Adventures in the Last Week of August

The crap month that is August is finally coming to a close.  If the Zombie Apocalypse occurs at the end of the year, I'm sure I'll quite happily take another August over that.

In the meanwhile, I will continue to speak ill of the month in which my camera broke.  Yep, August continues to prove that it is pure evil because it was all August's fault that happened! Don't you see?!

In some sort of end of August madness, I wound up coming home late three nights this week for fun events with friends.

It was as if August was trying to redeem itself for its asshattery but I know better.

On Tuesday, I attended a Yankees game at the new stadium upon invitation by a work buddy along with Alex and Active Goat T.  While my usual practice would be to root for the other team other than NY (to be a contrary jerk - no other reason), on principle I could not do so for Toronto.  You know, Canada and all... haha, Canada! I only kid.

The Delta Lounge or whatever it's called.  Too lazy now to look it up.  Laaazzzyyy!!

It's Happened

There are no high hopes for Muse's new album after hearing that rubbish new single "Madness".  If I could describe a pop song in the most disgusting of ways, I would do so for this.

However, there are currently no words to describe the horror.

That is all.

Unfreakin' Believable

Say what you will about the official song for the Olympics 2012 but as the OFFICIAL song, you'd think NBC wouldn't cut it out of their closing ceremony "broadcast", right?

It should come as no surprise to me the level of assness NBC has displayed during these entire games and yet they still managed to piss me off this day in one final hurrah.

I might be on a bit of a breakup from Bells but that is besides the point and what NBC did was really, really idiotic.

Really.

Yet I had to sit there and listen to that asshole Ryan Seacrest talk out of his asshole showcasing his lack of musical knowledge, watch Posh Spice almost fall off her car (which would have been fabulous except she didn't), Kate Moss heroin walk in a daze, Jessie J. butcher Freddie Mercury and waste two and a half hours of my life watching commercials and terrible performances when I could easily have wasted that time playing Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance instead.

Absolute brilliance, that.

Edit at 12:39 a.m.: I'm sure they cut tons of material and I'm seeing Kate Bush got cut too.  Complete shitnanigans.

The Shitnanigans of the Olympics Google Doodles

What does it take to get Gold on Google Doodles Featured Page during the Olympics 2012?!

This week, the Google homepage has been hosting Google Doodles you can "Play".

On Tuesday, I jumped hurdles and made a score of 13.4 seconds, jumping every hurdle without fail and only got silver.

Silver.

I call Shitnanigans!

Tonight, I was defending my goal like nobody's business in Football (which reminds me, I saw a great shirt today that read "I play football with my feet".  I need it) and managed to save 23 times.

Silver.

Silver.

Shitnanigans!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Curse you, Goolympics.

I curse you with my silver tongue.

Oodles- of Noodle+

As if we were not gluttons enough the evening before (hell, we still have to eat a meal the day after, right?), we made our way to White Plains on Saturday to try a new Noodle place that had been getting a lot of buzz.

Sushi in the Summer Time, with a Side of Blue Pig

It's Restaurant Week once more and once more, The HOchieS & Co. found themselves at Hatsuhana for sushi.

Fake candles were on our table.  It's almost as if they recall some sort of alleged fire to cloth napkin that may have occurred at our table last year.

It was Boohead who made the request but I was not opposed to the idea either.

Mk (sans X - much to her chagrin what with the pictures of sushi torture we kept sending to her during the meal) and new frenemy, "Active" Goat T* accompanied us for a night of fishy fun.

Chitauri, It is

In shopping for A'Face's Birthday presents and a potential scheme of racking up Lego Club points for the discounted purchase of a Haunted Mansion (which we have now estimated will take me 29.1 hours to build given my current building rate...ugh), H1 confiscated the Lego Captain America Avenging Cycle that I was going to buy for myself and squirreled it away for my Birthday.

I was bored yesterday, found it and built it.  I think this means I'm not getting a Birthday present come October 4th and I may be regretting things at the moment.  

In any event, I did not have that much fun building Captain America and his Avenging Cycle.  There was not much to it but I did love his shield and the finished product.  It was pretty cute.

So here's the thing with my abilities to use decals: I have non-existent skills.  From finger prints to crookedness, it's usually a right mess with me.  I can never be a Surgeon for many reasons and that's definitely one of them.  No comments from the Peanut Gallery, H1!

Buns of Fun

July is just a memory at this point and all the food fun we had, I never posted.  I tend to slack in the Summer because the sun and hot weather addles my brain.  Yep, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Now that August is here, I'll just to stagger the posts of all the food (mis)adventures we had in July because goodness knows there will probably not be much to talk about in August.  Ha.

You'd be convinced I like July but you'd be incorrect.  It's still part of Summer and it's awful stuff as far as I'm concerned.

All of it!

But as I said, we did have some adventures in food.

Thanks to Alex for trying to photo-bomb my picture.

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

It's that time of year again...August.

I've nothing further on the matter except for good luck wishes to all.  Hope it's a good month.

