1 or 2 HOchieS

Before the New Thing Without a Special Designation Arrives...A Celebratory Send Off of that Old Thing with the Special Designation

2012-02-19T04:23:00.000-05:00

Barring any madness, in a few days from now I will be the proud owner of a PsVita, gifted to me by my Brother Bunji as a Christmas presento-pyo for 2011.

As with most of my Sony products and electronics in general, there may have to be a replacement of said unit before the year is up as I am notoriously known for my bad electronic luck.

There'll be days of excitement as with any launch of new game system hardware for me as I play exciting new entries, have heartbreak playing others and the simple entertainment I get with outfitting a new system with junk.

Until such time, I'd like to take a moment to reflect on 45009, the Japanese Limited Edition Final Fantasy VII PSP bundle I sold bits of my life for to save from Ebay in 2008.

For nearly four years, I've had little 45009. He went from being in a clear plastic case, showing off his beautiful art to a hard metal case showcasing Star Wars and some cleverly placed stickers.

In looking at his UMD case cover, it's clear he has seen better days. The scratches and scuffs of being carried around in my bag are all there as ugly reminders that his case broke and he became susceptible to my heavy commute to and from work daily, being jostled about amongst a slew of other items. He sure did travel a lot though, even making it to Trinidad and Tobago in 2009.

Dangling off his shell (because for some reason, a love of rice and cellphone straps represent my half-Asian blood best) are straps from Patapon, an Ulqiuorra strap I purchased whilst in Japan and a creepy metal hand replica of Allen Walker's hand in D. Gray-Man. That thing freaks H1 out to this day but I guess you'd be creeped out too if I decided to scratch your arm with it like I do to her.

45009 was initially used quite heavily for Naruto and Bleach watching, amongst other anime I watched during my stints in 2008 and 2009. It afforded me long sleepless morning commutes anxiously watching Monster (the best anime and best in television EVER).

Gaming wise, some of the best games I've played in recent years (and ever) were a part of its library. I discovered some new series to love like Patapon and last year, played the ultra fabulous revamp of Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together.

Looking at my PSP game list does not reveal a library as extensive as my DS but that's not a downer on the quality of the games I've played on it as almost all I've played thus far gave me great memories (except maybe Hexyz Force. Psh).

Eventually my PSP will be phased out but as with any console, the games will be cheap and I'll get to play it longer as I build up my library.

So it's not really farewell or it cannot be at least until Sony decides to give us that blasted Passport Program where I can re-buy my games I already own for a small fee. Damn you, Sony! Don't you want my extra money?! I'm willing to give it to you even though you should be making it a free program, you jerks!

But in case I forget to do so when the time comes and sneaks up on me: thanks pretty silver thing.

Thanks for draining the battery every time you weren't in use and making me re-enter system systems for date and time upon turn on.

Thanks for that awful whirring noise you make in your UMD slot when a game is loading. It scares me every time.

Thanks for letting me be the Great Znyx, leader of the Patapons and all-round fantastic deity.

Thanks for making me cry when Zack Fair took his final breath even though I knew it was coming 10 years prior to seeing his story fleshed out.

Thanks for Moogle Mail via Dissidia.

Thanks for the giggles with H1 as we watched Kon, swooned over our favourite Soul Society Captains, and sang J-Pop songs together from some of the opening and closing themes.

Thanks for traumatizing me with Monster. No, really. Thanks. It gives me ammunition and has given me ammunition to torture others or at least, give Bughie J. something amazing to watch too.

Thanks for one of the best games I've ever played in Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together. I think I may have thanked you for that before but you know, thanks again because it really was pretty great.

Thanks for helping me finish Final Fantasy Tactics, only 12 years in the making when I finally did I might add. That allowed me to open up to play a whole new genre of games with the confident boost I got. Wooo! Well...I still suck at them... but FFTactis is done and was amazing.

Thanks for keeping me entertained on the train these past few mornings and evenings whilst I play Trails in the Sky. Thanks for same during my those long hours spent at the hospitals with Brother Bunji as he had his tests and subsequent successful surgery done. (Thanks to H1 and the Super Mario 3D Land for time spent too though. Stop hogging all the credit, PSP!).

But most importantly, thanks for helping to steady and occupy my mind if even for an hour a day during this less than pleasant week as we go through our difficult time with the senseless tragic loss of one of our cousins. It's been a downright shitty week but the fleeting distractions when able were welcome.

Currently listening to: "Tears of the Moon" by Nobuo Uematsu, from the Final Fantasy VIII Original Soundtrack.

Ridiculous Sightings in Retail

2012-02-18T11:18:00.002-05:00

These were some toys H1 and I spotted over Christmas last year at the Wholesale Club BJ's.

They seem...I don't know, a little bit racist maybe?

Just us?

2012-02-18T10:48:00.000-05:00

To our cousin who is being buried today,

Your family will miss you and we love you.

We always will.

Adventures in Restaurant Week, 2012: Michael Jordan's Steakhouse

2012-02-12T10:29:00.005-05:00

It was back to Grand Central for our second outing in Restaurant Week last Friday. This time we ventured across the way from Cipriani Dolci to Michael Jordan's Steakhouse.

Truth be told, Aims spotted this menu's offering and I was sold on dessert. Toffee pudding? Why yes, I do have an recently developed insane, frightening obsession with sticky toffee pudding.

Though, would I really suffer through a meal just to get to dessert? Hardly and luckily, that was not the case by the looks of the dinner menu.

Michael Jordan's Restaurant's space is beautiful. It's not cluttered, unlike Cipriani Dolci's which is extremely tight and with the crowds feels that much worse. There's a bar area which seemed pretty lively and crowded. Then there was the dining area that sat under enormous, gorgeous chandeliers that could crush a small village if it were to fall upon unfortunate souls.

A row of them, set up to destroy everything and everyone under them if need be.

Joking aside, goodness forbid that one ever falls. That would completely horrible.

With Aims, Luuuiiiisss and H1, there were enough mouths to partake of the different selections for appetizer. The no brainer was to have the chicken liver and fois gras mousse but the good news was that H1 was present and she chose that. It was so damned creamy and yummy (for me, caramelized onions aside though H1 assures me that cut the livery taste of the pate) and there was a nice portion size of it. Though, there needed to be more toast. Luckily there was extra bread on the table.

bread basket - salted bread, and onion bread

H1's appetizer: chicken liver and fois gras mousse

Luuiiiissss went with the artichoke and goat cheese salad. I did not try any but it looked good and I believe he expressed same.

It looks...like a salad. I do like how those tomatoes are brightly coloured though.

I went with the tomato bisque and grilled cheese croutons because grilled cheese croutons just sound awesome. When my appetizer came, it was a lot more fantastic than I anticipated. The colour of the bisque was beautiful while I was extremely excited to see exactly what the grilled cheese crouton was.

Wait for it...

Wait for iiittttt....

Extreme Close Up!!!!!! Oo, perhaps too extreme.

Rich, creamy and delightful, I could have sat there and eaten bisque alone for dinner. I wonder if X ever had it before from here or somewhere else. X, have you? This had you written all over it. Sadly, I left my crouton hanging out for too long and it was a bit soft but whatever, it still made that particular bite of bisque to be even more amazing that it already was.

Clearly at this point, I was excited to eat my entree. My favourite cut of meat has to be the ribeye and the filet was not really moving me too much but my other options were to have a beef stew with winter vegetables or grilled yellow fin tuna. Both of those sound decent but I'm at a steakhouse and one that I've never tried before, so the obvious choice for all of us was to go with the steak.

So, we all did but chose different sides. Aims went with baby glazed carrots which were so cute that it was almost sad to eat them. I felt sorry for the little carrots, H1. Didn't you?

H1 went with the five cheese potato gratin. I didn't try any but I was told it was not heated as much as it could have been and was a bit on the cold side. Taste wise, I think it may have been just okay and not something to rush out and get again.

It's layered nice though

See?

Luuuiiisss and I both went with the cauliflower with truffle oil. Roasted with a nice crunch and bite to them and of course, tasty thanks to some truffle oil, I rather enjoyed my cauliflower.

But who needs any of that stuff when there's lobster mac and cheese? At $26 off the regular menu (not offered for restaurant week and at that price, you know why), it was beyond creamy and beyond awesome. The HOchieS are not big fans of lobster as we prefer the sweeter crab. But after having some fabulous lobster mac and cheese at Capital Grille, we may be making it our life mission to try lobster mac and cheese wherever it may be at various restaurants. Michael Jordan's Steakhouse's lobster mac and cheese was not as good as we remember at Capital Grille's but then they may have 'cheated' by using harvati. I'm not sure what was in MJ's but it was good too and not to be too down on. It was pretty damned good in its own right with huge chunks of lobster that would have made any lobster fan be quite pleased.

So the steak itself...again, I'm a ribeye fan. Everyone thought the steak was really good. It was enough meat at 6 ounces and lightly seasoned to showcase the meat. That's all you can really ask for but a little unfortunate thing happened. It seems that Luuuiiiisss got my medium rare steak that I ordered and got his medium. By the time I realized what had happened, he was three quarter way done with his meal (you know, I was busy taking pictures and what not and he was starving). It was a disappointment for me and I didn't enjoy it. But, I guess if we ever go back, I'll have a ribeye and will be better able to judge a steak.

Finally, the time had come for toffee pudding.

Surrounded by blueberries and oh so cute with its sticky sauce and polished off with some cream, I dug in and...! Man, the taste was good but it wasn't gooey warm and sticky. What the hell! Having just had an amazing sticky toffee pudding at the Peekskill Brewery at the end of last year (or beginning, whenever), I was sad. The taste was good on Michael Jordan's toffee pudding but oh so heart-wrenching. ::sniff:: Well, at least it was beautiful to look at and wasn't a total loss.

H1 had the carrot cake which was plentiful but not that good. It was weirdly dense and cold. I thought it wasn't too bad but maybe it was the cream on top talking to be honest.

It was a pretty good meal overall, I'd wager. And of course, the greatness of being right in Grand Central Terminal meant that we did not have to worry much about catching our train home or scrambling to find a schedule to look up what with the main board right across from our view.

And that's it for NYC's Restaurant Week 2012 (Winter, anyway). Next up is Hudson Valley's Restaurant Week in March, so we'll see what we can do about that.

For My Own Benefit

2012-02-08T21:29:00.000-05:00

I've got an incredibly shoddy memory now and thus, I'm putting this as a log here to list all the games I'm looking forward to playing/purchasing this year.

I know that's what Amazon Wish Lists are for but mine can get a slightly out of control, so I'll just leave this here.

1. Animal Crossing 3DS
2. Luigi's Mansion 2 (3DS)
3. Kid Icarus: Uprising (3DS)
4. Resident Evil: Revelations (3DS)
5. Uncharted: Golden Abyss (PSVita)
6. Sumioni (PSVita)
7. Sound Shapes (PSVita)
8. Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 (DS)
9. Resident Evil 6 (PS3)
10.. FFXIII-2 (when it's cheap) (PS3)
11. The Last of US (PS3) (but more so I just want to own it when it's cheap, because I might be too scared to play)
12. Jak & Daxter HD Collection (PS3)
13. Lollipop Chainsaw (PS3)

That's all I can think of at the moment. I can't say I'm really looking forward to much. But, I'm sure this list will grow a lot. Psh. Now let's see if I can remember to refer to it throughout the year.

The Unexpected Friday

2012-02-07T07:00:00.000-05:00

Our Friday plans did not go as planned.

There was supposed to be a dinner at Brasserie 8 1/2 but as the day wore on, work happened and other crazy stories involving a certain Frass happened (but best of luck to you!) and dinner was canceled.

It happens and that's that but H1 and I still managed to find some amusement after work obligations.

What we found was a "safe" haven in preparation for the future Zombie Apocalypse, Fandango Paper Bags getting the Handbag treatment, cutie owls in retail and Bitler.

In our ongoing series for preparation in Our Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, which many of you have chosen to ignore, H1 and I have continued to find plot our escape and scope out suspicious activity in Grand Central Terminal.

On Friday, we found one such suspicious thing.

We see some folks at Grand Central have been prepping and start construction on something but don't they freakin' know that zombies can climb ladders?! Not very smart, folks. A re-design is in order.

At Grand Central's main hall, we sighted some ridiculous things in retail. Apparently, those Fandango Bags have moved up in the world and are high class now. Good for them, I say.

Ooo, and they love me. Well I cannot say the feeling is mutual but thank you.

We also saw some owls. They're not ridiculous but too cute not to share. Owls are awesome like that....

...Most owls anyway except maybe the Cosmic Owl. I'm not sure how I feel about him yet.

So as of late, I have been getting in a quick bit of news before work from ABC news and Good Morning America. The team of people at both news sources are fun and very likeable. Thus, it confused me when I saw what someone had done a promo poster for ABC News Channel 7 and more specifically to Bill Evans, weather personality.

To use the term coined by H1...

...someone made him into "Bitler".

Currently listening to: "End Credits 1" by Tsuyoshi Sekito, from the Ape Escape Original Soundtrack.

Picture of the Week

2012-02-06T05:00:00.000-05:00

It was Papa HOchie's Birthday this week.

We got him a cake. What kind? It's a secret...

Currently listening to: "Giruvegan Mystery" by a whole bunch of people from the Final Fantasy XII Original Soundtrack.

Let's Recap: Pork + Birthday = Tasty Love

2012-02-05T08:52:00.001-05:00

What better way to celebrate a Birthday than with pork? (Answers to Rhetorical question need not apply).

It's true that Momma HOchie loves us. However, I am beginning to suspect that she may love Papa HOchie the most and why shouldn't she?

Well...I mean, he did deny her rum cake at the airport in Trinidad that one time... perhaps she forgot that little incident but who am I to remind her? Especially when I would not have wanted to deny myself a participation in the awesome time meal that she prepared for him for his Birthday on Thursday last.

When we got home, we were greeted by Chinese style West Indian food of the epic variety.

Roast belly pork? Yes, please.

Black Beans belly pork? Hells yes, please.

Steamed egg with ground shrimp and pork? Need I even give an answer?

Shrimp chop suey? Is there pork? No? Well...yeah, okay. I'll still eat some.

Chinese style Roasted Chicken? Wait...what? CHICKEN?! Madness! Get that outta here!

While those pictures may not have meant a lot to some and not the best pictures to represent just how fantastic a meal it was, I can assure you it was freaking awesome.

And in so, in recapping we have discovered that pork makes the world a better place. Chicken, on the other hand, is an unnecessary type of thing when there's pork present. But...oh, I see. Mom didn't forget about the denial of rum cake after all and it's all evident by the presence of some chicken that she fed Dad.

Duly noted.

Currently listening to: "Hohoho" by Orange Range.

The End of Year Review III: Video Games 2011, Part III

2012-02-05T08:19:00.001-05:00

Finally, the Top 10 in my very late End of Year Reviews for 2011: Video Games.

Let's just get to them, shall we?

10. Catherine

Developer: Atlus Persona Team

Publisher: Atlus

Play Time: ?

Status: Unfinished

The minute this game started, I loved the style of it. From the very cool soundtrack to the sharp animation and the settings, it oozed style. The presentation of a play/tv show/theatre house was interesting and then things got nightmarish.

I knew going in this was supposed to be a horror sort of game. It's not Resident Evil scary but monsters lurked and the urban legend was laid out.

At the heart of it, Catherine is a game about relationships and the choices your character Vincent makes. Would he be a cheater or an honest man committed to his girlfriend? It sounds dull and while I found a lot of the questions to be very black and white and a clear indication of how you can mold Vincent, it really was a lot more interesting than I am able to explain.

I loved the male characters in this game. Well, I liked some of them anyway but I do have a serious problem with the two main female characters who were Vincent's "love interests". The goal is to choose and demonstrate Vincent's moral fiber but quite frankly, both Katherine and Catherine are such horrible people that I really don't want to be committed to either. One is bossy and one is annoyingly high pitched and whorish, not to mention crazy.

The actual gameplay is a series of block puzzles that Vincent has to climb during his nightmares to get to the top and to safety. At the end of every night, he is chased by his greatest fears or warped versions of his desires as he climbs those god forsaken blocks. Right now I'm stuck on the Sixth of Eight nights, I believe. I'm headed towards a relationship with Katherine but I wish I could be neutral. Can I? I'm not even sure. The puzzles themselves take a lot of trying, failing and falling to my death. It's a tough game and while I do not mind the puzzle game, obviously the main meat of the game is the story.

Music Review (Shoji Meguro): The soundtrack is made up of some classical pieces of music that have been remixed but not to the point of being unrecognizable in some cases. They're layered with a thin bit of just the right amount of modernized beats and additions of rock. The music fits in for those fast-paced puzzles that have to be solved. It's a modern sounding soundtrack embracing the classical and a good representation of the skin of the game - a modern story set in a grand, theatrical operatic scenery in the nightmare mode.

Song(s) Worth Listening to: "Mussorgksy - Picture at an Exhibition (The Hut on Fowl's Legs)" and "Bach - 'Little' Fugue in G Minor"

9. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D

Developer: Nintendo EAD, Grezzo

Publisher: Nintendo

Play Time: June 19, 2011 through July 4, 2011; 36 hours, 38 minutes (I think my 3DS Activity Log is lying to me!)

Status: Finished

I am not cheating! I played the original way back when and yes, this deserves to be on here again. The game got a fresh coat of paint by being in 3D and through the use of the stereoscopic controls. I had not played Ocarina of Time in quite the while and playing it again last Summer was like playing a whole new fabulous game. It's never been my favourite Zelda game with that spot reserved for Mask of Majora but that's not to say it's an awful game either. It's not and far from it.

The game just ran smoothly thanks to the enhanced graphics and the improved item inventory. The experience was enjoyable although I still really hate the Jabu Jabu level with a young Princess Ruto. Everything after that was fantastic to play through. The Water Temple was amazingly easy and so much more enjoyable in design.

The Forest Temple was even more of a brilliant wonder than I remembered and I loved that thing the first time around. The Darkness dungeon was still really scary and even more so, with zombies jumping on my back giving the nightmares I had forgotten I had so many years ago.

I'm still not sold on the 3D of the 3DS but the use of it in Zelda gave the game more depth and to my surprise made it even more compelling. Of course, there are complaints on the 3D. Without being able to use the 3D from any angle other than straight on, I found myself having a tough time during a boss fight while using the gyroscope. It was fun moving the entire system around to look for secrets and hidden skultullas but it was no fun during a boss fight and I had to shut off the 3D as it was just not feasible a use.

I thoroughly enjoyed playing this again even more so than I did the first time. I can only hope that Mask of Majora gets the same treatment.

