With Child

That's right we are expecting! We have talked about having children since we started dating some eight years ago, but we did not do so with regularity or serious intent until we got married. The plan was to wait five years post marital start line, so we could spend time enjoying each others company. Well we are at three years and change and we are both ready to share in each others company and a babies. It just felt like the time and we could not imagine anything in our lives that we would not want to share with our child.

I am nervously over joyed about our big news. I can't wait to hold our new born child, but what if I'm a horrible father. Sure everyone says "Oh you'll be great", but serial killers and dictators have parents who were probably told the same thing. I'm not the type to worry or get worked up about stuff like that though, so rest easy friends and family who might contact me to tell me "Oh you'll be great". I'll read the books, listen to the conflicting advice and hopefully filter it all down into what I think makes for a good parent.

We had our first doctors appointment the other day or the "Shit just got real!" appointment if you will. We got to see the babies heart beat and a blurry oval that the doctor assured us was the baby. Crystal had me throw out all of our turtle soup, shark steaks and sword fish fillets because she can no longer eat them. I also got to sit in on her yearly check up, which was awkward to say the least. Lets just say my doctor never gives me an over sized paper towel and a directive to get naked by the time they come back.

The icing on the baby cupcake is the gear and gadgets I get to pick out. I am on the hunt for a digital video camera to record all the moments no self respecting guest to our home will actually want to watch in ten years. I'm also looking for a manly diaper bag. I don't plan to be caught out on the town with a paisley explosion Vera Bradley over my shoulder. There are a bunch of options, but I am leaning toward a messenger style bag customized for baby care. I picked up two new domains earlier this week as well in anticipation of the media blitz we will force on family and friends. More on that in the future though.

Site Watch
Dad Gear has stuff that I would actual wear and/or carry, I guess that is a strong enough endorsement.

The Castles of Crash

It feels like this game was announced in 1993 and has taken fifteen years to be developed. Twenty three delays later and it finally came out today. In actuality it was announced at Comic Con in 2006 and took two years to complete. This games art style and simple concept scratched a gaming itch I have had for a long time. It is a throw back to the Golden Axes, Streets of Rages, Bad Dudes, NARCs, Double Dragons, etc, etc ,etc that I grew up on. My heart yearned for a coop online beat 'em up and Behemoth delivered.

The art is style very similar to their first console game Alien Hominid which I never played, but always looked to as an example of art I like. It looks simple enough, but has a hand drawn quality that adds depth and punch. The gameplay is in the same simple vein, but grows in complexity as you level. At the first level your control scheme is weak attack, strong attack, magic attack, jump and block. As you develop your character, dependent on where you put points (strength, magic, stamina, agility), you unlock new abilities allowing for unique builds. I have two characters going right now, one with a strong emphasis on magic and stamina (think arena mage) and one with more of a balance of magic, strength and stamina (think ret pally or enhance shaman).

The depth of character development, play style, weapon choice and pets (yes there are pets) makes for a more hearty beat 'em up meal than the microwave gas station burritos of the past. With full coop online, ranking and a pvp arena it is well worth the fifteen dollars on Live. I'd even drop a few more bills if the downloadable content that is forth coming was as tasty a treat.

Pen15 Fan Club Rides Again
After the relative success of Paper For My Daddy on Sunday night and my recent gear upgrades, Majarg and Pen hatched a plan. Start a 3v3 team with two restoration shaman and an arms warrior. The product of this scheming was the resurrection of the Penfifteen Fan Club. The P.F.C. last played as a three DPS frost mage, elemental shaman and destruction warlock team for all of season two and the beginning of season three.

It is unclear how far a matrix like this can go, but we went 11-2 last night with one of our losses attributed to a disconnect. Two healers makes for grueling matches sometimes as our warrior tries his best to solo burst someone down. We have double totems, shocks, nature's swiftness heals and bloodlust though. With two earth shocks and a pummel we are a healer/casters worse nightmare.

Greens No More

My baby shaman with the new car smell is starting to grow up. Between honor grinding and ten man raid content I have amassed a decent set of healing gear. As of last night I exchanged my final piece of green gear with a purple, Cord of the Ring->Guardian's Ringmail Girdle. First that was a huge upgrade and second I can no longer be mocked for wearing a horrible pun. I still have a cloth helm that needs to be replaced, but it is nice to shift my focus to rings and trinkets.

