32P. Let it rip!

It's been over 2 months since the last post on this blog, and I feel bad. Not because we have an avid readership (HI DARREN!) or because we've been too busy for fun or anything rational like that. I feel bad because we've neglected a living, breathing entity of internets.

Ok, it's not 'technically' living or breathing, but I still feel bad about the neglect. It's like not feeding a baby or pet or something. Except I'm pretty sure the blog won't like... die or whatever.

Speaking of which, how many days can a baby go without eating? Never mind. Stupid question.

It's 4:30 in the morning, and this is what happens. I mean, I had a moderately uneventful day... did some Christmas shopping and sat around, mostly. But I did manage to accomplish something 9-year-old me is super proud of, I'm sure.

I learned one of the songs from the Beyblade cartoon. Now, you may be asking yourself "But Patrick, don't you already know the theme song?" and you'd be right to do so. Yes, my band The Off Motive opens our set with the Beyblade theme song. But if you ever watched the show, you'd probably remember the battle music that would play during matches. Of all the songs they used, one called "All Across The Nation" by the band The Black Europeans was my favourite. Recently, I've taken up rewatching the entire series, and once again, I have fallen in love with this song. It's cheesy as hell, has no practical use outside the TV show itself, and isn't even that complicated of a song, yet I've been lost in its early 2000's pop-punk splendor all day. There's nothing like playing the lead riff, or belting the chorus like no one's watching.

After I learned the song, I really started to think back to the genesis of my musical taste. Other than blink-182, Simple Plan, Sum 41, Jimmy Eat World and Gob, the songs that always caught my attention were ones from my favourite TV shows. "All Across The Nation", "Here We Go" and "Run Around" (From Season 2 of Digimon), and the theme song from Sonic X always got me pumped, and eventually helped shape the songwriter I am today.

I guess I can say that my TV watching habits as a kid really determined the musician I became. I'm just really glad Beyblade didn't rely on heavy metal or country for their battle music. Who knows where I'd be then...

On a slightly related note, I wonder how much the old Beyblades are online?

EDIT (9 hours later): Holygoddamn, Beyblades are expensive. My birthday is in August, that'll give whoever wants to spend a kajillion dollars on me enough time to save up. I also want a pony.

31P. All the Magnemites

So, a couple of months back Amanda started Pokémon Red. While she was frustrated at first, she finally got the hang of it and came to love the series. She's since completed Gold and is working diligently on Ruby until she buys herself a DS.

Now, if you'd recall (if you read the blog and have an astoundingly good memory) I said I'd make a list of all the excellent quotations Amanda let fly while playing Pokémon Red for the first (and second) time.

Some of these are out of order because Amanda played through the game 3 times due to save file crashes.

"I talked to the guy. Do I have a badge now?"

"I can't believe I'm about to tell you what I'm about to tell you. I don't have a bike."

"God, that Gary is such an asshole."

"This isn't going quite as planned."

"You just wait till I get to the Elite Four; that's when all hell breaks loose!"

Amanda:"I'm in a stalemate and I can't do anything!"

Patrick:"Why, what's going on?"

Amanda:"Well I'm paralyzed, for starters..."

Amanda:"How come I can't get into the Gym?"

Patrick:"Because it's the last one. You come back here later."

-The Next Day-

Amanda:"So I think I have 3 Badges."

Patrick:"You already went through the SS Anne, got HM01 and beat Lt. Surge?"

Amanda:"No, but I've seen 3 gyms already."

...

Amanda:"Oh, no, wait. I couldn't do the first one. Do I have to go back?"

Patrick:"Did you catch an Abra yet?"

Amanda:"Oh, I'm WAY past there. I'm fine."

-The Next Day, at Celadon Gym-

Patrick:"You do realize getting an Abra would make your life a lot easier, right?"

Amanda:"..."

Patrick:"Oh, fuck. Just go buy one."

Amanda:"YOU MEAN I CAN JUST BUY AN ABRA!?"

*Instructs her to get the Coin Case, buy coins and get the Abra.*

Amanda:"Ok, so I'm at the Gym. But there's some jerk police guy standing in my way."

*She's talking about the Team Rocket guy in front of Saffron Gym, and she's meant to be (as per following the guide) going into the Fighting Dojo beside it.*

Patrick:"You're at the wrong place then."

*I'd forgotten the order of my guide, and knowing she'd just gotten to Celadon, she was at the wrong Gym.*

Amanda:"No I'm not! I followed your guide. It must be wrong."

Patrick:"I'm pretty sure it's right. Look it over."

*She reads through it, then goes over the map, the walks around in the game.*

Amanda:"Oh."

Patrick:"What?"

Amanda:"There are TWO buildings called GYM in this town!"

"My carpals hurt!"

