EAT GREAT, EVEN LATE!

10/26 That title works on so many levels.  For one, it's been 13 days since I updated this section. Why? Because it's been getting lousier.  Back in the day, it was the receptacle for everything.  Now I just use it to bitch about news, and you know what? News is boring.  Real boring.  So's my life, but I can spice it up a bit better than tedium concerning political boondogglery in the middle East, so I think I'll just cut out/down the news content now.  Back to the title, the second reason it works is because it's 1:45 AM.  I have an english midterm tomorrow.  Am I worried? No.  It's a scientifically proven fact you can't study for English, so I'm not going to.  Third reason the title's good? Well, Wendy's is wicked! Can't deny that logic...

Lonely? Depressed? Oh well.

castomel@hotmail.com

Bored? Ugly? Look no further.

The Archives

THE SCHMOOZETORIUM

Despite the fact that I'm usually up this late anyway, tonight I've got a special excuse.  Using dumb luck(and a friend's connections) I managed to get into the Canadian Playstation 2 launch.  This isn't particularly exclusive, since it was open to the public, but I did get in as Media, so I got to feel special, in addition to getting a folder full of meaningless press releases, a commemorative coin, a big ugly sweatshirt, a spiffy nametag, and a stupid highliter which ruined my pants.  Curse you! Anyhow, the launch was suitably stupendous, with an old guy who had obviously been pumped full of buzzwords blithely spouting platitudes, the best of which by far was the half-baked notion that PSX games will look even better on the PS2.  Why, you ask? The emotion engine, of course. You know, this mysterious little piece of machinery with no definable purpose other than to serve as filler in conversation.  I can just imagine it being inserted into the babble I heard snatches of... "Oh, yes. Ted was interviewing at Toshiba today. " "Ted?" "Yes, Ted.  You know, the one who invented the emotion engine?" "ooooooooooh..." Bah.  Like it does anything special.  The old guy is just a corporate type, so he didn't really know what the hell he was talking about.  He is apparently, according to press release, a leading figure in the Canadian videogame industry.  Go figure.  Speaking of corporate types, it was funny as always to watch older people trying to understand video games.  A likeable old lady in particular sidled up to us while we were playing an action-RPG(which, for the uninitiated, is where you wander around busting stuff up, usually in a 3-d environment if it's made in the past 3 years).  She then proceeded to wonder aloud exactly what was going on, marvelled at how half of the gameplay was watching animated videos(yeah...I marvelled at this too), and then joined in the spirit of trying to find our way off the boat we were stuck on.  Eventually, she lost interest, wandered off to the bar, some dude took over, and I eventually left to find Spanish Jehovah's Witness propaganda lying around on the streetcar. Praise Jehovah! ...yeuch.  Time to wash my hands.  That was old, smelly propaganda.

Encanta Alla, porque son solomente 1500 sillas en heaven! And if sillas actually means chairs, my memory shocks me. </bad spanish>

DO THE STALLONES GET TO STICK AROUND? ...yeah.

I may have pledged to get rid of (most) of the news related garble that I've become addicted to herein(hey, that sounds like heroin... but then again, that's only MILDLY addictive, so it's okay)but I'll be darned if I'm gonna get rid of my sports complainature moment.  Actually, to tell the truth, I don't have very much to complain about here. The Leafs have managed to unstumble themselves, and after a fairly lousy start they've managed to sweep up the dregs of the NHL.  Which are in much more evidence this year, since such hockey hotbeds as Columbus have been given teams.  Actually, as I was walking down the street yesterday a homeless guy stopped me to ask for change. Since I've been more or less thoroughly negligent since moving to Toronto in giving money to homeless people(I've operated on a talent basis- Buskers are doing something useful, so I don't object to giving them money.  I really don't object to giving the occasional homeless person money either, but I'm still irritated about the jerkhole bum I may have mentioned that started whining to us when we didn't notice him on the way by because he was reclining on one of those stupid concrete garden thingies in the downtown.. but that's another story. Actually, I did give someone money recently, to a distinguished-looking guy who was playing what I'm going to guess was a glockenspiel.  It really sounded nice, and he was right in this little beam of sunlight filtering through a spreading maple tree that was losing its leafs.  How poetic! ) my conscience got the better of me.  As I shuffled through my pockets, discovering the awful truth that I had absolutely no money on me, we talked about hockey, since I was wearing a Leafs jersey.  It was kinda funny, because he asked who they were playing next and I told him(it was Minnesota, who they incidentally crushed), to which he replied "Don't you mean Dallas?" So I told him about the expansion, which was news to him, and then had to apologize and wander off shamefacedly, looking like a pretty big jerk not giving him money.