Just shy of ten months to the date of Zul'Aman's release and my first and only trip to the 2.3 dungeon, I went back in to full clear it this weekend. Granted I was with seasoned vets this time and they were carrying me for the most part, but it was nice to see the instance in its entirety. Even nicer were the 23 badges I picked up and monster healing shield. Hopefully I proved my worth to the nine other guild members who took a chance on me and I will be invited back. Lord knows I could use the other gear that drops there.

Finally a lot of my time has been spent in battle grounds lately, think 95%. When I am not doing dailies for cash I am honor and mark farming the night away. So any break from that norm (see above) is most welcome. Last night we played ten games on our 5v5 team (appropriately nicknamed fail fives) Paper For My Daddy. We end up going 6-4 after a rocky 2-4 start. The team is essentially built to fail with me as the lone healer and two of our DPS speced for PVE. The take away for me is an opportunity to heal under real pressure. Something that doesn't happen when I am playing Xbox while farming marks.

Site Watch
After finding a good 40k community site (forums, guides, etc) I went looking for a news site and found Bell of Lost Souls. It is a great place to keep up with 40k news and rumors and has been added to my list of sites I check daily.

Old in Hip Hop Years

In what feels like the start of an annual tradition I ventured back to DC with Brian to see Aesop Rock again Wednesday night. Blockhead was missing from last years line up and had been replaced with Grayskul, a tough act to follow for sure. I'll be polite and say they weren't for me, but that brings up a larger issue I want to address below. This post is two pronged, so lets get started.

I'm Old
Realizing I'm getting older, not "old" mind you just older, is nothing new. Given my two bad back flare ups in four years, a house, marriage and a full time job lets say you could call me more mature and/or responsible now then I was in the past. It was more apparent than ever at the show on Wednesday. We choose to take in the first two acts from upstairs, because it was a more relaxed environment (read old people upstairs, young people downstairs). When Grayskul came on stage the first thing I noticed was how loud the music was. After their performance my back was already starting to ache.

Yak Balls came on after Gray and again it was loud and my back hurt. When Aesop finally took the stage I found myself looking at my watch. What the hell I came all the way to DC to see one of my favorite artist and I am looking at my watch? The performance was on point, but my ringing ears and a knot the size of a dodge ball in my lower back had my mind elsewhere.

Live Hip Hop
When Brian and I got back in the car we briefly reflected on the show we had just seen. The conclusion we came to was that hip hop was probably the worst genre to see live, for three reasons. One, the bass/beat can be so loud that it drowns out the vocals and even so loud that any subtle sound that could hook the listener is reverberated into primal bass hits. Two, the lack of things to do on stage can make for an extremely boring visual experience. Visual Experience! Three, outside of your DJ scratching the live performance is closer to the album than other genres given there are no instruments to play.

I perfect example of these live performance woes is Yak Ballz. I have seen him perform twice and come away with a negative impression twice. Until he came out for a guest performance on one of Rob Sonic's songs. Oh yeah that is that guy on that song that I actually like a lot. What the hell, maybe I like him. I had completely written off his work, until that point. I actually found myself in the mental exercise of wondering if I would actually like Aesop or Rob if I had been introduced to them through live performance. Probably not.

Ultimately, I did enjoy their set though. I have been listening to Aesop for almost four years now and knowing all of his songs can transcend bad audio levels and live hip hop clichés. Hip Hop Clichés! Armed with these new found revelations I am willing to at least try a Grayskul or Yak Ballz album.

D is for the Dramas

Not unlike notes passed in class between teenage girls, World of Warcraft is an excellent medium for the drama. Last night the guild I currently sit on the outskirts of (I'm new) had a bout of the dramas that almost had the guild leader quit permanently. The details and dirty laundry are inconsequential and I only heard about it through third party accounts any way. Having experienced plenty of guild drama in my days as a guild officer and through countless accounts on WoW news sites, it is safe to say that it comes with the territory.

It is easy to chalk it up as the law of large numbers, not this one, but putting 10-250 people together in a group (mostly 15-30 year old males) and expecting them to gel and accomplish goals. Jealousy, greed and people who just plan don't get along are just some of the scenarios that can play out on a day to day basis. As an officer managing that many personalities can be stressing to say the least.