Amanda:"But I don't have any flying Pokemon!"

Patrick:"What about that Spearow?"

Amanda:"Oh wait, I forgot birds fly."

Amanda:"I've been on this cinnabun island for over an hour."

Patrick:"I'll draw you a map."

Amanda:"That's what I was fishing for."

"Oh, Dugtrio just died. I guess I'll use (Kad)Abra, he saves me from everything."

"Should I sell my balls?"

Amanda:"I can't even tell you what just happened. Mostly because I don't even know."

Patrick:"What?"

Amanda:"I lost my save file."

Patrick:"Again?"

Amanda:"I can't even think about this."

On Bidoof:

Amanda:"His teeth are all over the place!"

Patrick:"Like, you've been beating on him so hard his teeth fell out?"

Amanda:"No, it was a joke. It was mean."

"You know which Pokémon I hate the most? Magnemite."

I would like to make a side note about this post. My computer recognizes the spelling of Pokemon correctly ONLY when there's an accent on the é. I love my Mac.

30A. Hide your husband

Hello there. I am currently blogging from work. I had started a wonderful blog last weekend, but it's being held hostage on Patrick's laptop.

I am going to say that this has been a really long week. I can't say it's been a bad week; nothing horrible happened. But it's been that week in the school semester when you hit the "academic wall". Assignment due dates are approaching, labs every week, mid-terms in a couple weeks. It's easy to get overwhelmed as it is, without being the complete stress case that I am already.

Yup. Those are my sentiments for the next three months.

I'm going to be a quarter of a century next month. Gross. I don't mean that. It could be gross. I could look my age, or older. I could have an excess of responsibilities. There are people my age who are already divorced. I've got my shit somewhat together, and first years at school think I'm cute. I can't really complain. I'm also going to have pretty much the best birthday weekend. I'm really looking forward to it.

I'm not liking this paragraph business anymore. I do enjoy lists. Here is a list of other things I enjoy:

- free parking
- 'The Buried Life'
- chemistry labs
- Tom Petty
- fall
- cats that DJ
- napping
- Taco Bell
- 'Dakota' by The Stereophonics
- board games
- making out
- camping
- 'Full Metal Jacket'
- red pandas

Actually, I'll leave off with a visual of that last one.

29AP. Glen, Please Read This

The title is fan service. HI GLEN - Kah Kaww your face!

Oh hi Mark. I mean blog. I always get your names confused. Sorry. Its been a long time since we've seen each other. So long in fact, that my llama has grown a beard.



I don't know if you noticed, but in the blog's title where there is usually only one letter (signifying the author), there are two. This is because it is being co-written. Co-operatively written. By the both of us.

Yup the both of us. Amanda here. I had to interject because if I left this entire entry to Patrick, it would take an eternity to complete. In two minutes, he already got distracted with iTunes twice, once to play 'Come Together' for all of three seconds.

Did not. Kay, write that. How I just said it. Period. Geez, Amanda. Ok, I did. but whatever. Anyways, if you haven't already guessed, the type in italics is Amanda and bold is Patrick. Me.

On to business. Blog business. Amanda and I have been relatively busy since the last time we blogged. And by relatively, I mean relative to a hermit without contact with the outside world. There has been a LOT of Pokémon.

Did anyone notice that Patrick started a sentence with 'and'? Hmmm. As he said above, we've been super busy. Since we last blogged I got a job, and accidentally quit.

And by accidentally, she means she misused the words "I'm done!" (Fuck you, Amanda. I'll start sentences with 'and' if I fucking want. Fuck.)

Patrick just hit the resonant frequency of his teeth by humming. Anyways, we've just been busy, okay? I start school this week. Patrick starts work this week. He is also playing his first show with his new band, 'The Off Motive'. While he is playing his set, I will unfortunately be four and a half hours north picking out which room I will hang myself from this coming semester.

Room 133, probably.

Yeah, I'm playing our first show. Its an acoustic set at University of Toronto's Frosh week, and we're headlining the night. Kind of a big deal. *Flips scarf around neck.*

Just so everyone knows, I've been listening to this band right from the beginning, before any of you had even heard of them. I listen to them while wearing my American Apparel t-shirts, which now have a market value of probably 50 cents since they have filed for bankruptcy. This is a huge ordeal for me, I don't know if you can tell, and it has been adding to my suicidal tendencies.

Ps. She's not suicidal. Just a little frustrated. Like Bono when he isn't allowed upstairs.



Bono is Amanda's cat, and I'm very allergic to him. So he's not allowed upstairs when I'm here. Safety reasons. I sneeze like an Airbender.

Fuck Macs. These keys are horseshit. We're typing this up on Patrick's laptop, and it's one of those horrible metallic things with a glowing apple on the top. Shiny metallic. You know who probably uses one of these?