Back to Brunchie Munchies at Birdsall House

Ah, July.

Some may say that it's the Dog Days of August (those "some" are loons.  Dog days of Summer, perhaps...) but I know that you're one hell more of a bastard July.

Though you know July, as much as I hate how hot you are, August will always hold the spot for the "Most Boring Month of the Year" Award.  August is my vile nemesis but that is probably a well-known fact at this point.

At least things happen in July though by the looks of it, you'd swear the HOchieS have done nothing all month long!

And you'd be sort of correct in your assessment because there were many mornings of rolling into the house between the hours of 2 a.m. to 4 a.m. due to work obligations.

Hey...wait a minute, how come this July is sounding really close to anything but awesome right now?

...moving along...

This July found us on way too many Food Adventures and one of them included a trip back to the Birdsall House for brunch.

The last time we went there, I was cursing the concept of Brunch but certainly not the food at the amazing Birdsall.  This second trip with X and Moodou was no different.

What better way to start brunch than with Hard Apple Cider? Hm?

What Final Fantasy VII Taught Me

Recently, I finished Persona 3.  

 It took me some years - almost completing one play through and then booting up an entirely new game with some 80 plus hours later (not counting the 60 plus I previously sank into my first run) - but now it's over.

This time around I enjoyed the game that much more including building up my S-Links (relationships), fusing Persona and of course, that soundtrack by Shoji Meguro.

While I may have almost finished my first playthrough, I never allowed myself to listen to any later tracks on the soundtrack since I had not yet encountered them in the game which of course meant not listening to the Final Boss music.  It's a bit of a code that Bughie J. and I enforced many years ago and a sensible one at that.

And if Final Fantasy VII taught me anything...it's that you need to experience everything as an entire package while playing to build up that great memory you will forever hold dear; and you should always (if a game is good and enjoyable enough) play your games to the end.

Because Gary Oldman is Awesome

Conundrum

In case you missed it a couple of posts down, I've come to the realization that I enjoy building Lego sets.

Now, I've only done two so far and while I'd like a Lord of the Rings: Mines of Moria set and The Avengers Quinjet set, there's one set out there on the horizon that makes me forget my wish for a Cave Troll or my desire to destroy a Lego Black Widow.

I present to you, the Lego Monster Fighters Haunted Mansion set:

As if it was not cool enough, it actually opens up like a play house with various rooms in your typical haunted mansion - a torture/potion/kitchen type room, a creepy basement, and a piano room.  I may be stretching it wtih a 'torture' room but I'm using my imagination as Lego would like me to and thinking up things my Haunted Mansion will have, okay? Okay.

Even cooler!!! (because why stop there), the set comes with a a zombie chef.  A zombie freaking chef.  And! ghosts...ghost that glow.  In.  the.  dark.

In discussing this with Bughie J. (Confidant for all my musings of ridiculous schemes involving Lego, toys and video games (while kindly reminding me I have a Hot Toys Loki to pay for at the end of the year)), we decided that all manners of things can live in this Haunted Mansion.

Some where along the way, the conversation on the Haunted Mansion went a little like this:

Me: ...people could live in there.  Like Loki.

Bughie J.:  and command his zombie chef to make him fish n chips! and Dalek cakes for you.

Me: He and I still trying to sort out the alleged chortling.  Let's not talk about it.  There was no chortling! pfppbbttfftt.  Hm? What? You heard nothing.

Bughie J.: Nothing? Or Something.

Me: Uhh...pancakes? No, nothing.  Really though, do we want to eat fish n' chips from a Zombie Chef?

Bughie J.: Depends how good!

Me: It's probably Gollum's fish, all rotten and stuff.

Bughie J.: Might be worth the risk.  Fish n' Chips and all.

Me: True.  True.

Bughie J.: Plus i'm sure the alcohol will protect me

Me: Who's brewing alcohol in the basement? The ghosts? Well, who else to brew some alcohol than some spirits, I guess.

I can see great things for this house and great frustration in my trying to build it.  14+ difficulty at 2,064 pieces, huh? Should make for hilarious times.

Currently: Trying to justify spending $16 for tax and shipping on the Wizard Edition of Ni No Kuni

Fish, Anyone?

My precious Gollum from my aforementioned Lord of the Rings Lego set...in pictures!

Creepy...nightmare inducing pictures.

Have some fish...

...yes.

Have some.

There's nothing busted about him as some may have you believe.

Currently listening to: "Dance Little Liar" by Arctic Monkeys.

A Lego Story

I built my first prefabricated Lego set last weekend.

Is that some sort of blasphemy on my part?

Lego sets are cool but the HOchieS had some lego bricks back in the day when the pine trees were the coolest spiral shaped things ever, and most everything you built was left to your imagination.

I don't recall having the instructions to build movie and television franchised sets back then.  I'm not sure Lego existed in that capacity as it does now.  It's rather brilliant and a little sad on some level, perhaps.

