Muggled.

I hope you all had a great, festive, fattening Thanksgiving. I've taken a few extra days off to add to my Thanksgiving weekend just to veg out.

I got to do some excellent Star Wars gaming with my RPG group this past Saturday. Our gamemaster, Mad Mario, came up with quite the scenario with loads of political intrigue as well as ass-kickery to please us geeks. So much so that the time just shot by. I got there at noon, we started playing at 1pm and the next time I looked at a clock it was already 6pm. We play again in mid December to finish out the scenario. Should be something to look forward to! Good job, Mar!

With my Xbox still down for the count, I've found myself hearkening back to one of my old computer games... Diablo II. It's quite a fun and easy action, hack 'n' slash RPG. Very addicting.

I went out and saw "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" yesterday. Here are my thoughts. I've never been overly impressed with the whole Harry Potter phenomenon. I've read the first book and have seen all the movies. Though I do see it as a great escape and something to light an imagination fire under the rumps of the MTV / videogame generation, it's never grabbed me the way the Star Wars, James Bond and Lord of the Rings franchise have. But, I do have to admit that it is aimed at a much younger generation than my crusty, old geek sensibilities can tolerate. I've always found the movies and stories... cute. Not horrible or awful or bad or wonderful or excellent, just... cute.

Prior to seeing the film, I heard that this was the best Potter film yet and that things start to go dark in this one. So I was hoping that maybe this would be the one that would win me over completely. That this would be the one I'd want to see again and maybe even start buying them on DVD. That this would raise the bar out of the "cute" territory on plunk it solidly into the "must see the midnight showing" realm.

Well, after the viewing I can admit that this Potter film does raise the bar from being "cute" and slightly moves it to "starting to get interesting" mode for me. Like the previous films, the thing I was most impressed with was the art direction. They continue to bring Hogwarts and the whole Harry Potter world to life while wallowing in the wonderfully absurd and (with each new movie) creepy. It's like a little trip to Disneyland for me. One the movie starts you can really throw your cares away and fall into J.K. Rowling's world of magic.

I'm also getting a vested interest in what happens to Harry in the future of the films. The fact that the story follows the same formula the previous ones did (There's some sort of mystery going on at Hogwarts and the evil mage, Voldermort, has somehow infiltrated the magic school to try and kill Harry) is getting a little stale for me. Oddly enough, I was able to put that aside this time and focus on the character of Harry. Daniel Radcliff's acting maturity starts to really shine in this one, thus I really want to know what's going to happen to Harry in the upcoming films.

I wouldn't say that "...Goblet of Fire" is hororifically dark when put in comparison with "Revenge of the Sith" or "Empire Strikes Back" or "The Crow" (ok, I was going a bit overboard with that last one), but you do get the feeling that things do start to go downhill at the end of this one.

So, I felt that the Potter series still isn't going to sit along side the great fantastical franchises that I hold so near and dear to me, but I think I'm going to look forward to the opening of a Potter flick with a little more anticipation.

We'll I'm off for some more Diablo II. See ya.

Zangz.

Coming Soon: Triptametephine Buzz

Nope. I do not know how to spell Triptametephine (apparently, neither does the "spell check" feature on the blog editor), but I do know it's the chemical that will flow through my blood and put me into a sleepy comfort after gorging out on the turkey meat it will come from.

It'll be like every year. After we've stuffed our faces, ate, drank and made merry and exhausted every frellin' conversation we could possibly have, some of us will be ready to hit the hay, while others of us will want to stay and chat for another 6 hours while our guests will be wanting to clean up so they can get to bed sooner. But, there will be that one relative (who shall go nameless..... mom) who will have come in my car, and that I have to take back home before I can ajourn back to Zangz Headquarters and put my butt into bed and then dream of Liz Vassey in her Captain Liberty outfit, who will want to stay as long as she possibly can no matter how many times both myself and the guests have hinted it's time to call it a night. This relative (who shall go nameless... mom) will not take the hint when EVERYBODY is starting to leave and I'm trying to give her that "I believe we should think about leaving before I go comatose" look and she just shakes her head or rolls her eyes.

Thanksgiving dinner at the relatives is always a good time with tons, upon tons of food and conversation. But, when that Triptametaphine hits you like a rock, it's time to say ,"Thanks for the grub, but my bed is a callin' me now." Don't be like my relative, who shall remain nameless (mom). Know when to call Thanksgiving an end.


Since some of you may feel ripped off for my slipping on updates in the past week here's something I haven't done for a while, another edition of..........