8. Uncharted 3

Developer: Naughty Dog

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Play Time: About 12 hours

Status: Finished (medium difficulty)

For the entire year I was incredibly excited to play UC3 after the fantastic Uncharted 2. How could I not be? UC2 is one of the best games I've ever played especially after improving so radically over the first part. While Uncharted 3 was no where near a horrible game, part 2 was so near perfect that it was hard for UC3 to do anything significantly different as an improvement and for that reason I was a tad disappointed.

What was a strong factor in the game was Sully and Nate's relationship and story wise, I found that to be a great focus and a step forward in the story. In fact, there was not much Uncharted could do but have a very heavy character driven story. Well, other than show off various locations and the acute sense of detail Naughty Dog put into building levels around the world.

The settings are what makes this game impressive and cinematic. However, much in the vein of how I come to expect beautiful art and cinematography from Square in the Final Fantasy series, I know I can come to expect same from Naughty Dog. The company does it well and certainly it is jaw-dropping at times but otherwise, I am happy enough just to be hanging out with one of my favourite characters, Nathan Drake.

And so, I look forward especially to what sort of thrills the game can present me with and what sort of danger I can expect to be in.

For some of the levels, I was truly impressed. I had "oh shit" moments and moments of wow. The jaunt on the pirate ship felt suspenseful and absolutely crazy just to name one instance. The other thing I loved was controlling Drake under his drug state early in the game. It was a disorienting experience for me as a player and completely cool 'getting into Drake's head'.

Near the end too with the ***SPOILER ALERT*** supposed demons, the animation was so fantastic and Drake's reactions were fabulous.

I played a few levels after I had finished the game the first time and realized that one problem with this game was the overuse of some 'danger' scenes. I don't know how many times Drake was dangling from a broken stair and the camera panned to looking down into a fiery pit of hell. These were things I did not notice the first time around but the second time it was pointed out so clearly that it was boring. And yes, I suppose the adrenaline going the first time really helped with the excitement but sitting back and enjoying the scenery the second time made it really annoying. Certainly these scenes were done to showcase the fantastic camera angles, filming and art direction use by Naughty Dog - and oh yes, were the camera angles in this game just dynamic - but Naughty Dog, don't overuse an already awesome trick because then it just cheapens the experience.

All in all, an impressive game that I needed to lower my expectations for to truly enjoy it all. That's the unfortunate curse coming off of Uncharted 2 I guess.

7. Kirby's Mass Attack

Developer: Hal Laboratories

Publisher: Nintendo

Play Time: November 1, 2011 through November 17, 2011; 27 hours

Status: Finished

Nintendo continues to design games with the most innovative, clever and fun levels that you did not even know you needed or could exist. This year I really got into Kirby than previous years. Mass Attack was a fun, crazy cute game that was exciting, colourful and charming.

Every level was crafted with fun in mind and getting medals took you to little nooks and crannies tucked away with fun ways to reach them. It's what Nintendo does best and exploration is their thing. Using 10 Kirbys was hella fun. They were some serious hooligans though! I found it hilarious how they would beat the shit out of enemies with little pink pummeling, furious fists and unassuming cutie voices.

Kirby's one adorable little pink ball of joy and there's nothing not to love about him and this game except maybe the length of the actual game. For a while there near the end, I was getting pretty tired of find all the medals to get a complete game. But, pressed on I did and I had some of the best fun playing this game last year.

Oh, did I mention the mini-games were great too? I rocked Kirby Pinball like nobody's business.

Music Review (Shogo Sakai): Cute, appropriate and some really good pieces, actually - the music was incredibly enjoyable. Even for a cutie game like Mass Attack there were moments of stress when encountering your enemies, The Skullies, and the music was tense when need be.

6. The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Anniversary Edition

Developer:Nintendo, Capcom, Grezzo
Publisher: Nintendo
Play Time: September 29, 2011 and ongoing; <35 hours
Status: Unfinished. Um, we're kinda stuck on the Heroes' Trial. Someone seems to think that as the game goes on, their skill level increases. While that may be true, I think they may not realize that the game increases in difficulty as well. I'm still laughing to this day.

If I had to name the most fun times had with a game in 2011, this would be it. Why? Because H1 and I spent glorious hours on the train playing through the levels. There were a couple of mornings where we played too much and took ourselves all the way to our last stop instead of catching up on those extra minutes of sleep.

It was some of the best times I've spent playing any game because sharing the laughs, the fighting to collect rupees, being annoying to each other, knocking each other over ledges and working together like good shistahs was something I do not often get to do and it was all rewarding. It was rewarding to be able to share a favourite series with her - to let her see the extreme care built into designing a Zelda game and despairing that you're stuck until the light bulb goes off and you realize that it took some genius to get out of a particular room.

Last year was the 25th Anniversary for The Legend of Zelda, and this was one way Nintendo celebrated the series with its fans by giving a free copy of the game to all those with the capabilities to download it. It was a welcome gift and the best I received all year. It was a joy to be a part of the celebrations (still going on too - hopefully a concert will be coming to NYC!) and to journey with Link, Zelda and H1.

5. Radiant Historia

Developer:Atlus
Publisher: Atlus
Play Time: July 31, 2011 through August 22, 2011; 44 hours, 3 minutes
Status: Finished

Music, a character driven story, and an interwoven plot of destruction and despair spread across two timelines in alternate universes made Radiant Historia an intriguing play. Actual combat may have been the weakest link this game had but could be partially overlooked due to the strength of its story. There were plenty of optional side quests and in this game, elements and clues you picked up in one time line affected the other or had to be used to advance the story in the other.

You got to see what would happen if you took the right fork instead of the left and if you ended in failure, you had the chance to rewind time to figure out what the hell it was you did wrong. The options were not always clear to steer you towards the good ending and that was a welcome aspect of the game, even if it did make me feel a little bit anxious every time I had to make a critical choice.

I really liked the main character, Stocke. He was deadpan and good looking (of course, they usually are) but a cold man and good at being an assassin in the special corps. The supporting cast each had their own little paths to follow that you could muck up or make right and while I cannot say I really cared for anyone, it's not that I totally wanted to dismiss them either. But it was the story that truly took center stage and it involved Stocke's fate completely.

The other thing I really liked about this game was that there was no real love interest for your main character. There are too many games out there, much like how Hollywood operates, that ruins things with a love story. Really? There's no need for that stuff when it's an afterthought or not done well (not you Uncharted series - I actually care about Drake and Elena, so good job!).

In this, the bond was between brother and sister and it was gutting. The entire reasoning behind everything that happened was heart-wrenching and in truth, it left your main villain in a position to be sympathized with. Of course, I like my villains crazy with a purpose, so I wasn't sad to cut his ass at the end but still - he was human and wronged, and that made the game that much more enjoyable.

Music Review (Yoko Shimomura): Yoko Shimomura makes another beautiful, haunting soundtrack with this one. This was one of the best soundtracks for 2011 with intense battle music, and mostly haunting set pieces evoking the depressed mood of the game. The entire game is set in despair with the feeling of oppression and a struggle for survival and the music reflects this emotion in its core.

Song(s) Worth Listening to: "The Edge of Green", "The Melody Connecting the World", "The Red Locus" and "Memories of the World".

4. Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride

Developer: Chunsoft, ArtePiazza
Publisher: Square Enix
Play Time: October 2, 101 through October 25, 2011; 45 hours, 51 minutes
Status: Finished

Here is my problem with Dragon Quest games: they often confuse me with their weird little seemingly initial stand alone stories that offer no real direction.

Here is what I love about Dragon Quest games: they may confuse me at first but they're charming and whimsical. The stand alone stories while an abrupt introduction eventually start to come together and form a great overall adventure. They're fun, familiar, funny, full of heart and sometimes dismal.

Dragon Quest V had one of the oddest openings to a game I have ever played. It was odd in an interesting way - engaging and kind of what the eff-ish. You are born; your father has a moment of joy in which he and his wife argue about your name (which of course you as a player get to choose and hear how it's not that good) and then tragedy strikes because your mother is taken away in a confusing flash of light and you really have no idea what the hell is going on.

You awake and you say you've had a dream that you're a prince in a castle and that you were born to your king father and queen mother and your raggedy brutish strong respected father laughs and tells you you're funny. You (as the player) know damned well it's true and off you go as a young boy, following your father around the world as he does mindless jobs for kings and lives in a humble village with your less than politically corrected presented Mexican servant (the very same from the kingdom you 'dreamt' about) with his thick heavy accent.

What's weird about DQV was the adventuring as a child. I mean, you're 6 and you can't yet read. it made for some fabulous moments of danger. I DO NOT THINK I have ever adventured at such a young age before and the doom awaiting your father which you know it sure to come has you on the edge of your seat.
What was great about DQV was the way the game expanded generations. You adventured through beginning as a child, to your adulthood and then with your own children.

Probably what's even more spectacular about this game is that you aren’t really the hero, at least not the Legendary Hero that the world has been waiting for but you do have just the right blood to mix with the person who does and you give birth to a son who is. Of course you know, really that you’re the one kicking ass at the end of the story but it was a nice, non-cliched kind of twist to the story.

There were some genuinely brutal things in this game and probably one of the most shocking things I’ve experienced in gaming was the entire bit about turning into a statue. It’s not shocking that I turned the statue. What was shocking was the disgusting things that happened to my wife when she was a stone statue. It is implied that she was molested and wow. That was heavy.

Dragon Quest V was simple enough in its design, and in that I think most of the series (at least what I've played) are not combat taxing. But that's not really the point is it? There's just something really endearing about the DQ series and this one was no different. I think of the games I've played thus far, DQIX remains my favourite but V is up there with it for its shocking and odd storytelling.

3. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective

Developer: Capcom
Publisher:Capcom
Play Time: January 20, 2011 through January 25, 2011
Status: Finished

The minute I started up this game, literally, the first minute, I knew I would like it if only for it’s quirky, dark comedy humour. I loved my red clad, blonde tall haired, shade-wearing main character. He was smooth looking much like all of this game. This was a good detective story with so many elements thrown in with no character a gloss over. As the chapters went on, it was clear that everyone is important and there were a lot of complicated tie ins. Nothing is black and white in the story with no relationship meaningless and there’s a twist around every bend that added so much depth in every moment, even down to the final moments of game play.

The writing was incredibly sharp, so clever and full on wit.

Not all puzzles are straightforward either, with some more pressing than others that forced you to go down to the wire to complete a task. For a change of pace, the elements are made fresh later on when you get help from a little ghost friend that opens up new possibilities with a simple addition of a game mechanic (new ghost tricks!).

The characters are unique (Inspector Cabanela’s got some serious style there with his white coat wearing ways) and everyone’s too damned cool and completely outrageous.

It’s not just characters' looks but their movements that added to their personalities - they would slide, dance and run across the screen - making this one of the most beautiful games I’ve played on the DS and in fact, ever. They fit perfectly in their surroundings and everything just blended into the utmost cool style. The game felt heavy and dark but vibrant in presentation. The outlandish members of the cast could annoy, while making you chuckle.

The story is fabulous and misleading with twists and turns you don’t quite see coming which culminate all so you can find out who you really are and why you’re dead. Nothing is as it seems and this murder mystery (uh, multiple murder mystery - there are so many headcounts it’s unreal) just kept getting unravelled, tied up again at a breakthrough point, and more complicated until it’s all revealed in one sad, touching, teary-eyed ending.

I love me (my character). I love Yomiel and I love that I took his form. He’s a great character - both the real and the ‘me’ Sissel. His ghost movements were creepy, when he went mechanical he was menacing and I loved it all. I loved his smile, I loved his ridiculous hair, and I love his red sense of dress. He’s got murder written all over him and it's awesome.

Music Review (Masazaku Sugimori): Due to the fact that in order to perform your ghost tricks, the clock was rewound to four minutes before each person's death, it usually meant you were scrambling to figure out what the heck to do. It was intense and so is the music during these times. Then there are the pieces that are just cool and smooth to represent their characters. It's a fun soundtrack to be sure in the vein of the sort of mystery music one would expect to hear in a cop show or something at times.

2. Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together

Developer: Quest, Square Enix
Publisher: Square Enix
Play Time: February 26, 2011 through April 19, 2011; 41+ hours
Status: Finished

I LOVED this game. A story full of twists, my not-so nice-guy decisions for nearly impossible choices wrought with shades of grey, the blood on my hands and atrocities of the War was beyond engaging and an example of writing at its best. I never had the good fortune to play the original version but was quite pleased to own this re-release. Honestly, this game is one of the best games out there and should not be missed.

While I surprisingly did okay during the majority of the main campaign, I appreciate the ending. It was a challenging end that caused me to loose my powerhouse black Mages and I got my ass handed to me after ruling most battles for so long. Usually nothing frustrates me more than having to go back and level up some more but that was not the case in this instance. It certainly made me sweat and while frustrating, it was completely memorable.

I did have a complaint though and I'm not even sure what the hell the designers were thinking and that was purchasing equipment. I could not outfit a character with equipment and had to blindly buy power ups only to find out it might not have worked so well. It was odd and almost makes me think maybe I was doing something wrong?

Music Review (Masaharu Iwata, Hitoshi Sakimoto): What fine composers Masaharu Iwata and Hitoshi Sakimoto are. They're probably two of my favourite composers with a very recognizable style. They masterfully enhance game play with the use of dark pieces to aptly express the depths of undercover plots and unholy alliances between parties. Then there are the more cheery, epic pieces that help envision your entire layout of the land and the battles to endure whether held on the grassy plain in the sunshine or in a dusty valley. And of course, let us not forget the pieces that alert you to the fact that there's dark arts and trouble brewing - they are seriously nothing short of amazing and intense compositions that instill fear in me.

The original soundtrack got an upgrade and the in-game notes from the composers on what they did to the pieces was a fantastic extra for an already amazing game.

Song(s) Worth Listening to: The entire blasted soundtrack. It's the best soundtrack to any game I played this year but you insist I make a suggestion or two, then go with these... "Theme of Black Knight", "Chivalry and Savagery", "Agitation", "Footsteps from Darkness", "Viking Spirits" and the not to be missed at all track, "Blasphemous Experiment".

****WARNING: SERIOUS SPOILERS FOR THE NUMBER ONE GAME!!!!****

1. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Developer: Nintendo EAD, Monolith Soft
Publisher: Nintendo
Play Time: November 27, 2011 through January 29, 2012; I'm calling between 50 - 60 hours, if not a tad more.
Status: Finished

In my history of playing video games, not only is The Legend of Zelda: Mask of Majora the best Zelda game I've played in the series but perhaps the best game I've played ever.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword has ushered itself as a close second in the series.

Before I get into the details of why I loved it so, I will say that it's not a perfect game and had its fair share of flaws.

The single most annoying thing about this game was the character Fi. I am one to ignore annoying things but Nintendo made that extremely difficult for me to do. I never found Navi in Ocarina of Time to be annoying but Fi... oh, Fi. It's not that she harassed me every minute to tell me something but it was the fact that she harassed me to tell me the painfully obvious. It was unnecessary hand holding that I'm not sure Nintendo felt the need to include.

Then there was the bit about her face during the singing scenes. What the hell was that? It was pained, unnatural and just terrible animation. And for a beautiful game it really was stilted and jarring to see. It was cringe worthy.

The harp was not the most fun instrument to play either. Every game since Ocarina of Time had much more engaging instruments to 'play'. And while this was the first to make use of the motion plus controller to sort of imitate playing an instrument instead of inputting a series of commands, it was not an exciting thing to do.

And then there were mini-games. I did not feel compelled to play them because again, they were not fun. Even the Archery game was very underwhelming and being a master of the bow and arrow, that saddened me most of all.

Despite the negatives, Skyward Sword did everything else right.

The art direction was beautiful. Before release, I was not moved by the character designs but I forgot all that once I started playing. The art is incredible and displays like an impressionists' canvas. In the distance as Link ran, you could see the landscape before you as one beautiful painting. You could sit on a stool in the forest and take it all in and it was truly an amazing sight to see, at all times.

The first few hours were painfully slow in the game and your usual fair, but as I got the meat of the game I sat there and thought to myself that Nintendo really knows how to make a game with care and love stitched into the seams.

The game paid tribute to Zelda games encompassing the 25 years of the Legend before it with little throwbacks to all my favourite Zelda titles whether it was the inclusion of the gust bellows reminiscent of the gust jar in The Minish Cap or running up that pathway to the first cave to go rescue your Loftwing. Did it not remind you of the a similar setting in The Wind Waker?

It was a true love letter and tribute to all the handiwork that came before while creating its own identity because yes, while it stuck with a formula, this game strayed a little bit from that.

How it did it stray? Well, there were some things were genuinely surprising - for instance, meeting the last two dragons at the end of the game. I did not think that took away from the game at all! We got to be friends with the water dragon only to meet the other two later. There’s much to pack in the game's story but while I probably would have liked to see the other dragons, I don’t mind it either. They were a surprise and a good one at that because aren't you just used to meeting someone important in the story that you know is important and will have a big role to play later on even if not revealed right away?

And just when you think you’re off to fight some big evil that flooded the forest, you find out that it was the Water Dragon and her temper that did it all, transforming the woods into something even more magical than before.

One other major welcome idea that was toyed with was the combination of dungeons. For a Forest Dungeon, there was a strange blue tint to the entire thing and did not make it feel like that the greenery of Zelda games past. It was sullen and dangerous with its almost muted colours making it feel like a new direction on what a forest could be in Zelda.

Then there was the sick feeling I got from mixing my worst temple nightmare from Ocarina of Time with many people's worst temple from that same game. Having the Temple of the Dead/Dark Temple sit below the Water Temple was incredibly frightful but it was intriguing, and unexpected. It was nothing short of brilliant even though it gave me some serious anxiety.

And the tools! Let us not forget the awesome use of the tools. In the past, the tools were designed to be used specifically for one temple and with each passing temple or dungeon, you would not even have to use your previous tools to get through the game. They were forgotten and took up space in your inventory because they served their purpose and that was the end of the life span. In this Zelda, tool use was well balanced with no tool forgotten. It made for more thinking in solving various puzzles and was a great implementation.

As previously mentioned, the game looked like beautiful Van Gogh paintings but that's not all. There were some incredibly dynamic scenes in the game that brought the art to life through its movements as an amazing ebb and flow. One such example and possibly the most awe inspiring moment of the game was setting sail on the vast ocean of sand with your time shift stone that when in contact with its surroundings made for a short vicinity around you to turn to waters from the past. It was engaging, beautiful and so magnificent being able to see stretches of sand before you transform into colourful water then leaving the trail behind you of fleeting dust. I have not seen a design so fantastic in a long time or in recent memory. It's truly one of the greatest moments I've experienced in any game.

