seriousness that we started to engage in was quickly forgotten. She said she felt a lot better and by the end of the night she had been able to stand up and get out of bed, and she's able to eat anything she wants now. I brought her a Devil Dog.

The Mets beat the Yankees 6-2 and no routine pop-ups were dropped. David Wright didn't have a great game but Gary Sheffield added a home run to my fantasy league totals.

Today I didn't even have to use my A.K.
I got to say it was a good day.

Balance

Mom's doing better; Mets lose heartbreaker.
She was talking to my sister and uncle; I was left speechless.
She was hungry; I was nauseous.
She wants to rest; I won't be able to sleep.
Tomorrow we'll fill her in; Tomorrow I'll try to forget.

I'm bringing breakfast back

I've been back in New York for almost a week now, and my sister and I have started to work out a bit of a routine of responsibilities. One of mine is being in charge of breakfast and bringing it to the hospital. As much as I hate waking up early, and everyone who knows me knows that I do, there is a silver lining - breakfast.

Now we're not talking a bowl of cereal, or complimentary bagels and spreads at Google or anything like that. Not even my beloved McDonald's breakfast. No. I've been running to my (former) local bagel store. Fantastic. Yes, technically I don't live in New York City but that doesn't mean that the bagels aren't delicious. Unfortunately in this picture you can't tell how delicious the bagels are because they mistakenly put my bacon and egg with ketchup on a roll (like my sister's sandwich), but it was still wonderful.

And worry not dear readers, I have already had 2 other bacon and egg sandwiches which were placed on the proper carrier. Nesquik chocolate milk - fortified with calcium - makes a perfect breakfast companion drink. While it is more nutritious, I'm not going to lie, a previous breakfast was made more enjoyable by substituting a Yoo-Hoo. Also pictured is the unsung hero of why breakfast rules - the double chocolate chip muffin. It tastes as good as it looks, maybe better, to account for the fact that you may not have natural 20/20 vision.


Breakfast has been just yum, especially getting it at one of those great local places in my "old" town. It makes me feel good to be home, like I was back to those oh so carefree days without a worry just looking for something delicious to eat. The feeling doesn't last that long because pulling up to the hospital always acts as a somber reminder, but ordering, standing in line and those first bites are a comforting way to start the day.

Craig Ferguson is a nut

I wrote a post before about the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson being completely off the wall. For your viewing pleasure, I now submit indisputable visual evidence from last Wednesday, June 3rd's show.

Oh and to set the scene, right after the credits for Letterman rolled, this is what you saw - no warning or anything.

The Shake Shack

Is a little food place where we can get our yummy,
Shake Shack baby, Shake Shack bay-bee
Shake Shack, baby, Shake Shack Shake Shack, baby, Shake Shack
burgers fries, that's where it's at, Ooo shake baby, that's where it's at

Last night I got a call from one of my West Coast friends, Wen-Ai, - she was vacationing in New York with her sister. She had heard I was coming back into town for my mom and was calling to see how things were and if I were free since her sister and her sister's boyfriend had left her for the Yankee game. After consulting with the family, I was assured that it was fine and that I should go and get out of the hospital.

So we made plans to meet up at the Shake Shack in Madison Square Park. We were both very excited, myself ever since I got a text from my friend Lauren from Citi Field where she had it for the first time.

At the start of my trip I was a bit anxious. I felt a bit weird about leaving my mom and my family in the small we have basically commandeered outside of the ICU, despite everyone encouraging me to go. Around the time the train got to Harlem I was able to focus on enjoying myself ("because that's what mom would have wanted" - isn't that what people always say to make themselves feel better about what they're doing?) and sort of fell back into the routine of getting around the city, well except that I think I got off at 28th street instead of 23rd. Okay, so I was a little rusty.

So I met Wen-Ai at the corner of 23rd and Madison, after helping guide her from from the subway station. As we turned towards the park we saw the line. Honestly it wasn't that intimidating, anyone who has seen lines in New York (Top of the Rock, the Empire State, the WTC back in the day, hell even the bathroom lines at Yankee Stadium) isn't really worried by them, but I was pretty shocked it was that long at 8pm on a Monday Night. I mean, I had read articles about how horrible it is during lunch time as everyone in a 15 block radius descends on the park to try and grub up before their lunch break is over, but thought we were going to be hitting it at a downtime. Silly Californian, down time is for the West Coast.