ZANGZ'S BLOG OF GEEKDOM'S WEBSITE OF THE MOMENT

The Lord of the Rings.net
I'm surprised this site is still up. I thought it would come down after the extended DVD's hit the shelves. But I guess fan appreciation has kept it alive. A few years back I got really amped up right around holiday season 'cause I knew that one of Peter Jackson's fantasy epics based on J.R. Tolkein's beloved books was going to hit movie screens very soon. Now that they've all been released in both the theaters and on DVD I kind of miss having that to look forward to. This site is filled with tons of information, downloadable goodies and interactive effects for fans of the movies to salivate over. So check it out. I think I'm going to sit back and watch them this Thanksgiving vacation.

Ok, gotta put some food into my belly and give it a good pre-layering before tomorrow night. See ya later.

Zangz.

The 360 Debacle.....

I know that I've been slacking for the last week. But it's not like there's millions of readers banging down the doors to Zangz Headquarters demanding a more consistent and timely blog. There's more like 2.5 readers who pop in from time to time and feel much better about themselves knowing that their lives aren't quite as dripping in geek-osity as mine.

But, enough about me. On to today's big, geek event. Today was the day that Microsoft shelled out their next generation video game/entertainment counsel, the Xbox 360, onto the buying public. Well... let me rephrase that.... onto a smidgen of the buying public, as the powers that be purposefully orchestrated massive shortages of the gaming system so the hype could be built up throughout the Xmas season.

Yup. I talked to someone "in the know" and involved in the distribution and sales of media merchandise (Big ElectronicsStoreSalesGuy... cough, cough... cough), and he surmises that the powers that be have well over enough of the units on hand to supply everyone who wants one over the Xmas season. But apparently, B.G. and his brood decided that they'll very slowly release a few to retailers here and there, taking their very sweet time. They want this to be the "must have" for the Xmas season. Unfortunately, according to my source (cough, cough), there won't be anywhere near enough to meet supply and demand until February or March. So both retailers and gaming fans are getting another rendition of a good ol' "B.G. Buggerin'"!

Another sleazy thing that some retailers pulled on gamers buying the Xbox 360 was that they forced them to buy it as part of a bundle of Xbox accessories, raising the price up from the usual $300 / $400 to near One Grand. They refused to sell the counsel as a lone item. So it looks like there's far more ugliness and greed upon the 360's release date rather than good things to say. It's sad to see such a nice, quality piece of equipment being marred by such shadiness. The greed machine plows on through.

Though I'm waiting until late winter/early spring to pick me up one, I did get to play a little of a store demo of a game called "Call of Duty" and it visually blew me away. Looks really good. I can't wait to see what the next Elder Scrolls game will look on it!!!

Turkey day is coming up and I'm ready for the triptometaphine (sp?) buzz that comes with it. Got a few days off afterward and will try and go see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and see how I like that one. So far, I've found them all... cute. Though, the last one was getting a bit darker and supposedly this one ups the ante a bit. So there's more incentive for me to try and get more out of this phenomenon called Harry Potter.

Ya know, that's all I got for now. Talk to you soon.
Zangz.

More mindless stuff...

I'm still mourning my Xbox. But I figgure that it is just one more reason to get myself an Xbox360 which is due out next week. I may wait until later this winter to get mine since I just put $400 into my car this month. Plus, I want to see if there are any major flaws Xbox360 consumers are going to hit with upon release. For example, will they have FAULTY POWER SUPPLIES, MR GATES? Eherm... I digress. I'll tell you this, it's kind of ironic that this $400 piece of hardware will have 20 gigs of hard drive space whereas my lowly $1700 home PC has only 128 MB. The times, they are a changin'. Of course as soon as I get a 360, I'll most definitely pick up "Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion". The most expansive, open-ended, visually stunning action RPG known to man and woman-kind!

Speaking of changing. the weather has done a 180 this week. We went from having a really nice and mild November at the month's start and are well into the wet, cold and windy November that we're all so familiar with. All the beautiful leaves have been torn from the trees and there is no longer any reminanat of the Halloween and fall season left. Crap and blech. We also have our local newscasters completely freaking out over the fact that there may be some snow on the way. At this time it looks like it will be just flurries, but leave it to the local news media to make a big deal out of it. It's like we've never seen snow before. Like this is all new and unheard of. I wish snow was unheard of, but then we'd have nothing to usher in the upcoming ba-humbug holidays. I can't believe that next week is already Thanksgiving. Then of course comes the wallet sucker known as Xmas. Ba-humbug and blech.