Not only was the scenery beautiful yet somber at times, but the bosses were genius. The design of the Imprisoned was amazing and it was a beautiful create that moved and felt so alive the first time I encountered it. Each time I had to fight him was more epic than the last with such urgency that it was scary.

There was perhaps one boss I did not care for and that was the cartoonish sea boss on the pirate ship. I felt he did not really fit in but aside from him, every other fight was astonishing. They were fun and pressing - the sort of thing Nintendo knows how to do well in carefully thought out level designs and exciting boss battles.

It certainly held true when I encountered the boss from the Ancient Cistern. I had a total "Oh f*ck, I am utterly screwed" moment and the fact that Link used the bosses' swords against him was that extra plus for pure excitement.

To put it bluntly, the bosses were epic in this game.

As per usual, the level designs were tight which is expected of a Zelda game for the most part and exploration was in full effect. What I really loved too was the inclusion of the Silent Realm challenges. They were scary things that required careful planning with a dose of stress. Adding to the panic was the inclusion of a stamina meter for Link. Those trials had me terrified and tense but rewarding when completed. I particularly liked the Mountain Silent Realm trial that required such precision to get every Tear to be able to proceed.

I have not yet spoken about the characters themselves. Save Fi, everyone was likeable even that freaking Groose later in the game. Zelda herself (and props to someone on a discussion on a forum that I read) was mostly not in need of saving and was off on her own adventure. In past years, Zelda's role has been more front and center to aid Link in some way which I liked and in this it even more intriguing. Her deception was heart breaking and made for a fantastic scene between Link and Zelda that was touching and made me shed a little tear.

And of course, let us not forget Link. I loved this Link. I love all Links, truthfully. This Link though was so charming, so wicked with his naughty tendencies (or at least, I allowed him to be kind of mischievous in certain side quests) and his facial expressions were the best. Link showed real emotion from anger, apprehension, caring, understanding and determination. He was fabulous.

Music Review (Hajime Wakai, Shiho Fuji, Mahito Yokota, Takeshi Hama, Koji Kondo): It was a beautifully orchestrated soundtrack. Honestly, I know it was good and that I was not offended in any way but I just can't recall anything specific about it at the moment.

Honorable Mention(s):

Find Mii, Find Mii 2

Developer: Nintendo EAD
Publisher: Nintendo
Play Time: March 28, 2011 and ongoing
Status: Unfinished

In 2011 I got a Nintendo 3DS system. I love my 3DS a lot and did not feel it a failed purchase for me as I used it almost daily for the past year. Okay, so I played a lot of DS games on it but yeah yeah, whatevs. If you may recall, I have games on my End of Year review that were high up on my list, thank you kindly.

But one of the things I really enjoy about the 3DS is the Street Pass feature. I like taking a peek into the virtual lives of fellow Miis and as of this date, I have about 172 Miis hanging out in my plaza.

What was also exciting about Street Pass was the mini-RPG Find Mii. On a very basic level, it's your standard RPG with a fun way to collect a bunch of Nintendo themed hats. Outfitting your Mii with these hats won after clearing a level in the dungeon has been charming and rewarding. Utilizing the coin collection feature acquired from a pedometer built into the system, I can hire heroes to save myself from the clutches of evil ghosts or meet others on the street via Street Pass to fight my battles for me.

It's a cute, interactive idea and even more fun when you meet more than one Mii once or meet Miis from other countries. For my own data, I've met 2 people from Japan, 1 from Spain and 1 from the UK. It's been a fun journey that I am currently continuing in the sequel Find Mii 2 which has an increased challenge and the opportunity to collect even more ridiculous hats.

For my own benefit, here's my Activity Log according to the 3DS as of this date:

And that's it for 2011. I intend to have a wrap up post. Why? Because I said so or rather, I have more things to say. For now, in case you missed them or wanted to read them again, here are the links to the other End of Year Reviews 2011: Video Games.

The End of Year Reviews, Part I: 30 to 21

The End of Year Reviews, Part II: 21 to 11

Currently listening to: "Under the Cover of Darkness" by The Strokes

Happy Birthday!

2012-02-02T02:02:00.000-05:00

Today we celebrate the birthday of young one, Papa HOchie. He's a rock solid 26 this year. Wooo! We hope you have a good day, Daddy.

Don't let those blasted ground hogs steal your thunder or Winter...or Spring, as the case may be. Or your...shadow?

Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit. Hare, Hare, Hare.

2012-02-01T00:00:00.000-05:00

Well, it's that time again - the first of the month!

Ooo, and it looks like we're in a leap year! That means we need extra good luck to cover that one extra day. So, here's to wishing everyone the best of luck.

(The Almost Mis)adventures in Restaurant Week, 2012: Cipriani Dolci

2012-01-28T23:34:00.000-05:00

Restaurant Week for the first round in February is upon us once more; and once more, we're making a conscious effort to get together with frenemies and try a place or two if we can manage.

As if not plainly obvious from our adventures last year at Brasserie and Hatsuhana, H1 and I are all for Restaurant Week. Some may argue it's a crap thing to do that does not benefit business or is not a true representation of the food one may find at participating place. For us, Restaurant Week offers us a chance to dine on a budget; we discover new places that may otherwise never get money from us; and if a restaurant offers a good enough meal, that encourages us to try it again sometime.

As we've said before, there are so many great places to eat at in the city that ideally we would not like to go to the same place twice but the reality is, through word of mouth we've been recommended to go to some places by friends and we've recommended some to others and may share a future meal with them if we liked a place enough.

The other thing about Restaurant Week is that it gives us a chance to spend a nice evening with frenemies. Of course, if some of our frenemies would get back to us, we could truly enjoy ourselves...Frass (seriously though, no worries if you can't make it. No need to feel guilt for anything but just let us know. We're actually concerned about you at this point since we've not heard back).

Friday night, H1 and I went out with our favourite Aims to Cipriani Dolci located in Grand Central Terminal. As shocking as it may seem, The HOchieS have never been to Cipriani. Italian food does not move me but that's not entirely accurate of me to say. Have I even had true, good Italian food? Perhaps once or twice but I am not a good judge on Italian food and therefore feel I have no right to speak on the matter.

Cipriani's Restaurant Week menu seemed fairly underwhelming to me. It was not my first choice of the few places I looked into but I knew it would be fine. Plus if it was not fine, a certain frenemy of mine named Bobolinkies would have hell toupee. Or uh, hell to pay.

Luckily for her, she is spared as I came away mostly content with my meal. In fact, it was pretty good and you know when a basket of bread is presented to you and the bread sticks have cheese baked in and the other types of bread are still warm, that you are in for a good time.

Before I go much further, I must apologize in advance for some of these photos. There were a few misadventures this night as is customary in the HOchieS' life. This night, my lens cap on the Nikon got stuck in the lens. I was panicked for the most of the night when it was wedged tightly in there and I refused to use my butter knife to pop the lid because I found that in poor form to do at dinner (plus Aims would have disowned me, probably). It pleases me to say that I promptly popped the cap out when I got home but it is with great misfortune that I could not use the camera at dinner and instead had to resort to my phone.

We also used H1's phone for pictures but that was not until later because the main mishap/misadventure/sucky sort of thing that happened was that H1 almost did not make it to dinner on account of crazy times at work.

While we tried to buy some time for H1 to show up, Aims and I had bellinis and enjoyed the view overlooking the main hall at Grand Central. Aims out-bellini'd me by one (but really, I had only one) and at $13.95 a pop, it was crazy expensive but pretty good, I must say.

As we tried to nurse our bellinis, we got the text from H1 that we should proceed with dinner without her. It was halfway through our entrees that H1 called and said she was leaving work. The staff at Cipriani were gracious enough to allow her to join us without trouble and for that we were thankful.

For our entrees, Aims had the fresh mozzarella and tomatoes. It was absolutely amazing. Fresh mozzarella is a hell of a thing, and those tomatoes were beautifully sweet.

H1 and I had the same choices for our meals. It's not something we ever do because we like to share each other's food. Due to the fact that we initially thought she would not even show up, I made an executive decision and ordered what I had based on my food and Aims' choices. I'm not sure if I made the right decision though for her entree, but I guess it was still alright for her and she liked it well enough.

We started with the tuna tartare. It was a large portion served with diced tomatoes, some greens, three pieces of toasted bread and a fantastic sauce. I probably could have eaten that all night and been super happy.

Next up, Aims had Filet Mignon "al Barolo" with Roasted Potatoes and Mixed Vegetables. I have no pictures to show for the huge chunk of meat that was with her meal that was cooked to medium and perfectly so. The meat itself was extraordinarily tender causing Aims to liken it to be pre-chewed. Ahaha, that's pretty gross but spot on in describing just how damned soft it was.

For our entrees, H1 and I had the Homemade Panzerotti with Ricotta and Black Truffles. There's something to be said about fresh pasta. It was magnificent and cooked perfectly. There were also pieces of truffle on the top and the meal was earthy, creamy and rich without being heavy.

There was a bit of a mix up for dessert though. Without our menus in front of us and who knows if we heard our waiter incorrectly but instead of ordering our Vanilla Crème Meringue, we ended up ordering a lemon meringue pie slice each. We could have sworn he said lemon meringue and thinking they ran out of the vanilla, that's what we ended up getting. I saw people getting the vanilla meringue after we got our lemon meringue pies hence the realization there was a miscommunication some place.

Looks can be deceiving

It was sad too because the crust on the lemon meringue was way too thick and the meringue itself was not that good. Though, I suppose that means the vanilla crème meringue was probably not that impressive either.

Aims got the chocolate cake and while H1 and I are not big on chocolate things, that piece of cake was smooth, not dense even though it looks it and quite the dessert.

Other than a dropped fork amidst an extremely crowded restaurant which the wait staff noticed I had done and brought me new cutlery (embarrassing, yes), there were no other misadventures to talk about and we ended the evening rushing off for our respective trains. Incidentally, that's the best part about Cipriani - we were already at Grand Central and yeah okay, we still had to rush for a train because life is funny that way - but it was so close, so busy and so awesome that we could actually see the train schedules from our table which was hilariously convenient.

It was a good night and we're looking forward to hopefully trying at least one more restaurant before Restaurant Week ends.

Address and Stuff:

Cipriani Dolci
89 East 42nd Street
Between Park & Vanderbilt Avenues
New York, New York 10017

Contact:

Phone: (212) 973-0999
Fax: (212) 973-9666
Hours: 11am to 12am, 7 Days a Week
Email: dolciny@cipriani.com
Website: http://www.cipriani.com

Currently listening to: "Call Me, Call Me" by Steve Conte and Yoko Kanno, from the Cowboy Bebop Original Soundtrack.

The Better Option: Birdsall House

2012-01-28T14:11:00.002-05:00

Overrated burger joint, Five Guys, opened up a new location in our neighbourhood. H1 and I have had the burgers a few times before and every time we wonder what the heck the big deal is.

Like my Japanese curry "illness", there's something in my being that makes me want to try things I am underwhelmed by, over and over again just to figure out what it is everyone else is tasting that is so great that I am not.

However, unlike my newly found fondness for some Japanese curries after acquiring a taste for it and convincing myself that I actually do like it (I do! Honest!); I just have not hit that yet with Five Guys. I may never will but I was willing to try it again since Luuuuuiiiissss was overly excited to have one.

It was two Saturdays ago that we attempted to get some of these burgers he had so anxiously been looking forward to all week since their opening that Tuesday before.

Instead of burgers, we met with a jerk of a manager.

It was a really cold day, we had five year old Boohead with us and Five Guys was unsurprisingly packed. The employee greeting customers at the front door asked if we would like a menu and told us there was a wait which unfortunately would mean that we would have to stand outside. That's no big deal for us as we do this all the time at Shake Shack. We figured the line would move quickly but due to the fact that it was so biting outside, H1 wanted to take Boohead back to the car with us while she would come in and order the food to avoid having him stand out there.

Simple enough, isn't it? Except H1 could not even get to talk to the employee because her manager was also INSIDE, near the door, towering over her and repeatedly bellowing like a buffoon to "CLOSE THE DOOR!!!!"

Really...is that anyway to speak to your customers? Not to mention it was completely disrespectful to your employee who was just trying to do her job.

Furious, we left and made sure to let them know that the burgers aren't that good anyway and our money could be used elsewhere (as calmly as possible of course - we had a five year old's ears to think about). There was a follow up e-mail to Five Guys' Corporate Headquarters to let them know about the poor customer service on behalf of one person. They responded and cc'd the offending location to let everyone know they'd be looking into the matter (an appropriate response on behalf of the VP, we might add).

In the meanwhile, we were starving. Luckily there are lots of great food places around our little city, and while it was probably more money than we wanted to spend, we had not been to the Birdsall house in some time.

The Birdsall menu was crazy to me. It was not over the top or anything but I just could not make a decision for the life of me.

To start with, we shared an order of the pulled pork nachos. We were so hungry that we polished off that huge plate of fabulousity without taking a picture. I really regret not taking a picture. The pulled pork was the best we had and the apple salsa was a perfect complement.

For her entree, H1 had the Goat Cheese En Croûte ($21) stuffed with butternut squash, portobello mushrooms, goat cheese and spinach lovingly baked in a puff pastry with a Dijon cream and accompanying mesclun salad.

More Goat Cheese, Please.

We have no complaints on the portion size which was ginormous, however there could have been less butternut squash love stuffed in there as that took away from the goat cheese flavour. The goat cheese was the entire point of ordering the thing!

Boohead and Momma HOchie both ordered the Hemlock Hill Beef Burger and Fries ($14). BH's was cooked to well done while Momma HOchie's was medium well. I did not get to try a bite of Momma HOchie's but in tasting BH's it was clear that the burger should not have been cooked well-done at all. The Hemlock meat was extremely lean causing the burger to be extremely dry.

I can report that the fries were fantastic and the house-made ketchup was a nice touch.

In my opinion, I think Luuuuiissss was the winner with his choice of entree. He got the Birdsall Reuben ($15) containing house-made corned beef, Cajun rémoulade, braised cabbage, and Adirondack Black Wax cheddar on a sourdough rye bread with fries.

I did not get to take a bite of his sandwich because I had my own massive plate of food to eat, but I got to sample the house-made corned beef. Just right on salt and amazing on flavour, Luuuiiissss' sandwich is something that made me jealous that I did not order that instead. I was jeally, you hear me?!

Too beautiful. I feel teary just looking at it, especially since I haven't eaten yet for the day.

I'm still jeally.

Then of course, there was my hard decision to make. There were quite a bit of things I wanted to try but luckily had everyone else there to try things in my stead (and the opportunity to taste their food is always a plus and vice versa).

I ended up opting for the choice of 3 house-made charcuterie ($16).

With quite the selection for yummy times, I may have put myself into even more of a predicament. Though, if there's pork then that's always a given. The same can be said of duck which left me with a final choice and I botched it by going with chicken. Again, I must have been swayed by bacon wrapping because as I always say, bacon makes everything taste better.

The presentation was magnificent and made for some excitement when my charcuterie came to me.

Bacon-wrapped chicken terrine, country pork pate with pickled eggs and mustard caviar, and duck and cider sausage with caramelized apples

Our waiter was a cool guy, helpful and knowledgeable about the menu and beer selections. He even offered advice when not asked which I appreciated but had to look at him as though he was crazy. As a friendly warning, he told me that most people who order the pork and chicken often clean their plate of the chicken and leave the pork back.

What? Opt out of a pork pate? That's crazy talk!

Sure enough, as I was eating up my choices, I found the chicken to be the least delicious of the lot. It was okay but dense and really was not as good on flavour as the pork pate.

Rogue piece of burger on my plate, in case you were wondering.

The pork was my favourite (look at those perfectly cooked eggs!) while everyone else thought the duck sausage was amazing. While I felt the duck was pretty good, the very smooth texture was a tad strange to me. What was awesome was that as it was sitting on a bed of carmelized apples, and the sweetness of the apples cut the gaminess of the duck.

After all that interesting food, I needed to see the dessert menu and was not disappointed to see some equally interesting things on there.

Upon the recommendation of our waiter, Luuuiisss went with a chocolate cake with a sweet sauce (butterscotch?) and something something and vanilla ice-cream (H1! Help me out here will you? I've forgotten what it was we ordered!). And again, I was less than impressed by our helpful waiter. No no, he really was a great guy but our tastes differ.

Instead, I went with the passion and pink grapefruit custard and house-made biscottis. As per usual, I see custard and I get stupid. I also enjoy a grapefruit and passion fruit so this was a must try. Although it did not explicitly state that it was passion fruit, H1 and I hardly thought that they would be calling their dessert passionate. Maybe they were but it was a chance we were willing to take because either way, it was a bold statement to make meaning it better be good or there was passion fruit involved and that made for a win-win situation.

The passion was actually passion fruit but I think they may have well been playing around with their use of words because it was passion fruit and a passionate dessert! That thing was amazing - the custard had bits of grapefruit pulp in it, with every bite being tart and creamy with a hint of sweet. The biscotti was good too but clearly an afterthought when eating the custard. I think it was there to cut the tart if need be and add more sweet but it was unnecessary for me.

It was an end to a good meal and quite the better option than that blasted Five Guys by far.

I am looking forward to our next adventure at The Birdsall House. Perhaps it may be an option for us to do when Hudson Valley has its Restaurant Week.

Address and stuff:

Birdsall House
970 Main Street
Peekskill, NY 10566
Phone: 914 930 1880
Website: http://www.birdsallhouse.net/

Currently listening to: "No No No" by Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

2012-01-23T20:19:00.000-05:00

It's the Year of the Dragon everyone!

http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail58.html

May your year be full on awesome burnination, wing-a-lings, beefy arms and consummate V's.

Also, thatched roof cottages.

Happy Birthday!

2012-01-23T20:10:00.003-05:00

I am sending Birthday wishes to my Imaginary Friend, Fred.

Does that mean I should be sending Imaginary Birthday wishes? Or does it not matter?

Food of Champions

2012-01-21T13:05:00.001-05:00

Never chronicled before (at least, I don't think so), I present to you one of my favourite quick time foods that H1 specializes in making.

There's nothing better than spaghetti with vienna sausages a la H1.

Just look at how beautiful it is!

More importantly, it tastes beautiful. What's in there? There are secret ingredients in here other than the love.

The HOchieS in Winter

2012-01-21T12:36:00.000-05:00

If there's one thing H1 despises, it's snow.

If there's one thing Or 2 despises, it's snow that falls on a Saturday completely reducing any chance of a snow day from work.

Yet, here we are.

Oh the depression this Saturday morning for the first real snow fall in NY for 2012!

::sigh::

Here are some pictures I braved the cold to go take. Okay, well maybe I stood from my front door and took the first two...but the others! Braved the cold, I did.