Anyway, the wait was pleasant thanks to some wonderful weather - a cool, slightly breezy, clear night. As we got closer to the actually shack we saw some of the memorabilia shirts available, and what I thought was the best one - a baby's shirt that read, "I waited 9 months... this line ain't that bad!". Fantastic, gotta love the quintessential NY attitude. Another highlight moment occurred around the same time, when they turned on the lights (a collection of outdoor bulbs strung from the shack to nearby trees over the tables and folding chairs set up in the park). As the bulbs illuminated you could hear the crowd "aaaahhh" as if they had lived their lives in complete darkness up until that exact moment. It was good for one of those quiet, "you gotta love life" laughs.

Alright, so to the food. The best thing about the menu - it makes sense. No code words, no silly names as opposed to In N' Out, which West Coaster's swear by and I teasingly blamed Wen-Ai for, because she was the closest native West Coaster. Basically the Shake Shack menu resembles something you would expect if I ever opened a burger joint. I went with a double hamburger (they asked if I wanted a salad on top of it!, rather than just globbing on lettuce, tomato, onions and mayo. I was happy) with lettuce and a black & white shake. Between the two of us we split an order of fries. The burger was delicious, great bun and the patties are plump and meaty. The shake was good. I'm actually still not sure if the name "black & white" meant chocolate and vanilla or a reference to another fantastic NY delicacy, the black & white cookie (perfected by Zarros). I'm thinking it's the latter because the shake definitely had a taste to it that was beyond simple chocolate and vanilla, perhaps actually a bit of cookie? Either way, I enjoyed it very much.

All in all, it was a relatively good night - beautiful night, great food and enhanced with humorous and interesting conversation with excellent company.

Now if only I was back in town for a vacation as opposed to a family emergency. Eh, que sara.

Status Update

Just a quick update on how my mom is doing - she's stable. Getting better but still has the flu in her system so she'll remain here, at the hospital, for a while.

My sister and I are doing fine. Everyone's been really helpful. Friends and family are stopping by to check on us, give us a chance to run home and take a shower, etc. It's been a bit of an inconvenience since my old bedroom has been turned into a teacher material organization studio, so I've had to find another place to sleep but couches aren't uncomfortable.

Anyway, I'm not really going to say much more about this until we reach a milestone or I can give an all clear. If you don't hear anything then things are progressing well and on schedule and everything is fine. That's just me, I don't like to keep saying things are slowly getting better.

The space that's in between insane and insecure

I just touched down in Phoenix, I have a three hour lay-over before my flight leaves for JFK. I'll get in at 5:11am tomorrow, June 7th, Mike's birthday. The irony isn't lost on me and it's got me worried. It's safe to say that I'm not in a good emotional state. I'm bouncing back and forth from sadness, to rage and everywhere in between. I'm in that state where I honestly believe that if I got into a fight with anyone, anyone, I'd kill them and think nothing of it.

My iPod is doing a fair job of keeping me in check, but when I heard "Let it be" I was on the verge of losing it in tears. I put my sunglasses on and hid my head from the other passengers on the plane. Then I'd get a song like "Badwitadaba" and just wanted to stand toe to toe with some sort of physical manifestation of what's put my mom in this condition and obliterate it. I started thinking about the new game Dante's Inferno that EA is releasing and showed off at E3. The main character is fighting his way through the 8 circles of hell using a scythe, the one he took from the Grim Reaper. I remember hearing that from the developers and it instantly gave the character badass credit. What happened?, he died, the Reaper came for him, he punched him in the face, took his scythe and then decided he was going to fuck up hell? That's basically what I've been feeling on and off.

I had to skip "Stairway to Heaven" when it came on. Not a good sign right now.

I'm just writing this to stop myself from going insane. Sorry you've had to come along for the ride.