Well, the three big holiday, geek movies that I'd like to check out sometime are King Kong, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I'll let you all know what I think. (Who am I kiddin'? Nobody reads this crap.)

I found out that the guy who produced the Halloween movies, Moustafa Akkad was killed with his daughter in one of the bombings in Jordan. Bummer.

The next Bond opus, Casino Royale is still being put together as the script is still being polished and they're still casting. Rumors abound that Anjolina Jolie has a semi-interest in playing Vesper Lynd, the female lead. But, she wants the character to be far more than the eye candy that it currently is. If they did get Jolie, it would improve their odds one hundred fold to have a hit Bond movie after the mistake of firing Brosnan.

I also have to start picking up some DVDs I've been wanting. Batman Begins is at the top of the list and I'd like to get my paws on Firefly the TV series. I'm hoping they make a special edition of Sin City. The current version doesn't have squat for extras. That's a movie that deserves a boat-load of extras, for Jimminy's sake!

Well, I'm outta here.

Zangz.

My Xbox... R.I.P.

File this one under, "Just one more way that god can hate me".

After putting $400 into my car (new tires and a battery), I decided to rent the Xbox game "Gun" (GTA meets Wild West). I get the game home and hope to pop it into my Xbox to start playing. I press the eject button and.... nothing. I then hit the main power button and.... nothing. I then check the cord and make sure it's plugged in correctly.... nothing. I then unplugged it from the outlet and tried a few others.... nothing, nothing, nothing and nothing. No power going to my Xbox at all for no frellin' reason.

After doing a little on-line research I found that it looks like it could be a power supply problem and that would have to be replaced. Here are what seem to be my very few options...

• Go through the trouble of finding out how the frack to send it back to Microsoft, get it repaired for some form of cost and then have them send it back in what will probably take a good month or two.
• Hope to dear god (the one that hates me) that there is some company or store in my home town that can do it for cheap and won't frell me out of a ton of money to do it.
  
• Find a power supply for the Xbox on-line at Ebay (which I hoped to never have to use) and after I get it in the mail, find someone who has some form of IT knowledge to do the fix up on it since I'm a complete dullard.
• Buy a new Xbox and subtract another $150 out of my account this month, right before Xmas. This will also make all the games I've saved on my current counsel null and void. Eight months of playing Morrowind.... gone.
  
• Hold out for the $400 Xbox360 that comes out later this month and hope that: A. They have enough at release time (Microsoft is rumored to have dropped the ball on that one), or B. That it is far more backward compatibly friendly than it is rumored to be.

It's sad that after less than two years of owning this Xbox that it should fall apart that quickly. Leave it to Bill Gates to create something that will fall apart easily and force us consumers to pump money into it to make it right again. I did nothing to prompt this to happen! In fact the last time I used it, it worked fine and shut off fine. No problems at all. I go to turn it on today... nothin'. Everything else in my entertainment center works fine. So there are no hints of a power surge.

Guess I'm stuck with the old PS2 and GTA until this problem is rectified. If I'm not being reemed one way, then the powers that be will certainly find another!

[end exlamation censored by Tipper Gore on 11/15/05]

-Zangz.

Frack, I'm bored!!!

I'm just in one of those moods to do some bloggin', but haven't the foggiest idea of what I'm going to drone on about. I have been just foating around the web seeing nothing that really catches my mind (goatluv.com was clossed down. Har, har, har. Just kiddin'. Honest, I was!)

Actually I was trying to find out when the next Type-O-Negative and Lacuna Coil albums are to come out. No luck. Dratz. I saw these two bands perform together (Coil opened) a few years ago and both were phenominal. Hopefully we'll see some new stuff soon.

Mother of frell!! Is there anything to blog about?!?!?!?!

Last night's episode of Lost was another highlight of this season. A lot of fanboys of that show are pretty dissapointed today. Can't belive the writers decided to off one of the cuties last night. And, WOW, the way it went down was pretty demented writing. It should play out nicely in episodes to come.

Hrrmmmmm..... what else?

Oh... I decided that the next book I wanted to read should be most definitley light weight and fun. So I went back into my James Bond collection and pulled out John Gardner's "License Renewed". It's fun to read since it was written back in 1981. There's a scene in the book where Gardner descibes a "high-tech" guest room in a castle that is equiped with all the modern day acruitraments a entertainment center should have including a video tape cassete and quadrophonic sound. DVD's and Dolby 5.1 souround sound, anybody? I'm reading this one pretty quickly, so I may give it a quicky review on here soon.

