Dear internet- I’ve had a hard time getting motivated to write this week- time just hasn’t been on my side.  So much stuff to do, so little time to do it.  We had a “firm” appointment cancelled today - not just one, but two conflicting factors at work.  We were told as early as possible- 5AM, so that’s better than waiting until 10AM when they were supposed to be here, I suppose.

Biblical rains started this all.  Did you know that our road is considered flooded when any part of it has standing or ponding water, regardless of the fact that it’s over 7 miles long?  I’m not sure I know what the difference between standing and ponding water is, not sure I care, but somebody in an office someplace does- that was obstacle #1

Yeah, okay, I’m rambling and venting.  So what else is new? 

Life Updates

1. •$710 to get the car functional
   

2. •We should be moving today, but we aren’t, at least not yet.
   

3. •Marissa’s wean off the Vigabatrin is going slowly, with little sleep for anybody
   

4. •Voicemail is a criminal thing- there should be some law requiring you to check and respond to it every so often, even if the message is “we’ll call again tomorrow”
   

Okay, vent over.

Mailbag!

Etepan writes:

“Dude, what are your favorite video games”

Dude!  Glad you asked.  Some you’ll know, at least one you probably won’t.  The original request was for 10 favorites, but my house, my rules.

5: Ann Arbor Softworks - Lunar Rescue.

No, this isn’t the arcade game of the same name.  Take the old Lunar Lander game and give your lander an arsenal.  Add a quest mission complete with increasingly hard to kill bad guys and throw in a healthy commerce aspect and you’ve got Lunar Rescue.  No handholding or tutorials here- you can destroy your quest objects and lose the game if you’re not careful.  This game was and remains unforgiving!

4: Bolo

This is a cheat for me.  Bolo for the Apple II series and for the Macintosh were entirely different beasts, but both are tank games- clearly named for the Keith Laumer series.  The former is a single player game where it’s you in a maze with bad guy generators.  Kill the bad things.  The latter is a multiplayer game of destruction, mine laying, building and harvesting.  Both sweet, both a bit off the radar.

3: Civilization series.

Once upon a military deployment, Civilization I came with me to fill the brief moments of total boredom while on station punching holes in the water.  One of those moments I heard Caesar declared that his words were backed with nuclear weapons.  Good times.  Infinite replayability.

2: Fallout Series

Another game played on a military deployment.  Sure, it’s an adventure with limited replay value, but still.  The writing and production were and are top notch, great games, didn’t shy away from themes not normally touched upon in video gaming.

1: Halo series

Once upon a Macworld Expo, the wife and I sat watching a satellite broadcast of the Macworld Keynote Expo when his Steveness announced the original toilet-seat iBooks.  Also in that keynote was a trailer from Halo by Bungie studios.  I thought it was a new Marathon game (which, sadly, didn’t make this list).  You know the rest of the story, Microsoft, Xbox twice, Xbox 360 once so far.  By far, I’ve got the most hours logged in a Halo game than in any other.

Honorable mentions go to Marathon, Myth (no, not Myst), Colonization, Rescue Raiders/Armor Alley, Alpha Centauri, various Mario platformers, and Rockband.  They just didn’t make the top five.

Fairfax Update

Bethany and her Fairfax visited Metropolis, Illinois.

The international Ctrl-Alt-Del bunnies have started arriving.  Don’t forget the pictures!