And I am perfectly okay with that. Also:



I'm feeling really conflicted right now, because my cat is downstairs meowing up a storm, and it's breaking my heart. But if I let him up here, Patrick might DIE. I'm not sure what's worse. FARKLE! My mom's gone to NYC for a few days, so I invited that boy to come stay with me.

THERE'S A BIG FREAKING NICKEL IN SUDBURY.

So other than the whole job/band situation for me and the lack of job situation for Amanda, and the whole Pokémon situation- oh right.

I almost forgot. Amanda has recently started Pokémon Pearl Version for the DS. She's doing quite well for herself, considering I spent a decent portion of two days breeding the right eggs for her with rad movesets. What up, Abra with Energy Ball and Pichu with Iron Tail? You know what's a pain to make? An Absol with Megahorn. Golly.

Ok. All this Pokémon talk has gotten me in the mood to battle.

Bitch, IT'S ON.

28P. Bad Romance

Rah-rah-ah-ah-ah rom-mah-rom-mah-mah ga ga-ooh-la-la, Fuck you Cid.

I spent a week and a half fighting Cid Raines. Wait, let me backtrack. Just less than 3 weeks ago I got Final Fantasy XIII. It was magical. I was so stoked to get my hands on a new Final Fantasy game, since I'd been waiting for about 5-ish years since the last one. I am aware it came out wall before I purchased it. I had no money - what do you expect of me?

Anyways, I got the game and it was magical. The graphics were beautiful, the story rich in detail and the characters um... well they grew on me. If you played past Final Fantasy games, you probably share the same sentiment as me. Lightning is a strong leading character with excellent potential right from the start. You can almost smell the emo-ness she channels from Cloud. Snow is a loving man, with a certain penchant to play hero. Sazh is black and he has an adorable baby chocobo living in his fro. Rad. Anyways, whatever - you probably don't care about all the characters. Rightly so.

After about 26 hours of gameplay, I got to a place called The Fifth Ark. Now, there are some spoilers coming up. Well, technically, I already spoiled it. Whatever. You fight Cid Raines, and he's a total prick. For the next week and a half I was stuck fighting this guy. I almost gave up and was about to make the disc into one fierce beer coaster- like I did with a certain one of Amanda's CDs. Cid has power, speed and smart AI - everything a gamer doesn't want to see in a boss. Once you get him down to a certain amount of HP, he metamorphoses and becomes really hard to damage. At the 20 minute mark, he hits your party leader with Doom, which kills you after 2 minutes, no matter what. The trick is hitting him with a Stagger and do a ton of damage before he gets the chance to transform. Every guide online won't tell you this. They will give you detailed descriptions on how and when to change your Paradigms and where to use certain combinations. FUCK 'EM. There's an item called "Fortisol", and it is your best friend. I'd never used one before for fear of wasting them. In my rage, the shrouds became a complete oversight, and it took me almost 2 weeks to remember that they existed. Fortisol gives your characters Haste, Faith and Bravery. I decided to try it out for the first time.

1:54.

One minute and fifty-four seconds.

27A. My name is Amanda, and I clear my Facebook wall.

I feel as though this entry is going to be a little contrieved because the pressure is on to post, as a) I haven't in awhile, and b) someone's been on my case about it.

I would easily say that this summer has been a fail so far. Not much has been going on, and Sudbury is about as exciting as the sex scenes from "The Room". I would say the weather has been the biggest letdown; it's been 40 degrees with the humidex some days. It's so unbearingly hot, but it's not the good kind of hot where the sun is scorching, and the UV index is at 8, and I can actually get a tan. It's that bullshit humidity kind of hot, where the air is so thick and gross, I could just set myself on fire.

I've recently begun a position as a front desk clerk at one of the local hotel in Sudbury. On the awesome scale, I would put it at a 6, but I think it'll get a bit higher once I get to know all of the staff a bit better. It's rarely boring, which is good.

*NOTE: For those who are not viewers, let it be known that David Duchovny's character on 'Californication' is Hank Moody, which is probably the raddest name of all time, and he is the coolest human being ever.

I had a conversation with a friend today about guys who honk at girls. What do they expect to accomplish? I mean, even if the guy is a complete babe, what are we supposed to do? Flag you down? Chase after your car, and talk to you through your window like a hooker? But I mean, that's never the case anyways. No attractive, professional, level-headed guy with an executive driven car is ever going to honk at a girl walking down a street.

I haven't played Pokemon in about a week. I'm on Cinnabar Island, and I don't really care to deal with that maze to get the key for the 7th gym. Not now anyways. I'm also getting carpal tunnel from playing so much.

I love naps. The end.