Cigarettes are cool

My mom's been smoking since she was about 12 and she's never gotten any cool merchandise like a leather jacket or even a lighter. She's never gotten lung cancer like her best friend. All my mom's ever gotten from cigarettes are a few minutes of "relaxation" per day, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, chronic bronchitis and an inability to breathe when the air gets cold, or she gets a cold or she gets the flu or if there's too many allergens in the air.

My sister called me from NY today to tell me that my mom's in the ICU - she couldn't breathe again. They ran some tests and she has some Type-A level flu, they had to send out the samples to find out exactly which strain but swine flu isn't out of the question at this point. She's a city school teacher after all and while not attempting to be racist, (so if you're going to call me one f off), low income, uneducated people aren't the best at hygiene. I'm not looking to point fingers in that direction, I'm just saying, there's not much we can do to insulate her from that. The fact that her immune system is already shot to hell is where my anger starts.

The last time I spoke with my sister, about 15 minutes ago (3:30am east coast time) my mom was still "laboring to breathe on her own". A five dollar phrase that just means at this point her body can't perform the simple and basic function of taking in oxygen on its own, so they've had to intubate her.

I want someone to blame, I need someone to yell at that this is happening...again. I want to yell at her, blame her for not quitting any of the times my sister and I have pleaded with her to. For not sticking with it after kicking the habit for a few weeks or a month. I want to grab her by the shoulders and shake the shit out of her and cry and scream and ask her why the hell she has to be the most stubborn person I've ever met. But she doesn't respond to that.

Of all the things I've learned in my life and possibly ever will learn, how to get through to my mom isn't one of them. We're 165 degree opposites. We can't be 180 because that would be too simple, just do the exact opposite. We're off in two separate worlds that have few intersections and their mostly trivial and superficial.

I don't know how to get her to stop and I lazily keep thinking and hoping that each successive hospital visit will do the trick. She comes back and says all the right things, like she were A-Rod, but it doesn't last. I need to get through to her because you can't go to the hospital 4-5 times a year, every year, unable to breathe. It's a numbers game, eventually it'll catch up to you, like it did for my grandmother and she took much better care of herself. She was the toughest woman we've ever known and one stupid time things didn't go right. That's all it takes.

This is one of my favorite shirts (that's not me wearing it though - I have a Coach bag). I bought it almost for the sole purpose of pissing my mom off. I told her I bought it because of her. I think I need to send her one of her own.

I'm burning for you

Tonight was the season premiere of Burn Notice. Actually, I'm watching it right now. But about 20 minutes before the show started I decided that I was hungry enough to make a quick food run. I abandoned watching the end of Casino Royale, no big deal, I have it on DVD, and set out on my mission.

I was going to be cutting it close, fortunately traffic cooperated and there was no line. I grabbed my food and was all set to race back. Funny thing happened, just like it did this time, I turned on the radio and got Blue Oyster Cult's "I'm Burning for You." Great sign from above.

Push the button (keyless ignition), hit the gas and I was home with enough time to eat before the season 2 finale recap.

Line(s) of the night

Required upfront knowledge before reading my transcript - Craig Ferguson is Scottish and earlier in the show Jeffery Tambor exclaimed that Ferguson has very large hands. Ferguson responded that he also has a very large...well you know.

Craig Ferguson interviewing Burn Notice star Gabrielle Anwar.

Gabrielle is plugging the show when Ferguson cuts in...
Ferguson: "You're not American!"
Anwar: "No, I'm not."
Ferguson: "What are you?"
Anwar: "I'm English."
Ferguson: "Ah, I always enjoy meeting English girls... (awkward pause) and doing to them what their ancestors did to my country."
Anwar: "My what big hands you have."

You've been burned

Tomorrow night Burn Notice returns for season 3 (now at 9pm to provide a strong lead in for the new series "Royal Pains") and I'm psych'd (clever intentional use of the title of another USA original series).

Burn Notice is one of the best shows on TV and I'm looking forward to another great season of action, laughs and practical spy tips. If you've never seen it, check this out to find out what you've been missing. Because of the way season 2 ended you could probably even start watching tomorrow night and get into the story and watch this new season straight through. Afterwords though you should go back and check out seasons 1 and 2 (especially 2) because they were awesome.

Io mi chiamo Roberto!