An interesting comparison of game genres is the juxtaposition between first person shooters and MMOs in regards to group cooperation.

1. MMOs give rewards for a large groups accomplishments to a small number of its participants. Over time the group as a whole is rewarded, but getting everyone on board for the concept of the whole before the parts can be difficult. It is a system that can harbor jealously, unhealthy competition and greed. Outside of high level sponsored FPS teams the only reward is winning and maintaining a win to loss ratio.

2. While there is a reliance on your fellow gamer in first person shooters there seems to be less emotion tied to it. Granted this is not a statement that can be made across the board given leagues like CEVO and LANs for monetary prizes. Every raid group in WoW from the lowly Kara only group to the fourth Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury Sunwell raid has to rely on each other to achieve victory. Factor in the consequence of failure being lost rewards and wasted time and you have a potential powder keg on your hands.

3. Finally the idea that there is continuity and a lack of finality in MMOs that is not present in FPSs. Week in and week out everyone is building up the same character or toon in an MMO. Over time small things can build into large drama, the concept is called gunny sacking, not this kind, this kind. FPSs leagues are usually set up in seasons, like the NFL, no prior match has any bearing on coming matches and when the season is over there is usually a period to take a break before the next season. MMOs and the guilds that play in them usually have no off button. It is a race to no finish for the life of the game.

Site Watch
I finally found a good 40k community site after slogging through tons of sites that looked like they were built in 1996. They have a ton of up to date guides and what appears to be a very large and active membership.

40k Again?

I skipped posting on Friday because I was out of town and on vacation. Crystal starts teaching at a new school this year, so Thursday we took all of her teaching materials and supplies to her new classroom. Friday we went up north to shop. IKEA was a bit of a bust, but we should have known better given we don't really need any furniture. I stopped in the Potomac Mills Games Workshop and was convinced by an employee to pre-order a 40k starter kit when I got back to Richmond, probably a mistake considering past experiences.

I am hoping this time will be different for a few reasons. I will have a rulebook so I can learn to play (L2P) at my leisure and in the comfort of my home. There is now an official GW retail store in Richmond, were before I was relying on a third party shop that was in all honesty a crappy place to build my interest. It is a board game when you boil it down to it's core, so I can probably convince my wife and brother to at least play once with me. I still have on nerd colored glasses for miniatures that will probably never go away, expect a model railroad post when I have a child.

Please don't be fooled into think I am completely retreading mistakes of the past. I still have my waders on while braving this geek river. The starter kit was a $10 pre-order and retails at $60. Probably a huge investment when I was a sophomore in college, but not going to break the bank now that I am three years removed from a ramen noodle budget. I picked up a calendar of events from the shop when I went in to give them my ten dollars, hopefully I can pick and choose events that will have like minded adult players. I say this a lot, but wish me luck.

Ex Machina
In the calm before the storm (I ordered five trades Saturday night) I went to my local comic shop Thursday to look for something to read. I walked out with Ex Machina after hearing good things about it on Fresh Ink and knowing that it was written by Brian K. Vaughan (Y). The writing is very well done, something I didn't expect given the books political nature. The art is so-so I guess, the artist uses pictures as a reference for all of the panels and occasionally the expresions on chacters faces can be a bit off putting.

Pineapple Braided Gangsters

Pineapple Express
We saw this film on Friday night and my sides still hurt from laughing. Seth Rogan has not worn thin for me just yet and James Franco finally gets the funny role I knew he could play from his days on Freeks and Geeks. If you have not seen F&G take a look at the cast for a laundry list of actors who have been in the funniest movies from the past 2-3 years. Where Step Brothers was funny in it ridiculousness, it felt very much like a string of sketches. Pineapple Express keeps some of the ridiculious dialouge, but is carried by its outrageous plot and action as well. Yet another movie that delivers this summer.

American Gangster
Denzel Washington puts on an amazing performance in this film. How this slipped through our movie viewing cracks for so long I don't know, but I do know that we were missing out. I even enjoyed Russell Crowe in this film, he went beyond the grunts and yells of Gladiator and actually put on a good performance. It has been a very long time since I enjoyed a good period gangster movie and American Gangster fits that bill.