We hope everyone is enjoying their Saturday and are safe wherever you are. We're going to stay indoors today and spend some family fun time together with Scrabble, crab dip, spaghetti and meat sauce for dinner, wine and other spirits and jokes.

The End of Year Review III: Video Games, Part II

2012-01-21T10:58:00.000-05:00

So, did you guys manage to read Part I? You got through that already, did you? Wait, what...? You didn't even look at it?! You bastards!

That's okay because I couldn't read it either.

But! You should read these from 20 through 11, okay?

20. Costume Quest; and Grubbins on Ice

Developer: Double Fine Productions

Publisher: THQ

Play Time:

Status: Finished

A light-hearted game about Halloween? Yes, please. Candy Corns, Monsters and children fighting things that go bump in the night in fantabulous costumes that reflect their overactive imagination of being seriously bad-assed in transformation in actual fights? Sure.

And that's what I loved about Costume Quest. It was just so damned clever. The kids in the neighbourhood joined forces and went on a grand adventure to rescue (in my case) my sister. Every time they got into a fight with the Grubbins (who really, just looked slobby and not anything scary), the kids would transform into some ultra-kick ass super-hero based on whatever costume they were wearing. So even though I looked like the most adorable ninja you ever did see, when I fought, I fought to kill and be Tenchu in my skills. Trust me, you did not want to mess with my crazy Ninja stealth.

There were lots of costumes to choose from too and they were chosen based on the costumes most kids want to wear in a real Halloween or those that your parents want you to wear (and are just lame and embarrassing). It was all very hilarious, and each had their special attacks.

Along with a great mood setting with apt locations, the game was hilarious and the dialog was quite the witty thing. Collecting stamps for special moves and stats in battle, bobbing for candy apples and knocking on door to door made this game fun, magical and a welcome little distraction to play with BooHead.

It's the kind of game I may boot up every Halloween just to get into the spirit because it certainly gives you that feeling of chilly air, spooky nights and adventuring for candy.

Music Review: It was a mostly quiet game or rather, just right for the roaming around the neighbourhood. Not bad.

19. Sly 2: Band of Thieves

Developer: Sucker Punch Productions

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Play Time: January 15, 2011 through January 17, 2011

Status: Finished

Much like Jak & Daxter, Sly needed that first game of standard platforming mediocrity to find itself, to revamp and be one of the most innovative games I have played. The game’s darkness was amped, the style while platforming as its base was completely different with added increased participation of my favourite Bentley (the brain) and “The Murray”. More mini-games of asteroids in likeness were included and while at one point I felt too plentiful to be a tad annoying, it was an overall fun experience.

I loved how each chapter had plan after plan after plan. Some were incredibly devised and presented beautifully. With a gamer’s play by play of the events, complete with a coach run down of every person’s action. In all it was cute, charming and just very thoughtful in how the plans all came together. The levels were genius stuff, really.

Not to mention the addition of photography and recon before each mission was just something so simple in theory but a wonderful addition to a true heist sort of feeling in game play. It all added to how tight the mechanics felt for both story and moving forward with the scheming.
I'm fairly certain it was due to the fact that I was just marathoning but the game felt way too long. I must have played for 8 hours straight in a two day period. The chapters were long, and some of the maps presented a frustrating challenge of “how am I going to get Bentley or Murray to that checkpoint mission” with repeated tries failure after failure. It was hard playing as those two, not due to the fact that their games were fun once you actually started missions (oh no, they were VERY fun) but just getting across certain terrains was difficult. It wasn’t impossible but surely a bit tedious. It’s always easiest with Sly but so ingrained were in my brain their abilities were for those three that sometimes, I’d play as Sly and wished he could shoot sleep bullets like Bentley. It was a curse and a blessing.

All in all, this was a fantastic entry to the series. The end was tragic, the characters more developed as they were serious and cleverly written in that I felt for them. Carmelita’s voice actress was terrible, the music was good but not incredibly memorable but fitting, and the presentation was sharp.

18. Kirby's Epic Yarn

Developer: Good-Feel, HAL Laboratory

Publisher: Nintendo

Play Time: 6 hours or so

Status: Unfinished

I've never been one to play multi-player games. Sure there's been the occasional Tekken 5 and other earlier entries in the Tekken series, Soul Blade, 2009's Resident Evil 5 with Bunji; not seeing elephants in Dynasty Warriors with Beetchie (hey man, elephants are hard to spot, okay?); and childhood days on the Commodore 64 breaking joysticks while representing Japan in the Summer Olympics with H1's Germany and Bunji's... hey, H1, what country did he play with again? Remind me to ask him.

It's not that I wouldn't mind having a companion at times to share in a game or two but mostly, I tend to play RPGs of the single-player nature. I love my single player games and am not particularly fond of multi-player games but I do like when Papa HOchie comes around to cajole me when he 'backseat drives' my playing thinking I am playing incorrectly. He laughs at me sometimes too, you know. Sometimes people are just a little too helpful (looking at you Papa HOchie and BooHead).

Last year, I encouraged H1 to play more games with me. We managed three and this was one of them. It was pretty damned fun.

We played for no more than 6 or so hours - having a sister weekend in the midst of a hurricane that had us taking water out of the basement, trying to sleep on the couch but worried about incoming branches and fearing for our lives really - and enjoying the clever stitches (literally!) in a Nintendo Kirby game.

I'd not really played a whole lot of Kirby before of all the Nintendo franchises and I have no idea why. Kirby's Epic Yarn changed all that. The little game was so full of charm and clever bits of level design. It was surprising just how thought out the whole thing was. The controls were not always the sharpest and I was frustrated quite a bit with the transformations and their controls but otherwise, H1 and I had a fun time doing a little exploration to get all the hidden items so interestingly tucked away behind a moving landscape that could change and fall apart with the pull of a thread.

I don't know if well get to finish it anytime soon but we were pretty near the end. This is one to file under fond memories with times spent with a shistah.

Music Review: I was really bad last year with paying attention to soundtracks apparently. This one was cutesy and I can't say I really remember loving any track though I'm sure I'll retract that statement once I take a listen. See, this is what happens when I am without a computer. I can't harrass Bughie J. for music!

17. Daxter

Developer: Ready at Dawn

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Play Time:

Status: Finished

I miss Jak and Daxter. I'm very much looking forward to playing the HD collection whenever I decide to buy it. I also know that after being burnt by playing a Crash Bandicoot game not made by Naughty Dog that I am hesitant to play their characters in games made by other people. I know, I should give people a chance and that's what reviews are for but can the Naughty Dog charm really be captured by anyone else?

Maybe I don't even really remember anymore just how completely sharp Jak II was (I need to be reminded but I do not need a reminder that it's one of my favourite games of all time. Please don't let time eat my words...) but I took the chance for $7.50 and bought Daxter and was pleasantly surprised.

I collected orbs, talked smack, played really fun mini-games based on popular fantasy and sci-fi movies and smack bugs like nobody's business. It moved like my memories of a Jak game and Daxter did not lose his annoying lovable assinine behaviour.

16. Patapon 3

Developer: Pyramid, Japan Studio
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Play Time: July 9, 2011 through July 29, 2011
Status: Finished

What’s with the metal soundtrack?! The animations?

It was apparent from the very beginning that Patapon 3 went through some major changes. In the last game, the Hero patapon was introduced and the god like entity, The Great Zynx combined his soul with the Hero Patapon to become an Uperpatapon. What?

As the Great Znyx, I was not too pleased at first. I almost felt as though I could not rule with an iron fist as I enjoyed doing before. In theory of course because as it turns out, my Uberhero’s Iron Fist was precious enough to slaughter tons of Bonedeth and Archfiends.

I’m still not quite sure what happened in the story - where we ended up or how the hell we finally reached Earthend (is that truly ‘it’?) or what happened to new favourite character Ragewolf and it makes me **SPOILER ALERT** sad to think he’s dead... or what really happened to the other Uberheroes at the end of it all but...

It had the fun of a $20 game that’s worth full price. I’ve always loved this series because it’s simple, funny and cute. You’d think that once you hear an eye joke you’ve heard them all but as it turns out, eye jokes never get stale (of course, it's all fun and games until someone loses one...haha, let me stop).

Patapon 3 shocked me with its radical changes - my patapons turned to stone and I was only able to awaken four of three of the little one-eyed bastards to assist on my journey. Really? Yes, I was nervous by my lack of a full fledged army but as it turns out, the streamlining was a welcome twist.
The Patapons could level up and switch classes with ease but if you stretched yourself too thin then you were screwed.

The good thing about that though is that if you wanted to level up, you had to push yourself to the challenge as a recommended level for a stage usually meant if you were too high then yes, you’d kick ass all over the place but your experience points would be nil. Well obviously! It’s such a simple truth and it forced your hand to move ahead.

The new mini game levels vs the Archfiends’ Dark Heroes were very fun. At first I hated the capture the flag level. It was frustrating but as different types of mini games were unlocked, I had tons of fun kicking the Archfiend possessed dark-heroes.

While I may not have quite figured out what the heck was going on with Sonarchy and all of a sudden, Covet-Hiss nor did I approve that they were the backbone of the enemies because they felt like rushed characters - I loved the designs of the Dark Heroes and loved them in general. Ragewolf was hilarious, while Naughtyfins annoyed the crap out of me. Also, their clever names were a marvel.

It was not all don chaka and awesome times in Patapon 3. Don’t we all hate poorly constructed levels? The kind of levels that are so precise in their creation that they make you fail over and over and over and over? A challenge is one thing but a level that has no rhyme (ha! did you see what I did there?) or reason to it and can be done on what seems to be a fluke is frustrating. So was the hell I faced on Level 2 of the Archfiend of Adamance’s board. It was horrendous and I still do not know how I got over the platform trigger. I don’t think I could do it again if I tried.

The story felt a bit disjointed but just a bit right at the end. Did we rip a hole in the fabric of the space time continuum? What the heck?

Music Review: I don’t know if I never really paid attention to the music in the other series but I’m pretty certain this was a whole new experience. The game is a rhythm genre as you beat your pons and your patas to victory (sometimes your chakas! Chakas are important, life saving things - don’t diss the chaka). However, the underlying soundtrack was tremendous. Boss fights were brilliantly composed, some dungeon levels were so fun to listen to before going into fever that I’d mill around just to hear the music (while risking degradation by my army of Znyx. Those little freaks...). The music mixed all different types of songs - jazz, metal, cheesey b-horror monster movie scores, marching bands and delicate snowy bound chimes and dings to name a few.

15. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening

Developer: Nintendo EAD
Publisher: Nintendo
Play Time: 25:50 (hours, minutes)
Status: Finished

Ah, confessions, confessions. I never truly played a Zelda game before Ocarina of Time (as chopping bushes in the original way back when does not count). I feel like someone's boo hissing me at the moment but you should not do that unless you played The Last Ninja on your Commodore 64. You didn't? Well, that just makes us evens stevens, doesn't it?

Link's Awakening makes me wonder how I managed to spend the last 15 years playing and finishing any damned game. Maybe they just got easier in 1997 but in 1989? Ooooo, weeee (Wii U?), were things tough. This game was almost nightmarish. With no room for error and no inkling of a guide for me to figure o9ut what to do next, I was literally stuck sometimes and had to use my brain to figure out on how to proceed at times. That's right, I was out-brained. But silly complaining aside, the game was a bit challenging which was enjoyable and that's what good exploration was all about (even if I felt like a bit of a dolt at times).

I loved the the photographs that were taken, the characters were jerks especially that ass-clown Raccoon and the art of sprites was charming.

I'm pretty sure everyone figured it out way before the ending but way to beat me over the head about who and what the Wind Fish was before the 'big' reveal at the end. Oh, and the no room for error thing? It was more of a control issue that had me frustrated. There were a lot of lost hearts by constantly falling into holes and multiple deaths by unforgiving bosses but it took skill and I am happy to report that I finished the game with what little skill I had.

...

14. Pokemon: Black Version

Developer: Game Freak
Publisher: Nintendo, The Pokemon Company
Play Time: April 24, 2011 through May 21, 2011; 42 hours
Status: Finished (main story line)

This was my first Pokemon game, and not a first game for H1 but a first major RPG campaign for her (she played Pokemon: White Version). I decided to see what the fuss was all about after all these years (I liked the stupid first season of the animated series but that's as far as it went) and was pleasantly surprised by just how basic an rpg it was. There was strategy to catching pokemon, and I loved the vastness of the Unova region. Seriously, going to little towns each with their own culture and region was fantastic. The game had all the elements of a classic rpg in a modernized world that characters that were cute each with their own little personalities - the weirdos, the quirky ones, the bitchy ones...as for the Pokemon themselves, sometimes their character designs could be quite hideous but their write up descriptions were never dull.

That vastness could be surprisingly overwhelming but it's not just the world map alone. The item lists, the day to day and the incorporation of real world days into the game )e.g. getting a casteliacone available on Tuesdays only) that were little things that kept the game highly interactive and fun.

I have a couple of serious complaints against this blasted game though. There was too much fighting. There was a cave that I had to go through and while I could have used some repel spray (and sacrifice leveling up? no way), honestly, every step taken led to a fight and it was frustrating. It was times like those that made me want to toss the game. Ah yes, a double edged sword that but frequent random battles are the pits.

In Pokemon, what I really disliked was that after being so bad-assed most of the way through, I get slaughtered by one of the ending bosses, Ghestis in what seems like a completely blindsided unfair advantage. One of his dragons was so fast, it destroyed me everytime with its two attacks in a row. It was hard to prep for that and what annoyed the hell out of me was that there really was no way to determine what you would get at the end. So essentially, I spent 42 hours of my life training a group of 6 pokemon out of hundreds only to be destroyed by one. Why would I stretch myself thin but training a whole bunch and being mediocre at best for all? Yes, I know it's one of those games where you can literally sink hundreds of hours into it but that's not a requirement to finish the main campaign or at least it should not be. That battle was cringe worthy. I don’t know how I pulled it off but by playing the waiting game, the other side ‘messed’ up and I did it finally. That's a terribly cheap thing too.

Music Review: I actually enjoyed the music quite a bit. Team Plasma's had the best crazy theme I've heard in a long while. Easy going and intense when need be, the music really added to having a grand adventure and journey.

13. 999: Nine Persons, Nine Hours, Nine Doors

Developer: Chunsoft

Publisher: Aksys

Play Time: First walkthrough January 2, 2011 through January 10, 2011

Second walkthrough January 11, 2011 through January 16, 2011

Third (and final for good ending) walkthrough January 16, 2011 through January 19, 2011

Status: Finished

I can honestly say that game made me anxious for a better part of it. When a door opened, I was shuddering to think what could be on the other side. And that was some stellar presentation on its part. It was like Resident Evil in feeling.

The dark feel of the game was creepy. It was creepy in animation (reference to the operating room with those medical mannequins) and had a weird grainy tint that added to the creepy factor. When I got my first bad ending it was not pleasant. I felt like a failure without even knowing where I went wrong and in that the game forces you to play more than once. That's not something I usually like with my games.

As it turns out, I did 3 playthroughs and from my own little mechanical mind, I figured it out (and this was a very important theme of the story). The game got a little sci-fi and timey-whimey. There were linear time lines and two paradox timelines going on at once where a present and a past were happening all at once and without the villain created in one, the other could not exist and...it was a mess. Being forced to play through again made me think that the in-game theory of the morphogenic field was thrust upon the real you and questioned YOU (me) as a player. I got the information through their theory field and as a receiver knew everything because I had seen the information before and then it was transmitted to my old self as I played through earlier games. I know, confusing if you have not played the game yourself. But the bottom line was that it was a clever plot device which the game implemented within the story of the main character all that while being manipulated to solve puzzles. It was...wow.

The puzzles were weak but due to the fact that "you" had done all this before it could have been seen as a 'weak' explanation as to why they were 'easy'. Timey Whimey, I told you! But no, the puzzles were designed to be pretty easy (which is a bit of a negative because they felt like chores more than anything) but that was an interesting concept that could have been implemented.

It was a good game, with a good story and beautifully presented for that horror movie feel. The characters were good in their own right and I loved how everyone just used your ass to do their bidding. It was truly a moment of putting you full on as the character in the game and I see what you did there Chunsoft and Aksys and I liked it.

While running through a second playthrough I came to appreciate the character development of other characters while hating some others. There were some geniune twists in there of others that I really did not see coming.

One of my major complaints about the game was the freaking joke ending with Alice in the end. It was not funny and really just insulting after having such an intelligently written game. Otherwise, this is a game I think everyone should own.

Music Review: I liked the soundtrack. It was appropriately creepy and appropriately heart pounding in dire situations.

12. Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars (3DS)

Developer: Ubisoft Sofia

Publisher: Ubisoft

Play Time: 61:23 (hours: minutes...it claims! I highly doubt that)

Status: Finished

I had no expectation from a Tom Clancy game. That’s not to say I have ever played one before but in my mind, I saw a shooting game in the vein of Call of Duty or something of the sort. I am not a fan of the shooters genre generally so it would be of no interest to me. Gaming blog, Kotaku recommended this one when the 3DS launched and from game play footage, revealed that this game was very much a strategy RPG. I still have a sort of a love/hate relationship with the strategy RPG genre. I suck at it but it’s too fun even if frustrating at times and so I keep torturing myself.

But as I said, SRPGs are fun as all hell. Tactical thinking, taking terrain into consideration, being shot at and taking cover as enemies converge on you was just exciting and engaging. While the characters did not have much in way of any development, that was not the point. I liked them well enough - they were stock but eh, I didn't care about that too much. Each character of course, had strengths in the field and figuring out who to use at certain times was awesome. I played on elite which in the later stages presented a quite a bit of a challenge.

Some levels actually gave quite the bit of anxiety as certain death awaited. They were pressing and fun.

The game felt a little big long at the end and kind of tedious. Maybe that's due to the fact that I could have sorted faster ends to get to the goal but I tend to play it relatively safe and kill most things in my path even when not required.

The story may have been pretty standard and there was nothing to write home about but the main focus was of course, the game play.

Music Review: I enjoyed the music in this game. There were some really good intense set pieces in there.

11. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

Developer: Capcom

Publisher: Capcom

Play Time: 28:24 (hours: minutes)

Status: Finished

I finally purchased this on the DS and hoping I can get the other games in this series (if ever Capcom decides they want to re-release or I get them cheaper somewhere than what I see online).

Phoenix Wright is fun. The opening to this game was a fantastic one - it begins with a murder and is surprisingly dark and sets up tone for upcoming events. However, once you get started you realize that while there are some moments of anxiety, the game is mostly comedic ridiculousness hidden under more series themes.