Once I got hit with the news, in early April, that I would have a great deal more free time on my hands I began to think of what I could do to fill it. I consulted the mental list I had constructed over the years of "Things I would do if I ever had the time". Right near the top, was to learn Italian and since I was no longer a slave to a full schedule it looked like the time would never be better. Armed with the Rosetta Stone software I started out, unsure of what to expect and hoping that all the hype was true.

It definitely is. I study 30 minutes a night about 3-6 times a week and honestly believe I now know more Italian than all of the middle and high school Spanish I learned (save for the lyrics to "Caress Me Down"). Even though I'm sure when I try to show my mom and sister what I've learned they'll still make fun of me for having absolutely no discernible accent and my inability to roll Rs (could never do it in Spanish either), I really feel like I'm learning and could be hold a well scripted conversation with a native speaker.

If you're thinking about or just want to learn a new language, Rosetta Stone is absolutely the way to go. I suggest going to their site and checking out the demo they have. I'm not sure if the speaking parts are fully featured in the demo (you need a microphone for the full version) but they really are one of the best tools.

Anyway, so far it's been a great experience and I'm loving it and I'm actually learning (there's more I can say, but it would require me to carry around a cat and a table)
Io mi chiamo Robert. Sono Americano e Io parlo inglese ma studio italiano. Io ho ventisei anni.

E3: Sony

Coming into the press conference the PSP Go was already leaked, so you had to wonder how Sony would react to losing potentially one of their trump cards. So kick off video is showing literally about a hundred titles flying by, while Queen's "One Vision" is playing, so you get the feeling Sony is going to stay on point in their presentation. Okay, high production intro videos are nice, but in the end mean little.

First game they're showing off - Uncharted 2: Amongst Thieves. This is big for them because everyone is expecting that God of War III won't be an '09 release. What I thought was odd was that the demo started immediately in gameplay, without an intro movie to set it up or anything. At the time I wasn't sure what they were thinking, but shortly into the demo Drake climbs up to a rooftop and pauses for poise overlooking, well the world. It seriously looked realistically picture-esque and stunning. The gameplay looked good too. I never played the first one (it's on my list) but given it's good reviews and how this sequel looked, this game is going to be good.

Next they showed off a demo for M.A.G. the 256 player capable massive multiplayer battle game. Unfortuntely the presentation focused on 1 particular character giving commands to his squad and so didn't really show off anything impressive. A bit of a disappointment.

Then Sony brought out the PSP Go and explained all about it. Most people had already learned the info via the leak and people like me didn't really care. Plus they're selling it at $249, which I personally think is ludicris, and not in the "what's your fantasy" kind of way. Oh and for some sadistic reason, when the Hanah Montanna special edition PSP there was massive "pop". Ah, sarcasm and pedophiles.

However, then they started talking about some games for the PSP and it started to get me considering picking up a PSP 3000. Only considering since I don't get to spend much time with my DS as it is (and I love my DS). But the PSP is obviously a big part of Sony's plans going forward as indicated by special guest - Hideo Kojima. He's back, and he's talking about a true sequel to Metal Gear Solid 3, exclusively for the PSP, Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker. Not only is it happening, but Kojima promised that he is actively inolved in the game, and it serves as the missing link explaining from MGS3 to Outer Heaven. Watching Kojima on stage I got a glimpse of what it's like to actually be a rockstar (when you're not in the music industry) as opposed to the "corporate rockstars" I ranted about earlier. Shameless plug.

Then they talked about changes to the Playstation store and tried to show off Playstation Home. Home is still pretty impressive - technically but I still can't see a really practical use for it. They do go on to say that the Playstation Store has had a lot of downloads, blah blah, over 90 pieces of exclusive content, getting warmer and will start releasing more PS One games, interesting, starting today, oh that's nice, with Final Fantasy VII. Oh by the way. Not a game changer, but a cool announcement.

But that's not all. Here we go with a new video from Square Enix for Final Fantasy XIII. More than what Microsoft showed off and it looks great. But probably won't swerve people to the Sony side since you can get the same game on the 360. And then the announcement. Here's a first look at the next game, Final Fantasy XIV, exclusively on PS3. Wow. Movie looks great, got me all excited and then it happens. Title screen comes up, Final Fantasy XIV and right underneath "Online". D'oh! Well that just took me down a peg. A whole peg! But good job Sony in getting exclusivity back.