But I can report that it was lovely fun building last weekend.  It was such fun that I am considering buying everyone Lego sets for Christmas.  It's a sort of calming thing and I am impressed by the genius of Lego Engineers.  I don't know what you call the people who think up the construction of these things but I'm sticking with "Lego Engineers".

There have been some amazing sets from Lego but I never have space for anything and the last thing I need is more toys or something else to obsess over.  Really.  I don't.

But as with all my obsessions, they start somewhere.  It's usually a villain in an anime, or video game or in this case, that blasted Joss Whedon and his The Avengers, a certain Brit, and one bad-assed Agent Coulson.

I decided to start small and with $20 later, an hour or so of my life spent dealing with tiny bits of super heroes and a very helpful BooHead, I finished the Lego set "Loki's Cosmic Cube Escape".

There is in fact a demented looking Lego Hawkeye driving Loki around.

For some reason Iron Man was included in this box and I guess they did not think Loki could sell it on its own.  Well, that's crazy talk! ...or I speak crazy.  I don't know but the other thing that sold me on it was the fact that it involved S.H.I.E.L.D.  They could not very well include a mini-figure of Agent Coulson because he is just too awesome to include in any Lego set and I understand.  The world would implode.

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

July has arrived with its hot days and all that stuff.

I hope this month works out for all.  Best of luck everyone!

P.S.

Can we make this the official Olympics Theme instead of this one?

Well, then...

This is awfully...

...

I don't want to say awful but it really kind of is...kind of awful.

Plenty kind of awful.



Alright.

Here's what I think, truly.  It's everything from the last two albums I did not fancy mixed into one track (think Knights of Cydonia (which I really dislike no matter what any of you louts say; that song is mostly lame) plus United States of Eurasia (which as the name implies was full of rot)) but will sound amazing in concert (no surprise) and somehow manages to be ever so slighty less agitating.  As an Olympic Theme, I can give it a pass in its ridiculousness.

What else can I say about it? I can say it's actually typical later Muse and not the dreadful influenced drivel I was expecting since the Unmentionable happened.  I'm still expecting some of that on the new album but it's not present here.  A glimmer of hope, perhaps?

And the end of this song?

It is in no way awesome.  It's in no way a "Whhaauuhhhtt" in your face sort of awesome.

It's more of a "Whhhaaaaatttt" disbelief reaction in its terribleness.

Yep, it totally smells like dog buns.

Currently: Unamused.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday to the Beast! Today, she turns 4 years old.  Four years already!  That's just craziness.

Sniffing a Sad Farewell to Spring, and Cursing Under My Breath at Summer

Spring brought quite the bit of rain for a couple of weeks there.  There were warm days to talk about too but nothing in comparison to the hellish heat today and for the next two days.

Yep, Summer, my Nemesis is here.

It's time to say goo'day to my bees (aww, my bees) milling about new buds of Spring and instead, say hello to a robot who echoes my sentiment about Summer.

That sentiment of course is to drink myself into a stupor so I just have a hazy recollection of anything Summery.

Oh, allow this to serve as a PSA while I'm at it: the amazing Futurama starts back tonight at 10 p.m. on Comedy Central.

Happy Summer to all you fools out there who are loving yourselves right now!

And Boo Hiss from the rest of us.

Freakin' Zombies

I got Lollipop Chainsaw this weekend.  I was so excited!

Suda51, James Gunn, Jimmy Urine, Akira Yamaoka, insanity, crude but hilarious humour...all these things to love!

All things to love except the zombies.

In case you have not been paying attention, the Zombie Apocalypse is upon us and we've been warning you for years of its coming.  Of all the undead or things that go bump in the night creatures, zombies are the worst.

Thus, I was apprehensive about getting Lollipop Chainsaw on account that I would be scared out of my wits.

But in typical Suda fashion, it's been nothing but fun, crazy nonsense.  The zombies say ridiculous things including every manner of curse words possible and it's hard to take them seriously.  I had my first boss fight and it was Zed, voiced by Jimmy Urine if I'm not mistaken.  It was pretty fun and the music has been nothing but a trip.

It's been all fabulous and not in any way scary.

Tell me why then, I had to wake myself at 2 a.m. then again at 2:30 a.m. because I was having a zombie nightmare in which I was not going to make it.  Zombie food, man.  I was going to be Zombie food! I had to wake myself up.

But you know, the strangest thing? In the dream, H1 and I were running through golden fields and to desolate, country looking houses.  It was a clear indication that I have been traumatizing myself with a zombie induced frenzy with Wallander as a setting.

At least there was a small meeting with Magnus at some point.

Happy Birthday, Brother Bunji

It's our Brother Bunji's birthday today and I did not speak to him to wish him Happy Birthday.  I suspect I will hear of this tomorrow.  I left a voice mail though...doesn't that count for something?!

Congratulations!

Dear Beetchie,

Happy Graduation and congratulations!

We are proud of you.

Love,

The HOchieS.