The characters are an odd ball mix of humour while your enemies can be really distasteful in their design. They're designed well - evil and unlikable and not out of the realm of possibility. Being a very character driven type of text based game, everyone had to have very distinct personalities and a fine job was done of that through their quirky animations.

It was an enjoyably humourous title with mystery, suspense and a great cast of characters. It was a challenge too at times, raising wrong objections was something I was in danger of at times and it really forced you to think. Sometimes pieces of your evidence were more obvious to use than others but other times I felt the game didn't make too much sense but it was no big deal.

Oh, and that freaking blue badger video footage? I don't think I laughed so much for a game in a while.

Next up with be the finale with games 10 through 1. I know you can't wait!

In case you wanted to read/re-read/scoff at picks 30 through 21, you could always click HERE.

Currently listening to: "Judgement Day" by Nobuo Uematsu, from the Final Fantasy VII soundtrack.

The End of Year Review III: Video Games 2011, Part I

2012-01-16T12:22:00.000-05:00

In 2010 I managed to play about 20 or so games.

Last year, it was 30+.

...

I also decided unless I really wanted a Collector's Edition or there was a pre-order incentive that was a must have for me, then I'd buy everything on sale. Turns out games go on sale all the time or you can just wait until the end of year. So uh, yeah... that strategy did not really work out for me.

Due to the fact that the amount of games played last year is just staggering (I feel, anyway), I have decided it would be a kind gesture to myself (and to whoever wants to read) to break up the reviews in blocks.

As before and not uncommon, I have a serious backlog. It's a shameful backlog but who does not have one? And so, I played some games released in 2011 and some released prior to that.

So, read on!

It all starts with 30 through 21...

30. Glory of Heracles

Developer: Paon, Studio Saizensen
Publisher: Nintendo
Play Time: Just over 6 hours
Status: Unfinished

I usually try to read a review or something and not go in blind. I learnt a very harsh lesson and that is, even at less than $10, something can be so bad that it is unplayable. That's probably a no-brainer but it's sort of misleading when you see more than halfway decent reviews only to be completely disgusted!

I tried, I really did but Glory of Heracles proved unplayable. It's tough for me to call it quits on a game as I like to at least complete main story lines in any given title. However, slow controls; sparse, ugly settings and graphics (and I'm not even a graphics whore!) and uninspired terrain just made me put it down after 6 hours.

If you have nothing nice to say, don't say anything at all or something like that, right? Well, it was not a complete loss. I was enjoying the funny dialog between characters - they weren't exactly earth shattering, developed things but it was a light humour and it was not bad. But oh man... never again. I actually wish I could sell that game because it does not deserve to be in my little collection.

But why in good conscience would I inflict it upon anyone else?

29. Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus

Developer: Sucker Punch Productions
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Play Time: December 28, 2010 through January 9, 2011; In hours ???
Status: Finished

During my PSOne and PS2 days, and of the Platforming series, Jak & Daxter were my games of choice. I never played Spyro, Ratchet & Crank and the next series that made my 29th most liked game of 2011 - Sly Cooper: Thievius Raccoonus.

The HD collection was gifted to me by TD5 (thanks!) (convenient things, those HD collections...especially awesome for me as I missed these games in their prime) and was excited to see what the fuss was about. Sly had some big shoes to fill because Jak & Daxter are two of my most beloved characters and indeed, of my top series, I'd say Jak II and Jak III are some of the best games I have ever played. So perhaps, Sly did not have a fair chance to begin with in my mind but I played, played to the end and had the sense to finish the other 2 games in the series but more on those later.

A World Class Thief obviously had to uh, go around the world to pull of great heists, right? Sly and Co. went glob-trotting and that was pretty cool. They even went to Haiti! Can you believe? And I was so excited to see that level in there until I actually got to it and I could have very well called it the Bayou. Well, I've been to neither Haiti nor New Orleans so I guess who am I to judge stereotypes (heck, I just did some stereotyping of my own) but the idea of it was fantastic. It was not as fun as say running through time and places to capture some monkeys while traveling on the Great Wall of China or doing some Ninja Sneaking in the Bamboo Forest, but the idea is always great especially when the locations are so random and colourful.

I enjoyed some of the mini-games that Sly had to offer. Give me sniping and I am content. What! You're letting me collect chickens? Hells, yeah! (um, not that I toss cuccos or minku...that would be animal cruelty...yep) AND you're letting me run over piranha for fuel?! Good times, I tell you. Uh minus the animal cruelty of course. Yes. Yeeesss.

I found Sly’s voice to be unconventional and somehow it didn’t fit yet did. It’s a weird smooth talkin’ voice he’s got there that’s so.. normal. It’s like you’re talking to your strange friend who is also pretty likeable. That was my first impression of it. I suppose it was off-putting in the game because it was not so dramatic. It certainly worked after a while as I got used to it and it was by no means a bad voice acting job but it struck me as odd initially. Now I could not imagine it any other way.

If I had to name some favourite characters, I'd call Sly and Bentley. They’re pretty typical and in the first game there was no real character depth but they fit their roles as you would expect. I actually liked them a lot and more so as the games continued because at the heart, I always felt it was the story about a computer nerd and his handsome best friend. As I said, it's very typical but an enjoyable bond all the same.

After playing through four ‘worlds’ of bosses, jumping, sliding and sneaking through similar formula for a long time, the final boss level was quite the welcome change. It started out breaking through the base with a bunch of shooting mini-games, a serious laser light show rescue mission, Bentley's data snatch mini-game and finally, the final fight itself which was frenzied and easy once you recognized the pattern. It was enough of an interesting final showdown for me to want to play parts 2 and 3, and held me with enough interest to see what next they could do.

That said, the straightforwardness of the game and the fact that there was nothing unexpected about it for the most part as your typical platformer, kept this game from being the kind I could rave about. But finding its footing as the first part in a series can be challenging and heck, the same can be said of the Jak series and most games.

: I did not necessarily like the sneaking around sound, in fact that bit of trademark sneaking music irritated me to no end, but certain levels' music at times was damned fun. It was not all good but often I found the music to be very well suited to the level with the asteriods like mini-game involving Bentley with the Data grab comes to mind.

28. Eternal Sonata

Developer: Tri-Crescendo

Publisher: Namco Bandai Games

Play Time: Intermittently starting May 28th through July Something Something; 40 hours.

Status: Finished

Looking at the technical, I liked the idea of combat system when I first realized what the hell was going on. The additions of gameplay affected by light and dark areas made for an interesting mix. Some enemies were way stronger depending on what Jekyll and Hyde/Darkness and Light effects they had going and a guaranteed loss came if while running on the world map you managed to not get your pre-emptive strike. Of course, this made for it to be a little bit dull after a while fully knowing what to expect and battles could become tedious.

However, a boss fight was never dull. Like all boss fights, bosses have a set skill of moves and you know what’s coming but they were so quick that parrying an attack or blocking one took some serious timing, which I would more often than not fail big time.

The learning curve and increased difficulty as the game progressed as it transitioned from easy to experienced was well-paced, a little bit scary but a welcome design. It forced you to think and act quickly but built you up to it and didn’t just throw you to the lions. That’s not a flaw on the part of other games but in this one, it just gave it a tiny edge. It was very explicit in telling you what to expect and I did not find that to be hand-holding at all.

Character wise, I cannot say I LIKED anyone but as fighters, I had the bad-assed team of Chopin, the witch and the boxer. Some fighters just shine more than others and these were my three. They’re fast, strong and something told me I should not only rely on them (only to find out later why that was - SPOILERS!). That team was fairly well-balanced and I liked that everyone shared in level building even when not in use.

Ah ha, I also really love Beat’s camera abilities and photography to sell back at the shop, although I do not agree that some of the pictures I took were fails and ranked poorly. I call shenanigans.

So, I’m not sure if to like the story or dislike the story. On the one hand, it’s not that great a story. Really. It’s a typical story set in a beautiful setting that seemed to shine more than the writing but it’s not horrendous. The bit about the powder making people crazy is fine. There were some glaring “huh”? moments that did not make any type of sense but whatever. I cannot say that I am anxiously waiting to see what happens at the end, but okay, I already played for 40 hours so I may as well.

On the other hand, I really feel this story built around Chopin’s supposed life or speculation on how he felt during times of war and why he wrote certain pieces is a bit...pretentious and smug. Really, smug. While I found it commendable that they filtered Chopin's dream world (but was it?) around his final hours on real (again, is it?) earth and that made for an interesting concept, if I wanted a history lesson on Chopin, I would go to Wikipedia or the museum used as a reference in the game. Sure that’s the entire selling point and I should judge myself for even getting it the game but talk about preachy.

Having gotten to the second to last final boss and being stuck in a dungeon with low level enemies who do not help your leveling up goals when you NEED to level up to beat the second to last boss is damned right evil. It took me weeks to just sit here, spending 20 to 30 minutes doing a one level up necessity run only to get killed again. I admit, I almost did not finish due to sheer frustration but I managed. Five weeks of random spurts of gaming is what it took and I never want to look at this friggin’ game again.

Music Review: Motoi Sakuraba is a friend of mine. No, no, not personally. I enjoy his works and I really loved his piano arrangements in this game. They were calm and charming like most of the scenes, with a furious final boss battle arrangement that was stellar. Also if I had to call the soundtrack bad I'd be calling Chopin an awful musician since some of his work was featured. He is not.

27. God of War

Developer: SCE Studios Santa Monica

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Play Time: February 1, 2011 through February 20, 2011; about 10 hours

Status: Finished

Bought upon the high recommendations of J&D, I really wanted to like God of War. An ultra-violent hack n' slash game with some puzzles thrown in here and there, and admittedly, not the kind of game I usually enjoy (save my bizarre love affair with No More Heroes), made me start GoW with extreme prejudice. Still, it was a short romp and while it was not one I enjoyed for the most part, there were a few key elements that encouraged me to continue the series.

By the time part 1 ended, I liked Kratos just a little bit more. I cannot say I feel overly sad for Kratos and I'm not sure I am supposed to. In that sense, his family history feels as if it was a total tacked on bit of story for most of the game and I am supposed to believe that he's so hurt and angry that it drives him to take revenge on the gods.

He’s a bastard, what can I say? So he killed his family due to his hubris, his blood lust and the gods using that to their advantage. So what? He’s not likeable to say the least but I do enjoy his mouthing off the gods, Zeus included. Of course, Kratos is the kinda guy who has to feel to learn. Did I feel some sense of emotion from him other than anger? Sure. When he hugged his family that was a little bit of a redeeming quality for him. But did he care a lot? I think he cared more about his nightmares when he perched himself on that cliff and threw himself off. But, I did like the little twist on why his skin is white like ash. How...fitting. Double pun there. Did you see that?

I also liked finishing moves giving me life. I hated gorgons, let us get that clear and their finishing moves were the pits but in a stressful bind of having that little sliver of life left and then coming upon a minotaur? I knew once I stayed alive, I could take his life and make it my own to fight another day. Cool.

Then there were mah blades. I loved my blades. I may not have enjoyed my two rather technical useless powers (zeus fireball and medusa’s gaze) but the Army of Hades and Posieden’s Rage were the best. Powering up weapons is always a fulfilling sort of thing.

Unfortunately, what I really disliked about the game was plentiful and it started with the cameras. I can’t control the camera and being used to exploring everything really made this hard on me during initial play. I wanted to branch out and I couldn't look around me because there’s no camera to control. An example of this that really had me cursing was that first fight with the Hydra. The Hydra would not come around and the camera or lack thereof made things worst. All of a sudden I’d be pulled by one unseen force only to be slammed by the freakin’ Hydra. It was unfair and poor mechanics.

As I came to appreciate Kratos just a smidgen more by game's end, the forced voice-acting on Kratos’ part was off-putting, except when he was super angry and screaming. I do not think I am supposed to take this game very seriously but it could have used some polish in normal conversation, I guess. I know he's supposed to be angry all the time and a tough guy but more often than not, listening to Kratos speak made the conversations seem broken with unnecessary inflections.

Finally, I found the game controls to be overly sensitive. More specifically, the game suffered from a first game syndrome - and an ‘older’ game syndrome. “Cheap”, is that what we’re calling it? Yes. Example, scaling the bloody wall took too much precision when I know damn well I could ace that wall with my timing. It was frustrating to say the least to get five inches away from a blade and constantly being slammed to the ground even though technically it never even touched you.

Music Review: Everything about this game is extreme. The blood was extreme and plentiful, the waves of enemies were always huge and the same can be said of the music. I cannot say I found the soundtrack to be very memorable other than it just being very loud.

26. Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves

Developer: Sucker Punch Productions
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Play Time: January 22, 2011 through January 30, 2011
Status: Finished

By the time I got around to playing the third part in the Sly Cooper series, I was feeling a bit burnt out having decided to play all parts consecutively. I remember thinking to myself that I probably should have taken a break and played a different title but knowing me, I more than likely would not have gone back. But, I am glad I finished the series and part 3 had its moments. At the end of part 2, the group was in shambles and the game was spent the time to recruit new allies even from old enemies. I liked the construction of how the game was played in this with the ending scene at the beginning with Sly in a death grip and you play the game as his flashback.

The tension between Sly and Bentley was center stage and Sly's guilt into leading his friends into danger due to his lifestyle to indulge in his family legacy was a nice bit of character depth. Game mechanics wise, I found it much easier to control Bentley and Murray which was a good thing because their previous movements I found to be often really stilted and frustrating.

The hacking mini-game was also more challenging but a welcome one.

While I may not have loved all the cast of characters gathered and found at least Penelope to be completely pointless as a usable character (yeah, I know she was there to move a story with Bentley and Sly), it was a decent game and being able to utilize a lot more skills per character was a bit of fun.

25. Golden Sun: Dark Dawn

Developer: Camelot Software PlanningPublisher: Nintendo
Play Time: January 26, 2011 through February 25, 2011; 41 hours
Status: Finished

I never played a Golden Sun game before this, so I missed out on some nostalgia that others felt when this was released. I think I may have benefited from that and maybe appreciated this game more but as it stands, I was not that impressed.

As RPGs go, there were cute elements to it. Sprites are always fun and sprites with sprite Djinns?! Well, now you're just killing me with cuteness.

I could enter people's houses and within game history, enjoy milling around their stoves to see what different foods were being cooked native to their region. Stuff like that adds personality to your game but also loosely ties in to the culture of real countries. Along with building designs and music while I traveled this fictional world, you could get a sense of real life places these lands were based off. It was cute to 'discover' these things.

Coming in as a new player to an already established series that continued the journey from previous games, I thought how the game handled the re-telling the previous history was very well done. There was built in encyclopedia and histroy books you could collect which animated the story like a fairy tale. It was adorable. The game had an incredibly extensive history and there were a lot of names to familiarize myself with but it was never presented in a dull manner.

Though I have to say, by the end of 41 hours, I did not even know why the hell I did all the things I did to begin. I really enjoyed the blatant death and destruction that befell the world (at my hands of course, unwittingly and guided by evil forces) but what started out so simple ended up - SPOILER ALERT- with my killing a beast I was supposed to just get a feather from. How did things end up so bad so fast?

I know why I was inadvertently a tool but it was still utmost chaos and when half the world was drenched in shadow, it was damned creepy.

The final boss fight was very sad and while I did not get attached with all my heart to anyone character, that one character got done dirty.

Speaking of characters, did I mention I loved the Djinn? They played a huge role to the story and I loved the little jerks. I loved collecting them by smacking them around and solving puzzles just to get to them was great fun. I liked that they got angry or reacted according to personality.

I also really liked using them to create a unique battle system of magic strengths. It was an interesting class system approach and setting up your summons to use from the get go or waiting to use them during battle like I did was a nice choice. The combinations were plentiful and interesting. It made my life a little more difficult when fighting the end bosses but a good challenge all the same.

I did not like a lot of things in this game though starting with the characters. There was no one to swoon over except Amiti. Even as the hero, I was just a happy fool and the use of emoticons did nothing to enhance the game other than characters reacting to you just a little differently. Sometimes I would say something I thought to be completely appropriate and I'd get the evil eye from certain characters. What was the point of these emoticons? If there was one, I did not find it. Maybe it was hilarious that I smiled for almost everything in the gravest of situations but overall, they were pointless.

For the majority of the game, it felt almost too easy. There was a lot of back and forth running around. There were a lot of puzzles to solve but they were not that interesting and mostly a pain. It was tedious for 80% of the game, I'd say until near the end at the Apollo Lens Ascent. Those were actually intriguing bits of level design that the thought put into those were used throughout.

Though I guess with so much story to get through and so much to remember, I suppose the game did not want me to be stuck and frustrated on a puzzle either.

Music Review: Motoi Sakuraba was at it again. He did some good work here but unfortunately I can't remember much of it at the moment. I do know he matched sounds to their relative area for instance if I were in a Japan like setting the music was made to suite.

24. Limbo

Developer: Playdead

Publisher: Playdead

Play Time: Still going

Status: Unfinished (almost done though with about 4 more levels to the end)

Ever since I saw shots of this creepy little black and white game with the ghost eyed boy, I wanted to play this seemingly charming puzzler. It surely is creepy and not charming. I suppose things cannot be creepy and charming at the same time? I felt actual stress playing this sometimes. Being chased is never fun and all the ways the little boy can die is just horrible. When his body hits the ground the sound of silence is just deafening. As I have not finished this one yet, I have no idea why he's in limbo. The game did not do much to explain anything but he just woke up and is journey through a wonderful black and white landscape that went from forest to city seamlessly.

It's a beautiful game with some challenging little puzzles. While executing some of your daring escapes or jumps can be frustrating, the game itself flows quite well and it's easy to just keep on playing.

23. God of War II

Developer: SCE Santa Monica Studio

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Play Time: February 21, 2011 through May 14, 2011

Status: Finished

By the time part 1 ended, I was a tad more interested in continuing the rest of the series. Kratos' anger saw him kill the God of War and claim the title. There he sat, simmering in boredom at the beginning of part 2 and being treated the outcast by all the other gods, he goes off to battle alongside some Spartans. And then crap happens like a betrayal.

It was great starting the game as a god completely with bad-assed powers only to be killed and stripped of such might. Of course that meant crawling up the ranks again but this time, everything in the second installment was done on a grander scale and the scenes alone were rather impressive.

The cinematography was breathtaking. There are great overhead shots, shots that panned out and luscious landscapes that were built to impress. The scene with Kratos jumping from column to broken down column with the misty backdrop made for some actual excitement and was fairly epic.

In other instances, not only did I see a huge beast in front of me but there's Kratos getting up close and personal by crawling on massive creatures and gutting it from the inside out. Before, getting into a creature's face was only reserved for finishing moves.

Again, the game is no more than a blood fest. There were some harder puzzles to sort through which was cool but overall it is what it is. I'm still not sold on the genre or this particular series but the end did have an exciting cliffhanger and really good boss fight actually that required a lot of patience, skill and thought.