Then we start talking about the idea of play, create, share - epitomized by Little Big Planet. But it's not just LBP, introducing the team behind a play, create, share kart racing game. The game play looked liked a new version of Mario Kart (minus Mario and friends) with the ability to customize your characters and their karts. Then they showed off the track creator, and made a new, pretty cool looking track, in under 5 minutes. The key to this game - you'll be able to share your characters, cars and tracks with other players. That's actually a pretty cool concept.

Next has to be the reason why Sony shrugged off the PSP Go getitng leaked, and joked that it was the worst kept secret at E3, because it kept everyone off the trail of their best kept secret - the motion controller. Sure, it's been rumored but no one had much of a clue about it. Not only did Sony talk about it, but showed various tech demos to show off what they were able to do with it. And they made a good point - in some situations you need to have buttons, giving it a leg up on Microsofts Project Natal. However, throughout all of the tech demos shown there was nothing to address the idea of moving, or lower body movement. So Microsoft still has the advantage there, but if they can build a full body motion tracking camera, so can Sony. But in terms of the demos, they showed off the ability to write using sub millimeter precision, fight using a swoard and sheild, controll units from above (a possible RTS on console solution) and throw shurikens and fire a bow at zombie skeletons. Wii Motion Plus, you just got served worse than Voltron. Perhaps even more shocking than the demo was that it was announced that Sony Motion Control is scheduled for Spring 2010.

After everyone collectively gathered their thoughts from that Sony kept pounding the ground with a demo of Assasin's Creed 2. Sure it'll be on 360 as well, but it looked insane and the crowd yelled out with delight after witnessing a simultaneous two handed palm blade kill on a pair of guards. Oh and there will be exclusive content for the PS3 version, provided that you buy and play the PSP game Assasin's Creed: Bloodlines. Then there was the trailer for Gran Turismo, which must have racing facings on edge. Next was a trailer for The Last Guardian, from the producers of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. It looked beautiful in that sort of "obviously artisitc, hate yourself for being impure in the face of this obvious beauty" way. That had lots of people clapping, although for me I really have minimal interest in those games.

And then it was time to close the show, with the coup de gra, or however you spell it. God of War III demo. Graphics upgrade, check. New weapons, check. Seamless looking deadly combos, check. And then the guy playing the demo thought it would be fun to show you that you can not only kill a centaur, but knock him down, cut his body open and spill out his entrails. At this point the bloodlust of the crowd was probably quenched. But the demo proceeded. Eventually we come across Helios flying through the sky fighting one of the Titans. Kratos heads towards an arrow turret and is preparing to fire when a Chimera (which looks incredible) comes out of the shadows behind him. During the course of the mighty battle Kratos cuts off the beast's snake tail. And then cuts out the lionshead from the chest. Just for good measure, in the end Kratos knocks down what's left of the chimera, pulls off one of the horns and impales it through the creatur's eye for the kill. Bloodlust elevated to a new level.

It looks like Sony is hitting the comeback trail hard, but the price point for the PS3 is still going to be a tough obstacle. Microsoft stole the last big third party exclusive Sony had and their first party exclusives are a bit more known (Halo, Gears of War) and offers downloadable exclusives for many of the multi-platform games. That said, Sony has made strides to close the gap and the new battle it seems, Natal vs. the Motion Controller could swing the whole thing. Oh, and a few hours after Nintendo seemed to get new life, Sony may have just kicked it out of relevance for core gamers.

E3: Nintendo

As it was honestly and bluntly put by the G4 correspondents covering the Nintendo press conference, "last year's event sucked" and Nintendo really needed to step it up.

Through the first 10 - 15 minutes it looked like last year all over again. Their first "big title" was New Super Mario Bro. Wii, which looks like a 1.5 version port of the DS title. You know you're in trouble when you're porting games from the DS. Talking about the Wii Fit plus = borring. They did finally explain the Wii Motion Plus and showed Wii Fit Resort but now that we've all seen the Wii before the novelty didn't last long. What was funny though was Nintendo Golden Boy Reggie Fils-Amie winning a 3 point contest at the buzzer by sinking the moneyball.