Ok, I've waysted enough of all of our time. I gotta run over to Jimmy-John's and pick up a sub for dinner before The Donald fires off another, stuck up, elitist, greedy yuppie. It's supposed to have a Star Wars compitition tonight. Maybe General Greivious will get medievil on the ass-kissin' stooges. Cool beans!

Gotta run.
Zangz.

Cough, cough, wheez...some snot covered book reviews.

We're finally getting a taste of true November weather as it rained all day and all night yesterday. With the foul weather came the cold I was trying to subdue. I was starting to get it a week ago and thought I was in the clear, but it seemed to make a "u" turn and knee me in the groin Friday. So I spent yesterday on the couch watching a few of my favorite movies with a huge box of Kleenex at the ready for the constant Mt. Vesuvius that my nose turned out to be.

I watched the new Episode III DVD. I watched some of the extras including a few deleted scenes that should have been kept in the movie (slaughter of a Jedi and Yoda being exiled to Dagoba). One of the web documentaries had a hysterical scene of Anthony Daniels in his full 3PO garb, walking straight into a small cardboard blockade on the set. Apparently, both Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman got a few laughs out of it also.

Then I watched one of my favorite Bond movies, "GoldenEye" which helped remind me of what a cluster-frell of a move it was to get rid of Brosnan. I think that's enough of that before I get into yet another one of my anti Eon Productions diatribes.

Well folks, my wonderful ADD-esque reading talents finally got through the two books I've been reading for quite some time now. Here's what I thought about them.

First, "SilverFin" from Charlie Higgson. SilverFin is the first of the newest James Bond series aimed straight at the "Harry Potter" crowd. The powers that be have decided to put the ol' keebosh on the adult oriented Bond series that author Raymond Benson was writing so well and opted instead to make a quick buck by exploring the childhood of a young James Bond. The parallels between the SilverFin and the Harry Potter novels are a bit too close. Instead of a young magician being sent to a private magic school, it has a young future secret agent attending the famous, private all boys school, Eaton. Much like Harry has to deal with a bully counterpart at Hogwarts, Bond must also deal with a bully at Eaton named George Hellebore. Of course his father ends up being an evil millionaire megalomaniac who's hell bent on worldwide domination. Higgson also throws a lot Bond giblets into the dressing, such as a cute girl with a sassy name, a secret lair for the villain as well as the strange henchman at the villain's side. All in all, I guess I have to give Higgson props for trying to take the Bond series from the adult audience and taylor it to the younger reader. As the former Bond novels were seeped in sex, violence and complex plot twists, Higgson replaces those with a youthful inexperience and mischievousness within the character. Though I enjoyed the book in a carefree, fun sort of way, it didn't make me think to myself, "I can't wait for the next book in the series!". Nothing really captivated me in the book that much. Much of it was quite predictable. I feel that this is now a children's series and no longer will be able to capture and hold the minds of us adult fans. That's not as much Higgson's fault as he simply was doing as he was paid to do. So the fact that SilverFin wasn't anything special shouldn't be blamed on the author, but more so on whoever owns the rights to the literary Bond who just out to make a buck and trash tradition to do so. Though Higgson writes a decent children's Bond novel, I don't know if I, as an adult, can agree with the direction the rest of these books are going. Hopefully the Bond people will come to their senses and give us adults some new ADULT Bond novels in the near future.

The next book that took up six months of my reading life was Neil Gaimen's, "American Gods". For those not familiar to Gaimen's works, he's most noted for writhing one of best contemporary adult's graphic novellas (comic books) known as The Sandman. The books explored many ancient and modern day mythologies and centered around a family of beings known as The Endless and how they interacted with human life. In American Gods, Gaimen once again explores mythologies intertwinded with human life with many of the ancient beliefs that a lot of our ancestors brought to this county that have become humanized after they're seemingly forgotten by their followers. Gaimen's writing style has always been quite delicate while at the same time there's underrlying wickedness that pops to the surface from time to time. It's no different in American Gods It's a dark, modern day fantasy that revolves around the life of a young man, named Shadow, as he gets out of a prison stint to find out that his wife has died days earlier. He then comes in contact with the mysterious Mr. Wednesday who hires him as his driver. The two then embark in a cross country trip that has them visiting many of the forgotten old world gods who are living among us modern day folks. People who are well educated in a lot of old mythologies will probably get a heck of a lot more out of this book than dullards such as myself. Though, it's not much of a quick read, it does feature a lot of settings that I'm familiar with (House on the Rock). So that was kind of fun. This is indeed not a quickly read. This is a big, dense epic story where I found myself at times wondering, "Where is this leading". It does end up leading somewhere once you hit the end of the book. If you're into big, thought provoking, intellectual dark fantasy, then this is right up your alley. If you're not, then may I suggest Neil Gaimen's "Neverwhere" novel. For me it was far more enjoyable and a faster read than this.