I have not turned my attention to GOW III but hope to do so this year to see what transpires story wise. I'm expecting much of the same fight wise but who knows? It might just surprise me. Part 2 certainly built on its predecessor and was a tighter game.

But the truth is, I feel more of an obligation to finish the game since I got so far and not really a willingness of genuine, overwhelming interest on my part to do so.

22. Cave Story

Developer: Nicalis
Publisher: Nicalis
Play Time: Still Ongoing
Status: Unfinished

This game should probably be higher on my list. Again, you start off...awake. Just awake in some weird little cave and you have no idea what to do other than to move forward. In what sounds (and mind you, the music in this game is amazing) like the most charming, frenzied, crazy little journey you are about to embark on; I quickly was jolted out of that pipe dream. Oh yeah, no. There's so much bloody history and a really deep story disguised in sprite form telling a tale of enslaved bunny like creatures and a mad scientist that the game had me reeling.

Oh yeah, and it's hard as all hell.

I've upgraded my weapons and done all this stuff and yet I am near the end at one of the second to last bosses and I'm just at a loss on how to proceed. I love the game because of it's great soundtrack and fast paced game play but arrrgggh, death is so frequent. I hope to magically gain some skill one day to finish this especially since I'm just at the end.

Music Review: Didn't I say amazing and great, already? Sad, upbeat, urgent and all mechanical sounding makes it quite personal.

21. Okamiden

Developer: Mobile and Game Studio, Inc.
Publisher: Capcom
Play Time: April 1, 2011 through April 19, 2011; 25 hours, 51 minutes
Status: Finished

I went in playing this game with lots of reservations and maybe played it a bit too soon after I just finished the original. I really liked the original but felt that game suffered from being too long. It was a true marathon that left me slightly jaded at the end. Then there was the fact that the original studio Clover closed and would not have a hand in this sequel. Would anyone else be able to do it justice? Yes and no.

This was not a true sequel but this was said at the end of the game - it was a glimpse into a story just between the main campaign of the original game and what’s to come in the future. It could be tied in nicely to comprise a wonderful lore of a beautiful series.

The scenery was the same as Okami. It was beautiful, and had the same Japanese wood block print look. It was breathtaking but sadly the overworld was the same I had seen in the previous game. The journey carried me through the same world I got to know for 60 hours but not without its exciting new areas to explore for instance the Demon Market (and I really loved the Demon Market actually).

Some scenes familiar to Okami were there and presented in a different way. The mini chasing games were exciting. The cultural old Japanese feel was exciting there and in the Playhouse. The re-visit to the Moon Cave to confront that blasted 8 headed dragon was great because working behind the scenes was even more fun in conjunction to what we got to see in Okami - example being in the kitchen, with the staff as chefs for the dragon.

I found that while the boss fights were a tad repetitive, they were overall very fun. The use of the stylus was easy and more accurate than the wii version I had played and worked well.

But what of the characters? The new cast built on some of the children in the original game and they acted as companions to Chibiterasu in Okamiden.

Kurow. Oh Kurow. Arguably (is that the word I want to use?) one of the most loved and interesting characters in the original was Waka. A space man with charm, arrogance and a fantastic sense of style and humour, Waka was the pretty boy you loved to be annoyed with.

Then Kurow comes along and immediately you are reminded of your fun times with Waka. But what’s the tie? A relative? Waka? What is going on? And even if you did not play the original, Kurow was a charming mess of a boy. Easily he was the best companion Chibiterasu had of the 5.

Not every companion was overly great or diverse. It was not as though everyone could do something incredibly unique which was something I would have liked to see combined with Chibi's powers and dungeons were conveniently outfitted for their ‘powers’ (too convenient, really). Sometimes I already owned a power and did not need this lump riding on my back. Personality-wise, I cared for some more than others but they weren’t so bad. I like the mika, and the tubby fire boy.

The story was cute, with a good mix of heartbreak, seriousness and light humour. It was dark and engaging and like I said, a good point of introduction for support for further games. I hope people buy this one so that more are made in the series.

Music Review: Much in the same vein as Okami, the soundtrack comprised traditional Japanese music. Fitting and beautiful for its medium, everything worked brilliantly together and was very emotional in sound.

Next time, I'll review games 20 through 11. Isn't that exciting?

Yeaauuhhhhh!!!!

2012-01-12T21:33:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to Beetchie on passing her boards!

Woo!

We're very excited for you because we knew you could do it and you put in so many years of hard work!

It's super awesome.

We're also very excited for ourselves because guess who's one step closer to becoming a Suga' Momma?

Beetchie, that's who.

Thoughts for the Day

2012-01-11T21:00:00.002-05:00

It's been a while since I've listed any Thoughts for the Day. It's also been a while since I changed the Obsessions for the Week but that'll have to wait just a bit longer.

Thoughts...on Music:

As I was listening to The Beatles this week, it occurred to me that if bands these days wrote half as good as The Beatles, we'd not have to listen to a lot of the nonsense out there these days.

It might also mean that everyone would have to delve into a lot more drugs, but it's all for the music! Think about the music...

Thoughts...on Berries (Conversation of the Day):

Or 2: I think when blue berries were named, not much thought or creativity went into it. It's the stepchild of berries.

What's worse, said person who named the blue berry did not even take the time to bite into one to see that it's not even blue on the inside.

H1: They're blue because they are the stepchild of berries. Not even berries' biological child. All very sad.

Ah, Winter. Here You Go, Again.

2012-01-07T20:04:00.003-05:00

Christmas and the Christmas Season for 2011 is officially over!

Oh, I know. That's pretty boo hiss, I agree!

We are saying goodbye to that scary ass monkey...remember him? The Christmas Monkey with all knowing eyes who was ready to toss monkey poo at you if you misbehaved? Yeah... I know you didn't forget him. How could you?

Especially since I've placed him here for you as a reminder!

We're also saying goodbye to the St. Nick Express that rolled in on Christmas Eve into Christmas Day delivering prezzies and fun.

And so, it's finally time to accept that we are in Winter.

I am finding that a little hard to acknowledge with it being 51 degrees out there today with lots of sun and that extra warmth. Frankly, it felt like Spring. I best not complain though before the ice starts kicking in from blizzards but maybe this is just how things are going to be for the next few months.

But then again, we haven't even seen February yet. :::shudder:::

So just in case things start to get cold and wintry white, instead of being all depressed about being stuck inside your house, throw yourself a party!

Leading the charge on the blog is our very own Momiji Party Girl!

With boombox and smiles, she'll throw down the tunes for us to enjoy and be lively in the coming months.

Fret not.

It's a party up in this place.

Lost in a Sea of e-mails

2012-01-03T21:49:00.000-05:00

Today, Brian Crecente left Kotaku.com. It's a pretty big deal and it's awfully sad. Some are speculating that he was pushed out and I am inclined to believe them.

That said, I have no worries that he will be quite fine wherever he goes next. He's very well respected in his field and a fine journalist.

At the end of his farewell note, he entrusted his e-mail to his readership. That's a lot of trust!

I felt very compelled to write him and it was on the spur of the moment. Of course, I rambled because it is in my nature to do so, and I did not think through my e-mail carefully. I probably should have considering it might the one and only time I reach out to Mr. Crecente.

That said, here's the e-mail I wrote him (don't mind my rambling and gushing! He's awesome!) Click to Enlarge, if you feel so inclined:

I know, nerd right?

Even more nerdish joy is that he responded!

He didn't have to write, of course but I appreciate he took the time to do so even if it was not a very long response. But honestly, what else was he to say?

Though, you know...I feel sorry I forgot to mention Owen. Sorry, Owen! You are an awesome editor too!

And um, really...I'm still without a friend code for the 3DS but can't blame me for trying to be sly to get a friend code from Crecente. Bwahaha, I knew that was not going to happen.

But hey, you know...

I might just be persuaded to leave my 3DS friend code riiiiight here in case anyone out there with a 3DS wanted to add me as a friend...

Anyone?

...

Fine.

Friendless, it is!

Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T17:34:00.001-05:00

Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit.

Hare, Hare, Hare.

Good luck guys, for the year and for the month. Thank you for everything last year and we look forward to a great year together.

I have no Old Year's pictures of the drunken times The Cheat, Diderick and Gnomey-Gnome had because it may be that they had no drunken times at the house. I know, tragic but have no fear. The guys went to a pub last night and I have not yet seen them for the year. They heard that there was no hard alcohol at The HOchieS last night and promptly gave me the finger.

The End of Year Review II: Music 2011

2011-12-31T23:00:00.000-05:00

Once again Amazon and their nonsense business of making me that much poorer, threw $5 sales at me every month on music.

I do not think I bought as many albums from them other than the ones I truly wanted and had to invest in this year but looking at my Amazon Cloud may disprove my terrible memory.

As in previous years, here is the usual disclaimer - I listened to albums past and those will be included on this list mixed in with 2011 efforts.

I also will not be including video game soundtracks on the list this year because a) I will be writing well into next year and b) I will give them their own props when I do the end of year review.

That said, here we go!!!!

Adventure Time's Soundtrack makes number one. It seriously would if it had a proper soundtrack release! Casey James Basichis is brilliant and Pendleton Ward is a geinus. Since there has been no official release, I will "begrudgingly" go with these instead.

14. The Horrors - Skying

This is the second album after the 180 degrees of craziness The Horros pulled after their awesomely cliched goth, garage punk album Strange House. I think I have to just accept that this is the sound they're going with. It's not a bad sound as I noted last album but it certainly makes my head all woozy. They were probably on some serious drugs making this one.

I do not find it as engaging as some of the tracks on Primary Colours. Some of the tracks on Primary Colours are just immediately rotation heavy worthy. Skying feels and plays a lot safer sounding (perhaps it was the mellowing types of drugs that fueled this album) and I would go as far as saying it's a tad dull.

Songs Worth Listening to: "I Can See Through You" and "Still Life"

H1 vs Or 2: 5 < 6. A winner is me with "Still Life" over "Dive In"

Album Cover Review: That's not so bad and I kinda like it. B

13. Two Door Cinema Club - Tourist History

On TD5's recommendation, this album was bought. TD5, why? why? Dramatics aside, thank you. As we know with each other, sometimes we're hit and miss in our recommendations. I am going to file this one under a "miss". No worries though because I will never know until I try.

This album could have been fun. It is fun to some degree via a couple of tracks and I mean that. But then very early on into listening to it, I realized that all the songs began sounding too much alike. And a bit like Franz Ferdinand and some Phoenix mixed with a touch of Vampire Weekend, now that I am listening fresh. That's not necessarily a bad thing (sans the vile Vampire Weekend) at all as I generally love FF and will painfully admit that Phoenix's last album was half full of gems. I am finding though, that as the chorus starts up, the hipster of Two Door Cinema Club really just starts to come alarmingly through.

Before anyone is all "but Or 2, you listen to a lot of Hipster music! You...may be a hipster," let me just say that Hipsters are funny little things. They like to claim perfectly good music as their own then quickly drop them as uncool before the rest of us get to them. So you see, it's not that I listen to necessarily Hipster music but rather it's that you are confused. Hipsters "claimed" it their own but I can claim this land in the name of Spain but that does not make it so.

And just so we are clear, pox on those who think I am a hipster.

Songs worth listening to: "Something Good Can Work" and "What You Know"

H1 vs. Or 2: 5 < 6. A winner is me with "Something Good Can Work" over "This is the Life"

Album Cover Review: I had an obsession with LOL cats this year as H1 will tell you. While I think there is something strange going on with the top of this cat's head, until I know the truth because I just can't figure it out, I find this album cover oddly amusing. B+

12. Miike Snow - Miike Snow

It's time for a little bit of self-loathing. A little bit of a nasty confession, if you will.

Sometimes all you need is one cheesy love of a Brit in a show in which he plays a teenage vampire and an infectious soundtrack and before you realize it, you're that person. The one your friends disown.

Oh, wait...you thought I was talking about Twilight? Ha ha! Oh no, I will never be that awful a human being.

But I am talking about the original UK series Being Human (ooo, what I did there, did you see it?) or rather its spin-off, Becoming Human.

A few web episodes of this awesome little spin-off about a vampire, a ghost and a werewolf was a must watch for me after the stellar season of Being Human. Loving Craig Roberts had everything to do with my watching this and as I did, earworms of Miike Snow songs were effectively sprinkled throughout the series.

Ukkers are good at lots of things and one those things I have realized over the years, is picking the worst, catchy, trashy songs to soundtrack their shows. The songs are guilty pleasures and such is what happened to me. I had to have the album! And here I am now, writing an end of year review about how this never should have happened but feel little shame in liking it even though I know I should.

In its defense, the songs I heard from Becoming Human still stand as earworms I feel compelled to listen to once in a while (and enjoy immensely) but this album is what it is - full of Euro beats and synthesizers and um, bad lyrics sometimes sung questionably odd in their arrangement.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Animal", "Songs for No One", "Black and Blue", "Sans Soleil" and "Plastic Jungle"

H1 vs. Or 2: 5 > 6. A winner is H1 with "Black and Blue" over "Sans Soleil".

Album Cover Review: A Jackelope, aye? No. C

11. The Black Keys - El Camino

I had no intention of getting this album but since Arctic Monkeys will be on tour with them next year, I felt it necessary to listen to a couple of their albums before their headlining show which TD5, H1 and I intend to attend.

The opening track and current single, "Lonely Boy" is best described as bad-assed. I don't know much about The Black Keys other than they're two guys from OH who are the new hot. They're alternative with a country blues rock overtone. The first track aside, here's another album that implements similarly sung and musical arrangements that is present in a lot of the tracks. It gets tedious fast. Then you have thoughtful tracks like "Little Black Submarines" which are welcome, mellow and build up to greatness. (Incidentally, has anyone else noticed that if you stick the word "submarine" into your song, it's probably a good one? see R.E.M. and the Beatles.)

All in all, this is a mostly decent album that is held back by a little bit of repetitiveness that probably will sound really good at MSG in March because it sounds pretty good with a good pair of headphones (but in spurts) - catchy rock riffs with guitars that sometimes talk, strong vocals and strangely dance worthy at times. It's the country rock album you never knew you wanted. MC, get on it.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Lonely Boy", "Hell of a Season", "Mind Eraser" and "Little Black Submarines".

H1 vs. Or 2: 5 = I can't decide H1. "Money Maker" and "Run Right Back" may be in a tie. They're both good songs.

Album Cover Review: Uh, also no. I'm not digging into history of why this was chosen but purely based on my personal opinion and aesthetics. C

10. The Black Keys - Brothers

I won't be completely prepared for the concert in March as I refused to buy all 7 albums by the Black Keys but I thought that I should at least buy last year's album as it got stellar reviews. It's mostly heavier than El Camino and bit better. The songs are tighter, edgier, bluesy, brooding and darker. The album does suffer once again from being a bit too boring on a straight listen through because it's almost too mellow by the end of the album whereas the first half oozes some charm. There's an experimental sound here and there that deviates from their style on one of the tracks and it's welcome.

This is a review by Or 2 of The HOchieS and this is a solid album.

Songs worth listening to: "Ten Cent Pistol", "The Go Getter", "Sinister Kid" and "Tighten Up".

H1 vs Or 2: 5 > 6. A winner is H1 with "She's Long Gone" over "Black Mud".

Album Cover Review: Kind of smug? Kind of to the point. Meh. C

9. Radiohead - The King of Limbs

This album is not the crap everyone makes it out to be but given the high standard of previous Radiohead albums ever since the amazing OK Computer, I can understand the disappointment in The King of Limbs. Radiohead can frankly do whatever the eff they want because as far as I see it, they're making music for themselves with whatever musical experiment in sound that they want to try.

Always intriguing if not completely easy on the ears or very accesible, TKOL is a cacophonous bit of sewn together threads of bass and electronics. It's a bit of a template open to be interpreted and played with by other artists hence the subsequent remix album, I feel.

There's no stand out single other than "Lotus Flower" that one could easily sing along with. That's not what the album is about and that's okay. I appreciate it all the same with it being as fresh and different from most things out there, as all Radiohead albums have been and will continue to be.

Song Worth Listening to: "Lotus Flower", "Separator", "Little by Little" and "Feral"

H1 vs Or 2: 5 > 6. A winner is H1 with "Lotus Flower" over "Codex"

Album Cover Review: Well that's creepy. Maybe too creepy. What the hell is it? B+

8. Various Artists - (Ahk-toong Bay-bi) Covered!

Let's just get this out of the way one time - U2's Achtung Baby is one of the greatest albums of all time, and certainly one of my favourite U2 albums if not my favourite top 3 (with "Pop" and "Zooropa" being the other two, in case you wanted to know - crazy talk? Psh, I beg to differ).

So covering a magnificent album that re-invented U2 - and as I saw someone's comment on this album on a forum one day and I'm paraphrasing, it's an album that was influential on how alternative music is currently made or came after - is a madman's task.

In that vein, Q Magazine decided to gather some of the best of the best to do joint efforts of Madman handiwork in covering this album.

The line up is mostly stellar and so impressive on paper that I am sure everyone who did not know about this album before will probably want a copy.

Unfortunately, I feel mostly disappointed by what happened. There are some amazing covers to be sure, but for the 5 star artists collected on some of these maybe I was just expecting too much.

And maybe it's just that Achtung Baby just cannot be covered. It's a near perfect album and perfect cannot be expected to come from anyone else than the original band.

Maybe 20 years of listening to this one has sealed off my ability to be open-minded.

Or maybe I'm so disgruntled that Nine Inch Nails made such a blah cover of ZOO Station by doing absolutely nothing to it that I am angry. The same NIN who used to mix and remix the death out of a song and make it a whole new thing to behold, took the lazy route and did nothing.

Not to mention, they gave that awful The Fray the job of covering my 2nd favourite song, "Tryin' to Throw Your Arms Around the World". Really?! Why would you think it's a good idea to put The Fray and Snow Patrol up with the likes of Patti Smith and Depeche Mode?!

But here's my other complaint against Depeche Mode - your cover was bad! And that hurts me, personally much like NIN's.

Then there are the tracks by Garbage, Patti Smith, The Killers, Damien Rice and Jack White that are what I expected. I've never been one to hail Jack White as the Rock God people make him out to be but I'll be damned if I couldn't give him serious applause after his cover of "Love is Blindness". It's perhaps one of the best and unexpected covers I've heard. That song is beautifully haunting and somehow, Jack White gave it a new coat (in the angry colour), made a new song and made it great.

It's worth a spin because it's not the worst cover collection of an album out there but just lower your expectations some.