Braid
This is a game that I can sit down and share with my wife. It is a 2D platformer so her days of SNES Aladdin come in handy, the controls are stupid simple at just three buttons and it's puzzle game and she freaking loves a puzzle. Every puzzle in the game is solved by altering time in some way. As I said the three button controls are quick to pick up, jump, time reverse and use. It is the implementation of these buttons that make the game hard. It will bend your mind in ways it will not want to go, it is a mental exercise that is refreshing and occasionally frustrating.

Comcast Fights Fires

My original post about our experience with Comcast was intended to be venue to vent to friends and family (my regular audience). So I was extremely surprised when someone who works at Comcast commented on my blog (and this was before my story was on the Consumerist). I was asked by user: ComcastCares1 to send my contact information to a Comcast corporate customer service email, where upon some one would investigate and call.

The same day I sent the email I got a response back and a call. I was busy at the time and did not get a chance to answer, but the voicemail had a name and a direct line for me to call. Before I got a chance to call the number they called back again. The lady I spoke with was very understanding as I explained essentially everything I had written on this blog. When I finished my story she reviewed my current plan under the downgrade Crystal had requested. We were paying $128 for bare bones digital cable, high speed internet and DVR. I reminded her that our cable in our office still wasn't working as well. She asked if she could take a few minutes to crunch some numbers on our plan and attempt to fix the cable.

She called back 15 minutes later and had an offer that we could not refuse. For internet, digital cable, HBO, Starz, Encore and DVR our bill would only be $99 a month. She admitted that she could not get the cable working from offsite, but offered to send a tech to our house at our earliest convenience. Usually scheduling someone to come to your house from Comcast means waiting a week to have them come out for a four hour window that they show up late for. When I asked if the tech could come the next day and she said yes and offered a three hour window, I was a bit thrown. The next day the tech arrived on time and everything was fixed with in thirty minutes.

While this solution was great for us and we certainly will benefit from a lower bill and more channels it does leave me feeling a little dirty. Comcast only paid attention to me because I made a some noise on the internet. My problem was fixed, but the problem as a whole is still a glaring sore that needs to be bandaged. It should have never escalated to the point that it did in the first place. Comcast needs to prevent forest fires, not put them out with squirt guns when they have been raging for weeks.

Shoot One War

Batman Year One
I knew that Year One was one of "the books" you're supposed to read as a new or returning comic fan. Just like I knew Watchman carried that same weight when I picked it up. Unlike Watchman I really dug Year One. Frank Miller's gritty story not only takes on Batman's struggle to find his place in Gotham, but Jim Gordon's as well. The two travel down similar paths ultimately crossing in what is at first confrontation and eventually becomes the start of a working relationship and mutual respect by the end of the book. The art is jaw dropping and Miller's story telling is top notch.

Civil War Mavel Universe
Please note that this book is not the actual collected Marvel event Civil War. It is stories that relate to the event and it is for the most part confusing and terrible. It is my fault for picking up the wrong title, but look at the freaking cover. Even if I picked up the wrong book I would hope that the side stories would be complete. Some have no start or end, you are dropped off in the middle of a conversation and jerked out of it before its over. The art is a mixed bag and I'm not sure a lot of it would make sense even if I had read Civil War.

Shoot Em Up
Clive Owen's follow up to Inside Man and Children of Men, two of the best films of 2006, was a staring roll in this steaming pile. I get that it is trying to be campy and I'm sure a lot of people saw it on the good faith of Grindhouse, as it was released just three months later. Shoot Em Up gets it wrong though because it is a campy film that is not so bad that it turns good, it gets to the bad and stays there. How "writer/director" Michael Davis was given money to produce a Hollywood budgeted movie after working on such classics as Double Dragon: The Movie and not creating anything new since 2003 is beyond me. Maybe he is somebodies nephew.

WoW Fixed
Following the issues I described the other day I reinstalled WoW and BC on Tuesday night and meet a roadblock when I tried to patch beyond 2.0.x (the base patch the BC install gets you to). I would try to login and get disconnected immediately. After sitting on the phone with Blizzard tech support for an hour Tuesday night and getting no where I decided to reinstall windows and get a fresh start Wednesday. At 11pm Wednesday I finished the windows install. At 1am I finished the WoW and BC install and got stuck at the 2.0.x patch again.