Well, I gotta go grab a fistload of Kleenex right now, so I'll talk to you all soon.

Zangz.

The Undead Have Left the Building....

Yep, kids, the dead have indeed returned to their cold graves and the festive holiday of Halloween has come and gone. Although I didn't get to do as much as I would have liked, I certainly had a darn, foolhardy, good time!

Ya know, usually the day or so after Halloween is ridden with cold, gloomy, wet, crusty weather. It seems to be like that every year. It's like a sign that the good times of the year are done and that the times of long, cold darkness are about to be ushered in and shall stay for a good six to eight months. But this fall it is a bit different. It's almost as though the season doesn't want to give up on the Halloween holiday. As I drove into work every morning this week, I was blessed with wonderful fall colors accentuated with a golden, warm sun. People still had their Halloween decorations up, as if to say, "To FRELL with the upcoming "festive holidays". We want more of the season of the dead!" Sorry, not for another eleven months. But it is nice to enjoy a few more days of seasonal beauty. Very soon we'll be cursed with the usual "winter wonderland" that this region experiences every year. So enjoy the nice weather now, before the winter hell arrives and puts us all into a perpetual depression. Bah-frellin'-humbug!

Since things are back to "normal" around here after the dead took the blog over and the Halloween theme is done with for the year, what shall I geek it up about now......

• Here's a very quick review of the Xbox video game, "Darkwatch". I rented this puppy a few weeks ago and did enjoy it! However, there were a few things that could have been improved. The game is basically Halo in a very creepy, visually stunning, old wild west. The settings and art direction were incredible! Yet, the single player mode goes by quite quickly. I think I finished it in about 8 hours. And there's not much replayability to it after that. Since I'm not much of a multiplaying fanatic that a lot of the Xbox Live crowd are, I didn't go too deeply into the multiplayer modes, but it looks as if they have quite a boatload of levels and options. If you like playing Halo on Xbox Live, then you gotta check this game out as its control scheme is very much in the same vein as Halo. In the end, though the visuals are wonderfully disturbing and creepy, this game is aimed more toward multiplay rather than the single player mode that most FPS (First Person Shooters) of the past seemed to be aimed toward.
• Guess what I went out and bought Tuesday night? If you can't answer in under three guesses, what the frack are you doing in this Blog of Geekdom? STAR WARS, EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH DVD, FERCRYINOUTLOUD!! What do you think? "Steel FRACKIN' Magnolias"? Haven't watched it yet, but come Saturday afternoon, I'll be in Darth Sideous haven!
• Here's another friggin' death notice for us geeks... Michael Pillar, creator of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is dead. Not much of a Trekkie myself, but my heart, once again, goes out to them.
• Speaking of "out" and Star Trek.. Howzabout that little announcement from Lt. Sulu last week? You go girl! Not that there's anything wrong with that!
• Oliver Stone is making a movie about 9/11. I'm sure that the cocaine addled director's movie won't be biased at all. No more than a Rush Limbaugh radio show. Sensors say: PROPAGANDA ALERT! PROPAGANDA ALERT!
• So there's a new King Kong flick coming out on December 14th. Usually, I'd roll my eyes and ignore it with all the other monster/horror movie remakes that seem to be plaguing our movie screens lately (The Fog anyone? I didn't think so.) But this puppy is in the hands of none other than "Lord of the Rings" god-man, Petter Jackson. Plus it stars Jack Black. So I doubt highly that this thing is going to suck at all. In fact, I'll predict that this may even be better than the original!
• Nothing's really come of that whole Podcast idea for this blog yet. I'd love to do it, but I lack the computer power and technical skill to do it. But, there's still a drive and still some talk. We'll see where this leads.
• Still not done with friggin' "American Gods" yet. But I'm darn close, by cracky! Hope to finish it off tonight or tomorrow. Then you'll see a review for the book as well as one for "Silverfin" which I finished a while ago. Be patient.

Whelp, that's about it for tonight. Commons up: A review of those two books that I slugged through for the last 6 months (yes, I am a dullard!), plus I'm sure I'll find more stuff for me to grump and complain about that you can all ignore. See ya later.

Zangz.