Songs Worth Listening to: "One" by Damien Rice (he should cover it from now on and tell Mary J. Blige to stop her rendition. I can't stand that she does and I don't care if U2 gave their approval), "Until the End of the World" by Patti Smith, "Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses" by Garbage, "Love is Blindness" by Jack White (definitely this one).

H1 vs Or 2: 5 > 6. A Winner is H1 with "Until The End..." by Garbage over "So Cruel" by Depeche Mode

Album Cover Review: A tribute cover that's absolutely beautiful and well-representative of the spirit of Achtung Baby, I can give this a big A+.

7. The Strokes - Angles

I never fully appreciated the greatness of The Strokes' first album until this year. That's not entirely true as it made one of my best for the decade during that review, but it was listening to that horrible covers album that Stereogum put out of Is This It that truly made want to revisit that album in all its glory. It's truly an amazing and frankly, brilliant album which I found myself listening to for the majority of the end of this year and it piqued my interest to own Angles.

I listened to Angles upon release via the free streaming made available that day. It's no Is This It and that's unfair because nothing can be. But as much as I wanted to really dislike the songs and yes, they are not by any means great songs, I could not. In fact, the more it sits and simmers, the more you find yourself wanting to hear them over and over again.

TD5 and I came to that conclusion just a day after the album was released.

That was months ago and I only now own it to see if that remains true and it has. They're a mostly catchy collection of songs and I'm stuck in that The Strokes charm of yesteryear while listening to new, fun bits of arrangement with a dash of an 80s electronica dance party. And show tunes vibe. And uh, Talking Heads?

Overtime I think I may come to appreciate this one a bit more - maybe I'll find more things to love about it but for now, I'm having quite a bit of fun with it as is.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Metabolism", "Under Cover of Darkness", "You're So Right" (which I should probably REALLY hate, but it's so bad, it's good?), "Taken for a Fool", "Games", "Call Me Back"

H1 vs Or 2: 5 > 6. A Winner is H1 with "Taken For A Fool" over "Games". It was a close one though.

Album Cover Review: A hideous mess. C

6. Foo Fighters - Wasting Light

Here's the thing about Foo Fighters and me. I love them. There's nothing not to love about Dave Grohl & Co. especially on this album where everyone comes back and joins for a good time. However, like all well-established bands, you hear them and their sound is just so their own that you start thinking to yourself that maybe it's time to pack it up because everything might just be beginning to sound alike. Track after track. Album after Album. Year after Year.

That's what I hear when I hear the Foos these days. I hear nostalgia and I remember the absolute fantastic time The HOchieS & Co. had at their concert with Weezer and Hot Hot Heat in 2005 but a part of me feels a little bit, dare I say bored? It's true of everyone and this is not just a statement for Foo Fighters alone.

In listening to Wasting Light for this review, and having not given it the proper listen when I acquired the album back upon release, I still stand by the familiarity comment.

But I'm also hearing something pretty inspired here with this album. Before nostalgia kicks in on a lot of the choruses, I'm hearing opening riffs of a different caliber full on depth, and thoughtful lyrics charged full of chance. The songs are sounding fresh at start and a welcome change before falling into trademark Foo Fighters sound.

It's not a very fair complaint because I'm certain had they done something completely out of character, I could very well be cursing.

Hearing this little bit of freshness though, makes me know that they can do this next time and do it well.

In the meanwhile, this album is pretty damned good and my expectations are running a tad high for the next outing.

Songs worth listening to: "Bridge Burning", "I Should Have Known", "Rope" and "Arlandria" (minus the cheesey rhyme in the first two verses).

H1 vs. Or 2: 5 > 6. A Winner is H1 with "Arlandria" over "These Days"

Album Cover Review: Uninspired, I guess. C

5. The Streets - Computers and Blues

One of the greatest albums I own is A Grand Don't Come For Free with a close second in Original Pirate Material. Disappointment soon followed in subsequent albums but Mike Skinner's The Street always maintained a little blip on my radar and I listened to new albums in the hopes that I'd hear something great again. I was a bit sad knowing that the 5th album was going to be his last but I listened with reservation.

It is with great sadness that I am bidding farewell to The Streets. There's a sense of finality on the last album with a memory lane trip for me as a fan and Mike Skinner as an artist on the final track "Lock the Locks". Why the sadness? Because while it may not have the new, unexpected charm of Original Pirate Material or the genius of A Grand, this album is different, familiar and yet not at all that. It's not as masterful, clever, biting or funny as the first two but I feel like I'm truly saying goodbye to the friend I always loved, fought with and re-found. Lyrically and how presented, there's growth here - literally as though Mike has grown up and in that, it's a fantastic album and end to his era. There's more sampling, more mellow beats, more observations of human nature - sometimes happy and sometimes accepting, cleaner and more coherent musically, and more thoughtful lyrics than ever before. The album leaves me with a sad sort of warmth - comforting yet devastating.

Those late night club adventures with Mike Skinner are done - we're heading into morning and I know I won't see him again.

"I'm packing up my desk, put it into boxes, knock out the lights, lock the locks and leave..."

Indeed. and Goodbye, Friend.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Lock the Locks", "Without Thinking", "Trust Me", "ABC", "Outside Inside", "Roof of Your Car", and "OMG".

H1 vs. Or 2: 5 > 6. A Winner is H1 with "Without Thinking" over "Blip on a Screen".

Album Cover Review:

4. The Streets - Cyberspace and Reds

....Uh, wait what? Hello..Friend? So soon?!

Per Wikipedia, this "mixtape" album put out by The Streets is not canon in official album releases. Computers and Blues is the final album and while this one came out before C&B, the various recordings pieced together for C&R seems have been done after C&B was made. After my tearful farewell to The Streets and Mike's finality, this feels like the last big hurrah we may have shared before truly riding off into the sunset. It's mostly comprised of a bunch of U.K. rap artists and a whole slew of beats and forceful energy. Mike raps on the tracks but I feel bows out to the other talents collaborating.

The contrast is amazing - Mike was always one to be fairly even-paced but that's not quite right in this assessment on this. He sounds as though it's over even though the music and the guests are pushing faster beats. His vocals drag and it's actually quite an interesting bit of media, this album.

I love it.

It's chopped up, unrestrained, a mess of music that's fascinating. Mike even says he's no longer relevant as an artist who peaked in 2002 (as per the lyrics on one of the tracks), hence the need to hang it up (until the inevitable re-surfacing like everyone seems to be doing, I guess - time will tell).. As all over the place this is and disjointed as the tracks are with their very abrupt endings cutting off perfectly awesome songs that you'd like to hear how it ends but never will because they're nixed before their grand finale, it's not at all cacophonous.

It's on drugs, for sure.

But it's catchy.

And poses no threat on the settee.

All those garage beats and more are present and they all get thrown in here mixed with alternative, electronica and hip hop. It makes this stop in this ending journey just that much more bittersweet.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Robots are Taking Over" featuring Envy, Elroy and Frisco, "Don't Hide Away" featuring Wiley, Rinse and Ice Kid, "Tidy Nice and Neat" featuring Ghost Poet, "4 o' clock", "Breakbat Barz" featuring Scru Fizzer

H1 vs. Or 2: 5 < 6. A Winner is me with "Tidy Nice and Neat" over "Backseat Barz" featuring Loudmouth - fixed

Album Cover Review: I don't know what the hell is going on here but I love it. A

3. TV on the Radio - Nine Types of Light

Coming off my fairly new found love of TV on the Radio from 2008's Dear Science, I eagerly anticipated what sort of crazy alternative, funk rock I could expect to find on 2011's Nine Types of Light. What I found was a collection of love songs.

Slower, still funky and much more full of soul but not much on the dancey fancy.

While it's not all perfect with my biggest complaint being too many "oooos" on various tracks that were just way overused, for the most part I was not disappointed by the offerings.

The bass was prominent and TV on the Radio's funk is good for the soul. As noted before, their songs always sound pretty multi-layered - always an interesting blend of electronic, alternative, drum beats and never dull. The influences borrow from different genres including dancehall, reggae, rock and others. Eclectic and a master use of various styles, instruments and arrangements including beautifully sung vocals, TV on the Radio's album asked for your ears to indulge in exploration that bombarded the senses.

R.I.P. to Gerard Smith who tragically passed away this year. Gerard Smith who was so young, and so talented... Your bass lines were so prominent on this album and helped carry the band and contributed to the fantastic experimental sounds that TV in the Radio produces. Thank you for the gifts by sharing your musical genius and making my life that much richer.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Repetition", "Forgotten", "Will Do" and "Caffeinated Consciousness"

H1 vs Or 2: 5 < 6. A Winner is Me with "Will Do" over "Killer Crane"

Album Cover Review: Maybe this should have been the cover for Angles. I like this one, it is nice. B+

2. Arctic Monkeys - Suck it and See

Everything just fits on this album. Even the horrid, nonsense single "Brick by Brick" works when this album is listened to in its entirety.

I honestly did not foresee Suck it and See as being so high up on the end of year review. It's no secret that I am a huge Arctic Monkeys fan - they're one of my favourite bands but due to that I hold them in the highest regard and I expect a lot from them.

The sad truth is that after the disappointment of Humbug, I shuddered a little to think what sort of shitty hell I could expect to hear from this their fourth album.

I needed to grow up with Arctic Monkeys and accept that they're never going to make an album as amazing or rather, the same type of album as their first two outfits.

Suddenly things were much easier to swallow as I was no longer seeing dark shades of red. Even Humbug is now sounding a much better album now than it did in 2009.

This album as a whole is pretty even-tempered. They're mostly love songs which will integrate nicely into their portfolio of AM songs.

When Alex is at his best in his song writing on this album, he can write extraordinarily biting sharp witty things that can be deceptively melodic - stitching together words seamlessly that flow magnificently creating amazing story telling.

For those songs that are the more upbeat ballads, they're incredibly charming in execution.

And yes, you read right: Alex's more melodic in his singing more than ever before even on some of those songs that are heavy on bass, drumming and stinging guitar riffs.

Let us not delude ourselves though. I still see red when I hear the occasional absolute laziness in Alex's lyrics because for such a clever boy, he's not being so clever all the time and it's annoying because I know he can do better. They're allowed to have fun, sure, but sometimes I just have to WTF them.

I also see red when I do not hear Matt's drumming being utilized to its full potential. But there of course is the dilemma because they're not making fast paced songs anymore (for the most part) and therefore Matt's drumming does not need to be super fierce and everyone else just keeps up.

It's hard to let go of my boys but as I said, I'm just going to have to move with them. Past the red, I still hear brilliance and this album proves it.

Even if it's not the speed I'm used to. See? Hard to let go...but trying.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Piledriver Waltz" (though I prefer the Submarine version), "Reckless Serenade", "Love is a Laserquest", "All My Own Stunts" and "Library Pictures".

H1 vs Or 2: 5 < 6. A Winner is Me with "Library Pictures" over "Don't Sit Down 'Cause I've Moved Your Chair"

Album Cover Review: Well that was well simple, wasn't it? A-

1. Death Cab for Cutie - Codes and Keys

The moment I heard some of the smartest and surprising opening lyrics of "Monday Morning", I knew this album was going to be a fantastic one. After tearing myself away from that one song, I discovered the rest of the album was pretty great too. Mixed with soothing piano keys and pulsing with beats and bit of code giving way to the often calm, and emotional vocals, Codes and Keys was solid from start to finish. The range was vast from the up tempo songs to the quieter more focused ones, and it's for all these reasons it makes number one this year.

Songs Worth Listening to: "Monday Morning", "Some Boys", "Stay Young, Go Dancing", "Codes and Keys" and "Doors Unlock and Open"

H1 vs Or 2: 5 > 6. A Winner is H1 with "You are a Tourist" over "Unobstructed Views"

Album Cover Review: I think it's awesome. A+

Albums not numbered but that we did listen to:

The Decemberists - The King is Dead

American Indie Folk Rock, let me count the ways I do not love you. There's just one actually: hippies. This is another album that got stellar reviews and I'm not loving it but I can't get behind hippies, which is why this is happening now. Bought on a whim because it was $4 on Amazon (again, grrr) and well-reviewed this year, I am finding that maybe I should read up about new bands before jumping in blind. This is just not my style and it would be unfair to place it on an end of year review of mine. I think I may have confused them for another band. How the heck did that happen?

That said, they have a few songs that are pretty good for my little ears: "Rox in the Box", "This is Why We Fight" and "June Hymn".

Pomplamoose - Pomplamoose Video Songs

How cute they are. I bought this little album after being completely annoyed by the Hyundai adverts that featured this band in 2010 for Christmas. I said I was annoyed but I figured that the stupid little cover of "Up on the House Top" had to be performed by a real band. So I investigated and discovered that these little hipsters had a cute and frankly great song with "Expiration Date". They were interesting with all the music and sounds heard within any given song performed by the musical male counterpart master of sounds in the band, while the bass and singing parts by the cute female counterpart.

They're fun and I'll look out for their works in the future and buy those I have not got around to buying yet.

Song worth listening to: "Expiration Date" and "Hail Mary".

Alex Turner - Submarine Original Soundtrack

Our favourite Alex Turner contributed to the soundtrack to this movie. He proves to still be the best little lyricist with his clever words for sappy love songs. It's a bit of a beautiful thing with two of the greatest songs I've heard this year in "Piledriver Waltz" and "Stuck on a Puzzle".

The End of Year Review I: The Best of the Blog 2011

2011-12-31T18:03:00.000-05:00

Welcome to the first round for the End of Year Reviews.

I will be late with the End of Year reviews for Video Games because I started my final game at the end of November and have not had a chance to finish it up for inclusion.

The End of Year music review and the live show review will be posted hopefully later today.

Right now, let's take a look back at the best stories and memories captured on the blog!

January began with the inkling of horrid things to come. Child Protection Services probably should have been called in earlier for MC and kImpossible and their Plant Child. She was...::sniff:: so cute. Look at her!

We also made ramen. We haven't made it since.

Who does not love doughnuts and sushi in February? We also got our macro lens and thus started our love with our most precious of lenses and we took pictures of tiny food... Heh.

More importantly, our worst fears came true and waaaaauuuuggghhhh, she really was so cute.

March brought us closer to Adventure Time, a show you all should be watching. H1 also was the perpetrator in a crime against the Crown and we ate our fill at dim sum and good times at not one but two Chinatowns.

We had a Final Fantasy sort of April that was full of danger, orchids, Trini bush and Jammie Dodgers.

Hanging out with scary gorillas and eating good times Spanish food all happened in May.

Then in June, we visited our friends at the Pepsico Gardens and rode on a broom with our other friends another day.

We visited PA in July, where we rode on roller coasters, ate too many doughnuts and not enough awesome pho, and saw lots and lots of trains. Oh yeah, we also had a huge Pretzel Debate of 2011 and I clearly won. See for yourself!

Stay Pressed, August. And eff you with your hurricanes.

September found Or 2 drinking chocolate at a fancy cafe, at the U.S. Open and the HOchieS' had some whirlwind fun with H1's Rennie Frennie. We ate steak, saw Billy Elliott, visited a Summer fair in Midtown and knocked back some back at a bar.

Divali was a good time this October. Then we had a blizzard just in time for Halloween. Yep, a freakin' blizzard and a right scary one at that.

For some reason, Mario did us dirty in November and then food and Target did us dirty. November, what the frick! At least we had great times with our frenemies for Thanksgiving including the awesome Blokus marathons we partook in and we even had time to take in a Seminar.

This is the last day of December and there's still some adventuring to do but for now, we'll just leave you with the memories of Festivus and how unkind some of you were to us in 2011.

25 Years

2011-12-31T14:20:00.002-05:00

This year marked the 25th Anniversary of The Legend of Zelda. 25 years!

I chopped some bushes and messed around Hyrule in the original game a long time ago but did not play my first game until Ocarina of Time. I know! It's a terrible confession, isn't it?

Since then, I've played most of the games that followed with my favourite game of all time being The Legend of Zelda: Mask of Majora.

I've journeyed with Link (or Kuseph, as I like to call him) through forests, temples and dungeons. Together we've helped a lot of people along the way with not much gratitude in return. We've bottled many a fairy, spoken to the Minish, become quite wealthy by obtain rupees any which way possible, traveled by train and sailed the oceans blue.

W've fought dragons, wind gods, the undead, countless other manners of beasts and occasionally fought our Darker Selves.

We've learnt to play the ocarina, jammed on guitar, conducted symphonies of the wind, and we're currently learning how to play the harp.

To celebrate the 25th Anniversary of The Legend of Zelda, Nintendo planned quite a number of events. I am fortunate enough to live in NYC where Nintendo World is just a few short blocks away from work. It's here that Nintendo World is currently hosting a large display of all things Zelda showcasing the history of the game and the Legend.

On Halloween, I took the opportunity to visit the display. It was a fun tribute full of trinkets and item gets. Limited edition pieces of hardware, figures and collector's items were all beautiful and enough to make a Zelda fan both reminisce and a little bit jealous.

Of course, a tribute to Zelda is a tribute to Shigeru Miyamoto.

The man himself.

In 2005, Nintendo held a signing event for the release of Nintendogs and at number 36 and 37 in line, Beetchie and I had the opportunity meet Mr. Miyamoto and get some items signed. He was the cutest!

And he laughed at me.

...

He only laughed because the little Wind Waker Link figure I brought for his signature (that I unceremoniously pulled from my pocket) made him smile.

He's my most prized possession, my autographed angry eyes Link just as The Legend of Zelda continues to be one of my favourite series.

Thanks for the memories, Nintendo, Link and Zelda and here's to many years more.

A Trini Christmas in Food

2011-12-31T13:12:00.000-05:00

What Christmas would be complete without some pastelles.

Thanks to Frass this year for bring us pastelles from Brooklyn. H1 has decided they were little too hot which made them not as enjoyable as they could have been.

Mom and I loved them. Please bring more soon. Bwahahaha.

We also thank Frass for being this year's designated caper and olive boy for the batch of pastelles that The HOchieS churned out.

We bought a tortilla press this year to assist in the making of the pastelles and it is now universally acknowledged that H1 is the Master of the Tortilla press.

They came out pretty good but our cornmeal did not get perfected quite yet.

One more thanks to go around to Frass. Yesterday he brought us goodies of pone, currants rolls, coconut rolls, sorrel shandy, apple J. and pear J. He loves us. And we love him, hence the reason he does not get top of the Grievance List.

MC, take note.

The Tree and Jazzie

2011-12-31T11:45:00.001-05:00

This year, H1 and I decided the tree was going to be pink!

It turned a sort of pink, purple, silver and gold sort of a mess but it was a lovely mess!

Don't judge my tree! Just my photo.

Who you should judge is Jazzie.

Again this year, I bought the cats a bed. I actually bought them a dog bed =- large enough to hold 4 cats!