Reggie then started talking RPGs and my ears perked up. A new Final Fantasy Wii game that looked pretty good. Not sure how the combat is going to work, but at least you know there'll be a pretty good story associated with it. Then a new Wii version of Kingdom Hearts. A fairly solid strategy there - go to Square Enix and beg them to help you out. Also there's a DS game called Golden Sun which is supposed to be a resurrection of a franchise but I've never heard/played it.

And then it got really boring. The non-gamer philosophy, Iwata talking about a Wii vitality sensor. It's a friggin pulse detector for your finger. Let me put it this way, I actually was considering giving up and watching something else. I had half written a blog in my head declaring the Nintendo I grew up with dead and gone.

The woman who's not Reggie gets on stage with one last attempt to save the day. There's more Mario news. Like Bart Simpson saving the Fox network, Mario's going to have to save Nintendo. Video showing off Super Mario Galaxy 2. Afterwards the audience actually applauded - something I had heard and seen at Microsoft, EA and Ubisoft's presentations but was absent throughout most of Nintendo's time.

Good, but not exactly show saving. Out comes Reggie for one last attempt. He says that he reads the blogs (code for, I understand you're tired of games focused on non-gamers and you need to show your core some love) and has some titles from third parties to show off. First, Conduit from Sega a third person shooter that looks pretty good and needless to say is highly anticipated. Then, he shows a teaser trailer for a Resident Evil game. This would have been impressive except it looks a lot like a shooter remake of Code: Veronica. Although it did feature/show Leon, so I'm not sure where the storyline goes. They showed Steve Burnisde as well, lending more to the Code: Veronica theory. Lastly, a prequel to EA's Dead Space. Not surprisingly, a shooter. So the response seems to be, hey we can make games for core gamers just as long as they like shooters. Maybe RPGs depending on how Kingdom Hearts works out.

Then Reggie asks rhetorically "can Nintendo make these kinds of games?". "Absolutely" he answers, and to do it right they partnered with someone who is experienced in more adult themed games. I think everyone was wondering as the video started up.

Flyover of water, I know I've seen this intro before, then rising up through the clouds into space. Okay maybe not. Then the logo appears - Team Ninja. I knew the water was familiar. Team Ninja and Nintendo team up to bring a new version of Metroid (Metroid Other M). The demo showed Samus jumping around and blasting away a la Ryu in Ninja Gaiden. The promise of exploring her back story is a real selling point as of course is working with Team Ninja - guys who make games where you slice people up and cut off their limbs. This is the game Nintendo needed to make.

Few high points early, definitely dragged in the middel but ended relatively strong. Not a bad job from Nintendo, but Microsoft still has the top show so far (not counting EA and Ubisoft because that'd be comparing apples to bananas).

Sony's on deck.

It's a brand new night

Tonight was Conan's first show. I have to admit, watching him on the Tonight Show can only be equated to watching your team's top pitching prospect, who you followed throughout the minors and watched in Triple A, knowing that it was just a matter of time before he got the call to big show, make his major league debut. From the Simpsons, to the Late Show we knew this was going to happen and it's really, I think, a generational moment to see Conan take over the Tonight Show.

I was a bit nervous. As everyone knows Late Night is much different from Primetime and would NBC let Conan do the show his way or would they try to tamper with him to make him more "pleasing" to older audiences. So far though it seems as if they're letting Conan be Conan.

The opening skit for the show was great. Conan leaves NY but can't grab a cab so he runs across the U.S. When he gets to the studio he can't get in - cut back to the keys on the windowsill in NY. Lots of directions this can go for comedic effect, and what they choose will set the tone. Conan walks back off screen saddened. The door remains in view and then from off screen, a bulldozer drives right through the door and studio wall. Great start.

Max Weinberg is there, which I knew but I guess I missed the memo that Andy Richter was coming back. When he announced Conan I got really excited. Conan got a huge applause, "pop" as it's referred to in the wrestling game. It's obvious that the audience is aware of who he is, which I guess was a concern of NBC with regard to their usual demographic. After quieting the audience down, Conan introduces Andy and welcomes him back.