/pullhair

Before I threw my computer from the second story of my house I decided to call my brother and get his account info. I had a sneaking suspicion Tuesday night while on the phone with the Blizzard rep that my patching problem had to do with my Blizzard Authenticator. My guess was that the Blizzard servers were looking for me to enter my authenticator code to complete my login, but the game was only at patch 2.0.x so there was no place to enter the code as the game did not include the authenticator functionality back then. I plugged in my brothers account info (he doesn't have an authenticator), it logged me in immediately and started patching to 2.3.x. I wonder if Blizzard is aware of this issue.

Seventy and Crashing

With a name like Addicted 2 WoW you'd think I'd write about the game more. Thankfully there is enough going on in my life that I don't post every day about my leveling adventure. Dr Majarg did hit 70 over the weekend though. Since he is a man now I think I can dedicate a post to him on his birthday bar mitzvah.

It took me a grand total of 7 days and change played to break the big seven oh. Compared to my mage who took almost 8 days played to reach 60. Chalk it up to Blizzard speeding up the leveling process and a mod called Quest Helper. I leveled as enhancement from level one on, so when I hit seventy and went restoration I looked like clown barf. It will be a long road of honor grinding and Kara badges to get to an acceptable place with my gear for raiding.

That grind would be made easier if my game worked. I have been crashing at least once a night and at most ten to fifteen since level forty. I did everything just shy of reinstalling before I hit seventy to try and fix things. I got to my breaking point when I started my honor grind in Alterac Valley this past weekend and crashed every five minutes. Last night I uninstalled and attempted to reinstall. I got through eight disk (original and BC) and attempted to patch the game without success from 9pm to 1am last night. Tonight I will try a fresh install of windows, my second in two months, in the hopes of fixing the game. Wish me luck.

Diablo III Art Direction
I mentioned previously that Diablo III might not be the gameplay leap that everyone was looking forward to. I love the art though, when in motion it just feels right. Some D2 fans don't agree and have started petitions to try and get the game to look darker, "emo" even. MTV's MP Blog recently sat down with Diablo III designer Jay Wilson to have him comment on community created screenshot modifications. It is an interesting look at what makes games fun and less frustrating from a visual stand point.

UPS Knows Me
Wednesday last week Crystal and I stopped in to the local UPSery to send my borked 360 back to the mother ship. When we opened the door the gentleman behind the counter gave me a knowing look...

Him: Xbox?
Me: Yeah, do you get a lot of them?
Him: Tons!

Yesterday I got an email letting me know that my Xbox had been fixed or replaced already and would be shipping back today. The incredibly fast turn around time makes me think it was just replaced and shipped back. Even though it broke the quick response and solution speaks volumes for the company. Comcast are you paying attention.

Comcast is an Asshole

Most every Comcast customer I know has some story about poor service or a late/missed maintenance call. Turn to the internet if you haven't had the same experience, we are many. The torch we Tabibs bear is predominantly billing related. A year ago in June we were paying $165 a month for every movie channel, a HD/DVR box, digital phone and cable internet. In July of 2007 we received our monthly bill in the amount of $300. Yes, that's right almost double what we had been paying the previous twelve months (that shit deserves to be bold).

I ended up calling twice and finally getting an "account specialist" to adjust my bill to $185 a month after making a hollow threat to leave for Direct TV. Their explanation was that we had been on some sort of package deal that was some how saving us $115. It made no sense, but I had resolved the issue and that was all that mattered.

History has a pain in the ass way of repeating itself I guess. As of June 2008 our bill was still $185 a month. Our July bill arrived in the amount of $235 and our August bill came in last week at $265. None of our services had changed, we had not requested anything new and there was no explanation on the bill as to why the cost went up. Simple enough, I assumed Comcast wanted to make this an annual event in the hopes that customers too lazy or timid would not call. Neither of us are that customer.

- Monday, I got on the phone and called at 9:30pm to find that their offices were closed at 9pm.

- Wednesday, I called at 8:15pm, got the run around and had to hang up to take care of other obligations. I promised I would call back the following night to discuss the matter further.

- Thursday, I started calling at 8pm...

Call #1-2: The first two calls I was put on hold for ten minutes before getting a tier 1 representative. Tier 1 reps can talk about what is on your bill and why it is there, but can not change anything. When the tier 1 rep put me on hold for a tier 2 rep who could change my account (see above: account specialist) I was disconnected both times.