And once again, Pumpkin took it over making Jazzie hate me even more.

But then again, she did not use it effectively when presented with it and that's no fault of mine.

Ridiculous Sightings in Retail

2011-12-31T10:50:00.002-05:00

One of the things H1 and I wanted to start doing was dedicating blog posts to all the ridiculous and clever products we often see on our trips to various stores.

What better time to find questionable items in stock than at Christmas time? There's so much good stuff out there just waiting to be found.

Take these Christmas cards we saw at Target for instance:

Meanwhile in the Cookie aisle, Siamese twins are born!

They look quite healthy and delicious, if I may say so.

Sometimes products break and in this case of the rock n' roll nutcracker, things became a little bit crude:

This is what he's supposed to look like

And this is what a broken model looks like when there's no guitar

What? Public lewdness! Call the cops!

At a Toys R'Us, we found a new line of dolls. They're much like Strawberry Shortcake but perhaps, a little more racist?

I bought these boxes for B'Cheeks. I wonder which ones she got?

At the Chinese supermarket, in searching for a few more snack items to place in Beetchie's Christmas package, H1 and I found some noodle crackers and one little girl who was very much animated and adopted a "When in Rome" sort of attitude.

I had the barbecue and original flavours.

I will never have them again.

Oh, and before I forget, despite MC's bribery of wine to Momma HOchie for some fried bakes, he still made the top of the grievance list in 2011.

Perhaps next time if he were just a little more subtle about it, he will not find himself at the Number 1 spot. Alas, MC has no shame:

Currently listening to: Momma HOchie singing some calypso about being drunk and disorderly. How fitting.

The Christmas (Present List) Fraught With Extermination and Danger

2011-12-25T21:20:00.000-05:00

Some how, this Christmas saw a bunch of Daleks invade the HOchie household.

One Dalek can destroy an entire city so imagine what these three will do!!!!

Luckily for us, we have the Doctor to protect us! And thus Christmas was saved.

Thank you to everyone for the presents! Once again we got a lot of loot and the shame of it is overwhelming. It goes to show that we are well-loved even if we air Grievances against you guys.

We hope we managed to give you a little more joy too.

Now, on to the present list!

H1's Goo'd Time Pyo List

1. From Mama & Papa HOchie: Two sweaters, a sewing machine
2. From Luuuuuuiiiiissss: A smug Iphone 4S. Why. WHY?! Wait, I thought the Doctor saved Christmas? Psh. There were other gifts like clothes and a smoothie maker, and the joint gift of a sewing machine.
3. From Bunji, Angelo, A'Face and B'Cheeks: His words, "ridiculous presents". A veggie chopper and a digital timer, and a joint present of a sewing machine.
4. From Or 2: an ol' timey 3DS. IT was only 9 months old!, The Harry Potter audio book collection, U2 Super Deluxe Edition of Achtung Baby, and 3DS game.
5. From Frass: a luggage weight machine, and Hark! A Vagrant!
6. From MC, Kim, and BAM: a pin cushion, a gift card from Sephora and a gift card from Barnes and Noble
7. From TD5: Florence and the Machine Ceremonials
8. From X & Co.: Recipes Remembered
9. From Bughie J.: A beautiful picture of some rotund squirrels and the most beautiful pictures of Wimplebee, Lacey and friends
10. From Gen' Frien': Chocolates and cookies from Germany
11. From Alex and Co.: a gift card from Michaels

Or 2's Goo'd Time Pyo List

1. From Mama & Papa HOchie: Two sweaters, Klipsch headphones and a piggy shaped frying pan
2. From Luuuuuuiiiiissss: PSN Plus Subscription
3. From Bunji, Angelo, A'Face and B'Cheeks: A PSVita (yay!)
4. From H1: A Tokidoki Hello Kitty Watch, new flannel sheets, Trails in the Sky (psp)
6. From Frass: Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions (psp), gift certificate to Amazon (which I will put towards a new lens)
7. From MC, Kim, and BAM: xxxHolic, a gift certificate to Amazon (which I will put towards a new lens)
8. From TD5: Uncharted: Golden Abyss
9. From CLee: Cave Story 3DS
10. From X & Co.: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
11. From Bughie J.: A beautiful picture of some rotund squirrels, the most beautiful pictures of everything and anything including a wonderful GOOD Wimplebee, Lacey and friends, music and FMA: Brotherhood
12, From Gen' Frien': Lots of goodies! a Tokidoki hat, a Domo disguised as an alligator, zombie key cases, a Momoji doll, a piggy sanrio ornament, a Hello Kitty x Momoji keychain, and chocolates and cookies from Germany
12. From Alex and Co.: my own tin of butter cookies (with no bribe of black cake after it's done), and Futurama Monopoly

More Pictures to come...

Currently watching: The Doctor Who Christmas Special

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

2011-12-25T10:34:00.003-05:00

The Christmas Monkey is off boozing it up with some ponche-de-creme made fresh by Papa HOchie and vows to return some time this week to dole out New Year's Resolutions to you guys.

In his absence, The HOchieS are taking the opportunity to wish all our frenemies and everyone a very Merry Christmas!

We hope St. Nick's Express delivered all the toys, joy, best wishes and the presents Kyle, the presents...to your homes.

We will post the Presento-Pyo List later today once we open ours.

Momma HOchie is working today and will wait for her to return before busting open the good times.

Lots of love and Merry Ithmus!

The HOchieS.

The Airing of Grievances 2011

2011-12-23T00:22:00.000-05:00

'Tis the moment you have all been waiting for!

The Christmas Monkey with the all seeing gangsta eyes has come to deliver the news...

The crystal ball does not lie

Ah yes, the wonderful Airing of Grievances. Last year as it turns out, you guys were pretty good which is why we're so sorry to have felt your misgivings this year.

Here is something quite surprising and I believe its a HOchieS' Grievance List first...There's a tie this year for the top spot.

1. CLee

You know that business of yours where you came up to spend time with us for 2 weeks? That was awesome. But you know that business of yours where you came up to spend time with us for 2 weeks and neglected to tell us that you would be spending an extra week after you left us with your BFF?! Not. Nice.

You deserve top spot on the Grievance List this year but fear not, you are not alone because...

1. MC

For allowing BAM to smack Suga'Face (but I will have you know I had a stern talking to him and he will not do it again); for blatantly stating that the reason why you stopped calling me and called H1 instead was that you had no need for me because I do not have a child (I will have you know, I have 5 chirren!); and for buying me Danish butter cookies with underhanded intentions of my having a tin in which to bake YOU a black cake...

You also deserve top spot on the Grievance List this year.

3. TD5

For missing Thanksgiving with the HOchieS two years in a row. I mean, things happen and you couldn't come. We understand that completely but allowing me to fall prey to BAM and other chirren when you should have been praying over their naughty little heads...

You deserve the third spot on the Grievance List this year.

4. X

For allowing Moodou to smack that cup out of your hand like nobody's buisness; for allowing him to not share yogurt puffs with Suga'Face; and after all of that claiming he is a sweet child even though he is clearly a Bad Man...

You (or possibly Moodou) deserve the fourth spot on the Grievance List this year.

5. Beetchie

For considering taking an Internship in NJ for a year...really, need we say more?

6. Bughie J.

For not baking brownies. Some on this list may say that deserves top spot and at first I appreciated that you did not want to give me brownies not made with love. But then I realized you just caused an angry mob headed my way (spearheaded by Bunji Bro)...

You deserve the sixth spot on the Grievance List this year.

7. Frass

You always manage to end up so low on the list. You scheme quite well what with your treks to Brooklyn to bring us pastelles and always showing up to the house with wine. Bribery clearly works for you but you know, you really should not be laughing at the fortune cookie asshattery thrown at me. Also, I saw the great Simon Pegg and you had no idea who he was. How is it we can be friends and you have not seen Shaun of the Dead ? It's required viewing, damn it! Even MC has seen it. What the heck?! Unforgivable...

You deserve the seventh spot on the Grievance List this year.

Please all, try to be better next year, won't you?

With Best Wishes and Furious Angry Eyes,

The HOchieS

Fortune Cookie Asshattery

2011-12-20T19:48:00.001-05:00

It should come as no surprise now that I continue to be insulted by fortune cookies.

Here we have our order for lunch today:

Good times, right?

H1 and I had to share a fortune today and as if they are intentionally effing with me, this is what we got:

What?

In this case, I will go with wontons...which is what I actually did. H1 ordered the dumplings.

I suppose it was not as bad as the time before when it was not only implied that I was stupid but I was called out on my fat nature:

Adieu, Autumn! Bonjour, Christmas...Monkey...?

2011-12-19T20:57:00.000-05:00

It's not officially Winter yet but it is officially 6 days until Christmas and so we are bidding adieu to the happy Scarecrow friend with mute crow.

Warm, sunny days were full of fun. Rain showers were just a few but welcome all the same. The sometimes chilly air made us remember the what time of the year it was and the leaves were late to fall off the trees.

Thank you for the wonderful Autumn days. Thank you for the smiles and thank you, until we meet again!

Today, we say hello to a cheeky Christmas monkey. He's got a crystal ball full of glitter and happiness but he's got his eye on everyone.

I think we better be really good less we end up with coal. Or um, Monkey... poopies.

Who knows with these monkeys.

The Great 2011 Frenemies' Visit, Part III: Asshattery and Blokus

2011-12-18T22:21:00.000-05:00

If there was one thing we did a lot of during Thanksgiving week, was play Blokus. Budgie and Angelo introduced us to Blokus Jr. when they bought Boohead a copy of the game for his birthday.

We all were hooked on Blokus Jr. and after playing two players for a few days during the Frenemies' visit, Luuuuiiiisssss and everyone decided that a 10 p.m. run to Walmart was in order to get the full, adult version of Blokus.

The keyword here is that it was the 'adult' version.

If you must know, the above is not the proper way to play Blokus. It's a strategy game where you try to get rid of your pieces as much as you can but at the same time, block other players from putting down their pieces. It is a lot more fun than it sounds especially if like us, you designate titles to all your colour teams.

Blue = Serious Blue or The English (depending on which version you want to play - the historical version or the ass kicking version)

Green = Plague Green

Red = Clown Red or the Yanks (depending on which version you want to play - the historical version or the joker version)

Yellow = Mongolian Yellow

Note to H1 and self for future reference: Clown Red and Serious Blue from our misgivings during our gaming during The Legend of Zelda: Four Sword Adventures.

We had Blokus marathons nightly and it was ridiculous. I think it is safe to say that I would not be surprised if Blokus started showing up at everyone's houses everywhere. Yes. Plague Green, indeed.

Thanksgiving was fun. There was a lot of food as per usual and a lot more babies as our frenemies' and the HOchieS' families grow.

With the addition of so many babies, it also meant a lot of baby food in the house. I would like to make things clear right now: Gerber Graduates Banana Puffs are the best.

We ate up puffs and drank plenty of Coke Zero in Domo Cups.

Apparently, these puffs are for crawlers. CLee and I can both crawl. I don't see the problem.

CLee and I sat there and ate up the puffs like nobodies buisness. In case you think we are cruel, I would like to let you know that we did not take food out of babies' mouths. We ate up the container AFTER all babies went back to their homes.

Well, we would have eaten off the entire container but H1 reminded us that X's baby, Five Dumplings, was supposed to at our house a few days after the fact....heh, we may have forgotten but the eating of the puffs was not done intentionally to take food away from babies.

Although, it should always be done that way because you can be damned sure that Five Dumplings took dim sum out of my mouth last week Saturday.

He's asking for trouble, that one.

The Time Has Come

2011-12-18T00:01:00.000-05:00

Some may say I am an ass.

A lot of people do that, actually. And they're rude.

Some may say I can cook white rice like nobody's buisness.

Those people would be right. In fact, everyone should know this about me.

Some may say I talk too damned much.

Yeah, well. I believe that to be true because look! I've typed so many words here and have not yet said what I wanted to.

Some may say I am a dreamer.

Bwahahaha, okay. I won't go there. That was just a little kid.

Some may say I am a lot of things, but the one I no longer am...

...is displaced.

That's right because it was at this time 16 years ago, we moved to the U.S.A.

It was then at that young age that I was plucked from Trinidad and brought to NY to live my life. I was confused and felt like I belonged no where for some time but now, I am no longer that displaced child.

I am a New Yorker.

Some may argue.

And to those I say, "Screw you guys."

The Great 2011 Frenemies' Visit, Part II: Seminar

2011-12-13T21:39:00.001-05:00

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving it rained and put a damper on our plans. Ha! Sorry, I could not help myself.

The rain was pretty intense but off Clee and I went to meet up with Pandy, Jilly and Pandy Incarnate of Evilness (True story - PIE is wickedness and we love him plenty!), spend time at Nintendo World, eat at Shake Shack and then to drop some culture on Clee's ass at 7 p.m.

Due to PIE's 1year old tendency to go knocking about and picking up all sorts of women, our time ran a little short. It was not a problem with me of course, because it meant I did not have to go to that accursed Apple Store on 5th (Crisis averted, right Clee?) but instead picked up our Shake Shack order to go.

Everyone who comes around must be introduced to Shake Shack because it's just the respectable thing to do. As expected, Clee loved it because what's not to love?

I'm one to enjoy the rain, so the day was pretty fun for me. Clee and I shared a warm chocolate chip cookie from Jacques Torres that was just fantabulous. I do not think I have spoken about the greatness of that cookie before and one day I will buy one and take pictures but for now, you will have to trust when I tell you that it is a beautiful and tasty thing.

The big reveal of the night was the culture to drop on Clee's ass. I know you were wondering what the heck I was on about.

The "culture" was to take Clee to see Alan Rickman in the play Seminar.

Without a review, or knowledge of any real sort of plot, H1 and I knew we had to just go see this play. As it turns out, it was not that great.

But!

Alan Rickman is always a joy and as I have found over the years, I do not care what the movie but as long as I can watch that man and/or listen to him speak, I will gladly watch and/or listen with no complaints. He's just such a bitch, it's awesome.

H1 thought that the one character played by Hettienne Park was absolutely pointless or at least had the worst role. I am inclined to agree. I did not see the necessity of the part, honestly.

Jerry O'Connell did a good job of his bit - funny, self-centered and so such a damned annoying elitist hipster.

The whole play was sort of elitist - full of the kind of bullshit that English Literature Majors will spew when they believe their own hype and take themselves too seriously. Fortunately, the play poked fun at itself in some respects. It was clever and bogged itself down in overdrawn, pretentious language and then proceeded to mock itself.

Though, I do not think it mocked itself enough and I found Lily Rabe's character to be particularly annoyingly elitist. She may have had some of the best one-liners but every time she opened her mouth, I cringed a little.

Then there was Hamish Linklater.

I'm a bit biased, you know. I was not an avid viewer of The New Adventures of Old Christine but in the one or two episodes I did see, I loved his character played in that.

And so, I enjoyed watching him in Seminar. He was good but I suppose they all were for their respective roles (well except H. Park - not a bad actress - just a horribly written character).

What did Clee think of the play?

*****SPOILERS AHEAD*****

The play also contained some T&A.

*****SPOILERS END******

I think it's safe to say that he enjoyed it just fine and was pleasantly surprised.

I happened to get Hamish's autograph after the show too! He was cute and almost walked off without giving me the time of day but came back to sign after he realized I had been standing there. It was really pouring still - more so than it had before - so I was really appreciative that he made the rounds to sign the booklets, honestly. He didn't have to. Then he gave me a weird sounding "thank you" when I told him he was good in the show and a smile as he left.

Does not mean much to you, does it?

I did not stay for Alan's autograph which was sad but I'm okay with that. Who knows? Perhaps one day I will run into him like I did Howard Stern (that same day, actually! but did not say hello because I think he would have scared me and spoke unkindly of me on his show the next day) and Jeffrey Donovan last week. I could have hugged Michael Weston and asked for Sam Axe but I was too shy to do anything about it. Or maybe it's that I forgot his name for a good 20 seconds and it would have been downright embarrassing.

Noteworthy Lowlamps

The one other thing H1 and I would like to mention about Seminar is that it had a very strange choice of music to make the transition between sets and scenes. It was this weird techno, cacophonous sort of music that was so freaking odd that we do not really know what to make of it.

The Great 2011 Frenemies' Visit, Part I: It's Love

2011-12-13T21:00:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving week seems as if it was ages ago. We were fortunate to have some of the frenemies visit NYC that week and as per usual, it flew by.

It's awesome enough when frenemies hang out but it's twice as awesome when they bring you goodies and oh the goodies they brought.

A handful of tunnocks? Yes, please.

Reminder: Must go over there and eat last one before Luuuiiiissss gets to it.

A box full of fudge? Indeed. And thanks.

Reminder: Inquire as to whereabouts of the fudge.

A plethora of multi-coloured and flavoured rums? Uh... yeah... why...not..? Rum is always welcome. The radioactive green one though? Huh. It certainly makes my life (and cabinet) brighter!

And maybe my insides brighter too? Huh.

Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit. Hare, Hare, Hare.

2011-12-01T20:23:00.001-05:00

It's December and I don't feel Christmas-ey, do you?

Never mind that though! It's the beginning of the month and I wish every luck. Have a good one, all!

Happy Birthday

2011-11-26T09:12:00.001-05:00

Happy Birthday to two,
Happy Birthday to two,
Happy Birthday, dear two of youuuuuu
Happy Birthday to two!

Bughie J. and TD5, did you like my song?

The Pigeons are Dying - Your Happy (?) Thanksgiving

2011-11-24T00:00:00.000-05:00

That time of year again when an important question must be asked.

What is Gobblor planning?

Investigative reporter, Bughie J. sent us this update:

It's 2011: the war against the Gobblors does not go well. The pigeons, sensing they may become humanity's next thanksgiving bird of choice should the turkeys win, form a tentative alliance with humanity to defeat the Gobblors! Gobblor: The Pigeon War! This Thanksgiving!

Terrifying, isn't it?

So, uhhh, yeah....

Happy Thanksgiving, all...?

Happy Birthday, Momma HOchie!

2011-11-20T08:16:00.001-05:00

Today is Momma HOchie's birthday and she turns 06 today. The day after Momma HOchie's birthday, is not her birthday.

If I were to go off to work today as I intend, she might not be too pleased with me. But if Dad has his way, buying that new 55 inch 1080p LED television may just soften the blow.

She also wants flowers and wine. One of those things I did not get.

I fear for my life, but I'm hoping the alcohol might make her forget the misstep.

Happy Birthday, Momma from all your chirrens - your miserable first three, all the miserable sons and daughter we acquired for you along the way, and your miserable five plus one grandchildren.

Thank you for everything you have given us and continue to give.