26P. Fucking and Airbending

I'd like to apologize for not blogging for a while, specifically to our main reader(s), and also to those who flip by when I update my Facebook and Twitter with "NEW BLOG POST PLEASE READ ME".

So, sorry David Berman.

I haven't been blogworthy lately, since for the last 2 weeks I've been sitting around waiting for my mouth to stop being excruciatingly painful. I had surgery on my gums because they were receding. In other words, I have a hole in the roof of my mouth from where they took the skin to make my new gums, and I can't eat pointy food. I miss tortilla chips.

Without further digression, I'd like to get on with the blog. Recently, my blog partner Amanda (you may be familiar with her work) has gotten into a show called "Californication", and has been desperately trying to get me to watch. So I downloaded season 1. Now, it just so happened that the show I was originally downloading (Avatar, the last Airbender) was completed at the same time. So this morning, I watched the first and second episodes of both series.

It has become blatantly obvious that the shows Amanda and I like are very different, aside from AFV. Except during AFV, we differ as well - I like the videos where small children and ugly dogs get hurt, and Amanda likes things involving water/winter sports and when geriatrics fall over. And she also wants Tom. Move over, DB.

Anyways, I've decided to do a comparative analysis of the two shows. Which is probably more than Amanda is doing right now.

Main Characters:

Avatar's Aang and Californication's Mulder

Aang is an Airbender. The last of his kind. And going to be the most powerful. He's what's known as 'The Avatar', and no that doesn't mean he's a big blue Pandoran inhabitant. It means he's going to master all of the elements (Air, Water, Earth and Fire) in order to return peace to the world. It just so happens that all this pressure is put on a 12 year old boy who was frozen in an ice cube at the southern pole for 100 years.

Mulder is a writer from New York who moved to Los Angeles with his girlfriend and their child. Now ex-boyfriend and separated parent to his 12 year old daughter, Mulder must solve the mystery of where the aliens took Scooby and the Gang. Or something like that. He's a writer with a hit movie based off his last book. He hates the movie. Did I mention that he sleeps with anything attractive and skinny that moves? He's a bit of a nympho.

They're not exactly similar in any way. Aang is kind of oblivious, and Mulder is very self-aware. Aang rides a magic flying bison, Mulder rides women. They're both probably at the same maturity level though. I don't know if that's saying a lot for Aang, or not much for Mulder. Or vice-versa.

Supporting Characters:

Katara & Sokka and Karen & ...Bill? Bob? Billy-Bob?

Katara and Sokka are siblings, and members of the Southern Water Tribe. Katara is a fledgling Waterbender, and Sokka is the last remaining able-bodied man in the whole village since the men went off to war against the Fire Nation. While Katara is level-headed and adventurous but timid in the face of danger, Sokka is excitable and foolish yet brave - not to mention he's a loving brother. They serve as Aang's protectorates and, in Sokka's case, his comedic foil.

Karen is Mulder's ex-girlfriend and Bob is her new boyfriend. I don't like either of these characters. Bob is a pretentious douchebag with an ugly, vomit stained painting, and Karen is an "I'm only playing hard to get for the sake of the TV show" kind of girl. If this were a competition, point goes to Avatar.

Transportation:

Mulder's Shitty Car

Aang's Flying Fucking Bison named Appa

Point: Avatar.

Plot and Storytelling:

Avatar, The Last Airbender:

As the story goes, Aang was frozen away for 100 years, and he's now gotta learn all the elements, become the all powerful Avatar that legends tell of and save the world from the warring Fire Nation. For the record, don't go see the movie. Watch the series.

Avatar's storytelling is linear. There's a goal - to become the Avatar and save the world. For a show aimed at 8-16 year olds, it does its job well. Its engaging and funny, with a good solid story.

Californication:

Mulder moved to L.A. to get more work as a writer, and came into writer's block after he and his girlfriend split. He's having difficulty adjusting to his new life, and is constantly filling the void with alcohol and copious amounts of copulation.

Californication's storytelling is - by nature of being a TV show - linear as well, however, there's no specific goal or endpoint. It's the story of a man's life and his struggles as a writer/father/nympho. There's a lot of fucking. And some punching. Sometimes, at the same time.

At this point, I'd like to make some general observations before I conclude my analysis. Avatar is awesome. The characters are funny, there's the right amount of seriousness regarding the situation the world is in, and there's a flying fucking bison. Californication has sex, drugs, alcohol and sex. It also has sex. Mulder also said "Jesus H. Christ" which was rad. And he blogs. Represent.

Conclusively, I like both shows. I LOVE Avatar. I moderately enjoy Californication. But I do like them both. Overall, I'd say the story of Avatar is far superior to Curly-fornication, but the one liners in the latter are just too good sometimes.

"Yes, and it might be nice if I could fallate myself while farting the White Album but I haven't been able to quite master that yet." - Mulder.