I just wanted to paint pictures with MAGIC markers! Sniff sniff.. - My interpretation of random blubbering from Rambo I: Zeroth Blood(Or First Blood: Rambo, if you prefer its proper name)

NEXT ON THE BLOCK WE HAVE THIS BLANK SPACE!

Yep.  This spot is blank all right. Don't worry, I'll delete it as soon as I'm sufficiently not lazy enough to do so.  Might be awhile, but I'm sure we(and by we, I mean the dwindling numbers that read this) can all abide by that, mmmmkay?

For similar entertainment value to this section, read this comic.

THE REAL GHOSTBUSTERS

Now here's something that's cool.  Teletoon was showing the Real Ghostbusters... I haven't seen that show in ages.  It's kinda funny to watch it now, though, because there's some things in it that I just didn't notice when I was 5.  For one, since the evil villain, a banshee, is "an Irish Spirit"(oooooooooooooh... spooky), she had an awful, awful Irish accent.  Secondly, the dialogue was very badly dubbed in, though surprisingly good, in an 80s sort of way. Finally, and perhaps most prominently is the misfortune of the looseness of the plot.  Some things just don't make very much sense, and in other places logic is as inconsistent as hell.  That's what makes cartoons fun though.  Loose stereotypes mixed with nonsense mixed with some pretty funny stuff. And the ghostbusters is one of the best.  Old cartoons on the whole are cool.  There's some I really wish I could see again...  but what I'd most love to see again is the commercials, particularly since I can remember some of them so clearly.  Little bits and pieces of Zelda, Smarties, the one billion incarnations of McDonald's, McGruff the crime dog('users are losers, and losers are users...')and the myriad of toys, toys, and toys.  But who the hell keeps commercials around? I guess they just don't sell well enough.  Although they certainly work... given that I can still remember, perhaps too well.  Okay, I think this has dribbled on long enough.  Done and done.

Okay, so I couldn't be bothered to get a good picture... this section of the column sucks anyway, so what does it matter?

AND IN CONCLUSION

Well that kinda sucked... but I had a boring two weeks.. What can you do? Play up the Intrepid Baby for all it's worth, of course.

INTREPID BABY SAYS:

Oh, 'Play me up', eh? What do you think I am? A three-cent flute? FAUGH! I AM INTREPID BABY! YOU WILL NOT TREAT ME AS SUCH! YOU LOUSY PEDOPHILE! MUEH! ...Now get out of my sight. You disgust me.

SCHEMING MINISTER:

Me? But what have I done, but scheme for all I am worth?

INTREPID BABY REPLIES:

Not you, numbskull!

SCHEMING MINISTER:

Oh.  Well, it's alllll going according to plan anyway. meh meh meh...

INTREPID BABY REPLIES:

What's that supposed to mean?

SCHEMING MINISTER:

Nothing... nothing at all.

INTREPID BABY REPLIES:

I'm suspicious....

SCHEMING MINISTER:

Guah! I must flee!

And so the treacherous scheming minister was forced to flee, abandoning his devious scheme to steal Intrepid Baby's hat.  Intrepid Baby, for his part, was magnaminously malcontented for a brief period, but then diaper rash, combined with excessive whining, forced him to drop his cause.

Go Home! Inmediately!