Another skit, showing Conan leading a Universal Studio tour. Crowd shots showing someone didn't get his humor, while others are just cracking up. At one point he got the crowd on the tour chanting "circle, circle" as the driver did donuts on the Universal lot. Then Conan took the tour "off-road" through L.A. before stopping at a 99 cent store to buy gifts for everyone on the tour. Great stuff. As the skit ends and they cut back to the studio the studio audience is chanting "circle, circle". And that's when I realized, things are going to be alright.

Just one thing could have made it better - someone yelling out "Vroom Vroom party starter."

Good luck Conan. We're all happy for you.

E3: Microsoft

I just watched Microsoft's E3 Press Conference (thank you G4) and I have to say - I think I need to separate XBox 360 from the rest of M$, they seem to be less evil. Well, with the exception of the project natal camera with facial and voice recognition. As Kevin Perrera said, "this is some skynet level stuff".

They started showing off some of the big new titles: the Beatles Rockband, Modern Warfare 2 and Final Fantasy XIII. None of those are exclusives for the Xbox but "All You Need is Love" will be an exclusive song download and two exclusive map packs for Modern Warfare 2. It's a recurring theme, Xbox gets extra stuff for every game. I'd like to begrudge them for that, but I really can't. They can ask for it, probably even demand it from publishers, based on their massive userbase and the popularity of Xbox Live.

Tony Hawk showed off a new peripheral stakeboard controller, which at the time seemed awesome. But after they showed of Natal at the end, it makes you wonder why you would need a peripheral in the first place. Probably more of a stop gap.

The new Splinter Cell game looked pretty cool and there was a game called Andrew Wake, which I had never heard of before, that looked really interesting - sort of a third person mystery adventure.

Then Microsoft started talking about all of the features beyond games. That was a good time to catch up on the Daily News Sports page. I peaked in a few times though. Yeah Netflix on your 360 is nice, ooh look they're adding Last.fm - don't care. Facebook on 360, not interested. Oh what a surprise, Twitter the scourge of human existance. Well they hit all of the major buzz words, so by corporate presentation standards that's a success. One thing they showed off that was pretty cool was a type of share feature, where you can watch a movie or show with friends (indicated by their avatars) who aren't there. Sort of like a remote watch option. It actually seemed pretty cool to me, mostly because my main contingent of friends are back on the East Coast and I had thoughts of getting us all together to watch the Mets vs. Yankees together and having my avatar jump up and down after David Wright took Sabbathia deep.

After that segment ended another suit got on stage and unleashed one hell of a surprise - Hideo Kojima, legendary producer of Metal Gear Solid. I believe it was a this point that myself and almost all other Playstation 3 owners looked derisevly at their PS3 and wondered "why?" or "what am I going to do with you?" Fortunately I got mine free, so it's an easier pill to swallow. Anyway, MS suit guy throws Kojima an alley-oop when he says "I can't wait to see what's next for Solid Snake." leading Kojima to quip "I didn't say anything about Solid Snake." Queue a teaser trailer showing that the new game, Metal Gear Rising is starring Raiden, back in his cyborg ninja suit from MGS4 and has a makeshift bandage over one eye.

Finally Microsoft went beyond all the speculation of a "motion sensing controller" to show off project Natal. Basically it's a camera that recognizes voice and faces, does full body capture and is used as a controller, without the controller. Interesting stuff, but none of the games they showed off were practical. Then they brought out Peter Molyneux who talked about what he and Lionhead Studios have done with it. They showed a demo of this artificial kid, Milo. In the demo one of the people at Lionhead holds a conversation with Milo, sees her reflection in a pond and swirls the water in it and even draws something on a piece of paper and passes it to Milo, who reacts and comments on it in real time. That was some crazy stuff. Like Kevin said, skynet type stuff.

Anyway, it was a very impressive press conference. I mean they had Speilberg, Paul McCartney and Ringo. Then again they also had Yoko. Still, it's going to be very had for Nintendo and Sony to keep pace. Fortunately, I just need to wake up at 9am tomorrow to find out what they've been up to.