Call #3: My third call landed me a tier 1 rep again who sent me to hold for a tier 2. When what I thought was a tier 2 rep picked up it turned out to be a tier 1 again. I Expressed my frustration to this rep and was assured that I would be put in touch with a specialist this time. I held for 5 minutes and was disconnected.

Call #4: Call #4 had me back on the line with a tier 1 and begging to talk to someone who could actually help as it was 8:52pm and I knew they closed at nine. I was put on hold for a tier 2 and finally someone from sales picked up. The guy from sales said he could not help me, but would transfer me to a account specialist who could. I told him the department closed at 9pm and that I wanted to make sure I got someone on the line. He assured me that the department was open 24 hours a day even after I told him about the prerecorded message I had heard Monday. At 8:56pm I was transferred and got the message about the department closing at 9pm.

Call #5: While on hold for call #4 I asked Crystal to call as well in an attempt to double our chances. The tier 1 rep transferred her to the tier 2 department at 8:55pm and she got the closed message.

Call #6: Crystal's final call of the night was made at 8:57pm where upon she got to a tier 1 rep who told her that the account specialist office was closed at 9pm. My loving wife pointed out the simple fact that it was 8:57pm and wondered to the rep if every account specialist left early that night. The rep repeated herself again (in her best monotone put out robot voice) and tried to end the call. Crystal asked to speak to a manager and the rep told her that a manager would tell her the same thing and could not make account changes. The rep then wished Crystal good night and hung up.

- Friday came and Crystal had the day off. She called mid day and went from a tier 1 to a tier 2 the first try. She decided to downgrade our package and drop the digital phone. When the phone call was nearly complete the line disconnected. Having had enough phone calls to Comcast in one lifetime she decided to drive up to the Richmond office. When she arrived she got in line exchanged the combo internet/phone modem for just and internet one and got an estimate for what our monthly bill would be ($125 by the way).

When she arrived home she hooked up the new modem and the internet did not work anymore. She called Comcast repair and was told she had two options.

1. Remove the plan downgrade, get a chance to fix the internet and be transferred to a tier 2 rep who could reapply the downgrade.

2. Wait till August 5th (4 days without internet) for the plan downgrade to go through their system and then get a chance to fix the internet.

Frustrated she choose door number two in the hopes that I could fix it when I got home from work. When I did arrive home I made sure everything was hooked up properly (it was) and called the same repair department she had earlier. I actually got a competent person on the phone and had the internet fixed in 20 minutes, without any mention of downgrades.

The cable TV in our office stopped working later that night and has not worked all weekend. Crystal called and they assured her that the only way to fix it was by sending out some one to repair it. I am going to call tonight and roll the dice (more like Russian roulette) that I get someone smart on the phone. That or yell at a twenty something who makes $10 an hour.

The icing on this crap cake... Verizon sent us a postcard in the mail starting a two month count down for Fios in our area. You bet your sweet ass I am switching!

It's Too Damn Hot

If, then statements tend to explain most situations with a nice little bow...

If (x=hot as the devils knee pit) Then
--we will not ride bikes
Else
--we will ride bikes
End If

Simple enough right. It has been crazy hot in Richmond this July and as such my riding has taken a nose dive. My mileage log is down right embarrassing...

February: 46.6 miles
March: 82.25 miles
April: 121.42 miles
May: 135.22 miles
June: 134.02 miles
July: 39.6 miles

2008 Year to Date: 559.11 miles

August will probably be more of the same unfortunately. The earlier I have to get up to beat the heat the less inclined I am to ride given my proclivity to sleeping in. By ten in the ante meridiem it is already too hot to ride most days anyway.

Images
A google image search of all things hot, heat, steamy, etc yield near naked and fully naked women. Half the search terms you put in have this result, the internet has porn on it, who knew? A search for all things temperature, sun, etc yield pictures that belong on science fair posters. Tough day to find a header.

Slash Played
I was listening to a podcast the other day and heard a discussion about the total amount of time spent in WoW across all of your characters lifetimes (/played). A listener had written in with a total just one day shy of 365, meaning they had spent one human year out of the four years that WoW has been out in the game. Pretty scary to consider. Mine was 85 days and 23 hours across five characters.